Inexistent Misadventure/1

=Chapter I: The Beginning=

You would think that a supreme transcendental nonentity, resident in the Void between universes, could get a bit of peace and quiet. There I was, minding my own business, when suddenly I felt a solid impact. This in itself is quite unusual, both in the sense that it physically interacted with me, and also the fact that there even was an "it" present. The Void is generally pretty empty.

Unfortunately, this impact continued to prove itself to be uniquely bizarre, because I was actually knocked clean out of the Void by it. This is pretty much an impossible feat, so that did considerably narrow down the possibilities for what the hell it could be. So there I was, in a universe I was not entirely familiar with, trying to work out what had collided with me.

After a few moments, it hit me. The answer, that is, not another strike from the mystery object.

Some of you, especially those of you who are British, are probably reasonably familiar with the revived series of Doctor Who. You may recall that, in the second series, the TARDIS fell through a crack in the Time Vortex and landed in a parallel reality. What you probably don't realise is that the events of Doctor Who are not, in fact, fictional. They are actual events from a universe running quite a long time ahead of yours, which makes the episode in question mildly ironic, don't you think?

The point is that the mystery object that had ejected me from the Void was the TARDIS. As it fell through the crack in the Time Vortex on its way into "Pete's World", it inevitably detoured very briefly through the Void. It just so happened that its trajectory coincided with me. Now, you see, I had a problem. As one of the most dimensionally complex objects in existence, it had a degree of influence on me. While time and space are ordinarily of little consequence to one such as myself (and there is only one such as myself), being struck by a TARDIS as it transitions between two dimensions is bound to leave a mark, figuratively speaking.

The mark turned out to be an inability to escape the universe I had landed in. I had no doubt that I would regain the ability, but it would be quite an inconvenience in the meantime. I briefly considered my options: by far the best course of action was to sit and wait until I recovered and could return to the Void. Nothing could harm me, so it was not hazardous to remain in one place. The main objection to this was sheer boredom, which has always been something of a weakness of mine. In an act that sent the rational part of me into rabid outrage, I set off to explore my surroundings. It might be mildly interesting, I thought.

I had no idea how much of an understatement that would turn out to be.

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