Prologue:

England - Around 1500 AD

The plains were dark. It was a natural darkness. Merely the absence of any light pollution to speak of. This particular plain held something special. A ring of huge stones stood tall over the flat plain. There were many theories as to the origin of this construction, but no one, on this world, truly knew its story.

This particular night and in this particular place, something unique was happening, as a slight blue-silver glow began to radiate inside the ring of stones. Before long, a line formed in the air hanging horizontally about a meter above the earth.

This line pulsed a bright white light with a blue tinge and stretched about a meter long. After a minute of progressively more rapid pulsing, the line solidified into an intense glow, and then all at once, the top and bottom of it exploded out to form what appeared to be a doorway.

The door stood about two meters tall, one meter wide, and glowed with the same blue tinged white as the original line had.

From this doorway, a figure stumbled out.

It was mostly human in appearance, except its eyes were almost imperceptibly glowing in the dark, and it had ears that tapered into points, and by human standards, appeared extremely androgynous. The figure was also bleeding at an alarming rate from a wound in its abdomen.

On its back rested an awkwardly large metallic block that wasn't attached by any visible means, but it was clearly anchored in place. It looked to be a cube about a meter long to each side. The size of the box made it appear as if either the sleight figure was much stronger than they appeared, or the box was much lighter.

As soon as the figure and their cargo were all the way through, the door behind them rapidly pulled itself closed.

Slowly, the lone figure seemed to look around their surroundings, seeming to be scanning for witnesses. After they were satisfied they were alone, they slowly moved their cargo to the ground.

It seemed to hover a few centimeters above the ground after being fully lowered, and the side facing the figure lit up to show a display no one currently on earth would've been able to interpret. After a few minutes of manipulation, during which a normal human certainly would have bled out, the figure stopped and pulled their hand from the panel.

The face of the figure turned up to look at the sky. If judging by human standards, someone else likely would've said the figure appeared exhausted and extremely pale. After a few moments, the figure sighed, looked back down at the display, and touched the screen again before speaking aloud for the first time since arrival.

"Computer, initiate transfer process. Voice imprint authorization, Administrator Sil."

An entirely monotone, androgynous voice immediately replied, "Authorization complete. Transfer initiated."

About 2 minutes passed, and the pained look of concentration suddenly bled out of the fair features of the figure's face. For just a moment, they appeared totally serene, at peace with life, and quite dead. Then, suddenly, light seemed to explode from the figure's core in every direction. Thirty seconds passed, and the light winked out as suddenly as it had appeared.

The box now sat alone, and a moment after the light had vanished, that monotone voice sounded again.

"Transfer complete. Bringing consciousness online now."

Another moment passed when the metallic cube suddenly began to vibrate in a quick shudder, and the voice of the figure emerged from the cube.

"Well, that was terrible. It's better than actually dying, however. Computer, have there been any potential sightings I need to be aware of?"

"No administrator. This location seems fairly remote, and I have not detected any signs of life nearby. I will have to perform wide scans from orbit, but this world appears to not yet have developed far enough technologically to be a threat."

"That was expected. Excellent. Go ahead and take us up to begin preparations. I am due for a much needed nap."

"Yes, administrator."

As the cube rose and began to accelerate upward and away at a rapid pace, the two in the box had one final exchange.

"Computer, how long before we can expect some data signals we can intercept?"

"Unknown without more detailed scanning."

"Well, I guess their porn industry will just have to be a surprise then!"

"I… do not have a response for that."

"Which is exactly why I said it."