THE TIME TOURIST
I was meant to be gone just a week, back moments later. A quick mission to save a future life. But it all took so much more time...
* I *
The daunting task in our business is the avoidance of paradox-vanishing. Having the family of prominent families disappearing was not something the boss would appreciate.
Fixing such a thing was possible in theory but in doing so further paradoxes could easily be initiated. And a real mess of scar tissue could be brought into being by such an operation. The resolution techniques for this came to be known in later years as track surgery. It’s very delicate stuff.
The Time Track has been known about in theory since the early Fifties but only as something each individual owned. Everyone has an internal mind mechanism that takes a mental image picture every twenty-fifth of a second throughout their lifetime, and, so the theory went through all their virtually limitless lifetimes back to Year Zero.
That there was also a universal time track was a matter speculated upon in what was called science fiction. An early work, ‘The Time Machine’ by H.G. Wells captured many imaginations back then.
Now of course it’s a demonstrable fact that the universal time track exists, as discovered by the great Prof. Larkhall Hardy (God bless him wherever he is!) That’s how we at ‘Time Tour’ make our money after all.
IT’S TIME! SEE FOR YOURSELF!
That’s one of our ad texts.
You’ll have seen it on the Skyway daily no doubt.
TAKE TIME OUT TO SEE THE SIGHTS OF YESTERYEAR!
TRAVEL IN TIME WITH TIME TOUR
IT’S NO LONGER TOMORROW THAT COUNTS!
You’ve seen our slogans. You know the deal. And I’m sure you know the cost.
500 credits at the rate recorded the nanosecond you sign up.
If it seems too much to you, so be it, be content with your own time. Enjoy now to the full.
But... if there’s a mystery or a history to solve... we’re ready to take time for you.
TAKE YOUR TIME... THERE’S LOTS OF IT OUT THERE!
Okay, I’ll quit the sales talk now... as you’re a friend. Relax and let me tell you a tale.
Will you have a drink by the way? Whatever you wish...
* II *
The first travelers didn’t have the kind of safeguards we do now.
Now, as you know, there’s the Transcreen that keeps you from changing even as much as a microbe back there.
Back at first they took with them all kinds of tiny agents of change.
Naturally they made themselves as clean as they could, they weren’t stupid. But no matter how much soap and disinfectant you use, certain lifeforms persist, bacteria that can survive anything.
You’ll know Duncan Frost, he was our very own John Glenn of course.
Who knew his beard would cause such a problem?
But that’s ancient history that you know all too well.
So let me start with my story, one that you certainly never have heard. It’s time I told it.
* III *
I was to go back and sort what Frost had inadvertently caused.
For this I was put through air-brush style cleansing. That was painful I can tell you, almost to the extent of cleansing every pore. And as you can imagine, there are areas of the human body that will hurt more than most others.
Anyway, it was done. And I went.
For whatever reason (we never did get it out of him) Frost had chosen to go to San Fransisco and arrive there on the 15th of May, 1922. There he booked into the Hotel Whitcomb, 1231 Market St, San Francisco, Room 401 at precisely 17:31 that evening and left the next day at 10:55.
On the face of it, it was an easy mission.
I was to lock myself in that room after the purchase of the most powerful vacuum cleaner available of that time and cleanse the whole room with particular attention to the bed. Everything as thoroughly as possible.
It would have been easy but for the damn neighbors and an officious clerk.
The neighbors were husband and wife shift workers trying to get some sleep. I had been noisy a good hour and a half longer than was tolerable for them. I should have stopped and been diplomatic with the clerk... but I was in a sour mood having bent my back for so long and breathed in ounces of dust.
The long and short of the tale is I was escorted out for being a public nuisance.
Now here something that I was only to later discover the significance of, there was a flash. Seen out of the corner of my right eye.
Of course I didn’t think anything of it at that moment. You’ve probably experienced something similar havn’t you?
But now I wonder how many times it was the glint of sunlight on some Christmas tinsel or a piece of broken bottle, and how often was it... something else?
Did animals drinking at watering holes millions of years ago look up startled by such a flash at the corner of their vision? How many animals, birds, fish and humans have had that attention-grabbing but instantly forgettable experience? Forget that. For now it’s not important.
At that moment of being ejected as a troublemaker I was much more concerned by the failure of my mission. What would my boss think of me fouling up the disposal of Frost’s beard hair bacteria? I’d have no future.
That bacteria would infect a woman by the name of Berta Evans some 84 hours later when she occupied the same room and bed.
She would subsequently take sick and miss a date with a gentleman by the name of Jack Colson.
This would mean that they would never fall in love and so she would never bear a child to be named George Colson.
You see George Colson had flickered out of existence when Frost’s follicles had done the dirty...
And his relatives to be perfectly honest were NOT happy about that. They were not happy at all.
A billion dollar lawsuit was the result and I my friend was the schmuck sent to put things right.
But now I was in a mess up to my own very beardless chin. (They had taken away every last hair off my body before I left. This may well have a contributing factor to the hotel clerk thinking me an oddball worth relieving the hotel of in fact.)
I was in a mess.
* IV *
My slot for return was not due for another week.
In those days there were no variable time slots. You had one fixed slot and that was it, it was timed to the nanosecond.
I could move in time but only forward. We could only move back from base.
You only got one chance back then as paradox criteria kicked in otherwise. So, I was screwed.
What to do?
I had to do some lateral thinking. My name would be mud back home. I was certain to get fired.
I needed another plan and I needed more cash.
You’ll have to forgive me for what I did next, necessity being the mother of invention and all that.
I’d taken some time out before I arrived to memorize a few winners in the coming days at Belmont Park in case the opportunity arose.
With this I made a tidy sum.
I also knew which companies were going to be a big deal in the years to come.
My plan was to invest my winnings then move forward some years on to collect.
I was in control of my forward movement, no paradox concerns prevailed.
They couldn’t nullify my forward motion thankfully.
I knew from Wikipedia where to find the guys I needed. They had been friends at Tufts University School of Engineering. Roommates Laurence K. Marshall and Vannevar Bush.
The main asset for their future success was a scientist by the name of Charles G. Smith. Between them they’d just recently founded the American Appliance Company in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It later, after many changes plus a merger became much better known as Raytheon.
Perhaps you’ve heard of it? Course you have!
Well... I was of course enthusiastic about their plans and happy to help out with some startup cash.
In 1945 their employee, Percy Spencer, invented the microwave oven using the magnetron radar device they were making for radar equipment. In 1947 they put together the Radarange oven for sale commercially.
There was no stopping them after that. They got busy with missile guidance systems and away they went. So, it was just a matter of when to hop to after my share of the company was safely registered.
I chose the 24th of July 1966 to enjoy Christmas and New Years in San Fran as I’ve always had a hankering to experience the Summer of Love.
I didn’t cash in all my investment. Just enough to have a good time, buy some recreational drugs, see a few bands and be on my way.
Then I had an idea. I bought an old clapperboard house on Haight Street and offered it to the band Jefferson Airplane as their hang-out. It was bound to add value later, right?
So, I had myself a good time all the way through to the Human Be-In in January.
It was there I experienced my second flash.
Some of the hippie folk around me noticed it too. They started waxing lyrical imagining a “far-out” saucer with freaky aliens on board. I was less stoned than them at the time and recognized I’d had this experience before and wondered about that.
When Altamont happened and things turned sour I realized it was time to go.
I hopped on to 1980.
Haight-Ashbury had moved upmarket.
There were still some oddball characters about, but harder drugs had made things darker and stranger. Every trace of the light-heartedness of the early days had gone.
I noticed that shopping for Sixties nostalgia was becoming a thing so, I used a little more of my investment cash and bought a couple of shops in strategic locations.
I saw the time was right for a little investment in home computers so that was done too. I was just about ready to leave when... it happened again.
This time I was wandering back to the Hotel Whitcomb where I was staying (old habits die hard) I even asked to stay in Room 401. That night there was only a sliver of moon in the sky and there, just at a block’s end, at the edge of the building I was passing, that distinctive flash at the corner of my eye.
What the hell I thought. Twice is just a coincidence, but this is the third!
I didn’t sleep well that night... whether Frost’s bugs were still about going through a mini-evolution I don’t know... but I was distinctly uneasy.
I hopped to 1997.
I was still a long way from home in 2029 but I was in no hurry to get there and in fact I had already decided to bypass it.
As soon as I got to 1997 I knew I’d made a mistake.
Within an hour of looking around I decided I needed to make a longer jump and made it all the way to 2074.
That’s where things got a little strange...
I made the mistake of thinking things would look familiar. They didn’t. At all.
I was looking at white rolling hills to the horizon. Only these weren’t ordinary hills. They were too low for hills, more like undulating smooth pillows. I touched the ground. It felt like plastic, very hard plastic.
I chanced my luck and went on, in for a penny, in for a pound.
2100
I was suddenly drowning. I saw no land, only water... as far as I could see.
Again, on.
2185
The sea was black with debris. I choked. Now I began to panic. I couldn’t go back... I could only go forward and hope something better awaited me.
2210
I was back on the rolling hills but they were no longer white but a dirty mess of organic material of every description. And one item in particular... bones.
What should I do? Go on in hope or look around?
I decided on the latter and that’s when I struck lucky.
* V *
They emerged from nowhere or so it seemed to me.
They were clad in some kind of pure white rubber-like body suits with an oblong hole for the eyes, nose and mouth. Over this was a clear perspex mask.
They were gesticulating to one another and pointing toward me.
One brought out a small white wafer. He fitted it to one side of his head and came over to where I was standing.
“You are right on time”, he said in an accent I couldn’t identify.
“On time?”, I spluttered.
“Of course.”
“Come with us.”
“We’ve been tracking you. Didn’t you notice our flashing once in a while...”
So it was them. Why was I so important to them?
They turned and walked to the point where they had emerged. One of them grabbed my arm and pulled me toward them.
Smoothly we dropped down through the surface.
I could see that immediately below the top surface that was smeared black with grime that underneath it was pristine white.
We were in some kind of vertical clear tube of some material. At first I was only aware of the luminous interior lighting which flicked on just as we left the upper level. Then, slowly I became aware of a vast space outside the tube.
I saw hundreds, perhaps thousands of other tubes of various sizes traversing both vertically and horizontally. Inside there were both people, objects and vehicles. Some were traveling at walking speed, others at a dizzying rate where the object inside was often only a blur.
Eventually we arrived very smoothly in a large oval room with a flat white floor. These guys really liked white!
There were another three people in the room, presumably waiting for me.
One of them spoke.
“Welcome.”
“You are perhaps confused?”
“I am somewhat, yes.”
“Things have changed a lot since your time. Perhaps we can make things more familiar to you?”
At that the walls transitioned slowly from white to the kind of pastel shade and patterning I knew as flavor of the month in the design mags back where I came from in 2074.
“Please take a seat”, he indicated what appeared to be a rather comfortable-looking chair which I’m sure a few moments ago had been a rather stiff white plastic article.
“Don’t worry, it will know your preference for comfort and supply it to your sense nodes.”
He was right, it was the most comfortable chair I have ever sat upon.
“Would you like a drink?”
I nodded, “Why not?”
He poured a clear liquid into a glass.
“Just think of the drink you’d most like to drink right now or let the glass sense that for you if you’d like.”
I closed my eyes and took a sip of the most delicious nectar I have ever experienced.
I was beginning to like this.
“Now, what are we going to do with you?”
I had no answer for this. By this time the others were also seated and had somehow morphed their outer garments into familiar clothing for 2074. Everything was becoming exceedingly familiar. A soft sound was playing in the background and I recognized my favorite tune for relaxing at home. This was starting to feel like my own personal heaven...
The five men before me looked fully human. I assumed there had been no alien invasion therefore. There were slight differences here and there from my time but nothing major.
It was more their mannerisms that seemed to me a little odd but so slight I couldn’t quite identify them for a moment.
Then I noticed it.
There were slight movements that you might describe as slight tics, it occurred around the eyes, a momentary lack of focus as if concentrating on something else for a moment or two.
It was then I realized they could talk to each other by a means other than vocal chords.
At that moment a door opened in one side of the room.
”You must be tired from your long journey.”
“Let me show you to your accommodation.”
“But first I need to explain something to you.”
“As you will have seen there have been some developments since your time... so please bear with me.”
“Your place here will arrange itself for you if you will simply open your mind toward it for a few seconds in this direction. Just look that way and think ‘home’.”
And so I arrived home. A perfect simulcra of my home back in 2074.
After the shocks of the last few jumps I was in fact beginning to feel myself at home in more ways than one...
I was lounging in the pool when she arrived with a tray bearing a martini.
”Would you like some company?”
I was only too happy... she seemed the most attractive woman i had ever met and with the kind of voice I had always found most alluring.
Then I realized. Of course... she would have every one of the attributes I conceived my perfect partner would have. My own mind was overlaying whatever she really looked and sounded like with my own personal palette.
I assented eagerly, pulling myself out of the pool and onto a chair by the table where she placed what had become two glasses.
We smiled tentatively at each other.
I wondered if she was real or just a simulcra, this time’s version of Asimov’s robot or an earlier period’s automaton. Or was she in reality far from the vision my mind was creating?
I would never know, even if I took the liberty of touching her hand or face, my mind would relate what it knew I wanted to find there.
I was in a quandary.
“You needn’t worry about that. Just enjoy.”
She could read my thoughts.
Of course she could.
This was the logical extension of all that was going on here.
Humanity had moved far beyond secrets...
And far beyond reality it seemed. All fantasies could be realized here. Virtually.
I began to worry. I was beginning to feel a shock to my nervous system. This experience was beginning to engender something like the culture and future shock described by Alvin Toffler back in the long gone 1970s. My “old” brain was starting to freak.
I apologized and politely asked her if she could leave.
* VI *
That night as I tried to sleep I began to really freak out even further.
I realized I was unable to leave my mind in peace. It was like a bad acid trip that I’d experienced in the Sixties while I was there. My surroundings began fluxing and morphing and I seemed to have less and less control over them.
In the dim light from the lights around the pool I saw colors start to change before my eyes. I was losing control in an environment where the mind had the potential to be master and controller of everything.
Next day I knew I had to get help. No sooner had I thought of the man who had done the talking the day before than he was at my door.
“Don’t worry. It’s alright. We had hoped you would adjust, even if it took a week or two. But it is clear you cannot.
You have two choices now.”
“Stay until your mind senses adjust if you can... or be returned to your own time.”
“You may go back to whichever year you choose.”
“Oh... by the way, my name is Colson. I was able to tweak a few systems here so we could survive ‘The Deluge’. Glad to know you.”
He smiled, affectionately touched my arm and winked.
I chose to return. But not to 2074. To 1922.
* VII *
So it was I booked in at the Hotel Whitcomb, 1231 Market St, San Francisco on the 16th of May that year and was able to have Room 401 which had just been vacated by a certain Mr Frost.
This time I was careful to use the vacuum cleaner for only a short time only that day in case the couple next door were still catching their beauty sleep. I cleaned the bed thoroughly and that would do for a start. Over the next few days I completed the rest of the room section by thorough section.
On the 23rd I was ready to head home... my real home.
My boss clapped me on the back as I popped back into the launch room on the 15th of July 2074 at 13:33 the very moment after I had left.
I had achieved (by hook or by crook) my mission.
And no one was any the wiser concerning the circuitous route I’d taken.
I was really rather pleased with myself.
And I had my bonus to look forward to.
The Colson’s too were very effusive when I met them later in the foyer. They rushed to give me hugs as if I was family. All in all everything had worked out just fine.
And of course there was no need to tell anyone about the stocks and shares awaiting me in a certain bank deposit box, was there?
There would be plenty of time for that, if at all, later.
In fact my friend, you know...
I feel I truly have all the time in the world.