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The Gravity Of Time Travel

The rules of time travel were decided upon by a panel of the best and brightest of the world. As it turns out, even our best efforts at safeguarding our journey into this, our newest frontier, were anything but hopeful. We never really stood a chance, and in the end we only managed to expedite the inevitable: the extinction of the human race. This is the story that was never written.

The technology required the presence of a human vessel. The traveler’s mind was forced into that of the vessel’s. What became of the original consciousness was irrelevant in the eyes of the committee, as outlined by their decreed laws.

The first was the most obvious, and protected against what we thought was the most dangerous thing that could happen: A traveler could never go into the past. Doing so would theoretically negate our own existence, and could also negate the existence of time itself. Such a paradox was something that even grade school children could warn you about. Even changing the movement of a single atom in the past would change the entire course of the history of the universe. Regardless of how minute the appearance of change, our current time line would still no longer truly exist. This was unacceptable and led to the second rule.

The current time line — our universe — was to be considered the only true and valid of any. Therefore, what was sacrificed or destroyed in another time line was to be considered no consequence to our own. Even if, in our efforts to obtain new technologies and insights into our future, we managed to destroy an entire time line, it was irrelevant, as long as it was not our own present. The reasoning was simple: as soon as the travelers returned to the present, our future would be forever changed by the information that they had brought back. The future that they had traveled to would then no longer exist.

There were other rules, but they add little to this story and nothing can be gained from knowing them, since time travel is impossible anyway.

The first twenty or so travelers went no further then a few days to a week forward in time. These initial launches were mainly for testing and calibration purposes. The scientists in charge of the project were pressured to provide significant results to justify continued funding. The technology’s unofficial maiden voyage was set for ten thousand years ahead. They were astounded when it didn’t work at all.

The machine was then run through countless diagnostic and theoretical simulations and tests to determine the flaw that prevented the launch. After a while, it was decided that research and live testing should continue. They thought that perhaps ten thousand years was simply too far to travel under our current power capabilities.

After several more trips to next week they figured that the machine was still safe. They again traveled to the distant future, but a more conservative distance. However, after setting the dial to five hundred years ahead and flipping the switch nothing happened. Normally the volunteer travelers would jerk, as if they had woken up suddenly from a dream of falling. The return of the traveler would appear instantaneous to a viewer from the present. So much so, that a skeptical on looker would quickly claim that they were being made a fool of by the fastest gun in the west routine. This time… nothing. For all intents and purposes, the traveler was dead.

After much deliberation, use of the machine was declared unsafe. All funding for the project was revoked and the machine was destroyed. It was the first wise decision that they had made, but it was too late. We were dead the moment the machine went into production.

Then the climate changed. We started to see an exponential increase in tidal waves, earthquakes, volcanic activity, and other natural disasters over the coming years. The heat is unbearable now, but ultimately it will be the moon that finishes us off they say.

Now the machine is being rebuilt, but this time the laws have been thrown out and the objective is one that was not taken on lightly. If you are reading this, then the machine has been successfully destroyed. We can only hope that this will be enough to stop the impending doom of your time line.

I still find it a bit funny that this was never written and perhaps may never be read.

Tags: apocolypse, sci fi, short story, time travel

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 31st, 2008 at 7:49 pm and is filed under Short Stories. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.