A Self-taught Lesson in Time-travel

by Paul Beach

I made a time machine.

Wait a minute; that’s not right.

I was going to make a time machine.

Yes! That’s it.

I can already see you shaking your head, but it’s true! Scientific discoveries of the last century suggest that time-travel is theoretically possible. And only one hour ago, I actually thought of a way I could travel through time, practically.

It was during a instant of clarity, when the quintessential secret of the universe seemed momentarily within my mental grasp. I was staring at the digital clock, mesmerized by the two blinking dots of the colon in the display, 2:21. As it always does, the state of super-lucidity dissolved, but I was left with an epiphany – an idea for a marvelously simple device that would enable me to warp time and space!

The idea launched me out of my seat, and I was about to run to my workbench and begin immediate assembly of the device. However I was stopped cold by a monstrous vibration and a sudden overwhelming disorientation. It was as if the universe hiccupped and burped a soundless sonic boom, and reality itself blurred fleetingly. Then someone was standing right in front of me! And if all that wasn’t enough to stun me, I looked at the person’s face and experienced the biggest shock of my life – the person standing before me was ME!

Before I could collect myself to react, this second me said, “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

I sputtered, “Do what?”

“Whatever you were about to do.”

“What am I about to do?”

“You were about to go to your workbench and build a time machine.”

“How did you know that?” I asked with suspicion.

“Hello! Do you really have to ask?”

It was surpassing strange to talk with myself like that. The conversation seemed remarkably anticipated; like deja-vu.

His appearance told a story of its own. He was unkempt, as if he had recently been running, or perhaps fighting. His clothes were not unlike the costumes seen in certain futuristic movies; sharp, efficient, comfortable. But they, too, were scuffed and ripped; even bloodied in places. Pain clouded his countenance. His right hand held a small device that I instantly recognized! Its image and schematic had entered my head only moments before.

I wanted to be sure that I wasn’t hallucinating. To integrate reality with any degree of rationality one must be able to trust their senses. Rubbing my eyes, I assembled the amazing facts into the simplest logical conclusion. “It works!” I exclaimed.

“Of course it works, but you can’t make it!”

“Why not?!” I said with some belligerence. “Mankind has dreamed for centuries of being able to travel through time. Great minds have puzzled over whether it was in fact possible and how it might be done. Now I’ve figured it out and you’re suddenly here telling me that I can’t build it?!”

The future me smacked his palm against his forehead. “Oh my God! I was so daft! I had hoped that my appearing out of thin air would be enough to get your attention.”

“Fine! Obviously there’s a glitch somewhere. Tell me what happens and we’ll fix it.”

“Paul, you don’t understand. There is no glitch. Not in the time machine anyway. The glitch is time-travel itself.” As if talking to myself wasn’t weird enough, having me address myself by name was utterly bizarre.

“Does something bad happen to me in the future?” I immediately felt stupid for asking this, as I once again noticed that my double was quite disheveled, and it occurred to me that we were each in two very different states of being. My recent epiphany and shock had left me feeling energized and elated; even a little taken aback; I was truly beside myself! The future me, however, was visibly distraught. I continued, “Look, nothing has happened yet. Just tell me what’s going to happen, then I’ll do something to bring about a different outcome; a better outcome!”

“Paul, I know that looks good on paper, but it just doesn’t work that way. Think for a minute. What’s the first thing you’d do with a time machine?”

“I would travel to some point in the future, to a time when they have the technology for biological immortality.”

“And that is exactly what I did. I went to the year 2106 hoping that a century would be enough time to allow for the development of such technology. There, the time machine became hugely popular. The chaos just escalated from there.”

“Chaos?!” I stammered. “You allow someone to use the time machine?”

“There was no way to stop them!” he replied, clearly exasperated. “It’s a very simple device and duplicating it was simplicity itself.”

“I would assume that in one hundred years the world would achieve some state of highly enlightened utopian peace.”

“And, in fact, it had,” he said. “But that didn’t stop people from doing stupid things. Some of them decided to go back in time and try to ‘correct’ certain events to eliminate past suffering, but it only changed the future for the worse.” He swallowed a lump of grief. “You know, the funny thing about time-travel is that you have no way of knowing if the past has been altered, unless you’re already outside your natural timeline. So I had the profound experience of watching a fantastic civilization transform instantly into a ruinous world full of poverty and despair. I witnessed as entire populations ‘winked’ out of existence. And no one had any idea that it had happened.”

“Is that the worst of it?”

“I haven’t even scratched the surface.”

“Fine. I’m sure I can go to the future and do better than that.” I stepped past him and proceeded toward my workbench.

“I knew you’d need more convincing. I certainly needed more, and I actually witnessed the chaos.”

“Then tell me more. Tell me exactly what happens. We’re a couple of clever dudes; we’ll come up with a solution.”

“The solution is to not build it! This device is the cause of much grief!”

I began once again to argue. “No! There’s got to be –”

With that he stepped over to my workbench. In a swift movement he grabbed my hammer and laid the device on the flat surface. A look of bitter anguish contorted his face as he smashed the device beyond operability. “There is no other way! And now I’m not going anywhere until you see the light of day!”

“It doesn’t matter. I have the components to build another one right here.”

Hot heartache streamed down his face. “I tried everything I could think of to make things right! To bring her back! Do you think you are more clever than I?”

I looked into his despair-filled eyes, my future eyes, and saw the earnest there. I said, “Right now you exist in this timeline. If I decide to not make the time machine, will you cease to exist?”

He nodded. “That would be consistent with what I’ve seen. And if you’re still not convinced that you shouldn’t make the device, let me tell you one more thing. I met a woman in the future. She is alive right now, in this time, and she’ll be about twenty years old. She lived to see the year 2106 thanks to the development of radical life-extension technology, as will you, if you don’t do anything stupid. I had only a short time with her, but in that time she told me of her fantastic life, and we fell deeply in love.”

The future me had my undivided attention now. Thoughts of building the time machine were beginning to fade.

He continued, “Do yourself a favor and travel to Picayune, Mississippi. You should find her working in the jewelry store on Main Street.”

My future self was now beginning to fade as well. I guess I had pretty much made up my mind to not build the time machine. He was still talking. “She has dark eyes and dark hair, long and beautiful, with stunning lips, and her name…”

He was gone.

And that was how I almost made a time machine. I know it sounds like quite a yarn, and I have no way to really prove it. Sure, I could tell you exactly how to build one, but you’d never do it; and that’s assuming that I was even allowed to tell you. If I tried, a future me, or a future you, or both would be back here in a heartbeat to stop us. We mustn’t lose sleep worrying that some sort of world-killing technology might be developed. Mankind’s destiny is dictated only by the Laws of Cause and Effect.

So, here I am, on my way to Mississippi to find the girl with dark hair and eyes, and stunning lips.

And when I find her, you’ll know I’m telling the truth.

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