Time Travel Institute (Cold Curtain)

An Argument over Prepositions

"Adjectives agree with their nouns in gender, number, and case, but not necessarily in ending."—Dave Spotts

September 13, 2147

When Dr. White left, Benjamin said, "He says I have to rest for at least two weeks. Chloe said I have to stay with them, but I'm going to lose my job unless I tell them what's going on, so can you?"

"Sure," Alexander said.

Alexander asked for the manager, and when he appeared, he said, "It's about Benjamin Conner. He might be working under a different manager."

"Oh yeah," the manager said. "I know who he is."

"He won't be able to work for two weeks."

"Why not?"

"He and I created a causal loop. It worked great! The universe didn't explode, he didn't get sent to a parallel universe, time still works, he still exists, and everything. It just gave him a migraine and concussion without the injury."

"Huh?"

"The paradox damaged his brain. He has to rest for two weeks."

"You really believe he's a time traveler," the manager said.

"Yes, sir," Alexander said. "And my little sister will be one, too."

"Uh-huh. Well, tell Benjamin that he can either give into his delusions or work here, but he can't do both. If he isn't at his next shift, he's fired."

"Yes, sir. When is his shift?"

"Seven o'clock this evening."

Alexander gave Benjamin the message, and he did not go to work. Benjamin read to Claire while he recovered, though she slept through it all.

"Doing that was such a bad idea," Chloe said. "I can't believe you did it!"

"Somebody had to find out what would happen," Benjamin said. "And Alexander is working on what this means we can do! It's amazing."

"You are going to kill yourself."

"Time travel is perfectly safe."

"That's why you've ended up sick and in the hospital two out of twenty trips."

"People get sick and injured in the present, too, but nobody complains about that. It happens to astronauts, manned submersibles, and explorers, too, and nobody complains about them, either. How is time travel any different?"

"Because nobody knows how time travel works, including you and Alexander."

"He's working on that."

"Alexander, you have got to be more careful with your experiments," Mrs. Watts said. "Why didn't you test it on animals first?"

"Because I was pretty sure all the effects would be ones you have to tell. An animal can't do that," Alexander said. "I wish that people believed that time travel was possible. I was worried that nobody would come to help."

"Then teach people about it. Explain it as much as you can somewhere where people can read about it, and give them places to read more."

"Like a website or something?"

"Yeah. You be as close to a scientist now as you can, and more people will listen, and when you get a physics diploma from college, even more people will listen."

"But it's just a piece of paper. I still want to go to college, but why is a piece of paper saying that I passed a list of classes any reason to think somebody knows stuff?"