Tea Time (Travel)

Paul Through the Wormhole

“Honeypie (Paul),

Words are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup they slither while they pass they slip away… across the universe.  Pools of sorrow, waves of joy, are drifting through my opened mind possessing and caressing me…  Jai Guru Deva Om… Nothing’s gonna change my world. Nothing’s gonna change my world.  Nothing’s gonna change my world. Nothing’s gonna change my world.

Images of broken light which dance before me like a million eyes they call me on and on across the universe.  Thoughts meander like a restless wind inside a letter box they tumble blindly as they make their way… Across the Universe.

Sounds of Laughter shades of Earth are ringing through my opened ears inciting and inviting me. Limitless undying love which shines around me like a million suns and calls me on and on Across the Universe… Jai Guru Deva Om…  Last day of recording stay where you are but not when.”

Paul was mesmerized. These were parts from the lyrics to the famous Beatles song “Across the Universe”.  Except for that last bit.  That last bit wasn’t part of it.  That last bit was new.  Paul realized the letter was sort of like a puzzle, yet it was so simple whoever sent the message clearly did not seriously want to hide the message from anybody.  Whoever wrote that letter to him wanted him to travel back in time to February 8th 1968, the last day of recording for “Across the Universe”.  This was meant to peak his interest, which angered Paul, because it actually did peak his interest.  He could not find out what this was all about unless he made a Time Rod and traveled to 1968.  Clearly this was an incentive to make a Time Rod. Curiosity.  Paul, being one to easily fall for this sort of thing, got working on it immediately.  Strangely enough, every time Paul got stuck on some part in his equations and designs, a bird outside the window would fly by and splatter poop on the office window, thus inspiring him in some new way.  Once Paul was done with the actual theory involved with tea, he began to make his Time Rod.

He made a quick sketch of what the simplest time rod could be, then erased it, made it a bit more elegant, and then looked around his office for something even remotely similar.  He found a pen, and so he took the pen to his house, spent countless hours (actually only two hours, but, you know) modifying it, and then, happily, the first Time Rod was born.  He liked his design even more than Vomtin’s.  His model was similar, except that instead of diagonal lines at the center, it had a little slide button.  If you slid the button all the way up and then all the way down, it would take you wherever you were thinking about. If you slid it up halfway and then slid it back down, it would take you to wherever the front of the rod was pointing to.

Paul ceremoniously stood on top of his bed and was about to slide the button up when he began to think about the possible consequences.  Would he have to face the future Vomtin had told him about?  Would he lose his life as a normal person?  Would he turn the future into a tea-less dystopia with a totalitarian government?  Was this really, truly worth it?  Paul took a deep breath.  He had nothing, no-one, to worry about.  He had no friends.  He was an only child.  His parents did not care for him.  All he had was science.  The Time Rod was the future of science.  It would soon be all he had.  So, he shut his eyes, thought about his desired destination, and then pushed the button up.

His senses were suddenly gone.  Everything was dark.  Everything was quiet.  He was within the wormhole, and it was too late to turn back now, but he had a new fear.  A fear of the cold, vast, terrible emptiness of this vortex.  A fear of this giant shadow, this gargantuan pit, this vacuum, this horrible sum of all fears.  This nothingness.  Soon he entered reality again, which suddenly seemed like the opposite.  For a split second that seemed to last a millennia, he was in the loudest, brightest place imaginable.  It was as if a thousand trumpets were suddenly blaring in his ears, while the brightest spotlights were right on his eyes.  He felt as if he were enveloped in some great cloth,  and he smelled every smell imaginable.  It reeked of sewers, while at the same time he was surrounded by the aroma of roses.  He could even taste a thousand million foods, and linger on the thoughts of everything a taste bud could possibly touch.  His brain was overwhelmed, for a moment he suspected that it in fact would be fried, but the moment ended.  He was suddenly standing in his apartment, but in 1968.  His room was the same, but different.  And he was plummeting.  Well, of course he was falling, his bed wasn’t there.  He hit the floor and looked up.  Cassandra was standing there, looking younger than ever with her glossy blonde hair curling at her shoulders, her prominent cheekbones looking as if they could sharpen an axe, and her annoyingly bright red lipstick hurting Paul’s now sensitive eyes.  In fact, all of Paul’s senses seemed to have sharpened after the trip.

“Good morn darling,”  Cassandra said, “I hope you had a fun trip.  I’m afraid, though, that pleasantries will have to be exchanged later.  A few Galactic Time Officers are coming over here to assassinate us both, so I suggest we run for our lives.”