Time travel AUs for your Holiday requests? I love this blog, thanks for all that you do!
Time travel AUs, an age-old classic! (See what I did there?) Coming right up!
Many 18th and 19th century pieces of literature were strange, at least from Character A’s experience. Perhaps it was due to the fact that the language used was so different from what they were used to, or because the topics were wildly separate from their everyday life, but in the case of some pieces, they found that this was quite the opposite case. Each short story in this series was written by the same anonymous individual in 1839 and seemed disturbingly familiar, almost as if the stories triggered some sort of déja vu. (TL;DR: Character A stumbles across a series of 19th century short stories written by a future version of themselves that somehow got stuck in the past)
“You’ve heard of temporal assassins, right? Yeah, they’re pieces of work, always jumping through time and not giving a shit whose days they ruin. And I try my hardest, ya know? I’m sent on assignment after our office gets word that the pricks missed their targets yet again, and guess who has to deal with the aftermath? When I got a medical degree, I didn’t think I’d be time jumping after an idiot with a penchant for almost mortally injuring three people before actually getting the right guy, and it doesn’t help that I can only use period equipment…don’t get me started on that one early homo sapien they accidentally maimed. I came at him with a stick and some vines and the asshole started sprinting. It’s just like, ‘let me reattach your toe before it gets any worse, asshole!’”
“Time machines are fickle things – they can get confused very easily, especially since time isn’t linear. It’s like a forest, one without a moon to guide you…or at least a freaking compass. They get lost, just like anyone else, so don’t shake them when you get frustrated after landing in the wrong place (or wrong time, for that matter), because time machines are truly trying their best. I should know – I am one.”
Given that we see time in a specific way as something we exist upon, like a plane of existence, it stands to reason we can somehow, you know, fall off that plane, right? In a somewhat slightly downwards yet somehow skywards motion that leaves you breathless yet somehow with too much breath at the same time as you watch people and places and things and time pass you by in the blink of an eye? Well, all that happened and Character A landed with a slightly ominous thud that echoed everywhere and nowhere at once.
When Characters A, B, C, and D got jobs as switchboard operators at the local Telephone Dispatch in 1905, they were delighted – not for naught, this was the perfect job for them. They could all work in the same row, take their breaks together, and of course, take notes to share with one another later and poke fun at the particularly funny callers from the day. On paper, it was perfect, but in practice, they got a bit more than they bargained for. Character C shared a particularly strange experience with the others and they, too, found they could share the same experience since they each received the exact same call from the exact same person at the exact same time.
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