Watch by Barlekis the WizardThe Time Traveler Adventures
EPISODE 1 - BACK TO EMILY
The first letter came about two months ago. I had
just gotten home from class and stopped at the mailbox to see what life had
mailed me. There was a single letter. The envelope was pink and flowery; not at
all what you expect your phone bill to come in and the envelope looked old, very
old.
It was addressed correctly. Professor Henry Wilson, here at my address on the
University campus and the return address just said “Emily”. The odd thing
about it was that it was postmarked Culpepper Virginia, August 5, 1860. We’re
talking 144 years ago!
I went inside and carefully opened the letter. It was a single page letter
written in very feminine handwriting. It said:
Dearest Henry
I miss you so. You have only been gone a week but I just had to write and tell
you. Please hurry back to me.
Your loving Emily
I looked at the paper and it looked real enough. This had to be some kind of
hoax. My colleagues at the University must be behind this. Me, a confirmed
bachelor! I had never heard of anyone named Emily.
I put the letter aside and, after grading some papers, I ate dinner and fell
asleep on the sofa, as is my habit. I forgot all about the letter until the next
afternoon. I stopped at my mailbox again and there was an identical letter
waiting for me. The return address just said Emily and it was postmarked in
Culpepper Virginia again but this time, the date was August 14, 1860.
The mailman happened to be across the street and I walked over and asked him
about the letter. He looked surprised that it had been in my mailbox. He told me
he didn’t have any mail for me the last two days so he had not put anything in
my box. Very odd!
I walked inside and opened the letter.
Dearest Henry
I miss you so awfully much! I wish you were here! I am becoming concerned about
the talk of war that is going on. The boys are preaching succession and I know
it will only end in death. Please hurry back to me!
Your loving Emily
In this letter was a picture. A tintype actually of a very pretty young woman.
Her hair was dark and fastened up as was the style of the era. Her face captured
my attention but her bewitching eyes captured my heart!
I grabbed the other letter and walked back across campus to a colleague in the
chemistry department. I showed him the letters and asked him if there was
anything he could do to validate them. Several hours later I was sitting back in
my apartment, almost shaking with anxiety. The letters were real. The ink and
paper were at least a hundred years old, verified and documented by the most
modern of technology.
What was happening? I couldn’t guess! Several more letters came over the next
few weeks and in each one, Emily was a little more frantic. Civil War was
looming in her life and she was terrified. She kept asking me to come back to
her. Her cries for help echoed forlornly in my heart. Then came the letter that
had me shaking for about an hour. In the letter, she told me she felt our baby
move for the first time! I was stunned!
I should probably tell you a little bit about myself at this point. Professor
Henry Wilson. Single, with no lady prospects in sight. I guess I would be
categorized as a nerd. They call me a genius but to me, genius is something they
call you when they want something from you. I have two Phds’s, one in Quantum
Physics and the other in Quantifiable Engineering. Here I am 33 years old and
already head of the Physics Department here at the University.
These letters intrigued me because my field of specialty just happens to be time
and the prospects of time travel. I have a theory about time. I firmly believe
time is a series of moments, all piled on top of one another. Think of it this
way. Each moment in time is a playing card. The moment we are in is piled on top
of all the moments which have gone before, clear back to the beginning of time
and piled on top of those cards are all the moments that will be, clear to the
end of time.
Time itself is an irresistible force, moving us from one card to the next and to
the next and to the next. But what if, somehow, you were able to pull a card
from the deck (the card that is this moment) and reinsert it back in the deck.
Then you could conceivably move back in time. And once the card was reinserted
into the deck, the flow of time would catch you again and move you on.
There were now ten letters from Emily sitting on my coffee table and I could not
sleep at night thinking about her. I sat on the sofa, absently shuffling a deck
of cards. A mysterious woman from the past. An unborn child. Civil War. The
evidence was there! Could I have somehow solved my time travel problem? Could a
future me have traveled to the past, met and married Emily?? Why did I leave
her? How was she able to send messages through time?
Then it came to me. Like a bolt out of the blue it all made sense to me. A
design for a time machine! It was so simple it took my breath away! I had known
all along what to do, now I just needed a design. The thing is, it can be simple
or it can be complex and still work. Doesn't matter! All I need to do is post it
here!
Watch by Barlekis the Wizard
It was with supreme trepidation that I approached the now completed time machine. I checked over the controls one last time before stepping inside. I pulled the tintype of Emily out of my pocket and set it on the panel holding the time indicator. She gazed out at me with those beautiful eyes and I knew I couldn’t put it off any longer. March 1860. Somehow, I knew that was right. Six months before Emily wrote those letters to me across time. The same letters that were firmly tucked away in my pocket. Steeling my nerves, I flicked the motor switches to the on position. Taking a deep breath, I moved the accelerator lever back and set the time machine in motion………
Time Machine by Lady Bladecroft
Students walking across the University campus
later said that the lights in the apartment flashed on brightly and they heard a
loud popping sound. No one stopped to investigate or they may have found two
very tired people sitting in an odd looking machine,
holding each other like there was no tomorrow. But I knew differently! Now that
I have solved the time travel problem and had ventured into the past, there
would be no end to the tomorrows that I would have! I glanced at Emily, who was
sitting on my lap and I grinned! She smiled back and kissed me before holding up
the bundle she held in her arms. She moved the blanket away from the baby’s
face and I noticed again how little Anna Marie had her mother’s bewitching
eyes!