Wednesday 22 June 2022

Someplace At Every Moment

The Shield Of Time, PART SIX, 1989alpha, A. D., pp. 306-310.

"...the Time Patrol had operatives someplace at every moment of a million years or more." (p. 308)

Did we know that? So, if a stranded time traveller has a communicator, s/he should be able to summon help - provided that s/he is in the right timeline. Wanda Tamberly spends four pages thinking that she is merely in the wrong time but there is no response on her communicator. Beginning to suspect the truth, she crosses the Atlantic instead of returning to the Pleistocene. If she loses her timecycle, then she will be permanently stranded. The following chapter returns to Manse Everard although he is now in 1137 AD. Unlike "Delenda East," "Amazement of the World" follows parallel narrative strands in its alternative history.

2 comments:

S.M. Stirling said...

That might mean "operatives or listening devices monitoring the appropriate frequencies."

Seriously, what's going to happen in 35,000 BCE which requires a live monitor?

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Kaor, Mr. Stirling! The need for the Patrol to watch out for crazies and fanatics trying to do end runs around its agents even that long ago. Ad astra! Sean