(i) Mutant time travelers.
(ii) Time corridors.
(iii) A usually stable but occasionally mutable timeline.
(iv) Random space-time-energy fluctuations.
(i) and (ii) are unusual means of time travel, both incompatible with the Time Patrol series, in which conventional (!) temporal vehicles are used. (Wells' Time Traveler would recognize them as improvements on his contraption.)
(iii) is the premise of the series. A mutable timeline necessitates a temporal police force. (iv), a new idea introduced at the culmination of the series, turns out to be the meaning of the Patrol. Even if no time traveler ever deliberately or accidentally changed the timeline, an organization of time travelers would still be necessary to counteract random changes.
(i) and (ii) are each the premise of a novel exploring elaborate circular causality paradoxes in an immutable timeline. As ever, Poul Anderson is systematically comprehensive.
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