History And Biography

In time travel fiction, we encounter two distinct orders of events: historical and (for time travellers) biographical. Historically, the twentieth century continues to precede the twenty-first century as it has always done, no matter how many time travellers pass back and forth between the centuries. 

Biographically, a time traveller:

departs from the twenty-first century;

arrives in the twentieth century;

spends some time in the twentieth century;

departs from the twentieth century;

arrives back in the twenty-first century, in the simplest case scenario some time after his departure from it.

Historically, the order of these events is:

arrival in the twentieth century;

time spent in the twentieth century;

departure from the twentieth century;

departure from the twenty-first century;

arrival back in the twenty-first century.

In The Corridors Of Time, both Storm and Brann are born long after the twentieth century but die long before it. Historically, their deaths precede their births. Biographically, in the order in which an individual experiences the events of his life, no one's death can or ever does precede his birth.

That all seems straightforward although I think that I once conversed with someone who had problems even with that. But there might be an unconscious assumption that biographical orders that are out of sync with the historical order should nevertheless remain in sync with each other. The Warden Hu, having lived through the experience of capturing the Ranger Brann in Neolithic Denmark, seems to think that, from this moment on during his travels through time, he should encounter only Rangers who also know of Brann's capture. The very nature of time travel means that this is not the case. Indeed, Lockridge accompanies Hu to the Wardens-Rangers period precisely in order to contact the Brann who, biographically, has not yet been captured in order to persuade him to travel to Neolithic Denmark where/when he will be/has already been captured.