ONE ⚠ video

[sonofabyte]

[ The video feed opens in a rather mundane fashion: an expressionless man sitting within the library in the Initiative Hold, his tablet on a desk in front of him as he pages through a book--a somewhat battered old volume of history. ]

I have two questions. I would appreciate some answers, if you could.

[ His voice is deep and serious, but also remarkably flat and toneless. ]

I understand that the other "Transports" here represent a wide variety of worlds. How many come from one with similar components to this one? A ruined Earth, or one near ruin, and a repressive absolute government guiding humanity in the wake of that disaster.

[ He closes the book and sets it down on the desk just out of the screen's frame. ]

The second question is simple. Can anyone recommend somewhere I can find decent coffee?

Comments

[text]

[sonofabyte]

I would expect it to happen that way in most cases. Even if a single disaster did occur...it would also be the result of long years of human grasping.

[text]

[oldsoldiersneverdie]

True. Too smart for our own good, I suppose.

I've seen two totalitarian futures that were the result of a single nexus point that wasn't disaster-related, though both timelines were extinguished. To my knowledge, the world wasn't ruined in either, though I didn't have time to see.

One totalitarian future based on a single dictatorship, with the environment wrecked by uncontrolled technological manipulation. To my knowledge, that timeline is now orphaned.

One lifeless future with probably close to 90% of the surface rendered uninhabitable intentionally by one raving lunatic. Bright Lady knows I hope that timeline is orphaned, too.

[text]

[sonofabyte]

You talk of "extinguished" or "orphaned" timelines. Is this the jargon of the Initiative's time-travel assignments, or something else?

[text]

[oldsoldiersneverdie]

Something else. I've been time-walking a lot longer than I've been here.

[text]

[sonofabyte]

"Extinguished" is easily guessed at. What does it mean for a timeline to be orphaned?

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[oldsoldiersneverdie]

It still exists, but seperated from the timestream - like a river that's changed it's course, but left a pool behind as it did so. The events that lead up to it are gone, but it still exists, in some way.

Though they're impossible to reach, so it's something of an iffy definition - can't be proved with certainty and all.

[text]

[sonofabyte]

It seems like such existences would strain causality. But so does time travel in the first place. You and the Initiative alike must be tapping into dangerous forces.

[text]

[oldsoldiersneverdie]

When there are people with the power to remake the fabric of reality around, time travel starts to seem a lot less dangerous.

[text]

[sonofabyte]

Is that supposed to be comforting?

[text]

[oldsoldiersneverdie]

Not really.