Journal mcgrew's Journal: Bigfoots 3
Rority howled with laughter. "You want me to be a what?"
"It isn't funny", Rula replied. "If you become a protohuman your brain won't be big enough to understand how to synthesize the Lysergic acid hydroxyethylamide in such a way that it's nontoxic. It's onlly a single muon's difference in a single atom of one of the carboxamides out of every third molecule. Exact precision is needed. Here, read the report."
In 68 AB a fungal epidemic would have wiped out two years' worth of the US's entire corn and soybean crops. Had it occurred the world's food supply would have been in jeopardy, and the world's already existing monetary recession would have become a global depression of unprecedented scope. The mathematicians said that it would have resulted in the entire timeline being disrupted, with catastrophic results for the present, ten million years later. Humans would have become extinct. Rority would have to use the modified C18H21N3O2 to combat it.
"So I won't really be a Sasquatch," Rority said, mulling over the report. "I'll be human with a nobot covering that just makes me look like one. Hmm... this one might interest Gumal; he hates having his cells repositioned and their DNA restructured, but he's gotten very interested in the far ancient past ever since I brought that beer back. It might not be easy to control the nobots, though; my feet won't even reach the ground."
"The nobots will handle it," Rula said. "I'll ask Gumal if he wants in."
"He's inside getting us a beer... here he comes now" Rority said as Gumal walked out of the "house".
"Oh, Hey, Rula! Are you here are are you a nobot simulation?"
Rula grinned. "I'm slumming, you reprobate! I have a new assignment for you and Rority." She handed him a copy of the report, which Gumal promptly read.
"Want a beer, Rula?" Rority asked.
"No thanks, I have some stuff to do. Besides, Gumal's too busy reading to get me one."
"So, you want Rority and me to be Bigfoots?" Gumal asked, "In Illinois? Kind of, um, unbelievable to the folks at the time."
"Here, look at this," she said as the nobot report reassembled itself into an ancient newspaper, looking every bit the paper and ink they had used those millions of years ago.
Gumal read out loud. "Messing with Sasquatch may not be such a good idea by Kevin Tremain. 'There's something amiss in the backwoods of Chatham, something potentially big. Lately there's been talk around certain areas of town of an unusual howling and screeching sound as well as evidence of some very large footprints.
"Since June there have been at least five to six instances of residents discovering or hearing evidence that the infamous Bigfoot may be lurking somewhere in the Chatham community. One case in particular has garnered some attention from local police, as well as a few proclaimed Big Foot experts.' You gotta be kiddin' me! This is a real newspaper?"
"Yep, or rather an exact nobotic simulation. Speaking of which, what happened to your Butler, Rority?"
"Gumal lost a bet. He has to fetch beer for the next week."
"You two can be so childish!" Rula exclaimed.
"Well hell, Rula," Rority replied, "I'm only five hundred years old. I'm barely grown!"
"Well, are you guys taking the assignment?"
"Sure," said Rority. "How about it, Gumal?"
"Gumal laughed. "First you're a little green man from Mars and now we're Sasquatch! Hilarious, I'm in."
"One more thing," Rula said. "This isn't in the report -- the math boys said that the time distortion that you two are going to go back to fix shouldn't have happened in the first place, but did in fact happen. Someone has distorted the timeline, and we don't know who, what, or when they are and are from, or why they did it. The number guys say it could be something or someone from another dimension, or even from our future. They might not even be human. We just don't know.
"This one looks easy, but you guys could run into trouble."
"Oh hell," Gumal said, "no big deal. Rority can have the nobots turn him into a protohuman and he can get more beer. We've only got a couple of cases left. Shit, where's my stratodoober?"
The link... (Score:2)
In case you didn't see it, it's the word this [sj-r.com] when Rula says "Here, look at this".
The link will go away in a few months' time, as the SJ-R's links always do. The story is in their "premium content" section, but getting around it is easy. If you get a message that says "You have now viewed your monthly allowance of 18 free 'premium' article pages. For unlimited access to all of SJ-R.com's 'premium' content, which includes news, opinion, features and sports articles that appear in The State Journal-Register p
Bigfoot... (Score:2)
Sigh... really? Maybe he can run for the next Governor of Illinois.
Time Travel stories I've always stayed away from. More than a couple of sentences and you've probably already logically screwed something up.
Still, it is entertaining.
Re: (Score:2)
I used to hate time travel stories for the same reason, plus the impossibility of time travel; nature abhors a true paradox. Paradoxes are always nothing more than constructs of language. But faster than light travel is just as impossible, which would rule out most scifi, and if I can enjoy Tolkien and Pratchett I can get beyond FTL and paradoxes.
Writing time travel stories is fun, though, because of that very issue -- it's more of a challenge. I've seen a lot of scifi that could have as easily been set in