In mid-1990, 'Chance' Staute is briefly abducted and certain lost memories from 1972 forcibly reloaded into his head. Who does this to him? His younger 1972 self, who's striving to get around the mind-wipe he knows his time-traveling captors will perform on him before returning him to his 1970s college life.
The whole story behind that 1972 experience and the abduction in 1990 can be seen in the online novel The Chance of a Realtime. The accounts below take place after those events, thereby beginning around mid-1990 and continuing up through the present day and beyond.
- Treasure hunt; (this section still being written up) Now all but certain I truly had spent time aboard a time-traveling vessel in 1972, there was only one thing to do: prove it beyond a shadow of a doubt to myself. By retrieving the future technology I now remembered stealing and stashing away on Earth.
- Power training; (this section still being written up) I'm giddy with the fact I'm now freshly equipped with awesome goodies and knowledge from the future. Possessing the Riki android alone is like having my own combination Einstein, CIA, and SWAT team all in one person-sized package. But there's more...! It feels like the sky's the limit and nothing can stand in my way any longer.
- Shadowfast the living; (this section still being written up) I'm astonished to discover that still more artifacts from my future trip might still be on Earth. Namely, after fall quarter 1972 my Mustang supercar had been replaced with an awesome chunk of intelligent nano-technology from 2483 AD, programmed to look and act exactly like my supercar, almost no matter what.
I'd wrecked that machine and later sold it for parts(!)
Almost two decades later I learn I'd sold a priceless treasure trove of future technology for a pittance. Agh! If that nanotech Shadow car still exists and functions, I must get it back. The future could depend on it!
- Missing links; (this section still being written up) It appears if I won $100 million I'd suddenly suffer an accident costing me $110 million to be put back together again. Sheesh! For immediately upon the heels of me figuring out how best to use all my wonderful new toys from the future, I learn of things which tip the balance back into the negative again-- in a big, big way.
It all begins with a little nagging mystery, that grows ever larger the more you poke at it...
If only I'd left it alone, I might could have simply died soon after alongside everyone else, and gotten some much needed rest...
- Billions to one; (this section still being written up) Thanks to my future trek during 1972, I know what's supposed to be ahead for humanity. But now I discover an awful and mounting threat which will surely blindside mankind and maybe cause its extinction-- perhaps within just the next few years!
I can't alert anyone to the threat-- for that itself would screw up future history as I've seen it. Plus, present-day technologies couldn't defend Earth anyway.
I must somehow stave off Armageddon alone. And make sure humanity doesn't even notice.
But how does one man fight off an entire advanced civilization? Let alone do it in total secrecy?
I could sure use an Underdog super energy pill for this.
- The mystery sheriff gambit; (this section still being written up) As we couldn't come up with anything better in the time available, I tried to convince the Kerguelen I'd been specially selected and equipped by some unidentified higher authority of the galaxy to be guardian of humanity, serving the Kerguelen notice to leave the cradle of Sol system once and for all, or else suffer the consequences...
Unfortunately, if you give an entire advanced civilization with its own fleet of space-going battleships an ultimatum, you better be able to back it up...!
- Time enough for love...; [Robert Heinlein once used this title for a novel] (this section still being written up) Well, I finally managed to compel the Kerguelen to quit Sol system for the greener pastures of the galaxy corewards, with a mix of stick and carrot. Just barely though. I didn't actually clinch the deal until after they'd already killed me and didn't know it. Good thing I wasn't working alone!
Among my last thoughts was the hope my plan might allow humanity sufficient time to grow up and beyond its present mix of ignorance, violence, and greed, to finally appreciate and understand itself in some semblance of a truly enlightened and just civilization. That I might have given my planet-wide family time enough for love to show them the way.
I thought Bridget would have liked that.
