TTA (microstory)

TTA:
 “Welcome, everyone” The moderator started the meeting.
“Does anyone have anything new to say since the last meeting?”
“Yes, I have something to say” replied Clarence.
“Well, welcome back Clarence.” Joseph replied who was acting as moderator.
Clarence cleared his throat, “Hi I’m Clarence. And I am a Time Traveler. I had been clean for 10 years but I just fell off the wagon recently.”
“We’d been wondering why you had missed the last few meetings.” Joseph added. “So what happened?”
“I had been shopping by the Apple store to get something for my son for his birthday. Then I noticed their newest iTime device,”
Nick chimed in “That’s the one with the time waypoint navigation, very nice!” Everyone looked at Nick. He looked down at his feet and blushed.
Clarence “I looked at it and thought I’ve been good, that I deserved this little break.”
“You know you need to stay well away from anything resembling temptation, Clarence.”
“I KNOW! It was so stupid. But I tried it and it felt so AWESOME! I really loved saving people’s lives back when was an addict. I wanted to feel that again.”
“You know messing up the timeline can have unforeseen consequences, even when you save one life. Saving a life could cost millions later, don’t ever forget that. Remember when someone went back and saved the life of Ghengis Khan?”
“But it could also save millions, right? Like saving the life of someone that cures a disease?” Clarence proffered sheepishly.
“Yes, but the paths not taken are not knowable beforehand, thus we cannot take chances to have even worse outcomes happen down-the-line.”
“Sorry everyone, I just was trying to help someone in need.” Clarence shed a tear.
“Cheer up, each of us has a slip every now and again. Just forgive yourself and keep trying.” Everyone was nodding.
“Well, the problem can’t be too bad, otherwise we wouldn’t be here talking about it.” Joseph said. “So what did you do?”
“I saved a fellow named George, poor guy was about to throw himself off a bridge. So I showed him what things would be like without him, as if he had never existed. This iTime device also has a nice sim-mode which I put George into.”
“Oooohhhh” Nick let out. He immediately closed his mouth as everyone looked at him again.
“But how could the device know what would happen?” asked another.
“Well, the manual said the simulation can only make guesses at what would happen and the user can add some data, so I spun it in a way so George could see his life has worth.” Clarence explained.
“But of course his life could take a million different turns good or bad, based on his own decisions, not fate” Joseph added.
Clarence conceded the point “Yes, but hopefully he got that message too.”
“You did at least remember the ‘I’m your guardian angel’ bit, right?” Joseph inquired.
“Yes, even the thing about getting my wings. You were wise in telling me about that trick. I know the past’s knowledge of time travel could itself change the timeline.” Clarence acknowledged.
“What’s done is done. Or that’s the way it should be, Clarence. Let’s try harder next time, ok?”
Copyright 2014