The Last Time Traveler: Initial Notes
A billionaire in a post apocalyptic period some 100 years in the future hires an exorbitantly expensive guide to take him on the hunt of a lifetime, a hunt for the near human.
Background: A series of nuclear explosions have devastated Washington DC and the surrounding areas of Maryland and Virginia after the US has fractured with Texas and Arizona seceding and creating a new country. Much of this is hazy in the story, though. The country is still ruined and the effects of global warming, with its extremes of temperatures, of storms, and rising sea levels have significantly changed the landscape. Trees were blown down and/or burned in the conflagration, so the hills and mountains of western Maryland are barren and eroding, mud covered from the near constant autumn rains and winds. Actually wouldn't there be new growth?
The hunt begins as the protagonist, call him Chesney, is instructed in using the radiation suit and breather and how to deal if any problems arise. The guide, call him Rand, is tough, no nonsense, and has clearly been through a lot, and is short with Chesney when he asks too many questions at the ritzy base facility. Chesney tries to tip someone and is told gratuities are well covered in the overall fees. They drive off in a humvee type vehicle using ethanol? for fuel after Chesney is instructed in the legalities of the hunt and the use of the old style single shot rifle(?) required for the hunt in the wrecked territories which are also known as the cleansed territories. Also, Rand, the guide, is highly religious, and insists they observe certain traditions that are vaguely old testament. once they reach a base camp in the hills--where do they leave from and come from?--Chesney learns they will leave the humvee behind and actually ride horses deeper into the mountains, since they've crossed a deep river--the potomac--as the humvee is an amphib vehicle. Or do they cross through a heavily guarded gate in a wall that is at least 30 feet high and topped with razor wire? And continues in both directions as far as can be seen. They use old style walkie talkies and there are no cell phones...they have been outlawed in the cleansed territories.
Rand speaks of their quarry in terms of disgust mixed with some quiet respect and awe. How does he place these creatures in his religious context? Demons to haunt us? To prove theories wrong, since they clearly couldn't have evolved from mankind? How were they created? DNA ala Jurassic Park? Or somehow from the nuclear storm? hmmmmm.
Also, is there a third person? Another hunter to serve as Chesney's foil? A son in law? An executive clearly at chesney's beck and call? A newsman? Does he get killed due to some error/failure on chesney's part?
Nonononono! A time machine where rich guys can hunt anytime anyplace...or it's only Kaiser who wants to do this. Time travel has been outlawed since it can effect change in things...they will use flint arrowheads but with high-powered scoped crossbows! The guide is a woman with a Chinese name. Xiayin is the woman guide and leader and there's also a tech who operates the time machine...what would be a good name for it? Time is like a stream and the device allows one to step out of it...how go up or downstream?
Historical treatments and theories of time travel are discussed by the characters, including the grandfather paradox, and it is dismissed as having been demonstrated as not possible to change history except in tiny things, not in terms of the major track of events...ie, it turns out that your grandmother had another affair and got pregnant so even though you kill your grandfather you are still born. Hitler can't be killed, as any attempt somehow fails...etc. And yet...?
Does the machine have ability to move physically and change locations, or does it need to BE at the location where one wants to go in the past? Were there early experiments in secret by the government to confirm, say Jesus's life, and they failed, so the device has been outlawed by the Imperium...but that would not be christian, so rather than Chinese, the world has been fundamentalized? Religion controls all things? Except it's only a front for the wealthy, the bohemian grove secret society that truly runs things, the bulk of the world's wealth truly controlled by a handful of men, of whom Kaiser is one?
The capsule is hauled to Germany, to the Neander Valley, in secret and assembled somehow? Humans have been dated only to about 32,000 years ago, while Neanderthals to 50K or more. So set the Flux to at least 32,000 or a bit more...
Tesla and his theories and involvement, this has been a secret in use for decades, but finally outlawed and the last one destroyed to prevent its use to change political alignments, winners of battles/wars, etc. although it’s never been wholly proven that time and flow can really be changed except for major divergences, ie, if napoleon wins waterloo, he’ll lose something else and the overall result in the larger historical sense will be the same. Ie, one death, one small impact, is not enough to change history even though an individual here and there may be changed.
The time machine itself is quite large, and looks to be a combination of an old fashioned steam locomotive with a WWII landing craft, with hundreds if not thousands of clacking relays, and steam escaping, and trays of batteries with wires running everywhere. The passenger compartment is like an old stagecoach with black leather seats for four wedged in among all the paraphernalia…but no windows…lots of cranks and levers, like something from the early 20th century, pneumatic tubes, etc…Tesla invented it and scoffed at Einstein’s theories of space being bent and time adjustments as a cover for his discoveries.
The year is 2038...or 2076....
Four passengers:
XIAYIN, woman, in her mid 30’s, the leader/guide/expert/corpo rep, native mandarin with pure bloodlines, very proud of that, explains things to the other characters, very guarded, very attractive…
RAND, (or KAYNE) the billionaire industrialist, owns most of the corn growing regions in the domain of the Midwest. He bet on corn and ethanol to replace oil…and won. He is a win at all costs, hard assed and arrogant, take no prisoners type, in his early 50’s, one of the wealthiest men in the world, has hunted lions, climbed K2, flown on the chinese space shuttle, and is now eager to hunt the “near human” species in its own territory, on its own—well, nearly—terms.
BROWDY, (or BEDE) a younger, mid 20’s, fabulously successful entrepreneur in the latest electronics; also arrogant but a fundamentalist zealot who’s quiet goal is to prove the bible correct in its timeline of creation…
CONCEPCION, a lower paid but essential tech—part of the trained but highly limited class in the current very stratified society—in his 40’s or so, and charged with maintaining the Tesla Flux Machine, rather like an old chief engineer, but his duties include lots of cleaning of tubes, replacement and adjustment of valves and wires, as the physical action of all the relays takes its toll. The machine must remain “on” constantly to maintain their position in time, so his duty is to stay with it…there is some limit, say 36 hours, for the machine to ride the flux in a non-mated time, so they must return to the “present” prior to the expiration of that deadline.
And so it begins.
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