A brief history of Torbin

Since his first attempt to put things right, Torbin suspected he was under closer observation than ever. His personal quarters had never felt so confining. Not that the physical space of this room was any less than he enjoyed at even his most expensive house. fa!e window about two metres squared, showing an alpine vista " or any scene he so desired " that even opened to fa!e fresh air. There was exercise equipment, and a panoply of entertainment ports. He could be living in a mansion and still feel li!e a prisoner, !nowing that his every movement would be trac!ed # but only for his own safety, they would surely tell him, except the comfort of safety was theirs alone. How typical of the $%tari to not want to be seen as controlling& they tried to allow him the illusion of freedom. 'n theory he could go anywhere, at least they wouldn%t physically stop him " no more than a liberal(minded parent would stop their determined teenage child from a ris!y venture. )nly an immersion in the past offered that true feeling of independence. )ne of the programs contained a simulation of his family. His wife *melda, there as if part of a tableau+ her wavy copper(red hair framing soft smiling features, reminding him of her positive outloo!, and acceptance of his ,admitted- eccentricities. The children+ .u!en, aged five& ndrea, seven, !nowing their father was someone important, but not yet old enough to be as!ing those difficult questions. Torbin could not imagine any other woman accepting him so completely. /rom childhood he had always been a loner " an oddball, some would say& never one of the gang, never part of the in(crowd. Not that he was the aloof genius the media had made him out to be. 'n fact, his academic record was at best patchy& school never held much interest, there were even suggestions that he undergo 0imprinted learning% ,a latterly illegal process of grafting !nowledge

onto neuron networ!s- such was his failure at the core subjects " even mathematics, which at the time seemed irrelevant. $ut then at one physics lesson a teacher started telling the class about a physicist who had been researching the possibility of wormhole technology+ the Nobel pri1e winner had been able to create a micro(wormhole for all of two and a half picoseconds. /or the first time Torbin had a genuine interest in a lesson. nd that evening he researched this scientist%s wor!, even loo!ing at the then meaningless equations, determined that one day he would solve the conundrum of how to create a stable channel for information to pass. The following days he paid attention even to the seemingly irrelevant math of a pre(college pupil. His tutors were astonished " by the end of term " at his inexplicable improvement& he even had to convince the school principle that he was not cheating or receiving special tuition. $ut Torbin now had a goal, he would become the 2reat Scientist, the 3ioneer. nd the pri1e would be his. Such intense studying never served to improve his chances with girls. 3erhaps it was in his college years when he was developing his so(called aloofness. There sometimes was the occasional smile from a girl after a furtive glance from him when he then recoiled with embarrassment. He was sure there were discussions about who would ta!e the nerd for his first sexual encounter& he didn%t need to overhear the chatter amongst the girls " when their attention swivelled to him from a near dinner(hall table, and then bac! to the ensuing giggles " to !now just what they were saying. 't wasn%t that he was completely without any friends. He did hang out with a group of four, thought of as the uncool gee!s who were, if anything, proud to be such, to have their definitive place. fter all, they would be the ones to earn the big money, and then the beauties would come running to them. Torbin, however, was not entirely comfortable with such complacency. 't was never going to be about the money, he assured himself. The right girl would want him for what he had striven towards rather than for any framed piece of paper, that award which said he was now a success. $ut there were the girls in his undergraduate years who were

suddenly finding him attractive, whereas before he was someone only to be laughed at, at least it seemed. 'n those hormone(rich times he was even tempted to succumb to their advances, not particularly proud of himself afterwards, but the toast of his friends nonetheless. 't was at the age of twenty(four, in his post graduate year, when he met the woman who would eventually become his wife. He was already wor!ing fifteen hours a wee! as a research assistant at the 4ontana particle accelerator site ,a ringway extended for two hundred and fifty !ilometres underground, the world%s biggest-. He now had the confidence of someone on the way to becoming a fully( fledged physicist. He met her at a bar on a rare night out& his birthday celebration with a small crowd conspicuously absent of women. /rom the loo!s and giggles of this girl%s friends he thought he !new what had motivated her to approach him. fter she%d said a tentative 0hi% prompting his group to ceremoniously disperse to their safely observable distance. He said+ 0' !now you%re only here because you%re friends dared you.% Then her loo! of moc! astonishment. 0How could you suggest such a thing5% 6hether or not it was true, the girl would feel obliged to prove herself genuine. nd so, he gave her a chance& over the wee!s and months she did just that. 7et only when she accepted his marriage proposal was he finally convinced. 't wasn%t what he would call love at first sight& he doubted that she felt that way either. 't wasn%t even that he had a definitive type in mind as an ideal. $ut he%d learned from the experience of those pretty girls that good loo!s ,of the generally accepted standard- were a novelty that could soon wear thin& and to them he was surely just a good financial prospect. Here he !new was something deeper. /unny, he thought, how different someone can loo! over time when nothing has really altered in their appearance, as if the hidden depths emerged as an augmented reality only visible to him. She became the ideal he could never have envisioned. Torbin was brought bac! to the present with a start when his comm

bu11ed. 0There is someone who wishes to spea! with you,% said 8ardino, his b%tari appointed guardian. 0' thin! you will be interested in what he has to say. 3lease join us in the conference room.% Since his last foray trying to alter the past, 8ardino had clearly been concerned Torbin would ma!e some other attempt. ctually he%d hoped to see the psychiatrist woman again, he really felt he had a real connection with her. $ut who would this be " some $%tari appointed shrin!5 He entered the blue and grey(white conference room, where 8ardino was seated at the far end of the long onyx table in his usual brilliant(white suit. t the side was a man he immediately disli!ed the the loo! of " someone who clearly spent a lot of time at the gym and generally appeared to have a certain vanity about him, with his carefully styled hair. 8ardino introduced him. 0This is 9oidon :hanley. 7ou may not !now the name but he once lived in this compound. He has been very important to our efforts in combating the threat from the ;eepers.% Now Torbin was sure he would hate this man. The man spo!e. 0Torbin, it is very good to meet you at last.% He offered to sha!e hands but Torbin was having none of it, so 9oidon gestured to an empty chair opposite him. 03lease ta!e a seat,% he said, as if it were some property of his to offer. He continued+ 0' have heard some great things about your wor!.% He had that !ind of smug tone of voice " Torbin imagined " of a high(flying lawyer, or an investment ban! :*). 0' wish ' could say the same of you,% said Torbin, 0but it seems the $%tari prefer to !eep me in the dar!.% 06ell, if it%s any consolation, ' have also been !ept to a strict remit. $ut now we can share the data.% 8ardino must have sensed the the apprehension from Torbin%s expression. The b%tari said, 09oidon also has a theory as to why he may be responsible for our current state of affairs. This might come as a surprise " he once created a version of the temporal eradication

wave.% 0't%s a long story and a previous life, which '%d be glad to share with you presently,% 9oidon said. 0$ut suffice it to say, you are not the primary guilty party here.% 0't was ' who sent the message about our technology " across all those thousands of light years.% 07ou may have felt you%d opened 3andora%s box, but ' was the one who may have attracted the attention of the ;eepers by using their technology.% 0 nd when did you do that5% 0 hundred and seventy(four years ago.% 0$ut there was no evidence of the ;eepers having responded so long ago.% 0' guess we can play the blame game for some while, Torbin.% 8ardino spo!e. 0 nd really, arguing over who is responsible is mere speculation. 't could be that the ;eepers had intended this for a millennia. $ut we can at least briefly discuss a way to resolve this problem.% Torbin sat in the chair at the opposite side to 9oidon who said to him, 0These $%tari, they are ever the optimists. nd yet they won%t allow me to ta!e the necessary ris!s.% 0That%s a matter for your commander,% 8ardino said 0$ut we welcome all your ideas.% 0Sure,% responded 9oidon, 0provided they fit within the narrow parameters of the Temporal <irective,% 0<on%t get him started on that,% Torbin said to 9oidon " who had improved marginally in his estimation. 0There is someone else who wishes to contribute,% 8ardino said. He spo!e into his wrist(comm. 07ou can come in now.% Torbin was shoc!ed to see the reptilian(loo!ing creature enter the room. 9oidon gave not a flic!er of reaction. 0This is our chief astronomer, 8orandi *ntola,% 8ardino announced. 0He is someone who has had direct experience of the temporal eradication wave.%

0)ur host failed to mention that ' have no memory of such experience,% 8orandi said with that typically $%tari accent(less precision, as he made towards his seat. 0$ut you may consider me to be the first ever test subject.% 9oidon loo!ed to Torbin. 0The wave literally erased time right bac! to his childhood. '%ve been analysing the data from his craft as it passed through the wave, which itself resisted at least five nanoseconds of exposure.% 0He disappeared from his place in our continuum,% 8ardino explained, 0but still existed in the present having lived what seems to be an identical life.% 0 second chance at life,% mused Torbin. 0$ut as if the future had never happened. nd yet nothing had changed in this continuum5% 0/or this to have happened to an individual is unprecedented. $ut because he has no memory of the temporal erasure it is almost as if it never happened& he has no evidence. 'n fact, he was about to repeat the same experiment before we stopped him. nd we !now he had previously gone through with it from a tachyon message sent bac! in time from the craft. He may even have done so thousands of times, and been caught in a temporal loop if we hadn%t detected the transmitted data in deep space.% 0/ive nanoseconds exposure,% wondered Torbin. 06hat if it were longer, say a second5% 0That%d be difficult to quantify,% said 9oidon, 0$ut we do !now this phenomenon is so powerful it could eradicate time to before human existence.% 0'n fact,% interjected 8orandi, 0we have evidence of its power " to erase time for millions of years.% 06ell, that%s no revelation to me,% Torbin said. 09emoving us because they thin! we%re the threat. 9esetting the cloc!. $ut can you answer me why5 6hat do they fear5% 8ardino raised his hand as if to stop anyone else from spea!ing. 0That%s not the most important thing to consider, Torbin. s you have told us, these ;eepers believe themselves to be gods& they%ve made

some assumption about human progress. 't could be they do not trust you to be responsible for the technology you%re advancing.% 0)f course, it%s nothing the Btari have done,% said 9oidon, 0because you have the Temporal <irective to ensure the universe does not become disrupted, whereas humans have no sense of their action%s consequence.% stronomer 8orandi stood up. 0' have observed the T* wave for nearly a year, and ' can categorically state that it is not set to merely target humans. t its superluminal rate it could envelope the entire galaxy " and perhaps beyond, within the next few years.% 9oidon said, 0They are doing that because it%s cleaner. 7ou%ve seen the confusion caused when it%s locali1ed. $ut anyway, given how responsible ' feel over this, '%ll do what ever it ta!es.% 07ou won%t need to question my own commitment,% stated Torbin. 8ardino gave a flic!er of a smile and placed his tablet on the table. 0Then ' loo! forward to wor!ing with you all& though bear in mind just how dangerous it will be for us, since we are now the primary threat. $ut '%m sure you already !now that.% Torbin nodded. 07eah, they have a specific target now& not merely the general human threat any more.% http+==www.timeover(sf.com=