1954
Posted by timefiction on May 4, 2008
By Bob C.
© Copyright 2008
Bob Thomas was in a meeting room, drab, heavy smell of tobacco smoke. Three men in military uniforms, and one in a suit were sitting at the table. Two guards in military uniforms were standing by the door.
“Mr. Thomas, why didn’t you come to us first?” Bob Thomas was still groggy. “Mr. Thomas!”. Stirring himself, he answered, “Can I have some coffee?”, one of the men poured some from a steel urn, put it in front of Thomas with metal containers with cream and sugar.
“I actually recently read a science fiction story just like what is happening. I read an intro online then ordered the book, Foresight War, I think it was Tony Williams.”
“On line?” Thomas answered “Ah, it’s 1954, I was using a computer network, I can explain it more later. Anyway, the book was about a British man from 2004 who finds himself in 1934. He has some items that he normally carried which he used to get the attention of a scientist, then he helped Britain do better in World War Two.”
One of the men in uniform introduced as “Mr. Chadwell” asked, “So why didn’t you do that?” Thomas answered, “You see, that’s the problem, there’s only a little to fix, and much to get wrong, from 1954 to my year, 2008. There has not been a nuclear war, there was even the fall of communism, sure there are things that could be better, could have been better, but nuclear war was avoided so narrowly, that any change made now could change that outcome.”
