- Chapter 1: Introduction -
The year is 2250 and the world is all right. All right in the sense that not much has changed since the start of the century. People aren't much stronger than before, or smarter, or faster, or sexier - although, every once in a while, along comes someone with a little of everything. It's fun to argue this point. I've met one like that and he was fascinating. Still is, in fact. But most folks just don't like to believe me.
As far as Earth is concerned, though, things have changed: she's gotten smaller and quieter and much more tired. The world is getting more polluted by the day. Remember when they first warned about global warming? And how almost none of the experts believed it, how the ones who saw it coming were called "crazy tree-huggers" or "misinformed laymen" or things like that? Well, the misinformed were actually right for a change. Our planet is pretty messed up right about now - has been for a long while - and sometimes I think her life will be ending very, very soon.
I mean, look at the signs.
Take Antarctica - no one has heard of that continent for the last hundred years, ever since it melted and vanished right into the ocean. The same with the ice in the Arctic region. All gone. The sea levels rose so much the other continents started shrinking, and if I remember correctly, almost fifty nations so far have lost their coastlines to the waves. There's no such thing as winter or spring or fall anymore; only cool summer, warm summer, or hot summer - you can bet that last one's a killer. It's a miracle if night falls and the temperature drops more than three degrees, because it never does anymore. And nature is dying - every second we take a breath, some plant or animal disappears, just like that, never to be replaced. Not that there were many left to begin with.
All around the world, the talk of going green has ended. Green no longer exists. Our fake cities are taking over, and the land is crumbling, wasting away little by little. I would know. It's a sad thing to see.
Our world is basically one huge time-sensitive bomb waiting to explode. The countries left from the flooding stopped being countries; they banded together and established continental alliances. Places like England and France are now regions - you come from this region or that region but internationally, you only identify yourself as European, Asian, American, African, Australian. It makes for a wonderful intercontinental rivalry. Though rivalry is a nicer way of putting things. The one thing that brings people together is a world language: English. That's about it.
Still, on the (supposedly) bright side, our lives are pretty much the same. The one friend we have left in this world is technology, and she's proven herself trustworthy. To combat skyrocketing temperatures we've developed an advanced cooling system, with lots of underground vents and pipes. It needs water - but for that we purify seawater or make it ourselves, with machinery some guy invented a hundred years ago. All the existing cities use it. We also have domes built over our cities, so the sun's rays don't kill anyone on a hot day. And every bit of architecture or moving vehicle has its own solar panels for free energy. Really blinding on a cloudless day - every day. It helps things though.
It's funny to think how, 200 years ago, people still thought life like this was impossible. But we've managed to break that barrier, and Moore's law has held up, even if that has its pros and cons. Maybe people have gotten smarter and the American Times is all wrong.
Smart or not, though, there's one barrier we have yet to overcome and that is time. Time has always been our enemy - we've all run late to work or missed a date or (worst of all) overslept and missed that all-important rerun of our favorite TV show. Don't worry, I'm just being sarcastic. I think.
But there are more serious things - like getting horribly injured to the point of no return, or losing a loved one, or watching the world itself disintegrate around us, which is looking pretty likely. Things like that, where all that's needed to keep them from happening is time. If only we had known sooner. If only we had more time to fix things. Then our lives wouldn't be like this. Then our world wouldn't be like this.
Time is wisdom. Time is power. Time is the judge and the conductor of all things in life.
Now perhaps you're thinking, what if we could reverse things?
Well, that's exactly what we're trying to do.
Because we figure, if we can find some way to warp the fabric of time, allowing people to go backward or forward at their will - new decisions could be made, lives altered, worlds avoided and even more. In essence we could change history, change the world, make everything better. We wouldn't need to fear death so much if we could go back and relive our pasts and maybe prolong our own lives.
At least that's what most people think - and it is a nice vision. Imagine stepping through a portal and emerging into an earlier time, an earlier place, finding yourself younger and stronger and with knowledge of the future. Then imagine going to the future and seeing exactly what's going to happen to you in ten years and, if there's anything bad in there, go back in time and prevent it from happening. That's what everyone wants. The science fiction writers catered to those interests for years.
Problem is, nothing's really that simple. Not when time's involved.
Right now, scientists are going through old theories of relativity, preparing new ones, and trying to find out what exactly makes the perfect formula for time-travel. And even more important than that: what we could theoretically do - and not do - with it. So far no one's truly succeeded yet - but last I heard, the continental alliances have started a race. A race against time to uncover the secret. There's nothing we need more than the promise of a better day, and this discovery is supposed to make that happen.
So I don't think the leaders are far off the mark, when they claim that whoever controls time travel will control the world.
By now you're probably wondering who I am and how I know all this. My name is Antonio Fernandez Carriedo and I come from that region of Europe called Spain. I'm a scientist in charge of investigating natural issues and developing ways to solve them. An uphill climber, so to speak. You could call me an environmental scientist or an environmentalist - there's no difference between them now. It's a depressing job. But now I have a new one: I've been assigned to the EA-225 to go out into space.
Yes, it's a spaceship and no, it's not one of those clumsy dangerous giants of old. Our European spacecraft are the smallest, fastest, and most fuel-efficient in the world, and they've been around for decades. With them we've mapped the solar system, observed stars beyond, discovered other strange space objects that I can't even name because I know so little of them. Now, though - we're going to use the EA-225 to research time travel.
The idea is simple; the explanation is not. And since it's such a well-kept secret (in other words, I don't get it either) I'll spare you most of the details.
Our whole mission basically revolves around a black hole. You've probably heard of those - whatever goes in doesn't come out, because of the incredibly strong forces in the center. That center is called a wormhole. Well, that's what the astronomers call them; some of us laymen refer to them as time-tunnels. Because theoretically they can warp time - and if you were to go through one, you could end up in the past or the future. Some say you might even enter a parallel universe. But the main thing is, they allow time travel. The only problem is finding one safe enough to pass through.
And we in Europe have found one. Definitively. We know where it is, we know it's a good candidate for time travel. All we need to do is get there. Hence the EA-225.
Now you might be wondering what an environmental scientist like me has to do with any of this. Actually I've been wondering the same myself. I didn't know a thing about the mission because it was a secret - no one's supposed to know aside from a small group of European scientists - but somehow I was invited to join the team. Recruited, rather. Just in case we find any extraterrestrial life or things like that, was what they said. But that's highly doubtful. I'll probably become an assistant of some sort, since the only astronomy I know is in the patterns of the stars.
Still, it sounds like an amazing journey. We're going beyond the planets, beyond the stars, to solve a mystery that's puzzled people for millennia. And from the looks of it, we might just be able to get somewhere and save the world with what we find. Provided it's used correctly, of course. I hope it will be, and I hope that hope comes true.
I actually have met most of the other people on the expedition. There's eight of us in total - four men, four women. I'd say that makes a pretty good team, considering that some of the best minds in the world are part of our eight. You know what's interesting, though?
That Italian scientist. I couldn't take my eyes off him.
Space stuff (which you can skip if you want, but just FYI for science geeks like me, aka FAMILY):
A wormhole or Einstein-Rosen bridge is the hypothetical center of a black hole that can (in theory) connect two regions of time. So basically if you went into one end in the year 2014 you could possibly go forward into, say, 5908, or backwards into 1627, or something like that. But according to physics they'd be unstable, so if the smallest speck of dust went into the wormhole the whole thing would collapse. The only way something as big as time travel could happen is if there's negative energy present, which can keep the wormhole open and stable for long periods of time. Currently stable wormholes and negative energy don't exist. But a part of physics known as string theory has come up with possible solutions.
All of the above basically means that you can pass through a wormhole without turning into spaghetti. You'd get to the other side through something known as a white hole (an apt name), which is in essence the exhaust end of the black hole. That's what pushes everything, including you, into another time. It's been said that trips like these are one-way only but I'd rather not deal with that here so yeah. To any astronomers out there who read Spamano fanfics, please don't hurt me. But I will accept any criticism and fix things up if necessary!
Thanks so much for your interest in this story!
