In my classified lab I’d made the machine and called it something else, and in my childhood daydreams I felt whispers of something unknown and somehow formed the idea of future. I was prone to waking up places I had no memory of. I was touched. I sought this feeling I called future before all else. Future compelled me to pursue the sciences, to excel in my fields, to gather necessary higher learning in medical science, mechanical engineering, and astrology, all means to an end I truly had no name for but future. I built the machine and under the guise of classification kept its purpose opaque. I had to pursue future at any cost. All it needed was a final piece. Just one secret component, and I could-
“Oh, you little creature. That's right, you enjoy solving puzzles, don’t you? You enjoy the electric sponge lighting up in that ivory case of yours? Little thinker, thinking, dreaming up worlds you'll never belong to. And yet here you are, lost within mine. Don't worry, little one. We'll get you home.”
The dream passed only when I realized I was eating breakfast in my tiny kitchen, fork in hand, and milk inside the cereal box. What the…? I was without clothing. The chill of the morning air through every opened window made my skin clammy and cold. I looked into the cereal box; its contents were oversaturated with milk, a soggy mess of what used to be corn flakes. Did I finish off my beer last night? I carefully placed the cereal box into the trash and pulled my fridge door open. No, they’re all there… What happened last night?
Something disallowed my future. A test?
What time is it?
It’s 11 in the morning?!
Fuck I’m late to work! Nobody called me. Right? Surely they would have called. I checked my phone: five missed calls and three voicemails. Fuck. I’m so fired.
I listened to the first voicemail.
“Hey, Tom, what the fuck were you on yesterday? Y’know, the screaming about space gods? Call me back, we’ll schedule a drug test.”
She didn’t mention anything about me being late… She called this morning just before the lab would have opened. She would have known I wasn’t there- I always get there early. So why did she not mention it? I checked the second voicemail.
“Tom, we need to talk. You can’t just shout a bunch of nonsense and run away screaming. For fuck’s sake, you abandoned the project! Can’t talk about it on the phone, you know. Get your ass back here. And don’t forget!”
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“Hey Tom, better get here before Die Fuhrer does. Your ass is on the line. Hefty severance package only works if you quit amicably. Call me.”
What the fuck did I do last night?
I got my work clothes on less autonomously as usual, though there was a haze I never remembered feeling before now.
I walked toward my office ten blocks away, hoping to salvage my position and sanity.
My phone buzzed in my pocket- another voicemail. No, a call! In my hurry to redeem myself I nearly threw my phone, bouncing it in between my hands before my clammy grip held it firmly to my ear.
“Hello? Please, Sam? Are you there?”
There was only static on the line.
“Sam? I’m sorry, I’m on my way, please don’t fire me, we can sort this out!”
I heard screaming over the line. More than one voice. More than my own. My own, layered over several layers of its own layers over itself. Rolling inward on and over and through itself all of my layers of voices make their way to my front and I was being stared at by strangers on the sidewalk. Most shifted to form a clearing around me, scared to catch whatever I must have been suffering from.
Suffering? The weight of exploratory science was a source of pride, of-
"And is it really so evil to be ambitious? Or covetous, even; of discovery, of whatever meager answer you can get your greedy little digits on? The greed you accumulated and cultivated in the pursuit of knowledge is a valuable asset, and neither is ambition evil. You're not content with not knowing. You refuse to accept things as they are. And you, clever little engineer, further yet; you're not content with your own stagnation. You wish to see as I see, correct? To experience what grandness you have yet to fathom."
I righted myself on the guardrail of my building’s parking lot. My hands ached and bled. Bled? I felt no injury on them.
"Yes, that's why your little digits constructed such a device, even with such a cost. It's not evil. Their lives were a cost you were willing to pay. Admirable, truly, that you alone would ascend to greatness by climbing a mountain of corpses. To betray your fellow animal to join ME, I'm flattered. I applaud you. With your drive and relentless lust for knowledge, you alone have uncovered a world forbidden to those of your kind. Your motivation heralds in a new era. Come with me, little one, that I may show you the true nature of your universe.”
The future is written in blood. The future screams and writhes within every vein of my skull, penetrates every capillary to the micron and smaller still, layering and layering into itself the weavings of the cloth of the future within and behind my own eyes. The future bleeds from the iron of my coworkers within the macerating timepiece of dials and blood and secrets and blood and blood and layers of blood bleed from them into the capturing basin, repurposed into a sort of offering chamber I read about in the flesh book. My engineer brain controlled my engineer hands and the deus ex mechanic controlling the spyglass controlled all of me to ascend my vision to the stars in hopes of higher ambitions.
I have reached future at last.