Samson ate his breakfast in resigned silence.

“The school’s been in a budget crisis all year, Samson,” Kim said. “Waffle stockpiles are Dean’s lowest priority.”

“I get it,” Samson said. “I’m just grumpy about it.”

The absence of his morning waffles wasn’t the end of the world. That would come later. About thirteen seconds later, as a spinning blur of metal fell from the sky and embedded itself in the table. Hawke ducked for cover, but no more assaults came. Vell examined the knife from a distance.

“Okay, nobody touch that,” Vell said.

“Is it cursed?”

“Worse,” Vell said. “I think it might be time-displaced.”

“Oh, right,” Samson said. “The things that do that are usually metal, right?”

“Always, as far as I know,” Vell said. “And if two loopers touch it, it’ll send them both to some random point in time. If we just leave it alone, the time anomaly should reabsorb it and send it back where it belongs.”

“Okay, cool, totally sensible plan,” Samson said. He returned to his not-waffles, only occasionally glancing at the knife. Vell glared at him.

“But?”

“But what if I kind of want to time travel,” Samson said. Everyone groaned. “Come on! You don’t want to go to the future?”

“No,” Hawke said. “Pass.”

“I’m probably going to be in the future anyway,” Kim said. “Pass.”

“The last time I time-traveled someone tried to murder me with a sword,” Vell said. “Pass.”

“Alex, come on,” Samson said. “You have to be at least a little curious, right?”

After avoiding his gaze for a few seconds, Alex looked at the knife, looked at Samson, and sighed.

“I will presumably be here for three more years,” Alex said. “I should probably have some experience with time travel. Purely for academic reasons.”

“Yes!”

Samson went to grab the knife, but Vell smacked his hand away.

“Hey. If you’re going to do this, do it smart,” Vell said. “Get your weapon, get some food and water, and get a life jacket.”

“A life jacket?”

“Yeah, a life jacket,” Vell said. “Time travel takes you to the same general location, and we’re on an artificial island. For ninety percent of history, this place was water. Take a life jacket.”

“Ugh, fine, mom,” Samson said. “Come on, Alex, let’s get the stuff.”

“This is your field trip, you do the shopping,” Alex said.

“Fine,” Samson grunted. “But I’m picking the snacks.”

----------------------------------------

“I feel like a dipshit,” Samson said. He had already strapped on his life jacket, and handed one to Alex as well. She held on to hers for the time being, reasoning she’d have plenty of time to put it on later. Samson wished he’d thought of that, but focused on talking to Vell for now.

“Alright boss, got my equipment,” Samson said. “Even had Alex make my crossbow invisible to everyone else, just so I don’t freak anyone out showing up with a weapon.”

He patted a hand against a crossbow Vell could not see to demonstrate the spell.

“Okay, fine, you’re good to go,” Vell said. “But be ready for anything.”

“I’m always ready,” Samson said. He grabbed the knife out of the middle of the table. After a moment of thought, he carefully grabbed the bladed end, and held the handle out towards Alex.

“Thank you for that,” Alex said.

“If you didn’t say thanks I was going to turn it around,” Samson said. “That was a test. Good job.”

“Fantastic. Let’s go.”

Alex grabbed the hilt of the blade and braced herself for whatever time travel entailed. It was a quick rush of light, the sensation of movement without actually moving, and the sharp pain of the breath being sucked out of her lungs. Then the light and the rush of motion passed, but Alex was still breathless. She endured that feeling for a few seconds before realizing that the reason she felt like she couldn’t breath was because she could not breath. Across the way, Samson dropped the knife and started gagging for air, clutching his throat as he did so.

There were barren rocks all around, and no water in sight. Samson might have felt even dumber about wearing the life jacket, but suffocation made it hard to be embarrassed. He took desperate, gasping breaths of the thin air, until Alex’s hands started to glow and his ability to breathe return. He took a few deep breaths to steady his heart.

“Jesus, thanks,” Samson said.

“You’re welcome,” Alex said. She looked around at the barren terrain. “We must’ve been transported to a time before Earth had a breathable atmosphere.”

“Before it had anything else, either,” Samson said. He put his hands on his hips and looked around at the rocky terrain. “Are you fucking kidding me? First time I get to time travel and it’s to this?”

He held out his hands. The barren expanse of the rocky surface provided only an echo in answer.

“Statistically speaking, this was the most likely outcome,” Alex said. “Earth was a barren rock billions of years before humanity was here, and it will be a barren rock for billions of years after we’re gone.”

“Lame,” Samson said. “At least we get to tell Vell these life jackets were a waste of time.”

He took his off and tossed it aside, and Alex tossed hers away as well. Normally she would not litter the timestream, but Vell had explained the mechanics of time travel to her, specifically how it interacted with time travel. This entire trip, and everything they did, was technically part of the first loop, and would be erased as such. Vell had also explained another quirk of the time travel process that presented a much more immediate concern.

Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

“We’re supposed to find our way back by returning this knife to its owner,” Alex said. She picked up the simplistic kitchen knife and examined it closely. “But who the hell is alive here to own a knife?”

“Damn, good point,” Samson said. “Maybe there’s some kind of ancient alien explorer chilling here?”

“I’d hate to validate those conspiracy theories, but it’s possible,” Alex said. “I’m not sure who else could be on this barren, lifeless-”

“Hi guys!”

Both whipped around to see a short, mousy-looking woman in a jumpsuit waving at them. She stopped waving and then gasped in shock.

“Samson? Alex?”

Samson grabbed his invisible crossbow.

“Do I know you?”

“No! We’ve never met,” the woman said. “I’m Vell’s friend! Well, I technically only met him once, but we got along really well.”

The woman’s bubbly demeanor and overly enthusiastic greeting made something in Samson’s head click.

“Oh, hey, you’re...Ateela, right? Or was it Aleeta,” Samson said. “The looper from the future.”

“Got it right the first time! Did Vell tell you about me?”

“Yeah, he-”

Samson stopped. Vell had mentioned her exactly once, but Ateela was looking up at Samson with bright, pleading eyes.

“-talks about you all the time,” Samson said. That seemed to appease Ateela.

“Oh wow,” she mumbled. “Maybe I should find some way to visit him.”

“Let’s shelve that until after we get ourselves home,” Alex said. “You’re from the future, then? Do you have any access to a time machine?”

“I very much do not,” Ateela said.

“Okay, wait, hold on, speaking of time travel,” Samson said. “How’d you end up here?”

“Same as you, I imagine,” Ateela said. “Grabbed something metal.”

“So there’s another looper here besides you.”

“Several, actually.”

“Several?”

“Follow me.”

Ateela led the way to the barren ridge she had appeared from. Just on the other side, in a desolate valley, there were about fifty different people mingling, their clothing varied in such a way it was clear they were all from different spans of time. Alex watched from above as two such groups swapped metal objects between them, and both vanished.

“Apparently it’s weirdly common for loopers to be drawn to this exact spot in time,” Ateela said. “They got a whole swap meet set up.”

“This is unfathomably unlikely,” Alex said. “There are countless days of Earth’s history-”

“Let’s not start asking questions now,” Samson said. “We’d never stop. Come on, let’s swap and shop.”

Ateela led the way into the meetup, and Alex started looking and listening for anyone who needed a knife. Samson was also scanning the crowd, for very different reasons. A good chunk of the loopers present here were visibly from the past, or at least very close in time to him, but he did spot a few who were apparently from the future. Samson locked eyes on one with a cybernetic arm and bolted over, followed by a frustrated Alex.

“Yo!”

“Sorry, bud,” the cyborg said. He already knew what was going to be asked. “No spoilers for the future. That’s like, the number one rule of time travel.”

“Come on, I just want a cybernetic arm,” Samson said.

“Samson, we already have those,” Alex said.

“But his is cooler.”

“We still can’t violate the timeline.”

“I know, I know, but just generally,” Samson said. “I’m probably going to die around 2090, maybe 2100, will they at least be within my lifetime?”

“No spoilers,” the cyborg said.

“Aww, come on, man!”

“No means no, Samson,” Alex said. “Sorry to bother you. Are you looking for a knife?”

“Nope. Tungsten orb.”

Alex wondered why someone would possess a solid tungsten orb in the first place, but that might be future knowledge. She dragged Samson away from the cyborg and went back on the hunt. Ateela had not followed them on their brief detour to the cyborg, but she rejoined them as they headed back towards the center of the group.

“Hey, you guys are from the 2020’s, right?”

“Reluctantly, but yes,” Samson said. Ateela waved someone over, and a woman with poofy hair and a flowery blouse walked up to them.

“You all missing a ruler?”

The hippie held up a ruler, which Alex recognized.

“Oh, I was looking for that this morning,” Alex said. “I thought I just left it in the lab.”

The hippie handed over the ruler, and held up double peace signs as she and a fellow looper from the past vanished in a flash of light.

“Well, now nobody needs to hassle you about your stuff,” Ateela said. “Let’s find where that knife belongs!”

“Should we keep an eye out for your object while we’re at it, Ateela?”

“Oh no I’m good,” Ateela said. “Me and Daveed found our thing a while ago, he’s just letting me hang out because I like talking with the loopers from the past, and he’s a real good boss. Thanks Daveed!”

Daveed, who was relaxing on a nearby rock, returned Ateela’s wave, and then tapped his open palm.

“I know, I know,” Ateela said. Daveed was indulging her nostalgia, but only briefly. Discipline was also part of being a good leader. “We got like seven minutes left, let’s hurry and find your thing.”

In an incredibly inadvisable move, Ateela snatched the knife out of Alex’s hand and held it aloft.

“Knife! Anyone need a knife?”

“Is it a cool knife?”

“Not really.”

“No thanks.”

The hunt continued. Ateela took the lead on interrogating loopers, since she was apparently one of the furthest in the future and therefore had no need to fear “spoilers”. Alex and Samson took a back foot as Ateela interrogated multiple generations of loopers.

“You know, I never really thought about how much of a history we have until I saw it laid out like this,” Samson said. He looked back towards the cyborg, and only felt a slight pang of jealousy about his arm. “And how much of a future we have. I mean, shit, we have people going back to the 40’s, stretching on until god knows how far in the future.”

“And, given the mechanics of the loop, it’s an entirely unbroken chain,” Alex said. “All the loopers of the past taught the generation after, eventually reaching down to us, and we will teach the generation after us, reaching on into the future. It’s humbling.”

Alex stood back and watched as Ateela pivoted hard, tripped over a rocky outcropping, and fell flat on her face.

“We should make sure we do a good job,” Alex mumbled. Ateela picked herself up and brushed primordial dirt off her face.

“What was that?”

“Nothing,” Alex said. “Just wondering how long it’s going to take to get home.”

“Hopefully soon,” Ateela said. “Only a few minutes to go.”

Another group of loopers manifested from some unknown time period, but they didn’t need a knife either. They had quizzed everyone by now, so they were reduced to sitting and waiting for another group to appear.

“I wonder if any of these loopers are ever going to figure what caused the time loops,” Samson wondered aloud. Multiple people turned to him at once and shook their heads.

“No.”

“Nope. Don’t even try.”

“Seriously, don’t try to find out. Bad idea.”

“That bad?”

Overhead, another rift in time appeared, and a pair of battle-damaged loopers were flung through. They skidded across the ground, though the harsh landing did not hurt them in any way they weren’t already hurt. Both of them stood up, dusted themselves off, and looked around.

“What the fuck is this?”

“Time nexus,” Ateela said. “Lot of loopers here.”

“Fantastic. Anyone got a way home for us?” one of the two damaged loopers asked. “One of our new guys got the bright idea to look for the source of the loops, and now we have to deal with the Time Dragon.”

“Time Dragon?”

Several of the same loopers who had scolded Samson earlier nodded knowingly, which worried him.

“Yes, the Time Dragon,” the battle-damaged looper said. “Are you going to help or not?”

“You need a knife?” Alex asked, as she held aloft her misplaced knife.

“Yes, perfect! I’ve been looking for that!”

The looper walked up and snatched the knife right out of Alex’s hands.

“Oop,” Ateela said. “Bye guys, tell Vell I said-”

That was all Samson and Alex got to hear before they were snapped back to the proper timeline. Vell was still there, studying his textbook, and he barely looked up as they returned to the present.

“Have fun?”

“Other than the time I spent suffocating, yes,” Samson said. “Ateela says hi.”

“Ateela? You actually went to the future?”

“No. Well, maybe,” Alex said. “It’s a long story and it involves a Time Dragon.”

“Hmm. Don’t bother telling me,” Vell said. “I’m busy and it’s too late in my career to be dealing with Time Dragons.”

He returned to his book, and took some notes. Samson and Alex stepped out to get some fresh and appropriately breathable air.

“I suppose it’ll be up to us to warn future loopers about the Time Dragon,” Samson said. “I wish I knew more, it’s going to be hard to explain.”

“I find a Time Dragon to be a rather self-explanatory.”

“Touche.”