Recency Bias
“The job? Nah, it ain’t that much a thing, really. I wake up, get dressed, and head down to work, just like you folk. Only diff’rence is, well, I never know if I’m gonna get a mic, or a piece o’ squishy jello quantum linked to my listeners’ ears, or even, like that one time, a time-looped monkey stenographer!”
“Good mornin’, and welcome to WWTT Radio, your timewide public radio station, broadcastin’ to you live from a … jeez, is this place a nuclear bunker? It is!? The crap have you lot done to the timeline now?”
“…Anywho. I’m your host, theslowpath, and this is Recency Bias. The number to call, write to, video, or even think hard at if we’ve got psychics again, is, as always, 0900-WWTT. And someone better tell me why there’s a frigging shark tank in here!”
“It wasn’ really a choice, yaknow? Just, once the calls started comin’ in from the future and the past, when it ’came clear just how much people’d started dependin’ on me, well…”
“I couldn’t just stop.”
“Some of our callers’ve dropped scary hints about some big reason coming up why every time traveler knows this number… but hey. Don’t live in your Yet, right?”
“Good mornin’ to you, caller. What time is it?”
“Good… evening, sir. My name is Cecilia Hawnesworth-Jones, and I am calling from May 4326.”
“Ah, the good ol’ 4300’s! Last I heard from you lot, you’d up and finally developed a crazy little political computer, and put it in charge’o everythin’! How’d that work out?”
“Not… well, I am afraid. It started up an insane overoptimisation process, the second it learnt about Jaunting. We spent a lot of good men and women’s Yet to make it never happen, and I’m fairly certain the nuclear bunker you are currently situated in now is one of our ripples. I do apologise on our behalf, sir.”
“Eh, I ain’ the one you should be apologisin’ to; I’m all comfy and warm. I’m more fussed about this weird breakfast, right now. You got any idea why it looks like a tin’o crayons?”
“Ahem. Could I deliver my message, please?”
“‘Course, ‘course, Miss, you sound like you got places to be. Go ahead.”
“To Cecilia Jones, age 28 and three months. As your Elder, I order you to not abort your mission. I repeat, do not abort.”
“A message for your younger self, eh? Do we get to know what you screwed up big time, back then?”
“I would rather not say, but… thank you very much, Mr. Path. You don’t know what it means that I could send that message.”
“No problems, miss. And though I ask, when you’re me, it’s oft’n safer to not know the details!”
“Heh. I suppose it would be. Well, thank you once again, sir.”
“Safe travels, Miss!”
“Look, if anyone ever came here and asked for the thing, I’d just give it to’em! I ain’ a Jaunter, and I honestly don’t know why that little hunk o’ gold lets me remember timelines like they can.”
“The techs’ve tried to explain it to me, stuff about improbability containment and forcing reconvergence and other sortsa big words… but honestly, I get the sense that they don’t really understan’ it either.”
“But yea, til someone else needs it, the thing’s in my care. And if I have it, I’m’na run WWDT. It’s just what I do.”
“Good mornin’, caller. What time is it?”
“Uh, November, 865, I think. Listen, I need to get a message to -”
“Ya know the rules, caller. What’s going on, back in the 800s?”
“Dude, I- okay. I’m honestly not too sure. The Mayans are worshipping a god of math, I think the Igbo have spaceflight, and oh yeah - there are velociraptors. Velociraptors! I’m not crazy, right? We didn’t have velociraptors before, did we?”
“Not ‘sfar as I remember, no! ‘Bout a month back, some company’d developed pocket raptors in, like, the twenty-something hundreds, but this sounds-”
“Now do you get why I wanna get extracted so bad, man?”
“You runnin’ from raptors right now?”
“Well, no, but, I don’t wanna be! And my Jaunter’s trashed, so…”
“Heh. Go ahead.”
“To the Reconstructive Liberation Front, circa 4000 - I want out! ID 09329581, and please, hurry!”
“Heh. Oh hey, ya nev’r gave me your name?”
“They’re here, thank god. You’re a lifesaver, dude, let no one tell you any different. Though, uh, they don’t look too happy that I pulled out like this…”
“You gonna be okay, kid?”
“I’ll be fine, I think. Tell you what, I’ll call you again today to let you know, how’s that?”
“Sounds good to me. I wanna hear about that African space program, ya hear me?”
“Will do, dude. See ya!”
“Heh, the rules. It’s just, well, I don’ wanna turn into a message boy, right? And if I can remember these timelines, may as well force’em to talk for a bleedin’ second with a Leveller who does!”
“Way I figure it, you folk are all friggin’ time travelers. If you try to tell me you don’t have enough time, I’ma laugh in your face.”
“The other couple rules are just so’s I can stay neutral in, like, the billion different stupid wars you lot fight amongst yourselves. I ain’ part o’ any o’ that, I’m just a radio show.”
“Good afternoon, caller. What time is it?”
“Good morning, exalted one. I am Fa Satahl, and we here are about to celebrate the turn of the year 10,000.”
“Wooee. Gotta say, first time I’m hearin’ from someone that far out. So we make it that long? Humans? Jaunters and Levellers alike?”
“We do indeed, exalted one, in this timeline, at least, though perhaps not as you would recognise. Much of this conversation - my voice, demeanour, and bearing, in particular - are constructed so as to not leak significant information. Though I assure you, my respect for you is real.”
“Well, that’s mildly creepifyin’. How much can you actually say ‘bout what life is like down there?”
“We still fight amongst ourselves. Even now, we have wars. I am, in fact, estranged from my husband due to a … you would call it a philosophical distinction, or maybe a way of life.”
“Can I ask what happened?”
“I can try. It is roughly a question of just how much of one’s identity extends beyond one’s, uh, body, and how much of the concept of ownership even applies on-”
“Nah, I mean - can I ask how the fight happened?”
“…Oh. There is … not much to say, really - it was sparked by a misunderstanding, I suppose, and then we were frightening the children by how much we were shouting at each other. When phages started being involved, we both decided it had gone too far, so we went back and never married.”
“Dya love him still?”
“I do, yes.”
“Does he love you?”
“In this timeline? Perhaps.”
“Good enough. Then have some un-asked-fer advice from an old man: it ain’ worth it. I dunno the first thing about the kinds of creatures you are, or your matin’ habits, or why bacteria seem to be a normal part of it - but if you’re still human in any way that matters, then it ain’ worth it. Love is not a loss you should jus’ accept.”
“But - I mean, he just -”
“Son, I don’ care, and I prob’bly wouldn’ even understand anyway. But you say you think highly o’ me - I got no idea why, but if it means you’ll list’n to me, then good, dammit.”
“You… maybe. Very well, exalted one, and thank you.”
“…There a message you wanted to send?”
“No; this conversation must be why I called in. Thank you, again, and I will not take up more of your time.”
“All the best, son.”
“I’ve been tol’ that, yeah - this thing I said to some caller or the other sparked a war, that thing I said to another prevented one… but I always say that I’m neutral, right?”
“That don’ mean I don’ have a side, but it does mean I ain’ takin your sides. If I think somethin’s stupid, well, then I’ma say so. It’s my goddamn radio station.”
“And, hell, the reason you lot call me in the first place is to talk with a Leveller tolerant o’ your nonsense, right?”
“Good evenin’, caller. What time is it?”
“Hey. Hey man.”
“Raptor boy! You got old!”
“I’m his Elder by thirty years, yeah. Robert Marconi, calling from January 4167.”
“So. What happened?”
“The extraction team, the time I called you? Turns out, because I pulled out early, my side lost control over the Igbo peninsula, and that ripples all the way down to them being in charge now. So, well, I’m a prisoner, and they’ve cut me off from time travel.”
“They can do that, in the 4100s?”
“Yep. It’s not even an interesting government - a by-the-books Type 1984 Party, as our manuals would’ve put it!”
“And they got you, what, under house arrest? You jaunted any, since?”
“Nope. I’ve tried, and nope.”
“So… bit’o a rude question, I know, but when do you start to lose your memories?”
“It’s okay! I’m not too clear on that, myself. For you, it’s still the same day as when I called in the first time, yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“So yeah, I’ll have lingering memories, I’m told, over the next few major timelines… but after about three or four it’ll be gone. Assuming I can’t find a Jaunter in them, but I know our standard policy was to contain the dissident’s entire Yet, so…”
“Jeez, kiddo…”
“Hey, hey, I’m older than you, technically! It’s okay, I’m not asking for help; I just thought you might want to know. And, well, I promised.”
“Thank you, Robert.”
“See you around, theslows!”
“I ain’ gonna say it’s easy. Ya can’t help yer heart goin’ out, to criminals and idealists alike, and you can’t let that affect the job, neither.”
“We don’t ever really talk abou’ it much, anymore, how rewritin’ time is rewritin’ people, how the only reason so many o’ us are Jaunters is to avoid the horrific idea o’ bein’ rewritten without even realisin’.”
“I guess… I guess that’s all I’m really tryin’ to do, here. To remind folk o’ that.”
“I like to think I do more good than harm.”
“Good evenin’, caller. What time is it?”
“Cecilia Jones, 2156.”
“Hey, that’s only a couple o’ decades ago. Also, Cecilia Jones? As in…”
“Yeah. My asshole of an Elder called you up earlier today.”
“Oh dear. D’we get to hear about what’s goin’ on, this time?”
“You know what? Why the fuck not. So, basically, the “mission” she was all being coy and secretive about? It’s just her fucking boyfriend at the time. I just broke up with that jerk, and she wants me to … not.”
“She sounded very sincere abou’ it, though, no?”
“She can sincere up her fucking ass. I am not giving that dick the satisfaction.”
“Cecilia… okay, got a question for ya .Why do ya reckon your Elder asked you to, then?”
“She probably… I mean, I…”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“No, look, she’s forgotten, alright? She’s forgotten just how much of a douchebag he can be.”
“Maybe that ain’ such a bad thing.”
“…”
“Look, I ain’ sayin’ you have to. Lord knows it’s your life, not mine. But… yer Elder asked ya to. And as much as jauntin’s been crazy ass bullshit, having the world change and keep changin’ from under our feet all the friggin’ time… it can also be a gift.”
“…I’ll think about it.”
“Good! Now, what the crap’s going on in the 2100s - you know anythin’ ‘bout this nuclear winter?”
“I’d like to hope I do more good than harm.”
Management notes that this week's piece is part of an "informal intersection" (though Management still has not figured out what that means) with kickthehobbit . Be sure to read her piece as well, for she is incredible!