Self-Review – A Crime in Time

A Review of A Crime in Time

Let’s look at A Crime in Time. The prompt was the word chance.

I wrote this story during the third quarter of 2021.

Background

For this story, I wanted to write about something I have actually explored in fan fiction. This short story is wholly unrelated to that, except for the plot conceit of a time traveler siring children who are older than he is. That is, they are temporally paradoxical.

Plot for A Crime in Time

Rob, an employee of Salene’s at a time travel agency, has discovered that another employee has been changing time to his own ends. This is a capital offence, and they will need to turn that man—Donald Forman—in, to the authorities. There is no getting around this.

As Salene and Rob, and eventually Sergeant Lennox start to piece Don’s adventures in time together, they start to realize that he has effectively become a temporal Lothario. And he’s changed time to benefit his ancestors, his contemporaries, his descendants, and his temporally paradoxical offspring.

Characters in A Crime in Time

The characters are Salene, Rob, Don Forman, and Sergeant Lennox. There’s a crowd, and a number of people from the past are mentioned, but they don’t get any screen time. The crowd gets less than half a page of screen time.

Memorable Quotes

“Look, I love the fact that we can check up on them as much as anybody else,” Salene said, “but this is just, it’s ridiculously granular. How the hell do you expect anyone, or a bunch of AIs or whatever, to watch all this footage? And to what end?”

“We have to know if anyone in the organization is using time travel to their own ends. We’re not going to find it in grand, sweeping gestures. We are going to find it in little nitpicky shit like this.” Rob advanced to the next animated slide. “See this?”

“Looks like a guy rescuing a woman’s art portfolio from falling into a puddle. So?”

“So that’s what it looks like on the surface. But this, this moment right here?” He let the animated slide play, and it showed a scene surreptitiously recorded by the department’s time traveling equipment.

“Yes?”

“She gets the job. She works hard, makes decent money, and is fine even after her kids are born and her boyfriend dumps her.”

“A happy ending is nothing to discipline anyone for, Rob.”

“Salene, she’s his great times eleven grandmother.”

“Now I’m interested.”

“I figured you would be.” He punched codes into mid-air, and now there were two somewhat similar animated slides, playing side by side.

“What am I looking at?”

“Here is her dropping the portfolio, but there’s no knight in shining armor to rescue it.”

“I take it she loses her opportunity?”

Rating for A Crime in Time

The story has a T rating. Don attacks Rob pretty viciously. And Don’s purpose in going back in time isn’t to sell Girl Scout cookies—it’s to commit temporal incest with a number of his female forebears.

Takeaways

I like how this one turned out. It takes some of Sharon Ensley’s details and more or less serves as a prequel. It’s a kind of time frame where the rules aren’t quite set yet.

I also liked using the name Salene, from The Tribe!

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Want More of my Short Stories and Novellas?

If this story resonates with you, then check out my other articles about my shorter works.

Short Stories

Finally, for a complete list of my shorter works, please be sure to check out the Hub Page—Short Stories.