This is installment #3 of a sci-fi serial. Installment #1 was posted 1/23/21; appropriately a numerically-ordered palindrome. Follow the links forward from the last sentence and backward from the first sentence of each post.

Of course we have the ships and the capability to travel back into our future, but that world was in danger when we left, and now we are uncertain what, if anything, we may find if we return. As I have said before, time travel into the future is wildly unpredictable. If our actions in these past weeks have created or led to a divergence that extends past 2275, even if (as some of our science indicates) a third divergence is impossible and a revergence in 2030 is somehow forced, we will be unable to land in either of the two realities that now exist in that 2275 TimePlace. And even if we are able to land due to this theoretical corollary to the Law of Preponderant Sequentials, we will not know how the surviving possibility track or the intervening calendar years may have altered that future. We believe even a small alteration, one not large enough to prevent a landing, could greatly alter a time traveler’s reality, possibly creating a divergence in that moment of arrival. And then of course any ships other than the first one to land, would be left with only two possibility tracks. And as previously described, if we attempt a landing in the desired TimePlace, at cusp speed with no landing spot, like a game of hot potato we will (theoretically) be tossed from cusp to cusp until we do manage a landing and are able to recharge-reset to travel at SpaceTime speed. Remember, we have lost three fleets previously, attempting to land on less than three possibility tracks. Not only might we end up in an unknown or dangerous TimePlace, once there we are not certain we could find our way back. We have only mapped out the TimePlace pattern of cusps as they are nested in SpaceTime on a single WavePlane for the span from our current year 2275 to your more recent year 1959, and only for Earth and for our own planet. Mapping is a very complex process involving a larger ship traveling at orbital SpaceTime speed towing a small craft (technically) set for cusp speed which (because it is at cusp speed) is able to take pictures of the cusps relative to SpaceTime in the orbital plane surrounding the planet. The complexity lies in the combination of a maximum orbital speed of 20,000 mph coupled with the immense amount of SpaceTime (much enlarged due to the speed abrogation necessary to enter TimePlace) of which a statistically significant representation must be traversed at cusp speed even for this short span of 300 years. Once we figured out this towing system allowing us to see the cusps, the early stages of our time travel efforts into the past were still largely trial and error; hit and miss. They weren’t necessarily much more dangerous than they are now; we were just uncertain the specific TimePlace calendar year we might end up in, and when we were off in our theory, this created the need for additional cusp speed. Additionally, in those early stages, not knowing what repercussions might occur, it was always small teams to a nearby (TimePlace) year, with very limited to no intervention. In this way we hopped across our WavePlane in short hops at first, then progressively bigger hops to confirm our theories. This all took considerable effort and many TimePlace calendar years because of the small teams and because the necessity of cusp speed was more frequent not only when our theory was incorrect but also in order to verify accuracy and symmetry of spans. Today, with 300 years mapped, we can travel at our SpaceTime speed, (up to 650,000 mph), to the vicinity (we’ve gotten very good at pinpointing this) of the desired cusp entry point, reduce our speed to orbital speed, apply the TimePlace cusp map overlay to the actual (enlarged) SpaceTime overview, find the exact entry point for the desired TimePlace calendar year, reduce our speed to cusp speed, enter the cusp, land on the proffered possibility tracks, recharge-reset, take off at an orbital SpaceTime speed of (again) approximately 20,000 mph, and here we are. It is unfortunate that we can reduce to cusp speed in transit, but we cannot increase to SpaceTime speed unless stationary. And we are uncertain still, exactly when the SpaceTimePlace calendar changes. In this trip, for example, until we entered the cusp at cusp speed we are confident it was still 2275. And we believe that before we land on the possibility tracks, it is still 2275; we are fairly certain in this regard because otherwise we don’t believe our communication chain would work. But because we cannot see beyond the sheath, we are not sure if it is the act of landing on the possibility tracks, taking off from them at a SpaceTime speed, or exiting the cusp, that actually marks the perimeter between 2275 and 2022. There is differing opinion and it probably is mostly irrelevant, but because of the “pop” like a champagne cork that is both felt and heard within the ship as it gently stretches then breaks through, exiting the cusp sheath, most people believe this is the point where we cross over. There is widespread evidence as well (including the workings of our communication chain) that once engines are engaged to increase to a SpaceTime speed, we may for a few moments be partially situated in both SpaceTimePlace calendar times. Perhaps the most compelling argument though for the crossover to be cusp exit is the psychological fascination watching the sheath wall flutter as if caught in a light breeze, then lazily lay itself back down with cracks and folds and creases hypnotically erasing themselves as if a warship had never broken through. And it is also this last observation that leads many scientists and thinkers to believe that the sheath wall encourages reparations and the ultimate revergence of the three possibility tracks.

The discovery of cusps and their possibility tracks was an accident. Scientists and fiction writers before our discoveries have long considered the possibility of time travel, and (in a sense) scientists had proven the reality of traveling into the future, but according to most commonly held conjecture, believed that to travel into the past one must either find a suitable wormhole or somehow overcome causality. We have not tamed wormholes, but by accidentally discovering the process of speed abrogation (i.e. cusp speed) and the fact of three possibility tracks, we have discovered TimePlace. Since this initial discovery in 2187, we have found that TimePlace is separate from SpaceTime, the Laws of TimePlace (so far) supersede the laws of SpaceTime, and causality is a nonissue thanks to more than one possibility track. Essentially, if I go back to a time in which I already exist, I will reside on a different possibility track from my other self, which by itself will create a tiny divergence, which in turn allows causality to remain intact for as long as I am two separate individuals and despite the fact that both of me are in the same relative TimePlace. And as long as I am conscious and careful of the possibility of disturbing the Law of Preponderant Sequentials, the small divergence created will not adversely impact further time travel to my specific TimePlace. If I did widen the divergence, I would still not be defying causality, (we believe) I would be creating an alternate reality. We also believe that this divergence, this alternate reality, will reverge at a point when the two possibility tracks have again attained SuperSimilarity. This state of SuperSimilarity is the state of the three possibility tracks when only one has been taken and/or when any divergence is essentially inconsequential. This state of SuperSimilarity typically allows intertraversal between the tracks and appears to occupants of one or both tracks as one track. But now that we have begun traveling to and on a second possibility track, we find there are momentary spans in which certain aspects of one track seem momentarily inaccessible as experienced through a differing reality from a previous span; (in this context momentary spans or momentarily can mean anywhere from a moment to a day to a week to a few months). Fortunately, this difficulty is only experienced by the actual time traveler and not the native population, (except perhaps as a conversational Mandela effect), we assume due to a widening divergence to maintain causality. And if a craft comes in on one of these specific TimePlace points of momentary divergence, at cusp speed they can usually find a point before divergence or after revergence and land there. Unfortunately, because of the amount of energy required for speed abrogation and cusp speed, a very few months is the limit a ship can travel before having no choice but to attempt a landing in order to recharge-reset.

Below, on the left is a simple two-dimensional rendering of how SpaceTime is perceived in an orbital plane surrounding a stronger gravity field (such as a planet or a large enough satellite/moon), and/or at any SpaceTime speed. On the right is how the same cross section looks at cusp speed from outside of this stronger gravitational pull. Of course these cross sections are flattened. In space imagine the rendering on the right to be extended and wrapped around the planet (in this case, Earth) approximately where one finds the low Earth orbital plane. Each continuous wavy line encircling the planet is considered a single WavePlane. The subsection rendering below extended and wrapped around the planet is what we have named the TimePlace Orbital WavePlane. Mapping these peaks and valleys to equate to TimePlace calendar years proved to be less of a challenge than our scientists and mathematicians at first imagined due to the symmetry. In these early efforts we have estimated the furthest past extreme but not yet having seen past our current year we cannot say if the future is already potentialized or if the TimePlace cusps write themselves, are carried forth, as SpaceTime years occur. We can say that based on the placement of our TimePlace neighborhood, there is SpaceTime allowance for the extension of a nearly infinite number of TimePlace cusps, especially if (as we conjecture because the sheaths can widen) the cusps are able to tighten up to create greater capacity. Fortunately, relatively speaking, our planet is in Earth's SpaceTime neighborhood and our year (2275) is in the TimePlace neighborhood of your year (2022). To travel even several hundred or ultimately several thousand more years, (to the future or to the past), in order to map and/or to reach a desired TimePlace is a daunting, overwhelming thought; but of course we believe science will one day rise to this challenge.

So how did we stumble into this discovery of TimePlace and its cusps? It was a mechanical error on board one of our explorer ships watching the essentially uninhabitable planet Earth for signs of increasing life and habitability in 2187. A simultaneous failure of a coincidental combination of propulsion engines, maneuvering engines and some elements of the fuel supply process brought the craft to such an abrupt sudden stop that many of the crew described a momentary out-of-body type of experience in which they could see their self from behind and were then gently but firmly reinserted into their flesh and blood; (we have since found a pharmaceutical to negate this disturbing brain stimulation). Once an accounting of the ship’s crew and equipment was accomplished, the view to Earth was seen as shown in the TimePlace rendering above. Checking their speed the on-board engineers determined that though they were not in a negative speed (which has never been thought to be possible), they were definitely not in a positive speed, and they were also not simply sitting at zero speed. It was as if they were hovering on an edge, a precipice, rocking between absolute infinity, total inconsequentiality, and complete nothingness. It is this unimagined and unimaginable abrogation of speed that we have termed cusp speed. Though the ship’s officers and engineers soon found they were unable to reinitiate any sort of positive speed, they were able to maneuver and slowly approach the mysterious wavy conduits surrounding the planet Earth. After (according to their time) a few days passed, when they realized the system energy reserves were steadily decreasing, the ship’s commander decided to breech the (from close examination) possibly permeable sheath in an effort to find a solution. They of course found what I have already described and after some exploration, as their system energy approached dangerously low levels, they set the ship down upon the three possibility tracks, where they found they could recharge-reset and reinitiate SpaceTime speed. Upon doing so and exiting the cusp, they found themselves back in familiar SpaceTime and made their way to our planet. What surprised everyone at that time is that this ship returned in 2189, yet for the crew only two-and-a-half months had passed. Upon analysis of all the ship’s logs, we were able to theorize what had happened, (which was made more apparent by their jump to 2189) and replicate the exact combination of systems failures to replicate their time travel journey. Many things are apparent now including how they obviously moved along parallel to the possibility tracks before landing, causing the ship to advance two calendar years. (As with the vicinity at SpaceTime speed, we have since become very adept at pinpointing the exact landing spot on the possibility tracks for coming out in the exact calendar year, frequently the exact calendar month, and about one out of seven times the exact day we had targeted in planning the voyage.)

Once at cusp speed a ship will not, cannot, move in SpaceTime; location is locked. However, the craft can maneuver and adjust its location relative to TimePlace. At cusp speed, in TimePlace, it feels like you are moving, (though instead of miles or kilometers per hour your movement is measured in days per hour), but in actuality you are not moving, TimePlace is moving. Simplistically put, whichever direction you choose to face, you are pulling the curvature of the TimePlace Orbital WavePlane toward you, creating the illusion you are moving. To enter a cusp the ship will go nose down into a perpendicular dive, but is in actuality pulling the sheath toward them, another example of sheath flexibility supporting our theory of revergence. In TimePlace our maximum speed so far has always been ½ day per hour; and we are uncertain if we will ever be able to increase that TimePlace speed. So to go back (or forward) 300 years while at cusp speed in TimePlace following the wavy line of the cusp through all its peaks and valleys would take 25 years. But of course we can avoid this long way around by traveling through SpaceTime at SpaceTime speed and by using the map overlay. With the map overlay we can equate our SpaceTime position with the desired TimePlace location as long as we can calculate the degree of SpaceTime enlargement which differs according to latitude and longitude on the gravitational body below us; which of course at this stage is only Earth or our planet. In addition we have discovered that each cusp from peak to valley or from valley to peak is ten years. So far we have remained on a single WavePlane that encircles the planet but have determined that we do have the ability to cross WavePlane Gulfs. Due to our personal sense of urgency though, regarding this 300 year span, we have not yet explored the calendar time relationship moving from one WavePlane to another. And (at least on this single WavePlane), It is interesting (and convenient) that the instant we attain orbital speed above Earth or above our planet, the calendar time as measured from when and where we took off (at SpaceTime speed), adding (of course) actual number of days, weeks or months traveled, is always directly beneath us. So as long as we mark the exact moment we hit 20,000 mph above Earth, the map overlay works perfectly.

I am not a scientist. I have no advanced degree. I am not an expert in any field. I am merely an observer here to record what I see. That said, offering the lay technical explanations I have offered, has been a cleansing experience; cathartic; healing. It is helpful to focus on detail in the midst of so much turmoil.

Now, for the matter at hand…

As a species we have seen 200,000 years. Our civilization (marked by the advent of agriculture) has seen 10,000 years. From fossil records we know that a typical mammalian species can expect to survive about 1,000,000 years, and across all species average survival ranges between 1,000,000 and 10,000,000 years. As a species, in many ways we are atypical. Yet (literally) looking across time, in many other ways we are typical. Until recently, the past century or two relative to my year of 2275, we have acted in accordance with our atypicality as applied to the individual. We have forgotten, lost sight of, our commonness both individually across our species and as a species across all species. It is time. Today. Unless we remember, and act in accordance with our humble origin and our eventual unremarkable end, our atypicality will manifest as a short-lived mammalian species. Our legacy will last ten million years as the amount of time it will take Earth to heal itself after the damage we have inflicted.

Or we can change our trajectory to become a part of the healing process, and perhaps see our atypicality manifest as a long-lived species; perhaps even that same ten million years or more. The decision is ours. Today.

As observers we were asked to pen a plea to you, to help convince you of the immediate, urgent, important need for worldwide cooperation. I began by explaining time travel in an effort to bring you face to face with your future and in an effort to fill you with the wonderment of our potentiality as a species. In this moment, your year of 2022, we don't know if there is a future for us beyond 2060. We may have been mistaken coming to you for help. But we believed in you. We believed in us.

Now we are making plans to send explorers back out to our future and beyond. We do not know what we might find. Most of us will stay right here in this TimePlace and work for the future, knowing that there may be others in the future also working for the future. We will act as representatives for the future people. We should all represent our descendants. Depending on our decisions today, their future, our future, could be made more difficult, or possibly easier, or our future may not exist at all. It is up to us. It is time.