Indistinguishable From Magic

I leapt. Not in place, but in time. You had to be roughly in the same place as where you wanted to be to jump back in time. We probably ought to refer to 'when' we want to be rather than 'where.'

That meant the geeks had to create a portable time portal creator. It was a nontrivial problem. This happened only because the creator of time travel, Matthew Edward Ryan Lin, had slipped back in time and destroyed the machine he'd built. Then we realized he'd not stayed even close to the original site in New Mexico.

And based on the rebuilt machine, built on principles only Dr Lin fully understood, we couldn't send back nearly as much tech. It was only as much as could be carried on a person, whereas Dr Lin had gone back with a flyer. Fortunately, it'd run out of gas soon, so no world conquest with the flying machine. However, 22nd century tech would be bad enough.

I stumbled. Going through the time portal was brutal and disorienting. The world changed, even the altitude of where I was standing changed, it went down: soil can accumulate in places over time, filling in over the last fifteen hundred years. I was picked for my slight, but strong build. Mass mattered in transiting to another time and they wanted an operative capable of taking back as much kit as possible to stop Dr Lin before he could damage the time line.

We built the portable time portal. Then we had to smuggle it into Britain. No one in the world could know we had a time machine. This was the blackest of ops. If the wars of now, the politics of now spread through time...it would be a disaster. No, it had been decreed the only use of the time machine would be to prevent others from using time travel. Travel to when the machines are built or travelers go and stop them. Cold. Gently if possible, brutally in necessary. Dr Lin was to be captured if possible, killed if necessary.

I stood up and looked around. I walked into town. Post Roman Britain, during the Saxon and Angle invasions. We knew where he'd crop up. We knew what he had planned because of the ripples in time, the flashes of possible changes. The damned thing was he wasn't here in Londinium. I shall seek him out. He must be hiding somewhere then.

We knew the time portal we built would burn out. I would get one trip there. And they would smuggle in another portal and open it up when they found my buried item. It'd show up as a ripple. We'd agreed on the place and the code. Once it was there, I'd come back with my captive, arrested and to be tried in a court so secret, not even the FISA court would know. Then locked away, safely, in a prison so dark it made the darkest pit seem bright as day. But first I would have to find him.

Based on scouring the countryside, Dr Lin was not here. I'd come a decade too soon. It was a rush job, so something was bound to go wrong. We only had so much time before his changes became permanent and not merely ripples. So, I get to settle in and wait. Fortunately, I had a traps around the island of Britannia. Sensors that would let me know when he showed up. Some were quite clever and he'd have to remove the sensors to be able to hide from me. His tech and his chrono signature would give him away otherwise. I am sure he'd send some poor patsy to do the deed, but even so. Then I'd know and could go after him.

I found a nice piece of land on an island in a lake. I'll build a home here in the wilderness and wait. I'd spend my time keeping my training up, a special forces soldier would get soft just sitting around. Swimming, running, training, and observing.

I, Major Moira Gause of the US Special Forces Chrono Operations Brigade, would catch my mentor and time terrorist Dr MER Lin. It'd take time, but time I had.