The Organization had always been shadowy, even within the public realm. Outwardly it is presented as a defense contractor and so under the guise of “protecting national security” is put under less scrutiny than corporations in other industries. Internally, this is the only known company with time-altering capabilities. The discovery and acquisition of this fantasy-like technology has never been disclosed to me, but after signing an NDA under the threat of the full legal force of the Government of the United States if I dared to share my purpose, I was compelled to accept the offer presented to me. The contract was for two jobs, one in the 20th Century and one in the 21st Century. As children filled with wonder, we all wanted to time travel- how could I decline the chance when it was handed to me on a silver platter?
To begin with, we traveled backward in milliseconds. I was told that anything further for the first time would have destroyed both my body and my mind. Slowly this built to seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and years. I saw 18 different presidents sworn in over the span of over a century. I saw regimes and ideologies rise and fall. I saw the death of old technologies pave the way for the birth of new technologies. I was ever grateful to be given this opportunity but I knew I had been asked to take up this position for two specific jobs taking decades of careful pre-positioning and minor changes to the timeline in order to preserve the original fabric of the situations. Whilst the traveling outside of my two contracted jobs was controlled by me, during both jobs the Organization utilities a technology it had developed called RMC. It was a chip painlessly inserted into the back of my neck allowing them to dissipate negative emotions and to conceal memories throughout my lifetime of things seen or heard during the job- and more importantly yet conveniently not mentioned to me would be inserted for my entire life. I had not known about this before signing the original contract and by the time it was mentioned, I was too engrossed to care. Little did I know that getting into some legal hot water would be infinitely superior to the fate that awaited me.
The final date I was sent back to before the completion of the first of my two contracted jobs was Saturday, October 27, 1962. Black Saturday. The day during which humanity came to within an inch of complete and utter global nuclear annihilation. Whilst the world was staring down the barrel of death and destruction, the Organization supposedly believed humanity would eventually rebuild and a new renaissance of technology and knowledge would emerge hundreds of years after the almost complete genocide of the very same beings. They had convinced me that they had used similar technology to see a future without war, famine, or suffering. A future only possible through this specific branching of the timeline- other events were tested and trialed but none produced results like the Cuban Missile Crisis did. But, as I came to learn years later, it was all a lie. They simply wanted to watch the world burn. Or a world burn.
A Grandfather Paradox situation is created by this type of action, as the world that I helped wreak terror upon in 1962 would in turn mean the Organization, me, and everyone else alive today would no longer exist. But time doesn’t simply follow a singular line, it branches. The world today and everyone in it is the result of the branch created by destroying everything all those decades ago. If time followed a singular line, the only people born after 1962 would have been born into a world of extremely few survivors, full of lawlessness and suffering. Evidently, that is not the case, at least not for our branch.
Being able to use modern-day technology made convincing Soviet early-warning radar systems that a barrage of Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles was rapidly approaching Moscow a fairly easy task. I worked from a quiet basement in a fortified bunker with quick and easy access to my device in order to return to my original timeline as soon as the first real bomb fell. I turned the radio volume up when I had finished my spoofing job, waiting for news of the developments I created to break. Nothing for several minutes. Then, the reporter on Channel Six spoke: “We are getting word of a Soviet submarine exchanging nuclear-tipped torpedoes with an American sub, casualties are reported and if this is genuine we are at war”. I kept a steely look of determination on my face as the reporter gathered the facts live on air and continued to discuss the development. A few minutes later, a broadcast from the President of the United States: “My fellow Americans, a few minutes ago Soviet submarines and ships fired upon American vessels. We have now detected a massive wave of nuclear missiles traveling towards the North American continent from Soviet outposts in the small nation of Cuba just south of the US. Ensure you are listening to local radio stations for location-specific advice and relief efforts following this war. I have declared DEFCON 1 and I urge you to get inside, find cover, fill every available vessel with clean water, and to pray. Pray for these United States and pray for each other on this darkest day. God bless America and Godspeed to you all”.
I tuned into the main radio stations for at least 5 major cities that would be targeted first in an attack and waited yet again. Miami was naturally the first to be hit. I heard indescribable scenes of terror. People begging for help that would never arrive. Hordes struggling to find a way out that would never present itself. I traveled back to the present day seconds after that, not wanting to meet that same fate even from the relative safety of a bunker.
I am opening myself up to being dealt an unimaginable fate by breaking my NDA because I need to warn you. Last month, I woke up to a minuscule amount of blood on my pillow and memories of a life where I became the destroyer of a world. The screams rang out in my ears and pictures of pure annihilation flooded my mind. I remembered being filled with child-like wonder when I traveled back for the first time. I remembered agreeing to have the chip that hid these unimaginable horrors from me inserted into my body. I remembered that my second contracted job is scheduled for October 27, 2023. Exactly 61 years after the first job. The Organization is not targeting a branch far in the past, they are targeting our branch.
The large French window next to my bed was cracked slightly open, making it evident that somebody wanted me to wake up. To see what I had done. To stop me from doing it again.