The Perils of Time Travel

After all, it had succeeded at taking him back to the 21st century, to the days before women had gone extinct, as it had many many times before. And tonight, it would help him find a mate to take back with him - and while it was true that he had experienced little luck in his quest before, he had a good feeling about tonight.

Flipping a switch on its side, he activated the scanning feature, and used it to carefully examine the women scattered around the bar. On a stool at the far end, he saw a blonde with moderately pleasant curves, and a nice, pouty face. He closed his eyes. With the power in his pocket, he could take her back to medieval times, for a titillating horseback ride, or to ancient China, where he might lay her down on cherry blossoms which smelt of untamed passion. Yes, he had the power. But was she the correct choice?

A slinky, tall redhead passed him by, and he briefly entertained the thought of taking her back to the future with him, where the sleek shiny towers that pierced the sky would overwhelm her with passion. But he straightened up, and stopped his notion cold. As tempting as it was, he couldn't afford to show his time machine to just anybody. If he showed it to a girl who didn't understand, who was unsympathetic, then she could tell the police, who could tell the government, who would certainly lock him up, and perform tests on it until it would never work again. This time machine had seen him through many hard times, and life without it, he shuddered, would be lonelier than he could possibly bear.

Unzipping the frontal pocket where he kept it hidden, he made a final systems check before making his move.

But wait.

This couldn't be right. The small red light on the side, a warning that indicated low battery power, was flashing. But how? He had just done an oil check this morning! How could he have not noticed? Taking a nervous drink from his beer, his hand started shaking. If he didn't get the power back to an acceptable level soon, there was a chance he would experience a system failure. He had no time to lose.

A dark-eyed brunette passed by his booth, and he called out to her. "Excuse me, miss! Miss, I need your help with something..."

She barely turned as she passed by, and only acknowledged him with a rude comment. "What, did you lose your hairpiece? Good luck!"

He shuddered with anger, and ran his hand over his scalp. Where he was from, his hip balding hairstyle was a symbol of status, of power and wealth. Taking care to slip the time machine back into its pocket, he stood up and walked after her. "Miss! There's no need to be rude. I need your help with something serious. This is a matter of life and death."

She turned to him, clearly a little drunk and very annoyed. "Look, you've been watching me all night with those big freaky glasses of yours. Tell me what you want, but promise to leave me alone after."

In the future, his glasses symbolized that he was of royal stock - but, rather than making a fuss out of it, he let it go. This was an emergency. "Look, I realize this is an odd request, but I really don't have any time to explain it. You see... I have very powerful, potentially dangerous machine in my pants. It's about to run out of power, and I need you to help me get the motor running manually."

She stared at him for a second, trying to comprehend his words, then burst out with laughter. "Ha... well, that's very creative. But the answer is the same. Shoo!"

"Listen, I don't think you understand the danger we're in. This thing is nuclear powered. If we don't get the motor working we could be looking at a meltdown. I'm assuming that you don't want to get radiation poisoning?"

Her eyes narrowed. "Are you threatening me? Fuck off or I'll tell the owner!"

His glasses nearly fell off as he hastily retreated to the safety of his booth. What a dilemma! He couldn't afford to be caught, but if he didn't get this thing working in a few minutes, that would be the least of his worries. Using the table to hide his lap from prying eyes, he removed it from its pocket and began rapidly cranking the manual lever, desperate to keep the electricity flowing properly.

A thud shook the booth, and he looked up. Jim the barkeep, a hulking bear of a man, was staring at him, his fists on the table. "Listen, pal. What are you doing down there?"

"Oh, I... uh... I seem to be, uh, sending a text message, on my - what do you call them again - oh, on my cellular phone!"

"Really? Because I heard you telling one of those girls that you had a, whatyacall, nuclear reactor or something down there."

This was a bad situation. There was no way that he could enlist this large man's help - it had to be a woman. As a means of theft prevention, his time machine was equipped with a safeguard, so that if any male besides himself touched it, it would instantly stop working. And if Jim touched it now, on the verge of a power failure, there was no telling what could happen. "Look, sir, I don't mean to be rude, but this is not as easy as it looks. And I'd advise you to step back a bit - you don't want this thing exploding in your face, now do you?"

Jim shook his head, disgusted. "Look, man. You've been harassing the girls and diddling yourself under the table all night. Normally, I'd just kick you out, but one of the girls says that you threatened her. Now some of the guys in the bar are a little put off by this, and would like to have a little talk with you, out back of course, and... hey, hey, man, seriously, would you mind laying off of yer hand exercises, for just a minute while I'm talking to you?"

He and the Jim stared at each other for a few moments. The cranking continued. This idiot barkeep, he thought, has no clue what is at stake here. If I don't get away from him, now, his life and the lives of everyone in this bar are in danger.

Moving quickly to take the lug by surprise, he dashed out of one side of the booth, darting for the door. As he ran, he continued pumping the time machine, his eyes on the blinking red light. If he could only get it to turn green, he could jump back to the future, but first he would have to generate sufficient power, not easy while running for his life.

Bursting out through the bar's front door, he turned slightly, to see the barkeep almost directly behind him. He had been joined by three other men, companions of some of the girls he had been considering. The four of them were yelling, cursing loudly, calling him by whatever ancient curse words came into their minds.

He had almost gone a block when he saw the alley on his right - if he could make it to a dead end, at least he could shield any innocent bystanders of the devastating blast which was about to come. Ducking into the alley, he doubled his speed, his pursuers slowed somewhat by the unexpected turn.

He turned another corner, finding a dead end. This was it, he thought. Just as he was about to release the machine from his grasp and let the fatal explosion come, he saw the green light switch on. Finally, and just in time, he thought, as he stroked the button at the tip.