“Who was the first time traveller?”
That’s the question the teachers ask. I listen at the windows of classrooms sometimes when I go forwards. The children usually call out some of my successors. Sometimes there is a clever child, or else the teacher clarifies.
“The first time traveller was a dog named Chike,” they say; but little do they know, the chrono-wandering canine is just a few paws from them.
With every jump, my memory of my origins fades a little. I recall that I was part of a secret program. From what I remember, they had expected me to come straight back. Instead, ever since then, I have been lost in time; jumping forward and backward at random intervals. Sometimes I’m in a time and place for a few days or a few months, sometimes it can be a few minutes.
The past is quite wonderful. I love to see how people lived in simpler times. Human treatment of my ancestors is generally kind, if a little controlling. When I jump into the future, I get to see the rapid advancement of this world. Then it stops. Sometimes I jump, and familiar places are derelict wasteland. No dogs, no people, nothing. I have never been in that time period long enough to investigate and figure out what happened. Perhaps one day I’ll see the cause of the end. Perhaps one day I’ll jump back to where it all started. For now, I’m just a dog in time.
