Starting Over – Part 4

Teresa, The Haunted Wordsmith, started another Finish The Story challenge, this one titled “Starting Over.”

Here’s the first part:

Ask anyone living today what they would do if they had a time machine, and they would respond with, “stop him from destroying what we had.”

Their response was reasonable, of course, as it had only been fifty years since the fall of the United States and ten years since the world crossed the point of no return. We were doomed, and we knew it. Maybe that’s why we didn’t question when they came. No one questioned when they said we could go back and change things. No one asked what they stood to gain from offering the human race a chance to change the present, by changing the past. Maybe we should have.

It was a hot December morning when …

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Part 2 by Fandango

It was a hot December morning when Tim was being interviewed. Tim wasn’t sure what to make of the experience. He was just a New America vlogger who had been very vocal about how, if he could, he’d love to go back to 2018 and change the course of human history. But here he was, sitting face to face — if you could call what the creature had a “face” — opposite an alien life form being interrogated.

“How would you proceed?” the alien asked Tim.

Tim didn’t know what to say. He wasn’t sure if these aliens could be trusted. What was in it for them? He knew he had to choose his words carefully. His life possibly depended upon it.

“The first thing I’d do,” Tim said, “would be….”

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Part 3 by TheDarkNetizen:

“..to get rid of the power hungry leaders that plunged the world into chaos and I would get rid of him first.”

The alien interrogating him got up, and left the room. Before Tim could realize what was going on, green lasers materialized from the walls and targetted him. A flash of light blinded Tim and everything turned to black.

When his vision returned, Tim saw him sitting in front of him in a chair, bound to it. Tim noticed a gun pointed at the leader’s head…

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Part 4 by me:

When his vision returned, Tim saw him sitting in front of him in a chair, bound to it. Tim noticed a gun pointed at the leader’s head, but no one was holding the gun.

Tim’s face went white with shock, and then red with anger, as he saw the man, and he was using the term loosely here, responsible for all the woes of their world trussed up like a turkey.

Tim now heard the alien’s voice whisper seductively in his ears, “You have the chance to start over. Get rid of him now, and everything will be back to what it was before. There would be no nuclear holocaust, no alien invasion to fill the power vacuum, everything will be back to normal.”

Tim got up from the chair in one smooth motion, and grabbed the gun in his right hand. His index finger started pressing into the trigger, when the carrot-haired cretin spoke up, “No, don’t do it, it’s a trap!”

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I now nominate Ian Kelly , a fellow fan of the carrot-haired cretin, to take the story forward. Iain, if you do not have the bandwidth or inclination to do so, may I please request you to pass on the baton to someone else who can do this justice? Cheers.

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