Doctor Time - Doctor Zapp

Doctor Zapp was the Time Universities lead researcher and Instructor on Time Robotics. The various courses, Time Logic Gates, Robot Safety, Robot Fabrication and Programming, and Robotic Communications were all taught by him. 

 

Normally that would be too many courses and research trees for one person, but as the first guinea pig of Linear Integration, he could be in multiple places at once, literally.

Robot Fabrication was his specialty, or rather where he spent most of his conscious attention. That iteration of the school year, he had two students who he thought were going to go far. One was Nathan, and the other Jade.

The Null Pulse for the University had Nathan’s older self as part of the Faculty as Doctor Time, though there was some strange happenings around a TimeQuake that would happen later that year. It was rumoured among the faculty that Nathan had caused it himself somehow, in an effort to rewrite his own past, beyond the usual iteration sizes that the University allowed.

Lately Doctor Time had been somewhat off the deep end. Dressing up like a space cowboy and writing novels and doing unauthorized time broadcasts on his ‘sonic pen’.

Luckily, the younger Nathan didn’t seem to be affected, as the schools own Time Controllers had kept things relatively clean from interaction. He seemed to be on course as a Time Pilot, or maybe even a Time Cop, but seemed a little burned out lately.

Doctor Zapp considered suggesting a change of pace. He thought a split shift in Majors might help and in fact had to be done since Doctor Time was already part of the University’s Null Pattern.

Such a complete split might leave a temporal echo of him that would probably burn out by the end of the year.

This Echo of Nathan, could be paired up with Jade, who could act as a kind of integration function, to bridge the gaps between the older and younger Nathan’s and resolve the Time Quake Problem.

The best way to do that would be to have them on a joint project – a robot that could make a filament mesh out of the hundreds of the interactions that would be needed to keep all the various people from spawning too many paradoxes.

Jade was in year four, and had showed more than the usual drive at Fractal Integration. It was similar to Linear Integration, but let the individual specialize a bit more, while still allowing jumps between selves.

Doctor Time’s voice echoed in his head “She both had and had not decided to split herself that year, and it was getting tougher to know which shard of her personality you were interacting with.”

Doctor Zapp spun around as he heard Doctor Time talking behind him.

“Doctor Time, enough with the Narration Field. I can steer my own thoughts thank you very much.”

“Then why did you work with me on 7D Sims then?”

Doctor Zapp sighed. It was a project he had regretted working on. It was a joint work with Doctor Time. A kind of interface that narrowed people’s thoughts into a kind of binary readout. One that displayed choices as evenly as possible, so that you could influence a person to go one way or another.

It was a branch of DT’s research into Temporal Reorientation and Zapps Time Logic Gates. It had been helping to clear the noise from random interactions into a kind of quantifiable path.

It mainly worked within TimeShips and anywhere else they set up the scan/reaction fields. It was meant to talk a person down from any discomfort with temporal phenomenon by helping them gather their thoughts and focus on simple decisions.

With Doctor Time’s new interest in Live Action Roleplay fiction, it could just as easily get people stuck in narratives. There was a safety in the device that usually made people imagine a voice coming from the speakers or behind you, so you knew you had a choice beyond what was presented in the monologue.

Doctor Zapp turned down the field scanner in his office for the 7D effect and checked in with Temporal Seismics.

He fed them the plans from Doctor Time’s latest Narration session. It went back about 20 minutes. They took the info into their projections and amplified the results.

They determined that splitting Nathan’s Major and joining Echo Nathan and Jade would be overall advantageous. The intensity of the shift was still large, but in a smaller area, in a shorter amount of time.

Time shifts were inevitable, but getting a handle on them was the main goal. Know what would shift and by how much varied based on input and that determined the number of paradoxes that would spawn.

“Maybe the Doctor of Time has a plan after all?”

Zapp thought about the analogy. While Temporal Siesmics measures shifts and events, it never really could get a handle on the scale of happenings. A large shift in a small area might not affect too many people, and could be better likened to a broken arm. One that would heal given a clean break and stabilization.

Rather than trying to prevent something from happening, more work should be put into making sure the damage repair goes well.

If Doctor Time also helped on the robot, it could probably speak a language that his younger self could interpret based on his own context.

Zapp checked in with Seismic again. “What happens if we let Doctor Time sort most of this out?

There was a hushed pause on the line. A small voice echoed back eventually. “We’d have a level 9 scale TimeQuake, but we could pin the origin down to the day. It’d likely cause about 30 time loops before we can move past it though.”

“How long would each of the loops be? How tough would it be to manage them?”

Another pause while numbers crunched. “You know that Vanilla Year 3 end simulation that always tanks? That would be the rough estimate.”

“So if we had someone who was an ace at Fractal Integration?”

A laugh on the end. It’s Jade. “32 Iterations and between 12:15 and 12:35, the exact day doesn’t matter. But some time after the robot is built and Robot Safety lets the Double Paradox happen.”

The room shifts around Doctor Zapp. He feels woozy and turns up the 7d Narration field, hoping for Doctor Time to say something helpful.

It’s Nathan’s voice, but different somehow. “Doctor Zapp? I was just going to call you. Apparently I’m missing. You wouldn’t have any plans that involve a Temporal Echo that fades out?”

A burst of static interrupts the connection. “Oh I’m Narrating? Thanks Jade. I’m after the TimeQuake and he’s before it? That makes... sense.”

Zapp puts the pieces together and speaks freely.

“You’re not Doctor Time anymore are you?”

Nathan’s voice answers. “Detective Time at your service!”

The line cuts to more static and Jade’s voice comes on again. “That’s the best I can connect with till iOi is done, Comm’s Out.”

Another Jade walks into Zapp’s Office. She has a small blueprint of a blue robot on her padd. “It’s not finished, but I feel like I need a partner or something. Know anyone willing to help?”

Zapp grabs the padd and looks at the designs. He also looks at the chronometer on his wall. It has a green text below it that seems fuzzy. He asks Jade to register at the door. “Oh right. Safety first. Don’t want you to have a conversation with a Time Echo that’s going to get pruned.”

“Jade - Iteration 30 +/- 5. Year 4 Nominal.”

Zapp looks at the display and does some calculations. He can’t quite understand the “nominal” part.

“Do you know what this means Jade?”

She looks at the display and looks at her hand. A trial bracelet for Fractal Focusing is on it. “Probably something to do with this. I’m deciding if I want to split my awareness kind of like you and get more done as a team of .. me. So far it’s just making Temporal Echos that make a handful of memories and I can talk to them. They mostly just do errands and stuff while I’m getting used to it. The main me is still in the Non Linear Integration Lab, trying to sort out some signal noise.”

“What signal noise?”

“Oh from here and there, Temporal Siesmics, Doctor Time’s Lab. Oh. Oh. So that’s what happened. It seems like there’s a missing piece that needs my full attention.” She presses the button on her hand to summon her main awareness.

“Just give me a minute to sort my memories. First jump to a temporal echo. What am I doing? Right. Trying to track down the signal blips and work through year 4.”

Jade turns around and looks at the Chronometer and display. “Jade – Iteration 30 +/-5 Year 4 Nominal.”

Jade frowns. “Nominal? Mind if I scan again?” Zapp nods. She moves over to the display. It changes. “Nominal” vanishes and “Partially Integrated” replaces it.

“So this is in the future from the Integration lab, and if I decide to go through with it. That explains why the focus switch worked so well this time.

Zapp follows the logic and focuses more himself. “I guess the Iteration 30 bit is post TimeQuake.”

“Good catch” says Jade.

“What?” says Zapp.

Jade smiles. “I sorted out the signals from Seismic. Or will have by my next Ship to Ship class.”

Zapp looks confused. Then Jade walks him through the logic.

“I have a robot designed by me here, that means I’ve lived this time, or have effectively used time gates or whatever. University loop control has already gone through 30 iterations and not noticed. So that means they’ve either fixed it, or I’m part of the iteration signal that moves to the next version. I guess my combination of classes means I jump around a lot. ”

“Does that mean you notice the loops as well as the robots?” says Zapp incredulously

“Oh no. I just let a part of me drift through them once I get the proper signal. Loop management.”

“That would explain these circuits here” says Zapp looking again at the designs.

Jade nods. “It can detect the start of a loop and counts the iterations for me. Once it gets told to start counting.”

“That’s a lot more accurate than the Univerity’s TimeQuake measurements”

“I know” says Jade, proudly. “But this is only a third of the robot. It’s going to need input from someone who’s at the center of a TimeQuake to function properly.”

Zapp sighs. He’s been netted into the Narration field. Still, nobody gains anything if everyone is stuck in a time loop, and not noticing. Time to go a bit off script. Or rather. On it.

“Univerity Comms, this is Doctor Zapp from Iteration 30+ We might have a solution here. Can you patch me through to ...” he looks at Jade, not sure of who or what version of Nathan he should be asking for. She shrugs, having done mostly linear work on the robot for the last little while, or at least this iteration of her.

“... to Doctor Time I suppose.”

“Vanilla Time reference?” says Comms.

“Oh right. Post Robot Design.” The voice on the other end of the line changes. It’s Jade again “Almost there Zapp.”

“Huh?”

The Jade in the office has been pressing her Fractal Awareness Focus every few moments. She seems to want to gather all the relevant bits for the next part of the conversation.

Doctor Time is connected to Zapp who puts the conversation on speaker mode. “Doctor Time? Oh you want the iOi designs from me? I was wondering when you’d get around to it, say hi to Jade for me.”

Zapp watches as a file appears on his display. Jade forwards her file to the display as well.

Zapp looks at the two files. They almost merge to a single complete robot, but not quite. He realizes he hasn’t put in the Vanilla Time to teach Jade and Nathan’s Echo. Still the intention of doing so has got them this far, and the University’s Temporal Triggering let the files go through.

Zapp realizes that he’s the ‘Safe’ part of the Robot Design, the basic foundation of logic that helps determine what can be saved in a Null Pulse. It makes sense, as that’s his role at the University as well.

He never thought to have it with such granular control though.

“Didn’t you say this is 1/3 of the robot? It looks like 90% of a robot to me.”

“Margin of Error,” says Doctor Time. “I don’t know how much of the design is yours, but if you ask Jade what iteration she’s on it will separate out and you can do your bit from scratch.”

Zapp struggles with the logic, but presses the focus button again. “Oh right. I wouldn’t let a complete robot past a Null Pulse check knowing how instrumental it is. I had to make sure you two can design most of it from scratch if I’m not well enough to finish it.

Jade rolls her eyes “And can you finish it? Are you feeling well? Safe?”

Zapp looks around sheepishly. “Comms, Do I have a message for myself? Something small that will let me turn down the safeties on the office if it matches?

“Oh right. That’s the note from Jade. It just says 32”

Zapp looks at the Chronometer. Partial Integration. Iteration 30 +/- 5

Zapp does some work using Vanilla math allotting out various hours spent teaching and designing a robot with Doctor Time and Jade both getting a 90% on the final exam. He factors it in with the size of a level 9 time quake between the hours of 12:00 and 1:00 on any given day.

“32”

He turns down the safeties on the office after checking the math a second and third time. Various risky decisions about further future paths are given a temporary green light.

“Jade could you... Scan yourself again, again? Your exact iteration should be readable now.”

She walks over to the chronometer again, getting the strong feeling of Deja vue. “Wait. I need to do something first.” she says.

She writes down “32” on a notepad and takes a time gate back to the start of the iteration. She is back before long.

“I chose not to do that last time.” she says.

“Details matter” says a voice – it’s Nathan again, but with “Detective Time” showing up on the Chronometer. Iteration 32.

Jade scans herself. ‘Iteration 32 Pending.’