Pep Talk Redux

 

**SCENE JUMP - LECTURE HALL 7B, TIME UNIVERSITY**

**DOCTOR TIME (AUDIENCE):** *Sits in the third row, disguised in a student's hoodie, watching his own echo lecture. The air hums with low-grade temporal dampeners.*

**DOCTOR TIME (SPEAKER):** *At the podium, gesturing at a chalkboard where equations rewrite themselves.* "...and that's why we don't call them 'paradoxes' anymore. We call them **narrative compost**. They're not errors—they're the raw material for new growth."

**/Clunk-Whirr-Dunt/ from the back row.**

**iOi (floating near the fire exit):** "He's using your own metaphor. The echo is iterating."

**DOCTOR TIME (AUDIENCE):** *Whispering to iOi.* "Of course he is. I planted it in the Null Pulse data stream last week. A little humble offering to myself."

He watches his echo on stage—confident, clear, *contained*. The Null Pulse has done its work. This version remembers just enough to teach, but not enough to feel the weight of the loops. Not enough to dread the repetition.

**DOCTOR TIME (SPEAKER):** "Your final assignment isn't an exam. It's a **compost heap**. You'll take a failed timeline, a broken narrative, and you'll document what new things grow from the rot."

A student in the front row raises a hand. "But sir—isn't that just... giving up on fixing things?"

**DOCTOR TIME (SPEAKER):** *Smiles, a little too gently.* "The most beautiful gardens grow from soil we didn't sterilize."

**DOCTOR TIME (AUDIENCE):** *Winces.* I was so earnest then. So sure that compost was a theory, not a life sentence.

**/Click-Sprong-Tick/**

**iOi:** "The fractal pattern for this class just got upgraded to Year 4. The students found it... harder."

**DOCTOR TIME (AUDIENCE):** "They're feeling the weight. They're starting to realize this isn't a lesson. It's a diagnosis."

He stands, the movement catching his echo's eye from the stage. For a fractured second, they stare at each other—one who knows the loops, one who's happily trapped inside one.

Then the Null Pulse hits, invisible, inevitable.

The echo on stage blinks, shakes his head, and continues smiling.

The Doctor in the audience turns to leave. He's gotten what he came for—not an answer, but a reminder:

**You can't debug the system from the outside. You have to become part of the compost.**

“Brilliant” says the Professor still processing new and old information and settling it out. “And safe. Well mostly. I’ll likely have memory loss and probably lose a bunch of skills, but I’ve put in the, what did you call it ‘Vanilla Time’, to keep something.”

Doctor Time asks everyone to say what they know about the upcoming TimeQuake. Most of the students go on about the severity or disorientation. Particularly what you’d expect from a poor reaction.

“Anyone else?” he asks. Jade speaks up. “32” she says as blankly as possible.

The professor looks up from the calculations on his board, he’s just finished analyzing what happens if most of the energy of a TimeQuake goes into a large loops instead of a fracture.

“What did you say?”

“32” Jade says. “It’s the answer to the equation on the board.”

Doctor Time takes over. “I see, if you focus the loops into a large enough iteration then get a team together to focus the effect into smaller and smaller causes.”

Jade stands up. “And that’s why I’m here. I didn’t know the exact circumstances that prompted everything, but now that’s out in the open we can be more specific in the Null Pulses. Let people have more memories and skills to play with, though it seems like the two of you can operate pretty well without much to work on."

There is a large sigh of relief in the class, they’ve passed year 4 Fractal Integration Comm/Traffic.

The safeties drop and people remember the last few loops of the class they’ve been in.

iOi appears in the corner /Click Pop Whirr Clunk/ “Surprise to you too buddy!” says Doctor Time. “Thanks for keeping us safe and sane.”

Professor Time looks at the Robot with interest. “I see. That makes sense. The first time traveller would be a robot. Something that goes back in time, makes a paradox and loops till random fluctuations bumps it off course. Right, Doctor Zapp had mentioned that might be a solution the other day. ”

Jade taps her comm badge. “Doctor Zapp to Year 4 Fractal Integration Final -1 day, Robot Design”

The professor looks around. “Oh. So we’re just causing paradoxes now?”

/Click Whirr Thud/ The professor uses his Sonic Pen to Translate. “Of course, that’s how we power the time loops”