"So that's it. We weren't sent to the past. We were sent to the future. Could the subterraneans have made a mistake, and set their machine incorrectly, when they used it on us?" asked Ann.

"My observations of their behaviour when we were in 1953 would suggest that this deception was deliberate, Miss O’Malley."

"Of course! Maybe they somehow knew that we might have time travel capabilities, or at least be able to build our own device to travel one direction in time, and wanted us to make the futile effort of building a device that would take us in the wrong direction on the time path, further away from our own time. Maybe they somehow knew about this future depleted world. Maybe the oceans dried up, and we weren't transported to the surface after all. Maybe that area where we materialized was actually once the area below the sea bed. They tricked us very well. If they could guess that we would attempt time travel ourselves, then they made sure we'd go the wrong way, travelling forward in time, trying to approach 1953, when we were tricked into thinking we were in the past!" exclaimed the young adventuress.

"That could be true, Miss O’Malley."

"So now we need to travel back in time. Let's activate the time travel controls."

"But Miss O’Malley, since arriving at this point in time, we have displaced from our original jungle position."

"Oh yes. If we travel back, we might end up in the middle of a rock or something."

"Correct, and since two bodies cannot occupy the same space simultaneously, the results could be disastrous."

"Then you shall pilot Wildstar back to our jungle position, before we travel back to 1953, Butler One."

*          *          *          *

"We are in our original location, and also even facing the same directional vector, Miss O’Malley."

"Good."

"I shall activate time travel circuits."

"No don't! I just thought of something. If we materialize in the same spot, then they'll just use their ray to send us away again. They erected that device in the perfect place to trap a vessel from the surface. Why don't we move a little to the left, a little straight up, and then turn Wildstar around? If we do that, then we'll materialize just behind their weapon of time travel. We can destroy it completely by surprising them. Then they'll never be able to turn that device on us again."

"I shall make the required displacements before departure from this time period, Miss O’Malley."

"Good. I guess the jungle is about to have some more damage, but since we're actually from its past, we won't be changing history at all."

"If it had been a mountain, rather than a jungle, then the damage would have affected Wildstar too, when we first arrived Miss O’Malley."

"Then it's lucky for us that it wasn't a mountain. I was expecting it to be water."

"Displacements completed Miss O’Malley."

"Hey, before we go, I just thought of something funny. They used time to trick us. Why don't we use it to trick them? Could you ease off the power on the time travel circuits when we're getting closer to December 1953?"

"Yes Miss O’Malley. Visual monitoring of slower time travel would be far more familiar than the distorted maze of colours and shapes we have so far experienced while moving in the time path."

"Then do that, will you? I want us to see our own ship being sent into the future. As we look across at ourselves fading away, we'll slow down even further and arrive a little earlier. No actually, that would be confusing. If we arrive before and destroy the weapon before it is used on our past selves, we'll have two slightly younger passengers in an identical Wildstar, as we will have prevented our own original time trip. We'd also meet ourselves. We cannot allow that much confusion. We'll have to get back just after our past selves fade away. It should surprise them, and we'll destroy the weapon."

"Understood, Miss O’Malley."