#disclaimer this post is half baked and unreviewed I'm just vibing out here

[kindalikerackham]

In the creation of the time traveller, we imagine time in loops, in lines, in an endless branching explosion of decisions into a silly little network graph. None of these fully encapsulate the way we generally portray time (and I'm sure my suggestion will be no exception). Even in this branching eternity, our stories coalesce into the one core timeline, the one true story's outcome.

Maybe I've just been scrolling past too many mobile game ads, but I've recently become fond of another visualization. In my mind, the water of time flows down, down, down, and the facts of physical life shape its direction and speed, its depth and intensity.

It is thus the task of the time traveller to adjust that direction. Outside of time, they present new obstacles to its path upon returning, and the shape of the water changes, sometimes in minute twinges affecting few, sometimes in swirls of paradoxical eddies and stagnation, and, often, in the alteration of the flows beneath it.

Thus, the origin of the time traveler is real, and the river that dripped their way created them. And thus, the flow of time ceases to water it.

Thus, the new obstacles presented by the time traveler have real and lasting effects on the path of the water, though often much remains the same.

The old path of the water is no longer possible, but its still real. And it's effects will last, barring other obstacles' intervention.

That old path can be returned to, if the obstacles is removed or significantly altered.

Other streams may exist as well, but they're not xx

And in it all, time continues to flow down through the obstacles of space and time and human tampering