SAMUEL BOLTED TO his feet, and seized the time machine from the rough cobblestones, looked around himself fearfully, and darted off into the shadows behind the Bureau of Taxation offices. His lungs ached… Time travel really took the breath out of a man.

His pocket watch read 12:30 AM… Damn! He’d only gone back 12 hours, though he’d set it to 24. Damn machine… Maybe he could fix it. He didn’t have long… in 12 hours the police would set upon him like a pack of hounds, flinging accusations of a murder he hadn’t committed. If he could just fix this machine, he could catch the real killer…

Samuel raced back to his shop, fighting the inevitable progress of time. Upon arrival, he set upon fixing his contraption.

Time marched onward, steady as a Panzer tank.

Samuel checked the time, 12:20 PM! The police would be here any moment now… He fled his workshop, down cobblestone streets and back alleys, then…

He tripped. The machine clattered against the pavement, and the whole world blurred and twisted…