Mutantur Tempore

(This story contains the threat of violence and language.)

Greta woke and ran to the mirror to see if time travel messed up her face. She always worried about losing her looks in the name of one of Greg's experiments. Her face looked the same. Even the room looked the same. Greg was nowhere to be seen, though. Because everything looked the same, she figured the time travel didn't work. He must've left her sleeping while he went to drink away his fury. She hoped he was passed out because she didn't feel like dealing with a drunk Greg who went on and on about how no one understood his greatness. A bell chimed, and the door opened. 

Greg walked into the room. He wore different clothes than the ones he wore when he put her in the portal, but the sneer remained. She wondered why she married him yet ran to him anyway because she always did. He made the money. Instead of giving her his usual half-hearted squeeze, he stepped to the side, and she ran right into the wall. She wished she had already murdered him but stayed calm. In time, she told herself. In time.

He jerked her off the floor and shoved her onto the bed.

 "Welcome to year 2157, year of your Lord, whomever that might be to you. I meet so many of you I forget who believes what. But it's Christmas, and surely you believe in that." 

"Greg, that hurt," she cried, forgetting calm. "You almost jerked my arm out of its socket."

"Greg is one of my granddads. Was one of them. Honestly, I never know which tense to use with this time travel shit. I met the bastard, but I forget how many greats he gets. Anyway, I'm not Greg. I'm Michael. Grandad Greg sent you to me. We're family. We're going to spend every Christmas together, and that means we'll be seeing a whole lot of each other so if you always do what I say, it'll always be a Merry Christmas!"

 "Wait… I don't understand. Time travel works? Then…that means I'm one of your great-grandmothers?" she said.

"Yeah. But the funny thing is, the generations between us means I don't feel like cuddling you." He touched her nose lightly with his finger, then twisted it until she screeched. "Granddaddy Greg was right: You're a complainer." He pulled a gun from his pocket and an elf suit from the closet. "This is your suit. You will wash, dry, and iron it every night before bed."

"Iron an elf suit? Wait, what the fuck is going on?" 

Michael pointed the gun at her. "Uniforms pose a great expense. Now, I'm going to close my eyes, granny dearest, and you'll change into that suit, or I swear to God I'll blow off your head."

Greta shook with fear but managed to stumble into the suit. 

"It's on."

Michael opened his eyes and smiled. He loved free labor, and the suit really cinched that for him. He opened the door and summoned her to follow him with a flick of his head. She stared at the back of his head until they reached a door marked "Processing". Michael turned to look at her.

"Did you ever think that time travel might mess up more than your face?"

"How did you know that I---"

Before she could finish, the floor opened, and she fell into darkness. Michael opened the door and said, "Another one's ready for training."

___________________________________________

Greg gazed out the window, drinking a martini. Time travel worked, sending his wife so far into the future that she'd never be found, so it was his third martini. The same stars twinkled here that twinkled there. Her eggs remained frozen, waiting to germinate into so many heirs via the wombs of women whose names he didn't care to know. In these ways, Greta remained timeless.

Soon, Christmas would exist year-round, just like the story his mother made him read as a child when she said he was being greedy about not getting this toy or that toy. But there would be no fairy that made Christmas an everyday event. No, the law would make Christmas year-round with a mandatory buying minimum for every family, every week. Greg loved Christmas and power, so he decided to combine the two.

Greta never opposed the plan to make Christmas year-round. In fact, Greg listened to her tell her boyfriend how she broke into Greg's computer and read about the plan. Greg also listened to her tell her boyfriend that they should murder Greg and do it themselves. As if she could even begin to figure out how. Greta performed simple crimes, not mastermind ones. And to think that she never suspected that Greg had the place rigged like a spy. God, he couldn't figure out why he married her.

Another thing she didn't suspect was that Greg had already traveled through time. He visited the past and invested in the right stocks. He sent her boyfriend to the Middle Ages. He invited one of his grandsons back to see the present. He took the boy to the future. He showed the boy who he came from and the kind of man he could become if he'd just take Greta when she appeared in a sweatshop replica of their bedroom.

Greg smiled. He decided to make a fourth martini and look at surrogates. Death was inescapable, but time could be changed for the better.

___________________________________________

"Elf 501911, this is your productivity report. Your output fell fifteen percent last week."

"I'm Greta, not Elf 50 whatever. You claim I'm in the future, and I can't even see anything but this shitty workshop. If I can't see the future then it doesn't exist, and I don't believe you," Greta screamed. The older she got, the more she screamed.

"The same stars shine here that shined in your time."

"How on earth do you know that?"

"A great man told me. Look, you've read at least one history book, right? Did you have to see the history to believe it? You can trust me: It's the future. Everything looks the same, except every day is Christmas and people need things to buy to meet their quotas. That means elves make the gifts that make me, and a few select others, money, so make the fucking gifts."

"But if it's the future, why don't machines do this?"

"Because machines don't respond to torture. They respond to upgrades. That idea about men like granddad letting machines work was a bunch of shit. That costs too much money at this level. Only people are sentimental enough to control with ideas about hard work for the reward of hard work. And for the reward of Christmas, naturally. Look, Elf 501911, enough of school: Do you like Christmas?" Michael asked, leaning so far into her face that she could see the gray hairs popping up in his beard. What must I look like, she thought. All she ever saw was the aging faces of others and her wrinkled hands growing more wrinkled by the day.

""Elf 501911, I asked you a question."

"Yes," she said. 

"Then get to work and make it hard!" Michael screamed, slamming his hand onto her workstation. 

Greta suddenly remembered eating peppermint bark with her dad at Christmas. She loved it, but when she got older, she realized that diamonds didn't make her throw up. She could have as many of them as she wanted. Or she could at one time.

She was stuck, hidden from the sun and the moon, spending every Christmas with a grandson she hated. It was the worst family reunion ever, especially since she'd never had a kid. Greg told her time travel was real but she didn't believe him. She wondered if he was dead. She bit her lip to keep from crying and got back to work.

___________________________________________

"Jack, what do you think happened to the wife…what was her name?" Senator Gloria Fines asked, smoothing her eyeshadow. The camera caught every imperfection.

"I don't know. I should remember. It was just a few years ago."

"Do you think he…you know."

"There was no signs of violence. Maybe she drove into a lake by accident or something."

Senator Fines handed Jack a file. "Let's hope it doesn't thaw then. We certainly don't need her appearance distracting from the Christmas legislation."

"Oh, ma'am, Christmas can overcome anything. Even bad ideas," Jack said, scanning the file. He had a bad feeling about this, but hopefully he'd be dead by the time it became an actual thing. The future helped alleviate guilt because he didn't have to know what his greed caused.

"Jack, really. You'll be in my seat one day, and you'll be thanking me for getting this law passed. It's just the beginning of getting everyone back to work and us getting rich. It's a win-win."

"I guess. Christmas is for family. Maybe it can help families. But let's hurry, ma'am. The press conference starts in five. We gotta be on time if we wanna be rich."