Just a Time Travel Story.

Dan couldn't tell James the truth about the machine. It was a secret government weapon. No point in creating suspense there. Dan was an amateur engineer, but one of the most gifted in the world. He was so prodigious, he'd gained the attention of the government. The weapon, as they'd said, involved technology so revolutionary that it couldn't risk being documented in the records of an engineering firm or major contractor. No, the parts being manufactured by conventional means were done that way, split between several different companies for good measure. The core part, the part that used unprecedented technology, was given to a lone engineer to figure out. If anyone else learned of it, or if a written document was found anywhere (including the dossier they gave him, which was to be destroyed), Dan's life was gone. He wouldn't just disappear. All record of him would. He'll have never existed. That's how secret it was. They never even told Dan what it was supposed to be in the end.

Dan thought quickly when James opened the door of his garage unexpectedly. He couldn't tell even the partial truth. Not even to his best friend. He said, "Uh, I've been working on a time machine.

"Dude, really? You sure you've never smoked before?"

James had brought the weed over. He'd been asking Dan to try for ages. Dan tried to sell the story he'd already started with.

"Yeah, I'm an engineer, you know. I thought I'd take a crack at it. Just a side hobby, figured it was worth a shot."

"Any progress, dude?"

"No, not yet, but it'd be cool if it worked. We could go back in time and find out who really killed Kennedy, right?"

James took a drag off his doobie, "Yeah, or go to the future and ask our future selves if we found out who killed Kennedy, to save ourselves the trouble of actually going there."

"But what if the government makes them lie about it to us?"

"Then we'll have to go back and find out. If we don't go back, after all, how can we tell our past selves?"

It was a tough discussion, but James eventually left it alone, and the two found a place in the yard, free of debris they could hurt themselves on, and smoked there. After James left, a man came into the yard. He looked like James' dad from years ago, or like James, but older. He came in in a hurry. No drugs on him. His eyes were racked with fear and relief at the same time, somehow. He put his hands around Dan's face delicately, like they hadn't seen each other in a long time.

"Dan, it's me. Your time machine works."

"What? What do you mean?"

"The thing you're developing, for the government. It's a weapon to get rid of people by sending them to another time period. Mostly dinosaur times. They zap you, you get eaten by a Tyrannosaurus, and you might as well be gone to history, but at least it's a kickass way to die I imagine. You never tell me. I find out because I was drafted to use the weapon for a short time, but then they find out I smoke grass and they fire me. You never... you never expose it and get in trouble."

"Why did they send you back here, then?"

"Oh yeah, that's the bigger issue. I spent five years breaking back into the government arsenal to use it to send me back to this time, so I can warn you, the only person I trust at this time. You need to make things right. Prevent a great tragedy."

"What tragedy? What happens?"

"It's terrible, Dan. First, we get into a relationship. You may not know you're bisexual yet, but it comes with time. After that, restaurants become all the same. They all serve the same stuff. It starts with iHop introducing burgers, then Burger King introduces pancakes, McDonald's gets rid of its playplace because other restaurants don't have it, and now pretty much every restaurant has the same menu."

"Okay, why not just... contact the restaurants and suggest a new menu item? Or start your own?"

"If one tries to introduce a new menu item to set themselves apart, everyone else copies it or gets shut down. If they remove an item from the menu, fans riot until it gets shut down. It's just a few restaurants, now, that have the logistics to supply such a wide variety of food options, and the budget for multidisciplinary chefs to make it, and the food isn't even good anymore. So much food, they run out of budget to make any of it good."

"Are they at least set apart by their layout?"

"No, always the exact same layout. The logos are even all the same design just with different names being spelled out in cutesy bubble letters."

"Okay, that sounds tragic, but is this seriously worth going back in time about?"

"Oh yeah, it got so bad you and I went on vacation to Brazil, the last country to still have halfway decent restaurants. However, the government ends up at war with Brazil, and we get attacked. I get out of town in time, but you don't. You're back in Dinosaur times getting eaten by a T-Rex or something because of the restaurant industry."

"So, you want me to sabotage the weapon so they can't use it against us?"

"No, don't do that. They'll just execute you. I brought a list of major restaurant chains and what they originally served at their founding. iHop is a pancake place. Subway is a sub sandwich shop. McDonald's started as a grill. Only buy pancakes from iHop, sandwiches from Subway, and burgers from McDonald's. You want chicken nuggets? Go to Chick-fil-A or Cane's, but also don't go to Chick-fil-A because they're still homophobic. I guess if you want homophobia, that is. Get other people to join in. Lie about the reasons, but make sure the Restaurant Dystopia never comes to be. It's your only hope."

And so, Dan's and James's restaurant-going lives changed forever.