By His Bootstraps

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"By His Bootstraps" is a science fiction short story by Robert A. Heinlein that plays with some of the inherent paradoxes that would be caused by time travel. It was originally published in the October 1941 issue of Astounding Science Fiction under the pen name Anson MacDonald. It was reprinted in Heinlein's 1959 collection, The Menace From Earth. Under the title "The Time Gate" it was also included in a 1958 Crest paperback anthology, "Race to the Stars".

[edit] Plot summary

Bob Wilson locks himself in his room to finish his doctoral thesis on time travel. He hears someone say "Don't bother, it's hogwash anyway." The interloper, who looks strangely familiar, calls himself "Joe" and explains that he has come from the future through a Time Gate, a circle about 6 feet in diameter hanging in the air behind Joe. Joe explains that Bob has to go through the Gate, where great opportunities await him, thousands of years in his future. By way of demonstration, Joe tosses Bob's hat into the Gate. It disappears.

Bob is reluctant. Finally, Joe is about to manhandle Bob through the Gate when another man appears, one who looks very much like Joe. The newcomer does not want Bob to go. A fight eventually breaks out, during which Bob is punched, sending him through the Gate.

He recovers his senses in a strange place. A white-haired, bearded man explains that he is thirty thousand years in the future. The man, who calls himself Diktor, treats him to a sumptuous breakfast, waited on by beautiful women. Diktor explains that humans in the future are handsome, cultured in a primitive fashion, but have none of the spunk of their ancestors. An alien race built the Gate and refashioned humanity into compliant slaves. The aliens are gone, leaving a world where a 20th century go-getter can make himself king!

Diktor asks him to go back through the Gate and bring back the man he finds on the other side. Bob agrees. Stepping through, he finds himself back in his own room, watching himself typing his thesis. After recovering from the shock, without much memory of what happened before, he reenacts the scene, this time from the other point of view, and calling himself "Joe" so as not to confuse his earlier self. Along the way, he realizes that his earlier self is a drunk and an idiot, but just as he is ready to shove him through the Gate, another copy of himself appears to stop him. The fight happens as before, "Bob" goes through the Gate and "Joe" is left alone with the third version of himself.

His future self claims that Diktor is just trying to tangle them up so badly they can never get untangled, but he goes through and meets Diktor again. Diktor gives him a list of things to buy in his own time, to bring back. A little annoyed by Diktor's manner, Bob argues with him and eventually slips back into the past. He finds himself back in his room once again.

He lives through the episode for the third time, then realizes that he is now free to do what he wants. He collects the items on Diktor's list, which seem to be things a 20th century man could use to make himself king in the future. One is a copy of How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. Other items include books on politics, a mechanical gramophone, and gramophone records of popular music. He slips back into the future with his cargo. He then adjusts the Gate to deposit him ten years further back, planning to take Diktor's place. He finds two things by the controls, his hat and a notebook which translates between English and the language of Diktor's slaves.

He sets himself up as Chief. He plays with the Time Gate hoping to see its makers, but the one time he catches a glimpse of them, he is so shocked that he stays away from the Gate for a long time.

One day, idly playing with the Gate, he finds an old hat lying on the floor by the Gate. Shortly afterwards, his earlier self comes through. The circle has closed. He is Diktor, which is nothing more than the word for "Chief". Now he has to orchestrate events to ensure his own future by entangling the past. But it will be a great future!