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The Pranksters' Guide to Time Travel
Part of the Pranksters' Guide to Time Travel Series
A Short Story
I was never that good at writing short fiction. So, in 2021, when a contest came around for 2000-2500-word short story in the theme of "From the ordinary to the extraordinary", I was intrigued, and I challenged myself. A friend had joke for years that "If I could travel back in time, only once, I'd go back and punch Pythagoras in the dick," and the joke inspired me. I began writing the story of two frat-boy bro types, and came up with four misadventures for them, but it quickly ballooned into too large of a story. The limit was 2500 words, after all. So I cut it down, and was left with extra material for future stories.
As it stands, I have seven stories in the series. They are not serialized; you don't need to read them in any particular order or as a package deal. I have no plans right now for them to become the stepping stones towards The Pranksters' Guide to Time Travel novel. Future installments will be forthcoming.
This story was ultimately rejected from that contest. A panel of judges gave mixed results - one loved it, one was positive but a little meh, and one flatly refused to consider it on the grounds of "blatant violence against known historical figures and your treatment of the main character's proclivities."

In this first part of the series, two time travellers pay a visit to Alan Turing during the Blitz.
Read the Short Story
2000 words
Listen to the audio
36 minutes
Music: "Weird Synth Loop" by groebeats via looperman.com
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