In 2035, an experiment conducted in a Korean probe ship goes terribly, terribly wrong. The result is a spectacular explosion which, when mistaken for a long-awaited attack by China, causes a nuclear war. The explosion, oddly, was a hundred miles from the ship - which disappeared altogether, to God knows where.
Or, as it would turn out, when.
...
In December 1835, a firestorm was observed to rain down on a remote section of the Amazon. A statue in Bremen exploded, and a flaming strip of debris bearing a Hangul character streaked into and destroyed a barn in Illinois. A group of natives in Kenya found a man buried from the waist up in an otherwise smooth and imperforate rock face. A lone body rose to the surface of the cold sea beyond the Antarctic circle, and floated there for some time. The first and only human being destined to do so entered the atmosphere of Venus.
A man floated to the surface of a river in what would some day be Laos. He coughed once, hard, and swam to the nearest shore - where he would find, rather than a Siamese governor who had of late taken to killing travellers for sport, a Laotian nobleman who could read just enough Chinese...
Or, as it would turn out, when.
...
In December 1835, a firestorm was observed to rain down on a remote section of the Amazon. A statue in Bremen exploded, and a flaming strip of debris bearing a Hangul character streaked into and destroyed a barn in Illinois. A group of natives in Kenya found a man buried from the waist up in an otherwise smooth and imperforate rock face. A lone body rose to the surface of the cold sea beyond the Antarctic circle, and floated there for some time. The first and only human being destined to do so entered the atmosphere of Venus.
A man floated to the surface of a river in what would some day be Laos. He coughed once, hard, and swam to the nearest shore - where he would find, rather than a Siamese governor who had of late taken to killing travellers for sport, a Laotian nobleman who could read just enough Chinese...
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