Hiding Sunflowers for the Future

Hiding Sunflowers for the Future.

First thing you should know is that I’m from the future. No, wait, that’s the second thing you should know.

The first thing you should really know is that two petty officers from a German U-Boat in World War II were sent to shore to get needed medical supplies for the crew who had all, except five fortunate crewmen, contracted acute influenza. They were dropping like flies.

The two petty officers decided to stop at a bar prior to the hospital and there they met two accommodating women. At first it was simply an opportunistic delay, but the two men got to talking openly and decided that Germany was on the wrong side of the war and they had already committed their souls to hell, so why not finish the job by putting their crew mates into God’s hands? They left the bar and, soon thereafter, Germany, with their two new female friends.

I met the four of them in the bar that night and you could possibly blame me in part for their desertion. While I didn’t join in the conversation, I could hear it from my booth. And I did pay for their second and third round of drinks to make sure the conversation kept going.

One of those two men was your grandfather. And one of those two women was your grandmother.

“Am I supposed to believe that story? Let alone that you are from the future?”

Go ahead and quiz me.

“What would I know about Granddad’s military career?”

I mean about the future.

“What would I know about the future?”

You're right. I could be making this all up. Which would be more likely than the truth. So let me tell you the first thing. I am from sixty years from now. Fifty-eight to be exact. We’re in trouble. Big trouble. And I was sent back to fix it. Or, more precisely, steal some needed medicine and hide it for the future. Not a difficult task.

“What medicine?”

The desert sunflower. Not medicine in your time, but it’s critical to ours. And it's only found here. In fact they’re basically weeds, highly endangered weeds, it turns out, on the side of the road.

“So you only have to grab a handful of them, bury them in a special place, and return to the future to dig them up?”

It's a bit more complicated than that, but, yes. That’s pretty much the entire plan.

“And if you fail?”

Same as what happened to your grandfather’s crew mates, I suppose.

“Did they all die?”

Not all of them, no. So I guess it wouldn't be the same.

“Let me get this straight. If you don’t save some of the … what is it?”

Desert sunflower. Geraea canescens.

“If you don’t save some of the desert sunflower, then all of the world dies?”

Just the people. Much of the rest is already extinct. I thought you didn't believe me?

“I don’t. How could I?”

That’s right. It's unbelievable that someone would come back from the future, tell you about needing to grab some medicine and, added to this, knowing your grandfather’s story. Who made the same choice as me. Deciding to sit in a bar with a woman and a drink instead of saving the world.

“It's not the same.”

So you believe me?

“Regardless of whether I believe you or not, it's not the same. He was working for the Nazis.”

Which is true.

“He’s a hero for leaving Germany.”

For letting his crew mates mostly all die?

“They were Nazis.”

How do you know that the future isn't full of Nazis or the equivalent?

“It was just a handful of people. How many? Twenty others?”

Forty-three others. Thirty-four of them died from that flu.

“How do you know that?”

I do my research. Only four survived the war, including your grandfather and his fellow deserter. How do you think I found you?

“So let me get this straight. You came here to tell me… . Why did you come here? Do you want me to support your decision to let the world end, since I just happen to be the granddaughter of a Nazi submarine officer who let his crew mates die from the flu?”

Kind of, yes.

“Well, I wont do it. I certainly don't believe your story, but even if I did, I would tell you to get some of that … what was that again?”

Desert sunflower.

“Desert sunflower. Nazi deserter.”

I was just thinking that myself.

“Anyway, I would tell you to get some of that flower and use it to save the world. No matter how rotten the world is, it can't be worse than the Nazis. … Can it? … Could it be?”

Not much better. Not much different than if the Nazis had won, I suspect. Maybe worse.

“In only sixty years?”

Yep. Fifty-eight years from your now. Though most of the rottenness had taken place by the time I was born, thirty years from now.

“And the whole world, all the people are bad?”

Not many of us left.

“All in sixty years?”

A lot can change in six decades. E-mail wasn’t even invented until the Seventies, and now you can text videos to phones in your pockets. In 2001, a span of years you could count on your fingers and toes, the Netherlands was the first country to recognize same sex marriage.

“I thought we had same sex marriage in the United States in the 60’s.”

Nope. We still had bans on interracial marriage in the 60’s. And now we’re reverting-

“Unsure what point you are making.”

That–

“So, in 2075, the world is full of dying Nazis?”

Not full.

“-and you were sent back to save them and have decided, instead, to follow my grandfather’s footsteps and get drunk in a bar? … Hey! I hope you don't think I’m one of those, what did you call them, accommodating women like my grandmother? That didn’t sound very nice. I never met granddad, but grandma didn’t seem like a loose woman.”

Nope. The drinks and the understanding are enough.

“But I am not understanding. I think you should save the future with sunflowers. Sounds so funny when you say it that way.”

It does.

“I wonder how drunk my grandmother was when she decided to leave the bar with a deserting Nazi.”

Not that drunk. And she was a German, too.

“How do-? Oh, that’s right, you were there.”

Yep.

“I still don't believe a word of it.”

Funny you should say that.

“Why?”

Your grandmother didn’t believe a word of your grandfather’s tale either.

“But that was more believable. No desert cornflowers-”

Sunflowers.

“No sunflowers or time travel. Just a U-Boat full of sick Nazis. … OK, if I do leave with you, we would make sure to hide the sunflowers where the future could find them. Even if they are worse than the Nazis, they're all we have left. All that’s left of us.”

Which makes them worth saving?

“And I would make you prove you could time travel first.”

Proving I could time travel would be hard. Proving I’m from the future would be easy. Easier.

“Really, how?”

Imagine you were had just invented email and I popped out my wireless phone and showed you a YouTube video of a cat trapped in a paper bag? You wouldn't even need to posit the enabling technology of the world wide web or cell towers, both even more incredible than the video itself, to be blown away. And, well, it would be clear I was from the future.

“You have a cellphone?”

I think you need to slow down. Your drinking, that is.

“Yes, duh. You’re right. The future wouldn't still have cellphones. Does it? And I am allowed to drink heavily when I meet someone from the future who was sent back to save the world. … How do I know you aren’t one of those future Nazis?”

I am. And your granddad was a Nazi when he and your grandma met.

“Truth. For the record I still don’t believe a word of your story.”

Here. Take a look.

“Whoa! What is that?”

It’s future tech. Something pretty common to us.

“Is that a holoprojector?”

A what?

“A hologram projector. Like from Star Wars.”

Yes. Kind of. It's also our transportation device. Your automobiles with their gas engines, electric ones, too, are long gone. As are commercial airplanes.

“In sixty years?”

Again with the sixty years. Did you know that-

“Show me how it works?”

That’s not the point.

“That’s exactly the point. If I just invented the, I don't know, bicycle-“

Which was invented almost exactly two hundred years ago. But it was more of a pushbike than a-

“-and you showed me a flying motorcycle, I would need to take it for a spin to believe you.”

So, if I took you for a hover on this, you’d believe I was from the future.”

“Yes. It’d definitely be a good start. And I would then convince you to hide away some of those desert cornflow-”

Sunflo-

“…sunflowers to save the future Nazis from extinction. To save the world from extinction.”

Or to just walk away and live our lives like your grandmother and grandfather did.

“We’ll see about that. But, first, I want to take your snitch for a test drive.”

The End.