Future Technology
What fantastic marvels has mankind wrought!
“Would you like some breakfast?” young Timothy Walters asked the knight who had somehow transported from the Middle Ages to the current time.
“Indeed, I desire to break my fast,” Sir Gregory of Cornwall said, “The smells are so delightful—What devilry is this?” Sir Gregory jumped as the toaster chimed. “The bread you just now placed into that contraption! It has transubstantiated!”
“Oh, that’s a toaster.”
Sir Gregory nibbled the toast, “Does it turn bread into this delicious substance by means of alchemy?”
“No, it just toasts it. You know we have other things in the future like cars and computers and stuff.”
Sir Gregory was, however, transfixed by the toaster, “Amazing!”
A version of this story was originally published as “Don’t Ask Why He’s in the Present” on my now-defunct blog Brief Conceits in July 2008, and included in my 2011 flash fiction collection Momentary Lapses into Sanity. The full collection of stories and illustrations is available in print at Amazon.
