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Author’s Notes

This story was an absolute amazing adventure to write, and I really hope it was enough to just stir the smallest pieces of your wonderful hearts for a brief time.

I’m not really sure why I need to do this "Author's Notes" section, but here it is. Some thoughts that helped me organize the events in this story that might or might not help you. Maybe you guys all understood the story and everything I wanted it to convey perfectly, and I’m just being too much.

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The most important theme at the end of the story is the writing prompt for my contest entry: Lost time cannot be recalled.

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Implications of Forward Time Travel

- Kai and Krystal are 17 years old in 2013, their present time. (Taemin is as well.)

- I made it so that they were born in the year 1996.

- By 2030, they are 34 years old.

- Their ages didn’t really change when they were time traveling backward. Those events really took place in a matter of just a few days.

- Because they went straight from being 17 years old to 34 years old, they lost 17 years of their lives.

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The Party’s Time Jump Line

2013 (The Present)

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2011

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2003

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1998

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1993

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1987

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1985

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1983

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2030 (The Future and the endpoint)

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Baekhyun (Baekhyun Do) and Diplomacy

2013 was the beginning point of the most dangerous hunt of time travelers because the hunters were able to invent technology that allowed them to trace time travelers both normally and when they time traveled. The solution of sending time travelers off to the future allowed time travelers to avoid extinction. With the whole event of the resistance force defeating the hunters, that didn’t mean that they killed every single hunter there was. In this alternate universe in the story, there are always people who hate time travelers because they have special abilities. But Baekhyun used diplomacy to negotiate with the leaders of the world and eventually, killing time travelers became illegal and violations were heavily enforced. There are still people who hate time travelers in 2030 and beyond. But people like Kai and Krystal will not have to face threats of extinction or being hunted down, because of the diplomatic solution of negotiation.

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Setting

If you didn't realize it while you were reading, the setting of this story is not Earth. I've tried to drop subtle hints here and there, and although the place very closely resembles Earth (because that's really the only place I know, as well as everyone here, at least I assume), Earth is not a place where some humans have the biological power to time travel. A few of the hints that indicate that this is an alternate universe, not Earth, were the districts, because this world they live in is divided into districts, as well as the two moons in the sky at night. I can't remember if I had other stuff...

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Objects Used for Time Travel

I used just a little bit of symbolism for the three objects that Kai and Krystal's party used to time travel backward. The shoelace, the headphones, and the fishing nets. All three of them are objects that are long and stingy, and resemble yarn in a way, yes? I chose those three objects because usually, yarn is a symbol of time in many cultures. Like in Korea, yarn is a sign of long life.

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Source of Inspiration

I believe that the most important factor in me imagining this story was my admiration for a movie I saw last year. It’s an American movie called Looper, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Bruce Willis, and is a sci-fi action movie about time travel. It’s a movie that made me think about it’s ending message for such a long time after I watched it the very first time in theaters. Since, I’ve seen the movie three times, all while I was in the process of writing Abandoning Time. I still think it’s an amazing movie and it still makes me think after the third time.

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Kai and Krystal

This is exclusively and solely my outright opinion, but I think that Kaistal is absolutely the most beautiful and the most fitting couple for writing fanfiction. Their personalities complement each other so perfectly and they are absolutely gorgeous together. Krystal is such a wonderful, beautiful, and accomplished person and she is both a person and character that deserves so much love and admiration. I’m really proud to say that I’m an Arcadian. I genuinely hope that even if Kaistal doesn’t turn out to be real and we Arcadians end up however we end up in the future, that Kai and Krystal will at least become good friends.

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About Me: Advertisement XP

As I’ve said, Abandoning Time is a rather random story I started when I got on Winter break from University, written for a writing contest I decided to enter. I’ve also said before that the writing style used in Abandoning Time is not my conventional writing style.

Believe it or not, my genre of writing that I write here on AFF is slice-of-life romance. My main project that I’m focusing on right now is actually a short story collection I’ve been planning since forever called Short Stories from the Universe that Aliens Tell About Humans. The short story collection is not Kaistal, but a collection of 12 stories where I pair up each of the EXO members with a Kpop girl group member I researched. Having said that, the pairing I used for Kai was, yes, Kai and Krystal.

If you’re interested, I would very much appreciate it if you could check it out. If you’re a major crack shipper who ships anyone with anyone, this collection is definitely full of crack ships like no other, I guarantee that. Or if you just go by, read the Kaistal story, and then leave, I don’t have anything against that either.

AND a mention of not-self advertisement: If you really love Kaistal and you want to read an overload of Kaistal fluff, my sister, woobabylove0904 (also my graphic designer who designed this story's poster AND also the edittor who editted each part of this story for me~) is writing a Kaistal Drabble Collection called One Hundred Kisses. I got to contribute some drabbles for it too, so please go check it out also!

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Thank you  so so much for reading. I hope this story was worth your time and interest, and I really really appreciate everyone for being here. And oh, how could I forget, I sincerely apologize for not keeping my word and updating later than I'd said. But everyone, Thank you again.

OHHHhhh! And one more thing!

This is something that I think all of you should at least check out. Please please please. I think it's a great idea, and will be a very beneficial uniting event for EXO readers/writers.

AFF EXO FANFIC AWARDS

Toodles~!