Time Travel
All this information is in development and prone to switch and possibly drastic change. If you have ideas, please feel free to check out the discussion topics!
Within the Department of Mysteries is the Time Chamber, where the study of magic and the space-time continuum is conducted. Within the Chamber are smaller sub offices: The Time-Turner Workshop, where time-turners are built, repaired and kept; and the Time Travel Investigation & Regulation Bureau, that processes legal uses of time travel and investigates instances of time travel abuse.
How to Get Involved
Who?
Anyone interested in time travel shenanigans!
Plotting Resources
Plot Development Topics:
Primary Contact: Sissel Jowd
Tags: A Snarl in Time
Current Plots: A Snarl in Time
Canon Resources: Time Room, Time-Turner
Recall the climax of Prisoner of Azkaban: Buckbeak, Sirius Black and Harry are all saved by the very underpinnings of Harry and Hermonie traveling back in time, whereas the first time around Harry and Hermonie did not know what was going on.
That is the method of time travel AO supports, least everyone be driven batty by timey whiny dribbley bits that would give a Dr. Who fan migraines.Time Turner Repair Workshop
The Time Turner Workshop is the official hush-hush Ministry office tasked with the creation, maintenance, storage and study of Time Turners and other time manipulating devices. During the Battle of the Department of Mysteries the whole shop was wrecked and devices were destroyed or stolen. Slowly over the years since then the workshop has been returned to it's former Glory, thanks largely in part to the efforts of the Pepper family.
Within the Workshop are standard model Time Turners: the wearer is sent back in time one hour per spin and are forced to relive the time. They cannot be used to travel into the future. However, these are only the Time Turners allowed for specialized uses. There are other varieties of Time Turner stored here that Are Not Touched Period!
The differing models of Time Turner grow larger and have names like Diurnal, Synodic and Centennial that correspond to the units of time they operate with. The largest models also seem to posses a 'recall' feature that return the user to the point of time departed after they have gone back in time. However, knowledge of constructing these devices have been lost to the modern day magical community as these are very old often ancient devices. These off model Time Turners are also incredibly risky to use as they may transport the wearer in chunks of time they did not intend or leave them trapped in the past.
Adapting the recall feature to modern Time Turners (to not be forced through the remaining parts of the turned back hour(s)) is currently experimental.
Time Turners are not the only devices stored and studied here but as the most numerous properties they earned the space on the nameplate. Amongst the other devices include a bell jar filled with swirling sands of time (that causes rapid aging or de-aging) and fragments or wholes of Muhra Glass. There's also Daily Prophet newspaper that's always a day early, but TTI (below) keeps tabs on that and has a blanket ban on all gambling using advance sport results.
Workshop Personel
Time Travel Investigation & Regulation Bureau
Both regulation and investigation, the Time Travel Investigation & Regulation Bureau (TTI) is a newer sub-office of the Time Chamber created in the years the Battle of Mysteries. To go by the name of the office, it's primary task is to investigate illicit use of time travel and regulate the legal uses of time turners. Although the staff and purpose of the office has fluctuated wildly. TTI at times may act as the secretive enforcement squad of the Department of Mysteries as a whole or assist the Hall of Prophecies with detection and authentication. (You didn't know Time and Prophecy are first cousins? Why do you think the Hall is only accessible via the Time Chamber?) If the magic of Time is a factor you can expect TTI to be aware of it.
Time Turners are heavily restricted commodities so a bevy of a TTI operative's job is spent processing numerous time travel applications. The process regularly ends with rejecting the permit outright and having a long drink contemplating how insane the world has become if frequent reasons for time travel requests are to be believed.
However there are situations where time travel is authorized. Anytime you need several hundred wizards to do something in a short span of time (say erect a Quidditch World Cup Stadium or set up a TWT) the folks at TTI will be behind the scenes.
The real excitement of the job comes from investigating time travel abuse and misuse, along with (recently) phenomena that even bewilder the heck out of common wizarding knowledge. Time Travel Investigators are specialized individuals that go through training equal to the Auror academy, along with training usually received by Obliviators. They must be staunch, diligent, quick witted and have the cranial capacity to not wither under the snarling strands of time travel and straightforward methods of cause and effect flying out the window in their line of work. They are versed in the laws and regulations on not being seeing during their work in 'reused time' and abusing the power of the Time Turner.
The Time Travel Investigation & Regulation Bureau does have a dummy office in the Department of Transportation. It's so obviously a sham that the office must not exist and thus being sent there is a deliberate waste of time. Thus, its a great way for TTI to divert public face or deal with folk without bringing them into the Department of Mysteries.
Equipment and Resources
TTI operatives are issued a Time Turner for use in their work. They also have a egg timer that alerts them while in the field. Clocks with different functions, Communication hand mirrors (Two-Way Mirrors) and stuffed borrowed from other Mystery departments cleared for field use are issued on an as needed basis.
At the heart of the office is the Temporal Tinkering Tracker. Similar to a Foe Glass, it has a 13 hour range to detecting temporal fluctuations and potential paradoxes. New blips alert operatives through their egg timers. As a specialized scrying device, it can only render still images of the site in question of the suspicious time manipulating activity.
Also present in the office are Decelerated Time Chambers. Furnished like a cross between a hotel room and a cell, these rooms are locked by heavy doors that seal the occupants inside. Wands must be checked in while the room is secured, no magic can be used inside. Upon being locked in the chamber the door will not open until the present time is reached. On the outside. From the perspective of the DTC occupants, time for them is progressing normally at a recognizable rate. If they were able to peer into the outside world they would find everything to be accelerating on a faster time. For the real world occupants, those inside the DTC are moving very slowly on Decelerated Time. The chambers were originally designed to combat the effects of Time Turner use but they're also handy for keeping people in a suspended state for whatever reason. There's one chamber on the end that's always shut. It has no matching apparatus to denote when it will unlock so everyone assumes it is broken.
The Time Skip Spell (Evanesco Differedeo) was created in house by TTI. It is used to send things into the future. How it actually works is vanishing the target to reappear after a time delay, making it seem it has jumped into the future. Sentient objects have greater resistance to the spell.
Relationships with Other Ministry Departments
TTI is the mother (or Grandfather if you're into those paradoxes) of all secret enforcement agencies so if asked about TTI doesn't exist. Operatives typically have cover stories of working in the Department of Transportation or other offices that don't raise questions. TTI has to stay out of the public eye to have the full benefits of anonymity. As TTI works for the stability of the timeline and the good of all, it seems like they answer to nobody but themselves.
Thus they don't answer to any office in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement or follow MLE procedures or jurisdictions. However, just because TTI does doesn't mean it does so all the time. TTI acts beyond authority only in the most dire of circumstances though as necessary those that are Department Head or higher are filled in if recent TTI work overlaps with their Department on a need to know basis.
For extra backup, TTI often recruit Hitwizards for missions. Being especially trained for immediate operations and not asking questions, their service is backed up by dummied paperwork from whatever office would have the right authority for the current TTI mission.
TTI relies on in house Obliviators and operatives trained in the spell. Better than involving Accidents and Catastrophes though many TTI operatives value being so skilled at their work to not requiring the use of memory charms.
TTI regularly hides its paperwork through channels in other Departments such as Transportation or Accidents and Catastrophes.
Recruitment
So you want to be a Time Travel Investigator? Well, good luck dreaming, because you don't know that the job exists! TTI operatives are like the Men in Black of the Wizarding World so the job is not advertised in career fairs. You don't send in a resume/cv. They contact you.
So what does look desirable to TTI? Well, high scores in subjects you'd expect out of other field operatives of the ministry. Defense Against the Dark Arts, Charms, Transfiguration. Knowledge of History of Magic and/or Divination is encouraged. Experience in Dueling always helps. Beyond that, non-linear thinkers with good instincts that can handle pressure are observed to see if they have TTI potential.
Personel/Allies
TTI is closely linked with the Time Turner Workshop and Hall of Prophecies staff.
- Sissel Jowd, non-active operative that is now History of Magic professor at Hogwarts.
- Jacqueline Lumpkin, non-active operative
- Jarvis (formerly, NPC)
- Jenny (NPC)
At Absit Omen
A criminal believed to be called the Cowled Figure was a mysterious cloaked wizard that appeared to be interested in terrorizing activity through the use of false prophecy. It was eventually found that a TTI worker, Jarvis, who minded the Temporal Tinkering Tracker was under the effects of a time regressed memory loss/split personality from exposure to the looped time in the bell jar in the Time Chamber. After he was committed the matter was resolved.
TTI has a stake in the missing Muhra Glass artifact stolen by Nate Briggs.
