The Illustrated Man

William and Susan Travis watch fireworks at an October festival in Mexico, 1938. Susan worries that they might be discovered, but Travis is confident they will never be found. In a café, Susan notices an unusual man who is drinking from several different bottles of alcohol and smoking different cigars and cigarettes. She is worried he might be a Searcher, sent from the year 2155 to track them down and bring them back.

The couple’s real names are Ann and Roger Kristen. They took a vacation to the past with a company called Travel in Time, Incorporated, fleeing their jobs at a bomb factory and a bio-weapons facility. In the future, the government sought to “burn [their] books, censor [their] thoughts, scald [their] minds with fear, march [them], scream at [them] with radios” (153).

Susan is convinced the mysterious café man must be a Searcher, recalling her and William’s first nights in the past when they, like him, sampled everything they could get their hands on. The man introduces himself to them as Simms, the chief of the Searchers, and makes his suspicions clear. As they leave, he says one phrase: “2155 AD.”

Back in their hotel room, Susan is terrified, convinced that their odd mannerisms have given them away, but William is angry.