History Literature / TimeScout

* CorruptPolitician: Senator Caddrick.

* AGodAmI: Jack the Ripper.
--> "If a mere chit can be taken for a goddess, then I shall certainly rule as a god!"
** Ianira Cassondra is called the Living Goddess. Her psychic powers and strength of character have sparked revived worship of Artemis uptime.
** Skeeter spent some time being worshiped as a living god, too.
* AbusiveParents: Margo. Skeeter. Jenna.

* GoodFeelsGood: Skeeter's new job is much more satisfying than his old job.

* NoBiologicalSex: Armstrong is a character with an ambiguous sexual identity. He could be a feminine man. She could be a masculine woman. She never identifies as either and he can pass for either. His hair is cut short, she wears wigs, and long-necked clothing eliminates the possibility of seeing an adam's apple.

* ArtisticLicenseAstronomy: Reading stars like a clock is portrayed as much more difficult and complex than it actually is.

** {{Hustler}}: Skeeter's a master of the ShortCon. He's lied about being a time scout, a time guide, a luggage handler, a bookie, and a SnakeOilSalesman. All in a single book. Goldie loves these, too. So does Chuck.

* {{Intersex}}: Dr. John Lachley was born with ambiguous genitalia. A little of each. Combined with a [[DarkAndTroubledPast terrible childhood]] in the CrapsackWorld of London's East End, and you've got one hell of a FreudianExcuse.

* {{Hermaphrodite}}: Dr. John Lachley was born with ambiguous genitalia. A little of each. Combined with a [[DarkAndTroubledPast terrible childhood]] in the CrapsackWorld of London's East End, and you've got one hell of a FreudianExcuse.

* AuthorAppeal: Generally, the critique of the BadPresent. The present has gone LawfulStupid with regard to gun control, political correctness, and requiring things like a class in etiquette instead of a much desired math class. The residents of La La Land all prefer simple, practical approaches like carrying weapons when you're in a dangerous place, being forthright about the flaws of both past and present, and applying engineering and logic to everything(though they don't sneer at etiquette - skip that class in downtime taboos and you're liable to get burned at the stake or worse.) Finally, the time scouts are expected to be masters of anything they might need to know in order to fit in and survive downtime, which means studying all of history, all languages, and all skills. By the end of his career, Robert Aspirin despised working and preferred to pursue random hobbies, like martial arts, archery, and drinking.

Set TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture, the Time Scout books by Robert Asprin and Linda Evans follow the lives of the residents of Time Terminal 86, Shangri La Station, La La Land. Much of it involves time travel.

** {{Clairvoyance}}: Ianira can ''almost'' see the face of Marcus's kidnapper/former master. He's a MasterOfDisguise so capable it even befuddles her psyche.
** {{Precognition}}: Ianira gets visions of the future, usually bad. "It is from uptime the danger comes."
*** FaintingSeer: Sometimes she falls into involuntary prophetic trances that leave her weak, even unconscious.

* FantasyAxisOfEvil: The ''Ansar Majlis'' are downtimer jihadists recruited by uptime [[TheFundamentalist fundamentalists]].

* AncientGreece: The destination of the Philosopher's Gate and the home of Ianira Cassondra.

* ArtisticLicenseHistory: Occasionally. Particularly glaring is the presence of Aleister Crowley in Victorian London as a Satanist. He was alive, yes, but he was only nine years old.

* YouCantFightFate: You can act in the past, picking things up, talking to people, even killing people. However, if someone is crucial to some later act, he cannot be killed. YOU can, though, so you should be careful not to anger the wrong person. Paradox will be averted through a convenient coincidence.

* NoEqualOpportunityTimeTravel: Women cannot be scouts. ''Period.'' When Margo insists, she ends up tortured and gang-raped by downtimers and is almost ''burned at the stake.'' They ''can'' be guides. This isn't simply sexism, it's logistics. Guiding and scouting are wildly different professions; guiding is a fairly safe if high-compentence profession strictly limited to well-explored times and places where a woman can learn to blend in. Scouts, on the other hand, go through new, possibly-unstable Gates to unknown destinations, where they are likely to be killed if they can't blend in from the start. Due to cultural and temporal differences in how women were expected to behave and dress, blending in sufficiently on short notice is multiple orders of magnitude more difficult for a woman than for a man and it's difficult enough for a man. (Kit Carson is the only professional scout to ''retire''. All the others ''died''. The race issue is never brought up.

* SevenWondersOfTheWorld: Ianira Cassondra trained as a priestess at the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, where her mother's sister was high priestess.

* MsFanservice: Margo loves tight clothes and has quite the bosom.

* AGodAmI: Jack the Ripper

* MsFanservice: Margo loves tight clothes.

** BadassTeacher: Kit and Malcolm are general mentors in scouting for Margo. Anne's career is teaching guns, and she and Kit vie for the position of second deadliest person of Shangri La. Sven, the number one, spends his days teaching almost any martial art (principally [[WriterOnBoard Aikido]]) and how to use any blade.
** BadassBookworm: All the scouts and guides have the equivalent of multiple degrees in history, language, mathematics, and ass-kicking. Kit Carson is the primary example in-universe.
** BadassCrew
** BadassFamily: Meet Kit Carson, his granddaughter Margo Smith, and her fiance Malcolm Moore.
** BadassNative: The general consensus on downtimers. Specifically, Jack the Ripper. Also, Skeeter's adopted Mongolian family.
** BattleCouple: Margo and Malcolm
** TheCaptain: Kit's more or less in charge of the time scouts and guides when things go to hell.
** WorldOfBadass

* GuileHero: Time scouts are {{Badass}}, but they ''prefer'' to be invisible. Skeeter takes clever UpToEleven.

* {{Badass}}: So many flavors. It's a WorldOfBadass.
** Each character is multiple kinds of {{Badass}}.
*** Margo Smith: LittleMissBadass, ActionGirl, ActionGirlfriend, TookALevelInBadass, DareToBeBadass
*** Kit Carson: BadassGrandpa, [[BadassInANiceSuit Badass In A Rumpled Suit]], BadassMustache, RetiredBadass, OldMaster
*** Malcolm Moore: BadassInANiceSuit, BadassInCharge [[note]]of the Ripper Watch Team[[/note]], BadassInDistress[[note]]After Keaderman shoots him.[[/note]]
*** Anne Vin Mulhaney: ActionMom, GunNut, PregnantBadass
*** Sven Bailey: MemeticBadass [[note]]in universe, widely recognized as the deadliest person on TT86[[/note]], KnifeNut
*** Skeeter Jackson: ActionSurvivor [[note]]as a child[[/note]], [[LittleMissBadass Little Mister Badass]], BadassUnintentional [[note]]just to survive in ancient Mongolia[[/note]], {{Ambadassador}} [[note]]representing the downtimers[[/note]], {{Determinator}} [[note]]do '''not''' mess with his adopted family. He will spend days hunting you down without sleep. He will travel to the ends of time.[[/note]], BadassBoast [[note]]an odd thought makes him laugh, and he takes advantage[[/note]], [[BadassBoast Badass War Song]] [[note]]a Mongolian ditty that freaks out his opponent[[/note]]
*** Jack the Ripper: [[spoiler:DeadlyDoctor]][[note]]John, not James[[/note]], CulturedBadass, CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass[[note]]He goes a little crazy... a little '''more''' crazy in Shangri La, comparing it to hell.[[/note]], SubmissiveBadass [[note]]James, not John.[[/note]]
** PintSizedPowerHouse: Anne, Margo, and Sven are all short and deadly.

* NoEqualOpportunityTimeTravel: Women cannot be scouts. ''Period.'' When Margo insists, [[spoiler:she ends up tortured and gang-raped by downtime Catholics and is almost ''burned at the stake.'']] They ''can'' be guides. Guiding and scouting are wildly different professions; guiding is a fairly safe if high-compentence profession strictly limited to well-explored times and places where a woman can learn to blend in. Scouting is an extreme-risk profession where one is operating without a net and all but guaranteed to die horribly - Kit Carson is the only professional scout to ''retire''. The race issue is never brought up.
* NoWomansLand: The past is treated this way. {{Qurac}} is explicitly called as much. The downtimer muslim cult is presented as rabidly misogynistic, especially hating the revived worship of Artemis because it has a female deity.

* RedHeadedHeroine: Margo.

* FanOfThePast: History tourism is a thing. Time guides are basically incredibly competent tour guides who also have Ph.D.s. Time scouts are all IndianaJones.

* WeirdnessSearchAndRescue: Getting stuck in the past (downtime) isn't common, because it's an industry and everyone involved is very, very careful. However, it does happen occasionally, and when it does, the best are sent after them. The best being, basically, Indiana Jones, only with a much better ability to blend in. Time scouts and guides are trained to be invisible anywhen they go.

* TheUnfrozenCavemanLawyer: La La Land has a small population of stranded downtimers. Some have a [[FishOutOfTemporalWater great deal of trouble coping]], some going insane, some [[DespairEventHorizon walking through random, unstable gates]]. Others learn to cope fairly well. The downtimers organize their own small community to help them all to cope.
** One downtimer even deliberately sought out the station and [[GoneHorriblyRight coped a little too well]].

* SexTourism: Some people go downtime to have sex with downtimer whores. This is viewed ''very'' negatively and explicitly referred to as rape. They're called "zipper jockeys" - and as many of them have modern circumcisions, they have to visit the(''female'') doctor in La La Land to avoid anti-Semites. She deliberately makes the operations as painful as possible.

* AuthorAppeal: Generally, the critique of the BadPresent. The present has gone LawfulStupid with regard to gun control, political correctness, and requiring things like a class in etiquette instead of a much desired math class. The residents of La La Land all prefer simple, practical approaches like carrying weapons when you're in a dangerous place, being forthright about the flaws of both past and present, and thinking etiquette is stupid and useless. Finally, the time scouts are expected to be masters of anything they might need to know in order to fit in and survive downtime, which means studying all of history, all languages, and all skills. By the end of his career, Robert Aspirin despised working and preferred to pursue random hobbies, like martial arts, archery, and drinking.

*** Jack the Ripper: [[spoiler:DeadlyDoctor]][[note]]John, not James[[/note]], CulturedBadass, CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass, [[LikeABadassOutOfHell Like A Badass Out Of Temporal Water]][[note]]He goes a little crazy... a little '''more''' crazy in Shangri La, comparing it to hell.[[/note]], SubmissiveBadass [[note]]James, not John.[[/note]]

** BigBadassBirdOfPrey: A ''pternodon sternbergi'' that came through an unstable gate from the late cretaceous. Also a number of smaller proto-birds.

* ''The House That Jack Built'' (2000): The first direct sequel, Jenna's still on the run and Shangri La's mired in chaos. And then JackTheRipper starts killing downtimer whores in VictorianLondon.

* CompellingVoice: One of the magic powers of JackTheRipper, and his primary tool on the path to power.

* JackTheRipper

** While investigating JackTheRipper's occult connections, the Ripper Watch Team runs into Malcolm's favorite poet, Creator/WilliamButlerYeats. He can barely restrain from soiling himself.

* MsFanservice: Margo loves tight clothes and has BoobsOfSteel.