The Time Machine2002

Vox 144:
Area of inquiry?

Hartdegen:
Do you know anything about physics?

Vox 144:
Ah! [opens a file] Accessing physics.

Hartdegen:
Mechanical engineering? Dimensional optics? Chronography? [Vox 144 opens files for each] Temporal causality? Temporal paradox?

Vox 144:
Time travel?

Hartdegen:
Yes.

Vox 144:
[sighs, looking annoyed] Accessing science fiction--

Hartdegen:
No, no, practical application! My question is, why can't one change the past?

Vox 144:
Because one cannot travel into the past.

Hartdegen:
What if one could?

Vox 144:
One cannot.

Hartdegen:
Excuse me, this... this is something you should trust me on!

Vox 144:
[opens more files, still annoyed] Accessing the writings of Isaac Asimov, H. G. Wells, Harlan Ellison, Alexander Hartdegen--

Hartdegen:
Oh! Tell me about him.

Vox 144:
Alexander Hartdegen, 1869 to 1903. American scientist given to eccentric postulation. Found writings include treatise on the creation of a time machine.

Hartdegen:
Tell me about the time machine.

Vox 144:
The Time Machine was written by H. G. Wells in 1894. It was later adapted to a motion picture by George Pal and a stage musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber...

Hartdegen:
[as Vox continues] No, no, that's not what I mean--

Vox 144:
Would you like to hear a selection from the score?

Hartdegen:
No!

Vox 144:
[singing to music] "There's a place called tomorrow! A place of joy, not of sorrow! Can't you see, it's a place for you and--"

Hartdegen:
Thank you, that's quite enough. [turns to leave the library]

Vox 144:
Will there be anything else?

Hartdegen:
Uh, no, no, I... I think I'll have better luck in a few hundred years.

Vox 144:
[sarcastically giving a Vulcan salute] Live long and prosper!