[ WP ] A court that prosecutes time travelling criminals is once again charging someone for the attempted murder of Adolf Hitler .

I hated my job. 
 
 `` Next case.'' 
 
 The bailiff dragged a man into the room and chained him to the defendants chair. The man looked fit to explode with rage. 
 
 `` Defendant Nick Harkness, how do you plead,'' I droned. 
 
 `` How do I plead? How do I PLEAD? Innocent! Justified! I have n't done anything wrong!'' 
 
 I rolled my eyes. `` You went back in time and killed Hitler, did n't you?'' 
 
 `` I slew a monster! There's no crime in that!'' 
 
 `` Mr. Harkness... you ca n't truly kill Hitler. The many worlds interpretation of time travel is true. Killing Hitler just spawns a new universe, separate from the one where you originated. All the same people live, all the same people die, except that you bring into existence an entirely new multiversal branching point from which another infinitude of realities can spawn.'' 
 
 `` He's dead! I choked the life out of him with my bare hands!'' 
 
 `` You did n't kill him. By traveling back from the temporal front and exercising free will in the past, you spawned a new infinitude of realities. In some you succeeded, in some you failed. You accomplished nothing, and depending on which philosopher you asked, you might be responsible for a literal infinity of new holocausts in all the multiversal realities where you failed.'' 
 
 Mr. Harkness gaped at me. 
 
 `` Considering that the Defendant admits the crime, the Court finds him guilty. Sentencing will be held tomorrow.'' 
 
 The bailiff dragged the struggling man out of my Court. 
 
 I checked my paperwork to see who else was on my docket, even though I knew. Same thing as yesterday, and the day before that, for the entirety of my career and the careers of every other Judge in Time Court. Ten to the thousandth power and counting cases of The People vs Nick Harkness, as an infinity of multiversal variants on the same bailiff brought an infinity of the same man before an infinity of the same judge on the charge of murdering an infinity of the same Hitler. 
 
 I *hate* multiverse theory.
