“The Department of Discipline is the most important department in the Bureau,” says Lieutenant Tab NooN baT, a winged Omaxian with a beak longer than Augustus’s arm. “It’s not as glamorous as Temporal Law Enforcement or as explosive as Research, but someone has to actually contain and rehabilitate all the people who, you know, do all the time crimes.”

Augustus makes a face. “Rehabilitate?” he asks.

“Yes, Cadet, rehabilitate,” Tab NooN baT repeats, as if Augustus hadn’t heard xer the first time. “We can’t keep temporal prisoners here in perpetuity, it would extend the borders of our prison into infinity.”

“That isn’t how infinity works.”

“It’s a figure of speech known as hyperbole in which an exaggeration is used to form a rhetorical point,” Nathan tells him. “The number of hypothetical temporal criminals in the timeline is theoretically equal to the total population of the universe from beginning to end, though one can safely limit that number to only sentient, sapient life forms, and further limit that number to the point six percent who are statistically likely to encounter temporal travel. At that point narrowing the probability with any reliability becomes impossible, and it’s also irrelevant because the total population of the universe is an unknowable factor. Constructing a linear space that can safely contain even a fraction of an indefinite number of individuals isn’t possible, so ensuring that they are able to be released in a structured manner to allow for new intake is of paramount importance.”

“Hey, shut the motherfuck up,” Augustus says, giving the hologram a look.