Time was slowly retarding; Jo could feel herself being stretched to an impossible size as she spread over the event horizon. The wavelength of light was undergoing the same demands, everything was becoming redder, while the voices around her became lower. Her motions reduced to the point of complete inertia as the Hawking radiation slowly turned her body to nothingness.

“uhuh” Jo groan as she placed her head onto the desk.

“Not going well?” Shiela, her office co-worker, quizzed.

It was not as the analogy didn’t work from the participant’s view, only the observers’. As time was relative the participant would not notice the change in space time and everything would seem normal. As long as the black hole was of a standard size and not microscopic on a cosmic scale, which would cause a whole host of other issues. In all likely hood once the participant had passed the event horizon they would continue in free fall on towards the singularity living out the rest of their life in relative bliss, depending on if you shared Einstein’s views on happiness. This of course was totally ignoring the Firewall paradox.

“No” Jo glumly replied.

Jo lifted her head up from the desk, Shiela had left, which did not disappoint Jo. Who lives 50 years with a spelling mistake like that?

Sat in front of her was the cause for this existential morose. The Start of Year Personal Target Setting Form or more commonly known in the company as TSOYPTSF because apparently on this world no one knew what the fundamental purpose of an acronym was.

The banality of the form hurt her very spirit. Section 1. Please outline 5 goals you wish to set yourself for the upcoming year to improve the productivity of the company in relation to your job role. Remember! Make them TMRSAA (Timebound, Measurable, Realistic, Specific and Achievable).

In her dark hole of despair she fucking hated that exclamation point.

Section 2. Please outline 5 goals you wish to set yourself for the upcoming year to improve the efficiency of the company in relation to your job role. Remember! Make them TMRSAA (Timebound, Measurable, Realistic, Specific and Achievable).

And so on and so on. For eight different sections, each time focussed entirely on the company and each time with the fucking exclamation point, repeating the stupid acronym over and over. Until section 9.

Section 9. Please outline any support you may need from management with the above goals, or personal goals.

Sections 1-8 had half a page of space for the answers to be written, Section 9 had one line.

Suddenly, from nowhere, a sense of clarity arose within Jo, dispersing the fog of despair. She smiled to herself, that was a better analogy than the previous one despite sounding so cliched. She was going to throw herself into a black hole, that was something she had not done yet, she was going to solve the Firewall paradox. The plan was forming solidly in her mind, she was going to grab two Jo’s from the future and have them as observers.

No, wait that would not work, an observer could not see through the event horizon. That was the whole point. Would future Jo’s prove something? Not sure, she was a being free from time and space, reality too, so, no?

Instead, if she wanted to solve the paradox she would have to fire up the old 4th dimension computer she had sitting in a pocket universe.

But wasn’t the point to get away from the TSOYPTSF, that was why she was jumping into a black hole in the first place, perhaps she should just do that anyway?

Then she saw it, the photo of her family. Fuck. She had responsibility and love here. That was why she had to complete the TSOYPTSF. She could throw herself into a black hole, she could even travel around for a couple of millennia before returning directly to this point in time. But she knew she would not return, responsibility and love faded over the centuries, you moved on, you had to otherwise you would go mad.

Maybe Jo deserved the TSOYPTSF