History Main / GoneToTheFuture

Can be ForWantOfANail, if the absent time traveler is the nail.

* In the ''Film/BackToTheFuture'' fanfiction ''[[https://www.kristensheley.com/bttf/futureaint.html The Future Ain't What It Used to Be]]'', Marty and Doc Brown get into a random car accident that completely destroys the [=DeLorean=] while on a trip forward to the year 2030. With no way to get home to 1991, the ripple effect takes place around them and creates a new timeline where the pair apparently disappeared just days before Marty and Jennifer's wedding.

->'''Aku:''' [[SamuraiJack/TropesSeason5 What?! YOU'RE BACK ALREADY!?]]

* Happens in ''WesternAnimation/LiloAndStitchTheSeries'' when Lilo, tired of being just a kid, uses an experiment to jump forward ten years, becoming a teenager. Stitch stands next to her so that he can join her. She soon discovers that she had gone missing during those years, and later, when she uses the experiment to jump another ten years into the future and become a young adult, she discovers that during the time she and Stitch were absent, Dr. Hamsterveil managed to take over the world. Luckily, Jumba's future self manages to inform her of how to reverse the experiment's power and return to her own time and become a kid again.

* What Haohmaru, Nakoruru, and Darli Dagger from VideoGame/SamuraiShodown going to Franchise/TheKingOfFighters universe amounts to. They do adapt quickly to the ways of the modern world and even befriends one of their former adversaries in Mizuki to help weaken her hold from Ambrosia.

* What Haohmaru, Nakoruru, and Darli Dagger from VideoGame/SamuraiShodown going to Franchise/TheKingOfFighters universe amounts to. They do adapt quickly to the ways of the modern world and even befriends one of their former adversaries in Mizuki to expose her to the ways of the modern world to help them get along.

* There's a Donald Duck comic out there based around this. Donald travels 20 years into the future with Gyro Gearloose's time machine. In the future, everyone assumes that Donald left after Daisy married Gladstone Gander. To his satisfaction, he does discover that his old furniture has become valuable antique. [[spoiler: However, after traveling back to the present, he discovers that was just all [[LotusEaterMachine virtual reality]].]]

* The ''WesternAnimation/MegaMan'' cartoon also had this happen when Mega Man thought he'd accidentally trapped Dr. Light 30 years in the future and went to find him. Naturally, without Mega Man around to stop him all the time, Dr. Wily eventually managed to conquer the world and imprisoned Mega Man's family.

* In ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'', the girls once accidentally traveled through time into a dystopian society. They learn that they have vanished several years ago which allowed Him to take over and destroy everything. They fix this problem by going back through time and reinserting themselves into the timeline.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitans2003'' episode "[[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Recap/TeenTitansS2E1HowLongIsForever How Long Is Forever?]]", Starfire accidentally travels twenty years into the future while fighting a villain. Due to her absence, the Teen Titans have all but split up -- Beast Boy's become a circus freak, Cyborg's batteries have run out, Raven's been put in an asylum, having gone insane from loneliness, and Robin's gone solo, becoming Nightwing.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitans'' episode "How Long Is Forever?", Starfire accidentally travels twenty years into the future while fighting a villain. Due to her absence, the Teen Titans have all but split up--Beast Boy's become a circus freak, Cyborg's batteries have run out, Raven's been put in an asylum, having gone insane from loneliness, and Robin's gone solo, becoming Nightwing.

** In "Progeny", on a trip to 2147, Ray discovers that [[spoiler:due to his disappearance in 2016, his brother Sidney eventually took over his company and inventions and this eventually resulted in the ATOM suit being used for law enforcement in Per Degaton's totalitarian regime]].

* There's a DonaldDuck comic out there based around this. Donald travels 20 years into the future with Gyro Gearloose's time machine. In the future, everyone assumes that Donald left after Daisy married Gladstone Gander. To his satisfaction, he does discover that his old furniture has become valuable antique. [[spoiler: However, after traveling back to the present, he discovers that was just all [[LotusEaterMachine virtual reality]].]]

* In ''Manga/OnePiece'', [[spoiler: Momonosuke, Kin'emon, Kanjuro, Raizo and O-Kiku actually travelled 20 years forward using Lady Toki's Devil Fruit which allows them to travel one way into the future, escaping Kaido and the Shogun Orochi's wrath after recently escaping their Lord Oden's execution. The travelers were marked dead during the time they went missing.]]

That's right, OurTimeTravelIsDifferent. Going forward causes time travelers to be absent from the timeline, at the moment they leave the present until the moment they arrive in the future. Which kind of makes sense; why ''should'' a second version of you spontaneously materialize and live your life in the present? (On the other hand, if you were planning to return to the present, wouldn't your return form part of the 20 years of history you skipped over? Of course in that case, you wouldn't be here in the future stepping out of the time machine right now, and... [[TimeyWimeyBall AARRGGHH!]])

* In the BadFuture in ''Webcomics/AutumnBay'', Johnny specifically mentions that he hadn't seen Marie-Ange and Andrew since before the opening event of the comic (the "fallen star"), implying that they were gone all that time. That future seems to be obliterated when they travel back to the present.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'' episode "The Late Philip J. Fry," this happens to Fry, Farnsworth and Bender when they get lost in a time machine that can only go forward. [[ContrivedCoincidence Because a party the three of them are thought to have attended ended with a disaster that killed all the guests]], nobody wonders where they went.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/CaptainNTheGameMaster'' part of an issue of the ''SuperMarioBros'' comic, Kevin is knocked into a garbage chute. Samus takes a second-or-more-hand time gadget and tries to go forward just a little bit so she can catch him and take him back. But the device is defective and sends her 20 years forward, where due to the absence of Kevin and Samus, Garbageworld is the last place that [[Franchise/{{Metroid}} Mother Brain]] hasn't taken over, and it's under attack as well, defended only by Kevin and VideoGame/KidIcarus (Pit in the game, but Kid Icarus here). She eventually warps back in time and prevents the incident, so he can defend Videoland again.

'''Jack:''' What trickery is this? Aku—!!(''poof'')\\

-->-- ''WesternAnimation/SamuraiJack''

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* The DeathJunior tie-in manga had this happen to Pandora as part of the time machine's anti-tampering mechanism. While she was away, her friends had drifted apart and a snake goddess had seduced DJ.

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* ''Series/DoctorWho'': Amy Pond leaves with the Doctor [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E1TheEleventhHour on the night before her wedding]]. In the [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E2TheBeastBelow next episode]], a voting booth in the year 3295 successfully identifies her from the UK's voter rolls, but gives her marital status as . . . "Unknown".

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* In the ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'' episode "The Late Philip J. Fry," this happens to Fry, Farnsworth and Bender when they get lost in a time machine that can only go forward. [[ContrivedCoincidence Since a party the three of them were thought to have attended ended with a disaster that killed all the guests]], nobody wonders where they went.