-
Period: to
Slaughterhouse V Timespan
-
First Time Travel
Billy travels in time for the first time during the war when he gives up on his life and accepts death. This is the beginning of his delusions and it may not be time travel but Billy remembering past events of the war and is really PTSD -
Entering Dresden
Billy and the other prisoners are sent to Dresden to the titular slaughterhouse where they serve as laborers in a factory producing malt syrup. This is the beginning of Billy's mental demise, as Dresden will soon be bombed and the trauma he will experience will cause severe mental anguish and PTSD throughout his life. -
Firebombing
Dresden is firebombed on this day and Billy sees the total destruction of a city for the first time. This is important because of how it is the catalyst that truly starts Billy's PTSD. Dresden is the only event that Billy is able to remember without "time traveling" most likely because of how traumatic it is showing that no matter what he tries to do to cope with these events, his memory could never truly be freed from the impact of the Dresden bombing. -
The End
Billy and all the other soldiers are freed from their POW camp and the war ends. The impact left here is the utter lack of any impact. None of the soldiers are able to really react because of all the trauma they endured and all the carnage they have witnessed. In the end, they are left speechless and unable to say anything meaningful. -
Committed
Billy is committed to the vet hospital in 1948, saying he is crazy, but not due to the war. Doctors believe he is crazy from what had happened with his father. During this time, Billy meets Elliot Rosewater who introduces him to a science fiction writer named Kilgore Trout. Trout's writings about people's ailments existing in another dimension and about people being put in a zoo in another planet are the ideas that mold Billy's delusions that he was abducted by aliens to cope with his PTSD -
Meeting the Writer
Billy meets Kilgore Trout for the first time when he sees him talking to the kids he manages for the newspaper's paper route and eventually helps him deliver papers because Trout doesn't have a car. This is important because of how Trout eventually brings up the idea to Billy about traveling through time when Billy has a bout of PTSD when he sees a barbershop quartet that reminds him of soldiers in Dresden. This is most likely where he got the idea of constantly traveling through time. -
Abduction
Billy is abducted by Tralfamadorians, aliens, on his daughter's wedding night and was taken to Tralfamadore for years through a timewarp and is put into a zoo with an actress named Montana Wildhack. During this time, Billy learns of the Tralfamadorians beliefs and lifestyle of only focusing on the positive aspects of life and ignoring hardships, which Billy tires to use to curb his PTSD and changes his outlook on life entirely. -
Crash and Burn
Billy is in a plane crash with a group of other optometrists and crashes in Sugarbrush Mountain, Vermont. Billy is the only survivor. This indirectly leads to his wife's, Valencia, death, adding more to the tragedy of Billy's life and how death and hardship seems to follow his character. -
Widower
Valencia dies of carbon monoxide poisoning as he recuperates in the hospital from his crash. Valencia was on her way to see Billy when she got into a car crash. She was so worried that she drove after the crash without realizing there was a carbon monoxide leak and died. This further adds to the many tragedies of Billy's life and how the deaths around him are inadvertently his fault. Just like Roland Weary, Billy inadvertently kills Valencia Because she only continued to drive for Billy -
Forseeable Death
Billy is assassinated during a speech he was giving about Tralfamadore by a hitman sent by Paul Lazzaro. Lazzaro kills Billy because he indirectly caused Roland Weary's death after Weary beat Billy up for causing the group they were in to leave them. The importance of this event is it is most likely a delusion of Billy's because he really does fear Roland will kill him. The day it occurs is the same as the Dresden bombing, so it could be symbolic in that Billy really died when Dresden was bombed
