In his deep, powerful voice, the Führer started roaring out his speech, “As I stand here before you today, citizens, let us remember what we are celebrating, and let us look forward to the future. Many sacrifices have been made by our brave German warriors while accomplishing the short and long term goals of the Reich…”
Throughout the German Unified Territories, people were spellbound as they watched their Führer live on television.
A gathering of two hundred people listened intently to their Führer in the territory once called Arizona, with the majestic Grand Canyon in the background. The officials in the Reich Ministry of the Interior liked the name of this natural wonder — its name hasn’t been changed, though it’s typically spoken in German now Grandios Schlucht.
At UC Berkeley in the Bay Area, where rallies and political protests used to reign, the Führer has enraptured the student body. Swastika banners wave in the air held by idealistic college students.
A rally was also being held at the Oberkoblenz Military Base, located in upstate New York. Columns of German soldiers stood rigidly at full attention as they watched their Führer. Göring continued speaking, “…if land and resources were desired in Asia or South America, it could be obtained by and large at the expense of Japan. This means the Reich must again…”
A rally also occurred in South Dakota at Mount Rushmore. The once proud rock faces of four great American presidents had been recarved to bear the faces of four prominent figures in National Socialist history — Adolf Hitler, Hermann Göring, Heinrich Himmler, and Rudolf Hess.
Outside a farmhouse, a German flag flies proudly. The small Aryan family sits inside around an older television set watching the Führer speak. A copy of “Mein Kampf” sits on the table as the Ministry of Education says it should. They are the ideal family.
In New Berlin City, Göring continued his rhetoric, “…to secure for the German people the land and soil to which they are entitled.” The masses in Grunder Square roared their collective approval of his words.
In the Gestapo jail cell, Wayne sat uncomfortably on the filthy floor. The other prisoner in the cell approached Wayne.
“Erich,” he put out his right hand in a friendly gesture.
Wayne did not bother to shake his hand, but merely ignored the stranger.
“You have a name?”
“Wayne,” he mumbled.
“They roughed you up pretty bad, huh?”
Wayne just stared straight ahead.
“This is the third time I have been picked up,” Erich continues, “My crime this time was not giving the proper salute to an SS officer. Can you believe that shit?” he laughed. “Why did they pick you up?”
Wayne gave Erich a long stare, “For trying to change history.”
“What?”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you anyway.”
“Why not?”
Wayne stood up, walked over to the cell door, and stared out.
“You’re about to die,” Erich said. “What have you got to lose?”
“My mind is going to be rotting in a field or burning in a fuckin’ crematorium with the rest of my body no matter what,” Wayne snapped back.
“Suit yourself,” Erich shrugged, then mumbled, “Asshole.”
Wayne thought it a bit odd that some other prisoner was taking such an active interest in him. It was also strange that he spoke with almost no detectable German accent. So many painful thoughts were going through his head; Wayne almost thought he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
“I just met you,” he said. “What makes me think I can trust you?”
“You ain’t got nobody else.”
Wayne paced the cell a few times. Then he stopped abruptly. The sound of the silence of the tiny jail cell was deafening to him. Maybe, he reasoned, talking to somebody would help ease his mind, even a slight amount. “Alright, I’ll tell you how I ended up here,” Wayne said with anger in his voice. “From the beginning. You want to hear it, I’ll tell you the whole fuckin’ story.”
“Go on.”
Wayne took a deep breath. “My story starts in New York City,” he started. “Not New Berlin City, but the Big Apple — the great city that was. A city where a person could get anything that he might desire at any time. There weren’t any curfews or
The average morning rush hour hustle and bustle of New York City had taken place on an average day as usual. Men and women dressed in conservative suits quickly walked to their offices and yellow cabs noisily honked civilian vehicles out of their way. On a corner, a dirty man dressed in old tattered rags who grasped a small paper bag in his hand, sang opera at the top of his lungs. No one paid any attention to him.
On Liberty Island, the Autumn morning was unusually cold — the type of weather that reminded a person that the full force of winter was just around the corner.
Wayne Benjamin Goldberg had been attending New York University, the well-respected school in Lower Manhattan. Wayne had wanted to go there as long as he could remember. It was sort of a family tradition. It was Wayne’s senior year as an undergraduate and he was excited about graduating next May.
That morning he said goodbye to his girlfriend. Lauren had been up in New York for the weekend from Penn State and was going to drive back that morning. Lauren was twenty, and very beautiful with her long, golden hair, hazel eyes, and warm smile.
Wayne gave Lauren a big hug and asked her, “Did you have fun this weekend?”
“It was the greatest,” Lauren said with a smile.
“So, I guess I’ll see you at Penn in two weeks.”
“I can’t wait. I’ll make reservations at that Italian restaurant that you like so much. You know, the one with the real dark atmosphere,” Lauren said brightly.
“You’ll call me tonight when you get in?”
Lauren nodded her head and gave her boyfriend a passionate kiss.
Doctor Lisa Hoffmann’s advanced physics class had been Wayne’s first class of the day. Most students, and even some of the other professors, considered Dr. Hoffmann something of an unfeeling kook.
Dr. Hoffmann is a small, frail woman who is fond of wearing outdated horn-rimmed spectacles and styling her hair into a beehive. She long ago decided to marry her career instead of any Mister Right that might have come along. It had been a good decision.
Wayne had enrolled in one of Dr. Hoffmann’s classes during the previous summer session and was surprised when she had once actually asked him to go out for a cup of coffee with her. Wayne joined her for a few hoursand thought that his professor was just lonely.
Dr. Hoffmann was known on campus for her offbeat lectures and some of her “far out” theories and she did not disappoint.
“That process will occur through the mediation of a particle called a muon.” She lectured to her class in her usual manner of standing behind her big metal laboratory desk in the front of the room and not moving from that spot until the end of class. “Negatively charged muons attract positively charged hydrogen nuclei close enough together so that they can fuse. Now let us imagine what it would mean to mankind if we could harness this power. It could mean space travel over vast distances. Or even time travel.”
Next to Wayne was Steve Gruber, one of the first friends that Wayne had met as a freshman at NYU and who, like Wayne, was also an engineering major. Steve whispered to Wayne, “Time travel? Who does Hoffmann think she is, H.G. Wells?”
“Maybe,” Wayne whispered back. “Rumor has it that she’s been building some weird project in her lab.”