Not Gone Soon Enough

"'Four score and seven years ago...' that rubbish! The world would've been better off without Abraham Lincoln. Why did he sigh that Emancipation Proclamation? Freeing the slaves was a massive mistake. How could he not know that? Why wasn't he murdered sooner?"

According to the history books, Abraham Lincoln was assassinated at a theater by a man by the name of John Wilkes Booth. One single shot to the head was all it took to end the life of the President.

John Wilkes Booth IV is the great great great great grandson of the late John Wilkes Booth. They are related on his fathers side. His maternal great great great great grandfather was named Luther. Grandpa Luther was a plantation owner from the southern United States. Slavery provided free labor for him and effectively built their foundation of wealth. It started with the slaves picking cotton which then led to a cotton factory which after that led to a clothing line. Not bad right? The plantation was over 15 acres. Luther owned a lot of slaves. Actually, his plantation was the largest one in the area. He owned the most slaves. They picked the most cotton. Life was good and grandpa Luther was quite content. That is, until he lost his entire workforce. This made it necessary to now pay people for their labor. With such a large operation, a lot of workers are required. This drastically reduces production and profits. Instead of clearing around $20,000.00 a year, profits dropped down to around $8,000.00. (Now, keep in mind, these figures are from the 1700's. $8k then is like $200k now. Still good money.)

John IV is a self proclaimed inventor. To his credit, he has invented more things than Albert Einstein. Among these inventions are a time television. He calls it the Tele-Tube. It allows the user to choose a date, place and person or group to view. The user can only look. No communication or interaction. John becomes obsessed with his ancestry. Surprisingly, he was completely unaware that his blood grandfather shot Abraham Lincoln.

"It was my bloodline that brought an end to that menace Abraham Lincoln? Dear grandfather, you waited too long." John said aloud as he sat in his attic bedroom.

He learned of great great great great grandfather Luther as well. John IV blamed Lincoln for his families loss of wealth. In his mind and by his calculations, had his family not lost the free labor, their profits would have continued to increase exponentially year by year and by the time he is born, there would be millions of dollars waiting for him to inherit. Now, this could have been true, but...he skipped over the real reason he was born into poverty. The truth is that his ancestors from the generations before him each got less money than the generation before 'til it was all gone. There are a couple reasons for this: poor spending habits, bad investments, poor work ethic (as in member not wanting to work so the money didn't stay in the family), recession and inflation. Those things are not tangible though, Abraham Lincoln is, so thus begins his vendetta...

"Only a fool would attack without a plan!" John thought.

He researched Lincoln from when and where he was born, to when and where he died as well as the details of the proclamation because his father wouldn't answer any of questions directly. He was vague and deceptive.

"Could he know my plan?" John asked himself. "of course not!" he reassured.

After gathering what he felt was enough intel on the enemy, a plan was hatched.

Step one: invent a time machine.

He was genius level intelligent, this would not prove difficult at all.

"Eureka! It is done. I have successfully created my own personal time travel machine!!!" John shouted.

Step two: test the machine.

In order to test the machine, John turned the dial to 5 minutes ago. That was successful. The next test was to travel to a day last week. That test was successful as well. His excitement was growing because he knew he was so close to his goal and his life would be changing soon.

Step three: Go back in time and get rid of Abraham Lincoln.

President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863. He was assassinated on April 15, 1865.

"I shall kill him on the eve of the signing. I am sure I will go down in history for saving my family!" John assured himself. "How to do it though?" he pondered. "My grandfather used a pistol. Should I follow after him and do the same? Smother him with a pillow while he sleeps perhaps. This way is far less messy and virtually noiseless, well, provided he does not struggle too much." John continued with a chuckle.

He set the time machine to December 31, 1862 and was on his way....

TO BE CONTINUED....