Chapter Twenty-Two
THE CONFESSION AND VOTE
“I don’t believe you are quite correct Forrest - we may not be as far away from success as you might think.”
“What’s that supposed to mean Grandpa?”
“I’ll tell you in a minute. Okay, I guess I have toyed with you all long enough. In front of each of you is the brown envelope taken from my previously sealed bag. I told you not to look inside the envelope - does everyone agree the contents are still secret?” All nodded yes. “Great... all right, each of you remove the material from your envelope.”
Inside the large brown shipping envelope, they found a manila folder. The outside of this folder had the title:
MISSION: JFK ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT
Removing the contents and placing them on the table, they found a front page of the local newspaper; a copy of a death certificate; a copy of a U.S. Army Certificate for the Award of the Purple Heart including a picture of the front and back of the gold heart shaped medal with a relief of George Washington on front; a picture of a President elected in 2008 captioned, ‘President William Dixon’; a newspaper picture subtitled, ‘Lee Harvey Oswald Applying for Parole’ and the last item was a book entitled the ‘Warren Commission’s Report on the Attempted Assassination of President John F. Kennedy, November 22, 1963’. The Report was dated September 24, 1964.”
“What is the meaning of this Captain? This death certificate has Bud’s name on it - Buddy Edward Scarburg. What is this Captain? I don’t find this at all amusing.” Spoke Krista angrily.
“Krista,” said Captain Scarburg sternly, “it is not supposed to be amusing. Just bare with me and I will explain.”
Before Krista could respond, Bud shouted, “Grandpa, this Purple Heart in the picture has my name engraved on its back. I’ve never even been in the military!”
Gabby announced, “Look at this photograph, it’s caption reads, ‘President William Dixon’, who in the heck is President William Dixon?”
Lou holding up the blue bound copy of the Warren Commission’s Report said, “Grandpa this book says ‘...the Attempted Assassination of President John F. Kennedy.... why is it titled ‘Attempted...’?
Sam Lin was the last to join in, “Captain, what’s this about Oswald trying to get paroled. This newspaper article is only dated a couple of months ago. We all know Jack Ruby murdered Lee Harvey Oswald in the basement of the Dallas Police department on Sunday, November 24, 1963. Oswald has been dead forty-nine years! What gives?”
Gabby stood up, shoved all her material from the envelope toward the center of the table and turned to Captain Scarburg, “Grandpa why did you make up all this false information about the John Kennedy assassination? What was the purpose? What did you want to prove with these fake documents? Oh yeah, now I think I get it! You’re trying to get us to do something! You want us to travel on that blamed Lightening Rod thing, right?”
“Pegasus Gabby, ‘Pegasus’... not ‘Lightening Rod’, please be seated, and I will try to explain. All the items you have lying in front of you have not been faked! At the time I placed the pieces inside the envelopes the various things and the data they contain were indeed real! I did not fabricate anything. If you will remember, those envelopes were in my shoulder bag when I left to go downstairs to the lab. I brought the bag back with me in the same condition, as it was when I left. You saw me break the seal when I returned; however, Gabby is correct, I suppose I AM trying to convince you to do something.”
“Grandpa, please... make some sense,” said Lou.
“Do all of you remember my actions the last few moments before I went downstairs? Remember I took a few pictures?”
“Yeah,” Lou said, “The first one was of the board with your JFK notes and our initials beside the statements we all agreed on; another was just a picture of all of us sitting at this table, and as you were leaving the room you stopped and snapped another photo of the entire room.”
“Well the word “all of us sitting at this table” is incorrect Lou. Krista, please insert a cable to my Iphone then plug it into the projector controls. I will get the lights. Do you all agree I only snapped three photographs? Okay, that is good... everyone agrees. Krista please, hand me the remote control, and I will project the pictures myself.”
Walking to the light switch Captain Scarburg dimmed the lights and Krista inserted the USB cable into the laptop computer controlling the plasma screen. The large, wall size screen in front of the room began to lighten – an image was beginning to form. In a second or two the image filled the screen for all to see. The screen displayed the picture of the Captain’s board sitting on the easel in front of the conference table. The image on the large screen and the writing on the small whiteboard looked, at first glance, to be the same. What was the Captain trying to prove?
‘Wait, something IS wrong with the picture’, Forrest thought. What is it? Look closer. Now he saw it.
“Are you all having difficulty seeing the problem? Okay, let’s try this. Look at the screen then look at the whiteboard on the easel. Look at the easel then look back at the screen. I think then you can see the forest in spite of the trees. The whiteboard being projected onto the screen is the same board you all initialed as having statements that you agreed were correct, the same board that was here on the easel when I walked out a few minutes ago.
“Grandpa”! Forrest yelled... literally yelled. “Grandpa, the list on the easel! It’s not the same as the photo. And look at the photo on the big screen, our initials are right there beside the statements we supposedly agreed on.”
“You are correct Forrest, do all of you see it. Lou arose from his chair and walked to the wall to get a better view. Sam Lin also got up and walked closer. In a moment, they were all huddled in front of the screen.
“Okay, a few minutes ago, as you said, you read and initialed the chart on the screen, you can see your initials after each item. You all initialed all ten items on my whiteboard.”
Not believing their eyes on what they had initialed, each read the ten items slowly anyway:
1. Attempted Assassin - was Lee Harvey Oswald. (Initials)
2. Oswald fired shots from Texas School Book Depository at 12:30 P.M. (Initials)
3. Official records - 3 shots fired. (Initials)
4. President wounded by an assassin at Dealy Plaza, Dallas, Texas. (Initials)
5. President Kennedy received severe bullet wounds to head and back. (Initials)
6. Secret Service Agent Hill wounded. (Initials)
7. Jack Ruby arrested as he entered Dallas police basement. (Initials)
8. Severely injured but after months of recuperation JFK survives. (Initials)
9. Brother Robert Kennedy was JFK’s vice president in 1964. (Initials)
10. John Kennedy re-elected to 2nd term in 1964. (Initials)
“Okay, at the time you read, agreed with and initialed numbers one through ten. Look you can see your initials after each statement. Now look at the same whiteboard on the easel.
Grandpa walked from the end of the conference table over to the whiteboard and flipped the cover sheet over to reveal the notes he had written earlier; however, now the notes were entirely different from before:
1.Assassin - Lee Harvey Oswald.
2.12:30 P.M. shots fired from Texas School Book Depository.
3.Official records - 3 shots.
4.President assassinated by a lone assassin.
5.President Kennedy received a mortal wound to his head and back.
6.Secret Service Agent Hill was not wounded.
7.Jack Ruby killed Oswald in Dallas police basement.
8.President Kennedy died at Parkland Hospital November 22, 1963.
9.Vice president Lyndon Johnson, was sworn in as President on the same date.
10. President Lyndon Johnson re-elected in 1964.
11. Hubert Humphrey elected vice president in 1964.
“All rig
ht, is there anyone that does not agree with the facts I have placed on the board? If so, speak up now.” Everyone was nodding his or her head in the affirmative.
“Let me just summarize - at the time I wrote these items, and you all say this was just a few minutes ago, right...? Right! Okay, Lee Harvey Oswald fired three shots from the Texas School Book Depository building in an attempt to assassinate President Kennedy; he wounded President Kennedy and Secret Agent Hill. Jack Ruby was arrested trying to get into the basement of the Dallas City Jail. John Kennedy was re-elected in 1964 and had his brother Bobby Kennedy as his vice president. These are the items you all agreed on, right? Must be... there are your initials after each statement.”
“I do not know about the others here at the table, but those items on the big screen are not the ones I agreed on, I didn’t okay them Grandpa. Those are not true facts. Why would I initial something I understand to be historically inaccurate?” Stammering Gabby continued, “The statements listed on the small whiteboard sitting on the easel are correct. I don’t understand why my initials are on the incorrect items on the screen.” Bewildered see added, “My initials should be on the whiteboard sitting right there on your easel. Somehow Grandpa you faked the whiteboard photograph that is being projected on the screen,” exclaimed Gabby.
All those sitting around the table nodded their heads in agreement with Gabby’s statement. “That’s right!”, someone at the table commented, “Somehow, Grandpa, you faked that picture.”
“The picture has not been touched - it is not a fake. Neither is the whiteboard here on the easel. I’ll now show my second picture.”
The scene of the whiteboard on the screen suddenly changed to a group picture of everyone sitting at the conference table.
Forrest was the first to speak, “It’s just us Grandpa. I don’t see anything unusual about the picture. What are we supposed to be looking for?”
“Look closer Forrest.”
He strained trying to see something out of the ordinary when it hit him. “Ooooh... mmmmy... ggggoodness,” he could barely get the words out of his mouth.
“What? What? Gabby cried out. “What do you see Forrest?”
“Gabby, it’s not what I see, it’s what I don’t see!!”
“Doggone it Forrest, you’re as bad as Grandpa. What do you NOT see?”
“Bud! I don’t see Bud! Bud you are not in the picture.”
Olive Marie replied, “Yes he is... he’s got to be... he was sitting next me the whole time! Right here on my right. He... ”
“You’re correct Lou, I’ve been here all the time except my trip to the restroom.”
As they all viewed the scene at the table, Bud was nowhere to be seen. All they could see was an empty seat between Lou and Olive Marie. “How did you do that trick Grandpa? That’s a good one.”
“Is this the photo I snapped right before leaving the room?”
“No!! It can’t be, Grandpa, Bud is not in the picture. That was taken at a different meeting, and you switched photos... somehow.”
“What time did I leave? Does anyone recall?”
“Yes, I do Captain,” said Spook. “You took the last photo and left the room a few minutes past two o’clock.”
“That is about right Spook. What was the date?”
“Captain? Are you serious? The date? Okay, the date was today, Tuesday the 20th of November 2012.”
“Does everyone agree?” All heads were again nodding in agreement. “Okay, I’m going to enlarge the calendar clock in the photo. The one over in the corner of this room.” All eyes immediately shifted toward the corner and back at the photo on the screen, then they stared intently at the tiny clock image in the picture - Grandpa pointed the computer cursor, clicked, and the clock began to enlarge... bigger... bigger...
“Forget everything I just said. Forget it... forget it... wash my mouth out with soap Grandpa... I’ll never doubt anything you ever say again. Just look...! Just look...!” Gasped Gabby.
She and the rest of the group stared intently at the photo of the clock. The whole room was shocked, as the clock began to get large enough to read the time and date. They were startled by its revelation.
The time on the clock read 2:05 and the date was... was... Monday the 19th of November 2012!!
“See it is no trick, Bud you are not in the picture, and the picture was taken yesterday!! Gabby, I thought you said I was only gone about five minutes! If you all will return to your seats, I am going to explain what you are seeing, or in this case - not seeing. I realize it is going to seem strange, but just remember one thing: I am not making this up, it actually happened.”
“Grandpa, this is freaking me out. You are not making any sense.”
“As you sat here, in your minds, just a few minutes ago, we talked about the assassination of President Kennedy - sorry, but we talked about the attempted assassination of President Kennedy. Let me explain.
“Friday I had a surprise visit from our old friend Anhur. Yeah, you are right Bud I can see you, Forrest and Olive Marie grinning. He saved you from an airplane crash on your trip to Mexico City. He interfered in an event that would have caused the death of many people. Because of his interference in our future, people on our planet were allowed to live that should have died. That possibly could have included you three.
For his unselfish act, Anhur was sentenced to death back on his home planet of Sunev. His Supreme Council did not carry out the death sentence instead they gave him another chance to redeem himself and live. To do so, however, he had to undo another interference he had caused many years earlier. Forty-nine years to be exact. Anhur is a terrific Lilliputian, but he just cannot keep his fingers, all eight of them, out of Earth’s business.
“That brings us to the topic of our meeting today - when Anhur visited he told me a most unusual story. A story about Parallel Universes and how our ‘Time-machine’, ‘Timerider’, ‘Lightening Rod’, ‘Pegasus’ or whatever we wish to call it can bridge the gap between our current time dimension and another. We can actually travel from one Parallel Universe to another Parallel Universe. Even Einstein had his e equal mc square theory of relativity. He believed time wasn’t a straight line. His equations prove time travel is theoretically possible. Well until now his theory implied it was mathematically probable, but most scientists agree it was also impossible. I have now proven not only is it probable, but also it is, in fact, possible.
“I have an admission to make: Gabby, you were wrong - that ‘dadgum’ machine really does work.”
Almost in unison, the group emitted a questionable, “What? How do you know?”
“When I left the room you thought I was gone for just a few minutes. I was gone more than a few minutes - I was gone nearly three days!”
“What! What are you trying to tell us? Grandpa you’re talking out of your head!” said Gabby.
“Gabby, at the beginning of this meeting, I outlined on my board the situation with the attempted shooting of President John F. Kennedy. Yes, I said ‘attempted’. You see, when you walked into this meeting yesterday morning, we were all living in an Alternate Universe. Anhur and his people called it Parallel Universe B or ParUn B. I get the idea you are saying, ‘Captain, have you lost it?’ Well let’s take a look at all those items lying on the table in front of you, and I will try, using them, further to explain this Parallel Universe paradox.
“You all witnessed Lou, Sam Lin and Si Lei as they had sealed my shoulder bag before I left to go downstairs, and they inspected and determined the seal had not been tampered with when I returned. On my return, I broke the seal and gave each of you an envelope containing some strange items. Let me make one statement: this bag was in my possession when I left you all, traversed the Parallel Universes with me, and I personally brought it back along with all the items inside. As I previously said these items are real also and have not been faked. They were representations of real events, items and people at the time I put them into the bag. Any of you, if you had so desir
ed, could have assembled a package matching the ones lying before you, with no trouble at all. Two caveats – you would have had to assemble the items before I went down to the laboratory but today it would be impossible! I’ll explain.”
“Lou, Sam Lin and Si Lei sealed all of those items, from your brown envelopes, in my shoulder bag before I left this room. Isn’t this right? Yeah, I see you all agreeing. When I left this room we were all in a Parallel Universe we all knew and at the time was correct. I left that Universe of yesterday and returned to our Universe of today. They are not the same; although, you did not recognize the change. My duffle bag and I left one Universe and my bag and I came back in another Universe. I perceive this is hard to grasp, but remember I cut the seal in front of you all just to prove I had not altered anything in my bag.
“Now let’s take a closer look at the items from my bag - first is the Washington Herald newspaper. Check out the date - it is November 10, 2012 and then the headline: “PRESIDENT DIXON MEETS WITH HUSSEIN.” Who is President Dixon you have already asked? And you all know Saddam Hussein was executed December 30, 2006. Notice the article describing the forty-ninth anniversary party celebrating the survival of Presidential Kennedy in the assassination attempt on November 22, 1963. To commemorate that event, the Kennedys were planning a grandiose party at Hyannis Port, Massachusetts.
“The other newspaper article dated August 15, 2012, attests to the fact the seventy-four year old Lee Harvey Oswald was trying to seek a parole from prison. How can this be true you say? We all have knowledge that Jack Ruby killed Oswald in the basement of the Dallas City Jail Sunday the 24th of November 1963, two days after Oswald killed JFK. How is he now alive and seeking a parole in 2012?
“The next item - the thick blue book - was the final output of a congressionally ordered commission that investigated the ‘attempted’ Presidential assassination. Notice it is dated September 24, 1964.
“I saved some of the best for last... in our alternative universe, which began when Presidential Kennedy was almost killed, a war slowly evolved in Southeast Asia. Yes, you are familiar with Vietnam, and understand that war officially ended August 15, 1973. The other war, in the Parallel Universe, had its beginning as the Vietnam War. The Russians gradually got more and more entangled in the fighting. The Chinese did not want to be left behind, so they got mixed up in it too. It quickly outspread the borders of Vietnam and eventually involved all of South East Asia.
“It became known as the Viruchi War, VIetnam - RUssia - CHIna.
“Finally the escalation ended with the Russians sending a Tomahawk type missile streaking over South Vietnam, launched from a submarine offshore in the South China Sea. This nuclear missile nuked Saigon on Independence Day July 4, 1982. A few minutes later our military reduced Moscow and roughly seven million Russian people to dust. The vast empty steppe on the Moskva River, once the capital of the old USSR, would be uninhabitable for the next thousand years thanks to America’s modern military firepower. Counting both the two atomic explosions millions upon millions of lives were killed, maimed or otherwise rendered useless. Millions more died of hunger, disease or radiation poisoning in the ten years following those final attempts with men trying to settle their arguments using big boy toys. All sides finally saw the futility of continuing this war, so on July 4, 1984, exactly two years to the day after Saigon and Moscow had been vaporized, a peace treaty was signed.
“Less than seven years later the U.S. was embroiled in yet another war, this time with Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Syria and a couple of other smaller nations. This was the Southwest Asian War. This war killed millions of people too. It lasted from 1991 until 2008. You, unfortunately, were one of the casualties Bud. You had been in the National Guard, and your unit was activated and deployed to the Middle East. Later, while your unit was fighting in Iraq, you fatally succumbed in one of Saddam Hussein’s poison gas attacks.
“Bud, the Purple Heart Award and the Death Certificate - both, from that Parallel Universe, sadly I have to say were truly yours. Bud you cannot believe how devastated we were when the Army Chaplin personally delivered the news of your death to Trey and Krista.”
Krista spoke up, “Captain, wait! I don’t remember any of this - I never saw an Army Chaplin. Bud killed! I definitely would have remembered something as devastating as that!”
“You’re correct Krissy - you have no memory or knowledge of this other Universe, just like you have no memory of hundreds or maybe thousands of other Universes you may be in at this very moment.”
“Captain,” said Krista, “this is all so confusing it sounds like science fiction.”
“When Anhur approached me yesterday, he allowed me to use an alien device, they call the Visiondome, to see what our world would be like if President Kennedy had not survived the assassination in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, Texas on November 22, 1963.
“In this Alternate Universe world that I was shown there was no Viruchi War, no Southwest Asian War. Without this war, Bud you did not have to die... this alone convinced me to try Pegasus myself for the fourth time. Even if I never returned, I had to try to change our future. I had to insure President John F. Kennedy WAS assassinated at 12:30 p.m. on November 22, 1963, AND I DID!!!
“I left this meeting with you all, carried my duffle bag and camera downstairs to the lab. At exactly 2:30:00 I dematerialized from the Universe of yesterday and materialized forty-nine years earlier to attempt to change our Universe onto a different Universal path.
Anhur had informed me the split in the Universe must occur at exactly 12:30 p.m. November 22, 1963 at Dealy Plaza, Dallas, Texas. The trigger was the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. I will tell you now it worked. I left from one Universe and returned one day later to an entirely new world – the world we are living in today.
Gabby the change in the Universes explains why the items in my bag seem so strange. Those items of yesterday represent a Universe where President Kennedy was only wounded, the Universe of today is a world in which he died, but remember, I kept my bag with me the entire time I was gone so the items in my duffle would not have changed. They would be the same today as they were yesterday. As I crossed between the two Universes, the duffle bag and its contents crossed with me.”
Gabby spoke again, “Grandpa, I hear the words coming out of your mouth, and I have never heard you tell us a deliberate lie, but Grandpa you sure are stretching the truth with all of this. I’m still not convinced you left us in that Lightening Bug thing from one world and then returned in the present world we now live in. This is all very, VERY confusing to me.”
“Bolt! Gabby, not ‘Bug’. Okay,” Grandpa said clicking his remote control. “Take a look at this picture on the screen. The one I took after walking across this room, but before I opened the door to go downstairs.”
Instantly the screen on the front wall was covered with a scene of the group sitting around the table staring at Captain Scarburg taking their picture.
“Gabby, look at this picture - you all are sitting at the conference table – notice again the seat between Lou and Olive Marie is empty!! Don’t you see Gabby? Bud was not present when I left!!
Gabby said. “But no, wait a minute Grandpa! Bud got up and went to the restroom.”
“You’re right granddaughter, but AFTER I left. He should have been at the table WHEN I left.”
Gabby, shaking her head said, “Grandpa, I said a while ago I believed everything you said. I now want to put an asterisk beside that statement. I now believe I grasp what you are doing, you are trying to get us to go to Dallas, and I’m totally against it. I bought into the whiteboard changey thing, and I was blown away with the props concerning the Army’s award of the Purple Heart and Bud playing the missing man game and all that other stuff from the brown envelope. Even that last picture with Bud’s empty chair between Lou and Olive Marie was ingenious, still can’t figure out how you pulled it off, but it was real good. I’ll give you credit for that Grandpa.
“
Now this talk of you going back to Texas, I just cannot buy all of that. You were only gone less than thirty minutes - yet you say three days?
Yeah, right!!
You’re trying to gently lay the suggestion on our subconscious minds how exciting a mission would be if we went to Dallas ourselves. I emphasis the word ‘would’ - you are just telling us a make-believe story and inserting yourself in as the main character, so we will imagine the thrill and excitement of such an adventure. Just like I said earlier, you’re trying to make us do something. You think we will beg to be thrown on that ‘time-traveling’ pie in the sky, pipe dream, hunk of junk. Oh, I’m sorry – your Pegasus flying machine thing-a-ma-jig. Tell me Grandpa that I’m wrong.”
“Gabby, I... I...”
“See, I told you, it is all a fictitious story, right?”
“Krista, load up the rest of my pictures and tell me when they are loaded.”
“Hold on Grandpa, I thought you only took three pictures.”
“Your correct Gabby – three pictures – up HERE in the conference room. Let me begin the slide show from the time I went downstairs.
“Grandpa, I have been sitting here listening to all you have said, and don’t get me wrong some of it makes sense, but a lot of it is foggy. I can’t grasp this Parallel Universe thing yet. Daddy, Bud, Lou, Sam Lin, Spook, Tinker and Lei Li you are all scientists, so this probably makes sense to you all. Mom, I guess you and Dad have been working around these crazy people long enough that it probably makes sense to you too. You admit I only have an Anthropology degree, so you understand this is not my forte. Grandpa just tell me in simple words, plain English, what do you want us to do?”
“Thought you would never ask - for the few minutes, to you, I was gone, I experienced almost three days of the most unimaginable adventure.” Pushing the button to the projector’s remote control, the Captain said, “This is the first picture after I left you guys as I was being ‘launched’ from our lab in Pegasus.” He then went into detail of his ‘launch’. “I snapped this one looking out the porthole in the laboratory,” he explained. He went on to tell how he had taken the next two shots of the cow pasture in Texas after his landing. He had to point out how Pegasus landed in a pasture about forty miles north of Dallas, outside the town of Celina. He went into detail describing the couple of problems he had, “to begin with,” he said, “I landed, tilted at about a thirty-degree angle, on a tree stump, and, oh, did I fail to mention it was on the wrong day! I was supposed to arrive at 12:30 on Friday November 22, 1963; however, I plopped down in that pasture on Wednesday the 20th, two days early.” Captain Scarburg then explained what he saw in and around the cow pasture.
“Oh, almost forgot I took this one,” he said switching to picture number four on the screen. “This is a shot of the farmhouse where I got the red shirt and the blue overalls; the very clothes I was later arrested for stealing.” Pulling the shirt and overalls from the bag he held them up for all to see.
“Pictures five, this one, and now picture six were taken going into Clem and Penelope’s home they call the ‘Ponderosa’. I snapped both of these from their driveway. Clem and Penelope were the nicest people. He was a handyman and part-time limo driver, and Penelope was an every-now-and-then waitress. Admirable folks, yes, admirable people I tell you.
“I had to have transportation to get from Celina, Texas to Dallas. As you can see in picture seven, we used Clem’s Nash station wagon. Here, we are getting ready to back it out of Clem’s shed. See this is a shot of the back of Clem’s grey car parked in the shed.
“Clem and I drove into Dallas, Thursday morning on November 21, 1963 and went straight to Jack Ruby’s Carousel Club. Here is my picture number eight, a view of the outside steps of the Carousel Club before we went inside.
“The next pictures were taken inside Ruby’s club. Notice the guy with the brown fedora hat sitting with his back to the wall, that’s Jack Ruby. The other pictures are all Mafia bosses.” Captain Scarburg explained the subterfuge he had to use to get these snapshots. And he detailed how he was arrested for stealing the shirt and overalls, and carried to the Dallas City Jail just a couple of minutes after those pictures were taken.
For the next half hour, or so, the Captain painted a word picture of his stay in Dallas’s Finest – their city jail; he told the group how he left the message for J.D. Tippit on the cell wall; how concerned he was Clem was not going to arrive to get him out of jail in time to meet his 12:30 rendezvous on the Texas School Book Depository roof with the presidential assassin.
“Clem bailed me out of the Dallas City Jail just minutes before the 12:30 assassination. This next snapshot was taken as I looked north toward the School Book building. It was taken from the sidewalk as I walked out onto Houston Street from the jail. If you look at the picture closely, I believe you can faintly see someone already in the sixth floor sniper’s window. I’m going to give this photo to our lab and see if they might be able to enhance it enough to see who is there. It might be possible they could enlarge the image so we could identify that person. Look down to the far end of the roof and you can just barely get a glimpse of another assassin. He was my target.” He proceeded to detail the movement he and Clem made from his release from jail to his encounter with the man on the roof.
“I was on the rooftop of the Texas School Book Depository the exact second President John F. Kennedy was shot. I was extremely fortunate to disrupt one of the snipers.
“This next photo is a snapshot of that very same sniper. I took it standing on the fire escape a second or two before I charged the assassin. I hit him just as he fired his rifle.
“As he and I were tumbling on the roof, I distinctly heard a shot coming from the vicinity of the sixth floor, one floor beneath me and back toward the east end of the building. My assassin jumped to his feet and fled down the fire escape. He only fired one un-aimed shot. As he was escaping, I hurried to the four-foot wall surrounding the top of the School Book building and gazed down on the macabre scene that was taking place below me. I’m ashamed to admit, I was totally enthralled. I was in a state of mind even I cannot describe: I was watching history unfolding in front of my very eyes.
“I saw the President the moment the bullet struck him in the back, I saw Secret Service Agent Hill jump on the trunk. This photo I snapped from the roof, looking down on President Kennedy’s black limousine just as the second sniper shot was being fired.
“Here, is the most startling thing I saw. Maybe saw is not the right word, I heard a shot coming from the vicinity of the Grassy Knoll - it was not a rifle shot. It sounded more like a high-powered handgun. I tried to see the assassin, but I was running out of time and had to get off the roof before being caught. This picture I took of the grassy area, which is now referred to as the Grassy Knoll. I snapped it from the rooftop before running to escape. This photo was taken just a second or two after the shot was fired from the Grassy Knoll. I got a picture of the assassin running away from the wooded area.”
“Wait a minute,” Spook loudly interjected, “Can you enlarge that figure - that looks like a WOMAN!!”
Suddenly the room grew silent - you could have heard a pin drop as the Captain spoke, “Let me say, yes, this person I saw running away from that area was a WOMAN! And for some reason I think I have seen this woman before.
“What? What are you saying Captain that one of the assassins was a WOMAN? And you have seen her before?”
“Yes, Spook, it was a woman, and I really do believe I have seen her. This photo is presently in our lab to be enlarged and also enhanced. Once they have obtained a clear image of the assassins face they will run it through the facial recognition software. We must find out who she is. She is the first person, besides Oswald that has ever been directly linked to the Kennedy assassination. Anyway, let me continue.”
After the flurry of talk about the astounding revelation of the fleeing lady assassin from the Grassy Knoll, the Captain had a hard time returning to his description of
his Texas adventure. He managed to quieten the group and continued explaining how he had hurried down the fire escape and jumped into his get-away car. “Oh, yeah,” the Captain said laughing, “I waved and called out to Anhur as we sped away.”
“What?” One of them said, “You saw Anhur? He was there?”
“I sure did. Anhur was standing on the north side of Elm Street with a large black umbrella. He recognized me, and as you can see in this next photo, I took a fairly decent picture of him also. What do you think?”
“Doggone Grandpa, you sure are leaving out a lot of details - like who was driving your get-away car?”
“It was Clem... Clem Ruby was driving the car Gabby. Did I mention I met his uncle Jack Ruby in person? Actually I shook hands with Jack. Seemed like a pleasant enough fellow, but there is so much work still needing to be done in the Kennedy Assassination.
Captain Scarburg began with Lee Harvey Oswald mentioning he certainly didn’t work along. He related how he personally saw or heard, at least, three shooters in Dealey Plaza; the one on the roof; the one in the bushes and the one firing the shot from the sixth floor, which may or may not have been Lee Harvey Oswald. He insinuated it was possible the shot could have come from the Dal-Tex Building across the street. From his position on the roof, if was hard to tell where the shots came from.
He speculated Jack Ruby was more involved in the assassination than just the murder of Oswald. There was a lot of information the Warren Commission never uncovered, or didn’t want to discover. The Thursday before President Kennedy was killed the Captain was in Jack Ruby’s place. There were guys sitting at a table. He had taken pictures of them talking with Ruby. They were Cosa Nostra or Mafia. The Captain told the group the mobsters all had been identified. He then pulled the pink napkin from his pocket with their names. “Now we need to find out what their association was with Jack Ruby and the assassination of President Kennedy. As I mentioned earlier, I was arrested in Ruby’s Carousel Club and booked into the Dallas City Jail. I literally was placed in the same cell, which would later hold Lee Harvey Oswald. Guess who was my jailer? No, no more guessing I’ll just tell you... Officer J. D. Tippit. J. D. Tippit the very same policemen Lee Harvey Oswald supposedly killed as he was escaping from the Presidential assassination.”
“Grandpa, did you meet Lee Harvey Oswald?”
“No, never did – really did not have enough time, but I though I heard his rifle being fired. Let me rephrase, I heard the noise from a rifle being fired - I have no concrete proof it was Lee Harvey Oswald or not.”
“I am now making a request - lets all go back to Dallas and find out what really happened. I used the term ALL loosely. Spook, you and Tinker, should stay here and maintain a constant link with the Dallas team. Krista you need to stay too for administrative purposes. We will need your help here in the SCAR facility, and Olive Marie you must stay behind also. Trey you need to stay and run everything.”
“But Grandpa!! I can help on the Dallas trip too!” Moaned Olive Marie.
“I realize you can, but honey, we will be in and out of some sleazy places, and these could include bars and lounges. In Texas, you have to be twenty-one to get in those places, and you were just of age your last birthday. I believe you are just too young to be going in some of the dives in Dallas. Sorry, but you can be more useful here. Hope you understand.”
“Okay,” she said sadly, “Grandpa I’m sure you know best.”
Captain Scarburg continued to explain how they would travel back to 1963 Dallas in Pegasus, which he reiterated he had now proven was safe. Safe if the computers are programmed correctly. One other thing he mentioned.... this information was for their ears only. He stressed it could not leave the conference room. He cautioned them that someone had deliberately sabotaged the instrument settings before he left. He landed on the wrong day and forty miles from his destination point. Again he warned, with the wrong numbers, they could land on the right day forty years or four hundred years from the destination date and might never get back to the present!
Tinker had been sitting there silently through all this talk, but with the hint of a saboteur among SCAR’s personnel, that got her attention. “Captain, do you have any idea whom this saboteur is?”
The Captain responded that he had a fairly good idea whom it was and explained he had called this meeting with all of them that morning to reach an ultimate decision on the Dallas mission, and in doing so they could flush out the saboteur.
He wanted to send some of the SCAR personnel back to 1963 and look into the Kennedy Assassination case once and for all. There were a number of questions they must find the answers to. Things like: exactly how many assassins were involved? Who were they? What was the connection between Jack Ruby and Lee Harvey Oswald? Who was Oswald? Who was Officer Tippit? Why did Oswald murder him, or did he? Did the CIA have a clandestine finger in the pie? What was the Mafia’s connection? Was Lyndon Johnson involved? Why were so many of Kennedy’s medical records ‘lost’? There are these questions and others, but the Captain believed he had made his point - a lot of questions need to be answered. Questions the country needed, no, deserved to have answered. And only SCAR and their ‘special’ equipment would be able to discern these answers.
He then announced he wanted to put the plan to time-travel back to the Dallas of 1963 and he wanted a vote, a secret vote. He did not want anyone ostracized for his or her vote. And he wanted everyone to vote, even those who were not actually going to Dallas. It concerned them all.
“In front of each of you is a pen and a note pad - just write ‘yes’ or ‘no’ on the pad and drop it into my hat as I pass it around the table. Vote your conscious, if you believe we should go write ‘YES’ if not write ‘NO’. No one will have knowledge of your vote. Any questions? Okay... good... vote!”
The Captain’s hat passed from hand to hand around the table as it reached Gabby she, using only her thumb and forefinger, gingerly dropped her scrap of paper with her vote into the old, brown, sweat stained, tattered cowboy hat, with the lone comment, “Ugh!”
“Gabby that old, brown, tattered cowboy hat may be sweat stained, begrimed and tattered but I would not take a million dollars for it right now! You do not comprehend how much the man that gave it to me valued it! The hat continued around the table back to Grandpa at the head chair. He reached into the hat and pulled out the slips of paper one by one... ‘yes’, ‘yes’, ‘yes’, ‘yes’, ‘yes’, ‘yes’, ‘yes’, ‘yes’. “Well that’s all the votes - the voted are unanimous - yes.
“WE ARE GOING TO DALLAS!!!”