Without feeling any whirling sensation his surrounding changed. His clothes were stripped off, gently, but quickly. Other clothes fell around him. These were more tight, regular pants, boots, a slim belt, a tight jacket, a leather coat, and a hat. He couldn't see, but he felt the difference in the air, the different sounds, smells, and different ground under his feet. He opened his eyes.

He was in a forest, a temperate climate. It was warm though, early-summer he expected. He heard bird songs, crickets, and the sound of a lot of engines running. His new clothes were too warm for him. He looked at them and grabbed them in shock. He inspected them more closely. This was a nazi uniform.

He checked his shoulder underneath the coat, if he recalled correctly from history class the insignia told him it was a uniform of a captain. A Hauptmann. He also sported the Iron Cross medal and some stripes above his breast pocket.

He shuddered. Well, at least it wasn't an SS uniform. He knew he had these clothes on for a reason, but if it was SS he was inclined to take them off regardless. He took off the hat and inspected it. Nope, definitely not SS.

He straightened the uniform and decided to move towards the commotion.

As he expected he saw Wehrmacht soldiers and officers gathered around a dirt road, with a lot of trucks, tanks, and tents filling up the space between the trees. Some soldiers were playing cards, smoking cigarettes, or drinking coffee as they exchanged jokes. Some were hard at work, with shovels, with paperwork, with carrying supplies around. All soldiers gave the Hitler salute when he passed them. He returned them occasionally, with his upper arm against his body though, embarrassed every time he did it. Why was he here?

A lieutenant he passed gave a nod and indicated he wanted to say something, John stopped walking, trying not to look frightened.

"Hauptmann. Haben sie die ankunfstzeit des Fuhrers?" He asked. John couldn't help but be startled. He asked if he knew when the Fuhrer would arrive. Hitler himself. John coughed, shook his head, and moved on. His German was not bad, but he surely had an accent. Better not to speak.

He decided to move to the edge of the tents and trucks, a private place so nobody would address him again. He sighed.

So, Hitler was coming. John was tempted, tempted more than anybody who had thought about time travel. In fact, it was a big question he and his team had studied heavily ever since they found the possibilities of the machine. They needed to answer the question for themselves first, elaborately, detailed. If the machine worked, people would ask it, of course. Press, financers, colleagues, etc. The question was; If you could go back in time, would you kill Hitler?

The answer was not easy, almost as hard to understand as the question really. With the way the machine worked, the question was actually quite complicated. You didn't know when you would arrive, didn't know if you would be coming back, you simply didn't know if somehow your actions would influence whether or not you actually were able to return. John certainly did know now, now he knew what the machine was about, what his purpose was. This made the answer easier of course. John was not here to do anything, not to interfere. Anyone else, they would certainly try.

Anyway, the bottom line was paradoxes. Paradoxes, essentially, didn't exist. This is paradoxical on its own of course, but it was true. You can't do what you can't do. So, there is no changing history. The problem that then arises of course is the question of free will. Because, if you could go back, and you want to kill Hitler, why couldn't you?

John and his team usually lost their audience at that point. A lot of times they lost each other in the words too.

The bottom line was no matter what you call it, destiny, fate, or divine intervention, the past is set, and you are only visiting. They are ghosts, a film reel in replay mode. You can't influence it, you can't change it. All it can give you is the truth. That was John's experience right now, the first person to actually go to the past. And he doesn't, he doesn't change it. He couldn't even if he had wanted to. But the 'couldn't' is not as important as the 'doesn't', the 'doesn't' supersedes the 'couldn't'. The word 'could' implies a choice, whilst 'does', is set. There are powers at work no mortal could defy, his mind was set by the highest of powers. He won't, he can't, he therefore hasn't. So, the question becomes moot. In a linear timeline, nobody has changed the past, nobody can change the past, and nothing will ever change the past, period.

The future, now that is a whole different chapter. But John had not arrived there yet.

Still, as he checked his uniform earlier he noticed he was carrying a pistol. Now, he took it out of the holster, it was a Luger P08. It was loaded too. So tempting. He looked at it for a while. Then he sighed.

"Darn you, quantum physics." He said softly and holstered the pistol.

He heard a commotion behind him. As he walked back he saw soldiers walking towards one location en masse. Suppose it was happening.

In the distance, John could hear cars coming. He walked past the German soldiers, a lot of very young faces John noticed. As he walked past some vehicles he identified many of the tanks standing along the road. Mostly the Panzer III, he saw the Hetzer tank destroyers, and quite a lot of Panzer IVs, which meant it was probably around 1941. John wondered if this was on the eve of Operation Barbarossa.

The soldiers were forming a line along the dirt road as a column of vehicles passed. Eventually, John saw a red car, open top, nazi flags sticking out above the headlights at the front and a large reserve wheel on the side. Standing in the middle, wearing a brown uniform, was Adolf Hitler. He was holding on to the seats with both hands but occasionally let go and gave the salute, which was returned quickly and firmly. The men around him chanted "Sieg Heil, Sieg Heil."

John shivered. They were ready for war, Hitler was why they went to war. They were close to the biggest invasion in human history.

So many lives lost, so much suffering, blood, and horror. John had to make sure not to cry, or he might be noticed. Although, they might think he was crying after seeing Hitler in person. John let a tear fall down his cheek. These young soldiers, and their future opponents, deserved it. Not him though, John kept his eye on Hitler. He didn't show any sign of fatigue or bad health. Not yet though, John knew he was doped up on methamphetamine already by this time.

People get the notion, even when he was still in school that Germany did well in the war, up until Barbarossa and that it only went downhill after that. But this was not so, they, the nazis, just got extremely lucky in the first 2 years of the war.

But nothing went the way they had planned. The war, for starters. The western allies' opposition, whilst the nazis were convinced the democracies would be too weak to oppose them, that they would delay, debate amongst themselves, and try to compromise. Instead, they had been fighting the moment they entered Poland, and still were, and would be for another 4 years.

Madness.

As the car passed, John didn't salute, nobody noticed. He watched the car move on, as the entire column passed the men moved up the road, trying to look over each other's shoulders. Some were cheering and throwing their hats in the air. As John followed one of the thrown hats into the air he noticed a light in the sky. He kept looking at it as it got bigger, brighter, closer. It was a star, it was overwhelming him again and all went white. He didn't close his eyes this time, even when the liquid returned and submerged him. He knew what that light was now.