Chapter 1

I'm not really sure what happened. The night before, I had fallen asleep, watching a rebroadcast of one of my Sunday morning news shows. It was October 2008 and I was staying overnight in a hotel in North Carolina, having just finished a meeting with a tech company that my company did consulting for.

The next morning I found myself in the same town, but it was October 1995. And there were other differences too. Very significant ones.

I knew something was wrong when the media/internet center in my suite had been replaced by a TV that looked like it was from the 1950's. At first I thought I was dreaming, and turned it on. It took a few minutes to warm up, and when it did, a newscaster was talking about the recent round of economic talks with the United States of America.

I looked out the window and was further shocked. The hotel I was staying at was in a suburb of Charlotte. It was early morning and in the middle of the week, so I was expecting to see a growing amount of traffic heading to work. There was traffic all right, but the few cars there were, looked like they were from the 1950's as well. And there was something off about the cars. There were also a couple of buses, which also looked to be a bit off. I heard a humming from above, and you could imagine my surprise when I saw an airship above! An actual dirigible! I could see a few more in the distance.

I started digging around the room, trying to figure out what kind of dream this was. There was an open letter on the desk, addressed to me. I started reading it and found it was from the law firm of Thompson & Smith, based in Charlotte, North Carolina. The letter advised me I had inherited an estate from my late Uncle William (odd since, to the best of my knowledge, I didn't have an Uncle William), which included seventeen registered Indentures. The letter invited me to stay as a guest at the Wilson Hotel (I had gone to sleep in a Holiday Inn Express) at the firm's expense, as it would take a week or so to settle things.

I sat down in a chair, trying to figure out what kind of weird dream this was. As I looked around, I had to come to the conclusion that I had either had a psychotic breakdown, or had somehow found myself ... well, somewhere other than where I went to asleep at.

I had my answer after two weeks of going to the local library and watching the news.

Somehow, I had found myself in a world where the Confederate States of America hadn't lost the Civil War.

Fortunately, I had two weeks of paid self-study before I had to fit into this brave new world.

The suburb I was in was still a separate small town, as the city of Charlotte had not yet spread to the point of encompassing the small towns around it. I don't know if I replaced the 'me' in this world (and he was having to learn how to survive in my 'old' world), or if this universe somehow accommodated my presence. Whatever the answer was, I had a wallet full of identification and cash, including a 'steamer' license from the state of Virginia with a black and white picture of me. The information was correct, including my birth date. The other cards, including one identifying me as a professor of applied physics and advance technology at Roanoke College ... well, it appeared I had pursued a more academic career in this reality.

But I digress. The law firm had written a letter that stated I was to be their guest at the hotel I was staying at until they had certain matters secured. Until then, my time was my own, and it appeared from other documentation I had in my luggage that I was on a sabbatical from Roanoke College for the time being.

So I spent that two weeks going to the library, watching television and listening to the radio.

It was an interesting world I had found myself in.

One of the big differences is there had never been a world war of any type in this reality. All this world's wars had been regional. And then there had been no major direct confrontations between the major powers. Think "the great game" that had been waged between Russian and England on the Indian subcontinent, and you'll have an idea about how things worked. For the most part, though, the world was divided into areas of influence, with an alliance between England, the C.S.A. and Japan pretty much calling the shots across the globe. Not that there weren't tensions. Agents of the German Empire and the Russians were active all across the globe, and of course there were always local insurgencies, but for the most part the world continued on under the paternalism of the three major powers.

Of course, the lack of major conflicts after the American Civil War had created a certain amount of technological stagnation. Transistors were just starting to replace vacuum tubes. And this world had taken a greener turn, which was evident by the predominance of public transit even in a small town of this size, as well as the fact that automobiles ran on electricity and steam, rather than gasoline.

Lest you think that this world was a new Paradise, slavery still existed in the Confederacy, albeit in a sanitized and institutionalized form. The Confederacy still had racial purity laws that kept track of the the percentage of 'black blood' in each citizen, similar to those that the state of Louisiana had in my world well into the latter portion of the twentieth century.

And black 'citizens' of the Confederacy were restricted to a single name, and often economically 'indentured' to a property, although there was a thriving black middle class in many small towns. If you're wondering why black citizens of the Confederacy just didn't move elsewhere, it was because the options facing them were less than ideal. The northern provinces of the Mexican Empire had been brought into the Confederacy proper, allowing the C.S.A. access to the Pacific Ocean. The rest of Mexico, as well as the nations of the Caribbean, fell under the sway of the C.S.A.

In the second world country that was now the United States, blacks were held responsible for the downfall of the United States. Even more than a hundred years later, the hatred toward blacks in the US actually caused some blacks to seek sanctuary in the C.S.A. And no Commonwealth country was going to provide harbor for blacks fleeing from one the three great powers.

Again, though, I'm digressing. Suffice it to say that blacks might have had more rights one hundred thirty years after the Civil War than before it, but they were still second-class citizens, often subjected to the whims and laws of the white citizens of the C.S.A.

So it was two weeks later that I was listening to a Sinatra style-ballad sung by a man who had been a minor actor in my old world, when I was contacted by the law firm that was representing my late uncle's estate. When I walked into the office, I was directed to the office of the lawyer handling my uncle's estate, one Michael C. Hall. If the name sounds familiar, it should. In my old world, Michael Hall had been an actor who had starred in "Six Feet Under" and "Dexter."

OK, I know I'm getting off track again, but that was the weird thing about this world. Actors like Michael Hall would be normal people in this world, and people I knew in my old world were major stars. A guy that was in my garage band in high school was a major action film star. Hollywood wasn't in Hollywood, however. London was still the center of the world, although Nashville was becoming an avant garde music center. New Orleans was still New Orleans, though, but even more so, with elements of Las Vegas and Disneyland thrown in. People came from all over the world to party in New Orleans, especially between Christmas and Ash Wednesday. But let me get back on track.

Mr. Hall (he was very formal, insisting on calling me Mr. Johnson, rather than Ben or even Benjamin) brought me into his office, insisting on serving me coffee and taking a few moments for 'small talk' before getting down to business.

My late uncle had a small but active investment firm, and had significant shares in companies not only in the C.S.A., but throughout the world. He had a very healthy checking and savings account, as well as a very chique house in a gated community just north of Charlotte.

He also had left me seventeen 'indentured black citizens.'

Theoretically, indentured black citizens 'voluntarily' indentured themselves to a property in exchange for room, board and a small stipend, and could leave said property anytime they wanted. In actuality, they could only leave a property if they had secured employment elsewhere. Then the property owner had to voluntarily allow the indentured servant to leave the property. If the property owner refused to do so, the indentured servant could appeal to the local magistrate. Usually, though, the magistrate, if not a good friend with the indentured servant's 'employer', at the very least moved in the same social circles as said 'employer.' There were other avenues of appeals beyond the local magistrate, but as you can imagine, the employer could make the apealee's life a living hell while the wheels of justice ground on.

There was a short note about one of the indentured servants named Gabrielle. She was listed as a twenty three year old female employee hired by a friend of my late uncle as a chambermaid. I thought that an odd title for an employee in an non-English household, and made an off-hand remark about it to Mr. Hill. Mr Hill turned a bright red, and then began to haltingly explain what a chambermaid was in the household of an upper class Southern householder.

Chambermaid was code for an indentured servant hired for the sexual gratification of her employer. Chambermaids were usually young, attractive and virgins. A friend of my uncle's had hired Gabrielle approximately seven years ago for my uncle. Unfortunately for my uncle, his health had begun failing even then. His mind was as sharp as ever, right up until the end (or so I was told), but his body was a non-functioning shell that was a source of continuous pain.

I wasn't sure what to think about inheriting a woman whose sole purpose in my new household was to be deflowered for my pleasure. I will admit that theoretically, the concept of a beautiful young black woman waiting to be sexually awakened by me was arousing. The reality was probably going to be more depressing, as a scared young woman laid on her back, waiting for me to finish my business.