World Wright Incorporated (World Wright Inc. Book 1)

by Vlad ben Avorham

  “It’s ok if you don’t know what they are.” she said gently. She giggled again as he sighed in relief. She took out all the little figures as she explained, “It is called chess. Where I come from, they consider it a test of skill and wisdom. It is a game of strategy and reason. Everyone from the most famous of kings to our most learned scholars, to rogues and scoundrels in the most disreputable of places has played it.” Her eyes twinkled as she turned over the box, using the pattern he had noticed as a grid to set up these figures. He now recognized this game somewhat. The princes of the far east played a version somewhat like this it is reported. She smiled when he told her so. “It has been around in various forms for thousands of years. Tonight if you like, I will teach it to you.”

  He finally got it. The board while nice wasn’t the gift. Her gift was knowledge, and that was always precious. With a smile of understanding, she taught him how to set up the board. What the pieces were, and how they moved. Before beginning the first game, however, she wanted a wager. His protests of being unfamiliar with the game were only met with taunts of it being a game of intellect and wisdom. Surely the great and powerful magus would have the advantage. Knowing he was doomed but spellbound by the excitement in her eyes, he agreed. “So, what wager will satisfy? Do you seek to bankrupt me this evening?” he asked with a smile.

  She shook her head. “Nothing so dire. If I win, you must kiss me good night.”

  He chuckled. “And if I were to prevail?”

  She shrugged, “Then I should have to kiss you good night of course.”

  The first game took some time, as she often coached him, saving him from foolish mistakes. Helping him to protect his pieces, but in the end she claimed victory. Not quite ready for the evening to end though the hour was getting late, she proposed a rematch, “double or nothing”. He agreed, though he didn’t quite see how his victory actually benefitted him any. He needn’t have concerned himself. She was only using this as a chance to show off. Using what she said was the “fool’s mate” that really only ever worked the first time she had him defeated in four turns.

  Their first kiss was pleasant, however Ries was reserved a bit, considering his missteps earlier in the day. Upon collecting her second prize, though, he became more bold and was happy to see she responded well. Evita was only a bit surprised as Ries moved into heavy petting territory on the second kiss. A bit much for first dates for her, but damn it Georgia had been right she had been working herself up for this for a long time, and well in general it had been a LONG time, even before she got stuck in this backward ass world, so she didn’t stop him, but she didn’t really encourage him either. This was good for a first date. He wasn’t leaving until after the new year. There was time. Suddenly something was different, he had drawn in magic, his fingers were dragging lines of pure magical energy over... ooh... after all of these years, and this was something new... she tried to choke back the sound she really did, but she heard his deep chuckle just a moment before it was too late. Her face flushed with embarrassment as she realized everyone in the house had to have heard that but it was too late because here it was coming again...

  Breakfast was a tough time... Evita was certain that she could never look any of them in the eye again. Everyone only smiled. But it was just so... she was always so private about such things. What’s worse is that bastard had the gall to just look smug! She couldn’t even look at him without blushing uncontrollably. She was just ready to crawl under the table when Syria sat on one side of her, and Georgia on the other. Syria dreamily said, “you cost me almost an entire night’s sleep. John heard you and he had ideas for us all night. I owe you one.”

  Face burning, Evita could only giggle helplessly, a bit maniacally. Georgia sighed, “yeah maybe you could have him show Marcus that... whatever that was...” and just like that fits of laughter healed the shame and she was looking forward to the rest of his visit.

  Broader Horizons

  Spring Festival Preparations

  Preparations for the Spring Festival had been in full swing for nearly two weeks before the villages realized what had been happening. Eli had already sent Eeyore out with the mower to cut a wide path down to the Festival grounds. He had really wanted to work up some road grading equipment but without large draft animals; he had to settle for a handful of good steel shovels and hoped he could hire of few strong backs once planting was done. He put up the tipis, only this time along the trail. With the shear number of pregnant women traveling this spring, he would not have anyone caught out too far from shelter. Plus, with that many grand parents wanting to come see the youngsters... he smirked just a bit smugly. In addition to his seven, yeah that number still made his mind boggle just a bit, there were the two for the Roths and Anju just made the announcement last week and while it was official, the total lack of focus of one Marcus Godfreed more than likely meant that he had been told but they were waiting a few weeks to make it generally known, just in case.

  Remembering back to when his own kids were little, a diaper washing machine had been high on his list of priorities to design. All the parts for it that were of local manufacture were at the top of Elena’s priority list for the spring trading. When he explained what they were for, she had looked at him as if he said he invented the self mowing lawn. He snorted and smiled, remembering. This was going to be a busy year. He really hoped everyone in the villages played nice, he didn’t want to bust heads, but in addition to the modified long rifle that he’d demonstrated for Magus Ries, he’d worked out a mean double barrel street sweeper for Marcus and a brace of six fine, even if only single shot pistols for himself. The firing mechanism of these took a bit of getting used to. It wasn’t a trigger like a modern weapon, but a small clip on the side of the barrel. When you forced the pin in it caused a spark. Made these a little more “hair trigger” than normal guns, the “safety” being something wedged in the way of the clip, but with what they had available, it did the job the most reliably and for now, that was what mattered. Improved triggers could come in time.

  Baba and Eeyore came into the forge carrying the freshly sawn lumber for the new wagon’s wheels. He made a note to have Elena authorize a bonus for them. He’d clear it with John, but those two had come a long way since the fall. Still idiot kids. But now that was their only problem, and if they didn’t do something stupid to get themselves killed, time would fix that. He dusted off the boards and gave them both an approving nod before snorting; it had for the rest of us, anyway...

  Festival Excitement

  Having gotten smarter about things since the last time, Eli didn’t try to make the journey all in one big bite. Instead, he had set up staging areas along the way for people to rest as needed; He had a total of three wagons now with goat teams pulling to move supplies and in dire circumstance move people. It was a bit much to expect the little goat drawn wagons to move Marcus or himself in full armor very far or for very long but between reasonable walks themselves, moving gear by wagon, and having shaded rest areas to eat and rehydrate this evolution out to the festival grounds went much smoother than the first one last fall.

  Getting set up also went much smoother. Even with so much of his company in the family way, their extended family showed up happy to help. Shocked and almost offended when payment was offered but as they saw the offer was genuine and that each side was only offering what it had an abundance of to help where the other side of the family had a shortfall, they joyfully accepted. Several of what Eli couldn’t help but think of as father in laws, especially the ones most perplexed by the concept in the beginning, once they got the hang of it, were actually quite innovative and resourceful at finding useful excesses elsewhere in the family that were honestly quite helpful considering Eli’s relatively difficult position of just starting out not having a surplus of anything except money and metal, and if you asked the father-in-law’s generosity. For Eli and the others, it was the simple expedient of being able to buy what you didn’t have time to make or do for yourself, bu
t to the locals, it was an odd concept and a welcome one that allowed them to stretch budgets that were way too tight in the early spring, often known as the starving time traditionally.

  The end result was very happy extended family members. Very happy young women seeing their families taken care of, and as the saying goes, ‘happy wife, happy life’. The World Wright Incorporated section of the Festival grounds had an almost permanent feel to it. When asked about it by the two Chiefs, Eli simply shrugged, “We’ll be using this spot at least twice a year, anyway. Investing some in it now, will pay returns every year after. I had wanted to talk to both of you about some possible development plans for the area in the future. They can’t happen soon. I will need my saw mill up and running before much of it becomes practical, and probably some larger draft animals as well. Goat power is better than nothing, but it just will not work large scale or longer term.” Both Chiefs looked at each other in confusion. Yet they nodded wisely at Eli, and made their excuses to each wander their separate ways muttering under their breath about ‘development plans’ and the insanity of merchant princes, which is more or less how both of them had come to view the members of the original crew that found themselves unexpectedly marooned in this alternate and exotic world. Chief Teppo had given up on his earlier thoughts of riding a wave of public opinion to crush these new upstart arrivals. After descriptions by Magus Ries of the wonders they were building, there was far too much to be gained by befriending them, and by the description of their terrible weapons, they were way too dangerous for him to risk offending. That didn’t mean that he understood anything that this Eli had been talking about. How can a sawmill,, whatever that is, help develop a place that has no water, it made no sense?

  The Festival was going well. Though they were meeting resistance on planting extra acres this spring. Even with the demonstration of the mowing machine and the promise of harvest assistance the cost of planting more and not being sure of how they would see a return was a concern for the farmers, most of whom lived very meager lives never certain of enough to keep everyone in the family in food, to gamble more without a guarantee of return, it was just not something that they were sure that they could take a risk on.

  Everything came to a screeching halt as four children came running up from the direction of the beach. “A ship! A War Ship! they all shouted.” Unable to get more from them than a warship was striking straight for the beach, and that they should be landed at any minute, Eli just called for his crew and decided to march down and see just what they wanted. John grinned at him, jogged back to the wagons, then circled wide and into the trees to find a good angle.

  The large prow of the vessel furrowed into the sand of the beach just as they arrived. Marcus tightened the chin strap on his helm and said to Eli in a hushed growl as he fixed the long bayonet to his muzzle, “Hope they came in peace. That’s a lot of oars I’m counting, by rough estimate, it might be more than there are fighting age men on this island.”

  Eli just grunted. He had always thought that the armor of the ancient Greeks looked a bit silly. High crests and the long unwieldy spears and oversized shields. As the Hippolyte warriors dropped over the side of the ship and formed up on the wet sand of the beach, they didn’t look the least bit silly. They didn’t have long spears; they were carrying wicked looking bronze knives as long as his forearm, and they all looked like they knew how to use them. Six archers, and one guy in some funny-looking robes, that Eli had a bad feeling weren’t funny at all, formed up behind the neat rows of rather tough looking Hippolyte standing four deep and six abreast. Eli called out to them in Greek, “What is your purpose here?”

  The man in the robes said a word, and before anyone realized what was happening, the archers smoothly drew and fired. The arrows had not even fully left their bows when the first sign of the coming chaos erupted. With a deep boom like the rolling thunder, John fired the rifle he had been aiming steadily from his position up in the branches of a cypress tree about sixty-five yards out from the excitement. Making the shot from this distance wasn’t even a question.

  Magus Ries had felt his mouth go dry after seeing the other mage. He couldn’t judge the mage’s power from this distance, but if they assigned him to a warship, he would have to be a grade five or better. Officially Ries wasn’t even grade one. Technically, the only reason he could get by with calling himself “magus” at all was because on this small backward island there was no one to contradict him. Oh, he had natural talent, and some genuine strength, but lacking wealth or family connections, he could not attend the proper schools. His formal education was severely lacking. In a fight with this mage, he knew he was sorely over matched. So it was with a near euphoria that he watched John’s bullet impact the mage’s face, exploding it, lifting the entire one third of his head into the air and spraying the nearby archers with them. In that triumphant moment he used his surging elation as power and called forth a ball of fire, throwing it into the archers.

  Arrows were already in the air, however. Two burst into flames upon contact with Rie’s incoming fireball. One landed wide of Eli and three pinged loudly as they ricocheted off of Marcus’s heavy armor. Bronze tips being no match for fourteen gauge modern mild steel. He let out a roar, half a heartbeat, before discharging the top barrel of his heavy beast. The powder charge equivalent of nearly a third of a stick of dynamite propelled a four ounce three and a half inch long by nearly three quarters of an inch diameter solid steel slug at a muzzle velocity approaching sixteen hundred feet per second neatly across the intervening distance, through the first two ranks of fully armored Hippolytes, before starting to tumble, thus mostly tearing side ways through the two in the rear ranks nearly cutting the third man in the lineup in half as it went. It could be said that this event may have had a demoralizing effect on his comrades.

  Sam and Josh each fired a crossbow bolt, and as they had trained without even seeing, the results went to one knee and began to reload. Evita and Georgia standing behind them instantly opened fire. They got to see Sam and Josh’s bolts do the intended job on two of the archers as they sent theirs for two more who were drawing back at that time. Bolts away, they called out “Reloading” as they had trained, and Josh and Sam rose to fire again.

  Leaving the rifle in the tree, John quickly hit the ground and dashed across the intervening distance to scale the side of the ship. Setting loose all of those galleys slaves ought to make things a bit harder for the bad guys, he thought as he dug his climbing spikes into the hull of the ship working his way up to the deck to give them all a surprise.

  Marcus’ hands were still numb from the power of the first shot when he let loose with the second. This was rigged with a canister load. Shrapnel blasted free from the barrel in a wide arc. No where near the penetrating power of the first shot, this shot still ripped flesh from bone in any unarmored area for anyone in the front two ranks. They later discovered as they were treating wounded, they pulled teeth from some of those men out of men from the third row. To his side Marcus could hear more than see Eli firing aimed pistol shot after aimed pistol shot at any target that appeared to be able to mount an effective resistance.

  Anju had been organizing civilian response from the rear when he saw one arrow get through and Sam went down. He rushed in himself to pull Sam out, only to be relieved that while the man had been struck, the arrow had actually missed him completely and was simply lodged in the sleeve of his woolen jacket.

  John slipped over the rail nice and quiet like. Sure enough, there was the guy like in the movies who always hit the drum. Too busy watching the show on the beach, he’ll regret that. Lightening quick he sprinted over and before the man could react, he stabbed him in the kidneys twice and then backed up out of reach. The man he’d stabbed was no longer a threat, however he backed right into another man who grabbed him up in a big bear hug yelling “Gotcha”. John had lost his grip on his knife. Damn it, he thought as he pulled another and, aiming back over his head, drove it deep into the man’s eye s
ocket. The man let go. John falling on the deck, grabbed his good knife up and scampered over to the rowers bench. If he could just work loose this chain, he thought... then he noticed with a sinking feeling, there wasn’t any chain. These weren’t slaves, these men were sailors, and they looked pretty pissed that he’d just hacked up a couple of their buddies, and there was a LOT of them. He felt a hand clamp down on his upper arm, but John didn’t pull away. Just like he and Eli had trained, he ducked into the attack. Dropping to one knee and half falling back between the man’s legs he pulled the knife along the inside of the thigh opening the femoral artery, and then dragged the blade across the wrist of the hand holding his arm severing the tendons of the thumb breaking the ability of the hand to form a grip. He was able to back away, but there were more than a hundred men here. He couldn’t beat them all. Then he saw his way out. One deck down on a raised metal brazier, an open fire burned, it was about twenty feet away which made it about perfect. The sailors were getting to their feet and while they had learned caution and weren’t in a hurry to rush him, his time was running out. With his left hand, he fished in the pouch holding one of his grenades and casually tossed it into the fire.

  Not knowing their danger, the sailors not only didn’t run or take cover, they crowded around trying to close in on John. The fuse finally burned down, and the blast in the enclosed area of the wooden craft was devastating. The concrete shrapnel of the grenade was bad enough, but the additional hot coals and small bits of bronze brazier were every bit as deadly. Those who weren’t dead or too badly injured to fight were in a bit of a daze. John pulled on of the flash charges and touched it to a hot ember on the deck. The loud flash panicked the already shaken sailors, and they made a mad rush away from John and piled up in a nice grouping at the far in of the boat. Part of John felt a little sick about what was about to happen, but it was only the small part that didn’t want to see anyone get hurt. The part that knew what would likely have happened to all the people he cared about if no one had stopped these people, didn’t hesitate to light the fuse of the second grenade and toss it casually in the middle of the panicked mob as he went back over the rail.