The brilliant man had just turned twenty-eight a few months earlier, and as far as Noah knew, he still told his family that he worked as a programmer.
Noah paid Venu three times what he’d made in IT. The only rules he’d signed to follow were that he couldn’t tell others about his work with muscle-powered weapons and that he had to fly home to India a couple weeks before the shift, so in less than three more years. To Venu, the date given was just an arbitrary day and a really strange request. However, Noah had given him an agreement in writing stating that he’d be paid three years wages before he left, and be eligible to return to work with Noah after only six months.
The minor deception bothered Noah a little, but he wanted his friend to be with his family when things got hard. If Venu didn’t make it back to India before the Shift, he might never see his family again.
“So what do you have for me today?” asked Noah. He absently picked up a compound bow from a nearby table, fitted an arrow through the whisker biscuit arrow rest, drew, and released–all in one smooth motion. The arrow solidly thunked into a target set up on the other side of the chamber.
Noah’s [Instinctive Archery] skill had been level five for years now, but he’d never gotten tired of shooting a bow.
Venu took off his gloves and gestured, another smile on his dusky, smooth-shaven face. “I’m done with the newest prototype.”
“Oh, you mean the revolver?” Noah lifted his eyebrows.
“Exactly. Those videos you showed me with Joerg Sprave have helped a lot. That man is like the Leonardo da Vinci of slingshots. I would have never thought of using rubber the way he does.”
Noah nodded, immediately knowing what Venu was talking about. Two years ago, when he’d been at Camp Firestarter, Carlo had showed him old videos from the earlier days of this internet. This had reminded Noah about YouTube. Since then, he’d compared notes with the kooky Filipino genius, eventually discovering Joerg Sprave and the Slingshot Channel.
Joerg Sprave, a German man with an infectious laugh, had made videos featuring his unique, rubber-powered inventions for years, and Noah had been floored. This discovery had been the catalyst that had made Noah start thinking differently about weapons. In fact, the first few projects Noah had started Venu working on had originally been inventions of Joerg’s.
While Venu fetched his newest prototype, Noah examined some of the other weapons on the nearby tables. There were a few magazine-fed compound bows, notable because they allowed an archer to shoot four arrows in only a couple seconds. Noah picked up a sniper rifle made of plywood and slingshot bands, complete with a scope. The device could launch a standard, billiards-style dart accurately at forty paces.
Off to the side stood the massive, rubber-powered ballista that Venu had been working on. The contraption would allow anyone to load it, even a child. The device was powered by dozens of stretched rubber bands, creating incredible force, but each band could be tensioned individually and attached using a winch.
On another table, a repeating, rubber-powered crossbow that fired pencils had been a fun experiment. A cho-ko-nu, an ancient Chinese repeating crossbow design, had been modified to be powered by rubber. This invention and the dart sniper rifle had both been winners and were being mass produced in overseas factories. The first shipment of finished weapons would be ready in a few months.
Stocking thousands of throwing darts as ammunition would be easy, and take up far less room than arrows.
More strange devices sat on the table too, plastic shells in bright primary colors that Noah had asked Venu to modify. Standard foam blasters that children had played with for decades had been outfitted with stronger springs, tougher internal hardware, and the safe, foam darts replaced with shorter foam, tipped with razor blades.
The new weapons would probably horrify people today, especially if they were used to arm children, but those people hadn’t experienced the Shift yet, hadn’t seen the terrible things that could be done to children. Noah shuddered at the memory, and his old anger came back, filling with him fire.
Even kids should get a chance to fight back.
Raiders, slavers, murderers, or the Aelves, Noah was committed to giving good, every day people the tools to survive. He’d sworn it to himself.
Finally, Venu came back holding a strange device. “What is that?” Noah asked.
“This is what I came up with to solve the ambush problem you gave me.”
Noah nodded. He hadn’t told Venu the whole truth about the Shift, but had told the man that he sincerely believed the world as they knew it would come to an end. He didn’t think Venu really believed him, but the man was creative and loved medieval history. Every time Noah gave him a scenario, real things that would happen after the Shift, Venu had been happy to build tools that would apply. Whether the man thought Noah was brilliant, an eccentric rich kid, or a kooky survivalist, Noah didn’t care as long as he kept creating excellent weapons.
Noah’s old memories of his time as Worm burned, and he could never forget how that felt. He wished he’d paid better attention to the weapons and fighting around him at the time, but it couldn’t be helped now. Luckily, he did remember some things, like surviving ambushes among Redford’s Red Chain, and his experiences before that as he survived post-Shift America.
Ambushes had always been a problem.
“This is a repeating slingshot crossbow,” said Venu. “It runs on rubber. Basically, there is a wooden octagon inside that you can remove from the stock like this.” The swarthy man demonstrated, hitting a few latches and opening a door in the side of the contraption. Noah immediately began to understand how the device would function.
“These blocks basically function like magazines. They hold seven shots each.”
“Why seven? There are eight sides, right?” asked Noah.
“Yes, but I had to put each ammo slot in at an angle or it wouldn’t work. However, because of this, it’s really easy to load the thing properly. You just align the blank side like this, see?” Venu placed the chunky block back into the weapon and closed the door. Then he opened the door again and removed it.
Venu continued, “The magazine holds seven modified crossbow bolts of my design, but they’re really easy to make. Each ammo slot can be loaded by multiple individual rubber bands, just like the prototype rubber-powered ballista,” he said and pointed to the siege weapon in the corner.”
Noah nodded. “Uh huh. But wouldn’t those blocks be slow to load?”
“Yes, but once loaded, several could be kept on hand per person, especially with a wagon or while riding a horse. Plus, even a child or a handicapped person could use one effectively. The trigger is simple, and the weapon indexes itself, just like a real revolver.”
Noah soundlessly whistled. “So what you’re saying is that with two reloads, this thing could fire twenty-one bolts in, how long?”
“If someone was trained with the weapon? Maybe fifteen seconds. Probably less if they were good.”
“Wow.” Noah was impressed. The best defense for an ambush was not to be ambushed. But if someone was unfortunate enough to be surprised, running away was not usually an option. Standing to fight, and bringing every weapon possible to bear was usually the best option. The problem was that with bows and even with melee weapons, an enemy would have a massive advantage. Maybe this weapon would help, especially if a caravan had several of them.
“Did you come up with a name for this thing yet?” asked the excited teen.
“I think dazzler is a good name,” said Venu, puffing his chest out.
“No, it’s really not.” Noah sighed. “Okay, what else can you tell me about dazzlers?”
“Everything else I could tell you, you probably already know. This thing solves the problem of repeating crossbows like a cho-ko-nu, that they need to be relatively weak to work correctly. Our standard bows with built-in magazines for arrows don’t always work right, and only hold a few arrows.”
“I can see that,” said Noah. “What a
bout aiming and power?”
“Since the bolts are simple, accuracy isn’t amazing. Maybe we could add a tube or something to function as a sight of sorts. Power is better than a standard pistol crossbow, but still not anything like a full-sized bow. If an attacker was wearing decent armor, it would not be effective, but in the scenario you gave me, most attackers would not be armored.”
Noah rubbed his chin. “True, but can you rig up a batch of bolts that have long, thin, needle-like bodkin points? Since we know that the bolts won’t ever penetrate serious armor, maybe we can still set it up to punch through thick clothing, or chainmail links.”
Venu nodded slowly. “I think so. The bolts will be shorter then, but maybe we could have an equal number of both types of bolts in each magazine.”
“Does a,” Noah started and squeezed his eyes shut before continuing, “dazzler have to be wood, or do you think we could make parts out of plastic?”
“The stock could probably be made out of plastic to keep the weight down, and the magazine probably could be too, but magazines are easy to make out of wood and would probably wear out quickly anyway. If you theoretically wanted to build a lot of these, it would be best to have the stocks made of plastic, but make the magazines locally. The trigger parts could all be made out of aluminum, and I could probably mass produce them or give it to you to...do whatever it is you do.”
Noah made a face. These dazzlers had lots of potential–as Venu had said before, he could already see the benefits of weapons like this. He wanted to see a real-world demonstration, though.
Dazzlers would never take the place of a good crossbow or bow, but they could be devastating against most bandits, even if the weapons were wielded by average people. And if bad guys wised up and began attacking while protected with shields, or hiding behind trees, that would slow them down and give defenders a chance.
Preventing or ending an initial rush had been the problem Noah had given Venu, and he’d solved it. “What would I do without you?” asked Noah with a smile.
“Well for starters, you would probably be wasting a lot less money filling warehouses with enough obsolete weapons to conquer fourteenth century Europe,” quipped Venu.
Noah laughed, but his heart raced. Something dark stirred inside him, where the scars from his past life existed. All the people he’d seen hurt after the Shift, everything he’d allowed himself to just stand and watch as Worm, none of that was acceptable anymore, not in this new world.
This time, all predators–humans or Aelves–would not find such easy prey. Noah grinned savagely and impulsively grabbed the nearby dart rifle to play with. Venu, used to this sort of thing, patiently waited while Noah stared at the weapon in thought.
Finally, Noah snapped out of his contemplation and turned. “Please start focusing on this...dazzler, Venu,” asked Noah. “Next time I stop by, I’d like to have a firing demonstration.”
“Got it, boss. But seriously, you really do waste a lot of money.”
Chapter 21
At seventeen years old, Noah was actually beginning to miss school. During his first life, he’d practically slept through classes, caught in an endless cycle of depression. He’d never really felt like he was actually there. In this new life, it seemed he was literally never there.
“I hate flying,” he muttered. He glanced around his private plane and sighed before getting up to fetch a bottle of water and some chips. He’d realized that he would need to buy or charter a plane almost a year ago. This close to the Shift, it wasn’t enough to get reports from employees or take virtual tours of his properties. Some would need to be visited in person.
Flying filled Noah with anxiety, but not for the all same reasons most people might feel uncomfortable on planes. Even as good as internet connections could be in the air these days, they still didn’t compare to being on the ground. The loss of productivity was a normal concern, but not the memories he carried. He could remember the Shift, when everything that ran on gas, or compression, or electricity had stopped working. Every vehicle in the world that ran with an engine or electricity had suddenly stopped, including airplanes.
A lot of the fires that had started the day of the Shift had been because of fallen airplanes.
The first year after the Shift, when Noah had traveled most, he’d occasionally come across the wreckage of a plane. Each instance had given him a chill, as he’d imagined actually being on one as it plummeted from the sky. Most planes in the world had probably gone down over water too, which had been an even scarier thought.
And somehow, now, Noah regularly found himself in airplanes. Even knowing that the Shift was still a year away didn’t help his nerves. His skin crawled while he thought about how close the Shift was now. Luckily, distraction came in the form of a phone call. Noah checked his cell–Johnny was calling.
“Hey, what’s up?”
“Wow. I’m surprised you picked up,” came Johnny’s voice on the other end of the line. “I know you said you’d be busy for the next few days, but I wanted to make sure we are still gonna go hunting next week.”
“Yeah, I think so. Let me check,” muttered Noah. He pulled up his calendar using his phone, flashing a hologram to the side. “Yes. We are good to go.” Noah had never hunted before the Shift in his past life. His parents were not exactly hunting or outdoorsy people...at all. Neither of them had ever shot a bow or a gun before. Noah’s parents had flat out rejected all of his attempts to learn to shoot a bow. He’d tried to get everyone close to him to spend more time in the woods, to get away from civilization and learn a few new skills. Noah knew what was coming.
Speaking of skills, he checked his mundane skills and verified that [Skinning: Small Animals] was at level four. Next week if he and Johnny got a few squirrels in the mountains, he might level it to five.
The last year or so, Noah had really begun wondering about his mundane skills. His [Listener] skills, what he thought of as his core, class skills hadn’t changed, but he still picked up at least one new mundane skill every other week. It was strange that [Mathematics] existed all by itself as a skill, but skills like skinning were divided into sub skills, like [Skinning: Small Animals].
Other examples were sports and martial arts. He didn’t have a skill for just [Sports], instead they were broken into skills like, [Sports: Wrestling], or [Sports: Football]. There were obviously different types of wrestling, just like there were different types of Karate, so [Hand to Hand: Karate] seemed strange, too broad. Skills like [Singing] were even stranger, even broader.
There were obviously multiple disciplines of singing, but maybe Noah couldn’t access them until his [Listener] level was raised. He had a sinking feeling that until he could level up and gain access to higher tier skills, some of his advancement in the more general skills might just note knowledge of how broad they were.
Noah’s mind snapped back to his conversation when Johnny spoke again–there had been a pause. His best friend said, “That’s cool, but, um, can I be honest?”
“Of course. Always.”
“You’ve been gone even more than usual, man. People are starting to worry about you. Krystal asked me about you the other day, in fact.”
Noah frowned. “Krystal Connolly? I see her all the time! In fact, I think I have something planned with her and someone else next week–I’d have to check my calendar. She could just text or call me if she wants to know what’s up.”
“That’s the thing, man, like, you’re not approachable at all anymore. We’ve been best friends for so long that you’re like my brother, but other people feel weird about bothering you. Like, you’re doing seriously important stuff, and even employ other people, right? I mean, the fact we don’t even know for sure what you do makes it even harder to bother you. How could someone call to ask about movie plans when you might be in France doing a business deal or something?”
“Wait, it’s not like that–” Noah began to say.
Johnny interrupted, “The problem is that nobody knows
what it’s like, we just know you’re always busy and always gone. People like you, and they notice that you make an effort to spend time with them, but you’re a mysterious sort of dude now, you know?”
“So what do you want me to do about it?” Noah tried to control his irritation. These days, he practically got no free time, had to keep working, and even had to fly sometimes to visit special sites in person. Of course, he knew that Johnny and his other friends had no way to really know that. Noah had been more upfront with the people he relied on lately that he trusted, but still hadn’t told anyone the whole truth– all he did, or why.
Johnny sounded hesitant. “Just letting people know that you’re okay would be a start, like checking in, especially with your parents. They’ve asked me about you before. Sometimes they worry. I think if you hadn’t been willing to take a urinalysis test last year, and your father hadn’t been watching the companies that you own grow, they might not have been as hands-off over the last couple years.”
“That bad, huh?”
“Yeah. Dude, you’re still in high school. You’re still a kid, but you get no sleep and you’re always working. When you are at school, everyone wants to say hi, but half the time you have bags under your eyes and just brush everyone off. You didn’t use to be like that.”
“Okay, man. I hear you. I’ll think about it.”
“Alright. Sorry to be a wet blanket. I’ll see you next week,” said Johnny.
“Bye.”
“Bye.”
Noah hung up and closed his eyes, letting his head roll back. He’d been under a lot of stress. The Shift kept getting closer, and he kept wishing he had another ten years to prepare. Ultimately though, all of his work with the community would suffer if he got too distracted from Steelton. Everything he did felt like a huge balancing act.
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