Chapter 594 - 594: 566. Back To To Saint Denis With Much Gain

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Tesla, meanwhile, provided an exhausting but brilliant theoretical sounding board. He paced the dunes, his long black coat billowing like a cape, furiously debating fluid dynamics and air pressure differentials with Wilbur. Tesla's mind moved at lightspeed, and for the first time in their lives, the Wright brothers had a scientific peer who didn't dismiss their theories, but actively expanded upon them.

"The camber of the lower wing is too shallow to maximize the Bernoulli effect!" Tesla shouted over the howling wind one afternoon, pointing a long finger at the glider's leading edge. "If you increase the curvature by just four degrees, the velocity of the air moving over the top surface will accelerate exponentially, doubling your vertical lift!"

"But increasing the camber drastically shifts the center of pressure!" Wilbur yelled back, wiping sand from his eyes. "If the center of pressure moves too far aft, the nose dives, and the pilot loses pitch control!"

"Which is why you need a forward elevator," Caleb interjected smoothly, pulling a pencil from his pocket and sketching a crude diagram on a piece of spare timber. "You don't put the horizontal stabilizer in the rear like a bird's tail. You put a smaller, adjustable wing *in front* of the pilot. It prevents the nose from diving and gives you absolute, immediate control over the pitch."

Orville stared at the sketch, his mind rapidly calculating the leverage. "A forward canard... Caleb, that would give the pilot direct mechanical authority over the center of pressure. It's brilliant."

While Caleb and Tesla reshaped the future of aerodynamics on the beach, Hosea Matthews remained in the warm, quiet confines of the hotel lobby in Elizabeth City.

Hosea was a master of the con word, a man who had spent decades drafting forged land deeds, fake bonds, and counterfeit bank notes. Now, utilizing the full legal authority of the Thorne Holding Company, he drafted a legitimate ironclad contract. He meticulously translated the radical, unprecedented terms Caleb had agreed to into flawless legalese.

On the evening of their fourth day, the freezing wind finally died down as a heavy coastal rain began to fall. The group retreated to the lobby of the Elizabeth City hotel, seeking the warmth of a massive stone fireplace.

Wilbur and Orville sat nervously on a leather sofa, their hands scrubbed clean but still stained with machine oil. Caleb sat opposite them, while Hosea calmly set a thick, leather bound papers on the low mahogany table between them.

"Gentlemen," Caleb said, his tone shifting back to the quiet, absolute authority of the industrialist. "Mr. Matthews has finalized the paperwork. The terms are exactly as we discussed on the dunes."

Wilbur leaned forward, pulling the thick stack of paper toward him. He was a deeply cautious, methodical man. He didn't just skim the document, he read every single line, his eyes tracking the dense paragraphs of corporate law. Orville leaned over his shoulder, reading silently alongside him.

They were looking for the trap. They had been warned for years that wealthy financiers always slipped a hidden clause into the fine print, a loophole designed to steal the intellectual property or dilute the inventors' equity until they were nothing but employees in their own company.

After ten minutes of heavy silence, Wilbur tapped a finger against a dense block of text on the third page.

"Mr. Thorne," Wilbur said slowly, his brow furrowed. "Section Four, Subsection B. 'The Thorne Holding Company reserves the exclusive right of commercial and militarized distribution, subject to the defensive litigation protocols of the parent entity.' What exactly does that mean? Does that give you the right to sell the patents without our consent?"

Caleb didn't flinch. He smiled, offering a calm, reassuring look.

"It means exactly the opposite, Wilbur," Caleb explained, translating the dense legal language into plain English. "It means that if Samuel Langley at the Smithsonian, or the United States War Department, attempts to steal your wing warping mechanism and claim it as their own, you do not have to fight them. That clause legally binds my chief counsel, Pierre, and the entire financial weight of my holding company, to step in and tie the federal government up in court for a decade if necessary. It is a shield. It gives me the exclusive right to sell the airplanes, yes. But it guarantees that you own fifty percent of the patent, and no one can alter that split without your physical signatures or your will."

Wilbur stared at Caleb for a long moment, searching the young man's eyes for any trace of deception. He found none. There was only cold, unyielding sincerity.

Wilbur looked down at the document again, tracing the final page where the equity split was clearly, undeniably defined. 50% to the Wright Brothers, 50% to the Thorne Holding Company.

Wilbur let out a slow, steady breath. He picked up the gold fountain pen Hosea had laid on the table. Without another word of protest, he signed his name. Orville eagerly took the pen and signed beneath his brother.

Caleb took the pen last, his signature flowing across the parchment in bold, definitive strokes. He closed the folio, passing it back to Hosea, sealing the partnership that would conquer the sky.

"Welcome to the family, gentlemen," Caleb said warmly.

He reached into the inner pocket of his tailored suit jacket and withdrew a crisp, sealed bank envelope. He placed it on the table and slid it across the polished mahogany toward the brothers.

"As per the agreement, the Thorne Holding Company is providing the initial capital required to expand your research, build the wind tunnel, and begin casting the internal combustion engine," Caleb stated.

Wilbur picked up the envelope. He broke the seal and slid the heavy, watermarked bank draft out.

Orville leaned over to look.

Both brothers physically froze.

The blood drained from Wilbur's face. He stared at the piece of paper, his hands beginning to tremble slightly. In 1900, a highly skilled mechanic might make five hundred dollars in an entire year. The bicycle shop back in Dayton provided a comfortable, modest living, but it required them to scrape and save for months just to afford the raw canvas and wood for their gliders.

The bank draft, authorized by the Thorne Holding Company and drawn on a premier New York reserve, was made out to the Wright Brothers for exactly one hundred thousand dollars.

"Mr. Thorne..." Wilbur choked out, his voice barely a whisper. He looked up, his eyes wide with sheer, unadulterated shock. "This... this is an astronomical sum. This is a fortune. We only needed a few thousand to cast the aluminum block..."

"I don't fund hobbies, Wilbur," Caleb smiled gently, leaning back in his chair. "I fund revolutions. You need a dedicated laboratory. You need the finest tools in the world, the strongest ash wood, and the freedom to fail fifty times without worrying about how you are going to pay your rent. That money is yours. You earned it the moment you figured out three axis control."

Orville let out a breathless, disbelieving laugh, running a hand through his hair. "We could build ten airplanes with this. We could build a factory."

"We will," Caleb promised. "Which brings me to my next point."

Caleb leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "I want you to pack up the camp at Kitty Hawk. I want you to close the bicycle shop in Dayton. I want you to relocate your entire research operation to Saint Denis."

The brothers looked up, startled by the sudden request.

"Saint Denis?" Wilbur asked, hesitant. "Mr. Thorne, Dayton is our home. We have our tools there, our shop—"

"And in Saint Denis, you will have immediate, daily access to Nikola Tesla and the finest electrical and mechanical laboratories on the continent," Caleb countered smoothly, laying out the undeniable advantages. "You will have the full manufacturing weight of the Thorne-Marlin steel foundries to cast your engine block. You will have better weather, fewer winters to stall your flight tests, and my absolute protection from any prying eyes."

Caleb paused, letting the logic sink in. "You don't need a bicycle shop anymore, gentlemen. You need an aviation facility. If you come south with me, I will secure a massive, isolated stretch of flat land on the coast of Lemoyne. We will build you the wind tunnel, the hangars, and the machine shops."

Wilbur and Orville looked at each other in silence. The silent communication between the brothers was absolute. They were leaving behind everything they knew, their home, their quiet lives, their modest shop. But Caleb was offering them the keys to the sky.

Wilbur turned back to Caleb, a fierce determination settling over his features.

"We will come to Saint Denis, Caleb," Wilbur agreed, dropping the formal titles entirely. "But we need two days here in Kitty Hawk first. We have aerodynamic lift data from the last series of tethered flights that we must finish calibrating before we dismantle the glider. If we lose the tension measurements on the wings, we lose a month of math."

"You have your two days," Caleb agreed instantly. "Take whatever time you need to secure the data. The train isn't leaving without you."

For the next forty eight hours, Caleb, Tesla, and the brothers worked with relentless, manic energy.

They finished the mathematical calibrations, meticulously recording the lift and drag coefficients in thick leather journals. Then, the grueling process of packing began. Silvio and the capos were brought in to provide the heavy lifting, carefully dismantling the massive canvas and wood glider. It took four separate, agonizingly slow trips on the flat-bottomed ferry to move all the fragile wing struts, the tension wires, the tools, and the heavy wooden crates back to the mainland.

Finally, the entire camp was loaded into the reinforced freight cars of the Thorne private train.

As the armored locomotive pulled out of Elizabeth City, beginning the long journey back to Louisiana, the atmosphere inside the luxurious parlor car was a bizarre, beautiful collision of two entirely different worlds.

Wilbur and Orville, still wearing their dusty wool sweaters and smelling faintly of machine oil, sat in plush, crushed-velvet armchairs, eating a gourmet lunch of roasted pheasant and fine wine prepared by the train's private chef.

But they weren't paying attention to the luxury. They were entirely consumed by a fierce, highly technical debate with Caleb and Tesla.

"If we cast the engine block out of pure aluminum, we drop the weight by forty percent compared to cast iron!" Orville argued excitedly, drawing a diagram on a linen napkin. "But pure aluminum is too soft! The heat of the internal combustion will warp the cylinders!"

"Then you don't use pure aluminum," Caleb countered, taking a sip of his wine. "You use an alloy. You mix the aluminum with a small percentage of copper and magnesium. It retains the lightweight properties of the aluminum but drastically increases the tensile strength and the heat resistance. I can have my metallurgists in Saint Denis forge the alloy for you next week."

"An alloy!" Tesla shouted, slamming his hand on the table, nearly knocking over a crystal goblet. "Brilliant! And we can utilize an advanced magneto ignition system to bypass the heavy and unreliable spark gap batteries! I will design the electrical timing myself! We will time the spark directly to the revolution of the camshaft!"

Hosea sat in a leather chair by the window, a thick novel resting open on his lap, completely and utterly ignored. He looked at Silvio, who was standing guard near the door, looking equally bewildered by the barrage of mathematical jargon, metallurgical alloys, and aerodynamic theories bouncing around the room.

Hosea caught Silvio's eye, gave a slow, exhausted shake of his head, and buried his face back in his book. The nerds had officially taken over the train.

After several days of relentless travel, the heavy locomotive finally hissed into the bustling, humid rail yard of Saint Denis.

The transition from the barren, freezing dunes of North Carolina to the opulent, aggressively expanding industrial heart of the Thorne empire was jarring for the Wright brothers. They stared out the windows of the carriages in silent awe as the motorcade moved through the cobbled streets, passing the massive new radio factories and the sprawling corporate headquarters.

Under Caleb's direct orders, the capos transported the dismantled glider, the tools, and the crates of aerodynamic data directly to Tesla's massive, highly secure laboratory in the western swamps. The facility had more than enough space to safely store the delicate equipment until the dedicated aviation hangars could be built.

Caleb, however, brought Wilbur and Orville directly to the Garden District mansion.

"You will stay here as honored guests of the household until I have secured proper accommodations and a suitable testing ground for the flights," Caleb told them as they stepped through the grand iron gates.

The brothers, accustomed to modest boarding houses, were completely overwhelmed by the sheer scale and aristocratic beauty of the mansion. Antonio greeted them in the foyer, offering a flawless, respectful bow and immediately dispatching staff to handle their bags.

Mary-Beth was waiting for them in the main drawing room.

She looked radiant. The harsh, dizzying nausea of the previous week had subsided slightly, leaving her with a warm, maternal glow. She was wearing a beautiful, flowing dark red dress, standing near the marble fireplace.

"Mary-Beth," Caleb smiled, crossing the room to kiss her cheek. "I'd like you to meet the newest partners of the Thorne Holding Company. Mr. Wilbur Wright, and Mr. Orville Wright."

Wilbur quickly pulled off his tweed cap, stepping forward and offering a polite, somewhat nervous bow. "It is a profound honor to meet you, Mrs. Thorne. Your husband speaks very highly of you."

"And he speaks very highly of you, gentlemen," Mary-Beth replied, her voice warm and welcoming, immediately putting the two dusty mechanics at ease. She extended her hand, and both brothers shook it respectfully.

She offered Caleb a subtle, highly amused look, recalling the conversation they had shared before he left.

"Caleb tells me that the two of you are going to build a machine that flies," Mary-Beth said, a playful spark in her dark eyes. "I must admit, when he first told me, I thought he was trying to bring one of my fantasy novels to life. Is it truly possible?"

Orville smiled, the nervous tension vanishing as his passion for the work took over. "It is more than possible, Mrs. Thorne. It is a mathematical certainty. It will require a great deal of failure, and a massive amount of engineering... but with your husband's backing, we are going to touch the clouds."

"Then you are very welcome in our home," Mary-Beth said genuinely. "Antonio will show you to your suites. Please, rest, wash up, and join us for dinner tonight."

As the brothers were led away by the head steward, still gazing in awe at the crystal chandeliers and the oil paintings lining the halls, Mary-Beth turned back to Caleb.

"They seem like very kind, very brilliant men," she noted softly.

"They are," Caleb agreed, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her close. "They are going to change the world, Mary-Beth. And we are going to own the sky."

Mary-Beth rested her hands on his chest, looking up into his eyes. "You promised you would hurry back. And you did."

"I told you I wouldn't miss a thing," Caleb smiled, resting his hand gently against her stomach. "How are you feeling?"

"Tired," she admitted softly. "And inexplicably craving salted ham. But I am happy, Caleb. I am so very happy you are home."

"I'm not going anywhere for a long time," Caleb promised, kissing her deeply.

The empire had expanded. The political shields were in place, the radio was mass producing, and the blueprint for the airplane was locked safely in his vault.

For the next three days, the sprawling machinery of the Thorne Holding Company operated without its primary architect. Caleb Thorne deliberately, consciously stepped away from the corporate ledgers, the factory floors, and the geopolitical maneuvering to devote his entire existence to the woman he loved.

His Max Level Past Life Memory held more than just blueprints for firearms and aeronautic, it retained a modern, comprehensive understanding of human biology and psychology. He knew exactly how sensitive, volatile, and deeply vulnerable a woman's body and mind became during pregnancy.

He knew about the massive hormonal shifts, the physical exhaustion, and the very real and terrifying misunderstood dangers of postpartum depression that would follow the birth. In 1900, women were routinely dismissed by archaic doctors as being "hysterical" or "delicate." Caleb was not going to allow Mary-Beth to endure a single second of that ignorance.

He spent the days entirely by her side, cultivating an environment of absolute peace. They took slow, quiet walks through the blooming gardens of the mansion, surrounded by the towering oak trees draped in Spanish moss.

They sat on the shaded verandas in the afternoon, Caleb listening attentively as Mary-Beth read aloud from her newest manuscript, her head resting comfortably on his shoulder. He asked Vincenzo to scour the markets for the bizarre culinary cravings that struck her at random intervals, ensuring she had fresh fruit, imported cheeses, and salted meats available at a moment's notice.

He made her feel seen, protected, and unconditionally cherished. He ensured that she knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that no matter how massive the empire grew, she and their unborn child were the absolute, undisputed center of his universe.

By the dawn of the fourth day, with Mary-Beth resting peacefully and her morning sickness somewhat managed by a diet Caleb had carefully curated, the industrialist finally reemerged.

Caleb walked into his private study and sent for Pierre. Less than an hour later, the young, meticulously dressed chief counsel of the Thorne Holding Company sat across from Caleb's desk. He looked slightly out of breath, having rushed over from the corporate headquarters downtown. Caleb slid the thick, leather bound folio containing the Wright brothers' contract across the polished mahogany.

...

Name: Caleb Thorne

Age: 23

Body Attributes:

- Strength: 8/10

- Agility: 8/10

- Perception: 9/10

- Stamina: 8/10

- Charm: 8/10

- Luck: 9/10

Skills:

- Handgun (Lvl MAX)

- Rifle (Lvl MAX)

- Firearms Knowledge (Lvl MAX)

- Past Life Memory (Lvl MAX)

- Knife (Lvl MAX)

- Blunt Weapon (Lvl MAX)

- Sneaking (Lvl MAX)

- Horse Mastery (Lvl MAX)

- Poker (Lvl MAX)

- Hand to Hand Combat (Lvl MAX)

- Eagle Eye (Lvl MAX)

- Dead Eye (Lvl MAX)

- Bow (Lvl MAX)

- Pain Nullifier (Lvl MAX)

- Physical Regeneration (Lvl MAX)

- Crafting (Lvl MAX)

- Persuasion (Lvl MAX)

- Mental Fortitude (Lvl MAX)

- Cooking (Lvl MAX)

- Teaching (Lvl MAX)

- Trilingual Language Proficiency - G, I, & C (Lvl MAX)

- Inventory System (Permanent - 100x100x100)

- Acting (Lvl MAX)

- Alcohol Resistance (Lvl MAX)

- Treasure Hunter (Lvl MAX)

- Drugs Resistance (Lvl MAX)

- Business (Lvl MAX)

- Leadership (Lvl MAX)

Money: 2,772 dollars and 60 cents

Inventory: 283,392 dollars and 61 cents, 11 gold nuggets, 74 gold bars, 1 Double Action, 1 Schofield, 2 Colm's Schofields, 1 land deed (Parcel), 1 Mauser, 1 Semi Auto Pistol, 1 Lancaster Repeater, 1 Old Wood Jewelry Box, 1 F.F Mausoleum small brass key, 1 Ruby, 1 Broken Pirate Sword, 1 Milton's Safety Deposit Key, Proof Of Marlin-Thorne Firearms Co., 10 Dynamites, 1 LeMat, 1 M1899, 1 Carcano, 1 Ownership deed of Doyle's Tavern, 3 Diamonds, & Important Documents & Deeds Of Cornwall

Bank: -