lpffa Chapter 479: 452. Passing Days Passed & The Printing Begans
Chapter 479: 452. Passing Days Passed & The Printing Begans
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(A/N: Don't forget to give those power stones to Skyrim everyone!)
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The die was cast. The letter was on its way. In just a few short days, the former outlaws of the Van der Linde gang would step off a train and walk directly into the glittering, blood soaked palace of the absolute King of Saint Denis. The collision of his two entirely different worlds was imminent, and Caleb Thorne was entirely ready to introduce his family into these new situation.
With the die officially cast and the letter speeding westward on the fastest express trains available, Caleb and Mary-Beth then spent their passing days in Saint Denis waiting for the inevitable convergence of their two worlds.
They were also waiting for the three publishing houses to show them the very first printed, finalized copies of the stories that would change the literary landscape of the country.
Of course, they did not simply lock themselves away in the Garden District estate. The mansion, while breathtakingly opulent and heavily guarded, was still just a building, and spending all their time indoors would eventually become incredibly boring.
Furthermore, Caleb had already enjoyed the peak of modern technologies from his past life in the 21st century, air conditioning, the internet, digital entertainment, so the Gilded Age luxuries of Saint Denis, while charming, could not keep his hyper active, visionary mind completely occupied on their own.
So, they went out into the city. They explored the vibrant, chaotic, and beautiful metropolis that now rested entirely in the palm of Caleb's hand. Surrounded by a discreet but utterly lethal perimeter of plainclothes mafia enforcers, the Don and his Madam dined at the finest French restaurants in the city center, taking their meals on wrought iron balconies overlooking the bustling cobblestone streets.
They attended lively, extravagant shows at the Théâtre Râleur, sitting in the private, velvet draped VIP boxes that the theater owners had practically begged them to use for free. They rode the electric trolley cars just for the sheer novelty of it, Mary-Beth marveling at the sparks flying from the overhead wires, while Caleb simply enjoyed the radiant, unburdened smile on her face.
Caleb wasn't bored in the slightest, because he had so many things to do and so little time to do them. His mind was a perpetual engine of strategy and foresight.
As they walked through the manicured parks of the city, Caleb reflected on the monumental reality of his situation. He had finally achieved everything he had initially wanted when he first woke up in this brutal, unforgiving era.
The ultimate, overarching goal, the one that had driven him to acquire wealth, build a fortress, and seize the underworld, was to ensure that the Van der Linde gang wasn't disbanded and destroyed by their own internal rot. More specifically, his driving purpose had been to ensure that Arthur Morgan did not die coughing his lungs out on a freezing mountain, betrayed by the men he considered family.
He had successfully changed the timeline. Arthur was alive, healthy, and leading a united camp in the Heartlands. The Pinkertons were entirely blind to their true operations, and Dutch Van Dee Linde alongside Micah Bell was nothing more than a bad memory.
But Caleb was not a man who could simply retire after winning a single war. Now that his family was secure, he wanted to expand his business and leave a massive, permanent mark on this world's history.
He knew, with the terrifying, absolute certainty of a time traveler, that this world would share the exact same history as his past life. The turn of the century was approaching. The Gilded Age would eventually shatter, giving way to the mechanized slaughter of the 20th century.
He knew that in exactly fifteen years, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand would be assassinated in Sarajevo, and the globe would be plunged into the horrific meat grinder of World War I.
That was precisely why he had aggressively invested in the firearms company in Connecticut. It wasn't just to make a few extra dollars selling hunting rifles to local ranchers.
When World War I inevitably came, the federal government and the Allied powers would be desperate for reliable, mass produced, advanced weaponry.
By positioning Thorne-Marlin Firearms at the absolute forefront of military technology now, utilizing his future knowledge to bypass decades of trial and error, he would become the indispensable architect of the American war machine. He would shape global conflicts from the comfort of his Saint Denis study.
While the Don of Saint Denis planned for global conflicts, his newly minted corporate partners were busy conquering the local bureaucracy.
On the passing days, Archibald Vance, Arthur Sterling, and Thaddeus Beauregard, the three heads of the publishing houses, had also gone directly to the relevant government officials at Saint Denis City Hall. They moved with a frantic, terrified urgency, completely motivated by the absolute deadline Caleb had set for them.
Their task was to make absolutely sure that the name of their new syndicate, the Lemoyne Unified Press, had been formally submitted to the state registry and made completely official in the eyes of the law.
However, they were highly experienced corporate sharks, and they knew exactly how to navigate the corrupt waters of the city's government. They, of course, wouldn't tell the government regulators right now that it was essentially three of the largest competing publishing houses being merged into one massive, singular entity.
If the state senators realized that Vance, Sterling, and Beauregard were pooling their resources, it would immediately raise massive red flags regarding antitrust laws and anti competition regulations. It would definitely create the public appearance of a massive, illegal monopoly down here in Lemoyne.
Which was exactly what it was.
To bypass this legal hurdle, they utilized Caleb's immense shadow influence. They made sure the syndicate was built and registered under a series of complex, insulated shell corporations tied directly to Caleb's legitimate business names. The paperwork was presented not as a merger of publishers, but as a new, independent distribution company funded by a wealthy, highly respectable investor named McLaughlin.
Mayor Henri Lemieux's corrupt clerks, recognizing the Don's name on the filing paperwork, didn't ask a single question. They simply stamped the forms with the official city seal, filed them away in the deepest, darkest cabinets of the registry, and officially birthed the greatest literary monopoly the South had ever seen.
On the third day of the passing days, the monumental effort of the publishers finally bore physical fruit.
A sleek, heavily guarded carriage pulled up to the Garden District mansion. Vance, Sterling, and Beauregard stepped out, escorted closely by the mafia capos who had been stationed in their typesetting rooms. The three executives walked up to the back porch, their faces pale with exhaustion from three days of non stop, sleepless labor, but their eyes were burning with a profound, triumphant pride.
They finally returned back to the mansion, bringing with them the very first, immaculate copies of Mary-Beth's original romance and fantasy novels, alongside the breathtaking first volume of the Harry Potter novels.
Antonio escorted them to the glass table, where Caleb and Mary-Beth were waiting.
Mr. Beauregard stepped forward, his hands trembling slightly, and placed three heavy, beautifully bound books onto the table.
"Don McLaughlin. Madam McFarlane," Beauregard said, his voice thick with emotion. "I present to you the future of literature."
Mary-Beth gasped, her hands flying to cover her mouth.
The books were absolute works of art. The Harry Potter volume was bound in a deep, rich crimson leather, the title embossed in brilliant, shining gold leaf across the cover and the spine.
The paper edges were gilded, and the crisp, cream colored pages smelled intoxicatingly of fresh black ink and binding glue. Mary-Beth's romance novel was bound in a soft, elegant midnight-blue velvet, the elegant cursive font of her chosen pen name stamped proudly on the front.
Caleb and Mary-Beth, of course, checked them meticulously. Caleb opened the fantasy epic, his sharp eyes scanning the typesetting, the margins, and the quality of the print. Mary-Beth ran her delicate fingers over the textured leather of her own original story, tears of profound, overwhelming joy welling in her eyes. It was real. Her words were no longer just scribbles in a stolen journal, they were immortalized in print.
They were very satisfied with the results. It was flawless.
Caleb looked up at the three exhausted, anxious executives and let out a wide, genuine smile of approval.
"Gentlemen, you have outdone yourselves," Caleb praised them, his voice ringing with absolute finality. "The quality is spectacular. You can begin the full scale production according to these first copies immediately."
With the green light officially given, the original, handwritten manuscript pages were, of course, respectfully returned to Mary-Beth by the publishers. She clutched the heavy stacks of paper to her chest like a protective mother, beaming with pride.
So, after that highly successful visit concluded and the executives practically sprinted back to their factories, the three publishing houses' printing press machines began to work at blindingly fast speeds.
The heavy, steam powered presses roared to life, churning out thousands upon thousands of pages an hour. They were working day and night because they were making the massive numbers according to the strict, uncompromising deal they had made with Caleb.
The books were not just going to be sold to the local bookstores in the southern part of the country. Caleb's integrated railway distribution network was already primed and waiting.
The heavy wooden crates filled with the first editions were going to be loaded onto the freight cars and shipped out to the entire country as well, spreading the literary phenomenon from the cobblestones of Saint Denis to the the far Ambarino.
And then, on the fourth day of the passing days, it was the present time. The day the two worlds would finally, officially collide.
The central Saint Denis train station was a massive, sprawling cathedral of iron, glass, and hissing steam. It was the beating, mechanical heart of the city's transit system, crowded with wealthy travelers, shouting porters, and the deafening shriek of locomotive whistles.
Caleb and Mary-Beth had not come to the station quietly. The Don of the city did not simply stand on a public platform waiting for a train like a common civilian.
They had brought several massive, heavy duty transport carriages alongside their own luxurious, black lacquered personal carriage to the train station.
The fleet of vehicles occupied an entire section of the cobblestone loading zone, flanked by Silvio and a terrifyingly large contingent of elite, suited mafia soldiers who immediately established a secure, unbreachable perimeter around the Don.
The city police officers patrolling the station took one look at Caleb's men and smartly decided to patrol the opposite side of the building.
Caleb and Mary-Beth stood near the edge of the primary arrivals platform, where they were waiting patiently for Arthur and the entire gang to arrive by train.
The reason they waited here with such a massive logistical presence was because a critical letter of reply from the gang had arrived just yesterday.
The letter was written by Hosea Matthews, the shrewd, infinitely cautious patriarch of the Van der Linde camp. In his elegant, sweeping handwriting, Hosea had explicitly stated that the entire gang was profoundly confused as to why Caleb was suddenly inviting all of them to pack up and go directly into the heart of Saint Denis.
The last time Caleb, Arthur, and Hosea had spoken about the city back in the Heartlands, Caleb had informed them that Angelo Bronte, the Italian mob boss, and Leviticus Cornwall, the ruthless billionaire tycoon, were currently engaged in a brutal, bloody shadow war right in the streets of Saint Denis.
To the gang's understanding, the city was an active, highly dangerous warzone, and Caleb was simply acting as a spy caught in the crossfire.
However, Hosea's letter had continued with a profound declaration of faith. Despite their deep, ingrained paranoia and the apparent lack of logic in moving an outlaw camp into a modernized city, they, of course, believed him. Arthur and Hosea knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that Caleb wouldn't sell them out to the Pinkertons or the mob. He had saved Arthur's life, funded the camp, and bled for them time and time again.
So that is exactly why they had universally agreed for the entire gang to pack up their belongings, abandon the mud of the Heartlands, and come down to Saint Denis by train, exactly like he had suggested.
That was why Caleb and Mary-Beth were waiting on the platform, their hearts hammering with a mixture of immense excitement and nostalgic anticipation. Caleb checked his gold pocket watch, the hands ticking agonizingly slowly toward the scheduled arrival time.
Mary-Beth stood beside him, holding onto his arm. She was dressed in a stunning, highly sophisticated pale yellow walking dress, complete with a matching silk parasol and delicate white gloves.
Caleb wore a sharp, custom tailored charcoal suit that projected the absolute, untouchable wealth of a corporate titan. They looked like royalty, a far cry from the dirt stained fugitives who had fled into the Grizzlies just months ago. Suddenly, the ground beneath their boots began to vibrate. A long, piercing, high pitched whistle shattered the ambient noise of the station. "They're here," Caleb murmured, a genuine, wide smile breaking across his face.
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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: 3,222 dollars and 60 cents
Inventory: 285,392 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 Braithwaites Land Deed, 1 Broken Pirate Sword, 1 Milton's Safety Deposit Key, 1 Senator Pendleton Sealed Envelope, 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: -