The Future Art of War Company

"Thomas, I'm telling you it can't be done! This prototype is a failure!" A voice shouted from inside the large warehouse building.

"I'm telling you, if we put it on rails like our small scale model, it will work!" Another voice loudly responded.

The Princess chuckled a bit before walking in through the partially opened door. The inside of the warehouse was dark with only the light from a few windows at the top of the thirty-foot tall walls illuminating a small group of men standing at a table in the middle of the room, a huge oval track with a one fifth scale model of the Rhinoceros noisily traveling around at a good clip. She motioned for her escort to wait outside with the carriage and walked in alone. She wore a fairly expensive day dress in the normal fashion for a wealthy lady. Nothing too extravagant. Her blond hair was peeking out from under a lady's day cap. She walked up to a messy chalkboard and looked over the notes scribbled on it. One of the men finally noticed her standing there and asked, "Excuse me miss, I'm sorry but I am going to have to ask you to leave. This is private property."

"Which one of you is the mathematician?" She asked just loud enough to be heard over the model. The men looked at each other with confused looks. She picked up the eraser and wiped away some of the numbers and started to write on the chalkboard.

"Miss! I'll kindly have to ask you to stop that! That work is not some puzzle your women's group made up to entertain with, that is the foundation for our...." One of the men came racing over and stopped in mid-speech as he watched her scribble out a string of numbers.

She put down the chalk and spoke up, "First of all you didn't account for friction when taking it to full scale. Secondly, you underestimated the pressure you would need to move that much weight. Your full-scale model failed because it is too heavy and its boiler is too small." She dusted off her hands of the loose chalk before asking, "Can you turn that machine off, please? It makes it too hard to talk."

The model came to stop with a loud whistle as they released the pressure valve.

"Thank you, that's much better. My name is Emily Connaissance, I wonder, what is the name of this business?" She gave them a warm smile and looked at each of them in turn.

"It's called the Future Art of War Company. We design and build weapons of war for the battlefield of the future." One of the men answered, "My name is Thomas Wellbright to my left is Mr. James Duhan and to my right is Professor Samuel Thatcher. You said your name was Connaissance? As in the city of tomorrow, Connaissance?"

She nodded and then said, "In several days I am headed to the city to take over as the new city lord. I have been lead to believe that what I will find there is not the city of tomorrow, but rather a burned-out husk badly in need of talented people who want to build that very city of tomorrow you mentioned." She looked around, "Was this all you had, or have you invented any other weapons of war?"

James quickly ran into a dark corner and came out wearing two tanks on his back connected to a long hose that attached to a spray nozzle. We call this weapon, the dragon. It breathes a twenty-foot plume of flame that can set fire to men, horse, and any flammable materials like straw, wood, or cloth." He pretended to spray fire around the room while making sounds like setting things on fire.

Thomas not to be outdone quickly raced over and brought out another invention. It was a long metal tube with a pipe fitted to one side with a long hand lever valve. "We call this a pressure cannon. We tested it several times and it was able to send a small metal ball through wood and even left large dents in the stone. We believe that with the right steam engine we could launch a metal ball with enough force to breach a fortress wall."

Professor Thatcher snorted and then said, "Show her the only weapon we have that actually works." Both men turned red and then walked over to a corner of the warehouse that had a large tall object under a tan tarp. They slowly pulled the tarp down to reveal a machine that didn't look like a weapon. "I call it the Autolathe. With it, I can work on metal, wood, even stone the same way a carpenter works with a normal lathe. Only at twice the speed with almost no effort."

Emily got a bright smile on her face and clapped her hands in delight as she hovered around it like a bee, "This is incredible Professor, I am quite impressed."

He smiled and nodded his head, "Well you've seen all that we have, were you here to make an order?"

Emily turned to him with the bright smile on her face, "Yes, I will take it all. How much to purchase the Future Art of War Company. I will of course be stipulating that your continued employ be part of the contract."

One of the men snorted derisively and then blurted out, "One million Sprite."

The other two men shot him an angry glare before Thomas spoke out, "Miss Connaissance, I'm sorry the company is not for sale. In fact, we might be coming under contract with her Highness, Princess Emily Windsor-Smith so money problems are not something we have at the moment so simply buying us out isn't something we can agree with, I hope you'll understand."

The other two men nodded reluctantly.

"I can assure you, her Highness won't be granting you any contract. What she wants is to purchase your company outright. Her offer might be considerably less than one million Sprite you have asked. An amount I most certainly am willing to pay." Emily brought out her checkbook and put it down on the table in front of them, "So, what's your real price?" She smiled at them all before concentrating on Thomas, "My offer today will be the highest you'll see. Each day you turn me away the price I am willing to pay will drop by twenty-five percent."

Thomas looked a little rattled, "We only have four days?"

Emily shook her head slowly, "No, in four days I will be leaving this city forever, if I can't get your agreement today, I have to make other arrangements. You aren't the only men of science in the capital, you're just the ones I visited first. You have something that interests me beyond your working models that I am willing to pay top Sprite to get, don't be a fool and let a once in a lifetime opportunity pass you by out of misplaced trust in this Kingdom's Royalty."

"Can we think about it, please? Taking your offer means packing up and leaving everything we have and know for a strange place with no real reason to believe that there will be an opportunity to grow there." Thomas explained.

"Very well, tonight just before sundown my man will bring a carriage to gather you three. I will have the contracts all drawn up and ready for signing. Dinner will be provided and if you choose to accept my offer, if not, you will be brought back here to continue your Rhinoceros sales." Emily smiled at them, picked up her checkbook, and walked away without looking back.

*****

That evening Emily was standing in her parlor wearing an evening gown that exposed her shoulders. She wore her tiara and a necklace worth thousands of Sprite. Rather than looking like a wealthy young lady, she looked every bit the part of a Princess. Her guests started to gather one after another. The small residence had ample room for the twenty invited guests. Each of the men in the room showed a look of shock as they saw who had arrived before them. Thomas, James, and the Professor were the last to arrive. Looking around the room not one of them said a word. They knew that things were far beyond any ideas that they had. To her credit, the Princess made sure to greet each of them as they arrived and treated them with the level of respect she would have shown to a visiting dignitary. She tapped a spoon against the side of her glass three times before speaking out, "Gentlemen, thank you all for coming on such short notice. Today, I gave you something of an ultimatum. Sell me your company or miss out on the opportunity of a lifetime. My butler had you fill out a simple yes or no card when you arrived. If you have had a change of mind and wish to change your answer, please meet Mr. Edmonds in the entryway and he will allow you to change your answer at this time. Once he brings me the cards, I will be inviting each of the people who selected no to leave. Those of you who are a yes, will stay for dinner and be included in our travel arrangements."

A soft murmur broke in the room as several men quickly headed to the entryway to change their answers. Emily noticed that Thomas was among the group who left to change his answer. She smiled happily and then turned and started to make idle conversation with the men left in the room.

After a few minutes, Edmonds returned with a silver tray, rather than read off the names, Emily spoke up, "Those of you uninterested in our offer may leave now, thank you for coming this evening I shan't see you to the door." She took the stack of no cards and tossed them into the fireplace without reading a single one of the cards.

Seven of the men left while the rest sat down in the parlor. One of the men asked, "Your Highness, may I ask how much you are willing to pay?"

"Today, I went to visit each of your companies and I gave you an offer. I warned you at the time, that by wasting my time, my next offer would be considerably lower. I am willing to pay you ninety percent of my last offer. If you don't accept that amount tonight, tomorrow will be seventy-five percent of that first offer." She took a sip from her wine glass and then with a radiant smile explained, "Thankfully two of you accepted my offer already, so those remaining here can consider themselves lucky to even get that much of an offer. You see, I really only need one of your companies. You all showed me your inventions today, so I no longer really even need your companies anymore. I just need a few machinists and a competent team of metalworkers and I can reproduce any of the machines I saw today with improvements that will make your ideas obsolete. The reason an offer is still on the table for you is that I am interested in what you might think of next. I know what you've created and most of it is quite frankly, garbage, but I see the promise of great things to come in each of you."

Three men stood, gave a half bow, and then left.

Thomas asked, "Your highness, when will we be leaving? What arrangements will we still have to make?"

Emily smiled brightly at Thomas and then gave a small wave to Edmonds who brought over a sheet of paper for each of them. Most of the men in the room sucked in a breath through their teeth a few stood up and explained they would be leaving at once to start the disassembly of their factory machinery for transport. Thomas, James, and Samuel rubbed their chins and spoke softly together before James spoke out, "Your Highness, those of us with families, will it be safe to bring them?"

"We will have an escort from the Kingdom to Connaissance, as for their safety beyond that? I have also hired the Red Lion Mercenary Company on a three-year contract. So, for that first three years, their safety is assured. Beyond that, I will be counting on all of you to create the most advanced and well-equipped army ever seen in the world." She raised her wine glass and with a bright smile gave the toast, "To the future!"