Chapter 5

Humber Estuary. April 1067

Six weeks after Luke had been attacked while scouting the location of a new naval base, he was back at the Humber Estuary with Pollyanna at his side, although she was still weak. This time they had a company of cavalry as escorts, and there was no storm to interrupt their work, so Luke and Pollyanna were able to find an ideal location for the new naval base. It would be situated on the estuary’s north bank and the River Hull’s west bank. Standing on the estuary bank, Luke sensed someone come up and stand next to him. Smiling, Luke said without looking:

“Hell of a lot different than the last time we tried this.”

“Ya. Matt would be pissed if I lost my other breast.”

“You would still be beautiful, Polly.”

“Thank you, Luke. I don’t know what I would do if Matthew left me for someone else.” Luke smiled warmly at her and put his arm around her shoulders. Pollyanna sighed contently before continuing: “Do you think they’ll give us enough time to build this base and start building ships?”

“No, I don’t. Which is why we’ll set up temporary shipbuilding facilities as soon as the land is cleared.” Luke looked around before continuing. “Gabby’s spy reports tell us a European alliance may be forming against us, and Brittany is definitely going to move against us. They already have a sizable navy, and if I were them, I would move now before we have a chance to gain a solid foothold across the country.”

“Fuck. When do you expect them to attack?”

“They already are. European agents have been working to pay off local nobles to do all kinds of things to undermine Marion’s rule. Worse still, they have been paying the Welsh, and intelligence suggests an attack from that direction before the end of the year.”

“Then I had better get to work right away.”

Pollyanna headed off to find a messenger. She wanted an engineering regiment and a police unit brought down from York on the double. The heavy equipment could be put on barges until a railroad could be built, but that was Luke’s problem, not hers. As it was, Luke had sent a message to Bard ordering a railroad built to the site as soon as possible, but it would still take about a month. Every rail produced was needed for some other urgent rail project.

After the messages were sent, Luke and Pollyanna started laying out the sight while the escorts set up camp. The shipyard would eventually occupy almost one thousand meters of estuary bank and five hundred meters of the bank of the River Hull. There would be dry docks, piers, cranes, and everything else needed to build and maintain ships.

It took Luke and Pollyanna almost a week to lay everything out. While they were doing that, the escorts were busy cutting down trees to start work on the security infrastructure after building a rudimentary pier to allow the barges to offload quickly. As Luke and Pollyanna finished the survey work, the first of the engineers started showing up and were quickly put to work. Nothing heavy could be done until the heavy equipment showed up, but plenty could still be done. The land had to be cleared, and trees that could make good lumber were stacked so they could be sawed into lumber, while other trees were used as pilings to reinforce building foundations. Smaller pieces of wood were cut into firewood for the steam engines. They would switch to coal once the rail line was built but would use wood until then.

It took almost two weeks for the heavy equipment to arrive. Many barges had run aground in the River Ouse and had to be unloaded to be refloated. The silver lining of this delay was that Pollyanna and Luke had managed to build several primitive piers that allowed easy offloading of equipment despite the swampy nature of the land. As soon as the equipment was unloaded, Pollyanna had them hard at work. Seeing Pollyanna run things, Luke knew he could return home, where he had a million other things to do. Before leaving, Luke assigned a squad of his guards to Pollyanna. This pissed her off, but Luke was her commander, and she had to live with it.

Three days after the equipment arrived that Luke left. On his way home, Luke intended to stop and check the progress of the rail line to the shipyard, and what he found ticked him off. Not a single rail was available even though the leveling crew was almost halfway to the shipyard, with the crew laying stone ballast not far behind. This meant his next stop would be to see Bard instead of going home. Luke sent a message to Marion telling her what was happening and what he was doing.

Luke walked into Bard’s office two days later to find him buried in paperwork. Bard hadn’t left the office in over a week, and Luke thought he would die from the overwhelming smell. The first thing he did was to walk over and open all the windows in the office to air it out; in doing so caught the scent of the industry outside, but it still smelled better than in the office. Luke always did like the smell of coal burning. Then it was time to talk with Bard about the missing rails.

“Bard, I just came up from the Hull shipyard, and I have to say the lack of progress on a rail line concerns me greatly.”

“I was just looking over the reports, and I can tell you exactly what is happening.” Luke wanted for Bard to continue. “There are too many rail projects in progress right now, and I have them working on a first started, first completed basis. Also, the mills are not large enough to provide the large quantities of steel needed, and with you insisting on quality, steel manufacturing is progressing at a snail’s pace. Right now, the best guess for completing the railroad to the Hull Shipyard is in about a year.”

“A YEAR!!” exploded Luke. “We are likely to be facing another seaborne invasion in that time. That rail line has to get done faster.”

“We just don’t have the steel to build and maintain the quality standards you have put in place.”

“Shit. I refuse to relax the standards because that will cause us even more problems later.” Luke sat in thought for a minute. “Bard, here’s your new marching orders: divert all extra steel needed to build a large integrated steel mill between York and the Hull Shipyard. I think it will be a good place to put it on the banks of the River Derwent next to the railroad between York and Hull Shipyard. That will keep it safe from a surprise attack from the sea, close enough to the shipyard to efficiently provide the steel for new ships, and close enough to York to power industry and provide jobs to the residents. The next steel mill will be built in Manchester because the last thing I want is for everything to be concentrated around York. It’s not good in the short or long term.”

“Ok. Who is going to build it? All the construction crews are already committed to other jobs.”

Luke sat deep in thought for a couple of minutes.

“Send agents all over Britain to look for anyone without a job and offer them one on the spot. These people can provide some of the labor. Next, pull crews from all projects in York to provide skilled labor and equipment to clear the land and build the mill. I’m going to request an army engineering unit to help. Before you say anything, the company will pay the army unit’s payroll while working on the new mill. Keep making rails until it’s time to start the actual construction of the mill, and then you are to give the mill top priority on all steel.”

“What type of steel-making process are we going to be using?” Bard was pissed that Luke was fucking up all his scheduling.

“We are going to be using the Bessemer process. That way, as soon as pure oxygen becomes available, we’ll switch to the Basic Oxygen Furnace. The open-hearth method is too slow, and the conversion will be more difficult. I want at least two blast furnaces so that one of them will always be making iron for conversion.”

“The quality would be higher with the open-hearth method, and we could make much larger batches. Also, Luke, do you really think we’ll be able to start making industrial quantities of pure oxygen anytime soon?”

Again, Luke sat deep in thought before continuing:

“This is why I love having you manage my businesses; you see stuff I miss. I still suffer from thinking like I’m in the future. However, in this case, I’m overruling you. We have to have large amounts of steel NOW. Just ensure we have a continuous caster that can handle the amount of steel being produced.”

“Yes, boss.” Luke stuck his tongue out at Bard, who smiled.

“Bard, one more thing. Go home, take a shower, and spend time with your wife. The last thing I need you to do is burn out. In fact, from now on, your hours will be between 08.00 and 17.00. Unless something is urgent, I don’t want to hear about you being in the office, and you are forbidden from taking work home with you. Now, get out of here.”

Bard picked up his things and headed home while Luke wandered around the building. It had been a while since he had talked with some of his employees. Finally, Luke got to the office he used when he was there. Stepping through the door, Luke stopped to look over his office. It was on the top floor of the building so he could look out over his domain. From his window, he could see factories, sawmills, and tanneries. The factories made everything from glass jars to cannons. Luke began to feel what it must have been like for those early captains of industry from his history. By his time, those early captains were long gone and had been replaced by tech titans who thought they could control the masses just like those earlier titans. Luke was determined to avoid making that mistake in this history because the masses will always eventually win.

Turning back to his office, Luke sat at his desk and pulled out some large sheets of paper and drawing supplies. It was time for Luke to start making prints for the new mill because he knew it would take about a month to make the rough prints needed to build the mill. Using his computer modeling program would have been faster, but he didn’t have it with him. Luke would make the prints as the building was being constructed; he got away with it because the first print was a general floor plan that told him where everything was placed. With that, Luke could start on the prints needed to build. This mill would be the largest building Luke had designed in this world and would present headaches he had never suffered in either world.

Unlike his old world, Luke couldn’t use high-strength steel or crack-resistant concrete and now had to figure out to best use natural lighting instead of just adding lights. The only materials he could really use here were brick, stone, regular strength concrete, and iron for reinforcing. When Luke started working, he entered his own little world, and everything around him disappeared.

He heard someone clearing their throat from his door, and when Luke looked up, his blonde angel was standing there, leaning on the door frame. Bard had noticed Luke wasn’t leaving his office, so he called out the heavy firepower and told Marion.

“Hi, sweetheart. What are you doing here?”

“I came looking for my missing husband. Bard told me that you ordered him to work regular hours; then, you work almost four days straight. It’s time for you to come home and rest, darling. Your daughter and women miss you.”

“I’ve been here for four days?”

“Yep”

Luke looked around and noticed that he felt stiff and hungry. When he looked at his work, he was impressed. The general floor plan and foundation prints were done. Slowly, Luke stood up and stretched. All the muscles had tightened up, and it took Luke a while to loosen everything up. Eventually, Luke walked over to Marion and picked her up to kiss her. After kissing, Luke swung Marion around, causing her to laugh as her hair flew all over.

Setting her down, Marion dropped to her knees, and before Luke could react, she had dropped his pants. Luke might have been tired and sore, but the feeling of Marion’s skillful mouth on his cock caused it to harden, and when he looked down, all he could see was Marion’s golden blonde hair. Luke reached to get his hands under her arms to lift her and didn’t put her down until she sat on his desk. Looking up at him, Luke could see the mischievous sparkle in Marion’s eyes as he undid her pants and pulled them off. Even with the bit of foreplay they had, Marion’s slit was dripping, making it easy for Luke to thrust deep into her core. Marion quickly wrapped her legs around Luke and locked her heels into his arse to pull him in deeper. This was nothing but lustful fucking between Marion and Luke, and Marion started moaning loudly. That and the sound of flesh slapping were the only sounds being made until an orgasm slammed into Marion, causing her to groan and arch her back. Marion’s orgasm tripped Luke’s orgasm trigger, and he shot weeks’ worth of cum into Marion. As he withdrew, globs of cum fell out of Marion, landing on the floor. Luke turned around and leaned against his desk next to Marion, who leaned against him. She started purring when Luke reached his arm around her and rubbed her arm. Finally, they kissed and stood up to put their pants back on to head home.