The metal doors slid open before him as soon as he held his ID card against the lock. The doors seemed to utter, “Come, come now, you have been away for too long.” Out on the hallway, occasional passer-byes strutted along, some of them in fiery discussions with one another, their heads lowered and melded together. They all had glanced at him, some friendly, some not so much. From what he had noticed on his occasional round-abouts on Bruchsal, there was a certain vein among the people, almost as though they scented the aroma of tragedy that had befallen the movement. But Emmanuel knew they couldn’t. Or could they? There was a Job’s Message in the air, hanging like the sword of Damocles above the Rose, lurking to stab it to death. And though he was not pious in the slightest, he caught himself praying. Praying that nobody yet knew of this sword above them. Otherwise they might abuse it.

As Emmanuel entered the room, while leaving his gaze free reign over mustering the room, he found that nothing had really changed at all here. At least this one place had been left untouched by the wake of time – or so it seemed to him. Of course dust had spread over all the wooden furniture in the room during the months, and in the air lay a certain stuffy odor that suggested the ventilation system had not been powered up in a while; but otherwise the place was just as he had remembered it from his memories. What a fine pleasure. So nobody had seen fit to reuse his bureau during his – rather unfortunate – absence.

Settling himself on the smooth wheelchair and leaning back, he took another look. Most the furniture was of fine dark woods – cabinets, shelves, and last but not least his desk that was remarkably empty, something that would probably change in the near future. All in all to the kind spectator his bureau would have been more reminiscent of the past than of the future.

Weis and Richtofer, two main figures of the Bundschuh movement and leaders of the White Rose, were gone. The latter MIA during an assault by unidentified forces, the former incarcerated in a coma, lying on a bed of a CCU on Bruchsal. The Rose had once again suffered a devastating shock that could well rip her out of the ground and blow her away into the past, just like it had happened to her predecessors. The situation was critical.

There was a tingling sensation in his beard, and though he stroke over it multiple times would it not go away. He was quite aware of what that meant: problems on the horizon. Though his bureau’s appearance was smooth, comforting, tranquil, appearances had never been more deceitful than now. This little world in itself he resided in here felt as though sealed off from the outside, but the outside was not stopping to happen only because you denied the glance. Something in him wished it was different. But he was the one to do something about the impending doom of the movement, so he stopped the wishful thinking dead in its tracks and rather turned the attention to the matter at hand.

He fished his PDA out of his bag and opened a file he had created previously, a manuscript of sorts, titled “A Way out of Peril”. Hours of sweat and blood had he poured into this the last couple of days, racking his brains until they had pompously demanded for sleep and sent him away from his work. It was in no way a masterplan, he was not storyteller enough to claim that - at least to himself. Yet possibly was it a roadmap of how to weather this fuming storm without sinking the boat. A map to a new horizon, so to say. Attentively he went through the notes, sticking them on the pinboard of his memories. The less he would have to look on the PDA during the meeting, the better.

Now all he could do was to wait for the young Oberst Einfalt to make an entrance. And to hope that she would grant the suggestions coming from him an oper ear. She would probably not have many other options anyway.

For several hours the doors to Emmanuel’s office remained shut and locked, with a sign saying “Please do not disturb” appearing on the terminal next to it. The flood of words that took place inside had no chance of pouring through the metal and offering themselves to strangers with a keen ear on the hallway. The casual persons passing by the door, although they knew the importance of the person it belonged to, had not the slightest idea they were meters away from mayhaps one of the most grave conversations in recent history of the movement itself. For contrary to speeches in the Party Congress or the General Assembly, there was nothing to be sugar-coated behind endearing torrents of words here. Of course they could have done it that way, but what would it have been worth? There was no audience to grant at least slow and pitiful applause. After all it was plain hard reality in all its disfavor hat was discussed inside these four walls. Yet the people went by, wondering where to buy their coffee next, while two people only separated from them through a piece of metal wondered where to go to save the movement.

After a while the doors slid open and the “Please do not disturb” switched to an “Open for audience”. The conclave was over. Annika Einfalt, with graceful gait, left the room like the white smoke would leave the St. Peter’s Basilica and quickly mingled with other passer-byes on Deck 3.

Emmanuel lay in his chair, staring ahead at the opposite wall while not looking at anything in particular. With his hand he clutched at the edge of his desk, just to stifle the hint of trembling he felt in his dead fingers. With a sudden weight pressing on his shoulders, he had to fight against slouching on his chair too much. His beard trickled unnervingly. The air he breathed in went deep into his stomach, inflated it up like a balloon. A burningly hot balloon.

He had almost forgotten how that feeling was like, the feeling of utter suspense boiling up his blood and inflaming his heart. The last time he had been that way was when he, a younger and verdant man, joined the Bundschuh many, many years ago. Now this feeling showed its face once again.

To calm his heart and vanquish the vile carpet on his tongue, he produced a small bottle of glassy wine out of his desk drawer and poured some into a glass. Just a little bit – it was not his intention to blockade his own brains right now. But despite the suspense and silent horror that kept mumbling in his head, he knew the outcomes of the conclave he had to privately celebrate in some way. And since he was not the kind to make leaps or shouts of joy, he gave in to this one glass of wine instead.

As he tasted the sweet running down his mouth and throat like a rivulet, the past years ran down his mind. And now he was there. He had reached the end of a road. A long road, with obstacles and impediments scattered everywhere along it. But here he stood, at the end of it. Finally, after all these years.
But the joy had not been for very long, for there came in sight an even longer road stretching out before him now, growing smaller and smaller as he would look into the distance. Upon mere sight of this seemingly unending path that was content to stretch into infinity, Emmanuel’s head would begin to spin.

But the wine did its job just well enough to let him forget this ever-stretching road for now. He would have to overcome the obstacles waiting for him one by one, not all at once. All these would be difficult to tackle for sure; but difficulties only strengthened the mind further.

He got himself together finally and grabbed his PDA again. In the meantime, his fingers had stopped to tremble like tuning forks. Now came the time to get to work. There were many things to do, ideas spread in his head wildly and uncontrolled. Somebody had to say something about all this in front of the General Assembly, and obviously he would be the one to do so now. The fate of the Rose lay in his white hands entirely; at least that’s what they were trying to hell him through their odd behaviour.

One last glance at a little picture frame that stood on his desk, that portrayed a smiling woman with curly black hair, and he got up from his chair and left the room with all the confident posture he could exhibit. With the will to turn everything upside down, if the needs dictated it.