The man's heavy boot is sifting through the rubble. His long black coat covered with dust particles. It only adds to his rugged image of someone who hasn't smiled in years.
"Monsieur"
Bernard pauses, and lets out a deep breath. The visible air quickly dissipates in the freezing room. He slowly turns his face that is criss-crossed with deep wrinkles and scars.
"You found something?" He asks the rookie lethargically, his deep hoarse voice, sculpted by decades of smoking gently echoing through the room. He is only in his 40s, a dominating tall figure, yet it somehow seems like Bernard Pierlot's body lived through several lifetimes.
"I believe so" Lucas Delcroix lets out enthusiastically, even in the light of what happened, the Gallic National Intelligence agent seems to be fired up for contributing in one of his first assignments. He was overjoyed, even if slightly frightened when assigned to one of Gallia's most accomplished investigators.
Date somebody took great care to scramble the data beyond repair. Dear Diary.
Will life always be this simple? I feel like I deserve...more! Watching them in their full glory on Neural Net. Oh, how I would give anything to be one of them. Mother says they are bad people, but I don't think so? How can someone so elegant, so overflowing with grace and pomp be a bad person? To be admired by so many, in the light of reporters and suitors. To not live this basic life where I have to beg my parents for even a basic piece of clothing...I might be from a common class, but my heart yearns for elegance, pomp and admiration!
The ladies are like beatiful swans floating through life, oh how marvelous their days must be!
Bernard Pierlot's lips briefly wince in an involuntary reaction to his new protégé's enthusiastic tone of voice. His loins ache to snap at Delcroix, for his lack of seriousness, for not respecting the tone of the sheer scale of what happened here. His menacingly serious face that now shows signs of annoyment makes the Rookie pause briefly, his lifted hand that is holding the diary wavering and his enthusiastic proud grin starting to slowly turn upside down. Bernard in a short wave of self-awareness noticed the reaction he evoked. He hard tries to remember his first days after joining The Gallic Royal Police, before his pure and idealistic soul was disfigured by the relentless barrage of scars the ruthless swords of experience on duty inflicted upon it. He both envied and abhored Delcroix's child like drive, and he tried his best not to snuff it out right away. Time will do that for him. With a forced sublte smile he nodded and let out "Excellent agent, well done - let's have a look!"
Delcroix's pride returned to his face after it trembled briefly when he saw his superior's face. It was but a diary but he was ecstatic to gain Pierlot's praise. He remembered the rumors of the long queue of those that learned under his tutelage. Of those quitting GNI altogether, broken. But also of the many that did extremely well after enduring the agent's methods. "Here you go Monsieur"
Pierlot took the object and began reading the first entry. At first glance it was just some random babble of a teenager. Bernard's relationship to children was distant to say the least. His commitment to duty never allowed him to marry or have children, or at least that's what he always claimed when asked. He wanted to put the diary down after skimming the first few words, but he went on to examine it beforehand. It was en electronic diary, a standalone gadget people that didn't want to load their entries straight to The Neural Net used. It was covered with dust and carried signs of wear and tear, but it was inexplicably intact. Pierlot looked around the room - there was nothing else that withstood The Cascade this unblemished, and what's more - why would a random teenager go through so much trouble to make the date of the entries unreadable? It all didn't sit right with The Investigator - he turned the device back on and with a flick of a finger turned the electronical "page" to the next entry.
Date Even this entry's date is carefully scrambled
I am floating,
He saw ME! Amongst all those people! The confident elegance, the gentle yet powerfully deliberate mannerisms. When his confidante handed me the invitation I couldn't believe it. Those I have imagined all these years to be beyond the grasp of something tangible for a lowly girl like me. They conveyed the impression of beauty, of beings that represent what common people can only admire!
For a long time now I couldn't understand my parents' antagonism. When I revealed the joyful miracle of the delightful attention of HIM, their reaction was not what parents that want their daughter's happiness would be. Mother spoke of foolish naivete of my young soul. Father was furious, I have never seen him this angry. Even as the years went by and he went out night by night god knows where, with his strange angry printed posters, always leaving under the guise of the dark and looking over his shoulders. Many times he came home dirty, our lowly house was a revolving door of strange men and women moving boxes to and fro, meeting in our basement, I could often hear their angry exchanges and shouts, including my father's booming voice. Yet still never have I seen him this desperately enraged, not in my presence.
How can parents be this envious? How can they stand against love, against their own daughter's happiness? Bitter, yes, they are bitter for never achieving anything of note, of never rising beyond their common lower class upbringing. For never even coming close to touching the pomp and glory and beauty of the sweet man who showed me his affection!
When father calmed down, he insisted I tell him where and when Robert asked me to meet him. He threatened and demanded, he pleaded, but I will not betray HIM, I will not let my resentful parents stand between us, I will not allow them to put a hateful wedge between me and my chance at the joyous life I always dreamed of!
I must go, yes, secretly - I will go where HE asked me to go, and I will tell him everything!
Bernard lowered the Diary. The wrinkles on his forehead became even more pronounced for a while as his mind started processing the significance of the entry he just read. He slowly turns to Delcroix.
"Agent, stop sifting through the rubble for a moment. Connect with the bureau database, find out who lived here." Pierlot could only vaguely imagine how the area looked like before he was called here. The sheer force of the cascade transfigured the face of several square miles into a grotesque broken shadow of the dignified pomp of the district that was the pride of Ile du Palais just a few days ago. To Bernard it almost felt as if the force of time peacefully brought on the change over eons for a second, right as his rational mind quickly reminded him of the calamity and terror of what happened here just this week. Before he gets lost in trying to re-imagine what has been, Lucas, with the same out of place enthusiasm as before raises his voice.
"It was the mansion of Baron Robert de Marais Monsieur" the rookie reported. Bernard briefly sifted through his memory. He could rely on it as much as anything else he believed in, all his solved cases, all his interrogations he so excelled at in part thanks to the merciless and often ruthless commitment to his duty. But he knew he wouldn’t know the name of one of the former nobles. Those who remained on New Paris, not committed to The King but instead continuing to draw on their vast riches, clinging to their titles that now didn't mean too much in The Union besides nostalgia and admiration of "commoners". Those that stayed behind were unlikely to ever cross paths with the investigator. They weren't the fighting or bold types to begin with.
Why then here though? Why would the terrible unexplainable accident's epicentre originate in an arbitrary Baron's mansion? Ile du Palais was littered with former nobles and their homes. Why here? "What about any women besides servants and staff Delcroix - perhaps a daughter" Bernard inquired, in an attempt to gain more insight into the story of the young woman who's innocence oozed from the entries of the object he held in his hand.
"Baron de Marais. No children, only one registered non-staff occupant along with him." Lucas was reciting the data entries Neural Net was feeding him straight from The Intelligence Database.
The wedding was without my parents. Ever since I was liberated by Robert from the dreary common existence I couldn't reach them. HE told me not to worry about it. Their petty existence is beneath me in every way. The are the same, same as the disgustung Council rebels who try to stain the beauty and dignity of our kind.
They are resentful, petty and sour about our grandeur. I wish Marne and all I left behind were just wiped from history, so the horrible stench of my common class upbringing would be washed away from the back of my mind.
Robert says they will be pacified by our majestic fleet soon, and this will be over before it began. Why can't they see what I see - that we make Gallia better, that only the Elegance of us, not the rough simplicity of the commoners can bring us all into a bright future?
Bernard paused. Reading this entry threw him into a whirlwind of memories. Being a man of duty in Gallia was not easy. He recalled his first days in The Royal police. His pride when he was chosen as a trainee in The Royal Intelligence, much like Lucas was recently. His first case, first kill on duty - a young man running from justice. His first interrogations under the tutelage of some of the greatest "persuaders" in Gallia. But also the immense pressure on his sense of duty when The King himself left and the Council he was so ruthlessly helping to bring down came knocking on New Paris's doorstep.
That was the one time when his righteous drive for what he believed was right was called into question - when he decided he would keep serving the now autonomous New Paris, and later being chosen to The Office of Confederal Intelligence. He recalled the turbulent, messy days of The Confederacy - his kill count rose and so did his stature and successes in getting information and solving difficult cases. It was in these turbulent times when he was called to Marne this child now despised shortly after joining the OCI as the main interrogator. The times were frentic and fast, the Confederacy had to seem united, there was no time for gentle methods, but Bernard has never wavered to do what he had to do in line of duty.
It was there, on Marne, where he earned his right of a man that will be sent to the big cases and mysteries that needed to be solved. It was why now a yet again a brand new outlet he found himself serving, the GNI, sent him to investigate the disastrous Ile du Palais gasline cascade disaster that wiped out thousands of those who could call themselves "Nobles" in the old order where sense of ruthless duty for The Union on the front lines was not King.
He ordered Lucas to tell the assistants to sift through the rubble of the mansion, see any indication of The Baron or his wife's presence on the day of the Cascade, or their remains. And now more out of personal intrigue rather than professional obligation dove into HER probable posthumous memoirs.
Date After the last entry was revealed, this one again is scrambled A Stranger.
I don't know who he was. He approached me in the dark - it's a mystery how he got into the guarded streets of our district. He said he knows what happened to my parents. Just a few years ago I wouldn't care but now... now I am starting to question the very nature of everything I hold dear - could nobility and pomp just be an illusion not fighting for?
Robert and the others didn't join The King when The Council came knocking. He decided to stay - in the comfort of our home, we will live from our riches comfortably he uttered as if fighting for something would be absurd. Countless others did like he did - there was no sense of loyalty, no belief that their way of live and leadership is the right one. Could I have been blind to what they represented? Are they really just facade without substance and my mother was right all along?
I have over time grown to resent Robert himself - he doesn't stand for anything; he doesn't care about people, his cause or Royalty. He just cares about his comfortable existence.
That's why after seeing the stranger again I budged and inexplicably followed him to a dark alley, hidden from surveillance drones he explained what I never could figure out - the reason for my father's strange behaviour and angry attitude. My father was a vital figure in the opposition to The King and his regime, a hard working figure on the ground that sown the seeds for what was to become the rise of The Council. He believed I was "taken" against my will by Robert, and ever since I left became even more zealous in the hate of The Nobles.
Looks like my father stood for something after all. What does this mean? What is this feeling of guilt and regret that is coming over me?
There were formerly unfathomable feelings rising inside of the ageing inspector - this naive creature shared more in common with him that he could have imagined, the same struggle to recognise meaning, to recognise loyalty when the tides are changing. The train of his soul was also once at these crossroads before sliding back into the rails of habitual duty in the new order. He was starting to feel affection for the idea of Chantal, for her awakening in him the tides of self-awareness and perspective about his life. He was deep in contemplation about what could have been if their paths have crossed before her likely demise in the disaster, when his protégé distracted him from thought.
"Sir, we have found remains of a human male. The DNA scan confirms it Baron Robert de Marais himself!" Lucas said firmly. Bernard moved to the West Wing of the mansion of where the body was located. It was a mere lifeless husk of bones the gas explosion made unrecognisable. An untrained eye would assume The Baron simply perished to the destructive force of The Cascade - Bernard however noticed something unusual. The body was lying in an unusual angle, one not congruent with an impact of an explosion. There was no doubt about it in Bernard's mind. The Baron was lying there dead or at least unconscious before The Cascade happened.
I can't take it - what have I done? The man in the dark coat explained that after I told Robert everything all those years ago there was a big onslaught towards my father's cell. They had to run and go to hiding and almost lost everything. They grew even more resentful towards the nobles and dedicated their life...to stop the likes of me and Robert.
My soul is being torn apart, the darkness clouds my mind. I pushed them towards their terrible fate, and for what? The empty facade of the fake pomp of those that stand for nothing?
When I realized the end my parents met I just gave in. However substantial acts the man was asking me to do was, I just gave in. I surrendered my being to the one purpose of at least partially making up for the horrible mistakes of my former self. Entire Gallia will remember the names of my parents, of
![[Image: c2948d6ba203c7ebb1e50a9a390c5dbf.gif]](https://i.gyazo.com/c2948d6ba203c7ebb1e50a9a390c5dbf.gif)
