Emil Laurant sat beneath the flickering light of his drafting table, eyes fixed not on blueprints but on a letter — thick, embossed, and far more threatening than any artillery shell. The sigil of the Ministry of Armament stared back at him: a cog circled by laurels, a pen piercing its center like a spear. Below it, the name: Amélie Moreau. The elegant script bore none of the coldness Emil remembered from her voice.
She had left the foundry weeks ago, but her presence lingered — in memos, requisition audits, and subtle shifts in who answered to whom. And now came this letter. Not an order. An invitation.
You are hereby requested to present yourself before the Military-Industrial Oversight Council in Paris, to provide testimony on the methods, conduct, and strategic implications of your unit's operations...
"Testimony," Emil murmured. "Not inquiry. Not hearing. Testimony."
There was an important difference in bureaucratic language — one that usually meant someone had already made a decision, and now needed justification for it.
A knock at the door disrupted his thoughts. Lieutenant Rousseau entered, his young face uncharacteristically grim. "Colonel d'Artois is here to see you."
Emil nodded. "Send him in."
The colonel swept in like a gust of Parisian wind — sharp coat, polished boots, but a streak of weariness in his gait. He didn't sit, just tossed a folder onto the desk. "Three German airships crossed the Meuse yesterday. One dropped experimental bomblets on a rail junction outside Bar-le-Duc."
Emil opened the file. Photos, reports, sketches. "What kind of bomblets?"
"Incendiary. Precision-deployed. One train engine lost. Three carriages. Thirty-seven dead, mostly infantry reinforcements."
"They're testing targeting systems," Emil muttered, fingers tracing the angles in the sketches. "Trying to make Zeppelins something more than terror weapons."
D'Artois folded his arms. "And you're going to Paris."
"Yes."
"For what?"
"To be paraded or punished, depending on how much the Ministry fears what I represent."
The colonel didn't flinch. "You do realize what's happening, don't you? They've seen what you've built. The sabotage raids, the modular vehicles, the psychological operations. You're a prototype now, not just your machines."
Emil's lips curled slightly. "Good. Let them study me. And while they do, we'll keep building."
He arrived in Paris three days later, the city cloaked in autumn fog and political tension. Black cars and grey uniforms filled the boulevards. War posters covered the peeling paint of shuttered shops: "La Patrie Est En Danger" screamed one; "Invest in Victory — Buy War Bonds" demanded another.
The Council chambers were deep within the Palais de l'Industrie, an ornate remnant of another era now converted into a fortress of bureaucracy. Steel shutters covered the windows. Sandbags ringed the entrances. The grandeur had been conscripted, like the men who once strolled these halls.
Inside, the Oversight Council sat behind a long, curved table. Twelve members. Half military, half civilian. And at their center: Amélie Moreau.
She wore the same calm, analytical expression as when she first visited the foundry. No sign of allegiance, no clue of preference. Just observation. Calculation.
Emil stood alone before them.
"Commander Laurant," began General Richefort, a bulldog of a man with epaulettes large enough to serve as landing strips. "You've been summoned here to explain your... tactics."
"Tactics, or results?" Emil asked.
A murmur rustled the panel.
Amélie held up a hand. "Commander Laurant, this is not a trial. We're interested in understanding how your unconventional operations align with national doctrine."
"They don't," Emil said plainly. "They surpass it."
"Is that humility?" Richefort growled.
"No," Emil replied. "It's arithmetic."
The room quieted.
Amélie leaned forward. "Your most recent operation in the Argonne utilized bicycles and staged artillery to create the illusion of a larger force. This action led to the collapse of the Binarville Ridge Line. How did you predict their morale would fail?"
"I didn't," Emil said. "I gave it the opportunity to."
A civilian member — Duval, an economist — interjected. "So you engineer panic?"
"I exploit imbalance," Emil corrected. "War isn't just about force. It's about pressure, perception, and pace. Traditional command reacts. I anticipate."
Another general snorted. "You play games, Laurant. While men bleed."
Emil met his gaze. "So they bleed less."
The silence that followed was not one of victory, but of tension recalibrated.
Amélie turned a page in her file. "And your facility — what is its purpose now?"
"To build what the frontline needs," Emil said. "Before they know they need it."
She paused. "And if the Ministry were to transfer oversight? Assign a senior military engineer to supervise your work?"
"Then I'd ask if they want victories or reports."
They released him without formal judgment. That was the clearest sign yet — he had unsettled them. Not with arrogance, but with the clarity of his divergence.
Back at the foundry, Rousseau met him at the station.
"There was a bombing near Verdun," the lieutenant said quietly. "A factory. Civilian losses."
Emil frowned. "Which factory?"
"Ours. The satellite one."
That night, Emil walked through the rubble of what had once been Assembly Point D — one of his early expansions. The roof had collapsed. Twisted steel and charred bolts littered the ground. The death toll: nineteen workers. Two engineers.
On a burnt scrap of wall, someone had scrawled in chalk: "Les Rêves des Machines Deviennent des Cendres." — The dreams of machines become ashes.
Emil stared at it until dawn.
And still the work did not stop.
Within two weeks, he had authorized construction on a new prototype: the Libellule — a lightweight scout vehicle with modular armor and interchangeable wheels or treads. It could be assembled in three hours by four trained men. It was fast, almost silent, and carried a short-range radio system.
"Why the name?" Fournier asked him as they observed the first tests.
"Because dragonflies are fragile," Emil replied. "But they hover where others crash."
Far behind enemy lines, a German staff officer reviewed a dossier on Emil Laurant.
"Too clever," he muttered. "And too few limits."
The officer folded the file and sealed it with a wax stamp. Red. Coded. Reserved for only one set of eyes.
He whispered the name.
"Der Eisenstratege."