Coalition

Written 55-H20 [2024-02-21], Edited 55-H20 [2024-02-21]

Image credit: Twitter Twemoji

“This isn’t in keeping with the Pact!” yelled Jacques. He jumped in front of Alexandra’s pistol and held up his hand.

“What the hell are you doing?” asked Alexandra. Alexandra’s finger was a millimetre from the trigger. “That’s a traitor behind you, a counter-revolutionary, and we have to shoot him. It is the policy of the Coalition!”

Jacques despaired as he looked around the royal bedchamber. Behind Jacques was a small boy, at most thirteen, maybe as young as ten. “This child?” asked Jacques. “We are going to kill a child as a counter-revolutionary?”

“I’ll have you know that child is the son of a cousin of a Duke!” said Alexandra. “He’s on the list of nobles to be killed on sight, agreed upon by the Committee of Public Safety!”

“His age wasn’t on the list!” Jacques protested.

“So what?” asked Alexandra.

“So, the Sukhoivist party won’t be happy about this, when they learn the whole truth! We need to pull this child in front of the tribunal first.” said Jacques.

Alexandra rolled her eyes. Why did these bleeding-heart Sukhoivists always have to get away with impeding the progress of the nation? They always gummed up the gears of justice, which were already grinding much too slowly for her liking. They should stop worshipping dead dreamers and living criminals, thought Alexandra. It’s about time for the Coalition to cut its dead weight.

But since Alexandra was only a minor officer and not on the Committee of Public Safety she had little recourse. Killing a fellow officer was almost as dangerous as disobedience, so the little royal piglet would live to squeal another day. But in time the Sukhoivists would fall, and in time the Coalition would reach its full potential, and that day would be a busy one for the guillotine.

Notes

This was written in 15 minutes during a Joy of Writing meetup. There were several typos I corrected before uploading the work here.

Feedback from The Joy of Writing group

• (I read some of the typos aloud and concluded by mentioning them).
• What led you to write about a revolution?
  • It wasn’t my only idea of what “Coalition” could be about, but after a minute of thinking about it I went with it.
  • (I didn’t explain this point very well in the meeting, so let me elaborate a bit here)
    • I wrote the opening bit of dialogue immediately.
    • However I spent a whole minute thinking about which Pact might be broken.
• Is this meant to be 200 years ago?
  • It has to be in that time period in order for the guillotine to make sense.
  • It’s not meant to literally be in France. Some details French-inspired, others created from whole cloth.