Ils étaient tous les deux au palais lorsque Italo les rejoignit. Assis à une table avec leur mère, Carolina, qui tapait à la machine à écrire une longue feuille de comptes, Annabelle et Renato Spallacci parlaient commerce, comme toujours quand ils travaillaient. Sa mère, son frère et sa soeur entendirent de bruit de ses béquilles avant de l'entendre lui. Il s'installa à côté de sa mère et soupira.
— Salut, Italo, lança Annabelle. Renato et moi on vient de rentrer.
— Tu peux remarcher, c'est cool que t'aies fait des progrès aussi vite.
Carolina serra son petit dernier dans ses bras. Italo se réfugia contre elle et regardatoutes ces feuilles sur la table. Il ne comprenait pas grand chose, mais est-ce que ses frère et soeur comprenaient eux aussi ? Certainement. Ils étaient plus grands que lui, après tout. Plus grands, donc plus intelligents.
— Italo, t'es sûr que ça va ?
Il eut envie de dire oui, mais avant de prendre une grande inspiration pour dire oui, son cerveau le fit secouer la tête. Non, il n'allait pas bien, et de toute façon, même s'il mentait, sa mère le sentirait, alors mieux valait dire la vérité.
— J'ai dit au capitaine Galeazzo que je voulais pas devenir amiral.
Annabelle haussa un sourcil.
— Tu veux pas ? Pourquoi ?
Italo se mordit la lèvre inférieure, soudain honteux de ses choix. Annabelle et sa mère l'observaient, surprises, alors que Renato, lui, s'était plongé un peu trop assidûment dans l'étude d'une feuille de comptabilité.
— Je sais, plus, maman, je sais plus. Je veux pas faire de naufrages, je veux pas que ça me monte à la tête comme papa, j'ai seize ans, maman, je suis trop petit !
Carolina comprenait parfaitement son fils. Luca, n'était pas encore sorti d'affaire, et Italo était désigné pour lui succéder, Annabelle et Renato n'ayant, à 21 et 20 ans, jamais démontré les pouvoirs nécessaires pour commander la marine. Italo, lui, commençait à révéler une capacité à soulever des vagues de hauteur pour l'instant incontrôlée, mais son père le faisait s'entraîner régulièrement. Mais à son âge, Italo était bien trop jeune pour lui succéder et Carolina Spallacci comprenait bien les interrogations de son troisième enfant.
— D'abord, tu dois t'entraîner pour mieux maîtriser les vagues. Ensuite, on verra.
— Mais je veux pas m'entraîner !
Il regarda son frère, mais Renato s'obstinait à lire ses feuilles de comptes. Comme s'il voulait rester à l'extérieur du débat. Lui non plus n'avait, du moins en apparence, pas envie de succéder à son frère. Au palais de Campobasso, Italia l'attendait et il serait certainement un jour appelé à des fonctions plus hautes que chef de la marine. Un moment qu'il n'avait pas hâte de vivre, mais il préférait attendre de voir ce que lui réserverait le temps et l'évolution de son histoire, tout juste commencée, avec la fille du monarque Luigi Piazza.
— Il le faudra un jour, Italo, lui dit sa mère. Tu sais bien que ton frère et ta soeur ne peuvent pas succéder à papa.
L'adolescent fondit en larmes. Renato leva les yeux de sa feuille et se leva, faisant signe à son frère, les dents serrées.
— Toi, tu viens avec moi.
Italo le suivit. Lorsque Renato se mettait dans cet état, il était inutile de résister. Il montrait clairement son énervement, chose qu'il ne faisait jamais, en raison de sa nature assez calme et sa tendance à toujours chercher le compromis. Les deux frères sortirent de la salle, Annabelle et Carolina n'essayant pas de les stopper. Renato fit asseoir Italo sur un muret et passa une main dans ses boucles blondes.
— Tu veux devenir amiral ou pas ?
— Non, Renato, j'ai pas envie !
— Pourquoi ?
— Mais je l'ai déjà dit ! Je veux pas finir comme papa ! T'as bien vu comme ça lui monte à la tête ? Je veux pas virer fou comme lui et grand-père !
Alors que leur père était toujours porté disparu, leur grand père, Gian Galeazzo, semblait avoir pris la fuite. Introuvable ni à Campomarino, ni à Molisonia ni Melfi, les soupçons se portaient sur un suicide en mer ou une crise cardiaque. Ancien amiral lui aussi, Gian Galeazzo avait, s'il vivait toujours, 89 ans, ce qui ne garantissait pas vraiment qu'il soit encore de ce monde. Carolina pensait qu'il aurait pu fuir Capitanata via le passage de Goricna, au nord de l'Italie, et ainsi regagner le monde duquel ils avaient été exclus en 1951, celui de l'Italie "normale", celle sans magie.
— Et puis tu crois qu'à mon âge je peux faire quelque chose face à des marins qui font ce métier depuis des années ? Je sais rien faire, moi. Ils vont se foutre de ma gueule et pas me respecter.
— Ouais mais qui va gérer la marine pendant ce temps ?
Renato avait bien une réponse mais préférait ne pas la dire, Italo pourrait largement en profiter.
— J'en sais rien, pas Annabelle et moi, en tout cas.
Il restait une hypothèse, mais la branche germaine risquait de ne pas accepter, eux étaient surtout des armateurs, qui n'avaient pas navigué depuis des siècles, depuis Andrea et l'époque de Venise.
— Pourquoi vous pouvez pas ?
— Mais parce qu'on contrôle pas le vent, joue pas au con, tu sais très bien ce qu'il faut faire pour devenir amiral ! On a zéro pouvoir magique, nous.
Italo se leva, appuyé sur ses béquilles.
— Comme si c'était vrai. Annabelle sait influencer les cours du marché et toi…
Renato faillit le gifler. Au lieu de ça, il le força à se rasseoir.
— Moi j'ai rien, je sais, remets pas le couteau dans la plaie, merci.
Le jeune homme ne supportait pas de ne pas pouvoir exercer un quelconque pouvoir magique. Son seul talent, si on pouvait appeler cela un talent, était de parler un bon nombre de langues étrangères, ce qui servait pas mal dans le domaine commercial mais qui était finalement, selon lui, à la portée de n'importe qui.
— Renato ?
— Oui ?
— Aide-moi, s'il te plaît.
Renato ricana nerveusement.
— Je vois pas comment.
Il voyait très bien, mais ça allait totalement à l'encontre des règles. Et puis il ne pouvait pas abandonner Italia, surtout avec la situation du père de celle-ci.
— Joue pas au con, Renato, tu sais très bien que tant qu'on aura pas retrouvé papa, c'est toi le chef de la maison.
— Je peux PAS devenir amiral, faut que je te le dise comment ?
— Ouais mais en attendant que j'aie 21 ans, tu pourrais…
Renato le sentit venir.
— Je pourrais quoi ?
Italo était rouge de honte, anticipant déjà la réponse de son frère.
— J'ai dit au capitaine Galeazzo que ça changerait rien si c'était toi l'amiral et pas moi.
Le jeune homme regarda ailleurs, faisant semblant de réfléchir.
Il avait pensé à cette éventualité depuis déjà longtemps, sans jamais pouvoir envisager qu'elle se réaliserait un jour. Un rêve qu'il avait caressé pendant son enfance, pour ensuite s'obliger à l'oublier, un peu contre son gré. Un Spallacci, fils d'amiral, sans magie, faisait jaser dans le voisinage et Renato en souffrait, surtout vis à vis de sa sœur et de ses talents. Et la découverte du pouvoir d'Italo l'avait encore plus enfermé dans sa jalousie. Pourquoi son petit frère et pas lui ? Pourquoi était-il condamné à toujours rester en retrait, le second de la famille, celui déjà ignoré de par sa place ? Pourquoi lui ne brillait jamais ?
— Renato, penses-y un peu : t'es respecté, t'as déjà de l'expérience en navigation, les marins te connaissent. Tu peux devenir amiral.
Il lui prit le bras.
— Renato, s'il te plaît… Je peux pas y arriver sans toi.
Son frère secoua la tête. Il s'était rendu à l'évidence depuis longtemps et même si l'idée lui semblait désormais réalisable, il ne pouvait pas l'accepter. Ne serait-ce que parce que ça ne pouvait pas se passer ainsi.
— Ma place est dans la marine marchande. Qui prendra mon poste pendant que je suis avec toi ?
Annabelle ouvrit la porte et se planta devant ses frères, droite et fière, ses yeux brillants de détermination. Elle se doutait de leur réaction, mais elle ne se laisserait pas décourager. Elle était l'aînée et en tant que telle, ses frères devaient la respecter et lui obéir. A 21 ans, elle venait de finir ses études d'économie et de commerce avec brio et son choix était fait. Obstinée, elle suivait toujours ses idées.
— Je crois que vous savez déjà la réponse, non ?
[[include credit:start]]
Titre : DCD-2212 Opération Batraciens Magnétiques
Auteur : Oreobanane
Date : février 2023
[[include credit:end]]
Moyens requis : Surveillance aérienne des étangs autour de l'épicentre du phénomène. Conseil aux habitants des villages alentours de confiner leurs animaux et véhicules et de ne pas sortir le soir. Création d'une fausse brigade de gendarmerie. Invention d'une histoire de couverture concernant une bande de cambrioleurs rôdant dans la région et de consignes à l'intention des habitants concernant la récolte de preuves. Administration d'amnésiques à toute personne ayant assisté à une manifestation du phénomène. Destruction des témoignages et des documents détenus par la police.
Cas à Problème : Des balles de métal vues en lévitation à deux mètres de hauteur, en général au dessus d'un étang. Leur diamètre varie de 20 à 80 centimètres. Les morceaux de métal qui la composent sont de formes, natures et dimensions variables, en mouvement à l'intérieur de l'entité. Différents métaux ont été découverts (acier, fer, zinc) et semblent provenir des alentours des lieux des manifestations (clôtures, fils barbelés, fer à cheval, câbles électriques, carrosseries d’engins agricoles). Ces apparitions sont toujours accompagnées de bruits de câbles et de cris identifiés comme étant ceux de grenouilles et de crapauds, qui, lorsqu'ils s'arrêtent, provoquent l'explosion des balles dans l'air et la projection de leur composants à plus de 5 mètres de distance, avec une force pouvant infliger de sérieuses blessures voire la mort si les composants atteignaient un organe vital. Cependant, aucune mort n'a été enregistrée, hormis celle des grenouilles et des crapauds retrouvés autour des étangs où se déroule le phénomène. Ces décès semblent causés par un étouffement, dû à des vocalisations prolongées outre les capacités vocales et respiratoires des batraciens.
Découverte du phénomène : Octobre 2018, Le Pompidou, Lozère.
Protocole proposé : Les apparitions n'ayant lieu que la nuit, il a été conseillé aux habitants du Pompidou et des villages alentours de ne pas sortir après le coucher du soleil, ainsi que de fermer leurs garages, hangars et de confiner leurs animaux, qu'ils soient de compagnie ou d'élevage. Il a été raconté qu'une bande organisée de cambrioleurs se livraient à des vols de matériel pour revente dans les pays de l'Est et que des marginaux se livraient à des meurtres d'animaux dans le seul but d'effrayer la population.
Avant l'arrivée de la Fondation, une brigade de la Gendarmerie de Mende commandé par le capitaine Philippe Bicherel a été dépêchée sur place, mais la mention de balles de métal en lévitation a alerté la Fondation SCP, qui a envoyé sur place une équipe d'agents menés par le commandant Nadine Bovin et se faisant passer pour la Gendarmerie de Florac, proche du Pompidou.
Native du Pompidou, le commandant Bovin est parvenue à récolter rapidement des indices auprès des habitants, plus enclins à se confier à une personne qu'ils connaissaient déjà. Cependant, l'enquête a pâti des rivalités entre la gendarmerie de Mende et la brigade envoyé par la Fondation et de façon plus personnelle, entre les officiers Bicherel et Bovin, le premier reprochant à la seconde de lui "voler son travail".
Deux témoins ont rapporté au commandant Bovin des informations relevantes : Lucien Merle, 72 ans, maire du Pompidou et garagiste de formation et la vétérinaire du village, Margot Souillhac, 28 ans. Le premier a mis en évidence des vols et dégradations du matériel agricole et des mutilations d'équidés, qui voyaient leurs fers attirés et arrachés par les balles de métal. Cependant, Monsieur Merle a accusé le docteur Souillhac de faux témoignage, basant son affirmation sur le fait que celle-ci était probablement en état d'ivresse lorsqu'elle a observé les apparitions. Interrogée par le capitaine Bicherel, Madame Souillhac a confirmé avoir assisté au phénomène mais n'a pas souhaité en dire plus, apparemment intimidée par l'attitude "oppressante" du capitaine qui, selon l'interrogée, ne voulait pas accorder de crédibilité à son témoignage en raison de son état d'ivresse avéré au moment des faits. Un deuxième interrogatoire du témoin, mené cette fois par le commandant Bovin, a permis de découvrir qu'après l'explosion des balles, une personne venait ramasser les bouts de métal tombés au sol. Madame Souillhac n'a cependant pas vu le visage du suspect, en raison de la faible luminosité, mais elle a affirmé que la silhouette lui "rappelait quelque chose". Le commandant Bovin a concentré son enquête sur l'entourage de Margot Souillhac et sur les habitants du Pompidou.
Trois jours après l'interrogatoire de Margot Souillhac, le 29/10/2018 à sept heures du matin, alors qu'il allait voir ses moutons, Lucien Merle a retrouvé le capitaine Bicherel dans le fossé entourant le pré contentant l'un des étangs autour desquels se produit le phénomène anormal. Le capitaine a été transporté au CHU d'Alès (Gard) dans un état sérieux. Le commandant Bovin a alors renvoyé la brigade de Mende et disposé des agents de la Fondation armés autour des étangs du Pompidou. S'est produite une manifestation du phénomène. Après l'explosion des balles, une personne est venue ramasser les bouts de métal. Les agents l'ont arrêtée et emportée pour interrogatoire. Il s'agissait de L█████ M████, gérant du garage local et dont les affaires prospéraient depuis le début du phénomène. Monsieur M████ a avoué utiliser le métal ramassé comme pièces détachées ou tôles de carrosserie pour réparer les véhicules qui lui étaient confiés et a également avoué avoir infligé plusieurs coups de barre de fer au capitaine Bicherel pour l'empêcher de témoigner, le capitaine l'ayant surpris, dans la nuit du 29 octobre, en train de rôder autour de l'étang juste après la fin de la manifestation du phénomène. La Fondation SCP a décidé d’ouvrir une enquête complémentaire pour coups et blessures. Les investigations sont toujours en cours pour capturer des crapauds et des grenouilles. Le Département de Censure et Désinformation a mis en place une histoire de couverture afin de rassurer les habitants du Pompidou et des alentours, faisant croire à des cambrioleurs d’origine étrangère volant le métal pour le revendre. Cette histoire de couverture n’a pas éveillé de soupçons.
Mise à jour du 7/11/2018 : Deux rana arvalis (grenouille des champs) décédées et un bufo bufo (crapaud commun) vivant ont été capturés par le commandant Bovin à proximité d'un puits relié à une nappe phréatique utilisée par les agriculteurs du Pompidou à des fins d'irrigation. Des morceaux de métal étaient aimantés au crapaud. Les autres exemplaires présents se sont enfuis à l'arrivée des agents. Les trois spécimens capturés ainsi que des échantillons d'eau de la nappe phréatique ont été emportés au Site Aleph pour analyses et autopsie.
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Crédits
Original title: SCP-408-FR – Cerf Chantant
Author : Oreobanane
Published in: 04/19/2021
Software used for the photo: Generated Faces
Reworked byGesiatari
Object no: SCP-408-FR
Threat Level: Unspecified
Classe: Uncontained
Special Containment Procedures: No instance had been observed so far, the Foundation can base her suggestions only on rumours and the observation of herds of what could be instances of the anomaly. Every mention of SCP-408-FR in books or touristic or gastronomic guides must be the object of investigations and interviews. If an instance is located, it must be immediately captured and contained to be studied.
Description: SCP-408-FR would be a specie of Cervus elaphus, or Red Deer, , one of the most widespread specie of deer in Europe. It measures circa 1,5m at the shoulder for two meters long (tail included) and 150 kg. His colour varies from brown red during summer and grey brown during winter. Each of the antlers measures circa 80 cm, giving the anomaly a wingspan of 1,6 meter. It is supposed to be localized in the South Tyrol, at the border between Italy and Austria.
Following the rumours, SCP-408-FR is a deer presenting the capacity to sing with a human voice. It presents the tessitura of a dramatic low bass and allows the anomaly to sing in German or Italian. However, as no instance had been observed until now, the Foundation has no additional information and continues their studies.
Update of 11/16/19██: In front of the lack of information about SCP-408-FR, the doctor Chazelle decided to pause the study of this anomaly.
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Object no : SCP-408-FR
Object Class: Euclid
Threat Level: Yellow •
Special Containment Procedures: SCP-408-FR must be monitored from a distance, in cooperation with the SIR-II, form the Italian branch of the SCP Foundation. Direct approaches are not recommended: questions are to be asked to the inhabitants of the village where SCP-408-FR is located. The edifice remains accessible to them, and the agents can enter freely in the part tobacco shop and newsagent, which present no abnormality. The menu of SCP-408-FR is to be observed on a regular basis, and the changes of the menu must be reported to the Foundation, who must send D-Class personal to test the new dishes.
The Foundation must pursue the chase monitoring of Lorenzo Marini, in order to avoid the expansion of Ambrose Restaurants in the country. The personal in charge of his chase monitoring, must know Italian, or let the SIR-II take care of his case.
Description: SCP-408-FR is a bar-hostel-restaurant located in the village of [REDACTED] at 30 kilometres of the city of Merano, in the Trentino-South-Tyrol, at the border between Austria and Italy. It is located at the junction of two hiking paths and can serve as hostel or shelter. It’s the propriety of the family Marini since 1919 and is passed from father to son. The current director is Roberto Marini, assisted of his wife Gabriella.
SCP-408-FR is known for this speciality of singing deer, described by customers as “the best dish ever invented”, attracting more particularly hikers and skiers. This dish, would be, following the inhabitants of the village, the speciality of some “Lorenzo”, who, after some questions, would be Lorenzo Marini (called by now PdI-408-FR), oldest son of SCP-408-FR’s owners.
When the subjects eat SCP-408-FR, they develop the capacity to sing with a dramatic low bass voice different songs every day, and this even if they can’t sing nor know the lyrics. The lyrics are in German or Italian and customers, while affected by the anomaly, master one of these two languages even if they never learnt them. However, on 11/24/1983, several customers began to sing Highway to hell, from the group AC/DC, whom lyrics are in English. The interpretation was considered as “almost not understandable”, what customers justify by saying “Lorenzo is a rubbish in English”.
Recovery log: SCP-408-FR has been discovered in 19██ following rumours about a singing deer, diffused by skiers and hikers in holidays in the Italian Alps. The results of the investigation shown this deer did not exist in the wild and that the only mentions of this specie were associated to a restaurant in the Trentino-South-Tyrol. The Foundation concentrated their studies on the restaurant, sending there a team lead by Doctor Alain Chazelle and Captain Laurent Mirabelle.
Test 1:
Subject: D-346
Languages spoken: French, English
Result: Con te partirò, Andrea Boccelli
Duration : 30 minutes
Side effects: NoneTest 2 :
Subject: D-750
Languages spoken: French
Result: Va pensiero, Giuseppe Verdi
Duration: One hour
Side effects: Loss of voice the following dayTest 3:
Subject: D-890
Languages spoken: French, English, Spanish
Result: Tu, Umberto Tozzi
Duration: 25 minutes
Side effects: NoneTest 4:
Subject: D-789
Languages spoken: French, Italian
Result: Die Wüste lebt, Peter Schilling
Duration: 15 minutes
Side effects: The subject found it “So cool” and sang the song several times, even after the side effects disappeared. However, as he didn’t know German, the lyrics, were not understandable.Interviewed: Captain Laurent Mirabelle, responsible of the exploration
Interviewer: Doctor Alain Chazelle
Dr Chazelle: Rapport, captain?
Cpt Mirabelle: It is really a beautiful region, doctor. A village lost in the mountains, sometimes isolated from the rest of the world during winter, because the snow blocks the only road leading there. During summer, the weather is warm, and inhabitants told me they felt good. I felt good there too. Everyone knows each other and elders meet themselves at the exit of the church, or on the main square, talking on the benches under the shadows of the trees. Houses are made of wood or stone, among the pine’s trees. Cows eat in the hills all around, and we can fish in the Adige River. It’s a splendid setting, and I wish I stayed a little bit more. The dialect is still spoken, it’s a mix of Italian and German, which is obvious, seen the Austrian border is very close. However, Trentino South Tyrol has a complicated story with Austria and for decades, Italian-speakers had been rejected, or, worse, slaughtered. Indeed, until 1919, the region was under Austrian domination, that’s why SCP-408-FR’s owners say their restaurant is a family business since this year only.
Dr Chazelle: The story of Italy after war does not interest me, captain, talk about the restaurant and its environment.
Cpt Mirabelle: The village is isolated from everything. The closest big city, Merano, is at 30 kilometers, Bolzano at 50 and the main city of the region, Trento, is at the other side of the region. From what I know, many inhabitants of the village never went there. Only one road drives here and is winter, it’s often blocked by the snow. Without hiking paths and ski slopes, the village would be dead since a long time.
Dr Chazelle: If the village is almost dead, as you say, how does it survive during slack season without hikers and skiers?
Cpt Mirabelle: According to the inhabitants, young people succeed to their parents in the family farm or the family shop. The village and the restaurant live thanks to fishing, hunting and weekly supplies, from Merano or Austria, I guess. The restaurant seems to be known thanks to hike paths crossing next to the village. It proposes rooms for nights, with very interesting prices and also breakfast. I think it’s the main source of income of the village. During summer, it attracts hikers, and during winter, skiers, who participated to make the restaurant being known and so, make it live from tourism, because they talk about it around them. Snowy landscapes are splendid, doctor.
Dr Chazelle: Talk about the restaurant, now, as you’re here for this purpose.
Cpt Mirabelle: The restaurant itself is a comforting environment. There, we also feel well, and it has been my case and D-Class too. In the evening, the fire burn in the chimney, that, as the walls, are the only elements that are not wooden, but made in stone. Above, there’s a head of boar, that I personally dislike, but it seems Roberto Marini is hunter in his free time. Tables are made of wood, with tablecloth with squares on, and the benches are also made of wood. Sausages are hanged at the framework to dry; they diffuse a light and very pleasant perfume. They are offered in aperitif. Sausages with boar flavour are delicious and aren’t abnormal. All the dishes are handmade and homemade by Roberto and Gabriella Marini, helped most of the time by their sons. The menu is attracting, and the promised effects are very interesting, that make customers want to taste everything. That’s what we did. Le restaurant en lui-même est un cadre réconfortant.
Dr Chazelle: The results?
Cpt Mirabelle: The D-Class effectively developed the capacities “promised” in the menu. The other customers applauded when they heard them. As if it was normal.
Dr Chazelle: Then you came back in the restaurant.
Cpt Mirabelle: Yes, three days ago.
Dr Chazelle: Did you taste the Singing Deer again?
Cpt Mirabelle: No, it was not on the menu.
Dr Chazelle: Did you ask why?
Cpt Mirabelle : We heard someone ask why the Singing Deer was not on the menu of today. One of the waiters answered, “We’re sorry, Lorenzo has no voice this morning”.
Dr Chazelle: Who is Lorenzo?
Cpt Mirabelle: Following our investigations, the owners have two sons. Lorenzo is the oldest one, he has got 21 years old in April. He wasn’t at the restaurant when we wanted to talk to him. From what the usual customers say, the fights between him and his parents become more and more frequents and they fear the Singing Deer would disappear from the menu.
Dr Chazelle: Why would the dish disappear from the menu? If Lorenzo decides to leave the restaurant?
Cpt Mirabelle: Yes. When we came back for dinner, we heard shouting in the kitchen. Owners screamed “No, you won’t go in Bologna! You’ll stay here and you’ll succeed us at the head of the restaurant!” and a voice answering shouting “You won’t prevent me from going wherever I want, whenever I want and if I want!” Then a door slammed, I heard “Lorenzo, come back here!”, a swear word in Italian and that’s all.
Dr Chazelle: And the following day?
Cpt Mirabelle: Lorenzo has disappear and his parents didn’t know where he is. Apparently, he’s still away and his belongings are not in his room. Vincenzo, his little brother, 17 years old, didn’t know it either. Some say he’s gone at the university in Bologna, as he wanted to do. I’m sure Vincenzo knows where he is, but he doesn’t want to tell it.
Final note of doctor Chazelle, 24/08/19██: The Singing Deer is not at the menu of SCP-408-FR anymore. A declassification in Safe is possible. We continue to chase down Lorenzo Marini.
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Message of commander Francesco Galeazzo, SIR-II, 23/01/20██ : We have found Lorenzo Marini. He became economy teacher in Bologna. Dated with some Donatella, he’s got three children who’s youngest, Aurelia, was born in 2003. We arrested him in front of the criminal court, where he was waiting to his partner. We’re ready to interrogate him.
Interviewer: Cpt Mirabelle
Interviewed: Lorenzo Marini, son of SCP-408-FR’s owners
Introduction: Lorenzo Marini has been taken to Site Virtus, site of Italian branch of the foundation, to be interviewed. The Captain Mirabelle is assisted by Italo Mondelli, Eleventh Superintendent, in charge of the Investigation Sections and spy.
L. Marini: What am I doing here?
S5-11: We have to ask you some questions, Sir Marini
L. Marini: For what reason?
Cpt Mirabelle: We want information about your parents’ restaurant.
L. Marini: I… Is that because the sanitary scandal that happened in several restaurants of the Trentino?
Cpt Mirabelle: No, I want informations about your parents’ restaurant in particular.
L. Marini: There are 25 years I didn’t come back here, whatever you want t know, I can’t tell you.
Cpt Mirabelle: We don’t want to ask you questions about the current situation of your parents’ restaurant.
L. Marini: So what?
S5-11: Your parents have an Ambrose restaurant. You know it.
L. Marini: I know. We’re here for the connexion between Italy and Austria. Even without Ambrose, Trentino-South-Tyrol is a gastronomic and cultural crossroad.
S5-11: You know very well what kind of dishes are created and cooked by Ambrose.
L. Marini: Of course: the Singing Deer was my speciality. The voice developed by customers was mine.
Cpt Mirabelle: That’s why the restaurant talked about losses of voice.
L. Marini: Yes, it sometimes happened to me, by dint of singing.
Cpt. Mirabelle : That’s why they don’t have it anymore : because you left to go to the university.
L. Marini: Yes. And Vincenzo is not talented as I am.
Cpt Mirabelle: Your brother, right?
L. Marini: Yes, my little brother. He’ll succeed my parents at the head of the restaurant when our parents will die. It’s not even worth talking about me, I deserted.
S5-11: Is it a hereditary capacity?
L. Marini: My parents hadn’t and about my children, I can tell you my two oldest ones don’t have it: Alessia sings very bad and Eleonora is worse.
S5-11: From what I can read on your personal file, you have three daughters, how about the youngest one?
L. Marini: Aurelia is five years old, she’s too young to know whether she can sing or not.
Cpt Mirabelle: Okay… You never came back in your parents’ restaurant?
L. Marini : No. They lived my departure as a betrayal, I have new from them only by Vincenzo. They never saw my partner, nor my children and I wouldn’t even be surprised I’ll be cancelled from the testament.
S5-11 : Your parents never wanted you to become teacher.
L. Marini: Oh no, the restaurant is sacred. My parents didn’t appreciate at all the fact I didn’t want to succeed them. I already spent two years too many in this restaurant, I already wanted to go after high school, they never wanted to.
Cpt Mirabelle: Did you ever talk about the type of dishes your parents cook ? As example, to your partner, your children, your friends ?
L. Marini: No, of course no. Better not. Donatella and the daughters mustn’t be involved in this. The only one I still have contacts with is Vincenzo and I promised him I’ll never tell anything about our abnormal cooking.
Cpt Mirabelle: Could you say you’ve been exploited by your parents for this dish?
L. Marini: No, I was consentient and I even found it funny. I love singing. Of course, since my accident and my fracture of the jaw, I can’t sing like before. If I came back, the dish wouldn’t be as good as before.
S5-11: Why are you gone, Lorenzo ? Because the cook your parents made was a problem for you?
L. Marini: No, it’s something else, cooking had nothing to do with it, I still love to cook for my partner and our daughters for dinner. This village is beautiful, for sue, and I felt good here, I can’t deny, but it offers no future if you want to do other than inherit the shop or the farm your parents have. I spent eight years of my life making 60 kilometres a day to go to middle and high school, I was 21 years old, I didn’t want to stay all my life in this village. At Torino, everything was at my reach, everything was so close! You can’t imagine my change of scenery when I took a tramway for the first time of my life! And Bologna! Bologna is so beautiful! I have no regrets about the choices I’ve done. I’m 46 years old and I managed to do in Torino and Bologna what I could never have done in the village I grew in. Studying law and economy had been an experience I’d do again with no hesitation.
S5-11: Why did you also study law if you wanted to be economy teacher ? To defend your parents if they were attacked for their cooking?
L. Marini: Defending them at the court, no, the ethic would forbid me to do so. But maybe I did those studies with the unconscious aim to help them defending themselves if they were incriminated for any reason. But I’m not sure they would see me again. And coming back home is not in my immediate projects.Family Name: Marini
First name: Lorenzo
Sex: Male
Date of birth: 04/20/1963
Place of birth: Merano, Trentino-South-Tyrol, Italy
Job: Economy teacher
Address: 24, via del ██████ di ████████, Bologna, Italy
Description: Lorenzo Marini is 1,84 meter tall and slightly skinny. He’s got short blond hair, blue eyes and wears contact lenses to remediate to a light myopia. Because of an accident that caused him severe injuries to the neck and the jaw, Lorenzo Marini has problems to chew and sometimes to speak, and often suffers from neck pain, that forces him to wear sometimes a cervical collar.Lorenzo Marini is able to make sign with a bass voice the dishes he cooks. It is this capacity that made him create the Singing Deer, speciality SCP-408-FR was known for in all the Trentino South Tyrol and in the neighbouring regions of Lombardy and Venetia. Sir Marini is conscious of his abnormal capacity and claims he hasn’t been exploited by his parents, owners of SCP-408-FR. However, he didn’t want to succeed them and went, against their will, studying law and economy in the Piedmont region in 1985.
Despite his anomaly, Lorenzo Marini has a normal life, doing the job of teacher in Bologna He’s dated since 1987 with Donatella Giuliani, investigating judge he met at the university of Torino, whom he has three children with:- Alessia, born in 1992
- Eleonora, born in 1993
- Aurelia, born in 2003
Nor the partner neither the children of Lorenzo Marini have this capacity and don’t know he’s classified as abnormal subject. Donatella Giuliani declared that Sir Marini seduced her with his voice, but assured that “like her”, Eleonora and Alessia sing “awfully bad”, fact that had been confirmed by friends of the family among whom an infiltrated agent of SIR-II. This has not been verified yet for Aurelia.
Threat Level: Weak to inexistent.
Cooperation: Excellent
Particular needs: Psychological counselling to take stock about his abnormal capacity and allow him to talk about it. The personal in charge of monitoring Lorenzo Marini must know very well Italian, or, if not, German. If it’s not the case, F. Galeazzo, commander of SIR-II, said he was ready to do it.
21/██/202█ : Roberto and Gabriella Marini are dead, leaving the restaurant to their youngest son, Vincenzo. The Singing Deer is back on the menu of SCP-408-FR. Customers develop now a contralto tessitura and can also sing in English and French. It has been discovered that Aurelia Marini has been hired at the restaurant as cooker.
« SCP-407-FR | SCP-408-FR | SCP-409-FR »
PART ONE :
Yesterday, Lorenzo jumped. He went on the roof, and he jumped. The guards found this morning his body crashed on the asphalt of the parking, in a pool of blood, his face destroyed. Nobody could have recognized him if he didn’t have his usual red tie. He jumped and no one had been able to reanimate him. He didn’t breathe when the guards found him, with, in in hand, a simple piece of paper, on which it was written “Apologize, Alice”.
His family already lost their mother. Now his older daughter, Alice, is orphan and none of us knows how to tell her this terrible information, no one knows how to do so.
Yesterday, Lorenzo jumped. He didn’t even try to talk to someone first. He didn’t ask for help. No one knows why. Yesterday, he was smiling, he was laughing. Yesterday he was happy, and we talked together before going back home. If I knew, I’d stayed with him. I’d made him talk, I’d convinced him to seek for psychological help, that it’s not a weakness or a shame to do so, I’d have him convince to talk to me, we could have found solutions…
If I had knew…
Yesterday, Lorenzo jumped. Lorenzo jumped and in the meeting room, his chair is empty. His chair is empty, and the silence is unbearable. We’ll never know what happened and why it happened. We didn’t find anything in his office, nothing that could explain why he committed suicide. No mail, no message, no letter. Nothing.
Andrea would have been happy: as Lorenzo is dead, he can now do whatever he wants with D-class personal and satisfy his sadistic hobbies. The only thing who prevented him to do so was Lorenzo’s department. He always forbade Andrea to torture D-class personal without very good reasons, so I imagine his death would make him happy.
But Andrea feels particularly bad today. Obviously, everybody thinks he’s guilty, because he often fought with Lorenzo, he’s the perfect culprit. Everyone glares at him while we look at the empty chair of our colleague, as to make Andrea understand it’s his fault if Lorenzo tried to commit suicide. As if he was the real culprit. As if he was their scapegoat. Andrea stares at the chair and doesn’t say anything, dignified under the eyes full of hate, but I see he clenches his fists in order not to cry, in this deadly silence. If he says something, they’ll kill him, but still, if he doesn’t say something, they’ll kill him.
I personnally don't know how to behave towards everyone. I can't help but thinking it's not entierly Andrea's fault, but in the other side, that he's a bit responsible of Lorenzo's suicide. I don't know him well enough.
— You know this little game can last all day. You want me to breakdown, but I won’t confess something I didn’t do.
The tension becomes more and more touchable. In Andrea’s voice, I hear a little bit of sadness, he proves to hide in vain. Sadness and fear. Fear because he knows they want to punch him, whether he opens his mouth or not.
— How can you think you’re not a reason of his death? Screams a voice with a French accent.
Lucrezia, please…
— You spent your time bullying him and discredit all the job he did and believed in!
For God’s sake, Vittoria…
— It’s not me!
A desperate cry. Andrea broke down.
— Lorenzo would have committed suicide because of a “little brat” he doesn’t fear? Are you on drugs?
He giggles to hide his tears and turns back to go away. The silence comes back, always heavier and more unbearable. A deathly silence, the calm before the hurricane. I'm sure I heard crying when he passed behind me to go out. And not a fake cry: I heard a real sadness, in his voice, in his walk, in all his body. I didn't get to know Andrea very well, but I'm sure there's something hidden in him, a kind of childhood demon he never managed to kill.
— How brave are you, eh ?
My voce gets out my mouth and I can’t control it. As if it wasn’t mine.
— So you pay tribute to Lorenzo like this? Unleashing against a colleague? Do you think Lorenzo would be happy to see it? Do you think he would be proud of us? Is it a correct way to behave?
I literally listening to my voice speaking. It is not me speaking, it is not me, it’s my anger against the fate, against the sadness and all the reasons which pushed Lorenzo to death, but particularly against them. Andrea is not the only reason of that, Lorenzo always knew how to put him in his place.
— Instead of accuse Andrea, shouldn’t we unite to face Lorenzo’s death and find the true reasons of his death? Are we really a bunch of jackass?
I stare at them.
— I’m not by your side.
I’m watching myself going out of the room, without noise. Proud and dignified, without a glance to them. But I can’t be proud of myself. I feel only emptiness. Emptiness and shocking. In the corridor, I see Napoleone coming and I fly by the other side. He’ll see himself how to calm the bunch of jackasses which serve him as colleagues.
Yesterday, Lorenzo jumped and our group is destroyed. Doors succeed each other, I don’t even know where I go. Tears burn my eyes and prevent me from seeing.
I didn’t do anything to save Lorenzo. His death will mean the end of group, and this end will come faster than I think, if I don’t find Andrea now. He’s surely hidden, and not in the office he occupied when he’s here, it would be too easy.
It’s a kind of instinct who guides me to Lorenzo’s office. Andrea could be here to celebrate him in a more private and more personal, far away from the assassin gazes of the other superintendents. He wants to be insensitive but he’s not, I know he’s not.
When at the door of the office, I’m about to cry. It’s still written “L. Ferri, S5-7”. A name no one will manage to forget, even if in a few months, a new S5-7 will come, if Lorenzo can’t be saved. He’s been brought to Asclepio’s hospital by helicopter, but when Francesco called Emilia Lombardi, the Asclepio's hospital's director, to ask her for any news, she hasn’t been able to say something, she doesn’t know if Lorenzo will get through. But in all cases, she didn’t sound optimistic. And so we’re not.
I open the door and I hear music, a terrible music which breaks my heart. The office is empty, but everything is upside down, sheets on the floor, cupboards opened, floor covered with paper, wind infiltrating in the room, frozen, unoccupied desk…
And that music!
Ohne dich, kann ich nicht sein, ohne dich. Mit dir bin ich auch allein, ohne dich…
Lorenzo’s favourite song. Without you I can not be… Lorenzo often sang it, with a deep and powerful voice that made us shiver. Certainly Andrea did not played it by accident.
Ohne dich zähl ich die Stunden, ohne dich. Mit dir zählen die Sekunden lohne nicht. Ohne dich…
No. I can’t stand it anymore. I’m about to go, but I hear crying. I turn the music off and find, in a corner, Andrea curled up, his eyes closed. I come to meet him.
— Hey, Andrea.
He turns his head to the wall.
— Leave me alone, Rebecca. Go out, leave me.
I shake my head. I know he needs to talk, even if he doesn’t want to admit it.
— Andrea, I'm sure it’s not your fault.
He glares at me.
— You don’t say anything new.
— I know, Andrea, but it’s still a good thing, knowing someone knows and admits you’re not responsible, don’t you think?
Andrea shrugs.
— What does it change?
I sit next to him.
— It changes the fact that you’re not alone.
I look at him in the eyes.
— Andrea. As you said, a “little brat” will never push Lorenzo to jump off a roof. It can't be the only reason. You can't be the only cause of his death.
Andrea puts his head againt the wall.
— Everyone said I bullied him. That I'm childish and…
He sighs.
— Rebecca, I'm not a monster ! I can respect my enemy ! Lorenzo was pain in the ass but he always did an excellent job !
— You too.
He shakes his head.
— I’m here only since six years, I didn’t show anything yet. Vittoria, Mira, Italo and Lorenzo were Superintendents before me, they don’t have anything to show anymore.
I know what he means. I was like him, me too, I’m here since six years only. But, strangely, I’ve been immediately accepted by Lorenzo, Italo, Mira and Vittoria. Maybe because I arrived after the others and the anger and the disillusion of seeing the other superintendents was faded away, and maybe because I immediately tried to socialize.
— But they appreciate you! Not me: did you see how they treated me?
I can’t say the contrary. They have been awful with him. I never seen so much emotional violence towards someone.
— Andrea, can I ask you something?
— Hm.
I hear the refuse in his voice, but I don’t care.
— How did you considerate Lorenzo? Did you hate him because he prevented you from doing your work?
He shakes his head.
— I had respect for him. A lot of respect. He was powerful, very powerful, and we all knew that. Now, nothing will be the same anymore.
I can’t say the contrary. We’re all lost now. It’s as if we had lost the counterweight of our group. The one who was the catalyser of all the conflicts.
— Rebecca? Did you ever talk with Lorenzo out of work?
I nod. Last time was yesterday.
— Sometimes. Once, I saw him in the streets of Rome with a little black-curly hair little girl and a little dark haired little boy he introduced me as his children.
This day he was very happy. He laughed, he seemed to be amazed by the drawings of the little boy who was like ten years old. He was a normal father, as if he was a simple civilian who does not have to choose everyday the destiny and the death of hundreds of people face to abnormality.
— Lorenzo is completely another man when he wasn’t at work, says Andrea. I once went secretly to the bar with him. His grandson was newly born, and he told me about it. It was…
He starts to cry again.
— He told me about it as if I was his friend.
Andrea has almost no friends. From what I can guess of his personality, his childhood has been nothing else than loneliness, bullying and abandon, because he was a strange kid.
— Why didn’t he tell us?
The mood is morose today. I've learnt the terrible new and it’s my duty to tell the others.
Lorenzo is at the hospital, seriously hurt, after he jumped off the Virtus’ roof. His life-threatening is involved and from what I understood, he’s in the coma. Of course, everyone will ask me questions and I won’t be able to answer, because I don’t have the answers.
— My dear friends, my dear colleagues…
I gathered everyone in the meeting room. They don’t know yet and I’m afraid of their reactions.
— As director of the Italian Ethic Committee, I must tell you a new that will mark us for life.
I have all their attention. Unfortunately, it’s not a good new I’ll tell them.
— The elder of us remember of Doctor Lorenzo Ferri as vice director of the Ethic Committee. The most of us know him since 2012 as S5-7, our representative at the Superintendence meetings.
I’ve never seen such a guy. Lorenzo was more powerful than all the members of the Ethic Committee reunited. He was the king of the Superintendence and had something to say about everything. If he didn’t want an experiment to happen, because he thank it was too cruel, I let the others know it. If he wanted to limit the sacrifices of D-class personal and presented good reasons, nobody had the right to say the contrary. He always had the final word.
— Well, Doctor Ferri… fell off… the roof… two days ago.
The words get stuck in my throat, as if my brain told my “No, Emanuele, don’t say it”. But it’s my job to tell my colleagues about it.
— He’s at the hospital, seriously hurt, and we don’t know of he will survive.
I try to not hear the protestations and the sadness. I want to cry too. Without Lorenzo, we are nothing. We’ll be at the mercy of all the other sections, reduced to a useless department. No one will listen to us, we’ll be bullied, mocked, ignored. I’ve been ignored all my life, with Lorenzo as S5-7 I finally had the impression of being respected even if we didn’t get on well together. We’re noth-ing without him, I already hear S5-5 laugh at me saying I’m unable to do anything against him, that I deserve to die in hell, and other departments laughing at me, as other kids did at school for reasons I never knew.
— But we must continue to do our work. We have to face against cruelty and fight for human dignity whatever it takes.
It has always been our job. Bringing humanity in this so cold and private of ethic world the SCP Foundation is. There’s a reason why we are called the Ethic Committee.
— Doctor Bigotti?
I search who called me. At the bottom of the room, I find a young researcher, his eyes full of tears.
— Yes?
— What will happen to us?
I fix an imaginary point on the wall in front of me.
What will happen to us?
That’s a very good question, and I’d like to give him an answer full of hope and happiness, but the optimism is not here today. I know a new Seventh Superintendent will be elected, but it will never be the same. I tried several times to apply Superintendence, but never been elected, and I realised it’s better like this: Lorenzo was the only one able to face S5-5’s arrogance and cruelty, I’ll never be able to do the same.
I could tell this young boy it will be our end. I could tell him we’re done. I could tell him we just have to die and no one will care, because nobody cares about Ethic Committee; at the end we’re just here to prevent the SCP Foundation to do their job, right?
No. That’s not what Lorenzo wanted to hear.
— I don’t know. I don’t know what will happen.
I decided to go back in the office. I wanted to stay alone, with Lorenzo’s spirit. For nothing in the world, I want to come back in the meeting room now. Not to see their eyes full of hate and break down again. I don’t want to be humiliated.
They think I’m guilty and they hate me more than before? Very well, they’ll stay sure of that. They’ll stay ignorant and stupid. Anyway, make them change opinion is impossible, doesn’t it?
— Where is Andrea?
I recognize with a bit of horror Napoleone’s voice, who found Rebecca in the corridor. He wants me to ask me some questions. He’s also sure I’m responsible of all this. He thinks I pushed Lorenzo to suicide.
I’m unable to associate these two words. It’s unreal, impossible, why did he do that?
— I don’t know.
Rebecca answers to Napoleone, but it’s as if she answered me. Neither her knows how Lorenzo came to do that. How can a solid man as him, so confident, respected, feared and admired could have been found crushed next to a tower, a letter of apologize in the hand. It’s impossible, fuck!
— You didn’t find him?
— No.
My eyes watch the mess in the office. Who did that? Lorenzo, in the moment of rage that drove him to this tragedy, put all this mess? Or is it the wind that made it?
— Rebecca. Where. is. Andrea?
No answer. I hope she won’t denunciate me. I need time to rest. If I stay here enough time, maybe Lorenzo will come back.
— How is he?
Fuck. She denounced me. Or maybe she hadn’t been able to lie. Fooling Napoleone is quite complicate.
— He’s… overwhelmed.
— Aren’t we all?
How that, “aren’t we all”? It’s a stupid answer! It’s flat, without any sense, I expected way better form him! It doesn’t justify anything, nor their behaviour, neither their reactions, nothing!
— It’s not a reason to treat him as they did!
I put my face inside my hands in order to hide my tears.
In the end, they’re right: Lorenzo is dead because of me. This desire of attention and of being recognized for my job made me found an enemy who didn’t do anything to me, and I unleashed on him because his job prevented me to get the attention I always looked for. And here we are now. Acting like a child, I lead a 59-year-old man, married and father, to kill himself.
I say the contrary, I say he’s not afraid of me and they’re all dumb, but actually, they’re right. I say the contrary to not admit it, but I’m the culprit. If Lorenzo is between life and death, it’s only because of me. I bullied him, I humiliated him, and at the end, he couldn’t stand it anymore. Eleonora lost her husband, Alice, Aurelia, Tommaso and Francesco lost their father. Who will tell them? Do they already know it?
— I never said it was a good reason, Rebecca.
— So why do you approve them? Why do you justify their behaviour?
— I don’t justify anything! I simply try to understand, and if you think it’s easy, you’re wrong!
He’s wrong: everything would be so much simple if everybody made efforts, I’m fed up with trying my best to satisfy everyone and receiving only hate in return! If I got helped too, it would have been way better! I’m tired of all this!
— You didn’t try to understand Andrea!
Nobody tried. Not even my family, imagine an old man…
— Rebecca. Just one question.
My colleague grumbles.
— What do you think of all this?
— Of all what?
— Do you think Lorenzo killed himself because of Andrea?
There’s a moment of silence, who lasts an eternity. I’m afraid of what she will say. What if she says to Napoleone all the contrary of what she told me? What if she tells him I’m a real shitty person and I deserve to die? That it would be better for everyone if I disappear? Sometimes, I come to think that it’s the case and nobody will miss me if I do as Lorenzo. If I die, everyone will be relieved. I felt it, now I’m sure of that.
— I think it’s a combination of things, rather than only one, answers Rebecca. The fault is not only Andrea’s, in my opinion. I’m sure Lorenzo had other problems, the problem is, we’ll never know it if he doesn’t survive.
So, I’m still responsible. If even Rebecca says it, so it’s true.
— By the way, do you have news?
— Emilia Lombardi says his state is stationary. He’s still unconscious and it’s too early to say if he’ll do it or not. Eleonora and the kids have been told. Of course, they’re broken.
I broke a family. Eleonora Ferri will blame herself for all her life for not having saved her husband. Francesco is 13 years old, he’ll grow without his father. Tommaso will go deeper into deviant behaviours whereas he’s only 16. Aurelia will never show her father her pride to be the head of the Trento’s restaurant at only 18 years old. And Alice, who had already lost her mother when she was 3, is now orphan, and she’s just 29 years old. And it’s all because of me, because I’m nothing but a little brat who thinks that humiliate the others will allow him to fill some empty holes in my heart and get the attention I’ve never had.
I’m a garbage.
The door of the office Rebecca occupies when she’s here has a golden stain on the black wood. Golden as his nominative plaque. “Dr. R. Loschitz, S5-10”. I knock timidly, as a kid called by the headmaster.
— Come in. Oh, Andrea. I didn’t expect you.
Without asking her for permission, I sit on the chair face to her. I need to talk and I think Rebecca is the only one who, at least, will pretend she listens to me.
— You have two minutes?
She nods and puts a cup on the table. Her intrigued expression disturbs me, it’s as if she was demanding explanations I’m unable to express correctly.
— Everything is ok, Andrea?
I look at my feet.
Since I’m superintendent, I refuse to show when I’m down. Not only because superintendents have to be infallible and flawless, but also because if I show weakness, everybody will take advantage of it and laugh at me, more than when they learn my nomination. I like to seem pretentious and arrogant, because like this, they leave me alone, but, most important, they respect me.
— I don’t feel good, Rebecca.
I look at the kettle on the desk.
— You want a tea?
I nod.
— Yes, please.
Once it’s ready, I tighten in my hands my cup of boiling English breakfast.
— So, tell me. It’s still about Lorenzo’s suicide attempt?
Her kind smile reassures me. It seems she wants to sympathize.
— Yes…
I take a big breath.
— I heard you talking with Napoleone in the corridor while you got out of Lorenzo’s office and I stayed in.
— Yeah, and?
— You said you think it’s not only because of me if Lorenzo tried to kill himself. You… are you serious?
To my surprise, she nods.
— Of course I’m serious! What were you expecting?
I don’t answer.
Having people by my side for other topics than work almost never occurred, I don’t know how to react.
— You… think I’m innocent?
She shrugs.
— You know, I really doubt you were a problem for Lorenzo, Andrea. He had others and he didn’t want to talk about it.
No. Impossible. Lorenzo didn’t have other problems. Everybody loved him, he was powerful, influent and knew how to manage his job and his family life. He perfectly knew his job, did it perfectly, and I always wondered how he did that. Out of work, he was a husband, a father, and a friend everyone could count on. Eleonora and their children made him happy, his grandson too, and unlike me, he had a lot of friends. Really, I don’t understand.
— I really feel dumb, Rebecca. I can’t believe I’m innocent in that story.
She sighs and stare at my eyes as to ask me with a bit of exasperation if I’m serious and when will I “finish to say bullshit”.
— Do you really have such a low self-esteem to think about such stupid things?
— I…
For a moment I’m tempted to tell her the truth. Why I’m like this. The indifference, the abandon, the ignorance towards me for years. The things that built me, that made me how I am now: an arrogant child with a desperate need of attention at the expanse of the others, and who does everything to have it, even if it means humiliating some people.
But Rebecca must not know it.
— You heard what the other superintendents told at the meeting. I have a very high self-esteem, but…
She giggles.
— If you had a high self-esteem, you wouldn’t have been so affected by what they told you, and I wouldn’t have found you crying in Lorenzo’s office.
Fuck!
— Andrea, don’t think we ignore your little stratagem: some know your story, others suppose things about the things you hide. You’re not a good actor.
I burst into tears. So, everybody knows. Everybody knows where I come from, what I got through, why and how I knew the Foundation.
— But you, Rebecca. Do you know?
She shakes her head.
— No, but, for example, Lorenzo did.
— But those who know… Why did they react like this? Why didn’t they defend me?
Rebecca shrugs.
— You ask too many questions, I don’t know.
— What can I do to make amend?
The question got out of my mouth before I can do anything. Horrified, I try to find an escape lane, a place to fly away, but I’m like transfixed by my stupidity. And Rebecca understands it very well.
— To make amend?
— No, no, I…
I finally find the physical and mental force to stand up.
— I don’t have to justify myself to anyone!
Whereas I turn myself to go out, I hear Rebecca screaming.
— Andrea Verdi!
The surprise sticks me again. This vocal power is unexpected from her. Rebecca is the kind of very discreet and shy person whose age accesses must be spectacular and terrifying. And I’m facing it.
— Don’t mistake me for a fool!
Her voice became very loud and makes me shiver.
— I’m not trying to fool you!
It’s like a voice coming from beyond the grave, as if she was speaking from Hell.
— I’m trying to help you.
Out of breath because of fear, I face her. With a glance, she forces me to sit back. In normal circumstances, I would have refused and would be gone like a drama queen but this time I obey, like a child blamed by his teacher. Rebecca gives me another tea.
— Don’t talk about making amend, it’s not the right word. You say it as if you were a criminal, stop that!
— In a way, at the Memetic Research Section, with all the lethal we create and test, we are criminals, we send D-Class personal to death everyday…
That’s exactly what Lorenzo would say. The tests of lethal memetic agents always got him revolted and as I’m able to create some and I love to do so, he often treated me of sadistic and criminal.
— Andrea, it’s not the question! We’re talking about you, not about the Foundation’s duty! I’m okay to help you, but you must accept to listen to me and admit that, for fuck’s sake, it’s not your fucking fault if Lorenzo killed himself! You won’t “make amend” if you don’t understand that!
I cry again, like a child. Living again with no reason the screams of my parents who fought each other thinking I was sleeping.
— Andrea. I want to help you, really. But if you don’t listen to me, we won’t going anywhere. I can’t help you if you refuse to believe me.
I close my eyes, suddenly exhausted.
In the end, she’s right. She’s my only support for the moment; if I don’t cooperate, she will let me down and I’ll be alone again.
— Ok, thank you.
A satisfied smile appears on her face while she drinks.
— Rebecca?
— Yes, Andrea?
I look in her eyes and a shy smile appears on my face.
— Thank you.
PART TWO :
I never went to the area of the Ethic and Moral Regulation’s Section. First, because I don’t have anything to do there, second because I’m not appreciated by the personal and so, I’d be welcomed very badly if I’d go to them. But I have to take a look around there. I can’t talk to Lorenzo to apologize, but I can go to see his subordinate, Emanuele Bigotti, to make amend towards his department. In a way, it will be as an apology.
Even if Bigotti is kind of resentful and I often mistreated him.
— Yes, he’s in his office. Would you like to meet him?
His assistant welcomes me. He seems surprised to see me and I understand him: I’m also quite surprised to be here.
— Yes, I’d like to meet him, please.
— Ok, well, follow me, Sir.
The corridors are decorated, it’s almost relaxing. Drawings, photos, posters… Far, far away from the atmosphere austere and sterile of the department I’m headmaster of, the Memetics Studies Department, where every visual support can be a lethal anomaly. It’s a place almost… heart-warming.
Did I come here when they captured and contained me? I don’t remember. This section also manages the formation of psychologists and psychiatrists in charge of sentient anomalies and… particular cases, so I guess I inevitably went here, but really, I don’t remember anything.
— It’s here. C’est ici.
The door is the same since years. As if they did always exactly the same when they have to repair it. Even the name on is the same. The assistant knocks and I hear a voice that scares me.
— What is it?
— The Fifth Superintendent would like to see you.
Moment of silence. I’m mentally shaking, fearing he tells me to fuck off.
— Made him enter.
Oh crap. I’d prefer he tells me to fuck off. Door opens and I see an old man with a big belly, baldness, white hair and a ridiculous moustache. His green eyes look at me with hate and I take a step back, paralyzed with fear.
— Andrea Verdi! I didn’t expect you to see here. Let me tell you something.
He always hated me. Since I came here, didn’t do anything than cause problems. I was 14 years old and this old coot horripilate me since the beginning. We never got on well, it’s visceral, I always hated me and I’m sure it’s mutual.
— I didn’t come to talk about new tests, Doctor Bigotti.
— It’s perfect, because I’ll never approve them anymore.
I… what the fuck???
— Doctor Ferri’s death won’t chang anything to our course of action and we’ll continue to repress your sadism and cruelty! The Ethic and Moral Regulation Section won’t die with Doctor Ferri !
Yeah, his anger is legit. It’s just too bad he doesn’t want to listen what I really have to say. Ouais, colère légitime. C’est juste dommage qu’il ne veuille pas écouter ce que j’ai vraiment à dire.
— And from now, Doctor Verdi, we’ll look after you very very attentively! None of your activities and the ones of your department will escape from us! You’ll never send D-Class personal to death anymore, until we’re not informed!
I absolutely don’t know what to tell him. That’s my problem: I’m very strong at pissing people off, talking them down and humiliating them, but at talking calmly with someone I know I don’t dominate, it’s very complicated. And as my current interlocutor doesn’t seem to be open to the conversation, it’s even more hard.
— We’ll be intransigents and we’ll never let us be mistreated by an arrogant little boy.
Bigotti tells his assistant to close the door and let us alone. The public scandal is over, now it’s time for the personal settling of scores.
— Sit down, Andrea.
His severe voice forces me not to protest. I have the feeling I’m back in time, when I came here for the first time. A weird boy, too much brave in a knowledge field he’s totally unaware of. As the rest of the world is, by the way. A world the little boy hardly believe he belongs to.
— I always thought you should have stayed under high monitoring and classified only as ressource, for the reasons you know. You also know your nomination as Fifth Superintendent hasn’t been seen well, and only by the other superintendents.
I knew that.
— You have seen that bad too, doctor Bigotti?
He nods with no shame and, at my biggest surprise, lights a cigarette.
— I suppose you don’t smoke. And it’s way better like this. Anyway. Yeah, I wasn’t happy at all about your nomination, Andrea. 29 years old, unprevisible and head of a branche of the SCP Foundation? Alas, S5-1 didn’t had other solutions?
I’d also like him that he had other solutions…
— You’ve always a disturbed child, continues Bigotti breathing the smoke of his cigarette to the ceiling. In a way, I can understand, thinking about what you lived while you were young. I thought that becoming superintendent would make you grow up. Make you becoming more mature.
He shakes his head and sighs.
— But nothing happened. Always the same contempt, the same arrogance… It’s exhausting, at the end, and for everyone. It’s not by being like this that you’ll be appreciated, Andrea, and you know it.
I look at my feet, ashamed. I don’t have any arguments and he knows it.
— Whatever. Why are you here, Andrea?
I shrug.
— I don’t remember…
There’s a little silence, while I’m trying to remember why I am here. His little speech made me lose my ideas.
— Oh, wait, maybe I remember.
Bigotti crashes his cigarette in the ashtray.
— So tell me.
I take a big breath. I have to confess, even if I know he’ll told this confession to everyone. He’ll see my biggest weakness : my lack of self confidence.
— I think I’m responsible of Lorenzo’s suicide.
Bigotti raises his eyebrows.
— Did you push him from the roof?
What?
— Well… no.
— So why would you be responsible of his death?
I… I don’t know ! Some told me I was, it means that’s true ! Holy shit, when will people stop turning me crazy ? Je sais pas… je sais pas !
— I’d better go.
While I stand on my feet, a hand grasps my arm with violence and forces me to stay. Bigotti fixes me in mye yes, with a serious expression, but without hate.
— Andrea. You think you’re responsible for Lorenzo’s death? Andrea.
If I answer no, I'd lie. If I answer yes, he’ll take profit of it to avenge himself.
— Some let me think I was.
His lips stretch in a nervous smile. My voice broke, revealing the distress I tried to hide.
— Do you believe them?
— I won’t answer this question.
— If you didn't believed them, you wouldn't have told that : you would have simply answered no.
He smiles at me, almsot compatissant, this time.
— I begin to know how you work, Andrea, since twenty-two years old. I know how you avoid the questions that disturbs you. In the end, you’re very predictable, once we know how your brain works.
I do a move to free myself, but Bigotti maintains me strongly.
— Let me go.
— No.
— Let me go!
— Still not.
— What the fuck do you want?
— I’d like you to talk with someone about what’s wrong. You absorb, you absorb and obviously, one day, you break down. We’ve already lost Lorenzo like that, don’t do the same thing.
I giggle sadly.
— If I die, no one will care about it. You’ll even be happy to get rid of me. Am I right?
I see him watching at me with consternation and stupefaction.
— How that, we would be happy? No one said that!
Nobody told it but everyone thinks it. Why people never loved me? Why am I on Earth if nobody wanted me to exist? Would everything had been different if people had shown me a bit of love and attention?
Why am I so different?
She’s quite tall, a bit curvy, large hips and shoulders, black hair tied in a long braid. A beautiful and simple woman. She’s 42 years old, a big age difference with her husband, but she looks much younger.
— Hi Lady Ferri, I’m… I’m Lorenzo’s colleague. I hope I don’t disturb?
She shakes her head, trying to look fine despite her eyes full of tears. It may have been days she struggles to stay dignified and smile while her husband is in the coma, and she still doesn’t know if he’ll wake up.
— Oh no, no, you don’t disturb. What’s your name?
— Verdi. Andrea Verdi.
She nods.
— Lorenzo often talked about you. Come in, please.
I follow her in the house, wondering in which way Lorenzo told her about me. I observe the place, the rooms, the ambiance. I never went to his home before, it’s radically different from the austere closet that is my appartement. Pastel paint on the walls, white ceiling, and everywhere, photos of mountains, forests and rivers of his native region, the Trentino. Here, I see a blonde teenager, a little black curly hair little girl and a dark-haired little boy holding a baby in their arms, there, I see a beach, and here, two young men in a tree. Alice, Aurelia and Tommaso with Francesco new-born, the Atlantic Ocean, and Lorenzo and his little brother, Vincenzo, when they were young. I want to cry again: I put an end to the life of a happy man, who didn’t deserve what I inflicted him.
— Your house is beautiful, Lady Ferri.
— Thank you, she answers with a sad smile.
We arrive in the living room, and she invites me to sit on a little table.
— What do I offer you?
— A coffee, thanks.
She takes a cup and fills it, bringing also a plate of cakes.
— So, Sir Verdi, what brings you here?
Fix what I’ve done. I won’t ask her to forgive me, it would be too much, but at least I can begin to fix broken things.
— I just wanted to know how you feel and if you need help.
Offering my help is the only way I found to make amend.
— It’s very nice of you, Sir Verdi.
Her cup of coffee shakes in her hands.
— To answer your question, well… life continues. It’s hard, but, you know, in front of the kids, I stay strong. They need their mother.
She puts her cup on the table. Her hands shake more.
— About the help, well… it’s always welcomed, thank you. P
— What can I do for you?
I said it without thinking. Usually, I’m not that spontaneous and dedicated guy, it’s disturbing.
— Well… Lorenzo told me you’re the psychiatrist working in the same criminal court as him, right?
— That’s right.
I didn’t know he talked about me this way. I have a degree in psychology and he’s officially defence lawyer, but I didn’t know he invented such things.
— I think… I’d need to… talk. With… someone… A specialist.
— A psychologist.
She nervously giggles.
— Yes, this, exactly, a psychologist. If you know good ones… Lorenzo appreciated you, I suppose I can trust you.
Excuse me? He appreciated me? Like, really?
— I can look among my colleagues and give you names. If you have a urge need to talk here and now, I’m here, Lady Ferri.
She opens her mouth but changes her mind.
— I don’t want to piss you off with my problems, Sir Verdi.
It’s by dint of thinking things like that, that your husband went into coma after jumping off a ten-floors tower, Eleonora.
— I wouldn’t be here if it “pissed me off”, as you said, Lady Ferri. I’m neither here by duty or obligation: I have a great respect for your husband, despite our numerous divergences of points of view.
She blushes.
— Thanks a lot, Sir Verdi. Take a cake, please.
Racked by hunger, I eat a little vanilla cake, whose reveals being delicious. I wonder if Lorenzo cooked it, he’s very brave at cooking.
— Unless no one clearly tells me Lorenzo is dead or ask me if I want to turn off the reanimation machines, I consider he’s alive. Like… I don’t know, it helps me to hold on. This, and my children, of course. Aurelia is perfect, she takes care of her little brothers like a queen, I didn’t imagine her like that.
She sighs.
— She also tries to stay strong, but she’s 17 years old, it’s hard for her, I know that. A mother feels these things, Sir Verdi.
Yeah, a good mother does, without any doubt. Mine never seen (or want to see?) I felt bad.
— I felt Lorenzo was bad, continues Eleonora. But he never wanted to tell me why. And it worsened those last days, with…
Her voice breaks and she hardly swallow.
— Did he told you?
— No, Lady Ferri, he told me nothing.
Rebecca seemed to know; I’ll ask her.
— A very dark court case he’s involved in, and that took place 25 years ago. There had been news elements recently and… it might have worsened a depression already well installed.
I see a tear on her cheek, and I have a question: what is that court case? And if it was the last straw that broke the camel’s back, what caused this depression?
The answer is simple: me. That’s me, my immaturity and my stupidity.
— Do you know what could get him depressed?
Eleonora shrugs.
— I don’t know. Work, always more work, one of our sons who does bad things at school… it can be a lot of things, but you know, a real man doesn’t cry, a real man doesn’t show up his emotions… You know it, Sir Verdi.
You don’t know how much I know it, Eleonora…
— Were there people he didn’t get on well with? I mean at work. Colleagues, other lawyers, judges of the criminal court ?
This asshole of Memetic Research Division’s director?
— He didn’t say anything about that. Once he told about a young psychologist he works with…
Oh my God, me?
— … who can, sometimes, being immature and irritating, but he talked about him with… with love, as of a little boy who just needed support and attention to grow up. He said this young man needs more help than comtempt.
Fuck he really liked me! And I killed him, holly shit!
— And this colleague could have push him to…
— Oh no, not at all, Lorenzo liked him very much.
Phew.
We continue to talk, without watching the clock. Eleonora Ferri is a very attentive and devoted spouse, in love of Lorenzo, dedicated to the well-being of her family, her children and her step-daughter, all summed up, she’s the mother I wish I had. I actually wish Eleonora and Lorenzo would be my parents. Aurelia, Tommaso and Francesco are lucky.
I wonder how was Lorenzo twenty years ago, when he raised Alice alone? When Donatella died and he was with a three-years-old little girl without knowing what to do? How did he react?
— Hi mommy!
A young girl just came into the room. She’s got black and curly hair, brown eyes full of vitality.
— Aurelia! How are you, darling?
I watch the clock. 6:30pm. Fuck, already?
— Yeah, I’m fine. Good evening… sir.
— Here’s a dad’s colleague. Sir Verdi, I introduce you my daughter, Aurelia, she made these cakes.
I smile at her, trying to seem the less scary as possible.
— They are delicious.
She blushes.
— Thank you. Merci.
— Aurelia inherited his father’s talent for cooking, tells Eleonora Ferri. And it’s better like this, because if she had inherit from mine…
I’ll ask her the recipe. I love cooking, I could try to cook it myself.
— I’ll bring these cakes to Daddy when he’ll wake up, says Aurelia curling up to her mother.
I hope he’ll wake up, honey.
I decided to go outside. Passing by for a while. Rome is a beautiful city, yet I never visited it. “You work too much” Lorenzo told me one day, approved by my two only friends, Alessandro and Valeria, respectively Captain Draghi and Commander Cattaneo, also members of the Foundation. If they manage to find some free time between their work and their love story while they live very far away from each other, I can do it too.
So I went out. I think it’s what Lorenzo wants to. He wants the life to continue. He wants me to be happy. I put my MP3 player in my ears, and I went in the metro, up to the Coliseum. I’m 36 and I never saw it. My parents never took me to, and at 14 years old, I’ve been imprisoned in Sardinia, at Minerva Site, I was supposed never going out of. But it’s never too late and the Coliseum looks amazing. The sun lights up the edifice twice millenary and I’d really like to join the crowd came to visit the monument, opened to the public after one year of sanitary crisis. But wouldn’t it be strange, a guy like me, a bit weird, who visits a monument alone? If someone I know sees me, what will they think of me? I’m supposed to be a workaholic, not a lazy passing by where he doesn’t have to be.
Because I should be contained, not free.
— Andrea!
I jump with fear while someone takes my arm. It’s a gorgeous woman with brown eyes made up with shining violet eyeshadow and black eyeliner. She wears a very skinny blue jean tucked into high boots and a black fake fur jacket. I can’t see her lipstick because of the mask, but I can assume without error it’s black or purple, it’s what she always wears.
— Hi, Lucrezia.
Eighth Superintendent and last arrived of our group, Lucrezia Cerise, 45 years old, is a statuesque black-haired woman on who every human being who appreciates woman had a long look meeting her. She doesn’t let me indifferent.
— You, er… I wanted to tell you something.
She looks embarrassed. As if it was serious.
— Yes?
— I… Sorry for last day, when I said you were responsible for… you know Lorenzo. It was stupid and I’m sorry.
Wow. Lucrezia Cerise apologizes. It’s unexpected. She’s like me, she never apologizes. But unlike me, she’s very self-confident: if she never apologizes, it’s not because she’s too ashamed : it’s because she thinks she doesn’t have to do so.
— I… I accept your apologizes.
There’s an embarrassing silence. Lucrezia is beautiful, very beautiful, I’ve always been attracted, and…
— What are you doing here alone?
I blush with shame. What do I tell her?
— I’m passing by. How about you?
She shows me the wonderful structure I hesit to go to.
— I visit the Coliseum with Emilio. We took some free days and, moreover, Manuel is not at his mother’s, so we profit.
Emilio. This asshole of Emilio Rogazzi the Research Coordinator of Site Plutone? He’s 60, she deserves better!
— You go to Coliseum? I… I…
If I’m not alone, maybe I’ll seem less stupid.
— You want to come with us?
Yes, yes, yes, fuck yes!
— No, no, I don’t want to disturb.
A smile appears under the mask.
— If I ask you, it means it doesn’t disturb us. I asked Emilio before if he was ok, and he said yes.
Oh, it changes everything!
— So, I come with you.
It’s beautiful. Really beautiful. Who could have thought such an amount of stones would still stand two thousand years later? It’s as if I observed the world from above, as if I was as powerful, I want to seem. I’m sur excited, it’s amazing. Other visitors look so small below. From above, the wind whips my face, makes my hair a bit too long fly and makes me forget all my problems and preoccu-pations. I close my eyes and put my head up to appreciate the wind and the fresh, and I can’t help myself laughing. Triggering a violent pain in the muscles of my face, sign that I hadn’t laughed since too much time. I forget my faults, my errors and my sadness for a moment.
— Are you ok, Andrea?
I open my eyes. In front of me, Lucrezia ties up her hair that fell in her face.
— I’m super ok!
— Are you happy to be here?
— Yes, it’s wonderful! I wish I came here earlier!
I observe doctor Rogazzi, Site Plutone’s Research Coordinator, who explains his son things I can’t hear. The young Manuel looks as stunned as me.
— Did you come to show the Coliseum to your son, or for work?
She laughs. Elle se marre.
— If we were here for work, we wouldn’t have taken our son with us.
Logical.
— Lucrezia? In which film is the hero perched, with his arms wide open and screams he’s the master of the world?
— It’s Leonardo Di Caprio in Titanic.
— Every night in my dreams, I see you, I feel you…
Lucrezia smiles.
— Exactly.
I laugh.
— I’ve never seen the film.
She shrugs while laughing too.
— Don’t worry: neither I, I only know the song. Yes, Emilio?
Rogazzi makes her a sign. He and his son go outside. Lucrezia looks at them, worried. I don’t ask any questions; nor here, nor a few moments later when she decides to follow them and I follow her. We find back Rogazzi outside the monument, holding in his arms his son very pale.
— What’s happening, Manuel?
— He has a little discomfort.
I see a coffee on the place, and I suggest to Rogazzi and Lucrezia to go there, thing they accept with relief. Manuel needs to sit and drink. I decide it’s my round of drinks and I offer drinks to all of them.
— Thank you, Fift- doc- Sir Verdi, says Rogazzi seeing his son having his strength back and normal colours again.
— It’s normal.
The discussion starts. Lucrezia and Rogazzi often come to Roma, just to visit, they’re never tired of it. Normally, they are only two, in couple, but today, they are in family : the ex-lady Rogazzi consented to let her son hanging out with his father, which seems really rare. As the discussion progresses, I identify more and more with the young Manuel, shy, uneasy, almost afraid of adults. He tries to be as discreet as possible, and I see little afraid looks towards me.
He’s 15 years old, was I the same when I was 15?
Certainly, but I was contained in the bottom of Sardinia, studied and observed for anomalous capacities the loneliness made me develop unconsciously.
— Andrea? Everything is ok?
I wake up from my dream. Lucrezia and her boyfriend look at me, worried.
— Yes, excuse-me I was a bit lost. What were we talking about?
The Site Virtus is near Cinecittà studios, in the East of Rome. In the building reserved for the personal’s houses, Lucrezia has a flat just for her when she comes at the Superintendence meetings. Not me: I prefer sleep at the hostel or better: arrive in the morning, do the meeting and go back home just after. But, since the terrible announcement ten days ago, I feel I’m not able to go “home”, I couldn’t tell why. Not until Lorenzo will stay in reanimation.
So, sad to see me sleeping in a sleeping bag on the floor of my office, Lucrezia and Rogazzi allowed me to sleep at their home, on their sofa. It's comfortable but the night is not quiet at all. The sky changes his colour in continuation in an atmosphere of end of the world, the thunder in the background breaking my tympans. I twist my neck to endure the furious look of a blond-haired man with blue glasses and red tie, who fixes me from his ten meters high.
— I had a lot of esteem for you. Esteem and appreciation, and you knew it.J’avais beaucoup d’estime pour toi, Andrea. D’estime et d’amitié et tu le savais.
His very loud and deep voice, with a pronounced Piedmont accent, didn’t change. He knew how to set his dominance and when he shouted, it was worse. But unlike me, he didn’t need to shout to be heard. With me, they agree to make me stop shouting. They agreed with Lorenzo because he had good arguments.
— Lorenzo, I’m… I’m sorry.
That’s useless, he knows it and me too. It’s too late to apologize, if what I did would be excusable.
— Your incessant bites and you constant aggressivity pushed me over the edge. I feared each Superintendence meeting, because I knew you would humiliate me again and tell me I only prevent you from working correctly. Because by dint of repeat it, everyone began to think as you and humiliate me and made me doubt of myself, my capacities and why I was here for. What I have been made for. You destroyed my life, Andrea.
Harassment. That’s what pushed him to jump off the roof. Moral harassment. I went as far as that.
— I’m a shit, Lorenzo.
— You’re a brat. A brat who should have stay a dangerous anomaly, not becoming Superintendent. This task is too hard for you, and you said it yourself.
A tear runs on my chin. He’s right, I should never have gone out of my containment cell. I should have stay a humanoid able to create without knowing it lethal memetic agents. I should have remained an entity, not becoming what I am, the world as better when I was contained. Because he was protected against a kid who made killer drawings and wasn’t even conscious of it.
I was a monster and still am.
— You can slap me if you want.
He shakes his head, making his neck and jaw cracking.
— You don’t worth it. I never slapped anyone and I don’t want to soil my hands touching you, disgust me.
His lips twisted in a grin and he swips his chin decorated with a bruise that completely recovers it.
— I thought I’d be furious against you and slap you, he says, but I don’t even have the will of it. I’m not angry, Andrea, I’m disappointed, and it’s worse.
I burst into tears.
— Lorenzo, I’m sorry!
He sighs, tightening his tie. The thunder intensifies.
— Go away, I don’t want to see you anymore.
I kneel in front of him.
— Lorenzo… Lorenzo, please!
The wind makes me swing, as if I was on a boat caught in the storm. The lightning falls all around me while the sky becomes red as blood, ready to tear. The thunder is now a continued growling crossing my whole body as an electric current.
— Andrea! Andrea, wake up!
A bush goes into flames just next to me and I jump forward to avoid it.
— Andrea !
— Do you do that to punish me, Lorenzo?
He doesn’t answer, continues to fix me without expression. I can’t stand up, the wind makes me swing back and forth, as if some was shaking me. And this voice continues to scream my name! Make her stop, I can’t stand it!
— Andrea, please, wake up! Andrea, réveille-toi ! S’il te plait !
The thunder calms down and here come the artificial light. The voice becomes more precise, and I recognize her typical French accent. In a sur human effort, I blink and see Lucrezia shaking me, worried.
— Everything is okay, you just made a nightmare.
PART 3:
Bip… bip… bip…
I hear this sound since too much time, interrupted by longs periods of silence during which I suppose I sleep. I can’t open my eyes, it’s as it they were stuck by a screed of lead. I can’t move anything but the hands of my left hand. My head is a gong on which someone hits in continuation with an enormous hammer, synchronized with the incessant beeps. I feel pain everywhere in my body and I think I begin to understand.
I missed. I missed my jump and I’m still alive. Fuck me, even that I’m unable to do it correctly? Am I such a shit?
Oh, my head… Where am I?
— Doctor Ferri?
The voice again. I can’t answer it, it’s since days, it’s frustrating, I don’t know what to do to communicate.
My fingers. Moving my fingers.
— Do you hear me, doctor Ferri?
Trying to speak. To make a sound. To move.
— Try to open your eyes.
Impossible, they’re too heavy.
— Hold my hands.
Hands took my fingers. With some effort, I manage to move my fingers. I feel the tension and the anxiety in the voice.
— Again?
Another one.
— Doctor Lombardi! Doctor Lombardi, the Seventh Superintendent regains consciousness!
— Good morning, Sir Verdi.
Manuel Rogazzi is the only present when I arrive in the room for breakfast. He’s sat at the table, slices of bread and cup of chocolate next to him while he’s reading a book. I see no cell phone next to him, and it’s a good thing, young people are too addict to technology nowadays.
— Good morning, Manuel. Aren’t your parents wake up?
— It seems they’re not. I heard Lucrezia vomit this night, she needs to rest, and Dad stayed in bed with her.
He shrugs.
— It doesn’t matter, I’m used to be alone.
His sad expression breaks my heart. I imagine a shy child bullied at school, who fakes being ok and smiles whereas he hides a deep malaise.
A bit like me at the same age.
— What do you want to drink? There’s coffee but I don’t know how the coffee machine works.
— It doesn’t matter, I’ll take a tea.
While I make water boil, I watch at him. Seeing a cell ringing on the table. He doesn’t even watch it. I come back with my tea and see him reading his book with a concentration too forced to be honest. He puts the cell at the other side of the table, as if he didn’t want to see it. Intrigued and almost sad, I sit next to him.
— Is everything ok, Manuel?
— Yeah, yeah, he answers with a tone of voice that says the total opposite.
I have a slice of bread with hazelnut paste and soak it into my tea. There’s a silence moment, during which my eyes are attracted by the morning diary. I love reading, I read absolutely everything I see, even the little letters in the contracts. It is to say that for a very long period, I had nothing else to do.
— Are you a friend of my parents, or a colleague?
— A colleague.
I can’t say I’m Rogazzi’s friend, I saw him only once, and with Lucrezia, it had been tensed for a long time. Sexually, in particular. I’ve never indifferent to her beauty and for a long time I thought I attracted her, before seeing she already had a partner. And I’ve been disappointing about who it was. Let’s say I didn’t expect it.
— Ye, I see.
New silent moment. Nothing is interesting in the diary. I should buy new books; I don’t have anything to read.
— What are you reading, Manuel?
He blushes.
— Scapin the Schemer. It’s a Molière’s book, a French author from… 1600 something, don’t remember.
— What is it about ?
He explains me the plot, a forbidden love story between a rich young man and a gypsy, helped in their relation by a facetious valet called Scapin. He reads it for French class, a subject he loves, thanks to Lucrezia, who speaks better French than Italian. Manuel seems to be an excellent pupil, who spends his time reading and studying.
— And how is it at school with other pupils?
He gets paralyzed. In his eyes I see the same fear that never left me when I was younger. A visceral fear of the others, of the environment around me, a deep fear to be attacked, mistreated, that made me stay in my bed for days without no one worries about me. The terror to be confronted with others, to be hated, and this difficulty to socialize, despite the efforts I made and that was above my capacities.
— No.
— No?
— No, things are not going well. I don’t like school. I love studying, but…
He sighs.
— It doesn’t interest anyone, right? What I say. Nobody gives a fuck.
You’re right, Manuel. Nobody gives a fuck, because nobody listens to the others. Look at me, I pushed a colleague to suicide because bullying him enjoyed myself. The world is cruel and human beings are bastards. At your age, I was a confirmed anomaly, who developed dangerous capacities because she was left alone and has nothing else to do to entertain herself.
— I care, Manuel. I’m psychologist, my job is to help people who have problems.
— What will it do? They won’t stop trip me in the playground. You can’t do anything against them.
I can make them suffer. I can do killer drawings that took life of fellows able to do attacks against the Nation, I won’t be afraid of 14-years-old little brats. You mustn’t suffer what I suffered of, and you must not become what I became because of that. You don’t deserve it.
— Against them, no, you’d better talk to your father or to Lucrezia, maybe they’ll put you in another school. You can talk to me about your problems, your fears and so on.
— It’s not important.
Of course, it’s important. Teenagers as you commit suicide every year because of bullying. You can’t stay alone with that.
— It is important. You know, I’ve been bullied at school too. And I talked to my parents, but they didn’t do anything, they barely listened to me. I think Lucrezia and your father will listen to you.
He sadly sucks his orange juice by the straw.
— Yeah… are you sure?
— I’m sure of it. You can’t stay alone with this harassment, Manuel. Lucrezia and I have a friend who had been victim of harassment or years. Desperate, he jumped off a roof and he’s in reanimation since a week. If he had found someone to help him and listen to him, he could have had help, and maybe he wouldn’t be in that situation now.
Manuel starts crying. Without knowing or understanding what I do, I take him in my arms, and he lets me do. I’m a bit lost, it’s strange, I’m letting acting a part of me I reject since years, a part of sweetness and humanity. By comforting a child, giving him the occasion to talk, as I did with Eleonora Ferri, it’s a bit as if I tried to fill a hole, a love I never had. Or as if I searched to be forgiven. I killed Lorenzo, I’ll try to fix what I did, by helping others. As the Foundation saved me from what I was, from what I lived when I was 14. In a way, I preferred being imprisoned and studied but fed and treated than free but mistreated.
In the end, wouldn’t I be happier taking care of other instead of treating them as if they were some shits under my shoe? In the end, would I do better work if I wasn’t a garbage? Should I try to be a better person?
Ten days ago, it was the same configuration. All in the same room, around a table, and eyes full of hate fixed no me. The difference is that now, I have Lucrezia and Rebecca by my side. But Lorenzo’s empty chair still remains hard to handle. I don’t know how he feels, and I still don’t know why he did that. I can’t get out of my head the fact I’m not responsible of this.
— Good morning everyone. Bonjour à toutes et à tous.
Napoleone enters the room and here comes the silence. He always has his little effect, despite we know him and work with him for seven years, more than that for some of us. The aura of being S5-1, maybe. His white hair and his 73 years old give him an allure of grandfather full of wisdom and knowledge. And of a monumental charge: manage ten other superintendents who can’t stand each other. Meetings that don’t degenerate are very rare, mainly because of me, because I can’t help myself screaming to be heard as if it was the only solution.
— Thank you for being present in a way or another. Today, I have a very important new for you.
— Is it about Lorenzo ? asks Vittoria, shaking.
— It is about Lorenzo, yes.
I begin to shake while all the eyes of my colleagues turn towards me. They are full of hate again and I know we all have the same idea in mind.
Lorenzo is dead. He didn’t survive his injuries and they disconnected the machines. We definitely lost him. I bite my lip to make it bleed, in order not to cry. I don’t want to look at my colleagues, I don’t want to think his family has to be told about his death, I don’t want to think that…
— Is he… ? asks a shy voice I can identify.
— Emilia Lombardi, Asclepio Site’s hospital’s director, called me yesterday at 9pm.
My hands sweat and my lip explodes because of the pression of my teeth due to stress. If he says he’s dead, I kill myself. I’ll never forgive myself.
— Lorenzo is out of the coma.
The pressure vanishes and I burst into tears. Not only with joy: I’m also relieved.
He’s alive. He’s alive, he’ll do it.
— He can’t speak nor open his eyes. He’s seriously hurt and won’t get out of the hospital before several weeks.
I don’t care. I don’t care, he’s alive, that the only important thing for me. I’m not a murderer, he’ll survive, I’ll ask him to forgive me.
— I’ll let you be informed of the evolution of his health. For the moment, he needs to rest.
I expire slowly, tears in my eyes. It’s as if the gate exploded, releasing the pressure contained for ten days. As after a university exam but thousand times stronger.
— Andrea? Are you ok?
— Holy God, he’s alive…
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Codages des couleurs :
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Mot | Mot | Mot |
Formules | gdg | shhth |
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dgtjedg<d | sfhsdhd | xvndgn |
fhfhf | dhfhfhj | s<thdj |
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tphjryj,pkdtjh | <sfrhdhdjf | hthdjfhyjfh |
Créditer un rapport original :
Auteur original : nomdeluser ne correspond à aucun identifiant existant
Source Originale : Fondazione SCP
Date : JJ/MM/AAAA
Lien : SCP-XXX
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Crédits
Titre : SCP-XXX-FR - Le nom du SCP / Le titre du conte (modifier en fonction de la branche d'origine si c'est une trad)
Auteur : Le-pseudo-wikidot-de-l'auteur ne correspond à aucun identifiant existant
Date : La date de publication du rapport, avec le mois en toutes lettres (exemple "3 février 2016")
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