The Harvest of Souls

CHAPTER 36

VINDOBONA

12.01.8462 - 2:33 AM

Fernand had just come out of the bath when he received the call from Lélia. Contrary to what he imagined, he would not have time to rest. His mission would start right now. He put on his persona Gaspar Rocheleau again and walked out of his apartment excitedly, down Prinz Eugen-Straße to his favorite region of Vindobona, the Hofburg. It was common for him to carry out this type of mission a few decades ago, but these missions ceased to exist after the Last War. Being there, in the middle of the night, going to the center of Vindobona to invade a large complex of government buildings brought pleasant anxiety that Fernand had already missed.

Despite being a reasonable distance between his apartment and Hofburg, Fernand decided to walk. He wore five different layers of coats and two layers of pants. It was common to dress that way when going on a mission. If something happened and he needed to change his clothes, he just needlessly peel off the top layer and discard it somewhere safe.

After a walk of just over half of an hour, Fernand followed a narrow street at the back of the fenced garden to the darkest spot he could find. He came to a point on the street where there was only the garden on one side and a building under renovation on the other, full of scaffolding and a perimeter safety screen covering the entire side of the building. It would be the perfect place to jump over the garden enclosure. He looked to see that no one was passing on the adjacent streets, and then quickly, with surprising dexterity despite the many layers of clothing he wore, Fernand climbed onto the concrete section and then climbed over the black iron grid. Giving a hard kick with his feet and grabbing the top rails of the enclosure, Fernand threw his entire body over the spiky spears of the enclosure and fell into the garden. Fernand was silent for a moment, noting whether the noise he had caused had caught anyone's attention. He then noticed a large tear in his upper coat, caused by one of the spears. 'I'm losing my way,' he thought. After making sure no one was around, he started across the frozen lawn to a narrow path in the garden. Fernand followed the paved path to its end, in an expansive courtyard in front of a beautiful columned building. He crossed the yard quickly: the absence of trees to camouflage himself with would make him an easy target. Fortunately, he had not been observed by the two or three people passing around the park.

Fernand reached the left corner of the building and then analyzed how he would climb to its top. He knew very well that all the old need for security had been drastically reduced with the Safe Era. There were no more guards on the streets, houses had no alarms or walls, and therefore it was easy to invade commonplaces. But that was no ordinary place that was the cradle of the current power system. It was the buildings where it all started and where a lot was still happening.

Fernand knew that if he tried to enter through one of the buildings' windows, there would likely be some alarm system, and so when studying the building plans in detail, he had chosen a window that was on the side of one of the roofs, which overlooked one of several courtyards. He noted that the entire building had horizontal moldings and figured this would make it easier for him to climb to the roof of the building. Fernand then began to climb the left corner of the building and managed to reach the second floor with some ease. His fingertips ached, but he ignored the pain, as well as the height he was slowly gaining. There was a cemented walkway of about one and a half meters around the building: if he fell at any point, he made a mental note it would be wise to throw himself as far away from the building as possible and try to avoid the cement strip, falling to the grass in the garden.

Upon reaching the third floor of the building, things became more complex. The walls were completely flat, except for a column right in the middle of the corner of the building: a round column that had the same moldings as the first floors. Fernand then began to grip these moldings with his fingers and use his feet to brace himself against the sides of the building. He realized how much his effort had intensified, as well as the height. 'Great, the chances of me falling from here are bigger, so is the height,' he thought with a snort as he put his right hand higher and pulled his body towards the top of the building. Fernand was no longer even paying attention to whether anyone on the street could see him or hear his clumsy gestures to scale one of the walls of the Hofburg.