In the meanders of France a young man makes his way through the crowd, near the Pyrenees in a lost village, the young man was walking down the street living his day when in front of his house a black vehicle stopped.

  Three men got out and went to knock on his door. But he interrupted them before doing so for nothing.

  -Excuse me but I am the owner of this house.

  The three men in uniform turned to face him as the man in the center removed his sunglasses and smiled widely.

  -Bonjour. Excuse my French but you must be Olivier Lebeau?

  -Indeed, what can I do for you?

  -We belong to the European federation of Giant Monster Combat, GMC, and we would like to offer you an opportunity.

  One scrapper and two muscles, three with the one behind the wheel, maybe more. With a gesture, Olivier pressed his earpiece to inform his father of the situation. Less than thirty seconds later, Hector Lebeau opened the door asking only for their boss to come in for a chat. Still smiling, he complied, but Olivier already wanted to smash his face in. In half an hour the man introduced himself as Alexander Blewing and was looking for experienced monster controllers to fight in the arena. He explains that since the war the fighting circuit has become the main source of income in the entertainment world, even reaching the level of soccer with millions at stake per match and billions in tournaments. Unfortunately the fact that the participants are not human makes them expendable in the eyes of some, leading to embarrassing situations when the creatures die but their replacements are not ready to fight due to technical, genetic or timing problems.

  Being a former soldier of a former monster fighting unit in the French army, his services would be more than appreciated in the search for an easy solution.

  Leaving some papers behind, Alexander left with his men, leaving the father and son duo to discuss.

  -What are you thinking about?

  -You know what I'm thinking.

  -Dad, you know how much money I could make, we could finally stop worrying about being homeless, heating problems gone, treatment at an institute for you. We could even turn the village itself into an institute.

  Hector said nothing and that said a lot about him, stubborn but realistic, never did reality hit harder than when he said it, except when he was wrong.

  -Go to the barn and check the fine prints. If they want to hire you, you have to show what you can do, so you create more demand.

  -Thank you…

  -Never get obsessed with a deal you will always lose, make sure you always have an out in your contract, if you feel like you are going to lose everything back off, better a missed opportunity than to lose everything and not be able to recover.

  -Dad…

  -No, you've never known anything but the countryside or the battlefield where your enemies only face you. Once you're in the city the smooth talkers will be circling you like sharks. Create a clan of men and women around you to cover you and trust you, choose them carefully. But be careful to deserve them and they will be loyal to you. Now go, prepare him...

  -I wanted to know. Did you find out?

  -No, I know you'd like to, but the war has left scars that will remain long after we're dead. White's previous partner is missing.

  -But you know I can't control him.

  -Yes I know but others can, if you can sell it in the circles you can get a good price. You've taken care of it enough for the problems you've had. If the opportunity arises, don't hesitate.

  -...

  -I don't want you to go, son, but I know I can't keep you.

  Olivier went into the barn, in front of him a huge laboratory had replaced the old stables, in a stasis box at the bottom ready to be transported was a creature he had recovered. He will always remember that moment when the creature came back from the front covered in blood so much that it turned red.

  A giant gorilla with four arms, but who only have 2, "White" had lost his two arms during his last battle. Of the entire battalion only the gorilla had returned, no controller, no support or protection, not even a weapon. No news of survivors, impossible to check the corpses because of the bombing.

  The strangest thing was the fact that White had returned to the camp instead of wandering around the battlefield or letting himself die. Olivier knew that his last partner was still alive, at least until the end of the battle. Since then all attempts to connect his mind with White had failed or created laughable results.

  Maybe Hector was right, maybe the exotic gorilla could be sold abroad.

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Chapter 1

  In Germany, in the residence for the severely wounded Saint Raphael, Elga took care of her burned, disfigured patients, all survivors of the war, she was proud to work in this center, her own father had died in the conflict, but no one seemed to realize that there were still living people who had lived through hell. How many families came here, none, there were only those left behind without family and anonymous.

  Mr. Filmor, who had lost an arm, and Mr. Loprino, who had become blind. The first one in his armchair was watching the national news channel while the second one was listening in silence. The room was wide but already the patients were able to move in the corridors to come, the morning was hardly begun but already one of the complicated patients presented to Helga. Amadeus passed in front of her as she opened the door almost slamming it in Elga's face, she kept her calm not trying to follow him anyway, he had lost some of his common sense since his return from a battle, since his arrival and his ability to walk, he rushed as soon as he woke up to one of the windows of the great hall to watch the sun rise over the hills, convinced he had to stand sentry in case of an attack, because of his scarred face and a... Bad morning a few years ago. He knows that there is nothing, but he has to, it's stronger than him.

  Others were calmer, like Mr. Danny, in a wheelchair, he hoped sooner or later to be able to get out of the hospital, but before that he wanted to take advantage of the system to study law, collect a lot of money and finally buy two magnificent prostheses to replace his two legs torn off by a grenade.

  Mr. Ponchel, who became mentally handicapped following his awakening and several days in a coma, his family left him in the compound unable to take care of him comfortably. Give him a pen and he will look at it from every angle for an hour, remove the cap and start the process again.

  It was a beautiful day, the windows were open and bright, the summer heat was bearable, with her colleague Catherine, Elga went from patient to patient administering care or a wash. Their last patient was in the farthest room with the least amount of light, a single cell with a very small window. Their supervisor had told them that he was an unidentified person found on a battlefield who was conscious but in a comatose state. They put him in a wheelchair and guided him to the bathroom where he would be washed. The process was often done with a bit of discussion between Elga and Catherine, but Elga could not help but admire the scars on the man they called Hans, his whole body was the result of war. One in particular went from his throat to the back of his skull. His supervisor Nicolas had explained to him that he had probably been a monster controller and that a wound had destroyed his device, frying his brain in the process, hence the catatonic state.

  After having put him back on his chair. Nicola comes to see them. Looking at Hans Elga could see the closest thing to pity in the supervisor's eyes towards Hans. Clearly he was not indifferent to his fate. Curious, Elga asked him what he knew about him. Really.

  -He was found with his clothes almost completely burned, he was limping while carrying one of our men on his back in the camp, when finally the doctors came to take care of him he was in a coma. He was then transferred from hospital to hospital to land here. Everything I know is here, no more, no less, the report was not very large and in wartime it is already huge, go put it in the common room Elga we have work to do.

  Elga left him next to several patients in front of the TV. Catherine, who had been following the exchange, could not help but think about what Dr. Nicolas had said, taking Elga by the arm, she asked her softly.

  -Do you realize that this means that he might be French?

  -Don't talk to me about this as if it were a disease, the tragedies of war strike in all camps. We are here to care for people, not judge them for their origins. If you have a problem with that, you can always go see Dr. Nicolas.

  Catherine let go of her and apologized before leaving, she too is a victim like everyone else. The day ends with Elga turning off the TV, Catherine and patiently taking the residents back to their rooms. Nicolas came to see her before closing for the night, tonight Elga would be on call.

  She didn't like being on call at night, many of the very quiet patients had their demons coming out.

  Danny was crying in his room. Moaning came from Mr. Loprino. Amadeus was clinging to the bars of his little window trying to look at the horizon for hours. In short, nothing very motivating. Every hour she made her rounds, inspecting each room and asking those still up if they were okay. The night passed without incident which brought a long sigh to her knowing that tomorrow morning she would be taking over the duty of a sick colleague.

  Making the rounds one last time she passed the last room, Hans', opening the peephole she looked at him, motionless with closed eyes, until he opened them, startling her. Taking two steps back, she looked around again and finally saw that his eyes were closed. Tired, she thought.

  Morning came and once again the regulars greeted her as their doors opened, Amadeus even waited until his door was fully open to leave. Going to Hans, she put him in his wheelchair and took him to the common room. She then heard an altercation. Mr. Filmor was trying to get the TV remote back. Playing with Ponchel had turned on a wartime news channel. Looking around, she saw the faces of some people change. Moving toward Ponchel as quickly as possible, she let Hans' chair roll uncontrolled.

  -Ponchel, give me the remote control please. Now!

  Ponchel had fallen to the floor in a ball preventing Elga or Filmor from retrieving the object. She started to get up to turn off the TV manually when she got a shock.

  Hans was standing there staring at the TV, lost in thought. Filmor turned to look and was as stunned as she was. Their trance was interrupted when a shrill cry sounded next to them.

  -Der rote reise!

  Elga then saw Amadeus charge Hans, the scream alerted all the other patients who had been just passive at the time, Elga saw the situation go from tense to chaotic as the patients screamed to take cover, some calling for orders or a weapon. Dr. Nicholas immediately called for more staff to calm the panic.

  Amadeus had just collided with Hans but Hans pushed him back, trying to grab his clothes. Hans grabbed his wrist and twisted it, making him let go. Keeping his hand trapped, Hans swung at him with a judo throw over his shoulder, sending him straight into the TV. Knocking over the furniture and the TV in his fall, Amadeus found himself unhorsed on the floor. Filmor came out of his stupor and tried to stop the fight, but Olivier had grabbed his foot to keep the remote and still hadn't let go. Hans began to stand on top of Amadeus, beating him. But as chaos reigned. Another voice began to be heard.

  -Dei Kreig ist vorbei! The war is over!

  Loprino in his chair in front of Hans and Amadeus fighting shouted with all his body and the calm returned immediately in the room. Loprino shouted several times to make sure that everyone had heard, Hans stopped hitting Amadeus looking around, lost. Around them silence fell as the nurses and Dr. Nicholas took the patients to their rooms and cleaned up the mess.

  In his chair, Loprino, out of breath, kept repeating that the war was over in every language he knew, Elga took him in her arms, telling him he was right as tears flowed from his absent eyes. She watched as Amadeus was taken away by the nurses, who were repeating words as well.

  -Ich sah sie über dem Hügel, ihren Schatten auf dem Schlachtfeld. Der Rote Riese.

  He too was crying, his face covered with bruises. "Hans" was clearly lost in this environment. But Elga could understand Amadeus, towering over the nurses: a two-meter tall giant covered in blood looked around with a newfound intelligence in his eyes.