The French government had officially declared Emil Dufort a security risk.
To the soldiers in the trenches, he was a hero.
To the politicians in Paris, he was a threat.
The Warrant
It came in the form of a national bulletin.
"Emil Dufort, engineer formerly associated with Leclerc Works, is to be detained under suspicion of obstruction of wartime production, illegal trade with foreign powers, and violation of Articles 6, 9, and 13 of the Armaments Sovereignty Act."
A warrant. Quiet. Legal. Deadly.
"They won't arrest you in daylight," Vera said, reading it aloud. "But they'll come eventually."
Henriette folded the paper. "It's time."
"Time for what?" Emil asked.
"To disappear."
Exile Begins
That night, under cover of fog, Emil slipped away from Normandy with forged papers and a single satchel of tools. He was no longer the head of Leclerc Works—officially, he was Jean Laurent, an agricultural mechanic with a limp.
Henriette stayed behind to coordinate from the shadows. Vera would later join him in Brussels. Bruno kept the factory running, protected by sympathetic soldiers who had seen the Sanglier in action.
They weren't just resisting a government now.
They were founding a state within a state.
The Train to Nowhere
Emil traveled north on a goods train posing as a machine technician. He kept his head down, his accent neutral, and his fingers clean. But even in silence, the world whispered to him.
At a small station in Amiens, an old man selling apples stopped him.
"You're the one with the iron hog, aren't you?"
"Sorry?"
"The one who makes fire roll."
"No, sir. I fix tractors."
The man smiled.
"They all say that. But the dead don't lie. My son lived because of your machine."
He handed Emil an apple. No charge.
"Keep building, Monsieur Dufort."
Brussels, Sanctuary of Smoke
Vera met him in Brussels two days later.
The Belgian capital, spared from major bombing, pulsed with neutral chaos—refugees, soldiers on leave, spies masquerading as diplomats. It was the perfect place to vanish and plot.
They rented a top-floor room above a watchmaker's shop. The windows overlooked the rooftops.
"From here," Vera said, tapping her map, "we coordinate exports, smuggle steel, and hire talent."
"From here," Emil corrected, "we rebuild civilization."
Meanwhile in Normandy
Back at Leclerc Works, Bruno tested the prototype of the Sanglier Mk IV under the new name: Liberté.
It was nearly a meter longer than its predecessor, with a rotating turret design, a stabilized firing mount, and rear escape hatches. Camille and Pascal drove test laps around the perimeter walls, narrowly dodging Ministry observers.
Henriette issued payroll under shadow companies. Engineers rotated through secret dormitories. The Sanglier production line ran 24 hours a day, with workers sleeping in shifts.
"We don't just manufacture," Bruno said, arms crossed. "We mobilize."
Whispers of Wings
Word came from the front: Germany had begun using biplanes with mounted machine guns for trench raids.
And then came a letter from Colonel Varin—smuggled inside a wine barrel:
"Air power is coming. Faster than expected. You were right to break away. But if you don't adapt, you'll be outflanked from the sky. I can buy you time. No more."
Vera read the letter three times.
"We need to think beyond land."
Emil nodded.
"We build for the sky next."
Foreign Interests
As Vera began researching aerial designs, Emil received another visit—this time from an Italian attaché.
"The Regio Esercito has heard of your exploits," he said, adjusting his monocle. "Mussolini's industrialists want to order ten of your Sanglier tanks—under a different name, of course."
"What do they offer in return?" Emil asked.
"A Mediterranean port. A shipyard. Access to Sicilian steel."
"And strings?"
"Naturally. You'd owe the kingdom a favor."
Emil declined.
"This republic doesn't trade liberty for favors."
The Italian shrugged and left—but not before leaving a small card.
On it: a contact in Genoa, should he change his mind.
The Whisper Network
By mid-August 1914, Leclerc Works—now operating as Forge Libre—had established the following:
Rail smuggling routes through neutral Switzerland and Dutch territories
Encryption nodes in Brussels, Lyon, and Geneva
Design bureaus hidden within three civilian academies
Manufacturing satellites in southern France and Belgium
And Emil?
He was no longer just an engineer.
He was a strategist, building a nation of machines across borders, inside minds, beneath flags.
The Union Idea
One night, Vera found Emil asleep at his desk, a map crumpled beneath his hand.
She read the notes.
"Decentralized production. Mutual defense pact. Technology exchange. No monarchs, no armies—just engineers and soldiers bound by code."
She looked at the top of the page.
In large block letters:
UNION OF INDEPENDENT WORKS
A republic of steel, not blood.
Meanwhile, in BerlinThe Abwehr had not been idle.
Herr Fuchs, Emil's former mole, now sat in a grey cell beneath the Reichstag. Interrogated. Dissected. But alive.
General von Stein had watched the Sanglier defeat his A7Vs. He had watched as a French engineer became an international figure.
And he had issued new orders.
"If Emil Dufort will not come to us…"
He gestured at the file.
"…then we shall build someone who can."
The Germans began recruiting their own Iron Strategist.
A Prussian rival.
Unknown yet.
But growing.