Réveil de France

The year was 1920, and banners burned, bearing the colors of France on both sides. But each distinctive in the center and the symbols displayed there. Surrounding them was a sea of corpses. Some were wearing old uniforms from the Great War, barely cleaned in the four years since.

And others were new, tidy, or were prior to the stains of blood and mud that freshly coated their olive green hue. A great battle was waged here. The bodies were legion. Uncountable even. Yet, this was not a conflict waged between two foreign nations and cultures.

Rather between brothers, cousins, and neighbors. For what? Only they knew what was worth killing each other over. Standing over the corpses of the soldiers which bore the armbands of the Gallian Militia, Pétain, his uniform as clear, and pristine as ever, applied fresh wax to his mustache, as the rain tried its best to be away the human stain that slicked the earth below.