1941: The Valence Beat Cop (Deleted Scene)

Henri Mosmeau, Paris Police, and a member of the Resistance.
He died in 1944, defending Paris against the occupiers.
Source: France24

    As I've studied WW2-era France, I've noticed a curious trend, a divergence of sorts between two classes of police officers:

• Group 1: Collaborators.   Police officers tend to favor law-and-order, and are often comfortable enforcing tighter restrictions. They do their job, regardless of who they are working for.   The French police forces were responsible for rounding up a LOT of undesirables so they could be sent to detention camps, and this group absolutely helped carry out the Holocaust.
• Group 2: Resistors. There were a few who did what they could to help the Resistance, including warning the different units of impending raids.  As far as I can tell, this group was much smaller than the above, but they did exist.

    Really, there was a third group, probably the single biggest:  they did what they were told, but didn't like it. They knew it was wrong, but not knowing what else to do, they did their job anyway. I tend to include these men with the first group, because even unenthusiastic collaboration caused serious harm when the collaborator was in a position of power. 

    I wrote a scene that was intended to be a tribute to the second group, the police officers who did what they could to protect the people from Vichy or Nazis abuses, often at the risk of their own lives. I imagined this man later helping people join my grandfather's maquis unit, and sending them intelligence when he could.  It's a good scene, one I intended to be funny, but it no longer fits in the book (they would have arrived in the afternoon, not in the wee hours as depicted below).   

    Anyway, here's the scene:

    Arthur shook Roma awake, and they sleepily stumbled off the train in Valence.

    Too tired and cash-strapped to look for an inn, they found an unoccupied bench at the train station and made themselves as comfortable as possible. Arthur removed his shoelaces and used one to tie his briefcase to his wrist.  He shoved the suitcase under the bench and tied the handle to his ankle.  Then they covered themselves with their coats, and he and Roma fell asleep cuddled together, Liliane on Arthur’s chest.

    Something tapped Arthur’s shoe.  Arthur ignored it.  Then whatever-it-was smacked his shoe again, hard enough to hurt.  Arthur woke up and found a police officer standing over him.  Arthur jumped to his feet, nearly catapulting Liliane off his chest before Roma snatched the baby from him, which she did as neatly as if they had practiced the maneuver.

    “Yes?” he said as politely as he could, trying to keep his balance with the suitcase tied to his ankle and briefcase dangling from his wrist. He felt both frightened and utterly foolish.

    “You can’t sleep here. This isn’t a hotel.” The policeman was obviously trying not to laugh.

    Arthur took advantage of the man’s mirth and gave him an embarrassed smile. “Yes, I am sorry. We got in at 1:30, and nothing was open. We will not be staying.”

    “Best untie yourself before moving on,” he said, grinning slightly. “Clever idea. Ridiculous, but clever.”

    “Uh, thank you. And yes, I will.”

    “The markets are starting to open,” the officer added, “if you want something to eat, you should go early.”

    Arthur glanced at his watch. It was now five-thirty, and there were a few early morning travelers milling around.  “Oh, good.” He sat back down and untied his luggage, and re-laced his shoes.   When they stood, the policeman wandered off, though he kept an eye on them as they left the train station.  

1947: La Guardia, not Ellis Island

    I've always known I came from immigrant stock. I mean, it's kind of hard to miss when your grandparents had a name like Lubinski, spoke 3 languages, and had an accent.  I think I was 10 before I realized that when Grandma Roma said très bien, she wasn't actually speaking English. I knew what she meant.

    I'm not sure when I realized they were also refugees, Holocaust escapees, and that they went through something so terrifying, so traumatic, they rarely talked about it.  No, not the concentration camps, though they had relatives who survived the camps. And relatives that died in them, too. My grandparents survived by hiding.

    Anyway, I grew up assuming that they had gone through Ellis Island, which has a certain romanticism. However, when my grandparents and their older two daughters (one of whom is my mom) came here, they did so not by ship, but on an airplane.  They flew into LaGuardia Airport in New York City, decades before JFK was built.

    They had intended to take a ship across the Atlantic, specifically the SS Île de France. They had booked passage and everything, but then the French government requisitioned it as a troop transport for the war in Indochina. That one surprised me, because I hadn't realized that the roots of the Vietnam War reached so far back.  

    The ship wore many hats: a luxury ocean liner, a prison ship, a troop transport, and a movie set.  The women of the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion took the ship from the USA to England during WW2, and from what I can tell, it was more prison ship than luxury liner at that point.  In the late 50s, it was purposely sunk during the filming of a disaster movie, refloated, and quietly scrapped.  

    Anyway, my grandparents had to scramble to find alternate transportation and eventually got airplane tickets.  My grandmother was terrified to fly; for the 2.5 months before they left, Grandpa snatched the newspapers before Grandma could get to them, skimmed the papers for stories of crashes, and cut them out so she wouldn't see them.   I have no idea what he told her, or even if there were any airplane crashes at all during that time, but there you have it.

    So they went through customs and immigration not at Ellis Island, but at La Guardia Airport, and I imagine they were grateful to be on the ground again (my aunt was 6 1/2 years old, my mother was 14 months old, and I understand that both girls cried a lot, so I'm sure it was a flight from hell).  

    And when they emerged from customs, my grandmother's brother was waiting for them. I imagine it was a bittersweet scene.

Salvadore Dalí and the Alien Foster Father

Prompt - A Gun to the Head (60 seconds). Your main character is in a life-and-death situation, a gun to their head. Write out their internal thoughts or their final monologue in that moment, their final 60 seconds. Try to convey the frenetic energy and chaos they are experiencing. Bildungsroman is a literary device whereby the plot is played out through the growth and changes of the main character. This might be a social, physical, emotional, moral, or mental change. In the case of flash fiction, the change needs to be accelerated, like the final thoughts running through the mind of a character with a gun to their head. NOTE: It’s possible to read 200 words in 60 seconds.

Note: This is a rare bit of fan fiction. :-)

***

    The alien serving as my Foster Father spoke. “It will take a minute to charge. But when it fires it will silence your thoughts, and stop your heart. We will revive you after 37 seconds.”

    “Why 37?” I asked, glad a human medic was standing watchfully by. I trusted Foster Father, but he was concerned that he didn’t yet understand human physiology well enough to bring me safely back.

    “Tradition. That is how long our first foremother stopped her daughter’s heart in order to gain the trust of her rival clan. After that, they created a treaty that still stands today.”  He pointed at one of the paintings on the wall. "I painted this to represent that parent-child bond."

    I nodded, and he continued. “This ritual will cement your trust in our family and society and help you confront death, for no one can be an adult without understanding their own mortality. It is what marks full adulthood in our culture.”  He lifted the device to my head, and I felt him speak directly to my thoughts. Lizbet, are you ready? 

    “Yes.”

    With steady hands, he pulled the trigger, which started charging the device.

    Will it hurt? I can’t believe I agreed to do this. The passage to adulthood rite. Passage rite. Rite of passage. Rite. Right? What if they are unable to revive me? What do I do if it doesn’t work? Mom’s gonna kill me is this is it worth it?  Will it hurt? What happens when I wake up?  Will Star Fleet court marshal me they didn’t authorize this, but I did bring the medic.  It’s going to hurt I don’t want to die. I hope there are no bullets in that thing. His hand isn’t shaking at all oh my god oh my god. When is it going to happ— 

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    Lizbet.

    “Yes, Foster Father?” I said, but it came out slurred. Yesh, Fosher Fozherrr.

    Lizbet, he repeated, not seeming worried. Use my language.

    I had to think about that.  “I did. I said, ‘Yes, Foster Father.” I tried to enunciate but wasn’t sure if I was any easier to understand.

    Much better.  Now, are you ready to help us sign the treaty? We are ready to join your Federation.

    “Yes,” I said, opening my eyes. The medic was relaxed now and looking avidly at Foster Father’s artwork adorning the Rite room’s walls. 

    Foster Father was patient as thoughts and senses returned, and then he helped me up, and we left to join the ambassadors in the formal meeting room across the courtyard. “Who is ‘Dalí’?” he asked aloud, reading my thoughts and probably those of the medic’s.

    “A human surrealist painter,” I said, feeling myself smile. “You’ll like his work. I’ll show you pictures later.”

    “That would be excellent,” Foster Father said.

***

Notes: I wrote most of this bit of Star Trek fanfic in May of 2021, but couldn't figure out how it should end. Inspiration hit in January 2025, and I added the waking up section then.