On the alien side…

EYAËL

Membre N°2 de l’équipe parisienne. Lui aussi paie le « prix de la peau . Récemment tombé amoureux d’un humain, il éprouve des difficultés à se concentrer sur la mission de 2030. L’idée de devoir abandonner bientôt son corps d’emprunt (et donc aussi l’humain qu’il aime) le mine.

Tout au long du roman, Eyaël est coincé dans le corps d’un retraité suisse.

GABRIEL, KNOWN AS " MACHINE GUN "

Member N°3 of the Parisian team, and team leader. Speaks more than 1000 human languages (the other Muddies speak a little less). Phenomenal memory, phenomenal bullshit. He's a completely crazy Muddy, who has no respect for humans anymore. He owes his nickname of Machine Gun to the fact that he is capable of saying 80 stupid things a minute (but he is convinced that the other Muddies gave him this nickname as a tribute to his mastery of firearms). The real reason for his hatred of humans is revealed throughout the novel.

Throughout the novel, Machine Gun is trapped in the body of a very young punk.

SCRIBES

Employees of the Hive, heads of the Human Resources Department and heads of the Forecasting Department.  Sort of cephalic super-intellos, who have a religion of maths. The Scribes are responsible for providing the Muddy with any information that may help the work of Maintenance.

 

VIGILS

Employees of the Hive. Work in the Control Department of the Human Resources Department. Psychorigid, hyper-violent. They are supposed to monitor the work of the Muddies on Earth, and to punish the slightest infraction. In the past, Machine Gun has had to suffer their wrath.

 

DIRECTORS

Heads of the M 828 Hive. Lazy and incompetent, they spend centuries sleeping in their posh Hive quarters. They only wake up at the beginning of a project (for a speech to all the Hive employees) and at the end of the project (ceremony for the validation of the Peace Score).

 

On the human side...

JAOUEN

Junior policeman. Author of the " PIECES " in the ladybird file. Jaouen is very often off the mark, but sometimes has a formidable flair. He tracks down the 3 muddies (in their borrowed human bodies) between 2029 and 2034. Jaouen is convinced that he is in pursuit of "three weirdos" who have escaped from a psychiatric clinic: a former military man, a depressed Swiss pensioner and a young man with tattoos all over his body. At no time does Jaouen suspect the alien presence under the escapees' skins. That said, he soon realizes that something is wrong with this first investigation: the three fugitives are a team but had little or no contact with each other in the asylum + they are suddenly polyglot and have mastered languages that have almost disappeared + they play and win at the trifecta as if they knew the results of the races beforehand...

 

MOUSSA

Policeman. Colleague and friend of Jaouen. Moussa doesn't hesitate to act like a real spook to help Jaouen in his investigation and to find the 3 asylum escapees.

 

CERISE COLAS

Neighbour and childhood friend of Camille Landru (the astrophysicist/theologian), Cerise is a very reactionary anti-intellectual, about as off the mark as Jaouen. In 2030, Cerise meets Jaouen during the gendarmerie investigation into the murder of Camille Landru (the writer and neighbour). It's love at first sight between the two. Cerise married Jaouen in 2031.

 

CAMILLE LANDRU

Theologian, astrophysicist. Author of the "divine proof". Wife of the successful writer Camille Landru (same first name, same surname), whom the Muddies will liquidate by mistake in 2030, instead of liquidating her. In February 2033, she publishes her "divine proof" on social networks.

 

 

The construction sites: a well-oiled routine.

 

The Hive is a gigantic M-class spaceship (M828) from the depths of space, which has been travelling through the galaxies for almost a million years. Its home planet is the 'Mother House', which is 10 times the size of Jupiter.

On board the Hive are 50,000 alien employees divided into different departments. The Hive has a clear mission: to go from planet to planet to breathe life. Each time, it provides "Maintenance" by helping the creatures to organise themselves into a society incognito. How do they do this? Well, some of the Hive's employees (Muddy Service) use alien technology to temporarily take possession of creatures, and influence their immediate surroundings.

On all previous planets, the construction sites had gone smoothly. When a more or less peaceful social organisation had finally been established, the Hive had internally validated the creatures' peace score (at least 51% to get a triple A on the project) and had gone to breathe life into another planet.

 

 

You bet, it couldn't last...

 

When the novel begins, the Hive is on its 100th site... And that's where the problem lies. Why is that? Well, because the Hive has to respect an originality clause: each new life form must be unique. In other words, creating a peaceful life form is becoming increasingly difficult, because the 'good ideas' have all been used on previous planets.

The latest is the Blue Planet, with the unmanageable HOMO SAPIENS. Intellectually, homo sapiens is a disaster (in fact an old project from another planet re-served here in a "lesser" way so as to be "unique"). Socially too, homo sapiens is a disaster, because he is quick to violence and low blows.

For thousands of years, the Muddy Department has been working overtime in the field to ensure an acceptable peace score at the end of the day.

 

 

And it gets more complicated...

 

At the end of 2029, the Hive's Human Resources Department makes a terrible discovery: some humans are about to publish a "proof of the existence of God". From the point of view of the Hive, this text is a load of nonsense... But from the point of view of the humans and their cheap brains (thousands of unconnected neural sub-networks), this text will be "luminous evidence".

In short, this text will convince all humans of the existence of a remunerative god, a heaven and a hell BUT without revealing WHICH god... So we are on the verge of a HUGE religious war, which will reduce the peace score on Earth to zero.

 

 

Saving the "Blue Planet" site at all costs...

 

The Muddies know that their hierarchy (the Hive Directors who spend their time sleeping) will never accept the failure of this new construction site, and that sanctions will rain down if the peace score drops to such a level that the site will have to be abandoned.

The Muddy Service therefore discreetly sends teams to Earth to eliminate all traces of this divine proof before it is published. The special feature of this clandestine operation is the use of forbidden time travel technology. The muddies travel through time to kill (or divert from their projects) all humans who have contributed in any way to the development of this divine proof.

 

 

A bunch of good-for-nothings...

 

The three main characters (Raphael, Eyael, and Gabriel, known as "Machine Gun") are part of the many teams of Muddues who have been sent to eliminate/modify human targets throughout the ages. Their latest target, in Paris in 2030: Camille Landru, a theologian.

Unfortunately, the Muddies get the target wrong several times. The other alien teams deployed on the field do not do any better than them, accumulating blunders that trigger "ladybird effects" in shambles.

 

 

Caught red-handed!

 

Target errors cause terrible (and comical) time gaps on Earth, spotted by the Hive's automatic watch system... The Hive's computer sends an alert signal to both the Hive leadership (the direct leaders of the Muddies), but also to the very distant Mother House. This automatic alert message says: "Temporal rupture on the Blue Planet site".

 

 

Small arrangements with reality.

 

For the Directors of Hive M828, sending an honest report to the Mother House was out of the question! This would reveal their own incompetence and their fraud: the role of the Directors is to help the Muddies in their work over the centuries, to closely follow each project... However, all the members of the Directorate have spent their time drinking mead.

The Directors cannot bury the affair (the Head Office has already been warned of a crisis) but they can disguise it (since the warning signal did not specify the extent of the crisis). The Directors of Hive M828 therefore announce to the Mother House only one temporal strike on Earth (more than 60 in reality) committed by a small dozen employees (more than 3000 in reality).

The construction site is therefore cancelled because of "temporal abuse", but the Directors escape the sanctions of the Mother House: officially, they have done their utmost.

 

 

And so, twelve exiles!

 

In order to close this embarrassing file once and for all, the Directors cowardly abandon 12 scapegoats chosen at random from among the 1000 Muddies in the Maintenance Department on Earth. These twelve are thus stuck on Earth in 12 human bodies, in 2030. Their alien bodies, aboard the Hive, are destroyed (supposedly: by accident).

The official version served up by the management of the M828 Hive is that the "12 cheaters" escaped to Earth in unidentifiable human bodies, on an unidentifiable date: it is impossible to locate them. The Hive leaves Earth orbit.

Unofficially, the fate of the 12 scapegoats acts as a threat brandished by the Directors to the entire Muddy Department of Hive M828: "Never again attempt a deception of this importance without warning us first, otherwise see what awaits you. "

 

 

Mud, mud, mud...

 

The Hive has left the Earth's solar system. The twelve Muddies have only one objective left in mind: to find a way to contact the Mother House to :

1. denounce the illegal exile of which they are victims.

2.reveal the truth about the incompetence of their Hive Managers.

3.to be repatriated urgently to the Mother House, in new bodies.

 

 

A solution... Then another problem.

 

For our twelve exiles, there is only one way to contact the Hive: make an "Omega Beacon" (which allows you to temporarily open a wormhole). To function, this beacon requires 1g of a very special isotope... Californium.

Californium is extremely rare on Earth (the only element with stable ions in solutes), and completely unaffordable: 30 million euros per gram.  No choice, then: the Muddy Ones must amass a real fortune to acquire this isotope before dying in their borrowed bodies.

 

 

Forfeiture.

 

Now without the support of the Hive's Forecasting Department, the 12 Muddies have no way of knowing in advance the winning numbers of the trifectas. They are still able to read the minds of humans and use this gift in poker games, but the results are disastrous (cards in hand? Cards missing?)...

 

 

The runaway…

 

The 3 Muddies of the Parisian team cross a part of Europe (Paris, then Berlin, Warsaw, and finally Prague) in search of the 9 other exiled Muddies. That said, how can you spot the other 9 Muddies under their borrowed skins? The only way to recognise them for sure: their ability to speak ancient languages (obligatory at the beginning of the project, such as Summerocretan or Old Babylonian).

The three Muddies of the Parisian team therefore left little messages written in these forgotten languages everywhere, with their provisional address. In vain.

It was out of the question for them to return to Paris, where the police were looking for them for the murder of Camille Landru (the writer). The photos of their three borrowed bodies are posted in all the police stations in France.

 

 

The separation

 

Relationships in the trio are not easy, especially because of Machine Gun. The mood of the trio is down. After a year on the run, Machine Gun leaves the group to return to Paris where he hopes to find the other nine exiled Muddies. Raphaël (the narrator) and Eyaël remain alone in Prague.

 

 

Always lower

 

Raphael and Eyaël live under the Charles Bridge and survive by begging. They also engage in various forms of petty theft.

 

 

The world changes

 

On 14 February 2033, Camille Landru published her "divine proof": a creator god exists and will reward the Righteous in the afterlife! General elation. However, humanity quickly goes from enthusiasm to panic: what god? Because according to the religions, according to the translations of the same text of the same religion, the definition of the Righteous changes completely...

 

 

Council of Berlin...

 

In March 2033, the religious authorities organised a great ecumenical council. The idea: to find at least ONE point in common for all religions, at least ONE rule to follow that is valid for all. The council retained TWO golden rules:

1.  The (already famous in theology) rule of reciprocity: "Do not do to others what you would not want done to you. "

2.  "Blessed are the poor, for the gates of heaven are wide open to them. "

 

 

Place your bets

 

All over the planet, humans compete in ingenuity/hypocrisy to lead a life much like the one they used to lead but which respects the golden rules. Formation of the first religious alliances between old enemies. Each zone develops its own "mystical formula" (a bit like at the races) to optimise its chances of winning a place in "heaven".

For our Muddies in Prague, this is a golden opportunity. Raphaël and Eyaël then resorted to a thousand tricks to ride the mystical wave (opening an ethical investment consultancy, translating advertisements into "sacred" languages, etc.). Name of this company: Babel Brothers. VERY lucrative activities that allow them to amass a nice fortune. The fear and hypocrisy of humans are formidable levers.

 

 

Reunion

 

As the months go by, the nine exiled Muddies find Raphaël and Eyaël in Prague. They all work day and night for Babel Brothers. Their only fear is that they will not be able to raise the money they need (twenty million is still missing) to acquire the gram of californium. But they must act quickly, because the world is now on the verge of a huge war between super-religions that will interrupt all trade flows.

 

 

The ladybird effect: it can pay off...

 

Machine Gun, who had not been heard from for a year and a half, saves his eleven colleagues: he returns to Prague with a colossal fortune. He was able to take advantage of a ladybird effect caused by a team of Muddies during the clandestine operation. This trick of Machine Gun (linked to Baudelaire's disappearance as a poet) also arouses the wrath of the new religious authorities...

The Muddies now have enough money to buy the gram of Californium. But they have to be quick, because Machine Gun has all the religious police in Europe after him.

 

 

Demobilisation!

 

Le gendarme Jaouen (qui depuis Paris traque Mitraillette) surgit dans la pièce pile au moment du transfert.

In the summer of 2034, the Muddies manage to build the Omega beacon in extremis. They contact the parent company, which repatriates them (teleportation via a wormhole, in twelve new bodies).

Gendarme Jaouen (who is tracking Machine Gun since Paris) appears in the room at the very moment of the transfer.

 

 

Resolution: The case? What case?

 

Having considered all the elements of the LADYBIRD FILE (we then discover that the "sessions" and "pieces" are in fact extracted from the memory of the recently repatriated Muddies + the human Jaouen also teleported by mistake) the agents of the Motherhouse advise in their secret report to bury the case. Why do they do this? Because the failure of the Directors of this distant Hive M828 would also be the failure of the Motherhouse (whose overworked agents are also supposed to keep a close eye on the activity of the Hives, but who did not check the veracity of the bogus debriefings of Hive M828 effectively enough).

Anyway, 'homo sapiens' was a really rotten idea.

The Ladybird File must be destroyed.

 

 

A word from the author

 

My first novel (Les bras de Morphée) imagined a society turned upside down by a sleep wave. Everything was happening downstream, 20 years after the fact.

L’Effet coccinelle imagines another disruptive scenario: an amazing mystical wave sweeps across the planet. This time I'm looking at the events well upstream, since the narrator is at the origin of the mystical-social upheaval.

The anti-heroes of L'Effet coccinelle (nicknamed "The Muddies" by their hierarchy) owe a lot to the characters in Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire. They have been with me for so many years! As for Machine Gun, he comes straight out of Rabelais: he is the unlikely Panurge, a polyglot, a swordsman, by turns fascinating and disappointing... Seeing him and hearing him, one wonders: "How can someone so intelligent be so stupid?"

The novel articulates two points of view. On the one hand, the point of view of a calculating humanity suddenly put on the grill, urgently seeking to seize what Michaux called "the Great Secret" to ensure itself a comfortable place in paradise. On the other hand, the point of view of three extraordinarily banal beings... Three uprooted people on the run, holders of the famous "Great Secret" (the other side of the coin that we discover as the chapters go by) but who are no further ahead: no paradise, no hell, just yet another construction site where life had to be created. They simply want to go home.

On both sides: powerful administrations obsessed with figures, and the proud stupidity of the great purveyors of truth.

Mots de l'auteur

 

Mon premier roman (Les bras de Morphée) imaginait une société bouleversée par une vague de sommeil. Tout s’y déroulait en aval, 20 ans après les faits.

L’Effet Coccinelle imagine un autre scénario disruptif : une formidable vague mystique déferle sur la planète. Cette fois-ci j’envisage les événements bien en amont, puisque le narrateur est à l’origine du bouleversement mystico-social.

Les anti-héros de L’effet coccinelle (surnommés « Boueux » par leur hiérarchie) doivent beaucoup aux personnages des Ailes du désir, de Wim Wenders. Ils m’accompagnent depuis tellement d’années ! Mitraillette, lui, sort tout droit de chez Rabelais : c’est l’improbable Panurge, polyglotte, bretteur, tour à tour fascinant et décevant… À le voir, à l’entendre, on s’interroge : « Comment quelqu’un de si intelligent peut-il être aussi con ? ».

Le roman articule deux points de vue. D’un côté, le point de vue d’une humanité calculatrice soudain mise sur le grill, cherchant dans l’urgence à saisir ce que Michaux appelait « le Grand Secret » pour s’assurer une place confortable au paradis. De l’autre, le point de vue de trois êtres d’une extraordinaire banalité… Trois déracinés en cavale, détenteurs du fameux  « Grand Secret » (l’envers du décor qu’on découvre au fil des chapitres) mais qui ne sont pas pour autant plus avancés : pas de paradis, pas d’enfer, juste un énième chantier où il a fallu créer la vie. Eux, ils veulent tout simplement  rentrer à la maison.

De part et d’autre : de puissantes Administrations obnubilées par les chiffres, et la bêtise orgueilleuse des grands pourvoyeurs de vérité.

THE HIVES

Several hundred Hives are managed remotely by the Motherhouse.

The M828 Hive is an M-class spacecraft built for work and bustle. Miles of staircases, galleries, passageways, a gigantic labyrinth that buzzes at all hours. Placed in discrete orbit around the planet where life was just created, the Hive deploys teams of Muddies from time to time to ensure the "maintenance of the site". In other words, the Muddies quietly help the creatures to build the most peaceful social system possible.

EMPLOYEES OF THE HIVE

50,000 employees divided into four Divisions, eight Sections, sixteen Departments, making a total of seventy Services. Their real bodies resemble those of humans, except for the much larger size + their antennae + a green skin whose tone darkens with age (bottle green for the oldest). The Directors, on the other hand, are enormous (sort of big green cherubs).

 

The narrator's Department occupies the last rung of the hierarchy: it is the Department of "Human Resources" (the adjective changes with each new site).

There are three Services in this department: the Scribes, the Vigils, and the Muddies.

- The Scribes scribble down instructions.

- The Vigils photocopy all this and distribute it.

- The Muddies obey. In short, the Muddies are 'commissioned' to go out into the field. In the trade, this is called "putting on a skin" or "infiltrating a shell", since the Muddies borrow human bodies during their missions (2 or 3 weeks, in general).

 

OPERATION GODDAMN

Code of the clandestine operation set up by the direct superiors of the Muddies, without the knowledge of the Directors and other Departments. Apart from the Hive's Human Resources Department (3,000 employees out of a total of 50,000), nobody knows about it. Operation Goddamn consists of eliminating all traces of "divine evidence" on Earth to avoid the catastrophic drop in the peace score that would follow.

Mode of operation: to divert 267 humans from their theological projects who have contributed in any way to the development of the divine proof (or to eliminate them). Necessary recourse to the proscribed technology of time travel.

Vast operation: 27 teams of Muddies deployed on earth, each with a dozen human targets, in about sixty historical periods.

CAGE

A large prison on board the Hive. The Cage is used as a solitary confinement whenever a defendant has to serve a heavy sentence (more than 10 centuries of incarceration). The Cage is three thousand square metres of depressing space in the eighth basement of the ship. The Hive's architects built it at an angle, with low ceilings, the decorators painted the walls with rust, and the greasy fluids team took care of the floor.

Machine Gun, in particular, has just spent 2,000 years there for "serious misconduct".

LADYBIRD EFFECT

This is the Butterfly Effect, Machine Gun version. By intervening in the past during their clandestine operation, the Muddies cause a whole bunch of unfortunate incidences in the future.

This is particularly the case for Baudelaire. Because of the intervention of a Muddy team on Earth in 1840, Charles Baudelaire's life will be different from the one we know. Instead of opposing his father-in-law, a general, and becoming a poet, he takes up a military career. At the end of the novel, we discover his new Wikipedia entry, which is necessarily very succinct:

"Born in Paris on 9 April 1821, died in Versailles on 23 September 1904. Fascinated by his father-in-law, General Aupick, Charles joined the cavalry at the age of nineteen. He served in Algeria, Spain, the Crimea and Mexico. He is best known for having written, at the end of his life, a treatise on quince jam."

 

TOUCH-UP OPERATIONS

In order to compensate for the imbalances created by their interventions in the past, the Muddies carry out Touch-up missions (which, in turn, will restore the historical balance). These Reworkings are all thought/calculated by the Scribes, who have calculated their very long term consequences well in advance. For the Scribes, each mission in the past therefore concludes with four or five Touch-ups that they carry out without fully measuring their impact (e.g. slowing down such and such a passer-by at such and such an hour, leaving such and such a door open at such and such an hour, moving such and such a vehicle on such and such a day, etc.).

DIVINE PROOF

Text uploaded by theologian and astrophysicist Camille Landru, at 5:25am HMT on 14 February 2033.

-Reaction of the Muddies when reading this text: nicely turned out, but it's a load of nonsense.

-Reaction of the humans when reading this text: 1. Hallelujah, God exists! By the way... ... but by the way, which God? The Christian one? In this case, the jealous God of the Old Testament, the cushy God of the New? Orthodoxy, Catholicism, Protestantism? Or is it a divine approximation? The Torah's, rather, the Koran's? Let's admit it... So Conservative, Orthodox, Reform Judaism? Sunni Malekite, Hanafite, Hanbalite, Shiite Zaydite, Duodecimal Islam? More worrying: even if you follow only one school of a single religion, depending on the verses or suras, you will find very contradictory leads... One passage incites to shed blood, while another suggests clemency. Which one to trust? Worse still, which translation should be used? Because loving one's "brother" is easy, but loving one's "neighbour" is already more demanding...

This is the beginning of a great mystical-political reshuffle, with the emergence of super-religions combining old enemy brothers: the appearance of Zones of Faith. It is also a first step towards an avoidable war of religions

COUNCIL OF BERLIN

Ecumenical council organised from 1 to 21 March 2033, just after the publication of this 'Divine Proof' which does not pronounce on the identity of the 'true' god. More than a thousand religious dignitaries met to agree on at least ONE simple rule to be followed on a daily basis... a rule that is validated by ALL religions. Respecting this common "golden rule" would assure anyone a safe passage to heaven.

GOLDEN RULES

Common to all religious practices, from ancient Egypt to New Age Catholicism, from Taoism to Greco-Roman mythology.

Golden Rule No. 1: principle of reciprocity. "Do not do to others what you would not like them to do to you".

Golden Rule 2: Principle of poverty. "Blessed are the poor, for the gates of Paradise are wide open to them."

SRB

Sacrilege Repression Brigade created at the end of 2033. The SRB is operational throughout the JIC Zone. At the head of its Paris branch is a young man who was recently promoted to captain: Policeman Jaouen.

 

ZONES OF FAITH

2033-2034. New geopolitical spaces rethought in terms of "super-religions" to optimize the chances of worshipping the "right" God. These include:

-Zone JIC (Judaism - Islam - Christianity)

-Zone ODIN (ancient Nordic religions)

-Zone Ra (Ancient Egyptian gods)

-Zone BH (Buddho-Hinduism)

-Zone BJ (Tao-Jainism)

BABEL BROTHERS

Start-up created by the exiled Muddies in order to profit financially from the new mystical wave. Babel Brothers first offered translation services in ancient languages (those of sacred texts), before turning resolutely to the advertising space.

Babel Brothers offers its clients a single point of contact for a complete range of languages. Choose ten, twenty, fifty almost lost languages if you like, and they will provide you with catchphrases that conform to the golden rules and are guaranteed to be error-free.

Almost immediate success. Babel Brothers' turnover and profits soared in January 2034.