I am Marianne. I am Haven, in human form. I’ve watched many governments rise and fall like the tides. I was born with Péricard’s Republic. I saw parties rise and fall and rise again, over my hundreds of years. I appear to those who truly are Haven. 

 

While Michèle Péricard’s first child was the Republic of Haven, I was her second, Haven’s twin and human form. Chelle always cared about me, unlike so many later “Presidents”.

 

I first appeared to her the day the Constitution was signed, the day I was born. There were twenty people officially in the room in what would become Nouveau Paris. However, everyone in the room reported there to be a twenty-first person who didn’t show up on any of the holos, within minutes of the signing. 

 

I saw the rise of the welfare state, and the Economic Bill of Rights in 1680 PD. I saw democracy’s flame slowly flicker out until 1750 PD, when the Republic, the Athens of the Stars, was renamed the People’s Republic of Haven, starting my sister, my nation on a path towards being a shadow of its formerly productive self. I saw the Duquesne Plan, which replaced the whole worlds-joining-the-Republic-of-Haven-in-hope-for-a-better-future with the perverted version of worlds-being-forced-to-join-to-support-Haven. I saw the expansion, and while I support the Republic expanding, I didn’t like how or why it was being done. 

 

As so many rejoiced with the fall of Trevor’s Star, I wept out of sight, as I know this could only lead to war in which too many of my nation’s brave young citizens would lose their lives. I cried with how far we’d fallen from  Péricard’s Republic, despite looking somewhat malnourished to those that could see me (there weren’t many left). 

 

As I watched the Legisularurlists fall and the Committee of Public Safety rise and fall from Nouveau Paris, I wonder, Will Péricard’s Republic come back before I die?