Chapter 135: [135] "Remind them"
She dragged a high-definition photograph of Olivier Fontaine to post. It was an image from his Sunday night match.
Fontaine standing over a defeated goalkeeper, his face a mask of absolute lethality, having just completed his hat-trick.
Her fingers flew across the keyboard.
BACK AMONGST THE GOALS.
The King reminds them who wears the crown.
#Fontaine #HatTrick #ParisRoyal #ValoisTrash
She reviewed the copy one last time, her eyes scanning for any grammatical imperfections, before clicking the blue ’Publish’ button.
She corrected the hashtags.
#Fontaine #HatTrick #ParisRoyal
The post went live to millions of followers.
Chloé let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. She reached for her steaming cup of espresso, preparing to monitor the engagement metrics, when the glass door to her office was pushed open without a knock.
She looked up.
Olivier Fontaine stood in the doorway.
He wasn’t wearing his training gear. He was dressed in a tailored charcoal overcoat, looking every bit the aristocrat the media portrayed him to be. But his face was devoid of the manufactured, polite charm he usually reserved for the cameras. His eyes were dark but at the same time terrifyingly calm.
"Olivier," Chloé said, sitting up slightly straighter in her chair. "You’re supposed to be in recovery today. Did you need something from media?"
Fontaine didn’t answer immediately. He walked slowly into the room, the door clicking shut behind him, sealing them in the soundproofed office. He stepped up to the edge of her desk and looked down at the secondary monitor displaying the live social media feed.
He read the caption.
"Back amongst the goals." Fontaine repeated the phrase, his voice barely above a whisper, yet it commanded the entire room. He looked up, his gaze locking onto Chloé. "Explain this."
Chloé maintained her professional composure, though her heart rate spiked. "It’s a counter-narrative, Olivier. The GQ cover is dominating the news. Valois and Phocéen are trying to establish a duopoly in the press. We needed to highlight your hat-trick immediately to remind the market that you are still the premier asset."
"A counter-narrative," Fontaine echoed, tasting the word as if it were poison. "You think I require a counter-narrative."
"From a branding perspective, yes. You--"
"I have twenty-three goals in the league," Fontaine interrupted, his voice finally cracking like a whip. He placed his hands flat on her desk, leaning in. "I am Olivier Fontaine. I do not experience ’comebacks’. I am not a struggling prospect who finally managed to find the back of the net after a drought. ’Back amongst the goals’ implies that I fell off. It implies that I left. But I never did."
"You hadn’t scored in two fixtures since the cup exit," Chloé argued, refusing to back down entirely. "The media was beginning to spin a narrative of decline. My job is to protect your image."
"Your job," Fontaine said, his eyes narrowing into cold slits, "is to amplify my reality, not to beg for pity on my behalf. Beaumont and the Phocéen striker are enjoying their little fashion shoot because they think the throne is empty. Let them play dress-up. Let them sell magazines. I speak on the grass. We are very different breeds."
He tapped a single, heavy finger against the monitor screen.
"Delete the post."
Chloé blinked. "Olivier, it already has eighty thousand engagements in three minutes. Deleting it now will signal internal panic to the journalists monitoring our feeds. They will write articles about why it was removed."
"Let them write whatever the fuck they want," Fontaine commanded, his tone leaving absolutely zero room for negotiation. "I am not a reclamation project for your department to spin. If you ever do anything that makes me sound like an underdog again, I will personally see to it that the board replaces you. Delete it. Now."
Fontaine stood up straight, adjusted the lapels of his overcoat, and walked out of the office without a second glance.
Chloé sat in the silence of her office, her hands trembling slightly. She looked at the engagement numbers skyrocketing on the screen. She gritted her teeth, grabbed her mouse, and hit the delete button.
The post vanished.
The King didn’t want PR.
---
The Cold Mathematics of War
Back in SC Valois territory, Monday was designated for mandatory physical recovery.
The mental gears of the squad were grinding at maximum capacity.
Luc sat on a padded table in the medical wing, enduring the agonizing pressure of a pneumatic compression device strapped to his legs. The GQ magazine was sitting on a nearby counter. One of the junior physios had proudly displayed it, treating it like a trophy for the entire club.
Klaus Becker walked into the medical bay, holding a protein shake. The massive German didn’t require as much mechanical recovery, his body seemed to be forged from cast iron and sheer willpower. He pulled up a stool next to Luc’s table.
"You are quiet for a man whose face is plastered across every newsstand in the country," Klaus noted, taking a slow drink.
"Fresko is at twenty-five," Luc said bluntly, staring at the ceiling. "Fontaine is at twenty-three. The magazine cover is just noise. The numbers are the only reality."
Klaus raised an eyebrow, a low chuckle rumbling in his chest. "I see. You thought breaking the Bretagne wall would give you a moment to breathe. And instead, the ocean simply got deeper."
"It’s a nightmare," Luc admitted, the frustration leaking into his voice. "I am operating at maximum efficiency. Henri shifted the entire tactical structure to feed me in a 4-3-3. I’m fighting for ninety minutes just to find a single window to shoot. And Fresko scores a brace by standing in the six-yard box while the Phocéen midfield passes the opposition into insignificance."
"That is the nature of things, Captain," Klaus said, his tone entirely devoid of sympathy. "Phocéen plays a high-line, possession-dominant system. Fresko does not have to wrestle center-backs because his midfield pulls them out of position before the ball even arrives at his feet. His job is simply to tap the ball into the net."