Timeline (Napoleon Remains A General)

POD
France stabilizes because the people become content with the constitution of 1791. This constitution established France to now be the Second Kingdom of France making coups less likely.

Egyptian Campaign
While in Egypt, Bonaparte stayed informed of European affairs. He learned that France had suffered a series of defeats in the War of the Second Coalition. On 24 August 1799, he took advantage of the temporary departure of British ships from French coastal ports and set sail for France, despite the fact that he had received no explicit orders from Paris. The army was left in the charge of Jean Baptiste Kléber.

Unknown to Bonaparte, the Directory had sent him orders to return to ward off revolutions on French soil, but poor lines of communication prevented the delivery of these messages. By the time that he reached Paris in October, France's situation had been improved by a series of victories against the rebels. The Directory never heard of Napoleon's abandonment of the Egyptian forces; they thought he'd just obeyed their orders.

Napoleon's Grand Return And Attempted Coup
Despite the failures in Egypt, Napoleon returned to a hero's welcome. He drew together an alliance with director Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès, his brother Lucien, speaker of the Council of Five Hundred Roger Ducos, director Joseph Fouché, and Talleyrand. They were plotting to attempt a coup but French forces loyal to the new Constitutional Monarchy had gotten wind of a possible coup attempt and stormed the building they were plotting in and they had to scatter. Napoleon stayed behind and out of fear of being killed for treason proclaimed he had "been trying to undermine the coup plotters." The plan worked, and Napoleon remained a general for the French Military. He would command France's new Grande Armée that was being built with hundreds of thousands of French men enlisting to join it.