pro_patria_mortuus | (no subject)

Combeferre sits on his bed, drinking his coffee, and says nothing. He's still sleepy, but also deliriously happy. He has seen a happier Paris. They've found Jean Prouvaire. Combeferre's thoughts are, for once, settled and slow-moving and calm.

Enjolras emerges from the bathroom, shirtsleeves rolled up and nape of his neck damp, looking somewhat more awake than he did a few minutes ago.

Perhaps not entirely alert yet, however; evidence for that, aside from the early morning, is the fact that his next stop is by the coffee pot to refill his cup. He glances over, and smiles at the sight of Combeferre's contentment.

"Good morning," says Combeferre, smiling back. "The best morning in a long time, in my opinion."

There are a few contenders for that title, for Enjolras. Seven mornings, for certain.

But this one is very high on the list.

His smile broadens, brightens, settles in. "Yes."

He crosses the room to sit next to Combeferre on the end of the bed. Another sip of the coffee -- a little too hot, still, but drinkable -- and he rests the thick-walled mug on a knee to let it cool.

Jean Prouvaire is here. Enjolras isn't sure, even still, how much of a kindness coming to Milliways is, for Prouvaire or for any of them -- but the rest of them are here, apparently indefinitely, and Enjolras is selfishly overjoyed to see him, as he's been selfishly overjoyed to see each one of his friends. Jean Prouvaire is here, and it's a very good morning.

Combeferre has spilled coffee on his shirt. It's only a drop, but he dabs at it ineffectually. Ah, well, it will be covered when he puts on a waistcoat.

"Prouvaire found a Paris in the Labyrinth," Combeferre says, in lieu of trying to say how deeply happy he is. (There's little point in that, after all. Enjolras surely knows.) "I don't know if he told you. Joly and I found one, too--a different one. I didn't see Prouvaire until we were out on the lawn."

Thinking of the moment, he smiles again, or perhaps he had never stopped.

Enjolras shakes his head slightly, listening with intent interest.

"As did we. Relatively briefly. I hadn't realized -- Prouvaire didn't say."

He and Grantaire, Joly and Combeferre, Prouvaire. That's three of five groups, at the least; it's improbable enough that it must be a deeper pattern, of one sort or another. "Did we all?"

"Yes," says Combeferre. "Bossuet and Courfeyrac did--they had adventures, and Bahorel and Feuilly had even stranger times. You saw Feuilly's mask?"

Combeferre takes another sip of coffee. "What was your Paris like? Ours was--a delight, in every way, and then coming back to find Prouvaire--" It's too much good fortune to be believed, even if Milliways may not be the ideal place for all of them.

Enjolras nods: yes, he saw the mask, though he didn't get the full story. (Most of the story he got was along the lines of ...Well, Bahorel. Admittedly, that does explain plenty.)

At the question, he grimaces wryly. The Paris they saw wasn't a bad place, but it was -- well. It was different, and his feelings about that are both strong and complicated. Homesickness is a powerful one of those feelings, the peculiarly aching, dislocated homesickness of briefly visiting your heart's home to find it utterly changed; but there are other feelings too, especially with the Labyrinth's circumstances.

All the same, when Combeferre breaks off happily with Prouvaire's name, Enjolras grasps his hand for a moment, his heart full of shared joy.

"It was -- I don't know if it was our world or not. The year was 1885. If it wasn't our world, it was extremely similar. We found ourselves there," he says, delicately dry, "on the day of Victor Hugo's funeral procession."

He's not entirely sure how to feel about that, either.

Combeferre gives Enjolras's hand an answering squeeze, then raises his eyebrows at the mention of Hugo's funeral. "Oh?" Enjolras's dryness makes it clear that this funeral was no placid and dignified affair. Even if it wasn't already clear from the mere fact that it was Hugo's funeral.

"That must have been an...event."

His dryness is primarily because, while in 1832 Enjolras had no strong opinions on Victor Hugo the semi-respectable Romantic author, it's different now; it's something else to be deposited by a magical Labyrinth in a Paris that isn't quite his, on a clear day after rain in early summer, on the morning of a funeral procession just at the corner where he and his friends fought and bled and died, months ago or more than 50 years before; with Grantaire alone, at the crowded funeral of Victor Hugo.

There's a sense of humor of sorts in that choice, and he's not sure how he feels about it.

At any rate. "There were vast crowds," he agrees. "It was rather a carnival."

Combeferre, much as he loves Enjolras, can't help needling him on occasion.

"Were you recognized?"

This is, the narrator is afraid, such an occasion.

Enjolras glances at him, faintly bemused by the question; then, recognizing the needling, he grimaces in tolerant (and slightly rueful) answer.

"Not by anyone we knew in our year, nor who seemed to recognize either of us personally."

"But," he admits, "there was a group of men who asked our names, and when we answered seemed to regard them as jokes, or code names. So perhaps, in a way."

Yes, all right, Combeferre can be amused at that if he wants. (Enjolras isn't exactly, but he's not bothered by it, either. It's just strange. But being in Paris of 1885 was stranger, and far more disconcerting.)

Combeferre bites his lip to avoid snorting aloud. But he sobers, and hesitates before asking, "And how did you find 1885, in our Paris?"

It's a complicated question, with a complicated answer. Enjolras has another swallow of coffee while he considers his words.

"Strange."

"I would have liked to have seen more of it to answer better. We were only there a little while. And there were crowds everywhere -- it wasn't an ordinary morning."

"It was -- inexpressibly good to be back." Enjolras has never been a man to conceal his emotions, especially from a friend. His voice is quiet, but it's not to hide; his feelings are bared, in that quiet admission.

"But it wasn't our Paris. 1885!" They've learned, at Milliways, to speak knowledgeably of years in the 20th century, the 21st; all the same, 1885 was the unimaginably far future once, and in some ways still is. "After all Haussmann's work -- Combeferre, we stood on the rue Mondétour. And I didn't know it, until I saw the street sign."

Combeferre puts a hand on Enjolras's shoulder. The shock of recognition when he and Joly arrived in the Paris-with-airships, a shock that swiftly dissipated into a flood of joy--yes, Combeferre knows there are no words to describe how it feels to go back. Even to a Paris so changed.

"Still," he said. "It was Paris. Haussmann couldn't render it unrecognizable, I'm sure." Combeferre has read of Haussmann's work; he knows the answers to the questions he would otherwise ask about the planning and construction of Paris in 1885.

"The rue Mondétour--we came there, too, Joly and I, though in a Paris even stranger than the one you found. You say you met no one you knew? Did you converse with anyone at all?"

Edited 2015-05-14 01:40 (UTC)

Enjolras shakes his head slightly with the smallest of smiles, spurred by both comment and touch. No, Haussmann couldn't. Wide boulevards and utterly changed shopfronts and all, it was still Paris, and its crowds still Parisian.

"In passing. Enough to learn the day, the event -- little more. Then we realized where we were. The rue de la Chanvrerie was the rue Rambuteau, the buildings all changed, but -- Combeferre, listen." He turns a little, pressing a hand to Combeferre's arm in turn. "Do you know what someone had scratched into a plaster wall? Vivent les peuples."

Enjolras doesn't care if he himself is recognized, by name or by Hugo's florid descriptions. But that Feuilly's remembered -- that matters.

Combeferre's eyes narrow. "Truly? Enjolras--that was in our Paris, too. Carved by Feuilly himself. They'd preserved it, as a monument to Feuilly. And to everyone who fought in the June Revolution. As they called it. It succeeded, you see." Combeferre blinks hard. "But Feuilly was the one named on the plaque, since the words were his."

Edited 2015-05-14 03:05 (UTC)

Enjolras's hand tightens on Combeferre's arm. "Tell me."

He doesn't need to specify.

No, he doesn't.

"The uprising happened much as we remember it," says Combeferre, "but there was help, at the end. It wasn't just outliers like us and Saint-Merry left at the end. The other barricades held, the people rose in greater numbers and pressed their chance harder--I think perhaps the cholera epidemic wasn't as bad, in that Paris, though I'm not sure. And there was no rain on June 5th." No rain. The sun came out, the clouds dispersed, and men were saved. France was saved. It was that simple, that providential.

"And then--a Republic. Elected by a free and sovereign people, with no desperately poor people on the streets. I don't know the precise policies in place. Likely justice was still incomplete, but it was far less dire than in our world. A true Republic. And all of us a part of it. You were a statesman, had been for decades at that point--Joly was a scientist, Feuilly did great work for Poland and other nations, and their people who took refuge in France...and there were airships. In the 1860s, there were airships. And Matelote owned the Corinthe, and it was..."

Combeferre searches for the right word to describe the difference. He settles on, "Clean."

Enjolras's eyes are glittering by midway through this recitation. He closes his eyes, listening; his hand loosens, lifts from Combeferre's arm, rises to press his hand where it rests still on Enjolras's shoulder. In his other hand the mug of coffee rests still on his knee, cooling, distant, disregarded.

No rain. Greater numbers of citizens rising, a harder press at the right time; that simple, that providential. And then, a Republic.

What their poor France could have had, so many decades before it did. He doesn't understand the nature of the Labyrinth still, but perhaps -- perhaps, somewhere, another France really did. A free and sovereign people, the agony of poverty relieved, the light of liberty and equality spreading across the world. Feuilly alive, Joly, all of them, alive and doing great work.

The Corinthe, that he can't quite remember without thinking of it in blood and anguish and acid and wreckage -- the Corinthe, clean.

This future, described in Combeferre's wondering, exultant tone, is both a horrible juxtaposition with what was, and a gift beyond price. Enjolras chooses to focus on the latter; they're both true.

Enjolras says nothing, but it's not difficult for Combeferre to know what he's thinking. Enjolras is quiet but transparent, and in any case, Combeferre is thinking the same thing.

"I think it was a real Paris, not a dream," he says. "As I understand it, the Labyrinth takes us to places that exist, albeit in other worlds, other universes. That Paris is as true as ours." Combeferre has no words for the joy and the pain of that--something so wondrous, so real, and so unattainable for them. But still real, still true.

The cruelty of all the ways in which their poor worlds fell short remains, a deep and constant pain.

But this was real. A real Paris, an entire Earth, where this came to pass; where a Jean-Sébastien Enjolras, a Jean-Luc Combeferre, a Bahorel and a Joly and a Feuilly and a Jean Prouvaire and all the rest of them lived to see the Republic dawn. They couldn't bring it about, not in Enjolras's world and not in Combeferre's, no matter how much he and Bossuet strove to change their little corner of history. But in some world, the citizens of France know that bright triumph and concord as simple fact, achieved, unassailable.

A few tears have slid down his cheeks, twin glittering trails, cool against the warmth of the morning sunlight. His shoulders have sagged, very slightly, in a rare moment of rest.

"Good," is all he says, softly. His heart is full.

"Good."

Combeferre squeezes Enjolras's hand again. There's nothing to be said. It hurts to see Enjolras weep, even from joy, but--there's nothing to be said. Nothing Enjolras hasn't already said. It is good. Not as good as they had wanted, but good.

Some moments pass. One minute, or less, or more; it doesn't really matter.

Enjolras thinks, eventually, to bend long enough to set his mug of coffee on the ground. He'll retrieve it later.

"How much of it did you see? Was it only that corner?"

"Mostly that, yes," says Combeferre, "that corner, and some of the area around it, and the inside of the Corinthe, of course." He pauses. "It had pictures of the wall, of certain regular patrons of note. Including our friends. Matelote had stories to tell us, about our 'uncles', and their friends--she thought we were our own nephews."

He wonders, suddenly, what it would have been like to encounter his older self in this world. "We had no chance to see more," he says. "We were whisked back to Milliways shortly after arriving at the Vivent les peuples wall."

Enjolras is wondering what it would have been like to encounter that world's Combeferre, or Feuilly, or Joly, or any of the others. He hasn't thought yet of the strangeness of encountering himself.

"Still."

Still, what a miraculous gift.

Everything else he could say feels like an empty pleasantry, understated to pointlessness: Still, you saw it, or it's good she was there to tell you of it, or something else to wrap needless words around the heart of this bittersweet joy that overwhelms him. He presses Combeferre's hand once more, trusting -- knowing -- that Combeferre will know what's in his heart. All of them would share the same thoughts in the face of this.

Combeferre twines his fingers with Enjolras's, their joined hands resting on Enjolras's shoulder. He remembers the picture of Enjolras on that other Corinthe's wall. Enjolras was smiling, and had faint lines extending from his nostrils to the corners of his lips, and faint furrows in his brow.

Combeferre might have met that Enjolras, too, an Enjolras who had been a public servant for decades, whose love for France had been allowed to burn steadily for years. He looks down, unable to stop his eyes going blurry.

"Yes." Still, he had the privilege of knowing this other Enjolras existed. Still, he knew it was all real.

There's no need, really, to discuss the matter further, unless Combeferre has more details worth sharing; and there's time enough for that. Here, in this moment of silent fraternity, in the sun-soaked Milliways morning, there's space to think of a happier France, of friends alive and dreams realized, a citizenry freed.

Once, Enjolras quietly hated Milliways. No longer. Now he has friends here; now, there are gifts like this, a visit to another Paris, and friends to share that joy with beyond death.

"Have you told the others?"

Combeferre blinks again, but this time it's because the sunlight has shifted and is now reflecting painfully off of the windows and Enjolras's hair.

"No, I didn't have the chance. Last night--the Bar was busy, and we all had so much to discuss." He smiles. "I can't wait to tell them."

Enjolras returns the smile.

"Let's."

He rises.

(Sooner or later he'll remember his abandoned mug of coffee, but probably not until it's stone cold.)

Combeferre rises, too. He's finished his coffee, so nothing spills when he's careless with the cup.

He pulls a waistcoat at random from the closet. A somber gray, like every other one he has. He shrugs it on. "Feuilly might be awake." Unlike some of their other friends, Combeferre does not need to add.

"Yes. In any case, he wouldn't mind being woken for such news."

Enjolras had chosen black trousers when he rose, in the unthinking habit of months -- perhaps longer, in the indefinable way of time's passage at Milliways. It's hard to say, here where a week can pass in a night and the calendar seems to advance by steps and skips. But he pauses, now, and studies the contents of the drawer, and reaches instead for a pair of pale gray trousers.

He's never worn these. Nor the blue waistcoat and coat that follow after.

But Prouvaire is here now, the last of their number. Not the last of the Amis de l'ABC, nor the last man Enjolras called friend, but now the inner circle of their dearest friends is complete, all eight lieutenants and Grantaire; all dead on the rue de la Chanvrerie, and all here. It seems a worthy enough day to choose.

Combeferre hadn't worn mourning at Milliways. When he arrived, most of his dearest friends were already here--all except Feuilly and Prouvaire, in fact. He knew they were dead, but to him they were simply--elsewhere, and he had reason to hope they would appear.

But he couldn't fail to notice Enjolras's regular mourning attire. It was a daily tribute to their friends, and a moving expression of Enjolras's grief for them. To see Enjolras reach for light, bright colors--

Combeferre smiles, pulling on his coat, and says nothing. They'd never discussed Enjolras's mourning--they'd never needed to--and there's no need to discuss the end of it now. Enjolras's frame of mind is plain to see. Combeferre, still smiling, suspects his own is equally so.