pro_patria_mortuus | (no subject)

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Enjolras has, over his months here, gotten more or less accustomed to conversations with Bar. With Combeferre looking on in fascination, however, he's newly reminded of the depth of peculiarity inherent in a discussion in which one half of the dialogue comes in the form of notes in orange crayon (and legible but extremely strange and rather childish handwriting, to 19th century eyes) written on small paper napkins.

Nonetheless, the conversation is reasonably productive. Their request -- primarily Combeferre's request, though Enjolras raised the question with Bar -- was for either more shelving to be installed in their current room, or for a larger room intended for two and with enough storage space for the collection of oddities and equipment Combeferre is likely to keep amassing.

"And no cherubs," Combeferre added. "If you please."

Bar indicated, via orange notes, that shelving would be possible, but that a larger room was equally possible and likely more useful, and that she suggested examining the options to see if they would suit. It's fair enough, Enjolras has to admit. If none of them seem workable -- for example if every large room involves blue and cherubs or Bahorel's rocks-and-red-velvet... thing -- then they can always return to request shelves and any other modifications Combeferre would prefer.

So Combeferre and Enjolras are now making their way through the upstairs hallway comparing room numbers with those inscribed on a ring of keys.

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"No idea."

He touches the side of it, curiously.

Enjolras is not enough accustomed to this kind of technology to guess that the little lumps along the side are discreet buttons, nor even to notice them as anything unusual amid the sleek lines and corners of the rest. All the same, he does accidentally manage to depress one.

And startles back at the sudden blare of color and sound. It's not all that loud, but it's a lot louder than the room was a moment ago.

WHERE IN THE WORLD IS CARMEN SANDIEGO?

The rectangle blasts out the question. A succession of mobile drawings appear on its surface. Combeferre peers at it, stunned, before he remembers reading about something called television.

He's still stunned. He hadn't imagined this.

A woman in a red coat and hat is running about the world stealing things, or having her employees steal things. In response, schoolchildren are...answering questions about geography?

"Oh," he says suddenly after a few moments of puzzlement. "It's an educational story! This tale of a daring lady thief--it makes the children eager to learn, of course!"

Combeferre turns to Enjolras, beaming widely. "There has been progress in educational methods, then--great progress! This seems much more effective, more imaginative, more cleverly designed to instruct a child while holding his interest, than anything I've seen in our time! And it appears to be universally accessible--look, see that symbol there? It says Public Broadcasting Services. If it's truly public, then surely anyone may watch this, at no cost?" He pauses for breath, and shakes his head. "What a marvel!"

Enjolras has seen television a few times, in the main barroom. But the screen didn't look quite like this, and he's always watched it more to marvel at the medium than to absorb the contents.

But Combeferre's interest -- Combeferre's delight, Combeferre's leap of insight -- makes him smile back, at first only in reflexive answer to his friend's joy, but soon brightening to a shining satisfaction of his own.

(Satisfaction, and deep affection. He will always marvel at his friend's capabilities.)

"Imagine. Education available to any child, even in the form of public theater."

Or... games, or whatever this is.

The display on the tv, which seemed at first to be a loud and colorful intrusion into these potential lodgings, has become far more welcome; it carries with its noise and bustle a shining aura of hope.

Combeferre has not yet spent enough time in the main barroom to take note of television, so this is his first encounter. And what an encounter it is!

"I suspect it's a very effective form," he says. "Though I would want to read more."

Enjolras is smiling, and Combeferre feels a bone-deep contentment at the sight. But he remembers to ask, "So--you like this room, too, then? Shall we mark it down as the current favorite, and look at a couple of others before deciding?"

"Yes, it'll do."

He doesn't love it as Combeferre clearly does, but that's all right: he has no objections, and Combeferre clearly loves it.

He turns his attention back to the device, which is currently displaying several men in very colorful shirtsleeves singing a peculiar and somewhat discordant song. The song does, at least, stay in keeping with the educational theme by naming several countries and cities. "How does one silence this?"

Experimentally touching the area he touched before makes the thing get slightly louder and slightly quieter, and the picture change with a jarring abrupt flicker to a woman holding onions in a shiny room that might be a laboratory and then back to the singing men, before the rectangle goes black and silent again.

"These little lumps seem to be the mechanisms." He's giving a bemused look to Combeferre and the screen both. Of course; why not tiny lumps to control all this? (There's also a remote control, but Enjolras has not investigated the drawers to discover it, and wouldn't know what to do with it in any case until he discovered the page of directions underneath.)

This, of course, is Combeferre's cue to press the tiny lumps repeatedly. He makes the rectangle get deafeningly loud and then whisper-soft. He brings back the picture of the singing men, and then changes it back to the laboratory filled with food, then to a couple locked in passionate embrace, then to two women in odd dark suits arguing in front of what looks vaguely like a judge, and then to men in blue chasing after another man and tackling him to the ground. The last picture he switches to has one man in yellow, a pointy-eared (like Elrond?) man in blue, an ordinary-looking man in blue, and a black lady in red, all standing about some important-looking gray machines.

Combeferre finally pushes the tiny lump that shuts off the sound and pictures, and turns to Enjolras. "Shall we, then?"

The next key is for Room 183.

Combeferre opens the door, only to be confronted with pink. Violent pink. Bahorelian pink. He shudders.

Enjolras retreats a prudent few steps, wincing, when the noise becomes deafening. Otherwise, he watches with fascination -- although he also averts his gaze from certain scenes.

(Are these fantastically detailed drawings, somehow, or some kind of miniaturized image of real people, or some other method entirely? He has no idea.)

At length, Combeferre switches off the device. Enjolras follows to the next room. Which is, indeed, violently pink. Numerous shades of violent pink, from the walls to the carpet to the upholstery to the ceiling beams to the spiral staircase in the center of the room. There are flowers. There are little painted birds. There's a hulking piece of furniture like a crossbreed between a sofa and a balcony.

Combeferre has, in fact, shuddered at the sight of it.

Enjolras looks across the room again. It's certainly full of... design choices.

"It has a second storey," he points out. Blandly.

Now Enjolras has joined Bar in teasing him. Well, Enjolras is here to be glared at, even if Bar isn't, so glare Combeferre does. "Shall we go on?"

Enjolras is largely impervious to glares. This time is not an exception. He merely smiles faintly in reply, and slips his arm through Combeferre's as they turn back towards the hallway. "Let's."

Room 137, some distance down.

It's... rock.

Rock and skins. Like a...well, like a trite poet's imagination of what a savage's lair would look like.

(Yes, Combeferre thinks of some people as "savages." The narrator apologizes on his behalf, since he wouldn't think to do so for himself. Combeferre is a broad-minded man for his time and place, but he's still of that time and place).

Combeferre steps into the bathroom and sees a stained glass picture of a nearly-naked man carrying a stone club.

He turns around and speedily walks back out. "I vote no," he says.

That's fine, says Enjolras's face without words and without protest, though he hadn't followed to see whatever startled Combeferre so much in the bathroom.

He could live here, as he could live in most of these rooms, but it's all a bit much.

Especially that ceiling made of paving stones.

"Only a few left."

So, on to room 158, which...

which Enjolras does not have any vocabulary to describe.

It's colorful?

Combeferre has the vocabulary! Combeferre has words for most things.

The words that come to mind here are ouch and appalling and oh god why.

The carpet looks like it's made from scraps of odd, irregular geometric shapes, all in aggressive and ugly colors: bright pink, harsh blue, bilious green, red, black. It not only hurts the eye, it dizzies the brain. And then on top of that carpet there's a bed with a cluttered pattern of flowers.

The whole effect is the opposite of peace and quiet. Combeferre can't imagine studying anything at all there.

They move on to Room 122.

Which...does not look terrible. Or especially interesting. It's almost obscenely large--three bedrooms and a sitting room, each bigger than his Parisian apartment--but nothing in the room is wounding. He turns to Enjolras. "What do you think?"

Combeferre doesn't expect a detailed answer. He knows Enjolras too well for that. But he wants to make sure their living quarters are acceptable to Enjolras, even if Enjolras's aesthetic preferences are few and mostly not very strong.

Enjolras is frowning a little, having surveyed the rooms. (All six of them.)

"Any one of these rooms would be fine. But all this, for two of us?"

He knows Combeferre will find more use for the space than he will, but nevertheless. This isn't bachelor lodgings; it's larger than many houses.

"It feels excessive, yes. Let's look at the last one?"

The last one is Room 161.

Combeferre enters, and groans. The room looks like a particularly boring vision of the Christian afterlife. Pale pinks and golds, crystal stars, and--

"Cherubs," says Combeferre.

Really, Bar?

"Cherubs," Enjolras agrees.

Cherubs, and a bed with a headboard that might have been copied from a cathedral. Well.

"Not this one, unless you're fond of it, then?"

Combeferre takes one last disgusted look around. "Very well--Cabin Still? Room 133? The one where we watched the--the television? I liked that one, and I don't think there was any room either of us liked better."

Enjolras steps backwards into the hallway so he can close the door on the cherubs, in deference to Combeferre's outraged sensibilities.

"Yes. It's that or the one with the branches, I think, and you liked the other better."

It was moderately apparent.

"So how do we tell Bar that we want that one? Shall we go back downstairs?"

Idly, Combeferre wonders if Bar will play further jokes on them, or if she's exhausted her mischievous spirit for the nonce.

"I suppose so. We may as well, so we can return the other keys."

And get duplicate keys to 133: one key for each of them, of course, and copies for their friends as well, on general principles.

They return to Bar, and Combeferre places the old keys on the counter.

In their place appears two shiny golden keys, each with the number 89 carved into them.

Well. Combeferre throws a sidelong glance at Enjolras. It appears that number is following them.

He writes a note to leave with Bar, with five duplicate keys for their friends to replace the old ones:

Dear [Courfeyrac/Joly/Bossuet/Bahorel/Feuilly],

This key is for the new rooms Enjolras and I have moved into. The room number is the same, thanks to Bar's inscrutable motives. Naturally, you are welcome to look in on us at any time. The room has with some equipment for scientific experiment and is an excellent place to study. It also has a television.

Regards,

Combeferre

Enjolras returns the glance.

He's bemused, a little. But not at all displeased -- honored, if anything, and perhaps a little grateful -- to be followed by the number 89.

It's that sort of kindness, and the generosity that's beneath all these ridiculous rooms and the bowls of orange pasta, that makes up for any number of cherubs and blue walls.

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