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[And here's a particularly pensive looking Enjolras, who has, truth be told, spent the last week or so avoiding almost everyone and everything. His gaze is somewhat far off, his face clearly touched by grief, but he is holding strong enough up to a point. Even so, he HAS come here for a reason.]

I would ask where, besides the turtle's head one might go here to spend some time alone? I require...reflection in a place that is not this room and where I might be un-interrupted. Might I have some recommendations for such a quiet place?

[And then he is hesitating for a moment, clearly, still focused on the camera as he
thinks, hands folded at his side.]

And in what ways have people here come to cope with, and accept the unfairness and griefs of this world, such as they might be? It is proving to be difficult since my arrival here, and I would welcome strategy if you might share it.

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I doubt I'll ever accept certain aspects of this world. As far as coping goes: Hope that tonight will be the night I wake up back home, I suppose. Other than that, try to live without compromising your values as much as you possibly can. [Of course, Tarrlok's values include power-seeking and accumulating wealth, but he'll leave that out.]

It is those natural laws I wish I did not have to accept. In the world I left, I had seen those closest to me killed for doing what was right. I do not dispute that it is the natural law of things but accepting it is...I am struggling with that loss, I fear, even as some of them are here with me.

Live without compromising in my values though. [And there is a small, firm nod there.] I DO think I can manage that.

Accepting that things like that do happen is different from accepting that they should. I'll accept the first, but never the latter.

And if you can manage that, then you're still doing something right, at least.

When put that way, I feel much less as if I were sulking over the unfairness of some petty thing, after all.

[Enjolras is nodding at the screen approvingly.]

I do suppose that knowing that what brought me here did so is something different from accepting any rightness of it, true. You make a good point, monsieur.

I absolutely detest being stuck here against my will, but as long as I don't compromise what I believe in I think I maintain a certain level of independence.

I hope you are able to cope, even if merely coping isn't an ideal situation for anyone.

Enjolras?

[Jehan is concerned. He's rarely seen Enjolras this openly distraught]

I am...

[There has been so much less time, at least in his mind, that Enjolras has had for all of this and...he's trying to write it off much as he can.]

Well, no I am not anything. It makes no sense to lie to you. The barricades though... There is no way to remove them from my mind. It...troubles me.

[He frowns before checking the date on a nearby calendar. He's a little pale when he glances back]

I did not even notice the date.

[He never saw June 6th. This is...disturbing, to say the least.]

We are here now, Enjolras, and we know that France does become a republic. We did not fail.

In my case, there is nowhere else that I might be, which I well know. It is what came here from that plays upon my thought, and will not let them go.

[There is a moment where Enjolras is shutting his eyes, tired as they look, as if he is trying to clear something from them.]

The unfairness of seeing good men fall when they stood for a righteous cause that will not be realized is what I speak of. I know that they are dead, that we are dead, at least there, and I must accept it, but I struggle against that, I think.

Such unfairness in the world is to be expected and we knew there was this chance, but even so... Even so, I would wish not to accept it has. Am I some sort of schoolboy that I cannot handle fact?

[We probably should not touch upon the answer to that question, really, considering?]

This is why I fear I sulk so pointlessly. Can any beliefs outweigh that? I would say that mine can, and should be turned towards things here, yet feel so selfish about doing it just yet.

...My apologies.

[And here, Enjolras is flushing, ducking his head.]

Forgive me. I did not mean to disturb you with my whining.

The date?

[Enjolras is blinking for a moment as he remembers waking here for the first time just weeks ago.]

Can it be, really? For me it is but a few weeks so I am not as easily able to forget. [This is a confession as much as anything else.] .

When seeing all of you still, I see your falls. ...Hear them. It is still worth it, what we did for her but disturbing to think of. When I am with one of you, I would be with you and not your corpse. I wish that part would fade, if I am able to make it happen.

Of course we have not failed. To say that would imply that there were not others among the people who would come a...

[And Jehan has just said something else, a bit before the talk of failing that has Enjolras starring at the screen a moment, before tears of a different sort than the ones he would not let fall spring to his eyes, and he is not ashamed of these]

Patria... so it HAS come.

[He starts to point out that they knew about that but then he remembers--Enjolras has forgotten. Jehan nods]

I was told by a friend who is no longer here that France has been a republic for many years in his time--2012. She has not had a king for some time.

[This is when the tears do start flowing, for one of the few times in Enjolras's adult life, and a smile, wide enough that his face aches with the force of it, appears on his face.]

You paved that way. All of you, who were lost.

I still can hardly say that losing you is something that sits easy with me but to know that your deaths were not quite SO unfair if that is what she was given...

That does help.

[Oh dear, Enjolras is crying. This is not what Jehan is good at. Where's Combeferre?]

I do not know how, exactly, it came to be or even when and what life is like in the republic, but...the people did rise, in the end.

[It's the thought of the republic spurring it, the idea that someone in France, some shopkeeper, some working man, or mother, or schoolchild, is living in the light of liberty. It is not even Les Amis' or his role in it that brought the tears. For himself, Enjolras loves his friends and values them, but more than that, he loves the light, the rule of righteousness that must be there now, in all people, can feel its warmth even from here, guiding mankind onward and...]

Truly, I am...overwhelmed. [He manages at last, his voice choked up and heavy, despite the fact he feels lighter than he has ever been.]

"Whence should proceed that cry of love, if not from the heights of sacrifice?" When I asked the others that, much later at our barricade I understood it, of course, what we would be asked to do. My life was nothing compared to the loss of all of yours, but knowing now, what those sacrifices brought, and the sacrifices of those before, and those to come after...

She has delivered. or will deliver man, as we had longed for her to do...As we...

Thank you... [That is about all that he can manage between choking breaths] For the news and your sacrifice of love. I understand now, what was lost...and I am honored to have shared it with you.

[Jehan just nods. Seeing Enjolras so emotional has gotten Jehan emotional enough that he doesn't want to try and speak. He's not entirely sure anything would come out except a croak.]

[When Enjolras can find words again, and seems all right to speak, there is something else that he feels he must confide now.]

You were not meant to be among our dead, had all gone better than we'd hoped, had as many barricades as those in July been risen. You, Feuilly and Combeferre.

I would have preferred none of our number die of course, but you three were to build the new republic, lead the people, teach them where to go and chronicle what had been left behind.

[And Jehan is getting a small smile] The circumstances being what they were, of course that could not happen but you would have been my three choices for that. How fitting that you were the one to bring me news of the realized republic either way.

Edited 2013-06-07 04:42 (UTC)

[It takes a moment, but Jehan shakes his head]

I am proud to have died helping my friends and brothers, to have given my life for the republic. I honestly could not imagine a more romantic or nobler end for myself.

[Well, Tim generally goes in for rooftops for quiet reflection, but...]

There are some fountains in the Water District that are out of the way enough for quiet reflection. And the water can be kind of... soothing, I guess. I hope that helps.

[As for coping, Tim basically copes by... repressing everything ever. So, yeah, no advice there, sorry.]

And I am proud to have been with you there, that you so willingly laid your life down for those dreams of the future. I would guess, should Patria speak, that she could say the same to you.

As it played out, there was no chance to ask what I would have of any of you three. With consideration to how things continued, and stand now, perhaps fate was not so much unkind as I had thought. After all, though we died, so many of us live here again. What could that be but fate's kindness toward us all for embracing progress with hope?

[Jehan is not so sure that this is a kindness. Look at Grantaire, after all. The strange...things falling from the sky. The things Tu Vishan told him in his dreams.

Then again, perhaps it is kinder than what might have awaited them otherwise.]

I only wish that the others would join us here, that we may be reunited.

[That probably is not exactly Enjolras's style, somehow, no..,]

That certainly sounds ideal. [As much as he is not certain the water district itself is a place he would enjoy, the fountains seem as good a place as any, and as for water, well, he has memories of childhood attached to that which may be helpful too.]

My thanks for your help then.

It's alright.

[He was young and angry once, too, and now he's just not so young and angry, so he can't blame Enjolras too much.]

I don't know what your beliefs are, but all I can say is that the world isn't a fair place and it probably won't work out the way you want it to. The best thing you can do is be strong and stand up for yourself, so nobody can walk all over you.

[That is the question isn't it? Enjolras supposes that if they were not here, they would simply continue to be dead, which would be no great hardship as they would not posses awareness of that state, so with that in mind, he will take being alive here and knowing France has been delivered, while he looks for other places that may need the same.]

They may yet. Look only how long it took for... [Then he pauses, remembering that information is something only he perceives as true.]

Surely everyone did not come at the same time?

Edited 2013-06-07 05:41 (UTC)

Just about. I arrived first, or at least made myself known first, with you and Combeferre speaking up within a few hours. Grantaire and Courfeyrac arrived the next week or perhaps the week after. Gavroche and Pontmercy were next, a short time after or perhaps before. I do not recall exactly.

Indeed, it did not in my case.

[And the smile Enjolras is giving him is grim, the smile of one who has seen that unfairness in the world, tried to fight it, and will likely continue that soon if there is need for it.]

Wishes never are horses, are they though? Yet so much more could still be bettered.

[Even here. Even now...He ought to speak to the other amis soon, he's decided.]

Being strong and standing up. I believe that can be done.

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