oo1 ; [ video ]

[jondrette]

[The box-- a computer, she was told, is omitting some sort of light, and Eponine looks at it, her face angled away, her eyes narrowed and her lips parted slightly. She doesn't trust it. But, she was told, that was how you communicated here. When you didn't find people face to face. Reaching out, she raps her hand against the screen, gasping at the hollow sound.] So strange, this computer! I don't understand it. There isn't anything like this in Paris, yet here… In this strange sort of city-- I was told it is not heaven or the hell that I deserve, but rather a city in the In Between. I can only liken it to purgatory, which is better than what I expected. [Her voice is low and hoarse, not fitting for the seventeen-year-old girl that she is at all. Then again, her age is hard to pinpoint in and of itself.]

I'm dead. They said perhaps I was, but I know better. I remember life leaving my body, and… [She pauses, looking away, her eyes fixed at a far-off point, the ghost of a smile forming on her lips.] and I remember his lips pressed against my forehead as I passed. Oh, I am dead, don't try to tell me that I am not, whomever it is I'm speaking to. It's so strange, I'm speaking into a box, and others are supposed to hear me! [She tosses her head back and laughs.]

What a strange, strange world this is. Heaven or Hell or In Between, perhaps it is all the same. They said it was an In Between. Why am I not in hell? All who know me know that's where I belong. I do not belong here, and yet, [she gestures.] here I am. Is it not a wonder?

Comments

[video]

[poeticverses]

Oh.

[Jehan blinks at the screen]

You've returned, mademoiselle.

[jondrette]

[She moves backwards from the computer, her eyes trained on the man in the box. He looks familiar, but she wasn't exactly concerned with others at the barricade. What's puzzling is that he seems to know her. And here, she doesn't know him at all.]

No, m'sieur. I've never been here before. You must have me mistaken for someone else. My name is Éponine.

[poeticverses]

You were here, once, for a short time, and then you were whisked away. And now you've returned. It happens often enough, from what I understand.

[A slight smile]

Regardless, I am Jean Prouvaire.

[jondrette]

So strange. [She shakes her head.] I do not recall being here, so perhaps I am not that girl. Some other Éponine. If it happened, I would remember it.

Hello, m'sieur Prouvaire. I've already told you my name. How is it you know me? Is it from here? Though I doubt it, I recall your face, if only vaguely.

Video:

[solo_patria]

[And have an Enjolras who, though he hardly remembers this girl in life, not enough to know her by name at any rate, had watched her falling at the barricades, and honored her sacrifice then and there. He must say something to her, surely, but the thought of what is somehow difficult. Still.]

And I have died and been brought here as well, mademoiselle and can understand it no better than you. I too deserved...far different from what I got here.

[He had condemned himself and knew it so that being here still felt...quite unexpected.]

But I do not think that any such as you are deserving of Hell if God is righteous and good as they all say.

[This girl had lived in Hell already, and undeserved then as well. To send her to it after, no, that would be a greater injustice yet.]

So here we are instead, brought by caprice perhaps, but still, we live again if only for a time. You were among my barricade. If there is something I might do for you here, in dint of that, please only ask it.

[jondrette]

[This man she recognized, if only barely. His blonde hair and zeal, at least, were enough for her to remember. He was, as he said, the leader of the barricade. That much she had gathered before her death.

She frowns at him, her forehead creasing and, as such, she removes her hat, letting her dark hair tumble down about her shoulders, still caked with dirt and blood from the barricade. Her shirt had only just dried, her blood now a sickly brown color.]

You do not know me, m'sieur. So who are you tell me what I do and do not deserve? I say I am deserving of hell, and I know me better than anyone. You should accept it. You've seen first hand how 'righteous' and 'good' God is. I've seen you about. If he is at all just, then how do you explain how he has abandoned his people?

[Her frown turns up at one edge, morphing into her usual sort of smirk.]

So you recognize me as I recognize you, m'sieur! Yes, I was there, and I still wear the mud and blood that covered the ground. But if you have died-- then what of the others? [Gavroche had gone home, she knew he had. He had to have. Run back to his elephant, hopefully he never even saw her pass. She'd told Marius to keep him back. That should have been enough to frighten him away.] What of m'sieur Marius?

[solo_patria]

As they all say, of God of course, Madamoiselle.

[And that's a bit of a sardonic tilt to Enjolras's head there, even if he doesn't do anything else to indicate that.]

I have seen cause to doubt that God is there, or ever was, I think. What divine being would see your Paris, and my Paris, when there should be just one of them, and let things stand the way they have? I think it cannot be, truly.

[Seen, but not lived, and Enjolras knows that one all too well. What he knows is that it was wrong, and worth fighting to change but that is ALL he knows. ]

But yes. I recognize you, and I came here much the same. So many of us were killed as well, but others have come here without that fate. It truly IS an inbetween as you say. Marius survived, but he has come here too, with us. I suspect you will see him here before long. He seems to have that effect.

[jondrette]

You speak as if you know my Paris. You have only walked through it. It is rare that a person should know both sides. [But she was one of them.]

No, there is no god, not now. Perhaps there once was, but he has abandoned me. He has abandoned us all.

[She nods- at least he recognized her. That was enough to give her a watery smile as she listens intently. Many were killed, then. But others were not... And Marius... Marius had lived. She blinks, something dark spreading throughout her chest, twisting and pulling, turning her innards to ice.] He survived. [He survived, and he had Cosette's letter. It was easy to assume what had happened next. If only Cosette had moved away before he got to her-! She could hope.]

That effect? What sort of effect do you mean, m'sieur? That all those that are new to this city and this world see him?

video;

[philosophe]

[If she has returned, Combeferre has not noticed it, but he may have been lost in his studies or otherwise occupied during her residence in Keeliai. So he blinks a little at the screen, considering. The girl looks familiar, one of the half-remembered girls he would walk by in the alleys, sometimes leave some bread or some coins for.

He does not quite remember her death, either, he was tending to the wounded at the time; though in truth it is hard to recall much of that except blood and gunfire, even now. So he gives her a quick, curious smile after a moment, and a nod.]

I think I have seen you before, mademoiselle, in Paris. Are you from there?

[jondrette]

Perhaps you have seen me. [She regards him as best she can over the screen. He, too, looks vaguely familiar. Another shape with a name to it that she never knew.]

I am. I lived there for some time. How is it you know me? I did not fraternize with many. Unless... Were you not at the barricade?

[philosophe]

I was, yes, with many of my dearest friends. I think, perhaps, I saw you there, or about the cafes, sometimes. I am Combeferre; or Etienne if you prefer it.

[There's a pause, and he gives her another considering look.]

Are you hurt, at all? I was studying to be a doctor at home, and I have a clinic here; I should like to make certain you are all right.

[jondrette]

Perhaps you did. That is where I drew my final breath.

Etienne Combeferre. How lovely to meet you. Perhaps I will call you Etienne, or m'sieur Combeferre. Perhaps both, whatever fits my fancy. But in return you must call me Éponine, not mademoiselle or anything else. Simply my name.

[She looks down, pressing her hand against the hole in her shirt. Nothing but bruises, though, given her near skeletal appearance, she should not turn him down. At the very least, it would give her a chance to explore this new city, to meet new people, even those who had been at the barricade.] I shall have you know I have never been to a doctor. Not since my infancy. If you so wish to make sure I am alright, I will let you. After all, I was starving when I was shot.

[bacondivination]

Hell is wildly overrated. Tacky, garish decor, and you'd not believe the idiocy they get to. Try this pseudo-limbo turtle for a while, you might just come to like it.

[jondrette]

M'sieur? [Have a strange look.] Do you mean to say that you have been to hell and returned? [She'll deal with the turtle later.]

[bacondivination]

Yes, and, given your circumstances, skepticism starts to sound crazy. So don't bother doubting me. I don't like it nor him, though he'd take that as a compliment.

[jondrette]

Him? Do you mean the devil? Or is this the turtle you spoke of? Your talk is dizzying, m'sieur.

[voice]

[inseine]

[Ah. It's this girl.

It takes Javert a moment to pinpoint exactly why her face is familiar. Then he recalls - Patron-Minette, the Thénardier girl, alias Jondrette. The last he saw of her, she was dead in a heap along that back alley where that ex-convict...

She was here before, he recalls dimly. It was before the episode with Malicant. Before the decreed palace security investigations, and possibly before the rationing. Like the blond insurgent boy, a quick look over the previous replies tells him that she has no memory of ever coming to Tu Vishan before.

How many times has his own body and mind come here, only to melt into the ocean and resurface again? Would it add another three deaths to his list of 'experienced' drownings, whether they were real or not?

His response is flat - nearly coy, for a man that is often mistaken as humorless - but the low, hard, and cold timbre of his voice should strike a terrible chord of familiarity in Éponine.]

Don't let the handsome looks of this city dupe you. You are in Hell. Or on the road to it.

[jondrette]

[Oh, she recognizes his voice alright. Anyone in Patron-Minette would. The man who had taken it upon himself to ruin her father's plan, to thrust their poor little family into all manner of prisons, arresting them all. His arrests had brought her mother to her death, though she cared little for her now. Éponine and Azelma had been lucky, being released after only a few weeks. There was no evidence to hold them, after all.

She steadies herself, a smirk playing on her lips, as it always seemed to when she believed to have the upper-hand.] Do you not recall, m'sieur? I have already been to hell, and you were the one who helped bring me to it.

If you are the man I believe you to be. Come, let us see your face, if you, too, have found yourself in this city!

voice --> video;

[inseine]

Ah! I see you have not given up that 'Emperor of Devils' yet. One of the more creative street names, I will admit.

[The man on the line snorts. There is a flicker on the blank screen, and Javert willingly shows his cold, heavily lined face. He looks very much the same as he did when Eponine last saw him: unrelenting, unpitying, incredibly stony and probing in his expression. There is a subtle change, but it is hardly perceptible to any arm's length acquaintances: a slight weariness, a touch of resignation hidden deep in the way his gray eyes glimmer, in the way he holds his shoulders a pinch too loosely.

Javert studies her intently in a short silence, his arms folded atop his desk.]

You found your way on your own. Too soon, but there it happened, and here you are.

action!

[saisamour]

[And here is one (1) Marius Pontmercy just having left Courfeyrac's tree house and striding in the direction of the Earth Sector's Free Clinic, as overseen by the good M. Amon. He appears inattentive, as always, but there is a lightness to his steps and a spark in his eyes that tells any passers-by that he is having only the most beautiful of daydreams.

And, well, being in a state of daydreaming, he walks right past Eponine, wherever she is (for it is very likely that he is hardly paying any attention to where he is heading, too), almost brushing against her but without as much as a glance in her direction.]

[jondrette]

[Given her upbringing, Eponine is trained to know when anyone is near her, too close for comfort, anything, and when Marius very nearly brushed against her, she had already turned. She recognized that back of head anywhere.

Abandoning the box, she took off after him, ignoring the looks she got for her muddied and bloodied clothing. It doesn't take her long to catch up to him, and she reaches out, grabbing on to his arm.] M'sieur Marius! You're here! They said you were, but now I see you with my own eyes! How strange that you should be the last thing I saw in life and now you, too, have joined me in this strange city! You are here, with me!

[saisamour]

[WHOA HEY.

The sudden grab startles him to attention and he glances at Eponine, blinking once, a dazed look in his eyes, as if the last traces of a daydream had yet to be shaken off.]

Eponine? But of course I am here. [Because they have already spoken several times before, haven't they?

Although in retrospect, Marius has gone a considerably long time without speaking with Eponine... But whatever conclusion he is about to reach is lost when he realizes that her clothes are covered in blood. His eyes widen in concern and mild panic.]

You are hurt! What happened to you?

video

[lostundercover]

What do you mean you're dead?

Re: video

[jondrette]

I mean precisely that, m'sieur.

[She looks at him as best she can on the computer screen.] Do you not see the blood on my shirt? I felt my life leaving my body. Of course I am dead.

video

[lostundercover]

If you're dead then how are you here?