Les Miserables Love Story: Patria

Alternate Ending: Stranger Than You Dreamt It

As the gun had clicked before him, everything changed; his values, his soul even. He became aware of his longing to live and he ran from the firing squad and leapt out of the nearest window he could find. Miraculously, no bullet pierced his body, the only evidence of the combat was the glass that etched fearsome marks into the side of his chiseled face.

He hadn't paid attention to it at first, he only ran like a frantic creature escaping its predator. He leapt over the still and bleeding bodies of the militia, his footprints leaving a cursed trail of red in his wake. His head ached, his pulsed throbbed in his ears, his nose overwhelmed with the rusty scent of blood. He ran into the outskirts of the city until the sky faded to starlit navy and he returned and crept his way to a dark place, somewhere the police wouldn't look.

Once inside, he became aware of the atrocity that overcame his visage. He clutched a battered sleeve to his bleeding face, biting back his sounds of pain to avoid someone hearing him, though he supposed that the police would never find him there; in the Paris Opera Populaire. They were out on the streets, searching the houses of the Rue D'Bac. The Opera House was too gaudy and innocent a place for a marked man like himself.

Enjolras stumbled around in the darkness of the dressing rooms in search of something to ease the flow of blood from his wound. He found himself in a familiar dressing room. He recognized the red shawl that belonged to Patria.

Patria.

He remembered the gunshots and the bullet wounds and it felt like another bullet within him. His rage boiled and he looked into his reflection on the elegant mirror, displaying an ironic image through its grandeur. Before him was a mad, now ugly creature. A primal growl emitted from his throat without him stopping it and he threw an angry fist into the mirror before him, shattering the glass, creating more gashes across his knuckles and top of his right hand.

"Who goes there?" Bellowed a familiar, angry voice. Enjolras recognized this voice and tightened his jaw. It was the scoundrel of a man, Monsieur Beareux, he and his wife had beaten Patria when she worked for the Opera Ballet. He could remember in vivid detail the bruises and cuts, burns, and other scars on her body that they had left behind.

Enjolras hid behind the broken mirror as the Monsieur Beareux entered. He cursed loudly as he raised his lantern and cast his eyes upon the demolished mirror. "Cost me a good hundred francs for a new one!" Strangely enough, he chuckled and retorted, "Must have been a ghost!"

Somehow, a wicked smile teased at Enjolras's lips. "A ghost, you say? A ghost, maybe!" He said just loudly enough for the man to hear.

He tilted the mirror upward and it spun, jolting Beareux sharply in the chin and he cursed in pain, allowing Enjolras cover to sneak away from the room. He ran towards the first door he could find and found himself traveling up a long stairway towards the rickety bridge at the very top of the stage where the stagehands often bade their time. He heard Beareux jostling around below. Enjolras laughed maniacally, feeling the rush of adrenaline and the weight of agony pushing him towards the borderline of insanity.

"Come out wherever you are, my friend, and face me like a true man!"

He knew Beareux could never turn away a challenge and Beareux must have been scared out of his wits by then, for he was too sensible a man to believe in phantoms. Enjolras was going to toy with and torture this man for all he could; he was going to avenge his beloved Patria in any way possible. The heavy and slightly labored steps of Beareux sounded behind him. Enjolras turned on his heel and faced the haunted Beareux, who drew back in horror at the sight of Enjolras's- once handsome, now distorted- face.

Enjolras guffawed wildly again. "What do you see before your very eyes, Monsieur?"

The man stuttered and then gasped out. "A phantom! A ghost! Hideous beyond belief, but a ghost, nonetheless! Away with you!"