Fashionably Late

[clayforthedevil]

((warning for mentions of injury and death and other doomed revolt issues))


The first guard through falls to the only shot in his rifle, a first explosion that seems to set off a chorus. He tries to block the next soldier's bayonet thrust with his empty gun and only feels the slide of metal along metal and a shock through his ribs too sudden to hurt. Bahorel leans his weight onto the soldier's gun, grinning, trying to force him back for another second, fist raised for a last swing, and then there's a dark flicker as his foot slips and his balance fails him completely.

---

His foot comes down on a rather nice bar floor. The weight of his own swing moves him forward a bit, but he's used to punching moving targets and recovers quickly. The noise and air of the place are unmistakeably a bar; voices, glasses clinking, the sound of a door swinging shut behind him. He is, very definitely, in a bar.

Bahorel blinks. It's not the first time he's come out of a fight in a strange place with no memory of what happened in between, but really now--

and then he sees the window.

Either he's having a fairly impressive opium dream-- not his best, but not bad-- or Lesgle really hadn't been talking out of a cracked skull two years ago. A bar at the end of the world is a more interesting idea, almost mythic, really, so Bahorel chooses to believe it for now. He walks to the Bar proper and tries an order, in the way he's been told it works.

"Madame, or Mademoiselle, Bar, whiskey, if you please?" The request is wholly formal, complete with elaborate bow. And up pops a bottle of whiskey and a glass, so it seems to work. He thanks the Bar with equal flourish and pours his first drink. He's quite enjoying himself when he thinks of his apparently not-last moments, and lets his hand stray to his waistcoat.

Which has an enormous hole right over the heart. And is sticky with blood. He immediately takes it off to examine the damage, loudly cursing every king ever born when he sees the whole in the back, too.

So: here is a man in very good (but progressively less--and devil take them all, the undervest's even worse) bloody 1830s formalwear, expounding creatively on the heritage of the kings of Europe. He could be interrupted, and probably should be.

Comments

[clayforthedevil]

Bahorel lifts his bottle. "If you've got a glass, I think I've got our drink. Stories can be now." He holds up his wrecked waistcoats with regret. "I don't think there's any point trying to save these, so I'm in no hurry."

He'll just lounge around, drinking,with a torn bloody undershirt. Very picturesque.

[street_sparrow]

"Glasses we can get, and clean clothes - you sounded like you already know how things work around here, not many people jump straight to Madame Bar."

[clayforthedevil]

Bahorel shrugs. "I've ordered drinks at bars before. This one has no bartender to confuse the order on me. But if it can produce clothes worth having, that will put it far above any bar I've entered, and most of the tailors in Paris."

He absolutely does not know what's going on. But his expression is as calm as any cat that's ambled out of a tree after a person's gotten themselves stuck on a limb to save it.

[street_sparrow]

"She can even make them fit. How..." He shrugs, expressively. "Magic."

[clayforthedevil]

He runs his fingers over the counter in a way to make the innocent confused and the merely respectable blush. "A very talented Madame indeed, then. I am pleased to make your acquaintance. Are you kind enough to provide a second glass--? Ah, there it is. " He pours Gavroche a drink. "Now, I don't intend to ruin any new clothing by dressing before I clean up, and I don't intend to do that while I've a full bottle-- almost full, I'll be no liar, I am making progress-- so share a drink, and tell me: how'd we hold, after I lost my seat for the show?"

There'd been no sign, by the time he died, of which way the fight would turn, or how sharply.

[street_sparrow]

Gavroche, even at the age of ten, was neither, and just grins at his friend... but it fades a little at the question.

"Badly. It... didn't turn out as we'd hoped."

[clayforthedevil]

He nods, solemn now. "How many got out?"

[street_sparrow]

"Two or three that Enjolras sent away early because they had families, and there were uniforms for them to wear as disguises. And Marius Pontmercy was wounded but brought out alive."

[clayforthedevil]

He closes his eyes and says nothing for a few minutes. It's respect, and grief, but not exactly shock. That was the gamble they'd all made. That it paid out so badly is hard, but not unexpected.

But the youth telling him this is not the child who insisted on staying at the barricade. "And you?"

[street_sparrow]

"I died", he says simply. "And then I found myself here, ten years ago. Eventually, I found someone who could help me."

[clayforthedevil]

His laugh is deeply bitter. "Thorough. Their master must have been so proud." Not that he didn't expect it. Not that the children of Paris were ever shown mercy by the soldiers of Paris. But it's still vile.

And not at all Gavroche's fault. He thumps the boy's shoulder fondly and gives him a truer smile. "Still, either your math or your growth is off. This can't be ten years of growing, if Madame Bar is this generous."

[street_sparrow]

"I left cover", he explains. "To fetch bullets. The rain... Combeferre tried to make me come back, I remember, and Courfeyrac nearly jumped down after me... but I knew what I was doing." He nods. "I spent a few years not aging. The dead don't, after all - but now I think I'm 17."

He's small even for 17, but he always was undersized.

[clayforthedevil]

He nods at Gavroche's claim to understanding. Of course Gavroche knew what he was doing. That was the hell of the thing.

But he grins broadly at the end of the tale. "The dead don't age, eh? Then I got in just in time." He mock-preens. "Preserved in my prime."

... No but really. Take THAT,age and decay! He can punch the inevitable in the face, possibly forever! Death may have some perks.

Being stuck at ten would be another matter, though. "But you said the dead don't age, and you have. So you're alive again?"

[street_sparrow]

"Alive and kicking", he says with a cheerful nod. "I gained some abilities here, used them to help out a man with a lot of power, and this was how he paid me back."

[clayforthedevil]

That raises a lot of points that need debating, some later day. Or whatever happens in eternity. Right now there's more urgent matters. "Then you've been kicking around here for long enough to know the lay of the place! Any trouble worth getting into? Sights worth seeing? Water that's worth washing with?"

[street_sparrow]

"Hot running water in every room", seems to be the priority answer. "And rooms for rent for whoever needs them - reasonable rent, and tabs that seem to run indefinitely, I don't think anyone's been asked to pay up for years. The sights are - sort of limited, but alternatively not, 'cause the carriage house stretches out of sight and you can ride around for hours down there and not hit the edges. Then there's the lake and the woods - don't go too deep in the woods, you can lose time in there. And watch out for the red rabbits, they bite, and sometimes there's werewolves."

[clayforthedevil]

It sounds wonderful, and it sounds like Gavroche is completely making this up. Excellent either way! "Werewolves and dire rabbits I may accept, my friend, but you ask me to believe in the goodness of a landlord? Have we truly reached Paradise, then? The whiskey's good enough."

[street_sparrow]

"This particular landlord either has unlimited funds or just doesn't care. Nobody knows which, 'cause nobody's ever met him."

[clayforthedevil]

This gets a very skeptical look indeed. "The only reason I am even considering this as plausible is because of the great generosity of our Madame Bar. Clearly this is a very different plane of existence. But I suppose I'll see-- although I am tempted to go try my luck at finding your werewolves."

[street_sparrow]

"Some of them are just little ones", he says with a grin. "I taught them to use a boomerang the other week. And a frisbee, but that sort of got chewed."

[clayforthedevil]

That gets a long, raised-eyebrow stare before Bahorel starts laughing. "All right, I yield. Show me these magic rooms of yours so I can dress properly for meeting your amiable werewolves."



((ooc: want to wrap about here? He'll be back later, when he's not such a mess.))

[street_sparrow]

[ooc: looks good! Gavroche will tag along to the room and stay until he's chased out]