Authoress' Note: This story marks the end of my creative drought of late. I wrote it easily and without hestitation over the course of several hours, a few glasses of wine and a white Russian. It is dedicated especially to the authors who are also mentioned in my profile (the ladies who make this fandom worth participating in) and to my own Marius.

The quotes in italics are taken from the Charles E. Wilbour translation of Les Miserables.

What led Marius Pontmercy to the barricade on the evening of June the fifth, 1832, was not the promise of a French republic. Unlike the others-Enjolras, Combeferre, Courfeyrac, and the rest-he held no lofty ideals of a nation led by democracy, by the people themselves. He had never dreamed of freedom or equality for all of his country's citizens. He had never dreamed of a virtuous government, wise to the needs of all and deaf to the cries of none. He had never dreamed of a free France.

He only dreamed of her. Cosette.

His thoughts returned to her constantly and invariably, as the the sun returns to the heavens after a long night of invisibility. Yet Marius drew more warmth from the thought of his beloved than he ever could from that daytime star. The sun's light reached only his skin; Cosette's reached the depths of his soul and lit him from within.

But now that she was gone, Marius had been plunged into a veritable darkness. England! Her father was a murderer, and was fleeing France to escape the galleys, a fate that he justly deserved. But Cosette recieved the punishment for his heinous deeds; the crime which he committed now was even worse than his last. He was impeding the plans of God Himself, tearing assunder two souls whom He had intended for each other forever. And now Marius would never see her again. As the realization of what was happening to him became perfectly clear, his thought processes ceased, and his senses shut down. He percieved almost naught, the urgency of the situation at hand scarcely reaching him across the yawning abyss that had been created by the loss of Cosette and which now separated him from the reality in which he was exsisting. Marius was little more aware of his surroundings than the flowers in Cosette's garden were aware of theirs; and those, too, would surely perish without her.

Marius Pontmercy came to the barricade to die. Life was no longer worth living; Marius sought to end it.

"Marius fought without shelter. He took no aim...he was so hacked with wounds, particularly about his head, that the countenance was lost in blood, and you would have said that he had his face covered with a red handkerchief."

Over the past several months, Marius had conjured up countless fancies about Cosette and him and the life that they would lead together. He had dreamed of their wedding so many times that whenever he imagined it now, it was as clear to him as if he were watching it at the theatre. It would take place in her garden for certain. Marius could think of no place where his love would want to be married more; besides, God could see them just as well in her house on the Rue Plumet as He could in a church. Marius also imagined their children-two little girls, Mariette and Coralie, Cosette would be so pleased! He imagined the house they would live in, the food they would eat, and the clothes that they would wear. Oh, what a happy life they would lead! On Sunday mornings, the passerby would stop and stare at the four of them, incredulous, and wondering how a family of Angels came to live together on Earth.

Yet out of all of Marius' fantasies, there was one in particular that was his favourite. It was only a single image, come unbidden to him on one of his sacred walks through the Field of the Lark. And it was this vision that Marius chose to shroud himself in during the battle.

"There is no man more fearful in action than a dreamer. Marius was terrible and pensive. He was in the battle as in a dream. One would have said a phantom firing a musket."

The image was that of Marius and Cosette, together, decades in the future, wed and greatly aged. They were seated outside in their garden on a great stone bench, their hands clasped and their knees facing inward. It was Marius' favourite dream because it was his most cherished hope to see it come true one day. He recalled it here because now he thought that it never would. The dream was a poor substitute for reality, but it was all Marius had, so he held onto it with greater fervor than he held onto his carbine.

Instead of seeing the voluminous legions of National and Municipal Guards fighting furiously on the other side of the barricade, and instead of seeing the piles of the dead and wounded multiplying at a gruesome rate, Marius saw only her, dressed in a matronly grey dress and a wide, white bonnet. A few wispy grey strands of hair had escaped her coiffure, and were fluttering in the gentle Spring breeze. Her tiny pink tips, now thin with age, were turned up in a smile, and her watery blue eyes sparkled, in spite of the crow's feet and drooping lids. She leaned in close to Marius.

Instead of feeling his filthy clothes, stiff with old sweat and dried blood, chafe his delicate skin, and instead of feeling his eyes sting and tear from the blood which constantly dripped down into them, he felt Cosette's warm breath on his cheek as she kissed him.

Instead of hearing the deafening volleys of gunshots and the cries of his fallen comrades, and instead of hearing Enjolras desperately shout orders to the other insurgents, he only heard his wife whisper, "I love you..."

Marius exsisted on the barricade, and lived in this fantasy. While firing shot after shot, caring naught where they went, Marius hoped for one thing: for God to take him from this mortal world and deliver him to the garden in his dream, where he could wait for his Cosette in peace.

"Marius remained without. A ball had broken his shoulderblade; he felt that he was fainting, and that he was falling. At that moment his eye already closed, he experienced the shock of a vigorous seizing him, and his fainting fit, in which he lost consciousness, left him hardly time for this thought, mingled with the last memory of Cosette: 'I am taken prisoner. I shall be shot.'"

...Cosette, please wait for me. I will wait for you.

Cosette-