Ten Years Later…Paris, France, 1832

The days flowed together for him, a mixture of arrests, faces, and pleading. The desperate pleas of innocence and indignance were meaningless to him, and they always would be. Javert didn't care what they had to say. He never did. Monsieur Inspector had lost whatever vague sense of empathy or caring that he felt the moment he went to Toulon. Javert lost his empathy the day that he met Jean Valjean, or, as Javert most often referred to him, 24601.

The convicts moved in one line, their dirty and salty sea water soaked faces kept looking down at the wet concrete. They would cringe at almost every step, for they were all barefoot and the "clothes" that they were given, if you could even give them the dignity of being called clothes, were so thin and cheap that even in summer, the air made a chill.

The reason they looked down was Javert. Even though he was young, only 18, it was said, the young man had a frightening composure and stance that made even the murderers that were sentenced to the galleys quake in fear. The way he glanced at you, the way his eyebrows curled into a frown and his mouth twisted into something between a smirk, scowl, and frown all at once, was very intimidating.

Only one criminal dared to look up.

24601 was in prison for 19 years. Originally, it was only five for stealing a loaf of bread and breaking the baker's window. It had been extended when he had tried to escape from the galleys multiple times. While he was aware of the…..activities that surrounded him, none of his fellow members of the chain gang ever dared to even look at him with sinful thoughts. Valjean was all beefiness and bulked-up muscle, an intimidating presence even among the hardened criminals that were stuck in the prison, even the ones who had been pulling ships and building up muscles for years.

He dared to look Javert in the eye one day.

Javert took out his truncheon and held it in front of 24601. "Retrieve the flag," he commanded, gesturing to the flag of France that lay forgotten on the ground. The mast had snapped when they were pulling in the ship and the convicts were stepping all over it disrespectfully….truthfully, they were afraid to step out of line.

Valjean stooped and, with great effort, hoisted the heavy hunk of wood over his shoulder. Valjean grunted with the effort as he dropped the flag at Javert's leather-booted feet.

"Now prisoner 24601, your time is up and your parole's begun," Javert snarked at the sweating man before him who now wore an unmistakable grin on his face.

"Yes, it means I'm free!" Valjean answered, quieted excitement and happiness in his raw and dry voice, made so by the years of salty sea air.

Javert made his trademark scowl. "NO! Follow to the left to your itinerary! This badge of shame will show until you die," Javert scowled, handing the yellow parole slip to the excited man before him. "It warns you're a dangerous man!"

"I stole a loaf of bread! My sister's child was close to death and we were starving…."

"-You will starve again, unless you learn the meaning of the law."

It was Valjean's turn to scowl now. "I know the meaning of those 19 years….a slave of the law!"

"Five years for what you did, the rest because you tried to run! Yes, 24601…."

"My name is Jean Valjean!" the freed man interjected.

Javert hissed, "And I'm Javert. Do not forget my name! Do not forget me, 24601!"

While Jean Valjean climbed the steps to get out of his 19-year-prison, Javert watched him with hateful eyes. Javert decided, I that one fleeting moment, that he just didn't care anymore for the prisoners.

()()()()()()()()o_o()()()()()()()()

One day, the usual routine that Javert had become so accustomed to was broken by a brawl near the Café Musain. An older, middle-aged, bourgeois man was being attacked by none other than Thenardier, a shady ex-inkeeper, and various members of Patron-Minette, a gang that was terrorizing Paris, most especially San Michel. When Patron-Minette saw Javert coming towards them, they scattered and stood straight when they realized that there was nowhere to go. The bourgeois man huddled close to a girl in a rather annoyingly large bonnet and modest purple coatdress, shielding his face from Javert. The girl looked up at her father with large blue eyes, confusion evident in them.

Javert addressed the situation. "Another brawl in the square, another stink in the air! Was there a witness to this? Well, let them speak to Javert!"

Walking up and down the line of the gang members, which included the bushy red hair of Monsieur Thenardier and…..well, Madame Thenardier was just plain trying to seduce Javert into letting them go by pulling down the collar of her thin rag-dress to reveal more of what little cleavage she had. They were all looking down, like convicts…..like Jean Valjean, 24601…..no Javert, don't you dare think of him, he scolded himself.

Javert continued, this time turning to the man and his daughter. "Monsieur the streets are not safe, but let this vermin beware! We'll see that justice is done."

Monsieur Inspector surveyed the gang again. "Look upon this fine collection crawled from underneath a stone. This swarm of worms and maggots could have picked you to the bone! I know this man over here, I know his name and his trade, and on your witness, monsieur, I'll see him suitably paid."

When Javert turned around quickly, he expected to see the man and his daughter huddling together. Instead, he was only greeted with an empty space where they had been, and the faint scent of perfume that the girl had left. He could see the hem of the girl's purple dress and some of the girl's golden locks fraying behind her as the pair ran around the corner. "Where's the gentleman gone, and why on earth would he run?"

Thenardier piped up, slightly lifting his head up. "You will 'ave a job to catch 'im, he's the one you shoul' arrest! No more bourgeois when you scratch 'im than' that brand upon 'is chest!"

Sudden realization dawned on Javert and hit him like the fiery sword of the angel guarding the Garden of Eden. "Could it be he's that old jailbird that the tide now washes in? Heard my name and started running?" After a short yet thoughtful pause, he continued, "All the omens point to him!"

Thenardier was obviously eager to go….probably to do more pickpocketing and other forms of thievery. "In the….absence of a victim, dear Inspector, may I go? An' remember when you've nicked 'im, it was me 'wot told ye so."

Javert put his face very close to Thenardier's, and was reminded of the closeness that he had had with Monsieur Madeleine…..no Javert, you need to focus, he reprimanded himself. "Let the old man keep on running! I will run him off his feet!" he announced. When he noticed the crowd that gathered like a swarm of flies to spoiled bread, he yelled, "Everyone about your business, clear this garbage off the street!"

Inwardly, he was cursing himself. He had let Jean Valjean get away again.

()()()()()()()()o_o()()()()()()()()

Later that night, Javert returned back to his house and went immediately to his chamber rooms. He sat down at his writing desk, the one that had been a gift from Monsieur Madeleine for the first Christmas….Javert shook his head, effectively ridding himself of the memory. He wanted to forget Madeleine, everything that he had done with Madeleine, everything Madeleine had done to him, but he couldn't no matter how hard he tried. Madeleine had been his first….first in passion, and the first that he had shown true emotion and care for. Javert sternly had to remind himself quite often that Monsieur Madeleine was not real. Jean Valjean was. It was just a masquerade, Javert reminded himself, a ploy to fool him.

Javert picked up the small leather-bound booklet that he still had and thumbed through its pages. On one of the first pages was scrawled that message that he had written in his drunken state as a reminder to himself of the promise and oath that he had to uphold…

"I will catch that son of a bitch and show him the hand of justice. I swear this by God. I swear this by the stars."

He ran his thick fingers over the wobbly, size-varied, clumsy letters once again and remembered the burning anger that he had felt on that day. It had consumed him like a fire, and that night, he dreamed of taking Valjean up against a wall with his truncheon and literally showing him the hand of justice, the hand of the law. Javert now shivered at the thought. Even he was not so cruel enough to do something like that. Javert knew what people thought of him, and, to be honest, he didn't really care too much what the other people thought. Maggots. Slime. Disgusting idiots who can't see that he's not just a man in a uniform. That's why he never could find comfort. Nobody could see past the uniform. The only erson had been Monsieur Made-stop it Javert! he scolded again. In that one instant, Javert realized something.

He still loved Jean Valjean.