Candles burned, illuminating the dark that threatened to swallow him. Moonlight too, shined through the large windows of the Musain, the silver glow guiding him as he slowly walked through the café. The ground floor of the Musain was far larger than that of his true Musain, and the overwhelming size of the café itself left him feeling strangely uncomfortable. Tables were overturned and chairs were scattered and broken. Bottles were shattered and not a single step he took escaped the subtle crunch and clink of glass. Silverware even littered the floor, plates and utensils and even bits of half eaten food. The deeper Enjolras walked, he began to notice drops of blood, burgundy, old with rot. The drops slowly turned to streaks of strewn blood and he followed it, meandering through the tables and chairs until he came to the bar. Stools no longer stood beneath it, but instead the flag of France draped over the bar. Blood stained the flag, splotches all across, and Enjolras found himself staring, his eyes trying to make sense of strange spots. A trick of the light perhaps, but his eyes did not lie. They were not nonsensical stains of blood. No, these stains took the shape of hands.

Enjolras swallowed, his skin crawling as he stared at the bloody handprints. They ranged from the size of adults to that of children and infants. He bristled, his expression transforming into a frown. Where were the bodies that owned those handprints? He investigated every section of the floor and found nothing but more of the same tables, chairs, and unknown blood. He found the backdoor at the very back of the Musain, its size considerably smaller than that of the front door he entered. It was an average sized door with windows that had been busted, and a large beam had been nailed across it, barricading it firmly shut. To the right of the door was the staircase, and Enjolras warily walked up it, his cleaver in hand, candles lighting his way.

His heartbeat slowed as he peered up at the second floor. The cool light of the moon spilled into the room at his back, and two candles lit the only table at the very center. Enjolras glanced about, expecting to find anything else, blood, bodies, a trap—and as he walked towards the table, the floorboards creaking with every step, silence did little to quiet his worries. He glanced at the papers that laid spread across the table, his eyes quickly scanning them until anxiety stole his attention to an echoing creak from above. The creaking went and then abruptly ceased, and Enjolras glanced back at the staircase that led up to the third floor. He waited but nothing came for him. He did not relinquish his hold on his weapons as he turned back to the paper on the table, his ears waiting for the faintest whisper. He stared down at the papers again, his eyes fixated on documents and maps, and then his eyes made sense of what he saw. They were battle plans, his battle plans for revolution, and the topmost page was a map of Paris. Sections of streets had been crossed out, black ink soaking the page and the section of the map that placed the Café Musain was circled. His lips parted with sudden terrible recognition. This map was the same one from the night before his rebellion died. He had crossed out the fallen barricades and his was the very last standing. This was when he knew his hope was lost.

The candles then extinguished themselves, the two twinkling flames evaporating in a snaking line of smoke. The moon, now brighter than it had any right to be, illuminated the room and enlarged his shadow, draping his surroundings in cool white light. And then his stomach dropped as the moonlight opened his eyes to the true nature of the room. Bodies lined the floor, their blood painted deep blue, nearly black—men, women, children, and every one of their eyes were open, glassed and hollow. And amongst those nameless citizens were the bodies of his friends.

Enjolras stepped back, his heel connecting with a corpse, and he staggered, foolishly collapsing back over the human mound. His stomach churned and his jaw tightened as his eyes met the face of a deceased child. Fumbling, he rose back up on his feet, his heart thudding wildly, and he could not help but stare out at the overwhelming sea of death until he could not bear it and shut his eyes. There they were yet again, Les Amis at his bloodied feet. Every one of them lay on that floor amongst the rest of the dead. He sucked in deep breaths, blood like acid within him, until he eased his breathing, his head bowed before calmly opening his eyes. His eyes passed the window to look at the staircase. Cautiously, he stepped over the bodies, meaning not to disturb them, and his feet finally touched the first stair to the third floor.

"Plip."

Enjolras stopped, his hand tightening about the handle of the cleaver.

"Plop."

He turned, his eyes scanning for the source until his eyes landed on a bloodied woman sitting upright against the wall adjacent to the window at the corner of the staircase that led to the first floor.

"Plip. Plop. Plip. Plop." Her voice echoed around the room.

Enjolras approached her, staring down at dark eyes that did not look at him. They were fixated on the liquid that seeped from the crack in the ceiling and dripped onto the floor beside her knee. It was blood.

"Plip, plop. Plip, plop." She looked to be in a daze, as if she didn't realize where or who she was. Enjolras could see the wounds on her chest that soaked her garments, and her pale skin was sickly gray in the moonlight.

Enjolras kneeled down, glancing over her face, her high forehead, elongated nose, concave cheeks, and chapped lips. Her thin, brown hair was tangled and matted with blood, a few strands draped diagonally across her face.

She continued to mutter those two words, endlessly watching as the blood dripped beside her. He studied her eyes, the vacant black eyes and whispered, "Mademoiselle?"

Her eyes flashed, her stupor suddenly gone. Silver light reflected in them, and Enjolras watched as her eyes slowly looked up at him.

"Have you heard how curiously the sea churns?" She muttered, her voice somehow clearer than before, "Like a storm… But like the rain, only gentle, like dripping water. It bellows from deeeep inside of me. Here it comes!—Up through my insides," As she spoke, blood seeped into her mouth until it spilled over, and a thin line of blood dripped down to her chin, "But gently, like little droplets…"

She slowly turned her head, glancing out the window, and Enjolras did not follow her gaze, his eyes fixed on hers.

"Everything seems so pale now…" She mumbled, her head leaning back against the wall.

She did not hiss out her last breath. A look of longing and peace, something so unfamiliar in the Nightmare, remained on her face instead. How fortunate she was to die in such a state. Enjolras sighed and rose to his feet, staring down at her a moment longer before returning to the stairs up to the third floor.

It was the size of a small bedroom. It smelled of mold and musk that he could taste on his tongue, and his nostrils curled. There were no windows to light the room, nothing to alleviate the smell and only a single torch on the wall. Beneath its light was a small bundle, a child, a boy, curled up on a thin, itchy blanket covering a heap of hay. The child's back was to him, and he could hear the boy mumbling softly to himself.

His eyes widened and he felt a sharp twinge of guilt. How could he have not thought of him, after all this time? Not once did the child, his safety, his very face cross his mind. He resented himself for it. "Gavroche?"

The boy did not flinch at the sound of his name, at the voice Enjolras thought he would recognize. Gavroche remained on his side, muttering, and Enjolras walked up to him, his feet clomping against the dusty wood floor.

"Gavroche?" He leaned over the child, his heart aching to see his innocent face again.

Gavroche's knees were tucked up to his chest as he clutched a silver pistol, the one he had begged Courfeyrac to use. He pressed the gun to his heart, his body curling into himself as he quaked and shivered, his voice a whisper. Enjolras might have missed it if it hadn't been for the flame of the torch—the boy was bleeding. His position made it difficult to see, but Enjorlas saw the distinct shine of blood seeping from Gavroche's chest, staining his hands and the pistol he held. The blood soaked through the blanket and hay and pooled deep crimson at Enjolras's feet. He felt himself turn cold with despair.

The child's eyes remained open, vacant, like that of the girl's on the second floor, only blinking every so often out of habit it seemed, not necessity. He looked out into the dark of the room, at nothing, his murmurs unending.

Enjolras watched his thin, purple lips—deep and dark as the rings under his eyes—as they moved, and he could not make a word out of Gavroche's mumbling. Enjolras went to his knees, Gavroche's blood soaking his trousers. He did not care and immediately reached for a blood vial. As gently, tenderly as he could, he plunged the needle into the child's lanky arm, depleting the blood and tossing the vial away. Enjolras was puzzled by Gravoche's lack of reaction, but perhaps it was due to the state he was in. He chose to believe that was fact, sighing as he reached down to touch the remaining vials. "Only two left," he thought. But the life of the child before him was more important. His sacrifice was not vainly wasted.

He sat beside him, the moments becoming minutes, and he expected a change in Gavroche's behavior. However, his hopes were dashed as Gavroche remained unfazed by the blood; his bleeding did not stop. Frustration and sorrow rendered Enjolras still as he sat beside him, for what more could he do?

As he sat, Enjolras began to question whether or not Gavroche was aware of his presence at all. He liked to believe the boy knew despite his maddened state. And the longer he waited, the more the blood flowed, slow and steady, and Enjolras wondered why the blood had failed him. He hated that he had no answer. Was Gavroche's fate already sealed and death destined to come? How long had he been laying there, bleeding endlessly, all alone? Or, is it possible he was never meant to die at all, a perpetual bloody display of terror that his mind had created? Perhaps, this is the consequence of the Nightmare. Enjolras bitterly chuckled, "Only two more vials."

The little boy's quivering suddenly ceased. He began to shift, a stiff unfurling as he moved his limbs, his head and body following. He turned and faced Enjolras, his hands and the pistol dropping to his lap as he let the heels of his feet dip into the blood that pooled along the wood floor. He looked at Enjolras and the man held his breath. Drop by drop blood faithfully seeped from the wound at his chest, though Gavroche did not seem to mind as he stared up at Enjolras. His eyes, Enjolras saw, held more life than they had before, but somehow, retained an emptiness within them that could not be hidden. It mimicked, Enjolras noticed, the dark emptiness of the room, of the Musain, and it disturbed him. But then his lips began to move, his voice clear as it echoed within the confined space of the room.

Gavroche smiled, "Éponine, I'm a robin! Will I ever curl up and become an egg?"

Enjolras stared at him, perplexed, his lips parting in confusion as a frown lined his face. Gavroche's look was earnest and his smile held despite the silence.

"What say you, dear sister?"

Enjolras stood to his feet, watching as Gavroche continued to look ahead, his head slightly turned, as if he were looking at a ghost or hallucination. Perhaps he truly thought he was speaking to Éponine.

"Éponine? Éponine? Say something, anything…"

Sorrow crept over the boy's features, a sadness that came and distorted the life that only momentary existed within the child. Enjolras, having no response to give, watched as Gavroche, in his grief, turned his back to him. Gavroche returned to his original position on the pile of old hay and while Enjolras made effort to stir the boy, Gavroche made no motions of movement. His breathing was deep, as if in sleep, though his eyes remained open as he clasped tight the pistol, his shuddering renewed.

Enjolras stood over him, watching, waiting, hoping Gavroche would respond, but the longer he stood there, Enjolras began to realize that there was nothing left to the little boy. The boy, in fact, had nothing more of importance in his unnerving state, and Enjolras would waste no more time with the horrors that distorted those he loved within the Musain.

Across the room, a door revealed itself by the glow of the moonlight that managed to faintly shine through. He went to it, ready to continue, and placed a hand on the knob. Before he turned it, Enjolras glanced back at Gavroche, staring at the child that remained crumpled on the floor, a broken boy. When he could look at him no longer, Enjolras squared his shoulders and walked through the door.

He was greeted with a gust of wind and the perfume of flowers. A garden was laid out before him, a large stretch of grass, sunflowers, and roses from end to end of the Musain. He was no longer standing in a room, as the left and right walls no longer stood but seemed to have rotted and fell away as life somehow took over. Beams stood on the sides of the building, and vines wrapped around the remnants of what once were walls. The roof of the Musain had collapsed, this section above the garden no longer existing. Enjolras walked down the three stone steps into the garden, feeling the cool night breeze tossing the blond curls of his hair, the scent of flowers wrapping and twirling with the wind. He'd forgotten sweet smells, blood and death were all he seemed to know now. As he walked, he could hear the sudden tolling of a bell, a deep and low song, and a chill crawled up his spine as Feuilly came to mind. He stopped, standing in the middle of the garden and looked out across both sides of Paris in hopes of spying the bell tower. His search resulted in nothing but an endless horizon of buildings and no bell tower. Was the ringing only in his head? The clangor was as clear as the night sky and sounded only blocks away. Enjolras, knowing nothing could be done about it, counted the tolls and continued walking.

Across the garden, the rest of the third floor of the café still stood. The soft soil and grass of the garden turned into the same hard wood floor of the café, the tall walls of the building stood, and the ceiling ascended to a form a slender A-shaped roof. He could no longer feel the wind within the confines of the half-destroyed room, but he was glad for the scent of flowers. Candle stands on both sides of the room lit his way along with the meager moonlight that shined through the large, dust-fogged windows. At the very end of the large room, Enjolras could see a figure sitting upright in a chair. And behind that figure was the great window that took the shape of broken clock.

As Enjolras crossed the room—a broad expanse as far-reaching as the garden—he studied the person in the chair, the one he assumed to be Éponine. She was dressed in a tattered, tan trench coat, an aged, off-white chemise littered with holes, and deep brown trousers and shoes faded by time. A russet, newsboy's cap adorned her head and in her lap, one leg crossed over the other, rested a leather-bound, pale hand. She looked like a poor-woman queen perched upon her unseemly throne. Enjolras expected her to move, to speak upon his arrival, but as he came to stand in front of her, he realized the reason for her silence. Her head was lolled to the side, her other hand dangling lifelessly beside the armrest. Her skin was unnaturally pale and beneath her chair was a large pool of blood and a long, bloodstained sword. She was already dead.

The bell ceased its tolling, and Enjolras counted twelve low chimes.

Enjolras sheathed his pistol and peered down at the face beneath the cap. Éponine looked like someone he knew, her pale skin, dark lips, eyelashes, and rings under her eyes. But he could not be sure and a mad curiosity consumed him. He reached forward, eager to tear the cap from her head. Instead, Éponine's hand snatched his wrist, and his eyes widened in surprise as she pulled him to her, her body suddenly endowed with life.

Her face leaned close to his, her shadowed russet eyes glassed, and said, "A corpse… Should be left well alone."

Enjolras pulled his arm away with ease as she relinquished her hold. He stepped back, gripping his cleaver and pistol and watched as she took her weapon that rested beside her chair. She stood, lifting her sword, a long, slender saber with a dagger latched into the hilt of the handle.

"Oh, I know very well," she said to him. "How the secrets beckon so sweetly…"

Enjolras stepped back again as she walked up to him. His adrenaline spiked, and he breathed deeply, eyeing her intently, wondering still what truth she kept from him.

"Only an honest death will cure you now." Éponine said as she clasped her blade in both hands. With a forceful yank, she unlatched the dagger from the hilt of the sword, transforming the great blade into a dual weapon, "Liberate you, from your wild curiosity."