A/N – Dear all. I am so so so so sorry about the delay. I have been incredibly busy with study, youth group (leading), work, exercise, and so much more. In humble apology I'm updating twice tonight to finaly finish this Arc. Enjoy!

There was something ironic about all this happening around a stage in a small theatre in a small street in the maw of Paris herself. Gods, if it weren't for the pain in his side Perceval would have been glad to chalk this up to another aberration of absinthe – a lark of the Green Fairy twisting her wicked long fingers in his hair and pulling tight. Up in the centre of the stage – look closely and you'll see the medical drama fading to a happy conclusion with M. Medicine standing there and looking down on his poor patient. Forgive me… give me a moment to turn a clever phrase about that patient – give me a little space of time to forget the sound he made when that bastard broke his arm, will you?

Hell.

Forgive the profanity, mon ami, my dear little theatre. I love you more than you can know – you have been home and hearth to me when home and hearth have been anything but. But… this little panorama, the doctor and his man – the friends holding each other and sleeping off their fears, the discarded uniforms in a mound in the middle of the floor where we all wish we could discard the trappings of this growing insanity – the dying footfalls of Lucien off to bait the dragons and Enjolras off to some higher plane where god willing he'll realise this was not and never could have been his responsibility… All of this is beyond me. We shattered and – I shattered us, didn't I? Just like Dominic's arm.

Which had been a crunch. Perceval heard it again and shook his head hard. Dominic looking at him – Duval looking at him, both of them knowing that if he opened his thrice-damned mouth and said four little words My name is Grantaire then none of that would have happened. Or perhaps, and let's really get down to things, how about if he had said three other little words a little earlier, mm? I forgive you and voila – Dominic Bahorel is at home and safe and …

And Maurice Joly has the broken arm. Crunch. Or worse.

"All right, what now?" Combeferre earned what might be a short-lived eternal gratitude but was a very fervent one to make up for it, by breaking into that train of thought.

Pan turned from where he was standing and glaring in a distinctly 'if you think that wearing a mask means that I am going to let you hurt yourself then you have got another thing coming' way. "Perceval, would you like to tell him what happened to you, or should I?"

So many masks. Scaramouche, Scaramouche – take this for me, I am neither smart nor fine enough to understand what we do here any longer. Perceval lifted his head and narrowed his eyes at Alexandre, trying to focus. You called me my Christian name, ami. Why? Because we can now that neither Pilon or Enjolras are about, or to remind me that a man sits behind the mask we created? Dieu. I wish to god we were finished with all these games. "I'm bruised."

"He's bruised," Alexandre said with a heavy irritated sigh. "Because he knocked himself out against the cell wall."

Oh thank you. Thank you so much. That sounds like I was trying to get hurt. And I wasn't even trying! Well a little. Well all right so I was trying to get hurt but I had a very good reason. A very very good reason – don't glare at me like that. And it wasn't the wall it was the bars. Totally different. Smaller. Thinner. Hurt more. In more places. I'm not helping my case and – maybe it's a good thing I'm not a lawyer, mm? Yes, your honour but he didn't mean to steal the oranges. Well he did, but it was for a good reason. Wanting to eat the oranges was a good reason, right? And they weren't oranges, they were grapefruit. So we can go, right? Perceval shook his head again and caught a look of utter horror on Combeferre's face. "Half of it is because Pilon is generous with his fists."

Why did I say that? That's worse. And half the grapefruit weren't grapefruit, they were watches from the shop up the road…

Alexandre decided to offer the explanation which Eugene Combeferre was obviously looking for. "It was to stop him from whaling on Dominic in order to get information out of Perceval."

"It was necessary." Don't argue this one, mes amis. You didn't have to listen to that… crunch.

"Was it." Combeferre looked utterly unconvinced and was getting out his things again.

Alexandre folded his arms. "It wouldn't be so bad if he'd leave well enough alone and not injure himself further trying to do things."

I protest, counsel. What 'things' do we mean here, and am I suddenly four years old? Are you my mother? Because if you are then she has been reincarnated in a form I was definitely not expecting. Confusion mixed with anger and a sudden feeling of …. crunch … nausea. Perceval stood, with only a little struggle because at the moment the pain from his chest was preferable to thinking. "It was necessary, Alex." Am I Scaramouche now, telling you What Must Be? Or Perceval Grantaire pretending I know what I'm doing? Or neither?

"You're impossible!" Alexandre threw up his hands in exasperation, looking not unlike Eugene did sometimes when arguing with Enjolras.

Perceval wondered what was so impossible about wanting someone to stop… but derailed his own thoughts before he could get to the end of the sentence. Flowers. Oranges. Mother. Anything.

"Necessary or not," Eugene took his elbow firmly. "Please sit down, Perceval."

Who isn't using my Christian name these days?

The pressure caused him to turn a little and something grated and a white flash passed in front of his eyes. He reached up and passed his hand over his face and his hand was shaking and there was so little left of anything anymore that maybe all the thoughts would stop if he just kept going and going and going until whatever happened after everything stopped. Word for that. Can't remember what it is. "I'm going over there…" vague gesture. "To check on Dominic."

Alex took his other arm suddenly. "No you're not." You aren't agreeing with anything I say lately, why?

"You're really not," Eugene added, using a rare contraction. "Sit down, my friend. You'll make whatever it is worse."

They both glared, the fine ones. Alex trying to keep them all steady, Eugene doing the same. Both of them doing the same thing, one medically and one with the fierce protectiveness of a man who knows too well what hell they could fall into otherwise. They both glared and Perceval took a few steps uncertainly, wavering between Dominic and listening – Scaramouche – letting Scaramouche take over until Perceval could be asleep… and being Perceval who listened to his friends before he got them all into trouble.

His knees decided for him and gave out and he fell and was caught.