The delicate blond stared in horror at the Winecask, then turned heavily and stumbled down the stairs, through the café, into the street. He was nearly running, blindly. He felt revulsion touch him to his core and yet…yet…inside, he knew that it would solve his problem. The drunk would be gone. Patria would no longer suffer the stings of his jeers. Freedom. And once he attained it, he could bring it to France.
His thoughts drifted, flitted. Although part terrified and partially elated, Enjolras found himself musing logistics. He couldn't actually kill Grantaire now, this much he knew. It was a deplorable act, or so his morals said. Not only would he be alienating the Ami, and though they were hardly the best companions for his task, they were loyal and for the most part sincere, but he would be committing a crime against the very humanity he was trying to rise. It shocked him, the brief moment that he realized it was an argument that the other man had used against him not an hour ago. And yet, Grantaire wanted it. Was that enough to make it right? His mind wrestled with itself, and which part became the victor did not yet become clear, not even to the blonde.
His distracted mind's ramblings had brought him into an area of Paris that he did not know well, and Enjolras paused for a brief moment to attain his bearings. The sudden silence, no longer marred by his swift steps caught his attention and fascination, he looked now not for a way from the boulevard but along it, curiosity piqued. There were forms moving just out of the light, and in the state that he inhabited he moved forwards inquiringly, his mind drifted, shifted from his dilemma.
If only it could have remained so.
Often praised as the most beauteous of all youth, Enjolras' slender form could, conceivably, be taken as womanly. The man who had pressed against him apparently thought so, assuming his clothing to be yet another costume, the boy to be yet another whore. The revolutionary found himself forced to a wall, the stench of alcohol making him gag. Frightened hands scrabbled for a weapon, yearning to free himself from the unwelcome amorous advances as the drunk tore the ribbon from the blonde's locks, loosing a wave of hair. The attacking drunk's pawing hands got no further; a blade had been slid into him, the frightened rebel had found his weapon.
The scent of blood drove his predicament once more into Enjolras' mind. Coupling the coppery liquid was the pervasive reek of wine, and memories rose faster than he could cope with. Grantaire's mocking. Grantaire's jeers. Grantaire. Grantaire. His words, invasive, destructive. Begging for death, pleading for death, needing death. Wanting it.
The knife rose, lifted by a near-crazed hand, fell again into the other man. His liver. Poetic, the true end for a drunk always comes by his liver. Enjolras hadn't noticed that the man who he was stabbing in frenzy wasn't his true target; he was a target, and that was enough. He had had enough. He was accepting the offer.
Emotions flowed from the blonde in a torrent heightened simply since they had been bottled up for too long. Emotion rarely released in the meetings, an intensity never seen, even by the intended victim of the attack. They were liberated swiftly, sense filled the gulf. The boy slid back onto the balls of his feet, suddenly sobbing softly, staring at what he had done. What was once a man was now mere flesh, a gaping wound grinning up from where the liver had been. No. From where his abdomen had been. It was nothing now, barely a mass of tissue.
The knife was discarded, and the distraught man walked again. In the strange manner of men who are lost, his feet knew the direction and led him home. He was already trembling.
Mechanically he cleaned. Clothing was discarded, the student bathed in frigid water. He knew inside the blood must go. Instinct, tempered by morals again, but still instinct guided his actions. Even so, he had forgotten his deeds that night but for the words. The Winecask's words. Those tormenting words. Freedom would from then on be accompanied by that coppery tang that the substitute Grantaire's blood spilled.
A/N: This is from constant pressure, oddly enough, to write a second chapter. So minou...here it is. If it continues further, this will be the last segment from the past.
Disclaimer! I was going to let poor disturbed Enjolras be. Your fault, minou.