Like the Stars that never Change

The ground was shaking, making his head ache as if a glowing iron was driven through it. Any more and his skull would split open, he was sure of it. Where was he? What was happening? And what was that stench?

His hand began searching, blindly, and found some scrubby fur. Whatever it was, jumped at his touch and was at him, a second later. He heard a curious growling, a moment before his face was inspected by a cold nose.

The painful shaking of the ground beneath him stopped and stumping feet even louder than the rumbling before, made his brain scream in agony. Someone was by his side, the dog skipping back for its owner.

"Lay still." an old voice instructed him. "Lay still. You´re hurt, monsieur. Better don´t tempt your luck."

Javert managed to make out a face. Old, wrinkled, thin.

"Who are you?" he asked, barely able to speak.

"My name´s Arnaud. Bertrand. My home is not far from here, we´re almost there."

"Here." Javert tried to look about and had to give up. It was night and he couldn´t even see over the rim of the cart. And his head was spinning. "Where are we?"

"Oh like … ten kilometers from Lyon."

"Lyon?"

"Yes."

Javert managed to get his hand up to touch his head and learned quickly to better let this be.

"What happened?"

"I don´t know, monsieur. I found you, lying by the tracks so I assume you had an accident."

"Tracks?"

The man looking down on him frowned deeply at this – God his face swam away to the left again and again – he wanted to ask a question, Javert could tell, but in the end he only told him:

"You just keep it slow. I´ll bring you to my house and then you can rest. Before tomorrow we won´t be able to do anything. My wife can call the doctor. He lives nearby."

Javert leaned back, not objecting, and the old man accepted his silent content, climbing back to the coach seat.

"What´s your name by the way?" he asked when he picked up the reins.

"Javert. Inspector with the Paris police."

"Paris." Bertrand reacted confused. "What are you doing here in Lyon?"

But even thinking about this made Javert´s head hurt much worse again. "I don´t know." he sighed. "I can´t remember."

...

Valjean had believed the failure was the worst, the despair and almost loss of hope, to still find Antoine alive and well – stop thinking like that, he´s all right, he always is – but he soon had to learn that this wasn´t true. The worst was Cosette and the kids, awaiting them at the inn, eyes asking as soon as they walked in. And he just didn´t have the strength to calm their minds. Not after this day.

"Papa!" but Cosette stopped, dead in her tracks, seeing his tired eyes. "Did you …? I-is Javert …?"

"We didn´t find him." Marius took over, instantly turning to calm the kids. "But that is only good." he told them. "It means he didn´t die there. We believe he made his way someplace where he could find help. He´s a strong man. He surely found someone to help him. You´ll see. Tomorrow we´ll receive word from him."

No one spoke a word after that. Neither against nor for it. There was only this heavy silence of uncertainty and worry. And for a moment Valjean believed to feel it almost physically, pressing down on him.

"Papa?"

He tried to smile for her, but for the first time in years he couldn´t.

"I´m sure he´s right." forming words was easier but his voice still sounded broken. And he had no way to hide this. Eventually he turned away and went to his room without another word. Cosette did not try to hold him back. Eventually the door fell into the lock, a solid weight in his back.

He couldn´t believe this was really happening. Antoine. He couldn´t be gone. He just couldn´t. Not now. Not ever. He´d been there all these years. This fact alone proved that the idea of him being dead was just ridiculous. Not like this, when Valjean had been there to stop it. He couldn´t just go and leave him behind.

Valjean had no idea, no comprehension at all, what he would do without him. He was his friend, his partner, his comrade through all the highs and lows of life, especially in times as uncertain as these. Times that were not theirs anymore. He didn´t know how he should face this alone. Not anymore. Not anymore.

...

Javert took a deep breath. The bandage around his head seemed too tight, his whole body way too warm, and the throbbing of his head wound would not stop for a while, he just knew that.

"Monsieur. Would you look up, please?" the doctor held up a candle, right before his face: "Look into the light." he instructed him, and brought a hand before Javert´s eye. He removed it quickly, a few times in a row.

"Do you feel dizzy, monsieur?"

"Yes."

"Did it get worse just now, when I removed my hand?"

Javert thought about it for a second, and nodded.

The doctor straightened. "Well, I guess that was to be expected." he sat down the candle. "You have a concussion. So far I´m hopeful that it is only a slight one and that you will completely recover from it. But you need to take a few days off and rest."

"I can´t. I need to find out what happened to me. And why I´m not in Paris."

The medic frowned, thinking deeply. "This memory loss of yours concerns me. What is the last thing you remember?"

Javert had never found it harder to think than in this moment. It was as if his mind was sluggish, slowed down like that of an old man. Much older than he actually was.

"I was walking my beat." he answered at last. "Like always." He tried to think harder, but couldn´t recall anything specific.

"You can´t remember preparing for a journey to Lyon?" the doctor asked and Javert shook his head, a little too harsh. He needed to recover from the movement before he could inform his hosts about the facts.

"We were preparing for the funeral the next day. A tumult was expected. We´d need every capable man in the streets. To leave the city at this time, would be as good as treason."

When Javert noticed the strange silence, he glanced up. This time it wasn´t only the doctor who frowned at him in irritation.

"The funeral?" he repeated. "You don´t mean the funeral of one General Lamarque, by any chance, do you?"

"Yes. Why?"

A few uncertain glances were exchanged before the man informed him: "Monsieur, this man died three years ago."
Javert blinked, his head spinning again. What?

"There was a tumult, I read about it in the papers. But … I´m afraid your memory loss is more severe than we thought. If you lost the last three years …"

Javert tried to rise, but his brain instantly demanded him to sit back down, with a pain that felt as if he´d been knocked over the head. What?

"Slow down." the doctor´s hand steadied him.

"I need to get back to Paris. I need to … find out …"

"You, sir, need to rest. And take it slow."

"I need to know what happened to me. I might have been on a mission. If I don´t report back, the criminals who attacked me might get away."

For a moment the doctor seemed uncertain. "You remember being attacked then?"

"It must have been that way. Why else would I be here now? And without my uniform."

"It could have been an accident. The trains are not as safe as I´d like them to be and if you fell out for what reason ever …"

"Trains?" Javert again felt the room spin around him.

"You´re confused." the doctor decided to end the talk. "That´s normal. Take your time. I guess you´ll be up for a few more surprises."

"We could bring you to Lyon tomorrow." Bertrand offered. "Maybe inspector Taillon knows you and can tell you why you´re here."

"Yeah." Javert didn´t know anything else to do than nod. "That … that sounds like a plan."

"Just try to keep it slow." the old medic sighed. "I fear if you strain your head too much so shortly after this injury, it could only worsen your condition."

"I´ll try to be careful, doctor."

"I give you something for the headaches."

Javert leaned back while the good doctor took the medicine out of his bag. Something bad had happened, he just knew that. If only his head would stop hurting. If only he could finally remember.

...

The night had been too long, and without any rest at all. When Valjean came down the stairs he felt it in every bone of his body and even more so weighting on his mind. But none of this mattered. He had no time to waste.

"I need a map of this area." he told the innkeeper´s wife at the counter, a little less friendly than he would have been had it been about anything less than his friend´s life. "It would be a great help if you could mark for me all the farms and little villages in the near area. And if you know any other place where my friend could have gone to, please, tell me about it."

"Of course." the woman was sympathetic enough not to ask any more questions but go to work instantly, marking the map as best as she could. Valjean was on his way to the front door, but obviously Marius had been out even sooner than him.

"I prepared two horses." he informed him. "They´re ready whenever you want to leave."

For a moment Valjean was taken aback, but his anger was still too deep to simply accept this. So the only response he was capable of was: "You don´t have to come with me, Marius."

"Yes." the younger man objected. "I do."

"Did Cosette ask you to do this?"

"No."

The entrance of another man ended their discussion before it could even start. He was wearing a suit, neat and flawless, just like back then, when he´d visited Paris to hire them, in the name of the train company.

Valjean almost shouted at him to turn around and leave him alone, for he knew he surely wasn´t here to ask for news about Javert. If he even knew what had happened.

"Oh, good. Monsieur." the man exclaimed. "I´m glad to catch you before you leave. You´re on your way to the station-house I assume."

"Actually no." Valjean answered brusquely. "I´m leaving town."

"We." Marius corrected, and confronted with a new source for his anger, Valjean didn´t have it in him to object anymore.

"You´re leaving town?" their contractor asked, uncertain, and Valjean turned his back on him.

"My friend is missing." he stated, taking the finished map from the innkeeper´s wife. "Someone needs to look for him."

"Missing."

"He got pushed out of your train." Valjean swirled around. "This death trap you call a transportation device. And while we´re at it. How is it, that the handrails are not closed to keep people from falling out? How are the interstices not secured? Do you have any idea what would happen if someone slipped and fell? What if a child falls into one of those? Or an old person? I believe saboteurs are not the only issue your train company has to deal with."

"Excuse me, monsieur."

"No, you´ll excuse me. And you better hope that Javert isn´t hurt too badly. Because if he is, you´ll hear from me again."

"I don´t understand."

"I think you do."

Marius stepped forward, as if by coincidence, but it was clear, at least to Valjean, that his presence was the only reason – and not by coincidence – why he hadn´t grabbed the man.

"You can´t be serious." the businessman spoke, unaware of the risk for his health. "Sir, I´m sorry about your friend, but what happened to him wasn´t our fault."

Valjean was boiling, but Marius action had made him aware of how close he´d been to lose control. "You can tell yourself whatever you want." he said instead of arguing any further. "But you´re as responsible as those criminals. If your train would be safe none of this would have happened." And that was the last thing he´d say about this. He didn´t wait for a response but turned around and marched to the door.

"The safety of the trains is why we hired you." the businessman called after him, demanding. "And this job is not finished yet."

"It is for me. You have your culprits."

"They´re claiming to be merely hired. Which means the real organizers of these acts of sabotage are still out there. And they could attack again."

Valjean halted briefly, just on the threshold. "The police can take care of this." he then decided. "Your inspector doesn´t want me to meddle in his business anyway. And I have a friend to find. Good day."

...

The fresh air was good, soothing Javert´s still throbbing headache. But the medicine had done a good enough job, enabling him to at least sit on this cart without feeling dizzy anymore. Even though it still shook and jumped over stones and through potholes. Javert was more than relieved when it stopped at last. At the train station.

"I need to deliver this wood before we drive you to the police." Bertrand apologized but Javert climbed off the coach seat, barely noticing the assisting hand the madame offered him to keep him from swaying.

"It´s all right." he assured them, ignoring the curious sniffing of their old mutt. "I can make my way into town on my own. You´ve done enough."

The gazes he received were uncertain, and considering his still battered state, he believed to know why. But he´d rather walk the rest of the way than to ride one more meter on this old cart.

"I will reward you for your help as soon as I get back to Paris." he promised and instantly the two of them shook their heads.

"That´s really not necessary, inspector." Bertrand said. "You were hurt. Everyone would have done the same thing."

"Maybe. Maybe not. In any case a reward is only just. I have your address. So you´ll hear from me."

"We´d love to get word from you." the wife smiled. "To know that you made it back safely."

Javert nodded curtly. "Thank you again."

And with that he turned about, determined not to bother them any longer, or to receive any more of those worried glances. He wasn´t dead after all. He only didn´t know how he´d gotten here, to Lyon. But he´d find out soon enough. All he needed was a decent police station-house, from where he could contact his superiors in Paris … and someone to give him a straight answer.

He left the train shed facing the city of Lyon ahead of him, when suddenly a voice made him halt.

" … saw them get arrested." a man spoke in a hushed tone. "They were led away in cuffs."

Javert knew that kind of tone. It was the way people spoke when they didn´t believe to be overheard, talking about something illegal. Years of service had taught him to recognize it instantly.

"Now I know why I didn´t see the train derail last night." a second man answered the first and Javert made his way to the corner, to get a look at who was talking there. "Well, saves me the trouble to stock up my bag again."

"Which bag?"

"Never mind. Guess it´s obsolete now to go to my meeting with them."

Javert peeked around the edge carefully, and spotted two men, not by coincidence standing away from public view.

"Thanks for keeping an eye open for me." the taller one said now.

"Thanks for paying me well." the other one smirked and held out his hand. He got some money, combined with a fed up eye roll. "Anything else you need from me?"

"I´ll let you know. And don´t forget. I´ve never been here."

"´f course not. You know me, Luc."

"Don´t say my name." the man replied, but to Javert he didn´t sound too worried. As if the name he´d given to this man wasn´t even his real one in the first place. Obviously a professional. A big fish worth catching. This city might not be his jurisdiction, but he was still a police man. And coming upon a criminal like this, only left him with one option.

He hid, to let the man step out and make his way towards the city. When he was sure none of those two had noticed him, he followed after him.

...

"Don´t run off too far." Cosette chided the kids, mildly. "It´s a strange city after all."

Pascal only snorted. He´d lived in the streets his whole life. Finding his way no matter where was part of his nature. What did she think would happen? That he´d lose orientation after only a corner?

Someone bumped into him and made him stumble. He ran right into another person, and Pascal found himself swirled around for a moment. When he stood steady again, Cosette and Michelle were gone and somehow even the street looked different than before. What? What had just happened? He hadn´t walked that far. This was impossible.

"Cosette? Michelle!" he ran, only a few steps, and stopped, totally at a loss. They´d been right there, only a moment ago.

A hand grabbed his shoulder and he swirled around, too fast, as if attacked. Michelle only frowned at him, like she always did. As if he were crazy.

"What are you doing?" she asked, and for a change he actually felt as ridiculous as she claimed him to be.

"Nothing." he straightened his jacket. Was he ought to admit anything? Surely not. "I just …" he pointed ahead, in a random direction. "I thought I saw something."

"And what?" Michelle glanced past him, following his finger, and while he still thought about what he could possibly claim to have seen, she suddenly paled, her eyes going wide.

Pascal turned around, irritated, but only until he saw what she had seen.

Monsieur Javert was there, in the street right ahead of them. He had his back to them but there was no doubt. It was him. He had a bandage around his head and walked with heavy feet. But he walked. And not in their direction.

Michelle was faster than him, to follow the man, but Pascal was right at her heels.

"Monsieur." they began calling him. "Monsieur Javert."

The injured man swirled around to them, looking very annoyed, as if interrupted by something very important.

"We thought you were dead." Pascal blurred but the former police man only gave him one more glance before searching the street again. A suppressed curse escaped his mouth before he hurried on, without glancing at them one more time. Pascal was totally gobsmacked.

"Monsieur!" Michelle called after him, not less startled.

They watched Javert vanish around a corner, and of course they followed. Something had to be wrong, when he was acting like that. Maybe he needed help. If only monsieur Valjean was here.

Pascal heard a knock and then a grunt. Javert!

Michelle stopped short at the corner and Pascal ran right into her, her elbow keeping him from rounding the corner. And it was good that it did. If they´d run into this backstreet, they would have been spotted. They wouldn´t have been able to watch unseen how Javert got overpowered and dragged into a fiacre, by two men who just had to be criminals. Pascal gasped.

"Go tell Cosette." he whispered and rushed after this fiacre before it could drive off. He heard Michelle hissing his name, angrily, but he couldn´t stop. He had to make sure these men did not take monsieur Javert anywhere where they´d never find him again. He´d do the same thing for every single one of them.

So he hopped onto the fiacre, and clung to it, determined to stay there until it reached its destination.

...

By now Valjean knew that the real reason why Marius had tagged along with him was to make sure he´d give up and ride back after every reasonable lead had turned out to be a dead end. The last farm they´d checked had been unoccupied and hadn´t Marius insisted on riding back to Lyon, Valjean might have waited there until the owners, some people named Bertrand, returned. Be it in a few hours or a few days. Or he would have kept looking in the area, the fields, the woods, the rivers. Anywhere.

He didn´t know how Marius had managed it to convince him to turn around, but it might have something to do with the possibility of Javert already having returned to Lyon on his own – or at least sent a note somehow. How would he know if he roamed about the land?

Valjean hated it, that Marius somehow managed it to sound reasonable with these arguments.

He was exhausted when they finally reached the inn, but in his mind he was still racing. This was wrong. They couldn´t just go back in and sit down while Antoine was missing. They couldn´t …

and that was when Cosette and Michelle ran out to meet them.

"Monsieur!"

"Papa!"

Valjean instantly knew they had news but how good the news were, was only revealed when the two of them practically cried out unisono: "They/We saw Javert."

His heart had no time to leap in relief, when Michelle instantly answered his question of: "Where is he?" by telling the most unbelievable story.

Was that a joke? Taken? By men he´d followed?

The company man came to his mind. So he had been right. The men responsible for the attacks were still out there. And Javert must have found them.

Stubborn old man. Why couldn´t he wait for him? Why did he have to go after them alone? And with an injury on top of that.

But oh God in heaven, he was alive. He´d known it. He´d known Antoine would be all right. And now he might just get himself killed before Valjean could apologize for not catching his fall.

"Where did this happen?" he asked Michelle. "You need to show me this instant. We need to find him."

"Pascal said he´d be back and tell us." the girl argued but Valjean shook his head.

"We can´t risk this. They could notice him and catch him too. We need to act now."

"But if he does get back?" Cosette held against this, mildly but firm. "Someone should be here then."

"All right. You stay. I´ll go out and try what I can to find him. Both of them." He took Michelle´s hand, but halted, one last time, thinking. "Maybe you should go to the station-house, Marius." he decided. "Tell them they need to double the security around the train station. These saboteurs might plan another attack soon."

The young man nodded, for a change not discussing at all, and turned to his wife.

"I´ll wait here for Pascal." she agreed before he needed to say anything. "Go." And to her father and the girl: "Be careful."

...

The cuffs they slapped on him were too tight, and probably not by accident. Where did they get shackles anyway? Only police was supposed to have access to such.

Javert looked about the warehouse. He´d seen lots of boxes when they´d led him in, at gunpoint, giving him no choice but to follow their orders. Now he was chained to a post – ridiculous but unfortunately very solid – and glanced up at his two culprits.

"Now." the man he´d followed from the train station spoke. "Who are you?"

"I´m Javert. Police inspector. And if you two hadn´t already been sneaking around in illegal intent before, you would have dug your own graves just now, by taking a man against his will."

The two men only laughed about his accusations. "I think he seriously just told us we´re criminals." the man who´s name wasn´t Luc said. "Guess next thing he´ll do is arrest us."

"What are we gonna do with him?" his partner wanted to know, and the leader´s grin vanished, behind a very thoughtful frown.

"Let´s keep him here for now." he said. "Until I have decided."

And that was it. No more words were spoken. They simply left and closed the door, locking him away until further notice.

...

It was a backstreet, Michelle showed him, not even that far away from the inn. Dear God, Valjean thought to himself with dread. If he´d stayed put to wait for a word from Javert, maybe he´d met him and none of this would have happened. If only he´d known.

But he hadn´t. And now Javert needed his help. Again.

There were tracks of a fiacre, leading down the street. The fiacre Michelle and Pascal had watched taking Javert away. Thanks God the ground was soft, from the rainy weather lately. Valjean was sure he´d be able to track the way this fiacre had taken. When Javert could follow tracks like this, then so could he. And he remained sure of it, until they reached the main street, made of cobblestones. Valjean had never felt more like a failed student than in this moment.

Oh God, Antoine, how is it that you are the only person in the world I know, who could find out where these men have taken you?