Update: 1st of September 2023
Happy First Day of Spring Everyone!
Chapter 2: Months
As time moved on since the search for D'Artagnan was called off. The Inseparables were falling apart as more time went on. Treville was one of the ones having to watch as his best team fall apart. Only a few others had voiced their concerns for the Three Inseparables.
Everyone could see Athos was choosing to drown his sorrows in wine and he was talking a lot less, not like he talked much before, but you would be lucky to get a grunt out of him most days.
Porthos was gambling more and more and starting more fights. Especially with the Red Guards and sometimes with his own brother Athos and Aramis.
Aramis had taken his grief out shooting targets and trying to help his brothers. Which just started more fights. He also seemed to be sleeping his way through all the women in Paris when…or after he had been drinking with Athos and Porthos.
Treville also saw that the trio were being more reckless as time went on. It was like the three didn't have a care about their lives anymore. And that they believed they had a pence to earn for letting their 'little' brother down. Treville had found out that much when he had joined the men for some drinks. So, he could keep as eye on them.
As the sparring those three did in the fields was more vicious. especially with some of their brothers-in-arms mocking D'Artagnan. Just mocking D'Artagnan or implying in any way that his death meant the lad didn't deserve to be a Musketeer meant that the offending/foolish Musketeer or sometimes Red Guard would find themselves in a vicious duel with one of the Three Inseparables. And it would normally be Athos. There was no doubt in anyone's mind, even with his drinking, he was still the best swordsman in the regiment of the Musketeers and Red Guards. And that meant those facing him in a duel normally ended up injured in some way. The nastier the slur towards the Inseparables Fallen Brother the more vicious Athos and the others got in their duels. Treville just thanked God that nobody had been killed yet in those duels. As the patience of the Inseparables were wearing thin. And Treville and Serge had step in a number of times to stop things from getting too out of hand. But they couldn't be around every second of every day. And they wouldn't be everywhere. So Treville believed it was inevitable that something was going to go too far.
He prayed to God he was wrong. He prayed that somehow the Trio would realise this wouldn't be what D'Artagnan would want.
But the change in the Inseparables was noticeable too all and not matter what Treville did he believed that the King and Cardinal were starting to notice the behaviour of the Inseparables. And that didn't bode well for anyone if the King and Cardinal got involved.
And Treville didn't know how much longer he could keep the trio as they were. Their behaviour was going to get someone killed and more than likely it would be one of them and Treville was sure that was something D'Artagnan would never want.
But only if he could convince them of that…
And if only his gut wasn't churning trying to tell him something…
(Athos)
Athos knew what he was doing to his self wasn't healthy but he couldn't help it. Getting drunk helped to bury the nightmares he had of both Thomas and D'Art…him accusing him of killing them. Of them accusing him of not protecting his younger brothers. Of them asking what they had done to have made him so mad that he wouldn't protect them to the best of his ability.
So many accusations filled his nights. And he barely got any sleep without getting stone cold drunk. To get the thoughts of him failing his brother out of his head for at least however long he passed out for.
And the more he drank seemed to dull the pain in his heart of losing another Little Brother. The constant pain of knowing he failed again at protecting those that were most precious to him. Those he KNEW he should have protected better.
Deep down he knew this wasn't want either of his Younger Brothers would have wanted. But at this stage he didn't care. Especially when it hit the 4-month mark of D'Artagnan being missing/killed.
There had been nothing they could really do to properly grieve for the boy.
But Athos and his two remaining brother went to Gascony and planted a grave marker next to those of the young Gascons parents. But with no body it was just a marker. A mark to say that Charles D'Artagnan had lived and died in service of the crown.
It was all they could offer the lad.
They had picked up his things from Constance's and Athos had them at his place. Not exactly knowing why he kept them. But felt deep within himself that these precious few items belonged with him and Porthos and Aramis.
But even those things hadn't given Athos peace. Something in his gut was screaming at him. But he couldn't tell what it was. So, he drank, and drank and drank. To escape many things including the nightmares of D'Artagnan's broken, bleeding body as he crawls through a forest trail. It seemed to be one of his main nightmares. So, to try and block that out he just drank and drank risking alcohol poisoning just to drown out the nightmares and the pain in his heart.
He ignored Aramis pleas to think about what D'Artagnan would want.
He ignored the comments of his fellow Musketeers about his drinking. He ignored them unless they were saying anything bad about his lost protegee/brother. Then he was nearly ready to kill them. Only barely restraining himself when he duelled them till, they learned just how good he was with a blade even with the state he was in. Soon they learned if they weren't careful his restraint might crumble and they might feel his blade run them through for disrespecting his Little Brother.
He ignored the help Serge and Treville were trying to offer him. As he believed he didn't deserve help. He didn't deserve friendship. As people around him just seemed to always get hurt.
He knew he was dangerously close to losing his position as a Musketeer. His fights with the Red Guards had gotten more vicious like he was blaming them for his brother's death when he briefly stopped blaming himself. He knew he was getting sloppy with his missions.
But at the moment he didn't care.
He. Didn't. Care.
The colour in his world was gone and all that was left was dark and grey and filled with pain, despair and misery…
(Porthos)
Porthos had known that the Inseparables would suffer without their Little Brother. But in his moments, he stopped gambling, drinking and fighting he saw what the famous Inseparables were becoming.
But like Athos he couldn't find it in his heart to care. He wasn't nearly as reckless as Athos. But he still was reckless and he still couldn't stop gambling, drinking and fighting to take his mind of the fact he believed he had failed his brother.
They. Had. Failed. Him.
He like Athos had turned away Aramis's pleas and even Flea had come out from the Court of Miracles to try and drive some sense into him. But it was all for naught. Porthos couldn't be swayed.
As he too like Athos didn't believe he deserved help.
He also knew Treville wasn't going to be patient much longer and the questions on Porthos mind was did he still want to stay with the Musketeers and what would D'Artagnan want?
But he already knew what D'Artagnan would want.
But was he in a position to let D'Artagnan go? Especially when something deep inside him was yelling at him that something was up. That his nightmares showed a bleeding and broken D'Artagnan lying in the forest waiting for help.
But he shook that off, trying not to think of it and just tried to think if he was ready to let D'Artagnan go no matter what his gut was telling him.
He didn't think he was and he didn't think the others were either…
(Aramis)
Aramis fired and reloaded his pistol again and again. Taking out his grief on the targets. When he wasn't doing that, he was trying to pull Athos away from drinking or Porthos away from gambling. Also, he spent time fixing their injuries from fights with the Red Guards. That were getting more frequent.
Or he was going through his coping method of sleeping through a different woman a night. Barely caring if he got caught in a married woman's bed. After all any bruises from the husbands he rightfully deserved as pencase for his crimes. But he just couldn't stop. Like Athos and Porthos he needed this vice to get through the pain of their Little Brothers death.
Besides from this vice he seemed to pray a lot more begging God and D'Artagnan for forgive for his crimes against them. He prayed for peace to come to him, Athos and Porthos.
He prayed for a miracle…
But he knew none would come.
But something deep inside he was telling him something was going on here. But with his vices like the others, it helped to ignore those things. His vices like the others helped to fight off the nightmares of his imagination showing him different painful ways that D'Artagnan could have died.
The truth was Aramis knew these vices he and his brothers had weren't going to go away anytime soon. As they were the only things that were able to help them keep their sanity.
As on nights he pulled Athos and Porthos into Athos house he heard their nightmares. Them calling out for D'Artagnan and begging him for forgiveness.
And the truth was they heard him having the same nightmares too.
But when they were all together it seemed to also help them with their grief. But unfortunately, it also made it worse. As the fights between each other seemed to happen more often and Aramis was just tired. So tired.
He was sure the other two felt the same about a lot of things. But the thing with grief Aramis knew so well was that everyone handles grief differently but yet some points remained the same. And this seemed to be true in this situation.
But the question was would they be able to pull themselves out of the grief in time to save their own lives and their careers?
Or should he cut his losses and retreat to a Monastery somewhere and try to redeem himself of all the sins he had committed.
But what would happen to Athos and Porthos if he did that?
And that was another thing that was keeping him up at night. Could he really do it too them? He was sure it would feel like to them that they were losing another brother or they could feel betrayed or even get themselves killed.
So, in the end he decided to stay.
But that didn't mean those thoughts didn't keep popping up in his heard alone with the nightmares that like his brothers haunted him.
Like D'Artagnan's ghost was haunting them.
Like his ghost was trying to tell them something.
Like his dreams were sending him a message from D'Artagnan. A message of him bleeding and broken. Crawling across a forest track. Of him calling out for Aramis and the others for help. But it was just a nightmare. It couldn't be a message. Could it?
As it was impossible, wasn't it?
(Line Break)
In a town far from Paris a battered and broken man stumbled into town. His clothes ripped and torn. They were also hanging from the man's frame. The man was basically crawling his way to the town. When a farm boy spotted him and called for help.
Man from the town carried the poor man till the town inn and called the towns physician and his healer wife that lived close by. Both were horrified at the young man's condition. It was obvious that the man had been tortured. For what they had no clue. There was nothing on the man to suggest who he was and the people of the town had never seen him before.
His hair was mattered and brown with blood and dirt all the way through it.
His eyes when opened where brown and looked pained and feverish.
His skin covered in cuts, with his back showing the scars and fresh marks of being whipped. Burns also covered parts of the poor man's skin. Including a burn from a sharp object piecing his hip and going deep into the muscles, tendons and nerves and a knife stab wound to the same hip. The physician and the healer didn't know what sort of damage that had down to the hip. But it was already dislocated, with a small crack they guessed.
The man also had 5 broken ribs, a dislocated shoulder, dislocated elbow, a broken arm, wrist and three fingers on his right side. Besides from his right injured hip his leg, ankle and foot were broken on the same side in a worrying several places. And that knee and ankle had been dislocated on that side too.
His feet were cut up with a couple of toes broken. A broken nose and cheekbone with a cut diagonally across his face.
Whoever did this wanted the man to suffer on that particular side for a reason the couple wouldn't be able to find out. Unless the man awoke and told them himself.
The man was also burning with fever.
No one expected the man to lie with so many injuries it seemed inevitable that the man would die. Without a name and without family by his bedside. They weren't even sure he would wake up again. As his head injury was pretty bad too.
So many people thought it was just a matter of time. But yet the physician and his healer wife still worked on the man to heal him as best they could. They decided until the man actually gave up, they would do all they could to save him. He was obviously a man of great importance to someone. And they hoped that one day if the man survived and remembered who he was that they could reunite him with his family.
The healer wife was taking her turn with the man after a week and a half nursing him with her husband through his fever. It pained her to hear the man raspy call out names that she assumed were his family members. He begged them to save him.
All she could do was try to comfort him as best she could. She knew she couldn't replace his family but she hoped her presence would give him some comfort.
"Athos…", the man moans deep in the throes of his fever.
"Shhh you're ok", the woman says wiping his sweaty forehead with a cool cloth.
"Save…me Athos…Porthos…Aramis…!", the man moans weakly thrashing in his sleep from a fever induced nightmare.
"It's ok. You're ok", the woman tells him over and over again.
"I'm…al…ive Brot…hers save me", he moans brokenly.
The woman wondered if the names he mentioned where also the brothers he begged for them to save him. And why would these men believe this tortured man was dead.
Well, it was kind of obvious after treating all of the man's injuries. But surely these men must still be looking for him. Shouldn't they?
As she and her husband helped the man, they heard all sorts of things in the young man's delirium. But they wondered if they were doing the right thing trying to save such a tortured soul and one so physically broken.
Would it have been kinder to have let him pass?
As week two came with the young man still barely clinging in there. But somehow, he was. And the married pair realised he was fighting. The man was fighting for someone or someone's.
If this man was going to fight then they were determined to see him through this. As they realised this man seemed to have a fighting spirit even after everything he had been through.
Hopefully he still wound when he found out the extent of his injuries.
They could only hope.
And on the 15th day that he had been found the man's eyes shot open with a shout of pain. The woman gentle coaxes him into drinking a pain draught and she was surprised as the draught took affect the man's eyes weren't glazed with fever. They seemed to have some life and awareness in them now and when she and her husband checked his fever seemed to have dropped dramatically.
"Who…", the man rasps.
"Here drink this water", the woman says coaxing him into drinking some water.
The man drank it like a man who had been in a desert without water for God knows how long.
"Thank you", the man rasps wincing, "Ho…w lon…g have I be...en here?"
"15 days", the woman tells him, "I have Helena"
"And I am her husband Phillipe. I am the physician in this town and my wife is quite the skilled healer. But I have to say you're the most difficult patient we have ever had", Phillipe tells him with a kind smile.
"What is your name boy?" Helena asks him softly.
"D'Artagnan"
~~Author's Note: What Do You Think? Please Review:)~~
