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touch me i'm cold

CHARACTERS: Éponine Thénardier, and whomever wants to join her!
LOCATION: Here, there, everywhere.
WARNINGS: To be updated as needed.
SUMMARY: It's been a few months since Éponine arrived on the ship. And she still has no idea what to do with herself.
NOTES: Open! Come play! Want a specific starter? Let me know and I can toss one up.

Over the course of the month, Eponine can be found just about anywhere on the ship. From laying about in the Oxygen Gardens, to exploring (despite advice to the contrary). Perhaps you'll find her there, or sitting in the bar, drinking space booze. Maybe you even decide to venture into her apartment and say hello to the strange girl from Paris.

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"In something that I read when I first came here," Combeferre remembers, smiling at Eponine's words, "From earth's future, there was a politician who wished to use science to do great things, instead of to create horrors. I believe I've let myself focus on the horror of being here for a while too long now. It is so good to have met you, to have found someone who still sees the wonders and can remind me of them, and that there are likely many more still to be found."

That said, he does not plan on bringing up any of those horrors in depth, Nuclear science, eugenics, Smiley, are all things that he's allowed to cast a shadow over something he once loved, the same way that he had let his inability to help so many at the barricades cloud his practice of medicine for almost a year, until his tools from home reminded him of who he'd been once. Explaining more of these wonders to Eponine has also reminded him of who he was before the dark times, and makes him want to pick up where he'd once left off in exploration.

"It's good to know there will be someone I can share them with who understands and appreciates all of the good in them, And yes, not since Enjolras left here. I have really not...it will be good to start to change all that again. And yes, I am quite comfortable for one of those friends who comes to be you. Speaking to you reminds me so much of the things that mattered to me, that I think can matter again."

Despite herself, Eponine allows herself to get swept up in Combeferre's words. She listens to them tumbling, looking at him, her hand moving slowly across the table. A friend, a true friend, as he has claimed himself to be. One who enjoys speaking with her, that does not appear to look down on her.

"I am a help to you? Then, let me be that. Speak to me of all you wish. Teach me about this place, and their pop-tarts and microwaves. All of the good and the bad. I have seen so much bad in my life, I should like to experience the good."

"You are, a great deal of a help." Combeferre answers, reaching to meet her hand and squeezing it tightly for a moment. "It is as though...you remind me there is...possibility here yet, instead of purgatory." That there is more friendship when so lately there had been regret. Perhaps there is some balance yet again.

"I should be glad to do all of that. And yes, there certainly is good that I can show you here, that you can come to know. I promise that much, and easily."

"Possibility?" She asks, looking at their hands together. He touched her so readily, so easily, without hesitation. An unexpected gesture, truly. "Perhaps. We are in this new place. In Paris, we are dead. Why waste this, whatever it is?" It was a shocking bit of optimism from her.

Eponine flicked her dark eyes up to meet his for a moment. "And Gavroche. We must teach him, the both of us. We must not forget my darling brother. But we shall all help each other. Thank you, Michel."

"Yes, possibility, I...when I arrived here, things were different. There were so many more of us, for one. For a while, it seemed like gradually there was quite a bit of loss, a good deal of chaos and pain and a few things that were so infuriating and so frustrating that I had little idea of what else to do with myself. I think for several months now, there had been gradually losing, if not friends each month, parts of myself, but with you here, and Gavroche too, of course," Combeferre adds, a smile passing his face at that.

"It feels as though, perhaps, that all of those things that I might have been, that all of us from home might have been can come back, stronger, even. Helping each other, indeed. I would like nothing more than that."

He has a beautiful way with words, and she could listen to him speak for hours. The way he sings her praises in a way which makes it easy to digest... There's the faintest hint of a blush across her cheeks.

"I have never been that for anyone before, Michel. How strange that I find that now, here, after my death. I shall do my best, to help you return to your self."

Combeferre would argue that he is not Jehan when it comes to words, or Enjolras, but his philosophers and dedication to knowledge have helped a little when it comes to some articulation of his feelings now, but in the moment, he could hardly care about that, because Eponine, sitting before him like this, has rather captured his thoughts for the moment.

If Jehan is a love that saw him through the worst of times, and Courfeyrac is brotherhood, Bahorel encouragment and faith in himself and his abilities, then Eponine can be nothing else but Hope. He does not wish to burden her with it, of course, but somehow, it does not seem like he has done that yet.

"A good deal of strange things have happened and been found here. I shall do my best to help as well, in whatever it is you need."

"I need nothing," she says softly, meeting his eyes. "I have more here than I ever have before. There is food, I have clothing, a bed, and friends. What more does one need?" Love, Eponine. They needed love.

"Then perhaps what you need is simply to BE among those for a while." Combeferre suggests, glancing back at her. There is a part of him suggesting something else, but he's also putting that aside for now, because it feels more like it might be a whim. He would not speak on something like that until he was certain, so for now, he can do certainly that much.

"Amongst friends and food?" She gestures to the kitchen. "I believe I have that, now."

"Rather." He agrees, leaning forward a little. "Sometimes the best thing that we can do when the good things are new, or have not been there for a while is to simply BE amongst them."

"So I should exist in the kitchen, or with my friends? Or perhaps on a bed, for I have not had one since I was a child, until I arrived here. Perhaps all three at once! I shall move my bed to a kitchen, and have my friends here!" She laughs at the very idea of it.

"Come, Michel. You are a silly man."

"That is not so awful an idea as all of that." He's laughing too, now,picturing it. "A larger kitchen all of us and a few beds can fit into together. I could see a party of some sort coming from that."

"We shall carry our mattresses and pillows here! And together we can all cook and eat, and simply be together. Does that not sound wonderful?" Don't remind her how much that sounds like a barricade. Only this time, there would be more food, less blood.

"Yes!" Combeferre can't help but remember a barricade that actually took place in the kitchens, back all those months, over a year ago, now, when the pirates invaded, back before Jehan and Courfeyrac had even been a thing, when Remus had still been about, and Alfred and Enjolras.

"The idea has its merits." Certainly one where the food does not need to be actively protected could be much more fun at that.

"Something like some of us would do in the cafes during exam weeks." He adds, eyedarting a little. It was one of the few times of the school term in Paris when he'd spent more time in the cafes near the medical school and hospital than with his friends, when they'd invaded the cafes with books, materials, and yes, pillows and blankets for quick naps. "That IS one of my pleasant memories of home."

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