Work Text:
Amice stands before three guards.
Her hair loose, dark, wet with sweat and blood. Her shirt torn, her naked shoulders bruised, her arms scratched. She breaths heavily, holding the musket firmly in her right hand. Her eyes ablaze with the fire of her soul, serene and wild.
As they aim at her, the three fusils pointing at her chest, she raises up her chin, proud, fearless.
Dulce et decorum est…
¡No!
Combeferre drops his gun.
A deep terror fills his soul, the panic wraps his senses and the present loses all meaning to him. He just runs, runs towards her, with his hands empty, his mind blank.
The canons buzz in his ears, a dense grey cloud blinds him, the smoke of the fire fills the atmosphere, mixed with the sweet perfume of death, desperation and hopelessness.
She knows she is lost, cornered. She knows the game is over and her part has been played. The dreams of glory, the hope and faith in a success, they are all dim shadows, bitter in her memory. Nevertheless, she regrets none of the steps which have taken her to this point. She has lived, she has laughed, she has felt with intensity, she has loved with passion.
…Pro patria mori.
Three times do the bullets pierce her chest.
She opens her hand, the gun falls.
She falls on her knees.
And in that last seconds, all is silent, all is calm. All conscience abandons her mind and a soothing numbness takes over her body. There is no sound in the air. It is all over, it is all gone.
Combeferre sees her fall, the scarlet blood quickly colouring the white shirt, her eyes still open, fixed on the floor.
Her hands move, in a last sigh of strength, towards her belly, and she caresses it with extreme gentleness and care, with her last breath of strenght.
He can’t bring himself to react. He stands alone, in the middle of the street, a few meters away from her, easy target for the National Guard, unarmed, solitary, careless.
Amice raises her eyes, her hands on her belly, and they look at each other. She draws a little, doleful smile on her lips. She drops her eyelids as all strength abandons her.
Combeferre walks slowly towards her and falls on his knees before her.
He leans his forehead on Amice’s, his eyes fixed on her eyes, and he places his hands over hers, on her belly, on their unborn -and never to be- child.
He feels the shots on his back, but the physical pain cannot compare to the vast and pure sorrow his soul has turned into.
He kisses her forehead with sweet tenderness as she utters her last sigh. He lays her down, breathing with arduousness, his internal organs collapsing, embracing her, closely to him, his fingers tangled in her hair, his lips on her forehead.
He whispers her name as he closes his eyes.