Author's Note: Happy Holidays, everyone! Hope you had a wonderful day!

Also, remember when I originally had this being a two-shot? It's actually going to be a three-shot!

Thank you all so much for your support, and now on with Part 2!

She's no longer wondering, but worrying.

Her first instinct is to call out his name, but with so many voices, her cry would barely make it through the crowd. With that decided, she approaches Combeferre, and when he sees her, the joy on his face vanishes.

She knows immediately that this is not a good sign.

She notices him try to look away, as if her presence pains him, as if being there causes him both physical and emotional pain. As the physical distance between them lessens, he still seems far away. Corinne appears to whisper something to him, a question of some sort, and there is some form of reply, but Éponine was still too far away from hearing it.

Bossuet and Musichetta come closer, the former's head hanging as if in shame. Musichetta's gaze is also directed towards the ground, seemingly to avoid her as well. Éponine can't help but notice that Joly is still not with them, but like Enjolras, she had not caught him exiting the plane.

Combeferre, with a gentle voice, asks her to follow him, to sit down, and Corinne, Musichetta, and Bossuet follow close behind. She can tell from obvious signs that she is the only member of this group being left in the dark, and this panics her even more. This begins to remind her of those films, where everyone who cares asks the recipient of bad news, or the occasional good, to sit down to hear it, and she doesn't like it one bit.

Corinne directs her to a seat and stands by, a comforting hand placed upon her shoulder, but she does not find herself comforted by it at all, not without the knowledge of her husband's fate. Musichetta stands on the opposite side, and unlike Corinne, makes no attempt to comfort her, knowing full-well that even the slightest gesture would not aid her at all. Bossuet stands on the opposite side of Musichetta, leaving Combeferre alone to say it all.

"Éponine…" he begins, getting down to his knees to be at eye-level with her. Musichetta does her best to reach down a place a hand atop hers, but soon doesn't bother and the guide does so instead. He shakes his head dolefully, as if he could not get the necessary words out. "Oh, I had this so well thought out on the plane!"

"It's better just to tell her outright, dear." Corinne says gently with a weak smile. "She's going to found out one way or another, and we all know it's better to hear it from you than from someone else."

Éponine begins shaking her head, and the tears that had been forming in her eyes start to fall, and no one does anything to stop them, since it's of no use. She knows exactly what's going on, and she doesn't need them for her to know what it is. It's her worst nightmare come true!

Azelma makes her appearance and rushes to her sister's side, and even her sister's embrace isn't enough for her. Her husband is gone, she knows it. Her children's father, gone. Her best friend, gone. Everything he was to her, gone.

The one day she doesn't worry about him and this happens. She shouldn't have let her guard down, should not have let him convince her there was nothing to worry about, and it's for that reason she begins to blame his death on herself, that perhaps if she had feared for him until she saw him step off that plane, he'd still be alive.

"It's not your fault." Azelma says quietly to her, as if she could hear the thoughts of her sister. "You wouldn't have known, there was nothing you could do."

"I shouldn't have stopped worrying…" she sniffs. "I should…I shouldn't have let my guard down."

"He'll be home soon, Ép."

"He won't be alive, 'Zelm. He won't be the same."

"Yes, he will. Have some faith." Azelma says comfortingly. "You just need to have some faith."

"He's dead, 'Zelm, haven't you heard? Did your precious 'fiancé' not dare to speak of it?" Éponine hisses, the glare in eyes quite apparent. Her sister's stunned look is all she needs to continue on. "I suppose not, but then again, why dampen the mood of your engagement, anyway?"

"Éponine, that's enough." Musichetta says firmly. "You shouldn't be making false assumptions without knowing the full story."

The mourning wife snorts at her. "I don't see you doing the same for Joly."

"That's because there's no reason to." Combeferre cuts in, and there's a daring look in Éponine's eyes that tells him to shut up, but he does not let that deter him from speaking, for he has had many years to become immune to such a threatening look. She opens her mouth to argue, but something tells him that there are no words for her to say.

"What do you mean?" she asks after the passing of several silent moments. "What do you mean, 'there's no reason to'?"

"He's alive, Éponine." Combeferre says with a breath. "At least, he was we boarded the plane."

Alive?! Did she hear right? After all the tears she let fall and the lashes she dealt, it was for no reason at all?

"Enjolras…he's alive?" She has to make sure of this before she lets her hopes get too high, because who knows how many times that has happened and left her crestfallen.

Combeferre nods, but she can pick up that something still doesn't seem right.

"Then where is he?" she questions, and then stands up, hurriedly scanning the scene around them for his face. "Where is he?"

The guide's eyes become pained and he gently pushes Éponine back in her seat. "He's still there."

"Why?"

He turns his head, taking a deep breath, and then returns his focus towards her. "The night before we left, almost right after he spoke with you, a few of us were ordered to go check out of what was supposedly suspicious activity, Courfeyrac, Bossuet, Enjolras, and I. We didn't argue, we just followed given orders.

"None of us were thinking it was going to be anything, possibly an animal or something caught in the shrubbery in the dark of night…except it wasn't…" He stops there, as if he can no longer speak further, his voice gone. Courfeyrac, who she hadn't realized had joined in up until now, picked up for him.

"He saw something none of us saw. He pointed towards an area of tall, dried-up grass, and we all heard the rustling." Courfeyrac says in a grave tone. "We had pointed our guns to shoot, but then he told us to run, and when you are told to run, you don't think about it, you do it and if you find the need for it, question it later. We ran, and he followed us closely behind. We heard gunshots, and then he went down."

"He told us to carry on without him, to warn everyone else back at camp that danger was near, but we couldn't just leave him there." Bossuet adds. "You shouldn't leave a man behind, not ever."

"I told them to do as he said." Combeferre gains the strength to speak again. "That I would take care of him while they went back to inform everyone else. He protested, saying that he would never forgive himself if I was killed trying to tend to him. Not much longer after that, there was an explosion, not too far off, perhaps from a grenade, and then more gunshots. They missed me…he wasn't as lucky…I picked him up, the only thing going through my head being, 'Get him out of there.'

"Many were leaving by the time with reached camp, to do what they could with what we saw, and at this point, I see blood dripping onto my feet. Joly must have heard something before we got there, and following that, almost everything was a blur. They took him from me, his blood on my hands. I…I haven't seen him since… but he was still alive." Combeferre's voice is strained, trying to hold back his own tears threatening to fall. "Joly accompanied him to Kandahar, since his injuries were difficult for me to treat on the field.

"Last I heard, before our flight took off, was that Enjolras wasn't going any further until he was stabilized, and Joly stayed behind with him."

"Once he's stable, they'll fly him to Germany, and from there, the States." Courfeyrac puts in. "That might not be anytime soon, though—He flat-lined twice in Kandahar, according to Joly."

She had been listening the whole time, and almost every word stung. It was like taking a knife and stabbing her with it until she can no longer survive, her blood all over the floor. She felt numb by the point of him getting shot, but the pain made one more stab at her when Courfeyrac mentions that he flat-lined…twice.

Flat-lined, as in there were two chances where the only way he would come home was within a coffin with a flag draped across the top of it. Flat-lined, as in he basically died…twice.

She hears Courfeyrac hiss in pain after receiving a slap on the arm by Marie by her free hand.

"Was that necessary?" she questions rhetorically, glaring at him. "The poor girl was expecting her husband home today. It's bad enough she learned of the story behind it, but to tell her he flat-lined? She's expecting and so much stress isn't good for either her or the baby!"

"She was going to hear it eventually!" he argues. "Better for her to find out now before she feels betrayed by the fact we didn't tell her!"

One-by-one, the others join in, and it eventually escalates into a group quarrel.

Éponine storms off, not wanting to hear any more of it, and she's sure no one noticed her get up and leave. It was all too much for her to hear, the fighting (in more than one context), Enjolras' state…it was too much.

She is about half-way to her car when her sister's voice appears out of nowhere. She stops to turn around and see Azelma sprinting to her, calling out her name in one of the most desperate voices she can think of. Éponine is tempted to continuing walking, despite her sister inevitably catching up with her, but at this point, she doesn't care. Her husband still isn't home and lying somewhere within a war zone. She's angry, upset, emotional, disappointed…all at the same time. She just wants everything to return to normalcy, without having to fear for him constantly, over and over again, like a broken record. She just wants him home.

As she predicted, Azelma had caught up with her, with her breath trying to catch up with her.

"Slow down, will you, Ép?" her sister begs, her breath resembling that of pants. "I know it's rough, and that things aren't going as you like, but everything will turn out fine."

"Certainly, because everything that I have heard within the past few hours has been absolutely perfect!" Éponine spits sarcastically. "It's almost like a dream come true!"

"Ép—"

"No, I mean, really!" she continues, only to slowly begin to break down. "My husband isn't home, only to find out that the reason that is...is because he was…he was shot…and nearly died, and for…for a time, actually did die…Twice…"

She lets herself collapse to the snowy ground, not caring who sees and how much, not caring about much at all, and she doesn't bother to stop her tears, not even trying. She knows her sister has gone to the ground as well, but only to help calm and comfort her sister in such undesired circumstances.

"He promised, 'Zelm!" she cries. "He was fine, he was going to come home unscathed, for the most part, and then this happens! We don't know when he'll even be home. Tell me, what am I to do?"

Her sister doesn't say much and just wraps her arms around her, in hopes of trying to get her to at least calm down. This is the worst she has ever seen her sister. When their father chose to take his rage out on them, she would step up and take the abuse so neither her or Gavroche would feel the harsh blows to the cheek, the kick in the stomach, the hard shove-and-pin to the wall. Rarely then did she witness her sister break down when the black/blue marks formed on her skin. Seeing Éponine cry and break down like this…it hurts her, too.

"I'll stay with you and Matthieu tonight. Jehan will understand."

"No." Éponine sniffs. "Don't let me be the reason that your reunion with Jehan is ruined tonight."

"I think that you need me more than he does right now." Azelma counters in a calm and gentle voice, taking out a tissue from her pocket and wiping the tears off her sister's face with it. She helps ease her sister to her feet, and somewhat guides her as they walk along to Éponine's car. "How about I drive?"

"But the—

"Éponine, as your sister, it would be unwise of me to let you drive home in such a state of mind. Besides, I have to go there anyway because my car is parked in your driveway."

"What about Jehan?" she asks, and almost out of nowhere, the man appears beside the car, his large backpack in hand.

"I'm all set, if that's what you are referring to." he answers before turning to Azelma, who has just been handed her sister's car keys. "Did I miss something?"

"I'm driving Éponine home, and my car's there anyway." Azelma answers. "You coming along, or do the boys have some celebration planned?"

He shakes his head. "Not tonight that I know of, so—

"Hop in." Éponine gestures to the front passenger side door as she opens the driver's side rear door. "You might as well join us and save the trouble of you trying to find a way home or riding your bike in the snow."

"His bike's in the storage closet, anyway." Azelma informs her, a hint of laughter in her voice. "He'd be better off walking home."

"You'd make me walk home?!" Jehan asks, sounding shocked by the idea.

"Welcome to the family." Éponine smiles at him before climbing into the car. "You might as well get used to it."

When she gets home, she unlocks the door and walks inside. She stops when her sister asks if she'll be fine, and she answers the same way she had earlier, not wanting to ruin her sister's night with her now-fiancé. She could tell her sister was reluctant in leaving, but when she was reminded that their brother was still there, she appeared to be more assured and then she left a little more easily.

Éponine finds Gavroche lying on the couch, looking through one of his textbooks, and appears to be near to startled when he comes upon the realization that she's home. He stands up from the couch and approaches her, embracing her when the distance allows it.

"I am so sorry, Ép." he tells her, patting her on the shoulder.

"How did you—?"

"Courfeyrac called me about twenty minutes ago and told me about it." Gavroche replies, his voice concerned. "How are you holding up?"

"The best that I can, I suppose." she answers with a small shrug as they part. "How's Matthieu?"

"First off, he seemed better after you left, so I don't think you need to worry about that. Anyway…" Gavroche points the Christmas tree in the corner of the living room, something she had not noticed when she first walked in. "Helped me put that up for you. Said daddy told him it was too heavy for you to be setting up, and on top of that, he was sick of waiting, so I brought up the box from downstairs, set up the main part of it and he helped put on the branches."

"Enjolras and I normally set it up the day after Thanksgiving, every year." Éponine reminisces. "Six, maybe seven, years straight."

"Well, we got as far as the branches. He yelled at me for trying to put on the lights, and reminded me so much like his father it scared me."

"Really?" she asks, surprised by this one detail.

He nods. "He didn't want to decorate the tree without you and Enjolras there. He wanted to stay up and wait for you two to get home, and I almost let him, but after Courfeyrac's phone call, I put him to bed. He should stay there—he was almost asleep by the time his head hit the pillow."

"Thanks, Gav—I appreciate it."

"It's no trouble at all, Ép." he says with a weak smile. "Is there anything else I can do?"

Éponine takes a small look around the room, and then heaves a sigh. "Is it obvious that my answer to that would be I just want him home?"

"It's not a surprise, but at this point, I think everyone wants him home. I think he wants to be home. Joly, too."

"It has to be tough on him, too, thinking you'll be coming home one day and then a few short hours later, one of your closest friends is laying bleeding out on a table…" Éponine eases herself on the couch, trying to keep herself together. "And that you aren't coming home until he's well enough to come home."

"He's missed Musichetta and now Bossuet. Courf told me he was really looking forward to coming home and hoping that the baby didn't come before he stepped a foot off that plane."

"He hasn't missed it so far." Éponine says with a small laugh, "but perhaps that's a good thing, though I do wish her luck if it's only Bossuet."

"Bossuet's better than no one, I suppose." Gavroche counters, taking a seat beside his sister. "His luck may not be in his own favor, but hopefully it evens out somewhere, yes?"

She nods, and she hears a bedroom door creaking from the hall, followed by the pitter-patter of feet that could only be her son. The four-year-old emerges from the hall, appearing to be nervous about being caught out of bed. Upon seeing his mother and uncle, he tries to disappear from sight, but he stops at the sound of his mother's voice.

"Matthieu, why aren't you in bed?" she asks sternly. The little boy walks back into sight, but keeps close to the entrance of the hall. He looks around the room, and seems to be disappointed by the time he is finished.

"Momma, where's daddy?" he asks innocently, and begins to seek out places as if playing "hide-and-go-seek." His mother told him before she left the house that she was bringing his father home. "Is he hiding?"

"No." Éponine answers regretfully, not wanting to lie to her son about his father's whereabouts, while at the same time wanting to. "He's not home."

"Is he outside?" Matthieu dashes to the couch, jumping in-between his uncle and Éponine to gaze out the window. "It's dark. Bad things happen in the dark, momma."

"He's not outside, Matthieu." Gavroche answers this time. "He's with a doctor right now."

"Why?"

"He got hurt."

"A bug bite? Did he fall and get a red knee?" the young boy asks simply, his vocabulary not as advanced as the others in his room, but both adults know what he means.

"Red knee, as what happened when you fell off your bike after daddy took the training wheels off?" Éponine asks, and when he nods, it's confirmed he means "scraped knee."

"Well, he seemed ready!"

"Things are not always what they seem, Enjolras. Didn't your father teach you to ride a bike?"

"My father was killed in a car accident when I was three, remember? My mother taught me and I was off a tricycle by the time I was four."

"He's barely even three!" she argues. "All kids are different and learn at different paces. Just because you were riding a bicycle by age four does not mean Matthieu has to, and the same goes for all of our children we may have in the future."

The argument ended when she handed the dishrag to him, with a sink full of dishes, going off to finish bandaging up their son's injured knee, but even still he tries to have the last word.

"At least I made sure he was wearing a helmet!"

"Something like that." Gavroche answers, and the boy sits down in-between them, nearly landing on his mother's lap.

"Careful of the baby." Éponine warns him, a hand protectively placed on her stomach. "Don't want to hurt your little brother or sister."

"No, I don't!" Matthieu answers excitedly, turning things around quickly. "Why are they in there, anyway?"

"They aren't ready to meet us yet—he or she is too small yet."

"But babies are small, momma, I've seen them!" he says, and points to the television screen. "I saw daddy holding one on TV!"

"Oh, really?" Éponine narrows her eyes at Gavroche, whose cheeks redden slightly.

"Yeah!"

"I may or may have not been watching some of your home videos with him while you were gone." Gavroche explains, scratching the back of his neck. "Just the Christmas ones! The two of you have some oddly named ones there that I was scared about putting in."

"You should be!" she smirks before turning her attention back towards her son. "Forgetting that, you need to go back to bed."

"But I don't want to!" he grabs his uncle's arm. "Uncle Gavroche, can you tell momma that I don't have to go to bed yet, please?"

Gavroche shakes his head. "I agree with your momma. It's late, way past your bed time, and I think your daddy would be saying the same thing."

The boy sharply nods his head in reply, then slides of the couch and on his own, returns to his bedroom, leaving Éponine and Gavroche in the living room.

"Speaking of going to bed, that's probably something you and I should be doing." Éponine suggests before she yawns, Gavroche doing the same not long afterwards. "Could you help me up?"

He heaves a sigh before he stands up to help his sister off the couch. "Maybe coming home from college was a bad idea." he says half-jokingly.

"Hey!" she exclaims in mock-offense, and swats at his shoulder. "Note Enjolras and I could have offered you the garage over the spare room, so don't complain!"

"Perhaps I should have asked for the garage instead." Gavroche quips as the two walk through the hall and reach the bedrooms, just about to part ways for the night. "Good night, Ép."

"See you in the morning, Gav."

About three days past, and she doesn't receive a word. She asks any of the Amis she can get ahold of, with the exception of Joly, for any type of information she can get on her husband's condition. None have given her anything, claiming they haven't heard anything new, nothing since they boarded the plane home.

She comes home from a doctor's appointment one evening to find her brother and her sister milling about in the kitchen, with the radio near to its maximum volume, Christmas music blaring to her ears as she sees Matthieu handing her sister a couple of apples from the fridge, while Gavroche seems busy stirring something over the stove.

"What's all this?" she shouts from the doorway.

"What?!" Gavroche and Azelma shout back.

"Turn the music down!" she shouts and Azelma nods, moving towards the radio and turning the music down to a more "preferable" level.

"Now what were you trying to say?" Gavroche asks from the stove.

"What are you all doing?"

"We were trying to surprise you and get this all done before you got home, but I suppose we didn't plan properly." Azelma replies and begins to cut up some apples. "Dinner will be ready in about ten minutes, I think, by the time I finish cutting up the fruit and Gav finishes cooking the pasta."

"You didn't have to—" Éponine is cut off by the sudden sound of the landline phone ringing, before excusing herself and moving towards the living room to pick it up, hoping it wasn't some telemarketer or something like that. "Hello?"

"Is this Éponine?"

"Joly?"

"Hey, Éponine! So glad I could reach you! Are you feeling okay? How's the baby? What's Matthieu up to? Have you heard anything about Musichetta and—?"

"Whoa, calm down, Joly, one question at a time!" she has to tell him before the hypochondriac goes on and on with his infinite list of questions. "And I'm glad you called. Listen, Joly—"

"I'm serious, though, really, is Musichetta alright? I haven't heard anything and it's only Bossuet who's with her, and so on."

"As far as I know, everything is just fine, and before you ask, no, you have not missed anything."

"Oh, that's good to hear! If you have a chance, could you tell her just to hang in there? I would do so myself, but Musichetta doesn't keep her phone on most of the time and I'm pretty sure Bossuet lost his cell phone again, that or he dropped it in the fish tank and waterlogged it again."

"Yes, I will." Éponine nods. "Now, Joly—"

"How are you and the baby? Is everything moving along alright? No complications so far, nothing unusual…?"

"Everything is just fine. Just got home from the doctor's office, actually. The baby is perfectly healthy and the right size at this stage."

"That's good! Excellent! I'll be sure to pass that on to Enjolras."

"How is he?"

"In a bit of pain, has a few wounds sewn up here and there. He's stable enough to fly, though, which is a lot to say after what happened some days back and he's made good progress, healing nicely. Speaking of which, the plane for Germany leaves in about an hour."

"Could I speak with him?"

"He's resting right now—the pain medication left him a little drowsy, but don't you fret, I'll make sure he hears of it when he wakes up."

"I'd appreciate that."

"Good then. It was nice talking to you, Éponine, but I have to go. There are some final preparations that need to be done quickly before we take off. I'll call you when we land in Germany, and don't forget to talk to Musichetta!"

"I won't, Joly, now have a safe flight."

"Alright. Bye!"

"Goodbye, Joly." she says as she hangs up the phone. She turns her head, to see Azelma, Gavroche, and Matthieu patiently waiting to hear what the phone call was about.

"Well?" her sister asks impatiently after some moments of silence had passed. "Who was that?"

"Joly, and you wouldn't believe what he said!"

"What?" Gavroche asks.

"Enjolras is stable, and their flight for Germany leaves in about an hour, which means they're coming home! Enjolras is coming home!"