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There is a moment as he falls where he knows peace. There is wetness on his cheeks and he cannot tell in the few seconds he has whether it is tears or the spray of the water below, and he does not care. This is right. He has failed God, he has failed man, he has failed the law, and death must be his punishment. He closes his eyes, a small mercy he renders unto himself, that perhaps he does not deserve he thinks. And when he hits the water he waits for death.
The water floods into his lungs, surrounds him every way and finally he knows fear. He had expected to hit hard stone, to dash his brains out instantly, but God is taking his full measure, wringing every drop of blood at the last. He, Javert shall drown in this, and he knows futility, knows terror for long final seconds as he sinks beneath the water. He cannot swim after all. His eyes open on instinct and there is only blackness, and his mouth is full of it as he gasps it in, struggles helplessly against it, for he cannot control it, cannot die as simply as he would like it.
When the rope winds itself around his waist, he has no strength to struggle, no words to beg for release, to beg for death, to bend the knee as never he bends it to inevitability. It does not raise him from the depths to his surprise, it tugs him down, and perhaps that is enough. Until he is held in air, bound hand and foot by whatever loathsome rope has been wound around him, and unwillingly he sucks air in, expels the water inside him in hideous, racking retches, and only then turns or tries to, to face his captor. When that affords him nothing, he gazes at his surroundings in sudden terrible fear (it is like now he has given in once to that secret shameful feeling, it comes easier to him to bear this hideous cowardice) for he is almost under water. This, this is some secret cave under the canal, enough space for his head and shoulders to be held out of the water, the rest of him under, and when he turns his eyes to the side there is a small space almost entirely out of the wet where he thinks he could crawl and shelter.
Whatever binds him is hideously strong and he struggles to no avail against it, can only think of one man who could bind ropes so hard and hold them so tight, mutters his name between clenched teeth-Valjean. At the sound he makes, the pitiable broken squeak, the ropes loosen, unbind themselves and he is free to breathe easier and to move his arms a little. The next time they move he feels it, stares in mute disbelief at them. This is no rope, his mind says calmly. He has heard tales of giant octopi, even seen specimens in his travels, and this is something similar. Javert is not a man who puts credence in tales of horror, on what can be seen in the dark of night if you frequent the wrong parts of town, on ghosts who whisper longingly the secrets of the dead, or pure white beasts with slender horns. They are stories to terrify children with, this this is a beast of the deep yes, but of no more significance than that he tries to assure his beating heart.
When the limbs embrace him still he begins to doubt, yet still tells himself to calm. Orpheus, he remembers, was saved by dolphins from the sweet oblivion of death. Could it be that this is God's work, that he has been saved? To pursue Valjean perhaps, or to hunt down other lawbreakers. Javert does not think on God much. He trusts in the Church a little, believes in the Bible and the strict stern tenets of the Old Testament, and there are beasts within that, Jonah and the Whale, Leviathans, white horses with terrible riders. Is it so impossible that this beast will carry out God's will?
When the tentacles slide under his jacket and break through the buttons easily, he does not move. For now, he will accept this stern sentence imposed on him, will allow himself to live through the agency of the unknown, and hope that it sees fit to restore him to the face of the earth, the better to kiss the feet of the Virgin and bring evil to justice.
The coat does not come off easily, but he does not fear although the water is cold and the air colder still. There is a curious heat in the tentacles wrapped around him, a faint blossoming of warmth against his skin, and he holds still. When the coat is reduced to rags he closes his eyes, another part of him stripped away, another part of him shredded from contact with the hostility of the world. So faintly he barely knows it himself he begins to shake. The tentacles grow bolder now, slide with increasing fascination across his body, wet and slick and warm. Javert has never been held like this- almost tenderly- never been examined like this- curiously- and he tries to tear his mind away from those thoughts. He is almost cradled now, held up entirely by the strength of the beast, and he does not know what to think any more.
He is surprised perhaps in no way that he can name when the gentle limbs began their caress, began not just to smooth across his skin, but to meld to him, to pluck at his nipples and flick them with the tenderest smallest twitch of one of its extremities. Javert remains untouched by the world, he does not know enough to fear, this has always been his greatest defense and his greatest weakness. He does not understand, he thinks, does not understand why the beast treats him thus, holds him firm and touches him as no man nor woman has touched him before.
When the tentacles begin to shift and coil downwards deeper, slide in between his skin and his clothing, curl around his prick, then he begins to doubt and fear and strive for freedom. This is not God's will he thinks wildly. No beast of God's sending would treat him in this fashion. It would restore him to life, to freedom, to his purpose, not violate him in such a manner. His clothes fall away in shreds, and he is naked of insignia, devoid of his armour, defenseless at the mercy of he knows not what. Still the tentacles twine around him, soothe his skin, and bring him warmth, slide between his legs and encircle his flesh and with the smallest of movements bring him the satisfaction he has only ever known in the night, in the dark shameful moments before the dawn, or occasionally when he wakes and his bed is wet with his nocturnal exertions and emissions. It is weakness to thus be displayed, he knows this, and revolts against the indignity, yet another calmer part of him reasons that it must be so.
He cannot fight this thing that saved him from the deeps, succoured him in need and brought him to air. It is not possible. He must make this sacrifice, must pay in turn as gratitude requires, make of himself an offering. As an offering he thinks, as a gift and a thanks he will have paid his dues, can be absolved from what that requires. To break bread at a man's table is an exchange, a thanksgiving, to receive air and life- if not from a man then at least a being- is along the same lines. He untenses his body, does not offer himself passively, but closes his eyes and retreats for a time at least to the bright shining place in his head which he has always known, which dimmed in the moments before his fall. The stars, he thinks. He would like to see the stars again.
He is barely aware of the heated caress of his prick, of the slide and slick of the tentacles against him, tightening momentarily, then fondling him with ease, slipping up and down his length- which is hard and aching now, a betrayer, as bodies have always betrayed since Adam and Eve. Before he can fade out the sensation entirely a new one accosts him. A second slender tentacle identical to its fellow twines briefly around him, then caresses his thighs, and slips between them, sure and steady no matter how he jerks, calm lost and he cannot snatch it back, not so long as the curious tendril of flesh seeks inside him, pushes past his resistance and slides in with ease, aided by the water and the slickness of it's own being. He is now held inside and out, surrounded and encompassed by this beast and he moans helplessly, tries to stifle it for the noise echoes around his ears and he cannot bear to hear his words.
It is only slender, perhaps the width of a finger, but it pushes in so greedily as though it wishes for nothing more than to shelter within him, and the more he squirms away from it, the more he tries to deny it entrance, the deeper it pushes, a strange half-pain that leaves him still aching and still open, and still the limbs of the beast stroke his prick with firm insistence that clouds his mind and renders him unable to think. All too soon the pain fades and that he fears. He tries to grasp it with his mind, now he moves closer because without the pain there is nothing he can believe, nothing he can hold onto, and finally the tentacle slithers out, and he is given only a moment to sigh with relief before it returns twined with a fellow, wider and stronger, and slick as it begs for entrance, denies his entreaties and delves within him, and he can feel his face wet with tears that he does not remember shedding, intermingled with the water that dashes on his face, as he sighs.
It does not hurt no matter how much he wills it to. He moulds to its form, is shaped around it. He does not impose his will, he is imposed upon as much as ever he had bent prisoners to his blows and his words, now it is visited upon him. He does not break, he bends, and this hurts more than anything. Javert he thinks dully, should have died. Javert should break and snap in half, not soften and open and form. But he has no choice, and when the tentacles are within him, there is no pain just a queer aching sort of pleasure that floods his limbs, sends shivers down his spine and arches his back, and as though the creature senses his need, it bends back his legs a little, opens him wider, and inside him there are sparks like the stars settling back into his veins, as the tentacles find something deep within and mercilessly belabour it until he cannot breathe, can but gasp with empty lungs at the unforgiving world, prick hard and begging for more, to be touched, and he could never imagine this need before, this feeling saturating him completely. He does not know when the tentacles twine to the width of three, can only feel the stretch and quiet burn, only let himself go, let himself feel these sensations that have never been felt before he imagines.
A tentacle winds its way softly around his neck, holds his head up for him, as the creature fucks deeper into him, and the word has lost its shock over long years but not its force. It is a crude jeer tossed at the whores of the street, and Javert tries not to think about how close he is to that. Not of the streets but of the deeps. This is the coin he is paying for his life, and the change he receives is pleasure so finely edged that he cannot explain or contradict it. His body speaks for him, so eagerly spread as though he longs and yearns for it, though his mind says no, no this is not Javert, his body begs for more, changes and opens, lets the long tendrils take their pleasure of him and he loses his train of thought too soon, in the sweet agony.
When he comes he barely understands. Beforehand when he had taken his pleasure briefly and with the stern hatred of self and unruly uncontrollable nature, and obtained a utilitarian release it had been understandable, soon over and not without pleasure, but not the defining obsession the priests had warned about. Now though, perhaps he sees how one could long for the flesh, could long to be taken, possessed and brought to such heights, for when he comes, his eyes close and he convulses, the tentacles pushing closer around him it is like fire running through his veins, chasing the seawater away, burning and cleansing him, and he does not see how aught can withstand its conquering flame. He empties himself, spills himself into the waiting mouth of the water, is torn apart and made whole again in seconds.
The tentacles do not leave him, do not exit his flesh and for these long moments he does not wish them to do so, does not wish to be left empty and open and soiled, when the slow coil within warms him and urges him to greater heights.
They seem loathe to leave him as well, and when they curl around him closer, hold him tighter he feels not suffocated, but free, a perverse feeling that he dismisses on the instant until the tendrils stir within him, blossom afresh and push, and he notes with weary astonishment that again his flesh can rise to the occasion, that now it takes so little time for his bones to melt and his body to open with greedy abandon, and he can no longer control the sounds he makes- no matter if they shame him. He is held again with a greater love than he has known, a word he does not understand- has never understood but seems now to fit the occasion. When the priest talks of love he talks of God's embrace, death is a return to his bosom, and Jesus welcomed the lowly to him. This is the closest Javert has come to God, to death and he thinks, to the love proffered in those instances.
He is slack now in the caress of the beast, it takes its due from him, again and again until he wrenches unsatisfied and yet too finished from the languid press of its tentacles within him, around him, across him. He cannot bear another touch, too sensitive he shakes from it all, long wrung dry of tears, an empty wine-skin that beats a hollow sound, and gradually like the swell of the tide there is a retreat, a lessening and an emptying that leaves him pitiable, a husk sucked dry and abandoned. He sleeps then, uncaring of whether he lives or dies, done trying to assign reasons for the Lord's work. He cannot see the face of God nor understand his works, he can only accept and obey, as always he has accepted and obeyed. When he wakes, he is still above the water, still held, and he can only imagine with slow thoughts that this is his lot.
In this as it seems in so much he is proved wrong, for now the tentacles swarm over him, clutch him tighter to the veritable bulk of it's mass, twine around his face and then he is underwater again, hazy and choking, as the tendrils soothe him as best they can, propelling them both through the water. When they break the surface Javert can not understand. He is restored to air, to light, to liberty, and he gasps it in for long seconds, until he is deposited on the side, naked but for the shreds of his clothing, shamed in the sight of man he thinks, though he can see no person near. Before it leaves, his brief companion, his saviour strokes across his limbs, as though making a final note of what it has wrought, what it has formed and restored, and he is aware of a growing emptiness within him, as though he is no longer Javert completely, no longer Javert alone.
He lies in the mud, in the wash and shallow of the water and he does not understand who covers him with a coat and touches him so gently. It is not yet time to move, his mind whispers, and yet the rough scratch of wool awakens his senses enough that he looks upwards to the face of 24601, or as his mind says with sage reflectiveness- to give everything its proper name Valjean. There is no horror on his face, nor fear nor even pity, there is a certain sombre sadness, and that stirs Javert to recognition, to remembrance of his former self, even if it does not inspire action. But still like this even he can be aware of what Valjean has done and Javert has been, and the sound that makes its way past raw cracked lips, and a throat hoarse from cries he had not been aware of uttering, is his first laugh for many a year.