"That's no fair! I just spent the last half hour positioning my troops to take Poland and now you've gone and botched it!"

"Well, maybe if you focused on more than one country…"

"What, in God's name, are you doing!"

The four young men started, one hurriedly propping a book up in an attempt to hide the board from view. The newcomer, a tall blonde man, would have none of it, wrenching the book from his fellow's hands and tossing it aside in his fury. "What," he fumed with a disdainful wave at the collection of vari-coloured plastic soldiers strewn across the tabletop. "Is all of this?"

"I need that book for class!" Courfeyrac lamented, only to be shushed by Feuilly.

"Well, um…you see, we didn't really know exactly when you'd be back so we thought we'd, you know, find a way to pass the time." Laigle offered what he hoped was a placating smile, simultaneously trying to hide the bright red dice he'd been in the process of rolling when Enjolras had walked in.

"We're playing Risk," Grantaire offered matter-of-factly, oblivious to the danger. With a grin, he proffered his game cards (which had obviously been doused in some kind of alcohol) as proof. An overturned wine bottle lolled dangerously close to the edge of the table, threatening to deposit itself in his lap. "Care to join?"

"We'll let you have France," Courfeyrac coaxed, eager to avoid a scene. "Feuilly's doing a terrible job of defending it, anyway."

Feuilly's protests were drowned out by Enjolras thundering indignantly, "France belongs to the people!"

"Well that rules you out, doesn't it?" Grantaire quipped, slapping his cards back down on the table and groping unsuccessfully for the wine bottle. "I suppose there's some sort of law against countries being run by statues."

Laigle yelped suddenly, having attempted to deal Grantaire a swift kick and connecting instead with the table leg. "Come on, Enjolras, it's just a board game. Don't you think you're taking this a bit far?"

Enjolras drew himself up to his full five feet' ten inches and brought all the power of his fury to bear on his hapless comrade's gleaming pate. "A bit far? A bit far! How on earth am I supposed to react to the discovery that, while I'm out attempting to liberate the people of this country, the lot of you are hunched around a piece of cardboard vying for world domination?!"

"I don't really want to dominate the world," Feuilly interjected hastily, scooting his chair further away from both the table and his leader's wrath. "I only agreed to play because there was no one else here to talk to."

Enjolras' eyes slid from Feuilly across the room to where a lone figure sat looking dreamily out of the window, one elbow propped up on the table. Feuilly, following his companion's shift of attention, picked up on where this was going. "You've got to be joking!" he whined. "He doesn't hear a word anyone says unless it's about that stupid girl. I swear, if I have to hear about her limpid eyes one more time, I may be forced to kill him."

"You?" Grantaire balked, his quest for the wine momentarily forgotten. "You can't even take over North America! How on earth do you expect to kill someone?"

Impatiently, Enjolras slammed his palm down on the table, causing a brief flurry of plastic soldiers and cannons, one of which determinedly launched itself towards Laigle's eye. "Be quiet, all of you! I've had quite enough of this nonsense. Really, as revolutionaries, you ought to know better than to indulge in this garbage. Can't I leave you alone for five minutes!"

"Well, really, it was much longer than that," said Courfeyrac, as he ducked under the table to retrieve several fallen game pieces. "It took us at least an hour to go out and get the game in the first place. Bossuet had to dig through Joly's closet just to find the thing and then we had to take a detour on the way back because…" He trailed off at the sight of Enjolras' livid features and abruptly began to whistle a quiet, unassuming tune.

"I…" In a historically unprecedented moment, Enjolras faltered, covering his eyes with one hand. "I think I need to go lie down."