Opening A/N: This whole thing can be summarized with one big "OOPS." Seriously, it can. I sat down meaning to just write a quick one-shot as a warmup for working on my NaNo novel (which is currently in desperate need of being worked on, let me tell you) and then 5,000 words later, I ended up with this.

I'm not saying it's a BAD thing; it was just a complete accident. That's all.

IMPORTANT TRIVIA: I wrote this whole thing in a blanket fort that I made with my own two hands. NONE OF THE SOFAS HAVE CUSHIONS ANYMORE. They're on the floor. In my blanket fort. I'm sitting on them. TAKE THAT, FLATMATES

Disclaimer: I don't own Les Mis or the brands of the caffeinated products that I consumed which resulted in this. BUT IF I OWNED ROCKSTAR I WOULD BE SO RICH MAN

It was 1 AM when Valjean heard the key turn in the door lock. Putting down the book that he'd been halfheartedly reading, the older gentleman focused all of his attention on the front door as it swung slowly open and a tall figure in a long black coat entered the house.

"Of course you're still up." Javert closed the door with a barely audible click and re-locked it. Valjean frowned.

"I don't like the thought of you coming home to a dark, empty house." There was a pause, during which Javert pulled off his gloves and put them in the pockets of his coat. "What kept you out so late?"

Javert began to unbutton his coat. "Paperwork. And - " He caught himself and stopped speaking, but this only served to heighten Valjean's interest and concern.

"And?" he prodded, half-rising from his chair. Javert shot him a sharp look.

"Sit down. It was nothing. An incident." He inhaled sharply and glanced down, inside his coat. "It caused me some mild inconvenience, that is all."

"Javert," Valjean demanded, standing up. "Are you alright?"

"Perfectly so." A dark gaze slid up to meet Valjean's, one eyebrow arching slightly in an expression of irritated amusement. "I believe I shall retire now. Good night."

With that, he turned and walked down the hall to his bedroom, leaving Valjean to stare after him in concern. Something was wrong, he knew it; but he couldn't quite put his finger on it.

It wasn't until he was in bed and halfway asleep that he realized it, though he was too tired to keep the thought for longer than the half-second it took to occur to him.

Javert didn't take his coat off.

Javert arrived at the police station the following morning to an enthusiastic crowd of underlings.

"Inspector! Inspector, is it true what Sergeant Davies said?"

"Yes! He said you were in a fight!"

"Right outside the police station, too! A drunken maniac with a knife!"

Sergeant Davies, an attractive man with a scar on his jaw and graying hair, came up to the inspector with a steaming cup of black coffee in his hands. "I said nothing of the sort, sir. I simply informed them of the events of last evening."

Javert took the proffered cup of coffee with a grateful nod and slowly sat down at his desk, something flickering behind his eyes as he did so. He liked Davies; for a Brit, the man was extremely decent and almost as dedicated to the job as Javert.

"I trust you saw your injuries better tended to, sir?" Davies inquired, pausing on his way back to his desk. "That man did give you a good go with that bowie knife of his."

Javert gave the sergeant a brisk nod, and Davies smiled, snapped off a salute, and walked away, leaving Javert to reach a hand beneath his coat and brush his fingers lightly across the bandages he'd applied to the knife wounds last night.

The "incident," as he had termed it in his brief discussion with Valjean, had been short but brutal. If Javert hadn't been quite as skilled in the hand-to-hand combat area of his training, he might have sustained more serious injuries upon emerging from the fight – or not have emerged at all. The man had been at least a foot taller than Javert, probably 50 pounds of solid muscle heavier, and extremely drunk. He had also been extremely angry, and very much looking for a fight. So when Javert had come outside to ask him to stop shouting at the cabbie that had refused to pick him up, he'd turned and hammered the inspector solidly on the jaw with an unskilled but very powerful left hook.

Things had degenerated from there. Already on his guard, Javert had dodged enough so that despite getting hit, he did not receive the full power of the blow. He had then been able to use the man's rage, size, and intoxicated state against him, moving swiftly and delivering quick, sharp hits meant to incapacitate rather than harm. While this would have worked perfectly on a person of normal stature, the only thing it did in this case was to enrage the drunkard.

Javert hadn't seen the knife until Sergeant Davies – who had been standing by to leap in if need be – had shouted at him to fall back, and by that point it had been too late. One cut caused enough pain to distract Javert to the degree where the drunk man had been able to seize him by the throat and go at his chest with the knife, for some reason choosing to carve at him with it rather than stab.

He hadn't been able to do so for long, thanks to the presence of Davies; a solid hit or two from a policeman's bludgeon had put the man out of commission quite nicely, though unintentionally it had the effect of him collapsing on Javert. Sergeant Davies, however, had exhibited a strength that the inspector hadn't thought the man to possess, and shoved the drunkard off Javert's injured body.

By this point, a constable on patrol had shown up, and helped to assist Davies in pulling the man's unconscious body into the station and from there to a cell. Davies was quickly back out to assist Javert into the station and to his desk; despite Javert's protests, Davies had (almost forcibly) gotten him to remove his coat and shirt and proceeded to dress his wounds. His subordinate had then sent him home, with a borderline threatening recommendation to go to the hospital if he knew what was good for him.

By the time Javert had gotten back to Valjean's house, his injuries had opened up again and had soaked through the bandages and into his shirt, hence his reluctance to remove his coat in front of the older man; Valjean, he knew, was prone to overreaction in the cases of the people he lived with. He was especially touchy about Javert; apparently you try to jump off a bridge one time, and you get a reputation that follows you for the rest of your life. Who knew?

All recollections and retellings of the events of the previous night aside, the rest of that day was fairly uneventful. A few of the younger constables had to be scolded for harassing the prisoner – some of them even made threats regarding the man, at which point they were soundly rebuked and given extra paperwork.

Javert was starting on a new report when someone slapped a file down on top of it. Startled, he looked up.

"Go home, Javert," instructed Davies. Javert's expression was torn somewhere between confusion and anger that he was being ordered around by a subordinate officer.

"I cannot depart until I have – "

"All of your paperwork has already been allotted to other officers." Davies pressed the file he held into Javert's hand. "This is a written and signed order from the chief himself telling you to go home and stay there. Lord knows why you even came in today in the first place."

Javert visibly bristled at the insurgency being thrust upon him. "I cannot leave! It is only – it is only six o'clock!"

"And you've been here since six-thirty in the morning. Sir." Davies swept the pile of paperwork up off of Javert's desk and into his arms. "I'll distribute this amongst the masses. You go on home. You need to rest."

Javert started to protest again, but a single cutting glare from Davies shut him up. In truth, he didn't entirely possess the desire to protest anymore; due to not sleeping very well the night before and having not gone to the hospital, his injuries were bothering him a little more than they perhaps ought to have, and so he subsided and stood up to go home.

Halfway back to Valjean's house, things were going noticeably wrong. It hadn't been apparent in the warmth and relative comfort of the police station, but he had acquired a fever – he couldn't tell how severe it was yet, but he was certain that it wasn't as cold out as he was feeling. In addition, he was beginning to suspect that the knife gashes on his chest and ribcage were worse than he'd initially thought they were. The shallow wounds he'd taken them to be at first would not be, for the second time, opening so easily and seeping through the bandages again to ruin yet another one of his shirts.

They were also much more painful than they'd been earlier. The burning sensation of "oh, there's a gash in my chest" had now morphed into something much worse; burning had become stabbing, something that reached deeper than the surface. It almost felt like a gunshot wound, something he'd suffered before and thus knew the sensation of.

At least, he thought grudgingly as he staggered and fell against a wall, the massive bruise that had spent the day (and part of last night) spreading across his neck and creeping up onto his face was not bothering him quite as much anymore.

He reached the gate in front of the house with significant effort. The sight of the well-trimmed front garden – as much as he could see in the growing darkness – gave him hope, and he forced himself to stand up straight, to make his breathing level and even. If he could make it to his bedroom, he could tend to his wounds by himself and avoid a scene.

The front door swung open before he could even get his keys out of his pocket, much less into the lock. "Javert! What a wonderful surprise, to see you home so early! You're just in time for supper; Cosette has helped Toussaint to make the most splendid-smelling of stews. It's the kind you are so fond of, as well, with the carrots. Here, let's have off with this coat."

Javert was not a liar, and he did not make excuses. He wished he could have made one in this case, but nothing came to mind, and so he simply said "No," in a tone of impressive firmness that brooked no argument.

Valjean was noticeably surprised. "What? Why no – " he started, and then broke off, his expression growing horrified. It was then that it occurred to Javert that while his coat hid the blood from the knife wounds, he could hardly have done anything about the bruises that resulted from his near-strangulation and the blow to his face.

"This is not what it looks like," he began.

"Well then, you'd better tell me what it is!" Valjean snapped, concern coloring his features and voice more than the anger he was attempting to convey. "Come over here and sit down at once!"

Javert did so, grateful that he had been ordered to rather than having to do so of his own volition. Though he hadn't shown it, he had been experiencing some slight vertigo – he suspected it was related to his increasing fever.

"What happened?" Valjean demanded, hovering over him. "Here, give me your coat."

"No," Javert bit out. The bruise was one thing, but Valjean would definitely have a coronary if he saw the knife wounds. "No, thank you."

"Why not?" Valjean asked, already suspicious. Javert gave Valjean his most defiant look – or what he thought was Valjean. The fever and the vertigo had combined forces, and now there were two to five different Valjeans every time he moved his head.

"I am getting ill and I fear I have something of – a fever," he managed, still remaining truthful. "As fevers tend to result in bodily chill, I would like to keep my coat on."

This seemed to be a reasonable explanation to Valjean, who proceeded to take a seat on the edge of the sofa next to the inspector. "Very well. But you must explain to me how you came about being bruised in such a fashion!"

Javert sighed. "I told you, there was an incident. A drunkard looking for a fight. A sergeant and I subdued him and put him in a cell; in the process, he landed a blow on my person. That is all."

Valjean fixed him with a fierce gaze that had cowed many a man in Toulon. "That is not all. A simple punch would not have given you these." His hand reached out, and fingers calloused by 20 years of hard work ghosted across the bruises on Javert's throat.

Javert twitched. "He… wrestled with me. That is why the sergeant had to get involved. I was being subdued."

Valjean nodded and looked away, seeming to absorb all the information and find it plausible. Javert breathed a sigh of relief.

"Mm-hmm. I see. So," Valjean murmured, and something in his voice caused Javert to snap back into wariness, fever-bright eyes pinned on the older man. "You returned home last night after being beaten and throttled to the point where you had to be rescued by another officer, and you neglected to inform me?"

Oh. He was upset. Slightly more upset than Javert had anticipated him being.

"Not only that," Valjean continued, "but you went to work injured and sick and were very clearly planning to hide all of this from me upon your return home. Thank God that you have no talent for deception, Javert, or I might never have known any of this!"

"It is simply a fever and a bruise. Hardly anything incapacitating." Javert stood up, exercising the extremity of his not-inconsiderable willpower to avoid showing the fact that the room had just essentially tipped on its head to him. "Now, I believe you said something about dinner? I am famished."

The sidelong glance that Valjean bestowed upon him showed that their conversation on this topic was hardly over, but that he was willing to overlook it for now. "Indeed. It should be done by now. Cosette, darling?"

A head full of prettily done-up blonde curls appeared around the corner. "Yes, Papa?"

"How is dinner coming along? Javert is home early today."

Cosette's face lit up. "He is?! Marvelous! Dinner is just now finished! Oh, I'm so happy. Javert hardly ever eats with us."

Dinner was not a quiet affair. Cosette, of course, had to fuss over Javert, and then proceeded to press a significant amount of food upon him so that he might "get over his fever the faster." Valjean was almost excessively pleasant, and made numerous commentaries upon the risks of being out late by one's self. Javert was the only silent one, and that was (for once) due less to his natural stoicism and more to his concentration on not showing in any capacity that he had injuries other than what he had described to Valjean.

Finally, however, he was forced to excuse himself, rising from the table rather abruptly – too abruptly for his vertigo-flooded body to take, and was forced to stand stock-still for several seconds while his body readjusted itself in the aftermath of the sudden movement.

"Javert? Are you alright?" Valjean inquired, getting up as well. His priorities blurring together and becoming things that he found himself caring less and less about, it took Javert a moment to recall that he didn't want Valjean knowing that he was more injured than he'd already said he was.

"Y… yes. I'm fine. Don't worry about me. Just going to hang up my coat. Stay here." So saying, he wandered past the table and into the living room, where it took iron will to make himself remember to turn and head towards the coat rack.

If he hadn't been feverish and rapidly headed towards near-delirium, he wouldn't have taken his coat off in the hall outside the front door. At that point, however, his body had had enough, and was overriding his desire to keep Valjean from knowing that he was hurt.

A chair scooted across the floor in the dining room, and before Javert could register that this meant anything, Valjean was out of the dining room and approaching him with long, concerned strides. "Javert, are you sure you're – dear God!"

Javert was vaguely aware that he must look a fright. A glance down at his shirt, which had grown increasingly damp and sticky during dinner, revealed that it was, in fact, soaked through with blood. He snorted lightly.

"That's two shirts ruined," he muttered, failing to register the impressively rapid paling of Valjean's face at these words. "Might have to ask if we can get the bastard on destruction of police property, along with assault of an officer."

He looked up and into the horrified eyes of Valjean. "Oh, don't look at me like that. Knew you'd lose it. It isn't like he stabbed me." A small part of his brain was yelling at him to shut up, but the feverish part was in control now. "He just carved me up a little. Ah! Maybe he was hungry. Maybe he thought I was a turkey." He flashed a grin, quick and wolfish. "Poor sod. And Davies hit him in the head. All he wanted was a good dinner."

Cosette emerged from the dining room, started to say something, caught sight of Javert, and screamed instead. Startled, Javert stepped forward; this proved to be a bad idea, as the entire house pitched sideways and turned inside out on him.

He hit the floor hard, with the final thought of Davies is going to be furious that I didn't go to the hospital before everything went black.

Davies was furious that Javert hadn't gone to the hospital. He was so furious that he went to the police chief and told him that Javert hadn't gone to the hospital. The police chief agreed with Davies's sentiments on the matter and punished Javert by ordering him into two weeks of leave, during which he was not to be seen at the police station or doing police work of any kind whatsoever under threat of suspension.

Cosette cried until Javert felt like the worst kind of human being. Then she left, which put Javert in the dubious position of being relatively helpless in a hospital bed with Valjean lurking in the corner, where he'd been since he and Cosette had been permitted in to visit.

"I'm not sure anything you say can make me feel as bad as that," Javert informed the older man, gesturing in the direction of the door through which Cosette had left. Valjean simply glowered at him. Javert arched an eyebrow.

"Well, if you're going to be that way, I'll just go to sleep. It's not like I have anything else to do on two bloody weeks of leave." He couldn't keep the irritation out of his voice. Honestly, the nerve of Davies…!

"You could have died," Valjean blurted. Javert groaned and rolled his eyes. Apparently, while he'd been unconscious, Valjean had gotten the whole story from Davies and had been rather appalled.

"If Davies had stepped out there to calm that drunkard down, he could have died," Javert uttered shortly. "I'm the superior officer; it's my job to take the bigger risks. Besides, Davies has a family – "

"YOU have a family!" Valjean shouted, causing Javert to stare at him. In all the time he'd known 24601, even in prison, the man had never raised his voice. If he'd needed to be intimidating, the man was capable of raising a quiet menace about himself that was more fearsome than any kind of volume or posturing could have conjured up.

"My family," Javert responded a little cautiously, "is dead. My mother – "

"I don't give a hang about your parents," Valjean snapped. "I don't care that you were born in a prison, and I don't care that your father was a criminal. Family is more than the people to whom you are related by blood, Javert! Your family is the people that care about you! The people with whom you surround yourself, the people you love and cherish!"

Javert did not "love and cherish" anyone, to the best of his knowledge. He was about to point this out, but Valjean didn't give him a chance to speak.

"Whether or not you think of Cosette and I as your family, Javert, we are now. And you'd better get used to that, and stop trying to hide it from us when you're hurt or sick! We want to take care of you, you fool. You don't need to be stoic anymore."

"I dare say half the police department, if not more, feels the same," Davies announced, stepping through the door. "There are people that care about you, Javert, whether you like it or not. He cares about you, too," the sergeant continued, now addressing Valjean, "and all the rest of them as well. I simply feel that he hasn't got a conscious knowledge of the fact. He's got a pretty keen subconscious, though. It's that gypsy instinct kicking in."

Javert tried to sit up in bed, his upper lip curling in a snarl. "I wouldn't speak of your superior officer in such a way when he's in the room, sergeant!"

Davies – the upstart – tossed him a smirk. A smirk. "You need a good ribbing every now and again, monsieur. It'll do you good."

"My correct title is Inspect – " Javert broke off when Davies pointed at him.

"Not, I think, when you're on enforced leave." He arched an eyebrow, his lips twitching in a smile. "You know, if you think about it, that sounds awfully similar to a suspen – "

"If I were not an officer of the law - !"

"You would tear me limb from limb, I know. Or come to my house and kill me in my sleep. You'd make a good criminal, you know? You have the look of one." Davies winked at Javert, then turned and proffered his hand to Valjean for a shake. "Good day, M. Fauchelevent. Keep him out of trouble, aye? I'm going to pop off before he bursts that vessel throbbing in his neck. It looks like it might be important." And with a cheeky wink, he was off out the door.

Valjean turned to Javert, looking alarmingly enthusiastic. "I say! Are you making… is that man a friend of yours?!"

"I don't have friends," Javert snarled. "And I don't make them, especially not with insubordinate foreign curs!"

Both men could hear Sergeant Davies laughing from down the hall. Valjean was practically sparkling with enthusiasm; Javert found himself much preferring the earnest, angry attitude from earlier.

"This," Valjean announced, "will be interesting."

Javert twitched and calculated the ways he could regain favor with the police chief. Maybe if he begged, they would give him some paperwork to do. Then he wouldn't be resigned to –

"Cosette is very excited about your leave, you know! She's planning on you to help her bake and decorate cookies. Then we can go and deliver them to those poor unfortunate souls who do not have the capacity to make their own baked goods in this coming holiday season."

Javert's gaze shot past Valjean to the window. The second story was not too high to jump from, surely. He was still in decent condition. He could make it.

"Javert? Javert, you're not paying attention to me. …Are you alright? Oh, goodness. I'll see if I can find someone to get you some more morphine. Nurse? Nurse!"

As soon as Valjean left the room, Javert was up and over to the window, disregarding the pain in his chest. The window proved surprisingly easy to open; musing over this, he leaned through to estimate the length of the drop.

"Oh! There he is! Hello, Inspector!"

His mouth fell open slightly in surprise. He had not expected to see at least 3 young constables standing below his window.

"Wh – what are you all doing here?"

"Special assignment!" chirped the one who seemed to be in charge. "Sergeant Davies told us you might try to make a break for it! We're supposed to make sure you stay inside the hospital and get all healed up!"

Another one nodded. "Yes. And then we're to patrol M. Fauchelevent's house and ensure that you don't sneak out at night and try to do inspector things."

"Get well soon, sir! We're all pulling for you back at the station!"

Javert's eyebrow began to twitch. As it did so, the door in his hospital room creaked.

"Javert? Javert, get back in bed! What are you doing at the window? You're not healed yet, you fool! Walking around like this will reopen your wounds!"

Javert pulled back from the window and slammed it shut with a force that came near to breaking the glass. Very slowly, he turned to Valjean, a tic working double time in his jaw.

"I am going to murder Sergeant Davies with my bare hands. I am going to put arsenic in his coffee."

Valjean smiled. "That sounds lovely. You can do that when you get off of your enforced leave." The sound of the words made Javert flinch. "Now, back in bed. Right now."

Javert's nose wrinkled. "Yes, Mother."

Valjean's smile grew wider. "Oh, you haven't seen mothering yet. Cosette's very excited for this evening – the doctor says you're not supposed to move about very much, so she's going to make some soup with Toussaint and then she is going to come and feed it to you."

Sergeant Davies heard the agonized yowl of "WHY?!" from outside the hospital and chuckled.

"That man and I are going to be good friends," he announced to the sky. "I'd better hide any poisons we've got in evidence, though. …And possibly any really sharp objects, as well."

~FIN~

A3: So, uh... can Davies be a thing now? Because I kind of really like him. HE WASN'T EVEN SUPPOSED TO COME BACK, you guys. I was wrapping it up and then he just sauntered back in and was like "I'm British! And I want to be friends with Javert. Cool? Cool." And then he left and I was like "But - wait - I didn't give you permission - aahhh"

Please drop a review! Also, obligatory apology time: I'm sorry for not updating ANYTHING. Please accept this as a Thanksgiving oneshot and a token of my appreciation that you guys still read my stuff! I am not a bad person; I am a college student. My days are taken up with fighting through the mighty jungle of final exams, writing papers for various classes, and killing ramen packets for my dinner. Ramen fights are hard, yo. You gotta take that stuff seriously.

Okay time for papers and NaNo. I HAVE CAFFEINE, I CAN DO THIS. SLEEP IS FOR PANSIIIEESSS