Ça Va Sans Dire
French, means: “it goes without saying”
Summary: V survives the shooting and the story continues.
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Nothing from V for Vendetta is mine. This is just for fun.
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Chapter 3
“V?”
“Yes, Evey?” He was sitting up in his bed, reading. In the space of few days he had improved a great deal. He was more talkative and back to quoting lines from his mountains of books. He also stayed awake for longer stretches which boosted her confidence and made her feel free enough to detach herself from his side more frequently and for longer and longer periods. Thus the laundry was done, the bathroom clean and meals had improved from toast and jam to more creative fare. She also had time for TV.
What she saw on the screen scared her.
“I have to go up there.” She had been watching the news and it wasn’t good. Norsefire still had control of BTN and they were filling the airwaves with panic inducing lies. They spoke of riots and outbreaks of St. Mary’s and, more dubiously, Ebola. The message of fear that Norsefire had always used to keep people in line was being screamed through the airways with so much violence and hate it was terrifying. It was much the same as it had been just prior to the explosion at Parliament but now that the act was done there had been no word from V and Norsefire was capitalizing on his silence. Someone had to say sometime soon or the people would give up hope.
They might already be doing so. The interviews BTN showed with people on the streets made it seem like the masses were angry with V, like they wanted things to go back to normal.
She knew it wasn’t entirely true, not yet, but if you tell someone a lie often enough they will come to believe it.
“I had hoped you would.” His voice smiled at her and she had an image of him as a proud father sending his child off to university. She didn’t like that thought.
She rubbed her hand back and forth on her nearly bald skull. The prickly rough then smooth feel of what was left of her hair had become as comforting as twirling a lock had been when she’d had hair.
“I want to tell them what you told me. I want to remind them what we were before all this and what we can be again if we stick together. Will you be alright for a few hours?”
He put his book down, giving her his full attention. His head cocked to the left which indicated a question. “Of course. But if Norsefire controls the media, how are you planning to do this, might I ask?”
Evey’s stomach flip flopped. She’d known he would ask and she knew she wouldn’t lie to him but she was concerned that he would not be pleased with who she had enlisted to help her. “I’ve been back in touch with Detective Finch. He says he has access to the emergency frequency and that my message can be broadcast through the speaker network like you did with the music. I’m going to do it tonight when people are at home and most likely to hear it. We’re planning to do it right after the evening news. But I have to ask you something first.”
“Anything.”
Apparently he didn’t care about Finch. An interesting detail that she filed away for later examination. There was a bigger concern on her mind.
“Are you alive or dead these days?”
“Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one's head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday, and no tomorrow. To forget time, to forgive life, to be at peace." [1] He looked away from her, staring at the wall.
Time dragged out as she waited for him to say something else but he didn’t. To confirm she said, “So you’re dead.”
He picked his book back up and nodded. “To everyone but you, yes.”
Tone of voice and body language were all she had with V. And he was usually verbose in both cases. His voice gave her nothing now since it was still tinged with pain but the slump of his shoulder and the slight droop of his head spoke eloquently of loss. She reminded him, “But the idea will live on.”
He nodded, “In you.”
Okay, my friend, clearly a refocus is in order here. For a man with as much vision as V had, she knew he had to have something in mind for after his ‘death’. Apparently, it was time to get him thinking about it. “Can I ask you something else?”
“Of course.”
“What are you planning to do now?”
"The past and the present are within the field of my inquiry, but what a man may do in the future is a hard question to answer." [2]
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[1] Oscar Wilde – The Canterville Ghost
[2] Sir Frances Conan Doyle – Hound of the Baskervilles
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