Profile: M. Jean Auguste Sauveur

[Daroga]

Username: Jean Sauveur
Character: M. Jean Auguste Sauveur
Age: Ask me no questions I'll tell you no lies. To coin the phrase, "Old enough to no better and too young to care". It is what is in the heart which keeps me young.
(For the more detail oriented… he recently celebrated the seventh anniversary of his 29th birthday).
Gender: Le Gentilhomme
Occupation: Patron of the Arts

History: Jean was born and raised in Marseille. He ventured abroad shortly following his 16th birthday, but returned home before his 21st birthday when his mother fell sick. He then helped his father realize his dream of opening his own school, where he taught for many years. Missing the world beyond he has used his father’s wealth and his own name to move into a house in Paris and indulge in his true passion, the arts.
Dark and light, constant and varied. My history is my own. If you wish to know it you only need speak with me. It made me who I am as all history does.
Personality: Used to wealth but not a stranger to the more meager ways of surviving, Jean is a man of all occasions. The engage in conversation with him is a dance in and of itself as he sees it as the art of the common tongue. And never be lured in by his casual familiarity, in no situation is he ever naïve and rarely less than three steps ahead. But don’t be put off by his moody sarcasm when it manifests itself. He is at the end of the day he is a good man and a student and lover of people and all their facets… perhaps that was why he was drawn to opera, and the sharp contrast of these personalities and situations that it offered.
Other: Jean would like to say, If you have not yet deciphered who I am, you are simply not paying attention and there is no point in spelling it out for you here… Adieu

Click to plotty! (http://www.phantoms-opera.com/showthread.php?t=2522)

[Daroga]

A few things to note about M. Jean Auguste Sauveur

Jean grew up happy and healthy in the comfort of a wealthy family in Marseille. His father, Philippe Sauveur, held many varied interest in the fishing and shipping industries of this thriving port town. Many of these titles held under the Sauveur name had been passed down through generations each adding to it their own successes and watching the family fortune grow. There was not much that young Jean wanted for. But his kind hearted and shrewd mother, Sabine, made sure that this did not do anything to spoil the disposition of her young son. She taught him respect and civility, to value life and the value of a hard days work.

In all the upper class couple had done a truly noble job in raising their son to be a picture of the grace of wealth, not the sneeringly rude product of it too often seen. It was with all this in mind that on the eve of his sixteenth birthday they decided that young Jean was mature, well-grounded, and level-headed enough to hear the only thing that the close knit family had ever kept from him. Unfortunately they had underestimated the impetuousness of youth.

That night they confessed to him that a childhood disease had left Mdme Sauveur unable to have children. Shortly before Jean's own birth they had thought their curse lifted, only to have their hopes dashed in a painful miscarriage. Jean, it turned out, was not really their son.

He had been born Luc Reynard, the son of Henri Reynard one of the men who worked on one of M. Sauveur's many ships. Shortly after his birth the sailor had appeared on the door step and left young Luc with them before fleeing into the night. By the morning light it was discovered that M. ReynardÂ’s wife was dead and the police left with two equally possible suspects. It was suspected at large that she had been killed by some nefarious men to whom the husband owed either large amount of money or at the very least some sort of favor or explanation for a deal gone bad. The Sauveurs though were privy to the knowledge that while the police didnÂ’t dismiss this possibility they were leaning more heavily towards the delinquent father in their suspicions. But the truth was never discovered and the crime left unsolved.

Upon hearing of this turn of events they knew that it was unlikely that the police or anyone else would ever see Henri Reynard ever again. Thus the young couple, without hesitation, made the decision to adopt the boy. Quietly and through the ambiguous channels open to people with money and influence they sealed the deal within 24 hours and the newborn Luc Reynard was rechristened Jean Auguste Sauveur.

Hearing all of this from the only people he had ever known as mother and father was a wound to adolescent pride of Jean. He went to bed that night in furious rage at all that had been kept from him and assured by his teenage arrogance that they were mistaken or deceived in all the things they accuse of M. Reynard. By morning the Sauveurs had hoped that his head had cleared enough to see their reasoning, but instead they found that it was his room that had been cleared. Cleared of its occupant and the necessities he saw fit to take with him on his wayward adventure to find what he was certain would be his “real” family.

~*~*~

Philippe never asked how Jean knew that his mother had been ill when he reappeared on their doorstep five years later (for which Jean was glad as he wasnÂ’t certain he could find a proper explaination). The older man merely wept like a child as he embraced his prodigal son expressing his deep thanks that heaven would restore his child to him even as it had seen fit to take his wife away. In that moment Jean finally learned that a true fatherÂ’s love, compassion, and forgiveness knew no bounds, as he too discovered himself in tears.

But that day Jean cried for another reason. While the older M. Sauveur shed tears of joy the younger was in deep mourning. Racked by the grief of losing a mother he cherished without the chance to say good-bye, angry with himself for all the things he had let himself destroy through stubborn pride, ashamed of all he had seen and heard and done since leaving those hallowed halls, and heartbroken at what he had had to lose to come backÂ… Jean became a child again in the arms of his father as they wordless poured their souls together at their reunion.

In the weeks that followed there was no denying that the 21 year old man who had returned to Marseille was a different soul than the one who had snuck out under the cover of night. Philippe never asked for an explanation of the depth of his sonÂ’s eyes or the weight that seemed to hang about him, maturing him beyond his years. But Jean always felt that the man, in some deep secret way knew all of his secrets without him having to speak them aloud. And for this understanding and love, and to try to repair the hurt he had cause by his leaving, Jean knew that he would never again be able to leave his rediscovered and finally appreciated family.

After the grief of Sabine's passing dulled slightly Philippe enlisted Jean to help in his life's ambition, starting a small private school on the farm land the family owned just outside the city. His son enthusiastically agreed anxious to build new life of which he could be proud and free himself from the shadows he had been living in.

But sure as a shadow will always attach itself to your heel and never let you be, it didn’t take long for the dark dealings of his former life to find him. Denying it was not an option, the repercussions not worth the reward and so he was pulled back into a shadow game that he played all too well. The truly sickening part was the fact that his new position in his father school offered him an ironical excellent position from which to conduct such matters. Jean couldn’t help but feel this was yet another betrayal of the old man’s love—no mater how many times Philippe assured him it was not too high a price to pay to have his son with him again.

So Jean exsisted for a decade and half walking a strange and winding road to redemption that has finally brought him to Paris. He hopes that now he has finally worked his way to a position where he can step away from that life, that he can begin to enjoy his own again. But everytime the sun smiles down on him with the hope of brighter future he knows that it will throw shadows into harsher prospective, lurking always just a few steps behind himÂ…

[Daroga]

Jean dropped his keys in the dish by the door with the knowledge that when he left the door would remain unlocked and the keys in exactly that position. He wouldn't stay long, and he wouldn't be back. Without hesitation he went to his bedroom closet and from the furthest, darkest corner of the top shelf pulled down a non-descript black bag that contained what would from this moment on be his life.

The romantic appeal of a life outside the law, outside all the barriers and carefully defined limits of polite society, came with one undeniable catch. Once you dove into this existence you would never, ever, be free of it. Jean knew this. He had never tried to deny it or fight it, he had merely accepted it. Of course it was easier to accept when he first made this decision. When he was sixteen and filled with the righteous anger of youthful pride. Back then he couldn't imagine not being able to walk away from one shell of an existence and rebuild another, and to his present day chagrin had almost perceived it as game. A lifelong journey of cat and mouse, where he would sometimes be the cat and other times the mouse. But all of that was before he had been a teacher or a father or a respected patron of the arts, before he had learned about true family, true love, and a satisfied life. Now he looked at the black bag and realized more certainly than he ever had before that this was not a game. And if it were, the prize would be living, it always was. But to win it he would lose everything else in this world, including himself. A hollow victory that, as he continued to stare at the black mass on his bed cover, he was forced to wonder, was it truly worth winning?

He had first packed this bag sixteen years ago. He had just returned to Marseilles prepared to beg for his father's forgiveness only to discover that there was no clemency required as there had never been any blame. It was something he hadn't quite been prepared to hear and thus left him unsure of what to do next. He had spent the night in his father's house, in the room with the same window he had snuck out of all those years before, and felt crushed by an mammoth guilt. He knew what was out there, the shadow that followed him. He knew what he had brought back with him, and what could now hurt the only family he had left in the world. As he stared at that ceiling, remembering the impulse to run when he should have stayed that had won him over the last time he was there, he had battled with the impulse to stay when he knew he should flee. Just as he had when he was sixteen he had given in to the impulse, he had stayed in Marseilles, but this black bag had been his concession to his better judgment. This was all that he would take with him on that fateful day when his past would catch up with him and threaten those that he needed to protect. That with this bag and nothing else he would walk away from everyone and everything he knew and cared about was a reality he had admitted to himself would inevitably come someday. Today, it turned out, was that day.

The contents of the bag had changed over the years. He regularly rotated the two simple changes of clothes it contained and small collection of toiletries. The original bohemian garb, with which he had imagined he could blend into the cities nomadic youth of backpackers and vagabonds and disappear, had been long since discarded. The fake passports of multiple nationalities had needed to be updated through the years so that the picture remained current, and when the security became more stringent the quality of them had been vastly improved. Also with the progression of the technological age a disposable cellular phone had been added. The cash in it's neatly wound bundles in the large Manila envelope had been updated with advent of the Euro, which had thankfully brought the number of currencies he needed to carry down to a simple three; the Euro, the American dollar, and the British pound. But the most recent change was the letter to his brother that had been added several months ago, that he had, fatefully, never bring himself to discard. The small assortment of weapons had stayed mostly the same, though most of the metal had been replaced with as effective substitutes that would easily pass through a metal detector. The only thing that hadn't changed was the handgun which always sat on the very top in it's leather case.

He could list and identify every one of these items without ever moving the zipper. Year after year they had been packed meticulously, check routinely, and stowed safely. They were as familiar to him as the plan that accompanied the case, he could recite it in his sleep and had never muttered a syllable of it aloud. But he now knew that even after all his planning, his plan wouldn't work. His first stop had always been Hamburg it was a far enough distance away to give him space and time to think and plan. He would see Pieter Lachen.

Even though Pieter held a unique position on the periphery of this dark society the amount that he knew about it was a source of continual astonishment. But the German doctor had always flatly refused to repeat any of these secrets until he had made Jean the simple promise that if and when this day should arrive he would tell him everything that could be of use. It was a one time offer that had almost nothing to do with Jean himself. Pieter's was more to Jean's plan than a safe haven and source of information, he was also to be the Frenchman's last link to those that he loved. He was the only person in the world who knew and could contact the these people. It was from Lachen that they would learn that he had gone underground and would most likely never see them again. His role as Polaris' godfather was far more than a sentimental title, it was a pledge that when Jean was gone he would protect the boy and his mother at all cost. For his father's protection Jean had gone in a more ruthless direction. Jean's father was protected with fear. Long ago he had created contracts with six of the most godless and sinister men he knew, his six fiercest competitors in the trade. Should the elder Sauveur die in any way other than peacefully in his bed these men would receive a share of a large Swiss bank account set up for this specific purpose, and if any man did not honor his contact, his portion of the money would go to the man who made him regret it.

All of these steps he had gone through in preparation for this moment. He had what he needed to take, plans for where to go next, security for those who needed it, and a simple mental checklist of things to be double check before he departed. He could not have been any more prepared if he had known for months the date and time this moment would come. Except that he now saw the flaws of all of it.

Pieter Lachen was not in Hamburg, he was in Paris, and Jean had just made his best effort to get a message to him without putting him in any further danger. To go back to him now would compromise everything, including his friend's safety. Pieter was happy here in Paris, and whether he admitted it or not he was falling in love and therefore had to prospect of a new life of his own ahead of him. Could Jean risk that by asking him assume the responsibility of Polaris' safety? Lachen would say yes, that was not a question. The question came in moral delima of asking him to make that sacrifice. And what about Polaris? For years he had lived under Jean's enforced secrecy, and was just beginning to enjoy the prospect of having a life he didn't have to lie about as well as one that opened up to the possibilities of his own future. He would most likely have to go into hiding for a while if not indefinitely. There was no way he could rationalize that to himself as any sort of decent father. Speaking of fathers, could he put his through the trauma of actually losing son... again? Jean might not be dying, he might be fighting to live, but once he disappeared the effect on the old man would be the same.

Jean sank onto the bed next to the bag and laid a hand on the top, tracing the trail of the zipper back and forth as all these thought swirled about him. When he had first packed this bag and made these plans he had thought only of what he was willing to sacrifice to keep people safe, he hadn't stopped to consider what they would have to sacrifice when he was gone. "...yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished, visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth generations..." The line floated up from an even more distant past that haunted his conscience on occasion. It was the remnantn of a past where he had been raised in a loving and religious home, taught bible verses and to fear and love God. One of those verses, as the tend to do, had stuck with him. He hadn't chosen or even realized he remembered it til the day he had met his biological father, the man who's blood was in his veins and on his hands. It was the sins of that man that he had felt pressing in on him for so much of his life. It was the way he had justified this dark part of himself when it seemed so beyond comprehension. These were burdens he must bear, the sins of his father written on his soul. But what about his son? Where did it stop if he didn't stop it?

The weary and distraught look that had haunted Jean's dark features as he had entered his home faded slowly but steadily into a look of grim determination. With a long steady movement, the haunting sound of each tooth of the zipper slowly seperating themselves echoed off the ceiling as he slowly pulled the tab to open the bag, revealing the dark prospect it held to himself. He tenderly removed the gun in it's holster, lifting out the white envelope addressed to Luc Danier that sat beneath it, tucking it into his breast pocket. The gun was replaced and the zipper closed before the bag was unceremoniously heaved back into the shadows of his closet. His reliable firearm was in the drawer of his bedside table along with his passport. Ignoring the unamused shadow of the bag he had discarded he retrieved his normal travel bag and began to fill it for a trip. Moments later Jean left his apartment, his keys in his pocket, the door locked securely behind him. He would end it. He would face his sins and the sins of those generations of that came before him and it would end with him. But first there were some people he needed to see and the last train for Marseille would be leaving in an hour.