Earthquake

Chapter 13 - Marinette!

The two American soldiers lead them to the hidden entrance to the building and let them inside. Adrien was carrying his daughter and, halfway through, he surprisingly noticed that her leg was looking like new. On the sight of his face the little girl only smiled, happy with her new ability, and kept quiet. The younger man's name was Paul Mondelez and he was a full-fledged soldier for almost two years. However, the older one, who was still looking at them like they were the worst criminals, was introduced as Brand Mister. From what Paul said, no one really knew how old he is.

They were in a long and narrow corridor, with lots of doors on both sides. Brand lead them forward in silence, once in a while mumbling something to the walkie-talkie that was hanging from his waist. He didn't know how many rooms they had passed, but when they finally ordered them to stop and went to the first door to the left they found themselves in a small room, with only a table and a couple of chairs inside.

'Sit down,' Mister growled, pushing his inside. 'Someone with the appropriate competences to talk with you, will be here in a while.'

And he left, pulling Paul, who was assuring them that they will talk again later, behind him.

'We got into trouble,' Adrien stated, putting his daughter on his lap and closer inspecting her leg. 'Are you sure that nothing hurts you any longer?'

'Everything's alright, daddy,' said Félicité, smiling at him happily, however sadness appeared on her face after a while. 'I'm sorry. It's all my fault.'

'Nothing happened,' the attempt at consolation didn't quite work out as it should have. 'How could we know that we'll land just beside some secret military base?'

Then, the door's opened with a bang and some middle-aged man came inside. He was dressed as if he had just came out of the laboratory, in which something exploded. On one of his breasts he had big embroidered HM letters, and LDC on the other one. HM? Was that possible? He measured them up and down with his eyes, then he looked at Brand, who was standing before the door.

'Are they really this very dangerous spies that you found when they were trying to break into the base?' he asked doubtfully.

The soldier didn't answer, snorted and got out. Paul was the only one at the door. This was the occasion they couldn't waste. They just had to wait for the right moment. He shot an understanding look at Félice. She nodded.

'Okay,' the man murmured, visibly unpleased that he has to deal with this. 'Answer a couple of my questions,' he took a pad with some page and a pen, out of his apron. 'First name and last name?'

'Adrien and Félicité Agreste,' he answered calmly.

'Degree of kinship?'

'She's my sister,' the hugest idiocy would be to tell the truth. It would lead them to unnecessary complications. Even he wasn't that stupid and impulsive.

'Age?'

'Seventeen and ten,' what was he supposed to say. Two months?

'Parents?' he didn't even looked up at them, only writing his words on a piece of paper.

'Lucette and Gabriel Agreste.'

The man's eyelid twitched. Did he knew his father?

'Place of residence?'

'Paris.'

The man wrote the last sentence down and finally slid his sight through them.

'So, why were you found in the middle of the Sahara desert, whole and healthy?'

It's time. He squeezed Félicité's hand three times, silently signaling her to count to three.

'You know, sir,' the boy laughed, combing his hair. 'It's an interesting story...'