Alexandria (ONC entry)

Part two

Clutching the briefcase containing Agata's testimonial in a death grip, Maxence smoothly made her way through the Cairo airport, her blonde ponytail swishing behind her in the rhythm of her paces. She couldn't help but casually check out any potential threats in her peripheral vision: it wouldn't be the first time an archaeologist would be ambushed on the trip to the analytics lab and their finds stolen. Maxence shivered as she recalled a story her Dad used to tell her in that lilting French accent of his she always made fun of; a story about an archaeologist who'd dug up some medieval jewelry and a couple of huge rough rubies. On the way to his analytics lab, he'd gotten kidnapped and killed. The murderers had sold his finds and disappeared with the money. They'd never been unmasked.

Maxence gritted her teeth. Come on, Miller, she chided herself, angrily pushing her glasses up her nose. You're not going to get murdered. She shifted the weight from the briefcase to her left hand and stalked up to the receptionist's desk. A middle-aged man smiled at her and asked her what he could do for her. She whispered her name and the reason she was here and the man -- Jacob S., Maxence noticed out of the corner of her eye -- nodded in understanding, assigning her a chair in the waiting area and telling her that someone would be right with her. Maxence muttered a Thank you and shuffled her way through the crowd of people waiting their turn, never loosening her grip on her briefcase's handle.

Maxence waited for what felt like hours. The nervous tick of bouncing her knee she'd tried so hard to control resurfaced again: she tried to keep her mind off all the things that could possibly go wrong and to instead focus on the discoveries she'd made. Life-changing discoveries. History-changing discoveries.

For how long had people been speculating about the Alexandrian library and what happened to it? Centuries. Actual centuries, and if these documents proved legitimate, they would finally have their answer. Closure. If these documents were legitimate, they would not only have proof of how the library perished, they would also have scrolls that actually provened from the library. The finds would be unparallelled.

And they'd be hers.

Maxence had never experienced this kind of situation before. Had never been in a dig this important before. The fact that just a couple of days after she showed up to the site this kind of find was dug up was just unbelievable. Maxence still couldn't quite believe her luck.

She was pulled from her thoughts when someone cleared their throat in front of her. Surprised, she looked up and right into the face of who she assumed was her escort. He wore the same dark blue suit and red tie the rest of the workers milling about wore. His nametag read A. Dawson. Maxence pursed her lips. Where had she heard the name Dawson before? She felt like she should know it. It was an itch she couldn't scratch.

"Miss Mills?" the young man prompted, his dark eyes fixated on hers and his hands held behind his back in the professional way all flight attendants did. Maxence pushed the thought away. Dawson wasn't an uncommon last name. Probably an old friend of hers, or some far away family member... Oh, well. She smiled, stood up and followed the steward.

He led her down a couple of corridors, and Maxence was so lost in thought that at first she didn't notice anything was off. But there was.

She slowed her pace when the Dawson boy opened a door to a dark corridor. The sounds that usually filled an airport had faded to the background and the hallway she was walking through was bland. There were no signs pointing to the nearest gate, no billboards advertising some or other travel agency. A plaque above the door Dawson was holding open for her read Emergency exit.

Maxence cleared her throat. "Uhm," she started, "I don't-I don't mean to be rude or anything, but are you-are you sure that we're going the right way?"