Chapter 7

Jérémie and Aélita made their way down the ladder to the lab, both dressed in old cloths, to find Anthea and Franz had made a good sized dent in getting the place cleaned up. Music sang out of an old portable radio sitting on the floor under a plastic bag that hung from the elevator lock that showed a visible amount of rat poop and the broken keyboard, a few wires sticking out at the top. The screens now all lay on the floor, Franz sitting there with a tool box and a soldering kit as he worked on fixing what he could. Anthea looked up from where she was kneeling, pulling up the metal panels in the floor to do a thorough cleaning.

"There you two are," Anthea said, getting to her feet as she brushed her hands together. She reached up to tighten her pony tail and asked, "How was work?"

"Jérôme's still an idiot, IT doesn't know as much as they think they do, and truthfully, I shouldn't have the level of access I really do," Aélita admitted, rolling her eyes. "Though we think we found someone."

"Did you ever run into someone named Alexander Bau?" Jérémie asked.

"When I was stuck in the DRM's world," Anthea said, nodding her head as questions flitted across her face. She dropped her arms to her side and stared at the two, her mouth trying to find which question to start with.

"They work for the DRM, honey," Franz said as he leaned forward to solder a wire into place.

"You what!?" Anthea exclaimed.

"We're trying to save anyone else that was in that digital prison," Aélita explained.

"Alexander Bau's the first person we think we might've found," Jérémie said. "We don't work in the higher levels of the agency so technically we shouldn't even know of the virtual world's existence."

"What you're doing is very risky," Anthea warned, eyeing the two.

"We know," Aélita nodded her head.

"We wouldn't be doing it if we didn't believe what they were doing was wrong in the first place," Jérémie said. "People shouldn't be used as experiments like that."

"I'm proud of you two," Franz said, his eyes glued to his work on the floor.

"Thanks Daddy," Aélita said, smiling at the man.

"What do you want us to do?" Jérémie asked, getting back to the reason they were spending the afternoon underground.

"Could you see about fixing that chair?" Franz asked, looking over at the broken seat on the floor. "You might have to open the track up too and see what damage has been done there."

"You might want these," Anthea said, leaning down to pull out two pairs of latex rubber gloves from a box on the floor.

Jérémie took his pair and pulled them on before turning his attention to the overturned chair. To think when he had first found the place it had been ten years after Franz and Aélita had to run to Lyoko. He turned the chair over with a grunt and saw some tears in the upholstery that had happened during his constant two years of sitting in it but more had been added by the rats.

"We'll have to get a new pole to weld it into the track's swivel joint," Aélita said, knelling down at the piece of metal sticking up out of the floor.

"Do you know if Mrs. Akiko's still working on her sewing craze?" Jérémie asked, looking down at his wife.

"Check with Yumi, but I think so," Aélita offered, reaching over to the tool box beside her father on the floor to pull out a screwdriver.

"Maybe she can help us get this reupholstered," Jérémie mumbled.

"How are Odd and Annick holding up?" Anthea asked.

Jérémie noticed that was the first time he had heard the woman refer to his friend by his real name as he said, "We talked to them at lunch. They're only going to have a grave side service on Wednesday."

"Annick and Samantha should be released from the hospital by now," Aélita added. "Jérémie and I have plenty of vacation days built up so we're already taking the rest of the week off to help them."

"Not the best reason to use your vacation days," Franz pointed out.

"They want you to be at the funeral," Aélita said, keeping her eyes down as she started to unscrew the cover from the mechanisms that created the track.

"We'll be there," Anthea replied as she went back to pulling up the metal flooring to clean what was found under the panels. "Ech! I hate rats!"

"We should add rat poison to the list," Jérémie said, mentally creating a list for himself as he heard rats scurrying under the panels at his feet.