A/N: I'm posting this totally for you, PPG. Since you asked me to and really couldn't wait. :)

Chapter Ten – Reunited

Tintin walked along the streets of downtown Marseille, the sun throwing its warm rays into his face and giving the streets the feeling of a fresh summer day. It was a beautiful day, a perfect one really: not only was the sun casting the perfect amount of light, but a light breeze swept in from the south and sent a light salty small into the air. "Can you smell it, Snowy?" he asked, taking a look down at his feet. Snowy wasn't there. Looking back, Tintin saw him trotting back with a good bone stuck in his jaws. He shook his head. "If you weren't my longest friend, Snowy, I'd just have to–"

BANG.

Instinctively, Tintin ducked down and started running. The gunshot sounded slightly far away, and he didn't feel any pain, so he assumed it was someone else being shot at. Another murder could've just slipped through my fingers! Spinning around a corner, he noticed someone thrashing in the water, holding onto some submerged thing that he couldn't see. Just the movement told him that whoever was down there was alive, and that in itself was a good sign. The struggling person reached out toward the road, trying to grab onto the side but being just a foot too far, so he ran over to the edge and met their hand halfway.

Snowy, who had been following Tintin all the way, started barking at the person in the water. But it wasn't a threatening bark; it was more of a bark saying "Hello! Hello! What's going on?"

Ignoring Snowy's frantic barks, Tintin pulled the person back toward the road, letting go of their hand as they dragged themselves onto dry land and coughed, ignoring the fuzzy white dog that was trying to jump up on them. "I…am never…doing that…again!"

Tintin tried to look past the long blond hair and look at their face. "…Ellie?"

"Tintin?" Ellie looked up and flung the hair out of her face. "Tintin! Thank goodness! I was just…" She remembered that other hand was still underwater, so she dragged whatever she was holding onto the road beside her. It was a girl with black hair.

"Who's that?" Tintin's voice gained a fresh layer of worry as he crouched down beside the other girl. She wasn't breathing, and her eyes were glazed over and frozen in an eternally shocked expression.

"Louisa. She said she was a witness…to the latest Marseille murder. She said she was supposed to meet you, but…she couldn't." Ellie coughed a bit of water out of her lungs. "Then there was a gunshot and we both fell into the water. I wasn't hurt."

"Well she was." He pointed to a small hole at her neck; blood was pooling out around it. "She's dead now." His voice sounded hollow, as if he was thinking that he could've saved her somehow.

"She was telling us the name of the man that killed the man in Marseille. She said no one else saw it." Ellie sighed – partly from exhaustion and partly from exasperation.

"'Us?'" Tintin looked at her strangely. "Who's 'us?'"

At that moment, Chang emerged from the derelict building opposite the water, looking slightly upset. "He got away. He didn't leave any – Tintin!"

"Chang!" The two friends hugged for a moment, but stepped back before it could too awkward. "What are you doing here?"

"I had the feeling you were in trouble," Chang said with a smile. "Once I found out about the plane crash in Reims, I followed her."

"You followed her?" Tintin looked back at Ellie, who was now on her feet and wringing out her hair.

"Look at this," she said, brushing off the question and pointing to a silver chain around Louisa's neck. Unclasping it, she noticed something very strange about the pendant. It was shaped like a butterfly, but where there should've been colored jewel wings, there was nothing.

Tintin looked at the pendant for a moment, shaking his head. "Of course they're gone." He took it from her, silently reminding himself to take it to Detective Trouver later. But there was still a question that he had to know the answer to; he turned to Chang. "You followed her?"

"What do you mean, 'of course they're gone?' Did you find out anything more about the murders that may help us find the murderer?" Ellie was obviously avoiding the question. Chang rolled his eyes.

"I did find out something. I'm heading to a museum in Marseille tomorrow." Tintin picked up the unseeing Louise and turned to Chang. "We need to take her to the hospital. They will know what to do with her."

"I'll go find a phone," Chang replied quickly, then turned and ran off in the direction of the nearest business, disappearing around a corner.

Silence hovered between Tintin and Ellie for a while as they both looked at the sky, the water, the surrounding buildings…nearly everything but each other.

"…Is now a bad time to tell you something?" It was Ellie that spoke first, staring down at her feet.

"I guess not," Tintin replied. "Why?"

"Well, I need to get something off of my chest. I've been meaning to tell you, but I've never gotten the chance." Ellie looked up at him, total seriousness in her voice. "Could you promise to believe me?"

"Of course I would. Why wouldn't I?"

"…I don't know." Ellie looked down at Louisa for a moment, then back up at Tintin. "Well, now is as good a time as ever. I –"

At that moment, Chang ran back down the street toward them, leaning against a building to catch his breath once he neared them. "I'm sorry I took so long. It took me a while before anyone would allow me to use a phone. But there's an ambulance coming now."

"Thank you Chang," Tintin said with a smile, taking just a moment to flash a questioning glance at Ellie. We'll talk later.

He was answered with silence.