*** The tangled mess ***

* Threads, strings, elastic bands, cords... in varied colors and materials. Who may think that it won't end up being a shapeless tangled mess? Even the best threads end up tangled, as a rotten apple rotting the rest. You try to keep them separated, in their skeins... but there's no way. You can try to loose everything thread by thread, but they are knotted to each other. There's nothing to do. *

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Father?

Madeleine and Skipper were sliding throughout the corridors in the agency trying not to be seen, him having the revelation in his head. How could it be? It wasn't unusual to have several members of the same family at an agency, but... how come he had never known it if both had been his superiors? How could a father and a daughter feel such a festered mutual hatred?

Madeleine opened her office door and both went in.

"So Norbert is your father," Skipper said bluntly.

Madeleine said nothing, she just dried a silent tear. Skipper noticed the gesture and approached her. He wanted to be sweet, which was not his thing.

"What reason do you have to hide it? I know it must be very unpleasant to have a father like him, but -"

"It's better not to talk about that," Madeleine interrupted him.

"No. We must talk about it. There is trust between us, right?"

Madeleine shook her head. "No. Remember that I'm your superior."

Skipper raised her chin with his flipper. "No. Remember that once we were more than a boss and a subordinate." He saw then the scar on Madeleine's beak. "Hey, wait... what's this?"

Madeleine covered her beak instinctively and turned around.

"I've seen it," he said.

"Then... why are you asking what it is?"

"Because I want to know how you got it."

"It was an accident," she said, defensively.

Skipper leaned his flippers on the wall, holding her between them. He was staring at her very seriously. His eyes were saying that he didn't believe her. Obviously. Who could believe the most pathetic of all lies? Why didn't she tell him the truth for once for a change? She wanted, but she couldn't. She wanted to be sincere with him, to lift that weight which was squeezing her heart. On the other hand, she was scared. Fear had shaped all her lies, so many that she herself doubted about everything, and she was afraid of discovering what was under the surface. She couldn't say anymore that it was due directly to fear from her father: she had given him a blow that might have killed him and she didn't regret it nor she cared if he took revenge on her. She wouldn't allow Norbert to put his flipper on her again. Not without fighting.

"You want me to tell you it was him, right?" she finally said.

"No. I want you to tell me the truth. All what you have to tell me."

Madeleine sighed. "Okay..." She looked at Skipper and closed her eyes. "He always treated me badly. At first he told me things that I didn't like, such as that he didn't like me or that he was ashamed of me. Later he started to tell me very ugly words, his insults were direct and cruel. When I told my mother, she didn't believe me. Soon after she died, one day he slapped me. With no-one to complain, it had started being his word against mine and he didn't need to conceal his cruelty. So he went on."

Skipper was speechless. How could anyone tolerate that without rebelling? Saying nothing, he put his flipper on her shoulder and moved her closer to him. He heard her sobbing drowned in his plumage. Although he didn't say it, it cut him to the quick to see the true Madeleine. The colonel was strong and assertive, and she faced up to whomever. But when they all left and the chevrons were a minor thing, her determination abandoned her. Skipper sensed it, but he didn't understand it. The only thing he could do at that moment was to listen to her and to caress her head as he'd do to an abandoned little creature. He kissed her scar.

"Then... he did this to you? When?"

"When I called you for the last time. I couldn't hide the egg. He hit me and took it. I woke up in the agency hospital and I was told that Flint had taken me there, but I didn't remember it. He always insisted that it should only be known by him and me. Some days ago he told me that he had a very important document and that I had to revise and destroy it."

"He knew he was dying," Skipper just said.

"He also apologized for having let your team in the flippers of other penguins. At first I couldn't do my job, I couldn't even talk and I had to learn to enunciate again. When I did it I asked him to let me go back to my post, but he told me that I should talk to you as little as possible. Until Norbert was about to separate you for what happened to you with Blowhole, and Flint made me go back. But he told me to avoid talking about the egg and especially about what only he and I knew, which is detailed in the document."

"And what was it?"

"I cannot tell you! If I could, I would tell you. I'm sorry to leave you that way, but I really cannot tell you."

"Wait..." Skipper said. "If even I cannot know it, you must take it out of there. Why don't we go to look for it? Can you enter his office?"

Madeleine showed him the key which hung from her neck, hidden in her plumage.

There was no time to lose. Both left Madeleine's office towards Flint's. They slid throughout the corridors unseen, until they arrived at Flint's office door. Madeleine put the key in the lock... and she noticed that the door wasn't locked. Both stared at each other: that couldn't be good.

Skipper opened the door carefully gesturing Madeleine for being silent. He slid stealthily inside the office while Madeleine stayed in the corridor. Suddenly, light was switched on. Opposite Skipper there was Norbert, with a bandage on his head and aiming at him with a gun.

"Hey, look who's here," he said in a humorous tone. "And I'm ready."

"My team has cannons with lasers, flamethrowers, crossbows, katanas... I'm not impressed by that toy." Skipper was boasting, but he knew that he should be careful with a demented such as Norbert. Just in case, he put his flippers up.

"That things are really impressing, I won't deny it." Norbert showed a confident smile. "But they're not here, and this humble gun is. Or did you bring your little monster to hack them up?"

That comment made Skipper's blood boil. Nobody picked on one of his team. Norbert noticed that in his stare.

"And let me think..." Norbert went on. "You've come here with an intention, surely to search something." Skipper tensed when he heard that. "But you have no-one to carry picklocks or paperclips or master keys, and of course you don't have a key for this office. So..."

To Skipper's surprise, Norbert passed at his side ignoring him and went to the corridor.

"My child, it's not okay to stay outside... especially when you opened it." Norbert aimed at Madeleine. "That's right, good girl... let's go inside and talk like level-headed penguins."

Level-headed penguins... Norbert's cynism had no limits.

.

The three were inside general Flint's office. Norbert was standing behind the deceased leader's chair, aiming alternatively at Skipper and Madeleine's heads. They were keeping their flippers up. They spent that way for some minutes, totally silent. Skipper was staring at Norbert, trying to discover thanks to his demeanor and gestures when he would lower his guard, and then he'd take his weapon. Madeleine's gaze went from side to side of the office, looking for the document unsuccessfully. The whole office was full of folders in all colors: on the desk there were several high piles, some more organized than others. Several chairs had some other folder piles, not as high but enough to start threatening to fall down. And the shelves: two walls totally covered by shelves full of books and folders. There were signs indicating the subject, like in libraries. And the folders, they all perfectly aligned.

All except one. A sky blue folder, almost white, standing a bit above the rest.

"And what did you come to do here?" Norbert asked.

"What did you come to do?" Skipper retorted.

"I have the weapon, I ask the questions," Norbert answered. "Madeleine, answer me."

Madeleine said nothing.

"Come on..."

"I need some documents for the meeting," she lied.

"And why would they be here?"

"Because general Flint left them here for me."

Norbert got nearer Madeleine, with the gun still in his flipper, not lowering his guard.

"Why are you so sure that you will be the next general in the agency?" he asked.

"Because he told me personally. And he specifically said that you wouldn't be because you are a traitor, vile, swindling and corrupt," she answered staring directly at his eyes.

That upset Norbert a lot. Everybody knew that Flint had never appreciated him, but it was a low blow to have told his own daughter that. And what now? He was buried and was going to be eaten by worms... and would he go on commanding? He got nearer her, putting the weapon on her temple. Madeleine closed her eyes thinking that she was going to die right then.

"Don't even dare, Norbert," Skipper warned him.

Norbert stared at him. "Tell me why I should listen to you."

"Because, if you killed her, you couldn't be a general even though you were the only possible candidate. Remember that the first requirement is not having commited a violent crime."

Norbert was keeping the gun touching her daughter's head. She was praying silently, waiting for all to end.

"Tell me, Norbert: have you ever killed anyone?" Skipper asked him.

"Outside warfare, I haven't."

Skipper didn't want Norbert to be a general, but he wanted less something bad to happen to Madeleine. His priority at that moment was to protect her. He was going to eat huge crow.

"This won't be your first time, Norbert. Let your daughter live and earn the post in the meeting."

Norbert lowered his weapon. Madeleine, who wasn't recovered from the fright, hugged Skipper.

"Then, may the best win," Norbert said. "Madeleine, if that is you, you'll have the opportunity to discover how you really are. And remember that you have my genes, so you know what you may expect." He looked at Skipper disdainfully and at Madeleine then. "Remember what you did as soon as you were given a little power. Admit that it was just for the pleasure of feeling poweful."

He turned around and left.

"It was an act of rebellion!" she shouted while her father was getting away.

Norbert had spared their lives... and that was it? There had to be some trap, and Madeleine had just taken the bait. Skipper was staring at her incredulously.

"Rebellion? That's what I was for you?" Skipper was feeling hurt.

"I didn't mean that."

"Then what did you mean? I understand that you felt nothing for me, that you only wanted yor father to know it so he was pissed off. Why? I don't know!"

Skipper turned around raging and left. Madeleine followed him and overtook him at the end of the corridor, making him stop.

"It's not that, let me explain it."

Skipper crossed his flippers.

"Well, okay... I did a lot of things to make him mad. But not this, you have to believe me!"

"You played with my feelings!" Skipper shouted.

"Do you believe that I didn't feel anything for you?!" Madeleine was about to cry.

"Now I don't believe anything!"

Skipper went to the stairs that were after the corner. He didn't look back even once. Madeleine let him leave: she had fucked it up. If he hated her now, she had looked for trouble. Talking about looking for, she had gone to look for the folder. Being the corridor and the office empty, Madeleine retraced her steps and took the sky blue folder. She opened it.

Bingo.