In the shadow of the iron tower, under the great triumphant arch, a young woman sits and watches as busy people pass her by. The job was supposed to be simple: rendezvous with a contact, codenamed "Icarus", trade briefcases and code phrases, then make a getaway on the Métro. After sitting for two hours, the woman, codename "Daedalus", checked her watch once again and decided this job just wasn't worth the risk or delay. She gets ready to abandon the mission when a mysterious man across from her and reaches out his hand.

"Daedalus, you must be cautious as I have reason to believe you are flying too close to the sun if you continue down this path."

"Then I shall remain within the Labyrinth, in the company of the Minotaur, my dearest Icarus." She greets his hand with hers as a shock wave of passionate electricity races through her body. The raven haired man with the striking blue eyes was an informant of The Organization, like her, though he remained guarded, always the professional.

"You're late," she quipped while meeting his gaze, trying to shake that feeling she got when they met, every time they met.

"And I see you haven't changed much since Paris," He said as he recalled the brief affair they'd had all those years ago. He smiled at the memory of the time the two of them, serious people with serious work, spent that one day together enjoying the water.

"That's not what we are here to talk about," Daedalus tried to push thoughts of the affair aside and held her briefcase out to exchange.

"It's hard not to," he responded, gazing off at the Seine as the sun sparkled on its pristine surface, "meeting here again brings me back..."

"Lets get this over with," she says as she tries to grab his briefcase but he waves his finger implying now is not the time.

"Surely you aren't curious why The Organization would send us here to exchange briefcases in broad daylight," He said as he raised an eyebrow.

"I'm more interested in why they would send you, but it did catch my suspicion so tell me more" she says perplexed.

"It's all rather odd to be honest, which is why I'd like to find out," he glanced around before pulling her into a nearby alley. "I suspect the two of us aren't being told the whole story..." he continues, "do you know the woman who founded The Organization?"

"I mean yeah everyone knows it was Edith Mason, Codename 'Ariadne'," she blinked and tapped her chin, "back in the 1880s right?"

"Exactly, but fewer know where it started," Icarus mused, "Ariadne came to this spot all those years ago."

        Daedalus had ponder the implications of this because if true, then that would mean they'd been brought here for a reason; a metaphorical "Ariadne's thread." Ariadne's thread.... an exhaustive solution, sure to lead them to the truth.

        "You know, she wasn't much different than us" Icarus stated "we are trained to disconnect from our emotions, as the most effective method but..."

        "But we never were good at that, so we better learn quickly."

        Icarus smiled, “logic dictates we exchange and leave, emotion dictates curiosity of the contents and if we try emotion...” he held up the briefcase.

        It was at that moment that they heard a noise, like someone was coming down the alley, like they had been found out. Did the Organization know they had questioned both the reason for their meeting and the contents of the briefcases? As she turned around, a family of American tourists armed with cell phones came bumbling into the alleyway, recording everything in their sight. Daedalus acted instinctively, grabbing Icarus' hand and pulling him into the propped open back door of a boulangerie, much to the baker's, and Icarus', surprise. “We should go somewhere more private for this, such as the motel up the road,” she said, ignoring the baker who was yelling profanities. Icarus grabs a croissant, winks at the baker and with that they set off to the motel. Down the road they scurried, past the Museum of Modern Art, to a quaint, yet luxurious room across from the famed Champs-Elysées Theatre. Icarus set down his briefcase and produced a number of paper documents, mostly screencaps of facebook conversations from groups The Organization had been monitoring.

        Daedalus blinked, completely confused, as Icarus produced the documents and said, "what the hell is The Organization doing that merits stalking these particular conversations?"

        "It's weirder than you think," Icarus said as he pulled out a few of the pages he'd earmarked, "I obviously wasn't supposed to see these."

        Daedalus couldn't respond as a knock on the door came, which revealed a Bellboy with the nametag "Aidan" offering special discounted tickets to Drippy Swifty. Icarus made sure to block the doorway so "Aidan" couldn't see inside the room, but the bellboy was stubbornly curious, insisting they take the tickets.

        After the fourth "no thank you", the bellboy got the hint and left, leaving the two wondering if it was coincidence he showed up. They went back to the briefcase and found their shuffled papers were somehow more shuffled than before...two earmarked tickets to Drippy Swifty among them.

        "We are being watched, I'm sure of it," Icarus said, making sure to deadbolt the door and lock the windows, telling Daedalus to check elsewhere. Daedalus defaulted back to what she had learned in training, and made an effort to search the room for any bugs or suspicious devices.

        "Check out those tickets," she told Icarus as she scoured the room for anything that may be out of place, "Wait, where is my briefcase?"

         Icarus spun around and exclaimed: "Don't tell me you left it with those tourists!"

         "Shit, Shit, SHIT, there's no way I was that foolish and I swear I had it at the bakery!"

        She snapped upright, exclaiming: "Wait, when the bellboy visited, our papers got shuffled, then I found these tickets... and now my briefcase is gone!" With that, she jumped up and ran to the hallway while he called the concierge desk, "there's no Aiden working here" he yelled after her. Frantically searching her mind on what to do next, Daedalus took a closer look at the tickets in her hand... and realized something was off. Specific highlighted letters spelled out “TOO CLOSE TO THE SUN” and by the time it dawned on her vision became fuzzy and her head throbbed. The next thing she knew, Daedalus was waking up in an unfamiliar place, a cavern of some sort, with distant sounds of rushing waters. A gentle sounding woman's voice resonates within her mind: "Follow the thread which I have laid before you." She gave her head a shake and looked around, trying to get her bearings, but everything felt off. The world she saw before her fell away in an instant:

"Daedalus, snap out of it, where did that bellboy run off to?!" She saw what looked like a golden shimmer in the light from a window at the end of the hall, "The Golden Thread" she whispered.

"Never mind the bellboy... I believe we can find something far greater, together... follow me." Daedalus bounded down the hallway towards the thread leaving Icarus dumbfounded, stumbling behind her, chattering about papers and bellboys, trying to keep up.

        "A device to exhaustively solve a problem... Ariadne's thread... while we were caught up in our chaotic lives fulfilling prompts, we forgot each other."

         Icarus could not follow what she was saying and just looked baffled as he said, “what the hell are you talking about?”

        She turns to him standing in the light, grabbing him close, the heat from the light and her body next to his burn through her.

        "Hold on to me tightly and promise you will never let go" she said as the heat began to rise even greater.

        “Daedalus I...I...” his vision became fuzzy as he nodded and tilted his lips toward hers and whispered, “always my love.” Having totally forgotten the bellboy and the papers and the facebook conversations by now, Icarus finally let his heart melt away in the moment. And as everything fades the two lovers crashed through the window and flew to their Deaths as intended by the organization.