You're serious. Some people here don't even get to keep their own bodies? [ The thought is unbearable. Valmont has just gotten done going through hell and high water to get control of his body back. If, after all that, he were to have it snatched away from him... He doesn't even want to imagine. ]

[ And for whatever reason, Valmont finds himself inclined to believe this man about the France thing. Maybe it's the faint sense of familiarity he feels towards him, as though perhaps they'd met. Maybe it's just that no one who was trying to fool him would come up with such an implausible lie. ]

Suppose you are indeed France. I happen to have some French ancestry, myself. [ It seems like the most inane thing to bring up, but he doesn't know what else to say. ] Would that make us related?