With Hawkmoth finally taken care of, Adrien feels that he is ready to let the world know who is beneath Chat Noir's mask. Unfortunately, no matter how hard he tries, the world seems determined to undermine his every effort.

"I'm telling you, Plagg, there's really no down side to this."

"Ladybug will be annoyed if you go through with it, you know. Then I'll have to deal with your whining, and that's never fun for anyone."

"She said she would be fine with somebody managing to guess who we are. She never said I wasn't allowed to offer a little help. Besides, what are the chances of her actually finding out?"

"'What are the chances', says bad luck incarnate."

"Ah, whatd'you know?"

The universe hadn't been kind enough to grant anything that could be construed as a warning to Nino that weekend. There hadn't been any oddly worded texts, or phone calls at all hours of the morning and night, or even a brief visit in person. Not that he would be blaming his friend for acting a little strangely; he probably would have had a screw or ten knocked loose if what went down with Adrien's father ever happened to someone in his family.

But even so…

"Uh… hey, dude." Adrien's bright smile widened as he waltzed up to his best friend, clapping him once on the shoulder in greeting. Nino nodded to him, his expression giving everything away of the confusion he was feeling. "What's with the…uh… get-up?"

Being a model, not to mention the son of he would remain nameless for now, Adrien would every now and then show up to school in clothing that nobody had ever seen before. It didn't happen often, mainly when he wanted to annoy his father and hide behind the excuse of it being free advertising, but nothing he'd ever shown up in before had toted cat ears. Or a mask. Or a belt that had been looped around his waist and trailed down to drag across the ground behind him.

Adrien raised an eyebrow, not that it was visible behind his mask. "Oh, these? I just found them lying around the place when I woke up this morning. They felt… I dunno, like I'd worn them before, all over Paris, you know?"

Nino didn't know, not one bit, but he nodded along and silently grieved that loss of fragile grip Adrien had always before managed to keep on his sanity. The dregs were floating steadily away, and it broke his heart just watching it.

The rest of the day passed without incident, if you didn't count Marinette falling out of her chair as soon as Adrien entered the room an incident.

"Okay… how did that not work?"

"Here's a tip, kid. Humans are dumb."

"…But?"

"What do you mean, 'but'?"

Ayla had always considered Adrien to be a simple person. Not in terms of intellect, the boy was actually quite clever when he wasn't falling asleep where he stood, but he was remarkably easy to understand.

There was sweetness, and helpfulness, and maybe even a bit of happiness buried deep inside. But in order to get to that, you needed to wade through the layers of crippling loneliness that had been building up and attempting to erode his best qualities for years. He was quiet when he wanted to be, loud when the situation called for it, and after so many years of living like he had and not letting it crumble him into dust, he was undoubtedly strong.

Which made watching him slowly lose the plot over these last couple of week that much harder.

"Adrien." The boy in question turned around at the mention of his name, picking up the jet black cat that had been lying in his lap and scratching it behind the ears. A pair of green feline eyes stared up at her from the row before her, and if she didn't know any better, she would have sworn that the animal was mocking her. "Pets aren't allowed in school."

"Oh, I know." When had he even gotten a cat, anyway? The complaint about his father never letting him have any had been quite vocal- oh. "I got permission from the principal, because of everything that's happened recently."

The cat ear on the headband he was wearing flicked discretely, and Ayla brought a hand to rest against Marinette's knee when her best friend let out a small whimper.

"This is getting me nowhere."

"True, but look on the bright side."

"What bright side?"

"Now I don't have to stay hidden all the time. Ain't that great?"

"Mr Agreste, please give me the answer to question number five."

"Meow."

"Yes, now. We don't have all day."

Adrien sunk back in his seat, readjusting the bell that was dangling from his neck before slamming his head onto his desk.

"I'm starting to think desperate measures are in order."

"Finally, you've actually learned something from that place."

"Dude, what are you doing?"

Adrien looked up from where he was cutting up some sort of plant, crushing the leaves down into green dust with the flat end of his knife and spreading them out into a thin line. "Catnip… Noir."

Nino's mouth flapped twice, no sound coming out, and Adrien kept his attention set on him before shrugging and turning back to his desk. Pulling a straw out of his pocket, Adrien stuck the tube of plastic into his nose and leaned over, only stopping once Marinette darted over to his desk and slapped the straw out of his hand.

"If I wasn't so annoyed right now, I might actually be impressed."

"I don't know what you're talking about, this is prime entertainment."

"Adrien, dude, I've got a question for you, and it might sound a little weird but I need you to be totally honest with me."

"I'm always honest with you, Nino. What do you need?"

"Well, uh… I've noticed something a bit off about you for the last little while, and I just need to know. Are… are you actually Ladybug in disguise?"

"…"