Disclaimer: I do not own Miraculous or any of its characters. Probably a good thing as I have watched way too much Supernatural.

Ashes, Ashes

Plagg flew as fast as he could, still whirling from what happened.

This shouldn't have happened. This shouldn't have been possible.

"I won't. I won't. I won't." Adrien chanted, clutching his head, but the black mist was already engulfing him and Plagg could only watch in horror as he absentmindedly picked up the ring.

Adrien looked up at Plagg with tear-filled eyes, Hawk Moth's mask an outline around them, and Plagg had no idea what to do.

"Adrien!"

Plagg clutched the Miraculous closer and flew even faster.

Adrien was counting on him.

Luckily for them both, Plagg knew exactly where to go. He'd known ever since that first day in class when he had sensed Tikki right behind him. Except the rules were rules and neither of them were supposed to reveal themselves to each other or the other's Chosen.

His kitten was suffering though, so like hell was he going to pay attention to any rules. Breaking things was his specialty.

"Plagg, get the Miraculous out of here." His clothes were changing, marks appearing on his cheeks, but for the moment, Adrien's mind was still his own. His pleas struck something in Plagg's heart and the kwami cursed himself because he'd gotten too close, he always got too close, and now seeing Adrien hurt was hurting him, too.

"Find Ladybug." He gasped in pain. "She'll know what to do."

"I don't need to find her, idiot." Plagg growled, his goal in sight. "I've known where she was all along."

Plagg hit the window of Marinette Dupain-Cheng at full speed.

Ow. He shook his head to clear it and quickly checked the Miraculous. He gave a small sigh of relief at seeing that he hadn't accidentally dropped it.

He had heard a small shriek from inside when he hit the window. Now, the voice within seemed to find itself again. "What was that?" There was a scuffling sound as the girl tried to figure out where the noise came from.

Plagg growled. He didn't have time for this. And while he normally would've just gone through the window, he couldn't do that and keep a hold on the Miraculous. The Miraculous that Adrien had somehow instinctively taken off, the moment he had felt something off.

"I don't feel well." Adrien stared at the ring in his hand somewhat distantly. He didn't look all that great either, Plagg would have admitted if asked. But he really didn't want to draw attention to it or seem like he cared too much. Besides, there had been Camembert to eat.

So Plagg had focused on what had caused Adrien's current condition. He said his version of assurances and had made the usual promises that he knew would cheer the kid up. He had his own way of taking care of him, after all.

He hadn't thought there was anything really wrong.

Not until Adrien dropped the ring.

Plagg threw himself at the window, knocking into it over and over, trying to draw attention to himself.

Luckily, Tikki was a lot more observant than her Chosen.

She flew out through the window to meet him. "Plagg," she hissed before she fully registered his appearance, "you know we can't – " She cut herself off as she fully took in his state.

He knew he didn't look his best, trembling like a newborn kitten and clutching the Miraculous like it was his last lifeline. In a way, it was.

"Tikki." It was all he could say. And he hated just how pathetic he sounded.

Marinette had already begun opening the window upon seeing her kwami fly through it, so without a word, Tikki guided him through the open window over to the girl's desk.

"Plagg, what happened?" She asked softly, nuzzling into him. Plagg wanted to melt into the comfort she so freely offered, but he couldn't.

"Huh? Who's this?" They both looked up at Tikki's Chosen. She took in Plagg's appearance, and he saw the moment it clicked as her eyes widened. "Wait, are you – "

"This is Plagg." Tikki interrupted, sensing that Plagg wasn't up for this. "He's Chat Noir's kwami." Marinette obviously had more questions, but Tikki turned back to him and got to business. "Plagg, what's wrong?"

"A –" Tikki shushed him to stop from saying his name. "There's no point in hiding it any more, Tikki!" Plagg burst out. "Hawk Moth clearly knows who he is!"

"What?" Both Tikki and Marinette started at the revelation.

"What do you means he knows?" Tikki's eyes were wide and scared, but Plagg could see her figuring it out as she glanced at the ring in his paws.

"What? What's wrong?" Marinette looked between the two kwami. "Did something happen to Chat?"

Plagg snorted. "'Did something happen to Chat?' Of course, something happened!" He was still trembling, but now it was with rage. "He was targeted! He's – he's – " He held the Miraculous tighter if that was even possible. "He's gone."

"Gone?" Tikki and Marinette exchanged a look. He could see that he was scaring them, but he couldn't care about that. This was worth being scared about.

"What do you mean gone?" Marinette's voice trembled, and Tikki clearly wanted to know what he meant too.

"He's been akumatized." And suddenly, the severity of it all truly hit Plagg. He curled up over the ring, ignoring Marinette's wide eyed stare and Tikki's disbelief. He found that he couldn't look at them.

"That's impossible." Tikki's voice wavered at the thought.

"That's what I thought." Plagg laughed derisively. "And yet, here we are."

He still didn't know how it was possible. He knew how to keep an eye out for akuma. He knew there had been none in the vicinity. He would have seen it, even if it could have worked on Adrien! Which it shouldn't have in the first place. He didn't even know what the akuma had been absorbed into.

This was entirely different from what Hawk Moth had done before. It was unprecedented, insidious. It was almost like Hawk Moth had managed to find a way to get to Adrien directly.

Something more was going on, but Plagg didn't know what.

And Adrien was suffering because of it.

"He took Hawk Moth's offer?" Marinette asked, slightly horrified. After all, both she and Adrien knew all too well how Hawk Moth operated.

Still, the events of the day had left Plagg with a short fuse, and the momentary lack of faith was the spark that struck gold.

"HE DIDN'T ACCEPT ANYTHING!" Plagg yelled, glaring at her, and the sudden sound made Marinette and Tikki flinch back. "HE DIDN'T WANT IT! HE WAS FIGHTING IT! HE – "

Adrien was screaming as the akuma took over. The boy Plagg had grown to care about was disappearing right before his eyes.

He looked up at Plagg one last time. "Please… go." He ground out, grimacing. "I'm sorry." A tear trailed down his face.

Plagg's breath caught in his throat, and he wanted to reach out to him, to yank him back from wherever the akuma was coming from. But it was too late.

In a flash, Adrien was gone.

The Akuma was all that was there now, dull, dead eyes staring right through Plagg.

His gaze fell on the Miraculous, Hawk Moth's mask appearing over his face once more. "That ring." He held out a hand. "Give it to me."

"He…" Plagg deflated like a punctured tire, his ire leaving with his exhale. "He was forced into turning into an Akuma."

Tikki hugged him close. This time Plagg gladly allowed it. "And there…" She hesitated. "There were no signs of it coming?" She asked.

"No." He responded, utterly miserable.

"How? How did this happen?" Marinette asked in shock, sinking into her swivel chair. Her head fell into her hands as she took it all in.

"I don't know." Plagg truthfully said. "I mean, he was a bit down because his dad was a jerk like normal and he had found out he'd been lied to, but it wasn't anything strong enough for him to even turn."

"Are you sure it wouldn't have been enough?" Tikki urgently pushed.

Plagg snorted and pressed closer into her warm embrace. "The kid was taught almost all his life to pretty much suppress how he really feels if he needs to." Spotting Marinette's surprised look, he rolled his eyes, "Why do you think he tends to go all out when he's Chat? He got a little taste of freedom and ran with it."

"Well, what if – " Tikki started but quieted at his glare.

"There was nothing, no reason, for it to happen." Plagg growled. "Heck, he said he wasn't feeling well before it started."

Plagg's melancholy seemed to transfer the other two as they wilted. He turned away from the tears he could see building in Marinette's eyes. He didn't need her pain when he still had Adrien's screams ringing in his ears.

"So what now?" Tikki asked quietly. "What – what should we expect?"

Plagg shuddered. Out of all the akuma he'd faced, this one was the most… wrong to him. And not just because it was Adrien. "He's still destruction, but a different kind. Probably more stealthy. Simulacrum is pretty much the opposite of Chat Noir."

"Simulacrum?" Marinette asked, her nose scrunching in confusion. She obviously wasn't familiar with the term.

The Akuma was pretty at least, in a fragile, doll-like way. His clothes were as high-end as anything his father would make him put on, the butterfly symbol of Hawk Mothl clearly showing. The scarf had become longer, floating around him, almost ethereal in a way. White, porcelain skin with markings on his cheeks and oddly jointed fingers had replaced tanned skin and strong hands. It was his eyes that made the real difference though: those dead, muted green eyes.

The worst part was that overall it still looked like him, but it was an empty, cold, and seemingly unfeeling version of him.

"Adrien?" Plagg made one last appeal, because this couldn't be happening. Adrien was stronger than this.

However, it was almost like Adrien was finally everything his father wanted. A pretty, empty doll.

If things weren't so dire, Plagg would have laughed.

The Akuma's head tilted. "Who?"

Plagg turned around and swiftly flew away.

He couldn't save him.

"Simulacrum, an imitation or representation of a person or thing." Tikki frantically looked at Plagg as the full implication hit her.

"Yeah, another reason why it's useless to hide who he is anymore. At least from her." Plagg said as he glanced over at the Adrien posters and pictures on Marinette's wall.

"Why?" Marinette asked, oblivious.

"He still looks the same?" Tikki asked it like it was a question, but her tone let Plagg know that she already knew the answer.

"Yes."

"I'm so sorry, Plagg." Tikki hugged him tighter.

Adrien's last words hit Plagg once more. "Yeah, so was he." He tried to ignore the tears in his eyes, but somehow, at the way Tikki cuddled him, he knew she had seen them.

"So I guess we'll check the Ladyblog." Marinette turned to her computer, attempting to give the kwami privacy. Still, Plagg noticed the way she was biting her lip to stop herself from crying.

It was bad enough already, but this was not going to be pretty once she learned who Chat was.

She clicked on the familiar blog and started scrolling through the posts. "Uh, well, it looks like someone at the hospital has noticed a couple people that just… collapsed in the streets. They're being treated for exhaustion, but, it seems there were no signs of it previously. And they're not waking up."

A chill went up Plagg's spine.

"That's him." He just knew it was. There was no denying that Adrien was ultimately a force of destruction, but he hadn't thought it would take this form: a slow, gradual collapse.

"Let's see…" She hit the refresh button. "Wait, Alya just posted that she may have spotted an Akuma." Marinette peered closer to the screen as if willing it to spit answers at her.

Plagg gulped. The moment of truth was coming.

Marinette's phone went off. It startled the girl right out of her seat, and both kwami winced in sympathy. She quickly answered it. "Alya!" She greeted her. "What's wrong? I saw on your blog there might be an Akuma loose?" She tried to cover up her anxiety and knowledge of the situation by talking quickly.

Plagg was also anxious to hear news but he didn't want to deal with the fallout. Tikki made to move away, and he was glad that his partner would deal with it. She always had been better at dealing with emotional outbursts.

"I'm sorry, Marinette." Alya's voice was pained through the phone. "I'm so, so sorry."

"Alya?" Marinette's confusion was genuine at her friend's tone. After all, all she knew was that Chat was akumatized. "What's – "

"Look. Don't freak out." Alya tried to reassure. "I'm going to send you a pic. Don't freak out." There was a slight clacking as she obviously sent the photo. Then her voice was a bit different as it was clear she was talking to someone else, with the phone away from her. "Hey! Don't go! Wait!" There was the pounding of footsteps, before they slowed. "What did he even…"

Marinette's phone buzzed as the photo arrived. She took the device away from her head to look at it. Her eyes widened and the phone dropped to the ground.

"A… A…" Marinette's mouth opened and shut in shock. Plagg glanced at the phone and then shut his eyes to block out the image of Simulacrum on the screen.

"Seriously, what was he doing? Wah!" The sound of crumbling came through the speaker. "It's decaying from the point where he touched!"

"Adrien?" The tears welled up anew in Marinette's eyes as she finally found her voice. "He… Chat…"

"Listen, Marinette, I know you're probably freaking out, but I really got to go! I will call you back as soon as possible. I'm sure Ladybug and Chat Noir will show up soon enough to save him. So don't worry!" Alya ordered before hanging up the line.

"No, he won't." Plagg grumbled from his spot. Tikki gave him a sympathetic glance before flying to her Chosen, who was still standing there in shock.

"Chat is… Adrien, and Adrien is… Chat." Marinette said slowly. The tears began to overflow and run down her cheeks. "How could I not…"

"There is some magic in play to prevent you from noticing." Tikki tried to console her.

"But I… and now he…" Marinette was crying in earnest now. "How can I…"

"It's okay." Tikki nuzzled her cheek. "You're Ladybug. You can save him."

"But…"

"Of course, she can save him." Plagg looked away from her for a second to peek at the ring in his paws before his gaze flicked back up to her earrings. "She's his partner."

She can save him where I couldn't. Just like always.

Marinette seemed to take heart from his words. "You're right." She said as she straightened, wiping the tears away. A steely look came into her eyes, and he knew that this was Ladybug he was looking at now even though she was out of her uniform.

Tikki always did have a tendency of picking the strong, optimistic types.

Marinette's hand came up to touch at her Miraculous. She gave one last sad look at Plagg before she settled for looking at her own kwami. "Tikki?" She asked.

"Ready when you are!" Tikki confirmed, coming over to give Plagg one last comforting squeeze. "Stay here. Keep it safe." She whispered in his ear. "We'll bring him back to you."

Plagg couldn't say any more, but he nodded.

Marinette nodded as well. "Tikki! Spots on!"

Ladybug was on the case.

AN: Out of all the designs I've seen for Akuma!Adrien, Simulacrum is my favorite. Simulacrum is not just the opposite of Chat Noir, but he is also the opposite of Adrien while embodying the thing he hates the most to be: a mindless, pretty puppet. While I'm sure a reprieve from the crappiness of his life would be welcome, Adrien would never sacrifice it like this.

I've been meaning to write this story for quite a while, ever since reading naptillmorning's comic of how he turns into Simulacrum, but I've only now gotten the time. Writing from Plagg's point of view is interesting, especially in such harrowing circumstances. The title is both a reference to the nursery rhyme "Ring Around the Rosie" (where we all fall down) and bone porcelain, a type of china generally made in China that uses cremated remains as its base. As Simulacrum appears to be made of fragile porcelain, I thought it was appropriate.

Thank you naptillmorning for such a great Akuma design and being my inspiration in this case.