Chapter Fifty-Three

Sunrise came all too soon. Neither Marinette or Adrien had been able to get back to sleep, both were too wired for the incoming day. "Are you sure about this?" Marinette asked yet again.

"As sure as I can be. Believe me I'd rather not be dealing with the remote possibility of my mother being alive." He said as he straightened his white button up and looked at her with concern. "But we need to stop Hawkmoth. This may be the best way to do it."

"I know, it just doesn't feel right letting you go in there alone."

"I won't be alone. I've got Plagg and Pollen with me." He said, tilting his head towards the cat and bee kwamis.

Marinette signed and threw her arms around him. "I'm your partner, I should be with you."

He tenderly stroked her cheek with the back of his fingers. "I'll be okay. As you said, he's my father. If he wanted to do me harm, he would have already."

A line of worry knit between Marinette's eyebrows. "I hate this."

"You've given me the best advantage I could ask for." Adrien reminded her with a nudge of his fingertip to the right side of his head, where the bee miraculous was artfully hidden within his hair.

Tikki hovered before them, flanked by her fellow kwamis. "We know the drill. It'll be okay, Marinette."

Pollen gave an affectionate smile, "Remember we can float through pretty much anything. Besides I'll be hidden under Adrien's jeans, tucked in the side of his sock. His father won't even know I'm there."

Plagg burped his approval. "As far as Sir Cranky-pants goes, he'll think I'm the only kwami with Adrien."

The model squeezed his partner in reassurance. "We'll be fine. Even if things do fall apart, we work best under pressure."

Marinette returned his smile, though it pained her to acknowledge that he was right. "Okay, let's do this."

Stepping apart, the pair eyed each other for a full minute before Adrien called up his transformation. Marinette quickly followed. Chat Noir walked to the balcony, holding out his hand to Ladybug. "We have the advantage. As far as my father knows, I'm still injured. I promise I won't forget to limp."

"Did you put a rock in your shoe?"

"Considered it, but decided a true limp would be a pain in the… foot." Chat Noir smirked.

"Fine, just don't forget. Gabriel is very astute."

"I know, that's why I have a trick up my pant leg."

"Isn't it supposed to be sleeve?"

"Nope, but you can undress me to check," he said with a cheeky wink.

Ladybug gave her partner a half-hearted shove. "Shut up."

"Kiss me and I will," he taunted back with a wiggle of his masked eyebrows.

"If I kiss you, we might never leave."

Chat Noir let out an overly dramatic sigh. "The things I do for peace, justice and the Parisian way!" Ladybug laughed at her partner as he pulled her to his chest, grinning wide and flashing his teeth. "Let us go forth, milady."

"I'd rather we go first."

"Bah, ruin my moment why don't you?"

"Come on, Chat."

"Right," he smirked as he held her close and used his staff to launch them into the sky.


A block from the Agreste mansion, Chat Noir reduced the height of his staff and spun to the ground, holding Ladybug close. While he was hamming up their antics, he was truly nervous and wasn't eager to step foot in his own home. Before he could drop his transformation, Ladybug snatched him up by his bell and laid an extremely passionate kiss upon him. To the point he was backed up against the wall of a building as her mouth threatened to devour his.

They were both breathless as she broke away. "Stay safe."

By force of will, Chat Noir managed to form coherent words. "Of course." His bravado wasn't convincing as Ladybug eyed him sideways. "I'm serious!" he added.

Ladybug gave him a fierce hug and then they released their transformations. Tikki said a few encouraging words to the other kwamis and Adrien took the opportunity to kiss his girlfriend one last time. "I will be back."

"I know."

He just hoped she was right.


The walk to the mansion was brisk until Adrien rounded the corner where he could be seen. Here he switched tactics, walking with a pronounced limp as he headed to the tall metal gates. This was where Pollen was able to help out, she was now hidden within the pant leg of his jeans, nipping his previously injured leg so he didn't falter in his limping.

As Adrien approached his home the gates automatically opened as soon as he was near, allowing him to hobble into the grounds and to the intimidating front door. Lifting his hand to knock, Adrien was stunned as the door opened and revealed the last person he expected to see: Chloe.

"What are you doing here?" he snapped.

"My 'community service' remember? I had to be Nathalie's assistant slash slave." Chloe grumbled as she placed a hand on her hip.

"Oh right, I'd forgotten about that."

Chloe's features softened a little. "Yeah, I guess you were probably dealing with the fallout of what I did."

"Something like that," Adrien muttered more to himself than her.

"Look, I've been thinking a lot about what happened. Especially the stuff at the Eiffel Tower. I was horrified when I was strung up half naked, but I deserved it. If anything, it was less than what I did to you because you trusted me." Chloe plucked at her fingernails awkwardly. "I'm sorry, Adrien. I know that's not enough, maybe I can make it up to you some day."

Adrien stepped back in surprise. "Um, okay."

Chloe's bottom lip began to quiver. "I thought Chat Noir was dead, and it would have been my fault. I caused that akuma. I'm such an awful person."

Again, Adrien was stunned. Was she for real? He wasn't sure. Before his childhood friend could continue, Nathalie swept her aside. "Adrien, your father is waiting for you."

The model shuffled passed the two ladies, glancing briefly back to make sure they were aware of his limp as he headed into his father's study. Gabriel was standing with his arms behind his back, regally perusing his designs as if he had no other care in the world. "You're here," he announced as his grey eyes dropped to his son's leg. "How are you feeling?"

"I've been better," Adrien quietly hissed.

"Yes," Gabriel said glancing to the floor, "I suppose you have." The designer stepped away from the dais and strode to Adrien. Those assessing eyes held a note of concern but Adrien wasn't buying it. Here stood the man who had managed to conceal and lie about his alter ego. Not that Adrien was about to admit he'd done something similar when it came to being Chat Noir.

Forcing up his gumption, Adrien asked the question he'd been dreading. "So, what's this nonsense about Mum still being with us?"

A smile which was on verge of ominous spread across Gabriel's face. "It's easiest if I show you."

The hair at Adrien's nape rose and he resisted the urge to shiver at his father's creepy behaviour. He'd trusted this man for his entire life, regardless of how strict and cold he'd been.

Gabriel walked to the abstract painting of Emilie on the wall and paused before it. "Stand there," he instructed Adrien as he pointed to a spot directly behind him.

Adrien did as he was told and watched in fascination as his father reached up to touch a grouping of eyelets on the painting. The model gasped as Gabriel pressed his fingers into the concealed buttons. Suddenly the floor beneath Adrien shifted and he was being lowered down. There was some sort of tunnelling system that he'd never known existed, and as he travelled he noticed there was an offshoot that went upward. However, his journey was taking him down.

Eventually the platform beneath him drew to a halt and Adrien found himself in a cavernous room. On either side of him, a row of lights flashed on to illuminate the space and Adrien cautiously stepped forward. "What is this place?"

The clunk of the platform ascending made him jump as Plagg exited his pocket. "Wow, and I thought your father hid dirty secrets in his safe. This is like something out of a horror film."

Keeping up the pretence of limping, Adrien shuffled his way down the raised pathway which ran down the middle of the room. At its end there was a faint light and something tubular. He had only made it a third of the way along when the platform behind him returned carrying his father.

Gabriel quickly strode towards him, eating up the distance. "Keep going," he insisted as he walked at Adrien's side.

"What is this place?"

"A sanctuary," Gabriel said with an air of reverence.

Adrien inwardly winced as he scanned the room. It looked like something from the cover of a dystopian science fiction novel. Vines streamed up the walls, as if desperate to emerge into the world. He noticed they were camouflaging a mass of cabling strewn along the floor and lower walls.

The sense of dread only grew stronger as they neared the glowing tube. Its size was substantial, big enough for a body he realised. And the closer they got, the more apparent it became that there was indeed a body inside that lit interior.

Pollen's nipping at his ankle kept him limping and he was thankful she was there. Adrien had no doubt that he would have forgotten to keep up the act without her. "What is that?" The model said with a hesitant point of his finger at the cylindrical object before them.

"A cryostasis chamber."

"What? That sort of technology doesn't even exist."

Gabriel arched an eyebrow over his glasses. "When you have enough money, anything is possible."

Foreboding was a living thing in Adrien's belly, squirming and twitching with each of his staggering steps. The figure within that glowing chamber took on more definition as he drew closer and his heart began to pound. Gabriel hadn't been lying. There lay his mother within the confines of that brightly lit prison, appearing to be in a deep sleep.

Emotion thickened in Adrien's throat and tears pricked at the back of his eyes. "Why is she hear? She's meant to be dead."

"She's not dead, just damaged. This is why I wanted the ladybug and cat miraculous. I need the wish they can grant. With them I can restore your mother to her former self." Gabriel stated as he eyed Adrien's right hand.

The model curled his fingers to fists and shoved them in the pockets of his jeans. "If Mum is brought back, someone else will suffer her fate."

"So what? People die all the time. Why do you think I have Chloe working here? I intend to use her as a sacrifice to balance out the wish."

"She doesn't deserve that!"

Gabriel was taken aback. "Of course she does! Look at what she did to you."

"It was cruel and horrible but she doesn't deserve to end up a vegetable."

His father's upper lip twisted with disdain. "Wouldn't you rather your mother over that spoilt brat?"

"As far as I was aware, Mum has been dead for years!"

"Not dead, just in a coma of sorts."

"Dead to me. Damn, why didn't you tell me she was alive?" Adrien pleaded with an angry snap.

"I never said she was dead, just no longer with us."

Adrien took a step towards Gabriel, anger burning in his veins. "People interpret that as dead, Father."

Gabriel was the first to break eye contact, looking forlornly at his wife. "Perhaps I should have handled things differently. But I didn't want to give you hope if there was none to be had. Yet now things are different." Those grey eyes returned to him with a cunning glint. "You have the miraculous of destruction. All we need now is the miraculous of creation and Emilie can come back to us."

"I'm not giving you my miraculous," Adrien growled as he widened his stance with instinctual grace.

The corner of Gabriel's mouth turned upward in a snarking grin. "The loyalty you have to Ladybug is admirable, but she's never loved Chat Noir. You know that, right?"

"Recent developments would suggest otherwise."

Shock replaced smugness on the designer's face. "What?"

"Oh, Chat Noir's been getting a lot of loving lately." Adrien grinned.

Gabriel scowled, "I can't believe you're my son."

This time it was Adrien who was stunned, his eyes widening at the implication.

His father continued. "This whole time, that stupid foolish boy dressed in a catsuit was my boy." Gabriel's nose crinkled in disgust. "I had wondered briefly if it was you, believing it impossible. My sensible, obedient Adrien couldn't possibly be that ridiculous clown."

"I'm not a ridiculous clown, nor am I a fool!" Adrien growled, pulling his fists from his pockets, curling his arms tautly at his sides.

"Oh, but you are, son." Gabriel smirked as he swiped his hand across Adrien's exposed forearm. Scratching his skin with a sharp prick from the underside of his hand. The designer lifted his palm to display the back of his ring from which a spike sat. "Just like those spy movies you always loved."

Adrien's gaze wavered and the room appeared to sway. "You drugged me?"

"I must have your miraculous. You'll understand soon enough."

And with that, Adrien felt his knees give way, falling forward into his father's waiting arms. Only to have his ring tugged from his finger as he was gently laid on the floor as he lost consciousness.


Gabriel did a bad, bad thing. Anyone surprised? No, not really? Didn't think so.

Sorry this chapter took so long to get posted. I was having a case of writers block, knew where I wanted it to go but couldn't get the words to come. But hey, happy new year! Chapter done and more to come.

The review box below is feeling lonesome, please talk to it. Thanks for your support! :)