AN: This is the last one-shot I have written for the moment. I have ideas for more, but I'm focusing more on the multi-chapter stories at the moment.

To anonymousfriend27 and Speckleflower: Yeah… having a Kwami sit on her head and call her "Spots" is kind of hard to ignore! And we will get some fun "Anansi's a Hero of Paris now" bits moving forward…


Sabine stuck her head through the hatchway to her daughter's room to find the girl in question sitting in front of the sewing machine on her desk and humming contentedly while working on her latest project, with Adrien relaxing on the chaise lounge and watching her work. Sabine smiled approvingly on seeing the adoration in Adrien's eyes. "So cute," she sighed. She coughed loudly to get their attention, causing Adrien to jump to his feet and spin around, searching wildly for the source of the noise. She chuckled at seeing the way he looked up at the ceiling as though expecting the noise to have come from Marinette's balcony – but, then, these two did seem to get a lot of use out of that roof hatch.

"Adrien, dear," she finally called, drawing Adrien's attention down to her. "If you can pull her away from her project for a little bit, Papa and I have something we need to discuss with the two of you."

Adrien gulped nervously, but nodded before moving over to the desk and tapping on Marinette's shoulder. Satisfied that they were coming, Sabine climbed down the stairs, shutting the hatch as she went, to find Tom sitting at the kitchen table and looking decidedly nervous. She poured four cups of tea, set them on the table, sat down next to Tom, and put her hand over his, squeezing it gently.

"Are you sure we should talk to them about this, dear?" Tom asked, frowning. "We know it's going on, and we know they're being as careful as they can be… isn't that enough?"

"Of course they're being careful, dear," Sabine agreed, taking a sip of her tea. "And we've been supporting them as best we could this year. But they are growing up, and they need to know they can talk to us about this. Everything I've seen and heard about Adrien's father, that boy never received the support or advice he needed. He certainly wasn't a good role model!" She shook her head in frustration. She'd suspected Gabriel Agreste of being a poor parent since the first time Marinette told her that he had prevented Adrien from spending time with his friends, but she had not realized how bad it had been until Adrien was practically living under her roof, throwing out tidbits of his childhood as though it were normal for a father to require scheduled appointments from his six-year-old.

Tom was about to respond when Marinette's bedroom hatch opened and she came into view, followed immediately by Adrien. The teens sat down in their accustomed seats next to each other, across from the adults. Sabine's smile widened fractionally as Marinette leaned toward Adrien subconsciously.

"You wanted to talk with us, Mama?" Marinette asked, looking at her with interest and taking a sip of her tea. Beside her, Adrien shifted uncomfortably.

"Relax, Adrien, son," Tom said, putting a hand on his shoulder. "You're not in trouble or anything!"

"Sorry," Adrien apologized, running a hand through his hair with a grimace. "It's just… whenever my father would set an appointment for a talk… it meant I'd disappointed him in some way." Marinette squeezed his hand comfortingly.

Sabine frowned. "That man was a poor excuse for a father, dear," she told him heatedly. "You shouldn't feel like you are in trouble any time an adult wants to talk to you. I am sorry if we've ever given that impression."

Adrien's eyes shot wide open. "Oh, no, you never have! I just…"

Tom gently let him off the hook. "The reason we wanted to talk is not because you are in trouble, but because this is a serious topic we need to discuss with you. We are proud, of course. We are happy for you both, of course. But we want to make sure you are safe, too, especially since you are still children."

Marinette blushed furiously. "Mama! Papa!" she yelped, pushing herself away from Adrien and slamming her teacup on the table. "I don't know what you think but we're not – we're not – sleeping together!"

Adrien and Tom both choked on their tea and turned matching shades of crimson. Marinette buried her face in her hands and moaned in embarrassment. Sabine calmly sipped her tea, smiled serenely, and waited for the rest of her family to recover. Marinette was the first one to look up at her, and Sabine simply arched an eyebrow and smiled.

"Well we're not," Marinette repeated stubbornly, glaring at her in a way that dared her to contradict the statement.

Sabine chuckled. "Well, I suppose it depends on your definition of 'sleeping together,'" she conceded, ignoring the strangled noises Tom was making next to her. "But I've come upstairs to check on you in the middle of the night to find your bed empty – or find Adrien in your bed – often enough to know you occasionally share a bed, either here or at his mansion."

Marinette blushed a brighter shade of red. Adrien's face had gone the opposite direction and become whiter than his shirt. Tom was gaping at the three of them in surprise. On seeing how nervous Adrien looked, however, Tom burst out laughing and slammed his massive fist on the table, which made Adrien's teacup jump and his eyes grow even wider in worry.

"Please, son," Tom began, "you're not still holding that whole 'Weredad' incident against me, are you?" He wiped a tear from his eye. "That was one time, and it all got sorted out in the end."

"And there's no way that Impératrice Pourpre would let you reprise that," Adrien agreed. He grinned nervously. "The thing is… I'm not sure you couldn't rip my arms off without being Akumatized!"

Marinette gave Adrien and Tom a funny look before confessing, "Okay, so I've gone over to his house a couple times because of nightmares. He's come here in the middle of the night because of nightmares, too. But that's it! It's never gone past that!"

Sabine squeezed Tom's hand to silence his rejoinder. "And that's not a problem," she assured them. "I'm sure you have more than enough reasons to have nightmares and need each other's comfort. I trust you that you wouldn't do anything you're not comfortable with."

"Of course not!" Marinette insisted.

"And knowing you both, you are waiting for marriage."

"Yes!"

"And whenever you are out in public you are behaving perfectly decently for teenagers in love."

"Absolutely."

"And whenever you're suited up there's no chance of anything inappropriate, since Miraculous suits can't come off."

"Right!" Marinette agreed. Then she stopped, and Sabine saw the exact moment that Marinette realized what she had said. Marinette's jaw dropped open and her eyes bugged out of their sockets. She looked like she was trying to say something, but only managed to make tiny peeping noises.

Sabine smiled impishly at her while sipping her tea, waiting for Marinette to respond. Around the table, Tom looked like he was trying (and failing) to stifle a grin. Adrien for his part simply looked relieved. How long had these children been keeping this secret and trying not to collapse under its weight?

"How… how did you know?" Marinette finally whispered, looking at her with a mixture of shock, worry, and wonder. "I thought I was so careful…"

"You were, dear," Sabine told her kindly, reaching across the table and squeezing Marinette's hand affectionately. "But don't forget: I'm your mother, and I know you. Last summer when Chloe came to stay with us for a month and suddenly the two of you and Alya were thick as thieves? And then you stopped by to introduce Adrien as your new boyfriend hours after Ladybug and her team arrested his father – after you were missing for the duration of that fight? Suddenly the two of you are dating and flirting and teasing like you've been together for years, after you had been so nervous you couldn't even talk around him at the beginning of the summer? Adrien himself reacted to his father's unmasking as Hawk Moth far better than anyone would have expected, didn't even bat an eye at replacing that man with us." Sabine smiled. "It didn't take too much for us to put things together from there."

"And we couldn't be prouder of you, Marinette," Tom added warmly. "Of both of you," he amended, squeezing Adrien's shoulder.

"You saved this city from disaster so many times over those two years of fighting Hawk Moth," Sabine continued. "Even when it was hard, even when it seemed impossible, you found a way to keep going. Even though Hawk Moth was someone so important to you" she looked at Adrien with motherly love "you did the right thing: you brought him to justice."

Adrien looked troubled at that. Sabine moved her hand on top of the teens' clasped hands and squeezed. "We are so very proud of you both."

"This is not just about Hawk Moth," Tom supplied. "You've done so much good since defeating him. And not just as heroes, either. You have both become such wonderful young people. Any father would be proud to call you his child – both of you."

By now Marinette looked close to tears, but Sabine recognized them as tears of happiness and relief. "You have no idea what this means," Marinette choked out. "To know that you know, and you're not upset or angry or…"

Sabine reached up to wipe away Marinette's tears. "We certainly worry about you," she admitted. "When we saw on the news that you'd been shot… if you hadn't come straight home I might have marched right over to the lycée and insisted on seeing you for myself!"

"That's why you didn't ask any questions," Marinette stated, nodding in understanding. "You knew exactly what had happened."

"Enough of it, at least," Sabine confirmed. "But that was the first indication we had that your suit is bulletproof."

"Not exactly bulletproof," Marinette explained. She winced. "Miraculous suits can only be cut or pierced by miraculous weapons. So the bullets couldn't go through my suit, but I still felt the impacts."

"That's where the nightmares come from?" Tom asked, looking between them.

"Some of them," Adrien agreed with a nod.

Tom nodded and looked Adrien in the eye. "If you ever need someone to talk to, you can always talk to me," he told him.

"So you've known all this time?" Marinette finally asked. "Why didn't you tell us?"

"We were waiting for you to tell us yourself," Sabine explained. "But now that you are getting older – seventeen next week! – we didn't want to wait any longer. We want you to know you can talk to us about anything." Sabine smiled mischievously. "But we did drop some hints here and there."

"How did we never realize?" Marinette wondered, glancing at Adrien. Only to narrow her eyes at him suspiciously when she saw the nervous grin on his face. "We didn't realize, did we?" she asked him dangerously.

"Ummm… so you know how your father started experimenting with camembert macaroons last year?" Adrien started.

Marinette's jaw dropped. "You mean those things were Plagg's idea? Stinky cheese in a sweet macaroon is absolutely disgusting!"

Adrien opened his mouth to respond, but before he could make a sound a small black blob with cat ears appeared out of Adrien's shirt pocket, puffed up its chest and said, "'Disgusting'? Pigtails, I'll have you know that the man who can make such a delicious camembert macaroon is the most incredible chef in the history of cheese. And I should know!"

Marinette scoffed, but was cut off from responding when a red blob shot out of her purse, slammed into the black blob, and squeaked, "Cheese does not belong in macaroons, you stinky cat!"

Sabine's jaw dropped open as she watched the display. Beside her she could see Tom mirroring her expression. When she finally found her voice again, she asked, "Um… what are those? They're… kind of cute…"

Adrien groaned and swiped the black blob out of midair with practiced ease. "These are our Kwamis, the sources of the miraculous' power. This is Plagg, the embodiment of destruction, destroyer of the dinosaurs, Atlantis, Pompeii, and about 15 wheels of camembert per meal. The red one is Tikki, who is the Kwami of Creation. She may or may not 'create' plagues when she's feeling particularly angry."

"So you carry the embodiment of destruction around in your pocket," Tom deadpanned. He rolled his eyes. "Just don't let him get near that wedding cake I made for tomorrow."

"As long as it's not a cheesecake, we should be fine!" Adrien joked.

With a chuckle Tom commented, "I guess this explains why our cheese bill went up cat-astrophically when you moved in!"

"You have no idea," Adrien replied. "Nothing less than the most expensive – and stinkiest – cheese on the planet is Gouda-nough for him!"

Sabine smiled at the teens and their Kwamis across the table from her. To think: Ladybug, the brave, fearless hero of Paris, was her clever, sweet daughter. And the polite, reserved boy sitting next to her was the carefree Cat Noir. She looked between Adrien and Marinette for a moment before saying, "I hope you know that we want to help – as much as we can. We're not superheroes; we're just your parents. Without Hawk Moth and the daily Akuma battles, I can't imagine you are missing as much school as you did before, but we will cover for you if you need to go off and do hero things. And of course feed your… Kwamis. But in turn, I have two ground rules for you."

"'Ground rules'?" Marinette echoed, furrowing her brow.

Sabine nodded. "First, tell us what you are up to – as much as you can, at least – so we don't worry," she said. "I always find out after the fact from photos on the Ladyblog when you were on… 'patrol,' do you call it? I'd appreciate if you let me know beforehand so I'm not worried when you aren't in bed. Or so I worry correctly," she amended with a gentle smile.

Marinette nodded. "I suppose we can do that much," she conceded. "But what's the second one?"

Sabine looked her in the eye, willing her to feel her motherly concern. "Stay safe," she said, "and always come home."

Marinette and Adrien shared a look before Marinette answered, "We promise."