A/N: A sequel. Wha? You read that correctly. Hope you enjoy.

Chapter 8: Aftermath

The aftermath of chapter seven.

White.

Then red.

Pain. An immense amount of pain at his gut. Like he had been split open. His chest felt like it was on fire and all he could do was gasp. Everything was a blinding white again. He could hear voices calling out to him, urgently going back and forth, but he couldn't make any of it out. He didn't care anyway, he just needed to breathe. He tried to force his chest up and down, suck in a breath or two.

But he didn't.

He couldn't.

. . . . .

. . .

.

A jolt of energy shot through him forcing his heart to resume. His body was thrown back against a hard surface causing a huge gasp to enter him. The desperately needed oxygen burned his lungs anew as his body strained to function automatically once again. With the ability to breathe returned the pain. It was too much. Everything went dark.

. . .

Gray, misty silence.

Yellow, green, blue, and various other colored blobs spattered his vision. Adrien blinked wearily at the dim lights in an otherwise black surrounding, nothing changing remotely in clarity of appearance. A quiet hum emanated somewhere behind him along with a steady beep, and something else to his side was producing a faint, rhythmic ticking noise. Everything still seemed so muffled, like his head was sandwiched between thick pillows. The rest of him felt equally dampened to sensations as his limbs felt like giant cement slabs, his neck didn't move any more readily.

It was a good thing he couldn't move though, he figured when a dull pain throbbed at his abdomen, indicating he had exerted himself too much from even the small movements. So he looked around some more, eventually noticing he was surrounded by a sea of white linen. Pillows propped his head and back at an incline and he was covered from the chest down in a draped sheet and blanket. Someone had changed his clothing. He was wearing something- maybe blue-ish, it was too dark to tell, but it covered him loosely down to his elbows. He blinked again still unsure what was happening or where he was. If he didn't know any better, he'd say he was in a hospital.

Adrein moved his hand when his torso started to itch but it wasn't the weight that stopped it this time, rather, it was a collection of tubes and wires that tugged against the edge of the bed halting his movements. Upon further observation, there was a whole maze of lines connecting him to what was possibly every sensor and monitor on the planet. Whatever had led up to now must have been disastrous. He searched his memory, trying to recall anything that might give him a clue when he realized another hand lay below his. His eyes traveled from the unfamiliar hand along the wrist, up the arm, to find a man slouched over in a chair along side the bed. It was his father.

Everything seemed to come back instantly. That's right. He had gone to stop Hawkmoth. His father. And he did. But there was blood. Lots and lots of blood. That was all he could recall. Did he die? He stared at his father passed out in the chair beside him. The glowing lights of a monitor faintly lighting his features with a washed out green. The man looked tired. His hair was a mess, like he had run his fingers through his locks one too many times since the last time he showered, and while it was too dark to really tell, Adrien thought the circles under his eyes looked more pronounced. The boy felt his stomach flip as the realization of his father's presence hit him again. The man was there, with him. Even in the middle of the night, the man had chosen to stay with Adrien.

Gabriel's phone lit up with a notification. Curious, Adrien carefully reached for it and tapped the screen, lighting it up once more to view the time. It was 2:41 in the morning, and. . . Adrien felt his stomach flip a second time and drop, a lump forming at the back of his throat when he saw the date. He raced through his memories again, trying to recall the last day he had been in class. He remembered Ms. Bustier writing on the board "September 3" and Gabriel's phone had clearly displayed October 21. Maybe he had misread it since the phone faced his father. So he tapped it again. It was confirmed.

Adrien had been asleep for over a month.

His gut clenched at the news. He didn't want to believe it, but he probably really did almost die. Looking back at Gabriel, his eyes began to tear up when he realized there was a strong possibility that his father had stayed with him every night since then. Aside from that, who knew how much time out of his day had been relocated to his hospital room. It was probably the medication talking but Adrien couldn't stop himself and started crying freely. Tears dribbling silently down his face as his body tensed with emotion, when a bright pain suddenly flared along his abdomen making him want to puke. He sucked in a couple of sharp breaths biting back against the pain, but it didn't relent. His respiration rate increased, as if an increase of oxygen would ease his agony. However, every time his muscles moved in the slightest, the sensation worsened, leaving him to only take in broken gasps.

Gabriel woke with a start, finding his fingers clamped in the death grip which was his son's hand. The sensors around them were sounding, indicating to the medical personnel that something was wrong. The silver haired man took to leave, but when Adrien didn't release him he turned to find the pleading eyes of the boy, begging him to remain. A man in green scrubs darted into the room, glancing briefly over the monitors before reaching for a device attached to the end of a tube. After the second longest minute of his life, Gabriel heard the sensors returning to a steady beat again.

The doctor whispered something to Gabriel, quietly enough that Adrien couldn't hear it, but he was just relieved the pain had dissipated. After the doctor exited the room, Gabriel sat into the chair before scooting closer. Adrien could feel his eyelids droop again. It was if all the sleep he had gotten earlier had no bearing on his current state of fatigue. His father slid his hand back under his, squeezing his fingers gently. Adrien blinked at him but couldn't find the energy to smile. Gabriel smiled weakly at him when his eyes creased with sadness. He placed his other hand carefully over top to sandwich Adrien's hand between his as he looked at him. The man's head then dropped to the edge of the bed as he rattled with shivers.

"Forgive me," came Gabriel's voice with a broken sob.

The man said nothing more, but his trembling shoulders said everything else. Adrien had already forgiven him though. He was just happy to have his father back. He flexed his hand slightly in response. Gabriel looked back up to him with remorse, but a slight smile tugged at the corner of Adrien's lips this time. He wanted to reassure his father it would be alright. Gabriel nodded in small motions, responding with a weak attempt at a smile.

Adrien was confident that everything would work out.

A/N: Yay, yay, he's actually alive! I don't mean to kill him so often, so here's to make up for that. Anyway, thanks for reading. :) Next update will come at some point in the future.