Title: Shifting Tides

Fandom: Miraculous Ladybug, Bleach

Characters:

Chapter: 19

Word Count: 1739

Warnings: nothing

AN: Someone on AO3 asked a very good question: What is Gabriel Agreste in the show? And the answer is…complicated yet not. It boils down to: He went from overprotective father because of what happened to his wife, to so desperate that he lost who made Gabriel Gabriel. In the last of the episodes that I've seen, he was more Papillion than Gabriel.

This story was me testing out a new fandom with an old love of mine and figuring out the voices. I do think something very desperate will need to happen to get Gabriel back on track in the show. Then again, I haven't touched season 4 yet. I'm still salty over season 3 for the most part.

For now: enjoy!

Landing in Tibet, Adrien felt, had been like someone taken a shot of adrenalin and stuck it in his very soul, making him feel full of life and nostalgic all at the same time. He had noticed that Marinette had jolted slightly too when they had stepped off the plane.

By the time that they were at the hotel, and he was in his own room, he wanted to know what was going on. Luckily for them, his father had rented out the penthouse suite at the very top of the hotel, Marinette and him sharing a bathroom. Sado and Ichigo shared the room across from them and had one to themselves. Chloe, Kagami and Juleka were all sharing the last room since it had three beds and a private bath for them.

He flopped down onto his bed as Plagg shot out of his pocket, rolling around in the air as he stretched out his body with a groan. "It is so good to be here," he sighed, his tail curling as he floated towards the window. "But it's still very weird to be here after so long away."

Adrien pushed himself up and looked over to his Kwami with curious blue eyes. "What do you mean?" he asked. Plagg sighed as he floated over to him.

"I don't remember, but did we ever tell ya how we came to be?" the small Kwami asked.

"Whenever something new was introduced into the world, a new Kwami was born if there was enough strength behind the new thing that was a part of the balance," Adrien said as he remembered the book that he had been reading. Ichigo had sent both him and Marinette a digital copy. It was just the introduction book that all Guardians used, but it held a little bit of everything so that they knew enough.

"Yeah, well, you know that there's a darkness that is sealed away. What we didn't tell ya was that there was a Kwami before me that was the embodiment of Destruction," Plagg said. He shivered. "Tikki doesn't talk 'bout her, since they were born at nearly the same time, but..." He paused and sighed as he drooped in the air. Adrien stood up from the bed and offered his hands to the sad looking kwami, pulling him close. "She's what turned into that darkness that we keep fightin' and sealin' away. She lost herself to the Destruction."

"Oh, Plagg. Are...Are you afraid that you'll lose yourself to your power?" Adrien asked as he sat down on the bed again, holding Plagg close. The Kwami shook his head.

"Nah, not anymore, kitten. I'm old enough and experience enough to know my limits and to know what exactly would set me off for good," he admitted. He rested in his friend's hand, tail curling around his thumb. "I was born here, so to say. I came to be in Tibet when the first Kwami of Destruction had been stripped of her title. I'm like five centuries younger than my sugar cube if I want to be truthful. She's helped me a lot to figure out my limits, what would set me off on a bad path, all of that," he told him. "But her sister? The first Kwami of Destruction? It still hurts for her. So don't be surprised if she seems kind of quiet for a bit," he warned.

Adrien smiled down at him, nodding. "I get it. Do you want to tell me why I felt like someone stabbed me with an adrenalin pen?" he asked as he stroked over Plagg's head.

Plagg let out a soft purr as he leant into the stroke, his green eyes sliding shut. "It's 'cause I was born here. Us Kwami's have a connection to where we came to be. When she had gone rogue, I was created here in Tibet. At the time there were some things that were goin' down that history forgot about for good reason. I know that Tikki came to be somewhere in lower Africa, and she loves the land there. Pollen came to be somewhere around in the America's right around the time that the human ancestors started to gain brain power. By the time that the Miraculi were created, we were all here. And despite what other's think, we didn't bond with the items because we were forced," he said, looking up at his friend.

Adrien hummed thoughtfully. "I think that the book said something about the dark force that was going after you and trying to hurt you, so you ended up bonding with a go-between item to have a human wield your power to help without major consequences. That is because if you use your power without a medium to control the amount of your power so that it won't linger, it sticks around. Too much hanging about and it'll throw things off, right?" he asked.

Plagg nodded his head, smiling up at his kitten, pleased with how smart he was. Ever since Marinette and he had started to become closer, before the reveal, Adrien had been feeling better about coming out more and more as himself. And now that they knew who each other were under the mask, that bond was really starting to bloom between them.

"So, why did they put the spell over you guys to never be able to reveal who your wielder is? I know that it's over all of the Kwami, but Master Fu thought it was just over you and Tikki," Adrien said.

Plagg hummed as his tail moved to curl around Adrien's wrist. "Not sure really," he admitted. "I know that originally it was only to protect the wielders and the kwami from being forced to tell. There have been a few times that we got snagged by someone and couldn't escape until we were called by our wielders, so the original spell was set up so that anyone who wasn't in the know about us and the Miraculous' couldn't be told about us. Even when we're kidnapped. But someone, around the time that we were resting, had twisted it so that none of us could tell anyone, even if that person is a wielder. It's made some really hard times between the Cat and Ladybug wielders until we figured out that the spell didn't pass onto them," he explained. He shrugged as he shifted in Adrien's hold.

"That's really weird. I kind of wonder if any of the books that Ichigo has will be able to tell us about the spell and how the person twisted it," Adrien said, shifting so that he could hold Plagg close as he again stood. "For now, though, I need to take a shower, and get ready for dinner. Do you want to just hang out here?" he asked.

Plagg hummed in thought before shrugging. "I'll wait until sugar cube tells me what she's feelin' up to. I don't think that you'll need us here tonight, and it'll probably be safer to stay here during dinner. I can even smell my cheese that is waiting for me," he said, wiggling around as Adrien pulled out the small, extra thick blanket and bedding that Marinette had created for Plagg one day their first month in. He now had several of them but the one that Adrien was laying out was still his favorite one by far.

"Alright. I'm sure that Marinette will tell me what Tikki has decided to do," Adrien said as he placed Plagg onto the blanket on the bed so that he could watch the bathroom. With one last stroke down the cat Kwami's back, hearing the door to the bathroom unlock, Adrien grabbed fresh clothes and walked into the bathroom for a shower and to change.

He was glad that the trip took into account time zones and that coming in early afternoon for Tibet meant that they could get lots of sleep for the next day.

The entire class, including the group that was there under Gabriel's and Natalie's watchful eyes, were all going to gather for dinner in just under an hour and Adrien knew that everyone had wanted showers after the long plane ride.

Luckily for them, since the current archeological dig was really bringing in the cash for the hotel, the management could afford to finally fix things up so that their hot water tanks were on demand hot water.

Adrien stripped out of his clothes and made a note to get them clean along with the day set that he had worn on the plane and the night clothes that he had also worn on the plane. He silently thanked his father for thinking to make sure there was a washer and dryer in suite. It took him close to fifteen minutes to wash and relax under the hot spray of water, listening to the nearly quiet sounds from the rest of the penthouse.

Even though he was sharing his bathroom with Marinette, there were a total of four bathrooms in the penthouse.

Having just the four bathrooms worked for them.

Stepping out of the shower, Adrien pulled on his bathrobe, unlocked Marinette's side, and opened it, finding that Marinette was at her sink, wearing her own bathrobe, clothes hanging and toothbrush in her mouth.

"Hey there, Marinette," he said, getting a smile from his girlfriend around her toothbrush before leaving the bathroom and closing his door behind him, leaving her to her privacy.

It didn't take him long to get dressed and fix his hair. By the time that he was done, Marinette was knocking on his door, and he was wearing a pair of jeans that went just past his ankle, a simple pair of comfortable ankle boots, and a long sleeved turtle-neck sweater. Marinette had decided on a skirt that swept the floor, the material a red ombre, the darkest red on the bottom and turning into a rose-pink color near the top. She had paired it with a simple black, long sleeved shirt that looked warm. Tikki flew past him with a sad smile and went to cuddle Plagg on the bed.

"Well, that answered my question on what she wanted," he said. Marinette giggled softly and took his hand in hers, lacing their fingers together as he closed the door to his room, moving to the main living space, meeting with the rest of the group.