To Lyger 0: 100%!

Sabrina walked into the rehab center's larger meeting room fifteen minutes before the session was scheduled to begin and found the chairs already arranged in a circle. Two carafes, one with coffee and the other with hot water for tea, sat on a table against the wall, along with plates of fruit and pastries. On the far side of the room, Dahlia leaned against the handle of her broom, watching Sabrina nervously. "Did you set all of this up?" Sabrina asked her, eyes wide.

Dahlia flushed and looked away, nodding. "I saw that you had this group meeting today, and I thought you might want some help." She gestured toward Sabrina's stomach, and Sabrina glanced down. She couldn't possibly be starting to show, but the meaning was clear. Her eyes widened, looking up at Dahlia in surprise. Dahlia grimaced. "Cosette overheard you talking to Max the other day," she explained apologetically. Sabrina blushed. "I warned her not to go around telling people," Dahlia assured her, "but…" She shrugged. "You know how that girl can get!"

Sabrina nodded, letting out a breath. "I could set it up on my own," she pointed out.

"Oh, I know," Dahlia assured her, stifling a laugh. "I did it twice, after all!" Her emotions turned to nervousness, and she looked down at the floor. "I was actually wondering… would I be able to join? The kids are at the bakery for the evening, so…"

Quickly Sabrina counted the number of chairs in the room before pulling down a couple more and adding them to the circle. She smiled reassuringly. "Absolutely."

"Thank you." Dahlia leaned her broom against the wall and slumped down in one of the chairs. Sabrina moved around to take the one next to her. "It's–it's been a long couple months, hasn't it?"

Sabrina nodded ruefully. "It really has," she agreed. "How is Cosette doing, by the way?"

Dahlia smiled proudly. "She's incredible," she enthused. "Tom has told her a dozen times that she's more than repaid her 'debt' and she doesn't have to keep 'working' at the bakery, but she won't hear any of it. She wants to keep helping out there."

Sabrina giggled. "It's so amazing what the last six months have done for her."

"All thanks to the Heroes of Paris – and to the Dupain-Chengs, and to you." Dahlia looked away. "Thank you," she added quietly. "It means so much to me to have my daughter back."

Sabrina placed a hand on her shoulder as the door opened. "I'm happy that I could help."

A half-dozen people began to file into the room, all looking around nervously as they picked out seats in the circle. Scanning the faces carefully as they entered, Sabrina nodded to herself. Most were clients that she had seen here at the rehab center, though one or two who had signed up for this group session had yet to see her individually. As the room filled, she frowned: Sebastian had promised to come for the group therapy, but she couldn't see him in the crowd. But to make up for it, there was at least one new face of someone who hadn't signed up. "Ivan!" Sabrina greeted him with a smile. "I didn't expect to see you here!"

Ivan grimaced, looking awkwardly around the room. "I wasn't going to," he confessed. "But Mylène said I need to see someone, and it was either this or come to see you individually."

She gave him a sympathetic smile. "If this doesn't help as much as you hope, I have a slot available tomorrow right before lunch," she suggested.

He shook his head. "I'll be at work then. I'll–I'll see how I feel after tonight."

Sabrina put a hand on his shoulder, stretching so high she almost had to stand on her tiptoes to do so. "Hopefully it will help."

Finally, after a few minutes of quiet chatter, everyone had found their seats around the circle and Sabrina looked around at them with some trepidation. She could feel unease from most of the participants – unease, nervousness… With what felt like a herculean effort she pulled herself away from those same emotions, exhaling them into the atmosphere and allowing herself to relax. This wasn't the first group therapy session she had ever led; back in the fall she and Emilie had run a session for their "Therapy Girls." But that time Emilie had guided the group discussions, and Sabrina had been able to listen. This time, all the pressure fell on Sabrina alone. Her stomach clenched. But she knew all of these people – she had counseled most of them at least once over the past couple months. Feeling Nooroo's calming presence in her pocket, she took in another deep breath and released it slowly. She could do this.

"I'm glad you all came this evening," Sabrina began, as the soft murmurs of conversation stopped and every face in the room turned to look at her. "I don't know how many of you had met before tonight, but by the end of this session we will all be at least a little closer. Just as a reminder, everything that is shared in this room is in confidence: you don't want people talking about your struggles behind your back, so show them the same courtesy." She furrowed her brows in thought, looking around the group. "I guess… why don't we start by going around the circle and introducing ourselves. All you have to say is your name, though if you want to share a little more about where you were during April, you can do that, too. I'll start with myself. My name is Sabrina… which all of you probably already know," she added, suppressing a wince. "I was in Angola, though my boyfriend was stuck back in Paris." Sabrina nudged Dahlia next to her, and she swallowed nervously.

"Dahlia. My son and I spent the month near Montreuil, but my daughter was still here in Paris."

The man next to Dahlia sighed heavily. "Jean-Pierre. Angola."

"My name is Louis. I was stuck on the university campus in Sceaux for most of the time."

"I'm Morgane." The woman next to him hugged herself tightly, seeming to withdraw within herself. "I–I went to Angola… but my husband didn't make it."

"Was he stuck here?" asked Louis.

Morgane shook her head jerkily. Sabrina closed her eyes in sympathy. "He–he was killed. A building crushed his car."

"Oh, you poor thing!" cooed the older woman sitting next to her, wrapping an arm around Morgane's shoulders consolingly as the younger woman sobbed. Louis looked on awkwardly and swallowed. His chair screeched as his slid it a couple centimeters further away. Once Morgane had regained her composure, the other woman introduced herself. "My name is Perrette; I stayed in Paris, though I was the only one in my family to stay. The kids were all scattered: my one son and his wife made it to Angola, but their daughter was away at university and stayed there. Then my other son ended up in a camp a little south of Montreuil. And my daughter was in Versailles with her kids."

Jean-Pierre's eyes widened in disbelief. "They just left you here?"

"They didn't have much of a choice," Perrette pointed out.

"They could have–"

Dahlia tensed, her mouth setting in a thin line. "Do you have any idea how confusing that day was?" she demanded. "My daughter is eight! My son is three! With everything that was happening, I could either go to find my daughter, or get my son out of the city safely. I chose to make sure my son stayed safe, instead of putting him in danger when I couldn't be sure that I would find my daughter. Do you have any idea how much I regretted that decision, every moment of those six weeks? But at the time it felt like my only option!"

Sabrina placed a hand on Dahlia's arm, and she stilled. "It's okay," she told her soothingly, wicking away some of Dahlia's guilt as she did so. "We will get there. But for now…" She nodded to the man sitting next to Perrette.

He sighed heavily. "Olivier. My daughter and I were in Paris, also."

Finally, Ivan cleared his throat, looking around the room anxiously. "I'm Ivan. My, um, wife and I were in Angola, though I spent most of the time lying down so my back could heal – I got hurt during the evacuation."

Sabrina nodded. "Thank you all for sharing. I want to remind you that this is a safe space. We aren't here to judge anyone's actions; we're not here to say we know better what to do when a mythical monster attacks our city – my hope is that no one ever faces that situation again! We are only here to help each other process everything that happened."

Jean-Pierre scoffed. "I'm not sure which is more disconcerting: the fact that you say 'a mythical monster attacks our city' like it's an everyday occurrence, or the fact that mythical monsters attacking Paris is practically an everyday occurrence!"

Perrette shrugged. "That is the price you pay for living in Paris these days, I suppose," she commented. "I have lived in Paris all my life, and I don't have any intention of leaving. This is no worse than Hawk Moth."

"Isn't it?" Jean-Pierre objected frowning.

"Hawk Moth did seem to strike a lot more frequently," Louis pointed out.

"But Ladybug always fixed all the damage Hawk Moth caused," Morgane whispered softly, sniffling. "But this time…"

Beside Sabrina, Ivan tensed. "I'm sure Ladybug is doing everything she can," Sabrina assured the others. "And I'm sure she wishes that she could have fixed everything with a simple 'Miraculous Ladybug.'"

"Not just Ladybug," Ivan began. "All the Heroes of Paris have been pitching in lately."

Olivier nodded slowly. "I was taking my daughter to daycare the other day when we saw a couple of the Heroes helping to move building materials around at the new construction site next to the Sorbonne campus. She's a huge fan of the Heroes of Paris," he added, chuckling.

Ivan raised an eyebrow in surprise. "Does she have a favorite?"

"Mice are her favorite animals, so she loves Multiplice."

Ivan hid a smile. "She has good taste."

Olivier hummed. "Unfortunately, ever since the Tarasque came through, she just hasn't been able to sleep as well anymore. She wakes up in the middle of the night, worries that the Tarasque is going to come back, worries that the Heroes of Paris won't be able to save us, like they couldn't when they all ran away…"

"Now hold on there," Perrette objected. "Most of the Heroes might have left, but there were still a few in Paris. I was here – I saw them. There was that Chrysaor – I haven't seen him around since the Tarasque was defeated and the Heroes of Paris returned. But that other one… Nabatala? She's been around. And the one with the wings… I can never remember his name."

"True…" Olivier agreed, nodding pensively. "Sophie still remembers seeing heroes around Paris, but you know how little children can be: something happens and that has to be the way that things are now."

Dahlia sighed heavily. "That is far too true. My son hasn't been able to nap since the Tarasque – we fled during his nap time, so he's afraid that if he naps, the Tarasque will come back. But children are surprisingly resilient: my daughter was so upset with me for running away and leaving her behind, but she forgave me. Now, it's almost like it never happened."

Perrette smiled. "I'm happy to hear that, dear! And that your daughter was okay through that whole ordeal."

Dahlia nodded. "She was with friends when the Tarasque attacked, and she stayed with them when the evacuation began. They ended up taking care of her for the whole six weeks, until we got back."

"They must be some pretty nice people," observed Jean-Pierre, frowning. "Not everyone was so altruistic…"

Perrette shrugged. "My experience of that month was that there were some terrible people in Paris, but there were also a lot of nice people, people who wanted to help others and keep the city running as best they could. And it wasn't just the heroes or the police who were helping people. There were also a lot of normal people who stepped up and did what they could."

"Maybe…" Jean-Pierre allowed. He sighed heavily. "I still don't know if I want to stay in a city that has all these super-villains, on top of getting smashed up by a monster like that…"

Sabrina cleared her throat. "That is your decision," she reminded him. "If you don't want to remain in Paris, then you can find somewhere else to live. But don't assume that leaving will automatically make everything better. There's as much risk of crime or disaster elsewhere as in Paris, even if it takes a different form. And if you are running away from the fear that the Tarasque caused, you might fight yourself disappointed. Changing your external location won't necessarily change the internal emotions."