Chapter 2 - Part 2

Gabriel

"I think I got it," the girl—Marinette—whispered, the uncertainty to her voice making Gabriel step back for a pair of minutes, arms crossed and frowning, before actually leaving her to her own devices and the other half of a jacket he had pinned together in the way of explanation. A half-a-jacket that he was surprisingly curious to know if she could replicate.

"You will tell me if I prick you, right?" he heard her asking, taking some pins from the box on the support table and holding them between her teeth, still studying Gabriel's work. "It won't be on purpose."

"I know, don't worry."

It was like hearing Adrien's voice had reminded her of who exactly was under the black fabric she gazed so intently at. She looked up, face flashing red, the following stuttering and nervous arm waiving leaving Gabriel to roll his eyes and step away from the scene. Or, at least, try to. His wrist exploding with pain forcing him to bite down a sharp intake of breath as he turned back to the duo behind him, face empty of expression, to find Adrien looking between his face and the hand he had reached out to grab.

"Thanks," Adrien ended up saying, quietly, a careful squeeze being given to Gabriel's fingers before he let go.

The gesture, the smile, caught Gabriel so off guard he was still looking back as he stopped on a discreet corner of the room, feeling mesmerized. At least, until Marinette stepped back in sight and he remembered. Gabriel's mind immediately sharpened, leaving him to think, to ponder, to weight—Nathalie coming to stand with him, finally bringing him back.

"That was kind of you," she told him and he might have chuckled at how wrong she was if she was at least looking at him. "To let them stay."

"It had little to do with kindness and a lot with you glaring."

"I am glad I could be of help."

Still, her eyes avoided him, fleeing to the center of the room and the duo standing there—the girl trying to redo the steps on how to close a sleeve, Adrien taking to speak with the two sprawled on the chairs.

"Is she that good?" Nathalie queried, watching the girl's determined struggle. "Marinette?"

"She is talented."

And the girl would go far if given the opportunity. If she was not ripped apart by the critics or the press. Not that he could conceive why this was any the matter right now. It wasn't as if her talent was the reason he had set her aside from the group in the first place.

"I can't be the only one seeing it."

Nathalie frowned, studying the pair in the center of the room. He could see the exact moment the word "Ladybug" flashed through her mind, comprehension leaving her with eyebrows raised.

"That—That girl?"

"You have to agree it's an uncanny resemblance."

And put close to his son like this—He watched as she moved around him, completely focused on her work. Yes, he felt he had seen this a hundred times before.

"This can't just be a coincidence."

Nathalie was frowning, squinting, whatever was so wrong to her eyes unclear to his.

"You had seen her before," she finally said, still not sounding like herself. "During the contest. You talked with her. You didn't find anything odd then."

"Well—" His voice hissed with anger. "If I am to be forced into this arrangement by you I might as well find something now!"

He could feel Nathalie recoil at his side, the cold façade crumbling, the underlining current of panic making the Miraculous pulse against his chest as she turned her eyes to him, nervous, to find herself faced, not with fury, but an annoyed look.

"That wasn't funny," she threw at him, glaring back.

"It wasn't meant to be funny."

"With your sense of humor one never knows." She took a deep breath, getting her composure back. "It was not my intention to worry you."

"It was not my intention to force you to apologize, just to get your eyes off the floor," he snapped. "The last thing I need is you walking on eggshells."

Nathalie blinked, lips parting, but he interrupted her before she could speak.

"And I am not angry at you. Adrien made it quite clear who I should aim that at."

"He—" There was guilt to her voice now. "We scared you."

Gabriel's fingers drummed on the wall behind him. The answer was 'yes' if she truly wanted to know. But he didn't need to be reminded. Of any of it. Not of how empty the house had felt when he had stepped out of the atelier. Not of Nathalie not answering when he had called her. Not of Adrien not being anywhere he could reach him. Not of that gripping terror that had swallowed him with Nooroo's very ill advised choice of words.

"They are gone."

His attention slipped back to the center of the room. To his son as he chuckled at something one of the other kids had said. He still expected him to shatter. For all of this to shatter. Like the rest of his life had. And he would be forever grateful that Nathalie understood it without him having to speak.

"Is this about the book?" she was asking, softly, distracting, calling his attention to something he could occupy his mind with. "Marinette bringing it to you?"

"You have to agree it is odd."

"But not condemnatory," she pointed out, voice carefully lowered. "You have said 'they' can change physical attributes."

His eyes never left the center of the room, but he was no longer seeing it, a memory having overrun the space and left a specter standing with him instead, that of a woman in a long blue dress, a peacock feather fan on her hands. Emilie's golden ghost turned dark.

"She was lying, wasn't she?" Nathalie asked, going to nudge her head at the center of the room, puzzled, when she saw him tense at her side. "Marinette. About how she got the book."

"Half a lie, I gather. But she did keep it."

And he wondered why. And in wondering there was only one reason he could think of. Only one that made sense.

"You aren't convinced," he pointed out, watching Nathalie by the corner of his eyes. "Why?"

"She is hardly the only person fitting Ladybug's description," she offered, sensibly, and looking at her pale blue eyes and black hair Gabriel had to force himself to remain silent. One off that list, he gathered, going back to listening. "Furthermore that girl—she is a bundle of nerves."

It was as if the universe itself had decided to drive her point across. The very tranquil, painless "Auch" coming from his son so startling Marinette she ripped a sleeve off him, ending up giving equally horrified looks to Gabriel—as he raised his eyebrows at her—Adrien—as he tried to calm her down—and the fabric as it laid on her hands.

It wasn't like he hadn't noticed this before.

Yesterday. On the fashion contest she had won, even.

She owned nothing to her nerves.

The other girl, Alya, the one from the Ladyblog or whatever that was called, the one who had the gall to be copying the homework she had just finished onto both his son's and Marinette's notebooks right under his nose—he would overlook that, just this once—was closer to what he had expected. Confident. Brazen. With none of that simple charm her friend had in spades.

Her friend who looked so much like that damned bug.

"It can be a coincidence," Gabriel finally gave in, attention back on Adrien. A part of him did little but wish it to be so. That he was wrong. And yet—

"He is a lot like his mother."

Nathalie's silence as she looked between him and Adrien, lead him to continue.

"I was always so grateful, that he was nothing like me."

"If he was—" Nathalie wondered, quietly. "Would it be that that bad?"

Marinette was still trying to reattach the sleeve, her struggle to reach Adrien's shoulders making him look around, a quick "Give me a second," seeing him jogging towards the pair near the window, drop behind the chairs to pick something up and reappear with a small stool.

"He is wonderful, isn't he?" Gabriel said, fondly, watching as Adrien offered the stool to the girl and Marinette immediately climbed on it, putting the pins randomly into the sleeve, even now just high enough to be on eye level with him. "I didn't notice him getting that tall."

"Is that the only thing you haven't noticed about me?" his son's voice threw at him from inside his memory and the sadness he had kept so carefully hidden on hearing it the first time must have showed for Nathalie stepped closer, hand going to rest on his shoulder blade. It was one of the few things that felt real, right now. That made sense. Her warmth and the boy standing at the center of the room.

He is taller than you now, Emilie.

Adrien raised both his arms, giving the black haired girl in front of him a playful smile when the left one become stuck half the way up and she bit her lips, moving one finger in a circular motion to tell him to turn, seemingly refusing to step down from the stool.

You might want to take a page from that girl's book.

Emilie would have smacked him on the back of the head if she was here to hear that. A part of him still braced itself for it even if he knew it would not come. That he wasn't to see her stroll to the center of the room, to Adrien, and bump the two of them together on their height too. Like she did with everything else, pretending they were alike and loving it.

Every moment of it.

She who was losing it all.

"I just need a moment."

His back come to rest against the door, the lock clicking behind him leaving him standing in the empty corridor, listening to the muffled laughter coming from inside the room, barely able to breathe.

"Master?"

He swapped Nooroo away just as he left the jacket, much too aware of the kwami's presence as he went to float between the nearest water dispenser and one of the many snake plants spread on the corridor. Watching over him. Fear and what could pass for concern battling on his face.

"That is Adrien?" he finally asked, glancing at the closed door, his tone one of gentle curiosity. "The Adrien from the drawing?"

"Shut up."

He did. For once. Not that it was ever meant to last. And that Nooroo's next words were spoken in kindness, that they lacked even the slightest trace of mockery, of the spite he had hoped to catch, to pick apart, to make his own, made them all the more painful to hear.

"He looks like her."

I know.

There was a feeling of warmth on his shoulder when he closed his eyes, the weight telling him Nooroo had just gathered his courage and landed there.

I know he looks like her.

It had always been so. From the very first moment. He couldn't look at one without seeing the other. It used to reassure him. It used to comfort him. It used to. Now it was a reminder that he couldn't remember Emilie's voice anymore. That he couldn't remember her laughter—

"Master—"

That he couldn't remember.

"Please, go back inside."

She was gone.

"They are all waiting for you."

And he was losing what little he had left of her.

"Please, Master, you aren't fine."

The low rumbling of laughter made Nooroo flinch, eyes dropping in resignation as Gabriel stepped away from the door and he was called, the lonely white butterfly that had been on the closest snake plant taking flight to land on his gloved fingers.

He wouldn't have been able to stop, even if he wanted to.

Adrien

"Isn't that screaming or something?" Adrien asked, his and Marinette's triumphant high-five over the now reattached sleeve leaving the two of them with their arms stretched high over their heads, the tip of her fingers slipping distractingly between his as she tilted her head, listening, then turning to him, their arms falling back to their sides.

"I don't hear anything."

They made him blink her words, then look around at Alya and Nino, on the sitting area near the window, and Nathalie, alone and holding one arm against herself, eyes cast down.

"Can't any of you hear that?"

All three turned their attention to him, following his gesture as he pointed at the floor, then looking at each other, confused, Adrien's last resort for someone to hear the screams that were so clear to him falling to nothing as he looked around. There was one face missing.

"Where is—?"

Father, become lost in just about a second, the alarms starting to echo just outside the room, blasting all over the top floor with a vengeance, sending all three of his friends and himself—fighting to take off the jacket and falling behind on purpose so that Plagg could dash out of his bag to get to him—running after Nathalie as she marched for the door.

"Stay there."

She turned the knob. Her stern order clearly not meant for herself for she stepped outside. Alone. Determined. Looking around as the alarms blared. Her blue eyes flew over the water dispensers and snake plants, the lifts in the distance, the doors on both sides of the corridor, the fire escape, before she turned back to find all four of them with their heads sticking outside.

"With me," she ordered, stopping them before they could jump back inside to fetch their bags. "Leave those here, you won't need them."

Green, blue and two pairs of brown eyes looked rapidly at each other. Apprehension flashing through all of their faces as they took to follow Nathalie down the corridor and into the fire escape. Feeling her hand close around his—so tightly she seemed to fear he would disappear into thin air—Adrien found himself walking right beside her, a glance over the bright yellow handrail and into the squared shaped hole in the center of the winding stairs, letting him glimpse a cascade of people getting out from the floors, moving to get to the lobby and outside, before he returned to Nathalie still on time to see her grab her phone, fingers rapidly moving down the contacts to hit father's picture.

He could hear the call disconnect without even getting through. It made his stomach twist.

"Where is Father?" he asked, trying to sound calm. "Why isn't he picking up?"

"He left to speak with his legal team."

That—That was no answer. That was no answer at all!

"Where is he now?"

A loud shriek cut through his words. People were running out of the metal door on the landing right in front of them, getting into the stairs, screaming, crying—the reason for their panic made clear the moment the fourth floor door was impaled by a spear-like thing and him and Nathalie came to such a grinding halt they both slipped. Adrien ending up one hand clinging to the handrail and sprawled on the stairs, Nathalie lying further down still and almost on the landing, her hand still holding on to his, eyes gazing at the door as the spear was viciously pulled and it slammed shut, the panic bar moving up and down from the other side, knocking and screaming being heard—until they were no more.

"Run," Nathalie told them, letting go of Adrien's hand. "All of you, now!"

They would not wait for her to say that twice. They run down the stairs, jumping over the golden spear and into the crowd, all stopping to wait for Nathalie only to be nudged into continuing for she hadn't been that far behind. They were moving with the crowd now, down the stairs to the third floor then the second, the shrieks coming from up above turning into screaming from the crowd trying to flee when the door they had left behind was ripped from its socket, clanging and crashing into the floor above as the people around them pushed and pulled in what seemed to be an endless descent, the atrium, the street finally opening before them promising safety from all the madness—

If Adrien wasn't Chat Noir.

And he had to transform. He had to find some way to get away from Nathalie and his friends now that they had seen him safe on the street. That spear back there? If he had any doubts of what was going on before, that had been telling enough! This was Hawkmoth again and for the third time today.

If only Nathalie wasn't holding his hand. Or if this had been his bodyguard with them and not her! He had no trouble leaving him behind. But Nathalie? There was never anything that got passed her!

"Where is Marinette?"

The group looked around just as it left the building, glancing back to the lobby, then to the people around them, the crowd's pushing and shoving pulling them alongside it as more and more people tried to force their way out of the building, wheeling them across the sidewalk and into the road. They could see passed the black butterfly from here, even if it was still hanging menacingly over them. The lights behind it allowing to glimpse those still trapped inside, despite the crowd already here.

It wasn't to any of that they were looking, however. Nor was it at the cars forced to stop in the road due to the people standing in their path. Nor the dozens of terror filed faces around them.

No.

They were looking for a head of raven black hair. They were looking for their friend.

"She was right behind me!" Alya said, the sea of people around them barely allowing any of them to search more than one meter in all directions. "I saw her just now!"

"Now when?" Nathalie asked. "Where did you see her?"

"The stairs? Or the lobby… I—I thought she was behind me!"

The crowd was pushing again, forcing them back towards headquarters, closer and closer to the cars parked in front of it as if trying to flee from something other than Hawkmoth and his present victim. Looking back, seeing a series of vans squeal to a stop Adrien understood from what.

The press.

It had already caught wind of this.

Nathalie's hand pressed around his, her eyes also having found the vans and the cameras being unloaded one after the other, her expression hardening. And then something else called their attention. All their attentions. People were pointing up, the cameras rising. Adrien himself looking in time to see the red figure standing on one of the buildings thrown a yo-yo at the iron butterfly and with one easy move jump inside the building.

Ladybug.

She is already here?

And that Alya wasn't taking her phone out spoke volumes about the present state of the group, all of them back to look around, all of them trying to find Marinette among the crowd, Nathalie herself going back to her phone, gazing at it before hitting father's number again.

"Pick up."

Adrien felt as if the ground had opened beneath him. The way her eyes lingered on the building instead of moving over the crowd, saying more than he had wished to know.

"Father is inside?!"

"Control Room."

Oh, that was rich! And it sounded like him alright! Going around like he could control everything! Like—!

Again the shriek cut through his thoughts, deep and penetrating and so loud everyone around them was covering their ears, Nathalie one of the few remembering to look up towards the building just in front of them, her expression one of disbelief before she grabbed him, Alya and Nino and pulled them behind the nearest of the parked cars. Pressing them down and against it. Trying to cover them—not that she would have ever been able to do so if a much bigger shadow hadn't forced the crowd to open and jogged to reach them, putting itself over them.

It made little difference in the end. Looking up, gazing through Alya's brown curls and the car's windows, Adrien could see perfectly what had alarmed Nathalie. The building's glass walls were vibrating under the shriek, moving back and forth in wider and wider arcs… The windows were going to break. No way could they move like that and remain intact.

And break they did. Cracking and snapping and then completely falling apart, glass cascading to the street, raining over them as people screamed and Adrien gazed at the black butterfly, the only thing left of the building's former glory.

I have to get in there!

And he was trying to. He was fighting to rid himself of everyone that was pinning him to this spot. Not even thinking of Plagg. Or Chat Noir. Thinking only of—

"Adrien!"

Nathalie had managed to grab him, the hand that had pulled his wrist now moving to cup his face as he again stood with the group, back under the figure that had protected them and that he suddenly recognized as being his bodyguard, Nathalie's eyes on his.

"Stay here."

Another crash. The sound of more glass falling to the street. His eyes moved back to the building, Nathalie's hand cupping his face harder forcing him back to her.

"I'm serious, Adrien. Stay. Here." Her attention moved to his bodyguard. "I'm contacting security. There is a kid missing."

And she stepped away, a last stern look being given to his bodyguard, before disappearing through the crowd, leaving them to him. It was his chance. He could disappear from under his bodyguard's watch while wearing a blindfold.

I'm sorry, Nathalie.

He waited for his bodyguard's attention to move the other way to take a single step back, then crouch and practically crawl through the crowd and away from him, fighting to move passed the sea of people and into one of the nearby alleys.

"That was odd," Plagg uttered as soon as he got outside, looking back towards the crowd over a rubbish bin. "Nathalie was being odd, right?"

"She is afraid I will go back inside to search for Father."

Which he had meant to do. Which he had almost done. Which he intended to do still!

He took his phone out of the pocket—empty, despite father's reassurance just last night—and looked back at the ruined building.

Why do you always do this?! You said you wouldn't do this!

"Adrien?"

"I have to find Marinette and Father."

The staff was shoved into the ground, sending him high up into the air and on top of the nearest roof. Putting the staff over his shoulder, marching up to the other side of the building, while studying the broken windows in front of him, Adrien finally stopped at the third floor, movement inside making a broad grin appear on his face despite his inner turmoil.

Again he extended the staff, sending himself flying over the street and the pointing crowd and cameras. He fell inside the third floor, rolling, feet hitting a fallen table, his momentum causing it to turn and return to the right position, with him on top and a loud crash.

"Hello, peekaboo."

He must have scared her half to death just now considering he was laying flat on his stomach a second later, the yo-yo having come close to hit his head.

"Don't do that!" Ladybug reprimanded, pulling the yo-yo back and catching it. "You know you are late, kitty."

"That kind of sums up my day, Milady," Adrien chuckled, what little mirth he had been able to bring forth brought to an end as he took in his surroundings.

The interior of the building looked like a bomb had gone off. All of it was a ruin. Mannequins and ripped clothes lay amidst turned tables and broken sewing machines, but the weirdest of it all? He was standing in a forest of life-sized, very real looking statues.

"What happened here?"

"I don't know," Ladybug said, making the yo-yo circle at her side and looking around, vigilant. "It was like this when I arrived. No way they could be here before, right?"

Adrien jumped off the table. No, this had never been here. He knew this building well. It had been his playground from time to time. The only one he had known with his parents bent on not allowing him outside the house. And approaching the closest of the statues, that of a woman, trying to hide her face, her expression one of terror, he was left with a very uncomfortable sensation.

"Are these people?" he muttered, a shriek coming from somewhere making him raise the staff immediately. "Was that—?"

"The new victim," Ladybug finished. "It has been breaking every single mirror and window on the building." She looked at the statue he too had been studying. "Guess it can petrify people too."

"Have you seen it?"

"Glimpsed through a window when I arrived. When I turned it wasn't there," she said, attention back to him. "It's this half-human, half-snake thing with—"

She never stood a chance of finishing.

"With snakes for hair? And gold wings?"

"How did you guess that?"

He hadn't. And his face had lit up. A soft knock on the back of his mind, father stepping inside his thoughts with that guilt filled expression that meant he was sneaking some story to him that wasn't exactly mother-approved, leaving Adrien standing in his room a lifetime ago, excitement sending him running towards father as he got to his knees, smiling, one hand reaching inside his waistcoat to take out a carefully folded sheet, one where he had drawn something.

"I found something you might like."

He hadn't sounded that confident. He had always sounded apprehensive when he said that and Adrien didn't remember what his drawing had looked like, but angry as he still was at him for having disappeared, he remembered the story and he was grinning like mad.

"Does she look cool?" he asked, grabbing both of Ladybug's hands and looking around. "She must look so cool!"

"She?" If she could have looked more confused. "I—I just saw her through a reflection, I didn't see—"

"Good! Because looking at her is how everyone got like this!"

Ladybug looked around to the statues he was pointing at, eyebrows raised.

"How do you know that?"

"You know it too. Medusa?" She didn't seem to know and he was looking around again. Like one big idiot. "Okay, rule number one. Mostly for me. Don't look at her."

Ladybug seemed to be stuck between trying to look serious and smiling. It was quite the expression on her he might say.

"You are really excited about this."

"Are you kidding? I always loved this myth and now I am in it!" He dropped his voice, leaning closer to her ear. "I actually always wanted the snakes and the turning people into stone powers," he confided in her, stepping back to point at himself. "But Chat Noir is cool too, right?"

In the fight between being serious and smiling, smiling had just won. Ladybug chuckled.

"You're great, kitty."

"So what do we do, Milady?" he asked. "Ideas? How do we fight it?"

"You are the one who knows her."

Oh, true. But he was not the one who came up with the plans here. He was just good at putting her ideas into reality. And it would take him far longer than her to come up with something.

"So," he started, massaging his neck. "Guess you just have to get a mirror or a shield out of your lucky charm?"

"Kind of not how it works," Ladybug said, apologetic.

"Can't harm to try."

And if there was one thing he could say about her was that she did try. And it wasn't a mirror or a shield that fell into her hands. No. It was a frying pan.

"About that—" Adrien muttered, seeing her turning it on her hands. "Considering Cataclysm is really straight forward. How does Lucky Charm work?"

"I am not sure I want to know."

They stepped deeper inside the ruin that was the building's interior. Walking by what seemed to be the same scene over and over again. Fallen mannequins. Ripped clothes. Turned tables. Broken sewing machines. The statues of those caught inside around them—Until something weird caught their sight. A slithering path cutting through it all.

"I think we got her," he said, dropping to one knee near it, vision still clear despite the darkness. Judging by the piled up mess around them, the way it enclosed the space, this was some kind of lair. "We just have to drive her out."

Because it was lying in wait by the looks of it. Which made sense. And it meant they needed something. Maybe a sound? Or—

"Chat?"

He had just found a mannequin between the piled up tables that seemed liable to take the entire thing down—a plan if would ever come up with one. But it was at Ladybug he was looking now, staring into her eyes as she stood behind him in the darkness, the thought that she didn't belong there crossing his mind.

"About yesterday," she said, making him raise his eyebrows. "I'm sorry we—No."

Her expression became harsher, fingers closing tight over the yo-yo. This was probably the more serious she had ever faced him.

"I'm sorry I didn't get Hawkmoth's Miraculous. I saw the opportunity but I couldn't move."

He was still on one knee under her, looking up. Was she—Was she answering his question from yesterday? The one she had evaded? He couldn't read her to tell, so he repeated it. And there was more Adrien than Chat Noir in the way he spoke.

"Were you hurt?"

"No. I just... I never meant to hurt anyone. I never wanted to hurt anyone. And I didn't know that meant him too." She looked around, to the sea of petrified people. "Even when he is hurting everyone else."

A headshake and she turned back to him.

"I'm sorry."

Adrien tilted his head. Why was he getting the feeling she had been meaning to tell him this the entire day and had just worked enough courage now?

"Why are you apologizing? I'm not angry," he said. He still sounded as far away from Chat Noir as possible. "Did I look angry?"

"I don't think you get angry, Chat."

"Oh, but I do," Adrien stated, lightly. He was utterly furious at father right now, to be honest. And concerned. Not a day had passed and he was back at more of the same! Keeping to himself! Disappearing off the face of the earth and not telling him anything! But none of those things were hers to deal with. So he bottled them up. Nobody needed to know anyway.

"Hey, freezing happens," he finally said.

"It didn't happen to you."

Well no, but it was hardly the first time he hurt someone unintentionally. That was kind of bound to happen in fencing. One ill thought out movement and those sabers showed a lot of conviction in turning into whips. Also—

Adrien pointed at himself.

"Destruction, Milady?" he reminded her. "Probably got that Miraculous for a reason. Like—I'm the destruction to your creation."

Something moved inside the lair in front of them. A low hiss amidst the darkness making them both return to the situation at hand, Ladybug dropping at his side, turning the frying pan so they both were looking at the reflection on it.

"Probably not a good time to tell you I am not a fan of snakes," she said.

"You just have not to look at this one, Milady," he said, pointing at the mannequin he had spotted earlier. "And get that out of there."

And so she did. The yo-yo flying all the way to the blockage to wrap itself around the mannequin's leg, a strong pull bringing the entire structure down, a loud hiss immediately rising in answer and so they were off. Or as off as they could be with a frying pan in their hands and backs turned to the fight. Which was going wonderfully well considering in the first five seconds he had already been sent flying against a table, a spear ripping through it making him roll to the side as Ladybug ran the other way trying to catch the frying pan they both had dropped and that was now rolling away.

First rule of being a Miraculous holder as it seemed? Having a good sense of humor. He doubted anyway could keep at this without one considering how some of these battles turned out. But seriously now, frying pan? They needed a mirror. Something easier to carry. It shouldn't be that hard to find a mirror in here, or a piece of one. This was a fashion brand's building for crying out loud! But the only thing he seemed to be able to find was fabric and useless stuff and broken ceiling lights, grids still hanging from the ceiling and—a figure.

A—A woman and she was walking right into the battle. He knew her. He—

Nathalie?

The Medusa-like victim had clearly seen her too. It was moving to attack. And he was running, grabbing Nathalie by the waist and tossing her to the floor just as the petrifying gaze was turned on her and a kind of invisible wire seemed to give a vicious pull to Medusa. He heard her crash to the floor. Saw the tip of a snake tail contorting in the air. The spear that she had been about to stab them with crashing into the ceiling instead.

"What the hell do you think you are doing?!" Medusa bellowed, trying to get back up, to reach the spear, the ceiling falling around her as Ladybug's yo-yo hit her weapon and sent it all the way across the floor. "Keep out of this, Butterfly!"

Adrien was not staying here to know what that was all about. He was getting up, pulling Nathalie behind him, through the destroyed floor and towards the fire escape. And all the way there he was scolding her.

"You shouldn't be here! What were you thinking?!"

What was father thinking?! Unless he didn't know about this, which meant she had gotten inside of her own accord and he would be scolding her all the way from here to the house. A pity that left no one to scold him! Control Room! Why must he always be like this?!

"Get down there and outside!" he told Nathalie, letting go of her hand and pointing at the closed fire escape door he had just dragged her too. "You can't be here! This is dangerous!"

He was turning his back on her already, bent on rejoining Ladybug, but next moment Nathalie had grabbed his shoulder, the soft pressure making him look back at her. For a moment, with her being here, it felt like being home.

"There is someone missing," she told him and Adrien felt his anger—all of it, even the one at father—completely fall apart. That was why she was here?

"Who is missing?" he asked. He knew what she was about to say. But listening was the least he could do.

"There is this girl. About your age. Black hair. Blue eyes. Her name is Marinette." Nathalie looked around, attention falling on the statues. "She must be somewhere inside."

"I will look for her, okay? Get yourself to safety."

A desk was sent tumbling down behind him and he was off, leaving Nathalie near the fire escape door. He wanted to look back, to make sure that she had heeded his order, that she was leaving, that she was safe before he went back to help Ladybug. He wanted to look back. He really, really wanted to—

But he didn't.

And so he never saw Nathalie standing there, or the way her eyes kept following him until he disappeared.

He didn't see her hesitation as she looked at the destruction around her.

Or the moment she opened the fire escape door and came face to face with the broad shouldered man who was behind it all, who reached for her hand, gloved fingers intertwining with hers, and pulled her much in the same way Adrien had. Away from the fighting. Away from danger. Only this time under the watch of burning blue eyes.

Gabriel

"What were you thinking?!" Gabriel snapped, his and Nathalie's footsteps echoing on the winding stairway as they moved down it, the shrieks and hisses and the unmistakable sounds of fighting above them. "How many times have I told you to hide?!"

A dash of red went by his left shoulder, his instinct reaction to defend himself making him raise the cane to counter the attack only to have his mind overrun by the battle on the top floor.

The bug had just come swinging at Medusa, the yo-yo's cable—wrapped around one of the ceiling lights—sending her flying at her, eyes never leaving the frying pan she was carrying, bent, it seemed, at getting onto Medusa's back and catch the necklace holding the akuma.

If that was her intention, however, she failed at it. Spectacularly. And Gabriel was grinning, eyes burning, watching as she did, the reflection she was using for guidance sending her not left but right and straight into Medusa's reach, her tail whipping at the bug sending her flying, against the mannequins, tables, and everything that was broken in the floor. Not that it stopped her. Next moment, the bug was running, fleeing, back out of reach, without Medusa doing something.

The butterfly-shaped line lit around his eyes. The connection burning his mind as it was opened further and further.

"They won't be confused forever, Medusa," he snarled at her, attention following the bug as she jumped behind a turned table. "Stop messing around and get those Miraculous!"

The connection snapped shut. Angrily. Violently. And as difficult as it was to move away from the turmoil feeding it and the akuma, he grabbed at this sensation of warmth, a careful pressure on his hand and pushed through until he was back at the fire escape, looking over his shoulder and scowling at Nathalie.

"What are you doing?" he demanded to know, eyes on the undisturbed bright blue ones raised to look up the stairs, then dropping to face him. "What got into your head to be here?!"

"I lost one of the kids."

They came to such an abrupt halt she rammed into his back. The terror her words had given rise to making him turn on his heels, towards Nathalie, dreading what she might say, just as something darker pulled at that part of him that still was—and maybe had always been—the Collector, this deep feeling of betrayal invading his mind as the connection opened ever so slightly and he saw the cat.

He didn't know what it was Nathalie was seeing, right now. If his fear or his fury. It mattered not. She was here. And she had always understood either way.

"Adrien is outside," she informed, words making a shiver of relief go down his back, his eyes closing. "He is fine."

"And your lost lamb?"

"Marinette."

Nathalie would have crashed into his back again if they were still on the move. His eyes were on hers, searching them, probing them, trying to find an answer there.

"That girl…" His hand closed tighter over hers, a feverish urgency to his voice. "That was before or after the bug appeared?"

"Before."

"Truly?" A nasty grin spread through his face. "So she does fit."

The connection was ripped open again. On the other side, the destroyed floor was no longer in view. Instead, the open night sky was around Medusa, the city's illumination shining under her as she slithered out of the building and onto the iron butterfly's wings. The bug was under her and banging the pan against the metal. The cat taking advantage of the distraction it provided to drop from overhead, right hand seeming to be boiling.

It missed by inches. And they were both retreating now, the cat and the bug, a black and a red bolt, down and back inside the building through the broken windows, splitting once there, the mostly undisturbed floor seeing them disappear amidst the work stations, and mannequins and pined drawings of clothes.

"Leave Ladybug," Gabriel ordered, icily, the bug distinctive red clothing appearing and disappearing behind the different stations' divisions. "Concern yourself with Chat Noir. He has activated Cataclysm. It will initiate that Miraculous countdown when it hits something. Make sure it does. And get that ring the instant the transformation wears off."

An irritated hiss was his answer. The nearest mannequin being whipped to the ground by a scaly tail. She was on the move again, dropping to slither close to the floor, going by table legs, and chairs and discarded pieces of fabric. Searching. Hunting—

"You know, keeping an eye on the sky is normally a good move," a good-humored voice said from above. "You know, where the cats are?"

It came to a matter of reaction. Of willpower against agility. A black figure dropping from up above making Gabriel shove the cane into Nathalie's hands, then reach out for the akuma and twist Medusa out of the way just as the cat landed right where she had been, then strain the connection to reach out to grab his ankle, just like he had done the day prior, trying to keep him from fleeing. This time the cat didn't fall for it, he escaped. And the connection became too strained to be kept, slipping through Gabriel's fingers, as Medusa regained control over her body.

"Stop doing that, Butterfly!" she ragged, tossing her spear to the air and grabbing it before aiming it at the cat. It ripped through the table he had just dived behind, the alarmed "Chat!" coming from the opposite side of the room, giving away Ladybug's present position, making the cat raise his arms.

"I'm fine!"

And he was jumping out of cover as if to prove it, using the staff to back-flip over Medusa and rejoin the bug.

"Found a mirror!"

The announcement made Gabriel clench his fists, watching them again flee, Medusa in pursuit.

A mirror.

"He knows. That cat knows."

"Knows?" Nathalie's voice came to him. He couldn't see her. Her words were a mere whisper in his mind, but without the soft pressure of her hand one real enough to remind him he was not alone. Not this time. "What about?"

"Medusa. The cat knows about her."

And how old was he anyway? Fourteen, fifteen? Was this common knowledge? Something of no value to be discarded? For he only knew of a fifteen year old who would know this.

"Your son is outside," Nathalie said, calmly. "I left him there."

And he had kept nothing of what he had been thinking to himself, as it seemed. Unsurprisingly. Such was the joy of this Miraculous of his. He couldn't hear himself think over the connection and the images blasting inside his mind. Not unless he spoke. And the cat was not making Gabriel hearing himself any the easier.

"No hard feelings or anything, I'm normally on your side!" the cat was shouting, running alongside Ladybug and gesticulating as if he could feel Gabriel's derision through Medusa's glare. "No, not yours! Hers!"

"Why are you telling them that?" Ladybug queried, flabbergasted. "Does she need to know?"

"How many times do you think I will meet Medusa—Yikes!"

The spear had just been thrown at them, flying by as they rolled in opposite directions and Gabriel snarled at the entirety of the scene.

What was the problem with this feline?! Did he take pleasure on acting like an idiot?! On being seen as one?! This was ridiculous! This—

This is not you, cat! You had claws yesterday!

And the feeling of betrayal was taking hold of him again, burning like a festering wound. Was this Adrien? Was it liable to be him with this behavior? He would expect better of him than this silliness, this utter nonsense! This was not the quiet boy he saw from time to time. It was not the one who once used to fill the house with laughter. The one he had known. The one who had came running to him, chuckling and smiling, and tossing his arms around his neck to look with pure delight at whatever he had been doing. The one—The son he missed dearly, even if he was no longer a father he could run to anymore.

"When you say outside—" Gabriel growled, speaking to his side, to Nathalie, now a blue-eyed smear in his vision. "Who exactly is there?"

"His bodyguard."

Oh yes, speak of reliability made flesh.

"I hired that man because he can fight his way through a crowd, not for his intellectual brilliance. Adrien could run circles around him when he was three. Now?" he fumed, Nathalie was becoming clearer, steadfast and composed and undisturbed by his ongoing rant. "And you say somehow that girl managed to run passed you?"

"If she is Ladybug, she did a brilliant job. Both of disappearing and pretending to be arriving," she acquiesced, the shriek echoing behind her words, making the building shake, seeing her stern tone become kinder. "But if she isn't Ladybug? If she is here? Trapped inside with that thing?" she pointed out. "She is Adrien's age. She is his friend."

Her eyes had never left his, never wavered. They didn't even as he spoke.

"You say that like it should make a difference. Like I care." he observed. There was an honest bewilderment to his words. More honesty to his rebuttal. "I don't."

"You will."

She had more faith him than he ever would.

"I didn't attack that girl," he heard himself say, a rare calm to his voice. "Unless she is that bug, she is either well hidden or not here at all. And I would prefer for you not to be here either—"

There was a sudden pull at his mind. Urgent. Anxious. Alarmed. He would have hated Nooroo even more for the interruption, for daring to interfere, if it wasn't for what he showed him. He was pulling Nathalie behind him the next moment, ripping the sword out of the cane she was carrying just as Medusa's spear blasted through the door and he was forced to defend himself.

"Go up!"

The spear sank into the wall on the opposite side of the stairs, shaking in place as he grabbed at the connection again, the stairway disappearing as he moved to follow Nathalie, and for a moment, seeing through Medusa's eyes he could make no sense of what she thought she was doing for she was outside. Going up the iron butterfly and into the top floor. The doors being thrown down one after the other.

Storerooms. Fitting rooms. Offices.

Empty. Empty. EMPTY.

Where was that—?!

A last door was broken down. The one to the room he had been in prior with Nathalie and the kids. Inside, the cat was moving away from the bags, feet making the broken glass snap as he stepped backwards towards the window, eyes firmly closed, a step too many making him lose his balance and look down. The city lights were behind him. His right hand still boiling from Cataclysm.

"Where is Ladybug, Medusa?" Gabriel bellowed. Where was that bug?! "Search for her!"

She turned, tail crashing on top of the fitting room on one of the corners, destroying it entirely, then turning to look around, the cat getting back into view.

"So, are you an employee here?" he asked, something weird to the way he was standing making Gabriel squint, then scowl as he continued talking, somehow managing to point straight at Medusa even with his eyes closed. "I really can't tell with all of that going on."

Medusa hissed.

"Don't get me wrong! It's like the coolest thing ever! Thing is everyone down there has this nice ensemble, wondering if it is under that too."

He was looking back again, towards the street, eyebrows raised. Something in the way he kept his left hand out of sight made Gabriel practically snarl.

"He is hiding something," he said. "Whatever it is destroy it."

"I am tired of your orders, Butterfly!"

Next to the window the cat chuckled.

"Oh! Is he bossy?" he asked, turning back to Medusa, eyes closed. "Hawkmoth, I mean. I bet he is bossy! By the way, can he listen to what I say or just to you? Because I mean, this is some seriously cool Greek theme he has going on today. You know minus the destruction and the mayhem and the all around terror—But back on topic, if you work here this is seriously such a bad idea. I mean think of the huge mess you are getting into!"

"Focus, Medusa!" Gabriel snarled. "Stop listening to him!"

"Shut up!"

The cat raised his eyebrows.

"That was with me or with him?"

"He is acting as bait!" Gabriel snapped. "Look for Ladybug!"

"I told you to shut up!"

"Still don't know who should do that!" the cat sighed and it seemed to be the last provocation, Medusa moved to attack and, a huge grin filling his face, the cat jumped. Out into the vacuum, rotating mid air to shove the staff on the iron butterfly and sending himself straight into the fourth floor.

And his idiotic servant?

Medusa was mindlessly going after him, slithering down the butterfly's wings, passed the cat's abandoned staff and back inside the building.

"Stop following the—!"

It came into view then. The bug. The bug and the frying pan. A frying pan he understood what the purpose was the instant the cat dropped behind Medusa and what he had been hiding become clear. A camera. He raised it, aimed at the pan and pressed the button.

Gabriel grabbed the handrail, stumbling to his knees, pure instinct making him cover his eyes rather than just close them, Nathalie's footsteps running back to get to him, her hands holding his shoulders. For a moment, he thought he was blind. There was nothing around him other than this whiteness left by the flash. And then something cracked, the soft flapping of wings echoing around him. The connection still there as the akuma tried to get away, to flee back to him… and he got sight of the bug and the cat for a last second, bumping their fists, voices rising triumphant amidst all the destruction—Nathalie and himself not that far behind their backs.

"Hold."

"Hold?" Nathalie looked at him, eyes fleeing from the broken door at their side and from a pair he was sure, from the way she held his shoulders, she too could see, a single glance to the stairs as he picked her up, enough for her to understand. "No—Wait!"

He had jumped and Nathalie's arms wrapped around his neck, tightening as they fell, her face hiding on his shoulder. It took seconds for them to land on the lower floor and retreat under the stairs, away from view, where he put her down. Or he would have, if her legs hadn't given up under her and left him to drop to his knees and lower her to sit in the first step of the stairs. From where she looked up. One hand covering her mouth as she took in the drop.

"That—"

He never knew what she meant to say. If anything at all. He was clenching his bruised right hand, pure frustration aiming it at punching the ground and she jumped forward the same instant, to stop him, both hands grabbing his, pulling it to her, hugging it to her chest, protectively, as the transformation collapsed and the white butterflies surrounded them both.

Gabriel's attention went from her hands to her eyes.

"You came in here—" He sounded utterly bewildered. "Why?"

Her eyes met his, then dropped as did her hands.

"I have to find Marinette."

And she got up, walking outside, disappearing in the lobby, the pink light fixing the building following in her wake as Nooroo rose from behind Gabriel, tilting his head at her back.

The Miraculous seemed to be burying itself in Gabriel's chest.

It was the only answer he would get.

Adrien

"You did it again," Adrien grumbled in a low voice, right hand waving at Marinette as she got inside the bakery with her mother and was immediately ambushed by her father, the share difference of size between the two making it seem like she might break, like a twig, as he spinned around with her near the counter. "Why didn't you say something? You promised you would."

Attention breaking from the Dupain-Chengs to look at his own father, finding him dropping his eyes from Marinette being squeezed in a bear hug—some sort of emotion Adrien couldn't quite understand on his face—Adrien tried to catch his eyes, fighting for a moment of his time, for his attention, for some kind of answer.

"Father?"

A gust of wind broke through the street, cold and biting now that night had fallen. Shivering, Adrien rubbed his arms, something warm being put over his shoulders—A piece of blue fabric. Father's jacket, Adrien recognized—leaving him staring at father's back just his fingers stroked his hair and he moved passed him, walking to the cars.

He was—He was actually paying attention, so why wasn't he answering?

"You were not turned into stone, were you?"

The question seemed to take an eternity to get to its destination, when it finally broke through to wherever father's mind was, however, one might think he had just offended him.

"What?" he snapped, stopping and turning beside Nathalie, who was waiting for them near the second car. "No!"

"Are you sure?" Adrien insisted, tilting his head at him.

"I think I would have noticed if that had happened."

"Because if you were, nobody is going to think less of you."

"I wasn't turned into stone, Adrien!"

"I was just asking!"

Their voices, suddenly locked in the exact same snappish tone, faded into the night, a car going by, music blasting, leaving Gabriel glaring daggers at it as Adrien's voice went back to a quiet inquisitive tone.

"So… Did you forget?"

"Car."

Nathalie stepped forward, moving to open the backseat door before father could reach for the handle. Sliding inside, moving all the way to the other end of the backseat, Adrien looked back, watching as father followed him inside and Nathalie closed the door.

There was something weird going on here. This was not remotely part of her job.

"Is something wrong?" he queried, eyes studying father's face as he massaged his temples. "Are you alright?"

"Tired."

Adrien could see that. He had been visibly fighting not to slump in the car seat just now, to keep his eyes open, but he had been normal, for lack of a better word, for most of the night. And considering headquarters being destroyed by Hawkmoth and then restored by Ladybug, he actually had been pretty decent—except for that part with the confidentiality agreements he had shoved in front of his friends. That was… He didn't even know what that was. Other than father being father.

Rigth now, however, Adrien was concerned that he had just been putting up an act and that with Alya, Marinette and Nino gone, with it being just the two of them and Nathalie, he saw no further reason to pretend anymore.

"Try not to crash into the gates," father told Nathalie, his voice completely devoid of energy, as she hit the ignition button and his attention slipped outside. Back to the Dupain-Chengs—all three of them waving from inside the bakery as the two cars joined the almost inexistent traffic—and then at the city as it started to go by.

"Father?"

He seemed to have forgotten he was here. With him in the car. And taking advantage of a red traffic light, Adrien slid to the middle seat, right next to him. Trying to catch something on his face. To understand what was going on. Instead, he saw him holding his right wrist.

"Is something wrong with your hand?"

He was going to give a heart attack to someone today. First, Ladybug. Now, father. Father having the advantage of not being liable to throw a yo-yo at his head. In fact, having turned to find him sitting at his side, he seemed stuck on looking between him and the seat he had been originally at, clearly trying to figure out how he had moved without him noticing. At least, before something far more urgent crossed his mind and he snapped his attention downwards, towards the seatbelt, making sure Adrien had it on.

Honestly, as far as distracting him went, this one was the best Adrien could ever hope for and he was not missing the opportunity. He reached out for father's right arm, raising it to his eyes, what was going on underneath the white sleeve making his stomach turn.

"How did this happen?!"

It seemed to finally wake father this. And by that he meant he tried to get away from him, Adrien's refusal to let go, leaving them locked in this weird tug-of-war in the backseat, before the fight ran out of father and he turned back to the window and the city, to the lights going by, to the people still walking on the streets.

"I have no idea," he said, in the same exhausted tone he had used to address Nathalie. "It was like this after Selene returned to normal."

"Selene?"

It took Adrien a moment to get there. To remember that had been Wailer's real name. To get back at the mind controlled crowd the night before. And for his mind to take a sudden turn. To an abandoned building and a masked man rising above him, rapier in hand. To a yo-yo crashing into his wrist.

"He fits," Ladybug's voice insisted, rising from the same exact place in his mind as the wave of disbelief that left him rotted on spot, gazing at father's bruised wrist, before something else came to mind and relief let him breathe again.

The Collector.

Hawkmoth had attacked father.

It can't be him, he told himself, tone becoming more forceful. It isn't him.

And that meant there was only one thing that mattered here. Only one.

"This has been like this since yesterday?!"

There. That was what actually mattered. And looking up to face father's dull blue eyes, Adrien was completely incredulous.

"Why isn't it bandaged?! Haven't you gone to a—?!"

"For the last time, I am not going to a hospital."

"The last time?"

He looked at the front seat, eyes meeting Nathalie's through the rear view mirror. So, she knew. And had tried. If she hadn't been able to do anything, he didn't even want to know what tenuous chance he got at achieving anything. Go figure why he didn't just give up.

"Can you work?" Adrien asked, going back to the wrist, father grimacing when he tried to turn his arm, making him immediately stop. "Sorry. Seriously though, can you draw with this?"

"It's hardly life threatning."

Really? That was his reasoning?

Adrien gave him back his arm, leaning forward to get between the two front seats, attention raised towards Nathalie.

"Is there a hospital nearby or something?"

"Adrien," Father hissed.

"If it was with me you would drag me there!" he tossed to the back, turning to look at him to find him with his arms crossed.

"That is different," father replied. And there, there was the sigh and the slight eye roll.

"How?"

"I am your father."

"Well, I am your son."

And there was a glare. Not only at him, but also at Nathalie. It failed on both fronts. Nathalie was still looking politely amused at their exchange as La Tour Eiffel appeared in front of them and the car started going around les Champs de Mars, following behind the one driven by his bodyguard. Meanwhile, Adrien—

No, he was not letting go of this any time soon.

"You can't go around with your hand like this," he insisted.

"I won't be 'going around' with anything," father retorted, starting to sound annoyed. "I don't intend to make leaving the house a habit."

"Well, you can't go around the house like this either," he replied, back to his seat and pointing father's attention from the approaching Tour Eiffel to his own arm. "That looks awful. It must feel awful. What if it gets worse?"

And he didn't want to think what that entailed. Not that father seemed to care. And why?

"It will be fine tomorrow."

Adrien could do little but press his lips. There was 'why'. Always the same rebuttal. Some things never changed.

"Do you remember that time when I twisted my ankle while fencing?" he heard himself say, arms crossed. "Like three years or something ago?"

A deep sigh and father was back at massaging his temples.

"I would have a great deal of difficulty forgetting that," he grumbled.

"Yeah, me too," Adrien grumbled back. "I failed second place because of it."

Father blinked, seeming to have been thrown off course as he finally turned to look at him. Then, he shook his head. Priorities, he seemed to be thinking. Which was rich coming from him.

"What has this to do with anything?" he sighed.

"It won't be fine in the morning."

Now it was father who was pressing his lips.

"I am not going anywhere near a hospital, Adrien."

"Why?" Adrien insisted. "What is your problem with hospitals?"

"I have no problem with hospitals, I just won't have the press descend on us like a band of ravenous—"

There was a sudden flare of light. White, bright, illuminating the interior of the car like it was day. Both of them stood there for a moment, looking at each other. Adrien's immediate certainty that Hawkmoth was up to something—again—being shaken to its core when the first flare gave way to a second one, then another and another, and both of them looked outside to find the street packed with cameras, the house's walls barely visible behind them.

"The vultures are back," father immediately scoffed, turning to Nathalie. "Keep driving."

There was more than just hesitation to the way she bit her lower lip in answer. And the car was slowing down, the red tail lights of the one his bodyguard was driving threatening to disappear between the already closing crowd as she looked back at father.

"We are going to run over someone."

He raised his eyebrows, a sort of cruel amusement bringing a smirk to his lips. The reply, when it came, was glacial.

"That will give them something to write about."

Nathalie's hands closed tighter over the wheel, the car gaining momentum again. She looked as out of her depth as Adrien would ever see her. He didn't know why that scared him. He just knew of the madness going on outside. There were cameras hitting the windows. Muffled questions being tossed at them. Flashes.

Nathalie was right, no matter how dismissive father got over this situation. They were going to run over someone. There was no way this was going to end without someone getting hurt. And he couldn't take his eyes off it. Off any of it. He kept watching as the crowd went by, one hand clinging to father's hand, the opening iron gates coming closer and closer. Then, finally, the arch went over them.

They were inside now. In the courtyard. Peebles crunching under the wheels as the cars circled it and stopped in front of the stairway. Sliding out of the backseat behind father, flashes raining over them, Adrien immediately went for the stairs, a sudden pull at his arm making him look back.

"Father?"

He was not following. The harsh expression that had taken hold of his face as he looked at the iron gates the crowd fighting to get a clear shot of them was not allowing to close, the way his eyes followed Adrien's bodyguard jog across the courtyard to solve the situation, making Adrien pull at his arm fearing he intended to stay here—then sigh when he moved, following him and Nathalie inside.

It was just the three of them now. Him, Nathalie and father. His bodyguard still outside and fighting the crowd. And they remained here, in the hallway, for what seemed to be like an eternity. Him still holding father's hand. Nathalie to their right, attention outside. Both waiting, until father made a sudden turn for the atelier, taking them both in tow.

"Is that necessary?" Nathalie asked, voice following him, quiet and matter-of-fact, eyebrows knitted. "It might just make things worse."

"Worse?" father repeated, not looking their way. "They put us through hell last time. They can't do worse."

The atelier door was opened, the lights turning on around them as father went for the console making Adrien's hearth give a jump, finally understanding what Nathalie had been on about.

"Father, wait!"

His fingers were already flying over the display, moving over the house's blueprints that were so clear to Adrien as he stood with him near the console.

"Father!"

He was not listening and the entire house had come to life. There were steel shutters rolling to cover the windows, locks echoing all around them and Adrien found himself taking an instinctive step behind father, hand tightening around his.

"Keep everything locked," he heard him tell Nathalie. "No one enters this house and no one leaves."

Nathalie nodded, undisturbed, and took one of the communicators on the wall with her as she stepped outside.

It was just the two of them here now. The silence left in the wake of the house going on lockdown seeing Adrien's forehead come to rest against father's arm.

"Please, Father," he still whispered, pleading. I don't want to be locked in here.

He could not bring himself to say it. He just couldn't. So, he forced out the only thing that could make this house feel less like a prison.

"Can I still go to school?"

"I believe we already discussed that yesterday."

The answer had been angry, snappish, but still it was a yes. A 'yes', even if father didn't seem to be here anymore. Even if somewhere between the car and the house, he had lost him. And so Adrien stepped away, out of the atelier, into his room and curled into bed. Plagg coming to rest not on the opposite side of it as he used to but at his side, using his arm as a pillow, leaving him looking at the kwami for an instant.

"He is not locking you in here so everything is alright, isn't it?" Plagg said as if there wasn't anything abnormal in his behavior, taking to watch Adrien as he pointed the glass wall's command at it and pressed the buttons, trying to make it open. "He kept his word, right?"

"Guess so."

Adrien laid down, Plagg wiggling himself happily under the sheets alongside him, only to frown.

"Are you cold?"

He wasn't. That was not why he was shivering. But putting the glass wall command on the bedside table, he reached for the pile of clothes he had dumped at the foot of the bed all the same, pulling father's light blue jacket out.

He would still be huddled under it when morning arrived.

Author's Notes:

The second part as promised. Hope you all liked it! And that was worth the wait :)