Summary: Nathanael rarely hoped for a peaceful day, but could he have had at least not have had a mild concussion on his first day as a hero?

A/N: Okay, so I absolutely love Nathanael as a character and can totally see him as the bearer of the fox miraculous, so here's my bundle of reveals and bleh be bleh! So enjoy!

Warning: Mild swearing, injuries, mentions of loss of bodily fluids

XxXxXxX

When he was a little boy, there was nothing more he wanted than to tell a story. At night when his parents tucked him into bed, they wouldn't be the one rambling on about the princess and her valiant knights, no; he would find enjoyment out of telling tales of the dancing moon or the midnight maiden who visited the world when someone took roads at night. He had such an imagination; his parents lived for his tales. So, when he found a skill with a paintbrush, they immediately went to find him the perfect set. His first painting, that of a colourful fox, still hung in the living room.

Nathanael, like many nights before, was still in his bedroom, working tirelessly on his painting of Ladybug. It was of her based on a picture taken at a meeting with the mayor as she and Chat Noir waved on entrance. It was mostly focused on her, but the shadowy outline of Chat Noir could be seen behind her.

The people were painted as that of a galaxy pattern, shadowy, while Mari - no, Ladybug – was painted in vibrant colours, the red of her suit sharply contrasting with the darkness of the rest of the painting. Her smile, her gentle, beautiful smile, screamed for attention and when the last detail of her plump cherry lips were added with a colourless shine, Nathanael sat back in his chair, his back complaining in exhaustion.

"Marinette Dupain-Cheng… Ladybug… you are so alike, I do not understand why nobody sees the real you behind the mask. Your eyes, your smile… it's all there. I paint it every day, I see it all the time… but now, who's Chat Noir?"

Nathanael's mumbling went unheard as it lapsed over the chime of the grandfather's clock in the living room below. 2 A.M.

He stretched his arms above his head, his exhaustion overwhelming him momentarily. He yawned, lugging himself out of his chair. With finesse he handled the cloth on the back of his chair, draping it over the mostly dry painting.

With that done, he collapsed onto his bed; t-shirt, skinny jeans and sneakers.

XxXxX

He was late. He was late. He WAS SOOOOO LATE!

In a blind rush, Nathanael grabbed his writing utensils for school from his desk. He had five minutes to get to school, so he shoved everything in, grabbed the painting and RAN! LIKE THAT DAMN AKUMA FROM YESTERDAY!

A giant bunny. I kid you not.

There was no time for getting properly dressed, so he just grabbed his jacket and sneakers, not even bothering with his jacket as he just kept it over his shoulders.

In his rush to school, just as he was about to enter, an old man in a Hawaiian t-shirt, tripped. Nathanael's heart stopped for a second and he rushed to the old man in aid. He managed to scratch his jeans up even further, but he barely focused on that.

"Hello, sir. Do you need any help?" he asked politely. He was left with less than a minute to get to class.

"Thank you kind man," he said, grinning sagely as Nathanael helped him up. He leaned over to get the old man's cane, just as the bell rang.

When he was stable on his feet, Nathanael greeted him hastily and ran like the wind once more.

The old man watched in amusement, pondering to himself. "He is very fast. Very, very fast. Imaginative and speedy. Perfect, I'd say."

XxXxX

First Nathanael had to get to the main hall to have his painting settled with the rest of the art pieces. Their art teacher greeted him with pride, ushering him over to where the rest of his paintings stood. He was one of this school's assets in the art department and Nathanael prided himself over it.

"Nathan, m'boy! So? Where is it? The painting, c'mon boy. I gave you homeroom off, but that's as far as Ma'am Bustier would allow! Ah, what a woman!" his teacher kept on rambling as Nathanael carefully handled the painting, pleased to see that the canvas and the canvas frame was still intact and that none of the paintjob had been damaged.
"Oh, boy, this is lovely!" his art teacher exclaimed. "I love the contrast of colour, but Miss Ladybug's features look a little off to me…"

"Yeah, well, I mostly had to work on memory. It wasn't all that easy," Nathanael admitted defensively.

"It's all well. It looks lovely; now get on to class," the teacher chastised lightly and Nathanael ran. Again.

As he was about to open the door mid run, someone else opened it, causing him to trip his way in, books flying out of his bag.

"Omigosh! Nathanael! Are you okay!?" Marinette squealed worriedly, crouching down to his level.

"Mmm fine. Ow…"

He managed to ignore Chloé's snobbish laugh and snide remark about his clumsiness when Marinette helped him up with a sweet smile, much the same way he helped the older man earlier that morning. From there on the day turned out for the better. On his way to his desk, Adrien high fived him, congratulating him on getting in the art contest and Juleka and Rose offered similar compliments. Marinette disappeared out the door and the teacher was nowhere to be seen.

"Let the day begin!"

XxXxX

Nathanael was attacked in the bathroom.

Now, don't get the wrong idea, in fact the thing that attacked him could have been no larger than his hand, but then again he did have abnormally large hands…

Back to the point!

A blur of orange attacked him, squealing promptly about fish or something…

Needless to say Adrien who had followed him into the bathroom at a bad timing had a reason to be concerned.

"Um, Nathanael? Are you alright?"

"Yeah! I am fine!" he squeaked before realising his mistake, correcting himself promptly with a cough and a fake deep voice. "Yeah, I'm fine… I just… um… a spider fell on my head. It's dead now."

A spider fell on his head? Seriously?

"Um," Adrien murmured awkwardly, unsure of what to say, "Don't die?"

Nathanael chuckled awkwardly; suddenly extremely glad that he couldn't be seen. "On it."

Nathanael stayed quiet until he heard the tell-tale sign of the door closing and he turned to the strangely orange thing floating thing.

"What... the... what are you?" Nathanael whispered harshly, hiding his terror in order to avoid death. What? He didn't know what this thing was – for all he knew it could detect his fear and kill him.

No, Nathanael was not insane. He was just a lovable idiot.

"My name is Fayy!" it squealed adorably and Nathanael had to soften at the sight as it buzzed around his head like a little kid.

"I am… I am a... a kuh-wami!" It squealed, its bug eyes going wide. It had a cute orange body in the shape of what seemed to be a cartoon fox with a fluffy tail dipped in white.

"Uh… a what?" Nathanael breathily asked with eyes wide at the creature's innocent behaviour.

"Ah, a kwami! I'm one of those things that give Ladybug and Chat Noir their powers! I'm the fox miraculous and you have been chosen to be the new Volpina, or Volpin, whichever you prefer."

Nathanael fainted.

XxXxX

When art class started and Nathanael wasn't there, his art teacher momentarily dismissed it, but even Marinette and Adrien were early, so he got concerned. Nevertheless he waited for his star pupil to turn up, but after class was in session for fifteen minutes already and his students were getting restless, he said, "Does anybody know where Nathanael is?"

Several students looked up at him warily. Only Marinette had noticed his absence, but considering she was pretty much the only one from his homeroom class that year in his art class, that was fairly normal.

She raised her hand warily. "He never signed out, sir. I think he's still at school and the likelihood that he'd cut class…"

"Is zero, I am aware," the teacher muttered to mostly himself. He pushed himself off of the board and said to Adrien, "You go and look for him. Take someone with if you have to."

Adrien nodded and started leaving while Marinette followed him, her little bag snug around her shoulder, with Tikki buzzing nervously around inside.

He glanced around in surprise when Marinette followed him outside.

"Nathanael is a good friend. I need to know if he's okay," Marinette insisted to Adrien who didn't say anything, but his surprise probably gave him away.

"Oh, no I get it. Where do you think he could be?"

"We'll check the boy's bathroom and then the library. Maybe he fell asleep there…"

"The bathroom!" Adrien snapped his fingers when he realised that was the last place he had seen the redhead. "Come on! I think I know where he is!"

So the two of them rushed to the direction of the bathroom; Adrien slipping into the men's room while Marinette waited outside. She heard a choked gasp and a door being kicked down.

"Adrien! Is he there?"

"Oh, he is here alright and he unconscious!"

"What?"

Within seconds Adrien came out of the men's room with Nathanael's lanky figure in his arms. "I think he has a concussion. I'll take him to the nurse's office. Can you quickly go get his school bag? It's somewhere near the busted door," Adrien admitted sheepishly, but before Marinette had time to respond, he had run off to the direction of the nurse's office. Marinette sucked in her squeamishness and ran into the bathroom, got Nathanael's book bag and left, trying desperately to ignore the splintered door right next to it. She headed off to the nurse's office, catching up with Adrien on the way.

"There's no blood, at least," Adrien supplied rather unhelpfully. Marinette could see that!

"I wonder what happened," Marinette mumbled to herself, finding herself standing outside the nurse's office. She nudged the door open, finding the nurse behind her desk and three open beds behind her.

"Oh, Marinette, what brings you here?" she asked pleasantly.

Adrien then decided to step in with Nathanael's body and chaos broke out. In a flurry the nurse led him to place Nathanael on the nearest bed and Marinette and Adrien were sent out of the room. Out there, they caught their breath.

"You wait here," Adrien said softly, "I'll go get our bags." With that he planted a soft kiss on the crease on Marinette's forehead and she blushed sweetly as her boyfriend left. She sat down on the chair outside the office, exhaustion seeping in. She had been so worried about her friend, but now that she was alone, she could relax, knowing that Nathanael was in good hands. Besides, why would Adrien, her boyfriend of one month act so casually if he wasn't convinced that Nathanael was fine? Adrien had an acute sense of instinct and so far, he showed nothing out of the ordinary. Plagg was buzzing around her head and Tikki was let out of the pouch by Marinette so that the two could converse.

"I sense Fayy, Tikki," Plagg exclaimed immediately.

"Do you think he fainted because of that?"

"Probably. The kid's a wimp! Worse than Adrien was at some point!"

"Plagg," Marinette chastised. While she knew that Master Fu had recently spoken of recruiting new teammates, she did not want to jump to conclusions yet.

"Marinette's right. We don't know if Master Fu chose Nathanael or not. For all we know he could have fainted for a completely different reason!"

XxXxX

Nathanael groaned as he was torn from his sleep. His body felt heavy and –

A wave of nausea overcame him and he twisted his body that felt like lead, puking into a bucket at the side of his bed. His mother came in when she heard his dry hacking and Nathanael was surprised to see her. He thought she was still at work, but there she was, rubbing his back, looking at him with a face full of worry.

"Are you alright sweetie?" she asked consolingly when he managed to fall back and breathe properly, trying to get over the splitting headache he was suffering from.

"What happened?"

"A few friends found you in the boy's bathroom passed out. The nurse said you might have a concussion, so stay in bed."

"No, the art show… it's…"

"No, Nathanael. You will stay in bed even if it's the last thing you do!"

"Gee, thanks mom, plan my funeral, will you?" Nathanael teased, joking dryly.

"On it. Now, the two who found you would like to see you. Oh, and Juleka, Rose and Rupert send their regards. They are still at school, right now."

Nathanael nodded tiredly. When his mother left, Adrien and Marinette came in, looking too cheerful for the dark drapes of his room.

Adrien closed the door behind him and for some reason Marinette looked like she was hiding something behind her back.

"So, Fire Fox, huh? Or are you going to play it safe and go for Volpin?" Adrien asked in a teasing tone that nearly sent Nathanael jolting up in shock, but the nausea and the splitting headache prevented him from doing so.

With that said, Adrien held out a necklace with an orange pendant in the shape of either a fox tail or a teardrop and from behind Marinette the kwami, Fayy, came flying out, tackling his chest.

His hand went to catch the kwami whom only snuggled deeper into his hoodie.

"Welcome to the Miraculous team. It looks like you're our first recruit. I'm Chat Noir and this is Ladybug. Now, are you ready for an art show, you sly fox?"

Adrien had a shit eating grin only Chat Noir could truly muster and Marinette wore a look of pride, now making her one with Ladybug.

Nathanael was done for.