Adrien had a glass of champagne in one hand and a smile on his face. He'd left Marinette with a junior designer from one of the smaller fashion houses and was watching her from a distance. She had been too comfortable letting him talk when he'd been dragging her around during the cocktail reception. So he had made an excuse and gotten out of the way after making sure that Jacqueline knew that Marinette had designed the dress herself.
It was a good dress. Not too daring but very different. It didn't look anything like the original dress that she had taken home. It was purely hers and it suited her. Cute and flirty with surprising details like the lace she had added in place of the previous collar. She was radiant, especially when the conversation turned to something she was passionate about. She had been talking some specific detail of fabrics in the Valentino line when he left her.
The Gala was held in a chateau outside the city. Every detail was opulent. The bright lights and elaborate glass and metal center pieces weren't quite in keeping with the surroundings but it was beautiful. Adrien didn't know if the building was an imitation or something that had actually been built during the reign of the Sun King. He was trying to figure it out from the arches around the ballroom. He didn't know a lot about historic construction but he knew enough about modern design to be pretty sure the building wasn't new.
"You never get to call me 'jackass' ever again," Liam said coming to stand beside him. He tore his attention away from the walls and stood up a little straighter. He put on his Adrien-the-Model smile even though it was just Liam. He did not want to slip too far away from charming or he was going to say something rude to his father or one of his father's horrible friends.
"You're the sacrificial lamb this year?" Adrien asked, ignoring the comment.
"You, me, Nadine and Orla," Liam said, "We're the walking advertisements for this year's event. It's a good thing we're pretty."
"It is," Adrien said.
Liam's accent hadn't improved and in this room full of people putting trying so hard it was almost comforting to hear him butcher his vowels. French wasn't really a language intended for Irish inflection but Liam didn't let that stop him. He could probably live in Paris for fifty years and still be nearly unintelligible. Adrien cracked a grin at him.
"There are rules about bringing interns to events," Liam said.
"There aren't actually. I had a plus one invitation, I could have brought my cousin or put a hobo in a dress if I really wanted to. She's better company than either of those options," Adrien said.
"Not written rules, just rules," Liam said.
"See how much I care," Adrien said drawing a circle around his face.
He kept his expression intentionally flat. He was the boss's kid and that had always meant that one of the unwritten rules was that he only got polite invitations. He got invited to team building events but not out to the bar afterwards. He wasn't really a member of the little cadre that made up the in-house models. He knew most of the unwritten rules but was pretty sure that they didn't really apply to him.
"The other interns are going to eat her alive for this," Liam said.
That, Adrien hadn't considered. He'd invited her for purely selfish reasons. He hadn't wanted to attend this party alone or worse, with Chloe hanging off his arm and waving at the paparazzi. He hadn't stopped to think how much of an advantage this was for Marinette. It went well above the scope of the intern program. The interns were a competitive group. Most of them didn't like other people being granted things that they couldn't have.
"Hello little Intern," Liam said and Adrien snapped his attention back to see that Marinette had come over to join them. She gave Liam one of her big friendly smiles and Adrien pushed his worries to the side.
If anyone deserved this particular advantage it was her.
"Shall we go find our table?" Adrien asked holding out his arm before her small talk with Liam could stray to topics of conversation he didn't want her to have to put up with.
She gave him an entirely different kind of smile as she looped her arm through his and let him pull her away. Her smiles shone like spotlights for most people but he only ever got them in flashes. He studied her as they walked. She was scanning the crowd, looking over the clothes and marveling a little bit.
He didn't realize what he was doing until he'd leaned over and kissed her temple.
Everything froze.
What was that?
Why had he done that?
She was adorable and wonderful but that wasn't an excuse.
She stopped walking and it tugged him to a stop too.
Sh looked up at him, startled and pretty and confused and he had nothing to say. He'd forgotten how to speak as well as how to behave.
"Adrien, you haven't introduced your girlfriend yet," a voice interrupted the way she was staring up at him with wide alarmed eyes. She put her smile back on and turned to look at the speaker. Adrien smoothed his own emotions off his face to turn and smile at his father.
"Marinette, I'm sure you've met my father, Gabriel Agreste. Father, this is Marinette Dupain-Cheng, she's been an intern at your company for two months now," Adrien said. He bit down hard on his tongue and tried for a close lipped smile. He was digging himself into another lecture on how sarcasm was not proper behaviour in public.
Marinette giggled and it was charming enough that even Gabriel gave her a smile. It wasn't a warm smile but his lips lifted. Adrien wanted to kiss her again. He ignored that thought. Buried it. He squeezed her hand where it was still resting on his arm instead.
"I do believe Adrien had mentioned that he was going to lend you one of my gowns. Evidently not. Who are you wearing?" Gabriel said.
Emotions crisscrossed Marinette's face, surprise, pride, something like terror. She didn't say anything for just a moment too long.
"It's one of her own," Adrien said, "She really is very good."
Marinette beamed through a brief conversation on composition and detailing that Adrien wasn't really paying attention to. She held onto him with one hand and talked with her other. She gestured and grinned and stumbled through some praise of the winter line. Gabriel was serious but seemed to actually be listening to her. He didn't often to listen to anyone who wasn't one of his senior designers and it felt like thin ice.
"I promised Mari that I would introduce her to Wilhelmina before dinner," Adrien said before Gabriel could throw one of his dismissive lines at Marinette. Crushing that smile on her face would be unforgivable and Adrien was pretty sure his father wouldn't even notice that he had done it.
The distraction of the little conversation seemed to have swept Adrien's kiss completely out of her mind. She didn't mention it as she rehashed the conversation. It was easy for him to forget that Gabriel Agreste was a well respected industry leader and seeing him through Marinette's eyes was a little unsettling. Magazine editors and cronies liked Gabriel, Marinette was supposed to be too reasonable and kind for that.
"So who is Wilhelmina?" Marinette asked.
"Oh, I didn't actually mean that. You don't want to meet Wilhelmina," he said.
Marinette, being Marinette, was not to be dissuaded which is how they ended up being harangued by a ninety year old woman wearing couture from the 1950s until the lights dimmed to call everyone to their seats. Marinette tried to keep up her side of the conversation but Wilhelmina didn't so much converse as drive a verbal steamroller. She just talked over any and everyone.
"That was an experience," Marinette whispered as they headed for their table.
"Rite of passage," Adrien said, "Most people meet her at their first show. She spends oceans of money on clothing and so do all her friends but only if she likes you. People are always pouring flattery on her."
"Did she like me?" Marinette asked.
"No idea. No one can actually tell until you suddenly get a check for half a million worth of runway originals," Adrien said with a laugh.
"This is the least sensible industry on the planet, I'm going to go back to school and become a pastry chef. Baked goods make sense," Marinette said.
"You'd probably be good at that too. I bet you'd make those fancy cakes that look like art. You're good at making normal things into art like hats or dresses," he said.
"I am not that good," she said.
"My father couldn't pick out that dress as one of his. He can always pick out one of his," Adrien said, "Besides, you got into this intern program. Our house isn't a part of most of the placement agencies. Your portfolio is picked over by the senior design staff. You're good at fashion and you'd be good at baking and you'd probably be good at auto repair if you decided to do auto repair."
She flashed that smile at him and then looked away at the center piece on the table, "Thank you. I know how difficult it is to get in at Agreste. I know how luck I am. I wasn't actually even eligible. Agreste doesn't take internationals. Ever. I didn't even submit directly here. I think the only reason I got it is because I'm a French citizen and one of the interviewers I met with must have a friend here. I had my heart set on a few houses in New York. I didn't think I'd get anywhere in Europe, certainly not Paris. They even agreed to pay my flight or I never would have been able to come."
"Paris is glad to have you home," he said.
Whatever she was going to say next was lost in a crash.
Before Adrien had even processed what had happened or where the noise had come from, a hand closed on his shoulder. He had stood, lots of people had, Parisians knew what unexpected crashes and distant screaming meant. Marinette was there beside him. Calm. He vaguely remembered that from school. She was always calm as the monsters descended.
"Come with me," a gruff familiar voice said.
Adrien looked up at the same body guard he'd had as a kid. It had caused a fight when he had started refusing to keep a guard first anywhere near his apartment then at university, then anywhere he went. Having the big gorilla standing there behind him was almost nostalgic. Inconvenient because it was unlikely Ladybug would hear about this until it was over so he was going to have to deal with it on his own, but still it was nice to see the man.
"How have you been? How's the wife?" he asked.
"No time for jokes, Mr. Agreste, it is best if we get you out of here," Gorilla said.
"Would you like to be evacuated with me? It's a tradition in..." he asked turning to Marinette.
Marinette was gone.
The crowd had started moving. Adrien could see a pink glow down the hall and whatever Akuma was there was headed towards them. She must have gotten swept into the crowd. He turned, pulling out of the bodyguard's grip and hopped up onto his chair to see where she had gone. Black hair, pink dress, small. She wasn't going to be easy to pick out but he wasn't going to leave her in this crowd as a monster advanced on her.
Gorilla grabbed him by the back of his fancy suit jacket and yanked him back to earth. He forgot that being tall didn't mean he wasn't scrawny enough to be yanked around by someone bigger than him. He stumbled as Gorilla turned them both into the crowd and started to steer him away from the trouble. Gorilla did not let go. He had learned from years of chasing a teenage Adrien that Adrien disappeared in times of trouble if he was released for even a moment.
"Do you see my date?" he asked Gorilla in a conversational tone as he was frog marched towards the door.
"No sir," Gorilla said.
"Think we could pause and go find her?" he asked.
"You need to be taken to safety, those are my orders," he said.
Adrien sighed. That meant he was going to have to get creative. They were out of the main hall now and into the massive entry way of the chateau. It was packed with people pushing for the doors. Akuma attacks didn't happen this far out of the city, no one had been expecting it and everyone was panicking. They were a long way from help.
Pink lightning smashed into the window by the front door and everyone screamed as the glass shattered, even Adrien jumped. The security guards scattered and then scrambled into some kind of formation but they were not going to be any good in this. A bolt of that pink lightning hit a guard and they froze in a pose.
It was almost funny.
The same thing happened to another, then another, then a woman in a black silk gown and it got less funny very quickly. Adrien managed to pivot far enough in Gorilla's hold to see the Akuma itself. He wasn't close enough for details, pink and turquoise and a ridiculous feathered thing on his head but he was recognizable.
"Seriously, Liam?" he said aloud.
"Move," Gorilla lurched him back into the crowd moving towards the exit.
They hadn't made it to the door before the Akuma came swinging sideways over their heads and smashed into the brick work above the window. Adrien winced even though he knew Liam wouldn't remember it later. The crowd was thinning as more people made it outside. As they reached the door someone crashed into Gorilla hard enough that he loosened his hold on Adrien enough that Adrien could twist and drop and leave the man holding nothing but his suit jacket.
"Sorry," he muttered as he rolled away.
He moved sideways across the crowd, weaving and dodging around people and the frozen posers. Plagg had been in his jacket and was now floating along at his heels. In the chaos, he wouldn't be seen. Probably. Hopefully. Adrien was looking for a corner or a hallway to duck into. An old building like this should have had servant's entrances and passageways and all kinds of old corners but the space was too big and he was struggling against the dregs of the crowd.
He looked back up at the Akuma in time to see Ladybug swing off the chandelier and kick him square in the chest. Liam pinwheeled back into the ballroom in a blur of bubblegum colours. She landed not too far from Adrien and he spun and took those two extra steps to be beside her. It was automatic. He didn't even consider that he wasn't Chat. Plagg crawled into his pant leg and sat on his shoe and Adrien could just imagine the grumbling.
She turned to him with the start of a smile and he realized that she had assumed he was Chat as well. She blinked at him twice in surprise.
"Do you come to fashion galas often?" he asked.
"This is my first one, actually. Get outside before he gets back on his feet," she said.
But Liam was already coming at them again and Ladybug grabbed Adrien and swung them both up onto the grand staircase. She shouldn't have been able to lift him, it had been difficult for Gorilla to do but she had the magic of the transformation on her side. She put him down and physically jerked him around until he was facing a hallway of rooms behind a velvet rope that read: "no admittance beyond this point." She gave him a little shove in the middle of the back.
"Go," she said.
"Pendant," he said catching her wrist before she could swing away.
"What?" she turned half her attention back to him but she was watching for the Akuma and didn't really look at him.
"Liam always wears a pendant, that's probably where the butterfly is," he said.
"Right, ok, now go," she gently pulled herself out of his hold and then shoved him toward the empty hallway again. He ducked under the rope and took off down the hall at a run. He winced at every echoing sound from the battle as he shouldered open a door and barged into a little sitting room.
"Plagg," he said.
"I just had to be near your disgusting feet and you promised me those little cheese balls-" Plagg started but Adrien ignored him. Plagg sighed heavily before the transformation began.
Chat Noir took the long way around, dropping down into the ballroom from a second floor balcony to find that the fight had fallen silent. He snapped his head around. It wasn't over. She hadn't fixed anything yet. There were still over turned tables and a few members of the crowd who had been caught before they had reached the foyer were still holding their poses. The quiet was eerie. He headed for the entrance and it was quiet there too.
What had happened?
Where was she?
He heard a yell from outside and vaulted the broken glass to exit through the window. On the lawn, the party goers had scattered into the gardens and towards the car park but a pack stood posed together. They'd been caught before they could make it too far. Adrien recognized Orla among them though most were strangers. He ran past them to find an Italian garden full of statuary. Mixed into the replica Davids and Greek Gods were party guests who had chosen the wrong place to hide.
"Missed me, pretty boy," he heard Ladybug's voice and his heart rate slowed. If she was fine, then everything was fine.
He scampered up onto a nearby statue of Poseidon and balanced on the head to see where exactly the fight was happening. The flash of lightning told him where to go and he dropped to the ground and ran. She had led the Akuma away from most of the people that that also limited her options. The yo-yo couldn't swing her away when she had nothing higher than a six foot statue of some dead noble to attach it to.
He came up behind the Akuma and swept his feet out from under him. Before he could grab hold of the pendant, he had to lurch back from another bolt of that lightning. He skipped backwards as the pink fashion disaster climbed it it's feet.
"You got here fast," Ladybug said as he fell into step beside her.
"I can hear at a catastrophe from a mile away," he said.
She shook her head at the pun and said, "Go left."
He didn't go left. What she said and what she meant were not the same thing. It was a short hand they'd developed as they had been working out all the time apart. Multiple attacks a week meant lots of time to practice. The code was his favourite part. It meant they could talk strategy in front of a grandstanding Akuma without giving anything away. Left didn't mean left, regroup didn't mean regroup, applesauce was never something an Akuma wanted to hear.
He charged at Liam with his baton spinning and then feinted right. The Akuma turned to follow him and Ladybug caught him around the ankles with the yo-yo. It should have been the end of the fight. He went down hard and all she needed to do was pull him in and grab the pendant.
If they moved fast enough, it would have been fine. But Liam sat up. She dragged him in but he was warming up another bolt of that lightning. He could see it and he wasn't sure if Ladybug could. There were better strategic choices but Chat went with the quickest possible solution.
It was an easy decision.
She couldn't get hit.
She might have been fast enough to dodge it but it wasn't a risk he could take. He used the baton as a lever and and flung himself onto the Akuma's lap. Ladybug now had two people to pull over grass and cobblestones and it slowed her down. She was yelling his name but he already had a hold of the pendant.
The shock of the lightning hit him in the side and the last thought he had was to clench his hand tight but then everything went black.
Author Notes:
Ha! Got in some Ladrien moments!
I am back from my long mid-term related hiatus with a long chapter!
