Marinette sighed, leaning back in her seat and looking around the conference room at her six closest friends – their "inner circle," as Alya liked to put it. Adrien and Nino, distracted from the point of the meeting and instead arguing about the movie they'd gone to see last night. Chloe with her phone out, showing something to Sabrina. Max sitting beside Sabrina, engrossed in the tablet sitting on the table in front of him showing their patrol schedule for the next month, simultaneously answering messages from Turing, Paola, and Taureau Dechaine. Alya met Marinette's eye and raised an eyebrow in amusement, her mouth twitching slightly. Marinette's frown deepened. "Can we please finish this before I have to leave for the fashion house in the morning?" Marinette demanded, her arms folded. "I'd like to get some sleep at some point, you know."
Alya rolled her eyes. "Relax, girl! Things have finally started to settle down around here; can't we enjoy it?"
"Only took, like, a week for people to figure out it's easier to live in a city that's not on fire than one that is," Chloe grumbled under her breath.
Nino shrugged. "Considering the circumstances, I get that people were pissed off. I'm just glad no one else actually got killed in the rioting. And only one of ours even got hurt."
"Yeah," Chloe deadpanned, giving him a withering look. "One."
Nino winced. "Sorry. I just–" Chloe's eyes narrowed, and he coughed. "Um… how is she doing?"
"Zoe's fine. Now. I caught her before she hit the ground. But she had a concussion for two days." Chloe folded her arms.
Marinette's eyes bugged out. "If she was that bad, why on earth didn't you say anything? Mira or Claire could have healed that in a matter of moments!"
"I told her as much!" retorted Chloe, scoffing. "But she insisted that she was fine; other people needed them more than she did."
"Well, at least we know she's really your sister," Adrien mused, raising an eyebrow at her in amusement.
"Ha, ha."
Max looked up from his tablet and cleared his throat. "If you are ready, I have next month's patrol schedule prepared for your review. It was a challenge to accommodate everyone's requests, but Turing and I were able to arrange it properly."
"See?" Alya grinned, raising an eyebrow at Marinette. "You and Sunshine get to have your anniversary off, just like you wanted. There wasn't anything to worry about!"
Marinette pursed her lips, giving the holographic image a quick perusal. She would be on patrol five times this month – up from last month. But every day was at least covered. And there were a couple of new names. Still… "Sure, everything worked out for this month, but what about when University classes start up? You remember how exhausted we all were two years ago, right? And that was after Hawk Moth was taken care of. Now that we don't have a friend in the Mayor's office…"
Chloe frowned.
"And we'll handle it." Nino shrugged. "I don't have any classes before noon in the fall; most of them are evenings. If I need, I'm happy to take a few more late patrol shifts."
"The program does account for all those variables," Max pointed out. "Where possible, no one will be scheduled for patrol on a night that they have an early-morning commitment the next day. Fortunately, we have enough options to virtually guarantee that all normal commitments are accounted for; the primary challenge for this month was the number of additional vacation-related requests."
Marinette raised an eyebrow. "You say that now… but we already have two heroes who should be on leave for the next nine-plus months – who had better stay on leave for that long," she added, giving Sabrina a withering look.
Sabrina stifled a smile. "I haven't done anything in the field," she pointed out.
Marinette's eyes narrowed. "You and I both know what I'm talking about. It's bad enough that Kagami flagrantly ignores the 'no hero business while pregnant' rule, but Mylène? What was she thinking? She could have gotten hurt!"
"It's a good thing Nadine was there so she didn't get hurt," Adrien mused. His face drained of color. "Could you imagine Ivan's reaction if she had gotten hurt?"
"Dude…" Nino shuddered, giving Adrien a look before glancing over at Alya. "I can't imagine…"
"In her defense, they were never supposed to find Monte-en-l'Air," Sabrina argued. "Mylène just wanted to give Nadine a taste of what it's like to be one of us, to be a hero – something that Nadine has wanted all year. Their plan was to simply patrol around the neighborhood a few times before calling it a night. That they actually ran into the burglars was an accident – but that was why Mylène brought Aurore and Alix along. Besides," she added, raising an eyebrow at Marinette, "now Nadine is feeling a lot better about her position in the Heroes of Paris. She is excited to start going on patrols more regularly, which means that we have someone new to take some of the burden off the rest of you."
"And if that had come at the expense of Mylène?" Marinette shot back at her.
Sabrina let out a breath. "I know. But I only agreed with her plan because none of the previous incidents had turned violent. I figured the risk wasn't as high with this as if she had ended up face-to-face with someone more dangerous."
"Well, it didn't exactly turn out that way, did it?" growled Marinette hotly. "Monte-en-l'Air did try to fight them when they backed him into a corner, and he could have hurt Mylène."
"Hey." Adrien put a hand on her shoulder. "It's okay. Mylène is fine. Her baby is fine. And I think she's learned her lesson," he added, giving Sabrina a meaningful look.
Sabrina nodded. "Mylène has decided to abide the 'leave' policy until the baby is here."
"She'd better," Marinette grumbled. "And if I find out that you knew and said nothing–"
"Leave her alone, Mar," Chloe interrupted, giving Marinette a look. "She already said everything there is to say about this, so if you can't lay off our pregnant friend, maybe I'll have to make you – unless there's something you're not telling us…" She arched an eyebrow.
Marinette furrowed her brows in confusion. Beside her, she could feel the Cheshire grin forming on Adrien's face. What was Chloe talking abo– wait. Marinette blinked; blood rushed to her cheeks. Mutely, she shook her head. "N–no. Nothing like that."
"Or at least, not yet…" Adrien added, wrapping an arm around Marinette's shoulders and smiling broadly.
"Now that would really throw off the patrol schedule," Nino pointed out, stifling a laugh. "Having to work around Ladybug…"
"People would definitely start talking if you vanished for, oh, say… nine months?" Alya added with a smirk. "Why, what kind of articles would the Ladyblog have to run to keep up with all the speculation…"
"You wouldn't." Marinette paled.
Alya snorted. "Relax, girl. I'll always have your back."
Adrien let out a breath. "Don't worry, Milady. When that happens, we'll figure it out. We always do," he added, smiling at Marinette and pressing a kiss to her forehead.
"We will," she agreed with a nod. Fixing her eyes back on Sabrina, she sighed. "Sorry for losing my temper. I just…"
"Believe me, we all understand," Sabrina assured her with a reassuring smile. "Especially after that story you told us. Considering that a pregnant hero's death destroyed the future in another timeline, I don't think any of us want to see something like that happen to us. I don't think Mylène will give us any more problems. And as for Kagami…" She shrugged. "I'll sit down with Anarka and lay out our concerns. Kagami may be more willing to listen to her than she has been to listen to the rest of us."
Marinette nodded slowly. "Thanks."
"As for the patrol schedule," Max interjected, "we have a much better foundation for it now than we even did last year. Despite losing two heroes to maternity leave, we have added several additional heroes to our roster in Nabatala, the Owl, and Vesperia, as well as our two American guests."
"I'd rather not see the Young Heroes patrolling during the week too often," Marinette told him. "After doing it ourselves for so long, I don't want to force that on anyone else."
"They will primarily be assigned to weekends," Max assured her. "At first, they will be scheduled alongside experienced heroes."
"Nabatala and the Owl don't exactly need a babysitter," Adrien pointed out. "They've been doing it long enough – I think they've earned our respect."
"Definitely," agreed Nino, nodding. "They've been knocking it out of the park in training. Especially the new Owl kid."
"Who would've thought…" Chloe muttered under her breath, shaking her head ruefully. Clearing her throat, she added, "We also have Albailier and Elementa to help out – at least once or twice a month. Although Albailier did say he has some conditions…"
Marinette frowned. "Like?"
"Like a new wardrobe." Chloe stifled a laugh. "Civilian clothing, plus a new superhero/vigilante outfit. For some reason, no one stocks clothing that will accommodate wings!"
Sighing, Marinette nodded. "I'll get right on that. After I get the winter lineup designs finished."
"I told him as much."
Alya grinned. "See, Mar? With all of the options at our disposal, I think we'll be fine."
Marinette gave her a look. "Okay… but if one more hero ends up on maternity leave before Sabrina's baby gets here, I might scream!"
