The Past

They'd ended up on a sloped rooftop a couple blocks away from the scene. Rena was sitting down with Carapace, brows furrowed in conflicting thoughts. Carapace's eyes were narrowed, excess frustration being released in short, sharp hisses like steam. Pegasus was bunched up beside Adrien, who'd returned to his Chat form, a small screen in hand showing off a recording of the battle.

"So, screw those guys, right?" The words spilled out of Carapace like water, he'd been holding them in since the group left the scene. The Task Force's taunts had gotten under his skin more than the akuma literally trying to kill him.

Viperion pressed his back against the edge of the roof, glancing over his shoulder towards the Eiffel Tower. He made a sharp inhale. "It's not like our stellar performance proved them wrong."

Chat shook his head, just reaching the part of the clip where Carapace sinks into the ground. "It's my fault. I led us into an easy sweep without a plan." He scratches his forearm incessantly in the vain hope it would ease his mental irritation. Ladybug would have done better, he told himself. She wouldn't have needed to be saved. "I'm sorry."

Pegasus put the screen away, making a dismissive wave with it. "We all have off days, and we're still in the midst of the adjustment period. I'd say your performance exceeded expectations."

Carapace jumped to his feet, gently pushing Rena's comforting touch aside. He pushed himself center stage, spinning around to make sure every member got a good look at his indignant gestures. "One bad outing doesn't change that we've been on our A-game, saving lives on our own years before these task force bozos arrived." He crossed his arms over his chest. "They don't have any business dissing us like that."

Chat found his eyes drawn to the silent member of the group, Vesperia, who had drifted to the other end of the roof.

She stared out into the horizon, nervously rubbing her arm while her body curled to make itself look even smaller against the sunset. Her body language communicated fear, as if she was witnessing the approach of a disaster, she knew there was no escaping from.

Chat shuffled over to her, reminding himself that she was probably shaken up after taking a sledgehammer to the face. "You alright?" He asked cautiously.

"Just… Spooked, I suppose." He heard her gulp before she turned around. Her expression was unreadable, the only indication of emotion was the softness of her voice broken up with small spurts of dread. "I know he was a sentimonster and all, but…"

She didn't look at Chat directly, her gaze slipped past his face, falling straight upon his chest. Something about that sight triggered something in her head, creating a crack in her blank stare that revealed… Disgust? Before he could question it, she whipped around, sheltering herself from him once more.

The sudden emotional swerve unravelled Adrien's thoughts, throwing him into quiet mumbles as he caught the clear message that she didn't want to talk any further. "Yeah, it got a little intense there."

"Still can't believe a sentimonster could be akumatized." He heard Carapace say behind him, "Shadowmoth couldn't do that, right?"

Return to the conversation, Chat found that the group had huddled closer together. Pegasus was shaking his head, a clear shiver offsetting his voice. "This new butterfly user hasn't been wasting their time in-between attacks twiddling her thumbs, that much is clear."

Adrien was about to chime in when a beeping sound erupted from his pocket, or what would have been in pocket in his civilian form. It was an alarm he'd set on his phone, a reminder that had him cringing as he realized just how late it was starting to get.

"Can we continue this conversation over the comms?" He said to the group, tapping an imaginary watch on his wrist to get across his time-sensitive situation. "I've got to run to an important meeting."

And Nathalie will kill me if I'm late, he silently added.

There were murmurs, shrugs and nods amongst the group, Viperion flashing him a thumbs up and giving him the verbal "No problem."

With one quick extend of his baton, Chat launched himself off the rooftop, diving into Paris' expanse. Rushing through the Paris skyline had become as natural as walking, his body seamlessly, and thoughtlessly, moving through every nook, cranny and vantage point his muscle memory had mapped out.

He peered into an apartment window as he passed, catching a glimpse of a clock. Nathalie was only a few blocks away. He still had time. Maybe.

Just as he found himself reaching a consistent pace, he heard Carapace let out an uneven sigh. "Okay, guys, I don't wanna be the guy to point it out but…" He could picture Carapace looking to the rest of the group, hoping someone would finish the thought for him, but only finding silence. "That's the second sentimonster we've had to deal with."

Chat felt his chest tighten and his mind struggle to focus. He knew exactly where this was leading. It was a thought that had been plaguing the back of his mind ever since Marinette's death, one he so desperately didn't want to entertain, but could escape the certainty of it.

Pegasus was the one to make it a reality. "So why haven't we brought in the one guy who can make sentimonsters?"

Viperion added, "And who's been a no-show since we fought that magician."

There was so much Adrien was ready to say, but couldn't if only to preserve his identity and composure. Instead, he decided on the short-but-direct approach avoided any uncomfortable context. "I've been trying to track down Argos. Haven't had any luck yet."

He wasn't lying, while fear and doubt held him back from being as dedicated to the task as he could be, he and Nathalie had been diligently phoning around, trying to pick up any trail in regard to Felix. According to his aunt, Amile, the last she'd seen of Felix was the announcement of some private business that would take him out of the country for a while, with nothing left behind to contact him, of course.

Adrien would fold, would believe any excuse Felix could make to explain it all away, if only he could hear Felix's voice. His relationship with his cousin was a strenuous one, even after Felix's strange heel turn in regards to his care for Adrien, many of the scars still ran deep to this day; but Adrien knew his desperation to believe his family would win out.

Not only was Felix not there to explain himself, but the convenient trip made it all look even more suspicious.

"Let's not jump to conclusions, now." It took a good moment for Adrien to realize that it wasn't his voice stepping in to defend Felix, but Rena's.

Carapace spluttered, as surprised as Adrien as his girlfriend's sudden defence. "Who's jumping to anything? There's only one peacock, and we know who has the peacock."

"We assume we know." Her voice took on a sharp inquisitive edge, "He could be captured, had his miraculous taken from him."

Chat could hear her sigh, visualizing her shaking her head and raising her hands to gesture around herself. "And are we forgetting Copycat? Volpina? Chameleon?" There was hesitation, a quiet lack of confidence that was almost alien to Adrien's perception of the girl behind Rena's mask. Alya knew the doubt she was bringing to light wasn't popular, that everyone was still seeing red, fresh from Marinette's funeral, hungry for something solid to chase down. "We know that some akuma can replicate the abilities of a miraculous in all but name, and there's no shortage of akuma that create monsters."

Maybe Adrien too was still running on that pain, seeing Marinette's limp corpse permanently burned into the corner of his mind; because all he could think of in that moment, where Alya was taking his side, was how many of Lila's lies Alya had blindly accepted. All he could think – with a bitter edge he knew he shouldn't be indulging – was that Felix was getting the immense benefit of the doubt that Marinette never got.

He imagined that Marinette would have the same petty thought in her head if she heard this, that he was somehow giving her respect by channelling it. She was making decent points, ones his brain hadn't even contemplated despite how obvious they seemed right now, but he couldn't focus on them.

Adrien let his shame simmer as he vaulted over another roof, waving to passersby gazing up at him, before Alya sighed again. "I'm just saying, we can't say for sure that this is the work of the peacock."

"I dunno, Rena. We're talking about a guy whose debut was snapping away the human race." Said Viperion, "It isn't looking good for Argos."

Pegasus added a thoughtful hum, tapping his fingers against his communicator. "Viperion's right, all evidence points to him. We can't throw that away just because there 'could' be another explanation."

An instinctual, defensive urge caused Adrien to snap, far harsher than intended, "Ladybug trusted him, and that's enough to give him the benefit of the doubt."

"Ladybug trusted a lot of people." Viperion replied without missing a beat, as if he'd rehearsed this very argument in his head.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Adrien didn't know who he was mad at really; Viperion for making a good point for a conclusion Adrien wanted to deny, or himself for being so predictably, and blindly, stubborn about it.

"Look, I'm not saying this to insult her, but the reason Monarch got the miraculous in the first place was because she trusted the wrong guy." Viperion spoke so softly, with such measured understanding, and Chat Noir hated it. Hated that it made sense. Hated that, for a moment, he could hear Luka's voice saying it and couldn't bare the idea of snapping at such a gentle soul. "The very guy we're discussing the trustworthiness of in fact."

He failed as team leader, he nearly got a team member killed, he nearly lost his miraculous to the akuma, he had to be saved by Tsugi's new lackies, he made them all look like chumps, and they're so far from catching Marinette's killers that the two villains were confident enough to be there in person to mock him.

That's where the pettiness came from, isn't it? He was so frustrated, so pathetic, and he needed to vent it out on something, on someone. And he was pissed that no one was giving him an excuse to bite. Viperion was sitting there, bringing up his perfect lady's dirty laundry to knock her judgement, and even Adrien's natural urge to defend the dead couldn't find the power to be angry about it.

Chat paused in his sprint, falling against the walls of a dark alleyway nestled between two overbearing buildings. With every nagging thought he found himself punching the wall, not hard enough to break, but enough to leave his frustration scarred in the cracks.

At the end of the day, he was putting all this effort into defending Felix, a man who'd done nothing to earn any good will from Adrien or Chat Noir. A man who he'd known for most of his life, and yet knew next to nothing about other than the silent contempt he carried for most people in general. A man who Adrien's purest memory of was justifying how wiping out all of humanity was somehow for Adrien's benefit.

In that fog, he did manage to latch onto one certainty of Felix's, one that gave him grounds to stand on. "These sentimonsters were made to be human, that man down there was terrified, and they were treated like a disposable asset." It was a truth that sat so bitterly on his tongue, and somehow it was so easy for him to imagine himself in that sentimonsters' position. "I may not know the first thing about the story behind Argos' motives, but I sure as hell know that doesn't fit his MO."

He took a deep breath, digging his fist into the base of the wall and letting a clearer mind wrestle his restless heart. It was like wiping dust from his eyes, allowing him to suddenly see perspective return to him. These were his teammates, his friends; no matter how bad it got, he shouldn't be looking for an excuse to burden them with his issues. He needed to keep his head on straight. He needed to show them he's listening. "Right now, we need to focus on finding him."

Hesitantly, after a small sigh, Viperion asked "And if he does turn out to be guilty?"

It was the most important question. They all had their bias' at play here, and for a moment Viperion sounded almost like he knew Adrien had a very specific one. Argos was one of them, and if he was guilty, he'd have murdered one of them. It was a foundation rife with opportunity for conflicting feelings, tensions and connections to trip them up.

Chat needed to be clear that Adrien would not be interfering, that he could be trusted to do what needs to be done. "Then he gets to decide if we take him in or put him down."

Viperion heaved a heavy breath, a man gasping for air after almost drowning. "Good to know we have our priorities straight." There again was that understanding tone, as if he knew full well how hard it was for Chat to say, conjuring up images of Luka patting Adrien on the back in support.

There were murmurs of agreement all around until Pegasus asked. "Is there anything else we need to discuss?"

Chat checked the time once more; he'd definitely be cutting it, but he didn't want to delay talking about this particular subject. "Actually, I did want to know if you guys had any opinions on a new Ladybug candidate." He sighed, "I… I know it's too soon, but it is something we need to consider."

"Can't you just keep Mr. Bug on standby? It worked out today." Said Carapace.

Viperion spoke up "No, Chat has a point. Keeping the two most powerful artifacts in the world on the same person is too risky."

"Splitting it between two people means that one falling isn't an instant game over." Chat explained, fighting the temptation to let gravity pull him down to the floor to rest. This argument he had rehearsed, mostly to convince himself that it was okay to even think about someone taking Marinette's place. "And… Well, having all that power in my grasp…"

Rena finished his thought, "Makes it real tempting to fix things."

"Yeah, I didn't even consider it back when we... When we found Marinette." He nodded, thumb grazing over Tikki's earrings, reminding himself of how she had the same worry about him. "But I don't trust myself not to give in to that temptation eventually."

Carapace scoffed, though it sounded more like a humourless laugh. "You're made of sterner stuff than me, Dude. I'd never be able to resist that."

"If we're looking for a Ladybug candidate, why not that Scarabella girl?" asked Pegasus.

"No one's gonna feel comfortable taking the Ladybug mantle." Rena said quickly.

Chat shrugged, "I considered her, but I have no idea who she is."

"You… You don't know who the other users are?" Viperon was the sort of guy who, even in his worst moments, sounded like he was in control. Calm, smooth and casual. So, it made Chat do a double-take hearing the sudden shock gripping his voice. "You don't know who we are?"

"I found out about Carapace and Rena by mistake. Ladybug kept everything close to her chest." Saying it out loud, Chat couldn't deny that it hurt to acknowledge.

'Sad part is, I bet the death of Ladybug's side piece ain't even gonna make the front page', Disruptor has said, and that stuck with him. Ladybug was the leader, the one who held all the cards and all the secretes; Chat Noir was just the guy backing her up. He used to think he'd come to accept that, that despite Ladybug's insistence of them being partners, being equals, he could live with being the sidekick. Then she died, and, because she was the guardian who told the kwami's to not discuss any of the sensitive details with anybody else when it happened – everything she knew, everything she set up, died with her.

Viperion spoke in a harsh whisper, "We're flying blind then?"

Chat heard Carapace smack Viperion on the shoulder, his voice loud and cheerful in contrast to Viperion and Chat's dower demeanour. "That's the spice of life, Snake Boy."

Chat hoisted himself back onto the rooftops, spotting Nathalie's car in the distance. As he prepared to detransform, he made one final speech to sign off this impromptu team meeting. "I want to say… Well, I know this all still fresh and, well, I'm not half the leader Ladybug was, so I know that being here and getting back into the thick of things isn't easy."

"I… I just know I wouldn't be able to do this on my own. Thank you, all of you, for sticking it out."

Present

The world outside was a nightmare made real, a Paris broken by evil in the face of the heroes' failure. The mansion was a grim and desolate place, filled with worn down walls, shattered memories and indistinct groans that reminded Marinette how many dark corners could be hiding all manner of malicious shadows. The basement was an abyss of rubble, populated only by the hungry howls to angry beast they trapped there.

And yet, Marinette could say with certainty that Gabriel Agreste, quietly humming to himself as he flipped the contents of his frying pan over the stove, was the most unnerving sight.

After their near-death encounter with their sentimonster friend, Marinette had found herself mindlessly following Gabriel back down the stairs while she pulled herself together mentally. Now, she sat in what remained of the kitchen, the limited vision of candlelight forming a cage from her to Gabriel.

"Pancakes, really?" She uttered, irritation rolling off her tongue in bitter waves.

It wasn't just that pancakes were the last thing that should be on their mind in the face of all that happened, nor that she immediately associated Gabriel at the stove with him trying to emotionally bludgeon her into abandoning Adrien because she wasn't 'worthy' of Adrien's love.

What unnerved her was how mundane the action was. After all they've been through, all she's witnessed be unleashed at Gabriel's hands, all she knew about this man who had been the villain all along; it simply looked wrong to see him doing something so normal.

Of course, she always knew that Hawkmoth had a life outside of the fight, that he probably had his own hobbies to return to, that he didn't simply stop existing when he wasn't sending out an akuma. She knew that not all monsters wore elaborate suits or alternate identities, but were just normal, yet terrible, people. But seeing it in person, it felt so perverse. As if she were watching a corpse being made a puppet, strings pulling at the dead flesh of something inhuman, in an attempt to mimic life.

Maybe she saw him like this because Gabriel, having been dead not an hour or so prior, had come from the grave. Or maybe she realized that Gabriel might have always been a corpse, a flesh suit to hide Hawkmoth from the sun. Had Gabriel Agreste ever been alive?

Ignorant to her questions, though he most likely wouldn't have cared if he did know, Gabriel shrugged. "I've been dead for two years. I don't know about you, but I'm absolutely famished."

Her brow rose curiously, looking to the layers of dust and cobwebs around the room. "Pretty sure any ingredients you found here are gonna be seriously out-of-date."

"No, they're fresh enough." He said, patting the crushed box of flour on the counter. "Somebody was squatting here before we arrived."

Marinette's eyes narrowed at the explanation, marvelling at how Gabriel could admit someone else might be there, watching them as they speak, as if it were a casual aside.

She scoffed, "I'm sure he'll be delighted you're stealing his stuff."

Gabriel dismissed her words with a lazy wave, eyes never leaving his work. "He probably got killed by our friend in the basement."

She watched him in a tense silence, trying to decipher his shift in behaviour. If you looked at him, and just him while letting the rest of the world disappear, you wouldn't be able to tell that he had recently been dead, that he was almost killed again, that he was a man out of time who'd awoken to a future in ruins. All he focused on was a snack.

Marinette approached the counter, suddenly smacking the countertop in some vain attempt to make him flinch, make him do anything to register the world around him, but he didn't so much as blink. "…Seriously, pancakes?"

He launched his finished cake into the air, giving a playful twirl of the pan before catching it and adding it to the piled-up plate. His eyes finally shifted, falling upon her with an empty, dry stare. "So, you don't want any?"

Marinette crossed her arms, scowling. "I think we've clearly established where I stand on your pancakes."

"We have?" Emotion flickered through his eyes, but they made no sense to her. He blinked in quick succession, briefly turning his head to stare into space, slightly dazed, almost as if he was confused. Eventually, he shook his head, shielding his eyes from her before breaking off to sit at the table. "Suit yourself."

She turned towards him, arms wide and face exasperated. "This is not the time for food."

"And what would you suggest instead, Miss Dupain-Cheng?" He dug a fork into the top layer, scraping off a small chunk and brandishing it towards her like a weapon. His face tightened into that condescending sneer she was used to. "Aimlessly wonder the mansion with no idea of where you're going, what you're doing or what's going on?"

He couldn't find his horror at the nightmare they've found themselves in, he couldn't find the common courtesy to drop the mask for five seconds, but he could find the simple joys of treating her like a child. Why would she expect any different from Hawkmoth?

"Sitting down, cooling yourself off, getting your head together and assessing the situation is your best course of action." He continued, tapping his fork against his forehead. "And nothing stimulates the brain more than good food."

To counter Hawkmoth's patronizing tone, Marinette decided to respond by sticking out her tongue and pointing to it in an 'ew' gesture. "Anything you make is still tainted by your hands."

Gabriel rolled his eyes, which Marinette noted as annoying or mocking him to be an effective tactic to get through that mask. She was more than happy to use that strategy. "You could make your own food if you're that concerned that my 'evil' is contaminating it."

"How are you so casual about this?" She practically growls, one hand gripping the fringe of her hair so tight she thought she might rip it off. "Are you taking this seriously at all?"

"I was dead." He pops another pancake chunk in his mouth, rolling his head back in an almost merry gesture, carelessly speaking with his mouth full. "I accepted oblivion only to find it had rejected me." He paused, taking his time to chew over his words. After swallowing, he still didn't continue, instead busying himself with wiping syrup from his lips at a monotonous pace. For a moment, Marinette thought he was intentionally drawing it out just to annoy her.

Finally, he sighed, leaning back in his chair with his fork clattering onto the table. She noticed how he took great efforts to turn his face away from her as he spoke, lest she find anything too human in those hollow eyes. "This whole ordeal has left me a tad apathetic is all. Worrying just doesn't seem practical anymore."

She moves towards the window sitting at the head of the table, boarded up just enough to let a sliver of light cut through the room as a dividing line between her and Gabriel. Her hand comes up, wildly gesturing to the world outside, to all the questions hanging over their heads, hoping that Gabriel would find it in himself to acknowledge the nightmare before them. "You're not even curious about where we are?"

More loud chewing, a thoughtful glance towards the window and then a shrug. "Hell, I presume. Would explain the new decor."

Marinette scoffed, revulsion rising in her throat like he had just suggested she jump down a sewage pipe. Her face wore a sneer of her own, forged in sheer indignance, as she fell back against the window, blocking out the light. "I've done some questionable things in my life, but I'm pretty sure nothing I've done would damn me to the same layer of hell as the god damn super villain."

"Maybe the devil signed your paperwork wrong." Gabriel leaned forward, black pools looking her over again, assessing her as he would his latest sketch. "Or you flew off the handle after my death."

Marinette couldn't help but snigger. "Oh yeah, without you around, I had to become a real monster just to entertain myself." There was no eye roll big enough to convey the utter bitter sarcasm undercutting her words. "Besides, if this was the afterlife, why would we wake up at the same time when we died a year apart?"

Genuine consideration weighed down on Gabriel's brow. It seemed that, while he rejected the call of emotional conversation, his curiosity swayed him easily to discussing theories, a puzzle for him to solve. "Well, technically, I woke you up." He tilted his chin up. "I think."

Now it was Marinette's turn to hide her gaze, finding respite in the scuffed shirting board leading into the storage closet.

From what she could gather, Gabriel's journey to waking up under the mansion started and ended at his death. To him, it had only been a matter of hours since he left Marinette with the dying wish that haunted her ever since.

Marinette's experience wasn't as merciful.

She had been frozen in her last moments, forced to remain in the sensation of her skin crumbling under the pressure of the white-hot pain bursting at her seams. Stuck in that split second in a nightmare before the fall ends and snaps you back to reality.

It could have been hours, days, months; she didn't know. Time had been lost to her, but what she did know was that it passed. Her mind continued despite how the rest of her body was bound by invisible chains, eyes privy to only glimmers and blurs passing around her, obscured by the bright light.

From her prison, through a filter of white noise, her ears could just pick up the mutters of conversations around her. None were ever distinguishable enough to make out words, but she could hear enough to distinguish the speakers. Most of the time it was a low female voice, one that would talk her ear off for an eternity, only offering Marinette a reprieve when interrupted by a gruffer male mumble.

It was only in retrospect, without the pain and confusion to distract her, that she recognised Lila's voice. Lila so loved hearing her own voice, Marinette could vaguely recall the many one-sided conversations her jailer would attempt to hold, and she could imagine how much of them consisted of Lila bragging.

Marinette shivered at the image in her head, of Lila in whatever new form the butterfly gifted her, having her bound and helpless, leering over her with a sneer, free to inflict whatever revenge she sought. Closing her eyes, really thinking back on it, Marinette could feel Lila's finger against her forehead. Lila's nail sharpened into a talon that broke the skin, plunged through the skull and ripped something out. Little things in little portions, in so many portions.

She didn't allow Gabriel to see her eyes roll back as the memory overwhelmed her, fought to keep her body steady against the world around her seemingly dissolving, resisted the temptation to clutch her head where her brain cried out.

She couldn't let him know how happy she was to be out of that… That cage. Not while he could still turn out to be the one who helped put her in there. Ladybug could not let Hawkmoth see Marinette.

Marinette leaned against whatever she could find to support herself, breathing deeply, but breathing quietly. Quietly, when she felt her breath stabilize, she asked "Why did you break me out of that thing anyway?"

If Hawkmoth had witnessed any of her restrained panic attack, he didn't show it. His eyes had returned to his meal, and his voice was a sterile deadpanned monotone. "It was unintentional, I assure you. I was just following the magic butterfly man in my head, and I guess I stumbled into breaking you out."

The absurdity of the statement further worked to calm her, replacing the panic with annoyance. She paused to look at him through a quizzical gaze, trying to find some semblance of sarcasm in his body language.

She was left wanting, so instead she defaulted to rolling her eyes. "Good to know you still have your head on straight."

"Considering our circumstance, I'd expect worse than a brief hallucination." He said, "Ooo, maybe all this is that last neuron in my brain firing before death."

She stared, "You really just have the most depressing theories, don't you?"

He stared back, unapologetic. "I don't see you coming up with anything."

Once more, she could simply stare at him, her mouth trembling against grinding teeth. It was honestly like arguing with a wall, a man of stone determined to bounce back whatever was thrown at him. She'd take Chloe, hell, even Lila at this point; even at their worst they didn't dedicate themselves to being this obtuse.

She found herself rubbing her forehead incessantly, her headache only growing worse the more she listened to him. "I dunno, we could have fallen into an alternate timeline?" The unpleasant memory of Chat Blanc, of what Gabriel might have done to her own partner without hesitation if he had the opportunity, made her feel like vomiting. "Maybe we're in an akuma's trap… Or your wish went wrong when reshaping the world."

Really, while Lila and Defect had been the ones to kill or capture her, that still didn't confirm they had anything to do with their current situation. Hell, as far as she knew, those two could be dead and it's an entirely new villain that caused this.

She sighed, "There's no guarantee it's even miraculous-related, really."

Gabriel's eyes narrowed, scrutinizing her as she would expect he would an employee. Which just added a whole new layer of unpleasantness in her stomach. "All we have is baseless speculation."

"That's why we need to get out there, start exploring, find people. We can't be the only ones left." Once more, she gestured to the window, going so far as to reach up and tear off the boards, letting the outside world stream in. "There's gotta be someone who can tell us what we missed. Or, at worst, a villain with a monologue ready who'll chase us down."

Gabriel rolled his eyes. "You have fun with that."

"Look, for our plan to work-"

"It's your plan." He said quickly. While he attempted to keep himself reeled back, she could see his closed fist trembling. What made him shake, what added that extra firmness to his voice, she couldn't decipher. "My plan is to sit here, dig into my pancakes and wait for death to claim me."

His plan is just to give up and hide away. She thought bitterly, barely able to hold back a scoff.

"I can't believe you." She said, her voice lost between disappointment and fury.

"It's over, Ladybug. Look at the world outside and tell me anything different." He wrung his hands as he talked, as if every word made his palms itch. Perhaps his thoughts were as irritating to him as they were to her. "It was… Supposed to be over. The madness, the miraculous, my sins were all supposed to finally come to head and damn me. Take me to oblivion where I couldn't hurt anyone else."

Marinette advanced upon the table with her fist clenched tight. He had some nerve, putting her through all this, leaving all his baggage in her hands, sneering at her with such condescension and contempt, just to give up the moment that he needs to actually do something. Of course, she should have known, even at the end of the world Gabriel Agreste would rather do anything else other than take accountability. Even when he's talking about his actions damning him, he still has to phrase it like the whole matter is out of his hands, huh?

Leering over him, she found his face was ten years older on closer inspection. His skin haggard, loose and dotted with wrinkles. His eyes simply two black holes sucking in all light around him. She couldn't even recognise him as Hawkmoth like this. Hawkmoth was vibrant, dramatic, full of energy – Sometimes she'd think of Hawkmoth as akin to an evil, calculating Chat Noir. The thing that sat before her wasn't Hawkmoth, it wasn't Gabriel, it was barely even a man.

"This… Situation. It's a mistake. A cosmic whoopsie. And I'm sure the universe will soon enough correct it for both our sakes."

"How can you be so pathetic?!" Marinette found the words tearing from her lips before her brain could fully register them. His voice, so low and so pitiable, it almost made her heart feel for him. But then she reminds herself who he is, and just how messed up what he's saying is, and it only makes the resulting fury burn brighter.

She slammed her fist down on the table, knocking the pancakes over and making Gabriel jump. "I once admired you for your courage, for your dedication. I thought I could get through to you once." She remembered being a little girl tuning into his every interview, buying every magazine, attending every show her mother would allow – hanging on this very man's every word.

In her head, Gabriel Agreste had been the self-made man who came from nothing, building a living only on his relentless determination and his dream, whose talent shined through whatever life threw at him. When he treated her terribly, she clung to that image in her head, hoping that the man she admired was buried somewhere under that corporate front. Even knowing the monster he truly was, her optimism let him ambush her and complete his plan.

Yet it was here, watching the man become a shell of everything she'd ever assigned to him, that pissed her off more than anything. Perhaps it was that she could see Hawkmoth as something he became, something born from grief. But seeing him throw everything away with no miraculous to shelter his heart, she wondered if perhaps he had never been the man she thought he was, that the stories she built her dreams upon as a child were all lies made up for an interview.

It should have been obvious even before knowing he was a super villain, Marinette thought. Maybe I just refused to see it.

She tore her eyes away, unable to bare looking at him, or letting him see how her eyes glimmered with a hint of tears. All she could think of is how devastated her younger self would have been, or how Adrien had to deal with this man for all of his life. "But at the end of the day, you really are just a shameless coward. Even a second chance at life can't stop you from running away from your problems and responsibilities."

He sits there, slumped in his seat, the wrinkles in his skin and suit making him look more like a crumpled sack than a person. "I've resigned myself to my fate, Ladybug. Your insults don't carry the same weight anymore."

"Fine then, Hawkmoth, sit here and waste away." She said as she made her away to the door, "We'd just end up killing each other anyway."

Next Time - Tainted Legacies:

Adrien being Chat Noir brought many complications for Nathalie, the chief among them being that many factors of her super villain career became suddenly very relevant to her service to him. Tomoe Tsugi had been a stalwart ally of Hawkmoth, and Nathalie was sure that the hunger for power and control that led her to agreeing to such a partnership did not die with Gabriel.

The butterfly miraculous had gone missing during Monarch's final battle, as far as Marinette had informed Nathalie when she woke up at the hospital. It didn't take a genius to deduce that the only other person who'd be in any position to swoop in and take the miraculous from Monarch would be the only other person in the world who knew Gabriel's true identity, who knew exactly where Gabriel would be and what he would be up to at the time of the final battle.

Whether Tomoe was the new Hawkmoth or was working with the new Hawkmoth, she wasn't to be trusted.

However, there in lies the rub: Nathalie Sancoeur shouldn't know any of the reasons that Tomoe wasn't to be trusted. So, how was she supposed to warn Chat Noir without revealing her own true nature?

The answer became more and more reckless the longer she stood in Tomoe's lavish office, watching the Tsugi matriarch looking over Adrien from across her desk, sizing him up like he was a potential threat that needed to be dealt with. Or the more likely and even more anger-inducing option: sizing up how much she could take from him.

After all, it was no coincidence that Tomoe had dropped her interest in Adrien until a few days prior. When his inheritance, including control over Gabriel's company, was officially handed over to him.

"Adrien. It has been too long." Tomoe said, clasping her hands together over her desk, brows tightening around her dark glasses.

Nathalie watched Adrien shift uncomfortably in his seat, trying to match Nathalie's stiff posture, but his natural energy only making his joints itch. "I don't think we've ever properly met, Miss Tsugi; you only ever dealt with my father."

The skin of Tomoe's cheeks wrinkled, and somehow Nathalie could picture her eyes narrowing behind those glasses. The response, an indirect reminder that any leverage she had relied on Gabriel still being in the picture, must have left a foul taste.