💀 pour oublier ma peine immense

[bonnechance]

It had been a long and hard three years.

Ladybug had run out of fingers with which to count the sticky situations she and Chat Noir had been in because of Hawkmoth. But finally, finally, she and her partner had him dead to rights. As time went on, they had grown desperate, and they'd made mistakes - but nothing they hadn't been able to fix. He'd made mistakes, too, and that was how the two of them had managed to track him down.

Heart pounding, she cast her gaze down at the man that had been their adversary for so long. Hawkmoth stared back at the both of them with a dark glare full of loathing. There were a lot of things she had wanted to ask him when she finally caught up to him, but there was only one question she was actually able to form.

"How could you?" She whispered, her voice ragged. She was breathing heavily - the fight had taken a lot out of her. Out of her partner, and out of their enemy, too; had it gone on much longer, they all might have dropped dead out of exhaustion. "You hurt so many people."

Hawkmoth's eyes glittered, and he pressed his lips together into a thin line. Ladybug felt something roll down her cheek - sweat, she hoped, and not blood or tears, but she'd taken a hit to the temple earlier and she couldn't be certain that it wasn't bleeding (and in fact it was). But she was in better shape than him, at least. He was beaten down, he had lost.

All that remained was to take his Miraculous and make sure that Nooroo's power never, ever fell int the hands of someone like him ever again.

His refusal to answer stirred anger in her where there had once been pity.

"Men. Women. Children. You used them all - and for what? What on earth could have been worth it? I don't understand. Explain yourself, Hawkmoth."

He didn't answer. He looked between the two of them, seething. Ladybug scowled and knelt down in front of him, curled her fingers around his brooch, and yanked it away from his suit.

The magic holding his transformation together fell apart, and Nooroo emerged from the butterfly Miraculous at long last. Ladybug cradled him in the crook of her arm and watched as the facial features of their nemesis became clear.

A well-dressed man, middle-aged. Nobody she recognized. Without his Miraculous, he should have been powerless. Defeated. Done for.

She didn't catch his smirk until it was too late.

His hand darted into the suit jacket that hadn't been there before, and his fingers closed around something she couldn't see. "I'll make you understand," He snarled, and the next thing she knew his hand emerged from the jacket and the crack of a gunshot split the air. "Perhaps now we'll share the same wish."

There was a gun in his hand, Ladybug realized, as a dull roar and the man's twisted, bitter laughter filled her ears. He hadn't aimed at her. She turned toward her partner with dread.

He had aimed at him, and his laughter was not the laughter of a man who had missed his mark.

Comments

[sunsoutpunsout]

It was a bad fight.

Chat Noir had half a dozen patches of bruises under his suit, the beginnings of what he suspected were cracked ribs, and every breath stung. He had held out on using Cataclysm as long as he possibly could, and still hadn't been forced to use it before the fight drew to a close. The thought of being forced to drop his transformation and leave Ladybug undefended was a powerful motivation.

They'd waited years for this confrontation with Hawkmoth. Papillon. They'd hounded him at every turn, narrowed down their search, chased him until he went to ground. It had taken them years, but they'd finally discovered his hiding place. The room was dim but for the fall of sunlight, the shining white butterflies, and as Ladybug knelt, the only sound was the echoing whisper of wings.

Years ago, they'd speculated about this moment. Wondered what Hawkmoth could possibly want. It was Ladybug who was hellbent on knowing -- Chat Noir, who knew the darkness and pain that could lie awake and seething in people's hearts, was more content to simply stop him.

"You're gonna let him villain monologue? Really?" he'd joked, and he still remembered the laugh they'd shared over it.

The real thing wasn't funny at all.

As his partner pulled the Miraculous from Hawkmoth's grasp, the butterflies all coalesced into one small violet form, and Ladybug asked her question. Nooroo tried to warn her. Tried to clutch her arm and open his mouth, and Chat was distracted by the horrified look on the Kwami's face. He caught the movement out of the corner of his eye.

It was the last thing he would ever remember about that day.

He would never remember the way the floor disappeared, the way the room tilted, the way the blood flew in a stunning arc. The dying sun turned it a burning crimson.

Chat Noir's body fell like a marionette with its strings cut. Eyes and mouth open, blood blooming like a macabre flower against his hair.

[bonnechance]

For all the danger they faced on a regular basis, Ladybug had never once considered that a mundane weapon might pose a danger to either one of them.

It was stupid. Thoughtless. How many times had she transformed? When her phone had been in her pocket before transforming, it was always there when she released it. If this man, this villain, had anything dangerous on him before he assumed his magical form... She should have known - should have anticipated - she was supposed to be clever. What good was cleverness if it couldn't stop something like this from happening?

"Chat Noir!"

His blood splattered on the floor, on her suit, and on her cheeks. She rushed forward to catch him, sinking to the ground and wrapping her arms around him tightly.

"No. No no no. This can't be happening—"

It was supposed to be over. Over and done with, safe, they could go back to their normal lives - today was the day she was going to finally tell him who she really was, the way he'd been asking her to for so long -

Her vision blurred with tears, and she was only aware of her fallen partner, not of the man who had done this to him.

"Say something. SAY SOMETHING!"

[sunsoutpunsout]

The damage was hard to quantify in the slanting light, the stark shadows. He bled more as she took him in her arms, fever-warm against her suit, quickly cooling as it left his body.

Chat was breathing, but barely. Shallow, frantic as his body attempted to keep him alive. His eyes were rolled back, empty, his lips parted as his muscles spasmed, flutters beneath the suit. Mixed electrical signals. Misfires. Plagg was the best protection he could have, but even he had failed. There was only so much luck a black cat could have.

The transformation remained in place, but a soft green light began to flicker at the edges of his mask, a surreal whisper of fading light.

Hawkmoth knelt in front of them, Chat's blood staining the knees of his expensive suit.

"Do you understand me now, Ladybug?" he asked quietly, his voice a cold, coaxing rumble. "What wouldn't you give? What lows wouldn't you stoop to? What wouldn't you wish for?"

In Ladybug's arms, Chat Noir gave a ragged, bubbling gasp, lungs working on reflex alone. The transformation began to peel away at his hands. The edges of his bell.

"... we can save him," Hawkmoth whispered, lifting his hand in front of her. He opened his fingers, showing his empty palm.

"If you give me your Miraculous."

[bonnechance]

She should know by now that Hawkmoth could not be trusted. But their roles had been so easily reversed - he'd been the one beaten, bloody, hurting. Now Chat Noir's blood was pooling beneath them and Ladybug was desperate to save him.

It didn't matter how. He couldn't die like this.

He was her partner. For three years, he trusted her to see them through their battles, to bring them safely home. He had always had her back, but she'd let her guard down, and in an instant he had paid the price for it. It was a price she couldn't let him pay.

There was no hesitation, just as there had been no hesitation three years before when she had believed Adrien to be in danger of being tossed off the side of a tower. She brought one hand up to an earring, and although it beeped Tikki's distress, this time there was no one to stop her. The first earring came off, and the edges of the magic that held her suit together began to fray. The second came off, and it vanished, leaving Marinette Dupain-Cheng kneeling in Chat Noir's blood, clutching his body and holding her hand out over Hawkmoth's.

She dropped the earrings into his waiting palm.

"Please," She begged, unable to choke out any other word between her tears. "Please."

[villainousthetic]

The sun went down, the police arrived, and they questioned them (mostly Gabriel) about what had happened. They took Gabriel's car, his coat, swabbed his hands for powder residue, but nobody truly seemed to believe that Gabriel had hurt his son. Marinette's presence and how she reacted to him, alongside their obvious upset and mutual concern for Adrien made it very clear that someone else had done this.

That night, there would be an investigation at the scene. The attempted murder weapon would be found. The blood on the floor would be sent to the lab, but not much attempt would be made to actually test the evidence. Almost all of it was Adrien's, as it was.

Marinette was no questioned so much as examined. While the female officer didn't ask her to remove any clothing (and therefore didn't find some of the more wicked bruises) she did take a few pictures of the bruising along her temple, flowering darkly across the edge of her eye. Their investigation of Adrien's injuries was probably the most harrowing part.

An officer took careful stock of each of the bruises, even the ones inflicted by the hospital (he'd had several ribs cracked during resuscitation, not uncommon) and catalogued each, carefully.

The x-rays were the worst. The police were understandably agitated by them.

Adrien's body was a road map of injuries, obviously sustained from some form of combat. His ribs had been cracked multiple times before. His forearms showed signs of calcified bones from hairline fractures, and though it was hard to tell with his head injury, he showed signs of more than one concussion in his lifetime.

If not for Adrien's active, sporting lifestyle (including a love of climbing, fencing, basketball and karate) it would have been extremely difficult to explain away.

As it was, Gabriel could barely contain the rising protective anger (and luckily for him, the obvious shock helped the case). Adrien had suffered dozens of injuries as Chat Noir, not counting those healed by Lucky Charm, and had only sought medical help for the worst of them.

... the thing was, he hadn't told Ladybug either.

When the police finally left after the met seperately with a sketch artist, it was nearing midnight. Adrien was moved from the emergency unit to critical care. They'd both eaten nothing all day.

It was a nurse who brought them sandwiches, lemonade and chocolate chip cookies from the cafe on the first floor.

In the quiet of the night, Gabriel offered Nooroo some lemonade. The kwami came out and sat with him in silence while Gabriel drew on a napkin, and though they said nothing at all, there was a sense of... knowing between them. As if they'd more than simply met before.

[bonnechance]

Marinette wasn't hungry.

She'd lost her appetite at about the same time Adrien had started losing blood, and she hadn't regained it. Even if she had, she would have lost it all over again upon seeing the x-rays. She hadn't known. How could she not have known? Had Lucky Charm been ineffective all along?

Why hadn't he told her? And since he hadn't, why hadn't she figured it out? She was supposed to be the one who picked up on things like that.

...how many of those injuries were ones he'd only sustained because he had been protecting her?

By the time the police left and the sketch artist had done his work, she was more or less exhausted. She was sore, emotionally compromised, and just about ready to burst into tears. She nearly did when the nurse brought them food and gently encouraged them to eat, and there was a long moment where she buried her face in her hands and didn't look up until she had herself somewhat under control.

She couldn't cry. She couldn't complain that it hurt. Adrien was hurt so much worse.

The sandwich and the cookies went untouched, but Marinette pacified the nurse by sipping at some of the lemonade, and once they were left alone in the hallway, Tikki poked her head out from Marinette's purse, where her earrings were safely stowed away; by taking them back to try and use Lucky Charm, she'd reclaimed them, but she couldn't bring herself to put them in just yet.

Idly, her hand came down over her to stroke Tikki's head. It was a slow, unconscious gesture, and both the girl and the kwami seemed to draw some measure of comfort from it.

The familiarity with which Gabriel and Nooroo regarded each other, although they didn't speak a word, did not go unnoticed. Marinette opened her mouth as if to ask but Tikki cut her off with a shake of her head. They sat there in silence, the seconds and minutes ticking away. Marinette broke off a piece of her untouched cookie and handed it to Tikki, who nibbled on it and tried to stay still but who only seemed to be growing more and more agitated.

Finally, a little after one in the morning, she emerged fully from her chosen's purse and perched herself on her shoulder, fixing Gabriel with a stare.

"I want to talk to Plagg." The kwami's voice was as steady as it was possible to be under the circumstances - so, not very. "Let him out. You have to let me talk to Plagg."

It was a far cry from her usual sugary sweetness, and her bright blue eyes were fierce as they bored holes into his face. Plagg was her partner just as much as Adrien was Marinette's. She had to see him.

[villainousthetic]

Gabriel left Marinette to herself. They were both closed off, dealing with their own guilt, their own anger. As much as Gabriel tried to distract himself from his feelings, the x-rays had disturbed him more than he could say.

He wouldn't blame Ladybug. Marinette. She was a child. She'd been thrust into this, same as Adrien had... but who he did blame was beyond his reach for now. They hadn't spoken in years, and Gabriel was not looking forward to the meeting.

Instead, he began to steadily direct the anger to the being who resided in the ring, in his pocket. By taking off the Miraculous, he'd rejected Plagg, and the kwami had been forced to de-materialize.

Gabriel couldn't say that he didn't expect Tikki to confront him. He just wasn't expecting it to happen so soon. His fingers tightened on his pen, and Nooroo visibly winced, watching Gabriel with big eyes.

"No."

He answered without looking up.

[bonnechance]

"You have to!"

"Tikki—" Marinette reached up to her shoulder to try and pull the kwami away, but she phased through her fingers and darted forward and down to bring herself into his line of vision. If he wouldn't look at her, she was just going to have to force it. She was too upset to do anything else.

"He's not yours! You don't get to keep him locked up in there!"

"Tikki, stop!" Marinette sounded like she was close to tears - and she was. Tears were stinging at the corner of her eyes, threatening to overflow, and the kwami looked back at her chosen with a sorrowful expression.

"But, Plagg..."

"I know," She said softly. "But now isn't the time. Please... stop."

Tikki looked as though she disagreed with that, but Gabriel didn't seem inclined to change his mind, and Marinette had said please. She shot Gabriel an inscrutable look before returning to Marinette's shoulder, curling up in a little ball at the crook of her neck.

[villainousthetic]

When Gabriel eventually wandered back from wherever he'd been, he came with a blanket that he settled around Marinette's shoulders. He didn't apologize. He didn't thank her. But he clearly wasn't angry. He went back to Adrien's side and stroked his hair back from his face, avoiding the bandages.

It was a long night, and he wouldn't sleep.

The next morning, their results came back. Adrien was declared stable enough to be removed from support. Some of the machines came off, but he still had drugs keeping him in a forced coma, allowing him to heal. He had to be fed through a tube.

Gabriel made the arrangements.

That day, he was moved home.

In less than a day, he'd had Adrien's entire room outfitted with everything he'd need. All the machines, all the monitors. There would be doctors and staff ready to assist, round the clock care. Moving was a harrowing process, though the staff was gentle, careful with him, and he was soon settled into clean sheets.

Finally, Gabriel turned to her.

"Go home. Pack what you need. I will have Adrien's driver take you."

[bonnechance]

Gabriel had assumed that she wasn't going to want to go home permanently. To be fair, he wasn't wrong. Marinette had been prepared to try and persuade him - but he kept that from being necessary with a simple I will have Adrien's driver take you.

She blinked once, twice, and then hesitated.

If she went home like this... rumpled clothes, bruised face, and all, Alya was sure to notice. She glanced at her phone to check the time and blanched. At some point during the night, she'd missed no less than fifteen texts and ten calls from her roommate, and it was the time of day when she was sure to be around.

"I... I don't live alone." She bit her lip. "If my roommate sees... this..." She gestured at the bruising. "She's going to ask questions, and I... I don't think I'm ready to answer them. Could... could he stop somewhere so I can pick up some makeup first...?"

[villainousthetic]

Gabriel turned to her, frowning, as if seeing her face for the first time. Tear-streaked, puffy-eyed, no sleep. She looked like a wreck, and there was no way she wasn't going to be interrogated.

"... no." He paused. "We'll take care of that here. A moment."

He left the room, came back a few minutes later with a cool damp towel, and a few products. They were high-end, and they matched her skin tone. He handed her the towel so she could wash her face, then sat her down while he rolled up his sleeves.

He was a little rusty, but old habits died hard. He dabbed and blended, gentle on her bruises.

It had been several years since he'd done this.

"How badly are you hurt?"

[bonnechance]

She stared blankly after him as he stepped away to get what he needed. A moment? What, did he carry makeup around with him wherever he went?

...apparently he did. She shot the products in his hand an incredulous look as he returned, too quickly for him to have made a discreet makeup run himself, and took the damp towel without a word. That's right, he was Gabriel Agreste. Of course he had makeup... somewhere. Of course.

(Part of her wondered, as she wiped down her face, if Adrien's schoolbag had contained more than books back in collège and lycée. Probably. He was a model. Since she'd started attending design school earlier that year, though, she hadn't seen much of him; it was impossible to tell if he still carried his things around now.)

She stayed absolutely still as Gabriel worked his magic. Any other day, she probably would have been thrilled and intimidated to have him doing her makeup, but today, she couldn't summon up even the slightest bit of enthusiasm. There was something about being responsible for hospitalizing the man's son that made it impossible to gush over the fact that he was her idol in the field of fashion.

When he asked that question, she swallowed hard. She didn't want to answer it, not really.

"The worst of it is covered up," She muttered, and it was half a lie. He was in the process of covering up the bruises on her face. But the worst of them, the really vicious ones, were on her ribs and torso, and those were hidden by her shirt.

[sunsoutpunsout]

Adrien had been unconscious for more than a week.

It was the middle of the day. His bandages had been changed, dressings cleaned up. His head was healing remarkably well, and all the wounds had closed.

It was the second day he'd been off the drugs causing him to stay in a forced coma.

It started small. Elevated finger twitches. Gradual changes in his breathing. He'd held steady that way for more than a day before it actually happened, and when it did, it wasn't huge. Wasn't dramatic.

Nooroo was asleep, nestled in Adrien's blankets, and even he wasn't alerted to the change.

It was hard for Adrien to open his eyes. It happened slowly, foggily, and when he did manage it everything was out of focus. He slowly closed them again, rested for a few more minutes. Finally, it seemed right to try again.

Everything about him felt thick and slow, and he wasn't really aware of his body. Awareness came in patches. Light. Warmth. The dull edge of what promised to be awful pain.

She was the first thing he saw. The first person he focused on.

Adrien said nothing, just watched her, the way the sunlight fell across her hair and skin. Captivated, though he couldn't have said why.

[bonnechance]

Marinette felt like she was being watched.

Which, all things said, shouldn't have been possible. But she looked up anyway, cast her gaze around the room, and then locked eyes with him. He wasn't sitting up, he hadn't made a sound, but where she'd only seen eyelids every other time she looked, this time there were his glittering green eyes. Her heart leaped up into her throat and she leaned forward, disbelieving but infinitely hopeful.

"Adrien," She breathed.

She should go and get Gabriel, let him know that his son's eyes were open. But she couldn't look away from him - she felt rooted to the spot, and there was some part of her that was terrified that he would fall unconscious again when she wasn't looking.

[sunsoutpunsout]

Adrien wasn't all there, but the moment she said his name, there was a spark of something. It came alive in his eyes, pinched his brow, like he was trying to make sense of her. It was a sense of himself.

His fingers twitched, the same way they had countless time when she'd touched him, while he'd been asleep.

Adrien's lips parted, like he was searching for words, but instead, he smiled. It softened his whole face, and for one second, he seemed like himself.

Then the moment passed, and it slid away quickly. His eyelids fluttered closed, and he frowned. Breathing was... unexpectedly difficult, now that the pain was trickling in.

"... mmph."

[bonnechance]

It was just a second, just a single, brief second, but he smiled, and Marinette's heart felt lighter than it had for more than a week. It was him. He was back. He was going to be okay.

...then his expression contorted as the pain settled in, and she panicked.

"I—"

She wasn't a nurse. She had no idea what to do to make breathing easier for him, to dull the pain he was sure to be feeling. With shaking hands, she reached for her phone and started to scroll through her contacts. Gabriel...

"I'll call someone, they'll..."

He'd help Adrien. He had to. And she knew for a fact, now, that Gabriel would want to be here for his son's waking.

She pressed the screen and put the call through.

[sunsoutpunsout]

The next time Adrien woke up, it was to unexpected clarity.

He still hurt, but the morning light streaming in through the window seemed much more important than the pain. He was still propped up in the hospital bed, a pillow arranged under his neck, but this time he could feel the supportive bandage around his ribs, the tightness of his scalp due to the stitches. They felt vaguely itchy, which wasn't much of an improvement on the nauseating pain, but he'd take it.

Still half asleep, Adrien looked down to find the girl crashed out, slumped forward in her chair, arms pillowed on the side of his bed.

In his pain and sleep-addled state, he didn't realize how weird of him it was to be staring at her. She was pretty, but not in the way he was used to. Adrien was used to the cool beauty of priceless art, of the untouchable. She had a touchable kind of beauty, like the warmth of the sunbeams shining over the foot of his bed.

Looking at her, he felt warmer.

It didn't occur to him that he didn't know her name. Or that she wasn't in scrubs. What he did notice was that there were dark circles under her eyes, like she hadn't been sleeping, and her hair was a little damp at the edges, like she'd been up and showered recently.

What he noticed were the last green and yellow shades of a fading bruise across her temple.

Adrien's chest felt tight in a way that had nothing to do with the injured ribs.

He was reaching for her before he knew it, gently brushing back her hair with his fingertips.

[bonnechance]

Lack of sleep over the last couple of days had made her almost too exhausted to drea when she finally did. It was probably a good thing; Marinette was still haunted by the memory of their final battle, and she really didn't want to think what sort of nightmare it would develop into.

Worse, she didn't want to wake up screaming and find that she'd forced Adrien awake with the noise, either.

Her breathing was soft and even as he came into consciousness, and she didn't stir at the sound of his sheets rustling. She didn't stir until he brushed back her hair - then she awoke with a gasp, and jerked backwards as if she'd been struck by lightning.

This had the unfortunate effect of sending her toppling out of her chair. She hit the ground with a thud and stared up at him with wide eyes and a pounding heart.

"—Adrien?"

...at least the display of clumsiness provided a believable explanation for the bruise.

[sunsoutpunsout]

Belatedly, he realized that he'd hecked up.

Adrien winced as she hit the floor, and leaning forward that suddenly in concern was Not Good For His Ribs. He was momentarily a little lightheaded, but then breathed through it.

Though waking up before this was a little jumbled up, he remembered her being there. Remembered waking up with her here.

"... you okay?" he asked, his voice tight, but he managed not to wheeze. "Didn't mean to startle you that badly. I'm sorry."

[bonnechance]

Tikki knew that maybe she should be with Marinette right now.

She also knew, though, that Marinette wouldn't be going anywhere. Not with Adrien still laid up. If something did happen, she could be at her chosen's side in a matter of seconds - and so, careful to keep from being spotted by anyone not in the know, the kwami crept her way to Gabriel's office.

It remained to be seen whether she or Chloé would be the more unwelcome visitor.

She phased through the door and fluttered up to his desk, speaking without preamble:

"We need to talk."

[villainousthetic]

Two in one day.

Either Gabriel had the worst luck, or... he frowned slightly, considering (more like his son than he would have realized) that Tikki was the embodiment of good luck.

He should have expected this. It had been more than a week since their last confrontation, and they hadn't spoken since. Adrien was awake, functioning, and expected to make a full recovery, even if he memories were currently swiss cheese.

Last time, Marinette had broken it up. Not now.

"Ah," he said softly, setting his pen down and scrutinizing her, his expression bland. A kwami was vastly different from a human being, and his memories were still fresh enough to know this had to be handled delicately. Then again, Tikki was attempting to talk to him rather than break into his vault, like Plagg had years ago.

Oh, he'd put it together.

Unfortunately, he was still angry.

"Then talk."

[bonnechance]

"If you're not going to give Adrien back his ring," Tikki began, her eyes fixed on the man's face, "Then why are you keeping it?"

Of course she was going right for the heavy-hitting questions. She knew there were times when it paid to be tactful, to be gentle, to bend like bamboo and make it seem as if she was going to yield, but she also knew that Gabriel was the type of man who, if you gave him an inch, would take a mile. He was very set in his ways, very convinced that he was right, and that made him dangerous.

It was the reason why Plagg was trapped inside his Miraculous now. It was the reason why the peacock pin had spent so many years locked away in his safe...

"It's not safe to keep that ring here. If you won't give it to Marinette, then you should give it back to the Guardian."

Of course, to do that he'd have to actually see Fu, and she couldn't imagine that would be an encounter that ended well, but she had to get Plagg out of there.

[sunsoutpunsout]

Showering was an ordeal.

The worst part about being mobility-impaired (according to the nurses, that was the way to say bedridden these days) was that he wasn't trusted to go to the bathroom alone. Sure, they shut the door, but he was never going to get used to having somebody help bathe him because it literally wasn't safe for him to be alone.

If only he weren't prone to dizzy spells. If only he could stand unassisted. If only he could bend and twist enough to dress himself without falling over.

But Adrien wanted a shower. So he bit his tongue, let his aide help him, and hated it with all the emotional force he could muster when he needed a nap just to recover from it.

... but he was clean. Finally, he smelled like himself and not a walking hospital. And he was awake, even if he was in his pajamas.

He was just preparing to sneak out of bed when the door opened. He froze, guilty as sin.

[bonnechance]

Luckily for Adrien, the person on the other side of the door wasn't one of the nurses, or an aide, or even his father.

Instead - and perhaps predictably - it was Marinette, who looked equal parts confused and concerned when she took in his positioning, the set of his shoulders, the way he seemed to be trying to pull himself out of bed.

...the way nobody else was around to stop him.

"Adrien?"

Her voice was soft, a whisper.

[sunsoutpunsout]

Adrien flushed all the way to his ears, felt lightheaded, and looked down at the one foot he had out of bed. His hair was tousled, even worse than Chat's. It was sticking out everywhere, still damp, one giant cowlick.

He didn't meet her eyes at first, sure she was going to scold him like everyone else did.

He knew damn well he wasn't supposed to be out of bed on his own.

"I was going to get my comb," he mumbled.