💗 marinette (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bonnechance) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
genevrier2016-04-15 05:13 pm
bonnechance) wrote in genevrier2016-04-15 05:13 pm
💀 pour oublier ma peine immense
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.
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.
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(She would have stepped out of the room, except Adrien's grip on her hand tightened when he saw his father, and she didn't have it in her to be the one to pull away first when he needed her.)
She didn't want to intrude. The two of them spent so little time together even before the accident - involving herself in what should be their time just felt wrong. But if she'd looked, she would have caught Adrien's look of confusion. If she'd looked, she would have seen the way his gaze wandered to the door.
She saw none of it, and even if she had, there was no way for her to warn Gabriel about the question his son had asked. Not without alerting Adrien to it. If the man had picked up his phone, she could probably have tipped him off somehow and made it sound like a normal part of the conversation, but he hadn't, and now she had no way to bring it up without causing more questions.
...if Adrien asked, she could take her cue as to how to respond from Gabriel. If he didn't, she'd be able to ask him about it once he fell back to sleep.
For now, though, she tried to make herself as small and inconspicuous as possible. This was their moment, not hers.
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He was already sliding again towards sleep, but he was struggling against it.
"... is she all right?" Adrien asked softly, but clearly. There was a note in his voice, something that said he knew something was wrong. Guarded, a little gentle.
"Is who?" Gabriel asked. Adrien went silent, seemed to work up the nerve to ask.
"Maman. Is she-?"
It was Gabriel's turn to go completely silent. Shocked. Then, he hugged Adrien tighter.
"... she's fine," he said soothingly, and Adrien relaxed in his arms, though his brow pinched slightly. Some part of him knew that was wrong, but he was too tired and in too much pain to question it.
Adrien slid headlong into sleep soon after, and Gabriel settled him back down in the bed, pulled up his covers, and gave a slow sigh.
He didn't look at Marinette.
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At first, her expression was incredulous. She quickly schooled it into something more neutral until Adrien drifted back off to sleep, lest he see her face and realize something was even more wrong than it already felt to him, but as soon as he was no longer conscious she resumed boring holes into his back with her eyes.
What could she even say? He was his father. Ultimately, it was up to him to decide how to handle what went on with his family, but the thought of outright lying to Adrien simply didn't feel right to her.
And saying she's fine was too much of a lie. They didn't have any way of knowing that.
"...he's going to want to see her," She said finally. It wasn't quite the "How long do you expect to be able to keep that up?" that was the first question that came to mind - the observation was a little more mild, a little more soft - but it carried the same sentiment.
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"Adrien and his mother were extremely close," he explained, his words short and clipped, which was the closest indication of pain he would betray.
"Imagine for a moment, waking up and experiencing that loss. Fresh. Raw. He is injured and needs to concentrate on healing, not mourning."
... it all sounded good. It sounded like logic and reason and even kindness, if you cut it a certain way, but it also smacked of cowardice. Gabriel didn't want to tell him.
Not again.
"Who says he will remember that conversation when he wakes up again?"
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It made sense to her. When it came to herself, she had a way of running away from her own problems, of taking the easy way out. It was usually when it came to other people that she had the strength to stick to her guns and face things head-on. She wanted to shield Adrien from anything and everything, but...
But.
"Who says that he won't?"
Anxiously, she toyed with the hem of her shirt, and looked up at Gabriel's face just once before her gaze dropped to her feet.
"If... he remembers it, and he spends all this time thinking she's okay, only to find out later that she's..." She swallowed. "...not here, wouldn't that just make it worse?"
It wasn't just the pain of the loss, either. Gabriel and Adrien's relationship was rocky to begin with. If he thought his father had lied to him, it might make it that much harder to repair it...
"...it's... ultimately it's your decision, but..." Lying just didn't feel right. She'd kept enough secrets from him in the last three years.
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"I will not ask you to lie," he finally answered.
Hopefully, if things were ideal, Adrien would remember on his own. He would understand why Gabriel had soothed him rather than told him the painful truth when he was at his weakest.
Gabriel straightened his tie.
When it came down to it, he would do anything to protect his son, even if those things were not always to his benefit. "If Adrien asks again, you may answer him as you see fit."
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But in an ideal world, Adrien never would have gotten shot in the first place. Hoping for the best didn't always make it so, and Marinette realized that. There was a high likelihood that this was going to backfire, somehow.
There was an even higher likelihood that Gabriel would not change his mind about how he'd be proceeding.
She nodded, inwardly hoping that he wouldn't ask. She would dance around the answers for as long as she could without actually lying, but if his questions got more specific, she would have to tell him - even if there was a big part of her that didn't want to.
"Thank you." For not making me lie.
The part of her that didn't want to lie won out over the part of her that didn't want to be the bearer of bad news, though.
"And, uh... sorry. For... not getting out of there and giving you two privacy sooner. I should have..." Her voice trailed off. "...I wasn't thinking."
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Her apology surprised him. He settled into silence, thinking over her answer before he tipped his head forward, breathing in.
"If it had been her, I would not have left either."
Gabriel straightened, turned, and walked back down the hall.
Behind Marinette, Nooroo phased through the door, watching her with huge worried eyes.
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In context, that could only mean one person. Adrien's mother, the love of Gabriel's life, and as she watched his back as he made his steady progress down the hall and out of sight, she realized what that meant. In horror, she jerked back, her back hitting the wall as she sank to her knees and pressed her hands to her cheeks in panic. Her wide-eyed gaze darted to Nooroo, and she managed to squeak out only one thing.
"...he totally knows I'm in love with Adrien, doesn't he?"
Um. Duh, Marinette.
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Nooroo landed with a flutter on her knee, trying very hard not to smile. He failed, then gave a small start, looking completely shocked.
"You mean you aren't together?"
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"Neither of us knew who the other was behind the mask," She answered. "And I always though that he could never think of me as someone he could... well... you know. Like, that way."
She sighed.
"He liked Ladybug. I liked Adrien. So when Chat Noir seemed interested, I didn't... if I'd worked up the nerve to confess to him as Marinette, he might have... it's complicated."
So complicated she couldn't finish her sentences, apparently.
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Maybe it wasn't as complicated as she seemed to think it was.
Nooroo had been there to watch the way Adrien looked at her. Even with as hurt as he was, he'd reached out to her, smiled for her, sought her as his source of comfort.
"People are complicated," Nooroo finally said, his voice soft and comforting. "Love just is."
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"Thanks, Nooroo," She whispered. "You're pretty smart."
From Marinette's purse, Tikki gave a long-suffering sigh.
"I have been telling her that for the last three years."
The kwami was smiling as she poked her head out of the purse, though, and a moment later she fluttered out to settle herself on her chosen's lap next to Nooroo. "So Adrien woke up again tonight? You must be so happy, Nooroo!"
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"Again," he agreed with a nod. "He's one of those, Tikki," he said thoughtfully, as if she should know precisely what he meant.
Thousands of years old, countless chosen, all special. But as remarkable and unique as they all were, sometimes one came along that meant over and beyond the world to them. For Nooroo to have such love for a boy who wasn't his chosen was nearly unheard of.
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"He is," came her reply. "I don't think there's anyone who could meet him and not like him."
"That's true," Marinette agreed in a mumble. Tikki giggled and patted her knee, knowing exactly where her chosen's thoughts were straying - they'd been off to a rocky start at first, but as soon as she actually got to know him, she was absolutely lost.
"Even Plagg..." Tikki hesitated. "I think Plagg would have liked him even if he wasn't his chosen. And that's saying a lot."
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Though he hadn't spoken out nearly as harshly as Tikki had (in fact, he hadn't at all, the moment had been lost) he wasn't sitting well on the knowledge. Worse, Gabriel's treatment of Plagg was only the beginning of the big picture.
There was someone else involved too, and freeing Plagg would also mean they could no longer ignore them. But if Gabriel wasn't going to reclaim his Miraculous... who could possibly do so?
There was also the unprecedented matter at hand -- Nooroo was active, but without a Chosen. Though Marinette had assumed acceptance of him, he didn't foresee a reason for her to actually become Papillon. It was generally considered an enormous risk for any one mortal to have possession of more than one Miraculous, but this being Tikki's Chosen shook things up.
"Even Plagg has his soft spots," he agreed gently, knowing exactly what was on Tikki's mind.
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"...I wish we could let him know that Adrien's going to be okay."
Marinette bit her lip. Honestly, she agreed with her kwami. It was wrong to keep him locked up, and even more wrong to keep the knowledge of how Adrien was doing from him. It was just that trying to convince Gabriel of that when he was already emotional was something that probably did more harm than good, in the long run.
"And I wish..." Tikki's voice trailed off. There were four Miraculouses in this house - four kwamis - and she wanted them all together again. The question was, how on earth could she possibly make that happen?
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He didn't have to watch Marinette's face to know that she felt the same way. Marinette clearly felt for Plagg too, and Nooroo could only guess how they'd come by each other, but he imagined he'd love her.
I wish.
"Gabriel won't come around easily."
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Of course... Tikki, never having been a kwami that had spent much time in the Agreste house, didn't know just how stubborn the man could be. There was another kwami that had probably somewhere around a decade's worth of being shut away to attest to the fact that yes, yes it could go on forever, or at least until something happened and the Miraculous was finally passed on to someone else.
Marinette... didn't seem to realize every aspect of the situation. She knew about Plagg, of course. She didn't know about the other. If she did, she would have been absolutely horrified.
"...he's not the kind of person you can just keep trying to chip away at little by little, I don't think. For every chip you manage to make, he throws up a new wall." Marinette gnawed on her bottom lip, thinking. "And he's still angry at Plagg, right? But maybe as Adrien starts to get better, he'll get less angry and he'll let him go on his own...?"
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"Gabriel will never stop being angry."
He'd need to be convinced in one fell swoop, and most importantly, he needed to not make the decision himself.
"It needs to come from Chat Noir."
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Marinette didn't want to say it, and she hated to think it, but she knew it was true. If Adrien's memories were muddled - and they were... he still thought his mother was somewhere in the house, then it could be a long time before he recovered the memories of being Chat Noir, of spending time with Plagg. It could be a long time before he even thought to ask where his kwami was.
Too much time.
"He'll ask," Tikki, on the other hand, sounded certain. "Chat Noir's bond with Plagg is strong. I know he'll ask about him."
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"He will, when he's ready. If it's too soon, it might do more damage."
Saddened by the very thought, Nooroo went quiet again. If he was hurt more, through their meddling...
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"It will all work out," Tikki said, finally, her voice small. "We just have to believe."
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"Luck and wishes," he answered thoughtfully. Of all the kwami that could be of help, they were probably the best possible team.
Beaming, he fluttered at Tikki, smiling almost shyly. "It's good to be back."
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Some good had come of this, at least; Nooroo was free. They'd pretty much hit rock bottom, with Adrien's injuries and Plagg's situation, but from here, it could only get better.
They were overdue for some tremendously good luck, at any rate.
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