genevrier | 💀 pour oublier ma peine immense

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💀 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.

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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."

"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.

Gabriel had assumed that Tikki knew precisely why he was keeping it. He was not amused by the question, nor the way he tone had subtly shifted from talk to demand.

While Gabriel technically had no right to do what he was doing, he felt that it was the only way to keep the ring out of Adrien's hands, even if it was only a temporary solution. As his son healed, as the puzzle pieces failed to fit together, he'd seek out more and more answers. Adrien would never be satisfied with a half-life, cobbled together with what his father told him.

He would seek out his own truth.

"Giving it back to the old man would only set the cycle back in motion," he explained. Rather civil, all told. "And Miss Dupain-Cheng would immediately release Chat Noir's kwami. I don't suppose you could imagine the first thing he would do."

Gabriel had never personally met Plagg, but he was well aware of the bond between a kwami and their Chosen. He imagined Plagg would be frantic, would need to see Adrien, and he wasn't far off the mark. He also predicted that he wouldn't be as cautious as Nooroo and Tikki were.

Also true.

"And in turn," Gabriel went on, still quiet, "the first thing Adrien would do, the moment he was left alone."

She knew. But step one was getting Gabriel to say his reasons out loud.

"Of course I know what Plagg would do. Dealing with that is what I'm here for."

Ladybug and Chat Noir were two sides of the same coin; so were Tikki and Plagg. Marinette might not be able to keep the kwami from recklessly rushing in to see Adrien, but Tikki had been his partner for thousands of years, and she felt confident she could handle him.

Timing would be important, though. He'd have to be released for the first time when Adrien was deeply asleep, so the boy would stay out during Plagg's initial, inevitable rush to see him. After that, though, Tikki knew she could keep him from putting Adrien in danger. She believed in it.

"Adrien might not be ready to know everything yet," She said gently, "But even if you hide it from him, it's going to come out eventually. Especially if you hide it from him, he's going to try to hide it from you when he does start to look for more information. Isn't it better to be honest with him and to be the one to answer his questions?"

"Yes. I assume he always listens to what you say."

Tikki assumed so much.

Both of them had only known half of the boy in the bedroom down the hall, and Gabriel probably less than that, but he felt he knew enough.

He couldn't afford to be wrong.

Gabriel steepled his fingers, making a show of hearing Tikki out, but obviously, none of it was going to sway his decision. And he knew well that Tikki wouldn't be able to steal the ring on her own, even if she knew where it was.

"If he tries to hide this from me," Gabriel said flatly, "It would be nothing new."

Tikki couldn't possibily understand. Nooroo was the only one who had even a prayer of knowing what was going through Gabriel's head, and some part of him actually agreed with his decision, cruel as it was.

Gabriel had a reason for being there that night. He knew things. But he hadn't figured everything out.

"He listens to me more than he listens to anyone else." Except for maybe Adrien. At this point, Tikki thought that there was a very good chance that if Adrien told or asked Plagg to do something, he'd do it, just out of sheer relief that his chosen was still alive. "Just because you don't like him doesn't mean he's uncontrollable."

She watched the way he steepled his fingers, and slowly shifted her gaze to his face. Stubborn. So stubborn.

Was this where Adrien got it from?

"Listen..."

Tikki sighed heavily.

"You know, better than those two do, that Hawkmoth was never the only threat." Her eyes were wide and serious. "You don't want him going behind your back if what you used to fight rears its head again. Because if it does, it's going to come here. You're holding onto two of them. That makes you a target."

And Adrien is nearby. Wouldn't it be better to give him the answers before he took risks to look for them himself, to make sure that he was prepared instead of getting caught in the crossfire unawares? Tikki knew that Gabriel thought that what he was doing was best, but she thought that she knew what was best, too. And maybe neither one of them was really wrong - they both simply had wildly different perspectives.

The longer they spoke, the more walls Gabriel was throwing up. While Tikki had her reasons, Gabriel had his own, and they made him blind and deaf to any other perspective. He was resolute, and as Nooroo had predicted, not about to budge.

It would take something more than this, someone more than Tikki was to him.

"Perhaps that is what I want," he answered gravely, his eyes hooded by his brows, upset, but also far away. Better that he be a target than his son -- Marinette was here to be Adrien's shield, if it came to that. It was part of the reason he'd allowed her so close.

"As Chat Noir, Adrien failed to defeat Hawkmoth." It was a shockingly unfair statement, but ultimately it was true. Gabriel focused, suddenly, directly on Tikki, his silence like gathering thunderclouds.

"So did Ladybug."

Gabriel's chair scraped the floor as he stood up, hands folded behind his back.

"In fact, if I weren't certain that she would protect him as I would," he said, his voice a low, cold rumble.

"I would have kept her Miraculous as well."

Tikki was thousands of years old. Although she generally didn't use coarse language, she'd been around for long enough to be familiar with more curses than even the most foul-mouthed sailor, and for the first time in a couple of centuries she was really tempted to use them on him.

Her breath came out in a hiss, her eyes narrowed, furious.

"You have no right—"

She didn't curse, but she did raise her voice, and she only cut herself off because she knew it would cause more problems than yelling at him would solve if someone uninvolved overheard her ripping into him. She fumed, crossing her arms over her chest and glaring at him.

"Whether or not to keep someone else's Miraculous," She growled, "Is not your decision to make."

She was going to have to warn Marinette about him. Gabriel was stubborn, and in this mindset, he was dangerous. She already had a fairly negative impression of him because of how he'd treated Plagg and because of all the years the peacock pin had spent in that safe, and this was doing nothing to improve it.

"I have every right."

Gabriel's voice had grown hard, brittle and cold. He was dangerous, and he had no problem with letting Tikki understand that.

"You and your kind are so preoccupied with saving the world," he went on, watching her with a kind of attention that would unnerve lesser creatures, "that you forget the destruction you cause. The buildings may reassemble, memories might be reset -- but not everything, Tikki, can be fixed."

Gabriel lifted a gesture down the hall, toward Adrien's room.

"She understands that."

He paused, and something showed in his eyes, some small flicker of a loss that still remained unspoken.

"Sometimes, wishing is not enough."

"Not everything can be fixed," Tikki agreed, "But if you take away the tools they need to fix some things, then none of them will be."

Sometimes sacrifices were necessary for the greater good. It was a perspective that came with being as old as she was, with being something other than human. She would never want to leave someone behind, to lose them for good, but she knew that sometimes you had to lose one thing or one person to save thousands of others.

"If you don't want to let Adrien have the ring, then let the Guardian pick a new Chat Noir. And if you won't use the Miraculous you were given, then give it to someone who will."

She stared at him, expression utterly serious.

"Because if something that can't be fixed happens because of your inaction, that blood is on your hands."

If that was all Gabriel truly cared about, he would have given the Miraculous up long ago. Something had compelled him to keep them. Something that was with him still, even if it was only a shade.

There was a reason the pin remained in his pocket.

Tikki's last comment hit home, even more than she knew. Gabriel's eyes darkened, even as his expression sobered.

"My dear Tikki," Gabriel said softly, looking down at his fingers, which relaxed, palm open, a strange echo of the villain himself.

"You didn't mind when the blood was Hawkmoth's."

There was no pleasure in Gabriel's eyes when he spoke of murder, but there was also no regret. It was something Adrien would have never done, let alone Marinette, something the kwami could never condone... but they were safe.

They were all safe.

She watched and listened to him impassively. And then, slowly, her breath came out in a quiet, weary sigh.

"If you really think I didn't mind, that just proves you never understood me or any of the rest of us."

Tikki was glad Adrien was alive. She was glad Marinette was alive, too, but the both of them had been saved when he'd knocked the villain back, knocked the gun out of his hand. He'd already been separated from his Miraculous. Nooroo had been with Marinette at that point. They could have left him there for the police to find, put the butterfly pin into safer hands, and been done with it.

It had been Gabriel's decision to go the extra mile, to take Plagg's ring and make use of his power in a way that she hadn't seen in hundreds of years.

"Keep your distance from Marinette, as much as you can while she's here with Adrien," She warned him. "I don't want her to turn out like you."

It was an unfair shot. Crueler than Tikki would normally have gone for, but she was still bitter over Plagg being trapped, and while logically she knew that one could catch more flies with honey than vinegar, even she was finding it hard to keep her cool.

Perhaps Tikki did mind. But she was also hopefully old enough to realize the risks of a living, breathing enemy, beaten, this time nursing a grudge. Hawkmoth having Nooroo was one matter, but if it were Tikki or Plagg... ~~It would mean a second season of BS eventually, right?~~

Despite all Gabriel had done, the fact that Tikki was attempting to reason with him instead of simply stealing the ring back said a lot- especially because he could have held both Ladybug and Black Cat Miraculous' at the same time.

... and who made a better candidate for a desperate wish?

Gabriel's eyes glittered back, as if to refute Tikki's point without saying a word. He didn't have to.

"We both know that isn't possible."

At the very edges, Gabriel's voice had softened. It wasn't quite fondness, wasn't quite respect, but it was serious all the same. For a moment, the games fell away, and Gabriel looked at Tikki, really looked at her.

"But I can promise you that I will be ruthless, so she will not have to."

"...keep that promise, please."

It was probably the best she could get out of him right now. She still ached to snatch the ring back, to force her way into his safe and take it. She could do it. But that would risk bringing Gabriel's wrath down upon her and her chosen both, and with Adrien out of commission and in no fit state to take the ring back himself, Gabriel was the best protection Marinette had right now.

His words had reminded her. Strung out as she was, she'd almost forgotten that. Even if he wasn't actively using his Miraculous, he had a long memory, and he would recognize the signs. If something did happen...

In a pinch, Marinette could ask Nooroo for his assistance, take on his brooch and become Hawkmoth, grant wishes and powers on the fly to those who might be able to help for a time, but she wasn't sure if either of one of them was ready for that. It was better to have Gabriel keeping a watchful eye on things.

If push came to shove, would he use his Miraculous to defend Adrien? Or would he use Plagg's? Tikki wasn't sure.

...she needed to get Plagg out of there.

Her shoulders drooped, and she let out a heavy sigh. For all the times she'd cautioned Marinette to have better control of her emotions, she'd plunged headlong into the same trap herself.

"And please... consider letting Plagg go. I miss him, Gabriel."

"I will."

With the anger gone, or at least down to a simmer instead of a rolling boil, Gabriel regarded the tiny force of nature hovering over his desk. They were both tired, run ragged emotionally, and in Gabriel's case, physically.

Though they disagreed about nearly everything, there were a few fundamental things that had in common, and that included who they would protect. They would put their whole hearts into it.

This time, when Tikki begged him, Gabriel was silent.

I miss him, Gabriel.

He wouldn't look at her. But he didn't tell her no, either. Perhaps he wasn't as cold and heartless as he seemed.

Perhaps.

For a moment, just a moment, he seemed as though he might come around. That she might have reached him. That a crack had appeared in the ice. Gabriel finally looked up, and he seemed tired, but... present.

Like something was struggling to the surface.

Gabriel opened his mouth, hesitating on the words, as if it were a great struggle to bring them forth. As if he were fighting some battle inside his own mind. With his memories.

With his ghosts.

He hesitated on that precipice, holding his breath.

Then as suddenly as the change had come, a heavy calm stole over him, clouding his expression, chilling his eyes.

"... and I miss my wife."

Edited 2016-05-28 08:03 (UTC)

For a brief instant, Tikki allowed herself to hope.

But his gaze chilled, and she stiffened up, knowing that whatever words came out of his mouth next weren't going to be ones she wanted to hear.

She stared at him for a long moment, torn between pity and fury, and began to back up. Then, as suddenly as his expression had changed, she turned and phased through his office door before she could say something she would really regret.

He was hurting. He'd been carrying that hurt for years and years now, and while she certainly didn't wish his wife gone - in fact, while she wished she was still there, for Nooroo's sake and for Adrien's - it made her spitting mad to think that his method of coping with that loss was to foist a similar loss on other people. To rip Plagg from her. To rip Plagg from Adrien.

Punishing them wasn't going to bring her back.

With a heavy heart, the kwami made her way back to her chosen's side.

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💀 pour oublier ma peine immense

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