This month I've been realizing that Kris and Korvi's relationship deserved a lot more attention than I've been giving it. So this reading week, that's what we're going to do.
Title: Equilibrium
Word Count: 792
A/N: Here, Kishia (@catnoirism) . I hope you enjoy this. (*coughs* I hope you s u f f e r *coughs*) This is revenge for Hooked.
Anyway, this may be starting to morph into the soulmate AU prompt as well ...
"Your soulmate is dead and the only way you two can see each other again is in your dreams and everyday your soulmate tries to make sure you know they love you and will always be there for you the moment you close your eyes and retire for the night."
Yes. I genuinely want to make you all suffer. Yes, I’m not sorry. Yes, I’m aware I’m a monster. No - you can’t stop me. I’m enjoying this too much for my own good.
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“Please don’t do this, Adrien.” Marinette looked at him with pleading eyes, the crimson blood bleeding into her white gown that swept against the floor. The tips of her hair was tinged pink from blood. She was crying. “Please don’t do this –”
The world turned, swayed - her face rippling, distorting – Her eyes turned black. Blood dripped off her gray hands and her thinning blue hair. “Why didn’t you save me? Why weren’t you the one to take that bullet – Why was it me and not you? I have friends, my parents – You, you have no one who cares.”
I’m sorry. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry – Please forgive me I’m sorry please Marinette I’ll fix this I’ll bring you back I – ”
“It’s too late for that, Adrien.” His mother’s face, except it wasn’t – It was Ladybug, but it was his mother wearing the mask. “You’re too late to save us.”
“AGH!” The blanket was holding him captive, he wasn’t able to move – he couldn’t –
“Adrien!”
His heart rate shuddered as Plagg hovered in front of him, eyes round and concerned. He trembled all over. “Plagg …” He whispered, “Can I …?”
A hesitation, as if he was debating and Adrien was quite aware of how he looked right now – Trembling, shaking … Probably half mad.
“Okay.”
He hopped out of his bed and brandished his ring. “Transform me!”
The ancient magic engulfed him, turning him from plain, boring Adrien Agreste to … a cat without his partner. He leapt out of the window as soon as the transformation had faded and ran across the lawn.
He didn’t want to think – couldn’t think. If he thought then he would think of his pere, and if he thought of pere he would think of his mother, who was Ladybug, and then he would think of Marinette who was Ladybug who had died protecting him when it should have been the other way around and, oh, God –
It was hurting – but he deserved that because he had killed her; or did he even deserve to cry for her when it was all. his. fault? He leapt onto the Eiffel Tower, tail twitching to keep his balance …
He paused and looked back down … He was so far up … If he just let go …
“Please don’t do this.”
He shook his head, heart clenching and forced himself to continue climbing – forced himself to not look back down. He couldn’t. He had to bring her back first – He’d give anything and everything to bring her back. Because she deserved that and he couldn’t allow himself to forget that – She shouldn’t have died. She should have lived he should have saved her – She shouldn’t have taken that shot for him – He should have watched his back better or not joked so much or, or –
He crashed to the ground on the deserted platform, knees burning and chest aching and arms hurting and lungs protesting but it was crashing all around him like a wave – She was gone, dead, gone, gone, gone and it was all his fault and he shouldn’t – He could have saved her, but he didn’t and that was all his fault and … Oh, fuck.
He doubled over, retching up the bread and few bites of soup he’d eaten. Tears dripped off his cheeks and his chest felt like it was breaking in half and – Oh, God, this was his fault he’d known that but she really was dead now there would be no more laughter or puns or banter. There would be no flirting or trust or that thrill he got each time he saw her.
A sob ripped through his chest and he clutched his arm against his stomach, as if that would hold him together when, in reality, he was breaking through the seams. He didn’t deserve to cry for her, but he couldn’t stop himself and he didn’t even know why he was crying now, nearly a month later when he hadn’t before – Not that one time but, oh, God – It hurt so much and he couldn’t do this without her. It didn’t matter if there would be a new ladybug soon – She was his partner, his closest friend – Without her, he was incomplete. He was half of a whole and that … It was a horrible feeling.
He clutched his hair, tearing it but the pain felt good because he deserved it, and bent over, touching his forehead against his knees as his sobs turned ugly – turned into whimpering and maybe he even screamed at the sky – At God, if he was up there – once or twice, but he wasn’t sure what he was doing because it was hazy and ... and …
Title: Equilibrium
Word Count: 1,877
A/N: ... This is way more than a drabble. This wasn’t supposed to happen.
Have more feels, everyone. Especially you, @catnoirism and @nya-and-spots.
I hope you cry. :)
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The knock on his door made Adrien push down the blanket that he had been burrowing under and to sit up. It didn’t sound like Nathalie’s professional, single, crisp knock – It was quicker … more, personal. Except he was the only one who actually went into his room, other than Nathalie. Nino wasn’t allowed inside the mansion. Mari—
Plagg lifted his large head and blinked big, sleepy eyes at the door, ears twitching. His tiny tail swished.
“I think you should get that,” he said quietly. “He might break down the door if you don’t.” Then he closed his eyes and curled back up on the pillow. Adrien sighed, but he pushed himself off of his bed and moved toward the door. He placed his hand – pale, not black; normal fingers, not claws – on the knob and turned, opening his mouth to ask Nathalie what he was needed for –
Only to let it hang slightly when he recognized his pere was standing in the hallway. With two cups. In front of his door. There was no sign of his ever present cell phone, and his gaze wasn’t distant – It was very much here, in the present, focused on him. Pere smiled slowly.
“Careful, Adrien. You might catch flies.”
He closed his mouth with a pop and a click. Blinked. Wondered if he was dreaming or hallucinating. Dismissed that, because he’d have to be asleep to be dreaming and he wasn’t insane even though he felt like he was half mad most of the time.
“Pere,” he breathed. And then he frowned. “Why are you here? Is there something you need? Did I do something?” Because those were the only reasons he could think of – After all, pere wouldn’t just come over because he was worried or genuinely interested in him. He was much too busy for that. Pere’s fingers twitched – A nervous habit, he knew.
“We have to talk.”
“We have to …” He began, repeating it – It sounded like Latin to his ears; a dead language. He shook his head to clear it. Cleared his throat. “Uh. Sure. Come on in.” It struck him as almost funny, that he had to invite his pere into his room – That was what normal families did, when someone knocked on the door to their home that were not family.
It’s not funny, a voice inside of his head said, and it sounded like … her. It sounded like Ladybug. (It’s so hard to even think her of her without that ache in his chest. But he can’t forget her, will not allow himself to forget her.) It’s sad.
Pere stepped inside, and he bit his lip as he gestured at his desk. He had homework on top of it in an organized mess.
Neither of them sat.
Pere tugged at the edge of his collar, remind Adrien that he was just as uncomfortable as he was. Plagg opened his eyes and watched them, and he really hoped that pere wouldn’t see him –
Why would you hide? The world already knows who Chat Noir is.
Oh.
Oh. That must be why he was here. Adrien studied his father – And of course, there was no other reason for the way he was behaving. He was nervous. Of him. Or perhaps he was nervous of Chat Noir? (They were one and the same though – If he was nervous of Chat Noir, then he was nervous of Adrien. And if he was nervous of Adrien, then he was nervous of Chat Noir.)
Pere exhaled, still clutching both of the cups, and Adrien pulled one from his hands. Because he was nervous too. And Plagg was watching them with a strange glint in his eyes. He dropped his gaze to the melting whip cream – He used to love the cream, but with his modeling …
He sipped it and licked it off his lips.
“What is it?” He frowned at him slightly – What was he going to do now? Being in his pere’s presence was usually so much … colder. But this was downright boiling, and he wasn’t sure if that was good or bad or what.
He put the cup down on the desk and took a step forward, and then another – The next thing Adrien felt were hands pressing down against his shoulders. He skirted back, ducking out from the constraints automatically – And his pere actually bit into his lip. And then crossed his arms.
“Pere?”
“I know that you won’t like this, Adrien …” Dread settled on his shoulders, but then again, was he really surprised? He didn’t like a lot of things his pere forced him to do. “I just … When I saw …” He was struggling with words. Adrien stared at him. He gulped. “I don’t want you to be Chat Noir anymore.”
Of course he doesn’t, the thought is bitter, and unsurprisingly so. He was expecting something like this to happen … But he couldn’t give up being Chat Noir even if he wanted to. He had a duty to Paris, with or without Ladybug.
… Though at least there had been no akumas in …
He shook his head. “No. I can’t – Won’t.” Because it’s both, and he was firm on this. “I’ll do anything else for you, but … I can’t stop. Not when there’s still bad people out in the world; not when I can still do something.” I don’t want to be protected and sheltered behind these walls, he was trying to tell him without actually saying it. I know what freedom really is now, and I can’t give it up.
Though he really wasn’t free without Ladybug there, but that made his heart hurt too much and his head spin too fast and he wasn’t ready to really think about it.
“Adrien, for Pete’s sake, Hawkmoth is still out there and without Ladybug to purify the akumas – ”
Adrien stared, not hearing the rest of his sentence. “How do you know about Hawkmoth and the akumas?” He demanded, interrupting him. Pere stared back at him with too wide eyes, as if … he hadn’t intended to say the sworn enemy of Chat Noir and Ladybug.
But that wasn’t even public knowledge … Not even Alya knew Hawkmoth – Hell, the only reason why Marinette was … was gone … was because they’d finally figured out where Hawkmoth’s lair was. Or, at least. She had. She had been going to show him.
The only way for him to know was if he was Hawkmoth himself, or …
Pere’s eyes landed on Plagg and widened. Plagg was pretending to be asleep again, but Adrien knew he muttered under his breath in his sleep – Sometimes about cheese, most of the time about … other things, in a language that sounded ancient and musical to his ears. Sometimes in French, or English, but he tried not to think of the way his friend would wake up in the middle of the night, sometimes screaming.
He’d always pretended he was asleep when Plagg curled up to his heart.
“Plagg …” And then he closed his eyes and breathed out.
He knows Plagg, but the only people who know Plagg are his kittens and cats. That’s what he told me. Which means that …
“You were Chat Noir.” The previous Chat Noir. And that was something that was difficult for him to wrap his mind around – because his father was Chat Noir and that was just … He didn’t even know how to process that.
Pere nodded, and sat down on the floor. Adrien copied his motions automatically, mind still blank.
“I was.” He said, tone and eyes seeing the distant past. “I know how dangerous it is … Especially when it’s just a Chat Noir without his ladybug.” Adrien wondered who the ladybug was. His pere seemed to read his mind – “Your mother.”
He stared at him for a long moment, and then, without really processing it (because, really, he didn’t want to know), he asked, “What happened? Why aren’t you Chat Noir still?” Why has Plagg never said anything?
Pere closed his eyes, as if he was trying to block out a particularly bad memory. “She … vanished. We were fighting Hawkmoth and he touched her. And then she was gone, and I’ve been trying to find out what happened to her ever since.”
He played with the edges of his sleeve. So that was why she just vanished one day and never came back … They never even had a funeral for her. But that still didn’t explain why his pere wasn’t Chat Noir – Even without Ladybug …
He looked at his pere, who sighed and said, “Plagg shouldn’t have chosen someone who was ruthless enough to use cataclysm on a human.”
He blinked, not completely processing it for a moment – cataclysm … human … on … The words bounced around in his skull, disjointed and spoken in his pere’s lower pitch. And then it clicked.
“You did …”
Pere stood and ruffled his hair, but Adrien was too focused on trying to understand that. Too focused on …
“That’s why I can’t talk to Plagg and vice versa … I’m not sure if you’d do it if you had a chance to see Hawkmoth… but I can’t lose you to that bastard too.”
Adrien watched as he left the room, closing the door behind him with a soft click. Plagg settled down in his lap, and he ran his fingers over his fur.
“You okay?” Plagg asked, looking at him with large eyes. He shook his head.
“No,” his voice cracked. His eyes burned. “I don’t know. I’m not okay. I just … I don’t want her to be dead. Isn’t there a way to bring her back?”
He hesitated.
“Plagg?”
“Well, maybe …” Plagg sounded reluctant to admit that. Adrien stared at him. “But … so many people have failed. Either they bring back monsters, or they die themselves.”
“What is it?”
Plagg’s ears flattened against his head. “I … I don’t think I should tell you. It’s really bad, you could die … and … I don’t think she’d want you to do it.”
“I don’t care if I live or die,” he hissed. “This is my fault and I should be the one to fix it and, I can’t believe he was Chat Noir …” He pressed his nose against his stomach, and Adrien sniffled. “I don’t want to feel guilty anymore.”
He hesitated some more, and then he sighed. “It’s a black magic that came out of Egypt. The patron is Anubis. That’s all I know.”
He curled around the kwami, holding him to his chest. Plagg sighed and snuggled into him, and the tears dripped off his nose onto the floor and he just wanted to stop crying. But he didn’t deserve that. He didn’t deserve to cry for her, but he didn’t deserve to not cry for her because it was his fault she was gone and he could do nothing –
“It’s not your fault,” Plagg mumbled. “It’s Hawkmoth’s.”
He squeezed his eyes shut. “Maybe.” he said. “But I was the one who was supposed to protect her, and I failed in doing that.”
This is the day of birth of HONESTLYNOTIMPRESSED who is wonderful and amazing and who is going to have a FANTASTIC day! Happy birthday my partner in world domination!
