Spots Off, Chapter 11
In which the fighting ends
Fic summary: Through a series of unfortunate events, the world learns that Marinette is Ladybug. Now Marinette must deal with the consequences while her friends and classmates come to terms with a reality that has been carefully kept out of sight.
Chapter word count: 2,369
Chapter list: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11-you are here] [Epilogue]
Adrien had barely finished speaking when a giant crash echoed in the staircase above them.
“Hawkmoth,” Marinette said, snapping upright and leaping to her feet. “We have to go, now! Tikki, spots on!”
Tikki zoomed out from between two rows of shelves to meet Marinette and with a flash of bright pink light, transformed her into Ladybug. She pulled Adrien to his feet.
“Plagg?” Adrien called, and after a moment, his own sardonic kwami appeared as well.
“This gift shop sucks,” he whined. “No camembert. No brie even! It’s unforgivable!”
Adrien smirked and raised an eyebrow, feeling his spirits lifting. “No time for that now, Plagg. Claws out!”
Adrien felt strength surging into his body as bright green light flashed around him. He flexed his leather-clad fingers, enjoying the renewed vitality of his muscles.
“Better?” Ladybug asked.
“Better,” Chat nodded. “Now let’s—”
He was interrupted by the sound of the glass door of the shop, already hanging rather crooked on its hinges, shattering. The pair whirled around to see Hawkmoth standing in the ruined doorway, surrounded by butterflies. He raised an arm.
“Left! Now!” Ladybug yelled, and the pair dodged behind a row of shelves just in time to avoid a stream of butterflies as it shot towards them.
“Plan?” Chat said, pressing his back to the shelf. “Do we have a plan?”
“I’m thinking!” Ladybug said. “For now, just dodge, and don’t get split up!”
The butterflies were pooling around them now in undulating clouds. The pair fended them off with yo-yo and staff, running and ducking between shelves, never staying in one place for too long. They knew from various sounds that Hawkmoth was gliding around in the air above them, but the horde of butterflies made him practically invisible.
“We need to get outside!” Ladybug said. “In the open air, where we can see him!”
They both looked around, searching for anything they could use to their advantage. Chat’s eyes landed on the shelf next to them. He kicked it over, sending it crashing to the ground. Butterflies swarmed around them in an instant, forcing them on the defensive once more.
“What was that for?” Ladybug shouted, back pressed against his, yo-yo spinning.
“I don’t know!” Chat called back. “A distraction? I’m improvising!”
“Well, improvise somewhere not here!”
Chat looked around again. There was a shelf in the corner with some lovely looking snow globes. A rapid extension of his baton sent them skidding across the floor, spilling glass fragments, confetti, and water. The butterfly swarm thinned as a wave of them went to investigate the movement, giving Chat and Ladybug the few seconds they needed to scramble towards the doorway. A shout echoed behind them, but they didn’t look back. Pounding adrenaline carried them up the stairs and through the doorway.
“The fan! Get to the fan!” Ladybug called.
They sprinted towards it and leapt behind it, spinning it around just in time to aim it at the geyser of butterflies that burst from the roof entry. The stream scattered in the wind, some blown into the sky, others against the wall, and still others back into the doorway.
But while the air could force away the butterflies, it failed against the man.
“Cowering behind a fan?” Hawkmoth said, stepping out onto the roof, tails whipped back in the wind. “Why do you insist on running away?”
He surged forward, ethereal wings pumping against the air, and swung at the fan with his baton. Chat and Ladybug didn’t need words—they simply acted. Chat took hold of the fan and jerked it backwards, out of the baton’s path. As it whiffed through the air, Ladybug flung her yo-yo outwards, spinning it around the shaft. She yanked, hard, intending to pull it back to her, but Hawkmoth was ready. He instantly shifted his attention to keeping his hold, which he did, with difficulty. With distraction.
“Chat! Now!” Ladybug yelled.
Chat surged forward, reaching again for Hawkmoth’s neck, but the distraction had not been enough. The instant Hawkmoth heard Ladybug’s voice, he leapt backwards, freeing his baton from her yo-yo and striking out in one fluid motion. He caught Chat in the knees, sweeping his feet out from under him and sending him sprawling onto the roof. Chat reacted as fast as his cat-like reflexes would allow, flipping over and scrambling backwards, away from Hawkmoth and his glowing baton.
“Uh, got a plan B, m’lady?” he asked, not taking his eyes from the weapon.
There was no response.
He glanced behind him and saw Ladybug lying on the roof, butterflies settling on her motionless body. The evil bugs must have managed to fly behind the fan and catch her off-guard while she focused on Hawkmoth. Chat felt a spike of real fear as he turned to face Hawkmoth again, alone.
“Well, well,” Hawkmoth said, lowering himself to the ground. His heels clicked against the stone of the roof as he took several slow steps forward, baton extended towards Chat’s chest. “Looks like she’ll be giving up soon enough. How about you? Do you need another reminder? Do you still not understand?”
He scrambled farther backwards and felt his back hit the fan. Butterflies swarmed on either side. He was trapped. He knew he should look around for an escape, another strategy, but he couldn’t take his eyes from the tip of the baton. It seethed with black and purple, glowing, undulating. Echoes of memories gripped his heart like chains of ice.
“No… please…”
“Don’t run away from this,” Hawkmoth said. He was still moving forward, steps inexorably slow. “You dare think I ever had any escape? This is my reality.”
“No…” Chat tore his eyes from the baton at last, scouring the roof for some means of escape, but saw none. He tried to push the fan backwards, but it bumped up against Ladybug’s prone form. Any more motion would tip it completely, and he would be finished.
Hawkmoth was going to win.
His father was going to destroy him.
He looked up, one last time, and saw Hawkmoth’s eyes, deep and black, narrowed now, triumphant.
No.
Those were not his father’s eyes. He knew his father’s eyes—cold, steely blue, shot through with storm clouds when he was angry. These black orbs were alien. Monstrous. This was not his father.
Father, what have you done to yourself?
This was not his father. But maybe his father was in there somewhere.
“Father!” Chat called out, renewed urgency in his voice. “Father, I know you can hear me! Stop!”
The baton stalled. Hesitated. Hawkmoth’s eyebrows knit together, mouth quirking into a frown.
“Father, you don’t want to do this!” Chat continued, desperate now. “You don’t want to hurt me! I know that! You want to protect me—you want what’s best for me! You want our family back!”
Hawkmoth’s frown deepened. The arm holding the baton lowered slightly, though the tip was still inches from Chat’s chest.
Chat felt tears in his eyes. “Father, you love—”
Ladybug’s world was dark. Then the darkness began to solidify around her, dividing itself into shapes. Stone walls. A bright, blue sky. Her best friend, standing at the other end of the alley, staring. A crushing realization that her life as she knew it had passed.
Then the scene was swept away like smeared paint. Now she was at her computer, its bluish light giving everything in her dark room an alien tinge. She saw the video on the screen before her. Its title seemed to expand, to fill her whole world. Her life was over. It was her fault.
The computer’s light dimmed, grew smaller. Now it was her phone, held with trembling hands in front of her face, its tinny speakers booming with the incriminating words that would make the world turn against her. The string of sound wormed its way into her ears and snaked through her mind, expanding, stifling, suffocating.
Valid questions… is a middle schooler really fit… really fit… really fit…
She was not. They were right. It was her fault. Her fault. It would not be okay.
She could feel herself shrinking, the words paralyzing her with fear and doubt and guilt. She had a dim awareness of some need to move, to do something, but what? She didn’t know. She should just give up. What was she doing?
She closed her eyes, ready to surrender to the darkness, when she heard a familiar voice. It was yelling something. She couldn’t tell what. Suddenly it was very important that she know. She strained her ears, but it was like she was underwater, all sounds numbed, distorted. But she knew that voice. She remembered words it had said. Important words. What had it said?
It was coming back in pieces. A hand on her shoulder. A flash of bright green eyes, familiar, comforting. But what had he said?
Finally the words broke through, ringing clearly in her mind.
“You aren’t alone, Marinette. And we can deal with this, together.”
In a flash, the memories came back to her. Chat. Alya. Nino. Her parents. Her friends. People who didn’t even know her. She wasn’t alone. They supported her. Trusted her. And now, they were relying on her.
Her eyes snapped open. She was lying on the rooftop, cheek pressed against the cold stone. She could see Hawkmoth from behind the fan, but his eyes weren’t on her. They were on something else, something cowering before him, something that was still speaking frantically.
“Father, you love—” it said.
Chat.
Butterflies fluttered in all directions as she pushed herself to her knees, readied her yo-yo, and threw.
You love me—that’s what he had been about to say. He knew it was true. At least, he hoped it was. And if anything could stop Hawkmoth, could awaken what was left of his father inside him, that was it. But he never got the chance to find out.
Ladybug’s yo-yo streaked through the air and collided with the exposed brooch at Hawkmoth’s neck, knocking it to the roof. Chat froze for a moment, blinking. Ladybug’s shout brought him back to full awareness.
“The brooch! Now!”
Chat lunged forward. Beside him, Hawkmoth was moving too, roused by Ladybug’s shout. His arm stretched towards his goal, fingers taught, reaching…
Hawkmoth’s reach was longer, but Chat was faster. His leather-clad hand closed around the stone.
“Cataclysm!” he yelled. The brooch crumbled to dust in his fingers.
A single butterfly flitted out from the pile of dust, winding its way through the air, towards its kin. Before it could lose itself in the swarm, Ladybug’s yo-yo appeared and snagged it from the air. Moments later, it reappeared, pure and white.
The cloud of butterflies froze, bubbling over with the same darkness that had claimed them before. Now, it released them, and they scattered with a flash of bright, white wings.
Chat heard the same bubbling sound beside him, too close for butterflies. He turned and saw his father, Gabriel Agreste, hunched over on the roof, motionless.
His first instinct was to scramble backwards, to put some distance between them. The moment it occurred to him, he was ashamed of it. This man was his father. He hadn’t been in his right mind when he attacked them. He had never wanted to hurt his son.
But he had in the end, hadn’t he?
Gabriel groaned and pushed himself up, looking around with a dazed expression on his face. He saw Chat and started backwards, prepared to fight.
“It’s over, father,” Chat said flatly. He released his transformation. Plagg spiraled into his hand, too exhausted even to speak. “You’ve lost.”
Gabriel did not relax. His eyes as they scanned the rooftop, confirming the scene for himself. Adrien allowed himself a quick glance and saw Ladybug pick up the fan and toss it into the air, sending tendrils of ladybugs into the night, undoing all the damage they had caused. He turned his gaze back to his father and watched as he reached a hand to his own collar, searching for the brooch that must have become as familiar to him as Adrien’s ring was to him now. Only when he realized it was gone did Gabriel finally sink back, his face twisting in anger.
But when he spoke, his voice was soft, not angry.
“What have I done?” he whispered.
Then Adrien realized—it wasn’t anger. It was pain.
“I thought I could get her back,” Gabriel breathed. His voice was hoarse. “I thought, if I only had the power, I could fix this. Fix everything. But now, what do I have?” His mouth twitched into a pained smile, tears leaking out around the corners of his eyes. “Nothing. Absolutely nothing.”
Adrien felt his heart squeeze painfully in his chest. Part of him screamed that this man was everything he had ever fought against—that he had kidnapped and later attacked his own son, that he had willingly akumatized himself, that he had endangered all of Paris multiple times. But another part of him, the part that sobbed into Ladybug’s shoulders and melted at the words “I’m here,” saw a man who was incredibly lonely. A man who needed love.
Finally, he spoke.
“You don’t have nothing,” he said.
Gabriel looked up, surprised, as if he had forgotten about Adrien’s presence.
“Oh?” he said.
“I’m definitely angry,” Adrien continued, heart pounding. “I’m angry at you—about what you did, and how you acted, and… and a lot of things. But.” He paused, steeling himself. “But you’re still my father. We’re still family. I want to work this out. Not right now. I don’t think I can talk right now. But…” His voice trailed off, leaving him breathless and flushed.
Gabriel’s expression was unreadable. “You… you want to talk?”
Adrien nodded. “You said I didn’t understand. I want to try to. I want to be there for you.”
The silence stretched for a moment. Gabriel was looking at him with an odd mixture of sadness and pride.
“I didn’t realize you had become so mature,” he said at last.
Then the sound of police helicopters filled the air, and the time for words was past.
Next Chapter—>
