Chapter Text
There were many ways that Ladybug had imagined the final battle against Monarch. She’d imagined countless possibilities— of timelines lost to destruction, timelines rewritten, and timelines where the miraculous were lost forever.
“We can do it,” Chat Noir had assured her, not for the first time, with kind eyes and a gentle hold of her shoulders. He, her rock, leaned in close, with a warmth and conviction in his eyes that she tried, desperately, to grasp onto. “We’ll save them all.”
All of them. The miraculouses, the kwamis, the citizens of Paris, themselves. There was so much on the line, and so much to protect.
Marinette had always been a master at catastrophizing. She could envision countless scenarios in vivid, horrifying detail— no matter how terrible or ‘nonsensical’ (as Alya would put it) they were. She had a knack for it, after all, and with so many miraculouses at Monarch’s disposal, the horrible possibilities were truly endless. And after all the turmoil, all the anxiety, and the childhood ripped away from her, she thought that, perhaps, nothing could truly surprise her anymore.
She was prepared. She was ready for anything. No matter what Monarch may throw at her, no matter what she had to lose, she would come out of this battle on the other side with her head held high, determined to do whatever needed to be done to keep the people she held dear safe in whatever aftermath she may find herself in. She was ready.
She was wrong.
The man that once called himself Hawkmoth, Shadowmoth, and Monarch, once bathed in power and now frail and unmasked, cried out in desperation. Vaguely aware that Chat Noir was at her side, Ladybug clutched all the jewelry that she had removed from the man close to her breast as she watched in horror, unable to bring herself to acknowledge the name of the man who seemed so unrecognizable to her now.
She’d known that using multiple miraculouses at once could have bad effects on the users, but she’d never seen the consequences so plainly laid out in front of her. Gabriel Agreste, once known for his decorum and control, now disheveled and erratic, shouted out to the reporters, the officers, anyone who would listen.
“MY WIFE! MY FAMILY!” he screamed, and even the reporters flinched, “You’re killing her! You’re killing them! I was going to save her! She didn’t know what she was doing, we only wanted a family, we didn’t understand, I would have fixed everything!”
She sensed Chat Noir take a step back, and she swallowed, missing his presence and wanting to reach out to him, but she was frozen stiff.
“The rings! The rings! I need them back!” he shouted, his wild eyes locking onto Ladybug’s as he fought against the officers. She gripped the jewelry in her hand— the various miraculouses that she’d collected, as well as the wedding bands that she had taken in her haste. She’d only realized once they were already in her clutches that they weren’t any disguised miraculouses. “Give me back my SON!”
The reporters gasped, slews of questions thrown at him in a cacophony, the already incessant flash of cameras only growing more blinding. Ladybug gaped, her mind swimming, trying to make sense of what he was saying, what the wedding bands could possibly have to do with his son— with Adrien—
“Don’t you dare hurt him!” he continued to scream as he was shoved into the police vehicle, cameras and microphones from just about every news station pointed towards him, “Give me back his AMOK!”
*****
The whole world was tuned in for the disaster that was Monarch’s reveal and subsequent meltdown. Everyone had been watching, and with the headlines, newspapers, articles, blog posts, tweets, news channel coverage, and word of mouth, the people had figured it all out pretty quickly.
After all, with all the informative interviews that Ladybug had given reporters (namely the Ladyblog) over the years, it was only a quick google search to learn what ‘amok’ meant.
Gabriel Agreste had been Monarch.
Monarch had been Shadowmoth.
Gabriel Agreste once had the peacock miraculous.
The peacock miraculous creates amoks.
Amoks create sentimonsters.
Adrien has an amok.
Adrien Agreste is a sentimonster.
*****
Marinette was in a haze.
She couldn’t believe what had happened. She remembered, vaguely, the flashing of cameras, microphones being shoved in her face, and the cacophony of voices, saying things or asking things that she couldn’t quite understand. She remembered watching, helplessly, as Gabriel Agreste was driven away. She remembered the weight of the jewelry, the miraculouses and rings both clinking in her arms.
And then, she was home.
She didn’t remember exactly how she got there. She figured that she’d probably fled, and as she lay on her chaise, hands on her stomach and eyes glued to the ceiling, she wondered when she was going to wake up.
The kwamis chittered and chatted, hopefully to each other and not to her. Their voices blended into the fog, indecipherable background noise as they picked at the cookies on the plate, a dish that she vaguely remembered bringing up for them.
She’d considered so many possibilities of how the battle could have ended. She’d thought of the best and worst-case scenarios— of apocalypses, of celebrations. The world on fire. The universe being destroyed, fabric by fabric, and rebuilt from the ground up. Leaping into Chat Noir’s arms and cheering. The two of them finally dropping their masks like they had planned, and gaining a new friend in her civilian life. Being able to focus her attention fully on lycée, of looking forward to her future.
She hadn’t considered this.
How was she supposed to celebrate when Adrien… Adrien…
Adrien lost his father.
Adrien lost his family.
Adrien lost his humanity.
… Did he ever have any humanity to begin with?
Her lip quivered, and she realized only then that tears were streaming down her face. How long had she been crying?
“Guardian?” Sass hissed kindly, hovering just in her field of view, the other kwamis behind him, and she had missed him so much, she’d missed all of them so much, but even their presence couldn’t take the weight off her chest, and any words they spoke in her direction simply faded away.
How dare she bring Adrien’s humanity into question?
She clutched the wedding bands in her hand. The amok— Adrien’s amok. She wasn’t sure which ring it was in, or if it was split across the two of them, but it didn’t matter. They didn’t belong to her, they didn’t belong in her hands.
They belonged to him.
She thought back to Bugette, the sentimonster copy of Ladybug that Chat Noir and her had briefly befriended. She was a person, too, they had concluded. Once the amok was in her hands, she had free will, she could make her own decisions, she had her own thoughts and autonomy. She wasn’t any less human than Mayura was, was she? Not in any way that mattered.
She thought of Adrien, smiling kindly and patiently at her as she babbled nonsense in his direction. She thought of him, catching her when she tripped and asking so genuinely if she was okay. She thought of Adrien, snorting in laughter mere seconds after he had poured his heart out to her about how lonely he was. She thought of Adrien, sitting on the park bench outside the bakery, tears in his eyes for a reason she failed to learn. She thought of Adrien, confiding in her that he secretly didn’t want to be a model, that he always felt like something was preventing him from being able to stand up to his fathe—
She shot to her feet, ignoring the startled gasps of the kwamis as she shouted out a “Tikki, spots on!” and leapt up to her bed and out of the skylight.
She was at the Agreste mansion in a matter of minutes.
“Adrien!” Ladybug shouted, touching down on the hardwood. She raised to her feet, looking around the expansive bedroom. She fiddled with the rings in her hand, aware of the control that she exerted over him just by virtue of having them in her possession. She had to be careful of her words.
“I… come in peace!” she announced, cringing at the word choice as she stepped around the white couch. The bathroom door was open, so she took a quick peek inside. He wasn’t there. She headed out of the bedroom, making her way down the large steps to the foyer.
Only then did she see the police and RAID officers swarming the premises. She swallowed hard against the lump in her throat.
“Ladybug!” Raincomprix gasped, turning to her with a smile and gesturing for her. She didn’t want to talk to him, not now, not particularly. She was only here for Adrien, not to talk logistics about a situation she no longer wanted to be a part of.
“Oh… Hello, lieutenant,” Ladybug greeted stiffly, taking slow steps down the staircase, “Have you seen Adr—”
Her eyes caught onto a stretcher being wheeled out of Gabriel Agreste’s office, transporting a sealed and filled body bag, and her blood ran cold, a brick dropped in her stomach, the air left her lungs, and suddenly she couldn’t think, couldn’t feel, her eyes locked onto it as it was pushed out the front door and—
“Ah, unfortunate, isn’t it?” Raincomprix sighed, his voice only barely managing to break through the fog of her mind, “Another mystery solved. Mme Agreste had been missing for years…”
“Mme Agreste?” she gasped, air returning to her lungs as she whipped her head to face him.
“Mhm,” he hummed, watching as the body bag left their sight, “We found her in this… giant underground chamber, kept in some kind of stasis. I’ve seen some pretty wild stuff, but this?” He whistled.
“Yes,” she said, because she didn’t know what else to. This was all too weird, too much for her to process at the moment, and she needed to stay on track. “Anyway, you don’t happen to know where Adrien is, do you?”
The man blinked, staring at her for a moment longer than she felt necessary. “Nope, we haven’t seen him. We thought maybe you had him… or… well… took care of it.”
“Took care of it?” she parroted back, furrowing her brow. She felt the weight of the rings in the palm of her hand, and squeezed them tighter. “Well, actually, I was trying to. That’s why I came here, to look for him—”
“We haven’t seen him,” he said, giving her an odd look, “You don’t happen to think… You don’t think… he’s a danger, is he?”
She blinked. “What?”
“That boy… er… Adrien was in my daughter’s class,” he said, a nervousness in his voice as he raised his hand to rub at the back of his neck, “I’d hate to think that she’s been in proximity to a dangerous—”
“Dangerous?” She gaped, baffled by even the thought. “What? No! Adrien’s not dangerous.”
“Well, he’s one of Monarch… Shadowmoth… Hawkmoth… Er… Gabriel Agreste’s sentimonsters, right? We can’t ignore the possibility—”
“There is no possibility!” she snapped, her mind flooded with kind green eyes, “No. No. Adrien Agreste is not dangerous, he had nothing to do with this, I can assure you—”
“How can you be so sure—”
“I can assure you,” she repeated forcefully, “If you find him, just— just treat him like any other citizen—”
“Well, we’re honestly not quite sure how sentimonsters fall in terms of citizenship—”
“He’s a citizen!” she spat, her blood boiling, “And he was friends with Chloé Bourgeois, wasn’t he? You’d do best to remind the mayor of that. Something tells me she won’t be very happy if he’s considered anything less!”
Bringing up Chloé’s weird advantage over her father was a low bar, Ladybug knew, but she was desperate to cling onto whatever leverage she could. At least, she hoped Chloé would be on the right side for this. That girl had been pretty unpredictable as of late, and last she heard her relationship with Adrien was rocky at best. Still, Chloé and Adrien had been friends since early childhood, and she hoped that would be enough for her to recognize the injustice of this all.
The lieutenant only huffed at that, and Ladybug narrowed her eyes.
“Just… tell me if you find him,” she said, her mind racing as she tried to think of where Adrien could possibly be. She came up blank. “And be nice to him!”
With that, she turned and marched out the front door, pointedly keeping her gaze away from the gurney as she hooked her yoyo on a far off chimney and swung away.
*****
Nino sat hunched over his desk, his hands and legs shaking, eyes glued to the computer monitor as he scrolled through the tweets.
He never used twitter. He’d made an account a long time ago to promote his DJing side-gig, but he rarely found himself ever logging on. He generally made a point to stay away from the site, the vibes of it being, as he’d told Alya once, rancid as hell. Whenever he did look, he’d always find something upsetting, and he generally wasn’t about willingly distressing himself.
Right now, though, his mind was frayed, and his self-preservation was shot.
He hit the call button for perhaps the thousandth time.
Ring ring ring…
He set the phone, which was set on speaker, back down on the desk, the rings filling the air as he scrolled through the top tweets.
-
jean @hippityhoppity312
IM SORRY BUT WASNT ADRIEN PUBLICLY ALLERGIC TO FEATHERS??? LITERALLY WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS
[img attached - screenshot of a magazine article, detailing Adrien’s allergy]
-
summer @lightsoffsockson
ooohhh i see. so being in love with a sentimonster is FINE when ur an Adrien™ stan, but when I, a banana boom boom stan,
-
adrien’s bae @adriencallmeback
this can’t be real. this is a nightmare. i have to wake up.
-
Nino pulled his cap off his head, wiping the sweat from his brow as he took another glance at his phone.
Ring ring ring…
He wanted nothing more than to wake up, too.
-
my other car is a tumblr @livinaxolotl
so like……. are adrien stans monsterfuckers now or
giselle @deuxcamions
@livinaxolotl actually shut the fuck up hes a minor
my other car is a tumblr @livinaxolotl
@deuxcamions hes not??? human??? lmao
tulip @meowmeowarsenic
@livinaxolotl @deuxcamions animals cant consent either
-
kitty cat @blackcatstrut
lmao remember when adrien stans would always be like “omg adrien’s not boring hes soooo deep you guys just dont Get Him 🥺😍” sweaties hes literally just a dress-up doll. like hes literally not even real. u fell in love w a terrorist’s oc
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el @glittercouch
sorry guys but @adrienagrestebrand has ALWAYS been clearly fake lmao… seriously look at this. no thoughts head empty. like a puppet
[img attached - Adrien smiling at the camera for a photoshoot]
-
Nino squeezed his mouse, his blood boiling. They didn’t get it. They didn’t know him. They knew the perfectly crafted image that was presented to the public, and nothing more. What right did these people have, pretending like they could say with any certainty what Adrien was like?
They didn’t know the stupid way Adrien laughed. They didn’t know the way he always saw the best in people. They didn’t know the sadness behind his polite smiles, his genuine longing for friendship and freedom, how he’d find ways to disobey his terrible ‘father’ at any given chance, just so he could feel a little less lonely. They didn’t know what he was really like. They didn’t know him at all.
‘He’s so fake’, they’d say, showing a photoshopped image from a goddamn photoshoot. Of course that wasn’t real. That was a fucking ad, not Adrien. They didn’t know what they were talking about.
The Adrien that Nino knew wasn’t fake. He wasn’t a monster, he wasn’t a puppet, he wasn’t a dress-up doll. Adrien was a person, just as human as Nino was, perhaps even more human than the nasty people making these tweets. Nino didn’t know if this whole thing was some kind of elaborate trick or not, but he knew what Adrien was. And he didn’t deserve any of this.
Ring ring ring…
-
blueberry ice cream @flightlessbirdtalons
R.I.P. @adrienagrestebrand
jamison @raccoonsaremypeople
@flightlessbirdtalons wait did he die???
blueberry ice cream @flightlessbirdtalons
@raccoonsaremypeople i mean… ladybug and chat noir kill sentimonsters
-
Nino’s blood ran cold.
-
antoine @luckycharmsnspots
POV: ur an Adrien stan and Ladybug and Chat Noir, heroes of paris, just erased ur real life blorbo from existence. what do u do
-
He couldn’t breathe. He was drowning. This couldn’t be happening. There had to be some kind of misunderstanding, this was some kind of trick, and Ladybug and Chat Noir wouldn’t do that, they would never—
-
belle @okbutwheresmybeast
omg the war is FINALLY over!! Chat Noir stans and Adrien stans no longer have to fight because Chat Noir’s wife simply deleted Adrien! finally, the era of peace
-
Ring ring ring…
-
big ol’ ghost @lemonsareagreatsnack
For real though, has anybody seen or heard from @adrienagrestebrand like… at all? Is he actually gone?
-
“This is Adrien’s voicemail! Sorry I couldn’t answer the phone right now. Leave a message!”