Not Alone: A Miraculous Ladybug Story

Chapter 47

 After much argument, Ladybug finally got them to let her go home. Adrien was going to stop by later and probably spend the night after she let her parents know what was going on, but she refused to be escorted. She didn't want to make this into a bigger deal, and she refused to be afraid of this person.

She swung down into an alley adjacent to the bakery and released her transformation. Hearing a scuttle behind her, she and Tikki both turned and looked down the end of the alley.

"Probably just a rat," Tikki tried to reassure her, but her voice lacked the certainty that it usually held. Her kwami was rattled, and it made Marinette hate Germain even more. Tikki may have been millennia old, but she still cared for each of her charges as deeply as the next, and Marinette knew a part of her feared Marinette being taken like Adela was from Duusu.

Despite her tension, she smiled remembering what Adrien told her about Adela and Duusu. Saturday morning, they had all gone to Master Fu's and the two had a tearful reunion. Marinette started to walk towards the mouth of the alley, Tikki somewhat concealed in her pigtail. She would not let anyone harm Tikki, and her kwami felt the same. So she shrugged off the feeling of being watched, and walked home.

The next day at school, she was still tired, but much more rested than she had been all weekend. Adrien had spent the night with her parent's permission, on the chaise lounge of course. They had all been rattled from the idea that someone might be targeting Ladybug, and while no one outside of the miraculous and her family knew her identity, they didn't want to take any chances. Loathe as she was to admit it, Marinette slept better for it. She was worried more about her parents should someone find out who she really was; so having Chat nearby, made her feel more at ease.

Still, she felt lighter than she had in awhile as she walked to her locker to grab her books for the day. She was ready to focus on school again, and be a normal teenager. Her locker opened and a photo fell out and drifted to the ground. She looked over at Adrien and smiled, thinking he must have slipped it into her locker when she wasn't looking. He looked back at her and smiled, but he looked confused. Reaching down she picked it up and realized it was photo-booth style, with 4 pictures. Instead of each with a different pose though, this showed a progression of events. She gasped and the glossy slip of paper floated down from her hand.

"No."

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Adrien had walked Marinette to school, but was trying his best to give her space while still constantly scouting the surrounding area for Germain or any sign of danger. He'd just left her at her locker when she smiled over at him. He was confused, but thankful. He'd been cautious of seeming too overbearing and overprotective. He knew she could take care of herself, but he couldn't stand the thought of another person he loved being harmed by Germain.

Then he heard her gasp and whisper "No" in terror. In an instant, he was by her side and gripped her forearms in his hand, her own hands falling to lock on his in turn. His head swiveling, he couldn't spot what had turned her such an ashen shade. She only stared down at the ground and he spotted a slip of shiny paper.

Chloé was passing by and saw their faces. She reached down to pick up the paper, and immediately clutched it to her chest, hiding it from anyone's view. Looking around, she spotted Alya and Nino, pointed two fingers at them, and then at the art room where she proceeded to bodily drag Adrien and a still catatonic Marinette.

Once they were all in the abandoned art room, Adrien got a chair for Marinette and tried to make her sit. Her shocked had rapidly turned to anger and she brushed him off, ripping the paper from Chloé's hands and threw it to the ground, stomping on it for good measure. She started to pace.

"That bastard!" she yelled, and Adrien put his hands up trying to get her to quiet down. The last thing they needed was a teacher coming to check what the cause of the commotion was. "That evil, conniving, power-hungry..prick!" she let out a humorless laugh at herself, seeming pleased with her use of vulgarity. She suddenly turned on Adrien and Chloé. "If he goes after my parents, I. Swear. To. God--"

"I know. Trust me." Adrien looked at her pointedly and she stopped pacing to look at him, her expression softening a bit.

"Right, of course you do. I just--"

"No one is touching Tom or Sabine," Alya and Nino walked in then, closing the door behind them. "And keep it down, I could hear you from out there.." Then she raised an eyebrow at her. "Prick, huh?"

"You got me hooked on too many BBC shows," she muttered under her breath, but Adrien was relieved to see she had calmed down.

"Alright, well, who's the prick then?" Alya asked as she picked up the crumpled photo. "Shit." She looked up at Marinette, fury in her eyes matching that of her best friend. Adrien marveled at how powerful the two would be if someone got on their collective bad side.

Alya looked at Chloé, and Adrien was amazed what a unit the three girls had become in such a short time. There was a question in Alya's eyes and Chloé answered it without hesitation. As much as they had glossed over it, Germain was Chloé's family. Her uncle and her biological father. They had asked her to establish a deeper connection with him and then use this connection to betray him. Chloé could be cold sometimes, but none of them thought she was emotionless, certainly not anymore.

"There is no question," Chloé answered the unspoken thoughts in the room. "He is not my family. He's some jerk who tried to screw over my father, destroy Adrien's family, and now he's threatening my friend." She looked meaningfully at Marinette with a look of trust and understanding. Adrien wondered what had passed between the two to get them to this point and how he had missed it. "You know he's going to threaten to reveal your identity. I don't know what he's planning, but he'll try to leverage that over you. He like's having a miraculous under his thumb."

"What do you have in mind?" Marinette recognized something in Chloé's eyes that told her a plan was being hatched.

"We need to end this once and for all. We need to tear down every shred of credibility he has left and expose him as the pathetic and deranged megalomaniac that he truly is."

"How?" Alya asked.

"Leave it to me." Chloé responded, and the three girls all nodded, seeming to understand each other perfectly while he and Nino just stood there. He glanced over at his friend.

"Don't look at me, bro. They're the brains. We're just the eye-candy." He wiggled his eyebrows in a mock-seductive fashion and slapped Adrien on the back good-naturedly before they two walked over to be clued into the scheming.

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Germain sat sipping coffee in the park. One thing about being on the run was they never looked in the most open places. They expected you to hide yourself away in some hole somewhere. Well, he refused.

No, he much preferred to watch his daughter as she cavorted with the enemy.

He'd received a text from Chloé asking to meet that night. She claimed to be worried about him, but he was no fool. The only way Adela was found so easily was because there must have been a leak somewhere on the inside, and it was convenient that it happened right after he brought on his long-lost biological daughter. She'd been smart about it. He had no concrete evidence, and she was by his side at the gala when he'd heard of Adela's capture. She was brazen, and a part of him felt something akin to pride at her deceitfulness. She didn't get that from André.

A larger part of him was furious. She took him down once, but not again. She thought she was saving Ladybug: her friend Marinette.

"But who will save you, mon agneau?" He smiled menacingly, and stood. As he walked away, he texted Chloé back, whistling a flat tune.