Chapter Text
Click. What to do when your friend is in an unsafe home. First, tell a trusted adult…
Click. How to help a friend out of their abusive home. Encourage them to talk to a trusted friend or family member…
Click. How to tell your friend that they’re not safe at home.
Click. How to tell your friend that they’re living with a supervillain.
Click. Click. Click.
Marinette leaned back, frowning at her computer. Most of these results weren’t relevant, or would have been helpful for normal children dealing with…not normal parental problems, but at least problems with more precedent than…whatever this was.
The fact of the matter was that Adrien was living with a supervillain who, as proven by what happened with Chat Blanc, had no problem manipulating his own child to get what he wanted. If Adrien were just a normal civilian, Marinette would have zero issue swooping in with her partner to get him out of there, no matter what it took, but he wasn’t a normal civilian. Adrien was her partner, and not ready to face the person under the villain’s mask.
Chat Blanc’s plea still broke Marinette’s heart. As far as he’d been concerned, either she kept Hawk Moth’s identity to herself, or she found someone else to wear Plagg’s ring. Maybe it was selfish, but she just couldn’t imagine being Ladybug without her Chat Noir. Still, she was going crazy worrying about him, stuck in that house with the monster that dared call himself Adrien’s father. If she couldn’t tell Adrien (or any ‘trusted adults,’ as all of these websites suggested), then she at least had to find a way to keep him safe.
She’d told Alya, at least, and only felt a little guilty about it…she’d learned her lesson about trying to take on everything herself. Alya was helping her to monitor all of Gabriel’s movements, from events to tv spots to even minor interactions with other important people. Looking back, Marinette could see that a lot of Hawk Moth’s akumatizations happened to coincide with somewhere Gabriel went or something he said or did (no doubt looking to upset people enough to bring the victims to him).
Garbage. The man was absolute, unredeemable garbage.
But with her partner’s mental health and safety on the line, Marinette couldn’t do anything except try to be extra prepared for whatever schemes Gabriel pulled out of his expertly-tailored sleeve. Besides, she had no proof beyond her knowledge from an erased timeline, and Gabriel was plenty powerful even without the Miraculous…reporting him for neglect would probably bring more fire on her than doing anything to help Adrien.
So.
Click. Click. Click.
Marinette let her head fall onto her desk and groaned.
“Tikkiiii…this is hopeless. I’m never going to be able to help Adrien!”
“You have to take it one step at a time, Marinette,” Tikki said, patting her shoulder with a tiny paw. “Just because this situation isn’t exactly typical doesn’t mean you don’t have tools at your disposal that can help.”
“I can’t exactly Lucky Charm my way out of this, Tikki.”
Tikki shook her head. “That’s not what I mean, Marinette. You have friends you can talk to, and so does Adrien. Even if there isn’t a clear solution, you can always support each other and be a safe space. That’s part of the reason for your Guardian lessons, right?”
“That’s true…”
Adrien had been coming over twice a week, whenever his schedule allowed, to learn some things about the Miraculous and the kwamis and whatever else Marinette could think of to teach him. She’d insisted on doing so in costume, because, as she’d told him, “I just feel more authoritative as Ladybug.”
He’d thought it was funny, but he didn’t argue about it. He seemed to really enjoy the lessons, often citing them as his favorite part of the week. And really, wasn’t that half the point? She wanted him to be happy.
Still…
Marinette sighed. “I still wish there was something else I could do. It would be so much easier if I could just…whisk him away somewhere safer. We could go to a private island and live on nothing but fruits, and have a hamster named—”
“Marinette?”
“Gah!” Marinette jumped up, automatically blocking her computer screen as she turned to find Chat Noir standing in her room, looking adorably confused. “A-Adrien! You’re here early!”
“Yeah.” Adrien plopped down onto his usual bean bag, dropping his transformation as he sat, the very picture of an eager pupil. “My photoshoot got cancelled, so I thought I’d come by early for my lesson. I tried to call you, but you didn’t answer…”
Marinette glanced down at her phone. On her screen was a very polite column of missed calls from Adrien, which she’d apparently been too wrapped up in her stressful thoughts to notice.
“Oh, so I see!” She tried to cover, blindly clicking around with her mouse to try and close the windows she’d had open. “Guess I just got distracted with some research, haha! You know how I get!”
She called on her transformation rather suddenly, startling Tikki a little, and attempted to calm herself down while she bustled about grabbing her lesson notes. Finally, with a deep, cleansing breath, Marinette sat down in her usual spot.
“Okay! Let’s begin from where we left off last time…”