Chapter Text
The day was bright and warm, the bus traveling smoothly on the path to the camping site. The students of both classes either looked outside the windows to observe as the city buldings gave place to open fields, then large trees with jade-green leaves, or just talked to each other about how the next week would be.
"I've never been on a field trip like this." Marc fumbled with the cords of his hoodie while he passed from looking outside and to his boyfriend's eyes." What usually happens?"
"Well, we usually get divided on shacks, with two to four people in each shack, unless you are Chloé." He pointed to the heiress, sitting in the front of the bus with her usual 'better-than-thou" attitude." Who usually gets an shack all for herself. Then we have some ativities, like recognizing leaves, register the animals we find, map the constelations, this kind of thing. There's some history classes, too. But, aside from that, they let us do pretty much what we want, but some things need to be supervised, like swiming in the lake or climbing trees."
"I'm so excited!!" Adrien exclaimed, pratically bouncing on his seat. "I can't believe my father let me come with you guys!!"
"It's pretty chill, too. The camping site is a very fancy one." Nino put a arm over the blonde's shoulders, flashing him a huge smile, happy that the souless ghoul Adrien called a father his dad allowed him to have so fun.
"They get booked all year." Sabrina added, getting a nasty look from Chloé for participating in the conversation.
"There's some camping sites in America too, but I've seen them only in movies." Zoé mentioned, turning to look back at the others from her seat.
"What usually goes on in there?" Marinette asked with utter interest, on her usual bubbly tone, what made the blonde blush a little bit.
Despite this, she only shruggered. "Besides eventual musical competitions with another camp and your eventual zombie apocalypse? Pretty much the same you described."
"Zombie apocalypse?' Mylene asked nervously, her smile falthering.
"Or ghosts inhabiting the shacks." Zoé kept listing, counting on her fingers. "Creepy girls at the lake. Maniacs with masks hunting down anyone who misbehaves. Monsters in the heart of the forest the catches who venture too much..."
Only then the girl noticed both Marc and Ivan making frantic, silent signs for her to cut it off. Beside them, Nathaniel and Mylene had grown pale, their pupils small like grains of sand, eyes wide. They were gripping at their respective boyfriends' arm with such strenght like their lifes depended on it.
"Ah- but it's only on horror films! It doesn't happen in real life!" She tried to fix her mistake, waving her hands as an effort to make them know she was just joking.
Mylene seemed to calm down, but Nathaniel sank more on his seat, leaning closer to the other boy.
"Is it to late to turn the bus back?" He asked, in a tone only Marc could hear, especially since the rest of the bus had diverted their attention from then to talk more about what they wanted to do when they arrived.
Marc held him closer, gently whispering. "It's alright, Nath. I won't let anything happen to you. If any monster want to get you, they will have to get throught me, first."
After a few seconds of silence, Nathaniel replied. "...That's what I'm afraid of." He muttered, moving his hand to grip at his boyfriend's and then looked at his eyes. "Promise me you won't leave me?"
Marc took the redhead's hand to his lips and kissed it, stopping for a second to appreciate how right they felt together. The contrast of black and white painted nails was always fascinating to him. "I promise."
Nathaniel didn't seem convinced, though."...And that you won't do anything stupid and noble and dumb."
"I don't think I can-"
"Marc."
"Okay, I won't."
"Wow, you weren't kidding that this place is fancy." Alya comented as soon as they parked.
The camping site was huge, well-constructed and even clean. The shacks were of a beautiful architeture and each even had a comfortable lounge outside the buidings.
"Do you think that Chloé would go anywhere near here if it wasn't?" Nino shrugged, pulling his bag over his shouders and coming out of the bus.
"Now I'm starting to understand why Father let me come." Adrien looked around, fidging with his bag.
"I thought we were going to sleep in the open. They even asked to bring out some tents." Marc commented in a low voice.
"Oh, this is for stargazing. We spend one night in the open to observe the stars." Nath says, a little blush on his face as Marc's eyes lit, probably thinking the same as him.
A night observing the stars together...
Alya cut the thought in seconds. "That's so cool! I can't remember the last time I saw the stars without the city lights numbing them out."
"I don't think I ever did." Zoé added.
"I did, once, but I was about five, I guess." Adrien competed the chain, his tone somewhat melancholic.
Nino seemed ready to add something (probably about Gabriel being a big assh- not very nice), but he got interrupted by Mme.Bustier clapping hands to call their attention, in the middle of the site. The students reunited around her, awiting for her instructions.
"Welcome to another week in the wild!"She said cheerfully, petting her belly a little. A week away from Monarch's antics seemed ideal for her stress levels, and she just couldn't let her colleague to tackle two classes alone. "Let's make sure to respect each other and the nature-"
"And the camping site's rules." Mme. Mendeleieve added, suddenly on her side. He purple hair was addorned by one single yellow flower, what was a nice contrast. "To recall a few, no students should be in the lake or outside their shacks after nightime without the supervision of a teacher or one of the employees."
Most of the students of Mme.Bustier's class protested, some even trying to discuss ways to go through it, while the ones at Mme.Mendeleieve's didn't understand the commotion. Those were... very reasonable rules.
"If a student isn't willing to colaborate or is being harsh-" Majority of eyes turned to Chloé at Bustier's words, "you must settle the good exemple and-"
"Report them imediatelly." Mendeleieve cut her out. "So one of the teachers or staff can help solve the issue.
Again, the students of Bustier seemed annoyed with the purple-haired teacher, while her own students seemed even more confused. This was a good advice, wasn't it??
"And as you know, boys and girls sharing the same shack is prohibited."
While a choir of "AAAAAAAAAWWWWW!!" echoed, a few of the students simply exchanged some smirks and winks.
"Well, that's a pity." Aurore pipped in, holding Mireile's hand.
"What a shame." Zoé took her hands to her face.
"My day is ruined." Rose clicked her lips.
"I can't begin to say how disappointed I am." Nathaniel added with a little chuckle.
All of them were thinking the same thing...
They could sneak goodnight kisses to their S.Os as they wished, take that, sistem!
"Okay, that's enough." Marc sushed him with a kiss on the cheek, despite his little giggle. "Don't be mean."
"Marc is our official impulse control, isn't he?" Zoé commented, with an amused glint on her eyes.
Aurore laughed, shaking her head. "Not at all. You just didn't get to see him in the want for blood yet."
"You say it like you don't go feral every now and then as well, Aura." Marc replied, stucking his tongue out at her.
"Hey. That akuma was getting too close from our hiding spot. I'm not at fault if my parasol moved on it's own...ten times." She shrugged a little. "I suppose a part of Stormy Weather still lives in me. But I'm in command of her."
"Each of us has Heaven and Hell deep inside."Marc said, almost a whisper. At the flabbergasted looks of the others, he added "Oscar Wilde."
Any response that the small group could have was drown out by a shrill scream a few steps away. They turned and...
Oh.
Of course.
"Sabrina! Take my bagage to my shack." Chloé comanded, not even looking at her, too 'busy' checking her own nails.
Sabrina moved to obey her, but Marinette put a hand in front of her as a sign for her to stop.
"You have to do it yourself, Chloé." She said, her face stony serious.
Chloé seemed to give a full twist as her uninterested look gave way to a murderous one.
"What?! How dare-"
"All of us have to clean and organize our shacks, with our roomates. You wanted a shack for yourself, that means you have to do it yourself."
She gaped like a fish for a few seconds.... maybe even a minute. But for everyone's surprise, especially Sabrina's, the heiress grabbed the bagage and dragged to her shack, with an face that suggested she was moving it with her hatred alone.
"Uhhh, okay." Nathaniel laughed nervously, hoping that this wouldn't make Chloé go extra-bitch-mode. That's the last thing they needed that week. He turned to Marc, grasping gently at his hand. "Maybe we should head out to our-"
"HEY, KURTZBERG!"
And all of Nathaniel's hopes for a good week were thrown down the drain.
"Oh, no." He huffed, turning to face the blonde menance knowed as... Louis.
The lilac-dressed boy was backed up by some other boys who had signed to be in the trip, all of them seeming equaly mean and equaly dense. He smirked at the redhead. It couldn't be good.
"Catch this, noodle-arms!"He yelled, throwing something that looked like a baseball at him. It was something that happened often. Louis always liked to throw things at Nathaniel just to see if he would get angry and 'explode' at him. What was very, very messed up, on the artist's opinion.
But there was one variant that he wasn't counting on.
Before the ball could reach the target, a black-gloved hand caught it mid-air, surprising both of the boys.
Marc gave him a smile, his special smile that said "I'm about to tear your liver out, run". "Did you lost something?
Louis took a second or two to shake out his shock, but when he did he chose to only glare at the two boys and the group, who didn't seem any happy to see him. He then fastly walked off when he took notice of Alix fastly aproaching.
"Coward." Alix said, lowering the baseball bat she had in hands. "That guy just never leave you alone, man."
Nathaniel sighed with a little bit of frustration, a little bit of relief. "Yeah, I think that hug thing Bustier made us do weren't of much effect on him." He then turned to Marc, now with a flustered smile. "Thanks for the help, sweetie."
Marc smiled back, giving his hand a gentle squeeze. "I said I would protect you, didn't I?"