Chapter Text
"Hey."
The nonchalant greeting hovers over the akuma victim struggling to unpin itself and before an utterly bewildered teen-aged miraculous wielder. Adrien fails to hide his smirk when the akumatized baker's oven mitt bounces off the new Ladybug's forehead, and a trademark Chat grin split his face when Ladybug squawks and fumbles the charm. His lady would have caught the mitt. Then again, his lady couldn't stare him in the eye without tilting her head back nor did she appear able to wrestle a bear (though she certainly could).
Adrien frantically terminates that line of thinking and twists the akuma victim's arm just far enough to stop its possessed stubborn wiggling.
Ladybug finally snags the bobbling mitt, and her attention shifts back to Adrien, still poised atop the akuma victim as if he was holding a picnic on a blanket. When she makes no motion to tear the akuma's charm, Adrien raises an expectant eyebrow and asks, "Aren't you gonna..." A snigger at her fresh squeak and luminescent blush threatens to burst from his throat before her cleansing ritual turns the humor to a nauseating wave of nostalgia and heartsickness. At least he doesn't have to kneel on the baker's back anymore.
Akuma cleansed and day saved, a tiny, wiry slip of a girl approaches, black cat ears and mask clear in the evening sun, and yanks Ladybug down for a kiss. Suddenly Adrien's knees threaten to collapse as memories and emotions crash so effortlessly through his old and carefully constructed barriers. He can feel a pair of hands leading him away from the confused baker he'd helped defeat.
Through his haze he can faintly hear Chat berating Ladybug for letting a civilian get involved and Ladybug fiercely insisting that she neither asked for help nor gave this stranger permission to defeat that akuma by himself. To which Chat responds by staring at him while he sinks into a park bench.
Adrien notices the small form huddled against Chat's back when both the Miraculous beep out their first warning and the heroes begin arguing over how to get the pair of green eyes and high raven pigtails peeking over Chat's shoulder home. With the knowledge that they can't continue like this, he intrudes into their conversation with a ghost of his debonair smirk, "Pardon me, ladies, but I can hardly stand by when you're clearly in need of a hero yourselves. I can accompany her home for you."
The pair immediately assure him that he's done enough and continue arguing until the second beep of Chat's ring interrupts. With a sigh and a sad smile, Adrien reaches into the jumbled messenger bag at his side, slides out a small poplar box, and tosses it to Chat. "If you'd do me the favor of delivering that to..." he pauses for a moment to consider before deciding on, "our mutual friend, I'd consider us even." Her wide eyed stare makes Adrien glad he could never break the habit of carrying Camembert.
Chat wordlessly slides the girl off her back and leads her to Adrien. "This is Mr..." Chat says, eying him warily as he responds, "Agreste. If you tell him where you live, he'll take you home. Okay, Océanette?" The little girl nods and rubs at her reddened eyes, then transfers herself from Chat's leg to Adrien's.
Before Adrien can glance down to his new charge, Chat strides forward and hauls him down until she can stare him in the eyes. Their noses touching, she remains perfectly still until her miraculous beeps again. Then she's vaulting away, leaving him staring wistfully after her.
His reverie is broken by a tug at his pant leg and a tiny voice asking if Mr. Agreste was okay. Leave it to a kid to see right through him. He kneels and smiles his best Chat Noir smile before asking, "Océanette, right? Where do you live, Océanette?"
Adrien had forgotten how much excitable kids could talk, and little Océanette was no exception once she became comfortable with him. She regales him with the latest news about the new superhero duo, Chat Noire and Ladybug, and the stories her grandmaman and aunt tell her about the duo that came before - Maman doesn't like stories. She makes a face when she gets to the mushy part about the romance between old Chat Noir and Ladybug and another face about the new pair being just as gross even though Chat was really cool and really nice to her and...
Adrien lets his mind wander as Océanette steers him homeward through the evening crowds. Her adoration for Chat - both of them he's surprised to learn - worms its way under his somber mood and he nods with a growing smile as she helps him relive the best parts of being Chat Noir. Even the mushy parts.
By the time she points out the white corner bakery (the "Boulangerie-Pâtisserie Tom & Sabine" she announces grandiosely through a yawn), Adrien has the flagging girl in his arms, thankful that with her energy went her chattiness.
When he shoulders through the doorway, he can hear frantic conversation, "-been missing for almost six hours, Captain Rog-" Something clatters to the floor and a freshly revived kid wriggles from his arms and dashes across the floor with a ear splitting cry of, "Maman!"
The next minutes are a blur for Adrien. An older but unmistakable Marinette Dupain-Cheng tearfully wraps her daughter in a hug and showers kisses over that achingly familiar blue-black shade of hair. She is different now he notes through his haze. A cascading braid falls to her hips and the athletic tone in her arms is, if anything, more defined. There's a scar starting on her right cheek that terminates in her hairline. Her freckles are more pronounced. She's a mother.
She's Océanette's mother and he laughs breathlessly when the little girl giggles and squirms under her mother's continued assault and god he can't breathe.
Cool evening air does little to ease his burning lungs as he slides down the exterior wall of the bakery and its door slams in his wake. Of course she'd move on; the better part of a decade had passed before he'd returned to Paris. He couldn't save up enough good luck in a lifetime to even have truly hoped she hadn't. And that hope wasn't fair to her anyway. Before his thoughts can surround and crush his heart, he hears a chime and Sabine Cheng steps out of the bakery. Marinette's mother is instantly recognizable too.
Drawing upon years of modeling experience, Adrien schools his features and offers her a model smile. Sabine observes him for a few moments, head tilted and eyebrow raised. Apparently he checks out, so she kneels next to him and places a pastry and cup of something steaming on the sidewalk between them. "Are you okay, young man?"
Smile faltering, his brain scrabbles to find some shred of truth to offer. When her hand closes gently on his shoulder he blurts, "I barely had a mother to worry about me like that."
Her grey eyes scrutinize him for a moment longer before she pulls him into a crushing hug against her small frame, "Thank you. Thank you for bringing our little lucky charm back to us. I can't tell you how much this means to Marinette."
At the mention of Océanette's pet name he chokes out something that that's not quite a laugh and not quite a sob. He knows shouldn't ask, but he can't find the willpower not to. "What about Océanette's father?"
Sabine frowns and shakes her head. "She doesn't have one."
Adrien is racked by another sob and can't hold in his tears anymore. The conflict of his flickering hope and the memory of pale green eyes gazing up at him feeds the emotional turmoil spiraling in his chest. Sabine hugs him again, gently stroking the back of his head. He harshly squashes the urge to purr.
"What's your name?"
The question chokes him again and he's glad Sabine's shoulder hides the panicked expression on his face. "I'm no one important," he sputters, hoping she doesn't push.
"Alright, no-one-important," Sabine says as she pulls him to arm's length. "You can call me Sabine. Now eat up before it gets cold."
Though it must be uncomfortable, she remains kneeling and coaxes him to finish the pastry and hot chocolate. She doesn't ask any more questions, for which he is infinitely thankful.
When the pastry is gone, he uses the napkin to wipe the tears from cheeks and blow his nose. "Thank you, Sabine," Adrien breathes after draining the last of his hot chocolate. "I really need to be going."
"Then if you ever find yourself on the block again, no-one-important, come visit us, okay? There will always be some fresh pastries with your name on them," Sabine says as rises and dusts her knees.
"I will," he promises as he hauls himself to his feet and starts away. "I will."