Bug Bites

Chapter | Sixteen

This chapter is dedicated to @etherealtsh for an amazing edit she made inspired by this story. Thank you for that, and I am sorry that I couldn't figure out how to share that amazing edit here on Wattpad 😭

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Adrien wished he knew what to feel or even what to say, but the truth was that he didn't. He was in a shock, not really sure how to process the news that had unfolded less than twenty-four hours ago. Plagg was trying his best to try to help him through it, but realistically there was nothing anyone could really say or do to help him. 

Paris now knew that Gabriel Agreste was the one behind being Hawkmoth, and was arrested officially with Nathalie being an accessory. His mother was in a comatose state under the mansion, and the doctors weren't sure she would ever wake up. It was a weird to Adrien, the feelings he was feeling all at once. He had thought he dealt with not having a mother anymore but this felt like losing her all over again and he knew it was his father's fault. His father could have taken her to a hospital where she could have gotten the proper treatment, but any chance was more than likely a long shot now. 

Adrien was angry. He was angry that his father was the one behind hurting so many people, and that he had help. Gabriel wasn't even sorry, and that was something else that pissed Adrien off. It pissed him off enough that he decided to do the one thing he had never done, and now had proof of because of his father's phone records. 

He turned Lila into the Paris police, which only added charged onto Gabriel's count. Lila had a very public arrest of also being an accessory in the aid of a terrorist, and on Marinette's behalf Chloe also added the defamation charges on for Lila. Lila had been a screeching mess, and her mother had seemed burned out on the news. Yeah, Adrien didn't care at all anymore.

Then there was Chloe, who he knew had to be in a similar state of mind like him. Andre Bourgeois had officially been arrested on the counts of bribery, defamation, money laundering and the aid of a terrorist. The difference between him and Chloe though was how hard her poker face was. She showed no emotion to the cameras or anyone who asked her if she knew. She let nothing show.

Yet here he was sitting in Chloe's room where she was staring at her phone, and he wasn't really sure how to approach her. Their friendship was weird, because yes they grew up together but that was for a social status that their parents had pushed. Yet basically they didn't have parents anymore either. Realistically they had each other now. 

"You would think my mother would call me, but I haven't heard a damn thing from her at all." Chloe spat, and it was the first emotion he had seen in her since the news broke out of her father's arrest.

"I'm sure there's a reason Chlo." Adrien tried to talk calmly, but he understood why she was upset. No matter what, Chloe and Audrey would always have a broken relationship. 

"The company is going down in flames." Chloe says, finally looking over at him. "Investors are pulling out of everything that has to do with our last name. The Bourgeois name is tainted now, no one wants anything to do with it. My father refuses to admit that my mother knew the whole time. He paid her to keep quiet."

"We both lost everything." Adrien reached over and grabbed her hand, albeit a bit awkwardly. "Our parents did things we can never really understand the reasoning for, hurt people for their own gain but we have to remember that we made a difference. We did the right things at the end of the day, and that it wasn't our fault."

Chloe was silent for a moment before a hysterical laugh left her lips, "It's not fair you know. I know your mother loved you Adrien, you were her world. I envied that, and my mother couldn't even be bothered by me. My father was at least here, and  he wasn't a good guy. I have Pollen, and as much as Marinette sees the good in me sometimes I  feel like I don't deserve to be a hero."