Heartless

Chapter 4

Gabriel looks across the table as Adrien blathers on about his day.

"There was this villain, she looked really cool!  She didn't do any damage though, the heroes must have defeated her in time."  Adrien says casually, as if he didn't know that villain was his fathers assistant.  Gabriel continues eating.

"Yes, she did look rather cool."  Gabriel says as he glances over at Nathalie with a smirk, who's eating and working and her tablet.  "Nathalie, do you ever stop working for even just one second?"  Gabriel questions, slightly annoyed that she won't just eat instead of working and eating.  Nathalie looks up from the tablet in her hands.

"Hm?"

Adrien giggles a bit.

"I said, do you ever stop working?"  Gabriel says again.  Nathalie stares at him.

"...No?"  Nathalie replies.  Gabriel sighs and takes the tablet from her.  "Wha- hey!  Sir, give it back to me."  Nathalie says, holding her hand out for him to put the tablet into.

Gabriel shakes his head.  "No.  You need to eat and stop working."  Gabriel says as he puts the tablet next to him on the side of the table facing away from her.  Nathalie grumbles quietly and continues eating, knowing very well, that once again today, he's right.  She didn't like it.  At all.  Adrien hears a ding from his phone and he takes it out of his back pocket and looks at it.

"Oou, that's really nice Hawkyura fanart..."  Adrien mumbles.

Gabriel looks questioningly at his son.  "What?"

Adrien looks at his father.  "Hawkyura.  It's Hawkmoth and Mayuras ship name!  My friend Nathaniel draws a lot so he made fanart of them!  It looks really cute!"  Nathalie almost chokes on her food.  She'd heard enough from Adrien about anime to know what a 'ship' was.

"Making Hawkmoth and Mayura into ships..?"  Gabriel asks, clearly not catching on.  Nathalie sinks down in her chair, cheeks turning red, as she knows what's coming next.

"No, father, it's where like-"  Adrien sighs.  "It's kinda like a couple name."  Now THAT is something Gabriel knows.  Gabriel looks over Nathalie, who's face is so close to her food that she's practically in it.  "Hawkmoth's kinda boring and lame, but Mayura's really cool!"  Adrien says.  Gabriel tries to hold back the urge to defend his alter-ego and Nathalie sits up, a small smirk creeping its way onto her face.  "Mayura's always the one who actually goes into battle.  She also has a WAY cooler outfit than Hawkmoth does.  Though sometimes Hawkmoth can look cool, but it's mainly Mayura."  Gabriel looks over at his assistant who's already back on her tablet.  Gabriel assumes she grabbed it while he was distracted mourning over his son insulting him.  Nathalie glances up at him with a look that says all he needs to know.  She's happy about this small victory.

"There is one thing though."  Adrien states.  

"And what's that, Adrien?"  Gabriel questions the blonde boy.

"Mayura's heartless."  Adrien replies.  Nathalie grips her tablet tightly, her knuckles turning white.  Nathalie stands up.

"Is something wrong, Nathalie?" Adrien questions. Gabriel knows exactly what's wrong.

Nathalie smiles dryly at Adrien.  "Nothing, just...tired."  Nathalie says back.  It wasn't exactly a lie, she was a bit tired.

"Oh...uhm...ok."  Adrien says, worried about her health.  He'd noticed that she'd been tired more often, and have dizzy spells just like she had at the Louvre, and he could hear her violently coughing in the atelier and her bedroom, and when Adrien was eating, normally she would have stood the whole time, but recently she'd been sitting.

Nathalie walks to the door and reaches her hand out to the handle until she feels Gabriels hand on her lower-back.  Nathalie turns her head and looks up at him.  "I can walk to my room on my own."  Gabriel stares at her and opens the door, keeping his hand on her as she walks out the door and he follows.

Sorry this is so short for such a long wait!  School's going to be starting again soon, I won't have as much time to write, and I still have to go shopping for stuff.