Vanished (Lukadrien) • Miraculous Ladybug

Chapter 37 | family meeting

Half asleep, Adrien stood at the fridge looking for some breakfast. He'd just woken up and wasn't completely awake yet and quite hungry. Not feeling awake enough to cook, he ended up just making some cereal and sat at the table eating it as he checked the recent news on his own case on his laptop. Although there seemed to be nothing of note.

A beep woke him up a little more though, and he saw a notification from Luka.

Luka 💙: Good morning hun, you awake yet?

He smiled reading the message and replied quickly.

Adrien 💚: yeah, just woke up. You're up early.

Watching the little dots saying he was typing pop up, he waited for his boyfriends next message.

Luka 💙: I'm doing some deliveries today so I'll message you more later. But I thought I'd mention that when I went past your dads place there was a grey car and a blonde woman with someone else I didn't quite make out.

Adrien read the message a little confused. Grey car... blonde woman... who was that? And there's someone else with them too? It took him a second for the dots to connect, and when they did it just made him all the more confused.

"Wait... Felix?"

His guess was correct, as all the way on the other side of pairs in the city Felix and his mother were sitting at the table in the Agreste mansion.

"I'm sure you've already been able to guess why I asked you both out here today, but I'll cut to the point. It's about Adrien" Gabriel said.

"Have you got a new lead?" Amelie spoke up, suddenly exited.

"No... as you can imagine I'm extremely worried about him. It's been 7 months after all"

The excitement faded quickly with that statement. Like her sister Amelie was very much protective of her son so she could hardly imagine having a son go missing. But Gabriel's worry felt fake, like he didn't actually care Adrien was gone.

"You know Gabriel, when Emilie returns she's going to be very upset to find Adrien missing, he was her pride and joy after all" Amelie said.

"I'm aware of that. That's why we're working hard to find him, I must ask that both of you don't talk about him in the media as the case is ongoing. There's a lot of spotlight on us right now, as I'm sure you've seen"

Felix was silent the whole conversation, a lot of thoughts going through his head. He didn't like Gabriel much, and preferred Emilie to him. He was a mamas boy just like Adrien, so the happiness of his mother and her sister mattered more than Gabriel to him. He was mixed on Adrien at the moment.

While part of him was worried about his cousin being missing, the rest of him had grown an odd grudge toward Adrien. It was always Adrien this, Adrien that. Mr billboards face of the company Agreste. The fact he was made as a matching set with Adrien annoyed him, he felt like he was a mere second thought in the creation.

He was grateful to Emilie for creating him to give to his mother. Again, he was a mamas boy, he was very much close with his mother. But he could help but feel like he was made to be the lesser of the pair. That's why we wanted his amok ring, because that way he could control his own life.

It was a bad idea telling him the truth about everything once his father died, because it'd turned him cold, it'd turned him vengeful. He couldn't believe Gabriel had the nerve to keep his ring from him all these years. He was ok with Emilie having it, since she and her sister were so close that he know Emilie was trustworthy with it. But Gabriel? He wasn't trustworthy.

Everyone who knew the truth of the Agrestes knew that Gabriel was the ringleader but Emilie wasn't perfect either, at least her main goal was simply to have children. She was definitely the better of the two in Felixs mind.

So it was no secret that he was rather unimpressed having to sit across the table from Gabriel right now, being told what to do by him. He knew that the real reason that they'd been called here was because Gabriel wanted that ring back. But he wouldn't let that happen, because he didn't even bring it just to be safe.

"Are the polices findings in his computer true?" Amelie asked.

"No. I will admit that we did fight the day he vanished, but the search history story is just something the police made up to try and wrap up the case quicker" Gabriel lied.

Even to people who knew he was hawkmoth, he was still lying about the situation.

"Where do you think he went?" Amelie asked.

"I'm not sure, but I do believe someone from his friend group was involved. Someone who maybe had a romance with him behind my back"

"A girl?"

"... a boy"

It fell silent again. The mood shifting.

"Gabriel, don't just blame the boy because Adrien had a little crush... he's a growing boy whose still discovering himself after all" Amelie said.

"It's more complicated than that, whatever Adrien is I know that boy is involved"

They sensed homophobic undertones, but could tell there was no arguing with him. Plus, even if those undertones weren't there for all they knew this boy might be involved.

"So... Adrien likes boys does he?" Felix finally spoke up.

"Supposedly. He screamed about being Bi during that argument" Gabriel replied.

"Don't you think maybe he ran away because he knew you didn't accept that?"

There was silence again, Felix calling out Gabriel's bullshit. Even with Felixes grudge against his cousin, he wanted any excuse to rag on Gabriel.

"I didn't cause anything. That boy did, I know it. He'd a bad influence" Gabriel replied.

"Mm- sure"

"Felix, please" Amelie butted in "sorry he's still worked up about his father, he took is very hard"

Gabriel knew that was an excuse, but to avoid any more drama than he was already in he brushed it off.

"We understand. We won't talk to the media, it's a delicate situation after all... I just hope Emilie's baby is ok out there and he returns before she does. I also have a question regarding this situation though, Is Nathalie ok..? she hasn't been very active since she used the peacock when it was broken" Amelie asked.

"She's not in any danger, but her health problems are permanent. I warned her of that risk but she still insisted on taking it, so I'm afraid there's not much we can do. She's been resting a lot more recently to conserve energy" Gabriel explained.

"Aww, the poor dear... she really has done so much for us"

Felix couldn't help but feel like this whole situation was a mess. Adrien being missing and potentially involved with a boy was one thing, him being a senti monster alongside Adrien was another. And of course the whole hawkmoth thing was the cherry on top of this family's drama cake.

Felix couldn't care less about this whole mess, he wanted something completely different. He'd allow Emilie to be revived, but he had plans after that happened and now he had his ring things would be easier to execute.

He just needed to know who this girl Gabriel was planning on akumatizing was, the one that he'd worked with in the past. The whole reason he even agreed to come here today, was to find out who that girl was.