Against you

5

Well he didn't exactly see anyone, it was more of a glowing figure which got created from the ladybug and black cat miraculous being united.
So now the designer was more than confused on what the hell was happening.
Nathalie seemed to have 'died' whilst his wife remained 'dead', something had obviously gone wrong.

"Who or what are you?" He asked to which the glowing figure chuckled in an arrogant manner.
"I'm the one who can grant you a wish."
"I already wished for something...why didn't that happen?"
"Well that's because you haven't specified who your sacrifice will be..." 'That thing' explained. "...It needs to be a person you value equally as much as your wife, for example your son or that assistant of yours."

Gabriel gasped, he couldn't afford to lose either of those two people so he just shook his head and answered:

"I-...I can't sacrifice them!"
"Oh well...then you can't have your wife back."

And without a warning the glowing figure disappeared into thin air leaving the grey haired man all by himself.

"What the hell!" The designer cursed, but when he heard some silent whimpering coming from not that far away his mind got distracted and instead he decided to find out who or what was making those crying sounds.
Well it didn't take long before he made his way around the coffin and spotted his assistant hiding behind it.
She looked awfully pale, and barely alive so without hesitation Gabriel hurried to pick her up.

"Nathalie! Nathalie please tell me you're alright."
"I-...I'm fine sir." She whispered weakly whilst holding onto her boss's arms desperately. "D-did you m-make your w-wish sir?"
"NO! No I couldn't! Because apparently I needed a sacrifice!"
"Oh...that's...unfortunate."
"Yes Nathalie it is indeed very unfortunate! Did you by any chance know about this 'sacrifice'?!"

She vigorously shook her head but the designer didn't believe her. Instead Gabriel grabbed her face and forced his assistant to make eye contact with him.

"I know you're lying!"
"I-...I'm not sir!"
"YOU ARE! Why didn't you tell me before?!?!"
"I-...I didn't want to..." she cried "It would've only made things more difficult."
"OH REALLY!? So you just wanted to die without even warning me!?!...Nathalie how can you be so pathetic?!?! You know I-...I couldn't lose you."

The young woman gasped at his sudden emotion change and before she knew it her boss hugged her so tight that breathing became difficult.

"Don't ever do that again!" He sobbed whilst slowly pulling back from the hug and now lifting the woman off of the ground. "Stop keeping secrets from me Nathalie! I want to know everything!"
"B-but-"
"No! Don't even try to argue! This can't happen ever again, do you hear me!?!"
"Yes sir."
"Good."

Gabriel sighed in relief but as he made his way upstairs with his assistant the designer soon realized that he hadn't checked his son who was also one of the options to sacrifice.
So instead of taking the young woman back to her own room before going to Adrien's Gabriel ran straight to the toddler's room.

"ADRIEN!! SON!!"
The designer flung the door open to see his child on the floor looking exactly the way Nathalie did. Deadly pale and extremely weak.
"Oh no-no-no." He worried as Adrien slowly opened his eyes which were full of tears and before Gabriel could've done anything to help the kid in pain whispered:
"I don't feel good daddy."
"I know, but don't worry I promise to fix that!"

And without wasting anymore time the designer also picked up his son so now he took both suffering people to his room.
There Gabriel laid them down on the bed and hurried to get some medicine.
But meanwhile he was gone Nathalie tried to ease Adrien's suffering by holding him close and softly stroking his hair whilst mumbling something barely audible.
"You'll be fine"
"And you?"
"I'll also be fine."
"Do you promise?"
"Oh I pinky promise you."
"Okay." The toddler whispered as he crawled closer to Nathalie and hugged her desperately.
This slowly melted the assistant's heart but she couldn't really express her feeling since the pain she was in sort of turned her numb, however she did manage to lay a kiss on top of Adrien's head.

...

After a few hours of resting the young woman didn't even notice that she woke up in her boss's bed with Adrien still holding onto her and on Nathalie's other side Gabriel was sitting whilst reading some sort of newspaper.
The assistant wanted to close her eyes before her superior would've noticed that she was staring at him but it was already too late as he grabbed her face before she could've turned away.

"Nathalie! How are you feeling?"
"I-...I'm alright..."
"Good." He smiled "Do you think you're strong enough to go to your room or would you like to stay here for the night?"
"I-...w-what's the time sir?"
"Almost midnight."
"O-oh I wouldn't want to wake Adrien by moving away but I should probably go-"
"It's your choice."
The designer shrugged as he continued to read on and completely ignore his strongly blushing assistant who could barely breathe at this point.

Nathalie just gulped before she uttered something completely off topic.

"D-didn't you say that y-you wouldn't w-want anyone to g-go t-through you room b-because you h-had some secrets?"
"Yes and? How does this come into our conversation?"
"I-...well I-...I just thought you didn't want anyone in your room."

Gabriel sighed exhausted before rubbing his tired eyes and answering:

"That's if the person wants to search through my stuff, but since you're just too weak to move I thought I'd let you stay...so then...what will it be? Stay or leave?"
"I-..."
"Nathalie make the goddamn decision! It's not that difficult!"
"M-may I stay?"
"Sure." He said making the young woman feel much more relieved but that feeling was soon gone and replaced with stress again when Adrien pulled on her shirt and whispered something not audible.
He did this multiple times causing the assistant to assumed that the child was having a nightmare so she sat up on the bed next to her boss (which she didn't notice) and picked up Adrien.
"Shhh honey." She whispered whilst gently patting his back which caused the child to eventually wake up.
"Mom!" he cried to which Nathalie out of instinct hugged him.
"Yes?"
"I...I had a bad dream about this scary figure who looked very tall and shiny...h-he wanted to take me away from you!"
"Take you away?" Repeated Gabriel which made both his assistant and his son look at him weird. "Tell me more Adrien."
"I-...I can't...I don't remember the rest because I woke up."
"Oh...well it doesn't matter then."
The designer sighed as he now turned his attention back onto the newspaper but Gabriel wasn't at all focused on the article, instead his mind was wondering if his son's nightmare had anything to do with the glowing figure that appeared in front of him earlier at that day when he was trying to bring back Emilie.

Maybe it was a coincidence, but maybe it wasn't.
No one knew.

To be continued-