Miraculous: Tales of Shadowstar

Part 12: Aftermath

The following week, Lucien felt like he had stepped through the fiery pits of hell and somehow made it out alive. Except that he came out of it with a fever that refused to break for days. His body felt battered and bruised as a backlash from exerting more magic energies that he was supposed to use. To top it off, it felt like his insides were boiling for days. In short, the blonde haired teen felt absolutely miserable in his time of recovery.

Apparently while he's been out, Ladybug and Cat Noir had stopped calling for Shadowstar when an akuma or a sentimonster appeared. Several people had cut ties with the Veil family in response to the tragedy that took place at their home. Marcus attempted valiantly to keep the hard-fought contacts he's made over the years. But the only ones who stayed true was the Seylyn family. They had to return to Spain a short while ago, but Alissa had been spending a lot of time with Luka as well. She visibly looked heartbroken that they had to leave so soon. Marinette stopped texting or calling Lucien as well. Of course, he figured that maybe she was just busy or something.

However, when Lucien finally returned to school, he felt the air around him was... different. There was an unseen tension in the air as other students spoke in harsh whispers when they thought he was out of earshot. "That's the guy whose dad went total psycho." One student whispered to the other. "I can't believe they let psychopaths attend our school." Another whispered. Lucien felt the eyes of judgment were upon him, scrutinizing everything about him. Starr, hidden under Lucien's leather green jacket, peered up at their holder with concerned eyes. He understood that the reactions were normal and to be expected, but it still didn't do wonders to his mental health.

Yet when Lucien entered the classroom, everyone stared at him for a moment. Then either they looked the other way or glared at him. Marinette wouldn't even look at him now, and Adrien suddenly found the desk in front of him to be more interesting as Lucien walked past them. As Lucien sat down at his seat, the only one who would talk to him was Lila as she leaned to whisper to him.

"Congratulations on becoming the school's most disliked student. It only took your father to become akumatized to make it happen." Lila said. Her confident smile mixed with her mischievous glint in her eyes. Apparently, word around school was that Lucien set everyone up to be victims of his father's episode of being akumatized. Even though it wasn't his intention, enough time had passed for a lot of people in school to believe it. Which explained a lot of things now that Lucien thought about it.

Not to mention that Lucien had a week's worth of school to catch up on. So he spent whatever free time he had in between classes to catch up on those materials. Even so, Lucien could hear the whispers all around him. Some even wondered if maybe Lucien was akumatized as well and just hasn't shown his true colors like his father did. The whole thing made the teenager feel self-conscious for once.

When school finally ended, he wasted no time whatsoever to find a secluded spot to transform into Shadowstar. Mr. Pigeon had once again been akumatized as he was carpet bombing the streets in flocks of birds. "Alright, it's been a minute since we've done this, so let's not leave room for error on this one." Shadowstar mumbled to himself. With one leap after another, Shadowstar's dark poncho bellowed in the wind as he followed after the pigeon lover.

"Oh, look who finally decided to show up." A voice spoke from behind. Sure enough, the popular duo emerged as Ladybug and Cat Noir arrived at the scene. Ladybug still glared fiercely at Shadowstar though while Cat Noir flashed his pearly whites in a cocky grin. "Mind if we lend a paw?"