MariChat: Chat Out Of The Bag

Best of Worst

If there was any pain to Adrien's own wound, he hadn't even begun to feel it yet.

Against his own wishes, he had been dragged to a completely separate room from Marinette, to have his own wounds cleaned and stitched up. He had protested, even demanded that they take him to see Marinette. They were stubborn in their insistence though.

It turned out, that was thanks to the insistence of Gorilla.

A key difference between Adrien and Gabriel's use of an Akuma, was that when Adrien did it, the people he used remembered who had Akumatized them. They remembered the conversation, and they remembered the pleas Adrien had made. This also extended to what Gorilla had seen of Adrien. And he had seen a battered, battle worn boy. He was stubborn and protective of Adrien, befitting his job as a bodyguard.

But this had nothing to do with his job.

He was doing this because he thought it was the right thing to do.

Without treatment, Adrien was incredibly susceptible to infection. He had agreed very reluctantly, but he was so preoccupied with his thoughts and beating heart, he didn't even register the pain his right arm was emitting. Peroxide and needles were used, and despite Adrien having been given strong painkillers, this should not have been a painless event for him. He refused anesthetic. He refused anything that would put him to sleep. He refused to close his eyes until he saw Marinette.

If it wasn't bad enough that Marinette had ended up here... It got worse...

The doctors knew who Marinette was.

They had seen Plagg with Adrien. They had heard his explanation on how the Kwami helped the model become the hero Chat Noir. that had been broadcast to the entire country. Apparently, in their hurry, or by accident, or without thinking, or whatever the reason, Tikki was spotted with Marinette. The dots had been connected almost immediately.

If the reaction to Adrien being Chat Noir had been big, the reaction to Marinette being Ladybug was humongous.

Just another thing Adrien had failed to stop.

"... Leaving your right arm with a permanent scar." The doctor concluded, running his finger down the recently made stitches. "I'm very sorry, but there isn't anything we can do about that."

Adrien couldn't care less about the scar. He figured his modelling days were probably over anyway. He looked at it briefly. It almost looked like a lightning bolt, albeit far more broken and random. "It's fine. But doctor... Marinette... How is she?"

The doctor seemed to look away, hesitant to actually say anything to the young teenager. This doctor, Adrien knew, had worked here for years. He had been the bearer of bad news a hundred times before. He'd have had to report horrible, horrible things, to poor, poor people. The loss of a loved one, the failure of an experiment, the acquisition of some horrible disease or condition.

If he was hesitant to say anything now, this couldn't be good.

This only added to Adrien's anxiety.

"Doctor!"

"... There was... There was a huge wound that went straight through her left lung. There was... Also one that went directly through her lower stomach... We were able to replace the lung with a donated organ... But..." the doctor almost looked like he was about to start crying himself. "We... Her chances of survival are... Minimal at best... The operators say she has maybe a five percent chance to wake up. And until she does... We won't be able to guarentee her survival for more than a few minutes anyway... She's suffered incredible trauma from a source that is basically foreign to us... Essentially, we won't know if she will even wake up..."