Always Find You

Chapter 10 - "A Reasonable Explanation"

Possible trigger warning: violence and injury + brief mention of rape
~ ~ ~

  Marinette groans as she finally stirs from her deep sleep. She rubs her head and yawns, trying to shake the tiredness still engulfing her.
Expecting to find her bedroom when she opens her eyes, she's shocked to see she's laying on the floor of a small dungeon-like room with stone walls. The only things decorating it are a toilet, some old chains, and a ragged blanket.

"Where on earth am I?" She asks herself. Her mind flashes back to the night before; the hallucinations and then the world going black while Chat Noir looked down at her. Marinette gasps and her hands instinctively find her ears. No earrings. No Miraculous.
What happened last night?

"Tikki?!" She calls, hoping to hear an answer. Nothing.
'Oh no. No no no no...'

The girl looks and sees a door on one side of the small room. She tries it, but finds it locked.
There doesn't seem to be any other exits or windows, or literally anything else to get out of this stupid room.
She sits in the middle of the floor, trying to stay calm, but utterly failing.
'It's okay, it's fine. Maybe you're just dreaming or perhaps there's a reasonable explanation for being in here.'
Despite her attempts to convince herself there is nothing to worry about, she can feel deep down she is lying to herself. Something is wrong, and she needs to get out.
'Plan B, then,' she thinks, then yells, "HELP! SOMEONE HELP ME!"
The door suddenly opens and she jumps back to the opposite wall.

"Nobody is around to hear you," the person says.

She recognizes that voice and that figure,
"H-Hawk Moth?"

~ ~ ~

  Adrien wears earphones for most of the day, trying to block out the noise and the people, even his close friends. He notices Marinette's absence from school, making his gut twist even more with worry.
He only takes them out when he sees a TV showing her face.
"Breaking news: The people of Paris have been urged to stay on high alert and keep an eye out for Marinette Dupain-Cheng, a 17-year-old girl who went missing last night," The news reporter recites the girl's physical description before continuing, "Her parents reported her missing this morning and, although it's typical to wait 24 hours before filing a report with the authorities, it appears the girl's room was ransacked before she was presumably abducted from her own bed. This shows evidence of a premeditated act, giving high priority to the case. If we receive any more information, we will keep viewers updated."

Adrien's eyes get wide as his gut feeling becomes reality. He runs to find a secluded corner of the school and leans his back against the wall before sliding down and hugging his knees. He starts breathing heavily and tries to keep his tears down, to no avail. They fall slowly at first, then all at once. The boy puts his face in his hands and tries to make his breaths deeper, but they come out ragged as sobs rack his body.
'How could I have let this happen?' He asks himself, 'She could be hurt or even dead, and you didn't do anything about it!'
Obviously there's nothing he could've done about it, but the guilt rising in his throat suggests otherwise. He tries to push the image of Marinette being dead from his mind.
Nothing could be worse than death.
Nothing.

~ ~ ~

  "Ah, so you do recognize me." Hawk Moth says, "And here I thought we'd never met."

He holds his right hand out to shake, but Marinette presses her back further against the wall.

"I'm Hawk Moth. You must be Ladybug."

She feels her breath hitch in her lungs, but tries to play it off, "Wh-what are you talking about?"

"Don't play coy with me," he suddenly growls, his playful air gone, "I know who you are. And you know what I want."

"Please, I don't know what you mean. I just want to go home,"  Her voice trembles. It's easy to act scared when you actually are scared; this is miles away from a normal day as Ladybug.