A Haunting Past

•Chapter 16•

"My name is Adrien Agreste and I have the black cat miraculous. I'm a model for my Father and do numerous other activities. Which only two of them were actually helpful." Chat detransformed and gave his Father an accusatory look.

Hawkmoth gave an awkward smile to combat said look.

"No way! This is too good to be true!" Alya exclaimed at the top of her lungs.

"My best bro is Chat freaken noir. Aka lady killer."

"Wait, what. The only girl I ever had was Marinette. How can I be a 'lady killer'?" Adrien countered, making air quotes around the last bit.

"But that doesn't stop you from collecting all the girls' hearts." This statement came from Nathaniel.

"I am speechless. I mean... just...wow. I regret so much at this moment." Chloe said in disbelief.

"I don't know if I should be relieved or offended by that." Adrien retorted.

"Take it as you want, I still can't believe I fawned over an ally cat."

"Hey, he may be an ally cat, but his my ally cat." Marinette huffed, crossing her arms.

"Thanks m'lady-hey."

"You know. In hindsight this explains a lot. From frequent absences to random scars and sores. In my defence, your clumsy stories were convincing." Alya said in a light tone, referring to Marinette in the last statement.

Adrien glanced over to Hawkmoth. Seeing uneasiness in his expression. He didn't see a lot of that or any other emotion on him that much, in fact.

"Okay guys. We have one more revelation to get through." Adrien caught everyone's attention. They quieted down. All eyes fell on Hawkmoth.
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The nightmare slipped through the cracks of a barely opened window. He went to a bed that held a person with pain on his face. The dream must surely be terrible.

It studied the person with intensity. The creature of the night then whispered things in an unknown language.

Suddenly it absorbed itself into the person. It was silent for a few seconds.

The dream suddenly intensified. Making the person scream, or try to at least. It was inaudible.

The person's eyes opened. It was void of colour. It was a white abyss. It was almost like a light.

The nightmare exited the petrified body again. His ora somehow the same but different, more...

Powerful
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Hawkmoth looked at his son wearily and then he said: "My name is Gabriel Agreste and I am the current holder of the moth miraculous. I'm a CEO and I'm a designer of my company." Following the others' lead, he also detransformed.

The quantity of silences just kept increasing.

"Marinette?" Alya squeaked. "Yes?" The girl asked her best friend.

"You tried to stop your idol. Good luck getting a job there now."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence. I really appreciate it." Marinette replied sarcastically, rolling her eyes in the process.

"Hey, I'm just saying. If I were to be in his shoes right now, I would be pretty pissed at you at the moment." Alya shrugged after that blunt statement.

"No, no. She did the right thing. Even if it was against me." Gabriel cleared up the situation.

"Talk about a miraculous family." Nathaniel quipped quietly. The rest heard and started laughing. Nathaniel then started to blush when he figured out they heard him. Luckily it did manage to clear up the air.

"I'll work with you, but don't think I will trust you right of the bat. Got it." Alya didn't intend for it to be a question.

"Now that all that is settled... Let us get to the real reason we are here." Fu said seriously.

He looked around to see everybody nodding, so he continued: "Mistress is an ancient spirit bent on destroying the miraculous jewels. I know that I put you all in terrible danger. She will stop at nothing to kill us all with the help of her minions. I still don't have a way to defeat her per say. I will try my best to find a way. In the meantime, we need to defend the citizens from her minions. Luckily, I know a way."

"And?" Marinette didn't want to sound desperate, but it came out that way.

"Patience is the key, my dear Ladybug." "Yeah, sorry. Please continue."

"As I was saying, there is a way to defeat her minions. Adrien and Gabriel are the main components."

"We are?" Adrien asked. "Yes. Your father will acumatize you to accomplish it."

A chorus of 'whats' ran through the room.

"Don't worry, children. There is no real fear. Gabriel knows how to control his powers. Once he akumatized Chat. He must be transformed for it to work, so remember that. Anyway, then Chat must use his cataclysm on the nightmare. But the nightmare must first be weakened to destroy it."

"How are we supposed to weaken it?" Adrien was the one to ask this question.

Everyone nodded in unison. Fu stroked his beard and replied: "Well that depends."

"On what?" Nathaniel asked.

"Each nightmare feeds of the fear of innocent victims, they use this fear as a literal weapon. To put it simply, you must beat them at their own game."

"That clears everything up, really it does." Chloe said sarcastically.

"Chloe." Adrien reprimanded. "Sorry." Chloe said sheepishly.

"It will become clear as soon-" An ear piercing scream interrupted Fu from saying what he wanted to say.

Everybody in the room had determined looks. Looking between one another to non verbally confirm their next actions.

"Time to transform. Tikki spots on!"

"Plagg, claws out!"

"Trixx, let's pounce!"

"Wayzz, shell on!"

"Pollen, buzz on!"

"Duusu, feathers on!"
(I don't care if it's the right phrase anymore.)

"Gabriel, I think you should transform too. So we could communicate with the team." Fu advised

Gabriel nodded and chanted: "Nooroo, pure wings, rise!"

Hawkmoth now stood in his place, he looked at the children and said: "I'll wait here with Master Fu. When I see the opportune moment to release my akuma, I will."

The rest nodded and ran of in the direction of the aforementioned scream.