The Truth and What Remains: An Adrienette story

Chapter 21: The Dream Chronicles: The Maze That is The Mind

I don't know if I can trust him.... Mr. Agreste? I want to trust him, I do, but it's hard. I know he's my dad, and that's the scariest part. One of the people I'm supposed to love the most, the one I'm supposed to look up to for unconditional love and support, I'm terrified that I could be wrong. It's the most crippling thing you know? Lou and Emm trust him completely but I've been grappling and grasping at straws to even find it in my heart to trust him. My mind keeps saying the opposite and I wish I could stop listening to it, but it's almost as if I trust my mind more than my heart. Eventually, finding the answer became almost like a maze, searching for the answer in the midst of the tricks the mind plays on you. I still haven't found my answer, but I suppose that's why this is my challenge.

"Hey, sometimes, being a little mistrusting is good. It means you have a good sense of judgement, it's rare to find that in an eight year old kid," Hugo thought in his head as he remembered the words Adrien said to him. Hugo ogled openly at the large walls before him, a wide corridor beckoning him within. Hugo almost couldn't find the strength to take a step until he heard a shriek come from inside the maze.

"HUGO! HELP ME!" A voice rang out through the mist as Hugo shuddered from the chilling air he felt surrounding the maze.

"Maman... she's in there... and she needs me," Hugo murmured as he felt a unknown determination fill him, "I'm coming Maman!" Hugo called out as he finally took a step forward and ran into the maze. As soon as he did though, he felt the mist get thicker in the maze as if that was the ONE thing he needed in that moment. He turned a corner and kept running, listening to his footsteps as they pounded in a steady rhythm against the ground. Eventually, he heard another scream and found it coming in different directions, "Her screams.... they're everywhere, this maze.... it seems designed to throw me off." Hugo huffed as he wandered deeper into the maze. Eventually, he arrived at what seemed to be a dead end: a giant chasm in the corridor with the corridor continuing on the other side, its bottom unknown.

"A gap? How did this get here? Hmmmm... It seems pretty far.... 15 feet maybe?" Hugo thought aloud as his feet turned to go back the other way, "I better turn ba-." Hugo stopped mid-sentence as he heard movements behind him. He whipped around to find creatures coming out of the walls of the maze. They moved with a mechanical rhythm that wasn't even human, their joints moving suddenly and spastically like robots or puppets even. However, they did seem to take a human form and when they started to stand up straight and the mist cleared, Hugo could only freeze in horror. He looked fearfully at the things that seemed to take on Gabriel's look, their faces ever fixed on the increasing despair on Hugo's face. Their bodies constantly moved and bended in ways that weren't humanly possible but their faces just remained on Hugo regardless.

"Mr. Agreste? Well.... my dream certainly did a good job making them as horrifying as possible. He's not even human in real life.... to ruin Lou's first recital with Papa watching by blowing up the recital hall. Even here... he's ghastly..." Hugo murmured as one of them suddenly rushed forward and sprinted towards him. Panicked, Hugo took a step back into his fighting stance, his hands up and clenched. The Gabriel puppet dashed up to him and swung its arm at Hugo, who dodged before using his elbow to pierce the puppet in its stomach and he was surprised to find out that it was like wood. Hugo then used his fist to hit the puppet in the face and side-kicked him back, causing the puppet to collapse on the ground, its parts breaking apart. Hugo looked at it before looking at the rest of them and oddly enough, they just stood there in place as if they were waiting for something. Hugo looked at them curiously before looking at the puppet he just defeated and saw that the parts that fell apart were gravitating back to the real body and fixing itself. Hugo gasped as the puppet slowly rebuilt itself back on Gabriel and its eyes burned into Hugo as he felt his hands shake and his legs tremble. Suddenly, the other puppets started to sprint forward and Hugo yelled out in surprise as he turned around and ran towards the gap. The only choice he had now was to jump it, there was no way he could fight that many puppets.