Chapter Text
“Gabriel?” She asked, rubbing her eyes after experiencing a vivid nightmare and the pounding headache of a lifetime.
How long had passed? Surely she was just taking a short nap since she was feeling under the weather. Her sickness had been worsening for the past months after all…
Yet she felt better. No more struggling to breathe, no more weakness in her arms and legs.
“Emilie.” Gabriel responded, holding her hand and taking a seat on the bed next to her and using his other hand to brush her hair behind her ear.
She was in her room. It was quiet. She wondered where Adrien was.
“How long have I been asleep? It feels like I’ve been out for months.” She readjusted herself to sit up in her bed, sliding out of the blanket that she felt was suffocating her.
Gabriel took the liberty to lie next to her and place his arm around her shoulder, gently, and rested his head atop hers. “Only a couple of hours. Dinner should be ready soon.”
He couldn’t shake away the feeling that she was slipping from his fingers all too quickly. Emilie was everything to him, but he reassured himself that it wasn’t worth worrying her with his overactive emotions.
It was the last time he remembered touching her that made him feel that way. He was holding her hand as she took her last breath.
But Gabriel was just so happy to see his love again! Healthy! Here! Speaking to him!
Looking down at his hand, he saw no ring, though, and there were no earrings on his earlobes.
His phone said the day was June 3rd, 2016, but he had come from April 24th, 2017.
His wish came true.
“You’re awfully touchy today.” Emilie nuzzled into him a little more, holding his arm and savoring every bit of it.
Gabriel started feeling his heart thrum a little faster, tears began welling from his eyes.
He did it.
“I know, darling. It’s just been a tough last few months, and I feel like I haven’t had time to catch my breath until now.”
“I understand that.” She poked his nose endearingly. “I think the treatment is working. I feel so much better now that I slept.”
“That’s great news!” He perked up, realizing that his wish really did fix all of his problems.
“Father, you’ll never guess what Chloe told me about today!” Adrien came bursting into his parents’ room, but began slowing down his pace when he saw the rather vulnerable moment his mother and father had been sharing. “Oh, sorry. I should have knocked.”
Adrien always hoped he’d one day have as great of a love as his parents. There was just never a person who made him feel that way. No one he’d met before made him swoon the way his father had for Emilie.
“It’s okay, Adrien. Come here!” She patted the side of the bed that was free, and Adrien gleamed as he hopped up, without hesitation, and sat next to his mother. “My two favorite boys in one place, I love it.” She commented this while playing with Adrien’s hair and giggling.
Gabriel was amused.
His son wasn’t Chat Noir until September 1st of 2016.
Adrien wasn’t yet corrupted by a ring and tremendous responsibility.
He was never given the powers of destruction.
He was still perfect. Untainted.
This must have meant that Marinette Dupain-Cheng didn’t have her earrings yet, either. Perhaps he wouldn’t have to worry about her anymore.
Gabriel’s wish entailed three main details:
The first was that he wished to go back to a world where Emilie was never sick. That way, his son would have his mother and he would have his lover, preventing him from ever needing to become Hawk Moth.
The second was that he would not be suffering from the after-effects of being struck by Adrien’s cataclysm. He no longer had to worry about his body wasting away a little more every day, he and his wife could be perfectly healthy.
And the third was that Adrien Agreste would never be Chat Noir, just as Marinette Dupain-Cheng would never become Paris’ beloved Ladybug.
He wasn’t certain of how that last condition of his rather complex wish would pan out, but he also considered how there was no longer a need for villainy, so there would be no need for superheroes to be recruited.
He won. He truly won.
“What did Chloe tell you, son?” Gabriel asked, reorienting himself in his new reality.
“She said she and her friend Sabrina got to see Jagged Stone in school for a concert for career day!” Adrien said, excitedly. “It sounded really cool.”
“Very nice, Adrien.” Emilie grinned. “Mr. Stone is a very talented musician.”
Chloe’s stories of her experience in the school system was the catalyst for Adrien’s interest, but it was Emilie’s disappearance that made him want to sneak out for the first day of ninth year.
He had about three months before then.
The only responsibility he had now was to drink in every possible moment he could have with his perfect family. The perfect family he spent years cultivating. The perfect family that was now perfectly healthy. The perfect family he fought so hard to preserve.
He had to continue to protect it, though, and he was determined to do everything in his power to assure the maintenance of their familial perfection.
That would mean that he would have to eliminate any and all possibilities that Marinette would meet his son.
She was the driving force that tore their family apart on that fateful day. She meddled with his plans, she almost destroyed any chances of reconciliation between himself and Adrien.
So Gabriel was determined to make her life miserable. And he had to begin quickly, before Adrien would pursue his desires to attend school, just like Chloe.
Neither Marinette or her family should have any opportunity to show their faces to his son. He wanted none of it. It was too much of a risk to the fragile circumstances.
“Dinner is ready.” Nathalie knocked on the open door, a little pale but still standing.
She was wearing the same Tsurugi technology that crutched her when she was sick from using the broken peacock miraculous. She looked more sick than she was the day Gabriel won against Ladybug and Chat Noir.
It left Gabriel confused. He never included Nathalie in his wish, simply on the fact that she probably wouldn’t remember anyways. She seemed to be healing well from what Gabriel remembered, but perhaps this was just a little setback in her recovery.
She hadn’t even used the miraculous yet in 2016, which added more to his curiosity.
He decided not to think of it much longer. It would spoil the time he had with his family. His perfect, perfect family.
“I’ll meet you all there.” Gabriel said, taking out his cell phone.
“Okay, honey.” Emilie gave him a kiss, and Adrien simply smiled as he walked past them.
Once they were surely out of earshot, Gabriel dialed a familiar contact.
“Officer Roger, it’s Gabriel.” He said, hushed, waiting for a response. “Yes, I seem to have some concerns about the Dupain-Cheng bakery.”
“What would that be?”
“Every time my family eats their treats, we seem to get sick. It’s unfortunate, really, but my assistant seems to have fallen awfully ill as well.” Gabriel grinned. “I would like for the police department to see through an investigation, just to make sure they’re following all health codes and such.”
“No problem, Gabriel. I’ll let you know of any updates.”
“Splendid.” He hung up, then left to join his family in the kitchen.
Dinner felt sort of nostalgic to him. They were sitting by the counter, indulging in the meal the chef prepared them. He sort of remembered eating the same filet mignon the day Emilie fell asleep forever. He was alone back then, though.
That made this moment all the more sweeter. They laughed together again, they enjoyed their food together again, they watched television in their room together again.
And that was Gabriel’s wish come true.
Before he knew it, it was time to tuck Adrien in for bed. Quite frankly, Gabriel felt like he also needed the sleep himself.
“Ouch!” Adrien said, holding on to his wrist in pain as he readjusted himself under the sheets. He winced as his father decided to take a hold of it himself to investigate.
And there he found an all too familiar bruise, small yet dark purple, tainting the skin of his beloved son.