Adrien wakes up, and, just like a cliche, it takes him a moment to recognise the room. He's on a double bed in one of the spare Graham de Vanily rooms, which is better-dressed than a five-star hotel, and he'd know.

Like the rest of the Graham de Vanily house, it's themed grey, white and black. The only spot of colour is the notebook he was doodling in last night, sitting innocently underneath the coloured pencils on the desk.

He supposes that's probably a metaphor.

No alarm woke him up, and so he lies there a moment, staring at the ceiling, before becoming bored and sitting up to check his phone. It's little things that are different to home - here, his phone sits on a table beside his bed, whereas at home it sits underneath or on the side of his bed. He ends up having to tug it from the charger because it isn't quite long enough.

Little things. Little habits that show something's wrong, that this isn't the way things normally are. The way things should be.

The time glares at him from the screen, but with such a large window at home he's well-used to waking up in bright light and it doesn't particularly bother him. Seven. About the time he'd normally wake up.

He smiles a little, and turns the screen off before sliding himself out of bed. Another small thing - his bed at home is nearly floor-level, with a shelf beside it. It takes him a moment to find the floor.

The floor is carpet, softer and warmer than his floor at home, and he walks over to his suitcase. He brushes his teeth, tries to work out how to use the shower without boiling or freezing in the process, doesn't quite manage it, and gets dressed. It's about half an hour later that he finally makes his way downstairs.

He's been in the Graham de Vanily house before, back when he was young. Every summer, Gabriel would reluctantly agree to accompany them to England for Adrien to visit his cousin and Emilie to visit her sister.

The last visit was a very long time ago. There had been some sort of disagreement between the two sets of parents, and they had ceased the visits. Although they had gone over one winter to attend Adrien's uncles' funeral, they hadn't gone over for another two years, and though Adrien had been promised the two sisters had made up and they would visit next summer, his mother had died and Gabriel had ceased the visits altogether. Adrien does the mental maths - it had been nearly seven years since he'd visited.

He didn't know why Gabriel had spontaneously decided to visit the Graham de Vanilys, and he wasn't sure he wanted to ask.

To his great relief, Adrien isn't the last to enter the living room. His father has yet to make an appearance - all the better, as it means Adrien won't be told off for sleeping in late. Knowing Gabriel, however, he may not turn up at all.

"Good morning, Aunt Amelie," he says, knowing full well that if he handles this visit with anything less than the care needed when holding a nuclear bomb he will find himself dealing with similar consequences.

Amelie Graham de Vanily seems to be restrained by no such bomb, and looks up from what appears to be pancakes and ice cream in delight.

"Adrien!" she beams. "How did you sleep? Sit down by Felix, tell us all about what's been happening!"

Adrien finds himself smiling. He'd missed Amelie, even if he hadn't known it. He finds himself wishing Gabriel had taken her up on her offer to visit her while Gabriel recovered from Emilie's death.

He sits on the sofa beside his cousin, who, though he looks up, does not speak and has no particular expression. His plate sits empty on the coffee table.

"Hi, Felix."

"Adrien."

Amelie doesn't appear to notice the frostiness between the previously close cousins, and continues to beam at Adrien.

"So, Adrien, how have you been in Paris? What's been happening?"

She takes a forkful of pancake, and Adrien tells her about Paris. He tells her about how he's begun fencing classes ("I'm jealous! I wanted to learn fencing as a child, but your grandmother wouldn't hear a word of it, I'm afraid."), all about how he'd started school and his classmates, and after enquiring, how he'd continued with his studies of Chinese and piano.

He's just mentioned the piano, to Amelie's apparent delight ("Oh! You'll have to play for us later! Felix has continued as well, maybe you boys-"), when Gabriel enters the room.

Adrien, who had become to feel quite comfortable in the room until that moment, falls immediately silent. He was the only one whose behaviour changed; Felix had kept up his icy demeanor throughout Adrien's talking, and Amelie, if anything, seemed to brighten even more at Gabriel's appearance. How she managed it, Adrien had no idea.

"Gabriel! How are you?"

Gabriel gave her a very small glare and ignored the question.

"Amelie. I did mean to talk to you."

Adrien's phone buzzes, and, as his hands are hidden by the back of the sofa, he pulls it out and flicks the screen on. He's received a message from Miraculous without noticing, probably while he was talking, but the message that has come through is from Alya.

It's eight in the morning, and Alya doesn't really message him anyway. She knows he's away visiting family, she's usually walking to school at this time... why is she messaging him?

Felix watches his forehead crease into a frown, silently observing.

"I was just talking to Adrien," Amelie beams. "He was telling us about his studies. I hear you've let him start school - I always did think Emilie was being a little harsh in that regard. He was saying he's continued with piano, I was thinking the boys could play for us later on."

"I think that's a fabulous idea."

Adrien, who had been worrying himself into, if Amelie and Gabriel had kept talking, what may have become quite a state, but he's shocked out of it when Felix speaks. He'd kept quiet all through Adrien talking, and chooses now to speak?

"If you don't mind, Adrien and I might go up to my room and practice."

Adrien looks up at him. He and Felix could be identical twins, both in appearance and mannerisms, and so he recognises the glance he himself uses as a quiet Go along with it. Trust me.

And he does.

"I agree," Adrien pipes up. Both Gabriel and Amelie look at him, perhaps in surprise - he never has been very enthusiastic about piano - but neither protest, and Adrien follows Felix out of the room. Gabriel takes their place on the sofa and begins speaking to Amelie, and neither cousin says a word until they enter Felix's room.

It's changed, since Adrien was last there. But perhaps they've both grown up a little. Grown apart from, once upon a time, being best friends.

"Well?"

Felix stands in the middle of his room, a good five metres from a closed piano, and looks at Adrien expectantly.

"Well?" Adrien repeats, and Felix looks slightly frustrated as he sits down in the swivel chair.

"You were clearly worried about something. Sort it out."

Adrien looks at his cousin a moment, as though wondering whether this is some sort of prank, before unlocking his phone and opening Alya's message.

ik you're visiting family but can i talk to u?

He presses Call, and Alya picks up immediately.

"Adrien."

"What's wrong?"

Alya breathes heavily down the phone.

"I know there's nothing you can do and you're away but Nino's taking Chris to school and Marinette's probably still asleep and..."

"Alya, what's wrong? Are you okay?"

"Yeah," she says. "I'm overreacting a little. LadyBug sent me this message - I always congratulate her on the new episode, you know, and normally she's really grateful but this time... Adrien, it was vile."

Adrien frowns, because that isn't LadyBug. LadyBug is kind and grateful and has loved RenaRouge since the beginning.

"God, Adrien, I... I thought she liked them. I thought I was making sure she knew that even if she got other hate messages, if the comic's popularity declined, she'd always have one person in her corner. No matter what happened in her life, she had someone who cared about her."

I know, Adrien thinks. And she appreciated it, appreciated it so much you became the first cameo. So I don't understand why she would do this to you.

He can't say any of that, of course, and he wishes this was a video call so he could just nod sympathetically.

"I'm sorry," Alya says. "I'm almost at school. I just... I needed to vent. I'm sorry."

"No, no," Adrien says. "It's fine. Got me out of an awkward conversation with my dad, which is always good."

He hesitates, before speaking his mind.

"LadyBug really loves RenaRouge, Alya, I reckon. You got to be the first person to cameo as an akuma, and the first kwami. Something else is going on - you shouldn't take it to heart."

"What if she meant it, though?"

Adrien's never heard Alya's voice so quiet.

"Then she didn't deserve RenaRouge at all," he says matter-of-factly. "If she treats her fans like that, she doesn't deserve them. Don't deserve you."

"Thank you, Adrien."

Felix's foot nudges the swivel chair into a slow swaying motion, and Adrien realises how strange what he's saying must seem. Even if he could hear Alya's side of the conversation.

"Are you going to be okay, Alya?"

He won't leave the call if she isn't, but he's pretty sure he can hear Nino's voice in the background.

"Yeah," she promises. "Nino's here, I'll talk to him instead. Thank you, Adrien."

"No problem," Adrien says. "You'll be okay, Alya."

She sighs quietly.

"I know."

The call ends, and Adrien looks at his phone a moment before opening the notification from Miraculous.

You have been removed from The Adventures of Tikki and Plagg.

Adrien stares at it a moment. Felix is probably looking at him expectantly, but Adrien ignores him as he tries to find the comic.

It won't open.

He opens his messages, and types faster than he's ever typed in his life.

ChatNoir: lb?? everything okay??

ERROR: You can't send messages to this user.

He switches to AAgreste, beginning to panic, and opens The Adventures of Tikki and Plagg on that account. Sure enough, ChatNoir has been removed from the comic, and the most recent chapter is called Ladybug.

Something's wrong.

Hi everyone! This is Ladybug. I'm very sorry, but due to private issues between myself and Chat Noir, The Adventures of Tikki and Plagg has been discontinued. Thank you for your understanding.

He switches accounts, back to ChatNoir, and sends two identical messages.

ChatNoir: that's not our ladybug.

[A/N: had a lot of stuff to do and somehow i did not get around to posting this for like,,, 3 weeks. whoops. but on the plus side, i did write the next two episodes, so now i've just got the ending to write >:)]