One week later:

After emptying his pockets into a grey plastic bin and walking through a body scanner, Master Fu was escorted down a short hall to a room. The opposite wall from the entrance of the room was bullet proof glass on the top half and the bottom half was a row of six desks separated by privacy walls. Each desk has a chair pushed under it and a corded phone mounted to the privacy wall. Gabriel Agreste was seated on the other side of the glass, at the second desk from the left, wearing an orange jumpsuit and hair that was oddly lacking in hair gel.

Master Fu strolled over to the seat in front of the man and made himself comfortable. He picked up the receiver and put it to his ear. When Gabriel did the same, he smiled. "Good morning, Gabriel."

Gabriel nodded at his visitor, face impassive. "Fu. I didn't expect to see you here."

Master Fu shrugged. "I rather doubt you'd expect to see anybody here."

Gabriel scoffed. "It's only been you and that Ladyblogger girl."

Master Fu raised his eyebrows in interest. "Oh, I'm sorry I missed that. I'll have to check my notices for the update."

Gabriel scowled at him. "What do you want old man? Are you here to question Hawk Moth as well?"

Master Fu smiled politely. "Oh, no. Everything I need to know about Hawk Moth I've already learned from Nooroo."

Master Fu let his smile drop slightly. "He doesn't know it, but I actually came here on Adrien's behalf. You see, I have a feeling you know what happened to his mother. Unfortunately, if she's dead there's nothing we can do. We'll not be using the wish to bring her back just to sacrifice someone else. If she's not dead," he paused, "there may be other resources we can use. If it's possible, I'd like to be able to help bring Adrien and his mother back together." He raised an eyebrow at the other man. "I'm here because I don't think he should ever have to see you again to be able to make that happen, if he doesn't want to."

Gabriel leaned on his elbow, and eyed his visitor. After a moment of consideration he answered. "She is not dead," Gabriel said carefully. "Have the kwamis look below the mansion. All the information you need is there. If you can get her back, please? - I need to see her again."

Master Fu's tapped a finger on the desk in front of him. "That would be up to her. Do you think she would want to have anything to do with you after all you did to her son?"

Gabriel shot forward. "I didn't know he was Chat Noir until that day, when I realized both he and Nooroo were missing!"

Fu raised an eyebrow and smiled. "Of course. I'm sure that will make all the difference." He hung up the phone, stood, pushed his chair back under the desk and left without a backwards glance.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Adrien sat on his bed in his room. In his room. Sure, it was a little smaller than Marinette's, but the spare bedroom at the Dupain-Cheng's was still plenty big enough, and they had just finished getting the furniture and all of his belongings put away. He left almost everything back at the mansion, but somehow this room felt so much less empty, and it had nothing to do with clutter. He heard a knock at the door, and heard Sabine's voice (she insisted he call her that), carry through the door. "Adrien! Officer Raincomprix is here to speak with you!"

"Coming!" he shouted as he bounded off the bed and to the door. He opened it and was greeted by Sabine and the red haired police officer.

Officer Raincomprix offered a handshake, and Adrien accepted. "Sorry for the intrusion, Adrien, but there were some things I wanted to speak with you about in person, regarding your situation. May we speak in private?"

Adrien felt a little awkward, but stepped aside and allowed the man in his room. Sabine looked to Adrien. "Just let me know if you need me." He nodded and closed the door as she stepped away.

Officer Raincomprix clasped his hands behind his back. "First of all, I wanted to tell you that Ms. Nathalie Sancoeur's involvement has yet to be determined. If she is cleared of charges she is currently set up to be your legal guardian in the event that Gabriel could no longer serve in that capacity. I doubt this is what he had in mind when setting that up, but here we are," he gestured with his hands. "She has asked us on several occasions to tell you that she says she knew nothing about Gabriel's activities as Hawk Moth and would never have cooperated and is very concerned about your well being. She does ask after you regularly. She says she hopes you will be able to trust her."

Adrien nodded as he let that sink in. "I hope so too."

"The other thing I needed to tell you about, is that I think you should know that Chat Noir, has your back, and probably Ladybug too."

Adrien screwed up his face in confusion at the man, "What gives you that idea?"

Officer Raincomprix smiled. "Well, I was there at Agreste Mansion when they took Hawk Moth down. When Mr. Agreste and Chat Noir were having their showdown on the rooftop, there was a lot of yelling, but most of it was hard to make out. The one thing that we could make out was when Chat Noir shouted at your dad, 'Adrien's the best!'" The officer looked at Adrien meaningfully. "We don't exactly know the context, but everyone I talked to there agreed. That was absolutely the only thing said in that fight any of us could clearly make out." Then to Adrien's surprise, the man winked at him, then continued. "So you see, even though your own dad has let you down pretty hard, there will always be some who are watching your back." The officer looked around the room. "It looks like you've got a nice set up here. That's good to see. Let us know if you need anything. I should be going now. Thank you. For your time." He offered a second handshake, which Adrien returned firmly with a wide smile. With that they walked out of the room, and Officer Raincomprix bid the household farewell.

Adrien shook his head, and remembered that dinner would be ready soon. He quickly found the kitchen where Tom (who also insisted) was just finishing putting his personal flair into the coq au vin on the stove and Marinette was mixing the salad. He looked around and found Sabine carrying the wine to the table. He asked, "Is there anything I can do?"

Sabine gestured with the wine bottle, "be a dear and grab the cheese board?"

Adrien chuckled to himself as he obliged. Of course it would be the cheese. After the flurry of activity the four of them sat for their meal. Adrien was surrounded by the sound of conversation and laughter and utensils on dishes. Dinner had never been so noisy, not even when his mother was around, but it was much closer then. Adrien loved it. "The food is amazing Tom, is there anything you can't cook?"

"You know," Tom rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "I'm sure there must be."

Sabine playfully slapped his arm, "Oh Tom, stop it. Adrien, honey, if there's anything you can think of that you would like us to have for dinner, you just let us know. We'd love to try some of your favorites."

"So far so good, Mrs. Cheng." Sabine raised an eyebrow at him. "I mean Sabine."

Sabine smiled warmly. "Much better. Though really, I hope you know that I want you to be as comfortable here as you can, and if it takes a little while to adjust, that's fine. In fact," She looked to Tom, who nodded. "While I know we've mostly covered the bases on this living arrangement, but while we're all sitting here and you're nice and settled in, there's some things that need to be addressed directly." Adrien and Marinette glanced at each other and then gave Sabine their full attention. She continued. "This is your home as long as you need it. We need to you to understand that this has nothing to do with your somewhat sudden romantic relationship with our daughter." Both the teens cheeks turned pink.

Tom nodded to Adrien as he spoke. "We know you're a good kid Adrien. You and Marinette have been friends for some time, and we like knowing about the people Marinette spends time with, so we've been paying attention to you as much as we could ever since we started hearing your name around here." He smirked, slightly. "From what we knew of you before you two started dating, we'd have done the same thing we're doing now."

Tom glanced at Sabine and Adrien wondered if this had been rehearsed as she spoke. "Now, you seem to have a very healthy relationship, and you both seem very mature, but you are both young, and statistically speaking, it's likely that the two of you will eventually break up." She looked to Marinette, "I don't want you two to find yourself in the future feeling trapped in a relationship if he continues to live here long term. If it ends, it ends, and you will both just have to find a way to end it with enough maturity that you can still live in the same house. You will have your own space, and we'll just have to make the most of it." She turned to Adrien, who looked a little pale. "Adrien, I don't know how long you'll need or want to stay with us, once all the details settle out in the courts, but you are welcome here as long as you want to stay."

Tom interjected, "Until you're 40. I mean, by that time, we may have to renegotiate the arrangement. That's still up in the air."

Sabine shook her head at her husband. "Does anyone have any concerns or questions on the matter?"

Marinette and Adrien both shook their heads.

"Good!" Tom clapped and rubbed his hands together with a grin. "Now I can get back to designing your wedding cake." A loud laugh burst out from Sabine, while Marinette squealed, "Papa!"

Once dinner was over, Marinette and Adrien each got in their pajamas and then set about gathering every single spare blanket and pillow in the house for their movie date. Tom grabbed a few from the top of a closet. "Watch out below!" he shouted as he dropped them on top of Marinette's head, instead of her waiting arms.

"Hey!" Marinette shouted, but couldn't keep the grin off her face as she mock pouted.

Sabine laughed at the two of them while she helped Adrien gather up the snacks. "Now don't forget to clean up after yourselves, and have fun, you two."

They carried it all up to Marinette's room and created the greatest pile of soft fluffiness ever to grace a floor. Adrien looked approvingly at their creation. "So, what are we watching, Princess?"

Marinette snickered. "Funny you should say that. Hearing you call me that so much lately has gotten me in the mood for this." She pulled out a copy of Princess Bride.

Adrien raised an eyebrow. "That campy old thing?"

Marinette gasped, and scowled at him. "Admit it, you know you would make a wonderful Dread Pirate Roberts."

Adrien rolled his eyes and laughed. "With pride."

With that, they settled into the pile of blankets, laying on their stomachs, propped up with pillows. Marinette's feet were up wiggling in the air. They had a bowl of popcorn sitting where they could both reach. The kwamis settled in on their own pillow, snacks at the ready and they started up the movie. Around the time the farm boy, Westley, was fetching Buttercup a pitcher from the hook on the ceiling in a quaint little farmhouse, Adrien looked around the darkened room. His kwami was smiling and having fun. The love of his life was watching the screen with a grin on her face. She was the most relaxed he had ever seen her. He basked in the knowledge that they now knew everything about each other. It was better than he'd ever hoped on those cold nights bounding across the Parisian rooftops. At this Adrien allowed a peculiar feeling to really settle in.

Everything was going to be okay.

The End