Le Chat et Le Serpent

Chapter 31: Death Drive

"Adrien?" James' voice echoed through his room, followed by another knock.

"What?" Adrien's half-asleep word was miles from eloquent.

"Should I cancel your appointments for the day?" His voice cracked, intimidated by the fact that he had to wake up the corporate head.

Adrien rolled to his back, his hand falling towards an empty bed. The flashing lights seeped through his memories.

"Um, that's probably a good idea." Adrien rubbed his face in an attempt to comprehend his current situation. The maroon blood on his hand scratched against the scales on his face.

What the fuck happened? Where did Luka go?

"I can do that sir... um... your superhero friend said she won't wait though." James nervously turned to Rena, who was tapping her foot impetuously.

Fuck. I forgot about the footage. "Come on in, Rena." Adrien didn't have the energy to rebuff her presence.

James gave a slight nod to Rena as he attempted to awkwardly walk around her. It was not that she was in his path, but that he had not grown accustomed to the presence of people with such power.

"Shoo!" Rena did not have the patience to square dance with an awestruck boy.

It wasn't until Rena had walked through the threshold of the door that Adrien realised he should have asked for a minute to prepare himself. He resembled a Vincent Castiglia piece of art, a monstrous depiction of beauty painted by blood.

"Sorry, I didn't get all the footage." Adrien stepped towards his computer. "I found some of Felix and Lila, but-," Rena broke his words by pulling him into a hug.

"We are so worried about you. What happened? They said that you found your mom?" She took a moment to inspect his clothing. "Did you kill her?"

"Let me clean up, Plagg can fill you in." Or at least, Adrien hoped he could. Adrien was selecting clothes as Plagg floated towards Rena. Knowing that Plagg would not appreciate being the messenger, Adrien called out to him, "Sorry, here!" He lobbed a piece of cheese in the Kwami's direction.

"There better be more if you're expecting me to tell her the whole thing!" Plagg snipped before taking a bite of his cheese.

Now on the other side of the bathroom door, Adrien's voice was muffled as he replied. "Already ordered a whole new wheel."

"Adrien!"

"Fine, I'll order two!"

Pleased, Plagg shifted his attention to Rena, but purposefully spoke loud enough for Adrien to hear. "Have you ever seen a horror movie where you're like, 'no, don't do that! That's literally the stupidest thing you can do'?"

Amused at the start of the story, Rena chuckled and nodded her head.

"Well that was basically the ENTIRE night."

-

Adrien rested his head against the wall as the cherry red water spun around the drain. He continued to grapple with his memory of the night. The last 14 hours felt intangible, like a fever dream that he couldn't wake from.

He caressed his raw and swollen wrists. The memory of his own voice screaming was intangibly quiet. Was he fighting Luka? The paramedics?

Where was Luka for all of this? He felt a slight residual rush of anger towards him. Luka was sitting petrified on the front step with... with one barefoot. Was Luka afraid of him? Did he hurt Luka?

Luka heaving over the edge of the walkway flashed within his brain. Alya's introductory questions helped to fill in the blanks.

Mom, we found my mom .