Chapter Text
Business was slow but that somehow became the normal for Tom and Sabine, at first they resented it, they truly were busy bodies and they loved to work, needed to work, but then Marinette was akumatized and disappeared. Their baby girl was gone and it felt like there truly was nothing they could do about it. The worst part was they hadn’t even realized she was the akuma at first, they didn’t know things at school had been so bad that Hawkmoth was able to take advantage of their little Baguette’s emotions, and they hadn’t been there to help her through it. Their days seemed routine now, they would wake up at 3 AM instead of their regular 4 AM because of the guilt and the nightmares, they would prep the kitchen then Tom would start on the bread with his father Roland helping out since everything had taken its toll on Tom and he started to become forgetful in things to do with the bakery, even his timing was off. Meanwhile Sabine would attempt to do her morning meditation. The meditation was never successful nowadays because she truly could not clear her mind or calm her heart and memories of Marinette both good and bad would surface and she would be thrown into a fit of sobs that Gina tried her best to help calm.
Roland learned the hard way that he no longer could hum his and his son’s song while making bread as it had reminded his son too much of Marinette and the larger man would break down in tears if he even heard the slightest bit of the song. He would call out for his daughter while hugging whatever he had in his hands close to his chest. Roland had never been the most affectionate of father’s, he wasn’t even affectionate with his wife, but when he broke down like that, Roland felt the urge to just hold his boy and comfort him. It pained him to see his son in so much pain, but Tom and Sabine were strong people and they picked themselves up in order to get through the day.
Well, they tried their best and really that’s all anyone expected of the grieving parents. The day Marinette was akumatized and disappeared had been a normal day for them and maybe that’s what filled them with so much guilt. Their bakery was always busy and that was something they took pride in, before Marinette was born, the bakery had been their baby. They made it, helped and watched it grow, and they got to see it flourish. It was a lot of work and sometimes they would just get into this work zone where nothing else could grab their attention. Working with so many ovens and having to prepare so many things, there was only so much you could multitask before your brain felt full. Though those were only excuses, they had been neglecting their daughter and hadn’t realized it. Marinette knew how much they loved their bakery and how busy it could get and she always seemed to understand but now looking back on it maybe she had just pretended to be fine with it all. They tried their best to always ask how her day was when they would all have dinner together, but Tom would be the first to admit that sometimes even that just became routine rather than actual curiosity about their daughter’s day.
They had deluded themselves into believing that Marinette’s world was rose tinted, and they had taken comfort in the lie. Maybe they truly just wanted to believe that Marinette was their always smiling baby girl and she had no problems to worry about because it would be easier to deal with than the reality. When Marinette had become fascinated with fashion and that fascination grew, Sabine and Tom had been happy and supportive of their daughter, yes their hearts hurt a bit since they had hoped that maybe she would take over the bakery for them, but then they noticed how much time her designing took up. It hurt to think about now but Sabine could remember thinking that it was a blessing that Marinette was distracted and busy because it meant they had more time for the bakery. The more they remembered their shortcomings, the more they felt. They felt too much now after not being able to for so long because of Hawkmoth.
After having to shut down any and all negative emotions, finally being able to express them was like breaking a dam. Crying was never just a little tears, it was always these heart wrenching sobs and it could be for the littlest of things like a broken toy or missing a bus. Anger, now anger was the scariest in everyone's opinion, once someone started yelling it was like they couldn’t stop, they would break things, maybe hoping to see a butterfly, then there was the crying. Everything ended in tears. Anger came quickly nowadays, more so than sadness, though maybe they worked hand in hand now. Tom had found himself more on the depressed side of things, everything made him miss his little Baguette, sometimes he still expected to hear her footsteps racing down from her room and out the door with a shout because she was running late. Sabine on the other hand, everything just made her angry, every little thing. She would even snap at Tom but she would immediately apologize because she knew it wasn’t his fault. If anything she was angry at herself, angry at the school, at Hawkmoth, Hell, even at their bakery.
Some days she hated waking up to the work and the mingling, there were times where she was so close to just begging her husband to closing the shop for a while and taking a break or maybe closing it permanently. She hadn’t decided yet, but she just told herself to hold on, just hold on till their closing period or ‘vacation time’ as Marinette would say. Perhaps that was the reason why she wasn’t really giving it a serious thought, the whole giving up their boulangerie idea. It held memories, both good and heart-aching, of Marinette. Sabine would never talk about those memories with anyone but family now, but every time she was working she couldn’t help but look over at their ‘Artisan Boulanger’ sticker at their storefront that was slightly crooked because Tom had been putting it on when Sabine had told him she was pregnant and he had slipped in shock and the sticker was forever a bit crooked. She couldn’t help the way her hands would clench over a box or bag when giving a customer their things, Marinette had designed them and each time she handed them over it felt like she was giving away a little piece of her daughter each time.
“Have a wonderful day.” Sabine muttered to the latest customer of the day not even caring that her voice came out monotone.
“You as well! Merci Madame.” The young boy who had come in thanked her but Sabine just watched impassively as he hurried over to his friend. “Dude can you believe it? We get to eat pastries that the Protector ate!”
“Correction, we get to eat pastries that Ladybug ate.” His friend responded.
“That hasn’t been proven yet. That’s all just speculation man.” The first boy laughed as they made their way to the door and Sabine had to take in a deep breath or else she might have thrown something. How dare they come into their shop and talk about their daughter as though she wasn’t a person. How dare they treat her akumatization as some spectacle for them to worship and admire. How dare them all.
“Speculation? You are sorely mistaken bro, look at all the evidence! I’ll send you all the links then you’ll see.”
“Yeah, whatever.” Sabine just stared at the young men even after they had left until she no longer could make them out. This. This was why she no longer wanted the bakery, it no longer held the same joy it had when Marinette was there and Sabine and Tom hadn’t even known it until she was gone.
“Bonjour Madame.” Sabine was ripped from her musings by another customer walking in, a regular in fact, Mlle Josephine Bernard. She had been coming to their boulangerie since they first opened and had always been very kind to Marinette. In fact, she commissioned Marinette a few times as well.
“Bonjour Joséphine." Sabine greeted with a small smile, the most she could manage.
“One rhubarb tart please and a pain de campagne. I’m making stew tonight and my fiancé loves when I pair it with your bread.” Joséphine said with a kind smile as she took out her money and change and placed it on the saucer on the counter.
Sabine couldn’t help the soft chuckle that escaped, Joséphine always had exact change and honestly it was a welcome habit to Sabine. “Are you going to share the tart for dessert? It is small, are you certain you would like just one?”
“Oh no, that’s just for me. Our little secret okay?”
“Your secret is safe with me.” Sabine promised as she swiftly gathered Joséphine’s order, once she made her back to the counter to hand everything to the woman she was caught off guard when said woman placed her hand on top of Sabine’s.
“How are you holding up Sabine?”
First instincts were yelling at her to lie, to say everything was fine despite everyone knowing it was not, but another part of her was yearning for reassurance that wasn’t from her husband or his parents. “I...I’m trying. But it’s hard. It’s hard when people come in and talk about my daughter as if she’s this thing that is more than human, more than just a teenager. They don’t even say her name anymore. Tom and I have had to move and lock away her things because...because people have broken in and stolen her belongings in order to steal or collect them. The police have been no help on that front. They told us to just get better locks. As if it is our fault that people are breaking in.” Sabine took in a shaky breath before continuing, “We get people who leave “gifts” instead. They are letters to Tom and I, accusing us of abusing Marinette...of neglecting our baby. They seem to think we don’t care about what happened to her Joséphine. We’ve had to replace some windows after one incident with a rock and some spray paint.”
“Oh my goodness Sabine! I’m so sorry. You and Tom don’t deserve any of that.” Joséphine gasped out, but Sabine wanted to argue that maybe they did. “That is just cruel and disgusting. If you two ever need anything please don’t hesitate to ask, or if you just need to talk or get out of the house for awhile, call me okay? Things...things will get better.”
“Merci Joséphine...maybe I’ll take you up on that. Enjoy your treats and tell me how Stephan likes everything okay?” Sabine responded after a while.
“I will...I will keep you and Tom and Marinette in my prayers. Merci Madame.” Joséphine said before leaving.
Sabine’s movements felt robotic as she walked over to the door, locked it, and flipped the sign letting everyone know they would be closing for lunch. It was a small mercy that they were already at the middle of their day. Thankfully Roland and Gina would have lunch ready for them, they had been so helpful through everything but sometimes Sabine couldn’t help but feel like even they blamed Tom and Sabine for what happened to Marinette. Sabine knew how much Gina adored Marinette and she could see how much getting to know Marinette had meant to Roland, to have their granddaughter gone so all of a sudden, they too were grieving in the way they best knew how. They parented and distracted themselves with helping out Tom and Sabine as much as they could, that would be why they were staying with them. She knew how Roland was about them being late to lunch so Sabine made her way to the kitchen to see Tom baking but it looked like he was doing everything on autopilot, she wouldn’t be surprised if he hadn’t even heard Joséphine come in.
“Tom. Sweetheart. It’s lunchtime, let’s go eat with your parents.” She mumbled as she placed a soft hand on Tom’s shoulder stopping him from decorating the last of the cupcakes he had made.
“Oh...Lunchtime already?”
“Yeah. Here let me put those on display then we’ll head on up.” She took the tray of cupcakes gently from him and went out to the front again to put them on display where she saw several people looking in their shop. She decided to just ignore them...and the camera flashes, though maybe it wouldn’t be a bad idea to pull the security gates down just while they were upstairs for lunch. In fact that’s exactly what she did. “Ready to head up dear?”
“Hmm? Oh yeah, ready. Let’s go eat. It’s been a long morning.” Tom said with a small smile. She felt like it was more for her benefit but she still appreciated it all same. Once they went upstairs they went through the motions of eating lunch and if someone asked Tom and Sabine what they had eaten, they wouldn’t have been able to answer, but they gave the obligatory remarks of, “This is so good thank you,” and,”So good. Maybe you can make it again sometime.” Maybe Roland and Gina saw through them, they probably had and the fact they made no comment about it truly was a blessing. As a way to avoid conversation if they needed to Sabine turned on the television and it just so happened to be the news.
“And as promised viewers video footage of The Protector in action. This footage was donated to us by an anonymous source who had happened upon The Protector out in the open when she was akumatized. I want to warn everybody, the footage may be shocking to some viewers. Roll the clip please.” Nobody spoke. How could they? Sure they knew people still had some weird fascination with their daughter and granddaughter’s akumatization but the news stations had stopped reporting on it or at least they thought they had. Nadja certainly hadn’t given them a heads up about this little ‘special’ of theirs like she had done previously, and yet here they were watching her and Alec talking about their daughter and they wouldn’t even say her name. She has a name. Sabine robotically pressed on the remote to see more info on the program and had to swallow back bile, ‘The Protector Really Paris’s Protector?’ that was the title and already Sabine could feel her anger rising. She didn’t bother reading the summary, she already knew what this special was about.
She watched as her daughter, her baby girl, bent down in a patch of butterfly bushes crying her eyes out, sobbing out her hurt for anyone and everyone to hear. Her baby, even in the distance of the camera, looked so angry, so torn, she should never had to have felt like that. The video continued on with this person slowly zooming in on Marinette and Sabine had to wonder why this person was recording at all. She could never understand people’s obsessions with filming akumas, at least many filmed from a distance other than Alya and sometimes Nadja but it was always after the fact the person was akumatized. Maybe that’s why this particular video was bothering her so much, this person, whoever they were, they were filming her daughter breaking down because they knew at any moment she would be akumatized or, and the idea made her sick to her stomach, they were hoping she would be akumatized. They were hoping for a chance to have a video go viral, maybe they weren’t but that’s the only thing that Sabine could rationalize why they would be filming her teenage daughter in the first place.
The video was a bit shaky as it seemed like the person filming didn’t want to be seen even though there was no one else there. Sabine hadn’t realized she started crying until she felt the tears hit her hand. She hated seeing Marinette in pain and her not being able to comfort her. She, her husband, and his parents watched with bated breath as they saw an akuma finally fly into frame and slowly make its way towards Marinette. Sabine wanted to shout out a warning, do something, but she knew it was pointless and that just made the tears fall more. Everyone watching could tell that Marinette hadn’t noticed the akuma at all as she was still sobbing and wailing, Sabine could feel Tom squeeze her hand and she squeezed his right back. Then the akuma landed and merged but that wasn’t the shocking part, they had to watch their daughter stare at nothing with too-wide eyes and the familiar symbol of Hawkmoth over her face sit there as dozens...no, maybe hundreds of butterflies, white butterflies surrounded Marinette and landed on her body.
Then a bright light flashed, it was so unlike any akumatization anyone had seen, the butterflies were gone but if you looked closely at the fading light surrounding Marinette you could see the faint flutter of wings. Then she stood up, the Protector stood up. Sabine sobbed and not for the first time cursed at her daughters classmates, they had been around Marinette the most, they knew her daughter, she did everything for them and yet they treated her like that. To the point of akumatization. Sabine prayed that her little girl wasn’t actually Ladybug like it was speculated, even if it made sense, because that would mean her daughter had been suffering through more than just everything going on at school and really, Sabine wasn’t ready to face all of that just yet.
“Now before we discuss everything in that video I will say we do have many more to share so stay tuned Paris!”