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2021-12-03
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Weapons of Sock Destruction

Summary:

Gabriel has a problem on his hands. Well, in his closet. Half of his socks are disappearing - as in, half of each pair - along with some of his striped ties and other items of clothing. It's driving him crazy.

Then he realizes who's behind it.

And years later, he finds out why.

Notes:

Jenna posted the following prompt today on Tumblr:

Plagg hates the way Gabriel treats Adrien, so starts sneaking into his room at night and like cataclysming his socks just to mess with him.

Gabriel catches him one night and thinks Plagg’s presence means they’ve figured out he’s Shadowmoth.

He keeps coming up with increasingly elaborate ways to try to prove he isn’t Shadowmoth, and is super frustrated because the heroes still haven’t made a move, but they clearly don’t believe his ploys because HIS SOCKS KEEP GETTING CATACLYSMED!!!!

It started as crack, but we're dealing with an abusive and neglectful parent who's also a supervillain, so while his idiocy and Plagg's snark add comic relief, it's more Crack Treated Seriously than pure crack. I also deviated a bit from the details of her original prompt. Hope you enjoy this little lark that I wrote this afternoon instead of working.

Oh, and a little reminder: don't mess with Plagg's kitten. Ever.

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

"Nathalie!"

She blinks at the expense report she'd been going over on her computer when Gabriel barks her name through the intercom.

"Yes, si—"

"Where are my socks?" he snaps without preamble.

Nathalie blinks again. "I didn't realize I was supposed to be looking after them, sir."

"Exactly three pairs of my red socks are missing their mate. Two grey and one striped pair are missing the same," Gabriel informs her, his rage now a seething, quiet thing. "I want to know what happened to them. Now."

"I'll discuss it with the laundry service, sir."

"Inform me at once of your findings." And with that, he's gone.

Nathalie looks back at the monitor and blinks once more before minimizing the expense report and drafting a memo to laundry.

She doesn't get paid enough for this.

****

The head of laundry has been interrogated. Cameras have been checked from every possible angle. It has been confirmed without a doubt that when Gabriel's laundry was delivered and put away in his suite that all recently-laundered socks arrived in perfect pairs.

It was like they disappeared in the night.

A mystery indeed.

Two mornings later, he finds another two pairs of socks missing their other half, as well as discovering the disappearance of one of his ascots. He went to bed knowing there were seven red-and-white striped ties rolled smartly in his drawer, and now there were six.

This time, he skips Nathalie altogether and calls laundry himself, a phone call he ends satisfied that the clearly inept staff in the laundry understand very well what will happen to their jobs if this continues.

Gabriel finally makes his way to his atelier much later than usual, annoyed at having to wear white socks, of all things, because they were the only ones in the drawer not missing their mate.

He feels marginally better by midday after dismissing an intern in tears. That always brightens his day at least a little, but even that doesn't last.

Thwarted again by Ladybug and Chat Noir, Gabriel angrily detransforms and returns to his office to eat dinner at his desk. He can't even enjoy that, however, because he picks up a feeling of desperate loneliness, close by and tantalizing, before realizing it's just Adrien.

He rubs his forehead, sends Nathalie to talk to his son, and returns to his work.

When he dresses for bed, he stares at the pair of white socks in his hand for a long moment before placing them in the laundry hamper, wondering if he'll see both socks again.

Sleep is difficult to come by.

Gabriel has barely situated his glasses properly on his nose the next morning, such is his haste to run to and open his sock drawer.

His primal scream of rage reaches Nathalie's ears just as she's taking a sip of coffee. She closes her eyes and drains the remainder in one gulp. It's going to be a long day.

****

Half a week goes by without incident after the third disappearance, which he'd discovered later had also included the laces from one of his shoes.

Every morning, he checks each drawer, each hanger in his closet, each pair of shoes arranged neatly on the rack. Gabriel knows exactly how many of each he owns, and he counts them at least twice every day to be absolutely certain none are missing.

He can't sleep properly, waking often at the smallest of noises in his bedroom, tossing and turning fretfully even in the silence.

On Thursday morning, he finds two socks missing their entire foot, only the legs and cuffs remaining, as though they'd been unraveled and the threads snipped with precision above the heel.

Friday begins with the discovery of only the collars missing from no less than six of his white oxford shirts.

The now-terrified laundry staff have proven their innocence via daily supervision by Nathalie that every item is accounted for and in its proper place.

Gabriel's desk is littered with diagrams of his suite and a catalogue of each missing or ruined item. He hasn't produced a single design since Wednesday, instead staring wild-eyed at the blueprint of his bedroom and all the possible entrances and exits, including the heating vents.

"I will get to the bottom of this!" he mutters angrily to himself, punctuating the sentence by pounding his fist on the desk.

Nathalie sets another cup of coffee on a small sliver of unoccupied space on his desk and retreats to her own workspace with a cup of hot tea. She takes a sip of tea followed by a deep breath before speaking up. "Have you considered magic, sir?"

His head whips up, wild gaze snapping to hers. "Magic?" He repeats the word as though it's foreign.

She raises her eyebrows and taps the center of her clavicle, where his brooch sits on his own body, hidden beneath one of his remaining ascots.

His eyes narrow. "Nooroo!" he barks, scowling at his kwami when the tiny being appears in front of him.

"Yes, Master?"

"What do you know about the disappearance and destruction of my personal property?"

"Nothing, Master. I would never do such a thing to you."

Gabriel closes his eyes and removes his glasses to squeeze the bridge of his nose. "I wasn't accusing you. I merely asked what you knew."

"And I was truthful. I know nothing. Destruction is not one of my powers."

Gabriel's eyes snap open and his glasses are back on in a flash. "Destruction..." he repeats, trailing off. He looks to his assistant, whose gaze meets his over her tea cup, before moving back to Nooroo's wide purple eyes.

"Plagg," he snarls, watching Nooroo's eyes widen further. Fury rises within him, bright and livid, even as his veins turn to ice. He doesn't know how Plagg could possibly know, but it all makes sense. If Plagg knows, Chat Noir knows. If Chat Noir knows, then certainly Ladybug knows.

They know. They know, and they're sending their minion to psychologically torture him by ruining his clothing and keeping him from wearing his favorite red socks. It's twisted and sick and terrifying.

"I agree, sir," Nathalie starts, and Gabriel realizes he must have been speaking aloud. "But you can still wear red socks. Don't you still have three red socks left?"

"That little cretin destroyed every mate," he explains slowly, as though Nathalie is a child who wasn't listening when she was told the first time.

A beat of silence, and then, "Which leaves you with three identical red socks."

Gabriel decides not to dignify such a ridiculous statement with a response. Clearly Nathalie doesn't understand what he's going through.

Besides, it's not about socks anymore.

They know.

****

He spends the weekend devising and beginning to carry out plans to throw the heroes off his trail. They might think they know, and they might be 100% correct, but he can and will give them every reason to doubt.

His first plan was stupid, in hindsight, born of that initial fear and anger brought on by knowing that they know.

He learned his lesson from Jackady, honestly, but it seemed like a great idea to akumatize someone to come after his civilian self. Why would Shadow Moth do that? And more importantly, how, if he was Gabriel himself? It was foolproof.

Well, the diversion from his identity may have been. The plan was not. He was never doing that again.

The second try a few days later went much better. It was easy enough to create a sentimonster version of himself to become enraged at a contrived situation and give in to Shadow Moth's promises. He didn't get Ladybug and Chat Noir's miraculouses, but he's sure he's done his level best to get them off his scent.

His third plan is currently underway and going perfectly. While an akuma rampages through the Place du Châtelet, Shadow Moth sends a new Senti Gabriel outside - outside the house, outside the gates - to be not only seen but rescued from danger by either Ladybug or Chat Noir. (He hopes it's Chat Noir, and the message is sent loud and clear to his kwami. He's had to replenish his entire stock of red socks once already.)

It's so uncommon for Gabriel Agreste to be seen outside the manor, it causes exactly the ruckus he'd hoped it would. And Chat Noir takes the bait, swooping in and rushing toward him with abject terror in his eyes as the akuma swipes his sharp claws, narrowly missing them both as they soar away.

"What were you doing out there?" Chat Noir demands breathlessly as he sets him down on the front steps after vaulting right over the outer wall of the property. "You could have been seriously hurt, or worse." The hero's voice is stern, but his eyes betray his fear.

Strange.

Senti Gabriel adjusts his striped ascot. "I didn't realize the akuma attack was so close to my home." He doesn't offer an apology.

Chat Noir fixes him with another odd look, then his expression hardens. "Well, get inside your house and stay there. I don't want to see you near the fighting again."

In his lair, Shadow Moth's anger flares at Chat Noir's commanding attitude. How dare he speak to Gabriel Agreste that way?

Senti Gabriel scoffs. "I've told you once already, I don't take orders from anyone. Not even a superhero."

Chat Noir shrugs one shoulder. "What can I say? I don't listen well."

Shadow Moth rolls his eyes, while Senti Gabriel just glares at him.

And in a blink, Chat Noir is gone, rejoining his partner in the fight.

An hour later, when Adrien rushes into the house and bursts into the atelier, Gabriel finds himself wrapped in a hug before he can even stand up fully from his desk.

"I'm so glad you're okay, Father," Adrien murmurs into his suit jacket, and Gabriel pats his son twice on the back. Adrien's voice is no more than a whisper when he says, "Please don't go near akumas anymore. Please."

It reminds him of Chat Noir's impertinence earlier. He grasps Adrien by the shoulders and pulls him away from the embrace.

"I'll go where I please, Adrien." His tone brooks no argument, and he watches his son's expression smooth out and his gaze lower.

"Of course. I was just...worried about you."

"Thank you, but I can handle myself. Head to your room, now. You've clearly had enough excitement this afternoon."

"Yes, Father."

Gabriel sits back down at his desk, satisfied with a job well done. He's definitely put them off his trail. Chat Noir's chaotic gremlin of a kwami could go terrorize someone else, some other person who may or may not be Shadow Moth.

He goes to sleep that night feeling better than he has in two weeks.

When he checks his sock drawer the next morning to discover only one of every single pair of socks - the replenished red, the grey, the striped, the white - he wrenches the drawer from the cabinet and smashes it against the doorway to the walk-in closet. Partnerless socks fly across the floor as wood splinters around him.

He takes out all of his anger on the drawer and its contents until all that remains are shards of wood and metal and single socks on the floor.

Gabriel curses Plagg's very existence, Ladybug's and Chat Noir's and everyone who's ever crossed him.

He grabs two single red socks, disgusted at having to stoop so low. A man of his stature wearing mismatched socks? Never.

He lets that anger carry him to the intercom to tell Nathalie to call the contractor.

There's a mess in here to fix.

****

Years later, Gabriel finds himself in a bind, quite literally. Stripped of his miraculouses, arms and legs tethered around his civilian clothes by Ladybug's yo-yo string, he fixes his now-victorious nemeses with a look of pure hatred. He has nothing left but his fury now, anyway, so he concentrates it all on the two of them.

Chat Noir - Adrien, his own son - walks several paces away to where his ring rests on the floor after having it wrenched from his hand during the fight moments before. He places it back on his finger, then pulls his phone out of his pocket, likely to call the police. He pointedly avoids even looking in his father's direction, which just makes Gabriel angrier.

Rage makes his vision go hazy at the edges, rage at his son's betrayal, at himself for his failure to bring his wife back, at the world for taking her away in the first place, at the sanctimonious spotted hero whose boot still pushes into his ribcage to keep him still, who stares at him with so much bitter enmity that he has to look away.

When he does, he finds himself face-to-face with a tiny floating cat god whose acid green eyes burn with an ancient, terrifying fury. His own anger cowers in the face of it, his veins flooding with ice. All Gabriel knows in this moment is fear.

Then Plagg speaks.

"If I didn't love my kitten a thousand times more than you ever could," he growls, his little voice dripping with contempt, "I would destroy you where you stand." Plagg smiles a little half-smile, showing one fang and a world of animosity. "Oh, I'm sorry, where you lay, tied up and ready to be taken out like the trash you are."

Gabriel scowls at the kwami and spits, "You little piece of—"

Plagg continues as though Gabriel hasn't spoken at all. "I can't wait to see you locked up, imprisoned and alone, living a pitiful, lonely life like you gave your son, who loves you..." He takes a deep breath and his expression hardens, his voice pitching even lower, "Like I said, if I didn't love my kitten, it would only take one word and I'd send you to meet your hideous candy cane ties again."

Gabriel's eyes widen and flash with anger. Plagg simply chuckles, his laugh devoid of humor.

"Yep. Every time you were horrible to him, poof, another sock gone. A shirt here, a few ties there. I thought you deserved some recognition for your A+ parenting." He pauses, lets it sink in, and fixes Gabriel with a thoughtful look. "You know, I don't think you can wear red socks where you're going." He shrugs one tiny shoulder. "Not like you have any left."

The yo-yo string pulls tighter around him as he struggles against it. Plagg floats closer to his face, a blur of black and vivid green.

"Plagg," Ladybug warns. Gabriel wonders if she would actually stop Chat Noir's kwami from killing him on the spot.

"Adrien deserves better," Plagg snarls. And then he's gone, off to comfort his holder as best he can.

"He's right, you know," Ladybug says, simultaneously matter-of-fact and ice-cold.

Gabriel has to concede her point.

Notes:

I'm chatonne-rousse on Tumblr. Come say hi!