The silence of the old garage was broken only by the ragged sound of Kevin's breathing. Sitting on an overturned toolbox, he finished tightening the clean bandage around his left shoulder. The sharp, searing burn of the open wound had faded into a dull, constant, annoying throb, but it was manageable thanks to the three pills he had dry-swallowed a few minutes prior.
Using his teeth, he pulled the end of the white bandage, tying a tight knot to secure the dressing. He let out a long, shaky sigh, his shoulders dropping as he finally felt he could let his guard down for a split second.
"Hey…" a high-pitched, whiny little voice shattered the fragile peace of the room.
Kevin closed his eyes and let his head fall back, gently thumping against the brick wall behind him. He had forgotten.
Plagg, the tiny black cat-like kwami, floated out of the pocket of the bloodstained jacket lying on the floor. The creature crossed his little arms and glared at him with an expression that was equal parts absolute indignation and sheer exhaustion.
"I was very patient. I hid, I kept my mouth shut, I didn't breathe too loud, and I let you play doctor," Plagg started listing off on his paws, floating right up to Kevin's face. "But magic drains energy, kid. A lot of energy. And if you don't get me some cheese in the next three minutes, I'm going to start chewing on the electrical wiring of this pigsty. Cheese, Kevin! Camembert, preferably!"
Kevin cracked one eye open, staring at him with an exhaustion that weighed deep in his bones.
"We're not in a damn five-star hotel, furball. I just got to this city and barely even know where a pharmacy is, let alone some artisanal dairy shop. You'll eat whatever's in the fridge."
With a titanic effort, Kevin pushed himself to his feet. His muscles protested, but miraculously, the migraine had dialed down to a simple nuisance at the base of his skull. He walked at a sluggish pace toward the small kitchenette attached to the garage, with Plagg buzzing around his head like a relentless mosquito.
He pulled open the door of the old fridge. The yellowish light revealed a few takeout containers, a couple of water bottles, and, on the bottom shelf, a square block wrapped in clear plastic.
Kevin pulled it out and unwrapped it. It was just generic yellow cheese—probably cheap Gouda or processed sandwich slices his dad had picked up at some convenience store the night before. He broke off a generous chunk with his fingers and offered it to the kwami.
Plagg landed on the kitchen table, sniffed the yellow cheese, and his face contorted in a mask of pure disgust.
"What is this plasticized abomination?!" Plagg shrieked, pointing at the cheese as if it were radioactive waste. "This has no soul! It has no texture! It doesn't reek of putrid glory! It is an insult to magical gastronomy!"
Kevin shot him a dead-eyed glare, completely devoid of any patience.
"Listen closely, cupcake. Either you eat that piece of yellow plastic, or I stuff you in a shoebox and toss it into the River Seine. I am not in the mood for culinary critiques."
Plagg gulped, noticing the very real threat gleaming in his new holder's brown eyes. Grudgingly, the creature took the yellow cheese with his tiny paws. He took a minuscule bite, squeezing his eyes shut as he braced for the worst. After chewing a couple of times, his little ears perked up.
"Well… it's not Camembert. It's not even close. But I guess it has enough saturated fats to recharge my batteries," Plagg muttered, right before devouring the rest of the chunk in three rapid bites, stuffing his cheeks.
Kevin didn't stick around to watch the show. He grabbed his bloodstained clothes and headed straight for the bathroom.
The water from the shower was barely lukewarm, but to Kevin, it felt like a blessing. He leaned against the cold tiles, letting the spray wash away the dried blood on his skin, the dirt from the stadium, and the cold sweat of battle. The water swirling down the drain had a faint reddish-gray tint. As he washed, the stinging in his shoulder was a constant reminder of how close he'd come to dying in that pharmacy just hours ago.
Stepping out, he dried himself carefully and put on clean clothes: dark jeans and a black cotton t-shirt. However, his main problem was still staring him in the face: his favorite jacket, the one Arthur had given him, had a bloody hole right through the left shoulder, exactly where Silas's spear had pierced him.
Kevin filled the sink with cold water and soap. With almost obsessive meticulousness, he scrubbed the fabric of the jacket until the very last rust-colored stain was gone, leaving only the jagged tear in the material.
"I can't let my dad see this," he muttered to himself.
He dried the spot with a hair dryer and dug into Arthur's toolbox. His father, a man who was always fixing things, kept a small sewing kit tucked right next to the tape measures. Kevin also rummaged through an old keepsake box where he stored pins and patches he'd collected over the years.
He found two viable options: a circular red Nissan Nismo patch, and a rectangular Toyota TRD one. Kevin cracked a faint smile. Cars had always been his escape. He opted for the Toyota patch; it was wide enough to cover the hole completely.
Sitting on the edge of the bed in his room, Kevin threaded the needle. He was no master tailor, but he had learned to mend his own clothes after so many sudden moves and road trips. With methodical, precise movements, he began stitching the edge of the patch over the torn fabric. The stitches were tight, meant to hold against a hard pull.
When he was done, he bit the thread off. He inspected his handiwork. The Toyota TRD patch looked natural on the dark jacket, like a teenage style statement rather than camouflage for an attempted assassination.
He was just putting the sewing kit away when the unmistakable squeak of the front door hinges echoed through the house, followed by the clatter of keys hitting the entryway table.
Arthur was back.
The shift in Kevin's demeanor was instantaneous. The hardened edge, the sharp sarcasm, and the hostility he'd shown toward Plagg, Silas, and the girl in the red suit vanished. Kevin loved his dad more than anyone else in the world. Arthur was his one constant, his anchor in a life full of chaos, migraines, and uncontrollable powers. He would never dare disrespect or catch an attitude with the man who had sacrificed everything for him.
Kevin stepped out of his room and walked into the living area.
Arthur Mercer was shrugging off a heavy work jacket. He looked exhausted. There was grayish dust on the shoulders of his coat and a faint mud stain on the hem of his pants. Kevin, his senses still sharper than usual from his recent use of the Miraculous, clocked those details immediately. Construction dust and mud didn't align at all with the excuse of visiting the principal's office to sort out school paperwork, like the note had said.
But Kevin didn't say a word. He'd learned that if his dad was hiding something from him, it was for his own safety. Arthur had his secrets, and now, Kevin had his. They were even.
"Hey, Dad," Kevin greeted, leaning casually against the hallway doorframe, trying to keep his voice as relaxed and normal as possible.
Arthur looked up, and a warm, genuine smile lit up his tired face. His blue eyes, so different from his son's brown ones, flashed with relief at seeing him standing there, seemingly unharmed.
"Hey, champ," Arthur replied, walking over and playfully roughing up his hair. "How'd today go? Did you hit the pharmacy? Make it to your first day of school on time?"
Kevin nodded, swallowing hard to lubricate the lie he was about to spin with terrifying fluency.
"Yeah, went to the pharmacy early. Picked up the pills, already took a dose. The headache is completely gone." Kevin smiled, and at least that part was true. "Then I headed to school. Got lost a couple of times, which is to be expected in this damn maze of a city, but I made it."
"And how was it?" Arthur asked, crossing his arms, looking at him with genuine interest. "Did you understand anything the teachers were saying? Did anyone give you crap about your accent? Because if they did, I'm marching in there tomorrow and having a word with the principal."
Kevin let out a genuine, quiet chuckle, feeling a comforting warmth in his chest at his dad's protectiveness.
"Nobody made fun of me, Dad. Honestly… it was a pretty quiet day," Kevin lied, without a single muscle in his face twitching. He smoothly omitted the minor detail about the assassin in the white coat, the giant rock monster, the obliterated stadium, and the magic ring. "I sat in the back, listened to what I could translate in my head, and kept to myself. Classes are different here, but I guess I'll get used to it. It's boring, but it's safe."
Arthur studied him for a second, his piercing gaze searching for any crack in his son's facade. Seeing nothing but his usual rebellious teenager, Arthur nodded, satisfied.
"Glad to hear it, Kev. I know this isn't easy for you. Moving around so much… I know you hate starting from scratch. But I promise you, Paris is gonna be different. We can lay down roots here. We can have a normal life."
The words "normal life" echoed in Kevin's head with painful irony, but he simply nodded.
"I know you're doing your best, Dad. Don't worry about me."
"Alright." Arthur gave him a gentle pat on the right shoulder, thankfully missing the injured left one. "So, how about I order some Chinese takeout for dinner? I am way too dead to cook, and I'm guessing you're not exactly craving my burnt noodles either."
"Chinese sounds perfect."
Thirty minutes later, the two of them were sitting at the small dining table, bathed in the slightly yellow glow of an overhead lamp. In front of them, several white cardboard cartons overflowed with orange chicken, fried rice, and spring rolls.
Dinner passed in deep silence, but it wasn't a tense or awkward one. It was the kind of quiet that only two people who know each other perfectly can share without feeling the need to fill it with empty chatter. The clicking of metal chopsticks against cardboard, the distant hum of Parisian traffic through the window, and their steady breathing was all the conversation they needed.
Kevin watched Arthur out of the corner of his eye as he chewed on a piece of chicken. He deeply admired his father. Arthur wasn't a man of constant hugs or emotional speeches, but his devotion to Kevin was absolute. He had busted his ass in mechanic shops, shipyards, and factories, ruining his hands just to keep them afloat—and more importantly, to keep Kevin out of hospitals and away from anyone who might start asking too many questions about his Devil Fruit. Arthur was the only man on the entire planet Kevin obeyed without hesitation, the only one whose approval actually mattered to him.
If Arthur asked him not to use his powers, Kevin would fight tooth and nail to keep them locked down. Except now, with the ring on his finger, the rules of the game had drastically changed.
After finishing dinner, Kevin helped clear the table, told his dad "goodnight, get some rest," and locked himself in his room.
Flicking on the bedroom light, Kevin let out a long sigh, dropping his rigid posture. His room was his sanctuary, a true reflection of his personality. It was relatively simple and neat, lacking the chaotic clutter of your average teenager. It had a small, attached private bathroom, a twin bed pushed against the wall, and a solid wood desk.
The white walls were meticulously decorated. Dominating the space above his headboard was a massive poster of a silver Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution X, drifting through a curve with smoke billowing from the tires. Kevin was obsessed with automotive engineering, the raw speed, and the precise control those machines demanded. On the opposite wall, an Imagine Dragons poster added a musical touch to the room, its dark, vibrant colors perfectly matching the boy's aesthetic.
In the right corner, resting on a clean, organized desk, sat his custom-built PC. The tower featured a tempered glass side panel and subtle red LED lighting—a rig he had built himself, piece by piece, under his dad's supervision.
But the most striking thing in the room sat on a floating dark wood shelf mounted just above the desk. Three custom-made swords rested there. They weren't toys. Arthur had forged and assembled them for him years ago, combining heavy-duty metal hilts with blades carved from incredibly dense oak. They were training tools, designed specifically so Kevin could channel the vibrational energy from his hands into an inanimate object, helping him control his tremors and focus his anger back when he was younger.
Kevin sat on the edge of the bed, rubbing his eyes.
Suddenly, Plagg shot out from under Kevin's jacket, zooming around the room like a black bullet.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" the kwami exclaimed, doing mid-air flips and snooping in every corner. "Now this is different from the spoiled princes' rooms I used to hang out in! I am loving the gloomy, techy vibe of this place!"
Plagg floated over to the desk, inspected the dark PC monitor, and then drifted up toward the sword shelf.
"Watch it, half-pint!" Kevin warned him, his voice low but firm, jumping to his feet when he saw Plagg getting too close to the wooden weapons. "Don't touch a single thing on that shelf. My dad made those for me, and if you knock one over and break it, I swear to God I'll put you on a celery diet for the rest of eternity."
Plagg backed up in the air, throwing his tiny paws up in surrender, though a mischievous grin crossed his feline face.
"Take it easy, grumpy. I was just looking. Swords are boring anyway. I prefer destroying things with my own claws." Plagg did a backflip and landed on Kevin's pillow, sinking comfortably into it. "By the way, you should get some sleep. Magic repairs your body to an extent, but you're still just a mortal who lost a lot of blood today."
Kevin scowled, ready to tell him to shut up, when a sudden, ice-cold jolt of panic shot down his spine.
He looked at his desk. He looked at the floor by the door. He looked under his bed.
Something was missing. Something incredibly important.
"Dammit…" Kevin cursed under his breath, grabbing his head in despair. "My backpack!"
"What about your backpack?" Plagg asked, not even opening his eyes as he snuggled deeper into the pillow.
"I left it at the pharmacy!" Kevin gritted his teeth, feeling utterly overwhelmed by the sheer stupidity of his own distraction. "When that psycho Silas attacked me and everything went to hell, I dropped it on the floor right in front of the counter. That's where all my school supplies, my notebook, and my extra pills are! I can't go to school tomorrow without it, my dad will instantly realize I lied about my first day."
Kevin glanced at the digital clock on his PC monitor: 11:45 PM.
He had no choice. He had to go back and get it tonight.
He went to his closet and pulled out dark, low-profile clothes: a black hoodie, gray sweatpants, and a pair of dark sneakers. He dressed quickly, ignoring the sharp sting in his shoulder as he pulled the sleeve on.
"Where are you going?" Plagg asked, popping one glowing green eye open in the dim light.
"To fix my mistake. Stay here, hide, and don't make a sound," Kevin ordered, stepping up to his bedroom window.
He slid the glass window open with excruciating care, making sure the tracks didn't squeal. The crisp Parisian night air hit his face. Arthur's garage was on the ground floor facing a quiet back alley, which made sneaking out incredibly easy. Kevin swung a leg over the sill and slipped out onto the street, pulling the window closed behind him, leaving just a sliver open so he could get back in.
The streets of Paris were eerily empty. The City of Love seemed to have entered an unofficial curfew following the stone monster attack that afternoon. The yellowish streetlights flickered, casting long shadows across the sidewalks.
Kevin started jogging. He didn't invoke the power of the Miraculous; he didn't want to risk using unnecessary magic. However, as he trotted through cobblestone alleys and vaulted over a few low walls to take shortcuts, he noticed something strange.
He was faster than normal. His vaults took less effort, his breathing was perfectly steady, and his feet barely made a sound when they hit the pavement. Plagg's presence, even without the active transformation, seemed to grant him a slight passive physical boost—a lingering feline instinct that intertwined with his own athletic build. Even better, he realized he was running, fully alert, and didn't feel an ounce of a headache. His mind was razor-sharp and crystal clear.
After fifteen minutes of stealthy urban parkour, he reached the street corner where the pharmacy was located.
He stopped dead in his tracks, melting into the shadows of the adjacent building.
The pharmacy's facade was unrecognizable. The metal security grate was blown outward, the glass windows were completely shattered across the sidewalk, and broken shelving poked out through the hole in the wall. But what stopped Kevin was the long perimeter of yellow police tape cordoning off the entire area. Two French national police officers were standing next to a squad car parked a few yards away, smoking and chatting in low voices as they guarded the crime scene.
Kevin clicked his tongue. Of course there'd be cops. I blew up half the building fighting a psychopathic assassin, he thought, annoyed.
Assessing the environment took him seconds. The front entrance was suicide. However, he remembered that during the brawl with Silas, he had brought down part of the back stockroom ceiling, and the rear emergency door had also taken a hit.
Kevin skirted the block, moving as smoothly as a shadow. He slipped down the narrow back alley the pharmacy shared with an apartment building. The metal emergency door of the pharmacy was warped, half-torn off its hinges by the shockwave of his seismic punch.
With a silent, fluid motion, Kevin squeezed through the gap left by the twisted door, stepping into the pitch-black, ruined stockroom.
The inside reeked of bleach, spilled medication, and drywall dust. Only the moonlight filtering through the cracks in the ceiling illuminated the wreckage. Kevin moved in a low crouch, stepping carefully where the linoleum floor was clear of glass to avoid making a sound. The cops were right outside the storefront; a single crunch would give him away.
He reached the main counter area. The spot where Silas had tried to skewer him was in ruins. His eyes adjusted to the dark, scanning the floor behind the shattered glass of the cash register.
There it was. His dark gray backpack lay covered in a thin layer of plaster dust, but otherwise looked completely intact.
Kevin slipped behind the counter, grabbed the backpack by the strap, and slung it over his good shoulder. At that exact moment, he heard the crunch of heavy boots on the asphalt. One of the cops was walking up to the shattered storefront, shining the beam of his flashlight into the gutted pharmacy.
The beam of white light swept across the aisles, rapidly sweeping toward Kevin's position.
On pure instinct, Kevin dropped flat on his stomach, pressing himself tight against the bottom kickplate of the counter, holding his breath. The flashlight beam swept right over his head, illuminating the dust motes suspended in the air before moving on.
"Nothing in here, Jean. Just rubble," the cop's voice echoed from outside. "Whoever caused this explosion is long gone by now."
"Come back to the car, it's freezing," the other officer called back.
The footsteps faded away. Kevin silently exhaled the air trapped in his lungs. With the backpack firmly secured, he turned around and slinked out through the same warped back door he'd entered, vanishing into the Paris night without a trace.
The trip back to his room was fast and uneventful. He slipped through the window, locked it, and peeled off his hoodie, finally feeling the extreme exhaustion crash over his body. Plagg was still snoring softly on the pillow. Kevin tossed the backpack next to his desk, collapsed onto the bed fully clothed, and, in less than a minute, fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
The next morning, the sunlight streaming through the window forced Kevin to open his eyes. He blinked, feeling strangely refreshed. The pills, the rest, and maybe the residual influence of his new magical roommate had worked wonders. His shoulder ached, sure, but it was a bearable pain, like a deep bruise after a gym sparring session. Most importantly: his head was completely clear.
He got ready quickly. He threw on his black jacket with the freshly sewn Toyota patch on the shoulder, checking the mirror to ensure it didn't look bulky. He slipped a napkin-wrapped slice of yellow cheese into his inside pocket for Plagg, grabbed his recovered backpack, and headed out the door after shooting Arthur a goodbye nod.
The walk to the prestigious Collège Françoise Dupont was far less chaotic than the day before, mainly because Kevin actually paid attention to street signs this time and used his phone—hooked up to a nearby café's Wi-Fi—to download an offline map of the city.
The school building was imposing, built in classic Parisian architecture with sweeping archways and a large open-air central courtyard. Kevin walked through the wrought-iron gates with a look of utter apathy. He was pretty early, arriving before the main bell had even rung.
He found his assigned classroom with no problem. It was a spacious, well-lit tiered lecture room. The rows of two-person desks stepped up gradually toward the back.
Following his ingrained instinct to always keep his back to a wall and observe everything from a vantage point, Kevin walked straight to the very last row and took the outer seat. He dropped his backpack on the desk and crossed his arms, waiting for the punishment of the educational system to begin.
Slowly, students started trickling in. A guy in a baseball cap, a blonde girl who walked in like she owned the place followed by her bespectacled friend. A few of them noticed the new kid in the back. They shot brief, curious glances at the sullen-looking foreigner in the jacket covered in car patches, but once Kevin shot back a cold glare that clearly translated to "do not talk to me," they took the hint and found their own seats.
The chatter in the room steadily grew until a girl came stumbling through the door.
She had black hair with blue highlights, tied back in two pigtails. It was Marinette.
The girl stopped dead in her tracks as she looked up and scanned the room. Her blue eyes locked directly onto Kevin's brown ones. The initial shock on Marinette's face was almost instantly replaced by a look of deep disgust and blazing anger. She puffed her cheeks out slightly in indignation. She recognized him. He was the rude, ill-mannered foreigner with the garbage French who had yanked her by her hair and yelled at the old man the morning before.
Marinette held his gaze for a solid second, glaring at him with all the contempt she could muster, before she haughtily whipped her head away, marched up the steps, and dropped heavily into a seat in the second row, muttering curses under her breath.
Kevin rolled his eyes. Great, I've already made my first official enemy at school, he thought, though he honestly couldn't care less.
Moments later, a girl with thick-rimmed glasses and a plaid shirt rushed in and took the seat next to Marinette. It was Alya.
Bored out of his mind, Kevin propped his chin on his hand and tuned in, using his subtly enhanced hearing to eavesdrop on the girls' conversation a couple of rows down, just to kill time.
"You are not going to believe what I got for my blog!" Alya exclaimed, her voice practically vibrating with excitement as she pulled out her phone to show Marinette. "Yesterday was the greatest day of my life! I had front-row seats to the whole thing!"
Marinette, still trying to swallow her rage over the rude guy sitting in her class, forced a nervous smile. "W-what are you talking about, Alya?"
"The superheroes, obviously!" Alya waved her hands excitedly, her eyes shining behind the lenses of her glasses. "Paris finally has its own heroes, just like the States! New York has Majestia, and now we've got Ladybug and the Black Cat! They're amazing! Although, honestly, that guy in black is a little scary. I got a video of him shattering the stadium's facade with a single punch, and he didn't even flinch when Ivan almost got crushed."
Sitting in the back row, Kevin couldn't stop a small, dark, arrogant smirk from tugging at the corner of his mouth as he realized his intimidating reputation was already all over the internet.
Before Marinette could respond to the comment about her alter ego and her insufferable feline partner, someone stomped up the aisle stairs and stopped right next to Kevin's desk.
It was a short, tough-looking girl dressed in baggy sportswear, carrying a pair of roller skates, with a hip-hop-style cap flipped backward over her pink hair.
Alix glanced at her usual seat, then looked over at the serious-faced guy occupying the spot next to it.
"Sup," Alix said, giving him a quick, no-nonsense upward chin nod as she tossed her backpack onto the desk and sat down beside him.
Kevin looked at her out of the corner of his eye. He clocked her relaxed body language, the complete lack of any intention to force unnecessary small talk, and her obvious street-smart attitude. He liked her immediately.
Matching her dry vibe, Kevin gave a single upward nod in return.
"I'm Kevin," he said, his voice low and neutral.
"Alix," she replied, immediately starting to check the wheels on her skates on top of the desk. "Cool patch."
Kevin glanced at his shoulder and gave a slight nod. They didn't say another word. Both of them felt perfectly comfortable in that dynamic of mutual respect without the need for mindless chatter.
Suddenly, the teacher, Miss Bustier, walked into the classroom, clapping her hands a couple of times to get everyone's attention.
"Alright, students! Please take your seats and put your phones away. I know yesterday was a… complicated and frightening day for many of us, but today we need to return to our normal routine and—"
The teacher's reassuring speech was brutally cut short. Practically every cell phone in the classroom began vibrating, ringing, or pinging with notifications all at once.
Frowning, Alix pulled her phone out of her pocket. She opened a breaking news video alert. Out of sheer curiosity, Kevin leaned over slightly to look at the screen from his seat.
The news footage, shot live from a helicopter, showed the streets of Paris. But it wasn't normal traffic. Dozens of people in different parts of the city were completely immobilized. Their bodies weren't made of flesh, but of solid gray rock. They were smaller versions of the exact same stone monster Kevin had fought the day before.
"Mayor Bourgeois is urging citizens to remain calm," the news anchor was saying, her voice shaking with panic, "but reports indicate that this morning, the stone creature that attacked the stadium yesterday was not an isolated incident. For completely unknown reasons, dozens of citizens are being mysteriously transformed into identical stone golems, forming what appears to be an army..."
A chill of tension swept through the classroom. The students started murmuring in fear. Marinette clamped her hands over her mouth, pale and horrified as the crushing realization hit her: she had made a massive mistake by not catching that dark butterfly.
Kevin, meanwhile, clenched his jaw. His eyes sharpened.
Dammit. I told Wonder Woman yesterday, half-assed jobs always come back to bite you in the ass, Kevin thought, clenching his fists on the desk, feeling Plagg shifting nervously inside his jacket.
Miss Bustier tried to speak up to calm the rising panic, but it was useless.
The floor beneath their feet began to tremble. It wasn't an earthquake triggered by Kevin; they were footsteps. Massive, heavy, thunderous footsteps echoing down the school's outdoor corridor, making the glass in the windows rattle in their frames.
BOOM… BOOM… BOOM…
The students screamed, backing away toward the opposite wall. Kevin and Alix shot out of their seats instantly.
With a deafening crash of shattering brick, exploding drywall, and twisting metal, the main wall of the classroom burst inward in a massive cloud of white dust and rubble.
Emerging from the cloud of destruction, a colossal sixty-foot-tall figure made entirely of living rock with glowing dark purple eyes barged into the room.
Stoneheart was back, and this time, he was furious.