Disclaimer #1: Be glad I don't own Miraculous Tales of Ladybug and Chat Noir. If I did, Ladybug wouldn't basically have had the power to bring back the dead. Then again, that episode may have not occurred anyways if I owned it; I am not a big fan of time travel as it tends to give me a headache if I think about it too much.

Disclaimer #2: I don't own this AU. Rather, it belongs to InsanitySilver. Go blame her for some of the pain that this causes, and perhaps be glad she doesn't own Miraculous Tales of Ladybug and Chat Noir. But anyways, in this AU Theo becomes Copycat after Alix becomes Timebreaker, although it's for different reasons as will be explained. Sorta. Well, the reasons are implied.

Hawk Moth closed his eyes. Despite being a man whose livelihood lied in the humanities and greatest hope was in magic, his thought processes seemed more like they'd be found coming from a man firmly rooted in the STEM fields. Everything he did had a certain logic to it: fabrics were carefully calculated so that the folds would be flattering to most figures, perfumes were mixed so that they could have the strongest possible potency while still not hurting sensitive noses and sensitive lungs. He had finally been able to pinpoint the general area of the Miraculous, and would then pick out the strongest emotions that were closest to that area; that way his akumas wouldn't tire out too badly. It was too bad that they were so close to the school his son attended.

Correction: the school his son had attended. His son had been missing for the past few weeks, ever since an incident with an akuma called Timebreaker. At first, Hawk Moth had only been worried about the fact that his plans had taken a rather unexpected turn. Would they still work when one of the Miraculous was missing? His kwami, if it knew the answers to his predicament, had chosen not to share the answers. And so he was left like scientist staring at something currently inexpiable, such as gravity, the big bang, or time; trying to find reason in it.

He hadn't noticed the fact that his son hadn't come home that day and wasn't answering his calls. Teenage rebellion, he had called it, caused by hormones that he wasn't controlling properly. Then, when he realized that his son had been there when Timebreaker had shown up, Hawk Moth had blamed this rebellion on the fact that he had just seen his class be massacred. To be honest, he had expected that when the akuma was cured and Ladybug used her fix-all power, the students who had been erased from existence would be returned to life. He may try to act as if he wanted this to happen only because he wanted Chat Noir's Miraculous, but it was also because he had lost a child. He had lost one of his sons, possibly both of them. Even though he would unleash the full force of a hundred googol supernovae on the planet, and far more on the universe if it meant that he could piece together his family, he didn't want other parents to have to experience this feeling of loss.

The teen, it turned out, hadn't been at his friend's house, and so he decided to get the police involved. Because, after all, he would know if an akuma had dared to hurt his son. Thus, it must have been something else. Perhaps the stress of seeing your friends massacred in front of you had gotten to him. Perhaps that had been what had inspired him to flee home. Flee Paris. Flee France, possibly. But as intelligent as his son was, he could not vanish without a trace. Had someone chosen to kidnap him? No ransom had been given, so it meant that it probably wasn't for money. So what had happened to him?

In different moments, he'd go back to trying to find his son. Right now, Hawk Moth had more pressing matters.

Out of all of the low blows Hawk Moth could deal to Ladybug, this one was the worst. How dare he create a fake Chat Noir - a Copycat? And worse, he had all of her beloved - yes, beloved - partner's cockiness and none of his kindness.

The worst part had been that at first, she had truly thought that he had come back. If he came back, then so would Rose, Ivan, and Alya; it meant that things could go back to... almost normal. Nothing would be normal, not after the Timebreaker incident. Alix would still be in America, and Nino would still have transferred schools. And Adrien would still be missing.

"Gee, Ladybug, I don't understand. You wanted Chat Noir back, you got him back. Who cares if we're different people behind the mask?" Copycat switched his hold on his staff to one that was more like a hold one would hold their foil with when fencing. Hawk Moth's breath hitched in his throat. When fencing.

"You are nothing like him," Ladybug replied.

"Did you even know him?"

"I... I..."

"No, but you could know me," he said, flashing a model-perfect grin that made her heart lurch because she had seen it on someone else. "Just give me your Mira-"

He was cut off by his transformation ceasing without having been purified. Copycat disappeared into black bubbles, and Theo looked around in confusion, trying to process what had just happened. Trying to process why Ladybug was running away from him, in tears. He had made her cry, again.

But she wasn't crying because of Theo, at least, not directly. She was crying because both of the boys she loved had died in her arms and she hadn't even noticed.

How had I not seen it sooner? That was the thought that ran through Hawk Moth's head as he released his transformation, and by extension Copycat's. He had seen that smile so many times, but rarely in person. No, it was almost always in photo layouts that he'd approve. How had he never seen it? He hadn't been around to notice. What kind of father was he?

Gabriel Argeste pulled out his wallet with shaking hands, opening it to an old photograph from happier times. It showed him, his wife, and their twin sons. It was from nine years ago, before Félix had gotten cancer and died at the age of eight. It was before his wife had been hit by a car five years ago when his remaining son was ten. It was definitely before Adrien was killed by Timebreaker while under the guise of Chat Noir.

He had been doing all of this for them. All he had wanted, ever since they had found out about the tumor, was to fix his family. At first, it was simply trying everything so that his precious little boy would be okay rather than lying in bed and in pain with tubes coming out his nose. After that, there wasn't anything he could do. It simply was logical. The world did not work that way. There was no way to bring back a precious little boy and a wonderful woman who had both died before their time. There was nothing he could do until a dark and sweet little voice coming from a brooch shaped like a butterfly told him she could make all of his troubles go away. She could, if he got the other Miraculous for her, bring back his wife and son. It had seemed like a good idea, but it had taken his remaining family away from him.

"Maybe," Fiinks said to him, her cold eyes pretending to care about her host, even though she hadn't cared about any of them. He looked at her, tears in his eyes. "Maybe we haven't lost the chance. Perhaps Copycat's ring will be able to function as a proxy for Chat Noir's Miraculous. Then we can use it to bring him back, steal his Miraculous, and then you can have your family back." And the power will finally be mine, she silently added. He was so easy to dupe. They all were. Their grief had blinded them, had blinded all of them.

Grimly, Gabriel nodded before putting the photograph away and taking out his phone, telling Nathalie to call off the cops. Telling her that he got the feeling that Adrien would never be found.

He didn't tell her the reason why Adrien would never be found. The fashion designer didn't tell his assistant that his son would never be found because, indirectly, he had killed him.

Mwahahaha.