Juleka shrugged. “not like we haven’t made weirder excuses to escape class or mamman.”

True, except both siblings were 100% sure their mother knew what they were doing. The Kwami didn’t even argue against it, Tikki saying something about how some parents knew, though Plagg said some parents were morons. He respected the matriarch, so Luka couldn’t complain.

“Who would be in it? other than you, me and Rose?”

“Ivan plays the drums. Rose is really good at metal screaming, so that’s kinda what she was thinking. Ivan 100% could keep up with that. Besides, since Kim learned not to bully him anymore, he’s much more open to being friends with others.”

“I guess being Mylene’s friends help.” Luka said, digging his phone out from where it was buzzing in his pocket. “Ok, if you come up with a concept and a song and an actual workable rehearsal time, I’ll agree. But I still say we’re taking a risk. I got to go; someone placed an order for 3 different pizza places. For the same order.”

“People are weird.” Juleka said, moving her feet.

He looked at his sister who’d been cursed with not being able to be in pictures, loved horror and for a few hours sometimes, would wear a frilly black dress with cat ears and a tail. He was an empath who preferred music to words so much, that he went to an online school and would hop around Paris in a spotted sweatshirt.

His sister wasn’t wrong.

How it changed

Luka pushed the door to Dupain-Cheng Patisserie open, glad to spot a pigtailed girl carrying a tray of pastries – it looked and smelled like cherry turnovers – instead of her father. M. Dupain heard Marinette make one comment on Luka’s appearance and suddenly he was sure his daughter was interested in him. According to Adrien, Marinette had been interested in the blonde transfer student more, at least until Adrien turned her down.

“Welcome to – oh, Luka! Welcome. are you here for a delivery? Papa didn’t say we had one.”

“No, no.” Luka said, walking up to the counter, where Marinette met him after the turnovers were sitting on their shelf in the display case. “I was hoping to hire you for something. Rose mentioned that you opened commissions recently, specifically for graphic design?”

“Yeah! Jagged Stone had me do a poster for him for his latest tour and while he’s pretty easy to please, I thought if I got more practise with other people, that it would help me get better. That way, not even Bob Roth could try and get me to change things.”

Luka had remembered Marinette running around the hotel the day Jagged Stone was akumatized because of XY. He heard later the DJ was related to Jagged’s producer and since Luka himself wasn’t a fan of XY, he and Juleka had been theorizing if his fame was bought.

“Well, Adrien had brought up a good point when he asked if we were serious about doing Kitty Section. If we want to do this, we’re going to need a symbol to put on our social media. I’d like to hire you to design the symbol.”

“Oh, I’d do it for free.” Marinette offered.

“Nope. We’re going to pay you. Adrien has his hands full trying to get everything set up and still follow his mom’s rules for this, since it’ll be a public account, Rose is working on songs and I have to do melodies, Juleka is doing research for cafes or venues that’ll take auditions and Ivan is trying to convince his dad to be our roadie if we need to move our things and my mom’s out of town, who’s the main parent in charge. We need someone who knows our style to help us design a symbol. So, we are paying you to help make our lives easier because once we have that, a lot of the other things will fall into place.”

Marinette stared at him before smiling and nodding. “Alright. But I get to help film your first video. And make outfits!”

Luka nodded. “But symbol first. So, will you take the job, provided we’re happy with the price and timeline?”

“I will.” She said, holding her hand out so they could shake on it.

With Mme. Cheng taking over for her daughter, Luka sat with Marinette in her room, pictures Rose had texted him on his phone, along with blurbs the other members had written about the group.

“A band to show your colours and be free.” Was the main one she kept going back to.

With a picture of Lego Unikitty, Marinette decided to use it and the groups first song as inspiration. Pure white cat with rocker red eyeliner, horn and a heart shaped nose. She even did another with rainbow butterfly wings behind it.

“Ivan could have this version on his drums.” Luka suggested, when Marinette was about to scrap it.

In the end, Adrien had a symbol to make their profile picture, Juleka had something to attach to emails and flyers for places who were willing to accept amateur acts, Rose had something to reflect off of for them to write their band’s anthem and Ivan and Mylene ended up with a new date idea in figuring out how to press on the newly printed design to the front of Ivan’s drum set.

And Marinette had a significant amount of money in her bank account.

Luka using his last pay check – where he worked overtime 4 times –  was 100% worth it.

How it’s going

Luka loved the outfits Marinette made for their first music video, but sometimes, the jackets just made more sense. It was their first performance since opening for Jagged Stone and the restaurant’s owner had told them everyone who booked a table was there to see them. Adrien reposting clips Alya recorded from the concert seemed to be a major help. It was also a week after Fu wasn’t master anymore and Adrien said he loved him. Life might be insane but music was still his way of escape.

Their little group had expanded, with Nino and Alya helping Adrien with filming and Nino joining Max to get their equipment and sound set up. Nathaniel would help Marinette with any designs, Max getting them projected onto their backgrounds. Marc and Mylene were their roadies and assistants. Kim claimed to be their bodyguard, though Alix and Kagami could be more intimidating. After Scarlet Bug had rescued Chloe after she threw off being akumatized, she considered herself their ‘biggest fan’.

Luka didn’t actually believe she liked any of their music but he appreciated the effort.

“Hey.” Juleka threw her shoulder into his arm, Rooar letting out a squeak from where she hid inside Juleka’s jacket. Not hearing Plagg around his sister was taking some getting used to. He hoped Adrien was handling him alright. “How you feeling? Better?”

Since Luka didn’t attend classes in person, he had more free time, so he’d been taking a lot of the Guardian responsibilities, on top of being Scarlet Bug and leading a brand-new team. Juleka had been fighting him the whole way, like the best sister she was.

“Relaxed, for one. Do you think we can actually do this record deal thing with everything going on?” the thought had been running around his head all throughout rehearsal.

“I know we deserve it. you deserve it Lu. Music means the world to you and whether it comes from this or school or whatever you plan after, what we’re about to do, right now? You deserve this 100%. Rose might be the front man, but I like to think you’re the heart and soul of Kitty Section.”

Again, Juleka was the best sister.

She was slightly wrong though. It wasn’t just him as the heart and soul of the band, it was all of them.

“Ladies and gentlemen! We are Kitty Section!” Rose cried into the mic, her pink mask catching on the lights Max and Morvok programmed. The band was playing the opening for ‘Gimme Chocolate’, which Adrien and Kagami would test the singer on to make sure she still had the pronunciation right. “Are you ready to eat sweets and rock?”

It was the all of them, each member, all the people that helped with each performance. this was his main reason for loving music. For loving Kitty Section.