Chapter Text
The deal was simple: Ladybug had a private room, and since she wasn’t in critical condition, the doctors were trusting her to be in there alone, monitored by only her heartbeat. She could detransform as she needed.
And she did need. Despite the fact that it left her in more pain, she needed to see Tikki.
“It can’t be,” she said. “I... It can’t be.”
Tikki only hovered above her, avoiding eye contact. Marinette fidgeted with her fingers, wishing desperately she had her yoyo to keep her hands occupied.
“Fuck,” she said, not really to or about anything. “Fuck, Tikki.”
“Marinette, you should transform.”
If she were thinking about the pain in her abdomen, she might have.
“You know,” she breathed. “You know whether I’m misremembering what happened or not, whether I’m going crazy... You know the truth. You know who Chat Noir is. And you aren’t telling me. Which is good, which is what you’re supposed to do, and I don’t really want you to tell me, but I need you to tell me. What did I see?”
The kwami floated down to rest on Marinette’s knee. “I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought you’d say.”
If it weren’t for the sixteen stitches over her right ribcage, she would be pacing right now. She should be pacing right now; she’s going stir crazy in her bed, but the doctor threatened to sedate her if she couldn’t stay put. Compromises, compromises.
Her phone — a phone, anyway, one that Adrien had supplied for her to use while she couldn’t use her personal phone — started going off on the table next to her. She sucked in a breath as her stitches began to tear just so she could reach it. The sound was ear splitting, but she couldn’t trust she’d wake up for anything less.
Chat Noir visit, the alarm was marked. She sighed. For however much he annoyed her, he was punctual, she had to admit that.
“Tikki, spots on.”
The ache dulled. She preferred it sharp.
It could have been four minutes or forty before she heard a knock on the door. Or maybe she just didn’t hear the sound until he started banging louder. At any rate, she suddenly became aware of everything around her and looked up, calling out, “I’m transformed; come in.”
The door cracked at first, Chat’s green eye peering in half-closed, then he stepped in completely. He shut it quietly behind him.
“I brought flowers,” he said, holding out the small vase in his hand with a few flowers. “Chamomile, violets, and snapdragons. I picked them out myself.”
The flowers were white, purple, and pale purple-ish pink. She grabbed them, the ache from the motion considerably less dramatic, and brought them to her nose — the scent was faint, but she smiled into the soft petals anyway.
“How are you doing?” he asked, sitting in the chair next to her. “The doctors treating you well?”
“The doctors are treating me fine,” she answered. “Adrien Agreste scared them into that, I think. And it’s been better since I’ve been able to detransform and talk to Tikki, though she wants me to be transformed all the time.”
“You’ll be in less pain,” Chat responded.
“I’ll be bored and lonely.”
“Well, then I’ll have to fix that,” he said with a grin.
Ladybug went silent again, looking at the way he sat. She hadn’t been able to see Adrien sitting there for very long — she’d gotten fifteen minutes where he was relaxed enough to sit and she had enough focus to give his way. But when he sat, he leaned forward, feet flat on the ground, elbows resting on his knees. Chat sat leaning back, one leg crossed over the opposite knee, hands crossed in front of his chest.
It didn’t mean anything. Their transformations made their physiology different, and different positions felt more comfortable, things they couldn’t do normally. Maybe Adrien had bad posture that was fixed as soon as it was transformed —
No, she thought. It was wishful thinking. Adrien sat in front of her every day in Miss Bustier’s class. He had incredible posture.
“What did the doctors say?” he asked, quiet. A question Adrien wouldn’t ask, because she’d already gone over it with him.
“I have sixteen stitches over my right rib cage,” she answered, gesturing vaguely to the wound. “One rib that was broken all the way through, one that was fractured in two different places. I lost a lot of blood. Had a severe concussion, and some swelling on my brain, but no issues from that. The doctors said it was surprising, so it must have been because of my transformation.”
“And your family...?”
“I have it covered. And no, they don’t know my identity.”
Alya was covering for her. Luckily they’d moved into their apartment together or else Marinette would have a lot more lying to do to her parents.
“Good, good.”
They sat in silence for a moment more.
“Is the food any good?” he asked.
“I haven’t been able to keep anything down,” Ladybug said. Quietly. That, she hadn’t admitted to Adrien. He’d worry over her. She was still on IV, and the doctors said that was fine for the time being. “I had some apple juice this morning, but... Puking doesn’t exactly feel great with sixteen stitches, so my doctors agreed that I should wait until I’ve healed a little more.”
The room was quiet.
It shouldn’t be a somber thing, should it? Plenty of people needed IV supplements, or even to live off of IV. But Ladybug knew that her digestive tract hadn’t been impacted by her injury, and that’s where the issue lied. Whatever was keeping her food from staying down was mental, and he wanted to fix that, and...
She wanted to let him, but she couldn’t. She didn’t know how.
“How long until you get the stitches out?” Chat asked.
“Two weeks. More. I don’t know. I’d rather not count the days.”
He nodded. “Don’t put it on our shared calendar, got it.”
And despite everything, Ladybug cracked the barest of smiles. Such a stupid joke, but it was a glimmer of light in all of this — that he was still Chat.
“The doctors said that I’d be able to move around in a wheelchair soon,” she started, the conversation flowing a little more easily. “And I don’t think that’s a good idea. People already are panicking about Ladybug being in the hospital, and I don’t want to be in public like that. But I think it would be fun to have you pushing me around in a wheelchair. I can just imagine all the ‘roll with it’ puns you’d make, and you’d scream out dramatically every time I need to turn, and probably walk me much faster than any doctor would recommend.”
“The way I see it,” Chat responded, leaning in so he was closer to her, “there’s a very easy solution to this problem.”
“Oh, yeah?” Ladybug asked.
“We get Adrien Agreste to use his fortune to buy you your own personal hospital, and then we do all those things. I’m sure he could swing the money. I heard his father owns a blimp.”
Ladybug smiled again, properly this time. “And what else would we do in this big empty hospital all to ourselves?”
“Well, hire some decent chefs, obviously. If Adrien doesn’t have quite enough for that then I think I could find the cash.”
“Who says I couldn’t?” she asked.
“I’m not commenting on your financial state,” Chat clarified. “But this is our time to take care of you. It’s like... BFL. Blonds For Ladybug. We can even get matching T-shirts with your face on them.”
Ladybug rolled her eyes. “And it’s a win for me, because when the two of you fall hopelessly in love, I no longer have to deal with you.”
“I would never give up on you, even if I fell in love with him,” Chat said.
“Oh? So, what, we’d be a throuple?”
“That sounds more reasonable than giving up on my love for you, don’t you think?”
The smile on Ladybug’s face faded slowly, and not because she was unhappy... per se. She didn’t hate the idea of what Chat was saying, not that it would ever happen. But it made sense, that it could happen, because they were two completely different people, and so they could do something like start a polyamorous relationship between themselves and Ladybug.
“Please tell me you’re sleeping with your transformation,” Chat said suddenly. She looked up at him, eyebrows furrowing. “I — I’m sorry. I know you can make your own decisions, and we were having fun goofing around. But tell me you’re sleeping with that risk-free painkiller, if nothing else?”
Ladybug took a sharp breath and looked away. “I like it when Tikki talks me to sleep. She’s good at rambling. And it’s not like I can record her, anyway.”
“Maybe I can send Plagg your way.”
“You need to be ready if the city needs you, Chat,” she countered.
“Then you should get one of the other kwamis.”
“I’m fine.”
They sat in uncomfortable silence for a moment more. Anything she’d felt before, when she was more relaxed and more conversational, was gone.
“What happened after I was gone?” she asked.
“I cataclysmed the akuma,” he answered. “The city is rebuilding. The details don’t matter.”
She sighed and shifted, placing her hands on the bed beneath her so she could sit up. Quickly, Chat was at her side, lifting from beneath her shoulders to help her get an angle. She let him, if only because it would have been more time and energy to argue against it.
“If Hawk Moth attacks again, we should have Ladybug,” he said while he was still near her, whispering down to her. “And I don’t want to take you away from Tikki, but maybe I should take the earrings.”
Ladybug shut her eyes, taking a breath. She couldn’t cry. If only because her cheek had gotten scraped up in the fight, and the tears always got beneath her bandage and made it sting.
She couldn’t take any more pain, not even little pain.
“You’re right,” she said. “Go into the bathroom, and... we can swap kwamis. I’ll take Plagg and you can have Tikki. Maybe I’ll have Scarabella bring me another Miraculous, and she can use the Cat.”
“You can say goodbye,” Chat said, kneeling on the ground next to her, resting his chin on his forearm, which were flat on the mattress. “Don’t punish yourself for getting hurt.”
“No,” she said. “I’ll get Tikki back soon enough. I’m not saying goodbye for such a short break.”
He didn’t move, and she finally looked at him, neck craning down. The vivid green of his eyes was peeking through his eyelashes, gold and green.
“Go, Chat,” she said. “Let me detransform.”
“I never wanted you to detransform,” he whispered.
“You said I can make my own decisions. So let me do that.”
“I don’t want you making decisions you’ll regret.”
Tears began to prickle at her eyes. “Please. Please let me be done with everything. If it’s going to change then let it change all at once.”
They were silent a moment more as Ladybug’s tears built, and then she felt a sting at her cheek. She shut her eyes tight and swallowed what was left in her mouth.
She heard Chat standing. “Okay.”
And like that, he was out of sight, and she could only hope her transformation understood her sobbed “Tikki, spots off.”