Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The digital clock on top of her shelf marked the time with a light beep. 

She rolled her eyes at it, and sat on her bed, looking at the infinite. 

Brushing her hair away from her face, and rubbing her eyes to not fall asleep again, Marinette let out a big sigh. 

The dark atmosphere of the room did nothing to help her feelings. Not that anything would. 

She looked at the shelf beside her and reached for the pair of red earrings that were lying there like they were nothing when they actually were the most precious thing she would ever own. 

Marinette held the earrings close to her heart. 

To her stupid, damned heart. 

None of this would be happening if it wasn’t for it. She always knew her heart would be the doom of her existence but… not like this. 

She unwrapped herself from the sheets and made her way down to the first floor of her room. 

Tikki followed close, she was silent but she might as well be talking because her thoughts were extremely loud. 

“I’ll be okay,” Marinette said. Lying. “Let’s go through the rules one more time,”

“Do we have to?” Tikki asked in a tiny voice. “I know them perfectly, Marinette… you’ve been repeating them for a month and a few weeks now. I know what to do…”

“I just….” Won’t be there to repeat them if you need to. 

Marinette sighed, defeated. 

“No, we don’t have to,”

She walked to her desk and took the plate filled with baked goods.

“Do you remember my parents’ schedule?”

“Yes, I do,”

“Your hidden spot?”

“Yes,” She nodded and sat on Marinette’s shoulders, nuzzling her head against her cheek. 

Marinette sighed and threw her head back. 

“This is harder than I thought,” 

“Is it really?” Tikki asks, curious peeks through her words. 

Marinette nods, “I… thought pain had a limit, you know?”

“ Oh, Marinette, ” Tikki does her version of a hug, leaving tiny kisses all over Marinette’s face. 

Silence reigns in the night once again. 

The moonlight leaks through her window and lights up a square in her room. Marinette pulls a blanket, drags it to the chaise and brings with her the plate with food, ready to have a long and heartwarming talk with her kwami.

It is painful, to chat like this. It is not different from what they usually do but knowing that tonight will be the last time they talk like this makes it emotional.

What makes it worse is that it is not her first goodbye of the day. 

She already said goodbye to Chat Noir, he just didn’t know it. Because he can’t know it. 

So, he didn’t see this patrol as anything but a fun time with his dear friend. 

Marinette tried her best to have a good last encounter without making it obvious that she was leaving. She took a tupperware with food, a selection of his favorites, she raced him to the Arc de Triomphe and they ended up staying until very late talking about everything and nothing. She even let slide a few things about her civilian life so he would giggle with joy every time he realized what she had done. 

She hoped he had treasured tonight just as much as she was going to treasure it for the rest of her life. Or at least, until she could come back to him. 

Marinette lied awake, looking at the roof, Tikki sleeping on top of her chest, and hummed to herself. 

She couldn’t sleep. She wasn’t even going to try, it was going to be useless. 

Instead, she started to think about every battle she had had as Ladybug, trying her best to remember every single detail, as little as it could be. 

Those memories were the only thing she would have to remind herself that she was, had been Ladybug. 

Because as from tomorrow, she would not have the earrings as proof.  

xx

A brand new day started with the rise of the sun, with beautiful weather and birds singing. If today had been any other day, Marinette would be all about it, but sadly, that wasn’t the case. 

She had only slept two hours and the bags under her eyes were more prominent than ever, something her parents would not be happy about and neither was Tikki, but she didn’t say anything, giving the situation. 

Marinette took a short shower and dressed with the first thing she found in her closet. Unfortunate, since today she had the time to take care of her outfit and carefully select it, she just wasn't in the mood for that. 

She put her hair in a ponytail, too afraid that she would start crying if she did her iconic pigtails, and put a pair of black earrings she had bought a few days ago at the mall. 

“Are you ready?” Marinette asked at the silent kwami beside her. 

Tikki’s eyes gleamed with tears as she shook her head. 

“Oh, please,” She sobbed, biting her lip to keep her from crying. 

“I will miss you so much, Marinette,”

“I will miss you too,” Marinette took Tikki in her hands and pressed their foreheads together, “I’ll be back as soon as I can. I promise.”

“I’ll count the days,” Tikki kissed her cheek.

The kwami flew away and sat on top of the wood hexagonal box with the earrings. 

“Goodbye, Marinette,”

“Goodbye, Tikki,” She waved until a red light popped and Tikki disappeared.

Marinette closed the box without giving any second thoughts because if she let herself have them she would never leave her room. 

These days her routine was a constant of doing things as fast as she could because if she didn’t then she would never be able to reach her goal.

She took the bag on her chair, pulled her pink parka out of a hanger and ran downstairs.

Marinette couldn’t make it through the living room without getting caught. 

“Where are you going, little lady?” Her mother said from the kitchen. 

“I have an appointment I can’t miss,” And that was the full truth. 

“You need to eat breakfast first, you know it, Marinette. And did you take your medicine?”

Marinette rolled her eyes softly. 

She pushed the bag to her front, opened it and took a little cat bag and a bottle. She shook the cat-bag and this made a funny noise. 

“All here, I was going to take it on my way to the metro,”

“You need to eat before you take them,” Sabine said, a little angry.

“I was going to grab a bite at the bakery, mom,” Marinette whined, “I’ll be back soon, I promise, I love you!” She said running over her words as she ran to the door. 

She heard her mother scream but ignored it. There was no way she would be late today. 

As she said, she took one bag of small cookies out of the bakery, she put them on her backpack, and as she walked to the metro she took the medicine. 

When she put the silver plastic tablets full of pills back in her cat-bag, she frowned at them and threw them with hate inside the backpack. 

She was tired of taking them, she was so done with having to swallow fifteen pills a day. Especially when medicine had been the reason she was unhealthy. 

Marinette tried to brush off her thoughts, to keep her mind on the game, but when her heart started to beat fast, she couldn’t do it. All her focus was on the beat, on the rhythm, on how she was feeling. 

And it had been like this since she had been diagnosed two months ago. 

xx

Marinette only stopped worrying about her heart when she reached her destination. 

She bounced out of the wagon, on her station and her eyes were back on the goal. 

Her phone had been rining a few times, but she had ignored it. No distractions until she delivered her package. 

Marinette strutted the streets of a more suburban area in Paris. She looked around at the rooftops, they were lower than they were in the center, but they would work. 

She couldn’t change where her chosen lived. It was that or choosing someone she did not like to replace her. 

Marinette had look through all Paris, picking and testing different girls all over the city. Until she found her perfect match. 

Aimée Song. 

Aimée looked awfully similar to Marinette, -she was Korean, not Chinese, but because of her French ascendency, it wouldn’t be much trouble- she was also top of her class, very kind and had great physical skills that could come handy in the time for battle. 

With a little bit of training, she would become the perfect replacement. 

So, for a month, Marinette -without revealing her identity- had been training her to be the next Ladybug.

And now she was about to make her replacement official. 

Marinette stopped in front of a grocery store, she looked at each side, searching for curious eyes and when the coast was clean she ran to the alley to the right. 

She walked until the alley got divided in two by a green wall. Turning to the right, she leaned on the wall, took a cap of her bag and waited. 

Not long after, she heard cautious steps approaching. 

“Ladybug?” Aimée’s voice echoed through the alley. 

“Yeah,” Marinette said, doing her best to change her voice. 

Aimée walked at the other side of the wall and sat on the street. 

“I can’t believe this is really happening,” Aimée gushed.

Neither did Marinette but here they were. 

“Do you remember all the rules?” Marinette asked. 

It was important for her to remember, even if Marinette had written them in a note that she was about to give her. 

“I must not reveal my identity. I must do my best to keep the status quo. I can’t go looking for you. I can’t let anyone know that Ladybug has changed. I can’t let Chat Noir know I am not you. I can’t show Tikki to anyone. I can’t abuse my powers. I have to take care of Chat Noir,”

Marinette winced. 

They were out of others, but they were almost all the important rules anyway. She wouldn’t give her a hard time for it. However, she did think it was important to mention again one last thing.

“You can only look for me if, and only if you guys defeat Papillon, and if and only if something really bad happens. Understood?”

“Understood,” Marinette could tell Aimée was nodding and smiling. She was joyful like that. 

“I’m leaving you a binder with everything you need to know, please study it. You’ll find a few recipes for Tikki, and a few warnings that will come handy. There are a few notes about Chat Noir too, a few jokes that I remembered last minute, and things he likes in case you need to surprise him or cheer him up,”

“Okay,” 

“And all the information we have gathered across the years that you must know. It’ll be weird if Ladybug stopped knowing all these secrets. Please promise me you’ll make your best to remember them,”

“I promise, Ladybug. This is a once in a lifetime chance, and such an honor too, I won’t let you down,”

Marinette kept her mouth shut. Unsure of what to say because she was unsure of how she actually fell. 

“So, are you ready?” Marinette asked

“Yes!” Aimée answered.

At the same time, Marinette realized that she was not. 

But it was already too late. 

Chapter Text

Adrien changed his bag to his other arm as he made his way to the classroom. He chassé-ed his way to the door with joy beating on his heart. 

What a beautiful evening he had had. He went to bed beaming and he woke up with the same happiness still vibrant inside of him. 

Nothing could ruin his day, the memories of his incredible partner laughing and hugging him last night were going through his mind like the scenes of an old movie. They were so tender and they felt surreal, but they were a hundred percent part of his life. 

In the late months, Ladybug had loosened up her hair. She hadn’t been as strict with their identities as she had always been and had talked about her life with much sincerity. He didn’t know what had managed to make a change in her, but he liked it. 

Adrien was arriving at the art room when the sound of clattering books and school supplies distracted him. 

He turned around to find that the author of such noise was no one else but Marinette. 

Adrien gave a lopsided smile and spun on his heels to go help her. 

Marinette was on the ground, her bag was open on the floor,  books, pencils, papers, and miscellaneous items were scattered all around her and she was shakingly moving to every direction trying to catch things that rolled, so they wouldn’t distance away from her. 

Adrien ran to her, kneeled down and started to help immediately. 

“Morning, Marinette,” He said in a singsong voice.

“Hi,” She simply replied, too busy catching her things. 

Adrien started to pick up 

“Hey, how cute is this,” He said shaking the small cat-bag on his hands, “Is this like a pouch? I want one,”

Marinette glared at the little bag and snatched it from Adrien’s hands. 

Adrien swore he listened to something similar to ‘you wouldn’t’ but she said it so low and so fast that he couldn’t be sure. 

He stopped grabbing things and pushing them in the bag and stopped to look at her. 

Of all the girls he had ever met, Marinette was the only one that he considered was beautiful enough to get on Ladybug’s level and make his heart skip a beat every once in a while. Because of that, he had studied her features a thousand times, knowing them by memory. 

One look was enough to realize there was something wrong. 

Her hair was in a messy ponytail, she was wearing light wash jeans and a big purple hoodie. He checked her hair again looking for a bow a clip or some sort of decoration. It wasn’t like Marinette to dress so… sloppy? Could he call it that? She didn’t look bad, he had seen her wear this kind of outfit when he went to her house, however, Marinette -fashion lover, future designer extraordinary- liked to dress up. 

It was odd to see her so... normal .

This wouldn’t be a problem, maybe she woke up in a hurry or didn’t have time to prepare anything the prior night, those things could happen, but what made him certain and worried was the big purple under eyes marks and how pale her fair skin looked. The yellowish undertones of her skin were prominent and her cheeks were flushed in vivid red, instead of the peachy pink she always had across her face.

Marinette looked tired, sad and weak. 

“Everything okay?” Adrien lifted a worried brow. 

“Uh, yeah,” He heard the lie in her words, but he wasn’t going to push it further.

Not directly, at least. 

“Don’t take this the wrong way,” Adrien started, giving one look to check her expression, “But these days you’ve been clumsier than, uh… ever,” 

“I know,” She winced, “It’s been some rough days… weeks...” There was a hidden ‘months ’ at the end of that phrase. 

Adrien put one hand across her shoulders and pulled her close to him, squeezing. 

“I’m always here for you, you know that, right?” She nodded, “So it is Alya and Nino, and I’m sure Luka and Kagami will be more than happy to make time for you if you asked,”

“I know,” Marinette said, standing up quickly. 

Adrien mirrored her

“I’m meeting Kagami for ice cream tomorrow, you could join if you want,” He smiled.

“I’m fine, Adrien,” Marinette furrowed her eyebrows, but the mean gesture disappeared almost as fast as it had appeared. 

Marinette rubbed the space between her brows and huffed. 

“I’m sorry. Thank you for worrying is just… I… I had an errand to run super early and I’m not in the mood,”

“It’s okay, we all got those days,” Adrien shrugged and put one hand across her shoulders, bringing her close to hug her. 

He was expecting her to push him away, but to his surprise, Marinette hugged him back. She wrapped her arms around him as if her life depended on it. 

She shook on his arms and a whimper came out of her lips. 

“Oh, Nette,” He whispered tenderly, wrapping his arms even tighter.

Adrien lifted his gaze and looked at his surroundings. A few students were glaring at them with confused looks on their eyes. 

To keep this more private, Adrien started walking, moving Marinette with him, to a corner of the hallway that turned and where the light wasn’t reaching at that time of the morning. 

“Are you sure you don’t want to talk about it?” Adrien whispered.

He brushed pieces of her hair away of her face and cupped her cheeks to clean the tears. He bent his knees so he would be at her height and fix his sight with hers.

Adrien waited for an answer but Marinette remained silent. Which, thinking it well,  was an answer on itself.

So he did the best he could do right now. He kept his mouth shut, and he held her until she stopped crying. 

xx

Marinette never said what was bothering her, didn’t even give a clue. However, what she did said, was to keep the situation forgotten and don’t comment to Alya that she had been crying. 

Adrien followed her orders but that didn’t stop him from having his gaze on Marinette the whole day. 

They were having lunch at the park, taking advantage of the last warm days they would get before the autumn really came into town. Instead of breathing the delicious mix of cotton candy and feel the breeze on his hair, Adrien kept trying to catch a glimpse of information on Marinette’s expression.

Nino elbowed him at the middle of lunch, making a face and some gestures, asking him to stop. 

Adrien just shrugged, trying to explain back, without talking, that he was worried. Nino didn’t understand, and a frowning look from both of the girls made him stop. 

They ate the rest of their baguettes listening to Alya talk about the new gadgets she was about to introduce to the Ladyblog, to make the community interact even more than before. Adrien pulled a tupperware with strawberries and listened carefully as he ate one by one. The taste of the fruit was as sweet as last night had been, it was cheering him just by remembering it. 

Maybe strawberries could cheer Marinette up! They were her favorite fruit after all, just like Ladybug's! And bringing strawberries or strawberry anything to Ladybug always put her in a good mood.

This plan could not fail!

“Nette,” He called in a whisper, to not interrupt Alya.

Marinette lifted a brow and waited for him to speak.

Instead, he offered the tupperware so she could take a berry. 

A smile appeared on her lips, and his heart made a pirouette. 

“Thank you,” She mouthed and gave a bite to the fruit. 

Adrien gave a toothy smile, which made Marinette laugh loud. 

He sent her a wondering look. 

She pointed at his teeth, still laughing, “You have strawberries all over your teeth,”

Adrien could feel his cheeks getting warm, nonetheless, he laughed with Marinette, happy his embarrassment was at least worth it. 

“What are you two laughing about?” Alya inquired.

“Nothing,” They said at the unison, still giggling a little. 

“Okay,” Alya rolled her eyes, “Changing the subject, I was thinking we should do something this weekend,”

“Something like?” Adrien asked, interested. 

“We should go to an amusement park!” Nino said before Alya could talk.

But she must have thought it was a good idea because she didn’t complain. 

“Amusement park sounds awesome! I don’t think I’ve been to one since I was a kid,”
Nino took his cap off and dramatically pulled his hair, “Why is that phrase so common with you? Will it ever end? Oh, magical energies, I swear I’m doing my best,” 

Adrien rolled his eyes amused, and elbowed Nino. 

They both laughed loudly and started pushing each other and rolling on the grass like two kids. 

“Can you believe these two?” He heard Alya say. 

“You’re going to get your white pants full off green smears, Adrien,” Marinette shouted but it lacked her usual strength, “The jacket you sat on will not help you with this,”

Adrien pushed Nino away one more time and took Marinette’s advice, he stood up and cleaned his pants, already seeing some green spots, but nothing serious that couldn’t disappear with a quick wash. 

He went back to his seat, on top of his jacket and leaned to reach Marinette. Leaving one kiss on her cheek. 

The girl opened her mouth astonished, and she flushed. 

“Thank you,” He simply said.

He ignored Alya and Nino’s wiggling brows and amused look. 

“So,” Adrien cleared his throat, “Amusement park?”

“Yeah!” The couple screamed and put their hands in the air. 

Adrien copied them an looked at Marinette. 

She did not move. 

“Marinette?” Adrien tilted his head.

“What do you think, dudette?” Nino asked crawling to be in front of her.

He took her hands and swung them from side to side, “You love roller coasters, don’t try to hide it,”

“Uh…” Marinette stammered. Her gaze fell on each of them once, before looking at the horizon, “I’ll see if I’m free,”

“Oh my, oh my, look who’s busy. I was expecting that line from Adrien, to be honest,” Nino said. 

Adrien laughed and shrugged. It was true. 

“I’m just very busy lately,” 

“I’m sure your mom will give you a free day of helping on the bakery,”

“Yeah, Sabine is that cool,”

Adrien didn’t add anything, he just waited for Marinette to say something. 

“I’ll see what I can do, if not just go without me, don’t let me ruin your fun,”
“Are you crazy? We have to go together. All of us,” 

“If you guys can work around my crazy life, I’m sure we can work around your schedule, Nette,” Adrien said and the couple nodded.

Once again, she did not speak. 

He turned to look at his friend and the easy and relaxed smile he was wearing fell. 

There was vivid sorrow in Marinette’s eyes.

xx

When they made their way back to school.

Adrien made sure to stay behind so he could have a private talk with Marinette.

However, Papillon had other plans. 

Instead of finding an excuse to talk to his friend in private he had to come up with a nice lie to disappear on them. 

After three years of constant escapades, their friends were used to it so it wasn’t hard to run to the closest empty street and transform. 

The rush of the transformation, the sudden enhance of strength and energy was something he would never grow tired of.  He wished it didn’t come with a fluorescent colored villain trying to hurt him badly so he could take his precious piece of jewelry, but not everything in life could be perfect. 

This akuma to be exact was proving to be a nuisance. 

He wasn’t extremely powerful or dangerous-looking, in fact just by a look he seemed to be more interested in getting his goal than attacking him.

Although, he should have known better than underestimate an akuma. 

When he rushed to her, baton in hand and shriek of war resonating in the air he was meet halfway with a huge wall. To say that hitting it had hurt like hell was to fall short. 

This same situation happened four times before he considered to change strategies. Now, he escaping from it and attacking only when the time seemed right. 

Nonetheless, the akuma had her eyes on him, there was no distraction for him to use at the moment. 

This wasn’t a one-man operation, it never was, but Ladybug was taking her sweet time appearing. How long had he been fighting the akuma? At least an hour and a half and there was no sign of her. 

Had something happened to her? Had she been crushed by one of the wall bricks? Had she--

He couldn’t complete his thought when a bunch of heavy bricks started to fall like rain on top of him. 

Chat Noir was quick and strong, but he was human under the mask, so it wasn’t a surprise when one hit his head and he fell from the rooftops to the streets. 

Adrien groaned, slowly lifting his body from the ground, putting his weight on his elbows. He coughed and his ribs hurt. 

Where was Ladybug?!

He crawled to the edge of the street, to press his hand on the wall and help him stand. 

Once up, he shifted his body and leaned against the wall.

He looked up and saw the dust created by the akuma getting thinner. She had not seen him fall here, that was great. Now he had to come up with a plan. 

He couldn’t start reviewing the facts because a scream caught his attention.

At the end of the street stood his beautiful friend. 

“Are you okay?” Marinette asked from afar, hiding behind a locker.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” He said grinning and lying. He must look like a mess, but he couldn’t worry her. 

She frowned, unamused. 

Chat laughed. 

“Everything is fine, princess,”

Adrien stood up straight, he put his hands on his hips and made a superhero pose. 

He heard her huffed and she approached. 

“You don’t look okay,” She whispered.

Chat waved his hand and clicked his tongue, “I’m wonderful! You don’t have to worry about me, princess. It’s just occupational hazards. You’ll see, LB and I will have everything going right in no time. Like we always do,” 

Marinette looked down, “Yeah, like you always do….”

There was some sadness on her tone, but he couldn’t figure out what brought it. 

“I must go back,” Chat said, pointing to the sky. 

Marinette leaned on the wall and nodded. 

“Goodbye?” 

Marinette looked up, her eyes pierced his soul. “Bye… good luck, Chat,”
“Be safe, princess.”

xx

Back on top of the buildings his plan to come up with a strategy begun. It was hard to start, with the image of Marinette engraved on his mind. What had she been doing here? So far from home? Was she with Alya? She never followed the reporter, but it was the most reasonable theory he could come up with now. 

“Ugh,” He groaned. He had to worry about that later, now the akuma was his priority. 

It wasn’t a difficult akuma at all, he was just missing his---

An image on the distance cut his train of thought. A girl was running dressed in spots. 

Chat couldn’t help but grin. 

Finally!

She was at his side only seconds later. She didn’t stop running and he began to chase her. 

“Good evening, my lady!” 

“Good evening, chaton!” She replied, smiling back at him. 

“What took you so long? I’ve missed you,” He said, running closer. 

She giggled and pressed her hands on her face, hiding .  

That made him smirk. He felt some sort of pride in making her blush.  

“I wasn’t in the area,” She shrugged, gaining back her composure. 

“Let’s finish this quickly!” 

Ladybug nodded and focused her sight on the akuma in front of them. 

Adrien couldn’t help but look at her. She was his favorite vision after all. 

He watched her move with elegance through the rooftops, her pigtails bounced as she did so. He narrowed his eyes, there was something… different. Had her hair grown a little? 

He couldn’t tell as they ran, but there was something that wasn’t the same. 

But he would have time to admire her in more detail and tell her how beautiful she looked, later. Once they defeated the akuma. 

xx

Maybe he had jinxed the situation when he said they should finish the battle quickly. 

It hadn’t been the longest fight they had ever had, but it was up there. 

Tired and breathless, they sat inside of a dark room, it was safe -from strangers eyes, and their own- until they recharged. No one was coming and they couldn't see each other. 

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” She kept saying. 

“Bug, it’s okay, I already told you,”
“I fucked up so many times… I…”

And she kept rambling. 

He wasn’t listening to her now, it was the same speech over and over, and if he heard it one more time he was going to say what he was really thinking.

Was he a little disappointed by her performance today? Yes, he was. But everyone was allowed to have bad days. 

However, when he said this the last time, Ladybug had started crying. So, for today, sincerity was out of the question and he was going to be sweet. Sometimes friends had to do this, sometimes friends had to give one step back and let their friends express their emotions in all their colors. 

A sob echoed in the room and that didn’t sit well on his heart. 

“Hey,” He said, reaching for her hand in the dark, even if he knew he shouldn’t. “We all have bad days,”

She kept silent. 

Their hands met each other, and she squeezed his hand softly. 

“Thank you,”

“I’m always here for you, my lady,” Adrien caressed her hand with his thumb, “If there’s anything you want to talk about, anything at all, just call and I’ll be there,”

“You really are the best, Chat Noir,”

“Well, I can’t be nothing but the best to be with you,” 

A nervous giggle. Not quite like her echoed in the room. 

“Thank you,” She said again, “I have to go, but I’ll see you next time,”

“Until we meet again, bug. Love you,” He whispered and left one kiss on top of her knuckles. 

“I… I love you too,”

Adrien wasn’t prepared to be hugged, so when the girl threw herself at his arms, he lost his balance and fell to the floor. 

“I am sorry,” His partner whined.

He couldn’t help but laugh and hug her back. Leaving one kiss on her cheek. 

“It’s okay. I liked that,”

“Okay,” Ladybug giggled, “I have to go now. See you next time?”

“See you next time, my lady,”

Ladybug kissed his cheeks before transforming and leaving the room. 

Adrien waited for five minutes in the room once she left, and then did his same old routine, leaving the room by going out of the window. 

What Adrien didn’t know is that someone had followed them and had been hiding there in the room. 

She wasn’t happy with what she heard. 

Chapter Text

It’d been a week and a few days after Marinette overheard the superhero team inside the darkroom, yet the conversation still bothered her.

The lovely words they exchanged, words that should have been for her weren’t settling well in her heart. 

The worst part was that she couldn’t blame anyone but herself. The other horrible thing to deal with was that she had to see him from afar, and on the last days she had only been able to catch a glimpse in the night when he was doing his patrol. 

She hadn’t followed the last akumas as close as the first one, because they had been incredibly hard to reach as a normal civilian, and because she actually got caught by one -a new experience, very annoying experience-.

And Aimée wasn’t doing badly, so she shouldn’t be worried. 

As she thought, her athletic skills made her a more agile and fast Ladybug that Marinette had ever been, and while it took her longer to figure out how to use the lucky charm, and when she did, her ways of using it were rather odd and not as creative as Marinette’s, Chat was by her side and helped her make all the plans come to life.

Something told her that Chat had been coming with various parts of the plans they had pulled, just by afar, she could tell it was his style. 

But...

Marinette looked down at her notebook and saw the messy scribblings all around the page. 

She winced just by looking at them. All of those were little notes she had taken the last day after spending a whole afternoon following Aimée. 

Not her best moment she admitted, but she needed to know how she was dealing with civilian life and if she had not let clues behind her that could make her a target to get the earrings. 

Aimée had been fine, nothing to worry about, or well… nothing to worry about from the professional aspect because when it came to the relationship she could initiate with Chat… then Marinette had everything to worry about. Or so she thought after seeing her interact with her friends. 

One of the things Marinette learned about the girl as she trained her was that she was a complete extrovert and did not carry a grain of shame in her body. 

Marinette scooted over the notes: Flirty, extroverted, charming, not a grain of shame on her body, a bit arrogant.

Aimée had been all over the top when she was training with her, but all these new traits had been a late discovery. They weren’t bad, not at all, it was just…

“Ugh,” 

She threw her head back and rubbed her eyes. She had to let this go. 

She was great at faking her friendship with Chat Noir and isn’t that what Marinette wanted? For Chat to be loved and have a friend while she was gone?

Yes, that’s pretty much the reason why she came up with a plan, yet… she begged for Aimée to lower her attitude a notch. For Chat. 

As much as Marinette flirted with him, and how confident she was around him, she had never been that bold. 

Part of her wished he wouldn’t notice these changes, that he would brush them off if he happened to think weirdly of “her new attitude”, but the other half of her begged for him to realize that whoever was by his side, was not his lady.  

Nonetheless, that wasn’t the objective of her plan, if he did figure out that there had been a change, all would go wrong. 

Still, she couldn’t help but wonder if he had realized the little changes. 

“Nette,” Adrien put a hand on top of hers and squeezed, taking her out of her thoughts, “Dreaming of the moon?” 

“Something like that,” She smiled. “What were we talking about?”

“The amusement park,” Adrien said and looked at Alya and Nino who were writing down ideas on a notebook, “Is this weekend okay with you? Since you couldn’t last week,”

“Uh…” 

Just tell them the truth!

“Not this weekend either?” 

“Well-” A scream pierced through the air interrupting her.

“Akuma,” They said at the unison, the only difference was their tones of voice. Alya was excited, Nino sounded tired, and Adrien… Adrien’s voice was hard to describe. 

Marinette was sort of happy.

Saved by the akuma! No need to spill the truth yet!

Marinette stood up ready to give an excuse and start running but she sat down almost instantly. 

She didn’t need to disappear. She didn’t need to go. 

She wasn’t Ladybug any more.

Why was it so hard to get used to it? Wasn’t a week enough to stop these reflexes?

Actually, one week wasn’t enough to know what to do. 

It felt so strange to stay still or hidden while chaos was enduring outside. 

Maybe she would never let those reflexes disappear because it didn’t matter if she wasn’t going to fight, she was still going to be invested in the fight somehow, in case that anything went wrong. 

Also, she missed it so much already. 

Marinette always saw it as her duty, not some sort of game that she was allowed to be part of, but she had enjoyed it like one. It was freeing, it was fun, it let her do things that she would never have been able to do otherwise. 

She missed talking with Chat Noir too…

If she could only find a way to--

Wait a minute . 

Marinette looked at her side. 

Adrien was long gone now, wherever he went to hide, but Alya and Nino were fastening their backpacks around their waist and shoulders and taking their cameras, ready to go film the battle. 

“Can I go with you?” She spat, loud and quick so they would hear her above the noise.  

Alya turned on her heels and jolted her head as if she had punched her. 

“Why?” Her friend asked, curiosity mixed with judgment washing all over her face. 

She flinched, “ Jeez , sorry, I didn’t mean to bother,”

“No, no, no. I… I’m sorry. That sounded horrible, that’s not what I meant… I’m just really curious. You’ve never been interested in it before,”
“I just realized that I’ve never accompanied you to one of your chases. I’ve always supported the blog, read it and give you feedback but I’ve never seen your whole process…”

“Marinette,” Alya awed and threw herself at her arms, “You’re the sweetest, of course, you can come!”

“Amazing!” Marinette shout. 

This was a good idea. An excellent idea!

Alya knew how to catch the battles and avoid trouble better than anyone. This was her ticket back to the battleground. 

And an easy way to keep an eye on her partner and her chosen replacement. 

xx

Today’s battle had been short, one of the shortest battles they had ever fought. As amazing at that was, since they took care of the akuma quickly, Adrien was left with a bitter taste after it. 

Ladybug had changed his way of approaching the akumas completely in the short term of a week. She wasn’t fighting and analyzing them, she wasn’t trying to find ways to get through them instead of attacking them directly, she wasn’t coming up with smart ways to trick them. Also, she had been using her lucky charms at the beginnings of all the battles, and the ways she used them went according to her new style of fighting but were all the opposite of the smart plans she always used to have. 

Today she had actually gotten a teaser and electrocuted the poor guy. 

She had worn the most triumphant smile and she flickered her head with such confidence, that a little bit of arrogance leaked through.

He had fun, he couldn’t deny it, but it still felt… wrong. This wasn’t how their team worked. 

He barely got things to do but punch the akuma with his staff. 

Now, as they jumped around the rooftops he couldn’t keep wondering and coming up with answers himself, so he asked her. 

Her answer wasn’t what he was expecting. 

“I have a lot to do today,” She said, running her hands through her dark hair. 

Adrien gulped at the sight. It was rare to see her without her pigtails, he could count with the fingers of one hand how many times he had seen her with her hair loose, and two of those had been because one of the akumas cut the elastics, and the other because she used it for her lucky charm. 

But then he came back to his senses, leaving the lovestruck attitude behind and focusing on his doubts. 

“You’ve changed the way we fight… it’s okay if you do so but I would have like to get a warning… we are a team, you know?”

“Of course I do, the best team ever!” She chimed and swirled like a ballerina, moving towards him and throwing herself at his arms, “I just have so much to do that I rather end it quickly. Why must we come up with sneaky plans when we can just punch it really hard and get over with it?”

His stomach twisted. 

“Because they’re people?”

“They don’t remember anything,” She shrugged, then she batted her lashes at him, “Also, didn’t I look so hot when I got the akuma?”

She tilted her head close to him and pouted as she waited for an answer. 

“Yeah, you did,” He finally gave up at her charming face. 

Chat was about to hug her back when Ladybug pushed him away and started to walk toward the north. 

A bit dizzy with the sudden movement, he followed. 

“Where are you going?” 

“I left my backpack somewhere near here,” She said, “I’m going to a café to do homework until my mom can pick me up,” 

“For what class?” Chat asked. 

“Chemistry,” She answered. 

“Do you need help?” He knew she is not the best at chemistry. In fact, it was odd that she hadn’t asked for his help beforehand. 

Whenever they had the time they would do their homework together. She would always help him with geometry and french, and he helped her with chemistry and physics. 

Instead of the lovely smile and an excited wiggling of legs, he got an amused smile and a scoff. 

Ladybug flipped her hair and giggled. It didn’t sound good. 

He didn’t like it. 

“Please,” She mumbled and rolled her eyes

“What?” He asked between clenched teeth. 

He could feel where this was going. He didn’t understand that it was happening, but oh boy it was happening. 

“Nothing, nothing,” She waved her hand at him. 

“No, c'mon, I want to know.” 

It took all of him to not growl at her. Oh how much he loved her, but he felt so offended. And her attitude, ugh, he despised it. 

She let out a long sigh and walked to him, her hips swinging more than they usually did. 

“Chat… I’m top of my class,” She said, brushing one piece of her out of her face, and letting a proud lopsided smile appear on her pink lips. 

He crooked a brow.

Was she? She never mentioned. 

However, that didn’t explain the… disdain.
“ So? ” He was about to say that he, also, was also top of his class but he stopped himself. He wanted to hear what was she thinking. 

“Don’t take this the wrong way, okay? You’re incredibly hot and funny, those are amazing things to be,” 

He didn’t like where this was going. 

He didn't like this part of her that he was seeing. 

“But…”

“But?” He pushed.

“I… I don’t think you’re top of the class, I mean… I don’t think you could help me. But thanks for the offer,”

He scowled. 

“Good to know you think so highly of me, bug,” He scowled at her and looked away. 

He moved away from her, only a few centimeters, but giving how close he liked to be this could be interpreted as meters. 

“Hey,” Ladybug called, making the distance disappear. “Are you angry?”

“No,” He lied.

Ladybug wrapped her hand around his wrist and pulled him. He jolted his head to look at her, surprise shining on his eyes at the sudden attack. 

He was ready to speak, to send her away, but she rested her head on his shoulder and let out a dreamy sigh.

“Aren’t the stars so beautiful tonight?”

Adrien looked up. There was nothing. 

He snorted. Where was she going with this?

“They really are!” She threw her hands in the air and then when they dropped, they were on his cheeks. She softly cupped them and rubbed her thumb on them. “So big and gleaming and green, oh wait, those aren’t stars, those are your eyes,” 

She bit her lip as she said those words and he paralyzed. 

Chat blushed completely. He felt his heart stop and then start beating again like a maniac. 

It was a surprise that he hadn’t turned into goo. 

She’d never flirted so blatantly with him. She had never touched him that shamelessly. 

“Wh-what?”

She giggled, one hand covering her mouth. It leaned towards sexy more than adorable. 

“You were angry, or sad, I don’t know,” She shrugged, “I’m sorry if my comment offended you, I just say whatever is on my mind you know. No filter.”

No, she did not. 

Not for as far as she knew her. When it came to feelings and friendships she was very careful with her words, she was always thinking of how others could feel.

Where was she going with this?

Maybe she hadn’t meant it like that?

“Oh, kitty-cat,” She said and crossed her arms around his neck, pressing her body against his back,” Well, that was a new nickname. “You’re too cute to be this sad,” 

And a kiss on his cheek.

Maybe, just maybe he was leaving behind his anger.

She surely didn’t mean to offend him. She wasn’t like that. 

Yeah, maybe he misunderstood. 

“Can I get another?” He teased, pushing his luck. 

Instead of a roll of eyes or a huff, as he expected, she gave him another kiss. 

“A goodbye kiss for the sweet feline,” She harmonized, “See you next time!”
“You’re going so soon?” They hadn’t been together for more than twenty minutes!

“Didn’t you hear me earlier? I have homework to do!”

And she took off. 

Five minutes later, after the initial shock, he also went back home. 

More confused than he had ever felt. 

xx

Back in his room, Adrien stared at the ceiling. 

He did not check if Plagg was around to talk. If he was eating, sleeping or finding ways to get in trouble, it didn’t matter, he would hear him anyway. Besides, he didn’t need answers, he just needed to talk. If he got them, great, if not, he got the feelings out of his chest. 

“There’s something going on with Ladybug,” He started “And it is… weird,” 

“Maybe I’m going crazy,” He pushed his bangs back, “Or too sensible… people grow, maybe she just got a boost of confidence and… well, no, she’s always been confident it is just…

“You realize I’m not really listening right?”

Oh, but he was. 

Adrien kept going.

“She flirted with me… she’s been flirting with me a lot but it’s been different to her usual flirting, it’s been like that since… since… since our picnic at the Arc de Triomphe ,” 

And before that, she had spent a month or so being extremely nice and sweet to him. 

Coincidence? He thought not. 

“Oh yeah?” Plagg asked. 

Yeah, he could fake to be uninterested all he wanted. 

“Yes,” Adrien nodded, “She was super sweet, like beyond her limit sweet. She took more patrols than ever, she said yes to every plan I had, and now her flirting is… is not teasing, not like it was before. She isn’t following my game, she is not doing our dynamic she… she is calling the shots, almost like…”

Adrien stopped. He let the thought bounce around his head for a few seconds before he said out loud.

“It is like she is trying to seduce me,”

When he said it, he had to seat down. 

All the air disappeared from his lungs and suddenly his room felt too small. 

“Oh fuck!” Adrien shouted. He looked around until he found Plagg at the end of the bed and crawled to him. “Do you think she finally fell for me? Do you think she is trying to woo me?”
“Doubt it,” Plagg shrugged and gave another bite to his snack. 

“Oh, you don’t care about anything but cheese at this moment,” He rolled his maybe, “Maybe that’s it! She is trying to impress me! That’s probably why she mentioned being a top student, and it didn’t come out well because she is nervous!”

“I don’t think she would act like that if she’s nervous,” 

“Shut up, I know her well,” 

“You do not, not really,”
Adrien ignored that.

“This is wishful thinking, I know but, it is just… it’s what makes the most sense to me right now,”
“That is what makes more sense to you? Really? ”

“Yes, “ Adrien hissed and threw a sock at him. “I can’t come up with anything else that could explain that change of behavior.”

And he wasn’t able to keep thinking about it, because he got a text and his mind got busy with other things as important as Ladybug were.

It was from Luka. 

| LUKA |   23:08 

hey adrien! if you’re not busy, can we meet tomorrow?

i had dinner with nette today. you’re right, she is acting weird. 

Adrien stared at the text for a very long time. 

So, it wasn’t just him. It wasn’t just Nino noticing little changes in Marinette’s attitude, it wasn’t Alya getting worried because Marinette looks tired. It wasn’t him missing her cheery smile and chiming laughs. 

It was also Luka. 

It was also Kagami, who had texted him something similar that morning. 

It was Chloé who had let a nice comment slid that morning. 

It was everyone around his precious classmate noticing that she wasn’t the same. 

Adrien sighed and threw himself at his bed. 

What could have happened in the span of a week to make her change so radically?

Chapter Text

Alya and Marinette were together on the metro, going back to their respective homes after spending an evening at a new thematic café they had just opened downtown.

It was the most fun Marinette had had in weeks.

Alya was scrolling through her tablet, showing her the pictures she had taken of the most recent akuma attack.

“I think those are nice,” Marinette said, pointing out at a few pictures of Chat Noir in battle. 

All the elegance of his movements had been captured in the shot, and the best part of it was her smirk. It lighted up his face so beautifully. 

She was going to ask her for a copy.  

“Yes, those are nice but I’m trying to pick one of them together. I haven’t been able to get a good one in a while, well, of a battle. I have a few of them hanging out,”

Marinette hummed in response. 

She did not like to see pictures of Ladybug and Chat Noir, not now at least. It was difficult to watch someone else pretending to be you, being all cozy and sweet with each other. Chat Noir being his affectionate and flirty self with her as they went to all the places she used to go with him. 

She couldn’t shake the thought that he was betraying her. She knew it wasn’t that! And that was her plan for the beginning, for him not to notice! How many times did she have to repeat that to herself?

“Marinette?” Alya poked her shoulder.

“Yes?”

“You spaced out,” She explained. She was on her feet, “It’s my stop,”
Alya had her bag on her shoulder, she was going closer to the door, but was still reaching for her iPad.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Marinette said, giving it back. “Send me the rest of the pictures and I’ll keep helping, we’ll find the perfect picture!” 

Alya frowned. 

“Marinette, you don’t have to do this if you don’t want to. You know that, right?”

“I know. I want to,” 

Alya narrowed her eyes as she stepped out 

“Okay,” She finally nodded and waved at her, “Let me know when you get home,”

“I will,” She waved and the doors of the wagon closed. 

Marinette went back to her seat and threw her head back, leaning against the wall.

What was that all about?

xx

Days went by slower than she would have ever imagined. 

Marinette finally had the time to do all the things she loved and had yearned to do, but they didn't feel as good as she thought they would. 

She feared that her lack of enthusiasm was starting to get noticed by her friends. She almost got a confirmation that evening, as Kagami and her were hanging out in her room. 

They had a Korean drama on, blankets on the floor and scattered pillows; bowls filled with popcorn, and different kinds of sweets Kagami had brought from her trip to Japan a few weeks ago. 

As they watched the drama, Marinette was still looking for a picture to send Alya. She didn’t even like one. 

“You are really passionate about all this,” Kagami commented, leaning forward, looking down at the laptop where the pictures were open, “Can I ask what awakened this interest?” 

“Uh… I just… I don’t know, do I have to have a reason?”

“No,” She shrugged, “But I do feel like you have one,” 

Kagami was always straight to the point. There was no escaping on this one, she would not stop until she got an honest opinion from her. 

To think that she hadn’t liked Kagami at first, and now she was one of the people who knew her best, and who Marinette cared the most. 

“I like chasing the battles,” Marinette admitted, “It makes me feel something,” She couldn’t explain what, because if she did she would have to reveal more than what it was allowed. 

“I also like to spend time with Alya. I’ve never been quite involved with the Ladyblog, yes, I always give feedback and I try to read the articles she gushes about the most, but I’ve never supported her like she wanted me to. It feels nice to do it,” She continued. 

“It sounds to me like you feel as if you own Alya something,”
“No, it’s not that at all,”

“Alright, alright, it is not,” Kagami waved her hands at her, asking her to sit back. “It doesn’t sound like you. Why would you do something that you’re not a hundred percent passionate about,”

“You just said I was passionate about it,”

“It was sarcasm,”

“Oh my, we still have a long way to go in that area, don’t we?”

Kagami pursed her lips wtih certain desdein. 

Marinette giggled and elbowed her softly, “C’mon you know I was teasing,”

“Yes, I do, however, I would like if you teased me after telling me the truth,” Kagami glared at her, “I understand that it is a nice thing to do, to support your friends, but it is taking you time away from things you actually enjoyed. I have not seen you come up with anything new lately, it’s all old designs, and things you’re doing over and over again,”

“I’m going through a designer’s block,” 

“You’re distracted all the time and you lack your usual cheery energy,”

“I think you’re throwing this out of proportions,” Marinette tried her best to not hiss. She wasn’t liking where this conversation was going.

Kagami was someone who had not been very good at social relationships at the beginning, but once she started to hang out with more people and called them friends, she put all her effort into resources into being better at it. To this day, she had become one of her more assertive friends. 

Because of that, it wasn’t a surprise that she had come up with the right theory. 

“Marinette,” She said, a sigh escaped her lips, “Are you sick?”

Marinette felt herself paling. Her whole body turned to stone. 

“Why do you think that?” Her words came out in a stutter. 

“You’re tired most of the time, you’re being more selfless than you usually are, and you fake happy way too much to not be noticeable,”
“That doesn’t say a thing,”

“Also, last time when we went for ice cream with Luka, I saw your pouch, it was full of meds,”

“Allergies,”
“Marinette,” Kagami sighed frustrated, “Why are you trying to hide it?”

“I’m not… I mean, I am but… I just, ugh,” It was useless to keep pulling an act. 

Kagami had won. 

Marinette threw herself back, bouncing on the pillows when her body touched the floor. She looked at her roof and remembered that visit to the doctor. 

“Cardiomyopathy,” She finally said, when all her thoughts were sorted out, “It’s when the walls of your heart get so thick or they scar so badly they can’t pump blood as they should…”

Kagami stayed silent, letting her continue. 

“It’s highly rare to have it so young but… I was taking a medicine… ugh, do you remember the news that broke about the pain medicine that--

“Yes, I do,” She interrupted, her eyes grew bigger, “They pulled it out of the market because of all the heart and lung failure consequences”

“Yes… well, I was using that medicine,” Marinette shrugged, “My muscles hurt so much and the medicine helped like it was a miracle in a tube,”

There was only much the miraculous cure could do. As the years went by and the fights got tougher, so did her injuries, so did her pain. 

She thought she had found a solution to allow her to keep fighting freely. That was the saddest part of it. 

“I’m so sorry, Marinette,” Kagami said, her eyes were gleaming. 

Kagami didn’t cry when people were around. Her shining eyes were almost as powerful as a few tears would. 

“What are the repercussions of this?” 

“So many things,” Marinette laughed but it was numb, “I have cardiac insufficiency now, there are 4 stages, and I’m at number two, but they think it’s likely for me to pass to stage three, and then I won’t be able to brush my teeth without feeling tired and like suffocating.

Soon, my heart could start beating without rhythm, and that’s messed up, and I could have a heart attack too if I don’t take care of myself,”

“Have you been taking care of yourself?”
“As much as I can,” She had given up her earrings, that was answer enough, but again, she couldn’t tell. 

“Why haven’t you told everyone else? “Everyone can tell something is off with you,”

Had they noticed? Really? She thought she was doing such a great job at fooling everyone. She had been hiding a superhero identity for the past three years, how could she not hide this?

“Because I don’t want them to worry,” Marinette sat again, hugging her legs close to her chest, “I don’t like people worrying and, well, is more than that. I don’t want people to treat me like I’m fragile. I’m still me.”
Kagami smiled and then pushed her away playfully.

Marinette gasped, “What was that for?”

“To prove you I’m gonna treat you the same. This doesn’t change anything about you, Marinette. I think you should tell everyone else, I know they’ll act just as I do,”
Marinette pouted. 

“I don’t want them to know yet. I still haven’t made amends with it. The only reason I’m confessing this to you is that you’re too pushy,”

Kagami gave a smug smile.

She reached for her hand and squeezed. 

“Okay, but don’t let it be too long. It isn’t good for you,”

Marinette sighed. She knew this. 

She nodded and then leaned to rest her head in Kagami’s shoulder. 

Until she could come up clean, it would be nice to have someone knowing. 

xx

The truth was that her conversation with Kagami had helped a lot. Another truth was that it had made her feel really guilty. 

Kagami was right, she should tell her friends. 

She had good reasons to keep it a secret, she had told Kagami, and she still believed them to be powerful enough to not tell anyone else, but it was still stupid. It was better if they knew, in case anything happened, they would be aware of her condition and act on it. 

Marinette grunted. She hated feeling weak.

But, it was time. 

She really had it all planned, she was going to tell her friends all about her illness but then… the akuma attacked. 

Alya wasn’t even around her, but now Marinette was so used to leave everything behind and start chasing the battle, that she just did. After all, she had always been running to transform and fight when she had her miraculous, there was not much difference in this. 

Marinette picked up a bike with her transport app and started following the battle. She started feeling tired and lethargic quite soon, but the adrenaline and her need to be close to the battle helped her keep going. 

Nonetheless, it wasn’t easy, not only because of her condition but also because the akuma wasn’t making it easy to go through the streets. 

The pavement had completely disappeared and branches, shrubs, and dirt were replacing the streets. 

Maybe it was a gardener or someone really passionate about plants or jungles because the more time it took to defeat it, the more Paris looked like the mix of a rainforest, a glasshouse, and the Amazonas. 

The battle was pretty loud, if not Marinette wouldn’t have been able to follow it, because of the tall trees that were replacing the buildings of the town. 

When it was too hard to breathe and keep cycling, she left the bike behind and started climbing, this way she would find a good point of view and see the battle from afar. 

Marinette didn’t stop coughing in the good twenty-five minutes it took her to climb the tree. In the past, it wouldn’t have taken her more than ten, but with the constant wheezing, the weakness of her body and how many times she fell, this was the best she could do. 

Thankfully, it paid off, she could see everything from here. 

Chat Noir and her replacement were fighting viciously, however, they didn’t seem to be in the same team. 

Chat’s fighting style was the same then it always had been, but it lacked her. He did certain attacks where he expected her to be right behind, but she wasn’t there. 

Marinette focused on Aimée, who was trying to keep the akuma chained with her yo-yo, as she looked at the spray bottle in her hands.

What would it be? 

Why was it taking her so long to figure it out how to use it? 

Marinette sighed. It didn’t matter how clever she was, or how well she had trained her, Aimée lacked that little something that had made Marinette the perfect match for the ladybug miraculous. 

Tikki had warned her about this. 

Her thoughts were quickly brushed off by the scene that was presented in front of her. 

She didn’t know how, she didn’t know when, but replacement-Ladybug had used the bottle, however she had just tried to spray the liquid all over the akuma’s face. 

That hadn’t been a well-thought attack. 

It made the akuma angrier than he was, and he tried to defend himself. 

A branch full of thorns was aimed at them. 

Marinette watched it go down in slow motion. 

It wasn’t directed at Ladybug, it was directed at Chat Noir. 

He wasn’t aware of it because he was trying to come up with his own solution. 

She tried to scream but nothing came up, and it wouldn’t have made a difference, she was too far away. 

But, Aimeé could. Aimée could warn him. She was only a meter away from him. 

Had she seen it? She should have seen it! 

Ladybug let go of her yo-yo.

The akuma moved faster. The bran moved with more speed. 

Ladybug threw her yo-yo to a tree. 

Marinette felt her heart sink

What was she doing?

What was she doing?

WHAT WAS SHE DOING?

Aimée pulled the yo-yo and she jumped away from the branch, letting it attack and surprise Chat Noir. 

This time she did scream, and it tore her apart. 

The branch went through his chest as he kept fighting, unaware of what his partner had just done. 

Marinette looked everywhere, trying to find a way to go and help him out.

He was shaking and trying to use his batton to cut the branch.

He was trying to find a way to keep fighting.  

“Don’t move, you idiot,” Marinette sobbed.

She cleaned the tears on her face and sniffled. 

The akuma was coming closer to him and he couldn’t do anything about it. 

She couldn’t do anything about it. 

Marinette couldn’t remember what happened next. She couldn’t tell how her replacement had saved the day or how Chat had been able to keep his miraculous and his life. 

Because she was so so angry that her whole body had stopped functioning only to focus on the dark feeling that was taking over her. 

She couldn’t even tell how she made it back to the ground because the only image going through her eyes was the one where Chat got impaled with a green branch and red splattering all over it. 

She was vibrating with rage. 

Miraculous cure be damned. 

That branch had gone through his body, he was going to get a wound out of that. She knew the suits and charm had their limitations. 

And even if it didn’t, the girl had let him there to die. 

She could have lost him! 

Marinette finally understood what meant to see red. 

And she was going to do something about it. 

xx

Marinette found a motorcycle in the middle of the road and took it to get faster to where she saw Ladybug land. 

She was tired and had troubles breathing, so walking or a usual bike wouldn’t cut it. 

Also, she had learned how to drive one when she visited her grandmother in Italy a year ago.  The hardest part had been to turn it on without the keys, but years of being Ladybug and hearing random facts from Chat Noir had her well equipped. 

When she arrived, she saw Ladybug transform. It was odd to see someone else doing it. 

However, the weird feeling didn’t last long, because her anger was still the main emotion reigning her heart. 

She left the motorcycle behind and ran as fast as her heart allowed her. 

Another thing she learned through the years, was little fighting tricks and moves, I mean she didn’t spend all that time fighting without picking it up and sliding them into her civilian life. 

The moment she was in front of Ladybug, she attacked.

In a second she had Aimée lying on the ground and letting out a high pitched scream. 

When she recovered, she was able to snap out of Marinette’s grab. She stood up and took a few meters of distance. 

Aimée narrowed her eyes and spoke, “You’re not an akuma,”

“I’m not,” She said between clenched teeth. 

That seemed to relax her because her whole stand changed. 

“How can I help you?” The girl asked, fluttering her eyelashes and gifting her an amicable smile. 

Oh, but she was about to make all that sweetness disappear. 

xx

Marinette had never screamed so loud in her life. 

She had never in life treated someone like she was treating Aimée, not even Lila. 

Aimée apparently had never been treated this way, because she remained motionless and with her mouth hanging open as Marinette shouted. 

“You’re a coward! You’re selfish!” Marinette kept screaming, “Did you see him?! Did you see how badly hurt he was?! You could not have ignored it!”

Marinette grabbed her closer, not letting her escape if at some point she snapped out of the trance.

“You saw he was getting attacked! You saw he was going to get hurt! HOW COULD YOU?!”

Marinette opened her mouth to say something else. 

Her hands were gripping into Ladybug with more strength as she got angrier. 

But then, she was stopped. 

One hand wrapped around her elbow and pulled her back. 

“ What do you think you’re doing? ” 

Marinette’s anger shot down immediately. 

She turned around and saw him in all his glory. 

However, the sweet smile she was so used to wasn’t plastered on his face. There was not even a glimpse of happiness in his expression. It made her nauseous. 

She had seen almost every mood of his, she could read him like a book even when he was pretending, yet she had never seen him this angry. 

Chat had never glared at her with that amount of poison on his eyes. 

Marinette felt like crying. 

Chat seemed to be waiting for an answer, so she gave one to him. 

“She left you there to die,” Only saying it made her want to slap Aimée.
“She would never!” Chat said aghast. 

“That’s exactly what she did,” Marinette said, her voice was lower this time, to match his.

“You have no idea what you’re talking about, Marinette. You have no idea how our relationship works,” 

But she did! 

How could he be so blind?!

“You’re not a superhero! You have no idea how this works! LB and I are a team, this is between us two, not anyone else!” Chat shouted at her.

Marinette trembled and started breathing loudly. 

He had been harsh, but that would be enough for her to realize that she didn’t have to meddle. He couldn’t understand this interest she had in them, that popped all out of a sudden, but she needed to check her approach to it.

“Go home,” He ordered.

Then he turned and found Ladybug halfway.

His hands reached for her face and cupped her cheeks. 

His tone of voice turned softer

“Why were you listening to her?” Chat asked Ladybug, “Are you okay?”

The scene in front of her made her heart hurt. 

Yes, she should go home. 

She turned around and started walking away.

Each step she gave felt like a mission impossible on its own. Soon she realized her heart was not only hurting because of what she had just seen. 

xx

“Are you okay?” Ladybug asked, her hands roaming around his chest.

“Yes, I am. The cure fixed everything,” It was mostly true. He could still feel pain when he moved. He was sure he would have some big bruises once he de-transformed but she didn’t need to worry about that. 

Ladybug hugged him tightly and left a kiss on his cheek, very, very, very close to his mouth. 

A smile rose on him. 

He tangled his fingers in her hair and put one hand on her lower back, pulling her closer.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” She whispered, her nose nuzzled against the crook of his neck. 

Adrien felt warm inside. 

This was his Ladybug! This was the girl he had been missing so much!

Her flirty techniques were fun to watch at times, but they made him feel like he was seating right new to a completely different person. 

Here in this moment, it was only them and the strength of their bond.
“I have a few minutes to spare,” Ladybug giggled and suddenly her face was aligned with his. Her lips were dangerously close. 

“Uh…”
“We could go for ice-cream,” 

“That sounds great,” He smiled. 

Ladybug returned the smile and took his hand. She started walking out of the alley and into the street. 

“If I’m not wrong there’s a place close by,”

Adrien started looking around with her from their spot, she seemed to be sure it was on the street. 

From the corner of his eye, he caught a group of people gathered in a circle. At first, he thought they were coming to them, but when he focused he saw they were standing looking at the floor. They hadn’t even noticed the superheroes. 

Over the years he had learned how to control his cat-reflexes and cat enhanced hearing. At the moment he had only been trying to listen to Ladybug, but he had grown curious and let his hearing roam. 

“Did you call 112?”

“Please, take it easy, do you need something?

“Backpack,” A girly voice said in the middle of a wheeze. A girly voice he knew too well. 

Chat let go of Ladybug’s hand and ran to the circle. 

His sight bounced through the circle of people first, but just as he feared, Marinette was not there. 

Marinette was on the ground, her hands were against the floor and she was breathing heavily. 

“Marinette?” He asked scared.

She looked up but took her time and when her sight found him, Adrien felt like a piano had been thrown on top of him.

Her lips were purple. Her eyes were lost and she was tearing up. Her whole body was shaking. 

“Backpack,” Marinette wheezed again. 

What had happened?! 

He had just seen her. 

Adrien fell to the ground, beside her. 

He took the backpack and looked at her, but Marinette was not looking at him anymore. 

She was pressing her hands against her chest, pulling her t-shirt tightly. 

“Marinette,” He repeated again and reached for her hands. 

She pushed him away. 

More tears appeared in her eyes. 

His heart broke. 

Something was happening to her and he couldn’t figure out what. He couldn’t do anything because he didn’t know what would be right and what would be wrong. 

The mumbling whispers made everything worse, he couldn’t think with everyone trying to give their opinion, trying to touch Marinette, trying to give her instructions on how to breathe. 

She was doing her best! She was keeping herself afloat as everyone just stared and he couldn’t do anything to help her because he was too overwhelmed!

And then something hit him.

Actually, someone slapped him. 

Ladybug.

“What are you doing? Stop being useless and move! We need to call an ambulance and you’re just--
“I know what to do!” He shouted at her, glaring with so much poison anyone would think he was looking at his enemy and not the love of his life. 

He had been surprised by the hit. He was hurt with her words, but they had been enough to snap him out of his own feelings and know how to act. 

There was no time for an ambulance, he would be faster. 

He took her on his arms and he started running. 

Chapter Text

These were the times when having a secret identity did not only suck or made him annoyed, no, sometimes having a secret identity was the most horrible thing he could have. 

Yes, being a superhero did grant him powers and because of said powers, he was able to get Marinette to the hospital on time, however, once he had finished his mission he had to go back to being Adrien. 

Adrien who had not been there when Marinette was turning purple. Adrien who had not seen Marinette start shaking desperately. 

Adrien did not know, Chat Noir did, and because of that he had to leave. 

Adrien had to pretend not to know and go home as if nothing was happening. 

He had to go to his room and sit down on his desk and wait and wait and wait. 

And keep waiting. 

All of these while he knew that Marinette was not doing okay.

As he sat and looked at the infinite he couldn’t stop thinking of what could have happened to get her in that state. 

The worst was that he couldn’t help but realize that Marinette had to know what was happening. Between her fear, there was that determination that characterized her. She was giving orders, hardly but still giving them, because she knew what was happening. 

It made him feel sick to his stomach. 

The twisting and nauseating feeling only aggravated when he got the call he had been waiting for sixteen hours. 

Adrien did his best to fake surprise and ignorance but he was sure he hadn’t pulled a perfect role. It did not matter, he was on his way to the hospital and to see Marinette, and that would be the only thing on his mind, not what others thought of him. 

He was lucky that Nathalie had grown to like Marinette because when he was out and she tried to stop him, only the mention of her name and the word hospital was enough for her to set him free of any scheduled event he might have had. 

It took him twenty-five minutes to get to the hospital, and in those twenty-five minutes, his feet had not stopped bouncing of the anxiety the situation was causing him. 

When the car stopped in front of the hospital, only for a second as his driver saw where to park the car, Adrien wasted no time. He opened the door and jumped out, running to the entrance and kept running through the corridors of the clinic. 

He only stopped to ask where Marinette could be and when he had his answer he speeded up once again. 

Once he reached the floor and the hallway, he saw Nino and Alya in the distance, sitting outside one of the rooms. 

Adrien slid in the hallway and stopped in front of them. 

“Oh, you’re finally here,” Alya gasped, putting one hand against her heart and letting the tension disappear from her shoulders. 

The couple stood up and threw themselves to find Adrien in a hug. 

“What is it?” Adrien asked worried, his heart beating as fast as a train, “Is she okay?”

“She is stable,” Alya said, “They performed surgery on her last night, no complications or any other thing but… Sabine hasn’t explained anything to me. I have no idea why she could have needed surgery. Do you?”

“No,” Adrien shook his head, “Not at all. I was hoping you would know,”

“None of us knows,” Nino said, “Whatever this is, whatever she is going through, I bet this is why she’s been acting so weird these past months,”
“It has to be,” Alya nodded,

“Yeah,” Adrien nodded too, “But… does not one know? What about Luka?”

“No. I called him but he had no idea what it could be,”

“Ah… is he coming?”

“Yes. He was on Nice with the band but took a train back, he’ll probably arrive in a few hours,” Alya explained, “I don’t have Kagami’s number so I was expecting for you to let her know,”
Adrien nodded, taking his phone and immediately sending a text to his fencing partner, informing her of the situation. 

“Done,” 

“Great,”

“So, are we allowed to see her? Or are we here waiting for someone to give us more information?”

“We are allowed to see her, but we were waiting for you, and as we were waiting for a few doctors came to her room and are telling her and her parents a few things… things that are not audible through the door,” Alya rolled her eyes and kicked the air with her foot. 

“We’ll know soon, babe,” Nino said, putting his arms around her and rubbing her arms in an attempt to calm her down. 

Adrien wished there was someone to comfort him too. 

xx

Marinette looked at her parents as the doctors left the room. 

Her mom was on the edge of tears, and her father was already crying waterfalls. 

“Please don’t,” Marinette said, looking at the roof trying to escape her own tears. “I’ll be fine, you heard the doctors,”

“Marinette,” Her mother said and looked at her with so much pain in her eyes. 

“We have to be positive, maman,”

“I’m trying to be, but when you’re out there running around when you know you shouldn’t, I can’t help but think the worst. You’re not taking care of yourself, Marinette,”

“I am, I take care of myself!” She whined, “This was a fluke, it was important, I... I really did my best to not run and overwork myself,” The last part was a lie, her illness had been the last thing on her list of priorities. 

“Marinette,” Her mother sighed, “An angioplasty is something that is planned and procedure needed when things get worse. You didn’t plan this nor prepare it for it, they had to make one because of the damage your heart has suffered in the short run,”

“They didn’t have to,” Marinette huffed, “I was stable and then they decided to perform the surgery,” 

“Because they do not think you would have been able to stay stable if you didn’t have a little bit of help. What does that say, Marinette?” Marinette looked down, the accusatory look on her mother’s eyes was much to take in, “We’re trying our best to stay positive but when things like this happen we can’t,”

“I’m sorry,”

“You don’t have to be, sweetie,” Sabine sighed, “But you need to promise me that you’ll take care of yourself, that you’ll change the way you live your life. I know it is a hit on who you are and what you want to do, but you can’t do those things anymore… please, Marinette. We can’t lose you,”

“I know,” Marinette sobbed. 

She opened her arms and her parents approached to reciprocate the hug. 

“I love you,” She whispered.

“We love you too,” They said at the unison. 

“I’ll take care of myself, I promise,” 

“Thank you,” Her father said, cleaning the tears that were still falling. 

“Now we need to go back to the bakery for a few hours. You’ll be discharged tomorrow if everything goes according to the plan, so don’t be a nuisance to the doctors. Can you do that?”

“Yes, mom,” 

“Great,” Sabine kissed her forehead, “Marinette… your friends are outside,”

“What?!” She shrieked. 

“I know you didn’t want to let them know, but the situation has escalated and I think your friends have to know that you’re going through a difficult situation. It will take the weight of so many things, sweetie,”

Marinette couldn’t argue, her mother was right. 

Nonetheless, she sighed resigned. 

“Should we let them in?”

“Okay,” She shrugged. 

When her parents left and her friends entered the room, the energy around her shifted. It was a little lighter than the one her parents radiated, but it wasn’t something comfortable either. 

Alya was the first one to run to her and catch her in her arms. 

“Oh, my girl, you’re okay,” She said between sobs.

“You’re asphyxiating me,” Marinette said, trying to brush off the seriousness of the situation. 

“I’m sorry,” But she didn’t let go.

“Alya,” Nino called and pulled his girlfriend away. 

Alya huffed and leaned to leave a kiss on Marinette’s cheek. 

“Hello there, Marebear,” Nino said and shook her hair, messing it up more than it already was.

“Hello there, you,” 

Marinette’s eyes then found Adrien, who still was standing in the door and looking at her with numb eyes. 

She waved at him and got a weak wave back. 

“How long have you guys been here?” 

“Not more than an hour,” Alya answered.

She pulled the chair closer to Marinette’s bed and sat down. Nino did the same.

Adrien only took a few steps further. 

“What did my parents told you?”

“Not much,” Nino shrugged, “That you were in the hospital, that you got emergency surgery and that’s about it,”

“Oh,” Marinette hadn’t expected for them to tell so little. 

None of her friends spoke, but all three kept their eyes fixed on her. 

Marinette rolled her shoulders relieving some tension and took a deep breath before speaking. 

“I haven’t been honest with you guys,” She started, “I mean, I haven’t deliberately lie about anything but I have kept you in the dark about what’s happening to me,”

She looked at Alya who nodded, telling her to keep going. 

“I didn’t want to put the weight on your shoulders and I… I didn’t want you to see me as fragile. I wanted to stay being me,”

Something changed in the way they moved, and in the way, they were looking at her.

Nino and Alya now looked concerned. 

Adrien looked frightened. 

“I’m sick, I have been for a while,” She stayed silent after that, waiting for them to talk. 

“What kind of illness?” Nino asked, more serious than she had ever heard him before. 

“Heart disease,” 

“How did it happen?” Alya jumped, “You’re young!”

“I… remember how I had that horrible muscle pain?” Alya nodded “Well, I started taking medicine and… it had some consequences, my heart started to fail,”

“Medicine? You got sick beca--- wait a minute… did you take that medicine, the one with the lawsuit?”  

Marinette simply nodded. 

“Why didn’t you tell anyone?!” Alya shouted.

Marinette looked at her fidgeting fingers, “I told Kagami,” She whispered. 

“ Kagami?! You told Kagami and not me?!”

“She figured it out! I couldn’t lie,”

Alya opened her mouth to scream again but she was interrupted by Adrien who seemed to connect to the conversation for the first time, even if he wasn’t following the pace of it. 

“You’ll be fine, right?” Adrien pushed again.

“For now,” She said, sincerity breaking her voice. 

“What do you mean for now?” Alya asked in a high pitched tone, her anger disappeared with that.  

“My condition is more serious than they initially thought and… I’ll probably need a transplant,”

“A transplant?!” The couple said at the unison,

“That’s serious, Nette!” Nino shouted.

“Not that much!” She waved her hands, trying to calm them down, “It’s only a possibility, if I take care of myself I won’t need one like ever!”

“Why do I feel like you’re lying?” 

“Why would I? I mean, now, I know I’ve sort of lied before,” Her response was so quick that not even herself would have believed it

But she needed them to. She just had hit them with her diagnostic, she couldn’t tell them that the angioplasty would be a temporary solution, that it could only last one or two years with the pace her damage was extending through her heart. 

“Because a transplant is a serious deal, Marinette… you might need a new heart , you know what that means? It means that you could die if you don’t get one,”

“C’mon we don’t have to-

“No,” Alya cut, “I’ve been following this case, Marinette. I’ve read all that’s going down with it. Sixteen people have already died, Nette. Sixteen people took the same medicine as you and now they’re underground!”
“All the people who died got their lungs affected, not their hearts, also they were much older than me and had a history of smoking,” Marinette shouted. She had read all about it too. 

“Marinette!” Alya shouted back, tears starting to fall down her cheeks. 

“She won’t die,” Adrien’s whispered somehow turned to be the loudest voice in the room. 

All looked at him. 

Adrien’s skin was a green undertone and his whole body was shaking. 

“Adrien?” Marinette said

“You won’t die,” He said, this time louder. “You can’t die!”

“Adrien,” Nino said, standing up and going for him. 

But before he could reach him, Adrien ran away. 

xx

Nino had called after him and when he didn’t reach him, he called to his phone and left a thousand of texts but Adrien never answered. 

He needed his time alone. 

For that, he transformed and spend the rest of the day on the rooftops. 

He was sure Nathalie would be looking for him like crazy but he didn’t care. 

Adrien’s heart hurt so much that he was sure it was dripping acid all around it and burning everything inside him. 

The image of Marinette on the hospital bed bounced around his brain in the most painful way. 

When he saw her on the street, gasping for air and crying his heart broke, but when he saw her in the hospital it completely shattered. 

Then she said that she needed a transplant and after that Alya had voiced up what he had been fearing. 

Marinette could die.  

Marinette was sick and she could die because of it.  

No, no, no. NO!

Marinette couldn’t die! She just couldn’t! 

He would not let it happen! 

Marinette had to stay alive, cheery and playful, smart and confident. Marinette had to stay there with them and reach every goal and dream she ever proposed to get. 

Marinette didn’t deserve this! 

Marinette… 

She couldn’t die. 

He couldn’t lose her. 

He couldn’t lose anyone else he loved, it would be too much. 

Adrien hugged his legs close to his chest and let the tears fall. 

He wished the day would cry with him, but the sun was shining bright and that only added more pain to his heart. 

If Marinette died beautiful days would all be grey.

“Fuck,” Adrien shouted as he hit the pipe wall beside him. The anger boiling up inside him.

This wasn’t fair! 

And to think that just yesterday he had been so angry at her, that he had screamed at her and then… then all the chaos had ensued. 

He had treated her so badly when all she was trying was to help him. For what he had gathered, Marinette thought that Ladybug had left him to die. Marinette had been angry because he could have died. 

Was it because she herself could meet that end?

Stupid girl! She had endangered herself just because she thought he had been in the doors of death. 

Adrien growled. 

“Oh, what’s that?” Ladybug’s voice echoed behind him.

He turned around and saw her in all her splendor. 

He hadn’t even heard her land. 

“Hi, bug,” He tried to wave but he had no strength. 

“What is it?” She asked and sat down beside him. 

Ladybug threw herself at him and wrapped him in a hug. Her hands lied close to his face as she brushed his hair and nuzzled her nose against his cheek. 

They were touchy, but she had been crossing the limits these past weeks. For the first time, he did not mind. It was calming to have her so close and tenderly caressing him. 

“Why were you crying?” Ladybug asked.

He didn’t think twice, he told her everything. 

Without saying Marinette’s name, Adrien told him all his story with her, from when they first met to when they became friends and how their relationship evolved so much over the years. He told her how strange Marinette had been acting and how he and all his friends couldn’t help but worry, and lastly, he finished with the bad news. 

“I don’t want her to die, Buginette,” He sobbed, “I can’t lose her,”
Ladybug hummed beside him and let go of the hug. 

She put her hands on top of her knees, and then her head on top of the palms of her hands. 

“She said she wasn’t going to, that the transplant wasn’t necessary,”

“Yes, I know but--
“Okay so why are you worrying?” She asked, “If you ask me I think you’re exaggerating. Don’t worry about stupid stuff unless it happens. You’ll be happier like this,” 

What?
Adrien looked at her aghast.   

Ladybug stood up and looked around. 

“Is that all that’s worrying you?” 

“All? Yes, that’s all,” He said half laughing, not because he was amused but because he couldn’t believe what she was saying,

“Cool, then let’s patrol, I gotta be home earlier,” 

“Patrol?” 

“Yes, isn’t that what we do,”
“My friend could die and all you think about is patrol?!” Adrien stood up and threw his hands in the in complete incredulity.

“I thought we had already established that she wasn’t going to die,”
“You established that,” He hissed, “ What’s wrong with you?”

“Chat, c’mon,” Ladybug sighed and she put one hand against her forehead, “It’ll be alright! You just have to stop being a drama queen. Just be logical about it, I promise she’ll be fine,”
He shook his head slowly and took one step away from her. 

“Go patrol alone,” He spat. 

There had not been a single moment in which he had even considered the option of hating Ladybug, but at that moment, hate was the closest emotion to what he was feeling towards her. 

What was going with the girl he loved? What was going on with her sensible and assertive friend? The one he could trust, the one he could tell him all about, the one who would comfort him and talk to until he wasn’t hurting anymore.

That girl wasn’t there that night. 

And he feared that she hadn’t been in a long time

Whatever was happening with her, whichever change she was going through. He did not like it. 

Not one tiny bit. 

This version of her wasn’t the girl he loved. 

Chapter Text

Marinette was back at school after a week in the hospital and staying at home. 

Her meds, her diet, and her exercise routine had changed, but besides that, she was trying her best to pretend nothing had ever happened. As if her condition had not gotten worse. 

The day went by smoothly with nothing interfering her way to class, no akuma in sight and not much homework to add to the one she missed as she was taking care of herself. 

Per her request, none of her friends had said anything, they would keep the secret and join her little facade. 

None of them had been happy about it but they gave up after Marinette begged them. 

So, everything had gone pretty normal. 

Well, almost everything. 

Adrien was acting out. 

He barely looked at her or wouldn’t stop following her and asking her if she was okay. 

He opened the door for her, he took her tray for her, moved the stool, and so on. Then his attitude would give a drastic turn and he wouldn’t answer to her, too lost in his own mind to pay attention to her. 

In any other situation she would have screamed and called him out on his behavior, and she was about to when Nino took her by her wrist and pulled her close, only whispering one word: mother. 

His attitude started to make sense, they weren’t excused and she still believed it wasn’t the right way to approach the situation but she would let it slide. 

Marinette was going through papers, homework and missing assignments. Flipping through the notebooks and writing notes in the margins in different colors, she was in the zone. When she reached for a new highlighter, her hand didn’t touch a pen, but something warm and in movement. 

She shrieked and jolted back, pushing her chair to the back and hitting the left part of the desk. 

“Don’t scream!” A tiny voice warned her and right in front of her, Tikki appeared. 

Marinette gasped loudly. 

“What are you doing here?!” The question came filled with anger but inside Marinette was the happiest person in the world.

“Aimée is out with friends close by, I’ll be back as fast as I can if anything happens,” Tikki explained, “I just miss you, and couldn’t miss the chance to visit you… aren’t you happy to see me?”

Marinette’s heart softened, and so did her sight. 

She opened her arms and invited Tikki in for a hug. 

The kwami giggled excited and went to leave a kiss on her cheek.

Instantly, tears started to fall down her cheeks. 

They didn’t say a word for the longest time, only enjoying each other’s company and crying together. 

xx

After tears and kind words filled with love, Tikki and Marinette started laughing and talking about how their lives had been going. 

Eventually, Marinette couldn’t push the subject away any longer. She didn’t want to either, there was something suspicious about the way Tikki was behaving. 

“How is Aimée treating you?” She asked. 

Tikki stopped for a second, a weird look crossed her eyes, and then kept eating the little biscuit.  

“Fine,”

Marinette rose a brow. 

The lack of emotion was unlike Tikki.
“Does she give you nice cookies?”

“Yours are better,”

“But she is making an effort,”

“I guess she is,” 

Marinette opened her mouth, concerned. 

She knew Tikki enough to know what was going on.
“You don’t like her,” Marinette whispered, standing up from her chair, hands reaching her hair. “ Oh no, ” 

“She is nice, Marinette!” Tikki said, waving her little hands in front of her, trying to make Marinette sit down again.

“Nice? I can tell that you don’t like her,” Marinette frowned, “You try your best to see the good in others, but you just said ‘I guess’, so unattached… you don’t like her,”
“I don’t dislike her,” Tikki said in a tiny voice. 

“Tikki!”

“It’s not that bad Marinette, she can be really nice is just… she is… she is a little self-absorbed, that’s all, oh, well, and she is not very sympathetic towards others and sometimes she is a bit mani-”

“I don’t want to hear it, if I hear more I’ll have to do something about it, and as much as I love you if I want to go back to being Ladybug I have to focus on recovering, not anything else,” Marinette whined, covering her ears with the palms of her hands, “I can’t train anyone else and she is doing an okay job taking care of the akumas, and Chat doesn’t seem to have a problem with her--

“He does,” That had not been Tikki’s voice. 

They both turned where the voice came and saw the blub of black floating in the middle of the room. 

What was it? Marinette visitation day?

“Plagg, what are you doing here?” Tikki said before Marinette. 

“Kid is close by, I felt your energy here and had to come,” 

Chat is close. 

Marinette felt goosebumps run all over her skin. 

The thought was enough to distract her of the conversation, and once she was back she had missed a good bunch of it, but thankfully she got to the important part.
“I don’t like to know everything because is too much to carry on my little body but this is the kind of thing you must tell me!” Plagg spat, “I knew something was fishy but didn’t know how bad it was until now!”

“Pla--”

“I’m sorry,” Marinette said, “This was my idea. I begged Tikki to not say anything,”
“I don’t forgive you!” Plagg hissed, “Do you know in how much danger you put us in? Does Fu even know?!”

“Yes,” Marinette nodded, answering to both questions, “It took some convincing too but… since I’m the next guardian and he is too old and tired to keep calling the shots, he couldn’t say much. It was my decision to make, no one else’s.”

“It wasn’t! You left my kid alone!”

“He is not alone, and he is doing fine,” Marinette said, not trying to think of the akuma fight where her chosen replacement had left him all alone and not fine at all!, “He can’t tell--”

“He can tell,” Plagg interrupted her angrily, but then sighed looking defeated, “He’s been scratching his head the whole time. He realizes there’s something wrong with Ladybug. He is… not happy with Ladybug!”

“Did she do something?” Marinette gulped. 

“Not being you,” Plagg sat on the desk, “They’re unbalanced. Their dynamic is not the same that the one he had with you. She flirts with him one second and then looks down on him. He doesn’t know what to expect or how to react,”

“That’s… awful, it really is but.. he still doesn’t suspect so,”
“Why would he suspect that she is not you?”
He wouldn’t. He would have expected her to tell him. 

“I know… can you… can you just… ugh."

“Not let him figure out?”
“Please,”

“I’ll do my best… I’m still angry but I know your decision was not out of whim.”
“She would never!” Tikki pushed him.

“That’s exactly what I said, sugar cube,”

And then a fight ensued between them. 

Marinette couldn’t help but laugh at this. 

It was nice seeing them both. 

“Guys,” She interrupted, hiding her amused smile. “I’m going downstairs, would you like some food?”

Their excited response was all that she had been waiting and it was enough to light up her week. 

xx

Adrien missed his target once again. 

It was so bad that Kagami didn’t make fun of him once. What she did was talk to him,  a heartfelt talk, which she didn’t do often. It was enough to understand that he was not behaving like his usual self. 

“We all care about Marinette but you shouldn’t let it affect you this much.” 

“This is not about, Marinette,” He let out a shocked laugh.
“You’re not a good liar,” Kagami rolled her eyes and threw a towel to his face, “You’ve been odd the whole week."

“Ugh… it’s not only about Marinette,” He finally said.

“Okay. Why don’t you want to talk about it?”

“I never said that,”
“You didn’t spill when I asked, that’s a synonym to ‘I don’t want to talk about it’ in Adrien Agreste’s language.” 

Adrien clicked his tongue.

When had she gotten so good at reading people?

“It’s too personal,” It was not a lie. 

“Is it about your mother?” 

Adrien huffed. Maybe she read people know but she still wasn’t able to read the mood nor be assertive with her words. 

“A little bit,” He admitted, “I don’t want to lose anyone else,”
“We won’t lose, Marinette. She is strong, she is headstrong too, she won’t let the illness win that easily.”

Adrien chuckled at that, but the smile on his face faded away quickly.

Kagami’s words were very similar to Ladybug’s, one week ago, but why did they make him feel so different?

Because Kagami wasn’t brushing off his feelings. Because Kagami was like that, to the point. She kept eyes on the price, and as emotional as she could be -even if she didn’t like to show it- she never let the obstacles cloud her goal. 

Right now her goal was Marinette’s wellbeing, and if she believed she was going to be okay, then she most probably would be. 

Now, this wasn’t the case with Ladybug. 

His lady was emotional and as positive as she was, she did let insecurities leak through and worried about the unknown. She was also empathetic to a fault, and now… now she just wasn’t. 

That was what bothered him the most, that he couldn’t tell what had changed to make her act as weird as she was behaving the past month and a half. It wasn’t just painful, it was also eerie. 

“Ad--

“Kagami,” Adrien stood up of the bench and cleaned the sweat off his face with the towel she’d thrown, “Do girls radically change the way they act, like completely, when they like someone?”

“What? No, why would they do that?” Kagami grimaced with disgust, “Or maybe a few do, but I don’t understand why would you love yourself so little.”

Adrien threw his head back, a smile appeared on his lips no matter how much he tried not to let it curl.

“Why do you ask?”

“Well… there’s this girl… this girl that I like a lot,” Adrien started. 

A few years ago, he would not be able to start this conversation with anyone but Plagg, however, there were the least chances to have this conversation with Kagami since they had gone on a few dates, but now as friends, there was no damage in telling her about it. 

“Oh,” Kagami’s eyes popped. 

She sat next to him and looked at him attentively. 

“I’ve known her for almost four years and… I’m so in love with her, yet lately… It is like I can’t help but wonder why."

“Alright,” Kagami dragged the words, she sounded confused. 

“She’s been acting odd, nothing like herself sometimes and I don’t know what to do. We’ve always flirted, but it was always innocent and more teasing than actual physical contact and, ugh, those sensual looks she sends and how her lips--

“I really don’t want to know that, skip it” 

“Oh, yeah, sorry,” Adrien rubbed the back of his head, “She flirts constantly and intensely, but she… she is not as kind, assertive, and caring as she was and the way she treats me…”
“How does she treat you?”

“She treats me differently every day, sometimes every hour, she tells me I’m the best but then she throws mean comments or looks down on me,” Adrien sighed, “I don’t know what to do,”

“Have you talked to her about this?”

“No,” 

“You should,”

“We fought,”

“More reason to talk to her,”
There was no way to argue against that logic. 

“If you care about her and are confused about something she is doing, the only person who can tell you what is going on is?" 

“Her,” Adrien completed. 

He rubbed his hands against his face and let out a little moan of frustration. 

“I don’t want to,”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know,” Adrien shrugged, “Something doesn’t add up and I can’t tell what it is,”

“And you won’t know what it is until you speak to her,”
Adrien blew a raspberry.

“I hate when you’re right,”
“Then you must hate every moment,” 

Adrien let out a big laugh and Kagami joined him too, only to then keep laughing and teasing each other as they went back to fencing practice.  

A little bit of happiness before facing Ladybug was a nice thing to have. 

xx

That night, the sky was missing the moon. The only lights illuminating the rooftops were the reflections of the ones on the street. 

Nonetheless, it was a beautiful night to spend with your lover or someone you cared deeply about, it wasn’t a night to be alone in the rooftops waiting for your best friend to appear. 

It wasn’t a night to get frustrated because your partner was one hour and forty minutes late. 

Any other day, he would have understood but Ladybug had been testing his patience. 

What a change of roles. It was him who was always pushing her over the edge, it was him who was late most of the time. 

But, nothing had been like it always was, right?

When footsteps pounded in the air, and the roof quivered under him, Adrien stood and turned around, watching her come near him. 

“You’re late,” Chat said, watching his tone. He would not let out all his frustrations in one go.
“My cousins were over for dinner, I couldn’t just leave,” 

“You could have warned me,”

Ladybug put one finger on the middle of her mouth and tilted her head

“Yes, I guess I could have,” She nodded and sat down next to him.  

“Is it important? I am--

“Busy,” Adrien spat, “I know. You’re busy all the time now,”

“Yes, I am. What’s with the passive-aggressiveness?”
“What’s with you?” Adrien said, blowing all his plan of taking it slowly, “You don’t act like yourself lately. That air of superiority you’ve integrated to your daily behavior, I fucking hate it and I’m tired of brushing it off just because I love you!”
“What are you talking about?” Ladybug asked, but her voice shuddered. 

“You act like you are the cat’s meow, and I mean, you are, but you never rubbed it in my face. You’re acting… you’re acting like a spoiled brat! You’re being a bad friend! That’s what I’m talking about!”

Ladybug looked taken back. Her features were contractured in an odd expression and her eyes glimmered under the moonlight. 

A tear rolled down her cheek.

Adrien gulped but he didn’t take anything back. 

She recovered fast of that state, she sat down straight and rubbed her under eyes, pulling a confident look on her face, it wasn’t peaceful, it was full of anger. 

“I didn’t know it was going to be this hard!” Ladybug shouted, “I have a life outside this!

“I know that! So do I. What does this have to do with what I’m telling you?”
“It is too hard,” Ladybug whined, her voice fading, “I have so much to do, so much to work on, just… it’s too much and…”

“You’re doing it again,” Adrien gasped and shook his head. 

This was unbelievable.

“Doing what?” She asked in a suffocated whisper. 

“Only thinking about yourself,” He explained, “You’re not the only one that has things to do, you’re not the only one who has a hard life, you are…”

“You don’t get it!” Ladybug interrupted, “You would never get it,” 

“Help me understand, then,” He threw his head back and laid on his back on the roof, “Tell me why are you acting the way you are! I’m not a psychic, I can’t read your mind,” 

“Listen, I know you’re the funny and charming one, but I’m the smart one and--

“Oh, fucking,” Adrien growled, before saying anything he would regret, “There it is! You can’t even begin to explain what’s going on without telling me I’m worse than you,”

“I didn’t say that!”
“You’ve been underrating my intelligence for the past month, bug,” Adrien stood up and looked down to her, “Every time we talk, you describe yourself as someone wonderful, but when you talk about me… I don’t know what’s the objective of all this,”

“I didn’t mean to! Really I… I don’t know what’s going on with me,” Ladybug sobbed. 

Adrien’s heart broke but he gave her his back. He wouldn’t fall down until she spoke the truth, if he was weak then they would never patch this up.

“Chat… Chat,” Ladybug called, “Chat look at me,”

“No,” 

“Please, Chat,” Her hands were on his arms and she shook him, “There’s nothing to explain,”

“Don’t lie to me. Something is obviously going on with you, I can’t tell what it is but… I don’t like it,” 

“Chat…” Her cries were louder. 

“I’m angry, I’m disappointed but it all can change if you just tell me what is making you act this way, I know this isn’t you,”

He felt her head against his back, shaking as she sobbed. 

“I’ll work on it,” She whined, “I’ll fix it all, please just look at me,”

“Bug,”

“I love you,”

“Lately I’m not sure if you do,” Chat said, his heart aching. The truth spilled from his lips felt like acid. 

He heard her gasp, and repeat the words. 

Adrien pinched the bridge of his nose. 

This was a situation he never saw himself in to. 

Her hand gripped his wrist and she pulled him to her. 

Adrien let himself be moved but was ready to shout something, to push her away and try to convince her into talking when something he had not been expecting happened that made him forget about everything he had meant to talk about. Because the world stopped around him when Ladybug’s lips found his. 

Chapter Text

Adrien looked up to the roof, lost in thought, mind captured by the recent memories. A particular one to be exact. 

His index and middle finger were on top of his lips, drawing their shape as he played the moment on his head over and over again. 

His left hand fell on the water making a loud sound and splashing water all around the bathtub, but he did not mind, he was numb to everything but the memory. 

He was trying to find an explanation of why Ladybug’s soft lips had landed on his, why had she kept them there, brushing and moving them against his own. 

Adrien was trying to understand what had happened with his heart. 

He had returned the kiss, too lost in the sensations and in the feeling of dreams coming true to notice the uncomfortable weight landing on his heart and stomach. 

Something had not been right. 

He still couldn’t decide what. 

Adrien sighed and threw his head back, seconds later Plagg landed on his forehead. 

“You’re late.”

“I know,” Adrien answered, tone low and uninterested. 

“You don’t like to be late,” Plagg kept going. 

“I know,” Adrien said again, “Why do you mind? You always bother me about how early we go, that I deprive you of valuable hours of sleep.” 

Plagg flew around his head and ruffled his hair, not answering the question, but pulling his blonde locks to make him get out of the tub. 

Adrien didn’t complain, he just got out. The bewilderment that left yesterday’s kiss was too strong, his attention could not be directed to anything else. 

The astonishment followed his every move, making him stop his actions as his thoughts spiraled in a continuous mess. 

It took him half an hour more than usual to get ready for school. 

When he walked down the stairs, he saw Nathalie waiting at the end. She was frowning at him. It was subtle, but Adrien knew her well. 

“Adrien,” She started. 

“Good morning, Nathalie,” He waved at her weakly. 

“We said--

“No baths on school days,” Adrien finished for her, “I know.”

“Is something wrong, Adrien?” Nathalie asked. She didn’t look up to check on him, too immersed in her own tablet, but her voice did carry concern, the fact that she had asked her without him giving more clues was also important to remark. 

“Teen stuff.”

“ Girl stuff?” 

“That obvious, uh?” 

“Not at all, it was a guess,” Nathalie said, “I hope Miss Dupain-Cheng is feeling better.” 

Adrien rose a brow. 

What a change of subject!

“Yeah, she is. She’s a strong girl.” 

Something similar to a smile appeared on Nathalie’s lips, but it disappeared as quickly as it popped. 

“Go to the car, you don’t want to be late.” 

Adrien nodded and followed her instructions at a very low peace. 

For the first time in a long time, he wasn’t excited about going to school. 

xx

Adrien really wanted to go unnoticed today, but his wishes were destroyed the second he put a foot out of his car. 

Marinette was waiting for him on the stairs. 

If it had been anyone else he would have been angry, but it was Marinette, she made him feel nothing but happiness. 

Especially when she was looking stunning as ever, her fashionista style on but very chill compared to other outfits she had used to school. 

She was wearing a pair of summery striped culottes and a white turtleneck t-shirt with no sleeves. Her hair was up in space buns, she had black earrings around the arch of her ear to match the ones she usually wore, and to finish up, her eyeliner was on a cool variation of a cat-eye. 

Seeing her there, so lively and so herself made his heart warm up, and a few of his problems seemed to disappear. 

“Good morning, pretty girl,” The words escaped before he could really process them. 

Marinette seemed taken back, but thankfully didn’t say anything. That didn’t stop him from wanting to punch himself in the face. 

“Good morning, hot stuff,” She replied. 

Adrien let out a goofy laugh. 

Aw, she was awesome. 

“So, I was waiting for you,” Marinette begun. 

“What for?” Adrien said, softly nudging her arms with his elbow, to tell her to walk with him. 

“To talk,” Marinette’s voice was soft but determined. 

“ Talk ,” Adrien gave one nod, “Is everything okay?”
“ Dandy, ” She dragged the word, 

Adrien chuckled and rolled his eyes.

“Am I in trouble?”

“Of course not, it is just a small chat between friends,” Marinette singsong.

“Okay, I’m totally getting scolded,” Adrien shook his head from side to side, and covered his face with his hands. 

“Yeah, you got me,” She shrugged and threw her hands to the side, actually looking defeated.

“C’mon shoot me,” Adrien said, dramatically taking a step back, putting his hands on top of his chest and gasping loudly. 

Marinette giggled but quickly returned to her serious stand. 

“I like you like this, you know? Relaxed, joking around, not afraid of what my next move could be.”

“Well, thank you,” He scratched his scruff, “There’s more to that, isn’t it?” 

“Yes,” Marinette slightly nodded, “You’ve not been yourself around me. I know it took time for me to be a normal person around you, and that it took time for you to realize that you could be you and no one would judge, but those times are far gone now, so I don’t understand why you’ve been acting so strange around me.”
“Oh.”

“I mean, I do understand, I… I see where you’re coming from, and I won’t judge you for it but,” Marinette stopped, looking down, a thousand thoughts running through her eyes. “You know how I said that I kept my condition a secret because I didn’t want to look fragile?”

Adrien nodded, then softly he said, “You would never be fragile, Nette. You’re the strongest person I know,” A second later, the memory of Ladybug ran across his mind. Strangely, he didn’t back up or correct himself. Yes, Marinette was the strongest person he knew, even winning over Ladybug, or at least, this new version of Ladybug.  

“Well, it’s strange for you to say that because whenever I’m around you I feel like I’m made of glass,” Marinette panted, the frustration was clear, “Or ignored.” 

“I-ignored?” Adrien’s eyes went wide. 

“Yes. Either you treat me like I’m about to shatter or you avoid me completely.”

Adrien closed his eyes tightly, rubbing his fingers under them. 

He had not realized he was doing that. His mind was a mess and it felt like he had been working on autopilot for the whole week and a half that had passed after Adrien found out about Marinette’s illness. 

“I didn’t know I was doing it, Marinette,” He started, “I know that does not excuse it, but I really want you to know that. I’ll do my best to not do it again, you must have felt awful.”

“I did, but I understand.”

Did she? He didn’t understand it himself. 

But, he would not tell her that, this was for him to discover. 

“Hey,” Marinette said, jumping at his side and trying to press her arms on top of her shoulders. 

Adrien rolled his eyes amused and bent down his knees so she could do what she wanted to. 

Marinette put her hands close to his neck and hugged his shoulders, pressing her head behind his. 

“I wasn’t angry, a bit annoyed maybe, but not angry. And it’s all good now, right?”

“Right,” Adrien said. 

He threw his arms back and twisted them around Marinette’s legs, standing up after. 

Marinette let out a strange noise when he did that, probably the surprise, but then she laughed. 

“Amazing now I have my own personal carriage,” She said cheerily.

“Happy to serve you, princess.” 

Marinette tensed up behind him, her nails dug on his shirt. 

“Marinette?” He asked, concerned.  

But then there was no time for her to answer when Alya’s scream cut through the air and she came running, jumping and swirling until she reached them. 

“Did Nino propose or something?” Marinette asked, “Because I’m happy if you’re but I have to say you’re crazy if he did in fact propose.” 

Alya gushed so fast and in such a high pitched tone of voice that it was impossible to follow her. 

Adrien turned his head and looked at Marinette, she was staring back at him just as confused. 

Alya jumped in her place, holding her phone close to her heart. 

“What is it, Alya?!” Marinette asked, unlinking her legs off his waist and jumping to go back to the floor. 

Alya let out another shriek and showed Adrien her phone. 

His heart sunk. 

“Fuck,” He said under his breath. 

Now, his memory was not the only record of that night.

Now, there was a video. 

xx

Marinette brushed the dust of her pants as she heard Alya’s little blast of energy words. 

She shifted to Adrien, to look for his support in this strange situation but when she did, he looked like he had seen a ghost. 

It only made her more interested. 

“What is it?” She asked again. 

Alya didn’t listen, she was looking at the screen again. 

Marinette rolled her eyes.

Tired of waiting she reached for the phone and took it out of her hands. She would apologize later, and after all, they were friends, Alya would not be too mad. 

She flipped the device to get a better look and pressed play. 

Her breath got caught in her throat. 

Her hands shook. 

She watched how the video zoomed in. No more blurry silhouettes in the night, now it was more than clear -as if hadn’t been before- who were the protagonists of the video. 

Marinette paused the video and scrolled to rewind, only to press play again and zoom on it herself. 

Tall and strong, there stood Chat Noir, with his hands on the hips of the girl that was replacing her, with his lips against the girl who was faking to be her. 

A strange twisting sensation toured down her throat and into her stomach. 

Her heart ached. 

She had had enough scares to know that the pain she was feeling had nothing to do with her illness, this was pure emotion, poured like firey whiskey on her heart. 

“Marinette are you okay?” Alya asked, her euphoria dissipated. 

No, she wasn’t okay. 

She felt horrible, and she couldn’t describe exactly what it was what she was feeling. Disappointment? Betrayal? Jealousy? 

She couldn’t put a name to it. 

It was just dripping sorrow, like acid, it was burning and destroying everything inside her. 

“How did you get this?” Marinette whispered, “When was it?”

“Someone sent it to the Ladyblog last night,” Alya explained, taking her phone back, “You both look so shocked. I thought it was obvious that they were in love.” 

Marinette looked up, Adrien still looked like a deer on the lights. 

“But they’ve been off lately. You said so.”
“It was most probably was because their feelings were getting in the way!” 

Was it?

Was that really it?

No, it couldn’t be, Plagg said that Chat Noir wasn’t happy with Ladybug.

But, what if it had been a lie? What if Plagg had tried to make her feel better?

Because why would Chat kiss Ladybug if he sensed something different about her?

Unless… unless he only loved Ladybug-the-superheroine, the loved poster girl, and not… not her. Not who was underneath. 

Marinette gulped. 

After Chat confessed his love for her, she felt hurt, because that she would have to reject him, nonetheless, a part of her was extremely happy. He had seen through the mask and the spots and had fallen for her. 

She had never doubted his feelings.  Until now. 

This would be a problem all on its own, but it became even bigger when this little discovery made her doubt how she actually felt about him because this scorching sensation she had on her chest could not be explained by simple feelings of friendship. 

Maybe she felt something more.

Maybe these were romantic feelings.

Maybe she was in love with him. 

Maybe, she had always been. 

Chapter Text

Adrien looked down at his notebook, reviewing the chemistry problem and trying to catch the error. Because even if he didn’t have a sheet with the answers, he could tell something wasn’t right. 

It shouldn’t be so hard to understand why the equation wasn’t working, but here he was. 

A pen tapped the top of his notebook. 

“You put two instead of four,” Marinette pointed out, “It is implicitly said in the enunciate.” 

“Oh,” Adrien nodded and took his eraser, “Thank you, Nette.”

“You’re welcome,” Marinette smiled, “But is usually you who catches me making those kinds of mistakes, not the other way around.”

“Well, it was meant to happen,” He shrugged. 

“Yeah but… is everything okay?”

“Why wouldn’t it be? I mean besides the obvious pre-test stress.”

“Because your mind has been somewhere else from the past week and a half, and I sure hope this doesn’t have anything to do with me because we talked about it,” She rose a brow.

“Nothing to do with you, I promise,” He reached for her hand and squeezed, “Its’... it’s dumb and a little bit complicated… I don’t even know.”
“You don’t even know,” Marinette hummed. 

Adrien put his pencil down and looked around the café. It was quiet, only the sound of the kettles and cash making sound around them to accompany the music. 

“I… well… there’s this girl.” He started

Marinette gave a little jump on her spot, her face lifting and watching him with wide eyes. She looked taken back. 

“Sorry, sorry, let’s keep studying, I know you were troubled and here I am not helping and also wanting to talk--

“Hey,” Marinette leaned on the table and poked his cheek with the back tip of her pen, “A break is always well received. Tell me about it.”

Adrien lighted up with her sweet smile.

What kind of magic did she possess to make him feel good all the time?

Nonetheless, he hesitated. He doubted his problems were as important as Marinette’s were. She was facing her situation like a champion, and he couldn’t even bear with love. 

“Are you sure?”

Marinette looked down, she bit her lip and a strange yet melancholic look crossed her pain. It faded soon, but it still echoed on his mind.

“Of course. What are friends for? It is not like you haven’t asked advice about girls before...”
Something about that phrase hit him the wrong way. 

But she insisted and he needed to talk. From all the people he trusted and he felt at ease with, Marinette was on top with Nino. His stomach twisted when he realized he hadn’t mentioned his lady… before everything, she would have been on top, all alone.  

“It’s…” He sighed, and pushed back his hair, “Well, I asked Kagami first but--

“You asked Kagami? !” Marinette chirped, “ You dated her .”

“And now we’re close friends,” He said, putting his hands up, “I didn’t get into details or anything.”
“It’s still weird,” She shivered, “What did you ask her?”

“If girls changed their behavior when they liked someone,”

“What did she say?” A smile formed on Marinette’s lips.

“That it was ridiculous.”
She laughed, “Oh, I love her. Of course she said that. But, yes some girls do change the way they behave, in fact, I think we all do, since we’re trying to show the best part of ourselves to our crushes.”

“Well, yes, I guess, but what I was trying to say is… what if the girl changes their personality completely? Not all the time, but it’s like when she acts like her old self it doesn’t feel like her at all…”

Marinette rose a brow, “I think I will need a better explanation.”

“Yeah, I think so too,” Adrien threw his head back, his arms hang loose on each side of him as he leaned back on the chair, “I think I should start from the very beginning.”
“Be my guest.”
“Alright,” He sat straight and clapped his hands together, “So, I’ve known this girl since I’m fourteen, she is like… a friend from work. But our bond is more than that, or it was… something is not right lately.”

“Because she doesn’t act like herself?”
“Yes. She changed, not completely, but she has these attitudes that I can’t stand, and I know her well and I’m aware of her faults and I’ve loved despise them, but now it’s just…” Adrien moved his hands all over the place. 

Marinette gave a small giggle.

Adrien smiled at her. “It is a mess, Nette, my heart is in a duel.”
“You look like a mess when you talk about it,” She nodded, “How long have you liked her?”

“Ever since I met her.”

Marinette choked on her coffee. She grabbed a napkin and cleaned her face. 

“But… is this the girl you told me about a couple of years ago?”

“Uh, yeah,” Adrien nodded, trying to remember when this had been.

“But you dated Mimi,” Marinette looked down, her mouth slightly open. 

“I know but… that’s why it didn’t work out, I was too caught up on this other girl to give Kagami the attention and love she deserved.”
“ Ah ,” Marinette’s eyes darkened.

“I know, it’s bad.”

“No, I mean yes, it is not good, but… well, it’s normal, it happens,” She reached for his hand and took it, “I understand you. It didn’t work with Luka for the same reason.” She shrugged. 

“I’m sorry to hear.” He looked down. 

Adrien was aware that something had happened between those two, but he never dared to ask. He felt like it wasn’t his place to do so. 

“Yeah… I wanted to love him.” Marinette sighed, “But it was better, to be honest, that to push me to stay in the relationship and hurt him even more.”

Adrien hummed and intertwined his fingers with hers before taking a sip of his café.

Marinette’s hand trembled for a second, he thought he might pull away, but then she stayed. 

“Going back to your problem. What exactly is bothering you about her?” Marinette asked. 

“She… she has this superiority complex that is driving me insane.” Adrien admitted, “When I met her she was a bit insecure, and slowly she built up confidence, and I loved to see that, I loved to see her happy and trusting herself. She is beautiful, smart, kind, she really has it all so I was genuinely happy to see her so proud of herself, but this is different. She looks down on me, and when she talks it sounds like she thinks she is better than everyone else. She can be very kind and funny to be around, it’s not like everything has changed, but these little things are so powerful that they make me wonder if…

“If you’re still in love.” She completed. 

“Yes,” Adrien nodded, “Am I?”

“Only you can tell. Love is messed up.”

“Are you talking from experience?”

She nodded, “My heart is dueling too.”

“Tell me about it.”
“We’re talking about you.”

“I want to help. I don’t like that sad look in your eyes.”

“I have a sad look in my eyes?” She mumbled. 

“Yes, I’ve seen it for the past week,” He softly smiled. 

“It’s complicated too,” She begun, “I love this guy, and I’ve loved him for a long time, so long that it is hard to imagine myself not loving him. But on the other side, there is… this friend, my best friend that I love and respect and would want to keep forever in my life but lately… given my circumstances I… I might not see him ever again and I… I always knew that I could love him but it still took me by surprise.”
Adrien ran his thumb across her knuckles. His heart tightened at her words. A strange feeling made him shiver and a scorching sensation settled on his stomach. He didn’t like what he heard, it made him speechless. 

Marinette didn’t let silence lay down. 

“It’s crazy, I never thought something like this could happen but I guess I’m in love with both of them,” She rolled her eyes, and he could see the tears accumulating, “It’s stupid anyway, one of them has never seen me as more than a friend and the other… the other is dating someone else.”

“ Idiots, ” Adrien huffed, “You’re the most amazing girl I know, you really are one of a kind. Those guys really missed the greatest chance of their lives.”

It came out of his lips without him thinking it, but when he heard himself he realized how true his statement was. 

Marinette was as pink as her crop top, “Thank you…” She whispered. 

Adrien lifted her hand, and leaned to kiss her knuckles, “You’re welcome.”
He felt himself blush too. 

Butterflies appeared on his stomach, and even if he didn’t want to admit it, he knew his love problem had become more muddled than before.

xx

His studying session with Marinette ended up late. They stayed three hours longer than they expected, just talking and teasing each other as he ordered more food for them to share. 

He was walking back home after leaving her at her front door. He had not wanted to leave but he had to. 

The streets weren’t empty but it felt like they were, his thoughts were too loud to hear anything but those. 

Until a voice rang on his ear loudly. 

“We should have entered the bakery. I smelled cheese.”

Adrien was about to scold him for appearing in public but when he noticed they were walking through a lonely alley, he relaxed. 

“She didn’t invite me in.” 

“She was about to but you decided to leave. Bad decisions, Adrien,” Plagg grunted, “I like her, and I know that you do too.” 

“I know you like,” Adrien chuckled, “You tell me every time we see her.”

“I do not.”

“Almost every time.”

“Well, she is nice and has good cheese pastries. Also, she makes you happy, and you need that, I’m tired of seeing that kicked kitty look on your face all the time, is no fun.”

“Is this your way of telling me that you’re worried about me?” 

Plagg ignored him and gave another bite to the piece of cheese he was eating.  

Adrien laughed, “Finish that quickly, we’re late to patrol.”

“We are?” He asked, “Would have never guessed. Usually, you start to bounce and gush at least twenty minutes earlier.”

Adrien looked down. 

He was right but all that excitement had vanished in the last months. He hadn’t found a way to bring that excitement back, not even now when he had the kind of relationship he always wanted with Ladybug. 

His talk with Marinette had let him organize his thoughts a bit, but they were still messy. 

He had such great memories with her. He hadn’t lied, he would love her till the end of time, but right now… he wasn’t in love. 

It hurt to admit but it was what it was. 

After years of fighting the feeling, the moment he less expected it, it vanished. No, it didn’t vanish, there were still some feelings there. It had faded. It was washed out. 

Adrien shook his head and rubbed his face. 

This was all too much to handle. 

He didn’t wait for Plagg to tell him that he was ready. He called for his power and jumped to the closest rooftop the moment the suit and the magic wrapped him up. 

He ran as fast as he could, wishing that this way he could escape the increasing doubts filling his mind and heart. 

Who did he love? Who did he want?

What was going to happen next inside his heart?

He couldn’t know. 

In the back of his mind, the last months started to run like a movie. 

He thought of them and carefully analyzed them. 

What had changed? 

What in the world could have changed?

Ladybug had been strange at battles, she wasn’t as resourceful or merciful as before. It hadn’t been like this from the beginning of the change, but it had increased. She liked this job, less and less as the days passed, the only thing on her mind was to finish the battle fast. Yes, they usually tried to not extend it, but his lady would never jump into action without a plan, not before at least, because the only thing she was doing now, was trying to hit the enemy as hard as she could to leave them out of commission. 

The way she acted around him. It changed gradually too. After the picnic, there was something new in her, but nothing to worry about, it was only a few weeks later when he started to see these new behaviors blooming. 

And the flirting… why was it so blunt? Why was she all over him all the time? Why was she hot and cold and made him doubt her feelings?

Even when they kissed he wasn’t sure if she was really in love. Also, while kissing was fun… it lacked something.

She lacked something.  

Two weeks after their first kiss, he was finally able to admit it with Marinette, and now he was seeing it again. Something inside his heart wasn’t right. 

And talking about Marinette. It wasn’t a good sign that he enjoyed more his time with Marinette than his time with Ladybug. 

Adrien stopped harshly in the middle of a rooftop. 

He watched their point of encounter in the distance, he was so close, yet he had no desire to go there. 

Adrien spun on his heels and started running in a different direction, to a shadow in the night waiting outside a quiet balcony. 

xx

The night was looking as beautiful as a painting, but Marinette would have never known it. Her eyes were fixed on the screen of her phone and she wasn’t paying attention to anything else.

Alya had asked for help to select pictures of Ladybug and Chat Noir and now, Marinette was receiving a bunch of pictures of them having a romantic picnic on the rooftops two days ago. 

They were kissing. 

Aimée was all over her kitty. 

She could have twisted her cellphone with the strength of her anger alone. 

However, as much as she hated the pictures she couldn’t help but scroll through them and watch carefully.

“Bonsoir, princess!” 

She let out a scream and jumped back. The phone falling from her hands. 

“I’m sorry,” Chat said, taking her hand and saving her from stumbling with the table and fall flat on her butt, “I didn’t mean to startle you, I thought you had heard me.”

“What are you doing here?” She hissed. 

She pulled her hand back and put her hands on her hips.

“Visiting?” Chat said in a tiny voice. His ears dropped and he pouted, “I saw you in the distance and I wanted to say hi.”

“This is not your route!” 

Chat rose a brow, “How do you know that?”

Yes, how could Marinette know that?

But she came up with an excuse pretty easily, “Alya runs the Ladyblog and I’ve been helping so I know all this stuff too. So, why are you even here?”

“I haven’t seen you since…” Chat cleared his throat, “Since I had to take you to the hospital. I didn’t come earlier because I thought you would be too mad to see me.”

“I still am,” She answered without thinking it twice. Because as sad as she was to see him with another girl, the anger was still prevalent over that emotion. However, she couldn’t tell this to him. 

“I’m sorry.” Chat said softly, “I shouldn’t have screamed at you or treat you the way I did.”

“Yeah, you shouldn’t have.” Her lips sat on a harsh line, “Is that it?” 

“No.” 

Marinette knitted her brows together and waited. She waited and waited, but the only thing Chat did was look at her with gleaming eyes.  

“If you apologized and have nothing else yo say, why are you still here? I didn’t invite you and I bet you rather spend time with your girlfriend than with an angry civilian,” So much poison in only one sentence. 

“She’s not my girlfriend,” He mumbled.

What?

She was so taken back, she staggered a little. But then she came back to her senses.

“You haven’t asked her yet?” She huffed. 

How strange of him.

He looked down.

That look on his face didn’t go well on him. 

Something wasn’t right. 

“What?” She pushed. 

“I… I don’t know if I want to ask.”
“What do you mean?” Marinette asked, this time gentler. 

The confusion was overtaking her and the anger was slightly evaporating from her. 

“I don’t know if I want her to be my girlfriend…” Chat tsked and threw his head back, hands on his air, “I do know actually. I don’t want to date her.”

Marinette gasped. Baffled.

“I know, I’m as bewildered as you.” Chat said.  

“What happened?” She asked and took a step closer to him. 

“She is not the girl I fell in love with,” And once he said it, he wouldn’t shut up, and started to share everything with Marinette. 

“Is just… it feels like she is someone else. I don’t know the girl she has become. Sometimes she acts like the girl I know but it somehow feels forced, and when she acts naturally, she is not the girl I love.”

This conversation was just like the one she had with Adrien. It made her feel uncomfortable. 

Why did she always end hearing the boys she was in love telling her about their love lives? 

Okay, fair, Chat was technically talking about her. Sort of.  

“I mean I do love her, I will love her until the end of times but… I’m not in love… “ 

His eyes went wide and he shivered, “ I’m not in love. ” He repeated. 

The desperate state that left him in once he was faced with the truth. 

She could see him crumbling down. 

“I’m sorry,” She whispered. 

It took all of her to not cry.

“Saying it out loud… it hits different,” Chat mumbled, “It’s one thing to say that she is not the girl I fell in love, but to say that I’m not in love… I can’t even imagine myself not being in love with her… and I am!”

They stayed in silence once again.

Marinette wished she could hug him and let him know that everything was going to be alright, that she was going to find a way to come back to him, that that was her plan from the very beginning. Things had turned more difficult and dangerous that she initially thought, but she still had her eyes on the goal: going back to him. She was going to anything in her power to get back her earrings and her partner.
Chat took a step to the side, approaching her, yet still leaving some space between them. 

“Sorry, I really made you hear all of this without even asking… and you were angry.”

“I’m not angry anymore,” She truthfully said. 

No, that wasn’t what she felt. It was more like sadness.

“Is your pity stronger than your rage?” He chuckled, but it ran sadly. 

“Something like that,” She half-smiled and sat on the closest chair to her, feeling a little tired. 

She felt Chat glancing at her. 

“I was really scared when I saw you on the street that day,” He whispered, sitting on the chair across her, “I visited you… and asked one of your friends how you were doing. I hope you don’t mind.”
“I don’t,” She gasped. It made her heart warm that he was worried about her.  

Chat hummed, “I hate that this is happening to you. You don’t deserve it.”

“Maybe I don’t,” She shrugged, “But I don’t think it’s about deserving… it was just bad luck.”

“Well, I wish I could have the good luck to turn it all back. I would give it all to you.”

You don’t even know me. She thought to say, but another thought crossed her mind, stumbling with it. 

Your soul knows me even if your eyes don’t.  

Her whole body trembled and the tears she so strongly had tried to fight won the battle. She broke like a dam. 

She wasn’t human anymore, she was just water. Tears fell and fell and fell. Her whole body stopped working, she felt numb to everything around her but the pain. 

It felt like a river losing its course, like the ocean breaking down on the shore. 

She didn’t stop, it wasn’t an option, her body was releasing all her feelings without restriction. 

She cried even harder when she felt his arms wrapping around her. His hand tangling on her hair and pressing her face against his chest as he whispered on her ear. 

What he was saying? She didn’t know, but whatever it was, to have him so close, to feel his breath brushing her skin, it made the pain bearable. 

In safe arms, she cried until her body gave up. 

Chapter Text

Leaves and flower petals intertwined in her hair. It was not meant to be beautiful, it was only a consequence of the strong wind and the autumn season bringing orange and brown colors into the air, and what it was sure a mess and an inconvenient for the girl was something worth watching, something that made her a little more beautiful.

Or so it was in Adrien’s eyes, Marinette thought the opposite as she asked Alya to help her take out all of it from her dark locks. 

Adrien smiled tenderly at their interaction, it was nice to see Marinette smile, especially after last night. 

He couldn’t approach her and ask her how she was doing for obvious identity reasons, but it was nice to verify that her eyes weren’t red, that she didn’t look tired and that she was actually enjoying her day with her friends. 

His sight fell on her one last time before bringing back his attention to the boys and their little chat. 

But once back, he realized he had missed a whole conversation because right now he couldn’t make up anything of what they were saying, well, that was until Max said Marinette’s name.

Adrien shot a look to Nino who was frowning deeply, something not very common for him.

“She has lost some weight and she is already skinny so it kinda makes me feel like I’m going to break her every time I’m near her,” Kim said.

“I know what you mean,” Nathaniel said, “She has also lost all her strength. The other day we were in art class and the teacher asked her to bring a box with clay and she couldn’t even lift it from the table. Madame asked her because Marinette is usually the one who moves the heavy objects. 

“Yeah, I wonder how long she will keep lying right to our faces

“Excuse me?” Adrien and Nino interrupted. 

“What? Aren’t you two angry too?”
“They obviously know what’s going on with her” Nathaniel rolled his eyes.
“We know she is sick, I just don’t understand why won’t she tell us, why won’t she let us help her, I took one string of her hair and took it to a lab and now I got a database-”

“You did what?” Adrien stood up and watched Max with eyes as wide as plate, “That’s an invasion of her privacy. If Marinette has a secret then it should remain that way.”

“Yeah, dudes, it’s not cool, not a single bit,” Nino added, sounding as angry as Adrien. 

“We’re worried!” All the boys said at the unison, “You two are not the only ones who care about her.” 

Adrien jerked back and before he could call them out again he saw the sad and desperate look on their faces.

His shoulders fell, the tension dissipated and he sighed. 

“Alright, alright,” He said, putting his hands in the air, “I get it… I get it.”

“Yes, we understand,” Nino said, “It still not cool. You can’t be whispering and doing things behind her back. If you all are so worried then you should be straightforward with her, just ask her what has her acting so different to her usual self.”

“That’s easy for you to say! She would tell you almost everything, but when it comes to us it is different. Marinette cares about us but not half as she does about you.”

Adrien frowned.

“To me, this seems to be more about you guys feeling left out by her. It doesn’t sound like real concern.”

“Don’t put words in my mouth!” Kim stood up and punched Adrien away.

Adrien jolted surprised.

Nino reached for him and looked as surprised as Adrien was feeling.

“He did not do that, he was just saying how it felt, Kim,” Nino spoke.

“Well, it is easy for him to say it because he’s Marinette’s favorite boy since he got here,” Nathaniel added. 

As wonderful as it was to hear that they considered him to be Marinette’s favorite, it wasn’t the time, nor the context, to be happy about it.

“She loves all of you, you know this. She cares about you, if not she wouldn’t help you out when you need to. She goes far and beyond for all of us.”

“Then she should let us extend the same courtesy! She is obviously sick!”
“I don’t understand how this is a problem!” Nino shouted, “Let her do this on her own terms!”

“What if she dies?! Max’s data says that--”

“Who cares what it says?! If it’s real then it is not for you all to know,” Adrien interrupted, “This is Marinette’s life you don’t get the right to involve yourselves in it just because you’re her friends.”

This time it was Nathaniel who pushed him away. 

“We know her for longer than you do, and if the data Max took is true, which I highly believe, then we don’t have much time left with her and you all are acting very relaxed about it. We don’t want to waste the time we have left!”

“Don’t fucking say that!” Adrien shouted and took a step further.

Rage ran hot in his bloodstream. 

Kim took a step forward, his fists were up, covering his chest.

Adrien narrowed his eyes and tightened his own fists, ready to fight. 

It was Kim who threw the first punch, obviously because he thought Adrien wouldn't fight back. It wasn’t Adrien style to get into fights, nonetheless, it was totally Chat Noir’s style to do so.

He didn’t hit Kim, he just made sure to dodge and shield himself of every single punch his classmate tried to stamp against his face. 

Adrien was ready to end this fight by taking Kim by his arms and dropping him to the ground but he was stopped by the hit of a hand against his chest. 

Adrien let out a scream and so did Kim, and there in the middle Marinette stood radiating confidence and pulsing threatening energy.  

“Do you want to get suspended?” She said, voice calm yet poisonous.

“No,” Adrien answered, he knew it was better to do so than to stay quiet.

“Then stop this idiocy,” She sighed and put her hands down, and her head high, “Go back to being your funny kind of dumb.”

“Marinette, we,” Nino started but was cut short by the look on the girl’s eyes.

“I know what you were doing… I know what you were talking about,” She sighed and turned around, giving her back to Adrien and Nino, “It’s heart disease, now you can all stop whispering.”

Marinette crossed her arms in front of her chest and started to walk away in heavy steps.

The atmosphere around the boys turned even more dense as they watched her. 

Adrien swore he could hear them all swallow their pride and choke on guilt.

However, this state didn’t last long because across the yard a ball flew right into Marinette, making her stumble and fall on the ground. 

Then it was chaos. 

“Nette!” Everyone said at the same time, with the same worried tone and rand to her, extending their hands to reach for her.

“I’m fine!” Marinette shouted, her red sight was lethal.

They kept offering her a hand but she refused all the help, jumping back to standing and running to the girl’s restroom with less elegance than the one she had performed only seconds earlier. 

Adrien sighed. 

He gave a look around, but Alya was nowhere near here. He glimpsed at Nino and saw the answer to the question he did not manage to tell.

Adrien nodded and ran towards the bathroom. 

“Don’t follow me,” He shut back to the boys. He was sure they were going to listen to him now. 

He made it to the bathroom only seconds before Marinette entered, however, he waited for a girl to go out to ask her if there were more people inside, then when she said there were two more girls, he waited for one of those girls to leave and made his way in. 

He caught sight of Marinette immediately. 

She was standing in front of the sinks, one hand up and bent as she held a ball of damp toilet paper against her knee. 

She had hurt herself. 

“Can I help?” He asked.

“It just a scratch,” She said, not looking at him. 

It didn’t look just like it, but given what had just happened he didn’t think it was the best idea to push her. 

“How much did you listen?” No running around the bush, not when it was obvious. 

“Only a little, yet enough,” She said, cleaning the borders of the wound.

“I’m sorry, Nette.”

“It’s okay. I appreciate the concern but I don’t like the way… how they are seeing me. It is exactly why I didn’t want,” She sighed, “I’m sorry if I caused any trouble between you and the boys because I asked you to keep my condition a secret.”

“It’s fine, we’ll be fine. Boys fight all the time, don’t they?” Marinette shot him a questioning look, he only shrugged.

Marinette cleaned her wound with more water. This time Adrien approached and took her hand between his, stopping her motion. 

“I’m worried about you,” Adrien whispered, “You didn’t want anyone to know.”

“Yes, but I didn’t think I was going to be able to keep it a secret forever,” Marinette clicked her tongue, “It was meant to happen and thinking about it, I guess it is good that they figured it out now because if not they were going to start having questions next week.”

“Next week? Why?”

“My doctor called this morning. I went last week for a new check and he got worried about something not going right with my heart after the surgery and well, he studied and analyzed it and now he thinks I will benefit from having a pacemaker.”

“What’s that?”

“A small device that will go close to my heart to help it beat at the right rhythm.” 

“Will that make you better?”

“Hopefully,” She said, “It’s something to help me while I wait for a new heart.”

“I wish that comes soon,” He took her hand

“I do too…” Marinette looked up and grunted, “I hate wishing it tho. For me to have a heart, someone has to give up theirs, and the only way they do that is if… if they die.”

He squeezed her hand, “Don’t feel bad about it, it’s only natural.”

“Yeah, I know but… given my position in the list is like I’m hoping for like a hundred, or more, people to die.”

Adrien didn’t know how to answer that. 

On one hand, it was good that Marinette wasn’t the first priority, it meant that she wasn’t on the edge of the cliff. On the other hand, this gave her more time in the limbo, more time for her to get worse… 

“When is the surgery?” Adrien asked, taking the subject back to less dark ground. 

“In a week.”

He didn’t know how to answer that. 

Should he say that he was happy? He didn’t like the fact that she needed surgery, but wasn’t it good that if she did she was getting one soon? 

Adrien didn’t know how to keep going with the subject. This was so different from what he got with his mother, he knew something was wrong yet she never said a thing so most of his questions circled around trying to figure out what was going on. He did know what was happening to Marinette, and he didn’t know how he was supposed to react to the little things that came with that. 

Marinette reached for his hand and squeezed, a weak but gentle smile curled her lips.

“I’ll be fine, Adrien.”

Adrien looked up and focused on her, trying to brush away the shades and masks she could be projecting, yet there was nothing but sincerity in her expression… well, and beauty, and kindness, and just utter perfection in a way that only she could be. 

A shiver ran down his spine and his lips started tingling with need. 

It shouldn’t be allowed to feel this way around anyone. His heart would suffer from it. 

Adrien knew it wasn’t a thing of the moment. It had been growing on his heart since the day he met her, but right now it was so strong and vivid, and with everything else going on in his heart it made him look at these feelings from a different perspective. 

He couldn’t say that it was love because he was still trying to sort out how his heart really felt, but he was sure that there was something special about Marinette, something that made her different from everyone else. 

The thought nested on the highest part of his mind for the rest of the day, making it hard to focus on anything else that wasn’t Marinette, and when it was time to leave school and go back home, Adrien did it with her still on his mind. 

When the doors opened, he ran to Nathalie’s office, finding her sitting on her desk, running through some papers. 

Usually, he would knock the door, then politely ask her if she was busy before telling her about his day or ask for what he needed, today he just entered the office without any warning, he placed his hands on the desk with strenth making a loud noise and looked at her with narrowed eyes once she looked up startled.

“Is there a way to move someone a few spots up on a waiting list?”

Nathalie stayed silent and blinked quickly, confused. Then she closed her eyes, she rubbed her forehead and sighed. 

“What kind of waiting list?”

“Heart transplant.”

“For miss Dupain Cheng?” She rose a brow and her lip quivered. 

“ Please ,” He begged, it was best than explaining, “We can do something about it, right?”

“I don’t think that’s our business, Adrien.”

“It is my business. She is my friend, one of the people in this world I care about the most.”

“I don’t mean to undervalue your feelings, but you know what I mean, Adrien.”

No, he didn’t. 

They had the money and the connections and it had never been a problem to use those two whenever his father or he wanted something. Well, mostly his father, but this had to be an exception! 

“But, Nathalie-

“Adrien.”
“Nathalie please, please, please. You don’t understand--

“I’ll look into it,” Nathalie interrupted with her same neutral tune as always, just a few octaves higher, “But I can’t promise you anything. Are we clear?”

Adrien sighed. 

He would take what he could get. For now.

“Thank you, Nathalie.”

xx

Marinette leaned her notebook to the left and kept dragging the charcoal against the page. 

Her surgery was in the morning and she was enjoying her alone time at night and for that, she had sneaked out of her room and was sitting in one of the tables in the high terrace of the hospital. 

Her phone was vibrating at the table at her side, more messages from Alya were arriving, even after the one hour and a half call, they had had just two minutes ago.

Marinette didn’t pay it importance, it was just Alya being the overprotective best friend, and that was fine, but she didn’t need more pressure nor concerned words from her. Not that she didn’t appreciate them, because she did, but she was so tired of getting them all the time. 

She hated being sick. 

Marinette changed the angle of the notebook once again, to get into more detail on her drawing. With every stroke, the concerns watered down. 

The sound of boots knocking on the ground caught her attention, she stopped drawing and turned around and a very smiley boy in a leather suit. 

She couldn’t help but smile back.

“Goodnight, your highness,” He bowed at her, “Wow what a beautiful gown you’re wearing tonight.”

Marinette looked down at her hospital gown and shorts and then rolled her eyes. 

“Always so funny.”

“I can’t ever disappoint.”

“What brings you here and how did you know I was here, to begin with?”

“I don’t reveal my secrets, princess,” He winked, “I heard you would be here tonight and since I haven’t seen you in so long I decided to visit,” He said dramatically. 

“A week is that long for you?” She giggled. 

“I guess it is when it comes to you,” He wiggled his brows and they both laughed.

“Kitty, kitty, kitty,” She said in a nagging tone but kept her smile and body language open for conversation.

Chat walked towards her and wrapped his arms around her, pressing her close to his chest and leaving a kiss on top of her forehead. 

Marinette looked up, feeling all warm and fuzzy inside. 

She cupped his cheek and rubbed her thumb across his cheek. 

“You-

“Chat?” A voice broke through the night. 

Both Marinette and Chat sprang on their place, turning around to where the voice came. 

Right there on the edge of the roof stood up Ladybug. The anger on her face was hard to hide. 

Marinette gulped. 

This wasn’t going to end up good, not after the last time she had seen Aimée. 

“Ladybug,” Chat said, his voice trembled. 

“I saw you running in a different direction than your usual patrols and I got worried,” She said using a baby voice.  A voice Marinette would have never used to talk to Chat, at least not as Ladybug. 

“Yeah, I…

“He thought I was in trouble,” Marinette said, covering for him. 

“Yeah…”

“Oh,” Aimée said, tilting her head, “You look quite familiar, have I seen you before?”
“It’s Marinette,” Chat said and looked at Ladybug, taking a step forward, separating from Marinette, “We saw her like a few weeks ago and-”

“Yeah, but not quite,” Aimée interrupted and nodded, “I feel like I’ve seen you somewhere else.”
Marinette gulped, nervously. 

Could it be possible that with the use of the ladybug miraculous she was able to see through the mask and connect the dots?

It wouldn’t be too convenient right now.

“You’ve asked me to protect her before and we crossed paths with her all the time,” Chat’s tone increased, and Marinette caught a twitch on his eye. 

“ Oh, ” Aimée blinked fast and stress appeared on her expression, “Yeah! Oops! Forgive me, I’m kind of super stressed lately.”

Chat narrowed his eyes and gave her a strange look. And then he looked at Marinette with a see-what-I’m-talking-about? kind of look. 

Ladybug approached Chat and wrapped her arms around his left arm, pressing her body against him.

Marinette kept her eyes on their linked arms and felt fire burn in her stomach and up her throat. 

“ Ladybug ,” Chat whispered with a scolding tone. 

“Sorry, I’m being embarrassing,” She giggled, and took one step back but still kept herself very close to him, “You just ran so fast and I wanted my kitty time so…”

Marinette let out a low screech. 

Anger boiled her blood and she had no one to blame but her. She had given up her miraculous, she had chosen Aimée. However, never in her wildest dreams, she thought the girl she chose would use this opportunity to get together with her partner. 

It was stupid. Just because Marinette had been too blind before to see how incredible Chat was, that didn’t mean that a new girl would look over his amazing and caring personality. 

“I told you I was going to be busy this week,” Chat said between his teeth.

“Visiting a civilian? Didn’t you just think she had a problem?” Ladybug rose her brow, there was something threatening about it. 

“She… Marinette is my friend .” 

That didn’t explain much if anything at all. 

Ladybug frowned but just as fast a smile popped on her lips, “Are you too that close?”

The closest . Marinette wanted to say.

“Yes, very close,” Chat answered, he shook his arm and broke loose of her hold, walking back to Marinette, “Marinette is my girl,” Chat Noir cupped her cheeks and squeezed softly, “Right, princess?”

Marinette melted and smiled as wide as her lips allowed her to.

“You are dying for me to say yes, don’t you, mon chaton ?”  

Chat giggled like a little kid. 

“Oh, so you’re best friends!” 

Aimée pulled Chat back to her side, breaking the little moment they were having. 

Oh, that damn girl she was gonna break her. She was the one that gave her the miraculous, she could take it away from her if she wanted to.

“Ladybug, stop,” Chat Noir hissed and his tail stood up, just like the one of a real cat.

He was wrathful. 

“Stop what? I just want to know what’s going on. I’m your girlfriend after all.”

That made Chat take a step back, he shook his head and confusion plastered on his face.

He opened and closed his mouth but he didn’t say anything. 

Marinette could tell how he was feeling.

How could he answer her now? If he said what he was really feeling -or what Marinette thought he was feeling- Aimée would get hurt and angry and that was the last thing the team needed, given how disastrously their performance fighting akumas had been. 

Marinette bit her inner cheek, if she didn’t say something, this was going to end up being a horrible discussion and Marinette didn’t give up her miraculous, Tikki and Chat, only for things to crumble down. 

“Yeah, she is right, Chat Noir,” She said, not looking at him because if she did she was not going to be able to go through it, “I’m fine now so it’s better if you go with her, you have patrol and well, I bet you don’t have much time to be together and-

“Yes, thank you!” Aimée jumped on her spot and dragged Chat back to her, pressing a quick kiss to his cheek and then one on his lips. 

Marinette didn’t need to look at Chat to know that he was dumbfounded. 

“Okay, bye, have a good night, it’s time for me to go back to my room,” Marinette ran back to the chair and took her things as quickly as she could, without looking back. 

She waved back and only stopped running when she got to the window door, and then she looked back. 

Her eyes crashed on Chat’s hurt sight. 

Marinette wanted to say so many things but there was nothing she could say without making the situation worse or giving away more than what was safe to, so she opened the door and went back to her hospital bed. 

She sneaked out back to her room, holding the sketchpad closed to her heart, with her chest tight and in the border of tears. 

All the lights were out on the room, the curtains open were letting the night light inside and creating strange shadows, yet they weren’t as strange as the one on the window. 

Marinette walked to the crystal to catch a better glimpse of it.

A single rose was hanging from the frame of the window. 

How had he managed to get it there? She didn't know, but just that simple flower was what broke the dam. 

She cried the most bittersweet tears she had ever cried in her life. 

Chapter Text

The next morning, when it was time to go to surgery, Marinette wished to be anywhere but there.

She didn’t have time to go and get a pacer, she had to sit down a write a letter to Chat. She needed to come clean.

This plan wasn’t supposed to go like this. The plan was meant to spare him suffering, to have a perfect partner until she found the way to return to him. 

None of that was happening. 

It wasn’t even Aimée’s fault. She had fallen in love and her driven personality pushed her to pursue Chat, and fight for him using nails and teeth. She just knew it. 

Tikki didn’t like her, that should give away a little bit of her personality, but Marinette still wanted to believe that it was the circumstances pushing the worst of Amiée out there to shine. 

Aimée was good, she had stalked her enough to know this, and the little time they had to speak and training had helped her paint a picture of her, and get to know her. But maybe she had read wrong certain attitudes she had, she had underestimated certain behaviors she sometimes had. All the little things Marinette thought would make her thrive as a new Ladybug, were exactly the things that Chat and Tikki would complain about. They had presented in different ways that the ones she hoped.

It wasn’t Aimée’s fault, it was hers, she should have never sent someone with so little training and so little knowledge to battle, to fake to be her. The pressure Aimée had over her shoulders was double the one Marinette ever had. She never pretended to be someone else, the expectations people around her, and Chat , had about her where no one’s but her own. 

The whole plan was crazy and doomed from day one, she could see this now, but Marinette’s desire to keep Chat out of her own pain was so strong that her brain was still trying to find ways in which this plan would have worked out. 

Nothing that made sense came to her mind, but she knew that if she kept thinking about it something would pop up, however, the other side of her knew that this was meant to reach its end. 

She couldn’t keep playing with anyone’s emotions anymore, and Chat’s betrayed glance last night was confirmation enough to know that she had been pulling more heartstrings that the ones she was enabled to have.

The time to come clean had arrived. Of course, she wasn’t about to spill her secret identity, that was still a priority, to keep it secret. But Chat had to know what she had done, what he was really facing. 

Because of that, she decided to write a letter. A great way to keep her identity and the real extent of her situation well kept. 

However, as much as she wished she could have written the letter first thing in the morning, it was now the evening, and Marinette had just woken up, still a little loopy because of the anesthesia.

Her chest hurt where the cut had been done and she felt uncomfortable. It wasn’t unbearable but she could feel it all the time, just like the needle inserted in her vein on her hand. 

Her mom was sitting in front of her in one of the small couches in the room while she read a magazine. 

Marinette moved on her spot, trying to sit down straight, but she felt like she was made of goo so she ended up lying in one of the pillows.  

“I need paper,” She tried to say but her words came out like a stumbling babble.

However, it did catch her mother’s attention. 

“You’re awake! The doctors said you were probably just asleep but I still couldn’t help but worry.” She came to her side and brushed her hair out of her face, “How are you feeling, honey?”

“Tired,” She whispered, “Sleepy.”

“Oh, that’s normal. Does anything hurt?”

“No,” Marinette shook her head slowly. The pain she was feeling was almost undetectable, there was no need to make her mother worry, “I need paper,” She repeated. 

“You want to draw? I don’t think you have enough strength to do so yet, Marinette.”

“ It is important.”

Her mother sighed. 

“Okay, okay,” She nodded and walked towards the small closet in front of the bathroom door. 

Marinette took a deep breath and tried to put all her strength on her arms, to push herself up and sit straight. This time, her muscles responded, very slowly and with a few trembles, but it was better than before. 

She took the remote beside her and pressed the buttons until her bed stopped being reclined and turned more into a sofa. She smiled pleased and reached for the table to her left. 

Her mother, coming back with her sketchbook, pushed the table forwards, helping her out. 

“What are you going to do?”

“Just.. stuff.” Marinette shrugged. 

Her mother hummed and frowned slightly. 

“Don’t you have to go to the bakery?”

“I don’t have to, your father said he could be alone for the day.”

“I’m okay, I think you should go. I already took many hours of the day.”

“Please, Marinette, you didn’t take anything. I’m here because I’m your mother and I love you, no one obliged me.” The law. Marinette wanted to say, but just because she wanted to brush her away to be alone, which she knew it wasn’t fair. Just because she was angry at herself for the chaos she had made that didn’t give her the right to throw all the negative vibes to her mother. 

“I just think you should go. I’m fine here alone… I want to be alone.”

“Why? Is something bothering you?” Her mom jumped, concern flooding her eyes.

“I’m never alone anymore,” She sighed, “Here I am safe, if I need help I can call a nurse… but I just want to be alone.”

The expression on her mom’s face softened but the pain didn’t leave. 

“Alright, I understand,” She nodded and leaned down to kiss her daughter’s forehead. 

Marinette sighed in relief and as she pretended to hear every order and recommendation her mother made before leaving, she kept thinking about the words she wanted to write for Chat.

Once her mother closed the door behind her on her way out, Marinette opened her sketchbook and took a pen, as fast as her languid body allowed her. 

At first, no words came out, she had no idea how to begin, how to explain, and how to ask for forgiveness for what she had put him through. She still did not want to tell him that she was sick, that would bring him too much pain, and she was already going to break his heart. 

Then every word came out tangled, drenched with confusion and fear and the letter was a mess that did not explain anything but only left the reader wondering what was going on, why they had been hit with so much tragic information. 

How could she convey on one single letter all the feelings she held inside? All the thoughts that had run through her head when she found out when she realized that this was the end of the life she knew when she had to admit that she couldn’t keep up with her duties anymore because her body was betraying her. 

Tears streamed down her face and soft sobs came out of her lips as she wrote. The pencil dropped down and she covered her mouth with her hand, trembling from head to toes. 

If she could only swipe this sickness away if she could only be as invincible as people thought she was. This wasn’t fair, none of it was. 

The ring of a high pitched siren caught Marinette’s attention and she cleaned her tears and sniffed. Only seconds before a nurse was walking inside her room, her face expressed concern but her body screamed business. 

She was carrying a wheelchair with her.

“An akuma is loose close to the hospital. We must move you to a secure place,” She explained.

Marinette looked at her window, the view told her all that she needed to know. Her room was towards a big street, which made her place an easy risk spot. 

Marinette nodded and grabbed her sketchbook to hold it close to her heart as she shifted on the bed to get out of it. She had better control of her limbs and overall body now, but the nurse still helped her and insisted on taking her in the wheelchair.

“Hospital protocol!” She said. 

As much as Marinette hated it, she accepted and was taken to another wing of the hospital. 

The whole hospital was going through chaos right now, organized chaos, but still chaos. 

Marinette sighed frustrated. It was still so horrible to see how people ran and hid and she wasn’t able to do anything to give them back their sense of security. 

She was finally taken to a common area where more patients were waiting, watching to the two lit TVs. 

Her eyes followed immediately to the images on the news. 

Marinette gasped. 

“Three hours?!” She closed her eyes and opened them again, checking if she had seen the time right. 

She had. 

The battle had been going on for three hours and they were still trying to move the akuma, or that’s what she could tell by the images that were running, and Ladybug had called for a lucky charm twice now. 

Marinette gulped. 

That meant that she had left Chat alone to fight. 

She waited with her heart on her throat for more images of Chat to appear, but the only good ones there were displayed were of him running and jumping so fast that it was impossible to see how he was really doing. 

“Ladybug calls for another lucky charm!” The news reporter said.

“ Another ?” Marinette whispered under her breathe because something told her that it wasn’t the moment to call for one. If Aimée hadn’t been able to figure out how to use the other two, why would she call another one before tricking the akuma towards a less crowded place or better for a fight with more ground to move and better vision? 

Marinette dug her nails on her tights and bit her lip forcefully, trying not to scream. 

At this point, after four months of being Ladybug, Aimée should know better, maybe not about Chat or how to act like her, but how to be a superhero, how to think quick on her feet. 

The sound of an explosion echoed in the hospital and then on the TV. 

“Chat Noir has been knocked out and falls to the ground!” 

Marinette stood up, how she wasn’t sure, her body worked on her own. 

This was it. 

She couldn’t sit here and wait for it to be over, she had to do something, and with the chaos, the akuma was causing, no one would realize she was gone until it was already too late. 

xx

When Adrien opened his eyes, his head was trembling and there was a chirping sound echoing inside. 

He stood up with a jump and leaned towards a wall to recover from the horrible punch. He spat and blood came out of his mouth.

Cleaning his mouth with the back of his hand, he closed his eyes again and tried to calm down, so all the emotions he was feeling that moment wouldn’t overwhelm him and make him make bad decisions later. It was something he had been doing for a while and it had been working, nonetheless, in the last four months, it was harder to keep his head on the game.

He heard the splash of steps at his side and then Ladybug was in front of him.  

“Are you okay?” She asked, cupping his cheeks and looking at him as nothing else what happening, and as lovely as that would have been before, they were in the middle of a battle, and they were losing. 

And just like that, all the calm he was trying to project was gone. 

“No! What the hell? I’m not okay! We’re going nowhere and you have called for a lucky charm three fucking times, I’m not fucking okay!” He shouted. 

Ladybug jolted back and covered her mouth with her hand, tears started to accumulate on her eyes. 

Adrien tsked and threw his head back.

“Do you have a plan or something? Or are you gonna keep throwing lucky charms until next week?”

“I’ve only called for it three times!”

“It has never taken you more than two, and the times we need two is because both add something to the plan or solution, never because you have any idea what to do with it!”

“Don’t yell at me!” 

“Then do something! What are you expecting?!”

“Something that works!”

“Nothing will work if you don’t want it to work! It is almost as if you’re expecting to get a gun!”

“That would work!”

“You’ve lost your mind! What the hell is going on with you?!”

But Ladybug didn’t answer. She shouted and started to cry, the next thing he knew he was being pushed back with heavy strength. 

Adrien sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. 

He rolled his baton on his hand and jumped back into action, he really didn’t need this right now. 

But in that moment it was impossible to not think about the way Ladybug was behaving. He was livid, yet that wasn’t the worst part, the sadness, the confusion, the way he felt when he looked at her now… it made him want to burst into tears. 

What had changed? What was happening to her to make her act the way she was acting? She was lovely still every now and then, but mostly she made him lose his mind. 

The worst part was that he couldn't trust her in battle. Her feelings overwhelmed her, pride, sadness, anger, whatever it was, it was in full front. No logic, no cold head against a villain, it was like watching a rookie on their first day of work.

He had come to terms with not being in love with her anymore, he was not fully over it, but he was at ease with himself, nonetheless, feeling like he had lost his best friend in the world, feeling like he couldn’t trust the person he was supposed to trust with his life… that made his stomach twist. 

Adrien put his hands in fists and hit the wall next to him, pieces of bricks falling to the ground, a hole shaping around his hand. 

He grunted and extended his baton, jumping back to the rooftops, ready to get down the villain on his own. Because there was no way he could tell if Ladybug was going to turn this one around. 

As he jumped he tried to hide using the pipe walls and the blind points of the raging electric akuma. 

He was quick on his feet, he was smart and he had experienced on the field, he had high chances of succeeding if he just left Ladybug out of the equation, leaving her to figure out without bothering her, or her bothering him. 

The mere thought made him feel like puking, but this was what he had to do. 

His first instinct was to take him to the river, but they were too far away from it, and to take the akuma back there would cause more damage than good, so he had to find a way to trap him between the buildings, or bring something here. 

There were many thoughts on his head and he was getting physically tired, also, after many hits and twists, he felt dizzy and in constant pain. He only wanted this to be over. 

He saw Ladybug swinging a few times and then disappearing, she seemed to approach him and leave every now and then as they dodged the attacks of the akuma. 

Nonetheless, as much as she wanted to be noticed, Adrien wasn’t giving her the time of the day. He was too angry and too focused on figuring how to win. 

After a few minutes, she stopped popping into his camp of vision and he was left to attack the akuma alone, which somehow brought him some relief, maybe Master Fu would come to his senses and sent him back up, at this point he would take anyone, even Chloé as Queen Bee. 

As he fought and dodged the electricity shocks his vision became a tunnel, fighting almost on autopilot as he tried to come up with his own plan to take the akuma down, however, his mind came back time and time again to the river. 

Adrien growled with frustration.

It was the anger and the disappointment that didn’t let him come up with anything clever. 

Finally accepting that this was the only idea he had, he ran towards the akuma, who had been moving to the west, and when he did, he heard Ladybug’s voice. She sounded angry, yet, there was something familiar about her voice, a kind of determination he hadn’t heard in months. 

So, he looked down to where it came, and when he did, his heart stopped. 

Ladybug was right beside a girl wearing pink sweats from head to toe, she wasn’t wearing any shoes and her hair was a mess, also she seemed to have wrapped some bags around her waist. 

It didn’t take him long to recognize her. 

It was Marinette and she was right beside Ladybug, holding the yo-yo and covered in a strange polka dot raincoat and boots.

He could only guess that the plastic wires and bags around her waist where the IV medicine that she would have had at the hospital. 

Adrien saw red. 

What the hell was she doing here?!

“Ladybug!” He shouted, angry, and confused. 

How could she stand so calmly right beside a girl who clearly was supposed to be in a hospital bed?

But there wasn’t an answer and the next thing he saw was Marinette throwing the yo-yo with Ladybug’s help right where the akuma was. 

“NO!” Adrien shouted and he jumped down to the street. 

But everything moved faster than him. Lightings and electrical shocks lightened the city sky as he made his way down, lines of electricity appeared on the floor, and then disappeared. 

He saw Marinette pull a string and the yo-yo came back to her hands, an electric shock followed but lost intensity as it reached the girls. 

“ Yes! ” He heard Ladybug scram and snatch the yo-yo out of Marinette’s hands, making her stumble back. 

Marinette shook her arms as she staggered back. 

Adrien ran as fast as he could, his vision opening, his heart restarting. 

He caught her just in time. 

Marinette’s hands fell into his chest and her nails dug into his suit. She looked terrified. 

“Chat I need cataclysm!” Ladybug shouted. 

Adrien tightened his hold around Marinette but looked towards where Ladybug was running. 

“Cataclysm the fire hydrant,” Marinette said and pushed him away, falling to the ground in the process.

“Nette!”
“GO!” She ordered, and just like that, because she said so, he called for his power and followed Ladybug. 

Next thing he knew, there was water all over the street, the akuma was falling from the amorphous shape and turning back into a human and a small butterfly was flying around. 

The shining yo-yo crossed the sky and the butterfly was caught.

Then he saw her throw the strange clothes Marinette had been wearing, when she had taken them he couldn't know, everything was moving at an uncontrollable speed and he wasn't able to make sense of anything around him.

“We did it!” Ladybug shouted and ran to him. 

Adrien dodged her and when she came back to hug him again he pushed her away, softly, but cold.  

“What the hell was that?!” He wrapped his hand around her wrist and pulled her as he walked back to where Marinette was sitting on the floor. 

“A plan?”

“How dare you bring a civilian into this! What the hell were you thinking?! How could you be so irresponsible, so reckless, so… so terribly awful at your duty?! What is fucking wrong with you?!”
“I was doing my best!”

“Your best? That’s not your best, I bet to say that’s your fucking worse! This is the most horrible battle we have ever had, I was pretty much fighting alone because I couldn’t trust you and then you’re out there getting the help of a civilian, AN ILL CIVILIAN NONETHELESS!”
“Stop shouting at me! She had an idea and-” Adrien leaned down, without knowing what took over him, he grabbed Ladybug by her shoulders and shook her a little. 

“It is supposed to be your idea! We don’t bring civilians into this. You put Marinette in danger! If that hadn’t worked out-

“IT IS TOO MUCH PRESSURE AND I DON’T KNOW WHAT TO DO! DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD THIS IS FOR ME?!”
“AS HARD AS IT IS FOR ME!”

“NO, IT IS FUCKING NOT! I FUCKING HATE THIS, I FUCKING HATE IT AND I’M TIRED OF PRETENDING THAT I CAN DO THIS! THIS IS FREAKING CRAZY AND I NEVER ASKED FOR THIS! THIS IS USELESS, THIS DOESN’T BRING ME JOY ANYMORE, AND I’M FUCKING OVER IT!” Ladybug shouted and gave one hit on his chest, tears started to fall as she shouted, “I TRIED MY BEST BUT I CAN’T DO THIS, I DON’T WANT TO DO THIS! IT’S COOL BUT NOT COOL ENOUGH TO KEEP DOING IT AND- AND I FUCKING HATE IT!”

Ladybug shook her hand and broke free from his hold. 

Adrien opened his mouth to keep talking. He was hurt and confused but he wasn’t able to say anything else. 

Ladybug’s hand was on her ears and his eyes widened. 

A pink light washed over her and a beautiful girl with no mask on appeared in front of him. 

“I’m done, I can’t take any more of this, four months have been enough!” 

Adrien opened his mouth, then closed it. He narrowed his eyes and took a step back.

“ Four months ?” 

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” She started crying, “I tried my best, I really did. Tell Ladybug that I’m sorry…”
She took his hand and pulled it to her, he was so mortified with what he was hearing that he just stood there and let her move him. 

She placed the earring son his gloved hand and closed it, then she took one step forward and kissed his cheek.

“My name is Aimée Song, you can still find me. I do like you very much, that wasn’t fake.”

Ladybug.

The girl.

Aimée turned around and started walking away, as he watched her dumbfounded. 

What had just happened?

Adrien felt like it was getting hard to breathe, his knees felt weak and he slowly serpentined to the ground, kneeling as he watched her go. 

“Wha-

“Chat?” A little voice said right beside him. 

Trembling because of the adrenaline and the poisonous rush running through his body, he looked from the corner of his eye and found Tikki.

“Tikki… what… what is going on?”
“I’m sorry, I promise I will explain everything later, I can’t imagine what you’re going through.”

“I… she… ”

“I know, I know,” She interrupted, not letting him speak, “But the girl out there needs help!”

Tikki flew behind him and he followed. 

That’s when he saw Marinette, clenching her hand on her chest, and breathing heavily. Just like last time, just like when she had to run and take her to the hospital.

“Nette!”

Tikki was right, there was time for questions later, now he needed to take care of his princess.  

Chapter Text

Adrien wondered how many in times in these four months he had found himself sitting in bed staring at the horizon with lost eyes and with his heart about to fracture his ribcage because of how fast it was beating. The beating did not only make his heart hurt, but it also rang a terrible noise on his ears that didn’t let him focus on anything but the confusing pain he was feeling. 

But he was trying his best to put that aside and try to resolve the eerie puzzle that had been presented to him. 

He looked down as he opened his hand; he was still holding on to the earrings. 

Four months. 

Ladybug… the real Ladybug hadn’t been with him for four months. 

He had realized that something weird had been going on, he hadn’t like how she was acting, he had fallen out of love with her… but it had never been her. 

That’s what was wrong. It wasn’t her. 

Now he felt guilty for screaming and bad-mouthing Aimée. Yes, she had had terrible attitudes and had done some awful things, but how could he blame her? She was trying to play a part, and it was evident that the stress had brought up the worst of her. Her last words have been so sincere, and his eyes had let him know that she was telling the truth, and he could see that she wasn’t a bad girl, but this wasn’t her place, nor her path, it obviously would go wrong. 

Adrien eyes to his side, where his phone was laying with the screen up. It had not rung yet. 

He sighed. 

“Adrien you should go eat something or at least, drink some water and walk around your room,” The chirping voice echoed on his ear.

“I’m alright,” He lied. 

“You were in an awfully hard battle and then ran to the hospital with bakery-girl in your arms, also you have been sitting in this same position for four hours now. You need to eat, kid. I can give you some of my cheese if you don’t want to move.”

Adrien huffed.  

Wow. How bad was he that Plagg was offering him his cheese?

“I’m not hungry.” 

“But you need the nutrients and energy!” Tikki said, appearing in front of him, putting on a sweet smile.

Adrien didn’t return the kindness

“What I need it’s the truth of why Ladybug, my Ladybug left and found a girl to pretend to be her. That’s what I need, but none of you are willing to give me that answer, and I know you know. Both of you .” 

“We can’t te-

“I don’t care what she said to you! You should tell me, I have the right to know! How could she do this to me?

“Did she pretended to like me all this time or… why would she leave without telling me? I’m her partner , if she didn’t want to say goodbye in person, a courtesy card would have been nice ‘I’m done, you’ll have a new partner, see you never! ’” 

“She loves you! That’s why she did it, she didn’t want to hurt you.”

“THAT MAKES NO SENSE! SHE HURT ME TERRIBLY!”

“She wasn’t thinking straight,” Plagg interrupted, “She was so emotionally invested that she didn’t think it through.”

“Did you try to stop her?”

“I only knew until later.

“Of course I did, but you know her, she’s so headstrong!”

Adrien was gonna snap again but he knew throwing his anger towards them wouldn’t change anything. What Tikki said was true. Ladybug was headstrong and if she thought this was a good idea nothing was going to stop her, so she would have made sure that the kwamis weren’t able to tell him what was really going on. Because something had happened with her, that much he could tell. 

He threw himself back and fell on the mattress, closing his hand around the earrings tightly, placing them above his heart. 

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be angry at you two.”

“It’s okay. We understand.” Tikki said and sat on his chest, smiling at him, “I miss her too.”

Adrien sighed. 

Yes, because behind all the anger he was feeling that little voice that had been telling him something was off with Ladybug had really been trying to say: I miss her . 

“Will… did… did she ever plan in coming back?” Coming back to me?

“Yes. That’s part of why she didn’t tell you. She didn’t want you to notice her absence.”

Adrien sighed, “Well I didn’t.”
“But you did.” Plagg interrupted, “You knew something was wrong.”

“I started dating her.”

“Not really. You were confused.”

That was true, he was. He wasn’t in love but he felt as if he couldn’t accept all the love she- Amiée, was willing to give. He had craved it for so long. 

Adrien’s heart skipped a beat. Something had popped in his mind. 

He had not fallen out of love with Ladybug per se, because the Ladybug he had fallen in love with had been gone. 

What did this mean? Would he love her again when she came back? And what about Marinette?

Marinette!

Adrien sat back down and grabbed his phone. 

Still no messages.

He sighed. 

“Still not messages about the girl?” Tikki asked she sounded extremely concerned. 

“Nothing. If I don’t get anything in an hour I will go to the hospital.” He rubbed his hands on his face and twisted his neck, “I can’t believe she was there. Why was she even there? Why is she so reckless? She knew I was having problems with LB, she knew LB wasn’t performing at her best… she didn’t have to come!”

“She’s crazy but she saved the day, without her I bet you would still be fighting.”

“I don’t care, if she doesn’t get hurt, I don’t care. But she is hurt! She has a pacemaker, she received an electric shock. Her heart went insane!” Adrien said, moving his hands from one side to another, “You know what? I’m going to the hospital now.”

xx 

When Adrien arrived at the hospital, things had gone back to normal, which made it easier to move through the hallways of the building and find Marinette’s room. He was sure that if she was out of surgery or any medical care she had to go through, she would be in the same room that she had been last night. 

He saw Marinette’s mother, sleeping, hand bouncing from side to side outside of one room. 

He wondered why she was there and not inside, but was also grateful that her being there would make it easier for him to get inside and get a talk with Marinette with no one else there. 

Adrien checked on the inside pocket of his jacket where his kwami hid and then checked twice to see if Tikki was still there. He wasn’t used to carrying two powerful gods so he had been extra careful. He had to be since he was now wearing the earrings. They matched with his silver ring and he had put both on his right ear. 

He knocked on the door twice and waited for a response. 

“I still want to be alone, mom.” Was the answer he got. 

First, he felt relief. That was her voice, she sounded tired, but there wasn’t pain in her voice, which made his whole body relax, his muscles still keeping a little bit of tension in them. 

Why did she want to be alone? Had something happened between them?

“It’s me, Nette. Adrien.” 

“What? Why are you here?!” 

“Our cat masked hero wanted me to check on you.” 

He heard the sharp intake of air and did not know how he was supposed to take in that reaction. 

“Come in.”

He could hear a strange feeling crawling in her words, it somehow managed to go through all the cardinal points of negative emotions, and yet there was a positive shade falling into it.

Adrien opened the door slowly and took soft steps to get inside, going towards her bed.

The first thing he realized where Marinette’s watery eyes. All of the equipment around her was a second notice, but no less shocking. 

“I’m sorry for coming unannounced.”

“It’s fine.”

“You don’t look like you’re fine with it,” He smiled softly, not really trying to shame her but trying to know what was on her mind. One of the first things he would like to know is what she was thinking when she ran out of the hospital to help them and fake-bug in battle, but he couldn’t ask that now.

“I’m happy to see you really, I just… I just wasn’t ready to see anyone yet. I know you guys were supposed to visit but with the akuma attack and all I thought you guys would come later.”

“Well, Chat Noir found me and told me you weren’t doing so well.”

He saw how her expression contorted, how her eyes looked glazed with all the tears. 

Adrien cautiously moved closer to her, taking each step slow to know if she would push him away, but she didn’t and in the end, he managed to hold her hand. 

“Nette, what’s wrong? Did something happen?” This playing dumb game was annoying and it made him feel like the biggest liar in the world, but he just couldn’t spill the truth. 

“Everything,” She said trembling, “I want things to get better and I somehow I manage to make them worst.”

Adrien felt as if the edge of the blade was going through his throat. What did she mean by that? 

“What do you mean?” He said each word slowly almost as if he wasn’t ready to finish the phrase because he wasn’t ready to hear the answer, no matter how curious he was. 

Marinette looked down. 

“Nette…”

“I… I’m not allowed to leave the hospital.”

“Like, today as it was planned or as in-

“As in-” She sobbed, there were no tears yet but she was clearly struggling to not let them out.

Adrien felt himself getting shaky, and his body felt cold as winter itself could be. 

No words came out of his mouth, unsure of how could she receive them, unsure if they would make any difference at all.

“I fucked up. I fucked up big.” She talked again, her voice getting tiny, “My pacemaker… I did something that… My heart went crazy and the tissue… I just… I need a transplant. Soon .” 

Adrien took a step back, his hand let go of Marinette’s and he caught the bar of the bed to stop the staggering.

“What… but I thought”

“My heart could give up at any second. I fucked up, I made it worse.” Marinette covered her face with her hands and finally, the tears came out. 

Adrien didn’t come here to make her cry, on the contrary, he wanted to know how she was doing and make her smile, yet the conversation hadn’t even really started and he had fucked up. 

Marinette needed a transplant. Something she said wasn’t going to happen, something she thought that if it had to happen she wouldn’t need it soon. 

All this just because of that stupid electric akuma, all this just because she went to help him. Because that’s what she had done, there was no other alternative for it. She had seen on the news what was happening, remembered all that he had told her as Chat, and decided that she could help. Help him . 

Adrien wasn’t sure how he did it but he sat on the bed and wrapped his arms around her. 

Marinette put her hand against his chest and then hid her face. The tears streamed, wetting his shirt, but he didn’t mind. He kept his hold tight and kissed her forehead as she shook on his arms. 

He let a few tears fall too, but there was a damn about to break inside of him and the only reason it had not collapsed was that Adrien wasn’t going to allow himself to completely break in front of her. That was the last thing she needed. 

He let her cried until she went dry, until it was all sobs, until her eyes wouldn’t open because of how swallowed they were, until the pain and the world was too much and she fell asleep on his arms. 

xx

He stayed an hour watching Marinette sleep. It probably wasn’t the best of ideas and the doctor let him knew once he entered her room and he had to leave. 

Once he left the room, the world around him was fuzzy. He could only see what was in front of him at a distance of a meter as if his body was doing the bare minimum to keep him alive yet feel as if his life was some sort of simulation.

His body felt heavy, lethargic, yet his heart wouldn’t stop beating as if they were helicopter’s blades, and it cut him from the inside out as if he had been caught by those. 

Was this the physical pain Marinette felt? Was this how her heart behaved? 

Why did he have to fail on her? Was it that big and full of love that it just couldn’t handle anything else? Had her heart been given so much love that it had weakened itself to help others?

It wasn’t fair.

It wasn’t fair.

It wasn’t fair.

It wasn’t fucking fair.

She deserved the world, and the life she always dreamed of. A healthy heart to live it. 

When he got to the mansion, he wasn’t able to take the keys out of his pocket and he just shook the bars of the gate. 

It was one of the guards that received him, and really, the poor guy was probably about to throw him out of the street and yet had to help Adrien get inside and go up the stairs. 

When he got to the lobby, he could feel the cold inside his body increasing. If he had an option, he wouldn’t have come home. How could he want to feel worse than he was already feeling? 

It was Nathalie who came up to him. She was talking, Adrien could tell because she was right in front of him and very close, but Adrien couldn’t hear what she was saying. 

He felt dizzy, he felt as if he was underwater and all the sounds were mixed and he couldn’t make sense of anything that was happening. 

Nathalie grabbed his shoulder and shook him softly. 

In return, Adrien grabbed both of her arms and shook her.

“Did you call? Did you call?”

Nathalie looked confused and before she could answer, he spoke again. “The transplant list!”

“Adrien, no. I thought you understood that-

“You said you’ll call!”

“I said I would see what I can do, but-” Adrien staggered, he moved to the closest pillar and rubbed his hand on his forehead.

Nathalie kept talking, he wasn’t listening, it was all a no after all.

“I need you to call! I need you to do something!” 

“Adrien. No.”

“Please! We have the power to save her! We can save her!”
“There’s a list for a reason Adrien! There are people out there who have been waiting too.”

“But they’re not her !” How selfish that was and yet he couldn’t help it, “I don’t know them, I don’t care! I want her to have the next heart that appears.”

“ Adrien. ”

“She’s important to me! Please!” Adrien dropped to his knees and cried. His hands were up and entangled as he shook them and softly kept whispering please, please, please. 

“Adrien I-

“Nathalie.”

Adrien looked up, his father was getting inside the office. Adrien hadn’t even realized he was in the office, it was all still spinning around him. 

But at the sight of his father, reality leaked through the cracks. 

Had he heard anything? Everything? 

Adrien hoped not, he wasn’t stable enough to get scolded.

He stood by his side, all wobbly and looked down focusing on his feet, making sure he was actually standing.

“Go to your room, Adrien,” Gabriel said and pointed out at the door.

“No, I-

“ Go to your room ,” He said through clenched teeth, “I won’t tolerate this scandalous tantrum, you’re not five years old.”

“You don’t understand!” He shouted and this time grabbed his father by his arms just like he had done to Nathalie, for once unafraid of the response this could have, “I need Nathalie to do this for me! I need Nathalie to save Marinette!”

“Adrien, please act like an adult for on-

“I LOVE HER! PLEASE I’LL DO ANYTHING YOU WANT IF YOU DO THIS FOR ME!”

This had been the first time in all of Adrien’s life that he had seen his father show fear through his eyes. It was an unsettling view. 

Gabriel was immobile, looking at Adrien as someone would look the newest sudoku on the newspaper, a puzzling view that at the same time made complete sense. 

For a second, Adrien swore he saw compassion shining through the cold expression he always wore, but it maybe had been a hallucination, a trick of his confused mind. 

His father snapped his fingers and his own bodyguard came to the side.

“Take Adrien to his room. Make sure he calms down.”

“FATHER!”

“Now!”

The bodyguard put his arms around him and squeezed.

Adrien screamed and jerked at his place. The hold of the man didn’t let him get away, but that didn’t mean he would stop.

Adrien shouted, kicked, and even tried to bit the bodyguard.

“Please, please, please! I know you cand o something, I fucking know you can!”

“Calm him down! Now!” Gabriel shouted.

Adrien shrieked, he didn’t know what was taking over his body but he was letting it.

Suddenly the arms of the bodyguard gave up, Adrien was finally breaking loose and then something pinched his arm.

Adrien looked back and saw the man injecting something on his arm. 

It wasn’t instantaneous, but he felt it all in slow motion. 

He never hit the ground, the bodyguard caught him, but that was the last thing he remembered before he was too tired to keep his eyes open. 

Chapter Text

The first thing he felt when he woke up was a dizzying sensation throbbing on the back of his head, and the first thing he thought when his mind cleared up of the fog, was that it was scary to know that his father had had medication ready to use to calm him down. 

At these moments he didn’t want to round in circles and find an explanation for that, he guessed that he would never want to truly know why his father had something like that ready to put at use, but that didn’t make the bitter taste and the fear that was leaking inside his heart disappear. 

Nonetheless, this thought didn’t remain for long on his brain, at least not as a priority thought because when he looked to the side to his nightstand, he saw a glimpse of his phone and all the reasons why he had thrown the biggest tantrum of his life came back in full clarity. 

Adrien sat down quickly, yet he fell back to the bed, still not strong enough and his head not quite at the right place. 

“Take it slow, Adrien!” He recognized Tikki’s chirped yet motherly voice as it rang on his ear. 

“Yes, one move at a time, kid.”
He put one hand on his forehead, and then he pinched the bridge of his nose as he grunted, nausea bubbling up his throat. 

“Hand me my phone, please.”

“I don’t think looking at a screen is the best for you right now.”

“I just want to know what time it is. How much time have I lost?” Because if his father wasn’t going to help him save Marinette, then he had to start going through some other names, see what he could do to get what he wanted.

“Uh…”

The shakiness of the kwamis’ voices didn’t sit right with him. Whatever the answer was, it wasn’t good. 

“How long?” He asked, this time his tone was harsh, it demanded an honest answer. 

“For a day and a few hours.”

“A DAY?!” He tried to sit down once again, this time he didn’t fall as fast as the first, but he did stagger and had to use his elbows to not hit hard against the mattress, maintaining himself leaning upwards, but not completely sitting. “How is that possible?”

“Whatever that syringe had… it was too much for you. Nathalie was here a few times, she looked worried… a little horrified too, but you know her, it didn’t last that long once your father said it was nothing to worry about.” Plagg explained. 

“He called a doctor who said you were going to be alright!” Added Tikki, a little exalted, as if she was trying to make sure that the last part of Plagg’s phrase wasn’t going to hurt him if he knew this little detail. 

A nice thought, but not enough. He knew his father, he could imagine perfectly what his stand had been. 

Also, that wasn’t what he was worried about now. He needed to do something about Marinette.

He moved on the bed, closer to the edge, and reached for his phone. 

It was off. 

He grunted. The battery had probably died as he was knocked out. 

“Do you remember the last time this rang?” He shook the phone at Plagg. He was always complaining about how it didn’t let him sleep peacefully, so he must remember when he stopped hearing it. 

“Sometimes at night,” Tikki answered instead.

“Did you guys look at what it said?” If he had been passed out, maybe they had the curiosity to look. At least Plagg was prone to do it. 

“We did, your friends were asking about… about the girl you visited.”
“Marinette,” Adrien said to Tikki, “I call her Nette. She is my… best friend I guess.”

“If you couldn’t guess for the desperate screams, he has a crush on her.” 

Adrien frowned at Plagg. 

“Do you really have a crush on her?” Tikki asked softly, and her eyes opened wide, it looked as if they were shining. 

“I…

“He does!”

“I kinda do,” Adrien nodded, he had no energy to try what he was really feeling, and it wasn’t a lie. He kinda had a crush on her. “Can you two now pass me the phone charger?”

“Is it because of her that you’re so eager to look at your phone even though it’s clear that even the dim rays of sun in the room are making you squint?” 

“Yes, Tikki. The charger, please?”

Plagg came back with it and Adrien connected his phone, and then lied on his back, as he waited for the vibration to indicate to him that it started to charge. 

“What did the messages say exactly?” 

“They were asking if you had talked with the girl.”

“Marinette,” Adrien reminded her. 

“And Nino was worried about you, mostly because you weren’t picking up. He knows you haven’t been in your best form lately.”

“Yeah.”

Finally, the phone vibrated and the screen lit up.

He rolled to his side and took it, ready to start scrolling through the messages. 

Nonetheless, he didn’t expect to be welcomed with a bombarding of them. His screen went crazy.

Adrien closed his eyes at the flooding of popping text bubbles on the screen and waited until all of them appeared. 

But then his phone rang. 

Nino.

“Hello-

“Oh my god, finally! I’ve been calling you like crazy! You got me so worried when you didn’t answer any message and didn’t pick up the thousand times I called you! Are you alright?”

“Define alright.”

“Did something happen? Are you grounded? Are you sick?”

“A little bit of both,” Adrien sighed, “Things got ugly here.”
“I’m sorry… I… I figured it shouldn’t be good if I hadn’t heard of you for a day.” 

Adrien tsked, “Yeah. But you still kept trying, I appreciate that.”

“Well, I couldn’t stop trying,” Nino sighed, there was something in his voice, a spark of hope he would say.

“Did something happen? 'last message I could see was you asking about Nette,” He lied, using Tikki’s information. 

“Yeah, yeah, is just… oh fuck, Adrien this is the craziest twenty-four hours we’ve had.”

Adrien’s heart skipped a beat, going right up his throat. What had happened?

“Wha… what happened?”

“Well, first, we learn that Marinette is not okay, that the operation went well, but something else didn’t and Alya is crying because Sabine told us Marinette didn’t want to see anyone and that she will have to stay at the hospital until further notice, and everything is falling apart because no one will tell us anything but we know something is wrong. Sabine says something about you, and we get confirmation that you visited her, and yet we text and call you non-stop and you won’t pick up, so we start to worry even more, and the concern and the craziness only levels up as we see an amateur, extremely blurry video of someone who saw Ladybug give up her earrings!” Nino talked fast, stumbling one word after the other. If Adrien didn’t know most of what he was saying already, then he would have had to ask him to slow it down.

He almost stopped him when he said the thing about the video, almost revealing what he knew. That that girl wasn’t Ladybug, that her name was Aimée and she was just a replacement, a stand-by. 

But Nino didn’t give him time to stop him. Thankfully. Nonetheless, Adrien couldn’t truly focus and Nino’s words rolled on his head with not loud enough volume to suppress the strange acid feeling burning through his neurons. 

He couldn’t help but feel angry at his partner. He had tried to understand why she did what she did, and in his mind, there was some sense in the decisions she had taken, however, all the arguments that supported her plan of action weren’t as strong nor had a long life expectancy on his brain. Her plan was made to break, and she must have seen that. There was no way she could have replied to the bond they shared, not with someone else, no matter how much she trained them. 

And though he had managed to be fooled, his heart always knew there was something wrong. But of course, he had kept trying, he had tried to brush those thoughts away, because… how could have he known? The plan was crazy! It would have never crossed his mind!

“-and now we’re freaking out because one day she is only getting a pacemaker, and now is an entire fucking heart!”

Adrien snapped out of his thoughts. His phone almost fell but he squeezed hard, pressing against his ear, not sure if what he had heard had been right. 

“ She’s getting a transplant?! ” He stood up ignoring the unpleasant feeling. 

He put his hand on the nightstand as he staggered, to not lose balance and he started walking slowly to the wall to lean out there as he went to the closet. 

What was happening?

“Yes! She is getting a heart, bro! We are at the hospital right now, that’s what I’ve been calling you like crazy. We came after Sabine called us, they had just taken her to the OR!”

“Right now?!”

“Yes!”
“But… but she just told me about it yesterday… she-”

“Sabine explained that they obliged her to do tests and scans, and I don’t know all that medic shit before the pacemaker. They didn’t want to leave any threads loose, just in case, and well something happened, someone called, said they had a match!”

Someone called. 

Adrien gulped. Could it be…? 

“What- how… tell me where you are going to be, I might take my time getting there, but I’m going.” 

“Okay… I will but… you sound a little off. You don’t have to come immediately. You can wait until things are-

“No.” He said harshly, “I want to be there.”

Adrien took clothes out of his closet and brought them to the bathroom with him as he kept listening to Nino. 

Without the strength to take a shower, he did the best next thing and took the showerhead and washed as quickly as he could as he kneeled on the edge of his bathtub. 

He kept Nino on the line, not letting him go in case any news about Marinette came to him as he got ready. Nino told him he was exaggerating, and maybe he was, but he still felt the need to do it. 

Once he was ready, he felt a little better, being able to stand without grabbing something for a few minutes. 

He took his backpack, throwing cheese and a few caramel candies he had lying around from the last time Nino was here, hoping that would be enough for Tikki since he hadn’t been able to go buy fresh cookies because he had been asleep. 

Taking his phone, without Nino on the other line this time, he left his room. 

The stairs were the hardest part as he made his way out, but once he was on the first floor he felt as if he could keep going. However, something caught his eyes and he knew he wasn’t leaving the house without acknowledging it. 

Adrie walked slowly to the dining room. The door was open and on the head of the table, his father was sitting. 

A rare sight to encounter. 

“I see you are up.”

Adrien had to bite his tongue to not answer with the poisonous words he was thinking. 

“I am, and I’m going out.” 

“I assume you heard the news.” His father put the newspaper down. 

Adrien kept quiet, keeping a defiant glance. 

“You were so feisty yesterday and now so quiet. The least I would expect is a ‘thank you, father’”

So it was his father doing. 

“How… it’s been a day .” Adrien’s words trembled.

“I have many contacts around the world.”

Adrien gulped.

Gabriel took the wine glass, “The heart comes from Brussels. They tested the donor they got and it matched her perfectly. In case anything goes wrong, Nathalie is tracking other donors in different hospitals, and keeping an eye if the other ones that were reviewed are still available for a quick call.”

There were a thousand things going through his mind, a million variations of the same question he wanted to ask, yet and interrogation was the thing that he least needed right now.

So, he did what his father was expecting him to do. 

“Thank you, father.”
Gabriel didn’t answer. 

He cleaned his mouth with the cloth napkin and put his utensils on the plate. He stood up with the same rigid elegance he always exceeded and walked towards Adrien, only stopping him when their shoulders aligned. 

“I don’t want you to ever behave the way you did yesterday, or there will be consequences.”
Adrien didn’t answer.

“Adrien .”
“ I won’t. ”

“Good,” Gabriel nodded, “We still need to talk about what this means.”

And he left. 

For a second, Adrien thought that he was being a good parent, that what he meant to say was that they needed to talk about what kind of feelings had ignited such a heated response in him, but his common sense kicked in quickly. Maybe he did do what Adrien begged for because he related to his experience, after losing his mother, he couldn’t think he didn’t, however, it was obvious that there was more. There was a plan behind this. 

He didn’t like it, yet he knew there was nothing he could do about it, and right now was obviously not the time to think about it. 

He grabbed his jacket and ran out of the door before any other inconvenient popped out. 

xx

It would have been nice to say that all the tension that his body built up disappeared when he got to the hospital and met his friends, but on the contrary, it only grew thicker. 

The surgery hadn’t been long, since Marinette hadn’t shown any complications, and Adrien arrived just when Sabine was out to tell them that everything had gone right, however, that hadn’t stopped the aching of his heart. 

He stayed with Nino and Alya in the closest cafeteria to the ICU waiting for any news. 

And that’s what their routine became. 

It was nice to know that things had gone right, yet not seeing her was frustrating, and dreadful. However, there was never news coming from Marinette’s mouth. 

They would go every day and ask Sabine for updates, and Marinette would be always doing okay, but it all came from what her doctors would say, or what Sabine would observe. 

Marinette wasn’t talking. 

She was too tired, that’s what Sabine said. 

Both Adrien and Alya suspected that there was something else behind it, something bothering Marinette, because if not, then she would have already found a way to send a message. 

So, their days started to look the same, and feel as frustrating as the one that had just passed. 

They would go to school, do their best to collect everything Marinette would need, they would talk about her with their classmates, and then when it was lunchtime they would go to the hospital. Sometimes Adrien couldn’t go because his father would have booked him, or he would have a mysterious new class of whatever extracurricular activity Nathalie decided, but that didn’t stop him from visiting after school. 

Plagg wasn’t a big fan of this routine. He said it was wearing him out, that he understood but that it would be better for him and for her if he just went every now and then, or best once Marinette decided to call. 

Tikki nonetheless, seemed as invested with Marinette’s health as Adrien, and pushed all of Plagg’s advances and advice away, becoming Adrien’s best company whenever Nino or Alya couldn’t be there. 

It had been two weeks since the transplant, and Marinette if she was doing as well as her mother said she was, should have been able to receive visitors.

Yet, they hadn’t heard anything. 

It was late that evening, and Adrien had been busy, so instead of hanging on the cafeteria lounge of the hospital, where all of the staff already knew who he was and engaged in conversations with him when they had time, he only passed by the nurse’s office and asked for Marinette. 

As always, she was doing okay. 

She could receive flowers now, she’d said. 

Adrien smiled at that and left, taking the metro instead of his car in a fast escapade. 

When he got home, he let Nathalie scold him as much as she wanted for doing that, and apparently, his lack of remorse or guilt showed on his face, and that made her stop quite quickly.

He was told to go to his room, where he was going anyways, and once there he threw the backpack to the floor, right next to his desk, and then jumped to the bed. 

He pulled a pillow and hugged it, then pressed his face against it and grunted loudly. 

“This is wearing you out,” Plagg said. 

He was right, he had been for the past weeks, and it was a terrible sign to hear that Plagg was acting mature, yet he had been ignoring it avidly. 

“It is,” He simply answered. 

“How is she doing?” Tikki said, almost screaming at his face.
“Didn’t you hear?” Adrien lifted a brow at her, rolling in bed. 

“Nothing important, there was so much noise and Plagg wouldn’t shut up, I couldn’t hear anything about the girl.”

“She's fine.”
“And?”

“That’s it,” Adrien closed his eyes and rubbed under his eyes.

“That cannot be all!”

“It is!”
“Adrien!”

“Why are you being so insistent?” He hissed. Too tired for this. 

“I’m just worried about this girl, she seems important to you.” Her tone was chirper than usual. 

“She is, but that’s the only information I have.  Also, I don’t like that you call her ‘girl’”

“Oh…”

“Why don’t you call her by her name? It’s not that hard” He said, letting his frustration run to this route because right now it was the safest path he had found.

However, unknowingly, the question rang on his mind loudly and for a long time.

Tikki never called Nette by name, yet she was extremely worried about her. She was insistent and was the one pushing to go see her, the one shutting Plagg up whenever he recommended going home instead of the hospital, and yet she couldn’t call Marinette by name?

Odd. Way too odd. 

“Why don’t you call her by her name?” He asked again, under his breath. 

Dots starting to connect in his mind. 

“I just forgot it.” 

“You’re worried about her and you can’t recall her name?” Adrien sat on the bed and stared at the kwami, frowning. 

“No, I just don’t care about learning anybody’s names but holders.”

“That’s quite out of character for you. I don’t believe it for a second.”
“You don’t have to. I understand you’re stressed and-”

“What’s her name?” He interrupted.

“I told you, I forgot.”
“And I told you, I don’t believe you,” He said defiantly, “Say her name.”

“Why- 

“Say it.”

“I don’t understand-

“ Say it. It’s easy, just repeat it after me: Ma-ri-ne-tte”

Tikki stared back, if she could go pale Adrien was sure that she would be paper-white right now. 

“C’mon. I’m waiting.”

“Adrien,” Plagg said, but Adrien waved his hand at him, brushing him off. 

Adrien frowned deeper and Tikki trembled. 

“It’s just a name, Tikki.”

“I don’t like that you’re ordering me-

“You can’t say it, can’t you? ” The tone of his words cut as sharp as glass. 

“I, yes I just don’t feel like-

“ You can’t say it. ” An affirmation now.

Silence and tension roamed around the room, diligent and yet so loud, a tornado about to form, a hurricane about to blow up. 

Adrien’s whole body was shaking with frustration and wrath.

“Say it! ”  

“I can’t!” She said, giving up. 

Adrien gasped, letting out… he didn’t know what, but something inside him snapped and yet it didn’t mean realize, it didn’t mean relief nor satisfaction. 

Because he knew what this meant. He knew why Tikki couldn’ say Marinette’s name. 

It explained it all. 

The wind had cleared the cloudy sky and yet the storm was still raging. 

Chapter Text

The coffee cup between his hands was getting cold, so was the one Kagami was holding. 

They hadn’t talked but they were keeping each other company and that was exactly what the other needed at the moment. Their earlier fencing session had left them both exhausted and the anger they were both nestings inside their hearts had been drained, not completely, but a good amount that let them find some sort of middle ground between despair and calm. 

“I can’t believe they didn’t let us in.” Kagami finally spoke, taking a bite of her pain au chocolat.

“I can,” Adrien pursed his lips unamused. 

“She’s been home for almost a week now. She is fine enough to be out of the hospital and I heard noises upstairs, meaning she was moving around, not running but she wasn’t locked to her bed.” Kagami threw her head back, slouching on the bench in an unfamiliar way to her recurrent elegance.

“It is not her parents protecting her, this is on Marinette, she is the one who wants to avoid all of us.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, Adrien!”
“Well, not much of what she’s done makes sense either,” He said under his breath, beneath his skin his veins threatening to pop, the boiling blood spreading all over his body. 

Kagami frowned at him, staring at him with confusion shining on her eyes. 

“I don’t understand if you’re angry because of Marinette’s situation, or just angry at Marinette.”

“Both,” He said, sipping on his lukewarm coffee, “She did something she shouldn’t have done, and I’m furious, but I-
“-also love her and want to see if she is actually alright. ” She completed, imitating his tone.

“Yes.” He didn’t even try to fight the tease, it was the truth and he wasn’t in the mood to play around, his heart became a heavy rock unwilling to beat to the drum of anything but pettiness, frustration and disbelief. 

“It took you long enough to realize you were in love, uh?”

“No, I always knew I loved her.” And that wasn’t a lie. It wasn’t a perfect explanation of the real situation, but it was true. Pure universal verity.

“Always?” Kagami’s crooked brow was both playful and threatening. 

“Love can take many different forms, you know that.” 

It was an escapade to her question, to her accusation, a way to drift from the topic and a way to keep reminding his mind that it hadn’t been his fault to not see what was in front of him when the world had given him such little tools to face feelings, and how could he understand love when it was one of the most complex sentiments to exist. 

Having magic intertwined only brought more struggles and obstacles. 

“Do you know if Alya has talked to her?”
“Lately she has been more exhausting than normal so I haven’t reached out to her much. But, if I had to guess, I think she has received a note or something from Sabine, there was a shift in her attitude the last time we were all together at the bakery.”

“Why wouldn’t she tell you?”

“Not sure. This situation, the end of the year, and the fact that I’ve always been close to Alya just because I’m friends with Nino, I don’t share many interests with her, I always end up talking with Nette when we are all together… I don’t know, we’re drifting apart, we don’t have to get together, and when we do I’m the third wheel.  It's strange.”
“It's life, isn’t this a common occurrence when you leave high school?”
“So I’ve heard, but we’re not out of high school yet.”

“You’ll be in less than a month.”

“Yes. I don’t know, it is all so frustrating as if Marinette’s situation has thrown everything out of proportions as if all these little details that never mattered are now relevant and things are changing because we’ve got a new perspective because we thought we lost her. And maybe we did lose her, she doesn’t want to talk to us.”

“It is a situation that brings deep reflection with it, I won’t deny that, but I feel like your world has completely turned around because you’ve been through a change of feelings lately. This hit you harder than it hit us, because of that-” Kagami sighed, “- I think it is you who has completely shifted in the past week. Something, I don’t know what, made you change in such a short span of time, it is you who is pushing people away- no, not really pushing but as if you have become more selective as to if you have realized what really matters, who you really care about and want to keep.”

Adrien cleared his throat. 

“Now, I don’t know what made you angry with Nette, but I think it plays a part too.”

“She lied about something she shouldn’t,” He simply said, “And yes, you are right, it is connected. I hadn’t realized I’ve become selective, but it would make sense,” After grappling to Ladybug, the image of Ladybug and not actually use his common sense to see through the smoke and mirrors, he had realized that his desire for friendship blinded him from actually realizing what were the bonds he actually cared about. 

Maybe it was the reason why he had been so distant with Alya and Chloé, why hadn’t gone out with his classmates when they invited him to play football the other day. 

He liked to have friends, but he was questioning who he actually cared about and loved. Now, this of course had to do with the replacement LB, nonetheless, there was a thread going back to his father. 

Who did he put on his path for him to use? Who did Adrien bring to his life that could be used by Gabriel? 

If he was going to surround himself with love then he had to choose wisely, he couldn’t protect everyone. 

And he had already put Marinette on the line. 

Gabriel still hadn’t said what he wanted, but Adrien knew that one day it would come. One day she would have to pay the price to his requests. 

Couldn’t he just do it because his son asked? 

He understood the consequences of what his father had done, how unethical it had been, but… but it had saved her and that was what he cared about. Yet, of course, there had to be an exchange. 

If he could only know what it was. 

“I would love to keep bothering you with my deep thoughts,” Adrien gave her a side look and an amused smile, to which she smiled back, “But I have to go. Are you coming with me?”

“No, thank you. I will hang around here for a little longer.

Kagami stood up from the bench and squeezed his shoulder, “Try to not sulk too much.”
“Will do my best.” 

xx

He stayed around as he’d told Kagami, but it hadn’t been a little longer.

When the sun disappeared and the moon awoke, crescent and shining like a professional ring light, Adrien lurked in the shadows of the roof, looking down to the balcony, feet hanging and balancing at the tune of a piano melody. 

As Kagami said, there was noise coming out of Marinette’s room, human noise. Yet it was strange. She shouldn’t be moving that much, and why would she need to move around so much?

He had his theories but after the new discoveries he’d add to the complicated life they both led, he was unsure that he knew her enough to actually have an hypothesis that could be proven true. 

Because truly, how was he able to be blind to such bright and obvious changes? how was he able to not go down the questioning path, the right one at least? 

If he could have failed with one girl and asserted with the other one, then he would have considered it a loss, but have failed with both girls? Fucking devastating. And they weren’t even two girls, they were the same girl playing games and pulling strings while he jumped and ran and fought and cried and just got hurt over and over again. 

She didn’t want to hurt you! That’s what Tikki said, but how was this not hurting him? This was worse than telling the truth. What crazy irrational thought had crossed her mind for her to put this plan into existence? In which twilight state had she fallen to consider this a good idea?

The tunnel vision of questioning could have kept him busy all night if it wasn’t for the creak of the trap door opening right under him. 

Black hair popped up and then Marinette jumped. 

She was wearing black from head to toe and running sneakers, her hair was in two braids falling over her shoulders. 

He didn’t have to guess what she was about to do, only that she wasn’t supposed to do it. 

He jumped down, boots hitting the tiles with harshness, and he moved so fast that he did not give her time to react to the sound before he was touching her. 

“What the fuck are you doing?” He grabbed her by her wrist and pulled her to him, away from the rail.  

Her eyes were open wide in surprise, and he could feel her heart threatening to rip through her ribs. 

The sole realization of what would usually be a simple mundane expression being so tied to her actual situation terrified him to his core. What if something did happen to her just because of his little scare? 

He let go of her and took one step back, only one second later putting his hands on her cheeks and checking her from head to toe.

“I’m sorry I didn’t mean to scare you, but you scared me… are you alright? How are you feeling?”

“I’m fine,” She said in a tiny voice, her hands fell on his chest. 

A smile appeared on her lips, so bright he didn’t realize her eyes were filling with tears until later. 

“Good.”

He put the distance between them again, it had been impulsive to touch her, and while it felt warm and right, it also burnt as if he had dipped his hand in lava. Beautiful, intriguing and dangerous, that’s exactly what she was and always had been, but he had been too naive, in love, and just overall headstrong, to see.

“Now, answer. What are you doing? You look ready for a midnight run and yet I don’t think that’s what you should be doing.”

She blinked fast, and started fidgeting; there were bandaids on her fingers, which put a half-smile on his face that disappeared quite fast. He was happy that she was playing with needles again, but right now his anger was bolder. 

To see her, in a fragile state yet about to put herself in jeopardy as she’d been doing time and time again pushed the frustration in his heart to reach higher levels of intensity. 

If she was so adamant about still being involved, then why hadn’t she said something?

“I just needed… I was looking for you. ”

“ Me? ” He jolted, surprised by that answer, he wasn’t expecting at all to be the reason for her escapade.
“Yes.” She shrugged and rolled her eyes, in that amused teasing way, not the one when she was tired or angry, and yet it caused the opposite effect of what it usually did on him.

This was the drop that changed it all.

“Forgive me, Marinette, but your problem is your heart not your mind if I recall correctly -and I do because you’ve freaked me out more than once- so I don’t understand from where all this reckless behaviour is coming! Don’t you care about your health?! Give it a thought or two, for fuck’s sake!”

“I do.” She said back, angrily, yet obviously shaken by his words and tone, “But I needed to talk to you.”

“Well, I don’t want to talk to you, have you thought about that? I’m not at your disposition every time you call.” His anger was sincere, yet that was a lie, he was in fact ready to jump off a building if she said so, “I mean yes, I wanted to see if you were okay, but I don’t want to talk to you at all.” 

“What?” She whispered, breath caught on her throat and she looked around with desperation. “Why?”

“Does it matter? I just don’t want to.”

“But.. I need to talk to you, it is important!”

“How important can it be? You never tell me those things.”

Marinette opened her mouth, words didn’t come out but her eyes could have replaced those anyways. If there wasn’t so much confusion blooming out of her pupils, shadowing the blue skies of her iris, he was sure these would melt down into painful cascades. 

“Don’t look at me like that. You never come to me with serious information, you never come to me when things get overly tough or when you need to make extra complicated plans. Not even when they involve my own work on the field, or more importantly, my emotions.”

“Chat-

“If it was so important to talk, then you should have done it before you made this incredibly stupid decision.” He grabbed her aggressively, for once not caring how she was about to react, to catch up on his own feelings to notice that it wasn’t gentle, and placed the earrings he had been carrying around everywhere since he found out.

The gasp that came out of her lips could have echoed through the whole town. 

Marinette looked up, finally tears accumulating in her eyes and lips shaking.  

“I guess it wasn’t that important.” 

“Chat, please-” She grabbed him by his wrist and pulled him to her, yet he resisted, staying in his place like an iron statue.

“I don’t want to listen to you.” 

“I’m sorry, I am so so so sorry, I really am-

“I know you are sorry, that’s not the point,” He hissed, “The point is that we trust each other in every single way. Or at least we are supposed to, because you didn’t trust me one bit. You didn’t trust that I would be able to keep fighting without you if you asked me to; you didn’t trust that I would be able to take the fact that you were sick; you didn’t trust me to not try to find out who you were once I knew you were sick; you didn’t trust me at all and you hid it all under the premise of ‘not hurting me’. 

“That’s not true!”

“I don’t believe you! I don’t believe anything you say anymore! You watched me struggle, you heard all of my concerns knowing that you could fix it all and you kept quiet. Your identity was more important than I was. And right now I can’t listen to you or forgive you, and I wish I could, goddamn how I wish I could because I would love to hold you and tell you how happy I am that you’re alright, how much I wish that I could pamper and take care of you so you would heal faster, but I can’t because I’m so fucking angry!

So please, don’t say that you want to talk to me, don’t say that is important nor try to convince me to stay, because I don’t want to hear anything!”

Marinette took two steps away and pressed her closed fist with the earrings towards her chest, close to her heart. Now her lips weren’t the only thing shaking, her whole body was. She was a complete natural disaster, her body an earthquake, her eyes a flood, and her energy a whole hurricane. 

And Chat felt like a tornado, ready to pull everything from its roots and push it as far away as his intense rage allowed him. And that’s how he knew it was time to go. 

He brushed his hair away from his face and let out a loud and heavy sigh. 

“Take care, Marinette.” 

He jumped out to the rooftop and started running, hoping that he could outrun every gloomy feeling that was growing like poisonous vines around his heart.

Chapter Text

Once inside her room, Marinette breaks down. 

She’d already been crying and crumbling from the inside out, but she now had a safe place to completely fall apart, and she let the little control that had held her standing disappear, falling on her bed and bawling her heart out. 

She opened her hand, the mark of her nails piercing on her skin with red edges, and in the middle of her palm, her earrings shone brightly. 

There was a sudden dim of colour in them and a red light surrounded them, and when it vanished, Tikki appeared instead. 

There were no words said, they only shared sights but all that could have been said, was told through their eyes. 

It made Marinette cry more, it made her roll in her quilt and hide under her sheets, and Tikki followed her, pressing herself against her cheek to offer comfort. 

Two hours passed before they could start talking, and it was Tikki who cut through it. 

They said how much they missed each other, they agreed to never do it again. 

And then through all the lovely conversation, Marinette couldn’t kick around the subject anymore. She finally asked. 

“Do you think I made a mistake?”

“Yes, but you weren’t the only one. This isn’t only on you, Marinette. I agreed to some extent, and Master Fu thought it was the best option too. We were all thinking about Chat Noir.”

“We underestimated him,” Marinette hugged herself, “He’s grown so much, he makes mistakes every now and then and lets his emotions take over him, but he has matured… this should have never been a plan.”

“We can’t cry over spilt milk now, Marinette. It happened, now we have to deal with it.”
“I don’t think I can,” She sobbed onto the hand covering her mouth, “Did you see him? Has he looked as terrible as he did tonight? I could see the hate through his eyes, I could see how tired he was, how done he is.”

“I’ve been with him for a few weeks, Marinette, and he… he didn’t look good. Plagg said that this was his lower point, but that he hasn’t been doing okay for months-”

The same he had said when he visited back then. 

“He despises me.”

“He could never. He is just angry, and he has reason to be, but it will fade away. He does look bad, but he loves you, Marinette. You have no idea how much he loves you, it’s incredible.”

She gulped. 

“How did he find out?” Marinette didn’t want to hear the arguments that Tikki wanted to use to strengthen her point, she didn’t have the energy or emotional stability at the moment to hear all the words Tikki would say to make her feel better and to see right through all her sugarcoated lies. 

“I asked about you a lot,” Tikki said looking down, guilty, “He would scold me because I wouldn’t say your name, and then he realized that it wasn’t because I didn’t remember or didn’t want to use your name, but because I couldn’t.”

“Well, he has always been a smart cookie,” Marinette chuckled and then sobbed again, “Gosh, he is never going to forgive me, isn’t he?”

Tikki shook her head frantically, eyes growing wide, and buzzing around her desperate.

“No, no, no, don’t think that, please! It’s just the opposite! Marinette, he loves you so much more than you could ever imagine, he will forgive you! There’s not a world in which he stays resentful forever.”

Marinette stayed quiet, if she didn’t she would have fought Tikki, she didn’t agree with her statement, Chat could stay angry at her forever. He had the right. 

“I’m glad you’re back,” She whispered, opening her hands so Tikki could land in them. 

She kissed her forehead and heard the little kwami laugh. 

“I’m glad to be back too, Chat was better than Aimée but nothing is better than you.”

Marinette sighed.

“Was Aimée that bad? How could I be so wrong about her?”

“She wasn’t bad at all. She was really nice to me, but her family puts a lot of pressure on her when it comes to school. Adding Ladybug duties to her schedule stressed her out immensely,” Tikki explained, “And she isn’t as selfless as you, nor has done this for years to know better, so the responsibility and the power did make her make decisions I’m sure she wouldn’t have taken otherwise. Also, she had a huge crush on Chat and was scared that he wouldn’t like her if he discovered the truth.”

Marinette hit her forehead with the palms of her hands.

“I’m so damn stupid! I should have looked more into her!”

“That’s not it. She was a good choice! The situation was too much for her, I’m sure that if she was a little younger, and didn’t know she was a replacement she would have done amazingly. She isn’t you, she isn’t perfect as you are, but she isn’t a bad choice, Marinette.”

“Still, I should have sent her to Chat. I should have said something to him the moment I realized she might be interested. I bet that’s the reason one big reason why he is so angry because I let him believe he was getting Ladybug because I heard him complain, I heard him suffer through the loss of a friend, of someone he loved, and I did nothing, while I could have easily fix it”

“You were in a tricky situation, Marinette. It would have given your identity away and all would have been for nothing.”
“It was all for nothing.”

“That’s not true. It gave you time-

“I still ran around the city trying to help him, and I made things worse for me. Now I got you back but I won’t be able to run around, Tikki. You didn’t hear my doctor, I got so many restrictions.”

“You might not be able to run around, but you don’t win battles because you’re the strongest or the fastest, you win because you’re the smartest in the field. Chat can still rely on you, and he can bring the butterflies to you.”

“I won’t let him fight alone. He’ll be vulnerable.”

“We could beg Master to have a permanent holder helping him.”

“He said no remember? That’s why we got here because he is too afraid that Papillon will know we have more miraculous here.”

“There’s no other choice anymore, he will have to do it.”

Marinette shrugged. 

She wasn’t sure if that was going to actually work, but Tikki was right, this was their last choice. 

Marinette hid her face against her pillow and reached for her phone at the end of the mattress. 

“I hate everything.” She simply said, and instead of listening to Tikki giving another motivational speech, she texted Alya. 

xx

It was late in the morning and he was awake. 

He was awake because he hadn’t gone to sleep last night. There were a thousand thoughts still roaming his mind, and he wasn’t able to do anything about it but to keep going through them as if they were old pictures on a vintage photo album. Grainy and decadent and yet so interesting to speculate about. 

Had he been harsh last night? Yes, he had. 

Did she deserve it? Yes, she did. 

It still hurt him, because he still cared. 

The still image of her tears threatening to fall has been on the front of his mind since the moment he left. 

He’d made her cry. That was destroying him but part of him couldn’t help but feel a certain sense of justice. It was sickening, but the anger he felt by remembering all the nights he went to Marinette and expressed how frustrated, how sad, how conflicted he felt came back to him and he couldn’t help but feel that way. 

He’d been suffering, Marinette could have stopped it. She didn’t. 

It was a cruel attitude, it was a selfish decision coming from her, yet he knew why she hadn’t said a thing. 

Her identity.

Fuck her identity. 

Fuck every little secret she’s ever kept from him.

Fuck Master Fu for making her do that. 

Fuck her for accepting it.

Fuck her.

Fuck her.

Fuck her. 

Fuck him for not being more mature and understand.

Fuck him for choosing to keep these bitter feelings inside of him.

Fuck him for not being able to not be angry at her when she most needs him.

Fuck her. 

Fuck her heart.

Fuck diseases.

Fuck that stupid company and their stupid medicine.

Fuck Papillon for overworking them and making her choose that.

Fuck him for not protecting her so she wouldn’t get badly hurt. 

Fuck her. 

Fuck her.

Fuck, he already missed her so much.

Adrien pulled his front hair and let out a dry scream. 

“Woah, what’s got you so worked up?”

Adrien snapped to his open door, where his best friend stood. 

“What are you doing here?” He asked immediately, seriously confused.

“Nathalie let me in, I thought you would be happy to see me.”

“I am, I am,” He nodded.

“Yeah, but something is bothering you… do you wanna talk?”

“I’m fine,” Adrien waved a hand at him and stood up from his desk chair, rubbing under his eyes and plastering a gentle smile on his face, “Just life, nothing to worry about.”

“You sure?”

“Yup! ” 

Nino narrowed his eyes and frowned a little, then he shrugged and walked to him, leaning on the desk.

“So, I came to pick you up for something you’re going to love.”

Adrien genuinely chuckled and brushed his hair to the side.

“What would that be?”

Nino wiggled his eyebrows and smiled big. 

“I got a call from Alya early this morning, aaaaand,” He clapped his hands against his tights, doing a drumroll,” We can visit, Marinette!”

He felt his smile falling and tried his best to keep a neutral expression, leaning towards positive more than all the negativity he was already feeling, to begin with.  

“Good!” He clapped his hands together. He thought of saying something else but was unable, then his good attitude would evaporate.

“Amazing, right?!”

Adrien nodded and bit his lips to not speak.  Then curiosity sparked.  

“Why now? ”

“From what I’ve gathered from my girlfriend's speed-up speech, Marinette had to take care of a few things and she didn’t want to see anyone else before she sorted that out. Apparently, someone deserved to talk to her first or something, I really don’t know.”

But Adrien did.

“I’m busy,” Adrien answered, taking a pen from the desk and rolling it on his hands.

“What? You’re not doing anything! And I already asked Nathalie.”

Fuck Nathalie too. 

There was a silence, uncomfortable and unfamiliar. Nino’s breath shifted and he cleared his throat. 

“The lack of enthusiasm in your voice before was enough to let me know something wasn’t quite right, Adrien, but now… now this is serious .”

“It’s nothing…”

“It’s not nothing. You finally get an opportunity to see Marinette and you don’t want it? Adrien, your father put a tranquillizer on you because you were losing your mind over losing Marinette.”

Adrien clicked his tongue, he now regretted telling Nino that piece of information.

“It is complicated.”

“Complicated how?”

“I can’t explain…” He shrugged, not only because of the crazy game of identities but also because he couldn’t put in order his own thoughts.

“Marinette wants to see us… and I know you want to see her. Did something happen? Is that why you were yelling when I got in?”

Adrien shrugged but then retracted. 

“I’m scared,” He said. Which wasn’t a lie, but would stop Nino’s questions. 

“Oh,” Nino smiled, and put a hand on top of his shoulder, squeezing tenderly, “She is okay now, Adrien. If she wasn’t we wouldn’t be able to go… Marinette is safe, she is getting healthy and Alya said she was excited to see us. Let’s make her happy, okay?”

He did want to make her happy. 

Just not now. 

But Adrien didn’t have an excuse to not go and make her smile. 

Fuck secret identities.

Again.

He’d always hated the secret, he would always hate the secret, but right now it was the only thing that could keep him somehow at arm’s length with Marinette. 

She didn’t have to know that he was there, and with Alya and Nino there he wouldn’t have to make conversation, allowing him to stay on character as Adrien-the-friend, and not Adrien-who-is-also-Chat-Noir-and-is-incredibly-angry-at-her. 

Adrien sighed loudly. 

“Let me change clothes first.”

“Yes!” Nino put his fist on the air in a winning pose.

Adrien laughed and bounced his head side to side. 

And so the play begins. 

Chapter Text

His act doesn’t go unnoticed. Marinette picks up on it the minute they sit on her bedroom floor, he can tell by the way her smile trembles, by the way, her sight follows his every move. Nonetheless, she doesn’t say anything, she plays it cool and follows his game of stares and numb expressions. 

Nino and Alya monopolize the whole conversation and for that he is happy, it seems like Marinette is happy too. Her answers are short and she sports a gentle but fake smile whenever she has to talk longer than three words, she is kind as she always is but something is off about her.

Their friends probably think it has to do with the transplant, with being out of the hospital, but Adrien knows it has to do with their fight. 

“Everyone misses you a whole lot, Maribear,” Nino says, “Do you know when you’re getting back to school?”

“I don’t know if I’m coming back,” She answers, playing with a piece of her hair around her finger, “It’s safer for me to finish the school year through online classes, and once I get permission to run around freely in the outside world, we will have already graduated.”

“That sucks,” Nino looks down, crestfallen.

“It does,” Marinette nods along and hugs her legs close to her chest, “But I have to take care of myself this time, things already got pretty bad when I didn’t, and I don’t want to keep prolonging my healing process. Also, I could reject this heart any time, I better try to make the adaptation process easier for my body.”

“So you’re not going to be running around the city exposing yourself to danger, anymore?” Adrien asks in a snarky tone. 

Marinette looks ambushed by his question, and her lips open as if she has an answer ready to tackle down that very same question. Maybe she had one for Chat but he didn't give her the space to use that excuse. 

However, Marinette doesn't answer, because Alya takes over the conversation once again, ignoring the gloomy mood around Adrien and Marinette.

“We can do something to bring the class here."

“I can’t have that many people around, I need help with my antibodies, but I can’t be exposed to everyone’s germs. I chose you three, Kagami and Luka.”

“What? What about the girls? They’re going to be so sad!” Alya says with true sorrow in her voice.

“I love the girls, but I chose the people I consider the closest to me.”

“And you chose Kagami and Luka over the girls?”

“Yes, Alya, I did,” Marinette frowns.

“But you said six people over the phone, why didn’t you include Juleka at least? You love her.”

“And I can talk to her through Luka.”

“But there’s still a spot left.”

“The spot is taken, Alya! I get to decide who I want to see, and I chose the people I care most about, so please, stop.” Her voice dies down at the end with a certain spark of tiredness.

“I know but… the girls .”

“You know not all of you will keep being friends after school, right?” Adrien interrupts the conversation when he realizes that Nino won’t stop his girlfriend any time soon, “Marinette is allowed to make that shift if she wants to.”

“She isn’t saying that, and what do you-

“Can we not argue, please?” Marinette says between clenched teeth, “I didn’t invite you here for that.”

“He started,” Alya says in a whisper, like a little kid.

“Then finish it,” Marinette shakes her head from side to side, and stands up, walking towards her chaise and lying there, “My back was hurting, I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Nino and Alya say in unison. 

There’s an awkward silence in which Adrien stares at Marinette the whole time. She is looking at the roof, while she hugs a Chat Noir plushie and fidgets with the ears on its head.

“Without meaning to cause any stir this time, can we know who is your sixth person?” 

Nino clashes his hand against his face, amusing Adrien bites his lip to not let the giggle escape.

“A friend, Alya. That’s enough information, now tell me more about the school, I feel like I’ve lost ten years of education in the last few weeks, I don’t think I’ll be able to make a simple math equation once my classes start.”

It’s Nino who complies with her request and starts listing every subject, class or teacher Marinette might have missed. Alya slowly starts to give her own details, her crossed arms getting loose and the frown she has as she deadly glares at Adrien disappearing. 

Adrien doesn’t join in. The thing is, that what he talked to Kagami the other day has been sitting heavy on his heart and with what he just said to Alya, the thoughts are running on his head again. The truth is that he adores his classmates, but he doesn’t see them all being friends for years on end. He knows Nino and him are gonna be best friends after they graduate, he probably is going to hang with Kim because they tend to do workouts together and he is the easiest to get along with when they aren’t all together in a group because he can be as goofy as Adrien can be when he allows himself to be. The others he isn’t really sure about, maybe Nathaniel because he tends to hang around Marinette, and he wants to be around Marinette after graduation, even if he is still incredibly angry at her, if he had to choose one person, he would choose her. 

“Adrien,” Nino snaps his fingers in front of his eyes.

“What?” He asks, jumpy. 

“We are picking pastries at the bakery, what do you want?”

“Anything,” He shrugs, “I’m not that hungry.”

“I don’t believe that for a second,” Nino laughs, “I’ll bring some coffees too, two lattes, right?”

“Yes,” Marinette and him nod.

“Thank you, guys,” Marinette says, shifting on her chaise, “Tell my mom to warm the pastries and put extra caramel on Adrien’s latte.”

Adrien shoots her an angry look, while he is thankful and happy that she remembers that little detail about him, he doesn’t want all her sweetness right now. 

Nino and Alya stand up and go down the trap door before he can offer himself to go with Nino and for Alya to say. They close the door behind them and the sound of their steps start to vanish after a few seconds, and silence reigns in Marinette’s room. 

“Are you mad at me?” Marinette asks the second Adrien shifts his sight back to her. 

“Why would I be mad at you?” He puts on the best fake smile he can.

“I don’t know why, but I can tell you are. Kagami has also dropped very strange comments lately, so I know something is off with you and it has to do with me” Marinette shrugs, “I would understand if you are angry at me, I haven’t been the best friend, nor the most honest or reliable.”

“I doubt you can be your supportive utter excited self from a hospital bed, Marinette.”

“I rather you tell me why you’re angry at me than pretending everything is okay because you don’t want to hurt me. My heart will take it, both my emotional one and the physical one. I’m doing quite well, the doctors have said it, I can show it to you if you don’t believe me.”

“I believe you,” He gives a nod, “About that at least, I’m not sure if I believe you won’t be on the outside world. You didn’t take care of yourself before, what has changed? How do we know you won’t keep lying? How do we know you won’t keep more secrets?”

The words hide the same speech he gave to her as Chat Noir, one that he shouldn’t be spilling as Adrien, but it is impossible to focus on any other emotion, it is impossible to split these parts of himself and keep them apart. Now that he knows the truth about her, he can’t be anything but both of himself at once.

Marinette visibly pales down a few shades, making the bags under her eyes prominent, making her chapped lips turn a neutral pink, and her veins look bluer than before.

“I only kept secrets to protect you.”

“From what exactly?”

“From the pain. It was already enough to deal with it myself, I didn’t want you guys to feel it too. I already explained this to you before, when you guys found out,” She whines, “Why are you actually mad at me? Spill what’s on your mind, I will understand.”

But he isn’t ready to tell her, he isn’t ready to display it all in the open. Nino and Alya could come back any time and his identity is the only thing that’s keeping him here, putting on a facade for Nino. It’s the only thing that keeps him from continuing the fight they started last night. 

Nevertheless, there’s something he can say, something he wants to say, to leave out in the open, because the relationship between Ladybug and Chat Noir is broken, unstable, on edge, but what’s happening with Marinette and Adrien’s? He knows what he feels, but what does she feel? He needs to unravel this last layer, maybe it will help him put the pieces together, maybe it will help his heart and his brain stop fighting. 

“I’m in love with you.” It comes up out of his lips as a threat, as a double-edged dagger.  

Marinette’s eyes go wide in surprise. This is the last thing she was expecting, wasn’t it?

Her lips quiver and she sits straight on the divan, her hold tightening against her plushie as if she means to protect the little Chat Noir replica from him.

Adrien waits a minute for Marinette to say something, but her shuddering and the tears covering her irises let him know that she isn’t ready to talk. So, he continues.  

“I don’t know if you feel the same way as I do, I think you might but I’m not sure. Everything that has happened has been so confusing and convoluted that is hard to tell if I’m reading you right,” He sighs, “I’m in love with you and that’s the beginning and the end of everything in my life,  and I wish I could explain further but I’m not ready to get into detail. I wouldn’t have come if Nino hadn’t dragged me because seeing you hurts me, and enrages me, and it makes me even angrier that I’m probably confusing you and putting more baggage into your already heavy back, but I also can’t pretend any better than I have already tried -I’ve never been a good liar and I wear my heart on my sleeve, or at least it is that way when it comes to people that I care about and care about me in return-. So, I can’t tell you why I am angry, but I can tell you I’ve loved you for a long time… you can do with this information whatever you want to, heaven knows I have no idea what to do with it.”

Marinette keeps her mouth shut, and the tears have begun to stream down her cheeks. Her sight never leaves his. 

“You should have come up with a lie on your way here,” She sobs.  

Adrien is about to fight her words when he realizes she didn’t say “a better lie”. She knows he is telling the truth, then what does that mean? That she didn’t actually want to hear what was on his mind?

Marinette covers her mouth with her hand, and the little Chat Noir presses against her cheek. 

“It’s you, isn’t it?” She finally whispers. 

It’s vague enough to allow her a safety net if she’s wrong. But she isn’t, he knows what she is asking, he knows that she figured it out.

Now, does he want to let her know that she put the dots together? 

Did he unconsciously give it away? He wasn’t truly planning to, but he can’t play it nice with her in this shape, not when there’s so much rage in his heart. 

Maybe he hasn’t ever been good with words and what he thought was innocent and subtle enough actually wasn’t.

“ Adrien ,” His name becomes a plea, a beg. 

“What do you think, my lady?” He answers, tilting his head to the side, getting consumed by her scorching glance. 

“Howdidthisgetworse?” Marinette sob is loud and she hides her face, quickly pulling the blanket over her feet to cover her whole body. 

Adrien’s heart tightens as if his ribcage has gotten smaller as if his lungs are taken all the space on his chest to be able to breathe as he dies inside by watching her in pain. 

He is angry, enraged, but his love for her is stronger than these overwhelming frustrated feelings. 

Adrie stands up and goes to her, sitting on the edge of the divan and wrapping his arms around her.

Marinette starts talking but it is impossible to put together her words between her sobs and tears, so he just holds her and caresses her over the blanket, letting her lean towards him and change his hiding spot from the blanket to his chest. Her hands grip his shirt and her tears leave spots over it, her shaking body makes him vibrate and he starts softly humming to try to calm her down. 

“You hate me,” She suddenly says, the first words that make any sense.

“I just told you I’m in love with you, Marinette,” He answers, a little frustrated.

“You still hate me, you don’t want to see me, you won’t ever forgive me.”

“I don’t want to see you, but that’s because I need my time to think, to forgive you , because I know I will, because I love you, but you gotta give me time.”

“All you need,” Marinette looks up, finding his eyes, “I would wait for you forever.”

A part of his heart softens, a dark layer of anger slowly fading away.

He lets himself put on a smile for her.

“It won’t be forever, princess.”

It might be less time than she could ever imagine.