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Chat Noir’s baton made a soft thud as he extended it to the ground, vaulting over the roofs. Determining he had gained enough distance from his pursuers, the cat superhero shrank his baton and landed on his feet on a nearby building.
He glanced around for a suitable place to detransform. This area of town wasn’t near any of his usual spots, but there had to be a convenient alleyway for him to hide somewhere.
There! Tucked behind a few buildings was a small park—if it could even be called such. The area was overgrown with vegetation, sprawling vines spilling over its rusted iron fence. Wild rose bushes dotted its perimeter, the pink blossoms a stark contrast to the greenery of the garden. Chat could barely make out the vague outline of a wooden bench covered in moss. There was no way someone could’ve been there recently.
Unhooking his baton from his belt, Chat Noir vaulted into the park, landing deftly among the grass that grew as tall as his hip.
Smiling in satisfaction even though he was definitely going to have quite an ordeal leaving this park in his civilian clothes, Chat called out. “Plagg, claws—”
“Chat?”
Chat Noir froze. What? That couldn’t be.
A very familiar face poked out behind a rose bush, one with bluebell eyes and a red kwami peeking out from her long black hair.
“M—Marinette!?” Chat spluttered. This was the opposite side of town from her home and the université she went to. “What are you doing here?”
Marinette gave her boyfriend a very unamused expression before she glanced back at the rose bush. “What are you doing here?”
“…running from the reporters?” Chat rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. After Hawkmoth’s defeat, Ladybug had the bright idea of informing everyone Adrien had been the one to tell the heroes about his suspicions of Hawkmoth’s identity. And really, Chat was grateful no one blamed him for Father’s actions thanks to Ladybug’s speech—but would it kill people if they stopped asking him how it felt to choose justice over filial piety every single day?
“Oh.” Instantly, a sympathetic expression appeared on Marinette’s face, though her eyes kept darting back to the bush, half-distracted.
Naturally, Chat lunged onto the chance to shoot the question back at Marinette. “So, what are you doing here? It’s the middle of nowhere.”
Marinette shrugged, turning her gaze from Chat Noir back to the rose bush. “I’m stocking up for winter.”
“…I’m sorry, what?”
Marinette grabbed something from behind the bush, popped it in her mouth, and swallowed. She didn’t answer his question.
Chat Noir frowned. “Marinette? Are you okay?
“She’s fine.” Tikki piped up, flying out from her hiding spot in Marinette’s hair. “She’s just dealing with some new side effects.”
Chat Noir’s mind flashed to the uncomfortable few weeks when his teeth had elongated into canines in his civilian form. They didn’t bother him anymore—in fact, if no one pointed out how weird his teeth looked, he barely noticed they weren’t normal teeth most of the time. What was normal, anyway?
“What side effects is it this time?” Chat asked, concerned.
“You know how ladybugs hibernate?” Tikki asked.
Of course he did. Ladybugs were one of the research topics he had spent sleepless nights on after startling awake from nightmares. Besides, back when their only obvious miraculous side effects were slightly enhanced senses, Chat Noir had wondered why Ladybug hated the cold so much.
“You mean Marinette is going to hibernate this winter?” Chat gaped. Marinette would have to miss so many classes, and her workaholic tendencies would hate it so much—
“No!” Tikki replied immediately. “Not unless Marinette wants to, at least. She does have to stock up for winter, though. And she’ll be distracted until she’s finished.”
Stock up…
Chat Noir distinctly remembered most species of ladybugs’ food source. He also remembered they were currently hanging around an overgrown garden.
“…she’s eating aphids, isn’t she?”
“Yup!” Tikki chirped cheerfully, and happily accepted when Marinette picked an insect off the underside of a leaf to offer the kwami. “Thank you, Marinette! I’m so glad I have a holder like you. Most of my other bugs get very possessive over their food.”
Marinette nodded distractedly at the compliment. Tikki stuffed the still-squirming aphid into her mouth and beamed.
…so Tikki ate insects as well as cookies. Chat…had not wanted to know this.
Did Plagg eat dead mice as well? Was Chat going to be hunting mice and birds a few years down the line?
Marinette glanced back up, and blinked confusedly at her boyfriend. “Chat? You’re still here?”
“…yeah, I think I’m going to go now.” Chat told her, trying to banish the frankly disgusting image of Plagg feasting on a dead rat from his mind. “You’ll be alright here, right?”
Marinette tilted her head. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
…okay. Great to hear.
“Please get Marinette home before dark.” He told Tikki, because she had always been a very responsible kwami, and true to Tikki’s words, Marinette didn’t seem entirely present right now.
“Of course! There won’t be much aphid activity at night anyway.” Tikki chirped. “Don’t worry about Marinette, Adrien.”
Marinette pouted. “You’re leaving already?” She picked an insect from the underside of a rose petal, taking care not to squash it between her fingers, and held it out to Chat. “Aren’t you hungry, Chaton?”
“I’m really not.” Chat told her, trying not to glance at the aphid’s squirming legs. “Besides, who’d want to steal food from a princess as beautiful as you?”
“Your loss, my prince.” Shrugging, Marinette tossed the bug into her mouth.
Chat grabbed his baton from his belt. “See you tonight, my Lady.”
Marinette wriggled her fingers at him. With that, Chat went vaulting over the roofs once again.
An hour later, Adrien was strolling down the aisles of a pet store, a face mask over his face. He did not want to see the headlines tomorrow saying something along the lines of “Agreste buys pet to replace disappointment of a father”, even though he’d love to see Father’s face when he saw the news.
“Kitten, are you seriously doing this?” Plagg asked, tucked inside the warm scarf that Marinette had knitted for him, not the lying terrorist he used to call Father. If there was one thing Adrien liked about the colder months, it was that he had an excuse to wear scarves. It was so much easier to talk to Plagg like this.
“Of course I am.” Adrien huffed, holding a phone over his ear. It was a trick he often employed so people wouldn’t think he was talking to thin air, or worse, Hawkmoth.
“Your bug will be fine.” Plagg grumbled. “Sugarcube will ensure she’s well-fed.”
“But I want to do something for her!” Adrien protested. “Remember how she helped me when my canines grew out.”
“…yeah. Whatever. Fine.” Plagg huffed, sinking back against the soft woolen fabric.
Smiling at Plagg’s not-quite-approval, Adrien turned to the fridge in front of him. Bags of insects lined the shelf, some frozen, others only hibernating. “So? What do you think? Should I buy live ones or frozen ones?”
“My Lady!” Chat Noir sang as he landed on Marinette’s balcony. “I bought a present for you!”
Marinette blinked sleepily at him, thick blankets wrapped around her shoulders. It looked like she had been taking a nap on her lawn chair.
…opps.
“What is it, Chaton?” Marinette asked, shrugging off her blankets and stretching her arms.
Grinning, Chat Noir unhooked his baton and flipped it open, accessing the pocket dimension in his weapon. Green light spilled from the dimension into the night air, but Chat paid it no mind as he reached a claw into the baton.
He pulled out a bag of squirming aphids.
Marinette’s eyes widened. Tikki flew out from the mess of blankets and gasped. The kwami’s blue eyes twinkled. “Oh, Adrien! You shouldn’t have.”
Chat Noir shrugged, a sheepish smile on his face. To tell the truth, he had hoped the aphids would still be asleep when he presented them to Marinette, but it seemed like they had all awakened. “Can’t I do something for my miraculous girlfriend?”
Giddily, Marinette pressed a kiss to his cheek. She excitedly grabbed the parcel from his hands, and tore it open with all the eagerness of a child on Christmas morning.
“Wait—”
Too late. The insects, already awake and anxious to escape from the confines of their bag, immediately scattered into the night air.
Not missing a beat, Marinette called out. “Spots on!” A flash of red light later, Ladybug was lunging after the aphids scattered all over the balcony, like a predator on the prowl.
“Wait,” Chat interrupted moments before Ladybug flung herself from the balcony. “What are you doing?”
Marinette looked over her shoulder at him and blinked. “Enrichment…?” With that, she jumped off the roof, her yo-yo carrying her as she flew around the building.
…oh. Okay, then.