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Marinette woke up with a gasp, the lyrics of Stray Cat Strut blaring in her ears.
She stumbled as she made her way down from her loft bed—nearly falling off the ladder in her haste—skied across her room on her fuzzy socks—it was cold okay—overshot and crashed into the corner of her desk, and let out a few not-so-quiet curses before finally managing to grab her phone from her desk.
Slamming her finger on the answer button, Marinette was awarded with temporary but blissful silence as the song was suddenly cut off. Taking a deep breath, she brought the phone to her ears. “Adrien, what—”
What is wrong? Do you need me? Did you have a nightmare? Did Hawkmoth escape? Did the—
“Hey, m’Lady…” Adrien’s voice filtered out of the speaker, exhaustion evident in his every word even through the phone. “D’you think you can walks on walls?”
—did the paparazzi figure out our identities? Do we need to run—
Wait.
Marinette’s thought process screeched to a halt. She squinted blankly at a shadow-encased wall.
…no, she hadn’t heard that wrong.
“Can I…? Walk on walls?” What. Surely Adrien didn’t wake her up at—she chanced a glance at the clock on her desk—two in the morning to ask her this?
“Yeah!” Even without seeing him, Marinette could imagine Adrien nodding enthusiastically, seeming to shake off his weariness with this simple motion of his head. If he was transformed, his tail would be wagging excitedly right now. “All bugs can climb on walls, right? And—you’ve been getting a lot of ladybug traits lately. If you have to eat aphids to stock up for winter, shouldn’t you be able to stick to walls? That only seems fair.”
Marinette flushed at the mention of her aphid trance. In hindsight—even with Tikki telling her it was normal and Adrien wholeheartedly supporting her—that incident had been so embarrassing.
She pinched the bridge of her nose. “…did you just call to ask me that? At two in the morning?”
“Wha—it’s already two? No wonder I feel so tired!” Adrien laughed sheepishly. He paused, and then added. “So? Can you?”
Marinette groaned. She couldn’t believe she left the warmth of her nest of ten comforters for this. “Goodnight, Adrien.”
Before her boyfriend could tempt her with a reason not to crawl back under her covers and hibernate like a good ladybug during winter, Marinette hung up and slammed her phone onto the desk.
Finally. Peace and quiet.
She could go back to her bed and…sleep…
Marinette stood in the dark of the room, staring at a blank wall. Her conversation with Adrien repeated itself in her head, as if it was a broken record on a loop.
“Marinette…?” Tikki’s voice floated from the direction of her bed. Marinette winced; all the noise must’ve woken up the kwami. “Are you okay?”
“Tikki,” Marinette’s mouth opened, and the words poured out of her lips despite herself, “can I stick to walls like a bug?”
As it turned out, Marinette could stick to walls like a bug.
She giggled excitedly as she made her way across her bedroom’s ceiling, sticking to the matte paint with her fingertips and bare toes. Her fuzzy socks laid forgotten on the floor. The cold seeped into her hands and feet, but Marinette found she cared about the cold significantly less with the thrill of discovering a new ability soaring through her veins.
She felt like Spider-Man, except Spider-Man was an arachnid-themed hero and was more likely to devour a ladybug than hold a conversation about sticking to walls with her. Plus, Spider-Man didn’t actually exist. Not to mention a spider-human was as likely to eat a ladybug-human as a regular human was likely to commit cannibalism, and—what was her point in this? She could’ve sworn she’d meant to make a point.
Whatever. That was probably the sleep deprivation talking.
It was a pity she could only stick to walls by using all four of her limbs, though. It would be hilarious if she could walk on all surfaces as easily as walking on the ground—she could just picture the shock on Adrien’s face. But instead, she had to do her best imitation of a scuttling insect—except with four legs rather than six.
Speaking of Adrien…
(Later, she would blame her sleep deprivation for her stupid plan. But really, there was no good excuse for this.)
“Tikki,” Marinette said, and resisted the urge to cackle madly. “I have an idea.”
Adrien grimaced as cold air breezed over his face. He burrowed deeper into his duvet, not bothering to open his eyes.
A few seconds later, the cold spell had not ceased. Bright lights from the city seemed to spill into his bedroom, intent on forcing his eyelids to open. Adrien screwed his eyes shut tighter, equally intent on not letting the city lights win.
Honestly. And just when he finally managed to fall into some semblance of sleep. The open window was merciless—didn’t it care some humans had a mild insomnia problem and found it hard enough to doze off as it was?
Wait.
…the open window?
The window hadn’t been open when Adrien finally went to bed, after that disaster of a phone call with Marinette. Adrien had always made sure to lock his windows ever since that incident with an overzealous superhero fan looking to thank Adrien intimately.
He had drawn his curtains right after dinner.
Despite himself, Adrien shuddered, the ghost of a breath brushing over his cheeks—
—wait, what?
Soft thread—hair—tickled his eyes, as soft laughter echoed in his ears. His breath hitching, Adrien’s eyes sprang open, only to be greeted by—
Hair dark as a void, coalesced from the thick shadows of the room. Night blue eyes, reflecting eerily as they shone with mirth. The creature clung to the wall above Adrien’s bed, curled lips glistening blood red, and Adrien—
Adrien screamed—a blood-curdling sound that bounced around the confined space like the world’s worst pinball game—and jumped away. His heart hammered wildly in his chest, and as all his fighting instincts fled at a single glance of the creature, it was all he could do to shrink away from it.
The creature cackled, a distressingly familiar sound, “Oh my kwamis, your face—you—!”
Slowly, as Adrien’s sight steadied and his pounding heart calmed, the creature’s image…reconfigured. Raven hair, bluebell eyes, rose pink lips…with dawning horror, Adrien realized he just had screamed at his girlfriend.
His girlfriend, who was currently clinging to the wall with her head pointed towards the ground like a…a bug.
“I—” Adrien started, then found he had no words to describe the emotion that rose in him at the sight of Marinette doing…this. “—you—this—we—kwamis—”
Marinette giggled. Falling forward, she summersaulted into his bed, and glanced up—wait, up?—at Adrien, a teasing grin on her face. “It’s okay, Chaton. You can come down now. I’m not actually a demon wearing Marinette’s face. Pinky promise.”
…down?
Adrien glanced downwards, and immediately flushed. He…no wonder…she…this was somehow even worse than mistaking Marinette for a sleep demon!
Plagg—who had somehow remained silent throughout the entire ordeal—had Marinette bribed him beforehand—popped out from his sock-bed on Adrien’s nightstand. “I’m so proud of you for embracing your cat instincts, kitten.”
Adrien hadn’t known it was possible, but he somehow managed to get even redder.
Sighing internally—he was never going to live this down—Adrien made his way down from the top of the wardrobe, the hiding spot he had jumped to in a blind panic.
Once he was back on the ground, Marinette giggled again. Adrien used the opportunity to take a better look at her. She was wearing her fuzzy pajamas and wrapped in a soft pink parka—how had he ever mistaken her for a demon? The gloves and socks that had become a stable ever since winter arrived were missing, and Marinette’s fingers and toes seemed bright pink from the cold. Had she taken them off just so she could cling to the wall and play that—prank on Adrien?
Speaking of clinging to walls…
Adrien grinned. “So you couldn’t put that question out of your mind either, huh?”
In lieu of an answer, Marinette threw his pillow at him.