Chapter Text
Marinette’s life wasn’t going strictly according to her teenage plans. Sure, she became a fashion designer, the future of the business, according to Style Queen herself, but that was the only thing she had managed to get right all those years ago. She never dated Adrien, let alone married him. He was her best friend, her partner, her brother, but after years of fighting Hawkmoth, his father, together, they decided it would be too weird to go into a relationship with that baggage. Not only did that relationship not pan out, due to growing her business and the extensive list of guardian duties, no relationship had panned out. She just didn’t have the time to date, and when she did, they never understood why she was so flaky, so they never lasted long. As a busy, single woman living in an a hardly used apartment, she opted to not get pets, even if she had the time to properly care for one, she already had 19 mini gods, and that was plenty, thank you very much.
No life hadn’t gone to plan, but as she watched her first fashion line come to life slowly before her very eyes, she found that the rest didn’t quiet matter. She had friends that loved and supported her, she had achieved, and far surpassed, her life-long dream of making it in the fashion world, she had family cheering her on, and an entire hero community to back her when she needed a break. She was no longer a 13-year-old girl with the weight of the world on her shoulders, desperate for someone, anyone, to see she was drowning. No, now she was 24 and thriving. Well. Mostly.
She felt like that drowning girl this week.
As rewarding as it was to watch her line come to life, it was a tedious process that required extra hours she just didn’t have. Measure and remeasuring, fixing seams, last minute changes, fabric supplier mishaps, and so on and so forth, if it could go wrong, it did. Which was fine! Really! So, what that she was only getting 4 hours of sleep most nights, she had less when Hawkmoth was at large. So, what her normal stress reliever was currently out of the country and couldn’t lend his assistance. So, what she was feeling a little sick, stress does funny things to the body, once she was done, she would be fine. It wasn’t even bad, just some fatigue, she could handle fatigue. Some loss of appetite, but really, can you blame her? This is a huge defining moment of her career! Was it really so surprising that she had a little sensory overload that made the smell of the iron nauseating and the lights of the studio she worked in headache inducing?
And, okay, fine, she would be the first okay so not the first, but like the third, to admit that maybe taking on a commission order with a deadline the day after her line walked was a bad idea, but she was way ahead of schedule on it, and she hardly had to sacrifice any sleep for it! Plus, could you really expect her to turn down her biggest supporter, first customer, honorary uncle when he asked for a last-minute outfit for a charity event he was playing? Who was she to stand in the way of a good cause!
She would never acknowledge it, it would be detrimental to her health to even focus on it mentally for too long, but she was maybe struggling, just a little bit, and part of her is worried that she put herself in that position on purpose. She spent nearly her entire teenaged years juggling 6 separate jobs- student, aspiring designer, friend, class president, daughter of business owners, Ladybug, Guardian. She spent 4 years forced to deal with an overwhelming burden that everyone around her only saw one half of. It didn’t seem so farfetched that she had become used to the environment and now felt she had to be managing an overwhelming amount of work to feel like she was achieving anything.
Tikki assured her that wasn’t the case, but Marinette wasn’t so sure.
Speaking of Tikki, Marinette looked from the embroidery she had been working on for Uncle Jagged’s new suit, realizing the living good luck charm seemed to have vanished.
“Tiks.” She called out into the apartment, knowing she wouldn’t have gone too far. If it was Plagg or Trixx, she would have worried, but Tikki was one of the more responsible kwami. “Where did you run off to?” She waited, but still didn’t get a response, so she set out to check her frequent nap spots, it wasn’t like her leave without saying goodnight or trying to drag Marinette with her. After searching the various plants around the living room and the window bed in the kitchen, she headed to Tikki’s bed in the bedroom, only to stop when she saw the bathroom light on.
“Tiks?” She eased the door open and was shocked to see the red kwami scribbling vigorously on a paper while an unopened box of tampons sat next to her. “Tikki, what are you doing in here? Did you not hear me calling?” The kwami ignored her, in favor of her notes, but before Marinette could call out to her again, she gasped and flew up to Marinette’s face.
“Marinette,” she said slowly, which was meant to calm her holder, but always put her on edge instead, it was always followed by bad news, ranging from inconvenient to devastating, “when was your last cycle?”
“Uh, well let’s see.” Marinette pulled her fingers up to start counting, mumbling reminders of events surrounding her last cycle. When she reached her conclusion, she furrowed her brows, whispered a soft “That can’t be right,” and pulled her phone out to double check. “Okay so that is right. Looks like 6 weeks ago. Why? It’s not uncommon to be delayed due to stress.”
“Maybe for humans who haven’t wore the miraculous of creation every day since they were 13. Your body responds to my magic, trying to be as regular as possible to increase your odds of, well, creating.” Marinette grimaced at the reminder of that particular fun fact.
“Right, but that’s why we used 2 forms of birth control. I cannot be pregnant, its simply not possible.” Her voice raised an octave as she became more hysterical.
“Well, its not impossible, just highly unlikely, but you should double check. If you’re not, yay,” Tikki’s tone was slightly sarcastic, but Marinette knew it was because she strongly disliked her ‘arrangement’ with Robin, or, since she sees him out of the mask, Damian, and felt that human uses of birth control was unnatural and went against her very being, which it’s true, in a sense, but not nearly as personal as Tikki made it seem, “and if you are,” she was very obviously fighting back excitement, practically vibrating, at the prospect of a pregnant bug, “ then you would be informed, and you always say an informed Ladybug is a prepared Ladybug and a prepared Ladybug doesn’t die.”
“This is not exactly the situation I have in mind when I say that, but you have a point. If I am, it’s not like I can escape it, and now that you’ve brought it up, I’ll stress about it until I know for sure.”
“I’m glad you see sense. Here I had Adrien stock these when you and that Wayne boy started seeing each other.” She opened a cabinet Marinette had left unused and pulled a box of pregnancy tests out, only one of many.
“That’s not concerning at all.” She said as she grabbed the box and began to read the directions. “I should go grab a cup, knowing me I’ll miss or pee all over my hand.”
Cup procured.
Urine caught.
Number of pink lines: 2.
“Fuck.”
Marinette stared at the two lines and, instead of focusing on the title she gained from them, concentrated on how lovely the shade of pink was, especially against the stark white. Maybe she could just ignore that it was a pregnancy test and use it as inspiration. An abstract fabric maybe? With a blinding white background and light-colored, maybe pastel, lines intersecting across it. Maybe she could make a footed-paj- wait no, no baby thoughts, designer thoughts only.
She slid down the bathroom vanity to sit on the floor, hands sandwiched between her head and knees, as she contemplated her life choices.
“Tikki, how could this have happened? We were so careful. We both brought our own birth control to the table. I made sure it was in date and wasn’t anything that relied on timing. I removed the earrings. No expired condoms and we checked for potential breaks. Where did I go wrong?” Tikki cringed, a barely distinguishable feature on her small face.
“Well. I have a theory and you wont like it.” Marinette pulled one hand out to signal ‘go on’. “Well, you know how Adrien needed luck on his side for that mission last month, so you wore Plagg instead?” Marinette groaned.
“Oh no. Bad luck. You’re telling me it was bad luck?”
“Partially. I think his energy, ‘destroyed’ or at least voided your IUD. And then bad luck struck, you did say you both were drunk the last time you met, so it’s possible the condom was forgotten, or broken and you didn’t realize. Then, with the sperm being introduced to your system, and you took your own miraculous back.” Marinette groaned louder this time.
“Fucking creation. I created. And your good luck made it more likely to stick around. Tikki, I love you so don’t take this the wrong way, but I fucking hate magic.” The tiny goddess simply patted her Guardian’s head in sympathy.
Maybe Tikki didn’t quite understand the problem, Marinette was a creative soul and should be excited by the prospect of creating new life, it was her nature, but she did recognize that this wasn’t the outcome the young woman had been hoping for. She had no doubt that Marinette would be a wonderful, loving mother, but she had to admit, she tended to overdo it, and no doubt felt like she was being dragged in like she had with Hawkmoth, and running a business was time consuming, being the guardian was time consuming, being a parent was time consuming, especially if she ended up doing it alone.
“How do you think Damian will take the news?” Tikki gently asked, snuggling her Ladybug’s cheek, in hopes of bringing her comfort.
“Oh no! Tikki, he’s going to be so upset. He’s going to think I did it on purpose and then he’ll have Batman hunt me down. Or he’ll use his connections to have my business blacklisted. I’ll be a single mom with no reliable income. Oh, my parents! Tikki they’ll be so disappointed in me, they’ll disown me, I won’t even have a place in the attic anymore. I’ll live in the streets and- “Tikki let her go on for a minute, well versed in Marinette’s spirals by now, before cutting her off.
“None of that is going to happen. Even if Damian doesn’t want to be a father, he would respect you as a fellow hero and mother of his child, and if he wasn’t willing to help care for his child, your parents would gladly assist you, and you won’t be able to keep Adrien away, even if the father is in the picture.” She rubbed small soothing circles onto her back as Marinette settled back down.
“You’re right. I should just rip the Band-Aid off, right? Send him a message to reach me as soon as he can and that its important?” She glanced at Tikki, seeking guidance from the being older than the universe, who had experienced more than Marinette could ever imagine. Tikki gave her a nod, a flew off to grab Marinette’s phone for her.
Marinette: Hey Dames. We need to talk, come see me as soon as you get back in town. It’s important.
Yeah. Marinette’s life was going nowhere near planned.