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The strong wind whistled around the metal structure, tussling Ladybug’s hair even as she took cover. She had seen many forms of destruction and chaos over her time spent as the vigilante of Paris, but nothing quite compared to this. A strange creature, covered in rags of what had once been a child’s favorite blanket, laid now resting looking over its realm while the incarnation of Destruction circled around their Master’s recently acquired hostages or rather, preys. The creature appeared serene, yet, there was something about the innocence of it sucking on the blanket like a kitten that made the scene deeply unsettling, the soft blue fabric flowing in the wind.
Trespassing private property could have been a threat a couple of days before but now… The empty cradle moved with the wind, holding memories of a family that had lived there. A family who had loved, made their lives, cherished a little angel that would never see the softness of that mattress loving parents had selected especially for their creation.
Ladybug had loved once too. Now, the memories solely sparked tears in her eyes and hurt in her heart. The memories of the boy who once had been the king of her heart. The boy who now…
“WAITASECOND WHAT DID YOU DO TO THAT BLANKET AGRESTE? BAD KITTY! BAD KITTY!” Alya and Nino snapped out of character at Marinette’s frantic yell. Who knew IKEA was such a great place for roleplay? The lighting was great, there were thousands of props to pick from, and you could even get an audience.
“You tore it apart but you wouldn’t even let us use one to make a shellter? Really dude?” Nino followed. Everyone rolled their eyes at the pun, even Adrien himself. Ever since he had started using cat puns around the other three, NIno started doing the same. It was fun, but sometimes (well, most of the time) it was fun to annoy him by pretending to be annoyed. Even if that meant every single meetup that involved both Adrien and Nino turned into having two walking animal pun encyclopedias around. Alya and Marinette had even thought of running off while they were having a pun match a couple of times, just to see their reaction.
They ended up deciding against it when both of them got official Gabriel emails offering bodyguards in case the group ever wanted to split one time at a mall, when they went to the bathroom and left the guys behind for a couple of minutes. To this day, the part that still puzzled them was how on earth Gabriel got notice of it and redacted the email. Within five minutes.
Leaving aside her hypothesis of the Agrestes having some sort of magical spying force that was constantly observing them through everyday objects, they still had to solve the blanket incident. Based off the muffled snickering coming from inside Adrien’s shirt, she had a pretty good idea of what had happened. Adrien, on the other hand, blushed when he realized he was holding back the impulse to keep on pawing a now ragged blanket. Which also dripped drool from an edge. It wasn’t the first Miraculous Tendencies™, as they decided to call it to avoid further embarrassment, incident any of them had had in public, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t going on the Incident List either.
Ever since the four of them revealed their superhero identities to the others, they had been keeping track of the incidents they had, like that day where Alya jumped face-first onto the blackboard and crashed with Adrien attempting to do the same during a lesson when Mlle. Bustier had shown them a picture of a bird when they were reading Poe’s The Raven. Or the week when Nino kept falling on his back whenever he had a backpack on and for some reason couldn’t get back on his feet. Or last winter, when Marinette kept trying to snuggle with anyone who was within half a meter of her, so when she realized nobody in her class was physically capable of staying still long enough for her to fall asleep she ended up getting stuck between her chair’s legs, much to Alya’s amusement until she realized her friend was tangled up between her chair’s legs too.
Anyways, this incident meant Adrien was leading that month’s List, and leading the List meant he was in charge of paying for whatever they got on that trip. The rules stated that, unless it was something crazy stupid, illegal, or something that could potentially make the one paying go bankrupt, they had to pay during one trip to wherever they chose. Knowing his place on the list, Adrien internally reconsidered his IKEA suggestion. That had certainly not been his brightest idea to date.
Reconsidering their life choices, they decided to move on to the next showroom before someone noticed the half-destroyed fort chilling out in between the coat hanging rack and a wall very clearly designed to host pillows and not three fifteen-year-old kids reenacting an apocalypse. After trying (and obviously not jumping) on five different couches, they quickly passed a pillow rack. Yet again, Adrien was internally fighting hard to keep his cool, but his acquired cat impulses were fighting harder. It only took two seconds for Nino and Alya to get distracted as they fantasized about their future in a house identical to the showroom and Marinette turning to check how much they had left until the kitchen tool section before they heard the crash.
It turned out that the pillow container was not exactly childproof. Even less fifteen-year-old-catboy-who-had-just-had-a-massive-growth-spurt proof. By the time Marinette came running back, Nino and Alya were already trying to desperately put together the rack again while Adrien stood in a corner, sneezing nonstop. “Wait, I think I have something that can help!” she stopped them.
Revealing her superhero identity to her friends had its perks, such as no longer having to fill her purse up with potentially useful stuff that would most likely never be taken out and instead doing quick transformations to summon Lucky Charms specifically intended for the moment. Even after a lot of backlash from Tikki and a long talk about how it could be dangerous to use her powers as a substitute to what her class called the “Mari Poppins Bag”, both agreed it would be a far more comfortable place for Tikki to travel in since Marinette banned phasing inside her organs.
In fact, she had to tell the other Holders it was an option; for some unknown reason Kwami seemed to really like literally being in their Holders’ hearts. The only one who was never really bothered by that certainly disturbing fact was Luka. Said something about Sass staying inside him making “people’s inner melodies easier to hear”, whatever that meant. The only downside, according to him, was the fact that his gummy snake intake doubled anytime Sass insisted on staying inside him. And the fact that he often got the inexplainable urge to stick his tongue out and hiss, although as a human the closest thing he could do was a drill-like noise, even more obnoxious than her average Lucky Charm drills.
It was basically a miracle that this time it was a rather silent one, and that the screws were inside a tiny polka-dotted box instead of the usual scattering. None of them had any idea of what they’d say if an employee walked on a girl in a Ladybug cosplay using a drill on one of the store’s containers while a famous supermodel sneezed in the corner trying to help pick up what looked like at least fifty pillows, completely screwing it while a frantic couple nursed to him and dragged him apart. Of course, their shared Planning-brain-cell.exe crashed even more if Adrien put the situation in such a catastrophic way. Puns were courtesy of the house, of course. Alya was snickering inside while trying to put on her best “I-will-strangle-you-if-you-don’t-shut-up” face. Which was so obvious it ended up making everyone laugh even more than the puns themselves, much to Adrien’s offense.
Well, faked offense.
Marinette had laughed so hard she was still holding on to her belly in pain as she got back to work. A little fastening here, a little more there, and it seemed good to go. Seemed.
“Adrien, I hate to be the one to tell you to pay more but I don’t think this is going to hold for very long, especially if any kids are planning on playing here later. It wouldn’t be the first time any of us got blamed for something a kid did, and honestly, it would be wiser to not risk it. I don’t know about you, but personally, I would rather not have another parent threatening with a lawsuit.”
Adrien’s heart sank at those words. He had made her work for nothing if he followed that plan, and he would be a horrible person if he left the rack there, ready to fall on a random innocent victim. She would probably hate him either way. If there was something he refused to even consider the probability of, it was that. The mere thought crushed his soul.
As they walked away, he couldn’t stop thinking about one time he asked Plagg if there was any way to potentially suppress the most chaotic side effects of his miraculous. Plagg had explained over and over how since the Black Cat miraculous was the miraculous of Chaos, there was nothing he could do to fix specific side effects other than renouncing the Miraculous. And, even after doing that, each Holder would still keep at least a fraction of what they had acquired during their time with their powers, as a reminder of what they had once been. It changed between every single Holder- according to Plagg, not two Holders had had the same remnants, at least not until now. That, added to the fact he wouldn’t think of renouncing except in his wildest dreams, discarded the option completely.
Until he could find another option, he could only keep walking.
On the other side of the hallway, Marinette was once again getting lost in her own thoughts. The taciturn expression Adrien had on reminded her of one she had only seen on his face twice before. Two occasions that had passed to history on her own Incident list, completely unrelated to the Tendencies, but still Incidents.
The first time was right after the Gum Incident. She had been hesitant on accepting her feelings for him because, if she could have hurt him so much within literal hours of knowing him, what assured her she wouldn’t keep on doing the same every single day if they ever got together?
The second time had been the Grévin Museum Incident. The look of hurt in Adrien’s face while he faced the possibility of no longer being her friend was even worse than anything she could have imagined. He never once brought up the actual incident- he just wanted to make sure Marinette was okay. Even if they weren’t going to date (though sometimes she still hoped to fix that), having Adrien as a friend meant more than the world to her.
Both times it had been because of something she had said. Sometimes, she still thought it would’ve been better if her interactions with Adrien stayed limited to the usual nervous “hi” as he passed by. Sometimes, she feared her fear wasn’t unfounded. Unfortunately, it was one of those sometimes.
By the time any of them finally collected their thoughts and organized them in a drawer in a hidden section of their minds, Alya and Nino were gone. Disappeared. Vanished into thin air. Honestly, Adrien’s status as a shellebrity had him in turtle awe about their dematerialization skills; he had been practicing for years and yet he was nowhere even close to being as good as them. He chuckled under his breath. Why was it that he came up with the best turtle puns when Nino wasn’t around? As he glanced to his side, he briefly thought of telling Marinette those ones. After all, they were pretty genius. Adrien grinned at the thought of sweet Marinette laughing at his silly puns. He looked at her, suddenly deciding against the option. He’d rather not make it worse by upsetting her with yet another lame pun quip.
They had been walking for some time when Marinette suddenly gasped. Right there in front of their eyes, there was the cutest, brightest, cleanest kitchen any of them had seen in their entire lives. As they circled the kitchen island, Adrien’s eyes were practically gleaming at all the rope accessories his cat instincts were dying for. Shimmering lights hung above them, bedazzling Marinette within seconds. While Adrien inspected the various hanging racks and fought off the heavy urge to start climbing it, Marinette was doing her own thing, spinning in circles around the lights and reminding herself the plants in the mason jars were fake.
The spiral staircase was only fueling their intentions, allowing them to be closer to the racks and lightbulbs, respectively. According to her observations (and Max’s help to obtain statistics), they had a little less than ten seconds to snap out of it before actually succumbing to their Tendencies. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six… “Wait! Did you see this… eh, cake holder? I have never seen anything like this!” Adrien was confused. “Don’t your parents own about seven of these already? Wait, no". He hesitated for a millisecond. "Eight if we count the one Nino broke, the replacement and the extra one he got to compensate for it.” It had been during the week Nino's backpack and his sudden slowness were the downfall of anything even remotely fragile that had the bad luck to stumble on his way. The Dupain-Chengs had told Nino it was fine, they were used to living with Marinette and her everyday clumsiness, but he insisted. Even remembered not to call Tom "dude" for a whole week. Adrien wasn't displeased with this, after all, the extra plate allowed them to bake some more macaron flavors than usual, and the novelty was often passionfruit.
Marinette chuckled at the memory and replied "Actually, you were right, I kind of broke the replacement about a month after?"
Adrien's eyes widened at the news. "So THAT'S why the passionfruit macarons were cut down? I am so deepawly offended, how could you? I was hissterical after your mom told me you lot were only baking them only on Wednesdays again-” he said with his signature dramatic tone. Marinette’s former chuckled turned into yet another one of her pristine laughs, the sound filling Adrien’s ears like music. Well, it was pristine until she started choking on a strand of her hair and Adrien had to pat her back hard enough that she fell. The coughs stopped for a second while she stared at the counter in front of her, processing what had just happened. Worried she was hurt, Adrien didn’t even think before speaking. “Princess? Are you alright? Please don’t tell me I patted you too hard, I’m gonna kill Plagg if he enhanced my strength without asking again.-”
She looked even more shocked at those words, and as he opened her mouth to say something, she burst into laughter again. “Wow, that was- that was the fastest anyone has ever- ever cured one of my choking coughing fits”, she said still between laughs. While she got up, she added “Also, was that a “princess” I heard?” teasingly.
Adrien went redder than her supersuit could ever dream of being. “Well, uh, sorry, I thought you were going to die or that i had broken one of your ribs and trust me, Miraculer taught me it definitely isn’t a fun experience and I was worried you were hurt and then I remembered you still could be mad at me for the pillow thing earlier today and then I panicked because of course you would end up hating me if on top of making you transform in the middle of an IKEA which made you clearly upset at me and then spitting out a pun set I patted you so hard I gave you a broken rib and-”
“Wow, is that what i sound like?” Marinette wondered. “I thought I had hurt you-”
“Wait what?”
“Yeah, I watched The Incredibles the other day and then when i saw the broken racket I remembered that parent that threatened to sue us and that’s why i was so worried about it. Worried about it, not upset at you”
“Oh. So you weren’t mad at me.”
“Nope”
“But then why weren’t you speaking to me?”
“I kind of thought you wouldn’t want me to?”
He was so confused. “Wait what?”
“Yeah, you made THAT face, I had only seen it after the first day of school, when we met, and that one time at the Grévin and those were two times I had hurt you so i thought i had done it again and you surely wouldn’t want to talk to me?”
“I was hurt because I thought I had made you mad-”
“And I was upset because I thought I had hurt you-”
“Wow, I can’t believe you two have the exact same type of reaction braincells.”
Their hearts almost stopped for a second. “First of all, Alya, Nino, WHERE IN THIS EARTH HAVE YOU BEEN? And second, I know your fox side effects include extra stealthiness but, for Tikki’s sake, please don’t use it on us again. Look at Adrien! He’s pale from the scare Alya, pale.”
Nino was quicker to answer. “Hate to break it to you but that’s his natural color, Mari.” He turned to Adrien and whispered ”Dude, seriously, have you considered tanning?”
“Aaaaaanyways, can y’all help me find the plate so we can go? Maybe so we can go find the fabric scraps?”
“Sure, but not until you look at these curtains I got” Alya remarked.
“And my new towels!”
“Nino, those things are stiffer than my mother. And she’s been dead for almost five years now.”
~(x)~
After selecting a few scraps, nothing too expensive, they headed for the exit. Until the plant section caught their eye.
Alya had an idea. “Wait, what if we all pick a plant? That way it will be a cute friend thing right? Friendship plants instead of frienship bracelets.” Adrien’s modelling duties had prevented them from sharing any friendship jewelry; they tried once and it ended up with him almost crying when he realized his bracelet wasn’t where he had left it. Granted, an akuma had wrecked the place minutes before, but even after the Lucky Charm the poor thing was nowhere to be found. So, they discarded the option.
THey decided on an indoors plant, one that wouldn’t die if they forgot to water it. While they searched, a peculiar munching sound came from the other side of the aisle.
Cautious, not even wanting to think about what type of animals could live in an IKEA plant aisle, they hid behind a massive palm. The munching increased, and frustrated growls started accompanying it. In a brave streak, Alya managed to put up her phone and started recording, too afraid to stick her head out. When the video was ready, they hit play, just to find nothing other than…
“Marinette?”
“Wait, wasn’t she with you, Adrien?”
“I thought she was with you?”
“MARINETTE DUPAIN-CHENG, PUT THAT PLANT DOWN”
She groaned before responding. “Fineee”, she said before the sound of clay on metal.
Adrien inspected the plant she had been eating and noticed something strange. “Mari, I get you’re tired and all the Ladybug stuff has you burnt out but, didn’t you notice it was a fake plant?”
Marinette’s face went redder than the flowers beside her.
“You know what? These cactuses should be good, plus that way Marinette won’t be tempted to chew on them again.” There was his way of making her pay for the “princess” remark from earlier.
Each one picked a cactus for themselves, and as they held them up searching for a way to handle the box containing the broken racket, Marinette’s cake stand, her fabric scraps, Alya’s curtains and Nino’s towels along with four extremely prickly plants. Nino wasn’t careful enough though, but when he pinched his hand his only remark was “wow, that sure had me shell-shocked”. They would all have smacked their faces, but none of them really wanted to suffer the same fate as him. Not taking a cart with them was surely not anyone’s brightest moment.
The checkout line was miraculously short, but the checkout machine’s plans didn’t include them leaving right away. “Go get a table, I’ll get there in a sec.” The other three nodded and made their way to the mini-restaurant. “Get me some meatballs!” Adrien yelled right before they couldn’t hear him anymore. The time the checkout machine was taking gave him an idea. He made a run for his plan, the poor machine still frozen.
~(x)~
“Mari, I don’t want to be that person but maybe try to slow down a little? If an akuma strikes right now you’ll be so full you won’t be able to move without your stomach cramping.”
“Ladybug makes me hungry. Plus, you’re here, so you could take over. Now, let me finish Adrien’s meatballs, they’re going to be cold by the time he gets here. We can order more.”
Alya sighed. She loved being Scarabella but she certainly didn’t love having her friend be an achy mess because her stomach hurt after having too many meatballs.
Marinette was about to start with what was supposed to be Adrien's meal, when he arrived with their newly acquired goods. He sat sneakily next to Marinette, and pulled out a fluffy grey thing none of them remembered getting.
"Guess what... IKEA SHARKS FOR EVERYONE"