Chapter Text
“And the award for the Agreste fashion design competition for this year goes to Isra Laurent”
Marinette deflates slightly as Gabriel announces the winner and a tan-skinned girl with bright green eyes goes up on stage, looking a little baffled and shellshocked herself, fidgeting with her hijab and looking very embarrassed by the spotlight.
In spite of the support of Alya and even Adrien himself, Marinette had lost the competition. It makes sense, every high schooler with an eye for fashion in Paris was participating, and as the name of the winner’s school was read out, she didn’t even recognise it, but… It still felt like a personal failure for her. Neither of her close friends are present to comfort her either, Adrien forced to be part of the presentation and Alya apprenticing under one of the writers for a pretty big local magazine. So, she doesn’t even wait to watch the rest of the ceremony, trudging back to sweep all of her designs off the table they were displayed on and back into the box she’d used to bring them here.
During the judging, she’d seen a blonde boy who looks startlingly similar to Adrien bump into Gabriel and grab his tie to steady himself. What she hadn’t seen was his eager attempt to grab a purple brooch off the man’s chest, almost, but not quite succeeding, nor does she spot the jewellery piece falling into her box, so she just piled her own stuff in on top of it and headed home, dwelling in her perceived failure to live up to the lives her friends are leading.
Dismissing the worries of both her parents and her friends via text, Marinette holes up in her room for the evening and just dwells on all those negative emotions she’s feeling, the relatively minor setback seeming larger than the whole world to the teenager.
Inside the brooch inside the box, those emotions awaken something… which is then immediately distracted by piercing pain and swirling chaos, unable to focus it’s mind properly. Oh right, this is why it was sleeping. But that’s boring. But it’s trapped in this gem and that’s boring too!
A couple hours later Marinette has recovered enough to begin unpacking the box, carefully un-creasing the clothes she’d carelessly stuffed in the box back at the contest. Adrien would have looked absolutely stunning in this. She can’t help but have that thought, even though she already knew he hated modelling for his father…
And her hand brushes against metal.
Immediately a small, blue birdlike creature seemingly appears out of thin air. Marinette goes to scream, but managed to remember her sleeping parents and drop the volume to a terrified squeak, grabbing a jar some of her own jewellery had been in and attempting to trap the strange creature in it.
Looking around at the glass, bemused, the creature speaks; “Hello! I am Doosu. I’m… I guess you don’t know what a kwami is… I’m a spirit embodying the concept of Emotion.”
Where’s Alya when you need that dork’s encyclopaedic knowledge of supernatural nonsense…
“I… erm… Hi, I’m Marinette. Why can you talk?”
“I’m magic! Speaking of which, I’m a little bored of this jar thing, so…” Doosu rolls her eyes and flutters right through the glass, doing excited laps around the room before stopping near Marinette; “Hi! Do you like superheroes or magical girls? Because we can totally do that thing.”
Marinette blinks a few times, processing the sheer information overload that is this tiny spirit’s presence, holding up the unfamiliar brooch she’d accidentally touched, which in her hands shifts colours to a deep almost black colour for it’s main body, contrasted with light blue jewels. “Okay. Assuming any of this is real… How. Do I do that.”
“Oh, this is very real, and it’s simple. Just pick a nice little phrase to call out each time you wanna transform and then say the opposite of that to go back. Doesn’t really matter what it is, the others are all picky, use it as a password, but I know you’re nice..”
“There are more of you little things?”
“Oh yeah~! There’s a whole bunch of magic jewels in a biiig box, and each one of them has a spirit! I miss Plagg and Trixx, they were fun.”
Marinette has waaayy too many questions for all of this, but tries to suppress them, instead politely saying; “I’m not a superhero nor a magical girl, though. I’m just… me.”
Doosu grins; “Spoiler alert, so are all of them. Every single hero in the world, every wielder of a miraculous, all of them are just regular people with all the same emotionsss. Insecurity, worry, loneliness, compassion, joy, fear, bravery. It’s really cool! Some people with powers don’t hero either. A lot of my more timid hatchlings still went on to be great at their time period’s equivalent of being a therapist today. So just try it on, see how it fits. You can always just stop, nobody’s able to recognise one of your forms as the other without good evidence.”
That… weirdly helps calm the anxious teenager down, and she quietly says; “Okay… Let’s try this then… Doosu, spread my wings.”
Blue light floods the room as the little creature is sucked into the brooch. Marinette isn’t paying much attention to any of that, overwhelmed with the sheer amount of energy rushing through her body. Even her mind feels refreshed and ready to take on the world, a sharp contrast from how she’d been even moments before. Her movements are quick and smooth, like those of someone far more fit than she is, and even her mind is more alert and observant… Then the emotions hit her. As her senses were reaching out and getting acclimated to their new potential, a new one came into much sharper relief. Or… no, an old one, heightened so far it takes on a whole new meaning. She can *feel* the peaceful calm of her parents sleeping in the other room, the playful excitement of a stray cat outside chasing it’s food, and then a heat almost like fire as the anger of two of their neighbours hits her… In the instinctive desire to NOT find out any more about those particular emotions, Marinette manages to gain a better control of this new ability, filtering down the overwhelming rush of information. It’s only after she does so that she realises that processing everything around her the way she had had given her a headache.
It's only now that she notices her reflection in the mirror. Her hair had been tied back into a ponytail instead of her usual twintails, her dark black hair and eyes had lightened to a clear blue, which is contrasted against a deep blue, almost black in colour, outfit with a feathered cloak, worn over a light and loose long-sleeved top, light blue nail polish matching her new hair and eyes, and a few accents elsewhere on the outfit. The bottom half of the outfit had leggings under a knee-length skirt, with shoes that’re clearly reinforced but try to do so without looking the part. A weird mix of practical, if she’s supposed to be a superhero, whilst still trying to stick on theme, her own desire to be fashionable at least elevating it somewhat from the relatively plain skintight jumpsuit she somehow knows is the default if wielders don’t put much effort into it.
And then, as she considers how exciting it could potentially be to have these powers, use all this energy she feels burning through her veins… all she can feel is guilt... All of this power, all of this cool magical freedom, is stolen. “Back to earth.” She makes up a phrase to end the transformation on the spot, not even waiting for the creature to pop out of the piece of jewlery before she climbs into bed. Tomorrow, she’d return it to Gabriel or something. Tonight, though, she’s too emotionally exhausted to do anything more than smile slightly as the weird bird creature cuddles up to her as she falls asleep.
And that slight headache was still there.
~~~~
She awoke at around midday on the Sunday, with a clearer mind, more energy, and a phone blowing up with texts from Alya to the group chat with her and Adrien.
Alya: Oh wow this is exciting!
Alya: There’s a new supervillain~!
Alya: They’re actually in Paris this time!
Adrien: What!? Oh no, that’s awful.
Marinette: Who are they, and what did they want?
Alya: Ooooh, Mari, has the world of superheroes finally caught your interest!? He calls himself Shadow Moth, and he’s claiming Gabriel Agreste stole a magic jewel from him.
Adrien: Wait, he’s targeting father!?
Alya: Seems so. Apparently he’s going to make a public statement on it this evening.
Adrien: Why does he never tell me any of this!? I know he probably just didn’t want me to worry, but… Anyway, I hope this new villain is just mistaken and we can clear it all up…
Even without her powers, Marinette could feel herself and Alya flinch at that one. Adrien is an amazing friend but he can be way too protective of his neglectful father and it hurts to watch sometimes. His own dad was being targeted by a villain and he first found out hours after the fact from a friend…
Doosu, still in the room, laughs bitterly, and then considers their words carefully for a few moments before saying; “Well, Gabriel doesn’t have the jewel, so at least your friend will be safe.”
“I… guess so. I still can’t help but have a really bad feeling about this. Did Gabriel really steal you? Who had your brooch before that.”
“I… Cannot say. They ordered me, if I was ever stolen, never to tell… Only the guardian of the box might be able to release me from that. And…” The little creature looks almost… guilty… before quietly saying; “The guardians don’t exist anymore.”
Marinette frowns; “They… what? And you just have to do that?”
Doosu’s expression grows even more sad and distant; “The Kwamis… we go far, far beyond the natural rules of the world. Whoever made the Miraculous, the jewels we’re tied to… They added that measure to make sure we’d never be able to harm the human world… but, as you might be able to tell, that backfired pretty much day one.”
“That’s awful…”
The little bird smiles sadly; “I’m glad you think so. It’s… been too long. But, sorry, didn’t mean to get into all that stuff, you’re gonna need to get dressed if you’re going to go meet up with your friends for the announcement~!”
Marinette might be a little on the emotionally dense side, even for a teenager, but even she can pick up on such an obvious deflection. Still, given the subject matter, she lets the topic drop, throws on a casual outfit and goes to head out… before hesitating and sticking Doosu’s brooch in her handbag. Considering she stole it, apparently from another thief, it’s not just something she can wear openly, but this supervillain business has her anxious, and even with the guilt over the theft, that memory of the sensation of power brings her a little comfort.
Doosu frowns slightly but doesn’t comment, instead letting out a cheer at their first outing in a long while, and hiding in the bag.
As she goes to leave the house, her mum stops her; “Hey, Marinette… a few of the pastries we left out to cool last night were missing this morning. It’s ok if you get hungry in the night but please tell us when that happens, okay?”
Marinette impulsively says; “But I didn-” before figuring out what happened and letting out a small sigh; “Okay, Mum. Sorry, it won’t happen again.”
Sabine watches the girl race out the door with a concerned expression. Apologizing over nothing wasn't new for Marinette, but this was even worse than they were used to.