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Alix was screwed. So, so screwed.
Well, technically, they weren't. She had all the time in the world in their pocket, to be honest. The thing was, she had learned the tough way that overusing that power was not always the best idea.
As much as time management got easier when they were quite literally the Time Manager, procrastination was much easier to fall victim to when it was always a chance. Doing something could take her all day, a few decades even, and it would never look as if more than a second had gone by.
So, she had an idea. Why not start sorting out her tasks for the next five years?
Well, five years for them, sure, but it would be on the spot for everyone else. The plan was perfect. She would not forget anything as long as it was written down in clear, big letters.
And as long as they didn't forget it somewhere in the Middle Ages, either.
Having to explain what the runes from Kwami knew when meant to a medieval lord had not been a fun experience. Man, multilingualism was hard.
They took out a pen, remembering the one time she was almost executed in the Salem Trials for such sorcery.
("What type of... demonic handcraft is that? And a woman using it, nonetheless! Branded with red hair, the color of Hell itself!" That had been a wild ride.)
Snapping out of thought before she could zone out and evade existence for a little longer, they took out the one journal they had miraculously never lost. Sometimes, she wondered if Fluff was actually messing with the poor book, after seeing words appear in it with no apparent reason, only to notice later it was something she would write in the future.
The first thing on the list was the weddings. As much as they had wanted to give their parents a little something, a few broken timelines had proven that was a horrible idea.
Rule number one of sneaking into festivities as a time traveler: Never give them anything if they don't know about you beforehand. A few royal weddings that descended into wars had made the point very clear, if some broken timelines hadn't already.
It took a prehistoric fly entering the room to make her remember. It was fairly confusing sometimes, whether it was just her usual mind or the result of experiencing Time outside of it.
Before she went back to trying to find out, she turned to the notebook. This was something important. If they took any more time, they already knew it would be a few millennia until the motivation kicked back in.
The weddings, right, they remembered as they read the headline.
She could remember quite a number off the top of her head.
First, the one they would never stop snickering about.
Ladybug and Chat Noir, she wrote down. July 28th, 2026.
She would have to make sure to go someday. The thing was, that no matter how obvious it was that they had just remembered to drop by, Ladybug would understand it. They had already forgotten to drop by for so many important things in so many timelines... It was kind of a miracle to them that Ladybug had never pointed it out once, whether that be out of kindness or simple obliviousness.
Whatever the reason was, Alix couldn’t be more grateful for it.
And yet, despite all the considerations they had had with her, from Marinette sharing tricks to remember things to the fact that she hadn’t been relieved from her Time Guardian duties even after failing a couple of times, they couldn’t find a single idea for a gift.
Maybe if they moved on to the next events?
They continued with the Birthdays list. Her dad’s, Jalil’s, Nath’s… Of course, she had to add the rest of the team’s. Marinette, Adrien…
Suddenly, a thought appeared in their mind.
Their kids would eventually have birthdays.
Especially the fifteenth birthday. It was supposed to be something special, not something they could just solve by giving them a peek at the dinosaurs or a glimpse into futuristic robots.
Alix groaned in frustration. Marinette had been right when she said their ADHD could make it easier to deal with the thousands of different timelines, having had a pinch of experience with it herself. But it also made the task a hundred times harder. Sure, they were able to think of all the possible outcomes for almost anything, but it did mean thinking of many, many things at once.
She had started with weddings, and now she was on the kids’ birthdays. Great.
On one hand, it let them procrastinate a little longer on the wedding gift, but on the other, she now had about twenty times the number of plans to make. And, they couldn’t even use the good ol’ shortcut that was peeking into the future to know what they would give them, since apparently decisions made by her had to actually be made by her before appearing in the timeline. Time was just weird like that.
And then, they had an idea.
What if instead of planning gifts for four separate events they could just plan one big gift?
At least, for the kids’ fifteenth birthday.
They truly deserved a pat in the back for that. It was genius.
Nothing could go wrong with that plan.
Right?
She had to start working on it before she got caught up on yet another time tangent.
~(X)~
For once in their life, they had tied their hair and put on their fanciest suit.
This was serious.
~(X)~
Emma Dupain-Cheng tried to finally get the courage to get up for the day. It was herday, wasn’t it? Maybe she could get away with oversleeping just a little. She knew for a fact her parents had something planned for the day though, and curiosity was able to overtake sleepiness.
Just as her feet landed on the ground, she felt herself fall into a… hole?
Was it the day her parents had warned her about? When Plagg would try to play a trick? Or was it the day a villain would appear for the first time in years? As she remembered her parents telling her not to worry the night before, she wasn’t sure if this was whatever they meant.
As she looked around, surrounded by white and some sort of windows, Emma wondered if she maybe should have overslept.
~(X)~
Hugo was excited.
As per usual, he had been barely able to sleep the night before. There was always something in the air before his birthday, some sort of electricity that filled the room the second he woke up.
After Emma’s fifteenth birthday, though, he had a slight feeling it could even be a little more literal than he thought. She had never wanted to tell him or Louis what her present had been, no matter how much they threatened to poke her in the arm until she gave up.
The only thing they had managed to get out of her, was that he had to wait to know, with a smug grin on her face. He was eager to know.
For a slight second, he thought he hallucinated the soft crackling of energy behind him.
Until he saw the portal.
Something told him he was very close to discovering what the surprise was.
~(X)~
Louis didn’t have a clue if his siblings had been messing with him for the past few years, or if he was actually in for what they liked to call “The Present,” with a showman tone to their voices.
The best, or worse part, was that he had absolutely no idea what it meant.
Everyone in the Dupain-Cheng household seemed to know what The Present was, snickering every time they mentioned like some sort of inside joke he was not a part of… yet.
As the portal opened beneath his feet when he got up, he realized why everyone had advised him to sleep with his slippers on.
~(X)~
Everything was too bright for a second, until their eyes got used to the amount of white in the… walls?
Each of the kids looked around, puzzled. While Emma and Hugo were weirded out at the sight of what were unmistakably their grown-up brothers, Louis smiled as he saw the familiar faces of younger versions of his siblings.
“You must all be wondering why I brought you here,” said a dressed-up figure in front of them, facing the opposite wall. The tone of their voice was uncanny familiar, even if none of them couldn’t connect it to a face.
As the figure turned around, Emma was mentally reviewing the list of potential akumatized items her parents had taught her ever since she could remember. Jewelry, shoes, glasses —she could only hope the item wasn’t outside of whatever this place was. If Hugo and Louis remembered it too, maybe the three of them could take whoever this was. She remembered the stories, the civilians had been a key part when they had to take down the villains in the past. Maybe—
”Untie Alix?”
It was the first time any of the three kids had ever seen them looking so… formal.
“The one and only,” they said bowing down dramatically.
“First things first, happy birthday! Now, for your actual surprise… Just a few things. It’s going to be all friends, but just to be safe, make sure to only call me Bunnyx. I can’t remember much of what happens so yeah, no first names. It’s not much of a worry if you’re seen, but try not to interact much with anyone outside the team. You know them, right?”
The three kids nodded, hoping it was the Miraculous team they meant.
“And of course, remember. No one knows you yet, but trust me, they’ll love you. Oh, and look out for your parents too!”
Louis looked at his siblings searching for answers, only to find them with the same flabbergasted look.
What on Earth were they getting into?
“Well folks, what are we waiting? When I open the portal, you walk outside, okay?”
The three kids did as she said, squinting as they went through the brightness of a new portal.
Emma yelled as she almost ran into someone… something? to her brothers’ amusement. As she took a couple of steps back, she realized what it was.
A wax statue.
So, they were at the Musée Grevin.
Before they even had the chance to try and ask the others anything, the chatter died down. Despite the reduced amount of people, it was notorious enough that the three kids squirmed as soon as they noticed, diving behind an empty table to hide.
Bunnyx, now detransformed into Alix, stood on a little podium near the stairs. An incredibly amount of flowers adorned an arc above their head. Mostly white, little tiny ones in green and red formed a beautiful, intricate pattern, adding a dash of color.
Alix took a microphone that had been hidden beneath the flowers, and cleared her throat.
“Hello everybody, and welcome to the event of the year! Family, friends, whoever you are, thank you so much for coming and joining us on this wonderful occasion.”
Hugo snickered from behind the table. It was the most formal he had ever heard Alix speak, not that he had had the chance to hear them a lot either.
“Now, everyone, please cheer for Paris’ favorite couple in and outside the suits!”
A beautiful melody played from some carefully concealed speakers on the walls, giving the room a magical feeling.
To top it off, the outlines of two figures appeared from beneath what seemed to be some sort of glowing mist.
Suddently, the kids realized.
They were at their parents’ wedding.
While it wasn’t the first time they saw them inside the suit, theyhad never seen them wear these.
The Ladybug suit had most of its black accents replaced in white, a flower crown finishing the outfit.
The Cat suit, though, had been completely changed to a white version of it.
And then, their transformations dropped.
Right where Ladybug and ChatNoir had been, stood Adrien and Marinette.
Adrien’s suit had an intricate lace application on the upper back of the coat in some kind of sparkly material, making the images of flowers, of bugs and an umbrella for some reason, visible when he moved against the white fabric.
Marinette’s dress though, practically glowed with how intense the red color on the fabric was. While the skirt was in the purest ball gown style with dozens of tiny ladybugs and paw prints embroidered in white on the hem of the skirt, the bodice resembled a qipao. The neckline was covered in small, sparkly gems in the shape of droplets, with a slightly bigger one for the center. With the veil added, it gave the illusion of wings trailing behind her, covering a tiny stain of what looked like tea on the skirt.
A round of applause followed them, only dropping when Alix cleared their throat again.
“Now that they are here, let’s proceed. First, the vows.”
Adrien reached for the microphone, his smile glowing.
“My Lady, Bugaboo, Marinette. I see you, beautiful as ever. If I could show mini-me on the day we met, all we have lived, all our adventures and all the late-night rooftop conversations; if I could show him where I am now, about to marry the strongest, most amazing woman I’ve ever met… Well, I don’t really know what he -I- would do. But right now, right here, I can tell you. I love you. I love you so, so much."
Alix took the microphone, to the collective sound of an aww.
"No cat puns?" they teased. "Now, Marinette, your turn."
For a few seconds, she stood completely quiet, visibly trying hard to get the words to come out. She took a deep breath, and started.
"You're dressed in white, and this time it's for the start of the rest of our lives together, instead of the end. I- I never thought I would see you in white again and love you like this. I never thought I'd see you in white and still feel loved. Still… feel safe. But, I do. It could only be with you," she finished, her voice breaking slightly
While most of the attendees were slightly confused by her words, Adrien smiled at her, reaching out to hold her hand. It and been a while since she had opened up about the Chat Blanc incident, and hearing those words couldn't mean more to him.
After a few seconds, Alix broke the silence, turning slightly to her left side first, already guessing it was better knowing Marinette.
“Now, Adrien, do you take Marinette to be your partner, to live together in the union of marriage, to love her, to honor her, to comfort her, and to keep her in sickness and in health, for as long as your love may last?”
“I do,” he said with the biggest, most genuine smile anyone had seen him sport. No magazine, no photoshoot would ever see the true radiance of his true happiness.
“Marinette?” they said, while Marinette internally thanked them for not making her speak a lot more.
“I do.”
Alix held out a small Miraculous box, one of the ones still untouched at the Temple. Inside, there were two thin metal bands, with a small white gem and a black one each.
Adrien and Marinette exchanged them, chuckling when Adrien almost dropped his.
“Now, by the power vested in me by the Order of the Guardians —and the city of Paris— I declare you married. You may share—”
Her words were interrupted by the sudden motion of Marinette throwing herself into Adrien’s arms, almost knocking him off his feet.
“Now, now, to let us keep this PG-friendly, I want to announce some very… special guests, because what is the greatest proof of love but knowing it will perdure through time? Everyone, please clap for the Dupain-Cheng children!”
Adrien turned around so fast it gave him whiplash, making him clutch his neck.
Marinette tried to get off the stage to find something that could help, only to trip on her dress and miss the cake only by inches.
Suddenly, both were glaring at Alix, more than angry, just very, very confused.
“Heh… isn’t it funny how this turned out?" they said awkwardly.