Chapter Text
Their miraculous had gotten switched, again.
Marinette briefly took her earrings off and safely tucked them away in her bag. She wasn’t going to be gone for long, just for an hour while she, Adrien, Alya and Nino hung out at the swimming pool.
The same thought passed through Adrien’s mind. He didn’t want it getting dirtied, or rusty (if that was even possible, he questioned internally). Or even lost at the bottom of the deepest end of the pool. How would he explain himself to Ladybug if he couldn’t show up for an akuma attack because he lost his ring to some water?!
Besides, it was just for an hour.
For now, they could relax together as a group. Splashing around in the serene pool, pretending to dunk each other under water and racing laps across the pool.
But it was short-lived.
With a loud grumble, the roof of the building was ripped off with ease. Debris fell, and people scattered. A man of colossal size peered through the now-open roof of the building, slashing and swiping, desperately trying to grab at the inhabitants inside screaming something about how swimming pools should be banned.
“Adrien!”
“Marinette!”
Both of them screamed in unison, as the blonde took Marinette’s hand. Neither of them looked particularly terrified, until their eyes widened in realisation that they were actively running away from their miraculous.
They were away from the villain for now as they snuck off, following the signs for the fire escape. The opposite direction to where they both really needed to go. They couldn’t reveal their secret identities, of course. But they both needed to figure out an excuse to go back towards danger…
…and saying ‘Oh actually, I’m Ladybug/Cat Noir, I need to be over there’ wasn’t an option.
So the teen girl stopped in her tracks, heels dug into the ground to grind Adrien to a halt. He looked back in surprise, not expecting to see her standing frozen in fear.
“Wait, I need to find Alya!” Marinette blurted out.
A bad excuse, since they both knew that she’d be able to take care of herself, but Adrien accepted it.
Besides, he had his own excuse. “Right,” he said. He looked around the long corridor until he found a door just behind them. Safety! Adrien quickly led her into the cramped space and pushed her in. He lingered in the doorway before speaking again, “You stay here, I’ll go look for Nino and Alya.”
Then gave his signature warm smile.
Marinette’s hand reached out instinctively to stop him, but was too slow since he already took off in the other direction.
“Stay safe…” she whispered with a stray tear in her eye. She wanted to follow her boyfriend, to make sure she was okay. But she knew what she had to do.
She shook herself out of her daze. At least she could protect him if she were Ladybug.
Her ear pressed to the door, she waited… and waited… and could no longer hear his footsteps. Wherever he was going, he wouldn’t see what she was about to do.
And she knew this place like the back of her hand. Marinette pushed on the door ever so slightly, light bleeding in from the crack as the door opened ajar. After confirming the coast is clear, she heaved the door open hard and fast, then burst into a sprint. Out of the closet. Down a different corridor.
Then finally looping back around to the women’s changing rooms, explicitly taking a different route to Adrien despite needing to go in the same direction.
“Tikki?!” A hushed yell.
Searching her bag, she found no earrings. And no Kwami.
Adrien, however, hadn’t even made it back to the men’s changing rooms before being ambushed by the Kwami of creation herself.
She was carrying earrings, the miraculous that transforms the holder into the Ladybug-themed superhero.
“Adrien,” Tikki looked surprised to see him there, but they were running out of time. She needed to make a choice.
“Where’s Ladybug?”
It was hard enough for Tikki to hide the fact that both miraculous holders were in the same place, at the same time. Adrien didn’t question it. She wasn’t sure if it was because of adrenaline from the akuma attack, or if he’d finally stopped trying to figure out who his partner was.
“We got split up, but we’re running out of time.” She gasped when she saw the lack of the Cat Noir ring. “You have to transform now.”
He took the earrings from her and pinned them onto his ears. “Tikki, spots on!”
This wasn’t the first time he transformed into Mister Bug. The whole scenario was reminiscent of that one time Tikki and Plagg were split up from the holders during the Reflekta and Reflekdoll situation, and he had to use Tikki and the Ladybug Miraculous for the first time. He’d be lying if he said he didn’t enjoy the power.
He made the first move, hoping that Plagg would either find him or the real Ladybug soon. He took out his yo-yo, spinning it around as he jumped to higher ground to confront the villain.
It was another weirdo, this one screaming about water and pools and removing all swimming pools from the world.
“Afraid of water?” He jeered, making the villain turn to face him. Within its hands, Alya and Nino had been caught by the villain.
“Mister Bug… where’s Ladybug?!” Alya coughed out, being squeezed by the oversized villain. His restrictive grip started to turn her skin blue.
He didn’t respond but instead tried to make the villain drop Alya and Nino by distracting him, throwing his yo-yo at him, running around him and just hoping he would open his palm to swipe at the red and black spotted hero.
He really needed the real Ladybug to show up… and that’s when he heard that familiar voice in an equally playful tone.
“Nice costume, bugaboy.”