AN: You thought you felt bad for her last time, ha! This is what you get for asking me to fix it. :D (I suppose this could be a second/third chapter, but the tone and POV's all different and UB is a stand alone... So meh.)

~o~

"Adrien Alert!"

Funny how that phrase used to inspire a burst of excitement in Marinette. How she'd jump to attention like a meerkat, eyes wide and searching before she found that unmistakably handsome face and angelic blond hair. Then she'd swoon with happiness and adoration, floating on a happy high all day.

Now however, the designer cowered and ducked for cover behind Nino and Alya, as the pair of them slid together to form a protective barrier. All smiles, the model jogged down the steps of the College Francoise-Dupont, coming up to his two classmates. "Good morning!" he said brightly. "You haven't seen Marinette, have you?" He teetered on his tiptoes, trying to peek over and around the impenetrable Nino-Alya wall.

"Nope," they both answered quickly, causing the blond to frown.

"Actually, I think she was going to meet Juleka this morning!" Alya lied, pointing a hand towards clear across the other side of the street. "Something about chatting about a project or something. You just... go over there and wait for her, okay?"

Adrien wilted just a little, but nodded and did as the reporter bid.

Once his back was turned, all three quickly hustled into school before Adrien could spot the pig-tailed girl. Once they were safely installed in their classroom, all three collapsed into their seats.

"Guh, he is persistent, isn't he?" Alya noted grudgingly.

"I don't understand! Why is he doing this?!" Marinette cried miserably, letting her head fall against her desk.

It had all started about a month ago, when Adrien gently whispered those soft words into her ear on the steps of their school. Je t'aime, Marinette. They had dropped on her like a bomb, leaving her shellshocked and paralyzed, unable to react until the model was long gone.

Afterwards, she began to doubt that it had actually happened. She was just delusional or something, to dream up what she'd always wished Adrien would say. He didn't act any differently with her afterwards, friendly and cheerful as always. Nothing to indicate why he'd say something like that out of the blue.

Then he did it again.

Two days later, he cornered her alone in the locker room. With eyes as warm as molten emerald, he put a hand beside her head on her locker door, leaning in to murmur in her ear, "Je t'aime, Marinette."

Which was when Marinette finally realized that it hadn't been a dream, even as she dissolved into a helpless, brainless, blushing puddle of mush. However, when she recovered, the model was once again long gone. Leaving her boneless on the floor, heart jackhammering so hard she was sure that it echoed in the empty room.

The next day, she attempted to gather up the courage to talk to Adrien about it. Feeling as though she were made up of a pile of shivering nerves, she walked unsteadily up to Adrien in the classroom, anxiously wringing her fingers. Her face very nearly overheated from the sheer effort of trying to talk. "U-um, Adrien?" she called uncertainly.

The blond in question looked up to her, bright and friendly as he regarded his classmate. "Oh, hey, Marinette. What's up?"

"Th-that thing that you said yesterday...?" Marinette tried, swallowing hard as her whole body broke out into a cold sweat. "A-and what you said before...?"

Adrien only gave her an innocent, expectant look. "Yes?"

Her mouth bobbed uselessly, like a fish. She just- she couldn't get the words out. The heat to her brain was simply too much and Adrien was looking at her and if this went on any longer, she was actually at risk of fainting. "N-never mind!" she stammered, quickly rushing past him to get to her seat.

Which was when Adrien caught her by the wrist. "Oh, hold up. Before I forget," he said, drawing her attention back to him, back to his hypnotic eyes and that gorgeous face. Smiling, he tugged her down just a little, enough so that he could say so sweetly to her, "Je t'aime, Marinette."

With that, he let her go. "Thanks!" he said cheerfully, turning his attention back to the front of the class. Once again, Marinette was reduced to a blushing, overheated zombie, unable to move until Alya came in and tugged her into her seat.

Which was when Marinette realized that it wasn't a dream. It was a nightmare.

Every day after that, Adrien never failed to track her down, nailing her with those seductive words, then abruptly leaving while she was still recovering. She never failed to dissolve every time he spoke them, not even in the nice floaty swoony way, but more in the unattractive pile of gibbering mush way. It got to be that she became hyper aware of the blond, her body on high alert as she wondered when he was going to accost her. The only break came on weekends, but her body would still tense with panic every time any blond happened to pass by in her field of vision.

If she didn't know any better, she'd call it one of the worst pranks imaginable. However, Adrien was just too sweet, too nice, too innocent to think up something so sadistic. No, it was more like he was getting a fix, like saying those words to her specifically were a daily multivitamin. Or it was an itch that needed scratching.

It got so bad, she started going out of her way to avoid him, just so that she wouldn't have to hear it. It never worked. It seemed like he had this supernatural ability to track her down. Which was when she turned to Alya and Nino for help.

"You know, girl, you did kind of have this coming," Alya remarked, as she kept a lookout on the street corner where Adrien was still waiting for her. "It's not fun getting stalked, is it?"

"Wait, when did-" Nino started, before Marinette quickly cut in:

"ALYA, DON'T TALK ABOUT THAT!" she shrieked, her face bright red with mortification. She still had that chart in her room, although now she was using it as a tool to figure out how to avoid Adrien as much as possible. "Look, he just needs to stop doing this! I can't handle it anymore!"

"Well, avoiding him isn't going to work forever. You two are in the same class!" Alya cried.

"I might get switched to a different class," Marinette said weakly.

"Months from now, if at all!"

"Look, Mari, you're just going to have to woman up and talk to him," Nino said, propping his chin up from the desk. "Alya and I tried, but it all just went straight over his head. If you want him to stop, just explicitly tell him to stop. He's not going to listen to anyone else."

Marinette flushed. "But I don't want to hurt his feelings," she mumbled, wringing her fingers anxiously. "Besides, what if he means it? What if he's trying to wear me down so that he can ask me out?"

"Girl, you do not want Adrien as your boyfriend!" Alya cried in horror as she whirled from the window, "That boy is cray-cray!"

"Yeeeah, I love him to death since he's my buddy n' all, but he's not 100% stable," Nino agreed.

Marinette was about to defend the blond's honor, when she suddenly heard: "Marinette! There you are!" The designer froze up, her eyes craning over to the doorway where Adrien stood with both hands on the frame, grinning brightly. Confidently, he strode up to the her, intent on once again reducing her into a pile of mush. Taking her by the hands, his eyes seemed alight with joy as he opened his mouth to speak.

Which is when Marinette suddenly felt two heavy headphones snap over her ears, blasting music so loud that it cancelled out all other sound.

Adrien balked, his face the very picture of perplexity as he looked up to the culprit. Nino kept his hands planted around the headphones, daring him to argue. Marinette sighed in happy, blissful relief as the pair of them began to quarrel. Nino had really good taste in music, she decided, as she watched Adrien petulantly go to his seat when the class bell rang.

Nino let her have the headphones all day and she made good use of them. Every break they had, every opportunity to speak, she'd pull the headphones up and watch as Adrien grew poutier and poutier as he was summarily cut off. This was perfect! All the benefits of having him close without the humiliating side-effects!

Before she knew it, she managed to get through the entire school day without having heard the cursed words from Adrien once. He gave one valiant try at the very end, but his bodyguard whisked him away to some shoot he had after class.

"Thanks so much, Nino!" she beamed as she handed the headphones back to him. Her ears ached, but it was a small price to pay for getting through the day in one piece. "Do you think I can borrow those tomorrow too?"

Nino frowned at her, he and Alya exchanging a look. "You know this isn't a permanent solution, right?" he asked warily.

"Well, sure. But maybe if I do it long enough, he'll get the idea and back off," Marinette said with a smile.

"Mari, girl, that boy is as dense as a brick!" her bestie cried in exasperation. "You just have to tell him no!"

"Lalala~ can't hear you!" the designer cried, inspired by her new solution, plugging up her ears as she headed home across the street. All evening, she hummed happily to herself in her good mood, finally seeing an end in sight. When she went to bed that night, she put back up all her pictures of Adrien over her computer. She could continue to gaze at her handsome prince all she wanted without getting burned in the process. At least until she built up some kind of immunity to him. Everything was going to turn out alright.

Which was when she heard the knocks.

Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.

Marinette froze, looking upwards to the hatch above her bed. No. No way. There was no way that Adrien was up there. Even so, she felt her body primed on high alert. She stopped breathing, waiting to see if the presence would leave.

"Prrincess? You there?" a familiar voice called.

All at once, Marinette folded over with relief. Oh, it was just Chat Noir. She could deal with that boy. Though she was curious what he wanted so late at night. "I'm here!" she called out, climbing up to the loft and opening up the hatch to her balcony.

As expected, she found Chat Noir kneeling by the hatch, a broad smile spread across his features. "Good evening, Prrincess," he purred, taking her hand to press a kiss to her knuckles. "Paw-don the intrusion, I hope I'm not interrupting anything."

Feeling toyed around with for nearly a month, she was quite happy to turn it around on someone else. Playing the fangirl, Marinette squealed and waved a hand, "Oh Chat Noir! I can't believe I have a hero come to visit me on my balcony!" She giggled as the black cat preened under the attention. "Whatever are you doing here? I'm not in any danger am I?" she gasped, batting anxious baby doll eyes on Chat Noir.

"No, no! Nothing of the sort!" Chat replied quickly, waving his clawed hands to dismiss the idea. "I apawlogize if this comes as a shock. I didn't mean to frighten you. I just had something I needed to tell you."

"Oh? What's that?" Marinette smiled, propping her chin up off the edge of her hatch.

With a broad grin, Chat leaned in and purred, "Je t'aime, Marinette."

At once, Marinette's smile dropped, her eyes going wide. "W-what?" she whispered as a shiver ran up her spine. Unlike with Adrien, she didn't dissolve into a puddle of goo, but her whole body had been trained to have a visceral reaction to the words. She went cold, then very hot. "What did you say?!" she demanded, grabbing a startled Chat by his gold bell. "Who told you to say that?!"

"N-no one! No one!" the cat-boy yowled as she shook him, his eyes wide with shock. Of course, he probably wasn't expecting his swooning fangirl to flip out like this. "I swear! No one put me up to this!"

Her lips curling into a snarl, Marinette let him go, her bluebell eyes blazing. Fist clenched at her side, she threw a finger towards the Seine. "Just- Get out of here, cat!" Confused and alarmed, Chat did as he was bid. With a lunge and a jump, he was far from sight, vaulting across the rooftops of Paris. Panting, Marinette was left alone with her furious thoughts.

The next evening, she was determined to get to the bottom of it.

It was all Ladybug could do not to outright strangle the cat when they met up for patrol. As it was, her smile was rather twitchy when Chat Noir lept onto the rooftop beside her. The cat didn't act any different when he approached with his usual swagger, taking a bow as he came near. "Milady, I hope you're feline fine tonight?" he smiled, taking her hand in his.

Ladybug plucked it away before he could kiss it. "Just fine, kitty," she replied, hopping off the motif she'd been resting on. Hands behind her back, she eyed her kitten suspiciously. "Chat Noir, you love me, don't you?"

"But of course, milady!" Chat Noir cried, as if it was absurd she would imply otherwise. "You're the sun to my moon, the sky to my stars! The pizza to my pie-"

Ladybug pressed a finger to his lips before he could go on. "Oh really?" she said, her tone too light not to be dangerous. "So what's this about you declaring your love to certain bakers' daughters on their balconies?"

All the blood drained from Chat's face. His mouth twitched into a nervous half-smile. "W-wow, milady. Absolutely nothing gets past you, does it?" It didn't exactly sound like a compliment phrased quite like that.

Ladybug narrowed her eyes. "So? What is it, Chat Noir? Do you love me or do you love Marinette?"

"You, of course!" her partner declared quickly. Perhaps too quickly.

"So then why did you tell Marinette otherwise!"

Chat's throat bobbed, not quite sure how to answer. "Ummmm..." he replied weakly, his eyes wide.

That was when Ladybug officially lost her patience. Her partner was a shameless tomcat. She knew this already. "You know what? Never mind," she growled, rubbing her temple as a headache began to throb. "Let's just go on patrol, Chat. You take north and I'll take south. I don't want to see you the rest of the night."

With that, she took off, leaving a speechless cat in her wake.

~o~

The next day, Adrien made a point of studying the tiny initials engraved on top of his desk. There were other thoughts he could be thinking. But they were dangerous and unwelcome thoughts, so he'd much rather just focus on wondering who BP could be. Bridgette Paget? Berenice Poirot? Bodin Pascal? Maybe he could look at old yearbooks to figure it out. That might be fun.

The door opened and he looked up to see his triad of friends enter the room. His heart thumped with a familiar je t'aime, je t'aime when he saw Marinette, compelling him to unburden himself. However, he faltered when he saw the headphones around her ears.

What? Why?!

She couldn't like music that much. That was Nino's thing! However, even as he pouted, he had the sinking feeling that he wasn't going to be able to talk to her all day. Well, he could. She just wouldn't be able to hear it, which negated the entire effort.

Marinette glanced to him, giving him a wide smile and a wave as she took her seat.

Well. Fine. Fine, then. He'd just have to go visit her as Chat Noir again. Even though it did clearly upset his Lady. Apparently, she had some sort of preternatural ability to sense all things romantic.

...Wait, wait, wait. What was he thinking? This wasn't romantic at all! It was just- a thing. Right, an unnameable thing that compelled him to expel those words every once in awhile. An itch that needed scratching. It was for his mental health!

Even so, he was going to have to be careful this time...

That night, he went to her as Chat Noir. Only this time, he didn't knock. Instead, he waited until the lights flickered out and even longer still to make sure that Marinette was asleep. He wasn't sure that saying the words in her sleep would work, but he didn't have much choice at this point. When he deemed it safe, he went to her hatch and used a claw to undo the lock. Then he ever so carefully slipped inside, making sure not to touch the bed quite yet. He didn't want to rock her awake. It took some doing, but he managed to slip down beside her bedside.

Smiling smugly at his smooth skills, he gently leaned over Marinette's sleeping form. Je t'aime, je t'aime, his heart pounded, tightening his throat as he took in her beautiful, peaceful face. Beautiful. Yes, she was. So, so...

...Was that his face?

Chat froze, inches over Marinette as his eyes caught onto the pictures taped all over her wall. All of Adrien Agreste. His eyes widened, a shiver running over his skin as though a cold draft had passed through him. Why... why did she have his face plastered all over her walls? Why would-

That was when the frying pan of Truth struck.

Marinette liked him. Liked Adrien. She hadn't been lying to Nathanaël. She'd lied to him.

Chat reeled back, falling onto his haunches as he scrabbled away from the bed. His heart thundered, an all too familiar heat spreading throughout his entire body. A blush blossomed over the cat's entire face, until even his kitten ears were red and toasting.

He just spent the last month telling a girl who loved him that he loved her!

His face contorted into a silent scream when he realized what he'd done, both paws clasped over his face to keep from making a peep. Suddenly the words were back with a vengeance, thundering so loudly in his mind that he feared that Marinette would hear them.

Je t'aime, Marinette. Je t'aime, Marinette. Je t'aime, Marinette.

Unable to take it, Chat jumped up out of the hatch, using the bed as leverage and letting the door slam shut behind him.

The combination woke Marinette up, who bolted up with a "Whazzat!" She blinked blearily around the empty room, never noticing the unlocked latch on her hatchdoor. "Guh, hate kicking myself awake," she grumbled, curling back into bed and dozing off.