Marinette has just about had it.
Cloe smirks haughtily in her direction from across the room, and nudges Sabrina next to her with her elbow to gain her attention. The class who had just been bursting with energy and volume is abnormally silent as the dark-haired girl silently makes her way towards the middle aisle. Marinette's face is bright red, her arms covering what she could of the giant wet stain on the front of her shirt, but there was no hiding it. Everyone could see the lining of her bra from the outside of her coffee-stained shirt, which had been hurriedly dabbed at with a few cafeteria napkins to no avail.
Marinette looks to Alya as she approaches her seat, and her best friend gives her an apologetic glance, then a small smile. Marinette attempts to smile back, if only everyone's eyes hadn't been glued to her once she walked in.
"Look what the cat dragged in."
Marinette turns an angry eye towards the front of the room, where Cloe has stood from her seat, arms crossed and hip popped. The pig-tailed girl glares, then turns away and faces Alya with eyes closed.
"I've had enough crap, Cloe. Back off." She barely mumbles loud enough for the blonde girl to hear, plopping down into her seat. It wasn't even worth calling her out for being the culprit behind this entire mess- Marinette had learned by now that Cloe always twists things to go her way, and it would only lead to more trouble than this is all worth. She could probably get permission to call home for a spare change of clothes, or wear her gym clothes for the last two hours.
"What, cat got your tongue? Finally too chicken to stand up to me?"
"She said back off, Cloe. This has nothing to do with you- or any of you." Alya speaks up, sending a pointed look at Cloe, then her gaze spreads to the entire classroom. "Let Marinette deal with it, it's not like she wanted coffee spilled on her at lunch."
"Are you sure she didn't spill it on herself?" Cloe stubbornly continues, looking down at her nails for inspection. "Have you seen the girl? She literally trips over nothing- it's not hard to believe that the klutz would fumble with a cup of coffee."
Sabrina feigns to fumble with an imaginary cup in her hands, then makes a stupid surprised facial expression as she pretends she had spilled it on herself, and the two snicker.
"Cloe-" A male voice begins, but gets cut off.
"That is uncalled for! You were the one that spilled the cup on her on purpose and you know it!" Alya gets fired up, and raises from her seat, eyes aflame with rage.
"What are you gonna do about it? You have no proof that it was me, and I don't think my daddy would-"
"That's enough."
The two stop bickering at the quiet, barely audible voice. They turn around to find Marinette risen out of her seat, facing down towards the desk with both of her hands on the surface.
Adrien turns to face her with concerned eyes."Marinette, I-"
"I said that's enough!" Marinette lifts her head, and glares over at Cloe. "I've had enough. I'm done. With all of you!" Her bluebell eyes sweep from one end of the room to the other, and Marinette finds her eyes accidentally lock with Adrien's, and she rips them away. Here goes the end of my social life. The dark-haired girl can't help but think to herself.
"Can all anyone ever do is watch? You all know that what Cloe is doing is wrong! Yet you all stand here, every single time, and watch as people are forced to stand up for themselves on their own. We're classmates! And as much as I'd love if Cloe were to share the same sentiment, she doesn't. So we just watch as others get hurt, and simply wait for an akuma attack? I'm sick and tired of it!"
There's a moment of thick, awkward silence that follows her small rant, until there's a small, quiet whimper.
"I-I'm going home."
No one says a thing, not even Cloe, as Marinette gathers her bag from beneath the desk, and briskly walks out the door she had entered just moments ago. For a few seconds, her classmates are frozen in their spots in awe. Then, as if he had just collected his thoughts, Adrien springs from his desk and sprints out the classroom door, assumingly to follow her. Cloe attempts to speak up to stop him, but Alya holds a hand to cover her mouth before she can do so.
And thus begins the chase.
Marinette, noting the loud footsteps behind her, turns in fear to find Adrien gaining on her.
"Marinette, wait!"
The girl finds her chest lurching for a multitude of emotions, and her gut tells her to get away as fast as possible. Following her instinct, Marinette leaps over the railing to the stairs below without thinking, and begins sprinting towards the front doors. Adrien grits his teeth angrily at himself, and follows suit over the railing.
Marinette turns her head to gauge how far he is, and it's not very far at all. Adrien reaches out to grab hold of her elbow, but she easily slips out of his hand and dukes around the corner. Knowing full well she wouldn't be able to outrun him for much longer, as she runs, Marinette looks for an alley or bush she could jump into fast enough to transform into Ladybug and get away.
"Marinette!" A pleading voice calls from her left. "Why are you running?!"
Marinette turns her head- to find Adrien's head peeking out the back window of his car, Gorilla and Stephanie in the front keeping an eye on the girl. Suddenly, a narrow alleyway catches her eye, and she quickly ducks into it, whispering "Tikki, transform moi."
The car squeals to a stop, as Adrien opens the door and runs out without thinking of how fast they were going, and follows into the alleyway he swore he saw her go into. The blonde boy can feel his heart sag when he finds no pig-tails to be found. In a fit of persistance, Adrien opens the side of his shirt to let his kwami out, and screams "Plagg, transform moi!"
Not that transforming made anything easier. As Chat Noir ascends into the sky ontop of his pole, no one that even resembled Marinette came into sight. Suddenly a flash of red crosses his eye, as if a god sent a hero to help him in his time of need. Smiling to himself for no particular reason, Chat heads off among the rooftops after his lovely Ladybug.
Ladybug felt her pounding heart rate begin to slow as she swung away from that alleyway. If she had waited even a second or two, Adrien would have caught her- and worse, he would have found out Ladybug's true identity. There was no deciding which outcome would have been worse- if Adrien found out the identity of Ladybug, Marinette couldn't possibly stand going back to school.
"My Lady!"
Ladybug jolts out of her thoughts at the sudden shout near her, and loses her balance on her yoyo, landing on a building nearby and rolling on her side to a slow stop. Groaning from the sharp pain up her side, Ladybug looks up only to find a familiar cat smirking down at her.
"Wasn't the most graceful of landings, but beautiful all the same, LB."
Ladybug merely glares up at him for a few moments, then jumps up onto her feet, pointedly ignoring the hand Chat holds out for her to take. Brushing off the dust and reclaiming the string to her yo-yo, she spares him a glance. "Seems a bit early for you to be out, Chaton. What's the special occasion?"
"I could say the same to you, my Lady." Chat smiles, extending his pipe in order to lean on it, his hands tucked under his chin holding onto the metal pole as he admired his Ladybug. "You, me, both here are the same place? It must be destiny."
"More like a coincidence." Ladybug crosses her arms, and simply looks down at her partner. "If you don't mind, I'm going to head home. We don't patrol until around four, and I'd like to change clothes."
"Hold on, Lovebug." Chaton reaches out and grabs hold of his partner's elbow just as she was about to throw her yoyo. "I need your help with something first. Would you mind?"
Ladybug sighs, and turns back towards him. "What is it? This had better be something serious and not another one of your-"
"It's a-a friend of mine, Adrien. I happened to see him in this alleyway a few blocks away, and I asked him what happened. There's this girl in his class, Marinette, who ran off from school. He said that she told him she was going home, but disappeared halfway there. Please, you've got to help me- I mean him find her. I sent Adrien to check the streets with his driver, but I've got no other options."
Ladybug feels herself tense up as soon as he speaks her real name. She can't help but internally marvel at the fact that Adrien Agreste was willing to go to such dramatic lengths to find her. But she manages to cough into her fist to hide her surprise, and digs in her brain for a way out of this.
"Marinette? Dark hair, pigtails, pink pants and black blazer?"
Chaton beams. "That's the one. F-From what Adrien told me. Have you seen her anywhere recently?"
"Y-Yeah..." Ladybug reaches behind her neck to scratch the back of her head in nervousness. "Totally. Just before I came around here, I saw her enter her home. I-She's fine."
Chat can't help but blink in confusion until the entirely of what Ladybug had just stated settled in his brain. Despite the wack coincidence, his smile brightens at the thought that even if it wasn't on purpose, she was watching out for Mari.
"Well then..." Chat then scratches the back of his head, feeling awkward for panicking over something that seemed so small in retrospect. He should have gone to her house before bothering LB. "Sorry for freaking out, then. I-I guess I'll go let Adrien know."
However, he couldn't help but get back in character, and reach an arm around Ladybug's shoulder and whispering in her ear: "Then we can spend some time together before patroling."
The blonde is cut off by a blaring blinking sound, and LB smirks at the perfect timing, sliding from underneath his arm and pointing at her miraculous fastened in her ear. "Sorry to burst your bubble kitty, but I've got to go. Wouldn't want to change back and embarrass myself." She manages a quick wave as she jogs to the edge of the building, throwing and fastening her yoyo on a streetlight. "See you later, Chaton!" And suddenly a blur of red whizzes by, and his Lovebug has disappeared.
Chat, left waving as he gazes after his idol, unable to feel completely lonely when she leaves as she leaves an impression of pure amazement, integrity and beauty in her wake. Somewhat content, Chat's mind wanders back to his original dilema. Sure, Marinette most likely made it home safetly after ditching him in that alley. It wasn't hard to believe she could have climed that rockwall in record time after seeing the things she could do in gym class. But there's no way that she's fine.
Determined, Chaton drops down into another abandoned alley behind a dumpster, and instructs his kwami to decloak him. Adrien heads out, turning right towards the Dupain-Cheng bakery.
A/N Hello there! I know, this is much different from the stuff I usually write, and I can feel some of my follower's disappointment for watching a show for smalls. But what can I say? I watch for the ship, that's pretty much it. I'm just waiting for a reveal, that's all.
Anyway, let's hope I actually finish this rather than abandoning it because I totally have never done that before.
Until next time, my filthy human toilets~!
Mina