A/N: Wow, thanks a lot for reading, guys. I'm really grateful :)
Anyway, new chapter up. There's more to this, actually, but it seemed to be getting a bit too long (plus I still have to review a few of the details) so with luck, I should be able to post that one tomorrow or the day after. That one should make up for the lack of Adrienette here.
As always, he stands to greet her when she flies in from the rooftops, soft eyes tracking her form as she lands on her feet, reels in her yoyo.
"Milady," he says, bowing at the waist like a lord in a queen's court.
Frowning, she bats him on the arm as she passes. "I told you, stop doing that."
He unfolds to his full height, all six feet something of solid, toned muscle. Chat Noir had always been slender in adolescence, but a few years is enough to give form to the muscle, to sharpen the lines, sand the rough edges. There's a vast difference in height between them now; it's to her consternation that she only reaches his chin, that he all too easily tucks her into his arms when he has to hoist her out of danger.
"I wouldn't be your Chat Noir if I did," he playfully retorts, twining his fingers behind his head, coming to stand at her side as she gazes towards the rooftops, the civilian life they left behind when their duties bade them to.
"You'll always be Chat Noir."
"I am Chat Noir. I always will be Chat Noir." He grins from the corner of his lips. "But I wouldn't be your Chat Noir. I wouldn't be the partner standing next to you right now, watching over Paris with you."
It's a good thing, she decides, that the mask provides considerable coverage of her face.
She laughs it off, tries to draw into the Ladybug facade, her familiar confidence. "The one with the terrible puns, you mean?"
"Particularly the one with the terrible puns."
She sighs, shakes her head. "What will I do with you, Chat?"
"As you always do, Ladybug. Roll your eyes and crush my heart with a single word." He mimes twisting his fingers over his chest where his heart lies, an expression of agony set upon his handsome features.
It takes considerable effort to keep her expression still, to force the amusement into her eyes when all she feels is guilt, even pain. Chat making light of her rejection to his advances is not meant to be cruel. Quite the contrary, it is a quip to the early stages of their partnership, during which Chat had doled pickup line after pickup line, hoping to cajole a favourable response out of her. Her heart lost to Adrien, she had shut him off, pushed him away as gently and as firmly as she could. Time and time again, he tried; time and time again, she had refused, groaned at his face, took not to heart the things he told her, the eyes that laid bare his soul.
Nowadays, he still flirts, but his lines had lost their juvenile desperation. It has become a thing of regularity between them, something of a bedrock to their relationship: Chat must flirt with his Ladybug, take her hand in battle. Take her place when she stands in the path of danger. Wait in faith as she struggles to concoct a plan, a ploy to pull him out of harm's way.
But beyond that unsaid accord, she wonders if this Chat (older, wiser) has had a change of heart. Had decided his pursuance of her nothing but a childish whim, and found a girl more deserving of his affections.
Her heart plummets.
"Ladybug, watch out!"
Startled, she looks down, finds some sort of vent rushing to meet her, a gaping maw of steel. Quickly, she jerks her arm, flings out her yoyo. It winds around a metal antenna and she pulls, physically drags herself up into the air, landing on the next rooftop on shaky feet.
Silent as a feline, Chat jumps down, straightens, picks his way through snakes of pipes and air vents towards her. Solemnly, he says, "Are you okay?"
She's still a little breathless, checking herself for unseen nicks out of sheer habit. "Yeah, I think so."
"That's not what I meant."
His gentleness makes her look up towards him, find the intelligent emerald eyes behind the black mask that always looked at her and saw too much.
"Are you okay?" he repeats, searching her face with unnerving scrutiny. "You seem out of it. Distracted."
"I'm fine," she insists, gearing her yoyo for another throw.
"We can talk about it," he says quietly, just before she could hurl it into the shadowy corners of the night.
Slowly, she turns to look at him.
He smiles. It's nothing like those of his usual habit; nothing like the half-smirks and self-assured grins. It's just a simple smile that is soft around the edges. Caring for her. Understanding.
The ache blooms a little more intensely in her chest.
"Of course, you don't have to divulge the details." You don't have to tell me what you don't want me to know. "But I can always listen. I can help you, if you'd let me."
Even though she knows he has never quite agreed with her decision to keep their identities a secret, it's been this long and he respects her still.
She says, through a smile that hid the pricks of her tears, "Chat, you've always helped me. You've helped me so much, that I don't know how I can thank you. But I'm fine, so you don't have to worry."
They are doubtful, the emerald eyes against a backdrop of a starry night. There is disappointment, too, in their depths, but he nods, smiles anyway, because she imagines that he's come to accept her stubbornness, learnt to let it slide, to not push.
"As you wish, my Lady."
Forcing back every smidge of irrelevant emotion into the box from whence they came, she straightens her shoulders, focuses her sights onto the resplendence of Paris: its Tower in the far distance, edges soft in the light; its winding streets she'd leapt over in nights and scampered across in days.
"Let's get back to business, shall we?"
Chat Noir nods. His baton extends in his grip with an emphatic snap, his dark gloves curling over the curved, silver metal, lethal. She leaps first and he follows, trailing her like a shadow.
Like a cat.
"Marinette, you look horrible. Don't tell me it's another sleepless night."
Weary, she only manages a smile. Alya studies her, shakes her head in disapproval. As far as she's concerned, Marinette had many late nights; studying algebra, perfecting a her self-titled seasonal line she hopes to one day brandish in her resume. She's oblivious to the wild car chases in the dead AMs, to the tracking of villains across the wild tumbledown playground of Paris' expanse, to the hours following the conclusion of her nightly escapades in which there are aching muscles to tend to, bruises to hide.
"You should really take a break. I'm starting to really pity you."
Together, they walk up the steps, arms hooked together. She leans into Alya's weight, content with her companionship. Alya isn't Chat; she doesn't dangle down helicopters with her or swoop to her aid from impossible heights, but Alya is dependable in a way Chat, restricted by the constraints of his mask, can't be. She can be the rock to which Marinette clings, the music to which she drifts off from troubling thoughts.
She can make her forget about Chat, if only for a while.
She feels the brush of Alya's hair against her cheek as the girl leans into her, grinning at something in the distance. "And there's your Romeo. Late as always."
Laughing, she shakes her head. "I swear, it's been two years and there has never been a week in which the two of you are on time for three days straight. It makes me wonder what his excuse is."
"Photoshoots, maybe." Marinette smiles sleepily, watching him from afar.
Hands on his knees, panting up a storm, Adrien is as immaculately handsome as ever. Looking up, he grins at Nino's quip, slings an arm around his best friend's shoulder as he walks.
"Maybe?" Alya raises a finely plucked brow. "I never thought you'd be unsure about anything when it comes to Adrien's schedule."
Laughing, Marinette tugs at the tips of her orange curls. "I pulled down the 'Adrien Schedule' a year ago, don't you remember?"
"And I thank God everyday that you finally saw reason. I love you Marinette, but pinning that boy's personal agenda to the roof of your bedroom to be pulled down and perused at your leisure is a tad bit creepy, if I were to be honest."
"I was fifteen," she argues, pouting. Ahead, she sees the flick of ChloƩ's blonde ponytail, the stiff black lines of Alix's cap. "We're allowed to be stupid when we're fifteen. Remember how you used to chase Ladybug across the city?"
"Hey, what're you trying to say about me?" Alya jokes, pinching her on the arm. "And I still do, thank you very much. Am still her number one fan."
To this, Marinette smiles. Sweet Alya, always loyal to her with or without the mask.
"At least you now don't explicitly get yourself into dangerous situations just to get a good shot of Ladybug and Chat Noir in action. I'm sure it's a relief to the both of them, not having to whisk you out of danger all of the time."
She throws back her head in a laugh as Alya makes a swipe at her face. She make for a run, slipping between crowds of students. Ducking through the door, she dances into class, having long left Alya behind. Through the crack, playful insults filter in from the hallway.
She's still laughing when she catches sight of Adrien, stylus in hand and tablet at ready, leaning against an empty palm, smiling as he watches her.
As they lock gazes, the playful, amused smile spreads into one of warmth and welcome.
"Good morning, Marinette," he says softly.
"Uh, good morning to you too," she says, an octave higher than the tone she usually speaks in.
Alya bursts in then, lays eyes on the scene, and in that exact moment decides overlook her revenge in the expense of grinning at them both, stopping only when Marinette snatches her arm and drags her up to their seat.
"Looks like you and your Romeo finally had a moment."
"Alya, he's sitting right below us. Shush!"
