With his clawed thumb and forefinger, Adrien flicked a tiny pebble over the balcony railing, watching with bored bemusement as it sailed to empty street below, clacking softly a few times in succession on the cobblestone before rolling to a stop. He was perched on the black iron banister of an all-too-familiar balcony, a favorite meeting spot of his and Ladybug's, waiting for her to arrive. It was the same balcony where he had once prepared a surprise romantic dinner for his Lady; she had rebuffed his advances then and even now, ten years later, very little had changed between them.

Except for everything.

"Did she say what she wants to talk about?" Plagg asked curiously, flitting about Adrien's masked face. He shrugged at his kwami companion's question.

"She just said that she wanted to meet to talk."

"That's it?"

"That's it."

Plagg huffed. "I hate waiting."

Adrien only pursed his lips, digging his chin deeper into his crossed arms as they rested on his bent knees. He hated waiting, too; with every minute that passed, his heart and mind continued waging their war on his sanity with an endless stream of unsettling thoughts, making him more and more anxious.

"Do you think that she discovered Hawk Moth's true identity?" The black cat kwami tapped a thoughtful claw against his maw. "Or do you think that she changed her mind about being with you?"

"I don't know." Adrien bit his lip; he didn't want to get his hopes up. Especially not when he was still hurting from his split from Marinette. People always said that time heals all heartbreak, but to Adrien it seemed that as time dragged on, the rift in his heart left behind by Marinette only widened, perpetually wounding him further.

His expression must have changed when he thought about Marinette, because Plagg was suddenly directly in front of his nose, placing a comforting paw on its tip to balance himself as he looked into his friend's eyes.

"Do you really think that you did the right thing by letting her go?" he asked quietly.

Adrien narrowed his eyes. "There was no other way."

"You could have tried talking to her about the situation." A single pearly white fang poked out from the side of Plagg's mouth. "Maybe you didn't spend enough time considering your options before you decided to do what you did. I could see how much you loved her. I'd never seen you so happy as you were when you were with her. Not even Ladybug–"

"It's just the way it has to be," Adrien cut in sharply, jerking his head to the side to release the kwami's grip on his nose. "It's been nearly four months. She's probably moved on by now, and so I have to move on as well. There's no point in continuing to talk about it, so leave me alone."

With a solemn nod to indicate that he understood that the conversation was finished, Plagg slowly drifted away from Adrien to find a quiet spot to sit alone.

Adrien sighed in regret. He shouldn't have snapped at his friend, but he couldn't handle any more talk of Marinette. He would never forget her, that was for certain, but that didn't mean he had to torture himself by speaking about how badly he had messed up. He made his decision and he'd have to live with it for the rest of his life. It was his fate.

A gentle whoosh of air and a delicate thud followed by the padding of light footsteps announced Ladybug's arrival behind him; he turned slowly to meet her blue eyes, noticing the way her hair shone silvery in the threads of moonlight that managed to filter through the clouds overhead. Inside of his rib cage, his heart thumped at the sight of her.

"Cat Noir," she greeted as she caught her breath, raising herself to stand up straight. "You came."

"Well, yeah, you asked me to," he retorted, his tone a bit sharper than he intended. His mood had soured considerably since Plagg's mention of Marinette. He couldn't be with the love of his life, and his first love– who may very well be carrying his child inside of her– wanted nothing to do with him.

"I just thought…" Ladybug's voice trailed off. She bit her pouty lower lip, and Adrien noticed for the first time that she looked as anxious as he felt.

"You just what? Thought that I wouldn't show up?" Adrien leapt down from his perch to stand a dozen paces from his spotted partner. "You really think that poorly of me, huh?"

Ladybug shook her head. "I don't think poorly of you at all, Cat."

She sighed. "But after what happened after we battled The Apprehender… in the bedroom… when I stopped us from…"

The lingering phantom sensations of her heated kiss with Cat Noir flashed through her mind like a ghost and she shuddered, bringing her arms up in front of her chest to hold herself.

"I thought you hated me."

Cat Noir swallowed thickly. He knew that his behavior towards his partner had been cold and unwarranted over the past months, although she didn't deserve it; he was battling his own demons and had unfairly taken his frustrations out on his Lady.

"I don't hate you," he sighed. He ran a clawed hand roughshod through his windswept hair. His gaze focused on the ground, too ashamed of himself to look her in the eye. "I'm just going through some things is all. It's been a rough few months."

Ladybug's attention piqued at hearing the pain in his voice, peeking up at him from behind thick, dark lashes. "I'm sorry. I've been so caught up in my own troubles that I never considered that you'd have some of your own. Do you want to talk about it?"

"No. It doesn't matter anymore; nothing I say or do can change what I've done." Adrien set his masqued face in a hardened, placid facade before turning his face up. "What did you want to talk about?"

Ladybug fidgeted a bit, shuffling her weight from one foot to the other as she found the words to say."

"Cat, I think… I know the baby is yours."

Adrien's heart thumped again, loud enough that he was sure that she would hear it. "How do you know for sure?"

"I heard some things." She averted her gaze, rubbing her arms as though she were cold; it made Adrien wish that he had a jacket to offer her. "Other women who got hit by the same spell got pregnant that night."

Then, as an afterthought: "All of them did, actually."

Adrien swallowed, his throat suddenly drier than a desert; he should have been thrilled by the fact, but it only served to muddle his already complex emotions further.

A baby, one that was a little bit of him and a little

but of Ladybug– it was what he had wanted with Marinette. His elation at the news eluded him.

"Okay. I'm the father of your child," Adrien stated with monotonous resignation, suppressing his initial emotions. "So, now what?"

Her muscles tense, Ladybug gave her shoulders a slight lift and dropped them. "I don't know. I thought that, maybe– if you still wanted to, that is– we could give this co-parenting thing a shot. As partners."

A scoff escaped from Adrien before he could stop it.

"You've only decided that you want to be with me now that you know the baby is mine?" It came out sounding more bitter than he intended.

"No, of course not. I mean– it's hard to explain." Ladybug sighed. "I've always cared about you, Cat. But I loved someone else, and I suppose I still do."

She wiped away the involuntary tear that leaked from her eye.

"I didn't want to take advantage of your feelings for me. Especially if I was carrying another man's child. But he doesn't want me any more… if he ever did. So, I suppose that I need to move forward with my life. One way or another."

Ladybug watched Adrien's reaction to her words with glistening eyes as she continued speaking; the sight of her so hurt and broken caused his heart to ache. It reminded him of the way that he had hurt and broken Marinette on the day that he had told her to leave.

His Marinette. His one and only.

"You may not have been my first choice. I am sorry about that, Cat, and any pain that I caused you because of my shortcomings. But I realize now that we could have a family together. I may not love you, but we can still be parents to our child. Together. And who knows? Maybe someday…"

Adrien took a step toward Ladybug, and then another, and another; seeing her so vulnerable made him want to hold her in his arms, and knowing that she carried his heir within her womb made him want to possess her for his own. He couldn't fix Marinette's broken heart, of that he was certain, but perhaps he could heal Ladybug; he could ease her pain, and she could fill the hole in his own heart. The idea of making love to his dark-haired partner, accompanied by lurid imagery, flashed across his mind's eye and a heat began to spread from his groin, warming his body from the bottom and up; he wanted nothing more at that moment than to make Ladybug his.

It would be a conscious decision this time; no witchcraft required.

"Someday what?" he asked her softly.

Ladybug shook her head and looked down at her feet. "I don't know what I'm saying."

Adrien snaked his hands under either of her forearms, grasping her gently, pulling her carefully toward him. He could feel the way that she trembled at his touch and it made him want her more.

"Kiss me, my Lady."

She whipped her face up to look at him, fear evident in her wide blue eyes; she wasn't fearful of him, but rather fearful of the plunge that they were about to take.

With a tantalizing, aching slowness, Adrien dipped his head towards his partner's face. Her lips parted in surprise and he took them tenderly against his own. Her lips were plush and moist and caused electricity to spark within himself like a lightning bolt.

He slid the palms of his hands up Ladybug's back, reveling in her warmth that radiated through the fabric of her suit; his fingertips reached the nape of her neck and tickled the hair there as he deepened the kiss, holding the back of her head for leverage to push his tongue into her mouth, eliciting a moan from the back of her throat. They continued that way for some time, gasping and sighing as they explored one another through their kiss, the initial resistance between them melting away until nothing but mutual need remained.

When it became too much to bear, Adrien broke away first, tipping his head back to see her expression; her cheeks were flushed a glorious shade of scarlet and her eyes were closed, her petal pink lips swollen and moist, still parted from their kiss. Her ample bosom heaved up and down from the effort of her breathing and a thin sheen of perspiration had broken out across her forehead.

This is my chance, Adrien thought. I have to know who the mother of my child is. I have to see her. All of her.

"Ladybug." He reached for her mask, cautiously slipping his fingers beneath its edges. "Let me see you."

Ladybug flinched at his touch; she seemed to consider giving in to him for a moment, allowing him to peel the mask from her face an inch, before her eyes snapped open and she jerked out of his hold. A broken sob shot forth from her constricted throat, the emotions that she had been trying so hard to hold in spilling forth at last.

"I can't. I can't do this." She clapped a hand to her mouth to keep the sobs at bay as tears began to fall with abandon from her glimmering eyes. "I'm in love with someone else. I thought I could try, but I can't. I'm sorry."

Adrien took a step back to give her space, sheepish with regret.

"I'm in love with someone else, too," he said, his voice a sobering rasp in the relative peace of the quiet night. "But I can never be with her."

Ladybug peered up at him, her eyelashes damp. "W-why not?"

"It's complicated."

"I know what you mean." She sniffed. "But if you really love them, you shouldn't give up."

He shook his head. "It's for the best."

"It's not for the best if you still love each other," she murmured. "Don't give up. Fight for her. Fight for your love."

"What about you?" Adrien retorted. "Have you given up?"

Ladybug gazed at him sadly. "It's too late for me. I'm pregnant with someone else's child– your child. And even if I wasn't, he doesn't want me. There's nothing I can do to change that."

Adrien sighed and turned away from her, leaning forward with both hands gripping the iron railing in front of him, feeling like a fool. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry. For all of this."

"It's nobody's fault."

Adrien clenched a clawed fist. "It's Hawk Moth's fault."

A pathetic whimper of a laugh ghosted from between Ladybug's lips as her sobs gradually slowed and her breathing evened out. "You know, I never did de-evilize Witchkraft's akuma. I wonder: if I did, would this child would cease to exist? Would all my problems be solved, and I could be with him again? But then I remember that it wouldn't change a thing. He doesn't want me. He made that very clear."

She seemed lost in her own thoughts, gazing out over the sleeping City of Love as she placed a tender palm over the subtle swell of her abdomen. "Either way, I want this child. I already love him or her so much."

Adrien watched her in awe, his heart simultaneously aching and swelling with… was it love? Could he truly love again? Not only love for his child, but for its mother?

He had loved Ladybug once; he supposed that a part of him always had and always would.

"I want this baby," she stated matter-of-factly. Her voice had retained its normal composure and her tears seemed to have abated for the time being. "And I… I want it with you, Cat Noir. I think I just need time. I hope we can be a real family someday."

"I hope so, too," he murmured; a wetness sprang to his own eyes and left staining trails on his cheeks.

As quickly as it had come, the wistful look that had overtaken Ladybug's features dissipated to something else, something puzzling and unrecognizable. She placed a kiss as fleeting as the flap of a butterfly's wing on her partner's dampened cheek before leaping off of the rooftop and into the night, disappearing from his view, fading until she was no more apart from the darkness than he was.

–

A/N: I hate hate hate this chapter. It's getting a rewrite soon (the other chapters are getting tweaked as well). I'm sorry I sat on it for so long. Life is a bag of dicks.