Hi everyone, Icarus here! I'm still alive, I just haven't been on ff much lately. Sorry If I've missed your stories, or kept you in suspense on mine. I slowed down on my writing when life caught up to me, and even more after losing some of my notes for chapter drafts.
Anyhow, this oneshot came from a prompt from a friend, though I admit I can't remember who. Blame the usual suspects- @Epcot97 @CaptainMalcolmReynolds @LyraMaeArcher
Dark
As suddenly as the heroic duo entered the cavernous room, the lights went out. Supreme darkness filled the entire warehouse.
"Oh look. Ladybug and Chat Noir, have fallen into my trap," the tinny voice sneered,"now if you want to live, you'll find the button that turns on the lights… and if you don't want to live, that's fine too. The last light you'll see will be the flash of five thousand kilograms of plastic explosives going off in one hour. Have fun!"
Ladybug gasped, "Chat, we have to stop this akuma. An explosion that large won't just kill us, it'll destroy everything well outside of the building. I can't believe we fell for this 'Saw' trap."
"Saw?" Chat asked curiously."What's that?"
A surprised silence filled the vast open space. "You don't know what the 'Saw' movies are?" His partner said to him in an exasperated tone that suggested she was ready to force him to watch one.
"Chat, we need to get you to see at least the first one. You don't know horror until you've seen a depraved psycho--"
"Um, Ladybug, I just learned that apparently you are more of a horror film fan than I could have ever realized… but shouldn't we be trying to get out?" Chat said, nervous anticipation dripping from his voice.
"Right, well I figured you could find the button and then we could just work on escaping," Ladybug said slapping the back of his head.
"Ouch!"
"Sorry, I thought that was your back," she apologized to the darkness."Anyhow, can't you see in the dark?"
The frustrated sigh to her right told her that she had likely overestimated her partner's skill.
"M'Lady, I can see several times better than the average human, but several times zero visibility is still zero visibility," he admitted.
Instant panic seized the heroine's heart. She could feel herself breathing more rapidly. "We might actually die this time." The thought echoed over and over in her mind until she felt like the darkness would kill her before the blast did. Seconds went by in black silence. "Maybe this is what death feels like. Maybe I'm already dead."
"Chat?" she called, her words almost tearful.
"Right here Ladybug. Ok, calm down. We haven't even been here for more than a few minutes. I'd say this building is probably 100 meters by 200. So if we each take half, we only need to search…"
"Ten thousand, square meters each," she gasped before Chat could finish the math.
She brushed her fingers through the air at chest level until she found a soft arm to grab. Clinging tightly to it, she looked where she imagined her friend's face to be. "Chat, can't you just Cataclysm a hole into the wall?"
She felt his shoulder shrug.
"Probably, but the building looked old. I can't guarantee it wouldn't all come down with my power."
The idea of being buried in ruble sent shivers up Marinette's spine. For the second time in her life, she didn't want to be a hero, she just wanted to be a normal teenager.
"Ok, well Ladybug, let's split up. As long as we can talk we can find each other," Chat said, though his partner didn't release her hold of his arm.
The pair jumped as a eerily mechanical voice echoed through the the building.
"I can't believe that in 55 minutes, I The Houdini Hunter, will have killed Ladybug and Chat Noir. From there, Miraculous extraction should be quite easy, albeit a bit messy. Speaking of easy, you've probably noticed this task isn't. Let me give you a small hint. The button you are looking for is a rubbery half-sphere gameshow type of button. Ok, well, I'll let you get back to your demise. No more interruptions, I promise… or should I say purromise?"
Even in the pitch black, Ladybug was sure Chat's nose was wrinkled. He didn't tend to take others stealing his puns particularly well, though to her surprise he didn't say anything.
"M'Lady," he began,"if we want to maximize our chances of finding the button, we really need to split up."
Reluctantly, the heroine let go of his arm. She heard footsteps move away from her before she wondered something rather important.
"Hey, Chat? How do we know which side each of us is taking?"
"Hmmm," he responded. "I guess I'll go to where my voice is moving and you can go in the opposite direc-- ouch!"
She heard a thud, followed by several crashes.
"Chat? Are you ok? Please be ok," she shouted.
"Fine," he grumbled. "I just ran into a pallet of candy bars or something. A few trays hit me in the head."
Ladybug nodded in understanding, not realizing that it was a futile act, and then followed what she thought was a row of pallets. She felt the first one, retrieving a single item from it. It felt plastic and sloshed as she moved it. She could feel the necked lid of a bottle, and a strange ovular shape. She passed it off as some medicine and continued down the line. Several crates were full of the same stuff.
She continued, finding what were possibly rubik's cubes, skittles, bags of army men, and boxes that sounded like pieces of plastic when shaken. She felt time slip away with each discovery.
Across the way, Chat shouted excitedly.
"Ladybug, I had an idea. Use your lucky charm!"
She nodded, hopeful that she might get something useful.
"Lucky charm!" She cried tossing her yoyo into the air.
A cold metal sound clattered across the floor. The girl leapt to her knees to find the object, glad that it hadn't hit her on the head. She finally found the tool. It was cool to the touch, a small cylinder around 20 centimeters long and about the diameter of a dry erase marker.
She looked around the room, wondering what this could do. Perhaps it could turn on the power if it came in contact with a power box? Or maybe it could complete a circuit if she could find some exposed wire? She swirled around the room waiting for an idea to appear in her mind. Finally, when it didn't, she threw the metal rod in frustration.
"Stupid!" she hissed, as clattered away.
"What's wrong," her partner consoled from across the room.
As she explained the worthless item to her partner he listened fervently.
"Could it have possibly been a flashlight?" He asked softly.
She cursed, her obscenity turning into a cry halfway through. "W-we're going to d-die and it's all my fault."
"Don't worry, M'lady, it's alright," Chat called.
She heard footfalls approach her until something knocked her over. A slick gloved hand slid against her chest.
"Chat, your hand--"
"Ladybug, sorry for knocking you over, but please don't move. I think I found the button!" he exclaimed.
Relief washed over her, and she nearly forgot her partner's accidental touch.
"It's a bit smaller than I expected, but here goes nothing," he said.
Marinette felt his hand press against her chest. Cold realization hit her. Chat had definitely found something he wanted, but it wasn't the button.
"Chat, that's not the--"
"Oh, there is a second one next to the first button, maybe this is the right one," he said, once more exerting a downward force.
"Funny, this one almost feels a tiny bit smaller," he observed. "And they're kind of warm…"
He gasped as Marinette's fist found his stomach. "They may be small, but they're all I've got," she snarled.
Instantly Adrien threw himself from the heroine.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry Ladybug. I swear I didn't mean to--"
"Ok, so I lied, I will be interrupting you again," the tinny voice of the Akuma returned,"but to be fair it's only 60 seconds before you two are blown to bits. Make that 55, 54, 53..."
Chat snarled at the speaker-voice. He had let down Ladybug, and the people all around the warehouse building, he had let down all of Paris. After Hawkmoth had their Miraculouses he would do terrible things. And worst of all, the girl he loved would die thinking he was some kind of pervert.
"Ten, nine, eight…"
He cursed, slamming his fist to the floor. The hand stopped before it met its mark, blocked by some rubbery object. Lights instantly provided a faint illumination in the warehouse.
"So," the Akuma's voice hissed,"you actually found it. Well, I suppose I've lost. You'll find me in the janitor's closet on the basement level of the office building five blocks north of here… Congratulations."
A creaking sound overhead revealed a giant garage door opening, sunlight spilling into the building.
Ladybug looked at her partner, his closed fist still depressing the button. A small beep let her know her time as a heroine was coming close to an expiration.
"Chat are you busy tonight?"
"Uh, no. Why?" he asked, his curiosity peaked.
"You'll see," she grinned as her yoyo sent her hurtling out the giant door.
Several hours later, Chat clung to Ladybug's arm on a Parisian rooftop, a gentle evening breeze blowing against the pair.
"Ahhhhhh," he screamed as gunshots rang from Adrien's cell phone. Of course he'd changed the background so Ladybug wouldn't find any of his personal information. That hadn't stopped her from mentioning she had a friend who owned that same model though.
She let her hand slide against his ribs, gently stroking him to calm him down. As the movie ended in dreadful screams, Chat turned off his phone.
"Wow, how can you watch that kind of thing?!" he asked.
The scarlet clad heroine shrugged. "I don't know Chat, but what I want to know is how you can calmly go through the real thing, yet freak out watching a movie?"
Chat smiled. "Because I knew no matter what you'd have my back."
Ladybug smiled, a deep genuine smile, then twisted it into something devious. "And apparently you'd have my front."
The feline hero felt his face flush, which gave Marinette a chance to smile in mischievous satisfaction.
"Um, I-I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. It won't happen again…" he paused. "Will it?"
His partner looked at him, her lips curved in a warm smile. "Chat, you do know I have feelings for someone else."
His kitty ears drooped ever so slightly in response.
"BUT, it's obvious you and I have chemistry. Let's just say on the off chance we do get together, it'll be a looong time before something like that happens again," she offered.
A wave of relief washed over the hero. "Oh, and one more thing. When I said that they were small, I meant in comparison to gameshow buttons. And small isn't even a bad thing, in fact--"
Ladybug picked up the rambling boy's hand and placed a gentle kiss on it. "Chat I'm going to stop you right there, right before you dig yourself into a hole you can't get out of. I think it's time we say goodnight. After all, it is getting late."
He nodded, and Ladybug walked towards the edge of the building.
"By the way, Chat," she said, turning back to him," I couldn't have asked for a better partner."
With those words she leapt from the roof, a perfect swan dive into the city.
"Yeah, and maybe one day I'll be something more," Adrien whispered, shaking his head and wondering how he was going to sleep without having nightmares of murderers or blissful dreams of a loving partner.