Minor trigger warning for this chapter, Mari has a panic attack.

Marinette breathes deeply. Today was the day she was going to finish her plan to save Adrien. Sitting down at her desk with Tikki resting on a small doll chair she had next to her computer.

Her goal was simple, yet very complex. She had to find a way to take the Miraculous from Hawkmoth and defeat him. Originally, her plan was to defeat Hawkmoth and send him to jail, but he was a gazillionaire! The chances of him actually staying in jail were low because of his status, so she would need to find some way to work around that. The only thing that made sense was taking away his Miraculous and hiding them all away.

The thought made her sad because if she went through with this, it would mean saying goodbye to Tikki forever.

Rolling her pen in her fingers, Marinette banishes the thought. They will cross that bridge when they get there. Lifting it once more she writes down everything she knows about Hawkmoth and his hideout. She maps what she can remember of the room Adrien is being kept in, what it looked like and how to get into it, etc.

Once she finishes with that, she writes down everything her team can do. Deep down she is still upset with them, but in order for them to win, they had to work together like Ladybug has no idea what's happening in Marinette's life.

If she was confident enough in her own abilities, she could sneak in and steal the Miraculous without alerting Hawkmoth, but she had never seen his brooch on him. Only when he's using it. So, their only course of action was to attack the next time an Akuma was created. Based on past experience and what she knows of her own powers, Hawkmoth would need to stay in his transformation while the Akuma was active.

Silently, she begs to the miraculous that the next Akuma won't attack anyone specifically and just be a town destroyer, as bad as that is. Those were harder to fight because they had to protect everything instead of a single person, but if this plan worked it wouldn't matter.

"Marinette?"

Swiveling in her chair, said teen glances at her covered trap door, hoping her mom didn't try to open it, "Yeah?"

"Just checking up on you dear! Do you need anything while I'm up here?"

She sighs in relief, "No! I'm good, thank you mom!"

"Alright, come and get us if you need something! I'm going to lock the front door today!"

"Ok, thank you!"

Turning back to her work, she contemplated moving the heavy boxes she stacked on the door to keep it closed. After the scare with Alya a while ago, she didn't want anyone barging in while she was writing up her plans. Shrugging it off, she goes back to her plans.

Rena was getting better at her illusions. Since it largely relied on her imagination, she had been reading fantasy novels and watching action cartoons to help give her ideas. Carapace has recently been focusing on his shield applications, watching and reading with Rena to help give him ideas while also learning to focus better, since his power relies on that. Bee, surprisingly enough, had taken up a personal martial arts trainer. She wasn't very good but her Miraculous power relied on close combat and a very short handed weapon. No one knew about it. Not-Chat was a different case all together. He wasn't as agile as Chat and he didn't have a lot of ideas. His distractions only worked because the Akuma's were usually after his Miraculous and he only didn't get caught because he was a good runner. Something about swimming lessons helping.

Marinette heaves a heavy sigh as she thinks. Master Fu had only been sort of helpful because he either spoke in riddles or didn't tell her anything at all. Plus, their last conversation had done nothing but give her anxiety.

She recalls sitting at his small floor table, his face intense as he started speaking with her, "Marinette," he was pouring her a cup of tea while they sat, "I have something I need to tell you, but I need you to remain calm."

She had nodded and started drinking.

"Soon, when I finally meet this Carapace. I will be giving over my duties as Miraculous guardian to him."

She choked a little bit he continued to speak.

"I will also be leaving the decision of what happens to the Miraculous to its rightful owner."

She finally cleared her throat enough to wheeze out a, "Who?"

"You."

The cup dropped from her hands, luckily it only landed on the table, spilling its contents over the wood.

"WHAT?!"

Tikki had floated into view, "Marinette, as Ladybug, the box technically belongs to you. So all of the Miraculous inside are yours. The guardian is just supposed to watch and protect the box while you can't."

Said girl flailed her arms around, "Wow wow wow, wait! I can't be in charge of the Miraculous! I'm barely able to keep Tikki safe!"

He nodded, "That is why there is a protector."

The rest of the conversation eludes her, that information had been very distracting and she wasn't sure she could handle thinking about it!

Back in the present once more, Tikki floats up from the chair she was sitting in, "Marinette? Are you ok?"

Glancing at the red Kwami she frowns, "Yeah, just distracted."

"Do you need any help?"

A shake, "No. I just need to focus."

"Alright." Tikki sits back in her spot.

Looking to her paper once more, she thinks up a few different plans and how they could go wrong. By the time her alarm goes off to remind her about dinner, she has at least four different plans and lists of their pros/cons.

"Let's go get something to eat."

Tikki eagerly flies into her bag, obvious hunger showing in her excitement. It takes a few minutes but eventually, she gets all the boxes moved and is in the kitchen.

Marinette looks around to check for her parents, "Mom, dad?"

When it's quiet, she opens her bag, "Looks like their still in the bakery. You can come out."

The Kwami slips out of her bag and flies over to the plate of sugary desserts on the counter, left overs or defects from earlier in the day.

The bluenette is about to open the fridge when a knock on the door catches her attention. Walking over to it, she leaves Tikki to disappear on her own before opening it.

"Hello?"

To say her spirits dropped would be an understatement, but it was greatly overshadowed by the uncomfortable feeling growing in her gut at what she was seeing. Just outside her own front door was Lila Rossi, a bag of sweets in one hand, a phone in the other, while being escorted by her Father.

"Oh hi Marinette! It's so good to see you! I was so worried you were mad at me when you didn't even stop to say hi to your bestest friend in the world."

Marinette doesn't think. Her mind a blank slate as she slams the door shut in the other girls face, and subsequently her fathers, while locking it. Then on a whim, she grabs the closest and heaviest thing she can carry, the armchair, and barricades the door.

Only when she is finished does she hear the shouting and knocking on the front door.

Suddenly no longer hungry, Marinette runs up to her room and slams the trap door closed, moving all of the boxes on it as well before climbing up to sit on her bed, crawling into the corner and covering her head with her arms.

She can't hear the banging and shouting from here, the distance was too far and with her windows closed, they couldn't yell up from outside either. The perfectly isolated little corner she needed.

She feels Tikki slide into a spot near her neck and muzzle her, the Kwami's form of comfort doing wonders for her frayed nerves. Her mind slowly gathering together once more, and with it the dawning horror.

"I just locked my parents out of their own house."

Tikki cuddles closer, "Lila was at your door."

"I barricaded the door."

A gentle touch to her cheek, "You panicked and were doing your best to protect your home."

"My parents are going to kill me."

A small shift, "Your parents would understand if you told them what was happening at school."

"They haven't before."

"You haven't tried."

"I'm going to be arrested."

"You didn't do anything to warrant an arrest."

When nothing else leaves her mouth, the Kwami forced her to look up, "Marinette. It's ok, I'm positive if you just talk to your parents about what just happened, it will be fine. Lila will leave when she figures out she can't get to you or your parents send her home to try and get in. Just take a minute to calm down, then we can go down stairs and try again."

Marinette nods, "Ok. Yeah. Good idea."

A ringing interrupts them and without much thought, Marinette answers is, "Hello?"

A deep but silky voice speaks on the other end, "Ms. Dupain-Cheng?"

"Yeah, that's me. Who is this?"

"No one you need to worry about." And then the call ends.

It's only Tikki's look of horror that has her looking down at the phone in her hand.

The slick black surface of the flip phone and lack of design confuse her for a moment before she drops it like it burned her. That was her emergency contact phone that only Adrien used. The one they used for their super hero work.

The one she just gave away her identity on.