Forty-Six: Cold Kitty

Author's Note: As spring dawns over Paris, Chat is suddenly reminded of Marinette's second encounter with adult Bunnix and decides to press for more answers.

"No changes at all," Bunnix said as she leaned on her umbrella. "The timeline is as it should be. At least," she added with a smile, "for the time being."

I rolled my feline eyes from where I was perched on a railing. "Puns are more my department, Bunny."

"That's Bunnix to you, Chat," the rabbit-themed holder laughed.

"Potato, Po-tah-to," I smiled.

Ladybug pressed a gloved hand to her face, and I laughed again. The three of us were atop one of the older rows of townhomes in the city at a meeting called by Ladybug. It was mid-April and we still had not found so much as a trace of the Miracle Box we had been searching for since New Year's Day. We were starting to throw up every Hail Mary in the book, including asking Bunnix to re-check the timeline. There was an outside chance Manon was an artifact of a timeline adjustment, but our teammate had just confirmed that wasn't the case.

"Thanks for researching just the same," Ladybug sighed. "I guess at this point, we'll just have to wait for Hawmoth's next move."

"It might give us something," I nodded. "Though I am starting to wonder if it truly exists."

"I won't discount that possibility," Ladybug sighed again. "But it does seem unlikely given how many Miraculous we recovered from her."

"I know," I said, tail twitching. "A cat can hope."

"I've got to hop," Bunnix interjected. "Unless you need something else from me?"

"No, not at all. Thanks," Ladybug smiled tiredly. The search and lack of evidence had been dragging her down, especially the last month or so as the treasure hunt had taken on the feeling of fruitlessness.

"See you around, then," Bunnix waved as she flipped over the edge of the roof and sailed away using her umbrella.

I watched her go, and thought aloud: "She's not far from the age when we saw her the first time, is she?"

"No," Ladybug said. "Within a year or two I would think."

I looked at my partner. "Do you think we are close to the moment, then?" I asked.

"Which one?" she replied a bit tiredly.

I slid off the railing and pulled her to me. "When Bunnix visited us all those years ago, we found out there was another Hawkmoth. That by definition means we must have defeated the current one, right?"

Ladybug looked at me. "I hadn't thought about that, but yeah, you're right. Maybe this Miraculous Box we're hunting for plays a larger role than we realized."

"We'll find it," I said as I kissed her hair. "Don't worry."

"I know," she replied. "Come one, let's get home."

"Uh," I said. "Can I ask you something first?"

Ladybug looked up at me. "Chat, it's been a really long day. Get me a glass of wine and then ask me questions."

"Fine. I'll race you to the apartment," I laughed as I vaulted into the air. "Last one home has to make dinner!"

"You're on!" she cried as she tossed her yo-yo to the sky and zip lined away from me.

In the end, it wasn't really a fair fight; though we were evenly matched, I was hung up on the rooftop opposite my balcony entrance, waiting for the neighbors in the apartment below us to go inside. Ladybug apparently had no such trouble, as a gloating Marinette informed me when I rolled out into the kitchen from my bedroom.

"Fortunately," I said as I narrowed my masked eyes at my girlfriend who was lounging at the breakfast bar, the bottle of red already open and decanted into two glasses, "I accounted for just such a possibility."

"Did you, now?" she asked, eyes twinkling.

"Yes," I said as I leapt over her and the wine and into the kitchen proper, landing in front of the fridge. Opening the freezer, I pulled out a turkey meatloaf from a few weeks earlier and went about getting it ready to go into the oven. Once that was warming up slowly, I pulled the bag of fresh fingerling potatoes from the pantry and began to scrub them under the faucet of the sink, using my claws to peel them. "Mashed, scalloped or whipped?" I asked.

"Mashed."

"Butter?"

"Absolutely," she said as she sipped again. "Did you wash those paws of yours before peeling the potatoes?"

"Yes," I laughed. "I think I have green beans or peas," I continued as I arranged the spuds in a pot and topped them with water for boiling, then placed them on the stove.

"Beans."

"Okay," I said as I went back to the fridge and pulled out the fresh green beans I'd picked up at the farmers market earlier in the week.

Draining the last of her glass, Marinette poured another and then looked to me. "What did you want to ask me?" she queried as she took another sip.

I paused, beans in one paw. "Why did Bunnix visit you a second time? And why don't I remember anything about it?"

The glass slipped out of her hand and smashed on the granite counter, sending waves of wine and shards of glass everywhere. I dropped the beans into the sink and instantly was by her side, holding her; to my surprise, she was shaking violently. "Mari?" I asked quietly. "What is it?"

"I've tried for years to put that whole incident out of my mind," Marinette replied softly.

Carefully, I carried her over to our couch, easily hopping over in a single leap to gently land on my back. Holding her close to me, I held my head to hers, purring gently. "Take a deep breath," I said, shocked to see tears in her eyes. "We'll just sit here like this for a bit."

Shaking, and then sobbing, Marinette curled up against me, and gripped me like there was no tomorrow. I held her against me lightly, more curious than ever as to what had transpired during this mythical other visit from Bunnix I couldn't recall having taken place. It was fortunate the meatloaf was on a really low temperature and I'd not set the pot of potatoes to boil, for it took more than an hour for the shaking to stop.

"Princess?" I asked softly as I nuzzled her head affectionately. "How are you feeling?"

Marinette took a shaky breath. "Sad. Angry. Depressed." She turned her head toward me. "And grateful for every moment we have together."

My masked eyes widened. "Marinette," I said carefully. "That's the kind of thing you say when time is growing short." I shifted slightly so I could see her whole face. "If there's something I should know—"

Marinette smiled slightly as she pressed a finger to my lips. "I'm fine, and you're fine," she said softly. "And as far as I know, nothing is about to fall out of the sky to change that, short of Hawkmoth making an unexpected run at us."

"Which would be just like him." I narrowed my masked eyes at her. "Your shivering and, dare I say delicately, rather emotional reaction to the name of our Miraculous team member would argue otherwise."

Her deep blue eyes were still moist from the crying, but I could feel she was over the worst of the storm. Leaning her head against my chest again, she pressed a hand to my heart. "Such a reassuring feeling," she said. "Feeling it pulse, just below your costume."

"It only beats for you," I reminded her.

"I know," she laughed. "Bunnix…" she started again. "She did visit a second time that same year we saw her during the TimeTagger akuma."

My ears went up. "Why don't I remember that?" I asked, before a cold shiver run through my body. "Oh," I said very, very softly. "It was about me, wasn't it? That's why you said what you said just now."

"You are one perceptive kitty," she chuckled again. "Yeah, it was about you but more about me. I made a colossal mistake and nearly ended the world."

I hugged her closer. "That's not even remotely possible," I reassured her. "Besides, unless this is some sort of fantastic afterlife, we appear to very much be in the here-and-now."

"I fixed it in the end," she replied. "Which is why Bunnix appeared; she discovered I went off script, apparently."

"All right, I'll scratch that post. What did you do?"

She pushed herself off of me and stood, then went to the floor-to-ceiling windows facing the Eiffel Tower. At that hour, dusk had descended, and the lights had begun to appear, illuminating the metallic superstructure. Normally, I would move to be by her side, but somehow, it felt like the right move was to stay lounging on the couch, catlike.

"You remember the gift your fan club gave you?"

That made me laugh. "Which one? I would remind you I still have fan clubs, numbering in the hundreds."

Still facing away, she answered. "The Brazilian one."

A mental image of a hat that matched the t-shirt Father had insisted I wear nearly every day of my school career popped into my fur brain. "Actually, I do remember that club. And that hat." I paused. "How could I forget? You delivered it purrsonally."

Marinette slumped slightly. "It was actually from me."

My ears and masked eyebrows went up, and I nodded slightly. "You know, I wondered about that. I mean, regardless of what you had told me that day, I assumed it was Ladybug that had given it to me, not having a clue who was under that cute mask of yours. I have to admit, it set my heart aflame all over again."

Mari looked over her shoulder. "I know. You were a terrible pest for weeks afterward, but I never connected why Chat was suddenly so much more over the top than usual."

I shrugged. "Secret identities suck. Just saying."

She turned back to the window, and hugged herself. "I don't exactly know how, but the first time I gave you the gift, it set into motion a chain of events that landed me in some sort of post-apocalyptic version of Paris." Staring at her reflection for a bit, she continued. "The Chat I met there had been… damaged. But he also knew who I was, under the mask."

"Was I…?" I started, not quite willing to ask the next question. Visions of me as anything other than the Chat Noir I had always been turned my stomach. "Did I come after you?" I finally asked, before adding in a slight burst of inspiration. "Was I akumatized?"

"Yes to both," she said softly. "You became Chat Blanc, victim of a horrific choice Hawkmoth had to have forced upon you." She turned halfway toward me again. "I don't know all of it, and Bunnix was unwilling to divulge anything. Near as I can determine, though, that version of you somehow managed to resist whatever it was Hawkmoth wanted you to do. Unfortunately… the price you paid was destroying the entire planet and killing everyone upon it."

My heart was thumping in my chest. "Everyone…?" I asked so quietly, Marinette had to step closer.

"Yes," she said as she slipped back into my embrace. "Paris was flooded, and in the process of fighting Chat Blanc, I tried to get away from him by diving from what was left of the Eiffel Tower and into the water below. Meters below the surface, I came across Ladybug standing next to Hawkmoth. Both of us were quite, quite dead."

I swallowed.

"It wasn't easy, but I managed to find the akuma and get you back, and then Bunnix returned me to my time. My Lucky Charm was an eraser," she smiled. "So you might be able to guess the rest."

"The smudge on the gift," I rasped.

"Exactly. That was enough to make sure the timeline reset." She settled against me. "I came away from that experience assuming there was no way we would ever be able to know our true identities, for I was certain that somehow, Hawkmoth had used that against you." Marinette looked up at me. "The Chat I met in that now non-existent future was desperately in love with me. And despite everything, I knew it was a deep, true love. I have no idea how long that Chat and the other version of me had been together, but my sense of it was long enough that they had a bond Hawkmoth thought he could leverage."

"But you let me visit you!" I cried. "Even knowing what had happened, you encouraged me to visit the Bakery. I fell in love with you anyway."

She smiled. "It occurred to me that I'd been looking at it wrong. Love wasn't something that could be weaponized. Love was protection. A defense against everything Hawkmoth stands for." Snuggling into me, she said even more softly. "I wasn't sure if I felt the same about you, Chat; certainly not in the beginning, when I was hot to trot for your alter-ego. But given what I had seen of Chat Blanc, I at least wanted to give you the chance."

Putting my paws around her and hugging her close, I thought about that for a moment. "That was pretty bold," I said after a moment. "Knowing that it had gone wrong – horrifically wrong – the first time."

"I trusted you, Chat. And trusted that love done right would win every time." She sat up and turned to look at me. "I don't deny that you had feelings for me back when we were teenagers. But looking back at it now, can you honestly say you were in love with Ladybug, or with the idea of Ladybug?"

Nodding slowly, I reached up to brush back her hair. "In my defense, it was a starting point. What we have today was seeded by my feelings from then."

"Fair enough," she smiled. "Our relationship," she continued as she laced her fingers with my gloved ones, "the one we have today, is built upon sturdier stuff than the one that led to Chat Blanc."

"You could have told me about this long ago," I said. "There was no reason for you to bear the burden alone."

"Probably not," she nodded. "I've been so happy with you, any thought of that terrible visit to a future that thankfully hasn't come to pass was one that I shelved in the 'forget about it' cupboard."

I looked at her. "You are still worried that it might happen."

"Yeah," she replied. "I suspect anyone under enough emotional pressure would fall victim to Hawkmoth – not just a feline," she quickly added. "I could be just as vulnerable. Say we have a knockdown, drag out fight; maybe we split up on bad terms. Under different circumstances, it could well be me sitting on the Eiffel Tower, looking across the wasteland of what had been my city."

"No," I said firmly. "No, I don't think either one of us could wind up there now. I'm not that Chat from back then, and you aren't the Marinette of old."

Marinette laughed. "Thanks, I think."

"You know what I mean," I said, smiling. "We've grown. We know what Hawkmoth does now. We know what kind of power we actually wield. And," I smiled again, "we know who we are. That makes all the difference."

"All true," she laughed. "All true. Hawkmoth is a wily adversary, though," she reminded me softly. "We can't know what he might throw at us. How he might try to use our love for each other against us."

I nodded. "Now I understand why you've wanted to keep our relationship on the down low."

"It was to protect us, Chat," she sighed. "I fear my desire to come clean with you will actually put us into greater danger."

"Forearmed is forewarned, I suppose. I don't deny, though, that where you are concerned, my decisions are not totally rational."

"Same here," she sighed again. "The only thing that saves us, I guess, is that we are expecting him to eventually find out and try to twist it to his advantage."

"Which he will."

"Undoubtedly."

We held each other for a bit before I broke the silence. "We can get through whatever he throws at us, Milady. With my enhanced powers, and your brilliance, he doesn't stand a chance."

Marinette chuckled. "I wish I had your optimism."

"I have enough for both of us," I said as I hugged her one more time before wrinkling my feline nose at the acrid smell slowly filling the apartment. "Now, if you'll excuse me… I think I need to make a new meatloaf."