prologue. colours
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the night is silent, and raw divinity spills from the stars
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GREEN.
GREEN, MARINETTE THINKS, IS her new favourite colour.
Green: the colour of life, of rejuvenation. Of hope and energy and all the good things. Of emeralds and jewels and riches; the feeling of a sunny day, of a stitch sewn just right, the brightest, widest smile on your face so strong your cheeks hurt.
This colour personifies Chat in a way Marinette can't really describe, but understands. That colour takes root in her heart, digs in roots in the muscles and spreads its vines, so deep and so far until it's woven into her very DNA. It sprouts tall trees with the brightest leaves, the softest grass, the warmest of smiles.
It races across her cheeks in a fiery, heated blush.
Trust me on this, okay?
All it takes is a heartbeat. One skip of that green-rooted heart and Marinette is gone. From childhood, her greatest desire in life was to lay claim to a love like her parents: steady, constant and so sweet it makes you sick. When she discovered the powers that her nimble fingers held with the slim stem of a needle, Marinette's desires adjusted just a tad, but that original desire still stoked a steady flame.
Now, it's a raging, roaring bonfire that consumes her whole, staring into green, green eyes, haloed by a mask as dark as night, hair as golden as the sun. An angel wrought in black and mayhem, thrilling to the red and order of her.
( She's always craved the adrenaline, the thrill of a tragic love story that fairytales were made of. And who doesn't? Who doesn't want a love story that stains their teeth red? )
Marinette is lost and she will gladly spend her entire life lost in the forests of Chat's trusting, divine eyes – no map could root her out unless it led her to Chat Noir's heart, where she could happily reside for the rest of her days. A heart that Marinette would trust with anything and everything: her whole life, her darkest secrets, her greatest mistakes.
She's fallen hard and fast, quicker than any person has a right to. A single skip of the heart and she's a goner – all from one sentence; all for one boy.
She snaps back to the present with a blink, registering the havoc circling them. Chat's hands still rest on her shoulders, scorching with the weight of them. Marinette can barely breathe and takes a step back. She mourns the loss of his touch, but sends a wobbly smile towards the newly-discovered love of her life. "Okay."
Marinette felt like an eternity had passed after Chat had said those words ( kicked her in the back and knocked her over the edge ), but it really hadn't been more than a second.
Snarling like thunder, a hideous something not quite natural thunders through the air and Marinette whips sharply to the Eiffel Tower, where Stoneheart presides over his kingdom, Mylene clutched in his bulky hand. Stoneheart creases, coughing with deep, gravelly breaths and a bolt of fear barrels through Marinette as she spies Mylene's meek form being tossed around.
Like a cat coughing up a hairball, Stoneheart reers back, a kaleidoscope of violet butterflies rocketing into the sky from Stoneheart's gaping maw. They coalesce in the air and the ground rumbles under Marinette's feet as Stoneheart topples backwards with a thunderous groan.
Marinette's petrified eyes are riveted on the kaleidoscope, seeming to pulse with unnatural life as the butterflies merge to reveal the face of a man. Even from the distance that gapes between them, Marinette can feel the waves of pure malice that roll off him.
"People of Paris," the butterfly-face intones, his voice deep and ringing, menacing and malevolent, "listen carefully. I am Hawkmoth."
"Hawkmoth?" Marinette and Chat repeat in unison, gaze pinned to his apparition. Helicopters swarm the Tower like a moth to the flame, hungrily devouring Hawkmoth's threat.
"Ladybug, Chat Noir: give the Ladybug Earrings and the Black Cat Ring now. You've done enough damage to these innocent people."
There's just something about Hawkmoth: his words, his threats, his strategy. It makes Marinette burn because she shouldn't've have to be doing this. She shouldn't have to fret and doubt herself, have to wait until her friend is in danger till she finally realises she can do this; she shouldn't have to.
It becomes glaringly obvious: Hawkmoth is a coward. Why else would this man ( if he can even be called that ) prey on the emotions of volatile teenagers, delight in the lives he ruins and the damage he wreaks, all while he hides in his lair, safe from harm and danger while she, fifteen years old, has to sacrifice her time, her life, to fight them. And she doesn't even fight him.
Trust me on this, okay?
It's the fire inside that grips Marinette, that causes her to clap in mockery of this coward who dresses himself up as someone frightening, someone worth running from. She's confident like she's never been before, surety flowing through her veins as naturally as her blood.
"Nice try, Hawkmoth, but we know who the bad guy is." Ladybug strides forwards, an ease to her steps that she could never possess as Marinette Dupain-Cheng. She fixes her eyes on Hawkmoth's apparition, allows him to witness the full fury of her fire. "Let's not reverse the roles here. Without you, none of these innocent victims would be transformed into villains. Hawkmoth: no matter how long it takes, we will find you and you will hand us your Miraculous!"
Maybe it's Tikki pulling the threads, encouraging Marinette even from inside the earrings as Marinette unclips her yoyo, charging forwards with single-minded determination, tossing the yoyo around two nearby streetlamps, using the momentum to leap high into the sky.
With gleeful viciousness, Marinette tears through the kaleidoscope of butterflies in a matter of seconds, the butterflies dispersing with Hawkmoth's cries of pain, leaving the culprit behind. Marinette sweeps up the akuma in her yoyo before it can escape, vaulting onto the platform of the Eiffel Tower.
In the silence that remains, Marinette turns to Paris and pushes her voice out. She's never felt more right, more like she belongs here, in this suit, in this mask, declaring to protect Paris. Like she could do this. "Let me make this promise to you: no matter who wants to harm you, Ladybug and Chat Noir will do everything in our power to keep you safe."
Marinette raises the yoyo in her hand, finger grazing over the centre spot and thrusting it into the air as the wings uncurl. A kaleidoscope of butterflies burst through, shining white and pure like something divine. Like hope.
Chest heaving, smile wide and hurting, Marinette doesn't have eyes for the cheers that thunder through her city. She only has eyes on one boy, who she can see even from this distance, clear as a crystal. He cheers too, arms thrust into the air, a smile so wide on his face, it lights up his whole face.
And his eyes.
Marinette's consumed by green.
By hope.
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BLUE.
BLUE, ADRIEN THINKS, IS his new favourite colour.
Blue: the colour of the sea, the sky – ancient and fresh in one dizzying paradox. Blue, the colour of calmness and electricity and those sweets his mum used to love; of riches and jewels Adrien has never had much interest in, but if one could capture the colour of her eyes, he would hoard them without guilt.
It's late morning lie-ins, the calm after the storm, the perfect shade of bluebells Adrien already knows he'll love forever. The kind of love his father still covets in the depths of his guarded heart, that ruined him so spectacularly he still can't love the same way after Adrien's mother disappeared.
It burns through him at the touch of her fingers.
Hey, what are you doing?
Her voice, so angelic and holy, sharpened by anger into something so . . . divine that Adrien understands why Lucifer fell from heaven, because he would do the same if only to hear that voice once more. Adrien is a good boy, an angel; Chat Noir is a reckless boy, a rogue but both seem to fixate on this angel before him, so kind and gentle with the warmest smile that it melts the ice crystallising in Adrien's bones from his long exposure to the frigid fortress his home has become.
( It wasn't once like that. Once his father smiled and once Adrien ran down those corridors that weren't so tidy and neat. Once his mother was alive. )
Adrien can't hold back the slight gasp that escapes his lips as Marinette's hand slides against his own to take the proffered umbrella. She smiles at him, slow and sweet, like the best kind of chocolate, but then it disappears under the collapsing of the umbrella.
A laugh bursts out of Adrien and it's so freeing, because oh God, it's been a while since he's laughed like this. His muscles loosen and the burden of being the perfect son rolls off his shoulders and it didn't even take becoming Chat Noir to do it.
All he can do is wonder at the marvel that is Marinette Dupain-Cheng.
Marinette lifts up the umbrella, peeking out from under the material with the most adorable look on her face, the night sky of her eyes twinkling with her own kind of stars that heaven could never have the hope to recreate.
"First thing to know about me," she says, voice divine in a whole other way to the dagger of her anger, but it intoxicates Adrien all the same, "I'm super clumsy, so I apologise in advance for any bodily injuries."
"I-It's fine," Adrien stammers out in response, caught up in the whirlwind of Marinette's smile and voice and eyes. His cheeks flush lightly with a lovesick blush ( he might be fifteen, but he's not a fool. He knows love when he feels it ) and he crooks out a smile of his own.
"You should get going," Marinette encourages, nodding to the car behind him, "I wouldn't want you to catch a cold because of little old me."
It occurs to Adrien that he's been standing in the pouring rain for more than a minute now, his shirt beginning to soak through and yes, he probably should hop in the car before anybody sees Plagg's silhouette in the fabric of his shirt, or even before Plagg gets even wetter than he currently is and demand a whole army's worth of camembert as reparations.
But Adrien can't move his feet. Can't bear to leave Marinette Dupain-Cheng when she's stolen his heart with such terrifying, thrilling ease.
Because Marinette is his freedom when he thought he needed a magic ring that comes hand-in-hand with a strange creature with a cheese addiction and attitude problem.
"I'll see you tomorrow, then," Marinette says softly, moving past to head down the steps. Adrien watches her go with adoring eyes, unable to take his gaze off her as she spies her jogging across the pavement and over the crossing, diving into the warmth of the bakery across the street.
Plagg pokes his head out of Adrien's shirt, and Adrien doesn't even need to look at Plagg to know he's got a shit-eating grin on his cat-like face. "First day of school and we already have two lovebirds."
Plagg's words tear Adrien from his trance, shoving his kwami back into his pocket with a finger. "Oh, shush you."
Even though Plagg disappears, his sniggering doesn't, but Adrien tunes it out with ease.
It's easy when his mind is swallowed up by bluebell eyes that snagged him in a second, tugged him off the cliff with smug ease, and Adrien's fallen, unable to claw his way out of the pit Marinette has dragged him into. Not when he's surrounded by something that feels like love and trust and something sweet.
Like hope.
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Do I have any idea where I'm going with this you ask? I have no fucking clue. I just like the idea of a reverse crush au and the pure chaos that would happen because of this. We'll see where it goes.