(A/N) So I came up with the premise for this fic back when Hack-san first aired, but didn't want to write it because well, salters were screaming that Adrien was an attempted murderer who should be arrested and thrown in prison. Which uh... no. I waited until that had calmed down before starting on this. I just really wanted to put Alya through some trauma so that I had an excuse to focus on her thoughts and emotions, and her almost being Cataclysmed seemed like a good catalyst for that. Though I also ended up exploring Adrien's feelings quite a bit as well.
Adrien, Alya, and Marinette are all good kids who care about each other a lot and hate to hurt people, but sometimes it happens unintentionally, like with what this fic is sorting out. Luckily, they can also talk things out and get to a good place again! With hugs. Hugs are mandatory.
Oh yeah, I always intended to release this fic after whatever the newest episode after "Multiplication" ended up being. The fact that "Destruction" touches on some similar themes to this fic is fortuitous, but purely coincidental. I finished writing this fic months ago.
"There's only one Ladybug, which means you can only be… a sentimonster or an akuma!" Chat Noir took out his staff, spinning it around and aiming it at Scarabella.
Her mind raced, trying to come up with some way out of this situation. Dammit, she'd assumed that Marinette had given Chat some form of heads-up about her, but it must have slipped her mind. She had seemed to be in a hurry at the train station, she probably didn't have time to consider her partner's reaction to someone else showing up wearing the Ladybug Miraculous.
She held up her hands placatingly, hoping to assuage the angry catboy. "Woah, wait, I'm not a bad guy, I promise!"
"Liar! What have you done to M'lady?!" he geared up, hitting her across the midsection, sending her flying into a nearby chimney stack.
Right. She'd always loved watching clips of Ladybug and Chat Noir being super protective of each other, but being the one perceived as a threat to their partner's safety? Not so much. "It's not what you think! She trusted me with it!" Crap, what could she do to convince him she was telling the truth?! It's not like she had a sworn affidavit from Ladybug proclaiming Scarabella to be her appointed substitute!
"She'd never do that without telling me! CATACLYSM!"
FUCK.
"LUCKY CHAR–"
She didn't get the words out in time.
Stumbling back, she stared at her hands as her suit slowly lost its luster, turning ash-black. Her fingers lost feeling, crumbling into dust before her eyes. As the corruption slowly spread down her arms, she fought to scream. Even that grew beyond her, the destruction reaching her chest, silencing her voice.
All she could do was watch as her body fell to pieces, until the last piece of her was gone.
Alya woke up gasping. Fumbling blindly for the light switch, she felt along the wall of her room until she finally found it, flicking the switch.
As light flooded the room, she looked down at her hands.
They were intact.
She let out a deep breath. Of course they were. She wouldn't have been able to turn on the light otherwise.
Everything was fine. She'd gotten the Lucky Charm up in time, fended off Chat, and persuaded him she was one of the good guys. Heck, they'd even had fun together near the end, posing and joking together during the museum fight! Things worked out in the end.
So why were her hands still shaking?
Right. She just needed to get her mind off this for a bit. Once her brain had time to calm down, she'd try to sleep again.
Setting her silk nightcap to the side, she pulled out her desk chair, waking her computer up.
Let's see… maybe working on one of her articles for the Ladyblog would make her feel better. Even if it didn't, at least she'd have something to show for her lack of sleep.
Not something with Scarabella yet – she'd need to wait for her readers to submit videos of the fight, or petition the city to give her surveillance footage of her debut. It'd take a long time to comb through the videos, cut them together in an appealing way, and add her own commentary to it. Definitely something she needed to do, but not a task she wanted to undertake at 4 am on a school day.
What about the article she'd been working on before Marinette called her up? What was it again?
Frowning, she looked at her most recent docs. "Top Ten Most Inventive Uses Of Catacly-"
Abruptly she pushed away from her computer. Right. That was enough of that for today.
Sighing, she eyed her bookshelf. What would be helpful for making her feel better…
Her vision caught on a thin, tall book with a red, yellow, and blue spine.
Smiling, she put on her glasses. Majestia comics always helped her feel better. Her daring rescues, her interventionist philosophy, her steadfast belief that anyone could make a difference in the world - it always electrified her imagination, even back when she was a young child. Sometimes you couldn't fix everything right away, but so long as you kept persisting, things would get better.
Opening the book, she let herself get sucked into the adventures of her second favorite superheroine.
"...Alya?" she heard Marinette ask.
Alya groaned, her head married to her desk
"Alya!"
"Is there an akuma attack?" she asked Marinette blearily.
"No, but-"
"Then NAP."
"You're gonna hurt your neck if you sleep like this!" her friend fussed.
"At least then I'll sleep," Alya muttered.
"Alya, what's wrong?" Alya still couldn't see Marinette's face since her head was face down on her desk, but she could hear the concern in her friend's voice. "Usually I'm the one coming in here half-asleep, because– well, you know why. You're the bright-eyed, bushy-tailed one. Did something happen?"
"I–" she hesitated. "It's nothing, really. Just some nightmares. Everything went fine."
Marinette gently laid a hand on Alya's arm. "If it's keeping you up, then it's not nothing," she said quietly.
Would talking about it with Marinette even help anything? There wasn't anything to change or fix, nothing bad had actually happened. She just needed to calm herself down, get her brain to realize that.
Turning her head to the side, she caught a glimpse of Marinette's worried expression, her eyebrows drawn together as she gave Alya a small frown.
That sealed it. She still wasn't sure whether talking to Marinette would help lessen her anxiety, but it'd help with her friend's worries at least. It was worth a try. "Alright. But we need to talk about it at your place, not here."
Marinette's frown deepened, but she nodded. "First, though–" she rummaged around in her backpack, pulling out a U-shaped pillow. "Here. If you're gonna sleep in class, at least lean back and use this. It'll be more comfortable and less likely to cause problems."
Alya took the pillow, settling it over her shoulders. "Should I ask why you have this stuffed in your backpack?"
Marinette blushed. "Well, you know how little sleep I sometimes get. I figured it was better to prepare for a class nap than to just pretend I'd never need one."
Alya chuckled. "Fair enough."
She laid her head against the soft pillow, absently noting the fine craftsmanship as she drifted off. "Oh, and Marinette? Thanks."
"It's the least I could do…" was the last thing Alya heard, before she drifted off to sleep.
Alya settled down in Marinette's room during lunch break, feeling a little less like a member of the walking dead than she had that morning. Thankfully Ms. Bustier let her sleep. She didn't normally like her students sleeping in class, but she recognized that if they were tired enough that they were conking out on wooden furniture, they weren't gonna learn anything anyway.
She smiled, watching the little kwamis flitting around, Daizzi happily drawing on a piece of paper in one corner, Sass arranging a game of red light, green light in another. At least they were having a good time.
"So what's going on?" Marinette asked, her chin on her hands. "I heard you muttering while you were napping, you didn't seem to be getting good sleep, even during class."
Alya looked away. Her dreams weren't as vivid as earlier, but they still weren't entirely peaceful. "How much do you know about what happened during Robostus's attack? About my team-up with Chat?"
Marinette blinked, frowning. "Not much, just what you told me. I mostly rely on the Ladyblog for superhero-related news, and you haven't posted much about it. I was actually gonna ask you about that, I'd expected you to have an article up about the 'new hero'" she made air-quotes with her fingers, "and I wasn't sure why there was such a delay. It's not like you."
Alya let out a frustrated sigh. "Yeah, the team-up… it went well near the end, Chat was fun to banter with and was good at following my lead, even when we weren't able to discuss a plan ahead of time, but… it didn't start out like that."
Marinette cocked her head to the side. "What do you mean? I know you said that he was put-out that I'd told someone else my identity without informing him, that he felt like I'd been pushing him out of the loop, but we talked it through, and I think we're okay now."
"'Put out' is one term for it," she replied. "Marinette, if, out of nowhere, a new Black Cat wielder appeared with no word of warning from Chat Noir, what would be your first assumption as to how this new Black Cat acquired the ring?"
"Well… hm. Chat wouldn't tell his identity to anyone but me," Marinette muttered, looking down in concentration, "so if someone else had his ring, then either he lost the ring and Plagg found someone else to use his Miraculous– wait, no, something like that's happened before, Plagg just went and hung out at Fu's. So he'd probably just take the ring to me. Which means that, if someone else had the Black Cat Miraculous, they probably stole it from Chat!"
Her face fell. "Wait… did Chat make that assumption too?"
Alya nodded. "I told him that you entrusted your Miraculous to me, but he couldn't believe that you'd give your earrings to someone else without telling him, so…"
"So he assumed you must've gotten them through nefarious means," Marinette concluded. "And if I hadn't tried to contact him in some way about the theft, like by wearing my motorcycle outfit and waving him down, then–"
She froze. "Alya," she said slowly, "did Chat Noir think that you'd hurt me so badly that I couldn't get in touch with him?"
Alya nodded.
Marinette groaned, burying her face in one of her pillows. "He attacked you, didn't he." her muffled voice said. It wasn't a question.
Alya nodded, before remembering that Marinette still had her head down. "I did persuade him I was one of the good guys, but it took me kicking his ass and pointing out that I could steal his ring, and choosing not to do so. Which he accepted, thankfully. But before that…" she trailed off, thinking back to the inky blackness that'd spread over her Lucky Charm as Chat destroyed it.
Marinette turned her face to the side to look at Alya. "Is that why you've been having trouble sleeping? Because of that fight?"
Biting her lip, Alya nodded. "I know why he thought I was a villain. Heck, if I'd been in his shoes, I'd probably have thought the same thing, been just as angry and scared about what'd happened to you. He found out I hadn't hurt you and everything was fine. But when I see him using Cataclysm, think about what could've happened if just one small thing had gone differently–" she shuddered. The only living beings she'd ever seen Cataclysm used on were Sentimonsters. But they weren't exactly regular creatures. If people were affected the same way that inanimate objects were…
She shook her head. No need to continue that line of thought, her nightmares had done that plenty.
Marinette looked away. "I– I know the feeling. I've had to face Chat a few times before. It's never been pleasant fighting him. Especially–" a shadow crossed her face. "Never mind. Let's just concentrate on you right now."
Sounded like Marinette was leaving something out. "You can talk about it, you know. I don't need to be the only one spilling my guts."
Marinette shook her head resolutely. "It will never happen, I made sure of it. I don't want to think about it."
Alya frowned, but didn't pursue the subject, filing it away for later instead. "If you're sure. Anyway, that's why I wasn't sure about talking about it. I don't see what can be done to help, except just… try to get over it."
Humming to herself, Marinette looked around her room, her eyebrows drawing together. She climbed down her ladder, approaching the Miracle Box.
Alya hurried after her. "Marinette? What're you doing?"
"Something I should've been doing more of since I became Guardian: sitting down and talking with my partner," she lifted the box out, looking at each Miraculous symbol. "Hey Pollen, you up for a quick jaunt with Alya?" she called out.
"Of course, my Guardian," Pollen said, flitting over to Alya.
"Oh no you don't!" Trixx protested, flying in front of her Holder. "Alya's my Holder, mine! Bad enough I had to share with Tikki for a day, I'm not sharing with you too, I've got dibs! Besides, you already have a wielder, you just don't get to be with her all the time like I do."
Marinette let out an exasperated sigh. "Trixx, Rena has to remain hidden at all times, Alya can't use you publicly."
Trixx opened his mouth, but Marinette barreled onwards. "And I know that you could cloak her in an illusion, but it'd only last five minutes and could be dispelled way too easily. It's safer for this if she just uses a different kwami for this occasion. I promise that it's temporary, and you'll still be the one staying with Alya permanently."
"What're you talking about?" Alya asked. Sometimes Marinette forgot that not everyone was privileged with knowing how her thought process worked, and you had to get her to slow down and actually explain what she was doing and why. She'd become adept at it over the past school year. "I thought you said you were the one talking with him?"
"You and me," Marinette clarified. "This whole issue arose through miscommunication, so maybe some better communication can help fix it."
That… wasn't a bad idea, actually. Though she had a feeling it wouldn't matter much what she thought of it either way. Once Marinette had seized on a solution to a problem, she pursued it with a single-minded determination that both impressed and scared her. "Just make sure to let Chat know I'm coming this time."
Marinette nodded, handing over the Bee Miraculous to her. "The transformation phrase is 'Buzz on'."
Taking the comb, Alya let out a slow breath. She didn't know whether this would help, but– "Pollen, Buzz On!"
Alya leapt across buildings, savoring the acceleration as she jumped, the exhilaration as gravity took hold of her and she fell back to earth, and the joy as she leapt once again. She giggled, unable to contain herself. As Rena she'd had to keep a low profile recently, and as Scarabella she'd had a villain to get to, but now? As Apidae? She could savor the abilities the Miraculous gave her.
A giggle escaped from Ladybug as she bounded, leaped, and swung alongside her. "Having fun?"
"You know it!" Alya said, indulging in a completely unnecessary (though oh-so-fun) double front flip, smoothly transitioning back into a run when she landed.
Ladybug's expression softened. "I'm glad you're feeling better. I was hoping a run would help, before-"
"Before we talk to Chat Noir," Alya said, voice dropping a little. Normally she'd look forward to seeing the catboy, and part of her still did, but… with how she'd been reacting to any reminder of Cataclysm, she was afraid of what would happen when she met up with him again.
Still. Marinette was right. She needed to talk to him, to attempt some sort of closure. She didn't want to be afraid of watching the heroes' fights, for fear of getting flashbacks. Maybe this would help, maybe it wouldn't. But it was worth a shot.
Rounding a corner, a flash of black caught her attention. Chat Noir's ears perked up as he turned to face her.
Not for the first time, she wondered whether his senses improved as Chat Noir. She hadn't noticed anything like that while she'd been transformed as Rena Rouge (or Rena Furtive nowadays), but then again, Chat Noir had always embodied the animal he represented more than most other Miraculous wielders did. No one else had a tail or ears that responded to their mood, after all. Seriously, that was a crime. She wanted to be able to wag her tail, dammit! And if Carapace had a tail of his own…
Nope. Not the time. She could think about how cute it would be to make her boyfriend blush in the suit, his tail betraying his feelings, later. This meeting was dedicated to something far less fun.
"Milady! And…?" he trailed off, looking at Alya.
"Apidae," she supplied. "Though you know me as Scarabella."
He nodded. "She did say that you would be using a different Miraculous." Chat gave a mischievous smile. "You look bee-autiful, by the way."
She laughed. "Thanks, but I already have a boyfriend."
He shrugged, unbothered. "I only have one Lady in my life, anyway." He tilted his head to the side. "So, what did you need to talk to me about? It's great seeing you again, don't get me wrong, but it didn't sound like this was just a social call."
That sobered her. She hated the idea of wiping the smile off of his face, but she was sure he'd be even more upset if he found out what she'd been going through, and that she hadn't told him about it. He'd been kept out of the loop enough already. "I- I've been having trouble sleeping lately. I keep having nightmares. Getting flashbacks."
He frowned. "Nightmares? Flashbacks? Why…" His eyes widened. "Is- is it because of something I did?" he asked hesitantly.
She drew in a breath, closed her eyes, and nodded.
"What is it? How- how did I hurt you?" His voice took on a strained tone.
"Do you remember when you first encountered me? How you thought I was a villain?" she asked softly.
He blinked. "Yeah, I thought you'd hurt Ladybug and stolen her earrings, so I-" His breath hitched. "So I… I tried to… to Cataclysm you… Oh. That's- that's why, isn't it?"
She looked away to avoid seeing his face. If she kept looking at his devastated, kicked-kitty expression, she wouldn't be able to finish describing her feelings. She needed to put this out there. "I had a nightmare last night where I didn't get my Lucky Charm up in time. I slowly watched the corruption eat away at my body, until I crumbled into nothingness. I couldn't get to sleep again for the rest of the night. Any mention of Cataclysm started to bring back those memories, the idea of 'what-if?'" She took in a deep breath, centering herself. "Ladybug suggested I talk with you, see whether that would help me… I dunno, come to terms with it?
"I- I didn't know- I'm sorry, I-" his voice cracked. "I never wanted to hurt another person with my Cataclysm. Not again."
"Again?" She'd never heard of Chat Cataclysming a person before. Sentimonsters a few times by accident, sure, and there was that one time Volpina faked him Cataclysming himself, but that was it. He only ever intentionally Cataclysmed non-living objects.
He winced. "You know Uncanny Valley?"
"Of course I do!" she was one of Majestia's biggest fans, she could hardly call herself that if she didn't know about her daughter. "What does that have to do with… oh no. No, what happened?"
Ladybug put her hand on Chat's shoulder. "Do you want to tell the story, or would you prefer I tell it, kitty?" she asked softly.
He hesitated for a moment. "You tell it," he finally said. "I don't feel up to it right now."
She nodded, turning to Alya. "During the fight with Techlonizer, the villain managed to grab Chat while he was distracted and whip him around so fast he wasn't able to stop his momentum. He let Chat go when he was aimed right at me, with Cataclysm active in his hand. I wasn't able to dodge in time. But Uncanny Valley saw what was happening, and took the blow instead."
"I gave up the ring back then," Chat said, fiddling with it. "I didn't want to risk harming anyone like that ever again." He let out a sigh. "But it happened again. I hurt you."
Nope, she wasn't letting him continue down this train of thought. It'd hurt both Marinette and Chat, compromise the fight against Shadow Moth, and would only make Alya feel worse than she did right now.
"Like I said back then, I don't know that I can be Ladybug without you," Ladybug said sharply, a tinge of panic in her otherwise firm voice. "I don't want to have to find out, either."
"Running away isn't the answer," Alya said. "The mistakes you made, the accidents that occurred… they could happen to any Black Cat. Hell, even Ladybug ended up making a sentimonster run amok-" she winced at the unintentional pun, but barrelled onwards "-when she was Lady Noire. We need to figure out a way to deal with stuff like this when it happens, not give up. That doesn't fix anything."
Chat looked down. "Do you have any suggestions? I- I'm just afraid I'll mess something up again, if I try to come up with an idea."
That would be tricky. It's not like he was hitting the wrong targets on purpose. During the heat of battle, tempers ran high, and accidents happened.
Still. There were some things they could try.
"What if you only called Cataclysm when you had a good idea what you'd use it for?" she suggested. "And tried not to use it unless you actually needed it, either. I've looked through a lot of the Ladyblog's footage of your fights in the past-" very recently in fact, since she had been working on her Top Ten list for best Cataclysm uses, "-and over half the time, you just use it to break an akumatized object that would've been destroyed just as easily by snapping it with your hands, or stomping it on the ground. It'd also reduce the time pressure on you, since you wouldn't be at risk of transforming back."
"..Huh," Ladybug said, a thoughtful expression on her face. "You know, that could work. There'd be some risk in it - it takes a second to prepare a Cataclysm, so if you only called it right before you were gonna use it, you'd risk getting interrupted - but it might be worth it." She looked at her partner. "What do you think? It's your call. If you think it won't work or you just don't want to do it, we'll drop it. You're the one who uses the power all the time. You'd have the best grasp of how feasible this is."
Chat looked down, his eyebrows bunching up in concentration as he closed his eyes. After a moment he opened them and smiled. "You know? I think that might work. And if it might reduce the danger of Cataclysming something- someone- I didn't mean to…" he looked down at his right hand. "I just don't want to hurt people."
"I think anyone who's been around you knows that, kitty cat," Ladybug said softly. "There's a reason Fu chose you."
Alya frowned. "This policy wouldn't have stopped you from Cataclysming me, though, since that wasn't an accident."
Chat Noir winced, looking away.
"I'm not saying it's a bad idea," she said, putting up her hands. "I was the one to suggest it. But we might need something else as well. Something based more on why you decided to jump to Cataclysming, when you don't usually do that for supervillains."
"I was angry and- and scared," Chat said. "I thought you'd knocked Ladybug out, or maybe even-" He took a deep, shuddering breath. "I lost my mom recently. I was afraid that Ladybug was gone now too, like she was." His eyes widened, processing what he'd just said. He whipped around to face Ladybug. "Sorry, I know we're not supposed to say anything about our identit-ooph!"
Ladybug's sudden bear hug knocked the air out of his lungs. "Kitty, you're allowed to talk about stuff that hurts you," her muffled voice said, "even if it's with your civilian identity. I never wanted you to feel like you had to hide something that affected you that much. Just try not to say anything that'd make your identity obvious, that's all."
"Thank you, Milady," Chat said, his voice quavering. He wrapped his free arm (the one that Ladybug hadn't inadvertently trapped at his side with her hug) around her, returning the hug just as fiercely.
Alya smiled, wishing she could record this for the Ladyblog. Granted, Marinette wouldn't like that, since she'd ordered Alya to get rid of her Ladynoir file, but she could still appreciate seeing the two of them being so close with each other. Romantic or platonic, they were quite the pair.
"Maybe you two should set up some contingencies for what to do if either of you suspect the other is… indisposed somehow?" She suggested. "I mean, I don't think it'd stop Chat from freaking out if you were hurt - heck, I don't think it'd stop ME from freaking out if you were hurt - but bad situations are less scary when you have a plan to deal with them. Just don't expect that plan to survive contact with reality."
Ladybug's face lit up, as Alya knew it would. If there was one thing Marinette was good at, it was making plans for any possible future. "I think I can help with that, kitty," Ladybug said. "Do you think it would help you, though?"
He gave her a soft smile. "I don't know, but I want to try."
Alya gave a small laugh. "Mind if I join the hug, or is this Dynamic Duo only territory?"
He blinked. Ladybug chuckled. "I think we can make room for one more."
As she wrapped one arm around Chat Noir and the other around Ladybug, Alya felt safe and at peace, in a way she hadn't since she'd transformed into Scarabella.
That evening, Alya pulled up the list she was making of Cataclysm uses, reading them over before exiting the file.
She wasn't ready to finish it yet.
But she would be.
