Bloom grins to herself as Marinette finishes about how she can't 'do this' with her Chinese great-uncle - 'this' being interact with him when she can't speak Chinese - and says "Hang tight, I've got this. Don't freak out when you next open the door, though, Mari." And then she presses the 'end call' button before Marinette can get through frantically asking why she'd freak out. Then, she pulls up Adrien's contact number, and hits the call button.
"Hello? Bloom, what's up?" Adrien's voice sounds worried even over the phone - his sister doesn't usually just call him up out of the blue like this. She usually prefers to come in person, after all.
He must think I'm in trouble. Oops. At least he'll relax a bit after realizing I'm not.
Bloom smirks, and says "Adrien, you said you speak Chinese right?"
"Yeah, why?"
"Well, our Everyday Ladybug is in a bit of a tight spot with her Chinese-speaking uncle…"
Ten minutes later, Adrien's successfully on his way - she won't force their heads together for a kiss, but actively setting up situations where Marinette and Adrien will potentially be alone together and able to get to know one another? She never said she wouldn't - setting things up so they're spending time together is different from locking them in a broom closet together or handcuffing them together, after all.
Marinette opens the door once more, only to find Adrien standing there. "Adrien! Um- wha-what are you doing here?!"
Adrien smiles, making Marinette's heart start beating its way out of her chest, and says "Bloom called. She said you needed someone who speaks Chinese, so here I am. Translator at your service."
"No! Wait, I mean, yes! Uh, where's Bloom?" And then Marinette's phone buzzes, and she sees a text saying 'Your welcome, Mari. Meet you at the hotel. I'll be rooting for him.' Marinette chuckles, and gestures for Adrien to come in.
Twenty minutes later, they're heading to the Mayor's hotel with Adrien speaking fluent Chinese and Marinette curiously watching the whole interaction. And then Cheng Shifu surprises both teens when he says "Your Chinese very good, not like my English."
Marinette gapes in utter shock, and Adrien says "I didn't know you spoke English!"
Marinette dejectedly murmurs "Neither did I..." Why didn't he tell her? Did he not like the detail that she can't speak Mandarin?
Cheng Shifu shakes his head, saying "No, my English not good."
They get out of the car, with Adrien still translating between Alec and the Chinese chef, and head inside. After Cheng Shifu and Alec head off, Cheng Shifu saying cooking needs no words, Marinette heads over and says "Thanks for helping out, Adrien. Sorry to bother you for nothing, I really thought he couldn't speak English." This is somehow worse than the usual embarrassing incidents she finds herself in around Adrien - there's spazzing out around her crush, and then there's not knowing something as basic as whether or not her great-uncle speaks English. But as far as her mother knew, he didn't!
Adrien shakes his head, saying "It's no problem, Marinette. It was great to practice my Chinese, especially with a Shifu." At Marinette's confused look, he adds "That means 'Master' in Chinese. Your Mom's uncle is a great master."
And then a familiar and unwanted voice says "Look who it is. My favorite person, Marinette Dupain-Cheng! I mean, seriously, does your great-uncle really expect to win the contest with a soup? It's not even a main dish! Doesn't he know how to make sushi like everyone else?" Chloe stands there with a confident - arrogant - smirk on her face, one hand on her hip and the other holding her phone loosely.
Adrien pinches the bridge of his nose, and says "Sushi is Japanese, Chloe. Cheng Shifu is Chinese." Maybe if he can keep the focus on that, instead of Marinette's relation to the famous chef, Chloe will go upstairs without a fuss. She takes a perverse pleasure in making Marinette's life more difficult - why, he can only hazard a guess about at this point - but he wouldn't put it past her to sabotage Cheng Shifu simply because he's related to Marinette.
Marinette says "Besides, my great-uncle isn't like 'everyone else' - he's the greatest chef in the world, his soup is legendary."
Adrien smiles inwardly at the obvious pride Marinette has for her great-uncle - apparently, cooking is a bit of a theme in her family. As is being an artist. Her family is so amazing. She's incredible...
Marinette bristles at Chloe's declaration of how her great-uncle won't be getting Chloe's vote - she's on the jury, and despises soup - and stalks over to the blonde at once while saying "Oh yeah? He doesn't need your vote to win, there are other judges with much better taste. Oh, wait, you don't have any - I mean, look at what your wearing."
Chloe growls, and snaps "Don't talk about me like that!" She storms past them both in a huff, and adds "You've made a big mistake."
Adrien waits until Chloe's gone, not wanting to hear about how he sided with Mari over her later, and says "You really stood up for Cheng Shifu, I think he'd appreciate it."
Marinette crosses her arms over her chest, shoulder's hunching in slightly in a familiar insecure posture, and she says "I'm not sure…I don't think he likes me. He even ripped up the bouquet I got him."
Adrien shakes his head at once, explaining what Cheng Shifu told him during the car ride - he uses fateful things that cross his path in his dishes, and was planning on adding flowers to his soup. And then Bloom's voice says "He must've been talking about the flowers you got him, Mari." They look over, and see the flaming red-head leaning against a column.
Marinette sighs in utter relief, and says "So…he actually likes me?" Little hard to tell, with the way he ripped up her flowers...and the thoroughly embarrassing fiasco with the translator app she downloaded onto her phone.
Adrien says "Of course he does, how could he not?" Marinette's almost impossible not to like - Chloe's the extreme exception rather than the rule, everyone else has something nice to say about her. Her dedication to her work, her positive attitude, her compassion - Everyday Ladybug indeed. If his heart didn't belong to Ladybug, it would probably be Marinette's.
Bloom chuckles, arms crossed over her chest casually, and says "Marinette, anyone who gets to know you for even five minutes - and doesn't actively have it in for you - likes you. It's impossible not to."
Not unless you're Chloe Bourgois, who's life's goal seems to be making Marinette as miserable as possible, anyway.
When Cheng Shifu's soup is served, though…all the jurors minus Chloe immediately spit it out in disgust and say it's inedible. Chloe doesn't even taste it, claiming that since it's so unappetizing she'll skip it…but still give it a zero. Cheng Shifu's score comes out to 0.8 out of 10, the lowest in the competition. When he tastes the soup, he also spits it out…and then says he never put the ingredients he's tasting in, and someone sabotaged his soup.
Bloom all but actually growls, and says "And the grand prize goes to whoever can guess how that happened…"
Adrien and Marinette deadpan "Chloe."
Adrien says "I wish I could say it wasn't her…but I know her too well." He's become deeply familiar with Chloe's petty, spiteful side ever since attending school with her, more and more with each passing day - she's nice to the point of sickeningly sweet when its him, always clutching at his arm whenever possible and practically tackling him in her choke-holds she calls hugs, but she's a real witch to everyone else around her…especially Marinette.
Marinette tries to tell her uncle what happened, taking the blame since she provoked Chloe, but Cheng Shifu says "Shame is on Celestial Soup. Will never be world's greatest chef."
Adrien puts a hand on Marinette's shoulder gently when he sees her expression, saying "It's horrible to lose face in China," one of the worst things that can happen, actually, since it's entirely your fault, "let's wait for him downstairs."
Marinette nods, looking incredibly guilty as Adrien leads her away by the shoulders, right up until Bloom clears her throat. "Don't worry, guys. I'm going to fix this."
Marinette dejectedly asks "How?" If she had just bitten her tongue and let Chloe say whatever she wanted...she probably wouldn't have sabotaged her great-uncle. She'd have still refused to taste the soup, but at least it would've been edible, right?
Bloom smirks at her, looking all Dragon Fyre for a moment as she says "I've got a few tricks up my sleeve. Rather…in my front pocket." She slips her phone into the shirt pocket, camera facing outward, and winks at them.
Adrien says "No…"
"Yep. After I go talk to Cheng Shifu."
Cheng Shifu stares at the pot of soup, a torrent of shame and despair bubbling inside him like a second soup, and then his gaze focuses on the bottle next to the pot. The bottle of olive oil, something he never uses in his soup. He never puts oil in his soup period, it makes it greasy and drowns out the herbs. "Marinette was right! This is evil act of blonde brat! No respect for Cheng Shifu!"
The shame turns to rage, starting to boil over in him...right until he hears a shout of "GET DOWN, CHENG SHIFU!" The Cheft turns around, rage forgotten for a moment, and just sees something going flying past his head. When he turns to see, it's...a flaming wooden spoon absorbing a purple butterfly. He puts the 'what the heck?!' moment aside in favor of grabbing the fire extinguisher - the wooden spoon is on fire after all.
The purple-black butterfly that crawls out of the destroyed spoon is looking half-dead, wings tattered and haphazardly flying away...right up until Cheng Shifu sprays it with the fire extinguisher at Bloom's direction. Thirty minutes and a mind-blowing explanation of Hawk Moth later, Bloom says "Cheng Shifu, I know Chloe's a brat. Believe me, Marinette and I have the misfortune of sharing a class with her. But we're not going to let her get away with this."
Back in his lair, Hawk Moth's wondering what the hell just happened - his butterfly was heading for the chef that had been sabotaged, and it was looking as normal as seeing things from the perspective of a butterfly could look...when suddenly a flaming spoon came out of nowhere. He managed to keep the butterfly alive, barely, and was trying to get it away when it was killed by the freezing-cold spray of the fire extinguisher. He has to wonder if Dragon Fyre, the most dangerous of the superhero trio, was involved. He wouldn't be surprised if she was.
She manages to crop up just about everywhere, it seems - and she's the biggest thorn in his side of the three superheroes, with her impossible magic.
Mayor Bourgeois is talking with Alec, hoping to determine who could be picked as the winner of the contest, with Adrien, Marinette, and Bloom walk over and Adrien says "Mr. Mayor? You need to watch this video." It's a video of Marinette and Adrien confronting Chloe about sabotaging Marinette's great-uncle's soup from Bloom's perspective behind the two….and his daughter admitting to it. Saying she told Marinette she'd regret speaking to her like that,
Mayor Bourgeois sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose - he'd put Chloe on the Jury with the expectation that she'd behave, not purposefully sabotage a contestant's dish just because she doesn't like it or a family member of the contestant. "Seems we'll have to give Cheng Shifu another shot, Alec. And my daughter will not be on the jury, nor will she be allowed to disturb the chef."
Predictably, Chloe throws a tantrum, screaming until she's red in the face and storms off in a furious huff shouting about how it's ridiculous, utterly ridiculous. From the look on the Mayor's face, he's less than pleased she made such a scene in front of everyone - Bloom raises an eyebrow at the things his ghost is saying...how he expected her to act more appropriately than that, how she's his daughter and should know perfectly well by now how to act to maintain his image as mayor. Bloom doesn't know what that's about, exactly, and she's not too keen on finding out right this minute.
Marinette asks her great-uncle to teach her to make Celestial Soup as he prepares a second pot, which he delightedly agrees to and Bloom and Adrien guard the door. Bloom sniffs the air as the Celestial Soup cooks, and says "I really hope he's willing to make another pot of that afterwards…"
Adrien nods, his mouth starting to water at just the divine smell alone, and all but whines "Me to…" Even the stuff his private chef makes doesn't smell that delicious!
Bloom nods, then switches subjects in an effort to distract her wandering mind and says "So, someone seemed calmer around you…" Maybe it was the detail that Adrien was speaking in Mandarin half the time, maybe it was the way Marinette was half-focused on her Great-Uncle, but the dark-haired girl was much calmer around her crush this time.
Adrien nods, quietly asking "You think Marinette's starting to like me, Sis?"
Bloom whips her head around to stare at him in utter disbelief, quietly asking "What now?" There is no way her brother is that oblivious! Right?!
Adrien nods, glancing back at the pair in the kitchen, and murmurs "She always acted so…different around me than everyone else, even Nino. I thought she still thought I'd been putting the gum on her seat…"
Bloom promptly facepalms, so fast Adrien's legitimately worried she'll have a hand-shaped bruise on her face. Yes, yes he IS that oblivious... After a minute, Bloom mutters "Sheltered, isolated kid dives headfirst into the rest of the world with no idea of social interactions…Adrien, she never hated you or anything like that. I can't really say what she feels about you, girl code and all, but…let's just say it's good and leave it at that. It ties her tongue up in knots, makes scrabble out of her sentences…but she doesn't dislike you or anything. Promise."
Adrien sighs in relief, and says "That's awesome, I just…I was really worried about it, actually. She's super nice, and always ready to lend a hand, and…" He trails off at his sister's increasingly dumbfounded stare. "What? What is it?"
"Not much. Just wondering just how big a number your father's done on you, Adrien." She's absolutely going to have some choice words with one Gabriel Agreste the next time she sees him - Bloom Peters or Dragon Fyre, to boot. She's just sorry, at the moment, that she was more focused on healing her injuries than tearing Agreste Sr. a new one the last time she was in his elusive presence. Then again, she did have a broken rib - she thinks, she's not exactly an expert in injuries - and was feeling like she'd been run over by a bus.
When the judges all taste Cheng Shifu's soup this time around, they all give him ten stars each and name him the winner, with Andre Bourgeois immediately asking for the recipe so the hotel can serve it as the mayor's special.
Chloe can be heard a few floors up, if you listen hard enough, throwing another temper tantrum. Screaming, shouting, throwing stuff...rom the darkening look on Andre's face, it's going to come back and bite her squarely in the behind.
AN: Hey, everyone! Next chapter is up, hope you like it! Can't believe Marinette went so long in Adrien's company without being a complete spaz about him - in canon, at that. I'm putting it down to Mari being more focused on her great-uncle at the time. As for Adrien thinking Marinette's still mad at him...c'mon, the kid's got literally no experience with society at large, he hadn't had a clue about anything his first day of school! All the interaction he had for most of his life were his parents, Nathalie, and his bodyguard...and then his mom disappeared, his father practically moved to Antarctica, Nathalie's more of a robot than a person with how much personality and emotion I've seen her show so far - seriously, I've seen her worried maybe once in the whole of S1 that I've watched, and that was when Gabriel demanded she get a birthday present at the last minute - and I'm pretty sure the Gorilla is a mute character since I've never seen him speak before. And, out of all of them...his mom and bodyguard seem to care the most about him.
Even still, he's not gonna learn any social cues from that group. He's getting better, yes, but some things just seem to go straight over his head even in canon - Marinette and her crush, for instance. How many times has he said, even up to this point, that she's 'just a friend' in the show?! Dear Plagg, please help this blonde ball of sunshine...because it's almost physically painful, just how innocent and oblivious Adrien is. And I'm pinning that squarely on his absentee father.
Anyway, enjoy! More chapters coming soon! Personally, I can't wait for Volpina, Befana, and Glaciator.