Summary: While Adrien is intent on seeing Marinette for a very important conversation at school, Chat Noir finds himself waylaid by an Akuma. Apparently, the reach of toy companies and their advertising campaigns extend further than he had realized. Just how much misery is he going to bring into the world before all this ends?
Learning to Dance to a New Tune
When there's nothing but a sheen of sweat shimmering and chill on his exposed cheeks and forehead and the swirling smog, stinging his nose, wafting up from the cars far beneath his feet, jaunts over the Parisian skyline are bliss.
In those moments, trailing behind Ladybug or leading Multimouse, or cradling the weight of Marinette in his arms, her breath prickling the soft hairs on the back of his neck as she nuzzles into his throat, it's perfection because there is no more Adrien Agreste.
That's what Chat Noir is, really. An escape not from his father's mansion and his father's personality, but from himself, and still he tries to flee whenever he becomes entangled in the uncertain maelstrom of an akuma battle.
Most people have a survival instinct, something that spurs them forward through agonies un-dreamt by a sheltered and privileged infant like Adrien himself. From stories perused on the internet, seen in sources reputable and disreputable but he doesn't care, he's heard of mothers fighting off bears threatening their babies; fathers lifting a thousand pounds for one shining instant of need, just to rescue a trapped child.
Adrien has the opposite. He has an escape instinct as Chat Noir.
Get out of his room.
Get out of his skin.
Get out of his life.
All right into the path of a searing, prismatic death-beam because Ladybug makes it safe. In those moments, he knew with the faith of a zealot that she'll save him, and if she didn't, then there was only cool oblivion and, before that, the fading knowledge that he would never have to return to his room.
Where was the freedom of Chat Noir when you knew that at the end of your jaunt, your daily exercise in the yard, that you'd have to return to your cell?
Where was the freedom of oblivion when he knew she'd bring you back?
How much of Chat Noir is just that?
How much has he failed to see?
Just how much thinking does he have to do?
This time, at least, his expedition across Paris is motivated by the blaring klaxon of the akuma alert. Droves of police officers and paramedics and other civil servants fan out across the city and direct the populace into evacuation and shelter zones, cordon off streets to try to contain the akuma itself, however futile those efforts might be, and start arresting adrenaline junkies and overly-exuberant reporters or civilian bystanders hungry to sneak into position to capture a viral video clip.
The akuma is relatively docile, really, content to remain within the six-square block quarantine zone established by the police. The individual of indeterminate gender is a melange of different colours that would give The Bubbler conniptions over his colour-coordination. A puffy and theatrical suit, somewhat akin to the flowing and mismatched patchwork outfit of a clown billows around its body, provoking a frown. Abhorrent. Garish. Eye-bleeding.
Worse still are the civilians who have been affected, though.
A snarl works its way through his diagram and out of his clenched teeth as he kneels on a rooftop, one leg propped on on the rim, hands to his knee, squeezing out feeling.
Silence from absent pedestrians holed up in shops and other nearby buildings leaves only the distant wail of the police sirens.
The victims too slow to duck into cover dance as if on puppet strings, their voices raised in a cacophonous harmony that's a slurred amalgam of a dozen different songs all weaved together so that antiphonal notes form into something that twists up Chat's guts as he hunkers down on a rooftop to survey the situation in an effort to pick out patterns and weaknesses.
In frustration at the sick impotence, he smacks his baton against the rooftop, narrowly avoiding his own foot. Increasingly frantic, wavering jerks of the akuma's arms clearly correlate with the half-crushed-cockroach-skittering of the victims, like they've been sprayed with RAID and are in their death throes, their screaming song rising and flowing so painfully broken that Adrien's ears flatten and another hiss erupts through clenched teeth.
This akuma alert early in the day cut short his morning class and will probably make it impossible for him to approach Marinette, and after he spent all last night – he has the exhaustion-bruised eyes to prove it – struggling to piece together his Lego-brick thoughts into something resembling a coherent speech. Trying to think of the way that he should paint himself up. Trying to convince himself that he shouldn't and can't and doesn't need to.
He endeavours to focus on the akuma, on the victims, as they slow, their motions oscillating in frequency and energy. Through the shuffle-stop of a hundred feet, he hates himself because neither Adrien nor Chat has the vision to pick out the akumatized object.
This isn't his role, after all; he should probably just stay in his lane, but he needs this whole thing over yesterday.
Which means that he needs his partner.
Amid a cluster of cruisers, lights flaring but sirens now silent, and barricades, one relatively robust officer whose rank Chat can't discern is directing subordinates and coordinating with Ladybug who is standing at his side and reviewing deployment information on her yo-yo when Chat pole-vaults in for a landing without preamble or any of the cocky showmanship that had defined him in his early years.
He still enjoys the performativity, but today is not the day for an akuma battle.
"What have we got here, LB?" he asks, watching her stern features unfold, the tension in her shoulders give way as she turns to him.
"Seems like the akuma victim was one of the team working on the cartoon series that Hasbro was developing for our toy line." A wince creases his face as she reads from her yo-yo screen, flipped open in her hands, her sapphire eyes trailing back and forth. Curiosity and shame commingle to send him peeking around her hand to review the information alongside her.
His throat is scratchy as a bevy of negotiations and legalese floods his mind. "I didn't even know that they were making a cartoon to promote us."
"Hasbro has rights to market the figures however they please." Flicking the yo-yo back to her hip, she smiles, and it's a brilliant, ethereal thing but this time it only makes him ache for Marinette and freedom from something that he cannot name. "That includes a cartoon show, I guess. Not really important now, Chaton."
"Oh, I- I guess that I didn't read that fine print closely enough." Gripping his baton tight, he shies away from her gaze while the police give them a wide berth, letting kids – and he is a kid – handle the planning and the cleanup and whatever else is racing through his empty head. There's an ache deep in his throat, visions of Nathalie and his mother in their sickbeds crawling through his brain like burrowing worms, like the smell of rancid pork, like bitter herbs, and the screaming song of all those puppets resounds in his ears. He feels like throwing up.
And then, instantly, one hand is to his shoulder, the other to his chin as she tilts his head up to make certain that he's looking her in the eye. "This is not your fault, and we are going to fix it, okay, Chaton?"
Measureless gulfs of trust, crackling with a kind of empathetic energy, flow across her sainted features, and he feels it right into his heart and tear-sore throat.
He nods, gripping her wrist to let her know that he's okay and she can let go. He's not going to fall apart over something like this. "Right, LB. So, what was his job?"
She doesn't have to review the notes on her yo-yo again this time as she takes a step back, pulling away from him to rub at her wrist gently. Had he been holding on too tightly? Had he hurt her. Nearly-burst capillaries in her cheeks suggested aggravation rather than pain, so perhaps not.
"I'll fill you in on the way." Jerking her thumb towards a rooftop from which they could again get a better view of the akuma and the cavalcade of dancers surrounding him, she directs him upwards and they begin moving together with staggering precision, yo-yo and forceful baton strokes carrying them to a new vantage point.
"He was a composer for the theme songs that they had written," she hollers as they're in the air, neck and neck, nearly as if they're racing, and the distant song and whistle of wind, sharp and chilling against the exposed skin of his face, muffles her words. He always hears her, though; whatever she says; whatever she needs; with words or without.
Through the whistle of wind and song, he hollers, "I guess that his day hit a sour note."
The smooth and slender gymnast's musculature of her shoulders rolls in enthralling waves with each spinning arc and barrel roll, and the sight of her in motion is simply too much for him. All he can do is follow along, his parabolic arcs through the air unguided and ugly physics rather than the fluid magic of her motions.
He can look, and feel, but the decision, the choice, has already been made.
"Apparently the company changed course for the series." She touches down one half-second before him.
The akuma is still mired in its grotesque dance routine as they gaze down on the street, though several groups of revelers or dance troupes have broken into discordant masses, their movements like those of manikins brought to life as each collection intones a separate, alien song. Ladybug's grimace mirrors the ache in his heart. All those poor people didn't deserve this.
"They wanted it to be more kid-friendly," she continues. "So they scrapped the theme music he and his team had been working on and ordered them to start from scratch."
Rancid slime pours into his mouth, mind whirring with images and sensations, injudicious hands and disaffected eyes all over him and still it felt good just to have his neck wrenched backwards without warning, to have someone grab his tight collar to undo the first button, the backs of bony fingers bruising his throat. Skin on skin. Pain on pain. Photo shoots and wardrobe changes, a thousand different aesthetics plastered over his body like he was a ken doll that he couldn't even dress up himself, manufactured to be perfect and innocuous.
Neutered.
That was art. The industry.
"That's really terrible, forcing him to give up on his art, trying to control his music, just so they can make sure that the show is marketable to a target audience." His baton taps against his palm. The akuma is largely ignoring them, caught up in its own world, reveling in forcing others to dance to its tune. It gives them time.
"That... that does sound pretty bad," Ladybug admits. She seems distracted; is looking at him funny like she can peel back the layers of his costume and skin, ready to salt a wound. Is he just imagining that? "But still, it's a children's cartoon show theme song."
He clears the gunky feeling from his throat and looses a cocksure grin, knowing that he's trying to hide. "Well, themes the breaks in the music world, but this tune is getting so old that I think it's starting to de-compose. So, My Lady, shall we conduct out business?"
A quick glance down at the assembled revelers seems to assure her that they're not going anywhere, and not in any danger of attacking. Transitions between the groups at irregular intervals that seem somehow familiar, itching in the back of his brain, have left them uneven.
"Are you sure that your head's in the game?" she asks with a note of concern and not an ounce of criticism.
It's not. He's seeing himself everywhere, in everything. Is it narcissism? That sounds like him. Maybe it's just because he's starting to see himself in himself for the first time.
Gleaming teeth still displayed, the smile on his face stutters downward into something that's not exactly a grimace, because nothing that she's said or he's experience warrants censure. Whatever her brilliant tactical ploys and innovations, oftentimes, Ladybug misses out on the little things, fixates too closely on problems to see the world around her. Marinette's good at checking her peripheries, learning to see things from side angles just like he taught her. Maybe his Lady can learn a thing or two from her.
Maybe he has to cut down the angles.
He nods his head, trying to clear it. "Yeah."
Letting down Ladybug, and leaving the city and Marinette, The Gorilla, Nino, Alya, Chloe – all those people who matter – defenseless because he hasn't got his head screwed on right and tight is not an option. He has responsibilities – ones forced and ignored, now accepted.
On the rooftop's edge, surveying the crowds, they share a fist-bump that surprises him. Usually – always – that's the capstone of an akuma battle; not an affirmation beforehand.
Ladybug's yo-yo line zips across the street, tangling around some outcropping of masonry in the distance and snapping tight as she winks at him before diving in. An extension of his baton, butt cracking against the rutted, chipped brickwork beneath his feet, has him flying through the air behind her.
Hopefully, they can wrap this up in time for lunch.
He has another partner to see, after all.
The hollers start the moment that they're beset by the crowd, Ladybug veritably having to scream orders, just to be heard over the chorus.
If that fist-bump was for luck, it turns out that they need it, the battle, once joined, rages through dozens of city blocks, overwhelming the flimsy barricades established by the police and roping in dozens of additional civilians that swell the akuma's ranks of thralls.
Ladybug, perceptive as ever, locates the akumatized object easily enough: a sheet of music that's sticking out of the villain and victim's breast pocket.
Getting a hold of it is another matter.
The collections of dancers converge into the equivalent of a human shield wall, rebuffing all attacks. Atonal intonations and the cacophonous background ululations of the akuma itself, baggy, multi-hued clothing billowing inwards and outwards like he's an accordion, buffet them about as much as the clawing hands of dozens, then hundreds of brainwashed civilians, all of whom grope and clutch for their Miraculous.
It's a slog. Frenetic notes pierce his ears, all four of them, and the sound echoes inside his skull, making it almost impossible to think. As the brains of their operation, Ladybug's having a worse go of it. After an hour of pointless struggle, hit-and-fade assaults and lucky charms pulled out and lost, her brow pinching in concentration as she tries to put the pieces together while he holds back the swarm, they have to retreat and regroup.
Sheltered from sight, if not the banshee-wails of a thousand mouths and the clop of feet, regimented chaos, is provided by a nook between two abutted mansard style roofs. The sound starts dropping off as the collection of victims spreads out, returning to their dance, but with a general search outwards.
He and Ladybug have to close their eyes this time as they detransform so that Plagg and Tikki can feast, and her lithe body is pressed to his in a way that, under other circumstances, might have been rather pleasant.
Now, there's the tang of sweat on his tongue, the feeling of it soaking through her tee-shirt, warm and cold, as they huddle close. She is so close, so hot, so human with all that exposed flesh, arms trembling with exhaustion as they hook around his waist, and they share an intimacy alien to anything that he could ever experience with anyone else.
Heroes on the brink of collapse, breathing each other's air, too weak to stand, but strong enough to hold each other up.
"It's going to be okay, Chat." Her breath is against his throat, and he shivers despite the heat of her chest to his. Delicious prickles tiptoe over his whole body as he's suddenly so painfully aware of her, every sense flooded because he's blind. She sounds strong, voice sure as it was that day before the Eiffel tower when he fell in love, but he sees through that lie. Police sirens and the clap-hiss of tear-gas canisters in the distance, punctuated by an amplification of the akumatized horde's shrieking opus, isn't enough to blot her out. He's not the only one who lies to bolster others.
"I know it will, My Lady," he assures, holding tight to the small of her back, her face to his chest but he still doesn't open his eyes. He bathes in that trust, the even rise and fall of her chest, the smell of her hair – strawberry shampoo and sweat from the battle that they'll have to rejoin. The song is still droning and screaming, louder alongside the police sirens, almost enough to wash out his voice as Plagg's loathsome slurps and slobbery gulps begin to slow. Almost time. "It's you and me against the world. It doesn't know what's coming for it."
That declaration might have had more force if the wailing chorus wasn't ramping up again, shifting into a new movement, as the distant chop of news helicopter blades draws... closer.
"I've got it!" Though his voice is still subdued, he almost blinks open his eyes before catching himself, the mere flutter in excitement exposing only the briefest shimmer of blank hair, pigtails in shadow under his chin.
"What?" Her hands clasp a little tighter to his waist.
"The song." Memories and melodies crash through his mind. If only he can pull out the pattern. Look at the much, much larger picture. He was thinking too small. "It sounds like chaos, but it has movements. Large scale. Like – like an oratio."
A tiny burst of air through her nose is somehow adorable, just the sound. "A what?"
"Like Handel's Messiah," he explains as something brushes his shoulder. From the stench, Plagg, ready to go. "I mean, not technically an oratio, but, like, pieces conjoined. Different tones and sounds and themes, but all one piece, and then it starts over again, another performance, but jumbled up again."
"Okay, that might be a little bit beyond me. I don't know much about music. But you're saying that there's a pattern to it," she breathes against him. Her breath smells like mint. Toothpaste. Still. After an hour. That's impressive. "Can you figure out what it is?"
"I think so, but that's not all. It's the sounds. The sirens, the helicopters. Us."
"What about us?"
"It hates competing sounds," he explains, hoping that he's actually on to something, even if all the pieces fit. "That's when it starts picking up, getting more jumbled, becoming more fast paced when we were screaming, or the police sirens started up again."
There's a moment of trepidatious tension as he waits for her to respond, maybe to shoot down a stupid idea and supposition because she sees patterns and plans; not him, and then a chuffing laugh sends his heart soaring because it's like the noise itself can cradle him. There's no mockery.
"Astro suits," she says, excitement thrilling. "No flight mode to keep the noise down, but we can turn off the external speakers and work by headset radio."
"And if it's attracted to sounds, or has to try to drown them out, we can use the police and akuma alert sirens to lead it into a trap." The hands at her hips squeeze tight, celebrating, and he can very nearly feel her grin.
"Sounds like you've got a plan, kid," Plagg murrs from atop Adrien's shoulder, the amplitude of his purr oscillating, ranging through a spectrum of tones.
With a groping scratch to the kwami's scalp, though Adrien is loathe to let loose his Lady even for a moment, Adrien responds, "You ready to go?" Scraping through soft hair that scratches and tangles, her scalp firm, bone on bone, he juts his chin forward. "Both of you?"
Her laugh is a giggly burst, like the firing of a gun at the start of a race mingled with the explosion of a confetti popper.
"Always, Chaton." It's a sigh, inspiring excitement and calm in equal measures. Hands firm to his hips with her fingers to the divots of bone and the edge of muscle that flinches in time with the fluttery butterflies in his belly, she breathes against his chest, lungs expanding, hot and full.
A clipped nod and subtle shake of her head follows, felt but unseen.
"Let's do it."
And they do, calling for their transformations to restore a sense of distance and propriety that doesn't seem quite so far out of reach now, and suddenly they are no longer simply a boy and girl in the shadowy crux of two buildings; they're the hero and heroine of Paris ensconced in their Astro-suits, bounding into danger side-by-side.
The battle is not easy, but it is manageable. Coordination with the police allows them to redirect the akuma's ire towards distant collections of police cruisers, their sirens on full blast while Ladybug and Chat Noir keep their decibel levels at a minimum. Careful manoeuvring into tight alleyways while directing the mob from place to place allows them to avoid becoming overwhelmed by the crush of marionettes, all organized by Ladybug who can split her attention between a map of the arrondissement and the battle itself, while Chat focuses on the music.
Within the cacophonous racket, patterns emerge, if he just trains his ear to listen past the surface interactions; he doesn't have the words to describe the techniques, but there is an instinctual resonance, a myriad of interplays and responses from a dozen different songs in a conversation. Reading the music, breath hot and heavy in his lungs and sweat clammy between his suit and skin, he forces himself to not be distracted by Ladybug. The taste of iron and copper in his mouth with every gasp, memories of piano recitals for his father assail him. Only for his father. His music was always meant to be a performance for a single man, never shared.
Not for others.
Not for him.
But he doesn't have time to think about that, so he pushes it down. Presses through. Focuses.
There's deliciously, deliriously heady power in choosing what you think about; what shapes the world you project and map onto reality.
Move and counter-move all in response, he starts weaving his own song through the mass of victims, the one, crystalline thought - cutting as deeply as did his yearning to ensure that Marinette doesn't die, that she's safe and can protect herself – is that he has to defend … her.
And he can do that by defeating the akuma.
While the initial portion of their battle involves copious amounts of radio-chatter to synchronize their movements, there comes a point when he bounces off a wall, executes a precision extension of his baton to redirect the path of his parabolic arc in the air, and grasps hold of Ladybug's arm to dance them out of the path of a new symphony of akumatized victims, that he realizes they've stopped talking.
They don't need to talk.
It's a song as melodious and harmonious as the deeper melody inside the seemingly inscrutable polyphonic tunes of the akuma, belted out in exhilarating horror.
She's conducting the mass; he's performing the aria.
And they win.
Just like that.
Chat delves in when the music swells up in just the right way, and plucks the little slip of sheet music from the Akuma's breast, rending it to shreds, and the tiny black butterfly doesn't even have time to float a foot into the air before Ladybug snags it in her yo-yo and dispels the swirling corruption that had rendered the villain's music, his art, into a asphyxiating curse.
Bone-weary with exhaustion, needing to recharge their kwami and just sleep, they end up on a roof together, on either side of a chimney. Their hideaway is scattered with detritus, including two heaving teenage bodies, little more than lumps. Blessed clean and fresh air floods his lungs to the sounds of life being restored to normalcy in the streets below them: people chattering and bustling; cars grumbling along the roads; no music but the mass of humanity and all their citizens restored and safe.
"You okay, Chat?" From the other side of the brickwork, her voice is almost sleepy.
"Yeah," he replies, watching Plagg licking clean his paws and bathing in normal, human sounds. All the pressure is gone, but the music, their music, echos and it's a sweeter melody than most, weaved and performed and orchestrated together. "Just tired."
Sweat drenches his shirt, the material clammy. He needs a shower and a change, as he probably stinks. Plagg doesn't appear to mind, snuggling into his lap.
"You want to talk about it now?" she asks.
"What?"
"Whatever was bothering you earlier," she explains as if it's obvious. As if it's the only thing that, even now, dripping with perspiration, nearly ready to drop unconscious, their days ruined by a backbreaking akuma battle, that's the only thing that she could want to talk about.
She makes it hard to move on.
"It's not really all that important," he deflects because he shouldn't worry her, shouldn't keep her from her life.
"I'm curious, Chat, and not just because it was obviously important enough to bother you." A soft tapping, accompanied by what he assumes must be Tikki's coo, resounds from the other side of the brickwork. "I'd like to know a little bit more about you. You're my partner, after all."
He looks downward at the rooftop, greyed and weather-worn, and then up into the sky. Late afternoon light bathes him; it pours down from the cloudy sky. Chill breezes buffet them, as they're exposed to the elements here, naked as wind cuts through soggy clothing.
His thoughts actually lock together.
"It was just what you were saying about cartoon shows."
"What do you mean?" The confusion in her voice is really rather adorable; it's not often he gets to stump her. Rarer still are the revelations that unveil aspects of the boy underneath the leather, underneath the designer clothes, underneath his skin.
"Well, I guess that cartoon shows are... a little more than just 'cartoon shows' to me," he says, glancing over the edge of their rooftop. Returns to normalcy even after an arduous akuma battle have become relatively quick: citizens reverting to their proper roles, living their lives.
"Spots on!"
A flash of red light signals that it's time for them to leave or talk, face to face.
"Claws out!" he cries while rising up, hearing her the scrape of mystical-spandex on stone and the clap of feet approaching.
"A lot like action figures?" As she rounds the corner, her voice is focused like her eyes and that easy smooth confidence, the level tone, has him shivering while they watch the performance.
"In a way. I like cartoons," he begins slowly, scratching at the apple of his cheek with a claw. "Kids stuff. It's really interesting to me, I guess."
"I didn't mean to insult you, Kitty," she says, shielding her eyes, focusing on the cracked and leaf-strewn rooftop. "I guess that I wasn't thinking, but I should have remembered that you liked toys." She grimaces, waggling her hands as she jerks upwards to stare him in the eyes, her face crimson. "Not that they're toys because they're collectible figurines produced for adults even though there's nothing wrong with joys – Toys! For adults but not, like, adult toys what even are those other than pollectibles- collectibles produced by you – I mean for you because you're nearly an adult collector of adult toys?!"
He blinks and tamps down on the laughter that's trying to creep out of his throat. It wouldn't do for him to appear to be mocking his Lady for an utterly adorable and uncharacteristic little flustered breakdown. She really must be apologetic and guilt-ridden for her to crack like this.
"No, no, LB," he assures. "I'm not mad, or insulted or anything."
"Oh!" Her lips pop, hand rising to her cheek to rub at the flushing heat while he extends his baton, the pole clacking against the ground so that his folded arms can balance on the tip, bearing half his weight like he's a cat tripod. Bent over, he's shorter than her, and the angle of her chin and undersides of her plump cheeks is a nice change.
"Yeah," she says, rubbing her bicep. Pretty bicep. Muscular. Kind of like Marinette's when she pinned him to a roof while training.
Beefy women, particularly pint-sized powerhouses, are under-rated.
"I guess that you wouldn't be too upset over something like that. I, uh, overreacted."
They quickly return to their observations of the cleanup crew, civilians beginning to emerge from their hiding places and life resuming. The creased worry lines along her face spur him to explain himself, just to assure her that there are no hard feelings.
"I just mean that cartoons. Toys. They're important in a way." Head to the cool, rutted brickwork of their chimney, he takes a moment to breathe. "More important than some people realize."
"How so?" She's watching him, considering, and he likes it. He's silenced her, but not in a way that's imbalanced or authoritative or ugly. Relationships, partnerships, are a process of ceding control, balancing.
"Cartoons may be kids' stuff, but those are some of the first stories that children see. That they get attached to. The kinds of lessons that you learn, that stay with you because they shape how you see the world." Can a child change the way he sees the world? Are those foundational lessons scribed in indelible ink, carved into the neural pathways that shape how you think? What you think? What you are? "Whether you're treated like a kid, or a stupid kid or a – a smart kid. That's a lot of responsibility for someone who's producing what parents see as just a half-hour-long toy commercial."
"I suppose that there's something to be said for that," she offers, seemingly a little abashed as she scratches her cheek. "I never really thought about it that way."
"Neither had I, really." He hasn't thought about a lot of things. "I guess I've just been thinking about the lessons that we learn from parents and teachers, and, well, cartoons. What we pick up about ourselves and the world without even knowing it."
She looks at him funny.
That's the only way that he can describe it, and the feeling in his belly that results.
He's never seen that look before.
"Well," she says, rising up to her feet and stretching her arms heavenward before giving him a quick nudge, elbow to his ribs, but there's a softness to the teasing, like she's afraid that he's nursing a wound that he's trying to hide, a deep blood-bruise to his ribs, concealed by the leather of his costume. "Thanks for giving me some food for thought."
"Well, you feed me all the time." Shrugging off the compliment that has his chest burning and his cheeks itching to suppress a grin, he rises up to his full height, twirling his baton. "It's only fair that I pay you back now and then."
"Oh, and Kitty?" she asks from the ledge, yo-yo cocked and ready to let fly.
"Yeah?"
"Good work out there today," she praises, hand to her hip in that heroic and smugly self-assured pose. A little cocky. A little flirty. A whole lot dangerous. And all her. "We made a great team."
"We always do, my Lady." There's no way that he can let this exchange go by without taking her palm in his and feathering a wholly platonic to her knuckle, only for a moment. To his shock as he withdraws and she rubs at her knuckles, starting at them, before shoving him in the face with an open palm, it feels platonic and playful, without the spark of exhilaration, the tingle of electricity and yearning that was Ladybug herself.
But he's smiling all the way back to school.
Whether that's because he did good work, was a good partner, and he believes it for once, or because he's minutes away from seeing Marinette, settling next to her in class...
Well.
He's content to say that it's all of the above.
Author's Notes
Hopefully the implications for Adrien's character in this chapter, and expressed through both his expanded ability to synthesize his personal reality with external experiences and work in a synergistic partnership with Ladybug - as he did in Oblivio - came across as natural aspects of his evolution through the story.