A/N: I spent an hour editing this and putting my formatting back in after ffn freakin deep fried it. again. thanks ffn for doing that to the longest chapter yet with the most randomly interspersed emphasis, really.

Still my favorite chapter of the entire fic tho tbh

They don't talk about it.

Well, they don't talk about a lot of things, even though they need to, and at some point they inevitably will. But for now, a tense silence hangs between them, and part of her wonders why he doesn't just leave.

Does she want him to? She doesn't know.

He isn't what she thought he was. Or, maybe she'd just forgotten what she knew all along. It had always been there, in the back of her mind, and somewhere between his warm voice and the odd urge to be near him that she still didn't understand, she'd forgotten what her common sense had told her in the first place. She'd pushed away the small part of her that still screamed concern over the pieces that didn't fit together, the part that still tried to bash her over the head with survival instincts and get away from him, because in the end, she still didn't know him.

She'd gotten caught up in the majesty of learning that things she'd always disbelieved were real, that legends and myths were more than just false stories. She'd been swept away in awe of the fact that he existed, and he was literally magical, so much so that she didn't stop to question the darker sides too much. Maybe she should have.

It doesn't matter now, because she's seen it. She's seen the animal bordering on a monster hidden behind fair skin and golden hair, she's felt the icy fear of caged prey, stared down by something they cannot hope to survive. She did, of course, survive, but that didn't change what she'd seen.

He'd leave if she asks, she thinks.

For some reason, she can't.

Maybe she's afraid to approach him.

Maybe she just doesn't want him to go.

Maybe it's more than that.

The tales of the Cataclysm make sense now. She'd forgotten about it all, brushed aside the stories into the overall ordeal of her 'near death experience', wrapping it up as one neat little package of "That happened, and it's over now, so whatever." But it wasn't just that. She should have picked back through it some more, and looked deeper into everything.

Ladybug had drowned in the dreaded dark waters, and she'd seen the bottom. She'd seen what lived there, what was the source of the stories. She'd been to the depths, and met death itself, in its own home where it shredded passersby into bloody strips and drowned fishermen for so much as inching into the wrong spot at the wrong time. She'd met the creature that lurked below, that no one else had ever survived even seeing.

Ladybug had made friends with it, and forgotten what it was capable of.

How was someone supposed to feel, at a moment like this? Was there a right way or a wrong way to handle it? She didn't know. She was a pirate, not a diplomat, she knew how to press the right buttons to piss people off, not to navigate the proverbial minefield she was in currently.

What do you do, when someone you want to like, turns out to be a murderer?

The sun has set, the waters dark black and reflecting nothing in the moonless sky, when she can finally bring herself to approach him again. Her footsteps echo within the hull of the hijacked ship, lit only by sparse lanterns, and if she encounters any of them, the original crew members skitter away from her in fear. They think she's immortal, and they think he's her pet. Above, the deck is silent, empty, the rest of the crew vanishing below as soon as Ladybug allowed, and Chat is coiled up like a snake on the rails at the head of the ship. He's out of the way, and hasn't spoken a word to anyone or moved elsewhere on the ship at all in the time since their last talk.

It's been a week.

He hasn't tried to talk to her, or even look at her. He's sat here gazing out over the sea, unmoving, almost as if he's waiting for permission.

For what, she doesn't know.

"Hey." Is all she can get out as she comes close, her footsteps more tentative and hesitant than she'd have hoped. She knows he can tell. He turns his head, catching her in the green glow of his eyes in the dark, and it takes all her willpower not to flinch. For some reason, she feels like he knows that, too. He doesn't say anything, only watching her, expectant. She doesn't know what he's expecting, and she can only swallow her trepidation and hold out a hand with a mug. It trembles in her grip, but her voice is deceptively strong. "Join me?"

The mermaid turns further, both of his inhuman eyes entering her vision, and stares down at the offered drink. He looks skeptical, and after staring down at it, looks back up at her. He's silent, waiting.

"I promise it's not poisoned."

He takes the mug, warily, still eying it like it might bite him. It would be funny if it wasn't so stiff, so distrusting. As if they were enemies.

…Are they?

Ladybug turns, and leans her back against the rail a couple feet beside him, forcing an air of confidence. Taking a drink of her own mug, she isn't looking at him when she says, "We can trade if you want."

That was enough. He takes a drink.

And then splutters, coughing disgustedly. "What is this?!" He hisses, and she almost smiles. It's the first thing he's said in days.

"Alcohol." She answers simply, taking a long, long drink of her own. "It'll drown your sorrows and let you make a fool of yourself without a care in the world."

If she were looking at him, she'd have seen the way he crinkled his nose as he sniffed at it, before trying again to drink it. It went better than the first time.

It doesn't get rid of the silence between them, tense as glass and ready to shatter at any moment.

He breaks it first. "Ladybug, I-"
She cuts him off.

"You killed her."

Chat flinches. He curls into himself some. Ladybug isn't sure what else to say. She says what comes to mind first, after a pause.

"Her name was Natalie." She takes another drink. "She was rude to her crew, and would send men overboard if they talked back to her. She liked coffee too much, and they say she used to keep cats on her ship. She'd claim it was to keep mice at bay, but the crew saw how she'd pet them when she thought no one was looking."

His hands tightened around the mug, but not enough to shatter it.

"We used to say her fate would be sad, because we always thought she was in love with Hawkmoth."

"Isn't the friend of your enemy also your enemy?" He asked, quietly. Ladybug swirled the liquid around, watching it. Thinking.

"... No." She decided, finally. "I think she could have been good, but she got caught under his influence and got stuck there."

"Do you think she would have ever left?"

"... No." Another sip. "We knew she'd never make it out alive. It's sad, but that's how it is for all of us, too."

He grimaced, catching her attention out of the corner of her eye. "All of you, as in… pirates."

"Yeah."

Silence fell, again, the tension hardening back into glass. She glanced at him.

"You don't like pirates." It wasn't a question, she didn't have to ask. It was obvious.

"No." He said no more.

"Chat Noir." Ladybug said his name with finality, and took another big gulp of her drink before continuing, the liquid courage making her tactless. "Now is the catalyst. Either we make our peace or forever go our separate ways, so if there's anything to be said, say it now."

Her tone was unwavering, steadfast. She was getting braver, due to the alcohol, and wasn't afraid to put her foot down at this point. If they didn't work it out tonight, she had to tell him to leave.

If he didn't give her reason to see his side, to forgive him, she'd only ever see the monster from the depths of the Cataclysm.

"Fine." He turned, with such force that it almost seemed as if he'd knock himself into the water. "But you're going to tell me why you're a pirate."

"Deal." She held out a hand. He just looked at it. Deciding she didn't feel like explaining, she waved it off. "Go on, say your peace."

There was a long pause. Whether it was Chat collecting his thoughts, or hesitating, or what it was, she didn't know. He downed the cup before he even started. "It was… decades ago, I don't know. Fifty years, give or take?"

Ladybug choked. "Fifty?!"

He raised an eyebrow at her. "I told you, mermaids live into the hundreds. Fifty is nothing. Anyway,"

He trailed off firmly, eying her. She took the hint, and drowned her words.

"Whenever it was… I wasn't always alone. See, for every generation, there's a pair of us born to inherit the powers of Creation and Destruction. The two always have to be together, they keep each other in line and in balance, and our world stays at peace under that. At least, it's supposed to, anyway."

"What does this have to do with you?" She asked, and he shot her a look.

"I'm one of the two."

"...Oh." She felt like that was supposed to make sense, like some magical revelation that answered everything, except she was still confused.

"I inherited the power of Destruction. And… she inherited the power of Creation." Ladybug whispered a faint questioning "She?", but Chat continued right over her. "It was up to us to keep the balance in order, and in the meantime, it was my job to protect her. Creation can never protect herself, at least not with violence, and sometimes that's what needs to be used to save her."

This still wasn't making sense. Did she drink too much? Her mug wasn't empty yet. How many times had she refilled it before she came up here, again?

"Protecting her was my one primary responsibility. If I did nothing else with my life, I had to at least do that. And do you know what happened, Ladybug?"

He was looking at her, his glowing eyes feeling as if they were burning through her soul. She shook her head, glued in place and silenced beyond her control.

"I failed her, and she died." He finally said, his face torn between intensity and sorrow. "I was born to protect her. We were two halves of a whole. She was perfect, the sun shined when she smiled and I could do anything with her by my side, we could do anything together. If anything happened to me, she could take care of me, she could heal me. She was Creation, she could do anything. She was amazing."

His eyes were filling with tears, and though she didn't realize it, Ladybug's were too. He was staring at her as if she held the answers, and she didn't. When he continued, his voice was strained, gaining volume as his emotions tipped over.

"But that's not what happened. That's not what happened. She was the one that got hurt. She was the one that died. And what could I do? Absolutely nothing. Because I'm just Destruction, aren't I? I'm the one that attacks, I'm the one that falls back on violence, I'm the one that breaks things and kills people and I'm the one that let her DIE." The last word came out as a shout, tears finally spilling over his cheeks, his voice devolving into sobs. "She was my other half and I watched him kill her."

"Hawkmoth." Ladybug breathed, everything clicking together. Her hands itched to reach out to him, to comfort him, and she didn't want to question why. Chat nodded harshly.

"It's been so long. She's been gone for so long, Ladybug, and I don't know what to do without her. Fifty years is nothing for us and it feels like a lifetime already and I want it to be over." He looks away, back out over the ocean, and covers his mouth with his free hand. He's trying to cover up the sounds of his own overwhelming heartache, and Ladybug just puts a hand on his shoulder, lightly enough for him to pull away if he wants to. He doesn't. "The incarnations of Creation and Destruction are always soulmates, and mermaids mate for life. She was my other half in every possible way and without her I'm just-"

He cut himself off, choking and hiccuping. She almost thought he wouldn't finish the thought, until he turned back toward her, with the most desperate puppy expression she'd ever seen in her life.

"I really am just a monster without her, aren't I? I didn't want to kill Natalie, I didn't mean to, it was just the way she was threatening you and you look like her and it was so much like back when he killed her and I couldn't go through it again, and…" He was rambling, somehow her hand had ended up clutched in his and he was slowly curling in on himself further, as if he could escape his pain. "All of the humans who came by my ravine, I shouldn't have blamed them but I did and I was scared-"

Ladybug had had enough, and finally, she just wrapped her arms around him and pulled him close, almost crying as much as he was. "It's okay, it's okay." She soothed, pitching her voice low and repeating it over and over, just wanting him to relax again. It hurt to see him this way, she didn't know why, but it hurt as if she was feeling his pain too.

She didn't want him to keep going, to keep explaining, when she already understood but he did, he'd opened the floodgates and the choked words didn't stop coming and it was almost as if he'd never gotten to talk to anyone about any of this, and then it hit her that he hadn't.

"The others are dead. They started disappearing after she died, because we couldn't protect them. I tried, I really did, but she would come up with plans and solutions to make everyone happy even if the humans didn't realize it, and without her, all I could do was fight back and it didn't work. Even him, he knew, he hunted us all down to give him what she couldn't and he didn't stop until he never saw another one of us."

Assuming he meant Hawkmoth again, but she was afraid interrupt him to ask.

"He was a pirate, Ladybug. He was a pirate and he took her away and then he killed them all."

She just held him tighter. She had no words, nothing that could fix or change anything he'd gone through. She couldn't bring back his other half, or erase his heartbreak. Soon, he pulled away and stared up at her with such betrayal that it hurt.

"But you, you're a pirate too. If there were more of us, would you hunt them too? Would you… are you like him?"

The broken tone he spoke in, the defeated look on his face. It stabbed right through her heart and wouldn't dislodge itself and she found herself holding onto his shoulders so much tighter.

"No! Chat I would never. I'm not that kind of pirate." She held on so tightly she might leave bruises, but he didn't complain, and only took hold of her arms just as hard as she caught his gaze. She hoped beyond hope that he would understand, that he could believe her. "It was the only option, Chat. It was the only thing I could do, and now I have no choice but to keep going after Hawkmoth until he's gone."

"But why? Why do you go after him?"

"I…" It had all started so long ago, it began so simply and completely out of her control. She'd never bothered to explain it to anyone else, her crew already knew, and the words to do so now were completely escaping her grasp. She shook her head, and let the shortest version she could come up with fall out of her mouth. Now wasn't the time to be telling him her life story, all the nuances and reasoning. What he needed right now was a reassurance, not a history lesson. "Because he came after me, Chat. Becoming a pirate was the only way to escape him, and now, no one else will stand up to him. I'm not a pirate for the same reasons your Hawkmoth was, I'm not going to hurt you, and I never would have hurt someone you cared about."

That was it, that was the last straw before his self control broke. Forget the floodgates, the entire dam came crumbling down, and then he was just a blubbering mess in her arms, clinging to her as if she'd disappear if he let go.

"You're so much like her." He cried, clutching her tighter, and her heart broke into thousands of tiny little pieces. Was she only making it worse if she was so similar? "Why?! Why is fate taunting me?"

"Chat…"

He continued right over her, as if he couldn't hear her at all. "Why? We're bound for life, our souls are connected, I cannot love anyone the way I do her so why does it feel like I love you? Why does it feel like you're her, why does it feel like she isn't gone when you're here? Am I so shallow that anyone who looks like her makes my heart cry?"

Ladybug froze, unable to process his tirade fully. Oh, no, this was so much more complicated than she'd thought. She really was just making it worse, she was so similar to his dead soulmate that he was confusing the two, and it was tearing him apart inside. She needed to push him away, to separate herself from him, ease his confusion and let him mourn, this wasn't her place and she couldn't help him so why wasn't she letting go?

"I'm so sorry." He mumbles through his tears, defeated, sliding off the rail and onto the deck floor to collapse in an overwhelmed heap. She goes with him, not letting go for a moment, until they're both on the floor and she's still hugging him so tightly, wishing that could make it better.

She was wrong. She had been so wrong. Chat wasn't a monster, he never had been.

He was a misguided, heartbroken widower, torn apart by decades of mourning his soulmate alone at the bottom of the ocean. And still, he'd chosen to save her, and she'd only turned on him without hearing his side. It was no wonder he'd been so scared from the start.

He wasn't hers, but still, she felt for him. It was tragic every which way around, and if she could make it better, she would, but there was nothing to be done. Part of her wished his Hawkmoth was still alive so she could kick his ass.

"Shhhh, it's okay." She soothed again, petting his soft hair and rocking them both gently side to side. "I'm here for you, Chat."

They stayed like that for a while, how long, she didn't know. Ladybug couldn't care less about paying attention to the time, instead just wanting him to be okay, not matter how long that it took. Eventually he did calm down a considerable amount, his cries turning to faint sniffles, though his grip on her didn't loosen at all. When he wasn't making any noise at all, she patted him gently, and pulled back some.

"How are you feeling, Chaton?"

Chat leaned back to look at her too, and his eyes blew wide at the nickname. Hers did too, the instant she realized what she'd said, and she was already scrabbling for an apology.

"I'm so sorry Chat, that was out of line, I-"

But then he was so much closer, and in an instant his lips crashed to hers and it was as if they both fell under a spell, unable to remember what was right.