Chapter 3

I'm so sick. This chapter nearly killed me. I'm sorry if its awful. Please review.

Hugs'n'shit

lil-fledgling

Adrian hadn't told anyone. It was surprising, Marinette was sure that everyone would be talking about her secret. But when she apprehensively crept into homeroom on Thursday morning, nothing happened. Alya didn't attack her, demanding to know why Marinette had never told her, Kim wasn't daring her to some sort of dance off to prove that he was superior. And best of all Chloé wasn't making horrible disparaging remarks about Marinette's oblivious lack of skill, talent and grace.

Adrian hadn't told anyone. And it made Marinette love him even more.

So the weeks pasted by and the talent show steadily drew closer and closer. Unknown to Marinette, Adrian stayed after fencing for the extra two hours to watch her practice.

But be also had seen a change in Ladybug. She was more focused in battle, more determined and more playful with him, their fun, mid-battle banter coming easier and more frequently.

"You seem different, M'lady," Chat Noir brought it up one night on patrol, when they were taking a break on the rooftop of some apartment building.

"How do you mean?" She asked, turning to look at him. The masked hero shrugged, unsure of how to explain it.

"I dunno, you just seem, happier." Ladybug blinked a couple of times before blushing. He actually noticed that?

"Things are just going really well in my life right now, I guess," She said, unable to meet his gaze. "I'm doing something that I really love and it's helping me with my confidence. I had kept it a secret from everyone for so long and then when Adr-a guy I really like, found out, I thought it would be all over for me." Ladybug smiled down into her hands and Chat couldn't help but admire how perfect she looked, lit up against the night landscape of Paris.

"But he didn't tell anyone. I don't know why but I'm so grateful. It makes me feel so much better knowing that there's someone watching out for me, you know?" Chat bit his tongue to keep from saying,

But I look out for you too.

LG&CN

That bliss came to a screeching halt when Chloé Bourgeois got curious.

"Where is he?" Once again Chloé and Sabrina were waiting outside the school in the Bourgeois's off white limo, waiting for Adrian to leave fencing class. Once again, he was nowhere to be seen.

"Maybe he has a private lesson," Sabrina suggested timidly, "or he went out the back door…"

"No," Chloé snapped, loosing her patience. "if something had changed with Adrian's schedule I would know. We're going in." Chloé stomped out of the limo and towards the school, Sabrina scurrying after her. Into the gym with out thinking and running straight into-

"Marinette?!" The two girls stared at each other, Marinette horrified and Chloé surprised, before she burst into loud peels of malicious laughter.

"Playing ballerina, are we Marinette?" She said in between chuckles. "Pathetic. You're the clumsiest person I know! You can barely walk with out tripping on your own two feet." Marinette's face heated and she felt her throat close up in the telltale warning of tears. She opened her mouth to defend her self only to be cut off by Chloé.

"And look at your hair, in a bun! God I thought you ditched that awful hairstyle last year! I didn't think it was possible, but it looks worse now then it did then!" Hot tears spilled down Marinette's face and her shoulder's shook with the humiliation of being found out. Chloé's verbal assault tore down her fragile wall of confidence, like a wreaking ball to a silk screen. She had been doing so well! She had actually begun to think that she could do this, that she was talented and beautiful. But that was all gone, with a few well-chosen words.

"And as if you could pull off that ballerina outfit!" Chloé snorted, looking Marinette's quivering figure up and down. "Pink is so not your color, and that tutu is not doing anything for your hips. Don't even get me started on those ugly, ratty shoes, either." Marinette turned to run, to hide away in the change room and cry until her body had nothing left. How could she ever show her face in class again? And then it all got worse, because Adrian was standing right there.

"What the hell is going on?" He asked, looking between a smirking Chloé and a sobbing Marinette.

"Adrian, I finally found you!" Chloé leaped forward, linking her arm with the blond boy. "Can you believe this? Marinette dances! Have you ever heard of anything more ridiculous in your life?" And that was the final straw, Marinette broke away, making a mad dash for the girl's change room, her loud sobs echoing behind her until the thick gym door banged shut, locking the pitiful sound away.

"Marinette, wait-!" Chloé gripped on to Adrian's arm, keeping him from running after the other girl.

"What are you doing Adrian? Leave her alone; she's not worth it. Did you see what she was wearing? You can't possibly be seen with someone like that!" Adrian tugged his arm out of Chloé's sticky tentacles, looking thunderous.

"Why would you say something like that?" He said quietly. "Who gave you the right to say such awful things to people who don't deserve it? What has Marinette ever done to you?" Chloé opened her mouth, but nothing came out. She had never been told off by Adrian before, she had never seen those green eyes so deadly or hostile. Chloé watched him sprint after Marinette, faintly wondering if he was right.

LB&CH

"Ah the insecurities of being a teenager," Hawkmoth smirked as he watched his akuma flutter off to his next victim. "It makes the heart so deliciously…vulnerable."

Marinette sat cured up between the wall and her locker, arms wrapped around her knee's as she cried hopelessly. Tiki was calling to her soothingly from inside the aluminum box but her words didn't reach her partner. Neither Kwami or Miraculous Holder noticed the little black butterfly flutter through the open window above their heads and make a beeline for Marinette's outstretched legs, easily absorbing into her pointe slippers.

Hawkmoth knew his akuma had reached it's target. Faintly he could feel the girl's transformation. But something was wrong. No matter how much he tired, he could not reach his victim, only able to receive broken thoughts, like an old radio with a bad connection. It was as if the girl was… fighting the akumatization.

Impossible.

Hawkmoth closed his eyes focusing all his energy on the girl.

"You are Black Swan, you can show the world how talented you really are but-" the connection was completely cut off and the villain roared in displeasure. He hadn't been able to tell her to get the Miraculouses!

LB&CH

"Wh-what's happening?" Marinette gasped, doubled over as a strange burning cold traveled up her body. The feeling was so dark and evil. She gagged, her body trying desperately to reject what ever was happening to her until a strange voice filtered through her head.

"You are Black Swan…" Her guard faltered and in one motion the darkness over took Marinette's small body, her cloths twisting and changing into an elaborate black and gold tutu, which flared wide at her hips. Her body suit went from a blush pink to a deep black, matching the skirt. Her hair fell from the bun Chloé had only just finished mocking and her hung loose and wild, fanning around her head like a dark, ethereal halo. And her shoes, which housed the evil akuma, turned a black darker than night, ribbons snaking up her legs in a complicated crisscross pattern.

For a moment Marinette was gone, and in her place stood a girl who was completely taken over. Until something in the back of her mind wiggled free from the chains of its prison, whispering,

"What about Ladybug?"

The Black Swan faltered. Ladybug, she was the hero of Paris, with Chat Noir. She stumbled, before shaking her head and rising up on her toes, her form perfect. Such a little thought like that wouldn't stop her! She floated towards the door, throwing it open and making a beeline for the exit, not even noticing Adrian, who stood gaping at the beautiful, evil girl sweet Marinette had become.

The akuma had won, or so it seemed, as Black Swan stood high up on a building, planning her attack on the city. The akuma had won, until the little part of Ladybug that had come free attacked it, plunging Marinette into a state of dangerous unrest that began a struggle for her mind and soul. A battle for her life.