Disclaimer: I do not own Miraculous Ladybug. If I did, it would be an amazing world indeed.

The Puppeteer

"I am so bored!" cried Manon.

Marinette was babysitting once again and the two sat in Marinette's room. Manon had collapsed on the floor. She had been playing with her dolls from home, but had since stopped. While Manon had been preoccupied, Marinette was folding her laundry and putting it carefully back in the drawers of her bureau. Marinette paused her folding and looked curiously at Manon.

"Why is that, Manon?"

Manon flopped around on the floor, and then turned her head so she was sort of looking at Marinette. "None of my dolls are like Ladybug. I just want to pretend that I'm saving Paris, but I can't." Manon started wailing and pouting. Marinette looked at her hidden kawami with a panicked look. Tikki lifted her hands, quietly saying that she had no clue how to stop Manon from crying.

Marinette tried putting a hand on the shaking Manon, but Manon only flailed around more. Marinette then looked hopelessly around her room, looking for anything that would save her from the most certain disaster. Out of the corner of her eye, Marinette spied a discarded red and black polka-dotted sock. Her eyes sparkled as an idea flew into her brain.

"Manon, I have a great idea. How about we make our own Ladybug doll?" Marinette held up the sock, and folded it into the shape of a torso. "Then we can try to save Paris together!" Manon stopped her tantrum and looked curiously up at the sock.

"How is that supposed to look like Ladybug? It just looks like a sock to me." Manon pouted as she sat crisscross, apple sauce on the ground. Yet she kept her curious eyes on Marinette as she had turned, inspired, to her stack of scraps and pulled out a skin tone fabric, and a dark blueish-black material. Marinette scurried across her room to gather the other sock and her sewing kit.

She sat in front of Manon and cut up her socks, and other the other fabrics, into pattern pieces. Then she carefully took out several pins and pinned some of the pattern pieces together. Manon stayed quiet, but her pouty face turned to awe as Marinette magically turned her cut up sock inside out and put stuffing into it. The sock had started turning into the polka-dotted clad superhero.

Next, Marinette sewed the skin toned fabric together, then the blueish-black fabric was sewn together to resemble pigtails. The hair was then attached to the head, and the head was sewn onto the body. For the finishing touch, Marinette sewed a mask onto the blank faced doll. Marinette showed Manon. "How do you like it?" she asked.

Manon squinted at the doll, and a smile spread across her face. "It looks just like Ladybug! But why doesn't she have a face?" Marinette looked down at her doll, surprised. She had honestly forgotten to sew a face onto the hero.

Marinette pulled out some black and red thread along with a large needle, and offered it to Manon. "How about you help me stitch her face on?" Manon looked excitedly up at Marinette, silently asking her permission. Marinette giggled and nodded. Manon eagerly grabbed the utensils and gingerly pulled the doll into her lap.

For the next hour, Marinette patiently showed the basics of sewing to Manon and helped her sew cute, round eyes for Ladybug, along with a cheery red smile. By the time they were done, Manon's mom had arrived to take Manon home.

Without complaint, Manon climbed into her mother's arms and waved goodbye to Marinette.

"See you, Manon. Next time you come maybe we can work on some other dolls." Marinette smiled to herself as Manon smiled brighter.

"Can we make Lady Wi-Fi next?" Marinette led Manon and her mother to the door of her family's apartment and stopped to think.

"Maybe, but first I think we need to make Chat Noir doll first."

"That's a great idea, Marinette. We can't have one superhero without the other," Manon's mother, Nadja, added in. The two waved goodbye one last time and closed the door behind them.

000

Several weeks had passed by since the Puppeteer's appearance and Marinette and Manon were once again playing with the dolls that they had made together.

Just like the day that the two had first made the dolls, Manon was playing on the floor with the dolls while Marinette folded her laundry. It was a nice and calm evening where it was impossible for any akuma to attack. Manon's mother had gone out for the evening, so Marinette was in charge of Manon till around ten. It was nothing for Marinette to take care of Manon now that she could no longer be taken down by the puppy eyes. Therefore it was a very nice and comfortable evening for Marinette. Marinette was so content that she didn't even notice a certain black cat land on the roof outside her window.

Chat Noir politely knocked on the frame of Marinette's window and meowed slightly. Marinette jumped into a fighting stance and grabbed a stack of rather sharp knitting needles, ready to fight any person or thing that came close to her or Manon. Chat's eyes widened to an impossible size and his hands flew up at an incredible speed to show surrender.

"Marinette! Calm down! It's just me! Who else would be coming through your window at this time of night? Yeah, only me, so put your weapon down." Chat screeched, hoping that Marinette would not start stabbing him with the pointy sticks in her hands.

Marinette just shrugged. "You can never be too careful." She still did not lower her makeshift weapon, but her body visibly relaxed at the sight of Chat's face.

Manon ignored the reactions of the two as she dropped the doll that she was holding and ran up to Chat Noir to hug his legs as he carefully crept through the window.

"Oh my gosh! It's Chat NOIR!" Manon screamed as she held tight to his legs. Thank god my parents aren't home, Marinette thought as she finally put down some of the knitting needles. Chat awkwardly kept still as Manon cuddled his legs, but he soon returned the hug, and picked her up.

"Well hello, young one. You must be Manon. As you probably already know, I'm Chat Noir." He said in a charismatic way, with no flirting or puns between the lines. Manon nodded enthusiastically in agreement.

"Oh course I know who you are. See here's the doll Marinette and I made of you." Manon bossily pushed herself out of Chat's arms and grabbed the doll from the ground. "Here you can play as yourself." Manon sat down with her legs crossed over each other and she patted to the floor beside her. With a child-like, but also father-like smile, Chat eagerly sat down beside Manon and picked up his doll.

Marinette shook her head in disbelief. "Chat, what are you doing here?" She asked, exasperated.

Chat looked at her as if the answer was common knowledge. He gestured to the doll in his hand. "I'm here to play dolls." Just like Manon did a few seconds ago, Chat patted the carpet beside him. "Do you want to join, Princess?" Marinette was shocked by Chat's actions, but sat down beside him, nonetheless.

"Wow! Are you best friends with Chat Noir, Mari?" Manon watched in awe at the friendly interaction between Marinette and Chat. She had only met the superheroes of Paris a few times in her short life, and she couldn't believe that someone knew them personally.

"The stray cat has visited enough times that I guess I can consider him a friend." Marinette gave him a sly look out of the corner of her eye. She looked at the array of dolls in front of her. "So, Manon, which character would you like me to play?" Manon scanned the dolls with her stare. There were dolls of Lady Wi-Fi, Rogercop, The Evillustrator, Kung Food, The Mime, The Bubbler, Ladybug, Stormy Weather, and The Pharaoh. After a few more seconds of pondering, Manon grabbed the Ladybug doll and held it out to Marinette.

"You can play as Ladybug. You're the best at playing her anyway. I'll be Lady Wi-Fi and The Bubbler." Manon declared, grabbing her dolls.

"Hey, that's not fair. You get to play as two characters," Chat complained playfully.

"Well, it will make the battle more interesting if there are two villains." Manon crouched down and held the dolls in front of her. "You'll never get away from us, Ladybug and Chat Noir!" The villains cried. "All of the world will finally be without adults, and we will finally know your identities!"

` "Oh no, you don't!" Marinette cried back. "Chat! We've got to protect Paris! What will we do? Do you have a plan?" Marinette positioned her doll in front of Chat's.

"Well, My lady, I think we're in a catastrophic event here. I think out best course of action is to find where their akumas are hiding." Chat giggled at his own pitiful pun, and Marinette rolled her eyes. Chat positioned his doll in a heroic pose and pointed his little hand towards the villains. "That-a-way!" Marinette giggled again.

The dolls entered into a fierce combat battle with death defying attacks and stunts, close calls with identities, and way too many puns.

"Chat wouldn't say that!" Manon would declare every once in a while when the real Chat would say something that he would actually say, or when he was secretly flirting with the Ladybug doll, or Marinette. Chat would kindly apologize and instead say a heroic phrase to get the battle going again.

Another thing that would happen quite often during the doll battle was that Marinette would say something that only the true Ladybug would say, and Chat would laugh to himself. With lines like that, I wonder what took me so long to realize Marinette is Ladybug, he would think to himself.

The battle finally ended, and the exhausted toddler and the two teens collapsed on the floor and lazily stared up at the ceiling.

"It would be so cool if the real Ladybug was playing with us," Manon whispered right before she fell asleep.

If only she knew, Marinette and Adrien thought in unison. If only she knew.

Hey Readers! I published really late for me this time, but I also have a slightly longer chapter for you guys. Yeah! I have noticed, especially with this chapter, that I seem to fall into the MariChat pairing a lot. Sorry(not sorry). Anyway, I really would love to thank you guys for continuing to read this story. I am so amazed that it has gotten over 4,000 views! My chapter for tomorrow will be a fun fluff chapter again and will be about the Reflekta episode. Please comment, favorite, or follow if you wish. It is amazing to hear from you guys. And until I write again, TTFN!