Quick warning, in order to ensure that no one tries to track her down, Marinette basically fakes her own suicide. This chapter includes characters reacting to things like suicide notes.
Stay safe.
Where are you Ladybug?
Alya heard the news when she checked her phone after waking up.
"Hawkmoth revealed, Gabriel Agreste arrested"
"Chat Noir Killed in final battle against Hawkmoth, revealed to be 18 year old Adrien Agreste"
She immediately calls her friend, trying to find out what happened. Marinette doesn't pick up. She calls again, still no answer. Getting dressed quickly, she hurries out the door to Marinette's house, making her way up the stairs and pushing open the trap door to Marinette's room. She finds her friend sitting on her balcony, staring out over the Paris skyline.
"Marinette?" The girl turned to face her. "What happened?"
"He's dead."
"Adrien?" Alya asks quietly.
Marinette just nods.
Alya pulls her friend into a hug. "What happened?" she asks, and Marinette tells her everything.
"Where's Marinette? Wasn't she going to meet us here?"
Alya sighed and shook her head. "I don't know Rose, she didn't even want to get out of bed when I went over earlier." It was a lie, Alya wasn't sure her friend had even gone to bed in the first place. Ladybug had been sighted swinging through Paris since before dawn, and all Alya had to do was look to the top of the church to see the red and black heroine keeping watch over her partner's grave.
Ever since Adrien had died fighting Hawkmoth his father, Marinette had been distant. Avoiding her, avoiding their friends. She had barely seen her friend since that night. They had cried together, and then she just pushed her away. Pushed all of them away.
She looked up at the stoic silhouette of her hero, her best friend. If Alya was more dramatic, she would say that Marinette had died the same horrible night that Adrien had, leaving nothing but Ladybug behind. Alya refused to lose both of her friends to Hawkmoth.
Alya knocked on the trapdoor that led up to Marinette's room.
"Marinette! Can I come in?" There was nothing but silence from the other side. She sighed and knocked again. "I know you're hurting right now, but please let me help." She waits and knocks again. "If you don't answer I'm coming in."
Alya waits a moment before pushing the trapdoor open and climbing into the room. "Marinette?" She sighed again when she saw that the lights were off and the room was quiet. Assuming her friend was out once again as Ladybug she wandered over to her friend's desk. That's when she saw the letter.
It's interesting how such a simple thing can make someone's stomach drop.
The letter was a simple white envelope, addressed to "Mama & Papa". Her heart sinking, she picked up the envelope and revealed a second one underneath it. This envelope was addressed to her.
She opened the envelope tentatively and pulled out a piece of paper. It was Marinette's handwriting.
She read the letter. She read it again. She dropped it. She turned and rushed over to the sewing box that hid the miracle box. With trembling hands, she entered the secret combination, dreading what she would find inside.
Nothing. No miracle box, no miraculi, nothing but another envelope and a small bracelet.
Alya, You are the only one who knows I was Ladybug, the only one who will know that I'm leaving not as Marinette but as Ladybug, the Guardian of the Miraculous. The Miraculous need to leave Paris. This city has become so drenched in magic and chaos, it needs time to reach equilibrium again. As their guardian, I must go with them. It's probably best for everyone to think I'm dead. In a way, it's true. Wherever I end up, I won't be able to live as Marinette anymore. I'm sorry to ask this of you Alya, but I need you to keep this last secret for me. No one can know why I left. No one can know that I was Ladybug. After you read this, please destroy this letter. I'm sorry for not saying goodbye in person. But I know if I did, you would try and stop me. I love you Alya, you've been a better friend than I ever deserved. And Trixx wants you to know that they loved having you as their holder. Goodbye Alya Cesaire, Holder of the Fox, and my best friend. Marinette Dupain-Cheng, Holder of the Ladybug, Guardian of the Miraculous
Alya sat on the curb, clutching the bracelet that Marinette had left her tightly as police lights flashed all around her. They were searching the house for any sign of where Marinette could have gone. They wouldn't find any. Marinette had made that clear enough in her letter. Marinette was gone, she wasn't coming back, and only Ladybug knew where she had disappeared to.
Alya hadn't known what to do after reading the letter. She had stuffed it deep in her backpack where no one would be able to find it, and then brought the letter addressed to Marinette's parents down to Tom and Sabine, getting them to sit down and read the letter. They had rushed out of the bakery almost immediately, calling behind them for Alya to call the police to help them search.
Alya did, and then stared at the letter that had been tossed aside, wondering if she dared read it. Eventually, she gave into her curiosity and sense of dread, opening the letter to see what made Marinette's parents look so frantic and scared.
I'm sorry Mama, Papa I've tried to be strong, and I've been able to not be akumatized for so long. But it's too much. Lila and Chloe bullying me in school, Adrien dying, all these years of Hawkmoth turning anything I try and feel into a weapon against me. I'm so tired. I thought things were supposed to get better after Hawkmoth was defeated, but it's all just gotten worse. I wanted things to go back to normal, but I don't think that that's possible anymore. I wanted to hope, but I can't anymore. I'm sorry. It's not your fault, this is all me. Don't try and find me, you won't be able to. Please, for your sake and mine, just let me go. I love you. Marinette
The police were called, and they searched all over. Their friends got together, and searched all over. But despite all the efforts, the Dupain-Chengs looked crushed almost from the beginning. In the first few hours they were frantic, rushing out the door after reading the letter and leaving Alya in the bakery to call the police and report Marinette missing. They searched all over, but they couldn't find Marinette. Neither could anyone else, and before long their desperation turned to depression.
Alya's friends searched longer than anyone else. Almost all of them getting together every day to search across Paris. But, little by little, people stopped showing up. Alya was one of the first. Nino was one of the last. It had led to one of their biggest fights as a couple ever.
They had thrown insults at each other that were barbed and angry, things they had both regretted. But when Nino had come to her house and broken down crying, she had held him and cried with him, both of them mourning their friend. Because, even if Alya knew that Marinette hadn't committed suicide, she still didn't know if her friend was alive.
While the others had been searching the Paris streets, Alya had been searching through the internet looking for any sign of Ladybug. And she had found nothing, not a whisper of a ladybug themed hero. She had kept looking, expanding her search to any superheroes with animal themes, in the hopes that she would be able to find Marinette using one of the other miraculi. But none of the heroes she tracked down matched. Ladybug had disappeared without a trace, and Marinette was completely lost.
When yet another lead had been a bust, Alya broke. She had been looking and looking, and every time she got her hopes up she had had her hopes destroyed.
This time, it was her turn to find Nino and have him hold her as she cried.
Through her tears she told him about the night that Marinette disappeared. About what Marinette... what Ladybug had asked of her. About how they were the same person and how she had been the only one who had known. How she had been looking for months now and how her last lead had been yet another bust.
He held her, and they cried together, mourning their friend all over again.
The next day Nino walked into a store and bought a ring. A few days later he took Alya on a date and gave the ring to her, telling her that he never wanted to be separated from her. She took the ring, and told him that she never wanted to lose him either.
Their wedding was beautiful. Almost all of their former classmates came, including everyone that was with them in the condiment resistance, but there were two seats that sat empty the whole night. One seat for the hero who would have been Nino's best man, and one for the hero who would have been Alya's maid of honor. It was one of the happiest days of their life, but there was still the undercurrent of sadness that followed both of them, and most of their friends.
There were supposed to be two more there.
Alya had cried when picking out a dress, because it was supposed to be Marinette who made it. Sabine had cried with her when she showed up on her doorstep and asked her if she would come with them, because Marinette was supposed to be there.
Marinette was supposed to make Alya's dress, and Adrien was supposed to make a sappy speech. But here they were, and in Alya's mind she cursed Gabriel Agreste with the worst fates she could imagine.
Nino smiled tiredly as he walked up the stairs to his and Alya's apartment. The party he had been DJing for had gone really well. Everyone there had loved the music he'd selected, and he'd even handed out a couple of business cards out to people who were interested in hiring him for other gigs. All the same, he was excited to finally get home and snuggle into bed with Alya.
The sight that he saw when he opened the door wiped the satisfied but tired smile off of his face completely, and sent him rushing to the couch where his wife was both awake and crying.
"Alya? What's wrong?" She just shook her head and pulled him into a tight hug. "Babe, please, you're scaring me. What's wrong?"
Alya laughed wetly. "Nino, I found her. I found her!"
"Found who?"
"I found Ladybug!" She let go of him and pulled him over to the laptop open on the coffee table. Nino looked at the photo open on the screen and stared in shock. There, standing on the roof of a slightly broken down building, was Ladybug.
On the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, a red and black suited heroine lands on the roof of her building. Below her, she can see the lights are on in her apartment. She thinks she knows who it is, but it's Gotham, so it's best to check first.
With a muttered phrase, her costume disappeared and a small red bug like creature lands in her hands. She hands it a cookie from her bag and smiles as they eat it.
"Do you mind checking the apartment when you're done, Tikki? I'm pretty sure it's just Hood, but I want to be safe."
The kwami smiles and gobbles down the last of the cookie. "Sure Marinette!" Tikki says, before they fly down to the window below them. In only a moment, they were back up on the roof, hiding a laugh behind their hand. "You're all good, Marinette!"
Wondering if she should ask what her friend found funny, she decided to just go see for herself.
Marinette makes her way down the fire escape and into her apartment through the window. Inside she is greeted by the sight of her partner in crime, quite literally, standing over a table piled high with some of her favorite foods. Behind her partner there was a ridiculous banner that had been hung up on her wall. It said, in what were most definitely the most garish and ugly colors he had been able to find, "Happy Anniversary!"
Red Hood pouted at her when she started laughing. Which, of course, made her laugh even harder. Could you blame her? The way that his face scrunched up around the mask was cute hilarious.