Chapter Text
Marinette’s first clue had only made sense in retrospect.
At the time, though, she was nothing more than a little surprised when Mylene approached her on the way back from lunch, right outside the school. "Marinette! Hey, Marinette, do you- um, could I talk to you? For a moment?"
"Sure!" For a change, Marinette wasn't running late for anything, so she was happy to oblige with a smile. "What did you need?"
Mylene was silent for an unusually long time, and then finally mumbled, "Can I ask a personal question?"
At this, Marinette grew a little wary. As a keeper secrets and perpetrator of a double superhero life, she lived in dread of personal questions, especially ones like, "Are you Ladybug?" or, "Do you have any detailed thoughts about Adrien Agreste's smile?" or, "Alya can be a bit much with that blog of hers, right?" Still, she could see that this matter seemed to be important to her classmate, so she steeled herself and nodded.
Mylene looked left. Then she looked right. Having confirmed that no one else was around, she leaned forward and spoke just above a whisper. "It's been really great with- you know, Ivan and me. I've been thinking about- about lots of things, and- and the future and- and other things, so I got to w- wondering about- Um, I've been wondering- figuring you'd know- um, and- and I wanted to ask what is it like?"
Marinette had a lot of trouble parsing that whole statement for actual meaning, but eventually concluded that Mylene- in the wake of the kiss she had shared with her boyfriend Ivan in the aftermath of the Horrificator incident- wanted to try kissing as a deliberate, planned act of affection, and as a person with strong fears, she wanted reassurances that it wouldn't end in disaster. Marinette had no idea why Mylene had picked her for this reassurance, but she was more than happy to be of help. "Well, Mylene, I expect it's different for every couple, but in general, it's the stuff fantasies are made of." She surrendered to a dreamy smile, imagining what it would be like to actually kiss Adrien, the greatest boy in the entire world.
Mylene's eyes grew wide, and she smiled back. "Wow. Thanks, Marinette. I'll keep that in mind."
"No problem!" Together, the girls went to their next class, and Marinette was in a good mood for a whole fifteen minutes before a giant gorilla attacked downtown Paris, and she needed to cut class again to take care of the incident as Ladybug.
Adrien was very used to being the target of broad smiles. After all, he was a world-famous model; smiles went with the territory. But grins were a different matter, and the first indication he had that something was seriously wrong was the positively evil grin that Kim gave him when they encountered each other in the boys' locker room soon after Adrien returned from saving Paris from a giant gorilla as Cat Noir.
Figuring that he would try faking his way through it, Adrien waved. "Hey, Kim. What's up?"
The bigger boy's grin grew even wider. "Dude, major respect." He followed that up with a thumbs-up.
Adrien blinked, trying to make sense of things but failing utterly. "Um, thanks?"
Kim nodded, and then leaned over and whispered, "Don't mess this up, man." Then he gave another thumbs-up and went on his way.
Adrien could only stand there blinking for the next minute. Maybe this was about a fencing tournament?
But then what had been up with that grin?
The next day started for Marinette in the worse possible way: she had no sooner sat down at her desk then Chloe was standing next to her, looming and fuming.
"Good morning," Marinette deadpanned.
Chloe's face was actually turning red. "I don't know how you managed it," she said- or rather, snarled, "but just know that you are nothing but trash and it means nothing. Eventually the novelty will wear off and then I'll prevail again."
Marinette found herself squinting and wondering if there was a part of this conversation she had missed. None of what Chloe had said was out-of-character, but she usually needed some kind of a lead-in to calling people trash. "Um, what?"
Chloe spun her heels and stomped back over to her desk, hands clenched into white-knuckle fists at her side.
Marinette looked over to Alya. "Did that make any sense to you?"
But her friend was playing with her phone, expression intent. "Probably not. What happened?"
"Chloe came over her spouting nonsense about how I'm trash."
"Oh. It must be Tuesday. Did you fight her?"
"No, I was just kind of confused."
"That works, too." Alya looked up from her phone. "I was just reading that a new bad guy calling himself Copy Protection is causing trouble at the tech expo downtown."
"Oh, wow, that sounds- uh, wow! I'm going to hit the bathroom before class starts, bye!" Marinette ran out of the classroom, already planning the route she would take as Ladybug to the expo, and never noticed that Adrien had yet to show up.
What had already been a trying day- first, there had been the attack of Copy Protection before he could get to school, then a second attack by a 'The Inflator' during lunch, and lastly what had seemed like a third attack during PE but turned out to be a thrill-seeker illegally trying to climb the Eiffel Tower in a Spider-Man suit- took a turn for the weird when Adrien was running back to class and passed Alix in the hall. Her eyebrows rose when she saw him, and she began smirking with an intensity that made him wonder if she was about to be transformed into a supervillain. (Again.)
But instead she just laughed and said, "Huh, three times today? You stud!"
"What?" Had she figured out that he was moonlighting as a cat-powered superhero?
But she passed by him without another word, and then he almost bumped into Marinette coming back from some errand.
Marinette liked to think that she was smarter than people like to give her credit for. If asked, any random classmate would have denied that Marinette had the makings of a superhero, but she had stepped up quite well when a pair of mysterious earrings randomly showed up in her possession, thank you very much. And in addition to now fighting supervillains an average of once per day, she had developed strategies- actual smart strategies- for managing her civilian life. Sometimes, they even worked!
Like the Class Notes Plan. Whenever she needed to run out to be Ladybug, she would have to get the notes she missed from someone else. Alya, as Marinette's bestie, would have been the perfect person to ask, but you could only bug the administrator of the Ladyblog to copy her notes so many times before she might get suspicious. So Marinette had a little chart at home of the people in her class, and duly checked off whenever she asked one of them for notes, making sure that she was spreading the 'love' evenly.
After using a request for a bathroom break to run over to Le Grand Paris to save another of Chloe's personal servants from an akuma infection, Marinette was back in class and walking over to today's 'notes buddy,' Juleka. "Hey, Juleka. Do you mind if I copy your notes from Miss Mendeliev's lecture? I was stuck in the bathroom with a stomachache."
Juleka, nice goth girl that she was, held up the notes. "Sure. You can give them back to me after study hall."
"Great! Thanks!" Marinette grabbed them and turned to go, but there was the distinct sound of someone clearing their throat in such a way that meant they had no need of actually clearing their throat. Marinette looked back, and found Juleka's best friend and seat-mate, Rose, standing up with a serious expression. "Rose, did you need something?"
"Marinette, as your friend, I just feel the need to say that-" She swallowed, and then blurted, "I hope you're being safe!"
Marinette nodded, understanding completely. Rose was a very kind-hearted girl, and it had to be tough for her to go to school so close to so many akuma attacks. Most of this very class had even been transformed into supervillains! No doubt she worried whenever someone left the classroom alone, no matter the reason. "Rose, I appreciate you concern. Don't worry, I'm taking every precaution."
She was startled by the sudden sound of someone choking, and turned to see that Nathaniel, still in his seat in front of Rose, was having a coughing attack.
"Oh, no," Rose shrieked. She shot over to the boy and began patting his back. "There, there. Time heals all wounds."
That seemed to be an odd thing to say over a coughing fit, but Rose had the situation under control, so Marinette gave a parting smile and went on her way.
The last thing Adrien expected to hear in the school library was the phrase, "Adrien is not screwing Marinette."
No, check that, the real last thing he expected to hear was, "Adrien is totally screwing Marinette."
And so he turned the corner around a book shelf to meet up with his best bud Nino for their study hall session, only to find Nino holding court before Kim, Max, and Ivan saying, "Adrien is not screwing Marinette."
And Kim immediately replied, "Adrien is totally screwing Marinette."
And thus Adrien had apparently entered his least likely reality.
Cat-like reflexes took over, and he zipped back behind the bookshelf before the guys could see him. He stayed out of sight, but close enough to hear Max add, "I've done the math. Whenever Marinette is not in class, there's a 98% chance of Adrien being absent as well. The correlation goes down to 80% if we start with Adrien's absences and then check against Marinette, but his modeling career could explain the discrepancy."
Nino laughed. "Dudes, I'm telling you, there is no hanky-panky going on there. I'm not even sure Adrien likes girls, and Marinette is still crushing so hard that she can't even talk straight when she's not distracted."
Adrien supposed he should be worried that the most shocking thing about that statement was that a kid his age was actually using the phrase "hanky-panky" unironically.
But, wait, Marinette liked him? Wow, and all this time Adrien thought the poor girl was an epileptic.
And people thought they were-
-they were-
-having hanky-panky?
Adrien used the fine mental control honed over several months of being the acclaimed superhero Cat Noir to keep himself from imagining anything related to his previous thoughts. While his brain went into shut-down, he heard Ivan growl, "Well, Agreste better man up and commit to her, or I'm going to have to give him a talk. As my favorite philosopher once said, 'If you like it, put a ring on it.' Hiding that they're even dating is disrespectful to Marinette."
Kim chuckled. "I'd pay money to see you beat up Adrien Agreste for dishonoring Marinette. What would Mylene think of that?"
"Shut up!" Adrien heart the distinct sound of one of Ivan's meaty fists hitting Kim's left shoulder, a sound that everyone in their class knew well. "Marinette is a good person. She's nice to everyone. Mylene says so, too!"
"I'm still skeptical," Nino put in, and Adrien silently cheered his friend on. Then Nino added, "I'm telling you, Chloe has to have left Adrien terrified of girls. He's probably into guys just out of survival instinct."
On second thought, maybe it wasn't too late to go back to being home-schooled.
Marinette came home from school to find Gabriel Agreste's scary assistant-lady waiting for her in her parents' bakery.
"Marinette, dear," Mom said, coming from behind that counter. "You have company. Miss- uh-"
"I am Nathalie Sancoeur," the severe woman put in. "I am here on behalf of Mr Agreste to make you an offer, Miss Dupain-Cheng. Might we have a word in private?"
Marinette looked to her mom, who nodded, and so she led the way into the residential side of the building. Once she and Miss Sancoeur were seated in the living room, she said, "Am I going to be talking to Mr Agreste through the tablet again?"
Miss Sancoeur gave a single, sharp shake of her head. "It was felt that this is a conversation that should be kept between us women."
"O- kay." Marinette decided to just roll with it. "Then what is this offer about?"
Miss Sancoeur took a deep breath, and then said in a disturbingly even voice, "We know your secret."
What? Gabriel Agreste knew she was Ladybug? How? Why?
"And give the Agreste family's obvious investment in the matter, Adrien's father wanted to offer support, in his own way," Miss Sancoeur continued.
Support? Adrien's involvement? What did-
And suddenly Marinette figured it out. She realized what this was all about.
Adrien was Cat Noir!
Mr Agreste had found out, and now he wanted to bankroll their superheroics!
And Adrien was the shameless flirt in tight leather who Marinette saved the world with all the time!
She was unable to stop her blush and a giggle, but she managed to say, "I appreciate that. Thank you."
Miss Sancoeur nodded, and took out a piece of paper from her handbag. "This is a prescription for birth control pills. If you feel you cannot get it filled yourself, I can arrange to pick up the pills for you."
Wait, what?
Miss Sancoeur continued, "If you need anti-biotics, let me know, and I'll obtain a prescription for those as well."
Wait, what?
Miss Sancoeur reached into her handbag again, and came out with some very suggestively-shaped little packages. "Of course, health officials still recommend physical forms of birth control in addition to the pill, but I didn't know which kind you would prefer, so I bought samples of everything available over the counter. Let me know which one you like, and I can-"
"Wait," Marinette screeched, "what?"
Miss Sancoeur blinked once. "We just want Adrien to be safe and healthy."
With dawning horror, Marinette realized that this conversation- that every mystifying conversation she had endured over the last few days- was about sex.
Sex with Adrien.
When she regained consciousness, she ran out of the room, out of her parents bakery, and skidded to a stop in the middle of the street to shout, "I am not banging Adrien Agreste! We're just superheroes! We're shy, innocent kids who use magic thingies to become Ladybug and Cat Noir and we're not doing anything other than that!"
Standing there in the busiest intersection in Paris, being stared at by everyone who had been passing by, Marinette realized that she might have just over-reacted a little bit.
And so Hawk Moth's next akuma was able to destroy Ladybug and Cat Noir by targeting their civilian lives, and he used their miraculouses to reshape the world.
Let that be a lesson to people everywhere: teenage sex stops supervillains.