Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

In the aftermath of that first mission, it was pretty quiet for a bit, to the point that Adri invited Mari to meet her at Café Attoms on a Saturday when she knew Bry would be tutoring and Cam and M would be at the café doing homework.

Adri was cleaning the counter when the bell tinkled. She looked up, ready to welcome the next customer, and… yes! “Maribug! I missed you!”

Marinette, clumsy as ever, rushed over to the counter, tripping over her own feet on the way to tackle-hug Adri and start babbling in French. “Adri! Are you busy? I’ve missed you so much too!”

“Barely,” Adri said, kissing Mari’s cheeks and switching to French. “And I always have time for my bug, even if I did just see you last week. Anything to drink? Oh, and sit down, sit down! Abuela will probably want to say hi and make sure you’re eating right, you know how she is.”

“Kitty, I live in a bakery. My own parents do that to me,” Mari said, giving her an affectionate shoulder punch.

“Who’s your friend, Adri?” Cam came over and stuck her hand out for Marinette to shake, while putting one arm over Adri’s shoulder.

Mari shifted so she wasn’t squeezing Adri. “My name’s Marinette.” Her English was good, but the French accent was pronounced. “Adri and I have been friends for years, we were in classes together.”

“How’d a French girl end up in Spain?”

“It’s a long story,” Mari said. “Adrienne is my partner.”

“That word doesn’t mean what you think it means in English, Maribug,” Adri said. “What she means is that we’ve known each other so long that we’re almost dating.”

“Yeah, exactly! I definitely wouldn’t know what it’s like to date Adri,” Mari stammered. “Definitely, totally, absolutely not!”

“You know, it’s okay if you’re… one of those lesbians…” Cam said. She looked clearly uncomfortable with the topic. “We won’t judge you.”

Adri started laughing only a second after Marinette burst into laughter. Dating was the least of their partnership. “We tried that,” she said. “It… when we’re older, when things aren’t so messy, we’ll try again.”

“So, kittycat, you wanted me to meet your friends?”

“This is Camryn, Bryden is the one tutoring the kid there, and that’s McKeyla at the table. Maribug, do you want anything to drink?”

“Black coffee, triple strong, and maybe a cookie and a few sugar cubes for the coffee?” (That was a polite way of saying she needed Tikki and Kaalki food.)

“Mari, that much caffeine is bad for you…” Adri still hurried behind the counter to get it, listening as Mari awkwardly sat down at the table with the girls.

“So, Marinette, how do you know Adri?” Cam asked.

“We went to school together for a year, and then we kept in touch. We got so close because we were the only two students who didn’t believe a liar who wrapped the rest of the class around her finger and wanted to discredit me and make Adri her girlfriend or something.” Mari raised her voice to the point Adri was definitely supposed to hear the next part. “Adri also gave me the worst advice I’ve ever heard about it.”

“I said I was sorry,” Adri called back, ducking under the counter to laugh and dig for the sugar cubes she kept for Kaalki. “It wasn’t my fault you didn’t tell me she threatened you, as soon as you did I retracted my advice!”

“I’m just messing with you, kitty, don’t worry.”

“Cute nickname,” Bry said.

“Adri was touch-starved for a while, thanks to her dad. When I met her, she would literally crawl into my lap to cuddle. The cat nicknames were a natural next step.” Mari sighed. “I wouldn’t try them yourself, if I were you.”

“Noted.”

M seemed eager to change the subject, busy fake-scribbling into ADISN as Adri brought the drinks over. “What do you like to do, Marinette?”

“I’m a fashion designer and I work part time in my parents' bakery. Lycée is pretty busy, so I don’t do much else besides a little babysitting. Speaking of, kitten,” Mari broke off, “do you want to call in to our game night this week? Alya and Nino miss you lots, and I know Kagami would love to catch up with you too.”

“Maybe. I’ll let you know? I miss all of you too.”

The conversation was nice, if a little stilted. And once Bry’s tutoring session was over, Adri suggested the others leave, which left her and Mari to their real reason for hanging out (after she got off shift and they could go hang out on the roof).

“So should I start calling you my fledgeling, kitty? You’re going to be my little bird now?”

Adri snorted. “Milady, you wound me. Plagg and I had a whole long talk the other night, he thinks it’d be good for me to get some experience with someone that isn’t him and isn’t– isn’t Sass. And we agreed that Duusu would be the least obvious. Besides, Nooroo– Father– you know, Mari.”

Anyone who’d seen the news out of Paris for the last few years would have known Chat Noire, and might guess that a butterfly could be related to Monarch/Hawk Moth/Shadow Moth/Gabriel Agreste. People knew about Mayura, but since she hadn’t been seen since the rise of Shadow Moth, which was when world news started seriously focusing on Paris’s supervillain threat, people probably wouldn’t immediately catch her on it.

“I know, chatonne,” Mari said softly, reaching out to take her hands. “I know, my kitten. Nobody gets to make either of you go through that again, not even yourselves.”

“Thanks, bug. So, mind helping your fashion-model girlfriend, designer bug?”

“Alright, kitty. What are you thinking?”

“No feathers except the fan. I’d rather not out myself by sneezing. And nothing like Mayura at all. Duusu says the blue skin is negotiable, if I want a mask instead. I was thinking more formal, appropriate for the sort of girl who stays back from fighting.”

Mari hummed and thumbed through her sketchbook to a page that already had a couple sketches of Adri from various angles. “Any measurement changes?”

Adri fingered the ring which held her amok. “I went up a cup size without doing it the easy way!”

“Oh, kitty, that’s great! I’m going to need your new sizing if I make you proper clothes, but for this…” She made a few marks on the sketches. “This should be fine. Are you planning on being like Chat Noire, or more serious like Cat Walker?”

“Regal, but not aloof, if you know what I mean? I was thinking of naming myself Blue Royale or Royal Blue and calling myself Royal, maybe sweeping my hair up and having a magical fake feather hair clip to hold it up. Other than that I don’t really know.”

“Duusu, thoughts? And mask or no mask?”

Duusu flitted over to Mari’s sketchbook. “I can do just about anything Adri wants to focus on the first couple transformations,” she chirped. “I love when my holders plan ahead!”

Adri hummed. “I think I’ll take the blue skin and a mask. And I’d look good with purple hair, don’t you think, bugaboo?”

“You’d look good in anything, chatonne. Skirt or suit?”

“I like my Chat suit, but I think Royal needs to be a skirt-and-heels heroine. Not too much like Mayura, though… maybe a shorter and fuller skirt?”

“You like to run on all fours, kittycat. You’ll need shorts.”

“Tights, like Kagami.”

“Fine, tights. But something under there. And you can have the heels if you can do a flip in them.”

“Plagg, claws out, and can you give me heels?” Adri waited for the transformation, checked she had high heels on, and promptly flipped along the ridge of the roof. For good measure, she sprinted on all fours for a few yards too. “Claws in. See, Maribug?”

“Okay, fine, chatonne, you can have heels. But low heels, you’re going to mess up your balance. And Plagg, if she unifies you two, don’t let her have heels.”

Plagg agreed through a mouthful of cheese, and Adri sat down to cuddle into Mari’s side while she worked. The kwamis were catching up, it was nice and quiet. They cuddled right up until dusk, at which point Mari showed Adri the finished design.

“I love it, Mari!” She leapt up and stared at the sketchbook, burning the design into her mind. As long as she knew what she wanted her suit to look like, she could transform into it. “Plagg, Duusu, Nooroo, come look!” The smart designer she was, Mari had even included designs for if she wanted to unify with Nooroo or Plagg (or both), and there were even a few different designs for unifying with Plagg depending on whether she wanted to be obviously-Chat (Chat Royale) or obviously Royal (Royal Noire).

“Try it,” Mari said. “I want to see how it actually looks on you.”

“Me too!” Duusu cartwheeled through the air to land on Adri’s shoulder. “You know the words, Adrienne!”

“I do indeed,” Adri said with a smile. “Duusu, spread my feathers.”

Her transformation light, purple-blue rather than green, washed over her and she snapped her fan open experimentally, pulling a feather out and bringing it to her face just to make sure she didn’t sneeze. (She was experienced enough now that she had her adult powers regardless of the miraculous she used, and Mari had found a way for the peacock holder to give a sentibeing complete control over itself, ensuring nobody could accidentally kill her or revoke her amok. It especially kept her from accidentally revoking her own existence, no matter how many sentibeings she was dealing with, but she’d also ensured Felix and Kagami were protected the same way.)

“You look good, kit,” Plagg said, “for a human. Nobody looks better than my beloved Camembert, though.”

Tikki giggled. “Oh, Plagg. Adrienne, you look gorgeous. Marinette, maybe you could summon a mirror for her?”

“Spots on. Lucky Charm,” Marinette said, grabbing the resulting full-length mirror with a hiss of surprise. She set it up and detransformed, stepping back to take in her work.

Royal looked at herself in the mirror. She was wearing a short unitard as her bottom layer, which served as both shorts under her skirt and as a top. Over it, she had a short-sleeved jacket with a flared peplum and a knee-length box-pleated skirt over at least one petticoat. She also had elbow-length gloves, made out of the same material as every miraculous suit; short boots with a medium heel; a masquerade mask; and her fan, simpler than Mayura’s. Her skin was light purple, her hair was light blue, and to top it all off, her hair was swept into a high bun with three peacock feathers swooping from the large clip that held it up. Front and center, Duusu’s brooch was pinned right between her breasts.

“It’s beautiful, Mari. I would never have thought of all the little details!”

She checked herself over again. Plagg’s ring and her amok ring under her gloves and unable to be removed except by her. Nooroo’s brooch was pinned inside her jacket, again unremovable, and there were the same hidden pockets as in her old shirts that could fit a kwami. There were three pockets on the lining, actually, and the frontmost one was a perfect fit for her fan. She felt around the outside of the jacket and…

“It has pockets!”

Mari beamed. “Yep, and you should be able to have that handful of buttons and stuff you keep for making amoks at all times.”

Royal found the jacket pocket with said buttons and ran her fingers through them. “Perfect. I have one keychain for a bigger or more permanent amok, and these for the smaller ones.”

“How does it twirl?”

Royal obligingly twirled around, skirt flaring. “I love it, my lady!”

Mari clapped and said, “Try unifying with Plagg, be Royal with the cat while you get rid of that mirror.”

“Plagg, unify! Cataclysm.” Royal Noire touched the mirror (well, after she looked at herself) and let it crumble to dust. “Plagg, Duusu, divide.”

“Duusu, you like almonds, right? Adri, do you want me to make you power-up candied nuts to go with the Camembert?”

“Send me the recipes and I’ll try to make them myself, milady? It’s about time I got to do some fun chemistry.” Adri held up a handful of nuts and Duusu landed to grab them.

“All nuts are my favorite, Guardian,” Duusu chirped. “But almonds are the best!”

“Nah, that’s Camembert,” Plagg said.

Adri just giggled. “Play nice, you two.”

Mari kissed her cheek and called Tikki and Kaalki over. “Let me know how this goes, kitty, and if you want to make a few appearances in Paris as Chat Noire soon. It’s almost the anniversary of our first appearance.”

“Maybe. I’ll think about it. Tell everyone hi for me, bugaboo?”

“Always, chatonne.”

After Mari had left, Adri ran her first patrol as Royal Blue, gliding across the rooftops as easily as Chat Noire used her baton. Nothing, though she kept a close eye out for trouble.