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Forbidden Love in All Its Forms
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Published:
2018-10-06
Updated:
2018-11-13
Words:
5,073
Chapters:
2/?
Comments:
166
Kudos:
565
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90
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Love Letters from a Former Hero

Summary:

Ladybug frowned. So what if Chat wanted to speak to her? So what! He’d made the dumb choice to follow Hawkmoth, for whatever reason. He’d been the one to make his bed. Now he was the one that had to lie in it.

In which Chat Noir unwillingly betrays Ladybug, and sends her secret love letters through the one method of communication they still have left.

But how can she know that they're love letters if she can't understand them?

Part of the Forbidden Love Collab Collection!

Notes:

(See the end of the work for notes.)

Chapter 1

Chapter Text

 

Betrayal was a horrible thing.

Before today, Marinette had never lived through the visceral, terrible and overwhelming pain of it. Sure, people had hurt her in the past, both physically and emotionally.

But nothing like this. This was…this was something else. A whole other level of pain she’d never experienced and wouldn’t wish on her worst enemy…

Her enemy.

Marinette stared up at her bedroom ceiling, numb with shock and grief. Over and over again, memories from earlier that day tormented her, twisted her heart, made her stomach flip with nausea. And all the while her thoughts tormented her with denial.

It’s not true.

There’s been a mistake.

He wouldn’t betray me.

She turned to her side, tucking in under her duvet as her legs curled up to her chest. The news still rang in her ears, Alya’s frantic messages, the internet exploding with theories and drama and hysteria over the fact that one of Paris’ own heroes had turned on them. It was unescapable. Only here, underneath her blankets, was she was safe from it.

Just for tonight, just for now, Ladybug needed to hide, needed to save herself.

But even as she hid from the world, she couldn’t hide from her own thoughts, from the truth.

Chat Noir had betrayed her, had betrayed Paris. Of his own volition, he had worked against her.

He had shown up to the battle late that afternoon, alongside the akuma.

At first, she’d thought he’d been luring the akuma to her, a tactic he’d used in the past. Until he turned and attacked her. Until he’d tried to take her Miraculous.

Until he declared he was working for Hawkmoth.

Then- even as she’d tried to reason with him, to break through whatever spell the akuma had on him before she’d finally realised no such spell existed- she knew his intentions. She knew it was real.

And it killed her.

“Marinette?”

It was the first time Tikki had spoken since they’d gotten back home and, for the first time ever, Marinette ignored her.

A few minutes passed in quiet torture. When it was clear Marinette wanted no part in any conversation, in fact she sunk down further under her blankets until only the top of her head was visible, Tikki went on. “I know things seem bad right now, but it’ll turn out alright it the end. I promise it’ll be ok.” Marinette felt the soft weight of her kwami landing on the other side of the blankets, resting where her shoulder was. “You’re stronger, and braver than you know. You’ll get through it.”

Why was it, Marinette wondered, that something as simple as a small act of gentleness, could completely dissolve the walls she’d built up around herself? One moment she was- not fine, but at least holding it together- the next, she felt tears pooling in her eyes.

That was all it took to fall apart completely.

She cried into the night.

The next day was spent in a zombie-like haze. Part of Marinette realised she was in a deep state of shock still at Chat Noir (her friend, her partner, her kitty) betraying her, whilst the other part was simply focusing on surviving, on making it through whatever the day had to throw at her.

She’d wanted nothing more than to stay under her blanket. The blankets that had left her feeling safe and protected, at a time where she’d never felt so lost and scared, especially considering she’d had a grand total of two hour’s rest. But the world didn’t stop for her despair and eventually her mother called her down to get ready for school.

Maybe the distraction of schoolwork would help? Who knew, really. Marinette went through all the motions of getting ready, having breakfast, walking to school, in a robotic-like haze. She was vaguely aware of her mother casting concerned glances in her direction as she left home for the day, but she managed to wave it off with the excuse that she was coming down with a cold.

It was the start of winter and, though the walk to school was short, the darkness of the early morning and the blisteringly cold wind sliced through her. But it wasn’t until she made it to school, and heard snippets of her classmates’ conversations, that her insides turned to ice.

“Oh my god! Did you catch the Ladyblog last night?”

“I can’t believe Chat Noir would do that!”

“It can’t be real right? It’s some sort of hoax. He’d never betray Ladybug like that!”

“I agree, he must be possessed or blackmailed. Logically speaking, they’ve been partners for two years now. It makes no sense.”

“You’re right Max, the whole thing stinks.”

Marinette collapsed into her seat, elbows on the desk, head in her hands. Of course. Of course, school was going to be worse. Of course, it was all anyone was going to want to talk about. Even Alya and Nino, who came to class holding hands, were talking about it, breaking their conversation only to find their seats.

As Alya slid into her spot beside Marinette, she glanced at the empty seat beside Nino and frowned. “No Adrien today?”

Nino shrugged. “Probably has some kind of lame photoshoot to go to, you know how it is,” he reasoned, “So as I was saying, Chat’s totally working as a double agent. I bet him and Ladybug worked out their little routine before yesterday’s attack. All of his shtick about it being ‘for the best’ and the way he didn’t want to hit her properly. You could tell his attacks were lacklustre! I’m telling you, they’re setting Hawkmoth up!”

Alya shook her head, “See I don’t think it was fake. Didn’t you see the look of anguish on Ladybug’s face? I was right there on the scene. You should’ve seen the way her face paled when he stepped forwards and told her he was working for Hawkmoth. There’s no way it was acting. She was genuinely shocked and hurt by Chat Noir’s betrayal, as we all were.”

“But it doesn’t add up!” Nino argued, “Chat Noir is… he loves Ladybug. And if you’re talking ‘bout anguish, didn’t you see his face too? He looked so sad. It didn’t look like he wanted to do it.”

It was all Marinette could do not to scream. The walls around her seemed to wobble and wave, then shrink as they inched in on her, the low hum of conversation turned into incessant buzzing. Her chest grew tight. Everyone kept talking about it. They wouldn’t stop. She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t escape. She was stuck, pinned into this hellish and warped dimension with no way to escape, just like her nightmares where she tried to move but couldn’t no matter how hard she tried.

All her mind wanted to do was make her run away. But her body wasn’t listening. It sat still, frozen in panic.

Because this made it real. Yesterday, and even this morning, she could’ve pretended it was a bad dream. But all of her classmates together, speculating on the why’s and the how’s, was too much. She needed to get away. She needed silence. She needed to get out.

Marinette was only vaguely aware of Alya calling her name. It felt like her friend was talking to her through several layers’ worth of concrete, her words were so muffled sounding. Only when she felt the warm weight of Alya’s hand on her arm was she able to hear properly again, find some sort of ground. “Mari? You ok?”

Her breath was coming out in short rasps. Her lips were dry. She looked at Alya with desperation in her eyes, and managed to find the strength to shake her head.

Alya swore under her breath. “God, I think you’re having a panic attack.”

“Oh my god, are you ok?” Nino asked, getting up.

“I’m going to take you to the nurses office,” Alya declared, standing up and taking Marinette’s hand. “Come on, you’ll be able to calm down much better without all these bozos being so loud.”

Marinette said nothing, hating how weak she felt. She was Ladybug damn it. She needed to be strong, she needed to figure out what she needed to do next. She needed to do the opposite of panic and hide, and ignore the overwhelming sadness pressing on her chest like a dead weight.

But all she could do in that moment was let her best friend lead her out of the nurse’s office. Sitting with her, Alya talked about nothing and everything. Silly things, fun things. Nothing serious. Nothing about Chat Noir. For that, Marinette was truly grateful.

They both missed the first lesson of the day, and thus missed the memo that came to their class. Though Alya went back after the first lesson finished, Marinette was sent home sick after that. She missed the memo completely. Her phone was turned off throughout the day.

She remained ignorant of the fact that Adrien Agreste would no longer be attending their school

 

They were due to patrol together that night, her and Chat Noir. Although patrolling was the last thing she wanted to do, the thought of Chat Noir appearing at their usual meeting spot, all smiles and apologies and explanations, was too much to resist. She knew, deep down, that it wasn’t going to happen. Chat Noir had turned on her, and there was nothing she could do about it.

It was funny, she thought whilst scanning the wintery city skyline, how quickly she could cycle through the different stages of grief. From denial to anger, bargaining to depression, but never acceptance- never ever acceptance. She kept torturing herself, sitting there for hours, torn between loving him and missing him and hating him, as she waited for her partner to show up.

He never did, and the city had never looked so cold and unforgiving as it did to her then.

Ladybug was unable to tell how long she sat on that rooftop, legs dangling over the ledge listlessly, but she knew it was far too long to be anything other than pathetic.

When she’d finally resigned herself to going back home (there were no akumas and what good would she be in the exhausted state she was in? No, she needed to rest) she stood up, stretched her aching limbs…

And gave a start when her yo-yo beeped.

She stalled, unable to comprehend what she heard. That beeping… it was from the communicator.

There was only one person who could talk to her through her yo-yo.

Ah. The four of the five stages of grief came back to greet her again, this time all out once so all she could do was stare as her yo-yo continued to beep. It almost felt like it was mocking her.

Ladybug frowned. So what if Chat wanted to speak to her? So what! He’d made the dumb choice to follow Hawkmoth, for whatever reason. He’d been the one to make his bed. Now he was the one that had to lie in it.

And her? Logically speaking, she knew what she would have to do; ask Fu for a new partner.

She hated how logic made her heart twist again, how it made her legs so jelly-like. She hated how logic was the thing that made her reach for her yo-yo and open up her messages because maybe, just maybe, Chat really had been faking. Maybe Nino and Max were right. Maybe the was something she was missing. After all, her and Chat were so close, and had been close for years now. He couldn’t, wouldn’t throw it away for something so ridiculous as power.

She hoped his message would prove that.

Message To: Ladybug

From: Chat Noir

Message:

Lp vruub. Lp vr vr vruub. L grqw phdq lw. L kdyh wr wdon olnh wklv ehfdxvh khv zdwfklqj ph forvhob. L nqrz brxuh vpduw. Brx fdq iljxuh wkhvh rxw. loo vhqg brx dv pdqb dv l fdq. L zrqw hyhu wdnh brxu pludfxorxv L surplvh. Lg udwkhu glh. Sohdvh grqw kdwh ph. L oryh brx. L zloo dozdbv eh brxuv. aaaa

Ladybug wanted to throw her yo-yo off the roof. Was he mocking her? What the hell was that? Some sort of error message? It was bad enough he betrayed her, now he was rubbing it in her face by sending her nonsensical messages?

Instead of throwing her yo-yo off the roof, she used it to swing back home.

After all, she’d need it to fight Chat Noir.

He was her enemy now. Whether she liked it or not.