#most of my exposure to ladybug is from leaving it on while i'm working

[transmetal-tk]

Happy to show you all what I was doing those few months when my digibashing output slowed down. This is what I was working on!

These are the "Miraclebots" who combine into Miraculous Miracletron. Not that I really know what any of that means!

Comm for @ Adventuremaker7 on Twitter

[aidanchaser]

Right back atcha 👀

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I hemmed and hawed over what fic to do, bc I'm not very subtle about my intentions in my craft, but I realized I haven't actually talked about how purposefully I structured the dialogue in how fair you were in [moonlight] which is a remix of how fair you were in summertime by @ladyofthenoodle.

“Why, my lady, do you wait in the dark?” a lilting voice curled in her ear. ... He stretched out along his branch, and his long, black tail swished mischievously at his waist. With a Cheshire-cat-sized grin, he added, “You are far too beautiful for shadows.” Marinette, despite her fear, returned the compliment with a curtsy. Manners were everything to the fae. So was truth, so she had to be careful not to lie. “I wait, good sir, for the right time and mark,” she said, “and find you too friendly for such shadows.”

I was teaching Romeo and Juliet at the time I was writing this fic, and teaching the scene where they meet at the party is my favorite scene to teach. It's beautiful to watch, the dialogue is precise and romantic, and it is an excellent tool for teaching sonnet structure. So I wanted to mirror that in my fic.

In this opening exchange, Chat Noir offers her two lines that Marinette (as Ladybug) rhymes back, completing the first quatrain as they discuss her intentions.

In the next quatrain, Chat Noir responds with his intentions, both alluding to his avoidance of his father and his desire for her--and she acknowledges her own desire.

The fae dropped from the tree and gave her a sweeping, dramatic bow. “As the moonlight makes nightmares out of dreams, forgive me, then, for lurking out of sight.” Her heart pounded in her chest as he held out his hand in an invitation. She wondered if his hand was a binding invitation if he did not speak his offer. “There’s always more to the night than it seems,” she agreed, and allowed him to take her hand. His hands were smooth and soft, like the pads of a cat’s paw, and even in the dark, his eyes glinted like emeralds. Breathlessly, she finished, “but there’s plenty of joy found in the light.”

This quatrain holds probably the most important line in the fic - "As the moonlight makes nightmares out of dreams / forgive me then for lurking out of sight" is an explicit summation of Chat Noir's internal conflict. The moon is his father's domain, and his only freedom is outside of that moonlight. Light and exposure are not safe for him.

With that in mind, I worked really hard to rhyme sight and light. In this fic, darkness is safety and freedom for Chat Noir, but light is safety for the humans. There's this divide between them that Chat Noir is trying to bridge.

While in Romeo and Juliet, they each offer their own quatrains and break into a shared quatrain for the third quatrain, I instead did paired lines to build quatrains as a partnership, then had the third quatrain break up almost line by line.

“There is enough joy to be found right here,” he said, and pulled her hand up to his lips. Heat rose in her cheeks, and Marinette prayed her glamor hid it as well as it hid her humanity. “And if that is all the joy you receive?” The ears in his golden hair seemed to flatten at her words. He straightened but did not let go of her hand. He took a step closer. “Then that joy is in my memory seared, and I shall take my lady’s cue and leave.”

And, as Romeo and Juliet do, there's this talk of exchanging, giving and taking. I'm fascinated by the concept of love as ownership, of love as something given and taken, and in a world of fay transactions, it seemed perfect to replicate. Marinette cannot take anything from the fay, following goblin market rules, but she is really enjoying this conversation with Chat Noir, so for their shared closing couplet, she makes an offer without making any promises or exchanges that would put her in danger.

“Give as you like, sir, but I may not take.” He tipped his head and curiosity glinted in those green eyes. She wondered if her warm breath or her refusal to accept a trade tipped him off. But he did not shy away from her, did not slink back into the night nor find another fae and raise an alarm. Instead, his soft, cool fingers found her chin and tipped her lips towards his. “Then just enough to relieve my heart’s ache.” It was a gentle kiss, little more than his lips pressed against hers—and it relieved no aches in Marinette’s chest. As he pulled away she leaned into him, chasing the kiss until his hand on her chin held her back.

Chat Noir and Marinette share two more quatrains, and this time the intimacy is deepened not just by shared rhymes but by splitting a line between them:

“My lady teases me so unfairly, to try to give me what I may not have.” “What you gave, sir, was given so sparely. Did you give at all?” “Then let me give half.”

Not only are they having a banter about giving and taking kisses, Chat Noir offers half of a kiss by giving Marinette half of her line that she left open for him.

And after another kiss, Marinette offers an exchange for a third. While Chat Noir refuses her offer because he is bound to fay rules, he leaves his line unfinished just as she did; her offer is rebuffed but he still wants her to give him a kiss. She just can't take from him as that would indebt her to him as part of the goblin market rules, and he can't take from her because as a fay everything is done in exchanges. But she could return what he gave her.

She swallowed hard and gathered her breath. “And will you take my half from me—for free?” His thumb brushed against her lips longingly. “I can’t take for free.” “If you will forgive, may I return what you have given me?” “As my lady may not take, she must give.”

After this third kiss and second quatrain, Chat Noir accidentally gets a taste of her blood. It's an inversion of the goblin market rules; Marinette has not eaten fay food, but now Chat Noir has tasted of human blood, and he is the one who will be left wanting after this exchange.

“I see the forest hides your secrets, too.” It wasn’t just his eyes that betrayed him. His voice trembled, and the words slipped past his fingers almost against his own will. “The darkness is meant to make lies unseen.” “I have told you nothing that was untrue.” She swallowed down her panic, tempered it with hope. He had not alerted anyone else, had not sent for someone to throw the human from the fae’s celebration—or worse, force her into partaking. “I trust my good sir played no tricks for me.”

Their third and final quatrain is divided back to their original exchange on meeting. It's still a unity, still a matched set, but the intimacy is lost as he realizes she's not a fay like him, and she appeals to his good nature not to reveal her secret.

And, though the intimacy is broken, they still manage to sum up their sonnet with a final closing couplet before Chat Noir reveals that he is not just any fay, but is in fact the fay she has been hunting.

He looked for all the world like a man standing at a freshly dug grave. He stepped towards her once more and it took all of her willpower stay where she stood. But he did not reach for her again. Instead, he paused beside her, on the edge of the clearing. His voice was still thick with fear, but a smile played on his lips as he met the eyes of another member of the fae court. He raised a hand in greeting, but his voice was low and desperate as he whispered, “My lady ought to leave while she can.” “I’d be caught before I even began.” He sighed again, and that taste of despair seemed to press against his shoulders with a fresh force. With the urgency of a man approaching the gallows, he stepped into the moonlight.

In tarot, the moon is a sign of secrecy and shadows. It both maintains secrets and reveals them. The full moon, too, is often associated with fay and other magical creatures. For Chat Noir, the moon does not necessarily reveal his true self, but it does reveal his true appearance as a member of the fay court, his true appearance as a fay loyal to his father.

I really liked the idea of pale moonlight washing Chat Noir out and turning him into Chat Blanc. I often use the gold and silver descriptions of his hair when making distinctions between Adrien/Chat Noir and Cat Blanc, that Cat Blanc is a lesser version of his true self, but that Adrien/Chat Noir is the fullest richest version of himself. (Don't ask me what I do with Cat Walker, who famously wears gold. He's not here on purpose.)

So all the imagery in the transformation description is intentional, to turn Chat Noir's gold into something silver, warmth into cold, and intrigue into genuine danger.

At once, the black that cloaked his face and shoulders melted away. The pale moonlight washed him out in pure white. The gold in his hair transformed into silver as his pitch dark ears turned a shade of white far paler than anything that Marinette had ever seen. The soft pads of his hands glinted with finely sharpened silver claws. He seemed to be a moon all his own, reflecting a dimmer light than its source. And as he turned to smile at someone else who called for the fae prince’s attention, she saw his face and gasped. All the joy and mischief that had drawn her into him were doused. Beneath smears of white powder, his warm, emerald eyes had become cold sapphires that, despite the light all around him, refused to offer even the slightest glint. But that wasn’t the part that terrified her the most. More horrible than the dramatic and tragic change that swept through him was the glowing lavender outline of a butterfly’s wings, shining on top of the pale white dust that streaked his face. It was the very mark she was looking for, revealed in the moonlight. Marinette turned and fled.

There's some narration as Marinette wrestles with her affections for Chat Noir, her attempts to reconcile his kindness and sadness with the vicious monster she's been hunting. The sum of it is that in her fear of falling victim to the fay's charms, she overcorrects and determines to kill him.

When she goes to hunt him down at the next full moon, she is herself, not Ladybug. But he recognizes her anyway, because he has tasted her blood.

They meet on the edge of the forest, him clinging to the shadow because in the shadows he gets to be Chat Noir, Marinette on the other edge, still in the light of the setting sun, holding her iron dagger to kill him. This time there is no even exchange. Chat Noir offers his own quatrain, summing up his desire for her:

“My lady,” he said with a smile, though she was wearing her plain work clothes, still streaked with dirt from the gardening she had done that day, “how you’ve lingered on my tongue. Your blood and its taste bind my emotions, the memory of you aches in my lungs, and I long for naught but your devotion.”

But Marinette does not match his rhythm, does not acknowledge his poetry. She is human in this instance and she is also fully rejecting him, so her reply is unmetered and unrhymed entirely:

As he extended a hand to her, she searched his posture for a threat, for a coil in his shoulders before he struck or the glint of his fangs before he lashed out, but she saw none. He was as eager and playful as he was in her memory. Perhaps more desperate and forward. She tightened her grip on her dagger. “You think you can simply woo me back into your arms? You tell me you’ve pined for me, you’ve ached for me, and you think I’m supposed to care? I know what you are, what you’ve done to the humans who’ve dared to come to you vulnerable and lost. You’ve made them monsters, and you’re going to pay for it tonight.”

And as the sun slips over the horizon, they are both left in darkness for the second quatrain. Chat Noir again bids for her affection, this time offering to help her with her quest. He is as much a victim of Hawk Moth as the people she is trying to avenge.

“If it’s the monster-maker that you want,” he said slowly, “then let me offer my assistance. It’s not only humans my father haunts. For his fall, I’d trade my own existence.”

But Marinette is unconvinced and her reply remains in freeverse:

“The fae may not lie,” she said, “but you can twist your words to tell the truth you want. Why shouldn’t the monstrous fae prince convince a human to help him kill the fae king? You get the crown and a target to pin the murder on. You think I want you so badly that I’d give up my humanity to destroy for you? I won’t let you trick me the way you tricked the others.”

And as the moon rises behind her, revealing Chat Noir once again as Chat Blanc, Chat Noir makes his final offer. In true sonnet format, the third quatrain offers a dramatic shift. Chat Noir goes from begging Marinette to save him, either from his intense longing or the curse his father has put on him, to begging Marinette to kill him.

He frowned and stepped closer, out of the shadows and into the point of her blade. As the moon crested the treetops and its light washed over him, every bit of black was whisked away by pure white. His emerald eyes once more turned cold and sad. The white cat ears in his silver hair went flat. “Then kill me, my lady. Death is preferred, when weighted against carrying this curse. Trust that I would rather die by your sword than live by his word. I know nothing worse.” The blade trembled in her hand. He pressed himself against it and a pinprick of blood bloomed in his chest. It continued to spread, staining the white dark and black, as if confirming his claim that only death would let him take back what the moon had stolen.

I'm not subtle about this simile here. The blood appearing black in the moonlight and staining Chat Blanc back into Chat Noir is an intentional suggestion that killing him would free him from Hawk Moth and restore his nature, even if only in death. Marinette could save him by killing him, if she won't save him by loving him.

But of course, she can't kill him, because she does love him. And as she puts aside her weapon, Chat Noir offers her a single line, and Marinette finishes his sonnet.

She lowered her blade. His shoulders slumped, though she couldn’t be sure if it was with relief or regret. “Then what else would my lady have of me?” he asked. “All of you,” she whispered, and his ears perked up, “if you’d have all of me.”

Not only does she finish his sonnet, she offers the summation of the exchange they had when they first met. She could not take from him, afraid to be bound to him; similarly he could not take from her without offering something in exchange. She completes his rhyme and offers a full trade, which is an incredibly vulnerable thing for her as a human, but is perhaps the only thing she could offer.

It was actually hard to have this be the final dialogue of the piece. I wanted more for them, but I felt like writing out another full sonnet would have taken away from the intensity of this moment, and it wasn't as if I could break my structure and finish with some romantic free verse. But I do really like this piece. Even if my poetic meter isn't perfect, I am proud of the overall structure and the narrative here.