#the only think keeping them from connecting the dots is that nathalie hates him

[cloudshapedpatch]

so do you guys think season 5 is gonna be the last season of miraculous or no

[mcheang]

What’s with the frown?

Everyone notices Adrien looking depressed about his global trip. This makes it easier for Marinette to rouse the others to stop it from happening.

Lila points out that Gabriel is in control right now and can ground Adrien.

Nina is fed up about Gabriel and actually lashes out, asking how Lila became cool with Gabriel when he hates everyone else.

Lila lies that the photographer insisted she become a model and Adrien was supporting her career, not Gabriel.

On a roll now, Nino decides to finally report Gabriel to the child authorities, never mind Adrien’s reaction

Kagami and Wayhem and all Adrien fans join in by encouraging Adrien to stand up to his father.

Adrien tries to stop the mob forming outside his house, but Nino confronts him about his busy schedule when he would rather just hang out. “You even see school as a form of freedom!!! If that doesn’t raise red flags, I don’t know what does!”

Thanks to Risk’s influence, Adrien temporarily blurts out that he hates modelling and doesn’t want to go on a trip with Lila of all people.

Gabriel: Adrien!

Adrien covers his mouth in dismay.

One fan: This is forced child labour!

Another fan: call the police!

Adrien: no! Don’t do that!

Forced to keep up a front, Gabriel at last said “I thought you would enjoy a trip to see the world. And I never realized how taxing modelling can be. I apologize, Adrien. You and Lila can stay here!”

Catching Lila’s glare at him for ruining her career prospects, Adrien blurts out again, “And Lila isn’t my friend! I only agreed to work with her so she would make sure Marinette got back into school.”

Marinette: so that’s why she took back her charges.

Adrien: i got your back.

Mylène: what was that about Lila?

Under influence of Risk, Adrien exposed Lila himself.

Lila: he’s lying! He’s siding with Marinette!

Alya knows Ladybug is Marinette however and said, “Well, we could always just ask Ladybug herself. And Rose can call Prince Ali.”

Crocodile tears steamed down Lila’s face. “You don’t believe me!”

One fan, impatient from all this drama now, called out, “Just let them make the call so we can all go home already!”

Lila is exposed as a liar by the celebrities.

Gabriel terminates Lila’s contract.

Lila is tempted by Risk to expose Gabriel hiring her to spy on Adrien’s friends and distance them. This lands her in hot water but also paints Gabriel in bad light.

Gabriel: your best friend threw a wild party in my house without supervision! What am I supposed to think? You are literally in the akuma class!

Adrien: Lila was an akuma too!

Gabriel: she agreed to keep you safe from bad influences. And she never threw you an unauthorised party!

Inside his mansion, Gabriel exhales. “So much for taking risks. Ladybug hasn’t shown up and already the police are eyeing me with suspicion.”

It looks as though the earrings and ring are the only way out of this mess.

Nathalie: sir, given the circumstances, how can we trust our own judgment.

….

Gabriel had to admit he had not thought that far ahead.

And if he was compromised, instead of Ladybug finally being defeated, what if he is the one who is finally caught and arrested?!!!

He recalls Risk.

Lila is now a pariah at school and it only gets worse for her because at work, her mother finally blurts out her complaints against the heroes. Before her colleagues had just told her to keep her mouth shut but now thanks to Risk, she just ranted about the incompetence of the popular heroes.

The people at the embassy are shocked by her tactlessness and ignorance. Needless to say, Mrs Rossi is in for a rude wake up call, especially when she connects the dots that her daughter must have been playing truant.

Lila will not be graduating at the end of the year. She will be held back a grade. Her mother is also furious and blames her daughter for making a fool out of her.

Lila: like it’s my fault you don’t even watch the news!

Mrs Rossi stops giving Lila her allowance and forces her to get a job. Given Lila’s record, no one wants to hire her but Chloe decides to get her daddy to hire her as the new garbage girl. (Like how Linguine was the garbage boy in ratatouille.) Mrs Rossi also cuts off cable TV and wifi, and confiscates Lila’s phone. The laptop will have to remain for school but Lila will need to use the school wifi to actually do research.

[seungnoir]

My Current top 10 favorite Miraculous Ladybug Episodes and why (+analysis)

1. timetagger - the amount of possibilities this brings to the plot and insight is so fun. also, it’s one of the few things of writing and planning i appreciate in this series because it was hinted in the very beginning of s1 that alix’s watch was a miraculous, but now we get to see that connection. Seeing things that were hinted long ago end up having substance makes it more interesting. Also, I do thoroughly Alix as a character and loved to see her and see that she will have a bigger role in the future. This episode alone leads to so many theories and things that can be analyzed and makes it so fun - such as the idea that there is someone (besides master fu) that knows about their identities, and even further, about what happens in the future. The idea of a new hawk moth also comes to play. The akumatized villain from the future proves that there is a hawk moth in the future, but that it isn’t gabriel agreste. This brings into question of what happened to Gabriel and the current Hawk Moth? How did someone else of ill-intention end up the miraculous after hawk moth? Who is this new Hawk Moth? This brings so many theories and possibilities to where the show is heading. We also see chat noir and ladybug do still exist in the future as adults. We can only wonder and theorize about how theyve developed between present and future, though. Another small detail at the end that was interesting is i’m pretty sure chat broke the fourth wall?? At the end of the episode, chat is talking to ladybug and about what alix said about the future as they walk away, and started saying “maybe in the future you might even agree to see a movie with me. Hey, what if it was in the very near future? Like, the next show...”

2. sandboy - there are many reasons i enjoy this episode. first, i love the kwamis and i love learning more about them and having some focus on them. We learned more about background and history of the kwamis as well as see more than we had before. In addition, I think it brought good development to character, particularly for adrien/chat noir. Marinette’s and ladybug’s biggest nightmares weren’t too much of a surprise, and neither was adrien and chat noir’s when you think about it but foes bring more insight to him as a character and helps set up ideas for his character and things later. As adrien, his biggest nightmare was being trapped and cornered, obviously a result of how he’s treated by his father. While adrien tends to always seem chill and nice around people and like everything’s always fine, it shows there’s more we don’t see. Then, as chat noir, his biggest nightmare was that ladybug hated him. It was important to show how much chat noir really cares about his relationship with her, and not just romantically. It shows us this not only as a watcher, but so that ladybug sees too. This sets up well for the ny special, where ladybug gets upset with chat and says she can’t trust him. While not exactly like his nightmare where she despises him, it is parallel to his literal biggest nightmare and shows why he reacted the way he did and shows just how much ladybug saying that would affect him. I also very thoroughly enjoy the moment where adrien sees the sock plagg left when he sneaked out and he went “Plagg! who turned you into a sock!” i think i find it funnier than i should. 

3. heroes day p2 - not to be a ladynoir stan but that’s a big reason i enjoy this episode. When the other heroes they recruited fall, Ladybug gets worried and begins to lose hope. This isn’t very common for her, but it shows she’s not some perfect hero, she has times where she has doubts. However, chat noir was right there for her. He was able to encourage her and get her back into the spirit. I think this is important to show their relationship without thinking about it in a romantic way. It shows chat noirs full trust in ladybug, and how even if ladybug doesn’t always express it, it shows how she does appreciate and trust chat noir and that he is able to help her when she’s down, it’s a balance. Also, when chat noir is encouraging ladybug, one thing he says “let’s go back to what always worked - you and me against the world, m’lady.” In my eyes, this reinforces the “soulmate” idea and the importance of the two. Don’t get me wrong, I love the other heroes and miraculouses being used, and maybe its just me, but I think it’s important that despite the other heroes being helpful, chat noir and ladybug are the core, and that reinforces that. Also I honestly love that adrien was detransformed at the time of saying that line. In addition to ladynoir, there’s the plot and villain progression of hawk moth and nathalie, which sparks the plot to really start picking up after this event. 

4. reverser - I love marc a lot, i relate to his character a lot so i enjoyed having him and I wish we had more outside of this episode. There are also other fun characters we get to see that we don’t see as much (Alex and nathaniel). I also like the akumartizaion set up, i think it’s a very realistic situation in which misunderstanding takes over and there’s no specific person to blame, and i appreciate the demonstration of that. Not to be a chat noir stan, but him being a “scaredy cat” after getting hit by the reverser was so cute and funny and i enjoyed that. Again, back to the other characters, as i mentioned before i like alix a lot. i enjoyed her mocking chloe in the episode and then not caring when the teacher tried to say she should be nice. and then i liked the moment she scared chat noir. and then i enjoyed seeing her role in helping the duo in defeating reverser. also, there was a moment on the beginning of the episode where adrien teased marinette and any moment where adriens chat noir side comes out is my favorite. in conclusion, i love seeing the characters we see in this episode and chat noir was cute. 

5. puppeteer 2 - as much as the wax statue scene gives me the worst second hand embarrassment of my entire life, the episode gave us a clearer insight to adriens perspective on his relation with marinette, which i enjoyed, and made me like him as a character even more. while i love a good “she’s just a friend” joke, it is confirmed in this episode he’s genuinely oblivious - which he shouldn’t be perceived as dumb for. social cues are harder for some people and can cause problems but it’s not smth people can help, we also have to remember he has very limited experience with people. anyway, it gives us that insight and i believe it’s important. he even expressed acknowledgment of how he doesn’t pick these things up sometimes. so he interpreted marinettes reaction wrong, and he believed marinette even didn’t like him. it distressed him so much to think that was the case. this was the insight we needed to see how adrien perceives their relationship and how much it really developed. even if he doesn’t have a crush on her, it introduces the idea that he still genuinely cares about her and having a relationship with her - parallel to us seeing ladybug see that with chat, which i believe is very important for the development of lovesquare and the plot. not to mention the frusturation of dramatic irony at the end when adrien, seemingly for the first time we’ve seen him as adrien, mention to someone else how he DOES love someone. while painful for marinette, i do think it’s interested because i don’t even think he’s mentioned the fact he loves someone to nino, showing how he still considers marinette as someone he can be close too. 

6. ikari gozen - I love Kagami and I appreciated this kind of redemption arc. I wasn’t sure how I felt about her at first, but after this episode she’s one of the most relatable characters, personally. In turn, it also helps Marinette learn a good lesson. So yeah, the main reason i enjoy this episode is Kagami’s character development and her character. Ryuko is also so cool.

7. kwamibuster - i mentioned this before but i love the kwamis a lot and i love getting to see them in episodes. in this episode we got to see not only interactions between plagg and tikki, but get a chance to meet other kwamis and see their miraculous jewelry and some of their abilities. we also see that marinette and adrien are not incapable of connecting dots, realizing both plagg and tikki were in the same school. however, plagg and tikki try to reason them out of it and they both did things to throw the other of their track, so they didn’t keep their theories - but it does show they’re not Completely Oblivious. 

8. troublemaker - there’s a lot of small things and moments that make me appreciate this episode rather than one big thing. to start, i enjoy penny’s character a lot and this is one the few episodes we really get to see her and the only one where we get focus on her. in addition, she was a good villain and arguably the closest a villain got to taking ladybug’s miraculous, taking an earring. then theres marinettes adrien photo collection being exposed, and adriens facial expressions in reaction to it made me laugh. and then of course, the scene following the fight, adrien talks to marinette. one noticeable thing is that marinette didnt stutter as much as she had and got out full thoughts. good for her ! and it shows that she is slowly beginning to be more comfortable with him. then of course, adrien. he starts by asking if she was okay since the fight happened at her house (even though he was literally there and knows damn well marinette wasn’t even there, kinda anyway). and then, as i mentioned before, my favorite thing ever is adriens chat noir side coming out, which is exactly what happened. he teased marinette for the photos, both asking if she was lying and then the “even in the most unlikely places” line. the thing about this is that this is something we barely see happen with adrien as adrien, yet it happened with marinette, which shows he’s comfortable enough with her to do that. and then of course the sincere moment of him saying he’s glad she’s her fan, he’s just so sweet good for him i love him. 

9. origins - a classic. provides us background we needed on how things start and characters meant. there’s so much things to take from origins about their characters and the story in general. for one, marinette not even wanting to be ladybug. i feel this fit her character and was more realistic than if she accepted it right away. and then her being a bit of a mess the first time and not even capturing the akuma. i think that was important; to show ladybug and marinette are not perfect, but that’s what makes her a better and more relatable character. it wouldn’t be fun if she were perfect from the beginning. and then chat noir, who was a lot less reluctant. in contrast to marinette. he had been isolated his whole life and forced to try to fit a perfect mold. this gave him not only physical freedom he always desired but also the personal freedom to be able to be who he wanted. it of course also shows the balance of the two heroes. ladybug was nervous and had no hope at the beginning, but was able to get though with chat noirs encouragement - which is something that comes up every so often, but shows their balance and dynamic. and then of course . the umbrella scene. one of the most iconic moments, and also one thing i’ve noted is that we barely ever seeadrien laugh like he did in that scene, and it makes me treasure that moment more. and despite the whole “she’s just a friend” thing, it was important in that moment and you can see how important it is to him that he has a friend, and probably establishes the trust and appreciation for marinette we see as the show progresses as she was very important to him being kind of his first friend and that it holds a different kind of importance to him. 

10. glaciator - an iconic episode of course. while marichat is probably my least favorite in terms of love square ships, i think marichat moments are some of the best. i think it’s where the two are more showing themselves to each other than in any other way. chat gets to see truly marinette in which she isn’t a nervous mess and is actually acting like herself, and marinette gets to see chat has more to him than she saw previously as ladybug. with his constant flirting and joking with her, it seemed that she interpreted this as this is just his personality and it didn’t mean much, that maybe he acted the same with anyone. but with the interactions of this episode, she learns that’s not the case, he genuinely and truly loves and cares and about ladybug, it was more than just joking around. this realization is big for marinette and she even comments that she misjudged him. this episode allows eachother to rlly learn more about eachother. and then it helps ladybug be honest. she’s completely honest with chat after that, saying there’s someone else and she doesn’t want to lead him on, but that sets the stage for them to still grow on their platonic relationship, which is still important. ladybug for the seemingly first time directly tells chat how he’s important to her, and chat admits that his friendship with her is the most important thing to him, showing us more about adrien/chats character, as well as demonstrates despite his love for ladybug the platonic relationship still holds great importance with seems to contrast how marinette views adrien at this moment. 

honorable mentions: 

reflekdoll - this was almost in the top 10 but i changed it last minute. i appreciate learning more about juleka and hope we get more to grown on that later. and not to be an adrien stan but he looked really pretty with his outfit for marinettes shoot. one thing i feel is also important to notice is how easily he was willing to take off his miraculous for the sake of marinettes shoot. he didn’t even really hesitate? that wasn’t really surprising for marinette to do, but for adrien it again represents a small thing that shows he really appreciates and cares about her (whether it’s romantic or not). the concept of them switching miraculouses were also fun, and seeing a little bit of tikki and plagg interactions again. the reason that it didn’t end up in the top 10 was because i think the execution of their miraculous switch should’ve been done much better. i feel like the writing made chat look dumber than he is and made ladybug look more bossy than she is. while i feel part of this was meant to demonstrate they’re truly made for their own miraculous, it could’ve been demonstrated without making the character look worse. 

startrain - i don’t mean to be basic but the adrinette in this episode was super cute. however that’s not the only reason this episode stood out. hawk moth rlly sent his own son into space, u know as one does. and then the irony of him saying “how ironic i have to depend on my enemies (ladybug and chat noir) to save my son” like if you think that’s ironic then… but anyway . i also enjoyed seeing more max in the episode. his transformation is fun and i think we deserved a max based episode where he (or markov) didn’t have to get akumatized. also i feel like in the beginning of the episode, i like how adrien flat out decided to go to london without even asking his dad. i think he’s slowly stopping to care so much about his fathers rules and realizing what he needs for himself and this shows that. 

[princess-of-the-corner]

I had a follow up dream to that Marichat accidental pregnancy and also identity reveal dream I had a while back. Some highlights:

When Chloé and Alya are huddled around a tablet filling an online shopping cart for the nursery while Mari tries in vain to stop them, they ask "are you setting up the nursery at your place or Adrien's? Because that changes what we buy." 

Mari then has a small crisis because obviously she wants the nursery at her place because it's her baby and as the mother she'll have to be near it 24/7 pretty much, but her place doesn't really have the room for a nursery. Adrien's place has room, but not her.

Adrien's like "okay, shoot me down if this I'm going to fast..." and someone points out that they're already having a baby so nothing is "too fast".

His suggestion though is that by the time the baby is born, they'll have graduated and they'll be legal adults. So moving into their own place isn't that bad of a decision....". 

They consider it, but decide to put a pin in it for later.

someone in the class (probs Rose or Mylene) asks about Baby Names. 

Mari tries to quickly shut down that conversation, but Alya teases her about her old choices with the "three kids and a hamster!" Fantasy. 

Adrien laughs about it a little but finds it adorable. He also has no real objections to the name choices, but that's another "let's stick a pin in it for later" conversation.

Gabriel invites the Dupain-Chengs for dinner at the mansion to discuss the whole situation. 

A lot of the conversation is pretty normal stuff that’s already been discussed. Adrien and Mari are staying together as a couple and keeping the baby, and they’re working out details. 

That includes the idea of them living together in their own place. That throws the parents for a loop, but they do agree it might be a good idea. 

Adrien does discuss potential in paying for said apartment, as he’d like to actually work for it instead of just having Gabriel pay for it. Adrien is already paid for the modeling stuff, but does discuss with Gabriel that maybe he can do some other things either behind the camera or in the business part of the company. Gabriel is surprised but proud. 

Another thing discussed is Mari’s career and how exactly they’re going to deal with the PR stuff

Adrien and Marinette’s half-truth about why they kept the relationship secret(since they can’t mention Hero stuff) was saying that they wanted to let Marinette create her own career before announcing the relationship, as people would either accuse her of seducing Adrien for an in at Gabriel’s company, or accuse Gabriel of favoritism when he chooses her for good opportunities

Gabriel’s idea is to tell the truth on that, and also the truth of his ‘long term plan’. 

He admits that Marinette does have plenty of design talent, but not much business experience. He already approved her internship application, and had plans for offering her a full time job at the company after, and eventually a personal mentorship. With all that, by the time Gabriel is ready to retire, she’d have enough business skill to take over the company. 

Mari absolutely chokes on that news because what the FUCK. 

Gabriel also admits that part of the plan did involve encouraging the potential Adrienette relationship, as not only would they be a good match, but it also means that the company will stay in the family.

Basically, Gabriel says that his statement about the situation would be admitting to all of that, and miscalculating how well Marinette and Adrien would get on together. 

Again, Mari is low-key losing her shit at this. Eventually she just kinda puts her head down and is like ‘stress is bad for the baby’. Adrien asks if she means the actual baby or her, and she’s like ‘yes’. 

Once they calm her down they all kind of agree on that. 

There was also more on the Miraculous Team finding out. 

The meeting was held at Chloé’s place and LB and Chat decided on a full team reveal

They explain why first though. Basically that Ladybug is pregnant and can’t really fight. They’re doing the reveal so that they can properly stay in contact, especially since Tikki refuses to not be around Ladybug for the months this would take. 

Rena Rouge gets excited of the ‘omg! You’re pregnant, my bff is pregnant, do you think you two could do a joint babyshower?’. 

Chloé actually puts the dots together first, because that’s a staple of mine at this point, and is just like ‘you motherfuckers!!’

Everyone detransforms and Chloé gets a noise complaint from Alya fangirling over her bff having been Ladybug all this time.

Speaking of the Miraculous stuff, Gabriel is having a crisis of his own. 

He’s realizing how much Adrien has moved on since Emilie’s disappearance. This whole situation is a wakeup call in that regard. How stuck he is, how he should move on, and how the whole situation is helping him move on, despite how much he wants to cling to the past and the idea of bringing Emilie back.

He decides to give up.

Side note: Emilie was straight-up dead in this AU because a lot of this didn’t work if it was just ‘Magic Coma’. 

The Miraculous Team get an alert that Hawkmoth himself has shown up at the Eiffel Tower and go to face off. 

The team tries to get LB to maybe sit this one out because baby but she’s like ‘oh hell no’. 

They get there preparing for a fight, but Hawkmoth only wants to talk and negotiate his surrender. 

The Team is suspicious af, but hear him out. 

Hawkmoth explains how his motive was to bring his wife back to life, but that recently things have changed and he has realized that he needs to move on.

When pushed, he admits that the thing that ‘changed’ is that he’s going to be Grandpa and that’s exactly the kind of slap to the face that makes you realize things. 

Hawkmoth’s deal is that, no matter what, he’s going to stop. However, he will only hand over the Butterfly and Peacock Miraculous if the team promises to let him go and not tell his family about the whole situation. 

Chloé is again the one to put the pieces together and is just like ‘Okay, first of all, Gabriel, I’m going to kick your ass. Secondly, not telling Adrien is gonna be REAL DAMN HARD’.

Hawkmoth’s like ‘how the fuck did you figure it out that fast?’ 

Chloé just says that things lined up too well. ‘Hawkmoth’ appeared soon after Emilie’s disappearance/death, Gabriel was a suspect once already, the timing of Akumatizations suggested someone who set their own job schedule instead of having a usual 9-5 hours, the number of late night Akumas indicated either an insomniac or an artist type who would be up at that time(because artists have no sleep schedule), and the final nail is that Adrien and Mari just announced the pregnancy so....

Hawkmoth’s just like ‘okay, you’re especially banned from telling Adrien anything’. 

Chloé’s just like ‘I don’t have to...’

Chat’s just like ‘Uh... surprise?’. 

‘oh shit’ said the Hawkmoth. 

With identities revealed, they all decided to have this conversation somewhere more private. AKA the mansion. 

There’s definitely a lot of yelling. And also Nathalie gets dragged in because the dots are connected to her being Mayura. 

Adrien is also not holding back about anything because what the FUCK

Gabriel is also low-key mad at Adrien and Mari for having Ladybug go into what could’ve been a dangerous battle even though she’s pregnant. Adrien and the rest of the crew are like ‘look we tried to stop her but we can’t stop her from doing anything once she decides to do it!’. 

Again, there’s a lot of yelling and arguing back and forth about the whole scenario. 

But like, it’s one thing when Hawkmoth was a faceless entity who was ‘probably some asshole hellbent on world domination’, and an entirely different thing when you’re facing down someone you know who was fueled by grief and is trying to make things right now. 

The team eventually comes to a ‘okay, we’ll be quiet about the whole situation, but it’s gonna take a long ass while to rebuild trust here’ thing. 

Lila was also still trying to be a fuck because what else is new?

She’s frustrated af because nothing works. 

She tries to imply that Mari is only with Adrien for the connections, but the class shuts that down because they know how much Mari loves him. Lila can’t even try to trick Gabriel into believing that considering Mari and Adrien’s story for the secret dating. 

Lila then tries to say that Marinette is being ‘extra mean’ to her because of the combo between jealousy and pregnancy hormones, but the class is just like ‘bruh... maybe but also they’re legit together and you’re being a lil clingy so it might be slightly justifed so you should probably back off?’

Also, as soon as this starts, Alya and Nino make the connection of ‘Oh. Lila says she’s Ladybug’s bff. Marinette is Ladybug. Marinette hates Lila and says she’s a liar’. They totally apologize and try to figure out how to prove that Lila’s a liar. 

Tbh, since Hawkmoth is no longer a threat, identies don’t have to be kept secret anymore! So Mari could just go to the front of the class and be like ‘Spots On motherfuckers!’ and prove that Lila’s a fuck. 

THat was kinda the last thing I remember so yeah. Goodnight y’all. 

[miraculous-ladybec]

Strong Girl Bong-Soon AU

In which Marinette, as Ladybug, is hired to protect Adrien with her superpowers.

Being the son of a world famous fashion designer was tough enough, but becomes dangerous when cryptic letters arrive at the Agreste mansion threatening Adrien’s life if his father doesn’t comply with their wishes.

Even though he hates to, Gabe figures hiring the local superheroine was his best bet at keeping his only family left alive. Plus maybe an opportunity to learn her identity for Hawkmoth purposes.

Adrien already has a huge crush on Ladybug so he’s more than okay with having a personal bodyguard for once

Marinette agrees, of course, because she “must protect all parisians”, at least that’s what she tells Tikki. We all know she wants more time with Adrien, and keeping him safe is top priority.

Adrien is allowed to be at school without protection because he’s in public and under the surveillance of his teachers and school security, so he has time to talk to Nino about how excited he is to see Ladybug all the time now (at least, more than he sees her as Chat)

Marinette figures this is a good way to learn more about her crush, even though she’ll have to be careful not to reveal too much about herself

She tells her parents she’s gotten an after-school job babysitting for one of her teachers for the next few weeks, in hopes that the authorities will find the people who are threatening Adrien by then

She goes after school to the Agreste Manor where the place is practically on lockdown mode. Adrien isn’t allowed to do photo shoots for the time being, and he’s definitely not allowed out of his father, Nathalie, or Ladybug’s sight.

She and Adrien are left alone in his room since Gabriel is always working, and he doesn’t handle stress very well (clearly)

At first, both parties are super awkward and giggly with each other. Mari is a little more confident behind her mask, but still blushes fervently if Adrien even looks at her for too long.

They find they can pass the time by playing through all of the games Adrien has in his arcade of a bedroom. Some of them multiplayer, some of them not. When they play single player games, they make a combination of their names for the playable character to be called. They trade off control while munching on snacks and making strategies in game.

Once Marinette calms down around him, she learns that Adrien has a lot of dorky interests that she finds rather endearing. She browses his collection of Shojo Manga and they even watch some anime together.

Of course, Adrien has to be careful not to make too many jokes or be flirty with his Bug. He can’t have her figuring out that he’s Chat Noir, and she’d be furious if she learned she was hired to protect someone who truly could protect himself.

The days go by and no more suspicious notes are left by the manor, so Adrien is cleared to go back to photoshoots, so long as Ladybug goes with him to keep watch. Luckily during this time, there haven’t been many Akuma attacks

Marinette doesnt complain about being toted along on photoshoots because she could watch Adrien all day, and she’s also super interested in seeing all of the designs being modeled.

The photographer instantly notices how “Senior Adrien is looking exceptionally happy these days” to which Adrien blushes, knowing full well that he shouldn’t be enjoying having a full time private bodyguard so much, given the circumstances

But honestly, he’s just happy that for the first time since his mother passed, he can come home and know he’ll have someone to talk to and spend time with who will smile genuinely around him and listen to his problems

Marinette notices Adrien looking happier in class and can’t help but hope she’s the reason why

That day after school, Marinette rushes to the manor to find Adrien asleep on his bed when she gets there. She sits on the edge of his bed with a manga to read, while she watches over him, but he reaches out in his slumber and pulls her over to him.

Blushinette

Mari let’s him spoon her while he naps and she finds herself drifting off being smothered by the smell of his sheets and cologne around her

ALARMS

There’s a break in at the manor, the power has been shut down internally.

Both teens wake up at once, not having enough time to process the position they had both been in, before Mari is in protect mode.

She curses under her breath about not having night vision like Chat, but Adrien supplies his cell phone flashlight

Full emergency shutdown goes into effect and all of the manor doors lock automatically with the backup generator, locking Ladybug and Adrien in his room, and hopefully anyone else out.

Ladybug decides it’d be safer for Adrien, and everyone else, to try to evacuate the manor and let the authorities swarm in to catch the intruders.

She uses her lucky charm to bust open Adrien’s bathroom window, and carries him bridal style to the safest place she can think of on the spot, her family’s bakery where he can hide in the back.

(Mari quickly detransforms and recharges Tikki)

She goes back to get Gabriel and Nathalie to find the perpetrator tearing apart Adrien’s room

“Looking for something?” Sassinette

She apprehends the intruder rather easily, since she’s used to fighting superpowered Akuma victims, and goes into full interrogation mode

She manages to learn that it’s an underground mafia trying to scam Gabriel out of money, by threatening at first, but that this mission was to actually capture and try to ransom Adrien off.

And she’d played right into their hands

In the case that she left with him, several men were waiting outside to follow her to wherever she hid Adrien, and they found him right where she left him

Of course her parents tried to protect the boy, but backed down when faced with real weapons

She hands the scumbag over to the authorities, now in full rage mode. If there’s anything Marinette hates more than liars, it’s people who put her friends and family in danger.

She steals the guys phone and manages to track it back to the headquarters of the mob, finding that they’d prepared for her to possibly come, but not expecting the level of ferocity to come out of such a usually peaceful heroine

Ladybug hands their asses to them for touching Adrien and even THINKING about harming her parents, and leaves them all bloodied on the floor when she calls the cops to come get them

Adrien is beaten up slightly from fighting back against them to the best of his abilities. He’s strong for a young teen, especially with his fencing training, but he’s no match for multiple full grown men with guns.

Ladybug takes him to the hospital to be checked over, he took a knife to the gut at one point in his struggle and she can’t help but feel like it’s all her fault, letting maybe a little too much Marinette show through while she kneels next to his hospital bed crying. Assuming he’s asleep, she detransforms to let Tikki rest after all the fighting.

He’s not asleep

She quickly passes out in the chair next to his bed

Of course Adrien is really injured, but it’s not nearly as bad as she perceived it to be. It’s not a deep cut, and it didn’t puncture any organs. He bled out a little and needed stitches, but it’s definitely not life threatening.

He suddenly finds it so easy to connect the dots between his lady and his princess now that he knows the two are the same.

Plagg makes an appearance finally to say “I told you so” as Adrien realizes he’s had feelings for his classmate and friend all along, pushing them down to maintain his love for Ladybug. But now that he knows they’re the same, he’s never letting her go again, so long as she wants him too.

He eventually doses off and has sweet dreams where Ladybug and Marinette are interchangeable in the most romantic of settings

Mari wakes up around 4 am and transforms back, heading home, unaware that Adrien discovered her secret.

The news the next morning show that Ladybug uncovered a major terrorist group that was behind all of the mob violence and the threatening of local celebrities and politicians

Mari feels awful and decides to fake sick to stay in bed, she manages to turn into ladybug around 3 pm to go to the hospital to see Adrien.

He’d actually been sent home that morning, so she swings by the manor where Mr. Agreste thanks her for her help and let’s her know she can go since it’s all been taken care of. She sees Adrien and that he’s doing fine and feels much better learning he’ll be able to return to school the next day provided that he doesn’t develop any symptoms around his injury.

Mari goes home, unable to sleep, she stays up making a new shirt for Adrien since “his old one must have a hole in it now”

This new shirt is a very soft sky blue material with a chest pocket with his initials embroidered on the inside. She stitches her signature on the internal hemline of the shirt after adding some final tweaks to make sure the striping across the chest is the same as his old shirt was.

She finally passes out with three hours left before class

Marinette wakes up late again and runs to school with her present for Adrien in hand

Just as predicted, he’s in his seat when she gets there. His eyes are glued to her from the moment she trips through the door.

He even tries to bolt from his chair to catch her, but the pain in his abdomen keeps him from getting up completely.

Mari waits until everyone has asked Adrien how he’s doing at lunch before approaching him with her gift.

She stutters way less than usual given that she’s spent the better part of two weeks getting to know him more

He opens the gift and starts tearing up at how thoughtful this girl is and “when did she have the time to do this?”

Unable to control himself, Adrien pulls a very stunned Marinette into a hug and whispers “How did I get so lucky as to have an angel like you in my life?”

Later at patrol, Chat decides he’s going to reveal himself to LB

They’re sitting on a roof together when he tells her how much he admired what she did to take down that mob group by herself and that he wishes he could have helped

She jokes about how he really should have been there to help, but she managed on her own

He gets serious, then tells her how much he appreciates what she does

LB brushes it off since it’s “Chat flattery”

But he looks her dead in the eyes, holds her hands and finally

FINALLY

Detransforms

“Do you get it now? Everything you did for me is more than I could have asked. You risked so much for me and singlehandedly saved my life.”

She’s stunned

“I love you, Marinette.”

She’s MORE stunned

“I-I love you too, Adrien.”

“BUT IF YOU EVER PUT YOURSELF IN HARMS WAY AGAIN WITHOUT TELLING ME YOU’RE CHAT NOIR FIRST—“