#the previous chapters were better bc they were saltier

[secretagentspydetectiveninja]

Slow down! - chapter 3

Ignore what I said earlier okay this is still a good ship and @colourfulheroes challenged me to write this and I swear I haven’t given up

And also on AO3

Alix had almost forgotten about the challenge during the next week, only remembering on Friday night when Lila sent her the second chapter of the story ready for Saturday’s meeting. She had a quick read through it. Right… apparently in the fic she and Kim had made a challenge out of being nice to each other in Max’s presence and the compliments were starting to get out of hand, though they still hated each other secretly… okay, that was actually pretty realistic. Surely she’d definitely win the challenge with a fic like this!

Saturday’s meeting was much like the previous one had been. She met up with Kim in the library, was glared at by every nerd in the vicinity for being a little loud, and they read through each other’s stories in silence.

“Are you finished yet?” Alix asked once she was done, knowing she was a much quicker reader.

“No, shush.”

“Okay…”

She waited for a bit longer. For a guy who was always bragging about being fast, Kim could be pretty slow sometimes.

“Alright, I’m finished,” he said finally.

“Good. First things first, I wanna say thank you for including my correct height this time. I guess sometimes you do actually listen to things I say.”

“Well yeah, duh, I’m just trying to make the story realistic!”

“It’s still not as good as mine, though. But you know what? It’s not half bad actually.” She hoped she wouldn’t regret saying that. The truth was, she was actually quite enjoying reading through his story, as stupid as it was. She may as well let him know. His ego was so big that giving him compliments was always a dangerous game, but hey – she was a much nicer person than him, of course, so why not prove it by being polite? It might make this more tolerable.

He looked rather smug for a few seconds, but his expression quickly changed to something like annoyance. He looked away and said, “I guess your story’s okay too. And more accurate than last time, now that you’ve stopped acting like I’m completely dumb…”

Oh, true. Lila had made sure to get in that Kim did his own homework and knew at least some big words. He was still an idiot, though.

“Yeah, sorry about that,” Alix said. “Just ‘cause you’re slower it doesn’t mean you’re dumb.”

“Hey! I’m not slower!”

“Oh really? Remember that time on my birthday when we had that race and I won?” She hated thinking about her birthday usually, but using it to make fun of Kim was an exception.

“No, I don’t remember actually, because it was in a different timeline. All I remember is a supervillain showing up and stopping the race before we could finish, so according to me, there is no proof that you’re faster.”

“I could easily prove it.”

“Then let’s have a rematch!!!”

Kim had no indoor voice, and several people nearby turned to glare at him with their fingers on their lips.

“Rematch,” he repeated, a little quieter. “Right now. You go get your skates, I’ll meet you at the Trocadero, and I’ll prove to you I’m faster.”

Really? He wanted a rematch? He was just going to easily lose again, obviously. Alix almost felt sorry for him.

“Fine,” she said. “I’ll see you there.”

Not too long later, she arrived at the Trocadero with her skates and helmet on. Kim was already there, jogging on the spot to warm up. It was weird being here doing a challenge without Max standing between them to be the judge. Hopefully no akuma attacks would happen this time.

“Oh, you finally made it!” Kim said, pointing at her in a very over the top anime way. It looked ridiculous.

She ignored him and grabbed a random nearby kid she vaguely recognized from school. “Hey you. Be the referee judge guy in our race, okay?”

The random kid nodded, looking somewhat terrified. Jeez, why was everyone so scared of her all the time? Even when she wasn’t trying to be scary? At least that was one of Kim’s very few positive traits. He was way too much of a fool to be scared of anyone, even when that was a bad thing.

The referee kid lined them up at the starting line and then, hands shaking, began the race. It was over quickly.

“I told you I’m faster!” Alix called from the finish line, waiting for Kim to catch up. He looked livid. “And I swear to god, if you be a sore loser like you were in the timeline you don’t remember, I’ll bash your head in–”

She stopped abruptly when she realized that the referee kid was looking mortified. He backed away slowly until he was almost out of sight, then turned around and began sprinting. Seriously, why was he scared? Alix wasn’t really going to bash anyone’s head in, she just talked like that!

Kim had finally reached the finish line. He stopped to catch his breath for a few seconds, then spoke. “Yeah, well done for winning and whatever.”

What? But… wasn’t he annoyed?

“Don’t look at me like that!” he snapped. “I lost today, but I’ll just train more and be faster and beat you the next time! Don’t act so shocked that I’ve maybe stopped being a jerk recently, honestly… everyone else has been noticing my efforts, except for you apparently…”

“Oh… um… good for you then. Sorry. And it was a good race.”

He looked at her, perplexed.

“Well I’m not going to be a sore winner!” she said. “Unlike you, I never was a jerk in the first place.”

“That’s debatable.”

“No it’s not, I…” She trailed off, remembering that maybe she hadn’t always been all that nice in the past. To Kim, at least. Though he was definitely the one who started it.

“Anyway, I’ve got other stuff to be doing,” Kim said. “Thanks for the race. I’ll see you next week.” He left without waiting for a reply.

Hmm. Okay. So he wasn’t a sore loser. Or at least, he wasn’t one anymore. He definitely had been before. She had even told Lila about it. Time to change that, then.

Hey Lila, just had a race against him and turns out he’s not a sore loser anymore so uh… yeah. Put that in if it’s relevant. He’s not actually 100% a jerk. Maybe like 50%.

Lila was such a quick typer that Alix had barely even moved before she got a reply.

Aww, sounds like someone is starting to make a new friend!!! :)

What? NO!

All I said was he’s not 100% a jerk! He’s not my friend!

Lila was having none of it apparently.

Okay, sure honey… you tell yourself that… :)

Ugh. Those sickly little smiley faces were making Alix want to punch someone. She clenched her phone so tightly in her hand that she was surprised it didn’t crack the screen. Alright, so maybe Kim had been upgraded from “enemy” to “acquaintance”. But that didn’t make him a friend! Alix didn’t even really have any friends!

Huh. Maybe it would be good to have a friend, actually. But not Kim. Not now, at least. If he got nicer, then… maybe?

Without Max here for the holidays, Kim had been visiting Marinette a lot more often. It was better than hanging out with Nath, who seemed to enjoy “stealthily” insulting him (Kim always noticed), and the run to the bakery was good training for him. He really needed to get faster. He’d beat Alix someday, he really would.

On the way back one day that week, he took a shortcut through the park to see that… oh, She was there. Looking smaller than usual, since she was standing in front of a giant tree. He looked up at the tree to see that there was what looked like a cat wearing a cap.

Well, whatever. Paris was a weird city that was constantly being attacked by akuma villains. He had seen weirder things.

“Oh – Kim! Can you help me out with something?”

Drat, she had actually noticed him. Now he’d have to talk to her, and she might just be mean to him again, though last time at least she had been sort of alright…

“What do you want?” he asked, trying not to sound too grumpy.

“It’s kind of a stupid story but I found a stray cat and I was messing about, and I put my cap on it, and now it ran up the tree and I can’t get it down. I tried climbing it but I’m… you know… too small. So can you go get my cap back? It’s got money in it, I really need it.”

Kim was about to say that storing money in a cap and then putting it on a stray cat was a ridiculously stupid idea, until he remembered that he had done things like that plenty of times in the past, and surely she would bring that up if he made fun of her for this. And anyway, wasn’t her family rich? Surely a lost cap and a bit of money wasn’t a big deal for her? Whatever.

He settled for saying, “I’ll do it if you give me half the money in the cap.”

“Fine.”

Kim quickly ascended the tree, grabbed the cap, and then jumped back down. Being tall was always such a good thing. He couldn’t imagine how awful it must be to constantly not be able to reach things, never able to see in crowds, being mistaken for a child all the time. It was kind of funny to mock, though.

“Here’s your cap,” he said, handing it to Alix. “Now gimme money.”

“Thanks.” She handed him a few euros.

“That’s less than I thought, but okay.”

Changing the subject entirely, she said, “So, how’s your story going?”

What was this? Small talk? (He tried not to laugh at his own thoughts. Small talk, indeed…) She never usually spoke to him for longer than necessary, did she? Why was she still talking to him?

“Yeah, it’s good,” he said, shrugging. “Uh, how’s yours?”

“Pretty good. Hey – what ice cream flavour do you like? Not ‘cause I’m gonna buy you any! I just need to know for the next chapter.”

Oh, of course. She was trying to make her story more accurate. That was why she was still talking to him. “Chocolate, duh.”

“Oh cool, same here!”

She high fived him. Why had she done that???

“Why are you being nice to me?” he said without thinking. Her expression soured immediately.

“Um, ‘cause I already told you I’m not a jerk? Like seriously, what kind of question is that? I can be nice to people if I want, I’m not just a mean aloof loner all the time! I’m not Timebreaker! I’m just trying to make things civil between us so, y’know, it’ll be easier? Or would you prefer me hating you again?”

“No, of course not!” he said quickly. “It’s… it’s a good thing… I’ll, uh, try to be civil too I guess…”

She smiled again. How did her moods change so fast? Yelling one second, happy again another.

“Good,” she said.

“Um, I’m gonna go now… gotta meet up with someone…”

“Cool, see you later!”

He left quickly, rather weirded out. Experiencing Alix being civil or nice was just so unusual for him. Well, at least he knew now that she had it in her? He’d better tell Nath.

Knowing perfectly well that Nath hated phone calls, he pulled his phone out of his pocket and rang him up anyway. It would serve that stupid emo art nerd right.

“Kim, I told you not to call me,” he drawled, sounding oh so pretentious, as always.

“I need to give you some more accuracy details,” Kim said. “I was talking to Alix just now and she’s not actually mean all the time. She can be nice sometimes. Occasionally.”

Nath laughed. “So Max’s plan is working after all! You’re actually getting along with her!”

He was right, but Kim didn’t want to admit it to him. Stupid smug geek. “That’s just a testament to how clever and awesome Max is, obviously! His plans always work. He’s the coolest friend ever, I’m so proud of him.”

“Wow Kim, I didn’t realize you knew the word “testament”. I suppose I’ll have to increase your vocabulary list in the fic again.”

Was that really what he had to say?! Kim just hung up without another word.

The rest of the week passed without him thinking too much about everything. It was only when he was leaving from Marinette’s bakery to go to the library for the next meetup that things occurred.

“I bet you must be missing Max a lot!” Marinette was saying, sweet as always.

“Yeah, I definitely am!” Kim replied. “But I’m keeping myself busy, don’t worry. In fact I’ve gotta go right now because I’m meeting up with a friend.”

“Oh, nice! Have fun!”

“I’ll try!”

It was only when he was out of the bakery door and halfway down the street that he realized what he had just done.

He had called Alix his friend.

He hadn’t even thought about it! Did she count as a friend? Surely not. They just weren’t enemies anymore, that was all. Friendship needed more than that. But then why had he just called her a friend if he hadn’t subconsciously been thinking about it?

When he entered the library he saw her smiling and waving him over. Okay, that was so different to how she had been the two previous weeks, where she had just rolled her eyes and looked somewhere else. Was this a friendship thing?

“There you are!” she said as he came to sit down beside her. “What’s up?”

“Oh, nothing much… What about you? Have you seen that cat again recently?”

“No, but I hope it doesn’t steal any more hats!”

She was still smiling at him. And she had just greeted him fairly nicely, and was talking to him without insulting him at all, and…

Oh boy, they really were friends, weren’t they?

He tried not to look too confused. It was just so weird seeing her be nice to him, smiling genuinely, being friendly. He’d barely even seen her act like that towards other people, let alone himself. It was strange.

But… good. It was good. Better than being enemies, anyway. This way he didn’t have to think up insults that didn’t sound lame all the time, or have to deal with her making fun of him. Maybe it was better if she was more of a friendly rival than an enemy rival.

“Anyway, here you go, read through at your own pace,” she said, putting her laptop in front of him. Oh – he’d almost forgotten that was why they were here. He gave her his own story, then began to read.

For once she didn’t tell him to hurry up or interrupt him. She just waited in silence for him to finish reading. That was definitely a nice change. This friend thing was turning out to be very good indeed.

“It’s really good,” he admitted once he was done. “I guess it’s true, your hair colour is pretty cool. And thanks for mentioning I’m not a sore loser anymore.”

“Hey, no problem. For the record, this chapter of your story is absolutely hilarious, especially the fake karaoke date. Thank you for putting those ace puns in, that was awesome!”

Kim grinned. Nath wasn’t actually the one who had come up with the ace jokes, that was Kim himself. For some reason they were easy to think of. And relatable. Weirdly relatable…

“Anyway,” she said, “I’d love to hang out more but I’ve got a stupid event at the museum to attend. I’ll see you soon, right?”

She was leaving already? And she’d said she wanted to hang out more… why was that really sweet? He was so unaccustomed to hearing her be sweet. He hadn’t even thought she could. How had he not known this whole time that she was actually not that bad after all when she wasn’t arguing with him? Why hadn’t he made friends with her earlier? This was just so much better – that someone who used to hate him actually liked him now.

A very hidden, idiotic part of his brain was yelling at him “STOP FRATERNIZING WITH THE ENEMY!” But he ignored it. Alix wasn’t his enemy anymore.

“Cool,” he said to her. “See you later, buddy!”

She waved and left. Kim looked around to see that for once, none of the nerds nearby were glaring. Either they were getting used to him, or maybe… just maybe… he wasn’t being so annoying anymore?