Noir Spots

Ashes, Ashes

we all fall down~

get it? FALL down

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It took only a second for Marinette to jump after her partner.

Only a second for her to transform mid leap, foregoing caution and throwing herself into the air.

Her identity didn't matter, caution didn't matter, the exhausting creeping over her skin didn't matter.

Nothing mattered if she didn't catch Noir.

Come on, come on.

Her wings weren't beating fast enough, her outstretched arms weren't long enough.

It wasn't going to be enough.

She wasn't going to catch Noir.

Stinging tears pricked at her eyes, swept away by the wind before they could fall. She was only a few feet behind.

Mere inches from the grappling cats.

Noir was holding on tight to Chat Noir, clearly trying to keep him from saving himself.

But that meant she couldn't do anything either.

Ladybug reached out, fingertips grazing Noir's boot.

She could do it, she was so close.

Come on, Marinette! Tikki screamed in her ear, just as scared as her holder.

Her wings hurt with the intensity she was beating them, but she couldn't stop, she wouldn't stop.

She needed to save her friend.

It couldn't happen again, there had been too many sacrifices for her, too many broken bodies lying too still.

She couldn't handle it again.

Flashes of civilians, bodies broken from various Akuma attacks flashed in her mind, Akuma's she couldn't beat without harming.

Stormy Weathers pale face, drained of life, drifted behind her eyes.

The panic was creeping.

Its violet tendrils slowly covered her body like vines, pulling her into the sinking darkness.

Ladybug could only watch as Chat Noir once again sacrificed himself for her.

Not again, not again, not again.

The words were a beat in her heart, pounding against her sternum. Her blood burned in her veins, scorching her skin and setting her on fire.

How was she supposed to react when he kept doing this? It hurt every time he tried to be her savior.

He thought that because she was Ladybug she could fix the world on her own.

But she felt so small.

She had come a long way since Stoneheart, but sometimes, in times like this, Ladybug felt like that clumsy thirteen year old who didn't know what she was doing.

And Chat Noir…he didn't understand the pain he put her through when he threw himself into dangerous situations like this.

Chat Noir wasn't a good partner,somehow, someway, Master Fu had been wrong.

The guardian had been wrong. And if he had been wrong about Chat Noir then what about her? Was she the wrong Ladybug?

It was too much to think about.