The Miraculous Tales of Ladybug and Chat Noir

The end is just a new beginning

~*Marinette*~

It was over. Hawkmoth was defeated. The butterflies no longer could be turned evil. No more akumas. No more Ladybug and Chat Noir. 

I was kneeling on the floor, my transformation about to be released. But that wasn't what I was worried about. I was worried about how Chat would take my death.

Hawkmoth had struck a fatal blow with his staff as his last word.

I was bleeding heavily.

"Ladybug?" Chat called me from where he had just come into the room. The room with the purple stained glass window, and sun streaming through. The room filled with white butterflies. Hawkmoth's lair, in Adrien's house.

"Ch-Chat." I guess my words broke because my throat wasn't doing so well, seeing as I coughed up blood. He sprinted over to me, kneeling in front of me. I thought his arms were holding my shoulders as my earrings gave their last warning.

"Ladybug, no, no no no, don't leave me! No, no, what will I do without you?!" He was crying, I was sure of it. I could feel his tears hitting my knees.

"Live, chaton. Live with-without me." I cut myself off by violently coughing again, my voice raspy and quiet. He was trembling. My transformation gave way.

"M-Marinette?" Came his shocked whisper. "Oh god, not you too... I can't lose both of you..." He hugged me again, tight to his chest. Lose both of you? What did he mean? Does he know me? Ah, it doesn't matter.

(PLAYITNOWPLAYITNOWPLAYITNOW)  

That last thing I remember was a bright white light and being pulled away from Chat's grip.

~*Adrien*~

Her kwami, a small, red thing with black dots, had flown up while I was sobbing. I couldn't lose my Lady and my Princess. It wasn't fair.

I barely heard the kwami's whisper. "Miraculous Ladybug."

But I did feel Marinette being pulled from my grasp, a white light engulfing her. The butterflies whirled around her, and ladybugs too appeared and surrounded her. Her face, oh god, her beautiful, peaceful face, it was...

It was filling with colour!

She was floating in the air, glowing mysteriously as butterflies and ladybugs covered her body, her wounds, her face.

I did hear her kwami repeating herself, this time screaming out the words.

"MIRACULOUS LADYBUG!"

Everything moved faster, everything glowed brighter, I had to close my eyes and shield my face from that illuminating, lucent, lustrous, resplendent, radiant light.

The butterflies and ladybugs burst away, as if pushed by a humongous force, carried away with a light that could surely be seen from all ends of the Earth. She was back in my arms, completely healed, wearing a fluttering white red with a single ladybug on it.

She...

...

She opened her crystal blue eyes.

~*Third Person*~

Adrien let out a cry of relief and hugged her close, for he too, had released his transformation. Marinette had no idea what just happened. Tikki was crying and hugging Plagg, who comforted the Ladybug kwami, happy that the girl did not die that day. 

Marinette heard a crack and looked up.

The roof had split open. A circle of sky let sunlight stream into the room, enveloping the two holders in a circle of light. 

A ladybug flew up, wings fluttering against her cheek for a second.

Adrien looked at her, cupping her face. Tears slipped down his face and he broke into a smile before it withered underneath all these thoughts.

Today was the end of Ladybug and Chat Noir. Tikki and Plagg would go back to being dormant, awaiting the day they would be needed again. Marinette and Adrien wouldn't be Ladybug and Chat Noir again.

"I-I don't want it to end." He choked on a sob, smile long gone. "I-I'm s-so l-lonely, I d-don't want Plagg t-to go."

"Kid, it was never going to be forever. And you have Marinette now. You'll be fine with her." The ancient black cat rested atop his holder's head, sad as the human to be parting ways. Plagg, as much as he was a sarcastic little snot, loved and cared for all his holders deeply, as deeply as Tikki. He just had a different way of showing affection.

Marinette herself was tearing up as she held onto him, not eager to let go of Tikki either. She knew she'd be okay, eventually. Both of them would be. But... it was okay to hold on for a while, it was okay to miss the kwamis, it was okay to break down and fix herself again.

Pulling away from Adrien, she looked to Tikki and Plagg. "Can you carry your miraculous to Master Fu?" At Tikki's teary nod, she took off her earrings and held them in her hand. "Quod victi mali. Ad somnum , qui magicae artis." She whispered the Latin words, remembering Tikki telling her them the day she got her miraculous. The words Tikki told her to say when it was time.

A pink light swirled from her chest, some of her life force. It would replenish quickly, but that wasn't the point. The point was that the time of Ladybug and Chat Noir was over.

And this life energy, this pure magic... it would make everyone forget about the heroes. They would be erased from the past, all memories of them gone, except for their own. It was the only way the kwamis, the heroes themselves would be safe.

But... the end is just a new beginning.

Adrien and Marinette made a show of warming up to each other for Nino and Alya, eventually becoming best friends, and soon after, a couple. They knew as years came to pass, they'd never find anyone better than who they had. They knew they'd never fit with anyone else as perfectly as they did. They knew they couldn't leave the other if they tried.

Adrien and Marinette's adventure had come to an end, but a new adventure was beginning.