When Duty and Desire Meet

Evillustrator Part 2

Then there was the slowly creeping guilt. The guilt which grew every time she kissed Chat, every time he smiled at her whilst unaware that she was his partner of four years, every time she said nothing when she could have told the truth.

Marinette hated liars, yet she was lying to the person she loved the most.

Her only solace was the fact that he was withholding his identity too. Still, he wasn't outright lying about it either. He wasn't all but tricking her into a relationship. Marinette, on the other hand, was beginning to suspect that she was guilty of that particular crime.

And yet here she was, knowing that she was practically offering her secret identity to him on a silver platter if things went wrong tonight. Here she was, risking it all.

Ladybug groaned, falling backwards against the pillows and stewing in the mess she'd made of her life and emotions. However, she decided that she couldn't stew for long, and sat up with a huff.

She was restless, agitated, and deliberately holding herself back.

Trying to rid her imagination of the look on Chat's face if he discovered just who exactly he'd been kissing all these months, she ran her hand over her braid and sighed a third and final time.

Besides, how exactly was she supposed to confess, anyway?

"Hi Chat, how are you?"

"Hey LB, what's up?"

"Oh, not much. Hey! Did you know you had your tongue in my mouth last night, Hot Stuff?"

"What?"

"What."

Yeah. Probably not.

Not wanting to drag herself through more anxiety, Ladybug swallowed the lump of panic forming in her throat and opened her yo-yo to call Chat. After a few moments of ringing, which seemed to stretch on for an eternity, her partner's friendly face appeared on the receiver- slightly shaky due to him walking. Paris' skyline glowed behind him, the light of the setting sun highlighting his hair with streaks of honey and gold and Ladybug had to fight not to drool.

"Hey LB, everything ok?" he greeted, cheerful and totally oblivious to the bomb she was about to drop.

"Hey Chat, I have a big favour to ask you," she replied, her tone serious as she shifted her weight. Now that she'd gotten over the worst part (the anticipation), the plan began to fall from her lips more easily, and the command in her voice took hold, her Ladybug confidence slipping on as easily as her favourite jacket.

It was tantamount to how well they knew each other by now that Chat instantly picked up on her tone, and immediately came to a halt. He frowned into the camera, nodding once. "Ok, what's going on?"

Ladybug gave herself a fraction of a second to remember the lines she'd rehearsed, and decided to look directly into the small camera as opposed to the monitor. Even when she wasn't truly face-to-face with him, it was still easier to avoid his gaze. "I'm out of town today- on a day trip. Not too far, which is why I didn't think I'd need to tell you. I'm a couple of hours away but-" she giggled nervously- "you know me! Seems like I always tempt fate."

"Tell me something I don't know, Little Lady," Chat grinned, and her heart flipped the way it always did when he called her that. "So, how'd you tempt fate this time? Or what happened to make you think you tempted fate?"

"Well," Ladybug quirked her lips, shrugged her shoulders, "you know how the occasional akuma still pops up from time to time?"

The grin dropped from Chat's face, and he brought a hand up to his face. "LB," he said, his tone low, "Please tell me there isn't an akuma around whilst you're a couple of hours away?"