They couldn't get a taxi or uber, as their large suitcases would not fit, so they had to walk. Sighing, Chloe pulled out her phone and opened google maps, typed in the hotel, and pressed start. "It is going to take us half an hour to walk there, it's not too far," she said tiredly. They were appalled at the irresponsibility of their teacher – sure, they knew she was stupid, but they didn't think that she would be that stupid as to leave them alone in the most crime-ridden city in America.
"You've got to be kidding me", Chloe fumed, "this is ridiculous! Utterly ri-diculous!".
They reluctantly started their journey to the Wayne Hotel, all of them drowsy from their long flight.
They trudged along the streets of Gotham, their suitcases bouncing on the uneven ground behind them. Chloe held her phone in his hand, Google Maps open and the direction to the Wayne Hotel displayed as a blue line.
"Ugh, how long left now?" Adrien groaned, his feet dragging across the ground as he made his way forward in a zombie-like state. They were all severely jet-lagged (it would be 2 pm in Paris, but it was 8 in Gotham when they landed, so it is now half past 8), and they had a long day ahead of them.
"10 minutes," replied Chloe, her voice devoid of any emotion. Her eyes were droopy, and her posture slack.
Even ever-cheerful Marinette was grumpy and tired. However, as they walked, a shop caught her eye. "STARBUCKS!" Marinette gasped, sprinting over to it, dragging her suitcase bumpily behind her. The others followed close behind, eager to get some caffeine to help them gain energy.
Once they had ordered and later received their Venti (that's the largest size btw) coffees, they headed out, now much happier and more energetic than before.
With wide eyes, they began to take in the streets of Gotham. They had all expected the city to consist of dark alleyways and wannabe gangsters, and although that may be somewhat true in sketchier parts of the city, the streets they were currently strolling down were bright and full of life.
They arrived at to what seemed to be the main square, with a large concrete fountain in its centre and lively shops surrounding the plaza. The Wayne hotel could be seen a street or two away behind the shops, so they continued onwards.
The people in the square seemed so happy and carefree, despite the looming fear of the many villains that plagued the city. The friends smiled at each other, their spirits lifted, now genuinely excited to soon call this city home.
However, it seemed they spoke too soon. It all happened so fast – one second everything was fine, and then the Riddler somehow appeared, capturing a random girl with a gun to her head.
Surrounding him and the girl, were over 20 men, all wearing angry glares, black clothing and many weapons. 5 of these men also held civilians in their arms, all sorts of weapons pointed at them threateningly.
MG looked at each other, before carefully walking towards them.
The Riddler looked around at the many people in the square, before shouting boldly "Why hello people of Gotham. Today I am going to be asking one lucky person 5 riddles," he grinned manically. "If you get it right, one of these civilians will be released. If you don't, then one of these innocent civilians will die," his smile deepened, and everyone's faces paled at what he was hinting at.
"I have this lovely little contestant here, however, if you think you can do better, I will allow you to take her place. So, is anyone feeling like playing hero today?" he asked.
Marinette looked at her friends, who nodded gravely. Marinette had an IQ of over 200, and even if she didn't get the question right, she could probably take down the Riddler before he shot her anyways.
(idk if I researched this right but apparently that was the smartest person in the world's IQ so let's pretend she's at that level ok?)
She stepped forward, looked directly at the Riddler, and bravely stated "I will."
The Riddler's head whipped towards her, and his eyes narrowed analysing her quickly before smiling wickedly, not deeming her a threat.
Oh, how Marinette loved surprising people. It was hilarious to see villains' faces when they realised that she was not some small, defenceless little girl.
"Well then," the Riddler drawled, "Come on up then little girl".
He quickly let go of the girl he was holding, who fell to the ground, before getting up and running quickly away. Thankfully, the girl had manners and mouthed a quick thank you to Marinette before disappearing into the crowd.
Marinette passed her suitcases over to her friends, threw her now empty coffee cup into a nearby bin and walked forwards, greatly uneased by the now hundreds of people staring at her – she had never been great with everyone's eyes on her, even as Ladybug, as she had always been somewhat self-conscious that she would mess up.
However, despite the extra pressure placed on her shoulders as Ladybug, she always felt freer than she did as Marinette due to her anonymity and the superpowers she possessed. When she was Marinette, her social anxiety sky-rocketed, although she was working on it, amongst other things.
But she didn't let that stop her. Soon, she was standing just a mere metre away from the Riddler, whose suit, that she could now see clearly, was an absolute disaster. From the fabric choice to the terrible colours, it looked like his outfit had been picked using an online randomising spinning wheel.
"Ok girl. You know the rules. 5 questions, you get it right, one of them gets freed, you get it wrong, and one of them dies. Good luck" he smirked, "you'll need it".
"Riddle me this! The more there is of me, the less you see. What am I?" He grinned evilly.
Marinette thought for a moment, before confidently replying "Darkness.".
The Riddler's smile dropped, and instead, anger burned in his eyes. He hadn't expected Marinette to get it right, let alone be confident whilst doing so. It seemed to him that he had to up his game. One of the men reluctantly let a civilian go, who ran away terrified.
"Riddle me this!" he said, attempting to conceal the anger from his voice, "I have cities, but no houses. I have mountains, but no trees. I have water, but no fish. What am I?"
Marinette took mere seconds to come up with an answer for this one. "A map" she grinned, enjoying watching the Riddler get even more annoyed. A second civilian was released.
The horrendously multi-coloured villain furrowed his brows and thought for a moment, before perking up and smiling "Riddle me this! I speak without a mouth and hear without ears. I have no body, but I come alive with wind. What am I?"
This one was too easy for Marinette. "An echo," she answered effortlessly, "come on, surely you can do better than that." Her smug face and answer made the Riddler visibly furious, and although he attempted to conceal his anger with a smile, it only made him appear more maniacal than before. Another civilian was let go.
"You've been lucky so far girl, but you won't make it to the end" he refuted.
"Riddle me this!" he growled, "What goes up a chimney down, but not down a chimney up?" The Riddler was certain that this would stump Marinette, but instead, she answered it within seconds. "Really, I thought these were meant to be hard. It's an umbrella."
The Riddler yanked Marinette forward by her collar, and smiled evilly, "You may have gotten them right, but I assure you, you will not survive my last one". He stepped back for a moment, to come up with his best riddle yet, as the fourth civilian was let go.
Whilst Marinette kept the Riddler busy, Batman and his crew arrived at the scene. They surveyed the situation but could not act without putting Marinette's life at more risk than it already was. So instead, they simply watched on, hoping that she answered correctly otherwise they would have to intervene.
Marinette looked at them briefly out of the corner of her eye, before returning her attention to the Riddler.
"Ok then missy, riddle me this!" the Riddler snarled "A man and a woman went to a café after a scenic walk. They each ordered iced water. The man drank it in mere minutes, whereas the woman drank it gradually as they talked. A couple of hours later, the woman collapsed and died from poisoning, which was traced back to the drinks the couple shared. Why did the man not die too?"
Marinette paused for a moment, before smirking and answering, "Simple. The poison was in the ice. The man drank it quickly, so the ice didn't melt, but the woman drank is slowly, so she drank the melted ice."
The Riddler was gobsmacked. He couldn't believe that he had been outsmarted by someone, let alone a random teenage girl. He could not let her get away with this.
He looked at the henchman holding the last civilian, and he let them go.
"Well little girl," he began to explain, "I did say I would let you go, but I never promised to not hurt you afterwards." He grinned.
"I'll give you three seconds to run, how about that?" He proposed, and began his count down, "One..."
Marinette stayed in place, knowing that she could never get away in time and wanting to kick Riddler's ass for holding her up and making her extra late for the hotel.
"Two..."
Batman and his crew sprung to action – they had to get to her before it was too late.
The rest of Chloe, Kagami, Luka, and Adrien began to run forward towards the two dozen men surrounding Marinette, ready to help her fight.
"Three."
(Hahaha, you thought I'd leave you with that?! Hopefully this super long chapter makes up for the billion years I've been AWOL. Sorry about that again. Anyways, back to the story!)
The Riddler lunged at Marinette, who quickly defended herself, and thus began their battle. "Ok now that I can talk, we really need to discuss that atrocity you call your suit," Marinette began, "It is simply the most horrendous thing I have ever had the misfortune of seeing. The clashing colours are ridiculous, utterly ridiculous! And don't even get me started on that stupidly basic hat.
And your hair! How is it not dead, with the number of chemicals you probably need to make it that atrociously feral orange? You look like a wack-ass dollar store knockoff leprechaun how do you have the audacity to go out in this rancid costume, let alone kidnap and kill people?
Did you not get paid enough attention as a child or something? Did your mommy not play enough games with you and know you play deadly ones with random people?!..."
As they fought back and forth, Marinette continued to heavily criticize the Riddler's fashion choices. Whilst this was going on, M.G was quickly taking down the Riddler's minions, whilst Batman and his crew helped.
After about a minute or so Marinette finally finished bashing the Riddlers style and said, "Ok, this has been fun and all, but I have places to be so this is gonna have to end now." And as she finished her sentence, she expertly tripped the Riddler, flipped him onto his stomach and pulled his hands behind his back.
"Oi Batman, chuck me some handcuffs, would you?" she shouted in Batman's direction.
Batman, stunned, quickly dealt with the goon he was fighting with and threw her over a pair of handcuffs, which she placed around the Riddler's wrists.
"Nice going little girl, but this won't be the last you see of me. You've just made an enemy of the Riddler, and nobody survives that. NOBODY!" he screamed in pure rage, thrashing against the ground.
Marinette simply rolled her eyes and held him to the ground with a foot on his back, to make sure he didn't escape.
After about a minute or so of standing there, Batman and M.G finally finished rounding up all the Riddler's minions and loaded them into police vans.
Batman walked fiercely over to her, glowering.
"Young lady, what the hell were you thinking? What you did was very dangerous and irresponsible, you could have been killed!" he exclaimed.
Marinette sighed and took her foot off the Riddler. She hauled him up and began to walk him to a police van, whilst Batman followed.
"A thank you would have been nice, but you're welcome anyways." Marinette scoffed.
"The fact that you somehow got lucky and survived doesn't excuse your irresponsible actions!" he exclaimed, throwing his arms out for dramatics. "You should have left it to the real heroes." He huffed.
They reached the police, who took hold of the Riddler and loaded him into the back of a truck.
"Oh really? Well, where were you when that girl was taken hostage, hm? If I hadn't taken action, she would be dead. Now I know that you two are total enemies and all, and you probably wanted to take him down yourself, but at the end of the day, all that matters is that he is in jail, and everyone is safe. Now stop acting like a jealous prick be grateful!" Marinette snapped, stamping her foot on the ground.
Batman stilled. Never had somebody had the nerve to talk back to him, let alone insult him. But he knew that she was right. Although in his mind she was still irresponsible, he knew that today's events would have resulted in death if she had not acted and that in this situation getting angry was not an appropriate reaction.
Even if he was a little jealous.
"I apologise, miss," he began, "My reaction was uncalled for, and I am very grateful for your actions. I just hope that in the future you think before you act, I would hate to see someone as courageous as you get hurt."
Marinette smiled, her forgiving nature showing as she beamed, "Oh don't worry about it. We all have our moments. Thanks for your apology, but I have to go."
Batman nodded, but quickly blurted "Wait! The Riddler just declared you his enemy, there could be all sorts of villains out there who now want to get to you. Let one of my boys escort you to wherever you are going."
Marinette nodded and walked over to her friends, who had collected their suitcases and were now finishing giving their statements to the police, beckoning for Batman to follow.
Once they reached them, Chloe jumped on Marinette, scolding her for 'always having to be such a hero'. After Marinette had a quick catch-up with her friends, she explained to them that a hero was going to escort them for safety.
Adrien rolled his eyes at this, "I can handle myself; those mediocre villains don't hold a candle to the others we-" Kagami stomped on his foot, giving him a pointed look. Adrien's eyes widened, remembering that Batman didn't know they were heroes and was standing just three feet away – well within hearing distance.
"What he meant to say was thank you, Batman. Your help is greatly appreciated." Kagami announced, giving Batman a fake thankful smile. They all knew they didn't need the help, but they couldn't exactly tell Batman their secret identities, so they had to go along with it.
Batman however could sense something was amiss and was still uncertain as to how a young girl could so easily beat such a highly wanted criminal that he, the Batman had not even been able to catch.
All in all, he was a bit suspicious of these teens. They had shown up out of nowhere, somehow defeated a major villain, and just acted as if that was all was completely normal. There was no way they were just normal teens.
"If you don't mind me asking, those were some extreme skills you lot demonstrated back there. How did you learn to do that?" Batman questioned.
The teens glanced at each other before Luka spoke up, "In Paris, many people learnt self-defence whilst Shadow Moth was still active" he explained. It was their go-to excuse, which they had come up with once to answer anyone suspicious of their skills.
(Shadow Moth is what he was called after he combined both the Peacock and Butterfly miraculouses, which gave him the ability to akumatize people and create sentimonsters.)
"Shadow Moth?" the Dark Knight inquired. "Who's that?"
The group of teens stared at him. "You really don't know?" Adrien voiced. "No," Batman said, "Should I?"
Chloe frowned, "The French Government kept in on the down low from other countries because they didn't want to decrease tourism and destroy the economy, but I would have thought that you of all people would know."
Nightwing, Red Hood, Red Robin and Robin headed over to them, having finished giving the police their statements.
"Know what?" Red Robin interrupted.
"Shadow Moth was a supervillain that terrorized Paris for 4 years. He basically preyed on people with any negative emotions and coerced them with magic into being supervillains. He was just defeated last month by the Parisian heroes." Marinette explained.
The batboys were shocked - Batman especially. He was known as the best detective there was, yet he didn't even know of one of the biggest supervillains in the world.
"Woah, that's crazy. Was he dangerous?" Red Hood asked.
"Yeah, he wanted to get Ladybug and Chat Noir's Miraculous, the source of their power, and combine them to make a wish. But the thing is, doing that would basically destroy the entire world. So of course, they had to stop him. He used the Akuma victims as bait, letting them wreak havoc so the heroes would come running to stop them, and then getting the Akuma victims to try to get their miraculous. It was pretty f*cked up." Adrien explained.
The batboy's eyes widened, and they exchanged nervous looks with one another. Well, except for Robin, who still wore an unreadable expression. "Well, we'll definitely look into the matter. It's good to hear that he was defeated. Thanks for informing us of this." Batman said, somewhat uncomfortably.
"Now, I'll have Robin escort you to your next destination." Batman continued, giving Robin a firm that's final, so don't even try to complain look.
Robin rolled his eyes. 'Tch, fine."
Marinette turned to look at him, only now really noticing his presence. Their eyes locked and Marinette felt a pull in her chest. Staring into his deep emerald eyes she felt almost trapped in their enchanting gaze.
Little did she know, Robin felt the exact same way looking into Marinette's bluebell eyes. After what seemed like forever, but was really little longer than a second, Robin finally tore his eyes away to look at the rest of the group.
"Where are you going?" he inquired, his face remaining stony and expressionless.
"The Wayne Hotel." Luka supplied.
When Batman heard this, his eyes snapped up, as he put the pieces together. Their French accents and destination could only mean one thing...
"For safety purposes, could I please get your names? If you go missing or we need information on the French villain, we may need your names to get to you." Batman asked.
Marinette looked at the others and shrugged. "Yeah. Um, Kagami Tsurigi is the girl with the short black hair, Luka Stone with the blue hair, blondie 1 is Adrien Stone and blondie 2 is Chloe Bourgeois, and my name's Marinette Stone."
Batman smiled. He had been right; they were the contest winners. The batboys smiled internally – they were looking forward to getting to know Marinette out of costume. Marinette Stone was proving to be an interesting person indeed.
"Okay then, I'll keep that in mind. Until we meet again" he replied, and with that, Batman, and his crew (excluding Robin) grapple gunned away.
Robin discreetly peered at Marinette – he had helped choose her essay as the winner and (although he would never admit it) had thought it was extremely impressive, so he was quite impressed by the ever-growing list of good qualities she, and her friends, appeared to possess.
"Come on then," he said, and turned in the direction of the hotel, beckoning for them to follow.
They began to walk, and Marinette decided to spark up a conversation with the traffic light themed hero.
"So, how has your crime-fighting day been so far?" she inquired, turning to face him as they walked.
"Adequate." he stated, "Only two muggings and one small robbery so far. Other than the Riddler."
Marinette nodded, and Robin continued, "So, what brings you all to Gotham? You're French, no?".
Even though he already knew why they were here, she couldn't know that – Damien Wayne knew, not Robin. And Marinette didn't know that they were the same person – or at least that's what he thought.
Marinette smiled, "Yeah, we are French. We won a competition hosted by Bruce Wayne for a month-long trip to Gotham. We're pretty excited, right guys?" She glanced at her friends beside and behind her.
"Very much. I am looking forward to the Gotham Museum of Antiques and the Gotham Natural History Museum." Kagami said.
"Ah yes, they are very interesting. I'm sure you will enjoy them" Robin agreed.
"I would love to see some live American music while we're here" Luka put forth.
"Well, I hope you aren't disappointed. It is quite different from French music in my experience." Robin supplied.
"I totally want to see the cute clothes and make-up styles of America" Chloe chimed in.
"Oh, I would love to go to a fashion show here in Gotham, I bet they'll have Halston and Marc Jacobs and oh, maybe even Virginie Viard!" Marinette added.
"Oh, are you both into clothes?" Robin asked.
"Well, I just like clothes, but Marinette here is a fashion designer! She made an album cover for Jagged Stone, designed his iconic sunglasses, and even had her hat worn by Adrien at a Fashion show after winning Gabriel Agreste's derby hat competition." Chloe blurted excitedly, always happy to take an opportunity to boast about her friend's achievements, as Marinette usually downplayed them all.
Robin's eyes widened – this girl was proving to be more talented by the minute. "Well congratulations Miss Stone, I'm sure you will find American fashion quite interesting," he said, admiration etched onto his usually emotionless face.
Marinette blushed at the sudden attention. "Well, it's really not that big of a deal but err, thanks." She smiled awkwardly.
"So, where is the rest of your class?" Robin asked, curious as to why they were walking alone in a city known for its extreme amounts of crime.
"Well, it's a long story." Adrien began. "You see-" Chloe cut him off. "There's this psycho-compulsive liar in our class who has turned everyone against us because we saw through her lies, and so the entire class and all the teachers hate us. And then we get in trouble for defending ourselves, or sometimes for nothing at all because Lila is a f*cking fake piece of sh*t that can't go three seconds without lying about something for attention!" Chloe shouted, earning odd looks from people in their near vicinity.
"...oh..." Robin uttered, too stunned to come up with anything else. "But their hatred for you doesn't explain why you guys are all alone?" he questioned.
"Lila has the teachers wrapped around her finger. Our teacher used to be the kindest most caring person in the world, but now she is horrible. Lila lied about the plane leaving early so Ms Bustier would make the bus driver leave early, almost leaving Marinette, Adrien, and I behind. I bet Lila told Ms Buster some sort of lie about needing to be at the hotel early because they left the airport before we even made it to the luggage pickup." Luka explained calmly.
"Tt, your class sound like imbeciles" Robin muttered.
"Yep, they sure are" Adrien agreed.
"I cannot believe they bought that preposterous story about Lila dating Damien Wayne," Kagami complained. Robin's eyes nearly popped out of his skull, but he quickly concealed his emotions before the group became suspicious.
"Don't you mean her precious 'Dami-boo'" Marinette joked, causing everyone to laugh – even Robin snickered at the atrocious nickname.
The group continued to walk and chat amongst themselves until after about 10 minutes they reached the Wayne Hotel.
Almost immediately after stepping through the front doors to the lobby, they were berated by the class and Ms Bustier.
"What took you so long!?"
"We have been waiting forever!"
"We couldn't get into the hotel because of you!"
'We had to fight off the f*cking Riddler you dumb sh*ts! P*ss off for f*ck's sake!" Adrien shouted heatedly.
The class was silent for a moment, before they recollected their minimal thoughts and began shouting again.
"I bet you did that all for attention you attention wh*res!"
"Why would you be so reckless just for attention?"
"How could you be so stupid and irresponsible!"
After hearing that last comment from their teacher, Robin had had enough.
"How could they! How could YOU be such a horrible and irresponsible teacher and leave a group of teenagers alone in a place like Gotham City? It's your job to take care of them and you couldn't even do that." He scolded.
"Now don't you talk to me like that young man. I trusted them to take care of themselves like responsible young adults, but they clearly cannot be trusted. Lila said that we had to be here early for a tour of the hotel, so they should have understood that and been faster!" Ms Bustier retorted, her face slowly turning red, blending into the atrocious bright orange mop she called hair.
"I thought you were the teacher. Why is a student telling you where you need to be and when? Also, how did you expect them to 'understand' and be faster when you left them behind and did not tell them anything? I'm sure the government would be glad to strip you of your teaching licence if I told them what you've done." Robin contented.
"Now, quit scolding them for doing nothing wrong, or I will report you. Do I make myself clear?" he seethed.
Ms Bustier glared furiously but was silent.
Robin turned and walked out, catching Marinette's eye as he went, and giving her a slight smile. Once he exited the building, he pulled out his grapple hook and swung off into the distance.
As soon as Robin was out of sight, Ms Bustier and the rest of the class began to scream at them even louder than before. Lila even broke down sobbing on the floor – Marinette wasn't sure why, but it got her the attention she so dearly craved.
Instead of standing there and taking in their insults, Marinette and her friends shoved past them and walked up to the front desk, where Marinette kindly asked the receptionist for the room keys.
"Of course, could I please get a name for the reservation?" he responded friendlily.
"Um, we won the essay competition by Bruce Wayne, so maybe try-"
"It's LILA ROSSI! She got us this trip; it should be in her name!" Alya insisted heatedly.
The receptionist, whose name tag read Jeremy, looked at her pointedly. "Ma'am, I have already told you that there is no reservation under the name Lila Rossi. If you continue to be a nuisance, I will have security remove you from the premises." He explained with a strained smile.
"WHAT! HOW DARE YOU, LILA IS-" "Try Marinette please" Marinette cut in.
"Okay, could I get the last name for that?" he asked. "Um yeah," she muttered, "Stone" too quietly for Alya to hear. Marinette put a finger briefly over her lips to try and convey that she didn't want Alya and the class to know her last name, and thankfully Jeremy understood.
The world didn't know of Jagged's children, adopted or biological, and they wanted to keep it that way to avoid paparazzi and media attention. The only people who knew were Chloe, Kagami and their mothers. Jagged had enough attention when he married Penny – any more of it and he might just explode.
"Right, yes I do have a reservation under that name," Jeremy stated.
"I have standard suites for the following groups of people. Alya, Lila, Sabrina and Mylene, another for Rose, Juleka, and Alix. Then one for Ivan, and Nathaniel, and one last one for Max, Nino, and Kim. Lastly, I have two penthouse suites for Marinette, Chloe, and Kagami, and then Adrien and Luka."
This caused an uproar among the Lila-believing students.
"WHAT!"
"LILA WON THE TRIP! SHE SHOULD GET THE BETTER ROOM!"
"LILA DESERVES IT NOT THEM!"
"THEY'RE BULLIES!"
"WHAT THE F*CK!"
And so on. Marinette just rolled her eyes. They just could not stop complaining, could they? Nothing was ever good enough for their poor princess Liela. Marinette smiled on the inside. She was glad that Ms Bustier put her in charge of managing the trip, as she had been able to specifically ask for the room arrangements.
Jeremy handed all the keys to Marinette, and gave her a sympathetic look, before turning his attention back to the computer screen in front of him.
Marinette gave Ms Bustier the keys that belonged to the rest of the class, and MG quickly escaped to the elevators to avoid the class's wrath.
Once they were inside the elevators, they burst out laughing.
"Oh, I feel so bad for poor Lila, how will her tinnitus react?" joked Kagami, which just caused more laughter amongst the group.
Soon, they reached floor 69. Marinette passed Luka and Adrien their key, and they hopped off, their suitcases in tow. "See you later ladies" laughed Adrien, winking.
The girls burst into laughter at this, pulling funny faces at the boys before the doors closed. Mere seconds later, the doors reopened on floor 70. The three teens walked out of the elevator and into a small waiting room, with a door in the middle.
Marinette put the keys in the lock, and opened the door, gasping when she saw the beautiful room.
They walked inside and admired the tasteful designs. The kitchen, dining room and living room were all in one large open space, with a window at the end displaying a gorgeous view of the city.
(Maybe something like this? But erase the white wall thing in the middle and put a city view behind the couch. Idk if you don't like it imagine something else)
To the right was a hallway with three separate doors. Inside each was a bedroom with an ensuite bathroom.
"OMG, this is stunning!" Chloe exclaimed. Marinette and Kagami nodded in agreement. They then each went into their own separate bedrooms and speedily unpacked. Just as they were finishing, there was a knock at the door.
"I'll get it!" Marinette shouted. She marched over to the door, frowning.
"If this is Lila, I swear I will slap her so hard-" she yanked open the door and came face to face with Adrien and Luka. "Oh... come in guys" she exhaled in relief. Adrien was holding a large tote bag that clanked as he walked.
Marinette eyed it suspiciously, knowing what was inside. "Jeez Adrien, it's the middle of the day." She laughed.
"It's not for now silly, it's for tonight. We are totally doing sleepover games. Plus, I brought snacks too!" he replied.
They came in and looked around, "Yours is just like ours... but with one extra room." Adrien noted.
"Wow, thats so crazy. Never would have guessed the two penthouses were similar. Never." Marinette replied.
Adrien glared mockingly, before making his way over to the living room.
The three of them lounged on the couches, talking about anything and everything until a couple of minutes later when Chloe and Kagami finally came out of their rooms.
They all chatted about the oncoming weeks and when they would look at houses they wanted to buy.
The first two weeks of the trip would be touring the city, and the last two weeks would be spent at Gotham Academy, the local high school. However, for them, they would be spending the rest of the year at that school.
Audrey, Jagged and Tomoe had given the teens permission to move to Gotham as long as they kept their grades and behaviour up. Which, knowing them, would be certain. Besides, they were practically adults anyways.
They couldn't wait to all live in a mansion together.
After about an hour, they realised that it was almost one o'clock – they had missed lunch. So, Kagami got up and went over to the phone in the kitchen. Next to it was a slip of paper with the phone numbers for room service, management etc.
"What do you guys want?" she called to them.
Marinette and the others agreed on getting pizzas, and then shouted back, "4 pizzas! One pepperoni, one meat lover, one Hawaiian and one veggie please!" Luka called back.
"Got it," Kagami replied and called room service. She made the order and hung up the phone. After coming back and settling down on the couch, she told them that it would be here in 10 minutes.
They went back to chatting and ten minutes later there was a knock at the door. "I'll get it" said Adrien, who then went up and opened the door. He collected the pizzas and handed the man the money with a "thanks".
He came back and they all groaned at the smell oozing out of the boxes. The pizzas barely lasted 5 minutes before they were all gone, now making a cosy home in the teen's stomachs.
"I don't know how other people can't see that the Batboys and Wayne's look exactly the same," laughed Marinette. "Yeah, I mean who else in Gotham has the money for that" agreed Adrien.
"I feel so funny talking to them knowing their identities, sometimes it's hard not to laugh," giggled Chloe
"Hey, do you guys wanna watch the latest Harry Potter movie – Fantastic Beasts, Secrets of Dumbledore? I have been dying to watch it." Kagami asked. Everyone agreed and Adrien pulled out 5 bags of popcorn from his tote bag, passing one to each person.
They spent the rest of the afternoon watching movie after movie, from Harry Potter, to James Bond to Mean Girls, their afternoon was full of laughter and smiles.
Their night was the same – with games of alcoholic truth or dare, never have I ever, and more. They couldn't have been happier, all of them together, no Lila in sight.
They all dozed off into a deep, alcohol-induced sleep sometime past 2 am, with smiles on their faces and their hearts – and stomachs – content.
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Hey!!
I know I haven't updated in FOREVER, I really just ran out of time and also possibly forgot.
But I got covid (the first time) so yay! I am at home now and decided to finish this chapter. I thought I would make it longer than normal to make it up to you guys for not updating in ages. Over 6 thousand words! Well, including this author's note at the end.
Anyways, how are you guys doing? Ik some of you are from America, and things look pretty shitty over there right now with all those old crusty dusty hoes in the Supreme Court being stinky rats and making terrible decisions. With the overturning of Roe v Wade, the many shootings because of the non-existent gun laws, and them now apparently planning on coming after gay rights, from my perspective, shared with many other Australians, it looks like an absolute shit show.
I'm not hating on Americans; I am saying I'm sorry for what's happening over there right now. Anyone who wants to chat or let anger out is welcome to message me. Idk you so you can anonymously lemme know whatever because im not gonna go FBI agent on you and hack you and let all your friends know that you hate life.
MOVING ON.
I had knee surgery because mine pops out ALL THE TIME. Seriously, I literally walked down a little hill once and it decided to pop out. Thankfully it always pops right back in so quickly I don't even see it come out, but it takes a week+ to recover because of the pain and swelling and ligament damage so now hopefully it won't happen in the future. I'm fine now tho. It just sucked. I got a cool little scar, its only like 5 cm long tho. I did get to stay overnight at the hospital though, which was fun. And health insurance covered the majority of it which is good.
Does American health insurance do the same? From what I've heard the American Healthcare system is absolute shite, and everything is super expensive, but it might just be an exaggeration.
ON A MORE IMPORTANT NOTE:
I updated the prologue so you can now see the ages and hero aliases of M.G and Batman and the Batboys. I think I also cut it down a bit and fixed a couple of mistakes in multiple chapters so if you want to re-read them it shouldn't take long, and I would recommend doing so.
ALSO
I changed the book cover because I thought it could look more mature. All credit goes to the amazing artist fizzart on tumblr, she is an incredible artist.
Okay all you incredible, wonderful, beautiful humans, thank you all so much for reading and I shall talk to you again when I next update.
Thanks for 2.6K reads!
Bye,
Ivy ❤❤❤