After school, Adrien figured he'd stop by the Dupain-Cheng bakery to check on Marinette's family and order a croissant. After all, he was hungry.
"Hello Mrs. Cheng," he greeted Marinette's mother politely once he entered the bakery. She was the only one working in the bakery that afternoon.
"Adrien, what a surprise to see you! How is school going?" She asked him, pleasantly surprised by his arrival. Sabine knew how much Adrien meant to Marinette. After all, it wasn't hard to guess who her daughter had affection for when her walls were covered with pictures of his face.
"School is alright. We have a new student named Bridgette!" He told her, watching as she smiled when he genuinely told her something that occurred rather than just answering with the simple 'good' reply that most teenagers give adults.
"That's nice, dear. Is there anything you'd like us to get you?" Sabine asked with a warm smile, gesturing toward the pastries she'd just baked.
"May I order one croissant please?" Adrien asked politely as he pulled out his wallet.
"Of course you may! Also no charge to Marinette's friends! Consider it on the house," Sabine told him, causing him to light up with a smile. Her kindness reminded him of Marinette's, and he knew where she'd inherited it from.
He could still see the sadness and anxiety within Sabine, even though she was doing her best to remain calm and think positive for Marinette.
"Thank you so much!" He smiled widely, hoping to distract her from her missing child. She smiled a simple, Marinette-like smile in return.
The brunette girl with green eyes from Adrien's class showed up, nervously clutching onto her bag. When Adrien saw her, he heard her squeak out of fear.
"H-Hi? Miss Cheng- I um- Adrien hi- like stuff... ph-phone and bathroom please?!" Bridgette whimpered, her face completely red.
"Sure sweetie. It's right up this way. I'll be back in a moment, Adrien," Sabine promised before guiding the girl to her bathroom upstairs. She noticed the girl kept her face down, almost as if she were really shy about her appearance.
"It's at the end of the hall to the left," she told Bridgette.
"Thank you," she replied in a voice pitch and tone that sounded more like Rose's to avoid her mother's suspicion. She rushed off to the bathroom before she could see her face.
Ladybug laid out her plan. Obviously, not wanting everyone in the world to know about her crush on Adrien, she edited cropped the video into two different videos. She would send the one video to all her contacts, send her embarrassing confession video to just Adrien, then leave her cell phone in her room.
After making sure her mother had left, she set a timer for the messages to send to the people she intended to send the messages to.
It would be a short twenty-four hours before the videos were sent off, before she made it official she couldn't return home, and most importantly, official that Adrien knew that she loved him.
She started the timer and tossed her cell phone back into her room, grabbed some of her allowance and went back down the bakery.
* * *
24 hours
* * *
"Everything okay, Bridgette?" Adrien asked.
"Never better," she smiled weakly, pulling her thumbs up. Ladybug couldn't find the strength to look him in the eye, knowing he'd know about her crush on him soon.
"Can I please order a sandwich from the special?" She asked her mother.
"Of course, sweetie," she replied with a smile, but Ladybug could see it in her mother that she wasn't really all that happy. She looked as if she were hold by her whole act together by a single thread that could snap with any added weight.
Seeing as Adrien was eating his croissant, Ladybug silently sat in the seat beside him. She paid for her sandwich and waited for it.
"So, how's everything going? I remember being the new kid," Adrien chuckled.
"Everything is... interesting. I learned a lot of this stuff from... uh homeschool! Social environment is different," she laughed nervously, putting on her best acting skills.
"Hey, I was homeschooled before I came to this school too!" Adrien laughed, holding out his hand for a high-five. She high-fived him in return, mentally facepalming at her fake story.
How did people even believe her story?
Bridgette Luck, a shy girl who happened to be homeschooled just before she dropped into a class the day after Marinette Dupain-Cheng went missing, taking her spot and was the same age and had the same build as Ladybug/Marinette, while also being friends with Chloe before coming into the class.
Marinette wasn't even sure if she'd believe it, but then again, no one even came close to realizing she was Ladybug.
Even though Chloe knew Ladybug didn't detransform and Marinette went bye-bye.
Did she know? Was it even possible?
"Your sandwich is ready," her mother said, placing her wrapped sandwich on the table in front of her.
"Thanks Ma'am," she gave her mother a sweet smile. Mrs. Dupain-Cheng politely chuckled in return, walking back to her register.
"I should get going. I'll see you tomorrow, Bridgette. Goodbye Mrs. Dupain-Cheng! Have a good evening!" Adrien told the both of them after seeing a text on his phone.
"Y-Yeah, bye Adrien."
Marinette sadly unwrapped her sandwich, taking a large bite out of it. A rush of familiar flavors and a sense of nostalgia crashed down on her and she felt the tears forming in her eyes.
No, no. She couldn't cry. It would make her makeup run and her mask would show and her second cover would be blown.
She used a napkin from the table to lightly dab at the corners of her eyes, careful not to remove any makeup. Marinette smiled at Sabine one last time before wishing her a good day.
* * *
19 hours
* * *
"Ladybug, it's midnight and you've already done your homework. Why are you so stressed?" Chloe grumbled from beneath her pillow tiredly.
"Is it noticeable? How am I stressed?! I am not stressing out!!" Ladybug squeaked, stomping her foot as she looked around in distress.
Of course she was stressed! She had approximately nineteen hours before her life would be changed forever and Adrien would finally know the truth about everything! She had every right to be stressed, she felt.
"You're pacing around the room, huffing and sighing about mistakes, groaning, laying down then getting up again, and it's literally impossible to sleep. What's going on?" Chloe finally asked, sitting up from her bed as she rubbed her eyes.
"Nothing is going on! I'm fine! I swear, everything is just perfect! Everything is great, yeah. So great," she pouted, flopping her face into her hands dramatically. This was the point she'd usually need Alya to reassure her and push her forward, but she couldn't do it.
"If everything was fine, you would be asleep or chatting with Chat Noir. Is it about superhero stuff?" The blonde asked her.
"Sort of. I mean, I guess. It's something- crazy. I just did something that will have consequences and I'm not sure if they'll be good or bad. I sort of revealed something and it's huge, for me at least. I'm just freaking out and- I'm sorry. You should go back to sleep. We've got a long day of school tomorrow," she cut herself off, but Chloe sleepily waved her hands out.
"No, it's fine. You could continue. It's basically Friday morning anyways. We could sleep all we want after school," Chloe assured her, which definitely surprised Marinette.
It really shouldn't have, because as the two spent more time with one another, Chloe seemed to have started to mature and start treating others more nicely than she used to.
"I'm just scared because I revealed something that could change everything. I don't know what to do," she continued, yearning to have the comfort of her old best friend.
As nice as Chloe was becoming, Alya could never be replaced. Marinette believed the blonde could never be supportive of the fact that she liked Adrien, or of her true identity in general. Once she found out she was actually 'Mari-trash' the entire time, their friendship was over.
And it slightly hurt to think that their friendship could be killed that quickly, meaning they weren't even true friends in the first place.
"Well, in my opinion, I think you should just leave it to be. Whether or not this secret of yours affects everything, you'll still be the miraculous Ladybug and no one could hate you at the end of the day. You're a hero, and that's what counts," Chloe told her.
Ladybug braided the ends of her hair, taking a breath as she continued to sulk. "The consequences are really scary to think about. I know, but it's a part of life. We all have to deal with the things that our actions leave behind and clean up the mess, or you could just leave it. Based on how different we are, just leaving it doesn't seem like your kind of style, but it's something I've grown to do. It's not the best thing, but my daddy and Sabrina always seem to have my back. They're always there to clean up after me and my actions," Chloe told her, and Ladybug could almost swear that she saw a sign of remorse.
* * *
11 hours
* * *
"Hey, rumor has it that Marinette was last seen on a plane to America," Bridgette heard one of her classmates whisper to another.
"That's not what I heard! According to my brother's friend, Marinette dropped out of school to run away to a remote island with her secret boyfriend..."
"Marinette doesn't even have a secret boyfriend. I would've known about it," Alya jumped into the conversation, remembering her best friend only ever loved Adrien.
"Hence the word secret," Kim told her.
"I heard she became Hawkmoth's slave!" Lila admitted, hearing it from the girl's bathroom earlier.
"Oh no!! We need to tell Ladybug and Cat!" Mylene cried out.
"Guys, she's probably just doing something like a top secret art project," Bridgette told them, trying to get the situation to calm down a little. Her classmates have been talking about nothing other than the mysteries of where Marinette could be. Honestly, she was glad that when the timer would send the message off, all these crazy rumors would probably die down and she'd hopefully be forgotten.
"Bridgette's right. Nothing too big probably happened," Sabrina took her side.
"I just hope that girl is still okay. We haven't heard from her in a while," Alya rested her chin in her hands as she leaned her elbows on the table. Bridgette began to drink from her water bottle to avoid making any crazy remarks while listening to her classmates' theories.
"Chat Noir hasn't found anything on her. Adrien told me that Ladybug finally stopped looking. There's no clues to go off of other than the note and she's unsure of where to go next," Nino said, causing Bridgette to choke on her water and start coughing.
Was Chat Noir really that upset that she didn't want to spend anymore time looking for something that was literally impossible to find?! Gosh, that cat was irritating, Bridgette thought to herself. Then again, she looked like she was giving up on a random civilian, so it was a little terrible of her. She couldn't spend another second looking for "Marinette" without feeling guilty about being unable to change back.
She spent so much time the night before calling out her de-transformation phrase in hopes of getting her costume off, but it only seemed to become a bigger part of her.
"That's not true! Ladybug would never give up on someone who needs her help!" Alya argued.
"Dude, I'm just going off of what Adrien said Chat Noir told him," Nino put his hands up in surrender, hoping to escape Alya's wrath.
"She's probably fine!" Chloe grumbled from the other side of the room.
"What would you know, Chloe?" Alya stood up, remembering how the blonde would torture her best friend with insults and dumb plans.
"What I know is that Marinette used to be my best friend!" Chloe told her angrily.
"Oh, since when?!" Alya threw her hands up.
"Two years before you came here!" Chloe told her.
"It was true. Actually, I didn't even come to this school until last year. I was Chloe's new BFF," Sabrina explained.
"Then why did you hate her so much?!"
"We got into a fight about something dumb, then we threw petty insults at one another. Eventually, we let our small feud grow into a large hatred, and always made fun of one another whenever we'd see each other. I don't even remember what the fight was about in the first place."
"My favorite pen..." Bridgette muttered to herself.
"What?" Alya asked her, Chloe's attention turning to her as well. They heard her mutter something, but couldn't make it out.
"Be nice to each other!" Bridgette yelled, getting off subject.
The teacher arrived and the class began their day with some poetic readings.
* * *
6 hours
* * *
For what seemed the hundredth time since being trapped in a disguise with another disguise, Marinette almost instinctively followed Alya to lunch, but had to mentally scold herself. She was acting too Marinetty and she needed to cut it out.
The girl had nearly forgotten that she had only six hours until her messages were sent to everyone in her contacts. That was the official message to tell everyone she knew that it would be unlikely for her to return and to stop looking for her. Not only was that going to get out, but there was a personal message only sent to Adrien that she was particularly worried about. Considering the fact that she completely confessed her love and probably risked being friend-zoned by Adrien, she was pretty dang nervous.
"Are you still stressing out about whatever it is that you said you revealed? L, just keep it chill," Chloe mimicked Nino toward the end, causing Ladybug to giggle.
"L? Isn't that a little risky?" She laughed.
"No, it's stands for Luck. As in Bridgette Luck."
"Right..." Ladybug smiled, laughing a bit.
"BL... LB. Goodness gracious! Couldn't you have chosen different initials?" Chloe laughed as she made the connection.
"That was completely unintentional, I swear," Ladybug pointed out, chuckling.
"Right, of course," the blonde girl sarcastically said.
When Adrien passed by them, he waved in a friendly manner. Ladybug almost fell off the bench they were sitting at as she dropped her sandwich into the grass.
"Whoa, are you okay there, Bridgette?" He asked her, looking at the fallen sandwich and the girl's saddened expression.
"I'm purr-fectly fine!" She screeched, giving a thumbs up as he chuckled at her pun. Chloe rolled her eyes at Ladybug's clumsiness and pun.
The poor girl wheezed at the knowledge that Adrien would know the truth about her feelings in a matter of hours, and seeing his physical, unknowing form standing right in front of her was causing her stomach to do backflips and cartwheels. Her heart was slamming itself into her chest and the hairs on the back of her neck stood up. It really made her wonder how she even uttered a pun to Adrien before this without choking on her words.
"Are you sure?" Adrien's eyebrows furrowed in worry, seeing as he just viewed her long wheeze.
In response, she jumbled her shaky fingers into the formation of a thumbs up before holding it out in front of her large, Marinette-like smile. The funny thing, she thought, was that that smile hadn't existed until she met Adrien.
"She's fine," Chloe replied. Bridgette nearly jumped when she noticed Alya sending her a stone-cold glare.
What? All she did was be nervous and blushy around the oblivious boy... which was exactly the same thing Marinette did, she realized. Alya knew she liked him, and she probably wasn't very happy that Adrien might show interest toward anyone beside Marinette.
At least if Adrien didn't like Marinette that way, she could try again as Ladybug, she thought to herself sadly.
* * *
2 hours
* * *
"Why are you staring at that clock? It doesn't move very fast if you keep staring at it," Chloe asked Ladybug as she lied across her bed, watching the anxious superhero.
"The little hand on the clock vibrates every time it moves an hour," she replied.
"You are one bored girl. Why don't you go patrol the city or look for Marinette? Maybe that'll get your mind off of whatever you're waiting for."
"I doubt it, but I'm actually trying to slow time down. It's not working. The clock keeps ticking and ticking, no matter how much I want it to stop," Ladybug whined.
Chloe rolled her eyes and picked up her phone. Once she touched it to see her notifications, her eyes widened.
"Uh... I think it's probably a good time to patrol," she spoke in a rushed tone.
"Nah... I already patrolled yesterday," Ladybug whined.
"No, no! It's a really good time to patrol!" Chloe shoved her phone in Ladybug's face, causing her vision to blur at the object that was too close. Once she got ahold of it in her hands, she saw a notification from the LadyBlog, sent an hour ago.
There's been an akuma attack at the subway station. Chat Noir is here, but Ladybug is nowhere in sight! If anyone spots the heroine, please inform her of the situation immediately!
Ladybug yelped, dropping the phone in Chloe's hand. She ran to the bathroom, ripped off her wig and wig-cap, tore off her Bridgette-clothing to reveal her suit underneath, then washed the makeup off her neck and face.
Without even pulling her hair into the usual pigtails held with ribbons, she used her yoyo to swing herself out of the hotel from the balcony. Launching herself across the city, she found her way into the station and ran in there with a fighting stance.
There was no akuma in sight as far as she could see, so she ran across the station to find the villain. The place was obviously evacuated, seeing as some of the walls were dented and the tracks were broken.
Quickly, she slipped into the ticket booth, but found only a jar. When she picked it up, she saw it was filled with water, making it heavy, but there was a paralyzed akuma butterfly.
A huge wave of guilt crashed over Ladybug, realizing her poor partner must've done all the work, waiting for her to arrive.
"No... no. How long... was Chat Noir waiting?" She asked herself, pulling her yoyo to her chest insecurely.
"Two hours, Ladybug. It turns out that water hold akuma well," a voice thundered from behind her.
"Chat... I am so- so sorry! I swear, I didn't know! Is everyone okay?" She asked, running over to him when she saw some bruises. He seemed to walk with a limp.
"It was a metal akuma. Luckily, I was able to save everyone on the subway. It was a really close call, but he only smashed his fist into my leg," Chat Noir told her, not directly looking her in the face.
"I'll use my Lucky Charm! I could fix everything! Lucky Charm!" She called her power down to her.
"A fish-catcher? Oh," she took the item.
She unscrewed the jar lid and used the net to fish the wet akuma out of the water. After purifying the akuma and watching it fly away, she returned the Lucky Charm. A red wave of ladybugs flew around, fixing the damage and injuries.
"I'm so sorry, Chat. I promise that will never happen again. I swear," she promised, throwing her arms around him and holding him in a hug.
"Everything is back to normal. No worries," he spoke, hugging her back. She heard him hum softly in confusion once he seemed to catch something.
"What's wrong?" She asked him, pulling away.
"Wow, you changed your hair! It's a good look," he complimented, winking.
"Yeah, yeah. I didn't have enough time to put my hair in pigtails today. I kinda rushed out once I found out about the akuma attack," Ladybug told him.
"Oh, I was talking about the red streak. It sort of reminds me of Mr. Agreste's assistant's hair, but it's nice. Was it the reason you were late?" He asked the heroine.
"Red streak? Did my ribbon get stuck or something?" Ladybug asked, grabbing at her hair and turning to a small mirror in the ticket booth.
"No, it's your hair. Right back here," he picked up the group of hair that was pigmented to match her suit.
"What the heck is this?" She asked, touching the hair.
"Maybe you dipped it in paint when you weren't looking," Chat Noir suggested.
"Uh... maybe. Here, let me wash it," she took the jar with water in it to stick the red streaked-hair in it.
After soaking it, she pulled it back out and tried to wash it away.
"It's totally not coming off. Oh my gosh... Chat, it's not coming off!" She began to panic, turning to her partner.
"Hold on, let's go to the bathroom. I'll run out and grab some shampoo, maybe see if it'll come out. It's probably just stubborn," Chat Noir tried to reassure her, taking her by the arm. He led her to the public bathroom, uncaring that it was only for women. Besides, it was closed off for the public, so it wasn't even considered wrong.
"Okay," her voice came out meekly as she followed him.
Ladybug knew this wasn't going to come out. Her hair changed, just like her ability to transform. It was only a little bit, but it still was unchangeable.
Was it because she returned the Lucky Charm? But she returned a few others while being in this state, and nothing had changed. The only difference was that she used it for an akuma instead of for her personal reasons.
When Chat left her in the bathroom, she had nothing to do but look into the mirror. How long had to been since the entire ordeal begun? Two weeks?
Two weeks changed her.
The powers of her Miraculous were changing her physical appearance.
Her earrings weren't even earrings anymore. They just sunk into the skin of her ear, just leaving behind round red patches of skin with black dots in their places.
The red suit still felt like spandex, but was a layer of her skin now.
Who could she even go to in order to solve this?
"Tikki, please. I beg you, please get this costume off of me. Please... detransform me! I don't know what to do," the heroine fell to her knees, holding onto the sink counter.
She leaned against the wall of the bathroom, letting go of the sink to wrap her arms around her own knees. Ladybug closed her eyes and laid her head forward.
* * *
30 minutes
* * *
"Bugaboo? Are you okay?" Ladybug heard as she begun to wake up.
"Hmm..." she hummed quietly, burying her face into her arms to find warmth.
"Sorry I took so long. My civilian life held me up, but I got you the shampoo. I had to buy it, because apparently someone doesn't like it when I take her fancy shampoo," Chat Noir apologized, waving the bottle in front of her as she peeked an eye open to look at him.
"Were you sleeping?" He asked, helping her to her feet gently.
"I think so. How long has it been?" Ladybug groggily replied.
"I think about an hour or two, but I could be wrong."
She snapped awake and realized her video messages must've either been sent or were about to send. Quickly, she looked around to see if there was a clock.
Of course there was no clock in the bathroom.
"Is there somewhere you have to go?" Chat asked her, putting the bottle down.
"No... no. I don't think so," she said.
"Then let's commence with the hair washing!"
She walked over to the sink where Chat had her put her head into the sink. He brushed her hair out with his fingers before turning on the faucet.
"I'm sorry if this water turns out to be a bit cold. There's no warm se-sett...ing," Chat Noir told her, but his eyes floated over to her earrings. "Ladybug... did you tattoo your earrings on?"
Ladybug twisted out of his soft grip from helping her wash her hair, leaving water dripping from her wet hair. Her heart pounded against her chest in panic. Was he figuring it out?! Did he know she was Marinette?!
"Uh... well, I kind of... I um- sort of- umm," she squirmed, grabbing at her hair as she looked away, searching for something to say.
He looked at her in confusion.
Then she had an idea.
"It's a new power! I did... umm- get a magical tattoo so now Hawkmoth can't take my earrings and I can't run out of time after a Lucky Charm!" She snapped her fingers, smiling as she realized she found what to say. He smiled in return.
"Now Hawkmoth is in for a big surprise if he tries to get your earrings!" Chat Noir laughed.
"Yeah, no kidding," she muttered, trying not to be too serious as she forced the awkward smile to stay on her face.
A part of her really wanted to tell him everything, just completely confide in her partner she trusted with her life, but she didn't. She couldn't.
It was too risky for the both of them, and not only that. He's probably be really really irritated with her for sending him on this wild goose chase for the Marinette who no longer existed, and in all honesty, she didn't want to lose her best friend/partner over something like this.
The two spent roughly twenty minutes trying to scrub the red out of Ladybug's hair, but it was to no avail.
"Do you think that maybe it has some connection with your magical tattoo earrings? The hair streak didn't show up until you used your Lucky Charm for this akuma. Or at least that's when I noticed it," Chat Noir wondered as Ladybug sighed.
"Probably. I guess it's just going to stay red," the heroine groaned disappointedly.
"If it's conjured by powers, I don't think it would show up while you're in civilian form, right? On our next patrol, let me know if your red streak comes out when you detransform," Chat requested, concerned about her identity hopefully not being exposed to the public.
"Will do, Kitty Cat."
* * *
Message Delivered
* * *