Adrien Agreste stared idly down at the small locked box in his hands, leaning away from it slightly, like he was frightened of it. For much too long, Marinette just watched him silence, hoping, wishing, praying to all the gods she knew of that he'd eventually come around on this. She was prepared to sit there for days on end if she had to. There was very little – if anything – that she wouldn't do, at this point.

They'd sat there, on that roof, without saying much at all for hours now. Marinette would've been fine staying and doing this in his bedroom, but Adrien had insisted they move somewhere else, somewhere far away from his father, negating any chance of being overheard and compromising themselves. Something in him was still so afraid of the potential consequences, and truthfully, Marinette couldn't bring herself to blame him. She knew he was being careful. It was the smart thing to do, in his position. Just like giving up his miraculous and trying his best to distance himself from her had been the smart thing to do, despite how much pain it had caused him to do it.

And here she'd thought he couldn't be objective.

She didn't know what to do. Didn't know what to say. Yes, she'd told him the truth and now he knew as much as she did, but he still hadn't taken back the ring. And if even if he did, their problems were still far from fixed.

It just never ended. No matter what she did, no matter how hard she tried, it would never be over.

She just wanted it to be over, already.

"Are…" she began awkwardly as she glanced over him; from the rigidly stiff way he held himself, to the agonised expression on his face, to his whitening knuckles as he gripped the box in his hands, "…are you okay?"

Stupid question. Of course he wasn't. How could he be?

Adrien shivered, but squared his shoulders and tried not to draw any attention to it. "Yeah. Fine."

Marinette sighed heavily and turned herself away, opting to instead gaze at the sprawling city lights below them, stretching all the way out to the horizon. There had been times where she'd taken it for granted – the city, its people, the privilege of being the one chosen to protect it. She wasn't going to let that happen again.

Beside her, Adrien groaned and looked up at the sky. "No, I'm not. I don't know anymore."

"I'm sorry," she whispered, not knowing what else to say.

He looked back at her, eyebrow arched in confusion. "About what?"

She didn't meet his eye. In that moment, she couldn't. "Well… everything."

For your father, she added silently. For pressuring you. For accusing you to your face. For outing you. For just making everything worse when you were already scared.

She should have known. She should've realised. She should've done something. She shouldn't have let it all slide like it was nothing. She shouldn't have let this happen. She shouldn't have let it go this far, and get this out of hand.

Adrien kept his head down, apparently just as eager to avoid looking at her as she wanted to avoid looking at him.

"It's not your fault," he said, his voice soft and gentle, but unable to mask the underlying pain that seemed to permeate everything about him.

Marinette wasn't sure if she believed that. Wasn't sure if she deserved that. He had such an unshakable faith in her, in everyone all the time, and she knew that she'd done absolutely nothing to deserve it. He was so perfect and so pure and so good, it was insane to think that he was the son of a supervillain. Marinette couldn't get over that fact. Adrien was Hawk Moth's son and nothing had seemed more absurd to her in her life. Because if Gabriel could raise someone like Adrien, then…

Then he probably wasn't the irredeemable monster of pure evil she'd written him off as. Then it wasn't as black and white as she wanted it to be, as she wished it was. Because it was easier to fight something with no good qualities to speak of. It was easier to hate him, hate what he did, hate everything about him when he was nothing more than a faceless evil looming threateningly over her city.

It didn't excuse him. It didn't excuse what he did. But it sure did make everything a hell of a lot more complicated.

"Do you think… will you do it?" she asked somewhat jerkily, desperate to change the subject. "Will you come back?"

For so long, Adrien didn't respond, he just stared at the box that contained his miraculous, looking more lost and confused than ever before.

"I… don't know," he whispered hoarsely. "I mean, I want to. More than anything, but it- it's not safe, is it? I'll be risking so much for the both of us and it just seems… selfish."

I don't care about safe, Marinette wanted to say. I don't care if it's selfish. I care about you.

"I trust you," she insisted quietly.

"That's not the point," he argued.

"Adrien," she called his name, perhaps a little more sharply than she intended. "I trust you. I trusted you when I didn't know who you were. I trusted you when you were actively fighting against me, for whatever reason. I trusted you when you told me Gabriel was Hawk Moth. And I still trust you now, knowing he's your father. That was always the situation. Nothing about that has changed. The only thing that has is your perspective."

"Most people would use that change in perspective to fix their mistakes," he pointed out.

"Being Chat Noir is not a mistake on your part, Adrien Agreste."

"How do you know?"

It took all her self-control not to roll her eyes. "I've met you."

That was all she had to do to know that he was just too damn heroic for it to be a mistake.

He didn't seem to have anything to say to that. Marinette didn't know if that was because he was genuinely considering her point, or if he just didn't want to argue with her. It could very well have been either.

"Adrien, please," she said, forcing herself to look unwaveringly at his face. "I can't do this without you."

"Yes, you can," he contradicted quietly. "You can handle yourself just fine without me. You always have."

"Okay," Marinette sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose in exasperation. "Okay, fine. I can. You're completely right, I can do it all on my own, and it's better if you stay far away. I don't need you, I don't need Chat Noir, I don't need anyone to do what needs to be done. I will take down Hawk Moth and stop all of this on my own, without your help. Is that what you want to hear?"

He didn't reply. At this point, she didn't know why she expected anything else.

"Ignoring the fact that none of that is true," she continued shakily, "we're supposed to be partners. Partners don't bail on each other when the going gets tough. I can't do this without you."

"Marinette-"

"Adrien," she cut across his protest sharply. "I don't want to do this without you."

That was all she could say.

Because that's what it came down to in the end. She didn't want to do this alone. She didn't want him to sit idly by, watching from the sidelines. She wanted him there with her. She wanted someone she could trust, with everything. Someone who wasn't there as a guiding authority figure, like Tikki or Master Fu. She wanted someone there who knew what it was like. Who knew what she was going through. Someone with whom she had a mutual understanding.

She didn't need him back, not really. But she did want him back. And that was just as important, in its own way.

"Listen to me," she found herself practically begging him. "We can stop this. We can stop all of this. We can stop Hawk Moth and save Paris, together. Like we're supposed to."

"And then what?" he asked, his voice low and a little scathing. "We stop my father and take back his miraculous and then… what? We put him behind bars?"

Marinette chewed her lip anxiously at his question. "Look, I know he's your father, but-"

"But, he's a monster and a horrible person, right?" he finished for her icily. "Completely beyond any hope of redemption. I mean, why don't we just kill him and be done with it?"

She pulled back, unable to keep from feeling hurt as he threw her own words back in her face like that. Marinette bit her lip anxiously, desperately trying to think of something, anything she could say to fix this. Or start to. Or something. But really, there wasn't anything she could say. Adrien's relationship with his father was complicated, sure, complicated in a way she knew she'd never fully understand. But there was some strange attachment there, something he couldn't seem to let go of, no matter how hard he tried, no matter how heinous his father's crimes. And really, if it had been her father, would she be any different?

She couldn't even begin to imagine what he was feeling.

It wasn't fair.

None of this was fair.

"He didn't used to be like this," he mumbled shakily, pulling his knees to his chest. "He used to apologise when he worked late, or when he missed things. He'd feel bad about it. He used to care."

"People change," she murmured, though she wasn't sure how exactly she expected that to make him feel at all better. If she was being honest, she had no idea what she was doing. She had, naively, thought that everything would just fall into place, that all their problems would magically solve themselves upon finding out who each other were. But reality, as it turned out, was never so kind.

Gabriel Agreste was Hawk Moth. There couldn't be any doubt now. Gabriel Agreste was Hawk Moth, he was cruel and cunning, he manipulated, abused, and controlled innocent people to achieve his own ends and Adrien couldn't help but love him, despite it all. Couldn't help but try to see nothing but the good in him. The good in him that Marinette wasn't sure truly existed, even though she could see how Adrien clearly needed it to.

He doesn't deserve this, she thought sadly. He doesn't deserve any of this. He shouldn't have to do this. He shouldn't have to make this decision.

"I can't do this," he whispered, his voice low and hoarse. "I can't fight him."

"Adrien…"

"He's all I have left," he murmured. "I don't- …I can't… I'm just- I'm so tired of losing people."

He sounded so lost and so scared and so confused when he said that. Strangely, he sounded young.

He was young. They were both young. They were just a couple of teenagers running around with magic powers, trying to do what they could to keep the world from falling apart around them.

"So, what?" Marinette asked, unable to keep the distinct edge out of her voice. "You want to just let him run around akumatising people?"

"No, I- …I don't know, okay?" he all but shouted, raking a hand through his hair and trying his best to hide the tears that were welling up in his eyes. "I don't know."

She'd never heard him so upset before. Never seen him be so open and raw with his emotions before. Maybe that was because now he wasn't trying to hide anything. He wasn't pretending to be detached from the situation anymore. He didn't have to pretend he wasn't caught between two sides anymore. It was all out in the open and he could be who he was and feel what he was feeling without fear of someone finding something out that he couldn't take back.

And she had never seen him so upset.

"I don't know either," she whispered, still staring mindlessly out at the sprawling cityscape before them. "But it wasn't going to just be stopping akumas forever. We both knew that."

Adrien didn't look at her. "Maybe you did."

"Oh, come on. There's no way you didn't realise we'd eventually have to face off against Hawk Moth himself."

He looked away. "It… honestly didn't occur to me."

"Not even during the Collector incident?" she asked, arching an eyebrow curiously.

He let out a shout of bitter laughter. "Not even then. I guess I had a lot on my mind… ugh, why didn't I see it sooner? I'm such an idiot."

Unable to stand hearing him berate himself, Marinette reached out and gently grasped his hand, in some effort to show solidarity with him.

"It's not your fault," she insisted quietly. "Neither of us saw it. And at least you saw past it eventually. You worked out the truth on your own. You could've refused to believe it. You could've gone into denial over the whole thing and no one would've blamed you. But you didn't. You recognised the truth and you told me about it because you thought I needed to know. That takes strength, Adrien. That takes more strength than you realise."

And then he stood there and stayed quiet even as she yelled and screamed and accused him of something terrible because he knew how important keeping their identities secret was to her.

A shiver went up her spine at the memory, a memory that was now tinged with sadness and regret every time it came up, because now she had the context. Now she knew exactly why he'd acted that way, why he'd said the things he'd said. She remembered him pulling back as she screamed about Hawk Moth being a monster, and now she understood why.

She glanced over him one more time, biting her lip as she thought about it, about him, about what the past week must've been like for him.

You're the strongest person I know.

"Part of me isn't even surprised. He hasn't really been the same since…" Adrien began, only to awkwardly trail off into silence.

Silently, Marinette shifted closer to him, in what she insisted to herself was supposed to be a show of solidarity and not… whatever the obsessively crushing teenage girl part of her brain was calling it.

"Since…?" she prompted quietly.

He didn't look at her. "My mother, I guess."

Her eyes narrowed slightly. He'd barely spoken about his mother in all the time she'd known him – under either identity. The only time she could remember he even mentioned her was when she was standing next to him in his bedroom, staring at his desktop background picture. And she'd been so flushed with embarrassment then that she hadn't asked for any details.

It all seemed so long ago.

"Your mother?" she asked. "What happened to her?"

Adrien shifted, still not looking at her. "I don't know. No one knows. She just- she disappeared. I woke up one morning and she wasn't there. It was almost like she'd never been there."

Marinette hummed thoughtfully, doing her best to conceal just how much her heart broke for him. As if he didn't have enough to deal with already.

It wasn't fair.

It wasn't fair on him.

He shouldn't be here. He shouldn't have to do this.

"When was this?" she asked carefully, blinking away her tears.

"Last year."

Last year. Recent, then. Recent enough, but well before Hawk Moth showed up, and well before either of them were mysteriously gifted with their miraculouses in order to fight him.

The blood drained from her face at the thought. "Oh… no. Oh no."

Beside her, Adrien stiffened. "Marinette? What?"

"Your father's Hawk Moth."

His eyes narrowed. "A fact I am painfully aware of, yes."

"No, Adrien, I mean, your father is Hawk Moth," she said, her hands balling up into tight fists. "Hawk Moth, who has been around for about as long as Ladybug and Chat Noir have. Don't you find it odd that your mother goes missing and then your father, a world-famous fashion designer with apparently everything anyone could ever want, goes on an akumatising spree trying to get our miraculouses – which grant insane, reality warping powers when put together?"

There was a moment where Adrien just stared at her, utterly confused, before she finally saw a flash of understanding cross his face, and he immediately paled.

"You're not saying…" he began shakily. "A-are you? He could- she could… is that even possible?"

"Adrien," she called his name softly. "Even if it is possible, it's too dangerous. I was told that no matter the intent, using the miraculouses like that will cause just as much harm as good. Even if you have the best intentions, it might end up destroying the world anyway. To keep balance."

Slowly, he nodded. "For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction."

Marinette blinked. "Uh… what?"

"Newton's third law of motion," he clarified.

She just stared blankly at him, until he let out an exasperated sigh.

"It's physics," he said. "Sorry, it just sounded- forget it."

"Uh huh," she mumbled, suddenly wishing she'd paid more attention in science class. "B-but my point is, we can't let anyone use the miraculouses like that. For any reason, Adrien. I'm sorry, but… you have to let her go. For the greater good."

For the greater good.

She hated that phrase, she decided. She hated it so much. She shouldn't be asking this of him. Did she have any right to ask this of him? To give up what little he had left, to condemn his own father, and let go of any chance of getting his mother back? What if it had been someone she cared about? Wouldn't she go just as far, doing whatever she could, to save them?

If that was the case, if it was all to save someone who was already gone, then…

Then Gabriel Agreste wasn't a monster. He was human. He was so, so excruciatingly human. And it was likely that very humanity that drove him to do this.

Because what was the world, compared to someone he loved? Someone he lost?

Adrien shivered at her words, and let out a shaky exhale. "Yeah. I get it."

She bit her lip. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be."

"W-what?"

"If bringing her back means doing this to innocent people, then I don't want her back," he murmured, never looking at her even once as he spoke. "And if she knew what he was doing, she wouldn't want to come back."

Marinette exhaled softly and shifted closer to him, until their shoulders were pressing against each other. Gingerly, she reached out, wrapping her arms around him and pulling him close, all the while ignoring both his startled gasp and her own heart thumping in her chest. She was hugging Adrien Agreste and for once, it felt so natural.

"You're a good person, Adrien Agreste," she murmured.

You're a better person than anyone gives you credit for.

"It doesn't matter anyway," Adrien said, pulling away from her slightly, like he was uncomfortable. "That might not even be it. You're just spit-balling."

"You have to admit; the idea has credence."

"I really don't want to think about it."

Marinette let out a long, exhausted sigh and rolled her shoulders back, before gesturing at the box in his hands. "Will you at least think about that?"

At her words, Adrien glanced down at it too, a thousand emotions flickering across his expression so quickly she could barely register them. There was some sort of longing in his face, a desperation to accept it, to go back to the way everything used to be, but it was all twisted up with fear.

"It's not going to be the same," he pointed out quietly. "You know that, right? It's going to be awkward and weird and we're not going to be able to talk to each other like before."

"We're talking to each other now."

"And it's not the same," he insisted. "I know I'm not what you expected…"

He trailed off into a tense, awkward silence, raking his hand through his hair and breathing hard, as if he was desperately to collect himself and utterly failing.

Marinette simply stared in confusion. "What I expected?" she repeated absently, having absolutely no idea what he was talking about.

"As Chat Noir," he mumbled, looking away in some vain effort to hide the flush of red colouring his cheeks. "I saw your face when you realised who I was. You were horrified."

Marinette opened her mouth to say something, to protest, but immediately closed it again. He had a point, she realised. She had been horrified to discover who he was. She hadn't wanted to know. But that had been days ago now. There had been time for the dust to settle, for her to calm down and adjust to the new reality of knowing his identity.

"That wasn't because of who you are," she told him flatly. "I was horrified because I realised just what I'd been saying to you. Besides, Chat Noir turning out to be anyone I know personally was going to be weird. I pretty much had him figured for some boy I didn't know who lived on the other side of Paris."

He laughed at that, but it was breathless, awkward, and insecure. "Sorry I disappointed you."

"What?" she asked, dumbfounded by his apology. "Disappointed? Are you serious? How could you possibly disappoint me? You're the one who should be disappointed! I mean, look at you! Who could possibly be disappointed by you? But me? Ugh, I'm so stupid. I'm stupid and clumsy and useless and weak and I can't string sentences together and I'm just so, so stupid-"

"Marinette."

"I said all those things right to your face without realising and I'm an idiot-"

"Marinette," he called her name softly, reaching out and grabbing her hand. "Stop."

The instant she felt his hand on hers, Marinette fell silent, gazing at him as a storm of a million different emotions raged around her brain.

And then;

"I'm glad it's you."

A small, shaky smile pulled at the corners of her lips and Marinette quickly looked away, desperate to hide just how much she was blushing.

Glad.

He knew who she was, the lame, awkward, clumsy person under the mask, and he was glad.

That couldn't possibly be right.

"Me too," she breathed. "Uh… I mean, I'm glad it's you. Too. Also. As well. I'm not glad it's me. Or maybe I am glad it's me? But I'm more glad about you. Adrien Agreste. Being Chat Noir. Because you're Chat Noir. You've always been Chat Noir. And I've always been Ladybug, and we didn't know, but now we do and we can talk or whatever- …but we don't have to do that. I mean, if you don't want to. Because sure, I'd like to, but I don't want to pressure you, because that would be bad and I don't want to freak you out any more than you already are. You know. Because Hawk Moth is your father and that's bad. But! We'll fix it, right? Yeah. Totally. Ha. Ha ha… ha… oh my god, I'm rambling and I can't stop, someone kill me."

He laughed. "At least that hasn't changed."

"What?"

"You're still so cute when you're flustered."

Marinette blinked. Once. Twice.

She'd heard that before.

He'd said that to her before.

The blood drained from her face as she remembered that particular conversation for the first time in days. The conversation she'd had with Chat and he'd prodded her into talking about her crush.

Her crush, who was Adrien.

Adrien, who was Chat Noir.

Chat Noir, who was Adrien, who knew who she was and who she had a crush on and was sitting right next to her.

"Oh my god," she murmured, as the realisation dawned on her, paling faster than anyone thought possible as a tidal wave of humiliation crashed over her. "Oh… my god. Oh no. No, no, no…"

Beside her, Adrien stiffened, anxiously scanning the horizon, probably for the signs of an akuma attack he thought she'd noticed. "What? Marinette?"

"I told you," she whispered, her voice low and hoarse.

He gave a small, shaky laugh. "Y-yeah… we've been at this so long, it's sort of crazy to think we don't have to hide who we are anymore."

Fervently, she shook her head. "No, not that. I mean, yes, that, but…"

"Marinette? You okay?"

"I told you I liked you," she managed to gasp out in a strangled voice. "I told you that I liked you, to your face."

He burst out laughing at that, and Marinette didn't know if she was relieved to hear him laugh again or painfully embarrassed to know he was laughing at her. She sat there, fidgeting nervously, completely torn between bursting into tears and punching him in the face.

"Oh- oh yeah," Adrien managed after the laughter subsided a bit. "Right. You did do that, didn't you? I completely forgot."

"You forgot?" she repeated incredulously, unsure of what she was hearing. She'd poured out her heart and soul to him, and he'd forgotten about it? As in, he hadn't remembered? As in, if she'd kept quiet, if she'd kept her big mouth shut, she wouldn't be dealing with how utterly mortified she was right now?

Oh, that was not fair.

The world really did like to mess with her, didn't it? She liked Adrien, who was Chat Noir, who liked Ladybug, who was her, and now this?

He held up his hands a little defensively. "It's been a weird week for me, okay?"

She sighed and looked away. "Yeah, sorry. I'm just kind of… absolutely hating myself for bringing it up, now."

He hummed thoughtfully. "We should… ah, we should probably talk about that. Sometime."

She nodded slowly. "I guess now is kind of awkward."

"I'm not sure that conversation will ever not be awkward," he mused lightly.

That was a fair assessment, she supposed. And it was probably wise to do a raincheck on that conversation. Things were bad enough already with everything else that had happened. Not to mention, the logistics of it all. It was one more mess to deal with, one more mess to add to the pile of messes she may as well be drowning in. Not to mention, it was absolutely not something she could think about right now, if she wanted to survive the night without melting into a puddle of embarrassment.

The boy she liked appeared to like her back.

Everything about this situation was just so alien to her.

"So, what are we supposed to do?" Adrien asked suddenly, bringing her out of her thoughts and back into reality, not that reality much felt like it anymore. "About Hawk Moth and the akumas, I mean."

Almost immediately, Marinette twisted around to face him, her eyes wide.

"We?" she repeated, shocked.

The corners of Adrien's lips twitched.

"We," he confirmed quietly, never quite meeting her eyes. "I mean, if that's okay. If you want me back."

"How is that even up for debate?" she asked him. "Of course I want you back."

They fell into a silence as Adrien smiled despite himself and Marinette realised with a dawning horror what she'd just said to him.

"As a partner!" she all but screamed, quickly facing away from him so he wouldn't see her flush a bright scarlet. "As the totally platonic second half of a crime-fighting duo. And all that. Until when and if decided otherwise."

God, why did he make her so awkward?

He just shrugged innocently, apparently taking no notice of her flustered scrambling. "I don't know… I wouldn't want to cramp your style."

Marinette snorted. "Right. Yeah. Like you could ever cramp my style."

"I am pretty fashion-forward, it's true."

She blinked in surprise, not quite sure how to take the quip before realising what had just been said and letting out a shout of laughter.

Yeah. He's definitely still Chat.

"Ha," she breathed, absently pinching herself as she was so sure this was a dream and expected to wake up any second now. "Style. Fashion-forward. Because you're a model?"

The grin, that good old cheshire grin that undeniably belonged to Chat Noir and no one else, was back now, etching itself onto his perfect lips. "Because I'm a model."

"You're terrible."

"I'm hilarious."

"You're making jokes to distract from the problem again."

He exhaled softly. "I have to. Something tells me I'm going to fall apart if I don't."

Absently, Marinette found herself snuggling against him once again. There wasn't really anything else she could do. Something about it seemed so natural.

"You are enough," she murmured. "I promise you are enough. I promise you."

Beside her, Adrien's lips twitched with a small smile. "Thanks, Marinette."

They lapsed into a somewhat awkward silence as Marinette shifted away from him slightly, trying to hide how she was blushing furiously while Adrien didn't appear to notice, too engrossed in once again staring idly at the box in his hands, before letting out a tired, defeated groan.

"Plagg is going to chew me out the second I open this, I just know it."

She blinked a few times, utterly confused. "Plagg… your kwami?"

"That's him," Adrien replied in as cheerful tone as he could manage.

"What's he like?"

"Wait until I've got a sufficiently huge pile of apology camembert ready and I'll introduce you."

Marinette's eyes narrowed. "Uh… camembert? As in the cheese? Why-?"

Adrien shook his head, quickly cutting her off. "Don't ask."

"But I have so many questions!"

"Marinette, please. Do. Not. Ask."

She laughed. "Alright, fine. When you've got a sufficiently huge pile of apology camembert, do you want to run around and be superheroes together?"

He grinned again – that oh so familiar grin that could only belong to Chat Noir.

"Try and stop me, Princess."

~The end~

Note: happy endings! Kind of! Mostly! Yeah, it's open-ended, I know (I like it this way).