Written for public static void, for wanted AdrienMarinette. I had a million ideas and none of them seemed to pan out quite right, so in the end I went for a meet-cute AU.

A was fatally wounded in an accident and suddenly finds themself looking down at their own lifeless body in confusion. B is a reaper and offers A guidance… but A doesn't want to do the whole follow the light bullshit. A wants to flirt with the cute reaper.

Word count: 1740

don't fear the reaper

Dying felt weird. It was a sentence Adrien had ever thought he'd say or thing, but yet there he was, thinking it.

Death felt weird.

Oh, the dying part in itself had been pretty quick, courtesy of one car colliding with his fragile human body as he pushed someone else out of the way. Of that, he remembered little: a sudden overwhelming pain and a loud crunching noise that he tried not to dwell on, before Adrien found himself standing over his own body.

It hadn't been long — minutes, at most — since he'd died, and yet Adrien already felt like it had been a lifetime.

He watched detachedly as bystanders gathered around his body, screaming for somebody to call an ambulance. It was too late, Adrien knew, and he was opening his mouth to tell them that when someone walked right through him.

He felt nothing, but the knowledge that he was now invisible to everyone made him shiver.

And it was then that it really hit him. He wanted to sit down, but without a body, he wasn't sure if he could, or if he'd just float, sinking down through the earth or flying up into space.

"I'm dead," he said, and he wasn't surprised to find that no one reacted to his voice.

He was surprised, however, to turn around and find a girl standing there, looking at him with an arched eyebrow.

He startled badly, and had he still been alive, Adrien was pretty sure his heart would have stopped in his chest.

"Hi," he said, voice strangled.

"Hi," the girl replied, giving him a small nod. She was wearing the oddest clothes Adrien had ever seen — some kind of red and black skin-tight suit — but her eyes were what drew him in the most.

They were… They were…

There were no words fit to describe how her eyes looked — somehow they were both lighter than the sun and darker than the deepest abyss. They were of no discernable color Adrien could name and at the same time, as he looked, Adrien thought he could see every color he knew reflected in her eyes.

It was mesmerizing.

"Hi," he repeated, and for the first time, he mentally thanked the fact that he no longer seemed to need to breathe. "I'm Adrien."

The girl smiled. "I know," she said. "I'm Marinette — your reaper."

Adrien blinked rapidly. "My what?"

This couldn't mean what he thought it meant.

"Your reaper," Marinette repeated. "You died," she added, voice soft and kind. "I'm here to escort you to the afterlife."

"Will I see you there?"

If Adrien could have blushed at his own audacity, he would have. Luckily, it seemed death had freed him of that. Death had freed him from a lot, but here, at Marinette's side, he couldn't seem to focus on any of them.

Marinette looked at him in bewilderment. "No." Somehow, Adrien gets the impression that she, too, would blush if she could. "I don't — that's not… Why would you want to?"

Adrien tried to shrug nonchalantly. He was pretty sure he'd failed, but he was equally sure Marinette hadn't noticed. He stared at heart, his unbeating heart constricting in his chest.

It was habit that made him lick his lips more than anything — him expecting to have a dry mouth from how nervous he felt. "No reason," he lied through his teeth. "No reason at all."

She shook her head and her dark hair, tied in short pigtails, followed the movement adorably. "Anyhow, you won't see me again — if you go through the light, you'll move on from here, go… Somewhere else. Somewhere better."

"And if I don't?"

Marinette's face darkened, her hands flexing into fists for a short second before relaxing. "You don't want to do that," she said. "There are… things here — dark things that would come after you."

And even though he was dead and shouldn't be able to feel anything, a chill ran down Adrian's back. He could see how serious Marinette was about this — whatever those 'things' were, they were dangerous.

"So I have to leave then," Adrien said, shoulders dropping. He bit his lips and looked down at his hands. It was weird: he could feel them, could twist his own hands anxiously the way he'd had when he was alive, but he had the feeling that he'd go through anything else he tried to touch here.

Except, perhaps, Marinette.

Said girl gave him a kind smile. "It's for the best. You'll see — you'll have a much better time in the afterlife."

Adrien frowned. "How do you know what the afterlife's like? Have you been there?"

"No," she replied, shaking her head. "Reapers are forbidden from entering. That's why you won't see me again after you step into the light."

She smiled brilliantly, and suddenly Adrien noticed the light. It was… Well, like for Marinette's eyes, there were no words to describe it. It was more than bright — it was warm and kind. It felt like all the good things in the world, distilled and radiating out, beckoning him forward.

Adrien had taken a step toward it before he'd even known it. It was only a glance back at Marinette's face that stopped him.

She looked perfectly happy, that wasn't the problem — no, the problem was that she was extraordinary (he didn't need any longer around her to see that) and that he couldn't just leave her behind.

He stopped and turned away from the light. "Is there any other way?"

"Another way to what?" she asked, staring at him in confused disbelief.

Adrien squared his shoulders and crossed his arms. "A way that doesn't involve going somewhere I'll never see you again or staying here."

"I — No, I don't — No, there isn't," she stuttered awkwardly.

There was a sudden flash of reddish light as something seemed to shot out from her right hip. It hovered in the air for a moment, the glow receding and condensing into… a flying pink thing?

(Death was officially the weirdest thing that had ever happened to him.)

It was cute, but apparently Marinette didn't expect its apparition. She squealed and made a grab for the creature, who avoided her with a lilting laugh and flew beside her head.

"Tikki!" she yelled. "What are you doing here? You know you're not supposed to show up when I'm working!"

The creature rolled its (her?) eyes. She spoke in a high-pitched voice, though it wasn't entirely displeasing to hear. "If you're working, I'm working, Marinette," she said. "Remember? We're a team."

She turned to face Adrien, smiling widely. "And actually, there's a way to do what you ask for, but it would take a great sacrifice from you."

Marinette's eyes widened — Adrien guessed she understood what Tikki's words meant, even if he didn't.

"What sacrifice?" He joked. He didn't think he had anything left to sacrifice, considering how he was dead and all.

Marinette rolled her eyes at him but Tikki forged on as though she didn't catch Adrien's sarcasm at all.

"You'd need to renounce the chance to get to the afterlife."

"Like Marinette, you mean?"

It was hard to say for sure, but Adrien thought Tikki smiled at him. "Exactly like Marinette — you'd become a reaper too. You'll —"

"I'll do it," Adrien interrupted. His eyes drifted to Marinette for a moment but he forced them away.

Tikki stared at him for a long moment. "You need to do this for yourself. Not for —" she glanced at Marinette quickly. "Not for anything else."

"I am doing this for myself," Adrien retorted with a smile. He shrugged. "I guess I'm not ready to be done with everything yet."

It was true — he'd died long before he had even reached eighteen and the most meaningful moment of his life had been his death, where he'd saved a little girl's life. He didn't know what this 'afterlife' entailed, but he knew what staying and becoming a reaper was about.

Or at least, he knew more about it.

"I'll do it," he repeated. "I'll be a reaper." He winked at Marinette. "You're not getting rid of me that easily. Now, what do I have to do?"

Behind him, the glowing portal of light he'd refused to enter finally closed, as though sensing that Adrien's choice was final this time.

Instead of answering, Tikki nodded once and returned to her earlier glowing orb state. She hovered in the air until Marinette cupped her in her hands religiously.

"What's going on?" he whispered.

"You'll see," Marinette replied.

It didn't take long — the glow receded, but this time it parted in two figures: one was Tikki, but the other was unfamiliar and all black, with tiny pointed ears like a cat's.

"I'm Plagg," it said. "Tikki told me you're supposed to be my reaper, right?"

Adrien nodded. "Yeah. I'm Adrien."

Plagg nodded once and flew closer to Adrien. "Now, this might hurt a bit."

He started glowing the way Tikki had moments ago, but instead of stopping, he zoomed in closer, flying straight at Adrien.

Adrien almost tried to dodge, but something told him that wouldn't be a good idea — if it even worked.

It didn't matter in the end. The fusion — for that was the only word he could think of to describe it — wasn't painful at all. It was more like his mind grew, like his conscience spread out.

There were two parts of him now: Adrien and the human he'd used to be, and Plagg, his scythe.

It was only now that Adrien truly realized what he'd given up. He didn't regret it — his reasons still stood (even more now that he knew what being a reaper felt like), but he also realized what that light had been. He may not have seen it for long, but he grieved for it like it had been longer.

He knew it would never come for him again now.

"Are you alright?"

Adrien nodded mutely, trying to get his new senses under control. "I'm fine," he finally said. It wasn't true yet, but it would be.

He glanced at Marinette, finally seeing her true self behind the human self she had shown him earlier — she was even more breathtaking this way.

Yes, he would be fine.