#insanity rambles

Number 9:  “Hey look! Mistletoe! … Oh, fuck you’re cute.”

Adrien slipped into the Dupain-Cheng bakery, having made an escape from I-Will-Turn-A-Blind-Eye-To-This-As-Long-As-You-Bring-Me-Back-My-Favourite-Pastry Gorilla immediately after school. It was the beginning of the Christmas holidays and he deserved the cookie he was after. 

Six Akumas, a piano recital and a fencing tournament along with final assignments really took a toll on a secret superhero/model.

Taking a deep breath and nearly moaning at the smell of the forbidden treats, Adrien was nearly startled by the cheery greeting.

“Adrien! It’s so good to see you! How have you been?” Mrs Cheng waved from behind the counter and gestured for him to approach.

Adrien grinned back. “I’m fine, Mrs Cheng. How have you been?”

Mrs Cheng let out a low laugh. “Oh, I’ve been just fine dear. You’ve come in at just the right time since it’s a bit quiet at the moment. Why don’t you slip upstairs? I know Tom had some chocolate chip cookies baking for Marinette and I’m sure she won’t mind sharing.” 

Adrien tried to decline but the thought of freshly baked choc chip cookies was too much. After thanking a sweetly smiling Mrs Cheng, Adrien practically skipped up the stairs.

He knocked on the entrance down and waited. He glanced up at the door frame and saw a small sprig of green leaves and white berries.

“Oh, Mistletoe!” He murmured to himself as the door swung open.

He looked down, made eye contact with blue eyes and froze.

Standing before him in a pretty green dress with a sprig of holly attached and a Christmas hat perched on her head was Marinette Dupain-Cheng. Her blue eyes were wide and she had a flush of red streaking across her cheeks. A smile was spread across her face and she seemed to glow with excitement. Adrien could hear the Christmas songs in the background and the way Marinette was trying to catch her breath indicated that she had been dancing along to the music. 

However, the biggest thing that struck Adrien was the way her deep black hair flowed down. He had near seen her without her signature pigtails let alone her hair completely loose.

“Adrien! Hi!” Marinette greeted with a bubbly grin. Her eyes flickered upwards as well and the red on her cheeks started to spread.

Adrien was having a mental break. ‘Oh fuck. She’s cute.’

Number Two: “How’d you and mum/dad meet?” “I hit them with my car.”

I decided to go with Miraculous Ladybug again to get myself back into the swing of things. However, I decided to take a slight twist on the whole thing.

“Mama?”

Marinette paused from where she was chopping vegetables for dinner and turned to face her six-year-old twins. Both with dark hair and green eyes, it had been her daughter who had spoken.

“Yes, Clara?”

“How’d you and Papa meet?”

Her son looked up from where he’d been colouring, interested in the conversation.

Marinette blinked. The question took her back several years to when she had been an eighteen-year-old superhero, Ladybug, battling against the feared Papillion alone. 

She was supposed to have had a partner, but they hadn’t shown until one fateful Akuma.

She was standing on the street, facing the villain when a black blur dived between her attack and the Akuma. She had sworn violently and threw herself off to the side.  

Managing to dive behind her car, Ladybug glanced around and made a decision. She sighed, mourned the year’s worth of savings, thanked Tikki for her enhanced strength then heaved the small Volkswagen Beetle above her head and threw it at her two opponents.

The Akuma fled. 

The stranger was pinned.

Ladybug leapt onto the remains of the Beetle and glowered over the other. He was blonde, green-eyed and had two cat-like ears perched on his head. Something about the other was familiar. Like an old friend from when she was very young that she had forgotten.

“Who are you?!” She demanded.

“Chat Noir. Master Fu gave me the ring?” The newly named Chat Noir squeaked out, showing her the black ring with a glowing green paw print on it.

Ladybug froze. Master Fu had mentioned that the Black Cat had returned to Paris and she was due for her long-awaited partner.

Coming out of the memory, Marinette glanced at her curious children then at her husband, Adrien, who had an amused smirk on his face.

Marinette cleared her throat then answered her daughter.

Number 8: “The cafe is giving half-price meals for cute couples this Valentine’s. Wanna be my fake date?”

“Do you know The Sunflower Cafe by the museum?”

Chat Noir glanced over at his partner as she leapt out of the building. They had just finished dealing with Papillion’s new Akuma, a sleep-deprived University student who had her thesis plagiarized by another.

“Vaguely. Why?”

“The cafe is giving half-priced meals for cute couples this Valentine’s. Wanna be my fake date?”

“What?”

Ladybug looked over at him with an amused look. 

“They serve my favourite quiche but they’re also really expensive. I want quiche but I need a date. Or at least someone I look cute with to be my fake date. One of my friends has bailed on me and I figured you want free food on me.” Ladybug raised an eyebrow. “They also serve the best butter croissants after the Dupain-Cheng Bakery in Paris with a delicious homemade butter.”

Well, damn. If only he hadn’t told Ladybug about his secret love for croissants.

“Also it’ll give me a chance to mess with the reporters again.”

“You really aren’t going to let that go, are you?” 

It had been a long time since Nadja Chamack had been akumatised into Prime Queen but Ladybug had started to take an almost vindictive pleasure in screwing with reporters (except Alya). She was firm in the fact they were there to fight Papillion, not be celebrities or rating boosts. The reporters were starting to catch on but a few persistent ones were given full reign of Ladybug’s pranking. Come to think of it, those reporters were usually the ones who disparaged The Ladyblog and Alya’s efforts...

Ladybug shrugged. “So do you want free food?”

Chat looked at his partner. “Sure. Why not? We are adorable.”

Fake or not, it was still a date and free food was free food.

Number 1:  “Are you… asking me on a date?” “Trying. Not entirely sure I’m succeeding.”

I’ll be honest. I’m more of a Jackrabbit girl so I’ve never written Frostbite before. I hope I can rise up to the challenge and give you a good one!

Tooth hovered nervously as she stared wide-eyed at an equally wide-eyed Jack Frost.

“Are you... asking me on a date?” Jack stuttered out, his usual confidence dismissed in the face of a rambling sentence that only half made sense. 

Tooth winced. She supposed blurting out ‘Do You Wanna Go Watch The Stanley Cup Grand Final Hockey Match With Me?’ as one word then starting on the history of hockey and its grand tradition of teams knocking the other’s teeth out wasn’t exactly how she wanted to approach this. 

She was Toothiana, Queen of the Tooth Fairies! Guardian of Memories! She was nearly a thousand years old and she couldn’t even keep her cool enough to ask one guy on one measly date.

Tooth took a deep breath. “Trying.” She wrung her hands together and looked away from Jack. “Not entirely sure I’m succeeding.”

A cold hand took her’s and linked their fingers together. She blushed and snapped her eyes towards Jack who was doing his own version of blushing as frost raced across his cheeks.

“I wouldn’t say that. Bridgestone Arena, right?”

Tooth preened.