#trime

This all should have been obvious to Marinette. These were facts of life. But that didn’t change the fact that Alya was standing in Marinette’s living room, pointing a finger at her and declaring loudly.

“You’re Ladybug!?”

Marinette sucked in a breath at the accusation. She had to keep her cool, dissuade Alya like she had done in the past. With a shake of her head, she tried to relax and start to figure out how to convince her friend that it was not possible for her to be Paris’ sweet heart.

“Alya, we’ve been over this. You know I’m no-” Marinette cut herself off as Alya flicked on a light which revealed Mari's living room walls covered like a homicide precinct. Various photos, newspaper clippings, printouts of texts messages. She even had red string connecting things together.

She brought a hand to her brow in frustration. This charade was getting old. It had been six years, and Alya’s accusations were becoming more frequent. She had too much information at her disposal from running the Ladyblog and all of it was pretty damning evidence.

A timeline matching all of Marinette’s disappearances an excuses to the same times as Akuma attacks, evidence pointing to Ladybug previously being a Dupont student and in Miss Bustier’s class which helped narrow down the list of suspects by a mile, and pointing out that Marinette would be the only person who would know Nino and her well enough to give them a Miraculous personally.

Alya even made a gif of Marinette with and without a Ladybug mask and ribbons photoshopped on her face and the likeness was uncanny to the point that Marinette was shocked no one had discovered her sooner.

Marinette let out a deep sigh, knowing that there was no point in hiding it anymore. She had felt bad for keeping Alya in the dark for so long, especially since she ran the top blog dedicated to knowing everything about Ladybug. A soft, assuring pat from Tikki within her coat pocket helped ease her nerves as she tried to compose herself, a Ladybug-like smirk crossing her face.

“Guess that’s why you're the master of illusions eh Rena?”

The room was silent for a beat before Alya let out a scream and threw herself at her friend. Marinette erupted into a fit of laughs at her reaction and she felt an immense weight removed with the confession.

“Holycrapholycrapholycrap. I can’t believe it’s you.” Alya then took the chance to slug her in the arm. “That’s for not telling me sooner.” Marinette rubbed her arm, feigning being hurt before giving her a small shove back. She looked over and Tikki has flown out to join Trixx on the coffee table, the two of them quite excited to be reunited.

After a few moments, the two composed themselves the best they could as Alya started her line of questioning. The fact that Alya had her own Miraculous and Kwami meant that Marinette thankfully didn’t have to try and explain all the technical details of her powers and lore that surrounded the superheroes, but that meant that the questions were much more personal.

A few hours went by and the two ended up curled up on the sofa, matching wine glasses sitting precariously on the coffee table as Alya did a deep dive into Marinette’s superheroine life. It honestly felt so good for her to finally get this secret identity thing off her shoulders and just feel a bit more normal for the first time in years.

“Oooh girl imagine what Adrien would say if he knew you were Ladybug.” Her cheeks burned at the suggestion. It was obvious that Adrien had a not too subtle crush on Ladybug that the crew endlessly teased him about. Even when being Ladybug, she could see how Adrien’s demeanor would differ to the point that his anxiousness and stuttering rivaled that of when Marinette would try to talk to him back in their school days.

“I have enough boy problems with Chat Noir on the Ladybug side of things and Adrien on my side.” Between Adrien fawning over Ladybug and Chat’s sporadic drop in visits to Marinette, which the number of late night talks had increased over the years, made keeping her identity a secret that much more difficult for her to manage. Alya nodded in agreement before tilting her head for another question.

“Wait. Does Chat not know your identity?” She seemed genuinely perplexed at the thought of them not knowing each other. Marinette ran a hand through her hair as she looked back sheepishly. Alya’s eyes went wide. “Wait are you serious?? I’m the first to learn that Marinette Dupain-Cheng is fucking Ladybug!?”

“We haven’t shared our identities to keep each other safe!” Marinette shielded herself as Alya whacked her with a pillow.

“You two are partners . You know Nino & I’s identities and Nino and I know each other's. Are you saying that the only person in the dark about everyone’s identities is Chat?” She thumped her friend again with the pillow. “Tell me how that makes ANY sense.”

“It was my idea to not share our identities.” She grabbed her own pillow and threw it at Alya. “And I had to pick the new Miraculous holders. Once we let you keep them for good, there was no need for him to know because he wouldn’t need to seek you out.” It was a weak argument, she knew it. But if Chat had been privy to Carapace and Rena’s identities, she knew that he would want to know hers even more.

“Girl it’s been 6 years! Have you never once been curious who is hiding under the mask? Who you have been trusting all this time?” Marinette clutched the pillow in her arms tight to her chest and partially buried her face in it before mumbling out a response. She could always reason with herself or Tikki as to why she was avoiding that conversation, but sitting here in front of Alya she knew she couldn’t lie her way out of it.

“What if he doesn’t like who is under the mask.” Her voice was weak as she spoke but her sentiment was still there. She wasn’t going to lie and say that she hadn’t become quite fond of the alley cat over the last few years. Especially when she interacted with him as herself and without the superhero persona as a barrier. A hand slipped on her shoulder and she looked up at Alya, keeping her face half buried in the pillow.

“If he can’t like both sides of you, then fuck him.” She paused for amount before rolling her eyes. “I mean, don’t fuck him, unless you want cause like that cat suit shows off a lot like oh man.” She fanned herself for affect before getting serious once again. “But if he is going to be that shallow and can’t see you for your entire self, then you don’t need him and he doesn’t deserve you.”

“Are you afraid of not liking who’s hiding under his mask?” She added softly after a few moments of silence between them.

“No. . .” Marinette exhaled slowly, leaning over and taking a small sip from her glass. “Well, maybe. What if it’s someone I know?” If she was being honest, she thought it might be much easier warming up to the idea of an identity reveal if her and Chat’s civilian identity didn’t really interact. What if her civilian form didn’t like his right now? Or he didn’t like her?

“Well he seems to already like civilian you if he comes and visits as often as you say.” The brunette popped a chip into her mouth before continuing. “Have you ever tried to figure out who it could be?” She shrugged in return, absentmindedly poking the pillow still in her lap.

“Sorta? But it’s not my place to find out his identity before he tells me. Which he would tell me in a heartbeat, even without me exposing mine. But that’s not really fair either.”

“If I told him, I think I’d want to be in civilian form and do it during one of his visits.” She mused quietly. “Because if he isn't happy with who is under the mask, then I don’t have to learn his identity if I don’t want to.”

“That seems fair. It gives you the chance to control the situation if you need to.” Alya polished off her wine before returning the glass to its previous spot and gesturing to her mess on the wall. “So we should probably take this down then before he comes over hm? Didn’t you say he comes on Wednesdays?” Marinette bolted upright and looked over at the digital clock on the stove that said 9:24.

“Shit he’s gonna be here soon. I definitely don’t want my identity revealed like this.” She began unpinning all of Alya’s evidence off the wall as the other began to put away her laptop and pack up her bag. “Should we just burn all of this? We kinda don’t want anyone finding this in my trash.”

“Do we have time to use the grill on your balcony?” Marinette pulled down the last photocopy off the wall and added it to the rather large stack before considering the suggestion.

“Ehhhhh that might be too obvious right now in case he shows up while we are burning things.” She threw open one of the drawers on her coffee table that was never used and started throwing the documents in there. “This should be fine until I can get rid of everything this weekend.”

The soft thump of footsteps on her roof interrupted their thoughts and the two immediately shoved the rest of the evidence away.

“Gogogogo he’s here get out!” Marinette began shoving her friend towards the door, barely giving her time to grab her belongings and for Trixx to slip into her hair.