#science fiction here i come wooooo

[mack-anthology-mp3]

ok what if, at some point in the future, someone does actually build a teleportation device that works, but it has like... a warm up period. and takes time to work. like in fiction you get disintegrated in one place, your molecules zapped to your desired location, and then you're reconstituted right?? what if they disintegration process took time?? like say you wanted to go somewhere four hours away, but the machine malfunctioned, and to avoid killing you they had to slow it down so it took you like an hour to materialise again. or even if the normal disintegration process took like 25 minutes. what would happen if the machine lost power halfway through?? would you die?? would only half of you get teleported?? which half???

or what if the machine were notoriously malfunctioney, so you had to pick between sitting in traffic or a long haul flight/train ride, or potentially being inconveniently trapped in a corporeal state for an hour? would it be something to complain about like traffic jams?

how many teleports could you do while still remaining healthy? like cos being stripped down to your molecules can't be good for you... would there be a limit of how many times you could teleport in a day? not recommended for pregnant people or young children??

[everyonewooo]

Virtual Reality AU

_Player 107 Wonwoo

_One shot Part 2

Genre: Action/ Science Fiction

Warning: Sadness, Mention of death

Previously..

[Player 108]

You have received a message from Wonwoo.

To be continued…

________________________________________

[Do you accept this message?]

Yes No

A message? From Wonwoo? Why would he send a message when he is right Infront of me?

“Y/N! Are you okay?” He shouts.

Huh?

“Y/N!”

I shake my head. “Yeah, I’m okay!” I shouted back.

Right. We were in the middle of a war between humanoids.

[Do you accept this message?]

Yes No

[ I found a way to get out of here!]

Get out? Of where? The message then disappears like it didn’t exist and I’m back to looking at what was going on Infront of us. I looked back to see we have lost the army of humanoids. I adjusted my grip only to realise I have been holding on too tight.

“Im sorry!” I said.

“For what?”

I lifted my hands.

He grabs onto my hands and put them back to where they were.

“It’s okay. Let’s go home.” He mumbled.

Why did he send me a message?

Back at base.

Shua hyung and Gyu were already back at the base and everyone started to rush to us once we opened the doors.

“Are you guys okay?!” Scoups shouted and rushed to us.

My arm. I needed to hide it. I tugged my sleeve down and hid it behind my back.

“Y/N! Wonwoo! I was so worried!” Joshua ran to us and gave us a hug.

My lips formed a tight smile.

“We’re fine.” I said, giving Wonwoo a nod.

“Hyung!” Mingyu shouted, running to Wonwoo giving him a hug.

Wonwoo patted him on the back.

“Y/N! Are you okay?” He gently grabbed on to both of my arms.

Ouch.

“Yeah, I’m okay Gyu, don’t worry. Here’s the piece.” He hugged and released me.

“Y/N got it!” Mingyu shouted.

Everybody clapped and cheered.

“Great job Y/N!” Jeonghan shouted.

“You did it again!” Minghao said patting my head.

“That’s our girl!” Seungkwan cheered.

“Wooooo!” Dk shouted.

“Thanks Y/N.” Woozi said giving me a nod and a smile.

I smiled back, turning my head to the side.

I’m proud of you, He mouthed.

I smiled. Thanks Woo. I mouthed back.

“I’m gonna head… to my room now…” I tipped toed out of the room, everyone too busy to notice, trying to fix the piece with their mission.

A nice shower, is all I needed.

I stripped out of my dirty clothes and got into the hot shower. Damn, my arm hurts. I then only realised it was a bigger graze with more blood than I thought. That’s gonna need some bandaging. Another battle scar. I washed my hair, dried it and got out of the shower changing into a new set of clothes.

I looked into the mirror and my wound and it looks pretty bad. It’ll pass. I dried my hair and opened the bathroom door stepping out.

A guy was sitting on my bed.

What the who?

He looked up and I froze.

“Hey,” A familiar deep tone said.

His black hair falling on his face, his squared frame glasses, soft eyes , his thin lips forming a small smile.

Wonwoo sitting there on my bed, holding a medical kit.

I blinked. He was wearing a big white T-shirt with brown pants fumbling with the box. Looks like he changed too.

“Hey, what are you doing here? ” I snapped out from my thoughts and walked towards the hanging rack to hang my towel distracting myself.

“I’m here to help you with your wounds.”

I stopped.

“You didn’t have to Woo,”

“I want to. Now sit.” He patted the bed.

Why in the world? I slowly and carefully walked to the bed and sat down until we were face to face with each other, hiding my arm.

“Let me see Y/N.” He said gently, eyes pleading.

I hesitated. He’s probably going to nag at me for not being careful.

He gently grab my wrist pulling me closer to him showing my graze arm.

I flinched.

“Y/N,” he shook his head pushing my sleeve up. “This is bad, how come you never told us?”

He looks up, and in his eyes he looked hurt.

“It’s not that bad,” I lied. I looked down at my arm. “It would heal on its own.”

He started dabbing the wound, cleaning it with cotton buds quietly.

Now I felt bad.

I stared at him gently helping me fix my wounds, not saying a single word.

“I’m sorry,”

“For what?” He stopped and looked up.

“For.. not being careful, and for leaving you in the van with Shua hyung.” I muttered.

He smiled. “Accidents happen. You were just trying to protect me, I’m relieve that you’re safe.”

My heart starts beating faster. Why is he making me feel this?

Is it weird that I somehow wanted more of this?

The other members cared for me, like brothers and family, but it has always been Wonwoo, who always had my back, who was always there to care for me, who always make me feel things I shouldn’t be feeling.

I want to tell him about the message, about it saying there’s a way to get out of somewhere. But, it would ruin the moment, wouldn’t it? And for once, I wanted to just leave things the way it is, and enjoy the moment I had now. It has never been great ever since the world turned upside down.

“I never said this yet but, thank you Woo for saving my ass back there. I thought I lost you. ”

“I’m not going anywhere Y/N, you know that. I’ll always be here.” He wrapped the bandage and patted my head gently. “Get some rest, you did well today.”

He tucked me into bed. I closed my eyes and slowly drifted to sleep as he gently kissed my forehead.

I don’t know whether he will be always here.

________________

The next few days went by, and I started looking for clues about the message I received. One day I decided to confront Minghao about it.

After that day, Wonwoo was more quiet than usual, even though he has always been quiet.

“You received a message from Wonwoo?” Minghao asked confused. “How?”

“I have no idea, it was like a glitch.”

“Have you asked him about it? By the way, what happened to the two of you?”

“Nothing. Nothing happened. And no, I did not ask him yet.” I sighed.

“You need to tell him Y/N. But in the meantime, I can do some research and help you find the source of it.”

“Thank you, Minghao.” I gave him a hug.

“Guys we have a meeting, Jun called us.” Vernon said.

________________

“We’re running out of food supplies.”

“I’ll go get it.” Wonwoo said without hesitation.

“I’ll go with him.” Mingyu said.

“Sorry Gyu we need you here to discuss on the next mission.” Woozi said.

Before my mind could register my mouth did what it wanted on its own. “ I’ll go with him.”

“No,”

“Why?”

“No.”

Silence filled the room.

“We will go with them.” Hoshi and DK said.

“Okay, me, Mingyu, Joshua, and Dino would go out to search for more weapons.” Scoups announced.

“Let’s go guys, we can do it!” Seungkwan shouts.

Wonwoo takes his rifle and walks out of the room coldly.

“What’s wrong with him?” Jun asked.

“I’ll go check on him.” Dk said as he rushed off.

I went back to my room to pack, gearing up on weapons and grenades just in case. I clipped my hair back and secure my bandage. My wound was healing well. I carried the backpack and walked out the door.

“Are you guys ready?”

Everyone nodded. Weapons strapped to our bodies.

“Let’s head out.” Wonwoo said.

We drove to a huge abandoned department store. Entering quietly, with Wonwoo in the front, Hoshi behind him, me in the centre and DK at the back. Lights hung from the ceiling. Some bodies were on the ground, dead. Shelves were down, everything was everywhere on the ground.

“Clear. Quickly grab all we can.” Wonwoo commanded.

We took out our bags and starting stuffing any food and medical things we could find and get.

“Stay close.” Wonwoo said to me as he surveyed the area.

Just as I turned to a corner, I saw someone walking pass quickly. I held up my rifle, pointing it straight ahead. I slowly and quietly stepped closer to where I saw the person walking pass. I turned to the corner and held up my weapon ready to shoot as I saw him glitch.

He become transparent and blue and then he came back to being there. He did not have a gun, and he just stood there. Then, my surroundings started to glitch. The department store started to glitch.

Things were there, and then they weren’t. Lights flickered, the floor started to shift, I started stumbling back, and soon everything started to glitch Infront of me. Colours glitched as I hit a shelve and sat on the ground, my hand hitting my head getting it to stop because it started hurting. I was getting dizzy and I saw someone running towards me asking me to wake up.

[Player 108 your time is running out]

You received a message from Wonwoo.

Open

[The glitch is the only way out.]

This is going on longer than I thought :)

Part 3?

Read part 1 here 👇🏻

Author note: I was listening to this song while writing the scene of Wonwoo and Y/N. Do listen to it even if you don’t understand, it gives the vibe to the story.

[peachcitt]

an emotionally charged chap 35!!! @gigiree @luvclick @megatraven

first off, im very sorry about skipping last week i just REALLLYYYY wasn’t feeling writing i don’t even know why and i felt bad about it but here i am now wooooo!! in other news my oc story now has 20 pages and idk how to feel about that. it’s wild. 

also i say this chapter is emotionally charged because DANG. i didn’t mean for all the stuff to happen but it did and honestly when do i ever plan for these things to happen. but it gets a little intense. a lot intense. oops. forgive me

Read from the beginning/where it’s originally posted here.

Story description: They say that curiosity killed the cat. But it can do a whole lot more than that.

Chapter description: The lab holds a lot of memories and a lot of secrets. Marinette wants to know it all, but Chat is keeping it all in the bag for now.

Rated: T (because some things may not be suited for some audiences... teensy bit of injury and a whole lot of emotion for this chapter)

There was an awkward silence that stretched between the three of them. Marinette’s eye twitched. Chat’s ring beeped, and he looked down at it idly. Sabrina cleared her throat.

“You have a Miraculous, too, right Marinette?” she asked, and Chat shot her a glare. Marinette didn’t get why he seemed so bothered.

“I do,” she said, pulling out the yo-yo. She could see Sabrina’s eyes track the movement, and for a moment she wondered if she should’ve lied.

“I saw on my feed that yours is a bit primitive.” Marinette raised her eyebrows. Sabrina flinched. “Not that it’s a bad thing of course, but I could install some new features to help you out on the remainder of your journey. Like texting, social media, emergency jetpack, face time, and other stuff like that.”

One of those was not like the others, but Marinette decided not to comment on it. She looked over to Chat, who was staring at Sabrina, suspicion obvious in his every feature. “Would that be okay?” she whispered to him. She liked the idea of having some more back up on the yo-yo, but she wasn’t sure if she trusted the Royal Scientist to do that.

Chat raised his chin, looking down his nose at Sabrina. She shrunk back. He seemed to go through a moment of careful contemplation, and it looked like he figured out what would be best. “Only if I get to help.”

Meaning he’d watch and make sure Sabrina didn’t do anything weird.

Sabrina didn’t seem keen to the idea, but when Marinette nodded in agreement, she sighed. “Of course.” She reached for Marinette’s Miraculous, and Marinette looked over at Chat before setting it in Sabrina’s hands. “It’ll only take a moment. Follow me,” she said, beckoning to Chat.

They disappeared from Marinette’s view, and she heard a lot of loud banging and tinkering and a lot more bickering.

She could hear Chat’s low rumble of a voice, but it was the voice he used when he didn’t want to be heard, and it worked. Marinette couldn’t discern what he was saying. She could hear Sabrina’s voice loud and clear, though.

“What do you mean you haven’t told her?” she heard Sabrina demand. Her eye twitched, and she cursed the shocks that Chloe had administered to her system. “That’s important information, Noir.” There was a pause as Chat muttered his counter argument, punctuated by a rather loud bang. “Of course you don’t have to tell the specifics – you never tell anyone the specifics – but it wouldn’t hurt to talk about it for once!”

“Don’t lecture me like you know things,” Marinette heard Chat say. They were on their way back. “I’ll tell or not tell whatever I want to whomever I please.” He sounded more annoyed than pissed, and Marinette blew out a small sigh of relief.

When the two were once again in front of Marinette again, Sabrina handed the yo-yo to Marinette. It didn’t look different, but when Marinette had it in her hands, it seemed to weigh slightly heavier. Magic, probably.

“I added my phone number in there,” Sabrina said, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear, “just in case you need any help with any new functions or anything like that.”

“Gesture’s appreciated,” Chat said, narrowing his eyes at Sabrina. “But I’m right by her side, and I’m just as much of a scientist as you are.” Sabrina rolled her eyes but didn’t bother replying.

“Thank you, Sabrina,” Marinette said, placing the yo-yo back in her pocket. She ignored Chat’s look. “For everything.”

Sabrina blushed deeply, portions of her body turning invisible. She pushed her hair back behind her ear. “I’m- I’m, uh, going to the, um, bathroom.” She hurried away.

“You’re too nice to her,” Chat said immediately after Sabrina was out of sight.

Marinette slapped his arm. “She helped me through Chloe’s game show of death. We’re both alive because of her.”

Chat pouted for a moment, but he seemed to be grateful enough for Sabrina’s help, and he knew better than to argue with Marinette about that kind of stuff.

“So,” Marinette said, wandering over to Sabrina’s cluttered desk and moving a paper idly, “what’s that important information Sabrina thinks you should tell me?” Marinette was not an idiot. Her eye twitched again.

She was still pretending to be innocent, and when she looked over at Chat, he had his face turned up to the ceiling, a deep sigh in the process of going through his lungs. “It’s really nothing you should worry about.”

“I’ll worry about it anyway,” she said with a shrug.

“Really, Marinette,” he said, and she realized he was serious, “it’s better for everyone the less people know about it.”

Taking her hand off the desk, Marinette turned to face him. “Once this all blows over, and we’re all safe, will you tell me?”

He gave her a pained look then, and she realized there had been no question in her statement other than the one intended. There was going to be an afterwards for them, and she believed it. “I don’t know, bug. I don’t know.”

She frowned. “If this is about whether or not we’ll both live through this-”

“That’s not what it’s about,” Chat interrupted. “It’s just…” He trailed off, blowing out a breath and ruffling a hand through his hair. “Can we look around? I want to see the rest of the lab.”

It wasn’t the smoothest segue that Chat had ever come up with, and Marinette got the point. Whatever it was, Chat planned on keeping it under wraps for an indefinable amount of time.

“Yeah,” she said, smiling at him. Her eye twitched, and she ignored it. “Let’s look around.”

 ---

 The bottom floor was relatively bare save for the viewing screen by Sabrina’s desk, the hole that Chloe had made in the wall, and the bathroom that Sabrina had slipped into, but the top floor that they got to via the escalator seemed to be a bit more filled. It had several bookshelves of human history in different languages, and it also had bookshelves filled with fiction and comics. Those bookshelves had no label, and Marinette hoped those also weren’t considered human history.

Chat wandered through the room like a ghost, trailing his fingers over the bookshelves and the walls with a sad look on his face. To Marinette, the expression was bit… nostalgic.

She stood by what looked like Sabrina’s bed, her hand resting on the wall that opened up to the escalator going down. It had notches from a couple feet off the ground to just above Marinette’s height. She traced the notches, looking over to Chat, who was staring at a wall with that same nostalgic look.

“How long did you work here?” she asked, and Chat seemed to notice her presence for the first time since they’d arrived to the top floor.

He saw where she was standing and he drifted over to her, his fingers touching the notches in the walls. “Since I was a kid,” he said, and his fingers traced over some less deep scratches in the wall by a notch. The scratches formed a capital letter ‘A.’

“A kid?” Marinette asked, and her heart pulled at the nod that Chat gave her. He was lost somewhere in his memories, and now Marinette was understanding there were a lot of them here. She looked down at the notches near the floor.

They were height notches. To measure a kid’s growth.

“Chat…” She tried to catch his eye, her fingers brushing over the letter A beside the notch she’d been touching.

He had turned away from her, back to the wall he’d been staring at before. “This whole wall used to be a chalkboard, you know,” he said quietly. “My… my colleagues” – the word seemed to pain him – “used it for extra space, and they gave me extra chalk so that I could keep myself busy. They held a contest each week for best drawing, and I always won.” His bright green eyes seemed wet.

She moved to stand next to him, staring at the wall with him. She tried to imagine a little Chat drawing on the wall, winning drawing contests and making scientists smile. The thought made her lips turn up a little. “You liked it here?” she asked.

“I grew up surrounded by science and progress. By people that cared about the future, and… and cared about me.” He paused. Marinette didn’t trust herself to look over at him. She was afraid of what kind of face he was making. “I more than liked it. I loved it. The years I spent here were the best in my life.”

It took a moment for the words to sink in. Marinette frowned. “You sound like you’d never want to leave. So why did you?” She finally worked up the courage to look at him. His bottom lip was trembling.

Before Marinette could act on her sudden urge to hold him, he took a deep breath and closed his eyes. “A lot of things went wrong. Some experiments failed, and my-my colleagues went rogue. They made a lot of mistakes, and it didn’t feel right for me to come back. It wasn’t safe.”

There was a lot of information that he was holding back; that much was clear. But Marinette got the feeling she shouldn’t press on specifics, no matter how much she wanted to know. “But you didn’t, um, go rogue, right?” The phrase felt strange on her tongue. She wondered what Chat meant by that. “Why was it dangerous to come back?”

Chat reached out, pressing his palm flat on the pale yellow wallpaper, as if by trying hard enough he would still be able to feel the chalkboard underneath. “When everything went to hell, my allies shifted, and so did my way of thinking. This lab worked towards hero work, and I used to believe in that, but it never seemed practical to me afterwards. I couldn’t call attention to myself by being a hero if I didn’t want to be killed. I didn’t go rogue the way my colleagues did, but I did turn my back on Plagg.”

When everything went to hell. Throughout all of Chat’s brief explanation, that was the one phrase that had stuck in Marinette’s head. She wondered if she’d ever know the full details of what had happened.

Closing her eyes, she pressed her hand on the wall beside Chat’s. It was a prayer, and it was a promise.

“I’ll be the hero,” she said, opening her eyes to look at Chat. “I’ll be the hero,” she repeated.

Chat laughed, shaking his head. “You already are.”

He took his hand off the wall.

---

 When they reached the bottom floor again, Chat started walking to go forwards, but Marinette turned back the way that they had come in. “Wasn’t there another path?” she asked, tugging on his arm. She really just wanted to go back to the save point that she remembered was there, both to get rid of the twitch she’d had ever since Chloe had electrocuted her and to save.

He frowned. “It should still be blocked off, and I don’t think even I’m charismatic enough to get them to leave.”

“Don’t sell yourself short,” Marinette said, already pulling him along with her. “And besides, the plan was for me to charm them away. Because we both know I’m better.”

“Can’t argue with that,” Chat said with a shrug.

It was a bad attempt at humor to lighten both of them up, and Marinette knew it. But Chat was obviously troubled by the sight of the lab and the memories it brought back, and Marinette didn’t like seeing that faraway look in his eyes. If he wasn’t going to tell her what was bothering him, she might as well try to make him feel better.

Before they stepped in front of the guards blocking the path, Marinette nudged the toe of her boot to the save point. Her twitch immediately went away and it felt like life had been breathed back into her shocked muscular system.

She hadn’t realized how much the electro-shock had affected her until it wasn’t affecting her anymore. She looked over at Chat, completely frozen next to her, that same troubled look on his face from before.

Pressing the ‘yes’ button, the world came back to life, and Marinette touched Chat’s arm. He looked over at her, raising his eyebrows and erasing that look from his face. “I have some food in the yo-yo if you need it. Since you got shocked.”

“I’m perfectly fine,” Chat said, giving her a toothy grin. It didn’t reach his eyes.

“Don’t lie to me.”

His smile softened into something that wasn’t fake. “I’m being serious,” he said, taking her hand. “I heal fast.”

She gave him a once over, examining for twitches or signs of fatigue. All she got was the tired look in his eyes and the gentle downward slop of his shoulders that she recognized from the times when he was thinking too much. “Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

She eyed him a little more. Finally, she sighed. “Okay, I believe you.” She believed that he was physically fine, maybe in need of a quick catnap, but not mentally. But he didn’t want to talk about it – she could tell by the way he was avoiding her eyes.

Giving his hand a squeeze – one she hoped helped him know that she was there if he needed her – she stepped in front of the guards. “I’d like to go on this path.”

The two guards, faces covered and very different in terms of height, looked at each other. The taller one looked back at her and straightened. “We’re not supposed to let anyone through. Orders and junk.”

“Alya says there’s a human on the loose,” the smaller one piped in. He made a full-body gesture that seemed to go along with an eye roll that Marinette couldn’t see. “Which is ridiculous. It’s been years since a human’s been down here, and there’s no real way they would be able to survive this long, let alone get inside the Underground.”

Marinette felt a little proud. She looked back to Chat to share a nice look, but he was staring at the guards with his mouth open.

“Max?” he asked, walking up to stand beside Marinette and pointing at the smaller guard, who shifted uncomfortably. “Why are you part of the Royal Guard?”

“None of your business,” the taller guard said, shifting forward as if to shield Max from Chat.

“Didn’t ask you, Kim,” Chat said, barely offering the taller guard a glance. “Why are you a guard?” Chat asked again to Max.

“Because I want to be,” Max said, moving his head as if he was lifting his chin.

“Yeah, that’s a load of sh-”

“Chat,” Marinette interrupted, resting a hand on his arm. He pulled back, but he didn’t seem happy about it. “How about you explain to me what’s happening.” She was getting very tired of never knowing what was going on when Chat got upset.

“This guy,” Chat said, angrily gesturing to Max, “is a scientist.”

Marinette frowned. “But didn’t Sabrina say that she was the only one right now?”

“That’s because she is,” Max said, stabbing his spear into the ground and folding his arms. “I’m not a scientist, Chat.”

“You are! You love science. You told me that you wanted to be the Royal Scientist.”

There was no telling what kind of expression Max had on, but Marinette thought it might’ve been a mix between pity and embarrassment. “That was when we were kids. And besides, a lot has changed. You also said you wanted to be the Royal Scientist, and now here we are.”

Kim, the taller guard, looked down at Max with what seemed to be disbelief. “You wanted to be the Royal Scientist?” They all ignored him.

“You know why I couldn’t go back,” Chat said, shaking his head. “But it’s different for you.”

Max shook his head. “Listen, Chat, I was just as involved with the lab as you were” – Chat was already shaking his head again – “and I also believed in the old policies. I liked what we were doing before… Before we messed up.” A slight waver of confusion appeared in his voice. “I couldn’t do the experiments that King Plagg wanted, so I just left the lab.”

“You could’ve changed things!” Chat said. He was getting more upset. Marinette wondered if she should intervene.

“And what are you doing?” Max demanded, seemingly undeterred by Chat’s anger. “Being a bum in the Royal Guard, lazing around the entire Underground? It’s like you don’t even care that your p-”

“I knew my place,” Chat interrupted, his words a growl that Marinette imagined had scraped his throat coming out. “And you should’ve known yours. You could’ve stopped Plagg. You. Could’ve. Fought. Back.”

At the last word, green light burst from Chat’s body, surrounding him in a sickly green aura dotted with black that radiated a deadly heat. Marinette backed away from him, almost not recognizing him with the rage that had distorted his features.

Both Max and Kim had stumbled backwards, and Kim raised his spear towards Chat. “That’s enough,” Kim said, pointing the spear at Chat’s chest. Chat grabbed the shaft of the spear, but he didn’t do anything to actually start a fight. Where his hand was touching the spear, the metal started to look as if it were rusting and flaking away.

Kim turned his head to Marinette. “I’m sorry, little lady, but you’re going to have to leave.” He really did sound sorry, but when he turned back to Chat, she saw his amicable nature disappear. “And take Chat Noir with you.”

“I will. I’m very sorry,” Marinette said, easing back towards Chat, wary of his green and black aura. Glancing at the slowly decaying spear, she reached out to try and touch him, try and ease him away but the light burned her fingers. She yelped, pulling back.

Her yelp seemed to bring Chat back to himself because he let go of Kim’s spear and looked away from Max, finally looking over at Marinette. His aura disappeared immediately, and he reached towards Marinette.

She pulled away on instinct, her fingertips throbbing and burning. When she saw the intense wounded look of regret pull across his features, she reached forward again, but with her other hand. “Hey, hey,” she said, gently touching his arm, “let’s go, okay?”

“I’m so sorry,” Chat said as they started to walk away, back towards the lab. He sounded like he was about to cry. “I’m so, so sorry.”

Marinette looked down at her injured fingertips. It looked like the top few layers of skin had simply disintegrated, leaving behind a horrible mess of blood and what looked like bone. She shut her eyes tight and clenched her fist, ignoring the pain. “It’s alright. I’m okay.”

“No, you’re not,” Chat said as they walked back into the lab, hanging his head. “I… I lost control. And I hurt you.”

The lab was still deserted, and Marinette looked around. There was a package of instant noodles on Sabrina’s desk next to a bunch of others, so Marinette took one and opened it up as quickly and quietly as she could. She broke off a little portion of the uncooked noodles from the square and stuffed it in her mouth, chewing on the dry noodles and watching as a new layer of pink, raw skin grew over the disintegrated bits of her fingertips.

She went back to Chat and hid the package of noodles behind her back, showing her newly healed fingers to Chat. “You did,” she admitted, making him look at her fingers. “But look. It’s not that bad.”

He looked up at her, his expression lost, and Marinette thought of the utter mess her fingers had been only a moment before. “It could’ve been, Marinette. It could’ve been really bad.”

“But it wasn’t,” Marinette said, lying a little bit. The sensation that had overcome her fingertips as soon as she had touched that green dotted black aura was unlike any other she had every felt. She was glad she had pulled away instantly, or else she felt like that disintegration would’ve spread throughout her whole body.

Shaking his head after staring at her for a moment longer, he ruffled a hand through his hair and walked ahead of her to exit the lab. She took that opportunity to stuff the noodles into the storage compartment of her yo-yo.

Jogging a little to catch up, Marinette caught Chat’s hand in hers, wincing a little as her new skin brushed against the leather of his glove. He seemed to almost pull his hand away, but she held firm, walking beside him.

“Can…” Marinette was almost afraid to continue, but she took a deep breath, gathering up her courage. “Can I ask what that aura was?” she asked. Chat’s steps slowed to a stop, bringing her to a stop as well, just outside of the lab.

He lifted their conjoined hands, keeping his eyes on that instead of her face. “Everyone down here holds a certain sort of magic.”

“Right,” Marinette said, nodding her head. “Akumas are basically made of magic.”

A small smile pulled at his lips, and his eyes flicked up to meet her gaze before going back to their hands. “Correct. Obviously I’m no exception. I’ve got some magic in me.”

“And that – that green and black light? That was your magic?”

Chat moved their hands so that he could see the ring on his ring finger. Marinette could feel it pressing into her skin. “It was some of it. A magician always has other tricks up their sleeves, right?”

“Right,” Marinette said. They didn’t start walking again. “Chat?”

“Hm?”

“What is your magic?”

He sighed, and his head dropped even lower than it already was. “It’s called Cataclysm.” There was a pause, and he released a small and bitter laugh. “Ha, get it? Cataclysm?”

Marinette didn’t think it was that funny, and neither did Chat.

“What does it do?”

Chat lifted his free hand, making sure it was away from both of them, and that same green and black aura burst to life around his hand, but it wasn’t like before. It only circled his hand, and he seemed to have total control of it. “This power can destroy anything I touch.” He looked up, finally holding her gaze. “It wasn’t just named for the pun. It can cause cataclysms.”

The aura around his left hand disappeared, and he dropped his arm. Marinette squeezed the hand she had a hold of, and then she brought his hand up to her lips, giving each knuckle on his hand a kiss. He shivered, dropping his head to touch their foreheads together.

“It seems like you can only cause cataclysms if you want to,” she murmured against his hand. “But you don’t want to.”

“Magic is an emotional force,” Chat whispered, and it seemed like that was the only volume of voice he could manage at the moment. “It can be affected by the user’s intense emotions, and it’s easy to lose control. I lost control earlier.”

Marinette gave his hand another kiss. “But you didn’t cause a cataclysm. You still had control, even if you thought you didn’t. You didn’t hurt anybody on purpose, and you didn’t destroy anything.”

That seemed to be exactly what Chat needed to hear. His breathing stuttered, and he brought their hands down. There was nothing between them except for their shared breathing space. Marinette could feel Chat’s breath brushing on her lips. She closed her eyes.

A loud ding sounded from Marinette’s pocket, and it startled the two of them apart.

Pulling out the yo-yo and sliding it open to the phone function, Marinette saw it was only a notification from a social media site that Sabrina had signed her up to. It looked like Sabrina had posted something about forgetting to watch Marinette and Alya’s fight.

Marinette blew out a breath, not sure of what to make of the situation. She combed her fingers through her bangs, trying to push down the blood that had rushed to her cheeks. “Sorry,” she said, not sure if she should apologize, but doing it anyway.

Chat cleared his throat, also running a hand through his hair. His ears twitched. His face looked a bit red. “It’s cool.”

How the hell was she supposed to clear the awkward air that now surrounded them? She was very sure that going back to whatever they had been about to do was out of the question, but she wasn’t sure where else to go.

She decided to go back to what they had been talking about before. “Don’t, uh, don’t akumas’ type of magic have something to do with how they turned? So, like, how-” She stopped, suddenly realizing in horror how intrusive that question was and mentally kicking herself for it.

“It’s a boring story, bug,” Chat said, placing an easy grin on his face and linking their arms. “You’d hate it.”

Marinette didn’t think that, but she was glad he seemed to not be offended by her stupid question. “Oh, really?” she asked, forcing herself to relax and not let her skin buzz where the sleeve of her sweater was making contact with the leather of his suit.

“Yes, really.” He started to walk forward, pulling her along until she matched her pace. “Now I believe we have a mission to complete.”

The thought of continuing to walk in this horrible heat made Marinette want to curl up on the spot. “Can’t we take a break?”

“You had your break. Ate some noodles and everything.” She gaped at him, and his grin softened a little as he winked at her. “And sweetheart, I do think we should save the world sooner rather than later.”

A grin of her own pulled at her lips, and she walked a little closer to him. “Darling, I couldn’t agree more.”