The Soul Link?

Another quiet night had passed by the city of Paris. Totally devoid of any and all disturbance, time passed the city peacefully. It was late, reaching roughly 11PM. Streetlamps and the late-hour shops lit up the city, and gave the night time travelers enough light to see where they were going. Even late at night, Paris was a fairly active city, with tourists and teenagers going out and enjoying themselves. A few cars drove on despite the late time, many of them taxi's, with people so eager to get places that they didn't care for the ridiculously expensive cost of the service. Small groups of people cluttered the busier parts of the city, like nightclubs, bars, takeout stores, and various other food and entertainment places.

It wasn't a sight Adrien Agreste was unused to.

The young blond teenager walked along the streets, his hands firmly in his jackets pocket, keeping to the side, so he didn't get in anyone's way. When it looked like he was going to walk into someone, he quickly moved to the other side of the pavement, allowing the other person clear passage. He didn't normally find himself in these sorts of places at night. Doing so was a rarity for him.

He had been unfortunate enough to run out of time before his transformation had worn off, after having pushed his luck with how much longer he had had left. Frantically, he had ducked into an alleyway hidden from sight quickly before anyone noticed him transforming from the famous Chat Noir, superhero, defender of Paris and partner of Ladybug, to the equally famous, yet less impressive all around, Adrien Agreste, handsome model for his father's fashion company. In the darker night time, he was less recognizable, otherwise he would have certainly been approached by someone who knew him.

"Adrien." The teenager heard a voice come from inside his jacket. Poking out from the neck hole in his jacket, was a small, cat like creature. A Kwami, called Plagg, Adrien's partner in becoming Chat Noir. He had met the tiny creature one day after finding his ring, his miraculous, placed on his table randomly, for no reason. The two of them merged, and Adrien became Chat Noir, and begun fighting alongside Ladybug as an applauded hero.

"What is it, Plagg?" Adrien asked, quickly checking around him to make sure nobody was around. They were in the clear, so he could talk to his tiny companion.

"I'm hungry. I need Camembert." While the tiny creature did need the substance to replenish his energy, Plagg often ate merely for pleasure. due to a lack of any sort of activity, Plagg didn't need to regain any energy. He was just a bit hungry. Like he always was.

"Do you ever think about anything other than Camembert?" Adrien sighed in somewhat amused, but mostly annoyed, exasperation.

"I think about Cheddar, and Brie sometimes." The gluttonous, charcoal black Kwami responded, dreamily licking his lips after making himself hungry and wanting a cheese buffet. "Occasionally Mozzarella."

"Of course." Adrien muttered to himself. His Kwami never thought about anything but food. In some ways, Adrien was jealous of his magical partner's one-track-simple-minded personality. "It must be nice to be so carefree, huh Plagg?"

After a quick look at Adrien in confusion, the Kwami caught on. "Oh, I see." The cat Kwami said with a smug smile on his face, levitating out of his masters jacket and just in front of his face. "You're thinking about your rejection by Ladybug again, aren't you? What's that make this, the forty-seventh time in a row?"

"Forty-ninth, actually." The model admitted with a depressed sigh.

It wasn't something he was particularly secretive about, but he did sometimes wonder, did Ladybug actually know, or did she choose to ignore it?

He had a not-so-secret crush on Ladybug. The partner he helped fight crime with alongside. He had been infatuated with her not long after he had met her, completely captivated by her strength, her determination, the confidence she displayed, her cool, calm, collected demeanor, her total dedication too helping protect the innocent people in Paris from an Akuma attacks caused by the villain Hawkmoth. Her stubbornness to do the right thing, and her defiance, and refusal to ever give up, no matter the circumstances, or no matter the odds against her. Underlying all of that, however, was a sweet, kind girl, gentle as any other person on the planet, with a soft side to her. She wasn't just a fighting machine, she was a person underneath all of that. A person who chose to go out of her way to help defend the people of Paris from danger, with no reward to herself. A truly selfless, courageous person.

Not to mention, she was cute on top of all that.

She was, in a sense, everything Adrien wanted to be himself. Everything he failed at, she was, so easily, and effortlessly. He had become totally infatuated with her in no time. He had begun to look forward to seeing her every day, and it quickly became the highlight of his day in no time at all. He loved becoming Chat Noir, not only for the freedom it gave him from his home, but for the chance it gave him to see Ladybug, his lady, the girl he had completely devoted himself to. He had dropped as many hints towards his feelings for her every time he saw her roughly equivalent to how many rain drops fell in a thunderstorm.

And she seemed to shoot down Chat every time, never outright rejecting him, but always seeming to make it rather clear she wasn't interested in him. Time and time again he had tried to make his feelings for her as clear as day. He had tried to bluntly confess to her once, but an Akuma attack had prevented him from being able to say what he had wanted to say. Despite that setback, he had made no secret about his feelings for the girl who ran around Paris with him in a red and black polka-dotted jumpsuit, helping to fight Akuma and defend their city, but not once had they seemed to stick with her.

The one downside to loving Ladybug.

She didn't seem to like him back.

Adrien loved Ladybug.

Of that he was absolutely certain. There wasn't a doubt in his mind that he loved her. How he longed to know who she was behind that mask. It didn't matter who she was, what she looked like, or what the relationship between them was in the real world. He loved that girl underneath that mask. He was willing to let her know who he was. He trusted her without question or condition. He had once offered to show her, simply to prove this fact to her. But she wanted their identities to remain a secret, even from one another. She said it would keep them more secure, and while Adrien hated that, he respected her wishes, and to this day, had kept his identity a secret, even from her, and did not pry as to hers. She would tell him when she was ready.

If she ever ready.

"I'll get you something to eat when we get back home, Plagg. You'll just have to hold on until then." Adrien informed his partner, following the empty streets towards his home. He lived very close to the Eiffel Tower, so it wasn't exactly difficult to remember his way home, despite having never gone this way back to his family mansion before, at least not at the street level. He'd probably made his way home via this route a few times across the rooftops as Chat Noir, but he didn't recognize this specific neighborhood. He was thankful that he lived so close to the biggest landmark in all of Paris. It meant he always knew which way home was.

"But that could take !" The magical creature dramatically cried.

"It'll take us twenty minutes."

"This is your fault." Plagg muttered. "You spend way too much of your time flirting with Ladybug, and not enough time focused on how much time you have left as Chat Noir."

"I'm in love. What do you want from me?"

"I want Camembert!"

"Oh shut it, Plagg. You're like a broken record sometimes." Adrien joked, flicking his magical partner lightly in the forehead. The two of them bickered, but it was never outright hostile. It was just the way the two of them worked. They did care for one another in reality.

"'Oh, Ladybug, my beautiful lady!'" Plagg mimicked, overly dramatically reenacting Chat Noir's previous movements, even down to the finest detail, including his rapidly blinking three times. He added on with a snicker, "'Oh how -fect you look tonight, m'lady'. Sound familiar, kid?"