37. Epilogue

“Quiet night.”

“Were you expecting otherwise?”

“Nah. Just seems kind of pointless to have us all out here when we know there’re no supervillain shenanigans going on, you know?”

“What, you don’t like hanging out as our superhero personas?”

“Stop putting words in my mouth! No, what I mean is that having us all together seems, well…a little OP, doesn’t it?”

Chat Noir shrugged, ruffling his shaggy blonde hair. He needed another haircut, Ladybug mused. Maybe she’d do it for him.

“I don’t exactly mind,” he said, leaning forward to let his hands rest on his crossed ankles. “Discourages a lot of people from doing bad things if they know we patrol frequently, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah, not like we’re gonna go the ‘Justice Gods’ route and start ruling over Paris with an iron fist. Too much work,” Emerald Shell commented with an exaggerated gesture of wiping sweat from his brow. Vixen bumped her shoulder against his.

“Nerd.”

“Hey, you married this nerd.”

“I’m not complaining…mostly because this nerd has a really big d—”

“Keep it in the bedroom, you two,” Ladybug interrupted before the two of them could get hot and heavy right there on the Eiffel Tower. Vixen turned and gave her a wink.

“Oh, like you’ve never wanted a piece of this.”

“Are you talking about you or Shell?”

“Why not both?” Vixen reasoned, and Ladybug snorted.

“Well, as much fun as I think a threesome with you two would be—”

“Hey!” Chat interrupted with a pout. “Why am I getting excluded?”

“No offense, dude,” Shell spoke up with a wink in a finger gun, “but between the three of us, we’d probs break you in about five minutes.”

Chat grinned.

“You wanna bet?”

Shell opened his mouth, a challenging gleam in his gold eyes—

“HEEEELP!!!”

All four of them snapped to attention, squinting in the distance. Two dots were running across the street it looked like, with a third dot chasing them. Chat whipped out his baton, and Ladybug leaned over as his baton’s camera zoomed in to get a better picture of what was happening.

“Thieves,” she concluded, seeing the stolen items they were hoisting under their arms as they fled the scene. “Well, looks like we’ll have some work to do after all—”

“Girl, we’ve got this,” Vixen said, pressing down on Ladybug’s shoulder to keep her from getting up as she got to her feet. “You and Tiger sit back and let the rookies take care of this.”

“I don’t know if you qualify for rookie status after doing this for a year,” Ladybug commented, but Vixen shrugged her off.

“Whatever. Point is, don’t worry about it. Your boutique opens early tomorrow, doesn’t it? You should get home and get some sleep soon.”

“Yes, Mom,” Ladybug called after her with an exaggerated roll of her eyes. Vixen blew her a kiss as she clambered onto Shell’s back, his hover board taking them low enough for her to jump to the ground safely as they chased the thieves down. Ladybug leaned back, inhaling the sweet night air.

“Can you believe it’s already been a year?” Chat said softly, moving closer to her. Ladybug smiled, leaning against him.

A whole year since Shade was defeated. A whole year since they finally gained peace…well, after a time. There was still the Anti-Akuma Taskforce to account for, a few of its members remaining stubborn even though there was nothing to protest anymore. On the other hand, the members of AVA seemed to be adjusting well; from what Marinette heard, Ivan was helping many of them deal with the trauma they all shared, but couldn’t quite put into words on their own. She was particularly satisfied to hear that Amanda was moving on with her life as well, turning her misfortune in love into a best-selling autobiography. Honestly, good for her—even though a part of Ladybug that was still somehow attached to her favorite professor felt ashamed of Desiree’s sins being put on display, if it helped Amanda gain closure, then it was important.

And then there was the matter of the Snake Miraculous, which Master Fu said he had taken care of—apparently, he knew a hero in America who had been willing to take ownership of such a dangerous Miraculous. What was her name again…Phoenix?

Either way, a year without akumatized victims was a good year in Ladybug’s book.

“Sometimes I can,” she said, replying belatedly to Chat’s question. “Sometimes I can’t. Time’s weird that way.”

“Mm.”

They stayed that way for a while, in peaceful silence, the night breeze caressing their faces.

“…Oh hey, Shell was telling me and Vix before you showed up—he Chose someone to take on the Butterfly Miraculous.”

Ladybug lifted her head from Chat’s shoulder, blinking in surprise.

“Really?”

“Mm-hm,” Chat hummed with a grin.

“Who?”

“Hi! Sorry, I know I’m late,” Bridgette apologized as soon as she stepped in the door, looking harried as she yanked the keys out of the door, a stack of documents under her other arm. “Now I know why Fantoche always made being mayor look so easy—he was pushing all his work onto me this whole time!”

Felix chuckled under his breath, reclining in his chair on the veranda as he carefully sipped at his wine. True, she was about ten minutes late, but it wasn’t a problem—dinner was still warm, and it wasn’t too late, so they could still have a lovely evening together.

Bridgette dropped her work on the coffee table inside, grabbing the mail as she inhaled appreciatively.

“Mmm. That smells good! What did you make?”

“Chicken parmigiana with penne pasta,” he answered, preening just a little. He knew himself to be a good cook, of course, but it was always much better when he had someone to share those cooking skills with.

Bridgette sat down across from him, and he obliged her in pouring her a glass of white zinfandel.

“This looks wonderful, Felix, thank you,” she said, giving him a bright smile before shuffling quickly through the mail. “I just want to make sure I don’t miss another letter from Erika; she was so sad when we didn’t get the last one, and I think I got the mailing address problem figured out now that we’re registered as living together, but—oh!”

Felix blinked as something fell out of the stack of mail Bridgette was shuffling through, his eyes narrowing when she picked up a small, black, unmarked box.

“Huh…what’s this?”

“Damn it, Nino,” he grumbled, only to regret it when Bridgette’s eyes flashed to him.

“What’d you say?”

“Nothing.”

“…You know, he never got around to telling us,” Chat realized, frowning a bit at that, before he shrugged. “Oh well—whoever he picked, I’m sure they’re the right fit.”

“I hope so. Poor Nooroo’s been through enough, but…” Ladybug frowned. “Don’t you think we have enough Miraculous users running around? I mean, there’s us, and of course Felix shows his face every now and again…”

Chat registered the venom that was spoken with Felix’s name, and he raised an eyebrow under his mask.

“Are you still mad at him?”

Ladybug huffed, folding her arms, her nose scrunching. It was cute…but Chat didn’t dare say so out loud, for fear that she’d accuse him of not taking her seriously.

“…Well,” she began slowly, as if she was just now trying to suss out exactly how she felt about Felix. “I’m annoyed about what he said to you to make you change, and the fact that he didn’t tell us that he knew about us not just when he saved us from falling, but the whole damn time…but it seems kind of pointless for me to be mad, considering you’re not anymore. …Hey, remind me why you’re not mad at him anymore?”

Chat snorted and rolled his eyes.

“I can only be mad at one family member at a time,” he said, his smirk fading as he thought of his father. “Besides…even though he really sucks at expressing himself…he’s kind of the only family I have left who actually gives a damn about me.”

Ladybug bumped her shoulder against his, and he turned to see her frowning.

“You have me,” she reminded him, as if he could ever forget. “And Nino and Alya, too. We’re your family now.”

Chat smiled at this. They were, huh? Didn’t matter that they weren’t connected by blood—they were just as close as any blood family would be, and Chat wouldn’t have it any other way.

‘Well,’ he amended in his head as he gazed at the woman he loved, looking as beautiful as ever as the moonlight threw her into a spectacular spotlight, ‘there is one other way I’d have it…’

“…Let’s go home,” Chat decided, getting to his feet. This decision appeared to surprise Ladybug, but she got up as well, unhooking her yo-yo from her hip.

“Sure, but…any particular reason we have to go right this second?”

“Nah, not really,” Chat assured her, extending his pole as he thought of the princess-cut diamond ring stuffed into a pair of socks in his dresser, marked only by the lucky charm she had given him all those years ago… “Just wanna get your opinion on something before we go to bed tonight.”

Ladybug slid him a suspicious look from the corner of her eye.

“…Adrien, we already have two grand pianos,” she reminded him, and Chat held in his laugh of relief that she hadn’t figured it out. “If you say you want to buy another one—”

“We have two downstairs,” Chat corrected her with a grin at her aggrieved look. “I teach with those, but if we had one upstairs—”

“Adrien—”

“—then I could serenade you before we go to bed, too!”

She shook her head.

“You’re ridiculous.”

Chat leaned over, his grin getting cheekier.

“You love me anyway.”

Ladybug sighed in an exaggerated fashion, but she smiled at him a second afterwards.

“I suppose I do.” She stretched up, kissing his cheek and flicking his bell in the same motion before she swung away. “Catch me if you can, chaton!”

Chat laughed, following eagerly, happy to play this game of Cat and Bug, now that he knew the Bug actually wanted to be caught.

Paris glittered and winked at them from below, peaceful and beautiful and undisturbed for one whole year to this day.

They were going for a record of seven years, at the very least.

After all, it was the luckiest number.

THE END