Heyo!

So I'm currently in ladynoir hell and I wanted to write so I asked tumlr for help and there are about six prompts for me to go through so look forward to those.

Summary: anon ask - "are you into tragedy because i know i am. chat noir gets gravely injured from protecting ladybug, and by the time she manages to cleanse the akuma, he's already struggling to breathe. it's up to you whether he lives or dies"

Word count: 1580

Warnings: Character death, blood, angst, the works

Disclaimer: I probably wouldn't have the heart to kill off a character I made.

Enjoy!

—

It wasn't meant to happen like this.

It wasn't.

They were the scarless heroes, the ones that always saved the day and repaired the damage.

So why, Ladybug thought, panic gripping her senses tight, is this happening?

Chat Noir, always the protective one, always the sacrifice - why did he have to be the sacrifice - was in front of her, arms outstretched and his form curling in a defensive stance.

He wasn't defending himself.

He was defending her.

Again.

The first time this happened - when Chat had hugged her, protected her, saved her - it had been against Timebreaker. That was fine, she knew she could save him, she had the reassurance in her heart that she would not let Chat Noir fade into nonexistence.

And she hadn't.

She had gone back in time and saved him.

But this time…

Ladybug stared up and the leathered muscles, tense and spasming as the harsh blade ripped through flesh.

She wanted to block her ears, to turn away, to go back and tell him not to come on patrol tonight, but she couldn't.

She was stuck, wide-eyed and slack-jawed, staring up at him as the scene played out in slow motion. The ripping, tearing, slashing sound of metal through leather and skin and muscle, the feeling of her heart miss a beat, and the insatiable rage and worry that wrenched at scream from her throat.

Red Samurai's laughter as Chat Noir fell to his knees, before slumping back against Ladybug, gasping for breath and eyes desperately searching for her.

The blood.

There was so much blood, more that she could ever think people had. It seeped into his suit and ran down onto her knees, the repulsive warmth flowing into her. She placed her hands on his chest in a feeble, desperate effort to staunch the flow.

Hot, wet tears gathered in her eyes and rolled down her cheeks, splashing down onto his face.

"L…Ladybug," Chat heaved, an arm stretching out to grab her own in a weak grip.

"No no no no Chat you are not giving me your dying speech," she told him, taking her hand off his chest - how did they get so red - and pulling him in close, head on her lap and her hands framing that masked face she had counted on several times.

Chat Noir flashed her a strained smile, a far cry from his usual smirk. He opened his mouth to say something, but closed it again, opting instead to gesture with his eyes over to the akuma.

She nodded and carefully set him down on the dusty roof before standing up and facing the samurai, whose armour was painted with that hated red that now covered her partner's chest.

She could hear Chat's laboured breathing behind her.

"You," she hissed, swinging her yo-yo around.

"Me," Red Samurai agreed mockingly, getting into his stance.

Ladybug stared at his sword. Blood was dripping from the tip and onto the ground, mixing with the dirt and lighting a flame inside Ladybug's chest because you did this to him.

With that, she attacked.

She fought with all the rage she could muster. With anger sharpening her moves and desperation heightening her senses, Ladybug fought.

It didn't last long. Within a minute, she had the loathed weapon in her hands and smashed it against the ground.

That was it. The akuma was gone. Red armour bubbled away to reveal the boy who sat near her in maths and a deep, irrational sense of betrayal filled her.

He was the one who did this to Chat Noir-

Ladybug took a halting gasp.

Chat Noir.

She couldn't hear him breathing.

Ladybug rushed to his side. "Chat?" she pleaded, "Chat, open your eyes… Chat!"

A pair of emerald orbs slowly blinked at her. "Lady…bug," he sighed.

His form was slumped with exhaustion, limps splayed out on the flat roof and the red liquid pooling around him.

There was a hollow emptiness in her chest, like something was constricting her lungs from the inside and she didn't know what to do.

"Chat…" she sobbed, helplessly placing her hands on the wound again, trying to help somehow.

A gloved hand reached up to hold her own. "My Lady…" he whispered hoarsely, "stop."

Stop.

Ladybug had never know one word to hold so much pain. It was like something snapped inside her, like a piece of her heart had been chipped off.

"No, no I'm not stopping, because you need to live," she protested, fighting against his weak grip, "you need to live and keep… keep throwing me those stupid smirks and fall down as we're running and… and you need to fight akumas with me and please, Chat Noir, fight this with me."

"Adrien."

Ladybug looked up from his chest and gazed at his masked face in horrified awe.

"What?"

"Adrien… my name's Adrien," he gasped, "Agreste."

No.

No no no no no this wasn't happening.

Someone had taken a sledgehammer to her chest and beaten her ribcage until it held nothing but broken bones and her pulsing heart, exposed and raw and it hurt.

She wasn't about to loose both of them. Not now. Please.

"Marinette…" she replied jerkily, tears flowing down her face like rain, "of course we already knew each other."

A soft smile stretched across his lips. "Mari…nette," he murmured, as if tasting the word on his tongue for the first time, "thought there was… something special about you."

He grimaced and the muscles on his stomach tensed.

All traces of hope dropped to her abdomen, rolling and twisting uncomfortably as it turned into dread.

"Stop talking, save your strength…" she muttered feebly, "I can…. I can still do… something, right?"

They locked eyes, and the resolution of the situation hit them both like a freight train.

There was nothing she could do.

There was nothing she could do.

Ladybug let out a mangled sob of despair. Chat Noir - Adrien - slowly moved an arm out, and she crawled in next to him, a hand resting just above the wound, clinging to the soft heartbeat like it was her own.

He pressed a kiss into her hair as she cried, bunching up the leather in her grip. A strong arm wrapped around her shaking shoulders and drew her in closer, so close she felt like she couldn't breathe.

Slowly - oh, so slowly - she extracted herself from the comforting embrace and bent over his face, brushing stray hair from his cheeks and looking deep into those emerald eyes because she knew she would get to do so for much longer.

"Adrien…"

The corner of his mouth twitched, like if they were in any other situation he might have laughed.

She wished he would laugh.

There were a million things she wanted to say to him, but her throat choked up resolutely.

Thank you for being my partner, thank you for going on these crazy adventures with me, I really like you, it made my heart skip when you talked to me in class, I'm sorry about your father, thank you thank you thank you please don't die please I'm begging you..

I love you.

She pressed a kiss to his cheek, soft and quick and marred with dust and dirt.

"You… missed," Adrien - Chat Noir - told her.

Ladybug gave a spluttery laugh. "This is the last one you're ever getting," she reminded him somewhat playfully, as if it was just another ordinary day, where the sun was shining and Chat Noir was flirting with her again.

"It's the only I'll ever be getting."

The world came crashing down around her as a spike of hopeless despair pierced her chest.

It was not an ordinary day, the sun was not shining, and Chat Noir was dying.

He wrapped a hand around her shoulders and brought her in close, their foreheads touching. Ladybug gazed sorrowfully into those pained viridescent eyes before leaning down and touching their lips together.

It was slow and soft and all Ladybug could taste were her own tears.

Then the pressure disappeared.

She pulled back sharply. "Chat?" she asked tentatively, as if asking if he had simply fallen asleep.

"Chat, open your eyes."

It was a command, a plea for him to be joking.

"Chat… open your eyes."

A desperate cry for help.

"Chat! Chat Noir - Adrien!"

A scream. A horrifying shriek of panic that resonated within the very walls of Paris.

There was no response.

Ladybug slumped back, eyes wide and unbelieving, arms hanging limply by her side. It felt like something had beaten her ribcage black and blue, her skin felt numb and she vaguely wondered in her increasingly blank why the world wasn't ending.

Why wasn't the world ending, when the most important thing in it was gone?

—

I'm sorry?

Please tell me what you thought and if I made any major mistakes~

As Always,

Thornsword