Shedding Fangs

The day after the world does not end, Marinette Dupain-Cheng wakes up to the worst headache she has ever known in her life.

Her body bolts upright, more by reflex than conscious thought. The pain pulses under her skin, like a hundred drums in her body. She opens her mouth to- complain, call for help, take a deeper breath- but all she can do is let out a weak, strangled moan.

“Marinette?!” Tikki calls out for her, a paw on her shoulder, and her voice sounds so far, far, far away. The other kwamis join in a chorus of Guardian, are you alright, Guardian, respond to us, Guardian, Guardian! But Marinette can barely hear them.

Vaguely, it occurs to her that the pain is not quite in her head; it’s in the back of her jaw, in the hollow of her throat, it’s in, it’s in-

Her slaps both hands over her mouth as her whole body seizes.

It’s growing. It’s growing it’s growing it’s spreading like rot like roots like bugs through a dead tree and she can’t breathe she can’t breathe she-

She retches, stills, and then coughs, so violently she almost bangs her head against the bedframe. Something small and warm lands in her palms, and finally, finally she can breathe again.

“-ere, there, there. Breathe, Marinette. Breathe.”

The pain stops so abruptly it gives her vertigo. Slowly, Marinette grows aware of her surroundings again. Little weights, on her arms, against her stomach. Kwamis. Holding her, grounding her. Whispering sweet nothings to calm her down.

She pulls her hands away from her mouth. Her face feels wet. When she opens her mouth to speak, she tastes copper. “Wh- what...?”

There is a second of silence.

“It’s... merging miraculi is dangerous, Marinette.” Tikki eventually speaks up. “Merging the Black Cat and Ladybug miraculi... is especially dangerous.”

... Ah.

Ah.

“Is the Guardian in danger?!”

“She didn’t use us for long, so I- think the worse is over?”

The kwamis start arguing, as they’re wont to do. Marinette only half listens. She sets her hands down, and then, slowly, pries her fingers open.

Inside her palms, shines four bloodstained human teeth.

Ha. Hah! Hahahahhahahahahahha!

“Marinette...?”

If that isn’t the perfect representation of her life! She did not kill Gabriel Agreste, sure- but she couldn’t stop him from killing himself. She could not save him. She could not save anyone. What does it matter, who wielded the knife? Her hands are bloodied all the same.

“Guardian, your nose...”

She stops laughing, briefly, to breathe, and to lick her lips. Oh. She has a nosebleed. So that’s where the blood is from- no wonder, no wonder, no wonder. Did you know that nosebleeds can be triggered by a change in ambient pressure? Why wouldn’t she be bleeding then, carrying the weight of all her filths? Her lies coat her tongue whole, twisting her mouth until it’s become something alien and monstrous-

Oh. No. Wait. That one is not a metaphor. Her mouth does feel different from usual.

She opens it wide, then sticks a finger inside. She barely has to poke around; soon enough, where her molars used to sit, she finds four things that are much too sharp and a tad too big to belong to a human being.

“... Cat?” She asks, finally turning to the kwamis.

Tikki shakes her head. “Plagg is not a literal cat. But... yes. Wielding too many of us for too long can lead to... changes. Like these.”

That makes sense. That makes so, so much sense- Marinette has never been more clear-headed in her life.

“Guardian? Are you... alright? Your face looks a little...”

“Yeah,” she replies, and then, with a bit more conviction: “Yeah. I’m good. I get it.” And that one is not a lie, because what Marinette Dupain-Cheng understands is this:

She is

Never

Going back.

She’s never going back to before. Before she lied to the world. Before she learned the truth. Before she was used by a full-grown man as a mean to commit cosmic suicide. Her human teeth fell out in the same way the innocent Marinette fell out, and all that is left in her place is something bloody and terrible that can only pretend to be good.

The day after the world does not end, Marinette Dupain-Cheng understands that she has become a monster.  

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