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Marinette's House

During Miraculous Ladybug, Marinette is often put down for being a baker's girl and a poor girl amongst her millionaire peers but then I looked at her home and thought to myself, "Aren't homes with more than two floors expensive? Especially if they include a walkable balcony?" Which led me down a road of frustration as I couldn't find the concrete cost of the bakery it's based on nor the house prices in any arrondissements.

However, I decided to make a poor man's attempt at an estimate with what I could find on the internet that wasn't advertising the real life bakery it's based on, Instagram posts, or the prices of baked goods.

I will explain my workings out below the "read more", but be warned of questionable reasoning and less than accurate findings. Please don't take this post as fact as I know I'm far from the truth.

Warning: maths ahead.

Since you've consented to read my shenanigans, I'll attempt to explain my thought process.

Since I couldn't find the cost of the IRL bakery, I searched for the Average Home Price in Paris. Results:

$1,150 per square foot.

A start, more than expected and in dollars, but a start. So, what's the dollar to euro exchange?

0.96 euros to 1 dollar.

We'll save that for later, but good to know for now. Next, since it's a bakery, I searched for the Average Sized Bakery:

At least 800 square feet, ideal being 1,200 square feet.

Alright, that gives us a boundary for the lowest and highest result with leeway for head canons. So, how many floors is the Dupain Cheng bakery? This is to know how many times we multiply the floor space. From top to bottom:

5F: Rooftop balcony

4F: Marinette's room / attic

3F: Living Room and kitchen

2F: Tom and Sabine's room

1F: The Bakery Itself

So five floors. For my sanity I didn't include the stairwell extension from the 1st to 3rd floor, not how the attic curves in, I'm taking excessive liberties to stop myself weeping. Now comes the maths of it all, starting with the smaller possibility.

$1,150 × 800 = $920,000 per floor.

$920,000 × 5 = $4,600,000 altogether.

A steep number, it shocked me as well the first time I calculated it, then I remembered that was the smaller guess, the larger being:

$1150 × 1,200 = $1,380,000 per floor.

$1,380,000 × 5 = $6,900,000 altogether.

Both well in the millions, to my shock, then remembered about the dollar to euro exchange rates so bunged those through a calculator to reach the following results:

€4,416,000 for the 800 square feet

€6,624,000 for the 1,200 square feet

Still in the millions. I'm still reeling from the final results of all this. I nearly forgot why I started looking for the cost of Marinette's house while looking at the numbers.

Ok, Marinette's family is absolutely loaded if they could afford to live in the bakery if someone considered my numbers, whether they rent or purchased the building outright, they're still wealthy regardless.

For being "a normal girl with a normal life", Marinette sure is oblivious to the wealth she walks on.

I'm not going into detail about the cost of her hobbies or the trip to Shanghai, those can be separate posts I can make as I recover from how her house may cost millions.

Did anyone else get a gross, slimy feeling when watching the bathroom scene in Confrontation where Marinette and Sabrina revealed how the mirror was actually a two way mirror allowing anyone to see inside, or how there were microphones recording everything happening inside?

Or how Marinette admitted to making the usual bathroom "out-of-service" so she could tamper with the temporary bathroom? Granted, we never see inside the potentially vandalized bathroom, only her putting up the sign, though if the school needed to build the temporary bathroom, there's enough evidence in the episode to suggest Marinette caused serious damage in order to carry out her plan.

Out of morbid curiosity, I searched up the prison sentence for recording in a public bathroom and found this from "prisonguide.co.uk". Before anyone comments, I know the UK and Paris are different places with different laws, this is just to show how scummy the whole scheme was from my perspective.

Warning, slight mention of voyeurism ahead. Nothing major but I'll warn you just in case.

Typical Sentences for Voyeurism Offences

Generally, offenders may face up to two years in prison. However, sentences can be more severe if the offence is aggravated by factors such as the victim being a minor or if the act involved recording and distributing images or videos.

Reading this over, I don't understand why the writers made the Main Character of a show aimed at children commit a crime this serious and damaging, and ultimately be rewarded by the narrative. Remember, this is how she defeats Lila, with Chloe following a few episodes later.

It's appalling how this made it past the drawing board. I know the writers wanted Marinette to expose Lila to everyone in an "epic, you go queen, girlboss" way, but did they have to choose such a scummy method of doing so?

Also, isn't Sabrina the daughter of a Police Officer? Shouldn't she know recording someone in the bathroom -a place where privacy is expected - is a crime?

Marinette Dupain-Cheng is overexposed, and it's why I've grown to hate her.

The show hinges on the audience liking Marinette enough to buy the premise that everything she does is 100% justified, she's never in the wrong and can't suffer consequences that last longer than an episode or else the show doesn't function as an enjoyable story. If you aren't a fan of Marinette, the show becomes a slog to get through, especially the later seasons.

One of the biggest problems I have with the show's narrative is how it shoves Marinette into being the solution to every major conflict, which robs other characters of having their moments, all because "she's super cool" and "please like our perfect protagonist who can do no wrong". I know this is an incredibly salty take but whenever a story tries to force me to love a character, I find myself hating the character more and more overtime.

What got me writing all this in the first place? Well I checked the Miraculous Ladybug fandom tag on Ao3.

Of the 69,749 works on Ao3 as of the time I'm writing this, 55,419 of them are tagged with Marinette as a character. That's 79.464% of the total Miraculous Ladybug fanfics. She's the main character, there's obviously going to be a lot of fanfic about her, I understand that. Here are some other tags that feature Marinette in some way.

Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir / Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug : 36,294

Adrinette: 5254

Ladynoir: 4254

Marichat: 4051

Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug / Damian Wayne: 1903

Last one may seem a little different until you remember that crossovers exist.

Batman - All Media Types: 4945

DCU: 959

DCU (Comics): 253

How many of those do you think are salt fics where Marinette leaves Paris to be "where she won't be taken advantage of" and "be around those who appreciate her". Let's not forget how the Maribat sub-genre began as salt fics and character bashing.

If you don't want to read about Marinette in a fic, you wipe out 79.464% of all fanworks on Ao3, maybe more as some works only tag her within a ship.

I think most of the growing vitriol towards Marinette is due to how overexposed she is within the fandom and the show itself. If some of the screen time Marinette had gotten was given to other characters who needed it such as the rest of the class, would the backlash against Marinette be so large?

I kept thinking back on the gift delivery scene near the beginning of Cat Blanc and wondered how long it took for Marinette as Ladybug to deliver her present. So I found the episode on the Miraculous Ladybug YouTube channel and made notes on when events occurred by pausing and writing down the timestamps. There may be a second or two difference as I paused manually on my phone but I hole my point stands regardless.

2:38 - Ladybug enters Adrien's room and admires the trophies, foosball table, video games, desk, then lays on his bed.

2:56 - Cuts to Adrien arriving home after winning a fencing tournament (I forgot this part of the episode existed)

3:14 - Cuts back to Ladybug sniffing Adrien's pillow. I thought it went from her laying on the bed straight to the pillow but having the Adrien section makes the whiplash even worse.

3:20 - Ladybug puts the present on the bed and goes to leave.

3:23 - She remembers she forgot to sign the gift.

3:27 - Ladybug begins signing the gift.

3:34 - Ladybug leaves through the window as Adrien opens the door and sees her leave.

The scene is 56 seconds long, which is how long Ladybug was in Adrien's room. Let's be generous and say the Adrien segment happened simultaneously, so 56 seconds becomes 38 seconds. Of those 38 seconds, 18 of them were dedicated to Ladybug meandering around Adrien's things. If Ladybug hadn't acted like a creepy fangirl and just signed and left the gift, she could've left without anyone ever knowing she'd been in Adrien's room.

The entirety of Cat Blanc happened because Ladybug chose to ogle at her classmate's room that she'd been in multiple times before.

I'm most likely stabbing at an old wound, but I'm pretty sure this was the breaking point for a lot of people regarding Marinette's character as a whole due to her actions in this episode.

Marinette has great friends but they often encourage her stalker behavior and are too willing to be apart of or even come up with plans, like in Gigantitan and Backwarder. Though in Backwader they didn't go through with it, their first thought when hearing Adrien and Kagami going on a trip was to come up with plans to stop them. They obviously mean well and want to support her but take things a bit far. So, i wrote this in the context of them meaning well and wanting to support her but unknowingly took things too far

Line Divider

Rachel and Adrien have been friends for a long time and sometimes modeled together. When she had called telling him that she would be going to his school he was excited. For the first week she stuck close by him since she didn't know anyone else. She got along great with the class and the girls were fun to hang out with

The second week she branched out a bit more and made friends with people outside of the class. She still stuck by Adrien because she was still a little shy but he was glad that she was making new friends. At the same time Marinette was not having a great time. When Rachel first came she didn't think anything of it until she saw how close her and Adrien were. The girls reassured her that it was fine and that she was a sweet person. Still, Marinette couldn't help but spiral, they modeled together and she was also famous. She thought of this leading to her getting Gabriel's approval and them getting married

Then a picture came out of Adrien and Rachel together at a cafe. Marinette immediately called the girls over to her house to show them. The girls saw that Marinette was miserable over the picture. They felt bad for telling her that she had nothing to worry about now seeing the picture, but at the time they really didn't think Rachel had a crush on Adrien. The girls wanted to comfort her and fix this so they came up with a plan. What the girls didn't know was that the picture attached to the article said nothing about them being a couple. In fact it was about the cafe they frequently visited stating that it was the new popular place to go

When school came the next day Rachel was surprised to find her classmates ignoring her. Even Rose and Juleka ignored her when she greeted them. The guys also ignored her when she tried to talk to them. Adrien was just as confused as she was. He tried talking to Nino but he never got a straight answer before he made an excuse to leave. Through out the entire week the class ignored her and stopped inviting her to things. Thankfully, she wasn't alone since she made friends outside of the class but it still hurt because she didn't know what she did wrong. Rachel had told Adrien that she was going to transfer classes. He was upset but he understood, he was distancing himself from the class and hung out with other friends. He no longer went out when they invited him, the one time he did he saw that Rachel wasn't there and they gave an excuse that she couldn't make it. He may be oblivious sometimes but he knew that they didn't invite her

It wasn't until one of the girls overheard Adrien teasing Rachel about her and her boyfriend that they realized they made a mistake. The girls met up talking about what they overheard. They were confused since the article pictured them together on a date, but looking up and reading the article they realized that it had nothing to do with them as a couple. Looking up Rachel, they see that she's been in a relationship for years with her actor boyfriend. After talking with the rest of the class they decided they needed to apologize. Meeting up with Adrien and Rachel they apologized and confessed they misunderstood and thought she and Adrien were dating. Adrien and Rachel were baffled, why did them thinking they were dating make them ignore her. Adrien was confused, they did this because they thought they were dating and now he can't help but think that the same thing will happen when he does get a girlfriend. Rachel didn't want anything to do with this anymore. She was hurt and confused but more importantly she just wanted to move on

In the end, Rachel had thanked them for apologizing but she wasn't comfortable being friends with them anymore. Word spread quickly around school about the reason why they were ignoring Rachel, and because Marinette's crush on Adrien was well known in school it wasn't hard to figure out why they did this. A lot of people looked at them weirdly, it was one thing to want to support your friend but instead of comforting Marinette and helping her move on, the first thing they came up with was to stop being friends with Rachel. Even if they were dating what were they hoping to accomplish by excluding her, for her and Adrien to suddenly to break up so they can all go back to being friends. The whole situation was confusing, they meant well and were trying to support their friend but went about it the wrong way

What is a character's core?

I've used this term and variants of it in a few of my posts and I wanted to take a quick moment to define it because I'm not sure how commonly discussed this topic is, but it's an important one to keep in mind when evaluating and writing certain types of media.

Most genres of fiction make use of standard character roles/tropes. The plucky sidekick, the dastardly villain, the last girl, and so on. This isn't a bad thing. The existence of this stuff is a big part of how we define genres and how we evaluate writing quality. For example, if you're writing a romance, you're going to have romantic leads. Two (or more) individuals who will be together by the end of the story. If these roles don't exist, then you don't have a romance. And if their relationship feels toxic and unhealthy? You may not have a romance. Or, at least, not a classic romance. The worse the relationship is, the more you wander into the genre of "dark romance," which is all about enjoying deeply unhealthy fictional relationships.

This brings us to Miraculous and why I feel comfortable defending Adrien and Marinette as victims of bad writing.

Unless the writers are doing something truly insane, the love square is our end game couple. The ones destined for a happily ever after. That means that everything the writers do with these two and their relationship can be evaluated through the lens of, "are you honoring the characters' roles as the romantic leads?" And if the answer is, "No?" Then the writers are failing because "romantic lead" is a defining aspect of these characters. It isn't what they should be, it's what they are. Anything that goes against them being a good couple is bad writing.

This doesn't mean that they must be perfect. They're allowed to make mistakes and have flaws. Those are the sorts of things that drive a story! But the mistakes and flaws have to be treated as such by the narrative, they have to have some sort of resolution, and they have to be maintained in balance with the whole "love interest" thing. Too many mistakes and flaws and we've gone from "romance" to "tragedy," which is what I'd currently define Miraculous as.

This role evaluation thing isn't limited to romantic leads. Any character that has a clear role in the story can be evaluated via this criteria. For example, Alya is clearly meant to be a good best friend and reliable confidant for Marinette. You can tell this because of things like her learning Marinette's identity and her helping Marinette discover the secrets of the miraculous, big story moment that are treated as positives by the narrative. So anything Alya does that makes her feel like a bad friend is bad writing. It's why I get the Alya salt, but don't participate because I can't view her as the awful person the Lila stuff makes her out to be. That's not who Alya is narratively speaking.

Generally speaking, this core/role thing is my main way of evaluating characters in genre content like Miraculous. It's the driving force behind most of the character discussion on this blog and something I strongly encourage people to think about if they enjoy reading/writing genre content as it's a great guideline! Figure out the role a character is supposed to be in, generally honor that role, and you're golden! You have room for flaws and conflicts while still having something to keep you in check from straying too far off course.

In Defense of Marinette

I like Marinette. While there are many valid criticisms of her writing, the same can be said for literally every other character and she's actually doing pretty well given that she's the main character. After all, in a show where consistent characterization is an ongoing issue, the one with the most screen time will probably be the one who's the biggest victim of the issue.

This is heavily exacerbated by the rule that supposedly governs Miraculous. Namely that, in each story, Marinette must make a mistake. Or, at least, so says the head writer:

I really do not care what this guy says on Twitter or anywhere else. I only care about what's in the show because, if you have to go outside the text to understand the text, then you have no idea how to tell a good story.

However, unlike many of the tweets that I've seen, this one isn't some BS bit of lore. It's a writing rule and it has substantial backing in the text. It's extremely rare to have an episode where Marinette comes out smelling like roses and that's a problem because Miraculous has over 100 episodes. In other words, to follow this rule, the writers have to come up with over 100 ways for Marinette to be wrong so of course she's going to come across poorly. Why would you do this to your main character?

It's extremely common for kids shows to have a "lesson of the day" element to them. Someone always needs to learn something, but I've never seen a show misunderstand the assignment so badly. Learning a lesson is not the same as doing something wrong.

It's been a while since I watched the 2010 version of My Little Pony, but it really leaned into that whole "lesson of the day" thing and it actually knew what it was doing, so I'm going to talk about it briefly to discuss things that Miraculous should have done.

The first thing to note is that MLP had an unambiguous main character - Twilight Sparkle - but Twilight was not the one who learned all of the lessons. She had a pet dragon and a crew of five friends who would, occasionally, be the ones to learn the lesson because there were lots of lessons that simply didn't fit Twilight's character. Instead of warping Twilight to make the idea work (cough cough Ikari Gozen cough), the writers just let someone else have the spotlight for a bit.

This is an excellent way to build out your cast and Miraculous had plenty of opportunities to do it. For example, Lila should not have been Marinette's issue. The fact that Lila hates Marinette could have certainly stuck around, but the one who takes her down and learns to investigate her sources? That should have been Alya. A liar is the perfect enemy for an investigative journalist, but a poor enemy for someone who shines as a battlefield commander and overthinks when she's given too much time.

Another way that MLP would teach lessons was to have someone other than Twilight or the main crew cause the issue that they then had to deal with. This leads to one of the best moments in children's television:

And, frankly? Marinette deserves a moment like this. That poor girl has been through hell and is never allowed to make the right call when it really matters. The show will even completely rewrite its lore to make her fail (see: Strike Back). That is such an awful thing to do to your lead! Shows about female empowerment should include women feeling powerful and, no, Lila and Chloe don't count!

Also, the show is literally about Gabriel taking advantage of people who are upset. You don't need to have Marinette make a mistake to shoehorn in a life lesson. Akumas are life lesson fodder and season 1 actually seemed to get this. I'm not sure why they switched gears to "Marinette is the star and, therefore, must always be wrong."

The final way that MLP taught lessons was to have Twilight do something wrong because having your main character do something wrong is a totally valid way to teach lessons. It just shouldn't be your only way because you know who is always wrong in children's media?

Villains.

They wrote Marinette like a villain.

And a large part of the fandom hates her for it because of course they do.

You're not supposed to like villains.

I'm sorry, but the fact that Chat Noir's new power is so convenient that Marinette doesn't face the consequences of hiding a terrorist's identity from her own teammates because they MIGHT tell Adrien is the stupidest argument this series has ever presented

And they created the Magical Charms.

I've said a thousand times that the justification for not telling Adrien anything being "we have to protect him, he can't suffer," is horrible, and I disagree. As Alya said in the last episode, no one can decide for Adrien whether he knows or not.

Taking care of him shouldn't be an excuse to lie to him, or to anyone else.

Adrien more than anyone deserves to know who his dad was and the things he did and why. He deserves to grieve for him and hate him if he wants to. Not telling anything is keeping Adrien in a bubble, a little glass box where he's safe.

Ladybug should have told him that Gabriel was Monarch immediately after the fight ended. She doesn't know that Adrien is Chat Noir, so she doesn't know there's a risk of the world ending because Chat went crazy and used his power.

She had the Miraculous at that time, so the only risk Adrien ran by telling him the truth was crying his eyes out. PLUS, he wasn't at risk of being akumatized because Gabriel was dead and Ladybug was there.

She didn't even have to make the information public; she just had to tell Adrien.

So no, I don't believe there was no option but to not tell him anything.

And I'm a little tired of people justifying all this by saying "Marinette is only 14, she's a child."

I get it, but there's a chapter where they tell you that Ladybug is already mature enough to be considered AN ADULT and use her powers infinitely. Even though Mari is 14, she's been Ladybug for about a year, where she's seen more than one loved one die, fought terrorists, adult supervillains, and even faced Su Han and the heroes of New York as an ADULT. Why is it that when it comes to taking responsibility (and almost always around Adrien), she's "just a child"?

But back to the last episode: Giving Chat Noir the power to erase memories is stupidly convenient for the plot. Marinette is safe from facing the consequences for lying and can continue being Alya's best friend and Adrien's perfect girlfriend without any problems because then if it happens again, she'll just find Chat and ask him to erase their memories again because "they know a secret that I can't tell you what it is, but it's bad and they have to forget it."

Only Mari doesn't know that Chat is Adrien, and that's another big problem. Marinette doesn't want to know Chat's identity, so she can't trust him with things because "maybe he knows Adrien and can tell him" is stupidly convenient and only makes me think that Marinette really doesn't trust Chat enough to tell him who the villain they've been fighting since day one is.

At this point, I really can't blame Lila for hating Marinette (look what you've turned me into, writers!) Marinette is really annoying, especially when it has to do with Adrien.

Sometimes I feel like Marinette sees Adrien more as a trophy, something perfect she wants, and not the guy behind it all. But that's the fault of the writers and their annoying need to make Adrien perfect and devoid of personality throughout the seasons. Not even Chat Noir can get a power upgrade on his own; it's Ladybug who has to tell Chat what to do.

And then the episode tries to teach you that erasing Alya's memory is actually giving Marinette the freedom to choose when to tell the truth.

FREEDOM FOR MARINETTE. But never for Adrien to feel ANYTHING.

I'm going to really enjoy it when Lila decides to really attack, even if it only lasts 10 seconds until everyone forgives Marinette for lying and Adrien just says "I love you even though we've been dating for months and you lied to me and hid sensitive information about my family. It must have been really hard for you to hide that my dead dad was the man who psychologically tortured all of Paris and even me, just because he wanted to revive my dead mom who had been hiding in the basement of my house for a year. Do you want to go to the movies tomorrow?"

And I can almost bet that Chat Noir's new power will be used to get Marinette's memories back if she gives up being a guardian, in a very convoluted way typical of the show.

Like: "The akuma caused Marinette to have to give up the box and lose her memories. If we use the Chat Noir Miraculous, we can erase the consequences of the akuma and Marinette will get her memories back."

Or much worse.

Paris found out that Ladybug lied and they hate her. We're going to use the Chat Noir Miraculous to erase their memories so they won't mistreat her anymore :D yeii freedom

"LET ME AT HIM,'' Jason screams, held back by the batfamily, Clark, Alfred, and Batcow

Okay, but what if Danny, in an effort to be less of a liar and more of a cheater, learned sleight of hand and magic and lock picking?

What if, as he gets older and the need to explain how he got in somewhere, or how he got something, or how he got out of something gets to be so abysmally frequent that he just decides: fuck it. I’m gonna be that guy. You know, that guy that just Knows Weird Shit. That guy that just Does Things because he’s a little feral.  

Instead of risking his identity and/or getting shot at as Phantom he just...becomes the delinquent that breaks into random places just to see if he could. Just ‘cause he’s bored. If they coincide with Phantom’s activities? Well. Phantom’s a cool guy. Maybe he’s got taste. 

He’ll break out some card tricks, do a little invisibility, make a little telekinesis happen--just cool little party tricks in the middle of the day. Break into locked closets just to ditch class purely because “fiddling with his magic tricks is better than class” (and totally not because he’s out there fighting ghosts, no sirree). 

Practices incessantly during lunch hours. Starts trying to break out of handcuffs in math class. A little bit of a routine with escape artist tricks applied liberally to get out of English class. Tries to see if a teacher can catch him in the act. (They never can, and it only takes a couple months for it to be purely on his skill, and not with a little help from his powers).

Loudly proclaims he’s trying to hunt Phantom, but not to “rip him apart,” just to hang because Danny thinks he’s really neat. 

Imagine that being Danny’s best fucking cover, cause at this point, whose gonna question why Danny is standing right where Phantom just disappeared to? Danny probably broke in just to stalk the poor ghost. Jesus. He’s been in weirder places for weirder reasons. He once pulled a rabbit out of some kid’s ear. His reason? 

“I just thought the coin trick was so dull. Plus, you know, bunny ears? ...No? Too much of a stretch? Yeah I thought so too. Oh, well. Back to the drawing board I guess.”

now that i’m free to yap about 1-800-GOTHAM without my a/ns being ridiculously long, deep dive into why i wrote things the way i did! if people want, i can go even more in depth, but for now, a quick paragraph for each reblog.

first, scarecrow. i did my hardest to make him real scary and intimidating but almost in a clinical fashion, mainly since he's a psychologist. i know he typically targets specific fears someone might have, but let's just say he was going for a mass fear control situation. everyone is scared of suffocating, anyways.

i also had him purposely not use his fear toxin because i think it's not the most important part of his character. he's a psychologist, he's a genius of fear, and he's very intelligent. scarecrow is also my favourite rogue and it sucks to see him always sidelined, his fear gas being the only thing used. he's SCARY. i hope i did him justice.

*snicker* For some reason, my brain came up with an AU of an AU - the Athenide AU, in this instance. Mainly, about what would happen if in a Percy/Lesterpollo 'verse, after they've - well, it's not a happy ending because nothing ever ends, but they've fought their wars and paid their prices and got together and /were/ happy - what would happen if both Percy AND post-Lester Apollo were sent back in time? (There's a newborn goddess rising from a fountain, and a sun god watching her in hideously confused surprise.)

okay but Perse and Lesterpollo have their memories right?

Apollo going before both Athena and Poseidon for Perse’s hand.

Perse asking them to allow the marriage.

Perpollo get their marriage and happiness and the famous children end up being Perse’s anyway: Asclepius, Troilus, etc…

this universe is happy

mmmmmm fish and chips….

[ HOSPITAL ]

Now. You might be wondering why on earth my first thought was that I was a reincarnate rather than—well rather than something normal like coming out of a coma or being miraculously saved at a hospital. 

(Miraculously—heh. You’ll get that joke soon enough). 

But let’s review the facts, shall we? 

Firstly, I got stabbed and bled out. I felt myself die. It was horrible, and agonizing, and quite frankly horrifying, but there’s no mistaking that sensation. Nothing else would compare, and I knew that I’d carry that feeling for the rest of my life. (Would that be the appropriate term, if the way I was alive counted for anything? The rest of my existence, maybe?)

Secondly, I woke up somewhere cold and unfamiliar. Not in an ambulance, not in a hospital bed, but rather with the strangest bone-deep conviction that I was somewhere warm and all-encompassing and suddenly wasn’t. This confused me the most, because­­—as I said—there was no possible way for me to have survived in any normal sense. It would take a miracle and a half, and evidently that hadn’t come up if the way I was carried around in the arms of strangers as though I weighed nothing had anything to say about this absurd situation.

And thirdly. This was the most damning part of it all: the last words I’d heard before I’d fallen asleep.

“Félicitations, c'est une fille!”

With my limited high-school French, even I could understand this.

Congratulations—it’s a girl!

So, with all these clues, with everything adding up the way it did, is it even a mystery that my first thought was reincarnation?

***

When I wake up from my impromptu nap, it’s to warmth. Cosy, pleasant warmth, the kind that makes you want to burrow further under your covers and maybe kick your feet due to the sheer contentment you feel, and drift lazily to sleep.

I was set on doing that—determined, even, to push away all thoughts of the sheer magnitude of this situation, and the absurdity of it—but my stomach decides that it’s going to rebel and make me aware of the fact that I was starving. The sensation is overwhelming, my tiny body wracked with hunger that felt devastating, and I do the only thing that this tiny body is capable of doing. I scream. I cry.

This is vastly different from my last outburst. That was the confused, panicked wail of an adult-turned-baby, and with the confusion and overstimulation and bright lights and cold and the smell of hospital disinfectant and being wet and slimy and being slapped on my rear­—

Yeah, there was nothing left for me to do except scream; no recourse available apart from distress that was devastating in its intensity.

This cry of mine is instinctual. It’s what this body decides to do, and before I’m even aware of it, I’m doing it again. Louder, even, as though my mouth and lungs have remembered what to do and are compensating for the initial delay. My limbs are trapped in fabric, and before I can panic at that, I’m lifted. Cradled.

My eyes are closed, squinted, and I’m sure that even if I could open them, I wouldn’t be able to see anything. But my ears don’t have that problem, and I can hear a soft voice murmuring in that same musical language—which I can now tentatively identify as French­—and I can hear the snap of something, a strap loosening and then—

Oh.

Oh.

Warmth. A new kind of warmth. It’s sweet, and rich, and flows down my throat like I’m starving. (As an aside, this was my first taste of food in this new life, no matter the source. No wonder I felt euphoric, almost drunk on finally filling my stomach, when this tiny body had never even felt so much as a hunger pang before).

I don’t think; I just act, latching onto the offered source of food and drinking as though my life depends on it. It’s humiliating. It’s weird. It’s something that I adamantly don’t want to think about, my mind shying away from exactly where I’m greedily guzzling from.

The voice above me hums softly. It’s a lullaby I don’t recognise, and it sounds soothing. My eyelids droop, a deep satisfied sleepiness creeping in again. This body betrays me by falling asleep, and honestly? I don’t fight it. I don’t want to think about what happened. I don’t want to process all that’s happened. Not now. Not yet. 

I sleep.

[PREV] [MASTERPOST] [NEXT]

***

FIND THE REST HERE:

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64262899/chapters/164948017#workskin

[ 0 ]

I blink.

I breathe.

I scream.

***

It is an oddly peculiar feeling to not only see the life leaving you (as evidenced by all the blood pooling around me), but to also feel your heart pumping sluggishly as though it’s trying to make up for all the blood haemorrhaging out of you but not being able to do anything about it.

Case in point—me.

I—well, there’s nothing to say about me. Or well, the me before me.

Fuck, I’m making such a mess of this. I’m aware that I’m not making a lot of sense, but I promise you I will in due time.

So. Back to the point. Me—haemorrhaging. It really was a stupid reason.

See, I’d had an argument with my mother. Something stupid, I don’t remember. Anyway, I decided to say, ‘fuck it’ and wander around a part of town she never let me go by myself.

And then I got myself stabbed. Yeahhhh, I think I can see why she hated me going out to that particular part of town by myself. Goddamn it.

***

The next thing I was aware of was cold. Not the darkness I anticipated. Not Heaven (or Hell). But cold.

Clinical cold. Hospital cold.

I don’t know why it shocks me, except that I’m quite sure I was somewhere warm before I was expelled out here. Which doesn’t really make sense considering the fact that I was dying out in the cold and one of my last memories before I arrived here (wherever the fuck here is) was my hands going numb out of sheer coldness.

Before I can ruminate on that thought, and why I’m quite certain that I was cocooned somewhere warm and dark—

Someone slaps me­­—slaps me somewhere unmentionable.

I blink.

I breathe.

I scream.

***

I hear voices. It all sounds foreign­­—musical, almost, and I can’t understand a single word. It sounds like I’m underwater, and like my ears are filled with water, and quite frankly: like I don’t know what’s going on.

I’m freezing. I’m wet­­—or well, I’m not wet but rather am covered in something that I’m trying my hardest not to think about.

I’m moved from person to person, and the fact that I can be carried like this, as though I was not a full-grown adult, but something in need of protection, as though I was something frail made me scream harder.

I’m sponged down, no longer as sticky and feeling a great deal warmer than I was moments ago. It occurs to me then that I was naked. No wonder I was cold.

I feel indignant. Scared. Overwhelmed.

Really, all I want to do is go to sleep, and figure out what the actual fuck is happening later, once the confusion and tiredness and overstimulation ends.

So that’s what I decide to do. My screams (my cries) peter out until I’m almost hiccoughing, and I’m finally bought to rest on someone’s arms, and bought up to their chest.

It soothes me almost instantly, and at this point I can’t be bothered to figure out why.

The last thing I hear before I finally sleep is, “Félicitations, c'est une fille!”

My last thoughts are ‘Am I a fucking reincarnate?’

[PREV] [MASTERPOST] [NEXT]

New chapter posted!

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64262899/chapters/165583069#workskin

NEW FIC DROPPED!

SUMMARY: A girl from our world transmigrates into Miraculous Ladybug, and finds herself reborn as Celeste Grahms—someone who never existed in the show. Finding herself heiress to a global empire, and with a completley different script, Celeste finds that she isn't interested in playing by the canon rules. Why settle for the sidelines when she can find herself the main chacracter?

The original plot? Doesn’t matter. She didn’t ask for this, so why follow the script everyone else is bound to? With a darker Paris, a more ruthless Hawkmoth and her least favourite character standing in her way, she can be sure of only one thing in this new life of hers—Celeste Grahms refuses to be anyone’s pawn, when she can become the queen.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64262899/chapters/164948017

the third best is both. i.e what i’m doing rn.

the best fanfic is the one the author had fun writing actually.

Reblog to make it die faster

You know the Grimm version of Snow White makes more sense than most versions if only because in that version Snow White was like 7 years old.

sometimes i love how funny i am

go check it out!!!

Rereading Harry Potter trying to figure out what makes him special. Is he charismatic? Kind? Perceptive? Is he a talented leader, is he smarter than he looks, is he a gifted ——? Nothing’s catching so far, which is a problem if I’m gonna write anything respecting him, his attitude, and his status as the Chosen One.

Any input, guys?

which one of u was going to tell me that tea tastes different if u put it in hot water?

I remember when I first found out the truth about “Somali pirates” I got chills because of how horrific the truth was and how insanely creepily well the media had twisted the situation. Every single fucking article making it seem like these “pirates” were just after money or something holding innocent people hostage and I never gave it a second thought, why would I? There was no indication that people were trying to legitimately fight off disgusting imperialism that left nuclear waste in their waters, that over 300 people have died from radiation sickness, that Europeans have been stealing Somalia’s seafood because they overfished their own waters and the indigenous fisherman are starving and so these “pirates” emerged to deal with those stealing their country’s natural resources. The truth is enough to make anyone sick to their stomachs.

New chapter posted!

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64262899/chapters/165170563

NEW FIC DROPPED!

SUMMARY: A girl from our world transmigrates into Miraculous Ladybug, and finds herself reborn as Celeste Grahms—someone who never existed in the show. Finding herself heiress to a global empire, and with a completley different script, Celeste finds that she isn't interested in playing by the canon rules. Why settle for the sidelines when she can find herself the main chacracter?

The original plot? Doesn’t matter. She didn’t ask for this, so why follow the script everyone else is bound to? With a darker Paris, a more ruthless Hawkmoth and her least favourite character standing in her way, she can be sure of only one thing in this new life of hers—Celeste Grahms refuses to be anyone’s pawn, when she can become the queen.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64262899/chapters/164948017

I wanna post my fic… but the time zones THE FUCKING TIME ZONES

INTRODUCTION AND MASTERPOST

Hi! I'm Mae, a long-time lurker, and occasional poster. I mainly post in the DPXDC community, but am active in the DCU, DP, Spider-Man, Miraculous Ladybug, Percy Jackson, Epic the Musical and Harry Potter fandoms (as well as some more that I'm pretty sure I forgot).

I have a discord server for my fics, and you can find that here!

Anyway, I'm also a freelance writer, who's commissions are usually open. My carrd usually has all of my stuff, including my socials, prices, how to commission and more.

ANWAY, onto to the Masterpost!

[MULTIPOSTS]

[Phantom & Fent—wait, that's a Wayne!]

[Kingmaker]

[ONE SHOTS]

[A haunting image]

[Jazz & Darkseid]

[Billy telling the truth]

[It's a nice day]

[PROMPTS]

[Maddie & Talia]

[Historical DP, Modern DC]

Mae's Writing

Mae's Writing

A freelance writer of over 2 years. Thank you for looking around!

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i need Dr. House to be Batman's temporary doctor for a month while Dr. Leslie Tompkins is recovering from some sort of rogue activity.

i think before you marry someone, you should sit down and go through the AITA subreddit with them and see what their take on those situations is