Treehouse

Epilogue

She pulled away from his lips, looking in the direction of the akuma. She sighed heavily and got out of his lap, standing up and helping him up. "Alright, fine, we're stopping," she muttered, rolling her eyes as she pressed one last peck on his lips. "I love you, wolfie."
He clicked his tongue, whether irritation because of the akuma's timing or her nickname for him, he'll never know. "I may love you too if you didn't call me that so much," he muttered, calling on his transformation.
She chuckled and transformed as well, arching her eyebrows at him. "Don't be a baby. It's endearing, love," she said, ruffling his currently curly and untamed hair - at her request, that is.
He raised an eyebrow, looked at her, a smirk tugging at his lips. His irritation never really lasted long, had it ever been there at all. "You calling me wolfie or me being a baby?" He grinned, wrapped her arm around his waist.
She glanced up to him and rolled her eyes. "Wolfie," she answered, and then proceeded to hip-bump him before yo-yoing off. "Catch me if you can!!" she called with a smirk before going off to fight said akuma.
He gasped, he expected to hitch a ride with her. On her. By her? He shook his head, scoffed disbelievingly before he leapt off and away from the balcony. "Don't you know better than to ask a canine to play fetch?" He called, running after her on the rooftops.
She gasped, looking behind her and seeing he was catching up to her, and then laughed and tried to go faster. After all, they had to save Paris. But it seemed as if a few other heroes had beaten them to it, including Rena Rouge, Chat Noir, and Carapace- they all knew that if Ladybug and Timberwolf weren't at the site first thing, they were probably already together and may not show up until the end.
He laughed, went faster on his heels to chase her. They'd probably wandered off the shortest route to the akuma site already, and it was probably really irresponsible to brush it off since the others are already handling it, but they were young and they were in love. Soon enough, he caught up to her, even went faster so that he could interject her mid-trajectory, catch her in his arms. He grinned wolfishly. "Hey, buginette."
She looked up at him and giggled, trying to push him off. "Go away, we're supposed to be there by now!!"
she whined, although she was no match for his strength, even more magnified by the miraculous he wore. His power was literally power. She had nothing on him. Except her yo-yo, which she really could've hit him on the head with. But she didn't.
"I wasn't the one who set the route by being chased, no?" He laughed, rolled his eyes and he leaned his head to the side, motioned for her to look at their direction. The sounds of battle were definitely getting louder, the commotion drawing nearer. He looked back at her. "You ready to fight, Ladybug?"
She frowned a little and sighed. "Yeah, okay, whatever," she teased, muttering as she pushed him off, scrambling to her feet. The two made their way to the scene of the akuma, together as they always did, and it was clear that as soon as they showed up, the fighting got a whole lot easier, what with Timberwolf being able to pause the villain while Ladybug and the others looked for the akumatized object, finding it, breaking it, and deevilising it. It was child's play, really.
As soon as the battle were over, the heroes had huddled up, pounded their fists together in another victory. "Where were the two of you for at least, like, ten minutes of the battle?" Chat questioned, shooting them a lighthearted dirty look.
Ladybug paused, looking like a deer caught in the headlights, and then pointed at Timberwolf, eyes wide. "He chased me down. Not my fault."
Timberwolf scoffed, nudged her arm. "You asked me to chase you," he turned to the rest of the team, "she asked me to chase her. I deserve more credit here, I was the one who brought her here."
Rena, who had basically already figured out Timberwolf's identity from comparing the actions of him and Ladybug and Felix and Marinette, crossed her arms, arching an eyebrow. "Mhm. You were also probably the reason she came late," she snickered.
He only rolled his eyes, shrugging. "I will not talk unless my lawyer is here," he chuckled and both his and Ladybug's miraculous beeped, signalling less than three minutes left.
She hissed at the sound and sighed, shaking her head. "Nice talking with you all!! We have to go though. Bye!!" she said, waving to the rest of the team before wrapping an arm around Timberwolf's waist, yo-yoing off with him. Once they were out of sight, she put him down on the roof of a tall building, calling off her transformation, and sat there, looking at the sunset in awe.
He didn't take his seat immediately. He stood pretty close behind her, watchingly. Stunned would be the perfect word for it, as he looked at the silhouette of her back, against the setting sun. Red and orange painted over her, the clothes she wore, colored her much like her superhero suit. And it awed him, how the same girl who had swung him over her shoulder once, sworn him off as her enemy, would be the same one he'd fallen in love with, in so many more ways that one? He took the spaced next to her, and he snuggled close. "It's beautiful," he whispered.
She looked at him and smiled a little, leaning her head on his and letting her eyes fall half closed. "It is, isn't it?" she whispered back, her arm around his waist and the other resting on his opposite shoulder. "You know, it sounds weird, but I used to be scared of sunsets."
He looked up at her, brows arched. Never failed to note that she really is beautiful with red. "Why would you be scared of sunsets?"
She sighed a little and then began. "With all the colors of red and orange and yellow and pink, all that I could think of was a fire. I always thought that every evening, when the sun went down, it would cause a fire somewhere, and someone would die. And that scared me for some reason. I didn't really understand what they were, it just made the clouds look like smoke, and I'd never seen anything like the red sky except at sunset. You can even ask Alya. If we were playing, I'd always go home right as soon as I saw the sun get low in the sky. And it kind of pissed her off," she chuckled. "But I felt this obligation to be near my family if it ever did happen, if there ever was a fire. There never was, obviously. But I feel the same with you," she said, turning to him with a soft smile. "It's you. You're my family. You're who I'd spend all my sunsets with, even if one day, it turns out that there actually is a fire in the sky. Especially if there is."
He bit his lip, tried to hide the blush that he was sure bloomed dark on his cheeks. He smiled widely, cupped her cheeks as he shifted so that he fully faced her. "I didn't know you've been a hero even before you became Ladybug." He tucked strands of her hair behind her ear, brushed her fringe away from her face. "Are you still afraid of them.. Or..?"
She chuckled softly, shaking her head. "I was no hero, just... just probably clingy to my parents. They've been there for me through everything, you know?" she explained, and then glanced at the sunsets. "And no, I'm not afraid anymore. When I learned that it was just how the sun looked when rising and setting, I settled down for the most part. Now they just remind me of my love for my family," she said, looking back at him and putting a hand over one of his that was on her cheek.
He shook his head. "Clingy or not, it didn't change the fact that you cared. And yes, maybe you were just scared, wanted them to protect you from the sky catching on fire. Sounds to me like it was the other way around though," he said and chuckled, turned his hand over so that he could intertwine his with hers. He looked at their hands. "My point is, you've always cared. For your family, friends, even people you didn't know. Hell, you're taking care of Paris. I love it so so so much about you." He squeezed her hand. "And since you've accepted me with open arms, called me family and... and loved me," he said the word in a whisper, as if taboo, but continued, "I want to take this time to promise that I'll at least do my part and take care of you. As cheesy as it sounds, I want to spend the rest of my life taking care of you. Will you let me?"
She bit back a smile and reached her other hand up to his hair, running her fingers through it, and nodding. "Of course I'll let you. I'll always let you take care of me. Unless you need taking care of. Then I'll make you let me take care of you," she smiled a little and pecked his lips softly.
He smiled and bit his lip, nodding. But he kind of looked hesitant for a little, looked out to the sunset as he took a deep breath. He turned back to her. "I mean it. I.. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I know we're like, sixteen, definitely has our whole life ahead of us but I... I want to write this.. This relationship in.. ink? If that makes sense?"
She looked at him bewildered for a second, unable to process words, process what he was saying. Was he asking her to marry him? Was he asking something else? Maybe she was over reading into this. "I..." she stammered. "What... what are you trying to ask me?"
"I'm not asking to- to marry you yet!" He immediately stammered, his red cheeks a testament to how much the thought flustered him. Marriage definitely wasn't soon. He cleared his throat, regained his composure. He fiddled with his fingers too. "I'm probably just being impractical and old fashioned, and maybe read too many books, but I don't want to date for the fun of it. Draw the conclusion to that statement yourself-"
A little smile tugged at her lips and she calmed herself down a bit. "So you're asking me if we can be serious? Not that we already are," she said, shrugged, and then smiled. "I'm fully committed to you, Felix. Believe it or not, I want the same things you do. I want a relationship where we aren't just together for some weird physical desire. I want love. Real, beautiful, Austen-type love," she smiled widely and then laughed softly. "So yeah. If you're asking me to consider us getting married in the future- the obviously distant future.... yeah. Okay."
He smiled bashfully, looked up at her through his mess of a fringe because he had let it grow out a little bit. Not her request, but he did like the shower of praises he got from his hair and figured there'd be more praises if there were more to praise. "You mean that?" He asked softly.
"Of course I mean it," she smiled, moving his fringe off his face and pressing a kiss on his forehead. "More than anything," she whispered against her kiss, and then pulled away and looked at him lovingly. "I told you thousands of times before, I trust you, with my heart, my soul, my everything. Felix," she paused and then cupped his cheeks, smiling at him. "I always have, and I always will believe in you."
He held the hands that cupped his cheeks, smiled widely. "I know. I know, so," he brought both her hands in front of him, kissed the back of them, once each. "I will do my best so that I will never break your trust. So that even if the world can't- won't believe you, you know that I will, I always will, and you in me." He turned his hands over so he could hold her hands. "Because I love you, Marinette. I really do."
"And I really love you too, Felix." She took his hands in hers and rubbed the side of his thumb with her own, meeting his eyes. He made her feel so comfortable, so happy, so amazing, and it had worked miracles for both of them. The months went by and Felix hadn't been portrayed as a liar anymore, Marinette neither. Their friends saw how genuine they were with each other, and Adrien, though regretfully at first, acknowledged that she and Felix were made for each other more than he was. Alya was actually able to talk to him, and surprisingly the two got along well. And like Marinette and Nino predicted, Felix ended up - first of all
being dragged to a babysitting job- being the one person who could get Chris to calm down during a tantrum. Not to mention, everything in Paris was calm
for awhile. Akumas weren't as frequent because the two would go out of their way to prevent people from being sad, mostly because they didn't want their alone time interrupted, and all in all- their relationship happening was just one key that fixed a lot of problems.
Ah, life really was such a playful thing. None of them really expected to be where they are now, nor were they prepared for it. But all of it was more than right. Things felt right, and they are right, because the both of them worked pretty hard to make it right and they were merely reaping what they have sown. Reflecting on it never failed to bring him to tears, now no different, and he pulled her closer, hugged her. Before anything else, they were friends. Buddies. They were partners.