Chapter Text
Finally, the question Jason had been dying to ask slipped from his tongue. "So...how are you planning on getting those sais home?"
"I have my ways," Marinette winked.
"How ambiguous."
"Gotta earn your information. Just because we're soulmates doesn't mean we're entitled to each other's deepest darkest secrets right away."
"I heartily agree with that," he nodded.
Marinette looked up from the sketchbook she was drawing his jacket design in. "Oh? Got something to hide, yourself?"
"Maybe," Jason smirked.
"I like a boy with a bit of mystery around him." She turned back to her drawing. "You said black and white cuffs?"
After eating supper (Chinese takeout) with the MPS, those not staying in Marinette and Chloe's room left to pack up and sleep before they were up far too early to head to the airport. Chloe kicked Jason and Marinette out to the balcony so she could pack up in peace, leaving the two alone to talk and enjoy the twilight.
"Are you going to sleep tonight?"
"No, I'll sleep on the plane. I'll just journal or something until we have to leave."
"Pulling an all-nighter on top of jet lag will be rough for you once you're home," Jason noted.
Mari shrugged. "I'll be fine. I haven't slept much in ages."
"You sound like my brother. He survives off of energy drinks and spite."
"He sounds like a great guy."
Jason snorted. "He's...not bad. One of us is probably going to Jump around them. Or your parents. My family's a bit crazy...and suspicious of new people."
"You're saying you'd like to keep it a secret for now?"
He looked over at her. "You're very intuitive."
She chuckled dryly. "I prefer 'creative' or 'lucky', but I guess 'intuitive' works."
At midnight, Jason finally left, swinging his legs over the balcony railing. "I'll just scale the walls. No point waking up Chloe if I don't have to." Marinette deserved to know he had secrets too.
She smiled and waved as he made his way down the exterior of the hotel, not ruffled in the least at his unconventional descent.
Both times Red Hood swung by the building that night, he saw Marinette on the balcony, drawing in her sketchbook and gazing up at the faint stars above her.
After texting Jason that she'd arrived home safely, Marinette crashed and slept for ten hours, finally waking up mid-afternoon. She filled in her parents on the trip, then told them all about her soulmate. Kagami and Luka came over to catch up with the rest of MPS, who'd come over to add their two cents' worth of perspective on the situation.
"I can feel the bond growing or strengthening as I spend more time with him." Closing her eyes, Marinette felt for her bond, tugging experimentally on it. It felt a little weird. almost like it was stretched too far, then suddenly, Jason's presence was directly in front of her.
"Uh, Sunshine? Did you bring me here?"
"Oops." Mari took in the circle of friends and family watching them with undisguised interest. "I wasn't intending to, I just wanted to feel you and our bond."
"Well, I'm glad you did," Jason smiled.
Tom and Sabine insisted Jason stay for dinner, he insisted on helping them prepare it, and MPS insisted Marinette join them in her room for a quick consult while the other three cooked.
Shutting the door behind her, Mari faced her friends and allies. "What's up?"
"How are you getting Jason home, Mari?"
She glanced around at their concerned faces. "I...was thinking of using Kaalki."
"This soon?" Kagami questioned. "You've only known him for a weekend."
"I know, I know. I'm not 100% sure that it's the right thing to do, but I've got to get him home somehow; buying a plane ticket every time one of us Jumps is not going to be feasible long-term. But he's my soulmate, which means he's been deemed my perfectly complementary companion. It's extremely rare for soulmates to do anything that endangers their bonded. I think it should be safe. Besides, Tikki is sure that this relationship will be good luck to us both."
"Are you going to tell him everything right away, then?" Adrien asked.
"No, absolutely not. Not even that I'm Ladybug. I plan to start with the fact that I'm close with her, which is a relatively common fact around here, and that I used to be Multimouse, so she trusted me with the Transportation Miraculous temporarily, until I get my soulbond figured out."
The group nodded. "That's a good plan to start with."
"I will let you all tell him your roles when you are comfortable with it. I won't unmask you before you're ready. Just because we're soulmates doesn't mean we won't have any boundaries, you know," Marinette mentioned to settle their minds.
After dinner, Marinette brought Jason up to her room.
"What's with the need for privacy?" he wiggled his eyebrows teasingly.
"I thought you'd like to know I have a way to get you back home."
"Oh?"
"I have to ask you first, can you keep a secret? Not like what someone got for someone else as a birthday gift, but something important. Possibly dangerous."
"I have experience keeping difficult secrets like that," he confirmed seriously.
"Do you promise to keep whatever I am about to show-slash-tell you a secret from anyone else?"
"I promise."
"Good," Mari smiled, pulling a pair of glasses out of her pockets. "How much do you know about the Miraculous: Paris Squadron?"
"Er...I looked up the basics of it. There was a magical supervillain and a team of magical girl superheroes who fought against his mind-controlled minions. His name was...Bird-moth? No, Hawkmoth. But it's been over a year since he was taken down."
"Right. There were a bunch of temporary heroes who helped out the core team, and I was one of them. Multimouse. Ladybug, one of the main heroes, became friends with me, so I contacted her when we met and asked for her help. She's agreed to temporarily lend me the Miraculous of Transportation until we get the bond figured out, so we don't waste time and money flying back and forth every time one of us Jumps.
"Kaalki, Full Gallop."
A bright purple light enveloped the room, and when Jason's eyes adjusted, he saw Marinette in a formal dressage outfit, purple glasses on her eyes.
"With this, I can create a portal to anywhere in the world. So, where were you when I yeeted you to me?"
"My apartment, Gotham."
"Voyage!" Marinette dragged Jason through the portal to his apartment. "Okay, we've got a bit of privacy now. By the way, I can only portal to some place I've been or seen before, so out return options are going to be limited if we head to Gotham." She cocked her head at him, crossing her arms and scanning his relaxed posture. "You're weirdly calm about this, you know."
"Sadly, that's not even close to the weirdest thing I've seen this month. Perks of living in Gotham," he shrugged. "Do you want some water or something?"
"I'm good, thank you. Sorry about dragging you to Paris, I really wasn't meaning to. I hope I didn't interrupt something important."
"It's okay. I was curious what was going to happen when I felt you tugging on the bond. Do you think that we'd be able to control it? Or maybe use it to communicate?"
They faced each other across the room and took turns experimenting. Eventually, they figured out a system and made a basic list of important signals to communicate.
Two long tugs: Can I come/can you come?
Long/Short: No
Short/Long/Short/Long: Yes
Short/Long/Short/Short/Short: Later/I'll contact you
Short/Short: Emergency/Pull me quickly
Short/Short/Short: Emergency/Come quickly
Signals figured out, Marinette reluctantly stepped back from a final practice Jump. "I should get back to Paris. Thank you for not freaking out and being so understanding about the whole situation. I know magic isn't super popular around here."
"It's no problem. I'm not one of the people magic bothers. Have a good night, Sunshine!"
"You too! Kaalki, Voyage!"