Swiftember: I see right through me
Fandom: Miraculous Ladybug
AN: The first of several Taylor Swift-inspired fics I’ll be posting through September. A short peek into Chloé’s head post-Miraculer, because The Archer has screamed Chloé vibes at me since the second it came out and I’m annoyed with the lackluster way they’re handling her supposed redemption arc.
Hope you enjoy!
Can also be read here
“Easy they come, easy they go
I jump from the train, I ride off alone
I never grow up, it’s getting so old
Help me hold on to you.”
- “The Archer”, Taylor Swift
Whatever stilted apology Sabrina tried to voice didn't make it to Chloé's ears, consumed in watching Ladybug and the other heroes vault off into the distant rooftops as she was. The Miraculous cure had taken away all the aches and signs of her fight with Mayura, but she could still feel the phantom of the woman's grip on her wrists, the empty spot on her crown where a striped comb should lay.
It matched the emptiness in the air around her head, where Pollen should float in quiet contentment.
They crossed the threshold of her room, Chloé handing back the Ladybug costume and Sabrina, thankfully, taking it as the silent dismissal it was, murmuring that she would see her in the morning. An absent nod was her only answer, and with the click of the closing door Chloé was left to the buzzing in her brain, and a quiet that only added to the tension in her shoulders.
Tension that was only growing the longer she stood there, drenched in sunlight that felt like a burning spotlight on her embarrassment. Heavy velvet drapes on gold rings clinked as she dragged them together, and the shadows wrapped around her like a blanket, for once more comforting than the sunshine.
She'd never run from a spotlight before. Never not wanted to have eyes on her.
The center of attention was her safe place; her ego the cushion against any and all blows reality saw fit to send her way. It was something hammered into her since the time she was first cognizant of anything else around her, watching as her mother and father cemented their positions of power: Showing vulnerability will be your downfall. There was a whole world of people with silver tongues and sharpened claws, waiting to wring any iota of influence out of her they could at their first chance. She'd once asked her Maman why she had told her to be careful about making friends with the other politicians' kids.
“Because Chels- Chloé,” she muttered, attention focused on the clipboard in her hand. “Relationships are primarily about what you gain from the other person, and what they gain from you. It's how the world works.”
The lesson stuck in her head as stubbornly as the hurt that came from how carelessly her mother stumbled over her name. And looking around, at the way her father's love translated to giving into her every want, at the way she only gained a fraction of her mother's attention by being her gofer, there was nothing to tell her otherwise. Her only friends, Adrien and Sabrina, didn't seem to prove any different—up until his father started pulling him away from the outside world, Adrien had easily acquiesced to her taking the lead in everything they did because her presence assuaged his loneliness. Sabrina, well, it had always been openly understood that they used each other.
So building a sneering wall of sarcasm and casual cruelty between the rest of the world and her own heart had really been a no-brainer. People would always disappoint you. People wouldn't stay. And no one would protect her from that, so she had to look out for herself if she wanted to survive it.
Knowing that her entire life hadn't stopped her from hoping that this would be different, though.
Finding the Bee Miraculous, being able to fight off the asshole that held every negative emotion in Paris hostage alongside the object of her (literal) hero worship, had been fulfilling in a way she never knew anything could be. Okay, so paralyzing the conductor and making her own disaster to fix had not been the best move she could've made. Her actions as Queen Wasp were a blank in her memory, but the warmth of Ladybug's quiet pride when she returned the Miraculous had stayed with her, even against the consuming wave of her mother's broadcast criticism. Making Ladybug proud of her had been a dream come true, but all dreams had to end, and now she stared down a future of never feeling so exceptional again.
“Don't you want your own power, to not have to wait for Ladybug to come for you?”
She wasn't as dimwitted as she made herself appear; Hawkmoth didn't care for her as anything other than a pawn. Any power coming from him would be ripped away as soon as she gave him what he wanted, and Chloé Bourgeois did not play anyone's fool.
It didn't make Mayura's offer any less tempting.
Power was something she'd be raised in, come to expect without question. Something she'd wielded like a sword and shield for her own self-interest. Having Ladybug stand there with pity in her bluebell eyes, telling her that she may never be Queen Bee again, like it was something she was just supposed to forget and move on from...
A knocking broke through the storm in her head; Jean called to her from the hallway, concern clear in his tone. She pulled her teeth out of her lower lip—she'd spent too much time training herself out of the habit to mess it up just because Ladybug didn't know a good thing when she had it. The butler's relief was obvious when she answered in her usual dismissing scoff, flouncing past him towards the elevators.
It was just a waiting game, til the time that Ladybug realized what a mistake she'd made in rejecting Chloé. The sense of a final showdown was brewing in the air—Hawkmoth would require a full team to take down, so there would be a need for all the help they could get.
She would be Queen Bee again; it would just take a little patience.
She had to believe that.
