straightforwardly | 304 | fic recs, mostly miraculous ladybug & shakespeare

A collection of fic recs based on my January/February fic reading, this time (unfortunately) without commentary, if only because I’ve been sitting on this version of this post for over a week now and I have the sneaking suspicion that if I wait until I have the energy to write up the commentary that I wanted to include, it’s never actually going to be posted.

Fandoms included: EPIC the Musical, Fallen London, Greek Mythology, Late Bronze Age Collapse RPF (if you know, you know), Miraculous Ladybug (99% lovesquare), Much Ado About Nothing, Naruto, Northanger Abbey, Othello, Stardew Valley, TAZ Ethersea

two sets of footsteps (EPIC the Musical, 17.3K)
Odysseus comes home. It's both easier and harder than he'd expected.

*

Gifts and Dreams (Fallen London, <1K)
You met her in the Singing Mandrake — she a Striving Singer, you a Wayward Heiress.

*

you should know where i'm coming from (Greek Mythology, <1K)
Clytemnestra's anger was justified.

*

Ammurapi, King of Ugarit (Late Bronze Age Collapse RPF, 14.5K)
The crops are failing. The sea people are invading. Your beloved father’s corpse is barely cold and your mother has swanned off to marry someone else. You are King Ammurapi of Ugarit, and is it any wonder that your mental health is not great right now?

A loose retelling of Hamlet set during the Late Bronze Age Collapse.

*

all of your flaws and all of my flaws (are laid out one by one) (Miraculous Ladybug, 7.9K)
Ladybug and Marinette have both been acting strangely since Monarch's defeat, and Chat Noir would give anything to know why—to be able to help them. He just...didn't expect his answers to come when Ladybug drags him to his father's statue in the middle of the night along with a bag full of spray paint.

Five Times Gabriel Agreste Caught Ladybug in His Son’s Bedroom (and the One Time He Caught Chat Noir) (Miraculous Ladybug, 1.9K)
Gabriel Agreste keeps finding Ladybug in his son's bedroom. As a super villain and father, this will not stand.

the calm I feel means a storm is swelling (Miraculous Ladybug, 8.0K)
Marinette talks in her sleep. What she says shocks Adrien beyond words.

Well, not really.

Adrien's got a clever tongue, and he's willing to use it.

(Some might even say eager.)

I only sink deeper the deeper I think (Miraculous Ladybug, 8.8K)
When the sky is fully dark, Marinette transforms and leaps off her balcony, swinging over to the Notre Dame; she climbs the central spire by hand and sits at the top, her chin propped on her knees, and tries to remember how this felt the very first day, when she was young enough to be excited. Before the pressure crushed her beneath the weight of the expectations of an entire city she's sworn to protect.

Marinette is alone now. Master Fu is long gone, along with his memories. It's just Ladybug.

And she's not enough.

(or, what if Adrien was interrupted before he got the chance to put on his ring?)

identity crisis (Miraculous Ladybug, 2.2K)
Chat Noir discovers that despite wearing a supersuit, it’s still possible to get a concussion. He also discovers that after hitting your head hard enough, it’s practically impossible to keep a secret identity.

Ladybug is not sure what to make of concussed-Chat-Noir, who is either suffering an identity crisis and thinks himself to be Adrien Agreste, or is Adrien Agreste.

The first option seems more believable.

haunted (Miraculous Ladybug, Plagg & Adrien, 1.7K)
When Gabriel goes a step too far, Plagg has decided he’s had enough.

Meanwhile, Gabriel has discovered that his house may or may not be haunted, because a vengeful spirit certainly seems to be after him.

the last day on earth (Miraculous Ladybug, 10K)
The first time Marinette sees Chat Blanc, she's fourteen years old. The second time, fifteen—the third time, seventeen.

The closer she grows to Adrien, the harder it is to save him.

love languages (Miraculous Ladybug, 21.7K)
When Adrien is forced to start a crazy new diet for work, Marinette can’t bear to sit idly by and watch him suffer. She decides to leave him gifts of food with notes of encouragement, completely anonymously - or so she thinks.

Meanwhile, Adrien is overwhelmed by Marinette’s kindness and is desperate to return it in some fashion. A not-so-accidental sneak peek at her jam-packed personal planner gives him a great idea on where to start - or so he thinks.

In truth, neither one is fully prepared for where their actions will lead them.

missing person (at the window) (Miraculous Ladybug, 7.2K)
Adrien expected to spend another night staring at the ceiling and ignoring his friends' messages, as he'd done every night since his father was unmasked as Shadow Moth. But when Ladybug falls through his bedroom window, he gets a little more than he bargained for.

a most fur-midable opponen (Miraculous Ladybug, 4.0K)
Chat Noir visits Marinette's balcony one night, only to discover he has a new rival.

Meanwhile, Marinette cannot stop laughing.

pretty lady, look at how he's smiling (Miraculous Ladybug, 4.3K)
When Adrien starts showing more interest in Marinette, it should feel like a dream come true. And it would, except one thing keeps nagging at her:

“Adrien doesn’t flirt,” Marinette proclaimed, ignited in the way one only was moments after several revelations had clicked into place. “Not with me and not with anyone else either. He never did any of this with Kagami, not even when they were dating. This is weird, Alya. Even if Adrien did just wake up one day with a crush on me—which I doubt—he wouldn’t be acting like this!”

Reflections (Miraculous Ladybug, 2.7K)
The mirror shows you how you truly are, but for a Miraculous holder, it shows what was. All Marinette can see is ghosts and she doesn’t want to become one.

the secret words written on your back (Miraculous Ladybug, 4.5K)
The launch of the new UMS game has Marinette so excited that she's all over the place. She's not quite sure how she tempted Adrien into coming over to play it at her house after school, but she really should have paid more attention when she was cleaning up her room in preparation.

or, Adrien finally gets a clue. Or two.

The Sun Will Rise Again (Miraculous Ladybug, 5.2K)
After Monarch's defeat, Chat pulls away, and Ladybug can't understand it. Why is he avoiding her? Why does it feel like he's miles away, even when he's by her side? He won't tell her what's wrong. He won't let her help. And Ladybug's starting to wonder if she'll ever get to tell him how she really feels.

That Awkward Moment When... (Miraculous Ladybug, 32.7K)
“Marinette wasn’t an idiot. As many precautions as she insisted they take, she knew she and Chat Noir were both going to find out sooner or later. Of course, Marinette assumed that the way they’d found out wasn’t by running right smack into each other and detransforming in front of the other. So of course, in a typical calm and rational manner, they pointed to each other and screamed.”

Because, nine times out of ten, letting the cat out of the bag just ends up being very, very awkward.

Two Steps Back (one step forward) (Miraculous Ladybug, 29.5K)
Sure, Adrien hadn't been texting her as often as he used to. And sure, Nino noticed it too. But just because Adrien had struggled with depression in the past, didn't mean he was struggling now. Surely, he'd tell her if something was wrong. Right?

Marinette just missed him, and she had a tendency to catastrophize. Surely, he was fine.

But if he wasn't... well, she wasn't above hopping on a flight back to Paris to make sure.

(Marinette's at an internship in New York, and Adrien has a depression relapse.)

the wonderful part of the mess that we made (Miraculous Ladybug, 13.5K)
They knew.

They knew, and there would be no magical reset button for the memories they'd made today. She'd have to see him at school every day, and she'd see the Chat in him, as surely as he'd see the Ladybug in her.

The Wrong Balcony (Miraculous Ladybug, 11.3K)
While taking shelter from a rainstorm, Chat Noir and Marinette accidentally sleep over at Mr. Ramier's house.

*

Arise, Arise, Arise (Much Ado About Nothing, Beatrice/Benedick, 4.5K)
When Beatrice is cast into an unnatural sleep by the pollen of a strange plant, Benedick takes upon himself the absurd task of waking her again.

Horribly In Love (Much Ado About Nothing, Beatrice/Benedick, 1.5K)
Her mouth is a delighted curve that belongs to him now and yet does not belong to him, and sometimes Benedick wonders what it would be like to marry someone who did not know all of his flaws already.

No more than reason (Much Ado About Nothing, Beatrice/Benedick, 7.4K)
Newly-wedded bliss, Beatrice and Benedick style.

pavane (Much Ado About Nothing, Beatrice/Benedick, 1.0K)
Relationships take time and care to develop--so why should a merry war of words be any different?

*

beloved, once (Naruto, Uchiha SI & Itachi, WIP — currently 29K)
The night of the Uchiha Massacre, Uchiha Miho perished under the hand of her brother. She didn’t expect to wake up, much less as an infant - again.

(SI!OC who tried and failed… and now had the unwelcome chance to try again.)

cahoots, explosions, and other things the warring clans era can't handle (Naruto, Deidara/Obito, 4.0K)
If Obito had a list of hobbies, he’d put “metaphorically yanking Deidara’s pigtail” right up at the top. It’s just fun, okay? It’s fun even after a freak accident throws them back in time. It’s fun even as Obito plots the demise of all shinobi villages before they even exist. That’s it, okay? It’s just for entertainment…

*

Behold the Walls of Jericho (Northanger Abbey, Henry/Catherine, WIP — currently 35K)
Catherine Morland, girl reporter (well, Bath Weekly’s junior weddings reporter and photographer), has always longed for something, anything exciting to happen to her. When she meets the Tilneys, it does.

1930s screwball comedy AU... though Catherine thinks she's in a Hitchcockian murder mystery. Otherwise known as "It Happened One Night At Northanger Abbey."

A Clandestine Correspondence (Northanger Abbey, Henry/Catherine, 1.2K)
Henry is much better at the kind of letters demanded by a clandestine correspondence. Catherine is not very good at concealing and conveying what she feels at the same time, but Henry loves her for it anyhow.

*

my lady, art thee well? (Othello,
Desdemona/Emilia, 3.9K)
Othello and Iago fail to kill their wives in any way that matters.

*

Lush & Verdant (Stardew Valley, Haley/Leah, <1k)
Haley asks Leah to model nude for her.

*

one eye open (TAZ Ethersea, Amber Gris, <1K)
The thing about Amber is, she was raised for land. To take care of the land.