YMMV / Leave for Mendeleiev

• Adorkable: Marinette still gets tongue-tied in romantic situations. She tries to pull off a weather metaphor for Aurore and can't quite do it. "...I like you too, you, you’re my, my sun. I, oh gosh."
• Catharsis Factor:
  • For anyone who thinks Adrien and Marinette's canonical Love Square status is a bad case of Strangled by the Red String, or just dislikes Adrien in general, "Don't Kiss and Tell" has Marinette nearly kissed by Adrien (who used to be Chat Noir and a firm believer of You Can't Fight Fate when it comes to Ladybug and Chat Noir's relationship, now reduced to a thrall in Zombizou's horde), but she pulls away and tosses him into Chloé, another blonde bully in Marinette's life. She unintentionally said Screw Destiny to Ladybug X Chat Noir, and for anti-Love Square readers, it was so satisfying to watch.
  • Similarly, for anyone frustrated by the series drawing things out, the story climaxes with Hawk Moth's defeat, which is ushered along by his incompetence and grossly overestimating himself.
• Fridge Horror: After dealing with Lady Wifi, Chat Noir sees Ladybug duck into a closet to detransform safely and stands outside, insisting that there's no point in trying to hide her Secret Identity anymore now that she's been 'outed'. It's with extreme reluctance that he backs down, leaving the question hanging: what if he decided to stay?
• Harsher in Hindsight: This fic shows Mme. Mendeleiev as someone who doesn't care about Chloé's status and threatens to punish her when she harasses Marinette. The series would eventually show she was nowhere as willing to deal with Chloé as she was in this story.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: The original version of the story has Amber, Chloé's nicer and more responsible twin sister. She was removed from the revamp, which began getting posted shortly before Season 4 introduced Zoé, Chloé's nicer and more responsible half sister.
• Moral Event Horizon:
  • Hawk Moth crosses the line in "Mime Your Own Business" when he finds out about Lila's claims to be Ladybug's best friend, has her kidnapped by Mime, and nearly has Mime murder her just to get Ladybug to surrender her Miraculous. While he's not above hurting anyone during these Akuma attacks, here he's deliberately marking a child for death who's only known crime (to him) is being the best friend of The Hero.
  • In "Undining Love", faced with Paris being submerged by Syren's magically rising waters, Chat Noir decides this is the perfect chance to try blackmailing Plagg, threatening to quit being Chat Noir and leave the whole city to drown unless his kwami starts spilling secrets. This serves as The Last Straw for the other heroes, with Master Fu and Tikki mutually agreeing that Adrien being the holder of the Cat Miraculous is much more trouble than it's worth and to retire him ASAP. Plagg, for his part, has no qualms about returning to the Miraculous Box if it gets him away from his abusive partner.
• Take That, Scrappy!: Several moments, depending on whom you hate the most.
  • Chloé Haters:
    • Chloé is one of the first targets of Stormy Weather, and one of the only two targets that Stormy Weather personally freezes on the spot, because she HAD to get even and sabotage Aurore by buying votes because Aurore stood up to her.
    • Mendeleiev standing up to Chloé, who just boasted to Marinette that she could have her new homeroom teacher fired at the drop of a hat if she attempts to get in her way, and threatens to suspend the blond brat if she doesn't get out of her classroom.
    • Not only does Chloé lose the hat competition like in canon, but she is banned from future competitions... by her own mother.
    • Chloé being utterly humiliated and called out by Aurore at her OWN party, then Kim and Odine unintentionally steal the entire party, including Adrien.
    • Unlike in canon where Chloé; kept getting away from Zombizou, here she stupidly stands at ground zero of the Akuma attack and is implied to be the first victim of her horde, very quickly taking away any hope of using the Akuma attack to her own advantage to get Marinette back under her thumb. She's also hit with Adrien, for that matter.
    • Chloé's mother complains to Marinette about the former behind the latter's back, pointing out that all Chloé got from her was the "ability to command" without the passion, creativity, and drive to work hard and earn the respect, and passionately compares Marinette to what Chloé should strive to be.
    • Her brief stint as the Akuma Queen Bee ends in a swift curb-stomping from Marigold, followed by her mother banning her from her fashion show as punishment for stealing Marinette's design during the earlier derby and for stinging her. Pollen also gets a good dig in against her.
  • Adrien/Chat Noir Haters:
    • Aurore calling Chat Noir incompetent to his face multiple times.
    • Marinette bluntly saying she wouldn't kiss him in the spur of the moment hits Adrien right in the ego. He's so used to being pursued by every girl, he's floored by Marinette's refusal, especially because he (at the time) nearly figured out she was Ladybug.
    • Chat Noir's reckless exposure of Lila's "Secret Identity" causes Lila's canonical, irrational hatred of Marinette/Ladybug to turn to HIM for a justified reason, resulting in her leading a smear campaign against him while sparing Marinette from Lila's petty spree of lies ruining her life.
    • Adrien's punishment for stealing the Miraculous Grimoire from his father nearly sticks since Marinette isn't willing to return the book after everything Adrien's done and the level of distrust Ladybug has for Chat Noir is too high due to his incompetence and stubborn refusal to take things seriously. It takes Chloé harassing his father to undo it.
    • Adrien loses the ring for good thanks to the Miraculous Cure he used to be a Karma Houdini returning it to its true owner: the Guardian, ending his career as Chat Noir.
    • Marinette tosses Adrien, who was about to force her to kiss him, into Chloé.
    • Audrey Bourgeois makes a snarky quip at Adrien's feather allergy, seeming slightly annoyed they have to use all fake feathers to get around it while Adrien's on the catwalk.
    • Adrien was denied a new Miraculous, and when he has the gall to reveal his former career to his father, who is Hawk Moth, his father gives him a thorough dressing down that makes him bitter enough to get Akumatized.
  • Lila haters: she only has one, but it's enough to satisfy. She's kidnapped by Mime who tries to threaten Ladybug with her safety, but it's made even worse when Chat Noir STUPIDLY exposes her fake Secret Identity, forcing her to admit she lied to get him to help save her life.

---