Eleven: Alternative Perspective

Marinette finds herself an unwilling hostage as Lila continues with her plan.

To put it quite bluntly, Marinette was pissed.

If she were truly being honest with herself, her anger at Lila had been simmering from the moment she'd watched her take out Chat in that faux forest they'd become trapped within; her feline had tried admirably to protect her, and seeing him go down like a rag doll had torn at her horribly. She'd made a scene as befitting an upset girlfriend, dropping herself to Chat's chest and sobbing uncontrollably; it had provided the cover for her to confirm her partner was only unconscious and not injured in any way that was easily detectable. Another moment more and she would have been able to reach his baton and maybe have done something about the situation, but Lila, who seemed to be reaching the end of her transformation, hit her in the back with the same whatever-it-was that had knocked Chat insensate.

She'd awoken, predictably, at the Bakery, strapped to a chair in her family's living quarters. From the pounding at the basement door a story below, she assumed her parents had been locked in with the supplies. Though she had assumed Lila had planned on using her as leverage over Chat, what she'd not realized was Lila had been aware that Adrien ostensibly was now living with her family. She'd been untied long enough to send Chat his next set of instructions, including a few codewords to try and prompt him; seeing him on the video call a short while later confirmed he'd understood her message.

Well, technically she was seeing Adrien, and she assumed she knew who had donned the faux Chat costume and had prudently perched in part of Adrien's old room dark enough not to reveal the swap. She had worried that the lack of glowing eyes in the darkness would tip off Lila, but in the end, the ploy had worked – nearly better than she had planned, for Lila had quickly bound her back up again and then, like a sack of potatoes, had carried her across Paris to the Agreste mansion.

Marinette had thought her first opportunity to escape and transform to Ladybug had appeared when Lila had set her down not-so-gently on the tile roof of the building across from the mansion; apparently, Lila assumed she'd try to make a break for it and had used her powers to conjure a green vine out of nowhere to lash her firmly to a chimney. That alone would have been easily overcome, given the better-than-average strength she gained while transformed; sadly, perhaps afraid that Marinette would cry out for rescue, Lila had used a little more magic to thoughtfully add a leafy gag for good measure. She'd been unable to do more than grunt, let alone speak the magic words needed to transform.

Tikki had appeared the moment Lila left, but the diminutive kwami was no match for the seemingly living greenery embracing Marinette, leaving the two of them to watch in despair as Lila systematically trashed the Agreste mansion. Once the flames had begun to lick out of the upper stories, Lila had returned and somehow managed to detach Marinette from the chimney while keeping her firmly within the grasp of the ever-tightening vines surrounding her. Carried once more like unwelcome cargo, it wasn't hard to divine Lila's next stop; despite her situation, she'd found a moment to smile at how her kitty had managed a little ingenuity and a lot of misdirection to attempt to even the odds.

Landing a few blocks from House of Gabriel, Lila stashed Marinette on a nearby rooftop, ensuring that the vines had her firmly within their grasp before heading off to take on Chat. It was clear fairly immediately that working against the vines was useless, despite her rising anger and it's infusion of adrenaline into her civilian muscles. Tikki had even tried to get her small hands beneath the gag, prying with all her might to make just enough space for Marinette to say the phrase, but the kwami had finally collapsed against her holder, exhausted with the effort.

Anger overwhelmed Marinette. Anger that she'd been caught unawares by the one person she quite probably loathed the most in the entire universe. Anger that someone like Gabriel Agreste had been grooming her, pulling Lila into his machinations so she could be useful to him. Anger that she was no further into understanding what, exactly, Lila was going after – for though the tasks she'd set out for Chat seemed to have been designed to flush Adrien out, her gut told her the ultimate prize was Chat himself. And the only reason she'd need him was to get to Ladybug, but again, she just couldn't puzzle out the why. The only thing that seemed clear was they were well beyond simply breaking out Gabriel from prison.

No, there was more here. And it pissed her off she couldn't see what it was.

Fuming as she struggled against the vines, she nearly missed the telltale thwip as the line of white webbing shot past her; a moment later, the red-and-blue clad form of Spider-Man landed beside her in that unusual crouch only he seemed able to do. Cocking his masked face at her, he took a moment before leaping toward her and starting to pull at the vines.

"I'm sure Chat would have some sort of pun here," he laughed mirthlessly, "but I've got nothing. And these things don't seem amenable to letting go," he added with a grunt.

Mute as she was, Marinette could only motion with her eyes and tried to get Spidey to focus on the gag; it took a moment for him to pick up the motion, but when he did, he immediately went at it with both hands. As gently as he could, he managed to get a finger or two below the massive leaf wrapping the lower part of her face, but struggled to pull it off.

"This is—ungh!—really tight," he said between grunts. He let go and flipped away from her, considering the mess once more. "I need to get you into the fight," he said thoughtfully as his head swiveled around the rooftop they were on. Nodding, he leapt toward her again. "Okay, here's the plan. I'm going to stick some webbing to this leaf here, and try and use that antenna aerial over there to get some leverage. If you get enough space, do your thing. Blink if that works for you."

Marinette blinked, and Spidey leapt away from her. "Okay, here it goes," he said before lifting his wrists.

Two weblines hit home and he immediately grabbed them and looped them around the aerial he'd pointed out. Pressing his booted feet against the tile, he started to pull, hard, grunting with the effort; slowly, the aerial started to bend, and he grunted further; Marinette watched in amazement as his biceps bulged with the effort, then was amazed even more to feel the vine starting to give way.

Come on, come ON! she mentally encouraged Spider-Man.

The webbing started to creak ominously, catching the web-slinger's attention; he swiftly turned and shot a third line and flipped it around to add to the first two, and grunted again with the effort. "I… think… this is working," he said. "But you might… want to make the most… of your moment…"

Just when she thought the aerial was going to snap, she felt the breath of fresh air across her lips. Without wasting a moment, she immediately cried: "Tikki – spots on! Lucky Charm!"

As she hoped, the red wave of transformation washed over her, and nearly immediately, a polka-dotted weed sprayer dropped out of the sky, clattering across the tile toward Spider-Man. The weblines snapped at that moment, tossing Spidey back and trapping Ladybug once more behind the leafy gag. But she'd done her part – now it was up to the hero from New York to figure out the rest.

Spider-Man had hit the tile hard, and was slow to get up. She could tell he was a bit stunned and worried he might have slammed his head hard enough to get into concussion range; still, he managed to shake his head and then quickly leapt toward the weed sprayer. "I may be a city kid," he said, the smile evident in his voice, "but I know what this is and how to use it."

Pumping it twice, he picked up the wand and shot a greenish fluid at Ladybug; the magical concoction immediately wilted the live vines, causing them to shrivel away from her trapped form. In mere seconds she was lying prone on the tile, free of the vines but still somehow bound hand and foot. Ladybug shelved her concerns about what that meant as Spidey moved to her side and quickly untied her.

"Thank you," she said as she finally stood, rubbing where her wrists were raw from the rope.

"My pleasure," as he joined her. "Are you okay? Do you need a minute?"

"I'm furious," she replied honestly. "And I do need a minute to recharge. But only a minute."

Something in her expression caught Spider-Man, and he stepped back slightly. "I wouldn't want to be this Lila person, I think," he said softly.

"No," Ladybug replied. "You don't. Let me feed Tikki and then we'll rescue Chat."

"What makes you think he needs rescuing?" Spidey asked.

"Because," she smiled, a cold thing actually, "it was part of our plan."

"No," Spidey said after a moment. "I really wouldn't want to be Lila."

A/n: Sorry for the delayed posting - the new year messed with my plans something terrible. Also note that I have shifted new chapters of After to publish on Tuesdays moving forward. -ep