Twenty-One: This Can't Be Happening

Suddenly confronted with his dream of being Chat Noir 24x7, the feline superhero tries to stay calm – and fails, miserably. Good thing Marinette's on the case…

Perched high in the Eiffel Tower, I watched the night lights of Paris glitter below me and tried to ignore the creeping sense of panic that was threatening to overwhelm me. Eight hours into what was looking every bit like a permanent transformation, I slowly banged my wild mane against the nearest steel girder. A single moment of cold rage had quite possibly destroyed any chance of undoing whatever process Ms. Mendeleiev had started on me – and had been reversed by Spider-Man, although with an unusual side effect. There was some irony in the fact that I had generally, intentionally, tried to stretch out my time transformed as Chat Noir nearly from the beginning of my being chosen as a holder. The freedom my alter-ego provided me – and the escape from the life my father had forced me into – had been a godsend, and anything that allowed me to extend it – and, by extension, my time with Marinette – had been worth it.

As I closed my masked eyes and smelled the scents of the city as the wind washed over me, I realized part of the attraction had always been my ability to command the time and place of my transformation. Now that I was every bit as trapped within the magical black leather as Plagg was in the ring, it felt somewhat less freeing. Sighing, I couldn't deny that I still relished every moment I spent as Chat, but in the end, I knew I truly couldn't remain a superhero all day, every day.

For starters, there were some practical considerations, the most pressing one being that Adrien was the one still crashing at the Bakery. Marinette had managed to cover for me on that one already, telling her flabbergasted parents that House of Gabriel had sent me to Spain for a few days to finish a catalogue shoot. She wasn't completely lying – I had been scheduled for just such a thing before the New York fiasco – but I'd used my baton to call in and get it rescheduled for the following week.

Sitting up there at the top of Paris, though, that now seemed a bit optimistic.

Sighing, I found myself wishing I'd not acted so rashly. I'd been such a good kitty for so long, but the feelings of betrayal had been far too intense to ignore. Ms. Mendeleiev was bad enough – no teacher should experiment on a student, not matter how noble the cause – but Spidey had hurt the most. I'd thought of him as a kindred spirit; to discover he'd continued with the work Fury had started – research that I'd confided in him scared the bejesus out of me and my fellow Miraculous holders – well, stacked on top of the ultimate betrayal by my father, it had been simply too much.

Eight hours on, though, I was feeling more like a heel than an avenging feline. Twice now I'd started to dial Spidey, on the cusp of an apology when my feelings would well up again and prevent me from hitting the send button. Tapping the metallic cylinder against my chin, I sighed deeply again, slid the baton open and redialed Peter before I could give it a second thought.

Given the time difference, I expected he might be up and getting ready for school, but also wasn't surprised when it went straight to voicemail. I waited for the beep, took a deep breath, and plunged forward.

"Hey, it's me," I said. "Look, about last night… I can't begin to understand the pressures of the work you do with Stark and Fury, or deny the allure that your chosen field of study holds for you."

I stood and began pacing the beam, my tail swishing behind me. If anything, after the accident the ears and tail felt even more real to me than before – which scared me slightly.

"I'm not sure either one of us were acting our best… so, please give me a call when you are free. Okay? Okay. Bye."

I hung up and pressed the baton to my head. That went well, I thought morosely.

Sighing again, I slipped it behind my back and perched, cat like, at the end of the beam. Technically, I had no place to be, as well as no place to go; Marinette was working on a way that Chat could stay at the Bakery, but as the hours had passed, I'd grown less certain she would pull off that round of magic. I'd slept out on the rooftops of Paris before, though, and could do so again; it seemed ironic that after all the time I'd spent trying to convince Marinette I was just an ordinary alley cat, it looked like I was finally getting a chance to play the part.

Albeit an alley cat worth a fortune.

A fortune that was worthless with respect to fixing my current situation.

My baton buzzed, and I snapped it open to see Ladybug's face. "Hey Kitty. How are you holding up?"

"Okay," I lied with a smile. "Can I come home now?"

"Yes," she replied. "I've got it arranged with my parents – if you don't mind the roof. Since Adrien already has our guest room, there's no other spot."

I smiled slightly. "I'll be fine."

"I'll be up there with you," she said firmly.

"That's not necessary," I replied. "My costume will-"

"I won't have you alone. At all. Now come on home."

"Yes, Milady," I smiled. "Any luck with Master Fu?"

"Not yet," she replied sadly. "Since this is a bit more on the science side than magic, though, he's thinking we might be in uncharted territory," she added carefully.

I nodded, hearing the implied gentle rebuke. "Well, thanks for your efforts so far."

"We're not finished yet," she reminded me. "Not by a long shot."

"I know. I'll be back shortly."

"Good." She smiled before her image winked out.

Snapping the baton shut, I pondered for a few moments what it all meant, then prepared to leap off the side of the Tower. My feet came to an abrupt stop at the edge, though, when my feline ears heard a very familiar thwip-thwip-thwip noise below me. Hooking my claws over the edge, I leaned out and down, and felt my masked eyes widen in shock.

Slinging his way up the side of the Eiffel Tower was the red-and-blue form of Spiderman; I watched with fascinated amazement at the grace in his movements, then settled back on the beam once I realized where he was going. It took mere moments for a final web line to smack onto the beam I was perched upon, and fraction of a second later, Spidey sprung up and landed in his weird spider crouch a few meters from me.

"Goddamn you are a hard cat to find," he swore as he yanked off his mask.

I shrugged, somewhat unsure of how to respond. "I'm a black cat. Stealth is my game."

"Clearly," he replied.

It concerned me that he was breathing hard. "Why are you in Paris?" I asked. "And how did you get here?"

"I had to call in a few favors," Spidey replied. "Including getting Mister Stark to fly me here."

My masked eyes widened. "Tony Stark… Iron Man is in Paris?"

"Yeah," Spidey said. "But he's hands off on this one. He dropped me in Paris and went on to the Riviera for a few days."

"That's… insane."

"That's not the important part. Look, I've been going over the telemetry my Spider Suit recorded earlier today. Chat – I think whatever Mendeleiev was doing, when I tried to reverse her procedure, it actually changed your DNA on a subatomic level." He stood up. "I think it might have actually merged your human DNA with whatever it is that powers you."

I sighed as I stood and leaned against the beam, crossing my arms. "Tell me something I don't know."

Peter's eyes went wide. "You can't transform, can you?"

"Nope. And from our side, we don't think magic can fix it."

"I doubt it can," Peter said. "Please tell me you saved that gun she had in the lab."

I nodded. "It's with Ladybug. Why?"

"I think it holds the key to how I can fix this, but we have very little time."

"Pete," I said carefully, "are you sure?"

"No," he replied honestly. "But do you want to stay a feline superhero forever?"

"No," I found myself saying. "Not like this, at least."

"Good. Take me to it. We need to get started, like, now."