Chapter 4: Gang of Secrets vs Team of Two

Ladybug and Chat Noir leaped to a rooftop after saving the Eiffel Tower again.

"Wow, you are on fire, bugaboo. We never beat villains so fast. Pound it," said Chat Noir, offering a fist to bump.

Ladybug was preoccupied and she didn't respond.

"Bugaboo? Something wrong?" asked Chat.

Ladybug noticed his extended fist.

"Uh... pound it – yeah," she said, doing a half-hearted bump and then moving away to look around. "Hey, why don't we check one more time that everything's okay in Paris? Like... an extra patrol."

Chat said, "You wanna tell me what's going on? You didn't even scold me when I called you Bugaboo."

Ladybug almost opened up, but she knew talking about a broken heart and losing a boyfriend would be insensitive to Chat... or give him ideas.

"I don't feel like talking about it," Ladybug said.

"Then I know the perfect place where there's no talking," said Chat.

"I'm all in!" said Ladybug.

They went to a romantic comedy. Ladybug got worked up about the main character and the secrets she kept. She started ranting loudly in the theater until Chat had to take her outside.

"Listen m'lady, I didn't get everything you said and obviously, I know nothing about your private life, but I do know what heartbreak sounds and feels like, and –"

Ladybug put him off, saying she was fine and she was going to the pool for a swim. She swung away on her yo-yo, leaving him worried.

Ladybug lay in bed in her aqua form, feeling more depressed than ever. She only detransformed when Trixx suggested Tikki might need rest and food.

"As long as I'm Ladybug, I can't have loved ones in my life," said Marinette.

Tikki asked, "What makes you say that, Marinette?"

"You know why. I had to break up with Luka because I couldn't tell him the truth, it'd be the same thing with Adrien. I can't share my secret with either of them. I can't be honest with my closest friends or my parents about anything. I'm doomed to be a big liar to everyone, forever. What do I do Tikki?"

"I wish I could tell you but... kwamis don't fall in love."

"You see? No one can help me. My life as Marinette is too complicated. I should just be Ladybug all the time! Tikki, spots on!"

Ladybug went up onto the rooftop patio to shout out a challenge to Shadow Moth. She didn't hear her concerned friends coming into her room: Alya, Alix, Mylène, Rose, and Juleka.

"Marinette? Marinette?" called Alya.

Rose noticed a new dollhouse. "Wow! Check this out, girls! This is new! Oh, it's so cute!"

"Another one of Marinette's cool creations," said Mylène.

"She must be up on the patio, I'll go get her," said Alya.

Ladybug was almost caught. She had to detransform before Alya saw her.

"What are you doing here?" asked Marinette.

"We're just checkin' in on you, girl."

Marinette heard Rose talking about the dollhouse and about to take off its roof. She would find the Miracle Box!

"No! No, don't touch that! Move away!" said Marinette in a loud voice.

She pushed between her friends and the house. Rose was so shocked she dropped the roof part and broke it.

Rose said, "Sorry, Marinette!"

Marinette said, "Will you please leave my room?!"

"Chill out Marinette, it's just a doll house. We'll totally help," said Alya.

Desperate for them not to see the Miracle Box, Marinette kept insisting they leave the room. Her anger was mostly faked. If Rose had broken any of her regular projects, Marinette would have smiled and been understanding about it. But now Marinette was holding up one side of the dollhouse with one hand. If it fell and they saw the Box...

Mylène held out a bracelet with beads on it. "Each of us told our secrets to this bracelet. It's your turn now."

"The only thing that's wrong right now is you guys still hanging out in my room, which is not cool!" said Marinette.

"If we're really your friends, you can confide in us," said Alya.

"Real friends don't ever let each other down," said Rose.

"Well then maybe I don't want you to be my friends. GET OUT!" shouted Marinette.

Shocked beyond words, the group left the room.

Marinette dropped to her knees and began to cry.

"I had no choice Tikki, I had to do it."

"I know, Marinette."

"At least now I won't have to lie anymore, since, there'll be no one to lie to."

Marinette got to work on a project to get her mind off her grief, something she had been working on for a long time.

The dollhouse was just a temporary concealment until the real box was done. It looked like a thread box and it had a combination of thread spools to push to open it. She put the finishing touches on it and put the Miracle Box inside. Good! Her friends would never think of looking in there... if she ever had friends again.

Marinette's phone rang, and she picked it up. It suddenly became heavy and she dropped it.

LadyWifi projected up from the phone. "I'm here for you Marinette – I'm your friend. You will tell us all your secrets, and you will feel so much better!"

LadyWifi shot pause symbols at the Marinette she saw running up the ladder to the trapdoor and the roof. She went up and out of the room, then left the top of the building.

The real Marinette was still standing where she was. It seemed Trixx had created an illusion to cover her, and a running illusion to draw the attacker away.

"Thank you for hiding me, Trixx," said Marinette.

"No problem," said Trixx.

"There may be a problem," said Marinette. "When a kwami uses their power without a holder to channel its energy, doesn't it often set off some kind of catastrophe?"

"My power creates Illusions, so the side effects will hopefully just be in their imaginations," said Trixx.

"I'm going to need your power again," said Marinette. "Tikki, Spots On! Tikki, Trixx, Unify."

Ladyfox used her yo-yo phone to leave a message. "Chaton, I believe there are as many as five akumas active. Meet me on the roof of Notre Dame Cathedral."

Then Ladyfox used the buzzer to alert Chat Noir.

As she left the rooftop porch, she saw that the Eiffel Tower was swaying and stretching.

"Oh, Trixx..." she said.

Chat Noir arrived at the rendezvous point quickly.

"You've become a foxy lady, M'Lady. More than you normally are."

Ladyfox was all business "I saw LadyWifi, Princess Fragrance, Horrificator, Timebreaker, and Reflekta moving around the school. They're looking for Marinette Dupain-Cheng, one of their classmates."

"Haven't we already saved her a bunch of times?" asked Chat. "Funny, you'd think everybody would like her."

"Well, apparently she's managed to alienate all her friends at once," said Ladyfox.

She stared into space with a bitter expression.

"You still there?" asked Chat.

"Just thinking. With five villains it's not gonna be easy finding the object that has the akuma," said Ladyfox.

"We'll just have to isolate them and try one at a time, by trial and error," said Chat.

"One at a time, but all at once!" said Ladyfox. "You've give me an idea. You unified with the Snake Miraculous when we fought Miracle Queen. Let's try that now."

She brought the Snake Miraculous out of her yo-yo and handed it to Chat. Sass appeared and bowed his head to Chat.

"We'll also need to stay in communication. Let's do like we did against Lies," said Ladyfox, taking dots off the top of her yo-yo that turned into earpieces for them.

Chat put the earpiece into his right cat ear. He could hear with it and it would remain uncovered when he transformed to unified form. Then he put on the Snake Miraculous.

"Plagg, Sass, Unify," said Chat. He became Snake Noir.

"The gang of akumas seems to have split up to look for Marinette. We can gather information by trial and error if you give us the time."

I'll do that now. Second Chance!" said Snake Noir, activating his timer.

"Got anything?" asked Ladyfox.

"No, this is the first time."

"I'm going to go after Lady Wifi. Either she has the akuma or I may be able to talk her into telling me where it is. Meanwhile, you find Timebreaker to stop her from going back into the past, otherwise she could really screw up our plan."

They headed out to find the villains.

Ladyfox spotted LadyWifi. She summoned a covering Mirage that made her look like the normal Ladybug, and an illusion of Marinette running into an alley.

LadyWifi charged in, shooting pauses and calling "Marinette, stop!"

Ladyfox ran the illusion out of the alley and around the corner. She caught LadyWifi by entangling her with her yo-yo. She picked up the dropped phone and broke it.

"Hah, bummer for you, Ladybug," said LadyWifi. "I don't have the akuma."

"No biggie, I just wanted to talk to you anyway," said Ladyfox.

"I've got nothing to say to you," said LadyWifi.

Ladyfox was about to appeal to her as Rena Rouge, to break Shadow Moth's control enough to tell her where the akuma was, but she thought better of it. She knew from what happened with Max that Shadow Moth was monitoring the former temporary heroes closely. He didn't need to be informed that Rena Rouge was close enough to Ladybug for an appeal to her feelings to work, if it did. It would put a target on Alya's back. She had two little sisters to kidnap and threaten for information about Ladybug. No way.

"Snake Noir, it's not Lady Wifi's phone. And I can't get her to talk," said Ladyfox over their communicator.

"Second chance!" said Snake Noir.

"Got anything?" asked Ladyfox.

"It's not LadyWifi's phone, and trying to get her to talk is a dead end. And it's not Timebreaker's left skate, which I destroyed when I fought her."

"I'll try Princess Fragrence's perfume bottle next," said Ladyfox.

"I'll try the other skate this time," said Snake Noir.

They headed out to find the villains.

Ladyfox spotted Princess Fragrance – she was jetting along with her perfume spray, not in sight of any of the others. She invoked Mirage to make herself look like normal Ladybug, and made an illusion of Marinette running into an alley.

As the Princess charged in, Ladyfox aimed her yo-yo at the perfume bottle, catching her by surprise and smashing the bottle. Unfortunately, it wasn't the akumatized object.

"Snake Noir, the perfume bottle isn't it. But there's too much perfume leaking out in this small alley; it's affecting me!"

"I've got you now!" said Princess Fragrance.

"At your service, Princess Fragrance," sang Ladyfox.

"Second chance!" said Snake Noir.

"Got anything?" asked Ladyfox.

"It's not LadyWifi's phone, and she won't talk. It's not Princess Fragrance's bottle And it's not either of Timebreaker's skates. I'll stop her again, anyway."

"I'll try Horrificator next. Reflekta is hardest to check with all those copies, so we'll try her last."

They headed out to find the villains. The battle went in a similar way.

"I beat Horrificator. She doesn't have a pin on her like last time. She spit goo all over me – yecch."

"Second chance!"

"Got anything?"

"It's not LadyWifi, Princess Fragrence, or Horrificator. And it's not Timebreaker's skates, but I noticed something in her hand this time: a bracelet with beads on it."

Ladyfox knew exactly what that was, but pretended ignorance.

"That must be the object that connects them all! But it's in her hand – that's bad. Trying to break it could get us touched and our existence drained. We need some extra luck. Lucky Charm!"

She got a spotted pool lifesaver.

"I've got a plan," said Ladyfox. "We'll work together..."

They got Timebreaker to chase Marinette, who appeared to run across an empty swimming pool on a plank. The plank wasn't there, and the pool was full of water. Timebreaker fell in, and Snake Noir jammed the lifesaver over her, pinning her arms. He Cataclysmed the bracelet, and Ladyfox purified the akuma. Snake Noir got Alix out of the water.

Ladyfox threw the lifesaver into the air. "Miraculous Ladyfox!"

All the battle damage, brainwashing, and looking like Reflekta was swept away. The Gang of Secrets was freed. The Eiffel Tower went back to normal.

"Pound it!" said Ladyfox and Snake Noir.

"I didn't notice before, but you look a lot like Aspik," said Ladyfox. "I think it's just how much of your face and hair is covered by the hooded mask."

Snake Noir hestitated. He realized he shouldn't know that name. "Pardon me, who?"

"Aspik, a temporary Snake holder I tried when we fought Desperada. It didn't work out, so I chose Viperion instead."

"I see."

"You're a great Viperion substitute, Snake Noir. I wouldn't have made it through this day without you."

"And you're a great Rena Rouge substitute, Ladyfox. You're the highlight of all my days."

Marinette had apologized to her friends. They met in her room, and Marinette held the eternal friendship bracelet.

"It's true. Breaking up with Luka broke my heart. And never being able to tell Adrien how I feel is just as painful. Love is too difficult. I think- I think I'm gonna stick to friendship, that's about all I can handle right now."

"Take your time," said Rose.

"It'll all work out," said Mylène.

Her friends gathered around her for a group hug.

"And whatever happens, we'll always be here for you," said Alya.

"When you're ready for love, just make sure you tell us, so we can help you with a sick new plan to win over Adrien, Luka or whoever!" said Alix.

They all laughed.

"Girls, it's you who I love," said Marinette.

The friends all prepared to leave, saying goodbye to Marinette.

Alya was last, and she paused. "You go ahead girls, I just have one last thing to say to Marinette."

She came back to Marinette. "You didn't tell us everything, did you? A journalist and a BFF can tell these things."

Marinette sat down on her chaise lounge with a sad sigh.

"I won't try to figure it out or force it out of you," said Alya. "If you can't tell me what's in your heart, it's your right."

"Will we still be friends?" asked Marinette.

"Marinette. I'm your best friend, and I'll always be. That's why it kills me that I can't help you with whatever's making you feel so alone."

Marinette was tempted to tell Alya everything. If she didn't, they might drift apart. Marinette would continue to be alone except for Chat Noir.

But she remembered the thing with eyes that spied on Max, that must have also spied on Alya. As a person chosen by Ladybug to hold a Miraculous, just temporarily, Alya was a target for Shadow Moth. He knew where she lived.

Marinette couldn't make that worse by giving her a deadly secret to keep. She could imagine Alya getting a call one day: "Rena Rouge, I am Shadow Moth. I have your loved ones. If you want them back you'll have to betray Ladybug. Tell me her secret identity." If Alya couldn't answer that she didn't know, without a trace of hesitation or anything that sounded like a lie, it would be the end.

Alya left the room with a sigh. Marinette didn't stop her.