Chapter 5
Ladybug paced back and forth on a lower beam of the Eiffel Tower. She knew she was being predictable and standing wide out in the open, but she really wanted Mylène to be successful on this first run with the Mouse Miraculous. Besides, she knew the other heroes, Ryuko and King Monkey especially, would not be going easy on her. It'd been a while. She checked her yo-yo for the time: thirty minutes since they started the game of hide-and-seek. Ladybug gnawed her lower lip. "C'mon Mylène, you can do it," she whispered to herself.
Another fifteen minutes dragged by. Ladybug, quite worried now, opened her yo-yo and phoned Chat Noir. He picked up immediately. "Hey, Chat, any word from My…our Mouse friend?"
"I'm… I'm… I'm in love with two girls," he stammered, then the image of Chat flew sideways as he must have dropped his baton, and then there was nothing but his shrieks of pain.
"CHAT!" Ladybug screamed, flipping anxiously to her tracking device and saw the symbols of all the heroes scattered around Paris. He was on their favorite rooftop. She triggered the AkumaAlert and initiated a conference call to the other heroes. Only Viperion and Pegasus answered. "We've got an Akuma on our hands, what have you guys noticed?"
Viperion's eyes widened with horror, "Where at?"
"Chat Noir for sure, but only you two are responding."
"Ok, I'm on my way," Viperion answered. Pegasus simply started running. Ladybug zipped forward into the night, the familiar dread welling in the pit of her stomach.
Pegasus had already arrived on the rooftop when Ladybug made it. Viperion was close behind. Chat Noir was no longer there. Ladybug looked around and found Chat Noir's baton on the edge of the rooftop and collected it. "This is not good," she muttered, dread replaced by outright fear.
Viperion put his hand on Ladybug's shoulder, "It's going to be ok, we're going to find them. Do you have the whereabouts of any of the other heroes?"
Ladybug took a deep steadying breath and opened her yo-yo again. "No, there's only us three on the map anymore. I think Ryuko was close to the Seine, maybe the Pont de Arts, last I checked."
"Alright, we'll go there."
Pegasus withdrew his horseshoe and started pointing it, but Ladybug touched his arm and shook her head. "Save your powers, both of you. I have a bad feeling that we're going to need them."
The three of them arrived at the Pont de Arts a bit later. While it was getting late, it was still a Saturday evening in Paris, France. Normally the Pont de Arts was packed with people. Now, it was eerily quiet. Ladybug looked around, trying to find some evidence of what happened. Upriver, maybe half a block or so, was a park bench that looked like it had been slashed with a sword. "Ryuko," Ladybug muttered, running toward it. "Someone attacked her here. Viperion, this is going to sound strange… but you know how you're the snake, right?"
The corner of Viperion's mouth raised slightly. "Sass taught me, yes." He got to work fingering the splintered wood of the bench. His tongue poked out between his lips subtly, and he continued walking upriver. "The heat trail points in this direction. Her scent is fading too fast for me to follow."
The three ran in the direction Viperion had indicated. After a few blocks, Ladybug heard something. "Shh!" she warned, and they padded forward silently, Ladybug leaning into her ears. "It sounds like… crying. This way." Viperion nodded his agreement and they followed the street up to a deserted square. "Ryuko? Chat? Anyone?" Ladybug called.
"Don't come any closer!" Rena Rouge's voice warned, followed by a blood curdling scream.
"Second Chance!" Viperion activated, which triggered a primal protective instinct in Ladybug. She charged into the square, expecting to find the akuma behind a tree or something, but there was nothing.
"Huh," she queried, turning to see Pegasus and Viperion looking just as confused as she was.
"Run!" a tiny voice below her called. Ladybug looked down to see Mylène—maybe ten centimeters in height but missing her jump rope tail—racing at her with a panicked look. Something else was chasing after her.
Pegasus dropped to his knee, howling in pain. "Stop! Ow! Please, release me!"
A tiny voice, barely audible, hissed, "Tell me your secrets, or you will suffer!"
Pegasus writhed on the ground, lashing back and forth against the pain. "Stop! Stop! I… I… I don't really need glasses, ok? I just wear them to look smarter. Please let me go!"
"Tell me everything about you. All your secrets to success."
Ladybug looked over Pegasus and saw a tiny grey creature latched onto the back of his neck, with a thin pink rope wrapped around his throat. "Hang on, Pegasus!" she cried, as she grabbed hold and yanked. He screamed. The creature broke free but struggled against her grip. It was a person, Ladybug realized with horror. A tiny, grey person with a long wriggling pink tail.
The little thing wriggled from her grasp and charged up her arm toward her own neck. Ladybug shrieked as she clawed at the thing and managed to bat it away. She felt a crawling sensation on her leg and looked down to see another creature making its way up her body. She grabbed it and was able to make out small mouse-like features on it. Oh no. Mylène.
"Hang on, I'll save you," she croaked as she fought with the creature. The one she'd flung across the square had made it back to her and was pouncing. She hurled the one in her fist and tried to stop the second, but then a third showed up on her ankle, then a fourth and a fifth. Ladybug swatted, squirmed, shrieked, and fought in vain as she was swarmed by the fierce akumas.
A horrid, piercing pain caught her at the base of her skull. Her senses shut off—the world black and silent and scentless. Her brain rattled with a command that overwhelmed her.
Tell me your secrets.
"Stop! Please!" She fought with every ounce of strength she had.
Tell me your name.
It hurt. No—hurt wasn't strong enough of an expression. Her nerves had exploded, her blood must be erupting from every orifice, she must be dying. This must be death.
Tell me your name.
"I'm.. I'm Ma—"
A whisper, a quiet, distant voice she barely recognized from a life long past—"Cataclysm!"
Ladybug was free. She could see and feel again, like stepping into the light after an eternity underground. Her head suddenly clear, she recognized the other heroes around her, battling tiny grey creatures.
"There's still six of them," Ryuko yelled. The steel of her sword flashed as she sliced one away from Ladybug's leg—expertly avoiding her flesh.
"Mirage!" Rena Rouge's voice called, and suddenly there were more superheroes surrounding them. One of the tiny grey creatures pounced on a fake-Ladybug, who disappeared in smoke but clued them into the creature's whereabouts. Ryuko tore after that one with her sword.
"Get all the tails!" Chat hollered, and Ryuko nodded, slashing her sword down and divided the little pink tail with a sickening thud. The grey creature looked confused, then disintegrated.
"One down!" she cried in triumph.
Two more creatures were closing on Carapace. "Shell-ter!" he screamed, knocking the creatures back, but they landed on King Monkey. Monkey started screaming hysterically, swatting and batting at anything he could reach.
"Get them off me get them off me get them off me! UPROAR!" A squeaky toy landed in his hand just as Viperion screamed in pain.
"My name is Luka Couffaine! I'm the son of Anarka Couffaine and Jagged Stone! He doesn't know I'm his son—mum never told him!"
"Viperion!" Ladybug hollered, racing toward him.
The squeaky toy hit the back of Viperion's neck before Ladybug's yo-yo could. The akuma's power broke and it fell off. Ladybug grabbed the creature and yanked off the tail. "Four left!" she updated.
"Make that three!" Pegasus whooped from King Monkey's side.
Carapace's shield whizzed past Ladybug's face and she leapt back in surprise. It was targeting a creature racing up Rena Rouge's side, but it was too late. "I do know Ladybug's identity, and her name is—"
Viperion suddenly appeared next to her with the mini-akuma's tail in his hand. "Not this time," he muttered with satisfaction, but looked at Ladybug with unexpected warmth. "Two to go."
With no time to ponder his strange look, Ladybug cried, "Lucky Charm!" and a jar of molasses thudded in her hands. She rapidly surveyed her team. There were three little akumas left, but nobody was currently under attack. Chat, Rena Rouge, Carapace, and King Monkey had all used their powers. Viperion was also running out of time. She locked eyes with Pegasus and Ryuko, and the plan came to her. She tossed the bottle of molasses and it crunched on the pavement, splattering thick black goo all over the ground.
"Ryuko, time for a storm! Pegasus, right here!" The two nodded their understanding.
"Wind Dragon!"
"Voyage!"
Ladybug hooked her yo-yo to a light pole as a massive windstorm lifted her off her feet. The other heroes were holding on to trees, benches, and poles as best they could, with varying degrees of success. King Monkey rammed his jingu bang into the ground and held on; Viperion grabbed his tail. Rena Rouge had managed to lock her arms around a tree. Pegasus's portal opened just over the puddle of molasses. Chat Noir scrambled for Carapace but managed to get caught up in the windstorm with his friend. The two were lifted off the ground in a swirl of leaves and debris and—Ladybug's heart skipped a beat—tiny, blurred grey creatures. Once high enough off the ground, the wind directed everything into the upper half of the portal and they were transported to the puddle of molasses, where they landed with a squelching thud. Chat Noir and Carapace were able to make it back to their feet, but the tiny creatures were stuck to the mess. Together, Chat and Ladybug made quick work of removing the last two tails. As the final akuma disappeared, the dislodged tails zoomed together to form a single pink jump rope that wrapped around the non-akumatized Mylène, who grew to full height. She shook her head as the purple akuma winged into the sky.
"No more evil-doing for you," Ladybug panted. "Time to de-evilize; bye-bye little butterfly." The white butterfly was released and Ladybug looked over her battered team. "Miraculous Ladybug!"
Once the magic cleared the area, Ladybug forewent their traditional fist-bump and opted for a group hug around Mylène.
"I'm s-s-so s-s-sorry!" she wailed, her head in her hands.
"Please don't apologize," Ladybug consoled. "None of you. This is entirely my fault. I should have known you needed more training and time."
"No, Ladybug," Chat Noir reminded her firmly, "you told me once, and I'll remind you forever: This is Hawkmoth's fault. He's the only villain out there. He's the one using everyone's natural, normal concerns against them. I'm sorry we weren't better friends, Little Mouse, but you did nothing wrong."
Ladybug nodded and Mylène sniffled before making eye contact with the team again. "It was so, so strange. I've been akumatized before, and this was so different. Part of me was still me, but part of me wasn't. I had no control over the others. I tried to release multitude and stop them, but they attacked me as well. It was like he was in my brain-" Mylène shuddered, "-it's fuzzy, but...Ladybug, I think Hawkmoth might have gotten more information than what was said out loud." Ladybug nodded forlornly. Everyone looked at their shoes.
The group was silent with shock. "Does anyone know what he found out?" Ladybug tentatively asked. Seven heads nodded solemnly and a tear slipped down Mylène's cheek. "Alright, we'll discuss everything later this evening via chat." Ladybug turned to Mylène. "Thank you. This has got to be horrible for you. I'm sorry I brought you into this mess."
Chat Noir's ring started beeping the loudest. Viperion's transformation had already fallen.
Ladybug cleared her throat. "You all need to get home. Little Mouse? Hold on to the Miraculous for n ow, ok?" Mylène's smile was sweet and genuine as she nodded. The team huddled once more for a hug, and then split in different directions, except for Luka, who was gazing at Ladybug.
"Marinette. We need to talk."
Author's note: Phew! Not going to lie, this last week or two has been hard! I'm sure everyone is feeling effects of the pandemic right now, whether economic, mental, emotional, or physical. I sure am. I want desperately to write, but it's hard to get the creativity flowing when there's so much anxiety and new responsibility. I'm sorry if I can't update this as frequently as I would like. I waited to start posting until March, thinking that my school and family schedule would have relaxed a bit. Ha! As a full-time student with four kids, this has been very overwhelming. Aaaand now I'm just venting.
I wish you all a blessed weekend/week. Stay safe and healthy. Feel free to drop me a line, whether about the story or venting yourself. We all need each other right now. 3, Mommadon