So after a comment about my Dolphin Kwami name, Botlla the Bottle Noise Dolphin Kwami is no more, so let's give a warm welcome to Bolla, the Bottle Noise Dolphin Kwam!
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Ondine walked towards her home, trying not to act like she was as nervous as she was. After the talk with Melisa, hearing about the Seven she knew that she was being hunted now. And she could stop these villains from hurting a lot of people, her loved ones might be among them. And for that reason alone, she would fight and risk her life to protect her world.
"Don't worry too much kid, Melisa and I slipped up I admit it, but you keep quiet about everything and you'll be fine," Bolla said from within her pocket and Ondine smiled as she made it home. Looking around and not seeing the family car, she sighed and nodded as she saw nothing out of the ordinary.
Ondine opened her door and walked into her house, seeing a message note from her parents on a mirror in the hallway and smiled as she saw what was on it. Bolla came out and looked from Ondine to the note and shrugged. "I don't understand, that looks like nonsense to me."
"It's a code my parents and I made up, everything is fine, Mom and Dad will be back tomorrow night and mom left a meal for me in the fridge, but let's go and check on what she said you had for me," Ondine said with a smile and Bolla shrugged as they walked upstairs to Ondine's room.
As they passed photos on the wall, Bolla landed on Ondine's head as she walked up the stairs, sighing as she looked down at her wielder.
"Okay, it's like this. Since my first Chosen after Atlantis fell, they've all always used our 'pocket' to store stuff, being on the move, really helped us survive. I remember during the war against the Nazis we smuggled medical supplies all over the occupied territories!" Bolla said as she landed on Ondine's head and she smirked down at her ride.
Ondine almost nodded as she entered her room. Okay, that's something. I wonder what they put away, loose change, nick-nacks? Might be something to look into now, I have free time now. She thought and closed her doors and pulled down her room's shades. "Bolla, do you know everything that's been put away in there?"
"I…. no. I don't remember every little piece…. Want to check it out?" Bolla said with a grin that Ondine returned. "Great, now all you have to do is to will it to form on one of your gauntlets at the back, and that's also your tool glove until the next transformation. And to open the pocket, just point it down and it will fall down, drop the transformation once you're done, I want to see what I've been hoarding like that old Dragon!"
"Yeah, got it. Bolla, Let's dance in the water!" Ondine called out and Bolla shot into the chocker and Ondine transformed into her hero persona.
She looked around for a moment before looking at her right glove and saw a raised circular bangle on the back of it. She tilted her arm a bit and looked at it before she 'opened' her pocket and a moment later a veritable tide of coins, clothing and boxes dropped onto her floor. She blinked and detransformed, Bolla looking at all the stuff. It was as tall as Ondine and it was at least five feet around. Slowly Bolla turned towards Ondine and laughed weakly.
"I guess that there's a lot more stuff than I thought there was," Bolla said sheepishly and Ondine looked at the pile with her mouth open. She bent down and picked up a black dress her size with a slit down the side that would expose her breasts and navel.
Bolla looked at the dress and smiled a little. "Oh, that belonged to Melissa's teacher, she used it to get Intel from Nazis during the war. She would romance them, and if they were SSS, she would arrange their painful deaths in accidents she set up. If they stuck in it because of where they were born she helped them defect."
Ondine blinked and looked from the dress to Bolla and carefully put it down on her bed, looking at it and imagining herself in and blushed as a picture of Kim appeared dressed formally in a tuxedo. As she looked at the coins she bent down suddenly and whistled as she held up a grey coin, paling as she saw the faces on it.
"This is from Rome…." Ondine said faintly and Bolla nodded, looking at it with a fond smile.
"Yeah, after my holder stole me and my friends from the people who made the Seven, we found an old fortress and a hidden treasure that the old commander had squirreled away in case of Rome being destroyed. There were a few weapons and maps to a safe haven that we hide at until the Seven tracked us down. Most of the money we used, but we put a few coins away for an emergency fund," Bolla said sadly and Ondine shook her head in awe. With how rare those coins were, if she could find a way to sell a few of them at an auction then her family would be set for years.
Ondine looked at a small chest and opened it, revealing a set of bracers with red gemstones on them.
"Nice, those were used in the Days of Magic by blacksmiths to handle the heat of the forge, they couldn't be used in deserts because they stopped working after four hours," Bolla said and Ondine looked at her before laughing as she went towards the other items before she stopped.
"Say, how about we get some supper, we can go through this latter and put most of it away, we can just separate what we know from what we don't when I open the bag, right?" Ondine asked and Bolla nodded.
"Yeah, I think so. Can we have fish? I might love lettuce but I like fish too," Bolla asked and Ondine laughed and nodded. As they left the room, the pile of stuff shifted and a golden chest with strange rigid runes on it, and as they glinted in the light of the room a strange golden glow formed around it for a few moments before dying away.
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Chloe sighed as she sat in her room, a thousand different thoughts going through her head as she looked across the skyline of the city. As Pollen moved around the flowers Chloe had set up after the first time she had transformed she wondered how she should handle this. She knew a lot of what she had done over the last years was wrong, but she had reasons!
She looked out the window, she had a lot of reasons to have been acting the brat, but looking back, she didn't have a leg to stand on once she had her epiphany about who she wanted to be. She looked towards her laptop and smiled, at least her novel was coming along nicely. With luck Marinette would accept her apology and then well, the future was open to them. And she needed to do this, before what she feared would happen.
With her father and mother spending more time together she didn't know how much longer until her mother got roped into her father's plan to drum up sponsors or get numbers in the polls, once she got fed up and left again, Chloe knew she had to clear the air with Marinette before that happened. She would need their help to stay on the right path, not fall back into the wrong habits that she needed to break.
"It'll be okay my queen," At Pollen's voice, Chloe looked at the Kwami and smiled. Last night the two of them had a long talk, Chloe had laid her soul bare to the little creature and sighed.
"Thanks, Pollen," Chloe said as she leaned back and tried to keep calm. She had been on an emotional roller coaster since they had come back from New York. What she had learned, and then that time she was stuck with a therapist in one of the hotel's elevators during a five hour Akuma attack, she knew what she wanted but to start to heal, she needed to apologize to Marinette and ask her for help, hell she had to ask everyone for help. And she just knew that Adrien will be completely happy to help, and he was trying to say that she was really making more of an effort than she really was.
A knocking on her door to the outside caused Chloe to smile as Marinette walked in and Tikki flew over to Pollen, the two zipping away to talk quietly as Chloe looked down and away as Marinette walked closer with a scowl. "Sorry Marinette."
Marinette blinked and shook her head, she was sure that she had heard Chloe but that didn't sound like she had.
"What?" Marinette asked and Chloe looked back at her and tears came to her eyes.
"I'm sorry okay?! I'm sorry about how I acted, how I treated you and everything I did in school! I tried to make my mom love me, I acted like her and she hated people from mix race families so I just!" Chloe began and looked away as tears came to her eyes. "And all that effort was worthless, the bitch doesn't love me, she'll never love anyone at all!"
"Chloe…." Marinette said and sighed and looked away. So that's what this is about, I wasn't expecting this. But she's might be trying to change, and that explains a lot….. wait no, that means. That makes sense. Marinette thought as she blinked and s few things crystallized for her. "I'm going to be honest, you've been a brat, when you pulled the fire alarm on my dad and everyone was punished I almost hated you, and when you locked Juleka away during Picture day with her 'curse'…" Marinette began but Chloe blinked and looked back, her mouth open in shock.
"Wait, Juleka thought she was under a curse, how!?" Chloe demanded and Marinette looked at her and winced.
"Photo curse, and well it lasted a year," Marinette said and Chloe's eyes widened and looked away, cursing as she remembered why she had really did what she did back then.
"Fuck, and my attack on Bustier got her Akumatized, that tracks. When I try and get her to be fired I really misfired that time, didn't I?" Chloe muttered and massaged her eyes, Marinette looked shocked and her mouth dropped open as she processed what Chloe admitted.
"Wait….. 'Attack on Bustier'?" Marinette demanded and Chloe blushed and looked away as Marinette's eyes shrank as suddenly she looked at a lot of what Chloe had done over the years and suddenly understood a lot of things about Chloe.
Chloe looked away as the Kwami flew closer and Pollen scowled. "My queen told me all about this sub-leader your school hive group has, with the way she spoke of her, I'm surprised that she even breathes right, she and the other."
"She isn't that bad…. Okay, she puts a lot of work on Marinette, she punishes the victim, and…..why was I trying to defender her again?" Tikki asked as she started to frown and Marinette looked up at her Kwami and then looked at Chloe in shock as she realized something.
"Oh god. All this time, for the last year you've been trying to get her to act as a teacher, should, even before Adrien came?!" Marinette said, Chloe just looked away and sighed.
"You know how she treats her class president, don't you? Did you think how it was is even a little normal?" Chloe asked and Marinette nodded, how she was supposed to plan all the trips, even if they were for education. Caline Bustier said it was for college applications and the like, but Marinette didn't think so, and given the looks she had seen the other presidents send her, she knew that something was wrong.
"Yes at first, but with looks the others sent me, but they never said anything… did she do something?" Marinette asked and Chloe nodded grimly.
"The Owl made it legal to let the teacher decide what duties the class president would have and said teacher must sign off on anything the president does. And the laws say the principal has total control of the school but must follow the rule set up for situations like yours. But the duties are his to assign soooooo," Chloe trailed off and shrugged as Marinette shook her head in disgust.
"So the reason you didn't do anything was because she always blocked you if you didn't do her job for her?!" Marinette demanded and Chloe nodded with a scowl on her face.
"Yeah, I don't understand that woman at all! I know that teachers need to lead the class, she's trying to train all of us into her ideals of what people should be!" Chloe said with a snarl and Marinette went still as Tikki started to frown.
Marinette looked back at everything she thought she remembered the time she had spent as the Class's representative and the looks some of the other representatives had sent her when they thought she hadn't been looking. That Aurora had time to be a weather girl at the TV station and been a representative as well, well Chloe was probably right.
"So let's drop that for now, the reason you attacked me with your remarks and trying to order me around was that you were trying to act like your mother?" Marinette asked and Chloe nodded with a look of shame on her face.
"Yeah, and I think deep down, I was jealous of you. Your parents always made time for you, they love you and they support you, dad means well but he did raise me, he bought things for me. Mom left for New York the first chance she had, and I….. she cheated on dad," Chloe said and Marinette's jaw dropped.
"Wait, what?!" Marinette asked and Chloe looked away as Pollen hovered and nuzzled her cheek.
"Or mom and dad decided to each me and my sister separately. I met her in New York on the second to last day there…. I decided to surprise mom at her office there and I overheard people talking about how the daughter was visiting, how she was such a nice person when her mother was away," Chloe said robotically.
Marinette winced and looked away, a strange feeling going through her, not pity but something else she couldn't identify. "But you've never been to New York before the trip."
"Yeah, so I hide and saw my mother and a girl our age walk out with the Queen of Fashion, hug her, and then walk away, with mother walking back in moments later. I followed her until she discovered me, confronted me and it was only when I showed her a few pictures with my dad that she believed me that I was who I said," Chloe said and looked uncomfortable at this. "Get this, she thought it was an open marriage with my dad!"
"no….." Marinette breathed and Chloe nodded and looked sick.
"Yeah. The story of how she saw a few of our mother's hookups when she was drunk off her ass caused her to start to question everything. And after that we started to talk, turns out she was at a boarding school for years, she was only with her because the school had an infestation," Chloe said and Marinette looked at her, feeling strangely proud of how Chloe had reacted to this girl. And looking back, she could see how a lot of what Chloe had done was just her trying to act like her mother and what memories the girl had of her.
"So that's why you stopped acting like a queen bitch after the New York trip, you decided to what?" Marinette asked and Chloe sighed and looked away.
"Stop chasing approval from the witch who sired me," Chloe said and looked up and sighed, smiling at Pollen who kept nuzzling her. "And the reason I was so silent these last few weeks was I was just living, trying to understand who I am and what I want out of my life."
"Oh, Chloe," Marinette said as she sighed and shook her head. I always thought she was just a brat, but I knew something was wrong once I met her mother. And that bitch, how could someone even treat her children like that, not to mention her husband? Marinette thought and Chloe grinned.
"Mom is a bitch, I've accepted it and that was hard. She was my idol, the inspiration for everything I did for so long…. But that's not who I want to be, I want to be a better person," Chloe said and Marinette looked at Chloe who looked away.
"Chloe…." Marinette said and Chloe grinned back.
"Don't worry Mari-Bug, I'm good really. I feel lighter, I think I'll be okay," Chloe said and Marinette sighed and looked at Chloe for a few moments. "I needed to tell you so I could start to heal, at least according to the therapist I talked to."
Marinette had interacted with Style Queen three times, and she might think of her as a person to admire as a Fashion Icon, she didn't like her as a person. She sat there and held up a hand, just thinking for a few moments as Tikki landed on her shoulder as Pollen hovered next to Chloe.
"I can understand why you did with her as a role model, but I won't forget what you did. And if I see you backsliding I will tell you," Marinette said and Chloe grinned back.
"I was going to ask, I just…. I need to relearn everything. So on a separate subject, think the Ministry will come to the school soon about what Lila did to you?" Chloe asked and Marinette shrugged.
Marinette looked at Chloe as she gathered her thoughts and sighed. "Hard to say, I mean I hope? They haven't gotten back to us yet but with the papers filled by our lawyer, I think they'll react soon. And I just know Lila will make a stink about it."
"Yeah, I can see that. But me, Sabrina and Alya shoot a great video and I can't wait to see how that false fox reacts to it and what she tries!" Chloe said with a savage grin and Marinette grinned back.
If there was one thing that both of them had in common, it was to see someone who deserved it pay. Of course, they used to have different ideas of who, but this time they were both on the same target.
"I know what you mean, I'm almost sorry that I won't see it. Think Markov will record it if I ask?" Marinette asked causing Chloe to grin and giggle as Marinette looked at Chloe, part of her shocked that they were bonding like this.
"Send an email to ask, you better go I'm calling my sister in a bit, see what's happening in New York," Chloe said and Marinette nodded as Tikki hugged Pollen.
"Have a good show on Monday Chloe," Marinette said as she turned to the balcony and paused looking at Chloe over her shoulder. "What's your sister's name?"
"Zoe," Chloe said and shrugged at Marinette's reaction. "Yeah, mom sure knows how to name them doesn't she?"
Marinette laughed a little. "No, Tikki Spots on!"
As Chloe watched Marinette turned into Ladybug and smiled before she jumped away. As she jumped back towards her home she never looked back, if she had she might have seen Hawkmoth and Mayura jumping from roof to roof just beyond the hotel, the three of them never having noticed the others as they all went about their business.
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An Italian woman with short brown hair dressed in a grey power suit walked into an apartment, closing the door silently behind her as she sighed. Her job at the embassy had kept her from her home much more than she would like, but then again what did she have to do otherwise, spend time with it? After what she planned to do, it just wasn't a good idea to get attached to that parasite, it helped that it was colored like that bastard and well, she had done this all before so why change something that worked?
As the woman walked into the kitchen she saw Lila sitting at a table eating some food as she worked on a paper not noticing her coming into the room. The woman raised a hand as it was covered in black energy and suddenly Lila went still and her eyes glowed black as she looked towards the woman.
"Report, what's been happing since the last time I was able to do this," The woman barked and Lila stared ahead robotically before replying.
"Personality shell has followed directives; Directive 2; Isolate Marinette Dupain-Cheng; directive followed. Marinette has been framed and expelled by actions taken by shell personality. Directive 3; Become Model Modeling with Agreste fashions with the deal with Gabriel Agreste to protect son Adrien Agreste from unworthy friends; attempt to do so by framing Marinette Dupain-Cheng as being someone out to use him, failed ended with Adrien throwing unit into Seine river. Directive 6; Gain Hawkmoth's trust; done by trying to expel Marinette Dupain-Cheng to Akumatize her and class, plan worked but failed do to an unknown variable on Hawkmoth's end," Lila droned out and the woman looked at her and started to chuckle that turned into a haughty laugh that was full with evil and vicious glee.
"Perfect, perfect! Once you've gotten close enough to figure out who Hawkmoth is, we strike ad kill him, take these Mira-whatever they are and then kill Gina and mindwipe Gina's granddaughter into my new handmaiden! All in all, this is perfect!" The woman cackled as Lila stared into nothingness. After a few moments the woman stopped cackling and looked at Lila with a hard glare before her hands both glowed white and Lila's head was engulfed by the same white glow. Hmmm, the remains of the original personality is almost completely dead, good. All I need to do is keep up with the plan, have an 'accident' once this doll has a big enough following and then 'Lila' will be an orphan with a trust fund and the public eye! She thought with a grin and almost started to laugh again but took a deep breath and smiled as she walked past Lila and turned a TV on to the news channel, Nadja on screen.
"….And this one picture was the only thing that was recoverable from the broken camera, whoever this woman is we have no idea, as The Heroes of Paris have made no comment on them at this time, but this reporter fears that this is the start of a new terror," Nadja said on screen as a picture of Nekhbet attacking News Jahrl appeared and the woman gasped.
"That can't be….. one of them is in Paris!? Why…. What could…no! They must be here for them! No, this place is my hunting ground! It's been mine ever since those Thule fools were thrown during the liberation!" The woman snarled and slammed a fist against the table and Lila just sat there without reacting to anything as the woman walked around the room and fumed.
She held her face and massaged her eyes as she went over a hundred different plans, thinking about what she could do and then scowled as she remembered that she lost her best hunter to Gina! "That bitch, why can't she ever understand, those things are but food for the strong! So some of them can work with them, and ascend that way but they lose so much of their power to it, and the beasts! The fact that Dragons are dead let them
As the woman raged Lila kept still, not reacting at all. The woman calmed down after a few moments and looked around the room, walking to a cupboard and grabbing a bottle of wine.
"Okay, work through this, you can figure it out," She said as she got a glass out of another cupboard and poured some wine into it. "Stay away, you've still got a lot of time until you can jump, you just need to keep to the plan, you can do this."
She sighed and drank the wine, letting the taste calm her down. Everything was going well for her, the trust she had set up long ago for her first 'daughter' was still going strong, she had added a fortune of scammed money and she had returned to Paris, and the harvest was going okay, better with the raw magic from Ladyslut as Lila called her.
As she walked to the windows she looked out as Hawkmoth and Mayura landed on the building across the way with two shapes following them. She blinked for a few moments and then turned robotically and walked to a locked cabinet, opened it with a key she wore as a necklace and opened it to reveal small figurines that could fit into a hand. She picked up a black bat, walked to the window chanting something before she opened the window and threw the figurine out it.
It glowed black and became a black stone bat that flew in the direction Hawkmoth and Mayura had gone and the woman sighed and shook her head. "Okay, Hawkmoth and Mayura just went by me, this is good. This will give me some intel to use to take over their power, all I have to do now is wake her up….."
Suddenly her phone started to ring and she sighed. "Of course, three things all at once."
As she took it out she looked at her smartphone and sighed as she saw it was the embassy. Turning it on she activate speaker mode and sighed. "This is Dolores Rossi, talk."
"Miss Rossi, sorry to bother you but the meeting was pushed up, something about problems back home for one of the parties involved. It's now about ten tomorrow night, sorry boss, but the ambassador said you don't need to be in until nine at night to make up for it sooo…" The voice said and Dolores Rossi sighed and shook her head. Of course, the perfect end to a perfect day. Okay, I'm not close enough to start the 'downward slope' yet, I need to do this. I can tell Lila to continue and make sure Marinette stays expelled, then once I jump I'll say I found a diary, it will say that Marinette saw through 'me' and that's why 'I' did everything to get her expelled. Once she's back Lila will try and be a friend to her. Dolores thought and she nodded after a few moments.
"Yeah, thanks. I'll rest and see you tomorrow night, but I better get overtime for this. Oh, and I want a paid day off next week or lunch so I can have it with my daughter!" She said sternly and a gulp was heard from the phone.
"I'll see what I can do boss, but that's not up to me. See you tomorrow night!" Her assistant said as he hurriedly hung up.
"Okay, I can deal with this, I can really. Everything is still perfect," Dolores said and sighed as she put her head against the wall. I can cast all my spells to reinforce the bot in that empty head this Tuesday, I just need to get through tomorrow and hope the so-called heroes don't find out what I'm doing and Gina never sees me. She thought as she walked into the kitchen and started to clean up, putting the glass into the dishwasher and the bottle of wine away.
Smiling she looked around and laughed when she saw she left the cabinet with all her creations open, rookie mistake. If she had made one of those back during Paris's occupation then the Thule would have bound her like so many of her fellows, but then she always kept her things away from where she lived.
She closed the cabinet and almost walked away before she paused and started to clean up the signs that she had been there before her daughter even knew and after a few moments she was done and walked towards the front door and opened it before she broke her spell on Lila.
Lila looked up as the door closed and she looked towards the hallway and moments later Dolores walked into the room, smiling at Lila.
"Mom, hey! How was your day?" Lila asked and Dolores smiled at her.
"Not too bad, I'll need to leave for a meeting at ten tomorrow night so I'll be sleeping away the day tomorrow, you okay to handle yourself? I promise a nice day out next week!" Dolores said and Lila smiled, but her eyes were dark and Dolores could see that the personality was trying to find a way to use that knowledge to her advantage. She hid a smirk, at least when she moved into her new body, so she wouldn't have to act too differently when she jumped.
Lila looked at her mother and tried to keep a good face, but inside she was mad. Her mother was always 'working' and she couldn't spare anytime at all to spend with her. Still, time apart let her build her skills, grow her empire and with her mother always on her side, if the school or anyone emailed 'her mother' it was easy to send something back herself without even bothering her oh so busy mother.
"That's great mom! School has been pretty good lately, nothing to say that's been different," Lila said and Dolores looked at her with a carefully crafted look of worry.
"What about that girl who's been bullying you, do I need to talk to your teacher about it," Dolores asked and Lila fidgeted and Dolores waited, wondering how Lila would spin what she had done.
"She's been expelled, I don't want to talk about how she acted when the decision was made," Lila said softly and Dolores smiled at her.
"Okay baby, say with the time how about we order some takeout and watch a movie together?" Dolores asked and Lila grinned and nodded.
As Dolores got up and turned away she never noticed Lila switch off a recording device built into her pen, a recorder that had listened in on everything Dolores had commanded Lila to report to her, and Lila would find the words once she listened to her notes.
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Hawkmoth looked around the stadium as Mayura stood next to him, waiting for anything to happen. When they had made it to the stadium they had sent the Sentimonster they had brought with them, a creature called Eye Hound, ahead with orders to patrol around them. It was a black blocky robotic dog with sensors on its back and a searchlight that moved around independently as it circled its maker and controller, the flashlight in Hawkmoth's hand clenched tightly as they waited. Hawkmoth kept one eye on the light and his other on Mayura, not liking how she was breathing heavily as they waited.
"Think this might just be a trap, they might have planned everything from the attack, we could be surrounded for all we know," Mayura muttered and Hawkmoth nodded, his thoughts following hers.
As Hawkmoth looked around and tried to find any signs of that being the case a laugh came from above them. As the two reacted and took combat stances, Hawkmoth willed his Sentimonster to shine its light towards the top and there, standing on the edge of the coverings on the roof stood Nekhbat looking down at them with a figure standing behind her just within sight but hidden in the darkness.
"You came, after all, my friend here thought you might not!" Nekhbat called down and Hawkmoth and Mayura glared up as their Sentimonster looked at them and growled, its lights locked onto her as it flawed its paws, its claws gripped the ground as it readied itself to lunge at anything that it was sent at.
"I thought that they wouldn't trust us, but then I expected there was a chance that they might have come," A hard male voice came from the other figure and Hawkmoth glared upwards.
"You are in my city, and I would have your measure first before anything else!" Hawkmoth barked and she nodded and laughed as she and the figure jumped down and landed before them within arms reach.
The second figure was wearing a black bodysuit with light blue accents on the arms and legs in the shape of lightning bolts. The bodysuit had a certain reptilian appearance to it and the black helmet that covered all but the figure's face head had two horns that split in three at the end that formed exactly above where the eyes were and two blue saber fangs from the sides of his mouth, over his right shoulder was the handle of a sword with the head of what looked like a black reptilian face like the helmet at the end of the handle. The man bowed and offered a hand to Hawkmoth.
"Greeting Sir Hawkmoth, currently I am Thunder Lord; but only when I'm dual-wielding of course," Thunder Lord said and Hawkmoth frowned and looked at him, trying to find the other Miraculous he used but finding none. Thunder Lord smirked and laughed as he looked at Hawkmoth. "Can't find them, can you? Well, they're here, but they're hidden from sight, a trick we've learned over the years."
"How many years, you don't seem much older than my foes!" Hawkmoth said causing the two to laugh and shake their heads as he willed the Sentimonster to look at them, and for the others to move closer.
"Another little trick, and we have much we could offer you if you prove you deserve it," Thunder Lord said and Hawkmoth kept his ire down and looked at him,
"And what do you want?" Hawkmoth asked taking the lead as Mayura watched the two newcomers.
As she looked at them she kept looking around, trying to find any hint that anyone else was here. As she looked around the darkened stadium, she never say anything,
"Our needs are something that we can handle on our own good sir, we are….. hear to give gifts. Our group has lost a few members to other wielders over the years….. so for our campaigns in new lands we speak to others like us who were there before us, so there are no problems between us," Thunder Lord said and looked at Hawkmoth with a grin
"Like what, what could you offer me to let you stay in my city?" Hawkmoth asked as he looked at the two before him. He remembered what Nekhbat had done to his Akuma today, and the fact that she had allies was bothering him more than he
"How about our first offering? The translation of the so-called Order of the Guardian's language that they use in their books, not something that's worth being much but for a limited value. After all, they've been going longer than we've had this power, and what books that are still around harder to find than a copy of a 1st Edition Gutenberg Bible," Thunder Lord said and grinned at Hawkmoth and Mayura who kept silent as their Sentimonster moved around them. "I'm sure whatever scraps of knowledge you found with what you use it will help you go farther with your power."
"And a way to repair yours, if you push the little spirit too far… that's a problem for us sometimes and I'm sure you know what I mean," Nekhbat said and it took everything Hawkmoth had to react, Mayura's eyes almost went wide but she kept calm but started to breathe a tiny bit heavier.
Nekhbat stayed silent as she watched Hawkmoth and Mayura try not to react, but to her, it was as if they were screaming at the top of their lungs. So that was why they want those two, a ritual using the Power of Destruction and Creation to heal? I wonder, is there something special that can only be done with them? She thought as she watch their hosts try and not react.
"Damaged Miraculous….. that can happen?" Mayura asked and Nekhbat giggled and hid her mouth.
"Please, I can see your Miraculous is damaged from here. The skin is a dead giveaway my dear. Given that you aren't in a coma you've not reached that point yet, if you had we couldn't heal you as easily," Thunder Lord said and both Hawkmoth and Mayura looked at him with even faces, keeping their emotions from their faces. They both stayed silent, each waiting for him to offer the 'carrot', he had to have mentioned the damage.
"Of course, there are ways to wake that person up," Nekhbat said and Hawkmoth looked at her with an even stare.
"Oh really? The few things the Kwami I control told me, the fact that a Miraculous could be damaged and repaired was not one of them," Hawkmoth said and Thunder Lord grinned.
"They didn't did they? Well, the order kept a lot of information from them so any rouge users such as us couldn't force it out of them. And the spells, my good sir the spells they would cast on the Kwami, truly sickening my friend! And then there was how they tried to set the course of history by their own beliefs, my god the audacity!" Thunder Lord said and Hawkmoth just looked at him as Mayura listened in with a raised eyebrow. Perfect, now I just need to bring it home. With him feeling indebted to us, we can start to set up for the 'blast. Once we harvest at least a third of all that wonderful energy, we can use it to create a wonderful beast, and with the other harvesters we've set up at the other spots, our grand plan can truly begin. As Thunder Lord thought about how he would fool Hawkmoth, Nekhbat meanwhile looked at the two they had come to bargain with.
Nekhbat knew that she shouldn't say anything, but something about how Mayura reacted caused her mind to run in strange places, regrets that she still had from years ago. Once before, when she had been traveling only with Lust during the last war in Europe, the two of them had found rumors of someone who had been stealing from Nazis and they had thought to team up with her, but they discovered she used a damaged Miraculous. They knew the dangers and sought to help her but they had only caught up with her after a SS Super had defeated her, the two of them had killed him and his unit before they could play with her but not before the wielder had fallen into a coma and stayed like that until she passed on.
"I keep Paris clean for my plans," Hawkmouth said and locked eyes with Thunder Lord. "I have chased out all the other supers who would dare to try and use this place for their schemes, and most other violent criminals. One of the most successful times was when I use my powers was to break a human trafficking ring and gave them to the police."
"Good for you, slavers deserve to die in fire," Thunder Lord said and smiled at Hawkmoth who barely kept a straight face.
Mayura looked between Nekhbat and Thunder Lord, the two of them both had both felt a spark of joy, was that something they could use against them.
"Your operations, what will they be?" Hawkmoth asked and Thunder Lord looked thoughtful for a few seconds.
"Well, I must admit one of the others has been here for a few months now, our Lady of Lust. She likes to stay in the background, plan until she has every angle she can see covered before she moves in for the kill, but never against the wishes of our host. Now Greed, he likes to take over gambling in the underground where ever we set up, but Sloth will stay silently in the shadows, let his brain do the work and hire minions to rob a bank or something like that if the mode strikes him. Wraith likes to challenge the greatest fighters around and Envy will mostly steal any jewels, paintings, or things that catches his eyes," Thunder Lord said and Hawkmoth kept his face blank as he went over the many ways this could go wrong, but he couldn't see anything that might hurt his chances.
"I want the Ladybug and Black cat Miraculous, if you take them down and keep them, we will have problems," Hawkmoth said and Thunder Lord drew his sword, the hilt glowed and a book fell out as Nekhbat came forward and handed over a small pouch to Mayura.
"This is the spell to fix your Miraculous, and the pouch has what will heal your partner. All she has to do is break the jewel in her hands then she has to crush the egg while thinking of being healed. When it works, we'll talk about any more we might trade with you," Thunder Lord said and Nekhbat grinned.
"We have an accord for now, if things change we will talk, hard," Hawkmoth said and Thunder Lord nodded.
"Of course, watch out for the Dolphin Hero, her power lets her reverse the ability of anything she touches, and if you get her down we'd like that one," Thunder Lord said and Hawkmoth nodded, a strange feeling of understanding passing between them.
Mayura called the Sentimonster back to them as they turned and walked away, leaving Thunder Lord and Nekhbat behind them.
"Maybe next time I'll see you're pretty skin without the blue!" Nekhbat called out as the two empowered humans disappeared down the tunnel. Smirking she turned to Thunder Lord who grinned back at her.
"We did it," He said and she started to laugh as they turned and jumped up to the rooftops. Nekhbat threw her arms around him and he kissed her on the lips, she moaned as she closed her eyes. "My Bloody Beauty, with this we will rule!"
"Yes, but why do they want those two? I mean our little slaves never told us anything special about them, maybe we should ask them," She purred as she hugged him and he laughed and smiled.
"We should head back and wait for the others. We have the time until it happens, and then we will have enough mana to rule over the whole world!" Thunder Lord declared and she started to laugh, he joined in.
"I think beloved that we should look into why he wants those two jewels, after all, we just need him to not bother us until we can finish our plans, we don't need him afterward, and his jewel would be something for Lust. Or maybe the dead woman walking one, more monsters for the monster maker?" She purred and Thunder Lord looked at her and grinned back before they kissed each other. "Let's go have some fun back at the base lover."
Nekhbat smirked at Thunder Lord and walked towards the edge with a swing in her step and he grinned back and laughed, running at her and picking her up and he jumped to the next building, running as he landed he didn't break stride to kiss her as she snuggled against him.
They never noticed a black stone bat hiding on the roof before it took flight and flew away in the direction of Lila's apartment, and moments after it left a black metal owl, flew away from its own hiding place behind an air unit on the roof and after its creators, Hawkmoth and Mayura.
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Ondine sighed as she walked into her room as Bolla swam through the air, a smile on her small face as she licked her lips, savoring the aftertaste of their shared supper. "That was great and it was beer battered? That's the word right?"
"Yeah, I hope you don't want that to recharge with!" Ondine said with a laugh and Bolla shook her head.
"And give up my lattice, never!" Bolla said as she put her hands over her chest.
Ondine grinned at her friend and looked at the pile and sighed as she shook her head. "Okay, how should we do this? Split everything into piles, this way we'll know how to separate everything once we put it back?"
"Better than a mess right?" Bolla asked as she dove into the pile and came out holding three coins.
"Good idea. Let's put all the items together with others like it, coins, clothes, and boxes," Ondine said as they started to work on the pile, slowly separating everything.
As Ondine was moving a pile of coins towards where Bolla had put the first few, she saw the golden box. Stopping as she worked she felt drawn to it and dropped the coins, startling Bolla who looked up and followed Ondine's gaze and saw the box, giving off a squeal of delight she shot towards it as Ondine blinked, realizing what she had done. She felt dizzy for a few seconds and held her head as Bolla looked over the box.
"This was from Atlantis, I didn't even know I had this!" Bolla said with glee as she tried to phase through the box only to bump into it. "Offf!"
"Are you okay, I thought Melissa said that you could pass through objects!" Ondine exclaimed and Bolla nodded.
"Only the Mage's creations….wait. this was made by Father!" Bolla said with a laugh as she flew around it and started to laugh. "Open it, open it!"
"Father?!" Ondine demanded and Bolla laughed.
"The Mage who created the Miraculous, open it please!" Bolla said as she looked at Ondine and made kitten eyes at her. Ondine smiled and opened it, revealing a strange double pyramid-shaped white gemstone. She touched it and a hologram her size appeared above them of a man with tanned skin, blue eyes, and short white hair wearing a golden robe with a circlet of obsidian around his forehead appeared, he was smiling down at them and Bolla grinned harder.
"Hello my little water dancer," The hologram said and Ondine frowned, his lips weren't following his words. Bolla only looked on and tears came to her eyes.
"Father!" She whispered as she cried, Ondine looked up and saw at the Mage, and realized that he was responsible for bringing the Kwami into the world and all the horrors and wonders that came with them.
"If I'm right, then you'll be seeing this when you're alone with your new wielder, just starting out with your new partnership….. I don't know how to say this carefully so I'll be quick. A Convergence will happen in that city after the next Day of Wraith, and it will happen again," The Mage said and Bolla's whole body went white as she dropped to the floor.
"No, a Day!? I thought that the bindings kept that from happening!?" Bolla cried as she looked at the hologram with terror in her eyes as Ondine looked on with surprise and the Mage nodded.
"The bindings have been destroyed by time, ignorance, and bigotry. I'm sorry but your team will have to find many of the old things that remake them, but you will only be able to find everything after the Day," The Mage said solemnly and Bolla looked up and whimpered as the Mage looked down at her. "The mission will be hard, difficult and because of others waking up, I can't see everything."
"Oh dad," Bolla muttered as she looked up at the hologram.
"But I have faith in all of you, you will be able to handle this problem. When all of my children are together and unmerge, then will my final message be revealed. I love you all," The Mage said as the hologram disappeared. Bolla looked at where her father's message had been before turning towards Ondine and with a scared look on her face.
"We need to contact the others, fast! A Day is coming, you have to tell them that, you have to!" Bolla exclaimed and Ondine felt out of her depth, wondering what was causing her friend to feel such fear.
"What is it, what is a Day of Wraith?" Ondine asked and Bolla looked at her and swallowed, before speaking slowly and as she listened, Ondine started to feel terror that caused her legs to fail her and she dropped to the floor, her arms holding her up as she shook in fear and worry.
"It's a day when the planet cleanses itself, every wound the Earth has taken will be healed. Earthquakes, Hurricanes and before it there will be a Convergence, a wellspring of pure Mana, what powers magic, will shoot up into the atmosphere and then the Day happens with a month of the Convergence," Bolla said and Ondine looked at her little friend, trying to wrap her head around just what she just heard.