So make sure to check out my profile for a link to Nino's Peacock uniform! It's going to become relevant this chapter!

Airin: Ahh, sí la pregunta que todo mundo tiene: ¿Qué le pasa a la Cura? Pues lo único que yo voy a revelar es que tendrás tu respuesta pronto. Y sí, la consecuencias serán peores antes que se desaparezcan. Pues ahora, ¡aquí tienes el quinto capítulo para disfrutar! :D

Chapter 5

He'd really screwed up.

Ten minutes of trying to open the rear doors of his prison left him with sore fingers and a distinct panic that suddenly made him claustrophobic. There was no latch for him to pull. The doors seamlessly melded into the truck's floor. This had to be some kind of safety violation— what if someone's kid ended up trapped inside a moving truck?— but then again, if anybody could afford a specially-modified truck that would keep everything locked tight during transport it would be Gabriel Agreste.

Nino rested his head on his knees. Backpack on the floor, back against the wall, he felt every bump on the road rattling his bones. Dust swirled inside the truck like a storm cloud, and Nino sniffled every time he bumped into anything. For the umpteenth time, he wiped his nose on his wrist and checked his phone.

Twenty minutes since partaking in the dumbest decision of his life.

Locking his phone, he was left in relative darkness. He'd been lucky that his wayward stumbling in the dark led him to three lamps with still, functioning light bulbs. The light was enough to give the inside of the truck a grim blanket of light that reached the center of the room and Nino's shoes. That was as good as it would get.

Nino turned his phone over in his hand. Could he call his parents? Alya?

Adrien?

Shame heated his face. Nino pocketed his phone and bowed his head. The conversation replayed in his head like an embarrassing home movie. Try as he might, though, he couldn't recall what exactly was said. However, sometime between the second right turn of the truck and a stoplight, Nino had realized what may have caused Adrien to shut down so vehemently.

Nino had thrown the possibility of him keeping the ring. Maybe not forever— Nino's capacity for any long-term plans was shot the moment Radiance had descended on the club— but the threat had still been there. It was no secret that Chat Noir considered himself Ladybug's shield. There was no shield with no ring.

Chat Noir protected Ladybug just as Nino wanted to protect Adrien.

Was it worth it when Adrien was getting injury after injury? At this point, with whatever was happening with the Cure, Nino had more protection than the kid in the magical cat suit.

Nino stared long and hard at the antiques lined up against the wall. Furniture rattled, bumped against each other, vying for the attention of people that would never come to take them home.

They were useless. No one wanted them. The best of the best were back at the fashion show, getting dusted and outfitted with starting prices. Nino was stuck with the rejects. Already the dust began to settle over his clothes and hair.

"Serves me right," he said in Arabic. French was too public. If Chat Noir decided to pop up, knowing Nino couldn't handle getting out of such a dumb situation by himself, then he wouldn't be able to hear how badly he'd messed up. "I wouldn't take the help of someone who locked himself in a truck."

The more he sat there, trapped by such a mundane thing, the more he wondered if he could help as much as he'd claimed back at Adrien's tent. Jardin des Plantes had been big enough for him to move around virtually undetected with whoever Araignée had beef with trapped in the museum. What if next time an akuma threw him somewhere with a lock?

No wonder Adrien didn't want his help.

Nino grabbed his phone but didn't bother to check the time. If there was a new text message from Adrien, he wouldn't have the heart to read it. If there wasn't one at all… Nino didn't know how he would feel about that one. Best friend learned your secret identity, gave a heart-wrenching speech, and you didn't dignify that with a follow-up text? That was a low blow.

The truck made a sharp turn, the screech of tires loud enough to penetrate the metal walls of the truck. Nino huddled against the wall as the armoires creaked. He shot an arm out to steady himself and keep the drawers next to him from crushing his legs. A vanity mirror fell and clipped his shoulder.

Another turn threw him against the furniture. "What the Hell is going on?" he blurted out in French.

Pushing the mirror aside, Nino dragged his backpack onto his lap and tried to pick up something above the endless, rolling of tires. When he only heard the distinct sound of car horns, Nino got on his knees. He could walk to the other side to try to listen, but he didn't trust whoever had been hired to drive this truck enough to risk it.

Another jolt slammed his ears and right temple to the wall. Blood welled up from his bitten tongue. Nino used the wall as support to stand up. The car horns outside were incessant, too much for it to be another bad case of afternoon traffic.

This time, when the truck seized to a halt, Nino braced himself against the wall and the drawers to keep himself upright. A bust fell and rolled across the floor. The truck swayed, and he inched out into the open, one hand fumbling to unlock his phone with his shaking thumb. If something happened to him then at least his parents would know where he was. Nino hoped, as he tried to position his thumb on the pad just right, that he was just in the middle of a traffic accident.

Underneath his feet, the truck's wheels spun into action. The truck threw him forward in a desperate attempt to escape whatever was going on outside. Nino immediately lost his balance. His chin slammed into the floor, his phone skittering into the shadows. Glasses askew, frames possibility cracked, Nino scrambled to where he thought he saw it slide. The feeble light in the truck kept shuddering too much for him to distinguish one shadow from the other.

Another hit rocked the truck and sent an antique chest in front of him crashing to the floor. When Nino uncovered his face, a stream of light filtered from his left. Squinting against the sudden brightness, he turned his head. There was a brand new hole punctured into the side of the truck.

There went the traffic theory.

In a perfect world, Nino would have laughed at the absurdity of it all. Two akuma attacks in a day with him in the middle?

But in this world, mind-numbing reality slammed into him. This was another akuma attack, and he was in a crumbling tin can.

His phone lay in the stream of daylight, just beside the fallen chest, but Nino couldn't move. Noise filtered in, everything he heard muffled through the walls dialed up to eleven. Car horns blared like they were announcing the end of the world. As Nino knelt there, the horns quieted, then stopped completely, replaced by the low rumbling of drivers fleeing the scene. No car was worth being akumatized.

A man's bellow replaced the short-lived silence. There were no words, just an incomprehensible string of rage that was much too close for Nino's liking.

When the truck lurched forward— why the Hell was the driver still there?!— Nino lunged for his phone. His home screen welcomed him, but his thumbs refused to move. The akuma's voice grew closer, like rolling thunder. Guttural growls transformed into stilted words. "I. Said. Stop!"

Raw power slammed the wall and threw his world onto its head. Nino lost touch with the floor. Everything was a blur of shadows and sunlight. Boxes and antiques slammed into his sides, his head. When gravity dropped him back, Nino instinctively catapulted to his feet. It took him a second to locate the punctured hole above him— the truck had been flipped over. Still the rear doors held shut.

Nino climbed over a fallen grandfather clock and passed by his phone's shattered screen, with the actual phone nowhere in sight.

"Shit." That was it. Nothing more needed to be said.

Something slammed onto the new roof of the truck. Nino glanced up, and through the hole he made out silver boots. They paced, each step denting the metal. The akuma stopped off sight, near what once was the front of the truck.

"I would just leave if I was you," the akuma warned, voice low.

Nino hoped whoever the akum was threatening was Chat Noir, embarrassment be damned. He hoped even when an adult voice cried out, then faded along with the rest of the civilians.

"Open up wide!"

Another shaft of light appeared. Nino screamed and fell over the side of the grandfather clock. Landing in a pile of knick knacks that escaped their boxes, Nino could only crawl backwards toward the shadows of the truck's rear doors. Self-preservation overrode the mind-numbing fear coursing through every vein in his body. If he stopped moving, he would die.

Nino threw himself into more broken boxes when another gash opened up above his head. On his feet, still aiming for the doors, Nino was faced with a mountain of furniture, chairs, drawers, and armoires piled high. He reached for a hanging drawer above his head while his foot looked for purchase on a handle. When Nino pushed himself up, he saw the rear doors, still locked but still bathed in darkness.

He could use a table leg or the ottoman nearby to ram the doors and escape. As sturdy as the truck proved to be, something had to give.

The truck heaved upwards, and metal screeched to let in more light. The mountain of furniture shifted dangerously with the movement. Nino jumped over the set of drawers he was perched on, arms out to soften his fall.

His foot caught the hanging mirror of the vanity. Nino fell straigtht down, the drawer he'd used upending and showering him with forgotten jewelry.

"Damn it, damn it, damn it." Nino launched to his feet. Earrings and necklaces cascaded down his t-shirt. Nino kicked the drawer and tore something clipped to his sleeve.

Bright light shot out from his hand. Nino yelled and dropped the burning piece of jewelry. The light in front of him coalesced into a shuddering shape that muttered, "Ouch, wow."

Metal continued to creak above him, but Nino, enraptured by the dimming sun in front of him, was rooted in place.

The shape rushed to his face. Red and black eyes bore into his own. "You look young. You'll do."

A blast of air rushed in from behind him. Light splashed onto the walls. Nino pressed himself against the rear doors, still stubbornly locked tight, and watched as the akuma's boots walked the length of the gaping roof.

Then blue took up his vision. "Seems like you're in trouble."

It was a bird. A strange, talking bird with the biggest eyes Nino had ever seen on something other than a stuffed animal. Undeniable magic rolled off it like a heat wave, stealing whatever breath he still had in his lungs.

The bird glanced at the streaming sunlight before turning back to a voiceless Nino. "I can help you get out, but you have to become my next Peacock to do so."

A peacock. The spark of recognition burst free, then died when another panel of metal was torn away. Nino opened his mouth but couldn't utter a word.

"Will you do it? I can't help you otherwise." The bird swayed before him, uncomfortably close. Its fan of tail feathers tickled his chest.

Whatever this thing claimed to be, it was a whole lot better than the akuma sawing away at the truck. Nino found himself nodding to a promise he couldn't quite grasp.

"Are you sure?"

When the truck rocked, Nino yelled, "Yes, yes, I got it!"

"Splendid!" The bird disappeared, and Nino choked, wondering if it had all been a brief hallucination. It reappeared a heartbeat later with the previous piece of jewelry in its paws. It was a metal peacock, the side of its fanned tail feathers rounded while the body was delicately raised to the forefront. It was no bigger than his palm.

The bird presented it to him with a wide smile. "Clip this onto you and say the words: Wings Up!"

Nino took it, turning it around to find the back blank, except for a metal clip. A belt buckle? His fingers fumbled to clip it on to his belt. The bird huffed something about it not going there, but once it stayed in place Nino didn't think his hands were steady enough to fix it. Traitorous sunlight washed over them both, and that was all it took for Nino to cry out, "Wings up!"

The bird chirped in affirmation before being sucked into the not-belt buckle.

Nino gasped when electricity raced up his arms, down into his toes, and up to the crown of his head. Warmth swelled in the pit of stomach and exploded as the power reached its zenith. Nino stiffened, expecting the high to come crashing down like a tidal wave and sweep him off his feet.

Thankfully, it evened out on top of his skin, sizzling on the surface. Nino let out a breath and wallowed in the warmth pooling into his pores. It dashed away his lingering fear and evened out his breathing until the ache in his chest waned. Nino glanced at his body, half-expecting actual fire or electricity.

Instead of his street clothes, he was dressed in a poor rendition of the Queen's Guard. His tunic and boots were a bright blue, with flared sleeves of black with a red trim. His black trousers were lined with the same red as his cloth belt.

Nino's fingers hovered over the center of his belt. There was the piece of jewelry he'd picked up. All the heat and power from earlier was concentrated there, like a live wire.

Get moving!

Nino jerked his hand back. The bird, wherever it was, had a good point.

He looked to where the sun streamed down. Nino wrinkled his nose in thought and felt something on his face shift. With his black gloves, Nino traced the clear edge of what had to be a mask.

When he sensed the akuma was farther away from the opening, Nino jumped onto what was left of the mountain of furniture. There was no stumbling, no cartwheeling for balance. Nino stared down in awe, then that insistent voice in the back of his head spurred him to leap where the light was the thickest. Nino jumped from his perch and landed in the center of the truck on silent feet.

The akuma stood further up and began to tear apart something, presumably the doors from the truck's front. "You can't escape Iron Lung. I know you're in there!" he yelled down into the cab and to whatever poor shmuck might still be there.

Nino eyed his exit. If he could jump out without a sound, turn, then—

A door flew at him. Nino executed a fluid roll to dodge it. While his mind tried to figure where the reflexes had come from, his body stopped at a crouch. Nino stared up at the akuma— Iron Lung— balancing a sheet of crumpled metal in one hand. Within it, the truck's logo lay lay distorted.

Iron Lung stared back, fury lighting up his eyes.

"You!"

The great, amazing courage fizzled out like a sparkler. Nino tried a very convincing, "I, huh…"

Iron Lung hurled the metal sheet down into the truck. Nino jumped back, and found himself soaring out from the truck. Sky and street blurred as, this time, he did reach out with his hands to grab some purchase. Nino landed twenty feet away with his heart in his throat and his feet firmly on the street. His stomach was still floating somewhere above him.

From on top of the truck, Iron Lung bared his teeth. He was encased in a cylindrical shield of armor that looked ten times as thick as the truck's flimsy exterior. Even his arms and legs were covered in chain mail, which Nino though was downright unfair.

However, the oddest part of it all was the string that stemmed from his chest, like a mirage he could only see from his peripheral. It was as thick as the cable of his laptop, yet as translucent as those glass noodles from his favorite take-out place.

Was it him? Was it the mask slapped onto his face? Nino tilted his head, and the string shifted enough for it to still be visible to him.

Iron Lung flexed his hands and pointed one needle-sharp nail at Nino's waist. The floating string vibrated, as though plucked. "Give me that Miraculous, boy!"

Nino glanced down. No chain mail for him, but his eyes were drawn back to the belt buckle.

A Miraculous.

Irony and horror warred in his mind while outside his body, Nino brought his gloved hands to his mouth. Instead of yelling for all he was worth, he bit on the knuckle of one of his fingers and tried to compose himself long enough to get out alive.

Iron Lung ambled over with murder in his eyes. If he noticed Nino was in the midst of the biggest mental breakdown of his short life, he didn't care for it. The low rumbling of something— drums?— reverberated between them.

"Wait!" Nino held up his hands. He marveled at the red detail on his sleeves, still wondering if any of this was real, until Iron Lung's steps shook the crumbling street. Automatically, Nino's feet adjusted to regain balance.

Iron Lung stopped at the edge of the gaping pothole that separated them. "Give me that Miraculous, or you're going to be the next thing with a hole in its side."

He had to get home.

Nino swallowed. Not trusting his mouth, he turned on his heel and aimed for the roof of a car. Higher ground, something in him told him. If he was on higher ground then he would be safe.

Immediately the street rumbled under the soles of his boots. Nino concentrated on the intact stretch of sidewalk in front him. Where there was sidewalk were street signs, and that was the first thing he needed to find his way back to his apartment.

The ground split underneath the car, toppling it over. Nino rolled out of its way, then another wave of power bucked him into the air. Nino twisted and instinctively put up his arms to block a flying piece of metal. It ricocheted up and pushed him back into the side of a stuck car. Both of them skidded and stopped only when the car hit a lamppost. Dazed, Nino struggled to his feet.

Iron Lung was coming straight for him with a ripped car door in one hand and an intact car roof in the other.

Just him. There were no heroes to distract the akuma this time.

Fear coiled in his stomach, but it was adrenaline that kept him on his feet. It radiated from the Miraculous and spread to his heart: a second pulse that beat along with his own. Like a good set of tunes in his headphones, it allowed him to disassociate enough from what was in front him to focus.

Nino found his voice when Iron Lung reared back the car door. "I'm not trying to fight you!"

As he moved to shield his face, the fingers of his right hand somehow grabbed the string that stretched between them. Immediately, the underlying beat of drums turned into a chaotic representation of a drum kit. Cymbals, snare drum, bass, a giant cacophony of sound rattling inside his head.

Nino, gripped his head, unwittingly twining the string around his fingers and intensifying the feeling of rage and destruction stemming from Hawkmoth's latest champion. It was akin to someone digging a burning cigarette into the center of his chest.

"Is this part of his attack?" he asked no one.

Iron Lung took advantage of his moment of weakness and launched the car door like a frisbee. Pure instinct allowed Nino to look up in time. He back-flipped onto the car roof, missing the flying door. His hands found purchase as the car rocked backwards. Something rustled behind him, steadying him when he found himself slipping.

Nino shook the string free from his hand. It floated back in front of him, annoyingly present no matter which way he turned. The twisting in his chest subsided to a tolerable ache.

"Scared, birdie?" Iron Lung crushed the metal in both hands and began working it into something long and sharp. "You are all the same. It's about 'me, me, me'." He scowled, though his fingers continued kneading the metal as thought it was putty. There was definitely some unresolved situation simmering in that gaudy suit of armor.

"What do you even want, dude?" Nino asked while he glanced around for an exit.

The way the truck had come from— from what he could tell from the twists and turns— was blocked by abandoned and overturned cars. On the opposite end of the street, beyond the stoplight and on the other side of the truck's remains, was a makeshift aisle in the lanes where he could possibly escape through. There were no people that he could see, but Nino didn't count on everyone having the common sense to flee. After all, he'd done the exact opposite earlier that day.

Iron Lung paused, as though he hadn't expect for his prey to actually ask. Then he glared, and Nino felt his annoyance in the palm that had gripped the string. "Give me the Miraculous, and it'll be over."

And reveal to Hawkmoth who he was? Somehow Nino doubted Hawkmoth would let him go on his merry way.

You need to fight!

Nino whirled around, but the bird was nowhere in sight. Where was it?

Vibrations trailed up the car. Nino leaped forward, tumbled onto the street, and was batted aside by Iron Lung's newly-formed spear. Nino planted his hand on the ground and used the momentum to lift himself to his feet. That something that rustled and pulled at his spine activated to stop him from flipping head over heels. Nino stole a glance over his shoulders.

Tail feathers, fabric ones that spilled from behind him to sweep the floor. They were fake— he saw the stitching with his enhanced vision— but he somehow felt them tug at his tail bone when they fanned out.

They were just like Chat Noir's ears and tail.

That the Miraculous gave him.

Nino had a Miraculous.

Holy shit he had—!

"Give it to me!"

Get your weapon!

On instinct, Nino reached behind him and plucked a closed fan from his belt. At his touch, it opened to reveal five peacock feathers nestled into the rivet. Nino grasped the end of one, and it came off. Instead of a delicate vein, the feather ended in a dagger point.

"I have throwing knives?!" he exclaimed, his shaky, mental wall finally collapsing at the sheer absurdity of his situation. He was Nino Lahiffe, and he had knives and tail feathers.

He waited for Iron Lung to come closer. Nino grabbed the dagger with both hands to stop it from shaking. When Iron Lung raised the spear above his head, Nino threw caution to the wind and jumped forward. Like something out of a movie, he somehow managed to land on the spear itself.

Nino stepped off and swung his arm back in a wide arc. Below him, Iron Lung pulled back a fist. Nino tucked in his legs, twisted in the air to avoid the punch, and swung his arm down, catching Iron Lung in the head with the butt of his dagger. The force of the impact traveled up his arm and numbed his shoulder.

When Nino landed, Iron Lunch collapsed to the ground in a tremendous shake of the earth. Nino stared at the dazed man, too shocked himself to move.

Run!

The bird was in his head, but he had bigger things to worry about. Nino ran full tilt down the street. Instinct called him to higher ground. Nino used cars and lampposts as stepping stones until he was on the roof of a building a couple of blocks away. There he collapsed on the ground, drawing in enough breath to keep himself from throwing up. He slipped his dagger back into the fan before he accidentally cut himself.

The bird kept pushing against his mind to run away, that he didn't have the power to cleanse this akuma. Nino knew nothing about whatever power that may be, but he knew that if he tried to stand he would possibly fall head-over-heels to the sidewalk, despite the tail feathers.

Nino's hands wandered to his trousers, instinctively trying to find his cell phone, until he remembered that it was a mass of broken metal and glass in the destroyed truck he'd left behind.

And his laptop. Even if his cellphone stayed destroyed, one look into his laptop would lead back to Nino Lahiffe.

Nadja Chamack would blab his name. Hawkmoth would kidnap him in the dead of night, if his parents didn't ship him off to some distant aunt in Morocco in sheer disappointment.

Nino struggled to his feet, even as the tread of his new boots kept him from slipping on the gravel. He turned towards where Iron Lung could be heard smashing his way to a new tantrum. Those wordless bellows started up again. Sooner or later, it would draw Ladybug and Chat Noir.

When he leaped to the next building, purposely focusing on landing right, Nino careened wildly to the left. On his second try, imaginary DJ headphones on to block out the constant stream of what the Hell what the Hell running in his mind, he landed his jump. Magic was all intuitive, it seemed, and wondering too much about the how's and why's caused more trouble in the long run.

Nino felt the chaotic drums of Iron Lung before he saw him. There was the invisible string from before, visible only to him. Whatever it was, Nino twined it around his wrist so it could lead the way.

He spotted Iron Lung tearing an overturned minivan. Scraps of metal and glass flew over his shoulder. There was a half-formed ball and chain at his feet that he occasionally added to. Nino shook the string loose now that its job was done. It felt too much like when he'd grasped Adrien's ring.

Nino slinked down to the sidewalk and used the parked cars to sneak his way to the far end of the street where the truck lay open, a modern carcass under the sun. Iron Lung's rage hummed along the string that kept on following him. Again there was the distinct sound of someone going to town on a drum set.

Why the Hell am I hearing drums, Nino tried to ask the bird in his mind.

He expected the bird to be as tight-lipped as Iron Lung. Miraculously, the bird replied, It's part of your powers as the Peacock. I'll explain later.

He just had to survive until later.

Nino scurried out into the open and entered the truck through the cavernous hole on the top. It was a mess of splintered wood and shattered mirrors. There was a flickering lamp somewhere near the far wall, casting broken shadows across the floor. Nino tiptoed past the scattered drawers and crushed jewelry. His tail feathers fanned out slightly behind him to avoid touching anything.

With the abundance of sunlight at his disposal, Nino fished out what was left of his phone and his backpack, unbelievably intact. Nino held it close to his chest, able to ignore the burning thrum of the Miraculous in favor of the familiar texture of the patches that adorned his backpack.

"Wow, I never thought I'd see a knight in the middle of Paris."

"Oh no," Nino mumbled into his backpack.

Of course it took Ladybug this long to come.

"M'Lady, that's not a knight, just a very sentient can of sardines."

And Adrien.

He felt Iron Lung's anger surge at the joke. Good, that would give Nino time to sneak out.

Slipping his destroyed phone in his backpack, Nino landed back on the street. There was a fight going on on the other side. He risked glancing back and saw Ladybug and Chat Noir dodging hits from Iron Lung's spear and brand-new ball and chain.

He made the mistake of catching Ladybug's eye. There was a noticeable shift in her expression that told him she noticed him, too. Nino stiffened and fled, reaching for the roof of the first forgotten car in his sight.

"Hey, wait!" That was Chat Noir.

Nino swallowed his response. If he spoke, Chat Noir could recognize his voice. This close to a truck that had once been full of Gabriel Agreste's antiques, Nino would have to explain exactly why he'd been inside of it in the first place.

Sorry, Adrien, but I was going to go back and talk you into letting me help even after you said no, he sarcastically thought as he slid down the windshield of a car and onto the street. Nothing said capable like getting stuck in a moving truck.

Or worse. Adrien would try to cajole him to fight Iron Lung when all he wanted was to rip this demented belt buckle off of him before his skin shriveled up.

He heard Chat Noir's staff hit the street. Nino put on a burst of speed, clearing two cars at once. He held his backpack hard enough to bruise his arms through his sleeves. From the corner of his eye, he noticed another one of those not-so-imaginary threads— this string that apparently came with the powers of the Miraculous. Nino knew, without even having to touch it, that it belonged to Chat Noir.

Eventually, Chat Noir fell back and Nino continued. Sometime after the fifth block he'd cleared, he started following the street signs back home. The chatter of Parisians filtered into his ears the farther away he got from the battle site. Nino avoided their eyes until he managed to slip away to reach the fire escape right outside his apartment.

Nino all but collapsed right outside his bedroom window. Dropping his backpack, he reached for the Miraculous and ripped it off. There was an indignant cry from the bird, but Nino only cared when the constant heat finally cascaded off him and into the piece of jewelry in his hand.

He threw it aside and buried his face in his hands.

The moment you've been waiting for! I'm so excited to finally bring you guys Nino with the Peacock Miraculous! I absolutely love writing him with it.

Like I said previously, this fic is all about my personal headcanon about the Peacock Miraculous. There will be no sentimonsters in this fic. (You can pretty much just throw out everything the show says about the Peacock Miraculous.) The next chapter will provide a better explanation about what exactly the Peacock Miraculous does in this fic and some of the things Nino noticed during his fight.

Want another fun fact? I designed Nino's Peacock outfit three times, and the one you see/read here is the second one with some tweaks to match Duusu's design.

Next chapter will be up Tuesday!