"You'll give me your Miraculous, and I will finally prove that I can be just as tough as everyone else in my family! I am not the weak link..you can't just let people walk over you, you've got to crush them before they can get the jump on you!" Sole Crusher ranted as she cleared the walls. "I'll never play second string again! From now on I look out for number one!"
"Zoe no!" Marinette cried out, crushed to see her friend reverting back to the insecure, lonely girl she had first been when she first arrived in Paris. "This is not like her!" Marinette tried to explain to Chat Noir. "She is the sweetest girl, but her family must have gotten to her again!"
"I know," Chat Noir nodded, and put a paw on Marinette's shoulder. "You need to get to a safe place to charge up Mullo though! Zoe's not herself right now, and even if I can cataclysm the akumatized object, without Ladybug to capture the akuma, I don't want to risk more Sole Crushers turning up around Paris!" Sole Crusher threw one of the soccer nets across the field at them, and Chat Noir grabbed Marinette, and rolled with her out of the way just in time. The impact took the breath right out of Marinette, and she felt herself freeze. Marinette looked up at Chat Noir who was suspended above her, who looked back menacingly at Sole Crusher. Chat Noir raised himself off her, and half pulled, half pushed her toward the exit. "Quick, get out of here!" he ordered her.
Marinette hesitantly moved toward the exit, but her eyes could not leave Chat Noir as he approached Sole Crusher alone.
"Of all the Bourgeois' you've always been the most reasonable and chill! You can usually picture a situation from someone else's shoes. What has suddenly got you stomping around like Chloe-zilla in Jimmy Choos? Chat Noir inquired to the looming Sole Crusher.
"I'm not a Bourgeois, as I am frequently reminded of at every turn!" Sole Crusher growled.
"Why sink to their level? Don't you think they should want to be more like you, and actually care about other people, not the other way around?!" Chat Noir challenged.
"I have always tried to be everything they ever wanted. I can put on the act...but it is still not enough. I will never be enough!" Sole Crusher's voice creaked with emotion.
Her words reminded Chat Noir about feeling the same way wen he had felt so alone, and cut off from his father, and had everyone, even Ladybug seem to push him aside or keep him at a distance. How much worse was it when that unrequited love wasn't only someone you wanted to be with, but even applied to your vey own family. The feeling of being truly alone.
"Zoe, I get it...seriously I do, but letting Hawkmoth take advantage of you because those around you take you for granted or don't really see you...well, then you are just giving up yourself!" Chat Noir called up compassionately to the forlorn looking shimmering giant. She narrowed her eyes at him, and then looked away with a flickering purple butterfly blurring her features. Chat Noir knew Hawkmoth was using his influence to try to hold her to his will. Chat Noir knew he had to reach her! "I know you have a strength inside you! Your friends see your true nature, and love you for it. Fight off Hawkmoth! Stand up to him...stand up to everyone who does not respect the person you are!"
"You're right," Sole Crusher closed her eyes solemnly, and for a moment Chat Noir thought that maybe his words had gotten through to her. But then she continued... "I have given up on myself! If I'm not enough, I'm going to create a whole new me! No more weak, pathetic Zoe...now there is only Sole Crusher!" She raced straight at Chat Noir, giving him no time to avoid her attack. She was over him in seconds with her huge strides, trying to stomp him out of existence with her gold heels.
"Mullo eat faster!" Marrinette urged in raw fear from the exit doors, where she was watching the scene between Chat Noir and Sole Crusher. "Chat Noir needs us!"
"I'm sorry, Marrinette, I just need a couple more minutes to be ready, I don't have the energy to transform yet!" Mullo apologized, trying to swallow the food to recharge.
"Tikki!" Marinette looked in panic at Tikki, whose antennas drooped, and she held her head, rocking back and forth.
"Okay say it," Tikki peeped wild-eyed at Marinette.
"Tikki, Spots on!" Marinette commanded, feeling a wash of transformation crawl up her body...but something was wrong. The electric feeling of magic was intensified and unstable. Ladybug felt like her skin crawling, and she couldn't focus on moving forward towards Chat Noir. It was like her body was tugging her in the opposite direction. "Tikki, Spots off!" Ladybug wheezed, releasing her transformation as quickly as it had come.
"I'm sorry...I can try again," Tikki said through tears, "Yes, I think I...no I can't...what if I...no, I've got to..." Tikki went back and forth, not able to shake the panic attack and guilt over not being ready for action to help her chosen.
"Tikki, it's okay," Marrinette comforted her, "We'll find another way." Marinette gripped the door onto the pitch with white knuckles watching as Chat Noir just narrowly missed a strike from Sole Crushers heel, trying frantically to think of a plan.
Chat Noir moved this way and that, trying to find a way out, and most of all stay clear of her shoes. "Cataclysm!" Chat Noir panted, and tried to swipe her heel, but when he tapped her left heel, although the heel dissolved, the villain didn't detransform or release it's akuma. The akuma must be hiding in the other shoe! Chat Noir mentally kicked himself, for having used up his cataclym before he had noticed which foot she was using for attacks. Finally in frustration Sole Crusher snatched the dodging cat up in her hands, and his baton fell clattering to the ground. Sole Crusher held him in her vice-like grip. "If you won't stay still enough for me to crush you properly under my heel, I will simply squash you with my bare hands, and take your miraculous myself!"
Suddenly Sole Crusher was struck in the back of the head by Chat Noir's extended baton by none other than Marinette Dupain-Cheng. The impact made Sole Crusher's eyes cross in pain, and she looked angerly down at the pitfall civilian who had dared strike her.
"Let him go!" Marinette yelled threatenly up at Sole Crusher, with a tone of authority totally bizarre coming from a seemingly defenseless teenager.
"Mari! Run!" Chat Noir gasped desperately with a whole new terror, seeing Marinette putting herself in danger trying to protect him, and not being able to do a thing to intervene.
Sole Crusher laughed down at Marinette. "I used to be weak like you! Now everyone is crushed beneath my power. I will never need to bow to anyone again!" Sole Crusher moved her foot forward, and Marinette backed up slightly drawing her forward. Just as Sole Crusher's toe was closing in on Marinette Sole Crusher felt resistance against her ankle, and she stepped back, trying to steady herself, but her feet lost their footing, and she came crashing to the ground. The two kwamis, Tikki and Mullo had both tied up Sole Crusher's ankles with a green water hose, while Marinette had distracted her and drawn her in to their trap. As her huge form thundered against the ground, her grasp loosened and Chat Noir was flung out of her hands, skidding to a stop a few meters in front of the Chloe-esc titan.
Marinette let out a sigh of relief seeing Chat Noir pick himself up off the ground with minimal wincing from where Sole Crusher had nearly bruised his ribs in her tight grasp. She was about the run up to him, but as soon as he got to his feet, he called out to her angerly, "What were you thinking!? You could have been killed!"
"You could've been killed!" she echoed back at him defensively.
"I'm practically indestructible in this suit, but you just rushed into danger without Mullo activated! Without even thinking!" Chat Noir's voice cracked with emotion.
"I was thinking!" she argued frustrated that Chat Noir would reprimand her right after she had just saved him! "I was thinking, what if he doesn't make it? How would I survive without him in my life!"
"You...you were thinking that?!" Chat Noir caught himself reeling.
"How could I not do everything I could to save you?!" she threw up her hands.
Chat Noir stared at Marinette. He didn't see behind him the dark-purplish butterfly akuma abandon it's crippled victim in favor of a much more enticing host. Hawkmoth had never sensed such a powerful emotion in his adversary Chat Noir before! How delicious! Chat Noir is conflicted over this school girl putting herself in jeopardy to save him. With Ladybug's kwami going rouge earlier, and her lone Kitty vulnerable, this was surely his moment of victory!
Chat Noir may not have see the stealthily approaching akuma coming up behind him, but Marinette did!
"Chat Noir! Get out of here!" Marinette screamed out.
"What?! Now you're telling me off?!" Chat Noir looked hurt, and stepped back, closer to the approaching danger.
"No! Behind you! Look out!" Marinette started running towards him.
"Wha...?" Chat Noir looked back and forth. The akuma was mere feet from him, but it stayed above his sightline, avoiding his detection.
Marinette's chest burned, racing to prevent the inescapable. She wasn't going to make it in time! Images of Chat Blanc flickered ominously through Marinette's mind, and tears blurred her vision as she got closer. She would not let Hawkmoth take him this time!
"Tikki! Spots on!" Marinette cried out, and immediately the kwami was absorbed into her earrings, and she transformed into Ladybug right in front of Chat Noir's eyes. Without slowing, she flicked her yoyo over his right shoulder, swiping the encroaching akuma right before it made contact with him. Her body hit against Chat Noir's who was rooted in one spot in shock, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, crying into his shoulder. With her right hand she flipped her yoyo releasing the purified akuma, but this time she had not words in parting from it. She just held onto Chat Noir, and after a moment of frozen limbs, he wrapped his arms around her in return, holding her tight.
"I'm sorry Kitty, I'm so sorry!" she whimpered, her tears streaking down her face.
"Why would you possibly apologize right now?!" Chat Noir tilted her chin, so he could search those blue eyes which deep down he had always felt was not the only thing his Lady and his best friend Marinette shared.
"This is not how it was supposed to be! I wanted to be able to tell you what you mean to me...to make it special!" Ladybug's lip quivered, and her eyes found his.
Chat Noir pulled her into himself tightly, and stroked his paw through her hair soothingly. Ladybug felt herself deflate, and relax under his touch. "Mi'Lady, I know what sharing your identity meant to you and the fact that you laid everything on the line to save me...well, I guess you have no idea how special that is to me."
"So...So...now that you know...it doesn't...it doesn't...change how you felt about me?" Ladybug whispered.
Chat Noir dropped his arms, and pulled back, " this changes everything!"
"Wh...what?!" Ladybug's heart dropped, and her throat tightened.
"In the best way possible!" Chat Noir reassured her with a bright smile, after seeing her face drop. "You're Marinette!" he whispered, excitement peaking at the end of her name, and his eyes shone in awe. "You've been by my side this whole time. Why didn't I follow my intuition from the beginning?! I kept doubting that someone like me could possibly be that lucky!"
Ladybug smiled nervously, and muttered a weak "Well...uh...surprise!"
"Uh...did we miss something?" Carapace asked, jumping down onto the edge of the field, seeing the ripped up turf, a overturned soccer net, collapsed sections of the arena, and Chat Noir and Ladybug in each other's arms.
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Thank you so much for reading! I really hope you are enjoying my story so far! Please let me know in the reviews! It always means so much to me to hear from readers.
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