To Armadas: Night Bat did not manage to finish using his Kiss on the Tarasque before it completely formed and sent a wave of its poison gas into its face. As far as whether or not Night Bat survived…

To Lyger 0: Good question.

"Tarascon." Ladybug cleared her throat, and all conversation in the mess tent cut off. It was less than thirty minutes since the scouts had returned from France, just as much time as it had taken for Ladybug to gather the other leaders together under the dining pavilion in Hero Town. Every eye in the vicinity was focused entirely on her, many of them wide with shock. Outside of the pavilion stood a small crowd of heroes, all frozen in place and straining to hear every word Ladybug said. Beside her, Cat Noir rested his hand on her shoulder. Her eyes narrowed as she looked around at her team. "The Tarasque is in Tarascon. According to the Knight, it has simply formed a nest in the middle of the city." She gave him a nod as she finished; standing just beneath the tarp behind her and to the side, he dipped his head in acknowledgement.

"Casualties?" asked Caridad, her mouth set in a thin line.

"Unknown," the Knight answered. He shifted his weight from one leg to the other. "I didn't see any people still in the city, but I also didn't stay for very long. But if I had to guess, the city must have been abandoned when the Beast arrived." He paused for a moment. "I couldn't imagine anything surviving in that wreckage for very long.

"Did it look like the Tarasque was planning to leave Tarascon?" O Patriota asked, leaning forward with a calculating look in his eye.

The Knight shrugged. "It seemed pretty content just staying where it was, though it shot fire at me when I stopped to look at it for too long."

Koldunya tapped her chin. "It sounds like nothing so much as an animal: harmless when left alone; dangerous when provoked."

"That may not be far from the truth," mused Jueran Eazim slowly. "My understanding of the various fights against the Beasts is that the Beasts more often than not only became aggressive when attacked. That or when their way forward was being blocked."

O Patriota hummed, frowning. "If that is the case, then could we just… ignore it?" he suggested. "If it is no longer threatening to destroy further cities or endangering more people, then what is the harm in cordoning off that region and simply allowing the Tarasque to remain there unmolested?"

O Brasileiro stared at him. "After all the trouble it caused, you would leave it be?" he demanded. "The Lion demolished three cities in Brazil!"

"And it destroyed countless more in Portugal!" retorted O Patriota. "I do not like the idea of leaving it be… but if we don't need to fight it, I would as soon avoid a conflict. After all the death and destruction it has caused, perhaps we need to move forward and leave it alone."

Lupa Gris' eyes flashed. "After that Monster killed my husband, there is absolutely no way that I will allow it to survive," she growled darkly, baring her teeth. "I will kill it myself if I have to."

"Lupa Gris," Caridad cautioned her mildly, rising to her feet and placing a hand on Lupa Gris' shoulder. Lupa Gris blinked, looking around dumbly before her eyes settled on Caridad and her shoulders slumped.

Ladybug shared a look with Cat Noir, and he gave her a sympathetic half-smile, which she couldn't return. They had been fighting super-villains for four years together. Over that time he had thrown himself into danger to protect her more times than she could count – and yet she could remember every single one of them as though they had only happened yesterday. Adrien had been hurt in front of her or vanished – erased from the timeline, turned to golden dust, frozen in time, and worse – so many times. And now that he was her husband…

If she ever experienced the same tragedy as Julia, the one responsible would be dead.

"I do understand your desire to avoid further loss of life," Ronin observed, nodding to O Patriota. "Sometimes, knowing when not to fight is as important as acting decisively in the fight."

"Unfortunately, I don't think it's quite so simple," Majestia interjected, folding her arms. "Whether we want to fight it or not, I think we'll have to do something about the Tarasque. I went back to search the region around Tarascon right after we returned, and it is a mess."

Koldunya furrowed her brows. "Because the Tarasque passed through it?"

Majestia shook her head, her mouth set in a thin line. "Because the Tarasque's poison is hanging in the air around it and spreading out away from it."

"The effects of its poison have been traveling down the Rhone," the Knight informed them. "That's what first clued me in to its location. Plants, animals, fish… everything is getting choked out along the river."

"It isn't just downriver that's being affected," Mecha-Man added, stepping forward and projecting several images in front of himself from his helmet. "The story was the same in Lyon: the Taraque's poison is traveling upriver. It hasn't spread far beyond the river itself, but I could already see evidence of plants being killed by it."

Iron Maiden hummed. "Parc National des Cévennes seemed alright while I was there, but I did detect traces amounts of poison in the atmosphere, particularly when I flew closer to the Rhone."

Pulling out a map of Europe, Knightowl spread it over the table in front of him. "After Majestia returned, I looked at the map," he announced. "I need a little more time to confirm it, but it does not look good. Depending on how long the Tarasque has been in place, the rate of expansion for the poison air seems to be close to ten square miles every day. It could be faster. And that doesn't count the leading edges of the poison that haven't caused long-term damage – that has reached the Mediterranean and even started moving through it. If we don't stop the Tarasque, then before long the whole planet will be covered in this poisoned air."

Joey's eyes widened. "How long do we have?"

Knightowl shrugged. "For the entire planet to be engulfed will take centuries – millennia even. But for the effects of the poison to be felt could happen much sooner. Here in Angola we may even have measurable levels of the poison by the end of next month, depending on the wind. As far as when we would start feeling the illness – again… Who knows?"

Lupa Gris' eyes hardened, her hands clenching into tight fists. "My husband gave his life fighting this… hell beast. I will be damned if I let his sacrifice go for nothing!"

"Can the damage be reversed?" Rugindo Leoa asked, turning to Ladybug.

Ladybug's stomach clenched. She shrugged helplessly. "I… don't know," she admitted quietly. "The Miraculous Cure hasn't been working fully on injuries or damage caused by the Beasts." Her eyes drifted in the Hound's direction, but her gaze stopped on O Patriota, when her lower lip began to tremble. So many had been hurt by the Tarasque, and she had been unable to help any of them. So many more would probably be hurt before this was all over.

"To be fair, A Saltadora's permanent injury may have been as much my fault as yours," the Knight interjected. "I don't know if our abilities are compatible. If you had tried repairing it before I healed it, maybe you could have reversed it and replaced her legs."

"Maybe…"

O Patriota cleared his throat. "Neither of you has anything to apologize for," he informed them, a firm tone to his voice. "Between you, you saved her life. For that, I think my whole team is grateful."

Sitting next to him, Caravela nodded. "What is done is done. All we can do is try to move forward with the information that we have." She glanced to the side at O Patriota and added, "And if that includes fighting this Monster, then that's what we do."

Jueran Eazim clapped his hands for attention. "None of this solves our problem," he reminded them. "What are we going to do with this information? We must stop the Tarasque – that much is clear, I think – but the last time you faced it, you lost."

"Ah, but this time it will be different," Joey told him, raising an eyebrow. "This time your team and mine will be there–" a shadow passed across his face but disappeared in an instant, his jaw clenching and his gaze hardening "–and we have the Jellyfish."

Ladybug nodded. "I am sorry about your teammates," she told Joey. "I–we also lost friends that day." Cat Noir's grip on her shoulder tightened. On her other side, Cavalière Lavande's shoulders slumped, and Ladybug caught the tiniest sniffle. Sympathetically, Ladybug put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. Firmer, she continued, "But we will stop this Monster! We've come too far, sacrificed too much, to give up now."

"How?" demanded Draco, his brows furrowed, a frown across his face. He swallowed nervously, looking around at the others. "I–" He let out a breath. "It knocked Estrella out of the air like it was nothing, and she was the strongest person I'd ever met." Majestia's nostrils flared, and Draco shifted his weight awkwardly. "Um…"

"No, you're not exactly wrong," Majestia admitted bitterly. "The Tarasque is the first thing I've fought that could actually match my strength…"

"It's going to take everyone working together," Cat Noir interjected, clearing his throat to silence the chatter around the pavilion.

"Our strategy last time was sound," Knightowl mused. "Provided that we can hold the Tarasque in place long enough to create the opening, Caravela can use her ability on it, and then – provided that it works – we keep the Tarasque contained until it is no more, either until it is entirely destroyed or until it breaks apart into its component Beasts."

"Is that all," muttered the Hound wryly.

"The only question is how we keep it restrained long enough for Caravela to do her thing," Cat Noir pointed out. "We could hardly hold it last time."

Killer Bee scoffed. "Isn't it obvious?" she asked rhetorically. "You give me a little extra boost and I–" She mimed poking something with her top. "Boom. Done."

Sent-Bee folded her arms. "Hell. No."

"What, don't you trust me, sweetie?" taunted Killer Bee, smirking.

"Not as far as I can punt you," Sent-Bee retorted, her eyes narrowed. "Although I'd be happy to give it a try…"

"What, trust?"

Set-Bee's lip curled. "The punt idea."

"Bring it!" Killer Bee rose halfway out of her seat, the table in front of her creaking slightly as she squeezed it.

"Enough." Ladybug cleared her throat, a bitter taste in her mouth. "At this point, it doesn't matter whether we can fully trust them," she told Sent-Bee. "We wouldn't be in the position we are in – we wouldn't have been prepared when the Tarasque arrived, we wouldn't have been able to retreat, we wouldn't have stopped the Dark Acolytes – without the Lynchpin-ions' help."

"Paris is my city as much as it's yours," Killer Bee piped up, raising an eyebrow and folding her arms. "I want to see it again, too."

Ladybug let out a breath, staring hard at Killer Bee. "Do we have your word that you will help us stop the Tarasque?"

"Yes."

Ladybug turned to Cavalière Lavande, sighing in resignation. "I guess that's our plan."

After another hour of planning, the meeting began to break up. Ladybug looked around the room at the group of heroes – along with a few villains – who would be fighting alongside them against the Tarasque in just a few short days. Who would they lose this time? How many would be hurt, or would make the ultimate sacrifice? Her eyes stopped on Cat Noir – her husband – and she swallowed. Could she bear it if she lost him? She had seen what a world without her would look like; what about a world without him? He always gave himself for her; would she do the same for him?

Yes; without hesitation.

As if he could sense her thoughts, Cat Noir looked up from his discussion with Rugindo Leoa, Joey, Lupa Gris, Majestia, and the Engineer, and gave her a wink. In spite of her nerves and misgivings, Ladybug couldn't help the fluttering in her stomach. He was her partner. He was her best friend. He was her husband. When the two of them were united, there was nothing they couldn't accomplish.

Cavalière Lavande placed a hand on Ladybug's shoulder, drawing her attention away from Cat Noir. "He knows how much you love him," she told Ladybug quietly. "Trust me: he feels the same."

Ladybug nodded, her lips turning up into a soft smile. "Oh, I know." She let out a breath. "I was just thinking…"

"It's a good plan," Cavalière Lavande assured her.

"We had a good plan last time," Ladybug pointed out. Cavalière Lavande's jaw clenched. Ladybug sniffled, giving her a one-armed hug. "I'm sorry."

Cavalière Lavande shook her head. "No – it's okay. Sometimes I'm just fine; others… it hits me all over again, just as bad." She sighed heavily. "I don't think I'll ever forget what happened." She glanced around the pavilion at the other heroes. "I doubt anyone else will, either…"

Ladybug cocked her head. "You mean…?"

"Yeah." Cavalière Lavande's shoulders slumped. "I can still sense it when I'm walking around the camp – and I know I deserve it."

Ladybug put a hand on her shoulder and smiled sympathetically. "You are making up for it," she told her. "You are making it good. I see it. You see it. The rest of the Heroes see it. And this will be the first step showing everyone else."