Scene 29 - Ladybug at the Eiffel Tower

"You have exactly five minutes until you detransform," Ladybug said aloud, reminding herself more than Viperion. "Everything must end at 01h05 in the morning. At my signal, turn back time."

This plan needed to be timed perfectly to work out, and if anything went wrong, the consequences could be dire.

"Sorry, I could not come earlier," Chat said, sneaking up behind her.

Ladybug opened her mouth to speak, but was interrupted by a large commotion below them. She and Chat rushed to the railing to peer down at the city below them, only to see complete chaos. Cars were stalled in the intersection, the street lights were turning on and off, and people were screaming.

"Wait, but what's happening?" she exclaimed.

She stared in horror as apparitions began to appear all around the city… a blimp, a dinosaur, and several previously akumatized villains. In the distance she could see a large figure climbing the Montparnasse Tower which could only be Gorizilla.

"It looks like several times are coexisting!" she shouted.

What had gone wrong with her plan? How many loops had gone by? This kind of chaos couldn't have been caused by something small. Her attention was broken by the interruption of an unfamiliar voice behind her.

"What are these voices I hear? Normans? Gilles?" the woman was shouting. She was wearing knight's armour, covered with a red and black-spotted tunic. "You! What is this sorcery?" She approached Ladybug and Chat Noir, spinning… a yo-yo? Could she be a previous holder of the ladybug miraculous?

But before they could even address this new person, she flickered out of existence, leaving only Ladybug and Chat Noir on the platform.

"Are the pedals of time lost, or is it just me?" Chat noir asked, trying to keep the mood light.

Ladybug had a bad feeling about this. The last time she had seen this many time periods in one place had been in Bunnix's burrow. But Bunnix was nowhere to be seen. Last time things had gone wrong with time, she showed up at the exact moment the timeline diverged, before Ladybug had even known there was a problem. If she wasn't here now… maybe time was so broken she couldn't have traveled here at all?

"I have a very bad feeling about this," she said to her partner. She put a hand up to her ear to activate the radio. "Viperion, Viperion, can you hear me now?"

There was no answer. Her heart rate was increasing. Was the radio malfunctioning, or had something happened to Viperion? Why wasn't he answering. The pieces of the puzzle were beginning to come together in her mind. Something was wrong with time. Viperion's power controls time. A kwamii using their power without a holder can cause chaos related to that power… had Sass needed to use his power without Luka? And if so, what had happened to Luka?

"Come with me," she told Chat, wasting no time.

She wasn't sure how she was going to explain to him why she had Viperon on the radio, or why he was supposed to be waiting for her in the sewers beneath the city, but she would have to deal with that later. A thousand scenarios were crossing her mind. Had Papillombre found him and attacked him? Had Su-Han come to take his miraculous? He had spoken to her only moments before, what could have caused him to de-transform so quickly?

They reached a manhole cover, but as Ladybug reached to pull it up, Chat Noir grabbed her hand.

"Ladybug, what's going on? What aren't you telling me?"

He should be angry with her. She had tried to trick him and now all of Paris was paying the consequences for her ill-thought-out plan. But his voice conveyed only fear.

"I'm sorry kitty," she admitted, pulling her hand away to lift the cover. "I don't know what's happening, but I know we need to talk to Sass."