You Didn't Tell Him?

Adrien was Chat Noir. Hawkmoth was Gabriel Agreste. Ten people were dead. Madelaine clearly knew her secret identity.

It was a lot to process, and she still hadn't done it by the time she got back to school. She wasn't entirely sure how she'd convinced the doctors to let her leave, let alone her parents, but it worked, and there was no way in hell she was turning that down. She and Adrien had a lot to talk about, and missing school, even for a legitimate reason, would destroy her resolve by the next day.

She was so focused on what she was going to say that she completely missed when class started and was only jerked out of her trance by the akuma alert system. She jerked, looking around the room with her eyebrows furrowed together. Her eyes landed on Adrien, who had turned to face her.

He shook his head, obviously as confused as she was.

Alya, of course, had her phone out in a heartbeat, looking up all the news sites. "There's an army in the streets," she said, looking up from her phone to Mlle. Bustier. "Why would Hawkmoth form an army right after helping Ladybug and Chat Noir stop the plague?"

Marinette finally gathered her wits about her enough to get up and walk over to the door, closing and locking it. She didn't see the butterfly, but she sure as hell felt it fly into the lucky charm Adrien had given her. She gasped, her body going rigid as she instinctively fought off the intrusion.

"Mlle. Dupain-Cheng, I need you to calm down," a voice- Hawkmoth's voice- whispered in her mind. "This won't work if you don't have a clear head."

"I'll do it," she blurted out.

"I didn't even tell you what I want you to do."

Marinette took a shaky breath. "I can imagine," she muttered, trying not to be heard by her classmates. "Find a way to stop her, right?"

Hawkmoth sighed. "Right," he confirmed. "And I need someone involved in this; we can't have anyone else finding out the truth."

A hand on her shoulder made her gasp, but she still didn't turn around. "Marinette?" Adrien asked hesitantly. "Are you okay?"

Marinette nodded, but she wasn't entirely sure if it was for Adrien or Hawkmoth. "Adrien?" she asked "I think I'm gonna need you to catch me."

"What? Why-"

White bubbles covered her, but when they vanished, she looked exactly the same. She also immediately fell back into Adrien's arms, unconscious.

Marinette opened her eyes to the ceiling of a church, the stone aged but kept free of dust. She blinked a few times and sat up, looking around the room.

"I cannot believe you're content to just sit around while innocent people are burning!" Marinette jerked her head to see two people arguing- Madelaine and a man in black.

The man shook his head. "You forget that my last chosen burned along with the others," he replied, just as angry. "If we intervene, the humans will know about us, and the last time our kind were worshipped, our father nearly destroyed the world. Besides, even if you're able to stay hidden, you only have a year left before you-"

The sound of a door opening made the two straighten up, the man in particular adjusting his black tunic and smoothing his equally dark hair.

Another man walked up, a bright red cross on his white tunic. "Lady Foy, what brings you here today?" he asked. "You're not a woman to sin so often you must confess every day."

Madelaine smiled and shook her head. "Not at all, cardinal," she assured him. "I'm just here to offer something my mistress found to your sacristan here. It's a chalice that's been passed down in her family for generations."

The man in black gave her a smile back, but his was so clearly forced while hers seemed almost perfectly natural. "Thank you, Lady Foy. We are honored to have your mistress's addition."

"I'm certain you are." She turned to leave, but not without shooting the man in black a dirty glare.

Marinette jumped up and ran after her, following her out into the street. The second she did, she knew she wasn't in Kansas anymore. "Holy shit," she breathed, looking around at the horse-drawn carriages and vendors in the street. Everything about it screamed Middle Ages.

Her eyes darted back to Madelaine's route, but she was long gone and her path hidden by other pedestrians. So maybe this wouldn't be as easy as she thought.

"It's too dangerous!"

Marinette spun to see the man in black outside the church, speaking with another man in a priest's robes.

"What is and isn't too dangerous isn't up to you, Plagg," the priest declared. "Now let me into my church. If we're lucky, we'll be able to find a volunteer before she kills anyone else."

"You don't know that she's killed anyone," the man said, taking a step aside to continue blocking the priest's path.

The priest scoffed. "Tell that to the families of her victims," he replied. "They all were killed by a short blade to the heart. That is her weapon."

"It's also the weapon of every soldier's child that they keep well into adulthood," Plagg hissed. "Return to the temple must be voluntary; allow me a bit more time to convince her, and this will be easier on everyone."

Footsteps marching down the street dragged her attention away, and she turned to see men in ancient Egyptian clothing, spears and other weapons in hand. She turned back to see the priest give Plagg a look that could only be described as saying "I told you so."

Plagg let out a sigh, worry and exhaustion on his face. "Fine," he agreed. "Do what you have to; I'm going to try to take care of these guys."

As Plagg ran into the fray, Marinette turned her attention to the rooftops and any place Madelaine could hide. She had to be close to do this, right? She thought back to where Madelaine had said she was going the day before- some spa in the first arrondissement. That was pretty close to most of the victims, but not all of them, so maybe proximity wasn't a concern.

As the realization hit her, Marinette groaned. It looked like her best option was to find out what the Guardians were up to.

She turned and retreated into the church, watching as the priest who'd spoken to Plagg approached the cardinal.

"Any word on a volunteer?" he asked.

The cardinal nodded. "She thinks it's a new form of baptism the pope proposed for ex-heretics," he replied.

The priest scoffed. "If we get caught-"

"I'm willing to risk it if it means taking that monster off the streets of Paris," the cardinal interrupted. "Let's just hope this one is stronger than the others."

In the blink of an eye, the church was gone, and Marinette found herself standing in a castle amongst a group of servants. In front of the crowd was Madelaine, holding a short blade to a man's throat. In a single, fluid motion, she cut his throat, and Marinette gasped, eyes going wide and hands covering her mouth.

That drew Madelaine's attention, and she looked the girl over- very obviously able to see her even though no one else could. She smirked and spoke to the 'congregation.'

"It seems we have a little witch in our midst," she declared. "A time traveler." She looked directly at Marinette. "When I find you- and I will- you will wish for death."

"Heard it before," Marinette spat out. "The only one going down today is you." She stepped forward, walking right through the servants' bodies and up to Madelaine. "I'm not gonna let you terrorize these people, terrorize Paris. I'm Ladybug and right now, a seijin. And you're not gonna win."

Madelaine hummed to herself. "A ladybug and a butterfly active at the same time… I'll keep that in mind for when it's time to kill you." Her eyes raked over Marinette again in a way that made her skin crawl. "Interesting attire, as well. No, finding you shouldn't be difficult at all."

Oh. Oh. Oh this was bad. Marinette glanced down at her outfit and realized that it was, in fact, rather distinguishable given the time period, and Madelaine would be on the lookout for it. She might even-

"Try to poison me…" The words slipped out of Marinette's mouth before she could stop them. "It was on purpose! I wasn't just a random victim; you were targeting me!"

Madelaine scoffed. "Obviously it doesn't work; I'll have to go for something more powerful," she declared. "On the bright side, this means I'll escape the Guardians' clutches."

Marinette opened her mouth, then stopped herself. This was her best bet, wasn't it? No, it was their best bet. The Guardians'. Let Madelaine think she'd be getting away for centuries when in reality, time was about to catch up with her. "This isn't over," she finally said.

Madelaine grinned and tilted her head a little. "No, it certainly isn't," she replied. "I look forward to meeting you for real, little bug. But until then, get out of my castle."

Marinette woke up with a gasp, eyes wide and breath coming in gasps. She rolled over, only to fall a good six feet to the floor. She moaned in pain, pushing herself up to her hands and knees.

A pure white butterfly fluttered away from her, and Marinette flopped backwards, down onto her butt. Her eyes drifted upward, and she realized she had been on top of the lockers in the locker room. Weird.

Ugh, the fall must have messed with her head. She swore she could still hear the marching of soldiers outside the room. Marinette stumbled to her feet and walked over to the door, freezing when she saw four lines of men in metal armor walking down the hallway.

Marinette jumped back, plastering herself to the wall next to the door. She pulled her jacket open. "Tikki, spots-"

She looked inside her jacket and found nothing. "Tikki?" Her eyes darted around the room. "Tikki? This is so not the time to play hide and seek!" she whisper-yelled. "Tikki!"

Still nothing. Marinette let out a frustrated sigh and shook her head. Maybe it could still work, even if Tikki couldn't hear her. "Tikki, spots on!"

Sure enough, the familiar reddish-pink light washed over her, leaving her in her Ladybug costume and… a little dizzy? Marinette put a hand on her head to steady himself. "Okay," she breathed, standing back up. "I'm good."

Ladybug threw the door open and cast her yoyo out, swinging straight through the lines of soldiers and taking out a row. She flipped herself upward, landing on the upstairs banister. She looked down, seeing Chat and a brunette woman in a crowd of soldiers, fighting them off.

Chat glanced up at her and smiled. "Have a nice nap?"

"I've had better," she called back down to him. "New friend?"

The brunette woman spared a look up at her, then spun back around and slammed her fist into one of the soldiers' chest, denting the metal and knocking him on his back. He vanished in a puff of blue smoke.

"You could say that!" Chat swung his baton like a baseball bat, hitting one soldier and throwing him into another, turning them both to blue smoke like the last one.

Ladybug looked around, seeing at least another two dozen soldiers ready to fight. There was only one way to end this. "Lucky charm!"

The world moved in slow motion. The brunette woman down below turned to her, eyes wide with fear, distracting Ladybug enough that she didn't realize for a moment that nothing fell into her hands. She lowered her hand, seeing black energy crackling over it like Chat Noir's cataclysm.

A round of coughs wracked her body, and even though she tried to cover her mouth with her free hand, she doubled over, mistakenly throwing herself off the banister. Her hand desperately sought purchase, but she only grabbed one of the soldiers, turning him to ash.

Ladybug hit the ground, her head bouncing on the concrete. Another cough escaped her, and she moaned in pain. Black spots clouded her vision, and she vaguely registered Chat's cries for her as the world faded away.

"Hey, she's waking up."

Marinette blinked a few times, the light from the windows burning her eyes. She moaned in pain, lifting her hand to cover her face. "Where am I?" she tried to say, but her words came out so slurred she was barely intelligible.

Thankfully, someone understood her. "You're in one of our guest rooms," a new voice said. "Adrien, shut the curtains; she's bound to have some photosensitivity."

When the bright light hitting her eyelids vanished, she finally opened her eyes and lowered her hand. Adrien came running over from the windows, and M. Agreste stood by her bedside, Nooroo floating next to him.

"What'd I miss?" Marinette managed to ask. "Who was that brunette lady? She didn't look like a champion."

Adrien shook his head. "She wasn't; she just showed up and started fighting. Dad was able to make Rose a seijin, and she helped after you were knocked out."

There was a flash in Marinette's mind, a stutter, really, of her hand being surrounded by black energy when she called for her lucky charm. Of a coughing fit and falling to the ground.

Suddenly, another round of coughs hit Marinette, and she rolled over onto her side in the bed.

"Is it the plague?"

Marinette looked back to see Adrien looking up at Gabriel, concern in his eyes.

"We defeated the Pharaoh, he shouldn't be doing any more damage."

Gabriel shook his head. "No, this wasn't the Pharaoh. It's something else."

"But Madelaine still might have had something to do with it," Marinette sighed.

Adrien's eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "Madelaine?" he asked. "What's she got to do with this?"

Marinette's eyes went wide with realization, and she looked to Gabriel. "You didn't tell him?"

"Tell me what?"

There's a little chunk missing from what Marinette saw, but that'll be a surprise until later. ;)