I thought a little bit longer, before turning to Neeks, who was waiting quietly for a decision. He studied my face for a moment before his ears drooped.

"You want to fight?" He asked softly, ears drooping further as he took in the look I must have been giving him. I nodded and he looked down. "Okay... We can't stay long though, and your transformation won't hold well." He warned, making me a little confused. What did he mean that my transformation would hold well?

I transformed seconds later, and immediately felt something off about it. My throat still hurt and when I studied my body I saw that marks from the tentacles still covered my arms. My miraculous let out a shrill beep, and I watched, shocked, as one of the stripes disappeared. "W-What the?! Why did I already lose a stripe?!" I yelled in confusion, staring with wide eyes. A large crash alerted me to the school and I pushed my worries to the back of my head to focus on the task in front of me. I need to help Ladybug and Chat Noir.

I crouched low and my boots activated, clicking faintly before I leapt into the air and over the school's walls. I ran towards the cafeteria when I heard Chat Noir yell Ladybug's name, eyes widening slightly when I see the half-frozen Akuma waving tentacles around and having some of them wrapped around Ladybug and Chat Noir. Their suits were dissolving much more slowly than normal clothes thanks to magic, but it still caused my stomach to twist into knots.

The Akuma itself was a bright, almost radioactive chemical green color that was translucent and showed the shape of what might have been a science beaker. It never stayed in one place for long, traveling from tentacle to tentacle and through the body as long as it wasn't frozen or broken by the liquid nitrogen.

"Guys! Hang on, I'll find a way to get you out!" I called up to them from where they were being held, glancing back to the body of the Akuma. It had dissolved a good portion of the floor and ceiling, and got itself stuck in the hole it created, but the mass of tentacles it had was enough to keep Ladybug from being able to grab what seemed to be the hiding place of the butterfly.

"You're late!" Ladybug snapped in irritation, and although we weren't on the best of terms, it sounded like she was more irritated by the Akuma than my tardiness. Chat Noir smiled brightly at me with relief in his eyes, mouth opening to say something before it clamped shut as the happiness disappeared and was quickly replaced with worry and confusion. "What happened to your arms?" He yelled down to me instead.

"Worry about that later! Let's just get you two out of there before your suits dissolve!"

Ladybug gasped and became a lot more nervous, and I could only guess one of her spots disappeared. "Hurry! I don't have very long!"

I looked around for the lucky charm, wanting to spray the tentacles and cut them with my claws once they were frozen. I spotted the red and black "gun" that held the solution behind a half dissolved table and rushed for it, snatching it from the ground and ducking as a tentacle shot towards me. It turned around and came after me again, causing Ladybug to shout, "Behind you!"

I turned and yelped as it wrapped around my wrist, instinctively trying to shake it off before I sprayed it with the liquid nitrogen, watching it freeze over. I smashed the tentacle and rushed towards where the others were, dodging more of the appendages as they tried to wrap around me too.

"Arcessere: Lemur!" I murmured, before jumping and climbing along the destroyed cafeteria with ease. I grabbed onto one of the steel pipes hanging from the hole from the second floor and sprayed the tentacles holding the other superheroes as well as the tentacles near them. I was about to swing from the pipe onto one of the frozen tentacles but before I could give myself enough distance a tentacle wrapped around my leg and yanked me down, scrapping my hand up in the process as it was forced from it's hold on the broken pipe.

"Wolven!" Chat Noir cried out as I get slammed into the ground. I cried out in pain, shuddering slightly as I started sitting up in the destroyed table, ears flat against my head as I lifted a hand to rub the back of my head.

"Ow..." I whined softly, bringing my hand back to my field of vision to make sure it isn't bloody from the crash. The other hand's palm was torn open but it didn't hurt much. "I'm okay!" I yelled to Chat, giving them a thumbs up after checking for any more wounds. Chat sagged slightly in what I assumed was relief before he used his staff to break the tentacles holding him and Ladybug captive, the two heroes dropping down to the frozen tentacles beneath them.

I gasped as I was pulled closer to the creature, feeling the dissolving fluids eat away at the parts of my clothes closest to my skin on my leg. My breath hitched slightly and I tried to scramble away, the lucky charm having fallen from my hand in the fall. "Guys, help!" My voice cracked from fear as I felt the bottom of my foot touch the body of the Akuma, and I could almost hear the bottom of my shoe start to dissolve. My breathing picked up and I dug my claws into the floor, trying to stop more contact.

Phantom pain exploded in my throat and lungs; I suddenly couldn't breathe. I felt nauseous and a scream choked itself in my throat as my shoe was dissolved and the slime of the Akuma began to touch the bottom of my foot. I knew I was shaking and when I turned to swipe at the tentacle pulling me closer, I saw a hand instead. I gasped for air and became more frantic in my attempts to cut it away, but just like when I wasn't transformed, it reformed almost instantly.

"Get it off, get it off, GET HIM OFF!" I heard another beep from my miraculous loud and clear, and the next thing I know I'm being pulled away from the mass of green and pulled against a warm chest. I tensed and pushed away, scrambling back a few feet before a sudden sense of calm flooded my system, my body relaxing and my vision returning to normal. I took deep breathes, panting as I saw that I had pushed away from Chat Noir and Ladybug was breaking the akumatized item to catch the Akuma.

Ladybug glanced worriedly over to us as she pulled out her yoyo to catch the butterfly,before focusing in her task while I returned my attention to Chat Noir. He looked extremely worried, and I frowned when I saw the smear of blood I caused on his suit from the injury in my hand.

"...Sorry." I said meekly, lowering my head and looking straight at my lap.

"A-Are you okay?" I glanced up to see him slap a hand to his face, angry with himself for asking the question with an obvious answer.

I opened and closed my mouth for a few minutes, trying to remember how to talk properly. "...I've been better... Did I hurt you?"

"I'm fine. So is Ladybug." As soon as Chat Noir finished speaking, Ladybug did that thing that basically resets the damage, and all physical traces of struggle with the Akuma disappear from my body- along with the ache- accept for the cut on my hand.

"I need to get going! Are you okay, Wolven?" Ladybug called over, already swinging her yoyo. I nodded and gave her a thumbs up with a smile, before shooing her away with my hand. "Get going before we find out who you are, Little bug!" I called, making her laugh softly in relief before she swung away.

Chat Noir still looked worried and I sighed softly, reaching up and gently stretching behind his fake ears. "I'm okay, don't worry... I'll tell you guys about it at patrol later tonight. For now, I need to get going, and so do you." I stood up quickly once I got him to relax and purr, crouching low and jumping over the school's wall again and finding a safe place to detransform before running back to the place I was told to wait for Chat Noir.

Not even a second later, Chat Noir came running over, and he sighed in relief at seeing me without injury thanks to Ladybug's magic. "Okay... Okay, you look fine. Thank goodness." He smiled as he looked over me, but his smile faded when his eyes landed on my hands. "Wait... What happened to your hand?"

I looked down and my eyes widened as I remembered the cut in my palm, which was causing some blood to run down to my fingertips. I quickly hid it behind my back and smiled the best I could, shrugging slightly. I tilted myself to the side and flailed my arms a bit as if to say, "I fell."

Chat Noir definitely did not look convinced, his eyes squinting in suspicion and he looked from my hand to my face, as if trying to see if I was lying-which I was.

After a few long, agonizing moments, he stepped back and nodded. "Alright... Well, you look fine, and you're standing without any trouble, so I should get going. It was nice to meet you Jasper. I'll see you later!" He smiled and waved before running off, and ai let out the breath that I didn't realize I was holding.

Neeks flew from his hiding place and sat on my shoulder, looking up at me. I looked at him questioningly, asking him silently about what happened with my transformation, and also wondering what caused me to calm down so fast even though that was not supposed to happen.

He shifted a little uncomfortably and his hears flattened against his head again. "We need to talk?"

I nodded, starting to walk home. Neeks whined softly, but didn't object aside from a soft "What about your things?"

I pulled my phone from my pocket, making sure not to get anything bloody, and quickly typed my response. "I'll get those from Nathanael or Alya or whoever has them later."

Neeks nodded and sighed again softly, laying himself over my shoulder like a stuffed toy as we walked the short distance home. Once I was inside, the both of us froze as I was about to close the door, hearing feet thudding against the floor. Before I could really register what was happening I was suddenly barreled into and squeezed almost painfully by my mom, hearing her shout my name.

"Jasper! Oh my sweet baby boy, are you okay?" She kissed the top of my head before grabbing my shoulders and moving back so she wasn't on top of me, looking over me. While all my burns had been healed, my clothes were not as lucky. "Your clothes! What did the Akuma do to you? Oh, baby, nothing hurts, right?" She cried, placing her hands on my cheeks so I could look into her tear-filled eyes. I blushed slightly from her overly affectionate actions, smiling nervously.

"I'm okay, mom. The superheroes made sure I was alright. The only damage on me now is a scrape I gave myself." I mouthed slowly so she could understand. She sighed and laughed softly, hugging me again; gentler this time. "Thank goodness. I was so worried." She ran a hand through my hair and I gently hugged her back, angling my injured hand so it didn't touch her and ruin her clothes. After a moment she moved away and gently took my injured hand, studying it.

"Okay... It doesn't look too bad. Could be much worse, yeah? Let's get this cleaned up and bandaged. Thank goodness this isn't your dominant hand." She said softly, wrapping an arm around me and leading me towards the kitchen sink so she could wash the cut. She turned on the hot water and let me wash my hands under it before it got too hot as she got out the first aid kit we had under the sink. We found that more accidents between the two of us happened in the kitchen, so we kept a first aid kit here for easier access.

After washing my hands, Mom dabbed the cut dry with a paper towel before grabbing a small container of Neosporin and giving my cut a good slathering of it. We stopped having any type of disinfectant that caused stinging after my accident, and Neosporin worked well enough so we didn't particularly care about the others anymore.

Mom wrapped my hand in gauze carefully, letting me clench my fist a bit to see if it was too tight. I gave her a thumbs up and she secured the end of the gauze with a sigh, kissing my forehead gently. "Try not to scare me like that again, please? I'll try to get you some new versions of that shirt and pants, but I can't make any promises..."

I shook my head, smiling, and carefully took her hand in my own before starting to trace letters on her hand to talk to her. "It's okay, you don't have to." I wrote, smiling up at her moments later. She laughed softly and hugged me again. "I'll start looking, anyway. Why don't you go get some rest and change out of those rags? I'll come check on you in a little bit."

I nodded, smiling. Mom ruffled my hair before stepping to the side, gesturing towards my room. I kissed her cheek and hugged her a final time before going to my room and closing the door. I locked the door with a sigh and made my way to the dresser, shedding the remains of my clothes and changing into some old workout clothes. Neeks flew to my desk and sat down by the peppermint candy bowl, grabbing one of the treats and beginning to nibble on it. He wouldn't meet my eyes when I went over to him, sitting in my desk chair and looking at him pointedly with my arms crossed over my chest.

Neeks sighed heavily and looked up at me, staring for a few moments before looking down, as if debating whether or not he wanted to tell me something.

"So, I'm sure you've noticed you are different from the others..." He started, trailing off as he watched me nod. His tail twitched nervously. "Well, that's part of a cultural difference- although I'm not sure why. Since I'm from America the... Rules, pertaining to the miraculous stones are different. Wolven's chosen- your predecessors- had a give and take relationship with us, unlike the Chinese kwamis. They give, but do not take. The human they are giving their abilities to, does not have to give them energy."

My eyebrows furrowed as a question formed, and as I opened my mouth to at least communicate my confusion, Neeks cut me off. "Yes, you humans do give us energy, in the form of nutrition, but the type of energy I'm talking about..." He flew over to me and placed a paw over my heart. "...It's from inside. You aren't give away your life force or anything dangerous, but your stamina and mental exhaustion are a part of the trade. The more exhausted you are, the shorter you will be able to be Wolven." He said softly, flying back to the desk. "That's why you can go on for longer than five minutes while using your ability, and why you appearance is so altered. In a way, you can say we merge together.

"Another difference is that, while the Chinese Kwamis wait inside their miraculous for the holder to pick a suitable chosen, I pick my pup. I create the miraculous and what the outfit looks like based on the personality and the spirit of my pup. There is no middle man."

I grabbed a piece of paper and quickly wrote down my question before he could continue, showing it to him. "How do you know that you've chosen the right person to be Wolven? What do you look for?"

Neeks was quiet for longer then he needed to be, but I eventually got some form of an answer. "There... There is a 'code' that my chosen must follow. You might know of it as The Way of the Warrior. If they fulfill that code, as well as a special condition... Most times, they are worthy of becoming Wolven. They become my pups, and I care for them a great deal."

After he said that, he looked like he was done with sharing for the evening. I nodded and gently picked him up, nuzzling his stomach with my nose. He giggled and hugged my nose gently, nuzzling back. "Hey Jasper?"

I nuzzled him again as I set him on the desk, a scratchy, questioning hum escaping me before a soft cough followed. Neeks smiled up at me brightly, although a small bit of sadness was hiding in his blue eyes. "You're my favorite pup."