The weather was perfect for the large crowd gathered at the Trocadéro. There was nary a cloud in the sky, the temperature was fair, and the trees were beginning to show their autumn colors. Even the pigeons seemed subdued today, bringing with them hope that the reason for the crowd's formation wouldn't be briefly interrupted by the 28th attack of Paris' least threatening supervillain. More than one-hundred thousand people filled the Jardins du Trocadéro on the hill of Chaillot where they stood, overflowing to the surrounding streets which had been closed off to accommodate the massive turnout, and even stretching out to the Pont d'léna and the grounds of the Eiffel Tower on the other side of the Seine.
The central esplanade was cordoned off at all the surrounding stairways, creating a stage for the speaker and the guests of honor. The passageway through the two halves of the Palais de Chaillot had a mobile power station set up for the stage. Draped between the buildings was a massive red-and-black banner displaying the name of the event: "Cérémonie D'Anniversaire du Ladybug et Chat Noir" – Ladybug and Chat Noir Anniversary Ceremony.
Mayor André Bourgeois stood on a slightly elevated platform to reach over the front of the wall facing the Seine, and he was flanked on either side by the Ladybug and Chat Noir themselves, the heroine and hero being honored this day. As the central microphone gained power, it created a slight buzz from the loudspeakers in front of the two main staircases that quieted the many conversations among the crowd.
"Welcome, fellow citizens of Paris! Three hundred and sixty-five days ago, a tremendous event came upon us that has redefined life as we knew it in our grand city. In the face of an army of superpowered stone giants threatening our very destruction, two brave and courageous young warriors called upon their own powers to emerge victorious, and since then have continued to defend our home from the devious plots of Hawk Moth and the akumas he creates to feed on our moments of greatest weakness.
"While Ladybug, Chat Noir, and their newer allies provide physical protection and recovery from the damages, it is still up to us, the people of Paris, to remain strong in our hearts and minds. We must continue to march forward each day without fear and defy the terror that the foul villain seeks to sow among us to claim the powers that hold us together. I, as mayor, have passed laws protecting the rights of akumatized victims, providing services to those at risk, and organizing our forces to aid in the needs of our guardians, so that the people I serve can be assured in their confidence and so our economy may continue to prosper.
"Today, we honor the fortitude of every Parisian and pay tribute to the efforts, past and future, of the miraculous heroes who wield the responsibility of keeping our city safe."
He paused, the sounds of applause filling the air in the time before he next spoke. "Let us now welcome those very heroes to speak to us. Please show Ladybug and Chat Noir your greatest appreciation as they come forward!"
The applause grew severalfold as the Mayor stepped back and the two costumed individuals took his place, standing side-by-side in front of the eyes of Paris.
A man and woman stood on a platform at the end of a long catwalk, the gardens underneath illuminated by sunlight that was cast down through a massive window on the far end. The pod in the center was opened, revealing Emilie Agreste in her eternal stillness.
"My dear Emilie…" Gabriel spoke, gazing mournfully at his unresponsive wife. "Only a few short weeks after that terrible fate placed you here did I begin my quest to find your cure. Yet it feels as if an eternity has passed since even the anniversary of that accursed day, and the shadow of each sunset without you grows longer than the last.
"I almost gave up on you once, and I shall never forgive myself for it. It has now been as long since then as that time was from the outset… yet I do not know if I am any closer to my goal."
He paused, reflecting on the path that had led him thus far. His initial expectation had been that he could wear down the Ladybug and Black Cat holders and win through attrition, but they proved to be very competent and resilient for a couple of teenagers. Any remaining hope for that plan was quashed when they began pulling out other miraculouses and those elemental potions when forced onto their back feet, and that was when he found himself at a loss.
It was the chance to akumatize a miraculous holder that made him realize that his understanding of his powers was all wrong; it wasn't pre-existing evil that made for strong candidates, but the potential for evil that the akuma could push them into. The closer to one's core one had been wronged, the more powerful the abilities they would gain. Now his attention was focused on consistently finding candidates who would use that power effectively.
The existence of a Guardian of the Miracle Box had been a major obstacle to his ambition, but his location was carelessly unraveled by the hands of the kwami, Fu's own sentimonster, and Ladybug herself. Though the transfer of Guardianship to Ladybug kept her main assister of the Miracle Box in play and out of his reach, it still gave him a great advantage, thanks to Nathalie.
Now he looked over to her, who respectfully remained silent as he spoke his feelings. If it wasn't for her, his mission would have failed long ago; it was she who saved him on Heroes' Day, she who took up the mantle of Mayura to aid him, and she who filched the Guardian's translated tablet to give them the knowledge to repair the Peacock Miraculous. That much was the minimum he could do for Emilie.
It pained him that the fixed miraculous wouldn't be of any help in healing her; in the same fashion that using a damaged miraculous would eventually copy its wounds to the wielder, only by using an intact miraculous could it restore one to good health. Emilie was not conscious; therefore, she could not use the Peacock to reverse the damage it had caused. He was grateful that Nathalie, at least, would be able to regain what she had sacrificed to get them this far.
"Today," he began again, returning his focus to his wife, "the people of Paris are celebrating your continued stasis. Today, they sing their praises to the heroes who fight for them while blissfully ignoring the conflict being fought."
He felt anger and resolve building in him, and he turned again to his trusted assistant. "Paris needs to be reminded exactly who's responsible for giving those heroes work. Are you ready, Nathalie?"
She met his eyes with a rare display of passion. "Always… Gabriel."
He held up the two miraculouses resting in his left hand. It still felt disrespectful for anyone other than Emilie to equip the Peacock. Today… he would fight with it in her honor. Gently, he lifted the Butterfly Lapel, and after one last gaze, he gave it to Nathalie. They nodded, maintaining eye contact, and pinned their respective miraculouses onto the top-center of their chests. The matching kwami of communication and emotion emerged, looking confused and scared by the swapping of their usual owners.
Gabriel and Nathalie spoke their commands in unison.
"Duusu, spread my feathers!"
"Nooroo, wings rise!"
Both miraculouses absorbed their kwami, the Peacock's five tailfeathers turning a vibrant indigo and the Butterfly growing its four purple wings.
A masquerade-style mask, indigo with curvature to resemble a bird's beak and angular eyes, formed upwards on Gabriel's face, and his irises grew wide and pink. The magic spread to form his hair from the mask's edge, also darkening it to a similar color and adding a black stripe on both sides aligned with his eyes. Meanwhile, the distinctive silver butterfly mask spread itself onto Nathalie, absorbing her glasses. It wrapped around her head to dye her hair a very deep purple and part it down the middle, placing side bangs on either side of the singular thread in the middle that still drooped down and to her left.
Their suits formed in sync, indigo and purple running up their bodies. Nathalie spread her arms as the wave traveled down them, forming an open-vested magician's coat that ended in black gloves and grew downward past her waist to end in coattails in the same butterfly shape as her mask. From Gabriel's Peacock Brooch, a deep blue grew upwards, creating a large collar that spread up his neck and out all the way to cover his shoulders. An indigo coat then formed down, meeting in the center with another blue line as the divider. It curved outward to end the coat around his calves in three parts shaped like peacock feathers, leaving a triangle shape opening to another indigo patch, matching his hair, under the coat. A similar silver waistcoat drew itself in on Nathalie.
Gabriel gained the Peacock's fan in his right hand, spreading it out. Nathalie formed the Butterfly's cane with both hands, with the top on her right side, then dropped her left hand so that she could twirl it around like a baton as she spun once clockwise. The transformation ended as she finished, the cane pointed forward as if it was a scepter, while her boss continued to stand morosely with the fan covering his mouth.
Ladybug didn't expect she'd ever feel nervous, but a part of her was still in disbelief that it had really been one whole year. Gazing past the crowd to the Eiffel Tower, she could still vividly recall how it all started there: the face of Hawk Moth that formed from his akumas and the impassioned speech she responded to his demands with as she grabbed every last one and purified them all.
"Good morning, everyone," she started. She attempted to clear her throat without it getting picked up by the microphone. Chat Noir looked at her and smiled reassuringly. It was him that had given her the courage to stand up for herself back then, when the police didn't have faith in her abilities and neither did she.
"One year ago today, I made a promise to you. I promised that Chat Noir and I would protect everyone, find Hawk Moth, and end his attacks, no matter how long it took us."
Again, she found herself pausing on the words she had rehearsed. She didn't think anyone, least of all herself, had anticipated that the conflict would still be going after this long.
"While there are still no leads on where Hawk Moth is hiding, our promise will forever hold strong. No misfortune is too daunting, and no amount of fame will ever dissuade us from our dedication to what matters most: keeping Paris safe. We've even recruited allies to help us in our battles; we regret to say that none of them could be here with us for the ceremony." That would be the doing of the man standing behind us, who insisted that this wasn't anyone else's anniversary and that we should focus on highlighting the deeds of the original duo. She expected that all of them were in the crowd.
A sudden screech emitted from the speakers drowned out whatever train of thought she was on.
"And what a pity," a deep voice boomed that Ladybug instantly recognized, "because now they won't be here to save you." Hawk Moth.
Both she and Chat readied their weapons in a fraction of a second. Mayor Bourgeois' protection detail wasted no time in rushing forward to retrieve him, Chat Noir moving to watch the rear of the stage as they did.
"I'm going to check it out, Ladybug," he declared. "Hawk Moth must've hijacked the audio cables."
She leapt over the retreating protection detail to his side. "I'm coming with you; I can't risk him beating you one-on-one."
They ran over to the tech van, the spotted heroine keeping an eye on their surroundings while her partner located the audio setup.
"Oh no…" he mumbled.
"What is it?"
He was gazing at one of the audio ports, where instead of the cable that should have been plugged in, an indigo feather had been jammed into the slot. He plucked it out and showed it to her.
"Mayura's here, too. They used this feather as a receiver to broadcast their announcement."
"That means they're no longer in this location. This must've been a distraction!"
Shouts and gasps from the audience behind them confirmed her theory for her. They turned to see that their two foes had taken their places center-stage… only they weren't the Hawk Moth and Mayura they recognized.
The heroes were halted from advancing on them with the sight of Mayor Bourgeois in the Butterfly-wielding Mayura's grasp, her cane held to the mayor's neck with both hands. She was looking directly at them, and her threat was clear. A brief glance to the side showed that the entire protection entourage had been wiped out, the guards lying unconscious on the floor.
"Citizens of Paris," the Peacock-wielding Hawk Moth spoke, projecting his voice without even needing the loudspeakers, "it seems a lesson is in order. You have been fooled to believe that Hawk Moth is some passive, crooked villain whose akuma lackeys Ladybug, Chat Noir, and their allies foil like a cartoon show. You are led to think that they are infallible forces of good who cannot falter, and I am here with my own ally to show the error in your judgment. This is a war, a battle of both brains and brawn. Today, I am Garuda, and I shall make it very clear that we whom you call the villains can and will adapt to the battlefield."
Garuda held his fan up as Butterfly Mayura uncapped her cane, releasing a darkened butterfly that immediately made its way into her partner's miraculous tool. The signature insignia of akumatization simultaneously appeared over both of their masks.
"Pride of Darkness, I am Mora," she introduced, her voice projecting the same way as his. "I am giving you the ability to seek and draw out the dark desires and emotions lurking within the heroes of Paris. By combining our powers, you can put on full display the struggle they face against their inner demons, and we shall prove them unworthy of the Ladybug and Black Cat miraculouses!"
Garuda needed no agreement as the process commenced, dark matter sweeping up and across him. His costume was recolored to a pure black with dark purple accents, excepting the red eye patterns on the five tails of his coat. He turned to his enemies, his real eyes piercing them with a matching red glare. Both heroes were ready to pounce, but Mora kneed Mayor Bourgeois to make him cry out as a reminder of the situation. Ladybug wouldn't be able to revive him if she had to use the Miraculous Ladybugs on the new akuma.
The villain in question took a step forward and plucked a blackened feather from the fan. It began charging with power as he delivered his next speech.
"Ladybug. Behind your heroic façade, you are nothing but a scared little girl. I can hear the voice in the back in your head, no matter how much you try to silence it. With every move you make, it asks you if that was a mistake, if you're being judged for it, if it will snowball into a catastrophe that costs you something you hold dear. Your deepest desire is to return to being a normal girl with a normal life, but you know it will never happen."
Pride of Darkness released the feather, silhouetted with a purple glow despite remaining perfectly dark, and it began to expand into a shapeless mass. The mass slimmed out into a torso, growing four limbs, shortly followed by the protrusion of a head that itself gained two smaller knobs on either side of the space where it met the neck. By the time it reached the ground, it was standing as a full-scale black replica of Ladybug.
The villain had plucked another one before the formation even completed.
"Chat Noir. Your jokes and playfulness are a pitiful attempt to compensate for the deep loneliness that eats at your being. It is a black hole darker than your suit, and it only grows larger with each day. Your deepest desire is to be loved, but all those whom you love have erected walls to keep you out."
He released that feather as well, which followed the transformation of the first. It soon distinguished itself with a long tail and two triangles pointing out of its head.
Mora turned, releasing the mayor and shoving him aside as she entered a combat stance with her cane. Shadow Ladybug and Shadow Chat Noir pulled out their copies of the yo-yo and staff, and they commenced their assault.
Chat Noir struggled to keep his composure as their dark duplicates bore down on them. Be strong, be strong, be strong, he repeated in his head. Can't fail Ladybug. He didn't know the Butterfly or Peacock had powers that strong; the words Pride of Darkness spoke to him sounded even more true than any that he could tell himself. If this duplicate was the manifestation of those desires… he didn't know if he could defeat it. It's not as if he was winning that battle in real life.
Next to him, Ladybug looked as determined as ever. Unfortunately, they still lost ground quickly with the two real supervillains looming on either side to cut off their flanking options.
"What should we do, Ladybug?" he asked as they backflipped over the tech van.
"I – I don't know yet!" she exclaimed. Shadow Ladybug wrapped her yo-yo around the van and threw it at them, wires sparking as it became forcefully disconnected. Chat threw his staff while extending it, and it held between the two buildings to catch the van and ricochet it out past the villains. He flinched as it soared past the stage and hoped that the crowd had evacuated quickly enough that it didn't crush anyone. Not his best idea.
"We need to focus down either Mora or Garuda. If we stop one, we can cut off the clones at their source." She snatched his staff with her yo-yo before her doppelganger could do the same, pulling it back and returning it to its owner. "But I don't know how."
By this point, they were already backed into the Place du Trocadéro, past the end of the barricade. Fortunately, it wasn't very crowded, and he expected that whoever was here had heard the commotion from the stage.
"I think we may need some help of our own," he suggested.
"No!" she shouted with sudden alarm. "He could just make dark versions of them, too. And–" she cut herself off as if to block out some thoughts, her voice cutting down to a hiss between clenched teeth, "if these things are drawing on our consciouses, even thinking about the you-know-what at you-don't-know-where could give its location away."
Now that they were in the open around the Ferdinand Foch statue in the center of the plaza, they could see all four of their foes staring down at them. Pride of Darkness pointed, and both of his creations charged forward in a single leap.
"We need to split up," Ladybug ordered.
"Why?"
"No time, I'll explain on the go!"
She pulled her earbud out of her yo-yo, throwing the toy to her left with one hand even before she had finished placing the device with her other. Chat did likewise, beginning his vault immediately in the other direction. The two shadows landed where they had been, then copied their actions to follow suit.
No matter how skillfully she swung through Paris, Ladybug's shadowy counterpart kept pace with her, following her like… well, a shadow. She was forcing herself to focus on the task and not the disturbing insights Pride of Darkness had made, just like she wasn't thinking about the you-know-what. Even if what she had told Chat Noir wasn't true, it was clear that she wasn't going to lose this foe long enough to– do the thing.
"Okay, what's the deal?" Chat asked through her communicator.
"We have to find a weakness of some kind, so I'm testing their decision making. Since they came from the Peacock's Fan, they must be sentimonsters, which means they should still be tied to the amok even if they're feeding off of our emotions."
"But there wasn't an amokized object, they formed right out of the feather!"
"I know, but Pride of Darkness was still giving them directions. The fan itself is probably the source."
"It could just be an extension of the akumatization link," Chat said. "Have either of them chased you?"
"I don't see them, but I would imagine one of them is," she replied.
The spotted heroine swung through Place de la Concorde in seconds, the dark copy following like a delayed afterimage. Running may have seemed cowardly, but it kept the akuma from doing anything else other than chase her. It also gave her a chance to think, her mind moving just as quickly as her body. There had to be some way to distract the dark Ladybug, or… That's it!
"Chat!" she called. "We could use a power-up! The Shadows can't use those!"
"We don't know that for sure!" he replied quickly. "They might be able to change to mimic our form as long as they're connected to us. Hawk Moth–err, Garuda, might even have some himself, since he has the grimoire."
"Urrrgh!" she groaned, but not through her earbud. Her only readily available option was using her Lucky Charm, but that was a huge risk, regardless of if Chat was right or wrong. For one, it might just be able to read her plan and render the superpower useless. Two, she expected that it would keep the physical prowess of a sentimonster even if it copied her de-transformation. Her foes would almost assuredly find out her civilian identity if time ran out, either through an akumatization link or from the Shadow easily overpowering her until one of its masters arrived. She expected at least one was following from a distance, especially if it needed commands. That also ruled out just de-transforming to test the theory.
The Lucky Charm would be an all-or-nothing gamble. Was that a chance she was willing to take?
Chat Noir wasn't having any better luck on his end, as he twisted his way through some back alleys in the 16th arrondissement with the even darker Chat, well, shadowing him perfectly. Since he didn't see Mora or Pride of Darkness either, he was considering testing that luck by taking his Shadow head-on, which had already nearly happened once when he tried to hide in a dumpster and it had found him. If it really was feeding on his thoughts, maybe he could weaken it if he suppressed his desires, like he was always forced to as Adrien.
Don't be ridiculous, he chided himself. While the initial dread may have worn off, the truths Pride of Darkness had dredged up were quite literally following him around both physically and mentally. He needed to stay focused like Ladybug always did, and that part of him was saying that if one of the Shadow's masters had chased them, he was going to lose a direct fight no matter which way. Unless…
There was one option readily available to him, but it would be a huge risk. He couldn't be sure if it would work, because it hadn't gone well when Lady Noire did it and Ladybug refused to let him try it as a result. If he failed, he would now be on a timer with a foe that could follow him until he de-transformed, that would likely be berserk, and may have perfectly competent backup.
But what other choice was there? He and Ladybug had shot down all of their normal tactics, and they were getting nowhere figuratively while running everywhere literally. Ladybug wasn't here, and he wasn't Lady Noire. He knew a lot more about how his Cataclysm functioned, and he still thought it was possible to destroy a sentimonster with it. And sometimes, you just have to take a chance if you want to get the reward.
He returned to a main street, extended his staff, and made a huge vault all the way over the Seine onto one of the apartment buildings. He turned around to make sure that the Shadow had committed itself to the same jump to reach him.
"Cataclysm!" he shouted, causing a black ball of energy to form in his outstretched right palm. He clenched it and pulled it close to show his control over the untamed destruction.
If Shadow Chat Noir had a face, the hero would've seen its eyes go wide in terror as it fell right into his trap. He had to remind himself that it didn't, it wasn't him or anyone sentient, and he was only destroying a magic sentimonster copy.
His hand contacted the body of his doppelganger, and time seemed to slow. The Shadow ceased movement and what felt like an eternity passed where nothing happened. Adrien relished in how good it felt, even if his idea was about to fail, to confront a representation of all of his problems with the full force of Chat Noir's Cataclysm right to the heart.
The black figure slowly dissolved into ash, blowing away in the wind. Chat Noir heard himself release a breath he didn't know he was holding. He didn't feel any different in the aftermath of his power, so it appeared that he hadn't destroyed any part of himself. And that was good, because he had a mission and it was time to capitalize on his progress.
"Ladybug," he initiated over the comms. "I defeated my copy. Let's meet up and take down yours. Where at?"
"Okay– hold on, what?!" she nearly shouted. "How… no, did you Cataclysm it?!"
"Didn't have a choice," he said. It wasn't really true, but it also wasn't exactly false. "And it worked, and I'm fine. I'm going to recharge now."
"You– ugh, we'll talk later! When you're ready, head back to the Trocadéro for recon until I get there. I don't think Mora or Pride is following us, and that means they're up to something."
He leapt down into an alley and checked his surroundings to make sure no one was around. Given that it was an outside ceremony that got interrupted, he wasn't sure what people were up to now, and there were always the Alyas of the city running around, looking for some action.
"Claws in," he commanded, and his leather suit dispelled down his body as Plagg emerged from his ring.
"I'm glad you're really starting to take the idea of rebellion to heart, but breaking Ladybug's rules? Gutsy move, kid."
Adrien gave him a confused look as he procured some camembert for Plagg to snatch. "How do you know I did that?"
Plagg took a huge bite of his cheese. "Have you forgotten whose power it is you're channeling every time you call on a Cataclysm? I know everything you've ever touched with one, because I'm the one that destroys it." He took another bite; the wedge was already half-gone.
"Then I guess you're also to blame for my plan working. And you know what, I trust Ladybug to use her Lucky Charm to the best of her ability all the time, so she should be able to trust me and my power just the same. Now finish your cheese so I can be ready for the next round. Pride of Darkness almost definitely felt the destruction of his sentimonster, so he's probably coming after me right now."
Plagg gulped down the last of his snack. "Well alrighty then, have fun sorting this out. Glad it's not my job."
The boy grew miffed. "Supportive as always. Plagg, claws out."
His suit formed once again as green light washed down his body, and he rose up and away using his staff. He was careful not to get high above roof level so as to avoid being spotted from afar by his foes, wherever they were. The place he decided he would counter-snoop on them was one of the buildings next to the Eiffel Tower, where he would hopefully not be too conspicuous while still having a good view of the Trocadéro. He pressed his staff's pawprint to pop open the phone, switching it to its camera mode so he could zoom in to see whatever was happening.
What he saw shocked him so much that he nearly dropped the staff. Pride of Darkness was plainly visible on the stage, and so were the five other Shadows forming a rank in front of him. He was currently creating a sixth one, which formed out into the shape of a tall boy with a long baton not too different from his own weapon. The akuma had created Shadows to copy all of their ally superheroes, and with a wave of his fan, they turned and moved as a group onto the Pont d'léna, likely to provide backup to their Shadow of a leader.
Chat ducked down to remain out of their sight. "L-Ladybug…" he gulped into his earpiece. "He made more."
"W-what?!"
The heroine on the other end was between swings in her crossing of Les Invalides, and she began falling to the street as she lost her concentration from hearing the news. She snapped back to reality soon enough to tuck into a roll as she hit the ground in the middle of the street.
"How many?"
"… six. One for each of our teammates. And Mora's not here."
Ladybug turned around to face her Shadow as it landed more gracefully on the cobblestone, while also looking around frantically for signs of the Butterfly wielder. Panic struck her when she saw a small form leaping on the horizon, in a different direction from that of the Eiffel Tower and the Trocadéro. The incarnation of her own shortcomings pierced fear into her soul as it foreshadowed the threat of a half-dozen more ghosts that was likely on its way.
Her instincts were screaming at her not to say the words forming on her tongue, but she could only see the situation getting worse the longer she waited to let them out. Chat's arrival would be delayed, perhaps even beaten by that of the other Shadows, and he wouldn't be able to Cataclysm them all at once.
"Lucky Charm!" she shouted, throwing her yo-yo in the air. She knew exactly what her duplicate was going to do, and she jumped into the air to catch what had formed into a sealed red bucket before it could be intercepted, kicking off of her black copy and flipping back onto the ground.
Something sloshed within the bucket as she moved, and looking down at it, it was surprisingly void of its regular black spots. Only a singular black circle covered the entire lid, and she had a pretty good guess as to what the bucket contained.
A plan formed quickly in her mind, painting over her fear. Aha! The can… herself… Shadow Ladybug… the Hôtel de Invalides…
Just like that, everything that she had been worried about happening was now what she wanted to happen. If Hawk Moth and Mayura thought they could flip the script and pull an unexpected victory, then she would let them believe that, right up until the very moment she pulled the rug from under them and turned it right back into defeat.
The form of Mora that was on the horizon quickly approached Les Invalides, and she was trying to come up with a new battle plan along the way. They had not expected Chat Noir to destroy his Shadow, and now Ladybug had circled around back towards the Eiffel Tower, if the position of her Shadow continued to be accurate. She wasn't used to being unable to track the sentimonsters herself, and it was a frustrating line of communication to have to rely on the relay of Garuda's connection and orders. It was for that reason that she had decided not to go with Shadow Ladybug initially to chase the real one, but circumstances had changed, and she didn't trust the Shadow alone now. Ladybug was too good at capitalizing on these sorts of surprises.
"Shadow Ladybug just entered Napoleon's Tomb," Pride of Darkness informed through their akumatization link. "The others will be there shortly. If you can keep Ladybug inside, she'll be surrounded, and victory will be ours!"
With another leap, the woman was only a block or so away from the Hôtel and the Tomb next to it. She didn't see any signs of the battle, though that was understandable since it seemed Ladybug had spent most of it running away. Despite her partner's claim, Mora knew better than to assume that the end of that activity had resulted in anything in their favor. She would believe the evidence when she saw it herself.
It wasn't until she was near to the Tomb's entrance that the ink-black Ladybug impression walked out, alone. The Shadow turned to her, looming in the shadow of the entryway. It lifted its equally dark yo-yo and spun it in a circle around itself; Mora understood the message. Ladybug has been caught.
Her first reaction was to question that conclusion, running over possible ways that Ladybug could get out of this. The heroine had previously managed to subvert her sentimonster copy from Mayura's control, but nature of this one as everything Ladybug didn't like and the Peacock Fan being back at the Trocadéro meant she couldn't persuade or force the sentimonster to her side. Her Lucky Charm may be able to free her from her bindings, but Shadow Ladybug was still as clever as the real one and wouldn't have left her alone unless it was sure.
Soon, she saw six black specks approach, their forms very conspicuous against the pale blue sky, and she finally felt secure in her next statement.
"Ladybug has been captured by her Shadow, sir. On your command, we shall engage in taking her miraculous."
"Finally! I've waited a whole year for this!"
With Shadow Ladybug in the lead, Mora and the Shadows moved in unison into the upper level of the Tomb. The suited villain's cane echoed off of the floor as she moved, and she kept an eye all around her for someone lying in ambush. Chat Noir's whereabouts were still unknown.
Shadow Ladybug stopped in front of the rim of the circular balcony of the atrium, and the other Shadows spread out around it. Mora walked up next to her to look down at the tombstone itself, and she saw– No!
Her next sensation was being flipped over the railing as the Ladybug next to her threw her overhead. She landed roughly, face-up, next to the other Shadow Ladybug that was tied to Napoleon's tombstone with a yo-yo, with a black splotch on the ground next to it.
"Chat, now!" the real Ladybug above shouted, disappearing from sight. The entire wall she could see beyond her circular viewpoint turned as black as the Shadows, and Mora hopelessly scrambled towards cover as the whole building came toppling down on them all.
Ladybug tucked and rolled to avoid the debris from the collapsing Tomb behind her. She briefly felt bad for defiling Napoleon's grave, but at this point, it was just another on the list of national monuments that had been destroyed in one akuma fight or another. She kept running towards the street as her now less-black-than-her partner vaulted into step beside her.
"I see black is the new… red-and-black!" he joked. "Lady Noire's already taken, though, you'll have to come up with something else."
"Not now, Chat," she replied in a serious tone, carefully lifting up the large manhole cover she had tracked down. "I don't know if that will hold them for long, we need to hide."
He jumped down and she followed suit, re-positioning the manhole where it had been before dropping down. They ran through the tunnels until they reached a spot where the sewer split, and each hero took a side and finally stopped moving.
"Spots off," Ladybug said, the black paint washing away with her costume.
"Claws in," Chat Noir mimicked.
Marinette leaned back against the curved wall with a sigh, opening her purse for Tikki to come out with a cookie. Adrien similarly procured another chunk of cheese for Plagg.
"Hawk Moth sure hates celebrations," the blond commented.
"I should've known, I should've kept our partners on standby," she criticized at herself.
"You can't know everything, Ladybug. We're going to get through this, we always do."
Marinette scowled and lightly banged the wall with a clenched fist. "Not if you pull anything like that Cataclysm again!"
Adrien turned to face the inner divider, for whatever good it would do him. "What, you don't trust me to use my own power? I follow your Lucky Charm plans all the time without questioning your decisions, why can't you do the same for me?"
The bluenette stood and mirrored the movement, but began pacing as well. "Because there's a huge difference between your power and mine! If I mess up my Lucky Charm, I'm the one that has to fix it, and I get to try again as many times as I need as long as I can hold onto it. When I succeed, I'm guaranteed to accomplish whatever it is I wanted, which is usually straight up winning against the akuma.
"But if you mess up your Cataclysm, that's it!" she exclaimed by spreading her hands forward, not that he could see them. "You don't get another shot without having to stop and hide to recharge, and there's no guarantee of anything no matter how times you use it. And guess what, if you fail, the person who has to clean up after you is still me, because my power can't function if yours isn't used correctly! Taking a risk like that, without telling me, in a fight that we were already starting to have trouble with, was incredibly irresponsible of you, Chat Noir!"
Adrien crossed his arms. "So what, you expected me to just keep running away without doing anything until you came up with an answer? That plan of yours just now never would have worked if I hadn't done what I did, because I wouldn't have been able to ambush them if my Shadow was still on my tail."
"I expect that you at least try it out before deciding to stake the entire fight on it! You could've Cataclysmed an easier sentimonster like the Lollipop Boy in a battle with lower stakes."
"Right, because you didn't already forbid me from doing that and wouldn't have yelled at me just like this if I did it anyway."
"I wouldn't if you told me in advance what you were trying to accomplish!"
"That's not true and you know it. You're only saying this now because I forced the conversation."
"I don't mean to interrupt your old couple's squabbles," Plagg's whiny voice interjected. "Well, actually, I do, because we don't have all day to wait for those sentimonsters to track you down, and I'm filled up and ready to go. Also, if you ask me, this argument sounds like a two-way street! You're both right, which means you're both wrong!"
"I have to agree with Plagg," Tikki added more softly. "Both of you are making good points, and that means neither of you handled things perfectly. You should apologize to each other and set this aside for now, because we need to focus on our objective. We can talk about this, hopefully more civilly, after we've defeated the akuma."
"Right, I, uh…" Adrien exhaled and leaned back against the sewer wall. "Sorry, Ladybug. I knew that I was risking a lot by doing that, and it was careless of me."
Marinette ran a hand through her hair and held the other to her forehead. "And I'm sorry for yelling at you. You're right, I… should trust you more."
Her recent conversation with her dad came to the forefront of her mind, but she banished the thought. Tikki was right, they needed to focus on their mission.
"Tikki… spots on."
"Plagg, claws out."
They both stepped out from their cover and looked at each other in the eyes, and then Chat Noir gave her one of his cheeky smiles. "Let's wrap up our birthday with some confidence, shall we?"
"Yes. Paris needs us."
Pride of Darkness had to hold in his anger and frustration when he came upon the literal ruins of his success in the form of Napoleon's Tomb. That blasted Ladybug always found a way to outsmart even his most well-crafted plans. She was supposed to believe that her Shadow formed out of her own mind and could read her intentions, and still she managed to figure out a way to dispose of it. How does someone outsmart herself? It was inconceivable!
He set the Shadow Chat Noir he had already re-created to clearing the rubble as he poured his fury into another feather, releasing it to form a replacement Shadow for the very girl the anger was directed at. Almost immediately upon its formation, it pointed up at the sky. When Pride looked up to see what it was, the two of them became forced to split and jump high in opposite directions.
It was an interception by the real Ladybug and Chat Noir. Pride heard Ladybug's yo-yo before he saw it, and he twisted in midair to swat it away with his fan before landing on his feet.
"No more games, Hawk Moth!" she exclaimed. "It's just you and us now!"
"And your worst nightmares," he replied confidently. He needed no command for them to join him in surrounding the two, all of them readied with their weapons.
"We're not afraid of a couple of fakers!" Chat Noir shot back. He initiated the fight with a rightward sweep of his staff, his Shadow moving out of the way and allowing him to pivot into a lunge towards Pride.
"No matter how dark or hopeless things get, Ladybug and I can count on each other until the very end!"
In one motion, Pride of Darkness dodged the weapon and swept his leg in a circle to try and trip Ladybug, who had just leaned back to avoid a swing of her Shadow's yo-yo and countered with one of her own to catch its arm. She had to ditch the move and hop into an awkward roll to avoid the villain's attack, which gave him and Shadow Ladybug space to stand between the two heroes and separate them.
Ladybug pulled her yo-yo back to her with finesse, not looking deterred in the slightest. "That's right! We'll never give up and we'll never stop working together to overcome any obstacle in our way!
"Lucky Charm!" she shouted, throwing her yo-yo into the air to exude a multitude of hearts. The hearts formed together into a black-spotted red cylindrical shape, wider in the middle and open on one end, which then fell into Ladybug's hands.
A vase? Pride thought. He hated how unpredictable those Lucky Charms were, and he needed to prioritize taking it away from her so she couldn't use it. A normal akuma wouldn't think of such a plan, as obvious as it may be, and he hoped that he could catch her off-guard with it.
At the very least, the vase now occupied one of her hands and put her at a further disadvantage to him and his sentimonster. Shadow Ladybug, following its primary directive, took the initiative and leapt forward towards its light counterpart. It threw its yo-yo again, but this time at Ladybug's yo-yo, which forced the heroine to dodge since blocking would entangle the weapons. The move left her open for Pride's follow-up slash of his fan, which she became again forced to block.
Behind them, both the real and imposter Chat Noirs were dueling in a whirlwind of pure black and slightly-less black. While the genuine hero appeared to have the upper hand, Pride had commanded the Shadow intentionally to play defense to keep him away from Ladybug.
He smirked at Ladybug's look of increasing frustration as she had to put all of her effort into her own defense.
"How's that teamwork working out for you, Ladybug?" he taunted. "Face it, no partnership was ever going to save you from the adversity inside your own heart! As long as that exists, you'll never defeat me!"
He finished that comment by finally getting past her guard, hitting her yo-yo shield at just the right angle to bat it away despite it still swinging. She staggered, and her Shadow took the opportunity to throw her own yo-yo and pin Ladybug's arms to her sides. She struggled against her bonds but only accomplished tripping backwards onto the ground, and Pride savored the look of utter despair that appeared on her face. He brought his fan back up to his face as he loomed over her.
"The Year of the Ladybug is now over."
He bent down and reached with his free arm towards Ladybug's right ear as she flailed even harder in the gravel.
Then, out of left field and actually to his left, he heard an impact, and then Shadow Ladybug tumbled on top of him. Chat Noir had, in desperation, thrown his weapon like a billiards cue to hit the black eight-ball, a move which left him wide open for his Shadow to put him in a lock with its own staff.
He shoved his minion off of him, but the damage had already been done. Ladybug seized the moment of surprise to escape the yo-yo, and he realized that he had dropped his fan just in time for her to dive aggressively for it with both hands. She snatched it just out of his reach and sprung off the ground, landing on her feet with a flourish of the feathered tool.
"NO!" he bellowed, leaping to his feet. That fan controlled his Shadows, and Ladybug had evidently figured that out as her dark counterpart jumped on him more intentionally to put him in a grapple of his own. He brusquely shrugged her off using his larger stature; he was not going to let the battle end like this.
"Your desperation techniques aren't going to work on me!" Pride roared. He on the other hand still had a legitimate trick up his sleeve that those children couldn't use. Ladybug hid the fan inside her Lucky Charm, and he scoffed at her pathetic attempt as he channeled his rage with all of his might. The fan obeyed his command to return to him, moving with such ferocity that it forced not only the vase but Ladybug herself with it, her grip barely holding as she dug in her feet and groaned with the effort as she was dragged across the rocky path.
When she was only meters away, he made eye contact, and the fire in her eyes told him that he had just fallen into her trap. He was suddenly tackled from behind by Shadow Chat Noir, the fan and vase flying past where his hand used to be, and the real cat hero was waiting behind him to catch them. Shadow Ladybug made its third and finally successful attempt at Ladybug's command, joining its shadowy partner in holding Pride of Darkness to the ground.
He realized then what Ladybug's real goal was, what the Lucky Charm had been summoned for. Each of them had just gained the chance to break the fan to de-akumatize him and destroy his Shadows, but they didn't. They were instead turning them against their master and continuing to fight. They wanted that extra manpower, because they wanted a bigger victory: taking the Peacock Miraculous.
"I release you fr–gah!"
His snap was interrupted by an uncomfortable pressure against his hands that forcibly curled his fingers in, and he found that he couldn't move them. It was the blasted vase, he could tell. It had flipped their fortunes after all, as Ladybug was now the one standing above him; she was quickly accompanied by Chat Noir.
"Everyone has their own darkness that they must face, and that will never go away," she spoke, looking tenderly at her partner before returning to a steely glare in his direction. "What matters is having people we care about by our side to help us through it, because the power of love is always stronger than the hate you sow!"
The two Shadows forced him to his feet, and he saw one last hope clamber out of the ruins. Ladybug reached for his brooch, but then a wave of purple matter washed over him and his two captors, dissolving them completely. A purple butterfly flew out of the Miraculous, and he ignored it completely to leap over the heroes straight to Mora's side, who was leaning on her cane for support. She managed to knock the vase down with it as he looked at their enemies with a surprising determination of his own.
"Then listen well, Ladybug and Chat Noir. That same power of love is what drives me to make my Wish. I will never give up either, not until I have the person who was taken away from me back at my side!"
He hooked an arm around Mora, and the two leapt away over the ruins of the Tomb. Ladybug let them disappear towards the horizon, because Garuda had left behind another task that she needed to take care of before it could get worse.
"No more evildoing for you, little akuma," Ladybug said, opening her yo-yo like a ladybug opens its wings to the glowing white compartment within. She swung the yo-yo in a circle to charge up her throw.
"Time to de-evilize!"
The yo-yo caught the akuma in one swoop, closing up to perform its magic purification.
"Gotcha!"
She opened the compartment again, and a regular white butterfly flew up and away. "Bye-bye, little butterfly!"
She walked over to where her Lucky Charm was lying on the ground, picking the vase up and throwing it into the air as well.
"Miraculous Ladybug!"
It burst into a swarm of ladybugs, which spread out in groups to restore all the damage. Napoleon's Tomb was fixed to its pristine state, and the rest flew over to the Trocadéro to clean up the stage, restore the tech van, and heal Mayor Bourgeois and his downed protectorate.
When Ladybug looked back down from the sky, Chat Noir was in front of her, and they made eye contact. Then she fell to her knees with a small cry and hung her head.
"Ladybug…" Chat whispered, kneeling in front of her and placing a hand on her shoulder. "Are you okay?"
Her hands were trembling. "I… I don't know, Chat. He was there, he was seconds from having my earrings. I know it's happened before, but… not like that."
"But you did it. We did it. We followed through on what we said. No matter how hopeless it may seem, we always trust in each other and keep fighting."
"Yes, I-I know, but… I almost didn't. I fell straight into his mind games, chaton. I let him convince me that he had plucked my darkest fears straight into that feather, even though it was a regular sentimonster the whole time."
"That's just what Hawk Moth does. Every time he sends out an akuma, he preys on those doubts and fears to get his victim to accept his devil's bargain."
Ladybug looked at him with her bluebell eyes. "And I'm supposed to be one above all that. The paragon that sees past the deception and shines through the darkness to save the akumatized person and the day. That's why Master Fu chose me to wield the Ladybug Miraculous… and become the Guardian of the Miracle Box… I just don't know…"
"If you're human?" Chat said with a little bite. "I– I'm sorry, that was rather blunt," he immediately added, then sighed.
"I was just as scared out there as you were, Bugaboo. And I know what it's like to have to be the golden boy and hide any blemishes behind a perfect smile. After a while, you begin to question who you really are under the masks and the expectations, or if there's even anyone there at all. I think that's why Master Fu chose me to wield the Cat Miraculous, to let the real me come out of the shadows. I think that's… why I defied you and Cataclysmed that sentimonster."
"So what Pride of Darkness said about you is true, then…"
His ears drooped, and he looked away. Ladybug reciprocated his action from earlier, her hand on his shoulder getting him to look back up at her.
"I've been an awful partner to you, Chat Noir. I never even considered that maybe your problems weren't simple or light enough that they could be ignored for me. If those problems prevent you from helping me with my problems, or if they lead to a loss themselves… then it's just as much of a failure as if my problems had been the cause."
Ladybug's earrings beeped, and she knew she had only two dots left. Counting that was automatic by now. She kept her gaze and smiled weakly at her partner.
"I… I wish things could be different. I know this isn't fair to either of us. But I want to try to help you, at least. We should meet sometime to talk about your problems."
He laughed, but it wasn't a good laugh. "You're right, Ladybug, it's not fair. I'm going to echo what you told me last month. You were concerned that I would take advantage of you if you opened up to me. You told me that you can't love me back, yet you're saying now that you want to provide that same deep, emotional support for me?"
Chat Noir stood up. "It can't work. There's nothing that can be done about your Guardianship or about Chat Blanc. The only way I can be what you need is to push my problems away from you."
The dark hero turned away from her. "I'm going to go now, so that I don't see your secret identity." And he did just that.
Ladybug stood with a startled expression. That heartfelt moment went sour quickly… and she couldn't say that it was unjustified. Ziggy had said that she shouldn't take it personally, because, as Chat just explained, it really can't happen any other way. She had to be perfect, and she said as such to him last month as well.
Maybe she was starting to lose herself. But was it under the weight of the expectations, or simply her own failures to meet them? Was she being entitled and making both of their lives harder than it needed to be?
Ladybug turned around to the Tomb behind her. Napoleon Bonaparte was a man who did incredible things, but even 200 years later, people still debated over what he made better and what he made worse. This past year also marked an era of incredible things, superpowers and chaotic battles beyond what anyone could have imagined even the day before it all started. So much had happened that she didn't even recognize the Marinette Dupain-Cheng from that day. She had grown in many ways, but also changed in others that she didn't know whether were better or worse either. There was a lot she didn't know right now.
Master Fu's final letter came to her mind. The road may be winding, and life wouldn't always give her the gifts she was hoping for. What really mattered was that she kept going. It may take time, but she had to trust that she would find the right answers eventually. The future, her future, depended on it.