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Hawkmoth slipped out of the back door of the house, and jumped up onto the next roof.

He had placed Ladybug inside a safe house on the other side of the city, one that could not be traced back to his civilian persona. It would be far too incriminating if he let Ladybug go and she just walked out of the front gates of the Agreste Mansion. She would have to be an idiot not to put two and two together if he let that happen, and Ladybug was no idiot.

Still, he had a meeting in half an hour, and he knew Ladybug was stubborn. It would take a while for her will to break, even with the two teenagers fighting for their lives in the Louvre, and in the meantime Gabriel Agreste was needed elsewhere.

He began to grin. The promise of victory hung tantalisingly close, and he could reach out and just brush it with the tips of his fingers. All he had to do was wait until Ladybug gave up her miraculous of her own free will too, preventing too much violence. This really was the best solution to everyone. A part of Hawkmoth urged caution, that he shouldn't celebrate until he had Ladybug's miraculous in his hand, because the hero of Paris was notoriously tricky and might still get out of this, but he had built a Miraculous-proof cage! He had even tested it on Nathalie, and she had been unable to break out of it.

He began to run, and leapt over onto the next roof, trying to stay out of sight and get to a place where he could detransform where nobody was watching. But as he jumped over a chimney, he came to a sudden halt at the sight of another man stood on the rooftop in front of him, leaning on a very familiar cane and watching him intently.

"Bongiorno, Hawkmoth," the man said, in a language that was almost but not quite Italian.

"And who are you?" Hawkmoth demanded, pointing his cane at the other man. Though his clothes were very old-fashioned, they followed a very familiar colour scheme- and Hawkmoth was sure he recognised the brooch that adorned the man's chest.

"I suppose I'm your moral compass," the other man- the other Hawkmoth- told him darkly. "I am the Butterfly, and what you could have been."

"How did you get here? And how did you find me?"

"You are not the only one with a time travelling Akuma," the Butterfly pointed out, and Hawkmoth suddenly remembered his conversation with Timetagger in his office. "And we are connected by virtue of having the same Miraculous, unfortunately. So I came here to have a discussion about how you are disgracing my good name."

"You know nothing about me," Hawkmoth scoffed.

"I've been told enough."

"By my enemies."

"And why are they your enemies?" the Butterfly waved his staff in the air. "You terrorise the city you should be protecting! You attack children for your own ends!"

"Those children are perfectly capable of looking after themselves," Hawkmoth replied testily, offended by that statement even though he knew it to be correct.

"Plenty of others aren't," the Butterfly replied. "Do you know why we can hone in on negative emotions?"

There was no reply, so he continued.

"We do that so we can quickly find people in danger," he said. "I allow them to fight back."

"So do I!" Hawkmoth stated.

"I help those under attack from armed men, and those drowning in canals. You weaponise the emotions of those presented with minor setbacks against them," the Butterfly pointed out. "My butterflies bring hope to those people when they see them approach; yours only bring fear and misery. Superheroes should be selfless; you're just a selfish, ugly rogue."

Hawkmoth just laughed. "Like I said, you know nothing about me," he said. "How dare you presume to lecture me? I have my reasons, reasons you could not understand. This isn't selfish, this has nothing to do with me!"

"How can you know that unless you tell me?" The Butterfly challenged him.

"My wife," Hawkmoth said after a pause.

"What?"

"I'm doing it to bring my wife back!" Hawkmoth said louder. "Do you have any idea what it's like to have to tell your young son that his mother is never coming back? I do. When I succeed my son will have his mother again; I'll have her again. That is the only reason!" He was shouting with rage.

"On the contrary," the Butterfly replied coldly. "I've lost friends fighting the Turks, and loved ones to the plague. I've known more death than you, boy. That's absolutely no excuse. You just seek to pass your grief on to those around you."

"That's not true! When I get what I want, this will stop."

"If you don't intend it, you certainly seem to have made your peace with it happening as a by-product of your personal crusade," the Butterfly spat, " and that makes you selfish, maybe even evil. You disgrace the Miraculous you wear."

Their standoff was interrupted by the faraway crack of a car engine misfiring.

"How dare you," Hawkmoth said dangerously. "Now get out of my way before I move you. Maybe I'll even take your miraculous, and see if two of the same one can achieve my goals."

I'm not sure you want to do that," the Butterfly replied. "The way I see it, you take my miraculous and you could change history; your precious wife might never even be born."

As much as Hawkmoth hated to admit it, the old man had a point.

"Then this conversation is at an end," he replied. "Go back to Italy, old man, this doesn't concern you."

"No, but it does concern an old friend of mine," the Butterfly replied. "And I didn't say you could just go."

"I did," said Hawkmoth. "We have the same powers, but I am younger than you, and fitter than you. When it comes to a fight, I'll win. So get out of my way." He levelled his cane at the other man's chest, daring him to stand his ground. But the Butterfly just looked bored.

"I agree," he said. "My knees hurt and my back aches, and even supernatural powers cannot entirely hide that. I am not the fighter I might have been twenty or thirty years ago, and so I'm sure you would win. I'm just fortunate I got this Miraculous, and not one that would force me to intervene more directly."

But still he did not move.

"So get. Out. Of. The. Way." Hawkmoth hissed.

"No," the Butterfly told him. "Because I didn't come here alone."

Hawkmoth realized what the Butterfly had been doing a second too late, as a baton slammed into him and knocked him flying off the roof and down onto the street below.