The Miraculous was an 'on the nose' sort of name. When Ladybug had first heard it, she had thought it was just a codename. The higher-ups loved them after all. There was a reason she had run around Europe in a spotted red jumpsuit, and it wasn't because it was tres chic.

But then Alya was kidnapped, and she discovered the truth behind it's name.

The Miraculous was the basis of the mutations that Dr. Tikki had done to her, and it was the basis of Hawkmoth's own mutations. The difference in their powers alone showed the dynamic powers of The Miraculous. It could do anything, save lives and take them.

To history, what Hawkmoth did with the Miraculous beyond his mutations would forever be a mystery. But Ladybug and Alya witnessed it. No, to be more precise they were the only ones who were able to even remember it.

Hawkmoth had used it to wipe a town off the map. Literally, every citizen erased from history like they had never existed. A wife who had been visiting her sister forgot her husband and son. A mother in Munich cried for days, but wasn't able to tell anyone why. A child living with his grandparents forgot the feeling of his mother's arms around him, the way his father laughed, forgot that he had ever been anything but an unloved orphan.

The moment they understood it, the one decision Hawkmoth couldn't undo, his fate was sealed. The two women knew then that there was no cost they wouldn't pay to stop him from committing the act again.

Alya first, she wrote and wrote about the evils of Hawkmoth. Her expose on the treatment of Hawkmoth's prisoners was later attributed as one that lead to a rise in recruitment as more people realized that the evil of it needed to be stopped. Of course, her articles and curious nature led to her capture, and eventual death at the bottom of a rushing ravine.

But her death brought some good, Alya had used her last moments to distract Hawkmoth so Ladybug could retrieve the Miraculous. It was returned to safety.

For a handful of months, until Hawkmoth captured it once more. Ladybug managed to jump onto his plane, and he took a chance at survival by jumping out of the plane, only to fall into the depths of an icy ocean. Of course, Ladybug followed after, forced to choose between the lives of millions or her own. But she died knowing the Miraculous was safe, doomed to the bottom of the ocean with her.

It turned out that even if you put something at the bottom of the ocean, somebody will find it.

And no matter how determined you are to protect something, someone will steal it.

Ladybug knew something was wrong the moment she woke up. It was only three am, the mutations had allowed her to function on less than an hour of sleep but she still tried to get a round five and she had only stopped reading wikipedia pages around twelve.

There was a change in the air. SHIELD HQ ran a tight ship, there were no loud alarms or flashing lights to signify trouble. No, when trouble struck it was passed from cell phone to cell phone, headset to headset. Most of the time trouble was on a need to know basis. The higher-ups got to decide whether lower-level agents got to know, from something as basic as a change to the lunch menu to something as vital as building evacuation.

But SHIELD couldn't control the feeling in the air, the way the very feeling in the building changed and tensed.

Marinette didn't know if it was the mutation or something she had always had, but she could taste trouble brewing in the air. Her first instinct was to find Chat, she knew he often hung around the labs, taking advantage of SHIELD labs to fix and upgrade his suit.

She was halfway to the lab when she cursed, Chat had told her during their last spar that he was going to be away for awhile. He apparently had a real job, outside of hero work, and he couldn't too much time off without looking suspicious. He had given her his number and showed her how to work her phone to call him, but she didn't want to drag him away from job for nothing but a feeling.

She turned and started heading for Adrien instead. He was a SHIELD agent if nothing else, she knew she could trust him. The two of them had returned to her parent's bakery a few times, and he had even escorted her to some movies. The first time, she hadn't been able to sit through it, to reminded of Alya, who had dragged her out of the bakery to be escorted to a movie with any boys she could find to pay.

She found him hunched over one of the computers in the SHIELD communications lab, typing away. She quickly moved toward him and grabbed his shoulder to alert him to her presence.

"Listen," She ordered, "Do you get a break? I don't know how modern day works, but in my day people usually got breaks, so you need to take one right now."

Adrien nodded once without looking at her, his mouth set in a grim line, "Carol, I'm taking my break."

He followed her out of the room. She led him through the building and straight into the garage, headed for the car they usually took, but he grabbed her arm and shook his head, and lead her to a smaller, grungier car parked further off.

"What's going on?" He asked once they were in the car.

"Something bad is about to happen," She said, trusting that he had made sure to pick a spot where they wouldn't be overheard, "I don't know what, but-"

She was cut off by the sound of an explosion.

"That was a bit on the nose." Adrien said with a raised eyebrow.

"I didn't think it was going to be right now!" She hissed, "I just had a feeling!"

"Look, you take care of whatever just happened, I'll track down Chat Noir."

She nodded and climbed out of the car.

The interior of SHIELD HQ was full of panicked employees trying to escape. She could tell that the explosion had happened on a lower floor, which was going to make getting to it's source harder. The elevators only went to the lower floors for the higher ups. Which meant she was going to have to improvise.

She headed straight for the first elevator she could find and pulled the doors apart. She could see the elevator itself on a higher floor, moving higher, despite this she knew she would have to move fast, at any moment it could reverse and head for her.

She had never rappelled down an elevator shaft before, but she had to say, it was easier then rappelling down a cliff face. She knew she had gotten the right floor when she threw the doors open and a thick cloud of smoke greeted her.

The floor was devastated, a battle had happened in it's entrance and continued on. A dead agent was sprawled across a desk, her gun still gripped in her fist.

Ladybug murmured a silent pray for her as she took it. Guns were for the living after all, and her pistol was from world war 2, kept in a box for several years. Whoever had caused the explosion was going to be armed, and she needed to be prepared for them.

She ran towards the room the most was coming out of, where the roar of gunfire was still sounding, only to be knocked down. She quickly jumped up, gun aimed at the women who had knocked her down, only to nearly drop it in shock. She had been prepared for many things in the future, but not for this.

It was a woman in a black jumpsuit wearing a black mask, clutched tightly in her hands was a suitcase that sang to Ladybug like nothing else in the universe had.

"Stay or die." The woman ordered, and then ran towards the elevator shaft.

Ladybug obeyed, because she wasn't sure what else she could do. Her hands began to shake so hard that she hastily shoved the gun into her purse rather then drop it and risk shooting herself in the foot.

It wasn't fair, she had mourned already. She was supposed to move on now, find a life in the crazy future. But it seemed her past was set on haunting her.

Alya had just stolen the Miraculous, and Ladybug needed to stop her.

AN: So yeah, stuff was merged haha.