The akumatized villain, an 80 foot tall orc creature, tightened its grip on Chat. Both Ladybug and Chat were near exhaustion, having fought this villain for seemingly hours on end. Most of their energy was spent trying to keep it in the open area of the park and not rampaging throughout the city. Even through all that, they were still unable to locate the akumatized object on the massive villain.
Ladybug falls to one knee, panting from the bout that got Chat grappled. He struggles in the gnarly hand, but after everything, he just doesn't have any more strength to spare. The villain saunters towards Ladybug, "Give me your Miraculous!" it bellows at her, simultaneously shaking Chat in his fist in rage.
She pushes herself to her feet. "Never!" she screams back, trying to sound confident in her weakened state.
A purple halo forms around the villain's eyes, a familiar voice begins echoing around them, "Ladybug,"
"Hawkmoth." she stands her ground.
"It seems this battle has reached an impasse. You and Chat Noir are obviously weakened while my akuma is as strong as ever" through his calm yet menacing voice, Ladybug could swear she could hear the smile on his face. She sneers. "So I'll offer you a trade. Stop this incessant fighting, Ladybug, and surrender to me, in exchange for Chat Noir's life."
Chat immediately grunts out in pain as the orcs hand constricts him tighter. She throws her yoyo in attempt to restrain the orc, but it's caught by its other hand. It flings her across the park, smacking her into a tree trunk. She falls, defeated, on the ground. Through her own haze of pain and dizziness, Chat's cries still cut through.
The orc stands over her, "Take my offer before it becomes a fight for both of your lives." Hawkmoth warns.
Ladybug shakily holds herself up with her arms on the ground. "W-why not just take Chat's Miraculous now?" she asks.
"I have my reasons; mostly being that once his better half is out of the way, taking his Miraculous will be easy. You, my dear, can't stand to leave up in the air like that. When is the next time I'll have Ladybug on her hands and knees, defeated, before me." he laughs darkly.
"Don't! LB, *gasp* you can't. I'll be fi-" Chat is swiftly cut off, left silently writhing in the fist of the orc.
"Stop!" she can't help but beg as she watches her partner's face change shade. Using the tree for support, she gets to her feet. "You have a deal! J-just please, let him go!" her breathing hitches as her eyes water up and threaten to spill. She watches Chat's panicked eyes practically scream at her 'No!'; but all she can do is silently mouth "Sorry".
Hawkmoth lets off a chuckle, "See how foolish love can make you?" The remark sends a rush of blush over her cheeks. The orc throws Chat to the other side of the clearing. Ladybug attempts to run to help him, her legs scrambling for a steady stride, but she's now caught in the orc's hand, arms locked down at her sides. "Not so fast, we had a deal."
Her struggles slow, "Fine, just take my Miraculous and let me go!" she demands, trying to catch a glimpse of Chat to make sure he's okay.
The grip on her tightens "I'm sorry, 'letting go' was not part of the deal." the purple halo vanishes just before the orc throws a smoke screen at its feet, completely engulfing them.
Chat lolls out of his daze. His blurry eyes focusing on a cloud of smoke where the orc and Ladybug were. He instantly snaps to his senses. He scrambles to his feet, struggling to find purchase on the dirt. "Ladybug!" the name rips from his throat as he runs. The smoke dissipates before his eyes, leaving nothing in its place.
When Ladybug opens her eyes, her body is immediately shocked by the coldness of the floor she's laying on. She pushes herself upright to see she's on a smooth concrete floor, new and untouched. The moderately sized cube she finds herself in has walls made of steel, a simple cot, and a bathroom area. A prison. A hatch on the ceiling made of steel bars the only way in or out.
"For my own deniability case, there are no cameras watching the inside of the cage." Hawkmoths voice bounces around the room. "Your secret identity is safe, for now."
In an instant, her transformation releases in a flash of light, an exhausted Tikki floats into her hand. Marinette strokes her Kwami's head. "Why are you doing this? Why not just take my Miraculous?" she questions, not realizing she was signing up to be kidnaped.
"As a Miraculous wielder myself, it turns out, I cannot use the power of another Miraculous, at least right away. That's where you come in, and eventually Chat Noir. We all have our parts to play.
"Now just be a good girl, and enjoy your stay. You're gonna be here a while."
Chat jumps through his bedroom window, tucking and rolling as his transformation releases. "This is all my fault!" Adrien stresses, pacing back and forth across his floor. "If I hadn't been so careless LB wouldn't have had to make that deal and get tricked. Where could she be?!" He turns to Plagg, refreshing himself by eating camembert on Adrien's bed.
"Well, 'bad luck' is kinda your thing, Chat Noir." he swallows another piece of stinky cheese, "We'll find her, don't worry." he brushes off. "You tried calling her on your communicator, right?"
He nods vigorously, "Of course! That was the first thing I tried! But she was already de-transformed," he plops down on the bed, "Hawkmoth must have her by now. What if he now knows her identity? What if he's planning on threatening her family? What if she's being tortured? What if I don't find her in time?" he bolts back up and starts pacing again.
"What part of 'don't worry' do you not understand?" he floats up to Adrien's face, stopping him in his tracks. "I can detect her Kwami's presence. I can allow you to feel it too once you're transformed. We'll find them in no time."
Adrien blinks, "Wait. Back up. You can feel her Kwami's presence? Do you know who she really is?" he cups Plagg in his hands.
He shrugs, "Let's say, I have a pretty good hunch," he snickers "that I'm not allowed to tell you about."
Adrien rolls his eyes, refusing to acknowledge the slight burn in his cheeks. "Let's just go already." he lets him go, "Plagg, transform me!"
Chat Noir leaps back onto the rooftops of Paris, a new feeling rising in his chest, as if a single thread was tugging at him, pulling him in the right direction. 'This must be what Plagg was talking about.' he eagerly extends his staff and vaults in the direction of his missing partner.
He leaps from rooftop to rooftop, following his new instinct. After nearly an hour, he finally comes upon a warehouse on the outskirts of Paris. 'I'm coming for you, LB' he thinks to himself as he peers in one of the windows. His eyes widen when he sees what the warehouse holds: "'Agreste Designs'?" he reads the writing printed on the boxes within. He shakes his head, 'This is just some weird coincidence. Stay focused.' he slinks in through the unlocked window, quietly landing on his feet in the dimly lit warehouse.
He's almost tempted to just scream out for her; so close but yet so far, he holds it in. He is absolutely silent as he moves along the concrete floor; his cat like senses also on high alert for any sign of trouble.
Just as he turns the corner around some shelving, he sees the remnants of smoke billows rolling over his feet. Without hesitation he scampers up the shelving and boxes, soon finding himself looking down upon the orc that stole Ladybug.
The massive creature lumbers around the corner that Chat previously occupied not seconds ago. He sighs with relief that he has gotten away unnoticed, so far. As the orc stomps past, he notices something shimmer purple, dangling on the back of his belt: a small key chain of a battle axe. 'The Akuma!' He crouches down, ready to pounce for it... but a tug at his chest stops him. The invisible thread pulls him back. Chat sighs, 'Right. I need Ladybug before I even attempt to get the Akuma.' he smiles to himself, 'Even without you here, you're still the voice of reason, LB'.
He stays on the high ground, leaping from shelf to shelf, until reaching a door on the far side of the floor. He climbs back down. The sign on the door saying 'Corporate access only'. 'Time to move up in the world, I guess.' he sticks one of his claws into the keyhole, jimmying it until a soft click comes from the mechanism.
A loud grunt echoes from behind him, followed by footsteps increasing at an alarming rate in his direction. He quickly slides into the room and shuts the door behind him, hoping for the best.
"Who's there?" the voice he 's been searching for cries out. The room is completely dark except for a dim light coming from a barred hole in the floor.
He smiles, relief washing over him. He opens his mouth to respond, but he's cut off.
"No one really, Ladybug. Your friend Chat Noir has just finally decided to join us."
A thin figure emerges from the darkness, standing over the light from below, Hawkmoth reveals himself.
Chat readies his staff.
"There is no need to be difficult, Chat Noir. Simply help me with my situation and you and Ladybug can be on your way." his deep voice echoing through the room.
"Don't do anything he says Chat! He can't use your Miraculous on his own!" LB yells from below.
He whacks his cane against the bars of her containment, sending a loud clang reverberating in their eardrums. "Silence!" he commands.
Chat doesn't move from his readied stance. "What would you have us do anyway? You should probably tell us so we can decide how much we don't want to help you." he provokes.
Hawkmoth chuckles and starts to pace slowly around Ladybugs cage. "Creation and destruction: Ladybug and Chat Noir. You bring balance to the Miraculous World." he recites as if quoting a passage from a book. "But it is rumored that combining the powers can do so much more." he looks down into Ladybug's cage, "Creation to make new what has been lost." he reaches his hand out to Chat, "Destruction to cut the ties from the old reality and into the new."
"'New realities'? Yeah, I think we're gonna have to pass on helping with that one." Chat throws himself at Hawkmoth. He swings his staff but only meets air as Hawkmoth seemingly transports to the other side of the room in a blur of motion.
"It's not as bad as it sounds. I simply wish to change the natural course of this world in my favor." he says with his voice still calm.
"And what would you change about this reality, exactly?" Ladybug calls through the bars.
He stops and looks down at her, "Oh, I would reverse the pain that even I would not wish upon you, Ladybug." he smacks the iron bars again, "The sudden loss of a loved one...I would bring my wife back.
"Do you know how that feels, Ladybug? You may have faced every villain that I have thrown at you, but the true horrors are ones you don't see coming and cannot stop." he hits the bars again, causing another loud clang, he raises his voice "Do you know how it feels?!" he suddenly turns to Chat, "Do you?!" he demands curtly.
Chat seems to weaver for just a second, "Yes." he admits "I lost my mother."
Hawkmoth grins devilishly, "You understand, don't you?" he says as he walks slowly towards Chat. "We can bring them back."
"And risk destroying all reality as we know it?" Ladybug yells from her cell. "Chat!" she calls desperately, afraid for him.
"Wouldn't you give anything, try anything, to bring your mother back to you?" he coos at Chat, locking eyes with him. "Don't you wish you could see her again?"
Chat tears his eyes from Hawkmoth, directing them down at the corner of the room, "Of course." he whispers, lowering his staff slightly.
Hawkmoth lays a gentle hand on Chat's shoulder, "Then look into yourself and do what you know you must."
Chat nods slightly, "You're right." he says as he sees the faint red glow from Ladybug's cage in the floor. A small smirk escapes his lips, "I understand now." he says before suddenly smacking Hawkmoth's cane out of his hands with his staff. It lands on top of Ladybug's cage, where she promptly ropes her yoyo around it before using her Lucky Charm, a wench, to tear the bars of her cage down. Before Hawkmoth even had time to react, LB leaps from her prison to her position next to Chat.
"Don't you know that breaking the rules of reality is never the answer?" Chat chides.
"Don't let Ladybug sway you, Chat Noir! Think of your mother!" Hawkmoth demands as he slowly backs away from them, recognizing his loss.
Chat leans on his staff, "If I remember her as well as I think I do, she would never want this." he narrows his eyes, "Would your wife?"
Hawkmoth growls in frustration and defeat just before vanishing from the room in a blur of purple.
They relax from their stances. Ladybug looks up at Chat, "You were never really gonna go through with it, were you?"
He smirks and shrugs, "Well as tempting as the complete collapse of reality sounded, I had to pass." he laughs a somewhat forced laugh. "Anyway, I think there's still an Akuma rampaging about this place that we should take care of. I saw the akumatized object on the way in."
Ladybug's earring beeps, her hand flies up to touch one, "Better make it quick." She says before they both run back into the warehouse to defeat the Akuma.