Ladybug and Chat Noir had not got near enough sleep, when Ember awoke them to embark on their next trial. A couple hours from the city of Indore lay Mandu. Surrounded by trees that encroached on its borders up steep hillside; the relic from the past looking out to the river below. This abandoned city of ruins from India's Mughal era had once been a capital fortress. Now it was a shadow of its former magnificent glory, crumbling and abandoned for over 400 years. Although it retained a hint of its exotic beauty, it lay silent as a was the city of ghosts of the past that Ladybug and Chat Noir teleported to for the next challenge in their Miraculous Trials.
They walked wordlessly through the floating palace of Jahaz Mahal along two ponds. Even though there was no one to disturb here, they felt a heavy sense of foreboding loom over the ornate halls. As they looked from Tupmati's Pavilion, out over a 1000 foot cliff, the silence was broken.
"Weilders. After all this time you have come," a voice addressed them. "You do have the look of heroes of old about you…"
They looked down and saw a large tarantula looking up at them with all of her eyes.
"You are one of the guardians of the Miraculous Trials?" Chat Noir asked.
"Yes," she answered, continuing to study them. "Sometimes a hero must be willing to sacrifice everything. Would you be willing to put you miraculous powers on the line?" the tarantula kwami scrutinized.
"We give everything we have any time we put on the masks!" Ladybug declared passionately.
"I would do anything to protect people at my Lady's side with my miraculous!" Chat Noir chorused.
"Everything…anything…well than…this trial will be easy for you!" the tarantula narrowed her eyes. "Come little Ladybug, let's see how true your sentiment is first." The kwami motioned for her and she followed behind a stone door with dark, jagged carvings.
She followed still further in through a passage to find herself in a dim room filled with spider webs. Drops of water from the cracked ceiling oozed down, and fell, suspended on each silken thread. They trailed down, till at last they fell to a small pool at the center of the room.
"What is this?" Ladybug asked suspiciously.
"Are you so quickly going back on your commitment to do 'anything' to weild a miraculous?" the kwami sneered sarcastically.
"No!" Ladybug shot back. "What is it you want me to do?"
"Oh it is simple really," the crafty tarantula kwami drawled, "a sign of good faith." Then she drew a translucent thread through the air. "Look into the pool, and tell me…would you give up the one you love the most in exchange for the unlimited power of creation?"
"Give up Adrien?!" Ladybug trembled, "But I…I…"
"Would you give up your Chat Noir?" the kwami clarified, as Chat Noir's face shimmered in the pool before Ladybug.
"Chat Noir?!" Ladybug sputtered. "But he…but he and me…I mean I couldn't possibly…he's …well…"
"You said you would do anything." The kwami pinched her face. "So what is your answer?"
Ladybug looked down dejectedly. "No. I can't. I won't give him up. Not even for the miraculous power."
The kwami loomed above Ladybug, suspended on the webs, before everything went dark and the floor swallowed Ladybug up.
Ooo
Meanwhile, Chat Noir was ushered into the same hall of webs. "Where is Ladybug?" Chat Noir demanded. "Did she pass the test?"
"Patience. First let us just focus on your question," the kwami smiled, showing her fangs.
"The trial is a question?" Chat Noir studied her critically.
"Just one little question," the spider soothed.
"Let's get on with it then," Chat Noir rolled back his shoulders.
"Would you trade the one you love for the chance to weild unlimited destructive power?"
"So this is your trick you nasty creep!" Chat Noir hissed, grabbing his baton from the small of his back. "Where is she?! Where is Ladybug?!"
"Humph," the spider kwami rolled all her eyes. "Your Ladybug is not the one on the line. I was referring to someone else….a "Very Good Friend!"
As she drew out each word, a face emerged in the pool at Chat Noir's feet.
"Mari!" he gasped. "You can't!" the blood drained from his face.
"Oh its nothing violent I assure you," the tarantula closed her eyes and batted one of her thin legs carelessly. "She will merely lose all memory of you." Then the spider opened each of her eyes, looking Chat Noir up and down. "What is wrong cat? Didn't you just say you'd do 'anything' to keep your miraculous? What is this mere mortal to you?"
"Everything," Chat Noir sunk to the ground.
"What was that?" the spider glared.
"She means everything to me. I…I…can't lose her," Chat Noir whispered.
"So be it," the spider replied in an emotionless voice.
Darkness enveloped the hall and Chat Noir felt himself falling. He fell through nothingness, where no trace of light could give him reference to how deep he plummeted.
Suddenly, he splashed down into water. He submerged, and then shot himself back up again to gasp for air. Throwing his arms up he caught hold of something solid; a hand drawing him out of the water.
"Chat?! Chat Noir? Is that you?" a familiar voice asked.
"Yes, it's me," Chat Noir coughed up water on the dark ledge he had been hauled onto. His night vision could make out Ladybug's form.
"You didn't pass either," Ladybug concluded.
"No…I couldn't," Chat Noir admitted.
"I'm glad," Ladybug declared, helping him to his feet.
"What do you mean?" Chat Noir asked in a nervous voice.
"Well, she asked you to give me up right?! That would be horrible to suddenly forget all our memories together," Ladybug assumed.
"Yeah…yeah…" that would be horrible," Chat Noir was relieved his partner couldn't see his face. She could not find out that it was not her the spider had asked him to give up. "Where are we anyway? If we both failed, why do we still have our miraculous'?"
"I'm not sure," Ladybug said uncertainly, touching her earrings tentatively. "They won't really take Tiki and Plagg away from us for this will they?" she whispered.
"That seemed to be the deal," Chat Noir responded sadly. "But there has got to be a way…"
Their faces both turned to a narrow sliver of light falling on the ledge further in. Walking towards it they saw it led to another stone hall. This hall was filled with carved human statues staring down on them.
A kwami in the form of a black scorpion floated up to them. Not only was this scorpion the largest of his kind, but this species was known as one of the most deadly. Both Ladybug and Chat Noir stepped back, eyeing the scorpion wearily.
"Do you still want a chance to keep your miraculous?" the scorpion kwami asked eyeing them critically.
"Yes!" they both responded together.
"You refused to give up the one you love…perhaps sacrificing a random civilian you've never met would be easier. This person will just vanish from existence and no one will even remember them."
"What!" Ladybug screeched. "That is horrible! You can't ask that of us!"
"What about their families and friends?! What about their choice in all of this! You're just going to take away someone's life from them!" Chat Noir yelled angrily.
"Not me…it is up to you," the scorpion responded aloofly. "What is it to you if someone in the world quietly disappears? Humans come and go from this world every day…what is one more?!"
"Every life matters," Chat Noir growled. "If this is what it takes to keep miraculous power it is not worth it!"
"This is not what we've fought for!" Ladybug agreed. "There is no way we will sacrifice an innocent person!"
"Hmmm…" the scorpion kwami raised his tail. "Not an innocent person…maybe one who is guilty then…."
The floor dropped out from under them once more, and they tumbled down with a 'yelp."
Once more their fall was broken by a plunge into a deep well. This time Chat Noir pulled a dripping Ladybug to the narrow ledge on the side.
"Not again!" Ladybug punched the water in frustration. "What kind of kwami-lesson is this?! Get ahead by stepping on other people! The miraculous' were supposed to be used for good…to destroy evil…!"
"You can destroy that evil you know…" hissed a voice from the door at the end of the lighted corridor.
Chat Noir and Ladybug glanced at each other hesitantly, and cautiously moved toward the direction of the voice.
They came to a hall with tall pillars with stairs leading up to three platforms with different colored doors. Each door was guarded by familiar adversaries they immediately recognized and they stepped back into a defensive stance.
In front of the royal blue door stood a glaring Myura. In front of a orange door stood Volpina bearing her teeth. Then before a deep purple door stood Hawkmoth who starred daggers down toward them.
"What is this?! It isn't real! They can't be HERE!" Chat Noir grabbed his baton tightly.
A large cobra coiled his way to their feet, bobbing his head. "Thisss is your final chance to keep your miraculousss," the cobra warned. "Sacrifices are often required of those who weild kwami powers. If you would not sacrifice your greatest love, nor an innocent stranger, your last option is whether you will destroy a villain!"
The heroes eyes widened as they looked around the room at the ones they had defeated.
"Strike down one of these evil humansss who have abused kwami power, and walk out their door with your miraculousss. It doesn't matter which one you choossse…but whichever being it isss…their true ssself will fade from the world forever…ridding mankind of their meddling and cruelty," the cobra declared flicking his forked tongue between his fangs.
"…And if we choose not to destroy one of them?" Ladybug asked.
"Then you will hand your miraculousss to me," the cobra raised itself to its full height and spread its hood.
Chat Noir and Ladybug looked from each of the villains posed to fight. They could win…they had already proven that. Each of the villains were remorseless even in defeat…but they were real people. Maybe they deserved to be removed from existence for the terror they had inflicted…maybe the world would be better off without them…but should they?
Chat Noir silently linked his gloved fingers with Ladybug's and looked over to her. She squeezed his hand affectionately, and nodded. Stepping forward toward the cobra both closed their eyes. Ladybug reached to remove her earrings, while Chat Noir slid his ring down his finger.
"Stop!" the cobra commanded, making them freeze. The cobra narrowed his eyes and hissed, "you would give up your powersss to save THEM?! After all they've put you through!"
Ladybug bit her lip, and trembled with her one hand still on her earring. Chat Noir moved closer to her, and hugged his arm around her shoulder, pulling her comfortingly into himself. "I might be willing to sacrifice myself to protect others, but I will not sacrifice others for power!" Chat Noir declared vehemently, making Ladybug gaze up at him admiringly.
"I hoped that would be the case, " the cobra lowered himself peacefully among his patterned coils.
Ladybug tentatively removed her hand from her earring and the projections of the villains faded away with the door's colors fading into solid slabs of stone. "You mean…you're not going to make us give up our miraculous?" she asked in a quiet voice.
"We just needed to see where your prioritiesss lay…and what you'd be willing to do," the cobra nodded.
"So we didn't fail after all?" Chat Noir clarified in disbelief.
The cobra laughed, wrapping himself into himself and transformed into his kwami form. "Oh preciousss children…I won't take the miraculousss from you. You have proven you wear them well." He floated up and dropped two token golden strands into their hands. "It is not a weakness to value others," the cobra concluded, and turned to leave.
"But how do we get out?" Ladybug asked after him. "The doorways have disappeared!"
"Go deeper in," the cobra smiled before he phased through the solid wall.
The floor opened up again and just like before they found themselves falling to a pool below. This time though, once they reached the water they were carried on a strong current through a channel of water, and shot out of the tunnel with a short drop back into the outside world.
Ladybug and Chat Noir pulled themselves up onto the bank, out of the water. Both just sat silently for a while listening to the birds calling back and forth. Sometimes it was the mental and psychological drain, more than the physical challenges that wore them out the most. They didn't think about the fact that they had been willing to be separated from their miraculous. They didn't talk about their values stripped down the their cores. They just took comfort sitting back to back with each other, and breathing in the morning air.
Ember floated up to a branch above them and waited. Wise as he was, he knew that sometimes silence was more healing than words.
Gradually the two weilders rose to their feet, and Chat Noir gave Ladybug a nod. She slipped on Kaalki's glasses, and Ember supplied their next portal destination: The Anaimalai Hills on the border of Tamil Nadu and Kerala in Southern India…also known as the Elephant Mountains.
The air was heavy with humidity in tropical rain forest of the Elephant Mountains when they stepped through the portal. Ladybug and Chat Noir pushed through the brush to reach a lookout point over the lush sanctuary.
They came to a gravely bed of smooth stones. There was a strange flat slab of granite that held a large clear glass cylinder which filled with large stones, pebbles, and fine sand. Before they could ask Ember what it meant they were approached by one of the most truly awe inspiring creatures on the planet; the elephant.
She led a family of elephants through the pass. One of the baby calves played with a stick he had found along the way, and his mother urged him gently with her trunk to keep up. The family strode up to the visitors creating a semi circle around the stone slab before the weilders. The female leader stepped forward and nodded her head toward them.
She wound her agile truck carefully around the glass cylinder and poured out the contents onto the top of the granite 'table.'
"Here is your whole life poured out. Here is your lesson," she said. "You must get every stone, pebble, and grain of sand back into the glass jar.
"Life," the elephant nodded to the glass jar, "is filled with many things, but if you do not prioritize what is important first you will not be able to fit everything in and may become overwhelmed. I want you to see if you can figure out this puzzle together."
Ladybug looked at the scattered pebbles, stones, and sand. This test was too easy. They had just seen the elephant pour everything out of the jar, so how hard would it be to fit everything in again. Ladybug grabbed handfuls of everything and rushed to fill the jar. Quickly the jar filled up with gaps between the stones and when Ladybug got to the top, she had no more space…but still had a surprisingly large pile of rocks, pebbles, and sand leftover.
"If you try to do everything at once in life you are quickly going to become overwhelmed and stressed. You do a little of everything, but nothing is done as well as it would have been if you had focused," the elephant said gently taking hold of the glass jar and emptying it out again.
"I know!" Chat Noir jumped in. "He swept all the sand off the slab of the rock and poured it into the bottom layer. Next he layered the pebbles. He thought he had figured it out, until he tried to add all of the larger stones. It almost fit, but there was not enough room left for the three largest rocks.
"If you start by filling your life with small commitments or expectations first, and try to fit the most important things in after, you will find that there is not enough of you to go around. You might please others, but you miss out on what could have made your life whole." The elephant once again dumped the jar out before them.
While she emptied the jars contents, Chat Noir turned one of the large stones that he had not been able to fit in. As he turned it around in his hands he noticed carved words inscribed into the rock. On it was carved the word "love." On another he discovered the word 'family,' and the last 'friendship.' Chat Noir looked beyond the three he held, and realized that each stone and pebble were labeled with different titles. He found work, sports, reading, music, school, gaming, travel, technology, eating…etc… Everything you could imagine from large important rocks to little pebbles with mundane tasks.
"The test is to determine if we can prioritize in life…if we put what is the most important first…" Chat Noir verbalized his thought process carefully.
Ladybug leaned over his shoulder and studied the carved words as well.
Ladybug and Chat Noir then worked together to gather the largest of the stones and place them into the jar first. They fallowed these with the pebbles, which fell in between the larger gaps, filling the available spaces left by the stones. Finally Chat Noir and Ladybug filled Chat Noir's scarf with the remaining sand and poured it over the top. Slowly the sand trickled through the remaining spaces, until it all siphoned down through the rocks and pebbles. This time every grain of sand came to rest within the container.
"A full life," commended the elephant. "…And even if you can't always fit everything in, at least you put what is most important first!"
Marinette nodded, looking with satisfaction at the filled jar. So often she had tried to be everything to everyone. On countless occasions she had been overworked and overwhelmed. She knew what was important, but taking on too much robbed her of the joy to live in the moment. Chat Noir had teased her before about missing out on the fun of being a superhero because the responsibility weighed so heavily on her shoulders. Here they were traveling the world together and seeing the most amazing things! She didn't want to miss a moment with Chat because she had her eyes set on something else.
Chat Noir looked at the jar and remembered how much of his life had been drained away by obligations to his father's company. Hours upon hours of lessons and training that took away from time with friends. Even the time he was locked away alone. No wonder he had felt such an emptiness for so long. But now it was up to him…becoming Chat Noir had only been the first step to carving out a life worth living. He wouldn't waste any more time not leaving time for what…and who…was the most important in his life. When they made it back to Paris he swore to himself he would find a way to tell her.
The elephant drew out two golden strands and presented them to the weilders. "Remember what is important in life," she spoke, lowering her head, "Namaste."
She turned with a trumpet to the family of elephants, who answered her call. They marched forward through the trees, forging their own path.
"You are ready to meet the council," Ember flapped his firey wings. "Get Kaalki. Navigating our landing will be a bit tricky this time."
"Why? Where does the council meet?" Ladybug asked.
"Further south in Kerala," the phoenix revealed. "In the midst of India's complex network of interconnected lakes and lagoons in a tropical landscape of teak and palms."
Ember had not been joking about summoning the portal to a solid landing being a bit more tricky. As they stepped out, Ladybug had to grab Chat Noir by his belt to stop him from sinking his first step right into a lagoon. They found their way through the marshy land till they came upon a fisherman who was willing to sell them a small boat to navigate through the complex channels. It took a bit of practice before both Chat Noir and Ladybug got the hang of steering the boat through some narrower patches.
Ember guided them through the back waters till they came to a small spit of land floating amidst the reeds. Putting their boat up to the shore they recognized the kwami waiting for them. Tigress, red panda, langur, rhino, blackbuck, tarantula, scorpion, cobra, and elephant. All of them were gathered among the teak trees of the island.
"They have their priorities straight," the rhino declared.
"Their hearts are at least in the right place, but knowing what is important and following through are two different matters," the elephant commented thoughtfully.
"You have succeeded in proving yourselves through the trials of values," the tigress finished. "Stay true to what you believe and what you know is important."
The red panda gathered the gold strands from the wielders. Then the red panda wove them together into a rope. Then he bound the rope around their wrists till they were tied in a complete circle.
"May your values strengthen you and each other," the tigress said as the golden bands began to glow, sending a warming sensation throughout their beings. As the gold dissolved by the magic, they felt a renewed sense of purpose and strength.
The tingling sensation of being anointed by a wild kwami council (that one would think they had gotten used to after facing previous challenges), still electrified them to their very core. When they looked up they were alone with Ember.
"Let's get back to Paris," Chat Noir broke the silence that settled around them.
"Of course," Ladybug said, a little disappointed he was in such a rush to leave such a magical place. "Is everything okay?"
"It's just…There is something I need to do…" Chat Noir said cryptically. Then he took her hand. "Ladybug, I have always loved you, and there is a piece of my heart that will always be yours…"
Ladybug went to interject, but he stopped her.
"Please, let me finish. This is hard enough to get out. You've always been honest with me that your heart belongs to someone else…now I have to be honest with you. There is someone back home that I care about…and who…I think…cares about me. I…I think I've started falling for her."
"Who?!" Ladybug couldn't stop the question from leaping from her lips, as an unexpected stab of pain gripped her chest.
Chat Noir looked down, and for a moment Ladybug feared that out of concern for the security of their identities he might hold his secret from her. But Chat Noir's face lit up with a soft smile, thinking of the girl who had anchored his heart. Then with one name he shattered Ladybug's defenses…"Marinette."
ooo
Oh readers! I'm so excited to get to this next part! Our beloved and most wonderfully frustrating love square is about to fold over on itself;) As always please favorite or follow to make sure you don't miss out on the next updates!
I also want to say a special thank you and shout out to KoalaWho, GuenZhenXuan2020, Habiba, Joana, Jadeana, SammieTheWonderFox, RTGreen, Starlin's Ghost, janicep801, glitterkitten3, Ab2d248, Lecordonbleu28, Sakhmet and Hathor, Light Mega Z, Malicious hero and others who have been so encouraging in their reviews and giving me the energy, inspiration, and drive to keep at it and write more! I really appreciate everyone who had taken the time to read this imaginary fantasy world I've borrowed!
Hard a work putting together the next pieces of this puzzle for you all;) All the very best, and hope to post as soon as I can!