Ladybug, Chat Noir, and Ember scaled the brooding heights of the Drakenberg peaks of South africa. The epic grandness of the wide expanses of jagged rock spaned as far as they could see and beyond. Sparse green vegetation clung persistently to the rock, climbing its way into the clouds. It seemed to highlight the insignificance of one single being; being a mere spec in the space of time that that long ago risen the Drakenberg.
160 million years ago the molten lava of split continents seethed the 2000 meters dropping spires of balsalt into being. The violent and fickle weather amidst the mountains changed quickly. Clouds built, and the softer sandstone ground crumbled on the edges of their path.
"Ladybug, I've been trying to get up the courage to tell you...," Chat Noir looked from the crumbling rock. "...This past year, my life has kindda been like this eroded cliff...but even when the rock beneath my feet crumbles away into a sea of uncertainty, I know that I can always rely on you."
"You're such a hopeless romantic Kitty," Ladybug shook her head, and bumped his shoulder with her own. "The things you say to me!"
"I'm serious!" Chat Noir insisted, locking eyes with her. "Ladybug...there is something you've got to know!"
"Kitty, you're shaking!" Ladybug held his arms with alarm.
"I had everything planned out...I was going to be so much smoother than this...but I need you to know!" Chat Noir urged, gripping onto her hands like he was afraid she would slip away at any moment.
"Chat, I..." Ladybug was about to say, when Ember abruptly shushed them both, and urgently beat his wing, motioning them to crouch low to the ground with him.
Over head they heard a shrill "nyip kek," and their hair stood on end immediately charged with static electricity.
"Stay low!" Ember ordered them, as Chat Noir tried to get up to survey the sky above.
"What is this next trial anyway?" Ladybug glanced up at the darkening sky. "I thought we were ready for the Courage Kwami council!"
"This isn't part of the trials, and that's no ordinary kwami!" Ember ducked his head, and warily eyed the sky.
"What is it then?" Ladybug asked, grabbing her yoyo from her side.
"The Hammerkop, the lightning bird demon. Listen and the Thunder dragon will warn us before he attacks!" Ember hushed them. Ladybug had never once on their journey ever seen fear in Ember's eyes...but it was there now.
They silently listened, but the sky was silent.
"This is wrong. Something is off!" Ember shook his head. "It is the Thunder Dragons task to trail him, and announce when he gets close."
The Thunder Dragon sent no warning though. Somehow the lightning bird had evaded him, and was flying rampant through the skies.
It's body was larger than a full grown man's, and his wing span spread out intimidatingly. There was a iridescent purplish blue sheen to his feathers, and pale blue electricity jumped back and forth, sparking the air. It stretched out its neck like an ibis, scouring the ground
"Foul impundulu!" Ember hummed lowly. "It is no coincidence it has arrived just as you are about to complete your trial. It has been summoned to intercept you and keep you from the council!"
"But by who?!" Ladybug whispered.
"The butterfly!" Chat Noir answered seeing a brief purple flicker of a mask cross the bird's long face, with it cruelty curved beak.
"Not again!" Ladybug moaned, and strung her yoyo through her fingers, readying herself to strike.
In that moment the electrified creature spotted them. He shrieked in such a high pitch that Ladybug couldn't hear it, but Chat Noir's heightened senses caused him to buckle forward with his gloved hands over his ears.
The lightning bird swooped down on a bolt. It was so fast that he was upon them before they could react. Ember flew up in front of Ladybug and Chat Noir. His flame swelled, and spiralled outward with intensity. The lightning bird veered off its course, but swung his talons out to one side, clipping Ember in the chest. The impact threw the Phoenix through the air, and he skidded across the dusty earth laying in a smouldering heap. Taking advantage of the opening the hammerkop bird narrowed its eyes, and flicked its rounded wingtips straight down, and it snatched Ladybug up by her shoulder.
Chat Noir lunged at him, but the hammerkop shot upward, with Ladybug in tow. The electricity radiating out from the deranged wild kwami was so intense that it pulsed through Ladybug's miraculous suit, making her cry out and flail as she was carried higher. it rose through the dark clouds.
Ember limped up, and he and Chat Noir pursued the lightning bird to a huge nest, more than 1.5 m across, thatched in the fork of the tree's branches. It was suspended high above a water fall plummeting off a cliff.
The lightning bird tossed Ladybug across the ground, and pinned her against the rocky plateau.
"Let her go," Chat Noir growled lowly.
"Try to take her," it hissed, shooting splintered lighting bolts toward him, which Chat Noir just barely dodged. The dry lightning scorched the grass, and ignited patches of brush.
Ladybug lay still on the ground, as the lightning bird rose higher to take advantage of its electricity bouncing across the clouds.
Chat Noir tried desperately to make it to Ladybug's side, but the lightning bird predicted he would, and blocked his way with electrified strikes raining down against him.
Chat Noir knew he was using Ladybug as bait to draw him in. He could see the lightning bird wasn't planning on eliminating her, until he could destroy her partner first. As long as he could draw him away from Ladybug they might have a chance.
His plan started to work. He taunted the bird and used his aqua cataclysm to shoot short burts at water to draw the bird out. Ember assisted by flying into the face of the lightning, narrowly dodging the deadly opponent. They had almost drawn it to the cliff, when Chat Noir's concern for Ladybug betrayed him. He glanced back toward Ladybug, and the lightning bird followed his gaze. Suddenly it realized what Chat Noir had been doing.
"You'll never have her," the bird declared, "Ill make sure if that!"
Chat Noir swept his arms forward, dousing the lightning bird with powerful waves of water, channeled from the waterfall. The water pushed the bird on to one side, but it turned to hissing steam after touching him. It did however manage to infuriate him even more...exactly what Chat Noir had been hoping to accomplish!
The lightning bird flew screaming at Chat Noir so fast he knew he could not possibly dodge him. The lightning bird aimed for his chest, but Chat Noir had his right hand in front of him. The hammerthot flew straight into a cataclysm. The bird ricocheted off ChatNoir like he had hit a brick wall. As the lightning bird fell writhing. A purple butterfly faded to white, but the lightning bird's rage was not quenched. Chat Noir sprinted as quick as he could to Ladybug's side.
"Mi'Lady! Mari!" He implored, touching her arm tentatively.
She moaned, and raised herself up slowly. Weakly she blinked up up at him. "Hey Kitty," she breathed, and winced from where the burned branches of electricity had scorched the skin on her neck, just above her collar. Getting hit with nearly 10 million volts took some time to bounce back from.
"Don't worry, I've got you!" Chat Noir reassured her, lightly brushing her cheek.
"You've got nothing!" the lightning bird screeched, and flew straight up into the sky, and dropped down over top of them from the swirling black clouds.
Again the possessed kwami fueled by furry shot down at them from above. It all happened so fast all Chat Noir could do was throw himself over Ladybug as a shield. Then he heard Ladybug shout "miraculous time!", and just like that the rocketing bird above froze in his decent towards them. Chat Noir looked down face to face with Ladybug who smiled at him.
"I could just kiss you!" Chat Noir looked adoringly down at her.
"As much I'd love that, we should probably use this time to finish this monster off first," Ladybug laughed, then thought a moment, and said impatiently, "On second thought, I think we've got time!" Then she grabbed him, and kissed him quickly, sending him reeling backwards onto his heels when she released him.
"Now that's electric!" Chat Noir swooned happily.
"No, that is!" Ladybug pointed upward to where the presumably frustrated lightning bird was suspended above them with paused lighting bolts that looked like the sky at been shattered.
"I've had enough!" Chat Noir said lowly. "Let's make this fast he said glancing at his flashing ring "Let's give him a miraculous welcome shall we!"
The advantage in time Ladybug had granted them was about to run out. "Lucky charm!" she cried out, and a spotted metal baton like Chat Noir's fell into her hands.
"Two are better than one?" Chat Noir's shrugged, looking from the luckycharm baton to his own.
When the rest of the world started turning once more Chat Noir's baton collided with the lightning bird making it scream out in rage. It's sporadic lightning scattered haphazardly between Ladybug and Chat Noir.
They dodged each strike, getting further and further apart. "For watt it's worth..." Chat Noir taunted the creature, "I'm fighting the surge to drop my positive outlook with all this negativity your throwing around!"
It swooped around them, and circled them just out of range. With a strange satisfied smile curved onto his beak circled again and again.
Ladybug wondered why it didn't just attack. He wasn't retreating and he wasn't closing in it just went round and round like a vulture waiting for...oh no! It was then she realized.
"Chat Noir!" She screamed from the wide gap between them, "Get out of here!He knows you don't have much time left! He's running out your clock!"
Chat Noir's ring began flashing more. He only had one pad left. The lightning bird turned and decided to put on the pressure, and hit white lightning scattered recklessly around them searching for a path to the ground.
"He's waiting till you detransform," Ladybug warned despiratly. "Chat you've got to get out of here!"
"If we run he'll catch us and I'm not leaving you to face him alone," Chat Noir responded with his jaw set, not looking at her.
"Chat he's going kill you!" Ladybug implored tears running down her face.
He didn't respond
And ladybug called out "Chat!"
"Its okay..." he said looking across at her.
Her eyes widened with the realization of what her partner had been doing all along. Drawing the danger away from her, and leaving himself exposed in the open. "Don't..." she started, but was interrupted by the lightning bird whose screamed again so high pitched that no mortal human could possibly hear, but this time it made Chat Noir's ears bleed.
"Hold on! I'm coming!" Ladybug shouted across the distance between them.
"No don't! Stay back!" Chat Noir held out a hand."
"I'm not strong enough to loose you!" she declared. "There has to be a way!"
"There is," Ember whispered in Ladybug's ear, coming up beside her. "At least a chance...all kwami are immortal, and the lightning bird is impervious to blades, poison, or water...but he does have a weakness,"
Ladybug leaned closer. "The heat of lightning bird may be as hot as the surface of the sun, but there is a fire on this earth that as hot as the heart of the sun." Ladybug stared blankly back at him. "The fire of a Phoenix," Ember prompted.
"But Ember, you tried to block us before and he struck you down," Ladybug said distractedly, glancing back at Chat Noir.
"Alone I might not be able to match him...unless I had a weilder." Ember said meaningfully.
Ladybug swung her head back to the kwami of wisdom. "Ember you would do that?! But I thought you hadn't joined with a weilder since..."
"Since my Seshat was taken from me," Ember's voice swelled. Then his feathers sparked determinedly, "...and I'm not going to loose another one I care about now!"
Ladybug took out the Phoenix quill miraculous and tucked it into her hair. "You're sure Ember?" she paused.
"It is Bennu today...Say Bennu blaze, and when you reach Chat Noir say Bennu inferno," he urged.
Then channeling the ancient power of the long dormant Phoenix she called "Bennu , Tiki unify, Bennu blaze!." She herself was instantly engulfed in a radiating fire. Flaming wings shot out from her shoulder blades, and she rose, the Red Phoenix, to challenge the demon of the sky.
The lightning birds eyes glowed white with the heat of the sun within, and narrowed a angrily at the Phoenix weilder. Pale blue electricity snapped and crackled across his wing tips.
Reaching Chat Noir's side she grabbed his waist, and clenched her eyes shut. "Bennu Inferno," yelled Red Phoenix. A blast of the most intense fire shot out from the Red Phoenix. Throwing her hand upward, flaming protectively above them. Bracing herself over Chat Noir, she struck her extended lucky charm baton firmly into the ground. Chat Noir's transformation dropped in flash of green leaving Adrien before her, but still she didn't open her eyes.
The fire that blazed out from her rose up like a flare to meet the coming strike. As the lighting bird dove down upon them, the lucky charm baton redirected the lightning's daggers, grounding them like a lightning rod. Just then Ladybug's earrings set off a warning chirp. She felt Chat Noir's smooth bare hands gently cup her face, and press his forehead to hers. "Open your eyes Mi'Lady. I want you to see who will always be by your side," he whispered.
"Chat, you don't have to. We're going to make it!" she resisted.
"We will...that's why I need you to know," he said with certainty.
The lightning birds energy crackled above them, and he raised his wings preparing his final strike.
In the split second it took Ladybug to open her eyes and realize in front of her was none other than Adrien Agreste, she went from shocked silence to a whistling tea kettle. "Aeeeeeeeeeeee" the high pitched inward whine continued to vibrate over her frozen lips.
"Mari?" Adrien asked worriedly.
"You...you're...no...naw...you couldn't...I didn't just..Adri..." Ladybug breathed,but there was no time. Her transformation wouldn't hold much longer and their doom was circling above them waiting to strike! But all she could think was her Kitty was Adrien! The long illusive first love of her life Adrien!
Then she heard another voice...a smaller voice...but one that was pure rage...yell out "Cataclysm!"
"Plagg!" She whispered hopefully, as she and Adrien looked up.
With horror they saw the split second that the lightning bird plunge down at them and the black cat kwami flew up to intercept him buzzing with distructive energy
They met with with a blast of energy that sent a shock wave radiating out from them. The shockwave hit the mountain top around them. What followed was a massive earthquake that jarred the
The earth cracked and seized, and a wall of earth rose up up like castle mountain.
Plagg protectively stared down the huge lightning bird standing over the huddled form of Adrien and Ladybug on the ground.
"Stand back pest," the lightning bird spat, limping in the air from where Plagg had struck him. "the mortals are mine! It's unwise even for the kwami of destruction to come between lightning and its prey!"
"It is unwise of you to underestimate how dangerous it is for you to lay claim to my chosen and the Ladybug!" Plagg shouted back.
Blinding electricity leapt amongst his feathers, and he tensed, seeming as if he was about to mount a follow up attack.
That was when both the earth and sky shook with the sound of thunder. If you have ever heard thunder boldly rumble across the open skies of South Africa , it was nothing compared to the moment the thunder dragon arrived. The lightning bird trembled, and its electricity made popping noises in fear.
The dragon shot straight at the bird that lit up the dark sky, and they tangled together in a brutal battle. The dragon over powered the bird, and it ripped into its glowing feathers, making is writhe in pain, and snap back at its tough scales.
Quickly the lightning bird let out a piercing screech, and fled into the sky, begrudgingly abandoning its prey. The Thunder dragon pursued it, driving it further into the sky.
"Bennu, Tiki, divide," Ladybug sighed. The Phoenix kwami raised his head at Ladybug's side, clearly exhausted from holding on so long.
"You've got to renew the land Ladybug. Before the destruction lightning has inflicted hurts anyone else," Ember instructed weakly.
Ladybug trembled.
Then more softly Ember encouraged, "you can do this Marinette!"
Hearing the kwami of wisdom using her true name for the first time, even though he had known it all along, snapped her out of her tunnel vision. She looked around them to see the destruction of the loose cataclysm and fire ravaged land. She gripped her lucky charm baton. "Miracuclous Ladybug!" She called, and the magic of the ladybug restructured the earth beneath their feet, and healed the destruction the lightning bird had wrot. As the ladybug's magic washed over the cliffs, Ladybug herself detransformed, and Marinette swayed to one side. Adrien reacted quickly and caught her as she stumbled.
The scorched patches on her skin had been repaired. Even the branching scaring seered into her left shoulder (tracing the path the lightning had travelled through her body) was gradually erasing like invisible ink.
Like a foggy memory replaying in her head, Chat confessed his love for her on the rooftop after Glaciator...only this time his mask faded away and it was Adrien standing before her. She blinked at him, with her mouth gaping.
"It's still me Mi'Lady Love," Adrien reassured her, taking her hand. "You're honestly surprised it was me?"
"...ou...you...love me?!" Marinette repeated shakily.
Adrien laughed, folding her into his arms. "I don't think I've kept that part a secret all these years!"
"But you're Adrien," Marinette stared at him dumbfounded.
"Well, yes, but I thought...I hoped you liked Adrien too," he searched her eyes getting steadily more nervous. "You DO still love me...now that you know?" Adrien whispered, ducking his head.
At this moment Marinette's own insecrities and shock crumbled into the face of Adrien standing vulnerable without his mask...wondering if he had lost her. Pushing aside all else she had to reassure him that she wasn't ever going to let him go. "Adrien...my Kitty...my two worlds have collided! Don't you see what this means? You have always and will always be the one I've loved with all of me. Adrien I am so over the top, crazy in love with you!"
"That's the way I feel about you!" Adrien's face broke into a smile. "Marinette, you have no idea how much I wanted to tell you!"
"No secrets will ever keep us a part again!" Marinette threw her arms around his shoulders.
Adrien leaned his face towards hers, and pressed his lips against her's.
"Mep!" Marinette squeaked, and then started to giggle, making a buzzing sensation against their lips.
"What?!" Adrien asked awkwardly pulling back.
"It's just that I'm kissin' Adrien freakn' Agreste!" Marinette practically squealed.
"And that is...um...good?!"Adrien asked hopefully.
In response Marinette sprung at him, tackling him to the ground with her embrace. Tilting his head back she kissed him with a frenzied passion. Now it was Adrien who giggled under her. She tore her lips away from him, smiling down from him. "Now you're laughing?!" she raised an eyebrow.
"I was just thinking that if I had known this is how you would react, I wouldn't have been able to wait so long," he grinned, putting his hands behind his head.
"You're smug!" Marinette challenged, lifting herself up from his chest with her arms stretched on either side of him. "You're like the cat who got the canary!"
"Or the cat who got the Ladybug!" he pulled his arms down to her waist.
"I guess you were right after all," Marinette sighed starring into his emerald eyes.
"About what Bugaboo?" Adrien smiled adoringly.
"You always said without the mask I couldn't resist you," she answered. "It's always been you!" she lowered her face to his, her bluebell eyes truly seeing his whole self. "I've loved you this whole time!" Then without another word or moment hesitation she kissed his lips with more passion than ever before. There was nothing to hold back any more. Their secrets and fears of loneliness and rejection dissolved into the past. Their hearts were whole for the very first time.
The clouds parted making way for the sun. The fierce wind was pacified, and sighed in relief. The breeze ripples through the leaves causing a gentle rustle as one brushed another. Thunder echoed in the distance.
Oooo
I can't begin to tell you how excited I am to share this moment in the story with you! I've been working on it for months, and now I'm sending it out to you:) Thank you so much readers, and especially to Guest readers, k9defend, Aria2006, KoalaWho, No One and everyone else who has been so encouraging and supportive in the reviews! Also to Vanilla123catnezzer who suggested South Africa for a location.
The story is about to ramp up even more now that the "Chats out of the bag!" The new butterfly weilder's attack and recruitment of wild kwamis as allies is going to intensify their trials. There are some awesome locations coming up in the next chapters, and Adrien and Marinette will have some awkward-cute-romantic new experiences as their relationship intensifies. Please favourite or follow so you don't miss what is coming...It is not just Marinette who has suddenly realized Chat Noir's true identity!