There was a formal awe in returning through Kaalki's portal to Canada's arctic tundra; Auyuittuq National Park, Nunavut. Where wide spans of snow and ice had spanned the ground on their last visit, now tuffs of wild grass and splashes of colour from flowers dotted the remote landscape. The temperature was bearly below freezing, giving the open air a fresh quality that seemed to rejuvenate them.
"It's still pretty bright out!" observed Ladybug.
"The closer we get to summer the longer the days get up here," Ember nodded. "Soon the sun won't rest for 16 hours at a time. This might be the last night for months we'll be able to spot the northern lights."
"So you're saying, don't screw this up," Chat Noir toyed with his baton distractedly.
"I'm saying," Ember correct, leaning his face towards Chat Noir, "that your timing is perfect tonight...but also, if you need more time you have plenty till next season."
"I can do this," Chat Noir said as if it was a mantra he had been working on over and over in his own mind.
"You can!" Ladybug linked arms with him, and gave his hard a reassuring squeeze.
The soft padding feet of the polar bear approached made crunching noises across the crusty panels of ice that lingered on the ground.
Once again the muscular imposing form of the great white bear was both awe inspiring and terrifying at the same time.
"Tungasugit, Welcome back my friends!" the polar bear greeted.
"Nanuq, the weilders have returned to finish the trials of peace," Ember regally bowed.
"And so surely you shall," the polar bear bowed in return. "From the Great Canadian Arctic archipelago it is here that the Arctic Ocean joins the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. They unite after long journeys touching the corners of the globe," the polar bear gestured to the waterways beyond them. "Just as you have come far to finally return to us."
"What do I need to do?" asked Chat Noir stepping forward.
"Before the sun sinks beneath these waters you must summit Mount Thor. Then your trial will begin anew."
"Last time it seemed easier!" Ladybug mumbled, eyeing the dizzying 4,100 foot wall of ice and granite.
"Indeed," agreed the polar bear sagely. "Forgiveness can be a uphill battle, and this peak just so happens to be the worlds highest vertical cliff...But make no mistake, once you reach the top you'll know whether or not you've found your peace."
Chat Noir's and Ladybug strained their necks, looking skyward at their challenge.
"Tukisiviit?" the polar bear asked.
"Yes," Chat Noir breathed out a breath of steamy air. "I know what I've got to do."
Off they set to conquering the challenges of Mount Thor. They approached from the North over the Asgard pass (also known as ᓯᕙᓂᑎᕈᑎᖑᐊᒃ, Sivanitirutinguak). The two cylindrical twin rock towers were bridged by a stone saddle. With Ladybug using her yoyo to belay them, Chat Noir used his baton to wedge footholds in the upright incline. Like a jagged tooth it jetted out from the mountain range.
"I wonder why this mountain is named after some Norse god of thunder," Ladybug mused, catching herself from a slip.
"Maybe stories of ancient Vikings wove their way into legends here," Chat Noir lent her his arm to steady her.
Scrambling up to the top, Chat Noir hoisted Ladybug up over the final ridge, but she frantically tapped him on the shoulder, gesturing him to lower her back down.
"What is it? Are you okay?" Chat Noir asked in confusion.
"Dragon!" squeaked Ladybug with her face pale as a sheet and her hands trembling on the string of her yoyo.
They both slowly edged their way to look over the lip of the cliff. Sure enough two thin trails of steam rose from the nostrils of an immense dragon. His armoured tail wound around himself, and his arched wings curved over his steely grey form. Their breath hitched, as the fire drake shifted in his sleep, and the mountain quaked with a rumble.
They ducked down out of sight.
"It might have been nice of that polar bear kwami to have mentioned a living, breathing dragon on the top of this particular peak!" Chat Noir whispered tensely. "Coming face to face with some basilisk is sure not making me feel more at peace right now!"
"Chat, there is no way this is a coincidence. I think...I think...we are meant to face him."
Chat Noir's took another peak up over the ledge, and then turned back to Ladybug. "Well, it's not like we've never faced a dragon before," he shrugged with a good natured, 'I'm about to do something crazy' type of smirk.
"Actually that's what was bothering me," Ladybug leaned in. "I think we have faced a dragon before...this one!"
"Lonng is back in the miracle box..." Chat Noir said confused, "...and he does NOT look like that thing...Jagged's acomatized Fang?"
"Not Lonng...or Fang," Ladybug shook her head vehemently. "We didn't get a good look at him last time, so I can't be positive...you know...because he was enveloped in storm clouds back in South Africa!"
"Thunder Dragon," Chat Noir breathed, getting a flashback to the moment he had been revealed to Ladybug against Lightning's fury. "You don't think that bird is here too do you?!" Chat Noir's scanned the skies suspiciously, but the pale blue was clear. "What's he doing here anyway?" he asked.
"Waiting for you," a strong baritone voice spoke like methodically playing solely from the left end of a piano.
Both Ladybug and Chat Noir froze, still suspended precariously on the side of the cliff face.
Booming sonorous laughter rippled up from above them, "Do you insist on prolonging our reunion, or will you join me,"
Chat Noir and Ladybug raised themselves up cautiously, keeping to the perimeter of the peak's plateau.
"Why do you lay in wait for us?" Ladybug asked, keeping close to Chat Noir.
"To bring you Justice," the dragon seemed to regard them curiously.
"Justice?" Ladybug and Chat Noir asked in unison.
"The Lightning-bird's unprovoked attack on you was orcasyrated as you know by the false weilder of the butterfly miraculous. What you may not know is that it was she who prevented me from interviening sooner that day."
"She?!" responded Ladybug, "So the new Hawkmoth really is a woman after all!"
"Yes, but she does not go by that name. She has proclaimed herself Falfalla," the dragon growled the name lowly.
"Falfalla," Chat Noir repeated as if the name strung his throat. "That means Butterfly in Italian!"
"She manipulated other wild kwami against me waylaying me. She still only has the strength to control one akuma at a time though, so as soon as she took control of the Lightning bird I was able to break free," the dragon explained grinding the granite wis his dreaded claws. "I am only sorry I hadn't managed to come sooner."
"Thank you for saving us!" Ladybug expressed earnestly.
"You are not alone in this war my weilders. Many wild kwami heard of the possession of fellow kwami and they look to you to take the lead," the dragon spoke with a clap of his wings as if in salute.
"A war?!" Ladybug Answered shocked. "You really think it will come to that?"
"Young Ladybug, it has already begun. Sides have been drawn. The wild kwami of this world will not give up their freedom so easily! They look to you for leadership and strength. The attack on you must be answered."
With that proclamation, the dragon raised himself up to his full height, and revealed the haggard form of the Lightning Bird pacified under his clutches, pressed down into the rock of the mountain.
"Here is the villain himself who sought to destroy you for his own means. Traitor to the miraculous power. All of us need to know how you plan to deal out his sentence," the dragon proclaimed with authority, with an ever glint in his eye.
The bird hissed miserably under the inescapable grasp of the Thunder Dragon, and glared out of bloodshot eyes up at the weilders it still so clearly despised.
"But what can we do?" asked Ladybug with a wary glance at the restrained villain.
"You command both creation and...destruction," the dragon directed his gaze at Chat Noir. "It will not be the first time for the dark cat to deal out a kwami's sentence."
Chat Noir's stepped forward, squaring himself off with the dragon growling," I am no executioner!"
"Are you nieve enough to believe he wouldn't have ended both your life and hers if I hadn't interviewed that day," the Thunder Dragon accused. "...or that he would have any hesitation coming after you again...and be given the opportunity to reveal your identity to Falfalla. Luckily the akuma had been stripped from the lighting bird before she found out who you are...but don't think that you'll get so lucky a second time."
"He is a prisoner. You yourself have him pacified," Ladybug pointed down at the brooding bird.
"Lightning and I are bound to an eternal struggle I'm afraid," the Thunder Dragon glared at the wretched creature. "Eventually, dispite my efforts, he will one day break free."
They stood on the steep peak in awkward silence. The chill the weilders felt running down their spines was not only the blistering breeze that stung their faces.
"You could merely clip his wings. At least that way he would be weakened," the dragon compromised. "You are the only one capable of causing lasting damage to another immortal kwami. It is up to you."
A vicious shreik spilled from the beak of the lightning bird, who sparked out against the hold of the dragon. The dragon grappled with the vicious bird, who broke his grasp for a mere instant and took the opportunity to lunge at Ladybug.
"Cataclysm!" Chat Noir shouted in warning, and leaped in front of Ladybug, holding out his hand out in front of himself. His quick defence forced the bird to pull out of the attack and rear up before colliding with the Cataclysm. Skidding to a hasty stop, it was once again pounced upon by the thunder dragon.
"Lucky charm!" Ladybug called, readying herself for the birds attempt at a second follow-up attack. The flag of Zulia (in lucky charm form) fluttered down into her waiting hands. Ladybug studied the distinctive lightning bolt pattern at the center of the crest.
The birds eyes bulged from its skull, and wheezed out swears against the humans under the grasp of the dragon. Then it caught sight of Ladybug's lucky charm and fell silent.
"Make your judgement!" Demanded the dragon with a roll of thunder echoing off gathering clouds that had snuck up around them.
Chat Noir's looked over to Ladybug, and she gave him a silent nod. Then Chat Noir extinguished his destructive power on a rock on the side of the mountain.
The dragon aloofly reguarded the humans, and then asked, "You're not going to use your power against him?"
"Maybe it would be easier just to end him," Chat Noir gestured to the glaring bird. "But thunder needs lightning in the great balance of everything. It would be easy, but it wouldn't be right. He is a wild kwami of the sky, and I will not take him from the world!" Chat Noir's shook his head with conviction.
For the first time the bird sunk its head, rather than proudly upright. "He said you were planning to enslave all wild kwamis to a miraculous jewel. He said if we didn't stop you we'd all end up in a miracle box, a slave to the whims of a human of anothers choosing," the bird admitted reluctantly.
"He?" Ladybug cut in, looking up at the dragon hovering above. "But the thunder dragon just told us that the new butterfly weilder, Falfalla, was a woman!"
"Not his human pawn!" scoffed the Lightning Bird. "The true leader of the uprising!"
"There are two of them in this now?!" gasped Chat Noir.
"Oh no not two! Hundreds! Maybe thousands. By the time he finishes calling all the free kwami to him. They will liberate the enslaved kwami once and for all..."
"That's nonsense!" The dragon huffed. "How could you have been taken in by such lies. The miraculous kwami choose to be joined to a human host to focus their power for the good of mankind! They are not slaves!"
"Noorro might see that differently after the way he's been abused by his recent weilders," Chat Noir pondered out loud.
The Lightning Bird nodded, and a crackle of electricity ripples through his wings.
The dragon growled threatenly, and pressed the bird more firmly into the slab of granite. "It would be impossible for any of them to destroy the miraculous jewels anyway...not unless they had the...had the..." at which point a look of horror flared across the dragon's face, and he looked straight at Chat Noir.
"Me?!" Chat Noir look a step back.
"You?!" Ladybug stepped forward protectively.
"Of course," breathed Chat Noir. Tiki helped the first weilders create the miraculous...that means only Plagg can undo it!"
"They are not as stupid as I first thought," the bird shrugged with a smirk up at the dragon, who just glowered down at him.
"That is why you used Ladybug as bait to lure me in back in South Africa! You didn't need her at all...you just wanted..." Chat Noir continued to work out undertured by the birds slight.
"Well...that is not completely the case. Sure we really need you to undo the magic link of the miraculous, but I was supposed to capture both of you," the bird interjected.
"Both of us? But why? For another wish?" Chat Noir's shot the bird a threatening look.
"The kwami of chaos has always coveted the wish from Tiki and Plagg," The Thunder dragon sighed.
"The kwami of chaos needs you," the Lightning Bird continued, "...but her," the bird nodded towards Ladybug, " I guess Falfalla has her own plans for that one."
Both Ladybug and Chat Noir shuddered the way he said those words.
"Why would you tell all now? Why should we believe you after all you've done!" Ladybug demanded.
"He has done unspeakable acts and evil in this undertaking," the dragon spoke sololmly, but I know he speaks the truth."
"How can you be sure?" Chat Noir asked.
"Don't you know when your other half speaks the truth?" the dragon spoke as if it should be the most obvious thing in the world.
"You're partners. But I thought you wanted me to destroy him?!" Chat Noir said in shock.
"I wanted to know if you'd try," the dragon replied pointedly. "We don't always agree...but as you said one of us cannot exist without the other. Your decision reveals the condition of your heart."
"Isn't that a bit reckless?" Ladybug asked sceptically.
"It would be reckless to allow a weilder of one of the most powerful forces in the universe go unchecked if they were fuelled by revenge," the thunder dragon replied undaunted. Then he looked back, studying Chat Noir, "Now tell me this, Cat weilder...you granted Lightning mercy...but do you have enough for me?"
"What do you mean?" Chat Noir's asked, "you were on our side! If it had not been for you we wouldn't have made it! Why do you ask for mercy?"
"If I had discovered earlier or acted on my suspicions, you might have avoided that battle. It is my fault you were both in danger," the dragon moved so he was nose to nose with Chat Noir.
"His choices are not your fault!" Chat Noir declared.
"Exactly," the dragon seemed to smile.
The sun sank low in the sky, stretching out, as silence reverberated between the strange creatures on the high peak.
"This was a test," Chat Noir breathed.
"Not everything is a test, but there are different choices in life that lead down a series of paths," the dragon sat up straight, and the lightning bird stretched out his wings beside him rather passively.
"And where does your path lead now?" asked Ladybug.
"Look to your lucky charm little Ladybug," the dragon winked.
"This...this flag?" Ladybug lifted it, puzzled.
"How long since we last visited Zulia, Venezuela?" the dragon said over his shoulder to the sulking bird. "We are off to the Catatumbo River," the
Thunder Dragon supplied. "It is a superb place to get charged up before a battle, what with the storm clouds circulating most of the year, and lightning off the charts 10 hours per day and striking up to 280 times per hour! It's the perfect place to hide in plain sight and keep lightning out of additional mischief."
"You'll keep any eye him won't you?" Ladybug whispered to the dragon.
"Not to worry little Miss," the lord of Thunder shook his great head. "We'll meet up with you soon, and you will surely see him in a better light."
Shadows lengthened across the tundra, and the light faded.
"The Arora is close at hand," the Dragon urged the weilders, and he offered them a ride to meet back up with the wild polar bear kwami.
Pulling up in front of the white guardian of the North and the Phoenix, the two were a bit shaky as they stepped forward.
"Did you find it?" the polar bear inquired to Chat Noir. "Did you find your peace?"
"I guess we'll see," Chat Noir replied, as Thunder and lightning rose off into the darkness in the south.
The light of the sun fell off the western rim, and the darkness over took them, having no human-made light to interfere with the purity of the night.
"Once again dear one, your task is to visualize the ones you need to forgive, and then find it within yourself to let the pain go in a breath out," the polar bear said kindly.
Chat Noir closed his eyes and memories spilled over him. He clenched his eyes, and his hands tightened so much he felt the pricks of his claws dig into the palm of his gloves. This heart throbbed painfully against his chest like it was being ripped from him.
"His choices are not your fault," whispered the gentle voice of Ladybug, sliding her hand into his.
Visions of his face in a mirror being replaced by his father's faded. Chat Noir was left looking at his own reflection. "I forgive you," he said, and breathed out a deep sigh that left him both exhausted and elated.
"Open your eyes," the polar bear smiled, laying a heavy paw on his shoulder.
Chat Noir opened his eyes to find the luminosity of the dancing spirits of lights all around them. They stood transfixed as the auroras born of the sun flared outward on the solar wind and collided with the charged particles of the Earths magnetic poles.
"I'm free," Chat Noir finally said.
No one else needed to say another word. They could see his heart laid out among the stars.