Chapter 9: The arrival of the guardians
Marinette thought she would finally have a peaceful day after everything she had experienced these last few days.
How wrong she was.
She heard knocking on the lower door of her room. He quickly climbed down from her bed to open it to the person who was waiting.
Marinette crouched down opening the door, meeting Luka.
"Luka, when did you come in?" She let him in.
Luka needed to get to the point.
"Su Han is coming to talk to you, Marinette." Luka said, closing the door behind him. He was carrying a bag with him.
"And what does he need this time?" Marinette put aside the notes she took a few moments ago.
"He needs you to lend him the horse's Miraculous so get ready," Luka fixed his jacket "And something else, do you have any way to explain what happened with Monarch?"
Marinette realized at that point that she had definitely forgotten something very important that she had to explain to the guardians.
"Not yet." It was a topic that worried her a lot, she didn't know if they would believe her. It was true that she had not yet prepared a lie to tell Su Han what exactly had happened between her and Monarch.
Surely, they were going to ask!
"Oh no, Luka, what do I tell them now?" Marinette had completely forgotten to create a story to explain Monarch's fate. Tikki came out of her hiding place when she saw that there was no danger of being seen.
"Marinette, if you need advice, the guardians are strict, but I think they will be willing to listen to what you have to say, even if it turns out to be a lie. But be very careful, they are not... very patient to say the least." Tikki held her paws, remembering the attitude of many of the guardians who were in charge of the temple.
"Do you have any ideas to explain it, Luka?"
Luka was thinking about what excuse they could use on this occasion.
"You can tell him that Monarch disappeared. That you tried to give you the Miraculous, but someone else took it before you could get it back." Luka shared his thoughts with Marinette.
"But won't they will wonder who the person behind the mask was?" Marinette panicked "How can I respond to that?"
"You can say that he died." Luka said relaxed "After all, Mr. Agreste received a direct cataclysm."
Marinette was surprised at how calm Luka was when he said that.
"Will they believe that?" Marinette sat in her swivel chair "How can I prove it?"
"Maybe some object can serve as bait. You can say that it was what you recovered and that the family asked you not to say anything."
"…To avoid retaliation because they didn't know anything about it until he died. That's a good lie Luka." Marinette complement "But now, what kind of object can I use to prove it?"
"Maybe Adrien knows," Luka thought "I guess they're also going to request his presence here."
"I'll call him then." Marinette got up from her swivel chair and started to dial Adrien's number. I wait a few moments before receiving a response from Adrien.
"Adrien, hello, I need you to come, it's something very urgent." Marinette moved her leg nervously.
"Hello Marinette, what's going on?" Adrien got out of bed. That day he hadn't felt the desire to get up early and he stayed there staring at the ceiling.
"The guardians are going to request our presence today. I need you to come. They may ask about your father, well about Monarch."
Adrien got up from his bed quickly.
"Are they going to ask about that? Now?" Neither Adrien nor Marinette had prepared what they were going to say.
"Yes, Luka came to tell me" Marinette showed Luka who greeted Adrien from a distance "I need you to bring something that can prove that your father is no longer with us."
"That my father died?" Adrien made air quotes imitating Marinette "What do you mean?"
"It's part of the lie we are going to tell to the guardians. When you arrive, we will explain everything to you. But we need some kind of proof to give so they have no doubt that our lie is true."
"And can't you come?" Adrien was very worried about having to talk to his father alone.
"No, Su Han is coming in a few moments and I have to be here to receive him, I'm so sorry, Adrien." Marinette wanted to help him ask Gabriel to give them something to mislead the guardians, but she couldn't let Su Han see she wasn't at her house without anyone taking care of the Miraculous.
"Then when I have it, I'll go looking for you, don't worry Marinette." Adrien said. He couldn't let Marinette down.
"I'll be waiting for you, Adrien."
Marinette ended the call. Luka approached her.
"Marinette, I need to change into my guardian uniform, do you have a place I can change?"
"Sure Luka, you can use the screen I have here." Marinette pointed in the direction of the folding screen she used for her friends to try on her designs.
Once Luka finished getting ready, they both heard knocking on the upstairs door.
"It's him" Luka said "Let him in."
Su Han jumped to where the two teenagers were.
"Oh Su Han, welcome." Marinette stood up straight and adopted a respectful pose in the presence of the guardian.
"I came to look for the horse's Miraculous. Today there is a very important meeting with all the guardians and it is extremely important to make myself present there."
"Oh sure," Marinette opened the place where she was hiding "Don't you require me to hand over the others?"
"Not yet. That is something we will decide today. How we proceed will be decided between us at the meeting. I would prefer that you stay here for the moment.
Marinette went to look in her drawer.
Su Han received the box. When he opened it, he couldn't explain himself how the Miraculous changed so much.
"What happened to the Miraculous?" Su Han examined one of the rings.
"It is a long story."
"What about Hawkmoth?" Su Han realized that the butterfly Miraculous was not in its place "What happened to the butterfly Miraculous?"
"Well... it's kind of hard to explain." Marinette felt her breath left her when she saw Su Han's doubtful expression.
"I need you to explain in detail," Su Han put on the ring "But for now, I don't have time to listen to it. The guardians requested my presence at the temple and I need to arrive quickly."
The guardian put on the ring and opened a portal.
"We'll come back for you soon," Su Han crossed the portal "You better be ready. Let's go Luka."
"See you later, Marinette." Luka walked through the portal, saying goodbye to Marinette.
Immediately after finishing the call Adrien set out to look for his father. He would have preferred if Marinette had been there to accompany him, but she needed him, so there was no other choice.
He mustered up the courage to ask him for what Marinette needed. Since he didn't have time, he half-opened the door finding his father there, working.
"Father." Adrien saw how his father lost focus of what he was doing and directed his gaze to the door.
"Yes, Adrien?"
"Marinette needs you to give her something of yours." Adrien said.
"Something of mine?" Gabriel wasn't understanding what was happening.
"The guardians want to speak with her, it's important or at least that's what it seemed like."
"The Guardians?" Gabriel put aside what he was doing and approached where Adrien was.
"They think they are going to ask them about you, but so that they don't discover us, they want to present proof to prove that you are Dead."
Adrien stared at the ground.
Gabriel was thoughtful. What kind of object could they use to mislead the guardians? He could probably find something he could get rid of in his room.
"Come Adrien, let's go find what Miss Marinette needs us to give to her."
Gabriel led Adrien to his room. Gabriel looked around trying to think of what he could give Marinette without compromising his identity. Then he remembered the perfect object that would be useful for Marinette to present to the guardians.
He searched deep in the drawer where he kept his shirts. In the in the corner was a colorful tie with Punk designs that he once wore in his youth before becoming Gabriel Agreste. Chills ran down Gabriel's spine as he remembered his past. Gabriel gave it to Adrien.
"Aren't you upset that you have to get rid of this, Father?" Adrien showed her back the object he had given him.
"No, don't worry, Adrien, it's good that you came to find me for this, but why doesn't Marinette come herself?"
"Because Su Han went to look for her right now. She can't risk raising suspicions and they'll probably summon me too soon" Adrien told him.
"Then get on your way, son. I'll wait here." Gabriel guided Adrien to his room and helped him open the window with the control. Adrien transformed and put the tie in the pocket of his suit. Adrien gave his father one last look before leaving. Gabriel stood watching until Chat Noir disappeared from his sight.
"Good luck, Adrien."
Once the portal closed, Su Han turned to Luka.
"Walk straight Luka," Su Han approached him "The other guardians are watching."
A group of monks approached Su Han.
"It's time, we are going to meet in the east wing, we need your presence, Su Han." said one of them.
"You stay here Luka," Su Han told him "I'll come look for you once we finish this brief meeting."
"Won't I going to participate in the meeting?" Luka thought that this time the he would participate in the meeting.
"Guardian apprentices are not allowed to participate in official Guardian meetings, Luka. It's part of the regulations. I'll come back to you once we're done."
Luka watched as they went to a room on the other side of the temple and locked the door. Luka was very curious about what they were going to talk about at the meeting. A few days ago, he had spotted a small hole in that same building that led directly to the room where all the guardians would be gathered when he first arrived at the temple. Maybe then he could find out what they were talking about.
He saw a couple of boxes he could use to climb.
He carefully climbed up trying not to make noise and with a jump he grabbed the border of the ceiling. He used his feet to propel himself up, finally going up.
Luka slowly crawled across the ceiling and carefully leaned on it. He managed to hear the murmur coming from the meeting the guardians were holding.
He carefully leaned against the ceiling trying to discern what the guardians were talking about.
"Su Han, please give us a report on what is happening." a voice said.
"The guardian managed to recover the remaining Miraculous."
Luka managed to spot another of the guardians.
"Guardian? What happened to Wang Fu?" said another voice.
"He decided to hand over his guardian duties to the current ladybug Miraculous wielder."
"May we know why?"
"Those are questions that she will have to answer. The sooner we go looking for her the sooner we will have answers from her. We will do an interrogatory and we will see what we will do with it. Although most likely we will have to relegate her from her duties as her guardian.
Interrogatory? To Luka it didn't sound good at all. That meant Marinette was in serious trouble.
He listened a little more to see what more information he could get. There were many things that he did not understand or that he could not hear well. Once the meeting was over, Luka was sure of one thing: he had to find a way to warn Marinette before the order came looking for her so she would be prepared.
Luka carefully climbed down from the roof. He needed to get the Miraculous from the horse to leave, but he didn't know how.
"Luka."
The boy heard his name. Luka followed the source of the sound. Su Han was calling out to him from a hidden door he had never seen.
"Here."
Luka went with Su Han to a more secluded area. He opened a portal.
"Luka, I'm going to let you go first this time. Tell Marinette what we're going to do. But hurry up, they won't take long to leave. You have one hour."
Luka went through the portal with the horse Miraculous, and left the Miraculous on the other side.
"Thank you."
Luka watched as the portal closed and an alarmed Marinette stood up from her seat in a panic. She fell with a crash to the floor, chair included. Some papers flew into the air as Marinette landed on the ground. Adrien, who had just entered, approached Marinette to help her up.
"Marinette!" Both boys exclaimed when they saw Marinette on the ground. Luka and Adrien offered her hand and she took both to stand up.
"Marinette, the guardians are coming to talk to you," Luka said, watching as Marinette brushed off her clothes.
"The Guardians? Luka…" Marinette didn't expect them to talk to her so quickly.
"I didn't think they would come so soon, but they want to recover the Miraculous." Luka pointed to the place where she hid the Miraculous.
"They want them back? Now?" Marinette mentioned nervously.
"That's what I heard at their meeting," Luka took a deep breath "I had to do it in secret because they didn't allow me to participate in the meeting. But they will come without a doubt."
"And when they are going come?" Marinette asked nervously.
"In an hour. But there is something even more important that you have to know and that is that in addition to that they want to relegate you from your duties as a guardian."
Marinette felt her soul sink.
That meant that she would lose her memory and she would not be able to help the Agreste family.
Adrien would be left alone. And she would forget about him and all of her adventures the past year with the Miraculous. Still, she had no time to waste.
"Then help me organize all this," Marinette pointed to the mess she had all over her room. The file containing the grimoire on her computer was open and several notebooks were on the table where she was working. "They can't figure out what we're doing here."
Luka organized several of Marinette's notes into one package. She opened a drawer in her desk and put them all in there. Even so, there were still things to hide.
"We'll have to put them under my bed."
Marinette grabbed several things in her hands and ran up the stairs to her bed.
Adrien cleaned most of Marinette's room quickly and closed the grimoire window on Marinette's computer.
"That's it" Marinette turned to Adrien "Did you bring what I asked for?"
"Here it is." Adrien took the garment out of his pocket "My father gave it to me himself."
Marinette took it in her hands. She examined the garment that Adrien had given her. She carefully put it in her bag.
"Now we have to prepare what we are going to say. How much time do we have Luka?" Marinette asked.
"45 minutes." Luka said looking at the time on his phone.
The three began to put together the lie they would tell the guards. They practiced it to make sure that all three would say the same thing and not cause inconsistencies in the story.
Five minutes before the guards arrived, Luka stopped them.
"Both transform now. You better introduce yourself as Ladybug and Chat Noir. If they ask you to show them your true identity, just do it without protesting, the less you can make them angry the better for you."
At that moment a portal opened again in Marinette's room. Su Han walked in through this, looking quite serious.
"Marinette, I've come back to look for you, she was summoned to interrogatory by the guardians" Su Han saw Chat Noir next to her "And I see Chat Noir is also here."
"I came because Ladybug asked me to." Chat Noir kept his distance. He didn't want to make a wrong step and ruin everything.
"Do you have the Miraculous box on hand? I need it back." Su Han extended his hand waiting for the box to be given to him. "You don't have to give up the box, just hand it over and we will protect it."
Marinette opened the place where she hid the box.
"Are we leaving now?" The kwamis came out of the box.
"No, we don't want to leave you." Ziggy said.
"I'm sorry. I don't want to leave you either, but I think you will be safer with them. Don't worry, I'll come visit you when I can."
The kwamis hugged Marinette before she returned the box. Su Han received the box from Marinette.
"Come on, the interrogatory is about to begin." Su Han stepped aside to let them pass. Ladybug and Chat Noir passed through the portal, amazed to see the temple. They had already seen it on the news, but seeing it in person was a slightly different experience.
"This way Ladybug," Su Han pointed out the place where she should go "You will have to sit in the middle of the room in the chair we arranged for you."
"What about me?" Chat Noir leaned on his cane waiting for a response.
"You can see from the podium along with the other guardians. You will be given the opportunity to participate from there."
Chat Noir then approached Ladybug.
"Good luck, Ladybug." Chat Noir hugged her. She hugged him back, nervous about what might happen from now on. They both separated and prepared to go to their respective places.
Luka was going to enter after Ladybug and Chat Noir when someone stood in front of him, blocking his path. Su Han was in front of him.
"Oh no, Luka. Guardians in training cannot participate in the interrogatory."
"I also wish to participate, master. Wouldn't that be good for my training as a guardian?" Luka used his best card to get Su Han to let him in.
Su Han thought about it for a moment before sighing and denying. He had already been getting fond of Luka at this point.
"Alright. Just don't cause any trouble Luka." Su Han stepped aside and allowed Luka to enter.
Luka took a place to the side where the other guardians were, next to Chat Noir. They didn't say anything. Su Han entered, closing the door behind him and jumping to the podium, another of the guardianss cleared his throat.
"The extraordinary meeting of the guardians goes into session. This meeting will be preceded by the celestial guardian of the mother box."
Ladybug sat on the chair in the middle of the room and looked around to see the guardians' faces. Su Han was in the middle and Luka was at one end next to Chat Noir.
Marinette couldn't make out many of the faces in the temple, but she assumed they were all part of the order of guardians which was thought to have been lost over a century ago. Feast probably stopped time for them like it had for Su Han. She gulped as she heard the gong behind her.
"Ladybug we need to know who you are, so please undo your transformation. Chat Noir must do it too."
Ladybug nodded from her seat.
"Tikki, spots off." Marinette was now in Ladybug's place. Adrien also undid his transformation.
"Marinette has been summoned because we need to know what happened to the Miraculouses of the mother box."
The guardians examined the Miraculous in the box and noticed that the Miraculous no longer looked like before.
"The person behind Monarch modified them. I don't know how he did it, but the first time he tried to get them back, they were already like this. However, they are still fully functional."
"Since you recovered the Miraculous, how did it happen?"
"I faced Monarch myself and after a really hard battle I managed to recover them." Marinette explained.
"And what about the butterfly Miraculous. Is not here?" The guardians examined the box, finding the empty space in the box. "And what exactly happened to the Miraculous?"
"The butterfly Miraculous was lost," Marinette continued "Someone else took it when Monarch was defeated. But I still don't know who it is."
"And what about the wearer of the butterfly?" Su Han had doubts about what happened to the previous wearer of the butterfly."
"He died... He received a direct cataclysm from Chat Noir by accident. I informed the family myself and they took care of his body." Marinette repeated the lie they created.
"Can you tell us who it was?" Su Han asked.
Marinette gulped before continuing with the lie.
"No. I didn't know him." Marinette looked each of the guardians in the eyes.
Marinette took out of her bag the evidence that Luka and she would show.
"That was the only thing left of him. After that, the family asked me to leave them out of this. They didn't dare give me his name, so I really don't know anything about him."
Marinette stood up from her seat showing him them the object and one of the guardians examined it.
Marinette's heart was beating very fast, she wasn't very sure if they would believe this lie.
"Then, there's no point looking for him if he's already dead." Su Han said.
Marinette can breathe a little easier hearing that. It meant that they believed her lie.
"Unfortunately, someone else took the butterfly Miraculous. Since I was dealing with Monarch it was not possible for me to recover it. We still haven't been able to find out who is the person who has it."
The guardians discussed among themselves what Marinette just mentioned.
"And about Mayura? What about Peacock Miraculous?" Su Han asked.
"Well... the Miraculous is in other hands, as for Mayura, I don't know what happened to her." Marinette lied again.
"Who has the Peacock Miraculous?"
"Felix Fathom." Marinette pronounced, "He has the Miraculous in his possession. But I have seen that he has taken good care of him. So, I haven't recovered it for the moment."
The guardians whispered once more before reaching a verdict. Su Han jumped close to her.
"Well with all the precepts she broke, Marinette should be forced to stop being the guardian."
Both Marinette and Adrien gasped.
"But what will happen to Marinette when she gives up being a guardian?" Luka asked into the air.
"Master Fu lost his memory when he handed over the guardian's responsibilities to me. Am I going to lose my memory too?" Marinette was very worried about the answer they would give her.
"Yes, unfortunately that is the measure that was implemented in the order several centuries ago for the safety of the Miraculous.
Su Han continued.
"It is something that was designed to change the box from generation to generation and avoid the risk of the information stored in the temple being leaked, as happened with the student Wang Fu." Su Han referred to the last student he had before the order disappeared for more than a century.
Marinette didn't want to think about that possibility. That would mean that she would forget everything she experienced with Adrien and Chat Noir. Adrien had met her when he received his Miraculous from Master Fu.
She didn't want to lose her memory.
"So, will I finally lose my memory?" Marinette asked.
"There is no other choice, miss." Su Han said.
"That's not fair." Marinette protested in her seat.
"She's right." Adrien was not very happy to know that his beloved Ladybug, his Marinette was going to forget him "It's not fair."
"I only agreed to be the guardian because there was no other choice. If we didn't, Hawkmoth would take over the Miraculouses and there would be nothing we could do to stop him."
"Then why do I agree to be the guardian in the first place?" Su Han still hadn't heard all the details of how Marinette ended up becoming a guardian.
"It was master Fu decision to train me with the little knowledge he had, not mine. He was the guardian for 184 years, so I don't see the problem. I myself agreed to take on the role of guardian when Master Fu asked me to."
"Despite the great responsibility that it represented?"
"Yes," Marinette admitted quietly. "Even if it cut short all my dreams and all the future I already had planned."
Everyone present in that room remained silent.
"Can I say something?" Luka took a step forward.
Su Han nodded.
"You can do it, Luka. Go ahead."
"I've known Marinette for a long time and I know she suffered a lot. But she did everything she could to keep the Miraculouses from falling into the wrong hands. You made mistakes too, didn't you?
The guardians looked at each other, knowing that Luka was right.
"And how do you know her identity, Mr. Couffaine?" One of the guards asked.
"It was a series of circumstances," Luka prepared to tell the story "I used the snake Miraculous to assist Ladybug and Chat Noir in a rather complicated situation in which everyone was at risk, including Ladybug and Chat Noir's Miraculous. Because the akumatized revealed the childhood dreams of whoever was in contact with his powers, they recruited me as I was the wearer of the snake Miraculous."
"And who chose you to be the wearer of the snake, Mr. Couffaine?"
"It was Ladybug, sir." Luka responded.
"Master Fu allowed me to choose wearers according to the needs of the moment. He gave me his trust." Marinette answered before any of the guardians could ask.
"Can I say something too?" Adrien raised his hand to get the attention of the guardians.
"Go ahead"
"I've been with Ladybug since the beginning. I know she has made mistakes, I have too. But she has always done her best to protect Paris and recover the butterfly Miraculous. Her solutions may have been strange and sometimes made no sense, but she managed to find the solution to each of our problems and did her best to defeat Monarch. She always knows what to do." Adrien gave Marinette a reassuring smile.
The other guardians spoke among themselves in low voices. They argued for a moment before giving their answer.
"Alright. We will take care of recovering the butterfly Miraculous for the moment. We will give you one last chance and let you be," Su Han declared "But be careful, if you get into trouble, we will not hesitate to recover the Miraculous and make Marinette give up being the guardian. Even if it puts Paris at risk."
Marinette stood up from her seat.
"It's the end of the interrogation. You can now go home."
Adrien went to Marinette's side.
"Are you ok?" Adrien was very worried about her.
"I think so."
"Let's go. I'll accompany you." Adrien took her hand.
"I'm going with you. Su Han asked me to take you home." Luka approached with the horse Miraculous in his hand. The three went outside and Luka opened the portal to lead them back to Marinette's room.
Marinette's legs felt like jelly, she looked blindly for her chair until she could sit down. That meeting had left her quite overwhelmed. So much information to process.
"If they discover our lie, we're doomed. I didn't think I had to lie again, especially not to the guardians themselves..."
"You did it for a good cause. But I don't think that's going to help us much once they find out." Luka was very sure that when the guardians discovered the truth it wouldn't be very pleasant.
"Mr. Agreste must not know about this."
"I know Marinette, I won't say a single word about it." Luka thought it wasn't a good idea to say much about what happened to Mr. Agreste.
"If we alarm him, he won't trust us anymore." Marinette saw that it was time for her visit to the mansion.
"I'm not going to say anything either, Marinette." Adrien crouched down next to her and hugged her "Thank you for protecting my father from the guardians even though he didn't deserve it."
"You're welcome, Adrien. I did it for you."
Marinette looked at the time on her phone. She should already be on her way to the mansion again to inform Gabriel of what happened.
"I'm sorry Luka, but I have to go, Mr. Agreste summoned me again for something important and I can't miss it."
"See Marinette, I have to go back to my house now. In the meantime, I will try to convince Su Han to give me access to the archives of the guardians. We'll be in touch if I find anything useful."
That was a close call from the guardians part.