Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug and Cat Noir

Stranger in Town

Chapter 13: Tokubetsu, Part 1

Thursday: Kagami was walking to the car, glad that the week was almost over. Her mother had become somewhat less controlling of late, and she couldn't quite figure that out. After all, she'd always thought the term "helicopter parent" had been coined to describe her mother specifically. But, whatever the reason, she reveled in the notion of the free time she had coming up this weekend. True, her mother no doubt had another extensive round of training prepared, but she'd eventually complete that and-amazingly!-be left to see to her own amusements. Though she was still struggling to find out just what those amusements were…

Perhaps she'd take in a movie. She'd heard, through the school grapevine, that the film, Solitude, starring Adrien Agreste's mother, was playing. She was the only one who hadn't yet seen it; the entire class had flocked to the theatre when they'd heard that the mother of their own classmate was starring in it. Miss Adriel had even let them out early to attend. It had embarrassed the poor boy no end, even though, from some dropped comments she'd overheard, she gathered he'd already seen it. Well, perhaps she'd go see it, though, to be fair, "art" movies usually didn't move her.

Idly, she wondered whether or not Damien had seen the movie, and, if not, might he not like to. That thought surprised her like an electrical jolt: why did she think of him? True, he was nice enough, and somehow she could tell he wasn't a "body snatcher," but he meant nothing to her…did he?

Of course he didn't. How could he? They came from two entirely different worlds. So why did thoughts of him intrude on her mind every so often?

It requires the human nervous system approximately one-twentieth of a second from the moment one perceives an event, to that event's being received and processed by the brain. Then the brain has to determine whether or not such an event requires action, i. e., fight or flight.

The thing that had been hiding in the bushes by the school burst forth and was on her in one-nineteenth of a second.

Marinette and Ayla had met with Damien and Better at the bistro. To Marinette's eternal delight, Nino and Adrien had happened by. Damien introduced Better, now wearing a toned-down dress, blouse, and vest, these last being the suggestion of Ayla. She didn't seem to care, as long as she could sit ever so close to Damien.

Both boys expressed surprise at Better's appearance, especially her resemblance to Kagami. Damien had repeated his line about his "family getting around." A large part of the Great Reveal he'd promised had had to be rescheduled a bit, to Ayla's obvious disappointment. But, he'd stressed, it was still on. There were some things they needed to know.

He just hoped Deanna didn't show up before then. His little sister was a Master of the Art of the Thrown Monkey Wrench.

Better had laid her head on Damien's shoulder, and was once again emitting pink Valentine's hearts, which drifted upward and popped about halfway to the ceiling. "Uh…" began Nino, pointing.

"It's the latest thing in Japan. Holographic, real-time, open air emojis," Damien said hastily. "I didn't know about them myself until Better showed me."

Nino turned to her. "Your name is Better?" That doesn't sound Japanese, he thought to himself.

"Mm-hm," she said dreamily, as though only half awake. "Damien himself named me."

Another gaffe, thought Marinette. Both Adrien and Nino turned to each other. Better looked to be about the same age as the rest of them. And Damien had named her? How'd that happen? He was trying to figure out some tactful way of asking when they heard the sirens go off. Akuma alert!

Marinette nudged Ayla, hard. We're on the clock, bestie. Then, aloud, "Okay, everyone, we'd best get to shelter. Damien? I know your apartment complex is some distance off…need a place to go to ground?" She really didn't know about how akuma resistant the pair were, but making the offer never hurt. Besides, Damien already knew about the pair's secret ID's.

But Damien was looking around. Even Better had roused herself and was swiveling her head. "This is no akuma alert."

"What?" asked Nino. "How do you know?"

"Trust me, I just do." The shopkeeper was preparing to roll down the protective shields over the windows. Like that had ever helped, thought Ayla. Still, what were people supposed to do?

"C'mon, Nino," urged Adrien, "I think it safe to say soccer practice is off for today." Together the two exited the bistro, followed by Damien and Better.

"Ayla, let's go."

"But if it's not-*" she was holding her hands over her ears, the alarm was so loud, and was shouting just to be heard.

"We don't know that. Besides…" And with the skill of long practice, Ayla could read her thoughts: It doesn't have to be an akuma for there to be trouble.

Outside: the streets were deserted, nobody wanting to get akumatized, not today at least. Marinette had to admit, there was something odd about this alert. Usually, akumatized individuals were hard to miss. But today, right now, Paris was a ghost town.

Since they were both familiar with each other's secret ID's, there was no reason not to change in front of each other. "Tiki! Spots on!"

"Trix, let's pounce!" Soon Ladybug and Rena Rouge were bounding across the rooftops, their enhanced physiques enabling them to make jumps that were normally impossible for humans, every sense alert for anything out of the ordinary.

Except…nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary. Just an ordinary day in Paris, if you ignored the deserted streets.

Wait. Up ahead there… "Look," Ladybug pointed.

"I see." Down below, near the school, was a group of police vehicles, all of them, the latest (hopefully) akuma proofed vehicles. And down there with them, along with Officer Roger Raincomprix, was Damien and Better. Damien was kneeling down over what looked like a large blackened area, examining it with unusual intensity.

That told them both more than just the simple tableaux. If those two had come here, there was probably a good reason. They landed.

"...but what were you two kids doing out here?" demanded Officer Roger. Ladybug frowned slightly. Sometimes he took his job a little too severely, or so it seemed. "I mean, there was an akuma alert on! I probably ought to fine you two."

Ladybug and Rena Rouge both saw Damien reach up and touch Better's wrist, which was ending in a fist. It's alright, Better. He's just doing his job. The reality warper had been on the verge of losing control. Marinette remembered the Toad Incident, as she and Ayla had come to call it, and shuddered slightly at the thought of what an angered Better could do, if she really put her mind to it.

She could just envision Sabrina coming home, later on today, to a toad scanning the news, with a cup of coffee handy, while wearing a policeman's cap.

Officer Roger saw them, and turned their way. "Oh! Ladybug! You've no idea how glad I am to see the both of you! Say, where's your partner?"

"Heeeere I come to save the daaaaay!" sang a voice from overhead, as Cat Noir slid down his baton, which immediately retracted.

"That's the old 'Mighty Mouse' song," Rena Rouge said, mock-disapprovingly. "And you're a cat. You eat mice."

"Not anymore," he said, balancing his stick across his shoulders. "The vet made me quit. Said those things were murder on my cholesterol."

Leaving them to their friendly bantering, Ladybug turned to Roger. She had a hunch she'd get more information from Damien and company, but she felt the need to go through the paces. "What have you got? Was it an akuma?"

"Well," he removed his cap and scratched his head in one motion. "That's just it. There's no trace of an akuma or an amok. Plus, we have a witness over there whose story is…a little strange." He gestured towards one of the vans, where a medic was treating a woman. "Maybe you'd best go talk to her. She seems…well, not hysterical, but close to it."

Huh, thought Ladybug. But if she was to get Damien and Better off out of the limelight here, she had better play along.

She went over to the woman. "Ma'am? I'm-*"

"I know who you are," the obviously distressed woman blurted out. "But, but I don't know if even you can help that poor girl."

"Er…girl? What girl?"

"A petite young thing walking along, minding her own business. Then, suddenly, just as she was passing by those bushes over there-" she pointed, "-something, something huge, just…just blasted out of them, grabbed her, and, and made off with her! She…she's probably dead, by now." She couldn't seem to stop sobbing. Ladybug could understand it; according to her own senses, she'd just seen someone die. She was having a hard time dealing with that.

"Did you see who it was?" But there were millions of people in Paris; it could've been anyone.

More sobbing. "I don't know. I didn't know her. Some Japanese girl."

Japanese girl. Although there were lots of Japanese girls in Paris, somehow Ladybug knew just exactly who'd been the victim here today. She sighed; a certain person was certainly having a rough time lately. She got up and left the sobbing woman, with the medic readying yet another tranquilizer shot. She couldn't even reassure the poor woman that everything would be okay, because she didn't know it would be.

She went back over to Officer Roger, who was still fussing at Damien. She could tell such was getting on Better's nerves; she had to come up with something just to forestall another Toad Incident. "It's alright, Officer," she assured him. "They're with me."

"Oh? Oh! Well, good. I'll leave it in your hands then." And he moved off. The medics would probably take the witness to the hospital for further treatment, though exactly what treatment would be most effective, Ladybug couldn't have said.

She fervently hoped Kagami wasn't dead. But in life, there are no guarantees.

Okay, she still didn't know all she wanted to about Damien, but that wouldn't stop her from asking questions. "Anything?"

"It was definitely Kagami who was attacked. By what I'm not sure. But I've a good notion where it came from, and it's not good."

"How 'not good'? Are there grades of 'not good'?" Cat Noir and Rena both joined them, either having concluded their friendly argument or else having grown bored with it. Or both. She noticed that Cat Noir seemed more than professionally worried; that was odd.

"Well, it could be worse, but it could also be a whole lot better." He lifted his hand: black soot decorated his fingertips, where he'd obviously run his hand through the blackened area. "We're standing in the middle of a charred area. Something immensely hot came through here…and, I'm supposing, left the same way."

"So…Kagami is most likely…" She was trying desperately to keep from saying the "D" word.

"I don't sense anything such as charred flesh or bone. I think she was taken, whole and probably unharmed. How, and why, I'm not too clear."

"Taken…where?"

Again he lifted his hand, the end of one finger showing the black residue. "It's only a hunch, mind you, but I'm smelling traces of burning sulfur."

"Burning sulfur?"

"You've another term for it: brimstone." At her shocked expression, he continued. "I think she was attacked and kidnapped, basically, by something from the region of the multiverse you call Hell."

….

Kagami woke up to two highly unpleasant sensations: one, stifling heat-she was already drenched with sweat-and two, an intense, acrid odor she couldn't identify, but that almost choked her.

What had happened to her?

She opened her eyes. She was leaning up against a rocky outcropping of some sort. The rock was seemingly made out of some sort of red rock that didn't look like anything she was familiar with. It felt hot, hotter than it should have, and she jerked away, fearful that she might actually suffer burns if she remained where she was. Looking around was no help in determining her location. The sky, rather than being the usual blue or blue-black of thunderstorm weather, seemed to be made out of fire. She couldn't see the sun.

She got to her feet and moved away from the rock-only to have the "rock" shift, move, and raise its saurian head to look at her.

Kagami didn't lack for courage, but she'd never seen anything like this. It was larger than most known dinosaurs, and sported backward-slanting spikes on its head, similar to the fossilized displays of Styracosaurus she'd seen in museums. But it was the eyes that caught her attention the most.

There were three sets of three arrayed unevenly around its head, giving it a total of nine. She noticed that they all blinked separately; at no time were all the creature's eyes closed, even for a blink.

It was huge, easily the size of a tank, and, if what she'd felt of it before was any guide, even less vulnerable. She backed up a bit farther…

…and the monster smoothly rose from its reclining position and padded towards her on all fours. Its head was nearly as big as she was. "Stay back," she said, in as firm a voice as she could. She cast about for a weapon of some sort, a stick, a rock, anything, even though she didn't think an RPG could so much as make a dent in the thing. "Stay back," she repeated, and suddenly, a memory occurred to her: someone, an American comedian named Will Rogers, she thought, saying, "Diplomacy is the art of saying 'nice doggy' until you can find a rock."

Such was the tension she was under that she behaved very much out of character: she laughed.

The monster's reaction was curious. It stopped in its advance and abruptly lay back down on the ground in front of her, just like a big dog. It tilted its head first one way, then the other, also like a dog.

Why would it do that?

But the creature's hiatus gave her the chance to examine it. It had felt like rock-hot rock, at that-when she was leaning up against it, but its reddish coloration seemed more in line with some kind of hide. It didn't seem to be armored, not armored as such; just incredibly hard. Hard as rock.

The eyes bothered her, for some reason. She counted nine of them; three sets of three, with, as she'd noticed earlier, no time when all were closed at once. They each closed in sequence, with the lids (or whatever served the purpose) seeming to be as thick and tough as manhole covers. With its mouth closed (a condition she frankly hoped would continue), she couldn't see its teeth, but she would've been extraordinarily surprised to see anything other than carnivore fangs within.

No creature on Earth had nine eyes. And the sky was not that of the Earth she knew.

Conclusion: she was no longer on Earth.

….

"So Kagami's in Hell?" said Red Wasp, between bites of a banana she'd filched out of Damien's fridge. She let a satisfied smile creep sideways across her face. "Good. Couldn't happen to a nicer tramp."

Ladybug noticed Cat Noir seemed exceptionally nervous, or something. He couldn't sit still, pacing from one end of Damien's apartment to the other. Whatever for? At Chloe's remark, he whirled towards her. "You-*"

"Quiet, everyone," Ladybug said to the group as a whole. "This is serious, Chloe. From what Damien-*" and she gestured towards him, already on his red phone, "*-tells me, conditions in Hell aren't survivable by unprotected humans. Damien? Any luck?"

The shadonai was talking rapidly on his red phone. "*-yes, Dee, I know. But you know I can't come down there and look for her myself. And if something from Home did grab her, don't you think we need to investigate that? Yes, I know, she's probably…well. You know. But the thing is, I didn't sense any trace of burned flesh or anything else that might indicate she's actually harmed. If not, that means someone or something down there kidnapped her and is holding her for who knows what reason. Although I'm pretty sure it wasn't to spread peace, love, and puppy dogs. Whatever it is, the powers-that-be need to know about it, don't you think? Yes. Yes, of course. So you'll ask around? Uh, maybe not the Black Throne…they can be a little heavy-handed sometimes. Yeah, I know, they don't have any hands. Ha ha. But will you get somebody? Even if she's alive, she may not have long to live. Yes. Yes, of course. Yes, I'll wait. I'll wait for your call. Yes. Yes, Dee, of course. I'll be right here. Right. Okay, then." He hung up the phone and threw himself down into the loveseat. Better immediately joined him, once again laying her head on his shoulder. He absent-mindedly put an arm around her, and she smiled, once again beginning to emit pink Valentine's hearts that drifted upward towards the ceiling, popping about halfway there. Ladybug just shook her head and tsk'd. Young people these days, thought the fifteen-year old superhero.

"What did you learn?"

"My sister, Dee, is gonna look into the matter."

"Look into it?" Cat Noir practically shouted. "Look into it?" What was with him?-Ladybug wondered.

"You don't know my little sister. She's…well, she's absolutely perfect." At their expressions, he continued. "There isn't any field of study that she doesn't know more about than her teachers." In his mind's eye, he saw a short, incredibly cute demon girl substitute teaching an upper-level mathematics class. "She's the best fighter I've ever seen." Mind's eye: the demon girl taking on hordes of hideous monsters without even working up a sweat. "She's being scouted by WorldCorp for upper middle management, right out of school." Mind's eye: WorldCorp, Hell's primary business, offering her a prestigious position that normally took centuries to earn. "She has to beat the boys off with a stick. Yeah, a stick." Mind's eye: the cute demon girl striking about her with a golden trident, with several demon boys running for their lives. Well, a trident IS a stick, sort of. "She…she's just perfect, that's all.

"Believe me, if she says she'll be 'looking into' something, it's as good as done. She'll go the distance."

"Oh," said Cat Noir, sitting down, rubbing his face in his hands. "I…I'm sorry, all of you. I guess I was just thinking of, of that poor girl, literally in Hell. I don't see how it could be worse for her…"

But why, wondered Ladybug, would he get so bent out of shape like that? That was not in character for the ever-optimistic Cat Noir.

Unless…unless…

In the next second, something happened. Later on, she could never say just what, but it was like that time just after one awakens from a deep sleep, a deep dreaming sleep. The dream seems so real, but if you wait even a few moments, the details fade, until finally, if you remember the dream at all (unlikely), all you can come up with are maybe the equivalent of a few still pictures. Then, those fade.

What had they been talking about?

Damien glanced towards the window in time to see a shadow flit past it. So, he is on duty tonight. Well, good.

They might need all the help they could get.

To be continued…