Chapter 6: Passion

Tomoe Tsurugi was practicing with her sword when the call came. The ringtone told her that it was Gabriel Agreste. With a coded nod of her head she accepted the call.

"Gabriel, I am busy," she said. "You know that this is an important hour of my training routine."

"Tsurugi-san, I desperately need your help. Nathalie has fallen into a coma!'

"You knew this day might come. I am sorry: she was a good employee."

Tomoe thought about Nathalie's self-sacrificing loyalty, which had saved Gabriel when he was nearly caught on Heroes' Day, but which had now led to her terrible fate.

"I didn't think it would be so soon," said Gabriel.

"These things happen. It won't do for you to forget the dream because of attraction to an employee."

"Of course not! Emile is the only woman for me."

"I meant our dream for the world."

It was Tomoe who had first employed Natalie Sancoeur.

Tomoe was a member of a proud warrior clan, which featured swordswomen inspired by the female samurai of ancient Japan. As the first born daughter in her family, Tomoe was expected to carry on this tradition, and she was raised strictly by the samurai code. Even when an illness in her youth caused her blindness, she was still expected to excel in the art of the sword. Tomoe pushed herself, trained harder than anyone, and learned to use her hearing and her other senses to be a grand champion in spite of her blindness.

To increase the family's wealth and influence, Tomoe entered an arranged marriage with a head of an robotic automotive firm. She hated the corruption and laxity that she found in the corporation, compared to the discipline of martial arts. When her husband died a few years later under mysterious circumstances, Tomoe became the owner and CEO; she ruled the company with an iron fist. One regret: she had not been able to have children in the marriage. (At this point her parents had also died, and her only living relative was her younger sister Natsumi, who had been allowed to pursue a career as an actress, and had traveled abroad to France.)

Tomoe started researching the life of her famous namesake, Tomoe Gozen. Legends had sprung about up about this famous females samurai. In 1182, under the leadership of Yoshinaka, she had led 300 samurai against 2000 warriors of the rival Taira clan and defeated them. However, there were mysteries about the woman, to the point where some doubted she even existed.

Browsing obscure chat-rooms with an audio reader, Tomoe discovered Nathalie, an explorer and researcher who claimed to have found ancient documents about Tomoe Gozen. Supposedly, she possessed powers of wind, water, and lightning from a magic item loaned to her by a temple in Tibet. The temple itself had disappeared in the 1800s, but legends said they held many more such items. Nathalie wanted to investigate further, but she lacked funding for another expedition. Almost everyone dismissed her as a scammer, but Tomoe realized her potential and became her sponsor. Magic like this in the right hands could reform the world.

"Tsurugi-san, I need your help," said Gabriel. "I have captured many of the miraculous, but my first attempt at using them went very badly, " said Gabriel. " I need a new approach. With Nathalie gone... "

"What miraculous do you have now?" interrupted Tomoe.

"I have the Butterfly, the Ladybug, the Goat, the Pig, the Monkey, the Snake, and the Horse."

"You should have more than that. Some are missing."

"I traded the Peacock to the wielder of the Dog Miraculous in order to get the Ladybug Miraculous, which I used to steal all of the Miracle Box contents that were not in use. Then they stole the Rabbit with a time travel scheme."

"Not satisfactory. What about this dog wielder? This seems to be a large loose end."

"I know who he is and I will eventually catch up with him. It's my nephew, Félix. I checked that his home in London; he's not there."

"I will set up a watch for him also."

"Now will you help me with a plan to get the Cat Miraculous so that we can continue our plan?"

"You have the Goat Miraculous?"

"Yes, but that's not very useful since it can't produce magical objects."

"Jūbun ni hattatsu shita kagaku gijutsu wa, mahō to miwake ga tsukanai."

"I don't understand."

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

"Oh."

"Bring the Goat Miraculous to my main research facility and we shall see."

Tomoe was waiting in the large research room when Gabriel arrived.

"An adult user can persist multiple objects at a time. is that correct?" Tomoe asked.

"I may have to take breaks to feed the kwami but yes, I can do that."

"It would save time if you let me be the wielder."

"All right, here you are."

Tomoe put on the horn hair clips and uttered Ziggy's transformation phrase, becoming Tomoe Goat-zen. She pulled a ring out of a drawer.

"The first thing I'm going to create is an Alliance smartphone ring like the one we've been developing here, but far better. It will run a much more advanced AI program which is capable of speech recognition in every known language, and advanced verbal interaction. It will track its wearer's location and learn their interests, weaknesses, and fears. The band will contain a small compartment on one side with a powerful hallucinogenic chemical, and an antidote for it on the other side, that the AI can inject on our command. Most importantly, it must be able to receive the transmission of one or more kwami's powers, without itself being magic, allowing the user to exercise that power as if they were a transformed wielder. Creation!"

With the swipe of her pen the new ring appeared. A robot carried away the ring as a prototype for reverse engineering.

"But how can we transmit the magic?" asked Gabriel. "A kwami can only give power to the wielder of its Miraculous."

"I'm coming to that. I need a second type of advanced ring. But first I need a device that can turn a Miraculous into powder without losing any of its magic and recast it into a ring that still retains all the power of a Miraculous. This new ring must be able to transmit Miraculous magic into any Alliance ring of the type I just created. The wearer must be able to draw the power of the kwami into the ring by saying the name the kwami with phrase 'your power is mine', Creation!

"Next I require a specifications for a machine that can mass produce the rings of the first type. Creation!"

" I will also require a caging station where all the captives Kwame's can be held in cages and fed as required, which will facilitate transmitting their power. Creation!"

"Excellent," said Gabriel. "With these devices our victory is assured!"

"This is going to take time," said Tomoe. "I will turn all these prototypes over to my engineers so that they can be reproduced. I will need to remain in Goat-zen form until the prototypes can be fully copied."

"How long is this going to take?"

"It will take weeks. I will probably need to create several iterations of the prototypes."

"I see."

"One more thing. We'll need an alliance ring with more features , something that will allow all Alliance wearers to be transformed and empowered as if they were all akumatized at once. Then the whole world will hunt down Chat Noir and get his ring."

"Why shouldn't we do that plan right away? "

"First, because it will take time to sell the rings everywhere. Second, because they are going to be worth billions. Enacting the plan would make them worthless because no one would trust them again. You must akumatize a series of people as you have done before, but now they will be able to have extra power through the kwamis and the new rings."

"This plan ensures our victory!" said Gabriel.

"The wise warrior never boasts before the fact," said Tomoe.

"One more thing about Félix." said Gabriel. "The amok rings that control Adrian are a pair. Félix returned one of those rings to me as part of a deal we made. Little did I know that he had impersonated Adrian on the train and stolen the other ring from Nathalie. He could order Adrian to run away."

"That was dishonorable. But you can simply order Adrien not to listen to him before he can do anything."

"I will do that."

"Our dream must succeed. Adrian and Kagami ruling as the icons of the world, bringing this wicked world under control forever."

"Yes," Gabriel said softly.

It was Tomoe's true goal. She had a passion to reform the world and put an end to its corruption, with true discipline like the martial arts.

She had met Gabriel when she traveled to Paris to visit her sister Natsumi, who was making a movie with Emile Agreste. Natsumi had gotten involved with a man and run off. Gabriel befriended Tomoe in her distress and shame. She and Gabriel and Emile had long conversations, and she learned of their desire for a child, their willingness to do anything for that. Tomoe saw the possibility of fulfilling her dream and atoning for her dishonorable sister.

Nathalie had found a prophecy of a world-ruling couple, but they had to be perfect children. And so Tomoe had made a deal with Gabiel and Emilie, a contract. They would find the means by magic to have two perfect children, one a boy and one a girl. The two would be contracted to marry. Tomoe let them hire Nathalie to carry out an expedition to Tibet to find the lost temple and its Miraculous. Only two of the Miraculous had been recovered, but one was the critical one that could create children by magic: the Peacock.

Emile had made the mistake of using the Peacock herself. Tomoe had been more careful and had ordered an employee to carry out the creation of Kagami. Then things had gone wrong: Emile had become sick from the Peacock and Gabriel was obsessed with saving her. Further research into the Miraculous produced a ray of hope. There were rumors that a Miracle Box had been in Paris in the 1940's, and that the Nazis had sought after it when they occupied the city. Gabriel learned, by carefully interrogating Nooroo, that combining the power of the Cat and Ladybug Miraculous would grant a wish. It was a very long shot that making trouble in Paris would stir up Miraculous holders, but it had paid off. All they had to do was beat the heroes.

Tomoe wanted Gabriel to be happy but even more she thought about using the Miraculous after him. Then she would really change the world.