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Chat Noir leapt at Monarch, grappling their hands together on the evening Parisian rooftop. Step one of the plan was executed.
Monarch grunted, slowly pushing Chat Noir back.
“You pathetic child. I have five miraculous active! What possible plan could you have?” he sneered.
“A simple one,” Chat Noir smirked. “M’lady! Now!”
A yo-yo wrapped around Monarch’s waist, pulling him backward, while Chat Noir held onto his hand.
Chat Noir felt Monarch’s rings in his fingers. Microsecond by microsecond, he was taking back a handful of the miraculous.
And then Chat Noir’s transformation fell, and with it, his strength.
Adrien was then grabbed by Monarch, and easily thrown into the nearby chimney. His ring now in the hands of Monarch.
He stared up at Monarch, only to see a man as shocked as he was.
“A-Adrien?” he muttered.
“Lucky Charm!” came Ladybug's frantic voice from the distance.
Monarch took one more look at Adrien. “Voyage!” he cried, leaving Adrien alone with a ring that was not his own.
---
Ladybug leant against the chimney, Chat Noir, or the boy under the mask, on the other side.
“And you’re sure he saw you?” Ladybug fretted.
Ladybug groaned. Monarch had the power of the Black Cat, and Chat Noir had been identified. She was going to have to save the city on her own, with akuma’s having the power of destruction.
“Yes, he even said my civilian name,” he muttered. “I’m surprised you didn’t see me?”
“I was too far away,” Ladybug confessed. “I saw blonde hair and a white t-shirt, but we already knew 50% of that to begin with.”
She had seen a bit more than that, but she wasn’t lying. There were too many people in Paris for it to be that clear-cut. Add Monarch blocking her view, and fifty metres of distance, and even enhanced eyesight couldn’t help her.
He sighed, “I’m sorry. You were right, this was too risky, we should’ve tried-”
“Don’t apologise. It was…a good idea, in theory. We were running out of options. How long before we got a world-ending akuma? We couldn’t just keep being passive,” Ladybug sighed, sitting down.
She felt a hand grab hers, and she smiled.
“What do we do now, chaton?” she whispered.
“Well…I did manage to get one of his rings?” he offered.
“What?!” she straightened up. “Which one?! Please tell me it’s the rooster or snake or—”
“It’s the pig,” he said flatly.
“That’s still…better than nothing! Now you can be Pink Noir or something and—”
“He knows my identity, Ladybug. He knows where I live, where I go to school, where I could be at all hours of the day!” he stressed. “I should be booking a flight to Shanghai right now, and staying there til this blows over, not trying to still figure out ways to help you!”
He sighed, before quietly adding “Even if I really want to.”
“But—”
“And besides, it’s still in its ring configuration. I already tried putting it on, but nothing happened.”
She felt the ring get pushed into her hand, and she inspected it closer. A purplish-black ring with a pink pig emblem on top. She got anxious just looking at it.
“It feels…odd. Almost like an unwelcoming aura,” Ladybug quizzed, peering at it.
“Like it’s null. Which makes sense,” he said.
Ladybug grabbed her yo-yo and flipped it open.
“Maybe if I…”
She dipped the ring into the white light of creation and pulled it out.
The ring suddenly burst to life, pink and white energy swirling around, lifting it into the sky.
“I’m peeking, don’t look behind you,” said a voice from behind Ladybug.
Ladybug nodded, unable to speak, staring at the show before her.
The ring shone brightly, before sparking and crackling, throwing off chaotic, untamed energy. Ladybug felt overcome by a sensation of excitement, she was smiling so much her face hurt, her brain overflowing with a beautiful feeling of adventure and love.
Jubilation.
And as quickly as it started, a simple anklet fell into her hands, with Daizzi floating before her, disoriented.
“Daizzi!” Ladybug cried, pulling him into a hug.
“Ladybug!” he exclaimed, nuzzling into her shoulder.
“He was so horrible, he fed us these awful pellets, and kept us locked up, and drained us so much and—”
“It’s okay, you’re okay now. And we’re never letting you go, okay! Never,” Ladybug said, tears streaming down her face.
Ladybug took in the moment, the pure elation of having finally saved a kwamii from Monarch.
“Ladybug, I have a plan,” came the voice from behind her.
“Sure, go ahead,” she said, still not letting go of Daizzi.
“Daizzi, can you tell us who Monarch is?” he questioned.
“But I wouldn’t be able to reveal my holders—”
“But he was never your holder, was he? Ladybug never renounced you, so you can’t have had a new holder!” he countered.
“Wait, that’s true!” exclaimed Ladybug, finally getting let go.
“But…are you sure you want to know?” Daizzi said, looking behind Ladybug, at the boy behind the chimney.
---
“Okay, we need to be quick about this,” Ladybug said, peering into the Agreste mansion from a nearby rooftop with her bug-phone.
A boy with strawberry blond hair leant a hand on her shoulder. “Are you sure you want me here?”
Ladybug looked him in his eyes. His sclerae had lost their green hue, returning to a human white. His iris’ though, remained green, the same brilliant green she had known the past year. Yet another thing to know about the boy behind the mask.
“I’m sure, Pygmalion—cute name by the way,” Ladybug said, brushing the silver-white bow on his neckline.
Pygmalion nodded, cherishing the moment, despite its ill-timed occurrence.
“He’s on the move!” ladybug says, snapping back to her bug-phone.
Pygmalion leans over, looking through the screen. He’s walking around his studio, before turning his back on the window to look at Emilie’s portrait. Nathalie had appeared to heed his text message; he couldn’t see her in the building.
“Now or never.”
---
Gabriel stood with his back to the window, his security camera’s trained on the two heroes in the street.
He sneered but grasped the miraculous rings in his hands. Action, Illusion, Sublimation, Derision, and Destruction via the Black Cat ring.
It was time to take these kids to task, even if it included…Adrien. His son might think he made his decision, but it was time for him to reconsider.
The crashing of glass behind him signalled it was time to begin.
“Nooroo, Plagg, unify!” he yelled, the reluctant kwami’s transforming him.
Monarch Noir whipped around, bringing his baton against the young heroine. He threw a glance at the pink hero, his son.
“I won’t let you hurt anyone anymore! Not Daizzi, not Plagg, not Adrien, not Paris, not anyone!” Ladybug yelled, swiping his feet and throwing him back into the painting of Emilie.
He groaned, getting to his feet. The cataclysm injury had sapped him of so much strength. Too much strength. Against the two of them, well, he needed more allies.
“Lucky Charm!” she cried, two rings falling into her hands. “...what?” she said weakly.
Monarch Noir stared at the rings. Those were his rings. One of which he was wearing right now. Why would that be the lucky charm?
“Sublimation!” Monarch Noir whispered, turning invisible.
“Fa—Monarch, I—I want you to know, this won’t end well. There’s still time. There’s always still time,” Pygmalion says, stoic.
“Oh, son, trust me, I know,” Monarch Noir retorts, twisting the cat ring out of habit.
“Son?” Ladybug questions.
Pygmalion gives Ladybug a soft look, distracting both from the fight.
“Cataclysm!” Monarch Noir cries, jumping towards Pygmalion. Pygmalion freaks, raising his tambourine in defence. Monarch Noir grabs the tambourine, watching it dissolve to ash in his hands.
“No!” Ladybug cried, she ran towards Monarch, fist raised.
“Venom!” he cries, bringing the spinning top against her neck.
Ladybug stands frozen in the moonlight and wrecked atelier.
Pygmalion raises his shaking hands, “Father, you have to—”
“No.”
Monarch stares down Pygmalion, seeing the sorrow etched onto his child’s face.
“I don’t have to do anything. Understand?” he says, holding out his hand.
“I—”
---
“It’s sad…isn’t it?”
Ladybug stares at Pygmalion, before returning her gaze to Gabriel’s gift. The perfect dream, a present from his son, where he gets everything he wanted.
“In what way?” she says, holding him close.
“Even in a perfect fantasy, he’s still…like that,” he says, gesturing to the gift. He sighs and looks down at the Butterfly Miraculous in his hand. “I guess Gift can only work with the current circumstances but…his perfect dream is still based on control. It’s still based on domination over others,” Pygmalion laments.
He stares at the painting of Emilie, “I don’t think I’ll ever understand the man behind that mask.”