Chapter Text
Ladybug bit back a frustrated groan when they rounded the last corner on their patrol route. Chat Noir followed her line of vision, his own frustration rising in his chest when he spotted the figure waiting on the rooftop.
“Maybe she hasn’t seen us yet,” he whispered. Nightlock was their ally, their liaison with the United Heroez, but they’d been seeing a little too much of her lately. It seemed like every other day she’d show up for a meeting or to ask for information.
“She’s got eyes in the back of her head,” Ladybug muttered back, as the cowled hero turned in their direction. “She’s worse than my mom.”
Chat Noir snickered at that, following Ladybug as she called out a greeting to the hero.
“I won’t keep you,” Nightlock said, once they’d both landed in front of her. “We both have our own duties to attend to. I needed to warn you that I won’t be around for the next couple of days. I’ll be out of the country on business.”
“What kind of business?” Chat Noir asked. He extended his baton enough to lean an elbow on it, fixing Nightlock with an innocent stare.
The hero turned to face him. Her face was completely hidden behind a pair of multi-lens goggles and a mask that covered her mouth and nose, but a lock of blonde hair had escaped the cowl to flutter in the wind. “Nothing you need to worry about.”
He hated secrets.
“Was that all you needed?” Ladybug cut in pleasantly.
“No. I have something much more important to discuss with you.” From one of her many pouches, she produced a small box that was about the size of her palm. “Our people have been researching Kid Thunder’s gear, which was the source of his lightning abilities.”
Kid Thunder. That had been in the early days of their association with the United Heroez, when Nightlock still tried to join them at the scene of every battle. She’d gotten better at just coming by to take the villain away, leaving the fighting to the Miraculous holders.
“And you found something you thought we’d be interested in?” Ladybug accepted the small box and slowly lifted the lid.
A bracelet was sitting on a square of cotton inside. It was a plain, silver metal cuff, with a knotwork design running along the surface. A deep gouge cut through the middle of the bracelet and halfway around.
Chat Noir leaned over Ladybug’s arm to get a closer look. “Is that…?”
Ladybug’s head snapped up to stare at Nightlock. “Is this what I think it is?”
“We don’t know,” Nightlock replied. Frustration bled into her voice, and she shifted her weight agitatedly. “We don’t know enough about the Miraculous to identify them without someone to awaken them. You are our only real contact for these things.”
“What about Eagle?” Formerly Fledgling, Nightowl’s daughter. She bore the Miraculous of the eagle, which they’d discovered on their trip to New York.
“She tried but couldn’t do anything. I thought you might have more information.”
Ladybug stared at the bracelet thoughtfully, running a finger over the gouge. “I can try. I’ll see what I can do and let you know.” She closed the box and tucked it into her belt. Nightlock started forward as though to protest, but let her hands drop and nodded.
“I’ll be waiting for your results,” Nightlock said. “I should be back in no more than eight days. Stay safe until then, Ladybug. Chat Noir.”
“You, too,” Ladybug called as Nightlock sketched a bow and turned to leap over the edge of the roof. Her van would be waiting below, and though Chat Noir had been tempted to follow her a few times he’d held back. Their ally hadn’t tried to figure out their identities yet, so they owed her the same courtesy.
“So, what did you want to check, Ladybug?” he asked as they turned for home.
“I want to ask Nooroo and Duusu, since they spent so much time with…um….”
“Hawkmoth.”
“Yeah.”
He caught the edge of a building, propelling himself up and forward to match her swing as she wrapped her yo-yo around the chimney of the next building. “You can say his name, you know.”
Ladybug sighed. “Anyway. Duusu’s Miraculous was broken once, right? So they might know more about it.”
“And you didn’t want to bring them out in front of our hero friend because…”
She snorted. “Do you really think she’s told us everything?”
“Right. Keeping secrets from allies. That always goes well.” Not that he had any room to judge her on that.
“Anyway,” Ladybug said through clenched teeth as they dropped into an alley a block from the bakery. “We might find something in the book, too.”
The actual book—the ancient tome his father had kept under lock and key—was probably locked up somewhere waiting for the court case to be sorted out. He’d only been allowed to retrieve personal items from the house, under his father’s lawyers’ supervision, so there’d been no chance to retrieve the Miraculous Book. But they still had the digital copy Master Fu had made, so the information was still available at least.
“Is your aunt coming over for dinner tonight?” Marinette asked, dropping her transformation while they were out of sight.
“She left this afternoon to take Félix back to London,” he replied as Plagg zoomed out of his ring to nestle in the hood of Adrien’s jacket. “I think she’s spending some time back home, she doesn’t need to be here right now.”
Not right now. Not after Félix disguised himself as Adrien to meet with his father, without permission. Now that Gabriel had had his last meeting (he thought) with his son, he’d signed the paperwork releasing his parental rights, and Adrien’s custody was being transferred to his aunt. Aunt Amelie wouldn’t need to spend so much time in Paris negotiating with the Agreste lawyers. She could get back to her regular life.
“She cares about you,” Marinette said gently. “I’m sure she’ll be back again soon.”
He shrugged, following Marinette up the stairs to her room. The kwamis came out to meet them when they returned, and Adrien took a seat in a bright blue beanbag chair while a few of the little creatures fussed around him. Marinette opened the Miraculous Book’s file on her computer and called Nooroo and Duusu to join her.
“We found this,” she stated, placing the box on the desk and lifting the lid to reveal the bracelet. “Could it be a Miraculous?”
Wayzz joined them, hovering over the bracelet with round eyes. “Master did say there were other jewels out there,” he said slowly. “More than what he’d saved in the Miracle Box.”
“I think I remember that,” Marinette said. She rested an elbow on her desk and stared down at the bracelet. “Master Fu made a sentimonster that destroyed the temple and some of the Miraculous, right? Maybe they were restored when we defeated it.”
Adrien tried not to flinch when she mentioned sentimonsters, his hand briefly straying to his chest where the pendant with his parents’ rings hung under his clothing. He still couldn’t believe everything his cousin had said…but it made a terrible kind of sense.
If they really were senti…sentibeings, then so much of his life with his father made sense now.
“I guess we could try to use it,” he offered.
“No!” Nooroo fluttered up close to him, waving his arms desperately. “You can’t! A broken Miraculous will inflict the same injuries on its wielder!”
His stomach dropped. Nathalie had started to get sick when Mayura appeared…when she used the peacock Miraculous.
His mother had had the same symptoms, suffered the same illness.
“If Hawkmoth found a way to repair the peacock brooch, we can find a way to fix this one,” Marinette said. She gently picked up the bracelet to examine it, holding it at eye level in the palm of her hand. “I just wish we could—”
Her voice broke off as the bracelet jolted. She yelped as a spark shot off, dropping the bracelet back onto the desk and backing away. “Tikki?”
The ladybug kwami was already zooming to her side as the bracelet clattered across the desk. Electricity was arcing off of it, muted now by the flash of red magic as Marinette transformed.
She grabbed the bracelet, holding it between her palms, staring wildly around the room. “Adrien, the box!”
He clambered out of the beanbag to run for her sewing box. The magic of the Miracle Box might be enough to stabilize the bracelet until they could figure something out, but it was already too late. Ladybug yelped and dropped the bracelet as something exploded out of it.
It was an unfamiliar kwami. Bright yellow with a ruffle of fur along its back and a small, pointed nose. Dark eyes darted wildly around the room as it flew in an unsteady circle, energy crackling off it in waves.
“It’s okay!” Ladybug called. She grabbed for the bracelet, but the unfamiliar kwami caught it first. It zoomed just out of reach, its gaze shifting between Ladybug, Adrien, and the other kwamis. “I’m Ladybug,” she continued, hand over her heart. “Who are you?”
The kwami stared at her. Electricity crackled over its back—and those were spikes, not fur. “You’re not the master,” it declared in a squeaky voice.
“Kwamis don’t have masters,” Wayzz said, floating next to Ladybug.
The strange kwami shivered, its head jerking to one side. “I must find the master!” it declared.
“We can help you,” Ladybug said. “Your bracelet is broken. Let me fix it for you.”
It didn’t seem to hear her, flying up to the ceiling. “The m-master!”
“Ladybug, the window!” Adrien lunged toward the wall, leaping off Marinette’s chaise to try to close the window, but the strange kwami had already seen its opening.
“No!” Ladybug darted after it. A yellow bolt of energy struck between them, making Adrien’s hair stand on end as Ladybug yelped. “Don’t go!”
It was too late. The yellow kwami, holding its miraculous, had flown out the window into the darkening streets.
“We have to catch it. Plagg?” Adrien jumped to his feet.
“You’re right,” Ladybug nodded as a flash of green magic revealed Chat Noir in Adrien’s place. “We don’t know what it’s capable of—we’d better hurry.”