The Missing Purrincess

Chapter 54: Visitation

If she escaped, then she was okay. And if she is okay, then she has a plan. She always has a plan.

---Nino's POV---

"Ok dude, you good now?"

It had taken me forever to find whatever the heck Wayzz ate, so I just went back to Marinette's place. Apparently she had a stash of some of the Kwami's favorite foods.

Somewhere.

"Unfortunately, I have not had the opportunity to be out of the Miracle Box for very long after Marinette became the guardian."

Wayzz looked at me, slightly embarrassed.

"You don't know where the food is, do you?" I asked with equal frustration to his confusion. "Mari's gonna need us soon!"

Wayzz shrugged, at least I think he shrugged, then started phasing through drawers.

I was slightly tempted to text Marinette and ask, before I remembered that she's just a little bit busy right now.

Still, I didn't like digging through her stuff. Not that I hadn't done it before, but I honestly wanted to be a better friend to the dudette, and that had to start with rebuilding trust.

I cringed at the memory. We had been so caught up in our worry for Marinette that we completely disregarded her feelings and privacy. Who knows what we could have found in there? What we did find.

"Found it!" Wayzz interrupted my thoughts and came out of a draw holding something green and leafy.

Just as Wayzz began to eat, a loud thud made me look behind me.

"Nino! There you are." I turned around to see Ladybug, panting like she had been running. "I got kinda worried when you never came back."

She wrapped me in a big hug before I could react. I slowly brought my arms around her too.

"Is Lila done yet?"

Ladybug pulled back and I had to try hard not to wince. She had a pretty bad scrape on her cheek that I hadn't seen when she came in.

"What happened to you?" I asked, trying to keep it sounding lighthearted. Truth be told I hadn't seen Ladybug visibly injured before. Not that I could remember anyway. And it was worse that she was my friend.

Ladybug brought a gloved hand to her face before brushing it off.

"I fell off a building, not important."

She paused, and realized what Wayzz had in his... Hands? Paws? Whatever they were.

"I swear I didn't look through your stuff! Wayzz and I just-"

Ladybug held a hand up and kinda shrugged. Then she checked her yoyo, I'm guessing having gotten a message. She smiled a bit before looking back up at me.

"We can talk about that later, Nino. I need you to do something for me."

--- Alya's POV---

Sitting in the airport with several little kids surrounding me while waiting out an akuma fight was NOT how I thought my day was gonna go this morning, but here we were.

One little boy was running around me in circles while another, younger girl cried on the floor while watching the broadcast.

Nobody had any idea what had happened after Ladybug had jumped off the roof, but Nadia got a pretty good angle of Monarch tripping herself on the marbles. Not as good an angle as I would have got, but still pretty good.

"Miss, is Ladybug gonna win soon? I'm scared."

"Oh yeah. Ladybug and Cat Noir are awesome. They'll beat this guy in no time."

I clearly sounded more confident than I felt, because the girl seemed happy.

I glanced back at the screen. Still no Ladybug. No Marinette. The fight had seemed pretty rough, at least the part that I saw. If Ladybug had gotten hurt...

No. She had to have escaped. Otherwise Monarch would have found her and it would be on the broadcast. And if she escaped, then she was okay. And if she is okay, then she has a plan. She always has a plan.

The little girl got up and ran to a woman on the other side of the room. She had been looking out the window.

We were far away enough from the destruction that we were safe for the most part, but it was easy to see a lot of smoke through the window.

"Ladybug's stupid." I turned around fast to see a boy about twelve. "She's been fighting Hawkmoth for years and still can't finish a fight fast."

I could see a couple of kids start to cry at his comment.

"Ok, so first of all, every akuma is different. That means that she has to figure out new things for each one." I stood up and walked over to the kid. "She has to find the actual akuma, wherever it is because it's different for different attacks, figure out how the akuma fights, and what to avoid."

"Second, her powers are different than the akumas. Lucky charm can only be cast once and immediately starts a time limit. It is almost always some random and obscure thing, and she immediately has to figure out what it is and how to use it. And she always does."

The kid got up in my face, on his tippy toes to do so. "She's slow."

"She's a tactical genius. Ya know what that means? It means she's smart. It means that she can figure things out fast and put things together than nobody else could even think of." I bent down to the boy's level. "She's never let Paris down."

"She's never beat Hawkmoth!"

"Hawkmoth can't beat two people whose powers never change despite knowing almost everything about how they work. He is a sad old man who thinks it's fun to send other people out to fight his battles, and yet can never outmaneuver either Ladybug or Cat Noir. You think Ladybug is slow? Hawkmoth's strategy has never worked and never will. And he won't change. Hawkmoth is stupid. Not Ladybug. Never Ladybug."

"Aww thanks Alya!" came a familiar voice from behind me.