You're The Music That's Been Playing In My Head: Book 2

Robustus: Part 2

"Yes, Ms. Mendeleiev, come on, Markov, go back in the bag," Max gestures toward the bag, but Markov flies into Ms. Mendeleiev's face.

"You're not being reasonable, Ms. Mendeleiev." 

"Stop it, Markov." 

"Why? It's true, isn't it?" 

This causes the class to laugh, embarrassing Ms. Mendeleiev, who gives Mr. Damocles a look to do something. He grabs Markov. 

"That's enough. Max, you can come and get your robot back at the end of the day." 

"But Mr. Damocles, I'm begging you not to do that!"

"Do you want three hours of detention, too?"

"No, sir..." 

"Max! Aren't you coming with me? Max!" Markov calls for his friend as Mr. Damocles leaves the classroom. 

We all head back to our seats except for Max, who approaches Marinette and me. 

"Markov has never been without me by his side. I don't know how he's going to emotionally handle this." 

"We'll see what we can do," I reassure him before raising my hand. "Ms. Mendeleiev, as class representative and deputy, can Marinette and I have your permission to see Mr. Damocles?" 

"No. You can go see him between periods," She turns back to her laptop to set up the lecture. 

"We don't mean to be rude, but we think you're mistaken about Markov. Max's friend," Marinette states with a smirk. 

"This whole thing is really starting to get on my nerves. Both of your behaviors are quite inappropriate."

I cross my arms and say in a matter-of-fact tone, "Markov wasn't wrong." 

"I'm sending you both to the principal's office right this minute!"

Mari and I give her a victory smile as we thank her and head to Mr. Damocles's office. When we reach his office, we find him talking to the school janitor. 

"Mr. Damocles, where is Markov?" I ask, catching his attention. 

"Hm? Who's Markov?" 

"Max's friend." 

"Not that toy again..." 

"He's not a toy, Mr. Damocles. Could you please let Max hold onto him? He won't cause any trouble, we'll make sure of it," Mari offers.

Before Mr. Damocles could answer, his door burst open to reveal Markov, but he was no longer blue and white but red and black. 

"You've made a serious error in judgment, Mr. Principal!" 

Marinette grabs my hand, and we run away, shock written on our faces. This proves Markov had emotion; regular machines couldn't be akumatized. We watch as Markov starts summoning all sorts of machines to build himself a giant robot, and everyone runs out onto the court to see what is going on. 

"Now I see why Max was worried," Tikki comments before we transform. 

When we came out, we saw Markov had captured Max and left Ms. Mendeleiev hanging by her coat on a roof beam. Her coat is starting to rip. Ladybug uses her yoyo to catch Ms. Mendeleiev before she could fall to her demise. 

"From now on, I am Robustus and Max, and I will be together 100% of the time forever!" Robustus claims, and LB speaks up. 

"If you truly love your friend, then you should listen to him, Robustus!" 

"Yeah, like we do," Chat chimes in as he lands next to us.

"You really think the three of you can stop me from doing what I want? I will show the world I'm probably more human than the three of you combined." 

"Well, duh, that's our job," I droll out, crossing my arms. 

"Do you really think Max is happy about his best friend becoming a supervillain?" LB points out, and Chat Noir charges at the robot, which uses its claw to capture him. 

"Such an impulsive cat," I sigh out as Ladybug, and I charge at him to free our partner, causing the three of us to be thrown into the city. 

We let out a chorus of groans as we watch Robustus hop around the city to his destination. 

"He seems to know where he's going." 

"We'd better play it safe. This robot's brain computes faster than ours combined." 

"Speak for yourself," Ladybug and I say in unison as we chase after Robustus. 

We only stop when we see a few Parisians being attacked by machines and swoop down to help. Chat Noir takes care of any flying devices while LB and I use our weapons to break apart the fridges. The two cars made a run for it but slammed into each other. That's when we see Mr. Ramier running down the street being chased by some vending machines. We get the civilians to the roof of The Grand Paris when Chat gets our attention. 

"M'lady, (s/n), look at this." 

We looked at the screen on his staff as the latest news report was on.

"Nadja Chamack here. Normally, inanimate objects have come to life, taking control of Paris. Broadcasting live from City Hall, where the new mayor has just made a declaration." 

The screen shows the mayor's office, André tied up as his desk lamp was wearing the mayor's sash, and started speaking in Morse Code. 

"What's it saying?" LB asks confused, and I shrug, Chat soon smirking. 

"Do you need subtitles? I speak several languages. Humans...Will...Soon be...Treated the same way as objects!" 

"Paris's only hope in this dire situation is Ladybug, (s/n), and Chat No- Hey!" Nadja makes a run for it as other cameras start chasing her, and the broadcast ends.

Last Edit - July 20th, 2022

Revised - December 2nd