Losing Identities

Chapter 7

WARNING - song has swear words

Adrien's POV

An hour after the girls left, the party's still raging. Nino's still DJing, and Luka's still playing his guitar. However, it's not as fun as it was earlier.

"Hey Nino?" Ivan calls out. "Nino!"

Nino slides off one side of his headphones. "Yeah dude?"

"I'm trying to write, and the music's getting to be a bit much."

"A bit much?" Nino narrows his eyes.

"Yeah."

"Well, you should come dance instead of scribble. That'll fix your problem!"

"Problem?" Ivan snarls. "You're the one who has a problem!"

No! I can't let a fight ruin my party! "Hey everyone, let's play a game!"

Wayhem hurries over to join me, but no one else seems to have heard.

"Come on, anyone else?" I try not to plead.

"Ivan, chill! Nino doesn't have a problem!" Kim is saying from on top of the skating ramp. "He just wants you to enjoy yourself and you're ruining it by being a hard-to-please idiot."

"Right!" Nino agrees furiously.

Ivan leaps to his feet, dropping his notebook. "That's it! I'll pummel both of you!"

"Ivan, stop!" I yell, but he doesn't listen. The three boys chase each other around the room, carelessly knocking over lots of my stuff in the process.

"Your guitar's kind of loud too," Nathanael tells Luka.

"What? Speak up, I can't hear you."

"Exactly," Max says.

"The guitar is loud!" Nathanael repeats.

Luka shrugs. "Yeah, and?"

"I don't like it. It's interfering with my ability to defeat this level." Max gestures to the TV. It's displaying a dismal-looking Level Failed screen.

"And I can't focus on my drawing!"

"No please, don't fight!" I say, stepping between them.

"Yeah, stop it!" Wayhem chimes in.

They look at me for a split second until Kim comes running this way, knocking me onto the floor. Ugh, I can't stand this!

"Maybe you could have dropped your activities for one second to come over and tell me that!" Luka snaps at Max and Nathanael. "Now I'm really getting into my music, and you guys just messed everything up!"

"We messed everything up?" Nathanael gasps. He holds up his sketchbook. "Look at Mona Lisa's face!"

"And look at my game!"

The argument turns into a screaming match. Wayhem and I glance at each other worriedly and cover our ears.

And then I see six purplish-black blurs pass through the door and float toward our friends. No! Stomach flipping, I grab Wayhem and pull him into the hallway.

"Where are we going?" he asks.

"Somewhere. I don't know where, but we need to go. I just saw six akumas."

"Six akumas?" he shrieks.

"Shh! We have to hide!"

He scans the hallway and finds a door slightly ajar. "How about in here?"

I nod.

We lock ourselves in Father's bedroom. Just to be safe, we barricade the door with any furniture we can push. I look around the room and find a cabinet. "Come on."

Wayhem goes into the cabinet first, and I follow, shutting the door.

Loud footsteps echo through the house.

"Adrien, come out, come out, wherever you are!" Max calls out shrilly. But it isn't really Max. It's a villain.

A villain that's after me!

But why?

"Did you hear that? They're..."

I clamp Wayhem's mouth shut with my hand.

"You can't hide forever, Adrien!" another villain shouts in Ivan's voice.

Closing my eyes, I try to calm my racing heartbeat, but it's only speeding up. I can't fight them while I'm hiding in here! And if I did get out, no way could I battle six, not even with Ladybug's help. Ladybug! Does she know about all this?

Somewhere, a vase shatters. I hold back a gasp.

Will I get out of this alive?

Are you scared for Adrien?  Me too.

Song:  Teenagers by My Chemical Romance

I do not own the song or the video.