"Future Rewoven" Book 3 of "Secrets Unraveled" Trilogy |COMPLETED|

Chpt 29: Looking for Clues.

Max nervously adjusted the glasses on his face and looked around at the hidden part of the park he was currently standing in. "I never knew this even existed here!" he said, still surprised that he could have been in the park so many times and never found this section. His gaze finally rested on Ladybug and Cat Noir. He wondered exactly what they needed him for.

"Yeah, I never noticed it either, Bro, but it has come in handy," said Nino, thinking about all of the times they had met the superheroes there.

Ladybug felt rushed for time and wanted to get right to it. "I've asked you all to meet here as Cat Noir and I need some help and we think the three of you have the best chance of finding the clues we hope are hidden in these objects," said Ladybug as she took the bag Alya handed her and started to carefully place the items on the ground.

"I've already looked through everything and I'm not sure what else I can add except that it looks like this tech is not anything that can be just purchased on the internet and it's possible that the bag is from that new shop on Rue Lagrange. I saw one just like it in the window," said Alya.

"Hmm," said Max, peering at everything more closely. He picked up one of the holographic devices and slowly turned it around, examining it from all sides. It definitely looked familiar. He set it back down and then picked up the tracker gun. "Do you know what this was for?" he asked, turning his eyes to Ladybug.

"Well, we suspect that we know," she said, sharing a look with Cat. They had discussed whether they should admit what it probably was or not. Cat nodded at her to continue to explain. "We think it shot some kind of tracker and that it's possible that I, or maybe both of us, were hit."

"You mean someone used it to track you!" gasped Alya. "Do you think they figured out your secret identity?" While Alya had always desperately wanted to know just who Ladybug really was, she certainly didn't want a villain finding out and going after the teenage girl that they all needed to be their superhero. Somehow going after a superhero when the didn't have their powers seemed really unfair! A tiny hint of an idea was forming in Alya's brain as it processed this information, but she couldn't quite figure out what it was.

"Possibly," said Ladybug, trying to keep the worry out of her voice. "We are trying to be careful, but this makes it even more important to figure out who this villain is- fast! Is there anything that you can tell us, Max?" She was hoping he might see something that indicated that it was Maya.

"I . . . hmm," Max interrupted himself as he looked at the gun again and a thoughtful expression crossed his face. "Did you ever see the tracker that was used as I don't see anything resembling trackers currently loaded in it?" he asked the superheroes.

"No," said Ladybug as she shook her head, "But, it felt like something hit me in the cheek. Do you think it's possible the tracker is still on me despite me not being able to see or feel it?"  She was glad that at least there didn't seem to be any trackers left that could lead the villain to the bag, but she really wanted to know whether she could still be tracked.

"Anything's possible," said Max quietly with a frown. Ladybug couldn't decide whether he was responding to her question or talking to himself. "Can I see the bag?" he asked Nino who currently had it and was zipping and unzipping the bag's pockets to see if any clues were missed.

Nino wordlessly handed it over. Max leaned over the bag and pushed his glasses back onto his nose when they started to slip. He then turned it over and looked inside, nodding slightly.

"Do any of these things mean anything to you?" asked Cat, who always felt impatient during the fact gathering parts of their mysteries. He wanted to take action and all of this careful examining was so slow!

"I think it may, but I have to check a few things first and get back to you. If I go now, I can with some certainty expect to have information by this afternoon. Is that acceptable?" he asked the superheroes.

Cat bit his tongue to keep from saying "Noooo! It needs to be now!"

Ladybug saw the impatience on Cat's face but said "Yes, that would be great! Please let Alya or Nino know if you figure anything out and they'll get in touch with us. Thanks so much for your help!"

Max nodded and stood up. He headed toward the main part of the park, muttering quietly to himself.

The remaining four teenagers were silent for a few moments, trying to decide what to do next when Ladybug suddenly asked Alya "Was there anything useful on the video footage you took of us and the holographic spider?"

Alya thought about it and then said "No, not really." Another thought occurred to her. "I suppose if I hadn't taken all of the stuff, maybe the police could have gotten fingerprints off of it and we might know who it was," said Alya glumly.

"I don't think so," said Nino, putting his arm around her. "I mean, if it is the same villain from the future, they don't even exist here. No way there's a record of the fingerprints!"

"Oh. Right!" said Alya, feeling a little cheered. "So, how do we go about finding this person then? While they haven't really caused too much trouble or put many people in danger- except that first time when the bubbles broke because the villain's suit lost power and people started falling from the sky- the villain just keeps popping up unexpectedly. And, if my comics teach anything it's that villains become more and more violent the more desperate they become. I would expect this villain is getting pretty desperate to return home!"

"I think Max knows something and once we know what he knows we'll be able to make a plan to finally defeat the villain," said Cat.

- - -

Max unlocked the door to the lab and was relieved to find it empty. He turned on the light and headed over to Maya's workspace to open the cabinet doors where she had stored that tech she had been working on. His hands stilled on the cabinet knob. Should I really do this? Could Maya possibly be the future villain?

He debated with himself for a few minutes before deciding that he needed to know. He opened the cabinet and found that it was empty. Which does not necessarily prove anything, he reminded himself. How to prove or disprove she was the villain?

Max closed the cabinet and went to sit at his desk. The first thing he needed to do was let Ladybug and Cat Noir know that he required more time than he had previously told them in order to determine whether he knew anything about what they showed him today. He truly didn't know for certain that the holographic tech and backpack evidence were Maya's, though he thought they were quite similar to what he remembered.

He pulled his phone out of his bag and texted Nino to tell the superheroes that he required more time. He wished that he hadn't promised to have something to report by the afternoon- he hated missing deadlines, even ones he set for himself. But, he needed more data before he came to any conclusions.

So, how to approach the problem? Maybe if he did some research into respected scientists' hypotheses regarding time travel, he could observe some parallels between these hypotheses and what he knew about Maya and the research they were doing. Max pulled his laptop out of his bag and got to work.