Cat's Eye (Lukadrien)

Volume 1, Chapter 9

Familiar purple bubbling erupted around Desolater, melting away her akumatised form to reveal a kneeling Kagami underneath, sobbing uncontrollably.

Odd. Usually, people were confused after an akuma, but not distraught. Chat had never in his time fighting Hawkmoth seen a victim like that. Surely... this wasn't his fault, right? Desolater had said something about there being a girl, maybe she was still upset about that? His gut sank. She... wasn't this upset about Adrien, right?

"Hey, Kagami," Chat knelt in front of her tenderly, "Everything okay?"

As she looked up, the whites of her eyes were entirely blue. Her face was contorted in agony, and tears tracked their way down her face like waterfalls. She clutched her forehead, rocking gently on her knees, "So dark... so dark... still...he's still in my head." She grabbed Chat's wrist suddenly, voice strained and pleading. Viperion flared his eyebrows at Chat "He won't get out. Please... please get him out."

"Viperion, what's going on?"

"I-" for the first time since the fight began, Viperion stance was uneasy. His tone was lacking the suave relaxed demeanour from before as his distress painted his face. "I don't know. I-I've not got this far before."

"Hey, Ladybug, let's get onto the Miraculous Repair thing quickly" Chat hesitated, gently removing his arm from Kagami's hold. "Something... something's really wrong with Kagami."

Ladybug nodded, outstretching her hand to link up with Chat's own. She closed her eyes, a faint pinkish glow emanating around her.

Chat closed his own, tapping into the green hum of his own power and focusing on it, letting it mingle with Ladybug's in their palms.

"Connect: Miraculous Repair"

The two opened their eyes glowing, the thrums of pink and green energy spiralling out from them and up into the sky, the powers of creation and destruction working in tandem. Tiny ladybugs and little green cats strode through the air, disassembling and reassembling the damage through the streets. The cats broke down the rubble from Desolater's cataclysm, followed shortly after by the ladybugs constructing new tarmac in its place. It worked as usual, the powers of creation and destruction balanced being able to restore the status quo.

Except... even as the tiny cats and ladybugs returned to their respective miraculous after running over Kagami, she remained sobbing, though the whites of her eyes no longer seemed to be completely blue.

Ladybug's timer beeped softly, only a mere two dots left "I've not got long. Viperion, come with me." She made pleading eyes, "Chat, I trust you can handle this?"

Chat nodded, "I'll send you an update later."

"Right – sorry to leave you in it, but we really have to dip. Bug out!"

Chat turned his attention to the hunched figure before him.

"Hey Kagami, talk to me sweetie." He knelt again, hands up placatingly, "You're safe, I'm not going to hurt you. The akuma is gone. The city is repaired. Everything's back to normal, okay?"

"Nono," she whispered, "It's not back to normal. He is different."

"What do you mean, 'he'? Is he still in your head?"

"No- he left after you did the miraculous repair-repair thingy."

"Okay... that's good then, right?" gingerly, he placed a hand on her back, rubbing a soothing rhythm, "So what's wrong?"

"He... you call-called him Hawk-Hawkmoth when I was akumatised-" her speech was faltering and stammered, and Chat tried to disguise the furrow in his brow. The akumatised never remembered what they did whilst they were akumatised, much less the details of what they experienced.