Under Oath | Ladynoir ✓

34 | arachne

BREAKING NEWS BULLETIN: SENTIMONSTER ATTACKS Le Grand Paris!

Chat Noir was in the Agreste mansion when his Cat Phone buzzed with the notification. After the city authorities had packed up their crimes scenes and investigation units, the gates had been locked and the grounds closed to the public. He'd vaulted over the back wall with ease and taken the secret elevator down to the underground cavern.

His purpose was to search for any missed hints about the Peacock Miraculous, but he wasn't optimistic. This lair had been scoured by multiple teams of professionals. The water still lay clean and blue over the exposed piping below, the metal walkways still glinted in the afternoon sunlight filtering through the mosaic window, and the grassy platform still teemed with inexplicable life, summer in the middle of winter.

"Fuck," he muttered to himself, thumb scrolling down his phone screen.

From the news report, Chat Noir gathered that everyone was stunned (except himself, because he'd been suspecting an attack ever since seeing the amok). The city had let its guard down since the last sentimonster attack, and at least back then Hawk Moth and Mayura were household names. Now, there was no-one to pin this on. He and Ladybug were chasing phantoms.

Chat Noir sent the news bulletin into the MM chat and raced to the scene, sprinting and vaulting across rooftops. The closer he got, the more the screams cut through the air. People sprinted from the hotel like ants from fire. There was fresh panic in their eyes, distant yet visible like lighthouse flares.

This attack affirmed his suspicious that the current wielder of the Peacock Miraculous was truly villainous. And one thing further. They wanted a spectacle.

When he cleared the corner to the hotel, he saw an oversize spider crawling up the side of the building. Its black body was bulbous and shiny, legs spindly and light furred. Out of its razor-toothed mouth it spat a clear slime onto the window pane.

The glass started smoking and melting, and before long it had dissolved into a simmering pile on the balcony. The spider squeezed its body inside. When it emerged, it was dragging a round white cocoon of silky webbing. A writhing cocoon, with a person inside.

To the top of Le Grand his eyes drifted, where a nest of similarly-sized human eggs had been deposited on the rooftop. His stomach flipped twice over. The civilian footage on the news bulletin had not done justice to this monster.

From out of one of the broken windows came Ladybug and Vesperia, acrobatically climbing their way up to the sentispider. He joined them on the thin railing of a balcony, and Ladybug unexpectedly threw her arms around him. "Chat Noir, thank God."

He tamped down the heat in his stomach and spun his staff in a theatrical circle. "What's the plan, ladies?"

Vesperia pulled her stinger from her belt. "I immobilize the creature to stop its acid attacks, and that will give us time to find where the amokized object is."

"Okay," Chat Noir said, "We'll draw its attention."

With seamless coordination, he and Ladybug darted into the sentispider's path as Vesperia crept behind. He saw the opalescent compound eyes and the gnashing mandibles and a shiver ran down his spine. When the sentispider spewed up another round of acid, Chat Noir leaped backwards onto another balcony and Ladybug jumped into open air, swinging herself down a level with her yo-yo.

But, surprisingly, once unobstructed the sentispider only blinked lazily and scuttled forward, dissolving another glass window. "Venom!"

Vesperia launched herself forward and pressed her stinger into the body of the arachnid. Her Venom took effect instantly, and the spider halted halfway through the window frame, its weight sagging onto the sill. Chat Noir and Ladybug both made their way back to the arachnid.