Secrets and Betrayals

Chapter 9: Information, Different Tactics

Chapter 9: Information, Different Tactics

The Trapper led Chat back to Hawkmoth's lair. Chat tried to use his animal instincts to keep his sense of direction, but with the Trapper's hand firmly clamped over his eyes he couldn't see. He was also positive the Trapper must have gone in circles a few times as well. Whatever he had done it had clearly worked. Chat was no closer to figuring out where he was than he had been two hours ago.

When The Trapper finally removed the hand that was blocking Chat's vision, he was so incredibly thankful that his emerald green eyes were not met with blackness. He didn't think he could take any more blackness. He didn't think he would ever be able to stand being in the dark again.

Although his heart felt blackened. Ladybug hadn't come. He knew he shouldn't blame her. He was the one who was praying that she wouldn't come. But that was before he realized exactly what he meant to her. He was the distraction, the expendable one, there to make sure that she could do her job. After all that, he really was just a sidekick.

He wondered why it hurt him so much. He had always assumed that he had kinda just been the sidekick. He was always slightly jealous of Ladybug (who wouldn't be?) but mostly he just admired her. The day when she stood up for him in front of the reporters, calling him her partner, her equal, was the best day of his life.

There was no one else that cared for him like that. It didn't even have to be caring on Ladybug's part. He had just always felt beneath everybody. His father, certainly, who made it clear that Adrien's opinions didn't matter at all; Chloe, who was his friend since childhood but had always made it clear that she was better than him; Alya, who was enthusiastic and brave (even to a slightly insane point); Nino, with his talent and good taste in music, who could make friends flawlessly and even had the nerve to ask out the girl he had been crushing on.

Heck, even Marinette, the adorable and clumsy girl who sat behind him in class, made him feel so much beneath her. Not that she tried, of course. She was WAY too nice to even consider that. She was just so nice to everyone, and she stood up for what she believed. She had even stood up to Chloe, something he just couldn't bring himself to do. And her talent in the fashion design industry was simply incredible.

He was a total and complete failure. He wondered where Ladybug was. Maybe she was sitting in school somewhere, if it was daytime. Maybe she was on patrol right now. Or maybe she was cuddling with her boyfriend on a sofa somewhere.

That thought made Chat Noir frown. And the fact that he had frowned at the thought made him internally wince. Why did he still care for her? He knew love wasn't easy to let go of, but he was in an extreme circumstance. He just couldn't bring himself to give up on her. And he hated that. It would be so much easier to give up right about now. To let himself realize that he had never had a chance with her, and that she would never come find him.

Although he had to mentally check himself and remind himself that he wasn't in a situation where he could just walk away from his problems so easily, considering that Chat probably couldn't walk at all right now. He forced his groggy mind to come out of the world of dreams and suffering and back into reality.

Honestly, if there was one place Chat Noir did not want to be right now, it was reality. He glanced around, observing his surroundings. The room looked surprisingly normal. Four greyish walls surrounded him. The floor was made out of linoleum, which he found odd. The only door in or out was the one that they had come in.

He looked up and his piercing green eyes widened in shock. Pacing back and forth right in front of him, dressed in a black and purple suit with a black mask all the way over his head, was Hawkmoth.