"Why am I not surprised," Ladybug stated with a bored look on her face as she watched the scene below her from atop the school roof.

The villain today called himself Dreamtime, and apparently she wasn't the only one who had a sleepless first night with their baby from Hell. This villain, who was akumatized due to his frustration from lack of sleep, had the powers to put people to sleep by shooting them with a beam from his right hand.

But that wasn't Ladybug's favourite part, no, what she loved the most about this villain was that whenever a student's doll would start crying his face would contort with rage and he would shoot a beam from his left hand, one which would vaporize the doll into nothing but tiny particles.

Ladybug really wished she could have had Emma with her, how nice it would have been to hear her baby's cries being cut short after being hit by his attack.

Normally Ladybug wasn't one to have such sadistic thoughts, but her lack of sleep was really starting to get to her and affect her thinking.

"Man, this guy is a nightmare."

Even with the powers of her miraculous, Ladybug's senses were still dulled from her sleep deprivation, enough to the point of not noticing Chat was with her until he finally spoke.

The two turned to look at each other and Chat was taken aback. His Lady's eyes were red and bloodshot, her hair was a mess and looked as though she had just thrown it into two sloppy pigtails without bothering to brush it. Although her face was covered by her red mask, he didn't need to see it to know of the panda-like dark circles that surrounded her eyes.

Ladybug noticed the face he was making.

"I had a rough night with my baby," she commented, "Emma refused to let me have a wink of sleep."

Chat nodded his head in the direction of the akuma.

"Just like Dreamtime I take it. Careful, you don't want to get akumatized yourself," he added jokingly.

Ladybug sighed and rested her head in her hand. "Why do I get the feeling that we're going to be seeing a lot more similar villains for the next week."

They were interrupted by a giggle and Chat reached behind him and pulled a doll from off his back. Ladybug hadn't been paying close attention to him before, but now she was able to see that he wore a baby carrier just like hers strapped to himself, and then her eyes locked onto the doll that he held. Blonde hair and blue eyes, just like Emma.

"Ladybug, meet Emma." He stated proudly. "I was hoping you would bring your Emma, maybe our daughters could be friends, or better yet, step sisters."

Ladybug ignored his last comment and the signature Chat grin that he was giving her, and instead focused on the doll.

"You weren't kidding," she commented, reaching for Emma, "she really is the same doll."

The second her hand touched the baby, Emma erupted into cries which caused Ladybug to flinch and Chat to wrap his arms protectively around his daughter.

"What did you do!" He snapped, taking a few paces back away from Ladybug with caution. It was the first time she had ever seen him recoil from her rather than try to embrace her.

"What...I didn't...nothing! I didn't do anything!" She shouted.

As soon as the distance between Ladybug and the baby was widened, Emma stopped crying. Chat quickly inspected her to see if anything was wrong.

"Emma is a very well behaved baby," he stated, eyes still searching the doll, "she wouldn't just cry without a reason."

Ladybug's stare hardened and she directed her attention towards the doll. When she opened her mouth her voice came out like a growl. "You...you...you demon! You're just like my Emma, you're doing this on purpose aren't you! There's no way you're a doll!"

"My Lady!" Chat stated in an accusing tone. "That's not how you're supposed to talk to a baby, she'll think you don't like her."

"But I don't like her," she argued, "and I've only known her for a couple of seconds!"

Their conversation was interrupted by the sound of screams as more students below them were put into a deep slumber.

"We'll talk about parenting styles later, for now we need to take care of this villain," Chat said while heading out towards the akuma victim.

Ladybug grumbled something about all Emmas being the same before bounding after him.

Dreamtime's outfit was a dark navy blue and was scattered with tiny white dots which were probably supposed to represent stars. He had what looked like grey clouds covering his shoulders, waist, wrists and head.

It wasn't too hard to find the item where the akuma hid. Strapped to the villain's back was one of their school's robot dolls which had been turned a deep purple colour.

The two heroes started their attack by drawing Dreamtime's attention away from the students and towards them. They led him away from the school and onto the top of a couple of buildings nearby.

"Let's make a deal," Chat stated once the three of them were up on top of the building, "you stop putting people to sleep and we'll turn you back to normal."

Dreamtime replied by shooting a sleeping beam in his direction. Chat jumped to the side to avoid it.

"No? Don't worry, you don't have to make your decision right now, how about you sleep on it."

Chat's puns weren't doing anything but make both Ladybug and Dreamtime annoyed. Emma on the other hand started giggling as if his pun was the funniest thing she had ever heard.

Dreamtime shot sleeping beams at them, to which the heroes had to act quickly to dodge.

While Chat was easily jumping out of the way, Ladybug was slowed down from her lack of sleep. Even though her miraculous gave her heightened strength and agility, it couldn't do anything to help her sleep deprived brain focus on everything that was going on.

Dreamtime, having caught on to Ladybug's more sluggish state, began directing his attacks at her. She had to mentally command herself what to do for each attack as it came her way.

Up, duck, right, left, left, duck, up.

She could see Chat behind Dreamtime, unnoticed by the villain, quietly making his way towards the doll on his back. Perhaps it was the knowledge of the battle being almost over paired with her tiredness because once she saw him her movements became slower, less focused and more clumsy.

She went to dodge another beam, but instead she tripped over the flat surface below her like Marinette would have done, and went crashing into the ground. Before she had time to react, or even realize what was going on, she was struck with one of Dreamtime's beams.

She should have been worried, but instead Ladybug felt herself being filled with a pleasant feeling of relief as her eyes closed and her body gladly accepted the chance sleep.

"Ladybug? My Lady?"

Chat had abandoned his chance to grab the doll and instead made his way over to his partner. He gripped her by the shoulders and began to shake her.

"Now's really not the time to be sleeping beauty."

His shaking became more violent, but she remained fast asleep.

"I would gladly like to play the role of prince and wake you with a kiss, but I don't think you would be too happy about that."

Dreamtime began to approach them. Chat knew that Hawk Moth was probably telling his victim to get Ladybug's earrings while she was defenseless. Chat gently placed her on the ground and stood in front of his partner in a defensive position, holding his pole up in front of him.

He had to distract Dreamtime and get him away from his Lady quickly.

Chat charged forward while holding his pole like a sword, jumping as a beam came his way, and brought his arms down, the pole colliding with Dreamtime's head.

The villain roared in anger and shot more beams at Chat. From the close distance he had to dodge more quickly to avoid getting hit.

Now that he had Dreamtime's full attention, he turned and started to make his way onto a much higher building. Chat glanced back down behind him to find that the villain had begun to follow him, but stopped and was now heading back towards Ladybug. Hawk Moth had probably yelled at him to focus on getting the earrings first and to worry about Chat later.

Chat began to panic. There was no way he would be able to reach Dreamtime before he got to Ladybug. What was he supposed to do! Had he really just failed his Lady? After all the times she had saved him, could he not save her, just once?

Suddenly Emma let out a couple of cries. Dreamtime froze, then slowly began to turn back in their direction. His face held a look of annoyance and rage. Completely forgetting about Ladybug, the villain began charging towards Chat. He held up his left hand and started shooting the baby vaporizing beams in their direction.

"Good thinking Emma!" Chat praised his daughter, to which she replied with giggles as they made their way up the taller building with Dreamtime following closely behind.

Once they were both on top of the roof Chat launched a series of attacks at Dreamtime with his pole, but had to take a couple of leaps back when Dreamtime shot out with his beams.

This wasn't working. Fighting this villain from close range was dangerous and made it hard to avoid getting hit by his attacks. Chat needed a plan. Usually he would distract the enemy while Ladybug came up with a solution, but right now it was all up to him.

As he continued to dodge the beams from a distance, he scanned his surroundings. Chat's eyes landed on a large billboard attached to the building. Calling upon his cataclysm, he coaxed Dreamtime closer to the billboard, and once the villain was in range he dragged his claws across the beams holding the board up. The beams rusted the second he touched them, however, being the hero filled with bad luck, instead of falling backwards and onto Dreamtime, the billboard fell forwards off the side of the building and onto the street below.

Chat scratched the back of his head and gave a nervous laugh as dreamtime aimed a beam in his direction. He leapt backwards to avoid the attack, but realized that he had already been at the edge of the roof and was now in the air with the road far below him. He extended his pole between the building and another one close by and stood on it as though it was a balance beam.

"How a-mewsing," he taunted, "you think you can hit me."

Hs comment only angered Dreamtime further as he relentlessly began to shoot both sleeping and vaporizing beams at the smirking hero.

Chat, being ever the show off, gave both a fancy and unnecessary dodging act. He stood balanced atop his pole dodging the beams with a series of flips and acrobatics, leaping to the left and right and ending it by flipping upside down and holding himself there in a handstand while flashing Dreamtime a cheshire cat grin, something which only enraged the villain further.

Chat was about to make a pun, but was stopped just as he opened his mouth when a series of screams erupted from the crowd of people who had stopped to watch the battle below. Thinking that the people were being attacked, his eyes flashed to Dreamtime who still stood across from him, paying no attention to the civilians.

Confused, Chat looked back down to them. They were screaming and pointing at him, or rather, they were pointing just below him. Chat followed their gazes downwards, eyes widening in horror. There was Emma, his one and only "daughter," plummeting to her death.

The baby carriers that the school provided didn't have anything that went around the baby's shoulders, instead they were designed for the baby to be easily slipped inside without needing to strap them down or buckle them in. Not the best design for acrobatics and crime fighting.

Chat's breath hitched in his throat and he felt his heart clench at the sounds that Emma was making. The poor thing wasn't even unaware of the danger she was in as she let out a chorus of squeals and giggles that echoed out around her. Only his daughter would find the position she was in to be fun.

"Don't worry Emma," he called down to her, "daddy's coming!"

He immediately leapt into action, launching himself off of his pole towards her. Being much heavier than the little doll, Chat was able to quickly catch up to it and wrapped his arms around her protectively. It wasn't until he reached his free hand to his hip, gripping for his pole, when he realized that in his haste he had left it suspended between the two buildings up above.

Chat looked around him for something the grab onto, but there was nothing within his reach. Then he started to panic.

He looked over to the shorter building where his partner slept and hastily called out to her.

"Ladybug, I could really use some help!"

However, the heroine who was already sleep deprived before being hit by Dreamtime's attack, remained fast asleep.

"Like, now!" Chat let out. "I could really use some help, now!"

Chat's attention was drawn away from his partner and was now fixed on the hastily approaching ground. There was a lot of falls and banging around that he could take with his heightened strength and endurance provided by his miraculous, but he definitely couldn't survive from this high up, or maybe he could but only after suffering serious injuries. He didn't think the situation could get any worse, but then his ring let out an all too familiar beep, letting him know there was onlyl so much time until he transformed back.

"LADYBUG!" His voice was filled with fear.

In that moment, Emma's laughs were immediately cut off and changed to a loud piercing wail. Loud enough to distract Chat from the danger he was in.

As if on instinct, Ladybug's eyes snapped open and she jumped to her feet, squeaking out Emma's name while frantically looking around her for the doll. It took a couple of moments for her brain to fully wake up as she took in what was going on. Her eyes snapped over to Chat and his baby who were growing dangerously close to the ground.

Leaping into action, she grabbed her yo-yo and launched it in his direction. The string wrapped tightly around his body and Ladybug felt her arms being yanked forward from his weight. She dug her heels into the ground and was dragged a little closer to the edge of the building until she finally came to a stop, Chat and Emma only several feet away from the pavement.

The black clad hero called up a thanks to his partner and untangled himself from her yo-yo's cord. He safely placed Emma back in her carrier and turned towards the villain who had made his way down to the streets. Ladybug landed beside him.

"Distract Dreamtime while I use lucky charm."

"With pleasure," he said and started to head off before stopping and turning back to his partner. "Oh, can you take care of Emma then, I don't want her to get hit by his vaporizing beams."

Ladybug didn't get a chance to refuse before the doll was shoved into her arms and Chat was already heading towards the villain.

"Guess I'm babysitting you," she grumbled to herself.

She had actually expected Emma to burst out crying the second she touched her, but instead the baby remained silent as if she knew crying would only divert Dreamtime's attention towards them.

Ladybug called out her signature attack, throwing her yo-yo into the air. From above her fell a red and black spotted metal garbage can lid. She caught it with one hand as the other was holding Emma.

"What am I supposed to do with this?" She asked herself.

She scanned the battle before her where Chat was taunting and teasing Dreamtime. The villain kept shooting the sleep beams at her partner who easily dodged them.

Ladybug's gaze shifted from Chat, to the beams, to Dreamtime.

She had a plan.

"Chat, heads up!" Ladybug called, tossing the garbage can lid to her partner like a Frisbee which he caught with ease. Like with most of their battles, the two didn't have to verbally communicate to know what they wanted each other to do, they knew each other well enough to know the plans they had come up with.

Chat held the lid like a shield and began charging towards Dreamtime. The villain let out a series of beams and Chat stopped, positioning the lid in front of him. The beams ricocheted off of it and headed back in the direction they came from.

Dreamtime was struck by his own attack and his eyelids slowly fluttered closed as he fell to the ground in a much needed sleep.

Chat made his way to the villain and leaned down, carefully pulling the baby off his back and smashing it, releasing the black butterfly which Ladybug quickly captured and purified. Dreamtime reverted back to his normal self but remained fast asleep.

Chat smiled as him and Ladybug did their signature fist bump. He handed her the garbage can lid which she tossed into the air, releasing millions of little ladybugs that restored all the damage Dreamtime had done; waking students up and bringing back vaporized babies.

Chat's ring started beeping and he realized that he only had a minute left until he went back to being Adrien. He gave Ladybug a hasty goodbye and launched himself onto the roof of a nearby building before heading off.

Ladybug sighed, glad that the action was finally over. She looked down at Emma who was still in her arms.

"Hopefully your daddy isn't worried about where we are. If he asks I'll just make up an excuse about taking you somewhere safe to hide."

It wasn't until Marinette was already back at school and de-transformed in the girl's bathroom when Tikki flew over to the doll.

"Marinette," she said, "isn't this Chat's Emma?" 

~.~.~.~.~  

In case anyone was wondering about update times, typically you can expect a new chapter to be uploaded sometime between Friday and Sunday. However, this isn't set in stone because if for some reason I have a super busy week then I may not be able to get a chapter up until a couple days after the weekend.

I hope you guys enjoyed this update!!!