"Awesome! Well done, you did what needed to be done on your first try!" Ladybug exclaimed. "I knew you were the one I needed! You really are the best A- I- I mean..."

"Flairmidable. Call me Flairmidable."

"Flairmidable, it really suits you." Ladybug said with a giddy tone in her voice. "Pound it?"

"Pound it."

Ladybug tossed her yo-yo towards a tall building and launched herself off the roof, the new hero, Flairmidable, following suit. And just like that, she was gone.

And Chat? Chat Noir didn't know what he did wrong. He couldn't understand what had happened between Ladybug and him to make their partnership so severed.

He'd been replaced yet again. Where did he go astray? What had he done to possibly hurt the heroine in red? Why was he suddenly so useless to her now?

What happened to being partners?

Chat Noir followed loosely behind the two other heroes as they found the previously craftily disguised akumatized child. A large group of other heroes met them there in the street while Ladybug and the brand new hero, Flairmidable, approached the kid and gifted him with a charm to protect him from the will of Shadowmoth from there on.

"Let's go recharge before dealing with these sentimonsters!" Ladybug said with a confident smile on her face. The heroes around Chat agreed to this and hurried off, scattering in all directions. Chat was alone, though he really had felt alone all day even when surrounded by these people.

It suddenly seemed as if he mattered little to nothing in the world anymore. Paris accepted the new heroes with open arms, all the while Chat Noir staggered back, hesitant to the touch of a warm encouraging crowd.

It had been this way for a while. The past few months, Chat had noticed it more and more. The feeling that he didn't necessarily need praise, nor want it, but couldn't help but notice he was never the favored anyways. Parisians adored Ladybug, she was their hero, their roll model, their idol. And Chat? Chat Noir was just her shadow.

It didn't bother him much at first. Everyone loved Ladybug from the moment they became heroes together. He always knew she was the more popular of the two, and he honestly did not care much about it at all. He loved her, he wanted her to feel special. He didn't need that for himself.

But then the other heroes came. At first it was just Rena Rouge, Carapace, and even Queen Bee. He was content with that. They only showed up when Chat Noir and Ladybug were desperate, or when one of them couldn't make it to the fight. But those small three soon became four, then five, then six, then... Chat couldn't even remember all their names anymore.

With Ladybug in charge of the miracle box, it seemed she dished the miraculous jewels out like free candy. Chat had told her several times that she was trusting people too easily. And to that, she'd snap at him angrily for daring to question her or suggest that her friends weren't trustworthy. So he just backed off and let her do whatever she wanted.

That's when he started to care. All of Paris loved the knew heroes. They were now popular, and people wanted to see them in action more and more. But Chat Noir remained a lonely distant figure in the background, standing in a cemetery of his desires.

Chat didn't need to recharge—he hadn't used his abilities yet since his last transformation. But nonetheless, he found a place secret to himself where he could release Plagg and catch his breath. And that place... was a dirty rafter under a canal bridge.

"Ugh finally, I was waiting for- hey! Why aren't we home yet?!" Plagg said the second he was released from Adrien's ring.

"The fights not over yet Plagg." Adrien said.

"Cheese?"

"I don't have cheese for you, you don't need it yet." Adrien said, looking up from under the bridge. The sky was red like blood, an orange haze stained the clouds and smoke plumed into the air around them. "Paris... Paris is being destroyed."

"So what, Ladybug will fix it with her power after all this, it'll be fine." Plagg said, looking slightly disappointed at being denied his cheese.

"What if she can't do that this time?" Adrien asked.

"What do you mean?"

"What if... Shadowmoth actually defeats us this time?" Adrien said anxiously.

"Hah! Not in a million years! Buts fun seeing him try!"

"Plagg seriously," Adrien sighed, "Everything isn't going how we expected and it feels like it's all just falling apart."

"Dramatic much?"

"Ladybug is distracted and it's because of whoever that Flairmidable guy is!"

"You're just jealous!" Plagg teased.

"Of what?! You think I still have feelings for her?" Adrien scowled. "She's been treating me like dirt and I'm sick of it. I'm not going to put up with it anymore."

"But you're jealous anyways."

"I'm not." Adrien said bitterly. "Flairmidable is just some other hero now that we're adding to the already massive pile she's collected. It only matters to me because she seems... twitter-pated by him..."

"And you wish you were him. So what she's got a crush on him, she's a girl, he's a guy. It just happens."

"I don't care!" Adrien exclaimed. "She won't tear her eyes away from him for hardly a moment! She's not acting like herself, and she just abandoned the team for- I don't even know what! But I'm the only one who's noticed!"

"She'll get over it once everyone regroups. She knows how to take situations seriously." Plagg assured.

"Plagg, please. Last time she was like this it was when Viperion joined us for the first time, but she refocused pretty quickly. This situation is getting people killed Plagg! And she's still fawning over the new guy rather than pay attention to the sentimonster!"

"Calm your tits Adrien." Plagg sneered. "She's fine. Just focus on yourself, alright? She'll get it eventually, but right now, YOU need to be the one out there protecting the city. And if not for that, then for yourself and your friends."

"Whatever Plagg."

"Geez kid don't be so grumpy."

"Claws out."

"I wasn't finished talki-" Plagg was sucked back into Adrien's ring and in a flash of green light, the boy became the Parisian hero known as Chat Noir.

"Oh I'm kicking your ass today."  Chat said through grit teeth, eying the sentimonster in the far distance wrecking havoc.

Chat moved out from the bridge and began searching the rooftops to find the meeting place they'd agreed upon without telling him. He didn't know where to look, and he already knew he would be the last one to show up anyways. He was in no rush.

He eventually spotted the gang standing on the small rooftop of a church near its steeple, and hurried to climb up to join them. He stepped up onto the platform where the other heroes stood in a circle, listening to whatever Ladybug had previously been saying.

"Oh! Chat Noir!" Ladybug said, and suddenly her arm was around his neck to pull him into the circle playfully. "Miraculous of the dog, miraculous of the cat!" She said, putting her other arm around Flairmidable. "Dog and cat! Hahaha! Funny isn't it?!"

Everyone just stared at her blankly, unsure of what she was doing. Or perhaps they too had noticed her strange behavior around Flairmidable, the orange suited hero of the dog miraculous.

"Hilarious." Chat said bitterly, pulling away from her.

"Nice working with you Chat Noir." Flairmidable said with a coy expressing on his face.

"Come on! Shake paws!" Ladybug said, grab Chat once again as if she didn't receive the message that he didn't want to be touched when he'd pulled her off of him just moments ago.

Chat grumbled and put out his hand for Flairmidable who offered his own to shake it. Flairmidable was too smug about something and Chat didn't like it. But what was bothering him a little more than that at the moment was the way Ladybug was acting. She hadn't been so friendly to Chat Noir in weeks it seemed. Was this all a show to impress the blond haired Flairmidable?

"I knew you two would get along! That's the magic of the miraculous!" Ladybug smiled. "Even dogs and cats can get along! You're going to be spending a LOT of time together now that he's joined the team!" She giggled. "Forever~" she said with a lovesick look on her face directed at Flairmidable.

She quickly pulled out of it and took on an orderly mannerism in which to command the team with. She summoned her lucky charm and a pair of sunglasses fell in her hands.

"Since we can't attack them, we're gonna trap them." She said as an idea came to mind. "Roostervolt, since you have the ability to choose your own power, give yourself the ability to clone objects."

The owner of the rooster miraculous nodded and took the pair of glasses she held in his own hands. They began to glow and eventually, he had a pile of the sunglasses in his hands which he distributed out to the team members.

Ladybug began relaying a plan to them, involving herself and a select few of the team members. Chat, of course, was left uninvolved. Whether it was intentional or not, he couldn't help but take notice to it. It stung him a little, but he told himself this was a thing to be used to by now. How many miraculous did she have left to hand out before she'd have to take his and give it to someone else, finally officially replacing him as a whole?

Chat did nothing, as he was told to stay out of it. He watched ladybug and the other approach the sentimonsters, capture them in a force field created by Carapace's shell, and use a portal from the horse miraculous to send them straight to the sun, billions of miles away.

And then everything was fixed. Just like that. The streets, the sky, the damage to Paris... it was all like nothing had ever happened.

Except for the dead bodies. Chat had never seen so many laying around after an attack from Shadowmoth. They littered the streets, crushed, trampled, beaten and limp. Did Ladybug know? Did she know that her magic didn't bring back the dead?

Chat returned home after that. He had no where else to be, nothing to do for anyone. His service was no longer needed, and Paris was now somewhat safe thanks to every miraculous but his own.

He wasn't exactly thrilled to be back in his room, where he detransformed in secrecy, but that's all he could do. Besides, he was exhausted from the day, nearly dying because of a sentimonster.

He suddenly heard a zipping sound behind him, and his heart nearly lept out of his chest. It was the sound of Ladybug's yo-yo, she was in his room.

He turned around curiously, fearing that somehow he was in trouble. But at the moment, he was Adrien. Why would she be mad at Adrien? Unless... she knew...

"Phew!" Ladybug said, landing on the floor after having jumped through his large wall of windows (one remained open from when he'd snuck back in himself). "There you are! I'm sorry, I thought I told you where we were supposed to meet up."

"Uhh... meet up?" Adrien stammered, giving her a confused look.

"Well yes, so you can give it back to me." She stuck out her hand as if expecting him to put something in it. For a moment, Adrien was afraid she'd found out he was Chat Noir.

"Give... what back to you?" He asked suspiciously.

"The miraculous of the dog." She said, now frowning impatiently.

"But you didn't give me anything." He said innocently.

"Of course I did! On the train!" She said, smiling sheepishly. A slight blush tinted her cheeks.

"The train...?" Adrien rose a brow. Then it dawned on him. "...Felix." He said, and finally it all made sense. Ladybug... Ladybug thought she'd made Adrien into Flairmidable, that he now possessed the miraculous of the dog. She didn't know that Felix and he had made an arrangement earlier where Felix, his cousin who looked identical to him, would pose as him and go off on some modeling campaign out of the country. How had this happened?!

Ladybug gasped. Apparently she knew who Felix was without Adrien having to explain it all to her. She froze, a look of terror on her face as she processed the mistake she just made.

"Lady-"

Something gently struck her hip in a flash of light. She jerked away, only to find that her yo-yo which was attached to her waist, was now gone. Vanished in a sheet of dim light.

"Th-the ball-" she inhaled sharply, starting to shake. "Th- of the dog-" she began to struggle breathing, "F-Felix- he has the yo-yo- and that means..." she inhaled once again though it didn't seem she actually got any air into her lungs. "He has all the miraculous..."

She put her hands on her head, her face as white as paper. She shuddered with every breath she took, trembling, trying to get oxygen into her lungs. She looked as though with every breath, no air made it to her lungs. Like she was standing their, suffocating in her own anxiety.

Adrien was still not happy with her. She'd done things to him he couldn't forgive anymore, he could no longer excuse the way she treated Chat Noir. But the look on her face, pure panic and fear, anxiety overwhelming her mind as she fell apart right in front of him... why would he let her suffer like that?

"Ladybug, just try to keep calm," he said, and lowered himself before her, placing his hands gently on her shoulders. "Just think, there has to be a way you can get your yo-yo back."

She gasped for air, tears drowning her eyes and running down her cheeks. "Y-yes- maybe if I transform back and then-"

"Go ahead! You'll be safe here!" He assured, coxing her into the bathroom attached to his room so that she may have privacy.

"I- I don't know anymore!" She stopped him. "What if it's a trap?! What if you're Felix?!"

"If you're going to trust me once, please let it be this time!" Adrien said, and shut the door. How did he let that slip out? That was Chat Noir speaking, not Adrien. Chat was the one dealing with Ladybug having no trust in him. Chat was the one who was upset and betrayed, the one who knew how important it was to keep the miraculous safe and earn Ladybug's trust. Adrien had nothing to do with it.

Perhaps... Chat and Adrien were more similar than he thought.

"No- no no no no!" Ladybug yelped from the other side of the door. By then she must have transformed back into herself. "No no no! They're all gone! There's nothing left!"

Adrien felt his heart do a double take. His throat felt heavy and dry, his tongue swollen in his mouth. This was real. This was really happening. Adrien wasn't supposed to know the weight of this consequence but Chat Noir did. This... was truly devastating.

"Ladybug?" Adrien said and knocked on the door. There came no response. His heart was beating so fast it was throbbing painfully in his chest. He was for once, terrified of something that wasn't his father.

He opened the door and found she was no longer there. She'd climbed out a window and vanished without saying a word to him. He felt a wave of guilt weighing down on him, and his inner thoughts stirred.

Sometimes, Ladybug acted like an asshole. She treated Chat Noir like he was nothing, and made him useless to her. She acted like the world of the miraculous was her kingdom, and she was the one who ruled over it. She was in charge, she had control, and whatever she said would go. There was no disobeying her, her anger was painful and aggressive.

In Ladybug's domain, everything was as thin as ice. It was hard to tell what was the right thing to do in any given moment. One step in the wrong direction would plunge you into an icy sea of her wrath.

But Ladybug was just as scared as Adrien at the moment. And he couldn't leave her alone like that.

As he transformed into Chat Noir and made his way out into the city night, he made a promise to himself. If she didn't make a change soon, this would be the last time he would ever show her his sympathy.

He found her sitting on the ledge of a museum rooftop, the elegant view of the Eiffel Tower standing grandly before them. She was crying, still shaking from her mistake.

Before Chat could bring attention to himself, he heard a loud booming sound of laughter erupt from the tower. An orb formed and expanded into the shape of a shell shock (force field from the turtle miraculous), and within it lay several glowing colored spheres of light and a massive hoard of butterflies with wings as black as night.

"People of Paris!" A voice boomed! Chat recognized it all to well to belong to Shadowmoth. "Ladybug promised to protect you! Well, she LIED to you! Behold her defeat! I now possess all her miraculous! From now on I will be attacking you relentlessly! I will be everywhere, pruning your thoughts and stealing your dreams! Whatever damage I can cause, I will not STOP! Unless... someone brings me Ladybug and Chat Noir's miraculous."

Ladybug clammed up. Shadowmoth finished his monologue and went quiet. Ladybug shrunk where she sat, curling her knees to her chest and burying her face in her hands.

"I've lost... everything..." she shuddered.

"You haven't lost me." Chat Noir said, stepping up on the edge of the museum roof beside her. He bore a scowl on his face, though he was unsure if it was meant for Shadowmoth or Ladybug.

"... why don't you just give up on me?" She whimpered. "I've lost all the miraculous... I'm the worst guardian ever. I- I wanted to control everything, I didn't listen to you! I lied to you! Every time you offered me a helping hand, I never took it! I've really made a mess of everything..."

"... Ladybug," Chat Noir said, offering a hand down to her.

She looked up at him as if speculating what he was doing. Perhaps she didn't know if she wanted to be his partner anymore, she hadn't for a while now.

But she took his hand. She took his hand and pulled herself to her feet. Not knowing what else to do, Chat pulled her into a hug, hoping this would somehow soothe her and calm her down.

"We'll get them back." Chat promised. "One by one, till the very last. And we'll make sure this never happens again."

"You... and me?" She said, returning the hug hesitantly.

"You, the best superhero there ever was." Chat said, pulling away from her. "And them, the people of Paris," he gestured to the crowd of Parisians which had gathered around the base of the Eiffel Tower and up around the museum.  "And me... your partner."

She looked at him, still questioning what was happening. Did she still not trust him? But he quickly forgot about that look she gave him when she turned her head to face the massive crowd, a sea of people before them. They were cheering for them. They were cheering, hoping Shadowmoth would be stopped finally. That this wasn't the end. They cheered.

But they only cheered for her.

A/N
.... What the fuck am I doing it's almost 4am ...
-Peter