the pharaoh

|A week later|

Jake's grandfather is looking at Alya's ladyblog and sees the most recent posted video where Alya finds a history textbook that the red and black hero dropped and is throwing out the suspicion that ladybug is still a student.

"Hah, would you look at that Fu. Your chosen hero is already struggling to stay unidentified." Jake says with a smirk.

"Better than you, who got himself akumatized." Fu berates his grandson.

"You could have just left me in America if you don't want me here. They have supernatural creatures there too, but I suppose you just want me to get you that peacock and butterfly kwami back." Jake says pissed.

"That's right. You do that and you can go back." Fu says.

"Ah screw you." Jake grumbles, thinking about how he doesn't really want to leave anymore, liking his new friends and the more relaxed daily life in comparison to every imaginable supernatural creature causing mischief in New York.

"I'm heading out." Jake says, leaving the house and wanders around the city until he sees a poster for a museum exhibit.

"We should go there. I could teach you about my history." Longg says.

"Fine." Jake mumbles to himself and heads to the museum.

"Jake?" Mylene says, surprised to see the boy there while she's standing at the entrance with Marinette, Rose, Juleka, Alix and Alya.

"Oh, hi." He greets them.

"What are you doing here?" Alya asks, having organized the trip for the girls after Marinette convinced her to go with her.

"Uh I saw the poster and thought it could be a good way to kill time. Is me being here so weird?" Jake answers.

"Well, you're not exactly artistic or seemed interested in history." Mylene says with the others nodding in agreement.

"Hey! I'm interested in mythology if that's worth anything." Jake says with a pout.

"Well, you're here now. And at least you're not a chatty Cathy like Nino so you might as well join us before Juleka guilts us into it anyways." Marinette suggests chuckling with Juleka trying to disappear behind her curtain of hair.

"Only means she's the nicest of you." Jake smirks challengingly with Rose and Mylene pouting, Juleka blushing and Alya grinning amused.

"Nice comeback." Alix says, high fiving the taller teen.

"Come on, let's go." Marinette says a bit disappointed that her quip backfired and the group follows her with Alya putting her arm around the dark haired girl's shoulder.

"Now, what did you want to show me?" Alya asks her best friend cheerfully with the others splitting off into their own little groups.

"Come on I gotta show you this." Alix tells Mylene and Rose, leading them to a section on Cleopatra, leaving Juleka and Jake by themselves.

"Don't you want to go with them?" Jake asks, nodding to the three girls.

"No and thank you for before." Juleka says quietly, barely visibly shaking her head.

"Alright. Let's have a look on our own then." Jake says, holding out his hand for Juleka a bit nervously.

Juleka looks at the offered hand for a moment and reaches for it with a shaking hand but Jake, seeing her look like she's about to have a meltdown instead puts his arm on her back and starts walking with her, removing the arm soon after.

"Thanks." The shy girl says, her voice barely above a whisper.

"Don't mention it." Jake replies in a whisper, the two not noticing Alya and Marinette exchanging knowing looks at seeing their interaction.

"Those two are so cute together." Alya says.

"Yeah. I agree." Marinette says smiling and drags Alya around until Tiki points her to the template which shows history of kwami and their heroes.

"Hah." Jake says, looking at the template surprised with Longg mentally telling him how he and the past ladybug hero were hailed almost as highly as the pharaohs themselves and how usually he is not trapped in a vessel, but free instead. Only having bonded to Jake by accident although with their perfect partnership it seems more like fate.

"What?" Alya asks, making hers and Marinette's presence known behind him and Juleka.

"Those figures. Doesn't it look like Ladybug?" Jake says, pointing at a female carving surrounded by dots and dots on her dress.

"It does." Alya says stunned and starts vlogging and taking photos.

"How did you see that so fast?" Marinette asks, looking at Jake curiously since she didn't even spot it and she's the new ladybug.

"Tut give me time!" They hear a dark voice shout from behind them and see a statue like akumatized person with a golden mask shoot bubbles at everyone, trapping them in time.

Jake quickly pulls the girls to safety with Marinette but Alya steps out from behind their cover of a showcase and gets hit by a bubble, starting to float around in slow motion.

"Jake. You have to do something." Juleka whispers worriedly while the akumatized man approaches them and sends the people in their bubbles flying away.

Marinette then dashes out of her cover and finds a corner to transform while Jake is holding onto Juleka tightly, staying behind cover while ladybug and cat noir who then arrives engage the pharaoh in combat.

With the shout of "Sekhmet give me strength and a change of his mask the pharaoh easily tosses the two heroes into a sarcophagus which closes on them and tips over.

"You have to help them." Juleka presses Jake, knowing his secret identity.

At hearing her voice pharaoh comes over to them and swats away Jake, sending him crashing through a collumn and takes a struggling Juleka with him, placing her over his shoulder and carries her out of the shut-down louvre, bending the security bars easily with his strength.

"Longg, dragon up!" Jake says wheezing a bit and is enveloped by fire, lying in the rubble in his dragon form the next moment.

"That's gonna leave a bruise." Jake groans and hurries over to the trapped heroes, turning over the sarcophagus and opens the lid, helping out ladybug and cat noir who was using the opportunity to get close to his partner.

"Come on, he has a hostage." Jake says, hurrying to the gates and cat noir destroys them with his cataclysm.

"Who are you anyways? We still don't know much about you dragon." Marinette asks, running through the louvre with him and cat noir.

"I have a kwami like you. But I have been at this a whole lot longer than you have. Just not so publicly, until recently at least." Jake explains.

"We can have a nice long chat after we get rid of that akuma." Cat noir interrupts their conversation, the three arriving outside the museum and see multiple mummies running around with pharaoh having a golden mask of Anubis on and holding Juleka by her wrist.

"Dragon! Help please." Juleka says, ladybug and cat noir looking surprised that the newcomer hero was called out by their classmate.

"You get the girl, we distract him." Ladybug tells dragon and tosses her jojo at their enemy with cat noir hitting him with his staff, only for pharaoh to catch the weapons in one hand each, making the heroes grin, because Jake picks up Juleka in his arms and flies way.

"Horus give me wings!" Pharao shouts and drops the two heroes' weapons, before flying after Jake and Juleka while Ladybug uses her lucky charm which turns into a red and black traffic cone.

"Huh?" She asks herself looking around but doesn't see any usage of it.

"Jul... miss, close your eyes." Jake says, pressing his crush close to his dragon chest and takes a deep breath, before looking back at the approaching pharao.

"I need her. She's the perfect sacrifice to get Nefertiti back." Pharao shouts angrily and Jake folds his wings around Juleka before skidding over the ground roughly on his back, pharaoh within arms reach and Jake shoots a massive stream of flames from his mouth, melting away the mask and destroying pharaoh's powers.

"The flames of fate are always burning as shall this girl's flame of life." Jake says, reciting a line Longg's previous partner used to say.

"Let's get you out of here, before he catches up." Jake says and flies over a roof while pharaoh gives chase on foot.

Jake leaves Juleka in a hiding spot on a roof and flies down next to the other two heroes.

"We have to hurry milady. We are about to transform back." Cat noir says, hearing his ring beeping.

"Leave him to me. Any idea where his akuma is though?" Jake asks.

"That pendant. That must be it." Marinette says seeing the pendant glow while his mask changes into that of a lion, giving him immense strength.

"Rahh!" Jake bellows, flying at pharaoh recklessly and their lock hands, trying to overpower each other, are in a tie though.

Jake uses this however to rip off his opponents pendant with his tail and bite down on it, crushing it with his strong maw, a black butterfly flying out and ladybug catches it, before repairing everything and everyone with Jake eating the now white butterfly again.

"Nice catch on the pendant." Jake says and flies up to Juleka, flying her down to where the other girls are waiting worried, only Juleka and Marinette still missing.

"Thank you dragon." Juleka says gratefully, looking at him with loving eyes.

"Jake won't be happy about that." Alix says teasingly.

"About what?" Rose asks obvious as ever.

"About Juleka here crushing on the red scaled hero while Jake is having the hots for our shy Juleka." Alya explains, poking the long-haired girl who ignores them.

"There you are. I was worried guys." Marinette says, arriving at the group soon after.

"Good to see you're alright girl." Alya says relieved to see her best friend.

"Hey you OK Jake?" Alix asks, seeing the green haired teen leave the museum with a wince in his step.

"Yeah. It's gonna be fine. I gotta head back home though. Have fun at the exhibit." Jake tells them and heads home.

Once home he takes off his shirt and looks at the bruised back and cheek in the mirror with Fu walking by his room, seeing the injuries.

"What happened?" Fu asks.

"Fought an akumatized guy and got slammed through a pillar by him before transforming to keep my identity secret." Jake groans, sitting down while Fu pats his back with a cold wet towel.

"I know the price to owning kwami's can be high. But it is a gift. Believe me." Fu tells him.

"I'm not complaining. I know that keeping your identity secret has a price. Back in New York it cost me my girl." Jake sighs.

"Me too. A long time ago." Fu says, remembering his old love.

"Maybe we have something in common then after all." Jake comments bitterly.

"I know we do, which is why I worry you'll make the same rash decision I made at your age." Master Fu tells Jake, handing him a cooling pad before sitting down next to his grandson.

"You should tell me your mistakes then so I can learn from them. Mom only told me the legend of the sentimonster you created." Jake tells him.

"I will and sadly it's no legend. It's all true. I almost destroyed the kwami civilization, the protectors of magic." Fu says downcast.

"You're not the first one to screw up. The first dragon had something to do with the plagues of Egypt." Jake tells Fu, having been told so by Longg.