x v i i i

Chatte and Volpina looked at each other before looking back to Emilie.

"What do you mean, 'what's the plan'?" Chatte asks.

"I mean, . What are we going to do?" She looks to Duusu, who was still resting in Chatte's hands, but he went back to Emilie's hands. "Gabriel has your miraculous, so we need to get it back. We have to go back and get it. Bring our world back to normal, no?"

"You're willing to help us?" Chatte questioned, blinking in surprise.

"Of course. This is a family affair after all." She replied.

The three of them sat in silence for a moment, Emilie awaiting the plan.

"You don't have a plan, do you?" Duusu spoke up.

"No," Chatte exhaled. "We didn't think things would go down so badly, and we, we didn't think that Gabriel would be Papillon and that Chat Noir was my 'brother' slash old boyfriend in the other world." She sighed.

"We planned the escape, but we didn't plan on going back so soon." Volpina rubbed her nose. "Say, Madame Paon Bleu, did you happen to see a pair of earrings when you were grabbing your Miraculous?"

Emilie hummed softly as she went through her memories. "No, there didn't seem to be such, aside from a book, Duusu and a postcard." She replied.

"Okay, so mark that one off the list." Volpina replied, leaning back into her chair. "Is there any other secret safes or lairs that Papillon has that you're aware about?" She questions.

Emilie tilts her head to the side. "As far as I know, no. Do keep in consideration that I have been gone for the past decade or so."

Chatte sighed, rubbing the outer edges of her mask. "I think there's more in the atrium than Gabriel lets on. He doesn't let us be in there much. I'm surprised it was left unattended in the first place."

"I don't think it's any coincidence that the atrium was left unattended. Once the security system was set, almost all people went after you." Emilie replied. "But I'm pretty sure Gabriel has something up his sleeve."

There was some rumbling outside that made them look up, followed by a distant roar.

"Duusu, you ready?" Emilie asks.

"Yes, madame."

"Duusu, transform me."

A blue light flashed and Paon Bleu was before them again.

"Then we should head to the estate. Try to pick up any akuma we can to bring down the amount of baddies out there." She leads them out to the school courtyard, where an oversized snowman was looking into the school. "Honestly, we used to use these for good, and now look at them."

The snowman noticed them and growled, bringing a big arm into the building and blasting them with oversized scoops of ice cream.

"Hey, why don't you pick on someone your own temperature!" Paon called out.

"Someone needs to out." Volpina added, blowing a tune on her flute and summoning a fire.

"Hello, I am in ." Chatte sighed behind them.

With magical fire and a gust of wind, the burly ice cream arm was melted down. The akuma cried out as he was melted, Paon quickly gathering it's akumatized item.

Paon looked down at the item, a red ice cream scoop with a golden 'A' on it. "Oh, this is André's. André, you've got akumatized?" She frowns lightly.

"I just wanted everyone to taste the love I have to offer." He replies in a warbled voice.

Paon's frown deepened. "Gabriel, how low have you gone, really?" She spoke to herself, going over to Chatte and putting the scoop in her bag.

The rest of the ice cream started to reform as the akuma stepped back, but it wasn't long before it let out more warbled whines in pain.

They continue to go through the city, towards the Agreste Estate, before Chatte stopped. The other two looked back at her as they stopped ahead.

"Hey, what's wrong?" Volpina asked.

"There's a little girl, crying in the park." Chatte replied, turning towards the general direction of the park.

"A little girl?" Paon looked towards the park. "We've got to go help."

Volpina sighed. "Guys, the city is full of akumas," she says. "Weren't the one who recommended for us to conserve our energy?" She point to Chatte.

"We can't not help a little girl, Volpina, let's go!" Paon called, going after Chatte, who had already started to lead the way.

"This is why I'm glad to be an only child." Volpina sighed before she went after them.

As they got to the park, Chatte slowed as she came upon a tree where the leaves were made of pink cotton candy. The trunk was black licorice, and it's branches were full of pink, fluffy candy floss.

"How sweet." Volpina chimed.

The sobs lead them further into the park, where they were greeted by blue peppermint street lamps and pink peppermint colored benches.

"It's like a Candy Land." Paon commented.

The wails grew louder as they drew closer, and closer to the merry-go-round. As the gravel shifted beneath them as they grew closer, the crying stopped.

Chatte couldn't hear anything, aside from the distant crashing from other parts of the city. She could hear the wind, but there was no crickets, and you couldn't hear any additional footsteps.

It wasn't a second later that Chatte was shot back, Volpina barely managing to catch her. The two of them were thrown back a couple feet before Volpina steadied, looking down at Chatte.

"Hey! Are you okay?" Volpina asked.

Chatte gasped for air, putting a hand to her chest, where she had received a strong blow of... candy?

Chatte pulled her hand away, where there was sticky candy apple syrup stringing from her hand to her chest. "Ow," she panted softly. "I'm fine."

The cries started again as a little girl started to float up in the air. "C-Chat... Nu, Nuwow," she stuttered through tears. "Gimme your ring!" Tears streamed down her cheeks.

Chatte tried to wipe the syrup off her hand, looking up at the little girl. "Alex?"

"No! Not Alex! Sparkle!" she stomped her foot in the air as she wiped her tears.

"A ?" Questioned Paon.

"Papillon has been rather ruthless." Chatte straightens with the help of Volpina. "Sparkle, you don't have to do this." She remembered when she first saw Chat deal with her. He got her the small stuffed lion. "I can... I can get you what you want."

"Papillon said that he would hurt mama..." she sobbed. "If Sparkle gets Chat Nuwow's ring, mama gets to go home!" She balled her hands into fists and wiped at her eyes.