Chapter 24: Reflekta Averted

(Author's notes: Now, we shall see precisely how Juleka Couffaine's Akumatization into Reflekta will be averted without Chloe being a b****ing a**hole and without Caline Bustier being naive enough to actually lecture bullied victims and turn the other cheek with bullies.

Also, just so you know, there'll probably be two bonus scenes in the second part of the Miraculous New York chapters. The second bonus scene will probably take place in the near future, BUT I can't tell you more, because of that would be spoiler alerts.

Enjoy chapter 24: Reflekta Averted.)

(Quantic Universe Earth 139, Paris, France, May 4th, 2015, Francoise Dupont High School, third person POV...)

Inside the courtyard of the school, Adrien's photographer Vincent is taking class pictures for Picture Day.

Everyone in Ms. Mendeleiev's class gathered around on the bleachers to have their picture taken.

Vincent calls out to Ms. Mendeleiev's class, "Alright, everybody. Look at the camera."

Ms. Mendeleiev's class does as instructed.

Even Ms. Mendeleiev gets into the spirit of Picture Day by putting on her best smile, which slightly unnerves Ms. Bustier's class since Ms. Mendeleiev's smile more or less looks like a Joker smile but without the stretched out lips.

Vincent continues, "Hahaha, they look perfect! Say spaghetti!"

Ms. Mendeleiev's class says in unison, "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!"

The picture is taken as evidenced by the camera going "Ka-Chick" because it was an old-fashioned film camera.

Adrien and Miguel's custodian clone respectively laugh at the picture silliness.

Marinette breathes in and out to calm her nerves.

Marinette then asks Alya, "Have you ever been in a class photo before?"

Alya replies, "Eh, yeah. Maybe once or twice, back in Martinque."

Juleka says to Rose, "At least you're gonna be in the photo this year."

Rose replies, "No, Juleka, I'm telling you, you're not cursed! This time, it will work out! I can feel it, right here!" Rose puts her hand over her heart for added emphasis.

Marinette comes over and asks, "What's this about being cursed?"

Juleka replies, "Hhhaaa. Ever since I was little, every time someone takes a photo of me, something always goes very wrong."

In a flashback, a photo is taken with a younger Max Kante accidentally covering Juleka's face. In another flashback, a photo is taken with Rose and Juleka with one hand in a half heart sign pose, and a pigeon is covering Juleka's face. In a final flashback, a photo is taken and Juleka is nearly not in it.

The flashback ends as Rose replies, "You're wrong, Juleka, you'll see!"

Marinette replies, "For sure! We'll do everything we can to make sure we get it right this time. Don't forget to smile!"

Juleka slowly smiles in response.

Vincent says to Ms. Mendeleiev's class, "A-thank you, kids. You've been a-wonderful."

He straightens everything for Ms. Bustier's class.

Vincent says, "Alright, it's now time for you guys to flash your pearly whites!" He gestures to Max, Juleka, Marinette, Adrien and Chloe as he continues, "You guys take a seat on the front bench. Quickly, please. I've got sixteen other classes to shoot a picture of."

Everyone sits down on the bench and Juleka manages to sit in the front without anyone blocking her, much to Juleka's surprise.

Adrien whispers to Nino, "(Softly) The new album is pretty good."

Soon, the rest of the class is whispering.

Chloe and Lynnette respectively say to Miriam and Sabrina, "Look, Sabrina, they're getting a front-row seat for the picture. (Turns to the people in the front row) Just put on your best smiles, boys and girls!" "Look, Miriam, they're getting the best position for the picture. (Turns to the front-row students and gives a thumbs-up.)"

Marinette nods once to signify she approves of Chloe and Lynnette turning over a new leaf.

Soon, everything and everyone was in place for the picture.

Vincent says to the Picture Day participants, "Say spaghetti!"

Ms. Bustier's class replies for the camera, "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!" "Spaghetti!"

Vincent takes a picture of the entire class, including Juleka this time.

In his lair, Steel Butterfly grumbles, "Punk-aleck son of a betamax. Whatever happened to Picture Day participants saying cheese for the pictures? I mean, seriously, whatever happened to that?"

Meanwhile, Marinette and Adrien went to her parents' bakery for their lunch break.

Surprisingly, Marinette's parents had already made them lunch and sent them to Marinette's room to talk with their kwamis and with Steel Butterfly.

Steel Butterfly teleports into Marinette's bedroom, and he's immediately replaced with Miguel Guevara and his kwami Leppey.

Marinette asks, "So, did you see our class picture?"

Miguel replies, "Hah! How could I not see it? I think you guys looked good."

Adrien and Marinette blushed a bit.

Miguel then adds, "Although, I want to know just what the hell was Vincent thinking in having you guys saying spaghetti for the camera? I mean, seriously, Picture Day participants are supposed to say cheese for the camera."

Adrien replies, "I would've asked Vincent, but I don't want to offend him."

Miguel face palms as he replies back with a groan, "Ooh, sometimes you tend to be too kind for your own good to the point of being naïve and a bit of a coward."

Adrien's cheeks flushed red with slight embarrassment and slight anger as he remembered all the times that Steel Butterfly and Bunnyx had shown him how much of a naïve coward he used to be and how much worse he would've become in other timelines.

Plagg then asks, "Was there another Akumatization we should've known about?"

Miguel answers, "Well, there was Juleka, aka Reflekta, a supervillain with the ability to shoot a laser beam from her Akumatized bracelet/wrist-mounted makeup mirror that transforms people into exact physical duplicates of herself, even Miraculous users."

Marinette, Adrien, Tikki and Plagg looked at each other in unison before looking back at Miguel.

Leppey then said, "But don't worry; Juleka never became Reflekta this time, so that's gotta be something."

Marinette then starts to fret, "But what if—"

Miguel shushes her with his index finger and says, "Uh-duhduhduhduhduhduhduhduhduhduh. Don't curse it with a what-if scenario. Just enjoy the temporary silence from Hawk Moth. Lord knows we're gonna need it."

Tikki slowly floated towards Miguel, assumed her human form for the first time much to the shock of everyone in the room, and hugs Miguel, causing him to hug her back.

Everyone could see that Tikki was crying because of how she treated the butterfly hero for being the leader of the team and how she was being punished for it.

Tikki eventually let go and transformed back into her normal kwami form.

Miguel nods wordlessly, becomes Steel Butterfly again, and teleports out of the room.

(Steel Butterfly's voice-over POV as he writes in his Rorschach-inspired journal in his lair under sunlight...)

Steel Butterfly's journal.

May 4th, 2015.

First and only journal entry today.

In the United States, May the fourth of every year is usually known as Star Wars Day. But I'm not into Star Wars or even Star Trek for that matter. I'm more or less into Miraculous Ladybug, Transformers, and pretty much other kinds of superhero fiction, as long as its not too kiddy or horror-rated.

In any case, Juleka Couffaine's Akumatization into Reflekta was averted.

And surprisingly, I didn't even need to do anything to help.

But what doesn't sit right with me is the photographer Vincent getting the Picture Day participants to say "spaghetti" instead of "cheese," as per tradition with Picture Days.

I even told Adrien to ask Vincent about it, but he's too wimpy about it because he's afraid of, and I quote, "offending Vincent and risking my father being informed about such a ridiculous question."

Bah! Sidelines coward.

He's always been a pushover and a coward even before I told this universe's Adrien about Lila's lies and her future as Hawk Moth II.

But I intend to make sure that Adrien won't hesitate to take risks, but not in the way that Froggy/Risk did in Shadow Moth's Final Attack Part 1 in season 4.

Anyway, that's not important; what's important now is that Juleka's first Akumatization has been successfully averted.

Although, something she said in the original Reflekta episode doesn't sit right with me.

She said, as Reflekta no less, that she hates cats, and I seriously do wonder why she doesn't like cats.

Could it be bad experiences with cats? A natural fear of cats? Or overall hatred of cats?

Let's call it my need-to-know.

In any case, the next Akumatization to avert is Chloe Bourgeois, aka Antibug for her first Akumatization. Also known as Queen Bee with the Bee Miraculous, also known as Queen Wasp as an Akumatized Queen Bee, also known as Miracle Queen as an upgraded Queen Wasp, Queen Banana based on her rejected movie character from the episode of season 4 of the same name, and Penalty, the leader of the Penalteam for her final Akumatized form before she secretly started working with that other b**** Lila Rossi to get rid of both Marinette and Ladybug. And this was well before the ending of Shadow Moth's Final Attack Part 2 in which Monarch's declaration of victory to the city of Paris allegedly made Chloe finally realize the consequences of her actions as Hawk Moth and Lila's willing ally.

Yeah, I don't find that anywhere near likely to happen as Thomas Astruc on my Earth was adamant about Chloe being unable to properly change for the better, and that's only because of the fact that as the primary and secondary director of Miraculous Ladybug, he made Chloe's redemption story arc go down the crapper. And that's not only just because of Thomas wanting to spite one of his former school bullies, but also because of the fact that he thinks that he can do whatever he wants with the show's character arcs, storyline plots, story settings, and so forth. He thinks he can do whatever he wants with the entire show and get away with it.

But believe me, if I had told Chloe about it some time in the near future after having taken down Hawk Moth, Mayura and Future Hawk Moth with Chloe on the side of good as Queen Hornet with the one and only Hornet Miraculous I brought to this universe, let's just say she would've been utterly disgusted to her core.

Next to that, Chloe started becoming a bit of a problem in season 5, but I don't remember how she did it. Oh well. Best that I don't dwell on it now that such a future will never come to be no matter what Thomas Ass-truck or Bunnyx have to say about that.

In any case, I wonder how Chloe's first Akumatization into Antibug and Sabrina's first Akumatization into Vanisher will both be averted.

Eh, I'll find out soon enough once we get there. And by we, I mean me and my team.

In any case, I feel like something bad is about to happen. I have this bad feeling like the sky's gonna fall or something, and soon.

But never mind that; we superheroes have overcome many challenges in the past hundreds to thousands of years in real life, in comic books, in movies, in cartoons, and in video games. And because of how many powers we superheroes respectively have for any situations at hand, we have overcome many challenges and hardships, and we ain't about to stop now.

Many superheroes like Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, the Avengers, the Ghost Rider, the Defenders, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, the Justice League, the Teen Titans, the Justice Society, the Batclan, the Doom Patrol, the Green Lantern Corps, the Legion of Superheroes, the Outsiders, the Young Justice Team, the Watchmen, the Violet Lantern Corps, the Blue Lantern Corps, the Guardians of the Galaxy, the Inhumans, the New Warriors, the Howling Commandos, the Runaways, S.H.I.E.L.D., the X-Force, the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense, the Umbrella Academy, the Aquabats, the entire Autobot army from different Transformers realities put together, the Ghostbusters, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the Maximals from the Beast Era, the Thundermans, the Incredibles, the students of Sky High, the Jedi of Star Wars, and so forth have solved many problems over the years in their respective comic book, cartoon, movie, and video game realities, and we can easily learn from them to make sure that our lives are full of warmth and to make sure that we don't fail in our endeavors today and in the future.

But whatever the case, I intend to make sure that my teammates and I come prepared for any Akumatized supervillains to replace Reflekta, Vanisher, and Antibug.

No matter what happens, we will defeat Hawk Moth and all of his allies permanently, but without killing them unless they killed someone first.

But for the time being, I'm just going to keep coming up with more and more new contingency plans for any situation we end up in during the rest of this Miraculous War with the various villains of Miraculous Ladybug, specifically the ones that are and still are willingly committing crimes through subtlety, manipulation, or even committing them outright when the time is right.

For now, I must be off to prepare for the next Akumatized villain attack.

(Third person POV...)

Later on that day, the next Akumatized supervillain to replace the chronological supervillain was Dreama Blankenship, also known as the Golden Assassin, a supervillain resembling a hybrid of Deadshot and Deathstroke in a suit of golden armor.

Golden Assassin was especially dangerous because she had the same battle experience as the actual Deathstroke, as Hawk Moth predicted that she would've wanted the magical terrorist to make her extremely formidable.

But Steel Butterfly was confident that he could take on the newest villain of the story.

In the swordfight that happened, Steel Butterfly overpowered Golden Assassin.

Here's how it happened: Steel Butterfly engaged Golden Assassin in a sword-lock for a few seconds, punched her in the masked face, knocked her sword away, and pushed her into a car. He punched GA in the midsection twice, punched her in the face twice, grabbed her by the collar of her chestplate, and threw her into the side of a building before engaging her in another sword-lock. Steel Butterfly punched Golden Assassin in the masked face again, uppercutted her with a shove to the ground, and began pounding on her face, stunning her even more. But then, Golden Assassin knocked his fist away and headbutted him off of her. Steel Butterfly dodged a running stab and executed a Superman punch, a strong left hook, and a spinning low face kick. Golden Assassin gets up and engages Steel Butterfly in a sword-lock. Steel Butterfly punches Golden Assassin again, uppercuts her for real and stabs her right arm into the ground. SB then proceeded to slam GA's face into the cement pavement multiple times before retrieving his swordstick and slicing Golden Assassin's mask off, releasing the Akuma.

Ladybug does her usual spiel, purifies the Akuma and uses her Miraculous Ladybug.

After comforting Dreama about the whole thing, Steel Butterfly and the heroes went home to sleep.

The End.

(Author's notes: Yeah, I made this chapter a tad shorter than usual because of the fact that Chloe and Lynnette are no longer spoiled brats, Caline Bustier is no longer a naïve enabler, and the students got the picture right with Juleka in it.

Also, there's a bonus scene for this chapter. It revolves around my version of the backstory involving Juleka's hatred of cats since no official backstory was provided in the chronological cartoon and the chronological timeline. Hope you like it and after the bonus scene, see you all in chapter 21: Antibug Averted.)

(Omake: Steel Butterfly/Dragon Butterfly finally learns about the reason why Juleka Couffaine hates cats and helps her overcome her apparent dislike and fear of cats.)

Dragon Butterfly approaches Juleka at the Place des Vosges, accompanied by Ladybug and Cat Noir.

Juleka asks nervously, "H-hey. W-what are you guys d-doing here?"

Dragon Butterfly answers in his normal voice, "I heard that you don't like cats. May I ask why?"

Juleka averts her gaze.

Ladybug then says, "Dragon Butterfly won't push you, Juleka, but he's helping you just like he helped prevent Rose from getting Akumatized the last time Prince Ali came to Paris. It's only fair."

Juleka mumbles, "Well, at least I'm grateful for that." She looks at the dragon and butterfly hybrid hero and answers the question, "I've been afraid of cats ever since I was young. When I was three, I tried to pet a feral cat, and I got scratched for my troubles."

Dragon Butterfly then replies, "No offense, but even I could see for myself a mile away that petting a feral cat is a bad idea."

Juleka replies back, "No offense taken."

Dragon Butterfly then states, "I believe I might be able to help you with your fear of cats based on what I learned from the experiences of my friends and family over the years."

Dragon Butterfly carefully took out of his duffle bag a young Tabby kitten and Juleka winced in fear at the sight of the kitten.

Dragon Butterfly advises, "Easy. Cats get scared just like we do."

Juleka takes a few calming breaths as Dragon Butterfly advises her to hold out her hand to let the kitten smell it.

Juleka asks, "And what do I do after the kitten smells my hand?"

Dragon Butterfly answers, "If the kitten smells your hand and nudges its nose against your hand, that signifies the kitten wants you to pet it."

Juleka holds out her left hand and lets the Tabby kitten smell it.

Eventually, the Tabby kitten nudges its nose against Juleka's hand, and Juleka carefully and slowly pets the kitten.

The kitten starts to purr slightly loud enough for everyone to hear.

Juleka then questions, "Why does a cat purr?"

Dragon Butterfly answers, "Cats purr when they're happy, when they're sleeping, and when they're being petted as a form of affection."

Juleka hums in understanding.

Juleka continues petting the Tabby kitten.

The Tabby kitten continues purring as it continues getting petted.

Eventually, after five minutes, Juleka slowly overcomes her fear and dislike of cats.

And it was mainly because of the fact that Dragon Butterfly was being slow and patient with Juleka, knowing the people of Juleka's type have to go slow with overcoming their fears, even if they already like scary things.

After another day, Juleka overcame her fear of cats.

Juleka eventually thanked Steel Butterfly for helping her with her fear of cats.

The End. FOR REAL.