Miracle Box - an MLB rewrite

A Butterfly Takes Flight

Carapace and Ladybug kicked down the doors of the film center to find a whole army of people inside waiting for them. They wore masks of angry expressions and bitterness. Most of them wore halloween costumes, which made the experience feel unrealistic; as if this were a video game. The people had to be under the control of the akuma victim's influence. No, they were. It was no speculation. If they'd wondered anything about it before, they quickly pieced it together as they were immediately charged by the hoard.

"Get to the elevator, the akuma isn't on this floor!" Ladybug instructed, warding away the people by spinning her yoyo around herself. Carapace charged through, using his shield to push people away. They got to the elevator and forced its doors shut, heading up to the second level.

Again, another hoard of people; though,slightly smaller this time. These ones, however, were much more hostile and violent. Ladybug and Carapace were yanked from the elevator and shaken up quite a bit before they were able to break free and make a dash back into the elevator, going up another floor.

"So we're just going to check each floor till we find the akuma?" Carapace asked as the doors slid open.

"Yep, though I suspect he'd be at the very top." Ladybug responded. Another surge of people came after them, and Ladybug quickly shut the doors. As they went up another floor, they felt the elevator begin to rattle. "That's not good-"

"Get out!" Carapace exclaimed as he yanked her through the barely opening doors. Immediately the elevator fell, cables snapped, slamming back down on the very first floor.

"Ah-" Ladybug panted, "stairs then."

There were only a couple of controlled people they had to sweep through to get to the stairs, but of course, the stairs were occupied by more of them.

"Oh... Hawkmoth thought this out for once. I see..." Ladybug hummed.

"This is going to be a long climb..." Carapace groaned, preparing for a fight.

"Not quite yet, give me your shield," Ladybug instructed. Curiously, he did so. She strung her yoyo to one of the arm straps and handed it back to him. "Throw it through the middle of the stairwell as high as it'll go. Make sure you lodge into a wall or something."

"Alright..." Carapace said and quickly pushed through the people on the stairs. He launched his shield upwards, shooting into the bottom of a staircase a ways away.

"Grab my arm!" Ladybug said, grabbing him. She yanked on her yoyo string and the two shot straight up to where the shield was lodged. They maneuvered themselves to the upper side of the stairs and pushed through the door it led to. This floor was empty.

"Hawkmoth didn't think we'd make it this high, huh?"

"Or he didn't think we'd make it this fast... look..." Ladybug pointed to the ceiling. Multiple cards were taped to the ceiling fans. As soon as she said this, the fans whirred to life and the cards came sprinkling down like a hoard of menacing butterflies, if you can imagine such a thing.

In order to avoid the cards, they'd have to go back into the stairwell, which unfortunately, was already teaming with people again. Ladybug was out of ideas. Carapace hid them both under his shield, which would be helpful if the cards weren't twisting and turning. They both knew that as soon as a card hit them, they'd have to do whatever the akumatized Siman Grimault said.

"Oh... it's a game."

"A game?"

"A game of Simon says," Ladybug said. "Come on, we're gonna get to the top floor a different way!"