The Killing Room

By: Lara Winner

DISCLAIMER: I don't own Miraculous Ladybug.

A.N. – This story contains graphic depictions of sex, violence and character death. There are also vague mentions of rape both directly and implied. Take the warnings seriously.

This fic will not be everyone's cup of tea. If you watch shows like American Horror Story and movies like Boondock Saints, Seven Psychopaths, The Watchmen and anything by Quentin Tarantino then you'll probably enjoy this mind fuck of a story.

If you want rainbows and unicorns and perfectly well adjusted individuals… please for the love of all that is fluffy GO READ SOMETHING ELSE!

You have been properly warned.

The first corpse was found floating face down in the Seine. The girl was identified as Rose Lavillant, she had just turned sixteen. Despite the gruesome mutilation of her body the coroner ruled cause of death as exsanguination.

The second body was discovered ten months later in a shallow grave at an abandoned construction site. Her name was Lila Rossi and she was the nineteen year old daughter of an Italian diplomat. The press had a field day with speculations but the police could find no leads. The cause of death was exsanguination.

The third body was found in a dumpster. The young girl was never identified. Cause of death was exsanguination.

And so the list went on; all young girls, all drained of blood and their tortured bodies discarded. The only thing that linked the murders was the cause of death and the trademark way the killer would wrap the corpses in high-quality silk sheets before dispensing with the remains.

The press dubbed the serial killer "Hawk Moth".

Adrien kept pace with her from the shadows, watching as she toyed with the strap of her backpack nervously. Her blue eyes were wide, darting around the unfamiliar alley as the setting sun cast her pale face in a sickly yellow glow.

"I know you're there," she called out bravely, tucking a stray lock of midnight hair behind her ear. "You can come out. I'm not scared." Her voice wavered.

She looked child-like, much younger than she should, as she scuffed a sneaker clad foot against the damp concrete. She was alluringly innocent; it made for an irresistible target, especially when she hunched in on herself as thunder rumbled in the distance, the harbinger of more rain to come.

Rain was good. It washed away evidence and excess blood.

A sinister chuckle broke the tense quiet as a tall and muscular figure came to life from the encroaching darkness. The man's face was cold, his greasy hair slicked back and his beard streaked with grey. There was hardness in his beady eyes and a cruel set to his bland smile.

Adrien waited, watching the hunter and her acquired prey with building anticipation, his fingers flexing and his muscles ready to spring.

"I was hoping it was you." The girl smiled knowingly, all traces of false timidity falling away as the backpack she carried fell by her feet with a dull thud. "I've seen your face all over the news," she told the older man, wagging a finger at him reproachfully, "You've done some very, very bad things Pierre Dubois"

Her eyes flicked to Adrien's hiding spot. That was his que. He moved soundlessly.

The man started at the use of his name. "What the fuck are yo-"

Adrien didn't let the man finish his question; answers would come in due time. Instead he was ruthlessly efficient when he slung an arm around the man's neck from behind, crushing the fucker's windpipe as he pressed the chloroform soaked handkerchief over the man's mouth and nose with his other hand. The man flailed his fists wildly, a few blows glancing his sides. He didn't feel them.

When the man finally fell into an unconscious heap at his feet, she grinned. "I've been dying to get my hands on this one." She was excited, practically bouncing in place.

"I told you we'd find him, LB." Adrien smirked cheekily. "We always do."

Adrien Agreste was seven years old the first time he realized his father was not well.

Finding Gabriel Agreste finger painting his latest design inspirations on the wall of his study in a rust colored, sticky paint; Adrien had giggled and wanted to help. Gabriel smiled and told him to only paint what he wanted more than anything. So Adrien painted a stick figure of his mother because he missed her so much. When he explained the picture to his father, Gabriel flew into a rage.

It was the first time his father struck him.

The dingy room was nondescript, fairly small and lit by a single bulb light. Beneath the light was a white metal chair, rusty and worn in spots with chipping paint and the blakish stains of old blood.

Pierre was tied to the chair, barbed wire wrapped securely around his wrists and ankles. This was punishment. It was meant to be painful.

Marinette sighed, "Okay, I'm tired of waiting. Wake him up please."

Adrien nodded, ever willing to follow his lady's bidding. He perused the contents of her backpack that was spilled out upon the rickety table tucked against the wall, carefully going over the various instruments until he found one that would serve his purpose. Hefting the taser in his hand, he flashed his partner a questioning look. "This okay?"

Marinette beamed prettily, her eyes sparkling as he pressed the arc of electricity into the man's gut. The fucker came to with a scream. Adrien flicked the device off.

"Fuck you!" Pierre hissed, his muscles still twitching, spittle clinging to his lips. "I don't know what you want but I won't give it to you. Fuck you! You hear me! FUCK YOU!"

Adrien laughed. "The others started off as tough guys too. But they begged and pleaded to die before our work was done." He leaned down slightly, looking the fucker in the eye. "In the end, you will too," he said pleasantly.

Pierre struggled violently against his bonds, enraged. A pool of crimson began to form on the floor around his feet.

"Do it again, Chaton." Marinette said, coming to stand at Adrien's side, slipping her arm possessively around his waist. She leaned up and pecked a quick kiss to his cheek. "I'll tell you when to stop."

His only purpose was to make her happy; it was what he existed for.

Obediently Adrien turned the taser on. Her smile only grew as the fucker began to convulse. She laughed, light and airy, when the fucker pissed his pants.

Adrien was ten when he recognized the face of Hawk Moth's latest victim plastered all over the news. He'd seen his father escort the pretty blond into his office. He never did see her come out.

Adrien was twelve when he caught his father hefting a suspiciously large bundle wrapped in silk bed sheets into the plastic lined trunk of his personal sports car. He hadexpected Gabriel's temper to explode and he tensed in anticipation of the pain, but instead his father had simply stared at him with an unnervingly blank gaze.

"You become a man the moment you face your own mortality. Remember that, son."

Then Gabriel slammed the trunk closed but not before Adrien saw a delicate, blood spattered hand sticking out from the cocoon of silk. He didn't sleep that night.

The screaming was becoming wearisome.

The snap of a breaking bone echoed off the walls and Pierre cried out. Marinette adjusted the pliers to his next finger, blowing lose strands of hair out of her face as she braced her hip against the fucker's shoulder for leverage. Using both hands she jerked the pliers and another sharp snap reverberated throughout the small room. Pierre yelled, his body bowing in the chair, the barbed wire at his wrists and ankles fully imbedded in his flesh.

"Why?" Pierre choked pathetically, his deep voice raspy from overuse. Marinette just started at the man, her face blank and her eyes far away.

Adrien knew she wouldn't answer. Just like he knew her mind was no longer in the room. She was reliving another time and place, years ago, rewriting her history in the torment of now. It was different for him though, he didn't dwell much on the past, there was nothing there he needed. As long as Marinette wanted him he would be by her side, immersed in the present.

Because his Lady was enjoying herself, Adrien decided to answer. "Haven't you figured it out? Hell isn't a place you go when you die. It's a state of existence." He rolled his eyes when the fucker whimpered. "You deserve this, quit being a fucking pussy."

His words were punctuated by another loud snap.

Adrien was thirteen the first time his father punished him with a pair of brass knuckles. It quickly became Gabriel's favorite method of discipline. But he never left bruises on Adrien's face. That was bad for his son's modeling career.

"Please… please stop… please…"

The scent of burnt flesh was unpleasant and Adrien smirked at Marinette's wrinkled nose. Still, his focus didn't waver and neither did the flame from the cheap lighter as he held it to Pierre skin. With each spot that blistered and charred he moved onto the next unblemished area.

"Please…" Pierre sobbed, his body trembling from head to toe as tears and snot ran down his sweaty, pale face.

"I don't know." Marinette tapped her chin thoughtfully. "Did you stop when you raped that nine year old little girl? I'm sure she begged you not to hurt her. I bet she cried for her mama too. But you didn't offer her mercy. None of those girls that you violated deserved what you did to them." Marinette's eyes turned hard as ice. "So tell me, why should we stop?"

"I… I never… killed no… nobody," the fucker gasped between shrieks.

"Just because your heart beats and your lungs breathe doesn't mean you're alive." Adrien replied. "What you did to them will haunt them for the rest of their lives."

Tossing the lighter back onto the table, Adrien motioned to the switchblade sitting near the edge. Marinette handed over the sharp knife with a giggle as Pierre began shaking his head frantically.

"No no no no, fuck! No no please…"

"LB, hold his head still. I don't want to mess the letters up."

Slamming Pierre's head back, Marinette grasped his beard with both hands, bracing his scraggily face with her forearms. Tongue peeking out the side of his lips in concentration, Adrien began to carve words into his cheeks and brow, sinking the tip of his blade into the fucker's skin deep and true.

Abuser

Rapist

Monster

When he was done Adrien looked up at Marinette seeking approval. She came around from behind the chair and pulled his face down to hers, kissing him sweetly; neither caring that in doing so she'd smeared blood all over his jaw.

Adrien was sixteen when Hawk Moth's body count began to get out of control. It was around the same time he'd found a bloody hacksaw in the laundry room sink, bits of bone and gore still stuck to the blade. He washed away the evidence before it was discovered by the maid, but all the while his hands shook and his stomach turned. The next morning he placed the cleaned murder weapon on his father's office desk as he left for school.

"I think he's going into shock," Marinette complained.

"Then we better get this done," Adrien replied. He held out the rusty saw blade in offering. "Do you want the honors?"

"Yes, please."

He stepped out of the way, handing Marinette the weapon and hopping up to sit on the table, kicking is feet back and forth as she showed the weapon to Pierre. The man's black eyes darted about desperately as he moaned pitifully around the bloody rag shoved in his mouth. It was hard to beg and plead without a tongue.

"As much as I would love to kill you, I won't." Marinette patted the fucker's cheek, her fingers glistening red in the meager light. "But I am going to make sure you never rape another little girl again." She popped open the button on his piss stained jeans, lowering the zipper slowly, looking the broken fucker right in the eyes so that the piece of shit knew what was coming.

She was vengeance. She was wrath. In that moment Adrien couldn't remember a time when she was more beautiful.

Even covered in Pierre's blood.

Adrien was seventeen when he met the girl of his dreams. She was a transfer student that sat behind him in class, petite and cute with the brightest blue eyes he'd ever seen. Her name was Marinette Dupain-Cheng and she was light and laughter and everything good he'd believed gone from his world.

"Do you ever wish we could go back?"

Marinette's question was hesitant and Adrien looked up, frowning. The steam from her shower enveloped her in a hazy mist; she looked like an angel wrapped in white terrycloth leaning against the bathroom doorframe.

"Back to what?" He closed his physics text book, shoving course work and college deadlines to the back of his mind. He knew what she asked but needed her to clarify before they went there.

"To before... when we weren't monsters too."

Marinette always felt guilty after a successful hunt and he always humored her as she questioned her way through the aftermath of their volatile ethics.

"My life was shit before you." He swiveled the desk chair to face her and held out his arms. She crawled into his lap, straddling his thighs, her towel coming undone and pooling about her waist. She looped her arms about his neck as he ran his fingers up and down the warm, damp skin of her back, tracing her spine. "You're my everything and I wouldn't change that."

"Ditto," she sighed, dropping a kiss to his lips though her eyes were still worried. "I let him live."

He had wondered about that. "Why didn't we kill this one?"

"He never killed his victims. They have to live with what he did to them. Now he has to live with what we did to him. Eye for an eye."

Adrien frowned. "He deserves to die. They all do."

"So do we." She leaned in and kissed him again, pressing harder and nipping his bottom lip as she pulled back. "Still, we have to have standards."

"Letting them live is just asking to get caught," he warned. Not that he cared really; he had no intention of rotting away in a jail cell, he would die first. And the loss of the Agreste fortune was of no consequence, money and influence was just means to an end. The only thing he feared losing was the girl in his arms.

"We won't get caught. You're too smart for that." She winked.

Adrien didn't understand love, wasn't sure it had ever been shown to him. But that didn't stop him from wanting and needing Marinette with frightening intensity.

He nicknamed her Ladybug, a teasing reference to her spotted cell phone case, and kept her close, always within sight. He charmed her with his photogenic good looks and gentlemanly conduct; always the perfect friend- the only friend she really needed.

Marinette was beauty and perfection. He itched to touch, to take, to have; to surround himself in her softness and lose himself in her warmth.

But as much as the want consumed him that was the very line Adrien dared not cross. Sweet, lovely Marinette deserved better than the monster that lived under his skin, the demon that dreamt of violence and blood and gnawed at the leash that kept it at bay.

He kissed her scars.

It was as much a gesture of worship as it was of penance as Adrien trailed his lips over the jagged ridges of healed flesh. He flicked his tongue tracing the one that ran along her ribs, following its path down the gentle slope of her stomach. Marinette sighed, her tone muscles fluttering.

Gray skin, torn with muscle and bone peeking from under the ripped edges…

Her fingers laced themselves in his hair, her body arching against the mattress as he moved his mouth lower, nipping at her bellybutton. She tensed as he slipped two fingers inside of her, easing them in and coating them with her wetness. She gasped, such a similar sound between pleasure and pain that he stopped mid thrust.

Shaking fingers feeling for a pulse, a gasp of pain followed by a terrified whimper…

"Don't stop, please."

Adrien never wanted her to beg for anything. He pumped his fingers deeper, sliding in and nearly out, adding a third finger and sliding deep again. Marinette's whole body shuddered. He continued kissing her scars until they disappeared into the dark curls at the apex of her thighs.

Bloody fingerprints garish and dark against pale legs, underwear still hooked around one ankle, the pink cotton a blood-soaked mess…

Marinette tugged Adrien's hair, urging him up and then down to seal her mouth to his. Her kiss was urgent and demanding because his Lady had a knack for knowing when he was remembering that and she wanted him with her in the now, not in the hazy red of then. He let her lead him; by the head, the heart, the balls… it didn't matter. He was hers.

"Make me forget, please…"

Greedy hands, hungry lips and the plea echoed in tear-filled eyes, dull and empty and so very, very blue…

Adrien grunted as Marinette raked her nails down his back, her tongue curling against his and muffing his hiss of pain. She clawed at his hips and he obeyed, grasping her wrists and slamming them down to the bed, rubbing his length against her until they angled just right and then he slid inside her dripping heat. Bracing his weight on his forearms he began to thrust his hips, hard and controlled and just the way she liked it best.

Marinette came with a soft cry, her bottom lip pinched tight between her teeth. He continued rocking into her, harder and harder until she quaked beneath him again, another moan escaping as she crested a second time.

Tucking his face to her throat, Adrien gave into his release. Her warmth clenched tightly around him, the uncontrollable spasms milking him as the pleasure was almost too intense to bear.

Blood swirling down the drain in the center of the floor…

He coveted the memory because that time the blood wasn't hers.

Adrien was eighteen when Marinette went missing. Fifty-two hours into her disappearance he found her distinct cell phone in Gabriel's office, partially hidden under a bookcase, as if it had fallen there unnoticed.

It had only been a matter of time before Gabriel Agreste pushed his son too far.

Pictures were released on the news, likenesses of the assailants that had tortured serial rapist Pierre Dubois and left him for dead. Marinette watched the tv screen with a doubtful scowl, mildly insulted.

"We look nothing like that," she growled, her annoyance tempered with a touch of amusement.

"Of course not," Adrien agreed. "You're a thousand times more beautiful."

"At least we'll never be identified by those sketches," she sighed, turning off the television and curling up against his chest. Her bare skin was warm and inviting but her muscles were still tense. He toyed with her hair and waited for her to speak her mind. "When will it be enough?"

"Does it matter?" He tried to see their crimes from her perspective but he couldn't. Marinette was the only thing that mattered. Everything else, even the whole fucking world could burn for all he cared. He didn't understand how she could feel enough remorse for the both of them, even if it didn't last long.

Adrien supposed it was because she was a better person, inside and out.

"I don't know if it ever will. I.. I still dream about… him." Marinette trembled and he pulled her closer. "I still cower when strangers touch me. I still get nauseated when I look at myself in a mirror. Some days I can't even leave our flat… Maybe… I don't… maybe you should have let me die."

And he definitely should have died with her… but Adrien couldn't bring himself to feel bad about that either.

"I hate that I enjoy it," she admitted into his skin, tucking her face against his shoulder as if to hide from that horrible truth.

"You're looking at it all wrong," he reasoned, pressing a kiss to her hair. "We are doing Paris a service. We're doing the dirty work that no one else has the guts to do. We're fucking heroes."

"I don't feel like a hero."

Adrien pondered her words, an idea forming in his over-active and intelligent mind.

The fire that burned the Agreste mansion to the ground was ruled as arson and the official report stated the blaze was started by Gabriel Agreste himself as an act of suicide.

Even Marinette didn't know the whole truth; that while she clung to life in the hospital Gabriel had paid for what he'd done to her ten-fold by the time Adrien granted him death.

One expertly forged suicide note later, it was an open and shut case.

Adrien was a smart boy, even more clever than his father. And when Adrien's restraint finally snapped it only proved that once awakened some beasts would never be appeased.

The flat was dark and quiet when Adrien returned home from class. He tucked the box carried under his arm as he toed off his sneakers and dropped his book satchel by the door. "Marinette!" he called out but received no answer.

He found her seated on their bed, the blanket wrapped around her bare body as she stared sightlessly at the Parisian skyline out of the wall-to-wall windows that lined the north side of their bedroom. He suspected she hadn't moved since he left that morning. Sometimes she didn't stir for hours, sometimes it bordered on days.

Adrien crawled across the bed, coming up behind Marinette and placed the plain white box next her. Brushing aside her hair he placed a quick kiss right below her ear.

"I got you something while I was out today." He waited a moment but she remained unresponsive, her vacant eyes staring at nothing, not even blinking. "You can open it when you're ready," he sighed, dropping another kiss to her shoulder before leaving Marinette to her stasis.

Adrien wondered if there would come a day when she would lose herself in the labyrinth of her broken mind, a day when he wouldn't be enough to call her back. He wondered but he didn't worry; he had a plan if that happened, hidden and loaded with the safety on just in case.

Adrien had a contingency plan for everything.

Adrien had never considered himself a danger to Marinette.

A bad influence? Yes.

Baggage that she didn't need? Most definitely.

But it had never crossed his mind that she might feel the same consuming intensity to be with him, to have him like a fever under her skin and there to fill the ache between her legs.

Adrien had foolishly believed his affections were one sided. And he hadn't planned for that. He hadn't expect her to make the first move; to seek him out at his father's mansion and inadvertently hand herself over to a fate worse than death.

When he finally found Marinette, the sight of her so frail and broken made him realize that he could never be good for her, no matter how much he wished differently.

When all was said and done and Gabriel lay in literal pieces, Adrien had surveyed the carnage with a sense of numbness and new lease on his existence that he had no idea what do with. But the only thing he did understand was that he wouldn't allow Marinette so suffer because of him ever again.

The sun was just beginning to set when Adrien heard Marinette begin to move about in their room. He remained seated on the sofa and patiently waited for her to come to him. She was always a bit sluggish and a little disoriented after one of her episodes. He'd learned early on to give her space or she turned ill-tempered and violent.

While it made for great sex, sporting a black eye or a busted lip only invited unwanted questions he would have to excuse away for the next few days.

Marinette padded into the living room in noting but an old black shirt of his, the yellow, green and purple stripes that ran across the chest accentuating her pert breasts, her hardened nipples poking against the thin cotton. The bottom barely made it to her thighs giving him a peek of pale skin and wispy curls. A pulse of desire curled in his gut, his dick stiffening in the confines of his jeans.

"What are these?" Marinette asked, holding the box he'd left on the bed earlier in one hand as she placed the other on her hip. She'd stopped just out of his reach. His Lady was such a tease.

"Masks," Adrien grinned.

"I can see that." Her blue eyes narrowed shrewdly. "What are they for?"

"Consider them a precautionary measure. It's only a matter of time before the police realize that their incompetence is being cleaned up by a pair of vigilantes and we certainly don't need our real faces plastered all over the television."

"Masked vigilantes… huh?" She was clearly amused.

"Or superheroes. Whichever you prefer, Bugaboo."

Marinette rolled her eyes and took a step forward. Picking out the black and red mask, she twirled it around one her finger. "A Ladybug? Seriously Adrien, our image should be able to frighten a cold-blooded murderer."

His shirt rose up slightly as Marinette shifted her stance. He licked his lips, his cock twitching. "That's because no one has heard of Ladybug and Chat Noir… yet."

She took another step closer. "And your mask is a black cat?" He shrugged and she laughed. "Of course it is."

"You've called me Chaton for years. I thought it was only fitting."

His fingers itched as he willed her to take one more step. He was the cat always chasing his little bug and right now she was almost close enough for him to pounce.

Marinette Dupain-Cheng was tenacious. It was one of the many things that made her irresistible.

It took five months for Adrien to realize that he had seriously underestimated Marinette when he made the deliberate choice to cut himself out of her life.

Adrien shouldn't have been surprised when he returned to his modest flat late one night to find her waiting. She was perched on the windowsill, her back to the broken glass as the moonlight cast her face in shadow. But he'd known it was her. How could he not when she was all he could ever think about?

His black shirt was pushed up past her breasts, her rosy nipples erect and thrust out as Marinette arched her back against the sofa, her body bowing toward his. Her ebony hair fanned around her head, a startling contrast to the white microfiber of the couch and her flushed face.

"Harder…" she groaned, panting as she clawed at the arm rest near her head.

Adrien drank in the sight, memorizing every inch of her creamy skin, every silvery scar, every bead of sweat, savoring the moment as he rocked his hips slowly to penetrate her depths in a leisurely but steady rhythm.

Marinette was eager for the pleasure, always in a race to go faster and harder until her body caved under the punishing momentum. And Adrien enjoyed it too… but sometimes it was better to go slow and let the sensation build up until it couldn't be contained.

Sometimes he just wanted to have her at his mercy.

Using his hold on the back of her knees, his pushed her legs wider apart, adjusting his balance so she could brace her heels against his shoulders. Gritting his teeth, he pulled back to the point of almost slipping out of her completely before driving back inside, her tight pussy sucking him in greedily.

It was fascinatingly erotic to watch his cock stab into her pink, glistening flesh, slipping in as easily as knife through butter. Or through someone's guts. The blood tended to make it just as slippery.

Mariette whimpered and his fingers bit into her skin tighter, his white-knuckled grip sure to leave marks. "Touch yourself," he grunted, pushing in even deeper.

Her fingers delved into the damp curls, spreading her lips open as she used her middle finger to rub circles against her clit. She moaned, her hips bucking involuntarily.

Pleasure could be its own form of torture. Canting at a slightly different angle, Adrien thrust hard and fast, hitting that spot that made her muscles quake, smirking when her entire body shuddered from head to toe. He waited a few more strokes before hitting the spot again.

Marinette's breath stuttered out on a sob, her chest heaving and her breasts bouncing as she tried to move against him but she couldn't, he gave her no leverage. He pushed deep again and she bit down on her bottom lip so hard he feared she might draw blood. A tear leaked out the corner of her eye.

"Hold on," he commanded as he moved his hands to the junction of her thighs. Once both of her hands were clutching the armrest, he gave into the frenzy.

Later they would both be sore, Marinette with bruises in the shape of his hands and Adrien with material burns on both of his knees. But it didn't matter. He would always give his little bug what she wanted and this time he didn't stop until she screamed.

Bathed in shadows and moonlight, she'd asked him one simple question.

"How could you?"

There was so much that she could blame him for, Adrien didn't know how to respond. So he didn't.

Marinette had cussed at him then, yelling and screaming and pounding her tiny fists against his chest until her voice was as raw as her accusations. And he'd borne her anger in silence knowing that she had every right to be furious. But when she'd begged him not to leave her again, alone with nothing but nightmarish memories, and pleaded with him to touch her and make the emptiness go away, his resolve shattered.

So instead of setting his ladybug free, Adrien came up with a new plan. He would keep her caged by his side and nothing would ever separate them, not even death.

Adrien understood Marinette's thrill of the hunt. She enjoyed being the bait, facing the fear of being stalked and then running on the high of turning the tables on her prey and becoming the very thing that they feared. He supposed that in a way it was a twisted form of therapy.

He didn't like using her to lure out the sick fucks they targeted but he let her have her fun. Still, there was always the potential of it going badly, much like it did tonight.

This particular fucker had given them a little more trouble than the others. The spoiled son of a French politician, Etienne Savoie was about their age with a penchant for luring inebriated young women to their deaths and because of his daddy's influence he considered himself above the law and therefore untouchable.

It had been up to Marinette to chat him up at the hotel bar while playing the part of a recently dumped girl looking for an exciting fling. Adrien had to stay out of sight. While he didn't know Etienne well they had moved in the same social circles in the past and the fucker would definitely recognize him. It put their usual tag team style at a disadvantage.

At first Adrien didn't realize the fucker had slipped something in her drink. By the time he did, it was too late. Marinette was still lucid enough to let him into the hotel room, thankfully, or Adrien would have blown their little game to hell and kicked the damn door down.

It was incredibly tricky to move Etienne's unconscious body and keep an eye on Marinette at the same time but he'd managed. It helped that he knew Le Grand Paris Hotel like the back of his hand, especially how to avoid specific security cameras.

Adrien had never much liked the motherfucker, but now… it took all of his discipline to think of the big picture and not tear Etienne's throat out with his bare hands. But that just wouldn't do. They had plans for this one.

The torture of Pierre Dubios had been a warning.

The execution of Etienne Savoie was going to be the statement of the century.

Adrien was twenty the second time he let the monster inside come out and play.

He heard the sounds of a struggle coming from the depths of the alley. It wasn't the best neighborhood and not unusual but the echo of a sob, definitely feminine and frightened, stopped him cold.

Curiosity urged him forward. Excitement buzzed under his skin as he anticipated what he would find. The monster he was strained and clawed. The cowering little boy he had been wanted to run.

He'd didn't remember the man's face, wasn't sure he really looked at him at all. What he did remember, clear as day, was the girl's life fading from her blue eyes as the blood spilled down from the deep slash across her throat. And for one horrible second he wasn't in a seedy alley with a ruthless pimp and a dead hooker, he was back in his father's house in a hidden room watching Marinette bleed out on the white tiled floor.

Adrien stabbed the man with his own knife. He lost count of how many times. When he finally made it home, bloodstained and completely wired, Marinette had kissed his lips and stroked his cheek and told him was a good boy.

Once everything was ready, Chat Noir pressed the record button.

Ladybug strode forward into the camera's scope, her hips swaying lazily in a red and black spotted getup she'd designed herself, and roughly tugged the silk handkerchief that acted as a gag from Etienne's mouth.

"What's with the Halloween costumes?" he laughed easily but his eyes were too wide and breathing too shallow. "Okay, you've had your fun. You can let me go now." Ladybug stared blankly, repeatedly twisting the scrap of silk in her hands. Chat Noir smirked from behind the camera, the inhuman cat-eye lenses of his mask turning his grin into something sinister. Etienne paled. "You think my father won't find you? You'll never get away with this. If you let me go we can come to an agreement-"

Ladybug cut off his rambling, her voice as cold as ice. "Natasha Polansky. Marie Hotard. Emmaline Trosclair. Simone Michaud. Adrienne Lutz. Harriet Stuart. Menly Robichaux."

"Who are you talking about? I don't know those names. Release me now."

"Are you sure? You really don't want us to jog your memory." Chat Noir warned.

Etienne struggled against his bonds, gasping as the razor wire bit into his skin. They'd stripped off his blazer and dress shirt leaving him in his white undershirt. Rings of sweat were forming under his arms. "I have nothing to say," he snapped.

"Then I suppose you won't be needing your tongue," Ladybug smiled sweetly.

Killing was not something Adrien would say he enjoyed.

He was good at it. He was creative about it. He didn't mind feeling the warm blood coat his fingers. But he didn't do it for pleasure, or for fun, or even for righteous reasons.

He did it because he had to.

It was a compulsion and it had a will of its own and sometimes the violent impulse downright terrified him.

Adrien wasn't sure how Marinette managed to scrounge up a solid-wood baseball bat but he had the perfect idea of how to use it.

Etienne was shaking his head frantically, ropes of bloodied saliva flinging from his mouth as he cried out, unable to form words as he pleaded with his eyes.

Adrien ignored him.

This had to be done. Paris deserved to know that when the police failed Ladybug and Chat Noir would correct the problem and make sure that the punishment would most definitely fit the crime.

Bracing his feet, Chat Noir rotated his shoulders and practiced his swing, showing off a bit to make Ladybug giggle. He liked drawing out the moment. He wondered if Etienne was thinking of those young women and about their bright futures that were snuffed out when he decided to bash their skulls in. The fucker deserved every bit of this, he truly did.

His aim true, Chat Noir swung the bat at the fucker's left knee and still flinched as the resounding crack echoed in the small room. Etienne screamed, his leg from the knee down slanted at an odd angle. Posing for the camera Chat Noir kissed the bat and winked. Then he swung the bat again at the fucker's right knee.

Marinette had asked Adrien once if he had an end game in mind. She always wanted to know when enough would be enough.

He admitted then, to her and to himself, that they were only delaying the inevitable. The time was going to come when they would have to take themselves out of the equation. The only real uncertainty was whether it would be by choice or if outside circumstances would force their hand.

He asked her how she wanted to die.

She requested he make it a surprise.

It was Etienne's fault that he kept jerking against his sharp restraints. The fucker's wrists were shredded and he was losing blood entirely too quickly. They weren't going to be able to drag his punishment for as long as they had hoped.

Chat Noir caught his partner's eye and jerked his head toward the bloody and broken mess tied to the metal chair.

Ladybug pouted. "Guess we better wrap this up then."

"What'll it be, my Lady?" Chat Noir held up a gently worn hacksaw and a box of matches. Ladybug reached for the matches. He slid the container of gasoline over to her with his foot.

Ladybug doused the fucker with just enough flammable liquid to insure he would burn, grinning maniacally as Etienne writhed and wailed. She slid the gas can back, taking one last circle around the chair, her nose wrinkling at the acrid gas fumes.

"You have to pay for what you did Etienne Savoie. You murdered seven women. We don't care who your father is or how much wealth you have. You deserve to die." Ladybug spoke clearly and with authority as if reading a verdict in a courtroom.

Then she struck the match.

Chat Noir made sure the camera was lined up perfectly as the fucker went up in flames.

When the video of Etienne Savoie's brutal execution went viral Paris flew into an uproar.

Mayor Bourgeois ordered a manhunt. The police were put on extensive patrols. Time and money wasted on finding two self-proclaimed heroes that were not going to be found.

Even so, there were many citizens who supported Ladybug and Chat Noir, sick of the judicial system's habit of dropping the ball and allowing the guilty to walk the streets. But there were just as many people who felt they should be stopped, that they should be held accountable for their actions and brought to justice by the very laws the vigilante duo deemed incompetent.

Adrien didn't give a damn about the public's opinion. It was just bullshit from people who had never bothered take a stand. In the end it wouldn't matter anyway.

However, love them or hate them, one thing was certain. The warning had been given and the monsters that hunted the streets of Paris now knew there were eyes that dwelled in the shadows and the fate awaiting them could give a demon nightmares.

A.N – This was written in the spirit of Halloween and because I wanted to practice writing from the viewpoint of a crazy person. I've always been prone to writing angst and it comes the easiest for me. Humor is a little more difficult but still fairly easy. Writing from a psychologically disturbed angle is always the hardest mindset for me to get into and I wanted to see if I could lend this askew perspective to our little miraculous babies.

Even if you hate it, let me know what you think. Thanks for reading.