A/N: Welcome to my latest mistake.

There's a lot one can say about moving to a new country.

You could comment on the dramatic shift in culture. Perhaps what is legal in one place isn't so in another. The people surrounding you are almost certainly different to what you'd grown to expect.

"Holy shit, France is fucking cold in the winter."

Of course, the obvious is always a solid option to take. You would almost never be wrong, and it's a great way to break the ice. Maybe I could use it to bust my way out of the snowdrift I'd managed to fling my rental car into.

It was my own fault, really. I shouldn't have demanded that the woman behind the counter give me the cheapest piece of shit they had, provided it could get me to my new address in Paris. I think the English may have thrown her off, because she obviously didn't fucking understand my request all too well.

Now here I was, an Aussie hardened in battle against wilderness and flames, huddling beside the smallest automobile imaginable to escape the gorgeous snowflakes that were in the air. Nothing to keep me warm except a psychology degree that was apparently completely useless in my home country, and a vague understanding of the French language at best.

So, fair to say that this day sucked. But it always could be worse.

At least the butterflies were pretty.

XxX

"Ice is such a bother, is it not?"

The voice flooded through my mind like molten chocolate that had been dipped in gravel. I poked my head out of the fluffy confines of my jacket, taking a moment to cross my eyes and decide that, yes, that was a strange neon outline wrapping around my face.

The road I was broken down on was by no means uninhabited, but there weren't all that many people around. All I could see were a few more cars in the distance, and a woman walking down the street towards me. She stopped dead in her tracks when I caught her eye, took one look at my face, and twisted on her heel, running back the way she had come and screaming some foreign word all the way. I guess she wasn't the source of the grumbling baritone I'd heard.

So, had I imagined it? Odd. I could have sworn that I'd already taken my meds earlier than morning. And even if I hadn't, then I probably wouldn't be talking to myself in French. But just to be sure…

"…Who said that?"

A wave of… something came over me. Even if I couldn't see it, I could still feel it crawling over my skin and hot damn the world sucked. Everything was horrible and my life sucked and oh shit it's just like when I was a teenager all over again make it stop-!

"I am Hawkmoth." That was the name of ultimate power. It was a very cool name and it would give me anything I could ever want and even thought the name could have been cooler like Sphingidae SERIOUSLY DID I MENTION HOW I WOULD GET ANYTHING I EVER WANTED IF I JUST LISTENED TO THIS VOICE? "You may think of me as a fellow hater of the snow, Wildfir-"

Hang on a second.

"Well, I mean, snow's actually pretty cool."

Much like vomiting after a great night out at a bar, the elated feeling of energy was leeched out of my body like air out of a punctured balloon. I almost fell over at the abruptness of it all, one moment it was there and the next it was simply gone.

"Did you just-"

"Yeah, I did, sorry." The voice spluttered while I leaned against the freezing metal of my fucked car. I got the feeling that it wasn't accustomed to being interrupted, but this was all in my mind and it hadn't even existed before now… right? "But you never see this stuff back in Victoria. Even if it's a pain in my ass, it's quite nice to look at."

All was silent for a moment. In that moment, I began to wonder if maybe continuing this conversation was truly for the best.

"Yes. Yes!" The voice rallied back, sounding far more confident as it went along. "Ah, yes, snow is magnificent, isn't it, Avalanche?"

"The name's Lukas, actually." Though really, you'd expect me to know that. Come on voice, catch up.

Kicking a leg up against the rental car, I gave my nails a cursory glance, dutifully ignoring a passing car and its inhabitants screaming about some lady and her blog. Fucking France, dude, what even. "No last name, I left that behind with the rest of my family."

The car that had just passed me honked its horn. I waved to them absently, in an attempt to convey that I wanted them to move on, which only got them to honk again.

"You… Ugh, tourists." Ohh, they weren't honking, they were screaming. That… made sense? "Look, that isn't how this works. You're Avalanche now."

It would be so easy to just be Avalanche. The world was in the wrong, the world had screwed me over constantly. I'd barely even managed to get off the plane before everything was going up in flames. I hated the heat. I hated the fire. The planet would be encased in a layer of frost that could be felt from the sun, if only I did what the voice wanted. It would be SO EASY-

I forcefully cut myself off with a sharp slap across my own cheek. The butterfly outline around my face dimmed for a moment, something I barely took the time to acknowledge as I started on one of the more basic breathing exercises I'd been taught. No mind-numbing hatred permitted, no brain power being dedicated to apocalyptic thoughts or plans. Those weren't allowed in my head anymore. So help me, me, do not make me come up there!

Hey, was the air feeling a bit warmer than it had been a second ago? Eh, probably just my imagination. I'd been told in the past that it was fairly active.

"Yeah, nice try, voice in my head." I rubbed the stinging skin of my cheek delicately. Was that a groan I could hear? "You sound cool as fuck and all, but I can't go around letting you and yours come up with names for me. My therapist said that it wasn't healthy."

"If you're going to sass me, at least have the decency to do it in French, you cur."

Okay, now he sounded mad.

That was still no excuse for me to take his abuse. Crossing my arms, I stuck my nose up in the air, giving no regard to the car that was slowing down as it neared me.

"I don't speak very good French, dipshit." I said, in perfect French. The car sped back up, and I could see the driver's tinted window winding back up as they passed me. "I can barely do English."

Yeah, that did it, I sure showed him… wait.

…What le fuck!?

"I tire of this back and forth, Avalanche. Go forth and fetch me the Miraculous, now."

I had an image in my mind of a tall man, wearing a ridiculous mask and even more ridiculous costume, rubbing at his eyes in frustration. He didn't look like he tolerated insolence or incompetence, which must have made the day he received his get-up incredibly awkward. Unless he made his own clothes, but, really, who did that nowadays?

"What the ever-loving fuck is a Miraculous?"

"Well, I could tell you." Great. Now the voice was being snide. Could I say welcome to France, or had I not lived here long enough to make that not racist? Was that rac- oh forget it. "Or you could go into battle with Ladybug and Chat Noir with the powers I'm trying to give you, and then you could see them with your own two eyes!"

A bug and a cat? Yeah, okay, I was going off the deep end.

"Dude, it's a bug. Just use a fucking pesticide or something, no need for miracles." I thought ladybugs were averse to cold, too. What the fuck kind of mythical land was my mind painting France up to be? "And what's this about black cats?"

"Good, you're getting angry." Was I? I hadn't even noticed. Time to restart those deep breathing exercises, I suppose. "You will be a powerful one indeed. Channel that anger, and do as I say!"

In, out. In… in… iiinnnn… and out.

"Nah, I gave up on anger. Too tiring." A bird in a nearby tree began to chirp. The chunk of ice that I broke off the window of my rented car and hurled at it just missed, but it did make it fly away. "You are beginning to annoy me, though. So, grats."

"Well then, channel that annoy-"

I yawned, cracking my jaw and effectively cutting off the voice for the second time in as many minutes.

"Nope. I'm done with this conversation." I leaned further into the freezing metal of the car, my survey of the landscape being cut short as something behind me groaned. I pushed myself off the side of the car, which turned out to be a quite large mistake, if the way a wheel fell off as it slowly tipped further into the ditch until it rolled over entirely was any indication. Shaking my head, I kicked the tire into the ditch with the rest of its useless parts.

Where were you on that one, physics?

"Fucking voices in my head, taking up my time when I should be getting this stupid car outta this fucking ditch." What could only be described as a light breeze blew through the area. The windshield of the car exploded inwards, as though a bomb had gone off. "Probably gonna lose my deposit on it…"

"If I get your car out of that ditch, will you repay me by taking Ladybug and Chat Noir's Miraculous'?"

Iiiiiiinnnnnnnn…

"Look dude, I've fought cats before. Little shits are vicious. So, I'm just going to call a tow-truck or something." Nothing was worth getting into a fight with a cat. Not even the potential benefit of getting to punch an asshole cat in the face, and there were a lot of asshole cats in the world. "Thanks for keeping me company through these trying times. And the impromptu French lesson, however the hell you managed that."

My sarcasm was powerful.

"You know what, I'm going to go find someone else to Akumatise. Good luck with your automobile."

"Thanks, Mothbro." I was just going to pretend that I knew what that even meant. Partly because I had other things to occupy my time with, but mainly because I really didn't give any iota of a shit. "Good luck with your stuff too."

"Yes, yes…"

The butterfly outline faded from my face. I could tell because it no longer hurt to keep my eyes open, what with the blinding light a few centimetres away from them gone, and a single glance into part of the car's shattered mirror proved it. Though speaking of the car…

I crossed my arms and looked over the damage that had been done. Let's see… missing tire, shattered windows and mirrors, filthy everything… As far as I could tell, it wasn't so bad. And of course, I chose that moment to blink, and in the milliseconds that my eyes were closed, the entire thing had managed to fall apart.

I took a deep breath, filling my lungs with the acrid stench of oil. Trying to take a step, I ended up kicking a flaming bolt that had been lying at my feet. The thing flew with inhuman speeds towards the wreckage, and the last thing I saw before the entire thing went up in flames were the headlights and licence plate, all twisted into what could almost be described as a portrait of agony.

I'd never seen the front of a car that was so expressive. Which also meant that I'd never seen a machine that looked to be in pain moreso than that instant.

An unholy shriek tore apart the air. It took me a moment to realise that it was the metal of the car's chassis crumbling apart, and not the Gates of Hell opening beneath my feet. Given everything else that had just occurred, I wouldn't have been surprised if that had been the case.

"Well, shit."

Guess I was walking to Paris.

XxX

The process in which I found my way to Paris was long and complicated. So long and complicated that I don't feel like writing it all down. Just know that it took a newspaper, a goat, and a strange woman named Tammy whom claimed to be able to see spirits.

The process in which I found my way to the small apartment I was renting was, in comparison, like trying to marry that goat. It was strange, complex, more than likely illegal, and I couldn't be certain that it had actually happened until I saw some conclusive evidence of my involvement. I was still waiting on that last one, and until it came, nobody could prove anything!

It started with me sulking in the snow for a little while, a process of about ten minutes. After that, there was a flood of red and black light, and the rental car was as good as new. Thoroughly confused and hoping that I would soon awaken from this fever dream before I froze to death in whatever pile of snow I'd fallen unconscious in, I'd set off once more.

A few twists and turns, a passing glance at a few monuments, a newspaper, a goat, Tammy, and more than likely some road rules broken later was around about when an old man in a Hawaiian shirt had leaped out into the road. I say leaped, because he was coming at my car with arms wide open like it was a friend he hadn't seen in years. I hit him before I hit the brakes, and he was able to give me directions through this strange alien city after I peeled him off the road. Dude must have been made of iron; he dented the fucking bumper bar.

"Left up the road, you can't miss it," he'd said. I'd missed it five times after that. "You're such a polite young man," he'd also said. I nearly accidentally hit him with my car again when I tried to reverse out of the parking space. He'd hobbled away after that. I wouldn't be surprised if there were police waiting for me at my new place.

Speaking of my new place, I'd finally managed to track it down. It was an apartment building in one of the more upscale areas, just down the road from a bakery that had some of the best croissants I'd ever tasted. It was seven floors of bright white paint, opening into a lobby was fairly basic rectangular shape. Paintings dotted the walls and comfortable enough looking furniture dotted the floor. A girl younger than myself, who was manning the counter, and a man holding a clip-board near the elevator were the only two people there, both looking equally bored.

The girl almost looked relieved when I flashed the card that had been sent to me in the mail, back before I'd left Australia. Apparently, if what she'd told me was true, it was my key into the apartment on the fifth floor that I'd paid a full month's rent for in advance.

I slipped the pen out of the man's hand and signed my name on the bottom of the page as I walked past, recognising the man's uniform as belonging to the company that had dragged all of my belongings halfway across the globe for me. His tip had been one of the Monopoly-money looking notes I still had left over in my wallet, with a '20' printed on it. He didn't look pissed off at me, so I could only assume that it had been an alright amount.

I'd opted for the stairs rather than the elevator, taking them two at a time. My door was three down from the stairwell opening on the right, a large '5-F' printed on the front and a little black box on the wall beside it. I trudged down the corridor slowly, straining my ears for any indication of neighbours; going off noises alone, it seemed 5-A was a meth lab and 5-D was hosting an orgy.

5-E may have been murdering someone. Or that was just the next level of the orgy, who knew.

Once I'd reached my door, I'd pressed my keycard up to the black box, for lack of anything better to do. A second later, the machine beeped, a small red light that I'd not noticed while I was walking up flickering to green. I'd pushed the door open, before curiosity got the better of me and I turned back around to glance at the neighbouring doorways.

5-B's light was the only one of the door I'd walked past that remained red. All the others were a slow, blinking orange, which I could only assume signified that the owners were all home. Looking the other way, I saw a small collection of red, a larger concentration of orange, and a green light cheerfully flashing next to an open doorway that had soft, classical music floating out of it.

I'd have to ask reception if it were possible to have my light be red at all times. Because, you know, people. If they knew that I was home, it might make them think that they were welcome. Which, ew.

The inside of the apartment was fairly simple. A small hallway led to a lounge room on one side and a kitchen on the other. Beyond the kitchen was a desk and table, overlooking the glass door that led to the balcony. It was all very open, aside from the bathroom tucked away in the back, and both doors on either side that led to the bedrooms. Why I'd put forth the money for a second bedroom, I couldn't tell you. Maybe just in case rent got to be too much and I needed a roommate, possibly? Hell if I knew why I'd done even half the shit I'd done in the past, but at least you couldn't really go wrong with having a second bedroom handy.

All the pieces of furniture were where I'd requested (and paid top dollar to ensure) them to be. Large, plush couch and an even bigger television, king beds, various appliances. The computer sat upon the desk, graciously hooked up entirely, though I'd be waiting until later into the afternoon to get the internet connected. All in all, it was fairly opulent; something I could be happy with, even if I wasn't entirely happy with what I'd done to get that far.

It also left me with very little to do, unless I wanted to go out and explore the City of Love a little. Which I wouldn't, because let's face it; I would need to see about refilling my prescription before I could confidently be around other people. I'd thought the dosage to be correct, but obviously, if I was both having audio and visual hallucinations to that level, it would likely need to be tweaked at least a little.

So, I had two options. Hook up all the gaming systems that I'd brought with me and leave this newest responsibility to fester until I could no longer contain it, or call the rental car company and plead my case. Considering leaving responsibilities to fester until I could no longer contain them was a solid chunk of the reason I'd had to flee- I mean move to France, now would have to be as good a time as any to test out the landline.

Even if the car wasn't in still in the ditch, there was the old-person shaped dent I would have to figure out how to explain. Maybe some blood, teeth, and hair too. Whoops.

"Nah, dude, I was super upset. Distraught, you could even say. Akuma?" There was that word again. Was it a verb? Adjective? Were those distinctions still the same in French? Eh, all I knew was that I was going to take this and run with it for as long as the foreigner excuse could possibly last. "Yeah, I was about to Akuma all over the place. No, no, I talked myself out of it, but you wouldn't believe how difficult that was."

I kicked my feet up onto the coffee table and snatched the remote from the couch cushion beside me. Cooking, kids shows, news broadcast, a superhero show with a woman in a suit commentating over it? Odd, not sure why that made the news, but whatever. Let's see, next channel was por- whoa, the package I'd chosen included the adult stations? Huh, guess that's what happens when you buy something in a language you didn't until very recently understand. Or I did understand it without realising, and that was why I'd chosen it in the first place…?

"Well, I mean, it took some deep breathing exercises, but I was just so angry with myself for swerving into that ditch." It occurred to me in that moment that I was contemplating language and the labyrinth of my own psyche while watching a young lady pay for her pizza via… shall we say, alternative methods. The saddest part was that I didn't think this was actually the first time this series of events had happened to me. What else was I going to consider, the plot? "What can I say, man? A runaway school bus full of puppies has that effect on people, I guess. If only I could have done more, those puppies wouldn't have exploded so hard that they became nothing more than mist."

Tragic, truly. What's that you say, 'the puppies or the fact that this is working'? Hmm, let's go with both for now.

Now where did I put that remote…?

"Tragic, truly. What's that you say, full refund?" I absently polished my nails on my shirt as the man on the other end of the line commiserated with my harrowing experience. "Thank you, thank you, that makes today feel a little better. What was that? Oh yes, it's parked right outside that building. You can't miss it, it's the one that's upside down."

…I was very enthusiastic to check out my new place. Shut up.

"Yes, I know, I know! A very big school bus, it was insane! Drivers these days don't know what they're doing!"

So the road rules were a little different here, sue me! Actually, don't, a few other people probably already had that covered.

Well, so long as I didn't run over anybody who had too much money, then it would be all good. Not that I ran over… that many… people…

Losing count is a good sign, right?

"Well, I have other things I must do now, so I wish you a good day." The scene on the television shifted, flickering and twisting away like the transitions of a PowerPoint presentation. It seemed to take the plot with it, as now the pizza boy was dressed as a plumber. Ma'am, I don't know how to tell you this, but I don't think he's qualified for this sort of work- aaaaand there goes his pants. "Yes, sir. Yep. Thank you for your time! Hahaha, indeed. Ba-bye."

I ended the call with a click, pulling the phone away from my ear so I could stare at it. Maybe I still was speaking a different language, because seriously? They believed that shit?

"What. An. Idiot."

Ahh, whatever. All the better for me in the end; having to burn through money quickly without making it look like I was doing anything suspicious left surprisingly little over in terms of funds. Sure, this place had been paid forward for a month, but I still needed to eat. 'Akuma' must have been some sort of insurance company or something, with a CEO that had way too much money and not enough ways to spend it.

Before I could ponder that any further, I heard a noise. It almost sounded like someone trying to smother a laugh by making it sound like a cough. A second later, it was followed up by three small taps, soft and yet audible over the T.V.

Someone was knocking on my door.

I shook my head, glancing around for the remote. The floor, nope. The couch, nope. The coffee table, nope. The tapping came again after about ten seconds, and with a shrug, I peeled myself off the couch. I suppose worse things could be blaring out of my surround sound system while meeting the neighbours for the first time, even if I could think of any in the moment. At least it wasn't overwhelmingly loud?

Well hey, it could be worse. For the moment, the woman had been gagging- I mean… For the moment, the woman no longer had the option to… speak her mind.

I reached the door just as the third set of taps were beginning, swinging it open perhaps a bit more aggressively than what was truly necessary. I could do this, I knew I could. It was just… people. I was a young, attractive man of 21, and I could totally hold one of those conversation things with that talk line that partway cut through the bottom of my head. Who cared if there wasn't a phone between me and the other human creature? I sure didn't!

I stared straight ahead, one hand still resting on the door handle. I then looked to the left, staring down the corridor for any trace of a person. There was nobody there, just as there wasn't anybody there when I glanced to the right. Damn kids and their practical jokes, of course those little shits would be universal-

Someone cleared their throat before I could close the door fully. By the sounds of it, they were extremely close. My arm froze, holding the door in place as I slowly looked down.

A very short, very familiar Asian man in a Hawaiian shirt was staring back up at me. He looked far too amused for my tastes, especially considering I could probably step on the entirety of him in one go if I tried hard enough.

"May I come in?" He asked, no pomp or circumstance. Just a regular old question that people ask.

I opened my mouth, to ask him who exactly he was and what he wanted and oh shit he's here for revenge I knew I should have hit him harder, when something chose that moment to interrupt me.

"Ugh, yeah, clean my pipes! Yes! YES!"

The cry echoed out around us and down the corridor. The classical music coming from the other end abruptly stopped, the door slamming shut a moment later.

Throughout it all, I refused to break eye contact, because that may just have been the only thing I had left.

"…I'd prefer we remained out here for a little while, personally."

The man's calm smile stretched just a little bit wider. The little fairy thing hovering right beside his head let out a small chuckle, looking me up and down appraisingly.

Yeah, laugh it up, you little bug looking freak. My hand's been known to slip in the past, if you catch my…

…Wait. What?

A/N: As you can probably imagine, this isn't going to be the most serious of stories.

I can't wait until we get to the puns.