Hawkmoth was really becoming a pain in the butt now. For the past month and a half, he had been sending out akumas every other night, disrupting Ladybug and Chat Noir's sleep.
Maybe it wasn't the strongest akuma every time- in fact, most of the time, they seemed like bottom-of-the-barrel akumas, low on both powers and creativity- but that didn't change the fact that it dragged the superheroes out of bed and woke them up enough that they lost at least an hour every time. The akumas during the day didn't drop off, either, and between that and all of his civilian responsibilities and activities, Adrien was starting to feel more than a little bit spread thin.
It was exhausting, and he had to wonder how long he would be able to keep it up before he simply collapsed from exhaustion in the middle of- well, anywhere. At school, at a photoshoot, during fencing, in the middle of an akuma attack.
If he could make it to summer, Adrien was pretty certain that he could get caught back up again. But the problem was going to be getting to summer, which was still several months away. His friends were already starting to notice that something was wrong, and if they were noticing, then Adrien was willing to bet that it wouldn't be long before-
"Adrien, your last several photoshoots have been completely subpar. Your father is quite displeased with your work."
-his father's staff noticed, too.
Nathalie looked completely disapproving as she set a folder down on the table next to Adrien. A couple photos peeked out from the top. Peeking out from under the folder was the edge of another piece of paper, probably an updated schedule of what Adrien was expected to accomplish for the week.
"I understand that most of the photoshoots have been early, Adrien, but that's because we're trying to schedule around your other activities," Nathalie chided him, tugging out the piece of paper, and- yep, it looked like Adrien was right. Another photoshoot had been added, it looked like, and an additional fitting. Not that the fitting was really necessary, since the photoshoot was going to be with stuff he had worn before, but that hardly made a difference to the Gabriel staff. "Either we continue doing photoshoots before school, or we'll have to start pulling you out in the middle of the day to get them done while there's still decent light."
"No, then I'll fall behind!" Adrien protested, his mind already spinning with dread at the thought of how much more difficult keeping up with everything would be if he got pulled during school. He would have to stay up even later than he already was to catch up on the class that he was missing on top of what he missed during akuma attacks, and then- well, he could say good-bye to sleep, probably. "I can't miss class!"
