Marinette could still recall all the days and nights she spent thinking about her friends’ betrayal. Stressing and crying over just how quickly they turned on her, wronged her, and made her out to be the villain. Despite everything.
In some of their cases, despite years of friendship. Kids who had grown up with her, who Marinette thought she knew as well as anyone ever could, who she thought knew her as well as anyone ever could. But Marinette was wrong. She was horribly, horribly wrong. And wronged. So badly wronged.
They had thrown away her friendship. Taunted her and bullied her, while claiming that she was the bully. The people that were supposed to be her friends damned her until Marinette was nothing more than a crying, miserable, mess. Cutting words had hurt more than a thousand akuma attacks. The entire situation had left Marinette friendless, alone, and a shadow of her former self.
No matter how hard Marinette had tried in the beginning, she couldn’t stop thinking about them, of how much it hurt. She had drowned so much in her feelings that every time she thought about it she was still surprised she hadn’t been Akumatized. She talked about Alya and Adrien and Nino more than she had when they were actually still friends; constantly on her mind. Especially after Marinette had returned from lunch to see her precious sketch book in pieces at her desk; the other students throwing vicious smirks at her. (“Should’ve been more careful,” Alix hissed at Marinette, ignoring the tears building in the bluebell eyes.) Marinette kept wondering what she could have possibly done to deserve this.
And the harder Marinette fought to not to think about them, the worst it got. Though actively plotting their downfalls, probably hadn’t helped the situation. But it did make her feel a bit better. Even more so, when the plans when into effect.
She could still remember Alya’s face when Aurore had unleashed her new website: Miraculous Nation; a tell-all news site for everything related to Paris’ favorite heroes. Its first release? An exclusive interview with the entire new team miraculous (with a little TV magic, and miraculous magic, to edit Aurore and Icefox into the same interview.) Marinette had used her connection with Nadja to get help to rent an empty studio big enough to do the interview in a professional way. Nadja, of course, wanted producer credits. The interview answered all the big questions:
Aurore relaxed in her seat like she wasn’t doing the biggest interview of her career. “So I guess, we should start with the questions that’s been on everyone’s mind thank to a certain nasty little blog. What’s with the replacements? What happen to Rena Rouge? Chat Noir? The turtle guy? Why the change?”
Ladybug: Rena proved she couldn’t be trusted outside the mask. The fox is the master of not just illusion but truth. She fell quickly to someone else’s illusions and willful blinded herself from the truth hurting an innocent in the process. She is no hero.
Chat Noir: The Old Alley Chat proved too immature for the mantle. He is the balance of Ladybug, and he was unable to show that.
Queen Bee: Who’s care about the turtle?
Aurore’s blue eyes narrowed, “Ladybug; Rumors have persisted for years that you and the old Chat Noir, I’ll call him Alley Chat for simplicity’s sake, have been in a relationship or at least dating. Did a bad breakup have anything to do with the replacement?
If Ladybug hadn’t been prepped and or written the questions herself, she would’ve bit the head of the journalist who dared imply anything of the sort. “I would like to state this as clear as possible,” Ladybug looked directly into the camera. “Chat Noir, correction Alley Chat, and I have never and will never be romantically involved. These lies have been instigated by the paparazzo that is the Ladyblog. If they had bothered before releasing any of the information, I would’ve corrected them.
