Miraculous Team ✔️

17

Seeing that there was no way her friends would let her go on her own, Marinette invited Alya and Nino to a tea party named operation-steal-pilot's-glasses-without-crashing-the-plane-and-dying.

Adrien tried not to show his disappointment when he was left behind. But he knew his lady wasn't stupid. He needed to stay away far away from the akuma as possible. Alya, Adrien and Nino took off their miraculouses and hid them in the highest cupboard.

"Be bloody careful, kid." Plagg blurted out before Adrien took off his ring.

"You'll be safe in there." Adrien replied.

"I'm talking about you."

Plagg's affection was as rare as chicks hatching out of supermarket eggs. Adrien smiled fondly at his kwami.

"I'll be careful." He reassured him, "See ya later."

Chloe had transformed. If the akuma decided to barge in, she would paralyze him. Marinette stood at the curtain, feeling like Iron Man leading The Avengers.

"You sure you're up for this, Alya?" Nino asked.

Alya lightly touched her injured shoulder, moved it around and nodded. "It's a shame I can't videotape this for my Ladyblog."

The pilot jolted when the three teenagers stepped in.

"Hey." Marinette said casually, "Chloe said we could watch you fly this beauty."

"What are these controls for?" Nino asked, edging towards the cockpit. Marinette raised him a youre-moving-to-fast eyebrow but said nothing.

"Oh they're nothing much." His voice was oddly hoarse, "Don't touch them."

"But they look pretty cool..." Nino trailed off.

Alya rolled her eyes impatiently and squeezed past a surprised Nino. She smashed her palm against the "autopilot". "Oops." She grinned.

Marinette immediately locked her arm around the pilot's neck. "Nino!"

Nino tried to seize the pilot's sunglasses, but the pilot packed a lot of strength for a little man. He struggled and managed to throw Marinette's arm off his neck. In the grappling, the pilot accidentally pushed the throttle levers in the middle of the tight space. To everyone's surprise and horror, the plane began to gain speed.

"I thought you activated the autopilot!" Marinette shouted.

"I did!" Alya shouted back.

Nino was several inches taller than the pilot, but feel intimidated when he caught a glimpse the pilot's bloodshot eyes.

"There's no autopilot, little lady." The pilot's voice had completely changed, "I tampered with it."

The pilot made a grab for Alya and stared down at her. "Where's your necklace?" He demanded.

Suddenly, a detransformed Chloe appeared and grabbed Marinette.

"Chloe? What-"

"He's sensitive to perfume." She whispered quickly, thrusting the pink bottle into her hands.

Marinette nodded so fast she felt like her head was about to fall off. "Go back to Adrien."

Meanwhile, Alya hissed in pain when the pilot gripped her shoulders. "For God's sake, let go of me!" Then a fist collided with the pilot's face. "What the-"

Nino rubbed his knuckles as the akuma fell to the ground. Marinette sprayed a cloud of perfume in his face. His eyes began to water and before he knew it, his sunglasses was gone. Alya had smashed it against the hard floor. Nino crushed the akuma in his hands. The sound it made was disgusting.

Instantly, Alya pushed the lever back to its original angle and spinned the control wheel back straight. Everyone sighed in relief, but they weren't out of the woods yet.

"Sir... sir!" Marinette gently shook him back into reality.

"What? Where..."

"Fly the plane!" Alya yelled in his face.

The pilot hauled himself up in a flash. He grabbed hold of the control wheel and checked all the systems. "Where the heck are we heading?" He exclaimed, alarmed, "What happened?"

"You were akumatized." Nino explained, "And I need to wash my hands." He skipped down the aisle.

"Woah." The pilot raised his eyebrows, then shrugged, "One thing off my bucket list then, I guess. I'll get us back on track to SF. Sorry about all this."

"It's okay." Marinette smiled a little.

She and Alya walked briskly back to the kitchen to inform the others of the success. Adrien breathed a sigh of relief and wiped his sweaty palms on his trousers when he saw them. Chloe detransformed again and reached into the cupboard.

"Thanks." Alya said, raising her hands to fasten the fox necklace back around her neck.

"Are you all okay?" Adrien asked.

Marinette nodded as Nino pushed though the curtain. "Another win for Team Miraculous!" He threw a triumphant fist in the air and chuckled.

"Team Miraculous?" Alya giggled, "Wow. Eleven out of ten for originality."

(A/N: Me at myself)

Alya stopped laughing and gazed at Nino, who was busy slipping his emerald bracelet on. She couldn't believe how quickly she had forgiven him, despite what happened just a day ago. Maybe he was just trying to help Mari. She realized, no matter what, she couldn't stay mad at him. Maybe it was something about his enthusiastic support for all his friends, or the look he would give her when he could tell something was wrong, or his words when he carried her away from danger and soothed her.

Later, when they all settled back into into their seats, Alya snuggled close to him.

"Hey, Nino?"

"Yeah?" He looked down at her.

"Aren't you gonna confront me about what I said to you yesterday?"

Nino tapped a finger on his lips, before answering. "No... I mean, unless you want to talk about it. You seemed troubled back then, I didn't want to make you feel any worse. And... deep down, I know you didn't mean it... Well, if you did, that would be, um, upsetting."

Alya touched his face with her right hand. "I didn't mean it. I was assuming things. I'm sorry."

"It's okay, really."

Nino grabbed hold of her right hand and leaned in. They had kissed a couple times before. But this was the best yet, because a few hours ago, Nino thought he'd never get to do that again.

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One couple fixed ;) Thanks for reading.

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