Work Text:
“You piece of shit! Stay put so I can use my RPG.” Marinette listened as someone who could only be described as an evil demon desecrated the street she was on. They giggled as they sent another missile from their homing launcher at Marinette's car.
She debated on disabling her voice chat. There was currently a very interesting individual in her Grand Theft Auto lobby, one who would not stop cursing and blowing up people’s expensive cars. And in Marinette’s personal opinion, she wasn’t a saint while playing this game (I mean. It is a game based around violence.) But she definitely wasn’t this crass while talking to others. She understood that there were real people behind the screen, so she kept her vocal comments to a minimum. Unless someone blew up her Ocelot Pariah, in such a case, the emotional stability of the perpetrator could not be guaranteed.
“Why would you blow up my car?! What’s wrong with you?” She unmuted herself for a moment to bark at the troll.
“Um, seriously? It’s GTA. Get over yourself.” The troll responded, their voice getting mushy at parts. Was the troll... eating while voice chatting and terrorizing her game session?
Either her body just got really hot, or her dad had cranked up the heater. Truly unnecessarily, it was already warm enough inside because of the ovens downstairs. A deep breath. “Bitch.” Marinette spoke with full force into her microphone, ready to make this nobody feel her wrath.
Not even a second later, “Oh, absolutely not. I’ll destroy you.” It seemed the troll swallowed whatever they were chewing, and locked in. Even the laughter stopped.
“I’d like to see you try.”
Marinette couldn’t remember when she fell asleep, but she could feel the deep ache of her neck and ears - of course she had fallen asleep on her chair. She winced as she pulled off her headphones, which had pinched a bit of her hair.
She could remember some parts of last night… like her blatant disregard of her parents' many reminders for her to go to bed. She could remember the anger she felt last night, why? She could feel a weight on her lap. She looked down and saw the cause: her Xbox controller. Oh jeez, it was probably on all night if she forgot to turn it off.
The console still had its signature X light brightly lit. It seemed to be in rest mode. The screen had gone to its screensaver, a cute little rotating Agreste brand logo. She pressed the power button on her controller to turn it on and then fully shut off the system.
The first thing that popped up was a notification on the bottom of her screen.
Friend Request Received
“Huh.”
FoxyCry2006
“Oh my god. That girl from last night.” Marinette realized out loud.
The nerve. The absolute nerve to add her as a friend after they spent possibly hours (Oh wow. She definitely needed coffee.) the night before just hurling curses at each other, shooting, and bombing.
“Your challenge is accepted!” She slammed down on the A button to accept the friend request and promptly shut down the console.
“Marinette!”
Bbrrrgghhh. Nooo. This... whatever she has her face laying on... It's so comfortable.
“Marinette. Get up."
A voice reverberates as Ms. Bustier knocks on her table. Her school table. Oh shit!
“I’m awake! I’m awake Miss!” She swings her head up and raises up both her hands in an effort to pertain innocence. Ms. Bustier gives her a solemn smile.
“Sleep better, this school doesn’t assign enough homework to have you staying up all night just to finish it.”
“Yes ma’am…” Marinette sighs while Alya facepalms. A shrill laugh is heard from the other side of the class as Chloe revels in her embarrassment.
"Ah, Dupain-Cheng..." Chloe hisses, "It must be difficult to sleep when you spend the night trying to figure out why your parents' bakery isn't raking in enough cash." Her rude comment was followed by her looking to her side at Sabrina, seeking acknowledgement, who gave two thumbs up. "Put those down, Sabrina," she scoffs, and Sabrina quickly shoots her hands down to her lap.
Marinette had learned not to take Chloe's insults to heart. As the years passed, she found them to get more and more personal. Talking about her parents' financial situation? Why the hell does Chloe care about that?! Regardless, she doesn't want to encourage the girl by getting visibly angered by what she said. So, Marinette employs a skill she has spent years honing: staying silent and not saying anything to counter Chloe's utterly ridiculous claims and insults.
However, her friends have not practiced that skill. And so, Marinette listens as Alya immediately speaks up. "Chloe, I think you wouldn't be saying that if you took the time out of your day to try even one of their baked goods." Alya looks to the other half of the classroom, past Marinette and downwards, so she can get a good view of the girl who's managed to piss her off once again by verbally attacking her best friend. She takes a deep breath, ready to name drop half of their damn menu in defense of Marinette, when she's cut off by a voice from behind her.
"Really! Their pain aux raisins are to die for."
Marinette knows that voice, and she knows that it belongs to someone behind her. Yes, she knows that Lila Rossi has just spoken up. But, since when did Lila know how her parents' pastries tasted? And an even better question - why was she supporting her against Chloe!?
"I..." Marinette sputters, and she wonders if it would be better if she just kept silent like before. No. She can't. It's too curious of a matter. "I didn't know you came over?"
Lila beams down at Marinette, and it sends a chill down her spine.
"I didn't! But I had no plans to go out last night, and I wanted something good, so I ordered delivery at noon. I paid the deliverer well, of course." Lila winks, and it relaxes Marinette a smidge. The girl may be a bitch, but at least she doesn't do the home delivery equivalent of dining and dashing. "So I know that Marinette's parents have a swell business running! And, well? The food is delicious!"
Marinette ponders the deliveries she set out for yesterday before she had the time to sit back and game. Three deliveries, to be exact. One to Nadja's, another to Jagged Stone, who was taking a break from his tour, and lastly, to a new customer who asked for the box to be dropped off outside, with the cash nestled between the apartment's door and threshold. They must have either really trusted the people in their area not to take the money, or just really not have wanted to interact with anyone, even a delivery girl. Geez, she couldn't remember the name for that order. Something starting with a... C? Ah! Cerise B..
But none of these people were Lila. And Marinette knows who the bakery serves. She knows Lila has never once come in to buy products or had them delivered. Which means she must be lying. Again. But why?
Chloe scoffs yet again, appalled that even Lila would hop on the in defense of Marinette bandwagon. "Ridiculous." She turns back to look at the front of the classroom, where Ms. Bustier has once again accepted that she cannot control her students when they get like this.
Alya leans over to Marinette with a huge grin on her face and whispers, "She didn't even add the 'utterly' this time."
It's a low enough whisper that Chloe doesn't manage to catch it, too busy pestering Sabrina for support. However, Marinette picks up a giggle from the back of the classroom. She turns from Alya to find that Lila is still looking at her, covering her mouth as she holds back laughter. Of course, not only is she as sly as a fox, but has the hearing of one too.
It was weird, though. Marinette could swear she recognized that same giggle from somewhere else.
After school, Marinette rushes her chores at the bakery. Her parents watch as she flies around the kitchen, mixing and kneading. She works well, but she's kind of out of it. Her mind is somewhere else. In fact, it's upstairs. Marinette thinks about last night and how annoyed she was over the video game, and part of her wants revenge. It's just a game, right? And it would just be evening them out if she hopped back online to mess with that troll.
The fact that the troll added her as a friend was excuse enough. She wouldn't even have to seek them out! And with that thought, Marinette finishes her chores and drops off her parents' last delivery of the day. At Cerise B.'s house again, actually, receiving her payment the same, antisocial way. Marinette wonders what would happen if someone took the cash before her. Would she have to knock and apologize? Would she get to see the face of their newest customer? Focus, Marinette! With the box of pain aux raisins left at the door, just like yesterday, she rings the bell and immediately leaves to take her bike back home.
Her Xbox calls to her, really. Marinette climbs the steep stairs to her room after buzzing past her mother with only a "Maman, I'm home!" and grabs her controller. She sinks her thumb on the X logo button and her console chimes in response, spinning to life. Within seconds, she's navigated to the friends tab, where she finds that FoxyCry2006 is currently idling on Fortnite. Not exactly Marinette's favorite genre of game, but she does have it installed!
The game loads up, and Foxy invites her to her lobby just a few seconds later. Marinette, honest to god, smirks as she accepts the invitation and joins her newfound online enemy.
Immediately, she notices that the girl is using a paid skin. It's Fishstick. Of course it's Fishstick. Of course Foxy spent actual, real life money on this game. Marinette has a few characters she got from the free tier of the Battle Pass, but she usually just plays as the default characters.
Something is off, she realizes. Last night was much louder. Marinette glances at the menu screen and sees that Foxy is connected to their team voice chat.
Marinette hurriedly plugs her headphones into her controller and slips them over her ears. "Can you hear me?" She wants to make sure Foxy can listen to every single thing she has to say.
"Sure can," the Fishstick player replies, "same grating voice from yesterday, if that's what you mean."
"Ugh!" Marinette realizes she's already fallen into her trap. "Get your headset checked, Foxy. Now, are we going squads, or what?"
"Hmm..."
Marinette listens as her opponent turned teammate (since they were playing a team game together) ponders if they should allow two other people in to be privy to their bickering. "No, let's just do duos."
"Seriously? I don't trust you to revive me if I get downed." She really doesn't. This was the same girl who spent last night ruining every expensive thing she owned in GTA, then laughing at her about it.
"It's alright, I'll help you since I want to win too. Trust me!" For a moment, Marinette believes her. It's no fun to lose in Fortnite.
As it turns out, Foxy lied. Marinette spent the next two hours having every gun above the green Uncommon rarity swept out from under her by Foxy. In fact, she couldn't even get enough ammo for the bad guns she did have, leading to her losing any shootout she got into due to her weapons emptying out. A pair of Seven Sliders? Forget it, Foxy would have already taken them. When Marinette was inevitably downed by someone, who wasn't even much better at her in the game, just more fortunate in their teammate selection, Foxy would come towards her and immediately clear out the assailants. Marinette would have a bit of hope in her heart that they could stay in the match! Foxy, having looted everyone she killed, would come pick up Marinette's character to take her away from the battlefield. Her savior!
Except, the time to put her down and revive her never came. Marinette ended up spending at least ninety percent of her time incapacitated on Foxy's shoulders. The last ten percent? Foxy would toss her off a cliff and try to aim for a tree. If Marinette didn't land in the tree and instead plummeted to the ground, Foxy would tsk and say "Oops!" But, if Marinette landed in the foliage and stayed alive, yet still downed, Foxy would stay put for a moment. She'd say "Oh!" and wait to see what option Marinette would take. Face the wrath of Foxy in the rest of her time spent alive or perish by crawling off the tree into the depths below?
Most of the time, Marinette would choose to hasten her death. Why? Well, when she decided that a life spent on all fours without access to her guns was worth living, Foxy would get entirely in her line of sight before spam using the Laugh It Up or Griddy emote, sometimes a mix of both, repeatedly until she ran out of HP. All the while, Marinette could just sense that the girl was snacking behind the screen again.
It was unenjoyable. Yet somehow, Marinette couldn't find it within her to stop. And the two spent almost every second of the matches they had together slamming on each other and their respective gameplay methods. Foxy charged into battle and needed Marinette's help all the time when getting overwhelmed with the missions she herself had chosen to take on. Marinette charged into battle as well, quickly facing the consequences of getting into fights with two other players while the best thing in her hotbar was an Uncommon SMG. Also, Foxy had taken to calling her "Jonesy," the name of the default characters she was using. No matter how many times Marinette corrected her with a reminder that her username was Ladybug themed, she was now Jonesy to this girl. Followed by her signature giggle, that is.
Matches pass by, with them racking up a grand total of two Victory Royales, only due to Foxy getting sick of guaranteeing their failures and finally letting Marinette get a bit ahead. After their second win, Marinette realizes her eyes are drooping.
"I think I'm going to hop off now, I'm really tired and it's like," Marinette checks her phone, "3 AM? Noooo!" She buries her head in her hands. She managed to stay up late yet again, wasting her time.
"What, you can't handle staying up at night?" Foxy questions, "You didn't have a problem with it last night. That was until I heard you snoring, though..."
Her face twists in sheer mortification. She snored on voice chat? "I'll have you know that what we got up to last night kept me awake so much that I ended up falling asleep in class! My teacher was totally annoyed with me!"
Foxy sighs, "I know."
"You know? Then why keep me up so late trolling me on freaking Fortn-" Marinette cuts herself off. Pauses. Takes a step back. Reconsiders, even. "What do you mean by I know?" Because, really? What does Foxy mean by that? How could she know what happened to her in class yesterday?
"Um, well," Foxy laughs again, but it's strained and uncomfortable. No. There's no way.
"...Lila?" Marinette tests the waters. If it's not her, then this troll will probably just laugh at her again and continue their borderline harassment over video games. Everything would be fine.
And then Fishstick disappears from her screen. A crackle and pop of a microphone disconnecting is heard, and Marinette becomes aware that FoxyCry2006 is no longer connected to voice chat. She's left the game, actually, and is offline on Xbox. Marinette knows because she checked.
It dawns on Marinette that for the past two nights, she's stayed up to ungodly hours to play video games with Lila Rossi. The liar, Lila Rossi. The Lila Rossi who pins her to walls in the school bathrooms to threaten her at least once a semester. The fact that Marinette kind of enjoys their rivalry is beside the point right now.
Marinette does not sleep well that night.
The next day, Lila walks into class with eyebags that are noticeable even under her makeup. She avoids locking gazes with Marinette as she makes her way up the stairs to her seat.
Marinette doesn't say anything about it. She couldn't, seeing as she looked to be in the same situation.
When class ends, everyone shuffles outside to get some fresh air. Everyone, except for Lila. Alya gives Marinette a small look of concern before leaving her, not before saying, "If you need a break from your... extracurriculars, let me know. Scarabella is always ready to make an appearance." Marinette wants to scream. Alya did not just reference her secondary secret identity while there was someone still in the room, let alone the person in question being Lila.
"Lower your voice!" Marinette yelps, "She's still here!" Honestly, she could cry. Maybe it would do good for her terribly dry eyes.
"You mean Lila?" Alya asks as she looks towards the back of the classroom. Marinette readies herself to respond, something along the lines of why would you call attention to her name too?!, but is cut short when she gets the girl in her sights.
Lila is, for lack of a better word, completely comatose. Her head is hung backwards, in a way that looks like it'll hurt when she wakes up. Her arms are slipping from their crossed position, and the best of all: Lila's kind of snoring.
Marinette doesn't feel so exhausted anymore. She doesn't want to be back in bed, nor does she want to close her eyes for longer than a blink. All she wants is one thing.
"Not a peep, Alya." The gamer stops her friend in her tracks. Alya rolls her eyes and exaggeratedly tiptoes out of class as a response, and it's enough for Marinette to begin her master plan.
Lila had started this. Sure, Marinette already struggled with her sleep. It was hard to balance everything in her life, not to mention the aforementioned "extracurriculars." It left her falling asleep in places not many people could. It had her rushing projects other students had the luxury of procrastinating on. It had her playing Fortnite for a bit of entertainment, for Kwami's sake! So this, what she was about to do, it really wasn't that bad.
Taking her phone out of her purse, Marinette slowly approaches the elevated back of the classroom where Lila is resting. It takes a moment to figure out the best angle. Why, there's so many choices. But she eventually chooses a good one. An angle that portrays Lila in her completely depleted state. With a cherry on top; a line of drool that won the fight to escape the corner of her mouth. It's perfect. Lila looks horrible, and it's a miracle that no one noticed enough to take pity on her and wake her up. Marinette takes the picture. It looks like something manifested by Gimmi themself. It also sets off the shutter noise on her phone.
Lila grumbles and Marinette starts to think that she should have muted her phone beforehand. There was no going back now, so she uses her grace period before Lila fully regains consciousness to book it the heck out of there.
That afternoon, Marinette delivers another small box of pastries to Cerise B.. It seemed her parents' new customer was really enjoying their products - enough to even leave a generous tip! Still nestled between the door and threshold, but Marinette appreciated it nonetheless. Her parents let her keep any tips from deliveries, and this was, well, a lot.
As she walked home, she pondered the possible uses of the money. New fabrics? Topstitching thread? Gosh - to add to her funds to save up for a serger! Marinette swirled these thoughts in her head until she got upstairs. And there it was: her Xbox.
This plan had been hatching since the morning. Now that she was home, she could take action. The first step was to wait for Foxy... No... Lila, to hop online. Marinette was scared she wouldn't, since the excess of gaming had caused both of them to suffer in class. Surprisingly, Lila was already online. Back on Fortnite. Perfect.
Marinette waits for her current match to finish before requesting to join her lobby. She puts her headphones on and smiles at herself. Just like last night, they were going to play Fortnite together again.
When Lila accepts her invite, Marinette chooses to be the first to speak up. "Hey Foxy, we can do duos in a sec - I just need to change something on my profile."
"Whatever you say, Jonesy."
Marinette's eyelid twitches. "Lila, my username is literally Ladybug78. Is it going to take me buying a new skin for you to drop this?" She asks as she unlocks her phone to continue her plan. She could technically buy a skin now without feeling too bad about it, too. Is Marinette really going to spend her hard-earned tip money from doing deliveries on Fortnite skins?
"And my username is Foxy, but we can't all win." God, Marinette can't wait for this to finish loading. Just a few more seconds! And hopefully the app doesn't crash - she cropped it perfectly...
It's done. "Whatever, Fishstick. Anyway, can you check my Xbox profile really quick?" She can barely contain her excitement. Her thumbs are quaking on the joysticks, and her face hurts from smiling so much.
"For what?"
"You'll see."
A second. Two seconds. Three? Seconds?
"What the hell is this?!" Lila hollers into her microphone, and Marinette bursts out laughing as she promptly lowers the volume going into her headset. Any more of Lila's howling, and Marinette might actually develop the tinnitus Lila lies about at school. "Marinette! What the fuck!"
She literally can't hold it in - "Don't!" Marinette manages to get through as she runs out of breath, "don't leave! It's so funny!"
"How the hell do you have this picture of me?" Lila shrieks, "Get rid of it! How many friends do you have on Xbox? Do any of them know me?! GET RID OF IT!"
"You fell asleep in class yesterday!" Marinette sets down her controller to grab at her face. Her cheeks are violently sore, but she can't stop smiling. "I just - I had to do it!"
Lila's breathing so hard the microphone picks it up, and it just makes Marinette laugh harder. "How much do I have to pay you for you to change this profile picture?"
"I'm sorry, Lila," Marinette closes her eyes and celebrates her personal victory. "It's priceless."
"I shouldn't have given you that huge tip."
For the second time in two days, Marinette's brain short circuits.
"... Cerise B..?"
"Fuck!" Lila shouts as Marinette watches her disconnect once again.