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Alya stared moodily at her phone with the Ladyblog pulled up. She was in the process of purging her beloved blog of any mention of that liar. How had she missed it? Marinette had tried to warn her, so many times. Why hadn't she listened?
It had all started yesterday afternoon, when Nino had shown her a magazine that was holding a contest for amateur journalists. To celebrate one year of being protected by superheroes, they were asking people to write in about their everyday heroes. Winners would be published in a special edition in September, with a possible internship as the grand prize. Apparently Adrien had seen it the day before and immediately thought of her, but he was busy with fittings all day so he sent it with Nino.
Alya had been thrilled. A chance to be published in a real magazine? And maybe land an internship? Sign her up! And naturally she had thought of Lila. She did so much charity work, sometimes Alya was a little worried the other girl would burn herself out. Lila worked so hard, and struggled so much, she deserved some recognition. She just needed to find some official sources to pull quotes from. It shouldn't be too hard.
Except, the more she looked into things, the more she realised there was nothing to find. Lila wasn't involved with any of the things she claimed she was. Half the charities she talked about didn't even exist, and the rest had never heard of her. When she asked the other girl about it, Lila had blustered something about "how could you accuse me of lying," and "did Marinette put you up to this?" before turning on the waterworks and running from the room. And then Lila had been akumatised - again, according to Ladybug. Who had also confirmed that Lila was, in fact, not her best friend. That title belonged to a beaming Chat Noir.
By the time it was over Alya had almost been ready to question if Lila was even Italian. How had she not picked up on all the blatant lies? What else had she not noticed?
How was she ever going to make this up to Marinette?
Alya deleted another mess of an article with an aggravated sigh. Hours of research wasted looking for proof of something that was never real. Add in the akuma it had sparked and Alya wasn't even sure she wanted to bother with the contest anymore. Not like she had anything to write about anyway.
"Alya?"
Alya glanced up. "Hi Adrien. Done with your fittings?"
"Yeah. All done. I hear I missed some excitement."
"Yeah." Alya frowned moodily back at her phone. For once she was not eager to talk about the latest akuma and subsequent superhero sighting. How had she missed it?
Adrien sat down next to her. "Are you OK?"
"I'm fine." Another video to delete. Why did she have so much on here about Lila? What had she been thinking?
"Um, OK. Did Nino show you the contest? How's your entry going?"
Alya sighed and put her phone away. "I'm not sure if I'm going to enter."
"Why not? I thought you'd enjoy something like that."
"Oh yeah, when Nino first showed me the thing I was totally excited. But it turns out Lila was just a big fake. That was the excitement you missed by the way. She's not involved with any of the charities she's always talking about, she's not friends with Ladybug, and I'm not sure if anything she's ever said to me was true at all. It's gonna be hard to write an entry when I don't have anyone to write about."
"..."
"Yeah, so I might not enter after all. Thanks for thinking of me though."
"...There's a contest to write about everyday heroes and your first thought was Lila?"
Alya frowned at the bewildered look on Adrien's face. "Yes. Who else did you think I was going to do it on?"
"Marinette."
"...What."
"She's always going out of her way to help everyone, never asks for anything, she's kind, talented, and generous. She's everything a hero should be. I mean, who better to write about than our Everyday Ladybug?"
Alya blinked. Blinked again, the cogs in her mind turning. Then a grin spread across her face. "Our Everyday Ladybug, huh? Can I quote you as saying that?"
"Sure," Adrien beamed. "I can't wait to read the article when you finish it."
"Thanks Adrien!" Alya grabbed her stuff, the new article already starting to take form in her mind. She had a whole new round of research to get started on, and no time to waste.
When September rolled around she proudly showed off her newly published article. She had won third place.