#lilas the character with no justification

[depressed-teacup-inc]

It’s the way derision is a legitimately awful episode for me

Hello, Hey, how y’all doing, I’m still grieving Luka, And it’s time for another miraculous episode review!

And lord I fucking hate this one!!!

So Marinette and Adrien go on pool date, and Marinette keeps having panic attacks over it, until she’s almost akumatized and has to dig deep in memory lane to not get Akumatized (and this is where the majority of this episode takes place)

So. I hate this with all my heart! This motherfucking show. Really just said “yeah guys, so all of Marinette’s creepy stalker behavior? Yeah guys it’s Chloe and Kim’s fault she’s like this it’s trauma and therefore she’s fine!”

…so let’s unpack this.

With Chloe, this is nothing new, the show keeps demonizing her and taking away from any nuance or chance she has at redemption, and the show needs us to some reason believe that Chloe (and Lila) is worse then the little abusive father terrorist in this show! Because they are probably planning on making her the next Lila in the show as Lila becomes Hawkmoth!

To the fucking point they decided to take her bullying from random mean comments and hun on a sit in season one, To fucking roaches in lockers and panic attacks!

And before you ask, no I don’t believe that every single character needs to be redeemed and complex (some people really do just suck) but the show takes that to an extremist degree! The show needs viewers to believe Chloe is more evil then literal monarch because if she got a redemption or had dimension (as she had in season 2) marinette by comparison looks awful and creepy!

To put a long analysis short, I don’t hate Chloe for being bitchy because I think everyone should be complex, I hate her for being bitchy because the show only does this to make marinette look like a saint in comparison, to the point that they will make child abusers look better then her, just so marinette can stay “the good guy”.

Now for Kim… THIS MOTHERFUCKING SHOW!!!

“Oh yeah kids ever wondered why marinette broke into Adrien’s house, harassed him, sniffed him, stole his schedule and personally belongings and information, hurt anyone that was a rival to her, broke into his house on multiple occasions, and literally got so many people akumatize from her selfish behavior? It’s because she was traumatized by Kim, who’s suddenly cruel, and it’s all Chloe’s fault!”

ThIS SHOW. LITERALLY BLAMED EVERY SINGLE WRING THING MARINETTE EVER DID (WHICH INCLUDES LITERAL LAWS BEING BROKEN AND SOME SHIT THATS ON CHLOES LEVEL OF BAD) ON “Yeah guys she has trauma PTSD, it’s all Chloe’s fault hehe”

And it’s just… so fucking upsetting!

Not only did the show demonize Kim (and everyone is just fucking buying it) out of nowhere to be this asshole (this is not the misguided himbo I know and love and I fucking hate it) the show basically erased every mistake marinette ever made under the guise of trauma, when it’s so fucking unfair and biased!

Like, by the show’s logic, if Marinette is justified for all the literal crimes she committed because of trauma, why not Chloe? You can easily just argue that her mom not being there is justification to committing literal crimes!

But the show won’t do that, because Marinette needs to be the good guy and can’t be wrong.

The show had to literally demonize and change characters entirely (boy in Lila episodes and specifically this episode) just to absolve marinette of any fault, and it’s just bad writing!!! The show doesn’t want to admit that marinette is frankly an awful person and will morph the plot around her to prove it!

Because reality is? Shit isn’t black and white! Even if marinette had this awful experience (which I will not minimize) it doesn’t justify the constant hurting and awful things she did to others, just like Chloe’s extremely bad childhood doesn’t justify her hurting and bullying others!

The show yet again just demonized and morphed the plot and characters to justify marinette, in order to make sure she’s always good and always in the right, so that they don’t have to change anything about the story, so they can drag on this show forever to make lots of money.

And frankly? I’m fucking tired of it.

(Also Adrien is officially nothing more then love interest, he’s out-of-character threatening murder on Kim because “marinette deserves people will kill for herrrr”)

[flightfoot]

Idk why alya is more blamed for putting Lila's lies on the ladyblog rather than Lila who was the one that lied in the first place. Like i always see in salt fics someone tells always something like "don't blame Lila for the this, YOU Decided to post the interview" like manipulation is not a thing Apparently? Alya was manipulated to post that, just like the rest of the class (though show has a flimsy writing to begin with but yeah, my point still stands)

Look, saltfics will regularly make up stuff Alya never did in order to demonize her, while just kinda ignoring that the behavior that's being deemed "unacceptable" is something that's ignored for other characters.

Like, just think about all the times Alya's demonized for getting Marinette to babysit for her, with her not paying Marinette or foisting the twins (and Noel, if she's having Marinette babysit while she goes on a date with Nino) off on her. You'll see a massive stink put up about how Alya's shoving the kids off on someone her parents haven't approved, how it's a massive betrayal of trust... but the thing is, we don't really have any evidence of that happening in canon? Nothing indicates that Marinette babysitting the kids for Alya is supposed to be some sort of secret, something that isn't allowed. And as for the pay, we never see ANYONE pay anyone anything for babysitting at any point so far in Miraculous, so that doesn't mean much.

Alya's babysat for Marinette a few times when Marinette was supposed to be babysitting Manon, so it might just be Marinette returning the favor. And as for babysitting someone else's kid without permission, while we don't see any evidence of Alya foisting that on Marinette, you know who DOES do that? Marinette. A couple of times, even. Once in Prime Queen when she accidentally double-booked herself and decided to resolve it by calling Alya over and tricking her into babysitting for her while she did the interview with Nadja (notably, Nadja was disturbed when Alya and Manon called into the show and Marinette was nowhere to be seen), and once in Simple Man, when Marinette scheduled herself to babysit four kids at once, then got a call from Adrien asking for help with his photoshoot, and she shoved the kids off on her grandpa against his will.

(Note: I don't think these things were horrible for Marinette to do, it's pretty common kid stuff. But it's illustrative of a double standard here).

Does any of this get brought up in saltfics? Nope. Because the point of demonizing Alya for shoving off babysitting on Marinette IS NOT to criticize the way the show handles babysitting. If it did, then Marinette would be the one brought up in those fics, not Alya. The point is to demonize Alya in order to justify punishing her. Any excuse is grabbed to do so, regardless of how nonsensical it is when you actually look at the show. There just needs to be a fig leaf of justification for it, that's it.

Back to the interview thing. I don't think "well this character was manipulated" is necessarily enough, it depends on how, exactly, the character was manipulated, what they were told, what they believed, what they were thinking, and how reasonable that thought process was. It's why I don't think "Zhan Tiri manipulated Cass" to be a sufficient explanation for Cass's subsequent attempts at murdering Rapunzel and taking over the kingdom in the Tangled cartoon: what we see of Zhan Tiri's manipulation doesn't track with how off the rails Cass went, with why she thought those actions were justified.

I still don't think demonizing Alya for posting that interview is justified though, because you know what? A 14-year-old girl believing this random new girl about being friends with a celebrity and posting about it on the school blog is not THAT big of a deal, it doesn't showcase anything except maybe some gullibility, which isn't that horrible of a thing for a teenager with limited life experience.

But I don't think the people really demonizing Alya for that, saying she was some horrible person for posting that interview who doesn't deserve to breathe in Marinette's presence and who should be banned from pursuing a career in journalism, are actually just THAT extreme on journalistic ethics, anymore than the people demonizing Alya for things she didn't even do with babysitting are THAT extreme on babysitting ethics. It's just an excuse. A reason is being found to demonize Alya, circumstances and double standards be damned.

[princess-of-the-corner]

The talk of Lila's potential Semblance reminds me of a completely unrelated character I came up with some years ago.

Meant for Bleach, the character's power is illusions that become more real the more people believe they're real.

I did this to make a character that has a justification for explaining what their attack does. Because everyone explains how their powers work in shounen. But this character wouldn't be explaining how their power works, they'd be explaining how they want the opponent to think their power works.

The biggest weaknesses were: having only human senses (plus eventual reiatsu sense) any character whose senses were different (Komamura the fox/dog person) or more refined (Tousen's incredible reiatsu senses and hearing) would notice something off about the illusion in that sense; and that it took a lot of power to fake doing damage to inanimate objects that couldn't believe in their attacks doing damage in order to sell the illusion.

The fun part is when they realized they could use their power on themself. Create the illusion they can fly? Well, so long as it keeps working, they definitely believe they can fly, so it becomes more "real." Want to run fast? The can move as fast as they believe they can, so if they start to believe someone else is faster, they will be unable to catch up.

Also, they'd use their illusions to counter Aizen's by overlaying them with illusions of what's really happening.

Okay that's great though actually.

Honestly maybe Lila's Semblance can work partly on other-perception too. Which would also give her another reason to dislike anyone who goes against her lies.

[cogentranting]

Based on my last post here's my grouping of how characters on Arrow respond when they're fighting with someone but they actually know that they're in the wrong

"Don't judge me": Thea, Laurel

"YOU can't judge me because you did X": Laurel, Quentin, sometimes Felicity

*Always has a justification for why they're right even when deep down they know they're not*: Diggle, Felicity

"You just don't understand the way the world works": Moira, Oliver, Lila, Slade

*Just pretends not to hear you*/"I know this is wrong/a bad idea but, consider: I'm going to do it anyway" : Oliver, Rene

"Yeah it's wrong but I'm a bad person 😔": Oliver, Sara

"Yeah it's wrong but I'm a bad person 😘": Malcolm

[cboffshore]

When you've got target practice at five but a coronation at six, you need a look that does it all. This is "Ascension."

God, I love Benthomaar. That's it. That's the post.

(Just kidding! You got off easy with the last two notes sections, so here comes Analysis Freak Lila on her bullshit again, lurking under the cut!)

If Seabound had released during my first stint on Tumblr, I guarantee we'd all have been tagging him as precious cinnamon roll, too good for this world, too pure. (Typing that out made me want to cry. We talked like that? Seriously?) Personally, I think that's just a touch reductive... but he is a sweetheart. There's no denying that. Anyway, I think Benthomaar is a fascinating character! We'll go ahead and break this one down piece by piece.

I chose to go for an unconventional blend of silhouettes here: a business-like lapeled jumpsuit, except it's got athleisure jogger legs (more on that in a minute) and none of the structured seams of the KPS and "Hired Trident" designs. The business vibes are a direct nod to Bentho's early attempts at winning his adopted brother's friendship; however, this structure has a more genuine expression of Merlopian loyalty. While the KPS and "Hired Trident" lapels are a relatively neutral shape and all kingdom rep is limited to hidden patterns, the lapels on "Ascension" are traced directly from the Merlopian crest that Bentho wears as part of his armor. It's a fresh take on the designs that made up the first third of this series.

As promised: the athleisure justification! It's no secret that Bentho is a skilled athlete (even Kalmaar's willing to openly admit this, which is pretty sweet if you don't think about the manipulative aspect of that episode). Given how much of his screen time revolves around some of the flashiest combat I've seen in all my 11 years of tenure with the fandom, I thought it would be appropriate to make this ensemble a versatile one. The fabric texture vaguely resembles sharkskin for what I hope are obvious reasons, and the jogger pant legs are designed for security and ease of movement. On the top half, the structured wrap lapels are balanced out by golden athletic mesh in the Art Deco pattern I chose to represent Merlopia as a nod to his lightweight, movement-friendly armor. It's tricky to see without zooming in (please, zoom in! these are designed for laptop viewing), but there's also a little bronze tennis bracelet and necklace on here too, because I wanted just a little royal glam here. He deserves it!

Speaking of movement, let's talk about the sandals. From the beginning (meaning the original iteration of this design, which Sketchbook accidentally ate earlier this year, so go scour my Twitter for the original if you want to), I knew I wanted to use sandals to represent Bentho's perpetual barefootedness. These are meant to be highly flexible and secure, and are fastened with a bar inspired by one of his throwing needles. The heel pillars on these are direct replicas of his iconic spear. Now, you might be thinking: aren't heels not great for, you know, running and throwing things? And you'd be right! In the event that this is ever made in real life, I have only one stipulation: the heel spears need to be removable. It's like the shoe version of taking out your hoops before a fight, which is something I can imagine Bentho doing for some reason?

It's not a Merlopian-royalty-themed Lila design without a fancy lapel pin! This one is pretty straightforward: two of his iconic throwing needles crossed under a Merlopian crest (with, of course, just a few dangly chains). This, I like to think, is another bit of kingdom rep that makes more sense than Kalmaar's self-centered attire, but the usage of the needles represents Bentho's unique narrative experience and quiet confidence in his skill set.

We're 2/3 of the way through the series now - can you believe it? I can't! I have the final two designs done and am busy prepping notes, but in the meantime, enjoy the obligatory wallpaper:

[colorfulsiren]

Reasons why ml class salt is not justified (and reasons why it is)

1. Reason why it's not: While to the audience Lila's lies are immediately known as false, the class does not have the same information. This class has a famous model, the daughter of the mayor, a genius who designed an AI that could be akumatized, people who have met Prince Ali, was in Clara's music video, a reporter that interviewed Ladybug, someone who designs for Jagged Stone. When you're a bunch of naive 14 year olds surrounded with people who have connections like these Lila's lies become a lot less farfetched. Also who wants to call someone out on faking a disability when you may be wrong.

2. Reason why it is: Many of her lies are easily proven false. When she lied about the napkin poking Max's eyes out that's a major red flag that even these people should know to look into. Alya even runs a clearly popular blog but doesn't think to do what any reporter should do before posting something and get more than one source. This is either them being way too impulsive, stupid, or willfully ignorant.

3. Reason why its not: Marinette is not the most reliable source. She's been shown to get far too jealous and paranoid over Adrien, most of the times she let's him go arent witnessed by the class. She also overthinks most thing which is what the class is most likely happening. She's also clearly not always honest as shown when she badly lies to Alyas face in Oni Chan to follow Adrien while the class has no reason to think her worry in that situation was justified. And her excuses to run off during akuma battles isnt painting her in the most reliable light to them

4. Reason why it is: Marinette is Alya's best friend and the every day Ladybug yet they dont even look into her claims. While she may get jealous easily the fact that they dont even consider her telling the truth while automatically assuming Lila is is terrible. They dont have any faith in Marinette to at least check for proof in Lila's claim. The class has barely known Lila before they start taking her word as gospel and accepting that someone they knew for a while stole, pushed Lila, and cheated. And they make Marinette sit in the back without even consulting her. Also Alya asking her best friend for proof while Lila doesn't give her any is enough to justify salt fics that arent too salty.

I may follow this up with posts on Adrien salt (Is he a sexual harasser or is his slate clean), Busteir salt (should she be fired), Chloe salt (does she deserve a redemption), and others. None of this is meant to change how you feel on these characters it's just meant to show some arguments for both sides, feel free to discuss any of your own points. Try not to just hate on a character without reosning and dont harass people who salt on a character you enjoy. Also this isnt meant to judge you if you read or write salt fics because I myself read way too much alya, adrien, and class salt. Honestly the salt which we can all agree on here is the writers salt, because gosh do I hate how the show writers write characters so inconsistent and shitty. And Lila salt, screw her.

[volperion-moved]

marinette and lila both ordinarily lie to impress people and save their own asses

SOMETIMES marinette lies to keep people safe and SOMETIMES lila lies to hurt people but saying the former is wholly innocent while the latter is wholly evil is incorrect smh

[miraculouscontent]

Anonymous submitted and said:

The whole debate about how ‘Adrien should be the main character!’ seems so deeply ironic to me because of how it underscores his real issues.  Because yes, Adrien probably would make a good main character, IF that status meant that his flaws were also addressed.

One of the main 'justifications’ used to excuse the idea that Marinette makes a mistake every episode is that, since the show centers around her POV, this puts the lessons front and center.  In practice, that’s primarily a form of scapegoating, pushing the toxic view that she’s somehow responsible for everyone else’s misdeeds and mistakes… but let’s assume, for the sake of argument, that Adrien wouldn’t have to shoulder that same burden.

After all, there’s plenty there to work with already.  So much of the underlying plot already revolves around Adrien and the Agrestes.  His father is Hawkmoth.  His mother is (allegedly) Hawkmoth’s main motivation.  His childhood friend is the class bully.  Lila wants to hitch her wagon to his bullshit.

There’s also the idea that his father is a control freak that micromanages his son’s life while minimizing his personal involvement in it.  Something that generally only comes up when it’s time for Adrien to Look Sad about something other than his stagnant love life.  And the recent implications that Adrien might not be human, and all that might entail.

All of these are things that the series could explore… if it wanted to.  But it doesn’t.  Because focusing on him or delving into anything about his character draws attention to how he’s not perfect.  And he can’t – or rather, won’t learn or develop because that destroys the notion that he’s perfect as-is.

His perfection is a paradox.  Comparable to Schrodinger’s Cat in that it exists as a concept that is best unobserved.  Since realistically, the moment you open the box, chances are you’ll find that yup, the cat isn’t alive… but until you do, there’s the suggestion that they could be.  It’s a possibility, however unrealistic.  Just like how Adrien could potentially be perfect… so long as you don’t actually look at him.

So instead, Adrien Agreste is the 'Sunshine Boy’ who sits at the center of the ML universe.  Everything revolves around him while he doesn’t have to do anything… and when he does, it tends to be catastrophic.

All the metaphors here are amazing.

The thing about Adrien is that he’s designed for everything to revolve around him, which is what gives the stans the impression that he could handle the role of a main character.

What they miss is that things revolve around him because otherwise he’d never do anything worth mentioning. Astruc has openly admitted that Adrien keeps being brought up so as to not lose him.

He literally gets rewarded with name drops/mentions without doing anything because he barely does anything at all normally.

(That’s even disregarding how many episodes would have to be him at a photoshoot/event/whatever-other-thing-is-on-his-schedule.)

Like--good luck to the writers in terms of developing a plot to someone with no hopes and dreams outside of living on an island with only Ladybug and a hamster while they live off of fruit.

[immaturityofthomasastruc]

The Chloe-Saga

Regarding the whole Chloe-situation: I don’t get it. Just what exactly makes Astruc not only hate a character of his creation to this extent but also makes him not stop giving her more and more prominence in the actual show? Like, in S1 she was the quintessential high school bully. Hates the main character, has the same love interest, causes a lot of “problems/villain of the week”. And guess what? That’s perfectly fine as an archetype. She fulfilled her purpose and it was fun whenever she got put down a notch. That some fans latched onto her and her being redeemed? That’s what a fandom does. It takes characters and gives them a new spin – that does not mean they like what a character in canon does, it means they want to explore those characters outside their bubble. With the identity-shenanigans going on, there even was a pre-build reason for why Chloe might question herself. In S2 we then got the full package of explanations for why Chloe’s Chloe. And while some of them were a bit much and Chloe still did a lot of bad things that might even exceed the “justifications”, Chloe became more than an archetype and more like a character with a clearer background and needs and wishes. What did Astruc expect? Even when we don’t buy her background AND think she went far beyond moral boundaries, there still is a lot more to latch onto. And in S3 and in S4 she got more focus and excuses. Fought of an Akuma. Was explicitly targeted by the big bad and more than once hurt by her idol. Got more family drama and focus on how her family affects people. If we are truly meant to hate Chloe and see not one bit of goodness (which Astruc tells us too) just why are we getting all that focus and excuses? As a one-dimensional schoolyard bully it would have been a lot easier to simply hate her. But that role is apparently Lila’s turf now… The way I see her character and development: One of her traits from the very beginning was how much she liked Ladybug and how much it hurt her whenever LB rejected or renounced her in a way she could not wave aside. She even literally dressed up as Ladybug! In S2 when her mother was introduced, what was one of the first things Chloe did? She sat besides her and mimicked every single movement. For me these were the defining moments of Chloe’s potential to be good. A girl who just really craves the attention of powerful female role models that she can model herself after. A girl who is way more insecure than her bratty face lets on. A girl who has not yet really found herself. Audrey’s entire character essentially is a grown-up Chloe. Petty and nasty and kicking down at every opportunity. Seeing how Chloe reacted to her, mimicked her, and just wanted to be recognized by her, I see most of Chloe’s character essentially as her modelling herself after her. Which is not helped by her father essentially being a rubberstamp with authority, Sabrina being an extended arm, and the butler…being a butler. Ladybug was the counter-weight. It was obvious Chloe cared about her and her opinion of her. She was still flawed and at times outright cruel but there was a hint of progress. Be it her later appearances as Queen Bee where she was either willing to listen (Maledictator) or act as part of the team (Heroe’s Day) or the entire “rejected an Akuma”-saga complete with shielding Sabrina without anything to gain from it. For me the most hurtful moment was when Marinette in her endless goodness reconciled mother and daughter. Because ultimately that was part of what made Chloe continue to model herself after Audrey and what made her stop questioning if Audrey truly is a woman to be emulated. Double hurtful because with Ladybug off her pedestal she was back as the sole role model and because this is yet another thing that can be construed as ultimately being Marinette’s fault (which I don’t believe in and absolutely hate!). We had all these things. Neglectful mother she wanted to emulate in the hopes to be recognized. Secondary role model that cast her out for reasons pertaining to her sins of the past and even before often rejected her for reasons Chloe couldn’t know about. A lot of enablers who either can’t or won’t tell her ‘no’ or 'stop that’ [and we know Chloe at least listens when the few people she cares about tell her]. This is not a condemnation story, that is a tragedy! Which is another thing I am weirded out about. How can Chloe be an irredeemable demon who has not a semblance of goodness in her and yet we are expected to feel stabbed in the heart by the S3-finale? Either she had the potential to be good and it was a tragedy it was not meant to be, or she is an obvious devil who nobody should feel for or with. We can’t have both! Should I feel betrayed or should I feel like that was just Chloe upping her Chloeness?

---------------------------------------------------------------

According to what Astruc said, we were all supposed to feel betrayed by the Season 3 finale.

Chloe’s relationship with her mother is a real missed opportunity, as she was set up as a completely despicable person everyone hates, and of course, she reconciles with her while the writers never acknowledge the abuse. Seriously, Astruc doesn’t think Chloe being emotionally neglected by her mother for years to the point where she can’t even get her name right and developing a slight inferiority complex as a result counts as abuse.

THIS IS WHAT THOMAS ASTRUC ACTUALLY BELIEVES

Like you said, there have been plenty of plenty of irredeemable villains the audience still felt bad for when they were defeated because of how tragic their stories were.

Tai Lung from the original Kung Fu Panda is a good example. He was trained by Master Shifu, someone he saw as a father, and his skills grew, so did his desire for power. He saw not being granted the title of the Dragon Warrior as if he was denied something that was rightfully his. There’s also the fact that his desire to become the Dragon Warrior stemmed from his desire to make his father proud of him by achieving the greatest honor in Kung Fu.

Tai Lung: All I ever did, I did to make you PROUD! Tell me how proud you are, Shifu! Tell me! TELL ME! 

Shifu: (quietly) I have always been proud of you. From the first moment, I've been... proud of you. And it was my pride that blinded me. I loved you too much to see what you were becoming... what I was turning you into. I'm s... I'm sorry. 

Tai Lung: (hesitates for a moment before grabbing the injured Shifu) I don’t want your apology. I want my scroll!

Even though he stops for a second, Tai Lung still wants his power, ultimately shooting down the last chance he had at reconciling with his father. Both him and Shifu had problems that led to Tai Lung’s descent into villainy, but while one recognized his part, the other simply couldn’t comprehend he did anything wrong in the first place. THAT is how you do a tragic villain, not what we got with Chloe.

If Astruc wanted Chloe to be an irredeemable monster, he needed to show her meaner moments weren’t something to laugh at (something the show Kevin Can F**k Himself is doing a great job at in regards to the titular character by deconstructing sitcom cliches), and have the audience take her seriously as a threat, not a joke villain like in “Queen Banana”. If Chloe actually was a “deep character” like what Astruc obviously planned from the start, she should have been more than comic relief after betraying Ladybug.

[mlwritingprompts]

submitted prompt: Trying to fix Marinette's jealousy and Lila's plot.

Seeing that this show apparently wants to tell marinette not to be jealous, but they keep putting her in situations where her jealousy is justified;

Like, marinette thought Lila is evil for wanting to be with adrien for a while, and lo and behold, Lila is aparently actually evil~. And kagami to a lesser extent due to the first impression she gave.

And the show as well wants us to believe that this 14 year old named Lila Rossi is a ‘true villain’, apparently.

So how do we deal with this?

Simple.

Introduce, before Lila, a new female character (let’s call her Caroline) in the school that makes an attempt to know adrien (not romantically), and Marinette jumps into conclusions because of jealousy, except this time, her attitude is not justified by the plot.

Because here, Caroline is not 'evil’, she is a geniunely nice girl, and she only wants to know adrien as a friend.

So Caroline gets hurt by Marinette’s actions, and Marinette doesn’t have the justification that Caroline is cruel or evil to hide behind, and is forced to acknowledge that she really needs to control her jealousy, or at least not get blinded by it.

So Marinette has a mini-arc where she has to acknowledge that it’s fine for other girls to desire to know adrien as well. She can’t expect him to only look at her now or expect other girls to simply not try to know him, can she?

This alll bears fruit when Lila comes, and Marinette here doesn’t worry as much about the new girl, just assuming that she simply wants to know adrien as a friend.

You can have Marinette coincidentally be at the park to fetch the grimoire, but even if she feels annoyed seeing Lila lying about being a superhero, she restrains herself until she finds a chance to be alone with Lila, and tells her as Ladybug not to lie about being a superhero or being her friend, because there’s a freaking terrorist in the city that akumatises babies and citizens into supervillains and might not be above kidnapping to get what he wants, so she better be careful lest Lila finds herself in space or something because she purposely upset someone  with her lies or got targeted because of them.

Lila then later either gets akumatised, or has an akuma go after her because of Lila’s interview on Ladyblog, and when the situation gets dealt with, Lila is actually thankful for the heroine for first warning, and then saving her, and now has a huge grudge against Hawkmoth.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that Lila will stop lying (at least not completely), or that Marinette will simply be happy with her lies, but the relation between the two is going to be much less antagonistic and volatile than in the show.

Rules for the blog - send a prompt

You can also have Marinette remind herself of all the lies she has told spur of the moment in an effort to impress people, like saying she had enough desserts to feed the entire school, for instance.

How many times has she gotten nervous talking to Adrien and ended up saying the most ridiculous things? It’s not okay for Lila to lie, but maybe she regrets it, and would apologize if given the chance, the way Marinette regrets the things she says without thinking.

[flightfoot]

One thing that bugs me in most ML Salt fics, apparently the world revolves around Marinette where everybody in the whole world (not just school, family etc.) just worships her like she's Jesus or a goddess, and just be her sheep where the shame/slander the class or anyone who dare hurt her. Hello yes she's liked but the world does not revolve around her!

Yeah I mean, everyone around Marinette loving and adoring her? That's just plain canon, the only people who don't like her much are antagonists like Lila and Chloe. But people treating her feelings and perspective as being the only thing that matters, to the point that her feeling negatively towards someone is the sole justification needed to join in on purposely trying to hurt the people who are supposedly "wronging" her, no questions asked... yeah it's out of character and just not good in general.

It's OOC for the class to be malicious towards Marinette anyway, even with Lila's machinations. At worst she might be able to paint Marinette as being a bully like Chloe, and even Chloe isn't really targeted by the class. So the concept that the class would bully Marinette back, even if they were fooled into thinking that she was a bully, is a complete fabrication. That's Zoe's backstory, it would never be Marinette's.

It mostly comes down to the author, to the narrative itself, believing that Marinette deserves special treatment and that her thoughts and feelings are more important than anyone else's, to the extent that they treat it as good and righteous for Marinette to go out of her way to rally people to the cause of hurting people who have been duped as some sort of vengeance scheme, often just for the personal satisfaction of seeing those people hurt. Generally the people writing those fics wouldn't agree that it was good and righteous if Marinette was the one duped, and the person who was framed for misdeeds then decided to hurt her for their personal satisfaction and pleasure.

I like that the show, while centering around Marinette, doesn't have the premise that the world does or should revolve around her. People love and care about her, but she's not the sole person who matters in their lives. It's one reason I loved the Miracuclass staying and comforting Luka in Crocoduel. He was the person who was likely to be feeling most hurt, so they let him know that Marinette didn't hate him and that they loved and cared about him.

[dessarious]

Guilt and Consequences

Okay, so this is just something that wouldn’t leave me alone. It has absolutely nothing to do with my other fics and may actually be a one shot. (We all know that’s not something I do but hey I can hope). Anyway, I’ve always hated the way Lila’s character was done. For so many reasons. The biggest issue I had was that there’s never any explanation for her personality. Sure, there is a small percentage of people that are straight up evil, but not many and it’s lazy writing to make a character, villain or otherwise, with absolutely no reason to be the way they are. If you’re not going to flesh out a character don’t make them a focal point period. Okay I’ll stop ranting now. This is in no way canon, nor is it meant to be.

---------------------------------------------------

AO3   Next

“You told her what?!” Adrien flinched as Lila yelled in his face but she didn’t care. This idiot had completely destroyed all her plans with no thought what so ever. How had things gotten so bad?

“It doesn’t do any good to put more pressure on the situation. I told Marinette that you’d come around once you got the attention you wanted, so she should just let it go. Take the high road.” She was dangerously close to punching him in his sanctimonious face. The only thing stopping her was that getting arrested for assault wasn’t something she wanted to experience right now. Not to mention she now had to try and fix this insanity.

“That is quite possibly the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Ignoring things may work with paparazzi but that is not how you should deal with anything else. More often than not ignoring a problem just makes it worse.

“I’ve been ignoring Chloe’s bad behavior for years and she’s getting better.” Lila felt like her head was going to explode. As good as Adrien was in science he apparently didn’t understand causal relationships. The boy was far too dense to survive in the real world.

“As I understand things, Chloe didn’t start improving until Marinette stood up to her and Ladybug called her out on her bad behavior. Your enabling simply allowed her to continue what she was doing without consequences. People don’t change without a reason Adrien. Most need a pretty enticing incentive to do anything out of the norm.” She couldn’t deal with this anymore. Lila knew that she wasn’t going to make him see the error in his thinking. Everyone thought of Adrien as a ray of sunshine but she’d seen first hand how hard he held onto ideas even when all the evidence pointed to the opposite conclusion. Instead she turned and walked away as he yelled justifications at her back. She knew he wouldn’t actually follow her because his ride should be there any second. He wouldn’t risk getting in trouble, no matter how much he wanted her to agree with him.

She didn’t even know where she was going at this point, just wandering randomly while she thought. Everything had gotten so out of hand. Nothing like this had ever happened to her before and she had absolutely no idea how to fix it, or even if it could be fixed. She didn’t think so. It’s like the perfect storm of stupid, incompetence, and compliance had coalesced into this mass of insanity that she couldn’t see a way out of. Why did everything have to be so complicated? She’d done the same thing dozens of times with the exact same result. Why did things have to turn out so differently this time?

Before she knew it Lila was standing in front of a building she had no wish to enter. She knew she had to, but honestly she would rather step into traffic. Still, if there was any hope of salvaging things this was where she had to start. She just hoped she’d be able to get out some sort of explanation before they threw her out. She took a deep breath before opening the door.

“Good morning! What can I do for you dear?” Lila hesitated. Surely Marinette had told her parents about what was going on, right?

“Madam, my name is Lila Rossi. I was hoping to talk to Marinette.” There was absolutely no recognition in the woman's eyes. What the hell kind of alternate reality was she in? From everything she could gather Marinette had a great relationship with her parents. Even if she had let Adrien talk her into staying quiet at school, why would she hide what was going on from them?

“Of course, and you can call me Sabine dear, no need to be so formal.” She followed as Sabine led her up the stairs at the back of the bakery and into a little apartment. Lila had lived in a lot of places, but not one of them had ever said home the way this tiny space did. “Marinette’s room is up there. I have to get back down to the bakery, just knock before you go in.” Lila could only stare at the woman’s retreating back in panic. There was no way Marinette wanted her of all people anywhere near her room. She’d expected Sabine to get her to come out here. She looked back at the trapdoor with no idea how to proceed.

Eventually she worked up the nerve to climb the stairs. A few minutes and many attempts later, she managed a timid knock. There was a muffled ‘come in’ and Lila almost had a heart attack. Now what? Against her better judgement she slowly opened the door and poked her head up. She saw Marinette hunched over her sewing machine, not paying any attention to who had entered. But what caught her attention was the bruise on Marinette’s cheek and a strip of gauze around her forehead. Lila’s anger from earlier reignited with a passion and before she knew it she was in the room standing directly behind the girl.

“How could you listen to that moron’s advice?” She winced the moment the words came out of her mouth. That was not how she wanted to start this. Marinette jumped and actually fell off the chair. Lila flinched back at the fear in the girls eyes when they registered who she was.

“Wh- What are you doing here?” Marinette’s eyes were darting every which way, looking for escape routes or something to defend herself with most likely. It hurt knowing that this was all her fault.

“I… I didn’t mean to scare you.” Then why did you yell at her dumbass? “I’m here because…” Why exactly was she here? She really should have planned this out, or at least had any idea of what she was going to say. “I’m here because I need to apologize to you, and I think you deserve an explanation for why I apparently destroyed your life.” Marinette’s eyes widened in shock and disbelief. Lila couldn’t blame her.

“You want to apologize to me?” The skeptical tone caused her to break eye contact. It was well deserved but Lila didn’t even know where to start. She was a selfish creature by nature so apologies didn’t come naturally, but this was something that needed to be done.

“Yes. I’m sorry for everything that’s happened to you because of me. I never thought…” She couldn’t continue. No apology and no explanation was good enough for what Marinette had gone through because of this mess. Lila didn’t even know everything because apparently the class had been bullying Marinette for over a month but they’d kept it from her because she was too ‘nice’ and wouldn’t have approved. How did you even begin to make up for something like that?

“You never thought what? That your plan to take away all my friends would affect me? That you making my school life a living hell would hurt me?” The girl sounded pissed and Lila couldn’t blame her but the tone sent her into her defensive mode anyway.

“I never thought anyone would believe the garbage coming out of my mouth!” Marinette blinked at her in confusion, all the fight suddenly gone.

“What?” Lila sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. Where did she even start? None of this was going to make sense to Marinette. Honestly she wasn’t certain it made sense to her anymore either.

“I should probably start at the beginning.” Marinette motioned her to continue. “My mom is a diplomat, that wasn’t a lie. She’s something of a fixer. Basically when a situation has escalated too far they bring her in to smooth things over. Because of that she gets moved a lot more often than most. I think the longest we’ve lived in one place is about nine months.”

“And that makes it okay for you to lie and bully people for no reason?” Bully? She hadn’t considered that before. From Marinette’s perspective she understood why she said it though. Especially after the bathroom incident. Lila winced.

“I didn’t mean to… The lying has a purpose but I’ve never had to escalate things before. It’s not an excuse, I should have considered things better. I just…” She just what? She’d just been so focused on her goal that she hadn’t bothered to look at the collateral damage. Hadn’t even considered that there would be. “Look just let me explain, then you can yell at me.” If she didn’t get this out now she wasn’t sure she’d be able to.

“Fine.” Lila shifted nervously as Marinette’s full attention was focused on listening to her. Having that much animosity directed at her was extremely uncomfortable.

“So when I was little the moves were more frequent. Because of that my mother hired tutors and enrolled me in online classes rather than try to attend school. There didn’t seem to be any point in having me adapt to a new place and teachers every couple of months. About three years ago things slowed down a little and she decided it would be good for me to socialize with other kids. Despite my best efforts, I was enrolled in school. I hated it.” That was a vast understatement. The curriculum wasn’t advanced enough and the kids were all immature and annoying. The teachers were boring too. Not to mention that she was used to learning at her own pace and having the ability to choose subjects that actually interested her. School was basically torture.

“I wasn’t happy and told my mother so but she thought I just needed time to adjust so she basically told me to suck it up and deal with it.” She’d had a perfectly researched and reasoned argument but her mother wouldn’t even listen to her. “A couple days later a boy was annoying me. He refused to leave me alone after I’d told him many times to stop and eventually I snapped and punched him in the nose.” It had felt really good at the time.

“Really?” Marinette sounded somewhere between horrified and amused and was obviously trying to keep a straight face.

“Really. I was sent to the principal and he called my mother. I was expelled because they had a zero tolerance policy for violence. My mother was not happy with me and lectured me about solving my problems in a different way, but she let me homeschool again because she wasn’t certain how long we’d be there and didn’t want to go through the effort of finding another school. I thought I’d won, until the next time we moved and she put me in school again.” Once again she’d argued to be allowed to stay with homeschooling. Once again her mother had ignored her.

“Let me guess, you just walked up and punched someone the first day?” Lila let out a snort of amusement and shook her head.

“No. Mother made it very clear that physical violence had far too many repercussions, so I had to get creative. I read the school rules trying to find the easiest way to get thrown out. I tried disrupting class constantly, but that just landed me in detention. So then I tried stealing. That got me thrown out quickly enough, but it also could have had legal ramifications that I didn’t understand at the time. My mother made it very clear to me after though.” Yet another fun conversation where her mother talked at her and wouldn’t let her get a word in edgewise. Lila couldn’t understand how she could be such a good diplomat and still have no idea how to listen to her own daughter.

“So you got to homeschool again?” She blinked at Marinette for a moment before nodding. She’d gotten lost in her own thoughts. “But I’m going to assume it didn’t last.”

“No. Every time we move she tries again. I don’t understand why she bothers. The next few schools I refined my technique. I found out that lying was the easiest and least complicated way to get thrown out quickly. They just don’t want to deal with it. Each school has slightly different thresholds but I found that obvious misinformation coupled with lying about medical conditions usually got me back home within a week. I thought I had it down to a science, until we moved here.”

“So wait… you’ve just been trying to get expelled this entire time?” Marinette was looking at her like she’d grown another head. Lila wasn’t surprised. To anyone else what she did sounded insane and maybe it was a little. But it worked and she was a very results driven person. “What about the Akumatizations?”

“What about them?” Lila couldn’t figure out what that had to do with anything.

“If you wanted to be found out, why were you so upset you became Volpina and Chameleon?” Lila winced. She’d watched the limited footage and remembered how she’d reacted after. She’d been disoriented and confused and had just lashed out.

“I was expecting Adrien to call me out. The necklace I showed him came from his father’s line after all. I misjudged how involved he was in the industry apparently. I wasn’t expecting or prepared for an actual Superhero to call me out. I’ll admit I reacted badly, but in my defense I didn’t know then how little it took for Hawkmoth to Akumatize someone.” That had been a less than pleasant realization. Maybe she should try and apologize to Ladybug after this as well. It wasn’t the hero’s fault that Lila couldn’t deal with normal social interaction and lashed out when she felt threatened.

“And Chameleon?” Lila winced at the soft question. She still didn’t know what she’d been thinking when she’d threatened Marinette. Well that wasn’t completely true but she didn’t realize how far she’d gone until she saw the Akuma.

“You were the only person who seemed to have a spine and didn’t believe the bullshit I came up with. I was trying to push you into reporting me to the teacher or convincing everyone else that I was lying. I’ve never been in a situation where people actually thought that my lies were real before. Looking back it was a stupid thing to do.” And wasn’t that an understatement. “After I left I realized how harsh I’d been and was coming back to make sure you were okay when the Akuma phased through the wall and straight into me. Apparently my being mad at myself for overreacting was enough to let him in, again.”

“Why keep lying though? You had to have realized it wasn’t working at some point so why keep doing it?” That was a really good question and she didn’t have a good answer. Lila ran a hand through her hair in frustration.

“At first I thought that I just needed bigger lies. I also expected the teacher or principal to call my mother and verify the ‘disabilities’ I said I had. Other than that I guess it was just habit. It’s what I’ve always done in that situation and I didn’t know what else to do if I’m being honest. Everyday I’d tell myself that today was when everyone would see through the bullshit. That’s also why I started lying about you.” Once again, in hindsight it was an extremely stupid move. Marinette looked confused.

“You’ve been lying to the class about me thinking it would make them realize what you were doing?” Yeah, it was a really stupid plan.

“Yes. I did my research. Everyone loved you. You were the class rep for crying out loud! I thought that lying about you would get them to at least think things through. I mean they’re supposed to be your friends. They’re supposed to know your character well enough to question it when someone says you’re doing something so completely off track from your normal. I didn’t expect them to believe me without question and I absolutely didn’t expect them to retaliate and hide it from me.”

Marinette’s head snapped up in shock. She was looking for something in Lila’s eyes but Lila wasn’t sure what it was. The girl's expression softened suddenly and before she knew it, Lila was on the receiving end of a crushing hug. What the hell?

“If you’re trying to suffocate me there are easier ways to do it.” The words just popped out and Lila winced again. So maybe her mom had a point about her needing more social interaction. It still didn’t mean she should be forced to endure school. She felt Marinette let out an amused huff and pulled back.

“So what brought on this need to come clean?” Lila’s eyes automatically went to Marinette’s injuries before snapping away to the wall.

“Alya slipped and told me what they did last night. I went to Adrien first since he knew Ladybug called me out to try and get him to make the others see sense, or at least help you protect yourself. That’s when he told me what he said to you.” She felt her anger resurfacing just thinking about that conversation.

“That’s what you meant.” Lila just blinked at Marinette in confusion. “When you first got here you yelled at me about taking a moron’s advice.” Lila winced at the reminder but nodded. “Apparently you’re not the only one prone to making mistakes and snap judgments.” Her tone was dry but still held a trace of amusement. Lila wasn’t certain what to make of it.

“I’ll text my mother and have her come here after work so I can explain what’s going on to her and your parents.” It was the least she could do. There was no way to fix this, but at least she could come clean.

“You can’t do that! What if one of them gets Akumatized over it?” Lila just frowned at Marinette. She couldn’t be serious. Her worried expression said otherwise.

“You can’t keep letting people hurt you because you’re scared how they’ll react. Hawkmoth is going to keep using people and that’s not your fault. It’s not your job to make everyone happy, especially not at the expense of your physical and mental well being. They need to know what’s going on so you can get out of that toxic school environment.” Marinette actually rolled her eyes.

“Just because you don’t like school doesn’t mean it’s a toxic environment.” Lila stared at her in shock. Marinette was serious. The phrase ‘what the hell’ was quickly becoming her new mantra.

“You’re kidding right? Your teacher avoids her job at all costs by making the class police itself. She blames the victims for things they have no control over because it’s easier than actually confronting someone. The principal hasn’t once tried to call my mother to verify absences or illness. That’s not even including your classmates who have gone full Lord of the Flies over a bunch of lies.” How could she possibly think any of this was okay? Marinette seemed confused as she mulled over Lila’s words. How long had this shit been going on?

“I suppose it may seem that way to someone walking into it, but I think your prejudice against school in general is part of your viewpoint. Things have always worked themselves out before and I’m sure everyone will come around eventually.” She was going to have an aneurysm. Apparently Marinette was just as bad as Adrien at holding on to things despite the evidence. She reached out and gently touched the gauze on Marinette’s forehead.

“They could have killed you. Alya especially is prone to acting without thinking things through or caring about the consequences. It’s why she posted all those ridiculous interviews. Honestly I’m surprised she hasn’t been sued yet. I took care of the site though.” She wasn’t even paying attention to the words coming out of her mouth, too focused on where Marinette’s blood was seeping through. This was all her fault.

“What do you mean you took care of the site?” Marinette’s tone was off but she couldn’t place the tone.

“Hacking is one of the things that I actually like doing. I took down everything with me and purged it from her harddrive. I also took down that stupid picture of Ladybug and Chat kissing after Oblivio. It’s not much but it’s as much of an apology I could manage to Ladybug even if she never knows who did it.” Alya had ranted for days about the Heroine’s denial. It was beyond annoying at the time.

“Why do you want to apologize to Ladybug?” Lila blinked at her before letting out a sigh.

“After my Akumatizations I said some things… let’s just say I wasn’t in a great headspace. I tend to go feral when I feel threatened. Add that to the whole lying and keeping in character to get expelled… She has enough to deal with without hormonal teenagers mouthing off at her.” Marinette was studying her again and Lila couldn’t read her expression at all. It made her more nervous than she would have thought.

“I still don’t think we should tell our parents. Maybe we can turn things around ourselves.” Damn it. The girl was out of her mind.

“That school is a breeding ground for bullies and narcissists. The administration needs to be held accountable for their neglect or who knows how many others could get hurt. There needs to be consequences or things will never change.” There was no way they could fix this themselves. She wasn’t even sure teams of lawyers and therapists could fix this at this point. Marinette was frowning again. Lila wanted to convince her this was the right thing, but if push came to shove she would tell the Dupain-Chengs the truth so they could do something about this. Her mother would just want to bury it to keep Lila out of trouble. Marinette’s parents would do what they had to to protect their daughter, at least she hoped they would.

“I don’t want anyone else getting hurt… Maybe we can talk to the principal. If we say we’re going to look into a lawsuit or call the police, maybe he’ll change.” Lila rolled her eyes.

“He won’t take anything seriously coming from two teenagers. Look, I realize your self preservation instincts aren’t very strong but you need to tell your parents what’s going on. If nothing else you can transfer schools. Honestly, you probably should.” She looked devastated at the thought and Lila’s guilt came back full force. She knew that she couldn’t control the actions of others, but if she hadn’t worked them up they never would have gone after Marinette of all people. They say ignorance is bliss for a reason. Marinette probably would have been perfectly happy not knowing what her classmates were capable of.

“I can’t just leave my friends.”

“What friends? The only person who has bothered to tell me to back off is Chloe. Something about you being more fun to square off with when you actually have a spine.” That girl was at least what she seemed. Lila could respect that far more than Adrien’s fake personality. In his defense she didn’t think he was doing it out of spite, he’d just been playing a part most of his life and probably had no idea who he was, let alone how to be himself.

“They didn’t mean it. I’m sure once they understand the situation they’ll calm down.” There had to be a way to get through to her, but Lila was getting far too frustrated to think things through properly. As usual, her mouth went into gear before her brain.

“If we tell them what’s going on now they’ll just transfer all that anger to me, assuming they don’t think you threatened me into backing up your story that is. Sadly, I have a feeling that it’ll be the second.” She would be fine with the first honestly. It would give her a reason to have her mother pull her out of school. Unfortunately given the class’s track record she couldn’t chance it. Alya could easily whip everyone else into a frenzy if she decided Marinette was forcing Lila to back her version of events. The girl hadn’t been able to find the truth yet so there was no reason to think she would come to her senses now.

“I suppose you’re right. I wouldn’t want them going after you.” She couldn’t have heard that right.

“What?”

“What you did was wrong but you don’t deserve to be bullied for it. I don’t want to be part of the reason that would happen.” Her supposed friends attacking her didn’t phase her at all, but the thought of those same friends bullying the person who’d set them on her in the first place caused her to pause. Lila would never understand that mindset.

“So can we at least talk to your parents about what’s happening? This has gone way past too far and I really don’t think we’ll be able to stop it by ourselves. Please.” Marinette finally nodded and Lila felt a tightness in her chest loosen. It wasn’t enough, but it was a start. 

AO3   Next

[ilikekidsshows]

Curiously, is there a popular fanon that you don't like in ml fandom? Is there anything that you like?

Most of the fanon I disagree with are fan interpretations of Adrien that I feel misjudge the entire point of Adrien’s character, especially when it comes to shipping stuff. The thing about Adrien is that he is intelligent and he understands people, he’s just too sheltered to utilize those skills in his interpersonal relationships all the time. He’s actually better at dealing with manipulative and kinda nasty people like Lila (as seen in ‘Ladybug’) because he has personal experience with such relationships considering his father and cousin. The parts of the fandom that insist that Adrien is a total social moron for not figuring out Marinette is in love with him ignore that the entire point of Adrien believing when Marinette swears up and down that she isn’t interested in him in any way is that he trusts her. This trust is a good thing.

Adrien knows Marinette is trustworthy, so he will not jump to the conclusion that she’d lie to him. Similarly, whenever Alya obviously pulls something to put him and Marinette together, Adrien can see what she’s doing (examples are ‘Star Train’ and ‘Despair Bear’) but he goes along with it anyway because he trusts that she isn’t up to anything bad. And he’s absolutely correct about Marinette and Alya both. They are both reliable, trustworthy people and they deserve Adrien having faith in them. Insisting that Adrien should mistrust Marinette enough to think she’d lie to his face is actually an insult to Marinette’s personal integrity. So many characters would be able to realize just how much Marinette lies (because of secret identities) if they didn’t make the active choice to take her at face value or let any obvious lies drop with the justification that this is Marinette, she wouldn’t be up to anything bad.

On the other hand, I do like the headcanon that Adrien is into anime and that’s where he gets his romantic notions from. He is very similar to Tamaki from Ouran High School Host Club and Mamoru from Sailor Moon, after all. Watching anime also makes sense as a hobby for someone who’s isolated, in addition to single-player video games. The western anime fandom is kind of a product of the internet, after all, due to the big role digital distribution of fansubs played in many shows getting popular in the 2000s. Because of this the anime fandom still very likely to bootleg shows.

[princess-of-the-corner]

"This would be a FANTASTIC story if this was about Marinette going down a dark path in the name of some Greater Good and becoming an amalgamate of all the Villains (Gabriel, Lila, Chloé, etc.) and justifying her behavior until she ultimately becomes an outright villain herself that Chat has to try and stop."

This honestly reminds me of what Tolkien said about what would happen if Gandalf had actually gotten hold of the Ring:

"Gandalf as Ring-Lord would have been far worse than Sauron. He would have remained 'righteous', but self-righteous. He would have continued to rule and order things for 'good', and the benefit of his subjects according to his wisdom (which was and would have remained great)."

OHOHOHO

BUt yeah just.

Honestly I do find characters who ultimately want to do good but do shitty things either because they /think/ it's right or because they think the ends justify the means to be fascinating. Double points if that inherent goodness does lead to them legitimately having a wakeup call and fixing their shit *side-eyes several of my favorite characters*.

But even if they never turn it around or even have that realization of 'hm maybe /I'm/ the asshole!', I still find it so interesting how far that justification can go

[lochrannn]

Warnings: Sexual Content (M Rating)

Characters: Lila Pitts; Diego Hargreeves; Allison Hargreeves; Klaus Hargreeves; Hargreeves Siblings (background)

Relationship: Lila Pitts/Diego Hargreeves

Roommates AU; Fake Marriage; Slow Burn; Mutual Pining; Emotional H/C

Chapter 4/?

-

Of course it’s been something that, at the very back of her mind, has been causing her no small amount of stress, but Lila has been doing a very good job of just completely ignoring the topic. Only, when her co-worker Nandi, a med student from South Africa, asks Lila how much longer she’ll be staying in the country, now that she’s dropped out of her degree, does it fully register with her that her student visa has expired and she’s into the last three weeks of her grace period. After that, she’ll be in the country illegally.

Lila smiles at Nandi brightly and tells her that she’s not made a decision yet and that she’s looking at a couple of options.

On her break she goes out into the alley and bums a smoke off one of the teenage busboys who seems to be working at the restaurant that’s right next to her café, even though she’s not had a cigarette in years, and contemplates what to do.

And predictably she comes up short.

So after her shift ends, she heads to the public library and finds several volumes on immigration law for research, because she doesn’t want to ask one of the librarians.

After an hour of frustratedly thumbing through the books, the only short term solution she has found is to get married to a citizen.

She’s back at square one with no idea what to do, when she leaves her books on the collection cart and heads out into the rainy evening.

By the time she walks in through the door, she’s not sure if she’s just breezed straight through panic and worry or whether she’s just too numb to feel it, but at the smell of cooking food, she immediately follows the aromas to the kitchen and for a moment gets distracted at the door by the sight of Diego gently stirring something on the stove.

Apparently sensing her arrival, Diego twists around to look at her and says, “Oh hey, I didn’t hear you come in.”

Lila drags her eyes up to meet his and belatedly realises that she’s unabashedly been staring at his arse in a pair of perfectly fitted jeans.

“Uh…” she says dumbly.

Somehow she’s got so used to him not being around over the last few days that coming home to someone in the flat is completely throwing her for a loop.

“I’m making gorditas,” Diego says, having turned back to stirring and making idle conversation, “d’you want some?”

When she doesn’t answer right away, still dealing with the whiplash of her day, Diego turns back around and asks, “Hey, you ok?”

Lila scrambles for an answer and, trying to avoid telling Diego that the sight of him all sexily making food has made all the thoughts in her brain combust, she accidentally lands on the other truth and blurts, “Yeah, uh, fine… just dealing with some visa troubles!”

Diego’s expression turns into one of such genuine concern that Lila instantly regrets being the cause of that.

“Ah shit! That sucks,” he says. “Anything I can help you with?”

Lila snorts loudly, “Thanks, but I doubt there’s anything you could do… short of marrying me,” she adds in a sarcastic tone.

There’s a beat where Diego looks at her with a completely blank expression and she knows it’s not the cooking that suddenly makes the temperature in the small kitchen go up a couple of notches. Then he makes a face that’s half smirk and half shy smile and something behind Lila’s ribs cracks at the sight and she hopes she never has to see it again, because she hasn’t the foggiest idea how to respond to it.

“Ha! Yeah,” Diego says then, pointing at her with his spatula and then turns back to the stove again.

“So, uh, d’you want some?” he asks, with a strained kind of casualness, not actually looking at her, and this time Lila is quicker to answer, “Yeah… yes, thanks! I’ll just go get out of my work clothes!”

Lila hurries into her room and then leans against the closed door for a moment. What the fuck is wrong with her? Only a few days ago, she was accusing Diego of being weird and now she’s joking about getting married. This is ridiculous!

She pushes off from the door and begins taking off her work clothes to change into something more comfortable.

Lila’s only justification for her odd behaviour is that she really is stressed out by the idea of having to leave the country. It’s not like she couldn’t start out again somewhere else, Australia maybe, the main thing is, she knows she can’t go back to England, too many bad memories there, but she just doesn’t want to.

She’s been floating about her whole life, and even though what she has going on right now isn’t exactly conventional, to her it feels like a respite. Maybe it won’t be permanent, but here in this city, with her job, and her flat, she’s been feeling significantly more settled than she has in a while and she doesn’t want to have to give that up so soon.

If only she could just marry Diego…

Is that really such an insane solution? Lila thinks to herself, while pulling on a pair of leggings.

She would pay him, of course, and she knows he needs the money. It’s a terribly weird thing to ask your landlord/recent lover/friend but Lila just cannot conceptualise any other solution. And he’s been remarkably patient with her antics over the last few days, maybe he’s actually a lot more relaxed about this sort of thing than she thinks. She can at least make the offer, worst case scenario they go back to being awkward around each other for a few days and she’s sure they’ll be back to normal in no time at all.

Lila makes her way back towards the kitchen and finds Diego already in the process of piling food onto the small table that barely has any room in the first place.

There’s a plate with little flat and round doughy things and a few dishes with different steaming fillings in them. There’s a decidedly spicy smell in the air and Lila can’t help the way her mouth starts watering.

“Yo, don’t just stand there, take a seat!” Diego says with a chuckle and Lila heads straight for the table and says with a laugh of her own, “Don’t have to tell me twice! Fuck that smells amazing! Did you make all of this yourself?”

“Uh, some of the fillings are made up of leftover takeout from the last couple of days,” Diego answers with a bit of a bashful shrug as he sits down across from her and shuffles around some of the dishes so he can squeeze one more onto the table, “but I made the gorditas and added some shit to the fillings,” he amends a bit more confidently.

Lila takes one of the little dough pockets and immediately starts spooning in different salsas and pastes. She doesn’t ask what’s in them, just picks up the dishes and gives them a sniff to decide which ones she wants.

“Mmmm!” she hums almost desperately when she takes her first bite. She looks up at Diego who is looking back at her with a glint in his eyes and chewing delightedly on his own food.

“Fuck, this is good!” Lila says, rudely not even having swallowed all of her mouthful.

“I know, right!” Diego answers with a chuckle.

They fall into easy conversation. At one point Diego gets up to get two beers from the fridge to wash down the food and Lila tries to get comfortable on the hard kitchen chair by tucking one of her feet underneath herself and her knee up under her chin.

After they run out of gorditas, Diego uses some slightly stale bread to finish up the rest of the fillings and then gets up to pile the dishes into the sink.

“I can do the dishes!” Lila offers, seeing as she’s been mooching off of Diego’s labour all evening.

“Nah,” Diego says, “dinner’s on me!”

As he starts filling the sink with water, the sudden domesticity of the scene reminds Lila of her plan to actually ask Diego for help.

She excuses herself and heads back to her room and while she’s rummaging through her drawers looking for her cheque book, her pulse starts speeding up and she tries to calm her nerves.

If he says no, she thinks she can handle the fallout of that, though she’ll still be lost for a way to stay in the country. But right now, she’s almost more anxious about what happens if he agrees. But tonight has been one of the most pleasant evenings she’s had in months and probably the most fun she’s had with anyone – she’s strenuously not thinking about the amount of fun she had sleeping with him. Diego’s her only real friend in this city and if after everything they can manage to hang out like this, then, Lila tries to convince herself, they can be pretend married for a while without it being too awkward.

Diego’s drying his hands on a dishtowel when she comes back into the kitchen.

“Diego?” Lila asks, tentatively.

“Mh?” He doesn’t properly acknowledge her as he reaches up to put the clean plates back into the overhead cabinet.

“Earlier… you asked if you could help me with my visa troubles…” Lila feels ridiculous. She’s always been confident and able to ask for, occasionally even straight up demand things. She has a sneaking suspicion that if it were anybody else, she’d just slap the cheque down on the counter and inform them of her plan, but somehow here with Diego, she’s just so unsure of herself.

Diego turns around and leans against the stove top. “Yeah?”

“I… uh… I’d pay you of course! I have money. Turns out I don’t have the same sense of pride as you,” Lila says with a slightly wistful shrug, “I took my mother’s money when she died, felt like it was the least I deserved after the way she treated me my whole life…” she drifts off.

“What do you want to give me money for?” Diego asks, crossing his arms but there’s a peculiar expression on his face that Lila can’t quite read.

“Will you…” She cuts herself off, she can’t ask him like that, “Would you marry me? You know, for money, so I could get a visa?”

Diego’s eyes go really, really wide. Clearly he did not expect her to ask that question and Lila immediately decides to backtrack, “No, you’re right, that’s insane! Forget I asked, I’m sure I can work something out somehow. I just need to do a bit more research and then…”

“Yeah, ok!” Diego interrupts her firmly and Lila’s mouth snaps shut.

She stares back at him and Diego looks no less harassed than when she first asked but he also seems resolved.

Lila panics. “You really don’t have to, I’m sure there’s loads of options. And honestly, if I’m just careful about it I’m sure nobody’s going to find…”

“I’ll do it!” Diego interrupts her rambling again and Lila can’t quite believe her ears.

“Diego, it’s illegal!” She says almost desperately.

“Are you trying to talk me out of it now?” Diego asks with no small amount of exasperation. Then he laughs, but with very little humour in it, “To be honest, the United States government and I have a slightly different understanding of what illegal means in this context.”

That gives Lila pause and she raises her eyebrows, questioningly.

Diego looks down at where he starts scuffing the toe of his shoe into the grout between the tiles, his arms are still tightly crossed.

“I was born in Mexico. From what I can piece together my mother brought me over the border when I was only a few months old. She died soon after that. The only things I have my father to thank for are my siblings and my citizenship. So yeah, I’ll help you.”

-

They’ve agreed to go down to city hall the next day to apply for a marriage license. No point in delaying the process, this way they can start the visa proceedings before Lila is officially illegally in the country.

After agreeing to get married the ease with which they spent the evening flies out of the window again and they quickly retreat to their separate rooms.

Diego’s lying, still dressed, on top of his comforter waiting till he can’t hear Lila moving about anymore before he’ll head to the bathroom to get ready for bed himself.

He doesn’t regret agreeing to Lila’s plan, not really. It’s fucked up that she has to even resort to something like this to avoid getting thrown out of the country, and honestly, had she asked he would have said yes even if she hadn’t offered him money.

But it’s less messy this way, a clean business arrangement. He already feels just a little bit guilty, because he’s not sure he didn’t also agree out of some sudden selfish fear that she’d leave. He pushes that thought back down as well, because what should he have done, say no just because he can’t quite handle his feelings for her? That wasn’t really an option either.

He breathes out heavily when the light in the hall goes off and gets up from the bed to go brush his teeth.

[thesevenumbrellas]

Yeah, what Lila did was wrong, but also it was because the Handler forced her to do so, by manipulated her, so she didn't really did this on her own decision. She was also abused by her adoptive mother, like the Hargreeves with Reginald, who made (really) bad decisions too, and that's why i think some people """"forgive"""" her (that's not really the word, but now i can't find anything else)

I’m not saying she’s evil. She’s not. She’s not the villain. She is a wonderfully complicated character.

But having been abused in the past is not an excuse to abuse others.

Luther’s past abuse doesn’t give his justification to throw Klaus around or hurt Vanya (which the fandom was very vocal about.)

Lila’s past abuse isn’t an excuse to trick Diego into sleeping with her (he slept with her under false pretenses and that’s wrong) and then later drugging and kidnapping him

I don’t think he should’ve fallen in love with her at the end and totally forgive her.