In which Lila takes going off the deep end to the next level.

The next part of Lila's plan unfortunately required more stakeouts on top of rooftops. Now that they were reaching the hottest part of the summer and the sun was beating down overhead, all she wanted to do was find an air-conditioned building and hide inside of it all day. Either that, or escape to the beach and spend most of the day splashing in the water.

But she wasn't going to do that. No, Lila had a plan, and she intended to stick to it.

Hiding out on the rooftop of the Grand Paris was both harder and more exasperating than Lila had expected it to be. She had to dress up to make it pass the doorman, work her way up to the rooftop, and then shed the gaudy, bulky parts of her disguise in order to effectively hide in the foliage on the roof, where everyone who had half a brain cell knew that Chloe always waited with her bee-light during akuma battles, waiting for the superheroes to come give her the Bee Miraculous. It didn't happen often- Ladybug and Chat Noir tended to take care of akumas on their own most of the time, and when they didn't they seemed to favor the temporary superheroes who weren't the most spoiled brat in all of Paris- but it did happen on occasion.

And Lila had to wait for that. With every hot, humid, sweaty, uncomfortable day that Lila spent on that rooftop, her anger grew. If Hawkmoth had just managed to honor their partnership, as strange as it was- if Ladybug had just kept her nose out of it and not made Lila into an akuma in the first place- if- if-

She should have been reaping the rewards of having most of the school wrapped around her pinky finger right now, attending picnics and invited to pool parties and sleepovers every day. But instead, Lila was sitting on a rooftop, trying not to attract any attention.

They were all going to pay for this.

Each akuma fight made her sit up and take notice. With every boring, underpowered, uncreative akuma that came out, she slumped. Chloe wouldn't be needed for those.

And then came D-Day. An akuma that was just a little too much for Ladybug and Chat Noir alone. Chloe cheered when she spotted Chat Noir heading for the Grand Paris, and Lila rolled up onto the balls of her feet, making sure that her hat and sunglasses were firmly in place. They would hide her face from view, and the long ponytail that she had pulled her hair into instead of her usual three-part style would keep her identity safe.

She was ready. She had to be. Thankfully, Chat Noir seemed to be in a hurry.

"Catch!" he yelled as he touched down for a moment, tossing a small box at Chloe. She nearly fumbled it. "Transform and meet us near the Eiffel Tower!"

Chloe nodded eagerly, opening the box. Something round and yellow popped out, but Lila knew that her target- the bee comb- was still in the box. With Chloe distracted by the yellow blob and Chat Noir already heading off, Lila had her chance. Popping up, she sprinted with all of her might across the rooftop. Her muscles complained after being still for so long, but Lila ignored them as she reached out and grabbed the box, pinning the comb down with her thumb as she ripped the Miraculous out of an unsuspecting Chloe's hands.

"Stop!" she heard Chloe scream. "Come back here right now! Thief!"

Up ahead, Chat Noir paused mid-air, turning around. Lila didn't wait to see what his reaction was. Instead, she shoved the comb into her hair, calling out the phrase that Chloe had oh-so-helpfully shared with the world during her superhero vlogs.

"Pollen, transform me!"

This rush of magic felt much more potent than her akuma transformations. Sting grinned and took to the air, her wings- why Queen Bee didn't have them, she didn't know and didn't care- beating furiously. Before Chat Noir could fully turn around, Sting was off, dodging between buildings until she reached street level. Once she reached an alley, she detransformed. Lila slid the Miraculous back into the box and pocketed it, smirking the whole way.

Phase Two was complete. Hawkmoth was going to regret ever crossing her, and then, once he fell... well, the superheroes of Paris wouldn't be far behind.

The news was all over Paris: the Bee Miraculous had been stolen from Chloe Bourgeois. No one knew who had done it, or why. After the escape, the new Bee hadn't been seen.

Public opinion was mixed, Alya had texted Lila. Some people were worried that someone connected to Hawkmoth had stolen the extra Miraculous. Some thought it was a foreign curiosity-seeker, because who else would risk the wrath of Ladybug and Chat Noir once they were found?

Others, much to Lila's surprise, were of the opinion that someone taking Chloe's Miraculous was long overdue. After all, she hadn't exactly been picked so much as she had taken the Miraculous for herself, and now she had at least a little experience as part of the superhero team, so Ladybug and Chat Noir kept using her. She wasn't much of a hero, particularly outside of the superhero suit. Whoever had taken it had to be better, right?

Most people were holding out to see what the new Bee would be like before they formed their opinion. After all, they hadn't joined the superheroes during that fight.

The other news- which Lila had already heard, because it was impossible not to- was that the mayor had dedicated a special police force to finding the thief and getting Chloe's Miraculous back. They were going over the video footage, trying to pick out any distinguishing features.

It was a really good thing that Lila had been wearing an outfit that she had gotten from a thrift store and had been able to toss. Her mom wouldn't recognize her, and neither would any of her classmates.

She let the fervor die down for a few days, then took the Miraculous out again. Once again, the yellow orb formed and a small figure appeared in it. It frowned.

"You aren't my Queen."

"I'm your new owner. The last one was inadequate." Lila surveyed the small being. From Chloe's videos, she was assuming that this was the bee kwami, aka Pollen. "And I'm going to defeat Hawkmoth."

Pollen frowned. "Then are you going to join Ladybug and Chat Noir?"

"No." Lila couldn't help the dark scowl that flashed over her face. She rushed to hide it, though, because this Pollen could be a valuable source of information if she played her cards right. "They only battle the akumas. I've spent the entire summer up on rooftops, tracking down the source of the akumas. And I've found it."

Pollen gasped. "You found- you found Hawkmoth?"

"Right. Unlike Ladybug and Chat Noir, I actually put in the effort to find him. And I'm going to take him down." Lila leaned forward, fixing Pollen with a steady look. "And to win, I need you to tell me everything about this Miraculous."

Preparing for the final battle took another two weeks, weeks in which Lila spent transforming in the dead of the night and practicing her fighting on the rooftops. Pollen had told her about all of the Bee's powers- which really weren't that impressive, if Lila were being honest- and Lila needed them honed to perfection. During that time, her relationship with Pollen got tenser.

The kwami had never been happy about the thief of the Miraculous, which was ridiculous considering that Chloe had pretty much stolen it in the first place. Lila's refusal to work with Ladybug and Chat Noir had the kwami further on edge, particularly when Lila refused to divulge why she was so against working with the superheroes. Lila didn't trust the kwami with Hawkmoth's identity, either.

And then she had discovered that Pollen had to do whatever she commanded. There was an order in all of her questions now, and the kwami had to answer.

Unfortunately, Lila learned nothing new from that. Pollen had already told her about all of the Bee's powers that she could access, and knew only the same things as the public did about Hawkmoth and his powers. She hadn't been holding anything back.

Lila really, really wished that Chloe had had the Fox Miraculous instead. Now that she could do something with.

With the end of summer starting to appear on the horizon, Lila knew that she had to act if she wanted to take out Hawkmoth and the superheroes before school started up again. So she transformed and flew over to the Agreste manor one evening, readying herself for the fight. Ten minutes of looking in the windows and prowling around the outside of the mansion told her that Adrien was out- no doubt with his annoying lie-detecting sidekick- and Mr. Agreste was nowhere to be seen.

He had to be in his lair. She had come at a good time.

Sting flew over the manor, taking advantage of the falling gloom to keep herself out of sight. Her dark outfit would keep her hidden against the rooftops, for the most part, and if anyone noticed her hopefully they would assume that she was Chat Noir.

Not that it would matter soon enough.

It wasn't long at all before the tiny window that she had noticed before opened. Before any akuma could come out, Sting threw her trompo forward and smashed the rest of the glass before flying in as fast as she possibly could. She landed in front of a clearly startled Hawkmoth and smirked.

"I am Sting... and your time is up."

Hawkmoth staggered back a step in surprise, then grabbed his walking stick and pulled a sword out of it. His eyes narrowed. "How did you find-?"

Sting scoffed. "Like it was hard to find. I just had to figure out where the akumas were coming from."

Hawkmoth's smile was anything but friendly as he took a fighting stance. Sting mirrored him. "How smart of you. And why, may I ask, did you bother to track me down? No one else in Paris has even tried."

"Because you betrayed me, you no-good backstabber," Venom spat. "I helped you so many times, and what did that get me? Nothing but on the Miraculous Watch List! You still sent an akuma villain after me!"

Hawkmoth's eyes widened, then narrowed as he glared at her. "Volpina."

"It's Sting now, and I'm here to get my revenge! Now say good-bye to your Miraculous!"

As she charged, Sting saw Hawkmoth smirk. "I wouldn't be so sure about that if I were you, Sting."

Her trompo connected with his sword, and Sting yanked on the cord to pull Hawkmoth's weapon out of his grasp. Instead of it flying into her hand, Hawkmoth yanked back and Sting went stumbling towards him. Once she got close enough, his foot connected with her middle and she was flung back, hitting the wall hard and slumping to the floor.

No! She couldn't fail like this! She refused. She had trained and trained for two entire weeks. Sting refused to lose to a backstabbing traitor.

Grimacing, Sting pushed herself up. "You'll pay for this, Hawkmoth."

"I rather think I won't. But you will learn what happens to intruders in my lair." Hawkmoth pushed a button, and several panels on the wall opened. Something slid out, and it took Sting a moment to place them.

Missiles. What had she gotten herself into?

Sting's hand tightened around her weapon, and with a start she remembered that she was protected by a super-suit. If Ladybug and Chat Noir could get thrown around Paris every day and come out without a single scratch, she wasn't in danger from a couple measly missiles. They were meant as a distraction, and she would not fall for it.

Gritting her teeth, Sting charged again. This time, she did manage to pull the sword away from Hawkmoth. A second of trying told her that she couldn't break it, so instead she flung it out of the broken window with all of her might. Sting gave herself a mental pat on the back and turned back to attack Hawkmoth.

She never got there.

A click and a hiss were all the warning she got before a missile hit her right in the middle of the back and sent her flying into another wall. Sting scrambled away before it could explode, only to get caught by another, then another. Her head was spinning as she tried to crawl away.

How- how had it gone this wrong? What was happening?

"Little baby superhero thinks that she can go up against a supervillain and win," Hawkmoth taunted. "How foolish. All you've done is deliver another Miraculous straight into my hands."

"I'm no superhero," Sting spat, activating Venom. "And I'm not done with you yet-"

Hawkmoth laughed, just as another missile hit her. The trompo clattered across the floor, and Sting had a moment to panic before her head hit the wall yet again and the world started fading. "Big words from someone who couldn't even land a hit."

And then the world went black.

Lila woke up in a hospital bed. She blinked her eyes open and tried to glance around, but regretted it immediately.

Everything hurt.

"Don't try to move. You took some pretty hard hits."

Lila gasped and turned her head anyway. There, standing in one corner of the room, was a police officer. A nurse stood behind her, looking worried.

"Ladybug and Chat Noir rescued you," the police officer informed Lila, and she had to resist the urge to scowl. Of course they had. "They defeated Hawkmoth and brought the two of you in. And I have to inform you that you're wanted by the police for the thief of the Bee Miraculous."

Her brain was working a little slower than usual, but as soon as the police officer's words sunk in, Lila began to sniffle. "After all I did to track Hawkmoth down? The superheroes never would have found him if it weren't for me!"

The nurse looked uncomfortable, but the officer remained stoic. "You could have informed the superheroes of his location instead of stealing a Miraculous to try to take him on yourself. Ladybug and Chat Noir have testified that they knew nothing of your research or plans, and that they only found you and Hawkmoth because of the noise from his missiles. They said that your actions could have given Hawkmoth another Miraculous and endangered the entire city."

Lila turned up the tears. "I t-tried to tell them and they didn't want to listen to me! They said that I was just searching for fame and not to w-waste their time and now they're lying to save face. What other option did I have?"

"You'll have to tell that to the judge, I'm guessing." The police officer nodded to the nurse and then left. Lila stared after her, disbelieving.

They- they couldn't possibly still be thinking of going through with charging her, could they? That just- that wasn't fair at all! The public should be thanking her, admiring her bravery and commitment to taking Hawkmoth down.

"I'm sure the charges won't go far, dear," the nurse assured her once the door closed. "It's just that the mayor and his daughter always throw a fit over any perceived wrong. The public will be thrilled over Hawkmoth's defeat, and they won't care so much over how it happened."

Lila played up the sniffles. This was someone who she could get on her side. "I r-really hope you're right, because I just- I just wanted to help-"

"And you did. Hawkmoth is gone, and Ladybug and Chat Noir saved the day once again." The nurse smiled as she raised the bed so that Lila could sit up, missing the flash of anger that flashed over Lila's face. Of course the superheroes were getting all of the credit. That's just what they always did, didn't they? "I hear that it was a hard fight. I don't think that they landed in the hospital, though."

Lila did her best not to say anything to that.

"And your mom should be on the way," the nurse continued, oblivious to her internal rage. "She was getting briefed by the doctors on the care that you'll need once- well, once you're discharged. That certainly won't be right away."

That pulled Lila out of her increasingly murderous thoughts. Briefing? And she wasn't getting discharged right away? That didn't sound good. Her mom wouldn't need to be briefed for a little concussion, would she? "Care?"

This time, the nurse's wince wasn't hidden at all. "I- yes. You see, what the superheroes said probably happened was that your Miraculous got dislodged during that last throw, and you started detransforming as you hit the wall. And I'm sorry to tell you that there were some spinal injuries. If- if you're very lucky, with therapy, you may be able to walk again, but it could take quite a while and-"

This time, Lila's tears were real.

Apparently the nurses thought that Lila wanted to watch the endless coverage about Hawkmoth's defeat, or maybe that was all that was on TV. Three days after she woke up, Lila was stuck watching some annoying news anchor chatter on about how Mr. Agreste's home was currently being combed from top to bottom and a second Miraculous had been confiscated by the superheroes, one belonging to Mayura, Hawkmoth's ally from Heroes Day. Mr. Agreste's secretary was being taken in for questioning on suspicion of assisting a supervillain. The investigation into Mrs. Agreste's disappearance was being more closely examined, and investigators hoped to get a break soon. The superheroes were on scene 24/7, of course, and had been joined by Rena Rouge, Queen Bee, and a little old superhero called Jade Turtle as they searched for clues.

The gushing over the superheroes was going to make Lila ill, and she only refrained from turning the TV's incessant chattering off because she needed to know what the current story was in order to make up her own. She would have to explain several things: why she had started hunting Hawkmoth down, why she hadn't just gone to Ladybug and Chat Noir instead of taking a Miraculous, and, to her classmates, why she had been in the city instead of in London or- actually, no, she had said that she was meeting with some people in Sweden now, she thought.

So far, it looked like Lila could keep on using the sob story that she had come up with upon waking up: that she had wanted to help the city, of course, and had spent weeks and weeks tracking down Hawkmoth's lair, only to have the superheroes brush off her claims all because she had been akumatized more often than the average person (because she was the victim of bullying, boo-hoo, and she was always so hurt when people called her a liar). She had taken things into her own hands, and bravely ventured into Hawkmoth's lair alone. She had wanted to call for backup, of course, but had been worried that Ladybug and Chat Noir would ignore her again, and now she had a permanent back injury as a result.

(It... maybe, possibly, might not be permanent. The doctors had said that she might be able to recover, but Lila had seen the looks they had exchanged. Full recovery wasn't likely.)

That story was what she had told the police, and the hospital staff, and her mom. As a result, Lila's mom was considering a lawsuit against the superheroes, since their "inaction" had pushed Lila into a situation where she had gotten super hurt.

Even if Lila couldn't take Ladybug and Chat Noir's Miraculous like she had initially planned, she could still drag their names through the mud.

That afternoon, a reporter came to visit Lila, and she happily fed Madam Chamack the story that she had come up with. She looked shocked at Lila's story, but dutifully recorded everything before promising Lila that she would get a proper interview with a camera once she had recovered and was out of the hospital. There would no doubt be a big special with all sorts of interviews once all of the investigations had died down, and Lila would feature heavily.

Frankly, she couldn't wait. She also couldn't wait to get out of the hospital and go home and eat some decent food and wear her own clothes again. She wanted to be able to have visitors- her classmates no doubt had heard what had happened and wanted to visit, but visitors were heavily restricted and it had taken even Madam Chamack several days to get permission to come in for a short visit. Lila wasn't sure if it was the hospital or the police who had made that decision, but it was annoying.

She was bored.

The next morning, Lila asked one of her nurses when she would get to leave. Instead of a straightforward answer or a fudging "I'll ask the doctors", she just frowned and shrugged.

Any answer would have been better than that. Maybe they were tired of asking, or maybe they knew as well as Lila did that between her condition and the police investigation, there was no real way to know when she would get out.

Right after that, another police officer came in for yet another official interview. Lila was getting tired of them by now- wasn't one enough?- but maybe it was because her mom had formally submitted the lawsuit against the superheroes the previous evening.

Lila smirked at that as she reached for the remote to turn on the TV. She wondered how the public had reacted to that, and to her interview. Madam Chamack had seemed shocked by Lila's story but accepted it easily enough, and Lila had to hope that the rest of Paris would be the same.

The superheroes would protest, no doubt, and try to contradict her story, but who was Paris going to believe: them, or the girl who had figured out who Hawkmoth was and tried to confront him on her own, leaving her with a serious injury?

(Lila hoped that she would get her legs back, she really, really did. It had only been a couple days and she wanted to walk, run, anything.)

"-continued developments on the Hawkmoth case," Madam Chamack was saying as the screen came to life. "Yesterday afternoon, Paris was shocked by accusations that Ladybug and Chat Noir ignored a tip-off from Lila Rossi, the girl who was injured during her face-off with Hawkmoth. There was even a lawsuit filed against them. Ladybug and Chat Noir refuted the claims yesterday evening, as expected."

"We knew nothing about Lila's efforts to find Hawkmoth, as we said before," Ladybug firmly told the camera in what was clearly a clip from the previous evening. "We take all potential leads very seriously. The police will have records of some of the tips that we received and subsequently investigated in the past, no matter how questionable the source or the accusation."

Madam Chamack's face filled the screen again. "We went to the police department, and while the files are closed due to the fact that they concern private citizens not accused of anything, the chief assured us that they do exist and that the superheroes followed up on all sorts of leads, even ones with absolutely no evidence. And then this morning, while Gabriel Agreste was being moved from a high-security ward at the hospital to the prison, we managed to get a shocking interview with him."

Slightly shaky interview footage filled the screen, with Mr. Agreste in the middle of a ring of burly police officers. There was a flash of Madam Chamack's hair in the corner of the screen as a microphone was thrust into view. "Mr. Agreste! Mr. Agreste, a few questions!" She didn't sound deterred by the police at all, even though several looked less than thrilled about her presence. "Mr. Agreste, you were found after Ms. Rossi spent several weeks following akumas back to your house. Why do you think, out of everyone in Paris-"

"Why did she decide to do that?" Mr. Agreste finished for the reporter. He had come to a stop, and none of the police looked thrilled. He shot one that was clearly trying to nudge him along a disgusted look. "That's easy enough. She told me why. She wanted revenge."

"Revenge?" Madam Chamack sounded confused. Lila was starting to feel a sinking feeling of dread in his gut. "Was she akumatized and wasn't happy about it?"

Mr. Agreste snorted. "Not happy about it? She was thrilled about it. She hates the superheroes and Ladybug in particular after some incident with them, and so she had been accepting akumas on purpose and even grabbing ones destined for others so that she could go after the superheroes. Apparently she was under the impression that doing so would grant her immunity against any akuma attacks."

There was a clear gasp from Madam Chamack. "She was getting akumatized on purpose?"

"She would volunteer for it. Then she got upset that she got targeted once and wanted revenge for that reason. It was hardly for a noble cause, and I don't doubt that she planned on taking out Ladybug and Chat Noir after defeating me." Mr. Agreste was jostled again, harder this time, and he glared at the policeman responsible before returning his attention to Madam Chamack. "If you don't believe me, I have proof. There'll be security camera footage- video and audio- from my lair on the home computer. The camera was there in case there were ever any intruders who came in while I wasn't there."

This was his revenge on her, Lila realized with a sick, sinking feeling. He was going down- there was no getting around that- but he was going to take her down with him. She wouldn't get cleared of the charges for stealing a Miraculous and needlessly endangering it, and at this rate...

She was going to get charged with purposefully colluding with a supervillain. If the police searched her notebooks- and they would now, who was she kidding?- they would see that she had been planning on taking out the superheroes, too.

Unless...unless they didn't listen to a supervillain. Unless they thought that he was just lying to slander her. But he had mentioned proof, and the likelihood of both reporters and police not following up on that was pretty slim.

"After that, while the police searched for the footage, we decided to approach some of Lila's classmates to see what they thought of the accusations," Madam Chamack continued. "Most of them were confused and not sure what to believe. Others, though, are positive that at least part of Lila's story are made up."

It didn't take a genius to figure out what was coming. Still, Lila couldn't hold in a hiss when she saw Marinette Dupain-Cheng's face appear on screen.

"Lila tells a lot of stories," she told Madam Chamack. "There was a video of her on the Ladyblog a while back with her claiming that she's Ladybug's best friend, even though she had just arrived in Paris. Anyone could have asked Ladybug about it and had that disproved in seconds."

"Ladybug told Lila to stop spreading lies about her right after that, and Lila didn't listen," another voice chimed in, and Lila scowled when the camera panned out to include Adrien Agreste. Why anyone would bother to interview him, she didn't know. Surely he wasn't considered a reliable source of information, with his father unmasked as Paris's supervillain. "That was the first time that she was akumatized as Volpina."

"She was akumatized again and made the illusions of the fighting Ladybug and Chat Noir on Heroes Day, even though she was claiming that she was in the middle of a trip out of the country," Marinette added. "She was gone from school for several months, claiming that she was on a trip and meeting all of these famous people. I don't know why no one besides us ever fact-checked her story. There were a ton of details that just didn't line up."

"Celebrities not even in the same country that she claimed they were, landscapes behind her with stores that closed years ago- it wasn't that hard to find the posters that she used as a backdrop to her Skype calls," Adrien told Madam Chamack. He wrapped his arm around Marinette's. "And no one ever checked up on that."

"And there were stories that she would tell in class, too- she claimed to have a hearing problem after saving Jagged Stone's kitten on an airplane runway, that's the one I remember most," Marinette finished. "Which is ridiculous. It's not hard to find video of Jagged Stone saying that he only likes reptiles and that he's had Fang for years. So I'd say that Lila is lying this time, too. Getting super-bent on revenge because of some perceived slight is totally up her alley. She's clearly trying to discredit Ladybug and Chat Noir and all of their hard work for the city."

"And she's certainly been akumatized far more often than anyone else in the city," Adrien added in. "Most of those times- the majority, I'd say- there wasn't even anything that had happened that we knew of to upset her."

"So even before we got our hands on the tape, there were some serious doubts about Lila Rossi's trustworthiness," Madam Chamack said as that clip ended. "Conversations with the teachers at her school confirmed that Lila had told those stories, and a source at the embassy confirmed that Ms. Rossi's mom was not traveling during the time that her daughter claimed. And then we received this clip."

Lila's heart was in her throat as a familiar scene showed up on-screen- Hawkmoth's lair. Glass shattered, and Sting appeared in front of Hawkmoth. They started their exchange, and every word she had said came over loud and clear.

No. No. All of her lies, all of her hard work, the careful web that she had spun- all of it was falling apart. Lila buried her hands in her hair, tugging as she tried to figure out some way- any way- out of this. She had to figure out something, anything, anything at all.

Nothing came to mind.

There was a knock on the door, and it opened to reveal several police officers. All of them had grim looks on their faces, and Lila knew without a doubt that they had already been informed of everything that Madam Chamack had just presented. The questioning that morning hadn't been because of her mom's lawsuit- which was definitely going to get thrown out, if it hadn't been already- it was because they were going to use her own words against her, pointing out where the evidence contradicted her words.

Lila gulped, unable to completely hide her nerves. She had never faced this level of scrutiny before, and had never told such large lies before, either. She hadn't ever done anything worse than threaten a couple people into silence before, and now- now she was facing multiple charges, each more serious than the last.

This time, Lila had to admit, she might have bitten off more than she could chew.

Fin.

A/N: Lila, what exactly did you THINK was going to happen when a Miraculous holder with two weeks of "practice" and no battle experience went up against a supervillain who managed to fling Ladybug and Chat Noir aside on Heroes Day? Realistically a battle like that would have injuries and so Lila learned that the hard way. Overconfidence in one's abilities will do that.

I hope you enjoyed the story! I thought it would be fun to do something from a bit of a different POV and have things just totally go off of the tracks and...yeah, it was fun.

As always, reviews make my day! :)