Marinette loved it.

What did she love?

Her internship. It was nearly to the point of being miraculous. An internship under Gabriel Agreste was everything she could have ever wished for at that point of her life and was going to look amazing on her resume. She was determined to be so good that he would be willing to write her a reference; if not offering her a job himself!

To be completely honest she had not yet started but that didn't matter. She would start and she would be amazing.

There had been a lot of preparation going into this internship. Marinette had been forced to make it through a rigorous application process. There had been the paperwork at the beginning, then there had been a sketch, then more paperwork and more sketches. Finally, she had made a jacket to fit measurements he had supplied. It had to fit perfectly for her to be considered, and it had.

And Adrian had worn it.

Ignoring that, she had made it though, signed all the clauses about how the internship could be terminated at any time, that anything creative belonged to him and that she wasn't allowed to talk about anything she saw (with alarmingly few exceptions), and was about to start. She was technically going through school and this was one of her subjects. Before they allowed her to graduate she was forced to do at least one practical experience and it was amazing that this was it.

Other preparations had included mentioning to Chat that this was a new endeavour. He knew that she had been passionate about a certain industry for a long time now and had just landed to the internship of her dreams under a king of the industry. He had been pleased but had wondered, correctly, how this was going to affect their fights against the Akumas. Marinette as Ladybug had been forced to admit that there may be times when she turned up late to the battle, but in return, she promised to bring him cookies regularly whilst it was all going on.

All that was left was to start.

There were some nerves. That was normal, Alya had assured her before mentioning that she had better be able to get out all her words in front of him otherwise it was going to be a very short internship indeed.

Two weeks later it was no longer the dream internship.

M. Agreste was a tight-ass.

There was no other way of saying it. She was practically run off her feet with everything. Nathalie, of course, was acting as the secretary, but so that she had "an appropriate level of experience within the fashion empire", she had to follow the lady around nearly constantly. There had been only a few times where she had managed to properly talk with him and that was mainly him talking to her about what she was to do next. There had barely been time to touch her sketch book in the two weeks and she hadn't even seen any fabric in the same time.

Thankfully Nathalie didn't question her disappearances when there was an Akuma running around. Apparently, the woman wasn't very keen on them and took to disappearing as soon as possible when one was running around. She would have begun to suspect that the woman was Hawkmoth if it weren't for the fact that the villain was a man and Mme Sancoeur was a woman.

Uhhh…

Well, she assumed that Hawkmoth was a man. He sounded nothing like Nathalie…

Marinette was now three weeks into her internship and sitting on the fence about whether she should just give up now and become a hermit, or continue like this. Alya was voting hermit, as her feelings about the internship had been one of the few things not mentioned in the contract.

The emails had started.

Oh, why did the emailing system have to exist?

One of the exciting perks about her internship was that she had been given a company email. The less exciting part was that she was expected to be within the range of it constantly. During her other classes (which to her distress continued to run), she constantly had to take a step outside to either answer the phone call or the email because of the teacher's "no phone" policy within the classroom.

At first, it was one. One that basically told her what she was meant to be presenting to M. Agreste the next day that she was meant to have worked on in her "free time". Unfortunately, it wasn't what she had thought she was meant to be working on at all. Quietly and without making a fuss she dumped her long report and presentation into another hidden (so she would never have to see it ever again) folder on her computer and spent the rest of the day, not on the assignment that was due for one of her classes the next day, but on what she was now presenting on. The presentation had gone well and he had told her that she was well informed on the subject, however, appeared to need to learn how to use concealer. The rest of that day was spent with Nathalie who taught her how to hide the bags under her eyes. The expensive makeup that she was given had been on the Agreste credit card and she cringed every time she used it with the knowledge of how much it had been.

A day after this was a new email on the next project within her internship. It was great, she was conducting research on something that he would use as inspiration for her next line! She daren't get anything wrong and as such again spent a ridiculous amount of time on it. It got so bad she had Alya pulling up articles beside her for her to read. Alya had access to a large trove of online articles through her university and Marinette wasn't against using what resources had been shoved down her throat by one of her best friends.

Two days later there was a second email. He had changed his mind.

A further two days and he wanted both.

Six days from the first email and she had resorted to putting her headin the ground in the theory that if she couldn't see the world, it couldn't see her.

Finally, she reached the presentation day, a full three weeks and a half (down to the minute) from the moment she began the internship. She appeared fresh and bright and chirpy and all other horrible things.

"That was a well put together presentation that was also visually appealing. I commend you."

Marinette had to physically stop herself from slapping him.

Week four and Marinette was finally working underneath the man himself. She attended most of his meetings and learned more about running a fashion empire than she could have imagined. It all came at a cost however when M. Tight-ass had her running around constantly under his feet. Every time she ran past Adrian he would give her a small, sad smile, knowing what she was experiencing and she gave him a tired but true one back as she now knew what it had been like in his life. It encouraged her to be less anxious around him, mainly as she was just too tired to even consider doing so.

The emails never stopped however and she was responding to them as promptly as she could manage, mere minutes later. They grew more and more in depth as her knowledge of the industry expanded and she began to give him input on designs he would send her. It was a recent venture of his to branch into a more affordable market and by selecting an intern who came from that, dare he say, side of life enabled him to gain an understanding of what would really sell.

Then a moment that Marinette dreamed of but never expected turned up.

"Design me something." Her mouth fell open before she mentally reminded herself of Alya's words.

"What would you like me to design, Sir?"

"Something that will match with my collection. You have seen most of the other pieces by now and I am sure that you can achieve such a thing. Prove me right."

That was what week five consisted of. In between multiple emails and document forwarding (at which point she recommended the marvellous things called google drive, he was sold at once), she managed to design something that was true to herself but aligned beautifully with what he had shown her earlier. To her amazement, once she had sent the email mentioning that it was finished he asked to see her at once. She had his schedule (not attained in the same way that Adrian's once was), she knew he was busy.

She also knew not to argue. She practically ran the whole way to his house and paused before putting in the code to open the gates. It was a quick check to make sure that the makeup applied before the sending of the email was still intact and not sliding down her face like a Katsushika Hokusai painting. It paid to be prepared.

Coming out of the house at the other end of the meeting she felt like she was floating on clouds. It could have been from the amount of caffeine in her system but she truly didn't mind. He had asked for her to make the outfit to fit one of his models (thankfully one she had met before) so it could be displayed at his show. And the design would have her name next to his when it hit shelves. It would hit shelves!

Even better, she was going to have a room in the offices with her name on it, a sewing machine and everything else she would need to make it. She was still going to be underfoot and going to all his meetings but she would be actually making and designing in his offices!

It was too good to be true and later her family all went out to lunch to celebrate.

A few weeks passed and they reached the break in her course. Normal internships stopped for that amount of time to allow the student to catch up on whatever they had missed out on but he had already told her that there was to be no stopping if she wanted everything to be ready for the release and to be part of it when the show happened. It was at this point where she was handing in major assignments left, right, and centre, along with being underfoot and making her design that Marinette had had enough of being enclosed in solely her internship and assignments. She decided to meet up with Alya.

She walked over to there from her house and ran into Alya's mother in the garden attempting to solve the puzzle of why there was a random and sudden pumpkin plant in the middle of her lawn. Alya was called down and Marinette walked just inside the door of the house so that there was a wall behind her for when Alya jumped.

And jump she did. Alya knew how busy Marinette was with almost everything in her life and wasn't expecting to see her best friend at all. Then when Marinette opened her mouth, she wasn't surprised.

"I need coffee."

"Why?"

"None in house. Show me coffee."

"Mum's on a decaf kick. I know a cheap place that sells shit coffee by the bucket, however."

"Perfect. Take me there."

Alya laughed and grabbed her purse before walking out the door holding Marinette's elbow. She told her mother where they were going and got a lazy hand-wave in response back. They managed to get all the way over there without Marinette collapsing and Alya was even kind enough to shout for the coffee.

"So, when does this finish?"

"After exams, mine end a week later than yours by the way. The worst part is that it doesn't stop for the exams, it just keeps going."

"Oh, my poor dear. You have another half semester to go!"

"I know. At least I can get sentences out around him."

"I suppose that is a plus."

They both paused to take a sip and appreciatively look around the room like coffee creeps normally do. Marinette sighed.

"Yeah, I was able to tell him that I was, in fact, wearing makeup when he asked if I had even looked in the mirror that morning before turning up."

Alya tried her hardest to hold in the laughter but couldn't. It seemed like such a typical thing for him to say and for Marinette to respond in such a way meant that she truly was tired. Alya then fell off the chair and wasn't able to get back up again. They were kicked out of the place with their coffees in cups to go and they decided to fudge sweets off Marinette's parents.

Eventually, the end of the internship came and with it all of the press releases. She was practically glued to Adrian's side for most of it, as he was to his father's. Marinette was never more thankful that she was finally able to talk to him because with his father listening in, the conversation could have gone south quickly. Everything she wore to the meetings and events from that point on were Agreste brand and was amazingly hers to keep. Gabriel chose what she was to wear each time and as such, she was never clashing against him or Adrian. Occasionally there was a wild Chloe hanging around but she was always too busy getting what she wanted from her father or cooing over "Adrikins" to bother Marinette.

At this events, Marinette began to truly learn what it was like to network properly. When it was mentioned what design she had created out of the collection, she was poached harder than an egg, but Gabriel always made sure to stick close by, or at the very least to have Nathalie beside her. She came across a man who wanted to design the shoes for the outfit for the runway and she was amazed at how fast she was pulled away before she was able to say anything.

"Not high enough and works with too many opposing brands," Gabriel muttered to her before greeting another man who really did end up designing the shoes. He had also designed the ones she had been wearing that night (a perfectly executed ploy by Gabriel), but she hadn't realised until later.

By the time the events and meetings finished it was practically assured that Marinette would never have to really start at the bottom. There were so many people who had wanted her to work for them that she really needed a card wallet just to hold the business cards. In case of an emergency, she told Tikki as she placed it in one of her draws inside her room. The Kwami gushed and started hunting through them, recognising most of the names from Marinette's own gushing.

Then Tikki forced her on a decaf program.

I apologise for this over 2500 word long rant about internships. I have roughly 12 nowhere near finished one shots on my computer. (As in one of them has about 6000 words. It grew) None of them felt right for this fandom and I didn't think that the characters were right either, then this happened. They may still be off (probably are) but I tried, right? And it was a long day at my internship. I did draw inspiration from my own, example being the emails (I got at least 4 today) and I will need to break my ever growing coffee addiction. I'm only about to hit week 7 out of 15! The pumpkin plant is a thing. We have four growing on it and we didn't even plant it.

If there are any typos I apologise. Microsoft word gives me the shits so I use a program that doesn't check as much as I need. I did download Grammarly but apparently, you need the internet to use that and I'm not currently connected as I write this.

By the way, HI!

Aly