let's talk about what the world can do for you
It's not like Alya means to start getting interesting in Chat Noir's secret identity next, but well, it kind of happens anyway.
The thing is, now that she's figured out Marinette's secret – even if she does still have to tell her friend that – she's kind of wondering what else she might have missed.
She knows that the probability for both of Paris' superheroes to be in the same class, much less in hers, is ridiculously low, but then again so was the probability of Marinette being Ladybug.
However, now she also has a clearer idea of what to look for. She's been learning all of Marinette's excuses to go out superheroing, and she's been a witness of the signs associated with that: the vanishing act every time word of an akuma attack comes around, the lateness (though that might just be a Marinette thing) with poor excuses, and who could ever forget the awkwardness whenever someone mentions secrets and secret identities in a conversation?
She can look for those signs in her other classmates now, starting by everyone she knows never fell under the influence of an akuma, with the right build and the right gender.
That list is surprisingly short – it's kind of frightening to realize just how many people in their class felt dark emotions deeply enough to open up their minds and hearts to evil, even if all the adults do say that teenage years are the hardest ones.
In fact, there's only on name on that list: Adrien's.
(Alya laughs herself sick on that one, because Chat Noir's so obviously in love with Ladybug half of Paris ships them already – see some of the posts on the ladyblog for example – and Marinette's absolutely gone on Adrien, yet neither of those relationships appears to be reciprocated)
(if the only reason her friend is still unhappy is because the boy she's got a crush on fell in love with another version of her, Alya's gonna hurt something. Or someone. Once she's done laughing)
Of course, she's not totally sure yet.
Just like 99% sure.
.x.
What she needs, Alya decides as she watches her best friend angst about the best way to give to Adrien the cookies her mother baked especially for him only to ultimately fumble through an explanation and thrust them at him like they were a ticking time bomb, is proof.
("She didn't even let me eat one Alya," Marinette had complained. "Not a single one! My own mother! How could she do this to me?"
"She probably knows what'd happen if she let you eat just 'a single one': before you know it, there wouldn't be any left," Alya had answered with a smirk, because lately any kind of sugary treat had a tendency to disappear in her friend's vicinity.
"I-" Marinette had started to protest, only for her hand to drift to the bag she carried everywhere. Clearly her friend had had some kind of revelation. "I would've, wouldn't I?"
Patting Marinette on the shoulder, Alya had bitten back on her amusement to comfort her friend. "To be fair, your mom's cookies are to die for. No one would blame you for not resisting."
For some reason that had only made her friend blush more, but she had nodded and dropped the subject to focus on a plan to approach Adrien without tripping on her own feet)
(sometimes Alya wonders how her friend can also be the so graceful Ladybug when she can't seem to be able to behave normally in front of a boy)
Getting it probably won't be as easy as it was with Marinette though. After all, Alya can hardly expect another golden occasion such as the one that led to Ladybug's secret identity to be revealed to fall straight into her lap. That's just not how the world works. She got lucky once, she won't again.
Or maybe she will. After all, akuma attacks do happen every other week at least – sometimes more often, it's getting ridiculously hard to walk around Paris without getting roped into an evil scheme these days – more often than not while they're at school too.
Being a reporter, even if that 'hobby' is only vaguely tolerated by her teachers, and only because the principal thinks it makes their school look good, does allows her to have a little more freedom than the other students when it comes to leaving school during the attacks.
Alya knows her parents would probably be furious if they realized that their daughter's teacher were purposefully letting her run toward danger instead of keeping her in a place that was moderately safe, but so far they seemed to believe that Alya was just good at sneaking out, which she was too, just not as good as they obviously thought.
That system works perfectly for her though, and her parents are even occasionally more proud than they are worried, so on the whole Alya counts it as a win.
Usually Alya is among the first one to escape in the panic, mostly thanks to the blind eye most of the adults turn her way, and while it's a great opportunity to catch as much of the fights as possible, it also means she loses almost an chance she has of noticing who else from her class disappears.
Which is why she decides that the next time the opportunity arrives, she'll hang back for as long as she can before leaving to record the incident.
Besides, she might even find out how Marinette manages to vanish so quickly and efficiently every time. Sure, her best friend apparently has super-powers now, but as far as Alya knows they come with the suit, and Marinette's definitely not wearing that in class when she leaves.
She doesn't even have to wait long for her next opportunity: an hour and a half actually, which is almost her entire French class – thankfully, because she hates having to catch up on those lessons – and also the moment everyone's cellphones start ringing with danger alerts about aliens in the streets kidnapping people.
Unfortunately, nothing works out the way she had hoped it would.
Instead of being able to discreetly follow Adrien and get the proof she needs, she gets abducted by the 'aliens' – she's not actually sure what they are, but they're real enough to appear on camera as she liveblogs the whole adventure – with the rest of her class.
Though Adrien and Marinette are suspiciously absent, but that's hardly concrete proof, which is what she needs to disperse that last 1% of doubt lingering in her mind.
They're back just in time for classes to resume too, and pretend to have escaped the kidnapping part by hiding in the bathrooms when they're asked.
Alya can see Marinette becoming anxious as the rest of their class starts asking more and more questions, and so she pulls out her phone with a smile a little too bright to be entirely real.
"Anyway, we were taken by aliens, or whatever those things were, and I have everything on video. It might even be one of my best yet,' she announces proudly as she sets her phone with said video in front of Marinette. "It was awesome."
It had kind of been too, because while the 'aliens' had been using their kidnapped subjects for some kind of nefarious purpose – stealing their energy by making them work, energy that powered whoever was the first 'alien' – which had sucked, Alya had finally been able to get a taste of heroics by staging a rebellion amongst the prisoners, which had helped Ladybug and Chat Noir defeat 'The Martian'.
The teacher's entrance at that very moment saves Marinette from having to say anything else – it also proves a more effective distraction than Alya's story, since everyone has to stop talking, but that doesn't stop Marinette from shooting a grateful look Alya's way as she hands her back the phone.
This is their last class for the day, and Alya spends it alternatively designing ways to find proof of Chat Noir's identity and looking at the boys in front of her for any kind of clue they might have – Adrien because surely he'll slip up at some point, and Nino because, while Marinette may not have told her, nothing guarantees that Adrien did the same with his best friend.
She gets nothing. This time.
.x.
The thing is, finding Chat Noir's secret identity – well, confirming it, since she grows surer of her theory with each passing day – isn't exactly her priority. Sure, she wants to know, because she prides herself in being a good reporter and investigator, and it's frustrating not being able to actually get the proof she needs, even if she's probably the only one who'll ever see that proof, but she also doesn't, because Marinette's secret already weighs on her – not much, but a little still, and she doesn't like that – and she's not sure she wants to add more weight on her shoulders.
That's not to say that she stops looking for it, of course, but her priority is Marinette and herself – sometimes even in that order – which means that covering up when her friend leaves to save the city is more important than to follow her and see if she can witness another transformation.
Besides, they also have to start looking for an internship, and Alya would love to be able to get one with some real reporters – not that she's not a real reporter, of course, but she's an amateur compared to nearly everyone else – and learn more about that world.
Unfortunately, she doesn't exactly have any connections there, which would really help, and so she has to research on who she should send her application to and what to say by herself, ask for recommendations letters from her teachers, letters they wouldn't give if they didn't see her applying herself in class, and make sure the ladyblog would make her look good instead of simply another teenage groupie.
It's a lot more work than she expected at first, but if she gets that internship – though it will only last two weeks, it's a start – it'll have been worth it.
It does make her a little too busy to keep chasing after Adrien in the hope of seeing him turn into Chat Noir though, especially when Marinette does that very well by herself.
Not that her friend suspects anything, of course. Marinette seems to be under the impression that Chat Noir and Adrien being the same person is impossible, but that doesn't stop her from knowing Adrien's schedule for every day of every week by heart, which at least told Alya two things: one, that Adrien and Chat Noir were never in the same place at the same time, even when everyone else in their class had met both of Paris' heroes, and two, that Adrien is coincidentally nowhere to be found whenever Chat Noir makes an appearance somewhere in Paris.
To anyone else, that would be enough proof, but all of this is still circumstantial, and circumstances aren't enough for Alya. She's having too much fun to settle for anything else, plus she might need the proof someday if she wants Adrien and Marinette to finally admit their feelings to one another.
It's become clearer that if she leaves this in their hands they'll never get anywhere, and while the pining is adorable, she can see that her friend is hurting over this.
She's also really beginning to think that Adrien – who definitely is Chat Noir even if she can't prove it yet – loves Ladybug and would refuse to date Marinette because of that, and really, kudos to him for staying faithful to the girl he loves. She'd congratulate him for that if it wasn't so ridiculous, since Marinette is actually that very same girl.
She also knows that Marinette, as herself, is sort of friend with Chat Noir – her friend has told her that at least – even if she doesn't really know how that particular friendship works out, and it's clear from her tone whenever she mentions him that while he infuriates her she's also really fond of him.
Almost as fond of him as she is of Adrien, Alya'd bet on it, and she'd laugh about it if it didn't make her want to tear out her hair so much.
Which brings her back to figuring out Chat Noir's secret, since then managing to somehow make the two idiots tell each other would probably be the best option for everyone involved.
The only problem is that she still doesn't know how to tell anyone that she knows, and short of locking both Adrien and Marinette into the same room and then stage an akuma attack so they'd have to change in front of each other, Alya doesn't really see another option to get Marinette to believe her.
Even if she could though, she can't just blurt everything out in front of Marinette or Adrien. Their secret isn't hers to tell, and she won't betray her best friend by telling anyone anything she doesn't want them to know, even if that would be the best thing to do.
They probably wouldn't believe her anyway – Marinette can be stubborn like that when she believes she's right about something, and she doesn't know Adrien well enough to actually manage to drop something so important in a casual conversation, which is the best she can hope for with him – and though Marinette would forgive her in the end, it'd hurt their relationship, and Alya isn't prepared to do that.
All of this leaves her with the only options of getting Marinette to figure out Adrien's secret for herself, which won't be easy but can probably be done, or somehow getting them to tell each other, which would probably be easier if Marinette could hold a conversation longer than five minutes with Adrien without blushing or tripping over something or stammering out nonsense.
She is doomed.
.x.
Of course, as with everything else that's been happening recently, an opportunity falls into her lap when she expects it the least.
It starts when Adrien and Nino invite Marinette to the zoo and Marinette ropes her into coaching her via Bluetooth so that she can actually know what to say without having to think about it, and ends with Nino confessing feelings for Alya and then Ladybug and Chat Noir locking them both in a panther's cage while yet another akuma attacks Paris.
She feels like karma is laughing at her. She considers locking her friends in the same room once, and what happens to her after that? She gets locked up in a room with a boy who just admitted to liking her.
'Thanks for that Marinette,' Alya thinks as she starts planning her sweet, sweet revenge.
(it will definitely involve sending her friend the most romantic Ladynoir videos she can find, because why not kill two birds with the same stone if she can?)
In the end, the afternoon isn't the complete ruin she thought it would be. She may be locked up in a cage that smells pretty bad – wet cat definitely isn't her perfume of choice – but Nino is a friend, and once they get past the awkwardness of the confession he didn't know she heard, everything goes much smoother.
She doesn't get to film anything of this particular battle, but she does get an ally out of it – as it turns out, while Nino knows nothing of the Ladybug/Chat Noir part of the story, he does agree that Marinette and Adrien are much better suited for each other than he and Marinette would, especially once he realizes that he's not actually interested in dating Marinette.
That conversation is weird but somehow still pleasant, and when Ladybug's magic washes over them and replaces them outside the cage – just in time for the panther to return there too, something for which Alya is eternally grateful since she's definitely not ready to get eaten – he invites her to get pastries and keep talking.
Still reeling from the fact that Nino actually likes her – it is no less bewildering to hear him say it to her face instead of hearing it come from the earpiece she had been wearing, but it is starting to feel real, and she thinks she could go with that – she orients the conversation so that they mainly gossip about their friends, which is how she learns that Adrien had actually been coaching Nino the way she had been whispering Marinette what to say.
"Do you have any idea of how we could get them together?" Alya asks at some point, because it's all good and well to know that Adrien may actually be reciprocating somewhat Marinette's feelings in addition to being interested in Ladybug – it will definitely make things easier (well, it can't make them any harder) – but that still doesn't help her in formulating a plan.
"We could just lock them up in a room until they admit to their feelings," Nino shrugs. "I mean, it sort of worked for us even if it wasn't done on purpose."
'But it was,' Alya moans inside her mind. "We can't do that," she protests out loud, looking quickly around them to make sure no one heard Nino suggest this. She's not tempting fate a second time – being locked up in a cage once was enough for her, thank you very much.
"I don't see why not," Nino answers with another shrug. "And why are you looking so panicky? Trouble's over, Ladybug and Chat Noir took care of it, remember?" He asks with a frown.
Alya waves off his concerns easily by pretending she's looking for Marinette, breathing a sigh of relief when he accepts that excuse easily, and they go right back to the scheming.
It leads to nothing, partly because Adrien and Marinette show up about five minutes later – and how is her friend not questioning Adrien's timely appearances every time Chat Noir disappears is a mystery to her – partly because Nino's ideas are even more outlandish than hers and would most probably end up with broken bones for at least one person, expulsion from the school and in one particular case, bankruptcy for everyone involved.
Nino has a devious mind, and she likes that, but his ideas are just plain crazy.
Still, it's nice to have a partner in crime, even one that might prove to be completely useless in this endeavor.
(not that Alya minds – Nino holds her hand like it's the perfect fit and he makes her laugh, and in the end that's all that really matters to her)
.x.
Alya ends up finding her so elusive proof by going back through old videos on her computer. Most of them she had immediately uploaded form her phone to the ladyblog, but she likes keeping copies both on her computer and on an external hard drive just in case anything happens.
There are a handful of videos she never uploaded on the ladyblog and probably never will – the quality is too poor, back from when she was still figuring out how to make good films, or the footage is useless, showing nothing of importance – but she keeps them anyway.
It's one of those videos she's watching right when she notices a tiny detail she had missed before.
She can barely make it out – the video had been taken with her old phone, and the quality had really been terrible with that – but now that she actually knows what to look out for, there's no way she can miss it.
Adrien Agreste is on screen going inside a building, and Chat Noir is seen coming out of it.
There's no way it's anyone else, and Alya's heart skip a beat in victory.
('got you,' she thinks smugly as she changes the name of the video so that no one but her will ever know what it contains)
(her victory dance knocks down the lamp and all of her books and she'll have a magnificent bruise on her shin for the rest of the week, but it's worth it)
.x.
Nothing changes after that. If she's entirely honest with herself, Alya is kind of disappointed. She had felt on top of the world at that moment – she knew both Ladybug and Chat Noir's identities, her, a teenager, when so-called experts couldn't even agree on the age of their heroes – and she had kind of expected life to be different after that.
It isn't.
Marinette's still her best friend, same as before, and she still spends all of their classes pining over Adrien and doodling his face on every surface she could get her hands on when she's not trying to save everyone in the city, and school is just as entertaining as it was.
In a way, Alya's thankful for that. She's realized some time ago that she really didn't want anyone to know that she knew. She just wishes she had someone she could share her epiphany with.
Hopefully her friend will wise up soon enough and then she can lord over Marinette the fact that she knew her secret and figured out Adrien's long before her for the rest of their lives.
That'd be really nice. The perfect revenge even.
In the meantime, she'll just have to enjoy dropping subtle hints in the conversation until, hopefully, either or both of them cracked and revealed their secret to the other.
She's looking forward to it.