Suffice to say she remained wide awake all night after her partner's visit. Thoughts of lurking catastrophe haunting her mind along with all the possible outcomes and reasons for his suspicious behavior. Did he find out her identity? Maybe he got wind of all her disappearances and assumed she was about to become a juvenile delinquent. Worse yet, maybe he thought she was working with Hawkmoth and believed her lame excuses and absence during emergencies to be irrefutable proof.
Worst case scenario, maybe he was having trouble at home and would spend the night out there on the cold rooftops, all because she didn't let him stay as long as he wanted. Wait, no, that couldn't be it... She didn't kick him out, he ran away as if he had realized something- oh no, maybe he saw Tikki... If so she was so screwed. She couldn't ask her kwami if that's the case because of the risk of being scolded into oblivion both for failing to keep her identity a secret and for waking her up at an ungodly hour. She didn't even notice her walls slowly being enveloped in the morning light before her clock began to screech with the loudest alarm she could possibly find online (one of her many attempts to stop having to rush late to class).
It was her mother's call coming from downstairs that took her out from her trance. Shaking her head, she jumped out of bed committing herself to not think about it anymore but to still keep her eyes open in case anything was out of place after last day's events.
That's how she spent the next few hours as alert as a caffeinated owl. She won't be caught off guard today!
Nothing escaped her attention, her gaze sharp and intimidating, forcing people to ask her what's wrong which in turn made her even warier of her surroundings. By the end of school, she had scared most of the student body - which had come to the unspoken agreement that she was about to snap or get akumatized or something, and then they'd be done for - because she was observing everyone with unflinching eyes and a manic grin that could in no way be called subtle. Afterward, she patroled a few rounds around her neighborhood at least until some shop owners started asking her if she had lost something.
With nothing else to do and barely hungry because of her anxiety she found herself sighing while looking at her reflection in the river. She hadn't realized how much talking to her little companion put her at ease when she was being unreasonable, but that was a no go if she wanted to keep her suspicions a secret. As if sensing her uneasiness, Tikki popped her head out of her purse and stared at her in curiosity, Marinette just shook her head in assurance. Tikki stared a bit longer until, not entirely convinced, she gave a shrug and went back to hiding. Marinette made up her mind to at least try to take a nap at home before going back to school and was about to turn around when she heard a familiar voice.
"Tell me again why we're doing this?- Yes, I know it's cheaper in the long run but- No, what?- That's not what I said!- well that's- yeah but it's a truck! I can't even!- I know, fine... A deal is a deal. - Don't you dare put me in trouble again. -you can come to get it yourself you know how to get in"
Risking one look behind her, she could see her long-time crush unloading a lot of cylinders covered in white paper with the help of a delivery man in what seemed like a hidden warehouse. Of course, only the voice gave him away since he was wearing a hideous hat to hide his face (maybe?). She promptly ducked behind a garbage can to observe without being detected.
"You know, I'm not about to judge but you look a little bit too young to be receiving this much stuff."
"Oh, oh yeah, I know. It's not for me... Believe me, I really hate cheese. It's for my mentor, he's crazy about that stuff but has no patience to deal with people." She couldn't hear the man's response as he closed loudly the back of the truck and got ready to drive away. "Thanks for your help anyway, here's a tip. Have a great day, mister."
There was something about the situation that she found unsettling. First of all, what was he doing there? Not even half an hour ago he had been picked up to eat lunch at home. Which means he wasn't supposed to be there, which means no one knew he was there. Also, that conversation from before seemed vaguely threatening and hostile - Adrien being hostile to someone? Now that's a surprise! - she could only assume that the cargo was for that person he was speaking with but he called him a mentor, something she hasn't heard him say about any of his tutors, coaches or teachers, ever. Any of that was already worrisome, especially if you considered the enormous quantity of cheese that was in the truck... If it even was cheese.
Her beloved Adrien always had a faint smell of Camembert, maybe this was not the first time that he was asked to do something like this... But what type of trouble had he been threatened with...?
Sooner rather than later, lunch break was over. Her overwhelmed brain made zig-zags between crime-fighting and her crush's shady deals; The idle chattering in the classroom and the prompt arrival of miss Mendeleiev failing to compute. Fortunately, for luck always seemed to lend her a hand when she needed it, a quick sweep at the news in her tablet showed one of the top results being someone being detained for smuggling drugs across some other country's borders using nothing more and nothing less than cheese as a cover, the article claimed that this was not as uncommon as it sounded.
"It can't be!"
