In retrospect, I should have scheduled my plan to start on Saturday rather than Friday. Dealing with superheroes was exhausting, and now I was faced with returning to school on two hours of sleep. At least it was Saturday now, so I'd only have half a day of classes. I wondered if Ladybug and Chat Noir were facing a similar problem, since they were fighting each other all through the night.

I hadn't expected the two to be so evenly matched—I'd expected Ladybug to emerge as the clear winner within a few minutes. But as the sun had risen, neither of them had defeated the other, and they were still clueless as to how I had tricked them, each still believing the other to be akumatized.

As I ate breakfast, I had a chance to watch the morning news. Sure enough, a reporter was covering the aftermath of the fight. "We're not sure what prompted Ladybug and Chat Noir to turn on each other," she was saying. "Some believe this was simply a disagreement between friends. But others fear that there is a more sinister factor at play. Perhaps one of our heroes has fallen victim to Hawkmoth—or perhaps one of them may have turned to evil of their own accord. Because of this possibility, Mayor Bourgeois has declared a state of emergency. Neither Ladybug nor Chat Noir could be reached for comment. It seems our only course of action at this point is to wait for future developments. Until then, I'm Nadja Chamack, and this is TVi News."

The plan was far more successful than I had anticipated. This city had gotten used to being attacked by villains on practically a weekly basis. But I'd seen the news coverage from those, and this seemed the first time in a long while that people seemed actually scared. They'd learned to rely on their heroes when danger struck. And now people were questioning whether that trust was misplaced.

"I'm impressed, Volpina," Hawkmoth's voice spoke in my head. "You're certainly the sly fox I took you for. But let's not lose focus. I want those jewels!"

"Don't worry, Hawkmoth," I replied. "Sabotaging their reputation and their trust in each other is only the beginning."

It was time to go to school. Since I couldn't exactly go into class looking like Volpina, I created an illusion duplicate of myself in my normal form. As I crouched on the roof of the school, my duplicate walked up the steps, and was met there by Marinette.

"Good morning, Lila!" she said cheerfully. "Did you sleep well?"

"I'm afraid I didn't," I replied.

Before I could say anything else, I noticed both Alya and Adrien walking up the steps toward us. "Good morning, Lila," Alya said as she brushed past my duplicate. "Marinette, did you see what happened last night?"

"No, what was it?" Marinette asked innocently.

Alya pulled out her phone, and both Marinette and Adrien leaned over to take a closer look. "Ladybug and Chat Noir were fighting each other. Look, you can see that they broke those windows and even cracked the sidewalk! It must have been intense. I wish I could have been there filming it, because we've got no footage at all."

Marinette didn't look particularly shocked, but took an expression of surprise as Alya looked up from her phone. "Do you know why they're fighting?" Marinette asked.

"At first I thought that Chat Noir was being mind-controlled by a villain. It's happened a few times before—with Dislocoeur, with Puppeteer, and with Princesse Fragrance. But each of those times, Ladybug beat him easily, and this time it looks like it was an evenly matched fight. Nobody even knows who won, if anybody did. So I think Chat Noir's turned evil of his own accord."

"Or maybe it's Ladybug that's turned evil," Adrien suggested.

Alya shook her head. "No way. I could never see that happening."

"I don't know. I could see that," I added.

Alya shot my duplicate a dirty look. "I know you could. But you've got the wrong impression of her. Even if you don't personally like her, she's a true hero."

"But so is Chat Noir!" Adrien insisted. "If we know that one of them's gone bad, it's equally likely to be either one."

The bell rang, and everybody headed to class. My illusory doppelgänger followed suit.

I took pride in my success in taking down the two heroes. But I was starting to feel that it was an empty victory, as nobody other than Hawkmoth knew that I was responsible for it. I'd done something no other villain had managed to pull off, and was getting no credit for it.

I had to confess to somebody. I suppose it's my fatal flaw.

And so, as classes ended for the day, my illusion approached Marinette. "Can I talk to you for a minute?" I asked.

"Of course, Lila!" Marinette grinned. "What is it?"

"Not here," I whispered. "Follow me." My illusion led her out the gate and behind the school.

"I have something to confess," I said hesitantly.

Marinette nodded. "Whatever it is, your secret's safe with me. You can trust me."

"Good," I replied. "Because if anybody else finds out—especially Ladybug—it could mean disaster."

Now Marinette started to look worried. "What is it?"

"I—" I couldn't find the words. It was a new experience—throughout my life, the words I needed were always on the tip of my tongue. And this had happened several times in the past couple days. Especially when I spoke to Marinette. There was something about her that made it hard for me to speak.

I saw it now. It was that I couldn't lie to her. I'd done it before, and it had felt as if I was betraying her. I now felt that everything I said to her would have to be the absolute truth, and that was difficult for me.

"Take my hand," I finally said after a long pause, extending the hand of my illusion.

Marinette seemed taken aback. "What?"

"Please, just do it."

She hesitantly reached out and touched the hand of my illusion. It promptly disappeared in a cloud of orange smoke. Marinette gasped.

That was my cue. I leaped off of the roof of the school and landed in front of her.

"Volpina!" Marinette exclaimed. I looked into her eyes, and instead of the usual compassion and kindness, I saw only shock and fear.

"Listen, Marinette—" I began, reaching out to her.

She pulled away. "What are you doing?!"

"Don't worry!" I pleaded, trying to reassure her. "I don't mean you any harm. You said I could trust you."

Now she seemed confused. "How are you back—did you get akumatized again? And what's your plan?"

I distracted her with a question of my own. "Have you ever been akumatized, Marinette?"

She shook her head. That was strange. I thought Alya had said everybody in the class had been akumatized; I wouldn't have imagined she'd forget her best friend. But no matter—I pressed on.

"So then you don't know what it's like. You might imagine it would be exciting and liberating, but it's exactly the opposite. When I was akumatized the first time, it only magnified the worst part of myself—the part that can't help but spin lies and trickery; the part I want to destroy. By being akumatized, I learned just how evil I could be, and that terrifies me. The entire experience was one of terror, guilt, and shame."

"So why did you let it happen again?" she asked.

"Because it was the only way I could stop it from happening to anybody else, ever again."

"How do you mean?"

I sighed. "Do you know why I hate Ladybug so much? It's not just because she humiliated me in front of Adrien…and besides, she apologized for that. It's because Hawkmoth has been akumatizing people practically every week, and Ladybug has done nothing at all to try to actually stop him. As a superhero, it's her responsibility to cut this problem off at the source, but she's been allowing this to happen to more and more people."

Now Marinette seemed even more confused. "So you hate Hawkmoth, but you got yourself akumatized again?

I nodded. "Since Ladybug wasn't doing anything to take down Hawkmoth, I decided to do it myself. Lila couldn't do it…but Volpina can."

"How?" Marinette asked.

"It's actually a bit ironic. If I go against Hawkmoth directly, he can take my powers away. So I have to trick Ladybug and Chat Noir into doing it for me. And they're going to. My plan is working perfectly. I've turned them against each other, making each think the other has been akumatized. Now they're both going to be terrified and distraught, since they've each lost their closest ally. And who are they going to blame for that? Hawkmoth. This will finally give them the incentive to take down Hawkmoth once and for all."

"That's brilliant," Marinette breathed.

"And that's why you can't tell anybody. If Hawkmoth finds out, if Ladybug finds out, and even if Chat Noir finds out, my plan will be ruined."

"But why are you telling me?"

"Because I need an ally. I need somebody I can count on if things go wrong, and I need to know that there's somebody out there who trusts me."

"Hang on a minute," Marinette said, looking concerned. "If Hawkmoth has akumatized you, how does he not know what you're saying right now?"

I grinned and opened my hand, showing her that I was holding my fox necklace. "I took it off. He can't hear or see anything I'm doing. Once I put it back on, I'll just tell him it fell off, and he won't have any clue. I guess I'm putting my skill as a liar to good use; he hasn't suspected anything this whole time!"

Now Marinette seemed impressed. "I didn't think anybody would be able to trick Hawkmoth to that extent. But now that I think about it, you're definitely the best liar I've ever met. If anybody could dupe him, you could." Then she started to look concerned again. "But how do you know you're not lying to me right now?"

"Because I love you, Marinette."

Wait, what?

What had I just said?

That wasn't supposed to happen. I was just supposed to tell her my plan. Why did I say that? Was I lying?

I thought for a second. I wasn't lying. I'd just never consciously realized.

Oh, no.

This was bad, this was very bad. What was I supposed to do now?

Marinette looked very surprised. Probably almost as surprised as I did. There was an awkward silence of several seconds in which none of us spoke.

I turned and ran.

"Wait! Volpina!" Marinette called after me. I didn't look back.

I'd known her for two days. That wasn't nearly enough time to know that for certain.

But it explained everything. That was why I couldn't bring myself to lie to her, why I appeared to her in person instead of just as an illusion, and why I so desperately wanted her as an ally. And earlier, when I had told myself I needed to find somebody to confess to, it wasn't true. I didn't want to confess to somebody—I wanted to confess to her.

And now she knew all of that as well.

That certainly threw a wrench in things.