Marinette was not just tired - she was exhausted. The akuma attacks were happening every single day for the last week, and it actually took a whole lot of energy. Add in regular patrols, tons of homework because of the upcoming exams, designing a dress for a school party which was in three days, and you receive a talking walking shape of a human with no interest for anything happening around. The worst part was that her parents had been in China for the last two weeks now - what for, Marinette couldn't even remember. So on top of that she had to do all the housework - cooking, cleaning, washing and so on.

It was no wonder she barely got any sleep. Marinette tripped a lot more than usual, which almost each time ended up with even more work on cleaning her clothes or the mess she made, or collecting the books that fell out of her backpack, or something similar. Alya tried to help her in every possible way, but mostly Marinette just needed sleep. A lot of sleep.

No wonder she overslept almost every morning, getting up barely on time only due to Tikki's help. Just like today.

"Marinette! Get up now or you will get a detention!" Tikki cried, actively trying to wake her up.

"Okay," the girl replied, already half-asleep and turned to the other side.

"Come on, you can do this!" encouraged Tikki. "Just move your body up and your legs down, come on, stand up!"

"One sec..."

"You don't have time for that! Oh, look, Adrien came to see if you're okay!"

"What?!" That seemed to wake up Marinette. At least, she jolted violently, tripped over the blanket and knocked off the lamp standing near her bed while falling. She messily got rid of a blanket and stood upright, glancing around the room.

Tikki was giggling like crazy.

"That's not funny!" pouted Marinette, but upon seeing the time she almost forgot her kwami's teasing. "Oh no, there are only five minutes before school starts!"

Her alert state disappeared as quickly as it came. Marinette tried to be fast while brushing her teeth, getting dressed and pulling her hair in two usual pigtails, but her exhaustion was clearly bleeding into her actions.

"Your mission is to get to school on time, not fall asleep while walking," chided Tikki.

Even while processing barely nothing, Marinette knew exactly what the fastest way to get to school was if she was late.

"Okay then. Tikki, spots on!"

Ladybug took her backpack and swung off in the direction of her school.

-page break ~==

"Yesterday's fight was so amazing! Ladybug and Chat Noir did an awesome job, as always!" Alya was discussing with Adrien and Nino her favorite topic while waiting for the class to start and Marinette to arrive. Preferably not in that order. "Although, they've seemed really tired for the last couple of days, especially Ladybug."

"Yeah," Adrien said with a yawn. "I bet it's not easy to fight all those akumas every single day. I wonder if they get any rest in their civilian life." As if, he bitterly thought. If I'm that tired, and Ladybug is beyond exhausted so much more than me with all my extra-curricula activities, I could only guess what is keeping her occupied that much.

"Let's hope today will be calm, dudes," added Nino.

Adrien sighed. Akuma or not, they still had patrol in the evening, which certainly didn't give them much rest.

"Alright, class, settle down." Ms. Bustier scolded as she entered the classroom.

"Oh god, Marinette is late again," whispered Alya almost to herself, while their teacher started to call the roll.

"Agreste, Adrien?"

"Present!"

"Bourgeois, Chloé?"

"Present!"

"Bruel, Ivan?"

"Present!"

"Cesáire, Alya?"

"Present!"

"Sorry I'm late!"

Ladybug burst through the doors, tripping over her feet and falling face first on the floor.

"Oh no, not again," Nino and Adrien could hear her muffled voice grumble. It looked like it took a lot of effort for her to stand up. Taking no notice of anything around her, the superheroine's shoulders slumped as she went one row up and took Marinette's place, and began to unpack her belongings.

Complete silence filled the room. Everyone, including Ms. Bustier, were watching Ladybug with their mouths hanging open.

Almost out of habit, Alya took out her phone and pressed the record button.

Nino turned out to be the best dealing with his shock since he first found the ability to speak.

"Um, sorry, but why exactly are you here, dude?"

That was perhaps not the best thing to call Ladybug, but to everyone's surprise, she actually replied to the awkwardly phrased question, seemingly completely oblivious to what was happening around her. Ladybug was clearly very sleep-deprived, as she stayed in her half-awake state, mumbling her answer.

"What do you mean, Nino? Last time I checked, it was Thursday, and we have school on Thursday, right? Literature is the first lesson and I almost made it on time. It's not like I was stopped for being late again and sent to the principal's office." Ladybug replied with a yawn, then dropped her head on her hands, unable to fight the urge to sleep anymore.

Adrien meanwhile pinched himself to make sure he wasn't sleeping (just like most

students in the class were doing). His Lady was here! Like, right behind him! And from the look of things, she didn't find anything out of the ordinary in being here! Almost like she forgot that she was Ladybug at the moment.

"Couffaine, Juleka!" Ms. Bustier decided to continue despite the situation, confusion clear in her voice.

"Present..." Juleka, like everyone, was still way too affected by Ladybug's appearance to say anything meaningful.

'But if she is here like that's how the things should be', thought Adrien, 'it must mean that…'

"Dupain-Cheng, Marinette!"

"Absent..." said Alya, still dazed and recording Ladybug.

'...Ladybug was…'

"Present!" came an offended voice from where Ladybug was seated in Marinette's seat. "Alya, have you lost your glasses or something?" She picked up her head and looked at the blogger like she was out of her mind. Honestly, Ladybug looked much more like an owl without sleep than an offended girl she tried to show she was. "Sorry I was late, Ms. Bustier," the girl apologized, trying to pull herself out of her sleep-deprived daze. "Couldn't get up on time with no one at home to wake me up. It won't happen again."

'...oh my god.' Adrien didn't dare to finish this thought.

"Oh. My. God!" shrieked Alya. Ladybug covered her ears with her hands.

"No need to be so loud," she informed the journalist before returning her head to her hands.

At this point, their classmates finally came to their senses, talking loudly all at once. However, they were almost immediately silenced when Ms. Bustier closed the journal, slammed it on the desk and raised her hand, calling for silence.

"Miss Dupain-Cheng!"

"Yes?" Ladybug shot up in a seating position, almost falling off her seat. She tried her best to pay attention to the question that Ms. Bustier was going to ask her.

The class waited, holding their breaths. But they already had all the confirmation they needed.

"I highly recommend you in future to double check your appearance before entering the classroom," said Ms. Bustier with a hint of amused smile.

There was a pregnant pause, where Ladybug finally looked down at herself, her eyes slowly widening in realization.

"Oops," she said in soft whisper, "I guess I forgot to detransform."

AN: this is one shot, not to be continued. I tried to, but it turned out a lot weaker than the original idea. Sorry:(