Fanfic / Bridges Burned

Bridges Burned (Mama Always Told Me That I Should Play Nice. But She Never Met You) is a Miraculous Ladybug salt fic by Unmasked Again.

After Lila Rossi convinces Marinette Dupain-Cheng's entire class that Marinette is a bully who deserves to be abandoned, they shun her just as Lila wants, and Alya even publicly announces that nobody in class considers themselves to be her friend anymore. But Marinette doesn't cry, or rage, or leave school. Instead, she just calmly acknowledges Alya's statement as if it were of no importance whatsoever.

And then she starts making some calls.

It seems that Marinette is actually very close to an astonishing array of celebrities, professional athletes, and other rich and powerful people, and those people are happy to drop by the school and offer fantastic favors to Marinette's friends. Unfortunately, as Marinette is quick to explain to them, her classmates insist they aren't her friends anymore. It's a good thing that she has lots of other friends in other classes who are thrilled to be the recipients of those favors instead. And while her original class may be distraught at losing out on opportunities for internships with world-famous reporters, contracts with major record labels, and training from elite athletes, they know they can't complain.

After all, they were the ones who said they didn't want to be friends anymore.

---

This fanfic contains examples of:

• Accusation Fic: The fic serves as this, accusing the class of being cruel and failing to treat Marinette appropriately. When Marinette proceeds to abandon them and leaves them to watch as she showers favors upon her new friends, the story treats this as karmic justice.
• The Ace: Marinette's secret web of connections that incorporates a huge who's who of real and (out-of-universe) fictional celebrities, all of which are willing to do her favors or sing her praises on mass media turn her into this.
• All for Nothing: Once Lila is finally exposed, the whole class realizes that they effectively ruined their friendship with Marinette for no real reason at all. Everything they thought they stood to gain from siding with Lila were things Marinette could have given them instead.
• Always Need What You Gave Up: The class sacrificed Marinette's friendship to suck up to Lila. Then it turns out they really needed Marinette's friendship because she has actual connections which she's willing to use to bolster her true friends, while Lila just has a pile of lies.
• Bratty Teenage Daughter: All of Marinette's female classmates show signs of this, especially Juleka, who agrees with the rest of Kitty Section that Luka — her own brother — should be fired from Kitty Section as Lila said.
• Cain and Abel: Juleka betrays Luka and helps force him out of Kitty Section, just because Lila says so.
• Celebrity Lie: Lila tells a bunch of these to placate the class, repeatedly insisting that she knows celebrities who are even more powerful and grant better favors than the ones Marinette knows. The class goes along with this, until Jagged finally reveals the truth.
• Contrived Coincidence: Canon Marinette knows a few celebrities like Jagged Stone, but this story exaggerates her connections to really drive it home that her friends did something stupid by prioritizing Lilla's promises.
• Crossing the Burnt Bridge: Notably Averted, aside from referring to the trope in its title. Nobody attempts to repair their broken bond with Marinette, even after seeing everything they've missed out on... mainly because they're banking all their hopes on Lila making good on her promises.
• Defiant to the End: A non-lethal example. Even as it becomes clear the class completely screwed up by picking Lila over Marinette, they don't come crawling back to Marinette in the hopes of taking advantage of her connections, instead choosing to remain loyal to Lila and opposed to the bullying they believe Marinette committed. This changes at the end after Jagged Stone reveals Lila was lying all along.
• Dramatic Irony: Throughout the whole story, Marinette's classmates bolster their spirits by reminding each other of Lila's connections and all the promises she's made, reassuring themselves that everything Lila has planned will be so much better than anything Marinette could have arranged for them. The reader naturally knows that none of these opportunities will ever materialize.
• Dramatically Missing the Point: Near the end of the story, Lila convinces Juleka and the rest of Kitty Section to kick Luka out of their band. Marinette takes this as evidence that none of her classmates have gotten the point of all her demonstrations: that they should value their friendships more.
• Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: Alya gets a moment of this while reacting to Lois' visit:
  Alya: Lois Lane was just in my class. World-renowned journalist Lois Lane was in my class. And I didn't say a word. I could've asked her so many questions. Tips, advice, anything.
  Nino: It's okay, maybe you'll get another chance.
  Alya: Marinette! She knows Lois Lane. I can't believe she never told me. And how could she recommend Aurore for an internship over me, I thought we were... (trails off in dawning horror) We're not friends. Lois Lane said she just wanted to meet Marinette's friends. I'm not her friend.
• Fair-Weather Friend: Marinette's class proves to be make up of these. They all drop her, ostensibly because they believe Lila's claims of bullying, but really because they want to exploit Lila's alleged celebrity connections.
• Forced to Watch: A key aspect of Marinette's revenge is how she has the vast majority of her contacts visit Francoise Dupont in order to meet her friends... and so that her former friends will have to watch as she hands all the opportunities they could have benefitted from to others.
• Ironic Echo:
  • Lila manipulated Nathaniel into breaking off his partnership with Marc by claiming he was "holding [Nathaniel] back". Marinette throws that same sentiment back into his face when informing him of Marc's new internship:
    Marinette: Tom King even said that he was surprised no one had snatched him up yet; that he expected a line of comic book writers following Marc around. He couldn't believe it when I told him that Marc was just dropped for not being a good enough artist. (smiling) It's fine though. Marc doesn't have anyone or anything holding him back now. He'll work with real DC comic writers now; real professionals.
  • She says much the same thing when Lila repeats the trick with Kitty Section, wishing them luck finding a new singer and that she "Heard you said the last one was holding you back. That he needed to grow up."
• Laser-Guided Karma: The class abandons Marinette because they want Lila to exploit her connections on their behalf. Lila, of course, has no real connections... but Marinette does, and she lets it be known she's willing to exploit them on behalf of her real friends. It's just that those friends no longer include her classmates, who can only watch their dreams die as Marinette arranges for crucial internships, training, and other favors to go to people who didn't abandon her.
• Malicious Misnaming: J.J. Abrams makes a point of asking Marinette if her "filmmaker friend" is going to be joining them for their weekend plans, asking "What was his name? Nathan, Neo..." and trailing off. Marinette informs him that Claude will be joining them, while Nino watches in shock.
• Massive Multiplayer Crossover: Marinette's contacts include both Marvel characters like Iron Man and DC characters like Lois Lane and Cat Grant. They also include in-universe celebrities like Prince Ali and Jagged Stone.
• Once Done, Never Forgotten: Tony Stark makes a point of asking Marinette which one of her classmates is "the genius who thought a napkin could take out his eyes while he was wearing glasses?", causing Max to blush.
• Real-Person Fic: Marinette's contacts also include real people like comic book writer Tom King, pro skaters Tony Hawk and Ryan Schekler, pro swimmer Michael Phelps, director J. J. Abrams, and singers Harry Styles, Selena Gomez, and Taylor Swift (the latter of which doesn't actually come to Marinette's school but instead tweets about how Marinette's outfits are the best, which of course makes Marinette one of the world's most in-demand designers).
• Removing the Crucial Teammate: Done three times:
  • First, Marinette's classmates turn their backs upon her en masse, unaware that this supposedly Karmic Shunning is actually ensuring that she will never use any of her connections to help them out the way they clearly expect from Lila.
  • Lila convinces Nathaniel to break off his partnership with Marc by claiming the other boy wasn't a good enough artist to illustrate their comic and was "holding him back". It turns out that Marc is skilled enough that Tom King is surprised nobody was working with him already.
  • Finally, Lila gets Kitty Section to kick Luka out, infuriating Marinette, who ensures his solo career promptly takes off without them.
• Revenge: Marinette has hers by calling in a bevy of favors with celebrities who know and adore her so those celebrities publicly help Marinette's new friends, thus rubbing her classmates' noses in how they could have been the beneficiaries of that largesse but blew it by listening to Lila.
• Revenge Fic: The story involves Marinette getting revenge on her fickle and fair-weather 'friends' in the class.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Connections!: It's mentioned that the favors Marinette's friends give out would usually only go to people who are older and closer to actually going into the industries they're striving for, but the celebrities are so adoring of Marinette (and so angry on her behalf) that they're willing to bend the rules and give out the favors early.
• Shipping Torpedo: Lila acted as one by convincing Nathaniel to break off his partnership with Marc, claiming that the other boy wasn't a good enough artist and was holding him back. Marinette makes a point to look him straight in the eyes while informing him of Marc's new internship.
• Spanner in the Works: Jagged Stone unintentionally upends Marinette's plans for a big reveal at the end of the school year when he storms in to complain about other celebrities trying to poach his designer. This gives Aurore a chance to ask him about Lila's claims of saving his cat from being run over by a plane, causing him to go on a rant while Penny reveals that he's allergic.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: By the time Jagged Stone drops in during study hall, the other students are so accustomed to celebrities showing up looking for Marinette that they're barely fazed.
• We Used to Be Friends: Alya and the other classmates find themselves in this situation with Marinette. They used to be her friends, but they abandoned her, and now she won't draw on her celebrity connections to help them because she only does that for her friends.

---