A True Hero of Paris
is a one-shot Miraculous Ladybug fanfiction by RicardianScholar Clark-Weasley on FanFiction.Net. When the citizens of Paris notice fashion mogul Gabriel Agreste repeatedly having secretive meetings with a teenage girl, it doesn't take long for them to register the implications. Lila just can't resist leaning into the rumors for fifteen minutes in the spotlight, but Gabriel is older, smarter, and most importantly, a ruthless businessman. He understands the importance of having Betrayal Insurance against someone like Lila, and if she's going to set the police on him with a False Rape Accusation, he's more than happy to expose her very real crimes to clear his own name.
This fic provides examples of:
- Abomination Accusation Attack: Lila leverages the highly charged nature of sexual harassment accusations to turn the public against Gabriel overnight, resulting in him being arrested on essentially nothing but her word. This also ensures her classmates are too riled up to even consider believing Adrien's claims that she's lying about it all — even Nino, who's more diplomatic about it, thinks Adrien is just struggling to come to terms with what happened and feels obligated to defend his father.
- Attention Whore: This is Lila's Fatal Flaw; when she sees the opportunity to gain widespread fame as a poor defenseless victim of sexual harassment, she seizes it and milks it for all it's worth. She's too busy enjoying the spotlight to consider that accusations as serious as the ones she's making would warrant a thorough police investigation and what they find might not reflect well on her. It also doesn't seem to occur to her that Gabriel is aware of many of her misdeeds, and now that she's throwing him under the bus, he has no reason to keep them secret. Gabriel notes that Lila has forgotten one of life's most important rules in her bid for fame: Don't bite the hand that feeds you.
- Betrayal Insurance:
- In addition to a long history of Lila's past misdeeds compiled via extensive background checks, Gabriel has multiple witness testimonies of her sexually harassing Adrien at photoshoots, as well as pictures of her as Volpina on Heroes' Day and her deliberately getting akumatized that he had Nathalie take just in case. Considering what Lila put him through, he has no issue unleashing all of it instead of simply firing her once she was no longer useful as he originally planned.
- During his police interview, Gabriel and his lawyer both take note of blatant irregularities in the investigation, which Gabriel immediately plans to leverage to get his case thrown out of court in the unlikely event things escalate that far. In the end, he doesn't need to use it.
- Blaming the Victim: A staple tactic of Lila's. When Adrien confronts her over falsely accusing his father of sexual harassment, she gets their classmates worked up and defensive enough to accuse Adrien of victim-blaming her.
- Deconstruction Fic:
- The idea that Lila is a valuable resource to Hawk Moth is completely shredded, with Gabriel privately noting he always planned to enact You Have Outlived Your Usefulness as soon as she got Marinette akumatized. Once Lila's lies become inconvenient for Gabriel, he smashes her credibility into dust himself and never looks back.
- A downplayed example with the Saltinette characterization. While Marinette has a moment where she acts like she would in a salt fic, throwing Adrien's words in his face and leaving him hanging the same way he did to her, this is revealed shortly after to have been a Moment of Weakness on her part, and she genuinely feels bad for acting petty and spiteful when Adrien clearly needed help and support.
- Adrien's typical characterization in salt fic is also deconstructed; his initial reaction to being called out is It's All About Me, but he quickly recognizes his own words being thrown back at him and has a Jerkass Realization, after which he sincerely apologizes to Marinette and admits he should have helped her out much sooner.
- The idea of letting Lila lie herself into a corner also takes a beating. While she does ultimately manage to trap herself like Adrien predicted she would, she still caused massive emotional harm to Marinette and Adrien himself in the meantime by telling lies that could have ruined their lives if they weren't disproved.
- Dramatic Irony: By the time the dust settles, all of Paris believes Gabriel is a brave citizen who risked his reputation to gather evidence against an ally of Hawk Moth, with the job he gave her, secret meetings, and announcement of her being his "muse" merely a ruse to keep Lila from getting suspicious until he had enough proof to bring her down. The story ends with Gabriel receiving a medal from Ladybug, who calls him a true hero of Paris. It takes all of Gabriel's self-control to keep from laughing out loud.
- Exact Words: When Adrien asks Marinette what he can do to help his father with the false accusations against, she responds that he do nothing. Marinette immediately clarifies that Gabriel and his lawyer will be able to prove his innocence themselves.
- False Rape Accusation: Downplayed. Lila doesn't go as far as accusing Gabriel of actual rape, but she does accuse Gabriel of sexually harassing her and heavily implies she's afraid he will rape her given enough time and the right opportunity. Once the truth comes out, women's rights groups are enraged because Lila's false accusations have made it that much harder for people who are really being harassed or abused by authority figures to get their claims taken seriously.
- Faux Affably Evil: Gabriel is completely fed up with the police investigation into his supposed sexual harassment right from the start, but remains outwardly pleasant and professional because he's pragmatic enough to recognize it will make him look better and get him out of there faster.
- Forgiven, but Not Forgotten: While Adrien and Marinette are willing to forgive their classmates for buying into Lila's lies and accusations despite being repeatedly warned about her true nature, they're not going to forget what happened any time soon, with the narration noting it will probably take months for them to build up any real trust again. Gabriel thoroughly approves of this mindset.
- Jerkass Realization: After Marinette refuses to help him defend his father from Lila's accusations, commenting that "lying doesn't hurt anyone," Adrien's knee-jerk reaction is indignation — and then he realizes those are his own words Marinette is throwing back in his face, leaving him horrified at having ever said them to her.Was this how she felt all those months ago?
That her feelings didn't matter to anyone else as no one listened to her or comforted her or did anything to defend her?
Wow.
He felt scummy. - Knight Templar Parent: Gabriel takes his son's safety very seriously, to the point of running in-depth background checks on all his classmates and their families. He has also seriously considered pulling Adrien out of school multiple times after personally feeling how selfish and nasty some of his classmates can get at their worst while akumatizing them. Ironically, he justified letting Lila, the worst of them all, get close to Adrien because he believed if she could get Marinette akumatized, he would finally get the Miraculous and bring Emilie back, making it Worth It. And even then, he's self-aware enough to recognize Emilie will be furious with him for letting someone like Lila anywhere near Adrien.
- A Lighter Shade of Black: Gabriel is by no means heroic and is very much acting to save his own skin, but he still has the moral high ground over Lila in this instance, feeling genuine regret for making Adrien put up with her in contrast with Lila's unrepentant selfishness and seriously questioning his own judgement for being willing to ally with her even temporarily. And unlike Lila, all his accusations are completely true, with plenty of evidence to back them up. The experience also brings out his oft-ignored parental instincts toward Adrien, leading him to forego a prime opportunity for akumatization in favor of spending some family time with his son.
- Laser-Guided Karma:
- When Adrien confronts Lila over her false claims that Gabriel was sexually harassing her, she turns her Blaming the Victim act on him. Adrien appeals to Marinette for backup, but she just throws his own words about lies not hurting anyone back in his face. Marinette comes up to him later and apologizes for being petty, but Adrien has the grace to admit he had that one coming after the way he initially brushed off her struggles with Lila.
- Lila's decision to falsely accuse Gabriel of sexual harassment ends up backfiring on her hard when Gabriel unleashes his Betrayal Insurance and gives proof of her very real crimes to the police. Within hours, she's the most hated person in Paris, bar possibly Hawk Moth himself, and has been deported back to Italy to face the consequences of her actions.
- Mistaken for Pedophile: What kicks off the plot; some people notice Gabriel having secretive meetings with the teenage Lila and draw the obvious conclusion, with Lila being more than happy to claim that they're right.
- Morality Pet: Adrien, to Gabriel. While Gabriel did manage to justify letting Lila get close to Adrien and harass him for the sake of creating an akuma powerful enough to finally get the Miraculous, he certainly didn't like it and always intended to drop Lila like a rock the minute Marinette was akumatized to get her away from Adrien. Later, being greeted by a relieved Adrien after his release from police custody convinces Gabriel to forego a mass akumatization in favor of spending the evening together as a family. And finally, at the awards ceremony, Gabriel recognizes a prime chance to snatch Ladybug's Miraculous, but decides against it, rationalizing that the earrings are useless without Chat Noir's ring anyway...and besides, Adrien looks far too happy for him to ruin the moment.
- Not What It Looks Like: Several of Gabriel's meetups with Lila are caught by passerby, who note the obviously clandestine nature of their meetings and the very uncomfortable implications of this. There's no proof of anything, but eventually it happens enough times for news networks to start speculating, and that's when Lila sees a chance to make a bid for fame by "coming forward" and claiming the rumors are true.
- Police Are Useless: This is Gabriel's opinion, with Officer Raincomprix's akumatization being cited as a prime example of their unreliability. He's smart enough not to say this when asked why he didn't come to them with his evidence against Lila earlier, however, instead claiming he didn't come forward because he wanted to be sure he had enough evidence for a swift conviction, before she or Hawk Moth could retaliate.
- Reconstruction:
- Of Adrien's character. When he's put in a position where Lila's lies hurt him and has his words thrown back in his face, his immediate reaction is an It's All About Me complaint that it isn't fair — but instead of sticking to this as he would in a typical salt fic, he soon realizes this is exactly what he put Marinette through and she's right to be upset with him for it, showing that while he can be selfish and insensitive sometimes, he's a caring person at heart and wants to do the right thing. After this Jerkass Realization, he sincerely apologizes to Marinette and concedes he deserved A Taste of His Own Medicine without trying to justify himself in any way, then listens to her and takes her advice seriously, demonstrating that he does value her opinion and friendship.
- Likewise, Marinette is reconstructed as a flawed person who can make selfish and impulsive decisions sometimes, but is still kind, driven to help others, and mature enough to recognize she doesn't always do the right thing. When Adrien tries to call Lila out and is made to look bad by Lila Blaming the Victim, Marinette refuses to help him and throws his own words back in his face. Rather than going even further as she would in a typical salt fic, however, Marinette feels bad about this after the fact, admits that hanging Adrien out to dry when he really needed her help was petty and spiteful, accepts his sincere apology, and offers much-needed advice and comfort. And while she's forgiving of her classmates, she's not an Extreme Doormat, with it being noted it will take a while for them to regain her trust after the way they believed Lila over her.
- Stating the Simple Solution: When he's arrested over the Not What It Looks Like implications of his meetings with Lila, Gabriel curses his own love of theatrics, reflecting that it would have been simpler and less noticeable to just get a pair of burner phones like Nathalie suggested.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Gabriel's internal monologue reveals he was only maintaining ties with Lila because of how much she aggravated Marinette; the minute Lila managed to get Marinette akumatized, Gabriel was fully planning to fire her in the most humiliating manner possible and ensure she could never come near Adrien again. Lila's decision to throw him under the bus for fifteen minutes of fame just ended her usefulness prematurely and put Gabriel in a position to get rid of her in a much more permanent fashion.
