A.N. Hi everyone! This story is part of a collaboration I'm doing with PusheentheLimits, they're a very close friend of mine who wanted to give writing a try so we decided to write the same genre of story for the same fandom! This story wouldn't have been written if it weren't for them, so if you enjoyed "Ring Around the Rosie" so far, go ahead and give theirs, titled "Graymail" a read as well!
I may continue the story depending on how much people seem to like it, so as always, feedback is welcome!
Chapter 1
"Akko," Sucy called over, picking at the loose clothing she had draped onto her frame. "I know you're almost unreasonably lazy," Akko planted the shiny rod between her two roommates, reaching down to draw a chalk outline around each of them Lotte's eyes following her every movement as her hands wrung together nervously, "And once you've gotten a bad idea into your head, you turn into the most stubborn, pigheaded-"
"Is there going to be a point to this?" Akko asked, frowning as she finished the lotus-like etching on the ground.
"I'll get there eventually." Lotte shot Sucy a pained expression in an attempt to egg her on, prompting a sigh from Sucy as she continued. "This is dumb, is my point. No one needs a spell to change clothes, it takes a total of two minutes. Less if you sleep naked like I do." Akko stood up, brushing chalk dust off her fingers and retrieving a small bag of pebbles from her nightstand.
"Ah, but that's where you're wrong my dear-wait, you sleep naked?" Akko asked, her thoughts scattered, frowning suspiciously at Sucy as a couple stones fell from the bag in her arms, "I've seen your nightgown."
"Akko, please focus." Lotte prompted, retrieving the stones and making sure the chalk wasn't disrupted.
"Oh, thanks." Akko bent over and picked up the stones, placing them in a circle around the shiny rod. "Anyways, it might seem like a couple minutes day-to-day, but if you add that up, you're wasting HOURS on changing clothes in your lifetime! Not to mention, if you're someone who's often late to class-"
"Whose name is Akko Kagari." Sucy interrupted, earning her a glare.
"If you're this hypothetical person, you don't have to waste even more time throwing your shirt on backwards or forgetting your underwear."
"Who forgets their underwear?" Lotte asked.
"Some people, I'm sure." Akko replied without eye contact with either of them, making the answer to Lotte's question abundantly clear. "Plus once I become a world-famous performer I'll need a way to change into my robes with a flourish won't I?" Adjusting one of the stones and finishing, Akko stood up straight, "Anyways, you both owe me favors. Sucy, I tried out that faulty potion that made me grow wings from my ass."
"It wasn't faulty. It was supposed to do that." Sucy reassured her.
"And Lotte," Akko continued without dignifying her with an answer, "I helped you study for your magic history exam."
"You ate all the cookies I brought, then fell asleep and drooled on my textbook." Lotte sheepishly pointed out, only to be ignored by Akko too.
"Besides, even more importantly, friends help one-another out. You know that if either of you wanted to do something like this, I'd help you." The other two stayed silent-it was true. Akko would trip over herself to assist either of them if they asked, even if she might end up tripping in their way.
"Just hurry up and cast the spell. Your shirt is itchy." Sucy complained, adjusting her t-shirt's hem before reaching down to the baggy pair of Akko's jeans she wore, rebuckling it for the dozenth time. Akko beamed at her, taking the response as an affirmation.
"All right, so here's how it's going to work. I'm going to cast the spell and our clothes are going to instantly swap clockwise." Akko said, placing her hand atop the shiny rod planted between all three of them. She wore a mint green blouse of Lotte's and a short skirt, which almost fit her, but fell a bit short.
"Do you know the incantation?" Lotte asked as Akko scoffed, sputtering.
"DO I know the incantation. I'll have you know I did fifteen whole minutes of research on this." Akko bragged, puffing out her chest at the meager show of focus she accomplished, "It's muta...mut...mustarrrrrd…" Bringing a knuckle to her lips, Akko looked down at the ground, trying to remember as Lotte and Sucy shared a look.
"This isn't inspiring confidence." Sucy said as Akko turned around and grabbed the book.
"Hey, I was going to double-check anyways!" Leafing through the book, she stopped at a dog-eared page and slammed her finger against it. "Ha! Got it," Akko chimed proudly, leaning against the shiny rod. "Lie se, Taru," At her words the shiny rod began flickering to life, throwing out glowing sparks.
"Umm Akko, maybe a practice pronunciation would be-" Lotte started, her words falling on deaf ears as Akko finished the incantation.
"Mutatia Miscatalis!" At once, a pulse spread through the ground, running along the chalk outlines on the floor as a shimmering aurora passed between all three of parties, lifting them in the air for a moment before they gently touched back onto the ground. Akko opened her eyes, blinking to see that she and Sucy were wearing the same clothes. "Awww man! It didn't do anything."
"Oh it did something all right." Her body said back to her.
"Wait…" Akko's eyes widened as she saw Sucy look down at her body in bewilderment before shrieking, a sound Akko had never heard before. Reaching up, Akko ran a finger through her short ginger locks before taking off the pair of round, thick glasses perched on her nose and staring into the blurry room, blinking a couple times before donning them once more to see both other parties staring at her.
"...Akko?" Sucy asked her nervously as Akko drew a deep breath, clenching her jaw.
"So not exactly a success. But hey, Rome wasn't built in one try!" She said in the most optimistic tone she could muster, hearing Lotte's voice come from her lips. Akko's own body shot her a death glare, which was surprisingly intimidating despite its big brown puppy-dog eyes.
"The only reason I'm not strangling you right now is out of respect for Lotte's body."
"Please don't." Sucy's body whimpered.
"I don't understand!" Akko said, reaching for the fallen book and picking it back up, flipping through the pages until she found the spell again. "I said the incantation correctly! I drew the symbol perfectly!"
"May I see it for a moment?" Sucy's body asked Akko, who passed the book over to her. Sucy reached up in an attempt to adjust glasses that weren't there. "...this says 'changing spell'."
"Right, like...changing...clothes?" Akko asked, realizing her gaffe as the other two looked at her, speechless.
"Lotte, could I see that book for a second?" Sucy, who was clearly inhabiting Akko's body, asked. Lotte, currently residing in Sucy's own body, handed it to her and Sucy closed the book before bracing it with both hands and slamming it against Akko's face, knocking a shower of spittle from her mouth `and sending her sprawling back onto the desk with a loud clatter, knocking over flasks and papers as Lotte shrieked again.
"Sucy! That's my body you're hitting!"
"But it's the idiot's brain that's feeling the pain." Sucy retorted, flexing her hand, "Still I didn't mean to hit her that hard. Does Akko work out?" Akko groaned from the desk, sitting up and rubbing her jaw.
"OW! Look it's okay! I'll just cast the spell again, and we'll change back!" She insisted as Lotte took the book back from Sucy, opening it again, leafing over to the correct page.
"It says here there's a latency period."
"A what?" Akko asked as Lotte looked up at her.
"A latency period. The effects won't replicate or respond to corrective magic on the same subjects until a certain amount of time has passed."
"You didn't even read the spell summary? Exactly how intensive was your 15-minute research session?" Sucy asked as Akko scratched her freckled cheek nervously.
"Well, maybe it was closer to five minutes." She turned back to Lotte, "How long is the whatever-period?"
"It doesn't say. This book has transcriptions of really old spells, the original Arcanists might not even tell time the way we do." Lotte looked over at Sucy, who was glaring at Akko again, and pulled the book defensively towards her chest. "Please don't, Sucy. I...kind of want to hit her too, but that's the only pair of glasses I have." Sucy closed her eyes, taking a moment to breathe before opening them again.
"Could we tell a professor?"
"And get detention for experimenting in our rooms!? Hard pass." Akko protested, crossing her arms.
"I agree with Akko, there's no real need to get in trouble needlessly since they can't do anything about it until the latency period wears off anyways. We know what spell it is, we just don't know how long until we can use it again." Lotte sat down on Sucy's bed, reaching up to run a hand through her lissome violet hair nervously. "I guess we can just try it twice a day until we get results."
"There must be another way." Sucy said, walking over to the shelf beside her bed and reaching for the potion bottles atop it but coming up just a couple inches short, forcing her onto her tiptoes. "We could be stuck like this for weeks. That means Akko's going to be taking exams for you. Akko. Taking your exams. Are you really okay with that?" Lotte froze up, her hands petting her hair faster as she swallowed hard, she was not okay with that.
"Oh yeah? Well what about you?" Akko asked, puffing up as she glared in Sucy's direction, "I don't want you lurking around the castle in my body. You're probably already planning on using it to steal taboo ingredients and not get in trouble." Sucy froze, her hand on a flask.
"Well, I wasn't before, but I certainly am now. Thanks for the idea." Akko growled, clenching her fists before pulling up a chair and slamming her weight onto it, her foot tapping the ground in staccato annoyance like an alarmed rabbit.
"Okay, we just have to take this one day at a time. Lotte. Did you have any plans for today?"
"Plans? No! No plans! I…" Lotte said much too quickly before thinking for a moment and shaking her head, "I mean...yes. Maybe I had one thing, I was going to meet up with Amanda in town."
"Okay, kind of a weird 180, but I can do that! Sucy, what can Lotte do in your body in the meantime?"
"I have a guided potions assignment due, normally I'd trust her to do it herself, but.." Sucy paused, interrupting her own thoughts as she pulled down a test tube and shook the contents, bringing it to her ear as the carbonated contents fizzled. "...but this is a very precise mixture, I'll have to watch her." Akko hesitated for a moment.
"You'll have to watch her the whole time?" She asked.
"Yes. Is that a problem?"
"No! I mean, not really. It's just that, y'know, Diana agreed to help the new tennis club get set up." Lotte shot Akko a curious look.
"That's good for her I suppose, but what does it have to do with you?"
"Well, I was in the tennis club back home, so I happen to be pretty good at it." Akko said, both of her roommates now audience to her, "Aaaaand Diana's a rich girl who spent her whole life practicing magic, meaning she's probably no champion."
"So...you want crash the tennis club's first practice to humiliate her?" Lotte asked contemptuously.
"Well it sounds bad when you put it like that." Akko replied, rolling her eyes at the accusation. "But yeah, basically."
"I'm bad at sports." Sucy said, sitting at her desk and firing up a bunsen burner.
"So? You're in my body, and I'm great at them!"
"Except flying." Lotte pointed out quietly.
"Even if the muscle memory happens to be there, I wouldn't know how it works, or the rules and tactics required." Firing up the soft flame, Sucy adjusted a flask over the burner and reached up to push her new fringed bangs out of her face. "Besides, more importantly, I don't care about your vendettas."
"Ugh, fine." Akko said, throwing up her ams and grabbing her bag. "We'll meet back here tonight to try undoing the spell. Lotte, where are you meeting Amanda?"
"Huh? Oh...i-it might be best to call it off actually," Lotte stammered, "I'm sure she'd understand seeing the predicament we're in. It's not like it was important anyways."
"Naaah, don't worry about it! It's been a while since I've hung out with Amanda anyways. Even if she finds out about this whole thing she's not the kind of person to snitch. I'll just act natural!"
"Naturally Akko or naturally Lotte?" Sucy asked, Akko made a sort of choked noise of indecision-she hadn't thought about trying to act like Lotte.
"I can pull off Lotte, I'll...just...talk about Night Fall the whole time!"
"Akko!" Lotte cried, her voice cracking.
"I'm kidding, I'm kidding!" Akko reassured her, winking confidently-a strangely brave motion for Lotte's body to be making, "I don't read any of that smut anyways. I'll pull it off, watch me."
Lotte sighed, "I wish I could, but I'll be busy making a potion that induces…" She looked over at Sucy for guidance.
"Death, if you do it wrong." Sucy replied without looking up from her work.
"Oh good, no pressure then."
"Okay, we can do this!" Akko said, stripping off Sucy's robes and donning Lotte's own as she grabbed the shiny rod. "Everyone be back here by 8 o'clock PM, okay?" Grabbing Lotte's hat, Akko jabbed her hand towards the center of the room, "Aaaaaand, go team!" She shouted, flinging her hand triumphantly. Lotte started at her listlessly as Sucy ignored her. "Ggggggo team!" She repeated the motion, hoping the others would join in, but receiving only stunned silence. "Go team?" She asked as Lotte cocked her head and Sucy shook hers. Akko blew them both a raspberry before huffily donning the hat and stomping out their room. "Fine." A few seconds passed before she poked her head back in, "8 PM!" Dipping back out of the room, her footfalls grew distant as Lotte looked out after her.
"I wonder if she'll be okay."
"She'll be fine. Akko's resilient." Sucy said cooly.
"That's in HER body though, I'm not sure anyone else's could deal with the consequences of her actions." Lotte said, twiddling her thumbs.
"Hm. I guess I should just be glad she didn't end up with mine, then." Sucy pointed out.
"Hey!"