Chapter 2: Contemplation

Darkness. Then, the violent twang of a spotlight flooded Akko's vision. She winced and squinted, and tried to get away from the searing light. However, in instinctively trying to raise her hand to cover her eyes, Akko met an unwelcome resistance, and fumbled, lost her balance, then toppled onto her side, hitting the ground with a blunt 'thud'.

When she opened her eyes, slowly, she met the gaze of Sucy kneeling in front of her. Akko tried to speak, to ask what was going on, but something suddenly constricted around her, taking all the breath out of her and tossing her back to sit upright. Akko looked down, and found snakes. Or, just one snake, an improbably long one wrapped several times around her arms and torso, with its tail end continuing down to bind her knees and ankles, and still having a foot or two left over. If its tail was down at her feet, Akko thought, then..

"Ahh!"

The python-she could tell its breed now, as it met her gaze suddenly-hissed with a flickering tongue that made Akko flinch.

"Sucy! What is this? What's going on?"

Sucy stood up and walked over, stopping in front of the restrained witch.

"Hi, Akko. How are you feeling?"

"Sucy this isn't funny! What the hell, let me go! Get this snake away from me!"

"Oh, is that all? The snake? I can fix that." With a casual flick of the wand, the snake disappeared in a puff of smoke, replaced with somewhat less threatening rope.

"There," Sucy purred, "Comfy?"

"...N-no, but this is better I guess..."

"Good. I didn't want you to get too excited yet."

"Wh-what? What's going on, why did you tie me up?"

"Why?" Sucy cackled devilishly, which stirred Akko inside in ways that didn't make any sense. Then, cupping both of Akko's cheeks, Sucy leaned in slowly. Akko felt a familiar heat forming inside her, and her heart began racing.

"It's because..." Sucy's face was incredibly close now, their noses just slightly brushing against the other's. Akko felt Sucy's warm, shallow breaths on her chin and lower lip.

"B-because why?"

Sucy leaned into her ear, taking her time to brush her cheek against the blushing brunette's, and exhaled deliberately onto her neck. Akko shivered, letting a moan escape as she waited anxiously for her friend's conclusion...

"Akko. Akko, wake up, we're going to be late!" Another voice, Lotte's voice, startled Akko out of her slumber, and she nearly smacked the glasses off of her smol friend. Finally awake, she moved her arms and legs to be sure that she wasn't still bound by snakes or ropes.

"Akko, are you alright? Did you have a bad dream?"

"I bet it was about electric eels." Akko leered across the way at the sarcastic source of her emotional distress. Sucy was slipping out of he nightgown, revealing her pale, lanky body. Akko found herself glancing a bit too long around her simple, white bra and panties, and turned away flushing.

"Sucy," Lotte chided, "That's not very funny. What you did yesterday was really dangerous. You probably gave her nightmares."

Sucy shrugged, continuing to get dressed. Akko slipped her legs off the bed, and couldn't help but steal another glance, this time of Sucy tying her tie. The way she seemed to effortlessly tie the elusive knot with concision and precision made Akko's lungs constrict, and her face flush, as if Sucy was tightening the knot around her. Akko shook the thought from her mind and reached into her drawer for her uniform and the clip-on tie, which she found much less vexing.

'What WAS that dream... Could you even call it a nightmare?' Akko pondered this silently as she changed, and wondered further about her mysterious friend Sucy.

Classes came and went, but Akko's mind was elsewhere, trying to decipher these confusing feelings.

'I don't get it... first I get electrocuted, then I start to think that it was fun, and now I'm dreaming of being tied up in snakes? What is Sucy doing to me?'

Lunch time came like a sigh to Akko, as she plopped down at the table with her tray of potatolike foodstuffs. The stresses of the day lumped its weight onto Akko's shoulders and threatened to tip her face-first into the mush on her tray.

"Akko, you're still sleepy." Lotte said, waving a hand in front of her friend's face.

Yawn.

"You know," Sucy began playfully, "I might have a little something to help you." Sucy shook a light blue vial in front of Akko like a set of keys in front of a child. Exhausted, exasperated, and laughing a little, Akko replied,

"Sucy, I don't think that would help..."

"Sucy, you really shouldn't test all these potions on Akko, you're clearly tiring her out."

"Maybe. But she doesn't seem to mind that much, does she?" Sucy redirected her sales pitch back to its target audience:

"Tryyy it. It's a special recipe I've had in mind for you, it should actually keep you focused the rest of the day."

"...Alright, fine. I'm too tired to argue with you." Typically, Akko was a terrible liar. The girl knew too little subtlety to keep a secret, or misdirect someone, that much was a fact. (An ironic implication of this being that Akko was terrible at so-called 'magic tricks'.) It was difficult, however, to lie conspicuously, when Akko didn't know why or what she was lying about, if there even was anything to lie about.

Sucy popped the top off, and spilled it onto Akko's tray. The conspicuous liquid melted into the food, leaving no trace of its tampering.

"What is it anyway?" Sucy's non-answer was a given, Akko thought, as she picked up a forkful of the stuff, and ate it. At first, there was nothing. No flavor change, no spontaneous combustion or sensory overload, nada. Akko felt disappointed, cheated, even. Sucy watched intently as Akko swallowed confusedly, asking,

"Sucy I don't think it's worki-ahh!" There it was. A sharp, staccato pain, like a whip, had struck her across the ass. Reflexively, she turned to yell at the culprit-but instead found nobody. Instead Akko heard the snickering behind her, and put two and two back together.

"Sucy, what did you-ah!" Another crack of the silent, phantom whip. Akko stared into the alchemist, searching for answers.

Sucy suppressed her laughter, and finally said,

"You're awake now, aren't you?"

"Sucy! Ahh, shit!" Akko convulsed a third time, but kept her swear nearly silent, lest she have a repeat offense on her permanent record. This was beginning to sting, and linger. Sucy could read this written across her face, and reveled in knowing Akko's displeasure in this development. She fessed up finally, saying:

"It's technically a noise suppressant, used by Lona Nova on their unruly students a couple hundred years back. Any vocalization, even the faintest whisper, and you get a little...corporal reinforcement. Was a lot more efficient than sending individual students to be punished. I figured it had been awhile, and I knew just the student who could use it."

Sucy leaned back coolly, dangling a mushroom above herself like a grapevine, "Maybe you'll learn something the first time when you're not being a chatterbox." She took a savory bite, and returned her gaze to the blushing, angry Atsuko Kagari.

All the while, as Sucy explained these details, Sucy's creepy grin had grown impossibly wide. Akko was about to whine, or yell, but her body stopped her, remembering the still lingering consequences. Knowing Sucy wouldn't give her an antidote so easily, she told her self she had to grit her teeth and bear it.

She surprised herself, as well as Sucy and Lotte, in managing to remain silent for about two classes. Though, Sucy still managed to extract an angry retort out of her in between classes, which yielded more amusement for the increasingly seemingly soulless witch. The last class of their day was none other than Professor DuNord's Magic Astronomy, and it proved to be a breaking point.

By this time in her life at Luna Nova, Akko had mostly overcome the complex mixture of betrayal and being starstruck at the presence of her idol Chariot DuNord (AKA Shiny Chariot, AKA Ursula Callistis), and three weeks into the new semester everything had smoothed out, for the most part. Right now, of course, was particularly taxing on her, given her inability to ask or answer questions without feeling Sucy's wrath by potion-proxy.

Akko fidgeted in her seat, between Lotte and Sucy, tapping her feet and tapping her pencil. She was hunched over her seat, resting her chin on her hand, simultaneously covering her mouth in attempt to prevent any more whipping, but more importantly to prevent the entire class from hearing her whine.

'Damn it, Sucy. Why do you do these things to me? Why do I have to be your guinea pig all the time? ...Why did I think being electrocuted was fun? It wasn't! It hurt, a lot!'

Akko lost herself in these thoughts, and stopped paying attention to DuNord's Lecture.

'...But, when it was over...my heart was racing, and I felt so hot. And I wanted more of that... whatever that is. What does that mean? Why would I-'

"Miss Kagari?" Professor DuNord asked suddenly, noticing the usually peppy, mentally present witch's current state of being forlorn.

Akko yelped, and quickly covered her mouth, but not before she felt the fury of a violent, but utterly silent and private thwack against her rear end, causing her to twitch conspicuously. Sucy took note of this.

"Are you paying attention? You're with us today, aren't you?"

Akko nodded quickly, still covering her mouth.

"Do you have any questions?"

Akko shook her head.

"I see. Do stay with us." DuNord turned to the board to return to the lesson, as Akko's ears picked up whispers of students around her, even catching her own name, and Sucy giggling right next to her.

'Oh god, Sucy's laughing at me...everyone's talking about me...'

Akko was becoming warmer and warmer thinking about it. 'The pain, the embarrassment...' And now she was beginning to feel something lower, much more...warm.

Click. Light bulb. With that, Sucy noticed Akko shift suddenly, shooting back straight up and raising her hand.

DuNord paused, asking "Yes, Miss Kagari?"

Akko didn't reply immediately, as she needed a moment to bullshit a question as an excuse to stand up, and also in part to mentally prepare herself to try not to stumble over her own words.

"Miss Kagari, what is your question?" DuNord's voice had a concerned twinge, and others in the class began to fall silent in careful observation. Akko opened her mouth finally, to speak, feeling a million eyes on her-but especially Chariot and Sucy.

"D-did-" Thwack. "Did all of theeese-" Another thwack. "B-begin during the R-Romantic p-p-peeriod?"

"...Yes, uh, Akko. Most of these methods of observation..."

DuNord answered her question, and Akko sat back down, sighing.

"Akko, are you alright?" Lotte asked.

"I'm fine." Akko said simply, not even looking at her friend. "Just-fine."

Sucy tilted her head back, laughing a sort of silent cackle, like a quiet hyena. Sucy didn't notice her brunette friend shivering, or twitching, having returned to a hunched, closed position. She hadn't noticed Akko had covered her mouth again, which would normally just seem like she was pondering something, but under close scrutiny, she appeared to be mumbling or whispering to herself.

'...Oh god, oh god...'

Thwack.

Akko thought about her dream last night, those last words Sucy had begun to say to her.

'Why did I let Sucy tie me up in that dream?'

Thwack.

'Why do I let her do this to me?'

Thwack.

'What the hell is the matter with me?'

Thwack.

'Why do I still want more?'

Thwack.