Smile (ch19)

EARLY RELEASE FOR MY $20+ PATRONS!

Continuing the OT3 of for Antiqua!

Disclaimer: I do not own Little Witch Academia.

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														Chapter 19.

Akko had always been excited about holidays, even ones that weren't traditionally Japanese.

But Valentine's Day was one she never truthfully got all that into - she'd never had a reason to, other than the prospect of free chocolates and candies. But the whole romance aspect had always been lost on her.

Until she'd gotten herself not one, but two girlfriends.

Now, as this year's Valentine's Day approaches, she eventually realizes that she should probably… get them something-

"Probably?!" Amanda shrieks. "Uh, you definitely have to get them something, Akko!"

Akko - being just a little bit slow on the uptake - had decided to wait until the last night before Valentine's Day to address her predicament. She'd come to Amanda's dorm in hopes to find a partner in crime, but when she'd finished explaining herself, shock was understandably Amanda's reaction. Akko chuckles sheepishly.

"Ahaha… y-yeah, I definitely should, huh?"


"Dummy! That's what I'm sayin'! Do you have any ideas in mind?"

"Uh… W-Well…" Akko looks around the room, from Amanda to Constanze to Jasna and back. "N…Not really…?"

Amanda smacks a hand to her forehead and groans.

"Geez, Akko. You're really somethin', ya know that? Waiting till the last second and then coming to us about it…"


"S-Sorry!" Akko clasps her hands together and bows her head. "I just spent so much time thinking about if I should do something or not that eventually it was already the day before and I had nothing! What should I do, Amandaaaa?"

As Akko starts whining, Amanda scratches her head and sighs.

"I really shouldn't be surprised, I guess. Since it's you, and all…" She looks back to her teammates in their beds and asks, "Whadda you guys think? Any ideas?"

Even in bed Constanze is tinkering with some little robot. She looks up briefly, then quickly does this and that with her tools until the robot activates, projecting an image of a few pink holiday cards. Amanda puts a hand to her chin.

"Write them some cards? That's not bad, Cons. Jasna, whadda you think?"

Jasna is munching away on a bag of mini cookies and doesn't even pause when she replies.


"That's obvious!" she grins. "Akko, you should get them chocolates!"

"Of course!" Amanda claps. "To be honest, you should probably do both, chocolates and cards, don't cha think?"

Akko makes a pensive face (or as pensive a face as she can manage) and mulls over the options. She imagines Sucy getting a card from her and just shrugging, or Diana getting chocolates and plastering a smile before throwing them away behind her back.

"Hrmmm… I'm not really sure if those would work the best…"


"Huh? Why not?"

Akko fidgets from her spot on Amanda's bed. "Maybe Diana would like a card, but I don't think she's a big sweets person. And Sucy… I don't think Sucy's really big on anything besides her experiments and stuff…"

"Ehhhh?" Amanda groans and flops down back onto her bed. "Geez, you've got some picky girlfriends, huh? Guess that's for the best anyway. Bein' on such short notice, you can't sneak into town tonight to buy cards or chocolates, and the student kitchen is already closed so you can't make any…"

Silence fills the room for a moment, save for the sounds of Jasna's chewing. Akko rakes her brain for a solution, but not even using magic would help her this time. Besides, she wants it to be something personal. She yelps when Amanda suddenly sits back up.

"Aha! I got it!"

"W-What? What should I do, Amanda?"

The delinquent witch turns to Akko with a big grin.

"Flowers!"

Akko's jaw drops for a second as the word registers.

"Ah! Flowers! Of course! I can do that! …Wait, can I?"

"Course ya can!" Amanda slings an arm around her shoulders. "Flowers are mushy-gushy romancy gifts, right? They're pretty and they smell good 'n all that. And we got a ton of 'em here on campus!"


"We do?" Akko gapes. "B-But I can't take any from the greenhouses or the gardens…"


"So? Just pick wildflowers!"

"W-Wildflowers?"


"Yeah! Why not? Nobody's monitoring those."

Akko thinks on it for another minute, weighing all of her options based on how much time she has left to do this. In the end, the flowers really are her best bet.

"All right, flowers it is!" She jumps up to her feet with a determined spark in her eyes. "Guys, I'm heading out-!"


"Hold on there, tiger." Amanda grabs her arm and leaves Akko almost falling over. "It's past curfew tonight so you're gonna have to go out early tomorrow morning."


"Haaaaah?! No fair! The school should know there'll be people going out to pick last-minute flowers tonight!"

"That's only you, genius. Just set an alarm."


"Oh yeah."

So Akko thanks the three witches for their brainstorming help before heading back to her own room for the night. Lotte is already asleep, but Sucy is just finishing up an experiment at her desk. Akko grins casually at her and crawls into bed. Sucy just shrugs and does the same.

Akko sets an alarm on her Alcor clock for 6AM and stashes it under her pillow so she won't wake the others. She's so nervous about getting caught, and excited about going to do this that she can't fall asleep for an hour or so. But when she finally does, her mind is filled with images of Sucy and Diana smiling and surrounded by flowers.

Akko is up at the first muffled ring of her alarm. She silences it, jumps (quietly) out of bed, wiggles into her clothes, grabs her wand, and is out of the room in minutes. Neither Lotte or Sucy even stir.

Akko hurries down the hallways, waving a good morning to one of the trolls on patrol as she nears the doors.

She pushes her way out into the cool, misty morning. Everything is covered in a light dew, and the sun is just barely breaking over the mountains beyond.

She glances around the courtyards, already spotting a few dappled buds in the bushes and grass. Akko rolls up her sleeves and charges forward at top speed with a motivating shout.

"This is gonna be Sucy's and Diana's best Valentine's Day ever! Or at least an okay one!"

With this conviction in her heart, she begins flower hunting.

Lotte and Sucy wake to a quiet, Akko-less room this morning, but when they inquire of one another, neither knows where she'd gone. Lotte gets to fretting immediately while Sucy gets to imagining all the stupid dangerous things Akko could be getting herself into right now.

They get ready for the day and head to the mess hall for breakfast, casually asking other witches if they'd seen Akko, but no one has.


"Geez," Lotte sighs. "What is she doing? We have classes today…"


"Maybe we won't if she does something catastrophic," Sucy muses.

"Please don't jinx us, Sucy…"

They enter the cafeteria and spot Diana's team together at a table. Hannah and Barbara are babbling and giggling together while Diana calmly sips some tea. Lotte and Sucy make their way over.

"Good morning, Diana," Lotte greets her. "Have you seen Akko this morning, by any chance?"


Diana tilts her head.


"I haven't. I was just about to inquire as to why she isn't with you two."


"Great," Sucy sighs. "So no one knows where she is. That's never good."

A flash of worry comes across Diana's features.


"Do you think perhaps we should-"


But before she can even finish, the cafeteria doors suddenly burst open. All the students turn around to the source of the commotion. A loud, familiar voice calls out,

"I made it!"

Lotte, Sucy, and Diana all sigh in relief.

"Thank goodness."


"What an entrance."

"What on earth is she doing?"

As everyone else returns to their meals, no longer surprised that it's just Akko being her usual extravagant self, her friends take a closer look at her. She's covered in dirt and her clothes are all messy. One hand is behind her back.

"Good heavens," Diana sighs.

Akko spots them and hurries her way over. But before anyone can ask what she'd been doing or where she'd been or why, Akko pulls her hand from behind her back and cries out.

"Happy Valentine's Daaaay!"

The next thing Sucy knows, there's a bushel of plants being pushed at her. She pulls her arms from her pockets to grab them. And Diana is getting a makeshift 'bouquet' (if you can call it that) of randomly-assorted flowers wrapped together by some vines.

As all of the other witches stare at her in confusion, Akko stands with her hands on her hips and a grin on her face. But when the only reaction she gets is silence, she frowns.

"Uhhh, guys? What's the matter? Do you not like your gifts?"

"Gifts-?" Diana is so puzzled about all of this, Akko's words from earlier don't even make sense until now. She gasps softly. "These are… for Valentine's Day…?"

"That's today?" Sucy mutters. "Crap. I totally forgot."

"As did I…"

Both Sucy and Diana taper off, now marveling at the presents in their hands.

Sucy's bundle contains various mushrooms and herbs, a few of which she'd actually been in need of, and the rest of which are just pleasant to look at or can be used for cooking.

And Diana had been given an assortment of wildflowers in all kinds of colors; mostly purple, pink, and white. But there's a single yellow flower - a rose - that stands out amongst the rest.

By this point, Lotte has stepped away to give the three of them some privacy, in spite of the fact that they're dead-center in the middle of the cafeteria at breakfast time.

Akko is still waiting for a verdict on her gifts, but being that Sucy and Diana have fallen silent, she's starting to get worried. Akko starts twiddling her fingers together nervously.

"Sucy? Diana? Do you… not like them? Crap, I should've done chocolates after all-!"

"N-No!" Diana quickly stops her. "Akko, that isn't the case at all! I'm just so… this is so sweet of you."

"To be honest," Sucy says. "Like I said, I didn't even know it was Valentine's Day. I didn't get you anything…"


"Nor did I," Diana admits. "Hannah and Barbara had suggested I should, but I had so much work to do it just… slipped my mind."

"That's okay!" Akko grins. "I'm just glad you don't hate the flowers!"

"I would never," Diana says firmly. "Akko, I could never dislike anything you've given me, especially something you spent so much time and effort into creating." Cradling the flowers in one arm, she reaches out with her free hand to smooth out Akko's uniform and hair.

Sucy is in agreement.


"Diana's right," she says. "How could I hate something you gave me when I didn't even remember to give you something?"

"I-It's fine! I don't mind if you guys didn't get me anything! I'm just glad you like my presents, even if they're a bit messy! That's enough for me!"

Sucy and Diana are struck by her purity and her warmth. They share a glance, one that says 'we definitely need to make this up to her' before stepping up to pull Akko into a hug.

"Thank you, Akko," Diana murmurs. "You've made my day. This is, without a doubt, the best Valentine's Day I've ever experienced."


"It's the only one I've had," Sucy says. "But it's definitely the best. Thanks, Akko."

Akko all but vibrates with glee before throwing an arm around each of them.

"I'm so glad! Happy Valentine's Day, guys!"

And normally, neither Diana nor Sucy are ones for public displays of affection. But they're more than willing to make an exception, just this once. They hug Akko back and leave secret little kisses on her cheeks. Akko giggles and does the same for them.

At last, they join the rest of their friends and teammates for breakfast, wherein Diana casts a quick spell to tidy up Akko's uniform for her.

It's more or less a normal school day after that.

But by evening, Diana has her collection of flowers in a little vase on her desk beside her bed, and Sucy has her mushrooms and plants in a jar on hers.

And Akko has the joyful, bubbly feeling of having given her girlfriends their best Valentine's Day ever, which is all she ever would've needed.

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A/N: An next chapter should be a White Day piece!!