A security guard leans in and knocks on the doorframe. "Professor Cardiello, we need to borrow one of your students, a Lucien?"

The professor is actually quite fond of Lucien but won't miss him for one session.

And so here is a Lucien, trying to figure out if he missed a rule on the maximum number of classes and also why this would be relevant to campus security. 

(He really should sleep more, during the precisely eight hours he has scheduled for that.)

The security guard looks kind of disgusted with him and doesn't explain of his own accord on the way to the security office.

Lucien doesn't know what is going on but he already feels terrible about it.

In the security hut there's another security guard and also, eyes closed and hugging her knees, a girl he's met a few times.

This does nothing to resolve Lucien's confusion - he can't even remember the girl's name.

"So. Do you have anything to say for yourself, kid?" asks the guard behind the desk.

"I uh. Don't know why I'm here? At all?" He is not actually so tired that he is taking seriously the possibility that this is because he is taking too many classes.

The girl makes a noise that is half pained whimper, half exasperated scoff.

"You're trying to tell us someone else dosed her," says the security guard, unimpressed with this assertion.

"I haven't dosed anyone with anything???"

"So you got a friend to slip it to her?"

"No!"

"Then what do you propose to tell us happened here, Lucien?"

"I have no idea!"

"You realize that isn't very believable from our perspective."

"I-um. Yes?"

"So how about you think about whether you want to stick to the story where you have no idea what happened."

"I-really- is there a witch on staff who can confirm I'm telling the truth about not knowing anything about this, please?"

Sigh. "Yes, we can get a witch if you want to make this difficult."

"I'm um. Sorry?" Well, mostly he's sorry for the girl who's name he should definitely know but has awkwardly forgotten. She does not look to be having a good time at all.

She really doesn't and is still refusing to look at him.

Security phones the witch. "Fifteen minutes," he reports when he's done on the phone.

Lucien nods.

He sort of wants to know what is going on in more detail. But he doesn't actually need to and opening his mouth to say more things sounds.... stressful.

She fails at not looking at him, flinches, and pulls out her phone.

Apparently not doing anything wrong doesn't stop him from feeling terribly guilty.

Eventually the witch arrives. "What exactly is going on here?" she asks from under her white hooded capelet.

"Hi Professor," croaks the girl.

"Bella, hello."

"After breakfast I noticed somebody'd slipped me a love potion. He says he had no idea."

Lucien nods and tries not to look guilty on account of how he isn't guilty and thus this shouldn't be hard even though he feels terribly guilty about it anyways.

The witch pulls out her wand and points it at Bella, nods, and then points it at Lucien. "Your word on the matter, young man."

"I didn't do anything, have no idea how this happened to her, and um. Feel really terrible that it happened. And I haven't misrepresented anything or been misleading about anything."

Security pipes up, "Did you let on to anybody else that you might like her?"

"I don't know her - I think she's in the EU287 with me but that's a big lecture class and I don't think I've talked to her at all or anything. I don't know why anyone would do this at all."

The witch puts her wand away and nods. Security goes on, "Do you know who might have had access to any of your hair?"

"-I got a haircut a week ago? And I have a roommate."

"Who's your roommate?"

"Dmitry Krustev."

Security is going to go round up Dmitry now.

Dmitry has about as much knowledge of what's going on as Lucien.

Security is pretty stumped. "We'll go over the security footage, Bella," says one of them, "but we're running out of possible motivated suspects, here."

"Yeah-huh," she grouses.

"We're pretty sure you're on the 'Grenadine', uh, 'Kisses', recipe, which'll wear off in a week."

"A week," she repeats, rubbing her eye.

"Is um. There anything I can... do."

"Just be aware she's not in her right mind if she -" Security waves vaguely.

"I mean, she's not drunk, it's not legally intoxication for purposes of -" begins the other Security.

"Yes, yes, but - know it's a potion, know it's only a week."

"Okay."

"We'll look over the footage but there's no point tying either of you up here while we do that."

"Okay," sighs Bella.

Once they are no longer being stared at by security guards Lucien... attempts to say some words.

"Um. Is there anything I can do to help or would you like to avoid me for a week or. Um. Sorry I really don't know what to do about um. Any of this."

"Me either! I don't have a living will to consult about what to do if I'm accidentally love potioned for some guy!"

Nod nod.

"I - did not think people did that and I really hope they find whoever did."

"Thanks."

"-I am not sure if dosing myself with something to make it reciprocal would make this easier or harder for you..."

"- why in the world would you want to do that," she says, stopping in her tracks.

"Because um. I imagine it's horrible to be in your shoes and I imagine that at least some part of that is it not being reciprocated?"

"It's - mostly about it being mind control. I don't like mind control."

"Yeah, it's horrible that people can just.. yeah."

"Obviously there is a part of me that's very tempted to take you up on that but that part of me is mind control and it'll be gone after this weekend. And we barely know each other at all."

"Will you be unhappy about me dosing myself after your dose wears off? Or uh, we can hang out without me dosing myself. If that would make things easier for you."

"I'd be upset about it now, just, in a more conflicted way. ...in some respects it might make things easier?? It'd maybe make it specifically easier to concentrate on my, like, schoolwork..."

"The hanging out or the dosing?"

"The hanging out."

Nod.

"I was going to go to Hechter Library to look at some records for my civil engineering class. If that works for you?"

"Yeah. That works fine till my next class."

Nod.

"I have another class at 3 and then at 4 and at 7. Probably I should drop one of those but I haven't actually decided which and until I do I'm trying to keep up with both..."

"What are you taking?"

"Intro to Agricultural Studies, Linear Algebra 1, Advanced Marcoeconomics, Civil Engineering 1, European History - you're in that one right? - Spanish 1, and Medieval Islamic Literature."

"I'm in that one yeah. I thought stuff as specific as Medieval Islamic Literature was only for upperclassmen or majors."

"The professor was very encouraging when I talked to her and it was a 7pm class so it was very easy to fit into my schedule.... That may be one of the classes I should drop."

"What are you going to do with that spread, anyway?"

"Well I haven't decided what I want to major in and I figured that taking a lot of things would help me choose."

"It kind of sounds like you barely even have a shortlist."

"I want to do something that's good the for the world and underappreciated and involves.... building better systems or institutions."

"You could narrow it down more by what you're good at?"

"I'm good at diligently doing work, staying organized, and I'm decent at math. In practice I think I'm doing best in Intro to Agricultural Studies and Civil Engineering 1."

"Huh. I've always known I wanted to be a witch."

"Oh, why?"

"It's sort of weird to me that some people don't. It's magic! You can like, heal people and stuff! What's not to like? Besides mind control spells which I will simply not perform."

"When you were younger did you want to be a witch so you could heal people, or was it just that it magic seemed cool?"

"Both. It wouldn't be cool if it just... turned lead into gold and nothing else."

"Oh yeah... though if anyone gets the more interesting metallurgical magic working I think that would be very cool on it's own."

"It'd have applications but I don't have an ambition to be an industrial process."

"That is a very reasonable opinion that people other than me often have."

"It didn't sound like you wanted to be an industrial process so much as invent them?"

"I'd like to invent one and then be involved with running it to some extent, but I mostly don't want to spend all my time as one of a large number of people doing a similar task, yeah.... their were some people in South Korea who claimed they had figured out a way to make a room-temperature superconductor with magic and if they had been right than one witch could have produced enough to revolutionize smartphones with just a few days of work each year, I think. I would have liked to be that industrial process, I think."

"What would you do with the rest of the year?"

"Well, probably there are other interesting metals to figure out how to make with magic... stronger versions of steel to help make taller skyscrapers, maybe?"

"Seems like more of an apothecary sort of thing, really."

"Yeah... I really wish that intro class had had an open seat."

"Yeah, I couldn't get into it either, I think one of the faculty had some kind of emergency."

"It did leave me free to take Spanish 1... which now that I think about it isn't actually a good thing."

"Maybe that's the one you should drop."

"I technically need a language if I do a humanities major... which isn't very likely at this point, so yeah. What are you taking?"

"Spanish 3, European History, Stats, Freshman White Arts Seminar and the associated lab, and Intro Econ."

"Oh, you got into Stats! I'm jealous."

"I think there was a lottery for it or something."

"Honestly I'm surprised at that one- I wouldn't have thought so many people would want to that it that they would need to be that selective."

"I think our class this year is bigger than previous ones and maybe they weren't sure where to hire to accommodate us. They need another apothecary and another math, apparently."

"I suppose that shows the student body has good taste, at least, even if it's inconvenient for me."

"You'll probably be able to get in next semester."

"Yeah, hopefully - are you enjoying them?"

"None of my classes have really gotten into the swing of things yet. I hope."

"My civil engineering class has already gotten really interesting... though that might just be me overdoing the first homework assignment."

"Oh, what is it?"

"Well, it was to sketch out a very basic site plan for a residential building using some educational software they provided us with but I wasn't sure about how to handle the density I wanted to support without risking the elevators being slow, so I had to look into typical elevator usage patterns and speed constraints, which turns out to be a subject of active study in some journals, so I'm trying to incorporate that and also trying to see if I can account for occasional stair usage and - probably this is boring you, no one is as excited about elevator usage patterns as I am."