Hawk
Chapter One
Levy danced alone in her room. She was happy, though it was hard to say exactly why. Her savings had been rebuilt after the money drain that was the timeskip. That was something. She'd successfully completed two solo missions, which made her proud of herself in a way that she hadn't felt since she had been chosen for the exam.
Oh. And he loved her. Not 'like.' Love. He hadn't actually said anything, but she was smart enough to see it. Lu-chan had teased her about her crush for months and months, but then Lu-chan saw it, too. The teasing stopped, replaced by speculative glances and nudging elbows.
What was she going to do about it? And when? That was the real question. She wasn't as brave as Juvia, to be so bold with her feelings for him. But she wasn't as timid as Bisca once was, unable to look him in the eyes.
She was shy, but not so shy that it ruined her happiness. She would make her move. Until then, she would revel in the fact that he loved her. And she knew it.
She danced.
Footsteps in the hall. There were footsteps in the hall. Rushed. Some instinct slowed her joyous feet and turned her to the door.
Knocking at her door.
"Levy! Levy!" a voice – Cana's voice – yelled. Urgent. Afraid.
Happiness died, sharp, as she opened the door and saw how Cana's expression matched her tone.
"Droy's at the guild," Cana said, pulling Levy into a run. "Jet's been taken. Hurt and taken."
Levy made a sound, a mysterious sound expressing distress and confusion. "Hurt? Taken? By who?! They weren't even on a job! They were visiting-"
"Bandits. On the road, Droy said. Yesterday."
"How did Droy-"
"Thought they'd killed him. Almost did. Trader found him and brought him in. Almost dead."
"But...why would bandits take a person? Usually...goods...money..."
Cana nodded, "They demanded ransom. They know he's Fairy Tail, and everyone knows who and what we are by now."
"Jet...How much money?" Not that she'd not want to pay whatever sum was named. Or that the Master would...but...
"Not money, actually. They want a trade." Cana looked over her shoulder, "They want you."
Levy almost tripped. "Me?" She stopped. Stunned. Breathing heavier for the statement than the exercise. "Me?! But why?!"
"We don't know. They didn't exactly give a reason. They pinned a note on Droy. They would trade the man, meaning Jet, for you. In two days, at the place where they took him. If any authorities are alerted, they'll kill him. If anyone other than you shows up, they'll kill him."
"Was there...was there a name?"
"No. But the letter was sealed in blue wax with the stamp of a dove."
"A...a dove?"
Cana's eyes narrowed. "You know it?"
"No," she lied. "No, I don't." She started running again, harder than before. Faster. Her muscles burned. Her heart burned.
A dove.
"You can't do it," Droy said as soon as he saw her. "It would...He wouldn't want you to do it."
The run had not been particularly long, but she had made up her mind on the way with little trouble. "I will do it," she told him and all the others gathered around his bed, placed in the center of the hall so that all the guild could be with him. "Jet is likely injured, so a solitary escape would be difficult. Were he free, obviously he could run out of their reach in an instant, but – as he hasn't come to us – he is unable to get free. I, no offense, have a much wider range of skills. I will be able to free myself."
A dove.
Her confidence was false, but necessary. She had to go. Had to.
A dove.
Gavin.
Gavin. Her brother. 'Long lost,' some might call him. But lost he was not. Escaped was a better word.
Gavin would kill Jet, no matter what, if she broke the demands. There was too much of their father in him. Cruelty. Viciousness.
A dove. A dove in blue wax, his sign for her when they were children. When he still cared. Before he killed their father. Their mother. Before he tried to kill her. But she had hid, and he lost interest. Young as she was, he probably expected her to die. Probably thought she had.
Then Tenrou. The Games. All the articles and gossip.
He was interested again.
He could have taken her. Two solo missions. He must have known. Attacked her partners when she wasn't there. He knew.
But Gavin loved to play games.
Too much of their father. Hurting others to hurt your victim. Their father had hated her, hated a daughter, so he hurt her brother to terrify her and fill her with guilt. Her fault. Every drop of blood. Her fault. Gavin was older. He understood at first. She had cleaned blood off of his face and cried, while he would stroke her cheeks and tell her it was okay. He would write her letters and hide them under her pillowcase so that their father would not find them.
Sealed with blue wax and stamped with a dove.
But pain was a powerful thing. Pain beat upon him day in and day out. And eventually her brother hated her for being the reason he suffered.
A dove.
"I'm going. I'm going alone. Like the note said." She smiled at them, "Then you can come attempt my rescue. The note makes no prohibition against that."
"But if they try to-"
She cut off Wendy, who had her small hands on Droy's shoulder. "They aren't going to all this trouble just to kill me. But they thought they killed Droy, so I don't think they'd hesitate to kill Jet if we violate the terms. I will rescue him. Then you all can rescue me."
So many facts she left out of the story. Gavin might not kill her, but he would take her far too far away for rescue. He could do that. He could teleport. Another reason for her to free Jet. There was no speed that could out-distance Gavin.
Teleportation and telekinesis. Snatch and grab and vanish. He'd turned to thievery, she had heard, after he abandoned her. But he didn't stop with thievery. He was talented. He could rip organs from inside a body and hold them in his hands. He could put such pressure on the organ, pushing it in a hundred different directions until the tissue gave way and exploded.
She'd watched her parents die in just that way.
Thievery wasn't enough to keep his interest. She knew he'd done worse. No proof, of course. She'd heard of no crime that she could connect him to, before or after Tenrou. But Gavin was Gavin, and she knew what the madness of pain had made him.
But. But. Gavin was an honest murderer. Disgusting phrase, but accurate. As much as she believed he would kill Jet if they broke his rules, she knew he'd spare Jet if she followed them.
"It will take a day to reach the location," she guessed. "Tell me where, then let me go pack."
Thanks to the current absence of all the S-class teams, out on jobs, the response to her command was silence instead of shouting. Gajeel would have shouted. Natsu would have shouted. Erza would have shouted. Elfman would have shouted. But they were away. Too far away to thwart her desires in this matter.
They wouldn't have let her go. Not alone. And that would be disastrous.
"We'll come as soon as you're taken," Alzack said into the quiet. She sighed; they would be rational.
"No, give me a day. Give Jet time to make it back and me time to figure out the point of this. If we don't find out why, then they're likely to do it again to someone else. "
"Twelve hours," Mira had apparently decided to negotiate. "Any longer and we might lose sight of you."
One second and you'll lose sight of me, Levy thought. We'll be gone the moment he touches me.
Which meant twelve hours would be okay. Surely Gavin would expect her guild to come for her, so he wouldn't fault them for doing so. Once he had his hands on her, he would abandon his pursuit of her guild.
She almost laughed. No he wouldn't. Of course he wouldn't. Not if he could twist them up, bind them and stick them with a thousand points of pain. There was no way to convince him that she didn't care for her guild, so they were all potential hostages.
She would have to keep him interested in her. And taunt him with his similarities to Father. He would know what she was doing – Gavin was no fool – but it might work regardless. Emotions did not always answer to intelligence.
Levy remembered him as hot tempered, but she hadn't seen him since she was nine. He could be a completely different man. Though, this event suggested he was much the same as the boy who tore down their parents apart, organ by organ. Skin pulled back like ripping paper from a package.
He was dangerous. He terrified her.
She had to face him.
Levy stood under the trees. Oaks. Like her hiding place, all those years ago. Likely purposeful. Gavin had never been the type to ignore symbols.
Two days, he had said, but she was willing to bet he was watching. Waiting. He'd take her, if she were to show up early. She felt that she had no time to waste. Every second that passed was a second that he could make things worse.
"I'm here, Gavin. Let Jet go, and you can have me."
"He swore to me that you wouldn't come." The voice came from above her, tucked behind a multitude of wide leafs. She saw movement, but no clear image of him. Her skin shriveled with goosebumps, having him so close to her. Hearing that voice once more. It tightened her throat and made her heart slam into her ribs.
"He wished for that," she told him, keeping her voice steady, "but he knew better."
"As I thought. Stupid."
"Optimistic," she corrected as he dropped down to stand before her. She swallowed bile. "Not quite the same thing."
"Close enough." He ran a hand through his shoulder-length hair. A few shades paler than her own; blue, like the sky. Touched with soft wisps of cloud. "Hello, little sister. You look well."
She shook her head at him. "We can do this later, Gavin. I told my guild to stay away, but that's not their style. Let Jet go, like you promised, and take me before they come after us and make this more complicated than it already is."
He laughed. "So serious, dove. But surprisingly fierce. Where did that come from, I wonder."
"Life. This. Let Jet go."
"Okay, dove."
She watched as he pulled her partner from thin air. Bruised. Bleeding. No. Bloody, but not bleeding. Injured in the fight that took him, but not hurt after. His hair was dark and limp with sweat, and he stank of fear and stress, but he had few injuries.
He trembled when he caught sight of her. "Levy! No! You can't! He-"
"Don't talk, Jet. Run. Please. Do this for me." She didn't turn her gaze from her brother. Did not look at her friend.
"No! I can't. I can't leave. I-"
"JET!" she screamed his name, throwing the word, the force of it, at him as a wall. "Run! Do as I say!"
Gavin's pale hand touch Jet's cheek. "Do as she says. I'd hate to harm her because you were too stupid to follow the orders of your superior."
"Superior? Gavin, what in the whole of Earthland are you- Jet!"
With a wave of a hand, Gavin flung Jet what seemed like a kilometer away (but couldn't be, couldn't be), arcing in the sky and landing with a sickening sound and an explosion of dirt.
"Now, dove, shall we be on our way?" His skin and hair glowed against the darkness of his clothing and the setting sun. He opened his arms to her. "It's time to go home, Levy."
And the road and oak trees and groaning Jet vanished. Leaving only her brother and the darkness that surrounded him.
Author's Note:
I'm testing this out. I'm not sure it will appeal to anyone. I have two and a half chapters worked out at the moment. I don't see it going more than four chapters, but I don't want to push that far if no one is interested. So... let me know what you think, please.