Disclaimer: If they were mine, Gray and Ultear would be wholly, explicitly, and heartrendingly canon, popularity be damned.
What hurts the most is how close they are and how the feelings between them are so damn easy and special and mutual and natural. The romantic progression and yearning to be closer is such a natural progression for them and a tangible expression of their mutually cherished relationship, and progressive feelings for one another, that it is such a shame it wasn't explicitly explored by Mashima in canon.
#Pulsing Life
She's pulsing life,
Rising above dark waters,
Illumined by gray shadows,
Still burning bright,
Pushing past ripples of sins,
And lost happiness,
He is silent,
As she slips away beyond his reach,
And he is afraid,
There are some places he wants to go,
But he knows he can't,
He is so aware,
Of places gone wrong,
The places that could be right again,
Eluded him.
Happiness was brief,
Always fleeting,
Sublime.
Sad.
And Unattainable.
Not for him.
.
.
.
Like Her.
She splashed into the wildly thrashing waters as he released the ice holding her captive. Tears melted down her wet cheeks, dropping and tangling with the cleansing skies raining down on her.
He waited a nervous beat, holding his breath.
Before the next thump of his heart, she broke surface…
Rising above the storming water-line, dripping wet and clutching herself; her amethyst hair fanning behind her like dark purple ripples, tangled thick in the hidden depths of the illuminating gray waters.
He sank back into the waters, floating face up; her unconscious vulnerability pricking him as he kept her in sight, watching over her with his dark eyes.
She seemed to him like a broken doll, Or a dark water nymph; empty and deprived,
The barely breathing shell of a nymph that should have been alive and pulsing with the power of life.
A mistreated, drowned kitten without claws to lash at him.
Lost. Battered. And cornered against her will.
Drained of every bit of her vibrant magic and purpose in life.
...
Then what did that make him? ...
The guilt-ridden ogre who wanted to be kind, but broke her instead?
...
He looked away abruptly, feeling a cold bite in his gut.
...
He was more than a little battered himself, drifting along painfully beside her.
Close enough to glimpse her dark, haunting orbs blurring from the corner of his averted gaze. Dusky, throbbing tears of her regrettable past clung to her smoky lashes and soaked skin…glistening afresh, like the darkest morning dew…gliding wearily down her pale cheeks… over and over again,
Mingling with the hammering raindrops descending down on them from thundering blankets of night, and fading twilight shadows.
She was like sorrow caving in.
Bathed in ocean cold waves of inescapable truth and warm, hard misery.
He could hear her.
Hurting, and pulsing with the sweet-sad remnants of her bittersweet life, weirdly vibrant even in her disgrace.
He could see her. All of her.
Broken, vulnerable, and exposed.
He could feel her.
Wanting more from the world than her miserable cursed existence of a life.
And he understood her.
They were both one mistake away from a happier existence,
Once upon a time,
And they had both failed. Miserably. And Horrifyingly.
And it hurt.
It hurt to look at her so he looked up at the pulsing skies thundering down at them.
All she wanted was love.
All she yearned for was to go back to a time before she hated her Mother.
To find a love that had always been hers.
To change her cursed existence into a life where she can find happiness.
All he yearned for was to wish his childish, mad desire for revenge away so Ul didn't have to die for him.
To find her engulfing compassion that had been his to appreciate, a little too late. And more.
But she hadn't known that happiness was always there waiting for her. And he hadn't known what the cost of his transgression would be.
And they had both lost because of it.
And what a miserable life she had led because of it! He hurt.
For her.
For Ul.
For Him.
For all the things that hadn't been conveyed because her misplaced rage had sought a terrible retribution from Ul.
For all the things that couldn't be conveyed anymore because his foolish, dark desire for revenge had stolen that away from them both.
He understood her.
In a way, different as they were, they were the same.
Except he had Ul and Fairy Tail. They saved him.
She had nothing except her ugly memories. And him.
A boy she resented with all the force of the cracks in her blackblackheart.
And he knew he didn't have the right. And he knew he didn't know how to save as well as Ul.
But he would damn well try.
Because he was the one who took Ul away from her.
He looked up wearily.
He hadn't realized how wild Mother Nature had become. The skies and ocean waves were raging furiously since he plummeted off the broken cliff-edge with her...he stretched his fingers up toward the crying blankets of storming night, keeping himself afloat with his other hand. And he tried to wrap them around the force of her dropping tears, holding them up with his palm and pushing against them, but to no avail.
The heaving drops…they kept slipping through his fingers...again ….and again. and again.
He couldn't contain its sorrow.
He couldn't reign it in.
He couldn't make it stop.
He couldn't brush it away.
He couldn't do anything.
And he wanted to. So bad.
But he couldn't.
He couldn't fix or change anything for her.
He couldn't even if he tried. Nothing he did would be enough.
No matter how hard he wished it.
She wouldn't let him.
She wouldn't let him.
So the storm outside matched the storm within them.
….
He threw shadowed glances at her. She looked reluctant to step outside.
Maybe she didn't. Maybe she didn't want to leave here.
The Galuna Ocean was home.
These waters were Ul.
They held the jagged pieces of her past Ultear hadn't been aware of.
Of course she didn't want to tear herself away. It was painful for her.
Some part of her didn't want to separate herself from the numbing, frothing waves of amethyst-gray tearing at her. Because she knew now that these waters were alive. That Ul herself melted into these waters, and-
Once upon a time, she was just a little girl who wanted to live happily ever after with her mother. And she never even got her once upon a time, let alone her happy everafter.
All that little girl in her had wanted was to be with her mother one more time.
And now she couldn't. She had found her mother again after all this time. She knew her mother loved her. She knew her mother never abandoned her.
But she couldn't 'be' with her again. Because of him.
He had killed her mother.
He had killed Ul.
And any chance Ultear had of reuniting with her.
He had no right.
No right to get close, or make any pathetic attempts to contain her tears anyway.
Not somebody like him.
He was the reason she couldn't find the happiness she sought.
He was the sole reason the mother she could no longer hate was beyond her reach now.
He doubted she would want his care. And it hurt.
It hurt to think how different things could have been if there was just one or two things they had both done differently.
But they hadn't.
And so he understood the gaping distance between them.
There was nothing but a bridge of painful memories connecting them-
…
He leaned his head slightly towards her, his cheek against the cool water surface so he could see her. He wanted to memorize his last glimpse of her. He – he couldn't see her!
His gray iris widened, panic seeping into them. He couldn't see her.
He felt a strange numbness gripping him.
He imagined her sinking;
Slipping under the surface, and willingly seeking the merciless embrace of screaming tides of bottomless ocean….
….the image of her moist vulnerable iris glazing with hapless tears, and sinking strength flashed before him….and he felt it….
…the crushing weight of her sins holding her down refusing to let her resurface…
And he trembled.
He plunged in after her without a second thought; without waiting to see if she would surface on her own. How could he not have realized she would be plagued with dark depressing thoughts determined to pull her under?
He struggled, pushing hard against the enclosing black waters…
He was underwater with her again…
Reliving the feeling of being focused on her and sinking under with her in emotional abandon, suffocating and pushing wildly against each other; the piercing pressure of the merciless waters pressing all around them, the pain in his damaged ribs building.
He forced his eyes open against the crushing currents for sight of her.
Ultear!
Her name repeated in his head in a mindless mantra as he sought her. And when he finally saw her, he reached wildly for the dark sinking blur in the murky waters.
'Ultear!'
He grasped her cold wetness still pulsing with life against his broken body, and struggled with her for the surface, fighting against the assaulting waters.
He could tell she was still conscious!
And it chilled him…Because she didn't resist. Him or the relentless waters trying to take her down, pulling her away from him. He realized then she didn't have any strength or will left in her to care, or fight anybody or anything anymore.
She didn't care if she lived or died.
He unconsciously tightened his grip around her, clutching her closer.
…..
He rose above the angry, tearing surface, carrying her in his arms and made his way, painstakingly slow, to the rocky shores ahead of them. Every cell in his body hurt, but he refused to let go of the soft weight against him. He told himself he must hold on till they were resting safely on shore. They could steady themselves there, and recover from their exertions.
They were both cold to the touch and aching everywhere. It was a relief, almost comforting to be this close to her- another warm body- he corrected himself, for the brief seconds before they touched land. They could be warm for a while- quietly stealing warmth from each other and share their body heat in silence- without a word or sound till it was time to let go.
He scoffed internally at himself as he stared fixedly ahead at their destination. It almost sounded like he was saying they should cling to each other for as long as they could, because this proximity wasn't going to last long and he knew it.
He cleared his throat.
Or as Juvia would decode it – cuddle and make hot steamy love under crying stormy skies to melt away the pain or something inanely silly, and elemental, and romantic like that.
Yes. That girl would definitely interpret his "steal warmth and share body heat" thought in exactly that way he supposed dryly. She would also turn into ice cold water and try to drown them both, or maybe just Ultear, if she realized whom his almost illicit wave was directed at.
He paused. He had literally just weaved a very vague, round-about, almost-romantic juvia-like fantasy around Ultear.
If you could call it that… Whatever.
At least it wasn't anything as wild or torrid as Juvia's illicit imaginations tended to be. Those were quite beyond his normal comprehension.
He was glad she wasn't here however, and couldn't read his mind.
A few more inappropriate, almost-fantasies about Ultear had just now, very weirdly taken root in his exhausted brain since he had begun this weird train of thought a minute ago.
It was pathetic. He was pathetic.
He was aching something terrible all over, and in no condition to be having useless sultry imaginations the likes of Juvia, and far be it for him to even think about acting on them. He couldn't perform well under these conditions anyway, regardless of whether he was under or over Ultea- What the hell kind of direction were his thoughts taking?
Damn! Juvia was a seriously baaad influence; speaking of which, she was really not going to like this bit of development in his head one bit.
He didn't care either way. It wasn't Juvia's business how he thought about Ultear in the privacy of his thoughts anyway. No matter how much she would like for it to be.
But he still really shouldn't be entertaining weird thoughts about Ultear at a time like this. Or ever, for that matter. Period.
He wasn't quite sure what to make of his own thoughts…
Chalk it up to pain and exhaustion? ...
Yeah, he must have hit his head really hard against the rocks or the water waves earlier; when they were rolling around, and he was entangled in her; wrestling and free falling together…
That induced some very powerful, and insanely suggestive images in his head again...
He found himself weirdly torn between ruing and thrilling to the fact, filled with a fresh awareness of the unconscious intimate contact, and little physical space between them at the time.
In angry headlock; necking furiously; limbs tangling, and so damn engrossed in each other they crashed hard into the waves together before they noticed.
For fuck's sake, what the hell was wrong with him today?
Why was he turning something so sacred and tangible between them- something that had them so powerfully and emotionally absorbed in each other they didn't realize, or care they were falling off a cliff-edge -into something almost sexual, when it shouldn't really be like that between them…right?
He had no right.
Damn! He was frustrated- sexually frustrated-, an evil voice inside him whispered, which he ignored, of course. He wanted to agonizingly rough his fingers through his wet hair, but his arms were occupied… with her …. she was in his arms right now…. soft, wet and compliant.
Fuck, talk about rotten timing and rotten visuals… she had him in a weird sort of bind right now.
A secret odd part of him right then wished he knew what it felt like to have his body ache so bad simply because he made wild, passionate love to a woman.
Maybe then his imagination wouldn't be acting up because of stupid stuff like this.
He was used to his body suffering from throbbing aches and bruises all the fucking time because of some raucous or another, 8 parts courtesy of Natsu, and 2 parts Fairy Tail shenanigans, but never because of a woman. Well, except for Erza. She certainly made his body ache in a lot of complicated ways plenty of times, but that was quite a misleading statement by itself…
He looked down at Ultear suspended gently in his stiff arms -after their soul-altering, rage-expending, passionate romp in the woods and waters -he couldn't help unnecessarily reminding himself dryly- going on another needless weird spiel…
Her eyes were unbelievably wide, almost like she couldn't believe he was bothering to carry her out of the water to safety. He paused his wild thoughts momentarily, his heart clenching painfully.
She had that low of an opinion of him, did she?
She bit her parted lips, and his eyes followed the movement. They were bruised and swollen, like the ragged red of a broken heartbeat still throbbing with life.
It was a mistake. To look at her lips was a mistake.
To look at her when his mind was plagued with vague, disjointed inappropriate thoughts of her had been a mistake. The image of her presently did nothing to help dispel his 'particular' thoughts.
She looked like a woman thoroughly loved. Or more appropriately, a woman irreparably abused. If he was functioning normally, he would focus on the second frame of thought easily, and promptly stem down the innuendo inducing thought process he seemed currently prone towards.
However more of the awful, unlikely cliché ideas, not unlike those spouted by Cana in her drunken stupors, (had she always been such a pervy drunk?) or in the exaggerated romance novels on Lucy's book shelves, (how did she read stuff like that with a straight face?) or Juvia's flowery, imagined delusions (how much crazier could her thought processes get? He didn't think he wanted to know) flooded him.
The guild's reaction if they saw him like this, and they looked something like they did now on a normal, regular day after a mission drifted into his fried brain.
…
He covered Juvia's zealous overreaction to the idea of him and any woman, and he wasn't going over it again. Given her sincere obsession of him, he might expect her to surround herself with depressing rains for a while, especially when she realized Ultear taking center stage in all his fantasies was explicitly and implicitly Gray-sama's choice and Ultear herself was without blame. At least until Lyon came around to charm her out of her blues or so Gray hoped for her sake.
Cana would tease him and look at him knowingly. She would say Ultear looked like Gray ripped her away from the violent, punishing kisses of a lover he disapproved of. Or maybe Gray was the terrible passionate lover who had reduced her to such a miserable state…?
Just to push his buttons and it would work.
Lucy would wink cheerfuly at him and look sympathetic. She might playfully agree with Cana's first assertion, and add that Gray probably fought someone really hard to save Ultear, judging by how beaten up they looked. Then borrow from her painful, trashy romance novels, and laughingly say, "Don't you think Ultear looks like she is finally happy to be secure in the arms of her unforgiving savior? I'll bet Natsu that Gray just rescued her from the violating, unwanted assaults of a dreadful rapist!"
She would know what that feels like. The poor kids been assaulted one too many times to keep count.
Levy and Wendy would be thrilled and buy into the exaggerations, nodding emphatically and slip into wistful daydreams of their own.
Alzack and Bisca would shyly glance at each other and wish they were them. Mirajane would just chuckle fondly and Elfman, Lisanna, and the rest would wish him luck. Natsu would be thrilled they were back and totally clueless, remark insensitively they looked like they lost terribly and ask Ultear and Gray if they wanted him to beat them up some more. Happy and Charle would fly around them and say something on purpose to embarrass Gray.
And Erza? Whoa, she would knock Natsu on the head and be concerned for them, then blush silly and promptly hold the sharp end of her sword to his neck. Asking him with a straight face if he compromised her chastity and if he intended to take responsibility by marrying her… { "I have a wedding dress if you'd like to borrow it Ultear!"}, after she attempted to seduce Ultear to the right side herself with uncompromising goodness, and made sure Ultear was incapable of hurting Gray in any wayand no longer the same villainess who tried to manipulate Gerard, of course.
She would probably be the hardest to evade because of the ugly history between the four of them.
Fuck. The people in his life were really something else.
And he really needed to put a stopper on the irrelevant, ridiculous scenarios popping up in his head. He was spending too much time with Juvia recently. Not that he had a choice; she refused to leave him alone for too long. And not that he minded too much either. She was a good friend and fun to hang out with, and he was flattered, but he preferred it when she was normal and kept her obsessive, romantic pursuit of him to a minimum.
In any case, her imaginative tendencies were superbly wild, and horribly catching it seemed.
Only, instead of Juvia, Ultear was taking over on the rare occasion his 'fantasies' decide to pay him impromptu visits like today.
And it unnerved him.
It didn't bother him, being in the privacy of his mind and all, but he suspected Ultear would be unhappier than Juvia if she gained access to his thoughts.
And the thought unnerved him more. Damn.
Either way, he was too bloody exhausted to filter his thoughts. And Ultear was too blasted sad and vulnerable, too blasted appealing and familiar, too blasted soft and wet, and too blasted close to him right now for her own good…
He stumbled suddenly, tripping on a rock, and going hard on his knees.
His vengeful karma had come back to haunt him. He scraped his elbows hard against the rocky, uneven landscape, even as he embraced her closer still, holding her above ground.He winced terribly as she cringed for him, exclaiming and placing her palms against his bare chest in concern, but he didn't drop her.
That she cringed for him when he fell, made the pit of his stomach burn with embarrassment and humiliation, serving to instantly sober his thoughts for him. He was ashamed and felt properly chastised for his inappropriate string of thoughts earlier.
He was a fool. A damn fool.
For a while, he had forgotten that he had no right.
And that he had killed her mother.
How could he feel right in thinking about her any further, in any way?
He couldn't allow himself to even want to be close to her.
He couldn't want her to be his family or friend or anything; least of all, a lover.
She said she didn't blame him for Ul's death, but she hated Ul when she said that.
She was playing a part then, lying through her teeth and thinking him a gullible, disposable little fool.
It was different now. Her hatred was gone.
She didn't hate her mother.
And she didn't seem to hate him.
(shecringedinconcernforhim and said, "Gray, i-its fine. I can walk. Don't-" and he had cut her off gruffly, "its fine. It's not far." and refused to let her go.)
Maybe she didn't want him touching her, butshedidntsayanythinguntil hefell. He preferred to believe she was concerned about him, even if unconsciously. Still, even if she did not hate him anymore…he accepted she might still notlike him and notlike being around him.
He had to.
For her, he was nothing but an eternal reminder of all her pain and mistakes. He had sealed away her darkness like Ul had done for him, but he didn't expect that to hold much weight with her. They had been strangers before this after all. He had heard of her from Ul, but she didn't know of him at all, until that fateful horrible day she felt abandoned by Ul in favor of him.
There was no reason to expect her to want to further their acquaintance.
There was no reason for her to want to have anything more to do with him.
So he ignored her, and refused to put her down, or make eye-contact with her, carrying her stiffly to the flattened rock ahead, and leaning her carefully against it with difficulty…the few, brief seconds he tried to situate her against the rock, his lips brushed accidentally against her ear and cheek, and he sucked in a breath as she shivered involuntarily, most likely from the cold.
But he was very aware of her proximity.
He moved away abruptly, walking woodenly to a safe distance, a painful feeling squeezing his hurting ribs and tightening it. He needed to physically put himself from her, crossing unsteadily over to the elevated rock across her, where his shirt lay, blown over in the scuffle.
The ocean meandered between their little island rocks, connecting them and dividing them from each other, alone and isolated, facing away each other. He had to drag his gaze to the turbulent seas, turning away from her to stare fixedly at it. He forced himself to feel distant from the forlorn figure leaning against the rock behind him and braced himself mentally even as he felt the sting of her listless gaze on his back.
He had been too close to her for comfort for a bit there.
But comfort was not something that could be found for them with each other.
And too painfully aware of her and the bare physical distance between them.
But he was her mother's murderer.
And he should never forget that.
….
He avoided looking at her.
Looking at her made his heart hurt.
And throb painfully and made him want to close the distance between them and envelop her in his arms, but he stemmed this ridiculous, irrational urge.
He could only imagine how the throbbing in her heart would be seven times worse for her, and unlike him, made her want to put as much distance between them as she could. So she wouldn't have to refuse his touch if he was ever so presumptuous enough to offer it, or god forbid, impose it on her.
Hadn't she had enough imposed on her against her will before her misconceptions corrupted her to darkness? He'd be damned if he was another addition to that bad list.
How could he offer her comfort anyway, when he could only see her feeling discomfort in his proximity?
He didn't have a choice.
She would be the only exception in his life where he would force himself to hold back, and notdo whatever the damn hell he pleased despite it all.
His only exception.
His role in her life was done now. He had dispelled her darkness for her. There wasn't much else he could do.
It was over.
"My fight is over…" she breathed tiredly, echoing him; breaking the heavy silence that had settled between them, and bringing him back to the present.
He was reminded again that he had no reason to linger or stay here beside her any longer. Fairy Tail needed him. And she didn't.
It was as simple and as complicated as that.
He looked around quietly, and picked up his wet slip of a shirt and tied it around his waist.
"….but mine isn't…" he breathed back in response, unconsciously completing her phrase and connecting it back to him.
"…you can't win against Hades…" she offered quietly and hesitantly.
"….I know…" he said steadily, surprising her.
He had figured that out. She was obviously playing him earlier, when she said he was their only hope against Hades.
"…it would be impossible by myself…"
"….."
She looked at him blankly, confused.
He took an odd sort of comfort in the uncovered, uninhibited truth of her naked present in contrast to the sugar-coated inhibitions of her deceptive past.
"… I won't be fighting him alone…"
A dim light returned to her eyes as she understood him and remembered that he belonged to Fairy Tail.
He felt strangely relieved to find something that looked strangely like concern and acceptance flash fresh in her warm and tired, brandy-onyx-red iris for him;
It was like she finallyfiguredout what he was about…. finallyfiguredhimout, and didn't dislike him too much for it.
He allowedhimself tocling to the tinyhope that shedidnt.
…and he also told himself that it didn't matter…that it shouldn't matter.
He would never look back and impose himself on her no matter what…
This was to be the end of their conversation.
The end of their dalliance.
There was nothing more to talk about.
Nothing more than an endless stretch of pain between them.
They had both done far too much damage.
To mess with that would be pushing his luck and breaking what little they had salvaged between them today. And he wanted to hold on to that.
….
She didn't try to stop him from leaving and he hadn't expected her to…
And he did not look back at her, but he had images of her permanently imprinted in his heart and brain…
[….every desolate...pulsing…throbbing bit of her… along with the very last one of her leaning alone against the big, uneven, hard rock….small and fragile and still beautiful… the fight expelled out of her…her vibrant, soulful eyes, endless and sad and regretful, but alive again,… a stunned and sated curiosity of him in their dark pretty depths….]
…when he pushed forward.