Chapter One
Days: 382 and counting
They'd been walking forever, almost. The younger of the two was ready to keel over and sleep, right there in the middle of the cobbled road. His feet dragged through the slush on the ground and his dark hair hung limply against his forehead while his tummy grumbled.
The older of the two looked down at him and grabbed his gloved hand. Despite being the one who carried all their stuff (and him, at several points), aside from his bedroll, change of clothes and a bit of emergency cash, and having walked just as long as he had, she smiled at him. Her own footsteps were light, bouncing even, as they moved through the snow. "We're almost there."
And as soon as those words were said, they could see the roof of the building they were looking for. From there it was only a few more blocks to the front door.
Harumi fixed his mismatched eyes on the building and said, before his sister could push the door open, "…Jack, I don't think this is a good idea."
Jack pulled her hand back from the giant wooden door. Her head swiveled over so that her mismatched eyes (the same color as her brother's) could focus on his small face. "It'll be fine, Ru-Ru."
"Don't call me that!"
"Besides," she continued as if she hadn't heard him, "this is Fairy Tail."
Harumi was still frowning from the nickname. "I know. That's why it's a bad idea. They won the Games this year; it's too public."
"…This is because they're the guild biggest on friendship, isn't it?" Harumi turned away, pouting. "It'll be fine, Ru-ru. We should at least check it out to get out of the cold, and get something to eat. It's not like we'll be selling our souls, and their reputation is better this time."
For a moment, Harumi looked like he was going to give in, but it was a moment short-lived. "But, Jack, what if-!"
Her voice was quiet but stern when she interrupted. "Vii-vyr joh ayem, Ru-Ru."
The young boy seemed deflate. "..Fine."
Jack pushed the door open. A burst of hot air rushed over the duo, and Harumi was almost glad that they were at Fairy Tail. Then he and his sister had to dodge a flying chair, a shoe and a mug- one with hot liquid sloshing out- all in quick succession. Just as he was about to complain to Jack again, a woman with short white hair popped up in front of them, yelled, "Don't be shy!" and dragged them over to the bar, murmuring something about saving on the power bill as she slammed to door shut. Or, at least, Harumi thought she slammed it. He couldn't hear it over the sound of the building-wide brawl.
Another woman with white hair stood behind the bar, calmly polishing a glass while dodging and deflecting any projectiles coming from the dust cloud mere feet away. "Hello! Welcome to Fairy Tail." The woman slapped away the other shoe from the pair, face still sporting a serene smile. "Sorry you had to come in the middle of this- usually if we have guests, they try not to hit the bar. I'm-"
"Mirajane, right?" Jack interjected, she too was smiling, as if the either the fight or Mira's apology was amusing. Harumi realized, at that exact moment, that all grown-up girls were Crazy, with a capital "c," and decided not to say anything until he knew he was safe. "We watched the Games this year. Congrats, by the way. I go by Jack- it's short for something I'll never, ever call myself- and this is Harumi, my brother."
Mira set down her glass, side-stepped a plate, which promptly broke on the floor, and began to sweep up the shards of porcelain. "It's lovely to meet you both and thank you. Please, call me Mira."
Jack elbowed Harumi, and he nearly toppled off the barstool that the other woman had dropped him on. He glared at her before turning to smile, timidly, at Mira. Mirajane stared at him for a second before placing a mug of hot chocolate in front of him.
At that point, Harumi's smile turned into a nearly face-splitting grin. But he still waited for Jack's nod before starting to drink. "Thank you!" And there were even marshmallows floating in the beverage! Maybe Crazy wasn't too bad…
Mira waved away Jack's hand as the teen tried to pay for the drink, simply putting another in front of her. "It's on the house. So," the white-haired mage had to shove someone away from Harumi. "So, what can I help you with?"
"Well," Jack took a sip of her chocolate. "We've been looking for a guild for a while and-"
"You're looking to join? That's great!" Mira pulled out a thick book and plopped it down on the counter with a loud thud. Flipping it open, she moved to and empty page and shoved a quill into Jack's free hand. "Just sign here, both of you, nicknames are fine."
As Jack finished writing her name, the ink glowed and soaked into the parchment. The spot where she had written was blank, as if the quill had never touched it.
"Well that's odd." Mira frowned. She ignored the guild mark appearing on Jack's face.
Jack fixed a sheepish expression on her face. Harumi finally drained the mug and piped in, "It's because we were members afore," completely forgetting his earlier rule.
Mirajane turned to Jack, who stole her brother's hat and ruffled his limp purple curls. "That's what I was trying to say earlier. We came by two years ago, looking to join and actually signed up and everything. But I didn't think that it wasn't safe for the two of us, what with the fact that we were living in the guild at the time, and the debt collectors came after Ru-Ru…"
Jack stole a glance at the rest of the guild as the fighting finally settled down, aware of Mira's scrutiny. Harumi reached for her half-full mug and she gave it to him without a fuss. "Master Makao agreed. We traveled around for the past few years, doing odd jobs for money when we could, but…Fairy Tail has something that's missing elsewhere…"
Mira nodded, and pushed the thick tome towards Harumi. Her eyes were soft as she said, "I know what you mean."
Harumi wrote his name with surprisingly neat handwriting, for his age. And then the ink glowed and vanished, just like it did for Jack. The symbol appeared on his neck, barely visible under his scarf and hair.
"Welcome home." She gave Harumi some more hot chocolate.
The two girls smiled at each other, and Jack was about to say something when the doors slammed open and cold air swirled into the guild for the second time that morning.
"We made it back alive!" A man with pink hair and a white scarf stood in the doorway, laughing at something the muddy, miserable-looking blonde said. A blue cat flew in behind them. The guy immediately started another fight (bumping the count up to five in the last two hours, with the guy who was wearing only boxers) while the blonde trudged over to the bar and the cat ran off...somewhere.
Harumi saw the other white-haired lady shut the door. Then his stomach grumbled and his attention turned elsewhere. Jack and the blonde heaved a sigh at the same time. But while both Jack and the other two girls ignored it- Mira was saying something to Jack about sandwiches- Harumi stared at the lady, who had sat down on his right.
"Hello," he said.
"Mmph. Hmm mm mmm hmph," she muttered.
Harumi frowned. "It's rude to mutter at people."
She lifted her forehead from the bar, and Harumi's eyes widened.
Lucy was having a bad day.
Sure, it started off nice. She'd woken up to a working heater, and no unwelcomed bed warmers. She'd written a letter to each of her parents (writing to her father was new, and awkward, but she tried to do it when she had something she would have liked him to know) and managed an entire chapter for her new story. She'd even managed to eat some breakfast, take a hot bath and get dressed in something warm without her apartment cooling down like it usually did in the usual early winter mornings.
Then Natsu and Happy burst in through her window, tracking slush and mud over her bed, soaking her floor and grinning like mad men. (And they thought she was crazy.) Natsu spoke so fast that she hadn't been able to think to kick him, and the only thing she'd understood in his entire speech was "mission."
And then they tugged her out the window, getting her once clean and dry clothing wet as they landed in the slush on Strawberry Street.
And they'd left her window open.
So now her apartment was freezing.
On top of that, the sun had just barely risen. (For some reason, she'd been waking up earlier. And that reason had nothing to do with how she wouldn't have minded Natsu's company at night because she woke up freezing when he didn't come over during the cold season. Absolutely nothing. At all.)
Then Natsu had forced her to walk to the site of their mission because, "Trains are worse when the weather gets cool." Cool, as if a pleasant breeze on a hot day. When it had snowed last night, and she didn't have the chance to grab a coat and "nearly freezing" would have been more accurate.
The long and short of the mission: everything went okay. Until Natsu got carried away and destroyed something he shouldn't have, Happy started mouthing off, and Lucy was soaked. And then almost singed when her partner attempted to dry her off and instead caught her scarf on fire and managed to make the mud crust onto her outfit.
Oh, and while they trekked back to Magnolia- through the slush. Lucy was going to kill someone when they got back- without the reward money, someone had mistaken her for a homeless person and tried to proposition her.
So, yeah. Let's repeat: Lucy was having a bad day.
But the time she actually made it to the guild, she was more depressed than angry, and couldn't feel most of her body. In fact, she was pretty sure she had ice in her boots…
She ambled over to the bar clumsily, ready to die just so she could be out of misery. And she'd said as much to Natsu before that idiot went and started a brawl.
In fact, she could even hear the angels beckoning to her. A cheerful, childish voice said, "Hello."
Lucy said, "Go away. I'm not dead yet."
And the voice, sounding louder- closer, actually- but still young scolded, "It's rude to mutter at people."
At that she had to lift her head from the bar and tell the voice off, because there was no way that someone coming to separate her spirit from her body could call her rude. But the words died as soon as Lucy saw the speaker.
His eyes- one icy blue and the other dark green- were wide, his mouth hung open and his cheeks were flushed. The speaker was a small child, perhaps seven years old, and he was easily as adorable as Plue, maybe more.
"Hello," she said, dumbfounded.
Apparently, the boy felt the same way, because he repeated, "Hello."
"I'm Lucy."
"Sissy calls me Harumi. You're really pretty." He frowned. "But you're sad. Why are you sad? Is it because you're covered in mud?"
And that snapped Lucy back to normal/cheerful. He was so cute! She giggled. "A little, but it's nice to meet you Harumi. You're sweet." Without thinking, she kicked away an errant table.
Harumi pulled a face, as if either her words or the table had offended him personally. Lucy figured it was the fact that furniture was flying everywhere; it had taken a while for her to get accustomed to it. "You're not allowed to be sad, Princess Lushy." That was so swee- Wait.
"Princess?" she parroted, brows raised. What was it about her that made him think of a princess? She was covered in mud, and he had just scolded her about manners a moment ago.
Harumi hopped down from his seat, ignoring the sandwich that Mira pushed towards him, and the looks on the girls' faces. He took off his gloves and held up a hand. A magic circle began to form as he said, "Shilog, shid, flohm mio ryjugh t' jybii heel jot!"
Lucy had no idea what language that was, much less what he said, but she watched as a tiny egg with a golden, five-pointed star formed in his outstretched palm. "Here!" he chirped, holding it out to her.
The blonde got up from her seat to take the proffered object, as oblivious to the other two girls at the bar as Harumi was. "Thank you." She moved to put it in the pouch she hung her keys from, only for him to grab her hands.
"You're s'posed to make a wish on the seed!" he scowled. And then the child calmly dodged a flying pair of pants, and what looked like a hammer made of ice. It seemed he was already used to the general mayhem of guild brawls.
"Umm," Lucy stared at the egg, wondering if that was why there was a star on top, and why Harumi called it a seed. It was obviously an egg. "Okay? I wish I had something dry and warm to put on…?"
As soon as she finished speaking, the shell cracked violently, and a seedling sprouted, flowered and withered in the space of a blink. In the object's place was a pink sweater-dress and a pair of black jeans.
Lucy gaped, looking between Harumi and the clothing. The boy stifled a yawn, but grinned at her. "Th-That was amazing! Wow, Harumi! Thank you!" She tried to hug (read: glomp) him, but he side-stepped and she fell.
"Sorry, Princess, but Sissy'll be mad if I'm covered in mud too…" He sounded so guilty. Not.
The blonde winced and rubbed her head. Following Harumi's gaze, she finally noticed Mira and Jack. "Don't sweat it." She got to her feet. "Hi. I'm Lucy." She held out her empty hand to the stranger.
Jack flicked her light purple hair from her face and shook hands with the other girl. Mira, meanwhile, cut up Harumi's grilled cheese sandwich so he could hold it properly. He thanked her and began eating as Mira went back to polishing glasses and sweeping away broken tableware.
"I'm Jack, the sister." Jack smiled. "I saw you introduce yourself to Ru-Ru. You must be pretty special if he likes you already. He never gives those things away, unless you give him food, like Mira over here."
Mira smiled at the mention, and Lucy looked slightly uncomfortable. "He's pretty amazing. I was just thinking of this outfit; it's what this," the celestial spirit mage gestured to the grungy disaster she was wearing, "looked like a few hours ago."
"Yeah, he is. It just tires him out a lot- he's got no stamina when it comes to magic."
"Oh." Now she felt bad about it. Lucy glanced at the clothes. "You know what? I think I'll go put this gift to use." She excused herself to go change, deftly weaving through the fracas known as Fairy Tail.
As soon as Jack lost sight of her, Mirajane remarked, "I can see why you felt like you needed to leave."
"Hmm?" Jack grabbed Harumi's full mug- hers really- and took a sip.
"With a power like that, the debt collectors would have definitely tried to take advantage of him. Although…" A fork went flying their way, and almost hit Mira's face as she paused to think. "If Harumi has no stamina, why doesn't he just make them work like lacrima, or other magic items? It would be easier that way…"
Jack met her gaze. "We've tried that. Only certain types of magic are compatible. For instance, I can't use one of his seeds, but someone with holder-type magic and a great deal of skill and stamina might be able to handle it. Otherwise the seeds break and- Well, it's not pretty…"
"Oh, I see."
"…You wouldn't happen to know where the request board was moved to, would you? Ru-Ru and I are getting kinda low on funds."
Mirajane smiled sympathetically and pointed the girl in the right direction. Harumi looked from his sandwich and frowned. Mira half expected him to hop down and go after his elder sister, but he just looked at her until she stopped in front of the board. And then he went back to his food, still frowning.
Obviously, he didn't like it when they were separated.
When Lucy came back from the bathroom, mud mostly gone (there was still some on the back of her head, but it wouldn't come off) and clothes changed, she plopped back onto her seat and ignored Gray as he was thrown her way. In his boxers, thankfully. He nodded a greeting at her before shouting, "You're dead, Squinty!"
She could just barely make out Natsu's, "Bring it, Snow Queen!"
She ignored him too. "Thanks again for the clothes, Harumi."
He nodded and handed her one of the quarters of his sandwich. And then they began chatting.
If Jack had been over there, she would have pinched herself. Harumi was never that generous with new people. He was hardly that generous with her, and she'd practically raised him. But Jack was over at the request board, and by the time she got back, she only got to watch as Harumi listened intently to whatever Lucy was saying. She sighed resignedly.
"What's wrong?" Mirajane really seemed to like being in the know.
"There's only one job over there that I can take."
"So take it, then."
Jack shook her head, watching the chaos around her. She winced as someone was elbowed in the diaphragm. "That's just it. I can't. Harumi wouldn't be able to come, and it's an overnight trip, maybe three days all together. I'll have to wait for something else. Do you think Master Ma-"
"I can stay with Princess Lushy!"
All three turned to look at the boy, Lucy included. Seeming to sense how rude that was, Harumi tacked on, "Can't I, Princess? Jack? I promise I'll be good."
Lucy paused to think on it for a moment; Jack paused to see if the world was ending. Mira merely reconsidered her earlier conclusion.
Her baby brother had never, ever, wanted to stay with someone other than her- their parents included. Especially after knowing them for all of fifteen minutes.
"Sure!" Lucy agreed. Clearly the two were quite charmed by each other. Sheepishly, the blonde turned to Jack. "If that's okay with you? I know I wouldn't want to trust someone I just met with this cute little guy."
"Hey! I'm not a pet!" the boy grumbled.
Then he, Lucy and Mira laughed. Jack's mouth lifted in a grudging smile. No choice then. She looked deep into Harumi's eyes. "…Okay. But if you have any trouble-"
"I know, Jack." They'd only been over it a hundred thousand and three times.
"And I'll share some of the reward with you, Lucy, and you, Mira. Make sure he eats properly, and don't let him stay up past ten- or stay in the bath until he prunes; he'll get sick. And…" Jack continued to list dos and don'ts for the other three until she walked out of the guild and into the late afternoon with her bag.
"Hmm. We should probably get going too, Harumi. That idiot made a mess when he dragged me out of my apartment earlier. It'll take a while to clean up and it's getting late."
Harumi zipped up his coat, put on his hat and gloves, and grabbed his bags. Then with a cheerful, "Bye, Miss Mira!" he let Lucy guide him to her apartment.
Posted: September 4, 2015
Words: Approx. 3,400