The boy's eyes pierced him with malicious intent, a smile flickered from the edge of his serious expression; he had found him.
Gajeel looked up at the slim blue-haired figure sitting in the tree and smiled back.
'7 years' the blue-haired boy muttered silently. He broke eye contact with Gajeel and shifted his position in the tree so that he was closer to the left. Something wet and slippery from underneath his footing tripped the boy and he felt his weight come over the front of him sending him plummeting straight down into the hard earthy ground.
Thud!
Gajeel cackled, having to hold onto his stomach to keep himself relatively in control. Looking through teary eyes he watched the boy try desperately to brush the dirt off his long black robe and tidy his once neat sapphire hair.
'"Hey hedgehog! Cut that out!" the blue haired boy shouted with a cheeky grin on his face.
Gajeel's face turned a bright tomato red, in anger he shouted,
"HEY! You little twirp! What'd you call me?"
The boy chuckled, until Gajeel thrust his arm forward and knocked him out with a shiny metallic pole.
He felt a high pitched ringing sound, then darkness.
…
…
Huh…
…
Ga…
…
Jeel…
…
His head hurt.
"You awake?"
That was a new voice, not Gajeel's it was strong, but yet contained a hint of youth.
"My head hurts…" he stated childishly.
"Hmmm well that's too bad isn't it?"
"Yeah I guess."
"Does this help?" Immediately the boy felt something jump onto his shoulder followed by a hard knock on the side of his head.
"Aaaggh!" the boy fell back onto the grass as the thing jumped off his shoulder. Reaching forward he made an effort to push whatever it was away but he didn't make contact. He opened his eyes and could make out the faint blur of a black animal through the foggy vision.
"WHAT ARE YOU? "
The creature laughed as the boy opened his eyes to properly see the creature; it seemed to resemble a miniature panda whose head was completely out of proportion to its miniscule body. This made the creature look extremely cute in contrast to his solemn facial expression. The strange cat –for now he included it was a small humanlike cat – walked off into the background.
The boy smiled to himself; the world was indeed a strange place. He would find out in time, the mystery of the bizarre creature, but many others things were far more prominent in his spinning head.
Someone else's voice arose from the background.
"What'd you do to him Lily?"
The drumming of his footsteps came closer. The boy finally opened his eyes to see a boy – of similar age - egotistically standing over him: he had long black spiked hair and iron dots covering the edges of his nose and eyebrows, he was looking down at the boy with a large smirk on his face. The boy smiled back.
"Seems we didn't hurt him enough Lily; he can still smile." The Iron Dragon Slayer stated.
Gajeel sat down on the cushioning grass, the cat –Lily- lay down beside him. Looking forward through the endless forest Gajeel spoke,
"It's been a while Fen."
"7 years."