Hello everyone. This is my first attempt at a fan fiction in a LONG time, so please be gentle! I hope that anyone who reads comments, good or bad! I love critiques as it helps me grow and gives me experience! More chapters will be coming soon!

Disclaimer: Hiro Mashima owns Fairy Tail and it's character.

Memories of the Past

Chapter 1

The room was dark and musty. A place sunlight dare not reach for fear of the unknown. Papers were strewn everywhere with not even a peek of floor visible. Various desks were pushed up against the walls housing all manners of knives and surgical tools, the majority of which hadn't been cleaned ever. Off in a corner a tall and slender figure bent over a cluttered desk, quietly mumbling to himself.

"Gender not good...defect...no!...yes...no gender?...yes...simple slice...pain...no matter..."

As he began his work, a shriek of pain cut through the dank underground workshop, calling for help where there was none. Behind the workstation a wall of commotion erupted, answering the poor creature's plea. Cages shook while animals, monsters and humans alike cried and begged for release, fear laced in their voices and whimpers.

"SILENCE!" The figure whipped around bloodied knife in one hand, a severed limb in the other, still twitching. A sharp energy burst from him to knock the caged protesters back into their fearful submission. "I need silence, my children. I need to make everything perfect for your brother and sisters to come home!" A laugh escaped his lips as he continued working, stealing a glance every so often at the lacrima with speckles of blood covering it, showing the end of the Grand Magic Games, and it's victors, three in particular.

- At the Fairy Tail guild hall -

"Mira-nee!" Lisanna called over to her older sister behind the bar. "A drink for me please?!" The youngest Strauss sibling winked at her barmaid-sister and clapped her hands together in a prayer. Being the youngest of the siblings, she tended to rely on her age and the fact that she was the baby to get what she wanted from her older brother and sister. Mirajane smiled at her sister and with a wink as she turned and slid a tall glass of liquid to her. "Aw! Mira-nee! This is milk. You know I hate milk! I want what Gildarts is having!"

"Sweetheart, you can't handle the smell of what I have in my glass right now," the crash mage drawled out while leering at her. He was promptly cracked in the back of his head by his equally drunk daughter. "Oy! Cana! Is that anyway to treat your old man after he comes back from a mission as dangerous as he did!?" Gildarts cowered his head as the brunette loomed over him and began yelling.

"Pipe down you old fart. And leave Lisanna alone. I've got my eye on you, you lecher," Cana shouted as she took another swig of her "boyfriend". "Oy Mira! Another!"

"This is the last one, Cana. Don't forget there's a guild that drinks as well. You need to share your "boyfriend"," Mirajane lectured. She could never keep up with Cana when her father was around. The two had a silent game going on as to who would pass out first. Usually neither won and they crashed at the same time. The only good thing about that was she gained amusement when Natsu and Gray noticed and quickly start drawing on their faces. She then turned to her baby sister and smirked. "And you," she pointed at Lisanna, a disapproving look in her eyes, "are too young to drink. Just because I work back here doesn't mean you can have whatever you like! And if you can't conquer milk what makes you think you can handle alcohol?"

Lisanna signed as she tilted her glass, still full, until the milk barely touched the lip of the glass. "But it's so gross," she whispered. All of a sudden a large shadow dwarfed hers against the bar. A meaty hand grabbed the tiny glass and chugged it in one drink.

"Drinking milk is man!" Elfman Strauss, the middle child of the siblings, was much larger than the girls, and wider. Since right before the Grand Magic games, he was tall, but beefed up considerably in order to participate. "Be a man, Lisanna! Don;t you want to get big and strong like me?!"

Lisanna rolled her eyes at her brother. She really did miss the two of them while she was in Edolas. Of course she got used to Edo-Elfman and loved him dearly, but there was just something special about the Elfman here and now. "I don't think anyone would be able to get as big as you Elf-nii." She got up from the bar and walked away, calling back something about needing to pick up a package from a nearby store. As she left the guild hall, she passed by the usual scenerios: Natsu and Gray fighting while Juvia cheered and Lucy ignored, Gajeel and Levy dancing around each other and being completely oblivious to the feelings that were clearly there between them, and of course, Erza and her strawberry cake. Lisanna turned and shot Mirajane a quick wink as she closed the doors.

Mirajane smiled as she watched her baby sister walk out of the guild and went back to cleaning and plotting. It was second nature to her to play matchmaker, and she was already brewing up something new for her brother and Evergreen. It's actually where Lisanna was heading. Oh the trouble those two sisters could get into. Little did Lisanna know, however, was that Mirajane was plotting something behind her back for her and Bickslow. Mirajane giggled to herself as she did a quick turn. She stopped however when she saw the relfection of an eye in the mirror behind her. It was only briefly and disappeared as quickly as she saw it, but she saw it nevertheless. Mirajane stared intently at the empty spot, almost willing the eye to come back, but was brought out of her trance by a drunk Gildarts and Cana singing loudly behind her. Mirajane put a smile on her face as she went to calm them down, and possibly sing herself, but kept looking back at that spot.

Something or someone was watching her.