"I'm very disappointed in you Laxus. I know you haven't been yourself since it happened, but what would Ressina think of your actions here?" Makarov glowered at his wayward grandson. Laxus clenched his fist at the mention of his late wife, but he didn't reply. Makarov sighed heavily.
"I have no choice. I have to exile you from the guild. You are no longer a member of Fairy Tail."
He had been thrown out of the guild. Yet, here he was, defending them all again. When the dark guild Grimoire Heart attacked his former guildmates on Tenrou Island, Laxus stepped up to fight alongside them, as he had failed to do against Phantom Lord.
Thunder rumbled in the distance. His dragon slayer senses reached out searching for the lightning that should accompany such a sound, but he found it strangely absent. His nose twitched as he searched for the scent. The thunder sounded closer, yet he still couldn't smell the burning ozone.
He reached the top of a hill. His eyes searched the sky until movement in the small valley below caught his eye. A woman stood at the bottom of the hill with her head bowed. The air shimmered around her. Short gray hair peeked from beneath a black hat. He knew she was no member of Fairy Tail, which could only mean she came from the dark guild. Laxus began to gather his magic energy at the core of his body causing sparks to dance along his fingertips.
The dark guild member turned her attention to him, and as his eyes met hers, Laxus froze.
"Ressina," he murmured.
"I don't know how you know that name," she said. "But my master has instructed me to kill all fairies on this island. Tell me. Are you a fairy?"
"Ressina, it's me, Laxus," he said. His voice was tinged with desperation. He hated the weakness that had crept over him at the sight of her. But how was she here? How was she alive?
Before he could ask any of the million questions tumbling through his scattered thoughts, the woman lifted her arms straight out from her sides and brought them together quickly while intoning the words "Thunder Clap!"
Caught off guard, Laxus was blown back from his perch on the hill by the force of her sound wave attack. He rolled down the opposite side and landed on his face. As he pushed himself up on his forearms, Ressina appeared at the top of the hill.
"Ressina, no!" He yelled as she aimed another attack his way. He deflected the attack with a lightning barrier. "I don't know why you can't remember me. And I don't know how you ended up with Grimoire Heart. Actually, there's a hell of a lot of things that I don't know right now. But Ressina, please, listen to me!"
"Thunder Wave!" Ressina invoked the spell, drowning out his words and nearly sending him flying again as waves of sound made solid rolled into him. Laxus somehow kept his feet, but he couldn't bring himself to return the attacks.
He was too lost in memories.
Laxus sprawled on the ground next to his wife. They lay in the wreckage of the dark guildhall that they had just razed to the ground. Both were battered and drained from the ordeal, but they had completed the job. Laxus reached out a hand, and Ressina's fingers intertwined with his.
"Well, my lightning, another job well-done, wouldn't you say?" She said with a laugh.
"Wait til the guild hears about this one. Fairy Tail's power couple does it again," Laxus replied.
"Yeah, but let's just stay here, a little longer. Catch our breath a bit. This took more out of me than I expected." Ressina moved enough to lay her head on Laxus's chest. "But this is what I need. Your heartbeat beneath my ear. That will give me the strength to make it home again."
"It only beats because of you, my thunder."
He was so lost in the joy of the moment. He wanted to stay like that forever, holding his wife close, basking in the glow of victory. He didn't hear the end of that joy in time.
Ressina's scream pierced the air like storm winds whistling through a narrow alley. Warmth hit his face and he tasted the metallic edge of blood. Her blood. As Laxus pushed himself to his feet, he saw the dark shape across the ruined hall. Somehow, they had missed fully incapacitating one of the dark guild members. The man cackled madly and sent another steel boomerang slicing through the air. Laxus deflected it with a burst of electricity and used what little magic energy he had left to roar lightning at the man, throwing him into the wall and knocking him fully unconscious.
Laxus turned to Ressina where she gasped for breath as blood seeped from the side of her throat. Her eyes begged him to help her. He ripped off his shirt and pressed it to the wound while trying to pick her up at the same time. Somehow he managed, though he feared he had done more harm in the process. He had to get her to a healer. There had to be one somewhere close.
He ran through the streets of the mostly abandoned town yelling for a healer. None appeared.
"Laxus," a small voice whispered against his chest. "It's no use, my lightning. Please, stop. I can't—"
Her voice died away, and Laxus fell to his knees. There was a subtle difference in her body now that she no longer breathed. Laxus clutched her to him. Her blood clung to his chest, sticking in her smoke gray hair, which curled around her too pale face.
Laxus turned his face to the sky and screamed his pain to the clouds, magic energy flowed from him to arc in shards of lightning. None of it was any use to him now.
For what is the lightning without the thunder?
Laxus was so lost in the memory of her death that he missed another onslaught from his supposedly dead wife. The force of the thunder knocked him flat on his back, and he felt bruises sprouting up all over. His ears rang from the sound. He tried to push himself up as Ressina prepared another attack.
"Listen to me!" He shouted as he sent a blast of energy at her. Maybe he could stun her enough to get some answers. Lightning made contact with her shoulder, but Ressina kept fighting.
"Thunder Clap!" She yelled again. Her smoky dress billowed around her knees in the wake of her attack. Laxus dodged and shot another round of lightning at her. This hit her squarely in the chest, but it seemed that he was trying too hard not to hurt her, and the blow did little to stop her.
"I thought that fairies were supposed to be strong," Ressina said. Her tone was dead. No gloating or glee, merely a statement of fact.
"Members of Fairy Tail are the strongest wizards around," Laxus said. "But I don't want to hurt you, Ressina. And if you remembered me, you wouldn't want to hurt me, either."
"Perhaps," Ressina said. She moved her arms above her head and brought them down in a swirling motion as she intoned: "Thunder Roll."
"Laxus!" Someone yelled just before a body collided with him, pushing Laxus out of the way of the attack. Laxus found himself on the ground once again. This was getting old. This time he had ended up in the dirt due to a pink-haired fire dragon slayer trying to rescue him.
"Get off me, Natsu!" Laxus roared.
"Geez, I'm just trying to help, man. You looked like you were getting pretty beat up there. Want me to handle this one for you? She doesn't look that tough; I can take her."
"You won't touch her," Laxus growled. He pulled the dragon slayer by his scarf until their noses were practically touching. "No one lays a hand on her. I've got this."
"Laxus! Are you okay?" Lucy appeared on the opposite hill.
In the confusion caused by the arrival of Natsu and Lucy, no one noticed that the Grimoire Heart wizard had gone deathly still. Her brow furrowed and her hands went to her ears as that word burrowed into her head.
"Laxus?" She whispered.
Images began to flash through her head. A smiling blonde with a scar down his face. A night sky where lightning danced across the stars. A crowded hall full of smiling faces. The same blond man standing in a tux, reclining on a bed, throwing a ball of lightning. The images whipped by with increasing speed like a silent film reel spun too quickly.
Ressina screamed and thunder echoed the sound.
Three pairs of eyes snapped to her as they suddenly remembered why they were there. Natsu took up a defensive stance, but Laxus knocked him backward and told him to stay with Lucy.
"Ressina," Laxus yelled above the din of crashing thunder.
Eyes the color of stormclouds ready to burst met his.
"Who are you? Who am I?" She screamed. Thunder claps dazed the two bystanders as high winds swirled around them all. Laxus began pushing his way towards the woman in gray. When he was within a few feet of her, he yelled into the noise, "What is the lightning without the thunder?"
All sound and movement ceased in the flash of a flying cat's wing.
"What is the lightning without the thunder?" Ressina repeated slowly as she sank to her knees.
My memory has been a slate of gray for as long as I can remember. I only know those things which Master Hades has told me. My name is Ressina. I practice thunder magic. I am a loyal member of the dark guild Grimoire Heart. I live to serve the guild. My childhood is unimportant. My adolescence is unimportant. All that matters is my life in the guild.
So why, why do I know this phrase? Why does this man seem so familiar?
Ressina finally looked back up at Laxus, and whispered, "Merely a deadly flash of light, which quickly fades."
Laxus collapsed to his knees beside her and said, "And what is the thunder without the lightning?"
"Merely a brief burst of sound which quickly dies," Ressina replied. Tears slipped from her eyes as she asked, "But how? How do I know this? Who are you? Who am I?"
"I am Laxus Dreyar, your husband, your lightning. And you are Ressina Dreyar, my beloved wife, my thunder. And I thought I had lost you forever." He pulled her into his arms. She stayed limp at first but slowly brought her arms around his neck. As her head rested against his chest, and she heard his heartbeat, the door of her memory unlocked.
A gray-haired child crouched in the corner of a dark bedroom with her hands pressed over her ears. Again. Yet, she could not block out the sounds of yelling from the front room. They were always yelling at each other. The girl Ressina wished with all her might for quiet, silence.
Suddenly, it was there, the silence she yearned for. She tiptoed from her room, needing to see for herself that the miracle really had occurred. But only a different nightmare awaited her in the front room. Two bodies at unnatural angles. Red liquid glinting from every surface in the firelight. A dark grin and chuckle from the front door as the villain fled.
Ressina screamed as thunder rolled outside the silent house.
A gray-haired teen found herself on the wrong side of the law. Again. This time, a blonde boy with a lightning scar down his face declared that he would bring her to justice and claim the reward.
They fought each other hard. Thunder rippled through the air and lightning cut the thunder. In the end, she fell. Yet, the lightning user dropped to his knees, as well. As they caught their breath, each nursing their bruises, he asked something no other bounty hunter had: why?
In the end, he carried her on his back all the way to Fairy Tail.
A gray-haired woman woke in the night, terrified of the silence that surrounded her, smothering her in her dreams. Strong arms reached out to pull her close. Her ear came to rest on the chest of her lightning dragon slayer.
"When you hear my heart beat, there is no silence."
She fell asleep to the sound of a thunderous heart. Again.
"Laxus," Ressina said with her ear still pressed to his chest. "When I hear your heart beat, there is no silence. How could I forget? The one thing that chases away the fear of quiet. My lightning."
Laxus sighed with relief. He buried his nose in her hair and held her more tightly as if somehow he could get back the lost years if he could only hold her close enough. He still didn't know how she was alive when he had buried her himself. He didn't know how she had joined Grimoire Heart. Or why she had lost her memory.
But for now, in this moment, he merely breathed in the scent and sound of the thunder.