Chapter One

Partners

Hello there! My name is Ro~ I am very honoured that you've chosen to read my au story! It will mostly be in Lucy's point of view (P.O.V) but I will also hopefully have a few snippets of other characters as I get more comfortable writing this fic! I love Fairy Tail very much and I've tried to write fics before but they didn't really work out.

Creds to my Editor for helping make this story not suck.

The only thing that I own is a love of Fairy Tail. These are all Mashima-san's characters.

Side note: Thoughts will be in Italics

I hope you Enjoy! ^-^

Lucy's P.O.V

I was having a really good day. I honestly was. The weather was great, I had just started a brand new book series, a new project for Law, my third period class, had been issued and my best friend was my partner. Not to mention I'd finished all my homework and it was ready to hand in. I was feeling great. I was especially excited about the project because my teacher, also principle, Makarov gave us ample time and allowed us to pick out who to work with. Levy and I, from across the classroom, immediately made eye contact and grinned at each other knowingly.

After distributing the rubric and guidelines, Makarov gave free rein and Levy quickly shuffled over to the empty desk next to mine. We would sit together but the seats were arranged in order of last name.

Anyways, we had already started to plan based on the criminal case we had been given. Who would be giving the opening and closing statements. It had to be over three minutes and convincing enough to persuade the Jury which would be played by a portion of the class. We were giggling and goofing around while working when a building tension we hadn't noticed shattered into a fight on the other side of the room. I didn't even have to look to know who it was. Natsu and Gray. Long time best friends who also hated each other's guts in a… good way?

"What do you think it's about this time?" I jumped at the sound of Levy's hushed, concerned voice next to my ear. She swept aside her professionally dyed blue hair as she leaned away from me, sparing another quick glance at the kerfuffle. I turned to her and gave a small shrug. I tried not to involve myself too much with that crowd. They weren't bad as far as I knew, just not my kind of people. They were very popular and liked to be the center of everything. I, on the other hand, much prefer to sit on the outside with a good book. Levy was pretty close with them and had once offered to introduce me but I refused and explained that I was more comfortable just being her friend.

As class continued, the volume of the yelling escalated and the atmosphere grew dense with testosterone and irritation. It wasn't long before a real physical fight broke out between the two. Levy and I immediately scooted our chairs backwards. In our experience, the two of them tended to throw things including, on more than one occasion, desks.

One of their friends, Erza, tried to step in a break it up. However this just lead to her joining the two of them. Their friends had circled around the three of them and were goading them on. Even Levy stood up at one point and went over to see. I just grabbed my book and sat back, hoping it would pass soon and that no one would be seriously injured.

Apparently, my hopes were in vain. Not five minutes later, Makarov had pushed away from his computer and started over to the fight with a rather terrifying expression. Makarov's really quite short despite his age, so he hopped up on a desk to level the playing field. He watched for a few moments to see if anyone would notice. When they didn't, his expression only grew darker.

"OI BRATS!" If I'd leapt at Levy's voice then I vaulted from my seat when Makarov shouted. I fumbled with my book and it ended up on the floor. Red-faced, though I knew no one could be paying me any attention after that, I bent down and grabbed my book as Makarov lectured Natsu and Gray.

That's when my day took an interesting and unfortunate turn. "Natsu, Gray, you two are not allowed to work together on this project." Both boys lamely protested but it almost seemed as if they were glad. Then came the news that shocked me enough to drop my book a second time. I was just sitting up and suddenly, "Levy you'll work with Gray. Natsu you'll work with Lucy. End of story." My jaw fell in unison with my book.

Immediately all eyes were on me. I nervously pushed my thick rimmed glasses up my nose from where they had slid and curled in on myself, trying to make myself as small as I could. I could feel the blood rushing to my cheeks again. My heart was beating so rapidly I thought it would beat right out of my chest and I couldn't breathe. It was as if all the oxygen in my lungs had been stolen and I couldn't catch my breath. I bit down on my bottom lip and averted my eyes, staring directly at the ground.

"Okay." Natsu's nonchalant voice took the attention off of me to my relief. It didn't last long since he soon walked over to me and sat next to me. I could still feel the eyes on me.

"Yo Erza. You mind?" I lifted my gaze and looked through my eyelashes. Natsu was looking at the vibrantly red-haired Erza expectantly. She blinked a few times, obviously trying to shake herself free from shock.

"O-oh yeah." She turned back to her partner, Juvia. Thes rest of the class followed suit and I let out a breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding. I stared at my shaking hands until I could breathe properly again then reached for my book.

"So what case did you and Levy get?" I froze as he spoke, swallowed hard then picked up my book and sat back in my chair.

'U-uhm… We got the assault case. We were going to work on it tonight." I grabbed the sheets and handed them to him. Natsu took them and skimmed over them quickly before putting them back on the desk. I was still hunched over a little so I straightened out and crossed my arms over my stomach, a habit I'd developed when I felt nervous.

'I-I was planning on being defense. Are you alright with being prosecution?" My eyes flickered over to him and was surprised to find him staring rather intently, as if deciding whether I was evil or something. I lifted my eyes to meet his and appreciated his unique eye colour like most people did. They were very dark gray almost black.

He abruptly broke eye contact and turned to look at the case file and sheet again. "So Luigi, odd name by the way, since you want defense I guess I'm cool with prosecution." I pursed my lips, trying to keep back the giggles threatening to reveal themselves. I managed to muffle them but Natsu still apparently heard them because he gave me a funny look.

"Why're you laughing?" His expression was so confused, I almost burst out in laughter then and there. I calmed myself, exhaling deeply. "My name. What did you call me?" He quirked a salmon brow. Why is his hair pink…? I'll ask Levy later.

"Luigi? That's your name right?" I shook my head with a tentative smirk pulling on the corners of my lips. "Not exactly. My name is Lucy. L-u-c-y." A look of understanding fluttered across his face before it returned to the same uncaring, aloof expression. "I see."

I looked up to the clock. Four minutes until the next period. Well considering Gray and Natsu spent most of the time fighting it's no surprise we're left with very little time. We'll start tomorrow then. I made a grab for the paper but Natsu had scooped it up before I could touch it. "It's cool I got it." He went to shove it into his bag without a binder which highly stressed me out. In those few seconds I made a decision that determined our entire relationship, working or otherwise. I reached out and snatched the sheets from him and quickly hooked them into my Law binder which was promptly tucked into my bag.

I didn't look up for a minute but when I did I found him staring again. His expression was a mix of shock, amusement and indignant disbelief. I shoved away from my desk and pushed my chair in, snagged my book, then took off just as the bell rang. I ducked into my math class and took my regular seat, still flustered.

He wasn't far behind me. Natsu and his friends walked in together. He didn't even spare me a glance. I sighed happily. I was back in my comfort zone. Away from the attention drawing boy who had been partnered with me for a project.

I closed my eyes for a moment, trying to come back to myself when I heard more shuffling. I figured it was people coming into the classroom but I was oh so wrong. A light tap on my shoulder alerted me to the presence of multiple people standing very close to me. I cracked open one eye and recognized the silhouettes of Natsu, Gray, and Erza. I opened my eyes and peered up at them nervously.

"Y-Yes?" My voice cracked painfully and I winced. "Is there something you need?" Natsu flashed a wild grin that I had only seen him show around his friends. Gray and Erza looked somewhat uncertain about something, the complete opposite of Natsu.

"You've got guts. I want you to meet some people after school today. We'll be working on the project afterwards anyways." He seemed to take note of my confused expression. "You said you and Levy were going to work on it tonight." He shrugged. "That's besides the point. Meet us outside the school parking lot after class." He didn't wait for a response he and his friends just sat down.

All through math class I pondered what he could mean by meet people. I glanced his way a couple of times but he was zoning out like he often did, offering no help or explanation.

I considered just not going. I weighed the pros and cons for the entire class. Pros; I could probably get it over with fast, he wouldn't be angry with me, it wouldn't make our partnership more awkward, we could work on the project tonight. Cons; People. Danger. Anxiety.

Pros outweighed the cons but not by much. So when the final bell rang, I hurriedly collected my things, put them neatly away in my bag which I then hoisted over one shoulder.

"Bye Ms. Porlyusica. Have a nice day." She grumbled something under her breath along the lines of "stupid girl. Leave" . She'd always been like that but deep down she was a total softy so her words never stopped me from saying good bye.

I paused as I came to the door leading to the parking lot. Looking through the glass I tried to see if I could make out who was with Natsu, whose pink hair I could spot from a mile away. I couldn't see anything other than outlines and hair colours but that wasn't going to help me so I gathered the very small reserve of courage I had and pushed open the door.

After which I stopped and stayed glued to my spot because opening the door was as far as my minimal amounts of courage could take me. Turns out, I didn't have to do much else. Natsu spotted me and gestured for his friends to follow him. Fortunately I didn't have to move. Unfortunately they were coming towards me.

As they got closer, I heard Natsu's voice. "Yeah I think she's got potential. You wouldn't know it from her appearance or how she acts right now but she has a fire. And I know fire." I really didn't want to know what he meant by that.

He came to a stop in front of me and his friends looked me up and down. Erza, Juvia, Levy, and Gray were there but so were a few other students I didn't recognize. I don't even think they're all from our school…. There were two dark haired guys but only one was riddled with piercings, a blonde boy, a ginger guy from our school, and another guy with dark blue hair.

"Guys this is Lucy, a few of you already know her." Natsu looked at me then pointed. "The pierced one is Gajeel. The other dark haired one is Rogue. The blonde dude is Sting. Ginger over here is Loki. And that's Jellal. You know the rest." I wasn't able to meet anyone's eyes except Levy's. She gave me an encouraging smile and two thumbs up which didn't really help anything.

"U-uhm Hi…" My voice felt small but it seemed that everyone had heard me. I trained my gaze on Levy who was still trying to encourage me. "Nice to meet you…."

Natsu grinned casually and swiped something from Erza. Then he grabbed my hand and pressed down on the back of it.

"Hey!" I ripped my hand from his grasp and threw a muted glare in his direction before inspecting my hand. I was taken aback when I noticed a rather beautiful symbol had been stamped there in nearly the same pink as Natsu hair. I looked up, puzzled.

Natsu straightened and took a step back from me, joining the others who were a bit further away now.

"Lucy. Welcome to Fairy Tail."

And that's how I accidentally joined one of the most notorious gangs in Magnolia.

Even though I didn't know it yet.

I hope you enjoyed it! I don't have an updating schedule but I figure with school nearly over I should be able to do more chapters. But around exams might be more difficult. Anyways, I hope you have a wonderful day/night wherever you are in the world.

See you soon

~Ro