A/N:Halla my dear readers, thank you for deciding that my fanfic was worth checking out and I hope you find it enjoyable to read. I apologise for the terrible summary too, I'm not particularly good with these things to be honest. Oh and any A/N that I have shall be relatively short and to the point unless you have any queries where the answer would benefit other readers.
Disclaimer: Any and all Fairy Tail related stuff has never, nor shall it ever be, mine…unless they happen to be an OC that I had to include for the sake of the story.
Summary: Lisanna joins Team Natsu but Lucy stays. And why wouldn't she, considering she was the one who invited her and she was the one who came up with the roster system. After all, Lucy has no problem with Lisanna going after Natsu so they never had a problem in the first place.
Prologue – The Start of Something Beautiful
Up, down, left, right, the young women sighed in relief as she gratefully sinks down onto the barstool, thanking the spirits for the once-in-a-Fairy-Tail-lifetime early morning calm. It was quiet, it was sweet, it was peaceful and, most importantly, no one was here to scream in her ear about one thing or another except the barmaids and the master, who happened to be upstairs. Pushing a golden lock out of her face, Lucy smiled and looked to Mirajane and the new/old guild member, Lisanna, admiring the way the two Strauss siblings flitted around the bar preparing for the day a head like they hadn't spent two years away from each other. It was a truly heart-warming to see that the two hadn't encountered any problems in their relationship yet.
It had been two weeks since the return of the youngest Strauss sister and that's how long Fairy Tail had been celebrating her return. Two weeks of non-stop screaming, drinking, fighting, and destruction. Not that Lucy could blame them to be honest; in the short span that she'd known Lisanna they've already become quite close friends. They had even gone on a quick picnic with Levy, Juvia, Wendy and Carla in order to get to know each other better whilst the rest of the guild was either too drunk to notice or too busy fighting.
"Good morning Lucy, did you sleep well?" Mira asked noticing the young blonde's relaxed slump and distant eyes, as she finished cleaning the glasses that weren't done the night before.
Lucy gave a little yawn, giving her head a quick shake, "Yeah," she answered "it was honestly the best sleep I've had in two weeks now that everyone has finally calmed down."
The Satan Soul user nodded her head sagely as a small giggle escaped the young, short haired takeover mage. "You know," she started, clicking her tongue, "you probably wouldn't have as much trouble with those three if you just got a bigger apartment and gave them a permanent room they could sleep in." Lisanna clapped her hands, "In fact we could actually all pitch in to get a house so then we could become roomies!" Her eyes sparkled at the prospect, face taking on an expression akin to a kitten begging to play.
"No," Lucy's reply was deadpanned "I've got enough crazy in my life as it is and I do not want to live on the street like some hobo because Natsu and Gray couldn't stop themselves from having another one of their pissing contests. Plus Erza, for some ungodly reason, would replace all the food in the cupboards with strawberry cheesecake and kill anyone who so much as thinks about the dessert." The stare was even more deadpanned. "And let's not forget that oh so annoying blue winged feline that still bothers me for fish despite that you're his 'mum' like Natsu is his 'dad'." Her upper class like indignant sniff raised eyebrows "So my answer will, and irrevocably always, be no to rooming with Gray, Natsu and Happy." Slight pause in which both women caught an almost imperceptible flinch "Plus, Juvia would probably drown me in my sleep or whilst I'm having a bath."
Mira snickered as Lisanna's whole demeanour fell and her kitten begging face changed to one that looked to be half drowned, sans the water of course. Watching those two interact was amusing and they always looked to have been friends for all of their lives while doing it. The oldest takeover mage's smile suddenly turned predatory, eyes fixed on the stellar mage's face and expression becoming something that even the almighty Zeref, with all his powers over life and death, would subsequently cower in front of…if it was actually, ever in a million years, directed at him.
Lucy felt a chill run up her spine, prompting her to turn her attention back to the oldest sibling. What she saw on that day exactly she'll never know for at that very moment her brain had temporarily blanked out the face of one Mirajane and, by the look of apparent horror upon Lisanna's face as she also turned her attention to her older sister, was for a very, very good reason. The blonde mage suddenly felt perspiration upon her brow as the faceless Mirajane drew closer to her, gliding like some type of beautifully horrid apparition, hands extended as if to grab her and fingers looking like wicked claws ready to dig into her flesh.
"So my cute little guild sister," Mira started frightfully sweet, dragging Lucy half onto the bar and pinning her down to ensure that she couldn't escape. Both women vaguely registered the quiet 'Please don't kill her nee-chan…' in the background as the older one's smile turned vicious and the younger's vision started to clear "you still haven't told me who you like yet~" the demon lady said in a sing song voice, causing Lucy's life to flash before her eyes.
Lisanna squealed, effectively breaking the tension as she vaulted over the bar and sat herself down onto a barstool next to Lucy, bouncing up and down on her seat like a little puppy on crack. "Oh tell us, tell us! I know you've already told Levy so tell us!" She demanded, giving her shiny, puppy augmented eyes.
Lucy sighed in exasperation and amusement "Fine, fine, just let me up will you." Mira let go of her and the stellar mage placed herself back onto the barstool with as much carefree dignity as the situation allowed. "Firstly, no one, and I mean no one can hear of this unless they already know." The blonde said seriously and pleadingly at the two Strauss sisters. They looked at each other, already mentally crossing off a few males "And secondly promise me that you won't laugh." Both nodded their agreement, waiting in anticipated silence.
Lucy sighed, "Natsu," She paused, looked down and started to fiddle with her hands nervously as Lisanna deflated a little, "everybody thinks I like Natsu." Mira noticed that she worded it quite oddly. "But that isn't true."
The young takeover mage perked up, "It's not?" she questioned though she already knew the answer.
Lucy looked over to Lisanna, smiled and shook her head, "No it's not; we had already tried once, secretly so as to not cause a fuss," her smile turned a little sad, "but he missed you too much to see me properly and I had started to fall in love with someone else."
Mira gave a soft smile to her little sister as she sat there with a shocked expression. "He missed me? Natsu missed me that much even after two years?" Lisanna asked, wonder, joy and sadness crossing her face. Quickly shaking her head, the youngest Strauss sibling pouted, "You're trying to change the subject."
The blonde laughed, eyes twinkling at being caught. "Sorry, sorry," she apologised after seeing the slight demonic glint in Mirajane's eyes "Now any male that you think may or may not have been a potential love interest you can cross out now." Lucy started, blushing while the Strauss sisters both gave a small 'Oh' of realisation. "It's probably stupid of me and might be signing my own death warrant but…"
Two identical squeals of delight could be heard all over Magnolia as a third, less perceptible scream of horror was drowned out in the cheery, early morning sun.
-| D | D | D | D | D | D-
It was 11 am once the first of the Fairies started arriving, doing some form of stumble through the doors all the while cursing the ever bright and deathly cheerful sun for shining its bright, golden rays down upon the world. It can never be said that the infamous Fairy Tail guild were immune to the natural horror called hangovers even if your name started with C and ended with ana. It was to the sight of three women merrily chatting and laughing away, obnoxiously loud too, at the bar that greeted these poor sobs as they slowly stalked to their usual spots and just laid their heads onto the cool tables of heaven.
The three said women had discussed many things since the topic from four hours ago; dreams, futures, clothes, abs, boobs, waffles, the usual things that women discuss over long periods of time. It was with this in mind that the subject changed to Fairy Tail and the teams prompting Mirajane to leave to make sure everybody else was alright. It was actually the reason that Lucy arrived at the guild so early in the morning; she wanted to discuss the team arrangement of Team Natsu with Lisanna.
For the past two weeks that the takeover mage had been back, the stellar mage had been thinking of ways to include her without having to make the team too big for missions or replace someone. It was while on this train of thought that it came to her; roster team mates, whether one or two, on and off after every two weeks or so of missions so everybody is on the team and everybody can get a little time to themselves to do whatever they feel like. The only exception to this rule was if the mission was a big one, then everybody could join unless they didn't wish to.
At first she had thought about going to Erza about the idea immediately; this thought was ruthlessly crushed as Lucy watched the proud woman try and beat Cana and Elfman in a drinking contest with the whole guild cheering them on only to subsequently faint halfway through her third barrel into a puddle of ohgodwhatthefuckisthat. This caused her to postpone the date 'til after the celebrations had died. It was quite lucky that the party died the next night.
"So what do you think of the idea?" the blonde asked, taking the occasional sip of the strawberry milkshake whilst she watched the door in case her fellow team members came through which she honestly doubted.
Wendy went on a little bonding mission with Gajeel, Levy, Pantherlily, Carla and Happy a few days ago, Gray got drunk and went home hand-in-hand with Juvia and Natsu and Erza decided that have a drinking contest with Cana again was the best idea of the century. That terrific idea soon turned out to be not as good as previously thought as Natsu decided to throw his empty barrel at Erza to disrupt her drinking, which in turn made her beat the living daylights out of him with a cup she grabbed from the table, which caused the Master to intervene, which made the Titania throw her cup through the roof with all her considerable strength while screaming in absolute rage, which eventually caused that cup to travel a fair distance to hit the poor, innocent Gildarts, resulting him in falling over and destroying the nearby, and absolutely innocent, dark guild that he happened to be passing. All the while this was all watched by a certain ginger haired lion from the spirit world as he laughed at the carnage and took pictures for black mail.
The short haired girl mulled it over a bit as she too watched the doors for any sign of the rest of Team Natsu, swirling around the last of the chocolate milkshake. Lisanna brought the cup to her lips and downed the last of the liquid and places the cup on the bar, sighing in content at the sugary goodness, "I like it, everybody gets to be on the team and we don't have too many at any given time. Though can I make a request?"
Lucy looks at her out of the corner of her eye, "What is it?"
The takeover mage blushes and starts pushing her two index fingers together while turning her gaze to the floor "Can we roster on and off in pairs? It would be so much more fun and you, Wendy and I would probably benefit more from this if we're paired with one of the others." She pauses to let a nervous giggle "They could keep us motivated for training and maybe even be our back up during missions."
Lucy laughs and turns to face Lisanna "You just want to get some alone time with our pink haired dragon so you can claim him." She teased, giving the blushing girl a mischievous grin "I'm sure it'll be fine though, as long as everybody else agrees to the arrangement." The blonde's face turned thoughtful as she looked back at the doors, "Who should Wendy be paired with?"
"Gray" Lisanna said, with such finality that Lucy had to blink in surprise and turn back to her friend.
"Why Gray? He's not exactly the perfect role model for her, especially with his stripping habit." Lucy said, raising a slight eyebrow.
The youngest Strauss sibling just shook her head, "It's him, a mildly socially competent man, or Erza, an overly violent and completely sociably inept S-class mage that happens to scare anyone and everyone she meets…also she doesn't quite understand the ways of women, while Gray will certainly have Juvia along on missions."
Lucy sweat dropped "Point taken…"
She received a light nudge in the ribs and a mischievous grin, "Besides, you could-" The short haired mage started only to be cut off by the blonde as she leapt off her stool and covered the takeover mages mouth, glancing conspiratorially around the place.
She had felt a disturbance and not a second later the doors slammed open, causing a many of a still hung-over guild members to cringe, to reveal the rest of Team Natsu in all their glory. Wendy, being at the front of the group, bounced happily over to a table, Carla resting on her shoulder, while Gray, Natsu and Erza followed at a much more slower and reasonable pace, cradling their heads in their hands while Happy, who had been surprisingly quiet, flew behind his 'father' and rubbing small, comforting circles on Natsu's back.
As they all sat down and laid their heads down, Lisanna and Lucy made their way over to the table, both wearing an appropriate expression for their friends plight; smug and amused satisfaction.
"We've decided on the arrangement for Team Natsu." Lucy said as she sat down next to Erza and Lisanna took a seat down next Natsu. This got their attention while Wendy clapped her hands together from her spot between Natsu and Gray, causing both to flinch.