PROLOGUE

In the dark age of true magical warfare, one boy is born amongst many. He is born into the Fernandes family, a cohesion of terribly formidable mages who battle alongside a multitude of legal guilds to rid the darkness from the world. He's luckier than most- at the time- and has a family: a mother and a father. He has friends: an assortment of sons and daughters of the maids and caretakers of the house. It's normal (at least he thinks it is).

(He is not aware of the sheer number of mages who died in the war; he's not aware of the true identity of his parents, the power they possess.)

Normalcy is the worst kind of fakery. Because it's all just gone one day—the day that his parents don't return home and the mansion was lit ablaze, when he's knocked out and thrown bodily over a grown man's shoulder. It's sad, because the faces of the mother and father and the children of the house (whose souls rose to the heavens) are slandered within time and neither remembered with endearment or loathing.

He's only a boy, albeit an unfortunate one living in unfortunate circumstances, but there's a difference between this boy and all the others in the world:

It is to be learnt and known that Jellal Fernandes is not expendable.

:::

Jellal can hear the swish swish of the waves thrumming against the coastlines, feel the course sands underneath his bare feet, and the fear that's pooling into iron lead into his stomach. He's visited the seaside too many times to count, (one of the past constants in Jellal's life was that his mother and father had business with noteworthy people, and it had become apparent that a good portion of important people favored secluded beaches) and at once realizes how dire his predicament is. Once the ships leave the mainland with him inside, there's no chance of escape- bottom-line.

Escape. It then hits Jellal that he's no free man.

For all this time, his capture has meant nothing to him—the roughhousing from the guards, the constant abuse; because Mavis, the noble blood of the Fernandes family is running through his veins.

But really, amongst chains of the enslaved, blood is nothing.

Jellal is not willing, though, to just give up. Oh, nononono. He's getting out of this mess.

So maybe it is a good thing, his pride, because that's how he slips out of the chains of enslavement and into the phantom chains of the free.

:::

The boy's smaller than Jellal and he's crying harder than anyone else in the prison hold. His breath comes in shuddering, shaking sobs and tears soak through the collar of his shirt clean. The ship is reeling, yes, but Jellal fears that this yellow-haired boy will tip the boat into the watery oblivions of the sea before any raging storm.

The others (the captured) offer no sympathy, too wrapped up in their own plights. Masked men, identities a mystery, had spoken of their destinations out of pure malice, (the unknown hell they would soon bitterly, with anguish, call home), their doomed fates, how twisted their personalities would soon become.

"Other than through death, no one has ever escaped the Tower," one man had informed, barring his jagged, yellowed teeth through his grotesque mask.

Death.

The blow which should render Jellal to a puddle of tears doesn't come. It's simply because there is this subtle ideology that's ingrained into his head: Jellal's too important, thus he can not die.

Because despite everything, he's still a child- an innocent child- and a sense of false invincibility is coupled along with it. Of course there's more to it. One quality that made Jellal, Jellal, was courage. It's the type that's rational, neither reckless or idiotic.

However, there are others; others in the prison hold who are not sheltered from death and loss, others who can't handle the idea as while the reality of captivity. Like the yellow-haired boy who's wailing for his mother, and before Jellal can crawl up to him, someone beats him to it.

"Hey, boy! Yeah, that's right, you who's crying a sixth ocean!" A scowl cuts clear across a wizened man's face. He's one of the wise few who are trying to sleep. "You'll never see her again if you keep up this act."

Heads turn in earnest. Everyone's desperate for a distraction.

"How...do...you k-know?" the little boy chokes out, hiccupping. He stifles another sob behind a hand.

"You familiar with farm animals, boy?" It's a bad time; many are poor, staggering under the weight of debts and the threats of raids. The children are being sent to the distant countryside by the storm, where it should be safe. But it's not safe. Nowhere is truly safe.

Mystified, he nods. Tear tracks plow clear lines against his tan, unwashed skin. "What of them?" he whispers.

"When a drove of cattle are birthed, tell me, what happens to the weak? To the frail and sickly?"

"I-I don't know... I've never thought about it before."

The old man waits a moment, allowing tension to settle.

"They cull 'em," he finally says, voice hoarse and hushed. "If a cow cannot perform its task to its master's satisfaction, it's either sold or slaughtered. In your case—our case, is death."

"But how can you give up like that?" Jellal speaks up, well-aware of the multitude of eyes that seemed to ask the very same question.

"I'm not giving up, youngster. I am giving the boy—you all, advice." A wretched sigh. "Perhaps one day you will see your mother again; but heed well, you must forge through tomorrow and the long days afterwards." Straggly gray hair swings to and fro with his head and then he rolled over, back facing everyone. He doesn't say a word after, and everyone assumes that the astute man has succumbed to sleep.

There's murmuring afterwards, heads mulling over the man's words. The talking begins small, then swells until cliques form and discussions with purpose begin. As tentative hands join together, Jellal discerns that he can't survive alone. But no one's reaching out to the likes of him; Jellal's considerably smaller in comparison to the men and women (teenagers, but to Jellal, they may as well be adults) who are scattered on the ground.

For a moment, Jellal considers waking the old man, but dismisses the thought as it comes to him. He's ancient, and evidently needs his rest. Jellal can talk to him later if needed. Approuaching the others was possible, but the age gap's a bit conflicting. This leaves the yellow-haired boy.

He's alone, too.

"Hey." Jellal dragged his aching body adjacent from him. "My name's Jellal."

"Hi, I'm Sho..." Sho stares at him, confusion shadowing fear.

"Do you plan on surviving, Sho?"

They stare at each other for a long time, so long in fact that awkwardness creeps and Jellal wonders if it's a mistake to approach him.

"I'll try..." Sho finally says.

"That's good." Jellal smiles broadly, feeling his lips cracking, dehydration getting the best of him. "Because if we plan on getting out of this mess alive, we'll need allies. So, friends?"

Sho wipes his running nose on his shoulder. He hiccups once, twice. Jellal can tell that Sho's trying to hold back his tears. He nods, eyes shining with tears and blinking them back. "Friends." They shake hands on it.

Eventually, everyone is soothed by new friendships and the lulling, almost soothing rocking of the boat.

Then the ship docks, and the hell they were promised becomes too real.

:::

The strips of stingy red and gruesome purple contrasts sharply against the skin of Jellal's back. He's limp and almost appears boneless as a nameless man hurls him across the cell grounds. Jellal rolls and bounces, moaning, the world blurring into gray.

Jellal knows even without looking that the prisoners freeze, visibly shaking, and the ground is where he stays. His lashed back sears with unquenchable flames, and the ground is an electrifying contrast in temperature. It's freezing, everything burning hot and red, but most of all, it hurt.

"Damn you all," Jellal hisses furiously, spittle flying between his teeth. "I'll kill you all for this, one day. I swear it." The guards don't hear him over their uproarious laughter and it's a good at thing, too. Another shipment of slaves is arriving next morning. One won't be missed with the addition of hundreds.

"Jellal! Jellal!" Sho scrambles up, and attempts to drag Jellal's limp form to a secluded corner; he does it once he was sure that the guards makes their leave. Jellal groans as the uneven stone dig into his exposed chest. "Are you all right?"

No, I'm not all right. Do I look all right? It takes all of Jellal's will power not to snap. Sho's fragile, he reminds himself.

"Yeah...just fine..."

Damn the world, why me...

"Oh, oh, good." Sho's face lights up, convinced, because the boy holds on to an everlasting faith that Jellal can handle anything. Tortured to the brink of death? Who cares? He's fine, because he's Jellal Fernandes.

You're not supposed to believe me. Don't believe me.

He believes him.

"I was so worried when they took you away, Millianna and Grandpa Rob, too. Right now, they won't be able to see you, because they haven't come back, yet." He paused. "But I'm not worried anymore, because Jellal, you're here!" He beamed.

No, you should worry about it because nothing really changes when I'm around. I just lie. Lie, lie, and lie. Maybe you and Millianna can't see it, but it's true: that's the damn, clear-cut truth.

These are the dark days.

:::

It's impossible.

But it's happening, so maybe you can call it improbable. The Tower is supposed to twist you into something unrecognizable; the prolonged captivity and the harsh conditions are the true evil. It sways personalities; once chipper, optimistic minds turn pessimistic, dark. Brawling, snapping, bickering that has no purpose ensue.

Nothing can be nurtured to fruition here, nothing but darkness. And when it occurs, it's extraordinary- maybe even the highest point of the century, or maybe not, but it is in Jellal's life.

It begins with one girl with no last name- no sense of belonging.

Jellal can't imagine it- no last name, what is the world coming to? He thinks it's sad. And despite Wally Buchanan's disapproving grumbling, he names her.

"Scarlet... It's the color of your hair," he says, smiling a smile that his face hasn't genuinely felt for a long time. "That way, I'll never forget it!"

(It's unintentional, but from that point on, she's his now.)

When he saw that smile of hers, something begun growing in his heart; it was something small, (living) its head pushing headily against the rocky, course (dead) grounds of the Tower of Heaven.

"Erza...Scarlet." A beat and, "I...I like it." Jellal's heart swells; he doesn't hear Wally's groans or feel Simon's sharp gaze. "Erza...Scarlet."

She's small, she's delicate, and she smiles, and he finds himself smiling back. There are hundreds- thousands- of occasions where Jellal is looked to by his friends for comfort and words of warmth. That particular torch shouldn't be his to bear (remember, he's just a child), but there were turns of events and situations that were well beyond anyone's control.

Events that will further ricochet into pure pandemonium- through staggering temptations and irrational decisions, through plunging losses and compensating gains. They'll change: the boy and girl from the Tower will become no more. Today, their relationship is simple. Easy and comprehensible, but then it will grow. It'll grow to maybe something more, then into something too complicated for a real label. This's what the future holds. And one day, one day, they'll look back and wonder what went wrong, and the possibilities of a future relationship is what they will heavily question.

But for now, they're still the boy and girl from the Tower; and in the entangled future, they'll just have to placate themselves with the matter of ending it first- ending it all and plunging the lands of Fiore with their individual ideals of the world.

Then, whatever position they may be in- a queen of darkness chained at his feet, a prisoner of light to the undergrounds- they'll talk.

a/n: hi! :) I'm new to the FT ff scene, but I'll try my best! so aha beware of occness (which is my biggest nightmare. really)

and the chap? a bit dark? yeahh, but hey, this is jerza. and it will lighten up considerably. I promise. :) oh! and fyi, this is an interconnected story of drabbles/oneshots/and hey, maybe even a character sketch or two. (basically no back to back, event by event chaps) but edifice definitely tells a story with a distinguishable plot. style, genre, length may vary with each update, (or maybe not hahaha) just to keep things fresh.

anyways, thanks for reading and drop a review if you like! :D