Mermaid Tail

chapter 1

"Lu-chan!" the small girl whined, "Slow down, I can't keep up with you!" She was pumping her tail up and down as fast as she could, but still couldn't keep up with the blonde.

"I can't slow down or we might lose Plue!" the blonde yelled back from far ahead.

The small girl's friend, Lucy Heartfilia, was beautiful, with a pink tail, blonde hair, and warm, brown eyes. She had a fish that she kept as a pet. Its name was Plue, and it had ran away, so they were trying to catch him, but he had a big lead on them. Suddenly, Lucy slowed down and eventually stopped, panting heavily. The girl—whose name was Levy— finally caught up to her, also panting. Plue disappeared behind a corner.

"We... lost him." Lucy said in between breaths, a look of sadness and disappointment growing on her face. Her eyes shined—as if they were starting to fill with tears.

Levy reached over and put a hand on Lucy's shoulder, trying to comfort her. "I'm so sorry, Lucy." She felt like she had somewhat betrayed her friend by not being able to catch Plue.

"Oi! Lucy!" it was the familiar voice of Natsu, a pink-haired boy that was a friend of Lucy. Levy turned around, her hand still on Lucy's shoulder, to see what Natsu was up to.

"Look who I found!" he held out Plue with a huge smile on his face. Lucy almost immediately turned around, and she also had an enormous smile brightening her tear-stained face.

Lucy swam up to Natsu and Plue at full speed, hugging them both when she got to them. Then, she grabbed Plue and twirled around with him before hugging him again. "Thank you Natsu! Where did you find him?" Lucy asked Natsu thankfully.

"Oh haha, it's no problem," he said rubbing the back of his neck. "He swam up to me a few hours ago and he was all lost so... I tried to find you, but you two were swimming really fast all over the place."

"Wait... if you found Plue a few hours ago…" Lucy was starting to realize...

"Then whatever we were chasing after wasn't the real Plue!" Levy said, clearly shocked. Lucy had the same, dumbfounded expression on her face.

"Well I'm glad that Natsu brought the real Plue." Lucy said while holding Plue in her lap. She had sat down on a bench where they were to settle down, after the strange experience.

"Anyway, I have to go to the bookstore because I volunteered to organize the books." Levy explained, "See you later!" She waved at both of them, getting ready to make her way to the bookstore.

"I can help, too!" Lucy swam up to Levy, offering to help at the bookstore with her. They were talking and sharing stories the whole way there; Levy was glad to have someone that made the journey less lonely.

"Lu-Chan!" Levy called out from somewhere within all of the books, "I can't—reach the top shelf." She was trying her hardest to put a book on the top shelf but couldn't get it up there. She was small, with blue hair, chocolate brown eyes, and a beautiful orange tail.

"There you go!" Lucy said as she took the book from Levy and put it on the shelf for her. "Oh—Was that the last one?"

Levy looked around the room to see if there was any more books to go on the shelves. "Guess so." The two grabbed their bags and headed towards the door to leave. It was getting dark outside, and Levy still needed to get home to eat dinner.

"Sorry Lu-chan, but I need to go straight home today, so I can't walk home with you." Levy made the disappointment in her voice distinct, feeling bad that she couldn't talk with Lucy more.

"Okay... Bye Levy-Chan!" They both smiled as they waved goodbye, starting to walk separate ways to go home.

'Lucy is such a good friend' Levy thought to herself as she was walking home. She wasn't paying much attention to where she was going—but she didn't have to. She'd taken that route home so many times now, that it was practically engraved in her memory.

She thought she heard a noise. "W-What was tha—" by the time Levy looked above her, it was already too late.