~Hey life's a bitch but I finally managed to get some time to post this. I hope y'all like it cause dear gods, it was actually a bunch of fun.~
Brimstone
Lucy and Natsu had been on the tail end of a simple job with a decent payout to retrieve a tome from a band of thieves for a sweet little old lady when the Fire Slayer just touched the thing and 'poof', her troublesome pinkette partner was gone. Normally when Natsu blinked from existence, he let her know he was leaving ahead of time that way when things like this happened she wouldn't freak out but for some reason he just forgot to let her knOW AND LUCY WAS FREAKING OUT BECAUSE NATSU WAS GONE.
Pacing around the little room they had descended into through the winding passageways of some random mine in the middle of the woods, she was trying to keep calm as best she could in the circumstances. They had just taken out the uncomfortably well-organized group of mages when she saw the book and its pristine plain black cover with what she could only assume was draconian writing embossed in gold on the bottom corner looking all pretty on a pedestal and called her Dragon Slayer partner over to take a look to see if he could read what it said when one second he was complaining about the fight being too short and the next he was gone with the book shining under one ominous spotlight in a very weirdly pitch-black room like something out of Indiana Jones. She couldn't help but have her palm connect to her forehead with a resounding 'smack' at the insanity she had to deal with on a regular basis that should have prompted her to connect all the foreboding clues together when they first walked into the ridiculous room.
Muttering under her breath all the while she glared at the innocent enough looking booby-trap of a book, circling around the pedestal as she waited for Laxus to answer his comm, hers sitting heavily in the palm of her hand, "I should have guessed. I should have known that something spooky-wiggy would happen. Just look at this setup. Next thing you know, I'll touch a doorknob and Natsu and I will switch bodies until we learn to appreciate one another…"
Laxus' voice was already drawn into exhausted irritation as his face held his usual look of mild disdain or as Lucy liked to call it, his 'resting murderbot face'. "If you're calling to tell me that flaming dumbass did something I'm gonna have to clean up, fucking save it, Blondie."
Her face twisted into something akin to shamed remorse at the Lightning Slayer's intuitive words as she sucked her lips between her teeth to say 'yeah, I hate to be that guy but…'.
Letting out a deep sigh, he motioned for her to go ahead anyway though he could feel the beginnings of a migraine stirring at the base of his skull only adding on to his mound of shit to deal with this week.
She thought about how to explain what had actually went down in the mine...and couldn't really articulate what happened so she just said it as plainly as she could while she stilled her pacing to give Laxus a tired shrug because honestly, she was too young for this to be easily explained beyond, "Natsu's gone."
"Thank Mavis…" was his immediate, relieved, response.
Taking a deep breath after his near serious-relief at her words to send him a glare through her end of the lacrima because hello? This was the kind of top priority stuff that snowballed into wars, of which she's seen one too many in her remarkably short lifetime. "No Laxus, like he was here with me, right next to me and then he touched this...book with draconian writing? symbols? I don't know, I'm not a dragon, I can't read draconian, and then he vanished from thin air. Gone. Poof. Just like that."
Her guildmaster just blinked at her with a bland neutral expression.
Letting out a growl of frustration at the lack of reaction from her Master, who should very much have some reaction to the fact that one of his members blinked out of existence. Literally. She ground out through clenched teeth and clenched fist, "I'm going to give you two seconds to formulate the proper response, Laxus Dreyar."
Rolling his eyes, he offered with a droll look and an flippant wave of his hand, "Well, why don't you bring the book back here and we can find him. If that's really what you wanna do." Leaving her plenty of room to decide otherwise if she wanted.
Her response was haughty and concrete. "It is and you are in agreement, Master Laxus." Drawing his name out in efforts to highlight the Lightning Dragons title and the responsibilities that came with it. Like finding missing guild members.
Reaching her hand out warily to grab the book with a shifty eyed expression in efforts to try and keep the safety of his steely-blue eyes in her direct vision while simultaneously trying to keep watch on the book as if it would poison her for not being a dragon and/or make her disappear completely and also be ready for spikes to shoot out from below her feet or a cage to fall from above and trap her here forever, she spoke with obvious remorse at her jump to accepting the 'just grab the book and come home' plan seeing as the book was definitely the source of her Natsu-related problems, "And I swear to Mavis herself, if I disappear and this is some long, drawn out evil plot I will not hesitate to rip your balls-"
And just like that, the small smooth communication lacrima fell to the stone floor and shattered without a body to hold it up. The sound echoed through the empty room as the tome they had been sent to retrieve disappeared slowly from under the bright spotlight.
Back in Magnolia, Laxus let out an involuntary growl as he watched her end of the comms conversation go black before trying to call her back repeatedly only to have his comm sit uselessly in his palm before he chucked the innocent stone-like object across his office and burst through the door of his second-floor dungeon with the ferocity of a caged beast finally free, his deep baritone bellowing down to the main guildhall, "I need all the information about Blondie's job, now," before his eyes fell on the blue-head of hair that marked the Solid Script's tiny frame, "You, bookgirl, you're coming with me and bring the rust bucket with you."
Narrowing her eyes at his nickname for her when he very well knew her name, Levy turned to the Iron Dragon fast asleep next to her and gave his stomach a smack to wake him up, the feet of his chair slamming down at the rude awakening. Her voice was tinged with irritation as she grumbled contemptuously and packed away her books, "Get up. Master Laxus needs us to go with him and I mean, it's not like we were doing anything anyway. No, not me. I wasn't in the middle of an easy translations job that paid bank."
Utterly confused at both the tiny mage's ire towards him and her angry sarcasm, he growled back, "Oi, what the hell do ya think you're doin', woman!"
The angry glare she sent him easily shut him up with an angry sneer of his own fixed firmly his face before following her to where Laxus was speaking with Mira at the bar with lightning sparking from his frame enough to create a static field around him so intense, it made a nice chunk of Magnolia as whole channel their inner bride of Frankenstein from the effects his magic had on hair, much to the annoyance and chagrin of everyone within three miles of the Lightning Slayer whose thoughts focused solely on the blonde woman adept in handling the more delicate parts of his guild. The parts that he needed running smoothly in order to keep from mass murder.
XxXxXxXxXxXxXxX
Sting had been in the middle of puzzling through the horrifying loopy, slanted, cursive handwriting of Sabertooth's Memory Make Mage when a thick black book appeared on the sill of his window overlooking the breathtaking view of the mountain range Sabertooth guild hall had been nestled neatly into.
Raising a curious brow at the book, his head swiveled around the room to try and see if anyone had accompanied the unwelcome addition to his office before squinting his bright blue eyes and calling out for Rogue as he started moving from his spot at his desk to slither over to the windowsill, his hands walking the edge of his desk as he went. Books were decidedly Rogue's domain. Right up there with capes and brooding.
After waiting a beat for his partner to respond and getting no answer, he called again from his contemplative stance looming over the thick book without lifting his clear eyes from it, this time much louder and some might even describe it as shrill and awful.
Letting out an impatient huff at the Shadow Slayer's continued lack of response, he moved to pick up the book to see if he could find his shadowy counterpart only to disappear completely the instant he brushed the smooth leather of the cover, the book staying neatly at its perch against the glass of the window, waiting.
Having heard the cries of her Master since near everyone this side of the mountain heard his girly squealing, one of the new additions to Sabertooth had knocked on his door, her voice a forced sort of cheery that was totally out of character for the usually acerbic Corrosion Mage but she had just gotten bitched at about being 'a killjoy' and 'a bully' from both Orga and Rogue so she had to at least put some effort into being slightly less venomous than usual. "Master Sting? I heard you shrieking like a banshee for Rogue but, he's not here. No one knows where he went so can I be of any assistance?"
She waited a solid ten seconds before knocking again and losing the false cheer from the alto of her voice, sarcasm and reluctance taking over in her usual manner of speaking, "If I open this door and you're any type of of nude, I will melt your dick off, Master or not. Once was one too many times and you've scarred me on four separate occasions." Her hands shooting out as she shook her head to convey how much 'no' she was trying to get across. "Four. Separate. Times."
When again she was met with silence, her brows furrowed and she bravely opened the door to find the office completely devoid of the overzealous and slightly dim-witted blond she had to call Master.
"Master Sting? Are you...still in here?"
Her eyes, both the yellow color of a felines except her right eye held the toxic symbol instead of a circular pupil, immediately looked up from beneath the usual unkempt lime green of her fringe, her silvery-grey roots standing out with the messy way she always tied her hair into buns low on the back of each side of her head, like she was expecting the wild blond moron to drop down from the ceiling in ambush. She backed up just a step, the high platform of her matte leather boots caught on a floorboard before catching herself with wide eyes to see if anyone had seen her near tumble. Her voice took a blatant threatening edge as she grew increasingly irritated with the White Dragon Slayer, "Seriously. If you pop out from anywhere right now, I'll do it. You'll live the rest of your life as a eunuch," before she noticed the one thing that definitely did not belong anywhere near the Master's office; a book.
Ever wary of the possibility of a sneak attack, she sidestepped her way along the wall to the windowsill, taking note of the unusual golden symbol in the corner before moving to open the cover only to meet the same fate as her guildmaster and his Shadow Slayer counterpart.
Having finished its work high in the mountains overlooking the desert of Fiore, it returned to its pedestal to wait for the next victim to fall into the ancient magics at work.
It had taken the trio of Fairy Tail mages exactly nine hours, 37 minutes and seven seconds to get to the little blip of a town Lucy and Natsu had been sent to on their mission. Laxus would know. He counted every miserable second on the train with the whiniest pussy of a dragon slayer in existence now that Lucy tamed the firefuck to be a purring kitten of himself for the entirety of the rides they took with or without Wendy's help. Unfortunately for them, Wendy had already taken a job with her mate and one of the strongest mages he's seen outside of the Dragon Slayer's, a Combustion Mage named Kekoa, and she couldn't help either of them with their motion sickness before they left.
And bookgirl pulled down the folding table in huff the instant they picked a cabin, pulled out four separate books each with a near slam and a notebook before putting on a pair of gale force glasses, taking a moment to shoot him a cutting glare and getting to work in silent but tangible annoyance.
At least when he rode with his team, he had entertainment. Something to distract him from the time when he couldn't sleep.
When the hulking blond knocked on the door of the address the job sent the doomed duo with no response, Gajeel let him know he didn't hear any heartbeats coming from the little hovel of a cottage but he could still smell the disgusting brimstone and burning sulphur smell that always lingered after Natsu used his magic to prompt the three to follow the Iron Slayers nose in the hopes of finding their missing nakama.
All the way to a sketchy mine that looked like it had been abandoned for years.
Standing in front of the opening, staring at the rickety at best woodwork of it, Laxus threw back over his shoulder with no effort into turning his head towards the blue-haired pixie mage to speak plainly, "I don't know if you want to follow us down into that, bookgirl." His intention to save her from the potential of a cave in though it wasn't received that way.
Giving a huff from a good ten yards behind the two oafs, she pulled her hairband down over her eyes to try and fix the mess of twigs and leaves in her hair from the hike here, her tone once again laced with indignant annoyance at the lack of use of her name from the guy she's literally spent almost all her life sharing the same guild that he was now master of. "Why? Because I'm 'bookgirl'? That's a load of bul-"
Then silence. Abrupt, resounding silence and Laxus was left to stare upwards with one question on his mind: why.
Turning to see what cut off her one of her infamously long-winded tirades, Gajeel bared his teeth as a gut reaction to Levy's persons being completely gone from his span of vision and all hints of her gone from his other senses to come to one illogical conclusion. "Someone took Shrimp."
Without turning around, Laxus ran a heavy hand down his face because honestly, he just couldn't catch a break before motioning for the jumpy lugnut to follow him into the maze of charred hallways from Natsu's magic. "Bet you half a million that fucking book is down here and with what little I got from Blondie before she disappeared, that's what'll stop all this weird shit and get everyone back where they fucking belong."
"Tch, fuck that," rolling his shoulders to shake off the bad vibes this whole place was putting out in droves, "I ain't losin' my jewel over somethin' stupid and ya better be right 'bout Shrimp. I ain't dealin' with her shit if ya lost her somewhere shitty." Because Levy McGarden was a force to be reckoned with and Gajeel has done enough reckoning for a lifetime of lifetimes.
And that was all the exchange of words the two unsociable dragons needed before the eerie silence of the tunnels was filled only with the sounds of the heavy steps of their boots just out of synch with each other to create an ominous false echo while Laxus gave every pristine torch they passed a sideways suspicious glance because they looked like they had just been lit recently and he felt no magic coming from them. He didn't feel anything except the rapidly lowering temperature while they made their way deeper into the ground.
When Gajeel finally put enough pep in his step to have their gait fall in synch to the Lightning Slayer's relief only to take another three steps, pause, realize there was no one behind him to echo his footsteps and let out a growl of a yell while trying to keep his rapidly degrading sanity in check, Laxus lost it. "What in the flying FUCK IS GOING ON WITH MY MAGES?!"
Four. Four of his mages have vanished. Two of them Dragon Slayers and two of them not in another suspiciously matchy-pairy magical bullshit way that was seriously going to grey his hair already. As much as he liked to say he was worried about being down two of his heaviest hitting mages, it was Blondie and...bookgirl his thoughts were centered around. If this book was really related to dragons somehow, what in the fuck did those two have to do with anything.
That and he really did not want to deal with all the shit from the guild without the brilliant Celestial Mage. He wouldn't tell her that or she'd get even more smug than she already was. She smoothed over his incapability of playing well with others to the point they rarely got the worse end of any situation they found themselves in regardless of him dispising nearly everyone outside of Fairy Tail. Something that he really didn't care to fix since he just had a low tolerance for stupidity and people that wasted his time with unnecessary bullshit.
Wasting his time like travelling across Fiore with a very specific pair of mages with a very specific set of skills that would be perfect to go get a book with draconian writing on it only to have them fucking disappear when they arrived at their destination. That was the kind of shit that really rubbed him the wrong way.
Aggravated passed the point of caution, Laxus channeled his lightning to flashstep to the room he last saw Lucy, her comm in pieces scattered across the floor to catch the single source of light to reflect it back at him in blinding flashes before stepping further in to look over the cover of the book and the writing in the corner.
His only option now that he lost both his translators with him was to try and get the book back to Magnolia somehow since the piece of dragon soul allowed him to confirm Lucy's original guess the gold markings were draconian but didn't give him the ability to magically understand the language, he needed to bring the damned thing with him. You needed an actual dragon with their own dialect of draconian to learn from and Laxus hadn't seen any flying around to ask one of them to come on down and teach him.
Unwilling to touch the cursed book, the Lightning Slayer shrugged off his coat with a silent prayer to anyone listening to keep it in one piece as he carefully wrapped tome up in the thick material before letting out the breath he hadn't noticed he was holding until the relief from it nearly burned his lungs more than the time Bickslow insisted he try surfing and a 'rogue wave' pulled him under. That's totally what happened...rogue wave…right off the shore.
Confident that he wasn't going to vanish with the book tucked safely beneath his arm, the hulking blond took one more good look around the pristine room aside from the shards of opalescent lacrima from Lucy's departure before pushing the limits of his magic with a tunnel vision set on the guild hall to get some answers from one of his other dragons. Granted they also hadn't disappeared yet.
Instead of going back through the front doors, Laxus had a small balcony built off the Master's office so he could have a safe place to land when he used his magic to travel. It doubled as a means of avoiding being hounded by the hovering, nagging mages of his guild and the media that loved them so much. A good thing to be sure, but not in regards to him specifically as a human who did not handle pests well.
The instant he touched down, a charred circle marked the thick enchanted planks before he opened the set of double french doors and tossed the book safely tucked in the folds of his coat on his desk just as he made a beeline for the private bathroom just off his office. The totally rebuilt guild hall boasted all sorts of fun new additions since the near total rebuilding of Magnolia and he happened to have gotten his choice of layout as the new Guildmaster.
Standing in front of the mirror with his palms on the edge of the cool stone of the sink, the oldest Dragon Slayer took in the changes the years paid him that he really hadn't the mind to pay any attention to. He knew he was attractive and he didn't really have need to look in a mirror with the new haircut both Lucy and Mira insisted he try out when he first became Master years ago in efforts to improve his image and show that he wasn't the same aggressively arrogant, misguided asshole from before. It was a pretty basic undercut, the top of his blond spikey hair longer than subtle fade of his sides save for the tuft of hair that always seemed to fall forward in his eyes now that it was a much thicker and longer patch of hair he had to slick back if he needed to do Master-type shit and while he worked out or it would fall in his face and piss him off. It was a good look for him but it required a mirror and effort. Something he just didn't have time for most days.
Aside from his hair and the addition of different colors to his wardrobe (Again, at the insistence of Lucy and Mira), there wasn't much difference to the way he looked even though he was in the beginning years of his thirties except maybe a few new scars. No, most of his changes were things you couldn't see and that was also for the better since he had a very 'don't fix what isn't broken' casual attitude about his looks.
In addition to being a relatively successful guildmaster in those years, he earned both the title of Wizard Saint and a rightful place as the fourth God of Ishgar, right behind Bickslow's older brother and Guildmaster of the White Sea over in Bosco.
An unreadable look crossed his face as he remembered as if for the first time that the Pradesh family alone held two both the Lunar and the Solar Dragon Slayers.
"Fuck."
The Lightning Slayer reached in his pocket to give Kaleb a call to let him know what was going on with his mages and hopefully bring in another guild of capable mages to try and help him out only to realize his comm wasn't on him.
Letting out another sharp expletive, he went back out to his office to look for the damned tiny lacrima with a grouchy air about him so thick Cobra actually said something to Mira about the lack of Iron Slayer and Script Mage who then immediately sent Bickslow up to his office to check in on him after losing another pair of his mages without having brought back Lucy or Natsu.
When the Seith Mage opened the door and found Laxus Dreyar on his hands and knees searching the floor while glaring daggers into the floorboards, he was mildly concerned and mostly entertained with the sight unfolding in front of his eyes. Laxus was a 6'4 brick house of a man and he did not crawl around on the floor no matter what the circumstances so while Bickslow could appreciate this was more than likely serious, he also could appreciate the fact that this was once in a lifetime and one of the funniest things he's seen in a very long time. Aside from the genius Natsu and Gray spin the bottle incident, that is.
From where Laxus had bent in front of the plush black leather couch to try and find where his comm landed when he chucked it after Lucy went missing, he knew his best friend had leaned his towering frame back on the door and the Lightning Mage was less than amused by the spectating.
Wrapping his fingers around the bottom of his couch and lifting it with ease, his eye darted over to meet the concentric circles of spiraling red with a look that Bickslow knew extremely well to gruff out while he inspected the space underneath the sofa. A pang of unwanted emotion hit him when he took in the dust already gathering from the last time Lucy did a clean sweep of his office. She had this insistence that as Master, his workspace needed to reflect his work and often came through weilding spray bottles and mops to have his office sparkle.
"Iron Dick and bookgirl are gone and I'm trying to find my comm to call your brother and get some answers. I have nothing but that damned book and I'm not about to touch that mother fucker," stopping his search only to shove his idiot best friend from his obvious line for the couch as if he was about to plop down on the half-raised furniture, "So how about you look over there and try not to disappear."
Raising both his hands in surrender with a jovial cackle on his lips, Bickslow turned to check the opposite side of the room before seeing his balled up coat and moving to check the pocket on the inside where he knew the Lightning Slayer often kept the comm despite never remembering he even had pockets along the inside. His voice was its usual teasing playful drawl as his hands wrapped around the familiar fur trim, "First of all, I'm pretty sure you mean Levy. I don't know why you can't remember her name and look for what?"
"My comm."
Letting his tongue loll out before jeering, "You know, we should get you one of those things senile people put on their glasses to kept themselves from losing them except make it into a little necklace for you. We can put little lightning bolts on it for you too," and knowing Laxus often liked to keep his things hidden away in the many pockets inside his coat, Bix crossed the room to look for the comm there first.
Dropping the couch with more force than necessary out of annoyance, Laxus let out a grunt before getting up to tell his smartass teammate where he could shove his old man bullshit only to watch as Bickslow lifted his jacket by the collar and the book fall out in a thud on the floor just shy of touching the boisterous man smiling at him like a maniac.
Letting out yet another breath of relief at the Seith's continued presence, Laxus opened his mouth to warn him not to touch the book when Bickslow's eyes glowed and the book floated up just in front of his face and before his lightning could put the idiot out of consciousness, his finger grazed the gold embossing before poofing out of existence with the book.
Blinking once, twice before turning to ask Mira for her comm with a raging fire in his belly and migraine the size of Pergrande. He only made it to the door before he heard a thud from behind. A thud he really hoped had nothing to that forsaken book. He just wanted his nakama back in their guild where they belonged and he really just wanted a drink of chilly beer in a frosted mug when they were.
Glancing back over his shoulder at the source of the thud, he saw it. There in the middle of his desk, propped up as if it were on display was the book. Same plain black leather cover. Same golden draconian in the corner. Same bullshit with this weird magical book.
Turning to face the damned thing, he almost wanted to run and grab Freed from the job he had taken along the coast because if anyone was going to know anything about this insanity, it would be the Rune Mage. But then again, if Freed also disappeared he would sort of be shit out of luck.
Irrational thought had started taking over and it was just the opportunity his dragon had been waiting for. The dragon part of his soul was growing restless with his solitude and longed for a mate no matter how hard the bigger part of his soul tried to tamp it down. It was still a part of him and that part of him was even more ruthless and cunning being pushed this close to the edge. It wasn't like Laxus was forcing it down because he didn't want a mate. He just didn't actively search for them and his dragon knew his mate was out there.
It didn't matter now though. All his dragon was telling him now was to read the book and at this point, he was more inclined to finding out where his family went by means of the only way he knew how to get there and working on getting them all home once he got to them.
Stomping across the room with a near crazed look in his eye, he charged up a blow that would without a doubt destroy the fragile binding of the book and swung with all the force he could muster before connecting and plummeting into total darkness.
~WHO DOESN'T LOVE THE SET UP? haha no but for reals, I had a blast with this so like hey-o, let me know what y'all are thinking.
I've desperately missed writing and hearing what you lovely humans have to say so please let me know ^.^ ~