AN: So this fic doesn't really follow the 'Fix' prompt, but it does have the word fix in it! Lol A
Anyways sorry it's a day late.
I knew the carefully planned out mission had failed the instant Natsu ran off on his own, saying that he could finish the job without the help of Gray. After that challenge it wasn't a surprise when Gray ran off after him, and then Erza after the both of them. Knowing my team I stuck to the plan, extracted the missing cargo from the dark mages basement, returned it to its rightful owner, got our reward and then escaped to our rendezvous point at the top of the hill on the outside of town. I didn't even have to sneak around; with all of the commotion my team was making all of the guards were distracted by them or were already incapacitated.
"Yo, Cosplayer, what are you doing out here?" A familiar voice said from behind me. Looking up from my book in surprise I saw the Thunder God Tribe standing there looking down at the seemingly quiet town.
"Oh, hi guys." I said stealthily putting away the book Erza had leant me. "I'm waiting for my team to realize that the job is complete and we can leave."
"How do they not know the job is over?" Evergreen asked, looking extremely confused.
"Cause they ran off and ignored my carefully laid out plans as usual. Instead of wasting the energy to find them and break up their fighting I decided to wait to see how long it would take them to notice I'm missing." Running my hand over my keys, Horologium told me that I had been waiting close to a half an hour. "To be honest I was thinking of just heading home and giving them their portion of the reward later. I've already left several messages on Erza's lacrima so it should be fine."
"We're heading back to the guild now if you want to join us, Miss Lucy." Freed offered, as Bickslow stuck out his hand to help me up. Accepting the proffered arm I hopped up, putting my pack over my shoulders as I did so.
"I will definitely take you up on that offer. It'll be nice making it home with a reward for once." I said giving the small town another glance just in time to witness an explosion of ice and fire from the middle of the town. The explosion was so powerful that it blew the four of us off of our feet and to the ground. But since I still had a hold of Bickslow's arm we were tossed to the ground together. I expected to have a whole bunch of debris hit me since I had been standing in front of him, but somehow we had switched places and he was on top of me, shielding me. Hearing him grunt as he was pelted with chunks of ice and stone I called out Horologium to protect us.
It was a tight fit, especially since Horologium wasn't really meant to house two people… We were squished against each other with no room to wiggle around, if we had been the same height I'm pretty sure we would have somehow ended up kissing, I was shocked to find myself somewhat disappointed that we weren't. With all of the clothes Bickslow wore all of the time it was hard to tell what shape he was in, but by the hardness of his stomach I could tell he had some serious abs.
"You enjoying feeling me up there, Cosplayer?" Bickslow chuckled, pressing his entire body harder against mine.
"I don't really have a choice in the matter at the moment Bickslow, so don't get any ideas." I said through clenched teeth, really glad that he couldn't see how red my face was getting. "Could you stop doing that?" I asked when he grinded into me again.
"Of course, I wouldn't expect you to do it on your own." He said, losing all traces of humor and giving me what room he could.
From the sound of it, it sounded as if I had hurt his feelings. I didn't even think that was possible, it wasn't like I had shot down his many flirty jokes and jibes before, what made this one any different? Wanting to explain myself to him I sent Horologium away when I didn't hear anymore debris raining down on us. Immediately I tightened my grip on Bickslow's arm to prevent him from retreating.
"Bickslow it wasn't my intention to hurt your -"I started only to be interrupted by multiple gasps and Evergreen yelling.
"Holy shit! What the hell did your team do?" I heard Evergreen yell as she ran to the edge of the hill and stared at the town in horror.
Taking a deep breath to prepare myself for the damage I looked over, and quickly expelled all of the air out of my lungs. "My reward…" I whined as I watched all of the buildings topple over from the middle outwards.
"We got to get out of here." Bickslow said dragging me down the other side of the hill. "Freed, Ever we got to go. We don't want the Rune Knights to think we had something to do with this."
As we descended the hill and found a side road so we would avoid the Rune Knights, I felt Bickslow distancing himself from me. Where he would usually strike up a conversations, joke around or have his babies fly around me saying inappropriate things to get a rise out of me, he was silent. Not once in our trek back to the guild did he try to talk to me, and when I tried to separate him from his teammates to apologize for unintentionally hurting his feelings he would come up with some way to avoid me.
By the time we got to the guild I was feeling like shit, for leaving my team behind and for damaging the budding friendship Bickslow and I had. Watching as the three of them went up to the second floor I reluctantly went to the bar to explain what had happened on the mission to Mira.
"I'm sorry Lucy, but we're going to have to take the repairs for the entire town out of your reward…which will be all of it and then some." Mira said apologetically.
Nodding my head in understanding I reached for the four portions of the reward I had divided up and handed it to Mira one by one. Handing her the last stack, sadder and slower than the others I didn't notice that one of Bickslow's babies was flying towards my hand. Intercepting the exchange Mira and I both looked up to the Seith Mage in question.
"Lucy had no part of the destruction of the town she should keep her portion of the reward. Take the remaining balance for the damages out of her three teammates' accounts." He said before going back to his wood carving.
"That's a great idea, the Rune Knight's don't even know you were there so that should work out perfectly." Mira said pushing my hand and my money away from her. Leaning over the bar she looked both ways before whispering to me. "You're lucky Bickslow is looking out for you. When are you going to accept one of his date invitations?"
"Date… invitation? When did he ask me on a date?" I said a little too loudly.
"He's been asking you for months, you always turn him down, or run out of the guild with your team on some spur of the moment job. He's really a nice guy once you get to know him, why don't you give him a chance Lucy?" She asked, her eyes alight with mischief.
Turning away from her without saying a word, I walked out of the guild to go home and think. How could I not have noticed that he was being serious when he asked me out? He always ended up laughing with his team or sent his babies to ask me. No it's not fault for not taking him seriously. I bet Mira I up to her old tricks, trying to set me up again. Look what happened when she tired that with Natsu… I couldn't look him in the eye for weeks after that. Shuddering at the thought I tiredly threw my back by my desk and jumped onto my bed. Everything will go back to normal in a few days. I thought surrendering to my exhaustion.
Over the next few days I endured endless whining from Natsu and my team over leaving them during our last mission. They were all bummed that we didn't get the half a million jewel reward and were really sorry I didn't have enough for rent this month. Even though they apologized over and over, I didn't have the heart to tell them that I had gotten a reward when they didn't and luckily Bickslow and Mira felt the same way and kept their mouths shut.
A week after Mira's matchmaking attempt, and the mission from hell, Bickslow still refused to talk to me other than polite greetings. Tired of the silence, and awkwardness I decided to confront him. Knowing that he and his team were always the first one to the guild I woke up early one morning and beat them there.
One by one I greeted them with homemade chocolate chip cookies; of course the one I wanted to see was the last to arrive so I had to endure Laxus, Evergreen and Freed giving me strange looks. Uncomfortable with his team staring at me for the past twenty minutes, I basically attacked Bickslow when he finally entered the guild eager to move behind closed doors.
"She wasn't there - Lucy! What are you doing here so early?" He asked looking from his team to me and then back.
"We need to talk." I said grabbing him by the hand and dragging him up the stairs and to Laxus' office. "Laxus we're going to talk in your office, hope that's alright." I yelled as I closed and locked the door on masculine chuckling.
"Look Lucy I -"
"No let me go first. Ever since I dismissed that last joke a week ago things between us have been strained. You never talk to me and you hardly look at me. I didn't mean to hurt your feelings with my comment, I'm sure there are a ton of girls who would love to feel you up… that sounded better in my head."
"But not you."
"Not me? Well I didn't say that. Wait, that's not what I meant… Argh." I said smacking myself in the forehead with my palm. "Look what I wanted to say was that I miss all of your flirtatious joking, and when you make all of those silly faces at me from the second floor. I miss talking to you. I miss our friendship. How can I fix things between us so we can go back to being friends again?"
"I don't want to be friends Lucy." He said. Lowering my head to hide the beginning of my tears I blocked out the rest of what he had to say, too stuck on losing his friendship. "-so what do you think?"
"Whatever you want." I mumbled, turning to leave the office.
"Lucy, why are you crying?" He asked pulling on my arm to make me look at him.
"Because you said you don't want to be friends!" I yelled crying harder.
"True, but if you had listened to the rest of it, I was telling you that I wanted to me more than friends and that I wanted to take you out on a date. The guys and Ever told me that I should ask you out normally since I wasn't getting anywhere with you with all of my other attempts."
"Oh… that'd be nice." I said smiling at him.
An: Hope you all liked it. Sorry if it isn't that good, it was just something fun to write. :)
Let me know what you think.