Disclaimer: Not mine TT^TT
Shattered
The forest rustled noisily with the wind.
Some birds persisted in chirping before the last rays of the sun were hidden by the tall mountain.
At the bottom, well hidden by the curtains of trees, surrounded by a clear lake, a small rundown mansion stood.
Suddenly, a scream pierced the noise of the wind before a clinking sound echoed.
After that, there was only silence.
Inside a dimly lit room, two mages were, looking at the mirrored walls. The bluish-green fires that burned in the lamps on the walls gave a haunted look to everything.
"Now what?" Natsu questioned, his hands ablaze. At least his fire gave a familiar glow that battled the other.
"I don't know. This wasn't supposed to happen…" Gray looked around. He had a bad feeling about this.
He and Natsu had come in this mission alone (and it was a wonder how they hadn't chopped their heads off yet) and what looked straight-forward at first had gotten quite complicated in no time. There was something living in this house. But it was deserted – that was odd.
The house just couldn't be haunted – and they didn't believe in that kind of things.
But… there was something out there and it was after them.
They had ended up in this room. With nowhere to go.
An eerie laugh bounced along the mirrored walls.
Both mages looked to the sides but didn't see anything.
There was a glint of light they each caught by the corner of the eye; a clinking sound and then – silence.
Natsu opened his eyes and lifted his head. He was lying down on the hard floorboards. This place was dimly lit with a blue light. Natsu sat up and shook his head.
"What the- Where am I?"
"You're here. Where should you be?" an ethereal voice answered.
"Huh? Who said that?" the fire mage looked around, alarmed. He didn't see anyone.
"Where else is there to be?"
Natsu finally caught the shimmering figure that seemed to be inside the mirror that covered the wall behind him. The woman had long flowing hair that moved as if blown by a soft breeze, and the several layers of veils of her dress moved with it too. It was difficult to see any color as she seemed to be completely blue. When she opened the eyes they were strange, unseeing.
"Who are you and where is this?" Natsu demanded, his fists flaming up.
"I am me and this is the world. All that is."
"Shut up. I don't know what this is but I want to get out. Right now."
"Silly boy…" she giggled.
Natsu pounced.
Gray opened his eyes to see himself reflected in the large mirror in the ceiling.
"What the-?" he sat up and assessed the large, empty room where he was. The green light was making his head throb. How had he gotten here?
As he got up and started pacing, seeing his reflection in the mirrored walls, he felt as if someone was watching him.
"Who's there?"
"Just me, dear," a sweet voice replied.
"Who are you? Show yourself!"
The glint that he caught made him turn to see her.
"I'm just me…" she lifted her hands in a placating gesture.
"Who are you? And where's Natsu?" the fire mage had been completely forgotten.
"Who?"
"Don't you start trying to turn the conversation. My friend."
"What friend? You were alone…"
"No. I was accompanied. Before coming here…"
"But what do you mean with coming? This is all there is…"
Gray's patience was coming to an end.
"Will you shut up!" Ice started creeping up over the mirror.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you…"
With the first crash of the mirror there was a twin sound of agony.
Natsu was on the floor, curled in agony. All around him there were shards of glass, shattered. In some places the mirrors had melted.
There was blood spreading slowly around him.
Natsu was starting to tremble.
"I told you that it was a bad idea. But you decided to go on…" she chided, hands on her hips.
The gasps grew in volume when a large chunk of the mirror on the ceiling fractured and a large piece fell, shattering into millions of tiny pieces.
Natsu yelled. He looked down and his right arm had split in two. The flesh parted and exposed the white bone inside.
Natsu screamed again.
Gray dragged himself towards the piece of mirror that still remained intact. The woman was still hovering in there, looking calmly at him.
"I told you that was a bad idea, what do you think you'll get from that destruction?"
Gray grunted and gasped when his hand slipped in a bit of ice. His legs didn't seem to be working anymore, there were only the nerve endings burning as if someone had poured acid over them.
"This isn't right. Not what-"
There was the sound of a crack and Gray threw his head back, back arching painfully. A scream emerged from his throat.
That was when things started disappearing. Normal colour started fading from his feet, his hands and it was climbing slowly. But something strange happened.
Some of the pain was fading too…
The more the natural colour of his clothes was taken over by the blue colour of the room, the more the pain disappeared. And there was a small voice in the back of his head that whispered that if he didn't feel the pain it meant that he was getting numb and that was giving him a sense of detachment, something he had never felt before.
It was as if he wasn't capable of feeling things anymore.
The blood that covered him didn't seem worrying anymore. And he was starting to believe in the sweet words the ethereal woman was whispering on the side. They were quite enticing, anyway. The green light of the room felt natural, finally.
Then a large piece of mirror made some spark come back to the Salamander's eyes. He could see a green room through it, and there was a familiar person in there. The other saw him.
So there was another place besides this room. He knew it – the ice mage couldn't help but think clinically.
And there was that other person that he knew. He was looking at him – had recognized him.
But there was something strange, coming from that blue room.
The person… was completely different from the one he remembered. There was some sort of liveliness missing.
"What happened to you? You look even more gloomy than usual." The fire mage grunted.
That wasn't the same person he had just been… he didn't know how long ago…
Maybe it was the lighting.
"And you… it seems that someone snuffed out that flame of yours…"
Gray knew he didn't need, he shouldn't but something compelled him to extend his hand, to try to reach the piece of the mirror and the other.
Natsu was doing the same, strangely. He knew that normally he wouldn't touch the other mage unless it was to punch him but now he had to reach for that hidden meaning…
He was almost there, just another stretch and he…
… he would reach it. Just a bit more…
The piece of mirror broke before either could reach. It became an amount of shiny dust, nothing more…
Natsu looked, stunned, it was gone. That thing that felt like a last chance had crumbled to dust right before his eyes. Right before he could reach it.
It wasn't fair. Why did that happen? Maybe the woman was right and it was all something he had made up. A fantasy of sorts.
The soft cooing words of the woman were making threads emerge from the mirrors and they were covering the ice mage, gently like a comforter warding off the chill.
It didn't matter, the words were entangling around him, restraining his limbs and lifting him.
He was suspended in the middle of the room and could still see the bluish blood drip into the puddle at his feet.
It should have a meaning and he somehow knew that it should be worrying but, couldn't care.
He watched his reflection in the mirror and noticed how pale his lips had become, they were of a faded green instead of the green he had seen before when he had been completely covered by the colour.
Strange, he managed to see that his eyes were weird.
Only one question remained… 'Why?'
Why had this happened?
The rustle of the trees was heard again, as the woman whispered more sweet words…
The forest's piece was broken as two individuals walked decidedly through it.
The calmness of the rundown mansion was breached once again.
"Do you think that they're still here Erza? It's been so long…" Lucy nearly tripped when a hidden root decided to make its appearance.
"I don't know but we need to start somewhere. They were here, or heading here last time we had news from them. There was nothing on the way so we must suppose that they got here. After we'll see where we go next…" Erza looked around suspiciously.
This place was just too calm for her liking. Besides, there was something in here that gave her goosebumps.
"Yeah, so let's hurry up here and go back. This place gives me the chills…" Lucy tried to warm her arms absentmindedly.
"Come on, the house's over there, just…" she was cut by Lucy's loud gasp. The red head turned to look at the Celestial Mage. "What?"
The blonde covered her mouth with a shaking hand and pointed to the lake on the left then at the one on the right.
Erza leaned a bit and couldn't help the sharp intake of breath that followed.
Inside each lake were their friends. Spread out in invisible threads with their eyes open and unseeing. Each was in a mass of water of different colour but the lazy sun that reached them, made them sparkle under the sunbeams.
A/N: A small oneshot that I was itching to write. Don't know why – it was stuck in my head and I decided to just write it down. And, in my excruciatingly slow pace, I did write it!
As you can see this is a bit different from what I usually do but, hey one has to experiment, right? And I hope nobody got confused by the way it was written, I mean, to me it's quite understandable... right?
And the slightly sadistic streak is still on, I have no idea why! *cries*
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this little piece.
As usual, my thanks to nightslayr for taking a look at this.
Comments are always appreciated.