Returning the Favor

I do not own the characters of Fairy Tail.

"Lucy-sama?"

A gentle voice broke through the thoughts of the blonde, brown-eyed young woman sitting at an outdoor table, occasionally sipping from a small drink. She looked up to find a beautiful, shapely girl about her own age with short, silver hair and a sweet, though somewhat shy smile looking back at her.

Lucy sat up straighter and tried, she really did, to put on a brave smile in return. She only partially succeeded.

"Yukino! I'm glad you could come. Would you like to sit down?" she asked, gesturing at the chair opposite her.

The other girl, one of the only remaining celestial mages in Fiore aside from Lucy herself, nodded and took a seat, a faint frown taking her expression as she recognized the weary grief in the blonde's face. "Is something wrong, Lucy-sama? When I got your message from Master Sting, I was a little surprised. Do you need my assistance with something, perhaps?" she prompted gently.

The brown eyes staring back at her saddened for a moment, and then Lucy drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Yes," she said, after a long moment spent getting herself under control. "But I'm also helping you, I hope."

Head tilting curiously, Yukino waited.

"During the battle with Tartaros, I ended up alone," she began. "All the others had been trapped by some weird pink mess inside Plutogrim. I fought as hard as I could, but... I was facing several mages, and I wasn't strong enough to save myself, let alone everyone else." Guilt was clear in her voice, and it was more than obvious that she was beating herself up for her perceived failure.

But before Yukino could really say anything she continued, her voice sounding so empty that it almost broke the young woman's heart.

"The last spirit I called was... Aquarius." This was said in a slowly fading voice, one that faltered as her brave front began to fracture. She gulped and once again forced the debilitating grief back. "But even with her power we were still just barely holding them off. So, she told me of a way to summon the celestial spirit king. At first I refused. I-I just couldn't-" she broke off, clearing her throat as she tried not to cry.

"There's a way to summon him?" the silver-haired girl questioned, very surprised. She hadn't known that.

Lucy shuddered. "Yes, but you don't ever want to do it. Trust me," she added when the other wizard went to interrupt, holding up a hand.

"Is... is it really that bad?" Yukino asked, paying no attention to the admiring looks both she and the other woman were getting from passerby.

'Is it really that bad?' No... it's worse, Lucy thought despairingly as she desperately fought back yet more useless tears. And it was. It was one of the most painful things she'd ever had to do, and even now she couldn't help but think and rethink over the whole disaster, looking for any way that she could have won that battle without doing what she'd - in the end - been forced to do.

Aquarius... I miss you. While the water-bearer had often been mean to her and she'd been terrified of the tongue-lashings she'd gotten from the spirit sometimes, she'd also been her oldest friend. She'd been with her since her mother's death all those years before, and so to lose her now...

She shook her head and blinked, looking back up at the other stellar mage.

"In order to summon the celestial king, you have to not only be powerful enough, but since he doesn't have a key, you have to use one of your other golden keys to do it."

Yukino frowned. "But how does that work?" she asked before the blonde could continue, now even more confused about the whole situation. Why had Lucy asked to meet her, and why was she telling her all this if summoning the ruler of the stars was really all that awful? Was he a cruel being?

She was answered with a half-hearted shrug and more sadness. "I don't really know for sure – we were in the middle of a fight for our lives and Aquarius didn't have the time to actually explain the entire process. She was too busy trying to stave off the other mages and convince me that there was no other way at the same time. I... I didn't want to do what she was telling me to, but in the end... she was right. There was no other way to save everyone and stop Tartaros."

She smiled again before looking down at her fingers, but to Yukino the effort looked exactly what it was – painful.

"It must have worked," she said gently. "You did it – you saved everyone, Lucy-sama."

"No, Aquarius did. If I had been stronger, a better mage, I could have done it, and then..." she half-sobbed, before catching herself with a hand over her mouth and closing her eyes in an attempt to regather her strength yet one more time. It was a fight she'd been having for days, anytime she'd left her apartment. She needed to finish this, so that she could go home and continue crying. She didn't want to do it here in the middle of town.

"I'm sure that's not true, Lucy-sama!" Yukino protested, almost wanting to get up and go around the table to comfort the blonde. She was in terrible pain, and it was almost more than she could bear to see. This woman had been so strong during the Grand Magic Games and what had come after them, refusing to give up no matter how badly the odds had seemed so stacked up against them all.

Her words were met with another shake of the head. "It is true, but that's not why I asked you to meet with me. I have to do this, for Aquarius," she forced out. "The only way to summon the celestial spirit king is to use one of your golden keys. But the catch is that it destroys the key. You can never summon that spirit again." She ignored Yukino's shocked inhale and grasp at her own keys to continue, her voice beginning to waver. "So I can never see Aquarius again. But now that our contract is broken her new key is out there, just waiting to be found by another celestial mage. I... hope that it will be you. I want you to find her key. I know you care about your spirits, and this... this is... it's the last – the only - thing I can do for her, to protect her-" at that point she just couldn't hold on any longer, and her voice disappeared, strangled in her throat as tears poured down her face.

Yukino, still shocked by what she'd been told, nonetheless couldn't stop herself from jumping up and doing what she'd thought about earlier, which was going around the table to hug the other girl. Though she was a little tentative, she just couldn't see Lucy so upset without trying to comfort her.

She was well aware of how much the usually bright-eyed and caring young woman loved her spirits – and they adored her in return. So she knew exactly how much of a sacrifice that action had been for her – to lose one of her spirits in order to save the rest of those she cared about. And while she knew that she would have done the same thing, because after all, the needs of the entire world outweighed her own desires to keep her spirits with her, she could also understand in exquisite detail just how much agony it would have caused. She was one of the only ones who could, because she knew perfectly well what was involved between a celestial mage and their spirits. It wasn't just Lucy's feelings affecting her right now - a contract broken in such a manner would have consequences to both the spirit and the mage. A backlash, you could say. Both would be feeling the effects of Lucy's sacrifice for a very long time to come.

Knowing the last Heartfilia member, she would grieve for the rest of her life, though she'd hide that away from everyone so as not to drag anyone else down with her pain.

So she wrapped her arms around the weeping woman and just let her cry, knowing there was nothing she could say to take the pain away or even make it better.

After a few minutes Lucy managed to regain herself, and she withdrew from Yukino with a small, but grateful smile as she pulled a few tissues from her purse to dry her eyes with. "I'm sorry," she finally managed, blushing a little.

Re-taking her seat, the pretty young woman nodded. "It's okay, Lucy-sama. I understand now why you said it was such a terrible thing."

Lucy just nodded. "So... will you do it? Will you search out Aquarius' key?"

"Of course I will," she responded. "If I find it and she agrees, I will make a contract with her. It is the least I can do for you both. Tartaros was a danger to all of Fiore, and you two saved us from that."

Almost folding in on herself with relief, a genuine, though still small smile broke across her face. "Thank you, Yukino!" she breathed. "Thank you. I know that Aquarius will be glad to make a contract with you, and that will mean you'll have three golden keys."

Smiling a little in return, Yukino met the soft brown eyes of the other girl. "Is there something you would like for me to tell Aquarius, if I should find her key?"

It was quiet for a few moments, and then Lucy nodded again. "Yeah... tell her that... that I miss her. And that I hope she's okay." True, Scorpio had already agreed to tell Aquarius that, since he was dating her, but still...

"I will," she assured the strongest celestial mage she'd ever met. One of the strongest people she'd ever met, period. When the girl's small smile returned and she stood up, Yukino stood as well, the meeting now over. She had a key to find, and Lucy, well...

Lucy needed to get home before she fell apart in public once more, because it wasn't just losing Aquarius that had made her feel as if the only things she'd had left in the world were vanishing one by one. Natsu had disappeared, leaving her behind to go on a year-long training mission, and now the guild was gone, too – disbanded. She'd had too many shocks and losses in such a short amount of time, and she wasn't sure how she was ever going to make yet another life for herself. It was just too much... too much to think about right now.

"Lucy-sama, you know... maybe you could join Sabertooth, now that Fairy Tail has disbanded. I'm sure that Master Sting would love to have you," Yukino offered suddenly just as she turned to walk away, and the young woman paused for a second and turned back, before nodding sadly at her.

"Thanks. Maybe... maybe I'll take you up on that someday."

"I understand," Yukino said. "Take care, Lucy-sama."

She left the mage looking sadly into the sky, one hand clenched around a purse-strap, sorrow still marring her features.

It would be a long time before the young woman would even begin to heal from all the recent heartbreak.

A/N: And here is another Fairy Tail one-shot, that I didn't plan to write when I posted the other one a few days ago. But I was watching an AMV about the Tartaros arc, and this just slammed into me while I was in the middle of it. My throat tightened up, thinking of Aquarius protecting Lucy – and then Lucy protecting her in the only way she's able now that they can't see each other again. And there was no way I couldn't write it, so here it is.

Amber