As I come into the waking world I hear the sound of crickets, and various other sounds of the night fill my ears. The needle pricking pain is gone. The only thing left to remind me of the night before are a few bruises. I try to gather my thoughts as to recall everything that had happened.
My eyes fly open suddenly and I sit up holding my aching ribs. "The lacrima, the lacrima it..." I stare at my hand where a seemingly harmless cut stares back at me. Aware now of how vulnerable I am I take a look around, my eyes adjusted to the dark I watch the grass for the unnatural wild swaying of the day before. I take a breath to relax. Nothing that I could see was out of place. Searching for my belongings I think about the man. "That's right, before I blacked out he stole them. Rotten man." I allow myself to fall back into the dirt. "My food was in there." I turn over to my side to get back on my feet. "I better hope a town is nearby." I remember that my jewels were in my pack as well. "I better hope I can get some kind of work too."
The bleakness of the situation fully dawning on me I walk on to who knows where muttering to myself, "stupid, stupid stupid."
It happens that there wasn't a town nearby. It had been two days. Two days of walking. Two days of fear, hunger, and random spurts of needle like pain. Not the hollow pain of being hungry. No, that was something I could deal with. It was repeats of the same needle like pain as before. Saying it hurt would be an understatement. It felt like my entire body was changing every time it happened. Like my body parts were being ripped off and replaced. As time went on it would become less and less painful.
Now I wander through a town bustling with activity. I smile widely. I'm exhausted, starving, dirty and probably smell really bad too but I am alive. That's about all I can ask for at this point of time. "Oh this stuff smells so good," I find myself dulling over a stand filled with fresh baked goods. I don't remember approaching it, but I'm having a difficult time walking away from it.
"Oh yes, it's all fresh backed. I'll give you a special deal; buy two and get another free. Interested?" A rather plump woman smiles at me.
My eyes brighten up as I take in the enticing scent, "Of course I'm interested!" then I blush with embarrassment. "Well, Ma'am I don't have any jewels bu-"
Suddenly I feel the impact of a broom handle against my skull. "Then get out of here!" the woman's smile had turned into a scowl. "If you can't buy anything then go away! Make room for real costumers!" Once again I feel the impact of the broom handle so I cover my head with my hands.
"Stop that! I'm leaving!" I shout as I walk away glaring at her.
"Come back when you get jewels!" she yells before turning to sweetly great a new costumer.
"Trust me I wont!" I retorts which earns me a rock being thrown at my head from the evil wench.
Soon I was catch up in another sweet sweet aroma. This time it's that of a fresh cooked pumpkin pie. My body without me telling it to follows it. Outside of a restaurant called "8 Islands" I stare longingly inside as the pie is served by a scarlet haired women to some men. My entire body leaned up against the glass as I shamelessly imagined myself digging in to the delectable pie. My entire being screams to me to run inside, take a seat, and eat; but I won't allow myself. As I stare I think to myself, 'jewels, I just need jewels. If I had that all my problems would be solved, I just need..."
The hollow pain in my stomach is suddenly replaced by the needle like stabbing. A feeling I will willingly admit I am far to acquainted with. Without a word I grab my self as if my arms are the only things holding everything in place and struggle to a nearby alley way where I clench my teeth to stay quiet. I feel my body hit the pavement before I bother realizing I've collapse. "Paaaaain" I moan loudly.
I don't notice him approaching, and if I did I wouldn't be able to, under my current circumstances, react the way I would like to. "Are you alright?" the ancient voice reaches my ears.
I open my eyes to just see a short old man standing over me. He's bald and wearing a chef's outfit. "I'm fine," I growl through my teeth.
He gives me a worried glance, "are you sure about that?"
The pain begins to disperse allowing me to sit up sweating and breathing hard. "Yes, I'm fine. I uh, just... haven't eatin' in a while. That's all. I'll leave if that's what you want," I decide not to tell him about the lacrima, and as I get up he holds out his hand.
"I wont ask you to leave. My name it Shitou Yajima. Come in and have something to eat," he gives me a warm smile.
I smile back my teeth showing, "thank you sir!" I follow him into a side door of the restaurant I had been gazing into earlier. Finding myself in a kitchen filled with the smells of cooking food. My mouth can't help it but begin to hang open as I think dreamily of having something tasty touch my lips and I think about the flavor of what ever I get exploding in my mouth. I get so caught up in a dream like state that I almost forget what's going on around me.
"Do you mind sitting down?" the man who's name I've already forgotten asks me. By the tone of his voice I can only guess that this isn't the first time he had asked.
I sit down quickly trying to hide my embarrassment, "ya, uh sorry."
"No problem at all, you sit here and I'll fix you something up."
As I wait I watch his odd employees go about their work. He has two cats, a white female in a dress and a blue male doing dishes with a small girl with dark blue hair and pigtails. Then he has this rose haired guy actually breathing fire into an oven. My body tenses as I recognize the rose hair boy as a mage.
"Hello," the blue haired girl greets me with a shy smile.
"Hullo," I reply before the scarlet haired women appears in the kitchen with a blonde waitress walking behind her.
"Break time!" the blonde smiles and stretches her hands up to the ceiling.
"Yes," the scarlet haired women crosses her arms. She seems like the leader of the group. "Ten minute break before we have to get back to work."
"Finally, hey let's get something to eat. I'm starved! What's that smell?" the rose haired mage wrinkles his nose.
The blue cat sprouts wings. A talent I was unaware cats even had, and flies over to me. "She smells bad." His huge eyes and smiling cat face look at me. "You should take a bath."
"Happy that's a little rude," the blue haired girl comments so nobody notices.
"Oh hey I hadn't noticed someone was here," the blonde walks over with a smile. "Hi I'm Lucy," she holds out her hand for me to shake.
I take her hand in mine, "I'm...Isoko" I decided to lie about my name. I don't know these people, and I don't trust people I don't know.
"Hey I'm Natsu!" the rose haired mage jumps up beside the blonde making me jump.
The scarlet haired women relaxes on a chair to my left. "I'm Erza Scarlet, it's nice to meet you Isoko."
I nod to her, "Nice to meet you too Erza."
The blue haired girl stands next to Erza, "my name's Wendy, this is Happy,"
"Aye Sir!"
"And Charle"
"Hm, you do smell rather awful" the cat crosses her arms and turns her head away from me.
"That's not nice Charle." Wendy says to the cat, then turns to me, "are you going to be working here for a while?"
"Um the chef just offered me food..." just then the old man walks in carrying a plate full of sandwiches, all cut neatly into triangles.
"Dig in, there's plenty for everyone," the old man smiles.
"Great! Just what I needed!" Natsu starts chowing down sending bits of food flying. Everyone else takes their share a bit more elegantly.
I take a bite of sandwich and join him in shoving food in my mouth. "You remind me of a shark having a feeding frenzy." I state around a mouth full of food.
"Your one to talk," he says between bites.
Eventually as my apatite dies I slow down, "that's the best meal I've had since I can remember, thank you for the food!" I smile at the old man. Then take a drink of water. My eyes go wide. "Whoa! This is good!" I take another drink.
The man smiles, "It's just regular water."
"Best water I've ever had. May I have more?"
"I don't see why not."
"Alright," Erza stands up, "time to get back to work."
"I'm not done eating yet," Natsu complains, his intake of food hadn't slowed down one bit.
Erza gives him a glare that sends shivers down everyone's spine. "Get back to work." She growls.
"A-aye sir," Natsu promptly gets up and goes back to blowing flames into the oven.
"Thank you for the food Mr. Yajima," Wendy does a small bow and goes back to cleaning the dishes. Lucy and Erza return to the dinner to clean up some tables before opening back up the restaurant.
"Hey, can I ask you something? Why is a mage working in a dinner?" I whisper to the old man.
"All my employees are mages. It's a magic based restaurant. Now why don't you go get cleaned up? There's a bath upstairs and I'll have Lucy bring you up a uniform," when he mentions everyone is a mage my blood runs cold.
"Hey, uh, you mean. I mean. Wait, uh you want me to work? You never mentioned that. Plus I'm not a mage," I feet bad about trying to get out of paying him back for his kindness but magic makes me uneasy.
"I didn't? Sorry about that. Anyway you better go get ready," with that I, resigned to my fate, head upstairs.