Drip, drip, drop…

Drip, drip, drop…

Juvia stared out the window of her room in the Phantom Lord guild building, which they'd just finished rebuilding. It now was able to move faster in its giant form and travel underwater as a submarine. Even though it hadn't been harmed, Juvia got to use the opportunity of the rebuilding to paint her room. Where the walls had once been light cobalt, they were now a dark sea blue. Juvia felt dark.

Not dark depressed, dark angry. The rain pounded on her window and fed her wild energy. It'd been a week since Phantom's fight with Fairy Tail, but the completion of the new building rekindled her memories of that inferior guild's jerky ice mage, Gray Fullbuster. She'd heard that Fairy Tail had remade their guild building as well. They'd made it bigger and flashier and altogether more commercial. Pfft, Phantom is above all that. Phantom has class, Juvia told herself. But if Phantom was above all that, why couldn't she stop thinking about Gray?

Juvia hates him! How dare he manipulate Juvia's heart. How are he live on thinking he beat her. He didn't beat Juvia; Juvia lost her reason for just a few moments, but those few moments cost her her undefeated record! Juvia screamed in her mind. She wished she could get one more chance to show him the true power of the rain. "How dare he make Juvia feel weak!" she shouted aloud, pounding her fists on the rain-streaked window.

"Juvia?" Juvia spun around to see Totomaru standing in her doorway with his hands raised defensively. She took a deep breath and calmed herself. She let Gray win. It didn't count. She was still undefeated. Totomaru walked over to her with a comforting smile. "Master wants to talk to us about an important job. It has to do with Fairy Tail, so he didn't know if you'd be up for it, but I assured him you would be. You wouldn't pass up what Master says could be a game-changing job, would you?"

"Fairy Tail? Juvia'd be glad to take this job. No, Juvia insists on coming," she said, ready for her chance to get back at Gray for embarrassing her like that.

"I thought so. Let's go."


Master Jose smiled down at the five of them (Element 4 and Gajeel Redfox), his dark purple lips curving just slightly. "Does everyone understand the mission?"

Gajeel raised his hand but didn't wait to be called on. "Yeah, why does the 4 have to come with? I'm pretty sure I could take care of this guy on my own."

"Don't get cocky, Gajeel," Aria scolded. "You are very strong, but so is he. The job'll take all five of us for it go off without problems arising. And if anyone were cut out, it would be you."

"Mmm," Jose nodded but soon noticed the expression on Juvia's face. "Juvia, you seem troubled by this."

"Um, yes," Juvia cleared her throat before explaining herself. "Juvia feels like this job isn't exactly Phantom's style. If Master knows what she means. Phantom isn't a dark guild, and to Juvia, this seems like the type of job a dark guild would take."

"Juvia," Jose said as if speaking to a child, a tone of voice Juvia simply hated, "as Phantom Lord mages, we don't need a dark guild to do our dirty work for us. That, and we can't leave any holes through which word can get out that we were behind it. We must take out Gildarts Clive discretely and without causing too much of a stir. The Council was a hair away from disbanded us last week, so we simply can't risk it again. I hate to say it, but Fairy Tail is not to be underestimated. They have a few strong members do all the work and earn all the fame for the rest. Gildarts is their strongest, so to crush their spirit, we must take him out, understood?"

Juvia nodded even though she didn't fully understand it. She's had the unpleasant experience of fighting a Fairy Tail wizard. If she'd given it her all, it would've been an easy win, but she did learn one thing form that fight: killing Gildarts won't be enough to crush the guild known around Fiore for its spirit. Jose knows that, but he's desperate to beat Makarov, his lifelong rival.

"Good," Jose grinned again. "Gildarts is currently on a job, but he's on his way back to Magnolia. It'll be a while until he gets there, since his job is very far away. However, my plan is for you to go to that place and take him out before he can get anywhere near the town Magnolia. The last thing we need is more Fairies getting involved."

"Understood," Aria said with a nod, and that ended the discussion. The five Phantoms turned and left the room.

Juvia was the last out of the room, and when she turned the corner, Totomaru slung his arm around her shoulders. "Hey, Juvia. Pretty exciting job, eh? I told you it was a game-changer."

"Yeah, it is exciting. Juvia wants to take Fairy Tail down a notch, or many notches, but it seems a bit under-handed. Oh well, Juvia supposes she'll get over it."

"That's the spirit," Totomaru smiled, moving his arm so that his hand left her shoulder, and the crook of his elbow rested on the collar of her shawl, pulling himself just slightly closer to her than Juvia would like.

Juvia forcefully shoved his arm off of her and shot him a glare. "Totomaru knows he's just Juvia's friend. Juvia thinks he should cool it just a little bit."

"Sorry, I get it. But when you do realize what a good match we make, you know I'll be here," Totomaru said to the beautiful girl with light blue hair and eyes like the ocean.

Juvia smiled back at him, feeling bad for not feeling quite the same way he did, but she did have that inkling in the back of her mind that maybe she might.

Walking back to Juvia's room, the two of them talked and laughed, and Juvia came to feel that giving Toto the chance was the right path for her. They stopped outside her door, and Totomaru was about to hold her hand but didn't in the end, feeling it would be too more-than-friends by Juvia's standards. Seeing this, Juvia took the chance and gave him a tight hug.

"See you tomorrow, Toto," she whispered. "Element 4 and Gajeel will take this big-shot Fairy down."

Totomaru smiled and gave her a warm squeeze before leaving for his own room. "See, you, Juvia."

Juvia fell onto her bed, wondering if this was the right decision. Well, she told herself, Toto loves Juvia more than anyone else ever has, and he's a very good friend of hers… Juvia let herself fantasize about her teammate, pretending she'd just met him, not being influenced by the friend feeling towards him she'd developed over the years. When she let herself see him as more than a friend, she had to admit he was pretty hot.


That night, she dreamt she was walking down a an empty street. Of course, it was raining, so she had her pink umbrella sitting on her shoulder.

"Juvia…." The voice that came from behind her belonged to Totomaru, who wrapped one arm around her and took her umbrella with the other. The rain started to let up, because Juvia was as happy as she had been after her fight with the ice mage from Fairy Tail. Juvia couldn't remember his name in the dream, but she knew it was something gloomy, like Sulking or Drab. "No," Toto whispered. "I like the rain. It makes me so happy when it's raining, because I know you're nearby."

Juvia spun around to face him. Looking up into his gleaming eyes, Juvia thought he looked even more attractive than that Drab guy. Toto's black hair hung over his face, one white piece sliding down the side. His mouth was set in a partial smile, which looked dangerous in a good way. The furry, red collar of his jacket framed his face like flames blazing. Then, real flames appeared around the couple. Because it was a dream, the fire was not killed by the rain, but fed by it. Each drop that hit the ground fed it, and it grew taller and taller around them, until Juvia couldn't even see the street anymore, only Totomaru's glowing face in front of hers.

The rain fell harder and harder the larger the fire grew, and when the two of them were being pounded down on by a beautiful rain while surrounded by a comforting fire, Juvia reached up to him. The black, horizontal line that crossed his face, breaking at two points, was a feature Juvia simply loved. She kissed each of the breaks and was about to kiss his lips, but something stopped her.

"Juvia…." This time the voice behind her wasn't a friendly one. It was his. When Juvia met the ice mage's eye, she felt her whole body go cold. The fire around her and Totomaru vanished, and the guy in her arms turned to ice and shattered. Juvia tried to attack the black-haired Fairy with her Water Slicer, but when it hit his body, the ice decoy shattered, and Totomaru laid on the ground where it once stood, dead. Juvia's hands covered her face, and she sensed the Fairy behind her. "Juvia…." he said, "Phantom Lord is weak, and you're the weakest."

Juvia woke up screaming. Why is it so hot in Juvia's room? Juvia feels like she's boiling! Juvia screamed and screamed like she'd been dropped on hot coals and had begun to evaporate into nothing. Totomaru grabbed her wrists and tried to calm her down.

"Juvia! Juvia, it's okay! You're safe, nothing's wrong!" he told her, and Aria flipped the lights on, standing in the doorway across the room.

Juvia let out one last shriek and stopped, staring at Totomaru with her eyes blue as the ocean and just as wide. She tried to speak, but couldn't find her voice.

Totomaru smiled understandingly. "It's okay, Juvia. We just came by to grab you for the Gildarts job. You're okay to come, right?"

"Y-yes, of course. Juvia wouldn't let Phantom Lord down for any reason. Just give her some time to get ready."

Aria nodded, "Ten minutes till we have to be at the train station, so hurry up," and closed the door behind him and Totomaru.

Juvia dressed, washed her face, and brushed her light blue hair into its perfect line of curl around her. Fastening her shawl with her old Teru Teru Bozu, she took a moment to examine herself. She looked like she did every morning, nothing was different, even after the dream and sense of heat. In the shadows behind her, she could've sworn she saw the silhouette of the ice mage, and it made her jump. Calming down after the startle, she remembered his name, having forgotten it in the dream.

"Juvia will kill Gildarts Clive, and then she'll kill Gray Fullbuster, too. Drip, drip, drop." The Phantom Lord mage quickly walked out of her room in her brown thigh-highs to meet her team and Gajeel.

"Looking good, Juvia," Gajeel said with a wink.

"Juvia is dating Totomaru now, Gajeel," she said flatly. Everyone seemed a bit surprised, but the couple wasn't unexpected: everyone knew Totomaru liked Juvia… a lot. The fire mage, who hadn't known himself if he and Juvia were official, smiled mockingly at Gajeel, who rolled his red, snake-like eyes.


The five of them were squeezed into a train compartment, almost arriving at their destination, when Aria explained the plan in greater detail. "Gildarts Clive has been on a job in the December forest up in Fiore's Northeast. Normally, it's a week's journey, but the Master wanted this done quickly, so he booked us for this AirTrain, which is much more expensive but will get us there in only a day. Our sources say he will spend the night tomorrow at the Dancing Spirit Inn in a small town called Harthblome before traveling back to Magnolia. It's very important that we take him out before he gets on the train back to Fairy Tail or we'll miss our chance at being stealthy with this. The sorrow! I can only imagine how displeased Jose would be with us if we were to fail him. Very sorrowful!"

"Oh, shut up, Aria," Gajeel sneered. "Do you have to sob over every little thing?"

Aria stopped crying, but it was because he no longer felt the sorrow for it, not because Gajeel had told him to. Aria would never take orders from the likes of the iron dragon. "I am the leader of our great guild's strongest team, I think I've earned the right to cry when I feel sorrowful without being snapped at by a nail-biter. Now, when we get there, we have three rooms reserved for us at the inn. They are connected with doorways for convenience and discretion. As Gildarts uses crush magic, Juvia is our greatest asset for this job."

"Juvia is?" she asked. True, she was the second strongest mage present, but with Aria's airspace of death and power to take the magic from a mage's body, she never thought any circumstance could put her ahead of him.

"Yes, with your water body, he can't hurt you," Totomaru explained. "If any of us, even Aria, tried to get close enough for our magic to be effective, he could just kill us. Also, I've heard he can crush anything, even fire, so he's a tough target for anyone."

Juvia blushed, a touch of pink dusting her pale cheeks. If he could just crush her water, none of her attacks would do much good, but if she was the only one who could get close to him without the risk of death, she'd have to be creative and pull through for her team.

Sol smiled, giggling to himself, but Aria gave him a light smack to shut him up. The others looked at them questioningly, but Aria assured them it was nothing but Sol being immature.

The AirTrain pulled into Harthblome station, and the Phantom Lord mages stepped off of it. The little town's economy is mainly supported by tourism brought in by their unique hearthbloom tree forest on their southern border. The hearthbloom tree's bark is a brown so dark it looks black to some and smooth as polished stone, and the leaves are made of fire. Definitely worth a trip to see, but these Phantom mages were hardly tourists.

"Totomaru wants to visit the heathbloom forest, doesn't he?" Juvia teased, because ever since they first came into view of the town, Toto's eyes hadn't failed to point south.

"After the job," he clarified, breaking his stare into the fiery trees to smile at Juvia.

The group walked through the town, which bubbled over with such happiness and friendliness, they wondered why the mage whose magic was to destroy would choose it as a resting place before the week-long trip home. The group walked through town until they were on its far west side, which was bordered by a river. This neighborhood seemed just as happy and friendly as the rest of the town, but significantly more hardcore.

They found the Dancing Spirit Inn easily and stepped inside what looked more like a nightclub than an inn. It was still only noon, so nothing too exciting was happening at the moment, but when Aria checked them in, the woman at the desk informed them that the party starts at 9:30pm every night and goes as long as the people want.

"Thank you," Aria said, taking their keys and walking towards the stairs with tears sliding down from his blindfold.

In the middle room of the three they had reserved, the Phantom Lord mages waited for night and discussed strategy.

"So, if Gildarts goes dancing tonight, is the plan to lure him away when he's drunk and not thinking and kill him then?" Totomaru wondered.

"Non, non, non!" Sol yelped. "Gildarts Clive may be of Fairy Tail, but he is very powerful and very smart. Even drunk, he wouldn't be stupid enough or trusting enough to be caught alone with us."

Juvia felt a little tickle in the back of her throat. The ice mage was also both powerful and smart. What was it Juvia had thought? "Not just a pretty face, but smart too?" What an idiot Juvia was.

"The rooms are reserved under a fake name, and no one's recognized us yet," Aria informed them. "So letting people know this was done by Phantom won't be too much of a concern. Still, it would be better for this to happen outside of the building and far from other people. Oh, and I probably should've taken care of this earlier, but in my sorrow, I forgot: we have changes of clothes for everyone to wear, disguises."


At 10:00 that night, Juvia stood on the edge of the dance floor, staring at all the dancing men and women. She wasn't expecting this to be part of the job, but if it was for Phantom, she'd be fine. Her hair was brushed out so that it hung in waves rather than it's normal, curled style. Instead of her very conservative navy dress, she now wore a rather short skirt, which was white and blue with blue waves around the hem, and a blue vest with lighter blue trim. Swallowing her nervousness, she thought of how her team upstairs was counting on her to get Gildarts outside and away from the group. He definitely wouldn't trust a suspicious group of mages, but one, beautiful, young lady? Almost definitely.

Juvia put on a mask of confidence and walked into the throng of moving people. Everyone was having fun, smiling and dancing, not caring about anything but living in moment. Everyone had such a lively spirit, and Juvia could see where the inn's name came from. Soon, the spirit of the night swept her along as well and the mask dissolved into reality. She was not a bad dancer and quickly became the life of the group, letting herself have more fun than ever before.

However, she soon noticed that their target, a tall, rugged, man with orange hair, was not dancing. She'd forgotten her objective, and now felt quite disappointed in herself. Shuffling off the floor, she caught sight of this man, Gildarts Clive, at the bar with a drink in hand, looking a bit down.

This is it, Juvia, she told herself. Drip, drip, drop.

Juvia walked up to the bar and took the seat next to Gildarts. The bartender set a free drink down in front of her, but she didn't drink any of it. "Hey," she said to Gildarts.

He replied, "Hey," without any energy. Juvia smiled despite herself. It was wrong to take advantage of a person who's been through tough times emotionally—Juvia would know—but she was good at relating to people, and this was her chance to take him out.

"Juvia understands," she said nonchalantly, taking a sip of the drink in front of her.

Gildarts chuckled and drank as well. "Oh, you do? And what limbs are you missing?"

"Juvia isn't injured. Juvia's never been injured, for her body is made of water and cannot be harmed. But the thing about a water body… one's heart is quite unprotected."

"Sorry to hear that, Juvia."

"Oh, I'm okay. What's got you down?"

Gildarts hesitated for a moment, but eventually decided to let this young woman in on the failure of his job. "I'm one of the strongest in my guild, Fairy Tail. Everyone looks up to me, especially Natsu, Lisanna, Cana…. Sorry, now I'm just blabbering about people you don't know."

"No, continue! Juvia wants to know."

"Well, see, I've been on this job for three years. I know they aren't supposed to exist, but you have to believe me: I was fighting a dragon." I stopped to gage Juvia's reaction, but she kept a straight face, knowing full well the existence of dragons because of Gajeel. "I don't know how I'll face the guild when I get home. I've let them down. I spent three years on a job and come home only to have lost my arm and leg in the process."

Juvia rested a hand on his shoulder, no longer trying to kill him as much as she was genuinely comforting him. "Juvia understands what it's like to disappoint people, but it was just one job, and against a dragon at that! Anyone would be proud to call him, who lasted three years against the beast and is able to return with his life, one of their guildmates. If they really look up to him, then one unaccomplished job will not condemn him."

Gildarts smiled. "I hope you're right, Juvia. My name is Gildarts, by the way."

"Oh. Well, would Gildarts like to go for a walk with Juvia?"

Gildarts paused, sensing something suspicious. Yes, just as Aria said, Juvia remembered, but hoped he would trust her enough to let himself be alone with her. After a few minutes of silence, Gildarts looked back up with a wide grin across his face. "Sure!"

So, Totuvia is offcial! Sent to assassinate Gildarts and successful in their plans so far, what will become of Phantom Lord and Fairy Tail?

Review Please!