The sun warmed Lucy's back to the point that she groaned into Levy's hair, eventually stretching and opening her eyes, she couldn't have slept too long, the sun was up, but not high in the sky, it was probably about 9 in the morning. Lucy rolled out of bed, breathing in quickly as the cool air enveloped her skin. She padded out to the living room, which linked up to the kitchen and checked on the clothes, some of them were still partially damp on one side so Lucy turned them over and moved the still wet ones closer to spots the sun was heating. Lucy tossed the completely dry clothes and underwear into a single pile on the floor, she'd fold it after she sorted out breakfast.
After rummaging through the kitchen, Lucy found some sealed granola packages towards the back of the pantry. Opening one, sniffing it, then tasting it. Once she found that the granola was more or less fine, she laid a few bags of it on the counter with 11 bowls piled in 4 different stacks around it. As Lucy didn't feel hungry she didn't want to waste their limited resources, she always ate enough to keep her body going but tried not to stress eat, as she was prone to, which would waste food the pack would need eventually.
Lucy dipped a finger into the barbecue sauce bottle, savoring the taste of it. Smiling softly she set the bottle back down on top of the refrigerator with the others.
A creak resounded through the house and Lucy tensed, turning quickly to the entrance to the hallway that began in the living room. Lucy's muscles relaxed again once she saw Wendy and Levy shuffle from the hall, rubbing the sleep from their eyes and stifling yawns.
"Morning." Lucy hummed as she moved to begin folding clothes and sorting them into the outfits she had come to memorize over the past few weeks, "There's granola on the counter." Lucy told her two friends, who nodded and trudged into the kitchen eyes still slightly hooded with sleep.
Gray teetered down the hall into the living room, Lucy pointed to the kitchen. She chuckled when she realized that before it all started, Gray's stripping had always bothered them, but now they all did the same, more or less. Gray stared at her as she laughed to herself and shrugged, moving to the kitchen slowly.
After the other three had eaten, they were completely awake and asked Lucy what they could do to help out. She shrugged "If you could search the bedrooms for clothes that'd be cool, might as well try to find cleaner, newer clothes.." Lucy said as she checked the clothes she'd left to dry, she was content to find them no longer damp, as she folded and separated them.
Levy and Gray returned with some very large t-shirts and hoodies from the first and second bedroom, while Wendy had found some soft sweatpants and jeans in the third bedroom. They placed them stacked on a couch organized in different piles from t-shirts to hoodies and sweaters to bottoms. That way anyone who needed different garments could just pick out what they need in particular. Lucy slid on her undergarments and zipped up a dark blue fuzzy fleece hoodie that was so large it came halfway down her thighs, she then slid on some bright red sweatpants and walked out the side door onto the porch that wrapped around the small house, as Wendy, Levy, and Gray all sifted through their old outfits, picking what had been comfortable and new clothes that looked warm.
After about two minutes, Levy followed Lucy outside, and sat down next to her on the squeaky front steps of the farmhouse. Levy dawned some black and white checkered skinny jeans they'd scored from a night where they'd had to sleep in the dressing rooms of a department store. Over her jeans, Levy wore an oversized dark green hoodie, zipped all the way up. Both girls were barefoot, and had to wiggle their toes constantly in an attempt to keep them warm. "Hey, thanks for yesterday." Levy wrung her hands.
"Don't worry about it." Lucy stated as she kept her eyes trained on the forest, "It's what friends do." She smiled meekly, looked at Levy quickly before redirecting her attention back to the darkness in the woods.
Levy sighed, she knew how much Lucy did for the group, and knew the toll it took on Lucy. Levy knew since Lucy talked in her sleep. Lucy often muttered about not being strong enough, the people they had lost or left behind at Fairytail, or gibberish.
Honestly, most people in the group had heard Lucy mumble or ramble on in her slumber, though most couldn't actually interpret the garbled speeches. Levy had developed a talent for translating Lucy's nightly monologues, and when she couldn't sleep she'd just listen in on Lucy's conversations with herself.
"Wanna go back inside? It's cold." Levy reasoned.
"I just gotta think a bit longer." Lucy kept staring into the trees. "Okay, don't catch a cold!" Levy tried to sound cheery, like she used to, but found it difficult to bridge the gap between her past and present self.
Levy returned to the slightly warmer indoors, finding almost everyone else dressed in a mix of old and new clothes, "Is Luce okay?" Natsu asked from the recliner he and Gray cuddled on in the far corner.
"Yeah, Blondie's been hauling ass lately, like maybe even more than us slayers.." Laxus awkwardly pointed out. Levy's cheeks flushed, she really wished she had the answers everyone wanted.
"I.. I really just don't know." Her shoulders slumped. Everyone had changed after the end, but no one had anticipated Lucy changing so drastically. She was just as caring and considerate, but somehow harder, tougher, more serious. In the first few weeks of their pack forming after the apocalypse, Lucy had tried to keep things lighthearted, but that soon melted away, leaving behind anxiety, worry, and lots of alone time on behalf of Lucy.
Cana walked over and pat Levy on the back, "I'm sure she's just getting herself together, it'll probably wear off." Cana hopefully suggested, though it had been nearly two months of this behavior from Lucy.
The only one not present for the conversation was Mira, for the reason that she was still asleep.
"What're we talking about?" Lucy's voice drifted in from the side door as she shut it behind her, she barely shivered as she joined the pack and took a seat on a couch next to Laxus, Gajeel, and Yukino. "Nothing, just the general well being of the group." Wendy smoothly stretched the truth as if it were elastic, and of course Lucy bought it.
"Oh? Is everyone alright? What's wrong?" Lucy's face twisted with worry almost instantly, as if her biggest fear was one of the others not doing too well, which it might've been.
"We're doing okay, Mira's even starting to improve. How about you?" Wendy nonchalantly spun the question right back to Lucy, the girl really was developing a talent for being manipulative.
"A little tired, but okay, I guess." Lucy blandly shrugged.
"If you wanna sleep a bit longer I can do your duties for today? You've done so much for us all already," Cobra offered, almost desperately, everyone was anxious about Lucy's stressful condition and wanted to help her out somehow. Lucy was just about to decline when she suddenly noticed how heavy her limbs felt and how much her head throbbed, "Yeah... Maybe that'd be good.." Lucy sighed, a collective sigh was released in the room.
"Want me to stay with you?" Levy offered.
"Only if you have nothing else to do," Lucy replied in with an almost bashful face, Levy looked at the rest of the pack who shook their heads, Laxus even shot her a brief thumbs up.
"Nope, I'm scotch." Lucy giggled with a sad look on her face, she and Levy had first heard it from Erza who had explained the joke later with a steely face, "Scotch as in tape, as in clear as tape. So it means you're clear." Erza had quipped.
They'd lost track of some of their nakama during the initial outbreak of zombies mobbing the guild, the pack had no idea if Erza had survived or not, it was like that with many of their friends, Elfman, Lisanna, Happy, Carla, Juvia, and a few others had been with the pack when they were caught and turned. Lucy's eyes teared up as she thought of Erza. Levy silently led her back to the bottom bunk on the left of the third bedroom.
Levy tucked Lucy in and kissed her brow before she slipped under the covers herself, placing her head on Lucy's back, falling asleep to the beating of Lucy's heart and constant shifting of her body as she breathed.
The rest of the group sighed quietly when Levy and Lucy had made it to the bedroom. "She's pushing herself too hard, her body probably won't be able to take it much longer." Wendy stated, looking mildly distressed.
"I don't know if any of us can take this much longer.." Gajeel pointed out. Every member of the pack was worn out and their man power was spread thin.
"We don't even really have a long term plan, it's just survive for now." Gray worriedly said.
"What about after for now? We can't live like this forever." Natsu asked the group, he and Gray held hands tightly to comfort each other.
"Well, we should figure it out with everyone present, but on the other hand we shouldn't stress Lucy out more than already." Sting looked at Rogue.
"Well, she'd wanna have some say in it, so I guess we should just bring it up when she's awake, or less stressed.. Mira as well, they deserve some say in this." Rogue reasoned. Most of the other mages nodded their heads and hummed in agreement.
"So I guess we discuss it with them later, when they're both conscious." Laxus said to confirm. The group collectively 'mmhm'-ed, and went about exploring the house and the woods around it, mostly to kill time.
The air was chilled but it was warm enough for the mages to hang about the house and try to relax a bit. Natsu and Gray climbed onto the roof of the house and surveyed the area, not that there was much to survey, so they just sat on the roof and talked. Cana and Laxus held hands as they walked into the forest, as they checked the perimeter around the house to double check if they were safe enough for now. Sting and Rogue sparred in a grassy patch behind the house, keeping their attacks small scale so they didn't waste too much energy. Gajeel was lounging idly in a tree just on the outskirts of the clearing. Cobra and Yukino sat on the steps of the house, discussing what they thought their futures held, as they tried to remain optimistic. Wendy decided to stay inside, she was sitting idly on the kingsize bed next to Mira as Wendy brushed her long dark blue hair with a hairbrush she found a few weeks back.