Intro: Lucy has no clue where her keys are and she's getting pretty worried. She needs them back so she can ditch this place. But wait.. how did Lucy's keys end up in this man's shop? And why is this girl so determined to get her hands on them?!
Disclaimer: I don't own Fairy Tail.
Missing Keys
While Lucy found herself stuck in this place, she kept mentally devising ways to obtain her missing keys so that she could finally make a break for it. So far, no one had given any indication that they knew where the keys were, but for all she knew they could all be very talented actors that were all part of some grand scheme. While that seemed a little far fetched at this point, the celestial wizard really didn't know what to think anymore. All she knew was that she was worried about her spirits and scared that her keys could fall into the wrong hands. The thing was, no one here would have any idea what they were dealing with if they tried to use her keys… Someone could end up seriously hurt. It was already pretty obvious that magic was something these people knew nothing about. The sooner she found them, the better off for everyone.
Little did she know that her keys were not in the hospital at all, but laying in a glass case in a little junk shop across town. And someone with a keen eye was about to take a very pronounced interest in them. A cloaked young woman caught then glinting even in this dull light, shinning like a diamond amongst the pile of coals… She sucked in her breath and bit her lip, frozen in her tracks as she stared down at the set of keys displayed so haphazardly in the old glass case. The item not only to valuable, but very very rare… and it seems the grizzly old owner didn't really know what he had on his hands.
A price tag of $50 graced the outside of the key fold, a hefty sum for a dingy old shop like this. She knew the old man probably had come across them while using his metal detector in the park or on the beach somewhere. That's how he found a lot of his jewelry and things like that. Not wanting to raise suspicions, she gingerly asked shop owner to see the 'chintzy looking keys' in the case. The old man grumbled that she 'better not be up to any funny business' and begrudgingly opened the case and handed her the set of keys. Her eyes shined with excitement as she gently fingered the ornate tops of the gold and silver keys. She scowled and looked at the old man.
"I'll give you 20 bucks," she said, sounding bored with them already, setting them on the counter. The old man guffawed and harrumphed.
"Like hell you will! Tag says 50, that's what I'm askin'" he grumbled back in gravelly tones. "Don't play games with me, kid."
"Look old man, I'm not playing games, but I don't want to be ripped off either. How about 25?" she asked again. She was greeted with an angry noise from behind the counter.
"I don't have time for this nonsense! If you're going to play games, get out of my shop right now!" the old man bellowed. She bit her lip again and looked at the keys. Her mouth always got her into trouble. And it was about to get her thrown out of this shop again. But she needed to get a hold of those keys… the magic emanating off them was off the charts.
"Okay okay, FINE! All I got on me is 35 bucks! It's the rest of my cash for the month!" she gave in, sounding exasperated.
The old man considered a moment and then finally replied with a contemptuous grunt. "Fine, alright then. They're yours. But don't come around here bugging me for the rest of the month then!"
Once she had the keys in hand and she was out of the shop, the young woman grinned to herself. She had just hit the motherload and there was no way of stopping her now.
Back in Earthland…
When they reached Porlyusica's house, they weren't met with a warm greeting and open arms. Quite the opposite, really. It was a known fact that the old healer was not fond of people. And she was even less fond of them coming to her house and knocking on her door. She made very few exceptions to this general distaste for humankind, and preferred to just live a quiet life, keeping to herself. However, whenever someone from Fairy Tail was truly in need, she would always help, no matter how sourly she behaved.
"What do you want? Why are you bothering me?" she bellowed out at them after Natsu had knocked on her door. All three of them winced at her amazingly loud voice and plugged their ears.
"This lady is scary!" yelped Happy
"Please, Ms. Porlyusica, we need your help!" Lisanna pleaded. "It's concerning our missing guildmate, Lucy!"
"I already told you! I cannot locate her anywhere in Earthland. There is no trace of her. She simply has vanished you must accept that she is gone! There is nothing you can do! Now go away!" she yelled at them, starting to pull her doors closed.
"Just a minute you old witch! You're gonna listen to us!" Natsu roared, grabbing for the frame of her door. The old healer swung her broom at him and furrowed her brow deeper.
"You're wasting my time and your own, boy. I understand you have a broken heart, but you must move on. I'm sorry. Now please, go," she said, her tone softened slightly.
Before Natsu could lose his temper again, Lisanna spoke up and pleaded with the old woman once more, Happy shielding himself behind her leg. "Please, Ms. Porlyusica, we think Lucy might have been transported to another world, the way I was transported to Edolas. And Natsu has been dreaming of her every night she's been gone! He says that every time he dreams about her it feels like she's really there, like she's so close he can smell her scent. So I was thinking you might know something about a way they could communicate through these dreams!" The young take-over mage's chest heaved as she tried to catch her breath after rattling off the long winded explanation as quickly as she could. When she looked up, Porlyusica was staring at her, and then glancing at Natsu, then back to Lisanna. After a few minutes, she turned back to Natsu.
"How long have you been having these dreams?" she asked him, her brow furrowed and mouth set in a hard line. He shrugged, massaging the back of his head as he thought.
"Well it's been since Lucy's disappeared, right?" Lisanna asked him, glancing between Natsu and Porlyusica.
The dragonslayer nodded. "Yeah, yeah they started the night of the day she disappeared and happened every night since."
"Yeah he always wakes up yellin out Lucy's name and stuff! Like every night! And cold sweats and all sorts of weird breathin! Sometimes I think he's havin a heart attack or something!" Happy chimed in.
Porlyusica was quiet for a few moments, as in contemplating all they had just shared with her. After what felt like an eternity she beckoned them to come inside.
"Come with me. I may have something that can help you," she said gruffly, entering her home and urging them to follow. Natsu and Lisanna looked at each other excitedly and scrambled to follow her into the house, closing the doors behind them.
She worked in silence for a long while, mixing different liquids, adding powders here and there. It seemed that she was concocting some kind of potion. Neither of them was really sure what it was for, but they knew better than to question the healer. She was a powerful wizard with a very short fuse. After some time, she produced a small vial of blue colored liquid and handed it to Natsu.
"Now ingest this on its own directly before going to sleep and it will assist you in having a lucid dream state. While in this lucid dream state you will have direct control of your dreams and this should allow you to make contact with your friend," Porlyusica directed, her expression grave. "But be warned not to spend too much time in this state or you could become stuck in your dream state. It it advised to have someone present while you take the position so that you might be roused from your state of slumber within one hour of taking the potion. Do you understand?"
Natsu was staring at the vial in his hands, nodding dumbly, catching only parts of what she said. All he knew was that this stuff was going to let him talk to Lucy and that was all he really cared about. Lucky for him, Lisanna was paying attention and took in every detail of the healer's very specific instructions. Once she was sure they understood, Porlyusica ushered them out of the house, closing the door on Lisanna's thank yous. Natsu was still staring at the vial.
"We should go back to the guild hall and tell the-" Lisanna started, turning in that direction but she was quickly cut off,.
"I wanna do it now," Natsu said loudly.
Lisanna raised an eyebrow and looked at him. "Do what now?" Then she noticed he was holding up the vial and staring at it again. She softened and smiled a little, putting a hand on Natsu's shoulder.
"We have to wait until later Natsu… Right now, let's go find Gray and Erza and tell them what's going on. And maybe we should let the Master know too. Who knows, maybe they could help," she said, patting his arm gently.
"Yeah Natsu, we should wait until bed time like Porlyusica said, remember? Let's go to the guild and get some grub. I'm starved!" Happy said, rubbing his noisy stomach.
The dragon slayer continued to stare hard at the vial, feet rooted on the spot he was standing, brow furrowed deeply. "I wanna talk to Lucy," he said,almost growling. "I wanna tell her it's gonna be okay and that I'm coming for her."
Lisanna sighed a little. She wasn't surprised that he was being impatient and albeit a little irrational. She understood that he had been pretty broken up over all of this and he just wanted to move forward in saving Lucy as quickly as possible. After all, Lucy was pretty special to him, she could see that. She stood in front of him, trying to catch his gaze.
"Natsu, we have to wait because Lucy would have to be sleeping, too, remember? So that's why we have to wait until when you usually go to sleep at night. If we do it at a different time, there's a chance you won't catch her, and you won't be able to talk to her at all," Lisanna explained, trying to talk some sense into him. This snapped him out of his daze in a second.
"Whoa, I didn't even think of that… you're right, Lisanna. Thanks," he said, surprised. He took the blue vial and carefully stowed it away in his pocket for safekeeping. "Okay, so later it is then."
Lisanna heaved a sigh of relief and nodded, giving him a warm smile. "Now how about we head back to the guild hall to find Erza and Gray?" Natsu just nodded and turned toward the guild hall.
"And to get some food!" Happy said, hopefully and this time both Natsu and Lisanna laughed a little.
"Yeah buddy, don't worry, we'll get ya some fish," Nasty said with a chuckle as the three of them headed back through the woods.
Once they reached the guild hall, they sought out Erza and Gray and retreated to a quiet corner to explain what was going on. At first the two seemed skeptical, but when Lisanna explained her thoughts on it, and told them what Porlyusica said, they seemed far more convinced.
"So you really think it's possible that Lucy is trapped in some other world?" Erza repeated in hushed tones, her hand stroking her chin as it always did when she was deep in thought. "If that is true, then we must find out how to get to her a retrieve her from wherever she is trapped. She could be in danger."
Gray nodded in agreement, "Yeah, we've got no clue what could be out there, and poor Lucy's probably got no access to her magic so no telling what she's up against. I'm surprised she's survived this long if she's hurt or-"
The ice wizard was suddenly interrupted by a fiery fist to his face. "What the hell was that for flame brains?!"
"Don't talk about Lucy like that ice prick! She's tough! She can survive anything!" Natsu bellowed, now both fist flaming and raised to fight. Gray gritted his teeth and raised his clenched fists, encased in sharp shards of ice..
"I was just saying that it must be tough for her is all, but you gotta go and open your big fat flaming mouth!" Gray shouted, taking a swing at the dragonslayer.
And before the fight could progress any further it was quickly thwarted and quelled upon the word Erza, who had both wizards sitting quietly and apologizing within moments, complete with a fresh set of knocks and bumps atop their heads.
"Now that that nonsense is over we can deal with the task at hand. Tonight we shall all go to Natsu's house and be present when he takes the potion. After that, we will figure out what our next move is to get Lucy back," Erza stated diplomatically, requipping back into her standard armor.
The cloaked young woman moved throughout the city with great stealth, careful to avoid onlookers and passersby. She couldn't afford for anyone to catch wind of her new treasure. It was far too valuable to her. These are going to make all the difference, she thought to herself. This is the break I've been waiting for. She laughed and smiled to herself, unable to believe her huge stroke of luck. After a short journey she arrived at her destination. It was an older, bright blue Victorian style house that was closer to the older part of town, more to the outskirts. The outside was a bit dilapidated, but the grounds were well loved and cared for. She took off the hood of her cloak and muttered something at the gate to let herself in. Once inside she made her way up the steps and into house itself.
"Welcome home Laeri" a disembodied voice chimed out in very sing song like manner. The young woman made her way into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. There were a number of strange things to be found inside, but quite used to them all, she ignored everything but the apple she had her eye on. She perched herself up on the counter, pushing her dark bangs out of her light colored eyes and began to bite into the apple she had just retrieved. When you got a good look at her, she didn't look so conniving or sinister as one might think she is when she had that dark cloak drawn over her. When you could properly see her face, it was clear as day that she was no more than 14 or 15 years old, and as fresh faced as the apple she was currently munching on.
Just then someone else entered the kitchen. Another young woman who looked to be an older version of Laeri, but she bore a much more serious expression. She looked at the girl sitting on the counter and frowned a bit.
"Where have you been all day?" she inquired suspiciously of the younger girl. "You know you had chores and lessons to get to today."
The younger girl flipped her long dark hair over her shoulder and took a pronounced bite out of her apple. "I was treasure hunting, thank you very much. A WAY more interesting thing to do than lessons and chores." She slid off the counter and looked at her older sister and the pile of books she was carrying.
"How can you STAND it?! Don't you get tired of studying all the time? Ugh!" Laeri cried out in frustration.
The older girl blinked several times, staring at her intently, her grey colored eyes fixed and concentrated. "You will never master your craft if all you do is going around looking for trinkets," said the older sister firmly, setting down the pile of books on a nearby counter.
"Yeah, well I happen to LIKE trinkets, so I'll keep on hunting them! Now please excuse me I have something to do!" Laeri said, pushing past her older sister in an attempt to head for the stairs that led to the second floor and more directly her bedroom, but just as she was passing her, Laeri's worst fear came to pass.
"HOLD IT. Whatever you are hiding, Hand it over, NOW," the elder sister said both loudly and firmly. Laeri winced and then began to whine immediately.
"Lux, you can't take it, I found them fair and square! I can tell they're super powerful and I can tell them for a TON at the open market and be set for LIFE! Don't take this from me! PLEASE LUX!" she begged and pleaded with sister, but Lux's hand remained opened and outstretched.
Sighing, disheartened and disappointed, Laeri reluctantly handed over the keys. Lux took them and examined them closely, not speaking for several moments. She even took the keys and started upstairs with them, heading toward the library. Laeri followed after her, begging for the keys back, but her pleas fell on deaf ears. Lux had retrieved a book and seemed to be leafing through it. After awhile she stopped on a particular page and looked at the keys and then the page again.
"Just as I thought," she said aloud. "These are summoning keys… they would be used by a celestial wizard...but from Earthland. And it seems there are ten of the twelve zodiac keys that belong to this single wizard. Even by Earthland standards that's really really rare… Whomever they are, they must be powerful and important. But the real question is… how did they end up here? And where is the wizard they belong to?"
Who are these mystery people that now have Lucy's keys in their possession. They seem to be using magic..are they wizards?! And how does one know so much about Earthland? And Natsu will have a way to talk to Lucy! Let's hope he can make contact during his dreams and they can find a way out of this mess!
Note: Thanks for the follows! Glad you still want to read. Constructive reviews would be appreciated. Thanks everyone! : D