...I actually didn't mean to post this here until tomorrow, but whelp the temptation got to strong (I generally didn't mean to post tonight, but I'm actually incapable of keeping from posting something I deem finished, it seems. |D;).

Anyway, welcome to Two Sides 04 aka Stin being so difficult on me aka Sting mirror chapter to Part 02. That one got updated to fit better with this one by the way, so maybe go check it out? :3

Enjoy!

Category: Fairy Tail
Characters: Sting Eucliffe, Rogue Cheney, Lector, Frosch
Genre: Gen, Friendship
Rating: PG
Warnings: Spoilers if you haven't seen the anime/read the manga up to the end of the Grand Magic Games. Otherwise you should be good.
Summary: Drabble Series/Collection | They are what time made them – the Twin Dragons of Sabertooth, the only two of the Third Generation, spearheads of the Strongest Five – and even though the path was long and costly, Sting would never dare to think to complain.
Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail.

- Two Sides Of A Coin -
- Part Four -

Rogue used to be more expressive, Sting sometimes thinks to himself in the quiet pause just after his partner shuts off his teasing with a single remark. Years ago, he would have indulged him and they would have bantered, would sometimes easily escalate into a lighthearted scuffle (a – maybe slightly childish – contest of wit and strength but never magic, they had thought, a game just between the two of them; an unworthy display for anyone aspiring the seat of the strongest, the Master had declared and that's why Sting doesn't even think much of it anymore when he squashes the impulse to reach over and tug on Rogue's cheek or on the fringes of his hair until his partner is fed up enough to retaliate properly); but those days are long past now and Sting hardly mourns them.

They are different people now, no longer the still-near-children that once roamed not quite aimless and yet without true direction through Fiore, no longer just aspiring to be as strong as those that walked the path of Dragon Slayer before them, to reach for even greater heights – no, they are Dragons in their own right now, proudly soaring their skies. They have made themselves an entirely new kind of breed – not just trained by a Dragon or forged by lacrima, but both at the same time; though the one thing that will forever truly single them out among the Dragon Slayer is the blood of their parents on their hands. Sting has come to wear it like a badge, a mark of pride because he has done what Natsu-san and Gajeel-san and Wendy-chan couldn't.

He's killed a dragon and so has Rogue, the result has left them marked in soul and magic alike and nobody else will ever understand what that truly means – nobody but them. No other being, not even any other Dragon Slayer, can.

Lector never will, for all that he is the very first to jump in defense of Sting's honor – though that in itself is the most precious gift Sting could ask for anyway. The time before Lector... it's truly nothing to be dwelled upon – the loneliness of those days started to ebb away the moment a small, red-furred cat insisted on becoming his student and was forgotten for good under the moon on a rooftop in Magnolia when he first met the then-boy that is his partner, his brother, his twin in all but blood.

It's been so long since that first proper promise they made, a month after they met – years that passed with what seems a blink of an eye in hindsight – since the evening that he and Rogue laid back in the grass, stared up into the red-stained evening sky and swore that they would become the strongest of them all, the night that Sting came up with the moniker "Twin Dragons", the moment they finally found a definition for themselves.

("...I guess, I could do worse," Rogue told him after a moment of thought, when Sting had proposed that nickname.

"Worse than what?" Sting asked, face scrunching into a frown.

"Worse than you for a twin," Rogue smirked and that in itself would already be challenge enough.

"Now you are just asking for it," was the only warning he got before Sting launched himself at him and they went tumbling through the grass.)

Rogue used to have a temper back then, irritation and anger flashing brightly in his eyes as he squared his shoulders just the moment before he pounced at Sting. Nowadays, any jab Sting throws at him seems to slide off without even the slightest hint of reaction – "I have no interest," he keeps saying and just continues on without a word of reply whenever Sting names him the liar he is – and the only reason Sting knows when he's hit a mark (for all that it might have him flinch inwardly in regret sometimes) is because he knows Rogue just that well.

(It's all still there, all bottled up beneath the smooth surface of Rogue's expressionless façade of disinterest and if Sting thinks about that for too long, he chills at the idea of what might happen if the threshold is ever breached and Rogue stops giving a damn about pretending that he doesn't care at all.)

Sting knows he's changed too; he's shed the wild kid that used to jump without thinking and has become someone more focused, more refined instead. Someone befitting the ways of the Strongest Guild.

They are what time made them – the Twin Dragons of Sabertooth, the only two of the Third Generation, spearheads of the Strongest Five – and even though the path was long and costly, Sting would never dare to think to complain. This is what the night in Magnolia, the time wandering, that very first fight against the Young Mistress, each and every request they've taken, each and every battle they've fought – side by side, always – have led them to become and one day there'll be a chance to prove that it was all worth it.

(There is a distance now that didn't use to be; a sacrifice made for the power gained in recent years. Sometimes there are moments – the pause before Rogue shuts him off, the even longer pause that follows after – that seem to stretch into the endless, that are almost enough to make Sting wonder, but when they fight together they slide seamlessly into place and become a powerful twine of light and shadow that cannot be severed, even by themselves and that ought to be assurance enough, shouldn't it?

"Don't cling to the past," Rogue tells him often enough, but Sting is well aware it's not him he's trying to convince.)

It's no secret to Sting that Rogue is discontent with the state of things within their guild – unlike the rest of them, who think his partner stoic and arrogant, Sting can read the lines of his faint frown, the way his head tilts sideways when they witness the Master dish out his punishments and the way he averts his eyes at the end every single time.

They used to argue a lot about that in the early days – never to the point of shoving or even actual blows, but Rogue had always thrown him that same unhappy frown by the end, the one that means that the issue is dropped for now but never forgotten; at least until that one day when they had ended up trading punches and using magic from one second to the next, and that's when things started changing, that's when loud words kept in private between them became muttered whispers. At some point they had disappeared almost altogether. It's good riddance, in Sting's opinion, because sometimes he can feel Rogue's doubts echo in his being, but they've already gotten too far to change course now, he thinks.

(The idea that Rogue may be right in his doubts is too terrifying to consider. It's so much easier to sigh and laugh, to brush it off as things that cannot be changed and remind himself that the weak deserve to be left behind.)

He can feel Rogue's eyes linger on him every single time he walks away afterwards, but he's learned to ignore the feeling of them – so what if he's earned himself a rebuke as well this time around; it's not like any of them could have known that this day's game would involve any kind of blasted transportation device and they'll both make up for it during the tag team battle part of the Games at latest.

They'll be able to prove that it was all worth it either then or on the last day, surely. Now that Natsu-san and Gajeel-san are both back (are fighting for reasons that make him shake his head, but it's just as well) it's just a question of proper opportunity for battle and just the thought makes Sting shiver in anticipation. They have always aimed to surpass the level of their elder Dragon Slayers – Sting because of his promise to Lector and Rogue because of past connections that even Sting knows only bits and pieces of – and for too long it had seemed that they would never be able to know for sure if they had managed, until the news had hit at least, the return of Fairy Tail's missing members loudly proclaimed over any and all papers.

Now, it's finally, finally time to surpass that wall once and for all, to fight and win and keep the promise made now almost a decade ago.

(It's not just him, he knows; Rogue, too, has interest in the battle to come – for all that he might proclaim otherwise. He's seen the way his partner's eyes linger on Gajeel.)

He gets a taste of things to come when Natsu-san storms into the halls of Crocus Garden, shouting challenges for their Master over matters that aren't his to be concerned with (madness, madness, madness surely) and then matches him for three blows before the Young Mistress appears to break up the battle.

Natsu-san is strong no doubt, strong like Sting imagined and maybe even beyond that considering that strange Lightning Flame Mode. It will be a fight worth having, he knows, one that will prove beyond any doubt and reproach that the path they've taken and the decisions they've made were the right ones.

He has waited for this chance for seven years and looking up to the near-full moon high up in the sky, he knows for sure that the moment of truth is near.

(Something about Natsu-san's onslaught to their lodgings has made Rogue thoughtful, Sting knows, that has been making his partner's doubts all the more apparent, and when they part that evening before battle, there is a moment it feels like they've never been further apart.

The feeling is gone by the next day though and when they enter the arena, they move in cadence again.

This is not a battle they are meant to lose.)

It was not a battle they could have won.

Sting knows this with soul deep certainty as he stands before the Master and the guild, head bowed in shame as he tries to search the words that describe the utter inevitability of that defeat, the impossibility of Natsu-san's strength.

Rogue is the one who finds them – for all that he says that there are no words to describe their loss – is the one that manages to say something at least. Sting is too caught up in it all even hours later, is too shell-shocked by the sheer difference in strength to comment on it, and too certain of what lies ahead.

He has failed the second time in row. There are no excuses left for him and he can't even hope that at least Rogue will be spared.

He hardly resists when the force of the Master's raw magic pushes them back and to the ground, doesn't dare to lift a hand to protect himself when the punches start raining down or to cover his ears in the ever lasting minute that the Master shouts at them.

'EraseThemEraseThemEraseThemERASE THEM', he shouts – louder, so much more furious than when he demanded it of Yukino or Marie or Jaydon or all the others that Sting has witnessed being forced to leave the guild over the course of the years.

It's Lector's voice that cuts through it all, trembling at first but quickly growing much more steady as he defends them both, promises that they'll grow stronger from the experience they've won in defeat.

"I'm still proud of Sting-kun," he says, even though Sting lost, even though he wasn't able to keep the promise he made and at that very moment Sting wants nothing more than to pull his cat close and apologize, to tell him that he'll definitely do better the next time he challenges Natsu-san, to thank him for all the times that he was there, that he believed.

For the very first time, Sting is truly aware that it's Lector's faith that is pushing him forward, that it's always been that from the very moment they first met.

Then Lector disappears in a flash of light and Sting's world stands still.

Sting hardly registers anything that follows – not how Rogue cries and leaps to cover Frosch from suffering a similar fate, not the state of utter shock and disbelieve that has captivated the rest of the guild, not the tears that have started running down his cheeks. Instead, that one last moment – the look of shocked surprise on Lector's face as the Master attacks him, the last whisper of Sting's name – replays over and over and over in his head. It can't be real, he thinks, but reality is starring into his face and Sting cannot deny it anymore.

There is a Dragon's sorrowful roar echoing in the room and it's only later that Sting realizes that it was his own. He is too busy screaming – what have you done, WHATHAVEYOUDONE – and the moment that Jiemma has the audacity to trivialize Lector's loss, Sting moves without thinking, the White Dragon's piercing magic at his fingertips with just a flash of unspeakable rage.

He is hyperaware of the blood rushing in his ears, of every single tremble of anger that shakes his body as he stares down at the fallen figure of the guild master, caught up between sheer outrage and faint shock that he truly dared to attack the Master, that he took him down in just one blow.

The Young Mistress steps in before he can waste another thought on whether to take another swing – how dare he touch Lector howdarehe – and takes control of a situation that Sting is barely capable of truly wrapping his head around.

He hardly comprehends what she tells him about the power he's just unleashed, can't see how he could ever defeat Natsu-san even with that – how can he even waste any thought on that when Lector is gonegonegone, how does any strength he might uncover in wake of that even matter when Lector won't be there to cheer for him, to watch as he finally keeps his promise after all?

(And then Minerva restores and crumbles his world all over within the span of three sentences, and leaves him kneeling on the floor, trembling, sobbing, begging at first and then terrified at the look in her eyes, at the realization that she will harm Lector, if he doesn't comply, that he will never see his cat partner again, if he doesn't bring Sabertooth victory.)

Sting isn't sure how long he knelt in the meeting hall of Crocus Garden, but it's Rogue's hand on his shoulder that steadies him at last, Rogue's fingers in his jacket that pull him back up to his feet. It's Rogue, who gently nudge him all the way to his room and for once Sting has no desire or intention to stomp the instinctive impulse that tells him to pull his partner along into the room so that they can curl up and sleep next to each other the way they used to when they were kids, to seek comfort in that, but when he thinks to turn at the threshold of his room and reach for the other, Rogue is already gone and all Sting is left with are the empty shadows of his room and the faintly lingering scent of Lector's presence.

(It's the first night in over a decade that Sting spends just by himself, that he doesn't fall asleep to the soothing sounds of someone else's breathing.

It's so much more lonely than he remembers.)

When Sting awakens the next morning, he spends a fleeting moment hoping against hope that it was all a dream, that in a minute or two he'll hear Lector's ever cheery morning greeting, except what's the use – no matter how much he pretends, he knows all too well that Lector isn't with him.

(It's his very own senses that won't truly let him fool himself, his own ears that tells him that he's all alone in the room, his own nose that notes any scent of Lector as over a day old.

It's moments like that when being a Dragon Slayer is more curse than blessing.)

The lack of deeper connections of anyone within the guild (with exception of Rogue) seems a blessing in itself right now, because nobody cares to knock and wake him – nobody dares to probably, considering the display from the evening before – and that's just fine by Sting; anything they'd have to say would probably be just hollow and fake anyway (just like everything he and Rogue had thought accomplished in the last seven years, but as it turns out, they still have ways to go).

As tempting as burying himself and trying to forget his despair over the situation at hand might seem, it's not going to bring Lector back to him. Only winning the Games will accomplish that, and no matter how much power he's gained, he won't stand any chance of winning unless he comes up with some kind of strategy for the day ahead, Sting knows.

Except that his thoughts keep running circles back to Lector, except that any resemblance of focus keeps escaping him until Sting finally admits, it's no use to keep trying this by himself and not even two minutes latter he swings himself from his balcony over to that of the only person he can trust beyond reason.

The already opened balcony doors are the first thing that registers with Sting as he straightens to enter, but he freezes on the threshold when he comes to face with Rogue, and though he hadn't even thought about the impulse that had led him to take the jump from one balcony to the next, somehow, in this very second, facing his partner is so much more awkward than he can ever remember it being.

(Between Lector's absence and Sting's resulting power gain, they've been left off balance with one another – in so many ways that can't be properly articulated – and neither of them quite knows how to deal with that.)

It's Frosch, who breaks the silence between them in favor of rushing over and offering him a hug of comfort – it's not enough to fill the void in his being, nothing could ever be enough for that, but Sting appreciates the thought and the reminder.

He is not the only one that misses Lector.

"I need to save him. No matter what," he finally says, hands clenching into fists as he meets Rogue's eyes.

I need your help, he doesn't say. He doesn't have to, he knows – they both know that tomorrow's game is crucial in more ways than one, that it may only be a one-point-difference between Sabertooth and Fairy Tail, but that there'll be so many more to gain on the last day and figuring it out will take both their heads.

They sit knee to knee on Rogue's bed as they do their best to guess at what form the last game will take – it will be some kind of team battle or battle royal; that much is easy to predict. Everything else is harder, but this is their fourth time taking part in the Grand Magic Games and it's that experience that allows them to predict some of the other guilds' moves – and that of their own.

"If it's really going to be all against all, then winning won't be as much about strength as about endurance," Rogue concludes after a while. "Even mages like Jura or Kagura get exhausted, if they keep being forced into battle."

Even mages like Natsu-san, neither of them quite dares saying aloud.

"In that case my strategy is clear," Sting starts after a moment of consideration. "I just have to wait them all out. No matter where they let us fight, the area will be big. There'll be plenty places to hide and wait until everyone else is exhausted. And the moment they are… I'll just take them out, all at once."

It will be child's play, he wants to laugh – boast and self-assurance all in one, but given the opponents in the game to come and, much more importantly, the stakes he's playing for, he doesn't dare. Lector's life is nothing to joke about or bet on.

But even so, Rogue looks faintly skeptical: "Do you really think you can do it?"

"Of course. Do you doubt me?" Sting shoots back with a snort of angry challenge, but he backs down the moment their eyes meet and he realizes that Rogue hadn't questioned his new found strength but rather…

"Is that really how you want to win?"

It's not, Sting doesn't say, because in truth they both know that already. The fight he wants to have is straight up – without any tricks, without any need for this kind of strategizing. That is his pride talking though, and he has no place or mind for that while Lector's life is at stake.

"It's how I'm going to win."

And he isn't going to let that be up for debate anymore, he silently swears as he holds Rogue's gaze… until the other tilts his head down and sighs in resignation. Between them, Frosch quietly whispers their names, making them both turn their heads and look at her – she looks so small when it's just her without Lector around to give them presence, and the misery that his absence and the current topic of conversation is causing her is written all over her expression.

"Stop making that kind of face, Frosch," he says finally, flashing a grin at his partner's cat as he pats her head. "Just watch; I'm definitely going to get Lector back to us tomorrow!"

There is no alternative. He can't bear thinking about a world without Lector at his side.

It's Rogue's next words that snap him out of that grim line of thought, that make his stomach twist with an entirely different kind of dread.

"In that case, I'll be going after Natsu Dragneel," he says straight out, and Sting wants to laugh because that just got to be a joke, but he knows too well… Rogue would never make a joke like this. He wouldn't have even back when he had allowed himself to smile at anyone other than Frosch.

"Run that by me again," Sting finally says; he really can't have heard that right. Rogue has no interest in fighting Natsu-san, he's said so himself not even a day ago.

…Or maybe he's heard right after all, given the way Rogue is scowling at him. "I'm going after Natsu Dragneel tomorrow."

Yeah, he's heard right.

"But you can't beat him," he protests; it's not an insult, it's fact – they both know it's fact after yesterday. Hell, right now Sting is the stronger one of them and even with the strength born from emotion, from his desire to rescue Lector… despite Minerva's words Sting can't say for certain if that will be enough to beat the older Dragon Slayer.

Natsu-san is a class of his own.

Rogue knows as much, knows it maybe better than Sting, because he chooses his own battles with much more care and thought (and it's all in his face that he's given this some thought too, that this isn't a sudden slip of lunacy): "That won't matter for your strategy and if you want it work, you'll need someone to exhaust him first anyway. It might as well be me."

Sting wants to hiss and argue – he doesn't want Rogue to play any sort of pawn sacrifice, not for him, never for him, would prefer to stick together no matter how disconnected they feel at the moment, but Rogue cuts him off before he can even get started.

"It's not your decision to make."

He can't argue with that, not when he's facing Rogue at his most stubborn, and not when just barely a day ago, he asked Rogue to step back, to let him take on the older generation all by himself, and Rogue complied despite his own stake in that fight, despite the fact that fighting Gajeel is so much more personal to him than it will ever be to Sting.

Which makes the only argument he has left to counter this plan: "What about fighting Gajeel-san?"

(Isn't that all Rogue had cared for in this set of the Games? Isn't defeating Gajeel-san his aim, like defeating Natsu-san is Sting's? Even with Lector on line, does he really want to miss his chance on deciding that fight properly like he hadn't been able to during the Tag Battle?)

Rogue's gaze drops at that, his eyes drifting to the distance like they always do when he lingers on times long gone, on things that happened before they met and that Sting knows he doesn't even know half of, before he sighs and replies: "There'll be another chance for that."

And that settles that for good.

(They spent the rest of the afternoon going over alternate variants of how the next day's game might go, well aware that it's probably all theory. They both know the plan they will have to go with and they both know it's far from ideal, but it's for Lector's sake and that is all that truly matters.

It's going to be fine, Sting tells himself when he finally turns in for the night.

One way or another, defeat is not an option after all.)

Sting feels strangely calm when he follows Minerva into the arena on the next day, feels a serenity he wouldn't have thought himself capable of the day before – for all that his thoughts still continue to circle back to Lector again and again, for all that his sense won't let him forget because he cannot hear Lector's cheering, that he can only hear the audience muttering about his absence… the memory of his cat partner's presence is heavy here, is encouragement enough, because right at this moment the path forward is clear.

He'll get him back. He won't lose anymore.

Fairy Tail's entrance brings surprise in form of Natsu-san's absence, a stroke of luck surely – and while Rogue startles at that discovery, Sting can't help but relax just a tiny bit – this can only make things easier for them, and it leaves Rogue free to go for the fight he's been meaning to have all along, the fight he had meant to give up for Lector's sake.

(Rogue will still be fighting alone, but it will be alright. His battle against Gajeel-san isn't one that Sting has any business being involved in anyway.)

There is no joy in battling today, no excitement, no delight, no thrill like Sting usually feels it. Taking down a mage like Bacchus Groh would usually leave him laughing in excitement, but in spite of the five points he had just gained Sabertooth, Sting feels empty.

This is just a small step towards getting Lector back, nothing more.

(He runs before Kagura can attack him as well, moves quietly through the streets as he searches for a good vantage spot to sit down and hide and wait. From now on that is all he can do.)

Waiting is an endless instant spent half listening to the commentary of the ongoing fights and lingering on the last two days, on the regrets, on his now-gained resolve. It won't matter how it plays out, ultimately.

Who fights whom, who wins against whom is irrelevant; Sting will take them down all the same.

And indeed, it all plays out like he's hoped and beyond that. All that's left is him, Team Fairy Tail and a margin of nine points – if he wins here, he'll bring his guild the dramatic victory that will establish it on the zenith of Fiore's mage guilds.

(If he wins here, Minerva will return Lector to him, and that is all that Sting cares about right now.)

He is confident when he stands before Fairy Tail, when he admits to having admired them, when he calls upon his magic – he is strong now, stronger than before and they are all exhausted; taking them out shouldn't be-

Except that with every second passing, they seem to stand all the taller, a wall of untouchable strength and resolve despite numerous wounds, despite fatigue.

There's a radiance about them that is beyond anything that Sting can properly articulate.

(He can't do it, he finally realizes, he can't bring himself to move. They are so large, so unreachable, so utterly beyond his level of strength – and… he can hear Rogue's question, his doubts from the day before echo in his memory and this time he can admit that his partner was right after all. This isn't the kind of battle Sting wants to fight.

Even more importantly, this isn't the kind of battle Lector would want him to fight.

No matter who he's fighting it for.)

Sting's surrender is a mere whisper as he sinks to his knees and fails to keep himself from trembling – he's messed up, he's missed his chance, he won't ever see Lector again and yet even if he had done it, if he had attacked, even if he had defeated them all… he wouldn't have deserved to see him then – he knows this for certain.

He doesn't deserve to see him now either, not the person he is now, not the person he's become that isn't the Sting that Lector has always admired, he won't see him, he won't ever see him again. He voices as much at Erza-san's question, his voice a quiet murmur and he hasn't felt so small since the years that had followed Weißlogia's death, hasn't felt this alone since before he had met Lector.

Sting has never felt this utterly lost in all his life.

And then one of the Mermaid Heel members calls out, but when Sting looks up he only has eyes for the sleeping cat in her arms.

Lector.

The next moment he's up and running, stumbling closer – he doesn't care how often he falls, that he's crawling on all four, that he's forgotten all words beyond Lector's name or that there are tears freely spilling down his cheeks until he hugs his cat partner tight tight close – failure and despair forgotten in the face of this moment's reality.

Lector is back at his side, is crying too, is safe is safe is back and that is the only thing that is important now.

Sting's world is whole again.

(He'll never ever let something like this happen again, he swears to himself then, he'll never allow Lector to be taken again.

And maybe rather than strive for strength for the sake of defeating Natsu-san, he'll first try to become someone worthy of Lector's faith. Someone who doesn't think to forsake the people around him at the first show of weakness.

It's changed him, this whole set of games and the events of the last three days alike… but maybe that's not a bad thing at all.)

Sting is still a bit giddy from happiness when he finally returns to Crocus Garden – Lector is back and the loss in the games the furthest thing from his mind, despite the way the chorus of celebrations to Fairy Tail's victory echoes through the streets of the whole city.

"I can't remember ever seeing you so cheery in defeat," is the greeting he gets from Rufus when they get in sight of the minstrel, but for once Sting can't be bothered to rise to provocation – not now – and just grins in reply. "The mood's catchy."

"I suppose, there is that," Rufus concedes with a smile that is much more wistful than it is arrogant, and maybe they all have taken something from this night, maybe it's not just him, but their whole guild that has tasted defeat and will now strive to grow, and for once not just in strength.

The King's messenger arrives before Sting can find a way to articulate that thought though, and he and Rufus part right after that – the guild needs to be informed about the summon they've just received, but before Sting can even bother wasting much thought on what that might be all about, he needs to talk to Rogue.

(There is so much to talk about, things that he didn't quite understand until now, things that Rogue saw and tried to tell him… Rogue has always seen the importance of bonds, had always mourned the lack of them within their guild and that's why there is nothing more urgent than to regain their own, than dispelling the ever growing disconnection between them that neither of them had known a way to address.

He has apologies and a request to make, because tonight has changed him and Sting wants change their guild according to that, but he doesn't want to do it without Rogue.

Never without Rogue.)

He leaves Lector to reunite with Frosch when he enters his partner's room, maybe just a little startled when he catches sight of Rogue. Rogue is different than when they parted after the start of the game, not just because of the still bleeding gash that crosses his nose or any of the other cuts and bruises he must have taken away from his fight with Gajeel-san.

Rogue looks relaxed in a way that Sting hasn't seen in years, like the need to keep up that uptight façade of indifference got ripped right out of him (and maybe that is exactly what happened, Sting wonders but never asks, because whatever happened will probably always stay between Rogue and Gajeel-san alone).

It's a little startling how much easier it seems to know what's on his partner's mind without having to ask, to laugh together, to feel like somehow all the years spent under Jiemma have been stripped away, to touch their foreheads together without any hesitation at all (to keep himself from laughing when Rogue startles at the sudden invasion of his private space) and finally put his desire into words.

"When we get home, let's make this guild into one that cares for its members."

There is no greater joy than hearing Rogue laugh in reply.

"Alright."

(Ten minutes later, Rogue starts their first proper scuffle in almost five years, red eyes narrowing in warning before he pounces – showing off that flash of Rogue's temper just like they used to.

It takes another few minutes until Sting yields, almost chocking on his own laughter when Rogue finally lets him out of the headlock he'd caught him in, and rests against his partner's side as he tries to catch his breath.

"I really missed this," he realizes then, and he has. The closeness, the ease, the silliness of this current moment… it's been a long while since they had anything like this, since they allowed themselves to have it.

He doesn't need to turn his head to know that Rogue is smiling.

"Me too.")

- Fin -

Review, maybe? :3