Intro: Mysterious magic users have got their hands on Lucy's keys and seem to be knowledgable of Earthland. Who are they and what are they up to? And Lucy had another session with the strange doctor. Will this lead to something or just another goose chase? Will Natsu get a chance to talk to Lucy in their dreams? Can they make that important connection?
Disclaimer: I don't own Fairytail.
Author note: Thank you for all the follows and reviews! I appreciate the reads! I hope you all continue to enjoy the story! 3
Getting Some Answers
Since her last session with the psychiatrist, Lucy had done as Dr. Luminaria requested and wrote down all of her dreams in great detail. The doctor had told her to remember them, and had repeated this time and time again at the end of their last session. It was almost painful to do so because every time she went to sleep she dreamt of home and Natsu. It wasn't painful to dream of these things, but rather to be separated from them was the difficult part. And it was torture seeing Natsu so close, being able to FEEL him- and not being able to connect with him. All she could do was cry out to him over and over again. She couldn't help but wonder if he was having any sort of similar experience that she was.. If he missed her as much as she apparently missed him. The truth was she missed EVERYONE. By this time she had been gone for a few weeks, and for all they knew, she was gone for good. Had everyone moved on already?
These doubts began to invade her mind over and over again when she was alone. It became especially pronounced when it was visiting hours and she saw others have loved ones come to see them. She was always alone, sans her roommate, who was not only unfriendly, but seemed to get some sick, twisted enjoyment out of Lucy's unhappiness. So the blonde mage did whatever she could to avoid the girl at all costs. And group therapy was no better. Over and over again she was chided. People telling her that she was making it all up, that she wasn't really a wizard from another world. Some people seemed to feel sorry for her and think she was just some deluded crazy girl. And others thought she was some pathological liar that was seeking attention. No matter how it was looked at - she was just a sad head case to them. And while Lucy was resilient and strong, the daily grind of it was starting to wear away at her bit by bit.
"I'm almost starting to feel like I belong in this goddamn place," she muttered to herself, staring out of the window. "I've really got to get out of here."
She was scheduled for a session with Dr. Luminaria that afternoon, and she was actually kind of looking forward to it. Even though this place was horrible and her top priority was to get the hell out of here, the doctor was a small comfort amongst the hell she was living in. The psychiatrist seemed to function differently than her colleagues and associates. Lucy couldn't really put her finger on it, but she felt calmer and more at home around her. Why, she had no idea. Maybe it was because she was more colorful and lively than the rest of the people around here. And she didn't seem to simply dismiss everything Lucy said. This gave the celestial wizard hope that there might be a chance the doctor could help her out of this mess. She was glad when the time for her to visit the office rolled around again.
"Hello dear, good to see you again," Dr. Luminaria said, greeting her with a warm smile and motioning for her to take a seat. "Lucy, yes? Please make yourself comfortable, dear."
Lucy returned her smile and nodded, settling down onto a nearby cushion, "Good to see you too, Dr. Luminarnia. I kept track of my dreams like you told me to."
The psychiatrist smiled again, nodding as she settled onto a cushion across from Lucy. The blonde mage held out the notebook pages to the doctor and she took them carefully into her hands. Dr. Luminaria looked over them for several moments before looking up at Lucy again, giving her the same warm smile.
"Tell me dear, when you have these dreams, what do you FEEL" she asked Lucy, her expression turned more serious. Lucy was confused. She thought she had conveyed that in the dream notes already.
"Well… like I wrote down, it makes me sad.. They make me miss home, miss my friends. They make me confused, angry.." Lucy felt her temper rising and emotions welling up to the surface as she spoke, her tone growing sharper and her voice getting louder. ".Upset that no one here believes me and everyone just thinks I'm crazy! It makes me-" She started to rant on, but she felt a gentle hand on her arm and was brought back to her senses by a few soft spoken words from the doctor.
"I understand my dear, however, what I mean, what do you physically experience? You said that this man you dream of, Natsu? You said that he breathes fire and often attacks this wall between you. Can you feel anything from this?" Dr. Luminaria asked, looking at Lucy. Lucy stared back at her, mouth slightly agape. Was she hearing this right?
"Um… well, yes I can feel the heat on the glass. I can feel the vibrations from when he strikes the surface. I can almost feel his presence. It's so real it's almost like he's RIGHT THERE, but I can't touch him," Lucy went on to describe, her voice trailing off at the end.
"Aha! Yes! This is good!" Dr. Luminaria said suddenly, getting up from her seat and rushing across the room. Lucy jumped back, surprised by her sudden movements. What in the HELL was going on here?!
The doctor lifted a large satchel onto the desk and proceeded to open it, then rooting around amongst it contents. Lucy watched her, eyes wide, eyebrows arched high. What the heck was this lady up to? Now things were just getting WEIRD. After a few minutes, she surfaced from the bag with a small glass bottle in one hand and what looked to be a wand in the other.
"Here we are!" the doctor exclaimed, holding up the small bottle and showing it to Lucy. Before proceeding any further, she turned toward the doorway, raised her wand, said some sort of incantation out loud and there was a small glint of light that came from the door. Now the celestial wizard was REALLY confused. The brightly clothed doctor turned back to her stunned patient and clapped her hands together. "Now this can really help you!"
Lucy shook her head, trying to make sense of what was happening. "Okay, doctor, I'm sorry, did I miss something? Could you please explain what is going on here?" she asked desperately, thoroughly confused and now very anxious.
The psychiatrist smiled warmly and chuckled lightly. "Ah, Lucy. I'm so sorry for the confusion. I'm just so very glad that I can help you! I will explain.. You see, when two individuals who share are deep emotional connection are separated by outside forces, their souls will a communicational point. This usually occurs during one's dreamstate. While in a lucid dreamstate, one can directly communicate with their partner, but only with the assistance of a special potion," she explained in detail, holding up the small glass bottle, which Lucy now noticed contained a blue colored liquid.
"So you must take this potion within 10 minutes of when you wish to sleep, and fall into a deep slumber. After one hour you must be roused from this slumber. But within that one hour you will be within a lucid dreamstate that will allow you to directly communicate with the other at your communicational point."
She handed Lucy the bottle and the blonde mage stared at it, then looked back at the doctor. Was she serious? Did this mean she could talk to Natsu in her dreams? And then maybe she could tell him where she was when she disappeared! Maybe there was some way he could get to her… Maybe there was some way she could get home. But really the first and foremost thing that was one her mind as the doctor spoke was… that she could talk to Natsu.
After the end of her "session" Lucy returned to her room, where she found out that her lovely roommate had been moved to another room, so that left Lucy alone for the night. Somehow she couldn't help but feel that this was no coincidence. She sat her bed and thought about everything that had just transpired. She had gone from feeling so low and depressed about her situation to now she was anxious and excited, rife with anticipation about the coming night. Sleep couldn't get there fast enough! For the first time in weeks, she was looking forward to going to bed because it meant that she was going to get to talk to Natsu and finally make some headway on getting the hell out of here and going home.
She had also found out that Dr. Luminaria was the equivalent to a wizard in this world, but she was called a sorceress. She specialized in healing and potions, much like Porlyusica back home. But she was also educated in non-magical disciplines. She told Lucy of how there were many others like herself that were working within the different education, medical, and governmental systems throughout the world. There was especially a presence within the mental health system, as most of the non-magic individuals in this world did not believe in magic at all and often those with natural born magical abilities would be filtered through the mental health system. They would be dismissed as being mentally ill for believing in magic or that they themselves had some sort of special powers.
Lucy also learned that magic in this world was not entirely ability based as it was in Earthland. Where you had ability magic, maker magic, holder magic and so on back home, here magic users could use it in a more diversified sense and often used a wand or some other magical object to conduct a concentrated stream of magic through. There were many different types of magical individuals, but the use of magic was much more concealed and secretive from non-magical eyes. This whole concept was so strange to Lucy because back home, magic was just an everyday part of life, even to those who didn't possess magical abilities It was strange to think that there were people that just straight up denied that magic even EXISTED at all.
So it was set that that night, when she went to sleep, Lucy would be taking the potion. And then she would enter a lucid dream state that would allow her to control her dreams and directly communicate with Natsu. She could only hope that he would listen to her and stop yelling long enough to hear what she had to say. It was hard to get him to stop once he got going, that's for sure. Of course she understood why, but this was important. She could usually get through to him, though. Lucy hoped that this would be one of those times. Dr. Luminaria had arranged for someone to come to wake Lucy after the one hour had passed. She told her to take the potion at exactly 10 pm on the dot. She anxiously paced the floor, waiting for the next couple hours to pass.
Lux glanced at the clock. 8:13 p.m. It was still awhile before they had to go. Still, better to be prepared on time than be lagging at the last minute. She gathered a few more things and put them into her bag for the trip to the hospital, including a change of clothes for the celestial wizard. She and Laeri would be traveling to the hospital to be present while the young woman was under the influence of the potion and then would wake her up when one hour passed. After that, they would help her leave the hospital and return her to their home where she would be invited to take refuge until her situation was figured out.
A few days prior, their mother had come home from work talking about about a young woman who seemed to have been accidentally transported to their world, someone from Earthland. She told them how the girl claimed to be a celestial wizard from Magnolia, Fiore, and had been inquiring about the location of her keys. Of course this struck a chord with her daughters, as Lux had just confiscated keys belonging to an Earthland celestial wizard from her sneaky little sister just recently. So that mystery had finally be solved. So the goal now was to allow her time to communicate with her people and then remove her from the hospital all together. By this time, Dr. Luminaria would have been able to take care of all the red tape necessary to get this Lucy out of the hospital with no issues. Once she was sure they had everything they needed, Lux and Laeri headed off from their home and set out toward the hospital on the other side of town.
Meanwhile back in Earthland...
Natsu was pacing back and forth across the floor of his kitchen, nearly having worn a hole in the tiles from pacing so much. Time couldn't go fast enough. Porlyusica had suggested that he wait until an hour that he thought most likely that Lucy would have gone to bed. Depending on the night, she sometimes went to be bed early, sometimes she went to bed really late if she was up working on her novel. But he had a feeling she wasn't staying up too late. It was so hard to know just when would be the right time and he was so anxious it was killing him.
"Aaaaghhhh!" he yelled out in frustration, gripping the sides of his head in his hands. "I can't stand this! Why the hell can't stupid time move faster goddamit!" The dragonslayer was growing especially impatient as the minutes seemingly slowly ticked by.
Lisanna smiled sympathetically. "I know you want it to hurry Natsu, but it will be time before you know it," she said encouragingly. "You'll get to talk to Lucy really soon."
"Yeah cool your jets flame boy, it'll happen soon enough," Gray chimed in, not so sympathetically. "We all want you to talk to Lucy, but freaking out isn't going to make it happen any quicker."
Natsu turned to Gray and snarled. "Why don't you just SHUT UP FROSTY! No one asked you ANYWAY! YOU WANNA GO AT IT?!" The dragonslayer lifted his flame covered fists, momentarily distracted from his timely torment.
"I'm just sayin' maybe if you weren't such an IMMATURE CHILD, this might be a little easier, but maybe I just need to BEAT some sense into you!" the ice wizard yelled back, now putting his fists up to counter the dragonslayer. Erza was about to intervene, but it was Happy that interrupted them.
"C'mon you guys, knock it off!" the blue Exceed cried out, tears welling up in his eyes. "This is really important! We gotta be strong and do this right so we can get Lucy back! And all you guys can do is fight!" They all stopped and stared at him, the room totally quiet.
"Oh Happy…" Lisanna said softly. Both Natsu and Gray lowered their fists, frowning.
"Sorry little buddy, you're right. We should be focusing on Lucy and not fighting," Natsu said, his head lowered.
"Yeah, you're right Happy. Sorry," Gray added sincerely, sheepishly rubbing the back of his head.
"Well, now that that's all settled, we can focus on the task at hand," Erza said in a diplomatic tone, checking the clock. "9:35 pm. And you said that around the ten o'clock hour is when you would want to try Natsu?"
Natsu nodded in response. "Yeah. That's a pretty average bedtime for Lucy. I'm hoping that I'm not wrong and we get lucky that she is asleep at that time. Or at least that she's asleep within that hour time limit."
"We will be here to make sure that you are roused from your dream state exactly one hour after you go to sleep. We will have no idea as to whether or not you have made contact, but that matters not. From what Lisanna has described, it is of utmost importance that we wake you after that one hour time marker. And that is exactly what we will do, " Erza went on, speaking firmly.
Natsu nodded, sighing. "Now all we gotta do is wait a little while longer."
He picked up the vial of blue liquid and stared at it for a long time.
"Just a little longer, Luce, I promise. Just a little longer and I'll come to you," he murmured softly.
And it would be only a matter of minutes until they both slipped into a deep sleep under the influence of a strong potion, unbeknownst to the other, in an effort to make a connection from worlds apart.
So Lux and Laeri are going to help Lucy! And Dr. Luminaria is in on it too! Soon Lucy will get to talk to Natsu and hopefully find a way to get back home! Let's hope nothing happens to interrupt their plans!
