***And like that, another chapter has been written. Way to go me! I do not own Fairy Tail, nor its characters or its storyline

Thank you YuaShizuka, Ella Daniels and animelover44163 for taking your time reading this tale as well as reviewing, and thank you to all those of you that took your time reading it at all. I really appreciate it!***

He came for me in the night. The man that I somehow knew would come. I had been tucked in by Mirajane Strauss a while ago, but had remained awake. Couldn't sleep. And then.. he was just there. I was taken, and somehow, I knew what to come next. My memories would be taken, followed by the memories belonging to those that had met me. Then I was taken back to HIM. I ALWAYS ended up at the place I had once called home.

The man was tall, restricted me with ease and held a big hand over my mouth in order to keep me from screaming. Down the stairs, out the door. Onto the moonlit cobbles that covered the streets of Magnolia. There he finally let me go, pushed me roughly so I fell to the ground.

"Silly little giRl. TRying to Run away fRom me yet again. You never LEARN!" as he yelled the last word he kicked me in the stomach, sent me a few paces away, and knocking the air out of me. He had a heavy accent. An accent that made him roll the R-s. Somehow I knew him, yet I couldn't conjure an image of him. Just the man in the hood. The man that always could be spotted in the periphery of my vision, and that always was nearby after I had been recaptured. I didn't think he had kicked me before though. And I said he kicked me in the stomach, but it also hurt profusely in my chest. Perhaps the fact that I couldn't breathe.

And as I lay on the cobbled ground, wearing a pink pajamas consisting of a top with hearts on it and a simple long set of trousers, struggling to breathe. He kicked me again. And again. And again.


MEANWHILE

Mirajane, the one in Edolas, stood bowed over the lifeless form of Lucy Heartfilia, her hands repeatedly pushing down the chest of the blonde. ..9.10. and then breaths. 1.2. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. The girl that literally was not from this world needed medical care, and right away, but before any kind of bleeding could be stopped, she needed to breathe. And THAT, she did not. In fact, Lucy Heartfilia had not been taking a single breath of air since her arrival in Edolas.

Legally, she was dead, which could also be the only explanation as to how she could be here in the first place. While magical while being alive, she was nothing more than flesh and bone while dead. Which made her revival all the more crucial. By the looks of things, earthly medicine would not suffice to heal her, and as such she needed to be alive. Hopefully Edolas would reject her then, and send her back to her world and give them back Lucy Ashley in the process.

"Are you sure that's how you do it?" asked Natsu for the hundredth time, pacing back and forth and moving between being worried for this Lucy and the other one, that currently was missing, probably situated where this Lucy had been. And if that was the case, she could very well be in danger, being pregnant and all.

Mirajane snorted. To be honest she felt sorry for whoever came upon the fierce blonde, being pregnant and hormonal hadn't exactly made the girl meek by any standards.


Maybe was it the initial yell. Maybe did he somehow pick up on my silent groans of pain. Maybe had the boy a knack for finding trouble. For it was Natsu that suddenly came running, yelling at the man to stop, and waking up the Strauss house in the same go. He really was a noisy kid.

"Are you the one after Lucy?" he asked, his voice dark and his fists ready. I lay on the ground. Unable to get up, hurting all over, and coughing up what I suspected to be blood.

"Oho.. you even told them youR name. Did you believe you could get away? That they would take you in?" the man asked, ignored the boy, but temporary paused his onslaught of kicking me around like a little plaything. In the meantime Elfman, Lissanna and Mirajane came out, all in different states of undress, clearly just woken up. The man laughed, a barking laughter that mocked my attempt to flee.

"And you even got a family, eh? You think they love you? You Really think they even like you? YOU, who aRen't even loved by youR own FATHER?!" he spat on the ground in front of me.

"ARe these all the people that knows?" he asked, all mockery leaving his voice in the instant he returned to strictly business.

"Oi, you didn't.."

"SHUT UP." the man ordered, and Natsu Dragneel discontinued his speech immediately, his hands falling limply to his sides.

"Yes." I whispered, the answer to his question. They all stood there, the people that had shared a meal with me, their eyes empty eyes staring at the man I called the Punisher, because he punished. And I looked at Lissanna, the girl that had confided in me earlier and told me she knew who I was. That my mother used to be a famous mage.

Mirajane, that actually told me of a time when she and my mother had met, and that the guild in Magnolia, Fairy Tail, gladly would accept a girl like me into the guild if I really wanted to join.

Natsu, that even though he too actually knew that I was an heiress told me that my past didn't matter. Only my present, and how I worked to create the future I liked. He even told me I could live with him for a while until I got money for my own place. Of course Mira had scolded him then, told him that a girl and a boy had no business living under the same roof unless they were family or married. And he told her that we could be partners then, as good as family. It had earned him a kick through a wall and onto the street, a hole already repaired by a crafty Elfman, but I still felt moved. He was willing to let me live with him. And the money, the wealth and the political power meant nothing to him.

Elfman had told me that he would show me the grave of his parakeet one day. And that he would love some help with the cooking.

"You will foRget all about Lucy HeaRtfilia. You have neveR met heR. You do not know what she looks like. NoR what she sounds like." the man in the cloak ordered, and of course, like always, they obeyed. The Punisher, the magician that had no name, and who had one job in the Heartfilia Concern. Keep me from escaping. Keep me from having friends.

"Now, giRl. It is time to make you foRget too, though in youR case a moRe violent method must be used. You aRe getting immune, afteR all." And with that he silenced, squatted down, raised me slightly from the ground, then thrust my head against the cobble.


MEANWHILE

"I need to pee. Where's the fucking bathroom?" Lucy Ashley asked roughly just as they entered through the doors of the guild, fresh of the train and finally back home. Well, at least one of them were. As for the rest of the guild? The ones talking or doing anything stopped doing that, and whatever had been in anyones hand wasn't in their hands anymore. The sound of falling objects was all that could be heard throughout the guildhall. Silence. And more silence.

That was followed by the sound of a sword being unsheathed only moments before that very sword was thrust into the doorframe only inches from the head Natsu.

"WHAT did you do this time, Natsu?" Erza Scarlet demanded as she made her way over to retrieve her weapon, or perhaps to finish the job. Maybe both.

"I didn't do anything!" he protested, took a step backwards from the approaching red fury that obviously was done with whatever it was that had prevented her from joining Natsu and Lucy on their mission earlier.

"It's Edo-Lucy!" he kept on going when she didn't seem to believe his statement, and this time, she stopped. Erza eyes the girl. Noted the black t-shirt. The flaming skull. The bulging stomach. Even if Natsu HAD done something, it would take more than a day for it to become this.. visible.

"I don't know either. Where's the bathroom?" the girl said, confirming his story with few words.


I was back in the field, in front of the two graves. The sun shone above me, swift clouds moving in the strong wind up there though it remained a soft caress down where I sat. Once more I was utterly naked. Was I in a loop or something?

"You're not supposed to be here." a voice said, and I looked up. My mother stood there, by the grave bearing my name, just out of reach from me where I sat before the grave of Lissanna.


"Come on, Lucy, don't give up on us just yet!" Mirajane pleaded as she ended yet another session of heart compression and breathed air into the girls lungs once more.


"Mom?" I asked, tried getting up, but an invisible force held me down.

"You can't give up, Lucy. You can't let him raise another grave in this place. It will break him," my mother said, mildly scolding.

"I'm dying?" I questioned. I guessed it made sense. She was not one of the living, and was not one to step outside my memories of her.

"I need you to fight, Lucy. I know you can," she continued without answering my question. In a way, she already had.

"How?" I asked. I knew too. Letting the boy raise a second grave in this place WOULD destroy him. Another close friend lost and outside of his reach.

"Just fight. Fight and find you way back home." she said, her voice fading with her body, though I could see a proud smile spread across her face just before she disappeared.


"Mira, I don't think.. you've been going at it for more than two hours, and even if you did.. she's too injured. Mira. I don't. I think it's too..." before Levy could tell the silverhaired barmaid that she thought it was too late the girl started glowing and disappeared in a flash, just as someone screamed out as the Lucy of Edolas reappeared, squatting, and.. peeing on the floor.

"Really? I had to be sent back NOW?" she said in her annoyed voice, just as Natsu jumped her, uncaring of her current situation and just glad she was back.


No one in Fairy Tail noticed the disappearance of Edo-Lucy at first, since she at that moment was.. well.. in the bathroom peeing for the fiftieth time, but they DID notice the bloody resemblance of a person that suddenly made an appearance in the middle of the guild.

"LUCY!" Natsu yelled out and ran to her side as she lay there on her back, coughing blood and quite possibly choking on it.

"Jet, go get Porlyusca now!" Master ordered immediately as he jumped off the counter and walked over to his injured child.

"Where's Wendy?" he asked further, and Erza went straight for the dorms in order to get the healing mage.


I was back. It hurt to breathe, and something rusty tasting gurgled in my mouth, it felt like a house had decided it'd be fun to have a go at my ribcage and my whole body just ACHED, but. I was back. I coughed some, tried ridding me of the liquid in my throat without too much success, mostly because I suspected that there was more of it wherever it came from.

"Lucy?" I heard my partner and good friend call out to me. I noticed him sending a frightened look at my stomach area, which I now noticed felt.. penetrated. Stabbed. Crushed too, but the stabbing could hardly make my case better. I coughed some more in a vain attempt to clear my throat. Since coughing didn't help I tried swallowing some of it instead.

"Don't look like that..." I tried, swallowed some more.. just don't think about what it is, Lucy. Just swallow it in order to talk.

"What did you DO?" he asked then. What.. What DID I do? I remembered that odd dream, but obviously I hadn't been handed my ass over by some strange fellow after a late dinner with the Strauss family. I actually didn't.. remember.

"I'm here! Oh god..." Wendy came running, paling considerably as she saw my reduced form. I looked at the roof. I sort of missed that clear sky from my dream. It had been.. peaceful.


She looked up at the roof, a small smile playing at the corner of the roof. Then. Once more. Her chest stopped heaving up and down, and the gurgling stopped. And once more the older Strauss sibling, albeit a different version of her, decided to step in in order to keep her system up and going while the young healing mage started healing, sobbing as she went. Fairy Tail does not give up. Fairy Tail does not give up. Fairy Tail does NOT..

*You can't give up, Lucy. You can't let him raise another grave in this place. It will break him*

*I need you to fight*

He held her hand, staring at her with wide eyes, not even acknowledging the presence of the others, yelling out or working desperately to save the person the hand belonged to. He was a fighter. Give him an enemy, and he would defeat it. But death? He regarded himself as untouchable, and his friends shared that same status. Even though the acclaimed death of Lissanna had shook his beliefs, that had been.. different. Not because she was Lissanna and not Lucy, though it might partly be that too, but... Her death had not been right in front of him. The happening leading up to her death had not been in his power to stop. Had he only been running slightly faster. Had he only been sitting a little closer, and he would've gotten her out of that house.

He squeezed her hand, staring at her empty eyes. Lucy was a Fairy Tail mage. Fairy Tail does not give up. Fairy Tail does NOT give up.

*I need you to fight, Lucy*

He swallowed, his eyes flickering across her body. The piece of wood protruding from her abdomen. The cuts. The bruises.

*You can't give up, Lucy. You can't let him raise another grave in this place. It will break him*

A Fairy Tail mage does NOT GIVE UP! It was as if a jolt moved through her body, and the pupils in her eyes dilated as she took a gasping gulp of air. It was chaos. It was blood. Then she squeased his hand back, and he knew. He knew that she knew. A Fairy Tail mage does not give up. Then Mirajane took hold of the piece of wood in her abdomen, ripped it out in one go, and Lucy Heartfilia screamed in pure agony.

***It was a bit odd, I will admit, but I think it worked out well in the end. Now the only thing that remains would be the mystery man, but that is a matter I don't regard as one that must be solved right away. Besides, I already wrote myself off any longer stories. This is the fourth chapter, so it's already longer than I would want it to be.

It's not like this is going to be the END end, at least I don't think so. Just the mission end or something. Or maybe it is the end. Nah, I don't think it's the end. I get too easily bored for it to be the end. So there will probably be more, just.. I'll actually have to start writing the next chapter before I can comment any further, really. The pregnant Lucy Ashley was ONE major piece not accounted for before BAM, there she was. It'll work out in the end. I need to remain positive***