A Change In Timing
Chapter 4
by Contrail

Disclaimer: Fairy Tail belongs to Hiro Mashima, and is being used without permission. No profit is being made from this story.

Another year passed. During that time Gray started making enough from jobs, and was old enough, that he moved out of the orphanage and into the male dorm that the guild ran. But due to the new expenses, he wasn't able to save enough to visit Juvia on her birthday again. She assured him that it was fine if he wasn't able to come, but memories of how happy she'd been to have him there last year still made him feel guilty.

A couple of months later, he found himself frowning at the latest letter he'd gotten from her. The previous one had been full of excitement over her uncle telling her that she was finally ready to join his guild. But this letter…

Dear Gray-sama,

Juvia is now an official member of Phantom Lord, but… Almost everyone here is older than her by at least a few years. And no one seems to care much about their guild mates, not like you've told me Fairy Tail does. Everyone just cares about making money and being stronger than the others. She was looking forward to joining so much, but now she's not sure that she even wants to be here.

Uncle wants Juvia to keep quiet about her being related to him, too. He said it's because he doesn't want the other guild members to think he would give her special treatment because she's his niece. That makes sense, but he's the only family she has left and she was hoping he would spend more time with her now that she's part of Phantom Lord. But she guesses that won't happen now. What do you think Juvia should do?

With love,
Juvia Lockser

It was kind of shocking that the guild she'd been talking about joining all this time was Phantom Lord. The relationship between that guild and Fairy Tail had always been somewhat tense at best. There were even rumors that that guild had been originally created to oppose Fairy Tail. Whether that was true, or if they just didn't get along because of their different attitudes, Gray couldn't say.

And that difference in attitude is what was making Juvia so unhappy to be part of that guild. Fairy Tail thought that supporting each other made them all stronger. Phantom Lord thought that the weak should get out of the way of the strong.

Sighing, he pulled out a sheet of paper and began to write, even though he wasn't sure how much he could help her.

Hi Juvia,

I'm sorry that the guild you joined isn't what you expected. Not all guilds are like Fairy Tail, unfortunately. I can't really tell you whether you should stay there or not - that's up to you. But if you do decide to leave Phantom Lord, I'm sure Fairy Tail would welcome you.

If you choose to stay in Phantom Lord, maybe you could try befriend someone that's close to your age? I know you said that most of them are much older, but there's gotta be at least one or two that aren't that much older than you right? As for your uncle, it sucks that he's still being distant. But being guild master seems to be a lot of work, so maybe that's part of it?

Gray Fullbuster

Juvia tried to keep Gray's advice in mind when she walked into Phantom Lord's guild hall the next morning. Looking around, she saw Gajeel Redfox sitting alone at a table, everyone else giving him a wide berth. She knew why, too - she'd already seen him lash out at someone who disturbed him. Still, he was closer to her own age than the rest of the guild, and well… There just seemed to be an air of loneliness around him, despite his apparent standoffishness. Maybe she was able to recognize it because she was so used to loneliness herself.

She got herself something to eat, then cautiously carried it over to where Gajeel was sitting. He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye when she sat down, but when she didn't try to talk to him or do anything except eat her food, he grunted and turned his attention back to his own meal. They ate in silence until Gajeel finished and got up to look at the posted jobs.

This pattern was repeated over the next few days, the two of them eating quietly together until one or the other of them went to get a job for the day. The other members couldn't seem to decide if she was brave or just crazy. But Gajeel was getting used to her presence - he didn't even look up when she sat down next to him anymore.

About a week after Juvia started doing this, her uncle called both of them into his office. With little preamble, Jose stated, "I've received a job that I'd like the two of you to complete together. I think your abilities will be well suited for handling it."

The two accepted the order, assuring Jose that the mission would be completed successfully. Looking over the mission flyer, it involved capturing a small group of dark mages, too small to even be considered a guild. Still the mission would take a few days, so they both agreed to go pack and meet at the train station later.

As they waited for the train in silence, Juvia fidgeted a little. Gajeel seemed to tolerate her presence well enough, but he'd never had to deal with taking her (and her rain) on a mission with him. Breaking the quiet, Juvia tentatively asked, "Does the rain bother Gajeel-san?"

The larger teen next to her just shrugged. "It's just some water. I'm tough enough to handle it."

She nodded, falling silent again. At least he wasn't complaining about it. Hopefully he'd continue to feel that way.

With Gajeel's sensitive nose, it didn't take him very long to find the targets while scouting ahead. As soon as they got close, Gajeel leapt into action, turning his arms into iron rods and laying about himself with them. Following his lead, Juvia captured a couple of mages who were trying to attack from a distance in her Water Lock, taking care to stay out of the way of Gajeel's strikes and staying in her Water Body form in case of unexpected attacks.

In only a few minutes, the dark mages were subdued and tied up so they could be dragged to the authorities in the nearby town, who were the ones who hired them. Once their targets had been turned in, Gajeel turned to her. "Not bad for a newbie," he allowed, and Juvia couldn't keep her lips from curling up into a small smile. She'd never heard of Gajeel even coming close to praising someone before.

They reported back to Jose when they returned to Oaktown, and he was pleased that they'd completed the mission with ease. "It seems the two of you work well together," he remarked. "I'll keep that in mind for the future."

Juvia simply nodded, while Gajeel shrugged. "She knows to stay out of my way, at least."

Over the next few months, they were sent out on the occasional mission together, and always completed them successfully. As they got more used to each others' company, they even started to talk some, though Juvia had to be careful of Gajeel's moods - if he didn't feel like talking, he made his opinion very plain.

It was as fall was starting to fade into winter that Juvia realized that Gajeel had truly accepted her as something close to a friend. They'd been assigned to take out a pack of bandits that hid themselves somewhere in a large stretch of forest. They'd baited some of the bandits into attacking them, and Juvia was concentrating on Water Locking a couple of them for just long enough so that they'd pass out so they could easily be questioned later. An iron rod whistled through the air behind her, barely missing the back of her hair to strike a bandit that had been sneaking up behind her.

As she whipped her head around towards him, he snapped, "Pay attention! You know better than to let your guard down!"

"Y-Yes!" Turning so that her back faced his, Juvia released the two bandits from her Water Lock and letting them fall to the ground unconscious. Taking in her surroundings, she fired lashes of water at the few bandits that were still up. They went down in short order, and Juvia let Gajeel rough up the ones she'd knocked out to get the location of the bandits' hideout out of them while she thought over what had just happened. She'd never expected Gajeel to look out for anyone but himself, and he'd expressed confidence in her skills, however backhandedly.

Dropping the last guy he was questioning back on the ground, Gajeel straightened up and walked over to her. "Did you find out what was needed?"

"Yeah. They're holed up in a cave system five miles up the river."

Nodding, she replied, "Then let's get going, Gajeel-kun! Sooner they're all taken out, the better, right?" As casually as she'd slipped the new honorific she'd decided to use for him into the conversation, she still held her breath a little as she waited for his reaction.

He raised an eyebrow at her, but just said, "Yeah, let's go." Falling into step beside him, she smiled a little to herself. That was probably about as good of an acceptance of the change as she was going to get from him.

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