A/N: CHA! Another chapter down!
Two chapters written in two days! I'm on a roll right now! LOL! This chapter doesn't have a lot of action in it. It's really here to set up the missions that the guild members will be going on. Now, not all the characters and their missions are not mentioned in the chapter. More missions will start being revealed as more chapters come along, so if your character and their mission isn't mentioned in this chapter then please be patient. They will be showing up soon! Oh! And if you all ever have any ideas that you would like to see played out, then please let me know! I do take in ideas, as dreadburner94 has been continuously helping me out with a lot of things! So you are all welcome to send something in and I'll see what I can do to make it happen!
I would like to thank all of you that sent in reviews last chapter!
Haley Le - Glad that I could make your day with the upload of the last chapter! And yes, the scouting for the GMG's have begun! Hope you enjoy this chapter!
Resmesh - Glad to hear that you enjoyed the last chapter so much! I hope you enjoy this chapter as well!
Blazingfire55 - Happy to hear that you liked the last chapter! Hope you enjoy this chapter too!
dreadburner94 - LOL! I was happy to hear how much you loved Kokou! She actually turned out to be a good number of people's favorite character for last chapter. And I absolutely love writing her! I hope you enjoy this chapter as well!
Joshua1277 - Glad to hear that you've enjoyed all the characters so far! I hope you like where the story ends up going from here and this next chapter as well!
FracturedDolly - Glad to hear that I could make your day with the upload of the last chapter! And I'm happy to hear that I was able to get Mahrin-Kah's character correct for you! I hope you enjoy this chapter!
Zades - Happy to hear that you enjoyed the last chapter and that you're excited for the GMG's! I hope you enjoy this chapter as well!
Guest - Glad to hear that you're enjoying the story so far! And yeah, Samuel will have bad memories/stories as well. For now though, I've been making them happy/funny for the opening of the story. I hope you enjoy this chapter!
Cat the Alien - CHA! I was so happy to hear that you are in love with the story! That made my day! And I'm so glad that Kokou turned out so well for you! I absolutely LOVE writing her character! Her character basically allows me to do whatever I so wish with her since she's just so out there. I love her! And I was happy to hear that you now enjoy Titan as well. I think he had a slow start to the story, but he's coming along really well now; and I think that's partly due to Kokou's character. They do work very well together. And yeah, I do always re-read my work before I post it to edit it. I tend to miss a few things every now and then, such as spelling, but I try my best with it! I'm hoping I get a home run with you on this chapter! The chaos hasn't quite started yet, but it's definitely coming! And CHA! I got this uploaded before your December 6th date! I hope you enjoy this chapter!
Gureifox - Yeah, you got it right with the GMG's! LOL! I hope you continue to like Mahrin-Kah, especially when I can get her to use her magic. And I was happy to hear that you enjoy Kokou as well! A lot of people enjoyed her character, myself included. And I'm glad your three characters turned out well for you! I think Reese will be a lot of fun for me to write! I hope you enjoy this chapter!
I don't own Fairy Tail!
Please enjoy!
Chapter 6
"Come on, Rin-chan!" Anna smiled, trying to pull the girl towards the group of three mages that she had planned to have Mahrin-Kah pair up with. She left finding a new mission to Liam and Shaw, trusting that Liam would be able to find a decent job and that he would be able to talk Shaw into going on said job.
"I…I don't know," Mahrin-Kah replied, feeling more nervous than she had on her walk back to Thunder Stone, "What if they don't like me?"
"How are you ever going to know if you don't introduce yourself?" Anna asked. The lighter blonde woman hoped that her people skills were as good as people said they were. She figured the people she would be pairing Mahrin-Kah up with would be able to help her out with her confidence. Anna was sure things would work out. If not, then things might blow back up in her face. Anna puffed her cheeks out in slight irritation when Mahrin-Kah just continued to stare down at the floor, "I say you're going! So you might as well get a move on! You can't be a hermit all your life, Rin-chan!"
"But why not?" Mahrin-Kah retorted quietly, "Life would be much quieter that way."
Anna huffed at her question, "It's not healthy!"
"You sound like my aunt."
"Good!" Anna said, "Now, let's go!" she added, pushing the younger girl towards the kitchen. Once they finally made it to the doorway, Anna peeked her head inside, "Hello?"
"Anna!" Hikari beamed, her head popping up from the mission paper her, Terran and Kimera had been reading over. Flora sat on top of her head, waving to the older blonde woman.
"Afternoon Hikari," Anna answered with her own smile, "Did you three find a mission?"
"Of course!" Hikari answered, "Kimera managed to push a bunch of the guild members out of the way in order to snag a decent mission."
"Is that true?" Anna asked with a laugh, looking over at Kimera.
"Wellllllll," the brunette replied, rubbing the back of her head nervously, "Everyone was in the way and no one would move, so I just kinda pulled my sledge hammer out on them."
"You always manage to escalate things quickly, don't you?" Anna asked.
"It worked, didn't it?!" Kimera retorted loudly.
"I suppose so," Anna laughed, "I'm actually not here to tease you today, even if it is rather fun," she explained, earning a huff from Kimera, "I was hoping I could introduce you to someone and hope that you'll take them on your mission with you."
"Who is it?" Terran asked, trying to see around Anna for the person she was talking about.
"Rin-chan!" Anna announced excitedly, stepping to the side to reveal the younger blonde.
"Um, Anna," Hikari said, "There's no one there."
"Huh?" Anna questioned, looking behind her. Where Mahrin-Kah should have been was simply a blinking outline of where the young woman had been standing, "Riiiiiiiiiin-chaaaaaaaaaan!" Anna whined, catching a glimpse of the blonde sneaking away. Anna managed to grab Mahrin-Kah's arm before she got too far and dragged her into the kitchen, "This is Mahrin-Kah Krists, aka Rin-chan. She's fairly new to the guild and doesn't have a team to work with yet. Would you three be willing to take her with you on your mission?" she asked with wide, puppy dog eyes.
"Well, I simply can't say no to that face," Hikari grinned, "Of course she can come with us. It's nice to meet you Rin-chan!" she said, taking over Anna's nickname for her. She stuck her hand out to greet the blonde, "My name's Hikari!"
"Um…it's nice to meet you too," Mahrin-Kah answered quietly, looking towards the floor. She also didn't shake Hikari's hand in return, causing the Earth Dragon Slayer to frown.
"Don't take offense to her reaction," Anna said quickly, not wanting the team to start off on a bad foot, "Rin-chan is really shy."
"I see," Hikari smiled softly, "Then there's no offense that's been made."
"Good," Anna said, "Well, I will leave her to you three. I have to go make sure my teammates have found a job to work."
"More like you have to make sure Shaw is ready to move it," Kimera laughed.
Anna laughed nervously before she quickly exited the kitchen.
"Welcome to the team," Terran said, turning his attention back to Mahrin-Kah, "My name's Terran and the klutz over there is Kimera," he grinned, pointing over to the brunette.
"Hey! Why do I get the crappy introduction?!" Kimera shouted.
"You are the one that that almost ruined the second batch of cookies," Terran teased.
The two continued to argue while Hikari simply laughed at them and looked towards Mahrin-Kah. She watched as the girl flinched from their loud voices, looking more nervous than she did when she had been pulled into the kitchen.
"Rin-chan," Hikari said softly, "You don't need to be scared of them. They argue like that all the time. They don't mean anything by it," she explained, earning a nod from Mahrin-Kah, "Now, why don't you tell me about what you can do with your magic and we'll explain the mission we're going on."
"All right," Mahrin-Kah answered, choosing to trust the smiling girl in front of her.
. : + : .
"I found our mission!" Zander announced, slamming a piece of paper down on the table that the rest of his team sat at.
The other five members stared at him for a moment before Walker finally spoke, "And we don't get a say in this at all?"
"Yeah, we have a few other options here, ya know!" Yuna shouted, "Aren't we supposed to be doing this as a team?"
"We have to take this one," Zander retorted, "Look at how much money is being given for the reward. And it's just up at Mt. Hakobe, so it's not all that far from here."
"Let me see the request paper," Quinn said, feeling like there was more to this mission than Zander was telling them. No one just randomly goes up to Mt. Hakobe unless there's a good reason for it. The place was always freezing and snowing and filled with ugly gorilla creatures. Zander did as she asked, knowing it was a bad idea to start an argument over something so stupid. Quinn took the paper and began reading over it, her eyes scanning over the description and the reward. When she was finished, her eyes peered over the top of the paper at Zander. She stared him down for a long moment. She saw him smiling, but there was an unusual seriousness that his eyes held. Finally, she sighed heavily and sat the paper down on the table.
"So what do you think, girlie?" Diesel asked, Ink sitting on top of his head, "Is the job worth it."
"Well, it does pay 500,000 jewels," Quinn answered, "So that's 100,000 jewels for each of us."
"Then what the hell are we waiting for?!" both Diesel and Yuna shouted.
"What's the actual job, Quinn?" Walker asked, wanting to know what was worth so many jewels.
"Taking out a dark guild," she answered, looking straight at Zander, "Jobs like this are normally left to someone with an S-Class mage on their team, Zander. Why would you choose something like this for our first team mission?" she asked, but in reality she knew why; or at least part of the reason why. She had kept the last part of the reward to herself, though she hadn't really been sure why. She knew that if she brought it up, the others would think that Zander was being selfish since he would get the most use out of it. It just so happened to be the sword that the leader of the dark guild claimed as his own.
"It's only five dark mages and there are five of us," Zander answered, "It can't be all that hard to take them down. And it doesn't say that we need an S-Class mage for the mission either. Plus, look at that reward," he said, giving Quinn a knowing look.
The two stared each down for a moment, Walker looking between the two. He inwardly sighed, having a feeling that something else was going on that the two weren't talking about. Somehow, Walker knew that the mission would end up being more trouble than it was actually worth. It wouldn't be until much later that he had wished that he had listened to what his instincts were telling him.
"Fine," Quinn said, earning cheers from Yuna and Diesel and Zander's infamous smirk, "We'll take this mission. But I swear, Zander, this job better go off without a hitch, what with you being so confident about it."
"Don't be so worried," he answered, "Unless you think you can't hold your own against one tiny mage?"
Quinn stood, carrying the request paper with her. She slammed the paper into his chest, "That's not what I'm worried about at all," she said under her breath to make sure the other members of their team wouldn't hear her, "Just don't do anything stupid for a sword." Zander stared back at her, not saying anything. She finally let her arm drop and Zander grabbed hold of the paper, "All right you guys," she said in a louder voice, "Pack what you need and meet back down here in thirty minutes. And I suggest you all wear something warm."
Everyone separated, heading down towards the dorms to collect their things. Zander stood upstairs for a moment longer than the rest of his team, staring after Quinn. She was definitely smarter than he gave her credit for sometimes and she hadn't even mentioned the sword to the others. He would probably have to thank her for that. Though, she hadn't managed to uncover the true reason for his persistent pushing of taking this mission; but then again, no would know that reason other than himself and Maddox. He stared back down at the request paper and his face turned into a scowl.
"Norman Randulf," he said lowly, crumpling the paper in his hand before walking down towards the dorms himself.
. : + : .
"Did you two manage to find a decent mission?" Anna asked as she approached Liam and Shaw, who sat at a table drinking.
"Well, Miss Anna," Shaw smirked, "What a pleasure it is to see youuuuuu," he said, slurring the end of his sentence as usual.
"It's good to see you're awake enough to greet me properly," Anna retorted. She hadn't meant to sound so mean, but she was still a bit miffed that the man hadn't gone on a mission with her a week ago.
"Now, now Anna," Liam interrupted them, setting down his empty beer glass, "You should know by now how Shaw is."
Shaw simply smirked at the blonde woman. Her eye twitched in irritation, hating that he could always get away with things when Liam was around. Anna was normally a very patient woman, considering she was the only woman that could put up with both Liam's and Shaw's attitudes at the same time; but Shaw always tended to test her patience. She took a deep breath before she decided to speak again. If she got to overbearing with the drunken man, he would just pretend to fall asleep. Anna knew he would do it too from her own personal experiences.
"So," she began again, looking over at Liam, "Did you find a mission?"
"Yes, we did," Liam answered.
"And did you manage to convince Shaw to go as well?"
"Of course," he replied, "You just have to know how to talk to him. Shaking him profusely and telling him he drinks too much won't light a fire under him," he said, smirking at Anna.
Anna sweat dropped and laughed nervously after hearing Liam's words, "So you found out about that?" she asked, sending a small glare over at Shaw. The blonde man just continued drinking out of his flask like he did nothing wrong.
"Of course I found out about it," Liam said.
"Well, you weren't here and I thought it would be better to go on a mission with Shaw rather than by myself," she explained, her voice picking up into a faster pace the farther she got into her story, "But he wouldn't budge from the bar and he just kept taking shot after shot and he wouldn't even look at me and-"
"Calm down, Anna," Liam said, cutting her off. He tried to hide his smile, but he couldn't help the lift of the corners of his mouth when he heard Shaw's deep laughter. His friend didn't find humor in many things, but Anna always managed to get him to laugh. It was a feat that Anna didn't even realize she could accomplish.
She looked between to the two smiling men and puffed her cheeks out in a pout, "It's not funny! I just wanted to go on a mission with him!" she shouted, pointing at the droopy eyed blonde.
"All right, all right," Liam said, hoping to get the woman to calm down, "Shaw, maybe you should try to go on a mission with her next time. It wouldn't be so bad."
"Says youuuuuu," he slurred, "She would just nag me about my drinking."
"And Anna," Liam said, turning to the woman, "Maybe you could refrain from mentioning his drinking so often."
"I suppose," she answered.
"Good, so next time I'm gone on my own, promise me that you'll go on a mission with her, Shaw," Liam requested.
Shaw looked between Anna and Liam before he sighed, "Fine. I'll go on a mission with herrrrrr."
"Thank you," Liam said.
"So what's the mission you found?" Anna asked, wanting to change the subject.
"It's a string of kidnappings out in a town called Bouvardia. It's about a day's train ride from here," Liam explained, "The locals have tried to solve the kidnappings themselves, but have come up empty handed. They have now begun asking for help from guilds."
"Who's being kidnapped? Men or women?" Anna asked.
"Children, actually," Liam answered, a serious look covering his face.
Anna frowned at that information. She loved children just about as much as Liam, so it was very concerning to her that someone was kidnapping children from this town, "Do the townspeople know why the children are being kidnapped?"
"That's why we're being hirrrrrrrrred," Shaw answered.
"He's right," Liam added, "We have to go to the town and solve the mystery ourselves."
"Then let's go!" Anna announced.
"Wait a moment," Liam said, "Just let Shaw stock up on some alcohol and you should go grab anything you may need."
Anna gave the pair a long stare, the blonde woman having a hard time not saying anything about Shaw's alcohol consumption, but she managed to keep her mouth shut. She began to make her way downstairs to go grab a few things from her room when she promptly turned on her heels to ask Liam one last question, "And just exactly how did you get Shaw to go on this mission with us?"
"I promised him a barrel of beer every day for a month," Liam smirked.
Anna's eye twitched again upon seeing the two men smiling again, "Of course you did!" she shouted, throwing her hands up into the air as she began making her way back to her room.
"She's gonna be fun on this misssssssssion," Shaw said with his own smirk.
"Always," Liam smiled back towards his friend.
. : + : .
"Kokou wants to fight monsters!" Kokou shouted, standing off against Titan with a heated look in her eyes.
"Look, freak-a-zoid," Titan retorted, "We'll make more money on this mission!" he shouted, pointing down at the request paper of the job he wanted to take. The one that Titan had chosen was protecting a museum from a master thief that had apparently sent a threat to the museum owner. The thief demanded one of the priceless relics that the museum owned or else he would steal it along with countless other items in the museum.
"That mission is boring, rock monster!" Kokou shouted, "Kokou will fall asleep before anything happens!"
"You chose the last mission," Titan said, "Actually, you choose all our missions!"
"That's because Kokou knows what she's doing unlike the rock monster!"
"Would you just let her pick the mission," Tejil sighed.
"Why are you always on her side?!" Titan shouted, shoving his face into Tejil's face.
"First off, get out of my face," Tejil said with a straight face, pushing Titan away from him, "And second, you know she's going to get her way anyways. I don't know why you always insist on arguing with her. You always lose."
"Music man is right," Kokou smirked devilishly, "Rock monster does always lose."
Titan groaned in defeat, "Fine! Go pick out a mission, Kokou."
"Kokou wins! Kokou wins! Kokou wins!" she sang in repetition as she walked back towards the board.
"Don't worry, Titan," Tiger said, patting his partner's head, "One day, you'll get to choose a mission."
"Thanks for the encouragement, buddy," Titan sighed.
"We'll be taking that mission then," Planteggs said in a sly voice, plucking the request paper up from the table that Titan had sat it on, "Too bad about that reward, though."
"Yeah, we'll be sure to show it to you when we get back from the mission," Snagget laughed, "I can't believe you let a woman talk you out of a mission."
"You're one to talk," Tejil retorted, "You do everything your sister says, even though you're the older twin."
Snagget scowled at the brunette, but his sister's hand in front of him stopped him from attacking Tejil, "That's enough, Snagget," Planteggs said, "Besides, he's not worth our time. I hope you do realize that you are talking to two S-Class mages."
"Tch, your brother only got that title because of you," Tejil said lowly, remembering last year's S-Class Exams and how the twins barely slid by in them. He normally didn't let things get to him, but Tejil felt it was wrong for Maddox to give the twins the S-Class title when they didn't even understand the true meaning of family.
"A little jealous are we?" Planteggs asked with a wicked smile, "Just because you're a failure doesn't mean you need to take it out on my brother."
Before anything else could be said between the two groups, a sudden crash interrupted them. Kokou slammed herself between the two groups, cracking the stone beneath her. She sent a fierce glare and a vicious snarl at the Cipini twins.
"If the creepy poison ivy lady is done, she should leave," Kokou growled lowly.
"What a beast you are," Planteggs huffed.
"Kokou could smash you with one hand and creepy poison ivy lady knows this," Kokou stated.
Planteggs stared Kokou down for a long moment before she pushed her nose up into the air and turned on her heel, "Come on, Snagget," she said, "We have work to do."
Snagget sent one last glare at Tejil before he followed his sister out of the guild.
"Kokou doesn't like the creepy poison ivy lady," Kokou said after the twins were gone, "She's creepy."
"I think we got that she's creepy," Titan said.
"Music man should stay away from them," Kokou said, turning to look at Tejil.
"I can handle myself just fine," Tejil replied.
"What got into you back there?" Titan asked, "You're normally not like that."
"Sorry," Tejil answered, "They just get under my skin is all. Acting like they're better than everyone else."
"Just ignore them," Titan said, "They can't do much to us anyways. Like Kokou said, she could take them out with one hand. And I'm sure we could make some damage ourselves," he smirked. Tejil nodded at the Stone Dragon Slayer, trying his best to shake off his anger, "So, did you find a mission, Kokou?"
"Kokou found the best mission!" she announced loudly, throwing the hand holding the request paper in the air, "Kokou's gonna go beat up some monsters!"
"Let me see the request please, Kokou," Tejil said. Kokou handed over the paper to Tejil, "Well, I guess she's telling us the truth. There are some monsters over in Clover Town terrorizing the town and its people."
"All right, then let's go," Titan said.
"Kokou bets she can beat up more monsters than the rock monster!" she shouted, running out of the guild ahead of the two men.
"Whatever!" Titan shouted back, "I'll bring down those monsters before you can even touch one!"
Tejil finally smiled as he leisurely followed his team out of the guild, whistling as he walked out the doors.
. : + : .
Maddox sighed in relief as he watched Akemi and Zell make their way out of the guild for their own mission. The guild was completely quiet now. All of his guild members had found missions to go on and all of them had left to go complete them. He had at least a good three days to himself and he had to say that it felt strange to be alone after always having some sort of excitement around him at the guild. He might actually be able to catch up on some of the paperwork he had been procrastinating on.
Suddenly, footsteps interrupted his thoughts. Maddox looked behind him to see Judge walking up towards him at the bar.
"I'm surprised you're still here," Maddox finally said, "You normally sneak out without any notice."
"Yes, well, I'm feeling unusually social today," Judge replied in a deep voice.
"I think you're stretching the meaning of the word 'social'," Maddox said, looking around the empty guild.
Judge simply shrugged before showing a request paper to Maddox, "I'll be taking this mission."
"That's fine, but I'm not sure why you're even bothering to show it to me," the older man said, quirking an eyebrow, "You've never showed me any of the missions you've taken over the past year."
"I thought this one might interest you personally," Judge stated.
Maddox grabbed the paper and quickly read over it, "So you're going to take a dark guild on your own?"
Judge sighed before he explained himself, "It's not necessarily the dark guild you should be paying attention to. It's how many times they have been hired and by who."
Maddox read over the description of the mission again, seeing the name Phantasm show up a few times when this specific dark guild would loudly announce who hired them during their missions, "Should I be aware of this Phantasm?" Maddox asked, looking back at Judge.
"I think you should just remember that name," Judge answered, taking the request paper back from Maddox, "I should be back within a few days. If this guild is stupid enough to announce who hired them for work, then they shouldn't be any problem to take out."
"Judge," Maddox said with a stern voice, stopping the other man in his tracks. Judge peered over his shoulder to show that he was listening to the older man, "Why would you even bother telling me about this Phantasm?"
Judge simply smirked at his question, "It seems that you care for this guild, so I thought you might appreciate the early warning."
"Early warning for what?"
"All in due time, Maddox," he answered before walking out of the guild.
Maddox stared grimly after the man before he headed down to his office. He needed to write that name down for future references. He would have a small job for Azielle to complete when she came back to the guild.
A/N: There you go! I hope you all enjoyed the chapter! I'll have the next one up soon!
Please remember to review!
Yours Truly,
MyDearWatson