Chapter 7

Punishment

The next day, Lucy gathered all of her things before dumping a cold glass of water on Bickslow as he snored away on the tiny couch in Lucy's hotel room.

"What the hell, Cosplayer?" he sputtered.

Lucy snickered. "Wakey, wakey, Sleeping Beauty. It's nearly noon and your snoring was getting on my nerves."

"Noon? Sweet Mavis, why'd you let me sleep so long? And I do not snore."

The blonde woman snorted. "Oh, please. Your snoring could wake the dead, Bix. You're just lucky I'm used to dealing with Natsu and Gray's snoring, otherwise I would've killed you in your sleep. Besides, you looked like you needed your rest."

Bickslow glared at her but grumbled a thank you anyway. "Your damn fox spirit kept me up half the night trying to play with my babies."

Lucy tilted her head in mild confusion. She must have slept like a rock if she hadn't heard any of that. "Your babies? I didn't realize you had them with you. I was wondering where they were, actually."

Bickslow grunted as he stood up to stretch. Lucy cringed at all the cracking she heard from his protesting back. "The babies can't keep quiet to save their lives so I had to deactivate them when we were following you yesterday. I got their totems out when I laid down last night and that stupid fox kept knocking them off the table."

Lucy covered her mouth, trying to hide her giggle. "I'm sorry."

"Are you sure he's really a fox? I swear, he acts more like a damn cat. And yesterday! I thought the mayor was going to declare him the official town mascot! I mean, seriously, how did he get away with everything he did to this town just by looking at the man and rubbing on his legs?"

Lucy let out a peel of laughter. "That's always how Vulpy's been. One look with his innocent, puppy-dog eyes and he could probably get away with murder."

"That sounds familiar," Bickslow said, looking at her pointedly.

She smirked. "I have no idea what you're talking about." Bickslow rolled his eyes and Lucy smiled coyly. "Vulpy was an excellent teacher," she added with a wink.

The Sieth mage chuckled as he gathered his things. A loud rumble then sounded from his stomach. Lucy giggled at him. "Sounds like someone's hungry. Come on, let's go. We'll get lunch at the guild."

"At the guild!" Bickslow exclaimed. "But that's a four hour train ride from here! I could die of starvation by then!"

Lucy rolled her eyes. "Oh, you poor baby! Four hours without food! Whatever will you do?" Bickslow looked at her indignantly and she laughed. "It's not going to take us four hours to get there, Bix. We aren't taking the train."

"Then how are we getting there?"

Lucy smiled and held up her purple bag from yesterday. "With the help of a black hole, of course!"

Bickslow smiled broadly, his tongue lolling from his mouth in excitement. "Sounds like fun!" Quickly, he gathered the rest of his things and in no time Lucy was preparing the black hole.

"All right, you have to hold onto me, Bickslow," Lucy said as she stood in front of the tall man. Gently, Bickslow placed his hands on Lucy's shoulders. Impatiently, Lucy spun around to face him, giving him a pointed look. "Really, you know that's not going to work. Here-" she said as she seized his wrists and pulled them tightly around her body. He now appeared to be holding her rather romantically. When he realized this he stiffened up and gulped. He'd be a dead man if the Boss ever saw this out of context. Lucy rolled her eyes and turned herself around in his arms so her back was against his chest. "Sweet Mavis, Bix. Relax, I'm not going to bite."

Bickslow snorted but relaxed a little.

"You ready?"

"I'm ready, Cosplayer," he said with excitement in his voice.

Lucy smirked wickedly to herself. "Okay, hold tight!" she said as she led his forward to fall away into the nothingness of the black hole.

As Lucy expected, Bickslow couldn't hold back a terrified scream as they fell through the abyss. He now clung sharply to her waist, all previous aversion to touching her forgotten. The second their feet hit solid ground again, Bickslow collapsed to the floor of the guild, now wrapped around Lucy's legs, completely terrified.

Lucy took one look at the shaking mage and bust out laughing. Their arrival in the corner of the guild had already captured everyone's attention so, when the Celestial wizard doubled over, clutching her stomach in violent laughter, everyone seemed to exchange questioning looks and raised eyebrows. Cautiously, Evergreen and Freed made their way to them, followed by a brooding Laxus.

"Bickslow," Evergreen said gently as she crouched next to the pale and visorless man. "Are you all right?"

The blue and black haired man looked up at teammate with petrified eyes. Not daring to believe he was safely on solid ground again, Bickslow wrapped himself more firmly around Lucy's legs as he trembled. Lucy snickered as she reached down to gently run a hand through the man's hair to calm him. She tried to keep the laughter from her voice but failed. "Aww, some on, Bix. It wasn't that bad."

Said man looked up at her incredulously as Gray, Erza, and Natsu came to see what all the fuss was about. "What have you don't to Bickslow, Lucy?" Erza asked curiously.

"I haven't done anything to him," Lucy said while trying to hide her guilty smile.

Gray was the first one to realize what had put Bickslow in such a state. He chuckled deeply and shook his head in sympathy. "That's cruel, Lucy. You didn't tell him what it's like to travel through a black hole, did you?"

Natsu paled where he stood and look as if he might be sick. "That's not fair, Luce! Stupid black hole is worse than a train!"

Lucy laughed as she continued to stroke Bickslow's hair. "I really don't think it's that bad."

"Only because you're used to it," Gray offered. "For the rest of us, it's awful traveling like that for the first time."

She giggled. "You passed out your first time, didn't you, Gray?"

This seemed to jar Bickslow from his near catatonic state. He released her legs and looked up at her with an expression of utter betrayal. "You knew this would happen?"

Lucy chuckled lightheartedly. "I knew it could affect you in some way. I had no way of knowing how it would, though."

Lucy smirked and Bickslow yelped as he scrambled away from her to hide behind a shocked Freed. "That's not right and you know it, Cosplayer!" he complained.

"Well, maybe next time you'll think twice before following me on a solo mission, then." Bickslow's mouth fell open and she looked at him smugly. "You can consider this your punishment."

"That's a dirty, rotten trick, Cosplayer!"

Lucy folded her arms across her chest and looked at him, mildly amused. "You deserved it and you know it."

Bickslow looked affronted. "I thought we bonded yesterday, Lucy!"

Lucy laughed loudly. "We did, Bix. But that doesn't mean you get out of punishment. If you want, I'll gladly add on to it and bring Vulpecula out to terrorize your babies."

Bickslow's eyes grew wide in horror. "Evil woman! You keep that damned fox away from my babies!" Lucy laughed again as Bickslow dashed away from her and toward Mira at the bar.

"That's what I thought," she muttered with a smile.

Slowly, the guild went back to normal, everyone laughing at Bickslow's expense. After that, it didn't take Lucy long to get lost in the guild's atmosphere. Sipping on her usual strawberry smoothie, Lucy happily glanced around at her chaotic, loving family. She was glad to be home, even if it didn't last as long as she wanted it to.

Lucy chanced a glance at Laxus as he sat listening to his sound pods at a table with his team across the guild. He wasn't looking at her but she could tell he was still angry with her. She sighed and turned back to her conversation with Levy. She didn't like Laxus being upset with her but, honestly, she wasn't sure she could handle him knowing the truth about her illness. She's already let him down once when she left the guild to train. She didn't want to let him down again with the knowledge of her looming death. It wasn't right and it wasn't fair, but Laxus would just have to remain mad at her because there was no way she was going to tell him the truth. Not yet, anyway.


A/N: Sorry this one isn't very long my lovelies. I hope you enjoy it anyway and I promise I'll have the next one up soon. This was more of a filler chapter so I could build to my next few major scenes. Anyway, after the holiday this week, I'll be sure to post at least two more chapters to make up for how short this one is. Hope you all have a lovely Thanksgiving!

~Andromeda