Chapter Six: Helluva Welcome
"Hey, woman!"
Stefani opened her eyes and saw the bright artificial light shining in her face. In front of her was a very large man with a cloak over his body, and mask over his face. He put the light away from her face and grabbed her arm.
"Get up! The Master wants to see you." His gruff voice said as he roughly pulled her to her face. She could barely stand from being weak, but the man still dragged her out of the cell, making his way towards the creaky stairs. He brought her out of the dungeon-like area and into one of the rooms upstairs. When he walked inside, he threw Stefani on the floor like a rag doll and looked back at her.
"He'll be here soon." The large man spat out, before slamming the door behind her.
Stefani stood up slowly and looked at the bright light bulb above her, and the lamp that was on the table to her right. She closed her eyes and the light bulb seemed to dim, before exploding completely. Her body shined a bit, and she felt energy flowing through her body, just as the door opened again.
"What did I tell you about breaking my lights?" A deep voice said from behind her.
"How else am I supposed to get my energy." She answered.
She felt someone forcibly turn her around, and she was face to face with the Evil itself.
"The whole point of keeping you in trapped in the dungeon is so you don't have energy, woman." Rin growled.
"Get off of me." She warned him lowly.
"I know you know where she is Stefani." He gripped her tighter, causing her to wince in pain. "Where is my daughter."
"I don't know." Stefani lied.
"You're lying. I know you are. So when I finally do find her, I will turn her into my powerful little monster right in front of your eyes." He threatened. "So you better hope and pray that I don't."
"Why do you want her so bad?! She has no idea about how she is, let my daughter be a regular girl!" She yelled back.
"She's not regular, so I'm not going to pretend that she is. Stefani, you are alive, and you've been alive this entire time for a reason, remember that. The second I decide you are useless to me, you're dead." Rin said. "Tell me where Ecaterina is, now." He then demanded her.
"I don't know where she is." Stefani repeated. "You might as well kill me, bastard."
Rin smirked and caressed her face and said, "I'll get you to talk, Stefani. I was always good with my words...you'd honestly rather my son find her than me? Fine." He finally let go of her and walked back out of the room. "Take her back into her cell. And she gets no meal tonight." He told the guards outside of the door.
Once Stefani was back into her cell, she felt her energy depleting slowly and sat up against the wall, closing her eyes once again.
"No matter what they do to me...I'll never lead them to you, sweet Cat." She said softly. "I just hope you're ready when the time comes, because I dunno if I can hold him off for too much longer..."
"Yo, Cat!"
Cat looked down the road and saw Natsu walking over to her, waving and smiling.
"Hey!" She said as she felt her heart skip a beat, and waved back to him. When he got up to her, she noticed that he was alone. "You're by yourself today?"
"Well I was with Happy, but he smelled fish and took off." Natsu grinned. "Whatcha doing?"
"Eh, nothing much, I'm kinda bored today. There aren't a lot of requests so I guess it's a chill day for me." Cat said. She held her hand out and a small ball of light appeared, just as he sat down on the bench.
"So you use the same magic as Gray, huh? You can make anything out of light?"
"I sure can. Watch." The ball of light in Cat's hand suddenly turned into a mini version of Happy, causing Natsu to start laughing loudly.
"That's awesome! I wish the little buddy was here to see that. He'd be flattered." He got out. "Are you able to use your magic anywhere, or just in the light?"
"I can use it anywhere, but I feel stronger when I'm in lighted area. Like right now—" Cat pointed to the bright sun in the sky and continued. "I feel pretty strong because of the sun. But I can also use artificial light to my advantage as well."
"Artificial light? Like light bulbs?"
"Uh huh. I can even use my magic in darkness...but I begin to get tired if I use it for too long without a source of energy near by..." The mini Happy that was made out of light in her hand suddenly turned back into four balls of light, and she threw them in the air. They eventually disappeared, and she looked back over at Natsu, their eyes connecting for one second.
"Uh well, I was about to head back to the guild." He said, looking away and scratching his head nervously. "You wanna come with me?"
"Y-Yeah. Sure, let's go." Cat said, standing up.
When they had got back to the guild, it seemed as though everyone was pretty excited about something, which Cat had no idea about it.
"So you guys celebrate Halloween out here too?" Cat asked.
"Duh, girl!" Levy answered. "It's pretty important, besides the Fantasia Parade."
"It's pretty fun...Erza gets particularly excited about it too." Lucy whispered.
"Of course, I get to requip into as many gorgeous costumes as I can." Erza called out.
"I think the point is to only wear one costume a day." Levy said back.
"I like to think outside of the box, Levy!" Erza said back.
Levy giggled and looked at Cat, before saying, "So, are you going to participate in this years Halloween Festivities?"
"Hell yeah!" Cat answered. "What do you guys do?"
"Well on the day before, all of the town's vendors come out to the market square and have a mini-festival type thing. All of the things they sell are damn-near free, so it's pretty fun to catch some sweet deals on food and magic. But the real fun happens on Halloween." Levy started.
"Yup! It's like a big party throughout the entire town. Music is playing, people are showing off their costumes, we give the little kids candy. There's even a costume contest that the townspeople judge and everything." Lucy finished. "It's going to be amazing this year, Cat."
"I'm excited hearing about it! Too bad it's three weeks away." Cat said sadly.
"Eh, don't worry. Keep yourself busy with requests and it'll go by quick. Besides, there's rarely any dull moments in this crazy ass guild." Levy joked.
"Alright everyone, I need you to lend me your eyes and ears for a minute." Makarov's voice called out from a distance.
The guild hall fell silent, and Cat turned around, looking up and seeing Makarov standing on the top of the stairs, with Gildarts and Mirajane standing on both sides of him.
"As you know, Halloween is literally weeks away. This time is one of the most festive for Magnolia, besides the week of the Fantasia Parade. The Magic Council allows us to go all out, which means we cannot cause any attention to this guild up until then. The requests you go on...please just make sure you do the job you are asked to do. That's it. I know for some people, it's probably impossible to ask for no reparation damages on your behalf—" He started.
"Aw come on Gramps, you don't gotta put us on the spot like that!" Natsu called out.
"I didn't say any names, child." Makarov chuckled. "You just made yourself look guilty. Anyway, while it may be completely impossible to ask for no damages that we have to pay for and report back to the Council, please try to at least keep it to a minimum. This year is going to be even bigger and better than the last, so I need everyone's help to make our party the best in town."
"You don't gotta worry about that. Fairy Tail always throws the best parties." Gray smirked.
"I can definitely agree with that, and I haven't been here too long." Cat agreed.
"Well, that's all I have to say. Let's make this holiday season one of our best ones yet!" Makarov said, holding his finger up in the air.
"YEAH!" Everyone cheered, putting their fingers up in the air as well.
–
When Cat back to her bedroom later that night, she was expecting to take a shower and head straight to sleep. Instead, she had gotten an unwanted surprise when she walked into a completely ransacked room. Her bed was literally ripped apart (she had no idea who or what could've ripped a mattress and bed frame apart so easily), the majority of her clothes that were hung up in the closet were thrown on the floor, and the picture frames, writing utensils and other necessities that were on her desk were thrown and in pieces as well.
"What the..." She said, too shocked to even say one word.
"Hey Cat, we're about to take a bath—" Mirajane started as she walked into the room, but stopped when she saw the catastrophe. "Oh no! What happened?"
"I don't know...look at my bed! And my pictures...my clothes!" Cat yelled.
"Okay Cat, just take it easy..." Mirajane said to her, trying to calm her down.
"...My jewel!" Cat suddenly remembered, running straight to her drawer to search for the jewel she had kept in there in case of emergencies. Thinking that it was stolen, she was relieved to find out that it was still was still tucked in an envelope.
"What's going on? We heard screaming." Levy said as she ran into the room. She stopped in her tracks as well and gasped loudly. "Oh my goodness!"
"It seems as though her room was ransacked..." Erza said, walking into the room as well.
"What the hell is with all of the yelling?" Cana slurred as she walked inside as well, her eyes widening when she saw what everyone else was seeing. "Cat, you had a party in here all by yourself?" She joked.
Mirajane saw the pissed look that Cat was giving Cana, and immediately stepped in. "Cat, she's just a little tipsy. She didn't mean it." She said quickly.
"This is unacceptable." Erza said angrily. "I'm the superintendent of Fairy Hills, and I let this happen right under my nose."
"It's okay Erza. Obviously this happened when we were all at the guild hall." Levy said.
"Even still...Cat, I don't want you worrying about this. I will find out who did this, and why. Okay?" Erza told her.
"Okay..." Cat said sadly.
"You can sleep in my room with me tonight, Kitty. Tomorrow we can go shopping for some new bedroom items if you want." Levy said.
"Yeah...sounds good. Thanks." Cat said, giving a weak smile.
Who would do this to my room? Cat thought as they all cleaned up the glass and broken pieces off of the floor. They weren't looking for money...so what were they trying to do? Mom, do you have any ideas?
Cat waited for her mother to answer her in her thoughts, but heard nothing instead. You must be busy...it's okay..she said, smirking to herself.
