I'M BACK! MISS ME?

To everyone who have been waiting patiently THANK YOU FOR WAITING!

I'm sorry it took so long guys...I got sick...Ok, I only got to work on my story the entire time but THAT WAS ON A NOTEBOOK! i wasn't allowed to stay on the computer long enough to type this out HONEST!

Shout out to CapitalCheerios! HEY SIS!

AND TO EVERYONE WHO HAS FAVORITED OR/AND FOLLOWED THIS STORY!

I LOVE YOU PEOPLE!

Sadly, Natsu and everyone else knows that I do not own Fairy Tail...They know how much I want it tho...

Chapter 10

The Challenge

Lucy rolled over and yawned. She had stayed up late last night, trying to figure out what her powers were, hoping that after a week she would finally have some type of clue. No. Such. Luck. She sat up and looked around her room.

(Do you wanna know what it looks like? To bad Imma tell you anyway!)

It was big with a bathroom attached and just to the right of the front door was a little mini-kitchen. She had checked it every night when she got back to the room and it had been fully stocked every time! All the ingrediants for the food she made would be there as if she had never used it in the first place. The entire room was shades of pink, white, and creamy yellow. The ceiling was really dark blue with different constellations that Lucy was proud to know the names of.

The room also had a long cream couch, a walnut coffee table, a white door that led to the closet (the bathroom door was dark pink), a fluffy bed with a white comforter and light pink pillows. She found no pet bowls but Happy had told her that he enjoyed eating from plates like she did so she, of course, complied. The cups and plates in the little kitchen were a rich dark emerald green.

The bathroom had a black tile floor, a soft pink sink and tub. It also had a stand-up shower attached that Lucy really doubted that she would ever use. She had already unpacked her belongings and seeing them had made her feel a little better. They added little homey touches.

Lucy sat up in the bed and looked around for Happy. He was curled up on the pillow beside her. After she prodded him, he stretched and crawled over to sleep on her lap. She would have protested but he just looked so peaceful! She gently set him down and walked out onto the balcony that was beside her bed.

She smiled as she gazed out, watching the town she had grown to love go about it's day in the distance. She stayed that way for as long as she could before her growling stomach drew her away. She approached the kitchen and started making a big batch of bacon and sausage. Halfway through, she began to wonder where breakfast was supposed to be that day. Thinking of this reminded her of her first morning in the castle.

She had been cooking herself some breakfast when a knock sounded on the door. Puzzled, she had opened it to find Mira, Erza and a tired looking Jean.

Mira had smiled, "Hey Lucy, I was wondering if it would be alright if everyone met in your room. We all have kitchens, so we all go around from one room to another day after day." Seeing the look of alarm on Lucy's face, Jean had chuckled, "Don't worry, everyone that can cook brings food so you won't be cooking very much if you don't want to."

Lucy remembered giving a relieved laugh. "Yeah, that sounds like a great idea." Mira grinned and started walking away. Lucy had sighed and looked back into her room. Glancing at the couch, she had called out, "HEY! Can you have some people bring their own chairs? I only have a couch."

At this, Erza turned and gave her a secretive smile before replying, "Don't worry, I bet it's already been taken care of." Puzzled, Lucy stuck her head back into her room and glanced at the couch again. Only, now it was different.

One of the walls had been pushed back and there was a large TV sitting on a white entertainment center, complete with X-Box, DVD player, Wii and a glass door that had vast amounts of DVDs and games behind it. She now had a large, white, L-shaped couch, a smaller couch beside it and a big recliner (pink, of course) for her. The coffee table was in the middle of the couch square and it had grown several sizes larger until it looked more like a low dining table.

And, on her bed, was Jean. Lucy figured that she had sneeked in so that she could go back to sleep. Lucy didn't mind, it wasn't like she was going to go back to sleep, anyway. Smelling something burning, Lucy ran to her kitchen to find that her breakfast had burned. Groaning, she dumped it in the trash and decided to do her morning routine.

Lucy smiled, it had taken an entire day of airing the room out before the smoke had completly cleared. The last few days, breakfast had become an event that was always in either Lucy's room or one of her sisters'. As she finished cooking the last of the bacon in her fridge, Jean, the only other person awake at this insane hour, stumbled in, apologized for being there, and asked Lucy to wake her up when people came.

Lucy frowned at this before it struck her, breakfast was in her room today! Groaning, Lucy headed for the bathroom to begin her morning routine, ignoring the passed-out girl who had stumbled over and almost crushed Happy when she fell on Lucy's bed. Lucy smiled as she gradually began to wake up. She did her routine: take a bath, brush her teeth, change clothes, brush her hair and fix her bed (she had to wake Jean up, she just grumbled and practically slept-walked to the recliner and collapsed).

About half an hour later, a knock was heard and everyone began slowly coming in. Mira brought muffins, Wed brought waffles and woke her sister, Levy brought egg-in-the-middle and was (as usual) followed closely by a silent Gajeel, Sting brought scrambled eggs and Rouge followed, looking like he was going to start laughing any second, and Erza waltzed in eating a slice of strawberry cake. She glared at everyone, daring them to get close and bother her. No one did, of course.

Finally showing his face after her first night, Natsu walked in with two big plates of toast. He ignored Lucy's gapping at him and proclaimed loudly that one plate was his and everyone could share the other. Since the plate he claimed had three times as many pieces of toast on it, this earned him a death glare from Erza who had pounded into his head for the last century that not sharing fairly was a dangerous thing to do, and Jean, who was sitting beside him, reached over and gibbs-smacked him.

(If you don't know what gibbs-smacked is, it just means she smacked the back of his head REALLY HARD...it hurts to be gibbs-smacked)

"Fine!" He growled, " I'll share with Happy." Happy agreed with an "Aye!" before timidly grabbing 4 slices and making 2 fish sandwiches. Natsu's face was difficult to see, but Lucy swore she saw his mouth tilt up into a small half smile before tilting back into what seemed to be his poker face.

Everyone but Wendy was there and Lucy started feeling a little anxious. It vanished, however, when she strolled through the door holding a large plate of cinnamon rolls.

(Me + Cinnamon Rolls = ONE SIDE PEOPLE, THEIR MINE!)

She blushed. "Sorry. I had to make the icing so it took longer then I would have liked." Mira grinned at her. "It's alright. We'll forgive you, so long as we get one of those cinnamon rolls!" Wendy laughed and started passing the plate around.

"So Lucy," Erza said as she grabbed a roll, "Any results last night?"

Lucy grimaced, "Nope. Not even a little. You'd think it would show itself in a week but it's like it has a mind of it's own and is taking a really long nap." She paused before turning to Natsu. "Which reminds me, what are you doing here? I have to fight you later and you seriously irritate me"

Natsu paused his eating (which resembled a shovel cramming coal into a fire) and replied, "I came for the food. I want nothing to do with your petty problems."

Everyone in the room, except the three newcomers, barely showed that they had heard him. Lucy and her sisters, who weren't used to his attitude, all gaped at him. Lucy was the first to snap out of it. She stood up and pointed a finger at the door, "Out."

Natsu barely batted an eyelash. "No." Lucy's eyes flashed with rage. She grabbed the key to the room, which she had put on the keyring with her mother's keys, and pointed at the door again. "Get OUT!"

Natsu sighed and looked up to glare at her. "NO! My castle, my room, my rules." Lucy gripped the keys tighter and turned them about in her hand, it was a bad habit she had developed when she was a little girl and it had never gone away. She crossed the room and opened the door. "Out!"

"No!" Natsu stood up now. He looked really angry. "I don't want to!" He would have looked dangerous if it weren't for the fact that as he said this, he stomped his foot like a child and pouted cutely. "You can't make me."

"Well, I said to! For the love of Leo! You are such a spoiled brat!" Lucy cried as she continued to hold the door open while twirling her keys between her fingers in the other.

Natsu started growing now. "I don't have to leave if I don't wa-" He was interrupted by a shove that sent him sailing through the doorway. An orange-haired man calmly walked over and closed the door before taking the keys from Lucy and locking it.

He then turned, letting Lucy see his face for the first time. Lucy broke into a huge grin, knowing who it was immediantly. She had grown up seeing that face.

"Loke!" She exclaimed as she hugged him. Following her lead, Wendy and Juvia both came up and greeted the man who had made their escape possible. Stepping back, Lucy asked, "What are you doing here?"

Before he got the chance to answer her, the door burst off it's hinges and Natsu walked in. Or rather, something that vaguely resimbled Natsu, main difference being that this one had a lot of scales.. It glared at everyone before setting it's eyes on Lucy and Loke.

"You know what?" It growled, "I'm not waiting, you're going to fight me now!" With those words it charged through the door and tackled Loke. Or it tried to, Natsu, being as dumb as everyone expected, didn't take his new size into account so instead of tackling Loke, he ended up flattening Loke into a pancake.

Lucy was mortified. She couldn't do anything to help her dear friend, she could only stare at the horrifying trampling that was going on. She flinched as Natsu drove one of his fists into the Loke Pancake, making it hiss and squirm.

'There's nothing I can do..' Lucy thought as she hung back. Then, as if the answer had been there the entire bloody time, Lucy had the answer. She could use her powers. The powers that she had literally just figured out.

As fast as she could, Lucy ran up to Natsu and shouted, "Celestial Dragon's Roar!" A spew of deep gold shining fire burst from her mouth, and, to Lucy's surprise, it didn't burn. Instead, she felt joy as she gained a higher knowledge of her powers and realized what exactly Loke was. He was one of 14 guardians that were her defense. Her offensive was the ability to use any and all kinds of celestial magic, including a Celestial Dragon Slayer's magic. It had been like that for her mother, and her mother's father, Laxus. As long as they understood the stars and their patterns, her family could use that magic. Traced from one person every generation all the way back to her great-great-great grandfather, Makarov Dreyar.

(Did you see that coming? HUH! DID JA!?)

Grinning in satisfaction, she walked over to stand right over Natsu, who had shrunk back down. "I win," she announced before she leaned back to stepped over him and checked on Loke.

IF YOUR MIND HAS BEEN PERMANENTLY BLOWN AWAY, REVIEW PLEAZE!

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THANK YOU!