"Someone falls to pieces, sleeping all alone"
Gajeel looked at the naked body next to him with disinterest. Truth be told, he had already grown tired of his escapades with Minerva. She was so boring and monotonous compared to his ball of blue fire. It had been a while since he was turned on by being turned down. Already making a decision to seek her out to apologize before classes start, he started putting his clothes back on to leave.
"Come back to bed," the black haired maiden made a pout. "I'm sure Laxus won't mind us taking up his guest bedroom for the night."
"First, not gonna happen." Gajeel didn't even bother stopping to look at her while he tied his boots, "and second, there is no us" He checked his jacket pocket for his newly acquired property before running a hand through his hair. That's when he heard the sirens. "Fuck," he quickly stashed his drugs into his boots and made a beeline for the door to the room without a second thought to the girl on the bed. I need to get out of this house fast before the cops start questioning people.
"Someone kills the pain, spinning in the silence, to finally drift away."
Once out of the room, Gajeel blended with the crowd, trying to make himself unnoticeable and failing miserably. For once though, he observed that everyone's eyes had an excited light to them and no one was eyeing the tall pierced brute stalking in the shadows.
He noticed a particular 'buzz' among the young adults and that's when he noticed the music was turned off. The sirens stopped, indicating they had reached their destination, and instead of the usual running of the minors, the hum grew more distinct. "They found her unconscious." Buzz. Buzz. "No, she was alone." Buzz. Buzz. "...blood everywhere..." Buzz. "...clothes torn apart..." Buzz. "...Levy..." Buzz.
"Someone gets excited in a chapel yard, catches a bouquet."
Gajeel popped his head to attention at the mention of Shrimp's name. Everything in his mind focused on the party-goer by the upstairs railing who had whispered it, grabbing him roughly, "What did you say about Shrimp?" Fear quickly replaced the excitement in the poor soul's eyes as the crimson orbs flashed angrily at him. Gajeel knew what kind of aura he was giving off, but he needed to confirm what he heard. "Speak now if you want to keep the function of your limbs." He growled menacingly.
"W-w-who's Shrimp?"
After a quick roll of his eyes, Gajeel corrected himself, "Levy! What happened to Levy?!" gripping the boy even tighter.
"Aaah! S-sh-she..." He never got to finish because, just then, Gajeel saw three paramedics rushing towards the back of the house with a gurney towards the pool and garden area. He let his grip go and starting shoving his way down the stairwell filled to the max with curious onlookers. By the time he made it down the stairs and through the swarm of drunkards, the paramedics were already making their way back through, led by a furious looking trio.
"OUT OF THE WAY NOW!" Erza shouted as she pummeled through the bystanders to clear a path. Laxus and Mirajane had her flank, catching anyone that she missed.
Gajeel could feel the blood rush out of his face as he saw two of the EMTs pushing the stretcher as fast as they could while the third was working on chest compressions for the frail body below her. He saw a knot of blue hair at one end and quickly went into action. Using the path opened up, he quickly caught up to the group of attendants. "What happened?!"
"Sir, please stand back. We are trying to help her." A gloved hand pressed into his chest as he kept an easy pace with the team.
"WHAT HAPPENED?!" Gajeel wasn't going to back down so easily. He needed to know who to kill.
"SIR! We are trying to save her life right now!" the tallest attendant snapped, "If you care for your friend, you will let us do our job! Now, back off!"
They had reached the ambulance and were loading Levy into the back. Gajeel made an attempt to enter when a strong hand gripped his arm. "Gajeel."
He snapped his head at the voice shrouded in darkness, "Laxus, What the fuck happened?"
The grimace that his oldest friend had given him did no comfort to Gajeel's erratic thoughts. "We don't really know," he began. Taking a deep breath, the blond continued, "Mira found her and at first glance it looked like she had fallen and hit her head on a bench and was bleeding pretty badly. But then we turned her on her back to examine her..." Gajeel gripped his friend's shoulders urging him to finish his sentence. After swallowing the bile in his mouth, Laxus finally said, "When we turned to examine her...someone raped her Black Steel."
"Another lays a dozen white roses on a grave."
"To be yourself is all that you can do"
Her senses came back to her one by one. The first was smell. Where ever Levy was at, it reeked of sterility. With the sense of smell, she could also taste the plastic in her mouth. The next to come was her hearing. There was a whirring sound and a constant beep. She could hear air being forced out at regular intervals like a pump. Sight and touch both came at the same time as she could feel the plastic in her mouth extend all the way down her throat. Her eyes flew open and she fought against the air being forcibly pumped into her lungs. Alarms went off and she saw a flash of orange-red hair fly out the door as she struggled to take a breath. Finally, a nurse ran in quickly and efficiently pulled the tube out of Levy's mouth. She winced as she felt the pliant tube scrape against the walls of her trachea.
The pain came last. The pain from her head made everything fuzzy. Levy didn't remember much of what happened the past 24 hours, she just got snippets or images of the recent past. Her should was radiating the threat of pain from any slight movement from her torso. Then there was the pain from between her legs. She doesn't know why it was sore, but she has a lingering feeling of being stretched too fast and none too gently. Which brings her to the pain in her chest. Levy's heart was broken in the worst way and she did not know why. She felt the tears threatening to spill from the unknown. Her body knew and that was enough for Levy to let her tears fall openly.
"Sh-sh-sh" a smooth voice tried to soothe the sobbing Levy with a gently placed hand over her own. She instinctively drew away before focusing on her comforter.
"J-Jet?" her eyes grew wide and Levy lifted herself to throw her arms around her oldest friend. She cried out in pain as she recoiled her right arm to hold tightly to her body.
"To be yourself is all that you can do"
"It's okay Levy," He continued soothing her and getting closer so she wouldn't have to move, "I'm here now. Nobody is going to hurt you anymore." Jet simply held his dear friend as close as her IV's would allow as she gripped his shirt tightly and continuously sobbed into his chest. They held this position for longer than they could keep track of before he noticed that Levy's grip had loosened and she had fallen back to sleep.
Gently he laid her down before sinking back into the chair provided next to her bed, remembering what the doctor's told him of her condition: "When the EMTs had found her, Miss Levy had already entered a state of shock from the hit to the back of her head. Her breathing was erratic and her heart had stopped. They were able to resuscitate her in the ambulance and further assess her injuries. She has a dislocated shoulder that we have already reset and we ran a rape kit on her and who ever did this left plenty of evidence. From what we could determine, she fought back. There was blood in her mouth that wasn't hers and the amount of force needed to cause this much damage on her skull meant that the attacker needed to use extra force to contain her. Now, her brain has hemorrhaged so she is going to need surgery to drain excess blood to relieve the pressure on her brain. Are you able to give us a signature for release?"
Jet mutely nodded, still focusing on how the doctor just bypassed the fact that she was raped with the news that now she was still battling for her life. "She has no family. It's just me." The older woman made a sympathetic face as she handed him the necessary paperwork for Levy.
"We will save her. Just let us do our job and I promise you will be able to talk to her soon."
A/N: Next chapter: Gajeel and Jet meet (dun, Dun, DUN)
Special Shoutout: RepeatingSimplePhrases - stahp...you're making me blush...thanks :)
LittlestMe - Thanks! He enjoyed it very much. Sorry the last chapter was too real for you, but in all honesty, it was too real for me too. It's kinda why it took a little longer for me to publish it. Keep strong and live on. It's way better than the alternative.
Doraluan - Thanks! I'll try not to, lol.
Music Credit:
Be Yourself ~ Audioslave