Csilla: The chapter we've been waiting for...
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Chapter 10: The Longest Night (part one)
It was late - that much Gray could deduce as he stared down the empty room that lead into an equally empty hallway. It was dark. And aside from occasional strips of moonlight painting the floor, onyx eyes caught glimmers of light from the room at the very end of the hall. The info broker's room. Levy and Lucy's room.
Drowsiness still evident in his mind, the former doctor dismissed it. Probably just one of girls pulling an all-nighter for an upcoming mission. Heading back to bed, he fell straight back to sleep despite his roommate's muffled snoring. The next morning the raven was woken by the sound of running water - Natsu was taking a shower. Pulling a t-shirt - he had left on the floor last night - over his head, Gray quickly slipped out of the room before the rosette could step out of their shared bathroom. Somehow in the length of a month, he had managed to avoid waking up to naked Natsu strutting out of their bathroom with water sliding down. Lower and lower until-
"Morning Gray..." A stern female voice jumped him out of his embarrassing trance as he turned to face one of the high-ranking assassins of their organization: Erza Scarlet.
The girl, by herself, was tolerable - as long as she wasn't pissed off for whatever reason - but when the scarlet assassin was around either of the following: Lucy, Meredy, Levy or Jellal. She became a whole another person. She was blunt and to-the-point stating the thoughts of the 'boy-love' posse. Speaking of which, why on earth was Jellal part of it anyways?
A gloved hand waved in front of onyx eyes yet again pulling him from his thoughts; "Oh, ah... Mornin' Erza," her gaze remained on him longer than he was comfortable with, "Uh... I think I heard Mira mention something about only having enough strawberries for a few servings... shouldn't you-"
He knew she was already long gone the moment he mentioned her favorite fruit; alone again, the raven sighed rubbing the back of his head to bring life to his sleepy locks of hair.
"Ah, Gray! Is Natsu up yet?" Onyx eyes wandered to the source - Levi, jogging over to him wearing the same clothes she had been wearing yesterday holding a small stack of papers in one hand. Another all-nighter for the young info broker.
Glancing back into his bedroom, Gray yawned: "Yeah... he should be getting out of the shower soon," before he turned his attention onto the petite girl near him. There were definite bags under her brown eyes and her skin seemed paler than usual; curiosity told him, he should just stay and wait to hear what she seemed to want to talk about with his roommate.
As if summoned by the devil himself, Natsu stepped out in his usual workout - sleeveless t-shirt and baggy sweatpants - attire but paused in his steps when he caught sight of Levi.
"Morning," He grinned down at her but when his friendly greeting wasn't returned, his expression became laced with concern: "Everything okay?"
Onyx eyes watched as the petite chest rose with a deep intake of breath before light blue hair tousled with movement as brown eyes swept upwards to meet Natsu's eyes: "I've been digging through Lapointe's finances," holding the paper stack with both hands, "and I think I might have found a clue about Gajeel's-"
"Levi" The rosette's voice was firm and for a moment Gray was surprised it came from his roommate at all; he could see the muscles tensing under tan skin as the other grounded out: "Please. Don't do this to yourself... You're only seeing things the way you want to,"
The paper crinkled in her pale fingers as she lowered her head down, "I'm not delusional..." her voice was barely above a whisper but before either male could push the issue, she ran back towards the info broker's ward.
"Do you really think that was necessary?" The raven asked as he switched his attention from the door to the info broker's ward to Natsu, who merely shrugged in response before mumbling, "Doesn't matter... I don't want her to work herself up on something that isn't based on facts and get hurt in the process" and stuffed his hands into his pockets.
The morning concluded with Erza having eaten every strawberry Mirajane had bought on her last shopping trip; the afternoon began and ended the same - Natsu taking a trip down to the doctors that were on-call in the medical wing.
"C'mon... its just a little stiff, Yukino" The rosette whined as both Gray and a girl with bobbed powder-blue hair grabbed various things from around the wing.
The raven had been more than welcomed when he stumbled in with the sudden desire to 'catch up' on what was going on in the medical world; he had visited the wing more for his comrade's sake than his own desire to read. Natsu, despite denying every time, had lately been having more and more phantom pains and a little stiffness.
The doctor on-call huffed, "You were probably out training again," turning to face the two, "Haven't you two realized how much you're inflaming the muscle? That's it! I'm telling Makrov to take you off of taking any more missions until you're fully healed!" Both would only admit the other that Yukino could be a bit bi-polar - going from being a good doctor to a scolding parent in a matter of seconds - but they still came to her whenever Natsu was having stiffness.
"Yukino! Don't!" Natsu argued back, much like a child trying to convince their mom to change her mind, before adding quickly: "We haven't even done any training today... that's why we came. When we were about to, the stiffness in my torso showed up"
Sighing, the doctor asked: "Where's the stiffness?" as she walked over and moved her blue-framed glasses from the top of her head to the bridge of her nose.
The raven helped lift his roommate's shirt as tan fingers pointed to the area bothering him - the right side of his lower torso where there was still a visible scar from Gray's make-shift stitching. He could still remember when he first walked over to the wing, returning a book he had borrowed, and overheard the rosette arguing with the doctor about leaving the make-shift stitches in since they were working.
Pale delicate fingers pressed around the area as its owner listened for any strange intake of air from Natsu; upon pressing on a spot to the left of the wound, the rosette did a small but sharp intake of air. Yukino's eyes raised to meet cobalt ones before crossing her arms against her chest: "I still think you should take a month or so off, at the very least. If you keep going like this, you will end up never taking another mission" Her voice was firm, leaving no room for arguing.
"...fine..." The two headed back to their room for the rest of the day talking; one topic, brought up by the raven, raised concern in his mind: "Levi was acting strange this morning..." Gray began, fiddling with the edge of his blanket.
Humming, "True..." silence then, "...hey Gray...? Since Yukino isn't going to allow Gramps to let me go on any mission, could you... would you mind watching out for Levi? You know, she's great on missions... Just take her mind off Gajeel... at least until I can bring him back..."
Gray had never seen his roommate so vulnerable than he did at the moment; pushing himself off his own bed, the raven walked over and sat down on Natsu's before speaking: "I never did ask... what happened to him,"
"He took up an assignment to take down Lapointe and he never returned... months later, a new mission came in to take him down and I grabbed it purely out of revenge until Levi brought up that the person suffering because of that bastard was a father... I never knew a family's love so every mission I take that helps a child, I do my utmost to complete it," Gray listened, taking in every word before responding when it was all out in the open: "And in the end, you were shot and then passed out in front of my car,"
Burying his face in his pillow, a muffled 'yeah' broke through the fluffy prison surrounding Natsu's mouth and it wasn't long after that that the rosette was asleep. Gray lightly chuckled, only his roommate could fall asleep after talking like that, before slipping out of their room and flicking the lights off in the process. It was late - most of the house's inhabitants had gone to their rooms to either sleep or shower. The raven headed downstairs and when he reached the bottom step, he heard noise from the armory. Curiosity piqued, he tiptoed over to the room to see as he peeked inside Levi of all people. She was loading a handheld with a loaded magazine with no problem and on the counter was five more magazines and a few flash grenades. He had only seen her this determined when she was behind a computer screen so on bated breaths, he watched not wanting to disturb her. As she was finishing up with slipping the loaded gun into the holster attached to her leg, the other magazines and grenades in a bag slung around her waist, the raven slipped into another room to avoid being spotted. She briskly walked past him and straight for the garage, unknowingly with Gray following a short distance away. Upon entering the chilled garage, she immediately went up to a black jeep and whispered: "C'mon Lily... its time to bring Gajeel home," as she opened the driver side door.
Silently, Gray approached her and in a gentle voice spoke up: "Where are you going Levi?"
The girl swung, brown eyes wide in surprise before growing defensive: "What does it matter to you? And why are you following me?" and her unspoken question lingered between them. The raven sighed, "Did you really find Gajeel?"
"I'm not delusional!" She barked angrily, clenching her small hands into fist.
Walking around the car, Gray muttered out as he opened the passenger side door: "If so, let me go with you... this way if anything were to happen I can be your back-up," and waited outside it for her answer.
"...fine..." With that the two slipped inside the jeep and headed out, the raven read through the papers the info broker had already placed inside the car as Levi drove to their destination.
Parking in a shaded region, Levi spoke: "I've been watching Lapointe's finances... he's been purchasing quite a bit of sedatives... and a couple months ago, he bought this old building but hasn't done any sort of renovations. He's paid off a few of the housing inspectors that have come over... suspicious right? And that's not all, as of lately Lapointe has been racking up hospital bills from one hospital... Lady Grandine Medical Center," at the mention of the hospital's name, Gray's eyes widened - that was the hospital he used to work for. Did that mean that the person responsible for his termination was working with Lapointe's? Or was it just chance his former work place was involved?
Shaking his head of those questions, the raven asked if there was anything else to which the info broker explained that all the hospital bills are for treatments for bacterial infections that can't be contracted under any normal circumstances.
"Let's go..." Her voice shook slightly before something seemed to dawn on her; Lavi glanced over asking: "Did you bring anything with you?"
Shrugging his shoulders, "Just my phone and knife... don't worry I'm better with a knife," Gray sighed as he slipped out of the jeep; even though that statement was fairly true but it was also true that ever since killing Hades the raven didn't have the stomach to shoot anyone.
The duo headed into the abandoned building, Levi with her gun cocked and ready and Gray with his knife out. Despite almost always being behind the computer screen, the info broker seemed to know what she was doing so that left the raven with focusing on protecting her blind spots. And her. The front of the building was unguarded as was the first room they entered. The hallway was filled with distant voices that lead them to a vast room - concrete floors, bare walls a few large poles that seemed to support the floor above it and a stairwell leading down. Inside the room stood several men, a few carrying guns, talking but even at the edge of the door their voices were still fairly distant.
"...Lapointe..." A soft growl beside the raven shocked him out of watching the group and over to the girl beside him; without another word, Levi burst through the doors and ran towards her target.
With no other option, Gray chased after her - attacking any of the men who raised their guns towards her. Mentally thanking all the training for making him fast enough to protect the info broker, who was moments from shooting her target when she suddenly froze. Pushing off from one of the guards, the raven ran over to her before understanding her hesitation - in the hands of the man, he assumed to be Lapointe, was a photograph of a badly-beaten raven-haired man with tan skin. Metal piercings decorated various spots and it didn't take much for Gray to figure out that the man in the photo was Gajeel.
"I guess its right to assume, you came here to rescue him... too bad though because you're gonna die," Waving his hand, several of the guards aimed their guns at the duo.
Onyx eyes hardened, as he weighted his options for possibly making it out of this alive - or letting Levi escape but somewhere in his thoughts he heard a voice he never expected to hear: "My my, what do we have here"
Gray's eyes darted over to the source, a tall man with dark lips and long raven hair that had a reddish hue to it; "Jose..." the raven muttered under his breath - his former boss stood not far from him.
"And here I heard you died, Gray..." Jose Porla, still wearing his hospital coat, sneered as he eyed his former employee with distaste before laughing: "Oh well, at least now I'll be able to see you die with my own eyes"
As onyx and brown stared down the guns pointed at them, a little bit of static near them broke their attention elsewhere and a muffled voice spoke: "...or... not..." followed by soft clicks.
A few of the guards went down without a sound causing the others near them to look around before their eyes settled on the door where Natsu stood with a sniper gun leaning against the door and handgun stretched out and cocked at them. Taking the distraction, Gray slit the throats of the guards closest to him as Natsu shot the others. Grabbing Levi's wrist, the raven forced her to follow him down the stairwell - with the guards brought down, Jose and Lapointe were of little concern especially since Natsu was still up there. The basement was dimly-lit but unguarded, handing the girl his phone Gray instructed her to call someone if she needed help moving Gajeel.
"What about you?" She asked in a small voice.
Smiling down, he replied: "I'll be making sure Natsu doesn't over-do it up there... we'll be down when we're done taking care of them but call someone when you find him,"
Holding up her gun: "Here take it... You'll need it more than me-" A shot echoing off from the floor above them had the raven grabbing the gun and giving the info broker his phone before running up the steps. Something didn't feel right about that shot. And upon reaching the first floor, that feeling ate away at his insides - standing where he left them was Jose with a firm grasp on Natsu's rosy hair and Lapointe lying on the floor dead.
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Csilla: First off, thank you for everyone's kind words~ they meant a lot to me! And next I'd like to ask was this good? Part two shouldn't take too long to come out :3 I only broke it up because this chapter was so freaking long!
I'M BAAAAACK~ ;D