A/N: And we are back onto the plot. Though I am not sure where that is leading….Oh well! I will figure it out when I get there! Preferably before the next chapter….I already have it up until the half way point, so it shouldn't be too much of a problem. Thank you all for reading, and I hope that you like this chapter. And please review too.
Lucy's POV:
I woke up to the sound of what I assumed my pans crashing. Damn it, and here I thought it would be fine to leave people to do their own things in my house! I figured that Natsu must have been rummaging for food again. That was what he usually did when he was in my house after all. Or it could have been Happy.
"What do you think you are doing?" I yelled as I tried to pry my eyes open. I felt the strain in my back and knew that was another thing that was going to threaten my day. My back was stiff from sleeping on the hard ground.
Wait, why was I on the floor again? I rubbed my eyes as I thought that over. Then I remembered. It was because Natsu had passed out in my bed before I could get there and I had no energy to kick him out. Stupid dragon slayer; he was always in my bed!
"Please forgive me, Lucy I was simply trying to see about cooking breakfast for everyone," Erza's strong voice came from my kitchen.
I sighed and quickly made my way over to where she was. I remembered the last time I let her cook. Let's just saw that the entire kitchen had to be scrubbed and not a single thing was considered edible. I would much rather just go through the process of making breakfast myself. Then I would be able to try and eat something. Unless Natsu woke up before I was done. But he was usually too heavy of a sleeper to get up in time for breakfast.
But then, as I looked into my kitchen I stopped dead in my tracks. Erza had five of her swords out and at least three of them were holding up the pots that she had probably knocked over. The other two were in her hands as she watched the balancing of the pans on her swords. I had a feeling that if they even dared o fall they would get skewered.
Thinking quickly I said "Um, I don't have anything good here, so how about we go to the guild for breakfast?"
"I did see eggs in your refrigerator," Erza tilted her head to the side in question.
"Yes, but I would not trust those. It would be much safer to just go to the guild. Let Mira cook for us!" I once again directed her attention to going to the guild.
"Right! I will go and wake them all up and ready them to go to the guild!" Erza announced as she had all of her swords disappear. Of course that lead to a very loud clash as the pans hit the floor in a heap.
I let out a sigh as I began to pick them up, hearing the startled cries of the others waking up, and by others I mean the boys because the girls had been woken up by the first clatter. "That is one way to wake them up," I noted for later.
"Oh, Lucy, I almost forgot, but don't you still have that new key you bought the other day? Perhaps you should summon it and make a contract? It should b better to do so before you go to the guild." Erza turned to me again. Only unknown to me, this time it was to distract me from being angry at her.
My face lit up right then. I couldn't believe that I had forgotten about the new key! It had completely skipped my mind between dealing with Natsu on the train and then doing yoga the right when we got back.
Practically jumping up and down I said "Wait right there, let me go shower and dress and I will make the contract!"
Much to the amusement of everyone in the house, I skipped over to my bedroom, pointedly ignored the dragon slayer who was just waking up on my bed, got everything that I needed, and ran back out to the nice big bathroom where I quickly got everything I needed done.
Knowing this time, unlike most of the mornings I wake up to, that people were in my house I did not come out in my towel but took the time to dress in the bathroom before coming out ready for the day to commence. It was nice not to come out to something unexpected, but then I noticed that someone was by my desk.
Letting out a very loud squeak I wrestled my manuscript away from Gray.
"Hey, I was reading that!" He complained as always.
"No, I told Levy-chan that she could read it first!" I said to him. Once again Erza stuck out her hand for it, but just like the last hundred or so times that she had one that, I resisted and just clutched it closer to my chest.
"Weren't you going to do something with that new key? I find the magic very interesting and would like to fully see how it works." Death the Kid came to my rescue right then. I could have kissed him. But I didn't, that would have just been wired. But I did take that distraction to safely tuck my work in progress into the inner sanctums of my desk, far away from prying eyes that wanted to read it.
Nodding my head I cleared a space and took out the key. In my commanding voice and a powerful stance I called out "I am the person who connects the road to the stellar spirit world. Thou shall respond to the calling and pass through the gate. Open the gate of the Greater Dog, Canis Major!"
A midnight blue magic circle appeared, and in a flash of light announced that the spirit was coming into this world. When the light faded and the sparkles were no more, there stood a small terrier in front of me.
I, of course, was expecting that, but the other seemed a little disappointed.
"At least this one is really a dog," I heard Maka mutter, but I ignored it. Instead, I took out the pad of paper that used to write down the details of the contract.
"Hi, I'm Lucy Heartfilia, and I would like to make a contract with you. Is that acceptable?" I asked the dog with a large smile on my face. It was always good to make a good first impression with new celestial spirits. It lets them decide how they want to proceed, and if they want to become your spirit. Though I have never heard of it happening, I always gave them the option to say no.
The dog barked excitedly and nodded his head.
Laughing I started the contract. I asked which days were available and found that he was fine to come any day but Wednesday. Finishing up I said "Well that concludes the contract, but now for a name. Would you be opposed to Sirius?"
When he once again barked and jumped up and down I took it that the name was accepted and looked around the others. "Let's get going to the guild now. Sirius, if you want to tag along that would be great. Since it's Monday, Plue is off for the day."
With a bark the little dog followed the group out, making sure to stay as close to Lucy as possible, even going up on the edge of the canal with her so that if the young celestial spirit mage should fall he would be right there to help her. Not that any of the others around them thought that the small spirit would be able to do anything should something happen.
"What's the plan for today?" Maka asked as she walked next to Soul.
Erza decided to answer that. I was thankful because I really wasn't sure what she had planned, and if she didn't answer they would have come to me next. "We will be looking at the job requests to see if there is something up there that matches the behavior of the mage you are looking for. Then we will be investigating it. While you scout out the board downstairs I will e looking to see if any of the s-class jobs are liable for investigation."
We all nodded at our tasks as we opened the guild doors. But smelling what was coming from the kitchen, we all opted that getting food was more important at the moment.
"Hey Mira, can we get some breakfast?" I asked her as I got to the counter.
The barmaid smiled and sweetly said "Sure thing Lucy," before heading to the kitchen. I usually didn't eat at the guild, but I would rather go against what I normally did then try and choke down whatever it was that Erza was going to try and make. Just the thought of it made me flinch a little.
"How did the mission go?" The white haired woman asked when she came back with trays of food. She knew from last time that Black Star seemed to be able to eat just as much as Natsu, though Natsu's food has been singled out due to the fact that it was still on fire.
"It was a success, but the numbers were way off. There were like sixty vulcans and then there were three blizardvern that we had to fight. But we handled it." I laughed at how screwed up that job could have gotten.
I regretted telling her almost instantly as I felt the aura around her turn demonic. "Lucy," she started with her voice deeper than usual and magic suddenly pouring out of her, "who was it that sent the request again?" She asked with a seriousness that I had learned long ago to fear. It was when she was about to go all Satan Soul on someone.
"Um, I don't remember, but Erza took care of that," I said nervously. I had my hands waving in front of me in an attempt to calm down the demon behind the bar.
When she calmed and gave me a smile before leaving I let out a sigh of relief.
"I never thought I would feel so much magical energy coming off of her," Maka said as she looked after Mira curiously.
I decided it would be best to explain the situation to them, "Mira actually has the nick name 'Demon Mirajane' because she uses demon take over magic. She is also an s-class mage like Erza. They actually have similar levels of power. They used o be rivals after all."
Maka nodded as she tried to avoid the food that was going flying because of Black Star's eating habits. If she wasn't used to that to begin with, she might have given him a Maka Chop, but she didn't have the energy so early in the morning for such things. So she just continued o eat.
I scanned the guild. I saw that Natsu and Gray had already begun to fight, but I could really care less. Now that they were in the guild I had no reason to stop them. After all, it wasn't like they were losing a part of my reward when they destroyed things here. I didn't have to pay a scent of the repairs to the guild.
Or I keep out of it until one of them tries to pull me into the fight. This time, Gray got thrown towards me, somehow only in his underwear. Before I could think to duck, a large Rottweiler was in front of me. It growled and leaped towards the flying ice-make mage so that they landed away from me. Then it started to drag him away by the boxers.
"Thank you Sirius!" I called to the spirit.
"Wait a minute! That is the same thing as the terrier that was in your apartment earlier?" Kid looked the spirit over with amazement in his eyes.
I nodded my head "Canis Major has the ability to change size and species according to what the situation is calling for. When it was just a casual visit, it was smaller and less threatening, but since he had to protect me, he turned bigger." I answered as Sirius came to sit at my side. He was still in the bigger form as the fight seemed to rage on around us. People were being dragged into it against their will.
"Come on, let's go look at the board, this fight could last forever," I suggested as I saw Erza heading up the stairs to the s-class mission board.
They nodded their heads absently before they followed me to the request board. I was looking for shadows and reality shifting, but that was not really helping the search.
Skipping over the monster exterminating quests and the guarding of a caravan, I looked to the other ones in hopes that they would help out more. The problem was that I still wasn't seeing anything that really shouted out to me. And the five who were looking with me didn't either.
Black Star and Patty seemed to have gotten thrown into the fight, only they were on even ground due to the fact that they hadn't annoyed each other enough to start flinging magic attacks. I was even impressed when I saw Patty completely knock out Elfman without breaking a sweat. Damn she could fight. She then turned to Max and gave him the same treatment.
I was pulled away from those thoughts as I saw Erza approaching us.
"I think I found something worth looking into." She announced as she handed us the flyer.
We looked over it.
Help Wanted!
Strange shadows are appearing along with strange swirling patterns
People disappear without a trace and are found months later looking as if they had just disappeared; only they are dead
Reward: 2,000,000J
Location: small village on the western slope of Mt. Hakobe.
I looked at Erza with uncertainty. If this was an s-class mission, it was bound to be a difficult one to help out with. But with the number of them going, it also meant that either it was going to be easier to win, or they would have a larger casualty list.
But with a nod and my eyes hardening in determination I agreed that this was probably the best lead we were going to get. It sounded as if it
Erza got it stamped by Mira before she turned to the brawl. "Natsu, Gray, Black Star, Patty, we have a lead, let's go!"
Natsu and Gray replied "Aye!" Along with Happy, as Black Star and Patty just jogged up to them. Patty was happily giggling about something or another. And with that, they all headed out.
A/N I hoped you enjoyed that. Now things are about to take a turn into a more violent and more dangerous side. Time for them to find out what the heck is going on. Muahahaha. Please review and tell me what you thought or any suggestions you might have.
