AN: Yeah, there's tons of similarities to the Tower of Heaven. I have the full explanation at the end of the chapter, explaining it. (I just didn't want to distract from this part~)
JOSE'S THRONE ROOM
She was just screaming, screaming and howling as Totomaru fell.
No.
No.
That's all she thought, no no no.
Gajeel watched paralyzed as she ran to him, wrapping her arms around his body and lifting him up so his head rested against her chest. Even Jose looked horrified.
"Toto…" Juvia stroked his face, smearing the blood coming from his nose and eyes. "Why?" She noticed that his midsection, the place where the spell had hit, it was bleeding too, a gaping hole revealing a mess of red pulp and shards of bone. She put her hand over it, both from desire to try and fail to stop the bleeding, and because she just didn't want to see it.
The fire mage looked up at her, smiling. He patted her tear-stained face, leaving behind streaks of blood. Her blue locks made a curtain around her face, leaving nothing but it in his sight. He loved it.
PHANTOM LORD GUILD HALL, NINE YEARS PREVIOUS
"Totomaru, c'mon, man. Do another trick for us!" they jeered.
He scowled at them. "I'm not a pony that does tricks whenever you want!"
"Ah, c'mon, buddy."
"Just knock it off. Remember, I could burn you all to a crisp anytime I wanted," he snapped.
They shut up.
Totomaru picked up a fork, twirling it in his grip. The guild hall was as dull as always, guys laughing and drinking and beating each other up, girls flirting in quite a scandalous manner, people threatening and screaming and being miserable. How he hated the guild hall. Nothing exciting ever happened, nothing to entertain him ever went on. Totomaru wanted some good, old-fashioned comedy, entertainment!
"Hey, Gajeel's here!"
"Who's the cutie?"
"Gajeel buy himself a lady?"
Totomaru looked up, standing on the bench to get a look over all their stupid heads. Behind Gajeel was a young lady folding up a pink umbrella, eyes shifting around nervously. She wore a dark blue coat, a fur shawl tied at the chest with a teru-teru bozu (man, he'd loved those as a kid), and a hat topped her tightly curled hair.
His heart stopped.
"Go talk to her," they said later, egging him on.
"Doesn't look like she wants someone to talk to her… She does look lonely, though," he relented.
And he'd slid in next to her on that tiny bench, smiling and holding out his hand. "I'm Totomaru. What's your name?"
She smiled a bit, small, nervous, that was the smile. "Juvia."
He loved that smile.
"Hey, hey." He coughed out some blood onto Juvia's hand. "Don't… cr...y."
"Toto, why?" she asked again.
He stared up at her in such a way that Juvia almost squirmed. His eyes were glazing over, his breathing becoming more shallow. Nothing else existed but her, that's what his eyes looked like to Juvia.
"C...an you… smile?"
She blinked back some tears, taken aback. But she did, pressing his hand that had been searching about against her face. She smiled, sniffing back snot and anguish. "Toto will be okay. Don't worry. Gajeel-kun and Juvia will finish this and get you to a hospital…"
He laughed raspily. "Not… an option. Such… a kin...d smi-" He looked at her again, blinking to focus his eyes.
Jose and Gajeel merely watched, horrified and enraptured.
"Juvia, you- know… what?"
"What, Toto?" Her smile was slipping. "Toto? What?"
His hand was becoming heavier, blood coming faster from his eyes, almost as though they were tears. He coughed up more blood and it clumped in her hair.
"I'm in love… I'm in love with you."
There was no sound. None at all.
His hand fell from her face.
There was no sound.
Juvia's eyes widened, her lips parting in horror.
There was no sound.
His eyes closed.
There was no sound.
His heart stopped under her hand.
Juvia screamed.
Gajeel nearly covered his ears, nearly threw up. Never, ever in his life had he heard someone sound so horrified, so horribly broken, so in pain. Jose merely began to chuckle, wiping at his eyes as if to brush away tears of mirth.
"WAKE UP! Wake up, Toto! Please, Toto doesn't… You don't-"
Gajeel grit his teeth, clenching his fists.
"I'm sorry… Juvia is so sorry. Please, please come back!" Juvia sobbed into her hands, getting his blood all over her face, her hair, her shirt.
"You took him away…" Gajeel whispered, eerily calm. "Now look at her."
"Why- Why were you… in love with Juvia?!" The air seemed to drop a few degrees even colder. "Why would you risk your life to save her?"
"He-he was in love with you?!" Jose chuckles died down. "How beautiful!"
Gajeel slammed him into a pillar, but Jose kept laughing like the pain didn't even bother him. Juvia looked up, blood streaking her face from where she had gripped it with her crimson fingers. Tears cut paths down her cheeks, tracing into the blood.
"Gajeel-kun… Just… be safe." She sounded totally out of it, like she was barely there.
"Look at her!" He shouted. Jose tried getting up. Gajeel lowered his head, shaking. "This is a nightmare. It was just supposed to be her birthday, her first birthday in the sun, and now this happens. It's an absolute nightmare."
Jose put his hands on his knees and pushed himself up, stretching. "I'm an old man, boy, you shouldn't do that."
"A nightmare. I want Juvia to wake up from this… And do all those stupid things she keeps blabbing about."
Juvia had gone back to stroking the corpse's hair, weeping and pressing her hands against his side, getting more blood on her.
"I want her to make all those hats she said she was getting behind on." The Dragon Slayer took a dangerous step forward. "I want her to make that dress she wanted. I want her to get a date with that stupid stripper." Magic almost as menacing as Jose's filled the throne room. "I even want her to help me ask Levy out on a date, because that's what she wants to do."
"Careful," Juvia choked out again. Then she shook her head, placing Totomaru's head on the ground and standing. "No. No, actually, you won't have to be careful." There was nothing in her eyes, no rage or pain or sadness. "Juvia will exterminate him now."
"Exterminate me, girl?" Jose laughed. "You couldn't even keep the man who loved you from-"
A shard of ice stabbed him in the stomach, cutting off his sentence. He coughed and stumbled back, surprised. Blood dribbled down his chin and he scowled. "Not ni-"
The ground turned into dozens and dozens of ice needles, some big, some small, and all sharp. They charged straight for Jose, cutting through his skin and into his throat. The dark mage coughed, blood gurgling up in his throat.
"What's the matter, Jose?" Juvia asked, tilting her head. Gajeel took a step back from her. "Why aren't you dodging?"
Growling, Jose picked a shard out of his throat and flicked it away, looking both amused and pained. With a flourish of his arms, Shades appeared from thin air and went after Juvia and Gajeel, screaming and howling like banshees.
One cut Gajeel's headband, Levy's headband, just barely. Juvia watched as his face went from horror to rage. He swiped out at the phantom, collecting the cut headband and stuffing it in his pocket.
Juvia turned to water and splashed out of the way, but Gajeel took to brute force, trying to smash them with his iron-scaled arm. She scowled back at him, keen that it would not work. Jose's Shades weren't easy at all to hit. She turned back and gathered him up in her watery arms, carrying him away as the phantoms chased them.
"Run, run, rain woman, but you will be Jose's!" he sang, moving his arms like he was in an orchestra. "That monster inside you will be all mine."
Juvia dropped Gajeel in a safe area and flipped around, charging Jose. Her body went scalding hot and she caught his side as he moved too slow, burning his right until it was dark, blood red. Jose screeched and snapped his fingers. Something invisible, a wave of something, sent Juvia flying, scattering her body into droplets. Wincing, one eye closed, she began to reform against her will.
The phantoms, the screaming ghosts, ran through her. She felt the effects immediately, falling tiredly to her knees, gasping. They came back for a second round.
Jose lifted his hand and they stopped. "Now, now, we need her alive. Another blow like that could kill Juvia-dono."
Gajeel had recovered and moved in front of her, guarding her. "Over my dead body!"
"That can be arranged."
A shadow lifted up from the ground and stabbed through Gajeel's stomach. Juvia wearily blinked up, seeing only hazy shapes. But she saw the blood, and she almost threw up. Gajeel fell over, falling prone onto the icy ground.
Jose shrugged when Juvia looked at him in horror. "Well, the boy said over his dead body."
The castle began to shake. Or maybe it was just the room? Juvia didn't exactly know, but she knew she was angry, so angry.
She wanted to destroy the world in that second.
With a harsh scream from the water mage, everything went crazy. The ceiling began to crumble, the ice pillars started to crack, and the floor collapsed in patches. Jose stumbled around, doing his best not to fall.
"Damn," he said. "She's gone mad."
She stood and swirled her arms. Two enormous waves of water crashed into Jose, enough force to
snap his bones. He fell, twitching, then tried to get up. The pillars around him began to fall, and a phantom swooped in and snatched its master up. Juvia swung an arm limply, sending a column of water shooting towards them.
Jose fell from its grip and collided with the ground, wheezing. Juvia stared at him, irises shaking from intense passion, assessing his situation. He didn't seem out of magic, no, his age merely seemed to be catching up with him. His leg was broken, maybe some ribs from his breathing. And he'd lost blood.
Good.
"Didn't Juvia say she would exterminate you, old man?" A crazy smile lifted the corners of her lips up. "Juvia likes to keep her promises."
A pillar began to collapse atop Jose, who was left with no where to go in absence of his phantoms. He pursed his thick lips together. His shadow rose up and swallowed him, sinking him into the ground.
Juvia's smile faded, replaced with confusion. That was a new move.
"I should go recover. Old men need rest." Jose's voice came from behind, and she turned to see him leaning against a pillar, weight heavily placed on one side. "Don't worry though, miss, I will be back. I will control the Tempest. The apocalypse will happen by your hands."
She sent another waved crashing into him, obliterating the mass he'd been leaning on. He was gone though, leaving Juvia in the middle of a collapsing tower. She narrowed her eyes and waved an arm, trying to stabilize the ice. Nothing happened. It was all too far gone for her minimal magic to control. Desperation overtook her features, and she shifted her feet and clenched her fists, trying to meld the ice back together.
Yes, it was out of her control.
The ceiling collapsed, sending flurries of powdery ice flying at her. She squeaked and covered her face from the cold, then removed them, looking around desperately. The situation sank in. Totomaru, who had been in love with her, with her, was dead. Such a precious friend was gone. Gajeel was lying face down in the wreckage, injured.
Her rage and insanity melted away, replaced with emptiness.
She fell to her knees next to Gajeel, pulling him into her arms. His blood leaked onto her, mixing with Totomaru's. Juvia buried her face in his rough, warm hair, like she had years ago when they met.
"Gajeel-kun. Thank you for trying to save Juvia, but this might be it." She looked towards Totomaru. Determination suddenly rose in her. No, no, one had already died, she wouldn't let another. She'd stop the castle from collapsing, somehow, and then get Toto and Gajeel-kun out, and-
The ceiling fell directly over Totomaru.
She gasped and screamed at the same time, some odd sound coming from her. She reached out her hands, hoping she could stop the rubble like that, but it did nothing. It fell down, down, down
crushing him.
Blood exploded around the ice mass, spattering the ground around him. Only a limp arm was visible from under the rock. It was likely the only part of him still intact.
Trembling, she lowered her arms towards Gajeel, lifting him up. No. No, she needed to get out of here.
No, no, he needed to get out of here. She was a danger to the world. It'd be best if she stayed here and died.
Juvia put him back down, pressing her bloody hands against her face, streaking more on her pale skin. Everything was collapsing, everything was her fault. "Heaven help me… I need to make this right." She stumbled back and forth, reaching out for nothing, something. "Th-there has to be something that will get Gajeel-kun out."
She thought, realizing that there was hardly any time. Then she thought about the ice. Break down her magic, Jose had said. Absorb it into itself, circulating it through the entire room, maybe. Juvia pressed her palm against the column next to them. It licked out at her, greedy and alive.
Juvia shook Gajeel. He didn't move. She sighed, closed her eyes and shook her head, and pressed her hand onto the ice. It licked out at her, but without Jose's command, it didn't consume her. Juvia pressed her lips together and focused.
Dark blue aura began to melt away from the ice, running up her arm and sinking down into her skin. It was cold, very cold, much colder than even Gray's ice. She swallowed and kept pulling it out, wincing at the bite. And then, it stopped. There was no more magic left to drain from it, and it was just ordinary ice, just crumbling ice.
This was it. She knew what to do.
He woke up to screaming. Juvia's screaming.
Against the pain and stiffness, Gajeel shot into a sitting position, turning wildly to find her. She was right behind him, hands raised to the ceiling. He knelt upwards and gripped her around the waist, startling her. The water mage looked down at him very gently, smiling a bit.
"Juvia thought you wouldn't wake up to see her off."
"Don't worry, I'll get you out of here!" He tugged on her, trying to lift her up, but she didn't. Her feet were glued to the floor. No. Gajeel looked down. Her feet were the floor.
Juvia stroked his hair, bringing down one hand, smile growing. "It's okay, Juvia did this intentionally."
He looked up at her, confused. He was a bit scared.
"She thinks there could be a chance of calming down the ice if she molds her magic into it. Juvia thinks it'll only be for a minute, however. Then maybe Gajeel-kun can get out of here, get back home to Fairy Tail." She ruffled his hair as he opened his mouth to protest. "Don't argue. If this doesn't work, Gajeel-kun dies. If Juvia doesn't even try, Gajeel-kun dies. There's absolutely nothing to lose."
"I could lose you!" he shouted. "Juvia, no, please. We'll just run-"
"We couldn't outrun the collapse. We only have a minute now, if it doesn't work." Juvia swallowed back tears, but they fell anyway. "Juvia just wants to go home."
"Then let's-"
"Juvia can't. Jose said he'd be after her again. This'll happen again and again until he gets his way. So she can't go home, you see." The ice pulled her in a bit more. She bit back a scream, her lips bleeding. "Gajeel-kun, you have to know how grateful Juvia is to you. You really are a good friend to her. Everyone Juvia has met… You, Gray-sama, Fairy Tail. You all mean a lot to her. So, that's why you have to say goodbye for her." She hissed out through her teeth as the ice froze up her calves and up her hand not in his. "Gajeel-kun."
He clutched her remaining hand, the one not ensnared in ice. "Juvia, wait!"
"I have to let go of your hand."
"No, you don't-"
"Gajeel-kun, it's time to say goodbye."
And the ice shot up her whole body, encasing her in ice. Gajeel shouted and pounded on the ground, tugging on her wrist pathetically. He kept yelling: Come back, we'll figure this out, this isn't right, c'mon Juvia.
He didn't realize he was crying. He didn't want to know he was crying. He just wanted to take Juvia home and pretend this hadn't happened, like Totomaru wasn't dead, like there wasn't someone crazy trying to tear her apart for the power of a dragon.
"Give her back!" he roared, placing his hands against the ice statue. "I want her back! Fairy Tail wants her back!"
Shadows erupted from his body, cutting deep into the ice mass. Eventually, it made a pathway to her through the thin crystals, and he reached out for her frozen hand, barely visible in the froth. He grabbed it and tried pulling her, but not succeeding in unfreezing her. What had he been thinking, that that would work? He looked at the room; it was still crumbling.
Shadows wove a tight sphere around them, the man and the ice chunk, hiding them from horror and the old friend that was only splatters on the ground now, falling deep into the bowels of the castle.
Praying that it would work, he pressed his hands against the ice, draining his remaining magic into it.
The ice started to become warm as the world outside the sphere exploded, sending them flying.
BEACH
Juvia woke up face down in the ocean, blood streaming from her mouth, clouding into the salt water. She breathed, choking on salt and sand, and pulled herself up, looking around. The moon was out. The water sparkled. The sand was a nice white, and Gajeel was drifting in the ocean, motionless.
Gajeel was drifting in the ocean, motionless.
She screamed and ran out to sea for him, pulling him back ashore and dumping him onto the sand. She collapsed on her knees next to him, yanking strands of tangled, salty hair out of her face. His pulse was still going, she determined. Why were they alive? Why was she alive? Shouldn't she be ice?
"Didn't I tell you not to give up, idiot?" he snapped after vomiting up a mouthful of blood and water. "That qualified as givin' up."
"Gajeel-kun, what-?" Her eyes filled with tears. She didn't know if she wanted to be alive.
"Went into Iron-Shadow Dragon mode. Wrapped us up to protect us from the collapse." The Dragon Slayer smiled at her. "I was worried… imbuing you with my magic… wouldn't change you back." He squinted, pressing a hand over his stomach wound. "I see lights. The impact must have drifted us all the way back to the island?"
"I did." That was when they noticed Lily, breathing heavily and lying on the sand. He swallowed, trying to get air. "I found your little container. I figured it was you, Gajeel, so I grabbed you and flew you as far as I could before I had to stop. You drifted the rest of the way." The Exceed collapsed, hand over his chest. "Carrying two… was hard."
"Lily…" Juvia blinked away tears. Now wasn't the time. The Exceed had fainted, along with Gajeel, who rested against her chest, breathing shallowly. "Gajeel-kun! Gajeel… kun?"
There was no one conscious, no one there with her on the beach save for two limp bodies.
She sniffled. She tried to hold it back, but she burst out into screaming sobs, clutching him against her chest. What she screamed and moaned wasn't clear to anyone, not to the two mean approaching, not to her. Maybe she was screaming for Toto. Maybe she was cursing the monster inside her. It wasn't clear.
But she stopped when she heard a voice, gentle and hesitant. "Mademoiselle?"
Juvia turned and fell back, inching away, pushing at the sand with her toes to propel her back. "No, no, go away! Just, just don't hurt them, please!"
Sol and Aria looked at each other, then tried to talk to Juvia again. "Where is Jose?"
Juvia had curled up into a ball and was weeping.
Toto.
Toto.
Oh, Toto.
They eventually came to the conclusion, between her shrieks and whimpers, that Jose had retired for the moment, and they were free from his grip. Aria threw Gajeel over his shoulder and picked up Lily in his hand, and Sol grabbed a kicking and screaming Juvia.
With difficulty, they took them back to the resort and patched them up, leaving Juvia sitting at the table, bandages wrapped around her head and chest and leg. Gajeel was lying in bed, Lily on his chest. She merely started at the wall, fingering the cup of tea they'd made her before they'd left quickly, as though they were never even there..
Toto.
Moonlight streamed in through the window. She looked at the clock. It would be morning in a few hours. Later in the day, they'd have to get on a train and go back to Fairy Tail.
Fairy Tail.
That seemed like such a distant place, another planet, even. She couldn't remember what it had felt like to be safe, though she had only been so a day earlier. A day earlier, she'd been laughing on the beach, not ever considering someone would come after her.
How naive.
Juvia got up and sat on the edge of the bed, looking at Gajeel. He seemed to sense her and woke up, blinking away weariness. She stared at him, silent.
"Sorry," was all he said. He scooted over and made room in the bed.
Juvia merely laid down and stared at the wall.
AN: Yeah. That was depressing to write. Juvia's gonna go through some pretty hard times. I'm well aware of all the similarities to the Tower of Heaven, but that's likely because I was watching it and that's what gave me the inspiration for this part. That's why it's so heavily resembling it, because it was the inspiration. I'm really not trying to plagiarize anything. I swear, nothing else in the story will resemble any plotline from anything.
