Yo! I'm back for the 11th installment of Blood and Iron! I started this chapter nearly a month ago now and just couldn't get any inspiration, so I worked on it off and on and this is what finally came out. It's not exactly what I wanted it to be, but better than I thought it would turn out, so here's to hoping you guys like it!
Please enjoy!
The iron dragonslayer and the man in his way were watching each other warily, and he could sense the predatory aura that the brunette was exuding. The familiar metallic scent was distracting, and Gajeel's red eyes narrowed even further when he noticed where the strong scent of Levy's blood was coming from.
This brown-haired bastard had her blood splattered on his boots and the bottom of his pants, and he also had the scent on his hands, although he had washed them once or twice since they'd been bloodied. The implications of that didn't do anything to help Gajeel's sour mood; it strongly indicated that he had inflicted her wounds, or worsened them, by his own hand. That meant that he was personally responsible for the fact that Levy wasn't quite up to having company, as he had said.
He had put his filthy hands on Gajeel's bookworm…and he would have to pay.
With a growl, Gajeel's arm became a familiar iron rod and he charged at the other man, who dodged. Before the dragonslayer could whirl around to continue his onslaught, something solid struck him squarely between the shoulder blades and sent him stumbling several steps forward with a well-chosen curse. When he regained his balance enough to turn, the first thing he saw was that damned smug expression.
"Is that all you've got?" the enemy asked, almost imperiously, of Gajeel. "From the way that Miss McGarden talked about her 'best friend', Gajeel, I was expecting so much more. You're not even half of what she said you were, are you, Mr. Redfox?"
"That your only skill?" Gajeel growled, straightening up and rolling his shoulders to relax his muscles. "Gettin' under people's skins? Lemme tell you something about that trick of yours. It might've worked for the flamebrained idiot, but it ain't gonna work on me. Gihihi…"
He showed his canines as he smirked in return, and then Gajeel charged again, this time dodging a piece of the stone wall that flew at him. It clattered down the hall and the dragonslayer swung his now elongated iron arm in retaliation. A wall of stones rose from the floor to block him, and then one by one started flying at him. With a grunt, the red-eyed man took blows from three or four of them—he wasn't keeping count—and shattered a few others with his other arm. In the time it took him to do that, his opponent had retreated down the hall. Gajeel grinned.
"Scared of me?" he asked, tauntingly, as he raised one of his arms in front of his face. "I thought you had more goin' for ya."
In response, the brunette just scoffed as he sent more stones from the walls winging their way at the iron dragonslayer, who deflected them with ease because of the distance. He began advancing in a wolfish, predatory manner, and the enemy stood his ground, continuously flinging stones at him. Gajeel continued deflecting them in kind, occasionally throwing a punch with his rods. The fight wasn't going anywhere…but Gajeel wasn't concerned.
This bastard didn't know what he was in for.
When the canal exploded upwards towards Lisanna, who was still carrying Lizzie, Lucy didn't think twice about pulling out a second key and gasping, "I open thee, gate of the Lion, Leo!"
Without even pausing to ask, he was able to leap in and rescue both Lisanna and Lizzie, pulling them out of harm's way as Lucy noticed the figure standing on the bridge they had just ignored as they ran by. With a frown and a fierce determination, Lucy reached for her whip. The handle to her fleuve d'étoiles was in her hands, and momentarily a stream of her own celestial magic was coursing through the air as she lengthened it.
"You guys keep going!" Lucy called, facing the tall blonde man on the bridge as he manipulated water. "We'll keep him as busy as we can!"
Erza gave the celestial mage a pointed look, and Lucy grinned as confidently as she could back. She then turned back to the mage and prepared herself for a fight. It had been a little while since she'd been against another mage one-on-one, so it was high time she pulled her own weight. And as she watched Lizzie being whisked away, she prayed that the others wouldn't run into anymore problems on the way to the guild.
A hand of water started to chase after them, and Lucy reacted quickly. She sent her whip out, severing the flow of water only briefly, but it was long enough to prevent it from reaching Wendy, who had fallen to rearguard in the blonde's place. And before it could reform and continue, the mage himself was hard-pressed to avoid the Lion's physical assault.
"Let's hold him here, Loke!" she called to her spirit as she ran forward to help, and she heard him laugh.
"What do you take me for?" he retorted, dodging a water whip very reminiscent of one of Juvia's trademark attacks. "I'm a Fairy Tail mage, too!"
And Lucy laughed too, recalling that Loke, too, had a fierce determination where the guild and protecting it were concerned. Fairy Tail had given him some of the happiest days of his life, leading up to the day where he had fully expected to disappear—and then she, a member of Fairy Tail, had been his salvation, in a way.
"Let's do this," she said, determination filling her for the first time that night, and she charged into the fray with abandon, not to be outdone by her spirit and friend. With a shout directed at Warren, telling him her location, the situation, and that the others were continuing, Lucy proceeded to strike out at the mage, who dodged her fleuve d'étoiles and found Loke's fist solidly connecting with his jaw. The mage wildly lashed out, and the celestial mage found herself toppling backwards, off the bridge and into the canal…
…or she would have ended up in the canal, if she hadn't felt something tugging at the collar of her shirt and pulling her up.
"Lushee, you're heavy," that damned cat whined, but he dropped her back on the bridge and hovered in the air beside her, looking very proud of himself.
"Happy!" Lucy cried, in relief and in shock, "Weren't you going to stay with Lizzie?!"
"Charle's there," he said simply, "and if anything happened to you, Natsu might kill me."
Lucy didn't try to puzzle through that cryptic statement at the moment, choosing instead to grab the blue cat's tail and yank him down into her arms as she ducked and rolled under a grasping hand made of water. When she rolled somehow smoothly to her feet, she let him go and grasped her whip more firmly in her hand.
"Watch yourself," she said simply to the still stunned exceed before pushing herself back towards the mage with an attack at the ready. She raised her voice to call, "Loke, Regulus Impact!"
"Gotcha!" He returned, and as he came at the water mage from the other side of the bridge, Lucy latched her whip firmly around one of the blonde man's arms so he couldn't escape the attack. Loke's punch hit the man solidly in the stomach with a brilliant flare of light and Lucy leapt away, pulling her whip free, as the enemy fell to the ground. With relief, she noticed that he was out like a light.
"If you can," Lucy turned to Loke as she stored herfleuve d'étoiles back on her belt, "tie him up and get him to either the police or Fairy Tail for interrogation. Happy and I are going to head to the guild to make sure the others make it."
"Anything you say," the flirtatious Lion spirit winked roguishly at Lucy, and she just waved it off. His tone was more serious when he added, "Be safe, Lucy."
With a slightly weary smirk, she retorted, "Do you expect any less of me? I'm a Fairy Tail mage, too."
At the almost familiar line, he grinned at her and then set about the task she had given him. The blonde motioned for Happy, and he immediately lifted her into the air with an, "Aye, sir!", winging along the path that the others had taken to the guild. Lucy sincerely hoped that they were already at Fairy Tail and that nothing else had happened, because her prolonged use of Capricorn's gate and now Loke's had drained her. She wasn't sure how much more she could help if another situation had arisen.
Gajeel wiped the blood off his cheek with a low growl as the other man held his bleeding forearm. The two glared at each other disdainfully as they watched for any signs of attack. A few stones were hovering around the stone mage, and Gajeel was tensed and ready to spring into action if any of them started flying at him. He felt a bit battered by the onslaught he'd just endured, but there was no way in hell he was going to lose to this guy. The smell of Levy's blood was coming from farther down the hallway, if the dragonslayer ignored the blood all over this guy's shoes and hands, and he needed to reach her.
And then it happened—one stone twitched and Gajeel ducked, successfully avoiding the one he'd heard coming from behind, and while he was crouching low to the ground he utilized his shadow iron dragon abilities to move more quickly. Using the shadows at the base of the wall and in the cracks between stones, he finally managed to give his opponent a good wallop across the face with one of his iron rods, tilting his head to dodge a stone as he brought the other arm solidly into the enemy's gut.
Stumbling backwards, the furious stone mage pushed Gajeel back with a wall of stones. And then the dragonslayer found himself surrounded by stones, both whole ones and those that had broken and had jagged edges. They began to spin around him in a whirling vortex of rock, and he swore vehemently under his breath. If this had been used against the bookworm, it was no wonder there was so much blood at the crime scene.
It was no wonder that he could smell so much blood here.
When all the stones converged, he did his best to toughen his skin and his voice boomed out, "Iron Shadow Dragon's Roar!"
The roar went down the hallway until it turned at an abrupt corner, and he saw the stone mage slam unceremoniously against that wall. With shadows spinning around him, the furious dragonslayer approached his feebly stirring opponent. As the stone mage started to get up, he found an iron rod ramming into his stomach yet again as the intimidating black-haired man leaned down over him.
"This is what ya get when you try to mess with Fairies," Gajeel hissed venomously, whopping him once upside the head for good measure. When the brunette man slumped to the ground, unconscious, the red-eyed mage stood up. He took quick stock of his wounds—he was pretty bruised up from those damn rocks, despite his hardened skin, and he was bleeding in more than a few places—before lifting his head and sniffing.
Once he had the scent, Gajeel set off down the hallway, eyes trained on the door at the end.
Levy vaguely heard what sounded like a familiar shout, and a loud crashing noise came immediately after. A faint hope rose in her heart as she tried to find her way to being fully conscious. She strained against the cuffs that held her to the wall, but still couldn't budge and she only caused herself pain. She whimpered softly, but couldn't relax in a way that would cease the hurt now that she'd incited it. She could only hang limply against the wall, biting her lip, as she waited for what she hoped was help.
Her thoughts were unclear and kept shifting because of her injuries and because she still felt feverish, but Levy tried. She could scarcely remember why she was here, let alone how long she'd been chained to a wall like this, but she didn't have a good feeling about it. She vaguely remembered a little girl, but she couldn't quite piece together the significance of that at the moment.
She didn't have to, though, because the door blasted off its hinges and thumped against the solid dirt wall on the other side of the room.
"Found ya," came a gruff, familiar voice. She felt relief swelling in her chest as the large figure stepped in front of her.
"G…Gajeel," she managed, but her voice was croaky and she wondered how long it had been since she'd had something to drink or eat. Her throat felt rather dry. But she felt the tears of relief in her eyes, despite the fact that he looked like he'd been through some sort of hell.
"You look like hell, Shrimp," he accused then, and she giggled because she had been thinking the same thing about him, and she hardly noticed when he bit one of her chains and her arm fell limply to her side. He supported her, though, when she realized that the pain in her shoulder was steadily rising. The tiny mage bit her lip as the large dragonslayer ate through the other chain, and she was finally free.
Her legs couldn't support her, though, and she collapsed against him.
"S-sorry, Gajeel," she said, flushing from both fever and embarrassment, as she tried to regain her balance. For some reason, her equilibrium was completely off and she couldn't do anything about it. Now that some pressure was on her legs again, she felt powerfully light-headed. And so she mentioned to her red-eyed savior, "I-I'm kind of…dizzy."
When she stumbled again, he steadied her and said, in his gruff yet soft tone, "Just lean on me and we'll getcha outta here."
And she tried—she really did—but after a few wobbly steps, the dragonslayer touched her forehead, cursed, and she found herself swept quickly and as gently as possible into his arms. He must have noticed her fever, she deduced, her thoughts determinedly muddled still. She tried to protest but one look from him silenced her, and she let herself be carried down the hall. At the corner, she spied the brunette mage that Lizzie's parents had warned the girl about…wait, Lizzie? The little girl that Levy was protecting for a job!
With a gasp, Levy asked, "Is Lizzie okay?" before cringing at her sudden movement and outburst and slumping heavily against Gajeel's chest with a whimper.
"The others have got the kid," her companion stated simply, kicking the boot of the unconscious mage as he walked quickly by. "Bunny Girl's apartment got attacked, but they're taking the kid to the guild while the Stripper and that flame-eating idiot handle the fighting. Rainwoman is upstairs clearing them out for us, and everyone else is doin' what they can."
Levy could breathe a small sigh of relief with that news, and let herself relax just a little bit more.
But then a grating, pained laugh sounded from behind them and Gajeel whorled around to find the brunette stone mage standing, supporting himself heavily against the wall. Blood was trickling down his chin, but he smiled a dark, foreboding smile and said to Gajeel, "Dodge this, fairy trash!"
The sound of cracking stone rent the air from all around them, and with a jolt, the solid script mage noticed that the entire building was shifting. From the look on Gajeel's face, Levy knew that the dragonslayer could see it too.
"Are you fucking crazy?" he roared, "You're going to kill yourself, too!"
The only answer was the other mage's laughter as the ceiling started to crumble. Gajeel cursed excessively under his breath and bolted towards the stairs. Stones fell faster and faster as they progressed, until a resounding snap echoed through the halls.
And then the entire ceiling started to fall.
The last thing that Levy remembered was clinging to the black shirt that her favorite dragonslayer always wore and shrieking, "Gajeel!"
And there you have it! Gajeel finally made it to Levy...but what now?
You'll have to wait for the next chapter to see! (And be warned: I may end up going back through this chapter and editing it in the meantime, trying to find a happy medium between what this chapter IS and what I wanted it to be haha).
ALSO PLEASE NOTE: I am a college student, a month away from finals and starting in on all my big projects for the semester. I have updated more this semester I think than any other semester at school so far, so please understand that I am busy if I do not update for the next couple of months. I ALSO WORK on campus 20 hours a week, which isn't much but it still takes a huge chunk out of my free time, so please be patient with me.
Thank you so much for reading, and I hope you guys are still enjoying it!
