Another reasonably short chapter... but I promise the next ones are going to be truly satisfying. Whether it's related to NaLu moments or just longer, I don't know...
This is not a good idea, this is not a good idea.
This was definitely not a good idea. Going on an S-Class mission? Not a good idea. Going on a mission out of the capital? Not a good idea. Going on a mission that happened to be way too close to Magnolia? Freakin' bad idea.
"Maya," Lucy said harshly, gritting her teeth as they rose from their booth in the guild hall, "Master Danny clearly said I'm not allowed to leave the capital, and so are you two!"
"We'll be back before he even notices!" she reassured, waving her off. Lucy growled.
"We'll be brought back by Master before we even notice!"
"Keep it down, you two, you're starting to draw attention," Ivy hissed, glaring at the pair of girls. "And Lucy, relax."
"You too, Ivy? Argh, are you kidding me?!" the blonde groaned. "Am I the only one with common sense here?!"
"I have common sense—" Ivy placed his hand on Maya's mouth before she could make a snide comment, "—and I think this is good for us. We've been wanting adventure for years and now that we finally get a job request like this there's no way I'm letting it go. Besides, it's perfect to test your new magic, Lucy."
"The S-Class mages will notice it missing from the S-Class request board," Lucy retorted stubbornly.
"We have no S-Class request board, we place all of the requests in one board," Ivy said dryly, to which Lucy raised an eyebrow. "Yes, we're that poor."
"And that powerful, powerful enough to defeat this monster. Come on, Luce, a little adventure doesn't hurt!"
"I've had plenty of adventures back in Fairy Tail, any more and I'll go insane," she muttered. She half expected them to be slightly offended by the comment, but that wasn't the case.
"Well then, it's time for some Dragon Claw adventure," Maya countered, pouting. "Come on!"
"No."
"Come on, come on, come oooooon."
"Maya…"
"Come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on—"
"ALRIGHT, FINE!"
"You mean it?!" she asked, bouncing on feet and grinning widely. Lucy scrunched up her nose.
"On one condition. Let's not go now."
"Huh?"
"I mean," Lucy began, sighing, "let's do other jobs before we do this one. Simpler jobs. And then, only then, we can take this S-Class quest."
"Sounds reasonable," Ivy agreed, nodding his head. Maya however, had a growing pout in her face.
"Not to me. Regular jobs aren't as fun as S-Class quests!" she whined.
"Exactly, because S-Class quests are all about fighting and spitting out blood, and that's not fun at all!" Lucy retorted.
"I beg to differ," Maya huffed. Ivy rolled his eyes, poking her left temple.
"Depends on the situation, moron."
Lucy slammed a slip of paper on Maya's face before she could start a brawl with him, glaring at the pair of Dragon Slayers.
"That job is a simple job in the capital. They want us to catch a few bandits that have been stealing jewelry from stores, they're not even mages. We get 30,000 each if we catch them."
"When do you think we get it done?" Ivy questioned. She shrugged.
"Hopefully by tomorrow, or even tonight, my landlord is complaining about my monthly rent and I'm running short on jewels. I'm counting on you guys," she said, effectively pouting as cutely as she could to persuade them.
She inwardly thought about what Natsu and Happy's reaction would be. They'd probably blink at her, and then laugh out loud, rather labelling her pout as a face not so pleasant to look at.
Maya and Ivy actually surprised her by widening their eyes and sighing in defeat.
"Don't do that, Luce, it makes me want to give you a lollipop and squeeze you silly," Maya said, gaining a face quite similar to the one Mira would make in her childhood—the one she made when young Natsu started crying. Lucy blinked, thinking why on Earthland had she remembered that.
"Did I ever tell you you're pretty damn cute? Well, there," Ivy said, smirking. Lucy knew he was just complimenting her, as she knew who he truly was after, and smiled. Even through the pink in her cheeks, the smile was wide and and hinted with pride.
"Why, thank you, Mr. Silver."
"You're welcome. Now," he said, roughly stealing the job request from Maya's hands, "let's get it over with and do this job."
They ended up doing three regular jobs, much to Maya's dismay. The first one, to catch those bandits, wound up to be tricky. They were fast, and hid well in the night, so their choice to split up hadn't been the wisest. Lucy was the only one capable of conjuring light to her eyes (how she had done that with Venus Lucem was still a mystery), so she had found two bandits and captured them easily. Ivy and Maya were not so lucky. Due to the moon being completely concealed by the dark clouds, the night was of a pitch black. If they hadn't put their Dragon Slayer senses to a use, it would have been impossible to tell where the criminals were at.
After handing in nearly fifteen criminals, Lucy insisted they went on another job. Maya would have complained (Ivy wasn't really bothered), but Ellia had already registered the job as taken and she didn't have a say in it. This one was slightly harder, since the people they had to catch were mages. Yet, they caught them without any major problem, though Maya should have really toned down the violence. She destroyed nearly as many buildings Natsu would have, and her reckless behavior took its toll on their reward. Instead of earning 80,000 jewels, they earned just as much as they had on their first job. Lucy glared at the poor girl through all the way home.
And then the third one, surprisingly suggested by Ivy. Maya had dramatically stated he was joining the dark side (which had made Lucy glare and pout at the same time), but he merely brushed her off and began explaining the job. This one was specifically, and secretly, requested by Princess Hisui herself. Apparently, she wanted a very rare rose from within the Forest Groove, a very exquisite one. They asked why she wanted another flower when the gardens of Crocus were packed with beautiful ones already, but she had simply smiled, and said that one more wouldn't hurt.
Well, it wouldn't hurt her. Lucy had found the reason behind those 130,000 jewels as a reward—the rose was in a very secluded area of the forest, which happened to be surrounded by dangerous looking felines and she had to fight every single one of them to get the rose. It was worth the exhaustion though, the rose was very beautiful. It was of an unusual green color, flawless and vivid, resembling the shades of a jade. Hisui, Lucy had remembered, smiling. They carried the rose carefully back to the palace, and when the princess saw the blonde with the precious rose tucked in her fingers, she gasped in awe and thanked her over and over again.
"This rose," Lucy had began, smiling, "this is one of the rarest roses in Fiore, Jade Sprout, right?"
Princess Hisui smiled in appreciation, nodding.
"This is the rose I've always wanted. It's not by accident that my name is Hisui. This was my late mother's favorite flower, and I wanted to have one in her memory."
Lucy smiled when she took her hands in hers, thanking her again, and the trio left the palace with a handful of cash and a special discount voucher for Lucy, Hisui sheepishly calling it a way of making it up to her. Fighting dangerous, leopard looking creatures had its advantages.
Now, the blonde was innocently looking up from her (in process) novel, in the middle of Dragon Claw's crowed hall, and facing a furiously glaring Maya and a scowling Ivy with his right brow up. In the brunette's right hand was a crumpled job request, which Lucy didn't fail to notice to be the S-Class quest she had promised to accompany them on. She gulped.
"Okay, Luce, we've done three regular jobs. Now, can we please go and defeat this stupid monster?" she whined, waving the paper in front of her like a maniac. Lucy stared at Ivy, silently begging the man to help her out. He puckered his lips, as if deep in thought.
"Sorry, blondie," he said, shrugging with his signature smirk. She moaned in defeat, and let her head hang low on her knees.
"Why are you so keen on avoiding this mission anyway, Luce?" Maya asked, and then frowned. "Is it because… it's so close to Magnolia?"
At how Lucy flinched, Ivy guessed Maya had just struck a nerve. Lucy kept silent, merely nodding as answer.
"Relax, then. We're going near Onibus, not Magnolia. Heck, we're going to chase it through the forests nearby, no need to worry," Ivy reassured.
"Yeah, it'll be fine, Luce. Nothing bad will happen."
"I know that," she said abruptly, and sighed. "I just… ah, I'm done worrying. When's the next train leaving?"
Maya furrowed her brow in confusion, before she jumped high in the air with her hands up and silly looking grin in her face. Ivy and Lucy had to laugh at her childish antics.
"YES!"
When the three boarded the train for Onibus, the night was dark and awfully silent. The sight of the cloudy skies through the window of their booth only cooperated with the jitters Lucy was getting from the mission flier. She pursed her lips, rereading the information and attempting to refocus over the loud racket a few kids were making on the other side of the train, playing some sort of game of tag regardless of the late hours. Lucy ended up sighing, still not liking the idea of doing this mission.
"Are you alright, Luce?" Maya called softly.
"Are you alright?" Lucy asked, surprised. "Don't you have motion sickness?"
"Nope. Since the element Earth tecnically has healing abillities, I'm not really affected."
"What about Ivy?"
"He has a special pill he took before he boarded," she explained. "I maintain my question. You look frustrated. Are you okay?"
"Yeah. I guess. I'm just a little nervous, I've only done an S-Class mission once and it was because Natsu dragged me along."
"But haven't you faced worse, from those adventures you've told us?" she insisted.
"Huh… I think I have. Maybe I'm really getting worked up for nothing," Lucy said, furrowing her brow.
"That's the spirit. Come on, it'll be fine! With your Celestial Caster magic and your new fighting skills, I bet you could even take on one of the Tenth Saints."
The blonde's eyes went abruptly wide.
"Oh no. I'll be pushing up daisies if I ever try that."
"Don't be so dramatic."
"Sorry, midget, but I'd rather not die at the tender age of seventeen. Almost eighteen…" she muttered, faking a horrid grimace. Maya puckered her lips with a raised brow, torn between wanting to rip her head off for calling her midget and laughing at the ridiculous face she was displaying.
"Never call me that again and I'll drop the subject."
"Deal," Lucy said, smirking slightly.
Both girls allowed silence to wash over the mood, and Lucy took the opportunity to grab her novel, with a pen already in her hand. Maya saw her intentions, and decided to keep quiet. Lucy read her last few entries, leaning her chin on her palm as she worked words in her head and willed them to come out as beautifully as she always endeavoured. Maya eyed the blonde mage curiously as her face contorted in what seemed concentration and frustration. Her green eyes squinted to read the charcoal words on top of the page faced in her direction.
"That your novel?"
Lucy glanced up, only to stare back at the pages with her hand already writing what her mind had conjured to describe the scene in picture.
"Yes. Second attempt, though, I threw away my first half written novel," she said.
"Why?"
Lucy shrugged half-heartedly.
"The way I wrote back then was not as smooth as my current way of writing, and the plot was simply childish and cliché," she explained in an unheeding voice, as she furiously poured words and adjectives onto the paper.
Maya scrunched up her nose, crossing her arms. Her eyes settled on the swiftly moving pictures outside the window, darkened by the somber sky.
"You should have kept it."
It was Lucy's turn to frown.
"Why?"
"It was one of the first steps you took to become a writer, right? You should have kept it as a reminder of your mistakes and how you should fix 'em."
Lucy blinked, and nibbled on the end of the pen.
"Didn't think of that…"
The pregnant silence was back again, and this time the kids in the back row had decided to keep quiet. Perhaps already tired from playing so much during the past few hours, and Lucy couldn't blame them. They had even pressured Maya to play with them, which the brunette had easily complied, and Lucy and Ivy were left watching the bunch with amused stares and common laughs.
Lucy shook her head with a soft smile, briefly eyeing Maya, before she returned to the ongoing work in her hands. It was actually getting good. What had inspired her was beyond her knowledge, but she blessed it to no end. Writing always made her forget about all worries and dilemmas. It was like music. It swept her off the face of Earthland.
She stopped writing for a moment, admiring her handiwork with a small smile.
Lynette eyed the target that stood hanging a few feet away, pulling the tight string of her makeshift bow close to her cheek. She inhaled, pressing her lips together, and loosened her hand, allowing the arrow to fly towards the target at the speed of light. A small rush of pride washed over her when it hit dead in the center, but she kept her face firm and stern.
"What's your trick?"
The princess turned to the source of the voice, bow taut in her hand as reflex, but sighed in relief at the familiar sight of Niall's tousled scarlet hair and piercing orange eyes. He looked amused, grinning with a raised eyebrow. She mimicked his brow gesture.
"My trick?"
"You've been with us barely over a month and you are already a skilled archer. How do you do it?"
Lynette shrugged, preparing another arrow as the hybrid dragon approached her in slow steps. She pulled the string once again to her cheek, feeling his presence inches away, and fought to keep her breathing steady. She always lost sense of thought whenever he was too close, and she hardened her grip on her bow as response to the conclusion in her head. Her cheeks were already heating up, and a scowl took over her face.
"Hey, you okay?" he asked quietly, his breath fanning over her ear. She struggled not to shiver.
"Yep."
She loosened the string, feeling relief when the arrow hit the target where she wanted it to. Niall whistled, and she turned to face him. She nearly regretted it—he was close, so painfully close, and he didn't realize the effect it had on her.
"You're getting good… getting more like a survivor, and less like a princess. Wild, ferocious," he said, smirking, and moved his hand to brush a strand of golden hair from Lynette's pale cheeks.
He stared directly into her forest green eyes, making her cheeks go red and her heart go berserk. His smirk prevailed as his other hand snaked around her waist, bringing them even closer, which was proven possible as contrary to what Lynette believed.
"Maybe you've been spending too much time with me."
"This is great stuff…"
Lucy squeaked, jolting in her seat at Ivy's sudden voice near her ear. For a moment there she feared her novel would fan out on the floor, but gladly she caught herself before the papers could slide farther down her curled hands.
"Since when have you been awake?!" she hissed. He moved from behind her, plopping down on the seat next to her.
"Just five minutes ago. You seemed so out of it though, focused on those papers, so I thought I'd check it out," he explained, and eyed her curiously. "Did you write this?"
She cleaned her throat, nodding. He raised his brow, clearly impressed.
"This is very good, Lucy. I think you should get it published when it's done."
"You really think so?" she asked, smiling. He nodded, grinning.
"Yes, I do. Though you do realize the way you describe Niall reminds readers somewhat of You-Know-Who? No, scratch that, Niall is basically him."
Lucy blushed faintly, and nodded, storing away her novel.
"I may have created Niall using a few bases from Natsu…"
"May?" Ivy teased. Lucy rolled her eyes, laughing softly.
"Shup up, Mr. Silver."
"Make me, blondie."
She ignored the nickname. "Pushing aside novels and Fire mages, what are we going to do when we get to Onibus?"
"We'll speak to the job requester first, naturally, and see what kind of downfall awaits us."
Lucy raised an eyebrow.
"That's it? No studying this mighty beast?"
"That's part of what the job requester has to tell us. Once we are filled with reasonable information, we'll set out to look for the beast after planning for a bit."
She merely pursed her lips as an answer. She had dealt with an S-Class mission before, as she had previously stated, yet couldn't help but feel a revolting cocktail of emotions spiraling in her mind. Courage, panic and fear were part of the mixture. Something about this job made her uneasy. Lucy had the severe fear at the pit of her stomach that this was all going to go downhill.
Knowing me, yep, it's probably going downhill, Luce. But you'll never know unless I keep writing this fic. Which I will. Probably. Putting that aside, tell me what you all think of Lynette and Niall.
Needless to say, REVIEW. You know I can punish you if you don't. Like… taking three months to update. Hmn.