The Raven

Chapter Fourteen: Gone, Gone, Gone

{Long after you're gone, gone, gone}

To be frank Igneel was having a shitty week.

He had accidently let the one girl he was trying to protect get kidnapped. Well, that wasn't exactly right. To say "accidently" would imply that it was something of little importance and, honestly, he knew several people who would kill him if he said that she being missing was "no big deal", one of those people was his son. He also hadn't "let" her be kidnapped. That had been a rather… large flaw in his plan to keep her safe and, honestly, he never would have expected it to happen; maybe in a cliché movie, but never in the real world.

Igneel could have slapped himself as he listened to his own thoughts. His whole plan had been incredibly stupid and it was no wonder it had failed. He had paid a huge price for his mistake; he knew that he was going to have to pay for it with something. He just didn't think that it would be Lucy. God dammit! He should have listened to Gildarts and Macao! Both of them had specifically told him to keep a close eye on her and that his plan was not a good one and what did he do? He went through with his plan and then he left. He left her in a jail cell for an hour with no way to defend herself and when he got back- with his son none the less- she was gone and all that was left of her was a puddle of blood and a knocked out cop who had no idea what had happened to her.

That was lovely. That was just fucking lovely.

And let's not forget the fact that his son refused to speak with him since the day she disappeared- he used the word "disappeared" very loosely. "Disappear" sounded too final. She hadn't just vanished out of thin air and he was sure as hell going to find her- not that Igneel really blamed Natsu for not speaking with him. Natsu had always been fiercely protective of and loyal to Lucy and now she was gone -missing, taken, kidnapped, whatever word works best- and it was Igneel's fault. Igneel could understand that. If anything were to ever happen to his wife because of someone's stupid mistake he would never forgive them. He would absolutely never forgive them for it.

Then again the situation was a bit more complicated than that because it was him and his son and his son's girlfriend and some crazy man that had an unknown fascination with her.

No. Igneel couldn't blame his son for the way things had turned out. He couldn't blame Macao or Gildarts for it either.

He only had himself to blame for what happened.

And that might just have been the worst part of all.

His job was to protect people. His job was to save people. His job was to make sure that nothing fucking happened to the people that he made a promise to look after. He was supposed to do the right thing and make sure that no one was hurt unnecessarily.

His self-appointed job had been to protect her, if only for a fleeting moment, and he couldn't even do that right. He wasn't able to do that one thing correctly.

She was hurt because he didn't think about everything that could go wrong.

Plain and simple. He didn't think.

Maybe if he had thought about it harder he wouldn't have arrested her to begin with.

Maybe if he had used some fucking commonsense he wouldn't have left her alone with a greenhorn cop that didn't know how to handle one fucking man. Why couldn't Zancrow have taken care of it?

Maybe, if he had just driven a little bit faster he and Natsu would have gotten back to her in time to save her before it was too late.

Maybe if he had just let Natsu say goodbye… if he had just let Natsu say goodbye to Lucy on the phone his son wouldn't be as angry as he was.

And maybe… maybe he should stop. Maybe he should just stop thinking about what he could have done and start working on a way to fix it. He needed to start working out a way to find her.

To save her.

Lucy glared at Igneel, "Why are you doing this?"

He glanced at her, "You're playing with a madman Lucy. Sooner or later your luck has to run out."

"So your solution is to arrest me?" she practically snarled at him.

He was right. Her luck did run out, but it wasn't because of something she did. Maybe it was him that had jinxed her in the first place. Not that it really made a difference anymore. He didn't even believe in superstitions.

"You need to stop moping. It's not good for your complexion," a man's voice penetrated his thoughts, practically tearing them to pieces. Igneel sighed as he recognized the irritating voice, looking up and placing the face with the name.

"Zancrow," Igneel forced a smile, secretly wishing his coworker would just leave him alone, or go jump off a bridge. He wasn't on the best terms with Zancrow before this whole mess began, but with Lucy going missing while Zancrow was supposed to be watching her, Igneel's distaste for the man was tripled. "What a pleasure to see you," he let the heavy dose of sarcasm drip from his words like venom, hoping that Zancrow would realize it and go away.

There was no such luck.

Zancrow gave him a brief smile and planted his hands onto Igneel's desk, fingers splayed out as if to take up as much room as humanly possible. Igneel's left eye twitched in annoyance. "I'm really sorry about what happened to that girl—what was her name?" he paused in mock thought. "Lacy—"

"Lucy."

"—Lucy," the blond corrected himself, smiling gently. "I'm really sorry about that." There was something in Zancrow's tone that made Igneel think that Zancrow wasn't sorry, but Igneel didn't voice the brief thought. "Some guy came in asking for help and the next thing I knew you were shaking me awake on the floor asking me what had happened," Zancrow looked down apologetically, shame flooding across his face.

Igneel nodded at what the blond man said, not really caring about his excuses at all. Igneel sighed. It wasn't Zancrow's fault either. The man had merely been a victim of circumstances. Zancrow hadn't been the one to take Lucy, Igneel was sure of that. Zancrow was a jerk and could be a bit twisted when he wanted to be, but Igneel didn't think that the other man had enough backbone to actually hurt a girl, much less kill one.

Zancrow just kept talking for several minutes, spouting off a bunch of useless encouragements and words of advice for the situation which had started nearly three days earlier. None of it was helping him in any way and he really just wanted to strangle the incompetent younger man, because, really? First he had—sort of—sexually harassed Lucy while Igneel was standing right there, then he had—also sort of—lost her, and now he was being a nuisance and not helping at all.

Igneel could have screamed. Really, he could have. He was just that frustrated.

The situation was going from bad—could the kidnapping of someone close to him merely be considered bad? —to worse. Things were getting really bad.

Not only was Lucy missing, but he couldn't do anything about it. He wasn't allowed to. That was a firm rule. Detectives were not allowed to get involved with cases that hit close to home- something about the case being too personal. Igneel thought it was all a load of BS, but he thought it would be wise to keep to himself.

So… that was another reason he was pissed. Lucy was missing, he son refused to talk to him, Zancrow was annoying and pretty much useless, and Igneel wasn't allowed to do a damn thing about anything which made him pretty much useless as well.

He didn't want to be useless. He didn't want to sit back and watch everything go by without being involved in some way. Igneel wanted to be helpful. "Useless" was not a word that he was used to. It wasn't even in his vocabulary.

It was something he would have to deal with though. He couldn't exactly go against orders without getting in serious trouble or, judging by how Jose was, losing his job. Not that it really mattered anymore; Igneel had already screwed up. There was no way that he could go back and fix things.

Igneel closed his eyes and sighed heavily, letting himself think about the mere hour of time where he had been gone from the precinct. It was only one hour, which seemed so short. It was one hour that had seemingly changed everything.

Igneel had practically sped home, not even bothering to try and obey the speed limit- nor thinking about how embarrassing it would be to be pulled over by someone he knew. Lucy was angry with him and Natsu was, probably, really angry with him and Igneel… Igneel wasn't sure what to feel.

This whole thing was so confusing and he was starting to doubt that what he had done was right. Not just the fact that he had arrested Lucy, but also the fact that he had left her with Zancrow. The man was a pervert with no sense of respect for women, but ultimately he wasn't that bad, he could have been worse. Igneel just had a really bad feeling that something bad was going to happen.

He didn't have time to dwell on that thought though, because in the next moment he was pulling into the driveway and practically throwing the car door open, having to backtrack and turn off the car after momentarily forgetting to do so. He stalked over to the front door and slammed it open, barely registering the fact that the door made a loud banging noise as it smacked into the wall.

Igneel didn't even have the time to close the door before Natsu pounced on him.

Not literally of course.

"What the hell were you thinking?" Natsu snarled at him, shaking the bigger man by his shoulders.

Igneel swatted his son away from him, "I'm trying to protect her!" Natsu had never been up in Igneel's face the way he was right at that moment. Then again, Igneel probably should have seen it coming because of what the situation was and who was involved.

Natsu was never calm when the situation involved Lucy. He was either completely freaking out or extremely happy. Igneel only saw Natsu calm when he was cuddling with Lucy, of course it wouldn't last for long because Igneel couldn't let them cuddle without teasing them.

"By arresting her?" Natsu snarled at him. "You do realize this sort of thing is permanent right? This will weigh over her for the rest of her life!" Natsu was practically screaming at him and, Igneel assumed, it had to do with the fact that he hadn't let Natsu say much to Lucy at the end of the conversation, it might have been the fact that his father had arrested his girlfriend though.

"Yes, Natsu," Igneel sighed, "I do, in fact, know the consequences of what I've done."

"And yet you still did it," his son spat back at him. "Maybe instead of arresting her you should be working on finding the guy who's after her!" Natsu nearly screamed the words at him.

"Natsu," Igneel barked, finally fed up with his son's anger. "You know what I said this morning. He is coming after her next." And that was true. She was next and the first thing to come to mind was to arrest her, well, actually, his first thought had been to put her in protective custody, but no, Jose Porla had shot that plan out of the water. "Believe me, the last thing I want to do is get her in trouble, but if all of this works out the way I have it planned no one else will ever know about this except for us."

Natsu, who seemed to have calmed down at least a little, backed away from him, exhaling through his nose. "Good to know that you're such a law abiding citizen." The younger man sighed and fell backwards onto the couch behind him. "I'm sorry," he apologized, "I just—I'm worried about her."

Igneel smiled softly and sat down next to the younger male. "And you think I'm not?" Igneel shoved his son playfully. "I just arrested my future daughter-in-law," Igneel joked, causing Natsu's face to turn the same color as his hair. "I wouldn't just do that for no reason."

Natsu nodded. Once, twice, a third time, and then lunged to his feet. "So she isn't hurt," Natsu clarified softly, "And she isn't in trouble." Igneel knew better than to think they were questions.

"She's not hurt," Igneel promised. "Probably—well not probably—scared and a bit shaken up, but not hurt," He explained. Obviously she was scared. He had just left her in a jail cell with a person that she had never met, granted, Zancrow was a cop, but he was a pervert and Lucy had no clue who he was.

"Thank God," Natsu breathed out softly. "If she was hurt someone would have hell to pay." Igneel nodded in agreement, humming slightly.

In Igneel's mind that was a great talk. No one had died, no punches had been thrown, not that he would ever hit his kid, and he had managed to calm Natsu down before anything had been damaged. Great talk…Great talk.

"So, what do you say?" Igneel stared down at Natsu. "Do you want to go see your girlfriend?"

Natsu didn't even spare him a look. "Is that a rhetorical question?"

Igneel's brows shot up to his hair line. "I didn't think 'rhetorical' was part of your vocabulary."

Natsu's lips twitched up into a smile as he lunged to his feet. "Can I go see my girlfriend now?" he asked, turning around to look at Igneel.

As soon as he caught the look in his son's eyes Igneel froze. The anger from earlier was gone and all that was left was worry- obviously not directed at Igneel- and affection- also not directed at Igneel-. His son's love for the girl—literally—next door was painfully obvious.

He just hoped that Natsu could see it as well.

"You love her," Igneel murmured. "Don't you?"

Natsu didn't say anything to that, but the soft look in his eyes spoke volumes to Igneel. Yes, Natsu did love her and he probably always would. Well, Igneel hoped he always would. Although, knowing Natsu, he never would care about someone else on the same level as Lucy, because she was special to him and that's just how Dragneel men were. They were only able to be in love with one person in a lifetime. Nothing would ever change that.

Igneel would later use this knowledge to tease his son mercilessly, but for now he would take his son to see the girl he was so worried about.

"Well," Igneel pushed himself to his feet and started to walk to the door. "Let's get going." When he didn't hear footsteps following his and an excited blob of pink didn't shove past him he stopped walking and turned around. "Are you coming?" Natsu stared at him expectantly. "Do you not want to see her?"

Natsu's left hand shot up and he pointed at something to Igneel's right. "What about Wendy?"

Oh, right, Wendy, his other child. Igneel blinked for a moment and then looked over at his blue haired daughter. "Wendy can stay here."

Natsu shot him a blank look. "Wendy is eleven," he deadpanned

Igneel glared at his oldest child. "Wendy is a little girl. I'm not going to bring a little girl to a police station."

"You brought Lucy there," Natsu argued back, sounding half exasperated.

"I'll be sure to tell Lucy you called her a little girl," Igneel told him dryly. "Wendy," he crouched down in front of the small girl, "Don't answer the door for anyone, don't answer the phone, and, most importantly," Igneel swallowed, fear flashing over his face, "Don't tell Mom." Wendy giggled and threw her arms around her father, launching a similar hug onto Natsu a moment later, before running back up the stairs, shouting something about "saying hello to Lucy for her".

Igneel glanced at the clock on the wall; he had been home for nearly twenty minutes. It looked like he was right. He had told Lucy he would be back in an hour and as long as there wasn't a ton of traffic he would be back by the time the hour was up.

"Come on," Igneel grabbed the hood of Natsu's sweatshirt and pulled it over his head, all but dragging him to the door. "Let's go." Natsu grumbled something under his breath but complied with his father's demand.

"Alright, alright," Natsu swatted his father's hands away from him, pulling the hood off of his head as he opened the door to Igneel's car. He slammed the door shut behind him and turned to the man starting the car. "So, are you going to tell me the real reason you arrested Lucy?"

Igneel peeled his gaze away from the road for a moment. "I already told you, to protect her." His gaze snapped back to the road. "I'll tell you what I told her," Igneel murmured. "She's gotten involved with a dangerous man and eventually her luck with violent people is going to run out."

"You mean her father," Natsu murmured. "Is that who you think is doing this?"

Igneel shook his head. "I don't have the faintest idea who is doing this, but it isn't her father." He glanced at Natsu again. "The night of the first murder he hit Lucy, didn't he?" Natsu looked away from him and nodded. Igneel could see the storm in Natsu's eyes, so he didn't press the matter. "The murder happened almost directly after Lucy said she got home, so unless he can be in two places at once…"

"Gotcha," Natsu mumbled. "So you have nothing?"

Igneel's eyes narrowed. "No. Macao and I weren't even sure that the killer was male until Gray was shot at."

The rest of the ride was filled with silence.

When they finally made it to the precinct Natsu all but jumped out of the still moving car. Actually he tried to jump out of the still moving car. He would have made it too if Igneel hadn't grabbed onto the back of his sweatshirt and jerked him back inside the, still moving, car.

"Natsu, do not jump out of my car while it's still moving!" Igneel cried out.

"Then hurry up and park the car," his son shot back at him, leaping out of the car as soon as it stopped moving and bolting into the building in search of his girlfriend. Not that there were that many places she could be hiding…

Igneel sighed as he watched his son run towards the building as if the devil itself was on his heels, for all Igneel knew maybe it was. The red haired man smiled as he got out of the car, shutting the door behind him. After a moment of just standing there he hurried after his son.

The sight that he was met with when he made it to where Lucy and Zancrow had been was not what he had been expecting.

The cell door was open wide, carelessly thrown open in a rush; papers that were at one time on the desk that Zancrow had been at were strewn over the floor, some torn; Zancrow himself seemed to be missing, or at least out of sight; and Lucy… Lucy was gone.

What… what had happened in the time that he had been gone? He had only been gone for an hour… only an hour and now… what had happened?

Natsu was just standing in front of the cell, staring at something Igneel couldn't see; maybe Igneel would never be able to see what his son was seeing. Maybe he would never want to.

Igneel started to walk towards Natsu, stopping when he caught sight of a body on the floor. "Zancrow," Igneel whispered, darting over to the fallen Officer. He dropped down onto his knees next to the blond man, checking him over for any injuries, not fining anything except for what looked like a nasty blow to the head. "Zancrow, can you hear what I'm saying?"

The, previously unconscious, man blinked up at him. "What happened?" He winced as the light hit his eyes.

Igneel shook his head. "You're supposed to tell me." The other man's eyes knit together in thought as he tried to recall what had happened in the hour that Igneel was gone.

Dammit! What the hell had happened here? Zancrow had been knocked out., everything was a mess, and Lucy was… Lucy was gone. She was just gone and god dammit Igneel had brought her here to protect her!

Where the fuck was she!?

"Dad," Igneel turned back around at the sound of Natsu's voice. The look on Natsu's face nearly broke Igneel's heart into a thousand tiny pieces. Natsu was crying. Natsu was crying for the first time in nearly twelve years. The silence that followed Natsu's one word was the loudest thing Igneel had ever heard in his life. The pink haired boy's voice broke at the next thing he said.

"There's blood on the floor."

Igneel cut away from his thoughts there. He didn't want to think about the blood- her blood- that Natsu had found on the floor just inside the cell. He didn't want to think about that at all, because that meant that she had been hurt. She had been hurt and it was because he had brought her to that cell.

Igneel nearly laughed at that thought.

She might have had a fighting chance to get away if she hadn't been stuck in a fucking cage, she might have been okay. Because, really, that's what it was. He had locked her in a cage, promised her everything would be okay, he had left her, and now she was gone. She was long gone…

Igneel sighed and dropped his head into his hands. He really needed to calm down. Blaming himself for something he had no control over was not going to help the situation. He was going to need a level head to deal with this situation. Igneel's head snapped back up. This was why he wasn't allowed to partake in finding her. By God they were right… his personal feelings were clouding his judgment.

He sighed again, something he had been doing a lot lately. The sighing bothered him more than it normally would, making him realize just how stressed out he really was. He needed to calm down right now. He needed to stop blaming himself for what had happened and he needed to figure this situation out before it got worse.

Stressing himself out was not going to help anyone do anything; in fact it would probably make things harder for everyone else. And blaming himself? Well…

"You deserve it." She murmured.

Igneel froze. That's not how she had meant it. He shouldn't even be thinking about that. He shouldn't be thinking about what had happened. He shouldn't be thinking about anything.

No—wait! He should be thinking. Thinking was a good thing in most cases. Thinking meant that he might be able to figure this thing out. But… he wasn't allowed to figure this one out; Jose Porla had made that incredibly clear. Igneel was not supposed to involve himself in—quote— "the disappearance of Lucy Heartfilia" —end quote—which was completely ridiculous considering that he had been the arresting officer in the first place. Not that he had been ordered to arrest someone in the first place. He had still been the arresting officer though, so didn't that technically make it his case?

Igneel blinked stupidly for several moments, trying to really process what had been going through his head. He really needed some sleep, like really, really badly. He hadn't been getting much sleep for the past three nights up until today, not since what had happened Saturday, it was now Tuesday. Not that anyone else in his family had been getting that much sleep either.

Nights at the Dragneel house had suddenly become quiet and sad. When the lights were finally out Igneel could hear soft cries coming from Wendy's room and angry cursing that turned into whimpers from Natsu's. He never commented on any of it though, he didn't have it in him to confront his children after what had happened.

Igneel could understand what they were feeling to some extent. He would never be able to fully understand the extent of what they were feeling, but he could come close.

Wendy was confused, he could tell that much. She really didn't understand what was going on other than the fact that Lucy was missing and no one knew where she was. The little girl did not know about the fact that the man who took her had killed seven other women. She did not know about the fact that there had been blood- her blood- on the ground in the last place she had been seen. Igneel was not about to let his eleven year old daughter know that Lucy could very well die, as much as he hated to admit it. Lucy could die if they didn't hurry.

Grandine was worried. Lucy was like a second daughter to both her and Igneel and now she was missing. When Igneel had explained what had happened just before Lucy was abducted- when Igneel had arrested her- Grandine had bluntly refused to talk to him for several hours and when she did- he cringed-. Igneel would not be forgetting that conversation for awhile. Grandine was never going to let him forget what she had said.

And Natsu… Natsu was distraught to say the very least. There were more words that Igneel could have used to describe his son, none of them were good. Panicked and hysterical were also words that could have described Natsu. After the fight the two of them had had the same day Lucy had disappeared the pink haired male had refused to say a word to his father, practically going out of his way to avoid him, only speaking with the female family members and Gajeel and Jellal, who had taken to staying at the Dragneel house as well.

Igneel knew exactly why Natsu wouldn't speak with him. That was the worst part. Not that his son wasn't talking to him, but the reason behind it.

If they never found Lucy or if they did and it was far too late… Natsu would have been denied the chance to say "goodbye" to her. Igneel had ripped the phone out of Lucy's grasp when she had been talking to Natsu and when Igneel had spoken to Natsu he had ignored the boy's pleas to give her the phone.

Igneel had denied Natsu the chance to say something to her and for that reason alone Igneel could not blame his son for not talking to him. He couldn't blame him because if someone had done that to him and it had been his wife on the phone—if it had been Grandine on the phone—Igneel would never be able to deal with that fact. Not even in a thousand years.

If Igneel could go back in time he wasn't sure what part he would change. There were so many little factors involved in the situation that just one little thing could tip the balance in either direction. He could have never arrested her, he could have let Natsu say goodbye, he could have stayed with her, he could have driven just a little faster. Maybe he wouldn't change anything anyway, because things could have been worse…

Igneel and Natsu could have walked in to find her dead on the floor- mutilated just like all of the other girls had been. That would have been much worse. It would have been so much worse. Natsu would never forgive him if she was dead and Igneel would never be able to forgive himself.

Or they could have found her by now. They could have found her dead on the side of some road or in the woods. It had been over forty-eight hours. Most victims didn't last that long, much less three days. It seemed nearly impossible that she could still be alive and that was enough to send Igneel into a near catatonic state.

What if she actually was dead? What if they just hadn't found her yet? Igneel didn't want to doubt Lucy's ability to stay alive; after all she had lived with an abusive parent for several years without being too shaken. There was still that chance that she wouldn't make it though. There was only so much pain that a person could go through before breaking, and Lucy had already gone through so much pain.

Igneel could only hope that she would be able to go through a little more pain, because he knew that she would be going through pain, possibly a lot of it.

Zancrow's voice drew him back to reality.

"Yeah, so I gave some of the other Officers a description of the guy who attacked me." The blond sounded proud of himself. "I think someone recognized the description and a few guys went to go bring the guy in for questioning."

Igneel turned to look at him, confusion and surprise etched across his face. "You did what?" When Igneel had first found Zancrow the man couldn't tell up from down and left from right and now he was just remembering to tell him that he remembered what the guy who had taken Lucy looked like? Igneel could have smacked him.

Zancrow nodded, completely ignoring the seething glare that Igneel was giving him, and smiled brightly at him. "I think someone said the guys name was—"

Zancrow was rudely cut off by a different voice. Someone was shouting- screaming for someone to just listen to them, and when Igneel realized he knew who that voice belonged to his heart jumped up into his throat, nearly suffocating him. Igneel didn't even have to turn around to look at the person to know who it was.

"I would never hurt Bunny Girl! Never!"

~The Raven~

AN: Not a new chapter (obviously…). To me the chapters were being so crammed with information you couldn't process anything and answers were being revealed too fast.

I've gone back and spaced everything out, so now the chapters are shorter and (hopefully) seem more evened out.

Fun Fact One: I started writing when I was about ten. None of my stories were very good and were promptly burned.

Love you guys,

-Riven