Like the other mornings Lucy wakes up much earlier than the others. She puts on some clothes and leaves to get some breakfast for the others, so they can have a Team breakfast-meeting in their room.
Arriving at a cute little cafe she enters and overlooks that the new Team A is sitting at one table, having their own Team breakfast-meeting.
"Luce!" "Lucy!" "Lucy-san!"
Lucy was standing in the line when hearing this calls, she turns around and sees the other Team, motion to her to go to them.
Lucy sighs and inwardly curses for not paying more attention to her surroundings. More or less forced to, she puts on a bright smile and walks over, growling inwardly that Natsu and her Team can still smile at her like that, she can see that the Thunder God Tribe can't look at her and that they have a guiltily expression but her Team...
"Hey guys, didn't thought that I would meet you hear this early.", she looks curious down at them.
"Freed made us stand up this early so we could have a Team meeting!", Natsu whined to her.
"I thought that it would be a wise decision to have a Team meeting before we enter together as a new Team. It would be for the best to clear certain things before the Games start and not when we are already in the middle of it and it is to late. And what are you doing here this early, Lucy-san?", Freed defends himself.
"Ah yes, Natsu you should listen to him, it is in fact a good idea to have a Team meeting before the Games start later. And I am here for the same reason you could say. While training I always woke up early, so I'm always up before the rest of my Team wakes up and I'm here to buy us all some breakfast so we can have a Team meeting in out room.", she explains to them.
"Luce, come on sit down with us, lets talk a bit. Your Team doesn't need a Team meeting. And maybe we could talk about Laxus? You know we have to tell you something...", while speaking Natsu had pulled her down to sit next to him with his arm over her shoulders. Lucy let him pull her down just reluctantly, he wasn't allowed just now to know that she already knows almost everything, so she had to act like always.
In his arms Lucy tenses up as if just the mention of Laxus name was to much, in reality she was tense because he touched her so casually after all they did to her and Laxus.
She notices how everyone looks expectantly at her but she wasn't having it.
"Sorry but I don't want to speak about Laxus. I will leave now!", Lucy stands up and does just that, leaving the cafe without buying anything.
Both Teams are left behind, staring at her leaving form. Both Teams have this sad expression, but both for different, but somewhat the same, reason.
Team Natsu is sad because they noticed that Lucy is a bit distant with them and from Natsu's explanation they know that she is hurting. They know that this is hurting her and Laxus, they know that they are the reason for that, they know that maybe they should try harder to talk with her but right now the Games are in the foreground of their minds.
The Thunder God Tribe is sad because they know that they are the reason why Laxus is hurting right now, they know that they should try to talk with Lucy but all they can think about is Laxus. How they hurt Laxus and that maybe he will never trust them again, that maybe he won't work with them anymore. At some point they wanted to blame Lucy for the way Laxus is hurting now, but overall they know that they and Team Natsu are the real reason for his pain, so they stopped trying to blame her.
After leaving the cafe, Lucy searches for another to buy some breakfast for her Team.
Should she have listen to them? Should she have talked with them? No, now is not the time for that!
Arriving back at their room Lucy sees that the only one awake is Laxus, who still lays in his bed.
She sets the bags down on their table and walks up to him where she sits down beside him on his bed.
"Good morning, Blondie. What were you doing this early? And is that breakfast I smell in these bags?", he asks while propping himself up.
"Yeah, this is breakfast you can smell. And I thought it would be nice to have breakfast together so I went out to buy us all some since I was awake anyways. And no before you ask, you can not start eating while the others are still sleeping. We will wake them up and then eat together!", she looks sternly down at him, already knowing where his thoughts were wandering to.
Laxus who was still sleepy responds to that in a way Lucy never would have guessed, "Well if I can't have breakfast, I want something else!" Laxus somewhat pouts before falling back down on his bed and pulls Lucy down with him.
Before Lucy even realizes what is happening she is already pressed against his chest with his arms securely wrapped around her, holding her there, and his nose once again buried in her hair, taking in her intoxicating scent. And that is when he realizes that something is off about her smell, and he really doesn't likes it, not one bit. There is this smell like a campfire and ash on her that makes his nose twitch in irritation.
He leans back a little to look at her face while still holding her close to him.
"Why do you smell like campfire and ash?", Lucy wasn't to sure, but it sounded like there was some jealousy in his voice.
"Well in the first cafe it wanted to buy the breakfast I met the new Team A. They wanted to talk with me about you and Natsu pulled me down to sit beside him with his arm around my shoulder, I guess you are smelling him on me. You Slayers and your noses...", Lucy explains and shakes her head at him.
"I don't like it!", Laxus growls and pulls her even closer, once more burying his nose in her hair, wanting to replace the smell of Natsu and her with his own scent. He likes it so much more when she smell like him, it always fills him with satisfaction when he detects his own scent on her, it's like some kind of claim.
"You know Laxus... as much as I like it here in your arms... you know that the other Slayers will smell this too, but luckily for you I still have to take a shower.", Lucy looks up to him through her lashes. She was telling the truth, she really likes it here in is arms, more like loves it, but she starts to wiggle to get out anyways.
Laxus didn't even notice that she is trying to escape his arms, his thoughts stopped at her telling him that she likes it in his arms, he replays this over and over in his head, every replay brings his smile to brighten. And just when he finally breaks out of this circle to tell her that he likes her in his arms as well he finally notices that she isn't there in his arms anymore. But before he can panic he hears the shower in the bathroom and calms down again.
After Lucy is finished with her shower Laxus goes in next while Lucy starts to wake up the others.
Finished with their breakfast and the little Team meeting, more like just talking with each other to bond some more, they made their way to the Domus Flau.
After hearing the name of the Game they decide that Laxus will participate and he leaves to go down to the arena.
Like Laxus followed her to her battle, Lucy follows him to shortly speak with him, "Laxus! Wait a minute, I wanted to give you something!" He stops and turns around, looking at her.
"I don't know how often you have the chance to eat lightning to power yourself up but I thought I can help you out with that. During my training I got some new Keys, one of them can use Lightning-magic. And since this is Celestial-Lightning it probably will give you an extra boost. You don't have to of course but I wanted to at least offer it to you.", Lucy looks down, suddenly a little ashamed to ask him something like this. Everyone knows how strong he is, he doesn't need any boosts.
"I would be really happy to have some lightning. You are right, I don't get very often the chance to eat some lightning. Only Lightning-Lacrimas but they are not the same as fresh lightning.", he smiles down at her.
So Lucy call out Aquila to give Laxus some lightning. Aquila shoots his own Lightning at Laxus until Laxus can't take in anymore, what costs Lucy quite a bit of her own magic. But Lucy is really happy to be able to help him in someway and this magic loss in nothing compared to the magic she needed to release while fighting Jura. She knows it won't take to long for her to replenish her magic reserves.
"Thanks Blondie! This lightning was very delicious, in fact I don't know if I had ever lightning before that was this good! And wow! You were right, this is quite an impressive boost you gave me. I feel so good and powerful now! I think from now on I will come to you and your Spirit whenever I want some lightning.", Laxus grins down at her, he feels for the first time in a long while really satisfied. Normally he tries to eat lightning during thunderstorms but it has been a while since there was one and Lightning-Lacrimas always tastes so stale.
Laxus pulls her in a quick hug and then leaves for the arena, leaving a happy Lucy behind. Happy that she could help him.
Lucy arrives back in their booth to see the Castle appear before them and Erza declaring that she wants to fight all hundred monsters.
Lucy gaps and asks Juvia what has happened while she was away. Juvia quickly explains the Game and that Erza got number one and choose to fight all monsters at once.
Lucy looks down to Laxus who looks really annoyed, she knows he wanted to fight something too and now Erza takes this away from him. And Lucy knows that Erza is very much capable of taking down all these monsters, she really hopes that Laxus will have a chance to show his own power. She herself wanted to see how much of a power boost she gave him with the lightning from Aquila.
The crowd watches in awe as Erza takes down one monster after the other until she defeated the S-class monster last.
As much as Lucy is angry at her own Team, she can't help herself but stare down in awe at the power from Erza.
Everyone is left gaping at the power of Erza, Titania like some of them slowly remembers her.
After some contemplating it was decided to test the other with the MPF to decide the ranks.
They continue with the numbers they draw before.
Millianna is first and gets a score of 365.
Next is Nobarly with 124, then comes Hibiki who just gets 95 and Obra with just 4.
Hibiki's small score is reasonable for Lucy since she knows that his kind of magic is really not one for the physical power. But with Obra she has a feeling that something is up there but can't really determine what it is.
And then finally the really interesting people are next.
Everyone was curious what Orga from Sabertooth would score since Sabertooth is praised for their strong members. And he doesn't disappoint with his 3825.
Lucy waits just as eagerly for Jura than for Laxus. She wants to see what score the Wizard Saint she almost beat will get.
And everyone is even more shocked when he gets a score of 8544. And Lucy knows that the only way she was able to fight him was because of her smarts and because he underestimated her, there was just no way that she could have beat him otherwise when he has powers like that.
Finally it is Laxus turn and Lucy practically shakes in her seat from excitement, how will he score compared to Orga and Jura?
You can compare the power from a Lightning God Slayer directly with a Lightning Dragon Slayer, and everyone is impatiently waiting for Laxus to start his attack. Will he score about the same as Orga or maybe even as Jura? Everyone remembers that Laxus was once feared for his immense strength and now they finally can witness it, even if it just in this test.
"Dragon Slayer's Secret Art: Roaring Thunder of the Stars!" Laxus unleashes a roar at the MPF, a roar so big no one had ever seen before. From his mouth erupts an onslaught of golden lightning with, if you look close enough, little sparkling stars in it.
Upon impact the lightning flashes all over the MPF, at first it looks like nothing happened and then the globe suddenly explodes in many tiny pieces. All of these pieces still have lightning flashing around them, letting the small pieces exploding into even smaller pieces until there is nothing left to see. Lightning is still flashing all around the place so that the people were to blinded to notice the 9999 at the place where the MPF once stood.
As if the explosion wasn't enough to shock everyone, he really destroyed the thing until nothing was left, now everyone can see the 9999, which means he is stronger than Jura, a Wizard Saint.
The crowd is left gaping and Laxus got second place for his Team.
He looks up at Lucy and sees her completely amazed, this was possible because of her power up. And he will make sure that she understands that he was just so strong because of her.
He sees the proud and happy smile she sends him and just has to return the smile.
Laxus decides then and there that he will make sure to ask her for more of this lightning when ever possible, he had never felt this good before. And even now after this strong attack, he knows that he still has massive of his own magic left, since he mostly used the lightning from her Spirit. Maybe he should take her, from now on, on all of his mission...
Secretly this is just an excuse to spent more time with her. Yes, this is a great power up, but he doesn't want to use her for just that and this will give him a chance to spent much more time with her. Especially if he takes her with him on mission.