A/N: Hello~ thanks for all the reviews I got last chapter, and I really appreciate you guys taking the time to read this story :)
I hope you enjoy this chapter! Lucy and Natsu aren't in this chapter, but they are in chapter 15, so don't get impatient :P However, there is the introduction of two new characters, one of whom was only mentioned by name, and if you can guess who it really is in relation to the story, send me your guess and I'll tell you if your right!
I'd love to say 'you win a prize' but I'm not cool enough to go handing out prizes :D
Meetings
Shredder had his arms wrapped around his knees, chin resting on his arms as his gaze locked on the bloodstained grass beneath his feet. His sweatshirt had grown stiff with drying blood, so had had taken it off, revealing the black shirt beneath with gray words splashed across the front that read 'Silver Bullets'.
Finny sobbed beside him. Despite all her complaints about Wish's laziness, idiocy, etcetera, she really had loved him as a teammate, trusted him as someone to watch her back, someone who would just be there.
Neither of them thought he would die. Not here. Not like this.
Neither of them saw what Wendy was seeing, feeling.
The darkness in the wound wasn't just a trick of the light, the blackness was a solid entity that moved fluidly in the hole like mercury, twisting, spiraling, writhing…..
A sudden spasm shocked through Wish's hands, and he clawed at the grass, ripping a few strands up by the roots.
The shadows began to overflow.
…..
The pain in his chest felt like it was going to rip him wide open; it had gotten worse, so much worse. The memory had already spiraled away, no longer there to distract him from what was happening, and with each passing second his agony grew. He could hardly breathe, his gasping a silent cry that made no noise in the abyss he floated in. He could sense his body drifting in the blackness, even down to the sensation of the golden star charm he always wore on his left wrist swinging gently in a breeze he was incapable of feeling. But despite the acute pain that set his nerves on fire, he felt really…. Happy wasn't quite the word for it. No, this feeling was more akin to…
Insanity. The kind of feeling he got when he had crushed his opponent so thoroughly they stood on death's door. But that was odd, because this time it was he who was dying, not the enemy.
But perhaps he had been his own adversary all along.
…
Shredder stood, unable to keep still anymore. Finny stood with him, and grabbed his wrist in alarm as her teammate snatched up his jacket and began to storm toward the Dollhouse, murder in his eyes.
"Hey…. Hey, where are you going?" Finny asked thickly through her tears.
"I'm going to wash my knives," Shredder replied softly, "in blood. Red on red on red…. They wail for death." He flipped the belt sheaths out of his sweatshirt and strapped one around his waist over his baggy black jeans.
"What are you talking about?" Finny gasped.
"The one who did this to Wish," Shredder averted his gaze, "You want her dead too, right?" His multicolored gaze flashed to the water mage's face, "Right?"
"I want Lacie gone as much as anyone else, but-"
"Not Lacie. Bisca Mulan and Alzack Connell. We saved that bastards ass, and this is what he does for us." Shredder curled his lip over his teeth in a snarl, trembling with fury. "I want to kill them. I want to kill them so bad it hurts."
"Shredder, you can't do that. You can't!"
"Why not?" Shredder swung his hand through the air, and Finny flinched as his fist stopped centimeters from her face. His hand dropped back to his side and he plopped back down in the grass. "Sorry." He murmured, "I'm…. just a little upset. That's all. Just… upset."
He buried his face in his shaking hands that were covered in blood only he could see and screamed voiceless sorrow to the graying sky. His silent shriek was the embodiment of insane grief, the very sound of a shattered heart, a twisted soul. No one else could hear him, the cry echoed only in his mind, but all the same he felt comforting warmth on his arm, as if, telepathically, someone had head his desperate plea for solace.
Shredder raised his head to look, and saw Finny, her arms around her knees, leaning on him for support.
"You're not alone." She whispered brokenly, "Not alone."
…..
Alzack was carrying Bisca bridal style, her gun slung over his shoulder. He shuffled exhaustedly from room to room. He had tried to follow the knife master through the rooms to the exit, but the boy was like a waif, there one moment and gone the next. The blood trail was smeared and led into rooms that made no sense until the gunslinger was hopelessly lost.
A door creaked slowly open, and Alzack halted, peering into the shadows. The darkness seemed to take shape, a young woman stumbling out of the black….
Shade appeared, but was not immediately recognizable. One dark iris flickered wildly around the room in a sort of fearful wariness, her hair matted with red, blood caking half her face. The bottom hem of her skirt had been torn off and wound around her head like an eye patch, crossing her face diagonally. She was using her spear as a sort of walking stick, leaning heavily on its support.
"Master Shade." Alzack said in surprise. She jerked her head up, one hand rising to point palm first in his direction. The shadows seemed to gather in her finger tips, a lance of darkness…. A sharp shiver ran down Alzack's spine.
The woman recognized him and dropped her hand tiredly. The shades scattered beneath her hand.
"Connell." She greeted hoarsely, "I see you've retrieved Mulan."
"Yes." Alzack confirmed with a nod.
"Have you seen any of my guild members? Shine, Shredder, Wish, Finny, Stitches, Daisy, Ithiel, Kova, Kazin, anyone?" she asked him. Alzack's throat seemed to close as words refused to form. In the short time he had been with the Midnight Sun, he had already been able to see a close bond between Wish and Shade. At first he had thought it something like his relationship with Bisca, but soon came to realize it was different, somehow closer…. The two knew nearly everything about each other, the good and the bad, and still accepted and perhaps loved one another. It was simply a matter of shyness that held them back.
Her brown eyes, or rather, eye, met his expectantly, and he simply shook his head. He couldn't tell her. He just couldn't.
"I shot him." A trembling voice said. Alzack looked down, startled. Bisca was shaking like a leaf, eyes wide, one hand gripping the front of his poncho convulsively, the other covering her mouth. "I shot him, I shot him, oh God forgive me, I shot him."
Alzack murmured words of comfort to her as she closed her eyes in horror, holding her close to him. He heard a thump and looked up to see Shade slumping against a wall looking like she didn't believe the words coming from Bisca's mouth.
"Who?" Shade asked softly, "Who?"
"Wish." Alzack answered after a pause. Shade slid further down the wall, using her spear shaft to hold herself up.
"You're lying." Shade said flatly, glaring eye glittering with hostility, "You're lying!" the woman staggered toward them ungracefully, fresh blood oozing from beneath her temporary bandage. Alzack backed up a pace, and he noticed tears in the guild master's blank eyes. "Tell me you're lying." She whispered pleadingly. The pair made no answer, and the woman turned and dashed through one of the doors in a flash, despite the pain caused by her injuries.
"Wait!" Alzack yelled, but she was already gone. "….I don't know how to get out of here."
…..
A loud rumble disrupted Levy's thoughts, breaking through her concentration as she attempted to map her progress through the Dollhouse on a scrap of paper.
"Are you really that hungry?" She cried in exasperation as she shot a look at Gajeel, who was sitting cross-legged against the wall, drooling slightly. His sharp red eyes locked on her as he wiped drool off his chin.
"I'm tempted to rip my piercings out and eat them." He replied harshly, "Or find a way up to that chandelier, that would work too."
"Or you could just ask and I could make my Solid Script into metal!" Levy shot back. Gajeel gazed at her for a moment in shock before nodding vigorously. Levy raised her pen, prepared to write, but was interrupted.
"Are you perhaps… here to take me back?" a voice asked. A lost looking girl had come unnoticed through a trapdoor in the flooring behind Gajeel. Only her top half was visible, the rest of her still hidden in the darkness below. She was pale, with bright pink hair and warm vermillion eyes, dressed in a bright yellow sundress, a sunflower tucked behind one ear. An overall extremely colorful person.
"Who're you?" Gajeel growled defensively.
"Daisy Evermore…." She said, looking dazed, "I remember being taken as a doll, and then…. I remember Nevermore…."
"Nevermore?" Levy queried, "We were only told about two of our guild mates, Stitches Merone, and you to look for."
"Oh, Nevermore isn't part of our guild. I found him here. It's funny 'cause his name is the opposite of mine! His last name I mean." Daisy said, smiling widely to display sparkling teeth.
She's sickeningly energetic. Waaaaay worse than Levy. Levy's pretty cool. Maybe worse than Lisanna. It's not natural, damn it! Gajeel thought, narrowing his eyes.
"Get your ass out of my face!" A male voice yelled from beneath her. The shout was followed by a harsh coughing sound.
"Alright, alright. You're such a downer!" Daisy stuck her tongue out as she pulled herself up out of the hole. Seconds after, a second head popped up. A sallow boy with pitch black hair that shimmered green in the light and stood on end around his head crawled out. He was dressed in a long black trench coat that swept the floor when he stood, the sleeves covering his hands. He shook his head and opened crimson-y purple, nearly maroon eyes, giving his croaking cough once again. He plucked a black feather out of his hair with mild distaste and cast it to the ground.
"Thought I was gonna die…" he muttered. He was perhaps fifteen or sixteen. Gajeel looked on hungrily as the boy turned, bringing to light eight silvery piercings on his left ear and seven on the right.
"This is Luca Nevermore; he broke the spell on me!" The girl cried gaily, throwing her hands around his shoulders in a tight hug. The boy winced and rolled his eyes but made no move to leave.
"Fantastic. Levy, can we go outside now? We found one of the missing people, and if she was weak enough to get trapped it might happen again. Let's leave before we find out if the doll spell can come back like an old injury." Gajeel told his blue haired partner. Levy nodded.
"I just finished the map, let's go outside and see if anyone else is there." She said sagely.
"Yay!" Said Daisy.
"Hn." Said Luca.
Gajeel led the way through the nearest exit, the door he had been seated by for the past ten minutes. He stepped in without really looking and fell flat on his face, having tripped over a pair of feet. Whipping around angrily, he saw Alzack and Bisca sitting on the floor, Alzack looking like he'd been through hell and Bisca in heavy tears, sobbing into his arm.
"Hi." Alzack said blankly, "Do you know how to get out of here?"
"Tch, that's lame, bastard. Real lame. How do you get lost in a place like this?" Luca called from behind Levy.
"It's not hard actually," Daisy said cheerfully.
"It's straight as the Crow flies." Luca commented dryly. He shook back on of his sleeves to reveal himself holding a black feather. He set it flat on his palm and it spun like a compass. The quill end pointed left, and the boy jerked his head in that direction. "We go that way."
"But my map says…." Levy was cut off.
"Lacie is getting mad. She moved the hall ways." The boy's eyes softened as he said Lacie's name, and Gajeel didn't miss the fact. It weirded him out looking at that boy. Something not quite right….
"We'll try it your way." Levy said, "And if it doesn't work, we'll try mine."
"My way won't fail." Luca told her confidently, "My magic is called Crow Flight. The ability to find the exit is one of the side-skills."
After a short ways of going they ran into another familiar person.
"Master Shine!" Daisy yelped, recognizing the woman far before anyone else. The guild master turned, looking distressed but a bit happy to see Daisy.
"Have you seen Shade?" she asked the group, "I haven't been able to find her anywhere!" Alzack shuffled awkwardly, again, a movement not missed by Gajeel's sharp eyes.
It looked like he and Levy were turning into a lost-and-found for people with twisted secrets and chronic idiocy.
And he was still hungry.