"…you will be emotionally attached to a man who can control fire, and he will be the one to kill you."

Lucy Heartfilia

The light burned me, from my eyes to my toes. My head began to ache terribly. The light that enveloped Sting and I was too strong. It made me feel like something or someone was twisting my body to death. It made me feel dead.

I tried to fight my way out of this light. But it seemed like wherever I ran, there was no end to the light. As time passed, my muscles began to burn like fire. It seemed like the path of light wouldn't ever end. I fell down due to fatigue. Sting… I thought. Where's Sting? I reached my hand out. Was I going to die here? I tried to move my leg again but I just felt that same burning sensation.

It was painful, like death.

Soon my body gave in. I layed on the ground, motionless. I looked far out with my half-opened eyes. Sting… I thought. He was in this light too. I just knew it. I could still sense his presence. But… Where was he?

I closed my eyes and cried as my consciousness was slowly lost.

OoO

My eyes fluttered open to see Minerva right above me, looking into my royal blue eyes. "Ah!" I screamed in surprise. I quickly scooted over to the side and stared at Minerva. What the hell was she doing here? I looked around to see that I was in the same cave Sting and I were hiding…

That's right… Where was Sting?

All I remembered was a burning sensation from a light that came out of Minerva. I looked at her. She was still staring at me. She didn't say a thing. I looked around the cave for Sting. I noticed him laying on the side of the cave. I gasped and quickly crawled over to him.

"Sting! Sting!" I screamed. I shook Sting's body over and over again. "Sting! Wake up!" After a few minutes, his eyes fluttered open like a baby's.

"Lay-Layla?" he said. I knew I told him to call me Lucy but I ignored that. I didn't care. If it was Sting, I could tolerant being called that disgusting name. He was used to calling me Layla anyway.

"Sting… Thank goodness…" I said. I began to weep in happiest. Thank goodness… Thank god. I truly thought he was dead. I noticed that he was back to his human form. How did that happen?

"You're my slaves now," a voice behind me interrupted. I quickly turned around to see Minerva. She crossed her legs and arms and glared at us with her frightening emerald green eyes. "Don't you dare think about disobeying my words."

"Why are you the one to judge what we do?" I asked her, confused.

"You're my immortal slaves," she said. "You do what I say."

"...What?" I asked. Immortal..? Like Rogue? I couldn't believe my ears. I immediately stood up and ran out of that cave.

"Layla!" I could hear Sting shout behind me.

I ignored his shout and ran even faster. Faster… I thought. Faster… Faster... I felt tired but the fatigue didn't stop me from running. I just ran. "Why…" I said to myself. I looked to my right to see a lake. I thought for a second. I could feel myself drowning if I went over there. I could tell if I was mortal. I was definitely mortal, not immortal.

I ran there and jumped in the water. I could feel the water tangle my hair around. I closed my eyes and allowed myself to sink. I could feel my lungs burning. I felt as though I was drowning. Did this mean I was still mortal? I stayed in the water a little longer. That was strange… It was painful, as if a fire was burning within me, but I wasn't dying.

I had been underwater for at least an hour. My lungs felt like they were about to burst, but I was still alive. How was this possible? I didn't want to think about it. I always thought immortality was interesting and cool, but in reality it was so… terrifying.

I couldn't die. I could be ripped apart or put underwater and feel pain, but I couldn't die. My body would just put itself back together again.

Suddenly, I felt someone grab my arms. I struggled to try to get the guy off of my arms. No! I screamed in my mind. I want to die! Let me go! I'm not immortal! I'm dead! I'm… a mortal…

However, because of the burning in my lungs, I couldn't resist against the stranger. I was quickly pulled out of the water. Once my mouth reached the air, I breathed heavily.

"Layla!" the person who grabbed me shouted. His voice sounded familiar but my ears were full of water, making it hard to identify the voice. "What the hell did you think you were doing?!"

I gasped for more air and turned around to look at the person. My eyes widened to meet the ruby red eyes. "Rogue…?" I said. "W-What are you-"

"Are you stupid?!" Rogue scolded me. "Even if you're immortal, you'll still feel pain! Idiot!" He slowly helped me swim back to the shore and rested me on the grass.

I could feel tears trying to burst out of my eyes. "I… I'm not immortal…" I cried. I began to cry heavily. My tears kept flowing from my eyes endlessly. "I'm not immortal!" I screamed over and over again. My body began to shake in fear, shivering. I wasn't sure if it was because I was so scared or just cold from the water.

Rogue looked at me, suddenly took his black coat off and wrapped it around me. Then he hugged me tight saying, "I'm sorry… Lay-... Lucy." I could feel his tears falling onto my cheek. "I'm so sorry… I-I could've prevented it, but I was afraid." He hugged me so tight that it was almost hard to breathe. "I'm so sorry, Lucy!" he cried over and over again.

The warmth from his arms felt comforting, almost like family, but I pushed him away before I could further become emotionally attached to this person. I stood up and threw the coat he put over my shoulders at him. "Stay away from me," I stated loudly. "I don't want to even glance at you anymore."

I was about to walk away but his strong hand wrapped around my ankle, not letting me go. "Lucy!" he cried loudly. "Lucy! I-I… I can't… I can't live without you! Please… don't leave me… Lucy…"

I kicked his hand off and ran away quickly, crying. "Why… Why?" I kept crying over and over again. I didn't want to become attached to someone who betrayed my family. No. Never. Suddenly, I tripped due to running too fast. I scrapped the palms of my hands and knees badly.

I slammed my fist into the ground so hard, I began to bleed badly. I didn't even know why I was crying. There was too many things happening. First, I was betrayed by my best friend. Second, my precious brother and I turned immortal. And et cetera. I couldn't take this anymore. I was hurt. I didn't know how to describe it, but I was so hurt to the point where I wanted to kill myself… But I couldn't… because I was immortal.

"Layla…" A familiar voice said.

I looked up to see Sting, standing before me. He was the only one I would allow to call me Layla. No one else. I didn't want to hear that disgusting name from anyone else.

Sting kneeled down and helped me get up. He hugged me tight. "Where did you go, stupid sister…" I could see his eyes trying to hide the tears he wanted to burst out. "Do you have any idea how worried I was?!" he shouted in his mad voice.

I cringed. Sting never shouted madly like this at me before. "I looked for you everywhere! Idiot!" Sting continued shouting. His eyes began to cry as if he couldn't hold it in anymore. He wrapped his arms around me as he cried. "Idiot! Idiot!" he shouted over and over again as he cried on my shoulder.

"Sting…" I said as I hugged him back. "A-Are we really immortal…?" I cried. "It can't be… right?" I loosened the hug and gripped my hands onto his sturdy arms. I stared into his eyes. "Right… Sting?"

He didn't reply. I gripped onto his arms harder, so hard that my fingers began to bleed. "R-Right… Sting…?" I said again. "It was a joke right? This whole thing is a joke Rogue and Minerva set up right?!"

But Sting didn't reply. He just stood there and stared into my eyes, speechless on how to reply. It was as if there was a lump on his throat, not allowing him to speak.

"I-It's not true… Right Sting?" I said once more. But I already knew the answer. It was obvious. Anyone would know the answer. I just didn't want to accept it. I couldn't accept it. It was just too unbelievable, even though there was evidence. Even though I was underwater for over an hour and did not die from it; I could not believe it.

Sting and I didn't say anything more. We just stood there, crying, as I asked the question over and over again. That was it. It was reality.

OoO

Eventually, I learned to accept the fact that I was immortal. It was hard but I learned to do it. I lived as a slave in Minerva's mansion with Sting and Rogue. Minerva kept us using magic cuffs with red orbs on top of them. We couldn't escape from the barrier around the mansion she made with these. Sting and I tried various times to break them off, but it was impossible.

We slept with the horses in the shed. My hair never grew, it was always shoulder length and uneven. I just couldn't grow anymore. Also, we never ate food. We were immortal so we didn't need to eat anymore. But even so, we could still feel the pain of hunger.

It was hard but thats how I lived for centuries. Four hundred years later, I learned of a secret of Minerva by eavesdropping on a conversation she was having with a man I couldn't identify. It was the weakness of immortality.

I was just mopping the floor like every usual morning until I noticed a stranger in one of the living rooms with Minerva.

"... You know if they find out their individual weaknesses they are just going to kill themselves, right?" Minerva screamed at the man. "They'll kill me too!"

"Minerva," the man said. "Don't worry, they won't find out your weakness. Look, what will go wrong now? We've been controlling them for four hundred years already! All their friends are dead, no one can help them now!"

Minerva's face seemed to panic. "No!" she screamed. "They'll find out my weakness on my body. Every immortal person has an achilles heel, whether it's on their body or something else!"

"Minerva, you know my daughter is already researching this," the man said. "We'll find out what went wrong with Rogue and how we can make every immortal like him."

I grasped onto my twelve keys madly. I finally found out a way to die, I just had to make Minerva tell me. Slowly, I walked towards the two people talking. I couldn't remember the man's appearance or name. All I remembered was that he was muscular, like every strong guy. He had a long black cape, but that was all I could remember. It was too long ago. I knew it wouldn't be a good idea to fight this guy, but who cared? I was immortal, I couldn't die anyway.

"Achilles heel, huh?" I stated loudly, interrupting their conversation. I allowed my bangs to cover my eyes. "Like the Greeks?" I asked as I tilted my head with the eeriest smile I ever pulled off. "Tell me more," I said as I laughed.

Minerva's face began to look pale. "W-What?" she shouted. She glared at me. "S-Since when were you listening?"

I walked up to Minerva with my torn up clothes I had worn for about four-hundred years. I had lived for so long that I had forgotten my age. I could only approximate. I gripped the collar of her clothes and glared into her eyes. "Tell me this weakness," I shouted at her, allowing my spit to hit her pitiful face. "Tell me now Minerva!"

"I-I don't know!" she screamed. "Leave me alone you piece of crap!" She pushed me away abruptly.

I fell onto the floor and looked up to see the man whose face I couldn't remember. "Do you really want to know your weakness and the rest?" the man asked me with an obviously fake kind smile.

Minerva elbowed the man. "Quiet!" she hissed at him.

"For Sting, it's if he ever turns into a dragon ever again," he said with a laugh. "And for you, it's fire."

My eyes widened. Being told something like this so easily seemed unbelievable. I could finally die after all of these years. Finally. My life could end. The sound of a weakness sounded like a dream. I began to wonder if any of my celestial spirits could use fire.

"Hey!" Minerva shouted at the man. "How could you just tell her so easily?!" she screamed.

"Trust me," he said with a smirk. "I know what I'm doing."

I thought about this for a second. How come he didn't mention Rogue's weakness? That was strange. I just couldn't help but think it was odd. "What about Rogue?" I asked with a confused face. "He has a weakness too, right?"

"Ah, Rogue," the man said. "He has a really rare case. He doesn't have a weakness."

My eyes widened. "W-What?" I asked.

"You know, Minerva can predict the future, right?" the man said. "She also creates your weaknesses too based on the future since every immortal must have a weakness-"

Future? I thought. Why would she make such an easy weakness for me like fire? I wondered at the time. Of course I didn't know about Natsu at that time. I mean, who knew that I would end up falling in love with my weakness?

"You talk too much," Minerva said, interrupting the man. "It's just that when Rogue became immortal, something went wrong. So now he's permanently immortal, that's all." She rolled her eyes as she shrugged. "The future is a bit hazy to me anyway," she said as if she read my mind, "but you will be emotionally attached to a man who can control fire, and he will be the one to kill you."

"Psh," I laughed. "Are you crazy?" I thought the woman was going insane. I already promised myself to never fall in love again. After what happened with Rogue, I never wanted emotional attachment ever again. The only person who I could be attached to was my brother. That was it. No one else.

As I thought, I looked up to ask the man and Minerva a question, but instead. my eyes widened. They were gone, as if they weren't even there in the first place.

I ran all over the mansion to find them, but they were all gone. "Minerva!" I screamed over and over again. But it was too late. They had already run away.

Before they could run any further, I knew I had to talk to my brother about this, so I immediately ran over to my brother to tell him about the whole conversation.

"We can finally end our lives Sting!" I exclaimed, smiling.

"No," Sting said. "I won't end my life until I find Minerva."

"What?" I said. "Why?" Why? I wondered over and over again. What was the point? Couldn't we rest in peace now? What was the point of finding her?

"I would never be able to rest in peace if she ran loose and continued to turn people immortal just to be her slaves forever," Sting said. "You said that her weakness is a part of her body right? So as long as we hit that part of her body, she will die."

I didn't want to hear it, but I knew he was right. I couldn't allow Minerva and that man make more people immortal just for their selfishness. "Fine," I said. "I'll corporate… Let's go look for Rogue and ask for his cooperation."

"Alright," Sting replied.

We walked around the shed to look for Rogue, but to our surprise, he was also gone. All we could find was a note on his bed that said: I took him with me. It was probably from Minerva also.

Damn it. I thought. I began to cry. It wasn't because I still loved him or anything, I had long gotten rid of that feeling. That moment was when I realized something very important that I should have realized a long time ago. Whether Rogue betrayed my family or not, he was still my friend and family and instead of ignoring him, I should have forgiven him like a true family member would.

I grasped onto the note Minerva wrote and cried, remembering the many times Rogue apologized to me for betraying. "Idiot!" I cried to myself. I was such an idiot. Why didn't I forgive him? I knew that he was strong enough to defend himself against Minerva, even if it was only a couple minutes. If I only forgave him, he wouldn't have submitted himself so easily. "Idiot! Idiot! Idiot! Idiot-"

"Layla…" Sting said, interrupting me.

"Wha-What?" I said, crying.

"Look," he said. "This already happened. We might as well make the best of it." I blinked a couple of times to make sure I was hearing correctly. Make the best of it? Was he crazy? Rogue was missing, what were we going to do? We had to search the entire world just to find him and Minerva.

"First, let's look for Rogue," he said. "I can look for his shadow using my light. Then we can all head for Minerva and get her together."

And that was exactly what we did for the next one-hundred years: looking for Rogue. It was difficult, but finally, after about a century, we finally tracked Rogue's shadow down.

I was wearing the modern day jeans and tank top. Sting was wearing a t-shirt and jeans also. As time passed, we had to follow the modern way of dress or else we would look suspicious. Or else I would definitely prefer the loose pants males always wore in the past than the tight skinny jeans all the girls wore now.

We spotted Rogue on a field, no one else there. It looked as if he was just there waiting for us, but I could sense that Minerva had been there shortly before. His way of dress also was the same as he used to wear when I first met him five-hundred years ago. He wore a ragged shirt and a pair of loose brown pants with a rope to keep it on his waist. It was odd to find someone casually wearing something like that these days.

"What are you doing here, Rogue?" I asked with a kind voice. I stuck out my right hand for a handshake. "We've been looking for you," I said with a smile. "Come on, let's go!"

My eyes widened to see that he didn't react to me at all. Rogue just stared at me emotionlessly. Was it because he thought that I didn't forgive him yet?

"Rogue," I said. "I forgave you for what you did to us already. Come on, we have things to tell you-"

But to my surprise, Rogue interrupted me by slamming his fist in my face, making me fly backwards.

"Layla!" Sting screamed in worry. Yes, after all these years, he still had the habit of calling me Layla. "Are you alright?!" He held my shoulders. "Layla! Layla!"

"I'm okay…" I said, moaning in pain. Slowly, I stood up. "What's wrong with you Rogue?!" I shouted. "Let's go! We aren't here to fight with you-"

"Layla," Sting interrupted. "He's different…"

"W-What?" I said, my eyes widened. I wrapped my hands around his left arm and shook it over and over again. "What do you mean…? He's just Rogue Cheney… Right, Sting?"

"It's not that Layla," Sting said. He lifted my hands off his arm and put it on my sides. He sighed. "It's Rogue but… he changed. He isn't the same person we once knew anymore."

What was he saying? Rogue was still part of us either way, evil or not. I thought he forgave him too. "But Sting-"

"LAYLA! WATCH OUT!" Sting suddenly shouted, pushing me onto the soft grass. My eyes widened to see a shadowy figure move at the speed of light barely miss Sting's body. I recognized it as Rogue immediately.

I immediately stood up to make eye contact with Rogue. "Psh," he said, laughing. "Forgiven me you say?" he said. He combed his hair out of the way with his hands. I gasped in surprise. I had never seen him do that before. Rogue hated allowing his right eye to show. He told me that himself. After all, he had a scar from his forehead down to his cheek. This was actually the first time I saw the scar. It was ugly but I didn't care. It was still Rogue, and he was still family to me.

He walked up to me and touched my blonde hair. "You think-" he pulled my hair hard as I cried in pain, "-I really care?"

I slapped his hand away in anger. "What the hell is wrong with you Rogue?!" I shouted. "Don't you remember who… I am?"

"Lucy Heartfilia?" Rogue said as if it was obvious. "Or should I say, Layla Eucliffe?"

I cringed when I heard him say my true name. I didn't like hearing it from anyone else besides my brother. "S-Shut up!" I yelled. "You know I don't like it when people call me by that name-"

"Layla," Rogue said with a smirk. I knew he was just saying it to get me pissed. I grasped onto my keys tightly as he walked in circles around me and Sting. Suddenly, he grabbed Sting by the neck. I noticed that Sting actually did get hit. His back was bleeding badly and his face from his forehead to his right eye was scarred badly.

"STING!" I screamed.

"Ugh…" Sting groaned. I could see blood dripping from his forehead. Fear crept onto my face as his hands tried to get Rogue to let go of his neck. However, he was too weak and was losing blood too fast. He couldn't muster the strength to rescue himself.

"Stop!" I screamed. "Rogue!" I didn't want Sting to get hurt, but I didn't want to hurt Rogue either. What was I going to do now? I was just so confused. Why was Rogue doing this?

"Layla," Rogue said with a smirk. That smile was the eeriest smile I had ever seen. Once I saw that smile, I knew the old Rogue I knew was gone. "Close your eyes."

"What?" I said.

"Close your eyes," he said.

"Excuse me?"

"Close your eyes," he repeated.

Did he think I was going to trust him? With Sting in his hands? I knew Sting was immortal and he was just feeling pain, but I still wanted to save him as fast as possible.

I didn't like using my keys a lot, but I had no choice. I pulled a random key out from my pocket. I looked at the sign of the key on the top and recognized it immediately, remembering how Sting described them to me five hundred years ago.

"Gate of the maiden!" I shouted. "I open thee…" I concentrated my power in the area I was in. The golden circle successfully appeared below my feet. "Virgo!" I screamed as loud as I could.

A swirl of golden light appeared before me and subsided after a few seconds. A girl who looked my age appeared before me in a maid costume. Her hair was pink and ended at her chin. And her eyes were baby blue. Now that I think about it, Virgo from my Prince Natsu Fan Club was the exact image as her. That was odd. I couldn't understand why though. Why was Virgo pretending to be my classmate at Fairy High when she was actually my celestial spirit?

Anyway, I summoned Virgo at that time. "Is it time for punishment, Mistress?" Virgo asked me.

"No…?" I said in confusion. For some reason, Virgo really enjoyed punishment. I was never sure why. "Please help my brother Virgo!"

"Yes, Mistress," she replied. Then she dug a deep hole in the ground. Rogue looked around in panic, after all, he wouldn't know where she would be coming from.

I sensed where Virgo was. She was going in the right direction, but when she struck Rogue, his image disappeared. Damn it. It was another fake. I forced Virgo's gate to close and looked around to find Rogue, but he didn't seem to be anywhere. Knowing him, he could only hide in the shadows, so I looked into the shadows of the trees, but he wasn't there either.

I looked down at my shadow. It wasn't in the shape of my body. I could tell by the masculine figure and ruby red eyes that shined from the shadow. "Rogue!" I shouted. But by the time I noticed, it was too late. Rogue, moving at the speed of light, quickly hit me several times over and over again. Then he stood in front of me again as I crawled on the grassy floor.

"Close your eyes," he said again. Sting was unconscious on his shoulder.

I didn't want to trust him, never again. He tricked me too many times. I was angered by this. I still considered him family however, so it was impossible for me to hate him.

I thought about the time Sting told me about star magic. I did think about using it, but I remembered the amount of energy it would take to use. If I failed, who would save the unconscious Sting? I decided to give my keys one more try.

Quickly, I pulled out another key from my pocket. "Gate of the scorpion!" I cried. "I open thee!" I allowed my magic to rush out of my body and twisted my hand as if I were opening a door knob. "Scorpio!"

But to my surprise, nothing happened. "Scorpio?" I asked. My eyes widened and my body shook in fear. This never happened to me before. "Scorpio! Open! Scorpio!"

"Minerva blocked your celestial magic," Rogue stated. "If you want to protect Sting so much, all you have to do is close your eyes."

"I-If I close my eyes, what are you going to do…?" I asked in confusion. "What's with you?"

"I'll take your memories, and your eye color too since it's a side effect," he stated simply. The eye color was my special connection to royalty. For an Eucliffe, losing the royal blue color of his or her pupils was the same as stripping royalty away from them. "That's all. Or else Sting is going to suffer the life of a slave again."

My body cringed at the sound of slave. But the sound of my memories being taken away seemed even scarier. I could care less about my royal blue eyes. I had long gone away from royalty. The royal blue eyes I had was the only thing that connected me to the royal bloodline. I despised being royal in the first place so the eyes didn't mean anything to me.

But what about Sting? If I lost my memories, then how would I know about my sibling relation to Sting? Would I forget about him too? I began to tear up. I didn't want to forget about Sting, despite all of my terrible experiences. My memories was what made myself me. Without my memories, would I turn into a completely different person?

I looked over to Sting. I knew Rogue was too strong for me. He was always stronger than me, being two years older. And also, since I was immortal, my body was paused in time, so no matter how hard I trained to get stronger, I always remained the same. So I was always going to be this weak forever.

But despite all of that, I would do anything to save Sting.

"Fine…" I said reluctantly. I looked at the world as Layla Eucliffe for the last time. "Just promise me three things, Rogue."

"What?" he asked.

"First, let me at least remember my name as Lucy Heartfilia," I said. Then, suddenly, my throat seemed to have a lump in it. I couldn't speak. My tears began to fall from the second condition I was about to say.

I breathed deeply and said, "Second, make sure Sting doesn't try to contact me after my memories are taken… To make sure he doesn't take me far away from this land." I really didn't want to say the second condition, but if Sting knew about my memories, I knew that he would try to avenge me for his whole life. I wanted him to find Minerva and kill her, not for me, but himself… and then die peacefully instead of wanting to avenge me his whole life.

"I can do that," Rogue said. "But what about the third thing?"

I breathed heavily as my tears would not stop falling. "This is totally optional but… I would be really happy if you could promise me this…" I told him. I looked at the green scenery for the last time and closed my royal blue eyes. "Promise me that you'll return to me as my kind childhood friend you once were."

I felt his hand cover my crying eyes as my world turned pitch black.

"I will… Layla…" I heard him whisper to me, as if it were a secret.

Then my world turned completely blank and white.

That was how I ended up in Japan, in Fairy High, with chocolate brown eyes.

-End of Chapter 21-

Hello guys! This was the last chapter of Lucy's memories. NALU moments will be coming back soon! Sorry for the long wait! Anyway, it's a couple days late, but Merry Christmas! And a Happy New Year!

If you guys don't remember, I wrote about Sting's scar on his face back in chapter two. So that was an explanation of how he got it.

And Virgo was in the Prince Natsu Club with Lucy back in chapter one if you want to look back at it.

Thank you so much for reading and please review~ Thanks!

~ Metallic Snow