A/N: i'm so soo so soRRY THAt i left this on a cliffhanger i'm such a horrible person fyfcjguiqjdi i have two quizzes tomorrow bc of summer school... fml

i'll make this chapter long, okay? :0 just for you guys. and bc i feel really bad for making you guys wait so long i'm so SSORRY MY LIFE IS SO BUSY I ... and it's not even a lie at all i have too much things to do

enjoy!

Chapter Twenty-One

.

.

.

.

"RUN!"

HolyshitholyshitholySHIT was the only phrase and thing that was going on through Lucy's mind. All she could think about was getting the hell away from this weird ass bitch who was SERIOUSLY creepy in every form and honestly all she wanted to do was go home and have a nice sleep. However, this situation was extremely far from over—considering the fact that they were currently running as fast as they could at the moment.

"Hold on." Erza then demanded, stopping at once and stepping into another hallway.

Gray blinked, and frowned slightly. "If we stop now, whoever that is will catch up to us."

As if on cue, the girl's voice broke out again. "Is this a game of tag, or hide and seek? Whichever one, I'm still going to find you and your friends Blondie... there's no escaping me!" Lucy held her breath, and felt her heart pounding against her chest. Who was this girl? Is there more of them? Not to mention that there's still Orga, Rufus, and Minerva to worry about...

"I know that." Erza said, a twinge of annoyance in her tone. "That's why we have to do something about it. I think the best idea right now is to split up. If we face her head-on, she might corner us with whoever she brought with her. It may be a trap. We don't know what they're planned now, but we've got one thing out of the way thanks to Lucy saving herself." She gave the blonde a smile, which the latter returned.

Gajeel huffed. "But isn't splitting up also the most damn predictable thing? Everyone does it if they're stuck in a shitty situation."

Lucy would have thought it unwise to argue against Erza's plan, but was a little surprised to see Erza smiling. "Exactly." The redhead said. "Even though it seems like more people'll be after us if we split up, if we put up a fight and defeat those people then it's our win. It's much better than us facing that other girl with all we've got, and even if we defeat her all at once there'll be a tougher enemy."

To Gajeel's left, Gray tilted his head. "I guess she does have a point."

"I do have a point." Erza muttered under her breath. Gray didn't hear her, but maybe he wasn't supposed to hear her anyway. Lucy hid her grin with a sharp cough, causing Wendy to look at her alarmingly—thinking that she was hurt or something.

"Natsu? You're quiet." The blonde said, raising her eyebrows. "Are you all in with this plan?"

"If at the end we end up defeating Minerva, then count me in. I'm all fired up!" Natsu said, breaking into a large grin. He looked around to his friends, his eyes big, excitement clear in them. "I'd love to have a crack at her, at the very least. Just to see what she's made of, and if she really means all that big talk about herself."

Gray crossed his arms. "If he gets a chance to get at her, then I have to too. It's only fair."

"No." The red-haired teen demanded, giving the two teens a stony glare. "I'm sorry that I'm being selfish, but I want to be the one to face her in the end. I don't care if I go down trying, because I won't. It's as simple as that. And plus, we've gone over this already. You two have agreed to let me be the one to rid of Minerva. Or at the very least, I'll knock her out and send her to the police so that she could stay in that cold cell where she belongs."

Wendy shifted slightly. "Should we have to worry about Sting-kun, Rogue-kun, and Yukino-san? I feel like their job's more dangerous..."

Lucy's gaze softened, and she pat the girl's head. "Hey, it's okay Wendy. I'm sure they've got their area covered. In the meantime, just stay behind whoever you split up with—it could get really dangerous pretty fast, and I don't want you to get hurt." The small girl didn't nod, instead her brown eyes sharpened. She straightened up, and looked around. Afterwards, she took in a deep breath—Lucy felt herself holding her breath subconsciously.

"We have to go." Wendy suddenly said, urgency in her voice. "I hear footsteps coming this way."

Natsu and Gajeel stopped too, and listened. Natsu nodded gravelly. "She's close. If we don't move now, she'll be closer."

"Right." Erza said, brushing a strand of hair across her shoulder. "I'll go by myself to Minerva. Natsu and Lucy, you two can go together—but no make-out sessions, okay?" (Lucy blushed at this statement and Natsu ducked his head in embarrassment as their friends snickered) "Gray, Wendy, Gajeel, you three go the other way." There was a long pause, and then she sighed deeply. "I'm going to hope that everyone's going to get back okay. Don't do anything too extreme and try not to destroy more things, it's our school after all."

Lucy nodded. "For Levy."

"For Levy." Her friends' voices echoed, as they took off running in separate directions.

"Do you think they're okay?"

Sting turned around to see Yukino fidgeting a little bit. She was biting her lower lip cautiously, and kept looking around. It seemed as if she couldn't stay still. He couldn't blame her though, this was something that they haven't really gotten into before. Sting doesn't know if Natsu and the others have either, but he thinks that they haven't for Wendy, Lucy, and Gray looked nervous when they arrived at their school.

The blonde opened his mouth to answer, but Rogue spoke first. "I'm sure they're fine."

"Yeah. Natsu-san's strong, and so are his friends." Sting agreed. "We'll just have to be as strong as them in the end."

Yukino sighed and rubbed her arms. "I just have a bad feeling that something happened. It's awfully quiet, the only times there's been noise was earlier when we came here. If Minerva finds out that we're here... how mad do you think she'll be when she finds out we've gone against her? She wouldn't ever forgive us... and if she does find us here I'm sure she'll do something horrible."

Sting agreed silently. At first, he followed Minerva—but not really willingly. That's the part most people didn't know about him. They knew that he was just associating with Minerva, and if someone knows you associate with Minerva, they won't mess with you. That's how it went back in Saber High. Minerva always told him what to do. She always wanted him to pick on others, so that people wouldn't confront him. Plus, to add more fun into the equation Minerva had threatened that if he didn't follow her decisions he would lose something really important to him.

It was why he was always mean to the Fairy Academy kids. He didn't want to lose... well, Minerva didn't specify but he had idea of what it was. She did tell him a few days ago too, and it was his cat, Lector. He hated being mean honestly—he couldn't really do anything about it though. He wanted to prove that he really wasn't the bad guy, but it was already too late to apologize once Lucy smacked him with her textbook. Afterwards, Natsu was pissed and so was everyone else, there was no way they'd forgive him.

It was all thanks to Minerva that Sting wasn't having a good time. That reason made him want to fight against her. Unfortunately, Minerva isn't stupid and she had a hunch that he was now being friendly to Natsu and the others. She cornered him one day after school and threatened him once more... once he got home after that, he had already made up his mind, though. He was going to help Fairy Academy. He felt really horrible when he found out that Levy was in a coma because of Minerva.

He doesn't know if Minerva knows they're here, but he has a strong feeling that she does.

If she has Lector (and Frosch, Rogue's pet) then Sting wanted to find a way to well, find them. He looked around and frowned. The desks and multiple other items that have been thrown at them earlier had stopped coming a long time ago, but he was still on edge. He had a feeling that Minerva wasn't alone. Crap. He then thought. "Hey, Rogue?"

"Hm?" Rogue said, snapping back into reality. He looked a bit unfocused, and a little worried.

"Have you talked to Rufus and Orga recently?" Sting said slowly. "As in, anytime this week? Do you think that they're working with her?"

Rogue's eyes narrowed. "I'm afraid so. Last time they saw us, they wouldn't talk to us remember? I bet Minerva told them something... or made up some stupid excuse to not talk to us anymore. Whatever it is, I'm sure that they're in here with her as well. I just don't know where... Fairy Academy's a big school. We're not going to be able to find them easily."

Another voice responded to his statement. "There's no need to do that."

Sting blinked. Shit. He knew that voice. And he knew that voice very well, unfortunately. He gave a deep sigh and looked back at Yukino, who was frozen. Her eyes were widened, and her mouth was open slightly. To his right, Rogue stiffened. Sting clenched his fists before raising his head to finally look at whoever it was that was speaking—although he already knew who was speaking.

Orga was standing there, his arms crossed.

Great.

Natsu tugged Lucy's hand as the duo walked towards the way Erza told them to go.

"So how did you get out?" Natsu said, amazement clear in his tone. "I thought part of the plan was to get you out ourselves, but I'm impressed." He cracked a smirk, and Lucy smiled back in response. "Maybe next time you get kidnapped, we'll just leave you to kick butt by yourself," he said jokingly. Lucy rolled her eyes at this, and hit him softly before laughing lightly at his statement.

She shrugged. "I didn't want to prove that I was useless. Minerva just put a gag on my mouth and tied me up to a chair. Fortunately I was able to scoot towards a broken desk and managed to cut myself free, as well as remove my gag. Then, I tiptoed out of the classroom I was in and it so happened that Minerva was in another room, with some two other people, talking about you guys. Their names are Orga and Rufus. Not sure if you know them, though. Anyway afterwards the weird girl found me and creeped the hell out of me, I used that one lesson you taught me about fighting and punched her. And then I ran into you guys, coincidentally."

Natsu stared at her for a while, wide-eyed. "Damn, that seemed pretty intense. That's probably why that girl had some kind of bruise on her cheek. And ha, I knew that lesson would come in handy!" He grinned, nodding in approval. "You have impressed me yet again, Luce. Great job. I wish I was there to see that, that would've been amazing."

"At the time, it wasn't for I was busy trying to get away as fast as I could." Lucy said. "But, thanks. I'm glad I found you guys sooner, and that none of you are injured horribly." The two continued walking for a while, still hand-in-hand. Even though there was nothing happening at the moment, it set Lucy on edge. She had a feeling that maybe it was too quiet. Natsu probably thought so too, his eyes were constantly darting from side to side.

Lucy felt reassured, however. With Natsu by her side, she felt safe.

Then, Natsu abruptly stopped moving, and shouted, "DUCK!" before Lucy was able to come back to her senses, she felt herself being pulled down as Natsu grabbed her hand instantly, bringing her to the floor with him where he was laying down. A huge table was tossed at them—luckily missing their heads by a few inches, and Lucy winced when she heard the loud crash behind her.

"Thank you so much," Lucy gasped, as Natsu helped her to her feet. Her head was spinning, and her heart was thudding against her chest.

He only smiled down at her. "I'm your boyfriend. I'm supposed to protect you."

"BOO!" A shrill voice then said, and Lucy almost fainted. The crazy girl had found them.

Lucy couldn't move as she saw the other girl walk out of the shadows, her red eyes piercing and a creepy smile on her face. She tilted her head to the side expectantly, and then stopped. "Did I scare you?" She said, giggling. "I'm sorry... I tend to do that to a lot of people, Blondie. Where are your friends? I wanted to find them too... that little blue-haired girl looked so lovely..."

Natsu stiffened, and Lucy held her breath. "Who are you?"

The girl looked confused for a second, as if she wasn't expecting to introduce herself. Then she grinned. "I'm Flare~! Flare Corona. And don't forget that, or I'll get angry. But our game of hide and seek is over, Blondie." She said softly. "Do you know why?" Flare...

When she didn't say anything in response, Flare tsked. "I'm disappointed, I must admit... but our game is over because," she cackled, and her eyes widened more, "it's because I found you! NOW COME HERE!" She said hysterically, as she moved with great speed towards the two of them. She spun around and lashed her leg out, about to kick Lucy in the face.

Luckily, Natsu pushed Lucy out of the way and blocked the girl's kick. He grabbed her leg and threw her against the wall, causing her to crash into it. Lucy scrambled to her feet and rushed to Natsu's side right away, who was breathing heavily. "I don't think she's down yet." He said, and the two backed up slowly. Flare still had a crazy expression on her face, and she giggled. "Aw, what a party pooper. You're no FUN!"

Immediately Lucy grabbed Natsu's hand and the two bolted, Flare right on their heels.

Flare was holding chunks of the wall that Natsu had thrown her into, and was now chucking the pieces at them as they ran. Lucy winced a couple of times when a chunk of the wall would graze her shoulder, or thud against her arms, back, or legs. "You can't run from me! I'll just find you again, just like how I found you now!" Natsu then yanked Lucy into another hallway, and the blonde nearly tripped as they suddenly changed direction.

"Do you have any idea where you're going?!" Lucy yelled.

"Nope!" Natsu shouted back. "But I've got an idea!"

The two ran fast enough that they couldn't hear Flare's yells and shouts anymore. A large vending machine was at the corner of the hallway that they were heading, and both Natsu and Lucy hid behind it. The two of them edged to the side of the vending machine to see if Flare was still there, but they didn't see or hear her. Lucy began to relax a little, but stiffened when Natsu's eyes suddenly widened and mouthed I hear her to Lucy.

The blonde shivered. She didn't like that Flare girl, she was too creepy for her own good.

"Where are you~? Blondie! Pinkie! You can't hide forever!" Flare was saying in a sing-song voice.

Natsu then bolted out of their hiding place at once, before Lucy was able to stop him. She could only yell, "Natsu, WAIT!" as the pink-haired teen dashed towards Flare with impressive agility. He was like a blur as he advanced towards Flare—Lucy peeked out of behind the vending machine and watched, stunned, as Natsu was able to dodge most of the girl's attacks and was jumping back in and out to punch or kick her.

"Don't you dare touch my girlfriend!" He shouted, as he grabbed some chunks Flare had dropped and started throwing them back at her. He winced a couple of times when the rocks Flare was throwing hit him, and Lucy felt her heart sink at this sight. Her eyes darted to the side and realized that the janitor's closet was still open—she grabbed a mop and tossed it to Natsu, who caught it and was now spinning it around to dodge the wall chunks. He began to edge towards her more and was now lashing out with multiple punches and jabs.

"You're getting annoying!" Flare said angrily, dodging one of Natsu's punches and instead grabbed his arm which knocked the mop out of his hands. She threw him towards the vending machine where Lucy was still at, and the blonde dashed in front of it and braced herself for the impact when Natsu crashed into her. Pain shot through her back, but it quickly went away for she was staring down at Natsu, who was grunting in pain.

Natsu smiled up at her. "Thanks for saving my life."

"I'm your girlfriend. I'm supposed to protect you." She said, grinning.

Then Natsu jumped up from her arms and told Lucy to move aside so that she was no longer in front of the vending machine. Flare was seething with anger, her face was turning redder and redder and her long, red hair was starting to stick up all over the place. Her eyes were still wide as ever, but she was gritting her teeth. "Now I might really have to finish you two off by myself."

"Yeah, that's never going to happen." Natsu said, crossing his arms. "Sorry about all the mess and running around! You must be tired. Do you want a drink?" He smashed the vending machine so hard that three drinks rolled out. Lucy's eyes widened, and stared at the drinks on the ground. She gave Natsu a puzzled look, but he just smiled at her. O-kay. Now Lucy was starting to get really concerned.

Flare looked bewildered as well. "What?"

But before she could say a yes or a no, Natsu grabbed a soda, shook it violently, swung his hand back and then chucked it at her. Since Flare was caught a little off guard at Natsu's sudden question, she ended up having little time to react until the soda can was thrown at her feet. Because of the impact, the can broke open and sprayed the floor with soda—as Flare was trying to walk towards them, she ended up slipping on the drink and fell to the ground on her butt.

"What the heck?" Flare yelled, scrambling up in an attempt to get them again.

Natsu and Lucy looked at each other, and then at their bookbags that they still had with them. They must've read each other's thoughts.

Then the couple walked slowly up to Flare, who was still in shock. Her ankles and feet were drenched in soda, and her mouth was open. As they got closer, Flare grabbed a wall chunk and threw it at Natsu, but he caught it and dropped it in front of her. They stopped directly in front of her, and were able to hear Flare's heavy breaths. Lucy could tell that she was getting pissed now.

"You're going to PAY for THIS!" Flare screamed, and lashed out at Lucy—her gaze beyond furious. On instinct, the blonde grabbed the textbook that was hidden inside her bookbag and swung it as hard as she could as the girl continued to get closer to her. She knew she was successful once she heard a loud THWACK. It was silent afterwards, Lucy still had her arm outstretched when she witnessed a now unconscious Flare crumble to the ground besides her.

Lucy stared down at her textbook, and pat it gently. "I really can do anything with this book."

"I'm so glad you're my girlfriend." Natsu laughed.

They left Flare there, laying facedown in a puddle of soda. Lucy picked up the mop and placed it back in the janitor's closet, closing the door. Then she turned to Natsu, smiling up at him. He had several dirt marks and small bruises from the impact of Flare's attacks as well as those wall chunks on his face, but he still looks good. Natsu then walked over to the vending machine, where the remaining two drinks lay waiting to be picked up.

He sighed as he took one, and offered the other one to Lucy. "It's a good thing you had that to finish her off."

"It's a good thing that you actually know martial arts." Lucy replied. "Did you learn from anyone?"

Natsu sighed. "Yeah, my dad."

It seemed like something he didn't really want to talk about, so Lucy didn't press. Instead, she opened her drink and sipped from it—it was good having a refreshment on them. And now that Flare was down, all they needed to do was to make sure everyone else is okay and then make it out alive. Hopefully. Well, they should be able to make it anyway—Minerva'd be the one to blame if someone got killed in here. Lucy was sure that everyone was strong enough to handle an opponent.

She couldn't help but worry a little bit about Erza, though. After Natsu tossed his drink away, Lucy started.

"Do you think Erza will be okay?"

Natsu looked a little taken aback, and Lucy couldn't really blame him. No one really questioned Erza's power. She was strong, fierce, and confident. She didn't get intimidated easily, mostly because she was the one who was intimidating. Almost nothing got in her way, and if something did it must've been really serious. Even though Erza had all of these things, Lucy couldn't help but worry. She felt like what Minerva did to Levy was nothing compared to her strength.

"Of course she will." He said, without hesitation. He looked straight ahead, and nodded slowly. "She's Erza, after all."

"I have never been in this part of the school before." Gray said.

Gajeel snorted. "It's not like you would. It's a large ass school in the first place." His arms are crossed and his tone is laid back, but his eyes are open and alert. "There's so many damn classrooms, we're going to get lost before we find someone to get rid of. I don't even remember which way we've came from." He stops talking to look behind him, where Wendy is walking slowly. "Come on, Wendy. You're safe with us."

"It's just—" Wendy sighed, looking down and fidgeting. "I have a bad feeling about this place."

"A bad feeling?" Gajeel asked, slightly surprised. "This is our school after all."

Wendy doesn't look convinced. "I mean, yes, but... I just have a feeling something's going to happen. It feels nicer if our classmates are around, that there's nothing to worry about since there's so many people." She paused slightly before going on. "Now, it's just the three of us here in one area. We don't know where everyone else is... I don't know where that girl went, her footsteps went away as soon as we walked the other direction."

Gray frowns. "Maybe she caught on to Natsu and Lucy. She wouldn't dare mess with Erza."

"That's right, because Erza would've taken her down in seconds." Gajeel agreed.

"I just hope nothing bad happens to anyone. I brought my first aid kit with me, just in case, but..." She sniffled slightly, and sighed once more. "I miss Levy-chan a lot." She looked down at the ground, and stared there silently. Gray and Gajeel exchanged glances nervously. None of them knew how to cheer or try to reassure someone, that was more like Lucy or Mira's job.

Gray shifted awkwardly. "You're safe with us, Wendy. Don't worry about it too much."

"What he said." Gajeel muttered. "Levy will wake up soon. At least she wasn't killed."

Gray gave him a icy glare at that, which made Gajeel throw a steely glare back at him. Luckily Wendy seemed like she wasn't really paying attention to that last part, and she ended up giving the two teens a small smile. "Yeah, I guess so. Thank you—Gray-kun, Gajeel-kun. I really do appreciate it." With that, she was walking again, and Gray and Gajeel both exhaled. They continued walking for a while, changing direction every so often. They (well, Gray and Gajeel) argued a bit on which way to go, and just took random hallways to walk in.

Moments later, the three of them seemed like they were back to where they started.

"Argh, I don't remember where we came from!" Gray said angrily. He placed a hand on his chin and tried to focus. "I've got to ask Gramps how many classrooms there are here, they throw me off so much. Seriously, is this some kind of labyrinth? I can't even find the school maps, and that pisses me off."

Gajeel opened his mouth to reply (or rather, to snap at him for not remembering although Gajeel didn't remember either) but was interrupted by somebody else—a new voice which he didn't recognize at all. "You people are so simple-minded. It's easy, you know—remembering. I remember where you've been, and the direction where you've came from. I also remember more things... but that is irrelevant at the moment."

The voice was coming from the back, so that's where they all looked towards.

"Excuse me?" Gray huffed, clearly annoyed that the guy interrupted his train of thought. "Who are you?"

He was a male, wearing a large red hat on his head with big pink feathers on the side of it. What seemed to be a mask was on the upper half of his face, and his hair was blonde. He was wearing a dress shirt with ruffles, and a red vest that spread out to be somewhat of a cape. He had beige pants on along with brown combat boots. He was also just sitting there, on a chair with his legs crossed.

He looked up at them, and simply smiled. "If I tell you my name, will you remember?"

"I guess?"

"Rufus." He said, his smile unwavering. "My name is Rufus Lore."

Erza knew Minerva was on the top floor.

It had always been her preference. Minerva always liked to feel as if she was above everybody, and that everyone below her was well, below her. Erza also knew that Minerva was expecting her, she knew it from the start. It was why she refused to let Natsu and Gray or anyone finish her off, because Erza wanted to be the one to knock her unconscious, and to defeat her once and for all.

She knew Minerva ever since the two were small girls, which was still a painful memory.

Back then, Minerva was lonely. She was quiet and never wanted to associate with anybody. She was scared of everyone and everything. Erza felt bad for her at the time, for Minerva would always be left out when the rest of the kids were playing games. The kids also whispered mean things about her, stuff like she's manipulative... but how could she be like that at Erza's age? So she made up a new game, and one of the three most important rules was that Minerva had to be in it. ("Thanks, Erza. I really appreciated it!" Minerva said). Pretty soon, the two ended up being good friends. They would always play together—and they shared a close bond with one another.

Then Minerva had to move out of the country since her parents got an excellent job there, and Erza was completely devastated. After she had left, all Erza could think about was her best friend. A couple of years had passed and soon enough Erza was informed that Minerva was actually coming back. Of course Erza was excited. She bought things for her, and made her a 'welcome back' card. She thought, Minerva is going to love this.

The two met at a park, and Erza was surprised to see that some of Minerva's friends she made had came with her on the journey back. Thing is, they all looked scary and mean—they showed no sign of friendliness when Erza ran up to her. "Minerva!" Erza said, glee evident in her voice. "I missed you so much." She had opened her arms to hug her friend, but was let down when she pushed them away forcefully.

"I missed you too." Minerva said, but her tone said otherwise.

Obviously, Erza was hurt. She suddenly felt awkward, and reached inside her pocket to unfold the 'welcome back' card. Minerva took it from her hands, and then opened it and read it. She gave Erza a smile—but it was a cold, dark smile. And then she ripped it up to pieces in front of Erza's face. It seemed like she did it in slow motion. Erza could only hear the laughs of Minerva's friends as she did so, and afterwards she stomped on the pieces to finish the job.

"Thanks, Erza. I really appreciated it." Minerva said sweetly. "Finish her off."

Erza's heart was broken. How could her best friend suddenly treat her like this? She didn't even do anything bad to her—as she tried to run away, Minerva's friends caught her and started beating her up. They taunted her, laughed at her, and they spat at her. Erza couldn't help but let the tears fall, as Minerva's friends beat her up she was pleading to Minerva for help—her ex-best friend was just standing there with her arms crossed, a cold expression on her face.

It was horrible. Erza was bruised heavily, she had a black eye and her arm was broken. She ended up being hospitalized for a week or so.

It was from that moment on that Erza wanted to be stronger. Soon enough, Erza stopped being sad about everything and turned it into anger instead. It was her reason for revenge, because she wanted to settle things once and for all. It hurt so much that day, the pain was unbearable. So she trained and trained, learned martial arts, took judo and boxing classes, and got the top grades in her classes and studied hard every night when finals rolled around.

And now she was going to face her again.

Whenever someone asked about her history with Minerva, she just said it was some "unfinished business." It was sort of true, for Minerva's friends did beat Erza up for no reason, and Erza was defenseless. She didn't see Minerva for a while after that incident, and she wanted to finish what Minerva had started. So in a way, it was unfinished business, so Erza wasn't exactly lying to people when asked what happened.

She didn't want to tell her friends because she knew it would be hard for them to imagine. She also wanted them to believe that she had the power to fight her, because she really did. She walked up the steps slowly to the top floor, and at the top step, she exhaled.

Erza entered the area. It was only a matter of time before she faced Minerva.

She walked around for a little while, searching. Maybe she was using the tone of surprise—

"Erza."

—yep. The tone of surprise was used, all right. However, Erza was not surprised because she was honestly expecting it. Either way, she turned around expectantly—to lay eyes on Minerva herself. She was smiling at her. As if she had the right to do that. Erza clenched her fists, on instinct. "Minerva." She said, her voice clear. The two stared at each other, both on separate ends of the hallway.

"It's so nice to see you again." Minerva smiled. "You look so proud. So strong. So confident."

The red-haired teen raised an eyebrow. "Thanks, Minerva. I really appreciate it."

As if on cue, Minerva's smile turned into a frown. It was the old saying, the one the two of them used to each other—back when they actually meant it. But now, it doesn't matter anymore. It was just a bitter memory. Her eyes narrowed, and she put a hand on her hip. "Are you really still pissed off about that? Come on, it was such a long time ago. I mean, I thought you knew it was going to happen sooner or later... You were so naïve, Erza Scarlet. Maybe you still are."

"Maybe I should thank you." Erza said, her voice cold. "Because you made your friends beat me up, I became stronger."

Minerva smirked. "I don't know if I've told you this already, but I never considered you as my friend in the first place."

"What do you mean?"

"I was only pretending to be weak and helpless, the day we first met. You're not the first person who I've done it to, but you were the last. You opened up to me so easily... I knew back then that I would be able to break you. No one else showed me that much affection, besides you have. So I let you be my 'friend', I pretended to like you. But you know, I really didn't. I've always disliked you Erza. I never wanted to be friends." Minerva said, smoothly.

Our friendship was a lie.

A lie.

A lie?

"And I was right!" Minerva said gleefully. "You were so happy, so glad to see me when I came back. I wanted to burst out laughing because it was that stupid. I can't believe you weren't suspicious of me at all, why else wouldn't the other kids include me in their games? Maybe you should've listened to them, Erza, they were right all along weren't they? Then I watched your heart break in front of my eyes, I had just betrayed you."

If anything, this revelation just made Erza angrier than she was already was.

"I'm sorry." Minerva said, not sounding sorry at all. "Did I make you sad?"

After that statement, Erza had already ran up to her, her brown eyes staring into Minerva's green. Minerva seemed quite shocked that Erza had come up to her so quickly—she was probably expecting the red-haired teen to have a breakdown in front of her. But those days were over. Erza was different now, she was stronger and smarter. She thought she saw a flicker of fear in the other girl's eyes, but it went away as quickly as it came.

She then spun around quickly, and kicked Minerva's stomach squarely—causing the other girl to stagger back, clearly shocked at this action.

"What were you expecting?" Erza said, her gaze stony. "Let's just settle this unfinished business."

A/N:OOOHH MAANNNN thiNGS ARE HEATING UP IN HEREEEE

also i hope this was long enough for youuu :0 also reminder i haven't really watched Fairy Tail in a while so i apologize for getting the personalities wrong or some shit but at least i updated RIGHT i'm really sorry for making you guys wait so long aaaaa i hope this'll make up for it SEE YOU NEXT TIME W/ THE NEXT UPDATE

-choco x