Gisela stared down the mouth of her tunnel. It didn't look like much really, just a crack in the rocks with some overgrowth and loose scraggly roots veining it.

It was the right spot.

If she focused she could feel the differences in ethernanos. Not that she was focusing that much because then she would be distracted and that would be bad and she had a job to do and-

Breathe.

Gisela kept her watch. Alone.

She fidgeted with the lacrima held loosely in the pocket of her jacket. She could do this.

All I have to do is hold the line.

There was a sound almost like a scream and the feeling of wrongness, of breaking apart.

Yuka. They've started. Then Gisela didn't have time to think.

She pulled her hand out of her pocket, lacrima on and ready for action.

The vulcan was saying something. It didn't matter.

This vulcan wasn't her friend. Wasn't someone she cared about. All Gisela had to do was win.

Duck.

The breeze of a punch passed over her head as Gisela flipped, bouncing off a convenient cloud and into the vulcan.

There was a popping sound and the lacima in her hand glowed.

Then Gisela was hurtling towards the earth.

I didn't do too much damage.

It was acceptable. She could see one tree whose branch had been broken, likely by one of the vulcans missed punches, but other than that it looked pretty okay.

I did it.

She hadn't failed.

Now she would just have to keep that up.

It was moments after she had had that thought that the next vulcan attacked.

Duck. Summon. Cloud. Punch. Channel. Move.

It kept going. Her breath was sharp in her throat. Her mouth tasted bitter.

Just keep going.

She ached.

Just keep going.

The next one came. This time it was a group. It didn't matter. Compared to everyone else she was only fighting a few because her magic didn't work as well underground.

She could hold this line.

She would hold the line.

The group was gone, sucked into the lacrima. Gisela had a moment to stare up at the sun.

It looked like it hadn't shifted much at all. It was still just above the trees, only starting it's daily journey across the sky.

Jura had said something about morning being theorized to be the best time to fight vulcans. Gisela wasn't quite sure she got the logic but figured that they would have had to fight them at some time and morning was as good a time as any.

Better actually, it left her less time to worry about everything that would go wrong.

It felt like much longer.

Still.

Gisela listened, she couldn't meditate, didn't have the time or safety for that but she could listen.

Vulcans weren't subtle. Mimics yes, quiet no.

Is everyone okay?

It wasn't really her place to worry, Gisela knew that. She knew that Max and Laki and everyone were strong. Jura felt immense, Gisela could still picture the blaze he had been when she had been meditating and-

The ground was rumbling.

The ground was roaring.

It was deafening.

Gisela catapulted herself up into the air, literally pulling herself onto the cloud she had summoned as the ground below where she had been standing fell away. She could feel the emptiness betheth her feet as the dangled, a sensation that caused her stomach to swoop as she lay sprawled on top of her platform.

What happened.

She needed a better view. Gisela forced the cloud up as she forced herself up, pulling herself over to the edge to look down.

There was a widening crack in the ground, the trees rattling and the birds screaming a warning in a cacophony of caws.

What is happening?

Something was glowing in the distance, a literal beacon in the morning light that burned as Gisela tried to focus on it.

The light faded.

Gisela felt her heart drop.

It was a vulcan. A giant vulcan, looming over the woods and screaming, it's cries sending up flocks of birds and scratching like nails on a chalkboard.

We have to fight that.

Gisela knew that it wasn't a question. That the vulcan wasn't friendly, already she was pretty sure she could see earth trying to restrain it and the sudden wood sprouting up.

It was already being fought.

I have to fight that.

There was no way she could stay by her not existent crevice. There was no more point in trying to corner the vulcans anymore, not when the earthquake could have opened up an unlimited amount of exit points.

I can do it.

The funny thing, Gisela gave herself a few more moments to think about as she zoomed over, cold wind drawing tears from her eyes, was that it didn't really matter if she could do it or not. It didn't really matter if her clouds were nothing but an annoyance because everyone else was there fighting and she couldn't leave them to fight alone.

That wasn't who she wanted to be.

Once more unto the breach.

Gisela hurtled down, trying to stay out of line of sight as best could as she ducked around the forest of branches that sprouted up, an attempt at restraint.

"What happened?", Gisela shouted as she crashed to the ground, leaping off her cloud and somehow managing to summersalt to the ground.

"It got Jura".

Gisela felt her heart drop.

"No time to explain, we need to beat it".

Gisela remembered Jura's magical presence. Remembered the beasts. How were they supposed to fight them both?

"Got a plan?". She was shouting and it didn't matter. They both had to break off conversation because a tree came hurtling at them. An actual tree. An actual tree picked up and thrown like a spear.

If it wasn't for the situation Gisela wasn't sure what she would be doing about that.

So much for not damaging the environment. Gisela pushed that thought out of the way as a second tree came hurtling, wrenching her leg out of the hole that had opened up in the unstable ground.

"We just need to beat it".

"Do we have enough power for that?!".

"Do we have a choice?". A tree came hurtling by Gisela, flying straight at Jura-vulcan and buying them a few moments to duck backwards.

"Where is everyone else".

"Lyon hasn't shown up yet, and Yuka got taken out when that one over power our trap".

"Is he safe?".

"Safer than the rest of us", Mickey shouted.

There was no time for talking after that. The vulcans fist hit the ground with a giant thud, starting another round of tremors.

They kept dodging. There weren't many other choices.

How long can we keep this up for? They were moving because they had too, because they didn't have another option and Gisela couldn't see anything else they could do. Laki was trying to immobilize it but she couldn't get enough wood made fast enough, already the ground was covered in splitters and broken beams, something else they had to worry about as they dodged and ducked.

They had to keep moving.

Gisela knew they needed a plan though. They were all going to run out of magic and then it would be even worse.

It happened in moments.

Gisela saw Toby stumble and called up her clouds.

She had just sent them over to shield him when the other fist came down.

Mickey!

There was no time.

A tiger blurred past Gisela, crashing into the fist and knocking it off course.

The fist impacted the ground, suddenly wood grew up around it, binding it down.

"Lyon", Gisela shouted, voice horse with relief.

Suddenly Gisela could breathe again. It didn't help much. There was nothing Gisela could think of to make this better. They were trapped and she was going to fail and-

Someone was calling her name. "Yeah", Gisela shouted as she tried to keep her distance from the vulcan, doing her best to grab the moments when it's fists were both trapped.

"Everyone, I have a plan".

"What is it?".

"Unison raid. Me and you and Gisela will keep him down, all our magics are good for that. Lyon and the rest can combine to cook up something with a punch".

Gisela couldn't breathe again. She had heard of unison raids at the temple, or what she thought they were. Unison raids were shaping magic in order to bind two different peoples will or rarely, after years of practicing, more than that.

There was no way she could do that.

She heard the groaning of breaking wood. They just didn't have time.

The world was bearing down on her.

She didn't have time.

Gisela jolted, only stopping at the last minute when she realized it was Laki's hand.

"You ready?".

Laki looked so focused, prepared with her magic vibrating under her skin, close enough Gisela could feel it.

The groaning got louder.

Gisela tried to let her magic out raw, tried to get it out half formed and ready to blend she had seen at the temple.

The ground was shaking and her throat tastes like dust, it felt like there were knives in the back stabbing her with every breath she took as she tried to focus on Laki and the magic that was Max on the other side of Laki but-

Gisela couldn't breathe.

I can't-

Gisela couldn't say it. Not when there was no other choice. They had tried air and tried fight and Jura was strong and this vulcan was strong and there was nothing else and she needed to win because everyone needed her and-

The magic came roaring out. It was like hitting the right pitch while singing or that perfect moment of flying and the world was just energy and-

Hold.

It was like thinking while not thinking. It was about the blank spaces and the steadiness that she had to hold.

Constrain. She watched, distance from herself as the twining, whirling chaos of wood exploded in front of them, all roots and branches and sand and force.

It would hold.

Grow! Trap! Hold!

It wasn't just Gisela, she could hear Laki and Max's voices overlaying with her's, echoing about in whatever frequency they had reached.

Gisela could feel the vulcan's magic battering against their own, could feel the force of the vulcan as it tried to break from it's bonds.

It didn't matter. They were going to hold.

Bind!

Absorb!

It burned and Gisela felt heavy and-

Absorb!

Suddenly there was a burst and an impact and Gisela felt the moment when it was okay. When she could be done.

They were fine now.

It was light and airy and relaxing.

Then there was nothing.

Her back ached. At least Gisela thought it was her back that was aching.

Gisela opened her eyes carefully. It was dark.

Her head was pounding and her body ached like she had just gone ten rounds with Mickey. Was that what I did?

It wouldn't have been the first time she had passed out on the ground like that, or the second really. She had done it more times than she could count if she counted all the training with the Southern Wolves and-

Then everything hit her.

The scream tore it's way out of her throat as she forced herself to sit upright, the gasp that came after wasn't much better.

Vaguely Gisela could hear other people trying to talk to her but in front of her she could see smarched trees and boulders scattered around, like some wierd, twisted version of dodgeball.

It was chaos.

The forest looked nothing like what it did before.

We did that.

I did that.

Did we win?

"-ela".

Her muscles hurt even worse from trying to sit up. "We win?", she rasped.

"We won. We showed that vulcan why they shouldn't mess with Fairy Tail", Mickey said fiercely. "That unison raid you guys pulled off was awesome. It was perfect so me and Lyon and Toby had time to take him down. You guys weakened him as well, that was an impressive binding".

"How?".

"How'd we take him out?".

Gisela nodded, not wanting to abuse her throat anymore.

"Well, canons are very useful, even if ones made of ice are cold".

"Lyon made a canon?". Was that really all it took.

"Not just any canon", Mickey said, grin showing all her teeth, "a human cannon".

Gisela thought about Mickey. Then she thought about Lyon. She thought of Mickey getting launched out of a cannon.

The old traces of the logic that she had learned Before tried to reassert itself. How would that even work? Gisela pushed that question away, she already knew that answer.

Magic. Another thought hit her, "is Jura okay?".

"Yeah, he hasn't woken up yet, that vulcan really messed him over".

"Are we going to leave when he wakes up?".

"Maybe. I've been talking with Laki and Max, we want to take a look at the tunnel system, or", Mickey paused for a moment, following Gisela's line of sigh, "what's left of it".

"Why?".

"We think it's a super old lab, like four hundered years old!".

"Oh".

"Not just oh. Wow", Mickey cheered, spreading her hands wide, "most of the time treasure hunters get to the ruins first and the council is stupid and says that they have the right to explore them before us because they are certified treasure hunters and so on and so forth, that will probably happen to this one too", Mickey seemed monmetatly dispirited before cheering back up, "but for the moment we have the right to explore it!".

Gisela didn't want to ask, still she had too. "Is it legal?".

"Yeah, right now it is, that's the point".

"Is it safe? I bet it's pretty unstable because", Gisela trailed off, Mickey didn't need her telling her all of this.

Mickey sighed, "if you don't want to we don't have to, I just really want to know where that vulcan came from. It was way too strong, took us all by surprise. If there are more like that than we need to get out a warning".

Gisela thought of how the beast had seemed to tower over the trees. It had just been so huge and not all of that had been Jura. "So not all nests have vulcans like that, right?".

Mickey burst out into laughter.

Gisela felt her heart drop. Did I do something wrong? "What?".

Mickey wheezed for a moment, cackling before calming down. "Do you think we'd have a normal mission".

"So that's something else we should look into".

"Probably. We might find some cool history".

The world seemed soft around the edges, now that Gisela knew that everyone was safe the exhaustion was nearly overpower. Why am I always the one to pass out? Gisela thought, or at least thought she did.

It was annoying. She was always the one blacking out from exhaustion no matter how hard she tried.

Gisela wanted to open her mouth and mention it and see if Mickey had any thoughts on why Gisela always had to be the one to pass out but the world seemed soft and full of cotton wool and pretty soon she just didn't have the energy.

The dark reclaimed her.

It was light when she woke up again and something smelled good, she didn't even have a headache! Carefully Gisela levied herself off the wooden bed, back aching. Note to self, wooden benches are not great places to sleep.

Technically she should have already known that but Gisela pushed that recimination aside as her belly growled.

It ached and rumbbled, feeling almost like the cave she had just been staring down.

And that's proof that I used a lot of magic.

Her stomach rumbled again.

There was laughter.

"You want breakfast?", Max shouted.

"That obvious?". Gisela could feel herself blushing. It was awful. It didn't quite register what she was eating, honestly Gisela just didn't care. She felt fine, her back ached a little from the wooden bed and Gisela knew her skin was peppered with bruises from the chaos of the day before but she was fine.

She was just so hungry.

Gisela looked down at the metal circle that they were calling a plate. It was empty.

Her stomach rumbled again.

Max looked at her again. Gisela tried not to blush, hiding her face in annoyance because she was always the one to pass out and be the burden and0.

Gisela looked at her plate again. It was full.

She kept eating. It was only after she had finished the second plate that Gisela remembered her manners, "thanks".

Idiot.

Max just laughed, Gisela felt something relax in her at the sound. "No problem, I know what it's like to use up a bunch of magic".

Maybe I'm not the only one? "Did you pass out like I did?". Vaguely Gisela could remember talking to Mickey the night before, it was kind of blurry though.

"No, that was an impressive fall though".

"Thanks?". Gisela really wasn't sure if that was a compliment or not.

A thought hit her. "Was I the only one to pass out?".

"Other than Jura, yeah". I was.

"Oh". Makes sense. Gisela looked down at her hands, and the scraps of whatever she had just inhaled covering the plate. Felt the slight aches that still lingered. Of course I would be the weak one.

"You did good through".

"I did?".

"Yeah, whatever absorption you pulled on the vulcan really helped to weaken it".

"I did that?". It was all just a blur now, like something that had happened to another Gisela and not her.

"Yeah, did you know you could do that?".

Gisela closed her eyes, Byard. She remembered that fight, her first real one in Fiore. The Jiggle Butt Gang. "I think I've done it before, I didn't realize I could do it to vulcans as well".

"It was exuding raw magic in an attempt to burst out of it's bindings, you contained it".

"Oh". I guess I was good for something. "Do you know when Jura will wake up?". Now that she was more focused she could see him collapsed on another wooden bench. It wasn't just him, Gisela could see another two bodies, one draping over the other. Suddenly it hit her. She hadn't been the only one knocked out of the fight, even if she had been the only one to collapse right after. "Is Yuka okay?". I didn't even think about him.

"Yeah, his wave magic was just overloaded and he ended up punched by the big vulcan". That helped a little but now that Gisela had started to ask after everyone she needed to know. "Where's Lyon and Laki".

"Out on patrol to scrape up the remains, me and Mickey and Toby stayed here to watch you guys".

"So they are okay?".

"Yep. You, Yuka, and Jura got the worst damage of the lot".

It felt like she could breathe again. "Okay, good. Will they wake up soon?".

"Not sure, being possessed messes you up but his body isn't so bad. Yuka just needs time to heal as well, he got more of the brunt of it with backlash and all but he should be fine".

"That's good".

Should I?

"What is it?".

"Huh?".

"You had the, 'I want to ask a question face'".

"I did?". Gisela was sure she could feel herself blushing again. Had it really been that easy to see?

"Yeah, your eyebrows do this scrunchy thing".

Gisela tested it out. Her eyebrows did do a scrunchy thing. It felt funny now that she was aware of it "Oh".

"So what do you question?".

Nothing to do but ask now. "I was just wondering if I should go see the tunnels".

"Do you want to?".

"I mean if we are going to explore them later…", she trailed off.

"Can you walk?".

"I made it over here".

"But can you make it over there?".

Gisela took a breath, "let's find out".

She could.

Next step: tunnels.

Gisela couldn't figure out if she was excited or not.