Chapter 24: Bickslow's POV:
She was gone. Lucy was gone and Bickslow could feel it. He didn't even need to look at her. Her life had left her body and there was nothing he could do to fix it. He was too late. He was unguarded, didn't try hard enough and it left him with the consequence. She was dead. Slowly, Bickslow uncovered his eyes and revealed to himself that Lucy's body had vanished. She was sent away. Despite being gone. Even the body of Lucy disgusted the Anomaly. He wondered if it would grow more now. Was he meant to be stuck here forever? Living the long life of reliving his mistake of letting go. To live forever reliving how he almost helped everyone survive this horrible place. This horrible Anomaly.
Tears filled his eyes. The panic that rose within him he couldn't hold back anymore. From the images of him dying. Of her dying. None of them affected him as hard as losing his Lucy did. Watching them dying had taken its toll but he didn't show it, didn't acknowledge it at all. He had been trying to keep it together, distracting himself with trying to figure it all out. When that wasn't enough he tried to let Lucy be his distraction. Bickslow let himself weep. He dropped to his side and curled up, still holding his head. The seith mage repeated the blonde's name, saying he was sorry. His eyes closed until he noticed that the sky had returned to its sunset, the light shining on his eyelids. He wasn't sure how long he had remained on the snow, mourning. But he lay there, eyes on the sun as it rose. The opposite way. It was rising the way it usually set. Going up, but backwards. At a much more alarming rate. The seith mage sniffled, sitting up. He was simply watching the sun move, until it hurt to look at. He turned back and tried to feel Lucy. As if she was buried in the snow where she had died. Like somehow going back in time but not space would bring her back to him. There was nothing. No Lucy.
Endlessly, Bickslow seemed to lose sleep. But he hadn't been moved in quite some time. However much time it was that had gone by or not. It didn't matter now. He needed to fix this. If not for himself, then for Lucy. His favourite blonde. He was certain Laxus wouldn't have much to complain about his rank being pushed aside. Perhaps he could get to where he needed to get to without being pushed out again. He was without Lucy. The thought still had tears running down his cheeks but it wasn't uncontrollable anymore. Bickslow got himself up and shivered as he walked, still freezing from the water. He'd save them even if it meant dying from hypothermia himself. The seith mage walked for a long while before he came across the spot where Lucy wanted them to go. Surprised that he had made it there without being thrown back to Hargeon. Or even in the water again. He was still cold, shivering. However, the next shock he felt was physical. Painful. Startled and dropped him to his knees. He felt warm soon after, but in pain. He could smell something burning, too. He was certain it was himself. Bickslow looked up to see Laxus sparking in the very spot they had all held hands. Directly in the middle. "Wh-" He started, but stopped as Laxus approached him. The much larger man picked him up by his shoulders and placed him back on his feet. "Sorry. Bickslow. I thought you were another one of them." Laxus confessed.
Bickslow raised his eyebrows. Mostly in awe. He felt like he hadn't seen this man in over a year. He felt a wave of overwhelming sadness and collapsed against the lightning dragon slayer. Arms around him in a hug. He could feel Laxus felt hesitant at first but eventually returned the hug. Bickslow let out a deep, shaky sigh. Tears still rolled down his cheeks. "Bickslow. Why are you so damp, man?" Laxus questioned him. He pulled Bickslow away from him, holding him by his shoulders once more and peered at him. "Crying?" Bickslow could see that he was perplexing the man standing in front of him, but what else was the right reaction? Laughter? He shook his head. "I've never seen you this beat up before. What the hell happened in the time between the two versus two fights and now?" Laxus asked, hardly giving the seith mage a moment to even answer.
"Did you get hit by a train? I-" Laxus was cut off by Bickslow laughing this time. Laughing at the concept of being hit by a train at this moment. He wondered if it would matter? It certainly sounded better than the fate Lucy had endured. Bickslow hated to admit he wouldn't mind a train hitting him right now. But he couldn't do that. He couldn't do it to Lucy. He had promised he wouldn't let go of her. But he did. He could at least try and stop this Anomaly without her. For her. One of them. The words of Laxus came back to him and he suddenly stopped laughing. "One of them?" Bickslow asked, eyeing the much taller blond than he was used to being around for the last however long. Laxus shook his head. "No no. You first, why are you damp? And why do you look like shit? You smell like the ocean." He encouraged Bickslow to speak up. Bickslow didn't want to explain it all again. He hardly had the energy or motivation without Lucy beside him. Holding onto him. Whether for comfort or something else. Now his comfort was gone. His eye candy. His… almost date. He could feel a pulse of guilt, a pang of remorse, surge through his whole body. He was shivering again without feeling the cold.
Numb is what he tried to feel after. How else was he going to get the words out? "L-" the seith mage choked on his emotions regardless. It was too fresh. He felt fragile. Like a thin piece of glass, standing on its side precariously. One little gust of wind would be all it took to knock him over and make him shatter. Turned to dust, maybe then, he could fit between the cracks of reality and find his Lucy. "Lucy's dead…" Bickslow managed to finally acknowledge aloud, his tone quiet. Admitting to himself that it was true. Almost as if saying it made it official. No matter how much he wanted to deny it. It did make one thing absolutely clear to him, however. His affection for the woman had run so deep in such a short - but long amount of time that he was grieving what he almost had. Grieving the love he came so close to securing in his heart. If the pain was this much, he was certain he did already feel such a way towards her. But now it was too late. She was gone and he couldn't save her.
The seith mage stood there, watching Laxus process his words. The taller blond seemingly had just as hard of a time processing what was said. "Don't fuck with me Bix." Laxus warned, glaring down at him. Bickslow shook his head, "Why would I make this shit up? Or even joke about it?" He retorted, returning questions back at Laxus.
"Wh- What the fuck happened, Bickslow?" The taller man frowned. Bickslow kept his eyes on the other man, watching him have a realization of some kind. "Did the demons get her too?" He asked. Bickslow looked afraid, was someone else here the one that Leo was talking about? The missing soul? The dead one? "Demons? Too?" Bickslow questioned. It was the lightning dragon slayer's turn to be overwhelmed. They seemed to be talking about two entirely different things. Bickslow frowned. He wondered if Laxus meant those from Grimoire Heart from their last time on the island. Seemed entirely like a cakewalk compared to this time around.
"No. Not… Grimoire Heart. If that's what you... mean." Bickslow slowly began to explain. To speculate. He shoved his hands in his pockets and tried to compose himself. Emotionally. Quickly, he glanced around them, noting how this area was warmer than the rest. He wondered if that was from all of Laxus' energy in his lightning. Or from the effects of the Anomaly. Laxus nodded regardless, answering his non-question about Grimoire Heart. Bickslow sniffled before he opened his mouth to speak once again. "This is long and complicated. I don't think what you're seeing is actually the Demons." He continued to explain. Then he went on best he could to explain everything that had happened to himself and Lucy since they started the maze. Right from the start, things had been adding up. The Anomaly hiding signs from them, eroded by time so they couldn't leave in any sort of timely manner. The only reason they had made it out of it was because they remained close to those mostly unaffected by the loops.
Bickslow still didn't understand that one himself. But he digressed. Continuing to explain how he and Lucy vowed to stick close to one another so they wouldn't get separated in the maze that made no sense at all. Then the eyeless body of himself. He spoke of his eerie souls speaking to them. Though suddenly, something occurred to Bickslow. His souls. They felt something he didn't. As creepy as they sounded, maybe it wasn't just nonsense. He recalled what they said. You see it. We see it. It's dark. Where did they go? Not here. Laxus seemed to look at Bickslow with more disbelief, if it was possible. "I don't get it, Bix. What- your souls have always been strange." He reminded the shorter man. Bickslow shook his head. "But this is a new kind of strange, Laxus. They knew something we didn't." He defended his souls. He felt like he'd had some kind of breakthrough. Talking the whole thing out was reminding him of everything. Bickslow put his finger up and began muttering something under his breath. Laxus made a noise in protest, clearly wanting to hear the rest.
"I didn't account for the souls I was possessing. That's why they're gone." Bickslow reminded himself. Speaking to himself but out loud. Laxus cleared his throat and shook Bickslow. "Speak, friend." The seith mage sighed and continued from where he left off. He recollected picking numbers to fight with. How things went well until they started to fight. First Lucy and Wendy had disappeared. That was the first time. But Gray could see Wendy. Then he was gone from Bickslow's sight too. Lucy returned to his sight shortly after, with a strange light around her. If he had to guess, it was a spirit's attempt to save her from being thrown back to Hargeon. Where they ended up. Eventually seeing the same things, only this time they fell in the freezing cold water. Dark. Cold. Unforgiving. Having possessed Lucy and somehow survived that, they made it back to the island and Leo had shown up. Explaining what he thought was the problem. Something malicious on the island. Undetectable by sight. Burning through their sane thoughts like wildfire. Stealing their time, trying more specifically to take back the time Lucy's spirits took from it. In the seven years they slept. Bickslow began to wonder if the seven years they slept here was what made it so easy to feel like months had gone by without any sleep. A baffling concept. He was sure he was wrong. The seith mage continued talking about how Gajeel and Juvia had watched their whole interaction with each other and Leo. Invisible but there. Then all decided to go back into the maze. The maze that was full of more of themselves, dying in horrible ways. Learning of why Lucy screamed the first time around.
Theories passed around until Gajeel and Juvia had been sent away. Then both himself and Lucy got sent back to Hargeon a second time. The shimmer in the sky had gotten closer. More guildmates showed on the ship this time, not just the sound of them. Next was the hardest part. Bickslow struggled against himself to explain how Lucy died. What they both saw after being put further into the ocean. The faces that rose from the depths. The horror's of themselves, pale and lifeless. All drowned or frozen to death. "She was mid-sentence. She used the air she needed. The fucking Anomaly killed her by putting us in that water in that second and knew what it was doing. Had she been able hold her breath a little bit longer…" Bickslow held back the verge of his second break down. His breathing became sporadic, unhinged from normality. The eyes of Laxus showed sympathy and confusion before Bickslow couldn't keep himself upright anymore. He looked away and tried to find something to lean against. Only after searching blindly for a few seconds did he give up and retreat to the ground. The warm and inviting.
"Ah shit." He could hear from above him. "Bicks- Bickslow? Can you hear me? Breathe, man. In and out." Laxus urged him, crouching down to eye level. Bickslow tried, best he could, to breathe right. He was having trouble focusing on Laxus at all. To focus on anything that wasn't the sight of Lucy lifeless in the water. Then on the island. His memory burned with the image of her. The immeasurable pressure of feeling as though he was solely responsible for fixing all this now. Without her help. The woman that needed to be the main one to fix it. He could hear the strange chuckle come from Laxus as he sat down with him, bringing the man into a hug again. "I believe you, but only because there's no way in Hell anyone could make that up on the spot. Where is she? Where's her body?" Laxus asked, trying to comfort Bickslow by rubbing the man's arm. Bickslow found himself feeling completely distraught. Broken by an insurmountable amount of time spent with a wonderful woman, only have it ripped away from him violently. Like the Anomaly teased him with it, the hope that they would get out alive, together.
The question he had to answer. But had no answer to. No justification as to where her body went, no confirmation on her whereabouts in the slightest. He could guess the sea again. Like the rest of them had gone. The maze, another favourite of the Anomaly's. The sheer amount of bodies caught up to him. The idea that the Anomaly seemed to wipe out every one of them from every conceivable timeline, eradicating them before they even knew what hit them. What was different this time? The seith mage wondered if there was anything that was different from the others. Would he die from simply walking around? Drowning while walking? Like the doppelganger Lucy had in the maze. Bickslow tried to take deeper breaths. Though with mixed results, he felt a bit more calm. Even with his mind racing. "Bickslow?" Laxus caught his attention once more. "It's gone, Laxus. She's gone. The Anomaly threw her away just like the rest of them. She and I are littered everywhere on this damned island." He said through a single breath. Still trying to calm himself.
For a few minutes, they sat there, silently. Waiting for the seith mage to pick himself up once more to think clearly. Even if he had little to no idea on how to continue.