Hey lovely peeps! I have not abandoned you I promise, and I know this chap is a wee bit small but I wanted to get it to you guys asap! Enjoy!

Chapter 40

Erza smirked knowing it would antagonize her target, she just needed him to charge at her with full strength. Normally this wouldn't be a problem but Natsu's instincts bordered on prophetic vision. The Scarlet Mage narrowed her eyes at the challenge, she'd known this would be no laughing manner, but she'd damned if she failed her family. Suddenly something or more likely someone shot past the Scarlet Mage and landed a very solid hit on the distracted Dragon Slayer.

"Need some back up?" Erza turned to see Lisanna swimming up to her in a mermaid form.

"Yes, much appreciated. Even with my Sea Empress form giving me control over water and allowing my to breathe down here he's still quite challenging."

The white-haired take over mage just nodded, "he's a challenge on a regular basis. Now he's just…". She tilts her head as if looking for the right word when another appears beside her, "A Dragon."

Erza does a double take as Jellal calmly watches as Kagura takes a turn at holding off the aforementioned dragon. "How are you both able to be this deep?"

"Oh that's all me," Lisanna beams with pride. "I can share small pieces of my transformations with those around me now."

"I think we can explain later for now it seems we need to assist in holding Natsu off." Jellal points at the Dragon Slayers retreating form while Kagura seems to be trapped to the sea floor.

Jellal shot after Natsu while Erza and Lisanna swim down to Kagura. "He buried me in the sand, super-heated it, trapped me in a cocoon of glass!" The swordswoman growled.

Erza used the butt of her sword to smash into the glass but nothing happened. The scarlet warrior frowned and Lisanna leaned in for a closer look only to gasp in shock, "It's not made of glass but diamond."

"In that case," Erza requips to her giant armor with the Hammer from the key of the starry heavens incident.

"I will assist you," Kagura flicks her trapped hand and the weight of gravity around Erza's downward swing increases shattering the diamond prison. They wasted no time and immediately took off in the direction Jellal went off, only to find a rather odd site. Natsu was completely still, just floating, the Wizard Saint slowly circling him with a perplexed look.

"He just stopped and hasn't moved since," Jellal explained tapping his chin, "not to keep afloat or to stay upright."

Lisanna was staring at his chest before quietly saying, "apparently not even to breath."

Jellal, Erza, and Kagura turn their focus to Natsu's chest seeing it unmoving they share a look of concern. "We must get him to the surface," Erza reached for him but Jellal quickly grabbed her wrist stopping her. She knew he would have a reason while Kagura growled, "get out of her way like she said he needs air!"

"Can't you feel the heat rolling off him?" Lisanna put her hand a little closer to Natsu. "This is the ocean floor its normally pretty freezing but because of Natsu almost the entire ocean is a warming up."

Erza wasted no time in taking a deep breath, requipping into her Flame Empress armor, and snatching Natsu up. About halfway back to the surface her lungs started to burn with the need to breath. Just when she was starting to struggle, she felt someone grip under her shoulders. She didn't need to even make a guess as to who was assisting her when a golden glow radiated from behind her, blasting her and Natsu up to the surface at breakneck speed.

Once they broke through the surface Erza was assaulted with a cacophony of voices all jumbling together. Erza felt her anger rising at the constant flood of bickering filling her mind when Warren's voice cut through the din. "Erza? Are you alright? Aren't you suppose to be with the girls? What's happened?"

Everyone went silent, needing to hear that their nakama was safe. The scarlet mage began to reiterate her side of things, pausing only to check on the dragon slayer, and finished her tale with bringing Natsu to the surface for air.

"It's weird, all the dragon slayers just went completely catatonic for some reason. Even Ms. Anna and Ms. Porlyusica are stumped." Warren muttered.

"What are we wasting time for, we need ta lock'em down!" a salacious card mage crowed.

"Cana's right guys, we don't have time to be lookin' a gift horse in the mouth." Bisca called.

Jellal nodded, "right so we know imprisoning them had little to no effect. This time I think we should simply try for distance."

Lisanna pipes in, "besides fighting us they haven't damaged anything in particular."

"Nor have they attacked any innocent civilians." Kagura hummed in agreement.

"I will carry Natsu since I have at least some heat resistance," Ezra offers.

Jellal smiles, "and I will carry you using Meteor in order to get his as far as possible."

The scarlet warrior nods then seems to realize just what this would entail and flushes, "it would be most agreeable."

"It'll take a real man to carry Gajeel," Elfman bellows accentuating "MAN."

Wasting no more time, the remaining dragon slayers were all carted off and everyone did their best to use this situation to their advantage.

Meanwhile the dragons and their soon to be mates each had sweet and tender dreams to share, all thanks to a simple blessing.

Kinana looks around the old run-down pier, getting a strange sense of déjà vu. "I hope this at least looks a little familiar to you." Kinana turned and frowned seeing Erik standing so far away from her. She tilted her head in silent question knowing he didn't even need that to hear her thoughts.

"You've never asked but I know you wonder where you came from." He took a deep breath, "and how you became cubellious."