Chapter 10: Am I gonna fly, am I gonna fall?
Lucy couldn't deny that she was surprised that Natsu could get her to laugh so easily. His laughter was infectious, making her realize that everything wasn't as bad as it seemed. His favorite way to past time seemed to be teasing Gray. Natsu jumped from Juvia, the girl who seemed to be in love with Gray, to his stripping habit. He'd already lost his pants twice.
"Damn it Gray! Are you trying to hit on my kid sister?" It would have sounded intimidating if Natsu wasn't trying and failing to suppress laughter.
Suddenly Gajeel barged in. "Once again, I'm not surprised to walk in on Ice Boy with no pants. Or Flame Brain looking constipated."
Lucy studied the guy. He looked oddly familiar, but she couldn't place it.
"Oi!" The two victims of the statement shouted.
"I do hope you boys aren't gonna start a fight!" Erza hissed from her cuddles with Jellal.
All three joined arms as they chorused, "no ma'am!"
When Erza seemed to be sleeping again, they jumped apart, Gajeel heading to Levy while Gray and Natsu walked towards Wendy and Lucy.
'Hey Luuuceee! Play with meeeee…." Natsu moaned.
Lucy scoffed. "One: It's LucY with a Y. Two: Go entertain yourself."
Gray chuckled. "You too Fullbuster."
He seemed to flinch at the statement and joined Natsu in puppy dog eyes.
Wendy snickered as she saw Lucy's resolve wavering. Luckily for Lucy, the door burst open once again, showing Cana hungover.
"What's up Lucy!" She said, holding her head in pain. "Finally get Natsu to - MPHM!"
"Why don't you have a seat?" Lucy said, patting the spot on her bed only for her hand to hit something not so soft. It was rather hard. Looking down, she shrieked and jumped from her bed.
"GET OUT OF MY BED NATSU!" She screamed as Erza suddenly woke up.
"Where's the zombie?" She shouted.
Lucy realized why what she felt was so hard. It was his Abs. Those were rock solid…. No. Focus. This isn't some anime highschool romance!
"No zombie, just Salamander sitting on Bunny Girl's bed."
"THE NAME'S LUCY! GET IT RIGHT!"
"Nah. Bunny Girl suits ya better."
"Where'd that even come from?"
"Your shirt. It has a bunny on it."
"Huh?!" Turns out Gajeel was right. There was a bunny on her shirt and she hadn't even noticed.
"Hmph."
"See, Natsu and Lucy should totally hook up. Right, Wendy?"
"You keep Wendy out of this." Natsu snarled as Wendy chirped a yes.
Natsu clutched his chest at his sister's response as he dramatically fell back onto Lucy's bed. "How thy has woundeth me!"
"Maybe Lucy's kiss would make it better Flame Brain."
"Not you too Gray!" Lucy cried, covering her face with her hands.
"That's it. Out."
"C'mon Lucyyy. I didn't meeeaaan it," Cana moaned as Lucy forcibly shoved her out along with Jellal, and Gray.
"Party's over. Go to bed and rest or whatever. We have to get up early tomorrow so don't forget that." Lucy reminded them as she turned to Natsu, figuring out how she would get him off her bed.
15 minutes later, Gajeel, Levy, Erza, and Wendy were snickering as Lucy struggled to get Natsu off her bed. That was it.
"It's getting late, Natsu. Get off!" She whined. Her only response was snoring and more snickering. She gave up.
She went into the girls' bathroom and changed into the pajamas she had been given. Gym shorts and another tank top with a sweater if it got cold. She put her sweater away since, if she was correct, it was summer. June? July? Who knew...
When she came back, Gajeel was leaving and Levy was going to stay over again. Much to Lucy's annoyance, Natsu was still in her bed. Sighing, she just told him to scooch and she settled in right next to him.
Levy and Wendy exchanged grins as Erza fell asleep. Wendy had to admit just how sly her brother was when he hid behind his stupidity and cluelessness.
Soon, all of them were snoring away as they suffered nightmares of a naked Cana.
Once again, Erza acted as their alarm clock in the morning.
"You guys better improve on waking up on time. Tonight's my last night with you guys, so I can't wake you up after tomorrow." She said.
Lucy just yawned as she stretched. She tried to get out of bed, but two strong arms pulled her back.
"Eep!"
Wendy woke up with Levy as they stared at the scene in front of them. Lucy was being held captive by a sleeping Natsu.
"Whoops! I guess I forgot to tell you that he's a cuddler despite his tough guy act." Wendy snickered.
Lucy glared at the girl she had saved. If she knew that she was this troublesome… nah. She was just kidding.
She carefully attempted to peel Natsu's arms off her, but he was too strong. Erza seemed to come up with a solution.
"NATSU WAKE UP!" She screamed.
His eyes shot open and he whimpered.
"Itwasn'tmeitwasgra- oh hey Luigi!" He said, smiling. Lucy cleared her throat and sent a pointed look to his arms.
Natsu quickly retracted his arms. "Whoops! Sorry about that!"
Lucy quickly got out and grabbed some random clothes to throw on. Turns out, they were the same ones as the day before. She couldn't be picky. Wait... What had Natsu called her? She shook her head. It was no time to start thinking about him.
She beat her own personal record of fastest dresser and grabbed her weapons. She had just finished securing her last knife in place when she saw Natsu standing by the doorway.
"Ready to go?" She asked.
"Yeah. You take forever to get ready."
Lucy scoffed. "Please. If I wanted to take forever, you'd be waiting here all day."
"NATSU! LUCY! GET YOUR ASSES MOVING!" Erza yelled, waking up their neighbors in the process.
The duo hurried down to the Master's office to hear their mission for today.
"Lucy and Natsu. You need to conduct a hunt on quadrant two of Sector 3. I'll be expecting you back by dusk in three days, so I had Mira prepare you all necessary meals on the go with extra snacks." Makarov said. "I've also taken the liberty in including a couple grenades and bombs with your weapons pack. We need to clean those bastards out as soon as possible before November. It's June. We're already behind. Now get moving."
Natsu and Lucy briefed their team members on the way there. Gray and Erza were quite experienced in hunting, but Wendy was a little confused.
"So we take a look at the population of zombies and just kill them?"
"Yeah. Headshots and burning and more killing. Don't waste ammo or weapons. Make sure you are always covered. Sector Three includes Akane Resort, so this will be tough." Lucy said.
"Again with the burning," Natsu said.
"From what I've heard, you're even more obsessed with fire so shut it Pyro."
"Alright. I burned down the chemistry lab once. That's it. It was a total accident."
Lucy gave him a look.
"Alright maybe twice, but still."
Gray snorted. "It was more like 5 times. I remember being surprised you weren't expelled."
Natsu just scoffed and mumbled a half-assed excuse.
"Let's get back to the task at hand. We need a plan." Lucy said.
"I think we should split up into two teams like yesterday," Erza said. "If we work our way down from opposite ends of the quadrant, we can round them up at the resort hotel and burn it."
"Alright, but do try to kill as many as possible on the way to the hotel. Also, leave the actual amusement park alone. We'll need to clear that separately. Damn, this might take more than one day." Natsu said.
Lucy agreed. "Then it's a good thing I brought extra food."
They split their rations and supplies as they went their separate ways.
Master had given them walkie-talkies that had been discovered the day prior during a raid. He couldn't spare any batteries, so Lucy had to use them sparingly. She handed one to Gray.
"Not sure about the battery, but they work for now. Good luck." She said as she turned off the safety on her gun.
Gray nodded as he and Erza took the car and started driving towards the opposite end of the quadrant.
Lucy turned to Natsu and Wendy and signaled to keep hidden. She knew that there were plenty of zombies in the area, more than Wendy had ever faced.
They went house by house, slowly making their way along the quadrant. At that moment, Natsu and Wendy were working on a two story house with a basement. They had already gone through the basement (no naked Cana this time to Natsu's relief) and were halfway through the first floor when they saw Lucy through a window. Natsu watched in amazement as she faced 6 zombies at once. She was armed with a whip and knife, having lost her pistol in the house she was clearing.
In one move, she had decapitated 3 of them with a whip as she went in to stab one. She had anticipated the fifth zombie to attack so she twirled around and ducked, flicking her whip again. Now she had one left, which she took care of by throwing her knife.
To Natsu's horror, another one had snuck up and was about to bite Lucy when a shot sounded and a window shattered. Natsu turned to the source and did a doubletake to see it was Wendy.
Lucy gave Wendy a thumbs up as she scrambled to retrieve her knife and pistol. She did some things with her hand and Wendy nodded, understanding the strange message.
"Lucy said that there were two upstairs," Wendy explained.
Natsu pushed his questions to the back of his mind as he raced upstairs with his sister to do his job.
Killing the zombies was the easy part. It was the broken glass on the floor that tripped Natsu up. After Wendy and him had each taken one out, he had tripped and cut him arm on a shard. But, Wendy was already ready with a first-aid kit. She moved quickly, disinfecting it and applying a bandage.
When she had finished, Lucy had finally found them and crouched down.
"This street is clear for now, but I expect some zombies will migrate here sooner or later. We need a distraction somewhere closer to the resort to draw them there."
"Let me guess," Natsu said. "Blow up a house?"
Lucy smiled. "You know it. But, this is gonna be different than mos- Is that an axe?" She cried.
Natsu turned to where Lucy was looking and there it was. A rather sharp looking axe was sitting on a shelf.
"Uh Lucy, I don't think that's such a good idea." Wendy said, already knowing what Lucy was thinking. She'd seen the contraption at the house they'd met at. She also knew what happened to it.
Lucy said nothing as she picked it up. She proceeded to search the hose until she found what she was looking for. A shotgun.
Natsu was lost. What was Lucy doing? Turning to Wendy for answers, he was met with a sigh.
He heard the rather loud sound of duck tape being opened and saw Lucy taping the axe to the shotgun.
"Is she seriously…"
"Yup. She lost her last one, so she's been trying to look for an axe to recreate it." Wendy said.
"Great. A psycho pervert with a joint weapon. Just what we needed." He said, sarcastically.
"I'm NOT a pervert!" Lucy said. "Anyway, let's go clear a few more hoses before trapping them.
Her count was 43 zombies while Natsu had killed 48. Wendy was at a steady 35. That was the good part. The bad part was that they had barely started clearing. There were hundreds of people visiting Akane when it hit, which added a lot to the already large population. If Natsu recalled correctly, Gajeel had lived in sector 4. Wait, no. It was Juvia, right? Maybe it was Max... It didn't matter anyway.
This time, they worked as a team. Since Lucy now had her shotgun-axe, she was able to give Wendy her pistol as she perfected her own techniques.
"How experienced are you in using … that?" Natsu asked, uneasy about the new weapon.
"There's nothing like learning on the job!" She said, stars in her eyes. That just made Natsu feel worse.
Lucy went in first, using her axe extension to slice right through first zombie's brain. The top part of the scalp slid off, splattering blood on Natsu who was standing beside Lucy. He gingerly wiped it off, glaring at the girl.
"Whoops! Sorry!" She said.
She took note of how different Natsu was at base and in the field. At the base, he seemed to have less than half a brain, yet on the field, he was a genius. He worked methodically to go through each house, knowing exactly how to attack each zombie.
"Let's split up. Lucy, you take the top floor so you don't kill us with that death stick if you miss the zombie and we'll take the basement. First one to reach the middle owes the other a favor."
"Excuse me! I don't miss when I aim." She hissed as she stalked up the stairs, weapon ready.
Natsu snickered as he made his way to the basement. It was too funny to wind her up. He and Wendy made a great team as they were able to nail every single zombie. Wendy only missed once.
Lucy, on the other hand, was struggling. She couldn't believe that there had been so many zombies in the top floor. The first room had held maybe 15 while more had come out after hearing noise. Lucy was panting as she hacked each one down, one by one. The shotgun was getting heavy in her hands and her whip was somewhere in the center of the mass of zombies that had collected. They were backing her up into a corner. That was bad.
"Shit." Lucy hissed as another one came up behind her. He arms ached as she swung again, getting two this time. The only benefit was that the weapon allowed her more distance when fighting.
She gasped as she saw teeth flashing, grabbing her arm as she swung back. She grabbed a knife in her belt and threw it. It lodged in between the zombie's eyes, but the damage was done. She had felt the teeth clamp down. To her surprise, it didn't hurt to much, just pressure.
Still in shock, she quickly checked her arm, ignoring the zombies advancing. At that moment, she thanked the gods and her parents who were probably in heaven. The zombie had bit the gauntlet Grandeeney had given her. She saw little teeth marks on the leather, but none had pierced through. A shot shook her out of her shock. (Yo does this count as alliteration?)
"Wendy!" She cried. She saw blue hair dasing back down the stairs. Lucy jumped back into the action. She used the gun part this time and killed the 10 who were chasing after Wendy. Next, she ripped the tape off and took the axe in her hand. There was not as much distance as before, but it was lighter.
She went back to swinging, adrenaline rushing through her veins. Her heart was pounding, but something caught her eye. It was a door. She yanked it open and there were no zombies, just empty beer bottles. She quickly jumped inside, barricading the door.
"This won't last," she muttered. She searched for somewhere to escape. Her eyes landed on the ceiling. It was a trapdoor. She stood on her tippy-toes to reach the handles, but it was too high. She cursed her short height and began to jump up and down in an attempt to grab the handle.
She was able to open the door on her third jump. She quickly pulled down the ladder, and climbed as if there was tomorrow. It hit her right then and there. There might not be one if she couldn't escape.
She felt a breeze as she reached the top, wincing as she heard the door downstairs break down.
"Is this the roof?" She asked in disbelief. Looking over the edge, she knew that the jump down would cause her to break a bone. And then what? Have Natsu take care of her for the rest of the mission? That was not an option.
A sound of nails on wood told her that she couldn't go back either. The zombies were coming and they were definitely not stopping. When the first eyeless faces appeared, flesh rotting a little, she knew she had no choice.
She stood at the edge of the roof as the zombies charged towards her.
"NATSU!" She yelled as she jumped, shooting at the zombies.
Now, she'd either fly or fall.
so i'm late?... yeah... sorry... I blame it on school... my responses will be short since class starts in like 2 minutes
Kalessia04: good choice! I love NaLu and Jerza too!
Ushindeshi: Glad you think so!
Questions:
Favorite arc and why?