Change of Fate

Lady Countryrose

Ch. 12

The Fairy Tail Royale, many within the guild had gathered at the makeshift arena. Round after round, many had been eliminated. Even though it may have started that only the men to compete, but with Grace not being there. Laxus allowed the women to compete. Which surprised that Lucy had beaten his friend, Bickslow.

Another shock was seeing Mira wanting to come out and fight it out with Freed. Which caused a round of demon vs demon. Nearly everyone knew why Mira had stopped using her take-over magic and respected that. But she found herself wanting to fight again. All because of her emotional state of wanting to have Grace home for Lucy.

The guild may have been in an uproar about not having one of their own home. But every one of them was making an effort for the towns people to enjoy themselves. Even seeing how the guild had grown through time.

On the final round, it was Natsu and Gajeel against Laxus. They found that neither one of them alone could take him down. But in the end, it became a three-way tie. Not voicing that one had beaten the other. By the end of the round, Fairy Tail had raised enough money to put in a rainy day account for the guild.

Lucy was holding the guild's lacrama, while Master Makarov Dreyar was running around. It was then that it started to glow, causing her to answer. It was when she saw a face that she nearly cried out in pain.

"Grace!"

Everyone turned towards Lucy, bringing Master Makarov at her side.

Grace gave a small smile, "Please keep it down. I don't know how much I can be on." She glanced around where she was, allowing those that could see that she was surrounded by trees. "They're going to be raising an ancient weapon called Nirvana."

"Nirvana," asked the guild master. "Are you sure that it was they're doing?"

Grace nodded, "It is sir. They've made me read tons of books on it lately and that is all they've talked about." She glanced around, "I've got to go…" Then the screen went dark.

Everyone glanced towards the master as he asked Lucy for the communication device. He made a called, "Master Bob of Blue Pegasus…"

The person on the other end had picked up, "Oh, Master Makarov. How can I help you with today?"

He glanced towards the screen with his 'don't temp me face,' "I need you to get your boys to look up Nirvana."

Master Bob glanced behind him and got someone to do as he was told. He then glanced back towards Makarov. "This must be important if you want my boys to look it up."

"Grace just called… that is what they're after."

Master Bob sighed, "This isn't good…"

"Master Bob," a voice from behind the Master of Blue Pegasus. "This isn't good… It's an old moving city that has the power to destroy cities."

Master Bob pulled away from the screen for a moment before facing Makarov again. "Have your appointed team to meet our safe house. Nirvana is near the woods nearby. We will be asking two other guilds to join."

"Sounds reasonable… Thank you, Bob." He turned off the device in his hands. "Those that should need to get going are… Natsu, Gray, Erza, Happy, and Gajeel." Lucy was about to open her mouth but he intervened. "I promised Grace that you wouldn't get involved. Do I have your promise that you wouldn't follow?"

She glanced towards the elder man with sorrow. He knew that he had gotten her, after hearing something about promises. "Yes, sir. I promise."

Gajeel came towards her with Natsu at his side. He came up to her and gave her a hug. "I'll bring her home." She gave him a hug back and whispered, "Thank you."

Natsu had also come up to her and also gave her his own hug. "Don't worry, Luce. We'll come home with Grace."

Once the others had hugged Lucy as well. The master faced the Thunder Legion, "I want you all to stay at the guild with Lucy. I want to make sure that she stays until Grace comes home. I don't care if we have to have a party for us to make that happen."

Laxus sighed and glanced at his three friends, "What do you guys think?"

Bickslow glanced at Lucy, seeing the sadness that she wanted to follow her friends. "We should do it, boss." This caused the three others to look at him. "Well come on, we're all part of Fairy Tail, might as well help out where we can."

Freed nodded, "Understandable." He glanced at the blonde woman with worry. "Times like these that strength in numbers is better than alone."

Evergreen saw the disbelief in Laxus' eyes, "Oh come off it." She glanced around, "How about this, we can have a girls day at the Guild and you guys stand guard. Does that sound better?"

Lucy was listening to them but was finding herself smiling. 'My sister did this… I don't think they would be willing to help others from all the stories I've heard.' A few tears had escaped her eyes as many of the guild had pitched in what they're planning for the night. She was pleased to understand that the guild was doing it for her. 'Grace, hold on a bit more…'

Grace was sitting by the stream with Cobra not that many feet from her. He had given her the communication device to call the guild. They had been talking for a few days when they were able to. Only on the days, the Brain realized that she needed to walk away from the cave and research that they wanted her to do. It was enough of it that nearly wanted her to scream and kill the man in charge.

The only thing that was preventing her from doing that was Kinana. The man had voiced that he would kill her, just to spite her and Cobra if they didn't cooperate. The group realized that she needed to use magic, every other day or her magic would get out of hand. She remembered yesterday too well.

They were in the cave. Grace reading buildings of books, when her magic acted up. Her hands were glowing. Her body shaking.

Brain growled, "What's going on?"

Grace couldn't speak because she was too focused on trying to rein in her magic. It was Cobra that spoke up. "She's having a magic overload. She needs to use her magic before it kills her."

"Fine," the man bark. "Take her outside and let her burn off some of the steam."

Cobra had marched up before dragging Grace from the ground and taking her out into the sunlight. It was when they heard a distant explosion and a sharp scream from Grace's lips. It was then the group was forced to put in an account. That she needed space from the research that was being forced on her.

That day, Cobra had told her to tell her guild of what was going on. It was time for Brain to be stopped and they knew it. He let out a sigh, "Don't feel bad of what had occurred. It's just time for the tables to turn around."

Grace smirked, "If only it's that easy."

A moment later a flash of blur and sound came to them. A male voice gruffed, "Are you going to burn some of that magic of yours or are you just going to sit around and talk?"

Grace glared before changing her form into her tiger and went for a run. Between the racing man and Cobra, who rides on his snake/sister. She was able to run around the forest floor. They were keeping away from other dark guilds that they had in the area. But still allowing her to run and use her magic enough to burn off.

Once they had reached the part of the woods that they deemed too far. Cobra jumped in front of Grace, with raised hands. "Calm down, sweetheart. Time for you to turn back and get back to research."

The tiger hissed at him, causing his snake to hiss right back at her. Within moments, Grace turned back to her human self, glaring at the man before her. "You know that it takes a bit more for me to burn off some of this magic."

The burgundy haired man smirked, "I'm aware of that, sweetheart. But we don't have all day unless you're wanting to face Brain's wrath again?"

The young woman sighed, "When you put it that way, not really." She turned back towards the way they came, along with the speedster. "You know, it's annoying that you're fast."

"That may be so, girly." The sun reflected across his sunglasses, giving him a sinister look. "But I'm able to outrun those that chase me." Then he ran off ahead of them.

With Grace walking ahead of Cobra, she knew that he was watching her. She just had no idea of what he was playing at. Allowing her to get ahold of her guild and let them know what was going on. Her heart was feeling a sense of a ping like a bad feeling was letting her know that something was up.

"You know, even with your soul singing with hope and happiness. I must warn you, the world isn't full of such things."

She glanced over her shoulder towards him. "You're not looking hard enough." It was the only thing that she would say before facing forward again.

He must have looked deeper because the next words that came out sounded on the borderline of shock. "You were hunted..?"

"Still not deep enough."

The vision filled her mind, allowing apart of her to be opened towards the male that was following her. Allowing him to see what the scientists had done. Along with hired thugs that were being paid by Jude Heartfilia to find her and Lucy. It was enough that was causing her a migraine. She could only imagine what was causing him.

"Okay," he gasped, which sounded pain in his voice. "I think I know enough…"

Grace stopped in her footing, closing her eyes to allow the imagines to fade away. Before making her way through the woods again. "I hope that's enough for your mind to choke on for a while."

"It sure is enough to ponder on," he sounded interested. It was the most common sound that she had heard from his voice thus far. "At least I know you didn't have a charmed life."

"The life of riches is another term for women of slavery. No voice of choices of wanting love in a marriage, nor voicing our ideas." She glanced towards Cobra to see the shock in his eyes. "Don't get me wrong, Mr. Heartfilia had thought he was doing his daughters the world of justice. Believing that he would be the voice of reason for us." She turned towards the path before her once more. "We just had other views about our own lives."

"Is that why you're fighting with Gajeel about being his mate?"

This caused Grace to stop walking and turned to look at him. "I really don't know why I'm delaying it." She glanced down at her hands. "I think part of it is because I want to get to know him better than what I've met him as. I don't want him ending up turning into Mr. Heartfilia in thinking, just because I'm his mate."

Cobra grumbled, "I can see where you're coming from. After seeing how the two of you met, I would have second thoughts on everything." He pushed her towards the path that they were following. "But in the last few weeks or so, hasn't he proved that he is far different from the man that you grew up with?"

"I'll think about it, but I'm also enjoying the bit of freedom I have now."

"Just remember sweetheart, life isn't a given. Life can change an instant." He smirked as his thoughts turned dark. "We've managed to take you away from him. I can imagine that he'll be going mad about now."

"Being part dragon that he is. I can only imagine the carnage that he'll give towards your group, Cobra."

His deep chuckled came to her ears. "Point taken." He allowed himself to rake his eyes over her body. "After seeing the curves of her luscious body. I can only imagine seeing him ripping out our throats after all this."

"Keep your eyes to yourself, Cobra." Her voice became dark as she glanced towards him. "It wouldn't be just him that you would worry about. But the nightmares that I could cause for you."

"OOH, I'm shaking in my boots." Images of dark sinister thoughts came to the woman's mind, causing the snake-like-man the laugh. Which made an echoing sound through the forest. "I like to see you try."