We're getting into the juicy part soon guys XD I know most people jump into all the action but I really want to take my time and make sure not to skim over important details. Also, thank you for everyone that has reviewed, favourited or followed the story, it really means a lot that you like it so much :)
~Chapter Five~
An energetic hand pounding on the door was more than enough to wake Lucy up instantly, her body jolting upright. "You awake?!" A man's voice yelled from outside her door. She glared at the door, figuring that if she stared long enough, the persistent stranger would stop. "Hey, if you don't answer in five seconds I'm coming in there!" He matched the banging of his fists to the countdown. "Five!" Lucy's eyes widened at the thought of a man seeing her in her current state. "Four!" She rubbed her head, the loud man as the cause of her morning headache. "I'm awake!" She yelled back, sighing as the knocking stopped. "Get dressed, I'll be back in forty minutes to take you to breakfast. If you're not ready by then it's tough luck!" She could hear him chuckle as he walked away from her door.
She sighed once more, confused at the lack of patience the residents here had. She rubbed her head as she threw the quilt off her, heading towards the bathroom to freshen herself up. She decided to have a quick shower, not taking the chance of the man interrupting her during a relaxing bath. Switching on the shower and letting the water heat up, she stripped off her hoodie and undergarments. She quickly hopped into the shower as her body felt a drastic loss of heat. She was quick to wash her hair with whatever shampoo and conditioner she saw, not caring (with her limited time) on which scent she was using. She also found a body wash in no time and lathered herself before quickly rinsing herself. She turned off the shower and hopped out, shivering almost instantly at the noticeable difference in temperature. She looked around for a towel and luckily found one hanging on the rack at the side of the shower.
She dashed out of the bathroom and into the wardrobe, unsure of how much time she had left to get dressed before the man would come and take her mid-change. She scanned over the sections of clothing and picked out an ordinary pair of white underwear and matching bra, slipping them on after rubbing herself dry. She didn't know what to expect today so she decided to just pick what she thought looked good. Noticing a lot of corsets, she put on a pair of black ripped jeans and a long white button-up shirt, placing one of the smaller black corsets around her waist. She then picked out a pair of flat, grey knee-high boots. She used her towel to then rub her hair as dry as she could before brushing out the tangles and leaving it to fall despite it barely reaching her shoulders now. She walked back into the bedroom and put on her gloves again along with her belt and keys before walking towards her door and opening it.
She felt her heart nearly leap out of her chest as she saw a man standing inches away from her. The man was considerably taller than Lucy, his black eyes burning into her soul. His skin was tan, contrasting to his light grey hair, styled to the right, the left side shaved. He had scars all of his cheeks, chin and nose, accompanying the many iron piercings forming a line down the middle of his face and ending with snake bites on his lips. He wore a loose, sleeveless, grey shirt which was tucked into baggy black jeans. The sleeveless shirt allowed him to show off his large muscles and even more scars across his arms. Her eyes trailed down to see his hands were covered by grey fingerless gloves. On his feet were black boots decorated with iron nails. 'They look more like weapons than shoes.' Lucy thought before flicking her eyes back up to his face, his lips pulled into a smirk at her blank expression. "Sure you don't want to stare a bit longer?" Lucy had to admit she was intimidated by his blunt personality and obvious strength. He felt familiar to Lucy for a reason she had yet to solve. He gave a gruff chuckle before nodding his head to his right.
"We gotta head down and meet the others." He walked off, expecting Lucy to follow him and not stopping to check if she was. Lucy decided not to question the man and rushed to catch up to him. She had to quicken her pace to keep catching up since his strides were a lot larger than hers and she was unable to match his pace. Again, Lucy was rushed to her destination that she was unable to get a good look around the castle. "We're here." He said, stopping in front of a brown door, gesturing for Lucy to enter. "Ladies first." He smirked down at her, having a way of making what would normally be a charming action, into a patronizing one. Lucy narrowed her eyes at him and pushed open the door, not knowing what to expect.
She could hear people talking as she opened the door and then silence as she revealed herself. She could see many people sat around a large table, food spread across both ends. "Ah, Lucy, so glad to finally meet you." A woman gave her a bright smile, gesturing towards the seat between herself and Demeter. The woman had a pixie cut of hair as white as snow and bright blue eyes to match her calming aura. Her skin was less tan than the man's but it wasn't quite pale. She was wearing a light blue, knee-length dress and a cloak made of white feathers. She wore matching blue flats with a band of white silk around the edge. She didn't bare nearly as many scars as the man but Lucy noticed one in particular across her left arm. Lucy gave her a nervous smile and sat down at her supposedly designated seat.
"Hello, nice to meet you..." Lucy reached out, shaking the hand of the woman. "I'm Grandine, Dragon of Wind and Air." She smiled brighter, clasping Lucy's hand gently. Lucy grinned at the familiar name. "You're Wendy's dragon?" She asked, perplexed at coming across Wendy's adopted mother. Grandine's eyes grew wide at the mention of her adopted daughter. "You know my Wendy?" Lucy noticed that her smile grew brighter with her question. "Yes, we were in the same guild, before I left." Lucy looked down solemnly but quickly snapped out of her sad state, wanting to have a better first impression. "I knew Wendy, Gajeel and Natsu." She stated with a forced smile.
Two men overheard their conversation and butted in. "You know my son?" They both asked, voices merging together. One of them was the man from before and the other she hadn't seen. 'They must be Igneel and Metalicana.' She thought, looking them over. She stared between the two men and came to the conslution that they did happen to look like older versions of the dragon slayers. Igneel had fiery red hair which was a bit longer than Natsu's and some stubble but despite that, he still just looked like Natsu would in 10 years. He had the same onyx eyes as Natsu, but they seemed deeper, wiser. His skin was a bit more tanned, his feature more mature and defined. He had scars across his face and body, much like Metalicana, but had two prominent ones across his right eye and cheek. He wore a white button-up and black jeans, paired with brown combat boots; already he seemed to have a better sense of fashion than Natsu, however she playfully questioned the choice of a dangling gold earring in his left ear in her mind.
Lucy nodded at their question. "Yes, or rather, I used to know them." She sighed, not looking them in the eyes. "What do you mean?" Igneel asked, leaning forward, intrigued. Lucy didn't know whether she should tell them the truth or to make up a pretty lie. After a few seconds of arguing in her head, she thought they ought to know the truth and began explaining. "Well, for the past year I have been ignored by my guild, including Gajeel and Natsu and even Wendy." Grandine frowned at that, evidently disappointed by her child. "It was a strange occurrence but it happened nonetheless. I was the only one doing the requests on the board and even had to lie about my status and complete S-Class requests. I was able to complete a couple of them, but..." Lucy gave a sideways glance to Demeter. "One of them I was not able to." Demeter looked away from her with regret. "When I returned to the guild, all of Team Natsu were standing over me and said horrible things." Lucy frowned, remembering the humiliating feeling. "They said I was weak and dead weight and... and..." Lucy stuttered, trying to say the words without bursting into tears. "Natsu told me to leave the guild, so I did." Everyone sat round the table frowned, sympathising for the blonde girl.
There were a few moments of silence until Igneel broke it. "That's not Natsu." His eyebrows furrowed in deep thought, he rubbed his chin. "No. That's not my Natsu." Igneel insisted and Lucy gave him a half-smile. "I did consider the possibility of a dark spell so I asked Loke to check it out but he came back with nothing." Igneel huffed and stood abruptly. "Excuse me." He all but growled out, storming out of the room, slamming the door shut behind him. "Jeez." Metalicana rolled his eyes at Igneel. "So his kid made a mistake, he's just gotta wait til he apologises." His gruff voice breaking the silence again.
Grandine took Lucy's hand in her own and gave her a sad smile. "I'm sorry for Wendy's behaviour but I can't help but shake the feeling that the person you described is not my Wendy. She wouldn't even look at a person too long nevermind ignore anybody ." Lucy returned the sad smile. "I thought so too, perhaps there is something deeper into this than I thought." Lucy sighed. 'This first impression hasn't gone very well.' She grimaced internally but followed the lead of the dragons and began eating the food displayed before her.
Back at Fairy Tail, all partying, celebrating and cheering had ceased, all that was left was a guild full of depressed mages with the light of their guild gone. It was the day after Lucy had left the guild that Mirajane decided to check the record book and noticed that Lucy had in fact taken on and completed pages upon pages of requests throughout the last year. 'We were blind this whole time.' She frowned at the book once it was discovered Lucy was telling the truth. Mirajane had informed the guild of their mistake, that caused their first wave of sadness. On the first day they still laughed but it was half-hearted or forced.
Everyone's behaviour had dropped suddenly, much to the dismay of Lisanna. "Come on guys, cheer up!" She gave them all a forced grin, trying to boost up the energy of the guild. "Wanna hear another story?" She looked hopeful at them but they all just waved her away. "Not today." Lisanna could feel her face contort to that of anger. 'This isn't how it's supposed to be! They're supposed to be loving and adoring me!' She growls in her head, storming away and back to Team Natsu. They greeted her with sad smiles. "What's wrong?" Lisanna asked in a bittersweet voice. "We miss her." Erza said, fiddling with her sword; something she rarely did. "Who?" Lisanna asked darkly but it went unnoticed by them. "Lushy!" Happy whined, rolling over onto the table.
Lisanna felt something snap inside her. "We don't need her. She is dead weight." They were unaffected by Lisanna's harsh words, although Wendy's mood seemed to grow worse with her unkind comment toward the girl that helped bring her to Fairy Tail. She rolled her eyes at their lack of energy. "Why don't we go on a mission to cheer up?" Gray and Erza perked up, just the slightest, and they looked at each other before sharing glances at the rest of the team. "Sure, why don't you pick? It'll be your first mission with us." Gray offered and Lisanna grinned at him, skipping over to the request board.
Once she was gone, Gray leaned in close to Erza. "Do you not think it's weird that she's unusually happy, it's like she has no regret or anything." He whispered quietly. Erza stared at the Take-Over mage and pondered before nodding her head in agreement. "Yes it is strange. I also question why we did something so horrible to Lucy. I'm trying hard to search for an explanation in my head but I come up empty every time." She whispered back, both of them sharing a worried look. "I have the same feeling." He moved back and sat upright as Lisanna hopped back over with a mission in hand. "Let's do this one!" She giggled and handed it to Natsu, who had not moved from the same spot all day nor took his eyes away from the floor. Seeing that he wasn't paying attention, she gave it to Gray with a bratty pout.
He skimmed over the details and had a confused expression on his face. "Are you sure you want to do this one? I'm sure there are better-" She cut him off with a tense grin. "I want to do this one!" He stared at her for a few moments before sighing. "Okay, if you want." She nodded and giggled, clutching onto Natsu. "Help, our couples reserve is being robbed by dark mages each week, we need your help to stop them. To make you blend in, you will need to act as couples or have a couple take this mission. The reward is 60,000J." Gray read out the mission with a dull voice, expressing his clear lack of excitement for this mission. Natsu finally propped his head up, shrugging Lisanna off him. "Lame." He grumbled, heading over to sit by himself. Lisanna huffed at his actions, crossing her arms over her chest.
"How about you and Natsu act as a couple, so you can keep him in check." Lisanna grinned at Gray, not realising his words were not directed at her. "And Lisanna, you can be paired with me." She glared at Gray with great distaste. "I'd like to be paired with Natsu though." Gray narrowed his eyes at her. "But if Erza keeps him in check then-" She interrupted him again. "I can handle Natsu!" She grinned and Gray still didn't seem convinced, slowly getting creeped out by her persistent nature. "I dunno…" He trailed off, causing Lisanna to shuffle closer to him. "We weren't going to come out with this just yet but Natsu and I are already an item so it's suited that we be paired together, don't you think?" She smiled as she whispered into his ear. Gray pulled a confused face. "Really? Natsu? In a relationship? With you?" Lisanna's face darkened. "Yes. What's so shocking about that?" Gray shook his head. "Nothing. Okay you can be paired with Natsu and I'll be with Erza and Wendy?" The blue haired girl looked up at him with a sad smile. "Yes? Gray-san?" He smiled at her. "You and Carla might want to sit this one out, it's not really a place for girls your age." Wendy nodded, understanding, before she and Carla moved to talk with Lily, Levy and Gajeel. Lisanna skipped over to Natsu to tell him the 'good news' and Erza stood to tell them that they were to meet at the train station in an hour, no later.
The guild grew even more silent in Team Natsu's leave, that was until they all came marching into the guild seething with rage only a day after they left for their mission. Gray walked up to Mirajane with a deep scowl, slamming the mission request onto the bar. She flinched at his anger. "What's wrong?" She asked, voice laced with concern. He sneered behind him, past a growling Natsu and seething Erza. "Ask your sister." He huffed, slouching against one of the bar stools, Natsu and Erza stood behind him. Lisanna eventually made it to view with her eyes rolling. "I didn't do anything!" She whined, dawdling towards Mirajane. "Yeah, nothing but distract Natsu the whole time!" Gray glared, turning his head away from her before his anger got the best of him. Erza placed a calming hand on his shoulder. Lisanna rolled her eyes yet again and crossed her arms.
"He's right. We failed the mission because Lisanna couldn't contain herself from fawning over Natsu like a sick puppy." Her eyes felt like daggers to Lisanna, to whom found no fault her own. "So what? The whole point was to be a couple and I did just that." Gray's eye twitched at her comment. "The job was to take down the guild!" Natsu finally spoke. "If I didn't have you following me around everywhere and being in my face 24/7, we could of actually completed this mission! Gah you're so annoying!" He growled, turning his back on her. Gray directed his glare back to Lisanna. "Guess this means you're breaking up." Lisanna tensed at his words, Natsu followed suit. "Who's breaking up? The team?" He shifted towards Gray, his back still facing Lisanna. Gray glanced between Natsu and Lisanna before he managed to put two and two together, smirking darkly at the conclusion.
"Oh didn't you know? Apparently, you and Lisanna are dating, but you don't want anybody to know." Gray chuckled sarcastically at Lisanna, who was now staring at the floor. Natsu growled in disgust. "Dating? You told people we were dating?! We're just friends, not even that now." He snarled, shaking his head. "At least Lucy can act professionally." He muttered under his breath, moving to walk away. Lisanna felt her patience snap in two. "Why do you even bother with Lucy?! She's nothing! It's supposed to be me, not her!" She yelled, stomping her foot and clenching her hands by her sides. Erza agreed with Natsu. "You're right, Lucy wouldn't be giving us this lip, we never should have kicked her out in the first place. In all honesty, I miss her with all my heart and would rather have her in your place."
As though her words were an incantation for a spell, every member of the guild simultaneously felt something unlock in their minds. It felt as though a wall had broken down and their memories of the wonderful blonde flooded their brains. Her loving personality and bright laughter was everything that they were missing from the guild, everyone craving to have their favourite celestial mage beside them yet again. Their happy memories quickly turned into those of regret and guilt. They had ignored her for a year, and then had done the unspeakable only a few days ago. 'What have we done?' Everyone thought, wishing to turn back time.
Everyone was overcome with guilt but none more than Natsu. He had neglected her this whole time, his bestfriend, his Lucy. He told her that she was weak, kicking her out of the team and the guild. He searched deep within his mind, trying to find an explanation as to why he had done such a thing but all he remembered was Lisanna; her unsettling grin, feeding him and touching his arm all the time, sometimes even forcing him to look at her. He shivered at the flush of disturbing visions. He felt a rage like he never felt before, his body temperature rising rapidly. "You poisoned me." His eyes bore into Lisanna with a darkness no one had seen from him before. This was perhaps one of the only times Natsu had come to solving a mystery before anyone else. Lisanna took a step backwards for each step he took forward, his eyes narrow but his lips pulled into a scowl.
Everyone stared at the helpless girl who was slowly getting cornered by Natsu's wrath. In these seconds, they felt no sympathy for the mage; after all, they were simply pawns in her game to steal Natsu away from Lucy. Gray, for once, didn't dare to go against Natsu and let him release his emotions. "You made us ignore her!" He growled, his hands now lit with scorching flames. Lisanna had nothing to say to defend herself, only looking at her older siblings in hopes they would intervein and rescue her. They only avoided her gaze in shame. "You hurt her! You pushed her out of the guild!" Lisanna's knees reached a table and she had to awkwardly shuffle around it so not to be caught in Natsu's flames.
"I had to! You wouldn't pay me any attention with her around." Lisanna whined, pouting her lips with fake tears in her eyes, attempting to play the victim but it only increased Natsu's hate for her. "You caused all of this heartbreak for my attention?!" He cracked his neck, a crazed look hazed over his onyx eyes. Lisanna took her last step backwards, feeling a wall behind her and her face was contorted into fear. "Well you have my attention now!" He snarled, his fist raised above Lisanna's head. "Natsu, stop! I'm your bestfriend." She whispered, holding her hands in front of her face. Her words fell on deaf ears. "Can you live knowing that you caused pain to a fellow guild member, who should be your friend, your family! Are you satisfied now that you've brought shame on yourself, Mira and Elfman?! Was it worth it?!" With that, he extended his fist behind his head, ready to unleash his newly pent rage. He felt a hand on his wrist, stopping his attack.
Erza shook her head at him and lowered his arm down. He gave her a solemn look, his flames disappearing into thin air. Lisanna peaked out from behind her hands and let out a sigh of relief. "I knew you wouldn't let-" Lisanna was unable to finish her sentence before Erza's armour clad hand punched her square in the face, knocking her out cold. "Come along Natsu, let's go for a walk." Erza placed her hand on his shoulder and guided him out of the guild, leaving the two elder Take-Over mages to tend to their little sister.
The guild returned to what they were originally doing before the drama pursued. Though they knew that they weren't fully to blame for Lucy's pain but they couldn't stop the guilt and regret that consumed them. Only one thought was on their minds; how badly had they hurt Lucy and where was she now?
Oh my god this chapter is so long D:, my neck is killing! Ah well, I hope you guys enjoyed it :D, I'll be hoping to get the next chapter up either tomorrow or Sunday :)