Chapter 1

She smiled. Tears slowly gathering in her eyes as she looked out over the city. She had been saved by her guild once again after the awful attack on Tenrou Island. And now she was standing at the top of this hill again, re-entering the village after another horrifying event in her life. It reminded her so much of back then, when she was a little kid and stumbled upon Magnolia while running away. At that time the place held no meaning to her as she had just expected to pass through it on her flight. Now, however, this was her home.

"Gray!" she called out to the – still young looking – mage behind her.

"Hmm?"

"Gray, come on! Aren't you excited to be here again?" She shouted at the slowly following man, who obviously wasn't as over the top about their short trip as she was.

"I am. But I don't get why we had to come to these stupid woods as soon as we arrived. Shouldn't we – I don't know – maybe check out our apartments before coming here?" he asked sarcastically, as if going to the place they met was such a bother for him.

"You're just bitter, because it reminds you of all the times I've kicked your ass here." She stuck her tongue out at him as he finally caught up to her, which earned her a flick on the forehead.

"The seven years must have messed with your memory somehow, because all emI/em can remember is you begging me for mercy on those very grounds."

She laughed at his retort, well aware that it was actually her who was in the lead. "You do know that just because Juvia worships the land you walk on doesn't actually make you a god, right?" She teased again as she knew how much mentioning the blue haired water mage would annoy him.

Groaning he started complaining about his colleague once again, "Well, I'm not really begging to be worshipped, or stalked and fantasised over. Gosh, why can't she just take it down a notch?"

Aya grinned. "Well…", she dragged out the word. "I guess if you just gave in and responded to her advances the fangirling would finally stop. She is kinda hot, don't you think?" Wiggling her eyebrows suggestively she got another groan out of Gray.

"Please stop. I really don't want to hear about it."

She huffed in fake anger due to not getting to tease him about his not-so-secret admirer anymore. "Well, that's just boring. Now what else should I entertain myself with?"

Gray shoved her away from him as he blushed making Aya erupt with laughter. He just was too easy to tease. Really it was his fault for giving her such good reactions.

They finally continued their journey from the top of the hill deeper into the woods, where Gray's secret training spot once was located. Aya, again and as always, was a step ahead of her companion as she was basically skipping through the woods. Excitement ran through her veins with the thought of seeing her old training spot again, so she was even faster on her feet than usual making it seem as if she was barely touching the floor with how light and quick her steps were.

"Oi! Wait up!" Gray had fallen behind again, trying to catch up with his mage friend with heavy steps completely contrasting the girl in front of him. To anyone close it must've sounded like there really was just one person running through the woods on his own, so silent were the young female mage's steps.

"No can do. I'm nearly there!" She laughed in amusement, not in the slightest bit surprised that Gray, in fact, couldn't keep up with her. She had always been the faster one, her thin stature giving her an advantage in any race especially against the muscular mage behind her. And she loved reminding him of that of course she sped up even more as soon as Gray started complaining.

While she was rushing past the trees and the plants over the barrows and through the mutt she was giggling childishly. How she loved the feeling of speeding, the wind rushing past her and gracing her skin ever so lightly giving her goose bumps all over and the dirt under her soles which gave in a little bit with every step she took, sinking in under her weight for just a millisecond under her gentle touch. It made the blood rush in her veins, made her feel it pumping through her body as her heart beat accelerated.

Until she suddenly stopped, her feet coming to a halt on their own as she reached the clearing. As if in trance she reached a hand out to the large tree on her right tracing over the pattern of the bark. Under her fingertips she felt the cuts they had made together, marking down their scores after every battle (also the proof that she, indeed, was leading). It was a rather immature competition they had started after Aya had joined the guild. Gray had insisted on teaching her martial arts personally after seeing her horrible failure of training herself. She'd steadily gotten better at fighting without using her primary magic, not meaning she hadn't practice that as well, she had, just in secret. When she'd finally reached his level he suggested having real battles, sparring like Natsu and him did just for fun. It had seemed risky to her at first as she didn't want to use her primary magic, not even in front of her best friend, but Gray once again had managed to talk her into it.

She laughed as her fingers glided over the telly marks next to Gray's initials. God, had he kicked her arse the first couple times they'd spared. She had been so focused on her physical techniques that she'd completely forgotten about the boy's ice make magic. Shocked and quite literally frozen to the spot she'd lost the fight within seconds. His first wins had been so easy, he'd not even really tried most of the time but Aya had been so overwhelmed with her new method of fighting that it had been near to impossible for her to win.

Then her hand lowered to another row of marks next to two letters. emA.K./em The row of tellies stretched out way farther than the one on top, surely surpassing it by at least twenty centimetres.

"Tsk… begging my ass." Her hand fell to her side again as her head turned away from the old tree and her eyes found the clearing.

The sparring grounds had transformed into a beautiful meadow over the course of the last seven years, hiding any traces that may have still been there from where they'd used to fight. The grass was green and long and pretty yellow and red flowers grew between it. The only evidence of the once training area was the wrecked bark of the trees surrounding the grounds they used for training. The wood had cuts from Aya's sword and was grazed from their countless attacks in order to perfect their martial arts skills.

"God, we really were gone for that long, huh?"

She couldn't help but jump as Gray suddenly appeared behind her laying an arm on her shoulder as he spoke. The gasp which escaped her lips made him laugh as did the perplexed expression on her face.

"Bastard! Why do you always have to do that?", she hissed in anger.

He held up his arms in fake surrender as Aya raised hers to hit him square over the chest for once again scaring her. When they'd been little he had used every single opportunity he'd got to scare the young mage, loving how big her doe eyes would become and how her bottom lip would jut out just a tiny bit more than usual in the cutest pout he'd ever seen.

Still grinning he placed a hand on the top of her head and ruffled her hair gently. Another thing she hated. He still treated her like a little kid sometimes even though she most definitely was not. Actually, they were both around the same age, as were her and Natsu and Lisanna and Lucy, but while everyone else treated her as a senior (mainly due to her S-rank title) Gray still saw her as his little sister, his responsibility.

To say that that sometimes sucked was an understatement, it was simply embarrassing to hold the title of S-rank mage and at the same time be babied by their best friend. Not to forget the many date opportunities Gray had ruined over the course of their friendship. Nevertheless she loved him from the bottom of her heart, not in the weird stalker way Juvia did but as a sister would love her brother, so she put up with his overprotective antics.

"Where is Mika by the way?", Gray suddenly asked, only now remembering the absence of the little cat.

Ayaka smiled softly at the mention of her loyal companion. "I asked Happy to look after her for the time being. She seemed tired and I didn't want to drag her up here with us if she already wasn't feeling well."

"But dragging me was okay?!", Gray deadpanned.

She pretended to think for a moment, then smiled heartily at the male mage as she answered, "Yep." Hastily, she grabbed his wrist and pulled him in the middle of the meadow before he could protest again, stunning him into silence. Taking her chance she pushed him down so he was lying on his back in the field then plopped down next to him, never letting go of his hand.

They stayed silent for a while, the young boy looking over at his colleague with curiosity in his eyes while she was staring at the sky above them. Neither of them knew what to say, not knowing how to articulate what they both were feeling. It was hard to express after all, the feeling of having missed half of their youth gnarling away at their conscience, making them painfully aware of their mortality. Worse than that was the sentiment probably all of the Tenrou people shared. They had left their mates to fight on their own, while they were sleeping on an island. All of those people dearest to them had suffered while they were gone and they could do nothing to change that, couldn't replay life to make sorrow into happiness and humiliation into pride. They had messed up indefinitely.

Ayaka was the first one to speak. Taking in a huge gasp of air as if she had only now remembered that she needed to breathe, she rolled on her side and faced the black haired ice mage.

"Gray…", she whispered, somehow scared of speaking louder, "I don't- I mean- Fuck. How are we supposed to repair what we've damaged?"

She didn't need to elaborate for him to understand what she meant. But still he had no answer for her, nothing that would reassure her at least. So he stayed quiet and raised his other hand – not the one that was still intertwined with hers – and caressed her cheek. It was a cheesy move, admittedly so, but it seemed to calm down Ayaka's erratic heart.

Again they kept quiet, not even moving a muscle as they tried to come up with something to say that would put them both at ease. They weren't like Natsu, neither Gray nor Ayaka had the ability to spew absolute nonsense in the dreariest situations and motivate others with it. They were, to put it simple, sulkers. They both knew that, never tried to hide it, but sometimes both of them wished they had a little pocket Natsu with them who would fire them up with some stupid lecture about never giving up, screaming Fairy Tail a dozen times and then actually spewing some fire just for emphasis.

Aya chuckled at the imagination of tiny Natsu screaming at her and Gray for being such crybabies. She rolled over onto her back again and stared into the wide blue above her, calming her unsteady breathing.

"Hey…", her friend muttered, sounding unsure.

"Mhh…" She made a small sound of acknowledgement, still not moving her gaze from the wide blue sea above her.

"We will make them proud again."

Now she turned to him, looking more intrigued by his statement than the baby blue sky.

"I mean, we will make Fairy Tail the strongest guild in Fiore again, so that no one will ever disrespect our friends again. We will start here in Magnolia, you know, kick those stupid ogres out of our old guild house, then we can start doing missions again, like before, kick some asses here and there, and soon enough no one will even remember the seven years we were gone." He grinned as if this explanation would solve all their problems.

It didn't. Not for her anyways.

Nevertheless she smiled at him and agreed weakly. She didn't want her pessimistic thoughts to put him down as well. So she just approved of his small speech. In all honesty, that wasn't the best solution to get them back on number one. It wasn't a solution at all. It would take them years to earn their reputation back and even then it wasn't guaranteed that people wouldn't disrespect them for the seven years of absence in which the guild – quite understandably – took a turn for the worse. What they needed was something quick, something that would display their strength to a big audience, something that would give people no chance to overlook their abilities. Something like-

"The Magical Tournaments!"

"The what now?"

Makarov had decided that their guild would take part in the Daimatou Enbu, some sort of annual magical tournament to pinpoint the strongest guild in Fiore, after Romeo had suggested the idea to the Tenrou people. Apparently Fairy Tail had placed last every time the guild took part in it during their absence, giving them little hope of an actual win this year. But Master being – well – himself, heard of the prize money and immediately made the decision of joining the competition.

With the new plan, however, came many opinions. The Tenrou people were divided into a group of complete enthusiasts, such as Natsu, and slightly doubtful one's, including Aya herself (due to the fact that she didn't like to go into things blind and had close to no information on the event). The others were plainly against the idea because of how bad their experiences were throughout the last years.

(Not that any of those views would matter after Master had made up his mind.)

"When is this tournament even taking place?", Ayaka asked finally silencing the room after the screams of agreement and disagreement.

"In three months", Romeo answered promptly.

She squinted her eyes at the new information. "That's quite a time limit. We would have to train more intensely than ever before if we want to be in shape by then." In their current state they wouldn't even be able to beat the lowest guilds let alone fight against top notch competitors.

"Then let's get started immediately!" Natsu took her statement as an open invitation to leave for practice, but fortunately Erza held him back.

"Calm down for a minute", she told him when he continued to struggle against her iron grip. Seeing the red glimpse in her eyes, though, he completely stagnated his movements and fell limp.

Disregarding the childish behaviour of Natsu, Aya turned to Romeo, who was seemingly the only one serious enough to inform her about these magical games without using the words 'money' or 'fun'.

"It's in Crocos, right? That means it's supervised by the kingdom. So if there was any kind of threat like… let's say a dark guild sneaking into the competition they would step in to prevent any harm from happening to either audience or mages, correct?"

Romeo nods. "There are soldiers posted all over the venue. The king usually watches the games so the security measurements are extremely high."

She mumbled a small 'good' after he had said that. Security was more than important, since events of such size would most likely attract attacks of any sort. Enemies – may it be criminals or foreign countries – would get the chance to have the entire defence of the country in one spot.

Gray who had been rooted to the spot on Aya's left side suddenly stepped forward and turned to the non-Tenrou-people. "Which guilds are the strongest at the moment?", he questioned, even though Ayaka would guess that he really only was interested in one guild.

"Well…", Macao muttered, as if not wanting to talk about who took Fairy Tail's place on the top from them, "among them are mainly still the same guilds as seven years ago like Blue Pegasus or Lamia Scale but the strongest of all is Sabertooth."

Aya furrowed her eyebrows at the foreign name. "Sa-ber-tooth?", she tested the word out, emphasising each syllable as if they didn't belong together. It seemed weird to her, that this guild she had never heard about before suddenly was the number one in Fiore. Painfully obvious was their absence once again. Seven years ago she knew every important guild and all the masters and their abilities as well as the S-rank mage's, but now she felt as if her knowledge was a dusty book at the very back of the bookshelf nobody used anymore, old and ancient and with no relevant information about current times.

Gray who had obviously spotted the scowl on Aya's face decided to lead the discussion into another direction before the young mage could grow even more irritated over her knowledge gap. "So if it's already decided that we participate why don't we hit the road already? If the tournament's in three months we should use all our time to regain our strength."

Makarov clapped his hands, happy that his decision had finally been accepted. "Great. We'll decide who's in the team after you come back, so you better use your time well. Now get going, brats!"

Author's Note: Hi guys, this is Franny! I am semi-new to this website (I tried my luck here when I was younger, and now I wanna do it more seriously). This is a story I have been working on for a couple months now and will be working on for another couple. This story is close to my heart and I hope you appreciate it as much as I do.

If you have any questions about me or the proceeding of the story, feel free to send them my way!

All the love to you for reading! Stay tuned for Chapter 2!