Zeldris felt a shove and suddenly a lifting sensation. He rolled over in his sleeping bag and he could hear the wheels, but he still drooled in his sleep; someone was grumbling and mumbling. He simply assumed it was someone in his dream. What he did not know was that he had been tossed on Erza's cart because he wouldn't wake up.
Erza fumed as Wendy followed alongside her, clutching her white exceed Carla happily while trying to find a moment to calm Erza down.
"I told him not to oversleep, and what does he do, he oversleeps again so bad that even with me threatening him, he drools in his sleep!" Erza said. "And worse still, he called me mommy in his sleep when I threatened him," Erza shuddered and blushed in embarrassment as the scene flashed back in her head. Wendy chuckled, almost as embarrassed as Erza.
As they walked to Hargeon train station, their minds floated back to the embarrassing situation from earlier.
"Zeldris wake up, I said wake up!" Erza said as she gently nudged Zeldris's sleeping bag, the shaking becoming increasingly ferocious.
Then finally, Zeldris mumbled in his sleep. "Not yet mommy, Ms Erza will wake me up in a few hours." He then promptly turned over in his sleeping bag.
The ladies reached Hargeon, and just like before, Wendy bought the tickets and Erza attached the cart, yanking Zeldris and his sleeping bag off the cart, now fuming at his sleeping habits. Zeldris's sleeping bag hit the steel rail and he woke up and waved.
"Oh, hey Erza, we're at the train station?" he mumbled, rather confused and promptly stumbled onto the train, falling into the last car in the rear. He sat in the rearward facing bench seat, still very groggy and drowsy as Erza sat beside him and Wendy and Carla sat down in the other seats opposite to him.
"Zeldris, are you finally awake now?" Wendy asked, looking bubbly and happy until the train started to move. Suddenly she started looking like she would be sick. A sad expression formed on Zeldris's face, wanting to help her, but unsure of what to do.
Erza sighed, trying to cheer up Zeldris, "Don't worry Zeldris, unfortunately it's normal for her and all dragon slayers to be that way due to the mix of human and dragon senses."
Zeldris shrugged. "If you say so." He paused, beginning to doze before asking "Oh, and when are we due back into Magnolia?"
"Should be around 3 o'clock this afternoon," Erza added.
Zeldris nodded. "I think I may get some sleep," and he almost instantaneously fell asleep.
Erza looked at him, still mystified at how he can easily fall asleep, however, Zeldris made a near fatal mistake; as he fell asleep he thought he had been leaning towards the window to his right, however as the train rounded a curve at speed, he leaned over to his left, landing on Erza's chest armor. His head then fell on to her blue skirt.
Wendy and Carla looked on, horrified. Erza wanted to be mad, but she could not after seeing the sleeping Zeldris on her thighs, curling into a fetal position.
"I want to be mad, but he's too adorable to be mad at," Erza said, looking down at Zeldris sweetly and gently tussling his hair. "I'll remind him not to do it when we get back to Magnolia'' she remarked, Carla and Wendy looked on, equally shocked.
"Just don't let Natsu or Gray find out; they might try and hold it against me and call him my child." Erza blushed and chuckled. Wendy cracked a sly smile before quickly returning to her sickly state.
"While this is cute and all," Carla added, "you do realize he is drooling on you, right?" Carla raised a paw to point at Zeldris drooling on Erza's dark blue skirt. Erza rolled her eyes.
"Well, nothing that a requip won't fix," she said. "But I'll save that for when we get to Magnolia later." Erza petted Zeldris's hair, as if her maternal instincts had finally found a place to manifest.
Three hours later the train got to Magnolia early, and Zeldris woke up, stretching.
"Good morning all. Feeling better Wendy?" Zeldris asked as he sat up, having not realized that he was on Erza's skirt. Finally getting his bearings, he looked down at Erza skirt.
"Um, Erza did you wet yourself or something?" Zeldris asked, referencing the noticeable wet spot from where he drooled earlier.
Erza's face quickly went from joy to disgust. "No! That's from where you drooled on me in your sleep!" Zeldris's jaw dropped and he went wide eyed in shock, unsure of what to do.
He stammered, "I, uh, um, I'm so sorry..."
"It's fine," Erza said, looking more relaxed. "You fell asleep on me thinking I was the train window," Erza said, attempting to comfort him "You were quite cute, too". Zeldris blushed in shame.
"When will this thing stop moving..." Wendy moaned sickly.
"Child, we've been stopped for 5 minutes; we must get going" Carla said, picking up Wendy with her paws and helping her out to the solid ground of the train platform.
"I'll get my cart and requip to fix my clothes; I'll meet you both at the entrance to the building where we came in," Erza said.
Zeldris slowly followed the motion-sick Wendy as she was carried to the exit, while Erza uncoupled her cart and joined them on the ramp out of the station.
"Lucy should be home. Should we surprise her?" Erza asked rather cheekily.
"Yeah, sure. Maybe Natsu and Gray are already there?" Wendy said, as she was set on the ground. "Just tell me when we've stopped moving, please" she pleaded.
Zeldris looked at her very confused. "Um, we're outside of the station," he said, in a very confused tone.
Wendy looked comforted by the statement as if to be instantly cured. "Great," she said.
"Well if the boys are already over, there's a good chance she's already kicked them out," Carla added sarcastically.
Zeldris looked at the ladies confused. "What do you mean by all this?"
Erza grinned very suspiciously. "Well Zeldris, follow us and have some fun annoying Lucy."
Zeldris was concerned and hesitant at first but nodded and agreed to go.
"I'll need to drop off my clothes at my place in the girl's dorm, but after that we can go and join in," Erza said, sprinting almost deviously as she took her cart.
Wendy finally came to her senses when Erza returned, smiling eagerly, holding a key.
"I'm so glad Mira gave me that spare key to Lucy's apartment!" Erza said and the wizards started walking towards the south side of town where Lucy's apartment was.
It was 3:30 and the sun shadows were starting to get long when they arrived at Lucy's apartment; they quickly entered and saw that no one was home. Erza smirked.
"We must get into a natural position and put the cake on her desk!" Erza added, practically giddy with glee. Zeldris followed her orders, putting the cake he surrendered on Lucy's desk and resting on Lucy's pink couch.
Suddenly the door unlocked, and Lucy stood there, her mouth agape. Her shopping bags fell to the floor and she quickly became infuriated.
"What are you three doing in my house?!" she shouted, "and worse still, bringing strange men in here!"
"Well you and Natsu weren't really getting together like the guild hoped, so we thought we might try some blind dating" Erza joked. Zeldris's face went from smiling to quite concerned at her words. Wendy chuckled and Lucy still looked quite upset and annoyed.
"Very funny Erza, you're almost as bad as Cana with that!" Lucy added. "Plus, if you're trying to get me on a date with him, then why did you bring him here? And who is he anyway?" she said.
"This is Zeldris Akuna; he's new. We just got back from a training mission and job with him, and we'll officially make him a member this evening," Erza said. Zeldris waved, quietly. "He wanted to join after our romp in the Grand Magic Games."
Lucy nodded, still fuming from all this. "Alright, fine, but you all better leave my house" she said, pointing to the door. The four walked out, Erza, Carla, and Wendy were giggling with glee. Zeldris smiled, still a little dumbfounded about the situation.
The four arrived at the guild ten minutes after and walked in slowly amid some cheers and questions.
"Hey Erza, Hey Wendy," a voice came from one of the middle booths filled with people.
"Hey, who's the new guy in red?" a different person asked.
"He's kinda cute," Cana shouted rather drunkenly, blushing in her normal, gleeful way. The quartet walked over to the bar where Makarov sat, a little surprised along with an ever-chipper Mira.
"So, I take it that the training went better than expected?" Makarov asked.
"Yes Master, he was a lot more powerful than he lets on," Erza said
"I see," the short old man pondered.
"Pardon me while I look around the guild hall if you all don't mind" Zeldris said, beginning to really take in the sights of the guild as he wandered.
"Mira, when he comes back down tonight or tomorrow, I want you to give him his guild mark please" Erza asked.
"Will do," Mira said cheerfully.
"For now, I need to return home; I want to get some things together. Let's go Wendy." The young blue haired girl smiled and followed Erza back to the girl's dorm. Mira waved at the ladies walking out of the guild.
Mira then turned to Makarov and asked "Master, have you seen Natsu and Gray? The guild seems too tame, loud, but tame".
"Hmmm, you know I haven't seen them either" the old man pondered "while I'm happy they're not tearing up the guild hall and fighting everyone, it worries me that they might be out on a job, destroying half the country they try to protect," said Makarov grimly.
"Oh, I wouldn't worry too much, they always come back; besides, Erza and Lucy can handle them," Mira said, countering the master's worries. The master chuckled, a sly smile coming across his face.
"They've all come so far," he thought from himself, thinking of all the powerful members of the guild and when they were just young kids without parents and looking for a home.
"Plus, if Zeldris is as good as Erza indicates, he might be able to help them as well," Mira added, as if to put all the master's worries further at ease.
While the two kept pondering the situation, the sun continued to set on the town of Magnolia and on the Fairy Tail guild hall. Zeldris had now made his way to the third floor of the guild, sitting in one of the booths where he eventually fell asleep, enjoying every moment of being in the guild.