"Where's Laxus? Cana, do you know where he is? Levy? Gajeel please say you know where he is? Ooo Erza maybe you know where he is?", Lucy was frantic. She'd been dodging around the guildhall looking everywhere for Laxus since she got to the guildhall and not to inflict punishment on him. She wanted to see him, she felt drawn to him – every fibre of her being was tingling with his electricity and it felt delicious. She could feel it running through her bones, it wasn't enough to show outside of her body so no-one else was aware but she could feel it and she wanted more – craved the electricity. Everywhere she looked and couldn't see him made her more anxious, which made her questioning more reckless until the point she forgot about her protective bubble and quite often got too close to the male members giving them a small shock before they shot away from her.

Natsu on the other hand was straight up furious, he'd already searched the guild for Laxus when they arrived wanting to knock him into next week but had no luck finding him. Not even seeing Gray being shocked innocently by Lucy had cheered him up, the most it brought was a brief chuckle as he had stripped at top speed – apparently lightning just made Gray strip faster and of course cry out in pain. And so Natsu was sat on a stool at the bar, his eyes were trained on Lucy, not letting her out of his sight lest she be snatched away by the one she was looking for.

Natsu wasn't sure what had happened, last night she'd been upset – beside herself in misery at what Laxus had done with no want to ever see him again. But since this morning she'd seemed as if her life revolved around him for some reason, he'd been very rudely woken up by her noisily bustling around her apartment getting ready faster than he'd ever seen before just so she could go searching for Laxus. She'd even tried to ditch Natsu and Happy! Happy had managed to convince her that her best bet was to go to the guildhall and ask around about him, which he'd informed her was where Natsu and he were going so they'd headed together. He was very thankful to his blue friend as the total personality change had ground Natsu's brain to a halt for a while and he'd had no luck in convincing Lucy that she shouldn't leave them. And now, she was acting like a lovesick fool for Laxus, and it was really starting to irritate Natsu.

"Hey Natsu…you're growling"

"What?! No way buddy, growling?!", Natsu laughed at the suggestion from Happy

"You were! You were looking at Lucy and growling! Is it cos you liiiiiiiike her?" chuckling into his paws mischievously.

"Wha – nu uhh – I mean I like her plenty – she's our best friend Happy so course I like her!"

"Woah Natsu, I was just messin with ya"

"Hmmmm, well I don't think he's that far off Natsu. And with everything Gajeel said last night you may want to make up your mind quickly about Lucy. Plus, you two would just make the most adorable couple and just the most precious babies!", Mira had appeared behind them, swooning over the idea of Natsu and Lucy together before she was called away by Cana.

With Mira distracted Natsu sighed in relief that the conversation was over at least for now.

"Carlaaaa!" Happy was off in a flash towards the guild doors, Natsu looked to follow him finding Carla held in Wendy's arms.

"Finally! Oi lug nuts, you comin?"

"Yeah, yeah Salamander I'm already walkin, you get Wendy. Come on Levy – grab bunny girl and let's head upstairs to Gramps"

And so the group found themselves upstairs in Makarov's office, Lucy was sat on the far side of the office looking out the window intently: Levy had finally coerced her upstairs with the idea that she could keep a lookout for Laxus through the window in the office and she was seemingly tuned out to the conversation happening around her. They'd put a barrier of Happy, Wendy, Carla and Levy between her and the males who were far on the other side close to the door for a fast exit should Lucy start to get near them. They'd just finished filling Wendy and Carla in on the events of the previous day.

"Oh no, poor Lucy!" she gave a quick sympathetic look towards Lucy.

"Indeed. But there's no time for that child. Is there anything Grandine told you that could help her now?"

"You're right Carla, if there's something I can do to help I want to do it"

"So, did she tell ya anything Wendy? Igneel just kinda ran through the basics with me, Gajeel didn't have much more either so we're really hopin you do!"

"I might not know everything Natsu sorry, but I'll tell you everything I can remember!"

"Thanks Wendy!"

"Right!" a fierce blush coated the young dragon slayers cheeks but she took a deep breath and launched into her information.

"So to start from the beginning, female dragons don't start the mating process as I'm sure you've worked out that's down to the men. Grandine told me that if I were to be mated with a human then nothing of a dragon nature would happen to me – she said if I were to get married to a non-dragon slayer that it would nullify the ability for a dragon or slayer to mark me"

"Well that's interesting Wendy, how do you mean it would nullify it?"

"Oh sorry Levy, so if they tried to leave a mark like the one Lucy has they wouldn't be able to. They could bite me but no mark would form, like if someone else tried to mark Lucy right now they wouldn't be able to either"

"That's great an all for you Wendy...but how does this help Luce?"

"Give her a chance would you!"

"Ahhh, sure, sorry Carla...sorry Wendy..." after Natsu had been scolded by Carla Wendy continued.

"Ok, so as Natsu pointed out, that doesn't really help sorry, it's just the order she told me things. Grandine then told me that if I didn't choose a human but a dragon slayer then we'd go through the mating ritual" Wendy's face was positively tomato coloured by this stage, still the young slayer ploughed on for her friends.

"She said that the first part of the dragon mating was for the male dragon to 'mark' the female, that mark would contain the element of the other dragon which was to make it clear to others who had staked their 'claim'. As you've already experienced it also deters other dragons by expelling that element as an attack to any males who get too close which can be needed as sometimes the whole ritual can't be completed at the same time although it is highly advisable that's its completed soon after the mark if not immediately. She said it was to do with compatibility but I can't remember how you should know if it's the right time to move to the next stage sorry. Grandine described everything for when I fell in love and so I think some of the things she told me replied heavily on that, she skimmed bits where it didn't apply."

"Well, that certainly explains why Laxus didn't just take Lucy last night. They can't be completely compatible yet, although I wonder what he plans to do about it. Laxus my boy, what are you doing..."

"I think I may be able to help here master", all eyes turned to Levy. "I've been in the Fairy Tail library most of the night and this morning. I think I found something that may fill in some of the blanks, of course the information we have from the dragons directly is the best as it's likely dragon slayer specific where all I've found is on dragon mating. But where there are gaps in what Wendy, Gajeel and Natsu know this book may be able to help" she then produced as if from nowhere a very thin leather-bound book.

"So that's where you've been shrimp"

Ignoring Gajeel Levy opened up the book and started to read, "The Dragon Mark: Full compatibility can be identified by the elemental ring formed around the 'mark dragon'. Those with a strong connection will have a complete or almost complete elemental ring when the mark is first made, those with lower connection status will have a partial ring. Should the ring not be complete then the connection between the two should be strengthened before moving on to the next stage – this is why the element barrier bubble exists around the marked female: in order to keep other dragons at bay whilst this happens. Note: the elemental barriers only last for 1 week"

"So she's gonna stop blasting us in a week?" with a short nod from Levy Gajeel continued "so why don't we just wait a week? Keep bunny girl away from Laxus and sorted?"

"If you'd let me finish Gajeel I'll explain" a quick glaring match later had Gajeel muttering to himself leaning back against the wall in defeat. "As I was saying, the barrier does only last a week. But it goes on further to say that then the next step needs to be completed whether the mark's complete or not. And to answer Gajeel's question it needs to be completed else Laxus and Lucy would both slowly lose their sanity, they'd be driven to madness by the uncompleted ritual. It states the last recorded case of an uncompleted ritual left both dragons destroying towns and mountains, only to then be found sobbing for days before going on another rampage. It says that some other dragons found them and put them down…"

At this jaws dropped around the room, even Natsu had nothing to say.

"So what yer sayin shrimp, is that if we don't let Laxus do the next stage we basically lose em both anyway?"

"Basically…yes. But…" everyone suddenly perked back from the sombre mood at Levy's slither of hope, "as Gajeel said yesterday you can have a dragon challenge, this book gives the information that this can occur but again the outcomes aren't exactly all rosy"

"Yes! I remember Grandine mentioning that there could be a challenge. If I remember she said that should that happen then there would be a dragon battle and the victor would walk away with the female. She did uhhh say that it was usually a battle to the dragon death." She cringed with the last piece of information quickly glancing to Natsu and then back to Carla for comfort.

"I believe, there is some room for interpretation there Wendy. See in here it also says to the 'dragon death' but someone has written some notes along this, as if added to on experience there's a couple of them throughout but this one seems the most pertinent to us. It says 'the dragon death does not have to be to the physical death, dragons are proud mystical creatures, for a dragon the loss of draconic powers would also constitute a loss in this fight. The loss of a dragons element is also common to occur – this does usually end in the madness of the dragon from loss of such power to them'."

"Gahhhh this is too much! Can someone just tell me how I help Luce please?", Natsu had his eyes scrunched closed and was angrily running his hands through his hair.

"Calm down will ya Salamander! She just told ya everything! Yer just too stupid to get it"

"Oh yeah lug nuts, then what do I have to do?!"

"Well it's obvious ain't it"

"Yeah obvious you don't know either!"

"Enough boys! This isn't helping Lucy. Now, Natsu. I'll summarise, we have a few scenarios that I see happening…we could let Laxus find Lucy and they continue the ritual. Or someone challenges Laxus, that then has several outcomes – Laxus could of course still win and then we're back to the first option anyway for Lucy. Or the challenger could win, in which case from what Gajeel and Wendy have said would mean they replace the mate mark and start the ritual with Lucy instead. The unknown in the challenge scenario would be the 'dragon death' part, whilst I'm sure any challenger wouldn't actually kill Laxus we don't know what he would do…I hope he wouldn't really fight to the death, but then…I wouldn't have thought he would have done this to Lu"

"Yes…as much as I hate to admit it, I just can't be sure on Laxus' state of mind at the moment. He certainly doesn't seem to be acting like himself. I wouldn't say we could guarantee that he wouldn't take the most brutal option to a challenge. We must ask Lucy what she wants to do, that is if anyone would still challenge Laxus after hearing all the potential consequences" he raised a pointed eyebrow towards Natsu which was noticed by everyone but the slayer in question, he was deep in thought staring at Lucy who'd had her eyes glued to the window the entire conversation.

"That's all great and everything. But Lucy isn't Lucy today, anything in your book about whatever is happening to her now Levy?"

"Oh right sorry, I skipped over that part earlier. So I don't know if any of you noticed but the elemental ring around Lucy's dragon is really sparse, there's actually only a few lightning bolts there so it's pretty incomplete. My guess is Laxus is trying to force the bond to be complete – to do that he can force it by filling Lucy with more of his element and of course them just being together would force it, although it's possible to force the bond it says it won't be as strong as if it were naturally there. Both Lucy and Laxus should want to please the other during the section between mark and mating but, I'm also going to assume Laxus is making use of the 'control' ability that a male dragon can put on their mate or claimed one, it's basically mind control – he can make Lucy do, say or go wherever he wants to"

"Oh my, the poor child" Carla found herself putting a reassuring paw on Wendy's hand sensing the fright in her.

"Well that explains her crazy mood swing at least! Oi Luce! Earth to Lucy land, we need to have a chat so you think you can come back to us a minute?"

"Yeah like that's gonna work Salamander"

"Well, you got any bright ideas metal head? All I know is Laxus is controlling her and it's got to stop NOW!"

"Honestly Natsu, could you keep it down. I am trying to look for Laxus here!"

"Luce…sorry. I just wanted to talk to you was all"

"Well, I just want to see Laxus. And Levy – I don't see him coming and this is a terrible view from up here, you can't even see the entrance, he might've come in to the guildhall already and I wouldn't know. I'm going to look somewhere else for him"

And with that Lucy stomped towards the door of Makarov's office, the males all scurried along the edge of the wall in the opposite direction to maintain their distance from her – Gajeel had shoved Natsu along as he'd just stared at Lucy in horror as she left him.

As soon as she'd been set free from the room Lucy hopped down the stairs into the main hall and resumed her search for Laxus. It didn't take long before she'd searched every inch and questioned everyone left. At her lack of Laxus she was angry to the point where she felt she was going to explode with rage, just as she reached her tipping point though the small buzz of electricity within her ramped up and she could feel her hair going static. And what was more, she could feel Laxus – the electricity was working like a homing device, and she knew now which way she had to go.

The group had followed her out of the office and to the main hall; carefully tracking her. Natsu noticed she suddenly brought her head up and…smiled? Yeah definitely smiling and a spark of determination in her eyes flashed before she started sprinting towards the doors at speed.

"Shi – SALAMANDER you best go get her!" Gajeel was evidently quicker to catch on to what was happening than Natsu who just sent him a confused head tilt so he continued. "That was a call for her and she's gone runnin idiot! Unless you want Laxus to finish what he started you best stop her and NOW!"

"Going!", he'd quickly gone scurrying after Lucy, easily catching up with her – she may be fuelled by lightning desire, but he was still much faster.

Well that was a long chapter and a lot of information - hopefully this fills in quite a few blanks on the process Lucy is going through. Finished this one up early so to make up for my couple of longer updates you get this one after just a few days!

The next one is likely to be a long one too!

Copperreign12 thank you as always for your comments, glad you're still enjoying the story.