Summary: In which Magical Deficiency Illness doesn't slow her down…
Bianca had always known something was off with her magic. She wasn't as magically powerful as her older sister, Aurora and she hadn't inherited Seith Magic like her brothers, Castor and Lucian. But none of that mattered because every time Bianca went out on a job, she came home feeling like a truck had run her over. This time was different. Bianca had just completed a job with her boyfriend, Kiran Redfox, when she had started to feel light headed. Kiran had immediately picked her up when she had started to turn green. Now, she was lying in the infirmary waiting on the diagnosis that she knew was coming.
"I'm sorry, Bianca," Wendy spoke in all but a whisper, "You have Magical Deficiency Illness. There is not cure but there are remedies to ease the pain. You won't be able to use large amounts of magic ever again. In fact, I recommend no magic for the next year, just to stabilize your magic levels as they are now. After that, limit yourself to your Nikora Key." Her mother was tightly gripping her hand and Bianca knew exactly what her mother was thinking. It was the same Illness that had taken her grandmother, Layla, well before her time, and Lucy was obviously blaming herself for passing the illness down the line.
"Does this mean Bianca is going to…" Her father started to speak but the words seemed to choke him as he turned around to hide the devastation.
"No, not unless she starts using large portions of magic. And, although this should be far off, should she become pregnant I would need to monitor her to make sure the baby isn't consuming what little magic she has. I would recommend not being pregnant or only having one child if you feel you have to have kids. Bianca, you're only 17, there are so many things you can do. Don't let this get to you," Wendy concluded facing Bianca. Objectively, the young woman knew this, but she is-was- a proud Fairy Tail mage! How was she supposed to be a member of the guild if she couldn't use her magic? Suddenly, the pressure in her hand was unbearable.
"Ouch, Kiran," Bianca, whispered to her boyfriend, "can you loosen your grip. I'll be ok. It's just going to be an adjustment. Don't you dare freak out on me! I am barely holding it together right now; I need you…" Kiran let out a barely audible whimper before pulling the love of his life into his arms. Thoughts of what their future should have looked like dashed from his mind as he processed Bianca's illness.
Months passed as Bianca, Kiran, their families and the guild learned to live with their new normal. Bianca slowly learned to take over some of Mira and Kinana's responsibilities and started to worry more about Kiran as he took jobs without her. They had always taken jobs with their separate teams, taking jobs together to reconnect after being away for too long, but now that she didn't have her team anymore, the worry seemed to fill her endlessly. Bianca took to summoning her Nikora, Betty, to keep her company as she tended to the bar and did her chores. It was no longer weird for anyone in the Fairy Tail Guild to see a pink and blue snowman/dog teetering around the bar at strange hours of the day.
On her sister's twenty-first birthday, Bianca gifted Aurora with six of her seven keys. Aurora had slowly been inheriting their mother's keys and training with them so she hadn't been very focused on gaining any silver keys. Polaris, Lyra, Crux, Caelum, Deneb and Pyxis were all sad to leave Bianca but understood. And they had all met Aurora before and worked along side her so they were ok with the transfer of their contracts. Aurora cried hysterically as the reality that her little sister was officially a retired mage at twenty struck her. Their mother too cried in front of them for the first time, having held everything as to not freak out Bianca before. Bickslow, Kiran and Skylar all stood around awkwardly as they watched the crying fest.
Her twentieth birthday arrives, almost thirty months after her diagnosis, and the little stick turned blue. Pregnant. Kiran freaked out of course, but by this point, Bianca was able handle anything thrown her way. Just because she couldn't use magic didn't mean she hadn't developed other skills. She trained psychically with her mother and sister and developed a mean kick that kept the patrons of the guild bar in line. And she swiftly used it on her dragon to bring him back to the present. Yes, the situation wasn't ideal, but this wouldn't kill her. She wouldn't let it.
"Are you sure you want to risk it," her dad asked her softly one day. She could see the fear in his eyes. Fear was all too common whenever anyone looked at her. They all saw this pregnancy as a death sentence. She didn't have the heart to tell any of them that she would gladly die to experience this just once. So she nodded and went back to drinking the gross nutrition shake concocted by Wendy, Mira and her mother. By the sixth month, Bianca was a shadow of herself as the baby fed on her, not like a parasite but like a parasite. Kiran, who had insisted they marry (Such an old fashioned sap Bianca often thought to herself), was about ready to claw the baby from her body to save her. Bianca just kept going. Pregnant, sick and nearly dead, she wasn't going to stop living because everyone thought a strong wind might cause her to shatter into a million pieces.
It was Aurora though, also pregnant and sick as a dog, who got her to slow down and stick to her bed rest. The two temporarily moved into their parents' house again while their husbands went off to make enough money for the babies. "Apparently babies are expensive…" Aurora had shrugged to her as they lay in their childhood bedroom while their men were away. The two connected in a way they hadn't before as they each experienced pregnancy for the first time and had more than a moment to talk about what they had been up to.
If asked, Bianca would say that nothing about her life to that point had been scary. She didn't have the propensity for being kidnapped like her mother and sister, she didn't have the sometimes uncontrollable and frightening powers of her father and brother. She had been herself and had excelled or averaged at everything she tried. No one had tried to kill her on a job and she had never failed at anything. Not truly. But the day she went into labor and had to be rushed to the hospital as she and her baby bled out was the scariest. It was pure, dumb luck that Wendy and Porlyusica made it to the hospital when they did. Wendy was able to control the bleeding, the hospital doctors were able to save her, and Porlyusica was able to save her baby. In the end, to stop the bleeding completely, they had to remove her uterus. The hemorrhaging was too great for Wendy to stop entirely. The devastation and joy Bianca felt, mixed with all the hormones from giving birth left her in a deep depression that took the strongest drugs to drag her from. Kiran became the true hero of the story, stepping up to the plate to be with Melody morning, noon and night as Bianca slowly recovered. Her jealously was pushed aside the moment she watched her normally taciturn and macho husband coo and nurture their daughter.
Melody was so strong. She seemed to have been born with a pre-disposition to Dragon Slayer magic as well. Bianca silently thanked the gods as this most likely meant she would not develop her mother's debilitating illness. As Melody grew and Kiran went back out on jobs, Bianca took to motherhood like a duck to water. Her early stumbling aside, Bianca felt she was made to be Melody's mother. When Melody was seven, the two started to do light training, which basically meant long hikes in the forest. It was there that they discovered two toddler girls, twins, abandoned to the elements and the monsters of the forest. Some digging and Bianca was able to figure out their names- Marnie and Mila- when and where they had been born and that they were abandoned for displaying magic, strong magic, magic identified by Uncle Gray as Devil Slayer magic, Iron Devil Slayer magic. Bianca smiled, these girls were meant to be hers. Her family was complete. Her life was as full as ever, even without being able to do more than summon Betty, and she was officially the lead Bartender of the guild. Yes, her life had never been fuller.