Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail and/or Akame Ga Kill. They belong to their original owners.

The Assassins of Fairy Tail

Job Eleven: The Assassin's Enemy

Gray and Natsu were surprised that Leone and Akame arrived as they did while their enemy Marin toying with them. The ice mage didn't quite understand why they came back. "I thought you two were with Wendy and Carla and where's your third friend?"

"Chelsea's with them. As for why we're here, we heard an explosion near where all of you were. Leone and I came to investigate and…" Akame stared at Marin who was grinning at them. "It seems we have our answer. My only question is what exploded?"

Leone took a look at the remains of the debris and saw what it was. "Uh…Akame…?" She tapped the other girl's shoulder. Akame turned to her and Leone pointed at the destroyed site.

Akame looked to where her girlfriend was pointing and gasped when she saw the sign Mango Gelato. Seeing the destroyed shop made Akame's body quake in disbelief. "The…Star Mangos. They're…gone?" Akame quickly put two and two together and turned to the person responsible. As long as Leone had known Akame, one of the things she knew was that the girl was an avid lover of all things food. And if anything were to happen to said food…she would be very upset. Akame yelled at Marin. "I'LL MAKE YOU PAY FOR DESTROYING SUCH A THING! I NEVER EVEN HAD THE CHANCE TO TASTE THEM!" Scratch that. She was furious.

Gray had only seen that kind of outburst from one other person. "And here I thought Erza was the one who really liked sweets."

Natsu, in a rare form, agreed with the ice mage. "No kidding."

Leone cracked her knuckles. "Bad news for you pal. When it comes to food, if anything bad happens to it, you don't want to be on the receiving end of her rage." Akame glared daggers at the enemy. "Now how about you tell us what the hell happened to Lucy and Erza and who the hell are you!"

Gray decided to explain that part to them. "He's part of the Alvarez army and he took Lucy and Erza somewhere."

Leone had more a reason to be pissed off at the guy in front of her. "He did what?"

Marin giggled at the two girls. "I must say, you two also deserve a well done. I think I'll introduce myself to you both. I am Marin Hollow and I am part of the Brandish Force of the Alvarez army."

Now Leone understood what he was. "So you're a soldier huh? You don't look the part. Still, we're going to make you pay for what you did."

Gray thought it wasn't a good idea for them to fight him. "Hold on a minute! This guy can control space! He can negate any magic that uses space! Look what he did to Mest!"

Akame was thankful for the information. "Is that so? I guess it's a good thing that neither Leone or I use that."

She took up a familiar stance that Gray recognized. "Wait…she can do…"

"Shadow-Make…" Akame's shadow began to shift and rise up. She separated her arms and gripped the shadows in her both of her hands to form katanas. "Twin Shadow Swords!"

Gray was right and couldn't believe. "She can do Maker Magic?"

Akame pointed one of her swords at Marin. "You are guilty of an unforgivable crime and for that, I will see that your defeat is at an end!"

Marin just giggled at her words. "As charming as that is, I really can't bring myself to fight two lovely ladies such as yourself-" He took a good look in both Akame's and Leone's eyes. His eyes widened as he discovered something not quite right with the two girls. Marin's expression changed. "On second thought, it pains me to say this but you two don't pass. In fact, you fail. You two are damaged. Badly damaged and that is ugly to me."

Gray didn't quite understand that. "Damaged?"

Leone should've guessed he would've seen them for who they are. "As goofy looking as this guy is, he's still a soldier and he saw right through me and Akame."

Akame could care less about what Marin said about them. "If that means you're going to fight us then fine." Akame glanced over at the blonde. "Leone…"

Leone nodded at her. "Right."

With that said, Akame launched herself at Marin while wielding her shadow swords to the side. Akame swung both swords at her opponent but he disappeared.

He reappeared behind her. "You won't beat me like that!" Marin kicked to the side. To his surprise, Akame disappeared. "Where did she go?"

Unknown to him, Akame had withdrawn into her shadow as a means to evade his attack. She suddenly emerged out of her shadow and spun around her swords at Marin. "Shadow Cyclone!" Marin couldn't avoid the attack this time as rows of shadows struck while being sent up into the air along with Akame. With her in front of the enemy, Akame disposed of her swords and took up her stance once again. "Shadow-Make…" This time she pulled back her arm and the shadows wrapped around her hand forming into a large claw. "Darkness Claw!" She extended her hand forward and the shadow claw stretched out and grew in size toward her enemy. Soon as it reached him, the claw slammed down to the ground. Akame landed back down and withdrew her attack. As she did, Akame saw that Marin was not in the spot her attack hit. "Where did he-"

Marin suddenly appeared before her and elbowed Akame in the stomach. She coughed out as the former assassin was sent away and rolled on the ground until she stopped. Marin gave a small laugh. "Not bad but as long as I control this space, you can't hope to possibly defeat me."

Akame groaned as she stood up. "Who said anything about me defeating you?"

Marin raised an eyebrow until he remembered the other girl. Said girl was suddenly behind him and yelled while trying to punch the guy. He vanished just in time and Leone struck the ground instead, leaving a small crater. She turned away to see her enemy keeping his distance away from her. "How about you fight instead of running away like a scared little chickenshit?!"

Her enemy chuckled. "And what can you do that she couldn't?"

Leone hissed through her teeth. "How's this for starters!" She bent down and grabbed the ground with her claw. "Take Over: Lionel Beast Soul Combination!" Leone's hair turned silver and spiky while growing longer to the point it reached the ground. Her bangs covered her left eye. The fur on her arms turned to silver as well. Her eyes also changed color to silver. Leone lifted her head and had a feral look on her face. "Spiky Silver Beast!"

Marin was actually surprised by what he had just witnessed. "Oh, my. I assumed the form you were in before was a Take-Over but never before have I seen a Take Over on a Take-Over."

Leone bared her fangs at her enemy. "Then how about you experience it up close!" She jumped over to where Marin was. She took a swing at him but like before, he disappeared and her attack missed. He reappeared from behind and tried attack but Leone already anticipated it. She grunted and her hair suddenly pointed outward. Marin saw it and stopped his attack in time before his fist managed to come in contact with the hair. Leone turned around quickly to the right trying to get in a swing but Marin vanished just in time to avoid the attack. She could already tell where he ended up at. "Hard to attack someone from the back if it's covered." She turned around to face him. "For someone who rules this space, you attack the same way. Easy for someone to counter you."

Marin didn't seem too worried about that small detail. "That may be true but it doesn't change the fact that you can't hit me no matter how hard you try."

Leone was hoping he would say that. "Why don't we find that out then!" She roared while jumping to where her enemy was. Marin teleported before Leone's swipe could hit him. She turned to the side to see him still keeping his distance. The blonde continued to attack and pursue her enemy. All of her attacks kept on missing as Marin kept on teleporting to avoid them. It was starting to annoy Leone. "Hold still damnit!"

Everything was going as Marin planned to be. "I told you. You can try all you want. There's no chance you can land a hit on me. You might as well give up."

Leone huffed at the words. "Let me tell you what I told this pipsqueak one time before. As far as tenacity and toughness goes, I've got them both in spades." She placed her left arm out on the front. "You, on the other hand, already lost. You just don't know it yet." Leone closed her claw and instantly pulled her arm all the way back. Next thing Marin knew, something wrapped around his body and was pulled toward Leone. Before he knew it, as soon as Marin came in close, Leone punched him in the solar plexus with her right fist and a boom echoed throughout the area. Marin coughed out blood while his body was being wracked with pain everywhere. "You know, the problem with being at the top is that you never know something might come out from below and knock you off." Leone roared as she sent her enemy into the air. "Now, Akame!"

"Right!" She quickly took up her stance. "Shadow-Make: Twin Shadow Swords!" She separated her arms and gripped her katanas. Akame jumped to where Marin was. "Shadow X-cution!" She swung both of her swords at Marin creating a black X as Akame passed him by. Akame landed on the ground without a problem. Marin just dropped like a sack of potatoes and landed with a thud. "That…was for the Star Mangos."

Gray couldn't believe what he saw. The two girls had actually managed to defeat him. "We couldn't even land a hit on the guy and they beat him?"

Natsu found it hard to believe but was also wondering about something. "How did you make him come over to you?"

Leone grinned at the fire dragon slayer. "Easy. What is that you can't see?"

Natsu didn't know how to answer that. The blonde decided to make it easy on him. Leone spread her arms apart. It was then the fire dragon slayer noticed something. There was a slight glimmer in the air. No, there was a number of glimmers in the air and they were all being drawn back to Leone's arms. Natsu had sort of an idea of what they were. "Is that…your hair?"

The blonde nodded at him. "Yep. In this form, I can send out thin threads of hair from my fur as you can see. They may not look it but they're as strong as wires. I picked up this trick from a friend we knew once. Thought it would be handy"

It was…sort of interesting to both Natsu and Gray. "Allow me to explain." Akame spoke. "Each time that one of Leone's attacks missed, she sent out the threads and continued to do so while he kept on evading. What we did was a simple tactic known as Observe and Deceive. My fight against him was to see what he was capable of, analyzing his attack patterns. It also helps that…someone we once knew fought against an enemy similar to him…" Akame glanced over at Marin then back to Natsu and Gray. "And defeated him in a similar manner. Once my part was done, it was Leone's turn. Once she had enough of her thread surrounding the area, he was already caught in the trap. As soon as he realized it, it was too late. He couldn't teleport because it was sudden. What the mind can't process, the body cannot react. Once that became a factor, everything else fell into place."

Once Leone recalled all of her thread, she reverted back into her human form. "Downside is that the bastard was lucky I was holding back. At most, some of his ribs are broken. We still need him alive if we're going to get Lucy and Erza back."

She was right on that part. Without Marin, there was no way in bringing back the two girls. Gray admitted that Leone and Akame had a pretty sound strategy and that's where he saw the difference. "These two…they fight completely differently than the rest of us. They knew what they were doing and how to do it. I'm still wondering what that guy meant by them being damaged. Also…" He looked at Leone's belt. Gray had seen it a few times since his first meeting with Leone. "She's always wearing that belt. Something tells me it's more than some fashion accessory."

Everyone suddenly heard groaning and looked to see Marin starting to stand up. "You've gotta be kidding me. He's still moving?"

Leone didn't blame Natsu for saying that. "I did say I held back. I'm just as surprised he could still stand after being hit by Akame's attack. Guy's tougher than he looks despite how scrawny he is."

Marin let out raspy breaths while coughing out some blood. "You two…how dare you do such a thing to me, the ruler of this space!" He had angry look on his face. Marin was obviously not happy that both girls had gotten the drop on him. "This is far from over!"

"Marin. That's enough." Everyone heard a new voice and saw a person walking towards them. As she approached closer, all of them felt a heavy pressure coming out of her.

Marin's expression suddenly changed and teleported right behind the woman. "Oh, Lady Brandish! You're well done, as usual.

Brandish wasn't a fan of Marin's sucking up to her. "Stop that, won't you? It's disgusting."

Spriggan Twelve member: Brandish μ

Gray was overpowered by the amount of magic exuding out of the woman. "What is this? Her magic is off the charts! It's nothing like we've ever felt before."

Natsu had a similar feeling. He instantly gripped his bandage arm tightly. For Leone, it was a different story. For the first time in a long time, she was terrified. The magic she was feeling out of the woman in front of her, it reminded Leone of a feeling she came across before while tailing a certain person. Except the difference was that this feeling was one hundred times stronger than what she felt from before. Akame was on her highest guard when she sensed the magic coming from the woman. It felt like if she would even relax for just a second, she would be crushed in an instant. All in all, this was a person unlike none of them have come across. "I want some Star Mango Gelato." And…none of them expected her to say that. Brandish walked over to where the shop was and discovered that it was destroyed. She turned to Marin. "The shop's in ruins! What happened here!?"

Marin pointed his finger at Natsu and Gray. "Oh, they went all boom on it."

Naturally, they didn't take kindly to that. "You did that!"

"That's really cheap of you!"

Akame was also in the same boat. "You're the one who's to blame!"

Brandish just sighed. "I was so looking forward to it." She started to leave. "I'm going home."

Marin didn't understand why she was leaving in the first place. "W-Wait, Lady Brandish! These guys picked a fight with our soldiers out of nowhere and look what two of those women did to me! And there might be more of them out there meeting with the spies!"

Tears were already coming out of Brandish's eyes. "I'm not interested." She stopped walking. "Marin, give them back the girls you've 'passed.'"

Marin whined at the order. "But they were going to be part of my collection and you said I could do whatever I wanted Lady Brandish-"

Brandish stomped her heel to the ground and it suddenly started to shake violently everywhere. Gray looked everywhere trying to figure out what was happening. "W-What now?!"

Natsu had the same question. "The ground's…"

Leone had a very bad feeling about what was going on. "What the hell did she do?!"

Akame couldn't tell what Brandish did all of a sudden. "This woman…"

The effect was felt throughout the island and everyone on it felt the same thing. Chelsea stumbled and fell down on the ground. The shaking soon stopped and she hissed in pain. "Jeez. Why was the ground shaking all of a sudden?"

Wendy looked up at the sky and then to Carla. "Carla, take me up!"

Carla nodded at her. "Got it."

Carla grabbed Wendy and fly up while Happy was carrying the kid. As they flew up, something didn't quite feel right to them. "Huh? We're up in the sky but…it doesn't feel like we've gone that far from the ground."

Carla looked out to the sea. "Let's move out towards the sea." They did just that and what they saw unbelievable to them. "No way…you're kidding." What they saw was the entire island suddenly raised out of the water as if it grew. "THE ISLAND CHANGED!"

Brandish looked back at her underling. "Don't make me…repeat myself again."

Marin knew twice to disobey her. "Yes!"

Gray still wondered what Brandish had done. "What magic was that?"

Lucy and Erza suddenly reappeared and landed on the ground. Natsu was already running toward them. "Lucy, Erza! You guys okay!?"

Marin made sure there was no harm to them. "My relaxation space isn't anything dangerous so no worries. No worries heart emoticon."

Erza groaned as she was still recovering. "What was that creepy room?"

Lucy whined while rubbing the back of her head. "We're back…" She suddenly noticed something. "Huh? And there's another person." It didn't take her long to sense her magic. "What's with her power?! Powerful alone is an understatement."

Gray came to a dreadful conclusion. "So she's better than the old man?"

Erza was now cautious of the woman in front of them. "What is she?"

With all of the excitement, Marin almost forgot what they were supposed to do in the first place. "Lady Brandish, our job is to capture the spy and their acquaintances that have gone to look for him and we can't go back empty-handed or Master Wahrl will-"

"Ishgar wouldn't even dare come at Alvarez even if we did let them go anyway."

Marin couldn't agree more but still had his worries. "That's true but wouldn't it be terrible to tell them we couldn't find any? We'd be failures."

Brandish gave a small smile. "Such things don't concern me."

She started to leave once again. "Wait up." Brandish stopped and glanced back at Natsu who was glaring at her. "Look at what you've done to one of ours. There's no way I'm letting that slide." Brandish saw the look in Natsu's eye and turned to Marin. With a simple raise of her hand, Marin suddenly blew up without a trace.

Everyone couldn't believe what she had done. Leone could only stare in disbelief. "She just killed one of her own…just like that?"

Even Akame thought that was too far. "Even Esdeath wouldn't do such a thing to her own soldiers."

Brandish thought she was done with all of this now. "And now we're one person down too. Does that make us even? I'm sorry but…troublesome matters aren't my favorite."

Natsu couldn't forgive her for what she did. "You took out your own."

Brandish didn't see what the problem was. "It's like I said. I was getting troublesome. I'll let them know that I've taken care of the spy etcetera. So don't come any closer to Alakitasia."

Erza narrowed her eyes at the woman. "She's belittling us."

"Makarov is alive." All of them were surprised to hear that. "But if you guys keep doing unnecessary things…. who knows what'll happen." She turned around to them. "This is a warning. Don't come any closer."

The ground shook again and all of sudden, it disappeared from underneath them. They, along with everyone else that was on the island, were now in the water. All of the people were struggling to stay afloat. "The island changed a minute ago!"

"And now it's no longer there!"

"What the hell's happening!"

"I'm drowning! Someone save me!"

Chelsea was among those trying to stay afloat. "Would somebody please tell me what the hell is going on!?"

Brandish narrowed her eyes at the Fairy Tail members. "There are twelve more wizards of this power in Alvarez. So don't fight a battle you cannot win…. Fairy Tail." She suddenly vanished in front of them.

Lucy couldn't even begin to imagine twelve more of that caliber. "Twelve more of that?!"

Gray couldn't ignore what the woman said to them. "So they've found out about us."

Erza finally understood what kind of enemy they are truly dealing with. "Alvarez Empire."

Natsu was more worried than ever about the sixth guild master. "Old man."

Leone felt even more frightened after hearing what Brandish said to them. "You've got to be kidding me. There are twelve others that are just as strong as her?"

Akame was hit the hardest in realization with who they're up against. "To think there are twelve of them with that kind of power…is unfathomable. They're truly on an immensely different level compared to what Leone, Chelsea, and I have faced in the past. How do we even defeat such an enemy like them?" Akame couldn't come up with an answer and she was terrified by that fact.