The Scars That Make You Whole

By CrimsonStarbird

The Chosen at the Turn of Time, Part 3

-Skyriders and Stormbringers-

He is the Wings of Darkness.

He is the night's claws, death's master, the apocalypse forged of bone and scale.

Where his shadow falls, crops wither; where his roar resounds, predator and prey flee side by side; where his breath scorches the fields, the spirit of the land burns with it, leaving behind an ash which smothers the prospect of new life.

He is the End of Days, the Scourge of Worlds, the Black Dragon of the Apocalypse; he is, in a single word, catastrophe. His wings are the veil that divide night from day, and the patterns of his scales mark the path to the underworld. He flew too close to the sun on the wings of the dragons he'd killed; his wish was granted there, and his fate sealed in fire and insanity.

He is the beginning and the end, the wyrm with its tail in its mouth, slowly constricting around all of existence.

The taste of his own blood is maddeningly sweet.

Too long he has waited. Four hundred years, neither dead nor alive, sustained by his purpose as much as by the malice of the heavens, here to fulfil that which has been his goal for as long as he can remember.

Now, at last, he has awoken.

The apocalypse is coming.

Not all that long ago, Sabertooth had been considered the strongest guild in Fiore.

It wasn't just their consecutive victories in the Grand Magic Games that proclaimed it so. It wasn't just the accolades or the interviews, or the extravagant guildhall built from the gratitude of satisfied customers, or the constant stream of mages casting aside their former colours and painting themselves with the stripes of the tiger.

If anyone needed a hero back then, they went to Sabertooth.

Everyone knew that the tigers were the strongest, the bravest, the best in all Fiore – and Sting and Rogue were the dragons amongst the tigers, famous all across the kingdom for their ferocity, their might, and their undefeatable power.

Slaying monsters, solving impossible challenges, rescuing civilians from disasters… yes, those were the days.

Rogue had to wonder how they'd managed to go from the two highest-regarded mages in Fiore to what was, essentially, glorified bait.

"SCATTER!" Sting yelled from somewhere to his left.

A moment later, Rogue felt the change in the texture of the wind. No longer was it the mere thrill of speed, running its eager hands through his hair. It was thickening, intensifying, pulling him back, as though the winds of freedom had become a river of tar. He felt the strain in Frosch's white wings as though they were his own, and then they peeled away to the right, Lector and Sting to the left, each pair fighting free of the vortex moments before an enormous blast of light tore through the sky between them.

Without a backwards glance, the Dragon Slayers and their Exceed raced on.

There had been a moment, back when they had first descended towards the slumbering dragon on angelic wings, when Rogue and Sting, secretly, independently, had each harboured a secret thought of being the hero.

What if they could win the battle, here and now, themselves? What if they didn't need to lure Acnologia out to the rift in space; what if they didn't need stupid Zeref and his stupid airship and his stupid plan; what if they could do what Natsu and Gajeel had been unable to do, and defeat the Dragon of the Apocalypse all by themselves?

After all, they weren't just Dragon Slayers – they were the Twin Dragons. They stood at the top of the greatest guild in Fiore.

So they'd attacked the slumbering dragon. And for a moment, just for a moment, Sting and Rogue had fought for real: divine white light and the shadows made stronger by the contrast, fist and foot and claw, determined to crush those scales and destroy the beast within…

And then Acnologia had fought back.

Just for that one moment.

And without exchanging a word, Sting and Rogue had unanimously agreed that they would pretend this had never happened and follow the plan to the letter.

It wasn't difficult to pretend to be overwhelmed by claws that could rip the sun from the sky, by scales which reflected back so-called Dragon Slayer magic as effortlessly as it would raindrops, by jaws blazing with the light of the furnace that yearned to re-forge the world into one of nothingness. If not for the diligence of their Exceed partners, they would already have died ten times over.

Now, Rogue understood why Natsu and Gajeel weren't ashamed to show fear of a dragon. And he'd still had all four limbs when they had faced him, whole and seemingly infallible, and still they'd lived to tell the tale.

Rogue twisted in mid-air, hurling a roar of pure shadows back through the stillness left by Acnologia's own attack, but he did not watch to see if it made contact. There was no point. Magic like his couldn't defeat the Dragon of the Apocalypse. He was starting to think that nothing could.

"Rogue!" His teammate's shout reached him over the thunder of their own flight. "The sea!"

The horizon was becoming bluer by the second, and Rogue understood the warning. If they were going to make a stand, it had to be here, over the land – where they could stand on their own two feet, rather than their Exceed taking the whole burden; where there were forests and caves to use as obstacles or shelter; where the sunlight threw down shadows he could use to his advantage, rather than fighting embraced by the cloudless sky and glassy sea.

Over the ocean, they would be exposed. They would be vulnerable. If they kept flying, there were only two outcomes that would spare them: Acnologia losing interest and returning home, or Zeref and his airship stepping in.

"Let's keep going," Rogue said grimly.

"You trust him?" came Sting's startled response, and it was clear he had reached the same conclusion about their fates.

Rogue thought of the vision Zeref had shown him, and how much it had affected him before he realized how foolish he was being, in offering the Black Mage himself such an obvious opportunity to manipulate him. Then again, it hadn't been Zeref who had broached the subject. Rogue was the one who had asked, and maybe Zeref was an opportunist, but maybe he had answered in good faith. Rogue didn't know what to think, and now wasn't the time for it, with living death in hot pursuit.

Shaking his head, he shouted back to Sting, "I don't know, but we're part of an alliance with the worst villain in history. How's it going to look if we turn out to be worse team players than him?"

"I would be much happier knowing it was Natsu and Gajeel waiting for us," Sting grumbled. Then, because they had to shout in defiance of their situation or they would crumble beneath it, he raised his voice: "Lector! Frosch! Onwards!"

"Alright! Let's do this!" Lector cheered.

"Fro likes the ocean," the frog-Exceed agreed, and so they soared onwards, leading all the darkness of the world behind them.

The Black Dragon's wingbeats were lazy and slow, the glide of one who was born in the sky. He had fought Dragon Slayers before. They, on their borrowed wings, would tire long before he did.

On they flew, between unfolding sea and unbroken sky. Only the increasingly laborious fluttering of Frosch and Lector's wings marked the enduring progress of time – and that wasn't a sign they wanted. With every passing minute, their odds of surviving a real fight against Acnologia grew worse, and there was still no sign of Zeref.

"Where is that blasted airship?" Sting hissed.

"They'll be there."

"Do you really believe that?" Sting's tone made it clear what he thought the answer should be.

"I have to," said Rogue. Had to trust his unusual team. Had to believe in the person least deserving of it. They had come too far to do anything else.

A pulse of air was the only warning they got. Acnologia's wings pulled through the air and snapped in tight against his sides, launching him from a patient hunter into a blur of breaking storm.

Both the Exceed dived, but not quickly enough. Sting's cry of pain echoed between the sea and sky, shedding droplets of blood like feathers as Lector struggled to pull up before they crashed into the water. Sting was clutching his left arm with his right. He glared at Acnologia with new hatred as the dragon's wings snapped open again, carrying him round in a leisurely circle, now between them and the promise of help – a promise which had still not materialized.

The Black Dragon of the Apocalypse had lost patience with this chase.

He was going to take the feast promised to him here and now.

"We can get around him," Rogue assessed, eyes narrowed. "If I use the shadows cast by his wings-"

"And then what?" Sting demanded. "We can't run forever!"

"We only have to get to the airship-"

A wild laugh, almost desperate. "Look around you, Rogue! We're almost at the rift in space, and can you see the slightest hint of an airship in the distance? He's not coming! We were fools to trust him!"

Rogue thought about the man who had thrown himself between Acnologia and two frightened children, and said nothing.

"I'm going to stand and fight while I still can!" Sting declared. "White Dragon's Sacred Talon!"

Rarely had the Twin Dragons been of more than one mind, yet in that moment, one attacked and one hesitated.

Sting, an arc of dazzling light, a shooting star of heaven, lunged towards their foe. Rogue, indecisive, unsure, watched as Acnologia batted away his partner's passionate attacks with one lazy paw. He glanced around a sky of stark hostility. If he could see nothing with even his draconic senses, then there was no airship, and yet… and yet…

The patient storm exploded into roiling fury. Gigantic claws abandoned their pretence of playfulness and sought evisceration.

White light was flooded with crimson, and then spluttered out entirely.

"STING!" Rogue screamed.

Frosch didn't need prompting. Rogue and his Exceed swooped down to snatch Sting out of the sky before he could hit the unforgiving sea. Frosch's little wings strained under the weight of two humans, but he forced them out of their dive, just as a roar of pure energy vaporized a crater in the ocean behind them.

The shockwaves tossed all four of them aside. Rogue clung to Sting's jacket, felt Frosch's paws clinging to his own collar, thought he could feel Lector pressed between them, and prayed.

It wasn't divine force that answered, but the resolve of his Exceed partner, who somehow managed to right them all above the sea. His paws shook, and his breath rasped, and it wasn't right that Frosch – his beloved, innocent Frosch – had to suffer, had to fight.

As Acnologia circled unhurriedly back towards them, Sting stirred. Blood soaked half his face, half his chest. It could be coming from anywhere, but it didn't matter. That much blood loss only meant one thing.

"Rogue," he hissed. "I'll distract him. You have to fly back to shore."

"No!"

"It's the only chance you have of getting away! Here, we're completely at his mercy!"

"But-"

"Zeref isn't coming, Rogue! Can't you see? It was all just a plot to get us and Acnologia away from Fiore, so that he and his pet mages can do whatever they please!" A bloody, racking cough broke up his words. "There is no point both of us dying here! Go! And fight him for the both of us!"

Rogue's heart lurched. To leave Sting would mean more than betraying his guild – he would be leaving half of himself here, to die in this blue nothingness. But Lector was too injured to keep up with Frosch now, and not even Frosch had the strength to outfly Acnologia.

This shouldn't be happening.

This was their glorious battle. They'd deliberately taken the fight to Acnologia – and now Sting was dying, and their backup wasn't coming, and for all their supposed Dragon Slayer powers they hadn't managed to land a single meaningful hit upon their opponent because of his damned impenetrable scales-

Then Rogue blinked, and looked again.

They weren't impenetrable.

As Acnologia raised his head to strike, the sunlight glinted upon a sliver of blood, drawn afresh from an old wound in the side of his neck. In his mind's eye, Rogue saw a memory that wasn't his own: a velvet night, an ancient land, and Skiadrum valiantly biting the Black Dragon's neck, his desire to protect his son the first and last weapon to have pierced those scales.

"It was true," Rogue breathed. "The battle he showed me really happened…"

"Rogue, GO!" Sting screamed.

"No. We're going to survive this. Together."

Coronas flared in the corner of the Black Dragon's mouth, and Rogue wrapped his arms around Sting and pulled him towards Acnologia. With a burst of effort, Frosch swooped under Acnologia's missing forearm and skimmed beneath him, causing the dragon to twist awkwardly to try and keep them in his sights.

The breath attack fell well short of its target. Walls of water rose up from the disturbed ocean, but the Exceed wove bravely between them, carrying the two Dragon Slayers away from Acnologia – and ever further from the shore.

"What are you doing?" Sting protested. "At least go towards the land! Even if we can't outrun him-"

"We're not running," Rogue told him, quiet, firm. "It's okay. Zeref will come for us." And then, quieter: "He did last time."

Roaring, Acnologia resumed the chase. Rogue could feel his presence physically sapping Frosch's strength – yet at the same time, he could sense something up ahead. Something awful. Something that wasn't of their world at all. He could taste iron on his tongue, feel the never-ending vibrations of a metal sheet running along his jaw. The hairs were rising on the back of his neck, soaked with sweat.

Sting gave a pain-filled whimper. Frosch wailed, but flew on. A twisted roar burst free of Acnologia's chest, as if he could frighten the universe into repairing itself. When it didn't, raw magic swirled between his jaws, far brighter than it had been when he had toyed with them on the flight here, ready to wipe out these irritating flies and fly far away from this disturbing anomaly in the sky-

And then there was an airship where there had been no airship.

It did not swoop in, nor did it materialize in a burst of magic. Somehow, it had always been there.

The roar of the engines hit Rogue as though the sound waves had become solid; the stench of oil and superheated air assaulted his draconic senses – and all he could do was stare, wondering how he hadn't seen or heard or sensed the behemoth of an airship before that moment.

From the way that the blast of energy stuttered and died in Acnologia's maw, Rogue reckoned that the Dragon of the Apocalypse was thinking much the same thing.

A cold voice spoke: "Fire."

Then the cannon flashed with beautiful thunder, and the mystery was suddenly a lot less important than its consequences.

There was something supremely satisfying about the smash of a cannonball upon scales.

Magical weapons had to be used with great care around Acnologia. Most of them had been disabled on the ship before it left Vistarion, lest someone forget Zeref's warning in excitement or fear, and fire at the great dragon something that would only strengthen him.

Yet, as magical technology had advanced over the years, Zeref had always ensured that the imperial flagship maintained some good old-fashioned armaments, just in case.

One couldn't go wrong with gunpowder and cast iron.

Especially not when Acnologia automatically tried to absorb its magic and found, to the effect of thirty-six pounds of cast iron striking him right between the eyes, that magic and projectile geometry were not the same thing.

Swiftly, Zeref turned from the reeling dragon to where Jellal was helping the two Dragon Slayers safely onto the ship. Sting landed heavily, tumbling to the deck and remaining there. He did not stir even at Rogue's frantic cries.

"Stand aside," Zeref ordered Rogue and Jellal. Two identical glares turned to him at once. He stood his ground on the rapidly thinning ice of his patience, and after a moment, Rogue acquiesced, stepping aside. Jellal held his gaze a little longer, enough to convey how much he didn't want to do this, before he too stepped out of the way.

The moment they were out of sight, Zeref brushed them both from his mind, kneeling beside the wounded Dragon Slayer. He closed his eyes and let the bitter, twisted tang of blood flood his thoughts.

This was about winning. Repairing a useful pawn ahead of the next phase of his strategy, nothing more. All sense of the child he had known a very long time ago fell away, along with all uncomfortable, unnecessary memories of the past. Sting was just a vessel for some very useful magic.

For a moment, it seemed Zeref's fingers were longer and sharper than they should have been, glowing not with magic, but with the iridescence of innumerable tiny scales. The healing magic took. The wound repaired itself in a matter of seconds, and Zeref pulled away almost as quickly, snapping out of the delicate mental inversion where his curse was subdued and returning to reality.

"That," Rogue spoke up, from somewhere behind him, "was Sky Dragon magic. Just like before. How did you do that?"

That was another memory Zeref didn't need to be reminded of right now. "If it ever becomes your business, I'll let you know."

Whether the nosy Dragon Slayer liked it or not, they had bigger problems – namely, claws that could tear an army apart, wings that dwarfed the largest ship in the imperial fleet, and a might that could certainly be stunned by mundane weapons, but couldn't possibly be defeated by them.

Acnologia's roar shook the airship where it hovered. The next one, those inhuman eyes promised, would contain more than just sound.

"Your orders, Captain?" Ajeel shouted from his place at the helm, having decided this was the best compromise between not being allowed to use Zeref's title but finding his given name too strange.

Zeref's gaze did not move from the blaze of death gathering in Acnologia's jaws. "Stick to the plan."

"But…" The white-knuckled grip yearning to push the airship into evasive manoeuvres tightened, and then relaxed again. "You're the boss," Ajeel acquiesced, his tone of voice making it clear that he was taking no responsibility for their lack of evasive action.

There were others who would not accept his decision so calmly, though. "Are you mad?" Sting exploded, his voice stronger than his still-recovering body, and his will eclipsing them both. "Have you not seen his power? One breath attack will obliterate the ship! We have to dodge!"

Zeref's eyes narrowed. "I believe I told you that if you wanted to be part of this mission, you had to follow my orders," he stated. "If you want to flee, flee. But don't bother coming back."

The Dragon Slayer ground his teeth, but made no move to leave. Rogue touched his teammate's shoulder, as if to reassure him that this was the right decision. From Sting's other side, Jellal was watching Zeref warily, but he did not speak up in dissent. He had thrown his lot in with them; he would honour it until the end.

Further away, Zeref could see the others gathering behind him on the deck – every single mage who had accepted him as their leader, his soldiers and allies, his skyriders and stormbringers, staring certain death in the face, but not running.

They trusted him.

Perhaps it was trust in him as a leader, as Ajeel and the others had, knowing he had never let them down before.

Perhaps it was trust in his reputation and power, all that Jellal and the Sabertooth mages would permit themselves; the certainty that if he had gambled everything on this mission, he would not let it end in such sudden failure.

Perhaps it was trust in him as a person, as Lucy had promised when she had first encouraged him to take this stand, and then reiterated in front of everyone as she'd stepped off the airship to prepare for her part of the plan.

Whatever was driving them, each and every one of them had chosen to put their lives in his hands as Acnologia bore down upon them.

It was them he was thinking of, as he raised his right arm towards the sky.

And as the Black Dragon unleashed the blast that would have vaporized the ship and everyone on it, light entwined around his arm, and his eyes shone gold with a power his cursed body could not comprehend.

Blinding light smashed against the golden sphere that materialized around the airship.

It wasn't a clash of magic, it was a clash of wills. The monster who understood nothing but destruction, and the only one who had ever successfully stood in his way – the two great powers of their age came together in a contest of pure strength, of magic and of heart.

Both had lived four hundred years and both had hated it, one condemned by a curse of immortality and the other, who had vowed not to die until every last dragon had fallen, had been forced to wait until the last of his prey returned to linear time. Both, by simple virtue of their tragedies, were possessed of magic far greater than any mortal life could conjure.

But while one had hibernated, doing little more than killing and eating while waiting for judgement day, a slave to his fate, the other had lived and loved and built in defiance of his.

After all these years, the Black Dragon still flew alone, but he did not.

And it was Acnologia's breath attack that gave out first, beating its fists upon the golden sphere in one last tantrum before fading to nothing.

Zeref let his arm fall. The protective sphere shattered. Shards of beautiful magic rained around the ship, and they all saw Acnologia give a fragile flutter of his wings, as if he couldn't quite understand what had just happened.

Not that those on the airship were much better. Even if they had not seen the newspaper photographs from the day Tenrou Island had returned, every single one of them recognised the guild mark that had been branded in brilliant light upon the protective sphere, the only non-Dragon-Slayer spell that had ever successfully withstood Acnologia's might.

"Thank you, Mavis," Zeref whispered.

Then he staggered, as the price of invoking such magic on his own was wrenched from his body. The moment was broken. Every single person on the ship started towards him at once, but he spread his arms suddenly, warding them off. He was under no illusions as to how dangerous his curse was right now.

But that was okay. He had factored that into his plan, too. Alone on the deck, his eyes gleamed with anticipation. "Do it, Ajeel."

Engines roared louder than the dragon dared. The airship burst out of the remnants of that magical storm like a heavenly beast, no more hesitation, no more fear.

Maybe non-magical weapons couldn't kill Acnologia, but if the Black Dragon had dismissed them as a threat entirely, he was about to revise his opinion.

Five metres of the ship's reinforced bowsprit rammed straight into the old wound in Acnologia's neck.

A horrible scream rent the air. Pinned by the airship, his wings thrashed in panic, unable to right himself or control his own flight. Those on board clung to whatever they could find as the ship was dragged along with him, its engines not enough to combat the dragon's blind panic.

At last they stabilized, still locked in their gruesome embrace. Acnologia's wings were outstretched, straining with the effort of holding them both steady in the sky. He could not turn his head, but one hate-filled eye glared up at them.

A smile curled at Zeref's lips. "Well, then," he said. "Now that I've got your attention, shall we negotiate?"

At first, Jellal was frozen.

In the last five minutes, he had seen Zeref heal Sting with Sky Magic – a lost magic – like it was nothing, deflect a blast capable of levelling a city with one of the sacred magics of Fairy Tail, and then skewer the Dragon of the Apocalypse like a lesser man might hunt for fish in the shallows. And that was to say nothing of the team he had assembled at such short notice – comprising some individuals so powerful that even he shuddered at the thought of fighting them – or of the airship he had conveniently provided, the likes of which Jellal had only encountered in rumours back when he had been on the Magic Council, his own fledgling ambitions overshadowed by the threat of a foreign invasion.

That was the moment Jellal believed that, when Zeref had told him he didn't want to be his enemy, he might have been telling the truth.

After all, if Zeref had wanted to be his enemy, he could have destroyed Jellal and his guild in an instant.

Instead, he was stood on the deck of this ship with as varied a team as Jellal had ever seen at his back, confident as he stared down Acnologia. The dragon was easily three times the size of the airship, yet it was the ship that had pinned him, and its captain that met his hateful gaze unflinching.

"Give me back the Dragon Slayers you have taken," said Zeref, "and we will withdraw."

There was, at first, no response at all. The dragon and the airship, its bowsprit still spearing clean through his throat, were in deadlock.

Then Acnologia folded his wings and wrenched himself and the airship out of the sky.

Panic erupted. Across the deck, mages scrambled for something to cling to as Acnologia's immense weight pulled the ship into a vertical dive. The wailing engines didn't stand a chance.

Acting on instinct, Jellal kicked off from the deck and let his magic take over, instantly having to accelerate to keep up with the plummeting ship. Striking the ocean at that speed would be fatal. He raised his hand, intending to sever the bowsprit and free the ship before collision.

"No!" Zeref roared. Amidst the freefalling hurricane, when all others were focussed on survival, his attention was entirely on Jellal, eyes blazing. "Do not use magic on it!"

So they should just let Acnologia destroy the ship and everyone on it, then?

That response was on the tip of Jellal's tongue when Zeref did something he couldn't have predicted. From his Requip Space, he pulled the cursed sword that had caused him so much suffering in Malva and threw it towards him. The blade revolved once, slowly, and Jellal snatched it out of the air.

There was, briefly, a moment when he considered turning it on Zeref; a moment when he marvelled that this man would freely hand over something capable of bringing him to his knees.

Trust worked both ways, Jellal supposed, and the impulse receded.

The light of his Meteor magic had winked out the moment the cursed sword settled into his hand. He could sense it pulling the strength out of him, even as he locked his knees around the base of the bowsprit and swung the blade with all his might.

It cut clean through. Immediately, the airship lurched, wheeling unbalanced through the air as Ajeel grappled with the controls and told gravity very explicitly what he thought of it. Frightened of falling for the first time in his life – for he could not save himself while holding the sword – Jellal clung on with everything he had until the ship levelled and Rogue could pull him back onto the deck.

Jellal slid the blade back across to Zeref, eager to be rid of it. If the speed with which Zeref returned it to his pocket dimension was anything to go by, he felt the same, which only made the situation more perplexing.

"What was that about?" Jellal demanded. "Why couldn't I have broken it using magic?"

Zeref shook his head. Something else he wouldn't answer, and so much for that momentary trust.

"I suppose negotiating is out of the question, then," Zeref remarked of Acnologia.

Ajeel gave a snort. "He's gonna regret that, isn't he? Look at him!"

The Black Dragon was ignoring them completely. Every wingbeat was cautious as he tried to avoid aggravating the muscles in his neck and shoulders. Several metres of steel remained impaled through his throat; blood streamed down his flank. He stretched his single forearm out in cumbersome motions, feeling blindly for that giant thorn, trying to wrench it out.

Zeref's eyes narrowed. "That is our sole advantage. Do not let him remove it."

"I'll go," Jellal said. Without waiting for a response, he let his power surge through him, and in the next heartbeat, he was in front of the great black dragon.

Acnologia was huge, a furious, armoured powerhouse, created to kill gods and claim the mortal world for his own. Jellal was emitting no small amount of power, and yet the dragon had not so much as glanced at him, and nor did he need to. Jellal knew, without needing to try it, that the strongest spell in his arsenal would wash over those scales as a spring breeze; that the force of a striking meteor would barely move him; that he would not have stood a chance against this behemoth of destruction, if he had been here alone.

He was not alone. None of them were.

As Acnologia finally managed to pin the broken bowsprit between clumsy claws, Jellal threw all his magic into acceleration. He flew one lap around the dragon's bulk, and then another, summoning all the speed he could muster – and he hurled it at the dragon in the form of himself, feet-first, crashing into the severed end of the ship's bowsprit.

His mass may have been insignificant, but his velocity was quite something.

The impact rammed the spike deeper into Acnologia's neck. The blood-soaked tip of it was protruding from the other side, now. The dragon gave an agonized roar and thrashed blindly in the air.

Nimbly, Jellal darted around him, the dragon's immense size working in his favour. Already he was eyeing up the next angle from which to strike-

For the second time in as many minutes, his magic failed.

It wasn't a sharp severance, like it had been when he had picked up that accursed sword. It was a steady removal of control, the lag between thought and magic growing from unnoticeable to sluggish to entirely unresponsive. The strength was being siphoned from his magical core – out through the Meteor spell he could no longer shut off – and towards Acnologia's gaping maw.

The Dragon of Magic, indeed, he thought, dully, as he began to fall.

Zeref had warned them about Acnologia's power. He had stressed the dangers of using non-Dragon-Slayer magic against him: in the best case scenario, it would not pierce his magic-resistant scales, and in the worst, he would react quickly enough to absorb it into himself, increasing his own strength.

Turned out it wasn't only direct attacks he could absorb. An angry Acnologia – and all his burning hate was focussed on Jellal, now – could draw in any magic that remained too close for too long.

Like him.

At first, Jellal wasn't overly concerned. Pragmatism triumphed over fear; once he fell far enough away from Acnologia, his magic would work again, and he could fly back to the airship to recover.

He hadn't counted on the fact that he had antagonized a particularly vengeful dragon.

Wounded and humiliated, Acnologia wasn't about to let a mere human defy him. As Jellal fell, the Dragon of the Apocalypse bore down upon him, mouth open to deliver one final breath attack. Overkill, certainly, but nothing else could satisfy the magnitude of his hate.

Realization came to Jellal so late that he had no time to fear it.

Liquid light blazed in Acnologia's throat, rising up, disintegrating in an instant the spike they had fought so hard to pierce him with, and all their hopes along with it.

And then the light of his breath attack winked out.

No, it wasn't just an absence of light – it was a presence of darkness. Black gas billowed where energy had previously surged.

Acnologia pulled out of his dive. His own claw dug into his already-ruined throat. Screams rent the air, so terrible that Jellal could not help but close his eyes, wishing he could do the same to his ears.

Then the ocean demanded his attention by sharp proximity, and he was not the least surprised to find that his magic came with its usual bright-burning ease. Shockwaves of water burst up around him as he reversed direction inches from its surface and arced back towards the ship.

Acnologia was also turning back towards the airship, shrieking and howling and roaring in his agony.

Yet no matter how ear-splitting his roars were, they never became more than impotent waves of sound.

Somehow, his breath attack, the signature weapon of all dragons, had been stripped from him.

Jellal tumbled onto the deck and remained there, breathing hard.

"What did you do?" Rogue breathed from behind him, awed.

"It wasn't me," Jellal told him, just as perplexed. The swirling darkness that had somehow saved him had come from nowhere… except it hadn't, had it? It had appeared at the exact moment Acnologia's attempt at a breath attack had vaporized the steel bowsprit lodged in his throat…

Eyes widening, he rounded on Zeref. "You hollowed out the ship's bowsprit and filled it with magic barrier particles!"

Zeref smirked.

And just this once, Jellal could not blame him for it. That had been Zeref's plan all along, hadn't it? The anti-magic particles now lining Acnologia's throat would absorb any further breath attacks he tried, just as he himself had been absorbing their magic. With one blow, the Dragon of the Apocalypse had been crippled.

"Well?" Zeref prompted, his eyes sparkling. "Ready to concede that you picked the right side yet?"

Shaking his head, Jellal remarked, "You know, this would go a lot more smoothly if you actually told us your full plan in advance."

"Where would be the fun in that?" Zeref shrugged. "Besides, it was important that we didn't look too confident, or Acnologia would have suspected something. It's the same reason why we couldn't step in earlier for you and Sting," he added, glancing at Rogue. "Acnologia was suspicious all the way. He only let his guard down once you had given up. The fewer people who know the actual plan, the fewer people there are to accidentally give it away by their actions."

"Then we've got to keep up this momentum!" Rogue exclaimed, scrambling for Frosch, who lifted him back into the sky with a chirp. Sting and Lector followed eagerly.

Only Jellal remained exactly where he was, staring up at Zeref, that old suspicion back in his eyes.

Zeref spread his hands in a gesture of exasperation. "What have I done wrong now?"

"Am I to take it, from the fact that you've now changed tactics entirely and are sending our mages back into the fight with confidence, that you're entirely out of tricks, and are now attempting to bluff Acnologia into thinking you're not?"

Zeref's grin only widened. "Ah, you got me." Then his amusement seemed to fade a little, and he gestured between the ship and the dragon. "Look at how far he pushed us from the rift in space during that brief skirmish," he said, and Jellal's eyes widened; he had been so focussed on surviving that he hadn't noticed until Zeref had pointed it out. "He's no fool; he knows what we're up to. Now that we've proven we're a real threat in battle, though – and weakened him too – he'll have no choice but to focus on fighting us for real. This is our chance to get him where we want him."

Clasping his hands behind his back, Zeref turned once more to the horizon and the wounded silhouette of the dragon twisting, enraged, before it. "At the rate he can absorb magic, those barrier particles will become saturated in no time, and he'll have his breath weapon back – assuming he hasn't smashed my airship apart with his claws or tail by then. We have to force him through the rift while we have the upper hand."

"Now that's something we can both agree on," Jellal said quietly, and with a burst of light, he was back in the fight.

Brilliant man, His Majesty.

Fantastic strategist. Unparalleled mage. Great leader. There was no one Ajeel would rather follow into battle.

Unfortunately, while His Majesty clearly knew an awful lot about tactics and fighting dragons, there were some things he didn't seem to understand at all.

Like the fact that you couldn't rip a huge chunk off the airship and expect the handling to stay the same.

Ajeel had thought something was off about the airship's balance from the start, but he had chalked it down to the fact that the imperial command ship had been built to a unique specification, and he had had few chances to fly it before. Turned out, it was in fact because His Majesty had filled part of it with magic barrier particles. Typical, that. Bloodman hadn't been invited to the battle – probably because him fighting in close proximity to a group of allied mages was a terrible idea – and yet His Majesty had still found a way to make him contribute.

That stroke of genius, however, was somewhat let down by the way that His Majesty's plan had treated the bowsprit as detachable, heedless to the fact that it actually had quite an important function in the smooth operation of the ship.

Sure, the airship didn't strictly need one, not having an actual mast or sails to support, but it didn't change the fact that its balance had been calculated to include one. Without it, the airship had an irritating tendency to tilt backwards in the middle of an attack.

The responsibility of preventing that now fell to Ajeel, using bursts of thrust as counterbalances, all while piloting the airship in a dogfight with a humongous dragon.

Brilliant man, His Majesty, but sometimes his expectations were a little bit unrealistic.

Also, it was bloody difficult to fly a ship that kept disappearing.

Jacob's magic was great and all, and the look on Acnologia's scaly little face when the jewel of the imperial fleet had seemingly swooped in out of nowhere had been priceless, but it wasn't exactly designed to hide a magically enhanced airship from something as sensitive as a dragon. Even with August helping, their magic wasn't exactly… stable. Whenever they forced the ship to vanish from Acnologia's senses, it and everyone on board would slowly become transparent to those within the magic too.

Ajeel had discovered that moving his field of view would reset it back to solidity, but it would soon begin fading once more. The only way to keep the ship in his sight was for him to keep moving his head. So either he couldn't see the ship, and missed out on valuable information like their precise proximity to Acnologia's tail, or he could see it, but was too dizzy to do anything with the information.

Also, had he mentioned how difficult it was to aim with old-fashioned cannons? Having no target lock was bad enough, but the projectiles were actually affected by gravity, of all things! It was all well and good His Majesty switching out the weapons, given Acnologia's ability to absorb magic, but had he ever actually tried to use one? There was a reason they'd been phased out of the fleet decades ago!

And yeah, sure, Ajeel was a good pilot – the best, in fact – but he was an even better mage. Yet he was stuck here with an uncooperative ship and useless cannons, having to concentrate just to bring his own hands into focus, while those wimpy Dragon Slayers and the renegade Fiorean mage His Majesty had an unhealthy obsession with were out there actually fighting!

All of which went some way towards explaining why-

"ARE YOU EVEN WATCHING WHERE WE'RE FLYING?"

-Dimaria's commentary was not to be taken as an accurate assessment of his performance.

"What am I supposed to be watching, exactly?" he snapped back. "The invisible ship's wheel, or the non-existent bowsprit?"

"Uh, how about the enormous dragon we're flying towards?"

'Towards' wasn't a particularly well-defined term at the moment, given that he lost track of precisely where the ship was heading every time he blinked, but as close as they had drawn to Acnologia, unseen, it wasn't quite enough for the limited accuracy of their cannons. The Dragon Slayers and their flying cats were avoiding claws and teeth with a grace that made the finest ship in the Alvarez fleet shudder with envy. "Just a little closer… there!"

As Acnologia snapped at a slightly-too-slow Dragon Slayer – Ajeel didn't particularly care which one it was – he fired the main cannon from so close he couldn't possibly miss.

Had the cannon been where he thought it was, that is.

Rather than striking the dragon right in the open wound in his neck, the cannonball glanced off his wing joint. Acnologia stopped trying to help himself to a tasty airborne snack and fluttered his wing to recover his balance – and, because luck hadn't been on Ajeel's side since his emperor had first started to reveal his hand, and that hand had taken for granted a lot of very difficult aerial manoeuvres, it just so happened that Acnologia's flailing wing coincided with the airship's escape route.

The ship may have been hidden from sight and sound and smell, but it was still there, and that brief contact was enough for Acnologia to glean its location. He twisted faster than they had thought possible and lashed out with his tail, and chaos ensued.

In Ajeel's defence, the barrel roll was a perfectly valid evasive manoeuvre.

It was just a shame that his teammates out on the open deck didn't agree.

He wasn't stupid, he'd deliberately picked a positive-G roll, they were never in any danger of falling to their deaths – but it seemed the non-pilots amongst them hadn't realized that. Whether it was the sudden shock of finding the open sky below them, or simply the unexpectedness of it, Jacob's spell failed. The airship snapped back into visibility. While Ajeel struggled to level out the ship again, Acnologia gleefully twisted away with the elegance the ship would have had if it were whole, and swept out again with his tail.

The starboard plates crumpled immediately. Cursing, Ajeel wrestled with the controls, trying to guess whether the next strike would come from jaws or wings or tail-

A brilliant blast of white light struck Acnologia between his open jaws. Dragon Slayer magic; the only kind he couldn't consume. Caught by surprise, the dragon jerked backwards. The veil of invisibility fell over the ship again immediately. Understanding a moment too late, Acnologia struck at the place where the airship had vanished, but Ajeel had already pulled it into a dive, out of sight and now out of reach.

Only when the dragon's attention had reluctantly returned to those pesky flying Dragon Slayers did Ajeel level out the ship with a snap of his wrist. It drifted to a gentle hover above the ocean waves as he assessed the on-screen diagnostics. That had been close. Too close. If Acnologia got hold of the ship, it wouldn't take much for him to cripple it, and then only those capable of flight would be able to carry on.

Change of plan, then. He'd have to wait for the dragon to let his guard down before closing in again.

Ajeel had barely begun to lean on the thrust when someone yanked his hand away from the controls. "Don't you think you've done enough damage?" Dimaria snapped.

"Get off!" He tried and failed to push her away. "I'm the pilot here!"

"Yeah, well, you're only making things worse, aren't you? The ship's armour can't withstand Acnologia's attacks without His Majesty's help, and your aim is about as good as a blind man trying to throw an axe with his teeth – it'd be better for everyone if you stay out of it and let Jacob and August hide the ship. The Dragon Slayers are doing a fine job of baiting Acnologia without your selfish dreams of glory getting in the way."

Now he did round on her, controls forgotten. The airship's puzzled whine faded into the wind along with the visibility of its engines. "Just because you're not able to do anything useful doesn't mean you get to drag me down to the depths of uselessness with you! They need me to drive Acnologia back-"

"No, Dimaria's right," a cool voice cut in. "Hang back, Ajeel. Jellal and the Dragon Slayers will have a better chance of forcing Acnologia towards the rift without us getting in the way."

"But-"

"That's an order."

Ajeel growled, but his emperor's black eyes were as hard as the metaphorical dagger their owner had driven into his back. Even when he turned away, he could feel them boring deeper into him, until he shoved his hands into the pockets of his baggy trousers, making it abundantly clear that he wasn't going to disobey.

Even if it was the stupidest order His Majesty had ever given him.

What was he thinking, leaving everything up to those Fiorean strangers? Alright, maybe they were doing better at avoiding Acnologia's attacks than the airship, but that was just because they were tiny. Put one of them in charge of a ship this size and Acnologia would have feasted before they'd even reached the ocean.

It was only a matter of time before the dragon got them. It wasn't as if they could hurt him – much – and they clearly had no experience of fighting in the air, let alone any concept of how to deal with a different-sized opponent. Not like Ajeel. They wouldn't stand a chance if he had been their opponent.

No, as commander of the imperial air fleet – and knowing that their soon-to-be enemies lacked a substantial air fleet but famously had strong mages who used their pets for flight – he had been dialling back their standard airship-to-airship training in favour of techniques for dealing with small, weak, but mobile assailants.

In fact, in this situation, there was one obvious course of action: let the Dragon Slayers lead him where they wanted, while striking back just enough to keep them focussed; wait as their repetitive patterns of attack became laughably predictable… and then come alive in a fury of explosions and magic, engines leaping back to full capability, obliterating them before they even realized what was going on…

Which, come to think of it, was exactly how Acnologia was acting, wasn't it?

Ajeel blinked, and looked again at the scene before him. This time, it seemed less like the Dragon Slayers were agile, and more like the dragon was sluggish; less that they were luring him in and more that they were being allowed to lure him – as if a dragon that consumed magic like Brandish consumed gelato somehow couldn't sense the magical distortion that they were clearly leading him towards…

That was the thing about His Majesty.

Brilliant man. Incredible strategist. Knew exactly how to win a war.

But sometimes, when it came to the battles that made up said war… it paid to have someone around with a little more experience of fighting.

Ajeel slammed hard on the thrust and the airship launched itself forward.

"Ajeel!" His Majesty snapped.

"I warned you he couldn't follow orders!" Dimaria exclaimed.

"I told you to leave it to Sting and Rogue!" His Majesty started forward, eyes flashing, perhaps to do with force what his words alone had failed to do, only for Ajeel to round on him angrily.

"Why do you trust those strangers from Fiore more than you trust me?" he demanded furiously. "I have served you faithfully my entire life! Do I really mean that little to you?"

An electric moment strained the air between them, neck prickling, hairs rising, static eclipsing the rush of the wind, stillness eclipsing the chaos they were rushing towards.

And as quickly as it had come, the tension snapped. His Majesty turned away as if he'd simply lost interest. The only indication that anyone had rebelled against him and lived to tell the tale was the curt words, thrown back over the wind: "Do as you wish."

"Yeah, and you'll thank me for it later!" Ajeel retorted.

"Why are you facilitating his recklessness?" Dimaria demanded of their emperor.

But the only person Ajeel would have even considered stopping for was the one who had decided he no longer cared, and his attention was already back on the dragon he was flying the ship towards at maximum speed.

Not a moment too soon.

Ajeel was the only one not surprised when the sedate dragon exploded into a twister of tooth and talon. Those Dragon Slayers had clearly never given any serious thought to how to fight a massive dragon, or how a massive dragon might fight them in return.

Still, it was worth it to see the looks on their faces when Acnologia's killing blow smashed into the side of the materializing ship rather than the hapless dark-haired mage. Roaring, Acnologia rotated and lashed out with his tail, attempting to knock the other Slayer from the sky. Ajeel had seen that one coming, too; had already twisted the ship to match it, taking the blow against the stern. The Dragon Slayers fluttered aside, astonished but unharmed.

That was what happened when you let someone who knew what he was doing join the fight.

The groan of crumpling steel shot down Ajeel's satisfaction mid-flight. No amount of reinforced armour plating could stand up to a dragon, and His Majesty, who had done a decent job with that golden sphere earlier, had apparently stopped paying attention to the battle. Ajeel wrested the ship away, waiting for Jacob to get his act together and hide the ship again.

Acnologia had other ideas. With a slither of scales, he vanished under the airship.

Ajeel froze, his fingers static over the controls, waiting, wondering, guessing and discarding and guessing again, because he knew by now that no one else was going to work it out-

Then he heard claws sinking into metal like it was flesh; then the lever ceased to vibrate in his hand; then he felt the dread as gravity kicked in, starting with his stomach and swiftly spreading to the rest of him.

And he knew without having to look at the diagnostic reports what he would see if he did – what someone should have considered from the moment the battle began.

Acnologia was the Dragon of Magic.

Their ship was powered by magic.

To be precise, it was powered by an enormous magic-fuelled engine, around which Acnologia's jaws were clamped around as he clung underneath the ship.

Dimaria had been seething before Acnologia had brazenly decided to exploit the airship's weakness.

She had been seething even before His Majesty's idiotic decision to look the other way as Ajeel – Ajeel! – gambled all their lives for a moment of glory.

She had been seething ever since he called her 'useless'.

Such a vehement response might have surprised her colleagues, who would be hard-pressed to name a day in recent times when she and her not-boyfriend hadn't exchanged insults ten times worse just in passing, but this was different. In an astonishing turn-up for the books, Ajeel was right.

She was useless. Ajeel was their pilot; Jacob and August, working together, were the only reason the ship had lasted so long; those mages from Fiore were pushing the Dragon of the Apocalypse back towards the rift in space – and yet she, who had fought harder than anyone to join the battle, was useless.

Couldn't use her magic in case it was adversely affected by the rift in the universe, couldn't fire a cannon, couldn't fly to act as bait, couldn't even shout sensible instructions without them being overruled by His Majesty's moment of madness.

Useless.

But the thing was, she knew that. She was seething not in denial of it, but because she was all too aware of it, fighting to catch a glimpse of a role she could play despite it.

So when Acnologia's attack suddenly rendered all of their efforts useless, it was only fitting that she, who had accepted that long ago, was the first to react.

Magic or no magic, she had never known fear.

That was why she threw herself over the edge of the ship while everyone else hesitated and landed right on Acnologia's head.

The turbulence of the engine shuddered through the scales beneath her feet, its power drawn endlessly down into that same black maw that would consume the world and everything in it, if they let him have his way – but she held her ground, her balance, her nerve; raised her sword in both hands and drove it towards Acnologia's right eye.

Acnologia jerked his head to the side.

The movement threw her off-balance. The blade shattered against his scales instead, breaking into jagged chunks of metal which fled before him. Dimaria considered the few inches left protruding from the hilt with a scowl. But he'd had to let go of the engines to do that, and if she could keep distracting him-

The dragon gave a mighty toss of his head, hurling her away. She struck the underside of the ship back-first. There were no stars in her vision, no dizzying pain; her resolve was stronger than both as she kicked off, diving straight into the dragon's open jaws and stabbing the broken blade into the roof of his mouth.

The force of his bellow of pain might have been the only thing preventing her from tumbling down his gullet, clinging to the hilt while his tongue writhed beneath her feet.

Suffering, yes. Dying? Not even close.

If only the blade hadn't broken, she thought bitterly, driving the fragment deeper with every last bit of vindictiveness in her body. Could've reached his brain. Could've taken him with me.

Then there was an arm around her, and a glowing orb of force encircling her – encircling them. Acnologia bit down and couldn't penetrate it. Couldn't kill her. The dragon choked, thrown by his prey's apparent resilience, but it hadn't been her that had cast the shield. No, that was His Majesty's magic, who shouldn't have cared enough to intervene for the life of a servant, let alone one who had acted so stupidly… but who, when he had told them he was not prepared to lose a single one of them today, had meant every word.

The sphere wavered, nothing like as strong as the first one he had invoked, but it had lasted long enough for that blue-haired Fiorean mage to catch up with them. He seized Dimaria's hand and dragged her back towards the deck of the ship.

She glanced over her shoulder as they flew. The Shadow Dragon Slayer was there, rushing in with a breath attack, but it was only a distraction, throwing forth a wave of magic Acnologia couldn't consume so he wouldn't bother trying.

And behind it was His Majesty, his expression cold, his eyes the eyes of an ancient god. He clasped his hands together and swung them down with more magic than Dimaria had thought existed in the entire world.

If they had been over the land, she thought the impact would have split open the world to its core. As it happened, Acnologia smashed into the sea and kept falling, barely slowed, until the ocean's alien depths swallowed him from their sight.

Then she was back on the ship – although that brought no respite, for the ship was also in spiralling freefall, and the ocean had already proven its appetite.

"Why are we still falling?" she shouted.

"Engines won't reignite!" Ajeel retorted, hammering at the controls.

"Are you a mage or not? Lift us up on a wave of sand or something!"

"Sure, if you want to damage the internals further, and remove all chance of us flying again!"

Dimaria made a strangled sound. "Are you telling me that the lead vessel of a fleet which you were supposed to be commanding doesn't have any kind of protection against sandstorms?"

"It had protections against everything! Then Acnologia got a bit peckish!"

"Well, at least do something!"

"Like what?"

"You're the pilot; you figure it out!"

Before it could escalate further, there was a twist of space and their emperor materialized beside her. Her hopes of a rescue were quickly dashed, however. He was barely able to breathe through the tremors of invoking so much magic at once, let alone lift the ship telekinetically. It was all he could do just to order, "Prepare for landing."

"On what?" Ajeel demanded. "The ship can't land on water! I don't think it'll even float!"

"It won't be a water landing," His Majesty said grimly.

Ajeel's laugh was almost hysterical. "There's nothing but water for miles around!"

"Do it, Ajeel."

The sand mage sucked in a breath. "I guess it's only the fifth or so time I've flown into certain death today," he acceded, and turned back to the controls.

Below, a shadow was surging up from the deep. Quickening, sharpening, raging, it came like black lightning, death rising, ready to burst through the water's surface and send the battered ship down to the depths of hell in its place.

There was an enormous release of magic, and the ocean's surface became dazzlingly bright.

A sickening thud came from beneath as Acnologia found, to his surprise, that the barrier between sea and sky was no longer metaphorical.

And instead of the thunderous splash those on the ship were expecting as they crash-landed, there was a solid crack, and a splintering thump, as the ship hit and bounced and then spun across the newly frozen sea.

Landing gear screeched. Engines whimpered. The hull scratched and shivered, and slowly, reluctantly, the airship came to a halt.

His Majesty smiled. "About time you showed up, Invel."