Alrighty! Finally got a spare moment to post this (I have fallen victim to the same great time devourer as many others on this site: College), thank you all for your patience and reviews! I hope you enjoy this!

Review Response: Dear Blaise Welshman, hello there! Yes, I can see how that would get annoying. I'm replying to you here by the way because I can't seem to PM you, the site won't give me the option. Sorry about that. Thank you for sticking with the story despite the lack of hype! Hopefully it will grow on you.

Dear WhiteWolf815, hey there! (tips hat) Your wish is my command, prepare for another cliffhanger! (laughs) I figured people would figure it out pretty fast. This arc is going to be ... interesting to write... Hope you enjoy the update!

Dear Guest, greetings! Then clearly I have done my work well. Enjoy the update!

Dear Guest, hello! That's basically what Wren's thinking, yeah. The only answer I can give is that I was bored and my friend has too much fun throwing out weird ideas.

Dear masimagine, hi! Yep, she still has magic and nope, she's not in a different universe. Remember the counterparts to the Whitebeard crew from One Piece showing up? This is like that, but on a larger, scarier scale. You're welcome and (winks) you might just get your wish granted if you stick around long enough!

Dear Guest, hello there! No one ever said Fairy Tail Luck was pretty. Eh, it'll be fine ... eventually.

Dear Captain343Spark, hey there! I would lecture you about good sleeping habits but ... I think I'm a bit too flattered that you were up so late reading my story. Glad you enjoyed!

Author's Note: So, just a reminder, WREN IS NOT IN A DIFFERENT UNIVERSE. This is me dropping counterparts of places and people into Earthland to flesh it out. Sorta like how Mystogan was (spoilers) Jellal from Edolas. Everything else will be revealed in time. Also, for those who read my other stories, I'm working on them still. Ballad is giving me writer's block again and the AMOSC chapter is turning into a monster-length one, but I'm still working on them. I also hope to have the next chapter of ER up as soon as I have another pocket of free time. All that aside, enjoy the chapter and beware the Cliffhanger at the end!

Copyright Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail or any references made in this story. The only things I own are my OCs and the Plot.

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Chapter Thirty-Eight: First Contact

(2 years, 3 months, 2 weeks, 6 days since joining Fairy Tail)

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A hand running through short brown hair, "We're getting closer to The Storm, you should be able to see it from here."

The flash of curious gray eyes, "The Storm?"

A short nod, the taste of salt on the fresh air as they all listened intently, "The Storm is — magical turbulence. It causes a massive storm and fog bank that lasts all year long. No — survives going in."

A narrowed gaze, judging the rising black clouds in the distance, "So why are we?"

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Thunder. Pounding rain. A sudden, almighty crash that shook her teeth. The split-second realization that the wall on her right was gone and water was everywhere-get-her-out-get-her-out-can't-breathe-

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Thunder snarled, loud and long, and Wren woke up.

She stared blankly at the stone wall in front of her, mouth open in silent gasps as she struggled to catch the vestiges of memory that had been floating through her mind. A storm … a magical storm? We … went into it? How? Why? Where were we, what were we doing? Who is we? The Raijinshū to start with, she was sure she remembered flashes of Freed's hair and hearing Laxus's voice in the dream. But there had been someone else, someone familiar —who's voice was that and why could she not remember the sound of it now that she was awake?—, telling them something important. She hadn't caught all the words, but clearly something more had been going on than going to the guild for lunch.

A chill settled in her spine, How long have I been gone? Because if she was right and that had been another flash of her missing memories, than it couldn't have happened on the same day she last remembered. The gap was bigger than she'd thought, and there was something very important trapped inside it.

Wren closed her eyes to concentrate past the hollow drumming of rain —it must have started sometime during her sleep, but it was falling heavy and hard now—. She needed a plan. Wherever she was —she refused to think of it as another world, wouldn't give in to the despair that possibility would bring—, she needed to figure out where it was in relation to Fiore, needed a plan to get out and away from the titans that lurked … wherever here was.

With shaking hands, she dug her thermos and an energy bar out of her Requip space —she could feel her blood-sugar wavering, magical exhaustion always did that and she'd need a clear head to think more— and carefully took a few sips of water before putting it back in Requip and yanking open the wrapper of the bar. She crumpled up the wrapper and put it in her pocket to throw away later —a lost, oversized person in this place she may be, a litterer she was not— and began slowly munching on the bar.

The taste of apple, cinnamon, and oats hit her tongue and made her stomach growl faintly. She ate slowly as she glared at the wall opposite her hiding place and tried to figure out what to do. Her magical reserves were better, but still on the low side, so willy-nilly teleportation was out. She didn't like the idea of just walking in a random direction and hoping she'd find answers and not titans.

She was so wrapped up in her own problems and keeping a magical sense out for titans that she didn't notice the faint clatter of tiny footsteps approaching the church over the sound of the roaring rain. What she did notice was the ominous groan of one of the church doors creaking open and the rain growing louder through the new opening. Her heart slammed into her throat and she instinctively curled her feet underneath her body in preparation to run or fight, titans? But they don't know how to open doors do they? They just smash things in their way. And I don't sense them, so what-?

She strained her hearing, not daring to move from her spot, and felt her lungs falter in surprise as she picked up a breathless mutter of, "Hurry … in here!" People? What are people doing in the middle of titan territory? That isn't anyone from Fairy Tail. Wait, then that means that they're-

There was scuffling and a muffled whimper, followed by a tired apology and the sounds of the church door being forced shut, partially muting the drum of falling water once more. Tiny footsteps scuffled closer and Wren pressed herself as far into her corner as she could as she listened, "Easy," the voice was female, with a thick twang of an accent Wren couldn't place that was made thicker by exhaustion, "This i' where tha map said tha emergency supplies for this sector were stashed, righ'?" The question had worry laced in it, a prompting tone that made Wren immediately think that the speaker was more trying to get a response out of the other person than asking out of actual curiosity.

A pained grunt and a panting male voice answered, "…Right. The walls are pretty thick and the rain is so heavy… Unless a titan passes right by the church … this place should … be safe for a few hours."

"Right. Great. Let's jus' get ya somewhere dry, then Ah'll fin' tha medical supplies an' tha towels. Ya'll be fixed up in no time, ya'll see."

The voices were coming closer and Wren kept her body as still as possible, trying frantically to decide if she should flee via the shadows or stay put. Her fear of the monsters wandering around somewhere outside was greater than her instinctual fear of whoever was coming —even though she had a strong suspicion that they were going to be noticeably smaller than she— and so she stayed frozen in place as the speakers rounded the crates and made for the opposite corner Wren was curled up in.

The lighting was extremely dim from the rain and lack of lamps, but she could see that they were very small. The tallest of the two was only a single foot in height if she guessed right, though it was hard to tell with him leaning so heavily on the shorter one —who was maybe ten inches? It was hard to tell—. The taller —the man— was clearly hurt, one leg was dragging slightly behind him and couldn't take much of his weight and his breathing was labored and pained. The smaller —the girl, woman? She sounded too young to be a woman, but that might have just been the smaller vocal cords— had exhaustion in her body posture, but was clearly pushing on with a cheerful facade for the sake of her comrade.

Both of them were wearing the iconic jackets and 3D maneuvering gear of the Survey Corps. Their green capes were tattered almost beyond recognition, the hoods being one of the only things intact, if soaked by the rain. Their gear was dented, and one of the man's —blade holsters? Hip canisters? Jets? She forgot the proper title so she'd just pick one— hip canisters had a concave as big as her thumb —which was pretty big on equipment that small—. Tellingly, it was on the same side as the man's injured leg, making her suspect that whatever else had happened to them —on foot and only two of them in a titan-infested area in the heavy rain couldn't be a normal or good thing—, the man had had a very intimate meeting with a large immovable object of some kind in the recent past. As someone who had, in the past three and a half years of her life, had many such intimate encounters with things including but not limited to rocks, trees, roads, ground, buildings, monster abs —don't ask—, and in one case a monster tooth the size of a carriage —not the same monster as the abs, but don't ask—, she sympathized.

As the person who was definitely too tall to go unnoticed if either of the two desperate —presumably armed and used to killing things bigger than themselves— Survey Corps members looked her way, Wren did her best to stay absolutely still. She wasn't even breathing really, just taking the tiniest puffs of air through her nose and praying neither of them noticed. Of course, if they turned around, she was ninety percent sure that they would see her anyway, but she could hope, right? She really didn't want to have to leave her shelter because of two freaking out lilliputians who would probably attack her on sight but that she couldn't dare fight back against because they were so small.

The girl eased the man down against the wall dangerously close to Wren's corner, rambling all the while about what she was going to do and how her friend would be fine and how the titans wouldn't find them there and how her friend would be fine. The man just nodded faintly once in a while, eyes squeezed shut from what was probably a mix of exhaustion and pain.

The girl then turned around and Wren officially stopped breathing from the tension. There was a long pause as the girl's eyes roved over Wren's side of the church, but —to Wren's internal astonishment— there was no freezing or shouting or pulling of swords. She just stumbled her way over to the crates Wren was huddled beside, her hands slightly outstretched as if to ward off unseen walls. Wait, unseen. Oh. She has bad night vision.

Which was understandable, Wren had no idea what time it was, but the church was completely unlit on the inside and any ambient light from the outdoors was being thoroughly smothered by the pouring rain. Wren's night vision was good, partially by nature but mostly because of practice —thank you, three years of being an Aternum street rat, thank you, all those times Fairy Tail Luck struck at night while on a job—, but she knew other people could have terrible night vision. Evergreen was basically blind as soon as the sun went down unless she had a lamp, for example. This girl must have terrible night vision too.

That didn't stop Wren from holding her breath as the girl growled and wrestled her way into crate after crate in search of medical supplies. Somehow, despite the terrible night vision that kept her from noticing the large boot she kept almost stumbling into, the girl managed to locate bandages, what looked like a jar of paste, and a bottle of what Wren thought was alcohol and shuffle her way back to the man. Wren dared to inhale again as quietly as she could, only to resume holding her breath when the girl stumbled back to the boxes and rustled about until she found a small oil lamp, a teeny matchbox, and a bundle of blankets —all from different crates, Wren wondered if the girl was just lucky or if there was some kind of uniform organization system for Survey Corps safe house supplies—. Wren watched tensely as the girl finally bumbled her way, cursing and talking about everything and nothing, back to the man and crouched down in front of him.

When the oil lamp flickered to life a few seconds later, Wren felt like she was going to have a heart attack. The girl's back was to her, but all the man had to do was open his eyes and he was sure to see the tip of Wren's boot just inside the ring of light at the very least, if not the rest of her huddled form. She didn't dare move her boot though, any noise might draw their attention and she wanted her secrecy to last as long as possible. Wren thought briefly of just ducking into the shadows, but her reserves were still on the low side and she didn't want to waste her magic if she could help it —because what if she had to run from or, Mavis forbid, fight a titan in the near future? She'd need all the magic she could get then—.

She tried to distract herself by breathing lightly and observing the two strangers in the better lighting of the oil lamp. The girl had shaggy red hair plastered against her neck and shoulders, just long enough to pull into pigtails if she'd wanted —maybe she usually did? For some reason the red hair was niggling Wren's memory with flashes of pigtails and the word "aniki"—. The man had dark, brown-blond hair and angular features that might have been handsome if his expression hadn't been so pinched from pain —she hoped he didn't have internal injuries, that would be really bad for the two of them out here—. She couldn't tell what his eye color was, because his eyes were still screwed shut as the girl wrestled him out of his ruined 3D maneuvering gear and began cutting off part of the pants on his injured leg to access the injury.

They were talking quietly, mostly the girl but partially the man when prompted, and Wren felt a bit bad for accidentally eavesdropping as the two talked about comrades in the corps and what they were going to do for their leave when they got back and how Levi-aniki was going to kick their butts for disappearing for so long. The last part had Wren muffling a gasp as memory zipped through her head. Red haired girl, blond boy, Levi-aniki, they can't be… they can't be the two from Levi's backstory can they? What were their names…? She didn't remember. It had been so long since she'd been forced to watch the anime —she hated losing bets, seriously hated them, the punishments were always too creative for her liking—. She barely remembered the names of the three main characters and the coolest character —because Levi was the coolest if also the meanest— and bits and pieces of the first season plot.

The only reason she remembered the Levi backstory episode/OVA thing at all was because it had broken her heart so badly to see Levi's two best friends massacred by the titans —she hated gory anime, hated it, it was more nightmare-inducing than most live-action movies she'd seen—. But that was just it, she'd seen them get killed on … hadn't it been their first mission outside the Walls? So how were these two here?

Then again, this was supposed to be Earthland and, assuming she hadn't fallen into yet another dimension somehow, that meant these two would be less the canon characters of the anime and more … counterparts of those characters. Like Ichiya and Nichiya or Jellal and Mystogan right? So it was theoretically possible that if one anime world was real, there could be counterparts of characters from even more anime worlds living in worlds where they weren't the "main characters", wasn't it?

…That thought brought up so many potential headaches she was going to stop thinking about it right now and come back to it another time —hopefully never— because there was no way she wanted to think about possibly meeting some of the characters of other anime she'd seen —Madara, Naruto, Ichigo, Light, Kaneki—.

Yeah, no, not dealing with that thought now —or ever—. Back to her current dilemma of being crammed in a corner with two oblivious tiny people who would no doubt freak out once they spotted her. Which she couldn't really do anything about without wasting magic and giving up her shelter, neither of which she could really do without.

Maybe she could reason with them when they noticed her? No, wait, she was mute and moving her hands would probably just make it worse. Maybe they'd be observant enough to notice that she was wearing clothes and hadn't attacked the moment they came in and put some of the pieces together themselves?

Yeah … no. Probably not. Fairy Tail Luck wasn't that nice.

Case in point, in the middle of her musing, she heard a stifled gasp. Snapping out of her thoughts, she refocused on the pair and accidentally locked gazes with the frightened blue eyes of the man. His mouth was open in a silent scream, face a picture of confusion and hopelessness and terror that broke Wren's heart instantly. The girl stiffened at her comrade's expression and whirled around, holding the lamp up high and throwing the rest of Wren's knees and face into sharp relief. Wren could practically see the thoughts flashing through the girl's head in the span of those frozen seconds were nobody dared move. There was confusion, terror, fury, despair, and the heart-wrenching expression of someone who wanted to cry and scream because life wasn't fair but didn't because they'd already learned years ago that those things wouldn't help.

In the back of her mind, a part of Wren acknowledged just why people like Gaara had been so messed up by their childhoods. Because seeing those expressions directed at her —ones that silently screamed monster, demon, hated and feared— was already tearing her heart open. She couldn't imagine what it would be like to spend a lifetime growing up seeing those expressions directed at her all the time, from everyone.

The man unfroze first, face crumbling in total despair and his shoulders slumping as he sank further against the wall, his every motion screaming that he was just … giving up. That he thought his fate was already sealed. The girl on the other hand, came unfrozen with a desperate string of curses and a hand scrambling for the hilt sticking out of the hip canisters. She yanked the hilt free, revealing a broken stub of a blade that flashed in the lamp light as she spread her feet in a defensive stance and placed herself more fully between Wren and the man. Green eyes flashed with anger and despair, but also a stubborn determination to keep fighting —because someone was behind her, someone she loved as kin, and had that been Wren's expression some of the times she put herself between danger and the Raijinshū? That mix of fire and anguish that spoke of someone with nothing to lose from fighting but everything to lose from giving up?—.

The man's voice shook as he raised his voice for the first time, "Isabel, what are you doing? Don't be stupid! Get out of here! Run! Run while it's busy with- with me!"

The girl —Isabel, that was her name, Wren remembered that now— bared her teeth in a feral expression despite the shaking of her hands, "No!"

"Isabel-!"

"Ah didn't leave yah behind two weeks ago, Ah ain't leavin' yah behind now!" A stubby blade —it must have gotten broken sometime before they came to the church— waved emphatically in Wren's direction, "Well? Come on yah bloody monster! Come get steel!"

Wren didn't move except for a quiet blink of confusion. Because how was she —a mute— supposed to respond to that? Shy away? Hold still? Try to wave and smile- no wait, smiling would definitely be bad in this situation, titans smiled all the time and giant teeth would be far from a comforting sight for anybody right now. Isabel waved the blade again with a shout of challenge. Wren could see how fast her tiny chest was rising and falling and a tiny voice in the back of Wren's mind whispered panic attack. She would know, she'd had more than enough of them since coming to Earthland.

The much smaller girl suddenly lurched at Wren with a wordless, gut-wrenching cry, sword stub slashing for Wren's … anything really and instinct —steel-blood-pain-bad— made a fraction of the shadows snap up and block the attack before it could reach her. Isabel stumbled back, eyes wide as she stared at the wavering, waist high —for Isabel— shadow shield, speechless. The man leaning against the wall breathed, "A titan … that can use magic…?" And the words seemed to break whatever tiny thread of desperation was keeping Isabel's courage from failing.

The hilt and sword stub clattered to the ground from shaking fingers and Isabel reeled back, crumbling to her knees just in front of her companion as heart-tearing sobs shuddered out of her frame. Tiny, pale hands cradled her face, but Wren didn't need to see to know that tears were streaming down her face, all the stress and terror of whatever had led the two here to the old church finally overwhelming the bravery of someone far too small to shoulder the terrors of the world. Someone who had finally seen the last of her hopes shredded to nothing before her eyes.

The man was crying too now, silent save for his deep gasps air, tears sliding freely down his face and reflecting the weak light of the lantern like twin streams of despair.

Wren felt her throat go tight, tight enough that it hurt to breathe, and tears burned behind her eyelids as she snapped them shut. She didn't want to see them cry because of her —because she wasn't a person to them, she was a monster, a terror that had somehow snuck up on them and destroyed their one hope just by existing—. It hurt. She didn't know them, not really, barely remembered their episode in an anime from years ago, but she didn't have to know them for their reaction —their terror and despair and grief just at the sight of her— to tear her up inside. Knowing that her mere presence was enough to cause this, to trigger a visceral reaction on the same level as she'd felt when seeing that first titan herself…

She took a deep, calculated breath, held it, let it out, then took another and held it too. She couldn't cry right now —not when this was her fault—, the sound would just scare them —remind them she was there, remind them why they were crying like the world had just ended— and they had already been through enough —too much— for her to add to it with her own distress.

She could cry later, just like all the days the world around her got to be too much and she would repress it —repress the knowing of why Gray was so lost, the guilt that she hadn't been able to help, hadn't even tried despite the impossibility—. The days she smiled and pretended she was fine —that she was a child like the rest of them— until everyone else was asleep and she could slip outside to sit on the cliff overlooking the lake and cry, silently scream where no one would hear —where no one else would see and ask what was wrong, look so sad when she didn't tell them and not understand that she couldn't—.

But not right now. Later. It was someone else's turn to cry now, and she had a feeling it was a lot longer in coming than just seeing her —even though the fact that she was the last straw for their tears hurt more than she'd ever known it could—.

So she waited. Forced her tears back and watched with dry, burning eyes as the two lost people in front of her cried and screamed and broke, oblivious to the fact that the thing they feared wasn't hurting them. It felt like hours before they stopped —maybe it was, the rain was still pouring down and time was meaningless in a place like this—. Sometime in between the start and finish, Wren had given in to the hunger pangs making her misery worse and nibbled silently on her energy bar to sate it —the two in front of her hadn't even noticed, but that was okay, she doubted the sounds of oats breaking between teeth as large as hers would have helped their trauma at all—.

By the time their sobs began to calm and their tears ran dry, there was only a lonely, thumb-sized strip of Wren's energy bar still uneaten and the lantern light was flickering in a telltale sign that the oil was running low. Wren watched as they shook and shivered —too small, how easy must it be to catch hypothermia in bodies that small?— and began to sluggishly look around. It was the man who opened his eyes first, an exhausted glaze to them until his gaze settled on Wren and awareness flooded back. His face began to twist with despair again, but then she saw confusion flicker through, stilling the second wave of grief and replacing it with an angry, lost sort of bafflement.

"Isabel." His voice was hoarse and quiet from crying, but the sound carried in the church, loud somehow even over the rain. Red hair bobbed as Isabel looked back at her comrade, sniffing noisily as she made a miserable questioning sound. The man didn't take his eyes away from Wren, blue still staring into larger hazel as he whispered, "We aren't dead yet."

Blank seconds passed before the girl's shoulders went rigid and she twisted around to stare at Wren. Red-rimmed green eyes filled with confusion and Wren waited in silence for several more heartbeats before Isabel rubbed her nose on her arm and choked out, "Why? Why hasn't it- Why didn't it already-?"

It was sympathy that finally unfroze Wren's limbs, the voice in the back of her head reminding her just how miserable and hungry she was after a long crying session like that. Her fingers, hidden behind her curled up knees and still wrapped firmly around the remaining corner of the energy bar shifted, gripped, and twisted. The crackle-snap of oats and glaze sounded like a gunshot in the silence and Isabel and the man both flinched violently, but otherwise didn't move. Slowly, painstakingly slowly, like her joints were made of molasses in winter, Wren lifted a broken piece of the energy bar —the part her lips hadn't yet contaminated— out of her lap.

They watched, seemingly paralyzed as Wren gingerly reached out and set the piece of bar down on the floor in front of them, nudging it a little so that it would slide the rest of the way to rest against Isabel's knees without Wren needing to bring her hand that close. Silent offering given, Wren wrapped her arm around her aching knees —her legs were screaming to stretch out or move in some way, but that would only scare them— and pulled her legs closer to her chest despite her body's protests.

Their eyes dropped to the piece of bar that was at least as big as the man's entire hand and three times as thick and looked at it with total incomprehension. Then their eyes flicked back up to her and Wren pointedly tucked the lower half of her face away —the part that had the mouth and big teeth they had to be so afraid of— behind her knees, only her eyes and forehead still visible to them.

Somehow, Wren wasn't entirely surprised that it was Isabel who first broke the stalemate and tentatively picked up the piece of food —she seemed like a "do first, think later" person really, like Gray or Bickslow were—. The red-head hefted it in her hands, sniffed it suspiciously, then murmured, "This ain't one of ours. 's too big…" Green eyes bounced back over to her and Wren internally jolted with surprise when Isabel cautiously raised her voice and asked, "This yours?"

The man visibly started at her question, then flinched as the motion jarred whatever injuries he had, "Isabel, it's a titan, it can't-" Wren lifted her head above her knees just enough for her nod to be obvious. The man's voice trailed off with a strangled noise and wide blue eyes.

Isabel scrambled to her feet, energy bar still clenched in her hands, eyes gleaming with something … desperate. Not hope, not yet, but something that was like curiosity mixed with the desperate, disbelieving thought that some impossible prayer might be on the cusp of being answered, "Yah can understand me? Yah can- yah understand what Ah'm sayin'?" Wren gave another nod and then, after a heartbeat of indecision, slowly lowered her hand to the floor again. The two tensed immediately, Isabel going so far as to hold her breath, but all Wren did was hover her hand low to the floor and gently swirl her fingers, eyes narrowing in concentration.

It was so much easier to just trace what she wanted into the air, but those movements would be too fast and large for the unsteady nerves of the two watching her, so she just focused on what she wanted to happen, on sending that desire through her fingers to the shadows pooling near her feet. Slowly, tiny tendrils of shadows rose to meet her fingers, twisting and curling uncertainly until they formed the desired shapes. Another twitch of her thumb and forefinger made the shapes slowly spin to face Isabel and the man. This time when the man sucked in a sharp breath, he didn't seem to notice whatever pain it might have caused, too busy staring at the little shadow constructs hovering next to Wren's feet.

"Yes. I understand."