Bickslow stepped out of the lift and into a small room with two small lounges and a plant in the corner. There was an archway opposite the elevator, and he cautiously moved towards it.

"Laxus?" he called out as he walked through the archway.

"Over here," came the reply.

Bickslow stepped into the large open living space. The place was nice, and Bickslow came to the conclusion it wasn't all that surprising that the magic-less Dragon Slayer would end up in the nicest apartment out of everyone, most likely. Bickslow walked over to the large L-shaped lounge that could probably seat way too many people, and looked towards wall with the tall windows as he slowly moved forward. The view from that floor was much nicer than the one in the other apartment. He could actually see the tops of some of the other buildings.

Laxus and Mirajane stood in front of the modern fireplace that sat in the middle of the room; dividing what was essentially the dining room that had a large rectangular glass table with yellow and black leather chairs, and the lounge room with the dark grey sofas.

Bickslow honestly never thought he would be so glad to see Evergreen or Freed – well, it was mostly Evergreen. Freed was okay. Evergreen was sitting on one of the stools at the large black counter while Freed stood just next to her. Bickslow raised an eyebrow as he looked at the woman. "No glasses?"

"No magic," she sighed and Bickslow shrugged.

He looked at everyone else in the room. Laxus seemed to be wearing the exact same clothes he usually did (he even had the coat and all), while Mira had on a burgundy sundress with white polka dots that matched the white flats she had on. Erza's high waisted navy skirt sat over the black sleeveless blouse, and Elfman sat on the end of the lounge next to her. The black shirt he had on looked like it was about to burst at the seams at any point, and Bickslow was a little relieved to see that he wasn't the giant 'beast' in that world. Granted, he was still massive, but not as massive. He was a little less terrifying, really.

He turned, walking over to where Evergreen sat near Freed and took the seat at the counter next to her. It was probably the first time he had seen her in something other than a green dress, too – she'd always liked her dresses, but he had to admit the shorts and the tank top suited her just as well.

Freed, on the other hand, probably surprised Bickslow the most. His long hair that was usually tied low was shorter and messily tied up in a high ponytail. The usual red coat he had on had been replaced by red sweater that he had rolled up to his sleeves, and wore grey jeans that looked as equally uncomfortable as Bickslow's.

Bickslow grinned. "Nice hair."

"I can say the same about you." He folded his arms across his chest before he turned to face Laxus. "Who else are we waiting on now?" Freed asked.

"Gajeel is on his way." Laxus mumbled.

"Gray and Juvia are apparently on their way, too," Erza chimed in. "But I still haven't been able to get hold of Natsu."

"He's probably on a rampage by now or doesn't know how to answer the phone."

Mira smiled slightly, "Lucy wouldn't let him do that. Has anyone seen or heard anything about Lucy? If we can find her, we'll have Natsu, too. Lisanna should be here soon as well."

"Uh…" Bickslow rubbed the back of his head. He hadn't really thought about why the Bickslow and Lucy of that world were married, rather than Natsu and Lucy. Almost everyone in the guild was waiting for the day that one of them realised that they obviously liked each other, but it hadn't happened. But that was in their world. What was so different about the world they were in now? Why was it him instead of Natsu? "About tha—"

"Jesus, Shrimp. Move a little faster, would ya?" Everyone turned or looked in the direction of the two walking through the archway.

"Shut up already!" the small woman shouted as they got closer. "Oh, thank god. I need to sit down." Everyone was staring with their eyes wide and mouths open, except Mira. Mira was most likely internally screaming with delight at the sight. A very pregnant Levy had just taken a seat on the lounge as Gajeel stood just behind the lounge, holding a black and white cat in his arms. His usually long and wild hair was almost the same, instead it ended just above his shoulders. He even had the orange headband he had taken a liking to, and all of the piercings were still there, bar the ones on his arms.

Before anyone could get back to wondering where anyone else was, Gray and Juvia had walked through the archway. Juvia was clinging to Gray's arm as she smiled up at him as he tried to escape her grasp, only for it to fail dismally and end with Gray getting himself pulled tighter.

"So that just leaves Natsu, Lucy, and Lisanna," Freed murmured as he turned to face the counter that was littered with books and papers.

Bickslow swivelled in his chair, looking over the messy counter. Did Freed turn into Levy in this world? "What's all this?"

"Research."

"Research? Damn, how long have you even been awake for?" Bickslow mumbled. He shouldn't have been surprised that Freed would be getting all the information about the situation that he possibly could, since he had always done that. There was a reason he was the leader of the Thunder God Tribe – even if it was self-proclaimed.

"Since about six."

"Oh, Lucy! You're here!" Levy had turned her head as the blonde walked into the room, her eyes going wide as she saw the blonde baby that was held against her hip.

"Huh? Lucy? Where's Natsu?" Erza asked as everyone else turned to look in that direction.

"Natsu? Natsu's not here?" Lucy blinked as her eyes scanned over everyone in the room. The rest of her team was there, but the namesake wasn't. Where's Natsu?

Mira's smile turned into a slight frown as she walked over to the blonde. "We assumed you'd be with Natsu here…"

"Uh…"

Bickslow suddenly felt his cheeks heat up as he turned in the stool once again and dropped his head. "That's what I was about to mention before Gajeel and Lev—"

"Sorry we're late!" the youngest Strauss said breathlessly as she ran into her room with her face slightly flushed.

Once again, everyone had turned towards the archway Lisanna had just come through with Natsu walking just behind her, a scowl on his face. The blue cat sitting atop his pink hair was meowing. Bickslow could only drop his head as they walked in. Not the end of the world if it doesn't get explained, right? It's probably not even important.

"Come on, Natsu!" Lisanna smiled as she pulled Natsu's folded arms from his chest, grabbing one of his hands in the process as she pulled them closer to the group gathered around the lounge.

Lucy couldn't help but feel the pang of jealousy course through here as she watched the two, and she didn't entirely know why. Natsu was her best friend as well as part of her family, and it wasn't like she had feelings for the Dragon Slayer, so why was she feeling that way? She should just be happy that her friends were here, and she wasn't entirely alone in this new world and wasn't stuck with just Bickslow.

"So is that everyone?" Freed looked up from the book he had been reading.

"I don't feel like inviting any more people into my apparent home, so yes," Laxus mumbled, folding his arms across his chest once again.

"I guess I'll go find Cana then." Mira turned and disappeared down a hall to the side of the kitchen as everyone else moved to take a seat on the lounge. Lucy had taken a seat next to Levy, and her eyes went wide as she realised that the former Script mage was very pregnant. She had been about to ask when Levy just shook her head, apparently not wanting to talk about it. Gray and Juvia had sat next to Lucy, while Gajeel remained standing behind Levy, and Lisanna had pulled Natsu to sit next to Elfman. The Thunder God Tribe remained seated on the stools, and Laxus stood with Erza in front of the fireplace that sat in the middle of the room. Who had deemed those two the leaders, everyone else couldn't help but wonder.

Everyone was looking around at each other, observing the differences that each had from their 'original' selves. They were just small things here and there. For most, it was the hair. For Laxus, it was the scar, being less defined and slightly smaller, but still there. For Evergreen, the lack of glasses that she had to wear, lest she turn everyone she looks in the eyes to stone. For Bickslow, it was the figure that sat across the middle of his face.

But everyone was still the same person, personality wise at least. They might not look exactly the same, but it was still them. It was just a different version of them. But how they all came to be in that mess was still a mystery.

A loud whistle came the other end of the kitchen. "Damn, Levy."

"Cana…" Mira sighed as she moved to stand beside Laxus once again, and Cana stumbled over to the lounge to sit on the other side of Levy, only to frown when she looked down at her empty hands.

"Hey, where'd it go?" she said with a frown. Laxus raised his arm, shaking the bottle of wine gently that Cana had apparently been drinking from before. "How'd you get that?"

Laxus just rolled his eyes before he moved to place the bottle on the coffee table. "You're too drunk to even notice someone taking a bottle straight from your hands."

"I'm not drunk."

"You were sitting on the bathroom floor, rubbing a towel across your face while meowing," Mira had said with a slight giggle.

"…I was not," Cana muttered, and she blushed slightly as she sunk into the couch.

"Anyway," Freed cleared his throat. "Shall we begin now?"

Erza nodded from where she stood as Laxus just grunted his usual version of 'yes' that Freed had come to understand. The former Runes mage picked up a notebook from the counter before he moved to stand next to Laxus at the front.

"So as you're all aware, we seem to have found ourselves in a bit of a situation as of this morning."

"You can say that again…" Gajeel muttered under his breath.

"Firstly, I'd like to point out that we are still in Magnolia." A few gasps from people around the room could be heard before he continued, "But obviously not the Magnolia that we know. From my research into this this morning, I've been able to determine a few other things. One being that we appear to be in an entirely different age, being that the current year is 2015, and the other being that everyone you see here is essentially your counterpart."

"So we've basically become our counterparts somehow?" Gray asked.

Freed nodded. "Correct. For now, we'll call this world Magnolia 2.0 to save the confusion, but that is what appears to have happened. Personality wise, you are you, but your bodies are that of your Magnolia 2.0 counterpart which is why some of you will notice the minute differences in details between yourselves." He turned a page in his notebook, quickly scanning over his neatly written handwriting on the page before looking back up at the group.

"It is unknown whether this is a spell of sorts, or a form of illusory magic, but we do know that it has only had an effect on those that were in the guild yesterday afternoon. Or at least that is what seems to have happened, at least. We haven't been able to get in contact with everyone, obviously."

"Jet and Droy were out on a job yesterday," Levy said quietly.

Erza folded her arms as she looked down at the ground. "Wendy and Carla were with Porlyusica, I believe."

"Gramps was at another meeting," Laxus shrugged.

Freed nodded again. "So if anyone were to come across any of those people in this world, they would completely be the Magnolia 2.0 version of themselves, and the Magnolia 2.0 versions of yourselves may or may not have formed their own relationships with them."

"Speaking of relationships, I need to address the elephant in the room here before my head explodes – well, elephants, really," Laxus chimed in again. "Who the fuck got Levy knocked up, and whose kid is that?" He said, gesturing to Levy and Lucy on the lounge as everyone turned their attention to the two women sitting next to each other on the lounge.

"Um…" Levy sank into the couch some more.

"I was about to mention that some of our counterparts appear to have formed closer… relationships with each other." Freed flushed slightly as he looked down at his notebook some more before clearing his throat and continuing, "But so far they seem linked to those in our world."

Bickslow brought a hand up to his forehead. Nothing about it was making sense, and based on what Freed had said, he really should not have been the one to marry Lucy in Magnolia 2.0. The thought that they'd had a one-night stand at some point had briefly crossed his mind, and had tried putting the fact they were married down to him getting her pregnant in the process and then marrying her to be a good guy or something. But he knew that he wouldn't do that in any world, ever.

So why the fuck was he with Lucy in this world?

"Maybe she doesn't know who it was?" Erza blinked, seemingly thinking it was perfectly reasonable for Levy to not know who the father was.

Unfortunately, everyone else in the room had disagreed as they all shot her a look that made the red-head blush and look down. "She knows who it was," came the slurred response from Cana.

Gajeel was subconsciously hugging the cat tighter than he should have been, and everyone's attention turned to him as the cat made meowed loudly before it escaped from his grasp and jumped onto the lounge before the ground and sat next to Levy's feet. "Lily, you traitor," he mumbled before he folded his arms across his chest again, looking out the windows that took up the entire wall.

"It's…" Levy sighed, then said quietly, "In this world, the Gajeel and Levy are together…"

"Fuckin' twins!" Gajeel suddenly shouted, causing Lucy to flinch and Ingrid beginning to whimper. "I'm gonna kill myself if this shit doesn't get sorted out," he finished in a slightly quieter voice.

Lucy got up from the lounge as she noticed Ingrid. She'd seen that face on Asuka when her and Natsu had been watching her occasionally, and she knew that she was about to cry, and Lucy didn't want to have to deal with that in front of everyone else. And as soon as she began walking towards the arch, Ingrid began crying in her ear.

"That was your fault, Gajeel," Levy said as she tilted her head back to look at Gajeel with narrowed eyes.

"Was not," Gajeel muttered.

"Well then… since we've established Gajeel can still make kids cry—" Laxus began.

"Hey!"

"—and Lucy isn't going to tell us whose kid it is until she's sorted that out, let's talk about something else."

The room was silent for a moment as everyone looked around at each other, waiting for someone to think of something to talk about. The cry of Ingrid could be heard from the next room before Juvia spoke up, "Juvia and Gray are engaged!"

"Only in this world." Gray turned his head away as he tried to shuffle out of Juvia's grasp once again, but she had tightened her grip to rest her head on his shoulder, leaving Gray to sigh in defeat. He wasn't going to get out of that one any time soon.

"Alright then… Let's find out who fucks who in this world then, shall we?" Laxus smirked as a few people around the room blushed, namely Erza and Levy.

"Elfman and I are apparently married," Evergreen scoffed with distaste as she glared at Elfman across the room, only for him to grunt and fold his arms as he looked away.

"Gray must sleep with Juvia, then," Juvia said, smiling dreamily up at the man she was latched on to, only for him to groan before bringing his head down to rest in his palm, shaking his head slightly.

Laxus rolled his eyes, apparently already bored with the two of them. "Yes, we've established that."

"Natsu and I are married!"

Everyone turned to stare at Lisanna who was smiling as she held up her hand, showing the gold band on her finger. Natsu had sunk into the back of the couch as the blue cat remained seated on his head, and he didn't seem to be too happy about being married to the white-haired woman. That, or he just didn't care. Who really knew with Natsu?

But everyone else was shocked, honestly. Even Mira's eyes were wide as her mouth hung open slightly, and even Laxus had an eyebrow raised. It wasn't very often he found things interesting, but this he did. He knew what was going on in his guild. He had seen half of the people around him grow up, and he took more of an interest in their lives than he appeared to. Well, for the most part.

But when it came to Natsu and relationships, he was one of the ones who was waiting for the airhead to do something about the blonde who was now in another room. So to find out that the Natsu of Magnolia 2.0 wasn't with Lucy, it was a bit of a shock to him, much like everyone else.

"Uh… Well that's interesting." Gray and Erza shared a look of concern across the room. They knew that if Lucy had been in the room then, it probably would have been considerably more awkward for everyone else. Not so much Natsu or Lisanna, because Lisanna seemed to be thrilled about it, which was probably another issue on its own.

"Who else is there?" Laxus questioned as he looked around at everyone in the room once again. His gaze flicked over to Freed for a second before going to Cana, leaving Freed standing there with his mouth slightly open. "Cana?"

"Who? Me?" She sat up slightly in the lounge as a few people rolled their eyes. Apparently the Cana of Magnolia 2.0 was a lightweight. That would prove to be interesting if they were stuck in the new world…

"No, I meant the other Cana."

"Shut up, Sparky," she smirked before relaxing into the lounge again. "And who knows? What about our dear Erza, though? Who are you hooking up with in this world?" A mischievous grin was sent towards the red-head, leaving her to blush furiously as she shook her head.

"N-No one," came Erza's timid response.

Lucy had silently made her way back into the room to sit next to Levy once again as she tried to figure out what they had been talking about in her absence. Ingrid was resting her head peacefully on her shoulder once again as she made herself comfortable on the lounge, just as the room fell silent again.

"Well, now that Blondie's ba—" Laxus began, only to be interrupted by Evergreen.

"Hey, hang on."

"What now?" Laxus groaned. He just really wanted to know who the kid's father was, and if it was anyone in the guild. Was that so hard? Apparently.

"Bicks is apparently married." Evergreen exclaimed, lifting up Bickslow's hand to point out the grey band.

Oh, fuck… Bickslow dropped his head slightly to hide the blush that had formed – he hated that he was at all, too. He really didn't want to talk about the fact he was married to Lucy in that world, especially after hearing about everyone else's relationships in Magnolia 2.0. They all made sense – to an extent – so what the hell were they going to think when he found about his? Would they assume they'd been secretly dating – or at least friends – in their world? Would they freak out? Hell, Bickslow was starting to freak out himself just by thinking about it.

Bickslow pulled his hand free from Evergreen's grasp to bring it down to between his knees with his other hand. "It… It's not important," Bickslow muttered. He wasn't going to talk about it, because it really wasn't that important. Maybe the entire situation was just a twenty-four-hour kind of thing and they'd all be back in the guild when they woke up tomorrow? He could only hope for that. But Bickslow had completely forgotten about what Laxus was so adamant about finding out previously, and he suddenly felt his throat go dry at the thought of them all finding out whether he liked it or not.

Oh… fuck.

Laxus just shrugged as Evergreen continued watching Bickslow. He honestly wasn't all that interested in who Bickslow was married to in Magnolia 2.0, because for all he knew it could be some random woman that had nothing to do with the guild. Evergreen, however, knew something was up with the man and he was trying to hide it and play it down, but the self-proclaimed Fairy Queen had a knack to getting information out of people. Little did she know that the answer to her silent question of 'who the fuck was Bickslow married to?' would be answered anyway.

"So, Blondie. Whose kid is it?" Laxus demanded as all eyes returned back to the two blondes. He could deal with Bickslow later.

Lucy was blushing profusely by this point. She'd seen Bickslow blush as Evergreen mentioned that he was married in Magnolia 2.0, and Lucy knew enough about the guy to know that that rarely happened. It was Bickslow: the guy who found a way to have fun with anything. He didn't get embarrassed or shy, and he was almost always cackling at something or someone, or both.

But Lucy realised that he hadn't exhibited any of his usual habits or tendencies. Hell, the guy wasn't acting like himself at all, and Lucy knew that it was because of the predicament that they had found themselves in early that very morning. He wasn't himself, and Lucy couldn't help but feel sorry for him. It wasn't like he had wanted to wake up in a different world to find out he was married to someone he had talked to only a handful of times, let alone have a kid with them, and Lucy was feeling the same way.

The blonde sighed as everyone continued staring at her. She looked up slightly to see Bickslow staring down at his hands that were hanging between his legs still before she looked down at Ingrid again.

Bickslow knew she was about to say it. It wasn't like he could expect her to keep quiet about it, and he had realised that if she didn't say it, they'd know she was hiding something and the entire situation would just get worse for the both of them. It wasn't like Lucy was happy about their situation either, so as he continued staring down at his hands, he braced himself for the hell that was about to break loose.

Lucy only thought about how sorry she actually was right then, but it wasn't like there was anything she could do about it. It had to be said, regardless of the fact that neither really wanted it to be said. Sighing, Lucy only looked back down to Ingrid before she quietly answered, "She's Bickslow's."

A/Ns: For those wondering about their counterparts, they still get mentioned a few times from here on.