Disclaimer: I don't own Fairy Tail
Azu's home was in central Crocus, blocks from the Flower Light Palace: Mercurius. Just like how she would've done things on Earth, she manipulated the currency of her new homeland so that she would effectively be infinitely rich without causing the currency to inflate. She wasn't the sort of person that would use that money to buy a thousand different cars and houses to flaunt off her riches to the world. Rather, she used the money to live comfortably and the rest was merely in reserve should there be an emergency where she would have to go on a massive spending spree.
Here in Fiore, she wouldn't need an infinite amount of Jewels because the high amounts of magic in the atmosphere could be used to create any new materials she would need. Additionally, all her experience from the past years meant that she didn't need any help in creating new parts, machines, or whatever else. That would mean that she wouldn't ever have to pay others for services that she was now capable of doing perfectly. Adding even more to the list, it seemed that Earthland was a predominantly magical society, meaning that their means of offense and defense would most likely be of magic, meaning that she would have to focus on magical development rather than technological development, the former of which didn't cost a single Jewel.
However, there was one special bit of technology that was on her mind.
It's been years in Earth time since I left so there must've been a lot of new anime that came out in the meantime, Azu thought as she lay on her bed, staring at her blank ceiling. I wasn't able to watch much in my final years on Earth because I was so busy, so I have a lot to catch up on.
Pulling herself up and sitting up, she continued, Actually, I have pretty much all of modern anime to catch up on… Well, at least I have plenty of time here.
Materializing a 75-inch curved TV of her own design, Azu began to rearrange her room so that it would have a comfortable sofa in front of the area where the TV would go. She didn't actually have much in her bedroom, so the rearrangement wasn't a tall task in the slightest. She didn't have much in her house at all because she didn't need to have stuff lying around when she could always just materialize it when she needed it and plus, she wouldn't want a cluttered house.
Once she was satisfied with the positioning, she recalibrated the TV to receive signals from Earth and its various networks that could provide her with what she wanted.
Mavis, you there? Azu asked, shooting Mavis a mental message.
I'm here, Mavis responded. Do you need me, Azu?
Could you come over to my place? Azu requested. Since your mobile body is made of magic, it should be able to reappear anywhere, right?
You're right and yes, I'll come over, Mavis responded. But what for?
I'll tell you when you get here.
Within a minute, Mavis reappeared on top of Azu's bed. Presumably, she would know which room to go to simply by sensing where Azu was via her magical signature. Even though Azu was trying to keep her aura at an almost nonexistent level so that it's choking power wouldn't bother normal people or impede on her opponents' abilities to fight, she let it radiate just a little stronger for Mavis to be able to find her more easily before returning it to its minimal state. She had no intentions of hiding who she was at this point, but it would be too annoying to deal with all the complaints that would come from allowing a very strong magic aura to constantly emanate from her.
Sensing the size of the entire house, Mavis asked, "Is this entire building yours?"
"Yes, it is," Azu told her. "But I don't use most of the space and it's not like I have a lot of rooms. I just wanted the rooms to be a lot more spacious and open because it's a lot more comfortable that way - more relaxing."
"How did you even afford this place? Last I checked, you spend most of your time sleeping and not working, and you've only been around for about a month," Mavis questioned.
Definitely not by questionable means… "I bought it legally and that's technically all that matter, so don't sweat the details," Azu said as she gave Mavis a wink in an attempt to convince her not to question any further.
Getting the message and shifting her attention, Mavis pointed at the TV, having never seen anything like it, and asked, "What's the large black thing on the wall for?"
"That's for what I wanted you to come over for," Azu answered. "You have lacrimas here that can display still and moving images, right?" At Mavis's nod, Azu continued, "Well this is sort of similar except it can receive those images without using any magic at all. It's not a lacrima, but rather a 'television' or 'TV' for short."
Staring at the TV with stars in her eyes and her wing ornaments fluttering with excitement, Mavis couldn't help but be curious like the child she biologically was. Never in her century of living had anyone even tried to make such a device without using magic because it was supposedly impossible. But here was proof otherwise, so what other possibilities could that open up? She would only have to let her mind run wild.
All the meanwhile, Az was waving her hand in front of Mavis's face, trying to get her attention because she was staring off into space. When Azu finally succeeded, she said, "As interested as you are about my TV, I didn't ask you to come over to just show you that. I wanted to watch some things with you."
"Things from your world?" Mavis asked, no less curious.
Azu nodded and continued, "There's one country that creates sets of moving images, which we call animations, in a unique style that we know as 'anime'. It's been a while since I've been able to watch it and I thought it'd be nice if I could catch up with the times with you since we're friends."
Mavis only smiled brightly while Azu was wondering whether or not she had screwed up.
It's been too long since I've had a friend, she thought. I don't really know how to invite people to do things in a casual and friendly way-
She was cut off when Mavis happily exclaimed, "I'd be happy to watch these 'shows' with you!"
Relieved that she hadn't been taken the wrong way, Azu smiled and turned the TV on. Sifting through a massive list of shows, she eventually ended up on one called "Aijou no Aru Sora", which seemed to have decent ratings. Interested, she started the first episode and went to sit on the new sofa. At Azu's invitation, Mavis joined her on the sofa.
|| In the show: ||
The clouds moved peacefully through the crystal blue sky, blown by the gentle breeze. In full bloom, the cherry blossoms marked the presence of spring in the small town. The children of the town were out and about, some more excited than others. The first day of school was one of excitement, nervousness, and boredom, all depending on who one would like to speak of.
All through the morning, different schools held their entrance ceremonies. At the end of one junior high school's entrance ceremony, one boy went to his new class, 2-A, and took his seat in the back of the room. He didn't particularly care for the entrance ceremony or what the principal and student council had to say to everyone. He was only interested in his programming and lines of code.
Of course, he was obligated to listen to the lessons to see if he could learn anything at all from them, but other than that, he didn't particularly care about anything that happens at school. He didn't have friends because his personality was frankly dreadful, so there wasn't anyone to be social with either. And so, he did the only thing he could and took out his laptop and started coding again, which he would do until classes started.
He wasn't insane, but the things he was trying to accomplish at his age and level of education might as well be. Instead of coding things like games, he was working to alter certain parts of the human body - for what reason, he'd figure out later on because it was just a hobby at this point. Most never paid attention to him because they all thought that he was just strange and should be left alone, but not everyone is the same, right?
On this particular first day of school, as the boy was working on his project, a girl with long, straight black hair stood in the doorway. She surveyed the room, only to be met with some of the boys "surveying" her. As a girl who held herself high, she turned, disgusted, to another direction, only to find a boy who paid her no attention at all.
She was actually a transfer student, so she didn't know anyone at this school. However, she was often a transfer student in all different parts of the country because her family was always on the move for business, but she had never once come across someone that didn't even bother to look up at her. There would always be people either leered at her for her looks or be even the slightest bit jealous, but this one just didn't bother. When people got to be around her for longer, she would always attract attention for other reasons, but the way the boy just ignored everything made her believe that he wouldn't give her that unwanted attention.
It didn't bother her because it was a nice break, but she couldn't help but be curious about this boy. She began to walk up to him, proper as always, only to hear the suddenly disgusted comments from her new classmates. Being a transfer student, she was entirely unaware of the circumstances, but it became immediately clear that this boy was not well liked at all here. More realistically, it was the complete opposite.
Nonetheless, that wouldn't stop her curiosity. Pushing aside the comments of the others, she continued to walk towards the boy, who had remained indifferent the entire time. Even as she stood in front of his desk and faced him, he didn't bother to look up from his laptop and just kept on typing furiously. As anyone would, the girl found this action - or rather, the lack of - to be quite irritating.
Clearing her throat, she moved to the side of his desk and spoke in a way that wasn't too proper, not rude, but enough to possibly get his attention.
"Hello," she said. "I am Charlotte…"
She stopped when he suddenly looked towards her, pausing slightly before looking up and locking his eyes onto hers. His emotionless eyes met her surprised ones and all at once, they both froze in place and felt a sudden rush within them that neither could describe.
And the clouds just kept on passing in the crystal blue sky, the wind picking up.
As the opening song started playing, Azu looked out of her own window, reminiscing on memories of her own. Only a few minutes had passed in the show, but she had already formed a personal connection.
Focusing half her attention on the show once again, she lost her other half in old memories.
\\ Flashback \\
The clouds moved peacefully through the crystal blue sky, blown by the gentle breeze. In full bloom, the cherry blossoms marked the presence of spring in the small town. The children of the town were out and about, some more excited than others. The first day of school was one of excitement, nervousness, and boredom, all depending on who one would like to speak of.
All through the morning, different schools held their entrance ceremonies. At the end of one junior high school's entrance ceremony, one girl went to her new class, 2-A, and took her seat in the back of the room. She didn't particularly care for the entrance ceremony or what the principal and student council had to say to everyone. She was just bored and lonely.
She was at a new school, in Japan of all places. Being from America, she didn't understand why the Japanese schooling system worked the way it did, but she had no choice but to go with it. Either way, it wouldn't matter to her because she knew everything a middle school could possibly teach her. She was never good at making friends, much less maintaining friendships, so she always had an abundance of spare time, which she used to study everything she could possibly study.
Her studying was not necessarily in the interests of becoming knowledgeable or becoming an exceptional student. Rather, her studying was to eventually fulfill the senses of a greater self that she was being fed. She knew of her potential. She knew of everything that she could do. She knew what everyone said about her - all the praises and insults.
And she also knew that all her potential was wasted. And she also knew that she was incapable of doing pretty much anything. And she also knew that the praises were false. And she also knew that the insults were mostly true. And she also knew that she really was useless to the world. And she also knew that she had to somehow do something about that. Not for anyone else, but only out of the selfish feeling of wanting to feel worth anything at all.
No matter how "smart" people said she was, no matter how "knowledgeable", no matter how "insightful", no matter how "formidable", she was in no state to accept those remarks as the truth. In her current state, she was nothing at all, so she had to make herself something at all and free herself from her constraints.
But there was one massive "problem". Somewhere down the line, her visions for being a person of use began to warp into those of someone beyond a known reality, someone that defied logic, someone too powerful. She ended up with a little voice prodding her forward, making her delve deeper and deeper into her imagination for more ridiculous ideas. The further she delved, the further she got from her goal. As she created a bigger and bigger distance between her and her goals, the more she lost herself in the endeavor to reach her goals.
In America, she was no longer in a state acceptable by society and her parents were by no means supportive of her wishes. They were always anything but supportive. Just find any classic examples of family abuse in novels and that's pretty much it except the only form of torture was emotional. Freedom was restricted, she was never to be supported or helped, she feared that her useless self would always be subject to more and more torture.
From the day she became conscious, it had always been like that. In the beginning, she took it in her stride, not letting it get to her. But as the years went by, her mind deteriorated more and more, dragging her entire life down with it. As she was thrown into the dark depths to drown for eternity, she could find no way to swim up. As she tried in vain for years to inch up, she would always end up being thrown down further. So, what could she do? Keep trying?
That's what she kept doing, year after year, again and again. But eventually, she couldn't hold everything in her anymore, pretending like she was just alright. No matter how hard she had tried to keep it all to herself and no matter how skilled she had become in the art of emotional concealment, she had to eventually lose it. And so, she did. So, what could she do? Keep trying? Or swim out through the bottom?
And that, she did. Snapping, she packed her things and prepared for her finale in the 'land of the free'. She didn't need much since her parents weren't particularly careful and just left enormous wads of cash lying around the house, meaning that she would be able to pay for herself in another country. With her quick planning complete, there was only the finale left.
Murder. The entire family. It was one to be all over the national news. Nothing too fancy. Just a pistol, a few kitchen knives, and a hell of a lot of blood. She took her sweet time, letting them bleed out slowly as she slashed at them time and time again. To finally take out everything within her felt so refreshing, even if she knew how terrible her method of doing so was. Nobody should find the sight of their family sitting in pools of blood a wonderful sight, but as far as she cared, these people were not her family. They were mere trash, that which deserved what they got.
Sure, murder still isn't moral, but she never had a moral code, courtesy of the lack of example from her 'family'. She knew this wasn't acceptable by society, so all she had to do was disappear for good, never to be found. And no, that didn't mean death, although she would've graciously accepted that fate.
Before anyone could find the crime, the girl rid the blood from her clothes and body and grabbed a fake identity that she had made earlier. Calling a taxi, she left for the airport. From the airport, she left for Japan. It was a pain, but she would have to go through a total of four years of junior high school - 6th and 7th grades in America, 8th and 9th grades in Japan. It was also a pain that she would have to speak Japanese all the time. Even though she was fluent in English, French, and Japanese, she greatly preferred to speak in English because she found it most comfortable for her, but she would just have to deal with it. If she wanted to live a new life, there would have to be some trade-offs. She still had a goal to achieve, after all.
Here, in her new school, she listened as everyone around her had their normal conversations, talking about games they played, shows they watched, things they did the other day. She didn't care what they were talking about, but she couldn't help but listen. She was always listening, whether or not she was meant to be and whether or not she wanted to. All information was important, even it seems useless. Even for her lack of friends, she knew how to navigate around the minds of people quite well and knew exactly how to converse with each person she observed. It might as well be called creepy, but it was just a habit she couldn't shake.
She watched as her new classmates slowly filed into the room, one after another. Most of them seemed pretty friendly together, so she felt a little left out, although she was used to that feeling. As kids streamed in, there was eventually one girl that stopped in the doorway, observing the classroom nervously. The girl's disruption of the flow caused many to begin staring at the girl, who promptly ignored them seeing as how the girl was nervous enough as is.
Eventually, the girl's eyes fell on her. She immediately recognized the girl as one who had visited her school in America for a week for no apparent reason. They didn't talk much, but they got along relatively well, not that they thought they would ever meet again so soon. They looked each other in the eye for a solid minute before the girl finally widened her eyes in realization.
"Charlotte?!" The girl yelled out in surprise.
"Mei Namida, or rather, Namida Mei as they would say here, that is no longer my name," she replied in English.
"So, what do I call you now?" Mei questioned.
"Azu Yami."
\\ End Flashback \\
Her last name wasn't literally "darkness" for no reason, and that reason was certainly not because she was trying to be cool or anything like that. Her very being was defined by darkness at that point. That aside, she really couldn't help but draw the connections between how the boy met the girl in Aijou no Aru Sora and how she had met Mei. However, neither of their cases could end at simple introductions like that, so there was clearly more, just like in the case that Azu and Mavis were currently watching.
As the boy and the girl saw each other more and more in school, the boy began to look up from his coding for once and the girl began to drop her guard a little for once. It was all just a classic beginning to a deeper bond, but even the most cliché occurrences have their realistic backgrounds and contexts from which they draw.
\\ Flashback \\
As the days flew by, Azu began to cling closer to Mei since she was friendly and literally the only person Azu could talk to. As the weeks flew by, the two began growing closer, getting to know what the other was interested in and what they liked. As the months flew by, Azu grew closer and closer to her goal with Mei at her side. Despite Azu's lack of ability to hold a friendship, Mei never let go of that bond, and so they were able to remain as friends, even when Azu occasionally pushed Mei away for various reasons.
Despite Azu's initial comment, Mei still decided to call Azu "Charlotte" rather than "Azu", although Azu didn't mind all that much in all honesty. As thanks for becoming her 'saving grace', Azu gave Mei every ounce of knowledge she had, allowing them to easily breeze through school without a care. With all their free time together, they worked towards Azu's goal together, with Mei participating because she wholeheartedly wanted to support Azu through her long endeavor.
After four years, they finally broke through and finalized their first masterpiece: the perfected mind. Mei had reluctantly accepted that Azu would be experimenting on herself whenever she felt like testing out their work, despite them both knowing that they were doing very dangerous work. Luckily, nothing bad had ever actually happened to Azu during all of her self-experiments, but luck couldn't always be counted on.
Their masterpiece, the perfected mind, was essentially a system in which half the brain was biologically natural and the other half was a supercomputer of sorts. The biological half handled all of the body's natural functions with the assistance of the supercomputer while the supercomputer enhanced the brain and body's abilities and allowed its user to become able to attain ridiculous powers. The biologically impossible became entirely possible with this masterpiece, achieving the groundbreaking first step that Azu had come to so desperately need over the years.
Naturally, Azu gave it a test run first, as in having her brain rearranged by Mei's hands and having the supercomputer installed. If anything happened to her, at least Mei would be physically fine and Azu would find her long accepted fate to be her reality, but those thoughts were unnecessary, for the procedure was a success. Azu thereafter did the same procedure for Mei because they did make it together after all. It would be wrong if only one of them were to reap their rewards.
Mei was content with only the immense knowledge and brainpower now at her disposal, but Azu still had an endless list to take care of. When school was entirely out of the way, Azu and Mei went together around the world in search of vivid imaginations that Azu could recreate for herself. Fighting styles, "magic" tricks, fictional abilities, everything. Occasionally, Mei would find that something that they made was desirable and proceeded to incorporate it into herself, like flying or being able to survive in outer space.
For years, they scoured the Earth together for every last shred of knowledge and imagination. It wasn't a droning task in the slightest, for the two friends were having fun in their work. As time passed, they had become famous for their immense knowledge and achievements as a result of said knowledge, but they almost never revealed their superhuman abilities to anyone. Only the highest ranking Japanese, Chinese, and French government officials knew of their abilities and occasionally asked for assistance in various issues ranging from disease control to fighting against "terrorists".
These governments didn't exactly ask frequently, but the French government eventually had a slip-up and well… Nicola Dieu happened. The Chinese and Japanese governments were exceptional at keeping their secrets, but the French government was ever so slightly corrupt at the time, leaving room for a higher ranking government official to allow for misbehavior. In the end, only Nicola Dieu knew something that she shouldn't have, but that was still more than enough of a problem.
Not too long after that incident, Azu and Mei were in Rome to rest for a bit, exhausted by their long hours of searching, analyzing, creating, and stressing. They had just come back from Egypt, where Azu had found something she could only describe as "magic". They had been looking through mythology and legends for any hints but found nothing too substantial, so they resorted to playing around with Azu's new powers.
Their experiments did not go unnoticed by many, but most importantly, they were very clearly noticed by one woman. Clad in red, she looked over Rome from above the Vatican, watching as the lights flickered a few miles away. Holding a pistol in each hand, she flew at twice the speed of sound towards the source of the lights. Reaching her destination in mere seconds, she found the two girls together on the floor, poking at a swirling orb of light.
Azu and Mei both immediately recognized their intruder: "Nicola Dieu."
Nicola smirked, replying "Why hello, you two. Cutting straight to the chase, I've already proved my prowess overall to France and now I must prove it to the world!"
"Because making the Eiffel Tower the tallest building in the world by three-fold, by yourself, is an accurate representation of prowess…" Mei muttered.
Before Nicola could defend her ego, Azu said, "And I assume by 'proving your prowess overall to the world', you mean getting rid of us." At that, Nicola forgot about defending herself and smirked wider, raising her two pistols.
Azu continued, "You appear to lack understanding of the situation at hand. By killing us, you are no more than a murderer known the world over. Making yourself infamous worldwide does not translate into being the most powerful person on Earth."
"And you seem to also misunderstand the situation at hand," Nicola responded mockingly. "Once you two are dead, I can be primitive and twist the story of your deaths as I wish, but that's not all I wish for. I also have the capability to take all of your 'powers' and transfer them to my body seamlessly. Once you're dead, there's nothing that'll stop me from achieving the childish dream of world domination."
"You said yourself that it's a childish dream…" Mei retorted in a low voice.
Ignoring Mei and not waiting for any response, Nicola shot a volley of bullets towards the two, all of which were cut by a sword that Azu instantaneously materialized. While Azu and Mei got their footings, Nicola shot round after round at them, all of which Azu managed to cut or deflect.
It should be noted, however, that Mei was in no condition to fight someone the likes of Nicola. She never took an interest in fighting strategies or body reinforcements that would help her in a fight because she simply wasn't interested in fighting. It had no appeal to her and she hoped that she could get out of most situations peacefully. If peace doesn't prevail, she would have Azu to help her out, but not against anyone like Nicola.
Azu knew this perfectly well and couldn't fight Nicola with her full attention because she was worried about her one and only friend. She wouldn't dare call Mei a hindrance for that reason, but it was something that Nicola could take full advantage of to even the odds. It only meant that Azu had to fight the odds, and it's not as if she hadn't done that before and walked out victorious.
Nicola and Azu both momentarily adjusted their positions before leaping at each other. Mei could only cower against a wall as fragments of bullets flew past her, some cutting her superficially. Azu was trying her best to keep Mei from being injured at all, but she could clearly see that Mei was slowly being injured.
The little voice within came forth, saying, It's not working. Your efforts are for naught. You aren't able to protect her.
Initially ignoring it, citing the need to focus, Azu kept trying harder to block all the bullets and fragments. However, the harder she tried, the sloppier she got because she was losing focus. And the sloppier she got, the more Nicola took advantage and made everything worse for Azu.
See? You're not helping in the slightest. You were bad before. Now you're even worse. You're just plain useless.
Slowly losing it, Azu brought forth a second sword to take in her other hand and began swinging with everything she knew and could muster in the moment. Had she been stable, it would've worked splendidly, but she was currently quaking with frustration and the worry of not being able to protect Mei. Again, there was no way she could blame Mei, but she was beginning to lose the battle and things were getting more desperate.
Just give up.
Be quiet… Azu thought back at it.
You know you can't do anything now.
Shut up…
You can't seem to accept your reality.
Shut up.
You can't protect Mei.
Shut up! Shut up! Azu's eye was twitching with annoyance and anger at that point.
You've failed her.
SHUT THE FUCK UP!
And at that, Azu lost it. Her movements became irrational and she started to miss bullets. She got multiple times throughout her body, but more importantly, bullets were beginning to fly at Mei.
At the expense of her own body, Azu was able to protect Mei for about half a minute before a bullet got Mei in the leg.
See? Do you really need more proof?
You… just shut up…
Recognizing the events as a sign of failure, Azu began to tear up for the first time in years. Before, nothing could get to her, but Mei just meant way too much to Azu. Her entire world consisted of herself and Mei and nothing else mattered. She knew that being so attached to a single person had its immense risks, but she didn't want to think about that. All that mattered was Mei.
And now, for Azu to see Mei being injured due to her failure, her entire body was shaking in a mess of emotions. With blurry visions and uncoordinated movements, she pressed on, but in vain. Azu was easily shot in the head, stopping her for half a second with the impact was stopped by her reinforced skull. But during that half second, Nicola shot Mei dead in the center of her forehead, twice.
As Azu turned to see Mei bleeding from the head, lifeless, the entire mess of emotion within her exploded in a firestorm. Everything from the hate towards Nicola for murdering Mei to the happiness of all the memories she had made with Mei. Simultaneously, the orb of swirling light still lying in the ground began to rapidly expand.
Just about as Azu was about to unleash a hell storm on Nicola, the orb of light engulfed the entire room, blinding Azu and Nicola alike. Azu still knew where Nicola was, but she couldn't move. Somehow, the light was restricting her movements and she was trapped in place. In truth, it was the fact that Azu was the user of the magic being displayed that prevented her from moving because the spell was that taxing on the body - not that Azu would've known that.
When the light finally cleared, Azu looked to find that she was the only one left in the room. Mei had disappeared and Nicola wasn't even in Italy anymore. Dropping to the floor, Azu burst fully into tears, mourning the loss of her one and only friend, regretting that she wasn't good enough to have prevented her death.
And now you understand.
In an instant, she threw her sword through her reinforced skull. Anything to just make that voice shut up.
For the rest of the night, she just lay there, listening to the voice, unable to do anything.
Mei…
\\ End Flashback \\
"What's wrong?" Mavis suddenly asked.
"Huh?" Taking a moment to realize her surroundings, Azu found herself curled into a ball on the sofa, tears streaming down her face. "Oh… I was just remembering something from a while ago."
"Should I ask?" Mavis questioned hesitantly.
"Maybe another time," Azu responded. Motioning with her arm at the TV, she said, "There's still a show to watch, after all."
With a last, worried glance, Mavis refocused her attention to the show. Relieved that she didn't have to explain her situation to Mavis just yet, Azu turned her attention towards the TV as well, but not before she had one last fleeting thought.
Mei…