Celestial Dragon

by Silken Ink

What if – instead of Natsu bringing Lucy into Fairy Tail, it's the other way around? This is the story of a Fairy Tail celestial mage who stumbles across a red burning key…one that summons a celestial fire dragon. Nalu pairing. It will be a slow burn romance with eventual fiery lemons. ;D

38. Chapter 38

Author's Note:

Alrighty! It's Sunday! For another 40 minutes at least. ;P So it's time for a new chapter!

Special thanks to noseinabook145 for their medical consultation on this chapter's injury. It was a huge help. :D

As always, ginormous thanks and sparkles and cake to all my fabulous reviewers out there! Big hugs and kisses to my repeat reviewers: stranger1999, TheJSmooth, Donthedarkdragon26, quidditchChick6, Anna5949, ravenqueen162, Lucinda, WisdomDragon27, Lady La-sara, SunnieDayys, Leomae2.0, and Firefly9917. Equally big hugs and kisses to my new reviewer: Mhilano.

Alrighty! On with the show! And stay till the end for a special sneak peek of next chapter. :D

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It took a week of answering stupid questions before the Magic Council finally let them go, and by then they were beyond ready to go home.

When they all finally staggered back home and into the guildhall, they were met with a warm welcome…and a shocking sight.

Elfman and Mira's younger sister, Lisanna – who had supposedly died years ago – was standing there perfectly alive and well, and greeted them along with everyone else. Lucy herself had attended the funeral, so she was absolutely stunned and of course delighted to see the sweet white-haired mage again.

Of course, since they'd been in Crocus at the time of her arrival, they had missed the whole thing – including her explanation. So, she quickly launched into her story as they all bombarded her with questions.

"Well, you see, when I was hit by Elfman all those years ago, I actually ended up being pushed through a small Anima and ended up in Edolas."

"You've been in Edolas all this time?!" Gray asked, sounding shocked.

"That's what she said, Droopy-Eyes." Natsu snorted.

"I heard her, ya mouth breather!"

With a sigh, Lucy separated the two so she could continue to hear Lisanna's explanation. "Sorry, please ignore these two, they have a habit of getting into fights. So, you were saying?"

She blinked in surprise and then stuttered, "W-well…um, ever since then, I've been searching for a way to come home of course. So… when I heard about everything that happened with you guys and the lacrima and King Faust, I went to the capitol and asked if there was any way for me to rejoin you. King Mystogen decided to reopen the portal and send me back. Oh, but uh, he did ask me to tell you that he promised not to make a habit of sending Edolians to Earthland."

Everyone chuckled, but there was still some appreciation in it. Having people randomly pop up would probably cause some problems, so it was good that this wouldn't be a regular occurrence.

They were in for yet another big surprise though when Makarov invited them all to his office after they had greeted everyone.

Firstly, he asked how the interviews had gone, and whether they had been able to keep Mystogan out of it. When they all confirmed that Mystogen's name hadn't been included in any of their statements, he immediately cut to the chase. "I'm sure you're all wondering why I asked you not to mention him."

They all nodded, and he resumed. "By keeping Mystogan out of it, we've now acquired a very important opportunity."

They silently waited for him to continue.

"As you have all been told… during our year-long absence, Jellal orchestrated his own release in order to help search for us. I'm sure you are also aware of his current standing in society, and that everyone considers him a criminal mastermind. Nevertheless, he is a legitimate member of society, despite the public's opinion of him. Which means…that if a legal guild wanted to make him a member, it would now be possible to do so."

Erza was listening with wider and wider eyes, looking confused at first and then gradually more hopeful. "Master…are you suggesting what I think you are?"

He smiled. "Quick as ever. You are correct Erza, I intend to bring him on as a Fairy Tail member. Of course, I offered him membership as soon as I found out that he'd been released, but he refused – saying that his reputation would tarnish ours. That was true enough, and I didn't push the issue. But now, Mystogan has provided us with the perfect solution. Given that man's habit for constantly wearing exceptionally concealing clothing, nobody ever saw his face. So, if Jellal were to wear those clothes, he could easily pass as Mystogan and join us under that alias."

Naturally there were no complaints from anyone assembled in his office.

Erza was ecstatic. Gray and Natsu both shrugged and grinned – mostly from watching Erza – and Lucy was beyond delighted. She was so incredibly happy for Erza that she couldn't quite contain herself, and quickly drew the redhead into a brief side-hug. Wendy was also happy for Erza, though she didn't know the history behind it all. And of course, Gajeel and Laxus couldn't have cared less.

"Excellent. I've already asked the other teams who have worked with him before, and nobody had any complaints." After a slight pause, he turned to Erza. "Very well then, I imagine that you would like to take this mission?"

"Yes, I would be delighted to."

"I expected as much. Do you wish to take your team with you, or make it a solo mission?"

She glanced at Natsu, Lucy, and Gray – seeming to consider for a long moment. "No…I believe I would like to do this alone. If that's agreeable to all of you of course?"

"Go right on ahead Erza, I'm still exhausted from everything that's been going on." Lucy quickly said, waving her hands in a shooing gesture. Similarly, Gray shrugged and gave an excuse about wanting to stay here and spend some time with Juvia.

After that, they all left Makarov's office, and Erza went to pack so she could immediately head out. She met them back at the guild for a last goodbye, and they all sent her off with hugs and 'good lucks.'

She left with a smile on her face, and they didn't see her again for the next several weeks.

Of course, in the meantime, everything went back to normal – or as normal as things ever got for Fairy Tail.

Lucy found some small jobs to take to pay for rent, and Natsu continued working to hunt down Tartarus. He had his connections in the celestial realm of course, but he had also teamed up with Laxus – who had taken over managing the information's base here on Earthland. It was impressive, the network that had been cast in their yearlong absence, but Laxus had managed to increase it even more since their return. The blond lightning dragon slayer had never really been good about dropping grudges, and he was just as determined as Natsu to find those bastards. They made a surprisingly good team.

…

About a week or two after returning from Crocus, Lucy and Natsu's two occupations crossed over.

Lucy was at the missions board, glancing over the very sparse selection. Their reputation still hadn't gone up since their return, and the missions hadn't exactly been flooding in. Probably having their hometown magically disappear for a couple of days hadn't helped them any. There had been plenty of rumors that it was somehow their fault – that some sort of big spell had been bungled really badly. Or else they were seriously looked down on for not being able to protect their city in the first place.

It was ridiculous how much things had changed. Just over a year ago, before the Tenrou incident, their reputation had been good enough that they would have been praised for being able to bring Magnolia back – instead of cursed for losing it.

Lucy did her best not to dwell on it, but it was sort of difficult to ignore when it seriously impacted work.

Not only were there fewer jobs, but whenever she did get a job, her patron always seemed shocked that they'd gotten a response so quickly – or at all. And from there, things typically didn't improve. Most were openly doubtful about whether she would even get the job done. They seemed to be under the impression that Fairy Tail wizards always bungled their missions or created more chaos and destruction than good. That part of their reputation probably mostly originated from their past misadventures… since the worst of their stories were more frequently circulated these days.

Unfortunately, those rumors weren't unfounded, since Lucy herself had participated in plenty of missions that ended with extensive property damage.

As for the no-shows and failing to finish a job…. after all of the strongest Fairy Tail mages had been put into a coma, all of the others had to deal with jobs that were out of their class level, and it generally ended in failure. That wasn't their fault by any means, they had still been receiving jobs that were extremely difficult and dangerous – including S-Class quests. Plus, there simply hadn't been enough members to deal with the number of requests they had been receiving.

However, while she didn't blame her fellow guildmates for their current predicament, Lucy still wasn't happy about it. Being disrespected and having to scrounge for jobs was frustrating and discouraging…and most of those jobs didn't even pay well.

They were currently accepting every single assignment, no matter how ridiculously low the pay was, because they simply couldn't afford to turn away a paying customer right now. Because of that though, their reputation took yet another hit, and they were seen as the 'cheap option' by many of their patrons. And of course, that didn't exactly prompt those patrons to treat them with a lot of respect.

Lucy had been treated almost like a cheap hooker on more than one occasion

While she knew that some of the other guildmembers hadn't put up with it… she had to pay rent. Besides that, she was doing her best to help rebuild Fairy Tail's reputation, and getting mad at a paying customer wasn't exactly the way to do that. Although, it was possible that she was going about it the wrong way, and standing up for herself would actually be the better plan.

Heaving a heavy sigh, she plucked off one of the few missions up on the board today and took it to Mira, glancing it over as she walked. Naturally the pay was ridiculously low for what they wanted, but at least it didn't seem TOO difficult. Basically, a farmer was having some problems with magical gophers…or at least they thought it was gophers. Could be any number of things - squirrels, moles, even burrowing spiders. The last one wasn't fun to consider, so Lucy didn't.

The other irritating thing about it was that the mission was located in Crocus, ironically, and Lucy shook her head and rolled her eyes. She hadn't wanted to see the capitol again for a while after the whole Courthouse incident, but it seemed like that just wasn't in the cards for her.

When she reached Mira, she was pleasantly surprised to find herself behind Laxus and Natsu – who were eagerly talking to the white-haired barmaid about some sort of job as well.

"Hey, you guys got a lead?"

Natsu turned and gave her a big grin. "Yeah! We did! One of Laxus's contacts is working in the police force over there, and he just reported that there was a break-in at the jail. Remember that Angel chick that you beat the snot out of? She was taken from her cell. Since she's a celestial wizard, it could be related."

"Definitely sounds like it's worth checking out…" Lucy mused, and then realized something. "Oh! Hey! Look, I found a mission in Crocus too! Mind if I tag along with you two? We can split up for our different missions of course, but it would be cool to have some company."

Natsu of course was totally on board with the idea and Laxus just shrugged. Mira signed them all up for their respective missions and wished them luck.

And so, bright and early the next day, they all set off. Lucy and Laxus boarded the train to Crocus alone of course … Natsu would join them on the other side. Happy and Amy tagged along too though, so Lucy wasn't left totally alone with the older and grumpier Fairy Tail member. She liked him just fine, but he could still be a little intimidating to be around when it was just the two of them.

Funnily enough, Frosch also tagged along. It seemed like the little pink frog/cat had taken a liking to Laxus, and now went with him most places. Lucy never would have expected Frosch to pick Laxus to hang out with – given his prickly personality – but after watching them together, it was clear that he liked her just fine. While he addressed everyone else harshly, he was generally nicer to the green cat…gentler almost. It was kind of cute.

It was amusing really, each of the dragon slayers had an Exceed partner now…because Gajeel and Panther Lily had teamed up as well.

Unsurprisingly, there wasn't much conversation for the first hour or two of the train ride. Laxus just flicked his headphones on and closed his eyes, slumping in the bench across from her, and Frosch zoned out in that weird way of hers. It was like she fell asleep with her eyes open or something.

As for Lucy, she brought out her writing notebook. She was just finishing up her first novel ever and was excited to see it to the end. Her first few stories had all tapered off as she either hit a major writer's block or else messed up the plot so badly that the story just got too confusing to continue. This one was finally working out for her though, and she was eager to finish it and maybe – just maybe – get it published.

"Hey, what're you always writing about anyways?"

The abrupt grunt startled her out of her zone, and she jumped, getting a snort of amusement from Amy – who had her head out the window. How the wolf could see or hear anything going on in the cabin with the wind in her face, Lucy didn't know. Happy was asleep on her lap, so he said nothing, just continued to snore and drool on her skirt.

She blinked at Laxus, surprised that he had asked. "Um…I'm writing a novel."

"No shit." His eyebrows raised, and he leaned forwards to rest his elbows on his knees, seeming mildly interested. "You sure have been working on it a long time."

"Well…I started a few before this one and messed them up. But this is finally almost finished."

"Huh. Well good for you, Blondie."

And that was the end of the conversation…. Until Lucy decided to ask him a question too.

"Sooo, what music do you listen to?" She nodded at his headphones.

He shrugged. "All sorts. Whatever song I like I guess."

There was a pause in the conversation again, and then Lucy braved another question. "What are you listening to right now?"

He cracked open one eye and fixed her with a mildly annoyed expression. Then, to her surprise he jerked his headphones off, leaned forward, and clamped them over her ears. The whole thing had been done in one motion, smooth and quick and impossible to avoid, and she was left gasping and wide eyed in the aftermath. Then, the sound now filtering into her ears made her jaw drop again, right as it had been starting to close… which probably made her look like a fish. Her eyes popped wide open again too, and her eyebrows shot up her forehead.

She had fully expected some sort of headbanger metal band to blast in her ears, or possibly rap…or…she wasn't really sure. Given his tough appearance and tough guy attitude she'd made certain assumptions about his taste in music. Then again, Gajeel definitely looked like the heavy metal type, and he listened to shoo-be-doo-ba jazz – or whatever that stuff was called – so she supposed she shouldn't have had any expectations.

Still, the soothing cords of piano and violin that filled her ears was a bit of a shock. There was also maybe a cello too. It was lovely, gentle, and completely at odds with the disgruntled man sitting in front of her. He was all rough edges, and this music had positively none. It was smooth as silk and just as pleasing to the senses.

"Wow…"

Finally, amusement started to replace his irritation as he took in her expression. "I take it you weren't expecting that, huh?"

"Um. No."

"Then what did you think I was listening to?"

"I dunno…rock…or rap maybe?"

He laughed out loud. "Doesn't surprise me. And just for the record, I listen to those too. Like I said, I just listen to the songs I like, whether or not they really go in a playlist together."

His point was proven as that song came to an end and the next started up. A full-blown country song filled her ears – complete with twang and cowboy references. She gaped at him again, and this time he started to chuckle and leaned back in his seat, looking for all the world like he was now using her as his entertainment. When she got to the chorus, she spluttered and turned red – both with amusement and a bit of embarrassment.

"Seriously? Save a horse and ride a cowboy? Where the heck did you find this song?!"

At that, Laxus full-out started laughing at her, holding his stomach and tilting at a dangerous angle. She just shook her head and snorted in amusement at his laughter before unclamping the headphones and handing them back over. He slung them around his neck in between fits of snickers.

After that, the ride was less tense and the atmosphere loosened. Eventually Amy got her fill of wind in the face and pulled back in to curl up near Lucy's feet as she got back to writing her novel.

The rest of the train ride went quickly, and soon they arrived at the station. Once they had disembarked, had their luggage on the station, and were contemplating a map, Natsu popped up. He appeared behind Lucy without her knowledge and announced his presence by snaking his tail around her leg, where it coiled around and around and gave her a good squeeze. Almost instantly after that, he slung his arm over her shoulders, but the first sensation had already startled her into jumping a foot in the air and squawking as she looked down to see what creature was molesting her.

Unfortunately for Natsu, he timed it just right so that when she jumped in fright, her head slammed back into his, clocking him in the jaw. She heard teeth click together and him grunt in surprise.

Laxus raised his eyes at the commotion and then cocked an eyebrow as he watched the situation unfold.

"Damn Luce…. Your head sure is hard."

She turned as much as she could with the tail still gripping her thigh. "You're the one with a hard head! Don't go announcing your presence by sneaking up on me and doing that with your tail!"

The other blond snorted as he noted the red scaly appendage wrapped around her thigh and covered his smirk with a grin and cough. Straightening his face, he added, "Generally you don't molest your girlfriend in public, Pyro. Save it for the bedroom."

Lucy turned red and glared at Laxus for just making the situation more awkward. Her pink-haired attacker just spared him a confused look and then seemed to dismiss him and turned back to his angry mate.

"I totally thought you'd recognize it as me. I mean, my tail's been all over you … shouldn't you be used to the feeling by now? Hell, we sleep with it-"

She cut him off by groaning and facepalming, her cheeks vividly tomato colored. His statement was true, but it really didn't need to be said in public. It didn't help when Laxus snorted again and then gave up on trying to contain his mirth and started to chuckle.

"Well that's not really something I needed to know…but whatever. How about you put it back in your pants for now dumbass?"

When Natsu didn't immediately follow through with the suggestion – which only made Lucy feel more self-conscious and irritable with him – she decided to take matters into her own hands. Literally. She reached down and grabbed onto his tail, aiming for the tip which was near her knee. Given her aggravation at the whole thing, she probably used more force than necessary, and essentially manhandled him to peel the bottom few coils off her thigh.

Natsu immediately hissed, flushed, and shuddered. As soon as he snapped out of his initial shocked response to having her grab and squeeze his tail, he quickly whipped it back to where it was generally located – wrapped around his own thigh and not hers. When she glanced at his expression, it was impossible to not notice the extra dark eyes and how his breathing had picked up, and she rolled her eyes. She'd unintentionally turned him on… but didn't really feel too badly about it under the circumstances. At his reproachful look, she just shrugged at him. It was his own fault for wrapping his tail around her in the first place. She knew it was a gesture of affection, much like a kiss to him, but this just wasn't really the place for that.

Laxus just watched the whole thing with raised eyebrows and couldn't hold back a few snickers as he noticed the distinctly hot and bothered aura the pink-haired man was now giving off in waves. Apparently he liked her messing with his tail, which Laxus just couldn't help but find funny, and he muttered under his breath, "The guy really does have a third leg…heh."

Natsu just had to suck it up though, because they were already setting off to get checked in to their hotel and then go on their separate missions. So, he was stuck with blue balls for a little while, and his disgruntlement was not missed by the others.

Happy and Frosch didn't notice though, and they remained blissfully unaware. The blue cat was much more interested in the fish vendors they passed by, and Frosch was equally interested in the sweets. Lucy gave in and bought her cat a couple of fish and Laxus's cat a couple of sweets, which pacified them for the rest of the way to their hotel. Just to be fair, she bought a snack for Amy and Natsu too, who both greatly appreciated it. For Natsu, it had the added benefit of completely distracting him from the state his body was in.

After checking in to their hotel, they split up to go their separate ways. Natsu and Lucy shared a brief kiss; and then she, Happy, and Amy all set off towards the outskirts of town where this farmer was supposed to be located. They arrived within an hour of brisk walking, and Lucy was shocked with what they found.

She'd been expecting a small farmer, based on the payment offered – which was tiny – but instead, she found a huge sprawling plantation as she crested the last hill. It reminded her uncomfortably of the Heartfilia lands, which were similarly huge, although they hadn't been all farmland. Casting a quick eye over the place, she noted that they had what seemed to be two crops – a large vineyard and a huge swath of flowers. She wasn't sure what sort of flowers they were, but it was obviously a lucrative business to farm them, based off the huge mansion that was located at one end of the plantation.

Anger started to burn in her gut, now knowing that this person had offered small payment not because he couldn't pay, but because he was just one of those rich people who hired cheap work to save a buck. She could already predict a bad attitude off this guy, and she hadn't even met him.

Her prediction proved correct when they arrived at the front door of the house, and she announced herself as Lucy from Fairy Tail. "I'm here to do this job?" She held up the job request she had brought from the board.

"Ah yes, Mr. Xavier has been expecting you. I am his Butler…Jeeves. Please come in."

She smiled, and they walked through the doorway, but were stalled as the butler stopped them. "Oh, and please leave your pets outside. There are no animals allowed inside the house."

Lucy scowled. "Happy and Amy are not pets. They're members of my team."

"Aye!" Happy chimed in, shocking the butler, and he took a step back as his eyes widened.

"Perhaps it would be best not to push the envelope too much." Amy added and glanced up at Lucy. "I'll return to the celestial realm for now."

"You really don't have to…"

"No, but I'd rather not cause problems for you, given the circumstance."

Lucy sighed and finally nodded, and Amy poofed, which left the poor butler speechless. As Happy and Lucy stepped into the foyer, he just wordlessly motioned for them to follow him and then led them down along hall and into some sort of large office.

He excused himself and went to get his employer while Lucy waited in the plush chair. Happy sat on the armrest, his arms crossed and still looking irritable.

"Don't worry about it Happy. I mean, you are a cat. It's an honest mistake. Though it was definitely rude for them to ask you to stay outside."

He hmphed.

Before he could reply though, the door opened behind them, and in came an impeccable man in a suit, straw hat, and cane. The cane was obviously just for show, since he didn't actually lean on it at all. He took a seat behind the huge desk in front of them and then instantly scowled as he spied Happy.

"I'm sure my butler told you that no animals are permitted inside this house. I would have thought that even a Fairy Tail member could follow such simple instructions."

Instantly, Lucy found herself intensely disliking the guy, but gritted her teeth and swallowed the nasty comment on her tongue. "Yes, your butler did explain the rules. However, Happy is a member of my team, not merely a pet. He sits in on all my meetings for missions and needs to know all the information as much as I do."

Mr. Xavier visibly scoffed. "A cat is your partner? I know you people are cheap, but honestly… I wasn't expecting this."

Happy puffed up with outrage, and his tail more than doubled in size. "If you don't like Fairy Tail, then we can leave!"

Lucy winced just a little, but mostly applauded his comment. Thankfully the jerk seemed too shocked to have been offended by the comment.

"You can talk?!"

"As I said, Happy here is a member of my team. He's a magical creature known as an Exceed, a species just as intelligent as humans. If his presence bothers you, then we can leave and send another team."

The man scowled and harrumphed, but eventually said, "Fine. He can stay. I need this problem solved as quickly as possible, and you two are already here. I should have had lower standards. However, I do expect the job to be completed properly, and with minimal damage to my property. Any property damage will come out of your paycheck, and if it goes over then you owe me."

She gritted her teeth but forced a polite smile. "Yes of course. That is standard policy."

"Then let us get down to business. As you read in the job description, I am being plagued by some sort of burrowing animal, or a pack of animals. They are tearing up my fields, eating my flowers and grapes, and causing horrible damage all across the property. Some of my workers have even been injured."

She highly doubted that he actually cared if his workers got hurt, unless it affected their work. Which suggested that their injuries had been pretty severe for him to have mentioned it.

"So, you want me to get rid of it somehow."

"Yes. Obviously. Hunt it down and kill it."

She grimaced. "I'll remove it, but I'd prefer not to kill it if that can be helped."

"I don't care what you do with it, just get rid of it. Or them. Whatever is doing this."

She stood, figuring this meeting was over and wanting to get away from the unpleasant man as soon as possible. "I understand. I'll get out there right away and take care of it for you."

He nodded tersely and then cocked his head, eyeing her up and down. "It's a shame you're just a mage from Fairy Tail. Such beauty is wasted on you."

She was positively shocked. Sure, she'd been insulted plenty the past month or two that she'd been back, but she hadn't really seen that one coming. It was alarming how a guild's reputation affected how its members were treated…. Or perhaps accepting all of those low cash jobs was just attracting scum-balls.

It was ridiculous though, and she drew the line here. Slowly turning to face him fully again, she fixed the man with a stern look. "I'm happy to do my job here, but I'm going to have to ask you to refrain from saying such rude things. And while we're at it, I don't appreciate such blatantly disrespectful comments about my guild. In the interest of keeping our working relationship pleasant, please avoid saying such things in my presence. Good day sir."

His mouth was already opening, undoubtedly to say something unpleasant, but she didn't care to stick around and hear it. Turning sharply on her heel, she strode out of the room without a backwards glance. She didn't intend to see the guy again until she collected her money for completing the job. He could just sit there and stew on that for a little while.

…

As for Natsu, Laxus, and Frosch, they were dealing with someone significantly more helpful. Laxus's informant had agreed to meet them on his lunchbreak at a small mom and pop joint near the police department.

"So, you're saying that all the doors were opened without any sort of forced entry, and all the guards on duty were frozen solid?"

The informant – Rey – nodded and shrugged in sympathetic confusion. "Yep. The guy obviously has some ice magic. It's unlike anything I've seen before though… can't be broken or reversed by anything that we've tried. We don't have any answers about the doors though or how he got in."

"Probably made ice keys." Natsu grunted around a burger.

The policeman blinked at him in shock. "That…makes sense. I can't believe we didn't think about that…"

"You just haven't spent enough time around an ice mage." Laxus responded, but was similarly impressed. Even he might not have thought of that – and certainly not as fast. Maybe it was because Natsu was around Gray so much that he had thought of it so quickly.

"Well that potentially answers one question, but not the other. We still don't know how to melt the ice, and if we aren't careful about it they could break."

"I could try my flames on it." Natsu offered, once again surprising them both. But the policeman hesitated.

"I would be happy to let you try, but I'm not in charge of that part of the investigation. And I'm not even supposed to be talking to you two about this, so I don't really think it's a good idea."

Laxus shrugged, but Natsu wasn't so easily put off. It wasn't really in his personality to just leave someone behind who needed help. "Why don't you talk to whoever's in charge of that and suggest they put out a call for fire mages, or just any mages in general who could melt ice. If they like it, I'll respond to the posters or whatever."

"I'll give it a try. No harm in that I suppose. But you have to act like you don't know what's going on and pretend to buy whatever story they give you."

"Sure. We'll do that. Now back to the story. Are you positive that the only person taken was Angel?" Laxus rerouted the conversation brusquely, irritated by the detour.

"Yes. She was their target. They went straight for her cell and didn't touch anyone else. The whole operation was so quiet that none of the prisoners even woke up for it, and if they did, they're not talking. There's one or two who act scared when we question them, but they insist they were asleep and didn't see a thing. They're terrified though."

"Shit…it would really help to get a description of the guy. But at least we know that this isn't related to the Oracion Seis, because she was the only one taken. Unless it's personal to her, or there's someone else out there who's going after celestial wizards, I'd say it's a good bet that this is related to Tartarus."

"Fro thinks so too!" his Exceed chirped agreeably, but they all sort of ignored her for the moment. She agreed to just about everything.

"That's a lot of 'what ifs.' If I can get a whiff of that ice I'll be able to tell you if it's demonic, which'll tell us something at least."

"I'll be sure to suggest your idea to the head of that division, and hopefully we can get you an up-close look at the ice." Rey promised and then glanced at his watch. "I've gotta go though, my break's almost over."

Natsu and Laxus nodded and picked up the tab as thanks for his help. Once he was gone, they sat around and discussed it some more while they both ordered second helpings. Frosch quietly watched and listened, licking her vanilla ice cream cone and inserting an agreeable, "Fro thinks so too!" every now and then.

…

Meanwhile, Lucy was not having a good time.

As soon as they left the plantation, they got to work. The first order of business was to scout around and take a look at what they were dealing with – so she, Happy, and Amy took to the grounds and did some investigating. They immediately noticed the prolific holes scattered all over the fields and vineyard as they poked around. It was even worse than Lucy had expected, and she sincerely hoped that the majority of the holes were just tunnels… and not burrows… because if they had to deal with that many creatures, this mission could take a while. Amy had already identified the creature's scent as a mammal, which meant they were probably gophers, moles, ground squirrels, or something else like that. She also said she smelled quite a few, but couldn't tell just how many there were.

After snooping for a bit, they split up and looked over the whole plantation to try and pinpoint where the holes had started, and - with any luck - where this creature's home base was located. With some help from the workers they ran into, Amy's nose, and a bird's eye view from Happy, they found the highest concentration of holes relatively quickly.

Once they had found the hub of it all, the next matter was to try and catch one, so they could see what they were dealing with. Her first thought was to flood the holes with Scorpio's sand or Aquarius's water, but then she reconsidered. If there were babies down there, she didn't want to smother or drown them. Finally, she came up with Aries, realizing that they could use a wool ball instead of sand or water to push the critters out of their holes. It was even better, because the animals would be comfortable and stick around for examination.

"Open! Gate of the Ram! Aries!" she called, and instantly a puff of pink wooly smoke appeared, along with Aries.

She quickly explained the situation and her plan to the timid spirit.

"I'm sorry, but…I think I can do it Miss Lucy…" she said, not overly confident as usual, but happy enough to go along with the plan.

And so, she pointed her hands at the ground, aiming for one of the holes, and exclaimed, "Wool ball!"

A pink mass shot from her palms and into the ground. She kept it going until pink puffs were suddenly popping up out of the ground all around them – emerging from the holes – and Lucy, Amy, and Happy each ran to take a look at different holes.

"We caught one!" Amy exclaimed, and they all rushed over to where she was standing over a pink decorated hole.

Sure enough, snuggled up in the pink fluff was a white bunny.

"Oh my gosh! It's rabbits! Or bunnies! Or whatever…Wow, I can't believe they did this much damage…." Lucy murmured, glancing back to the mess of holes peppering the ground all around them.

"So now what? We've figured out what's doing it, but how are we gonna get rid of them?" Happy asked, leaning in close to look at the bunny.

"I don't know. I guess it depends on how many there are."

"A lot probably. 'Reproducing like rabbits' isn't a saying for no reason. And the scent is really strong." Amy said dryly, poking at the little bunny with her nose.

"I suppose we could try to push them all out of their holes like this one and then just…collect and relocate them? It would be a lot of work but-"

She cut off when the bunny stirred at Amy's nose-prod. "Quick! Grab it!"

They all reached for the rabbit, and Lucy managed to seize it. The fluffy thing was complacent for all of a minute before the comfort from the wool ball wore off and it woke up. And then it did an abrupt role reversal. Instantly, she was holding onto a white fluffy bomb as red eyes snapped open and it started to struggle in her grip. She hung onto it for a moment but yelped as amazingly sharp claws dug into her, and then she cried out as it bit her hand.

She dropped it, or tried to anyways… but it hung on with its teeth embedded deep in her palm, dangling like some sort of ornament.

"Let go! Let go!" she screamed, shaking her hand. That was not a good idea because it hurt her hand quite a bit more and she instantly stopped.

Her good hand hovered over its head, thinking about trying to pry its mouth open, but she jerked back when it growled. The bunny growled.She was pretty sure normal bunnies did not growl.

By now she was crying in desperation and pain. "Help me get it off!" she yelled to her friends, who were all hovering around her anxiously.

She went in again to try prying its jaws open, figuring it was the only thing she could do, but there wasn't really any good way to attempt it without sticking her thumb in its mouth, which she refused to do. She really did not want to lose her thumb, even if it probably didn't have teeth there. Happy grabbed it and tried to pull it off, but that had a similar result to her shaking it. It only ripped the bite open more.

Finally Aries tried putting a wool ball around Lucy's entire hand and the bunny attached to it, hoping that it would lull the creature back into a relaxed state. After a moment, she felt the vice grip on her relax and yanked her hand out of the ball of pink fluff that Aries continued to hold. The bunny stayed safely wrapped up in the wool.

Everyone gasped as they stared down at the damage to her hand. The stupid rabbit had essentially punched a hole in her hand, leaving a gaping wound that bled profusely. It dripped to the ground and was already forming a tiny puddle, and she immediately grew concerned. It wasn't so much that it was dangerous, yet, but if they didn't get it to stop soon she might have a problem.

Aside from that, it also hurt. She could see bones in the wound and was ninety percent sure that at least one had been broken. Plus, it was instantly evident that the motor function in her hand had taken a serious blow. It wasn't like she was wiggling her fingers or anything – that would hurt way too much – but she could easily tell that if she tried, she wouldn't be able to. Even her wrist had gotten harder to move.

The sudden urge to vomit came and went with thankfully nothing more than a gag. Aries threw the bunny ball away as far as she could. Then she turned to Lucy and instantly made more pink wool, wrapping it tightly around her hand – but not so tight as to cause even more tissue damage. A wave of comfort soothed the pain, and the wool helped to stop the bleeding somewhat.

"We've got to get you to a clinic and get that fixed." Amy said seriously, and everyone nodded in agreement.

"I'll fly you there at top speed Lucy. We'll be there before you can say 'ow.'" Happy promptly offered.

"Good idea Happy, we'll be right behind you." Amy said, and both spirits popped out of existence. Lucy temporarily panicked, until she saw that the pink wool on her hand remained, while the rest of it poofed away. She could still feel Aries's presence as she sent her magic to Lucy through her cracked gate.

Suddenly a loud growl started up and she whirled around, her jaw dropping when she saw at least ten of the little white devils standing up on their hind legs from where they'd been deposited out of their pink beds. Red eyes fixed on her and Happy.

Dread shot through her and she yelped, but Happy was quicker than her. His wings flashed open and he launched forwards, snagging her and then flying them both up into the sky. It wasn't a moment too soon either, as the rabbits all charged, and the speed with which they hopped quite frankly terrified her. They probably would have been ripped apart if Happy couldn't fly.

That fear stuck with her all the way to the clinic, which luckily they found relatively quickly thanks to Lucy's map. It was hard to unfold with her bum hand, but she managed somehow, and they located the nearest clinic in a matter of minutes.

As soon as they landed, Amy popped back into existence, and they rushed inside and ran up to the intake desk. The wool was staunching the blood flow, but it was still running down her arm, and she had plenty of it on her clothes, which would hopefully get the seriousness of her situation across.

When she got to the desk, the woman there barely glanced up and said, "One moment please." She was on the phone.

Lucy impatiently shifted from foot to foot, trying to wait like the woman had said, but she was quickly running out of patience. Amy started up a low rumble of irritation in her chest. When the nurse – at least Lucy assumed she was a nurse – didn't look up again after about a minute of chatting, she reached her limit. It didn't even sound like she was talking to a patient. Based off what Lucy could hear, it sounded more like a social call.

"Excuse me, but I-" She tried the polite route and got shut down once again.

Without looking up, the woman heaved an exasperated sigh and just reached for a clipboard and some papers, which she slammed down on the top of the desk. "Fill these out."

Lucy growled, a sentiment which was echoed by her wolf companion, but she took the papers and looked at them. It asked for her name, date of birth, and other such important information, which she did understand the need for, but didn't really feel like filling out at the moment. Actually, she couldn't fill it out, because her dominant hand happened to be wrapped in pink wool and was leaking alarming amounts of blood.

"I'm kind of in a lot of pain right now, and my dominant hand is the one that's hurt. Is there any way that I can have a friend fill this out while I'm being treated?" she gritted through her teeth, planning to call Loke to fill out this form for her.

The woman glanced up, appearing utterly disinterested, and looked at her over the desk. It was a tall desk, one of the kinds that hid most of the person's body on the other side. Lucy doubted this nurse could see any of the blood on her, which was a shame really.

"What sort of emergency happened to you?"

"I was bitten by a rabbit, but-"

The woman didn't even let her finish. "That isn't serious enough to skip the paperwork. Please come back up once it's filled out."

Lucy angrily tried again. "If you would let me finish, I was about to say that this wasn't just a normal rabbit. It was some sort of magical attack rabbit, and it tore my hand open."

The woman hid a scoff behind an almost polite cough. Once again she wasn't looking up. She was looking down at something she was working on behind her desk, and she had already picked back up the phone. Amy's growl kicked up another notch, but thankfully she restrained herself. Happy was equally beside himself with anger and she could see him shaking with it.

"I'm sorry Miss, but I cannot help you until the paperwork is filled out. I will tell the doctors that you're in a lot of pain and need a Tylenol."

"How about you just look at the wound and tell me if it's bad enough to get attention right away?" Lucy asked, waving her bleeding bandaged hand up so the woman could see it. The woman didn't see it though, because she was still looking down, and trying to talk on the phone.

"Like I said before Miss, I will let the doctors know that you're in pain. But there's really no reason for you to argue about the paperwork, because there are several people already waiting to be seen. You will have to wait either way."

Lucy had had enough. She unwrapped the wound, and naturally it reopened as soon as it was no longer under pressure. She winced at the sight again, and blood quickly began to drip to the ground.

Her intention had been to somehow get the nurse's attention with her blood – possibly by bleeding onto her desk – but she was somewhat distracted when Leo summoned himself to her side. He took one look at Lucy's hand and then glanced at the unobservant nurse and his eyes went cold and hard.

As for Lucy, she was supremely happy to see him, and instantly held up the paperwork she couldn't complete. "Leo! I'm so happy to see you. By any chance, could you fill this out for me?"

"Sure thing." he said, his eyes softening for a moment as he took the clipboard from her, but then his expression shifted back to pissed as he looked at the nurse again. "And why aren't you getting medical treatment?"

"I'm working on it." she grumbled and turned back to the nurse. "Excuse me…my friend has shown up and said he can do my paperwork…. So would you please look at my wound and tell me if I can go get it stitched up now?"

All she got in response to that was, "Your friend can fill out your paperwork, that's not a problem. And no, a rabbit bite probably won't require stitches."

And the woman still didn't even look up.

At that, Lucy finally lost her temper. "Happy, could you please get this woman's attention?"

"Aye sir!" he almost growled, and his wings popped open so he could fly up over the desk. He landed with an intentionally loud thud directly in front of the nurse. "Hey! You!"

That finally got her attention, and the nurse's head shot up, and she jerked back in surprise at the blue talking cat that suddenly landed on her desk.

"Wha-what in the world?"

"Look!" Happy spat, pointing back at Lucy.

She was so stunned and in shock, that her eyes automatically followed his gesture, before locking on to the bleeding hand that Lucy held up for her to see.

"Have I finally got your attention?"

The nurse gaped up at her.

"Something tells me that this rabbit bite is going to need stitches. So could I maybe get someone to do that before I bleed out? And maybe check to see if I have any broken bones? I'd like the use of my hand after this you know…"

Despite her tough words, she knew tears were streaming from her eyes. Some of them were angry tears, some frightened, some from pain, but she didn't care at the moment.

Finally, the nurse seemed to snap out of whatever stupor she'd fallen into. "Yes of course! I am so sorry!"

She rushed out from behind the desk and yelled for some help, seeming to have forgotten about Happy in the face of Lucy's wound. Another nurse came from the back, and at the sight of Lucy's hand, she also rushed around the desk and opened the door for them to go into the back. Then she ran off to get a doctor. By this point Lucy really was getting a little lightheaded, so she was grateful for the support.

Leo followed, still working on her paperwork and periodically sending sharp looks towards the thoroughly apologetic nurse. At first the nurses protested having Happy come back with them, but after he did a little more speaking and Lucy insisted that he was her teammate, they allowed him to be in the exam room. For simplicity sake, Amy poofed back to the celestial realm.

The doctor took one look at the wound and said she would need emergency surgery to put it all back together, and she was rushed to the back. Happy stayed in the room for her to return, and Leo quickly finished up her paperwork – knowing that she would likely be knocked out soon under heavy sedation, and he wouldn't be able to stay out.

They did some x-rays and determined that some of her bones had been broken along with everything else. So, after numbing everything, they set about fixing her bones and then her torn tendons and whatever else they needed to fix. Thankfully the doctor was a mage and was able to reconnect everything that had been messed up, so she would be able to regain all her lost mobility.

…

While Lucy and her team had been busy in the fields for a couple of hours, Natsu and Laxus hadn't been doing much of anything. At least not until the informant suddenly called Laxus with a lacrima.

"I ran the idea by Axel to ask for any local fire mages for help, and he thought it was such a good idea that he just sent the call out. He also asked me if I knew anyone that could help, and I suggested you. So he's requested that I give you a call and ask if you'd be willing to come down to the station as soon as possible."

Laxus was shocked by the speed with which that happened. "Woah…this Axel guy must be really freaked for him to accept help so quick."

Rey nodded solemnly. "He knows one of the guards personally who got frozen. He's desperate to save them."

And so, they immediately headed to the station. They were just getting checked in and shown to the back when Natsu felt the first stab of echoing pain through his hand that told him Lucy had been hurt. He flinched and stared at his hand, then looked around wildly – as if he could see her, which of course he couldn't.

"What's up with you?" Laxus asked, giving him a weirded-out side-eye.

"Lucy just got hurt. Pretty bad too."

Immediately the blond lightning dragon slayer sobered. "Is it really bad?"

"I…don't know. I know it isn't life threatening, but it hurt her a lot."

"Alright. Well, if you think Happy and Amy and the rest of her spirits can handle it for now, let's stick around and just try to get through with this as quick as possible. We might not get another chance."

Reluctantly Natsu agreed, but from there on out he was brisk and rude to everyone, telling them in no uncertain terms that he had to get out of there as quickly as he could. He pissed several people off, and Laxus had to cover his ass by explaining that Natsu had just gotten a lacrima call telling him that his 'wife' had been admitted to the hospital with an injury. Almost instantly they always forgave him on the spot and hurried up the process to their best of their ability.

Within a few minutes he was shown into a room with the frozen people, and he got up close for a good look and sniff at them. He wrinkled his nose, smelling demon magic all over them, but didn't say anything about it. Instead, he hurried to blast the first frozen guard with fire.

It shouldn't have surprised him that the demon ice wasn't easy to melt. But he still wasn't happy that it took at least an hour just to melt one. Might have taken longer.

The police were ecstatic, but he was done. "Alright, look. I'll come back and melt the rest as soon as I've gone and checked on my, uh, 'wife.'"

He decided that going with what Laxus had already said was probably his best bet here, even if 'wife' wasn't really the right word for her. He just thought of her as his mate, and knew that she thought of him as both a boyfriend and mate…but not a husband. Not yet. That wouldn't happen until they got married the human way. And he was totally fine with that.

There were a few protests, but mostly he just got thanks, and they let him go without too much hassle. As soon as he could, he poofed back to the celestial realm and then poofed to Lucy's side.

…

Meanwhile…

Finally Lucy was out of surgery and was being carted in a wheelchair back to her room where she could rest and recover before being released. On the way there though, a sudden flash of fire and smoke appeared in the hall, and abruptly Natsu was rushing towards her. All the doctors and nurses yelled and scattered in shock and fright at the sudden appearance of a freaked out dragon – not that they knew he was a dragon… but they certainly saw the distraught young man with pink hair that nearly tackled Lucy.

"Luce what happened?! Shit!" he yelped as he got a good look at her heavily bandaged hand. "What did this to you?!"

"A rabbit on steroids." she said dryly, and Natsu responded hilariously.

He froze and blinked at her for a moment, then squinted and frowned as he worked hard to process the information, and finally his head reared back as her answer hit him.

"A RABBIT?"

"On steroids." she firmly repeated. "It wasn't a normal rabbit. Obviously."

"I guess not. Damn…I'm so sorry I wasn't here sooner. I should have just ditched them and come as soon as I felt you get hurt…"

"Don't worry about it Natsu. I had plenty of help. And I'm sure whatever you were doing was really important. There's nothing for you to apologize for."

He still looked like he was about to cry, and she couldn't help but feel a warm bubble of love swell up in her chest. With her good hand she reached over and touched his cheek. "I'm fine Natsu. Really."

By now, everyone had started to recover from the shock of seeing him appear from nowhere, and the questions started up. Lucy explained as quickly as she could.

"This is Natsu, my boyfriend. He's also one of my celestial spirits, so he can summon himself to me. I'm sorry that he startled you all."

Eventually the hullabaloo died down, and they finally made it back to her room where Happy was still waiting for her. They found him curled up on the pillow on the bed, and it was obvious that he'd been crying. He woke up though as soon as she was wheeled in, and he immediately launched himself at her chest.

They were all told that she would need to stay for several hours for observation, and then she could check out. Natsu stayed with her for the first hour, and then she sent him back to the police station. He had explained some of what they'd been doing, and she wanted him to go save those people. She would be fine.

"I'm just gonna take a nap Natsu. I'll be here for a while, so go and do your thing, then check back in. You can take me back to the hotel when you're done. Okay?"

He reluctantly agreed.

…

It took Natsu the rest of the day to finish melting the ice, but he took a break after each one to 'check on his wife' – which meant he transported directly to her and then flew back over to the police station. About the third guard in, he went back to find her ready to go, and so he helped her check out and took her to the hotel before going back to the station.

Late that night, he finally finished melting the last guard's ice shell, and they left with many thanks and a nice tip. Of course, the most valuable part of it all was getting info… finding out that the ice reeked of demon magic and whatever their informant could get from the woken-up guards. Hopefully, Rey would have a description of the demon by tomorrow.

Meanwhile, as soon as Lucy was in her hotel room she summoned Aries, and of course Amy popped up of her own accord. The four of them put their heads together on how they would deal with the rabbit issue.

"They're vicious little buggers. As soon as you guys left and the wool ball disappeared, they all attacked like a pack of wolves or something…no offense Amy."

The white wolf sneezed in response, which Lucy took to mean, 'no problem.'

"I'm so sorry Miss Lucy…I should have kept the wool ball up until you were safe…."

"Don't worry Aries. You kept it on my hand, and that was the important thing. Speaking of, thank you so much for that. It really helped."

The shy sheep girl blushed and ducked her head.

"But how are we going to get rid of them all? We still don't know how many there are, and what if there are little babies that won't come out? If we leave them behind, they'll die without their moms." Lucy continued.

"I can make sure to push them all out with my wool ball …. Even babies will get caught up in it and pushed out." Aries offered.

"Well that solves one problem. But what do we do with them once they're out?" Amy asked.

"Yeah…as soon as we remove them from the wool they become super nasty!" Happy added, and they all nodded in agreement.

"The only thing I can think of is to buy a bunch of cages."

"I dunno…that rabbit seemed pretty strong."

"Yeah Happy, you're right about that." Lucy sighed, running the fingers of her good hand through her hair and tugging on it in frustration. "So we just need really sturdy cages…or one really big cage. Is there anything like that in the celestial realm aside from Bartolomeo's shield?"

Both Amy and Aries shook their heads. Which left Lucy to heave a sigh. "Well, I guess that means we're going to have to go buy some cages. There goes the money I was going to earn on this mission."

"What're you gonna do with them once you've got them all caged up?" Happy asked, and Lucy felt another headache coming on.

"I guess we're just going to have to fly them out of here. Which means I have to go and do some research in the library…see if I can find some information on these crazy bunnies."

So decided, Aries popped back home in a puff of pink wool, but of course Amy stuck around. A while later Natsu returned, and they heard the door open and shut in the room next to theirs, which suggested that Laxus and Frosch had also retired for the night.

"So…how was your day?" Lucy asked, and Natsu told her some of the details he'd left out earlier. He rushed through it a bit though, so he could ask her the same question.

Exasperatedly, Lucy groaned. "Yeah, we're gonna have to figure out what to do with those stupid bunnies tomorrow. First thing in the morning, I'm heading to the library to see if I can turn up any info that could help, and then…well I guess we've gotta go buy a cage."

"Why don't you ask Bartolomeo to cage 'em for you? You know his shield is strong enough."

"Yeah…but our contract is weird. I can't summon him, he just turns up when he wants to."

Natsu scoffed. "That weirdo…"

By then, Amy and Happy were curled up happily in the comfortable chair together, and Natsu and Lucy were similarly entangled on the bed. After a long pause, Natsu leaned in and pressed his forehead to hers, whispering, "I hate that you got hurt when I wasn't there…"

"I know…" she whispered back. "But it's okay Natsu. In our line of work, it's bound to happen every now and then. Don't beat yourself up over it."

He grimaced and fell silent, only pressing his forehead tighter against hers. "I wish I could heal it for ya Luce…but I'm no good with bones."

"So that only works on flesh wounds? You helped ease the pain of my bruises on Tenrou Island though…."

He shrugged. "Yeah, but they've already got ya all bandaged up and I'd hate to unwrap it only to mess up and have you go back to the hospital."

She sighed, deflating a little. "Yeah…true. Well, maybe we can experiment with it some other time. But whatever the case I-"

She was cut off as his lips pressed to hers. She gasped, but eagerly got into the kiss a second later.

He pulled back for a moment, whispering against her lips, "I can still do something to help, maybe. I dunno if it'll work, but it's worth a try…"

"Sure…" she whispered back, fine with anything he wanted to try – just as long as it didn't involve burning down the hotel accidentally.

His lips sealed back over hers and he asked her to open up by deepening the kiss. She complied happily, sighing through her nose and sinking into his embrace. Very slowly she felt flames begin to trickle into her mouth, much more controlled that usual, as if he was doing it on purpose instead of just spitting them up uncontrollably like usual. She shivered as the heat tickled down her throat, feeling like a very slow shot of whisky, and oh did it feel good. It slid down into her chest and warmed her from the inside out, like the best cup of hot chocolate – more soothing in this small amount than arousing.

He kept up the thin line of flames, and she waited patiently, wondering what he was up to but enjoying it whatever the end goal was. It didn't take her long to figure out what he was aiming for, and she accidentally blinked her eyes open in surprise when she felt his flames shiver in her chest and then branch off down one side only. Usually his fire went straight to her belly – coating her throat, chest, and stomach all the way down to her pelvis before branching out to her limbs as it overflowed her core. This time it didn't even reach her stomach, it turned off and traveled down her shoulder and arm…all the way to her hurt hand.

With her now awkwardly open eyes, she could see his eyebrows scrunched together in deep concentration, as if it was taking a great deal of effort to keep his flames so tightly controlled. It was a little out of character for him to be so careful about it, but she supposed that he could sense her exhaustion. They both knew that if he pounded fire into her, not only would she get insufferably aroused – which couldn't lead anywhere with Happy and Amy in the room – but it would also fill her up with energy that would keep her from getting any sleep. By keeping it a gentle low burn like this and just sending it to where he wanted, it was like a soothing warm bath instead of being dunked headfirst into an aphrodisiacal energy drink mix.

Realizing that her open eyes were glassing over, she let them slide shut again and groaned into the kiss, feeling his fire finally reach her finger tips and then circle around the throbbing wound which – despite all her pains meds – still hurt a good deal. As his fire burned inside her, the pain eased… like a sore muscle under a heat pad. She could feel muscles that she hadn't known were tense from the stress of pain begin to melt. Since the fire was inside her, it didn't burn the bandages - which was a plus - and he kept it there long enough for a lot of the pain to ease, before he pulled back and cut off the supply of fire. Licks of it remained in her system, but they spread out before dispersing into mild heat.

"How was that?" he asked, sounding a little nervous and unsure, and his forehead once again pressed to hers. She could feel long eyelashes tick against her and knew he was peering at her through his pink bangs.

She let her own eyes slide open a little and smiled sleepily at him.

"Amazing. It took away almost all the pain. I hadn't even realized how much it hurt until you did that. Thank you."

A relieved smile lit up his face like he'd just gotten an awesome Christmas present. He ducked in to press a happy kiss to her lips before nuzzling his nose against hers. "Good…"

By then Lucy was slipping into sleep.

"…luvyoo…" she mumbled nearly incomprehensibly, and was already out by the time he whispered, "Love you too, Luce."

…

The next morning, she woke up to banging on the door and grumbled, burrowing her head further into Natsu's scarf that he'd forgotten to take off last night. Normally she made him take it off, for fear it would strangle one of them – despite him scoffing at the notion – but they'd forgotten last night. She had to admit, it made pretty great earmuffs … as did his arm as he snuggled her head. The only problem was that she couldn't breathe, but with the loud thunderous sound still assaulting her ears, she didn't really care.

Maybe those pain meds had affected her more strongly than she'd thought, because she didn't even bother to listen to the increasingly loud tirade from someone trying to wake them up. Apparently it woke up someone though, because the pounding suddenly stopped as the sound of the door unlocking and opening clicked through the room.

On the other side of the door, Laxus was starting to get pissed. He had told Natsu that they'd be getting up early the next day, and it was almost noon. After pounding on the door for at least five minutes, it finally opened to reveal Happy, who was rubbing sleep out of his eyes. Frosch waved hello to her fellow Exceed and he sleepily waved back.

Meanwhile, Laxus glared down at the blue cat, but it wasn't like he could really cuss the little guy out. His voice was still pissed though as he asked, "Where's the flame brained idiot?"

Happy just blinked up at him, looking confused for a moment, and then he pointed at the bed. Laxus leaned to the side and peered in the direction Happy had pointed, and then he recoiled a little at what he saw. In all honesty, he wasn't sure how the hell those two love birds were managing to sleep in the position they were currently in – which he could clearly see since they'd apparently fallen asleep on top of the covers.

Lucy had her head buried somewhere under Natsu's chin and arm – and couldn't possibly breathe. His other arm was tucked up under his head with the forearm folding back down in front of his face, which allowed his hand to tangle in blond hair. Her head was likewise pillowed on her arm…and she had draped her forearm on top of her sleeping partner's face. Her clunky bandaged wrist was resting on his cheek, and Laxus couldn't imagine that was comfortable. Her other arm was wrapped around his waist, and a red coil looped loosely around her forearm. Another coil of the red snakelike thing draped over Natsu's waist and disappeared between them, only to reappear much lower, where her leg was hiked over his hip. The tail emerged from between her legs to wrap around the thigh that was on the bed next to his. Then the red appendage looped back between Natsu's legs, hooked around his hip, and wrapped around her other calf on his thigh. The tip was wrapped around her toe.

That thing was fucking long. Laxus probably shouldn't have stared so long, but it took at least three minutes to track Natsu's tail, which he did just out of sheer shock. Again, he wondered how they slept like that.

After a moment of gawking, he shook himself together and fixed a frown back to his forehead.

"Oi! Get up, Dumbass! We're gonna miss our meet-up with Rey for lunch at this rate!"

Natsu grunted and raised his head – which caused Lucy's hand to slip off his face and land on his neck instead. The dragon stared at Laxus standing in their open doorway, his expression still half-asleep and dull for a moment, but then pink eyebrows slammed down hard over black eyes. Laxus had the distinct impression that he'd just crossed a line he shouldn't have and triggered a reaction in the fire dragon that was going to be rather nasty.

He honestly couldn't care less – he was too pissed to really give a shit.

As for Lucy, she had no idea what was going on, and was still about eighty percent asleep …. up until she was successfully roused by Natsu's body temperature suddenly spiking to dangerous levels. A positively terrifying growl ripped from his chest – which was right under her nose and nearly deafened her. She flinched violently as she woke and poked her head up, which forced Natsu's arm to relocate from on top of her head. He wrapped it instead around her shoulders and grabbed her tightly, while she felt his tail – which was tangled all around her as usual – tighten significantly too. It was only just barely not painful, and edged strongly into uncomfortable.

"Get out!" Natsu snarled, and Lucy craned her neck to look over her shoulder, where she saw a very irritated looking Laxus standing in the doorway.

It took her all of a second to realize that her sleep shorts had ridden up, and he could definitely see way more of her butt than she wanted. She instantly yelped and squirmed to try and cover it up. However, Natsu's tail and arms were utterly absolute in their immobilization of all her limbs, and there was no wiggle room for her to adjust anything about her position or clothing.

Her squirming must have startled Natsu out of whatever rage he'd flown into, because the anger slipped out of his eyes for a moment as he stared down at her in confusion.

When he still didn't let her rearrange herself, she hissed, "Natsu! My ass is on display!"

He blinked down at her for all of a moment before fire flashed through his eyes and another one of those really horrifying growls shook her chest – since it was pressed tight to his. His eyes snapped back up to Laxus and he snapped, "I said get out!"

"I'm not going anywhere till you get up and get moving Flame Ass! We're gonna-"

He was probably going to say something about being late, but he was shut up when Natsu reacted very badly to his refusal. Another blast of heat singed every inch of her, and she felt his body ripple against hers. Her hand was solidly on his waist – urging him to let her go so she could flip the covers over her butt – and so she felt some muscles do really interesting things as they shifted under her palm. Suddenly his wings popped out, one tucked tight against his back along the bed and the other one arched up angrily in the air. It hung there for a moment, almost like a coiled viper in an obviously aggressive pose, and then it fell over her – completely cloaking her body from head to knee.

It took Lucy a moment to realize what had happened when the lights suddenly went out and she found herself in a wing tent. The temperature heated up dramatically, but with her still being sleepy, she found the warmth soothing instead of insufferable. Now that her brief panic over having her ass on display was over, she relaxed back into Natsu and decided to let him deal with it…. Which might not have been the smartest idea.

Meanwhile, Laxus was frozen in place, shocked by the display of possessiveness. Before he could get himself back on track, Natsu made a face that made even him take a step back. When he didn't immediately leave or close the door, the dragon apparently reached his limit. With another growl, flames suddenly coated his body, licking over every inch of him.

"You idiot! You're gonna burn Lucy!" Laxus bellowed, taking a step into the room, ready to pry the unreasonable dragon off her.

He could clearly see fire burning around the bit of her he could see – which was just a calf and foot really – but before he could get to her she had started yelling. Her screams were not of pain though, but of irritation.

"Damn it Natsu!"

She must have thrown an elbow into his gut or something because he suddenly coughed and lurched – spitting fire as he did – and then his wing was shoved off of her. Laxus was horrified when he saw the rest of her and the fire that coiled around her entire body, and he was halfway to the bed before he skidded to a halt. His jaw dropped as she lurched to the side and grabbed up an aerosol lacrima from the nightstand, and then returned to her previous position next to Natsu within a split second – as if it was a well-practiced move.

Then she stood up on her knees and grabbed one of the black horns that were now curling out of Natsu pink hair – which had popped out at the same time as his wings. She gave him a good shake using her grip on his horn, and her free hand brandished the unknown aerosol lacrima almost threateningly.

"How many times have I told you not to set the bed on fire! Look at this! We're going to have to pay damage fees again! Now put it out this instant!"

To Laxus's shock, despite the tongues of flame still flickering around her, she was absolutely unharmed, but he couldn't say the same necessarily for Natsu. His head was at a very submissive angle, tilted according to her grip on him, and his eyes were squeezed shut. The flames flickered and then died with a hiss, but the bedding was still on fire. She released him to spray the leftover fire with the lacrima – in an extremely fast, efficient, and accurate manner that said she'd done this way more than once before.

It was about this time that Laxus realized her clothing hadn't survived the experience nearly as well as she had, and it was starting to flake off in big black pieces – which finally prompted him to spin on his heel and march out of the room, slamming the door behind him. It was only after he had walked down the hall that he realized the implications of what she'd been shouting, and he had to pause for a moment to slam his palm to his face and do his very best not to bust out laughing. Apparently having a fire dragon as a lover was not all fun and games.

Back in the room, all the fires had been put out and they were both getting dressed. Lucy was a little flushed after having realized that her clothes were coming off and Laxus had gotten a really interesting show. Hopefully he hadn't stuck around long enough to see anything important.

"What made you go off like that anyways?!" she finally asked, not sure if she should still be aggravated with Natsu or not.

He pouted, his horns and wings back to normal and his clothing straightened out. Not for the first time Lucy eyed the apparel with more than a little jealousy. While a close encounter with Natsu's fire always left her clothes as ashes, his clothes never even got slightly scorched. They were obviously special and fire resistant, which made sense for a dragon to wear, but that didn't mean that she couldn't be jealous of him for it. It sure would be nice not to lose an entire outfit whenever he got sparky….

Her thoughts were brought back to the conversation at hand when he responded to her previous question.

"It's…a dragon thing I guess…" he mumbled, looking like a kicked puppy.

She just couldn't stay mad at him when he had that look on his face, and she walked over to reach up and rest her hand against his cheek.

"Wanna explain?"

His pout lessened, and he risked a glance up between his pink bangs. "Even though it's temporary, this room is our territory. He busted in here without permission, didn't leave when I told him to, and upset my mate. I was half asleep and my instincts kicked in before I knew what was happening."

That all made perfect sense, and suddenly Lucy was a little sorry she'd gotten so mad at him. Not too sorry though, because he had caused a lot of damage that they would have to pay for.

Still, she reached up on tiptoe and kissed his nose. "Alright. I'm not mad anymore. But please stop destroying stuff. We really can't afford it right now. I'm barely getting paid at that stupid job, and I'm going to have to take a pay cut to buy cages today, so we probably aren't going to go home with any rent money as it is."

"I got a big tip from the guys at the police station for melting all those guards. It should cover this easy enough." Natsu offered, jerking his head at the ruined bed.

A tightness lifted from Lucy's shoulders. "Really?!" she sighed in relief. "Thank Mavis for that."

Suddenly Natsu's attention was diverted. "Hey, how's your hand? The bandage burned off."

She glanced down to see that he was correct, the big bulky dressing had indeed come right off. The wound itself was still pretty ugly, but it looked like it had healed much more than it should have over night.

"Wow…you know, I think whatever you did last night really helped, because it's definitely better. I should probably stop by the pharmacy though and pick up a cheap hand splint, since my bones were broken."

He picked up her hand. "Before you bandage it up again, at least let me take care of this part."

He lit one finger on fire and gently ran it over the nasty deep wound, which had been stitched up. She felt intense heat and winced when it stung a little as her flesh was cauterized, but as before, it just sealed the wound shut without hurting too much, and now she wouldn't have to worry about it opening up again. The stitches also burned out, which meant she didn't have to go back to the clinic to get them removed.

Once he was finished, she inspected it, impressed by the job he'd done, and then grinned up at him.

"Thanks, Natsu!" She reached up and kissed him enthusiastically.

He would have pulled her in closer to deepen the kiss, but a loud clearing of Happy's throat distracted them.

"Ahem! Luuuucy…. I'm huuungry!" he whined, and a loud growl confirmed it from his stomach.

Natsu's stomach answered with a snarl of its own, and Lucy couldn't help but laugh at her two boys. She glanced over at Amy and grinned, sharing a female moment of amusement at men in general.

"Okay boys. Let's go get you something to eat before you wake up the neighbors."

…

After breakfast – which was very much rushed by Laxus, who was eager to get to lunch and their informant – they separated again, and Lucy was off to the library for some research. Naturally Amy had to go back to the celestial realm once they got there, but thankfully Happy was able to come in without any hassle, and they hunted up and down the stacks for any books on uncommon or magical pests. Eventually they had collected a pile big enough to sit down at a table and set to work. Lucy slipped on her magical quick reader glasses and began skimming through the textbooks, hoping to find something of use.

After a couple hours of tedious work, they finally stumbled across the information they needed, and Lucy yelped in excitement.

"Look! Here it is!"

Happy yelped – but for a different reason. Her sound of excitement had startled him awake and caused him to fall off the table, where he'd been sprawled taking a nap.

"A rare but vicious pest known as the 'Bunnicula'…" Lucy paused here to snicker at the stupid name. "…is a vicious white rabbit with red eyes. They normally live in large packs, but do not reproduce as fast as normal rabbits. At any given time, a pack could consist of 20 to 50 rabbits, the largest colony recorded being 62."

At this, both Happy and Lucy went a little pale and shared a horrified look.

"62?" Happy whispered, his eyes wide and terrified. "How would we deal with that many?"

"I don't know Happy." Lucy answered, shuddering before turning her eyes back to the passage. "Let's see…um, right. So, they generally live far away from human population, in the Atlana Mountains, where their natural food source is found – a rare flower called Antixopolin…oh. No wonder this guy is having problems. Check out this picture."

She turned the book a little and Happy crowded in close, staring at the photo of a very familiar looking flower. It was the exact same flower that Mr. Xavier was growing on his plantation.

"It says, this flower is extremely difficult to procure, given that it grows hidden in the Atlana Mountains and is surrounded by colonies of Bunniculas. It's highly sought after though, and used for…wow that's a long list. It can be used for all sorts of medicinal purposes, and also as an aphrodisiac. Of course. No wonder Mr. Xavier is so wealthy. He's probably got the cornerstone on this market and is making bookoo bucks."

"Yeah, but I don't think it's worth it. Not if it attracted those things to his house."

"Good point. So let's see…ah. The Bunniculas are fiercely protective of the flower fields they guard, and are extremely aggressive, strong, and fast. They're exceptionally dangerous and have been known to kill entire groups of adventurers bent on finding the flower. Normal cages, traps, and weapons are useless against them."

The description went on, but it was just more of the same. The long and the short of it was that they were screwed.

Finally, she let the book fall closed with a snap and sighed, resting her forehead in her palm.

"Lucy…" Happy asked, coming up and resting a paw on her shoulder, sounding as worried as her.

"Yeah, Happy, I know. It looks pretty hopeless doesn't it? The only thing we know for sure that works is Aries's wool ball, but it's not like we can really transport anything with that…at least not safely. We need some sort of trap or cage capable of holding them for the entire trip to the Atlana Mountains. And we should really get one big enough to carry all of them, otherwise we'll have to make several trips, and that's just not really feasible."

"How are we going to transport them?"

"I guess…. I guess I'll just have to ask either Natsu or Amy and the pack to fly them there. I hate to ask them for something so strenuous and time consuming…not to mention dangerous…but I really can't think of any other options."

They exited the library and sat in a nearby park, both rather dejected and frustrated by this turn of events.

"Well…I suppose we just have to give it our best shot, huh? Maybe we can knock them all out, and they'll stay out."

Happy shrugged, and Amy – who had popped up and been informed of what they'd found out – likewise shrugged. Then the three of them proceeded to trudge around town, trying to find a place that might have magically reinforced cages. They started at a hunting shop.

Lucy didn't bother looking around the aisles, she just went straight to the front register. "Excuse me. I'm trying to trap a bunch of Bunniculas. Do you have any really sturdy, magically reinforced traps or cages by any chance?"

By the blank confused look on the young man's face, he had no idea what a Bunnicula was. "Um…we do have some very strong traps. But nothing magically reinforced."

Lucy sighed, figuring as much. "By any chance do you know a shop that might sell something like that?"

He thought about it for a moment and then took out a piece of paper and wrote down several names of shops. "These are the only ones I can think of."

She thanked him and left.

Now that they actually had destinations to get to, Happy flew her to save time and Amy trotted along in the sky next to them. The first few places didn't have anything, but after several hours of dedicated searching, they finally hit a shop that sold magically reinforced cages – ones supposedly strong enough to hold Vulcans and such. The only problem was the price…which was pretty steep.

So, Lucy resorted to haggling, which was always a little demeaning, but in this case necessary.

After checking the price tag of the cage she wanted, she took a quick glance in a shiny metal container to check her appearance and spruce a little, making sure her shirt was positioned just right to show off her assets. Then she sauntered up to the register, and leaned forwards to rest her elbows on it – which of course pushed her boobs together.

The guy manning the register glanced up and then down, where his eyes stuck and bugged out of his head. Lucy had to restrain a smirk, knowing she had him.

"Hi there…" she purred. "I'm looking to purchase that big shiny cage over there…the one that's magically reinforced?"

"Uh huh…" he mumbled, then glanced up, his eyes clearing for a second as he realized what she'd said.
"Wait what? You want to buy that?"

She nodded and pouted her lips, making sure to squeeze her elbows in a little to push up her boobs. His eyes flashed back down to where they were supposed to be, much to her relief. But he still mumbled, "What on earth could a pretty girl like you want with that?"

"Well I'm a mage from a guild…and I've been tasked to catch some really big scary monsters." She did her best to look cute and innocent and maybe scared…hoping that she could play off several of his gut instincts.

He glanced back up to her face and noted her big intentionally watery eyes, gleaming with unshed tears – fake of course – and he scowled lightly. "You got stuck with a job like that? How cruel…"

"I know right?" She stood up straight and made a production of running her fingers through her hair in a fake aggravated way, but one that she knew showed off her curves and fanned out the golden strands. When she risked a glance over her shoulder, his eyes were raking her up and down and she made sure to pop her hip out a little to enhance her figure.

She flashed him her fake 'poor me' look – pouting lips and big eyes with a little frown. "I just don't know what to do…. I need that cage, but it's so expensive…. I just can't afford it. I don't suppose you could help me out?"

Of course by now he was catching on a little, but thankfully he seemed only too happy to play along. "Oh you poor thing. Well…I suppose I could do something about the price, but only if you do something to cover the money I cut off."

"Like what?" There was no way she'd be giving out any 'favors,' so she really hoped it was something tame.

"Well, I've been trying to make some advertisements for Hunter's Monthly Magazine – Magic Edition, and I need a model. If you agreed to be my model for a couple of hours, I could give that cage to you for say….5000 jewel."

That was a steal. It was more than 80 percent off, which meant he intended to basically pay her for this modeling job with the cage. Instantly she was in business mode.

"You've got yourself a deal. As long as I don't have to be in underwear or something indecent."

He grinned and cocked an eyebrow. "I won't put you in anything more revealing than the outfit you're currently wearing. Deal?"

They shook on it and agreed to meet after he closed, which was in a couple of hours. So, she set off with a bounce in her step, heading to the small restaurant that she, Natsu, and Laxus had all agreed to meet at for dinner. She arrived first, but it wasn't long before the others showed up, and then they traded progress updates while they ate. Natsu and Laxus told Lucy that they'd finally gotten a description of the demon who had broken into the jail, which was fabulous news.

All Fro had to say was, "Fro thinks so too!" when they all expressed how great it was. She also commented on how good the pie was that she was currently eating. Lucy had grown to really like the cute, mostly quiet, and amazingly positive Exceed over the course of this mission.

After the guys were done describing their success, Lucy shared how her job was going. When she told them about how she'd struck a deal with the cage seller, Laxus busted out laughing.

"You're something else, Blondie. I'm gonna have to watch out for you."

Unlike most boyfriends, Natsu was just amused as well and shot her a proud smirk. "That's my Luce alright."

They all laughed over it, and by the time they were done eating, it was actually time for her to head back over to the shop to fulfill her part of the agreement. Laxus and Natsu decided to tag along for fun.

When they got to the outdoors shop a 'closed' sign was hanging on the door, but the lights were still on and they could see the shop owner bustling around inside. He rushed over to the window and posted up something, then rushed back inside, looking super busy – probably trying to do normal closing up stuff as well as get ready for the photoshoot. Lucy glanced at the poster he'd pasted up in the window with some curiosity. It was an advertisement for the Grand Magical Games.

"Huh. Check this out guys." She pointed it out, and Natsu crowded in immediately to peer at it. Laxus looked at it much more casually over the pinkette's shoulder.

"Looks like a lot of fun!"

Laxus rolled his eyes at Natsu's excited exclamation but looked a little closer. Even he looked intrigued. "Actually…it might not be a bad idea."

By then though, Lucy had moved on and was walking over to the door.

As soon as she tapped on the door, the owner opened up with a big grin. When he caught sight of her guy friends, he just smirked and let them in too. He also had a gleam in his eye as he looked them up and down … and she had the funny feeling that she might not be the only one modeling today.

"Welcome back!" he enthused and bustled around, grabbing stuff and setting everything up. "If you'll just change into this, we can get started."

He handed her a black catsuit, one that was skintight but didn't really show any skin, so she couldn't exactly complain about it. Shrugging, she stepped behind a curtain and switched her clothing, having to basically pour herself into the pleather outfit. She had to admit she looked hot when she glanced it over in the provided mirror, and when she stepped out, all the guys let out some whistles and catcalls. The owner of the shop – who had introduced himself as Greg – gave her a black mask for her eyes and a pair of black cat ears. Once she was all decked out like a cat burglar basically – he set her up, ironically, in a cage.

He'd already cleared out a corner of the store where he had a display earlier, so it left a white corner and a few pedestals for the photoshoot. As soon as she got into the set-up, she was directed through a series of somewhat provocative poses as Greg clicked the shutter.

She started out on top of the cage, perching in various poses – from crouching to draping. Then he asked her to pose in front of the open cage by looping her arms through the door and slinking against it in a sexy manner. Naturally after that, she ended up inside the closed cage, acting as if she had been captured. He asked her to wrap her hands around the ceiling bars and strike several different poses, then grab the door bars and press up against them, and other similar things. It wasn't all that different from the shenanigans she'd been asked to do for Sorcerer Weekly, so she felt perfectly fine doing all the stuff he asked her.

After that set was concluded, he asked if one of the guys would be willing to join in, and offered to give them the cage scot free as an incentive. Natsu agreed and bounced in with a grin. He was given a hunter's outfit…a white tank top that showed off his muscles, loose camo pants, and sturdy hunting boots. A big fancy hunting knife was sheathed on his thigh – which Lucy was sure the shop probably also sold. Then Lucy was given a leopard version of the cat costume, and Greg dragged out some props he used for the window displays – some fake trees, plats of fake tall grass, and a jungle background.

Then, once his makeshift backdrop was set up, he had them pose together like Natsu was hunting her or had caught her. He was given a bow and blunt arrows, and Greg asked him to act like he was aiming at her. Meanwhile, she was either pretending run away or surrender – naturally striking provocative poses while she was at it. They also did a similar set with a magic gun instead of the bow. Then they did a series of photos where he had caught her and was brandishing some sort of weapon the shop sold. Those pictures were a little more embarrassing since they involved a whole lot of dominating poses that normally she wouldn't have put up with – including him throwing her over his shoulder, some hair pulling, and him standing over her. It was mostly embarrassing though because of the stupid comments from the sidelines – thanks to Happy – and the smirks and chuckles that came from Laxus.

She was much more comfortable when they switched positions, and she got to hunt him in his humanoid dragon form, which Greg was absolutely thrilled to discover. She ended up in an outfit similar to the one Natsu had just had on, and he ended up completely naked, covered in red scales, and wearing a loincloth that Greg provided. It wasn't really necessary, because all his business was tucked away when he went full coverage with the scales…but still. His get-up caused plenty of snickers from everyone present, and even he laughed at it. Naturally he was completely unselfconscious about the whole thing, which made the experience amusing and fun rather than awkward or embarrassing.

She got to use a couple of magical whips – once Greg discovered that she had a talent for it – and also a magic gun and some magic chains in that set. In all honesty, she probably enjoyed tormenting Natsu a lot more than she should have, though of course she didn't actually pop him with the whips or do anything to hurt him.

The next series of photos had them modeling various traps, and they repeatedly switched roles as hunter and hunted depending on the trap they were modeling. One had Lucy back in her cat-costume with a foot trap gently clamped on her ankle. That particular trap was meant to rig from a tree, so it was looped over one of the fake branches in their set-up…. though of course the fake tree couldn't possible hold her weight. So instead, she was draped over Natsu's shoulders, her upper half hanging down his front and her foot up in the air like she had been caught in the trap.

After those, he asked if Amy would mind posing in some of the live traps, and she agreed… though she wrinkled her nose a little at the prospect. She was a good sport about it though, and those photos were snapped quickly, since Greg could tell she wasn't too comfortable with them. Then, Greg switched to fishing gear when Happy wanted in on the fun.

All in all, the whole experience ended up being mostly fun and games, and by the end of it they had definitely given him enough pictures to pay for the cage several times over. He was positively delighted by the photoshoot and promised to list their names and say they were from Fairy Tail, which would hopefully give them some good press. Of course, it was in his interest as well, since this was for a magic edition of the magazine. He also threw in a free fishing pole, which made Happy ecstatic.

Then, they returned to their hotel room, lugging the big cage with them.

---

Sneak Peek

The next day, Natsu decided to come with her on the very dangerous bunny eradication job – and to also help her lug the super heavy cage. Plus, she definitely needed his help to transport the little buggers to their mountain home once they'd been captured.

Laxus opted out, uninterested in tagging along for fun, so it was just the four of them as they made their way out to the edge of town and the plantation where Lucy had been chewed up only a day ago.