Our two faves are in a bit of a pickle, eh? Wonder how they'll get out of this one (or if they even will...hmm...)

rated: M (heavy violence and blood)

summary: In a world of underground fighting only the strong survive, abiding by the rules of kill or be killed. In the Ring, a feeble emotion like hope is all it takes to destroy you. And yet it exists– and those who hold onto it play a dangerous game. But once you enter into the Ring, it will never let you go.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Bare-Knuckling

two individuals fighting without boxing gloves or other padding on their hands, closely related to ancient combat sports

He was dragged outside in time to see a man throwing Lucy to her knees, gripping her neck roughly as he tore off the bag around her head.

Her eyes were wild with fear, disoriented as they desperately flicked along the constricting brick walls on either side. Sticky strands of her usually so tidy and perfect hair fell into her face and clung to her temples, and what little was left of her hairdo was cruelly destroyed when the man behind her gripped her hair and yanked it sharply upwards. She wailed in surprise, hands trying to fly up and relieve the pain but they remained firmly bound behind her back. A trickle of blood from her torn right ear bled right into her beautiful dress, ruining it.

The man grunted and smacked her in the face, the sound of his hand connecting with her cheek so loud it reached even Natsu. Near Natsu's knees, Happy hissed in anger. He growled furiously, trying to rip himself free for the hundredth time.

And then he saw Zeref.

And, more importantly, the gun in his hand.

No.

He stood right in front of Lucy, hands hanging loosely by his sides. He didn't look angry or upset… no, the expression displayed on his face was… bored exasperation.

"I'm astounded," he spoke, in such a tone that it was barely above a whisper. He lifted a hand when Natsu opened his mouth, his gaze on Lucy alone. "I've been watching you this whole time, you must have known you would run into me eventually. Why would you risk coming back here?"

Natsu's eyes flashed to Lucy, whose face was twisted, her shoulders raised to try to relieve the pressure on her scalp. Her chest heaved with frantic breaths, eyes squeezed shut but cracking open to glare up at Zeref.

She was pale, deathly pale, but the way she glared at Zeref - it was with an expression of recognition.

"I had to," she struggled out, her thrashing weak compared to the hold on her. "I promised."

"Promised…" Zeref turned the word over, as if saying it for the first time. He fixed Lucy with a cold look before turning it on Natsu. "Promises are easily formed and easily broken. It's impossible to fully and completely keep a promise, you know. Look where you are now," he told the both of them.

Lucy stayed silent, anger burning in her eyes.

"Though I do admit that you're tenacious. Not many people would risk their own lives to return here," Zeref murmured almost approvingly. It seemed as though he could appreciate Lucy's sense of duty. "You grew up. So smart...and yet so foolish at the same time."

Natsu watched the one-sided exchange with no small amount of confusion.

The way Zeref spoke...it was as if he knew Lucy. But Natsu knew that to be impossible, because Zeref never would have let her live.

And yet...something tickled the back of his mind. A memory, perhaps.

"I wonder," murmured Zeref as he pressed the gun to Lucy's temple, "how much your father would have paid for the return of your body?"

The alleyway full of people fell entirely silent, and the ominous click that echoed all around them as Zeref unlocked his gun felt all the louder.

"No," Natsu breathed, his voice rising to an angry snarl. "No!"

Ever the gentleman, and with the penchant for dramatic effect that he'd always possessed, Zeref did not simply shoot her.

No, he had the gall to smile at her.

"Any last words, Miss Heartfilia?"

Natsu froze. Something inside him, knowledge deeply buried and stacked away, reared its head with an urgency that had him see stars. Heartfilia? His vision blurred around the edges, but he saw Lucy turning her head towards him nonetheless, focusing his entire energy on her alone.

She looked so brave. As if she had accepted death.

No.

"Thank you, Natsu," she said, trying to keep her voice steady despite the trembling.

A sharp pain shot through him at the mention of his name, as if his heart had been pierced by a fiery blade that was now burning him up from the inside out. Her words resonated in his mind, repeating themselves over and over with an odd familiarity that drove him insane, growing louder and louder and louder until he thought his head might burst. There was something he had to remember. It was important.

And then he did.

In that moment, his entire world cracked, shattering around him in a mess that made perfect sense. He didn't know how she knew his name. He didn't care, either.

But he remembered hers, now. The one by which they'd called her. Her last name.

It was her. Of course it was her.

He found himself unable to speak, but the look on his face must have given him away.

"I told you I'd come back." Lucy - his Lucy, the scared little girl from years ago, the girl he'd saved, the girl who'd come back for him - fixed her watery eyes on him, and smiled. "I'm sorry I'm late. I'm sorry I lied. I'm sorry I made you wait so long. I'm-" Her voice broke, and tears started spilling over her cheeks as a sob shook her body. "I'm sorry it was for nothing!"

Natsu was numb, his chest growing tighter with her every word.

She was apologizing to him, on her knees and about to be executed, and she cared more about him than she did for herself. Those tears in her eyes were for him, not for her inevitable demise. Her wobbly smile, an attempt at reassurance, was all for him...pleading with him to understand and forgive her.

As if she'd done something wrong.

But she hadn't - Lucy was blameless. Her only crime was being his friend.

Natsu's already shattered heart splintered further into miniscule fractions, the unfairness of it all clawing up his throat. A flame was simmering in his belly, his mangled heart thundering in his ears, and it dawned on Natsu that he was struggling against the two men who were forcing him on his knees.

Though his hands were tied behind his back and the men were pushing down on his shoulders, Natsu threw them off with ease.

He shouldn't have been able to, he knew that, and yet he didn't give it a second thought. Instead, he opened his bloodied mouth and released a bellowing roar so loud that everything else seemed to fall into deafening silence.

Zeref, still poised with the gun to Lucy's golden head, blinked in shock.

Natsu felt the ugly, murderous look on his face. But before he could charge, those two men were back on him - grabbing his arms, punching his sides and back, kicking at his calves. Anything to get Natsu back onto his knees again. But Natsu stubbornly refused to go down. Even when one of the men smacked him clean across the face so sharply that Natsu's vision grew spotty.

No, Natsu growled to himself, they weren't going to touch her.

Lucy was going to live. He was going to save her...just like he had before.

"Natsu!" her voice called to him, cutting through the chaos like a sharp blade.

He found her watery brown gaze again, blinking the blood out of his eye, and the raw emotion he saw there filled him with strength. Hope. There was no mistaking the shard of hope Lucy was clutching onto as she watched him eagerly.

And that hope was enough. With strength Natsu hadn't known he possessed, he tore free of the hands gripping all over him, screaming in rage as he threw his entire body forward even as his hands were still bound behind his back. Zeref was too surprised to react in time.

Natsu collided right into him, tackling him to the ground with a wild roar.

He felt Zeref's arm twist beneath him, and the gun slipped from his hand and fell onto the asphalt.

They both hissed as the air was driven from their lungs.

He'd made it. He'd stopped him.

But before he knew it the men were back, encircling the pair and boxing and kicking at Natsu before they ripped him off Zeref.

Natsu's arms strained against the rope. He had to get free, or he was dead. And he couldn't die, because he had to protect Lucy. He wasn't going to let her light die.

The veins in his arms bulged as he pulled...and snapped the rope that circled his wrists.

He heard the incredulous gasps and shouts of the men attacking him, but he didn't give them time to react much further. With another hoarse scream, Natsu eblowed the one to his left and grabbed the face of the man on his right.

One suffered from the blow to his gut while Natsu slammed the other into the ground.

His skull met the concrete with a dull thud. In the heat of battle, Natsu being thirsty for blood, the noise pleased him.

It always happened like this.

The fighting and the bloodlust consumed him until he was nothing more than a killing machine - hell-bent on destroying his targets by any means necessary. It wasn't natural, that feeling, and Natsu loathed it when he came back to his senses. He wasn't natural, he was a monster, and it was all Zeref's fault.

It was all Zeref's fault...and Zeref almost had killed Lucy.

The one good thing in Natsu's life. His light, his hope. They wanted to take it away from him again.

No.

He wouldn't let them; he'd kill them first.

Natsu's bruised hands tightened on his enemy's face as he picked it up and brought it back down. This time the noise was a sickening crack that made him shiver with anticipation. The man in his grip started to scream and howl and Natsu delivered a quick chop to his throat to silence him.

He wasn't allowed to cry - he didn't even know the beginning of pain.

Hands landed on Natsu's shoulders again, tearing him away, and Natsu struck out blindly. He reached behind him, flipping his other opponent over his shoulder.

The second man flopped to the ground hard, a groaning mess.

Natsu was hurting - his face was swelling and his wrists burned from the rope and he'd done something to his left leg - but that didn't stop him from ruthlessly attacking again. He delivered a flurry of hard kicks to both men writhing on the ground, relishing in their yelps, and when that wasn't enough Natsu resorted to using his fists.

He hit wherever he could, wherever would hurt the most.

The cold irony of the situation almost made him pause and think about what he was doing, but Natsu shook off the feeling. This was nothing they hadn't done to him before...they deserved this -

And that was when he heard the crack of gunfire.

Panic flared in Natsu's chest - Lucy, no - and he whirled around. His heart was in his throat as he searched for those beautiful brown eyes. He'd been stupid, so stupid. Getting caught up in revenge for his years of abuse instead of focusing on rescuing her…

But, to his surprise, Lucy was perfectly fine.

Still kneeling on the dirty ground, her mouth was parted on a silent scream and her eyes brimmed with more tears. She wasn't hurt.

But Zeref was standing behind her, eyes turning nearly red with rage as he cradled his side with one hand. In his other hand was the shiny gun he'd aimed...directly at Natsu.

And with a pained gasp, Natsu realized that he was the one who'd been shot.

Glancing down, Natsu spotted the blossoming red stain on his side. That was when the agony cut through the adrenaline, and his vision went blurry for a moment. He was barely aware of the cold sensation spreading through his chest as he fell to his side, gravel slicing into his cheek. Natsu couldn't help but vocalize his pain with a small scream.

"I didn't want to do that," came Zeref's growl. "You made me. That's your own damn fault."

"You shot him!" Lucy snarled then, her voice filled with rage. "No! Don't touch him. I'm right here, shoot me!" There was no fear, only anger. "That's what you want, isn't it? Shoot me."

No, what was she doing?

Natsu turned his face to the side, prepared to yell at her. But Zeref wasn't even looking at her anymore - his dark eyes met Natsu's.

As Lucy continued to loudly protest in the background, straining against her own bindings, Zeref's black boots came closer and closer into Natsu's focus. The Master of Tartaros walked with calm, measured steps as he cocked his gun once more. As if the thought of murder didn't even faze him.

And, to be honest, it probably didn't.

That grim thought weighed heavily on Natsu's mind as a heel dug itself into his back. It pushed him further into the ground, putting pressure on all of his wounds.

Natsu hissed.

The door burst open, signaling the approach of two more bulky guards, having been attracted by the sound of gunfire. But Zeref never missed a beat, grinding his heel into Natsu's spine.

He and Lucy were both dead. This time there was no getting around it. The world was hazy, even as fire continued to burn through his gut. He had to get up!

The thought was so powerful even in his staggered state with blood pumping from his side and under Zeref's crushing heel, he forced every crying muscle to fight him. It was hard to see past the red fog of blood sticking his bangs to his forehead. Everything was red, blackening quickly around the edges of his vision.

Lucy screamed again, but this time not even the sound of her voice was able to give him enough strength to get to his feet.

Zeref's eyes were on him, like pitch black tunnels staring back at him. There was no sympathy there, only disappointment.

"I had such high hopes Natsu," Zeref's voice was tight, hope still clinging to him. "Turn away from this hopeless resistance. Take your place in the ring like you were meant to, all this pain - all this suffering will go away."

Natsu's glare was murderous, his chest heaving past the pain clogging his lungs. Take his place in the ring? Look the other way as they abused and dragged fighters through hell? Let him kill Lucy?

"What the fuck happened to you to make you this way?" Natsu spat at Zeref, lifting himself up onto a single knee.

In a rare flare of temper, Zeref lashed out, sinking his foot into Natsu's bloody side and throwing him off balance. His scream choked off into a wet gurgle

Groaning, Natsu's arms curled down, elbows instinctively trying to protect his bruised ribs. Zeref wiped his bottom lip free of the blood from where Natsu had nailed him earlier.

"Hold him," Zeref snapped at his new guards, "and make sure he stays down this time!"

Natsu's eyes widened just a hint, Zeref's unshakable calm shattered in an eerie showing. The man's chest heaved, not at all from the fight he had with Natsu, but from whatever Natsu said to set him off.

"I'm, as usual, doing you a favor, Natsu." Zeref stormed around, this time to Lucy. The gun glinted in his hand.

Zeref took a second to adjust his tie, pulling back on the slide of the gun to ensure it was working properly after its fall.

"Women will inevitably cause you more pain than you can ever realize," Zeref spoke, in such a threatening and quiet way, it was almost like he wasn't even there.

Natsu struggled again, but he was lacking the strength to push off the new men who had come at the sound of the fighting. Every ounce of his ability to fight was pumping out his side with every beat of his heart. And these guards were fresh and angry, their friends still lying motionless on the ground.

"No!" Natsu screamed, Zeref's back turned towards him.

Lucy was lifting her chin at him, defiance pooling in her angry glare. The gun was trained between her eyes, her bound hands twisting in angry fists.

Natsu couldn't watch, but he owed it to Lucy to witness this. His own hopelessness weighed down on him, crashing into him like thousand bounds.

A gunshot went off, Natsu's heart choking in his throat. He closed his eyes, his head flinching up at the sky. It was like he couldn't breathe, the cold stone dropping deep into his gut and crushing into all his organs.

But a new voice tore through the silence, one Natsu hadn't heard in five years.

"Drop the gun and step away from the girl, Spriggan, or the next one goes in your head!"

The cavalry arrives! Let's just hope they can get to everyone in time...

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Next time! Chapter 18: Saved by the Bell