Turf Wars Chapter 11- Teamwork

I'm so sorry it took forever for me to get this chapter up. I really have had plenty of time, enough to finish the whole story but I've been lazy. I can't even use the excuse I have a cast on because that doesn't slow my typing down that much. So sorry. On the plus side, it's a long chapter.

So here is Natsu and Lisanna's challenge. Let's see how things work out. Enjoy.

…

"Let's go!" Natsu yelled as he grabbed Lisanna's hand the second Erza's left foot hit the dock.

Lisanna yelped as her arm was suddenly yanked by the eager teen. He pulled her along as he ran into the forest, ignoring the path ten feet away. For a minute all Lisanna could do was try and stay on her feet.

After long enough though, she got fed up with being dragged and dug her heels into the ground and yanked her arm back, causing Natsu to fall over. His face slammed into the ground and he let out a groan as he rolled over, a hand clutching his nose. "What the hell?"

"Stop dragging me everywhere," the silver haired girl growled as she watched the boy get up, dusting his clothes off. "Where is that path?" she said to herself as she started spinning around trying to spot the forest path Natsu decided to ignore.

"We don't need a path!" Natsu growled. "All they do is twist and turn, going straight through the forest will save us time."

"And how do you know which way to go?" Lisanna snapped back, her hands on her hips.

"Up, duh," the pink haired teen replied like it was the most logical thing.

"Up? Up where you dumbass?"

"We have to get to the top of the mountain, so we head up," Natsu said, folding his arms across his chest.

"UP ISNT A DIRECTION!" Lisanna yelled at the stupid boy. "And with all the trees, we can't even the mountain!" she said, throwing her hands up, exasperated.

Natsu looked at her, then around and up. She was right, the tree canopy was blocking the view of the mountains. "Well, then we just keep going that way," he said, pointing toward the way he was heading. "Since that mountain is still in that direction more or less," he said, a grin on his face as he 'solved' the problem.

"Or we can look for the path and follow it!" Lisanna yelled back, heading off to the side, where the saw a break in the tree line.

Natsu grumbled, but followed her, seeing the break in the trees too. The two pushed their way through the tall ferns until they broke through the tree line and onto a small deer trail.

"So where is your path now?" Natsu asked.

Lisanna didn't know what she wanted to punch him more for, the smart ass question, the smart ass tone he used to ask it, or just because he was him. But she decided not to punch him when she caught a glimpse of the mountain peak. "Look, there's the mountain, let's just follow this trail for now. It beats getting all scratched up from sticker bushes.

Natsu hung his head at the defeat. "Fine."

The two started jogging along the deer trail, following its twists and turns that led them to a stream that cut a meadow in two. The mountain clear in the distance.

"Did you know about this island?" Natsu asked as they jogged through the meadow, following the creek as the terrain stated a gradual slope up.

"Nope," was all she replied with, cutting off a chance for a conversation.

…

About twenty minutes passed when the trail ended and they were at a small landing before the mountain really started slopping upwards.

"It doesn't look like much more now," Lisanna said as she shaded her eyes with her hand and stared up at the mountain's peak.

"What are these?" Natsu asked, ignoring his classmate and walking over to a strange plant. It looked like a venus flytrap but brightly colored with reds and oranges.

"Are you even listening?" Lisanna sighed as she followed Natsu over toward the plant. She watched him poke it with a twig that was lying nearby. The plant opened its trap up some and its leaves twitched, but other than that, ignored the teenager. "Do you want to get eaten?"

"I'd like to see it try," Natsu snorted as started to poke the plant harder and in more places.

"Natsu, do want to win this challenge or not?" the silver haired girl said, exasperated with the boy.

"Fine, fine, killjoy," Natsu said, mumbling the last part. He tossed the stick at the plant's trap before turning away.

Lisanna watched him head back toward her before movement out of the corner if her eye caught her attention. "Watch out!" she called as she yanked the boy out of the way by his arm. The pink haired teen stumbled, feeling something brush the top of his hair. He turned his head just in time to see that something go flying straight into Lisanna's eyes.

He caught himself before falling and rushed over to the girl who let out a pained scream as she fell to her knees, her palms pressed to her eyes.

"What happened?" Natsu said as he tried to pull her hands from her eyes to see the damage.

"It spit in my eyes," the girl got out. "It burns really bad," she said in a half cry.

Natsu grabbed his bag and pulled his water bottle out. "Here, open them, imma pour some water, that should help."

The girl pulled her hands away from her eyes and opened them as far as she could. They were already bloodshot and starting to swell. Natsu tilted her head back and let a couple drops of water fall into her right eye. She instinctively closed her eyes but forced them back open after a second as more water dripped into it. He did the same with her left eye before recapping the water bottle and inspecting them. They were still bloodshot and still swelling quickly but Lisanna said they felt better. Still he could tell just how painful it was for her to keep her eyes open.

"I'm so sorry, Lis," the boy said, helping the girl up, "this is all my fault, I shouldn't have poked the plant."

"Damn right!" she snapped back, fixing her book bag strap. "Now I gotta rely on you to get us there since I can't see shit," the girl snapped, her eyes closed.

Natsu hung his head. She was right. He looked at her and then at the mountain that they had to climb. He sighed and slid his book bag off his back. "Here, imma put my book bag on you," he said, sliding the straps over Lisanna's arm before she could protest. She hadn't even gotten out a 'why' before she felt herself being picked up by her arms and slung onto the boy's back.

"You aren't serious," she asked. "You can't climb up this mountain with me on your back!"

"Challenge accepted!" the pink haired teen said as he walked over to the mountain and found some good places to hold. "Besides, I'm not climbin' the whole mountain, just about twenty feet. I can see a path up there."

"That doesn't make me feel any better," Lisanna sighed into the boy's shoulder. She felt him grin. Not good.

"Hold tight."

…

"See that wasn't so bad," Natsu said as he squatted down for Lisanna to slide off his back.

"We almost fell, three times!" the girl replied, tossing his book bag off her back.

"But we lived, so it's all good," he replied back nonchalantly.

The girl held back a smart remark, opting to fishing through her book bag for her water bottle. She twisted the cap off and poured a little more over her eyes. They were even more swollen, to the point where she could barely open them, even if she wanted too. They burned too bad for her to want to try. Natsu watched with a sad look on his face. He could tell she was in pain because of him. What if it did permanent damage? He couldn't live with himself. He shook his head, trying to not think so darkly and focused on trying to find a way to the top of the mountain. He took one last glance at Lisanna as she sat there gingerly touching her swollen eyes before walking around the corner.

When he got to the other side he sucked in a sharp breath. There was a rickety old bride before them. It was the only way too unless he wanted to climb back down the mountain. What they hadn't seen when they got off the boat was that there were two mountains, the large one they had to get to the top of and then the smaller one that the pair was on now with the bridge he only connecting path. "Shit."

He turned and headed back to Lisanna to tell her the news.

"Fine, you'll go across it first and find out where to step then tell me how to get across," Lisanna said as she stood up, grabbing her pack.

"You sure?" Natsu asked, surprised at how confident she sounded.

"Well if it's the quickest way, then yes, let's go."

"Okay," the boy said, grabbing his pack and linking his arm through hers.

He led her to the bridge and took her pack with his, one slung over each shoulder. He took the first step onto the slightly rotted wood. The plank held and he stepped out toward the next, testing it with some weight before placing his whole body on it. Then another and another. When he came to the first gap he looked between the boards. The fall was about fifty feet. Not good. Two boards were missing and the next one was badly rotted. He held onto the frayed rope and put a little weight on the board. He retracted his leg when the board snapped in two and fell.

"What happened? You alright?" Lisanna called out.

"Yeah I'm fine, this bridge is just old," Natsu said as turned to look at her, her eyes completely swollen shut. For them to swell so quickly, it was bad.

Turning back around, he leaned his leg out to the next plank and tested it. It held. Slowly he leaned more weight onto to until he had to swing his left leg over. The next couple planks held fine, the fifth collapsed. Another gap, but the nearest plank held. Three more planks then he was on the other side, setting the packs down.

"I made it over," he called causing Lisanna to perk up.

"Don't let me fall," she said before heading forward, her arms outstretched so that she could hold onto the rope on both sides.

"Take it slow, test the planks too," he called as he watched her take her first few steps. She did as he said and after a minute was at the gap. "Here's the first gap," he called, bringing her to a stop. "It's about two feet wide so stretch your leg out until you feel the plank."

Lisanna slowly stuck her left leg out over the gap, taping her foot every so often until it hit the wood.

"Good," Natsu called out as encouragement. "You're half way there now."

The silver haired girl pulled herself toward the other side and started along again, testing the planks. When she got to the second gap, she stopped, sticking her foot out again. Her foot found the other side and she started to lean over the gap when she heard a board snap. Her back foot fell as the board gave way under it and she started falling back. She cried out as her body fell, with no boards under her, but her grip on the left side rope remained tight. Her other arm flailed until it too found the rope and she swung a leg up and onto the nearest board, then her other until she was kneeling on the boards, her hands still gripping the rope.

Natsu heard the snap and ran toward the edge of the bridge, but stopped. He couldn't help her, the bridge wasn't strong enough for two people. "So he helped her the only way he could, by being her eyes.

"Are you okay?" he called.

"Yeah," she called back, her voice shaky.

"You can't stay there long, you gotta get up and continue," he shouted. "The gap is only about a foot, you can do it."

The girl stood up, her knuckles white as she held the rope in a death grip. She took a deep breath and stuck her leg out again. The second it found and tested the board, she leaned over on to it and listened to Natsu as he told her to keep going, the boards keeping.

The second she was an arm's length away from the end, Natsu grabbed her arm and pulled her into a tight embrace. She winced a little as he pushed her face into his chest but returned the embrace anyway, a small sob escaping her lips as it fully sunk in that she almost died.

"You did great," Natsu whispered, holding her for a couple more seconds before letting her go and inspecting her eyes.

Lisanna was sad when he let go, his body was always really warm and it calmed her.

"Your eyes are looking a little better, not as swollen," he lied as he rubbed a thumb over her left eye gingerly.

"That's good," she said with a small smile. "Now what? You see a path?"

Natsu dropped his hand from her face and looked around. "Well, there's a cave."

"That's it?" Lisanna asked. "No path or anything?"

"Nope just the cave."

"Great."

The cave was well lit since only bout fifteen feet in they came to an opening with the top of the mountain gone. Natsu looked up to see the blue sky and Lisanna could sense the light when she titled her head upward. "Wanna take a break? We can split a chocolate bar?" Natsu offered.

"Sounds good, I have skittles in my pack somewhere," Lisanna said as she kneeled down before sitting cross legged. Natsu fished out the candy and broke the chocolate bar down the middle, handing her half. "What's this place look like?" she asked as she broke a square off the chocolate and tossed it into her mouth.

"How were you able to get that into your mouth? I can't do that even with my eyes open!" Natsu asked as he watched Lisanna do it again.

"I don't know, I just can," she said with a laugh. This boy took interest in the simplest things.

"Ugh," Natsu said jealously before looking around the place some more. "Well it's open at the top, so this place might have been a volcano at one point," he started. "The whole area is a little smaller than the gym but bigger than a classroom," he said as he looked around. "Is that a lift?" the boy asked as he got up and walked over toward the strange looking cage.

"Lift?" Lisanna asked, looking up.

"Yeah, it looks like it is," Natsu said as he pulled on the door. It creaked open and he stepped inside. "It looks like it goes to the top," he said eagerly as he looked through the top of the cage toward the sky. "I wonder if it works," he said quietly as he searched for a button or lever. Not finding one, he exited the thing and checked the surrounding walls. Nothing. "I guess there goes that," he said so Lisanna could hear him. "No way to operate it."

Lisanna finished her chocolate and felt around for the skittles. Opening the bag she fished some out and popped them into her mouth. "Anything else besides the lift?"

"Not that I can tell," the teen said as came and sat down next her, taking the skittle bag she held out for him. "How are your eyes?"

"I can open them a little but everything is blurry," she responded.

"That's good."

When the skittle bag was empty, Natsu stood up and helped Lisanna up by the arm before grabbing the two packs. "I guess we can feel around the walls for something or head back toward the bridge."

"Let's feel along the walls first," she answered, not keen on going back over that death trap.

"Okay," Natsu said as he led her to the wall. "Start here and I'll start on the other side and we'll meet in the middle."

Lisanna started along the wall, her hands moving over it as she searched for something, anything.

When her hand brushed Natsu's sometime later her heart sank. Back to the bridge they go. "That was disappointing," he commented, looking back at the lift. "Not even a lever for the damn thing."

"I wonder what it's doing here, I mean, what is this place," Lisanna asked. She could feel the swelling going down and she was able to open her eyes a little more, but her vision was still blurry.

"No idea. Gives me a Jurassic Park vibe though, the second or third one though, after the island was abandoned," the boy said.

"So long as we don't run into any dinosaurs."

"I always wanted to wrestle one though," Natsu said, trying to keep the conversation going since he saw the smile on her face.

"Why on earth would you want to do that?" Lisanna asked with a bigger smile as they headed back toward the bridge.

"Why not? Gotta test my new workout regime to see if it's working," he responded, flexing.

"Boys," Lisanna said shaking her head, but her smile was wider.

"I'm like 37 percent positive I could take a T-Rex," he said, grinning wider. He enjoyed her smile.

"Well, at that point it's go big or go home, so you gotta go after the other dinosaur, the one with the frill on its back that killed the T-Rex," Lisanna suggested, entertaining the boy's joke.

"Now you're talking," Natsu said. The duo were half way across the room when the ground shook, catching them off guard. "An earthquake?" Natsu asked as the ground settled.

"No idea, but let's get out of here," the silver haired girl suggested. But before they could get much further, the ground gave way and the two fell.

It was only about ten feet, but Natsu had the breath knocked out of him as Lisanna landed on him. "Was that payback for the plant?" he asked as she got off of him.

"Sure," she said, not paying much attention. She tried to look around but a combination of not being able to open her eyes wide and the dust in the air made it hard.

Natsu got up and tried looking around too, but in the end had to wait for the dust to settle as well. It didn't take long and soon they were looking at three different colored doors. The paint was faded and peeled in many places but the colors were still visible enough, green, blue and red.

"This isn't weird at all," Lisanna commented as she headed to the closest door. They were all on the opposite wall of where they fell and spaced evenly apart, built into the stone.

She placed her hand on the doorknob of the red door and turned it. But it didn't turn much. "Locked."

"So is the blue one," Natsu said removing his hand from the doorknob. He walked over to the green door and tried it but like the other's it didn't budge.

"We need keys,' Lisanna said as she felt the key holes on the door. She couldn't see them well, but she could tell the keys would be big and oddly shaped.

"That a sign?" Natsu asked as he stared hard at the middle of the door. He brought his hand up to brush off the dust and dirt.

"What's it say?" Lisanna asked, walking toward his voice. It was still painful to keep her eyes open for long periods of time.

"It looks like it says 'Upper level," he responded.

"See if the other doors have signs too," Lisanna suggested as she looked around briefly. She spotted something in the corner, close to where they fell and headed toward it. The cave-in opened them up to a small room, only about seven feet wide but was open in the middle, strange machines were against the wall, but by the looks of them they were so old and rusted there was no need to investigate them.

"This one says, 'Lower Level'," Natsu said as he lowered his hand from the blue door.

"Well that's not the one we want," Lisanna said absent mindedly as she crouched down in front of a small burlap sack that leaned against one of the machines.

"The red one says 'Top Observatory'. Not like it helps any without the keys," the pink haired teen said as he kicked at the door. It didn't budge.

"I might have found them," Lisanna said as she walked toward him with the bag. "Sort of."

"What do you mean 'sort of'?" Natsu asked as he took the bag. He peeked inside then squatted down on his knees and dumped the contents onto the ground. "Puzzle pieces?"

"I think they are the pieces of the keys, if we put them together then we can get out of here," she said as she kneeled on the ground across from him and the pieces. "We just gotta match the colors."

"How can you tell the colors apart, they look the same to me," Natsu said as he held a piece close to his face.

"I know they are faded but not that badly," Lisanna said.

"I guess it's just because I am color blind," Natsu said nonchalantly as he put the piece down.

"Wait, what? You're colorblind?" Lisanna asked, incredulous.

"Yeah, red-green colorblind. It's normally not bad though."

"Fine, I'll sort the colors and you put them together," she said. "Only the green and red door seemed like good choices, but I'm leaning toward the red one. The one that said 'Top Observatory'."

"Okay, we'll start there and if it doesn't work then we'll go through the green door," Natsu said as he watched Lisanna separate the pieces. The swelling in her face was almost gone but her eyes were still bloodshot. She had to bring the pieces close to her face to distinguish the colors. Even so, it didn't take her more than three minutes to put them all into piles.

"Three pieces each, shouldn't be too hard," she said as she watched Natsu pick up the red pile that she pointed at and start putting pieces together.

It was relatively straight forward, having to just slip the pieces together and so in less than a minute, Natsu was placing the green key in his pants pocket an opening the red door. It opened with the help of a shove and he went to retrieve the packs before heading back to Lisanna. She had already turned her phone's flashlight on and headed in a couple feet.

…

The tunnel had seemed to go on forever, but according to her phone, it only took five minutes for them to get to the end. They had come to stairs early on and spent most of the time climbing them. So when they got out, they weren't surprised that they could see the top of the mountain and a glimpse of Laxus's blonde hair. The path before them was straight forward and Natsu didn't wait a second before grabbing his partner's hand and running with her up the path.