Ch. 2 - A Long Way to Go

"Luce! Let's go fishing!" Natsu jumped through the window of Lucy's apartment, landing on her bed. "Luce?"

"Lushee! We were going to try and catch a big one today," said a certain blue neko, flying in after Natsu.

Natsu looked around the room, expecting to hear Lucy screaming at him to get out any second now…

Three…

Two…

One…

Nothing? Weird. Happy was by now flying around the apartment freely, looking for the blonde mage. Natsu then realized something very strange. Where was all the stuff? Her pink quilt was gone, her desk was cleared, and even the rug was missing.

Wait a second, there was a white rectangular shape on the desk. 'A secret compartment?' Natsu thought excitedly. Wait no, it was just an envelope. It had 'To Fairy Tail' written in Lucy's neat handwriting on it. There were a couple of weird splotches on it. Kind of like little drops. Curious, Natsu opened the envelope and took out the neatly folded paper inside.

"Natsu!" Happy shouted, flying into the main room. "Lushee's not here!" When the blue neko did not hear a reply, he looked at Natsu and saw him sitting slumped in a chair, with a white piece of paper in his hand.

"Natsu?" Happy exclaimed worriedly. Happy inched forward, thinking that this behaviour was very strange, especially since Natsu was not one to just sit and think.

"Lucy's gone, Happy," Natsu whispered. Happy's wings disappeared and he landed on the ground. Happy started to laugh as he slowly padded up to Natsu.

"Stop joking, Natsu. Where is she?" Happy's laugh began to falter. "Natsu?"

Natsu's head snapped up and Happy was shocked to see Natsu's eyes dark and cloudy. Was he… crying? Natsu silently held out a the sheet of paper, now stained with Natsu's tears as well. Happy, with a trembling paw slowly reached out and grasped the paper.

As Happy read the letter his eyes filled up with tears as the letter fell to the ground.

"Let's go to the guild," Natsu muttered, a dark shadow covering his now emotionless face.

"A-aye…" Happy hiccuped.

—

The guild was in their normal state when they arrived; loud and cheery. Wakaba and Macao were being perverted as usual, and Lisanna and Mirajane were chatting by the counter.

As soon as Natsu arrived the Master stood up on the counter and hollered out, "OI! EVERYBODY SHUDDUP! I HAVE AN ANNOUNCEMENT TO MAKE!"

The guild immediately went silent. Macarov eyed Natsu as he sauntered through the door.

"I assume you know already, Natsu?" Macarov said stiffly. Natsu continued his silent walk to the counter where he handed Master the sheet of paper, now wrinkled. The guild went up in murmurs. Natsu was rarely seen quiet, so the guild already knew something was up. Natsu then retreated to a corner table, where he sat down, Happy flying to his side.

Everyone was silent, a rare occasion for this particular guild. "Master?" Levy said softly, cutting through the silence. "What happened? And," she added, "where's Lucy?"

Master Macarov stood stiffly on the counter. He began to speak. "As you all have probably noticed, Lucy is not here today. That is because she…" Master took a breath before finishing the sentence. "She has left the guild."

The guild was quiet before erupting into laughter. "T-that's crazy!" Macao sputtered.

"Yeah! Lucy loved this guild more then life itself!" Max cried.

Master stood on the counter and waited in silence for the laughter to die down, which it did as soon as it started.

"Master… you're serious…?"

As Master began to read the letter that Lucy left them, some of the guild members began to sob, while others retained a somber and grim face.

Natsu, however, didn't move from his spot. He just sat there, arms crossed, looking down at the floor.

They didn't even get to say goodbye.

—

Meanwhile, Lucy was boarding a train that headed anywhere but Magnolia. She boarded a train that was heading to a place called, 'Rimoro'. She had given all of her luggage to Virgo to temporarily store in the Spirit World, so she only had her keys and whip on her.

She didn't really have a place to go, let alone train. She looked out the window at the scenery flashing past her. Before she knew it, she was asleep.

It was dark. The wind was howling a song of loneliness. Lucy ran. She didn't know why, or where she was running to. She just ran.

She heard voices behind her. "You're weak," one hissed.

"You're nothing but scum that lies on the bottom of the ocean floor," another murmured.

"You just do nothing, and take advantage of your so called 'friends'," one uttered, this time right next to her ear.

"Stop…" she mumbled.

"Weakling."

"Stop…" Lucy cried, her running slowing down.

"Scum."

"Parasite."

"Stop!" Lucy screamed.

"Coward."

Lucy crumpled to the ground, clutching her head, trying to stop the voices from getting to her mind. But, no matter how much she tried to block them out, they would work their way through her fingers and invade her brain.

She heard a wail, an agonizing, excruciating scream filled with unspoken words of self-hatred and loneliness. She soon realized it was her own cry. The voices got louder and louder, shrieking words of disgust and loathe in her head.

Lucy jumped in her seat, shaken by the extremely vivid dream that was now implanted into her mind. She rose from the train seat and made her way to the washroom, where she splashed her face with cold water several times. She strided back to her seat, and for the next eight days she sat there, completely lost in her thoughts.

— Time skip: 8 days —

— Rimoro —

Lucy was stumbled out of the train, groggy and tired. She couldn't help but notice she was the only soul getting off at this stop. "Where am I? Is this Rimoro?" she murmured.

She was surrounded by forestry, with a single gravel path leading down the centre of a thick, dense forest. She decided to trek down the path.

"My training begins here," she declared.

—

Hours later, she staggered into a small village. It took all of her willpower to not summon Horologium to carry her the way there.

"Uh… Excuse me?" she called timidly. A jet-black head of hair poked out of a clay house. He seemed to be about Lucy's age, and his features were sharp but handsome, in a way. His grey eyes looked stormy and his skin was tan. He was wearing a dark tunic with white cotton trousers.

"It's not often we get outsiders here. What do you want from us?" he said sharply.

Lucy, admittedly, was slightly taken aback by his harsh words, but decided then to stay polite. "Um… My name is Lucy. I'm only going to be here for a short period of time, so please let me stay the night in this village!" She bowed down.

She peeked back up again, and jumped about fifty meters into the air to discover that he happened to be right in her face… smelling her hair?

"KYAA!" she screamed, jumping backward. He seemed to disregard the whole fact of smelling her hair and pointed to a clay hut across from his.

"You may stay there. My sister stays in there, I'll introduce you," he said, turning away to walk to the hut. "Please excuse her… quirkiness."

'Look who's talking,' Lucy thought. She followed him into the hut.

"Also, my name is Rimokoro Wobiso, but you can call me Rimo." he added as they were walking to the hut.

"Sakimo, I have an outsider who will be staying in your hut today," he called. A woman who bore a striking resemblance to Rimo emerged from behind some curtains. Her eyes, though, sparkled with joy. Her hair was cropped to fall right below her ears in wispy locks. She stood and stared at Lucy for a second, before grinning and offering Lucy a plate of some kind of food.

"This is Sakimo. She can't speak but she can hear," Rimo said before gliding out of the room. Lucy looked after him in mild interest, before accepting the plate of food and being guided to a table with chairs crafted out of stumps.

Sakimo sat across from her, and as Lucy hungrily ate she pushed a piece of paper toward Lucy. Lucy picked up the parchment and read, 'so what are you doing here, outsider? talk to me. tell me your story.'

Lucy remained silent, suddenly losing the appetite to eat. Another paper was hurriedly pushed toward her.

'its okay. you can tell me when your ready.'

Lucy nodded, and Sakimo smiled warmly.

—

Today was tiresome. Lucy had been introduced to many of the villagers, who all seemed to like smelling her bright hair and watching her summon Spirits. She was then shown a river, where she almost drowned when she attempted to bathe. Now, she was lying in a makeshift bed trying to get some rest.

'How am I going to train…' she thought. 'I'll leave tomorrow to go into the forest,' she decided. 'I'll train there. I'll stay there until I'm strong enough to fight Natsu even.' she thought. 'Natsu…' She pictured the child-like mage in her head. She shook her head violently. She forced the thought of Natsu out of her mind and then rolled to her side to sleep.