Hey guys,

Sorry for such a short chapter. I've been really busy getting ready to leave out for my new job working on a cruise ship so if you don't hear from me, please don't be discouraged. I'll be back after two months and will hopefully have an idea for my next chapter. well thanks again please read and review.

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Chapter 3- New Territory

Since leaving Hargeon, Lucy and Luffy were almost never apart, much to Sanji's dismay. They talked about everything from the training they had done and how they managed to get where they were, but most importantly they talked about their future together. Lucy wasn't sure yet if either of them were far enough yet with their dreams. While Luffy was in the new world and had made a name for himself he hadn't gotten anywhere close to becoming the pirate king yet, and Lucy didn't think she was strong enough yet to be part of his crew.

"Hey, Luffy," She asked pulling herself out of her thoughts, "I don't think I'm ready yet to become part of your crew, there is so much more I want to do as a mage of Fairy Tail, and I don't think I'm strong enough yet to be part of the pirate kings crew."

Luffy looked at her with a thoughtful look on his face,"If you feel there is more that you need to do, then go do it, I will never hold you back from the things you want, I could never do that."

Lucy smiled and leaned her head againist his shoulder,"Thanks Luffy."

Luffy smiled a small sad smile, " That doesn't mean I won't miss you like crazy." He leaned his head on top of hers as he waited for her reply.

"I know and I'll miss you too, just promise you won't go getting yourself killed before I can find you again."

Luffy pulled back from her with a surprised look on his face, "Of course I won't, I've gotta become the pirate king. How can I become that if I can't even stay alive to see my girl again."

Lucy blushed. "You looooove him," said a voice from right above them. Luffy looked up to see a blue cat flying around with white wings.

"COOL," he said stars shining in his eyes.

"Shut up you stupid cat," Lucy said jumoing up and trying to hit him out of the sky and then stopped suddenly to look back at Luffy who was still staring at him, "Luffy did you not see them when we boarded the ship."

"Them," he looked back at her, "Theres more!"

Lucy nodded,"This is Happy, he's Natsu's partner." Then she turned around and called the others over. "This Carla and this is Panther Lily, who we just call Lily," She said pointing to the white and black cat."It's nice to meet you," said Lily and Carla just nodded her head clearly displeased with the situation.

"It's nice to meet you to," he said before he got up and started walking around them inspecting them.

"Would you stop that, it's creeping me out," said Carla rushing back to her partner.

Luffy just smiled and looked back at Lily, " So can you fly people around."

Lily nodded, "We can, but it's dangerous for someone who can't swim since we only have so much magical energy we can lose our wings over the ocean and that wouldn't be good for any of us."

"Awww," Luffy says diflating, "I guess that mean I'll just have more time with Lucy."

"Well, don't sound so enthuisastic," She said sarcasm dripping from her words.

Luffy just laughed and hugged her from behind, leaning down to her ear he said, "There's nothing I would like more than to spend every single moment with you."

Lucy blushed as she heard whooping calls from her guildmates. "Well you could only be so lucky," Luffy laughed and just held her tighter to him.

"I never would have thought that Luffy could act that way with anyone," Nami said looking away from the heartwarming scene the two love birds were making.

"Yes, they do make a very cute couple,"Robin said looking up from her book.

"I wonder if that's why he would sit on the figure head so much with that look on his face," Nami said looking back towards her captain.

"What face?"

They turned to the blue haired girl named Levy, " Our captain will usually sit on the figure head and have a face that's a cross between thinking and sadness."

"They were probably thinking of each other, Lucy gets a look like that all the time," Levy answered with a small smile, "I didn't even know she had someone she liked until a few days ago, none of us did, we always just thought it was just a Lucy thing, when she would slip in and out of her daydreams."

"No need to beat yourself up, Levy," said Lucy walking towards them. She could just see the unshed tears, so she held her arms open to give her friend a hug. "You know now, and that's all that matters." Levy nodded as she hugged Lucy, but the heartwarming scene didn't last long as everyone heard the unmistakable sounds of cannon fire. All the wizards ran to the side of the ship to see, but were pulled back by the crew before anyone could get a good look at them.

"Are you guys crazy," Nami said, " If they see you it'll cause trouble for your guild, especially if they think your all part of the crew now.

"Your right, we can't be seen otherwise we will make master angry...again," Erza said looking towards the group. They all had sweat drop, all except two.

"I don't care about that," said natsu standing up, "Their our friends, we should help them."

"Yeah, I mean there looks to be about ten ships, I'm sure they could use the help,"said Gajeel.

Levy and Lucy looked toward each other and then back to the boys and saying at the same time, "You both just want to fight." Both boys went stiff as their true motives were reavealed.

"I agree with what they said," Wendy spoke up, "Even if I don't like their true motives."

Both boys looked away from the small girls eyes looking ashamed.

"You know if we keep the ship far enough from them they won't be able to see us, and the faster we finish them off, the faster I'm sure Sanji will make a strawberry cake to celebrate, " said Gray sealing the deal for a fight.

"Your right, we can't let our new friends down," Erza said and everyone sweatdropped.

"You don't really have to, "said Zoro, "We deal with this all the time it'll only take a few minutes." As he said these words though a giant cannon ball struck him in the back of the head, "What the hell your suppose to hit the cannon balls away from the ship, damn Euro-cook."

"Well if you were up here helping I wouldn't have missed one, stupid Mosshead."

And with that Zoro went to his post and the wizards starting making a game plan.

"Wendy stand behind the sails and when it looks like the marines are getting close give us a little boost," Wendy nodded and headed to her post "Levy and Lucy you provide back up for the others, Me and Gray will stay on the ship to help keep cannon balls off the ship, and Natsu and Gajeel,"They all froze, " Go give them some hell.

The boys smiled, "Yes ma'am," and with that everyone went to their places.

"Hey Lucy, do you think you can get me a little fire over there," Natsu asked while Gajeel was munching on a cannon ball.

"Sure, I'll just wait until you surface over there." He nodded, " Hey Gray, can I get a little path."

"Do I look like a construction worker to you."

"No, you look like a stripper but that's besides the point."

"Gehehe, Lucy I like your friends, they seem like fun."

"You should see our entire guild then," she replied pulling out one of her keys.

"If you want I can get you across," Luffy says to the Dragon Slayer.

"Really thanks."

"Me too," Gajeel said running after them.

"Uh, Natsu," was all Lucy got out before he was catapalted through the sky by Luffy's devil fruit power. "Oh well, I tried to warn him."

"Open gate of the hourseman, Sagittarus."

"How dee doo, my lady, what can I do for you today."

"Can you shoot fire to that first ship for Natsu."

"Sure thing."

Lucy turned back to her friend, "Levy."

"You got it, Solid Script Fire,"

As the flaming words moved into the sky, Sagittarus shot several arrows through the fire and towards the ships.

"Will those really land,"Nami said watching the arrows.

"Of course, no one can beat Sagittarus at archery," said Lucy giving watching as the arrows hit their mark.

"Thank you, my lady for your kind words, and if that is all I will head back now."

"Sure, thanks for your help."

"Wow that must be handy, do they always do what you tell them to."

"Not always," she said thinking of Aquarius, "But that's ok cause I'm not their master, I'm their friend, I will ask for their help, not demand it."

Nami nodded in understanding, and then they all looked out towards the ship where they could see all hell was breaking lose.

"Well if there is anything we have in common it's that both groups are destructive," said Nami and everyone smilied.

Once all the ships were dealt with, Luffy made himself into slingshot and once agian flung Natsu and Gajeel back towards their ship.

"That was a great work out," said Gajeel.

"Yeah, it was, I must have brought down one hundred men in one punch," Natsu replied

"I brought down two hundred with one punch," said Gajeel trying to beat Natsu in some way.

"Oh, that's really cool you guys, I brought down a whole ship on accident when I lost control of my hand and punch a hole through to the bottom, so I had to hurry off to the next ship so I wouldn't get caught in the sea water."

Lucy bursted into laughter at the sight of their faces when Luffy said that.

"Does that even count," Gajeel said.

"I guess it does, even if it was on accident," Natsu replied shrugging.

"Well now that we got that out of the way, we can get back on course to the next island,"Nami said bringing everyones attention to their destination.

As everyone was heading back towards their points of intrest on the ship, Lucy spotted a small piece of white, burning paper. She picked it up and looked to see that it was slowly burning, but was still in one piece.

"Hey, does this belong to anyone, I found it on the ground."

Everyone looked and it seemed that the crew knew what it was. Luffy walked up to her with his hand out, " It's Ace's Vivre card."

"Ace's what?"

"His vivre card," Luffy said again, "he gave it to me after I saw him on one of the islands we had visited."

"You saw Ace?" Luffy nodded.

"Yep, and he gave me this so that if I ever needed to I could find him, but it's never burned before," he said scratching his head.

"So whos Ace," Gray asked.

"Well he's Luffy and my brother, though mine is only through Luffy, we grew up together."

"Uh...Lucy," Lucy looked back towards Levy who had a book open, " You need to see this."

Lucy and Luffy walked up to her and she handed the book over to Lucy and pointed to a passage she had been reading.

A vivre card is made to help find a person from where ever they are in the world. There is no way of telling how far your target is, but it is a fool proof way of knowing that the person it's associated with is doing well. If for some reason the card starts burning then you should make haste, that person is in mortal danger.

Lucy froze, "Luffy it's says that if the vivre card starts burning that the person it's from is in mortal danger."

"Danger, but what kind of danger could Ace be in, he's one of the strongest pirates out there."

"I don't know, it just say that if it's burning, that means he's in danger."

"Well you know as well as I do that he wouldn't want us to go and barge into whatever he's doing."

"Maybe, but I at least want to go check on him no matter where he's at, it really worries me."

Luffy hugged Lucy to his chest, " I guess theres no harm in going check on him, but I don't know how far away he is, and I'm sure he'll be pissed when we show up, but he could never be mad long especially when you were involved."

"I'm sorry everyone, is it okay if I stay with Luffy and his crew while we go check on my brother."

Erza walked up to her, "I can't say that master will agree with this," Lucy froze, " But I can't imagine he will say no, if it has something to do with your brother, if anything he'll have the whole of Fairy Tail coming to join the fight."

"We can all go with you," said Wendy, " it'll make things easier if something goes wrong, especially with two healers on board.

Lucy gave a relived smile, "Thanks guys."

"Ahhh...it's not that big a deal, I mean what is family for, " Natsu said leaning up againist the mast with a smile on his face.

"Aye," Happy said throwing up his paw.

"I guess it could be fun, if a fight breaks out," Gajeel said with a smirk.

"Of course I'll help Lucy anyway I can," Levy said bouncing up and down.

"The way I see it, if he's Lucy's brother, then he's our family too," Gray said in the middle of taking off his clothes.

"How dare you take your clothes off in front of all these ladies," yelled Sanji kicking the Ice make mage.

"What the hell was that for, oh damn where did my clothes go," Gray said standing up and looking for his missing clothes.

Everyone started laughing, " I'm the luckiest girl in the world to have so many wonderful friends," Lucy thought as she leaned back into Luffy's chest.

"I like knowing you have such great friends," Luffy whispered in her ear and she nodded in reply.

"Well, alright then, Nami change our heading to follow Ace's vivre card, the rest of the crew prepare any and everything just in case we end up in a battle," Luffy said giving his orders to his crew, "I'd like to ask that you mages help out as much as you can since we aren't sure how far away he is, we could end up finding him tomorrow, and I'd like to be prepared, please."

"Sure, no problem, "said Erza. Wendy went with Chopper to make medicines and potions, Erza went to help Zoro with weapons, Levy headed towards Robin and Nami ready to give any knowledge they would need on the new world, Gajeel and Natsu went to help Franky make repairs to the ship, and Gray went to help Sanji with counting how much food they had on the ship, all of the exceeds were asked to keep watch on all sides of the ship for any threats. Lucy of course stayed with Luffy trying to calm her nerves, and hiping they would find Ace sooner rather than later.

"Don't worry, I'm sure he's fine,"Luffy said holding her tighter.

"I hope your right."