Ria's POV

It had been two years since that, and it seemed as if everything would be okay. How wrong I was.

"We're going on a job! By ourselves!" I bounced, making my coat ripple in the air. It was a coat just like my dad's, long, black, but instead of creamy gray fur, it had a dark orange color to match my black tank top, orange jean shorts, thigh high black socks, and black lace up boots. My blonde hair was wavy and loose around my shoulers, with one long spike in a ponytail, falling over my forehead.

Jerlac and Erx, the almost twin brothers followed behind me, not quite as enthusiastic. They were fourteen like me, but slightly more mature when it came to things like missions and fighting. Most people saw them as twins, considering Erx liked to keep a bandanna over his purple shouler length hair, always saying that a boy should not have that color. The rest of us just told him to cut it.

The heveanly body mage was also wearing a form of what I had heard his father used to wear when he was pretending to be Mystogan, the great Fairy Tail mage, with a long navy cloak, wraps around his face, odd black striped pant things, and sandals. On his back were several staff things, but he hardly ever used them. No, Erx was more of a fistfight kinda guy.

His brother however, preferred the less skin to skin contact, and thus was an equip mage. Jerlack had bright red hair, to go with his oddly shaped tattoo that went over his left eye, that his brother shared. As we were walking, he equiped into his regular clothes, consisting of chest armour, gauntlets, black pants, and gray shoes. A blue Fairy Tail insignia showed on his inner right forearm. "Yeah yeah," he grinned, "we know that we're going on a mission. Mavis, Ria, you've only told us a hundred times."

"I know! But I'm still excited! I just wish that Amy had been able to come along."

Amy Redfox, my best friend in the world, and also currently the only girl Iron Dragon slayer in Fiore, was off on a mission with her father's cat, Pantherlily. She said that it was jst for training, and would take about a month, but that still annoyed me.

"I do too," Erx piped up. "She could at least calm you down for the train."

Wait. . .what?"T-train? Who said we were taking a train to Oaktown?" I checked the flyer again, smae information: find a bunch of bandits in Oaktown, defeat them, and bring them in for a reward of onehundred and twenty thousand jewel.

"Yes, a train. I get that you have mtion sickness, but you must understand that we, your team, are not going to walk the whole way." Jerlac patted my shoulder like a little kid, even though I was pretty tall, almost as tall as him.

As much as I didn't want to go on the cursed piece of metal they call transport, I gave in. "Ugh. . .fine."

It was as horrible as I thought it would be.

I had never actually gone on a train myself, even when my mother brought us to Fairy Tail, she made sure to knock me out. But I had heard the stories from the other dragon slayers. Uncle Gajeel had told me and Amy about how you could feel it moving, and how our stomachs would lurch, and he made Jerlac and Erx's uncle Natsu sick from his description.

So I had a pretty good idea of the word 'grateful' when we arrived in Oaktown. Never was I going to not know what one of my syblings went through when they had to face something equal to the train's misery.

But of course, my supposed team mates found it hilarious. As we walked through the town, Erx actually had to hold his brother up to keep Jerlac walking, as he laughed his stupid head off. "Oh. . gh ha ha hee, do you. .he he. . rem-hahaha remember an. . .an hour ago?"

Erx snickered under his mask, "Yeah. . .hmmhmm. . .her face was so green. . ."

"Ahha ha ha ha! I know! Gahaha, I thought she'd turn into one of Droy-san's plants!"

I turned on them, my hands crackleing with electicty. "She is standing right here, for your information!"

"Oh," Jerlac grinned, "we know. That's why we're remeniscing."

"Well remenisce this!" I grabbed them both by the collar and shocked some sense into their unfortunate selves.

It worked up to a point. They calmed down, Jerlac finally being able to stand up on his own, and only leting out an occasional giggle as we made our way to a large brown house that sat next to a row of destroyed buldings.

The man we met there was a nice old man named Shobie. I asked him why he had offered so much for such a simple job, but apperantly the bandits hadn't been taking anything, but every building they looted was trashed.

"So they're looking for something." Erx spoke up from the living room corner.

"Yes," Shobie replied, running his fingers through his thinning white hair. "But we can't figure out what they could want. And their pilaging and looting is starting to slow down buisness."

"Well, you can expect us to do all we can to help." I bowed slightly, then asked "Is there a spicific time or places they might strike?"

"I have a theory about that Ria." Jerlac said.

"You do?"

"Yeah, you know how this is the one house standing out of an entire row?"

"Yeah. . .oh. I see." He meant that Shobie's house was going to be the next target. "But the time, when should we expect them."

Shobie shook his head. "That's the main problem, miss. The bandits never attack at the same time. We can never expect them."

"Hmm. . .well then we'll just have to wait for 'em!" I smiled, and we did exactly that.

/line/

The bandits tried the house in the evening. We had been patiently waiting, ready to chase them into the woods like planned. There we could take them down, without any civilians getting in the way.

Our stratagy worked, and we faced them off in the middle of a clearing.

"Alright," I started, "what the hell are you looking for?"

A bruntette sneered, "Isn't it obvious? Treasure."

"Buddy!" A guy with a headband hit him, "don't be giving it all away!"

"Well, it doesn't matter what he gives away. We'll still be taking you guys in anyways."

"How?" Buddy asked.

"Easy, like this; Lightning Dragon's Roar!" I threw myself at them, scattering a couple, and hitting others.

My companions got into the fray just as quickly, Jerlac shifting into a feather like armour covering his chest and legs, with silver wings sprouting out of his back. "Heaven's Wheel, Scattered Petals!" Swords flew through the air, and more opponents were down. (A/N Just try and imagine a masculine version of Erza's armour)

Erx was taking a different approach, not even using his magic. INstead, he was just beating the bandits sensless with his fists, plams, and feet in an odd but conventional form of martial arts.

Me, I just electrocuted anyone who came near, while also using some small attackt to people who weren't as scared. "Lightning Dragon's Sword Talon! Wing Slash! Breakdown Fist!"

I noticed one was trying to sneak away, but he seemed different than the others, more threatening. "Hey, you! Come back here!" I gave chase, leaving the other two to finish off the job. It was when we had reached the base of a large oak tree that he stopped and I got a good look at the dark cloak that covered everything except his black shoes, and dark shoulder length hair that peeped from under his hood.

"You." His voice sounded odd, slightly raspy, as if he had a cold.

"Are you okay? You don't sound right." I stepped closer, not realizing my mistake till he attacked.

"Darkness Jab!" A beam of purple black smoke hit me in the chest, knocking me down and somehow holding me there. "You are what we have been searching for."

"What! Why?" I struggled, but it was no use, the darkness held me.

"Don't try to break free, not even you can get out of our trap. . .Phoenix."

My flailing limbs went still. "How do you know that?"

"I know many things-" he was cut off by the sound of footsteps. "But today is not the day for the end. Goodbye Phoenix." The darkness disappeared, and he ran off, as if he had never been there in the first place.

Jerlac POV

I knew that Ria could take care of herself, but I also knew that she had a bit of a caring side that could get in the way easily when someone was hurt. It was an odd little additon to her violent and leading personality, but she couldn't help it. Her mom was Mirajane Strauss after all.

So, when my little lightning mage friend runs off after some guy I didn't really care, preferring to beat a couple bandits unconcious with my brother. But when we had them all tied up and subdued, and Ria still wasn't back, I was scared slightly.
Her older brother said I had a crush, but I denied it. There was no way that I ever would fall for a girl who could beat me up as easily as my mother. No way.

Erx and I ran after her, reaching a giant tree, and finding Ria brushing dirt off her shorts and Fairy Tail mark. "Hey," I said, lookin her over for inguries that her family would kill us for. "Where's that guy?"

Her blue eyes shifted from mine to the ground, and she fiddled with the spikey ponytail that made up her bangs. "What guy?"

"The guy you ran after. Had a black cloak." Erx responded, calm but I could sense he was as confused as I was.

"Oh, that guy. I couldn't catch him." Her eyes spoke different words, but I let it slide, we had a job to finish.

"Okay, well lets get those bandits back to Oaktown, or we won't be returning home with bragging rights." I equiped into my regular clothes.

That perked my friend up, and she eagerly jumped up. "Great! I can't wait to tell Roku and Amy, they'll be so surprised!"

Erx smiled under his mask, conveying the same thing.

"Then lets get going!"

/line/

Shobie was perfectly happy with helping us drag the tied up bandits to the town holding area, saying that the authorities would get them in the next couple of hours. Then he paid us the jewel and we caught the train to Magnolia the next day.

It was still funny watching Ria deal with her motion sickness, which basically meant that she didn't deal at all. For the first half of the ride, her head was out the compartmant window, blonde hair flying, and face green as one of Oaktown's trees. After that, she lay on the seat passed out, grumbling, or just staring at nothing. Suffering all the while.

When we reached Magnolia, Erx had to carry her off to where our family's were waiting, her father looking at his little girl with sympathy. As soon as she saw us, Mira-san rushed over to take her daughter, Rokuru not far behind. They fussed over her for a bit, but then Ria regained her fiesty adittude and shooed them off with an "I'm fine, seriously. I'm fine."

Erx's and my parents had come to congratulate us and I got hugged till the air almost left me. "Yeah mom, we did good. Got the job finished in a couple hours."

"Then why did you stay over night? Hmmm?" Her scarlet eyes bore into my blue ones, searching.

"Because," I shrugged. "We didn't have time to catch a train aterwards, and Erx and I didn't want to walk."

She nodded, and I turned to my father, who was smiling and talking with my brother. They had a special bond like Mom and I, so I left them alone. Besides I had other things to deal with as I was tackled by Ria who was yeeling about something. "You bastard! That's why? You didn't feel like walking so I had to suffer! I'm gonna kill you!" She twisted my arm a bit until her brother's dragged her off. "H-hey! I'm. . .not. . .done! Gah! Let go of me you two nusances!"

As she was pulled away I walked up to her father, preparing to report how the mission went buthe waved me off. "Don't," Laxus said. "I already know what happened from Ria. You guys did well for your first mission."

"Oh, well did she tell you of the guy she chased? The one that dissapeared?" His grey eyes turned to me, and I realized she hadn't why not? "Because there was one who got away, but he wasn't like the others."

"How so?" Mira asked, appearing next to her husband.

"I don't really know, he just seemed like more of a threat. I do know he had magic, I could feel it when Erx and I caught up to them."

"Them?"

"Yeah, Ria ran after him when he tried to escape and Erx and I finished the bandits off. When we found her, there was this trace of dark magic in the air, and she seemed nervous."

"Hmm. . .maybe he scared her is all?" Dad suggested, but Laxus-san shook his head.

"No, I highly doubt that Ria could be scared by a bit of dark magic, she's a third generation dargon slayer after all. We'll have to see if she tells us or not."

"Exactly," Mira-san took his hand and started walking in the guild's direction. "There's no point worrying about it now, because that'll only get us worked up over nothing. Now let's head back."

We all nodded, and walked with her but my thoughts were somewhere else. What was Ria not telling us, and why wasn't she speaking?

Okay, so this is by far my longest chapter yet, and I'm sorry if it sucks. It probably doesn't, but I don't know.

Tell me what you think of Jerlac's apperant crush, and the guy who attacked Ria. I was going to put more spoilers in his piece, but I decided not to. GiHi! Also, yes Jerlac will have all of Erza's armour at his disposal, simply because I feel like making fun of him. Also, if you have armour ideas, OCs, or something else you think would be cool in this story, don't hesitate to tell me. Especially magic ideas.

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