Summer break's here and I swear I've been getting lazier each day . . . I apologize. I just want to spend the entire day doing nothing at all . . .

AkumaNoKiseki, in the Loke arc, Lucy was able to summon all her spirits to help him. I was kind of toying with the idea that Lucy had gotten stronger since then, so now she's able to summon two spirits at the same time and fight with them.

Thanks to everyone else. You know the drill — read and review, yadda yadda yadda.

Oh, and someone will die in this chapter. Just a little heads-up.

Chapter Ten.

"LUCY!"

Lucy Heartfilia clutched the dagger that protruded from her chest and toppled facedown to the ground.

"Luce . . .?" Natsu's fire sputtered out as he watched the scene with shocked eyes.

"She's gone." Twin Two cackled.

Erza was motionless.

"YOU SON OF A —" Natsu started.

"Didn't you hear me, boy? She's gone. Pathetic stellar spirit mage."

Natsu wanted nothing more than to rip the head off the man who had stabbed his friend. Flames burst angrily from his fist as he prepared to charge —

"Hey, you. Take that back."

A familiar cracking sound was heard as a familiar whip sailed through the air and smacked Twin Two right between the eyes, leaving a bloody gash.

Twin Two cried out in surprise, clutching his face. In front of him was Lucy's body, lying on the ground. Behind him stood another Lucy, very much alive.

"What —you — how —"

Before he had time to recover as the dripping blood temporarily blinded him, Lucy's whip was back and tied around his feet. With a savage yank, she pulled the whip and effectively tripped him.

"NOW, ERZA!"

The scarlet-haired mage bounded to Twin Two in a blink and brought her sword down in a wide arc across his body.

The Lucy on the ground reformed into the twin shapes of Gemi and Mini.

"Ah," Twin Two gasped. "Didn't see that one coming. Brilliant, Fairy Tail . . ." he slumped down as the life drained out of him.

Erza exhaled slowly as her Heaven's Wheel Armor shimmered and disappeared.

"Good job, Gemi, Mini," Lucy said. "You can go back now."

"Anything for Lucy-san!" The twins replied as they vanished with a poof.

Natsu, who had stayed frozen throughout the entire scene, finally managed to say something. "Luce . . . what . . . you're not dead?"

"You idiot, of course I'm not!"

"But you died!" Natsu gestured at the air wildly.

"He stabbed Gemini, not me." Lucy paused. "You mean you didn't notice that was Gemini? Erza knew."

"She knew? So you're not dead?"

"Idiot," Erza interrupted. "Yes, I did. Now let's go find the others."

"But what about him?" Lucy nodded at Twin Two's body lying on the ground.

"We leave him there," Erza said grimly. "To move the body would be an insult to him as our opponent."

"Oh." Lucy blinked. "Alright, then."

"Luce." Natsu grabbed her hand. "Don't do that again."

"Do what?"

"Play dead." He shifted uncomfortably. "It scared me."

"Oh. Sorry about that. I'll try not to," Lucy laughed nervously.

"I mean, I don't know what I'll do if you died . . ."

"Aww, thanks, Natsu, that's so sweet of you —"

". . . because, y'know, I won't be able to steal food from you again . . ."

Lucy twitched.

". . . and then there'd be no one for me and Happy to prank anymore!"

Forget what I said about being sweet. Lucy huffed internally.

"So if you died, that would be really bad for us." Natsu finished with his typical innocent grin.

"You jerk." She promptly bashed him on the head.

"Ow!"

"Are you two coming?" Erza demanded from some distance away.

"Coming, Erza!" Lucy skipped towards her.

"But I really did mean it," Natsu muttered, clutching his head.

"Levy-chan!" Lucy waved as she caught sight of the blue-haired girl, Gray, Happy, and Wendy emerging from a cluster of trees.

"Hey, Lu-chan!" Levy chirped.

"He took us a long way," Gray said. "You took care of Number Two?"

"Of course we did!" Natsu looked offended.

"We got the key, Erza-san," Wendy held up the silver key.

"Good," Erza said. "Now the problem is to find the base itself."

Everyone was quiet as they finally registered what Erza said.

"Oh, that's right, we don't know where the base is," Lucy laughed. "And since they wrecked our train, we're still a long way from Era . . ."

"First things first, we need to get to Era. Let's go, everyone." Erza said.

"Yes ma'am!"

"Aye!"

"They have the key. One and Two failed."

". . . Rats."

So, who thought it was Lucy when I said someone would die? *nudge* *nudge*

I won't be able to update for a week or so because I'll be going out of town. Sorry about that.

-TheAliensDidIt