Hey Guys,

So, here is this week's chapter. I'm hoping that next week I'll have another chapter as well, but I'll be gone for Thanksgiving and the entire weekend, so we'll see. As always, enjoy!

- Singed

Disclaimer: I don't own Fairy Tail.

Lucy awoke in a room to herself. It was obviously a prison cell. She was laying on a cot, with a sink, a toilet, a chair, and a table all crammed in a space barely able to hold so much. Normally, Lucy would have waited to make demands until after the bad guys showed themselves. She had been through this before, plenty of times. However, with Igneel not being there she instantly made her anger known.

"Ahhhhh!" She screeched as she slammed herself against the door. She continued over and over again until her hands bled and her shoulders and knees ached. Finally, a slit in the door opened, revealing a pair of feminine eyes. Lucy also heard a baby crying. It was Igneel, she'd know that cry anywhere. The latch closed again and Lucy heard the lock. She prepared herself to tackle the jailer, until the woman walked in holding her baby with a knife pressed against his throat. She was really hated that that was how they chose to control her, but she couldn't risk hurting him.

"Good, Lucy. I'm glad to see your motherly instincts so strong. Levy reacted just as well. Now Igneel, other than being a little cutie, has shown to be very stubborn. He has cried nonstop since he awoke and only calmed when he smelled you. He is also hungry. So if you wouldn't mind?" The beautiful, green haired woman held the baby out to Lucy. Lucy grabbed her son and retreated to the bed, hushing him. Although, it was difficult to do since she was shaking uncontrollably. He had stopped crying as soon as Lucy got him settled against her on the bed and he nuzzled as close as possible. Lucy curled herself around him in a protective a fashion and finally calmed enough to start nursing him a few moments later. He nursed greedily and Lucy wondered at just how long it'd been since that early morning feeding.

Hearing the chair pull out Lucy saw her jailer sit, watching the pair of them like a hawk. Angry and wanting some privacy, she quickly pulled the blanket up so that she could watch the woman, but the woman couldn't see Igneel. The woman laughed and crossed her legs. "My, it would seem that some instinct transferal has occurred. Duly noted."

"You took my son! Of course I'll be protective of him!"

"True, but your motions and looks are so animalistic that I see your mate every time I look at you."

"Natsu?"

"Yes, Natsu."

Lucy, quickly adding things up straightened a little. "Your part of the research team that wanted to study the dragon slayers. This was a set up."

"Good job. Levy figured it out before you though. I'm sure the others will in time."

"What have you done to them?"

"Who, the dragon slayers? We just made them incapable of tracking you and the others down. After all, without their extra senses they will have a hard time finding this place. So, yes they're still alive. As for the other women you were staying with, all of them have been brought here. We even took Erza Fernandez and Juvia Fullbuster."

"But they aren't dragon mates."

"No, but Erza got pregnant with the special potion we sent to the guilds holding dragon mates and Juvia's made of water, so the boss wanted a chance to study her while he had the chance. The man is a true scientist at heart." Here she stopped for a moment to clean under one of her nails. "I will admit that my special potion was much more potent than I'd thought."

"So it was magic."

The woman straightened and nodded. "In a manner of speaking. It was more a special knowledge of biology and botany. I made the potion and then set it out with a friend to the guilds as a special flavoring in your drinks."

"You mean that delicious cherry flavoring."

"The very same. You women couldn't get enough of it. Anyway, you and Levy were pregnant well before the others, but my potion made sure the others would soon follow."

"So, the real objective of all this was our children, not us."

The woman smiled and nodded. "Even as a prisoner Lucy Dragneel, you've earned my respect. Of course, you've had that and my jealousy for years now."

"Jealousy? What for?"

The woman stood as Lucy propped Igneel on her shoulder and began tapping him on the back. He burped happily and loudly in her ear and Lucy smiled despite herself. So much like his father. "Do you not recognize me Lucy?"

Startled, Lucy looked up at the woman. She was beautiful and in complete control of herself. Lucy would have remembered someone like her. "Should I?"

"No, not as I am now. I've matured much since you met me all those years ago in Hargeon." Suddenly, Lucy had a flashback to a pimply, shy girl she'd met the morning before meeting Natsu. They had met at a local restaurant and had spent the day together. She and Lucy had had much in common, especially their love and admiration for Fairy Tail. They were supposed to meet the next day in the square where Lucy had ultimately met Natsu, but this girl had never showed and Natsu had.

"Reina?"

"One in the same, Lucy."

"What…what happened? You never met me in the square."

"Oh no, I was there. I, like everyone else, had been caught in that fake salamander's spell. I can't blame you for not noticing me but I can blame you for forgetting about me. You never even looked for me."

"Reina, everything happened so fast. You're right, I did forget, but I did go looking for you later that day after I separated from Natsu and before I went to the yacht party."

"Perhaps. In all honesty, I cannot blame you. Perhaps I did once, but now, well, all is understandable. After all, you had just met your soul mate. How could a day old friend compete with that?"

"Soul mate?"

Reina gave Lucy a look of reproach and settled again. "Honestly Lucy, are you still so unsure?"

"Well no. I've been aware and secure in such things for a long time now, but how did you know?"

"Because that ring the fake salamander wore was bought at my family's shop. My blood does not run with much magic, but the magic we can control is very powerful and specific. Some can create very potent charms, and others, like me make potions. My father crafted that ring. When the man bought it, my father assured him that there was but two ways to dissolve its enchantment. First, by the owner's own desires. The second was if the enthralled met their soul mate. You, dear Lucy, were the only one to be let free unintentionally. I was let free because I wasn't deemed pretty enough. When I put together what had happened, my jealousy could not be contained. My magic was far too weak, at least at the time, to allow me passage into such a guild. So I watched you live the dream and to be a dragon slayer's mate. This simply added insult to injury. After all, you loved Fairy Tail and later the salamander because of it. I love the salamander based on all my research into dragon slayers. I wanted so badly to be a dragon slayer's mate and decided that Natsu was the one for me. Then, I wanted to be a part of Fairy Tail because of him."

"Reina, I didn't know."

"Of course not. It wasn't like my desires would change anything. You were his soul mate. I could hardly change that. However, I could make it so you never had your happy ending. So, when I heard about this project, I jumped on board without a second thought."

"You're talking in the past tense," Lucy said. Although Reina was giving a good performance, something about her told Lucy that she no longer felt this way.

"Of course," she said icily. "This all started years ago."

Deciding that this wasn't the time to get into it, Lucy went back to the previous conversation. "What exactly is this project Reina?"

"We want to make an army of dragon slayers. We had originally wanted to control the current generation with their mates."

"The master."

"Yes, but he diverted from the original plan and he lost. So we had to start over. Now, our plan is much more simple. Cripple the current dragon slayers, take their children, raise them and brain wash them, and kill the mates once the children do not need your milk anymore. This way, we have the only viable dragon slayers under our control and the crippled dragon slayers, once bereft of their children and mates for years, will of course gladly train their children when called. Once the next generation is properly trained, Natsu and the others will also be disposed of."

"That's evil!"

"Of course, but brilliant." Lucy swallowed and just stared.

"But,… why would you want this?"

"Because, it amuses me. Also, I can finally get my dragon slayer children." She stood to take Igneel, and Lucy pulled back. Igneel, sensing Reina's intent, started crying again. Reina sighed and nodded. She actually looked sad.

"Yes, Ali and Gavey reacted much the same. He will stay with you for now. Hope that he nurses longer than the average." Reina left and Lucy held her son to her. She curled over him, weeping at their fate. However, she was only using it as a shield to fool whoever was watching. She was not going to go down quietly. She would fight, if not for herself then for her son.

Natsu awoke to a world he could not understand. Everything was at once overwhelming and at the same time dulled. His sight went in and out of focus and sometimes he saw in color and at others, it was black and white. His hearing wasn't much better. Sometimes, the only thing he could hear was his own heart beat and at others it was like he could hear everything, and it was so loud that it deafened him. His scene of smell was completely gone from what he could tell and he tasted ash, but that was it.

What he did know was that he was no longer in the hallway, and that the other dragon slayers were there. They were nearby somewhere and he knew that they were awake too. He also knew, after a half hour of picking up some pieces and putting them together that Gray, Lisanna, and Sherria were all there with them.

"Okay, one more." Natsu heard Sherria say.

"You should have started with him," Gray growled. Natsu felt an amazing sense of relief as Sherria used her healing magic on him. Finally, he wasn't going back and forth any more, but his world was considerably dulled. Opening his eyes a bit, he saw no color, but he could see the people and objects around him, though they were burry.

"What happened?"

"Leave it to Natsu to ask the obvious question first," a very irritated and irate String spat. "We were attacked and our mates taken! Or don't you remember?"

"I remember just fine you…" Natsu had attempted to rise and strike the Saber Tooth leader, but he fell, too weak to do anything else.

"Natsu!" Lisanna cried. "Sting! Don't anger him! It took us this long to get you all awake and conscious. Poor Sherria has been working non-stop for days. Now, Natsu," she said turning back to him, "we'll need to ask you a few questions, then you may ask yours." He nodded and sat back down, but glared at Sting.

"Okay, what can you see right now?" Natsu answered as best he could and the medical questions just kept coming. Finally, Lisanna sighed and sat back, satisfied with her knowledge. She stood and went to write her findings down, while Gray took his place in the center of the room. Sherria had laid down on a cot and was sleeping, or so it would appear.

"Alright, now that you're all awake and functioning, we can begin. I'll start from the beginning. I had just returned from a mission and was heading over to Fairy Hills to pick up Juvia." Natsu raised his eyebrows at this. He alone knew that they had split, so either Gray was delusional, or he had gone to reconcile. "When I arrived, I found the place completely deserted and ransacked. It was obvious that the girls had been taken. They made no steps to cover their tracks. I ran for the guild hall after that and got everyone I could together. We had a difficult time finding a leader in all this, since Laxus was gone, and Mira and Erza were both taken. Instead, we just decided as a group to get myself and Lisanna to Crocus as soon as possible. I've never wished for Happy, Carla, and Patherlily so much in my life. They could've flown us at full speed. They picked the worst time to go visiting the other exceeds. Luckily, when we arrived we had no trouble finding you guys."

"Yeah," Lisanna chimed in. "It was the only hotel smoldering and half destroyed." The dragon slayers grumbled and Laxus put his head in his hands. He was going to have so many apology letters to write.

"Anyway," Gray continued. "We found you easily enough. We got you to the nearest hospital, but even after their best treatments none of you would rouse. The only thing we could all agree on was that all of you were in excruciating pain. So after a week, we sent for Sherria who arrived with Jellal. Apparently, Erza had been taken as well since she'd been staying with the girls while he'd been on a job."

"How long have we been out," Rogue asked. His eyes hadn't left Lisanna and she was giving him just as much attention. Natsu felt an overwhelming amount of jealousy. He wanted Lucy there with Igneel and he wanted it now.

"Well according to the hotel staff, we found you a day after your battle and we've been trying to revive you for two weeks now." The collective groan was almost deafening. Natsu's bed lit instantly, lightening shot around the room to fast for anyone to duck. Sting's lasers made the wall across from him look like Swiss cheese, while all the metal in the room bent and twisted into odd shapes, and acidic poison literally dripped from Eric's skin.

"Enough," Jellal said, stepping in. "You aren't the only ones whose mates and wives have been kidnapped." This calmed the dragon slayers, but not by much.

"Who else was taken?" Eric asked.

"Like Gray said, Erza, Juvia, and Wendy. Yukino was at her own home, but was also taken, much to the horror and panic of those guards you put on her Sting." Sting's jaw creaked as he gritted his teeth, however since that was where his reaction ended, Natsu realized that he already knew.

"Though, we did get some very useful information from them. It would seem that the reason they all failed was a sleeping spell. It was a powerful one too, because one of the guards had an anti-sleep spell charm. According to all the intelligence we could gather, it would seem that Julius is the only wizard alive to be able to produce that kind of power." This news caused the dragon slayers to become enraged again and it took them a few minutes to get them calmed down.

"So what you're saying," Laxus finally said after everyone relaxed, "is that our mates are gone and we have no idea where they're at or how to find them."

"Unfortunately, yes. It would seem that even with Sherria's help, you will not have full use of your special over sensitive senses for months now. However, we do think that if the machine that did this to you were to be destroyed that you might have your senses back immediately," Jellal confessed.

"We don't even know what they actually want," Eric said, leaning back.

"That's not true," Gray answered, plopping a folder down onto Laxus's lap. "We found this under Laxus. It's their full plan. Either they didn't realize you had it, it's a fake, or they just did't care that you had it. However, we can determine which in a little bit."

"Have you read it?" Gajeel asked.

"We have," Jellal confirmed. "It would seem that they are after your children. They want to take them, raise them and make them a brainwashed dragon slaying army. Unfortunately, they don't need your mates to do it. So, once your children are weened, they will be killed."

The dragon slayers took this news as best they could, but it still took them a good fifteen minutes to calm down and listen. "I'm angry too," Gray put in, "after all Juvia maybe killed as soon as the child is born. Our child doesn't need special milk."

"How do you even know they're still alive?" Gajeel asked. He wasn't trying to be unkind, but he was far too angry to be even his brand of polite.

Gray bristled, but Jellal answered smoothly. "A note stuck in the back from the head researcher to Julius. He told him to kidnap all the women, since the children they carried were all conceived through a magical potion created by the group or the mother's themselves were interesting test subjects. I assume they want to see if they'll be useful."

"It makes sense now," Laxus muttered.

"What does?"

"Why they took Mira if they were after dragon slayer children. She is my mate, but I haven't done anything about it yet. So, if their after the children of this potion, then that's why they took her too." Laxus was too busy writing his own story to see the glance passed between everyone else in the room. So, he still didn't know, well no one was brave enough to tell him.

"So what do we do now?" Sting asked, trying to get the ball rolling again. "We have less to go on than when Lucy was taken the first time."

"True," Gray said. "The problem is that last time they wanted us to find her, eventually. This time, I don't think they do." Natsu closed his eyes and sighed. Now, he felt, was the perfect time to reveal his secret.

"Actually," he started. "I can track them down."

"You said that you couldn't smell anything."

"I can't. But, ever since the master incident, I've been learning how to use the bond more thoroughly. Sometime last year, I was able to turn the bond into a homing beacon. I can find Lucy anywhere, as long as she's alive. I can even glean some information from her, from time to time." He wasn't about to tell them that he could read her mind whenever he wanted.

"And you're just telling us this now?" Gajeel yelled.

"So what? If I'd told anyone before now, they'd know about it." Everyone allowed their surprise to show. He was right and they were all thankful for it. Once again, his instincts were stronger than their brains.

"Good," Jellal said. "It's settled. We will begin traveling tomorrow. I'll send a message to the guilds immediately. They'll meet us here sometime tomorrow. Then Natsu, it's all you. In the meantime, Laxus, read over that report and give any other important details you feel necessary to the others. Also," Jellal said, over his shoulder as he left, "you might find page 13 most enlightening." With his departure, Lisanna helped the dragon slayers up and got them moving to their rooms. It was a different hotel in Crocus, though not as nice as their last one.

All of the dragon slayers fell back to sleep once settled, but Laxus was determined to uncover Jellal's meaning. He started from page one, assuming that their might be important information on those pages. There was, but when he got to page 11, he blanched, then blushed, then felt like a complete pervert as he read, what they were calling the 'Conception Reports.' The first one was Gajeel and Levy's. It went into extreme detail about the circumstances, the day and at what time they made little Gavey and Ali. There were even pictures. The first one was obviously shot through their bedroom window. The second looked like it was shot from a high shelf in the Guild Hall Library.

"Oh, gross guys. Geez, people go in there and stuff." He flipped the next page and saw Natsu and Lucy's report. It was pretty much the same thing, and thankfully, their picture showed them in their own bedroom. Laxus stopped for a moment. He had come to terms that Mira was his mate by now, but he was still confused as to why they'd take her and the other two. True, they were sick and twisted, but if their main objective was to gain dragon slayer children, why not wait until Rogue and himself had claimed their mates and produced their own offspring? When Laxus flipped the page, he was incomplete shock for a few moments before he went through a litany of emotions.

There before him was the title, "Conception Report 3 – Laxus Dreyar and Mirajane Strauss." Sitting up, his attention completely engaged, Laxus read about that night. The first thing to catch his attention was the date. It all made sense now, why he had no memory of that night. He thought back and sure enough it was fuzzy as if he'd been drunk. His last clear memory was him taking the job back from her and their hands brushing. His last conscious thought was, 'I have to have her. She is mine.'

The next thing he remembered was being sick on the train the next day as he journeyed from the town. He simply figured that he'd had too much to drink the night before and now was paying the price. Although, he hadn't been truly drunk since he'd learnt his lesson in that lightening town, and he didn't have a headache that morning either. In fact, he felt better than he had in ages. Well now he knew why! He continued to read and as he did, he couldn't help a smile. He'd partially bound Mira. She was his and that meant that the child she carried was his! The best line from the report was, "While this form of dragon slayer bonding is not the normal way of doing things, Mirajane went quite willingly into the coupling and seemed most pleased with it."

Laxus leaned back in relief and sighed. Mira was his, the child was his! He'd never felt more relieved in his life. Now all he needed to do was finish the bond and he could settle his mate before the child was born. He'd find some way of explaining everything and make it up to her. He continued reading, but the last paragraph caused a new fear to take root and a panic to set in.

"As speculated, Mira's pregnancy is not going well. Having not received the mark of bonding, her body is incompatible with the child's dragon slayer magic. Thus, the child is killing her. Will hope that Laxus marks her before the plan in enacted and if not, all studies show that she will stay alive until her seventh month of pregnancy. When she passes, the child will be removed and another mate will nurse him or her until weened."

Laxus stood and in a rage threw the folder into the wall. If she'd only told him! She was dying and it was his stupid fault! If he wasn't so standoffish! If he could have just been man enough to tell her that he loved her! If he'd listened to his gut when he knew something was wrong. Sitting back down he placed his head in his hands and shuttered. His resolve was now set. He'd get Mira back. He'd mark her the second he saw her and then he'd kill every last researcher himself, if the other dragon slayers didn't get to them first.