Juvia is a rain woman. Drip, drip, drop.
The rain was soft and gentle today- a rather bright day for Juvia Loxar. The year was X783, and in all the girl's nearly 16 years she'd scarcely seen weather so clear. Of course, it was only fitting that the weather was so pleasant on such a pleasant day~
Juvia had a date this afternoon, and she really felt this one had potential. She'd always romanticized, well, romance- as evidenced by her signature heart-covered parasol, among other things. With a body of water, the rain certainly never bothered her if she was being honest, but she loved the little parasol; it was both adorable and an expression of her desire to find real, true love. And while this was far from the storybook love at first sight that often fluttered through her fantasies, she really felt things were going well up to this point. There was certainly potential for it to grow into something wonderful, at any rate~ The mere thought made her heart soar.
Up ahead, she saw the object of her affection. "Bora, my darling!" She picked up her pace to meet him, but stopped cold when he turned around. In his eyes was That Look- the Look they always gave her. As Juvia's heart sank, the rain fell harder. She should have known It was coming; It always did.
A week after the break-up, the Rain Woman was still a mess. Though she was always acutely aware of the complaints surrounding her showers, it always seemed like they grew twice as prevalent after such a heartbreaking event. Perhaps she was just listening harder, or perhaps the rain was simply that much worse. But whatever the case, Juvia wasn't sure how much more she could take.
"Well, well, well," came a voice from behind her. It was somewhat old, and a little unnerving, but not unfriendly. Snapped from her dwelling trance for the moment, Juvia gave a sound of acknowledgement, but did not turn to face him. "Might you be the one they call the Rain Woman, my dear?"
Cringing, Juvia droned in response, "Juvia's been called that. Why do you ask?"
"Splendid~" sang the man. "You see, I come representing a wizard's guild."
Blue eyes lit with a sudden hope as her heart quickened. "Wizards-" She did turn now, and saw a middle-aged man with long red hair and sly eyes, though he wore a gentle expression. "Please, sir.." she began hesitantly. "Do you.. Might you know a way to remove Juvia's curse?"
She wasn't prepared for the laugh to follow. "My dear, why ever would you call it such a thing? I would more say you have a wonderful gift!"
...Gift? "But Juvia is..." The word resounded in her head over and over in a thousand voices, causing her to flinch and turn away again to hide her tears. "Gloomy," she squeaked out. "Juvia's rain.. ruins everything..." She wasn't even sure what the appeal was to fishing, or camping, or going to the beach, or having a picnic without the rain. All she knew is that apparently all those things were more important to others than she was.
"Dear Juvia," he comforted. "I can tell you have an abundance of magic power. What you need is to be somewhere that can appreciate your talent." Appreciate..? "Come with me, and put your skills to good use. We can help you hone your abilities. Perhaps in time you could even gain enough control to stop the rain of your own will."
Of her own... Juvia liked that. She didn't hate the rain. It was her only constant companion. The only reason she would want to stop it would be for others. Being able to turn it on and off whenever she wanted.. that sounded much better than banishing it forever. And even if she never could... Even if she lived in the rain forever... If this wizard spoke the truth, perhaps.. this guild would prove to be the one place where it didn't matter. Where no one minded her rain.
As she looked back over her shoulder, she saw his hand was outstretched toward her. "What do you say, my dear? How would you like to be a Phantom Lord wizard?"
Guild life was absolutely splendid. It wasn't perfect by any means, of course. Every now and then Juvia still felt others were giving her that Look, or that she was being a burden to them, but rarely if ever did she hear those awful words, and never once was it directly. She quickly began to wonder if Master Jose had perhaps ordered others not to say anything, or if whatever annoyances she perceived were just her own ingrained paranoia. (In actuality, it was a little of both.)
No matter the case, though, it still felt wonderful to go more than a day without hearing it. She was rather shy at first toward her guildmates, but quickly warmed up, and having so many people with whom she could talk about something other than the weather was fantastic.
Moreover, completing jobs was a thrill like she'd never known. Generally when she arrived, people were too concerned with their problems to care about the rain, and when she left they were far too grateful. Though gloom still followed her, Juvia was also bringing joy. She was doing something positive with her life, and it was all thanks to Phantom Lord. For that gift- for showing her the true beauty of her own gift- she would gladly do anything Master Jose asked of her. Between her devotion and raw power, she quickly rose through the ranks, until one day Jose approached her.
There was in Phantom Lord an elite rank of wizards. Juvia had only really seen them in passing, or stared in awe among the crowd the rare times one would really get involved with the rest of the guild. So she could not have been more surprised when just two months after coming to Phantom, Jose invited her to join them!
"Everyone," Jose called their attention, having led her to a large room where the four men were gathered. "This is Juvia Loxar, an impressive water wizard. She'll be joining you from here on."
She could feel all eyes on her- even Aria's behind his blindfold. Hell, especially Aria's, in fact. "H-hello," she stammered. "Juvia promises to do her best to be useful."
"But of course, mademoiselle!" exclaimed a slender green-haired man; Juvia knew him to be the earth wizard Sol. "I, Monsieur Sol, am quite certain you shall be a most excellent addition," he chimed, taking her hand to plant a kiss lightly upon it. Juvia wasn't entirely sure she was comfortable with that, but let it slide for now.
Seeing a lack of reaction from the others, Jose implored in his sly-sweet tone, "Now don't be rude, introduce yourselves to the lady."
This elicited a chuckle from the group's fire wizard. "Ah, c'mon. We're Phantom Lord's elite- the greatest wizards in the greatest guild. Everyone knows our names." The author absolutely did not have to look up their names.
"Non, non, non!" Sol replied to his comrade. "We mustn't neglect formalities!"
This was answered first by an eye-roll and a sigh, but then by, "Whatever. It's Totomaru. And don't think for a minute that water will give you the upper hand over me- Juvia, was it?" Although his words were defensive, there was a jesting nature to them, and Juvia smiled as she nodded.
"Aria.." The blindfolded air mage sighed simply.
Crunch, crunch, cruch. The final member sat in the far corner of the room, seemingly intentionally in shadows. He had watched the whole exchange, but had said nothing. Now, as all eyes turned to him, he made a point of gnawing on an iron ingot and very specifically refusing to respond.
Totomaru at last spoke for him. "As I'm sure you guessed-" you know, 'guessed' because she clearly needed to be told- "Mr. Grumpypants over there is our own Black Steel Gajeel."
"Wha'd you say, twerp?" the rough voice growled back. For a moment, Juvia couldn't help but wonder if eating metal contributed at all to such a gravelly voice.
"Nothin'," mused Totomaru, clearly unintimidated. That he could get by with such remarks, even in passing, spoke volumes about this group. The Dragon Slayer's temper was legendary.
"Well, I suppose that's about as good as you're going to get," Jose commented, equal parts chagrin and amusement. "I'm sure they'll warm up in time. Now... I was thinking."
A unison of whining sounds rang through the room, though Juvia was not at all sure which or how many of the men they came from. Apparently, they'd heard that tone more than once or twice before.
"If we want to keep Phantom's reputation as the most powerful guild in Fiore, we need to stay in the public eye. Strength alone will mean far less if no one notices, after all," the Master explained.
"To be forgotten..." Aria began, but he was quickly cut off by Gajeel.
"Oh can it, will ya?"
Jose didn't appear to notice them. "So then, from here on, I want you all to start working as a team." A chorus of various manners of 'what' rang through the group. "You're all remarkable wizards alone, but the image surrounding a real 'team' of wizards of such caliber is certain to keep all eyes on Phantom Lord. And given all your forms of magic, I'd like to propose a name. The Element Five."
"That's kind of lame.." Totomaru muttered under his breath, but that was all the protest he offered. "I guess it's not the worst name."
"But of course!" exclaimed Sol. "We are happy to honor the master's désir!"
"Juvia.. is honored."
"Sorry old man," said Gajeel, standing. "I ain't got no interest in bein' a part o' no team." Heading toward the door, he went on, "Nothin' personal, but I work alone." And then he was gone.
"So sorrowful..." Aria sighed.
Jose shook his head. In all the guild, only Gajeel could get by with such a stunt. Still, he needed the Dragon Slayer, so he would allow it for now. "Very well. It seems you're now the Element Four, then." They couldn't have realized that Gajeel would end up essentially part of the team anyway, or that this would from a certain outside perspective appear to begin a chain of number-based teams with one too many members for their names. The Element Four plus Gajeel, the Oracion Seis plus Klodoa, the Seven Kin plus Bluenote...
To Juvia specifically, Jose said, "Take this time to get to know your teammates, my dear. I'm sure you'll all bring much glory to the name Phantom Lord~" This would show all would-be usurpers. Jose's guild was still the greatest in all Fiore, and his newest team would prove it.
A/N: Worth noting, I watch both subs and dubs interchangeably. What this means is: I use official dub translations for spelling, so Loxar rather than Lockser, Fried rather than Freed, etc; and although I don't like to drop random Japanese in an English fic (ex: "Name-chan", etc) unless it's a specific character quirk, I do like retaining speech patterns and such, so I will write Juvia speaking in third person and Gajeel's "gi hi", etc, from the sub, as well as Juvia's more affectionate bits in place of -sama from the dub where appropriate, etc.
Also. The four-character limit is killing me, so I'll be alternating which four out of the main five are tagged at any given time.
But yeah~ 8D As always, please review~ Next chapter should hopefully be within a day or two, as I initially planned to do it as one thing. This just seemed like a good breaking point.