AN: Surprise! I know I said I was going to be updating less often, and that's still true, but I managed to crank this one out in a night, so... up it goes! I'd like to just give some quick thanks to libby[string of numbers] for all the awesome reviews and support, and to my sister, nightowl880, for reading my stuff beforehand and making sure it doesn't absolutely suck (seriously, go check her out, she's better than me). Anyway, as always, I hope you guys enjoy my first fanfic and I'm psyched to see people's reactions to this chapter!

Notice: I don't own any part of Fairy Tail. You know the drill, please don't sue me, Hiro Mashima. However, just letting you know, the fic contains OC's (if you haven't noticed) and THOSE are mine. But nothing else. Yeah.

Chapter 11: How I Feel

Sic had never felt so nervous in his life. It was ridiculous, of course. It was just Lucy. At his house. Waiting for him…

She wanted to see him.

Sic's heart started beating incredibly fast.

Maybe Nasty was right, he thought. Maybe I should go see a doctor right away.

He shook his head, and then scolded himself. You idiot, it's Lucy. You've wanted to talk to her for days now. Why the hell aren't you over there already? Sic tried to move his feet, but he wouldn't budge. Was he feeling fear? But that was ridiculous- Gulldratz had said that you felt fear when your life was in danger. His life was most certainly not in danger at the moment. It was just Lucy.

It was just Lucy.

And him.

Alone.

Sic smacked himself on the forehead in frustration, trying to dispel these pesky thoughts. Unfortunately, he smacked harder than he'd intended, causing him to stumble backwards, where he tripped over a rock and fell straight onto his back. Cursing at the stinging pain from his fresh bleeding gash on the back of his head, he brushed the hair out of his eyes. He then heard a familiar voice: "Oh my god, Sic, are you okay?"

Goddammit, Sic cursed himself. Since when am I so clumsy? Now I have to explain to Lucy how I tripped and fell like an idiot.

Suddenly he felt a soothing sensation enveloping him. A familiar pair of arms wrapped around him, and lifted his upper body onto a warm surface- crossed legs, he thought. He blinked, and there was the same face he'd first woken up to after his time in the prison. Her smile was disarming. He wasn't able to move- not because he couldn't, but because subconsciously, nothing could make him want to. He felt her fingers stroking gently through his hair, massaging the stinging wound on his head. The combination of woozy pain and blissful ecstasy from her touch made it incredibly hard for Sic to keep his eyes open.

"Lucy…" he whispered weakly.

"Shhh," she whispered gently, placing a finger in front of his mouth to silence him. He felt her lean down towards his ear. "Don't worry, Sic. I promise I'll take you to the stars someday."

Sic closed his eyes and drifted off to sleep.

Lucy watched the sun set from the window of Sic's makeshift cottage. He really had chosen the most beautiful view in all of Magnolia, and no matter how much he denied it, she knew that was why Sic had picked the spot. Oh, Sic. That's right. He could probably use some soup right about now. She ladled some soup from the pot she'd been cooking on the stove into a cup and took it over into his bedroom, but the sight of Sic sleeping gave her pause. She'd never really gotten a good look at Sic before with his eyes closed. While she loved his eyes, they were incredibly distracting. Lucy decided she'd take this opportunity to admire the rest of his face, and feed him the soup later.

She pulled up a chair to the bed and stared at Sic's serene face. Since he'd broken down in front of her a couple days ago, she'd been unable to think about anyone else. She'd had Natsu tell everyone at the guild she wouldn't be there for the next couple days. She stayed at home, worked on her novel, and thought about what Sic had said.

Part of her felt like she should still be angry, or scared of Sic for what he'd done back at the bank. But she knew that wasn't fair. He was so scarred, an empty shell containing none of the things that defined a human. Or he had been, anyway. Lucy could tell just by looking at Sic that her fellow guildmates had changed him. In fact, even before Sic had acquired any emotion at all, he'd still been capable of incredible acts of kindness and companionship. Lucy had decided she needed to be a little more assertive when she interacted with him if she wanted to bring out his sweeter side.

Sic moaned a little in his sleep. Lucy started. Crap. She should probably give him some soup now. She propped his head up against the bed and gently ladled a spoonful into his open mouth. As Sic swallowed, his eyes began to flutter open.

"Hi, Sic," Lucy cooed. "Feeling better?"

Upon hearing her voice, Sic's eyes opened all the way and he sat up instantly, banging his bandaged head on the bedframe. Lucy couldn't help but giggle as he winced in pain. He was just so cute sometimes.

"Watch your head, dummy. More soup?" Sic didn't speak, just held out his hand for the cup. Lucy didn't oblige him. She held out another spoonful toward his mouth. "Say 'aaah,'" she giggled again. Sic rolled his eyes, but he obviously wanted more soup, because he grudgingly opened his mouth. Lucy fed him another spoonful. This went on until he'd eaten the whole cup.

"Feeling better now?" Lucy smiled at him. Sic glanced at her, then looked down without saying anything. That was weird. Lucy wondered what the hell was going through that boy's head right now. She shrugged and turned around to go put the cup back in the kitchen.

Just as she was passing through the doorway, she heard Sic's voice behind her. "Lucy."

She turned around and smiled at Sic, who was getting up and sitting on the side of the bed. "Yes?"

Sic looked up at her, and then down again. "Thanks… for everything. For being with me. And… for the soup. It was good."

Lucy laughed. "Of course, silly! I'll always be here for you. You'd do the same for me, wouldn't you?"

Sic looked up again and gave her a rare treat- a smile. "Yeah. Yeah, I suppose I would. I'd do anything to take care of you."

When Lucy came back into the bedroom after dropping the cup off in the kitchen, Sic cleared his throat. "I… I think I'm ready to learn now."

Wow. Lucy had completely forgotten why she was here. "It's okay, Sic. I think you already know. Don't you remember? You just said what compassion really means!"

The expression on Sic's face right then was absolutely priceless. Lucy would've given one of her gate keys to have that expression captured in a picture. He just looked so bewildered, so utterly uncomprehending. "But… but… I-I don't…" he stammered.

Once again, Lucy began giggling uncontrollably and sat down next to Sic on the bed. "Come on, Sic, you said you'd do anything to take care of me! That means you have compassion for me! Simple as that!"

Sic just stared into her eyes with a look of wonder. "So… that means-"

"Congratulations, you're human!" Lucy exclaimed and threw her arms around the bewildered boy. He looked incredibly uncomfortable right about now.

"I-I'm sorry, but.." Sic protested, slightly scooching away from her. "I still don't understand it. Could you please clarify a little further?"

Lucy sighed in annoyance. He really needed to get a clue. She impatiently began swinging her feet back and forth, which were dangling off the side of the bed. "Tell me a story, will you?"

"Uh…"

"Never mind," she commanded. She threw one arm around his shoulder, turned his head to face her, and poked him three times on the nose. "I'll tell you a story."

She took a deep breath and began, making up the story as she went. "See, once upon a time there was this guy, named, uh… Bo. Yeah. So, anyway, Bo was a simple peasant in a small village, but he only had eyes for this girl in the royal family, and she was too old for him- oh wait, no, too rich, sorry… anyway, when Bob-"

"Stop."

Lucy's mouth stayed frozen in the same position it had been in since she was interrupted. Sic seemed like he was about to burst out laughing. While ordinarily that would be a good thing, right now it was just plain insulting.

"What? As I was saying, when Bob saw-"

"Stop," Sic interrupted again, grinning madly. God, how good he looked when he was smiling like that! "You said his name was Bo, not Bob. Man, you're the worst storyteller ever, Lucy."

Lucy's face turned red out of a mix of embarrassment and anger. "Oh, yeah? I'd like to see YOU do a better job!"

Well, he sure did. Sic continued with her story, expanding it to a point where Bo was a master ventriloquist who saved the world from conquest by an evil army, by pretending to emanate the voice of a god from the greatest tree in the kingdom. The story took several hours to complete; by the time it was gone, it must have been one in the morning.

Lucy and Sic sat in satisfied silence for a couple minutes, just enjoying one another's presence. Then Sic said something Lucy had no way of expecting: "What did you mean when you said Bo 'only had eyes for' someone?"

Of course! Sic had never learned about various terms people used to avoid saying the L-word all the time. "It just means that he loved her," Lucy explained.

Sic cocked his head quizzically to one side. "Are you saying… Bo is insane?"

Lucy couldn't believe her ears. Don't tell me no one taught him about love, she thought. "I thought Juvia taught you about love."

"I thought she did too," Sic replied.

Lucy sighed. "She obviously didn't. Love doesn't just mean insanity."

"Well, what does it mean, then?" Sic inquired. "Surely you won't mind telling me?"

Lucy had to think long and hard about how best to explain it to Sic. She was tempted to say, It's how I feel about you just to see how he would react. That was ridiculous, of course. I mean, it wasn't like she actually… No, she had to keep her train of thought from getting derailed.

"Love is…." She attempted to articulate. "It's really hard to explain. It's like you feel so much better when you're with a certain someone. You feel angry at people who take time away from you and them. You feel sad when you're without them. You feel like you would do anything for them. They're the one person you'd want to spend your whole life with. Does that make sense to you?"

The expression on Sic's face was one of shock. "You… just described how I feel about you."

If Lucy's brain had wires, it would've definitely short-circuited. She didn't know what to say, what to do, or what to feel. All she could do was look at what she was most comfortable with. Sic's eyes seemed especially deep tonight, the voids in his corneas inviting her to some kind of spiritual realm. As Lucy kept staring deeper and deeper, she felt her inhibitions slowly slipping away.

The last candle in the house went out. With both hands, she grasped either side of his face, and gently leaned in, her lips parting for a-

Suddenly, Sic's body began to glow a bright white. He began to levitate upwards. The white light expanded into a cube surrounding him. Lucy screamed his name and reached a hand up to try and pull him down, but as soon as her hand touched the light, the most searing pain imaginable spread up her arm and she was forced to retract it. She could hear Sic screaming her name from inside the cube, but his voice was getting fainter. His eyes glazed over, and his screams died down. Lucy didn't know how she knew, but this must have been the same "white prison" Sic had told her about. She had to save him. She couldn't allow him to be separated from the world again.

She braced herself and plunged her hand into the light once again. Ignoring the unbelievable pain, she forced her hand closer and closer to Sic's leg. Four inches apart… three…

Stop, a deep voice said in her head. He is not yours to keep.

"What? Leave him alone, he means everything to me! You can't just take him away!" Lucy yelled back.

He has learned all he needs to learn from you, the voice replied. His destiny lies elsewhere.

"No! He's staying here with me! I'm never going to let you do this to him again!" Lucy yelled, and finally made contact with Sic's leg.

As soon as Sic came into contact with something outside the prison, the prison's power rapidly began to fade. He fell and collapsed onto the bed, breathing heavily as the life returned to his eyes.

You have made a grave mistake, the voice reproached. The fate of the world rests on his shoulders, and now it is your burden as well.

"I'd do anything as long as it's with him," Lucy growled back.

There was no reply. All traces of the light and the voice had gone.

"Lucy," Sic wheezed. "Thanks for saving me. I could never go back in there again."

Lucy smoothed back his hair and lay on her stomach, her face a few inches away from Sic's. "I know. No need to thank me. I could never bear for you to go back there again either. Because I love you."

Sic's voice barely escaped his lips. "I… suppose I love you, too."

Lucy's face swooped in once again towards Sic's, and this time, there was no white prison to get in the way of their kiss. It was a long kiss, no tongue or anything, and Lucy could tell Sic didn't know what the hell he was doing, but it was okay, because honestly, she didn't really either. It was all they had the energy for, really.

Shortly after, Lucy nuzzled her face into Sic's chest, and they both drifted off to sleep in their mutual embrace.

So? What did you think? I'm dying to know what people think of this chapter, because I think romantic scenes are definitely my weakest point. If you read all the way through my story, thanks so much! PLEASE review and let me know what you liked and didn't like about the story so I can improve! Yeah. Thanks a bunch. Y'all are the best. Hope you have a nice day!