Diclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail

A new Lucy

Chapter Ten – Returning to the Guild

Apparently the guild had been in chaos since I had 'died'. People had been devastated and almost no missions had been taken. Some of them mourned me and got on with their lives, others were walking around like living dead, unable to realize that I wasn´t coming back. Then there were Levy and Wendy whom had given up completely and then there were Natsu and Lisanna, whom didn´t seem affected at all.

It was a little overwhelming to hear how everyone had taken my death but at the same time it made me love them even more, Fairy Tail truly was as close as family. But I was still envious of the bonds between the members of the Raijinshuu, they were as close to each other as siblings and I had always wanted a brother or sister, being the only child that I was.

"What are you planning on doing now bunny-girl?" Gajeel asked me quietly since Wendy and Levy had fallen asleep again, trying to restore their energy. I shifted a little in Laxus lap and frowned as I thought about my answer. I wasn´t sure about what to do now either, I needed to talk to Master but I wasn´t sure I was ready for returning to the guild yet either… I was afraid of how I would react to the entirety of the guild all at once.

I also felt that I needed to see Erza and Gray before they sunk so low that they too became catatonic like Wendy and Levy, Happy told me that they were on their way there rather quickly nowadays, the guilt apparently eating them up from inside.

"I think… that tomorrow I will go and see Erza and Gray. Then I probably need to go to the guild but I´m… I´m afraid of doing that…" I admitted weakly and let my head fall towards the ground.

"Why are you afraid?" Laxus asked me quietly, his lips brushing against the shell of my ear as he spoke, sending small shivers of pleasure running down my spine.

"I´m not sure of that either actually… It just feels like when I enter the guild hall again, something bad is going to happen…" I told them and almost winced at how pathetic I sounded.

"You know I won´t let anything bad happen to you Lucy, and I´m sure Gajeel won´t either, so there´s nothing to worry about." Laxus told me with a growl in Gajeel´s direction that promised him pain unless he agreed with him.

"Yeah I just got you back bunny-girl, I´m not going to lose you again, not to someone outside the guild and definitively not to anyone in it." He promised as well and I smiled at them, thankful for their comforting words.

"Thanks guys… Now let´s get some sleep shall we? Tomorrow I will go and see Erza and Gray and then we´ll return to the guild hall.

Laxus and I stayed the night in Gajeel´s house with all the others, we shared a guestroom which only held a bed and a set of drawers as well as a mirror mounted on the wall. The next morning we left early, before the others awoke and walked together back towards Magnolia.

I was nervous about seeing Gray and Erza but I also felt that it was necessary. I simply had to see them and talk to them to be able to put another part of this traumatizing event behind me. Laxus and I had agreed that same morning that we would split up and I would go alone to see Gray and Erza while he returned to the guild and talked to Master.

We reached the point where we had to split up and he turned towards me with a serious expression on his face and told me.

"Be careful Lucy, I know that Erza and Gray had nothing to do with Natsu and Lisanna leaving you behind but still. I couldn´t bear it if anything happened to you… it would kill me, literally." I knew my eyes widened almost comically as he told me that and I immediately asked him.

"What do you mean? What would kill you?" I had a feeling I already knew the answer but I asked anyway. Laxus sighed lightly before grabbing me and hugging me tightly against him before he answered me.

"I mean that if something really bad happened to you and you died, I would too. A dragon cannot live without its mate." He said solemnly and I wrapped my own arms around his middle and hugged him back.

"Even though you haven´t marked me yet?" I asked with a voice that was muffled by his shirt. I could see him nod from the corner of my eye and then he said.

"Yeah, when the dragon within us recognizes our mate we are bound to that person whether they accept it or not." With that said I lingered in his embrace for a little while longer, drawing comfort and strength from his warmth and mere presence. When I finally pulled away from him I gave him the best smile I could manage and said.

"Let´s get going then shall we? The faster we do this the sooner we can be together again." He nodded his agreement and bent down to kiss me longingly on the lips before he turned to walk away with the words.

"See ya at the guild later Blondie." I watched him leave with a small, happy smile on my lips before I left down the road that would take me to Gray´s apartment inside Magnolia.

A little while later I was standing on the street in front of the apartment building where Gray lived. It was a simple house, white with black trims holding four apartments. I didn´t know which apartment that belonged to Gray but it was easy to figure out.

Only one apartment had the windows covered in a thin sheet of ice in the middle of the summer.

That fact was also making me worried; Gray usually had very good control of his magic, had my death really affected him so much that he was losing that control?

I straightened my back and told myself that there was only one way to find out and began to slowly walk up to the house, entering it and taking the stairs to the second floor where I turned left to Gray´s apartment. As I raised my hand to knock on the door I felt how cold the door was and realized that it was probably below zero inside the apartment.

I looked down at what I was wearing; the black leather pants Ever had given me and a dark blue corset top with small golden details provided by Virgo. I was also wearing my boots, bandanna, whip and keys and had my hair pulled back in a high ponytail.

I was going to freeze.

I shook my head to get rid of those thoughts, I might get cold but I had to talk to Gray no matter what. And hopefully he would take control back over his element when he realized that I was actually not dead but alive and relatively well.

I knocked on the door and since it opened by itself when my knuckles made contact I stepped inside and shut the door properly behind me before calling out.

"Gray? Are you here? It´s me, Lucy…" It was completely silent for a moment before I could hear frantic movements from what could only be the bedroom and the half-closed door between us was slammed open with enough power to make it crack and splinter.

Then Gray stood in front of me, his appearance disheveled with black rings underneath red-rimmed and bloodshot eyes, his hair standing on end and what clothes he wore wrinkled and dirty. Since he was dressed in only a pair of jeans I could clearly see that he had lost weight but what almost made my heart break were the lines of scars and wounds that covered both of his arms, the scars still bright pink and the fresher wounds barely closed over.

"Oh Gray what have you done to yourself…" I whispered, horrified that he would do such a thing to himself. My gaze went up to his eyes that were wide open and completely focused on me, he didn´t even notice that one of his fresher wounds had torn open and were slowly dripping blood on the carpet.

I walked up to him slowly, a little wary of setting him off, and gentle grabbed both of his hands between my own and started leading him towards the bathroom.

"Come on Gray it will be okay, I´ll take care of you." I promised as a lone tear fell from my eye and trickled down my cheek until it fell to the floor. I turned on the lights in the bathroom and had to hold back a wince at all the dried blood in there, but I did my best to ignore it and pushed him down to sit on the closed toilet lid as I opened the cabinets in search for a first aid kit.

I finally found one in the last cabinet and as I pulled it out and started looking through it for the things I would need, Gray spoke his first words since I got there.

"Is it really you Lucy? Or are you just another ghost of my imagination?" He sounded so incredibly sad when he asked me that, as if every ounce of his will to live were gone and he was running on empty. And judging by the wounds on his arms, that was the truth.

I wrapped some gauze around his arm where the wound had reopened and then pulled out a jar with ointment to put on all the other wounds and scars before I answered him.

"Yeah it really is me Gray, I promise." I told him softly and as I cared for his wounds, I told him my side of the story. When I was finished his arms were neatly bandaged and he was sitting with me on the bathroom floor, holding me as I cried for him. After I had told him my story, he had told me his and it was just as sad as my own. When he had woken up from being unconscious and found out that I had died he had shut down. He went straight to his apartment and locked himself inside, hiding from the world and punishing himself for not being able to save me.

We sat on his bathroom floor, our backs against the wall and my head on his shoulder. He had one hand gently threading through my hair while the other was held in between my hands. A shiver went through me and Gray pulled me closer to himself to help keep me warm.

"I´m sorry it´s so cold in here, even though I have taken control back over my magic it will still take some time before it goes back to normal. We should go somewhere else if you´re cold, I don´t want Laxus to kill me when I finally found out what happened to you…" He told me and I nodded and answered.

"I don´t want to leave you yet… You´re one of my best friends Gray and it really frightened me to see you like this. But if you feel up for it you can go up to the guild and wait for me there, I have to go and see Erza first but then I´ll go there too."

"I can do that, but are you sure you don´t want me to go with you and see Erza?" He asked and stood up, holding his hand out for me to take. I let him help pull me up and told him with a giggle.

"You know that Erza live in Fairy Hills, boys aren´t allowed in there. Thank you but I´ll be fine Gray, I´m stronger than before." He gave me a gentle smile and told me softly.

"You were always strong Lucy, don´t doubt that." I felt my eyes water up again, I would never be able to convey to him just how much those words meant to me, to hear them spoken out loud. His hand came up and brushed away a stray tear from my visible eye before it lingered at the edge of my bandanna, as if he was waiting for permission to remove it. I nodded my head once and the cloth was pulled away from my face and eye.

I kept looking at a point to the left of his shoulder since I still had trouble showing people my new eye, even those that were as close to me as Gray were. But when his hand gently grasped my chin and forced me to meet his eyes, I let him.

It was nerve-racking to just stand there and allow him to gaze into my wolfish eye but I managed and after a little while he put my bandanna back in place with the words.

"Thank you Lucy, for trusting me." I broke into a genuine smile and answered.

"I´ll always trust you Gray."

I stood outside of Fairy Hills with a new batch of nervous butterflies in my belly, Gray and I had just parted ways and I was now on my way to see Erza. I walked up to her room and looked for her there but the room was empty and became even more worried for my female friend.

I decided to go and check her usual training grounds in case she was there and as I got closer to my new intended destination, I could hear someone fighting at least.

And there she was, hacking away at training dummies as I had expected her to, what I hadn´t expected was the condition she was in.

She was in just as bad shape as Gray, her skin was pale and clammy and her eyes were empty, just staring at the air in front of her. What I could see of her body was bruised and mistreated and her knuckles were bleeding, my guess would be that she had been training hand-to-hand combat before drawing her sword.

I was standing at the edge of the training ground not knowing how to approach her when she spotted me and with a war cry that made the hair on the back of my neck to stand on end she attacked me.

I just stood there for a moment, completely confused but then I noticed the tears falling from Erza´s eyes. She thought I was another ghost of her imagination here to torment her.

Thinking fast I pulled out one of my keys and chanted.

"Open! Gate of the goat, Capricorn!"

Capricorn´s well-dressed figure appeared in front of me and after letting him know to distract Erza for me for a little while I started gathering my magic for a celestial spell. When I had gathered enough magic in my hands I cried out.

"Star Swords!" And two beams of celestial magic shot out from my hands and formed themselves into two swords. I dismissed Capricorn and met Erza´s attacks with my own. I knew she would realize that I was the real Lucy sooner or later.

And much as I had expected, after fighting me for about ten minutes she froze and dropped her sword as she realized that I was real.

"Lucy it´s really you…" She whispered and I simply smiled at her and cancelled my star sword spell.

"Yup, it´s me." I reassured her and watched with a little amusement as she fell to the ground when her legs went out from underneath her. I sat down in front of her on the ground and told her my tale, it was the second time I was telling it and I knew I might have to tell it yet another time later today still.

When I had finished telling her about everything that had happened to me we just sat there on the ground, holding on to each other's hands and looking at each other. I had pulled off my bandanna during our talk so my wolf eye was bared to the world when my improved hearing picked up on someone running in our direction. The steps were too light to belong to Laxus or Gajeel, Wendy and Levy were staying in Gajeel´s house until they got their strength back and the exceeds were much lighter so it couldn´t be either of them.

I tensed up and mentally prepared myself for battle while tying the bandanna back in place and letting Erza know what was going on.

"Someone´s coming." I told her as I stood back up and took a casual fighting stance.

"I´m with you." She promised me and took her own stance next to me. It probably wasn´t anyone who would try and fight me but I had learned the hard way that it was better to be safe than sorry.

But the one entering the training grounds with tears streaming down her face was not whom I had expected, not even close.

The one who came running towards us with the biggest smile possible on her face and tears falling in the air behind her was no other than Mirajane. She didn´t slow down in the slightest even though both Erza and I were in fighting stances, no she just kept on running until she was close enough to throw herself around me, hugging me around the neck and bawling openly into my shoulder. I just stood there, completely shocked and only looked to Erza for help a Mira showed no signs of releasing me anytime soon.

Erza put her sword away and gently pried Mira off of me with a small smile on her face. When Mira managed to calm herself down she started explaining her reaction and why she had come looking for me.

"I immediately understood that something serious had happened when Freed was away, he wasn´t his usual self when he came back. Especially since he told me that it wasn´t his place to tell, he always tells me what he´s been up to but this time he didn´t even though I could tell that he wanted to share his information with me."

"Then how come you know about this?" Erza demanded to know, her usual self coming back fast.

"I´ll get there, please be patient." Mira responded before continuing. "Since he wasn´t going to tell me I didn´t bother him with it but instead watched him and the other two from the Raijinshuu to see if I couldn´t figure it out on my own. They were glaring at Natsu and Lisanna so I guessed that they had found something about you Lucy, during their last missions and that was why they had been late back. Of course I still had no idea that you were still alive at this point. I can see how Lisanna and Natsu have changed these past few months, even before they left you, and I was both hoping and dreading that they had found out why they were acting so different. I was making myself sick just waiting for Freed to be able to tell me. I thought that it was because of Laxus that he couldn´t tell me so when Laxus entered the guild hall this morning I begged him to tell me and after watching me for a really long time, trying to decide and even asking Gajeel what he thought about it. Then Gray came to the guild looking better than he have since they returned without you and it suddenly clicked in my mind, that you had to still be alive despite the odds and when I asked them if it was true the caved and told me everything." Mira explained.

"Everything?" I whispered, feeling overwhelmed again. Mira only nodded her head and then everything around me turned black. I didn´t even notice that Erza caught me before I could hit the ground and that she told Mira to go back to the guild and get Laxus.

The first thing I noticed were the voices that were all around me, Erza, Mira, Gray, Gajeel and Pantherlily. My head was resting in someone´s lap and I recognized Laxus scent.

"What the hell did you two do to bunny-girl?!" Gajeel asked loudly, clearly agitated.

"We did nothing! Mira was just telling her how she knew Lucy was still alive when she fainted." Erza answered just as loudly. The two of them growled at each other but then Pantherlily took over and asked Mira.

"What were you telling her when she fainted Mira?"

"I told her that Laxus and you guys had told me everything."

"I think I know what happened then, she has been really worried about coming back to the guild and how everyone would react to her still being alive. It´s likely it just became too much for her. She has been expecting everyone to think lesser of her because of what she went through and because of her eye so when she encountered none of those scenarios the stress from all the worrying in combination with the relief could have caused the fainting." Laxus told them and brushed a few strands of hair away from my face.

"I didn´t mean for her to faint… I was just so happy that she was still alive…" Mira said quietly, clearly saddened by the fact that she was in a way the cause of this.

"It´s alright Mira, she´s doing so well dealing with everything that even I forget sometimes just how much she´s been through. I think we can count on a few fainting spells." Laxus told her and then let out a deep sigh and admitted.

"I just wish I could do more for her…"

"You´re clearly doing everything you can for her, I see Lucy as a little sister and had I known what really happened during that fucked up mission I would have gone after her. I owe you everything for helping her." Gray said solemnly.

"I agree with Gray, I owe you as well Laxus." Erza said more formally and I felt my heart fill with warmth. Gray and Erza considered me a sister… That almost made it worth all this pain to hear them admit that.

"You consider her a sister? What about all the times you invade her apartment then? All the things you break when you get into fights?" Gajeel scoffed and I wanted to scold him a little for being so harsh with them but at the same time he really had a point, why were they so destructive if they saw me as a sister?

Neither of them said anything and after a little while Gajeel spoke again.

"You hadn´t even realized that? I know that you two as well as Natsu grew up together here in the guild but are you telling me that no one of the older mages bothered to teach you anything? The three of you coming from really rough pasts and they just let you raise yourselves even here?" I could tell that Gajeel was shocked, so was I but if what he had said right now was true, it would explain so much…

They hadn´t grown up in a home the way I had so they didn´t have the same sense of privacy that I did. And with the way their lives had begun it´s no wonder that they were destructive… It suddenly felt as if I was drowning in a sea of guilt and regret. It was as much my fault as theirs for not realizing this sooner…

Maybe that´s why we didn´t have the same family feeling as the Raijinshuu as well…

A pained whimper escaped me and halted all the other conversations around me, then Laxus told them to leave us alone and with a few grumbling protests, they obeyed.

When he was certain that we were alone he brushed his hand across my forehead again and told me softly.

"Open your eyes Lucy; I know you can hear me." I did as he told me but as soon as I opened them, tears leaked out. I didn´t say anything, I didn´t need to.

"I know it hurts but there´s nothing you can do about the past, the only thing you can do is change the future." He told me gently and kept threading his fingers through my hair in comforting strokes. I knew he was right but that did nothing to ease the pain inside my chest, tears kept falling from my eyes and small sobs escaped from my mouth. He lifted me up in a sitting position in his lap so that I wouldn´t choke on my own tears and then he started to hum a soothing tune while I cried most of the pain away.

Laxus and I were walking back towards the guild hand in hand a little while later and I had made sure that every sign of my breakdown was gone before I allowed him to lead me towards the guild.

"Thank you." I told him quietly as we walked in silence. He slung one arm around my shoulders and pulled me closer before he said.

"You don´t need to thank me, you´re my mate I would do anything for you."

"Yeah I know, you´ve told me so. But still…" I trailed off and I felt him tighten his hold on me but he didn´t say anything. Soon we could see the guild before us and outside of the doors Gajeel and Pantherlily were waiting for us.

"You okay bunny-girl?" Gajeel asked me and I mustered up a somewhat happy smile and nodded at him. I didn´t think he bought it though but it was the best I could do right now. Gajeel gave me another long look before he turned towards Laxus and told him.

"Natsu and Lisanna are here." Hearing that made my heart skip a beat which drew both of the dragon slayers attention.

"Don´t worry Blondie I won´t let anything happen to you." Laxus reassured me again and took up position on my right side while Gajeel went to my left; Pantherlily flew up and stood on my left shoulder.

"I know." I told him and swallowed nervously as he opened the door to Fairy Tail´s guild hall, exposing me for everyone inside to see.

The noisy guild hall turned completely silent as I entered the building with a dragon slayer on each side and I could feel all of their gazes on me, burning. Not one word was yelled, said or whispered as we moved across the room towards the stairs that would take us to the offices on the second floor where Master Makarov was.

When we reached the middle of the room I spotted Natsu and Lisanna and froze.

They were sitting next to each other at the bar, laughing and talking to each other. They hadn´t even noticed that something was up. Anger rose within me and I had to hold back an animalistic growl that wanted to tear itself from my throat.

Macao noticed at whom my glare was directed at and he elbowed Natsu, making him aware that something was happening in the guild. When his eyes met mine they widened and became instantly flooded with different emotions.

Guilt. Fear. Sadness. Confusion.

He in turn nudged Lisanna until she too turned around to see what was making such a commotion but her reaction was very different from Natsu´s. At first, she too reacted with surprise and confusion and then those feelings were replaced by anger, a whole lot of anger…

Her baby blue eyes darkened until they looked to be completely black and then she stood from her seat and launched herself at me. I was so surprised by her actions that I didn´t move out of the way, she was really going to attack me in the middle of the guild?

Luckily Gajeel caught her and held on tight, she was screaming and flailing around uncontrollably in her attempts to get to me which caused me to back away, this wasn´t the Lisanna who had returned with us from Edolas, this was an entirely different person.

She let out a kind of keening howl that made Natsu spring into action as well, trying to launch his own attacks towards me. I took another step backwards and let out a whimper. This couldn´t be happening, Natsu had been one of my best friends for years and had saved my life more times than I could remember and Lisanna was one of the sweetest girls in the guild, and from what I could tell they were trying to kill me.

"You´re not supposed to be here! You´re ruining everything!" Lisanna yelled at me as she fought against the hold Gajeel had on her.

"Yeah, you´re supposed to be dead! You´re nothing but a weak little freak now!" Natsu added in and I bit my lip to keep myself from screaming. I had thought that with everything I had gone through, he wouldn´t be able to hurt me any longer, oh how wrong I was…

Hearing him say that I should be dead… and that I was weak which I had always felt self-conscious about, since compared to him and the others of team Natsu, I was weak. But that he called me a freak was actually what hurt me the most.

Natsu was being held back by Laxus and I could see nothing of the Natsu I knew in this new and terrifying version of him. Another step back and then I turned around and ran.

I couldn´t take it any longer.

Hey guys! I just want to say thank you to everyone who stayed with me and kept giving me encouraging reviews, I love you all!