Characters: Lucy Heartfilia, Natsu Dragneel, Happy, Gray Fullbuster, Erza Scarlet, The Celestial Spirit King

Genre, warning: Angst

Rating: K

Summary: It was a decision that hurt, but not one she regretted.

Request: '...could you maybe write Lucy having to choose between Natsu and her keys in a life or death situation?'

Lucy woke up from her deep mediation, feeling the eyes of the two onlookers she wasn't yet looking at.

Instead she cradled her keys to her chest, tears flowing freely as she whispered her apologies to them, before standing up and squaring her shoulders, eyes resolute even in that moment of crisis.

"Lushiiii," Happy called softly, hugging her leg, "please say you found a way to save him?"

She looked down at his big watery eyes, her heart squeezing painfully at the sight. "I have," she breathed. "The Spirit King told me."

"Lucy don't."

She peeled her eyes away from the exceed to the ice mage who had just spoken.

"I don't know what you've planned," he said his voice clear as it echoed in the infirmary room. "But whatever it is, it can't be good. He's far too gone for you to save him now."

"No," she said quietly, stepping around him to reach the prone form of her best friend. "No, he isn't."

Gray held her wrist, stilling her advance. "Please," he begged, his voice cracking, "Please, Lucy. I can't lose another - "

He was cut off as Lucy pulled her hand away and walked to Natsu's bedside, ignoring her teammate breaking down.

She was thankful that there was no one else in the room; she didn't know if she could take all of them pleading in the same manner, one was painful enough.

Silently, she lay down her gold keys, five on each side of the dragon slayer, before moving to straddle his plagued body.

Doing as she was told, she began reciting the ancient spell, Happy and Gray ceasing all movement as they watched her keys rise and float around her.

As Lucy continued chanting, she and her keys began to emit and ethereal glow - a beautiful sight only marred by the never ending stream of her tears.

Finally she moved, as if in a trance, bringing her face closer and closer to Natsu's, her keys dropping to the floor just as her lips met his.

And for a second nothing happened.

That is, until Natsu's body began to glow in the same manner, even as Lucy continued breathing life into his corrupted body, purifying it with her light.

Erza, startled by the sudden brightness visible even from the corridor outside, ran indoors with yell ready on her lips, which died as she took in the sight before her.

It wasn't long before the light died and Lucy collapsed, falling off the bed in a heap.

Erza ran to her, lifting her up to find her alarmingly pale. She looked up to where Gray and Happy had now ran over to Natsu who was visibly better, all signs of cursed flesh gone, colour having returned to his now peacefully slumbering face.

A welcome sight after days of seeing the same twisted in pain.

Erza breathed a sigh of relief, turning to congratulate a still unconscious Lucy, only to find her even more pale than before.

Titania's heart lurched into painful overdrive as she realised she wasn't pale, but disappearing, vanishing from right within her arms.

She frantically called to Gray, to Happy, to anyone in the guild who could help, but no one came in time.

For she was gone.

And, after a heartbeat, Erza wondering why she was seated on the floor, with tears in her eyes and why her throat felt so hoarse.

She stood up and glanced at Natsu smiling at him looking well again.

She then turned to a similarly puzzled, but happy seeming Happy and Gray.

Erza did have a vague feeling she was forgetting something, but that moment passed soon.

"We should celebrate defeating E.N.D when he wakes up," she said pride lacing her voice.

The other two agreed.

"Hey Erza," came Happy's confused voice a while later, "what are these key-like things lying around?"

Following his line of sight, Erza noticed was the exceed right.

"They look like gate keys, judging from the magic inside," Gray commented observing the one he had just picked up. "Look, this one has Leo's sign on it."

"It seems so," Erza concurred. "But what are they doing here?"

"Beats me," Gray shrugged. "Let's hand them to the Master when he comes back, he'll know what to do with them. Give them to that Saber girl maybe?"

Erza agreed and they collected the keys, before they each took their seat at Natsu's bedside, not able to shake the feeling they were still missing something. Something huge.

Observing all of this across in a different dimension was the Celestial Spirit King, his heart aching at all that he saw.

"You were given the choice between the boy or the keys to save. Why does it surprise me not that you chose to save both, old friend?" he mused, tears falling from his eyes for the first time in centuries.

"You paid with a price even the Dark Mage was not able to pay. One that was so steep, but none of those you love would ever know, save this old piece of star dust. It is for the best, one would suppose," he sighed finally, turning away from the sight, "the price of your entire existence is a painful one to pay after all."