Smoke and Mirrors

Natsu stared at the mirror while Lucy talked, like nothing was wrong. He looked to the floor, at the empty spot on the sofa, and decided that something was very wrong.

Gray was gone. He hadn't walked out the front door, or headed upstairs to the bathroom, he was just gone. Vanished into thin air.

And Lucy was chatting away like he hadn't been there at all.

"-ever stay at your own house? It isn't like I have anything you don't."

"Lucy..." She stopped speaking immediately, and Natsu was a little shocked for the suddenness of it. It wasn't until he realized just how quiet he had been that he understood why. "Where's Gray?"

The blonde looked at him, befuddlement written across her face. Natsu gave her a hard look as he waited on her answer.

"Who?"

He blinked. "Gray." Nothing registered on her face. "The squinty-eyed, good for nothing, ice mage. He was standing there a second ago. Looking at that stupid mirror. He's gone. Don't play with me."

"Natsu! Stop shouting, please," she begged. He hadn't realized he had been. "I don't know any Gray, Natsu. It's only been you, Happy, and I all day."

What?! The dragon slayer moved his attention quickly to Happy. The little blue cat had curled himself into the back of the chair, a mixture of fear and confusion written on his features. Then he asked, more than accused, "You're lying?" Happy just shook his head. It had to be true. So he fell silent and went back to staring at the offending object.

It was a standing mirror, outlined by a gold trim of carved vines and leaves. Gray had gotten up to take a closer look at it just before he disappeared. He had pressed his hand to the fiendish object; his print should still be on the surface, but the glass was clean. While staring he'd been questioning Lucy about it (like why she had bought it, and when). Like he had distrusted it. It had been just a mirror to Natsu before, who had such a good sense of things. Even Gray couldn't explain why he had felt the way he did.

("What the hell is this?" he'd asked Lucy upon entering her house. He'd stared the thing in question down like it was a demon. Gray looked at it and had hated it for all its silver filigree and gold trim.

"It's a mirror, of course," she replied like it was the most obvious answer in the world. "I thought it would look good in my room and I had some extra money. Don't you like it?"

"It's pretty."; was all he had said.)

Lucy didn't continue talking after that. A heavy weight fell over the room, a thick atmosphere that moved in around them. Neither did she remain seated for long and soon she had migrated to the kitchen to mix up something for supper. It was rare that the two of them ate at her apartment as they spent a lot of their time at the guild. The moment got rarer still when she asked Natsu what he would like to eat. He grunted, barely hearing her at all, his mind full.

He stared at his hands. Only when the little cat came over and placed a paw on his knee did he look up. "Are you okay?"

"No," he answered in earnest.

"I wonder where Gray went?" Happy flopped down beside Natsu and mimicked his position: hunched back, drooping shoulder, and folding paws.

His sentence caused Natsu to stir. Did he-? "You remember Gray?"

"Um," he shifted in his seat, "not exactly. No. B-But I believe you! I believe that he was here and we just kind of forgot about him."

"Really?" A nod. "It's that mirror. I don't know what happened but it took Gray. The mirror took him."

(The ice mage sat dead in front of the mirror. That was where he was when Natsu and Happy entered the room.

"What the hell is that?" the flame-head asked. Unknowing that he had mimicked Gray's question he flopped onto the sofa beside the mage. Lucy didn't answer, leaving it to Gray to do so.

"It's a mirror."

Natsu had just shrugged. Gray had hoped that the fire mage would get the same feeling as he did. Suspicion, distrust, there was a world of words that one could be used to describe Gray's mentality and all he wanted was for the stupid fire mage to pick one to feel. Instead he left Gray alone on his ice flow of thought.

So Gray decided to question Lucy regardless of whether he was alone in his thoughts or not.)

In a second Natsu was on his feet. His once dejected expression had morphed into something sour; a combination of hatred and conviction. He set out to mirror Gray's motions just before the ice mage had vanished. Not that it was difficult. Besides the thousand questions he had asked Gray didn't do much. He had only walked to the mirror, huffed, and placed a hand to the glass. When Natsu did this he found that the glass was not the cool surface anyone expected a mirror to be, rather it was heated and electrified.

The shock, not of pain but of reality, caused the young man to lurch back, his shoulders jerking away, but his hand, curiously, remained. Like it was seared to the surface. Somewhere being him he heard Lucy openly musing why she had prepared three places.

He had already been forgotten.

"It's Natsu's," Happy replied. Natsu quivered in relief. Of course Happy would not forget. He would never forget Natsu.

Natsu was looking out into the living room when Lucy asked who that was. He didn't remember turning around and he didn't remember his vision blurring to what it was.

It was odd. Odd that his hand was in front of him attached to the mirror and he was looking into the room. A room that was supposed to be behind him, not in front of him. Odd that his vision was wavering and darkening, threatening to drive him into unconsciousness.

"Is this what Gray went through?" Natsu openly mused. His voice sounding distant and gurgled in his ears.

/

Natsu woke up in musk, surprised to be waking at all. The air he sucked in hungrily was dank, heavy with moisture and thick with the smell of rot. Wrinkling his nose, the boy attempted to filter the air with his vest, but when he reached for it there was nothing. His hand met only flesh. A hand that continued over his body, checked for wounds as well as clothes, as his eyes couldn't see worth a damn for all the blackness around him. He flexed his hand, trying to will the flames to life. But no flames came. There was no magic in him here.

With slow unsteady movements the young man managed to push himself to his feet, only to find his legs trembling hap-hazardously. Lack of use had turned the bones within gelatin. It made Natsu wonder just how long he had been unconscious for. Hours? Days? Not that he felt hungry or dehydrated at the moment. Just nauseous from the odour.

He was unsure of whether or not his legs could support him, but the thought of a comrade, a friend, Gray, being in danger stirred him on. So he pushed past the shaking in his limbs and rolling in his stomach, set his hands to the walls on his left, and started walking.

The more steps he seemed to take the brighter it appeared to become; and the wider the hallway grew. It would never get to be the level of brightness that the sun would have brought. Yet in the dim ambiance Natsu could make out the gritty cobblestones that he was touching.

He walked for who knows how long, drifting into the middle of the great hallway, before finding something that wasn't stone. There were lumps scattered along the floor. When his foot connected with a stray lump it gave slightly and skittered away. He stopped to pick one up and he found it to be cold and clammy in his hands. One finger pressed to it hard, driving through the outer layer, and a viscous liquid bubbled forth. The smell of decay was coming from these things.

Did that mean these things were...?

The object hit the floor with a wet slap. The light was now better, bright, and he could make out the shapes on the ground for what they were. Hands and feet jutted out of the miscellaneous mix as tombstones. Some parts could be identified as a man's or a woman's based on genitals and breasts but for the most they were unknown.

Goo, rot, blood and pus covered his left hand and for a moment all Natsu did was stare dumbly. Then he tried to flick it off – having no clothes to wipe it in even if he'd wanted to. It landed in thick globs on his legs and torso before dragging slowly down.

He shivered. His stomach heaving and bile rising in his throat. He fought to keep it down but quickly gave in. Whatever he retched up landed atop the cadavers, black and reeking. The smell around him growing all the more violent in its assault and he felt his stomach revolt again. Natsu fell to the ground, hands and knees landing in the half digested remains of his last meal. His body shook as his stomach tried to throw up something that was not there.

(How long had he been walking? How many steps? He had fallen once, landed in bodies. The ones on top had been soft, but deeper into the pile they were basically bones wrapped in sheets of skin. He'd smashed through with a scream and the liquid-insides had washed over him. Gray had been able to pick himself up after that, though he doubted he would ever feel clean again.)

When the episode was over his body was left weak. Tears blurred his vision, his throat burned with tossed up acid, and he couldn't seem to move the elbow that had cut through someone's guts, the half decayed insides sloshing up against his skin as a masticated pulp.

It was too long before the world stopped spinning and Natsu could push himself to his feet again. He had to move on. Had to find Gray, who was somewhere in this mess, alone. A reality that Natsu didn't have to imagine and didn't want to be living.

One foot in front of the other had never seemed to slow. Unable to balance himself, as that meant leaning over festering remains, each step was precariously placed. A wrong move, a too-fast motion, threatened to send him tumbling. His body was already coated in more gunk than he wanted and even though it was starting to dry that only made him more aware of its presence. He tried to wipe it away but that just caused it to smear. Still, he persevered.

The more he seemed to walk the more he could see. The long corridor had stopped growing in brightness but that didn't stop his wandering eyes. After walking for so long Natsu discovered something lacking in the piles: heads.

There were hundreds of body parts, but no heads. All the legs had feet attached, all arms had hands, and torsos had neck and pelvises both. That was where things ended. All the necks had been cut just below where the jaw would have started. Maybe if he were Erza, or Lucy, or someone who had to find out why he would pick one and investigate. However, his hands were gross, the taste of bile clung to the roof of his mouth, and he was in no mood for playing detective. He only wanted an exit.

It felt like he had been walking for an eternity. His feet were sore and numbing, and his legs were ready to drop him where he swayed. When he had gotten sick of thinking about the vomit and gelatinous fluid which covered him Natsu had started counting the seconds. He had stopped when the number took more than a second to say.

He staggered, unable to walk any further. He couldn't do it. He couldn't move ahead that one foot. One last try, one small lurch, and Natsu was tumbling as a heap to the ground.

(It did not take long for Gray to notice the missing heads.

When his morbid curiosity had gotten the better of him he had moved in closer to a nearby corpse – female, with loose rolls that had long burst to release toxic, running fat and a stench that could drop a horse. But Gray didn't dare cover his nose for he was wearing that same mess.

Looking at the wound he could not see much for the dark. He wasn't a biologist, or scientist, or doctor, so whether or not he would be able to tell what he was looking at was doubtful. What he could see was that there was no spinal cord inside the vertebrae. Though it could have just decayed. Then there was the wound itself. Whatever had sliced off the head had been sharp and hot. It was a clean cut through and had cauterized the wound behind it, so barely any blood had been shed.

Gray's stomach coiled, a sign to call his investigation quits. He stumbled on.)

/

Natsu woke slowly – he always seemed to be waking – and he woke in denial. He longed to feel the soft cushions of a bed or even the fluffy rug that covered Lucy's floor. However the feeling of crusted blood and slithering rot on his skin, and the reeking of the bulbous cadavers around him, all of it was too strong for him to suppress.

He was not lying in the same place he had fallen asleep. Rather than the cold cobblestone floor of the hallway beneath him Natsu awoke to the equally cold feeling of a stone slab. His forearms and feet dangled limp over the too-short makeshift table, his cheek was pressed uncomfortably onto the rough stone. In the distance he could hear heavy footfalls and the sound of steel slowly dragging.

He went to get up, jump quickly to his feet. But his limbs felt leaden and would not rise. He could only turn his head to the side and watch as the cause of the noise walked sloppily into the room. His strides were long, and lumbering, and he reached the table in short matter. 'He' was a matter of opinion. This thing was easily the height of a small vulcan, with the opposite build. His bottom was far heavier than his top, a large gut hung to his thighs and was still swinging when the man stopped moving. He had sleek hair that dripped with grease, and it hung to his shoulders, staining the leather of his clothes. A heavy cast-iron mask was attached to his face and a long tube swung free.

At his side was the thick broad sword, stained red with blood. A sword that scrapped across the ground until the man heaved it into the air with intent. A wet wheezing filled the air as he tried to suck in oxygen.

"Where's Gray?" You bastard!" Natsu shouted. No answer. The man just shifted his grip and let the blade fall.

Natsu screamed. Pain lanced through him, awakening him, his body. He threw himself from the slab and fell hard on the floor. The one arm that had tried to stop his fall wasn't enough. Still, he scrambled for the hall that the man had come down, vision darkening with pain. His chest was tight and it was hard to breathe, hard to move, but he moved fast despite.

The hall was short and was halfway down it before he was on his feet. One shoulder ground against the wall. His sight half gone with pain. Limbs were stiff and unwilling to bend. He didn't get a chance to see the double doors before he was falling through them.

The light on the other side assaulted him. His eyes burned in their sockets, unaccustomed to the brightness. Natsu fell knees first to a hardwood floor, a single hand covered his face, shielding him. There was no sound from the giant behind him and the door swung closed on an empty hall.

Natsu allowed his eyes to adjust to the dim candle light around him with slow blinks. It was only when they could remain open without tearing that he cautiously looked to the room around him.

One word came to mind: huge. It looked like some grand entrance to a castle and Natsu had clearly come through the entrance. In front of him was a curving foyer with a tall banister made of serpentine dragons, their scales outlined in tidy gold filigree, which was matched by the sleep pillars that rose up to a ceiling too high to see. The entire room was too rich for Natsu's blood – or his filth and nakedness.

Logic said that this was a sinister place, being connected to that butcher's room and, no doubt, to the corridor beyond that. But it didn't feel bad. There was a clean smell to the air that seemed to squeeze past the smell that wafted off of the fire mage's body.

He did not get any longer to take in the atmosphere before the doors behind him drifted open. The clicks and clinks or a million shows killed the air. Natsu scampered away with waning strength, placing his back to the wall as dancers flooded through the entrance. Pretty dresses and tailored suits made a dizzying sight as men and women spun around each other in a seemingly mechanical manner. Every muscle in Natsu's body was rigid, waiting for one of them to notice him. None did. They all just spun round and round and round.

Then Natsu noticed their heads. Fleshless, with white polished bone above the neck. Empty sockets stared longingly and lovingly into their partners eyes. Lip-less mouths smiled and clicked open and closed as sweet nothings were whispered. Natsu shivered. These were the heads taken from the countless torsos in that corridor. This was where Natsu's head would have ended up had he not gotten away. He shivered against the thought.

One shadow moved against the rest, without a partner. It turned to him. "Natsu?"

He blinked, starting and looking up. Dark, spiky hair and tanned skin bobbed quickly through the crowd and soon Gray was standing before him. Gray who was still talking and was clean and clothed, with all his limbs attached. Gray who was very much alive. Natsu could have wept. But he just smiled instead.

He came over looking simply surprised at seeing him. "What the hell are you smiling at you lunatic? Come on let's," the ice mage slid his arm under Natsu's remaining, "get you cleaned up. What happened to you? Where's your arm? And do I want to know what's covering you?"

Gray didn't know what was beyond that door. That was something, he thought. "I'll tell you later. Right now... just bath and clothes. Then we've got to get the fuck out of here," he cursed. It came out weak and he leaned listlessly against Gray.

The ice mage just nodded, not complaining about Natsu's weight, and lead them away.

(Gray awoke on a stone table. He didn't remember falling asleep and he felt drugged, his mind was groggy though still aware, and his limbs were heavy, too heavy to move.

Then there was the glint of metal to his left and a shadow he hadn't notice brought a sword down upon him and his world exploded in pain. Both legs were gone in an instant. He didn't stop screaming until the world turned black.)

A/N: While this story was meant to have two sequels (as mentioned in the previous version) there are many reasons why they likely will not get done. While I do have the first sequel started I'm 1. back at college. and 2. have been slowly wanting to write less fanfiction and more original. Just a thing... Sucks :(

But it works as well as any of my oneshots. :) very cliffhangery and very cruel.

Thanks to the amazing MiyuTanemura for the beta. I know it was hard for her because she's not as sadistic as I. ^^

Thanks getting to the end. And I'd love some reviews/critiques. ;D