Lucy woke up early today. The sun was shining and while smiling to herself, she stretched. Today was going to be a good day. It had to be. The rent was due in three days and as always she didn't have the money. That thought made her cringe a little, but she shooed it away real quick. They would go on a quest today and get the money she needed. There was nothing to worry about and in the end it would all turn out well, like it has always done before.
A loud noise from the outside interrupted her thoughts.
"That must be Natsu and Happy", she thought. Only they can cause so much trouble so early in the morning. Well then, if they are already up they could head out early and get this over with. And then she would be able to pay her rent. This thought made her happy and with a jump Lucy leaped of her bed to get ready before Natsu and Happy could storm her apartment. No way would she let those two trash her place when she had to work so hard to pay for it.
"Good morning, Lucy! We were just about to come and get you," shouted Natsu all excited and pumped right from the porch of the house.
"Well, to avoid that was the whole point of me rushing like crazy so early in the morning", she mumbled to herself.
Luckily Natsu wasn't listening anyway. He had already pranced of somewhere in the direction of the northern city gate.
"Hey, Natsu! Wait up! Don't you wanna tell me where we are going?"
"Oh, right, I forgot… ", he turned around and handed her the flyer from the guild. "We are going to catch the Podicu gang that has been terrorizing a convent in the mountains."
"Why would somebody attack a convent? What kind of person bothers women who don't harm anybody? I hate that! We've got to help them!"
"See! I knew you would like it. Come on! Let's hurry before somebody else does the job before us."
"What are you so excited for? This isn't going to be much of a battle. Two Fairy Tail wizards against some mountain punks."
"We are going to save a lot of young single ladies! I am sure the girls are going to be real grateful to me for that. Plus the pay for the job isn't bad."
"Natsu, do you even know what a convent is? Only nuns live there. If they are thankful, they probably include you in their prayers for the next year or so."
"WHAT? Nuns?"
"Sure, what did you think a convent was?"
"I thought it was some kind of special boarding school for cute girls. Oh, no! This is a huge letdown. I don't want to do this job now."
Lucy laughed for a while, but added, "Come on, Natsu! We would be doing a good thing. Also, I really need the money to pay my rent."
"Ugh! But…Happy, what do you think? You have been so quite all this time"
"I am hungry. You didn't let me eat the big fish because you wanted to go on this job. So now we have to go. Saving nice nuns is a good thing to do."
"Alright!" Lucy shouted victoriously. " Let's go save some nuns!"
It took them almost the entire day to find the convent that was hidden away in a small valley in the mountains. The sun sets early in the northern region, so the sun was already setting when Natsu finally knocked on the door of the convent.
Lucy stayed behind a little to marvel at the colorful sunset. As far as you could see the mountains were glowing in different shades of pink. From a light rose to the deep, almost red colors, everything was there. At the bottom the pink slowly changed to purple and finally into soft blue tones. It was beautiful. She almost forgot where she was and why they came there in the first place. Her serenity was interrupted by scarred whispers from somewhere behind her. She tried to ignore them, but it was completely shattered by Natsu's shouting.
"What do you mean we can't enter the convent? We came all this way to help you and now you won't let us in?"
Lucy sighed and turned around to figure out what the noise was all about.
She heard one of the nuns explain: "We are grateful for you coming to our little convent and we would truly appreciate your help with the men of the Podicu."
"So? We are here. We came to help. Wouldn't it be all holly and polite of you to let us in? Also some food wouldn't hurt."
"Yes, Happy is hungry, so hungry…" Happy whined.
An older nun stepped in front of the group and spoke in a low and calm voice.
"We will provide you with shelter and food, but you and the cat cannot enter a women's monastery. It cannot be allowed. No man shall ever enter this holly place. It is enough that those filthy bandits come here and try to break in. The girl, though, may enter."
She pointed at Lucy, who was still trying to catch up on what the nun just said. Natsu sat down on the ground. Landing on the gras with angry and loudthumpf.
Lucy just thought, "He must be quite tiered if he gave up so quickly", as a few of the nuns took her by her hands and led the way into the monastery. On the inside it was a bit dark, but warm and felt like a home. Maybe it was because it was a holly place, but Lucy just felt so safe in there, like nobody could ever hurt her while she was inside the walls of the convent. Nothing on the outside seemed to matter anymore. She could just stay here and live the happy and safe life of a nun. What a wonderful feeling… Just stay here…forever…in peace… Her knees felt weak and all of a sudden the world went dark.
Lucy woke up on the cool grass outside of the monastery. Her head felt fuzzy and she turned around only to see Natsu and Happy not far away chomping on something that smelled suspiciously like delicious mountain Elk. One of the nuns nearby noticed Lucy waking up and waved at her.
Natsu also turned around and with a full mouth he called: "Lucy! You are missing out on the tastiest meal ever. If you continue like this you will even miss out on the Podicu gang and I will have the fun of beating them up all to myself."
"What happened? Why is my head so fuzzy? Were we attacked?"
One of the nuns from before answered her: "We apologize. We sometimes forget what power such an old church like ours has on people who come here for the first time. A church that was used as a women's monastery for so long gains it's own kind of magic. It does not grant men passage, but it also gives women that enter it a feeling of safety and closeness to God. We carried you out as soon as we realized that you had fainted from the power the old magic had on you. We need you to be able to fight right now. But if you should chose the path of God after your battle with the awful men, we will welcome you into our convent with open arms, despite of your violent past."
At first Lucy wanted to laugh at the idea and at the hypocrisy, but the nun's warm smile told her that the invitation wasn't meant as a joke. She mustered up a quite "Uhm, thanks. I will consider it." and quickly changed the topic, "Your request for help didn't have many details. Could you tell us a bit more about what is happening here?"
"But, yes, of course, as I was telling your companions… the Podicu gang has been attacking our convent every night for the past few weeks. So far the old magic of the church has been able to keep us all safe and out of the reach of those unlawful men. Sadly, even such old magic has its limits. We live in constant fear of the bandits finally being able to make it inside our lovely church."
"Ok, but what do they want from you?" Natsu interrupted, still his mouth full with food, "Do you have some old and expensive artifacts? Or maybe gold? Or I don't know…what could you possibly have in your magical house, huh?"
The nuns didn't answer and the younger ones even hid their faces.
Confused, Lucy asked: "I am sorry, but you have to tell us. Otherwise we can't do our job and properly protect you."
The nuns stayed silent and shied away even more. Finally the oldest nun, that had stayed out of the conversation before started to speak: "In the past years many young and fair maidens have joined this convent. Most of them had many suitors in their towns and the men were unwilling to accept the girls' choice to devote themselves to God. Podicu are a gang from one of the hometowns of my lovely girls. They heard that many beautiful young women lived here. In their sick minds the idea developed that they could just come here and…"
The nun had to pause in order to calm the anger that had been rising in her voice. When she was calm again, she continued, " Those Podicu want to enter the monastery in order to, how do I put this politely, defile those pure girls."
The girls were now all hiding their faces and you could even hear a few sobs. It took Lucy and Natsu a moment to realize what the nun just said. Natsu jumped to his feet, his magical fire blazing around his clenched fists.
"No way in hell will something like this ever happen while we are here. Something so awful, how could somebody even think of doing something like this? I am ashamed to be a man. Your magical church is right not to let men in. I will destroy them all until nothing but ashes remain!"
The older nun started speaking again, "Young man, we are grateful for your words, but we do not desire the death of the Podicu men. We just want to live safely once again. The men should be justly punished for their deeds and hopefully they will find their way to God. If they atone for their sins, God will forgive them and so should all of us."
The nun fell silent again, but despite her words condoning Natsu's violent outburst many of the nuns were looking at Natsu with gazes filled with hope.
After that, the conversation died out and everybody continued eating in silence. Once everybody was done, the older nun suggested that it was time to go inside. The Podicu gang usually attacks not long after the moon is up. Only when Lucy, Natsu and Happy were left completely alone in the moonlight the tension went away a little.
"That was intense, right?" Natsu smiled. He was back to his normal self. He couldn't stay in a bad mood for long. Only by the flames dancing around in his eyes you could tell that he was still angry as hell and ready to kick some serious ass. Lucy and Happy only nodded and just kept listening to hear sounds of the gang approaching. But all there was to hear was the silence of the night.
"I don't care what the nun says. I am going to turn them to ash."
Natsu jumped up to his feet and added: "I can't just sit here. I want to fight them already. I am going to go look for them."
"Natsu, wait! There is no point in rushing things and they might not even come today."
"Nooo! I want to beat them up as soon as possible."
But he gave in and he plopped down on the grass again. Lucy just kept looking and the stars and wondered what had made all those women give up their life and come here. She wasn't as excited as Natsu for a fight. She would be more then happy to just stare at the star filled sky all night. They have been spending way too much time indoors in the last few weeks. It was refreshing to spend the night outside again.
But Natsu could never enjoy some quite time and asked: " Lucy, do you know what spirit you are going to call?"
Lucy just shrugged. She had not thought about it. She never did. Once the moment came she would just intuitively know what spirit to call upon.
"I just thought you should call Loki. I know he is much too strong to be called for a fight with a bunch of bandits, but I miss seeing him around the guild. Ever since we found out he was a spirit he hasn't been back to the guild at all. Plus I think he would really enjoy beating those Podicu up. Despite being a bit of a player he does not take it lightly when somebody hurts women. I mean, that's how he ended up as a member of our guild in the first place."
Lucy contemplated for a bit, but shook her head: "I don't think I should call him. He wouldn't want to be bothered for such small things. But if you want me to… Sure." She smiled at Natsu and added, "but if he is unhappy about it I will blame it all on you."
Just when that was decided, they heard heavy steps and laughter coming from somewhere in the nearby woods. All three of them jumped to their feet and braced for a fight. Shadows began to leave the woods. There were far more of them then expected, but nothing they could not handle. As the shadows came closer, they also became clearer. When the shadows were no longer just shadows, but a large group of men. They finally noticed Natsu and Lucy standing in front of the church.
"Uh, look! The nuns got themselves some additional protection."
"Haha, the penguins must be really getting scared now."
"It's just two kids. What kind of protection is that?"
"The blond one is pretty, don't you think?"
Natsu's fists lit up with his magical fire and wiped the smiles from the bandits' faces.
"Enough chitchat! We are going to wipe the floor with you and then hand-deliver you to the police. Nobody attacks innocent nuns on our watch!"
Natsu started running towards the men and seconds later Loke appeared right next to him.
"Hey, Natsu! It's been a while. Lucy already filled me in. Let's kick some Podicu butt."
"Hell, yeah!"
It didn't take them long to finish of the bandits. Such a gang was no match for a Dragon Slayer and Leo, the leader of the Zodiac spirits. After cleaning up after the fight, they all set down in front of the entrance to the convent.
While sitting down Loke addressed Lucy: "Is it okay if I stick around? I don't think that it will use much of your magic power. Not that you will have much need for it tonight anyway. I haven't been in the human world for a while."
Before Lucy could say anything Natsu had already answered him: "Sure, Loki, you have to hang out with us for a bit. We don't get to see you nearly enough since you went back to the spirit world."
"Hah, thanks, that's nice to hear. What about you, Lucy? Don't you miss me?"
He smiled at her. He had a dazzling smile. It was one of the things that made girls go crazy over him. When he still pretended to be human he could have any girl he wanted just with that smile. He was quite the pickup artist. It was hard not to get caught up in his act.
This smile always made Lucy blush a little. Embarrassed she turned away pretending to look for something in her back. He was a spirit and a flirtatious spirit at that. She should not have such a strong reaction every time he smiled at her like that.
Loke just laughed and turned back to Natsu to get caught on everything that has been happening with the guild.