Rude Awakening
…Off the Rails
Note: I guess her name's actually Carla? Maybe? Whatever. I'm too used to Charle.
Also, sorry for the year long wait. Got caught up with original projects. Gonna try to finish this.
-FAIRY TAIL-
Early mornings in the Fairy Tail guild were generally pretty quiet. This was largely to blame on the fact that hardly any of the members were awake and at the guild until around ten.
Of course, Mirajane was always there by eight and was cooking breakfast within thirty minutes. Erza and Lucy were usually the first to get there, and Mira was so used to it that she nearly called out their names when the guild doors opened. She caught herself when she instead saw Wendy and Charle, the first of whom gave a big yawn as she walked in.
"Good morning, Wendy and Charle!"
"Mmm… G'morning, Mira… Can I just have some chocolate milk for now?"
"You need something to eat, silly girl," Charle grumbled.
"Nonsense. Let her wake up, first," Mirajane said, smiling.
Wendy nodded and sat down, resting her head in her hands. Charle's tail twitched, annoyed, as she also sat down. Mirajane put down a glass of chocolate milk for Wendy and one of regular milk for Charle.
"Sleep well?"
"Not really. I'm used to Zuri making noise at night," Wendy said, yawning again.
"…Eh?" Mirajane asked, blinking, clear concern evident on her face.
Charle stared at Wendy, her tail frozen stiff in agitation at the succubus and mild terror that Wendy bothered listening to all of that…
"You…"
"Mostly her talking. I can't really make out what she's saying, but it's comforting to know she's in Fairy Hills. Without her there, it's so quiet and… creepy."
"Is Wendy afraid of ghosts?" Mirajane asked in a conspiratorial whisper.
Wendy froze, "Is… is Fairy Hills haunted?"
"Well, aside from Lucy's report, not really," Mirajane said.
"Wh-what? Lucy saw a ghost?" Wendy demanded, leaning forward, eyes wide.
"Oh, she was a friendly ghost. Dressed Lucy up like a cat princess and sent her on some weird treasure hunt. I don't recall the details, and I'm sure Lucy could tell you all the details," Mira said, dismissively.
"Ooooh! I could go back and ask-… Oh, right, they're not here," Wendy said, crossing her arms and pouting a little, "I don't see why I wasn't allowed to go."
"Wasn't it a succubus village?" Mirajane asked.
"Yes, so it's full of people like Zuri… so what? Zuri's nice!"
"…Zuri's also rude, disrespectful, and disgusting," Charle grumbled.
"Be nice, Charle. Zuri's quite alright!" Mirajane declared, her hands on her hips.
"I did not think Zuri would've been able to seduce you, too," Charle deadpanned.
Mirajane glared at Charle, her hands still firmly on her hips. The white cat stared blankly back. Wendy shook her finger at Charle, annoyed.
"Be nice to Mirajane. Zuri's hardly been in her room and they've certainly not had sex. I would've smelled Zuri on her if they had."
"…What?" Charle and Mirajane asked, in near-unison.
"Yeah, Zuri's got a non-human smell to her. Levy pretty much reeks of her at any given time. Mirajane hardly has any of Zuri's scent! And she never has. So she can't have been seduced by Zuri."
"I did not mean to imply that kind of seduction. Merely that Zuri, with her brazen behavior, should not have won Mirajane over so easily."
"Mira's nice, unlike some grumpy cat I know," Wendy said, sticking her tongue out at Charle.
The Exceed rolled her eyes, before returning to her milk. Wendy smiled and nodded, believing herself to have won.
"Can I have a piece of toast?" Wendy asked, giddily.
"Coming right up!"
Wendy spun around on her stool a few times, idly humming an old kid's tune, while Charle just sipped away at her milk. Before Wendy's toast was quite ready, the doors to the guild opened once more to reveal Evergreen, Bixlow, and Fried. Mirajane waved at them as they approached the bar.
The Thunder God Tribe quickly gave their orders, aside from Bixlow, who changed his mind three times during the process, and sat down.
"Hello, Wendy," Fried said, sitting on the other side of Charle, "How are you today?"
"Kinda sleepy. But I'm fine! Do you want to go on another mission? We did good on that last one, I think… Kind of."
"Mm… I am unsure it could be called "good"… but yes, at some point, we should go on another mission. Today, however, I've already booked a mission to deal with some rampaging beast."
"Aww… Bixlow?" Wendy suggested.
The most erratic of the Thunder God Tribe guffawed for a few seconds, before looking back at Wendy.
"You serious? WOW, I did not expect that. After hearing about your mission with Fried, I'd love to book one witcha. Evergreen, you comin'?" he asked, nudging the witch, his dolls floating over her head.
Evergreen glared at him for a moment and batted away the dolls.
"I've got an appointment today," she said, adopting a dainty pose, "Sorceror Magazine is going to be taking pictures of me for their photospread! I may even be the centerfold!"
Mirajane smiled as she began setting out the plates of food for everyone, "Best of luck, Evergreen!"
Evergreen gleefully, almost mockingly, chortled. Bixlow joined in on the laughter for a few moments, until the witch stealthily smacked him on the back of the head.
"Your laughter disturbs me, fool," Evergreen chided, "Don't join in on my graceful chuckling."
Bixlow just shrugged and grinned at Evergreen, putting his Fairy Tail mark on full display, before turning to his food and becoming the equivalent of a human garbage disposal. Fried began eating, with all his usual manners, and Evergreen followed all of the laws of etiquette and then a few extra.
Wendy just happily munched on her toast, until a question popped into her head. She leaned forward and looked over at Evergreen.
"Um, what's a centerfold?" she asked.
"Why, dear girl, they're every beautiful woman's dream! They are an achievement, forcing all men to look upon me and know beauty and despair because they can have it, not!" Evergreen swooned.
"That's certainly one view of them," Fried said.
"Yeah. Pretty hilarious one. I ain't known a guy who despairs over a centerfold, yet," Bixlow said, crumbs flying from his mouth as he spoke, "Got too many other things to do over it."
That earned a sharp jab from Evergreen, but Bixlow just laughed it off.
"Um… that still doesn't answer my question," Wendy said.
"It's the part of the magazine that folds out, for a bigger picture," Mirajane said.
"Ohhhhh. So those things that Erza's got tacked up in her back room are centerfolds. You look really nice in those outfits, Mirajane!"
Mira blanched, "She did what now?"
Wendy grinned, "Yeah! Erza's got a bunch of your centerfolds tacked up in her fifth armor. She said you were an inspiration!"
Mirajane only went whiter at the news, "That's… that's great…"
"She's got a couple of Cana, too…"
"She will surely want my centerfold when it gets published!" Evergreen declared, grinning, stars in her eyes.
"I'm not sure you're her type," Mirajane said, under her breath.
-FAIRY TAIL-
Erza woke up to the sounds of Lucy screaming in horror. The knight sat up in a second, sword in hand.
"What's wrong, Lucy!"
The sight of three naked succubae curled up at the foot of their bed caught Erza sharply offguard. When she looked down and saw that she and Lucy were naked, Erza's face steamed.
"Um. Lucy, what in the world did we do?" Erza asked.
"That's just IT! I don't know!"
"Jeez, are you guys always this loud after an orgy?" a voice murmured from the floor.
Lucy's eyes bulged out and she pulled the blankets up to her chest, letting out a small scream as she did. Erza glanced over the side of the bed and hurriedly pulled back.
"There's like eight succubae over here," Erza said, quietly.
"So… eleven succubae had raucous sex in this room?" Lucy asked.
"I'm over here."
Horrified, Erza peered off the other side and her jaw dropped. Nearly twenty succubae were curled in various, suggestive positions on the floor. The one who called herself Etna had propped herself up on another sleeping succubus and was grinning at the two.
"You two got brought in by Zuri? How?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, aside from Fu, Zuri was always the wildest succubus. I mean, she totally sucked at all of her non-sexual succubus powers, so she kind of tended to overcompensate with some serious libido. So, how did she bring you two in?"
"These humans aren't that bland. I mean, I've heard about how humans have been. These two kinda seem wild by their standards," the succubus that Etna was propped on said.
"Psh. If that's the case, it's way easier to see why the Elders say we don't leave. Humans must be boring."
Lucy and Erza stared at each other and silently evaluated their situation. Two naked women laying on a bed, surrounded by 31 succubae, mostly groggy or asleep. The most unsettling part, though…
"Where's Fu?" Lucy whispered.
"I don't know," Erza said, wildly looking around.
"Under the bed, you colossal pansies!"
Lucy immediately set to seizing about, until she was doing a handstand, so as to keep her bottom as far from the bed as possible. She whimpered as she looked down at the bed, as if expecting the terrifying succubus to burst through at any given moment.
"I believe Lucy would like it if you came out…"
"She can suck it. I'm comfy."
Erza stabbed through the bed, though she didn't feel her sword connect with anything living.
"I'm going to keep stabbing through. Next time you might not be so lucky. Want to reconsider?"
The Lucy-lookalike succubus rolled out from under the bed, grumbling in anger. Lucy collapsed back onto the bed, her breath coming in short gasps. The shock of hitting the bed caused it to shake enough to wake up the other three succubae on their bed.
"Oh… hey, sweeties," the red-haired succubus said, flipping her hair about.
"What?" Lucy asked.
"What happened?" Erza added, "…last night."
"Well, you two were being all anxious and uptight and scared of us, so Lati here got some of her awesome tea and gave it to you," the red-haired said, pointing to the smaller, black-haired succubus.
"Tea?" Erza asked.
"Well, it's basically tea. But it has some nifty effects. It's really great for getting succubae out of their funk. Gets us going real strong!" Lati said, smiling.
"…I think we were raped," Erza said, pointing her sword at the three succubae at the edge of their bed.
"Oh, no, no, no! Succubae don't rape. We seduce," the red-haired said.
"Besides, we don't do anything that's not at least something a person's considered. Both of you seemed totally willing to get in on this, with a little nudge."
"I'm not sure what that says about us," Lucy said, her eyes wide.
"I feel dirtier and dirtier just sitting here," Erza added, "Let's get out of here."
The door opened to reveal Zuri. She was slumped against the frame of the door and slowly shaking her head, sweat dripping down her face.
"Hoo… hoo… hoo boy… They got… way greedier… or I got… way lazier…"
"Zuri, we're getting out of here," Erza said, firmly pointing her sword at the worn-down succubus.
"I don't suppose we can rest? Just for a few hours? I'm sore."
"We promise we won't give you any more of the tea!" Lati said, pleadingly, "Don't make Zuri go!"
Lucy and Erza looked to the three succubae, all of whom looked back at the couple with pleading eyes.
"We'll put on clothes and get everyone out of here and everything! We swear to be good, alright? Let her stick around for a little longer! The orgy was an honest mistake!"
"…fine," Erza said, getting rid of her sword.
Zuri hobbled over to the bed and collapsed on top of it. She curled up, yawning, and looked over at Lucy and Erza with misty eyes.
"So, what'd you find out?" Lucy asked.
"Well, the village doesn't care about the soul-devouring anymore."
"What? That's a serious offense!" Erza said.
"It's unnatural… and terrifying…"
"Well, see, that's the thing. The Elders found out… it's not souls."
"WHAT!"
End of Chapter Three
Okay, for the record, I have a general idea of how this is going to go. But there will be rambly bits, and if people have any requests, I might just do it.