"Luke!" Lucy ran forward and crashed into him, wrapping her arms around him in a tight hug. He gave a laugh as he returned the hug. Everyone else could only stand and watch in confusion as they watched the scene unfold.
"Uh, Lucy? Who's that?" Natsu awkwardly stepped towards them, his nose twitching slightly. Natsu knew he had never seen the young man before, but for some reason, he seemed so familiar.
He had blond hair that matched Lucy's own, and while relatively short, was long enough to fall over his forehead. His eyes were the same brown color as Lucy's as well. He was tall, maybe taller than Gajeel, even. Natsu could tell that he was fit and well-built, even with the cover of his clothes. He was wearing a black suit, similar to what Loke tended to wear these days. All in all, he looked like he could give a fight, which excited Natsu on the inside. He felt his blood boiling at the thought of finding another rival to prove his strength to.
"Oh, you haven't met him yet, have you?" Lucy pulled away from the man. He smiled and turned to the rest of the mages, and gave a slight nod.
"I'm Luke Heartfilia, the Celestial Marshal. I also happen to be Lucy's twin brother." Everyone dropped their mouths in shock.
"You have a twin brother!?" Gray asked. Lucy blushed a bit, suddenly feeling awkward about the whole situation.
"Yeah.. I guess I never really mentioned him to you guys. Sorry." Erza walked up and extended a hand towards Luke. The blond took it happily as they exchanged greetings.
"I'm Erza Scarlet, nice to meet you." The others followed with their own introductions.
"I'm Wendy Marvell, nice to meet you!"
"Yo! I'm Natsu Dragneel!"
"Gray Fullbuster." He looked around at all them and smiled.
"Nice to meet you all. I hear you guys took care of my sister when she got knocked out and stuff. Thanks for that."
"It was our pleasure." He turned to Natsu, and his smile faltered a bit when he caught the dragon slayer giving him a strange look.
"Um, is something wrong?"
"Sorry, I was just thinking that you kinda looked like Loke when you first showed up." Luke blinked.
"Oh, sorry. I was borrowing his powers for a bit. I'll deactivate it." With a wave of his hand, pale, golden light covered his body, and the black suit was gone. He was now wearing a white button-up shirt with its sleeves rolled up to his elbows, strikingly blue jeans, and black sneakers. Around his waist was a black belt with two swords mounted on one side. Even though the swords were sheathed, Erza could tell that they were unique blades, probably crafted specifically for Luke's combat style.
Natsu walked around Luke, inspecting the taller man. After circling him a couple times, the dragon slayer stopped and gave a devious grin, happy that his initial impressions of the man were proving to be correct.
"You look strong. Let's fight!" Gray was approaching him, ready to smack him for being too eager to fight, but Luke merely laughed.
"I'll consider the offer, maybe later." Ignoring Natsu's pout, Lucy tapped on Luke's shoulder and regained his attention.
"So what have you been up to? It's been too long." He nodded in response.
"It really has been. I've been traveling around various regions in Earthland, closing up gates and stuff. I think I actually got most of them outside of Fiore."
"Really? That's great! That means we should be able to get them all pretty quickly, if they're all around here!" Luke nodded, but Erza noticed that his face was grim.
"Is something the matter, Luke? You don't look very pleased with that." He started a bit, but smiled again.
"Heh, are you always that observant? But indeed, there is a slight issue. We still have very little information on who's actually responsible for this. The Spirit King has a few ideas, but we aren't completely sure. There just isn't enough evidence."
"Well, there is that woman who attacked me back when I still had memory loss. I haven't seen or heard of her ever since, though.." They all stood in silence for a moment, unable to come up with any answers. Gray huffed after a while, unable to take the silence.
"Well, no use standing around here. We should head back to the guild and check up on everyone there." Erza nodded.
"Good idea. We should head out." As everyone turned to head back to the guild, Lucy and Luke both snapped their heads up.
"Watch out!"
"Specter!" It jumped out of the water, forcing everyone to dodge to the sides. It was more humanoid this time, but it was extremely tall, and was wielding two broadswords. Wendy looked up in fear. She could feel that it as different than any Specter she'd ever met.
"How did it get here..?"
"It must have managed to get through the gate before I shut it down." Luke sighed and helped Lucy up. The two took a fighting stance next to each other. "Ready, Luce? It's been a while, so I'm not sure how we'll do against a thing like that." Lucy smirked.
"I'm more than ready. This guy's a joke." Luke mirrored his sister's smirk. They both stepped forward and readied their magic.
"Star Dress: Sagittarius!" Lucy changed into a twin-tailed coat with boots, and was holding a large bow.
"Star Suit: Scorpio!" Luke's shirt turned red, his jeans black, and a small hand cannon appeared in his left hand. He drew a sword with his right hand, and gave Lucy one last glance before charging in.
"Sand Buster!" He shot a large blast of sand from the cannon. The Specter stood unfazed, but a sound cloud remained, obscuring all vision. Everyone else had to cover their eyes and mouths to keep the sand out, but Lucy kept her eyes focused on the impact. Luke had disappeared, and the Specter was hidden in the sand too.
"There! Star Shot!" She shot several arrows into the cloud. Moments later, the arrows all exploded, blowing the sand out. They could now see that the Specter and Luke were engaged in combat. Luke was wielding both of his swords now, nimbly jumping around the creature, trying to get the upper hand. The Specter, however, was too sturdy for any of Luke's blows to do much damage.
"Let's go!" Natsu set his fists on fire and was about to run in, but Erza stopped him.
"No. Don't. At this point, joining the fight will do more harm than help. You might distract him, and that will be the exact opening it needs to win." Natsu huffed. It was apparent that he was displeased at the idea of being unable to fight. Not only did he want to take the beast down, he also wanted to help his new friend.
"Don't worry, Natsu. We got this." Lucy winked and took a few more steps forward, firing more arrows. When it became clear that the arrows weren't doing anything to the Specter, she gave up and changed outfits again.
"Star Dress: Taurus!" She changed into a more revealing outfit with a cow pattern on it. She took her whip out and ran in, taking her brother's side.
As Erza watched, she noticed that the siblings were impressively coordinated. Their attacks were in sync, and they were never in each others' way. Luke jumped and slashed at the Specter's torso, while Lucy ducked and cracked her whip at its legs. It tried to spin and hit both of them at once, but Luke jumped off of one of the swords, and Lucy slid under the swords.
"Earth Wave!" Lucy charged power in her whip and slammed it on the ground, breaking it and forcing the Specter to lose balance. Luke then lunged at it once more, knocking it back and forcing it to fall over. He stepped back in time for Lucy to deliver the final blow with an enormous axe that she spawned. The Specter dissolved into starlight, leaving the siblings standing on the ground, panting. They stood up and gave a sigh of relief.
"Wow," Erza could only mutter after watching their coordinated movements. Lucy and Luke gave sheepish smiles as they processed that they had an audience during the whole fight.
"Impressive, indeed." They all heard clapping come from farther down the shoreline, and they noticed that someone else was watching them. Luke and Lucy tensed slightly as they slowly started stepping towards their friends. Gray took a step towards the stranger with a cold aura around his skin.
"Who are you?" They could see the stranger more clearly as he walked up. He was a young man, leanly built. Probably a few years older than them. His hair was a grayed-out shade of blue, and his eyes matched his hair. He was wearing a simple combination of a t-shirt and shorts, both white. His smile was his most defining feature, as it served to only alert the mages even more.
"Just an onlooker. You are both truly strong, Lucy and Luke Heartfilia. I must admit, you had my own heart racing a little with that brilliant demonstration." He closed his eyes and shivered a bit as he relived the fight in his mind. He opened his eyes after another moment, and laughed lightly.
"Really, I must thank you for the entertainment."
"What do you mean? Are you involved with the Specters?" Luke snapped at the man, his tension growing by the second.
"I... know of them. But that's all. I was only here to see you, nothing more. And with that, I must leave. Farewell." The man disappeared in a flash of light, leaving the group with more questions than before. It was hard for them to grasp that he had been there at all. It all just happened so quickly. Gray shrugged.
"Well, I guess we should be going."
A/N: And there you have it! A new character joins the story! I had a pretty hard time describing him, but I hope you all have some image of who he is! I probably did a pretty bad job portraying Luke, but he's pretty much a tall, lean, blond guy that's easygoing and reliable. Color scheme pretty much matches Lucy, but I guess he can be a bit more tanned. Eh, I can't say much more than that.
Sorry again for being late! I won't say much about it though, since most of what I had to say was in the last 'chapter'. I will say, however, I might have to reconsider my update schedule. I might have to start having to do biweekly updates and skip every other week (I really don't want to, but I'm getting busier and it's getting harder to write :3). If I end up spacing updates out more, I'll definitely make the chapters longer. But ideally, I won't have to do that! I really want to be able to consistently update once a week... But if I'm late again next week with no update, please understand that I've probably changed my update schedule..
Either way, see you soon! Sorry for everything! But I won't ever scrap this project, and I'm definitely going to see it through. Just.. I might have to be a bit slower. Thanks for reading and understanding!