Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail, all rights go to Hiro Mashima.
Lucy's POV
We stopped in a clearing in the forest, and were sitting next to each other on the grass, leaning our heads against trees while looking overhead as the leaves swayed and the clouds rolled past in the sky. Watching the sky had become sort of habit for me, now. Except this time, unlike the other times I looked up, the sky seemed vibrant, the clouds bouncing and the sun's rays dancing.
"The light is beautiful..." I told Sting, knowing that it secretly held a double meaning.
He nodded. "That's something that I can't deny" He agreed, and we sat there for a moment, silent. Then, I piped up.
"I'm assuming that Rogue told you about the dragons…?" I trailed off, hoping I made the right decision in asking.
"Yeah, I knew that you were going to tell me eventually, and I was looking forward to it, but right now, with all the chaos, I don't really think that…" He trailed off, looking at his hands. Tugging one of my keys out, I held it out to him so he could study it.
"Weisslogia's key is one of my favorites. It's beautifully detailed, and portrays the meaning of light perfectly, don't you think?" I pointed out, watching as he examined the key's intricate designs that immediately drew anyone in. The light was beautiful and intricate, just like the key design. Skiadrum's key was intricate, yet mysterious, as the darkness was. Igneel's key was simple and straightforward, like how fire just seemed to burn everything. Metallicana's key was super cool, like a punk- metal rock, I would assume. Grandine's key was bright and cheerful, like the sky. I mentally went over all of the dragon's key designs, and stopped when I noticed that Sting was staring at me.
"Wow, you sure do love your spirits…" He said, and I blushed in embarrassment. Did I just say that aloud?
"Yup, and you just said that aloud, as well" Sting said grinning. I blushed even more, and buried my face into my knees, changing my sitting position.
"Whatever…" My voice was muffled by the coverage, and Sting scooted closer.
"Wait, what did you just say?" He asked, and I repeated my half- hearted 'whatever'. He still didn't seem to get it, though. He stopped in front of me, and pulled my face out, so that I was staring at him.
"I can't hear a word you just said, and sister, I'm a dragon slayer" He explained, a little annoyed as he huffed and plopped down next to me again. I rolled my eyes .
"Whatever" I said, repeating what I said for the millionth time.
"Hey! Don't whatever me!" He exclaimed, shooting up. I laughed.
"I said, whatever" I repeated, hoping that he was getting the point.
"Yeah, and I just said, 'don't whatever me!', remember?" He retorted, sitting back down. Realizing what our conversation was starting to sound like, I decided to clear up the misunderstanding.
"No, I meant that I legit said the word 'whatever' when you couldn't hear me!" I explained, and got and 'Ooh! I get it now!" from the fellow slayer. We both chuckled and sat in silence once again. Then, it was Sting who started the conversation this time.
"Here, your key" He said, handing me the dragon's key. I raised an eyebrow at him.
"You don't want to see him?"
"No, I want to see him when I'm worthy. As I am now, I can't do anything. I'll meet him, but only once I've proven myself to be able to protect the others who've helped me" My eyes widened, and I held respect for the guild master.
"Sometimes, I forget that you're still a guild master. Wow, that was deep, dude" I joked, and it was Sting's turn to blush this time. Hooking my key back onto my key chain, I sighed at the sight. My keys were so crowded together, it was probably uncomfortable for them. I mean, sure, the spirits themselves don't feel anythg, but I still wanted to take care of my keys. Sting saw my wrinkled brows, and poked me on the forehead.
"Smile, you're going to turn into a wrinkly grandma if you keep furrowing your brows like that" Sting pointed out, and we started to laugh again.
"Anyways, what's wrong?" He asked, once we settled down.
"I wanted to get a new key chain…" I trailed off, knowing that I probably made no sense to someone who wasn't a celestial mage. Sting laughed at me
"Sure, you want to keep your keys safe, right?" Sting asked, and I looked at him, interested.
"How did you know?" I asked, wondering.
"Well, I've known you for a while now, and that's enough to know how much you deeply care for your keys" He explained, blushing again at the end. I smiled at him with appreciation, and he looked away, taking my hand uncertainly, and started to walk with me towards the magic stores. I looked at our intertwined hands, and Sting noticed me.
"Oh, sorry…" He said, beginning to take his hand away. I stopped his drifting hand, though, and gripped it tightly, humming to myself happily, ignoring Sting's shocked stare. I was a blushing mess on the inside, but I was still happy. There was the big chance he was my mate. I was a dragon slayer, after all. Still humming, I felt Sting's shoulders loosen up and heard him breathe a sigh of what seemed to be relief. We walked out of the forest together to get a new chain for me, never letting go of each other's hands.
Natsu's POV
I walked over to the takeover mage, who seemed depressed about something. Worry evident in my eyes, I sat across from her, gaining her attention.
"Hey, what's wrong?" I asked, curious.
"Dan Straight rejected me!" She cried comically and fell to the ground in a dramatic manner. When I tried to hold her up, she refused my hand and held to me a piece of paper.
"Eh?! Why are you giving me your will?!" I asked, freaking out as I watched Lisanna start to slowly fade away from the world. She popped back up, though, and answered my question. Her eyes turned to hearts.
"He rejected me, but in such a noble manner, saying that he had a princess to rescue! Oh my, how romantic!" Lisanna was squealing now, and I covered my ears with my hands. I looked in shock, though, as she started to cry again. Patting her back soothingly, I watched in partial horror, awe, and wonder as she continued the frequent mood swings, and the rest of the guild watched in what seemed to be amusement. When she popped back up again, and declared that she would find her own knight someday, everyone laughed, and I joined in. Girls… Are weird.
Sting's POV
We walked into the store, and finally parted hands as Lucy went over to the celestial wizard department. Getting bored, I decided to look around myself in the dragon slayer department. There were limiters, wristbands, magic amplifiers, and all the sweet stuff, but there was nothing that interested me. With a bored stare, my eyes scanned the shelves, but then I saw something shine in the corner of my eye.
"Magic Manipulator, huh" I swiped the item off of the shelf, and quickly paid for it before Lucy came out. I heard her approaching, though, and panicking, I stuffed the pendant into my pocket, and looked around for a place to throw out the receipt. Finding none, I ate the paper, cringing at the overly salty taste of the paper in my mouth. Who knew that trees were salty? Shaking my head, I watched Lucy skip out from behind a shelf, holding 5 jewel embedded chains, along with some miniature figures that I couldn't see because her hand was blocking them, Shrugging, I offered to pay, but was refused, and watched her friendly interaction with the cashier, who was, to my disregard, male. As we walked out, he waved to Lucy, and Lucy waved back, but once she had her back turned, I sent a death glare that made the poor man faint. Smirking, I walked out with my companion, satisfied with my work.
Lucy's POV
I was happy with my purchase. I had bought multiple chains, and tags for each of them, so that I could section off my keys. We stopped at a park, and say under a large tree on top of a small hill. Sting sat down, next to me so that we were shoulder to shoulder. I was a little embarrassed at the contact, but dropped my gaze down to my over crowded chain. Taking it off from my belt, I unhooked all of the keys from it carefully, and placed them on a handkerchief that I always brought around with me. Taking the old chain, I placed it one of my pockets, making a mental note to clean it later. Taking out my new chains and the tags, I began to group my keys. Taking a simple dragon charm, I hooked it onto an emerald adorned, green chain, and put all of my regular dragon keys onto it. Placing the small chain onto my belt, I proceeded to the other chains. Taking a sapphire blue chain, I hooked an intricately designed dragon this time, and put on all of my Reborn Soul gate keys on carefully. Setting them aside, I hung all of my Tortured Soul gates onto a blood red chain, with a Roaring Dragon charm. Sighing in content with my dragon gates, I took a gold chain and hung on all of my zodiacs. Taking the last, silver chain, I hooked up all of my silver keys, and I was happy with my organization. Multiple, small and organized chains were way better and easier to handle than one large, overcrowded chain where I could barely pick out one key without having all of the others fall off with it. I smiled, happy with myself, and carefully reinforced the chains onto my belt, standing up and jumping a bit to make sure that they didn't fall off. Looking to Sting expectantly, I was surprised to see him asleep. Watching him for a bit, I grinned. He was considerate enough to go shopping with me, then stay with me while I did something as boring as organizing keys, something he barely knew anything about. Ruffling his hair a little, I was in a happy mood. March was a wonderful month, wasn't it? Twirling under the tree, I felt like dancing. So that's what I did. I did little twirls and jumps around the base of the tree, waiting for Sting to wake up. I didn't gain any attention, so I happily continued my dance. When I saw him stir, I had a brilliant idea pop into my head. Crouching right in front of him, I put my face really close to his, and waited for him to open his eyes.
Fluttering open, I saw his bright blue orbs bore into my brown ones, and when I saw his look of confusion, I dropped the bomb.
"Boo" I whispered, and he jumped up, freaked out. I rolled on the grass, laughing as I watched him jump up and hit his head on a branch, then fall down on his butt.
"Seriously?!" He exclaimed in protest at my laughing, but he cracked a grin of his own as well. March was a wonderful month, wasn't it?
Master's POV
I watched my children converse, all happy and healthy. Smiling to myself, I breathed a sigh of relief. Who knows what would've happened if Lucy didn't come to save us? I really need to be more careful. But for know, I have a feeling that Kukyo will be the least of our worries. I don't know why, but I feel as if we won't be seeing him for a while, for I felt something else creeping up on our tails.
Mavis' POV
When Kukyo came in, I couldn't do anything; I was too scared to move. I'm glad that Lucy was here, she was always a strong wizard. However I faintly detected Zeref's aura around her. Could it be…? I had been searching for him, but he had always run away from me. I wasn't mad anymore, he was cursed, and he couldn't help that. Evil did weird things to you, saying that from personal experience. More than Zeref, though, I'm worried about what Lucy is planning. She's planning to interfere with whatever Kukyo is coming up with, and Time Ark interference never turns out good. The last person who did that was one of my friends, Damon, and he… he aged so quickly to the point of dying in mere days after he had deflected a time ark spell. I shuddered at the thought of my friend. I didn't want that to happen to Lucy, but, for once, I didn't have a battle plan. I had some time, though. Kukyo was busy right now, so we don't have to worry about him. However, with all of the bad things happening to us, I can't help but wonder what other forms of torture fate has in store for us…
Sting's POV
We had walked out of the park, and was now going back to the guild. I received a call, though, so we had stopped in a café, where We had ordered a quick drink, and I retreated to a corner to take my call. Sipping my latte, I answered my phone.
"Hello?
"WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU, STING?!" a voice screamed into my ear, and I moved the phone away. Cringing, I laughed nervously.
"Hehe, well, you see, Minerva…" I began to explain, but the demon cut me off.
"DON'T GIVE ME THAT CRAP! WHY THE HELL AREN'T YOU AT THE GUILD?! DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH PAPERWORK THERE IS TO DO?! AND I SURE AS HELL AINT GONNA BABY YOU THIS TIME AROUND, SO YOU AND ROGUE BETTER GET YOUR ASSES HERE PRONTO, COMPRENDE?" Minerva shouted, and I cringed once again, both at her loud voice and crude language. With a quiet whimper, she hung up and I slumped against a wall. Lucy then came up to me.
"Minerva?" She asked, and I numbly nodded, knowing that she probably heard Minerva's loud voice. Wait… wasn't she across the room though?
"Well, I need to go pick up Rogue and take my leave. Sorry about that…" I sheepishly rubbed the back of my neck, and Lucy waved it off with her usual smile.
"Nah, it's no problem. I heard her, anyways, since, you know… hehe, never mind" Lucy cut herself off, and started to walk nervously past me, but I caught her arm.
"Continue" I ordered, and she sighed.
"We'll talk while we walk, okay?" She offered, and I nodded. Following her out of the café after paying the bill for us, I didn't take her hand this time, since it took all of my willpower and energy not to blush and stutter when I took her hand before. Instead, I stuffed my hands into my pockets, and let my eyes wander around the streets, trying to make it seem like walking here with Lucy didn't just make this the best day of my life.
"So?" I questioned her, breaking the silence between us.
"I'm not going to sugar coat my words, so I guess that I'll just tell you straight. I'm a dragon slayer. And I repeat do not bombard me with questions. You can ask Rogue to explain things to you later" She said that last part sternly, and I was shell-shocked.
"Oh…" I mumbled, seeing how that made a lot of sense, and how that answered a lot of questions. An awkward silence was made, each of us trying to look anywhere except each other. Dragon slayer… that's how she knew it was mating season. That makes sense… Thinking about it, I blushed, and she did too, probably picking up on what I was thinking. If that was the case, the probability of her being my mate had just increased by tenfold. SO… wow. We locked eyes for a moment, and then looked away from each other again, hurriedly. When we came to the guild, I kicked down the door, hiding my nervousness with my smirk. Always works… just put on your mask…
"Yo, Rogue! We have to go back to the guild before Minerva kicks our asses!" I yelled out, and Rogue appeared from my shadow. He nodded, and, waving to everyone, we walked away. I stole one last glance behind me, and saw Lucy smiling at us. Darting my eyes forwards again, I put on my mask, hiding my true emotions from everyone.
Lucy's POV
That was… awkward, to be put in the least. I shook my head, and tore my gaze away from Sting's retreating figure. Looking around and immediately spotting a tuff of salmon, I saw Natsu talking happily with Lisanna, and thought against calling out for him. He could meet Igneel later. Walking to my usual spot, I ordered my usual drink, as usual. Everything seemed normal, as if I hadn't just made the most embarrassing discovery of my life. My first mating season was going to be a hectic one. Mira walked over, and handed me my drink with a smile.
"Thanks, Mira. I don't know how you're able to do this everyday" I commented, watching her as she prepared multiple dishes in one go. She just laughed in modesty, and my admiration for her grew. Mira had been my role model even before I had joined the guild. Smiling, I didn't notice when the guild doors flew open.
"LUCY!" A familiar voice yelled, and everyone stopped what they were doing to turn around and look at the figure standing in the doorway. I turned around, as well, and my eyes widened as I saw who was standing there. Childhood best friend, most popular kid in school, powerful mage, my hero… Jay Turront. Gaping, I looked at him as his eyes frantically searched around the guild, and then his gaze locked onto mine. Smiling, he plowed into me, sending me to the ground with a bone crushing hug.
Still shocked, I whispered out, my voice hoarse.
"Jay…?
"Lucy!"
"Jay…?"
"Lucy!"
"Jay…?!'
"Lucy!"
"JAY?!"
"LUCE!" At this point we were just screaming at each other, and everyone watched in wonder. Jay got off of me, and helped me up. Snapping back to reality, I immediately hugged him back.
"Omigosh! Where have you been all my life?!" I exclaimed at my friend.
"I can say the same to you!" Jay said, laughing. But then, his expression turned serious.
"As heartwarming as this is, I have something important to say to you…" He held me by the shoulders, and looked at me straight in the eye. Then, Mira converted to her Satan Soul, and screeched out.
"NO! YOU CANNOT RUIN STINGLU! YOU HAVE TO GO THROUGH ME!" Mira yelled, and charged at us. Jay just blinked a few times before dodging and speaking up.
"StingLu? Is that a ship name…? LUCY, YOU HAVE A BOYFRIEND?!" Jay exclaimed, but then patted me on the back, flashing a thumbs up at me. I sweat dropped as this caused more commotion, and the guild was now in utter chaos. Yelling out, I stopped everyone in their tracks.
"NO, I DO NOT!" I yelled, and things calmed down. Jay laughed at my guild's hectic routine, and looked at me again.
"Well, whatever's going on, I have to warn you. Luce, you're in danger. I came here so I could protect you…" Jay said, then leaned in to whisper something in my ear.
"Remember that guild we once beat up when we ran away? Wizard hunters. They're back… they're after us. We need to be careful…" Jay whispered, but I laughed.
"Bro, that's nothing. I have freaking Acnologia and dragons stronger than that!" I exclaimed, and Jay chuckled, apparently not nervous anymore.
"Really? Just what I'd expect from you, but… Their master is Zeref…" Jay whispered again, and my eyes widened. Let's see… how does one defeat someone immortal? No clue. Or… My eyes held a devious gleam. I leaned forward on my tippy toes, and whispered back.
"Divide and conquer. Trap the king in checkmate" I recalled the boring games of chess that my father made me learn, saying that I would have to play games with 'grace and sophistication'. I also remember that one time Jay was dragged into it, too. Jay groaned, and I laughed.
"You can stay over at my place" I offered, and he accepted. Walking out of the stunned guild hall, I began to interrogate him.
"How did you know where I was? And why did you decide to come? Weren't you in another kingdom altogether?" I asked, curious.
"One at a time! I saw you in a Sorcerer's Weekly article, I came to protect you because I bumped into Wizard Hunters and they threatened me before I got away, and then, yes, I was in another kingdom. But then I decided to come here because of answer number two" Jay answered my questions diligently, all in one breath. I laughed, since it was so like Jay to do that. He raised a brow questioningly.
"So, how's life?" I asked, wanting to catch up with my childhood bestie.
"Well, I got married, and I'm in a wizard guild called Serpent Legends. Other than that, there's nothing else major. I live a normal life" I listened with interest.
"Really?! Who's the lucky girl?" I teased, and Jay blushed.
"Remember Nina…?" He asked uncertainly, bringing up my other childhood BFF. My mouth dropped to the floor, and I squealed in excitement.
"I'm TOTALLY being a godmother, you understand me?" I ordered, and he blushed deeper at what I was implying. Regaining his composure, it was is turn to interrogate.
"What about you?" he asked, and my smile faltered. He seemed to notice this, but didn't say anything. Putting up my façade again, I began my own story.
"I'm in Fairy Tail, as you know, and my crush sort of had a girlfriend… he was my best friend here. But then they broke up, but I'm already over him. He's my BFF! Right now, I'm part dragon slayer, and I think I might've found my mate…" I said, a bit uncertain at how Jay would react.
"OMG! Are you serious?!" He exclaimed, excitement in his eyes. I nodded, and he fist pumped the air.
"Really?! Did you learn any other magic?" He asked excitedly. So like him to ask about that. I nodded, excited myself, too.
"I have teleportation, elemental card, dragon slaying, and, as you already know, celestial magic and the caster side of it" I explained, silently gloating. He looked at me in awe.
"COOL!" That reminded me of that reporter Jason… I giggled, and he continued to look at me. We got to my apartment building, in which I have been able to keep up with my rent, which is always surprising. Letting him into my room, he looked around, and nodded in approval. Shaking my head, I let him use the bath, while I took out the spare clothes that I had bought for when Gray and Natsu come over. Throwing them to him, I flopped onto the bed. Today was weird… but nice. As heard the water turn on, though, I frowned. First, there was Kukyo, and now there's Zeref after me?! Well, Kukyo doesn't seem like he'll make a move anytime soon, so I don't really have to worry about that. For now, I need to think about Zeref, and what he wants with my guild, Jay, and I. He was immortal, for Pete's sake…
Immortality, huh?
You guys can probably guess the ending of this. I know, sad, but I thought that it would be the best way to end this story. I'm not sure how many chapters are left, but I do know that this story is going to end soon. Who knows, though, maybe I'll make up to 30 chapters? Wow, that'll be a big feat. Anyway, I just watched episode 99 of Fairy Tail Zero, and I cried my eyes out! Because of that, I wasn't really in the mood to write some action scenes today, so I decided that I would just drop a simple surprise bomb at the end! Hehe, hope you like the story so far, please comment and review!