An: Sorry for leaving you guys hanging last chapter, hopefully this one answers any and all questions you had.
Sorry for any mistakes I tried to catch them all.
Enjoy!
Rogue POV
Groggily opening my eyes, I stared into darkness waiting for my senses to awaken before I was able to take in the surrounding area; I was lying on my back on the hard, jagged ground of a cave that had no openings to speak of which made me question how I had gotten here in the first place. To the side there were several shapes that I couldn't identify in my current position, but I assumed they were prisoners like myself. Slowly sitting up to get a better look I let loose a groan as my body protested the movement, and my head began pounding fiercely. Feeling the cavern spin I bowed my head forward resting it on my knees and closed my eyes, waiting for the dizziness to fade. Once everything had stopped spinning I touched the back of my head and felt around for the source of my headache and dizziness. My hands met with dried blood coating the majority of my hair and scalp, along with a tender huge bump that encompassed most of my head.
While I checked myself of other injuries I tried to remember what had happened before I blacked out. Snippets of my encounter with the crazy bear and even crazier red head flashed through my head; the last thing I remembered was agreeing to trust the bear before everything went blank. The bear did keep her end of the bargain; I'm still alive… even if it doesn't feel like it at the moment. I thought as I laid back down to help my still pounding head.
"Rogue, are you alright?" A familiar voice asked from across the cave. Turning my head towards the voice I peeked up to find Juvia limping towards me. Glad to see her alive I moved to get up but stopped myself when the room began spinning again.
"Dizzy." I moaned.
At my response she nodded her head in understanding. "That's because they tossed you down here like a sack of vegetables, Juvia saw it when the grate above opened. That she bitch was upset about something and was yelling at the nice bear, right before you fell in. She was yelling something about stealing your shadows as they went away."
"...stealing my shadows?" I yelled, forgetting the consequences of my earlier attempt to rise and sat up too quickly, grabbing my head again I squeezed my eyes closed when the room spun round and round. For several minutes I stared at the inside of my eyelids as the room continued to spin, even with my eyes closed I could feel my body swaying with the fake rotations and felt my stomach begin to churn. Just when I thought that I'd begin heaving the room suddenly stopped and my stomach was able to calm down when cool water covered my head, relieving some of the pain. Gingerly opening my eyes I looked to find Juvia still glancing at me in concern knowing the question was on the tip of her tongue I waved it off and mustered up a small smile to show her I was fine. "Thanks." I mumbled before slowly scooting backwards towards the short table that had bones littered atop of it. Once I had made it the few feet to the table I leaned against it; taking several deep breaths before I attempted to feel for my magic.
"Rogue, Juvia thinks you shouldn't be doing that. The she bitch said these pits-" Feeling for my magic I found it and began to draw it out, ignoring Juvia's warning.
"Ahhhh!" I yelped, wishing I had had the sense to listen to her.
"-are warded against the use of magic." Juvia finished a little too late as I fell sideways on to the floor and began withering in pain. Vaguely I heard movement around me but was too preoccupied with the constant stabbing pain that was occurring in my head to track see who it was.
"Here this will help." A new voice said as that same someone helped me to sit up slowly and put a cup to my lips.
"Sting?" I asked around the lid of the cup ice cold water was tipped into my dry mouth.
"About time you got here, though I thought it'd be to release us, not join us." Sting joked. "How did they catch you? Ow! What was that for?"
"You're pouring water down his throat, now isn't the time to be asking him questions. Let him get his bearings before we make him think too much." Minerva said from behind Sting.
Pushing away the now empty cup I opened my eyes to look at me best friend and my guild master, but all I saw where blurs as my head continued to pound. "How long does this pain last?" I whispered, afraid that if I spoke too loud it would make my head pound even more.
"How would I know?" Sting scoffed tossing the cup to the side before sitting down next to me.
"Please, you're worse than me, I know you would have tried to reach your magic more than once." I said, feeling the pain lessen a bit, my closed eyes and lack of movement likely speeding up the process.
At that Minerva let out a booming laugh as Sting kicked at the dirt and mumbled something under his breath.
"What was that?" I asked unable to hide my smirk.
"I said give it another two hours and you should be good. Though, your head will pound until you get some sleep…but you won't be able to do that for a few hours." He said glancing at the smooth portion of the cave's walls before glancing at the two girls.
"What, what aren't you telling me?" I asked, examining the smooth areas of the walls that I had over looked during my initial sweep of the room.
"We don't expect you to help this time, but once your better it will be nice to have an extra set of hands." Juvia said vaguely.
"Those smooth portions of the wall are actually doors… every eight hours the 'she bitch' as Juvia calls her opens up the roof and watches as she releases various wild beasts and deranged mages loose into this room. We have been fighting them for at least a week now and each time they are released they get stronger and harder to beat. Luckily our blocks on our magic are taken off so we have some semblance of chance to beat them." Minerva said, obviously pissed off because she was at a disadvantage in a fight for the first time.
"Why not escape when you got your powers back?" I asked receiving glares in return from the three of them.
"We tried that once and we nearly escaped. If it hadn't been for that bear I would have slit that bitches neck with my Light Dragon Claw, or Juvia would have locked her in a sphere of water, but the bear kept stepping in between us and taking the hits instead. So the she bitch was able to activate the wards again and release twice the amount of beasts and mages for us to fight. Let's just say we do not want to piss her off again unless we know we can escape for sure."
"That damn bear! She did the same thing to me right before I got captured." I snarled, fed up with the bear's interference.
"That bear is saving our lives." Juvia said to deaf ears as I told Minerva and Sting how I came to be here. Mid-way through my story of what I found and been up to for the past five weeks, all three of us were splashed with a wave of water. Turning towards the water mage that didn't look the least bit guilty or sorry we all glared at her. "Juvia was trying to say that the bear isn't the problem, we are. By blocking all of our attacks, Juvia thinks the bear is trying to tell us that we can't hurt her with our magic. When Juvia heard the she bitch ranting about stealing Rogue's shadows, everything made sense. Juvia thinks that if a magic attack hits the Abastor bitch then it will allow her to steal our powers."
"That is the most ridiculo-"
Putting a staying hand on Sting's arm I thought for a minute. "Wait Sting, that actually makes sense actually. Ayame, the bear, did say that if I attacked her I would die, and that she would consume me and my powers."
"Stealing other mage's magic for personal use is illegal, and if someone could possible possess that many different powers they would go insane, plus there is no way that's an actual power. We would have heard about it by now!" Minerva scoffed in disbelief.
"People are always drudging up the ancient magics and there's no guessing how many have been lost over the centuries, so it's not completely impossible My Lady." I defended the possibility.
A grating noise sounded above us as light poured into the cave, temporarily blinding me and the others. Once I could see past the light I saw Ayame and our captor looking down at us.
"Angelica shouldn't we give him some more time, he just woke up-"
"Shut it, you're the one who prevented me from having my fun earlier so you have no say in this now." She said, violently yanking the collar and making Ayame fall to the ground none too gently. As if she had purposely provoked Angelica and knew that she would throw her to the ground Ayame took the moment to toss something down at me without her anyone else noticing, before resuming a sprawled out position on the ground. Sticking my legs out before me I caught the object on top of them, and then quickly spread my legs to hide it before she looked back down here. With an evil cackle she dragged Ayame with her as she walked a few feet to a panel with a series of buttons.
"Now before we begin let's go over the rules shall we so we don't have any insane thoughts of escape like last time." Angelica said glaring at Sting, Minerva and Juvia. "As you have already figured out Rogue, there is a ward blocking all magical use within the caves, that is, until I turn them off. But I will only turn off the wards when I open the two doors, when they are opened you will have to fight to the death to survive, anything less than death blows will result in yours – weakness will not be tolerated once my master has risen, so think of this as the beginning stages of the purge." Finding that funny somehow she threw her head back and began laughing. "If you, at any point attempt to flee the battle your magic will be stripped from you along with the rest of your friends' and you will have to fight without it.
"Any questions, no? Good, let the fight begin!"
She shouted in excitement as she brought her hand down hard on the control panel. As a result an even harsher noise than before overtook the room as the two doors swung open releasing the creatures and humans that had been locked away.
Death blows... Not even Sabertooth did death blows anymore, not since Minerva took over. Looking at the others to see their reaction I cringed when I saw all three of them glance away to hide their guilty looks. I didn't blame them really, not if it meant the difference between life and death, but I knew neither one of them saw it that way.
Pressing my legs into the object I had been given, I made a decision then and there. I vowed to find a way to escape with the others even if it meant blindly trusting Ayame then so be it.
Phoenix POV
"Old friend you must heal Lucy Heartfilia, she is the only chance we have at defeating my daughter." The Spirit King said followed by a chorus of agreements from the entire Spirit World community.
Spirits, friends who had tried to save me at the beginning of my down fall, they all surrounded me with varying looks of worry, fear, anger and forgiveness. I deserved all of those looks, all of them except for forgiveness. I should have known better than to blindly follow Polaris and my master at the time, their schemes and actions had sent off signals in my head telling me to cut ties with both of them but I ignored the warning signs and fell deeper into the darkness.
It was hard being back in the Spirit World the only place I had called home had been out of reach for so long, I longed to remain here permanently but I knew that wasn't possible not with how most of them were looking at me now.
"As I told the mage that freed me I won't do it, no I can't do it. Technically she is alive but the amount of damage that has been done, and the state of her mind is too far gone for me to repair."
"That's a load of bull Nick! I've seen you bring someone back from the brink of death, reattach limbs and in some cases re-grow new organs, so you should be able to heal Lucy."
"Yes I've done all of that and more, but never on the same person at the same time. I know she doesn't need any limbs reattached but in her case she has been on the brink of death for quite some time and is in desperate need of new organs, not one new organ all new organs. Healing her would take all of what magic I can access right now which would kill me, and to put so much strain on her body to accept all new organs and to jerk her from limbo would be too stressful on her." I said tiredly.
I had told Natsu, that it depended on her condition and whether or not she deserved to be healed, so on the way to Fairy Tail the three mages proceeded to tell me her life story, and how she had helped almost everyone she came in contact with. They told me about how she willingly let the Infinity Clock absorb her without knowing if she would survive, how she gives everyone second chances no matter how much they had hurt her, and how she goes out of her way to make sure everyone around her is happy. As I had listened, for I had no other choice but to, I thought that there was no way someone could be so selfless, and caring. No way would someone put herself on the line for her spirits, when almost every Celestial Mage in the past had worked us to the bone, and couldn't care less about our wants and needs. No way could she touch so many lives, that they would all come together to save her, but the moment I landed in front of her guild I knew the three of them hadn't been lying and that she was worth saving.
Every single person there had worry and sadness oozing off of them and it wasn't just her guild mates there were several different marks visible as they surrounded me as I landed. All of them hopeful that Natsu had found a cure; if that wasn't enough to show me how loved and worthy she was of being saved then seeing what remained of the spirits joining together to protest my decision definitely showed me.
I wanted to heal her. Not just for her sake, but for everybody else's too. If what everyone said was true then she is our only hope of defeating Polaris,
"But you won't be healing her alone!" Loke shouted, stepping forward with something in his hands. Shoving the piece of paper at me I looked down at it and read.
Dear Mr. Phoenix,
My name is Wendy Marvell and I am one of the healers that has been taking care of Lucy since she entered her coma. Constantly healing her for nearly a month I know the toll that comes with healing others all too well and understand why you may find healing Lucy a daunting task, but you won't be alone as you do it. I know that you have centuries of experience while Chelia, another healer, and I only have a tiny fraction of that but we will be with you every step of the way, you only need ask for us to do something and we will do it or find some way to get it done.
If our presence does nothing to change your mind then please tell us what is needed to heal her and we will do it on our own. Lucy means the world to me, to all of us, so we cannot just give up on her when we have come so far and are so close to saving her.
On behalf of the entire guild we are begging you for you to help in any way you can.
Sincerely,
Wendy Marvell and Fairy Tail
Looking up from the letter I stared at Loke in disbelief. "There hasn't been another healer in ages, and now there are two? How?"
"Wendy is a Wind Dragon Slayer and Chelia is a Wind God Slayer." Loke waved the topic off and stepped even closer. "Will you reconsider? Hell, we'll even unlock the rest of your powers if you do this."
Hearing numerous gasps, I continued my look of disbelief, especially when I heard the Spirit King clearing his throat. "Old friend that is not wise-"
"Screw wise! My friend and master is dying down there, and there hasn't been anything we could do about it during the past month. If giving Nick accesses to the rest of his powers will get him to agree to heal Lucy then let's do it. It's your fault she's in this situation to begin with, if you had told us sooner, we would have been preparing longer and wouldn't have gained the Abastors' attention. Then Lucy wouldn't be in this situation."Stunned because I had never heard the leader of the Zodaics speak to the Spirit King that way I watched as the rest of the Zodiacs had to drag him away before he did something he regretted.
"Fine your powers will be returned to you as long as you agree to heal Lucy Heartfilia." The Spirit King said begrudgingly.
Lucy must mean more to the king, more than a means to an end. I thought surprised that he had let a human get close to him, something he hadn't done in all of the time I had known him.
"Even with my full powers and the two healers it still doesn't change the fact that Lucy's body may reject the healing after it's been through so much already. There are all sorts of complications that could arise, not to mention the consequences of infusing so much celestial magic into a human. She may become reliant on the Spirit World as most of us are."
"No one cares about all of that, we just need you to save her and we will deal with the consequences when we get there." Aquarius said, still tightly wrapped in Scorpio's arms.
Seeing everyone else nod in agreement I let loose a sigh of defeat and walked towards the king, ready for him to give me back my powers. "Fine, I'll do it, but remember I tried to warn you all of the consequences."
Feeling my half empty magical reserves suddenly fill up I closed my eyes at the rush I felt. For once since I was banished I finally felt complete; I was back where I belonged and my powers were as they should be but I was afraid of what would happen if this healing went down hill, as I suspected it would.
An: Hope you all enjoyed it!
Amethystra: Good Ohh or bad Ohh?
Alaina Kuski: Yup, they haven't had a very good run of things lately. :(
nicole143mb: :)
artificialartofficial: Thanks! The spirits disappeared because the King wanted to speak to Nick and he sent Capricorn to get him since he isn't allowed into the Spirit World on his own.
LHeart: Thank you!