"Lyon, we need a favor."
Lyon blinked several times, looking up from his ipad as Sting strode right up to him with a look that said that something was needed and needed now. Juvia moved closer to Lyon, trying to meld her body to his as the silver haired man narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the men before him.
"And what 'favor' would it be that you seek, Eucliffe?"
"Can you trace this back to its original source?"
Lyon blinked, thrown off by the request. He opened his mouth and was about to ask what the blonde was talking about when Sting, as if reading his mind, held out a small plastic bag that held what looked to be a microchip. Lyon's brows furrowed together into a tight knit and reached out and took it from Sting's hand and look it over in his own hand. He studied it carefully, onyx eyes narrowed into snake-like slits as he studied the object in his hand, barely flinching as the light flickered at him.
"Yeah. If we can get under a microscope, I can look up the serial number and run into the database."
"Great!" Sting smiled, clapping and rubbing his hands together. "We can all head to Sabertooth and use my office then."
"Will Rogue be joining us then?" Lyon asked, looking up to the blonde. "I heard he's pretty good with technology."
"No." Sting shivered before shaking his head. "He's going to stay with Natsu. Doesn't want to part with him right now..."
"But- What about Natsu?" Lucy piped up, suddenly standing up. She stared down the long hall that lead to his room eyes wide with terror. "Will he and Rogue be okay here? By themselves? With- With that nasty man- That monster- Just on the other side of this building?"
"You might have a point there, Blondie," Laxus said eyebrow raised. He turned to Freed. "Freed!"
"Yes?" Freed stood straight.
"You are to stay here with Rogue. The others are welcome to stay as well." Laxus said, pointing toward the hall. "Gray, Gajeel, Lyon and I will head with Sting to the Sabertooth Guild. Call me if anything goes wrong, even if it's just a hiccup, I wanna hear about it! I'll send Evergreen over. Just in case..."
"And Bickslow?" Freed asked, looking a bit weary but hopeful at the same time.
"Don't know where he is... Haven't seen the smartass in over 2 years now." Laxus growled, turning to look at his grandfather who returned his look.
Gray blinked. Did he miss something?
"I see..." replied Freed, looking a bit down. "Oh well..."
Laxus sighed before he gathered the downed man into his arms in a tight embrace. He rested his head atop of the green hair before placing a soft kiss into the soft locks while Freed hummed.
"Look after Natsu and Rogue," Laxus breathed. "And please- Please be safe."
"I will." Freed smiled, as Laxus captured his lips into a sweet chaste kiss. "I promise."
"Good," Laxus smiled. "I should be home before dinner tonight."
"Be safe." Freed replied before blushing, "I love you."
A pause.
"I love you too baby."
The trip to the Sabertooth Guild wasn't as bad of a journey as Gray previously thought or basically when he and Fairy Tail last made their trek to Sabertooth. They simply stepped out of the hospital but making a quick stop at the front desk for the Vitullo kit and then they were on their way. The Sabertooth hall was actually only a simple walk away and all they had to do was walk a few blocks and then, low and behold, there was the guild hall. Barely a rock throw away from the hospital.
'Pretty convenient.' Gray thought. He chanced a glance toward Sting. 'I wonder why-'
They went right through the double door with Sting leading them straight to his office, ignoring the many questions and looks his employees shot in his direction. Not that Gray could blame them. If he was head of a guild and he suddenly brought in members from both Fairy Tail and Lamia Scale, of course, questions were bound to arise. That immediately made Gray think back on what Laxus said about Bickslow.
Sure-
It wasn't really news that Bickslow, Evergreen, Freed and occasionally, Laxus, tend to disappear at odd and inconvenient occasions. Heck, they were hardly seen anyhow since Freed was more of a stay-at-home-mom type, trying to get back into college so he along with the other three worked graveyard shifts. But if Laxus hadn't seen or didn't know where one of his group had gone then this was news. Bickslow may be odd to the point that many called him 'creepy' and 'freaky', but if there was one good quality about him, it was that he was extremely loyal to Laxus and to Fairy Tail.
So why did Bickslow disappear and without telling Laxus?
Gray was immediately shaken from his thoughts the minute Sting stopped in front of a large door at the end of a large hallway. He pulled out a set of keys and began to unlock it before pushing it open and ushering them in.
"In here."
The office was pretty spacious, rivaling that of an average studio apartment. Two large desks occupied the room, one overflowing with paperwork while the other was neat and clean as the day it may have been purchased, bookshelves that carried boxes and books stood behind each; one clean, the other in disarray, and by not looking at the name plaques on the wooden surfaces, it didn't take a genius to figure out whose desk was whose.
"We'll be using Rogue's computer," said Sting, placing himself behind the cleaner desk of the two and began typing away on the computer. "It'll be better and faster."
"Why?" Gajeel smirked. "Is it cause you can't seem to find yours?"
"No." Sting huffed, puffing his face up child-like. "It's cause Rogue's computer's got the cooler stuff on it you asshat."
"Gi hi hi. Sure."
Sting's eyes narrowed childishly. "I really don't like you."
"Who cares?" Laxus suddenly growled, folding his arms. "Let's locate the bastard already."
"Fine. Lyon, if you will." Sting gestured to the seat he just vacated.
Lyon nodded and moved around the desk, placing himself onto the soft leather seat and quickly made himself comfortable as he set his backpack onto the floor. While Sting pulled down a microscope from the bookcase behind him, he began pulling out items from his bag including his own laptop, pens and paper, the microchip, the Vitullo kit and...
"Is that my truck's navigation system?"
Gray had to do a double take. There was no mistaking it; it was definitely the little black box that used to be in his truck and as Gray was about to ask how they got it when dimly recalled that his truck sunk to the bottom of a man-made lake when his memory quickly kicked in the explanation; Laxus and that had Gray face palming. He completely forgot about Laxus fishing both it and Montoya out of the waters after saving Rogue that allowed them to apprehended Montoya and forced him to reveal Natsu's location in the light of the current situation.
"God damn it." He breathed, burying his face into his hands. "I fucking forgot."
Lyon chuckled. "Yes- Well, I'm going to need it."
"Why?" Gajeel asked, leaning over the desk slightly. "We have the DNA and the chip. Can't we nail the bastard that way?"
"We could but here's the flaw," Lyon replied in a bored tone and a roll of the eyes as he started booting up his own computer. "DNA, unfortunately, is only limited to the person's identity. Not their current location as we currently know that Natsu's kidnapper has been out of jail for probably a majority of his life prior to his breakout. So, obviously, the location he last had on any guild's files could be currently be occupied by someone else or might have been demolished by order of a higher power."
"But we have this micro- whatever- thing."
"Yes but while we may have the chip, it can also lead us to dead end." Lyon replied. "If we're not careful."
"How?"
"Microchips, in a way, are just like cellphones," Lyon explained, as he hooked the laptop up to Rogue's hard drive and began carefully angling the chip underneath the microscope. "They both send out signals that often need to be amplified in order to be detected or received by the opposite end, mostly by towers and or satellites because their wavelengths can only travel so far before they fall flat."
He looked up at them all, with a funny smile on his face.
"And thankfully for us, they're both easy to intercept thanks to their easy to do hacking systems. While we may be able to rule that Natsu must have been held somewhere in the Dark Woods- For why else would he have turned up the way he did?- But we're also going to need the exact location of where he was held and hopefully that's where your truck's navigation system might come in handy, Gray."
"How?" Gray asked. "Wouldn't they have deleted the location off of it, prior before attempting to kidnap Rogue and water-logging my truck?"
"Yes but the search engine leaves behind an electronic signature every time its been used," Lyon answered waving his hand dismissively as he peered into the microscope and began typing. "So your truck's navigation system would have stored the information into its memory banks. Which is good, since apparently our chip's serial number puts it as it was home made and it's base has a rather large signal mass since it has been picked up by three cellphone towers..."
They all quickly gathered around Lyon and his miniature lab. On the computer screen they could see the satellite map of all of Fiore and there around the entire Dark Woods was four large red circles merged.
"Now we add the truck's last known navigation from about as far back as 24 hours..."
Lyon clicked away at the computer before pulling out several different USB cords from out of his bag and hooking them up to both computers and the black box. With his tongue between his teeth, he furiously typed before checking Rogue's computer screen before returning to his own and digging through the files on the black box until-
"Done." Lyon said with pride before leaning back in the chair and folding his arms behind his head.
They all blinked in awe as they stared at the computer screen. The large radius was brought down to a single pinprick that was centered a little to left-hand side in the Dark Woods. Gray blinked before he smiled.
"Let's go give this place a ring."
"Right."
The return trip to the Woods was not only a bit more but also very frustrating.
They managed to drive their way back to the site of Natsu's hit and run where they relied solely on Gray's water-damaged navigation system to lead them after they came to the location from where they found Natsu. It was made briefly difficult as without Lyon to explain how to hook it up properly to his laptop that he lent them or even activate it since he remained behind at Sabertooth to test the rape kit given to them with Yukino and Rufus, it was a little challenging but Gray took a shot in the dark and somehow- which Gray attributed to dumb luck- succeeded into getting it to work. They discovered that the location they sought was a little farther south from where they were and where they found Natsu but what confused them was that the signal seemed to resonate from deep into the woods, away from the road. According to both the computer and the navigation box, there was supposedly a path somewhere that the Gray's truck last took that lead to the signal so they all got out of Lyon's car and began searching the surrounding area for the mystery path.
"HEY! I FOUND IT!"
They all quickly joined Gajeel as he held aside the thick branches of a ancient weeping willow and point a bright LED flashlight down to a worn dirt road that was hidden beneath the canopy of thick trees, ivy and brush. Gray quickly checked the laptop to make sure and it seemed to confirm that this indeed was the road they sought.
"Clever," Laxus breathed, a dark smirk twisting on his lips. "Not only did they hide well from us but they also made sure it was hidden well from any passerby that happened to pass through the area- whether intentional or not."
Gray's face darkened. "Let's take a look, shall we?"
They all nodded before they stepped onto the path, lead by the light of Gajeel's flashlight. They walked on in silence, deeper and deeper into the darken path for about a good ten to fifteen minutes before they stumbled upon a decrepit-looking old log cabin that looked as though no one had lived in or taken proper care of it in years since its last occupation for the wood was beyond faded and weather beaten and the ivy grew up and over unchecked all over it frail looking structure. They halted and stared at it.
"Have you guys ever watched a movie called 'Cabin the Woods'?" Sting asked after a long and lengthy silence.
"Yeah."
"Once."
"Bits of it," replied Gray turning to face Sting. "Why?"
"Cause I'm being heavily reminded of it by this place..." Sting answered before his eyes widen in sudden realization. "Wait- I remember this place now-"
"You do?"
"Yeah," Sting stepped closer to the cabin before halting dead in his tracks. "There was a story I remember hearing when I was still living in the orphanage about an old man that supposedly lived in these very woods, a man who was about as bad-tempered and feral as the animals that lived here. He hated all living things and often shot the first living creature he saw- Which kinda helped bolster the Woods' reputation and kinda helped me and some other dumb little shits to do some insane tests of courage."
"Wow. He's making Porlyusica sound tame and more approachable." Laxus said, folding his arms.
"He does, doesn't he?" Sting grinned. "But rumor had it that none on had seen the old man in quite some time. Everyone, even the Council was too scared to approach these woods to figure out why- Some say he died some time ago while others say he moved away and this was before Rogue and I joined the Sabertooth Guild supposedly. Since he had no living kin on record and people around the area knew that these very woods were home to most dangerous animals and believed his spirit may now haunted it, no one dared to approach here to claim rights to the cabin-"
"Till our guy came along and decided to test the waters." Gray breathed as he walked up to front door. "That or they somehow knew each other- Shall we introduce ourselves then?"
"Oh hell yeah." Gajeel smirked cracking his knuckles as he strode up and past Gray to the door. "Allow me."
"If you insist," Gray's smile grew darker as he moved to the one side in a mock gentlemen fashion. "Then by all means Mr. Redfox, I must insist-"
"Gi hi."
SMASH
Gajeel didn't need telling twice as he suddenly brought up his foot and smashed it into the front door, knocking it clean of its hinges in one kick. He strode into the cabin along with the others with a dark grin.
"Honey, I'm home~" He sang.
The inside of the cabin was dark, devoid of life as Gajeel made his way further into the house, leaving the other three on the threshold while trying to find a light switch. After waiting outside the dark house for ten minutes and listening to Gajeel fumble around rather noisily and quietly curse in the dark, there was a click and light flooded the cabin.
"Well, that settles it then," said Laxus, eyes roaming over the interior. "Both our guys and Natsu were defiantly here."
There was no arguing that. The entire inside of the cabin was quite the opposite from the outside as it was too clean, crisp and rather polished to have been abandoned for a long time by its last owner. The cabin's interior looked as though it may have come straight out from the 70's with its walls holding traces of glitter, its furniture and wall decorations seemed to be from that decade and rather well kept. Not a sign of dirt or dust could be seen in the entire house.
"Let's split up and see what we can find," Sting breathed as he moved around Gajeel toward a hallway. "Either this bastard's here somewhere in this place or he left us a clue or something that will further screw him and Montoya."
"Right."
They split off from one another and began moving to different parts of the cabin, searching them high and low, left to right for any and everything that might tell them something or reveal them something. Gajeel searched the kitchen and dining area while Sting stripped the living room and bedrooms and Gray handled the bathrooms and the occasional closets littered here and there. In the end, all they found was articles of clothing that indeed support the fact someone was living here, half eaten food, a bag of garbage and other necessities.
Nothing.
That was until they came across the master bedroom.
"So I think I have a good idea as to where the skull we found may have come from," Laxus muttered, as he stood outside the doorway. "Looks like you weren't far off the mark about this introvert blondie..."
"Huh?" Sting blinked, moving toward the taller blonde followed by Gajeel, "What do you mean?"
"Take a look."
He did and nearly reeled back, clamping both his hands tight over his nose and mouth as the smell of death and decay overpowered him. Once Sting was able to steady himself and blink back the tears of pain, he looked back into the room and found lying on a decrepit bed in the rotting room was the remains of a human skeleton.
"I'm gonna go out a hunch here and assume your hermit's been dead for a long time," Gajeel choked, covering his own nose and mouth. "Probably have Hayden take a look see into it."
"On it." Sting gasped, moving as far away from the bedroom as possible once Laxus closed the door. "Jeez! What the hell?"
"Bastards must've killed him some time ago." Gajeel reasoned. "No other reason as to why they'd keep his body-"
"Yeah- But he's not here either," Laxus pointed out. "Must've vacated the minute he found out Natsu escaped-"
"So he would've known we were coming soon or later." Gajeel scoffed, tossing a pile of books and magazines onto the floor. "There's nothing here that can link us to him or then a body long since dead that tell us us if they killed him or croaked by himself."
"Well, we got nothing until Lyon, Rufus and Yukino get back to us," Sting pointed out, folding his arms. "But- Fuck. We've got nothing."
"He got away." Laxus agreed. "Poor kid. No idea what we're going to tell him- or Rogue-"
That was until Gray found one door at the end of the hallway that was locked.
From the inside.
"HEY! THINK I FOUND SOMETHING!" Gray called over his shoulder just as the others joined him. He rattled the door handle. "Door's locked. Gajeel can you-"
"My pleasure."
SMASH
Gajeel bought up his foot once more, and like with the first door, he brought it down in one kick. The door scrapped and clattered down a large dark staircase before crashing into a hard surface, a wall no doubt, at the end. They stared into the dark abyss that was now revealed.
"What do think waits for us?" Sting asked.
"Dunno." Gray replied as he flipped on a switch next to him flooding the staircase and its landing in light. "But let's go and find out shall we?"
They all nodded before proceeding down the stairs into a narrow hallway that lead straight into another living room to the left where Gajeel and Laxus that decided to explore with a dryer and washer hookup and to one side, a door to the right that was partially opened. Sting and Gray both approached it carefully before the inky haired man reaching a hand out and pushing the door open further causing it to creak almost anonymously. Gray's heart began pounding his rib cage as the door swung open.
Inside was a room that surly had to come from one of Lucy's cheesy romance novels. Inside the room that greeted them was a large plush bed to the right hand side of the room, a queen from the looks of it supported by a dark mahogany board base, with soft blood red satin comforter with matching sheets underneath and large bundle of black pillows that were completely thrown all over the place. The walls were painted black with dome lights clinging to its smooth surface, no windows, floor made of hardwood flooring, a dark polished table on one side of the bed and another in completely shambles, a matching wardrobe to the corner of the right and another door that lead to a bathroom that barely stone toss away from the bed with an entire interior made of the color of white and ivory. They both took deep breathes, steeled themselves and entered the room.
"There is no doubt about it," Sting breathed as he bent down and picked up a chain that was connected to one of bed's legs off of the floor. "Natsu was held here."
"And raped here." Gray snarled as his eyes roamed over the bed and landed on a familiar crusted stain that was mixed with another familiar but dark red stain.
"Hey. There's a blood pool here." Sting said pointing to a small dark puddle. "Looks fresh. You think it's Natsu's?"
"Probably but I really don't think so," Gray muttered, crouching down to his knees and studying the puddle. "Yeah- he was already banged up before Erza's car got him but-"
He bit his lip.
"But?"
"I don't recall seeing a wound on him that would cause this prior to the accident or even seen a blood trail in or around the cabin," Gray muttered racking his brain carefully. "Most of the wounds that caused major bleeding were after he was hit by the car- Some were even internal."
"You think it's our missing kidnapper's then?"
"Possible." Gray looked up. "I noticed that this bedside table had its leg ripped clean off and it's on the foot of the bed other there."
"So- Natsu fought back?"
"Mostly likely," Gray smiled, his entire form filled with pride. Always the fighter his baby was. "Natsu probably found the time to tear the leg off when both kidnappers slash rapists were away one night then clubbed our missing guy probably sometime while we had Montoya and made his getaway while the bastard struggled with his state of consciousness."
Sting beamed with pride, pumping his fist. "That's my baby brother."
Gray beamed as well as he made to stand up. He was proud to say the least, that even the most horrid faces of evil, Natsu's fiery spirit couldn't be broken. They continued exploring the room further, finding a key ring of keys in the toilet- both men refused to touching that- a wardrobe full of, for the politer word, toys that had Sting utter words of anger and utter disgust- as well as a make a few obscene gestures- and had Gray break the door off as he smashed it shut in a fit of rage.
How dare they-
"STING! GRAY! GET BOTH YOUR DUMB ASSES OVER HERE RIGHT NOW!" Laxus barked from somewhere down the hall.
Bewildered, Sting and Gray both shared a look amongst one another before walking out of the room and down the hall, wondering what they could have done this time. They walked until they found the living room and found another room at the other side with the door ajar. They walked in and found Gajeel and Laxus staring at a wall, looking rigid and as Gray was about to ask what had them so stiff when his eyes wandered over to whatever it was they were looking at and halted as shock and horror began to enter both his and Sting's brains.
"What in-"
They had walked into a room that was probably the very reason behind the creation of the word 'stalker'. The walls were covered in photographs of Natsu, smiling and laughing ranging from when he was a child, around three, to as a young adult, some were just of him while many others had either one of his friends or brothers with him. There was some bits of newspaper clippings here and there with headlines that said 'mysterious death of Fiore's best fire chief' and 'trial of the century' while little sticky notes were posted on certain photos or news clippings and were connected by a thin string of different color yarns. There was a table in front of the wall, covered in books, papers, half-completed clay models, a lamp , art tools and familiar looking carving tools and glass jars.
Then Gray's phone went off.
B-E-N-D-E-R! Bender! B-E-
Barely realizing and looking at it as he reached for it and swiped the green circle, Gray's brain suddenly went blank and went on autopilot.
"Talk to me."
"Gray. It's Lyon." Came a familiar voice. He sounded scaried. "I got some good news, bad news and if possible, worse news."
"Talk to me." He repeated eyes never leaving the wall as he and the other three continued to stare in horror.
"Good news, so not only did Montoya rape Natsu but so did our mystery guy and we got a hit. His DNA is in the database." Lyon said. "Bad news, he's one of our three supposedly dead escaped convicts."
"And the worse-?"
"Does a man by the name of 'Jeremy Valmen', sound familiar to you?"
"The Mad Taxidermist Killer?"
"The very same and according to the files Fairy Tail supplied me-" Lyon answered. "You put away 6 years ago after he attacked Natsu and attempted to rape and butcher him for his eyes to make into 'living art' it says."
There was pregnant pause.
"You don't think he was Montoya's partner do you?"
Anger flared deep inside of Gray's mind. "I do now."
Time for some pay back! :3