Erza was fed up. Enraged. Down right pissed off.

Poor Dale was feeling the brunt of that rage at the moment.

"You will tell us where those tunnels lead, or so help me, I will leave pieces of you in each one!"

As soon as Gray had made his ice knights clear a space among the rubble that was left of the hide out, he and Erza had returned to the end of the corridor, finding the wall she'd originally wanted to tear down had collapsed. Behind it laid the fragments of a recording lacrima, the source of the voice which had almost lured them into the trap.

Erza could now tell from the remnants of a magical signature that the wall had been hastily created. Stepping into the now exposed room, they could find signs of life everywhere. Food scraps and paper products lay scattered on the floor; along with the odd assortment of worn toys, and doodles drawn by tiny hands on wrinkled food wrappers. At least Gray was right. The hostages had been held there until not long ago.

Knowing Maker magic when he saw it, Gray had quickly found the shoddy work within the floor at the back of the room. Pointing it out to Erza, he'd stepped away, knowing she would understand from years of working together his desires without having to speak them out. Requipping an outrageously large warhammer, she'd quickly smashed it down, destroying the floor, finding beneath a long, dark tunnel. Through the dim light cast from the hallway, she could see how it branched off in several directions.

Erza was instantly wary, remembering Laxus' report about mysterious tunnels underneath the abandoned school in which the entirety of Leviathan's Wake had met their fates. She had no reason to believe these had any relation to the others, but the worry remained. Gray had wanted to jump right in and follow it wherever it may lead, and was confused when Erza had stopped him, covering her true concerns by saying they should interrogate the fallen smugglers to find out which way the hostages would have been taken. At the very least, they'd lessen the chance of delay from choosing the wrong path.

Now they were questioning Dale, who had been unlucky enough to wake up first. He was currently chained to a support beam with a distasteful set of manacles Erza had found in the rubble. She'd balked at the idea of using it, but didn't want to ask Gray to waste his ice for such a purpose. She wondered how he now felt about the use of restraints against an enemy.

"Do you think I'm stupid? I know guild wizards aren't allowed to harm others outside of self defense. You're not going to torture me."

Erza could sense how Gray had stiffened at that remark, but kept her gaze on the current target of her ire.

"For the sake of innocents, we guild wizards are willing to cross certain lines."

"Don't give me that bullshit! You fairies have a reputation for being reckless and all, but you're all just a bunch of straight-laced do gooders. You don't have it in you to go that far. Besides, we've got people watching this place. There's no way they don't know you're still alive. You can bet some guys are already coming to finish you off."

"Are those the same guys who had no concern for you and your comrade? This building was rigged to come down with us inside, and given what I've seen, you two were completely unaware of that fact. You escaped serious injury, maybe even death, due to my friend's intervention. You owe no loyalty to those people."

"Wow. You're trying to play the 'divide and conquer' card now? Ha! I work for people who are way scarier than you. What kind of operation do you think we're running here? You think we're just shuffling contraband around? Trying to avoid some measly tariffs? Nuh ah! You're dealing with the big leagues now, kids. These people deal in slaves!"

He wanted to laugh when his interrogators reeled back in shock. The woman was actually quite attractive when she was angry, but he knew better then to quip a dirty joke at her expense. The man, though, looked like he took a personal offense towards what he'd said. His demeanor shifted in a curious way, from shock and outrage to a cold bitterness, then a frightening calm. No matter. Now that they knew what they were up against, they'd think twice before messing with the likes of those he answered to.

"Yeah, that's right. My bosses don't play games. They've got the balls to get down and dirty, and the money to back it up. You think I'd risk my neck betraying them like that? Hell no! I know the kind of people they are. Yeah, it sucks being on the bottom of the totem pole, but they'll be Hell'a impressed when they learn of my resolve to stay loyal to them. I won't stay on the bottom forever."

"You try my patience! Speak now before I beat the answers out of you!"

"Bruises and bones heal! Meanwhile, you'll have to answer to the Magic Council for use of excessive force. You've got nothing on me. Like I said, my bosses are way scarier than you guys," Dale finished with a satisfied smirk.

Erza was about ready to punch the guy out and find another way to track the hostages down, when Gray stepped up.

"Do you know who I am?"

With a scoff, Dale answered, "No. Should I?"

"Have you ever heard of Avatar?"

They could assume by Dale's shocked silence that he indeed had heard of them. Gray continued.

"We had many branches throughout the kingdom, and had business dealings with scum like you and yours every day. I think you're aware enough of our own reputation for attaining what we want from difficult persons, along with the means of doing so."

Dale dry swallowed past the lump in his throat, and felt a cold sweat forming across his back.

"You… *ahem* you keep saying 'we'."

Gray smiled a cruel smirk, and Erza wanted to stop him from having to continue in what must have been an uncomfortable role, but this was the first time she'd seen the smuggler's defiance waver. They couldn't afford to lose the momentum now.

"How quickly you catch on. Unlike you and your fellow bottom dweller over there, I was a leader within the hierarchy, a captain of the main branch, and a member of the inner circle of our guild leader, Arlock. I can assure you, I don't give a shit about the moral high ground, and the Council can go f*ck themselves.

"This is your reality right now: You don't have to worry about whether you can impress your bosses with your silence, or if they'll be pissed at you for talking, because they won't exist after today. We're going to end them and their operation, with or without your help. Your only concern is how your cooperation, or lack thereof, will directly correlate to how intact your body will be when it's all over."

"… L-like I said, bones heal. I'm not scared of a little pain."

"I'll teach you to fear the absence of it."

"W-What?!"

"Gray…?" Erza warned. While Dale thought she was trying to reel him back, she was actually more concerned for how this would impact him later.

That concern doubled when he raised his left hand, the sudden movement causing Dale to flinch, and started removing the layers of dressing still wrapped around it. With the scars out in the open, he then extended his other hand towards Erza, quietly saying, "Knife please," and accepted the short blade she'd requipped automatically upon his request. She did find it strange that he hadn't just made one of ice, and wondered if his magic stores were already so low, but the thought died the moment he drew the blade across the scarred palm of his hand, allowing the blood to dribble onto the floor. A good amount landed on Dale's shoes.

"What the f*ck—," Dale tried to yell, before the sharp edge of the blade was jammed between his teeth, garbling his speech. He froze, afraid any movement could cause him to gain a grotesquely widened smile, or to lose his tongue. Gray tilted his head, studying him, staring deeply and menacingly into Dale's terrified eyes, his own scar-rimmed eyes utterly terrifying to behold. He was silent, unblinking, and unnervingly still.

Dale was ready to piss himself when the knife was suddenly yanked away.

He watched as the mad man backed up slowly towards a small pile of rubble, some of which was burning still from the initial blast of the bomb. Dale was too fixated on the knife he still held, wondering if he was going to throw it at him, to notice the way Gray tried to control his breathing, or the way his grip tightened around the knife's handle to prevent his hand from shaking as he got closer to the heat. With feigned ease, he slipped the blade into the flame and stepped away.

Taking slow, measured steps as he returned, Gray spoke.

"My hands were burned during an unfortunate encounter with an enemy. You'd find the same damage on a good portion of the rest of my body. As a result, I feel very little in those places. In some spots, I feel nothing at all. You'd think that would be a blessing, feeling no pain. It's not. Not a day goes by that something makes contact with my deadened skin, and I'm brought back to that incident. It wasn't a pleasant experience. The pain was… unspeakable."

As Gray spoke, his voice was soft, almost soothing, and he took on such an even tone, nothing that suggested any sense of aggression. Dale almost expected him to sling his arm across his shoulders like he was just trying to convey some sagely advice or teach him an important, life changing lesson.

"Let me tell you a little something about burns. They're some of the most painful things you can ever experience. Your skin and muscle quickly chars away, and even though it would kill you faster, you would beg for the total destruction of your flesh, so the nerves would die, and you wouldn't feel it anymore."

Gray had reached Dale by then, and was slowly circling around his prey as he spoke. Finding his shirt had torn in the back, he reached for the large hole, grazing his fingers lightly across the exposed skin of his lower back, showing no response as Dale tried to flinch away. He continued.

"That's total and complete bullshit. The layers may be gone, but the edges are still raw and angry. Every touch, every movement, every breath of air that ghosts across them will send you reeling, and have you wishing for death. If it reaches the muscles, that's a whole other level of torment. Something most people don't know about burns, though? If they reach deep enough, and the nerves get truly f*cked, the pain gets so intense, they start firing off the wrong signals. Your brain interprets the heat as a deeply fierce cold. Nerve damage is funny like that, I guess.

"I was fortunate in a way," he said as he gathered the loose dressings from the floor. He pulled them apart, eying the length in his hands as he came behind Dale again, and tightly wrapped them around his eyes.

"W—what are you doing?" Dale whimpered.

Tying the knot snuggly, Gray replied, "I can tell you from experience that what you're about to go through hits differently when you can't see it coming."

Dale gasped as Gray backed away, shaking his head wildly in a vain attempt to remove the blindfold. Gray's voice returned, though it sounded like it was moving away from him.

"As I was saying, I was fortunate, because my injuries came instantly. In barely a second, I experienced the longest moment of my life. I lost more than half the feeling in my hands, and still deal with the pain in what remains, every day. You get to look forward to that. After months and months of torment as your body heals what it can, you'll be left with that emptiness all over; and you'll return to this day, and the agony you're about to experience.

"Every.

"Single.

"Day."

Dale had no choice but to listen to that eerily calm voice as it detailed such horrific things. He followed it as it crossed the room, back to where the mad man had left that knife, and back again. He gritted his teeth as he tried to free himself from the manacles, his struggles useless.

"Except—"

He jumped, startled, heart pounding almost painfully as that same voice whispered right into his ear, "—you won't have the mercy of just a single moment."

"P—please… I… you… you can't do this. You can't! You're a guild wizard! This isn't something you would do!"

Gray's quiet, sinister chuckle caused his heart to sink, while Erza wondered who this stranger was, because this wasn't the Gray she knew. How far was he willing to take this?

"Like the lady said: For an innocent's sake, there are few lines a guild wizard won't cross. Sucks for you. This isn't one of them."

"Gray! Stop!" Erza tried to persuade, but was too shocked to do anything more.

In that instant, Dale felt a shocking, painful burning at his lower back, as the heated blade was harshly pushed against his skin. He must have actually pierced his skin, destroying the nerves instantly, for the intensity of the burn did indeed feel bitterly cold.

In that instant, he screamed in pain and terror.

In that instant, he felt a wet warmth trickle down between his legs.

In that instant, he began to talk.

"Stop! No more! I'll tell you! They took the family north, towards the suburbs! An old house that's been empty for years. It's the second tunnel that branches off on the right as you jump in facing the wall! It leads right into the basement of that house! Please! Stop! I'm begging you!"

"If we find out you're lying—"

"I'm not! I swear I'm not! That's where they are! Please, make it stop! I don't want to suffer for the rest of my life for them! No more! Please!"

After a few seconds to consider, Gray relented, pulling the burning instrument away. Dale slumped against the beam, breathing harshly and crying almost embarrassingly. The bastard must have totally destroyed the nerves in that spot, for it was completely numb now. Gray walked around to face him, looming over him as he considered the pathetic man before him.

"You gave in after a single burn. Don't hold your lack of resolve against you. This only proves the people you work for never truly held your loyalty, and had never done anything to earn it. Find someone else worth your devotion, and take your friend with you. There are people out there who'll value you enough that they won't leave you to die as collateral damage. One more thing: Open your mouth."

"Open m-my m-m-mouth?"

"Don't make me repeat myself."

Fearing what the monster before him would do if he pissed him off anymore, he complied, timidly opening his mouth. Maybe he wanted to gag him. He silently begged that he wasn't about to finish him off by shoving the still burning hot blade down his throat.

He tried to scream when he felt just that, and vainly tried to spit it out, but the son of a bitch held his mouth shut around the knife. He struggled and screamed even more, but began to lose steam when he slowly realized that his mouth wasn't burning, at least not in that way. The object in this mouth still burned, not from heat but from…

Cold?!!!

Timidly probing the object with his tongue, he found not the sharp edge of a searing hot knife, but a thick, blunt, freezing cold icicle!

Erza blinked, confused, turning her gaze to look behind her, to where the small fire had died down to mere embers. Embedded in the ashes and cinder was the knife. Gray hadn't retrieved it.

Dale felt the bastard give a friendly pat against his cheek, saying, "Thanks for the intel," before he heard two sets of footsteps walking away, back towards the hallway and the tunnels.

He was too stunned to move, to think, to even take a moment to spit out the icicle. He simply stood there, almost limp as the beam held most of his weight, feeling the dull numbness on his back slowly fade away as sensation returned.

He just stood there, seesawing between wanting to laugh or cry, as he heard the footsteps of those two insane wizards echo away.

Down the hall, Erza hurried after Gray, following him as he went straight for the tunnels, jumping down and turning towards the right, finding the one that branched off as Dale had described. He didn't even pause as he eyed the menacing gloom, pulling out and extending his cane in a single motion as he dove right in. She thought about requipping a light lacrima, but decided against it. They'd lose the element of surprise if they announced their presence with such an obvious beacon. Gray's skills were proving to be very handy today.

He had no trouble navigating, his movements sure and confident. He must have heard the hesitation in her slow steps, for he paused for just a moment, reached out and found her hand with little effort, and continued on his quick pace down the invisible path before them. She could smell the musk and damp of earth, and heard only their steps as they echoed from all around.

"Gray, what the hell happened back there?"

"Not now, Erza."

"Yes now! Don't you dare try to—"

"—I need to focus. We can't waste anymore time."

She knew he was right. She also knew he was more than happy, though likely feeling guilty also, to have that excuse to evade her questions. She hoped he'd at least give her something if she persisted. She knew he must have been referring to his flashbacks earlier, though he'd never really specified what all he'd experienced during those episodes. She was more worried of how he'd had to revisit those memories in order to get that man to talk, even going so far as to become a villain who'd use torture to get what he needed.

That couldn't have been him.

"Are you okay?" she quietly murmured.

Instead of answering, he sped up, Erza almost tripping at the sudden increase in speed. She easily kept up the pace he was setting, and waited to see if he would answer. After another thirty or so meters, he slowed, and she could tell the tunnel was curving slightly. She caught her breath, hearing him do the same, and tried again.

"Gray?"

…

…

"… No."

…

"If you need a moment—"

"—Let me focus on the mission!"

"But what if you have another breakdown?!"

"…"

"I'm… I'm sorry. I don't mean to doubt you…"

"…"

"Please say something."

"… later…"

"What?"

"They're kidnapping people. Taking them from their homes. From their families. Enslaving them. I can't afford to feel right now. When this is all over, and we've rescued Rhein's family, and kicked the ass of every trafficker in the region; then I'll have time to deal with the fallout, and all the shitty memories and feelings that will come with it. Until then, let me stay focused on the mission."

Erza knew he could do it. He's done it before. The dread and heartache she's been feeling only grew as she recalled how this situation was not unlike what had occurred during his attempt to rescue Bisca and Loren from the fire. She knew he could turn off his emotions and function like a precision machine when he willed his feelings away, leaving only cold logic and determination behind. She knew he could do so only when he had a purpose to dwell on, leaving no room for thoughts of anything else.

She dreaded what would happen when that purpose had been fulfilled. Would his mind shut down like before? Would he retreat into another stupor, and they'd have to wait him out for days or weeks again? Or even months?

Would they have to force him out again?

"… I'm so, so sorry. This was supposed to be such a simple mission. I thought I'd chosen the perfect job for all of us to complete together, something quick, and even a little dull, but easily accomplished. I never imagined things would turn out like this. I hate what all of this must be doing to you—"

"—It's you I'm concerned about."

If Gray hadn't been pulling her along, she may had stopped in her tracks in surprise.

"Me?"

"... Because of your time in the Tower."

Erza dry swallowed, better understanding his urgency now.

"That was a long time ago."

"You and I both know time only dulls old pains. They never truly heal completely."

She couldn't possibly argue with that.

"None of this is your fault," he continued, "Shit happens on missions. It's something we've always had to be prepared for. Sucks that it happened this time around, but we can bitch about it when it's all over. And I'm not okay… but I will be. You and the others will make sure of that. So put your regrets and worries aside for now, and stop blaming yourself. Direct your anger towards the traffickers. Alright?"

Erza agreed to his wishes, squeezing his hand briefly to let him know. He returned the gesture, breathing a relieved sigh, grateful now that he could keep his focus where it most needed to be.

Towards the battle they're to face when they reach the end of the tunnel, instead of the one currently raging within his steadily fracturing mind.

Still can't move my thumb, and my index won't close all the way. Bummer, but getting better. This will be it for a little while, at least until all my joints are back to normal. Thanks for the well wishes.

As you can see, things are about to it the fan. Or already have. I really can't wait for y'all to see what happens!

Next Chapter: Natsu and Lucy implement their plan, while Gray and Erza come up with their own.