Chapter 13
At the Honeybone Inn, Fairy Tail's celebration in the hotel's bar was in full swing. They'd opened a communal tab with the inn's management, and those of the guild who were still halfway sober were beginning to realize they'd need to win the games just to pay it off.
Master Makarov was howling at the top of his lungs. "Let's hear it for Lucy, everybody!"
Several of the guild members, including Elfman, Max, Vijeeter, Natsu, and a few other of the guys had Lucy up in a chair that was propped on their shoulders.
"HIP, HIP, HOORAY! HIP, HIP, HOORAY! HIP, HIP, HOORAY!" Everyone cheered together.
Each repetition of the chant was accompanied by a small pivoting that lifted Lucy a bit out of her seat.
"Come on, guys, stop it! Put me down!" Lucy chided good naturedly.
Her entire face was crimson as it could be by a combination of the alcohol she was drinking and her emotional high. They finally put her chair down and Lucy stood up, but only to be immediately ensnared by Cana wrapping an arm around her shoulders.
"Lucy, you did real good out there today! (Hic!) You showed them all that they can't laugh at Fairy Tail!"
"Thanks, Cana, but how many have you had so far?" Lucy asked.
She knew that when Cana started to finally act like she was drunk, it was time to ask.
"Dah! Not that much! Only eight barrels from my own stash and about twenty of these bottles from the inn!"
"Hey, Canna! Where were you today, anyshway?!" Elfman slurred. The gigantic man was clearly just as drunk as the shorter brunette. "We were all shupossed to be there, cheerin' for our guysh!"
"I was cheerin' for 'em. All the pubs in town have lacrima-vision! Which is how I saw this cutey take down that crazy girl!" Cana rebuked.
"Yeah, well, you should have been there! And hey, aren't you one of the B team's alternates?! Shince Mystogan left, you'll have to be there now!" Elfman's eyes started to mist over. "Why couldn't I be the alternate?! I worked myself like crazy to get like this!"
"Sho, I'll be there tomorrow!" Cana spat, not noticing his emotional decline. "Not like I can't handle this little amount of liquor! Right, Lucy?!"
She turned her head to get some affirmation from the blonde, but discovered that Lucy had slipped out of her grasp.
Halfway across the bar, Lucy happened to spot something which gave her pause. She really wasn't sure whether or not she should engage. It wasn't as though she'd be hurt by interacting, and she knew that, but even still, it was a daunting visage before her.
Juvia was sitting on the floor, curled up in herself, her face an inch away from one of the inn's support pillars. Even from behind, Lucy could tell that she wasn't in the most happy or stable of moods. To Lucy, Juvia looked about a step away from having a visible dark aura surrounding her.
"Uh, hey there, Juvia. How you doin'?" Lucy asked timidly.
"My darling Gray attacked me. I lost my prize. My darling Gray attacked me. I lost my prize. My darling Gray attacked me. I lost my prize." Juvia was repeating over and over again.
Although Lucy felt uncomfortable poking this emotional time bomb, she decided to still take a crack at trying to make her friend feel better.
"Look, Juvia, it was just part of the competition, you know? I mean, you were fighting to beat Gray as well, right? Just try not to take it so seriously and cheer up a little."
As if a switch had been flipped, Juvia turned her head to look at Lucy, cold and barely contained hysteria radiating from her eyes.
"I'm sure you must be overjoyed at how things turned out." Juvia said accusingly. "If I'd won my competition, than I could have made Gray do anything for a day and then he finally would have been forced to admit his feelings for me. But now you get to be the heroine of the day. You're probably already scheming how you'll take him away from me."
OOO
In a darkened, private room of the inn, Gray quietly slipped in through the door. The only light was filtering in from the city outside, creating a relaxing, yet sensual mood.
"You got my note. I'm so glad." Came a voice from the window.
Lucy turned to face him, her hair being gently and beautifully illuminated into a shining gold from the light outside. She wore a smile that was as sweet and expectant as it was nervous.
"Yeah, I did. So, what's this about?" Gray asked.
"I just wanted to ask you something. Do you remember the promise you made to me before we left for our training at the beach?"
Hearing those words, Grey's face quickly grew scarlet with embarrassment and he turned his eyes away from her.
"Ye-ye-yeah. What about it?" He stammered.
Lucy came close up to him, closing the distance so that the swell of her breasts was nearly caressing his t-shirt.
"Before we left, I asked you a question, and you promised that if I proved myself in this tournament, you'd finally be honest and tell me how you felt about me. I think that with how I won today, that should be enough to prove how much stronger I've become."
"I... I can't do this!"
Grey turned to leave, but before he could take a single step, Lucy grabbed him from behind. She wrapped her arms tightly around his chest, crushing her body into his.
"Please!" She shouted with deep, rending emotion. "Please. I have to know! All this time we've been together, all the fighting side by side we've done, I can't believe you haven't noticed how I feel! If you say you don't care about me, than I think I might-"
"Don't do that." Grey said sternly.
That broke Lucy's fervor, and she allowed Grey to proceed as he softly pushed her hands off his chest. He turned back around to face her.
"Don't cry for me Lucy. I don't think I could stand that."
His lips broke into a soft and soothing smile.
"If it'll make you cry for me to act how I normally do, than I just can't. If you want the truth, than I'll show you how I really feel."
Snaking his arms around her waist, Grey pulled her lovingly into him, and slowly began to lean down.
OOO
"And then there'll be a night of such debauchery that I'll never be able to convince my beloved Gray again that I'm his one true love!" Juvia shouted loudly with exaggerated agitation.
In response, Lucy could only smile and try not to show how insanely deluded she knew that scenario to be.
"Hey, Juvia, maybe you should lay off those romance novels for a while." She said, trying to be helpful.
Juvia did not give any sign that she'd heard or understood the blonde, so Lucy decided it'd be better to leave her alone for the time being.
As she moved to leave, Lucy happened to catch a glance out the window, and it might have been her imagination, but she thought she saw the shoulder of Gray's white coat.
"Well, if he's out there to hide from Juvia, than I really can't blame him right now." She thought.
OOO
On the other side of the bar, in a corner slightly more quiet than the rest, Erza and Mirajane were having a light drink together. Erza had changed back into her usual armor, while Mira still had on the black dress she'd worn during her introductions at the games earlier.
"So, how's Wendy?" Mira asked.
"She and Carla are back upstairs now. I went to see them before the festivities began. They were still asleep, but Porlyusica says they should be almost back to normal by the morning."
"That's good to hear. From what you told me about what happened in the infirmary, they should be anxious to be able to get back into the games. It'll be good that they'll be able to watch them tomorrow."
"Yes, I think Wendy, will quite enjoy it." Erza said.
"So, what do you think about our chances going forward?" Mirajane asked.
Erza put her drink down and gave the matter some serious thought.
"Lucy's victory today gave us a good start. We're far from last place, but we have four more days, with two competitions per day where that could change. We can't afford to get complacent, or to become too confident in ourselves." She explained.
"I agree. I think Sabertooth will be our biggest obstacle to overcome, but we can't rule out any of the others as well. Blue Pegasus, Lamia Scale, any of them might cause an unexpected upset."
"Quite. Which is why I plan to turn in early, and will try to convince the rest of our competing members to do the sa-"
Before Erza could finish her sentence, something with pink, spiky hair and a scarf wrapped around its neck collided into her from out of nowhere.
Natsu sat up after his crash landing, shaking his head like a dog.
"Hey, Elfman! What'd you do that for?!" He barked.
"Ya-you jush shush up! You were crowdin' me, so I jush made a little space!" The big man slurred.
"Oh, so you want get started, do ya?!" Natsu asked with a mischievous smile.
"Natsu." Growled a threatening rasp.
The dragon slayer looked down to notice for the first time that he was sitting directly on Erza's side.
"Eh, heh heh." He laughed nervously. "You know that was just an accident, right?"
Almost faster than the eye could see, Erza rose up on her elbow and clobbered Natsu in his cheek with her other hand. He went flying across the room, crashing into Elfman, who was then carried right along by the force of Erza's punch. The two of them together didn't stop until they crashed into the antique, stone fireplace on the far side of the room.
Seemingly unfazed, Natsu leaped back to his feet with excitement in his eyes.
"Now you're in for it! FIGHT PARTY!"
That starter pistol of a declaration was all it took for the members of Fairy Tail to quickly fall into their favorite form of group recreation.
OOO
Up on the roof of the inn, Pantherlily found his partner sitting on the edge with his legs hanging over the side.
"There you are. I was wondering where you'd gotten to."
Gajeel didn't say anything. Lifting a hunk of metal up to his mouth, he tore off a chunk with his teeth as easily as if it were a piece of bread.
"Isn't that the top shelf iron you don't usually buy because it's too expensive?" Lily asked.
Gajeel didn't respond. He just continued to stare out at the city, munching away on his metal.
"So, you're taking your loss today pretty hard." Lily said as a statement rather than a question.
Gajeel said nothing, and didn't look at his feline friend.
"Alright, I know when nothing will get through. I'll just go make sure the room's ready for you when you come out of this one."
Pantherlily walked away to do as he said, leaving Gajeel alone once again.
In his mind, Gajeel was going over every second of his fight with Jura, replaying it again and again, bit by bit. More than just reviewing what happened, he was altering the events, visualizing and imagining how it could have and might have gone. He was determined to go over this again and again until he had Jura's moves memorized by heart. In addition, he would eat nothing but the best, purest, and most high quality iron he could until the games were done, regardless of what it might do to his wallet.
"This ain't over yet, baldy! Not by a long shot!" He swore to himself.
OOO
Back down in the bar, with roughly twenty-five percent of the furniture having already been destroyed, Erza had just finished walloping Natsu's head into Max's navel when she looked around the place, and realized there was someone missing. She didn't find it surprising that he wouldn't be taking part in the fight since he didn't care for this type of recreation. Still though, Erza did find it a bit odd, because she couldn't remember the last time she'd seen him since they'd all returned from the coliseum.
"I wonder where Logan's gotten off to." She thought.
OOO
Seventeen miles to the west, in a section of the city which did not have quite the same atmosphere to encourage the lingering of tourists, sat the Tell-Tale Inn. While not quite as cheap to stay in as Fairy Tail's lodging, it presented an image to the outside world of being rundown. The kind of place where it wouldn't be hard to imagine that the staff could be encouraged to look the other way by the timely application of a few extra jewel notes.
This was the Crocus home base for the Raven's Tail guild. They weren't a particularly large association at all, the entire guild being made up roughly of only fifteen members. A few of them had chosen not to come along, so there were only eleven present at the time. Despite that, they'd rented out the entire building to themselves, with the purpose in mind of what was then transpiring. Aside from Flare herself, they were all men.
Flare Corona, donned in nothing but her underwear, was dangling from the ceiling of the top floor's master suite. Her fellow guild mates had been working on her for the past three hours, ever since she'd returned from the Domus Flau infirmary. The entire guild had each taken a turn in torturing Flare for her loss against Fairy Tail. She'd been taken to the brink of death multiple times already, only to be almost fully mended by their black magic healer. His magic used life force energy stolen from various victims to almost fully heal her wounds, but because of the caster's own execution of the magic, it did nothing for her pain.
Within the past three hours, Flare had been mercilessly battered in every form imaginable. She'd been physically beaten, her fingernails torn out, her bones broken with tonfas and other blunt weapons. She'd had two-hundred pound weights attached to her legs so that her muscles would tear and her hips were wrenched from their sockets. She'd been outright stabbed multiple times, only to be healed straight away so that she could be stabbed in the same place again. She'd had long strips made entirely of hair tied to her arms, soaked in vinegar, and then left to dry so that when they were torn free, her skin went with them. She'd been made to ingest strychnine poison so that she'd go into the throes of seizure, her chest convulsing, her ability to breathe blocked as her lungs burned for oxygen, only to be given the magic antidote a step away from death.
After most everyone had gotten a turn on her, the rest of them had retired to their rooms, leaving only the competing team to conclude Flare's discipline. At the moment, they were using needles magically sharpened for the penetrating point to be as small as possible, stabbing them directly into her pain receptors. With a low-powered lightning lacrima to set off the effect, Flare was writhing in agony, every cell and fiber in her body alight with the most unbearable pain. Her screams would have brought everyone in the city running to investigate if they hadn't erected a soundproof enchantment.
Having inflicted that on her for five straight minutes, they finally shut it off at the source, and she slumped in her chains. The guild master, Ivan Dreyar, then stood before Flare, sneering at her evilly. Flare tried to pull her head away as much as she could. If there were an independent observer, they might have remarked that she looked as terrified as any helpless animal confronted with its natural predator.
"Well, my dear, after all this time, have you been able to see just what you did wrong?" He said greasily, forcing her face towards him.
"Ye-ye-yes, master." Flare replied in a tiny, panicked voice. "I'm... I'm very sorry that I failed you today. It won't happen again! I swear!"
"I do hope you mean that."
"I do!"
"Because you know, if this were to happen again, we wouldn't be able to let you off so lightly the next time." Ivan sneered sadistically.
Flare's face managed to fall even further into fear, thinking about what might possibly be done to her that could be worse. Before any concrete visions could invade her mind's eye, something occurred to distract everyone present. The lights in the room went out, leaving everything in pitch blackness.
"What's this, now?!" Ivan demanded.
Through the darkness, there was a sound of footsteps, and a squeak of door hinges on the other side of the room a few seconds later.
"Lights are out in the hall too." Kurohebi hissed from out of the void.
From the window, Nalpudding's face could faintly be made out.
"Looks like it's just us, boss. Everything's on out there."
"Ugh!" Ivan grunted angrily. "If this flophouse allowed their electricity lacrima to expire with everything they're charging us, than someone's head is literally going to roll."
He made his way across the room as best he could, given the conditions. There wasn't anything in the way between him and the door, but there was always the possibility of stumbling since it was complete blindness, zero visibility. Ivan had just nearly reached the door to the hall when there came a loud, thoroughly audible crashing sound from downstairs. It was unmistakably the sound of wood splintering in on itself, and a good amount. From his various criminal activities over the years, Makarov's son recognized the sound as that of a door being cleaved in half.
Through the darkness, a very long way off, there came the clunking of a pair of heavy, sturdy boots walking across the stone floor. Ivan didn't know who it was, but he knew what it was. There was a manifestly, almost tangible aura of hostility suddenly permeating the air. Humans hadn't lost every animal instinct hardwired for survival, and Ivan's were telling him that he was most certainly in the presence of an enemy.
The cadence of the footsteps were slow and controlled, rather than the cautious and nervous tone that might come from one of the inn's employees. Whoever this was, they were only making a paltry effort to conceal themselves, probably just from the hotel staff, but it was clear that they wanted the guild to know they were coming.
As the footsteps drew closer, they mounted the stairs, each level of the landing groaning beneath the intruder's weight. In a flight of fancy, Ivan briefly imagined that the stairs were crying out in fear that they might be a target as well. Realizing this, Ivan was aghast to discover that he was actually feeling a measure of fear. He had to forcefully remind himself that almost his entire guild was present, that each of them were masters of their magic, and every magic as deadly and sadistic as it could be.
"CREAK! CREAK! CREAK!" The stairs sounded again and again, growing louder.
Every groan of the staircase alerted Ivan that this enemy was drawing nearer, getting closer, and with every inch of distance closed, the miasma of malice seemed to grow stronger. Ivan's heart rate picked up speed, and he could feel his own blood-pressure spiking. He was in mental shock from the awareness of his own sensations, clenching his teeth and digging his nails into his palms. He couldn't even remember the last time he'd felt like this, or if he'd ever felt like this before.
He tried to calm down by telling himself that they may have had enemies, but none of them could have mobilized quickly enough to have someone in the city tonight. It wasn't possible, and there wasn't anyone in Crocus he knew of who would come after them like this. But then, he suddenly remembered something. It seemed to make sense, but not a kind of sense that made sense. Surely, that person couldn't be emitting an aura this rancorous.
"Besides, not even one of them would be THIS brazen." He told himself.
The footsteps reached the top landing, and the intruder stopped, on the same floor with the entire Raven's Tail guild. Ivan had the unmistakable sense that they were staring right at each other through the blackness. Stillness descended. The intruder was just standing there, right where he was, not budging an inch. The only sound to be heard was Ivan's own breathing, which he was strenuously working to keep normal. A single drop of water right then would have sounded like the roar of a waterfall.
Out of nowhere, the intruder was suddenly moving, the sound of his footsteps running sharply to the right. A door to one of the rooms was audibly shattered, and the heavy clunking darted swiftly inside.
"What the?! Who's there?!" Ivan heard one of his men shout. "Wha- AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
The man's protest became a scream of equal parts terror and confusion. It was promptly succeeded by the sound explosions of his body blasting straight through the wall of his room, sailing across the hallway, and all the way through the next wall as well.
"Boss, what was that?!" Nalpudding yelled.
Ivan heard the three others rush up behind him. In rapid sequence, all the doors on either side of the floor began to open, the various members of the formerly dark guild roused from their inattention. Ivan couldn't see any of them, but then, there was a snapping sound, and the lights suddenly flickered back on.
The site that greeted the assembly was even more intense than Ivan had imagined. The farthest door on the right side, a good sixty feet away from where he was standing, was just a scattered pile of splinters, but that was far from the most eye catching sight. It looked like a bomb had gone off. The holes on either side of the corridor were roughly the size of the biggest man in the guild. Vapor of plaster was settling down to the floor like smoke, while pieces of wood, chunks of plaster, and internal insulation were laying about with the randomness of a true explosion.
From the vacant hole of the room's doorway stepped the intruder for all to see. Ivan found himself surprised to be right in his summation. It was who he'd thought. The man who had most recently threatened them. Logan Bloodborne of Fairy Tail.
He walked right out into the middle of the hall, turning only his head to stare down the nine members of Raven's Tail when he'd stopped. He'd changed out of the purple outfit they'd all been wearing before and into a more normal set of clothes. A matching pair of metal braces and knuckleduster gauntlets adorned his arms and hands.
He just stared at all of them, while the members of Raven's Tail stared right back, some confused, some intimidated, and some angry. The staring contest was broken after only a few seconds. Before anyone in Raven's Tail could make the first move, Logan dashed forward in the blink of an eye. Almost too fast to be seen, he jumped right into their midst, throwing his legs out in a split-kick, nailing two of them at once in the side of the head.
Landing on his feet, not letting up on his barrage, Logan lunged at a man on his left. Logan grabbed the guy by his wrist and under his shoulder, kicked his weight bearing leg out from under him, and then flipped the guy over his shoulder. While the guy was still airborne, Logan performed a powerful side-kick that nailed the man's groin and stomach all at once. He went sailing across the empty space, colliding into another man on the right, and sending them both smashing through a decorative table and vase.
The man Logan flipped slumped down onto the floor, while the one he crashed into was still on his feet. Logan rushed the standing man, jumping shallowly to bury his knee into the guy's solar plexus, shattering at least four of his ribs. The guy coughed up blood, but Logan didn't let him off there, grabbing him by the hair and slamming his head back into the wall half a dozen times until his body went slack. Blood seeped down the wall from the point of impact, but not enough to make Logan worry he might have killed the guy.
At that point, the one remaining member of Raven's Tail besides the competing team finally recovered himself to try something. He was a deathly pale man, who somehow had an aura of strength, despite looking like he could use a good meal. The guy pulled a baton from his waistline that then magically threw out a chain with a ball mace at the end. He hurled it, and the mace extended spikes with gleaming, visible sharpness.
"Hmm. Must have an internal magic source." Logan mused to himself.
It was careening straight for his head, but Logan acted with cold, undaunted calculation. He easily held up the unconscious body of the man he'd just beaten, and moved it into the path of the mace. The weapon's wielder grimaced at the ruthlessness of the act, panicked, and retracted the spikes. The heavy, metal ball plowed into the unconscious man's right shoulder, and Logan allowed it to knock the guy away so that he could grab hold of the chain.
He yanked on it with just enough of his strength to bring the wielder stumbling towards him. As the man uncontrollably staggered towards him, Logan took up the freed lengths of chain, then spun the wielder around as he lashed the chains about his neck.
He pulled the chains tightly, choking the guy with his own weapon. At that moment, one of the two who'd received Logan's split-kick rallied himself and got to his knees. He was dazed and only half a step away from a coma, but even so, he began to mumble something which sounded to Logan vaguely like a type of explosion magic. Logan didn't give him the chance to finish, unfurling the chains to release his current hostage and then push-kicking him towards the spell-caster.
The mace wielder didn't even come close to hitting the guy trying to cast, but it was merely a diversion to begin with. Logan used the distraction to move in and swing down with a hard, cross-hook punch into the guy's temple. His brain shaken for a second time in less than three minutes, the wizard collapsed as completely as anyone could.
Turning to the rest, Logan was just in time to grab on and block an assault from Nalpudding. The purple skinned man had expanded his fists, spikes and all, just as he had done as he'd targeted Gray during the Hidden game. With the surprise, Logan was pushed back a good ten feet until he dug his heels in, the wooden floor tearing up beneath his boots.
"Where are all your little pals? You fairies never do anything alone, right? Or did you just want to cry and whine in person?"
Logan said nothing in regards to the taunt. Noticing how the Fairy Tail wizard seemed to be holding him back with no visible effort, Nalpudding's veneer of smugness and complacent superiority began to crack.
"You know, you're really not so bad." He said, nervous tension evident. "What you did to the other guys so far, you got a streak in you we could use. What do you say you come over to our side? We'd pay you a lot better than those fairy losers."
Logan said nothing. His cold mask didn't break. Displaying an ease as if they were no more substantial than toothpicks, Logan broke off the cartilage comprised spikes he was holding onto.
"Ack!" Nalpudding grunted in pain.
Stepping in and to the side to adjust his angle, Logan jabbed his elbow into Nalpudding's temple, causing the shorter man to spin from the impact. Shifting himself again to take advantage, Logan waited until the other man's back was to him, and then grabbed his hair with both hands. Shoving his right foot into the spot between Nalpudding's shoulders, Logan pushed and pulled at the same time.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
Nalpudding screamed in agony as Logan ripped massive chunks of his hair out by the roots, dragging pieces of flesh from the scalp along with them. Hair separated from head, and Nalpudding fell forward onto his stomach from the momentum. Logan didn't miss a beat, and unceremoniously kicked him while he was down, dislodging his lower jaw from the rest of the skull.
At that point, both Kurohebi and Orba tagged in together to try and stop him. Kurohebi used his Mimic magic in order to copy the Wood-Make magic of Fairy Tail's own Laki Oiletta. Wooden spikes erupted out of the floor, but Logan flipped backwards to evade them. More came from the left wall, the right wall, and even overhead, zigzagging in seemingly random patterns. Logan dodged them all, moving nimbly, performing handstands, bending and contorting himself in ways that were surprising from a man of his musculature.
While trying to impale their opponent, Kurohebi shot a glance at Obra, silently asking a question. The tall, blue skinned man looked right back with his black, shark like eyes, and shook his head. Kurohebi glared back at Logan in both anger, and puzzlement.
"What's with this guy?" He wondered to himself. "Isn't he using any magic? Obra said he did at some point, but there doesn't seem to be any now. If I don't see any, I can't copy it, and it seems like Obra isn't sensing the buildup of any magic circles to cut through and cancel."
While dodging one spike, another managed to sink it's tip into Logan's thigh, but only about an inch before he swung a back-fist to break it off from the rest. He started to bleed, but nothing that he couldn't handle. Taking an idea from that little near miss, Logan broke off larger pieces from wood still coming at him while still dodging.
After dodging yet another barrage, Logan stopped, and stared right at Kurohebi. He held himself openly, his guard down, his body loose where it had rigid moments before. His body language and the look on his face combined to give off an aura of disinterest, and even boredom. The look in his eyes was like someone growing tired of things. It even looked like he might be suppressing a yawn.
"Is he not even taking me seriously?!"
Infuriated, Kurohebi made all of the wooden spikes bunch up and converge into one giant weapon that took up half the corridor. It flew at Logan with all the speed and size needed to skewer him right in half on contact.
That was just what Logan had wanted. When the enormous spear was only a few feet away from him, he kicked himself back to a hundred percent. Logan jumped, just hard enough to propel himself over the tip and land on the body of the weapon. He ran along its length towards the other two, and with an unobstructed view, tossed the pieces of wood he'd broken off like throwing knives. The first two nailed Obra in the face, along with the little creature on his shoulder.
Logan belatedly threw the third one at Kurohebi's gut, but the delay allowed his enemy the chance to readjust his position and dodge the block. Kurohebi watched the wood whizzing past him, satisfied with himself and his evasion. In doing so, he failed to notice the boot Logan had taken off and thrown with a calculated trajectory for where he'd move his head. With the amount of strength put behind the toss, it was more than enough to halfway daze Kurohebi, and Logan then finished him off with a flying cross-punch.
With that opponent down for the count, Logan slid his boot back on without tying it, and then turned to the only unaccounted for member.
Ivan was standing in the same doorway to the master suite he had been the whole time. He'd watched everything, and if he'd been intimidated before, he was legitimately terrified now. Logan walked around the giant wood spike, surreptitiously reapplying his magic while out of sight, just to be safe.
He approached Ivan resolutely, not saying a word. Ivan looked like his mind had almost shut down from fear. In desperation to try and fend off this attacker, he fumbled in his pockets for something he knew was there. It was something his underlings in the guild had made custom. A death curse lacrima, guaranteed to infect the victim with a magic that would slowly eat them alive from the inside out, in the most painful way possible. He thought the threat of that awful fate might just be enough to get this berserk fairy to leave him alone.
Ivan found and pulled out the black marble, but the by the time he'd done so, Logan had reached him. He easily batted the lacrima away, and then grabbed Ivan's fingers, bending them backwards. The bones made a cracking sound like dry wood as they broke.
"AAAAH!" Ivan shrieked.
He buckled to a halfway kneeling position while his hand was still being held. With a teep-kick, Logan lashed out at Ivan's right knee, snapping it back the wrong way. Ivan screamed once, and then doubly hard when his shattered knee hit the floor. Logan grabbed Ivan's right shoulder and wrenched it out of the socket. He pulverized Ivan's pelvic bones with one kick. He reached out and tweaked Ivan's nose, breaking it cleanly. The previously proud and sadistic guild leader began to weep as openly and as heartfelt as any small child.
"You shouldn't have hurt Wendy."
Logan released Ivan's hand, and then put a roundhouse punch into the knockout button on his jaw to put him to sleep.
Only then, as he looked up did he notice for the first time the one member of Raven's Tail who'd been missing from all the proceedings: Flare. He took in the state of her, observing all the marks on her body, seeing plenty of scars, both old and brand new. He saw the ridges of barely healed flesh, and new they'd been taken off entirely, along with the fresh burns and all other sundry damage inflicted.
Logan walked over, standing right in front of her, just where her guild mates had been less than ten minutes before.
"Please! Please, don't hurt me!" She pleaded.
Logan lifted up a hand, Flare closed her eyes for the blow, and then felt herself falling to the floor. Opening up again, she saw that her chains had been yanked out of the ceiling, and that Logan was walking away. On his way out, he bent down and patted Ivan's body. He found the keys, tossed them to her, and left without a word.
OOO
While on his ride back to the Honeybone Inn, Logan had the time to think about everything he'd just done. It hadn't occurred to him before, because he'd just been too focused on punishing Raven Tail. He'd broken into a hotel, sabotaged their infrastructure, caused massive property damage, and beaten the living hell out of almost each and every person he'd found there.
Just to realize everything he'd done was something of a revelation to him. Logan couldn't remember ever having acted that way before, and even though couldn't totally recall every moment of his life, he thought for sure that he hadn't. He'd never been one to shy away from causing damage if it couldn't be helped, but he'd never wantonly committed it before. His occupation demanded causing a certain amount of bodily harm to people, but he'd never been that brutal against any target before.
In spite of the ferocity of the assault, Logan felt no guilt for what he'd done, nor thought that he should. Those members of Raven's Tail were all criminals, even if not officially wanted by Fiore's government. There was no telling what they had done or to how many people, and despite how vicious he'd been, Logan knew he hadn't caused any truly permanent damage. Not with magical healing, anyway.
Thinking about what he'd done, what he kept coming back to was why he had done it in the first place. They had hurt Wendy. Logan still wasn't entirely sure why he felt such a strong attachment and protectiveness for her, but he was just now beginning to see how that attachment had grown even more during his time with the guild. More than that, if he really thought about it, he felt sure that he'd do the same for everyone on his team. Lucy, Natsu, Erza, Gray, even the cats. He would do just the same to protect or avenge any of them as he'd done for Wendy tonight.
"I guess somewhere along the way, I started to care about these guys." He thought.
It felt strange to him, to have to actively realize that he did care about someone else, and then he figured that if it weren't so difficult for him to process his own emotions, it probably wouldn't have been. He still didn't feel quite ready to tell them all about his past, or the strange circumstances which may not have directly lead to, but aided in their meeting. He wasn't ready, but, in the light of this epiphany and what he'd just done, he guessed maybe it wasn't as far off as he might have thought.
It wouldn't be right to go in there tonight, but the first thing he'd do in the morning would be to check on Wendy and Carla. After that, he'd have breakfast with everyone, just like he always did. Maybe he'd take Erza up on that offer she made months ago to train privately together. It might be fun.
OOO
A/N: Well, there's another one all done now! I hope all of you enjoyed this chapter, because I had a lot of fun writing it out. Getting to show Fairy Tail in celebration for happiness instead of for commiseration was great, and I loved getting to add in this new event of Logan pummeling the hell out of Raven's Tail. Things will be getting back to the regular games in the next chapter, but with some all new events, and new fights. As always, I'll love to hear from my regular reviewers, as well as anyone else who may want to leave any constructive criticisms, and I'll see you guys next time!