Chapter 65 - In a Flash

Fairy Tail: Paths of the Soul

From the moment the sun rose that day, Jaina had been preparing for an evening of drinking. She spent the day running around collecting whatever she needed from town. A bottle of rum, a case of beer, a bag of pretzels for when she got hungry, and half a dozen water bottles for the hangover. She found the sight of the many festival attractions an eye sore, and as such, kept a brisk pace. Or at least, as brisk a pace as a one-legged woman lugging what looked like a week's worth of junk food could manage.

The whole way through, she felt the eyes of the townspeople on her back, and a sensation of unwelcome filled the air. She knew exactly why; the missing arm, the eye patch, the peg leg, not to mention her almost perpetual scowl. She frightened people, and nobody made any effort to hide that from her. That, and her reputation as a quack doctor had apparently not gone over well either. Though she told herself she didn't care what they thought of her, she still quickened her pace on the way home.

Isa had dropped in on her by at twilight, trying one last time to convince her to go with her to the festival and, in her words, have a good time. She also gave her a disapproving look when she spied the stash of alcohol in the other room, and made a point to ask her to cut back on her drinking. Jaina dismissed her in a huff, flipping on the TV and dropping into her couch. Isa left a moment later with a long sigh, telling her to try and at least be responsible.

The first channel she flipped too was something about food. Jaina wasn't much of a cook, so that didn't hold her attention for too long. The second was a weather station, which she looked at for only two seconds before flipping channels. The next one was a documentary about the most accomplished mages in the country. This one really caught Jaina's attention, mostly to see if they'd name a certain twin of hers at any point.

Unknowingly, Jaina had left all her gatherings from that day in the other room, and hadn't so much as touched a drink for the whole three-hour duration of the program. She dropped back and huffed in disappointment as the credits rolled. She'd seen a few people she recognized, bit it made no mention of her sister. Or any other member of the guild, for that mater. Snorting, Jaina got up to stretch her back, glancing out the window to find the sun had long since set and a vivid array of fireworks going off over the town.

She thought about what the others where doing right now. Isa was probably having a good time, she was always good at relaxing when the time was right. The magic show that the guild was putting on came to mind, and Jaina wondered if it would be worth while flipping to the news station to see if they'd broadcast it. Then she through of a few members of her guild getting into a drunken bar brawl, and remembered that she'd yet to touch her stash for the night.

Quickly trying to rectify that, Jaina fished the rum bottle out of her shopping bag and flicked off the cork, when a quick knocking came at her door just before she could touch the bottle to her lips. She glanced at it momentarily, deciding to ignore it, when another, more rapid knocking filled the air again.

"Ms. Donwheel!?" It was Jon, and his rapid knocking persisted. "Ms. Donwheel, please open up!"

Letting out a long, slow moan, Jaina finally dropped her bottle on a stack of books next to her couch and when to answer the door. "Alright, alright..." She urged, as the knocking had already begun to give her a headache. "What's the- Whoa!" She opened the door, only to have Jon grab her by the wrist and drag her outside. "Whoa, whoa, where's the dame fire?"

"The guild master..." The short man huffed, already out of breath. "The guild master has been attacked!"

"Ok, we're loaded up." A paramedic called to his carriage driver, shutting the doors after he and three assistants had loaded Davin inside. The three assistants quickly packed up their equipment while the paramedic approached Jaina waiting by the guild entrance. "We'll do what we can for him." He assured.

Jaina huffed, glaring at the ground. "How bad is he?"

The medic opened his mouth to answer, but it looked like he was only making a guess. With a sigh, he shrugged his shoulders and said. "It's too soon to know, but the sooner we get him back to the hospital, the better his chances will be." Jaina snorted, but kicked off the wall and nodded her head with a grimace.

The carriage sped off into the night, and Jaina pushed through the gate into the guild's courtyard. Jon stood outside, admiring a long slash mark in the stone that ran through the hall's double door entrance. "If it's all the same..." Jon muttered. "I'd rather wait out here." Jaina nodded, took a deep breath, and stepped inside.

Inside the guild hall looked even worse than outside. It looked like there'd been a war in here. A large hole sat in the middle of the guild's back wall, and the bar top below it had been demolished. Most of the furniture, and several of the booths had been destroyed as well, and the spiral staircase in the corner that led to the upper level was nothing but splinters.

The people through, where what Jaina really focused on. Shelly was the first one she saw, sitting at what was probably the only table left undamaged with a somber expression. Zeke sat tucked against her tummy, and Jak sat crouched on the ground next to her, both of them trying in vein to start a conversation with her. Elligr sat off to the right, sitting cross-legged and trying to piece together what she guessed was a chair. There where too many broken pieces to count, but his uncoordinated moments and drunken flush to his face made her decide to leave him be. Rift was currently inspecting the spot where the spiral staircase used to be, his shades resting on his forehead.

Seeing as he was closest, Jaina approached him first. "Rift...?" He glanced over his shoulder, shying away when he saw her stern expression. "What... The hell... Happened?" She spoke in a whisper, glancing over her shoulder to make sure none of the others heard her, but the anger and confusion in her voice carried as if she'd been yelling.

Scratching his thin beard, he took a quick look around the destroyed guild hall. "Uh... There was some guy..."

Jaina shoved him by the shoulder, which seemed to do nothing more than grab his attention. "I come out here to find my guild in shambles, and the best you can do is: some guy?"

The two of them looked back towards the others, but Jaina's outburst had gone unnoticed. Fearing another however, Rift thought back. "The place was like this when we got here. Building was wrecked, and the Guild master..." He paused a moment, a grimace falling over his face. They all saw his condition, there was no point in talking about it now. "I think the fight had just ended, and some masked guy was here with him. Me, Geno, and Jak tried to jump him, but..." He paused again, crossing his arms across his chest in disappointment. "We couldn't even touch 'em."

"He'd just won a fight against Davin." Jaina huffed, staring at the floor and running her hand through her hair. "No shit you couldn't touch him."

Rift snorted at that, looking somewhat insulted. "Well, I didn't see much else. I heard Axel do something..." He glanced past Jaina to the gash in the front wall. "And boy, did he do something. But after that the guy just up and vanished."

"Just into thin air?" Jaina let out a long sigh, not really expecting an answer. Rather than that, she racked her brain to think of who the culprit might have been. Revenge for shutting down that dark guild last month was her first thought, but if they had someone that strong on their payroll, that little adventure would've ended very differently for everyone. An assassin was her next guess, but that didn't sit right with her either. And they didn't have much of value, especially not worth fighting someone as strong as Davin over, so a robbery didn't seem likely either. Grunting in annoyance, Jaina gave up trying to think of a reason and rested her hand on her hip. "What the hell where you lot even doing up here, anyway?" She huffed, looking over the guild hall again. "There's a big festival in town. You lot are suppose to be out having fun, right?"

"We ran into Jon. Asked us for help keeping Elligr out of the bars." He shrugged, nodding back to where the round man was sitting. "Plus, Amber was sick, or something. So, we figured we'd just come back here and hang out a bit."

"Sick?" Jaina repeated. "Sick how?"

Rift just shrugged. "I dunno'. Something about her ears."

Jaina's stomach tied itself in a knot. "Right... Because of the fireworks." That'd probably put a pretty heavy dampener on their plans. With a huff, she scanned over the guild for injuries, trying to make herself useful now that the paramedics had carted Davin away. "So, where is she? Do her ears still hurt?"

"You, uhhh..." Rift took a step back. "You... May want to talk to Axel about that."

"Why?" Jaina asked, still scanning across the building. She still couldn't spot Amber however, and her tone got worse when she looked back at him. "Tell me why, Rift."

"Um..." It looked like he couldn't find the words. "She's... Missing."

"Axeeel!” Jaina roared, charging toward the center of the room. "Axel, where the hell are you?" She furiously looked around, following Elligr's gesture to find him sitting in one of the undamaged booths. He had a pair of large books laid out before him, which she discovered where the guild's catalog of wanted posters when she got a little closer. "Axel, I-." She paused a moment, noticing that he'd remained fixated on flipping through the pages, not so much as glancing her direction. "What are you doing?"

"I'm looking..." He paused moment to turn a page. "Looking for the one who attacked us." He flipped through a few more pages, but the look of dissatisfaction persisted on Axel's face. "S-Class criminals are the only ones who're strong enough to be a threaten a guild master's life, so-."

"Keep your damn voice down!" She snapped, slamming her hand down on the book. She glanced over her shoulder to find Jak and Zeke staring back at her. Shelly though, the one she'd been concerned about, remained still. Taking a deep breath to calm herself, she slid the books away rested her palm on the table. "Where's Amber?"

He didn't look at her, but sat up and stared at the front of the hall. "That guy... He took her." Jaina caught a lump in her throat, delaying any outburst she may have had while Axel continued to speak. "We tried to stop him, but nothing we did worked. Then he grabbed her and... Disappeared." He trailed off, staring at the large, horizontal gash that split the entrance in two. "She was right next to me..."

"Ok..." Jaina couldn't think. This was crazy! Why the hell was this happening? She felt angry. She wanted to be angry. At someone, something, anything. She just couldn't find a source to vent on. "OK, just..." She pushed the book of wanted posters back towards him, trying to clear her thoughts. "Keep doin' what your doin'. I'll be right back."

She stumbled away, more worried for Amber now than she was for Davin. Her stomach burned, she needed a drink. Unfortunately, she'd left anything alcoholic back at her hut. And from the look of it, most of the stuff they had stocked at the bar had been destroyed along with the bar. Not starting into her beer for the night really began to weigh on her, especially as she approached Shelly. This part was probably going to be the hardest conversation yet.

"Hey, baby girl..." She said, placing her hand on her shoulder. "How're you holding up?"

She glances up at her, her blue eyes glistening in the light. "Dad..." She mumbled softly. "He called me by mom's name."

Recoiling her hand, Jaina's stomach grew even tighter. The hardest conversation had also just become the shortest. "W-well, uh... T-the doctors'll take care of him, so just sit tight." She continued to stair at her, making Jaina feel compelled to keep talking. "Isa will be here with the Council goon squad soon enough. Then we'll get looking for Amber, alright?" Shelly nodded slightly, and Jaina turned to face the whole room. "Anyone called Leo?"

Rift shook his head. "Figured we'd wait until we had good news."

Licking her lips, Jaina nodded begrudgingly. "Yeah... Good plan." How the hell could things get any worse? "So, there's no other surprises I should know about, are there?" She asked finally, taking another look around. "Where the hell's Geno gone off to?"

As if on cue, the back door burst open and Geno came stumbling through with a hand clamped over his face. Everyone turned to watch him kick the door closed, sealing a rancid stench that had begun to fill the building. "Do not..." He began, wiping his nose. "Go back there."

"What the hell's your problem?" Jaina barked.

Geno began shaking his head to get the stench out of his nose. "There's a dead body back there."

"Riiiiiift!" Jaina shouted, furiously turning in his direction. "What the hell did I just say?!"

"Hey, hey, I don't know what he's talking about." He backed away, trying to quell Jaina's anger. At the same time, it appeared that he was working on his last nerve as well. "What body?" He asked, shifting the focus to Geno. "Where?"

"In the arena." Geno began, staring at the back door like he expected it to pop open on them at any moment. "But... It ain't from today. It looks like the lad spend a few weeks in the ground already." He shook his head, finally turning to face them again. "That... And it looks like the Master flattened him. Poor bastard's nothing but paste and-."

"OK, OK. Shuddup!" Jaina barked quickly, sparing them any gory details. "I'll go take a look. You guys just... Stay put and wait for Isa." She pushed past Geno, knocking the back door open with her elbow to investigate this body for herself. In the brief moment she stood between the main hall and the arena building, she glanced up at the sky, dyed red by the bright red moon high above. "Dammit..." She cursed. "I knew red moon's where bad luck."

As the door slammed shut, Geno slowly made his way to the center of the room. "There's... Something else too." He said, waving Rift over to one of the booth tables. "I found something back there. And I'm pretty damn sure it ain't somethin' of ours."

Despite talking to Rift, this caught everyone's attention. They watched Geno drop something small and metal onto the table, and Rift stepped closer to see what it was. It sat on it's side, resembling an insect made of clockwork parts. The back of it had been blown open, and some parts of it's legs where broken or missing, but it looked like it could jump to life at any moment all the same.

"Well..." Rift began, scratching his chin. "You're right, don't think it belongs to us."

"Think it belongs to that masked guy?" Axel asked, crossing the room so fast that it blew some of the loose wanted posters into the air. "Did he leave it here?"

"I don't know, Axel." Rift snorted.

"What about that body?" Geno added. "How the hell did that get here?"

"I don't know." Rift said again.

"Is that old guy going to be ok?" Jak asked, pulling at the back of his shirt and nodding his head towards the door. "Shelly's really worried about him."

"Dammit guys, I don't know!" Rift snapped, pushing them all away from him and scratching his head in frustration. The tension in the room was building, which they all realized upon Rift's outburst. "Just give me a second to think. Isa's going to be here soon, so just-."

"Aaaahhh!" Zeke cried, diving into Axel's stomach. His claws hooked onto his shirt, timidly looking back to a room full of confused faces. "It m-moved." He said, pointing a shaky paw towards the table. "T-that bug thing moved."

This caught everyone's attention. Shelly hopped up to join them at the booth, carefully watching for any sign of movement. A clock hanging from the upper floor balcony ticked the seconds away, and everyone seemed to be holding their breath. Suddenly one of the machine's legs twitched, causing them all to jump back a step. An array of lights flickered from what would have been the insects head,looking eerily similar to eyes. The thing shakily rolled upright, pushing itself up on it's shaky, damaged legs.

"It’s getting up..." Jak mumbled, taking another step back with the rest of them. "Guys, it's getting up!"

Gritting his teeth, Axel stepped forward holding a ball of electricity in his hand. The others recoiled another step, turning away from the bright flash of lighting that flew from his hand. The machine crashed into the wall, a glowing red hole through the side of it's body and a dark scorch mark across the table.

"Dammit!" Rift cried, pulling his fingers out of his ears. "A little warning would be nice!"

"Sorry..." He mumbled. "It's dead now."

"Great..." Geno mumbled, picking the thing up and dangling it upside down by the legs. "But now we're back to square one: The hell is this thing?"

As if on que, the machine lit up and sprung to life, twitching and flailing free from Geno's hand. It danced around the floor, mesmerizing them all with it's spasms, while a light blue glow began to build in it's back. "Hey..." Elligr mumbled in a drunken haze, shielding his eyes from the light. "What're you lot doin' over there?"

A bright light enveloped them all, just as the back door flew open and Jaina rushed back inside. The moment she lay eyes on it, the light flashed brightly, then blinked out of existence, taking everyone who had been standing too close with it.

A small, scorched hole in the floorboards was all that remained, which let out a dull hiss and a thin trail of smoke in the cool night air. "What...?" Jaina mumbled, exchanging a glance with Elligr. "What is...?"

The sound of the front gate opening echoed through the hall, and soon Jon and Isa stepped inside, accompanied by half a dozen Rune knights from the Magic Council. "Jaina. What's happened?" Asked Jon. "Where is everybody?"

"What was that light?" Isa added, noticing the smoldering hole in the floor.

"I... Don't know..." Jaina began, the frustration of the night finally boiling over. "What!? The fuck!? Is going ooooooon?!"

Next Chapter – Chapter 66 - Silunna