Chapter Text
After our free period is lunch so Natsu, Lucy and I head down to find our exceeds, Levy saying she'd prefer to stay in her room. As we walk out into the Plaza I immediately spot Gajeel and Sting with Lily and Lector trying to start fights again, Rogue and Frosch are also in the Plaza but stay by the sidelines, watching their friends picking fights. I decide not to detour thinking the Plaza looked crowded enough to slip by without Sting or Gajeel noticing us, I was so wrong.
We're not even halfway across the Plaza when an iron dragon roar blocks our path and I hear the footsteps of the iron dragon slayer approaching us, my entire existence fills with fear. I see Gajeel storming towards us, Sting not far behind when both turn around as Rogue is calling out for them to stop. Sting walks back a little to find out what's wrong, Gajeel just glares at the other dragon slayer from his current position.
"Sting, why do we have to fight her? You've already taken down half of the people in the Plaza isn't that enough?" Rogue is almost begging his friend to see sense.
Sting just laughs at Rouge's worried expression. "We're only messing around with her Rogue, just roughing her up to put her in her place." I gulp at his last words, I didn't like the sound of that.
"And what place would that be? How come you should get to decide where everyone's place is? I don't want to fight her Sting!" I see Gajeel's angry response to Rogue's reactions. Before Sting even has a chance to reply an iron dragon club hits Rogue in the gut.
Ignoring Sting's protests of 'What the hell?' at his friend being hit Gajeel turns to him "If he doesn't want to fight then I have no problem with it, he can stand on the sidelines for all I care. But he doesn't get to stop me from fighting! Now are you joining me for this fight or not Sting?!" Slowly Sting nods and turns away from his friend.
After seeing my friend being struck by someone he'd considered a friend and seeing Frosch in tears running to Rogue's side the fear that had paralysed me turned into pure rage, but I still didn't feel strong enough to take both on alone. I turn back to look at Natsu, he gives me a knowing look and with a short nod walks up beside me, using the magic that Erza taught me, my body starts to glow yellow as I swap into my battle armour and step forward, glaring at Gajeel. This is war!
Both activating our magic, our fists become ablaze. Natsu's flames a bright orange that burn intensely, my own flames a deep blue that sparkle like crystals. Turning back to see the two of us ready to fight Gajeel grins; reaching into his pocket he takes out a piece of iron and begins to eat it. Sting activates his White Drive and an aura of bright light surrounds him. This is going to be the toughest fight of my life.
Natsu is the first to make a move, launching himself towards Sting. "Fire Dragon, Sword Horn!" Natsu's entire body becomes ablaze as he launches himself at Sting, head butting him. Sting is sent flying backwards into one of the nearby building, sending the crowd gathered there running.
Deciding to follow the tactic Wendy had shown me in our first spar, of using my enhancement spells early on before my opponents have the chance to make up the distance, I begin my own spells. "Darting light as bright as crystals ... AGILITAS!" The yellow light rises around me and I feel my body become lighter again. "Crystal rocks as hard as diamond ... TUELA!" Increasing my defence so their attacks won't do as much damage. "Crystal shards that slice the Earth ... VIRTUS!" My arms glow as my physical strength is increased. Only my ranged attacks like my roar or wing attack aren't boosted now, but those were always more of a speciality of mine. I am holding nothing back in this fight!
Gajeel launches himself towards me, "Iron Dragon, Sword!" Gajeel's arms turns into a sword, the spikes of which begin to rotate like a chainsaw. Lifting his sword he brings it down towards me. With my enhanced speed I easily somersault backwards avoiding his attack; which lands on the ground beneath me and as I return to the ground I land on the flat side of his sword.
Bending me knees I force all of my weight down onto the sword; in addition to my enhanced strength it's relatively easy for me to pin his sword to the ground. I ready my own attack, keeping my weight down on his sword so he can't move away. "Crystal Dragon, ROAR!" I jump back off his swords moments before my attack lands so that Gajeel is sent flying into a nearby building . I turn towards Natsu with a smile on my face, never have I felt so good fighting!
Both Sting and Gajeel are quick to return to their feet and both fire their roars towards us, Natsu counters Sting's with his own roar, I easily sidestep out of the path of Gajeel's attack. The fight continues as two separate fights for a while, Natsu fighting with Sting and I fight with Gajeel. I had never expected to have the upper hand in a fight against Gajeel, with my enhanced speed and strength I am able to dodge most of Gajeel's attacks and most of mine send Gajeel to the ground with one strike.
Gajeel dodges one of my slashes and catches me off guard with an iron dragon club; despite my enhanced defence his attack still sends me flying backwards, "Ahh!" I scream out as I fly through the air, landing roughly on my back the momentum of his attack causes me to roll backwards and it takes a few rotations before my hand - covered with crystal scales - can dig into the ground to stop my rotations, my other hand out to the side to steady myself. But Gajeel is already firing his roar towards me and I don't have enough time to dodge.
Natsu steps in front of me and counters Gajeel's roar with his own. Both Sting and Gajeel launch themselves at Natsu but Natsu is already responding. "Fire Dragon, Brilliant Flame!" igniting both hands and bringing them together Natsu creates a large fire ball that engulfs both Sting and Gajeel. Both are down on the ground but neither have finished fighting as they both begin to return to their feet.
I remember one of the fusion dragon spells Mr Gildarts had taught me, "This is a technique to be used when you fight teamed up with dragons or dragon aspects - whatever they are. Most wrongly think, like I did, that it's an absorbing spell to absorb the power of your teammates but I have been reliably informed that it's actually to grant you control of friendly fire that makes contact with you while it's in effect and gives you the ability to combine it with your own power" He'd told me, I hadn't had the chance to try out this new technique.
Until now. I raise my arms and focus my energy, "Fusion Dragon, Adsorption!" My body begins to glow and I turn to Natsu as I run forward, "Natsu roar at me!" Natsu's face fills with confusion at my request and he's about to argue, we don't have time to argue, they're down and this could finish it. "Just trust me Natsu, roar!" I cut off any argument and launch myself into the air to make myself an easier target for Natsu.
At first I'm worried he won't comply but then I hear the spell he casts. "Fire Dragon, ROAR!" Natsu's flamethrower engulfs me and at first it feels hot, burning me. I worry I was wrong about dragon aspects being dragon slayers but when I reach out my arm his flames start to circle around my hand and I no longer feel burning. I just hadn't given them an order yet! Once Natsu realises his flames are no longer obeying him he stops his attack.
Igniting my other hand with my own crystal power I bring my hands together, almost in a praying fashion, and reach them out towards Sting and Gajeel, who have made it to their feet; I cast a stronger version of one of my original spells. "Fusion Dragon, Nova!" the explosion is more powerful than it's ever been before and both are sent back to the ground.
I land on the ground, I'm surprised that I'd been able to stay airborne that long without Flash's help, I don't know, it must just be magic. Returning my focus to the fight I'm shocked to see Sting already back to his feet. How strong are these guy!? Sting's body is now covered by a brighter aura of light than before and white, scale-like patterns cover the edges of his face. He's now in dragon force. I stagger back towards Natsu. He can do that at will? I didn't know he was a third generation slayer!
Natsu, Gajeel and I are all first generation dragon slayers/tamer which means we can't enter dragon force - the most advanced state a slayer or tamer can achieve - at will, but Sting can which means he's a third generation dragon slayer.
Gajeel is back on his feet and Sting begins to absorb the surrounding light, preparing for his secret art, Natsu starts to prepare himself to counter Sting's attack when Gajeel launches an iron dragon club in our direction, I notice and dodge but Natsu's too focussed on Sting's attack to even hear my warning and get's struck and sent to the ground. "Dragon slayer secret art" both Gajeel and Sting ready their ultimate attacks.
Gajeel claps his hands above his head and they turn into a gigantic sword "Karma Demon, Iron God Sword!"
Sting launches his secret art towards Gajeel's sword "Holy Nova!" a bright light engulfs Gajeel's sword and Gajeel brings his attack down between Natsu and me causing an explosion that engulfs both of us. I brace myself for the impact but am surprised to find a familiar pair of small but strong paws lifting me up by my t-shirt, I feel the wind passing over my body and bring my arms to my sides to make myself streamline so we fly away from the blast faster, I end up relatively unharmed.
Flash and I exchange short smiles before I look to the ground for Natsu, I'm relieved to see him not far away, airborne, being held up by Happy. He looks over towards me, relief on his face at how unscathed I look. I hear annoyed moans as Gajeel's joins us at our level, Pantherlily holding him up and Sting shortly flies up carried by Lector, although it's obvious from his reaction that Sting's not use to fighting airborne.
The fight continues airborne for a while, Natsu and I initially overwhelm Sting while he's still becoming accustomed to fighting in the air, although it doesn't take him too long to get use to it. As we fly it's almost as if Flash can read my mind, she knows exactly where I want to go and what position I need to be in for my next attack just from the way I move my body, Natsu and Happy are also in sync. It doesn't take Sting and Gajeel long to realise they don't stand a chance if this stays airborne, so they start playing dirty.
Sting launches his attack towards me, "Whit Dragon, ROAR!" the laser flies out towards me, although I wasn't the target. The laser makes contact with Flash and we're both sent falling to the ground. I call out to my friend who doesn't even have the energy to stand after taking the full force of Sting's attack, I hadn't noticed Gajeel flying lower down yet. I twist in the air as I fall, landing on my feet I begin to run towards my friend; now I notice Gajeel, barely above the ground and readying an attack at my helpless friend.
Natsu and Happy start to fly towards us but I know there's no way they'll make it before the attack. "Iron Dragon, Kunai!" I see the small knives appear and fly towards my friend.
Without a second thought I change my course and launch myself to intercept the attack. "Crystal Dragon, Slash!" twisting in midair I launch my attack towards Gajeel's knives, I expect it to do little to his attack so am surprised when my hand makes contact with the ground and all of the knives fall down around me. Only then do I realise what's happened, I've entered my own dragon force. In my dragon force form my skin gains patches of scale like patterns that sparkle and shine like sunlight is constantly hitting them, the point at which my upper arms reach my shoulders are lined with small gem-like crystals, my hair becomes a sparkling silver and appears to float and my entire body is surrounded by a multicoloured aura which looks like white lighting hitting a prism and being split into its component colours.
Sting, Gajeel and Natsu have all landed back on the ground but all I feel is pure rage at our opponents. I begin to ready myself for my fusion dragon secret art, this secret art could be the strongest secret art of all the dragon tamer and slayer secret arts if used by the right person in the right way. "Dragon tamer secret art!" I put every inch of power I have into my attack. I feel the wings burst from my shoulder blades, just below the rings of gems; the colours of the wings are a mixture of those associated with the magic of each of my dragon and dragon slayer friends. These wings are mostly a deep blue - for the crystal dragon - and bright orange - for both Natsu's fire dragon magic and Spiral's part flame dragon - but they also have a pale, light blue - Wendy's sky dragon magic - and a pitch black - Rogue's shadow dragon magic. "Dragon Soul!" I launch myself forwards, flapping my new wings as I go, and my body becomes encased in a mixture of all of the powers in my wings in the shape of a dragon; I get closer to Gajeel and Sting and rear back to a halt, the dragon that had been surrounding me continues flying towards the two boys and attacks them, immediately both are unconscious.
My wings disappear and I collapse back on the ground, exhausted. My dragon force fads and I remember that Flash had been attacked. I struggle to my feet only to be pushed back down to a sitting position by Natsu who hands me Flash, now conscious but exhausted and in pain just like me. Wendy runs over to us from the crowd and uses her healing magic on us. Despite the pain all I care about is Flash's safety. Once I know she's fine I find myself relaxing and one thought crosses my mind. I did it! I finally took down Gajeel!
***
I've now been at Fiore Sylva College for six weeks, I've now had half a term at the college. I have a good group of friends and have finally found a place I belong. Sting no longer attempts to pick on me - although he does still challenge me to fights but they're more like spars now. And although Gajeel still picks fights he only ever does so when I'm alone, which isn't very often anymore. I've become stronger and have learnt many new spells and made more friends, I found out that dragon force for a first generation dragon tamer only activates when our friends are in danger. I am now a proud member of Fairy Tail, the mark on the left side of my neck proves this, and the wings I use during my dragon soul secret art now have yellow and white colours added - yellow for Laxus's lightning dragon power, we're not best of friends but not enemies and we're part of the same guild so see each other as family, and white for Sting's white dragon power, although he still wants to fight and can be very annoying we've both got a sort of respect for each other now. I feel like I've done so much more in these last six weeks than I ever did in the years before joining Fiore Sylva College, it's the best choice Flash and I ever made!