Chapter Text
I look across the café table at my black haired friend Rogue, his hair falls down over his face covering his right eye in its usual style and for some reason the scar across the bridge of his noise seems to stand out more than normal. Sitting next to Rogue is our mutual friend Sting, although the blonde haired boy usually annoys me, when we're with Rogue I can tolerate him, and today I certainly have to. We each have our exceeds on our laps. The ginger cat on my lap, Flash, keeps fiddling nervously at the buttons on her denim jacket. On Sting's lap is the reddish-brown cat Lector, he doesn't seem to have his normal amount of energy today and just stares at the door, none of us have much energy anymore. Except for the green exceed on Rogue's lap; Frosch is wearing his usual pink frog costume and seems oblivious to the whole situation. It's raining outside, the flash of lightning corrects me, no it's a thunderstorm - the perfect weather for this situation as our college is at war. Waiting for the one person who made my life hell before moving college I remember the events that started this war.
***
Walking down the path I can hardly even walk in a straight line I'm so dizzy. I hear a thud and look towards the ground on my right to see my pink haired friend collapsed on the ground, his face has a hint of purple due to the nausea he's feeling. "Natsu, if you have such severe motion sickness why did you suggest going on the new rollercoaster? It's supposed to have more loops than any other in the country!"
Natsu doesn't even both trying to get up, he just looks up towards me, "I lost a bet with Sting!" was all he said before trying to bury his face in the concrete ground.
Suddenly Natsu is lifted off the ground by our black, spiky haired friend, who has managed to lose his shirt again. Ignoring the calls of 'clothes' from the blonde and red haired girls behind us - Lucy and Erza - Gray almost shouts in Natsu's face. "Since when have you been hanging out with Eucliffe?!"
Natsu punches Gray in the face and collapses back to the floor looking like he'll vomit at any moment, "We have IT together, I was watching a quiz show and said the third answer would be the best, Sting walked up behind me and said the second would be the best. As we both have motion sickness we decided whoever was wrong would have to ride the new rollercoaster, the second was the best!" It's strange for Natsu's motion sickness to affect him for so long after he gets off the vehicle.
"Oh no, Natsu! Maybe I can help!" We look towards the source of the voice and see our blue haired friend Wendy running up towards us with the three exceeds - Natsu's blue exceed Happy, Wendy's white exceed Carla and my ginger one Flash - all running behind her.
"Wendy, you're a lifesaver!" Natsu exclaims after Wendy uses her Troia spell on him to relieve him of his motion sickness. With Natsu relieved of his affliction we decide to ride all of the fast rides in the park now so that Natsu can enjoy them too. Wendy's Troia spell lasts until we decide to ride the Ferris Wheel, for the majority of the ride Natsu is able to enjoy the view, this was apparently the first time he'd been able to do so. The carriages couldn't hold all six of us so we had to split into two groups: Wendy, Natsu and I rode in one with Flash and Carla; Erza, Gray and Lucy rode in the other with Happy. The Troia spell wore off for the last quarter of the ride and after trying to cast a second one Wendy's spell didn't have any effect on Natsu.
After Natsu's motion sickness returned we decide to play some of the arcade games until it was time to leave the seaside. Wendy wanted a large stuffed bear that you could win in a clearly rigged shooting game. It doesn't take me long to figure out how the rigged game works and I win the bear for her.
Returning back to the Fairy Tail guild hall we remember that this is the last Saturday before the second half of college starts again. We receive news that the new college that was being constructed has opened, it's called Tartaros Demonic Haven. None of use gave the other college much thought, just thinking it was ironic that a college had both Demonic and Haven in its name.
***
We've now been back in college for about a week, I currently have a free period. Of my three free periods this is the only one I share with Flash, we're sitting in our shared room, the other residents aren't here - Wendy has her Cores lesson and Carla also has a free period but decided to spend it in Wendy's lesson. Happy is also in our room, asleep, all of the exceeds have a free period now. I usually spend this time with Rogue and Frosch but Rogue was behind on work so is using it to catch up. Natsu and Erza have their Supernatural Theories lesson, Gray has his Magic Enchantments lesson and Lucy has her IT lesson. And for some reason I just can't shake this bad feeling I have.
"Hey Flash," Flash looks up at me, my sudden speech wakes Happy up and I apologise, "I've got a bad feeling, do you want to go flying, see if we can shake it off?" I turn back to my exceed and she gives me an enthusiastic grin before unfurling her wings, Happy next her unfurls his wings intending to join us.
We fly out through the window, normally I'd have gone through the door and outside before flying but this bad feeling is unsettling me so I want to do whatever I can to stop it. We fly over top of some of the other buildings with Happy following close behind us when the unthinkable happens. We're flying over building 2, looping around towards building 5 when an explosion engulfs the entire building! All three of us freeze, too shocked to move when I remember, IT and Cores are in that building! We fly towards the rubble left over from the explosion, "WENDY! CARLA! LUCY!" I shout at the top of lungs when a blur catches my eye.
Immediately noticing where I want to go Flash turns in mid-air and we fly towards building 4, it's the library and where assembly and social gatherings are held, it's also currently where Rogue and Frosch are! I see the figure that had come from the explosion, he was young and muscular, I would've thought he was human if it wasn't for the ears that were in his shoulder length brown hair, his hands appeared black from where I was flying and he had a furry tail protruding from his lower back. I wonder if he caused building 5 to explode.
I don't have to wonder for long, as we fly closer the mysterious figure turns towards us, I can now see that his hands are black up until his wrists and after that there appears to be diamond patterns going up his arms. As he looks up at me his hair covers his left eye and his nose is small and canine-like. "Drat! I've been spotted!" when he speaks I see that his teeth are all pointed and fang like. We begin to fly closer but he raises a hand out towards us "I wouldn't come any closer human, or I'll blow up you and your little cat friend!" He then continues to cause an explosion in front of us but I manage to negate most of it with a crystal dragon wing attack. "Oh, so you're a little wizard then? I guess destroying you could be fun!"
I glare at the figure in front of me, "Who the hell are you and why did you blow up our building?!" My voice is full of anger but the figure doesn't look impressed.
He suddenly starts laughing up at me, "You've got a lot of nerve for a human, I'll humour you for now and play along. I'm Jackal, an Etherious demon, a member of the Tartaros guild and a student at the Tartaros Demonic Haven. So who would you be peppy little wizard?"
His arrogance annoys me but I don't know enough about Etherious demons to be confident enough to fight him. "My name is Crista Draco, I'm a Fairy Tail wizard and a student at Fiore Sylva College and you have made a big mistake attacking us!" I summon all of my courage to try and stop my words from wavering.
"Oh really? And why would that be, I only blew up one building!" The smirk on Jackal's face annoys me, did he not know there were people in that building or did he just not care?
"There were people in that building! People who had never done anything to you! They didn't deserve to..." but before I can finish an explosion to my right causes us to stagger in the air, almost falling we recover and fly back up and towards the left just as Jackal jumps towards us.
"They were only humans! Human lives mean nothing to me! They're inferior to demons and nothing more than my playthings!" He snarled as he lunged towards us. For some reason I couldn't shake the feeling that I shouldn't let him touch me.
Flash knows exactly what I want to do before I even do it and starts flying backwards, out of reach of the Etherious, "Crystal Dragon, ROAR!" I aim my attack towards him but he easily negates it with his explosions.
"Attacks like that just don't work on me little wizard!" He snarls back up to me. Before either of us have the chance to do anything more Natsu flies in - carried by Happy - and lands a fire dragon iron fist clean on Jackal's jaw.
"Happy flew down to me and told me what happened," Natsu flies back towards me but his gaze never leaves Jackal, "Wendy and Carla's class was moved to building 3, they're both fine, but Lucy was in building 5 and they still haven't found her yet."
He lunges for another attack on Jackal despite me calling out for him not to. "I'd listen to her flame-head!" Jackal aims at Natsu after dodging his attack, "you don't know what happens to people who touch me!" Jackal indicates to a glowing mark on Natsu's fist where he'd hit Jackal earlier. Jackal smirks at Natsu and with a low laugh says "boom" before the mark explodes on Natsu's hand. Calling out to my friend we start to fly closer again but Jackal raises an arm warning us away. "I have to go now little wizard, Kyoka wants me back at college, but I'm sure we'll be seeing each other again real soon." He arrogantly grins up at me before jumping off and disappearing into the city.
"Natsu!" I call out to my friend who's still lying down on the ground. With the help of Flash and Happy we get Natsu back to the infirmary and explain to the teachers what happened.