Waking Dreams (A Gruvia fanfiction)

Chapter 14: The Last Midnight

((Into The Woods reference, yeah!))

Tick, tick, tick.
The reverberating sounds of the clock seemed to taunt Juvia.
Do it.
It will be quick and easy.
Make him bleed.
The voices in her head went on endlessly. They were there every second of every day, only reminding her how easy it would be to murder her captor.
In her Phantom Lord days, she may have done just that. However, like Gajeel, she had changed for the better after joining Fairy Tail. And now, even after all she had been through, she couldn't quite bring herself to kill Nightmare. She was close to snapping like a twig, though.
Juvia sat on the ground against a drab stone wall, pressing her hands over her ears as though it could block out the voices inside her mind. Her cerulean hair fell in front of her eyes like a curtain, and she shut them tightly, as though it would make the torture end.
"Rain Woman~" Nightmare's voice made its way to her ears somehow.
"No," she muttered, "No no no no no. Juvia just wants to leave this place."
Nightmare smirked.
"You're not leaving until one of us dies."

The group in the labyrinth wandered on, Gray carrying Natsu on his back and complaining the whole time, Gajeel carrying a sleeping Levy, and Cana vaguely wondering what time it was.
Nozomi led them through the labyrinth, to dead ends and monsters and staircases that went nowhere. They had been wandering for hours, and they were starting to give up hope of finding a way out. Their morale was low as they all trudged on, barely saying a word. In an attempt to lighten the mood, Cana stated, "When we get home, I'm drinking the ten largest barrels of any alcohol the guild has."
This caused Lisanna to smile a little. "When I get back," she said, continuing the trend, "I'm going to spend some girl time with Mira-nee and bake with Elf-nii."
Gajeel seemed to think for a bit. "When I get back, I'm gonna give Pantherlily the biggest kiwi I can find."
Eventually Gray added his own statement in. "When I get back, I'm going to make sure that nobody ever hurts Juvia again." He was blushing furiously as he said it, but everybody smiled and Wendy even giggled a little. "When I get back...," she mused, "Maybe I'll just sleep all day with Carla curled up next to me."
This did lighten the mood a little, and soon the group decided to take a break from walking.
"I wonder what the rest of the guild is doing," Lisanna added.

It was sharp. Sharper than she had expected. Juvia cradled the glass shard in her hand, examining her reflection. Nothing mattered to her anymore except for getting out. Her mind was hazy, like she was doing everything half-asleep. All she knew was that she had to get back to Gray.
And if her dream had been correct, she could do that easily.
She practically held the key in her hand.
Juvia made her way down one of the identical-looking stone hallways, unsure of exactly where she was going but knowing what she had to do. Her feet pattered on the floor as she stepped in time to the ticking of the clock, which read 11:56.
You could do it by midnight, came the voice in her mind.
Yes, four minutes had to be enough to stop somebody's heart.
And there he was. Her victim, her captor, her jailer. Her nightmare.
He was standing right out into the open, gazing through what looked to be a window, though Juvia could not see beyond. She gripped the glass shard tightly, so tightly that she began bleeding, but that didn't matter to her anymore.
All she wanted was her escape. Juvia took another glance at the clock.
11:57
Her blood dropped onto the frozen floor, splashing onto the tiles with a brilliant red burst.
Juvia advanced, looking him straight in the eyes as he turned around.
11:58
Stab him. Shove it right into his flesh. How pretty his blood must look. How amazing that a body can bleed so much.
The voices whispered to her. And Juvia almost laughed. She almost actually laughed out loud, because it seemed too good to be true, that the voices of his own creation were now what was inspiring his death.
"Ah, Rain Woman. Have you come to 'entertain' me again?"
The words slipped from his mouth but didn't reach her ears.
11:59
She was nearly there now. Just a few more steps, one well-placed thrust, and she would be free. She could return to Fairy Tail with Gray and the others. Nightmare noticed the glass shard and her blood splashing onto the floor, leaving a thin trail behind her. "Rain Woman?"
12:00
Juvia finally reached him. Her victim, captor, jailer, nightmare.
With one strong, rage-filled, madness-induced thrust, Juvia shoved the glass shard into his neck as far as she could. Deep red blood poured from the wound, adorning the glass like exquisite vermillion lace.
The warm liquid ran down her hands, up her arms, dripping off of her and onto the floor. Nightmare's clothing was dyed red.
And then, the most inexplicable thing happened.
He laughed.
The man that she had just stabbed through the neck laughed.
"Thought you could kill me easily, Rain Woman?"

A/N: AAAAAND, CLIFFHANGER!
Hey guys! Again, I apologize for the slow updates, but that's just how life is. Anyway, there should only be two or three more chapters left. After that I might write an epilogue and I'll add in some "deleted scenes", AKA scenes I forgot about or just didn't feel like writing.
I'll try to finish this story within the next two weeks because after that I'll be going on a pretty long vacation.
Thanks for reading, commenting, voting, and please continue to do so!