Kia knew she should have tagged along like Lucy and Gray. There was no doubt in her mind that the eight could take care of themselves, but they had been gone for far too long. A faint glow was forming in the sky to the east as dawn was trying to break.
"They probably got back and passed out in the bar after the long day." Amber tried to ease Kia's nerves, but something was just telling her that everything wasn't alright. At first, she tried to chalk it up to this odd sickness that she was dealing with, but her instincts were saying otherwise.
Verani moved ahead of them, pressing her ear to the door, "I can hear some of them still in there."
"Do you hear any of them?" Kia tried to keep her voice down, not wanting to intrude.
"Are we just supposed to put up with this crap from those jerks?!" Her brother's shouts crept through the door. "Untie me, and I'll go up there and get her right now!"
A hushed voice tried to calm the yelling pyro, but Kia just sighed as she knocked. Those inside went quiet as footsteps grew closer. Mira peeked around the door with a sigh.
"You three might want to hear this." She stepped to the side, giving the girls room to enter.
"Kia! Tell them to untie me!"
"Shut up until I know what's going on!" A growl could be heard in her throat, making her brother immediately do as he was told. She exhaled, taking a second before turning to their Master on the counter of the bar, "What happened?"
He answered, "Lucy has been taken into custody because of some secret military operation."
"What the hell?" Verani exclaimed.
Kia pinched the bridge of her nose as she sighed, "That makes things overly complicated."
"Yes it does." Master started, "We can't afford to take reckless action against the kingdom... And they surely wouldn't want word to spread that they mistreat innocent civilians. But I suppose we should consider her a hostage until this Eclipse Project of theirs is called off."
"Eclipse Project?" Amber asked as she leaned back on the table behind her.
Gray answered, "They have this magical gate that supposedly can be used for time travel."
"Colonel Arcadios said he was planning to travel back in time to take out Zeref before he became immortal." Wendy added.
"Man..." Laxus grumbled, "They got us by the you-know-what don't they?"
Verani and Amber listened intently to everything that the others had to say about what had happened, but Kia's eyes had glazed over. She thought back to the first time she had run into Anna after they were all separated when they had stepped through the Gate. She remembered how the Celestial Wizard had explained that the king had agreed to destroy the Gate, the very thing that was causing their problem right now.
"You're all on the first place team in the games..." Mira pointed out, "High profile. It would be pretty suspicious if you all just didn't show up for the final match tomorrow."
"Mira has a point," Amber chimed in. "Everyone would have noticed if all of you had just disappeared."
Others in the room agreed as they all turned back to their Master, ready to hear what he had been thinking through while they talked. But Kia still wasn't really catching everything that was being said. She bawled her fists as her anger gradually began to manifest. Slow rings of fire started to lick up her body one at a time.
"Kia..."
Though Verani spoke softly, the bar had chosen that moment to get quiet. As everyone shifted their gazes to the girls by the door, their eyes widened. They were a little surprised at how upset the Phoenix Slayer was over Lucy's arrest, but that was only the half they knew.
"It shouldn't still exist." Kia's words were nearly inaudible, but for the sensitive ears of the Dragon Slayers it was clear.
Gajeel turned, "What shouldn't exist?"
Kia looked up, locking eyes with their Master. His brows raised as he read her expression. There were very few things or people that could cause the pink-haired girl to become this hostile.
Her words came out like a growl, "Those idiots are playing with things they don't understand."
The rings of fire began appearing and rippling faster and more violently. Master's eyes widened as he watched Kia's eyes shifting from their normal onyx color into a golden hue with dilated pupils.
"Verani!"
The blonde had already started the gestures for the spell even before her grandfather had called her name. Slamming her palm against Kia's chest, a glow erupted throughout the room. Everyone else was forced to shield their eyes. After blinking a few times, they found Verani placing a now unconscious Kia in a chair.
"What the hell was that?" Laxus asked, looking between the pair and his grandfather.
Master sighed, but it was Verani who answered, "The uncontained rage of a phoenix."
"I was afraid that might happen with how she's been feeling since we got here yesterday." Amber muttered.
"What do you mean?" Cana asked.
Finally turning back around, V replied, "She's been feeling off since we arrived in Crocus. When Amber checked her at lunch, she said that whatever it was showed similar symptoms to her time sickness."
"If what we know about the Eclipse Gate is true, it's nothing but a concentration of time magic." Mira said.
Juvia took a step forward, "But will she be alright?"
"Yeah," Amber nodded, "V just contained the fire and knocked her out. She needed the sleep anyway."
"That's good." Erza said, before turning back to their Master. "But we still need to figure out what we can do about Lucy. The Royal Army isn't known for acting rashly and taking citizens for no reason. If we knew what the real justification for her capture was... Perhaps we could use that to help her."
Natsu growled as he snapped the ropes that had been constraining him, "We all need to quit flapping our gums and do something!"
"Simmer down!" Makarov said firmly as his enlarged fist flattened the pyro into the floorboards. "A member of our family has been taken against her will. Believe me, we all want justice right now."
Though he was addressing the issues as it had first been presented to him, Makarov knew that he was going to need to have a conversation with Kia whenever she woke up. There was much more to the story for her transformation to forcefully start that way.
"That being said, we can't just charge headlong into conflict like we usually do. It's too risky. However," he looked up and locked eyes with those in the room, "We are not cowards and we will not let them get away with this. We are Fairy Tail."
||~x~||
After the excitement of the fourth day and Lucy's arrest, most of those involved with the Games slept until the late afternoon on rest day. Kia was no exception to this as she sat on the windowsill of the Mythics' hotel room. She assumed that the girls had gone out to get something to eat, but she welcomed the quiet.
She gripped the bottoms of her shorts as she closed her eyes, "I can't believe I almost lost control like that."
Things would have fallen apart if Verani hadn't reacted when she did. Seeing as no one was busting down their door for answers, she could assume that she hadn't completely broken her seal, but that didn't make it any less frightening. It wasn't time for anyone else to know that truth about her. Kia wasn't even sure if she was ready to face that part of her past again.
Knock, knock.
Kia didn't even open her eyes, "Yes?"
She listened to the sound of the door creaking open and closed, before footsteps moved across the room. The bed squeaked slightly as the person perched on it.
"I was wondering if you were up."
"I'm sorry, Master."
"I heard from Amber and Verani how you haven't been well since arriving." He spoke softly as to try and keep their conversation as private as possible. "But that wasn't the entire reason I came up to check on you."
Kia waited, already having a good idea where this conversation was going.
"I need to know why you got so angry over the Eclipse Gate."
A sigh crossed her lips as her eyes fell closed. "This has come up briefly before when you asked where I had learned my magic." She paused, not ready to say the words, but doing so anyway. "The means by which I did that little time hop was with the Eclipse Gate."
Master's shoulders tensed.
"I never went into any details because I was under the impression that it had been destroyed once it had served its purpose."
He raised a brow, "Its purpose?"
Kia clenched her fists in her lap, "Though it wasn't why it was originally constructed, the Gate was used in a plan against Acnologia."
The mention of the Black Dragon sent the old man even more rigid. From what Kia had mentioned before, he knew that she had learned her magic by traveling through time. Even though the notion was crazy, he could tell that the young child had not been lying to him. Every word that had left her was genuine.
"And what do you fear could happen knowing that it hadn't been destroyed?"
The Phoenix Slayer shook her head, "There are plenty of possibilities, but I fear they could be grim because I doubt they understand what they are playing with."
There was a look in her eyes that Master could not ignore. It was a darkness, an unknown storm of anger that he had only seen one other time: when she had originally told him a few details about her past, when he had helped her with her seal. "What else is on your mind?"
The hardness that had formed in her onyx eyes did not waver, "No matter how much I want Zeref to end, his absence throughout history would be too great."
Her words had come off clipped, as if she hated having to say them. Kia knew that was a big reason why Zeref couldn't be removed before he had advanced magic, but she had a much bigger reason to keep him alive for now. However, she knew that this plan to travel back in time and kill him before he became immortal would never work. The Eclipse Gate was created after he had gained his immortality. Any time further in the past than that couldn't be reached with the Gate, but it would have been too complicated to explain that. And also to explain why she knew that beyond a reason of a doubt.
Master sighed, "There is no denying that fact."
He crossed his arms behind his back. Kia had shifted her gaze back to the window for a moment. There was so much tension in her body and she knew it wasn't just from the time sickness that she could feel lingering in her bones. Her internal flame flickered uncomfortably.
Her words came out low, but steady, "But whatever is about to happen, I think we'll be stuck in the middle of it again."
||~x~||
Verani felt like a little kid again as she stared at the First Master as she spoke with the five who would be competing during the last day of the Grand Magic Games. Amber had wandered off with the rescue team, determined to help them make a plan. They both knew that they could only do so much without knowing the layout of the castle or the fact that Natsu would end up winging something anyway.
But currently, Gray was the one throwing the minor fit. He wanted the chance for a rematch against Rufus. Though from what she had heard, Verani was pretty sure he just wanted the chance to prove that he wasn't that much of a screw up.
Beyond that little outburst, the meeting went off without a hick. A new sense of confidence seemed to flow off each member of the five-man team. It brought a smile to Verani's lips.
"What are you so happy about?" Amber asked as she slipped into the seat across from her friend.
"Master Mavis is so cool."
"Well duh." Amber chuckled, "She created this guild in the first place."
V turned to face her, "How did your little meeting go?"
"Everyone was all ears surprisingly. Natsu was a bit scatterbrained at first, but he's determined to rescue Lucy." She sighed, "I just wish they would still be in range for my signal runes."
"Don't worry." V playfully nudged her foot under the table, "If we have to get ahold of them, Warren should be able to get them over telepathy."
"Right," she nodded. "Did Master come back down?"
"No. Not yet."
"I wonder how much she's going to tell him."
"I'm surprised she hasn't told him already." V rested her forehead against the table. "I mean, how could she explain anything without mentioning that?"
"Who knows with Kia? She would find a way."
V sighed, "True."
A silence passed over the two as they both knew there was nothing else they could say in the public space. Kia's past was complicated and for anyone not listening to the full story it wouldn't make sense or it would give them the wrong impression. Verani sighed as she lifted her head up, seeing her dark-haired friend looking across the room with a gentle smile on her face. Following her line of sight, the blonde quickly saw Juvia trying to cling to the arm of an embarrassed Gray.
"Okay," V pushed against the elbow Amber had resting on the table. "Spill. What's going on between you and Juvia?"
Amber raised an eyebrow, "Nothing's going on."
"Then why are you staring at her like that?"
"I wasn't meaning to." She couldn't help but smile softly again, "It's just so good to see her finally happy."
"Huh?"
Amber sighed, "Juvia and I were friends when we were really little. The other kids used to make fun of her because of how the rain would follow her, but I didn't mind. We were practically inseparable until my parents decided to move to Magnolia."
"Oh." Verani said, "Now everything makes a little more sense. That's why you went all protective mode when Lyon approached her at the guild."
"Yeaaahhhhh, it wasn't uncommon for me to shield her from the bullies." Amber tapped a finger nervously on the tabletop, "I guess I just reacted when I saw her getting all flustered."
Verani slid over so she could whisper, "Sooooo, there's nothing else going on?" She left Amber with a wink before sitting back in her chair.
"No," Amber sighed, "even though I wonder about it, I think she's found the right person already."
One of the blonde's eyebrows raised, "You wonder?"
The dark-haired girl rested her cheek in the palm of her hand, "Once upon a time, I would have liked it to be me, but I'm okay with this too."
They both found themselves looking over at Juvia and Gray as the Ice wizard was trying to get away from the lovestruck rainwoman. Neither could help the grins that appeared on their faces.
||~x~||
"Sorry that I can't come with you."
Natsu elbowed his sister, "Will you stop apologizing? It's not your fault that you can't get that close to the castle."
"I still feel useless like this." Kia sighed as Happy jumped into her lap.
He smiled, "Don't worry. I'll look after Natsu for you."
She couldn't help but smile back as she patted his head, "I know you will."
"I'm not a little kid anymore," Natsu crossed his arms, "You don't have to worry about me."
"Tough," Kia elbowed him, "It's my job."
He turned to face her, holding one of his ankles as he pulled his leg up on the side of her bed, "Then it's my job too."
She chuckled, "Natsu."
"No. If Amber hadn't told me, I wouldn't even know that you're sick again." He locked eyes with her, "You know you can tell me anything, sis."
She sighed, "I know."
"Good. Because I hate it when you hide things from me."
Kia grabbed his shoulder, pulling him into a hug. "Stop growing up on me."
"Sorry. No can do." he laughed as he hugged her back.
Kia tightened her hold on her little brother. Her eyes stung as she thought about everything he didn't know yet. All the secrets that she was hiding from him that she would deny no matter how much she knew he would hate her in the future.
'I promised that I would always protect you. And I will.'
||~x~||