“No fucking way.” Out of all the things he’s heard in his life time, Laxus, along with Interpol Agents and FBI Agent Gildarts, were baffled to hear what the so called CIA agent, Mard Geer, had revealed to them.
“A spy?” Ultear, the senior agent from Interpol had gotten up from her seated position and stomping furiously as she walked towards the CIA Agent. She then held the man from his collar, prompting the surrounding the people in the room to go towards them. “DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY PEOPLE SHE’S KILLED AND INJURED!? DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY OF THOSE WERE KIDS!?” She yelled at the man, carrying him still.
“Ultear!” Meredy, the junior Interpol agent, along with FBI agent Gildarts try to pry of Ultear from Mars Geer.
“I’m fully aware of the actions she’s done, I don’t have to be reminded of them,” Calm as ever, even as he was held in the most threatening position by the Interpol agent. “At the time, we knew what she was capable of but what we didn’t know was that she had gone rogue, that she had done all of those tragic things.”
Finally prying her hands off, Mard Geer was let go and Gildarts and Meredy now restrained her from lashing at her. “You son of bitch!” Ultear cursed at him, trying to loosen the grip the two agents held on her.
Laxus and Chief Jura could only stare at the primitive actions the two were doing in his office. “When you say rogue, does that mean she’s no longer affiliated with you guys?” Laxus asked.
“Correct detective,” Mard Geer fixed his tie. Ultear had undid it while she was holding him by the collar. “And since she was part of our Agency, she is our mess to clean.”
“Oh no, she does not get off the hook that easy!” Ultear finally calmed down, but it didn’t stop Gildarts and Meredy to continue to restrain her. “She’s wanted for killing the Ambassador of Bellum, one of the Senators from Caelum and many charges for her inhumane actions. She’s Interpol’s bitch to catch.”
“Now wait a minute, none of you have jurisdiction here,” Jura stood up from his chair across from them. “Ms. Milkovich, you are fully aware that we still hold jurisdiction here, so far you and your associate are only consultants to our case.” He looked at her and then back at Geer. “And Mr. Geer, while I thank you for the information you’ve given us, this isn’t any of your concern anymore.”
“But I’m not done yet,” Mard smirked. “Minerva, like I said was our spy. She was in a secret organization of Assassins that she had infiltrated while she was still with us.”
“And what does that have to do with our case?” Laxus crossed his arms around his chest. He was already familiar with an assassin he had come across over the last 2 months.
“That same organization was the one that sent that pretty little blonde assassin of yours in the morgue to kill Natsu Dragneel.” Mard placed his hands behind him, giving the group a smirk as he told them.
“You mean to tell me that Mirajane Strauss was an associate to Minerva?” Gildarts asked. He and Laxus were the ones to had finally had some closure to that case. But somewhere, he knew that he wasn’t done so easily with it.
“Both are associates to that organization,” Mard corrected him. “But yes, they were very much associates as well.” He continued. “For years before she had gone rogue, she was feeding us information about it’s members. But all we ever wanted was the information of the ring leader, the one who pulls all the strings.”
“And that’s why you want her?” Jura asked.
“For the most part, yes,” Geer answered. “But also to make sure she doesn’t spill the beans of our operations around Earthland.”
“Typical.” Gildarts rolled his eyes. The CIA, always treading carefully with discretion.
“How about this, we, and I mean Detective Laxus, Agents Gildarts, Ultear and Meredy capture Minerva,” Jura now devised a plan. “She’s then sent to our Precinct then a FBI holding facility, there is where you can speak to her and afterwards, she can go with Interpol.”
“That sounds good.” Mard agreed with the sudden proposition.
“No, he would kill her before we even get the chance to get her.” Ultear was opposed. She knew how the CIA operated, and killing a rogue CIA agent was one of their styles.
“I will not,” Mard told her. “I will assure you, Miss Milkovich, that I or the CIA would not kill the person for interest, hell, I will pinky promise that.”
“Uh no, I will not do that,” she seemed rather disgusted at the pinky promise comment he made. “But if you so much as kill her, I will have bark up that tree of yours and the CIA.”
“As wish then,” Mard told her. “Well I should get going now, my presence would only bring you more of the media here.” He soon walked towards the door.
“Well, I thank you for the information you’ve brought us.” Jura got out from behind his desk and walked towards the man, giving him a handshake be for he left.
“Aye, aye then,” just as he was about to walk out, he looked at Laxus. “Tread carefully now, Detective, I hear you are in her sights.” He left now, leaving the group be.
“Well that was-”
“Intriguing.” Ultear finished Gildarts sentence.
“Yes, that was a lot to take in.” Jura walked back behind his desk again. The four of them turned back to look at him, now seating where he once was when the conversation began.
“…” Laxus couldn’t help but to think of the words Ultear said to him, how Minerva would do much to get the attention of the man she was interested in. How far would she really go?
“Hey, you okay Laxus?” Gildarts placed his left hand over the blonde’s right shoulder, trying to comfort him.
“Huh? Oh yeah.” He got back from his mind, now back to reality as he should be.
“Detective Laxus, do you have anyone that you might want with protective services?” Meredy had asked him. If Minerva’s sights were set on the blonde detective, they would want to do as much as possible to protect the people he’s close with.
“A few,” Laxus answered. “I’ll… I’ll write a list for you.”
“Alright then.” Meredy said.
“Okay, I need to speak with my detective alone here now, if you want you can set up in one of the empty offices we have downstairs, if you will.” Jura told them.
The Interpol agents and FBI agent Gildarts soon left, leaving the two alone in the room now.
“What do you want to talk about sir?” Laxus asked. He knew something was up if he wanted him to be alone here now.
“Where were you this morning?” Jura asked.
“Well that’s more of a personal matter.” Laxus refused to answer. He wasn’t about to tell him that he had finally got the engagement ring for his girlfriend, Levy, the forensic scientist.
“Are you sure? Minerva didn’t try to contact you in any way again?” He asked once more and with another question, this time about Minerva.
“If you must know,” Laxus sighed. He knew if he didn’t give his boss a direct answer, he would continue to try get an answer. “I was at a jewelry store.”
“Jewelry store?” Jura raised an eyebrow at the detective.
“Yeah, the rest is sort of a secret.” He told him.
“Hmm,” Jura looked at Laxus, inspecting his body language. And like that, he knew what the man was hiding. “Alright.” He asked no further questions.
“Thank you.” Laxus was now about to leave the office.
“Laxus…” Jura called out to him, stopping him in his tracks.
“Yeah?” He turned to look at him.
“Do tread carefully, the woman is dangerous.” He advised him.
“I will boss, I will.” He now left the office, closing the door behind him.
As he walked down the stairs, at the bottom of it was the familiar petite scientist. “Hey, wanna grab something to eat?” She greeted him.
“No, maybe later.” He turned her down, stepping down on the last step of the staircase.
“What’s wrong?” Levy asked him. He usually never passes up the opportunity to have breakfast with him, much less any other opportunity to spend time with her. “Did something happen at the bosses office?”
“No, it’s just, I’m not that hungry.” He told her, making up some type of excuse. As much as he wanted to, he wanted to wait, make her feel unappreciated for some time before telling her his proposal.
“… okay, are we still on for dinner later?” She asked him.
“Yeah.” He answered now walking away from her to go to the next destination.
“That was… strange…” She stood by the staircase, watching the detective leave her be.
…
It was now 3:30 P.M. in the afternoon. Though Erza, along with Natsu in the passenger seat of her car, had been driving for more than 5 hours. “Are we there yet?” Natsu had continued to nag her with that saying for the last hour or so.
“You tell me that one more time, I will kick you out that door.” She meekly threatened him as she drove.
“… sorry.” He now stopped knowing she probably would do it.
She turned right, now entering Highway 17, the same place the article mentioned where the crash happened.
The scenario itself was already familiar to Erza, as she remembered this place from the dream slash flashback she had when she crashed.
Natsu felt the car drive much slower and turned to look at Erza who seemed uncomfortably nervous. “Do… Do you remember something now?” He asked her. She had the look a person would make when she’s seen a ghost of some kind.
“…” She didn’t answer. Her nervousness showed when she erratically started to breathe in and out.
“Erza?” Natsu called out to her. He then placed his left hand on the steering wheel and with that, she stopped the car. “Hey, are you okay?”
She turned to look at him. “I… I don’t know…” She started to breathe in and out, slowly.
“Do you remember something? Is that why you started to act like that?” He asked her, concerned for her well being.
“I do remember, but vaguely,” she recollected. “When we crashed, when I was unconscious, I dreamt of this place, remembering this place.” She took off her hands from the wheel and placed her arms over her chest, caressing her arms with opposite hands.
“And?” Natsu asked her.
“I saw myself in the backseat, my child self crying for my mother, my father, dead after the crash…” She continued. “After that though, I can’t remember.”
“That’s okay, maybe… if we find where you crashed, you might remember.” He told her.
“Do you mind if you take the wheel here? It might be better for me to look for the spot if I’m on the passenger side.” Erza suggested to him, hoping he’d be the one driving her down memory lane.
“Anything for you.” And like that, Natsu switched places with her.
He slowly drove down while Erza frantically looked around on both lanes. The trees all looked the same from when she remembered from her dream.
After several minutes of driving slowly, Erza saw a tree that was badly bent inward, like if a car had crashed into it. However, the mark on this tree was badly burnt, like something had set fire on it many years ago. “Stop.” Nonetheless, her gut told her to investigate, making Natsu stop.
She took off her seat belt and walked right out of the car. She took little steps, closing in on the odd tree. She could feel it now, a flashback was about to occur as she stood in front of the tree by the road.
And like that, everything was vivid, now having another episode of a flashback.
This one was like the first one she had, staring at the accident in her child self eyes. She could see the crash from where she stood, but inside the car she was put in by the manly silhouette.
She could see the figure putting gasoline all over the car and on her parents. He came back to his car to put the gas container in his trunk.
He went back to it, now standing a few feet away from the crash. He took out a lighter from what seemed to be it’s pocket. With a few tries, he managed to lit the lighter and threw it inside the car. Within seconds, the car was on fire and so were her parents.
“Let’s go, Erza.”
“Erza!” The pinkette brought the scarlet haired woman back to reality. She blinked, making Natsu let out a relieved breath. “Oh, thank god. You were doing that thing again that you do.”
“I finally know…” She muttered.
“Hmm, what was that?” He didn’t hear what she said well.
“I finally know what happened,” she walked towards the tree, touching it’s burnt area. “This… This wasn’t an accident, this was a murder.”
“Are you sure about that?” Natsu asked her, hoping her instincts were right.
“Positive, the person who did this… abducted me…” She didn’t want to say it, but she couldn’t hold back that part of her information.
She had doubts and most certainly with what had happened to her parents, she knew her kidnapper. Somewhere, deep down inside, she knew that it was the one who mentored her, treated her like a daughter, and that person could only be, Jellal. The one who took her in.
“That’s wow, do you remember who took you?” He asked her.
“… no,” she lied. She tried as much possible to tell him the truth, to tell herself the truth. “… I spent most of my time in Orphanages… the reason why no one connected the dots…” She continued to lie through her teeth.
“I guess, seemed like the person tried to cover his own tracks.” Natsu crossed his arms over his chest, assuming much of what the kidnapper might’ve done.
“Yeah…” She said.
“Well, we’re not that far from the port town, maybe you can ask some more questions over there, maybe you have living relatives.” Natsu started to walk back to the car.
“Living relatives, huh?” She muttered to herself. Though she only expected to investigate her own kidnapping, she didn’t think as far to see that maybe she had relatives. Some that maybe knew her parents.
She walked towards the car, feeling a bit better than before, took over the driver’s seat once more.
After another hour of driving, they finally made it to Caelum Town. It was a small town, the usual which everyone probably knew each other.
Having many ports, it lived up to its expectations to it being a trading port for Fiore and Caelum itself. Along with it’s port was a carnival. A big one as well.
“Huh, didn’t know they had a carnival visiting.” Natsu said as he could see the Ferris Wheel, high and mighty from where they were. Indeed, the town was small.
Era had finally stopped right in front of the sheriff’s office, parking in it’s parking lot. A change from a city scenery to that of a town scenery was rather nice as the two saw the beautiful autumn leaves fall from the trees as they walked towards the building.
The two entered and saw one of the deputies’ leaning on chair and his legs and feet on a desk, sleeping with on his arms as pillows. He had a brown cowl instead of a typical sheriff hat and an eye patch. He has a brown uniform and had the small star badge on his chest. “Uhm, excuse me?” Erza and Natsu stood in front of the desk.
“HEY!” Natsu yelled, also banging his hand on the desk.
The deputy woke up with the surprise, falling down with the chair and on the floor. He quickly picked himself off the floor, turning away from the two and dusted off the dirt from his clothing. “Sorry about that, I was just… meditating, yeah, meditating.”
“Oh, okay.” Natsu knew the man had just come up with that excuse, but simply let it go.
“Oh well, I have a few questions.” Erza told him.
“Well let’s hope I have the answers to them,” He turned to look at them and suddenly the man’s eyes widened, like he’s seen a ghost. “Erza!? T-That really you?”
“Wait, you… you know me?” She was shocked to know that the deputy knew her.
“Oh my goodness, it is you!” The deputy jumped from behind the desk and went in for a hug, which surprised both Natsu and Erza. “Do you not remember me? I was your friend, Simon.”
“Simon?” She was finally let go from his bear like hug.
“Her memory is a bit jacked up at the moment, you’re going to have to give her time to remember.” Natsu told the deputy.
“Hey, I know you, I seen you on TV,” the deputy went in for a handshake at the pinkette. “Natsu, right?”
“The one and only.” He shook his hand, and vigorously too.
“It’s been 2 decades, where have you been all this time? Everybody else gave up on you, that you were dead, but not me, or Millianna.” He told her.
“Who’s Millianna?” Erza still couldn’t remember anything, so the name didn’t ring a bell.
“Wow, she really can’t remember anything,” Simon was surprised. “Well, she’s your friend as well.”
“I would’ve guessed so,” she told him. “But, honestly, I’m only here to know where my parents are… where they were buried…”
“No reunion party, I see?” Simon understood. “Well, maybe if you saw where they are, maybe that’ll help you remember.”
“Maybe.” She had hoped of that as well.
“Well, the house they used- you used to live in has been cleared out but there’s a storage unit not far from here where we put all of your stuff,” he told them. “Storage Unit B8.”
“Where at?” Erza asked.
“Other side of town, that’s also where the cemetery is, where we buried you three…” He answered. “I suggest you go to the storage unit first, maybe the stuff in it might help you remember.”
“Thanks.” The two walked away and headed back in the car.
Like earlier, it was a small town, so getting from one place to another didn’t take long.
They found the storage unit Simon mentioned and parked right next to it. The got out of the car and headed towards the security guard which overlooked the keys to the place.
Without much trouble, Erza got the key to Storage unit B8. The unit was on the second floor, being the last unit at the end of the hall.
With the key, Erza unlocked it and Natsu opened it. A bunch of boxes were in it. “Wow, this is a lot of stuff.” Natsu said, surprised everything from her house fit in it.
“I guess we should be looking for a photo album, huh?” Erza asked. Pictures were the best medicine in her case of amnesia.
“Oh, found one.” Natsu said as the first box he opened contained a small album of photos. He gave it to her.
She laid out the book on one of the boxes and skimmed through it. Pictures of a red headed man and a dark haired woman were mostly in it. Like her dream, they look exactly like the couple she was, dead in the car crash.
She then stopped right at the last picture, a picture of the whole family. Her child self, her mother to right of her and her father to the left of her, all in a family portrait happy.
“Is that them?” Natsu asked as he saw the picture as well.
“Yeah, yeah I think these are my parents.” She took the picture, folded it gently and placed it inside her pocket. She put the photo album back where it belonged and closed the storage unit.
“Are we heading to the cemetery now?” He asked her.
“Yeah.” She answered.
“Are you ready to face them?” He asked her. He knew that this was the first time, in many years, that she would be meeting her parents, even if they are buried.
“… I’m ready.” She answered, completely confident.
“Let’s go then.”
The two walked down the building and towards their car. After a few minutes of wandering around the town inside the car, the finally found the cemetery. It was small compared to that of one in the city.
Caelum Town Cemetery, it read above the gates as they entered. “We should probably ask the grounds-keeper where your parents are buried.” Natsu suggested as they randomly walked in the cemetery.
“It’s pretty small, we should honestly be able to find them on our own.” Erza said.
After a few minutes of wandering around the cemetery, the two finally found the engraved tombstones.
Erin Scarlet, 1969-1996, loving father and husband, the first one said.
Zariah Scarlet, 1971-1996, loving mother and wife, the second one said.
And finally, Erza Scarlet, 1988-1996, loving daughter of Erin and Zariah.
“Erin and Zariah… that’s what there names were…” Erza kneeled down to their tombstones, touching the engravings of their names.
“They named you after their names,” Natsu noticed. “E and R from Erin, and Z and A from Zariah.” He kneeled down beside her. “Together it formed-”
“Erza.” She finished his sentence.
“Do you need some time alone with them?” He asked her.
“Would you mind giving me the time?” She asked him.
“Yeah, sure.” And like that Natsu let her be.
Erza stared at her tombstone. Must’ve buried it without nothing. She then stared back at them, at their tombstones.
“So, we finally meet.” She said, talking to them like they were still alive.
“I wish it could’ve… been in any other situation though…” She sat down, having her legs cross each other as she sat across from them.
“For many years, I was angry, I thought that Jellal’s words were true, that he adopted me because… you never wanted me…” She looked down. Her voice began to sound raspy, almost holding her tears back.
“But I was wrong… I realized, from the photo album, that you loved me…” A small tear escaped, strolling down her cheek and falling down to the grass.
“I wish I could remember… the times I’ve probably made you worried as a kid… the times I would hurt myself and either one of you at my side, kissing my injury…” More tears escaped, after so long, her emotions were now bottling away with each tear that escaped. “The times I said I love you mom or I love you dad… or the times you said you loved me...”
“The times you’ve probably came to my room, helping me sleep while I had a bad nightmare… the times you showed me how to walk… talk… learn manners… all of those things…” She finally let go and waterfall of tears flowed down both her cheeks, continuously falling down on the grass, making that dead grass come back to live with each drop. “I wish I could remember!”
“But I can’t, and it’s killing me that I don’t know.” She continued to sob. “And I want to say I’m sorry! Sorry for hating you for something you never did! Sorry for thinking bad thoughts about you!”
“Sorry for ever doubting your love to me!”
Natsu could see her, crying from the distance. He himself couldn’t help but have a tear stroll down his right eye as he saw the reunion between a girl, who only ever wanted was to feel the love of her parents.
The pinkette wiped his only me year away and walked towards her. He sat down next to her, lending his shoulder for her to cry on.
“… can we just sit here for a bit?” She asked him, sobbing slowly now.
“Yeah, we can definitely do that.” And like that, with a simple answer and a simple smile, he was there for her as she was there for him.
He put his arm over her shoulders, hugging her as she cried. Helping her as she finally showed her weakness. Being there for her when she needed it the most…
Author’s Note: Hope you enjoyed the chapter, I sure did enjoyed writing it.
Finally listening to sad music and watching a lot of sad episodes from TV shows I like paid off. Hahaha.
Don’t really have nothing much to say here besides that. See you next time when I update again.