Gajeel's P.O.V.
"Lu-chan!" I glanced down to the main floor of the guildhall, hearing Shrimp squeal. I'd gotten to the hall before Flame Brain's team, somehow, and come immediately upstairs. If I'd stayed down on the main level, I'd have wanted to be with Levy. I didn't think she was ready for that yet. Fuck, I didn't think I was ready for that yet. 'Sides her shadows were following her around and I knew she wanted to spend some time with them too.
"Kya!" Blondie laughed as she was tackled by the tiny bluenette, the girls hugging as if they hadn't seen each other in months rather than weeks. I chuckled to myself, remembering my own homecoming with the Script mage. Tech. Stop that thought right there, idiot. The guild was in an uproar about the little girl following everyone. I was too far away to get a scent on her, but I'd heard her name as Wendy. She was tiny, probably the only person I'd seen shorter than the shrimp.
"And then a serpent flew through the sky!" Salamander was running his mouth about the mission, almost making it so I couldn't hear anything else over his roaring. I was pretty sure he was exaggerating, too. Juvia was drowning the Popsicle, uncontrollable tears pouring out of her. "...sky Dragon Slayer." My ears picked up her tiny voice through everything else, and I snapped my gaze to her, studying her again in a new light. There was almost silence in the hall as the idiots all stared at her. I watched as her face fell, a blush creeping across her face. Aye, girlie. I remember that feelin'. Give it a sec- The sudden outburst of noise might have startled me if I hadn't been expecting it. "With Gajeel, that gives us three Dragon Slayers now!"
The smile that broke out on her face almost made me smile myself, it was so sweet and happy. She reminded me of the little bird, so easily happy, even if there was a sadness behind their eyes. A little flash of white by her feet caught my eye and pulled me from my wandering thoughts. A cat? Just like... looking around, I found that blue tomcat that was always following Flame Brain around. The little white cat looked irritated, in comparison to the air headed tom, but otherwise they were clearly the same. Where's my cat then? Why don't I have one?! A sudden loneliness settled in my chest, but I shook it off and scowled down at the madness that took over the hall as the demon woman broke out the ale. I caught the Rain Woman's eye and jerked my head in a signal to come talk to me, knowing she would when she found a chance, and thumped down in my chair, content to just watch the fools below.
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"Miss Levy wouldn't really have our clue end up there... would she?" James looked over at his redheaded teammate, the latter bouncing up and down on her toes. "Oh! I've always wanted to go up there!" She squealed and closed her eyes, James sighing as he grabbed her arm. "Touch the sky where lightning met fire." The rules were that the whole team had to participate in every clue, so James had been piggy-backing Sam's teleportation, and Steven was travelling with Ryos. Those two disappeared into a shadow at the base of the huge cathedral, and the little Script mage saw it shoot up the side of the building before his stomach lurched and he was standing on the roof.
"You would think I'd be more used to that by now..." He took several deep breaths to soothe his nausea as Sam squealed, looking around at the evening sky. There was a brilliant sunset on the horizon, and James found himself joined by the rest of his team, staring at the colors. "Papa's roof! Papa's!" The kids whirled, hearing small voices behind them as a man stepped out of the shadow of the bell tower. His eyes glowed green behind the strange visor he wore over the top of his face. Ryos bristled, drawing himself up as tall as he could, his shadows starting to spread out on the roof below his teammates. Steven stepped back, sliding behind his friend as James slipped his hand into his pocket for his light pen. Several shapes were floating around the man, he voices seemed to come from them. "Have fun, Papa? Papa's roof! Go away!"
Sam grabbed James' arm as a low growl slipped from Ryos, and suddenly the man laughed, the glow leaving his eyes as his tongue lolled out of his mouth. "You the secret Levy's been keeping, then? She keeps sneaking in and out of the guild, and wouldn't give me a straight answer... You, boy... I suppose you could be her brat, but you look a bit old to actually be Levy's." He said this, looking over at James. At least, James thought that's where he was looking. It was too dark to tell now that the man's eye's weren't glowing. "Who are you kiddies then?" Ryos was still growling slightly, but Sam smiled and stepped forward. She was somehow always so friendly, even with strangers. "Who are you? Who are you?" The squeaky voices echoed the man.
"That don't matter. Who's this Levy yer talkin' 'bout?" She grinned at the man, earning another laugh from him. "Well, see, Levy is my guildmate. She offered to teach me some runes I've been pestering her for if I'd drop this note off up here on the roof. But, she wouldn't tell me what it was for..." James stiffened a little at his laugh, not trusting the man, even if he was Levy's guildmate. "Well, I jus' like th' sky. An' offered to bring m'friends up here." Sam still stood confidently in front of him, although she slipped her hand behind her back to signal to Ryos to get ready to flee. Steven grabbed his partner's arm and James readied himself, curious what she was about to do. "But, if this 'ere is yer roof, we'll just bug out."
She screwed her eyes shut, blinking out of existence and appearing just behind the man. The shapes around him squealed and shot towards her, but she simply snatched the paper and yelled, "GO!" before disappearing again. The voices shrieked as they flew through the empty space where she'd stood, and the children heard several wooden sounding thunks as they collided with each other. James saw Steven and Ryos sink into the roof as the man yelled in surprise and lurched towards James. The boy started to pull his pen out to write a defense when he felt someone grab the back of his shirt, then the roof of the cathedral no longer under his feet. He felt Sam tugging on him as their teammates burst out of a shadow near them and he forced his feet to move, running as fast as he could with them as his stomach lurched. "Let's... not tell... Gajeel about this." He gasped out as they ran. Sam laughed and nodded, the other two agreeing as well as they sprinted ahead. He heard a distant shriek and the weird laugh of the man they'd left behind, but they didn't slow down long enough to look back.
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Gajeel's P.O.V.
"Juvia is so happy that Gajeel-kun is letting her meet hi- the children!" The Rain Woman was bouncing along the path next to me as we walked to our meeting spot with Levy. She had spent the entire night before and most of today following the stripper around the guildhall. When she'd finally come to talk to me last night, I'd told her about Shrimp's plans for this evening, and asked if she'd meet us, needing another adult involved to keep an eye on things. I sighed, my hands in my pockets as I trudged along next to her. I couldn't really snarl at her for calling them mine, since she'd caught and corrected herself already.
"Does Gajeel have any special things Juvia should know before we arrive?" I just grunted, shaking my head. I'd already told her about most of the kids when we'd been on our week long job and I was desperate to talk about almost anything other than the damn ice princess. We walked into the woods on the edge of town, just deep enough in that the gaggle of brats we were meeting with wouldn't be obvious to the citizens of Magnolia who were headed to the carnival. "Is Gajeel going to tell Juvia what happened?" Again I shook my head, feeling heat on my cheeks. I didn't want to tell her how I'd spent the day before hunting for a cat. That I'd been a fucking idiot and felt left out because Salamander and the little girl had cats and I didn't.
"Gajeel! Juvia! Over here!" I glanced up as the tiny Script mage waved to us, a few of the bastards standing around her. "Uh... Gajeel... what happened to your face?" She looked up at me, concern in her eyes that made me want to kick myself. "Nothin'. I got scratched. Thought ya were the smart one." I looked away, sulking that she'd said something in front of everyone. "Gajeel-kun should not be so rude to Levy-chan when she is just being a good friend!" Shrimp laughed and set her hand on the Rain Woman's arm. "It's really okay, Juvia. I'm pretty used to it. Oh! Before I forget!" She turned and rummaged through a brown leather bag on the ground, and I found my gaze drawn to her before I realized Juvia was watching me and barely holding back a giggle. I growled and turned away, checking to make sure the brats hadn't noticed.
Shrimp finally turned back around, straightening up and holding out two small notebooks. The cover of the top book had a large white guild mark on it, and the binding looked as if it could be opened to add or remove pages. We each took one, and I turned mine over in my hands curiously. "What is it, Shrimp? Aside from a book?" She beamed up at me, and my heart almost stopped, forcing me to look back at the book to keep from doing something stupid like kissing her.
"I've had Freed help me figure out enchantments for these. They're all connected and keyed to each of us personally. For example..." She pulled out one more notebook, grabbing a pen and writing on an open page. She turned it so we could see what she had written. The top of her page now said, "Juvia" with a little face drawn smiling next to it. Underneath the top of the page was simply written, "HELLO!" I stared at the page, wondering what exactly we were supposed to be seeing with the woman standing next to me squealed, looking at her own notebook. The emblem on the cover was glowing a soft blue color, exactly like Levy's hair. She flipped it open to the first page and there at the top of the first page was Shrimp's name and below it her message.
"You can also write messages to more than one person, as long as they've got one of these books to receive on. I figure we are going to be splitting up with the kids tonight, we may want a way to keep in touch." I smiled slightly, tucking the book into my pocket. "Alright, Shorty. Good thinkin'." I met her gaze for a moment before turning to look at the little bastards gathered around us. "Right. Who ain't here yet?" I was counting heads, little voices clamoring around me when I felt a tiny body collide with my back, Sam's arms wrapping around me as had become her usual greeting. It didn't even bother me anymore that I never smelled her coming, I'd realized that she was using her magic to simply appear right behind me just before hugging me. I snorted and patted her arms before pulling them off me, glancing over at Juvia to see her covering her mouth. I could her the snorted laughter she was barely covering up and glared at her.
"Tha's everyone then. Alright, ya bastards. We talked about yer groups. This is Juvia, she's a friend of mine, and she's gonna be with Kasai's group. James, yer group is with Shrimp. Fitz, yer with me. Ya stay with each other, and stay outta trouble." I glared around at them as I heard Levy step up next to me. "You guys, I want you to have fun! You all brought your jewel, right? You're welcome to spend as much or as little as you want on rides and food, okay?" The smile on her face was contagious, and as the brats lost any nervousness they'd had about all being out in public together. They split off in their groups and the tiny woman walked out of the woods towards the carnival we'd decided to take the kids to. I waited a few minutes, struggling to keep a smile off my face as I watched the Rain Woman get to know the brats she was in charge of. "Right, Juv. Yer turn." She beamed at me and headed out of the woods as well, her group following her like little ducklings.
I immediately headed off in a different direction, not even looking to see if Fitz and the others followed me. After a brief moment I could hear them crashing through the underbrush behind me, and before long I turned and took us out as well, making sure we came into the clearing and the carnival from a different direction than the girls. There were a lot of families and groups of people arriving at the gates, so I wasn't overly concerned about someone connecting all of us. But it never hurt to be cautious. I growled out my request for five tickets and paid, watching the brats' faces light up as they took in all of the sights. The lights and music and people yelling were almost a sensory overload for me, but nothing I couldn't handle. Shrimp was right. These kids ain't had enough time to be kids. I gestured for them to head inside the fair grounds, and grinned as they whooped and took off. Trudging along behind them, listening to their squeals and exclamations, I decided that it was all worth it.