A minute at most passed when Juvia regained consciousness if all the yelling of everyone asking if they were alright was any indicator. Cana was slapping the blunette's face lightly and only when she opened her eyes, Cana stopped and sighed in relief.

"Gray!" Cana looked over her shoulder and yelled making Juvia blinked a few times and groan when she felt the throbbing on her temple get worse with the brunette's loud voice but she felt slightly better when she heard her Gray-sama's voice asking a rude 'what?' from somewhere. "She's awake!" Cana's attention returned to Juvia and she snapped her fingers in front of Juvia's eyes when her eyes became heavier. "No, no. Don't close your eyes for too long, stay awake."

"I'm fine." Juvia whispered, probably dragging her words. She took in the state of her surroundings up the stairs the door was off its hinges, and there was smoke coming to the stairs and she could see the orange color reflecting on the walls, the floor was burning. "How is everyone else?"

"No casualties." Cana informed. "But there are some hurt, that's where Gray is, by the way, a little down the stairs." Seeing Juvia's blue eyes wide, Cana cleared up her words. "He is fine; there's an obstruction at the door and he is helping clear it so they can get help and we can get out."

Juvia nodded and she noticed the brunette looking down to the rest of their friends, who just seemed frightened. "Go." She said and Cana's gaze returned to her, confused. "Juvia is fine now and she just needs a few minutes to feel better. Go see to the others or help them get the things out of the way."

"Gray said-"

Waving her off, Juvia spoke again. "Juvia will keep an eye on that fire." She pointed upstairs. "Go be of some actual help."

"Shit." Cana cussed. "I'll just go see how they are doing. I'll be back in a moment." She said and then yelled again, making Juvia's head throb a bit. "Lucy! Come to stay with Juvia for a second!"

"Alright!" Lucy said and in a few seconds, she was next to Juvia and Cana left. The blonde woman coughed with the smoke but sat next to Juvia. "Glad to see you are awake. A few people hit their heads during the explosion, most just got a headache but three lost consciousness." Juvia opened her mouth to say something, but Lucy predicted her words and answered before she could ask. "All awake and fine. We are just waiting for them to work on the way out."

With a nod, Juvia looked up to see how the fire was and she got worried. "We need to get down a few steps." She got up and blinked fast when black dots appeared in her vision. Lucy put a hand on the blunette's elbow and they went down three steps, the furthest they could before there were people standing, talking to one another and it was clear they were afraid, but thankfully most were trained and contained themselves. She looked over her shoulders and the smoke was getting thicker.

Knowing that a little of the tension needed to be undone, she cleared her throat and yelled: "Gray-sama? It's getting hot up here. Any time you guys want to get us out, it's fine by us." Whoever was speaking, stopped and listened to her words; all of them knew about their relationship.

There was a second of silence and she heard an answer from a few flights of stairs below. "Well, if you are done with your beauty sleep, come down here to help." Obviously he was joking and some people laughed even through fear.

"Hey, you said I'm pretty!" She said playfully, glancing over her shoulder again, her stomach twisting in fear.

"You obviously think you need to be even more: sleeping when things are getting interesting." He yelled back and even after a cough, she snorted. "Thirty seconds and we can finally open it."

"Good." She tried to yell, but coughed instead and so did Lucy, their eyes red and watery because of the smoke.

Thankfully, a minute later they were slowly walking down the steps and a few moments later both Cana and Gray were in their view, walking up against flow. The moment she saw him, Juvia felt one hundred times better. She let go of Lucy, the blunette didn't even realize they were holding each other's hand, and threw her arms around his shoulders the moment he was close enough.

"Are you alright?" He asked in a whisper, his arms around her waist and then led her down, Cana and Lucy a few steps ahead of them.

"Yes." She agreed. "Just a headache now, the smoke is the thing doing more damage at this point."

"I'm sorry I left you, I needed to-"

"Get everyone out was the priority and Juvia just hit her head mildly." She waved his concern away. "Juvia understands and we need to get out of here, have a few of those oxygen masks and then we are going to take Tartaros down." She looked at him and Gray nodded.

#

The first emergency attendants were already there when they came out and after a long talk with the EMTs, who were pissed none of their patients went to the hospital, Makarov finally focused on the plan and Levy finally told them the address of Tartaros' base.

"Listen up everyone." Cana yelled to get their attention. "We know where those bastards are and we are going to get them. Gear up, we are leaving to get those sons of bitches in twenty minutes."

Juvia thanked her EMT and walked over to where Gray was, arguing with Lucy quite enthusiastically. "-and that's final." He told her.

"Don't you dare to try to boss me around, Gray Fullbuster." Lucy's face was in an angry shade of red and she was clearly holding her own against Gray. "I am going with you and I don't care what you say."

Gray shook his head. "That will be dangerous, Lucy. Natsu wouldn't want you to-" Lucy actually hit Gray's shoulder with her tiny fist and even though it probably didn't even sting, Gray protested. "Hey!"

"He is my boyfriend and he is most likely being held captive there. Now every single friend I have in the world is going to put their lives at risk and you are asking me to stay behind?" She hit him again, but his eyes were softer that time. "Don't even try, because I refuse to stay behind. I will not get in anyone's way, I'll stay as hidden as I can, but I. Am. Going."

"You don't even have a weapon!" Gray said in frustration.

"Juvia will find you a nice gun and some ammo." The blunette intervened and both looked her way: Lucy's in hope and Gray's in indignation.

"Really?"

"Yes." Juvia nodded. "Mira's bar wasn't affected much with the explosion and Cana is getting the guns out. Boy, Mira-san knew how to stock weaponry." Being formerly military and member of FT, Mirajane never lost her interest in guns and was more than glad to hold FT's stock in a safe under her bar. "Tell your situation to Cana-san and I'm sure she will show you some options. Juvia will be with you in a second."

Lucy gave Juvia a quick hug and threw Gray a dirty look before she walked away from the couple.

"What the fuck do you think you are doing?" Gray hissed. "This is dangerous. Lucy got into danger before but that was out of our control. Now we are deliberately going and-"

"And she is going whether we 'let her' or not and I'd rather she has a gun with her rather than nothing." She told him and pointed towards the general direction Lucy went. "It's Natsu, the man she loves. She will literally fight with her hands and nails if she doesn't get anything else." He just stared at her. "Do you know how I know this? Because that's exactly what I would do; nothing would make me stay put if you were in danger."

Gray narrowed his eyes at her. "I don't want you to ever-"

"Men, always thinking you have a say in everything." Juvia rolled her eyes. "It's about what she wants and she wants to go." She gave him a quick kiss on his mouth. "Now, we need to prepare. I'll go get guns while they are still available. There's a Sig Sauer P226 I saw that would be perfect for me and a reliable Beretta for Lucy-san."

Knowing better than to protest, Gray sighed in resignation. "Meet me by my motorcycle when you are ready so we can go."

#

In two hours, they finally arrived at the place Levy thought was Tartaros' base and the terrain was enormous, and it appeared to be some sort of research facility with all the large blocks and buildings. It made sense if they were half as organized as they seemed to be.

"We are so gonna get lost in there." Gajeel groaned and Juvia snorted. They were waiting outside the walls surrounding the place while Levy, who was inside a car, typed fast in her computer alongside with her friends Jet and Droy trying to disarm the alarms so the FT crew could get in. Both Jet and Droy weren't as fast as Levy with is, but the petite blunette needed all the help she could get. "Shortstuff, how much longer?"

The group turned to look at her, but Levy didn't look away from the screen. "A backdoor?" She frowned and hesitated to type for a moment before starting again. "What the hell? Someone just helped me?" She looked at her companions, but both were just as surprised as she was.

"Don't look at us: you are the genius here." Jet raised his hands in surrender.

"Who helped you?" Gray asked in curiosity.

"No idea." Levy shrugged. "But it just cut my job in twenty minutes, at least."

"How long do you need now?" Juvia asked.

Levy thought for a moment. "Five minutes."

They nodded and Cana told the other operatives who went there to help: "We are a go in five. Everyone check your vests and your ammos. Do not take unnecessary risks and take as many evidence of foul play as you can. We will probably have to explain why we didn't wait to nail these bastards, got it?" With everyone's nods, Cana turned back to the smaller group.

"Well, aren't you the bossy lady." Juvia chuckled.

"You should see me in bed." Cana winked towards the blunette, who chuckled but felt her cheeks get warmer: she liked a bit too much whenever Gray took charge in bed for Cana to play with that around her.

"You shouldn't be a secretary, but a full-time operative." Juvia said to change the subject a bit after seeing the smirk Gray tried to hide.

"We've been through this; I like my benefits as a secretary." Cana shrugged. "I told you sometimes I'd get to shoot people even then." She showed Juvia her weapon. "Today is one of those days." She looked around and saw Lucy's pale face. "I'll go talk to Lucy for a minute, she looks as if she is about to throw up." Juvia nodded and watched as she pulled Lucy by the elbow and away from them.

After making sure her vest was in place, her ammo accounted for and her ponytail tight so she didn't have any distractions during a fight, she looked to the two men talking a few feet away from her. Gray and Gajeel weren't the best of friends, but they formed somewhat a friendship and they worked very well together. They were the most important men in her life.

"You two." She said and they stopped talking to look at her in confusion. "I need you both to not do anything stupid for once in your life."

"I second that." Levy said without missing a beat. Or stop her furious typing.

"Look who is talking." Gajeel snorted and Gray rolled his eyes.

"I mean it." She narrowed her eyes at them. "I know everyone is under pressure but you need to keep your cool and think before you do something that will get you killed."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah." Gajeel waved her off. "Same to you. You know our deal and I'm not looking forward to that."

"Sure." Juvia was the one snorting at that and Gray frowned in confusion. "We have a deal that if one of us die doing something stupid, he will have to be buried in a pink sparkly dress and I'll have my eyebrows and only the front part of my head shaved, if memory serves me right?"

"That's the deal." Gajeel shrugged and Juvia chuckled at the memory of the night they made that pact, when they had lost part of their team a few years before and were drowning their sorrows in tequila.

Gray looked at them, mouth slightly open. "You... you two are crazy. And ridiculous."

"True that." Gajeel mocked saluted him and fisted his hand in Juvia's direction. "See you on the other side."

She bumped his fist with her own. "If you can keep up, sure."

Gajeel rolled his eyes and pointed at her face. "Fuck you." His attention went to his girlfriend.

Juvia smiled and then looked in Gray's direction and he was staring at her with curiosity. She shrugged. "It is something we used to do in really dangerous missions. It's silly, but it's ours." Stepping closer to him, Juvia put her hands on his chest. "The last time I asked you not to do anything stupid, you almost got yourself killed. Could you please avoid that this time?"

"I'll try my best." Gray smirked. "Now you don't go doing anything stupid, alright? Keep close to me and we'll cover each other and take out all these fuckers."

"You say the most romantic things, Juvia just swoons for you." She told him playfully and he snorted. "I think we need a vacation after this."

"Yeah." Gray agreed. "A whole week locked away sounds good to you?"

"Oh, hell yes." Juvia sighed when Levy said she was sixty seconds away to take down their security. She tip toed, kissed him and Gray lost no time in deepening it for a few moments. Once their lips unlocked, Juvia didn't let go of him just then. She pecked on his lips again without opening her eyes just wanting to feel him next to her for a bit longer. The moment she opened her eyes and looked him in the eyes, she knew she needed to tell him once more, just in case. "Don't forget I love you."

Gray blinked two times and opened his mouth to say something, but Cana called everyone to get gathered around. They were going in.

With one last longing kiss, Juvia let go of Gray and grabbed her gun.

#

The group had been divided in two just before they arrived, Master was on the other side in a second gate waiting for Levy to open both entrances so they could attack in two fronts. Once he spoke through their comms for the blunette to do it, they barged in.

Obviously their reception in Tartaros' compound was a fly of bullets everywhere. The goons hired to protect the premises, though, had no chance against such an organized group as FT. They were the best of the best, especially the ones leading the group.

Juvia had to shoot four men who had tried to sneak behind Gray to shoot him on the back and even though she never enjoyed taking a life, she didn't feel guilty. Not when she was saving the man she loved.

However, what the guards lacked in being good, the numbers surely compensated for it: they didn't stop coming and it was getting annoying if nothing more.

"We need to get in the building!" Cana yelled and Juvia couldn't agree more.

"What should we do?" Lucy asked from between them – both women had been flanking the blonde, and she even had taken a shot or two.

"While we tire ourselves out here, Erza and the others will..." Gajeel started but got interrupted by a man trying to shoot him.

"Have we still not found a breach into the building?" Makarov's voice came from the comms and as if summed, there was a small explosion in one of the doors.

Erza stepped out from it, her red hair looked as if it was on fire. Truly, she looked almost mystical even when she was pushing a battered woman out, throwing her on the ground, panting and hurt herself.

"Erza!"

"You're okay!"

Everyone cheered and the guards got distracted by the commotion, making FT's job to take them dow slightly easier for a few seconds.

The red haired woman blinked in confusion with seeing all operatives there. "Everyone?"

"Sorry, but there's no time to explain." Gray said loud. "We need to get inside through that door Erza opened!" People agreed fast and they started to run towards the opening.

"Natsu and Lisanna are okay!" Erza informed them. "All that's left are Mira and Elfm- oh." She finally spotted the tall man.

"I'll handle the rest." Elfman said, running alongside with them. "I'll bring Mira-nee back safely!"

"Don't forget about looking for something that looks like an antidote!" Polyuska's voice came from the comms in their ears; she was in the other group alongside with Makarov.

Even inside the building they were shooting and the enemies seemed to multiply in a blink of an eye. The group wasn't too big, Juvia, Gray, Elfman, Lucy and Wendy. A minute after they got inside, Elfman told them he needed to find his sister and ran off before they could say anything to stop him.

When a large group of guards appeared in front of them, Gray quickly pulled Lucy and Wendy out of the way with him to a long hall telling them to run while Juvia ran to the opposite hall.

They looked at each other and Juvia pulled a new clip in her gun. "Go with them!" She yelled and shot at the group. "I'll find you later." He looked over his shoulder, to where Lucy and Wendy were running away just like he yelled for them to do. "Go! I'll cover you."

"Fuck." Juvia saw his lips move rather than listened to him utter the word, since the guards started to shoot in her direction, and then he was running after the two women. She cussed when noticed she only had one clip more.

Thankfully, the guards they managed to take out had no use to their guns after they were dead or badly injured. She counted the bullets she had and sighed.

She had to work with roughly thirty bullets and there were about fifteen men trying to kill her. Juvia snorted: she'd worked with worst odds than that before.

#

It took her fifteen minutes to take down all of those bastards. She thought they'd given up after they saw her kill a couple of their colleagues and incapacitate another good number, but she had to give them that: they resisted quite well.

Her gun was useless, then, so she helped herself with one of the guards' she killed and got some ammo. She was so tired already, her body ached and the excitements of the day could be felt through her body. Gosh, it had only been that morning her and Gray visited the village? And only a couple of hours since a floor of the FT building exploded?

The throbbing on her temple informed that it all happened and Juvia could feel exhaustion in each cell of her body already.

"Shit, I'm getting old." Juvia whispered to herself even though she would be turning just twenty-nine in a few months. She shook her head and ran towards the direction the rest of her group had gone to.

The building was big and just like Gajeel predicted, she had become lost and her comms had stopped working the moment they entered the premises; of course they'd have a device that jammed foreign communications.

Thankfully, after a few minutes of running around, she followed loud noises to a large room and her eyes widened at the sight.

Lucy was on the ground and a tall large man hovering over her with a sword aimed at her neck. Before Juvia could raise her gun, though, the blunette saw her best friend run towards the foe and use his elbow to knock him away.

Unfortunately to Juvia, she had been at the end of one of those and it hurt like hell. Good, if he wanted to kill Lucy, he deserved it.

Her relief was short lived, though, because just coming behind Gajeel, there was a man with a weird skeleton mask and thick clothes with a gun pointed at Gajeel's back.

Juvia gave three steps inside the room and shot the man two times; he had realized she was aiming at him the moment she appeared and took a step to the side, so she missed the headshot and the bullet meant to hit him on the chest, just grazed his arm.

"Juvia!" Lucy exclaimed in happiness and the blunette glimpsed at her, missing completely the third enemy in the room.

"Now that wasn't nice." Juvia looked back and saw a man with dark hair slicked back, a nasty scar on his forehead and left brow. She only had a quick look before he shot at her, but she could've sworn she'd seen him somewhere before.

The pain on her stomach made her double over and she was without air for a moment. She heard both Gajeel and Lucy call her name, but she couldn't answer. On the back of her mind she heard Gray's voice and then fumbling with her vest.

"It hit the vest!" Gray told her. "Breathe, Juvia! Breathe through the pain!"

Juvia nodded and tried to take slow breaths but could only do so when he finally freed her from the constraining device and threw it away. People often thought a vest would be the perfect protection against bullets, but they forgot to account the fact that it still hurt like hell when hit.

It was much better than the alternative, though.

"I'm fine." She breathed, noting some fire at work behind them for some reason. "Juvia can breathe now."

"Good." Gray said and helped her up. "Brace yourself, they are not hired help. They are the real thing."

The blunette glanced at the people Gray was referring to and the older man with black hair intrigued her. "Juvia has seen him before, but can't place where. The one with black hair."

Frowning, Gray looked at their enemies – somewhere along the way another one appeared (and so did Natsu!) – and a second later he took a step back, all color drained from his face.

"Well now... lookie here? Some pretty strong lookin' dudes all lined up for us..." She heard Natsu say; "Now that's what I call hospitality 'cause now I'm getting all fired up. Whatever nasty scheme you guys had, is over now."

Juvia was surprise to see Gray's eyes focused on the man she had mentioned before. "You..." He started and the older man seemed interested in what Gray had to say. "No. Never mind. You can't be." Gray shook his head.

The unknown man smiled evilly. "I might be, kid." Listening to those words made Gray's body tense and his eyes widen. "Let him through, this one is mine." And then he was running from the room while Gray didn't hesitate to run after him without saying another word or look in her direction when she yelled his name.

She tried to run after him but, the dark-skinned man gave a few warning shots on the ground, preventing them to leave. "No guns as of now." He pointed up to a visible camera and threw his gun to a corner of the room. "He likes the show."

Juvia didn't have time to think who "he" was because the next moment, everyone was moving, Gajeel tried to hit the dark-skinned man, but was blocked before he could. Natsu tried to get the man with the skeleton mask, but he kept dodging. And since she was closest to mask-guy, she tried to hit him, but just as with Natsu, he kept dodging and ended up hitting her square on the jaw, making her take a few steps back.

She spat a bit of blood but even so, chose to attack the masked man but he was terribly good at hand-to-hand combat and even though she was hitting him at some places, his thick clothes were a hindrance.

Out of nowhere, he got two small daggers from inside his coat, cutting Juvia superficially making her hiss because of the annoying pain.

"Damn it."

"I know you." The man in the mask said, almost singing, teasing her and playing with his knives. "Silver thinks I don't know about his past, but I do. And I know his future too. I am looking at it." With the mask it was impossible to see where he was looking, but with a shiver, Juvia realized it was her and it confused her a lot. "Oh, you don't know." He chuckled. "Even better."

"I don't want to hear anything else." Juvia tried to hit him again but, as if playing with her, he gave another cut on her arm.

"Do you want to know why your comrade ran after Silver?" Juvia tried to give nothing away with her expression, but couldn't help it. "Silver's his father."

"What?" Juvia tried to understand his words. "You are lying."

"No reason to." He shrugged. "No one but me knows and I am glad it was you who ended up fighting me. Things will get so much more interesting now."

Breathing hard and confused, Juvia tried to put the facts together. "Gray-sama's father was an army man. He'd never-"

"Sure, because no one deserts the army." He said in a mocking tone. "The Underworld King realized Silver's skills and honored him with a position among us." Juvia tried to hit him again, that didn't sound good at all.

"Why would you welcome him?" She asked between gritted teeth.

"Perhaps it was simply a whim of the Underworld King. Whatever the reason may have been, the man was accepted by the Underworld King."

'Gray-sama.' Juvia thought, worried. The man in front of her really seemed to think there was a King around and calling him 'King of the Underworld' was everything but a good sign.

A hit on her face made he stop daydreaming and she was focused on the fight once again, but then, the man ran away from the room. Juvia blinked in surprise but

#

For some crazy reason the bastard ran around for almost five minutes before he stopped in an room that seemed to be used to do some science research. He dropped his weird cape and held his knifes. Juvia looked around and ruled out the scalpels laying around on the one table the room had, they were too small and she'd need to get too close, but kept their location in her mind just in case. The only thing she found to help her was a metal trash can lid; shew knew how ridiculous she looked, but she'd rather not get cut anymore; those didn't do much damage but stung a lot.

Fifteen minutes later Juvia was about to drop; the lid was gone and she had another five cuts on her arms and legs. She was so tired, her body was almost spent and she had no help coming her way, not when Gajeel and Natsu were probably engaged in their own fights even. She just wanted to drop to the floor and pass out at that point.

But Keith – she learned his name a few minutes before – was relentless and didn't seem to get tired as she was. Finally, he was up for a break when he started to speak again.

"Silver died twenty years ago." Keith said casually a bit out of breath. "The moment his wife died, he went with her. That's when he was approached. Who else hated the world so much besides the people who were happy and had it taken away?" Juvia stared at him. "I'm a Doctor, Psychiatrist and Silver's want for revenge... oh, that was beautiful. I could've written three theses on him alone. He was a magnificent subject, unlikely my others."

"What-"

"I had to work with him at the beginning, he still cried about his son." He said the last word with disdain. "The boy got adopted quickly so I couldn't kill him without raising suspicion, but I trained Silver well." Keith said. "Soon, his only desire was to serve me and master Zeref. We were few back then, but I made Silver loyal after a while, especially after I inserted a subcutaneous device with a deadly poison on his arm." Keith stopped for a moment. "But a few months ago he saw Gray at that silly Game the King organized and I could see the threat."

Juvia was so focused on the story she almost jumped when a grave voice spoke through her comm: "Is this Gray's girlfriend? Can you hear me, sweetheart? Do you have in your sight the man with the skull mask?"

Juvia didn't recognized the voice, and, trying to speak lowly so Keith – who was still talking about his crazy project about conditioning people to join Zeref's cause, talk about self-absorbed – couldn't hear her, asked: "Who is this?" The moment the words left her mouth, she had a thought and asked quietly: "Are you Gray-sama's father? How is he?"

"You are as smart as I thought you'd be. Gray is fine." He said. "Do you see him? The man I'm speaking about."

After a second of deliberation. "I am fighting him."

"Did he use his knifes? Are you cut?" She didn't answer, thinking about the several cuts she already had on her body, and it seemed answer enough for him. "Shit!" He breathed hard. "Okay, I need you to listen to me: kill him. He is not as skillful as the others but he has implanted a subcutaneous device on the President of the Council to make him activate FACE, the nuc bombs." Juvia gasped and Keith probably thought it was because of his fable about neuroscience of a brain set on revenge. "Keith is so self-absorbed he implanted with a dead-man switch: if he dies, all his subjects die."

Juvia's eyes widened, recalling Keith saying he had implanted something on Silver as well. "B-But if I do that... You'll also..."

The answer took a moment. "What? Did you know? It doesn't matter, you have to do it, though. For Gray's sake too. I have to go now."

"Father? Father?" Juvia hissed, but it seemed Silver was no longer listening or uninterested in answer her.

'I can't hear him anymore.' Juvia thought, already assessing Keith with new eyes, already with the plan of killing him forming inside her mind. 'Do I have to do this? Will it really be good for Gray-sama?'

She didn't know Gray's state, she didn't know if Silver was telling the truth or if it was a ruse to make her do his dirty work for him.

"I knew that Silver wanted to rebel against us since he saw Gray alive." She was finally paying attention to his words again. "But he became such an asset... He wanted to take revenge on us, but that was fine. I realized that this new wave of desire for revenge were the driving force that held him together, even more than before. I changed his mind, I made him put that hate towards Gray with a technique of my invention. He is very interesting and pleasant puppet."

Juvia felt anger boil inside her stomach, he was talking about a human being's life but was so detached it disgusted her. "How can you be so cruel?" Juvia hissed.

As if he didn't listen to her, Keith kept speaking. "Father and son will kill each other. This is my story in which I try to create the perfect molded mind."

"What do you think human beings are?" Juvia yelled at him.

"Tools for my experiences." He said, evil dripping from every word. "Nice tools."

"Humans don't do as you please!" In pure anger, Juvia grabbed the trash can lid that was forgotten on the floor and threw it at Keith to distract him, launching herself at him with all her might and started to make all the movements she knew to just stop him.

"I can make them do so." He mocked her. "I'll take you and turn you so I can use you to kill your friends."

"I won't allow you to do that!" In her rage, she was sloppy and the next thing Juvia knew, Keith had his gloved hand on her throat, squeezing it tight and pulling her until her back hit the wall.

"Then try to kill me." He said mockingly, and Juvia tried to scratch his hand away from her throat. "The moment he loses his master, Silver will also die." He squeezed it harder. "What? Aren't you going to erase the ghost of that boy's father?" His other hand roamed over her body, she noticed in disgust. "Cut the bond between father and son."

"I... can't... do it." She managed to croak.

She couldn't see his face but could feel the waves of satisfaction coming from him. "That's why humans are fools; we know humans, feelings her in the way of reason." Her vision started to black out. "They're ugly lumps of ego." Her body went limp and just like that he let go of her, she hit the ground with a thump. "Pathetic." Keith snorted and turned around.

Having timing it the best she could her fake pass out, Juvia didn't mind her body was warm, her vision had dark spots and she was feeling so sluggish: with a burst of energy, she managed to reach for one of the scalpels on the desk, get up from the floor and threw herself on him, arms around his shoulder, the scalpel right on his carotid artery and he screamed. And for good measure, she removed the scalpel and stabbed him again.

Keith fell onto his knees, trying to contain the blood flow, but couldn't. Juvia, crying, told him: "You can't sever the bond between humans. Gray-sama's feelings, his father's feelings... they will reach each other. Even if they physically vanish, their feelings remain in the others' hearts. I believe in people's power of love."

With a sound she'd never forget in her life, Keith gave his last breath and fell on the pool of blood in front of him. Such a gruesome death, but all Juvia could think was on Gray.

"Gray-sama, I'm so sorry." She muttered to herself, falling into her knees and crying like never before, knowing she had just sentenced his father to die. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry." Juvia stayed like that for a few moments, she was feeling hot but was shivering with cold, her vision started to appear black dots once again and it was hard to breathe. Confused, Juvia felt sick and threw up the little she had on her stomach and when she was done, she moved over a bit before lying on the floor.

She was about to pass out to what she thought was exhaustion, she even had her eyes closed, when she felt someone put one hand under her head and check her pulse on her throat with the other.

Opening her eyes, the figure was somewhat blurry, but the black hair was unmistakable. "Gray-sama." She breathed.

There was a sigh in relief. "Sorry, sweetheart. Older Fullbuster, I'm afraid."

"Father?" She had no idea why she took the idea of calling him that way. "Where-?"

"He is fine, don't worry." He told her. "I'm more concerned about you, you've been poisoned." Juvia frowned in confusion. "Keith's knives. He liked to create his own poisons and drench his knives with it, they are powerful and deadly even in small doses."

Speaking of poisoning... "Shouldn't you be-"

"Dead?" Silver started to fumble through his pockets. "I will be soon. I created a certain resistance to his poisons through the years so I'll last longer. But don't worry, I have the antidote for you."

Juvia frowned in confusion even with her fogged mind. "What about you?"

"Just one dose, I'm afraid, sweetheart." He told her kindly. Silver finally found the vial and opened it with one hand, the other still supporting Juvia's head and he tried to make her drink it but she refused. "Come on, Juvia. I am not trying to poison you, I promise."

She shook her head. "You need it."

"I accepted my fate a long time ago." Silver told her gently. "I lived to hug my son again. I am ready to go now. Besides, Gray would be devastated if you died." He tried to joke.

With another shake of her head, Juvia refused the antidote. "He needs you more than he needs me." She whispered. "You just found each other again."

Silver looked at her, surprised and then smiled softly at her. He, then, leaned and kissed her on the forehead. "Oh, my sweet girl how I wish we met under different circumstances. Both times. I believe he feels more for you than you can possibly know." He whispered but she was almost losing consciousness. "How about this, I take half and you take half? It will hold us alive until I can get more."

Her mind was mud, by then, and the idea seemed reasonable enough. She nodded and made an effort to open one eye. "You first." Silver chuckled and raised the vial to his mouth, gulping and Juvia drank easily when he put it on her lips. Juvia's breathing was still labored and she was exhausted. "Can Juvia sleep now?"

"Of course you can, my darling girl. This is for the best, thank you." Silver told her gently and passed his fingers through her hair. "Thanks to you I can finally go to heaven, see my Mika again after all these years. And you've stopped the FACE bombs." Juvia hummed in agreement, just wanting to fall asleep. "Look after Gray for me."

"Juvia will." She agreed. "Juvia wants... to see Gray-sama." She muttered.

"You'll see him, very soon." He answered.

"Good." She mumbled, consciousness slipping away, finally; but just before it overtook her, she felt again lips on her forehead and she was glad Gray had his father back.

#

The moment Juvia woke up, she was in an ambulance, her consciousness came and went; she could remember bits of the ride, then she remembered the bright white lights from the hospital. The third time she woke up, she was in a hospital cot, an IV line on her arm, breathing cannulas in her nose and she felt as if every inch of her body hurt. She tried to move, but couldn't.

She probably made some sort of sound because a moment later Cana's face was in her line of view. The brunette looked like she had gone through hell too. "Juvia? Juvia, can you speak?"

Her throat was so dry it hurt. "Water." She managed to croak the word out and Cana nodded. Juvia heard some fumbling and then Cana offered her a straw and the coolness of the water down her throat felt like heaven. She drank the whole thing and could feel her need for it again soon. "What... what happened?"

Cana hesitated. "You... don't remember?" Juvia frowned, her mind was still a mess. "We went after Tartaros."

And with just those four words, the events returned to her as if she had been slapped with them.

Tartaros. Gray. Keith. Silver.

"Where is Gray-sama? And Silver-sama?" She asked fast and weirdly enough, her breath shortened. "Are they alright?"

Cana blinked two times in surprise. "Gray is fine. A little battered up, but he is fine." Juvia sighed in relief. "But... Juvia, Silver... well, he didn't make it. He was poisoned." It was as if Juvia's blood became sheer ice, her heart skipped a beat.

"No." The blunette shook her head. "We... we shared the antidote to... slow down the effects."

"Juvia." Cana sighed and grabbed her friend's hand. "I'm sorry, but I don't think he got any for himself."

"No." Her eyes watered. "No. No. No." She started to cry. "I told him..." Juvia cried. "I didn't want it. He wasn't supposed to die." Tears started to fall and her breathing became labored. "I told him."

"Alright, Juvia." Cana's eyes widened. "You need to calm down. You still need some medicine for the poison to get off your system completely and raising your heartbeats won't help you." The brunette told her and only then Juvia realized the wild beeping coming from the machine next to her. "I know this sucks, but you really need to calm down. Your breathing is impaired because of the smoke after the bomb and the poison, you need to take it slow"

Without saying another word, Juvia just started to cry harder until Cana had no choice but to call a nurse, who gave her a sedative.

A few minutes later, the medicine was working and she was quietly crying, then, wondering about what Gray was thinking of her, in how much pain he was in.

And all because of her.

She had lost the right to love him.

#

For a week, Juvia didn't see Gray at all. He didn't show up at the hospital during the day she was there, he wasn't even present when some agents appeared in her room to ask questions about what happened.

The doctors discharged her and prescribed her four types of pills for her to really get over the poisoning but Juvia didn't bother to buy them at all. The only thing she did during those six days at home were to stay in her apartment, preferably in her bed, curled up in a ball.

Not even Snowball could help her, but the loyal pet laid next to its owner in a form of support and, feeling bad for not taking her out, Juvia paid one of the kids in her building to take her out for an hour each day.

The only thing that made her smile the whole time was the text she received from Cana telling her that Laxus was awake and out of danger.

On the sixth day, Juvia decided she needed to confront Gray, no matter what he had the right to know exactly how his father died. And why.

With just a bit of digging she found out he had bought a train ticket to Gerbera, his hometown and his father's body had been released from the coroner's office. She booked a ticket for herself and packed a small bag, knowing it would be awfully cold there, as it always were.

By the time she arrived, Juvia checked in the B&B she reserved for herself and went to the place she was certain Gray would be.

Gerbera's cemetery was under a thick layer of snow and there were remnants of an old church and sitting in one of the fallen walls, there was Gray, looking straight to a wooden cross. She couldn't see his face, but by the way his shoulders were hung low, she could easily guess.

She stayed looking at him for a minute before gathering courage to finally say something. That was the point of no return, the moment he'd seen what she truly was, what she had done.

"E-Er... Gray-sama?" She walked to a few steps behind him and the moment he heard her voice, he looked over his shoulder, eyes wide.

"Juvia?" He was confused. "Did you... follow me here?" He didn't sound angry, just surprised.

"Juvia is sorry! Very sorry." She looked down to the snow. "Juvia has something she really must say to you." The blunette couldn't look up no matter what, she couldn't see the look on his face when she told him. "Keith, the.. man who controlled your father all these years... The one who killed him... was Juvia." She took a deep breath, her eyes burning with tears.

"You did...?" He started, but she couldn't let him speak, not yet.

"Juvia realizes..." her next words would be so painful she didn't know she'd survive them "that she doesn't deserve to love you anymore." A sob escaped her. "Not now that she is the one who..." she sobbed again "killed your father."

There. She said it out loud and the realness of it dawned her.

Still after almost a whole minute, she couldn't look up when she heard his heavy boots hit the snow as he approached her.

"You..." He grabbed the front of her coat and Juvia 'eeped' in surprise but didn't move otherwise.

That was it. The end. The moment he would tell her he never wanted to see her again.

By some reason she couldn't start to fathom, Gray didn't push her away; instead, he hid his face on her chest, crying and shaking like a scared little boy. He was muttering something and it took Juvia a moment to make out he said: "Thank you."

As if he couldn't stand on his own, his knees gave in and in a second, both of them were kneeling in the snow, Gray crying like she never saw before and saying "I'm sorry" over and over again.

Once the shock wore off a bit, Juvia put her arms around him, holding him tight. "Gray-sama...?"

"Sorry." He said it again, but other than that, didn't move from his position and neither did Juvia, waiting for him to let it out of his system.

#

Gray cried for a long time before he finally looked up and Juvia's heart broke with the sight, his face and eyes red and swollen, his painful gaze. She would've done anything to take that pain from him in a heartbeat.

Worried about him, Juvia pulled him up from the cold ground and led him to where he was sitting before and he let her handle him as if he didn't mind at all.

"I'm sorry about" he waved towards the spot they held each other just moments before "all that. I got... overwhelmed."

"Of course." She put a hand on his thigh and was surprised to see him reach for her hand and twine it with his, but said nothing about it. "Gray-sama, did you.... Did you hear what Juvia told you? About... About..."

Gray nodded. "You think you killed my father." Juvia looked away and tried to remove her hand from his, but Gray held it tighter and she looked up in question. "Juvia, the person who killed my father was Keith, no one else."

Juvia shook her head. "You don't understand, there was an antidote and-"

"I know." Gray cut her off and Juvia frowned in confusion. "Juvia, I saw my father die. I was with him." Juvia's eyes widened in surprise. "After I left after him, we fought, we punched each other, but he told me the truth, that he was undercover on his own all this time. That he never converted himself, he was just trying to get to the bottom of it all. He only shot you that day because he needed to keep his cover and you were wearing a vest. He had been giving clues about massive attacks for years, a lot more could've happened if my father weren't there to give the intel. Who do you think posted on the dark net the Tartaros' address for Levy to find? Who gave the backdoor to Levy so she could hack faster?"

"Your father." Juvia's eyes widened even more in realization.

"Exactly." Gray nodded. "After he told me that, the son of a bitch used a technique so I could lose my conscience for a few minutes; he knew I'd try to stop his crazy plan. He used my comm to talk to you; the signal was scrambled but he had some device, I don't know the details, but he managed to speak with you." Juvia nodded. "That's when he figured out you were poisoned."

"I'm sorry." Juvia muttered. "If I had been better-"

"Let me finish." Gray interrupted her gently. "He knew the only way to stop the Councilman was to kill Keith so the dead-man switch could take care of him. But it would also kill my father." Juvia's eyes watered and Gray shook his head. "Juvia, my father chose to go and find you, to give you the antidote."

"I told him I didn't want it. You needed him more than-"

"Don't finish that sentence." For the first time since she arrived Gray was truly angry with her. "Don't say that I don't need you or that if I got to choose, I'd choose him because I still have nightmares about having to choose." He said between gritted teeth. "I needed you both, each in their own way. Not more and not less."

Taking a calming breath, Gray took a few moments to speak again and when he did, he was looking at the wooden cross a few feet away from them. "Do you know what he told me when he was dying?" Juvia shook her head, silent tears falling. "That he was glad his last action was to save a life instead of taking one." Gray used the back of his hand to wipe a stray tear that rolled his cheek. "He gathered information, he tried to help but he also had to do terrible things to fit in." He looked at her. "You helped his last action to be a good one." Juvia also tried to dry her tears, but there were too many. "Besides, he was dying anyway." The blunette looked up to him in confusion. "Prostate cancer. Advanced. My father told me and the coroner confirmed it. He had just a few months to live at most. I would've lost him either way."

"I'm so sorry." Juvia squeezed his hand.

"Me too." Gray sighed. "I've been trying to understand all this, that's why I haven't been around. I was looking for some clues he told me, his phone, his belongings, anything." Gray told her. "And... And I didn't think you'd want to see me."

"What?"

"You were almost killed by a psychopath related somewhat to my life." Gray tried to be nonchalant about it. "It might make some people mad. But I called Cana every night to know how you were."

Juvia filed away that bit of information and said: "Juvia was afraid you hated her."

"Yeah, I got that with all the drama a few minutes ago from both of us." He snorted and Juvia smiled weakly.

Gray cupped her face. "I am not mad at you at all, don't you ever feel guilty about this again. Remember what you told me about Lucy wanting to go after Natsu? That it was her choice? Well, it was my dad's choice and we will respect it." He stared at her until she nodded and he sighed in relief, hesitating just a moment before kissing her lips sweetly. "You look tired."

Juvia put a hand on top of his and moved her head just a bit so she could kiss his palm. "So do you."

"I didn't even get a room yet." He groaned. "I rented a locker at the train station, left my bag there. I just wanted to get the burial done." Gray removed one of the hands from her face and waved towards the general direction of the grave.

"Juvia has a room, we... could go there." She hesitated even when it was clear they were alright.

"Oh, thank god." Gray breathed and got up, offering her a hand, which she gladly took. "My father gave me an address. It's in this town, an apartment. I haven't entered yet." He told her in a whisper. "Would you... come with me? I don't know what I'll find there."

Juvia smiled kindly at him. "Of course. But first we need some food and a good night's rest. Juvia will be with you in everything you want her to."

"Thank you, Juvia." Gray said, bringing her closer to him, uncharacteristically, but Juvia enjoyed the moment: she had started the day thinking her relationship was over just to find out it was stronger than ever.

She had her heart shattered, the pieces all over and with just a few words from him and she was on her way to be whole again.

She did love him more than anything.