A comforting motion smoothed her blonde hair out of her face, gentle and soothing, and she simply lay there as she slowly came back to awareness. Slowly, ignoring the pounding behind her eyes, she let her eyes flutter open to meet familiar onyx eyes, which were filled with sheer terror and concern. While the concern remained, the fear disappeared, replaced by relief. "Lucy."

"Natsu," the celestial mage rasped in response, groaning softly as she raised an arm to cover her eyes and protect them from the painful bright light. Her head was killing her, and every single bit of her ached. "What...what happened?" she whispered, not wanting to speak too loud.

"A lot of things," he admitted. "You've been out for nearly a day."

Lucy grimaced. No wonder the dragon slayer looked so frantic. Twenty four hours of unconsciousness wasn't a good thing. "Well? What kind of things? Where's Gray and Juvia? Are they okay? What about those things? Oh, and - oh." Her gaze filled with grief. "Aries..."

Natsu helped her sit up, nearly hovering over her, and Lucy shot him a look. Just because she'd passed out for as long as she did didn't mean she couldn't handle herself. But she let him remain where he was, sitting right beside her, because she knew that it kept him calm. Or as calm as the situation would let him be, if the jiggling of his bouncing knee was anything to go by. "Uh, Gray and Juvia are fine. They're checking around the area again. The Marked - that's what we've started calling 'em - are mostly dead. They come back every now and then, but not all at once like they did. Doesn't look like anyone's left alive here, Luce, so we're heading back as soon as those two come back- Lucy?!"

She groaned, doubling over, gagging violently as pain clenched her stomach. She threw out a hand to stop him from getting closer as her stomach rolled and she vomited onto the ground, grimacing at the metallic taste in her mouth afterwards. Red had spattered the ground beside her, and by the horrified look in the pink-haired mage's look, she knew immediately what it was. "I'm fine," she insisted, feeling a hell of a lot better than she had moments before. "It looks bad, but I feel better now, I promise. It's probably left over from whatever happened," she reassured.

He didn't look convinced. But recognizing the pleading look and the fact that there wasn't anything they could do, he sat back. His hands trembling, he rasped, "Your heart stopped for a long time, Luce... Gray said you were gone for a few minutes, but I did that thing Erza said would come in handy to try and help you and it worked. But you were...Lucy. You can't do that again. You scared the hell out of me."

Lucy's hand drifted up to brush against her chest, remembering the furiously burning ache and grimacing when she realized it was still there, though nowhere near as intense. "I'm sorry," she said quietly. "I don't know why or how it happened though, Natsu. So I can't stop it from happening again. It might happen and if I'm passing out..." She shook her head, dragging her knees to her chest and resting her chin on them, ignoring when her stomach rolled again. "I'm sorry, Natsu," she sighed. "I'm being useless. Can't even summon my spirits, and to top it all off I get sick at the weirdest and worst moments..."

Natsu rolled his eyes, annoyed. "Shut up, Luce, we're not going that way. Life sucks right now as it is, don't need it getting even worse."

"Jerk," she muttered in response, though she didn't seem surprised at the clipped tone he used. He always hated when she went into that discussion. She puzzled over their life at the moment. What had they done wrong? Why was everything going to hell when they hadn't done anything recently? Was this the karma she'd been waiting for when she'd felt guilty for not speaking to her father before her seven year disappearance?

She didn't care anymore. She just wanted everything to go back to normal.

"Juvia touched one of them," Lucy whispered, her tone becoming agonized. "I mean, she was going to end up getting them from Gray without a doubt, but...Natsu, that's so many of our friends that have it now. What are we going to do?"

Natsu opened his mouth to answer, but was interrupted when Gray's voice called, "Natsu! We're coming back! Don't incinerate us!" A few moments later, they walked into view. Lucy pressed her lips into a hard line when she noticed the black creeping along Gray's hand and fingers, though she said nothing. He was still fully clothed, and Lucy found herself deciding then and there that it was worse than he was letting on. Juvia smiled broadly at her.

"You're awake!" the water mage cried happily, hurrying over to kneel beside her. She didn't touch the celestial mage, however, and Lucy was glad. She didn't feel like watching Natsu burn their friends to a crisp. At least Juvia was aware of what was going on now.

"Feeling any better?" Gray questioned then smirked a little when Lucy flushed at his next words. "Natsu had to do some CPR stuff...he said this was the worst little attack of yours so far."

"I've felt better," she admitted. Lucy smiled reassuringly, and then stopped quickly when Natsu's eyes widened slightly at the sight. Not a good idea when you were spitting up blood. "But I feel better now...sorry for scaring you guys. Natsu said we were leaving as soon as you guys got back?"

"Yeah," Gray answered. His dark eyes searched the landscape around them. "We need to get back and report what we found to Gramps...you able to move now? We need to get going as soon as possible. We learned the hard way those things are stronger at night."

"Great," Lucy sighed. She carefully pushed herself to her feet, staggering and grimacing with a white face when she gagged again, that disgusting metallic taste threatening to fill her mouth again. But she forced herself to ignore it, instead forcing a grin to her face despite reaching out to grab Natsu's arm for balance. "I'm good. Let's go- Natsu," she growled warningly, "If you dare and try to pick me up, I will make sure you can't walk for a week, you hear me?"

Natsu scowled. "Lucy, you're going to fall over- damn it, Luce!" Just as he'd spoken, the blonde's knees gave out and she went down with a grunt, nearly dragging him with her. He managed to catch her in a painful way before he hauled her back up, this time scooping her up with care before giving Gray a pointed look when the Ice-Make mage shot him a smirk. "Shut up, you icy bastard, and let's go. They're coming back. Again."

"Right," Gray muttered, gently nudging Juvia forward. The water mage nodded, explaining to the exhausted and bewildered Lucy as they headed in the direction of the vehicle they'd been using, "Juvia is driving this time. Gray wants to talk with Juvia's love rival and Natsu."

"Err, okay?" Lucy raised an eyebrow at the soft smile on Juvia's face as she kept ahead of them, thought not too far from her beloved Gray. Lucy felt a flash of sympathy for both of them. While Gray was an idiot, he wasn't completely oblivious to the real emotions that existed behind Juvia's excessive stalking. And she was pretty sure the ice-make mage had a little something in his heart for her. Otherwise he wouldn't have spared her in the beginning.

Natsu's grip tightened around her, and Lucy snapped to attention, listening intently. Even without the dragon slayer's sharp hearing, she could hear the soft movements and hisses the Marked gave off. "Be ready," Natsu warned under his breath. Lucy let a hand fall to the whip that had been returned to her hip, prepared.

Luckily, it seemed they'd caught a break. The Marked stayed back, as if realizing they were finally leaving and wanting them gone. Out of habit, Lucy gently grasped the scarf wrapped around Natsu's neck, the strange cloth bunched in her hand, and Natsu ended up having to flick her fingers away when they arrived at the vehicle and the celestial mage was lost in thought. Flushing, she jerked her hand away, shooting him a look that he merely rolled his eyes at.

How she missed the Natsu of just a few weeks ago. He would have teased her despite the "attacks".

Juvia hopped up into the driver's position with ease, and Gray climbed inside the vehicle first. Natsu carefully put Lucy down and she took the chance to lean against it to kick him before joining Gray. Swearing and wincing, Natsu slipped in after her, slamming the door shut after him. Lucy rested her head against the window and gave a sigh of exasperation when she recognized the already ill look on Natsu's face that only grew worse when the vehicle lurched forward. "Come here," she sighed, ignoring the sly look on Gray's face as she helped the dragon slayer slide down and lie his head in her lap. "Alright, guess you're just chatting with me. He's out for a while."

Gray became serious immediately. "You already know what we're talking about, Lucy."

"I had a guess," she admitted, stroking Natsu's hair comfortingly as she watched him roll up his sleeve, revealing the Marks that twined together as they traveled up his arm. They weren't moving as she watched like they had on the child and Xavier's wife, but they were there. There had to be more beneath the jacket he wore. She was impressed he'd kept it on as long as he had. "Juvia knows now, right? You told her?"

He snorted. "Lucy, she already has them herself. Not quite as much, but there's a little spot where the thing caught her."

Lucy groaned softly. "Poor Juvia," she sighed. She paused in running her fingers through the soft pink hair to study Natsu's face. "I'm worried about everyone..." Tears threatened to show up in her eyes. "What are we going to do, Gray? There's no way we can save everyone at this point..."

"I think I've figured out how it happens," Gray told her, studying the black Marks on his arm. "Obviously, don't touch me or Juvia or anyone else who has it. That's how it's transmitted." His dark eyes darted up for a moment. "I think it's when it reaches a certain point that we lose our mind, our logical way of thinking or whatever the hell it is. I don't know what the certain point is. Obviously, unless you kill us, we turn out looking like what we saw..."

Lucy's throat tightened. "We can't kill you. Natsu and I can't, at least. I'm not going to kill you, Gray. I can't."

Gray glared at her. "You better if I'm trying to kill any of you guys, Lucy. Do you hear me? If it's between me and someone who isn't infected with this, then you better kill me." He huffed, sitting back and crossing his arms. "I want you to promise me that you guys or one of the others at the guild will. And I want you to promise you'll do the same for any of our nakama that end up the same way, got it? None of us want to kill our nakama. Elfman didn't. Lisanna didn't. It's for the best."

Her voice trembled as she spoke then, her grief obvious. "What did we do to deserve this, Gray? Look how it destroyed Blue Pegasus and where they were...what if it happens to Fary Tail and Magnolia, too? What are we supposed to do if someone like Erza goes crazy and uses her magic against us? Or Mira, or any of the other S-Class mages? They'll kill us all."

"I don't know," Gray said grimly. "But we'll figure it out when the time comes. So far it's looking like the stronger you are, the longer it takes to take over, so they should be okay for the time being. It'll be a few more days at least before Juvia and I are gone." He sighed, turning to look out the window. "We need to try and check in with the other guilds, especially Lamia Scale and Sabertooth. The more mages we have gathered together, the better."

"It could be dangerous though," Lucy commented. "If too many of us get together and a whole bunch have it..."

"True," Gray admitted. "We'll just check in with them, then...Gramps isn't gonna be happy about this..."

"I hope everyone's okay," she murmured quietly, resting her head back again. Her eyes fluttered shut and grief washed over her. Aries...Virgo... She was so worried about them. Were they okay?

"Virgo's alright," Aries had said before disappearing. "She's with the rest of us. I have to go now. Sorry!"

So perhaps they were safe in the Celestial Realm. But it didn't mean she couldn't worry about them! She wanted to talk with Loke especially, and she knew he wanted to speak with her as well if the heat of the key was anything to go by. But she wouldn't risk summoning him unless she had no other choice. She couldn't.

Natsu groaned and she smiled faintly, patting his cheek affectionately. Everything was going to hell, but she'd take the few moments of normality she could get. Especially when it came to taking care of those she loved.

XxXx

"Shit!"

Gray somehow managed to jump up onto the seat, yelping when his head smacked against the roof of the vehicle when Lucy and Natsu were sent flying into where his legs had been moments before, the celestial mage sent sprawling across Natsu's face. The dragon slayer let loose a string of curses that would have undoubtedly resulted in Erza's wrath had she been there, gagging, and Lucy squealed, slamming a hand over his mouth after sitting up. "Don't you dare!"

"The hell was that?" Gray muttered, looking confused. His hands fidgeted uncertainly, unbuttoning the buttons on his jacket, and Lucy rolled her eyes at the fact that he didn't seem to notice.

There answer came in the way of Juvia throwing the door open, tears rolling down her cheeks and terror written across her face. "Th-there's...s-something happened! Juvia was just...Juvia was just driving and then Juvia saw..."

Lucy scrambled off of the groaning Natsu and threw herself out of the vehicle, careful not to touch Juvia. She made it easier by stepping aside, weeping into her hands. Lucy's face went white and she gave a strangled sob, clapping a hand over mouth when she took in what Juvia had noticed.

Natsu, still looking sick, made his way out after her and Gray hopped out quickly. There was silence except for the girls' crying as they took in the view.

What had once been the town they loved and called home was no more. Similar to the town they'd just returned from, the buildings had all been reduced to rubble except for the occasional ones. Smoke billowed from various places, and there was a certain section of the town that was still ablaze with raging flames. "No," Natsu rasped, looking stunned by the sight before him. His jaw worked furiously as he clenched it, a mixture of rage and grief flooding his features. Gray just looked lost, his eyes staring blankly.

"The guild hall," Lucy choked out, swiping at her eyes to try and see better. She looked dully at the fire mage after taking in the biggest fire of them all. "Natsu, we need to-"

"Yeah," he agreed, cutting her off. He grabbed her arm, pulling her after him as he started forward, but Gray stopped them with his sharply said words.

"Don't, Natsu. We can't go down there yet. There may be more of the Marked running around. Magnolia was even bigger than that other place...it could turn into a lethal situation, and it's getting dark as it is. We'll stay around here for the night and head there in the morning, see if there's any survivors...I doubt all of our guild could have been, err, hurt by that mess."

Juvia sniffled. "Gajeel would protect them." But she sounded uncertain, as if she knew even the iron dragon slayer would have had issues against so many of the Marked.

"If we had Happy," Lucy said mournfully, "We could send him to do a fly over, but...Gray's right, Natsu. We can't do anything now. We need to stay here." She looked at him with watery eyes and Natsu, being himself, groaned, unable to resist her pleading gaze.

"Fine," he snapped, looking irritated and frustrated. "But the second the sun is up, we're heading down there. And I'm not sleeping," he added. "Someone needs to keep an eye on you two before you go nuts and try to kill us."

"Natsu!" Lucy snapped, exasperated, but Gray only shook his head.

"That's not a bad idea, Lucy," he replied. "We could turn at any moment...you should have someone stay on guard. Natsu," he turned to the Salamander now, his eyes firm. "You hear what I told Lucy earlier?"

"Yeah, you stupid ice bastard," Natsu grumbled. "Doesn't mean I like it."

"...how much do you remember of that ride?" Lucy asked curiously, and, to her surprise, despite his irritation towards the situation they now found themselves in, he smirked at her.

"Could rival Mira," was all he said, making the celestial mage groan and bury her face in her hands. Gray didn't seem to look as confused as Juvia did, probably because he'd been with them in the cabin of the vehicle. She glanced confusedly at her beloved ice-make mage and he snickered, muttering, "Lucy decided to do a little song for the idiot."

"Aw," Juvia cooed softly just loud enough that only Gray could hear her. "Juvia is glad." Her gaze darkened. "Juvia doesn't think there will be any more of that now though."

"Probably not," Gray agreed. He took a moment to let his gaze travel over the mess of what had once been Magnolia, his face grim. "Come on, Juvia," he said suddenly. "Let's get things to start a fire...on second thought," he added suddenly, shaking his head. "Let's not. It might attract the Marked...but it's going to start getting cold soon. The first snow should be coming any day now."

In a weak attempt to light up the situation, Lucy patted Natsu's arm. "That's okay. We have a torch if we need it."

Gray gave her a faint smile for her attempt before folding his arms behind his head, studying the area around them. "Come on, let's head a little bit away from here. Just to be safe."

No one said anything as they made their way into the nearby trees.

XxXx

Lucy woke up to shooting pains racing up and down her body. She choked on nothing, unable to release any sort of sound to alert her friends as to what was happening. The familiar fire raced through her and she jerkily tried to reach out to brush against anyone to get their attention. But she couldn't reach the nearest person - who would have been Natsu had he not been checking the area at the moment - and she gave a soft groan at the realization that this one she would have to deal with by herself.

It felt as if her heart was literally twisting at the realization that she'd come to rely on Natsu to be there whenever she went through this.

Struggling to drag in air, Lucy weakly forced her arms to move, shoving herself up into a sitting position. Suddenly freezing, she hugged herself, forcing herself to ignore the pain as she rested her head in her lap, a soft sob escaping her lips. It hurt. And her back felt as if it was melting off and reattaching itself before repeating the process over and over again...

Trembling, she nearly leaped out of her skin when warmth surrounded her followed by a startled hiss of "Lucy!"

"N-Natsu," she managed to grit out without screaming in the process. Her lungs screamed at her for using what little bit of oxygen she had. She felt something force her upright, pressing against her chest just over where her heart was still thundering away.

And then the pain began to fade away. Lucy shivered as cold washed over her and she instinctively leaned into the above average body heat Natsu offered as he soothingly rubbed her back. She gasped softly, breathing in quiet little pants as she wheezed out, "Thanks."

"Damn it, Luce," he huffed, "If it starts happening, just call for one of us, we'll come help. At least I will, dunno about those two..." Onyx eyes annoyed, Natsu frowned she she trembled again. "You're cold? There's barely a breeze around here."

"Sh-shut up," she stammered, burying her face in her arms. "It's n-not my fault, okay?" She wanted her bed desperately, though she doubted that she'd ever see it again. A thought suddenly hit her. "Natsu," she asked, "Do you think your house would have survived this? It's outside the town, isn't it?"

"Might have," Natsu said thoughtfully. The dragon slayer tilted his head back thoughtfully. "We'll check after we make sure everyone's okay and find out what happened." His gaze darkened. "I'll destroy whoever did this to our guild."

Lucy was hesitant, but pointed out, "Natsu, whoever did this might be in our guild."

He huffed at that, and fell silent.

Lucy dozed on and off for the rest of the night, the nightmares she'd been having chased off by the warmth that Natsu created when he sighed and let her curl up into his side.

XxXx

The next morning found the four Fairy Tail members once again looking over their destroyed home. The flames that had roared upon their arrival the day before had died down to a small remainder of cinders though smoke still billowed from the building, and Lucy had to blink back tears. There went the town they had all loved so much.

And it was in that direction they started for. Gray had lost his jacket and shirt during the night, and was still frustrated about it due to the fact that he wasn't exactly happy about walking around with the Marks showing. Lucy had been startled when she'd first seen the extent of them. They'd laced up and down his right arm and chest, almost reaching for his heart. They were mere inches away, though they seemed to have stopped moving for the time being. Juvia kept glancing at him anxiously, clutching one of his arms - the one without the Marks - and he didn't bother trying to push her away as he usually would have. Natsu looked furious, surprisingly silent despite the obvious fighting he wanted to do. And Lucy just hung back slightly behind the rest, miserable.

As they slowly began the descent into Magnolia on foot, her previous conversation with the guildmaster and Cana returned to the forefront of her mind. No matter what they said, the celestial mage couldn't help but feel as if this was her fault. She couldn't exactly pick out how it was her fault, but it was.

"Keep up," Natsu snapped over his shoulder, and Lucy winced at the sharpness of his tone. She couldn't blame him, though. She'd be snapping at everyone else, too, if she wasn't sure that they were the last members of Fairy Tail alive.

That thought made her blood run cold. What was wrong with her? Fairy Tail? Dead? As if. There was no way something like this would have killed off the entire guild! Look what they'd survived through up until this point! Biting back a bitter and hysterical laugh, Lucy forced herself to keep up, feeling determined. Surely at least a few had survived. Their guildmaster wouldn't have been destroyed by something like this.

Her hands came to rest on her keys, more for comfort than anything else. Not like she could summon any of them to help her. But the heat that radiated from them soothed the troublesome feelings in her mind and she found herself able to focus.

Only a few minutes later, the group came across a body...or what was left of it. Lucy looked away quickly, feeling sick, and Juvia gave a small gasp as Gray and Natsu made themselves examine it. "A citizen," Gray decided after examining it for a few moments. Even the ice-make mage looked ill at the sight of a man missing half of his body, his innards sprawled out for a few feet behind him. "Do you smell anything that might be people still alive, Natsu?"

The dragon slayer shook his head. "No," he answered, wincing when he inhaled. "All I smell is smoke and death. And the Marked."

"Juvia thinks we should check where the guildhall was," Juvia said softly, still looking away from the corpse.

"She's right," Lucy agreed. "If anyone survived, it would have been in that area. Our guildmates would have tried to protect innocents."

"Then let's head that way," Natsu muttered. He kept a close eye on Lucy as they headed in that direction, forcing themselves to ignore the dead that littered the streets. When the celestial mage tripped over an arm that had been ripped from the body, she quickly began edging closer to Natsu, who somehow managed to help her not let that happen again.

Finally, they arrived at the destroyed guildhall. It still had puffs of smoke escaping embers, but Natsu ignored them in favor of stepping into the rubble, sniffing intently and ignoring the tears that accompanied the smoke. Lucy watched anxiously as he shuffled through it, undoubtedly looking for people.

But he found no one. Wrinkling his nose, he eventually gave up, returning to join them, completely covered in soot and grime. "Nobody's in there. Not a single body. They might have burned, but...not to complete ash. The flames would have left a body."

"That means there may be survivors?" Juvia said hopefully.

"We need to start looking then," Gray said firmly. "We need to be careful though...the Marked may show up at any point. There have to be a few throughout the place by now. I'd say we should split up to look, but..."

"No," Lucy disagreed. "That's a bad idea. What if we get attacked? We were able to fend them off the last time. We wouldn't be able to if there aren't four of us hanging around together. Not with that amount. But Gray." She glanced at the Marks on his body again. "If you think you're about to lose it, it'd be nice to let us know."

Gray rolled his eyes. "Like I wouldn't say anything," he fired back before rubbing his head. "Tch," he muttered, "This is ridiculous. The hell happened to the world? Where did this even come from? Need to figure out where Elfman came from."

"Who care where it started?" Natsu growled, "We need to figure out how to stop it."

Lucy murmured her agreement to that. She slipped around a corner ahead of her friends, pausing to examine an abandoned building that had managed to stay standing despite all of the craziness around them. A frown appeared on her face and she hesitantly approached it. Juvia, noticing, slipped over to join her.

Lucy had barely brushed her fingers against the doorknob before it suddenly flew open. The door itself slammed into Juvia, sending the water mage flying with a scream. Natsu and Gray whirled around immediately, and Lucy gave a scream of her own, diving out of the way to avoid the streak that flashed through the air. It bent and went after her again and Natsu swore when it went after him when he tried to jump to Lucy's aid. Watching carefully, Gray threw up a barrier of ice that seemed to catch it long enough for them to see what it was.

The second she recognized it, Juvia threw her head back and wailed, "Gajeel! Juvia promises! We're not bad people! We're not like the others!"

Lucy grimaced. Not technically completely truthful, but enough to get their point across, because a moment later, a thunderous looking iron dragon slayer was stepping out of the doorway, his skin replaced by scales of iron. A scuffed looking Levy peeked out from the doorway, her eyes wary, and she was soon joined by a dull-eyed Wendy. Growling, Gajeel gave them a piercing look before relaxing, gruffly muttering, "What the fuck are you doing just storming into buildings, Bunny Girl? Could have killed you idiots."

Lucy gave a strangled laugh that was cut off when Levy gave a sob and pushed past him, ignoring her dragon slayer's warning look as she threw her arms around Lucy in a tight hug.