Calm Before the Storm

Lucy

Lucy didn’t exactly wake up just like that. During her sleep, she wandered through something like a murky lake. A bottomless, cold, dark lake. Here and there, small orbs of light would appear, and she would follow, but she seemed to be stuck in the same spot whenever she tried. Lucy thought of swimming up, but she was either somewhere very deep or there was no up or down or right or left. Just where she floated aimlessly at that moment.

     She was lost, in a maze that had no paths, no walls, or perhaps even a goal.

     The orbs of light set the water in an eerie mood. It did nothing to help Lucy’s anxiety. In fact, it made her worry more. Shadows danced around her and clawed at her feet. It was as if they wanted to pull her down, forever and eternally lower. A second later, the orbs started moving. It was flowing further and further up.  No. She was going down. At that realization, she couldn’t breathe. It became cropped. Oxygen and carbon dioxide was going through her mouth at the same time. Suddenly, her surroundings brightened, and she could see where she had been this whole time.

     Lucy had been wrong. She wasn’t in water, she hadn’t been swimming, but now she thought perhaps the lake was a better place. Lucy was flying. Or falling, to be exact; like an angel who had her wings ripped off in the middle of her flight. One by one, the orbs that had done nothing but annoy Lucy grew bigger and bigger and hotter, so hot that though the closest orb to her was miles away, Lucy could feel the scorching heat that was being exerted. More and more appeared all around her.

     And the sky… the sky was especially peculiar. However, it was fitting for the moment. The heavens were red. Deep crimson; the colour of blood. All around, it was the colour of fire.

     Have I been sent to Hell? Lucy wondered.

     Time slowed down. It was like déjà vu. But why? Had she fallen from the sky more than once in the past? That wasn’t quite it…. She could remember words. The sensation of something rough yet smooth at the same time between her fingers. The familiar weight propped onto her hands as she sat on a bench. A girl with sapphire hair looking at her with round, childlike eyes, expectant.

     Of course; she had read it. In the books that she loved, with her best friend she treasured, in the Great Hall of her guild.

     Of Fairytail.

     Memories flowed like water through cracks in a broken dam. First a trickle; bits and pieces of books, libraries, shopping, and all the little things in life. Then, bigger events played in her head. Meeting Nastu and Happy, Erza, Gray, Wendy, Gajeel, and everybody else in the guild one by one. Her Celestial Spirits, her parents, the Fairy Tail in Edolas, Tenrou Island, and…

     The Eclipse.

     BOOM.

     Her fight with Virgo.

     BOOM. BOOM.

     Everything came back. Lucy’s body pounded. Her head was imploding little by little. Her limbs suddenly became heavy. But her heart. Her Heart. It was being squeezed by a hand, the hand of Tragedy, Sorrow, and Regret, all at once. Her face contorted in pain. Her back arched and her ears ringed as she screamed. A horrible, ear-splitting scream—

     Natsu! Everybody! Where are you! Help… me…

     But her screams were drowned by the balls of fire, and the flames pulled her in.