brains and brawn | sting eucliffe

¹⁶ᴀ ᴄᴀɴᴏɴ ᴡᴏᴜʟᴅɴ'ᴛ ʙᴇ ꜱᴏ ʙɪɢ

The guild had decidedly gone all out for the party the night of day four. Everyone was excited after Natsu won his fight with the twin dragons.

Cana drank more beer than ever- Bacchus had somehow even gotten into their party.. but no one seemed to care at that moment. All they felt was pure bliss- at least until the news of Lucy's capture.

By then, Gears had returned to hear the news, and her jaw set firm. So.. she was right. There was another Lucy running around somewhere.

She'd excused herself after the meeting, heading to her room.

When the sun rose, she was gone. Telling only one person- the only one up at that hour- where she was going.

--

Amaya scanned the room yet another time, the green smoothie beside her half-melted and no good to drink anymore. She huffed to herself, where the hell was Gears?

Mira popped around the corner, silently taking the drink away and cleaning up the circle of water it'd left behind. She gave her a soft nod before turning back to the room of people.

It was then that Kinana sat besides her, giving the girl a smile. Maya smiled back. "Hey, what's up?"

She hummed to herself. "Not very much. How are you? Excited for the games tomorrow?"

"Haha, yeah." The girl rested her head on her hand. "It's gonna be great to get in on the action again. Well, that and beating the crap out of that Sting Ocliff guy."

The purple-haired girl laughed. "It's Eucliffe, but I totally get you there. He was just awful to Gears during that fight."

Maya nodded. "Yeah. That is- if she's even here to see it. Where'd she run off to this time?"

"Oh!" The woman started, turning to her. "That reminds me- Gears said that she ran to the library for the day and wouldn't be back until late."

"Oh god." The bluenette sighed, her form slumping. "Knowing her, she'll be there until next week and won't even remember that there was somewhere else she needed to be. But, anyways- thanks for telling me, Kinana."

"Oh, no problem!"

--

In truth, the orangette had kept her word- indeed going to the library.

She tried to match up what folklore knew about the Dragon King festival, versus the book she held in her hand.

There were a few missing pieces to the puzzle- things that she couldn't put together. Especially knowing that she couldn't use archive to look it up. Normally she would ask Hibiki- but she didn't want anyone else to get involved in the chaos that she had gotten dropped into.

The Eclipse Gate was used as a gateway through time- using the magic energy that the kingdom leached away from wizards during the grand magic games. It was designed originally for mages go back into time- a powerful weapon made to kill Zeref before he even became the black wizard.

But, the purpose designed in the blueprints had another use- an ethereon canon. At least, that's what it said in the notes. With all the calculations she had made in the past seven hours, there was no way that the gate could store that much power to shoot down the theoretical 'dragons.'

The gate wouldn't be shaped like that if it was a canon- it wouldn't be so.. big.

Why was it so big, anyways? If they were only sending a few people back originally to kill Zeref. A smaller door would require less energy as well.. which confused her. Even if dragons swarmed over Fiore, Crocus was in the center of the continent, surely someone would see them and send the nation into panic.

So why was the royal family hiding such a huge weapon? If anything the people should be informed and notified that everything would be alright- that they had a plan to fend them off. And why not get the dragon slayers in the loop? Just in case shit hit the fan and they needed people on the front lines?

Nothing about their plan made sense, but as the sun set over Crocus to signal the end of the rest day, Gears was still hard at work.

Trying to find the truth behind the true Eclipse Project.

--

Midnight struck quicker than the boy would have liked to admit.

The end of the day had been the roughest time of his life, and he was ready to call it quits.. but the terror of his best friend's expression haunted him whenever he closed his eyes.

After tossing and turning for what seemed like forever, he sat up and rested against the headboard. He knew he needed rest in order to get his friend back the next day.. but he could barely even blink without feeling guilty.

The clock had struck a few seconds ago, sending a soft wave of liveliness for those around town. The young teen included.

Tired eyes passed over the words, bringing with it a newfound peace. A peace he always found when reading the words on his arm- knowing that someone was out there, waiting for him. Someone who he could turn to when the days were dark, someone to be happy with and make memories.

Someone to rely on.

'Hey, can you tell the others not to wait up for me- I'll just be at the library.'

======

✎crocodile