A Dragon's Treasure

Gold Fever

Morning at the guild brought with it the usual ruckus and laughter. Natus and Lucy were sitting close enough to each other to have their legs pressed together and hands intertwined on Natsu's lap. Of course when the girls had arrived form Lucy's house that morning they made a bee line for one another, and haven't been separated since. Despite all of the jokes thrown their way from the other guild members.

Levy had headed straight for the library, now more curious than ever about dragon slayers, and their mating process in particular. As per usual, Juvia had gone to fawn over Grey, Cana had already begun drinking, Erza was polishing armor between bites of strawberry cake, Wendy had gone out back to train with Romeo, and Lisanna was helping Mira behind the bar taking orders and cleaning glasses.

It was still early in the morning by guild standards when Laxus approached the bar at the center of the guild hall, a piece of paper form the upstairs billboard crumpled in his hand. "Mira!" he called as he approached the barmaid, "Can you approve this for me? should be an easy one."

Mira glanced up from the glass that she was polishing to see the large, blond, dragon slayer walking up to her while waving a request form in his hand. She gently placed the glass down, remembering the promise she had made to herself the night before.

Just do it, Mira. If you don't talk to him before he leaves on the mission you will lose your nerve, and I am not going to chicken out again!

With determination in her heart, she made up her mind. "Sure, of course I will, but could we talk first?" She asked, as cool and collected on the outside as she always is. Lisanna sent a glance her way, trying to decide if it was worth the torture from the She Devil to try and make fun of her.

"Uh, sure I guess. What's up?" He had a slightly questioning look on his face, unsure if he had done something wrong.

Mira looked around for a moment, seeing all of the people hanging around the guild and immediately deciding that she didn't want to talk out in the main hall. "Um... why don't you fallow me? Someplace a bit more private?" Without awaiting a response, she turned and walked out the end of the bar and toward the S-Class level, Laxus shaking his head briefly in confusion as he followed behind. Walking up the stairs and into the S-Class level, she noticed that there was still a good number of people around, and continued on down the hallway. Unsure of where to go from there, she pulled open the first door that she saw on her left. "We can talk in here!" she said with a smile in Laxus's direction, as she grabbed him by the arm and dragged him in behind her.

As she closed the door, she looked around to see what room she had dragged them both into on a last second whim. It was a small office. Or used to be, it was now mostly used for storage, but it was comfortable enough for them to both stand, and had a few old chairs along one side, and large wooden storage crates along the other. Most of which had been covered in large sheets of canvas cloth. She then turned back to Laxus, who was looking down at her with a confused and questioning look. This, accompanied with the slight smile she could see lifting one corner of his mouth caused her heart to stop for a moment, before it started up again even louder than before.

"So," he began, not knowing where the conversation was going but thoroughly enjoying the slightly flustered look on Mira's face. "What did you want to talk about?" He looked into her eyes for a moment longer, and then moved to sit on one of the chairs.

"Oh right, well... hmm... how do I say this..." Mira began to pace back and forth in front of Laxus. As he watched her from his spot against the wall, he was trying his best to keep a smile off of his face -- amused by the way that she seemed to be so frustrated -- and crossed his arms as he leaned back, waiting for her to say what was on her mind. All he could tell was that she was muttering some nonsense about just say it and better late than never. He let her mumble to herself and continue pacing for about a minute before he decided to interject, but just as he was about to do so, Mira stopped in her tracks, turned to him, and began speaking.