Beauty and the Iron Dragon (A GaLe Fairy Tail Fanfic)

Chapter 20

Levy was standing inside her closet with Mira, Lucy, Wendy and Erza. The short solid script was in a towel, her blue hair dropping a little bit, since she just got done with her bath. After Gajeel asked her on a date in the library, she rounded up some of her friends and told them the news, and they've been prepping her up. While in her bath, they made her put on face wash, a mask and whatever other skin products they had. Now, in Levys closet, they were deciding on a dress. "Oh, how about that blue sparkly one!" Lucy said, pointing at a sleeveless mermaid dress with a sweetheart neckline. The fabric color being all kinds of blues, and gold sparkles fading to the top. "I don't know, I kind of like this one" Wendy said. The dress that caught her eye was a classic ballgown. With a thin waist and long sleeves, and extremely poofy from the waist down. The color was blood red, the silver stitches visible. "No, none of those. This one, definitely" Erza said. The dress looked like a combination of a white dress that had a little poof to the skirt and blinding diamond armor. "Maybe not. How would I even walk in it?" Levy said. Why is than even in here?!, Levy thought. "Actually, I know the perfect dress" Mira said, her glowing ghost like figure walking towards the back of the closet. There, Mira pointed to the most beautiful and perfect ball gown Levy ever did see. "It's perfect!" Levy cried as she went to hug Mira. However, it didn't go as planned. Instead of giving a hug, the blue haired women fell flat on her face. "Are you ok Levy?" Mira asked. "Yeah, just forgot for a sec" Levy said. Then a long time forgotten question popped in her mind. She didn't know why, but it just did out of nowhere. But now that she remembered it, it quickly gained her interest. "Hey, how does Gajeel know who Laxus is?" Levy asked standing. The whole room seemed to tense up until Erza speaked, breaking. "Well, when Gajeel lost his father, the only thing he would do was fight. Helped get his anger out of him. He'd sneak out and cause trouble. He'd go from bar to bar when he was only 17. He would cause bar brawls, and win all of them, until this one fight. He went to this one bar, and challenged Laxus to a fight. But he refused, causing Gajeel to try and try again. Eventually, Laxus got quite annoyed and accepted Gajeel's challenge. As you can imagine, it didn't go well. The fight ended up with Gajeel gaining scars. You've never seen them because of his scales hides them," Erza explained. "But without his scales, they were huge. They stretched across his both of his arms. Three on each arm" Erza said. Meanwhile, the guys were having a more harder time preparing the iron dragon for tonight.

"Hold still while me and ice block here tame your damn hair!"

"Maybe I would hold still if you didn't pull so hard!"

"Fire empress and I wouldn't have to pull so hard if you bothered to brush your hair at all over three years!"

It wasn't the smoothest time of their lives. Even after brushing Gajeel's long monstress ravin hair, it was still pretty wild. When it dried it just looked the same as before they brushed it, so they gave up on his hair and put it in a low pony tail. Picking out his clothes however, was way easier. "Now, what you want to do is sweep the girl off her feet" Natsu told Gajeel. "Oh yeah? How the hell do I do that?" Gajeel asked. "Be a gentleman. Try not to be mean or rude in anyway" Natsu stated. "Why would I be rude to shrimp?" the dragon slayer asked. "He never said specifically who to, Gajeel" Gray said, trying the point across the Gajeel. "I still don't think I can do this" Gajeel said, dout filled in his voice. "Gajeel, who mentioned the word date first?" Natsu asked. "Shrimp" Gajeel answered, remembering the moment at the library. "Then that tells you everything you need to know. She thought of it as a date and still said yes. Plus, the second you see her in her dress, you'll be instantly dumbfounded, and the whole world will stop. I guarantee you metalhead" Natsu explained, seeing Lucy in her own pink ball gown she wore on their first date. It still felt like it was yesterday. "Alright, enough sappy talk. Let's get dressed" Gray said, pointing to the pile of clothes. "He's just jealous because he couldn't land a date if he tried" Natsu muttered to Gajeel with a smirk on his face. "What did you say?!" Gray exclaimed, glaring at Natsu. A few minutes later, Gajeel was in his best suit. The silk vest was a dark teal, and the pants were a dark gray, almost black. The long sleeved ballroom coat he was wearing was navy blue, the buttons made of dark iron. His knee high boots were a dark brown. Finally, he wore a pair of white gloves on his iron clawed hands. Right now, he was waiting for Levy in front of her door. Saying he was nervous was an understatement. He was terrified. He was terrified that he would mess up in some way, and ruin everything. However, when the door opened, he felt all his worries vanish into thin air. Damn it. Salamander wasn't kidding, was all Gajeel could think inside his head right now. Levy looked beautiful. Her hair was in her normal hairdo, but the headband was a shining gold. Her dress had the colors of orange and gold. It had a sweetheart neckline and a skinny waistline, until it flared out a little bit just above her hips. Like Cinderella's dress, there was the two golden outer skirt parts on top of the orange part of the skirt, the hem gold. The sleeves were long and hanged on her arms, the hem also gold. Since she didn't really like make-up, her face was natural. Gajeel couldn't take his eyes off her. "Do I look ok?" Levy asked a little nervous. This was the first time she had ever really dressed up for anything, and this was very important to her. So really, it made sense that she was nervous. "Ok's an understatement shrimp. You look beautiful" Gajeel said, trying to keep calm. "Thanks. You look handsome Gajeel" Levy said sweetly. Gajeel held out his hand, and Levy took it. And the soon to be couple was walking, hand in hand, to the dining room for their dinner date. Behind the door of Levys room, her friends had heard everything. Everyone was having a moment. Giggling and smiling like a made man, especially Mira. It was after all, her newest couple and she was beyond the point of calming down. "I can't wait till they confess their love and my plan works!!" Mira said, a huge smile on her face. She was by far the craziest out of all of them, and truly dedicated to her work.

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The iron scaled man and the short blue haired women were enjoying dinner a lot. They talked more about themselves, getting to know one another better, even though the pair already knew pretty much everything about the other. When it was time to dance in the grand ballroom, Gajeel couldn't be more nervous as he heard a magical music lacrima, magical crystals with different uses, start playing. To calm down, he took notice of how Levy looked in the soft candle light. When he saw that she practically glowed, the iron dragon felt all his worries instantly fade away. Gajeel put one of his clawed, iron scaled hand on Levy's waist. While the other went under her small delicate hand. Once he found what little confidence he had left, Gajeel pulled Levy along with him. And finally... they both took those first few magical, mesmerizing steps on the ballroom floor, and they're eyes locked. And nothing from Earth, Heaven, or Hell could break it. They kept on dancing as the lacrima played its song. The iron dragon never knew how thankful he would be for those dance lesson he was forced to take when he was younger. Whenever Gajeel gently twirled Levy, her beautiful dress would fan out, all around her. Making a heavenly halo effect in the dim soft candle light. And the longer the two of them continued, there was more heart and soul that was put into their dance. Every step, every move, and every twirl brought more, well, love. As the Gajeel and Levy became more and more confident, the two started doing more advanced dance moves. Longer twirls, and a faster pace. They're moves were quick and fluent, but still fine and elegant as a traditional ballroom dance should be. Yet Gajeel and Levy still had their own personal touch to it. Looking as though they were flying across the ballroom as they moved from one point of the room to the other. Then the major lift of the song came. And it was at that moment Gajeel lifted Levy onto his side, completely off the floor. And he spined on his feet, while the whole world seemed to stop. And throughout the whole dance, they never took their eyes off of the other. As the major lift of the song came falling down, so did Levy into a low dip. And they stayed that way for a few moments as the music played until the two were once again standing. And Gajeel and Levy slowly swayed, not moving far from their original place in the middle of the ballroom. When those last few seconds came, they slowed down until the music stopped, and all they were doing was staring each others eyes. Without even realizing it, the iron dragon and the solid script mage were on the balcony. "I can't remember the last time I danced" Gajeel said. "I remember my father teaching me. I stepped on his toe a lot" Levy told him. That was when the iron dragon noticed the sad glint in her eyes. "Miss your old man shrimp?" Gajeel asked with worry in his voice. Levy merely nodded her head as Gajeel grabbed both her hands and led her to his room. Once there, he placed Levy right in front of his mirror. "Ask it to see your father" Gajeel whispered in Levy's ear with a stern face. "Show me my father, please" Levy said. Then, the glass on the mirror turned into the image of Levy's father. He was sick, on a fallen log. Gajeel could see the silent tears smoothly flowing down her face. At that moment, he knew what he had to do. I have to let her go, Gajeel thought sadly. "Go. Help him" Gajeel said gruffly. But Levy could still detect the sadness in his voice. "What?" Levy asked in shock. "Go save your old man shrimp. But before you do, take this" Gajeel said as he grabbed something from a small shelf. "A communication lacrima, it'll help you find him" Gajeel explained as he put the small lacrima in her hand. They both stood there for a few seconds before Levy pulled down Gajeel's head and kisses his iron forehead. "Don't worry. I'll come back" Levy whispered before she walked slowly out of the iron dragon's room. The farther away she got, the faster she went, out of the castle, before she could change her mind. Before she knew it, Levy was running out of the castle, towards where her father was. Meanwhile, Gajeel was climbing out of his huge balcony to Wendy's balcony so he could see Levy run off the castle grounds. After what felt like hours, Wendy came up to find Gajeel since neither him or Levy had been seen at all. And then the blue haired woman was seen by Lily running away from the castle and everyone was fearing the worst. And now everyone was running around the castle, looking for answers from the iron dragon. "Gajeel! There you are, there's something I need to ask you about" Wendy said with worry in her voice as she ran up to Gajeel, who was sitting on the stone railing of the balcony. Gajeel sighed and ran a clawed hand through his hair, which resulted in breaking the rubber band. "I know, Levy left and you want to to know why" Gajeel mumbled to the little wooden doll. "Mmhmm" Wendy replied, unsure if she really wanted to find out the answer. "I let her go. That's all you need to know. I want you to go and tell the others that" Gajeel told Wendy, gripping the railing tighter. Wendy just stood there, absorbing his words slowly. She could feel her heart breaking into thousands of tiny pieces. "O-ok" Wendy whispered, on the verge of tears. If it wasn't for Gajeel's sensitive hearing, all he would have heard was the door closing. Finally being alone, Gajeel's grip on the stone railing tightened more and more until the stone crumbled into pieces.