Lucy gripped her waist tightly and gritted her teeth in pain. She looked up at Natsu who was running in front of her, dragging her along by her hand. He was just as injured or even more than she was and he was able to run quickly while she could barely stand. She had to keep running though. If she didn’t, they would probably catch her and if she fell, she probably wouldn’t get back up again. Lucy sucked in quick breaths and aloud Natsu to pull her along.
“Come on, Lucy! Pick up the pace! They’re right behind us!” Natsu shouted, not turning around to look at her. He couldn’t do it; she was in so much pain, it would hurt him to look at her.
“O-okay!” Lucy forced herself to keep going as she observed Natsu and Happy’s wounds to distract herself from wanting to give up.
Happy was passed out and tucked under Natsu’s arm. He had many major scrapes and most of them were on his face. Happy was knocked out of the sky and landed on his head. Lucy hoped he didn’t have a concussion, but it looked like the case.
As much as Happy was severely injured, Natsu was the one Lucy was worried about. She was pretty sure he had a broken arm and a few broken ribs. Blood was running down his legs and arms and his clothes were torn. His eye was sown shut and he had lots of pieces of glass in his skin. As Lucy observed him, she noticed something she didn’t before and she gasped at the sight of it.
His scarf…
Natsu’s scarf Igneel gave him was like another part of Natsu. It was like an attachment of his body. It was always with him. Natsu’s clothes tore in fights, but his scarf always remained untouched. In this case, however, that was not what happened.
His scarf had too many holes and so many tears that Lucy half-thought it would be impossible to fix. What was most terrible was the edges of it. Lucy didn’t know how much of the scarf was gone, but she wagered at least half a foot. There had been a couple times she had seen how long Natsu’s scarf was and here the edges were sheared and torn, making it look very small and only wrapped around his neck twice instead of four or five times.
“N-Natsu…y-your scarf…”
“It’s nothing.”
Sympathy tears came to Lucy’s eyes for her best friend. “It’s not nothing…You love that scarf! It’s not nothing, Natsu…”
.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.
Lucy woke up in the infirmary in Fairy Tail and thought back to remember when she past out and how she got here, but nothing came to mind. It didn’t matter anyway. They were alive and back.
The first person Lucy saw was a teary-eyed Wendy and a straight-faced Erza. They both gasped in delight when Lucy opened her eyes and helped her to sit up.
“Lucy! Lucy! You’re okay! Thank goodness!”
It seemed like every Fairy Tail wizard was in the infirmary. She turned to see Natsu and Happy next to her in another bed. The three of them were wrapped up in bandages (though Natsu needed new ones because his blood was seeping through the ones he had on now) and cleaned up. Porlyusica walked up to Lucy and ran a few tests on her. Lucy was oblivious to it though, she weakly turned and looked at Levy who was drying her tears with a happy and thankful smile.
“What happened?”
“You, Natsu, and Happy took a job and ran into a dark guild. The client is dead, but we’re so happy you three made it back alive!” Levy smiled brighter as she hugged Lucy, lightly so she wouldn’t hurt her friend.
