Hello everybody. For those of you that don't know me, hi, I'm Fergus Flamacron and I hope you enjoy my story. For those of you that do know me, hello everyone. Yes, I am starting this new story alongside my old story Quest of the Gods but I think that this is going to do me a heck of a lot of good. However, this first chapter DOES contain a HUGE spoiler for something that happens a long way in the future of Quest of the Gods. Just be aware of that if you do decide to read this.

Anyway, welcome to all Fairy Tail and Harry Potter fans. I have only one thing to say before we get started. This is primarily an adventure story but it will have romance involved. However, THIS WILL NOT BE A NALU STORY! So, if you are one of the many NaLu fans who can't seem to stand seeing Natsu or Lucy romantically involved with anyone but each other, please turn around now because this story is not for you. I like NaLu fine myself but this site is full of it anyway so I wanted my story to contain a different pairing, for a change of pace, and I would rather not hear complaints about my choices in any of my pairings because they're not things that I am planning on changing. Natsu and Lucy will still be very, very close friends. But not romantic partners.

However, if you are a NaLu fan but are open to the idea of alternative pairings then by all means come in and I hope you enjoy this story despite the fact it doesn't contain any of that pairing.

The one and only disclaimer I will pit in this story:- Fairy Tail and all its works belong to Hiro Mashima, and Harry Potter and all its works belong to JK Rowling. I wish I was inventive enough to have come up with either.

Dance of the Fairies, Flight of the Phoenix

Chapter 1:- Dimension Dragons

Six years.

That was how long it had now been since that fateful day in the year X784. The one where the entire island of Tenroujima had been seemingly obliterated in one fell blast from the Black Dragon of the Apocalypse, Acnologia.

That was how long it had been since the Black Wizard Zeref had made his return to the world.

That was how long it had been since twenty-one members of the guild known as Fairy Tail had been presumed utterly and completely dead.

…But of course that wasn't true, and currently the only person in existence who actually knew this for a fact was someone that wasn't even still alive, but who's consciousness lingered on in the form of an astral body she'd made for herself. To all intents and purposes… a ghost.

And that ghost was currently sitting on the calm surface of the pristine ocean as if it was as solid as a dining room table, one elbow resting on her knee while her hand supported her head. She stared out across the empty horizon with dull eyes.

Her name was Mavis Vermilion. The first ever Master of the Fairy Tail guild, whose grave resided on the missing island.

And she groaned, rolling onto her back and lying with limbs splayed, staring up at the sky, her incredibly long blond hair trailing down beneath her small body and the wing-like projections on either side of her head twitching slightly as she mulled over recent events.

Gods, this was boring. It had been nothing short of boring for the last six years. After the island had disappeared there had been some excitement with ships going all around the area searching for the missing Fairy Tail members, but gradually they'd begun to disperse until everyone had completely stopped looking.

And that was their mistake. But even if they had known that the Fairy Tail Tenrou Team was still alive, there was nothing that they could have done about it.

In the final moments before Acnologia's breath attack struck, the members of Fairy Tail had attempted to cast some kind of protective enchantment, pooling all of their trust and faith into one another to try and pull off the impossible and survive the dragon's attack. But it wouldn't have been enough alone. Not without Mavis adding her own help in. Despite the fact she was no longer capable of using her own magic, she was able to convert the power of those incredible bonds between the guild members into a different kind of Magic and cast the Fairy Sphere, a massive protective shield that nothing whatsoever could penetrate.

The only thing was, it was now currently impossible for her to remove the spell. She would have done had she still be alive, but now she was deceased she had to wait for the spell to dispel itself on its own. And for something so large as the entire island of Tenroujima, that was taking a while. How long would be left? Another year? Two? Mavis guessed at least one more year.

But at least the members of the guild were still safe, for the Fairy Sphere had frozen them all in time and they were all lying in suspended animation in the exact same place they'd landed after the blast from Acnologia had pushed the island down beneath the waves.

She'd go down there and visit them sometimes, wondering around the still forests and standing over the still bodies of the various members. She was beginning to wish that she'd paid attention to what was going on with her beloved guild when they'd been awake. But when she'd passed the leadership of the guild on to the second Master, she had decided that staying out of the way would give the guild its best chance to grow on its own. It would allow new ideas, new customs, new everything. After all, if the guild didn't change with the times it wouldn't get anywhere. And from the looks of it, the Third Master had turned it into a true guild to be proud of.

But just because Mavis was no longer in charge didn't mean she couldn't have visited, got to know people, been a part of things. She enjoyed the peace and quiet that came with having her own island, but she'd had a chance to observe some of the fighting from a distance when she'd been woken from her slumber and she greatly admired the youths of today. They were great people, every one of them, and she couldn't wait until they unfroze so she could some to know them better.

For now though, it seemed all she could do was sit and watch the sky, sensing the magic of the island slowly weakening as it was brought closer and closer to the material world once again. Eventually it would do so enough that her limited magical power as a ghost could remove it completely.

Mavis sighed. That was all well and good but she wished something interesting would happen. Six years since she had been disturbed from her rest, which she did not intend to go back into anytime soon and this… when would the fun start?

And naturally, it was at this point that the sky above her practically exploded!

Mavis jumped so violently that she probably would have leapt right out of her physical body if she still had one. She almost vanished beneath the surface of the water and when she looked up it was to see the a rush of blasting energy streaking across the sky out of a large swirling hole in existence and towards a creature that had definitely not been there before. Some kind of huge grey draconic animal with six legs, a broad head that was armoured with what looked like platinum and shadowy tendrils coming out of its shoulders tipped with three red claws each.

The creature swooped underneath the energy blast, which cannoned downwards to blow up the surface of the ocean several miles away and turned around to hiss at the swirling portal, out of which emerged two more dragon-like creatures of equal size - one four legged and blue with a long neck and crests jutting from its back and head and something that resembled a glowing diamond on its chest, and the other bipedal with shield-like shoulders with giant pearls embedded into them, a comparatively small head and a huge tail sweeping out behind it.

Mavis gaped as the two dragons rushed towards their third opponent at high speed that belied their great size. Just what was going on here? Even when she'd been alive, she'd never seen a dragon. The only one she'd ever seen was Acnologia and now suddenly in the same place that he'd tried to blow up her guild members, suddenly there were three.

Pearl closed in on Platinum and launched a purplish-glowing claw right his head, but Platinum brought up his shadow claws to catch the strike, though it was pushed backwards under the brute force of the attack. Hissing, Platinum summoned some kind of orange glowing orb in front of its mouth which it fired at Pearl but Pearl formed an orb of exactly the same nature and flung it right back, the two orbs crashing into each other and detonating in mid-air, sending smoke in all directions for half a kilometre.

Platinum thundered straight into the smoke but came shooting out again moments later under a forceful ramming from Diamond who's roar shook the water far below and as it raised what looked like a steel-plated glowing tail and pushed away from Platinum to ram the tail around. But suddenly Platinum disappeared right into thin air, the tail swinging uselessly through the space where he had been. Mavis gasped as suddenly Platinum re-appeared next to Peal and slammed him with some kind of Shadow Force. Pearl let off a high pitched, ululating squeal as he was tossed from the sky and slammed down into the water with a tumultuous splash.

Platinum hissed in triumph and turned around, another swirling portal opening up in front of it as it prepared to dive through, only for Diamond to send a bright burst of white light energy from its mouth to ram right into the side of the escaping Platinum and send him rolling upwards, the portal slamming shut behind him. Platinum let loose a strangled squawk, turning to see Diamond coming rushing up at him and fired a golden bolt of light into the air the split into around a dozen and came crashing down towards Diamond like falling meteors.

Except suddenly the water of the ocean churned up in a giant whirlpool and several geysers erupted upwards past Diamond to slam into each of the meteors and vaporise them with a burst of steam. Pearl exploded up from the water with something akin to a smirk on its draconic face and watched as Diamond fired another several rays of light that sparkled like gemstones from the diamond on his chest, each zeroing in on Platinum's stomach.

But Platinum suddenly turned itself into a shadow and streaked down past Diamond before the attack could hit and aimed itself right at Pearl, who raised a kind of sphere of water around him to pulse the attack away. Mavis frowned. It seemed that for whatever reason the Platinum dragon was more focused on taking out the Pearl rather than the Diamond one. She had no idea why that would be but there must have been a reason.

But the Diamond one wasn't having any of that and was gathering up a huge amount of energy between his jaws. Mavis gasped as a huge purplish blast of energy cannoned out of his jaws and fired straight down straight towards both Pearl and Platinum.

Was it mad? Wasn't Pearl it's ally?

But Pearl just smirked and suddenly a pink portal opened behind it and it backed itself in, reappearing right next to Diamond out of another portal to leave Platinum in the firing line alone. The attack struck him dead on, blasting him down deep into the ocean with such force that a huge tidal wave seemed to erupt in all directions around him and wash outwards, forcing Mavis to rise high into the air before she was caught up in it.

Was it over?

Pearl and Diamond hung in the air for a moment, seemingly waiting for something to happen… right before there was a Distortion right between them and suddenly a heavily battered Platinum appeared out of nowhere, slashing them both with his Shadow Claws and knocking them out to the side. A furious roar curdled out of Platinum as it fired another glowing orb at Diamond, who took the attack with a grunting roar and staggered in the air. Platinum then whirled around and seized Pearl in some kind of Psychic hold, dragging him back towards him and charging some kind of Dragon Pulse attack of his own between his beaked jaws.

But Pearl beat him to it and fired one heck of a huge water blast out of his own jaws, sending Platinum backwards head over heels under the force of it and right towards Diamond, who seized Platinum by the tail in his jaws and swung him bodily around, heaving him down towards the waves. Platinum struggled to right himself, flailing his claws wildly until he was back upright but Diamond had already flung what looked like a bunch of glowing rocks down towards him. Platinum growled and swept and dodged from side to side to avoid them but suddenly found itself face to face with Pearl, who had dropped down to the water's surface and its armoured arm was glowing bright pink.

Mavis watched in shock as Pearl slashed his arm downwards and generated some kind of massive pink energy slash that seemed to make the very air around it ripple. The attack smashed into Platinum and seemed to both hit him and keep on going past him without cutting him in half at the same time. Platinum roared as it was apparently bombarded with pain…

But Mavis only gasped as the tumultuous attack ripped a line across the sky right on past her.

And that was when the suction began.

While with Diamond's attack everything had seemed to slow down to an absolute crawl, with this one everything around it seemed to rise up and head straight for it, the water of the ocean arcing up into the air as it was sucked into the attack which Mavis suddenly recognised to be a tear in the fabric of reality.

And right now, Pearl's space was influencing more than just the sea. It was influencing what was underneath it.

As an astral body, the suction of space had no effect on Mavis herself but she gasped when she saw the glowing, golden orb of the Fairy Sphere beginning to rise up from beneath the waves until it breached the surface and was hauled up and out of the waves, the Fairy Tail symbol glowing proudly on the side and the massive Tenrou Tree visible on the inside. The entire thing was being hauled upwards and tipped sideways, moving towards the portal.

Mavis immediately dove towards the sphere and passed through it, looking around wildly to see if everything was alright and trying to find some way of stopping it. But a tremendous roar took her attention and she turned to see Platinum had burst his way up and out of the attack, staggering in the air and heavily damaged but a leer on its face as it dove straight towards the glowing tear in space, trying to dive into it and away… but then suddenly it was moving so slowly that it might as well have been a snail. Mavis blinked and looked around for an explanation… and found one, in the form of Diamond not far away sending out a truly MASSIVE blue blast from his jaws that skimmed right past the Fairy Sphere and zoned in towards Platinum at high speed.

Mavis was beginning to think she understood a little more. Pearl could control space and that was why Platinum was targeting him more than Diamond because he was trying to escape and Pearl was stopping him from doing so or something like that. But if Pearl could control space…

Mavis suddenly gasped as she felt something happening to the Fairy Sphere. It was designed as ultimate protection for those within, shielding them even from the passage of time… but for some reason the rate at which the magic was wearing off had suddenly accelerated!

That Dragon Roar… it was distorting time, slowing down Platinum but speeding up other surroundings, including her protective sphere! Diamond could control time just as well as Pearl could control space.

But Mavis had other things to worry about now because it was also speeding up the rate at which the Sphere was being drawn out of the water and thrown into the spacial rip.

Mavis gritted her teeth. She couldn't stop it! She didn't know how! It was unavoidable - all she could do was grab onto the Tenrou Tree and hitch a ride as the entire island was sent rolling forwards. She extended her limited power over the Sphere to try and stabilise it but it was… inexorably… pulled through the tear in space, leaving their dimension and the three battling Dragons behind.

Everything became a helter-skelter from there, Mavis holding both her arms wide to try and keep the Fairy Sphere together. The time had accelerated it up to its zenith and it felt like it would now be mere minutes before the spell broke, and if that happened while they were tumbling through the gap between dimensions, who knew what would happen to everyone on the island, blissfully unaware of their current predicament as they were.

Outside the sphere it was utter madness, swirling nonsensical colours ripping left, right and centre and the swirling winds of the vortex sending the entire sphere spinning over and over, tumbling like a marble down a plastic obstacle course round and round. Mavis was getting dizzy just trying to keep sense of everything and she screwed her eyes up, flexing her fingers to exert her power still further. No… not yet… she couldn't… let this…

But it seemed to be unavoidable - the Fairy Sphere was fading, its magic finally depleting as a whole year's worth of magical time was accelerated and stolen away. Mavis couldn't stop it now. She could barely keep her focus on keeping her bearings as it was now and trying to stay with the Sphere itself, gripping the tree branch hard with her legs.

"Must… keep… together…" she panted to herself. "Come on… Fairy Tail… stay… with me…"

But it was too much, and Mavis eyes opened wide when she felt the Sphere breaking up. It wouldn't stay up much longer no matter how much power she put left into it. Not with so much to preserve in it like this.

And then she felt it… the Fairy Sphere finally beginning to fracture and break apart.

Mavis cursed and did the only thing she could. She narrowed her focus down around the island, locating the life forces of everything she could down there and zeroing the magic of the Fairy Sphere down around them specifically… strengthening the magic around them as much as they could… and then suddenly the giant Sphere burst entirely, leaving Tenrou Island whipping through the vortex unprotected, along with about a dozen smaller Fairy Spheres that went shooting off ahead into the vortex. Mavis yelled and managed to use her magic to grab hold of one and keep it close but the others went off into the distance and out of sight.

"Everyone…" the First Master grimaced. "Please… be safe…"

And abruptly… after about another minute or so of madness - it was hard to tell in this place - she suddenly felt a natural wind again as the island was thrown out into the light. The massive tree arced through the air before somehow… miraculously… the island landed right side up with a colossal splash into water. A huge wave burst upwards all around the circumference of the island and washed across the shoreline, Mavis almost falling from her perch on the tree with a yelp. The world around her seemed to vibrate as the island was drenched in sea-water until finally the island came to a thumping stop as it touched bottom.

It took a while before Mavis could recuperate herself and when she did she sat up and shook herself slightly, clambering to her bare feet as she looked out across the island, inspecting it for damage. It looked to be remarkably intact considering what had just happened, but then again there was powerful magic interlaced with the island's very structure so that wasn't so surprising. And the water rose up a little higher around the island than it would have done were it in its proper place back home, but mostly everything seemed to be okay.

Except, of course, for the fact that the entire island where her natural body had been laid to rest had been zapped into a whole separate dimension.

There was no sign of the battling Dragons. Perhaps they were still wreaking havoc back in their true world. Perhaps Platinum had been defeated by that roar from Diamond - she hadn't actually seen whether the attack had hit him or not. Or perhaps their battle would take them right into another dimension - who knew if they were even from Earthland anyway. They had appeared rather abruptly after all. What they were and why they were fighting… perhaps she would never know.

But this was something that Mavis could never have predicted. Not once in a million years could she have expected something like this.

What universe were they in now? It was a universe of magic - she could feel that in the air. But other than that, she could say nothing about it other than the fact it had oceans apparently.

But then something else grabbed her attention and her eyes swung round in search of that one Fairy Sphere that she managed to keep close. Where was it? And what had been inside it?

She soon spotted it lying at the top of the giant stone cliff in the shape of a wolf's head and leapt from her place on the tree branch, floating her way down until she alighted gently on the ground, the grass tickling her bare feet slightly.

She could see faintly through the little spherical shield and she pressed her face up against it, squinting to try and discern the shapes she was seeing within.

"I see…" she sighed in relief. "Well, at least you four are safe."

She then looked out across the ocean, her wingtips drooping slightly as her expression turned grim.

"But the rest of your friends… where could they have ended up? Did they all even end up in the same universe? I hope to whatever gods might exist here that they did…"

She sighed. There was rather little that she could do for them now. But she could feel the power of the Fairy Sphere before her beginning to fade, so she settled herself down on a nearby rock to wait until it did.

The first thing that Wendy Marvell felt was pain. Pain rippling through her body seemingly from head to toe like a dull, throbbing ache, but it somehow felt far away as if she'd drifted outside her body but was still able to feel what it was feeling. She almost frowned to herself as she began to stir. That explanation made very little sense even to her. Jeez, her head must be muddled.

She groaned, turning her head and shifting her arm slightly, gritting her teeth as her head pounded and wishing not for the first time that she could heal her own wounds as easily as she could heal those of others.

She could feel grass beneath her hand as she moved it. Why was she lying on the grass? The last thing she could remember was holding hands with her fellow Dragon Slayer Gajeel and her Exceed partner Charla, as all her fellow Fairy Tail members formed a circle and tried to defend against…

"ACNOLOGIA!" Wendy shot up, her eyes opening wide as she looked around wildly, searching the skies for the massive, black Dragon. But there was nothing. Just white fluffy clouds against a blue backdrop, with some distant grey the promised rain somewhere.

The young blue-haired, twelve-year-old girl lifted a hand to her head, rubbing it in confusion. "I was… unconscious? What happened? How long was I out for?" She started looking around and her eyes immediately found her three companions, who were lying prone beside her. "Charla…" she crawled over to the little white cat and frantically started shaking her. "Happy… Lily…"

There was no response from Charla or Happy, but Pantherlily twitched and grunted, slowly beginning to push himself up and shaking his head as if to clear it.

"Wendy…" he muttered, when he opened his eyes. "What's… what's going on? Last thing I remember is… wait…" he sat up, looking around. "Gajeel! What happened to Gajeel! And the rest!"

"I don't know…" Wendy sniffed, holding up her hands and beginning to use her Sky Magic on Charla to try and heal her wounds. "I only just woke up myself and I can't see anyone else. But it looks like all of us here are still alive at least."

"Damn it," Lily muttered as he pushed himself to his feet. "I should… I should go take a look around… see if I can… nngh…" he flinched as his side twinged.

"Don't strain yourself, Lily," Wendy cautioned him. "You need to rest."

"No, I must do my duty. To the guild. Need to make sure everyone's alright…" Lily shook his head stubbornly.

"Everyone is fine," replied a voice that drew their attention around behind them. They both blinked in surprise at the side of the young looking girl sitting on the rocks above them in the long flowing pink-layered dress with red ribbon around her neck, blonde hair that fell like a curtain behind her right to her ankles and the wing-like projections behind her ears.

"Well…" said the girl. "I say fine. As fine as can be under the circumstances. They are all still alive at least, and they should be relatively uninjured."

"Um… who are you?" Wendy asked, as Lily's hand went to the little yet bulky sword strapped to his back warily.

"Who am I?" the girl smiled slightly. "I feel like I should be rather offended. Are there no pictures of me left in the Fairy Tail guild? There should be. I did found it…"

"You… founded it?" Wendy blinked, before her eyes widened. "Wait… don't tell me…"

"You can't mean it…" Lily agreed.

"I do," the girl nodded. "I'm Fairy Tail's First Guild Master - Mavis Vermilion."

"But… the First Master died many years ago," Lily protested. "How can you be her? Is this some kind of illusion or trick?"

Wendy, on the other hand, was staring at Mavis, to use the clichéd and yet highly appropriate phrase, as if she'd seen a ghost. Not least because if she was, this would not be the first time that she'd ever seen a ghost. She'd grown up with one, after all.

"Perhaps it would be better to wait until your companions have awoken before I fully explain," Mavis replied. "Save me having to do so more than once. But from what I've seen of my guild, it has become rather hardy. I'm sure you'll all be fine. In any case, Mister Cat, looking around for your friends would be rather pointless now. None of them are left on the island except for you four."

"What? But…"

"Like I said, I'll explain everything. But first, tend to your friends. I'm not going anywhere… I haven't the first clue where I would go."

Wendy slowly nodded, deciding to shove her questions aside for now and focused on her glowing hands, healing up Charla and Happy's minor injuries before a slightly suspicious but still able Lily helped her in waking the two of them up.

When Charla woke up she immediately moved to hug Wendy, thankful beyond words that her best friend and partner was still okay. Happy was the last to wake and when he did the first thing he did was ask for fish, while the second thing he did was immediately try and run off to find Natsu. This led to Lily having to grab hold of his tail to stop him, causing Happy to faceplant right into the ground.

Needless to say, the both of them were also shocked when Mavis introduced herself. Charla gasped and placed her paws over her mouth while Happy screamed, "EEEEHHHHHHHH!?" but they were soon calmed as Mavis descended to the grass in front of them and began her explanation, telling them everything that had transpired from the moment Acnologia had tried to blast them right up until the point where they had landed in this universe.

"Another world?" Happy asked, looking around him. "Could it be that we've landed in Edolas again?"

"Of course not," Charla huffed at him slightly. "Can't you feel it? There is definitely magic in this world whereas Edolas was totally stripped of all its magic."

"Hmm," Lily nodded. "I was there myself. I saw the Prince of Edolas send all of Edolas' magic to Earthland with my own eyes. This is definitely not Edolas. Yet it is true that it does not feel like Earthland either. The magic here… it is different than our own."

"At least we can still use magic here though," Wendy frowned. "But if the magic is different, does that mean when we run out of magic we won't be able to restore it?"

"That's a good question," Charla agreed. "After all, all magical beings of Earthland obtain their magic by absorbing Ethernano from the atmosphere and converting it to magical power. Does this universe even have Ethernano in it?"

"If it did not before, it does now," Mavis replied. "I felt it. The portal that sucked us here was absorbing absolutely everything from the surrounding space. Water, air, Ethernano, all of it. It's likely that it is now spreading across the world as we speak. You should be able to use magic here just as you could at home. If you couldn't I probably wouldn't be able to stand here talking with you."

"How are you standing here talking to us anyway?" Lily asked. "Not to offend you, of course, but are you not in fact dead?"

"Oh yes," Mavis nodded. "But there are ways, if you know how, to transcend your consciousness and magic past your death. I decided before I passed away to carry this out, in the hope that I could continue to watch over my guild from afar and see it grow and flourish, watch the ideals that I had laid down bloom. But I have been rather neglectful of that in recent decades, preferring to remain in isolation and enjoy the peace and quiet of my island. A decision I am now regretting, as it looks like I have missed a great deal."

"I see… So that's what Master Roubaul must have done," Wendy murmured.

"Master Roubaul?" Mavis blinked in bemusement. "Who is that?"

"Oh… he was the Master of my old guild, Caitshelter," Wendy smiled fondly. "A funny old man with really strange habits, who kept saying the word 'nabula' for reasons nobody understood, but such a kind and wonderful Master. It… turned out that he had created the entire Caitshelter guild for me and that every single member except for me and Charla were actually illusions he'd generated to give me a family when he took me in. It was only when I gained friends outside the guild and his reason for remaining in the world no longer existed that he finally revealed the truth to me and passed on. I joined Fairy Tail soon after and I love it here."

"That's good to hear," Mavis smiled. "I'm so glad that we could provide the family you needed. It must have been hard though. To learn the truth."

"Yeah… it was…" Wendy sniffed, trying not to cry as old memories were re-awakened.

Mavis sighed slightly. Truly how neglectful had she been not to know something like this. Well, she wasn't going to be neglectful any more.

"So, what are we supposed to do now?" Happy asked. "We've got to go and search for all of the others, but where can we find them?"

"I do not know," Mavis replied. "Most likely they are scattered at random across this world, but they're all in separate little pockets of the Fairy Sphere, frozen in time still, most likely. The roar of the Diamond Dragon distorted time greatly, so there's no way of knowing how long it will take each sphere to wear off now. Some of them could be awake now, others might still have months of being frozen in time yet. But I'm fairly certain that they're all in this world somewhere."

"Then how do we set about finding them?" Lily asked. "It would probably be best if we could track them all down as quickly as possible."

"You cast the Fairy Sphere spell didn't you, First Master?" Charla asked. "Can't you sense where they are?"

"The Spheres are small and faint now. I could probably sense them if I got within thirty miles or so of one of them but until then I would be searching blindly."

"That seems to limit our options," Lily placed a hand to his chin thoughtfully.

"What do you think we should do, Lily?" Wendy asked. "You used to be a Captain of Edolas. What do you suggest?"

"I've never quite been in a situation like this before," Lily pointed out before humming to himself and considering. "I believe the first course of action should be trying to gather some supplies like food and water from the island before we strike out and try to find the mainland. We should scout out the settlements, try and learn what type of people live here and if they might be friendly or best avoided. If it's the former perhaps we can garner some help in such for our comrades. If it's the latter… then we may have to search ourselves but keep our ears out for any potential news."

"I'm sure that if Natsu-san and the others are spotted it wouldn't take long for the news to spread," Wendy giggled nervously.

"They do tend to be rather… memorable… don't they?" Charla snickered.

"Don't worry, Wendy, we'll find them," Happy declared, sounding as though he was trying to reassure himself as much as Wendy. "We'll definitely find them and then when we do we'll find a way to get back home again."

"Oh, that's a point," Wendy sighed. "I hadn't even considered how we might get home."

"And I was just getting used to living in Earthland," Lily agreed. "Only to be whisked off to another world almost immediately afterwards… or rather six years afterwards though I only experienced a few weeks of it."

"We ought to worry about how we will get home another time," Mavis pointed out, rising to her feet. She was almost pleased to note that she was actually the tallest person there right now. That didn't happen very often. "For now our first priority is finding all of our guild members. Once we are all gathered again can we think of a way to take us back. After all, we don't leave any one of our own behind."

"That we most certainly don't," Wendy pumped her fist.

"We said we would all go home together right before Acnologia attacked and that still holds true now," Happy cheered.

"I'm still amazed we actually survived that," Charla chuckled.

"Well, from what I've seen, this guild does make a habit of pulling off the impossible," Lily noted with a smirk.

"You all certainly seem upbeat under the circumstances," Mavis giggled slightly.

"Well if we weren't upbeat we'd never get anywhere, First Master," Happy held up a paw. "Considering the amount of things that happen to us. This is just the start of another adventure. And we'll definitely overcome it, just like everything else. No matter what gets thrown at us."

"I like that attitude very much indeed," Mavis clapped her hands together lightly. "That's exactly the sort of spirit and determination I always wanted from the members of my guild when I set it up. I suppose it is decided. I shall accompany you. There's very little reason for me to stay, after all."

"But isn't your grave here?" Wendy asked. "This is Fairy Tail's sacred ground - shouldn't someone stay behind to keep an eye on it?"

"The island will be fine. The barrier I put in place around it to normally keep people from finding it has started functioning again. Even if a ship comes upon the island it should just go around it without even noticing it. Besides, an island is merely an island. What is most important are the lives of the others."

"Then let's go…" Happy exclaimed, before his stomach rumbled. "Um… after we eat. Anyone got any fish? I think I ate my last one some time ago."

"Not everything is about fish, you know," Charla pointed out

"Fish seems to actually be a practical thing to search for right now," Lily acknowledged. "If there's an ocean there should be some here. Hopefully. But this is another universe so who even knows what the local fauna here could be. I'll head back to the boat and see if I can find a net to catch some. It may be faster than a hook and line."

His body glowed briefly and expanded until he had taken on the towering, musclebound humanoid panther form that was his original body, his Exceed wings materialising behind him before he shot off into the air.

Mavis oohed slightly at the sight, before suddenly realising that now there was someone taller than her here, causing her to slump and murmur, "Figures…"

"I guess we should try and make a fire," Wendy suggested.

"That would be easy as pie if Natsu were still here," Happy's tail drooped slightly.

"Well, he's not," Charla replied. "But don't worry, Happy. Natsu's one of the hardiest members of the guild. He's probably one of the last ones we need to worry about."

"Aye," Happy thumped his chest lightly. "Because he is Natsu."

"As if that explains everything," Charla sighed with a slight smile. "Come on then. Let's gather some firewood."

"Aye sir!"

Mavis smiled brightly as she watched them go. Yes, this was hardly the most ideal of circumstances, but it looked like there would most definitely be some fun times ahead if these were her companions. But her eyes slowly drifted back towards the ocean and out towards the horizon.

Whatever trails and tribulations lie ahead for my guild… I will see them all safely home, she thought to herself. I swear it on the name Fairy Tail.

What none of them could know was that actually there was one other member of their guild who was already awake, having been split away from everyone else in his own little Fairy Sphere and having woken up alone in the middle of a meadow with no clue as to how he had got here, or what had happened to the rest of his friends.

With no answers for him in the meadow, he had picked a direction at random and wandered off searching for answers. Yet he was pretty sure that he'd been walking for miles across open expanse with scattered trees all about the place and come across absolutely nothing. Not even a farmhouse or some other kind of settlement. But still he trudged on. There had to be something close by. Something that could tell him how the heck he'd been on an island being attacked by a Black Dragon one minute and on the mainland and totally alone the next.

But his walk eventually came to a stop when he reached the edge of a cliff and found himself looking out across the great salty expanse of ocean. Definitely not the same expanse of ocean that the island had been in. That had been a very tropical environment. Not so here. The cliffs were rugged and the spray that was coming up them from below was cold. This was some kind of temperate zone, no question about that.

But that just made everything even more stupidly confusing.

"Jeez," he muttered to himself. "This is messed up."

But suddenly his nose twitched and he looked up towards the sky, his eyes widening when he saw something that looked like some kind of black, skeletal winged horse soaring up near the clouds. His red eyes lingered on the creature for several moments before it winged its way inland at high speed, shortly becoming a little black dot in the distance.

"That sure as heck wasn't normal," Gajeel Redfox growled, his long, wild black hair wafting in the breeze that blew up against his chest, bare except for the bandages that were still wrapped around them from six years ago but the black guild mark on his left shoulder on full display. "What kind of shit have I managed to get myself into this time?… Well, at least nobody can say that life with this guild is boring."

Massaging his forehead and having to resist the incredibly strong temptation to just throw down his quill and slump back into his chair, Harry Potter did his best to focus on his latest Transfiguration essay. Something about the Inanimatus Conjurus Spell… but his heart certainly wasn't in it? Less so than usual in fact.

He knew it was important. He was a fifth year student now and the Wizarding World's equivalent of the GCSE exams - their OWLs - would be coming up at the end of the year as his close friend Hermione Granger never failed to remind him. But Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was the only place that he'd ever truly called a home and after just one week of being back after the summer holiday he was currently wishing he was practically anywhere else.

Heck, even his magical-phobic aunt, uncle and cousin - the Dursleys - were seeming like a more attractive option right now, and that was saying something.

Why was everything going so wrong? Ever since the Dark Wizard Voldemort had returned at the end of last summer it had seemed like half his world had fallen apart. And not just because Voldemort had killed his parents when he was a baby and left a scar upon his head when he'd tried to kill Harry himself. It seemed almost every other aspect of Harry's life was taking a turn for the worse right now too.

Perhaps that was being overdramatic, but that's the way it felt.

Sure, he'd been let off for using a Patronus Charm to ward off the two Dementors that attacked him and his cousin in the summer and that was a plus. And he still had his two best friends, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, by his side and looking out for him.

But that seemed to be about all that remained. Dumbledore was ignoring him, Hagrid was missing, his godfather Sirius was cooped up in his house in London, unable to send him proper messages in case it was intercepted and certainly unable to visit due to the fact he was a convicted criminal for crimes he had never committed. Not to mention practically the entire Wizarding World was convinced that his stories about Voldemort's return were attention-seeking lies and the Ministry seemed to be out to publicly discredit him at every turn - a stark contrast to previous years where everyone seemed to idolise him. He'd always longed for that to stop, but not to completely reverse like this. He'd always wanted to be a normal kid but it seemed if he wasn't a hero then he was practically a juvenile delinquent in the eyes of most of the populace.

At least there were some who believed him, like the Order of the Phoenix, but the fact that so many others, even one of his own dorm-mates, didn't want anything to do with him anymore almost made their support negligible. Plus the Order wasn't here now for the most part. Harry kept thinking that's where he should be, with the secret team trying to find ways to stop the low-laying Voldemort rather than stuck here doing essays he didn't even care about.

And what else - ah yes, there was the fact that one of the Ministry's own goons, the toad-faced Dolores Umbridge, had taken over the position of Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher here, spreading the Ministry's smear campaign against him by word of mouth even here, and when he angrily attempted to justify himself and tell the truth she'd taken him away from his favourite pastime of playing Quidditch to make him write lines that carved scars into the back of his hand. The words I must not tell lies were still quite visible even now.

Was that all of it?

Hardly. There was also the fact that the first Quidditch practice session he HAD been allowed to attend had been a total bust, thanks to jeering members of the Slytherin House and poor Ron's nervousness at being the new Keeper, interfering with his gameplay, and now Ron was in a rather bad mood himself as he tried to sort through the same essay. But to be fair that wasn't Ron deliberately trying to ruin things for him like practically everything else. He was sure Ron could do better if he could get his act together.

Surely things had to start going right for him pretty soon, didn't they? How much worse could they get?

He shook his head. God, don't think like that. He knew as well as anyone that things could always get worse.

Slowly, the two of them crawled on through their essays until they could finally put it aside and begin yet another, this one from Professor Sinistra and her Astronomy lessons. Honestly, Harry could barely see how this subject counted as magical. Why did wizards need to know about Jupiter's moons? Surely that was just something that Muggle astrophysicists needed to know.

Jeez, he really was sounding like a student complaining about something like algebra.

"Which one is the one with the giant ice pillars?" Ron murmured sleepily, bashing the side of his head a little as if that would keep him awake. "Europa or Ganymede?"

"I think its Europa, but don't call me on that," Harry murmured back.

"Eh, I'll put that in anyway. If its wrong, we can be wrong together."

"Not exactly the right attitude Hermione would want us to have but what the heck."

"Yeah well, looks like she's a little busy with those elf socks of hers," Ron glanced over to where Hermione and his sister Ginny were knitting together. "Honestly I don't know why Ginny's helping her with that. She knows the House Elves don't want to be free."

"Yeah well, something's been taking the things she's been knitting," Harry pointed out dully.

"Probably Crookshanks. Trying to spare Hermione's feelings but throwing them on the fire or something."

"Don't let her hear you say that… though it wouldn't surprise me if that was true."

Ron snorted slightly, before murmuring something about Callisto and trying to write it down.

"Hey guys," their thoughts were suddenly interrupted by their fellow fifth year Neville Longbottom, who had come running up to them, catching the attention of Hermione and Ginny too. "Have you heard?"

"Heard? Heard what?" Harry asked.

"There was something on the Wizarding Wireless Network today," Neville huffed. "Apparently loads and loads of people have been messaging in telling them that they've seen shooting stars or something like that, right across the country."

"Shooting stars?" Hermione frowned. "That's rather odd, isn't it? Surely if there was a meteor shower coming soon, Professor Sinistra would have mentioned it."

"Why would something like that make its way onto the Wizarding Wireless?" Ron asked, bemused. "Sure, it's unusual, but there've been plenty of things like that before and nobody bothered mentioning it on the news."

"That's the thing, you see," Neville replied. "They weren't saying it was just a distant thing in the sky. They were saying that they saw these bright golden lights come flying down really low. Some of the people said they think they might have even hit the ground not far away."

"What, made impact?" Harry asked. "Seriously? Seems kinda farfetched to me. Wasn't it a meteor hitting the earth that was supposed to have wiped out the dinosaurs or something?"

"I dunno, was it?" Ron asked.

"Technically that was a meteorite," Hermione replied. "But it does seem weird. You'd think some kind of falling rock would cause a tremor or too. Wasn't there anything like that mentioned?"

"No, nothing. Just passing on what I heard," Neville shrugged. "Just thought it was interesting."

Harry forced a light smile. "Yeah… yeah, its really interesting, Neville. Thanks for the heads up. Maybe we'll try and sit up tonight… see if we can see any more."

Neville smiled back and nodded. "I think that's what Professor Sinistra is going to do," he said, before he wandered off to tend to his ugly looking Mimbulus Mimbletonia cactus plant.

"We're not really going to stay up tonight to look for meteors, are we?" Ron whispered.

"Oh heck no," Harry replied. "I reckon I'm going to need one hell of good night's sleep after all this. Still, it is rather weird. Do you think… I dunno… could maybe…"

"You-Know-Who?" Ron raised an eyebrow. "You think he could have had something to do with it?"

"I dunno, maybe," Harry shrugged.

"I kinda doubt it," Ron chuckled. "I don't know much about You-Know-Who, Harry, but I've got a feeling that pretty lights in the sky really aren't his style. Giant floating skulls with snakes for tongues, yeah, but this… not every weird thing that happens is related to You-Know-Who, mate."

Harry sighed and shook his head. He knew Ron was right. He was probably being overly paranoid again. It just seemed now that every shift in the shadows and every unexplained phenomenon could potentially be a link to Voldemort. He knew he was just scrambling for details that weren't there, trying to find an answer to the question of what the heck the Dark Lord was doing. But it didn't look like he was going to find them any time soon.

"Yeah, you're right," he muttered. "Sorry."

"S'fine, mate. I get where you're coming from. You want answers. Believe me, we all do."

Harry nodded and started writing a section about the moon Io. "I guess. Maybe astronomy does have some real world applications for wizards after all."

"I doubt it," Ron chuckled. "Not unless a bunch of fairies come bursting out of those lights or something like that."

Harry laughed. All the horrible stuff going on in his life was still there of course but Ron had helped lighten the mood a little temporarily. So that at least he could concentrate a little more on the task at hand at the very least.

Little did he know how bizarrely accurate Ron had actually been.