Chapter Forty-three

How I hadn't noticed Chance was holding a camera when she had given Bixlow and I our instructions is one thing, not noticing Laxus' jealousy when I had felt it before, especially when I had felt it before, was something else entirely.

"The face you made was perfect for the scene created. I didn't even have to tell you what was going to happen, or how I wanted you to react. You've really got a knack for this version of storytelling." Gideon was gushing over Laxus as they walked over, either not taking notice of Laxus' stony expression, ignoring it, or thought Laxus was staying in character. The storm I felt going on inside me, from both my own emotions and Laxus', told me otherwise. It matched the storm brewing in the sky. In my mostly blank mind, I wondered if the storm actually was because of Laxus' emotions.

His anger, jealousy, and something akin to rejection threatened to swallow me whole, they overthrew my own emotions, even I barely knew what I felt. They barely let me breathe, crushing my lungs and closing my throat. They pushed against my skin, trying to break out.

"Lucy, are you alright?" Chance's voice broke into my mind, and I felt myself jump. I didn't take notice at how Chance's eyes flickered to my hand for a second before looking back at my face. I tried to push everything down, attempting to focus on Chance and her concerned eyes. My throat was still closed so I could only look at her questioningly. "You seem to be sparking."

At Chance's words, my eyes widened and I began to feel fear and dread along with everything else as I backed away from her, my breath quickening. I saw from the corner of my eye that Laxus was moving closer, his raging emotions disappearing as new ones began to take over. He was so angry only seconds before, but the moment he thought I was in trouble he let it all go and only felt worry and concern towards me.

"Girly? What's wrong? What happened? Why are you losing control?" Laxus knelt in front of me, his large hands grasping my elbows. I felt my arms turn to allow my hands to grip at his forearms, using him to root myself as I forced myself to regain control of my breathing and fear. Without Laxus' overwhelmingly powerful emotions prodding at me, it proved to be much easier and within a few minutes I was able to relax again.

I opened my eyes, not realising I had closed them, and looked around the area. Many of the workers were packing up smaller objects and equipment, and covering the things that couldn't be moved. I couldn't think of why until I felt a raindrop hit my eye, causing me to blink rapidly. I saw Bixlow helping cover the tall sets in one direction, Gideon and Chance in the other gathering equipment and giving instructions in commanding voices to stop any chaos before it starts. I felt pressure in my knuckles and looked down to see Laxus' eyes staring at my face, a layer of concern over them, the occasional raindrop dotting his face.

I released Laxus' arms from my apparent death grip over them, stretching my fingers, I vaguely noticed the little red dots, along with the small crescent indents, they left on his skin. I lifted my hands to his face, hesitating slightly when he still hadn't let go of my elbows. No matter how loose and gentle the hold, I didn't want to go past any boundaries he may have set, not after the feelings I was subject to only a little earlier. I moved my hands closer to see if he'd tighten his hold, or pull away, or really anything to say that I couldn't touch him. When he didn't, it was a simple task to convince myself to begin wiping away the raindrops, that were multiplying every second, with my fingers. He seemed to sigh in relief, but relief over what, I don't know.

Next thing I knew I was pulled closer to Laxus. Because of the position we were in, his head rested atop my breast, leaving me thankful that he couldn't see the bright blush quickly overtaking my face.

"I'm sorry." Laxus spoke so quietly that I barely heard it over the people and the quickening rain. "It was my fault." His arms seemed to wrap tighter around me.

I opened my mouth to say something, but he stopped me. "Don't you dare try to deny it." He growled. "You lost control because I couldn't control my emotions. I didn't even think of what that would do to you. I didn't care." His fingers dug into my side, seeming to get tighter the guiltier he felt. My fingers moved to his hair, stroking lightly.

"Laxus," I started, my voice cracking slightly, and I felt his jaw move to tell me not to deny it again, "I'm not going to say it's not your fault, because it kind of is." I heard him hiss slightly as he sucked in a breath, seemingly expecting me to hold back my words. "I only said kind of. It's not entirely. You have every right to feel what you do. You shouldn't have to hold them back just because I can feel them as well. Granted, they were a little stronger than usual."

Laxus released a long breath, tightening his hold for another second before pulling away and standing again.

"Come on. We've gotta go change before the clothes get damaged." Laxus said, standing up straight.

Laxus and I made it about halfway through the park before someone called out to us and we had to stop. We turned in the direction of the voice and saw Gideon jogging over to us.

"Sorry, but would you two mind staying. The rain was supposed to come tomorrow and I was planning on using it for your story. It shouldn't take too long." Gideon explained once he was in front of us, his curls frizzy and sticking up in odd angles from the light rain.

I looked up to Laxus, who shrugged, and shook my head, "I wouldn't mind, especially if you were counting on the rain for the story. But, what about our clothes? Wouldn't they get ruined for use tomorrow?"

"Oh, don't worry about that. There's a reason we were able to make all of the clothing within a single night to be ready for today." Gideon said, seemingly looking around for someone or something. "Ah, there."

Gideon sped over across the park and stopped in front of Chance, who seemed to be organizing everything that needed to be done before the rain could damage any of it, and Bixlow, who was a few feet away getting directions from Chance on how one of the taller sets should be covered. As Laxus and I walked over to join them we could see Gideon gesturing widely to Bixlow and Chance, Bixlow in turn nodding his head while Chance wrote a few notes on her clipboard.

When we were all standing together Chance spoke, "Thank you for staying, I'll send someone to the hotel to tell Wendy and Doranbolt before they start wondering where you are." Chance turned so that she was directly facing Bixlow. "This next scene might become strenuous on your shoulder, so you should let us know immediately if it begins to hurt too much." Bixlow made a noise of confirmation, and I looked over to him with a warning in my eyes. I figured out during our time together in recent months that he didn't like to tell people when something was bothering him. Bixlow took notice of my stare, and smiled while lifting a hand in surrender.

"As I'm sure you've noticed," I heard Gideon start to say, once again serious, and I focused back on him, "this story is about a knight, a princess, and a dragon. Well, a sort of dragon. I wasn't able to do any of the pictures that have the dragon and the princess meeting today because of the rain, but that's going to happen, and Lucy, as you could likely tell, you, the princess, and Bixlow, the knight, were well on your way to falling in love, and something similar is what I had planned for you and Laxus, the dragon, after the knight had left. Unfortunately, we didn't get to have any of that build up before this next scene, which, basically, the knight comes back, sees the princess and the dragon together, and challenges the dragon to a fight, and the dragon accepts, which is when the storm begins. Now, let's get started before you guys get too soaked."

I felt Laxus' emotions flare up at the mention of a fight, and I had to stifle a gasp at the strength and suddenness of it. I stared at him in confusion from the corner of my eye while Gideon gave us our instructions.

My part in this was to stand by and react to the way that the two fight and destroy everything around them. Laxus and Bixlow both would and wouldn't be fighting. Gideon wants it to look as realistic as possible, so he wants the two of them to move and attack in ways that they actually would, but they wouldn't actually be attacking eachother in serious ways since moving around and capturing all of the attacks wouldn't be possible for Gideon, no matter how skilled he was. So, there would be a small series of attacks, Gideon taking several pictures, then a break as Gideon found a new angle, all the while slowly moving around so that the setting of the fight wouldn't be the same in all the pictures. Meanwhile, Gideon entrusted Chance with capturing my reactions to it all.

Laxus' thrill at the thought of a fight had dwindled throughout the explanation, which only confirmed my suspicions, but before I could confront him about any of it, Gideon had us begin.

Because we were already partially soaked, Gideon decided that we would do the beginning of the fight tomorrow when it, hopefully, rained then. I didn't have to do much, so the time seemed to drag on, but within a half hour the rain had slowed to a stop, lasting a much shorter time than any of us anticipated.

"Well, we're done for today." Chance began, all of us getting ready to walk back to the hotel.

"We have a lot to do tomorrow afternoon, so be rested."

"Tomorrow afternoon?" I asked before either could walk away completely. "Wouldn't it be easier to do some of the photos in the morning?"

"Oh, we have much for tomorrow morning as well." Gideon took a breath, "Well, I do, with other groups, along with Wendy and Doranbolt," He said looking to all of us before looking forward again. "Unfortunately, I have nothing for you three, until maybe a little before noon,if even that early. I really only need the rest of the storm scene and the afternoon lighting now for you three."

I'm fairly certain I heard Laxus let out a sigh of relief beside me, probably happy that the job is almost over.

"Anyways, I'll see all of you tomorrow." Gideon announced suddenly, walking further into the hotel.

All of us went into the rooms from before and changed before making our way back to the hotel we were staying in. When we arrived at the hotel we agreed to meet up for dinner later.

Wendy and Charle were in the room when I arrived. We talked about our individual photo shoots, before Wendy asked a question.

"So, Ever's going to kill me if I don't ask, but did anything happen with you and Laxus?"

"Why would you think that? And why would Evergreen kill you?" I asked in return.

"Ever forced me to swear to ask every day, and by her tone, I think she might actually kill me if I don't ask." I breathed an inward sigh as I pictured Evergreen talking to the small girl in front of me.

"No, nothing happened." I felt electricity buzz beneath my skin as my mind went back to Laxus' extreme jealousy over Bixlow.

"I don't believe you." I heard Charle say and I jumped at her accusation, thinking that she had read my thoughts, or that some of the electricity wasn't beneath my skin.

I forced a smile onto my lips, "Why would you say that?"

"I saw you holding onto him as the storm was starting." She said without even looking at me.

I released a small cough and rubbed my hands together, like I was a child who got caught with their hand in the cookie jar. "That was something else."

"But it was something between Laxus and yourself." I could swear there was the smallest of smirks on her muzzle.

"Nothing that would qualify as the something that Ever wants to know about."

"What was it then?" Wendy cut in, in a completely innocent way, the conversation not feeling like the interrogation it could have felt like.

I still didn't want to admit... whatever it was. I was still rubbing my hands together as I took a deep breath because admitting to losing control was not an easy thing to do.

And another.

"I lost control of the lightning magic. Laxus was calming me back down."

Wendy instantly looked like the worried nurse she was when they saw a bloodied patient.

"What? Why? What was happening?" She began in a calm, but urgent, voice.

"I was just feeling too many things." I waved my hands to tell Wendy that it was nothing serious. "From both Laxus and myself." I lied.

It's just a small one. If she knew I lost control purely because of Laxus' emotions, Wendy would feel additional guilt about the strength of our Link than I already know she does.

Wendy nodded and seemed to relax.

"I'm going to shower and get changed before we go out do dinner." I grab some clothes from my bag and head to bathroom. Thankfully, I knew that it rained in Amourose a fair amount during this time of the year, so I thought to pack a pair of jeans and a purple cardigan to go over the black tank top I brought. After quickly brushing through my mostly dry hair, I knocked on the bathroom door as way of asking if I could leave yet.

The moment I left the bathroom, there was a knock on the hotel room door. Wendy answered it to reveal the guys, apparently ready to go and eat. The dinner was short and, after Wendy had another healing session with Bixlow, we went back to our rooms to bed.

During it all, I hadn't gotten the chance to talk to Laxus about his apparent want to fight Bixlow.

It's finally done. Honestly, I've rewritten the ending of this chapter so many times, and I'm still not fully satisfied with it, but I need to move on. This is going to be one of those times where what's best is to just leave it as is and work with it.