Your opponent is me!

It was once again noisy in the guild Fairy Tail. It had started with a small fight between Gray and Natsu about nothing important, but soon Elfman joined in, then Gajeel, then Jet and Droy, followed by Levi, who tried to stop them. Erza was quite annoyed and had her sword ready, but in the end she just stood by and watched.

"Let it go, Erza." They will never learn after all. Smiled Mirajane happily. "They won't kill each other." Erza went to sit down, she was still annoyed but did put her sword away.

"Everyone!" Came suddenly the voice of their guild master from the bar table. "Settle down. I have an announcement." He said. Gray and Natsu stopped mid punching each other in the face. Without even a glance to one another, they let go off each other's shirt-colours and looked at the bar. Their tiny master stood there with his arms crossed and with a broad smile upon his face. "Children, it will be my birthday soon and in celebration of that, I want to have a small competition between ourselves." Markarov looked at his crowd and only saw confused faces. "Hm? I thought you all liked a little bit competition?" He frowned.

"Yeah, if we can show our guts to other guilds." Protested Max, who undoubtedly spoke for the rest of the guild.

"Oh, but I haven't told you the details yet." Smirked Markarov. "This can become quite interesting."

"Tell us then, already!" Yelled Natsu, who became more and more enthusiastic.

"I am going to let you compete against each other in an one-on-one match to practice your magic. And the best part is that you can choose yourselves with whom you want to battle."

"Erza, let's fight!" Shouted Natsu immediately.

"Oi-oi, do you really think that's such a good idea?" Asked Gray him, a bit skeptical.

"Yeah, Natsu, that's not a good idea." Agreed Lucy a bit shocked.

"No I agree. That will cause too much damage, that's why the S-class mages will be left out of it. I already decided that with them." Erza and Mirajane nodded as conferment. Natsu growled.

"Come on, Natsu. You can fight with Erza another time." Said Happy. But Natsu didn't quite hear that, his mind seemed to be somewhere else because no sooner had Happy said that, when he jumped up and faced Lucy. "Let's have a battle, Lucy." He grinned.

"Huh?" Lucy looked surprised at her friend's sparkling eyes.

"Let's have a practice fight for our team!"

"Eh? But you defeat me in no time." Protested Lucy, she was more keen to fight Cana or Levi. "Why don't you fight Gray?"She pointed at the ice mage, who sat behind her.

"No thanks, I have someone else, I want to fight." Gray said and he turned to Juvia, who happened to sit next to him.

"Huh, why Juvia?" Blushed Juvia in utter surprise.

"You owe me a rematch from back then." He smirked. "I told you didn't I?" Juvia remembered Gray say something about a 'round 2' after he saved her, back when she fought him as a Phantom.

"But Juvia doesn't know if she is good enough."Said Juvia blushing while playing with her fingers.

"Come on, it will be fun." Gray smiled and brought his face even closer. Juvia couldn't say no to that. He smile at her! Her head was now flaming red and she turned away.

Meanwhile, everyone was busy finding themselves a partner. Jet and Droy were doomed to fight each other because Levi had her mind set on Gajeel. He had been her partner before after all, maybe he would agree. when she approached him a bit shyly, he was a bit surprised.

"Erm, sure. It will be interesting fighting someone who is so much smaller than me." Her replied, grinning teasingly. Everyone who had heard that, knew that it was no complement, but Levi only smiled.

The day drew near. The battles would take place in a small arena in Magnolia. Everyone was busy preparing and their minds were filled with strategies. Markarov grinned to himself. I knew they would be in to it! He thought.

Gray was thrilled with excitement. Natsu would say that he was completely fired up. He could finally fight Juvia again. It would be the ultimate challenge. Something had hit him during his first fight with her and he'd liked to experience it again. Juvia on the other hand did practice too, but with less enthusiasm. How could she fight Gray-sama? She asked herself in frustration. Why did he want to fight her anyway? Was he mad at her? What did she do wrong? Lisanna saw all this and decided to help her former partner. They had become quite close, although it wasn't always to see. Juvia and Lisanna were both quiet and liked to keep things to themselves.

"Does battling Gray bother you that much?" Lisanna asked Juvia concerned.

"Juvia doesn't understand." Began Juvia down. "I can't fight Gray-sama like I did then. Did Juvia do something wrong?"

"No, of course not." Answered Lisanna cheerfully. "He is Just like Natsu in this matter- although he will never admit to that- he just wants to fight you because he sees you as a good opponent."

"Juvia still doesn't get it. Is that a good thing?" Juvia blinked twice at the odd theory.

"In a Fairy Tail-man's world it is." Lisanna smiled. "Do you want me to help you practice? Elfman-nichan and I are taking a break right now."

"Lisanna." Juvia said and she almost cried at her friend's kindness.

Part 2

And then the moment was finally there. The first fight of the event, between Gray and Juvia. The rest of the guild had taken their seats in the tribune and waited for the match to begin.

"Are you ready, Juvia?" Yelled Gray, already stripped down to the middle. He stood on the other side of the battlefield. "Give me your best shot!" He grinned, but Juvia didn't have any reason to smile. Even if Lisanna was right, she didn't want to hurt him.

"Begin!" Came the signal from Markarov and Gray took position.

"Here I go!" He yelled. "Ice make lance!" The ice closed in on Juvia fast, but she was prepared. She forced herself to forget who she was fighting with and wanted to give it her best.

"Boiling water wall!" She cried out and raise up, creating from her arms and lower body a large wave of boiling water. "Here I come, Gray-sama!" She said and with that, she shot towards him. Gray's eyes widened, he knew his lance was useless now and he replaced it quickly with a huge ice wall. It did cast him a lot of magical energy and he was panting with exhaustion already, but this was what he wanted all along! He moved around his wall and ran to Juvia with full speed.

"Ice make hammer!" He only produced a small one to save his energy, but it was big enough for him to use as a weapon.

"Water slicer!" Juvia cried and attacked him with several sharp blows of water, but the hammer was too thick for them to go through. Gray then attacked, but Juvia used her water-body to avoid it. So the battle went on and on. Everyone was overwhelmed with excitement. Who would have thought that such a pretty, shy rain girl, could fight like this.

Gray couldn't stop smiling. Juvia, you're amazing! He thought, but that brought him suddenly off his feet. What did he mean by that and why did he want to fight her that badly? Damn it. He thought. Why am I bothered by that all of a sudden. If I don't watch it, I'm going to thing like Lyon. He ignored the oppressive feeling he had and forced himself to focus on Juvia's attack. With both arms, she shot boiling geysers at him. Gray froze them and managed to freeze her arms too. This was his chance! Before Juvia could melt the ice, he jumped on top of the ice pillars. It brought him all the way up to Juvia, who was now stuck in mid air. Just before Gray reached her, he broke the pillars behind him and brought himself and Juvia to the ground. He held her down with one arm, while he made a small knife with the other. The match was over. Gray had won, but he saw with pleasure that there was still fire in Juvia's eyes. If this was a real match, she would have freed herself and fight again.

"Gray wins!" Exclaimed Markarov's voice, but Gray strangely didn't hear it. The same question that came to him during the fight, came into his head again.

"Congratulations, Gray-sama." Smiled Juvia, while Gray helped her stand up.

"Yeah." Could Gray only say absently. He just had answered his own question. He was just like Lyon after all. He just couldn't get enough of Juvia. He smiled at her. Of course, he wouldn't tell her that.

` -The End-