Chapter 33: Ch28: PANIC

AN: Welcome back one and all! Before we continue, a word for our reviewers!

AnimeMyWorld: And so it begins!

Arclight001: You're not wrong to wonder about Jerry's power level. One thing that I guess I haven't spelled out yet even though I've been trying to make it clear since at least Chapter 8, is that Jerry actually has some borderline crippling self-esteem issues. That's what's been holding his magic back: the simple fact that he actually kinda hates himself and is walking down the edge of some serious depression. For all that he IS incredibly formidable, his magic is still somewhat unresponsive compared to what Natsu, Erza and Gajeel can do with theirs. The other thing to consider is that his success against Wall and Ajeel was mostly due to his knowledge, determination and luck. If Ajeel hadn't stopped to gloat, he would've killed Jerry easily before Jerry could pull that trick with the portal to the seafloor. If Jerry had tried to take the Etherion instead of redirecting it, or if Ajeel or Wall either one hadn't been so stunned he did, then they would've killed him immediately afterwards. If Jerry's magic wasn't absurdly versatile and custom tailored to beating the stuffings out of other wizards, he would've lost BADLY in about a minute. Ajeel and Wall went into that fight cocky and it cost them the battle, but only because Wall chose to try thawing Ajeel to end it quicker rather than going balls to the wall and finish them himself. If Wall had continued that fight himself, he had a 1 in 3 chance of victory, 100% guaranteed if he managed to take out Jerry for even a moment, which he could've very easily done. Make no mistake, Jerry and the whole team were hitting WAY above their weight class and only even SURVIVED because of pure dumb luck and some poor choices on Wall and Ajeel's part. If even the tiniest thing had gone differently, they would've lost. That was a 1 in 100 win right there.

Me (Guest): Welcome back! Glad you're still enjoying, glad you like it since it's a rather important element of this final third of the Road to Mattachu. There's actually going to be a small little detour on the way back to Fairy Tail, so you'll have to wait just a liiittle bit longer to see the Guild Hall again after the end of this arc. Don't worry, it's just a little 3-4 chapter arc to mark our return to the normal flow of the story.

And now, without further ado...

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Chapter 28 – PANIC

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For an instant I couldn't see the dark behemoth at all through the miniature sunburst, as the drain on my power almost quadrupled, then it faded and my eyes went wide, "Virgo?"

Where my beloved partner had stood only a second before was an entirely different woman. Her hair was long and gently curled near her shoulders and a golden laurel wreath was nestled in the silky pink locks. The black militaristic uniform had been swapped out for a flowing white dress with a golden belt wrapped around her waist and a sheathed sword at her side. Then she turned her eyes to me for a brief moment and smiled gently, "Fear not, Justice has arrived."

I did fear though, because the instant I saw that smile, I knew that wasn't Virgo. My eyes widened, "You're Astraea…"

Her smile widened ever so slightly, "Correct." Her smile should've been a thing of beauty, and it was, but for all that her looks honestly surpassed Mira, there was an eerie calm about her that tore my heart, because I was terrified that one of my dearest friends had just given her existence to bring this one back into the world.

Then she turned her attention back to the shadow monster that I had almost forgotten was there in my fear for Virgo. Astraea's voice rang out with more authority than Erza or even Master Makarov could ever have hoped to achieve, "You have grown slow and weak Titan of Shadows, so much so that I almost wonder if your presence was worth mine. Has your confinement taken such a toll upon your strength?"

"No matter though," she continued coldly, "Now that I am here, your slumber will be made eternal. Properly this time." She swept her hand to the side and I suddenly realized what had happened to the Shadow Titan's fist that had been plummeting towards us: Astraea had caught it in a portal. Now as she swept her hand to the side, the Shadow Titan was yanked sideways as glowing pink portals opened all over its body. Astraea waved her hand over her head and spun the Titan overhead like a flail before casually flinging it down the valley like a doll.

Then Astraea was gone in an instant and I recognized my own teleportation magic at work. I didn't have time to ponder it though, because just then, distant points of light marked the Shadow Titan's location as Astraea proceeded to go to town on it. I almost felt bad for the Titan, because judging by the way those portals were moving, Astraea was as out of its weight class as Natsu was for most of the criminals we rounded up. Then Astraea sent the Titan shooting down the cliff face towards the town, grinding its face into the stone while it flailed.

She appeared next to me again as it passed and with a simple motion of her hands flipped the Titan on its back, flattening dozens of trees in the process. Astraea made a few quick little motions with her hands, those and the slight furrow of concentration on her brow being the only sign of any disturbance to her ethereal serenity. Meanwhile, her portals were forcing the Shadow Titan into a kneeling position.

It roared in protest and struggled, but Astraea's portals had it bound as thoroughly as any chains. Astraea stepped towards it and then teleported, reappearing atop a portal in front of its face. A moment later, she unsheathed her sword. The ensuing…attack, was something like a nuclear bomb loaded into a sword slash. When I finished blinking the spots from my eyes, the Shadow Titan was gone and there was a glowing red line of molten stone in the cliffs. With an almighty WHOOSH! The forest suddenly ignited from the heat of the attack.

I was honestly about to get worried. Then Astraea casually mimicked the attack I'd used to finally wound Ajeel on a scale comparable to Niagra Falls…and used it as a giant fire hose to put out the fire now raging below.

When the fire was out, she reappeared next to me. I could only stare at her for a second and then, "Lady Astraea, what happened to Virgo?"

She tilted her head in confusion, "Who?"

My heart felt like it was suddenly encased in ice that would make even Gray shiver, "Virgo, my partner! She's a Celestial Spirit, one of my best friends! She did some kind of spell to turn into you! Something about her origin? She said we'd have to renew our contract and she wouldn't be able to fight for a while after. Tell me you can bring her back!"

Astraea studied my face for a moment, "Your words ring true, but I am sorry. I do not know of this Virgo who you speak of." As my mind stopped in sheer horror, she mused, "From what I can understand of your words, she is a future version of myself. I can sense that your magic has mingled with mine, and…" She laid a hand on my chest over my heart, "…yes I see. You are my anchor to this realm, that explains it." She raised her hands to either side of my face and looked me in the eye, "This may feel strange."

Suddenly every memory I had of Virgo flashed through my mind in an instant and then Astraea was gone and Virgo was in front of me, looking utterly exhausted. "Jerry…" she breathed a small smile spreading across her face, "You saved me…"

Then she collapsed and I only narrowly caught her, "VIRGO!"

She laughed weakly as I knelt with her and cradled her close to my chest, "Sorry for the scare… You're…going to…" she yawned and that was terrifying because I didn't know Virgo even could get tired, "You're going to need to be careful. If he was here, then that means the others are waking up. We should've known when the darkness obscured this region…" She was barely able to keep her eyes open at this point, "Stop the…tree…"

I nodded, "I will. Now you go home and get some rest, let me take care of things down here." I clutched her to me and the tears that had been threatening to fall since Astraea appeared came down from sheer relief, "Don't ever scare me like that again."

Virgo laughed as she dissolved in familiar golden light, I'll try…

A moment later, she was gone, but I knew she was safe. Which led to the next order of business, Why is there a sleep spell down there?

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I teleported down to the Town Hall and my eyes narrowed as I spotted some sort of tentacle rising up from the center of the room. It looked like it was nearly a meter thick and there were numerous smaller tendrils spreading rapidly across the room like the branches of a tree. Every single tendril was sticking to a person and spreading across them like roots. A quick glance turned up none of my team, Serena, Miguel, Elric or Mary among the unconscious victims of the quickly spreading tendrils. I reached out with my magic and frowned, every person the tendrils were touching was being shielded from my magic by them.

I snapped my fingers and teleported all those I could outside. Then eyes started opening. My eyes widened as the townspeople started getting to their feet with slow jerky movements and glowing pale blue eyes. I growled, "Because of course the alien looking tentacle can do mind control."

I reached into my pocket and drew the knife that had been in my pocket since I'd arrived in Hargeon (couldn't believe I'd never used it before), and grinned as I flicked the blade open, "Let's see what happens when I cut that tentacle off."

Just because I couldn't teleport the now remote controlled townsfolk didn't mean I couldn't teleport me. A split second later I was next to the central tentacle, and my arm shot out like a striking snake, carving a wide rent in the tentacle. My eyes narrowed at the inky black contents and then widened in horror as more tentacles suddenly surged out and tried to grab me. I only narrowly managed to teleport back to the door in time, and just in time for the tentacles' victims to prove they had gotten a lot, and I do mean a LOT faster under its influence.

They weren't as fast as Jet, but anyone who hadn't scrapped with him on a regular basis wouldn't stand a chance. Thankfully ever since I'd stuffed him in the trunk of my Card Car on our first mission together, he'd always taken any opportunity he could get during the Guild Hall Brawls to get a cheap shot in with his High Speed magic. It made dodging the empowered townsfolk actually not that difficult. The difficult part was lining up a shot at those tentacles controlling them without hurting them.

I spent what felt like an eternity ducking dodging and teleporting around the lunging zombified townsfolk, shooting my cards at the central tendril through any opening I could get. Unfortunately, even with my cards hitting as hard and sharp as they could, they were just bouncing off. After a few minutes, I realized I was getting nowhere, so I teleported into the air and hovered there with my telekinesis to catch my breath and assess the situation. I grinned slightly, "Can't get me up here."

The tentacle immediately proved me wrong by flinging Alan the architect at me. I dodged Alan by a hairs breadth and then he just hovered there for a second. If it hadn't been for the sixth sense of spatial awareness my telekinesis gave me, I would've been snatched out of the air by the three more people the tentacle launched at me. I teleported out of the way and then it was a mad whirlwind of motion as the tentacle started using the people like flails, wildly thrashing them about as fast as it could and trying to hit me. It was absolute pandemonium.

I had to teleport outside immediately because I realized pretty quickly that whatever the tentacle was, it wasn't concerned with the wellbeing of its puppets. It had smashed over half a dozen people into the walls in less than a minute trying to hit me. Then a solution occurred to me as I looked at the tendril pointedly not extending outside the confines of the town hall.

I grinned and chomped down a bit of air to recharge. Thank whatever gods there were that Master Precht's visit had revealed that I wasn't limited to light. Light was still my primary element and I got the most boost from it, but anything else worked too. Astraea's presence had really drained me, so it took me a minute of munching, but when I was done, I had more than enough power to rip the town hall and the ground it was sitting on up into the air.

My eyes bugged out as I saw the damn tentacle stretch but not break. I put my hands together and unloaded on that thing. It wasn't as big as the beams I'd been firing at Ajeel and Wall, but it should've been enough to obliterate basically anything.

The tentacle was barely singed, and in a disgusting boiling bubbling instant it was whole again. I grit my teeth and teleported the people I'd managed to save from the tentacle as far away as I could. If that's the tree Virgo was talking about, I mused, Then it looks like I'm gonna have to find the root and rip it out, because that thing's not giving. I set the town hall back down flew down the valley, my Archive radar stretching to try and find my team because I honestly couldn't see them wising up and backing off from that tentacle without dragging everybody out with them. Which means something must've lured them away.

I pulled up short in horror not a second later, What the hell?!

The tentacles invoked a barrier against my magic on everything they touched. On its own, that was terrifying. What I realized now as I attempted to scan the jungle below me for any sign of my friends catapulted that thing to the same level of existential dread as the Shadow Titan, "IT'S TAINTED THE ENTIRE JUGNLE?!"

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MEANWHILE

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"GO!" Erza shouted as she leapt to dodge the massive blow that nearly crushed her and left a crater in the jungle floor, "I'LL HANDLE THIS ONE AND CATCH UP TO YOU! GO GET LUCY AND LEVY BACK!"

Natsu wanted to argue, but Gajeel tossed him over his shoulder and took off, shouting over his shoulder, "YOU HAD BETTER! IF YOU DIE, I'LL KICK YOUR ASS ERZA!"

"KEEP DREAMING!" Erza shot back with a grin as she requipped in a burst of light.

A split second later, she was gone among the trees, even the sounds of her titanic battle with the giant Shadow Monkey thing fading quickly as Gajeel raced forward at top speed, Happy and Miguel flying alongside him. "I know you don't like leaving her Natsu!" Gajeel shouted, "But she's Erza, and Lucy and Levy are helpless until that sleep spell wears off! So we gotta help where we're most needed! Jerry'll figure out where we've gone soon and catch up, and you know he won't let anything happen to Erza!"

"I do?!" Natsu asked in surprise.

"ARE YOU SERIOUSLY THAT OBLIVIOUS?!" Gajeel demanded, "THOSE TWO CAN'T KEEP THEIR EYES OFF EACH OTHER!"

"WHAT?!"

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If Erza'd had any idea what Gajeel was saying, she would likely have decked him to shut him up. Right then though, she had much bigger concerns in the form of a shadow beast as big as anything she'd ever fought. It had apparently barely even felt her Heaven's Wheel Blumenbatt, the hail of swords serving only to get its attention as they bounced off like rubber balls on a great iron wall.

The monstrous monkey had returned fire with a fist the size of a wagon that she'd only managed to dodge by a hair's breadth after requipping into her Flight Armor. It was great for speed, but it had a serious lack of striking power compared to some of her more heavy duty armors. Conventional weapons won't work, she mused, Which means it's an elemental weakness because it HAS to have a weakness. She chanced a glance at it as she dashed through the trees, It's all covered in darkness, so… "MORNINGSTAR!"

She changed as she leapt over a fallen tree and landed in a white orange and yellow ensemble, with two fresh swords in her hands. She sprang into the air and attempted to land on top of the Shadow Beast's arm as it threw another world wrecking punch at her. Instead she fell straight through it and felt as though she'd been soaked in pure, cold fear.

It ate into her like acid, the literally bone chilling dread doing its level best to consume her as she crumpled onto the ground, her graceful landing completely ruined by the lack of anything to land on and the sudden direct attack on her mind. An instant later, the Shadow Beast slammed its massive and alarmingly solid fist down on top of her and drove her almost a foot into the ground. Then another, and another and another. The immense impacts drove the wind out of her and Erza felt bones cracking and then breaking with every fresh hit. She wanted to move, to use her telekinesis to force the earth to shield her, but the earth wouldn't respond and instead only served to trap her more thoroughly beneath the Beast's furious hits.

After what seemed like an eternity of pummeling, Erza saw the Shadow Beast peer down at her now still and nigh unconscious form with those terrible green eyes. Apparently satisfied that she wasn't getting up any time soon, it turned and left.

It wasn't until a few minutes later that Erza felt the tickling begin. It started on her left leg and quickly started wriggling across her skin. In a fit of instinctual terror, Erza flung herself out of the ground and hung in the air with her telekinesis, her heart hammering as all her injuries screamed at the sudden movement. As she saw the blue slimy tentacle probing the bottom of the crater where she'd been a split second earlier though, she realized she'd dodged a bullet. Without a second's hesitation, she aimed her swords, "PHOTON SLICER!"

A massive stream of light erupted from the points of her swords and slammed into the ground where the tentacle was, and for a brief second Erza felt some slight vindication in the assumption that her attack had vaporized the offending tentacle. I've read enough racy novels to know where that was going, she mused.

Then she hurled herself skyward with a shriek of "CRAP!" as the ground suddenly erupted in a forest of tentacles, shooting skyward in an attempt to snatch her.

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"What the heck Miguel?!" Gajeel yelled as they suddenly broke free of the tree line and raced into a city covered in cobwebs, "I thought it was a city of gold, not spiders!"

"This is new!" Miguel called back, "Trust me I would not have come back if it looked like SPIDERS! PULL UP! PULL UP!

Gajeel didn't even break his stride, "NATSU!"

"FIRE DRAGON…ROOOOOOOOOAR!" Natsu's burning breath flooded the street and forced the encroaching black carpet of arachnids back.

Gajeel suddenly flipped him around off his shoulder and held him like a rifle, "EAT FIRE YOU LITTLE BASTAAARDS!" he yelled while Natsu continued to spew flames like mad, running on unimpeded, "DON'T MAKE ME USE THE OTHER END!"

"GIVE US BACK LUCY AND LEVY!" Happy yelled from where he'd shot twenty feet into the air with Miguel.

Gajeel and Natsu charged ahead, the flames easily clearing their path to follow the glowy-eyed bastards that had kidnapped an unconscious Lucy and Levy. The glowy bastards were fast, but not fast enough to completely escape the sharp eyes of the dragon slayers. Combined with the fact that even the fastest things left a scent trail, Gajeel and Natsu had no trouble weaving through the city in flaming hot pursuit.

It wasn't until they rounded a blind corner that they learned where the kidnappers were going. The giant mass of shadows with eight holes of horrible white light turned to look at them from where it was crouched over the street, lines of darkness connecting it to the blanket of webbing that covered the surrounding buildings. "NATSU THROW ME!" Gajeel yelled without a moment's hesitation as he dropped Natsu.

"FIRE DRAGON IRON FIST!" Natsu roared as his hand erupted in flames to catch Gajeel's foot as he jumped and give him a rocket powered boost. Gajeel's hands suddenly became massive chainsaw like blades and as Natsu launched him, he whirled through the air like a tornado of flaming bladed death, ramming into the immense black spider with a roar of, "FIRE IRON DRAGON SWOOORD HOOORN!"

Then he disappeared into the shadows, popping out the other side and crashing headlong and extinguished into side of the building the kidnappers had run into. Natsu stared in horror for a split second before his hands ignited like miniature suns and he ran on, "HAPPY! GET MIGUEL TO SAFETY!"

He charged forward as Happy banked away, "Fire Dragooon ROOOOOAR!" The spider shied away from the whirlwind of flames, but only enough to shield its eyes. The instant Natsu's attack petered out, the Spider returned fire with a blast of jet black webbing that slammed the Dragon Slayer to the ground with the force of a train crashing into him and glued him there, smothering his flames in an instant. Then Natsu's entire world became itching, searing pain and terror as the carpet of spiders his flames had been keeping at bay surged forward, covering him and biting him mercilessly while he struggled against the webbing that poured fear into his soul every second it touched him.

As Natsu's vision began to fade, he saw the Shadow Spider peering down at him, I'm sorry, everybody…

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LATER

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Let it be known that I normally like hummingbirds. They're tiny, adorable and I like their colors, plus their ability to hover is very neat. I also normally like most birds. Birds had never done anything bad to me.

I was now being subjected to a very thorough attempt to change my mind on the subject.

Not enough that there was another one of those huge Shadow Monsters which came after me. Nope, ONE wasn't enough. I was now being chased by three dragon sized birds, one of which was clearly supposed to be a humming bird with glowing blue green eyes that had wings that sounded like a helicopter and could fly and maneuver like one to boot. That was the first one to arrive.

The second one was acting like a pelican…a pelican capable of biting the tops off mountains and spitting them at me like artillery fire. Thankfully its rounds were susceptible to my portals, I guess the tentacles hadn't made it to the mountain tops yet. The bad part was that even when I redirected them to smack these monster birds in the face point blank, it didn't help, and unlike the boulders or the Shadow Giant, they were immune to my portals. They just went right through them like the hole in space time wasn't there, so I couldn't even try portal cuts or binding.

The real bugger though was that damn heron. It was perched on a mountaintop and didn't fly around, but the thing's neck had to be a mile long, and it could shoot its beak out like a sky scraper sized arrow. I'd almost gotten knocked out of the air the first time it did it, and it had a better success rate for trying to hit me than either of the other two. It got a lot closer and was a lot better at predicting my movements.

As I swooped and dove and rocketed around through the sky trying to dodge around the mammoth avian horrors, trying desperately to come up with a plan, I could only hope that the others were having a better time than I was.

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"What do we do now?" Happy asked in a very small voice as he and Miguel sat atop a mountain overlooking the city of gold, now all but covered in the spider's webs and writhing darkness. Only the city center was still visible beneath the stormy sky, and it hung in mid-air over a massive gaping pit with cobwebs slung between the massive chains that anchored it to the surrounding earth. Waterfalls poured into the massive void that led to who knew where from the surrounding mountaintops, and from the center of the floating island rose a massive parody of a tree, wreathed in darkness and glowing with lines of charcoal gray that seemed bright compared to the roiling darkness that comprised it. Its branches reached skyward like gnarled fingers, spewing virulent darkness into the sky like the thick, choking smoke from a mighty bonfire.

It was obvious now what had been causing the cloud bank that covered the entire region, and it was horrifying. "I'm not sure even Gildarts could break that…" Happy muttered fearfully, "And we haven't seen or heard anything from Erza or Jerry. I don't know where those guys took Natsu and Gajeel and I don't know where Lucy and Levy are."

"Well Happy," Miguel declared in a surprisingly upbeat voice, "It may not be much, but I do have one idea."

Happy looked up at him, "You do?"

Miguel smiled politely as he nodded, "Yeees, how about we run away from this fuck off huge bird looking at us like we're dinner?!"

It was at this point as Miguel frantically pointed it out that Happy noticed the immense red eyes staring at them and turned almost as white as his wings in terror. In the blink of an eye, he had snatched Miguel up and flown out from beneath the beak of the titanic Shadow Bird that had somehow gotten right behind them to tower over them menacingly, almost like it was waiting for them to notice it before it attacked.

Its head snapped up, and with a scream like a million nails on a giant chalkboard that almost knocked Happy from the air, it spread its wings and took to the air after them with a flap like a thunderclap. "WE'RE SO SCREEEWED!" Happy screamed.

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"NONONONONONONO!" Erza shouted as she shot through the sky like a comet on the enchanted wings of her Black Wing Armor, "NO TENTACLES UNLESS THEY'RE ATTACHED TO SOMEBODY I LIKE! AND PROBABLY NOT EVEN THEN!"

The writhing mass of tentacles shooting up from the jungle floor like a hail of javelins attempting to snatch her from the air paid her protests no heed, if anything trying even harder to catch her as they sensed her fear of what they'd do to her. For every tentacle she cut down with her holy-element imbued sword which had proven the most effective weapon in her considerable arsenal by far, a dozen more surged forward from the stumps.

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Lucy stirred for a moment before her eyes flickered open in the dark gray not-light and writhing pale blue glow. She attempted to make sense of what she was seeing as the strange tickling sensation all over her legs and arms continued. There was some sort of wall in front of her made of varying shades of darkness, with even the poorly lit ground seeming bright next to it. There was a glowing blue…was that a jellyfish?... next to it, and a woman standing before her.

The voice that reached her ears a moment later as the woman in the headdress noticed she was awake was like the sensation of spiders crawling down her spine as Lucy heard, "Sssooo you're finally awake little star witch…" Then the woman laughed and Lucy knew beyond any shadow of a doubt she was in trouble.

Then the woman raised her hand with a malicious grin and dangled something that glowed faintly golden and silver in the dim light. Lucy's eyes went wide, "MY KEYS! GIVE THOSE BACK!"

The woman's grin only grew as she threw them into the air, and a sound like rocks crashing together erupted overhead, drawing Lucy's attention to the mammoth dog shaped monstrosity wreathed in shadows as it snapped up the keys. Its horrible orange eyes bored pure fear into Lucy's soul as it met her gaze and growled while the woman laughed, "Whoops! Cluuumsy meee…"

Then Lucy jumped as she heard Levy scream. Her head whipped around and she saw Levy wrapped in tentacles and held off the floor just like she was, only the tentacles had covered considerably more of Levy's body.

The woman chuckled, "Oh yes, your connection to the star demons is making your body much tougher to overtake for my darling beasty, but your friend had no such defense. She'll cave soon, and then she'll be my puppet, just like aaall the others."

She surged upwards on a tentacle that erupted out of the ground to ferry her up right into Lucy's face, and as she did, Lucy got her first good look at the decrepit corpse of a woman. The woman's breath was like rancid carrion and her pallid skin was more wrinkled than any prune. Bones jutted and blood vessels bulged against the skin stretched over her ancient frame, but her eyes were still alive and full of madness and hate as she ran a bony hand over Lucy's cheek purring, "But don't feel left out, soon you'll be my slave too little star witch. By all means though," her horrid prune of a face split in something that had to be her version of a smile, "Struggle and scream all you like, because nobody's coming to help you this time."

And as terror seized Lucy's heart while the tentacles surged across her skin and began to sting and burn like ribbons of hornets, she did scream. She screamed a LOT.

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The stage is now set, the villain's revealed.

Who can say now what next week will yield?