"I don't play games," Gajeel snorted, peeling is face backwards and slamming his fist forwards, only for it to stop suddenly at the same point his body reached.
There was no impact - no sound that indicated he'd touched anything. He just seemed to stop here as if his body physically couldn't go any further.
...
"What's… going on?" Happy yelled as he tried to haul Gajeel forwards to no effect whatsoever. The blue cat flapped backwards slightly to draw Gajeel away and then zoomed forwards again, only for Gajeel to suddenly stop at the same point as if he was being repelled by a giant magnet and couldn't get a single step further.
"Oi, stop that!" Gajeel grunted as he felt his face flatten against something he couldn't see.
"It looks like the castle has some kind of magical defences," Mavis noted as she hovered through whatever it was that was blocking Gajeel's way.
"Runes, maybe?" Charla asked.
"Don't feel like runes to me," Gajeel muttered as he pushed himself back. "Runes felt solid. This just feels like the air itself is trying stopping me from going through."
"No but it may be the same kind of principle," Mavis pointed out. "Some kind of magical barrier that's preventing humans from entering the premises without being invited. I'm guess they don't have a defence against ghosts and flying cats or the rest of us might not be able to get through either."
"Put me down, Blue Cat," Gajeel grunted, and Happy obeyed, lowering him towards the floor as the Iron Dragon Slayer glared at the towering structure before him.
"Think you can keep out Gajeel Redfox, do you?" he murmured. "Bring it on. One way or another I'm busting in there. You can count on it!"
...
Tonks' brain was absolutely reeling from the information overload she was receiving. Lisanna seemed to be the one doing most of the talking and Gray and Juvia both seemed quite happy to let her - it seemed she was a better storyteller than they were. But everything she was saying… it was so much to take in.
More and more, the Metamorphmagus believed that this trio of incredible youngsters really were from another world. Everything Lisanna was saying jarred with everything Tonks knew about her own world, from the fact that the Muggles in their world not only knew about magic but asked for help from it with the magic users more than eager to oblige, to talking dragons, to the guild system - both light and dark - and everything else like it.
It was unfathomable.
Yet she didn't doubt a word of it.
Yet at the same time she was constantly asking herself how two separate worlds, both with magic in the air, could be so utterly and completely different from one another even without delving into the differences between magic itself. It seemed that magic for this lot wasn't about learning an assortment of different spells and theories that could help them accomplish multiple different tasks like levitating something to a high shelf, cheering somebody up, turning cutlery into crockery or anything like that. There were dozens and dozens of different magical types for them, each with a specific focus. In fact, when Tonks had demonstrated a little transfiguration by turning one of her cushions into a teddy bear, all three of them had found that astounding.
"This is all so much to take in," she rubbed her forehead slightly, leaning back in her chair thoughtfully. "You guys are… freaking mental. And what the heck am I supposed to do with you now? I can't very well let you stay here eating through my food but can I just let you go off and do your own thing. Nobody in this world has seen anything like you - you could be a one-way freight train to disaster under the wrong circumstances."
"And yet we cannot stay even if we wanted to," Gray pointed out. "We've got friends to find. And trust me, if we don't find Natsu before he goes and blows something up there will definitely be a one-way freight train to disaster."
"Blows something up?" Tonks blinked before she gasped and sat up. "The bank! I forgot to ask you about the bank!"
"Ask us about the what?" Juvia frowned. "What have riversides got to do with any of this?"
"Riv… You guys don't even have banks in… well, never mind. It's not important. All you need to know is that in this world, banks are places where people go to keep their money safe when they're not using it."
"Store their money? That's an utterly ludicrous idea. Why not just keep it in a safe or something like any sane person would?" Gray scoffed.
"Well, it doesn't matter. It's hard to explain the concept of a bank but the point is, yesterday in a place called Portree miles and miles and miles to the north of here some young men broke into a bank and tried to steal the money there…"
"Yep, see, stupid idea," Gray confirmed.
"Well people's personal money wouldn't have been… oh why am I defending Muggle banks anyway? The point is people broke it to try and rob the place except they were very quickly stopped by a man with extremely strange magic who destroyed half the bank in the process. My boss, Scrimgeour, and the rest of the Aurors are trying to find this guy before he exposes magic to the Muggles. Does that sound like he could be this Natsu guy? The man what looked like a freaking tornado out of his mouth!"
"Sounds very Natsu to me," Lisanna beamed slightly. "What did he look like?"
"Rather tall guy, strong arms, very long very messy black hair… oh and he seemed to turn his arm into some kind of club as well to smack the robbers with."
"Oh, that's not Natsu," Gray replied. "But it sounds like someone else we know."
"Gajeel-kun!" Juvia breathed. "It must have been Gajeel-kun."
"Who's Gajeel-kun?" Tonks blinked, not missing the fact that while Lisanna still had a look of relief on her face, she had ever-so-slightly deflated at this news that it was not Natsu.
"Gajeel is one of those Dragon Slayers we told you about," Gray nodded. "The Iron Dragon Slayer. He's not really got Natsu's penchant for blowing things up but the guy's got just about as much subtlety as him in battle. As in, none at all."
"Oh, don't pretend you don't break things all the time while on jobs yourself, Gray," Lisanna rolled her eyes slightly. "And you've taken your shirt off again."
"DAMNIT!"
"Gray-sama… stop showing your abs to all the other girls!"
"Ooookay," Tonks replied, as she pushed herself to her feet and stretched slightly. "Well at least you know that there's someone else you know in this world now. I suppose that can be your next step - tracking this guy down before he breaks something else maybe. Though how you'll find him I don't know. But anyway, I really need some sleep. I've been up for over twenty-four hours now so I could do with some shut-eye. Feel free to kip wherever you like. Heck, Gray and Juvia you can snuggle up on the sofa together for all I care…"
"THAT'S NOT GOING TO HAPPEN!" Gray immediately bellowed with a violent jerk while Juvia went red as a cherry and clapped her hands over her cheeks, murmuring something that sounded suspiciously like:- "Aah… Juvia and Gray-sama… snuggling together… Gray-sama could use Juvia's chest as a pillow… and…" before Lisanna suddenly covered her mouth before she could get too into it, hoping Gray hadn't heard that.
But he had. And he also hadn't put his shirt back on yet.
"Riiight…" Tonks scratched her arm, eyes flicking to each of her sudden houseguests, guessing she'd trodden on some very awkward territory there from the way Juvia was looking down at her boots and Gray was determinedly looking anywhere but at her. "Well… as was, er… saying, you can kip anywhere you want - sorry I don't really have anywhere specific but I'm not exactly used to houseguests. Anyway, I need to…"
She stopped, blinking, when she spotted something which in all her excitement and amazement before she had totally failed to notice - there was an unopened envelope sitting on her table not far from her open window. She immediately crossed over to it and ripped it open, pulling out a hastily scrawled note inside:-
Emergency meeting at nine o'clock tonight. Be there if you can make it.
She recognised the writing as the relatively neat quillmanship of Remus Lupin - even though she hadn't know the guy for very long he was one of the neatest of the Order members despite his shabby appearance. Regardless, her head snapped up to stare at the clock on the wall and yelped when she spotted that it was now eight past nine, meaning she was already late.
"Something wrong?" Lisanna asked.
"No, nothing's wrong but I've just learned I'm late for something important!" Tonks immediately hurried to her fireplace and scooped up some Floo Powder. "Do whatever you want. Hopefully I'll be back soon."
"Where you going?" Gray demanded.
"Secret," Tonks replied as she stepped into the fireplace, swung around and cried, "12 Grimmauld Place!"
All three of the Fairy Tail members yelled as Tonks was immediately engulfed by green flames the moment she dropped the Floo Powder to her feet. Juvia acted immediately and flung a wall of water in an attempt to douse the flames, but just as it splashed over Tonks she suddenly vanished, as if she'd been whipped down into the flames and out of sight.
"…What… just happened?" Gray muttered after a short blanket of silence.
"Um… I'm guessing some kind of magical transportation of this world," Lisanna murmured. "We used to be able to transport the entire guild from place to place in Edolas. Well… Levy did."
"She could have warned us though," Gray sighed.
Juvia picked up the note that Tonks had found and read it through herself but couldn't glean anything from it. "Juvia wonders where she went," she murmured.
...
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