A week later in Gran Doma's office.
Gran Doma was doing his business as usual. New laws to discuss some political rivals to convince some movements problematic Fairy Tail. Sometimes it was very tiring. Then he relaxed his mind by watching the broken sculpture. Yes it was still there. Someone even tried to fix it using tape and glue but didn't finish it. For some reason this picture was making his days brighter despite his sincere belief that such mess being here is improper.
'I have to be careful. This girl is not a wrong disciple but she also has a corrupting influence on me.'
He had a decent idea about what she was doing because everyone she had contact with informed him about her deeds. Training with lacrima on lessons. Using Gran Doma's name to threaten directors to... let her use training grounds. Using a library without the card. Contacting with mother without school's post office. Arguing with teachers about... methods of justifying the 'so called' phenomenons of harmony in magic devices. Complaining about not presenting more naturalistic points of view about the meaning of order in the context of casting spells while presenting wordy concepts of ancient forms of rationalism. Her problems clearly showed that she needs to learn more about theories of esthetic judgment and relations between feelings of selfless pleasure pure reason and intellect but... this may be true also for other students... or teachers even.
'Is it really what worries me? Or...'
*knock* knock*
This time Gran Doma was alone meaning he can let them in without previously redirecting them to the special room.
To his surprise the knocking one was... Layla.
"Good morning Mr. Gran Doma."
"Good morning. Actually I expected you to come with Lucy that day but you didn't. Now you're coming without warning. What's the matter?"
"Then it wasn't necessary to come in person. Lucy is quite independent. She can bear whatever you will throw at her. Did she please you by the way?"
Layla wondered about what's Gran Doma's view on his disciple. She knows that despite having some aspirations to be her good mother Lucy's not a child anymore. She can only support her in whatever she wants to achieve. But Gran Doma doesn't know yet.
"It's still irresponsible to leave your children alone. You should understand what I'm talking about. Do you remember what happened to you after your mother died?"
"I remember. I had nowhere to go and had to live on my own even after I met you. But what do you mean?"
"To live happy lives we need order. We need to live with parents have home to which we can return after experiencing everyday contingencies of fate. We need rules that'll keep our lives stable and rather free from crimes and to find our place in the world. Lucy is not an exception. She's just young so she can't appreciate the real value of those."
"Do you even think we can provide her with that and keep her safe from the world?"
"I hope so. What I mean is that Lucy is not really happy. Trying to get her perspective... she seems to expect that something will come. Something big and fatal. Something that will take everything from her. She doesn't want to wait for me to give her student card. Instead she's using my name to play with the director. She's acting like she doesn't have even time to spend. Am I wrong?"
"In fact no. You're right. She's like that. Sometimes a bit nasty and careless. And it may be partially my fault."
"Did something happen in your home?"
"Yes... no... it's much more simple than you think yet not simple at all."
"Explain. I have time."
"Yes you have probably 18 years of life to spend and that's all. The future is knocking on her door. The knocking is so loud that she can't deny that she heard it. Did you know about children born with oracle talents?"
"So she knows when I'm going to die? How?"
"Just killed by some Zeref's demons. Knowing this you can't just sit and do nothing. Our world is not a safe one and it rather won't become. We can't pretend it's different. Some time ago Lucy told me that I'm going to die for 3 years from now because of using too powerful spell without complete form resonance. Do you think I can happy with that?"
"No you probably also can't be happy despite seeing you're having some fun here. But how? Why do you think it's even reliable to believe her?"
"Because she already knows things that are way too beyond her age. Me being a bad parent can't explain that. Did you test her by any chance?"
"My best purification barrier didn't detect any signs of possession. Probably there's no evil magic in her. Probably. She passed my exam with almost flying colors. I didn't ask her about motives because... because children facing adults have some kind of tendencies to have a problem with telling the truth even if it doesn't hurt to tell it at all. She asked me about the possibility of Acnologia being the effect of a stronger being blessing the dragon. Can you perhaps tell me something more about this 'future'?"
"So Mr Gran Doma is still sharp. I'm here to talk about one of the concerns involving this 'future'."
"I'm listening."
"There's someone working for the Research Bureau. He prefers to call himself Brain."
"Our best researcher. He earned this name with his reputation. What about him?"
"He conducts involuntary experiments on humans to increase their magic potential. In the future he's going to leave researchers and make his dark guild and put his hands on an ancient tool using magic power to change people's characters called Nirvana."
"He dares..."
"Unfortunately. And there're two clear traces of his doings. First he actually sent an assassin to kill me."
Gran Doma raised his eyebrows in surprised expression.
"What? Is he alive at least?"
Layla smiled and raising a hand to gesture like this incident was nothing.
"Barely. With me as his target he failed miserably of course. Second there's a child with strong magic power. She's a daughter of a wizard with an ability to create ice and probably the only product of those experiments that managed to survive. I won't say more about her before you swear you're not going to put her in jail or something."
"You... *sigh* You don't trust me? We're the Magic Council. We guard the safety of Ishgar and prevent guilds from making..."
"Yes I don't trust you. Actually I don't trust you for those reasons."
"But it was Brain right?"
"Everything has a price. Even maintaining order. However she shouldn't be the one to pay it."
"It sounds like you have a person to pay the price already."
"Not really. I don't even know the price yet."
"So do you want the price to not be paid? What's the point of talking about unknown prices of unknown things?"
"It just depends on what price Brain is able to pay and what consequences his actions will bear."
"Okay. I swear. Who is she?"
"Ultear."
"I... understand."
"You would just try to turn her into your double agent working for the sake of inflirtation of Brain which would be kind of stupid and would leave you with an untrustworthy person too close to you. Don't misunderstand. She will be useful but first we have to solve her own problems. Words and even your love are not enough despite that she may say different."
"What a pain for such a child to have this kind of character. So what do you want to do?"
"To take Makarov with me and crush Brain secretly."
"How will it affect the reputation of the Council?"
He knows already what it's all about. She needs him because he's a politician and in times of peace relations between politicians are diplomatic. He needs to deal with the diplomatic aspect of her plan. The problem then is: Who should be convinced?
"Just think a little about the best scenario you can turn it into. Winners can write their version of the history. It can be written without Fairy Tail for example."
"Are you fine with this?"
"If it was other member of Fairy Tail that is involved Makarov would say something against it but this time the secrecy guarantees the safety of his children."
"Does Lucy know?"
"Lucy is going to act with or without concerns about acts of adults. She's determined to change the future so she'll try to do something. The only thing we can change is to let her go with our blessing or deny it. Denying it means that we disapprove plan to crush Brain."
"Why can't we have both defeating Brain and her safe?"
"We can but she can't just do nothing about us risking to defeat Brain."
"*Sigh* You know. If not for your abilities to lead the future to the 'right place' with absurd moves proving otherwise I would say you're just crazy."
"It's not anything special. In fact everyone can learn it."
"Sure. That's why it gives unexpected conclusions based on unexpected statements."
"Like most of good ethical arguments for politics."
"Layla do you think... Can I... at least go with you? I want to see it myself. At least we should do something to be able to prove that we did the right thing. Otherwise it would be like for most of situations with... Fairy Tail."
"Sure. You don't even have to ask us. You should have some fun."
...
"Remember to feel the symbolic form of the star. You have to comprehend it like any other element wizards learn to manipulate. Otherwise your intent behind spells will be unclear. Again!"
Getting another portion of Hayako's comments Lucy tried again. Her fingers were a bit red and arms had light burns here and there. That was a clear sign that her body didn't adapt to the use of star attribute in this way. Sometimes sparks flew in unexpected directions. They wanted to fly everywhere when Lucy wanted to force them to fly in one direction. From holes in the ground strange fumes were giving of. Another four pointed star formed slowly on finger tips. It rotated a few times taking on a stronger flash.
*POW*
A magic bullet hit the puppet's certain vital place.
"Lucy... you have strange taste. Don't make me comment it further."
"I'm sorry. Direction is still somewhat random. Should it be like this?"
"Your mother is coming here. Let's take a little break."
"Hmm?"
Layla seemed to be a little brighter than usual. Lucy wondered about what kind of relationship she shares with Mrs Hayako.
"Long time not see Hayako. How long it is already?"
"Two years I think. We haven't talked since I decided to look for my children."
"Any progress?"
"No I found everyone dead or missing. The village was practically burned down. I gave up."
"Hayako..."
"Don't look at me like that. We can't change anything and if I could I swear I would do that. But I can't so it doesn't matter."
"Want to go somewhere? I want to hear about what you found."
"Later. Lucy is training one of my own spells. She's taking a little break and we're going to start again."
"Hi mom!"
In the background of that scene the puppet was looking with literal tears in its eyes and a painful expression.
...
In basements of secret laboratories were happening quite scary things. Sometimes someone was kept to be tortured. Mostly they were used as a place to throw away things or to keep wood needed to fill the furnace. Once a certain dark guild used basements of the royal palace as their main base. Their reasoning was: Officials always enjoyed pretending that the problems they say that they want to be solved have to be solved by doing great investments including making use of great amounts of money and traveling great distances. Therefore officials were looking for vacation. Is there any place worse for vacation than a dark basement being right under the place where they work? Unfortunately they didn't predict that people are able to consider it as a good place for a holiday if only you sprinkle some salt on the floor and walls while placing dim lights and loungers.
Basement used to prison Severin was one of the similar places trying to color his situations as just a bit extended vacation. I wouldn't not fail in the end but it was worth trying. Brain was always experiencing problems with their test subjects because they were kind of unwilling to bring him satisfying results. They didn't have the will to succeed so they were dying one by one. Ultear's example made him change his approach. It's not enough to sincerely experiment on people and pray for success while they're begging for the end of whatever he does to them. He needs their prayers too. So this time he decided to prepare his guinea pig more carefully.
"Face the reality! Your dad doesn't care about you anymore! He brought you here and did some visits to me to pretend it's different but now he thinks it's too inconvenient! He decided to leave you and to stop doing jobs for me abandoning you in your sickness. Do you understand?"
"No! I don't believe you! He wouldn't..."
"Yes he would. Let me show you something."
Brain showed a recording lacrima. Special kind of device used to make information last must longer. He used it to record the message from Layla because it was a convenient way to analyze her when she is his new enemy.
"This lacrima contains recordings of the last message from your dad. See!"
'In fact this is my manipulated version to make him think that he's allied with Layla but he doesn't need to know the truth. Of course she just killed Kibbe! But that boy doesn't need to know.'
The boy watched fragments of Layla's mocks combined with Kibbe's fake declarations of not having any interest in Severin anymore which Kibbe himself once recorded in his attempt to deceive Brain. Unfortunately Brain found out it's fake because Kibbe's acting was bad. There was still a use for this. After manipulating the video a bit of bad acting could be covered and it would seem like he really didn't care about Severin and voila! Brain just enjoyed his masterpiece doing a thing for him. Breaking the child's spirit is easy.
"Daddy... won't come for me!"
"Sad truth."
"Can I convince him to..."
"No I experienced something like this before. This world doesn't care about our sadness. Maybe... there's a way..."
"Tell me!"
"I don't know. I don't know. Do I know?"
"But you seem to know!"
"Kids these days... yes I know something but are sure you want it?"
"Yes!"
"So I'll tell you. This world cares mostly about power! If you have the power you can change reality. Do you have the power?"
"I.... I don't."
"Indeed. So you have first to get the power."
"How can I get it mr Brain?"
"You can call me uncle Brain. There are a lot of ways to get power but all of them have two things in common: Strong determination and sacrificing something. Even ordinary training requires some pain to give the result. In your case the therapy you have to endure is indeed painfull but it's also a way to make you healthy which means making you stronger."
"Are you doing this for me?"
"Yes. You see. I also need the power but my determination isn't strong so I can't change my fate. The fate of being weak. But you're different Severin. I believe that you can do it. It'll bring you more pain but if you endure it and truly believe in your prayers they can be heard. I wanted to heal you faster but I'm scared that you won't endure that much pain."
Brain played with Severin that way a little and in the end the result was more than satisfying. He will make him believe that he can become some kind of hero or protagonist and because he is the source of such hopes Severin will place his hopes in him. And that's what Brain needs to succeed: trust.
"Uncle Brain I want to try harder."
After those words were said he did know that he need only to create some tension. He performed a few seconds of silence and a little long 'hm' sounding a bit like Minecraft villager and not letting the boy realize the unnatural characteristics of the tension he said.
"It takes a few days to prepare everything. Set yourself until then. You're going to get healthier than a fish."