"And now, I have officially had my fill of royalty..." said Mikoto collapsing on the bed in her room.
"You had to do a lot today, that's for sure." said Elli climbing onto the bed and lying right next to Mikoto's head. "You looked really pretty doing everything though!"
"Well 'pretty' isn't exactly my style." said Mikoto. "It's already enough I have to represent Tokwadai for everything....now I have to do this...I'll be glad when this job is over."
"Are you sure?" said Elli. "I think it's cool that you have someone related to you on your dragon side."
"Well okay, that part was nice." said Mikoto. "But considering what she has to go through every day...well..."
Mikoto sat up and took her crown off. She stared at the intricate jewels for a moment. She didn't know how to explain it, but the crown scared her. Somehow, she felt like she became a completely different person when she put it on. Of course such a thought was ridiculous. She was still the same person wearing the crown as she was not wearing it.
But the crown seemed to represent a bridge between two completely different worlds. In one world, lay the 3rd strongest level 5 and the strongest Dragon Slayer in Fairy Tail. This Mikoto was free to do what she wished, free to explore, love, cry, and laugh.
In the other world, the world where the crown was worn, Was the princess of Fulmen. A girl who just sat on a shelf looking pretty while her kingdom suffered from an arrogant snob, being able to do absolutely nothing about it.
Mikoto put the crown on her bedside table and tried her best to ignore it. "I'm no princess...."
"Mikoto...." said Elli. Elli flew into Mikoto's lap. "We'll find the people who are trying to kill the princess....don't worry."
"It's not that I'm worried about." said Mikoto. "It's Hope....she's only got so many years until she turns 18 and has to get all this responsibility. And yet she has to spend all those years being a prisoner in her own home....It's stupid."
"Yeah...if only there was some way we could just all sneak out and show her a good time.." said Elli.
"Wait...." said Mikoto. "That's actually an idea..."
Before Mikoto could think more on this tough, there was a knock at the door.
"It's open!" said Mikoto.
The door opened and Hope peaked in. "Sorry to bother you and all.....but it's almost time to go to that reception..."
"Oh yeah." groaned Mikoto. "That thing...."
"I-I was wondering...." said Hope. "Could we talk...?"
"Eh? What about?"
"It's just that....well, it's what needs to happen if the assasins succeed in killing me.."
"What?" said Mikoto. "Don't worry about it! We won't let anything happen to you!"
"I know..." said Hope. "But if there's one thing that my father taught me before he died...it's that a princess's responsibility is to her people...and I need to be prepared in case...you know."
"Well, what do you need?" said Mikoto.
Hope took a deep breath. "Umm Mikoto.....I know we've only known each other for about 2 days....but do you see me as family?"
"Well, yeah I guess." said Mikoto. "I've got a pretty strange family anyways...so I guess I do..."
"And family always sticks together right? And helps each other when things get rough..."
"Yeah, sure."
"I-I need you to promise me that..." Hope took another deep breath. "I need you to promise me that if I die...you'll take my place as ruler when you turn 18.."
"W-what?!" said Mikoto. "M-me? But I don't know anything about ruling a kingdom or anything!"
"It's either you, or Constantine takes the throne." said Hope. "He doesn't have complete control now...but he's already militarized alot of Fulmen...I don't know what he's planning....but he can't take complete control, not as long as their is still somebody with Thundaarix's blood in line for the throne."
Mikoto paused. She didn't know what to do. The crown seemed to glimmer ominously from it's place on her bedside table. What should she do?
Suddenly, tears began to well up in Hope's eyes and she held Mikoto's hands desperately. "Pl-please....I-I don't know what to do! There aren't any other heirs......Y-you don't have to do it....but...I don't know where else to turn...."
Mikoto looked into those tearful eyes...the eyes which were like a reflection of her own.
Mikoto hugged Hope tightly. "Don't you worry.....I won't let this place go down the drain....I promise."
Hope sniffled. "I'm so sorry...it feels like I'm forcing this on you..."
Mikoto smiled. "You know...I think I probably would have done it anyways....even if you hadn't asked."
Suddenly there was sound of more sobbing. Elli was wiping her eyes with a tissure. "Waaaaahhh!! I-it's just s-so touching!!!"2
5 minutes later: Edge of Fulmen at the Museum for Unique known and unknown artifacts.
"Well this place is a dump.." Muttered Natsu as he looked at the extremely old looking museum. "Ya sure this is the place?"
Mikoto looked at the invitation and narrowed her eyes. "Yep...this is the place....I think."
Mikoto, Hope, Natsu, Happy, Lucy, and Elli had almost gotten lost on their way thanks to the fact that they were constantly surrounded by a multitude of gaurds. It was like having a thick wall made of armored men that constantly surrounded you.
"Would you like us to come inside M'ladies?" asked one of the gaurds.
"That won't be necessary, thank you." said Hope bowing her head slightly. "Just wait outside..."
The gaurds nodded and they lined up on either side of the museum's doorway as the group entered the old building.
Inside, the museum looked like a completely different structure altogether. There were beautiful chandeliers hanging from the cieling, and the inside was full of guests just wandering around and looking at the exhibits.
"Nothing to suggest a trap here." muttered Mikoto as she looked around the place. "But I can't seem to shake theis weird feeling that something bad is about to happen."
"How can anything bad happen!?" said Natsu as he stuffed some food from a waiter's tray into his mouth. "Mmmfff the food here is sooooo good...mmmmff."
"Aye!" agreed Happy as he stuffed some sushi into his mouth.
"Guys, just because the food here is good, doesn't mean that we shouldn't be on our gaurd." said Lucy.
"We are being on our gaurd!" said Happy. "We're checking all the fish for poison!!"
"Yep!!" said Natsu taking a bite of a mini sandwhich. "No poison here.....though maybe I should take another bite to be sure.....yep, no poison!! Hey Happy, let's check that guy's tray next!"
"Aye Sir!!"
The twosome happily chased after the other waiter as the one who had just had his tray completely emptied sighed and went back to gather more food."
"And the hungry monster has been unleashed." said Mikoto. "Everyone get to the bunkers."1
"Hide your ham and hide your horses." said Lucy. "Cause now, anything edible is about to be gone."
"Are those two really that enthusiastic about food?" asked Hope.
"You bet." said Mikoto. "The last time I took them to an all you can eat Buffet back in Academy City, we got kicked out because those two were eating too much of the food."1
"And the last time we went to see a movie." said Elli. "We got kicked out because Natsu and Happy were caught in the concessions eating all the popcorn and hotdogs."
"I think I should probably go make sure Natsu doesn't make the same mistake again..." said Lucy. "If you need anything, you know where to find us."
As Lucy went off to stop Natsu from stealing food out of people's hands, Grimmix came out of the crowd and bowed. "Hello your majesties. I am so glad you could make it."
"Ummm....right." said Mikoto. "So do we just.....walk around or something?"
"Yes, yes....do enjoy yourselves." said Grimmix. "Feel free to check out all the artifacts, oh and before I forget...do keep a sharp eye out won't you? I'm afraid an uninvited guest made it in here just before you arrived......"
Mikoto and Hope looked at each other a little worriedly. An uninvited guest....? Could it be one of the assasins? But it just seemed too obvious.
"We'll keep on our gaurd." said Mikoto. "Thanks for telling us..."
Grimmix nodded and as he turned away, Mikoto almost thought she could see him hiding a slight smile. Before she could think much on this however, Elli held up a plate to her. "Hey Mikoto! You wanna try this shrimp? It's really good."
"Er sure..thanks."
"You think the uninvited guest might be an assasin?" said Hope.
"I don't know.." said Mikoto. "It just seems too obvious. The guy who attacked me was definitely no amateur."
Mikoto looked around the room, trying to see if she could spot Oblitesco in the crowd. But of course, even if they knew he was here, he could still probably use some sort of concealment magic or something. Then again.....who said they would send Oblitesco again?
Mikoto felt the necklace that Nicole had given her. It wouldn't be any use here. It wasn't designed to detect specific presences.....there were just too many people.
That's when Mikoto saw it. A middle aged man who looked to be in his thirties with a beard and well featured face was walking through a dark door at the end of the museum....a man whom Mikoto knew well..
"D-Dad?" Mikoto stuttered. Mikoto started pushing through the crowd frantically trying to get to the door Tabigake Misaka had just walked through as Hope and Elli followed her.
"Mikoto wait! What's wrong!?" said Elli.
Mikoto didn't answer, instead she pushed right over to the door ad opened it. It was almost completely dark inside, obviously this area of the museum was closed off. But Mikoto ignored the darkness and stepped through with Elli and Hope close behind.
Mikoto looked around, but she could find no sign of her father. "Dad!? DAD!"
Suddenly the door closed with a slam. Hope ran over and tried to open it. "It's locked from the outside!"
Hope clenched her fist and it became engulfed in powerful yellow lightning. She rammed her fist against the door, but still it held strong.
"Stand back!" said Mikoto. Her bangs flashed, and a powerful lightning bolt collided with the door. But almost as if the door were Touma's Imagine Breaker, it just stood there without a single scratch.
"Dang it!!!" shouted Mikoto. "I just led us into a freaking trap!!"
"Not a bad assesment." Mikoto stiffened as the whoever was speaking touched the tip of a gun to the back of her head. "But it's already too late."
Aeros stood there with a hand gun that was covered in a series of magic ruins. Mikoto assumed she must have been a specialist in gun magic. She'd only seen gun magic a few times when Bisca had given her a demonstration back at the Fairy Tail guild hall...but she knew the basic concept..
"Let her go!!" said Hope angrilly as she began to crackle with powerful yellow lightning, a few electric dragon spines could be seen coming out of her back. (A Dragon Born's ability depends on the nature of the person. Therefore, even though she is also a Thunder Dragon Born, Hope Ellendiel does not posses wings, instead, her ability is a little different.)
"You best behave yourself." said Aeros. "My gun is known as the One-Hit Hurricane. It shoots pressurized air powerful enough to punch through 80 layers of dragon scales. One wrong move from any of you....and you can start picking up what's left of the Railgun's brains from the walls and cieling.1
"Oh, well that would definitely be a smart plan..." said another voice. "If she didn't have any unexpected backup that is."
Aeros's eyes widened as she felt an ordinary hand gun against her head. Tabigake Misaka was standing there with a grin on his face. "Now I would appreciate it if you removed that unsightly thing from my daughter's vital area please..."
"D-dad!? You're not an illusion!?" said Mikoto with utter shock.
"Of course I'm not an illusion!" said Tabigake. "And wouldn't a hello to your father be nice now and then?"
"You're Mikoto's dad!?" said Elli. "Wow!! It's nice to meet you!"
"I'll save the introductions for after we get this lady to kindly put down her weapon." said Tabigake as he jabbed the gun further against Aeros's head.
"But it will be you puts down his weapon first." A familiar shadowy knife appeared near Tabigake's neck as Oblitesco rose out of the darkness like a black shadow. "Now do as I say...."
"And you had better do so yourself.." A giant shadowy moaning talon pointed a claw to the back of Oblitesco's head. Nicole Mavros gave the assasins a demonic look. "My spirits have been keeping an eye on Mikoto and Hope just in case something like this happened.....now put down your weapons, or I'll rip out this man's eyes."4
"No, you surrender, or I'll kill her right here!" said Aeros.
"If you do that, I'll shoot you in the head!" said Tabigake.
"uh....uhh...uhh.." said Hope. "Wh-what am I looking at!?"4
"They're in some kind of stand off!!" said Elli. "It's so confusing!!"
Everyone just stood there for a moment. Mikoto tried to frantically think of some way to get out of this....but at the moment she was at a loss for ideas. If she zapped Aeros right there, Oblitesco would probably kill her father....if that was her real father...she still didn't know if it was some clever trick used by the assasins. It was a standoff alright.....
Well, thought Mikoto, I might as well take advantage of this situation somehow.
"Hey....." said Mikoto. "So why don't you tell me why you want to kill the heir to the thrones so bad?!"
"We don't want to kill you.." said Aeros. "Neither do we not want to...we're hired mercenaries, we don't think much on this kind of subject..."
"Well then...why don't you tell us why your boss wants us dead?" said Mikoto. "Since you're about to kill me anyways, it couldn't hurt to tell could it?"
"I'm not that naive." said Aeros. "My proffesion does not take pleasure in gloating in a target's downfall, you're just another job that needs to get done...end of story."
"What a harsh existance." said Tabigake. "Don't you ever get tired of just blankly killing all those nameless faces? Do you ever remember the ones you've killed?"
"Now that would be just pointless." said Oblitesco. "A job is a job and nothing more. And now, that job is about to be completed."
"Well I'm sorry about that." said Nicole. "But that's actually quite the contrary. NOW NATSU!!!"
"Iron Fist of the Fire Dragon!!!" The ground beneath Oblitesco's feet smashed apart as Natsu came bursting through the ground and punching Oblitesco right in the chin with a flame engulfed fist.
Caught completely off gaurd, Aeros staggered away from the scene. Mikoto took advantage of this and blasted at Aeros with a powerful stream of lightniing. Aeros jumped out of the way with the same astounding speed her partner possesed and fired her gun at Mikoto.
A massive glowing sphere surrounded by a powerful gust of wind shot at Mikoto. In just the nick of time, Mikoto activated her Thunder Dragon wings and blocked the move, which drilled into the wings's lightning surface for a moment before finally dissapating.
"Dang, that is a powerful gun.." said Mikoto.
"It gets better." said Aeros with a sinister smile. "Flesh Seeker!!"
Two more projectiles shot out of the gun, and this time, they curved around Mikoto's wings and colided straight with her back in a large explosion. Mikoto fell to the ground koffing as she was surrounded by smoke.
"Wind Razer!!!!" Aeros fired her gun again, this time a massive blast of wind blew Mikoto against the wall and cracked the concrete at her back.
"You're begging for a beating lady!!" shouted Natsu as he threw Oblitesco straight into Aeros.
The two assasins tumbled right at Nicole's feet who had morphed her talons into ghostly battle axes.
"Executioner of The Ghost Dragon!!!" Nicole bought the two battle axes swinging downward with deadly force.
The two assasins dodged the blow with a streak of lightning quick speed, leaving a crater where the two deadly axes connected with the ground.
"Shadow River!!" Oblitesco pointed a finger at Nicole and a blast of dark energy shot out from it..
Nicole reformed her talons and grabbed the energy blast with the ghostly claws and crushed it into nothingness. "Sorry, but spirits live within the darkness....your tricks won't work on me. ROAR OF THE GHOST DRAGON!!!"
Nicole shot a tornado of purple moaning energy with tortured faces swirling around in it. The blast of specter energy crashed right into Oblitesco head on and blew him straight into the wall.
"Hey!" said Tabigake. "Has anyone noticed that no matter how much damage we do, the room is somehow staying intact!?"
"They enchanted the room so me and Hope couldn't escape." said Mikoto gritting her teeth. "But it looks like they didn't enchant the floor since Natsu was able to get in....speaking of which, where's Lucy!?"
Suddenly the ground burst open again, and a cow man wielding an axe jumped out with Lucy not far behind.
"MOOOOOO!!!!" shouted Taurus. "How was that Lucy my beloved hot queen!?"
"Great! And don't call me that!" said Lucy.
"So let me get this straight." said Tabigake. "Your friends couldn't get in the traditional way.....so they dug their way in instead!?"4
"Uh huh." said Mikoto.
"You really have made some odd friends." said Tabigake. "I like it!!"1
Mikoto's eyes suddenly widened. "DAD!! DUCK!!!"
Mikoto pushed her father to the ground and enclosed her wings over them as more powerful air projectiles blasted into the electric surface.
Taurus jumped in, swinging his massive axe at the quick Aeros. Aeros jumped back and fired her gun again, the air blasted a hole straight through Taurus's chest.
"AGGGHHHH!! brought down by a beautiful woman!" said Taurus as he dissapeared in golden light. "SO HOT!!!"
"Pervert..." Lucy muttered as she brought out another gold key. "Open, Gate of The Giant Crab!! Cancer!!"
A tan skinned man with crab legs, shades and design hair clippers appeared. " Do you wish for me to give you a new hair trim? Ebi!"
"Take her out!!"
"But I haven't dated in ages! Ebi!"
"I meant take her down!!" Shouted Lucy. "And give her a haircut that'll scare even a blind man away!!"
"As you wish!! Ebi!!"
Cancer moved with blinding speed and slided in diced with his hair clippers. "Ebi!! Ebi!! Ebi!!!"
But Aeros proved to be faster and easily dodged the blows.
Nicole and Mikoto suddenly both appeared behind Aeros. Mikoto used a lightning engulfed hand to grab one arm while Nicole grabbed the other with a shadow talon. Together, the two of them pinned Aeros to the wall.
"You're not getting out of this!!!" growled Mikoto. "I'm already in a bad mood!!"
Cancer moved in to deal the finishing blow. But before he could, a serpent made completely of darkness slithered quickly from behind and wrapped around Cancer, constricting quickly and dissapating Cancer into golden light.
"It takes more then pathetic Dragon Slayer magic to take me down..." said Oblitesco dusting himself off and looking quite unharmed.
"Wh-what's with this guy!!" said Nicole. "I thought I took him out!!"
"Tell me about it.." said MIkoto. "I swear, I hit that guy with over 1 billion volts and he still got up afterwords." ( As an esper, Mikoto is capable of generating a maximum of about 1 billion volts. When in Thunder Dragon mode however, the amount of voltage increases exponentially. It is currently unknown what the maximum voltage is now, as it hasn't yet been measured by Tokwadai's esper programs.)
"Then we just have to hit him harder!!" shouted Natsu. "WING SLASH OF THE FIRE DRAGON!!!!!!"
Natsu whipped his fists around and blasted two big slashes of fire onto Oblitesco. Oblitesco powered through the blow and punched Natsu straight in the face, causing him to fly into the cieling. And had the cieling not been enchanted, the whole building might have collapsed right there.
Aeros smiled, and used the distraction to kick Mikoto and Nicole away from herself.
"We would love to stay..." said Aeros jumping to stand next to Oblitesco. "But it seems we are outmatched here......goodbye."
"No WAIT!!" Mikoto puffed up her cheeks. "ROAR OF THE THUNDER DRAGON!!."
Before the massive twister of white lightning hit however, Aeros and Oblitesco dissapeared in puffs of smoke. Mikoto punched the ground angrilly. "DARN IT!!"
"They'll be back..." said Lucy.
"I know.." said Mikoto. "But now....I think we have a bigger issue...."
"Eh?"
Mikoto turned to look at Tabigake Misaka. "What.....the heck...are you doing here!!?"