Day Three

[Gildarts]

"It's time you learned your lesson."


The rush of battle had reached a sticky calm. Sticky as the blood that had splattered on his body and blade, caking in crimson layers over his bandaged skin.

The victim clattered to the ground in a dense lump, Erza and Guu's eyes stayed down on the corpse with youthful shock as Samus nodded to her male ally in acknowledgement and readjusted a bit of her disjointed armor. After eying the shortest of the group and reading the minute movements advocating Erza's trust, Samus slung the great canon into an eased position.

Gildarts was still a bit swept in the battle as he had lowered his blade but not his guard. He seemed suspicious as to what Karl would throw at him next, or if the ninja's body would come back to life. Still, the veteran hadn't meant to completely kill him, only teach the guy a lesson. His brown eyes hung on the once-live man, You fought well, but you chose the wrong enemies, and hurt my dearest friend.

With this closure, his boiling blood began to simmer and cool; Gildarts let his eyes move up to Erza, who seemed to be looking back at the auburn-haired male too. With a relieved smile that she was still breathing, still standing, and still fighting, he took a step closer to her. She matched his step and together they strode toward one another as a ioyful relief swelled in his heart. He moved his silver arm to extend a greeting, only to have Erza look over the man's shoulder and walk right past him to Samus, or rather, to Pazo who had safely endured the battle from some hidden nook beneath her armor and had just now come out to his perch on Samus's shoulder.

By then, Samus and Erza were petting the creature, engulfed by the round shiny eyes and purring spirit. There was nothing better at lightening the mood than a soft creature's gentle hum. It tuned out the pain flooding in the blood of Erza's thigh, and the fresh stench of death that plagued the tainted air.

Guu was a bit too short to see the Caterpie with Gildarts standing in her way, so they greeted each other as lost friends. It hadn't been too long and yet the child looked to be in grave condition. Concern, distaste, and failure; each tasted like a lump on his tongue.

"Leader, are you alright?" It wasn't worth asking what had happened, the girl had gained significant damage from the golden one in the last time he had seen her. They had fought side by side.

"Gildarts!" She was quick to smile and glad to see him, but her heart sunk when she saw Desco was no where to be found. "Oh of course I-"

Guu's strapped bandages were slanted off the wound, exposing the scorch marks that alerted him to her crisped skin. "When was the last time someone else took care of you? Here, even leaders need a little care too. Keeping that chin up can get tiring kid, but," he leaned in a little closer, as though speaking in secret, "Isn't it worth it?"

Guu's eyes followed his gaze.

If any doubt had been lining her mind due to the ruthlessness of battle, Guu now felt a hint of assurance, for she saw the noble Erza and the mighty Samus, both smiling together with a little creature curling with pleasure on the elite's shoulder.

Words weren't really the man's forte, and he primarily preferred action, yet the hope rising in the child's eyes showed that he had hit home, and set a new flame in his own.

The drastic change of the wizard's determination, from brutality to compassion, helped the girl remember why he had joined Ambrosia and was a perfect fit. Her eyes hung on him as she tried to read his thoughts, simply from the gentle grinding of the weathered creases on his face. Gildarts played doctor, and tightened the youth's bandages once more, leaving Samus and Erza who seemed to be getting along rather well.

Every once and a while, his eyes passed over in the two's direction. Sometimes staying a bit too long on Samus's blonde hair. By now, the she-warrior was bandaging up the scarlet injury on Erza's thigh and to they were speaking the name of a missing friend.

He couldn't help but ask Guu, who was nearest, "Do they know each other?" Or maybe he had just fallen back into his old oblivious habits and overlooked a crumb-sized detail.