Chapter 4: Chapter 4
Bodies littered the floor all around him. His hands were stained in blood. Blood that would never wash off. The blood of his loved ones.
Looking closer at the bodies, Lucien recognised them. Annabelle, his mother, and Joshua, his father. Then all of a sudden, their eyes opened, and they stared at him with pure hate, causing him to stumble backwards.
"It's your fault, all your fault" they whispered over and over again. Each time they did, Lucien took a step back, until he tripped over something and fell on his back.
Staring up into the blackness where the sky should be, he turned his head to the side to see what he tripped over, only to come face to face with Madam Prich's severed head. "It's all your fault, Lucien. You did this to me," she whispered. Her body was nowhere to be seen, and blood was still dripping from her wound.
Lucien's eyes filled with fear - and guilt - but no matter what, he couldn't scream. Scrambling to his feet, he spun around and tried to run away, only to trip because something had grabbed his ankles. Something that felt like small hands.
Suddenly, the hands seemed to multiply because another and another grabbed at his ankles.
Looking over, Lucien realised what it was, who it was. Jacky, Stevens, Pauly, and Rodericks, the little kids who were so full of energy and happiness. The ones who became something akin to Lucien's little brothers over the little time he had spent with them. The ones who always seemed to have perpetual smiles on their faces.
Only now they were different. They were corpses with dead eyes and no smile and covered in blood. They grabbed at his ankles, then his legs as they pulled him backwards. "Your fault, your fault," they whispered, their 4 voices merging into one.
Their nails dug so deep they drew blood, but Lucien couldn't escape from their grasp, and could only helplessly grab at the ground - which was nothing but inky blackness - hoping to grab onto something that would save him.
Suddenly all of the bodies were gone, and Lucien was standing face to face with a girl with brown hair, brown eyes, and a plain, forgettable face. But Lucien would never forget that face for as long as he lived, and clearly, it would haunt his nightmares even after death.
"Lucien," she whispered, "it was your fault. They're dead Lucien, and it's all your fault." This girl wasn't a human. No, to Lucien, she was a demon in human form.
The tears that had begun to fill his eyes fell down his face, and his head was a mess of guilt and anger and sadness and shame and so much else that couldn't be put into words.
She was right. They were all right. It was his fault. His parents were dead. Madam Prich was dead. Jacky and Stevens and Pauly and Rodericks and all of the other kids in the orphanage, no, everyone in the village was dead, and it was all his fault. His hands were covered in the blood of everyone and anyone he ever cared about. And it would never come off.
The mask he used to hide his true feelings - the one he showed to the public so they wouldn't look at him differently, so that they wouldn't ask him what was wrong - was falling apart. Tears continued to stream down his face - the face that normally held a confident look, the face that showed people nothing was wrong - and pooled up around his feet, trying to drown him in his sorrows.
"Lucien," her voice came from everywhere, and yet nowhere at the same time. That voice just made them come back. Now they were all staring at him. Their bodies stood there, staring at him with eyes filled with nothing but hate.
Lucien tried his best to hide. He curled in on himself, trying to block them out. "It's all my fault," he whispered to himself over and over again, through sobs and tears, and with a voice laced with nothing but guilt. Because it was. They were dead. And it was his fault.
"Lucien," she said again, louder this time. There was something different about her voice this time, it sounded more desperate, but Lucien could barely hear her over his own mutterings of guilt.
They were dead. They were dead. They were dead. They were de-
"Lucien!!!" Erza shouted, desperate to wake him from whatever nightmare he was having. She had realised something was wrong, and when she got closer she could see he was crying and muttering about how it was all his fault.
"*Gasp*" Lucien sat up with a jolt. He looked around frantically, looking for any bodies or blood.
Upon finding none, Lucien managed to calm down enough to slow his breathing enough that he didn't hyperventilate.
Lying back down, he closed his eyes and thought about his nightmare. He hadn't had one like that since he was 15. Everything that happened probably awakened old memories. And he thought he had finally left that nightmare - and HER - behind for good. But it was a nightmare. Just a nightmare. He kept repeating that in his head over and over again in order to calm himself down.
"Lucien," Erza softly called, worry lacing her words.
"I'm fine," he replied immediately. But even with his eyes closed, he could tell that she didn't believe him. And who would, he was still sniffling every now and again. "I'm sorry if I woke you."
"It's fine, you were actually the last one to wake up," she replied.
Sitting up, Lucien opened his eyes and realised that all of the kids were looking at him. Though thankfully, none of the other adults were looking at him.
Then again, in a place like this, nightmares were probably quite a common occurrence. And thankfully, despite the worried gazes of the kids sitting around him, none of them asked Lucien about his nightmare, which he was thankful for, though he could tell that they probably wanted to.
Feeling a comforting hand on his shoulder, Lucien turned his head and realised that it was Jellal's. He and Erza were probably the only ones close enough to hear what Lucien had been muttering.
Jellal offered him a smile and nod of the head - which Lucien reciprocated - before removing his hand and picking up a new topic, completely ignoring Lucien's nightmare as if it never happened.
"We weren't able to talk yesterday, but how are you feeling now? And do you know where you are?" Jellal asked. He seemed to be the leader of the group, which lined up with what Lucien could remember.
Lucien had been so focused on his nightmare that he hadn't even realised it at first, but his body was no longer aching. Other than feeling hungry, he felt fine. Well, physically, anyway. His mind was another thing entirely. Anxiety, guilt, and fear riddled his mind from the nightmare, and would probably continue to affect him for a while.
Thinking quickly, Lucien assumed that it was because of magic. The characters in Fairy Tail always seemed to recover quickly, so Lucien just decided to write it off as magic.
"I feel alright now, thanks," Lucien replied. He wiped away the tear marks left on his face and tried to put his mask back into place. Managing a smile, he continued, "And I'm pretty sure one of the guards called this place The Tower Of Heaven, whatever that means." He decided to pretend that he didn't know what this place was. Who knew how people would react to all of his knowledge. It was better to keep it to himself.
"That's right," Erza said bitterly. "However, this place is no heaven. We're slaves, they want us to build this tower for them, we were captured from our own villages and are forced to work here." She looked down at the ground and clenched her fists as she finished speaking.
"Maybe it is heaven, after all, I'm definitely handsome enough to be an angel," Lucien joked, earning a few smiles.
They continued to make some small talk - avoiding anything personal, nobody here wanted to think about the past - before they heard a loud bang against the prison doors. The doors were opened by a group of guards, all carrying 'pain sticks'. The group started to stand, seemingly used to this.
"Come on," Jellal told him, offering a hand to help Lucien up, which he took. "It's time to get to work," he explained, before following after the others, Lucien on his heels.
"Work, huh, I hope we get dental," Lucien joked, gaining a laugh from Jellal. Jokes were good distractions, Lucien had found.
"You're funny. You know," Jellal started," I think we'll be pretty good friends." Hearing that, Lucien's mind froze, only offering a nod in response as they caught up to the others.
It's not that he didn't want to be friends with Jellal, he was just surprised. He had always pitied Jellal because of his tragic story. But he was also glad to have a friend, he never really had many, in either life.
He remembered Jellal had a tough life, maybe he could find a way to help him, maybe get him and Erza together.
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