A star's mercy mission.

Lucy sat in the masters's office, a distant look in her eyes as she absently wondered why he called her in here. She hadn't done anything wrong - hadn't destroyed any buildings, hadn't pissed off anyone from the magic council, the two biggest taboos in her guild, yet the most frequently broken. And she had plans to take another job, since it wasn't like she could count on her team to help her out anymore.

The look in her eyes moved farther away, and any emotion on her face blanked. Her knuckles whitened as she tightly gripped the hem of her skirt, quiet tears falling from her eyes as her expression did not change.

All those times Natsu had snuck into her apartment, all those times he had rushed after her on the battle field, and all those times he had boldly declared her as his nakama, were little more than fond memories now.

He and the others had dropped her for Lisanna, going on a month-and-a-half-long mission, and all anyone at the Guild would talk about was either about how it was about time those two took a mission together, or how they kicked Tartaros's asses, or that they couldn't believe it would be another year-and-a-half until the next Grand Magic Games due to extensive damages, all of which got very old (and painful) very fast.

Not that anyone besides a handful of people, most of whom were out on missions on a daily basis (Levy, Wendy), or busy with something important (Mira, Cana, Juvia...even though the latter two could be debated) talked to her anymore. It didn't help either that Levy had finally gotten Gajeel to notice how she felt, and they had now formed their own team with Lily.

Don't get her wrong; Lucy was ecstatic for her friend, but she couldn't help but wish that her and Natsu were in the same position. Instead though, the way things were going, it looked like he might have something happening with the youngest Strauss.

That thought made Lucy's heart physically hurt, and caused the tears run down her cheeks thicker and faster than before, her body trembling as she fought to keep herself under control. She had noticed it a while ago - a long, long while ago - but it was something she constantly pushed down, built up until she couldn't keep it in anymore and it all just boiled over with her tears.

She loved him, the idiotic pink-haired dragon slayer that saved her more way times from way more dangers than she could even care to count.

She loved him, the happy knucklehead who found her in Hargeon when looking for his missing father, and gave her, the lonely runaway, a home. Friends. Family. Nakama.

She loved him, the clueless dummy who didn't know about her feelings, the one she could not bring herself to hate for abandoning her to go on a quest with another girl 'for old time's sake'.

"Here," a soft voice in front of her said, and Lucy shifted her eyes to see Mavis Vermillion, her guild's first master, handing her a tissue. She hesitantly accepted, first wiping the tears from her eyes and then blowing her nose. Mavis smiled lightly, and Lucy felt her mood lift a bit. "That's better, isn't it?"

Lucy nodded, a small motion, and Mavis gazed sadly from her to the other wizard sitting behind the desk. She and Makarov were worried; everyone in the guild had left Lucy, and they weren't sure why. But they did know this - Lucy had already lost everything once; if it happened again, there was a chance she wouldn't be able to come back from it.

The masters couldn't just tell people to start paying attention to the blonde again, as sad as it was; that wouldn't end well, no matter how they went about it. Best either could figure, it would be a good idea to have Lucy out of the Guild until this blew over, as it was a simpler solution than telling the whole guild to take a vacation.

But first they wanted to make sure she was okay.

"Lucy," Makarov started softly, directing a pair of glazed cocoa eyes to him. "Do you know why I called you here?"

The Celestial Spirit summoner shook her head, causing her blonde locks to swish gracefully around her shoulders. "I don't know, but I can't think of any reason I would be in trouble, master."

The old man felt the corners of his mouth tilt ever slightly. She was one of the more responsible members of his family, after all. "You aren't in trouble, so don't worry about that,"

Lucy's face showed her confusion. "Then why am I here?"

She hadn't been expecting both him and Mavis, who was sitting on the edge of the desk, to bow their heads and hunch their shoulders to her as a sign of apology. "I'm apologizing for the inconsiderate ways in which my other children have been acting in your regard, Lucy." Makarov stated, raising his head again to meet her surprised eyes.

"But we're even sorrier that we can't just tell them to pay attention to you again," Mavis continued, a sad pout on her face and a guilty look in her eyes. "It would be overstepping our boundaries as master,"

Lucy didn't know what to say to that, but she could feel her heart swell with gratitude, and the relief that came with it brought new tears to her eyes, and made her glad she was already sitting, because her knees had sudden gone to jelly. She hiccuped, her marked hand shooting to cover her mouth. "T-thank you, Master, Mavis..."

That little sentence opened the flood gates, and the two masters of Fairy Tail moved from where they sat to wrap the sobbing blonde Mage in a hug, just letting her grab onto their presence as a way to assure her they were there.

A good ten minutes later, Lucy's desperate crying had been reduced to quiet random sniffles as she made her way through the box of tissues Mavis had handed to her; she was not a clean cryer, after all.

As soon as she had fully stopped crying, she could feel Master and Mavis pull back, allowing her to see that they weren't the only ones who had sought to comfort her. Standing behind her masters, was Loke, Capricorn, and Virgo, who was holding what looked to Lucy like several 'Get well soon' cards.

"Hime, it would be better not to cry again," Virgo stated, noticing her masters' eyes filling up for a third time. "Aquarius seemed rather annoyed by your tears, and informed me to punish you if you did not stop,"

"H-hey, Virgo," Loke sweatdropped. He might need to teach his surrogate sister a better way to comfort people. That wasn't the kind of thing you said to a depressed person, no matter how well you knew them, or what someone else said.

It turns out he didn't have to worry though; a beat after Virgo finished talking, Lucy burst out in laughter, her features visibly lightening and the tension fleeing the room.

"I see," the blonde stated, smearing the tear trails on her cheek. "Tell her I'm sorry for making all of you guys worry about me,"

"It's quite alright, Lucy-sama." Capricorn stated, giving Lucy a comforting smile. "We are your Spirits; it is our job, and our honor to protect and make sure that you are okay,"

Loke smirked, gazing down fondly at his key holder. "Couldn't have said it better myself, Lucy. And you know that if you ever need a shoulder to cry on, just say my name, any of our names really, and we'll be there to help you."

Mavis giggled from her spot on Makarov's desk (how Lucy didn't notice either master moving right in front of her was beyond her), bringing the eyes of three spirits and their owner to her. "Isn't it nice to know people care, Lucy?"

The blonde thought for a moment, her mind taking her back to the actions of her guild mates, before nodding her head. "Yeah...it is,"

"Hime, I am sure that everyone still cares," Virgo stated, and Loke dearly hoped she wasn't as blunt as earlier. "They're just letting all they've done in the past few years finally sink in, and they have become so lost in their own thoughts that are acting out of character,"

"What was it you said earlier, Leo?" Mavis asked, a smirk on her lips as she looked between the maid spirit and her summoner. "I couldn't have said it better myself."

Loke snorted, but as the hope in Lucy's eyes reappeared for the first time in days (since Team Natsu talked to her again, only to see if she would let them go on that mission with Lisanna), Loke he couldn't help but help push her on, to get the old her back. "Our guild isn't exactly known for their thinking prowess, Lucy. It's probably going to take forever before they their heads out of their asses, especially that dragon slayer you're so fond of,"

Lucy flushed a bright pink, the color of Natsu's hair, causing a round of chuckles to go through the room. Grumbling under her breath, Lucy took the cards from Virgo, once again thanking her spirits before they went back to the Spirit world, their self-appointed task complete.

As Lucy was about to open the first card on top, which looked to be the one from the aggressive mermaid spirit, Master Makarov cleared his throat. Placing the stack to the side, Lucy promised herself she would read them later.

"Feeling better child?" He asked, already knowing the answer by the refreshed look in her eyes, and the added color to her completion, but he wanted to hear it himself.

"Yes, very. Thank you, though. You and Mavis didn't have to do that,"

"We felt that an intervention was necessary, and I think we made the right choice," he smiled, but all to soon a serious look came over his face, and Lucy felt traces of dread pooling in the pit of her stomach.

"Why do you look so serious, master? I thought you said I wasn't in trouble,"

"You're not; but there is something we still have to ask you."

Lucy looked suspiciously between the two wizards before her. "And that is...?"

"We would like to know if you wanted to take a brake from Fairy Tail for a while, just until you felt truly ready to come back," Mavis stated, and Lucy could say she was a bit blindsided.

Leave Fairy Tail? Why on Earthland would she do that? Her home was here, it was full of her cherished memories, and all her Nakama were here as well! If she just up and left...they wouldn't know she was gone until someone remembered to look for her, a small voice spoke from the back of her head. Shocked, Lucy realized what that fully meant; she would be surrounded by all of her precious people, but they wouldn't acknowledgelookforcarefor her for an unknown amount of time, possibly months.

Master and Mavis were giving her there choices.

One, leave now, when she had forgiven her guild and all her emotions were sorted out, making it easier on her friends later on.

Two, leave later, when she felt depressed again as she went on like a ghost in the background, actively trying to severe the ties she had to the cause of her pain.

Or three, stay, and hope that when her friends and fellow guild mates remembered she was in their lives that they could pull her out of whatever hole she would have undoubtedly dug herself into.

It wasn't that hard of a choice. Lucy loved her friends above all else, after all.

"...what would I do while I was gone, though? I don't have the money to put my apartment on hold for long, plus, where would I go?" Lucy asked, weighing her options.

"You could train, expand upon your knowledge and abilities," Mavis offered, before Makarov continued. "I have a few favors I can call in to get you a place to stay, and while you're gone I can send you jobs for money,"

The blonde mulled it over in her head for a second, before nodding. "When would I leave?"

"As soon as I can get the paperwork done and a letter sent, if you want," the short master offered before reaching behind his desk for the needed documents when Lucy muttered 'yes, please.'

"I have a general idea of where he's sending you, so I'll write down the address and the trains you'll need to get there," the young first master chirped, taking a scrap piece of paper and humming as she scribbled something down before holding it out to Lucy.

Lucy took it, noting that she would be taking three separate trains, her final destination being the capital city of Fiore, Crocus. Which, despite her ire at the multiple train switches, confused her.

"I thought the city was destroyed by those dragons?" Lucy asked, looking back at the one who gave her the paper.

"Most of it was, but that doesn't mean that there aren't places to stay," Mavis stated simply.

"I guess you're right... Hey Mavis? What did you mean by expanding upon my knowledge of Celestial magic? I thought that there was only Spirit Summoning, the Heavenly Body magic Jellal uses, and a handful of casting spells," Lucy asked the older girl, racking her brain to see if that was all she knew.

"As far as most people know, that's all there is to it," Mavis said, jumping off the desk and then scanning through the bookcase until her eyes landed on what she was looking for. Raising a hand, two books flew off the shelf, one a deep blue, the other a dark green, and landed in her hands. "But what they don't know is that Celestial Magics are older than Dragon Slaying by several centuries, and you've seen first hand how varied that type of magic is,"

"Um, yeah, but isn't Dragon Slaying an art that goes back more than four-hundred years? I know that reading the celestial bodies of stars and planets dates back to before the time of Fiore, but that doesn't have much to do with the magic..."

Lucy yelped as Mavis dropped the two books on Lucy's lap, and in her frantic squirming to not drop either, noticing that the books were much larger than she originally thought they were. "Look at the green one first," Mavis instructed.

Lucy obliged, shifting the blue one so that the green book was now the one on top. She blinked, staring at the title -

The Theory of Magic's Origins: Emotion, Nature, and Celestial Magics.

Volume One - The Gypsy Mages.

That wasn't...was it? I've misread it, that's...no, I saw it correctly...but that would mean...

"Gypsy...Mages? Weren't those..." Lucy muttered, terminating her internal monologue, her mind flying back through the years, to the bed time stories her mother used to tell her. They were always fascinating; brave heroes fighting terrible foes to save the day, clever wizards using their abilities to save their villages from calamity, and fearless leaders who lead their people with strong yet fair hands as they moved from place to place...

When she, like any other child, asked her mother, all those years ago, if the people from the stories were real, she could recall vividly what Layla had told her.

"Hey, mama?" Wide brown eyes looked up into an older pair of the exact same color. It was something Lucy always loved; how much she resembled her mother.

"Yes, Lucy?" Layla responded, leaning over her daughter's bed to pull the thick pink comforter up to her little chin. Much to the older Heartphilia's amusement, the little girl hesitated, fidgeting under the blanket before finally asking her question.

"Are...are the people in the story - are the people real, Mama?"

Layla blinked, taken back as though she hadn't suspected her daughter to ask that question, and for a brief moment Lucy thought her mother was going to call her silly. But that thought melted as she watched a bright smile overtake the woman's face.

Layla leaned closer to her daughter as she brushed the flaxen bangs out of her child's face. "Yes Lucy, yes; they were once real, but that was a long time ago...and most people have forgotten about them by now,"

"Like Opi- Off-y..." Little Lucy huffed in annoyance, her six-year-old mouth unable to mould the word she wanted to correctly.

Layla chuckled, knowing what her daughter meant anyway. "Ophiuchus, dear?" She suggested, and watched the annoyed look melt off of Lucy's face.

"Yeah! Him! The Snake-Bearer star-guy!" She gleefully said, having a small celebration for getting it right, before a look of curiosity similar to the one she had earlier dominated her face. "Why did they forget them, Mama? Off-y-uk-is and the story-people?"

Layla giggled at her daughter's antics. "Well, a lot of people didn't exactly like what Ophiuchus stood for, so they took him out of the Zodiacs, and anyone who was seen with his Gate key was believed to bring about a great dishonor or bad luck, so he just kind of faded away from memory," Layla stated sadly, still playing with her daughter's soft hair as she continued. "And those 'story-people' had a name, Lucy, one you'll need to know,"

"Why is that, Mama?"

Layla smiled, but Lucy wasn't sure why it was so wistful all of a sudden. "While most people have forgotten about them, my family has had a special connection with your 'story-people' for a long time. Meaning so do you, missy!" Lucy giggled at her mother's sudden tickle-attack, trying to fend her off for several minutes until She and Layla regained their composure.

"What kind of connection do we have with them, Mama?" Lucy asked, her eyes dropping as she finally started falling asleep, the tickle fight taking away most of the energy that had been keeping her awake.

"The same bond you and I have, Lucy - the bond of blood, the bond of family," Layla said, petting the top of the child's head as she watcher her quickly slipping into sleep.

"Does...that mean, daddy, too? What's...their name, Mama?" Lucy blinked, her last question cutting off with a yawn making her harder to understand.

Layla smiled, continuing to just watch over her daughter, feeling contentedness settle over her. "Through his parents, no. But through you, yes, that does make him their family, too,"

Lucy nodded, almost asleep when her mother got around to answering her other question, but she really wanted to know the answer, so she had strained her ears to hear the faint whisper said to her as her mother got up to leave.

"For your other question...Gypsy-Mages, Lucy. Remember them, because it's who we are, you and I. Now, sweet dreams, dear," she felt a soft touch on her forehead, before the sound of footsteps continued. "I'll see you in the morning-bright,"

Lucy felt her eyes watering at the recollection of her mother and the bonding that memory retold, but she refused to simply let herself cry again. She furiously pushed the salty water out of her eyes, not letting them linger for a second longer than they already had; she had cried way to much already today, and if she really wanted to get stronger, it had to stop.

Oddly enough, her brain suddenly supplied her with the image of Yukino at the Grand Magic Games, summoning the spirit from the cursed gate key. It brought a sardonic smile on her face, as she compared herself to the other Celestial Mage of the GMG.

Yukino had had some pretty rotten luck that day, getting kicked out of her family for losing a cheep fighting match, but it was her former master who ended up getting it worse, later losing both the Game and his guild. Lucy though was not getting kicked out; she was leaving, and it was her nakama that would be on the receiving end of misery soon, with her master getting a stronger Mage out of the deal.

So if that legend her mother had once told her was true, why shouldn't she believe she was Gypsy?

Only... Ophiuchus aside, Lucy hadn't been able to find anything on Gypsy Mages, no matter where she looked or who she asked. Not a single thing, zip, zero, and nada. It didn't help that after her mother died, she had just completely given up the search, convinced that it was something that been told just to get her to sleep.

So, if what Mavis had just dropped in her lap (literally) was real...

"Master...Mavis," Lucy asked, her bangs blocking her eyes from the two she had gotten the attention of. "This book...is it accurate?"

Mavis looked surprised, eye brows raised like she wasn't quite sure why that had been asked. Makarov looked much the same. "Yes, it should be, as it was part of my personal collection before I died, and Precht turned most of my old books into a part of the master's collection, with some others going into the guild library. Why do want to know?"

"...just something that Mama told me a long time ago," Lucy said, running her fingers over the smooth, exposed page sides, taking in that this was real and her mom hadn't just spun her a yarn. It was only because her eyes had never left the book since she had seen its title, but towards the last few pages, Lucy swore that the book was glowing. The longer she stared at it, actually, the more certain she was that she needed to open the book to exactly that page.

Watching the blonde hurriedly moving through the book for what seemed to be no good reason, Makarov grew concerned. "Mama? Child, hasn't your mother been gone for nearly fourteen years?"

Lucy flinched, but didn't stop her hands as they flipped through dozens of pages at a time. "Not even a week after I turned ten."

"Then how-" Makarov was cut off, as Lucy finally reached the glowing page, and something happened.

The room exploded into a golden light, temporarily blinding the office's three occupants before receding. The three Mages were left to stare in wonder at the magic runes scrolling up and out of the opened book, reminding Lucy of Fried's magic, and at the same time Hibiki's Archiving abilities.

"This is..." Mavis breathed, reaching out on instinct to examine the scrolling letters, suddenly jerking her hand back as they shocked her. Cradling long her limb, she looked on resolutely at the magic in front of her. "Those are names,"

"Names?" Makarov echoed, moving behind Lucy to get a better look at the words that were still flowing from the book, only instead of being completed they now looked to be configuring themselves from scratch. "You're right, First. But why would this happen after Lucy opened the book?"

Mavis watched the unknown spell for a few moments, before she finally noticed the pattern; the runes at the top of the list, as she figured it was, never changed, indicating it as a title of some sort. And as for the list itself, the characters in the beginning of each row remained the same, and were always followed by a handful of symbols from previous row only...

Suddenly, it clicked. She turned her head to Lucy, looking at the teen with eyes resembling those of an owl.

"I know what this is, and why it reacted to you, Lucy,"

"What...is it," Lucy asked, tearing her eyes away from the golden letters that had held her gaze since shooting out from the book on her lap. She could hardly help it; they were beautiful to look at, and Lucy felt oddly connected to them, even though she wasn't an expert in reading runic letters like Levy or Fried.

"Your ancestry," Mavis stated, looking at the opened book. "Or more specifically, the female ancestry on your mother's side,"

Lucy breathed in sharply, different emotions flashing across her eyes as she looked at the still-scrolling list of names with a new perspective. She felt a small smile form at her lips. "This is a line of Gypsy Mages, isn't it Mavis?"

Makarov's eyes widened when the first nodded, eying the blonde as though mentally drawing new connections. "Yes, it is, and as I'm pretty sure that as soon as your magic came into contact with the previously unknown type of spell I know was stored in that book as an example, the records stored in it updated, scanning your genetics and comparing them to the last entry,"

It was silent for a few moments, the three wizards just watching as the ancestry slowly came to a halt, and sure enough, as confirmed by the first master, read Leading Mage of the tribe, Daughter of Layla Heartphilia - Lucy.

Lucy quirked an eyebrow at what her supposed title read. "I'm the Leading Mage of a tribe?" She scoffed, ignoring the serious looks on her masters' faces. "There aren't any tribes like this around anymore, and even if there were, I don't have the strength to be its 'Leading Mage'."

"Which is exactly why you're going to train until the next Grand Magic Games," Makarov said, and Lucy noted that this was the first time anyone had said anything about how long she would be leaving for.

"Why that long, master? Our guild might not think very much, but that seems a bit extreme for them to simply organizing their thoughts," Lucy stated in slight disbelief, looking at Mavis for back up.

"Oh, it is," the little girl said, and Lucy felt the beginnings of a gloat for, until Mavis continued. "But now we know you need to get a hold on the Gypsy nature of your magic, and it has to be done immediately,"

"... I'm a bit afraid to ask, but why?"

"How about this? Your mother died at twenty-nine because she hadn't known your exact lineage as the leader of your tribe's magic, and her magic's other nature had been slowly eating away at her health. She was a Celestial Wizard until the age of sixteen, three years before she had you, until she reached the point where her control over magic was shot to where she couldn't summon anything anymore," Mavis looked in Lucy's ever widening eyes, and the blonde Spirit Summoner felt worse with every word out of her mouth.

Noticing how uncomfortable she was making one of her guild members, Mavis sighed, easing up on the tension she herself had unintentionally created throughout the room. "I'm sorry, but I wanted you to know the situation you are in. I didn't mean to rant at you,"

Lucy relaxed, closing the opened book on her lap as she noticed it had been opened for too long and casting eerie lighting and shadows on people's faces and around the room. "It fine, but I'm already seventeen, turning eighteen soon. If what happened to my mother is going to happen to me, why hasn't it already?"

At this Mavis smiled. "It would seem that your magic's consistency is better than your mother's, and you've been able to successfully hold off the effects until now. But..."

"If you don't start training now, it will lead to problems further on, no doubt," Makarov finished for her, shuffling against the papers in his hands against the desk until they were in an even pile. "And, speaking of your training...all the documents are signed, waiting to be sent to the council, and I just transported the letter, so now there is only one more thing left to do. Let me see your right hand, child,"

Lucy did as instructed, nervous anticipation in her gut as she knew what was coming; guild regulations decreed it, after all. Still, she couldn't help but blurt her out thoughts as she watched her guild mark be engulfed in a soft glow. "How long will it be gone for?"

Makarov smiled, but it was the sad sort of upward tilt both of them had seen too many times. He was saying goodbye to his child, after all. "Until a few days before the next Grand Magic Games. Or, if you finish your training more than a month early, and you feel indescribably homesick, it will show up sooner,"

The second option sounded much more desirable to Lucy, and she silently swore to herself that she would put all her effort into training to make it happen. Her friends would be so worried about her by that point, she didn't want to imagine what it would be like.

"Now that all that's settled, all you have to do is pack your things and tell your Land Lady to put your apartment on hold!" Mavis chirped, doing her best to lighten the mood. "It would be a good idea to leave a letter with her as well, since I'm sure they'll make a huge racket looking for you later,

Lucy chuckled morosely, already picturing Natsu's face as he did just that. "Good idea. I need an apartment to come back to, after all,"

Master and Mavis laughed, and Lucy took her hand back, staring at the spot on the back of her hand that used to be mostly covered by pink.

Soon. She swore to herself, fists clenching as she later exited the master's office, and a few minutes later, the guild hall itself, staring up at the large, bold Fairy Tail sign placed just above the entry way, a frozen February breeze ruffling her jacket and twisting her hair. As soon as possible, I will be back here. Back home...

Ok, so I've read a lot of these stories where Lucy leaves Fairy Tail for one reason or another, and its become such a prominent idea in my head that I've written 4,996 words for the first chapter. Your welcome.

I actually got the Gypsy idea from someone I think pulled off a really nice fiction where Lucy leaves, though, I will be putting my own spin on the idea. The name of the story is Replaced, by Basara of Ryther, and it's my favorite of her two FT stories.

I totally recommend it as something to read in between this chapter and the next one. So until then, peace!