An explosion of light so intense Lucy could actually see through her own hand. She could see Natsu's teeth inside his head!

Lucy was thrown against the ceiling. She fell to the floor and rolled, out of control. Erza landed on top of Lucy, knocking the wind out of her. The room was spinning. Lucy's eyes were filled with balls of light, like suns inside her own head.

Spinning . . . spinning . . . spinning . . .

And with each turn Lucy was thrown hard. Into Gray. Into Natsu. Happy batted his wings wildly, trying to get some control. It was like they had all been tossed into a washer on spin cycle. Then, with a sickening lurch, the room came upright. There was a floor again. And a ceiling.

FLASH!

I saw green. Green on green, rushing up at me. And then something bright explode. And for a while, Lucy didn't see anything at all.

HOO! HOO! HOO! HOO! HOOHOHOHO-HOHO! HAH! HAH!

KEEYAAAH! KEEYAAAH! KEEYAAAH!

Lucy woke up.

Lucy woke up very suddenly.

KEEYAAAH! KEEYAAAH! KEEYAAAH! YAHA-HAHAHAH! Her head hurt, and the screaming noises didn't help. Her back hurt, too. She was lying on the ground. On mildewed, rotting leaves. Trees towered over her. Insanely tall trees. Ferns dipped down to tickle her face. There was a root or something under her back, which explained the back pain.

But she was alive.

KeRAW! KeRAW! KeRAW!

VrrEEET! VrrEEEET! VrrEEEET!

Lucy sat up quickly. But that sent a spear of pain through her head. "Oh, man," she groaned. Then she saw the bug. The bug on her lap. The big, giant, MONSTER bug. She guessed it was some kind of beetle. It had yellow and black stripes and something that looked almost like curved antlers. She swear it was six inches long. Or at least three inches. It would have been beautiful, if it hadn't been on her.

"AAAAAHHH!" She yelled and brushed the beetle away.

Then, she felt the itchy, crawling feeling on her leg. Ants! There were a dozen ants climbing up her right shin. She slapped at her leg till she was sure they were gone. She climbed to her feet. She felt woozy and confused. Where was I? Where were the others?

Lucy looked around. Green. Green everywhere. She mean, everywhere. She was in a jungle. She knew that for sure. She'd never been in a jungle before, but there was no doubt in her mind. Maybe it was the monkeys and birds screeching at an insane volume all around her in the trees that gave it away. Maybe it was the creepers and vines. Maybe it was a flash of an amazing red-and-blue bird flitting through the branches. Maybe it was the fact that beetles really shouldn't be as big as that beetle had been.

It was the jungle, all right.

She decided to yell for the others. "Hey! Hey! Natsu! Erza!"

It was like her voice had no power. The sound was just swallowed by the trees and ferns and bushes.

"Okay, get a grip, Lucy. Try to remember. You were in the room with the others and someone yelled in your mind that he will kill all of you and something flashed and what the heck I'm going insane."

She glanced around at the solid wall of green in every direction. The air was steaming with humidity. And the smells of overly sweet flowers and tropical rot made her feel like she was walking past some department store perfume counter.

Then she spotted a tree where the top half had been snapped off. She started walking, trying to get a better angle on the broken tree. She saw a second tree, splintered. She began to notice what looked like a tunnel plowed through the dense foliage.

A tunnel plowed through the trees and foliage should lead to the others.

HOO! HOO! HOO! HOOHOOHOOHOO! HAH! HAH! HAH!

The jungle was quieting down a little, but there was still some fairly crazy screeching from up in the tall trees. The jungle animals sounded annoyed. Probably they didn't appreciate someone crashing into their home. And they didn't like her looks, either.

The jungle floor was surprisingly clear. Down at foot level there wasn't much growing, just dead leaves. But at face level there were vines and bushes and ferns, all slapping her in the face as she pressed on.

Suddenly she came to a clearing. A hole in the canopy where a tree had fallen. Bright sunlight shone down through the gap. And it was as if every species of plant life you could imagine was crowding into that sunny spot. She found myself facing an incredible wall of vegetation: a dozen types of brilliant flowers, mosses so green they didn't seem real, small vines wrapped around bigger vines wrapped around tree trunks.

It was the greenest place on Earth . . . or Fiore in this matter. There were even plants growing out of the smooth trunks of tall trees.

She trudged on, back into the shadows of the forest, and when she looked up, she could no longer see the tunnel through the foliage.

That's when she started to get really scared.

She was in a jungle. And jungle isn't like forest, where you can usually see for hundreds of feet in any direction. Jungle presses in close around. It's like being buried in green.

Ger-AK! Ger-AK! AKAKAKAK!

"Natsu! Erza! Gray!" Lucy yelled, feeling the edge of panic.

"How about Happy?" A voice said.

Lucy looked up and saw nothing. Then she noticed him swooping down toward her from the high branches of a tree.

"Happy!" She yelled. She waved. Of course, he'd already seen her, obviously. But she was massively relieved. So she waved again.

The cat with angel wings seemed almost bland, boring in the context of this jungle. He landed on a rotting, moss-encrusted log.

"Happy! The others?"

"Everyone is alive," He said. "It took a while to find everyone, though. I think we must have spun around a few times tearing through the trees. Gray ended up practically on top of this snake. This extremely large snake."

"Where are we?"

"I don't know," Happy said. "But I'm pretty sure this ain't home. Come on, follow me. It's not far."

Lucy followed Happy, pushing and shoving and fighting her way through forest that seemed determined to stop her. She was dripping with sweat and gasping in the thick air. Then, a clearing. Not a natural clearing, but one created by the crashed humans.

"Lucy!" Natsu yelled and ran over to give her a hug. He had a nasty cut on one hand, which he'd bandaged with strips torn from his T-shirt.

"You're alive," Erza observed. "For now," she added darkly.

"I told you she'd be okay," Gray said.

"I'm glad you're all right." Natsu said.

"I'm glad I'm all right, too," Lucy agreed. She looked around the place. "Now . . . where are we?"

"Where is easy," Erza answered. "Rain forest. Not Magnolia, because I've seen monkeys with prehensile tails. You know, tails they can swing by. Most likely, we're in Caitshelter. Either the south rain forest, or the north rain forest."

"I'm betting North," Gray said brightly. "I'm also taking bets on whether we live long enough for me to collect on bets."

Lucy laughed. "You're always such an optimist, Gray." She turned back to Erza. "So. Caitshelter, North rain forest, huh?"

"Like I said, the question of where we are is fairly easy."

Lucy was still in suspicion. Erza wasn't in her usual aura of confidence, like she was keeping something terrible and she was afraid she would scared them. "Erza, why do I have the feeling there's something you're not telling me?"

Erza finally sighed in defeat. It would be best if they know the truth. "I used my ShinSakato and fired simultaneously and we intersected the lightning, and that's when we created what we call an Anima."

"A what? Anima? What's that?"

"We blew a small hole in space-time. And were drawn in through that hole."

"English, please," Lucy warned. "Plain English, please."

"We were blown through time, Lucy," Erza explained. "We aren't where we want to be. And we aren't when we want to be."

Lucy stared at her. "Did we go forward or back? Are we in the past or the future?"

"Yes," Erza said. "It's definitely one of those two choices."

"So let me just summarize here. We are probably in the Caitshelter rain forest. And we are either in our own past, or in our own future. Happy can't fly us all out of here. We have no way of knowing if there's a city or town or even a road near here." Lucy looked around at my friends. "Anyone have anything to add?"

"I know that it is one twenty-two p.m.," Gray said. "I just don't know what day or year it is."

Lucy looked at Erza for an explanation. "Ice elementals have the ability to keep track of time naturally. Like some kind of internal clock. It's useful. Of course, it's more useful if you know what century you're in."

Happy held up his hand, like he was in school. "The rain forest is full of poisonous snakes, poisonous insects, poisonous plants, and poisonous frogs."

"Excuse me?" Natsu asked in excitement. "Poisonous frogs? Did you say poisonous frogs?"

"Plus, there is at least one large predator: the jaguar."

"Love their cars," Natsu said.

"Right now we have no food and no water," Erza added helpfully. "Also, no weapons. Except my ShinSakuto. Magic doesn't work here."

"Why do we need weapons?" Natsu asked. He punched his fist on his palm. "If something came out we can just beat it with our fists and Happy can fly us out, I know he can."

"I don't know, Natsu. . ." Happy muttured.

"None of us can use magic and well everything around here have magic," Erza pointed out. "Realistically, Happy can't fly more than twenty or thirty miles an hour at best. And we could be a thousand miles from nowhere."

"Besides," Gray said glumly. "What are we supposed to do? Find a town, make a collect call to Magnolia and tell them we're in Caithshelter? 'Hey, guys, guess what? I'm in North rain forest. Or maybe South. Could you come pick me up?'"

"If there even is a town," Erza said. "If there even are lacrimas. If our country have been born yet, or are still alive. You're kind of missing something — we may be in the year two thousand b.c. Or . . . we might be in the year ten thousand a.d."

"Erza, what's the deal with this Anima?" Lucy asked her. "I mean, is there some way to undo it?"

Erza didn't answer. Instead, Lucy noticed her eyes turning slowly to her right. "We are not alone," Erza muttured.

Everyone shot a glance in the direction Erza was looking. Something moved! Lucy had a fleeting impression of a shoulder, arm, and head.

"A fairy," Erza finally conclude. "I didn't see it very well. But it was watching us."

"Swell," Natsu said. "Happy?"

"I'm on it," he said, opening his wings and flapping away through the trees.

"As for the Anima, I . . . all I know is what it is. It's a rip in space-time.

"Yeah, you told us that," Gray said.

"I think . . ." Erza hung his head. "Lucy, we studied the Anime effect in school. But there was a game later that day. And I was thinking more about the game than class. Also, there was Jellal who distracted me. "

Gray laughed. "Erza, are you telling us you were too busy flirting with some boy to pay attention to the lesson?"

Erza glared at Gray. He shut his mouth closed. Then she said, "I don't exactly know whether you can reverse an Anima. I remember some things, but not everything."

"I'm thirsty," Natsu announced. "Whatever else we're going to do, we have to find water. And food. Don't forget the food."

"The food's only you cared about, flame-head." Gray teased. Natsu snarled at him.

"Hey! If you starve to death don't blame me!"

Erza suddenly snapped her fingers. "Oh! I forgot! Caitshelter, right? Why don't we visit the Queen of the Fairies?"

They all looked at Erza, blanked.

"Are you sure?" Gray asked, giddy now that maybe this isn't a lost case after all. Erza nodded her head in assurance.

Natsu was scratching his chin. "I thought the Queen of the Fairies hate Elementals from Magnolia?"

They all looked at Natsu, blanked.

"She do?" Erza asked, her shoulders dropping now that the confidence is detouriating.

"Yes. I thought you all knew and that's the reason why you're all on hysterics. Caitshelter is obviously a dark place."

Silence followed. Erza is the one who break it.

"So maybe, in addition to everything else, we have the Queen of the fairies and a load of Fairy warriors to worry about," Erza said. She sighed. "Someone please give me some good news."

"Well, it's still daylight," Natsu said, putting on a big phony grin. "When night falls, then we'll be —"

"Natsu! Duck!" Happy yelled.

For once in his life, Natsu didn't stop to think about it. He ducked. And even as he ducked, he saw the face. He saw the arm. He saw the spear.

It was coming straight at him.

Right for his face.

The spear went over his head and flew on harmlessly into the bush.

Happy flapped wildly into the air. "I shouldn't have been resting," he berated himself. "I should have been in the air."

Lucy was too weirded out to worry about Happy. "Shit. This 'Queen of the Fairies' was really angry at us!"

"Three Fairies, Happy reported. "They almost look like they might be kids. They're hauling butt out of here. Which is what we better think about doing, too."

"Why?" Natsu demanded indignantly. "We can handle some kids with spears."

"Forget the kids. I see a group of twenty . . . maybe thirty grown up Fairies. They're tearing up the forest and coming this way!"