Hello, people! Nightlingbolt here! Welcome to what is possibly the first LucyxJellal story on this site, if not in existence, "Lucky Star!"

Now I'm aware not many people ship these two. I'm also aware that not many people ship Natsu and Erza either, so I guess it all evens out for me, huh?

Either way, the idea for this pairing came to me... *checks profile*around the end of August. I would've incorporated it into "ABCs," but I felt like I had already invested too much into the LucyxCana pairing (which I still support! Don't even worry about that!) to change it now, not to mention how the Cheat Trilogy would be affected by it (I'd have to add Lucy's reactions to it, which can and will get VERY messy), so that would not happen. Not to mention there's still Sortea from Canis Majoris I'd have to explain away, so... yeah, I kind of dug a hole for myself here. Long story short, this takes place in its own canon, but any ideas on how to incorporate the pairing itself into "ABCs" would be very much appreciated. That being the case, enjoy!

I don't own Fairy Tail, Hiro Mashima does.

Freedom felt, to say the least, weird.

Of course, Jellal Fernades wasn't totally free yet. He still had to go through a probationary period mandated by the Magic Council. Basically his magic was bound to Lahar of the Rune Knights until the Council decided he could be trusted within society. What this meant was that he couldn't leave the town where his guild was located without Lahar, and he had to be a certain distance away from him at all times outside of town.

And where was this town he would be calling home from now on? Why, none other than Magnolia, home to the infamous Fairy Tail Guild, of course! A guild known for destruction, idiocy, and its S-Class mages, one of whom Jellal was eager to meet.

"Jellal?" asked a voice calling his name. Jellal was shaken out of his thoughts by his jailer.

"Huh? What?"

Doranbolt (or as the guild called him, Mest) sighed. Ever since he and Jellal joined the guild the former Wizard Saint would space out constantly. He was probably waiting for Erza Scarlet to return with her team.

"I spaced out again, didn't I?" asked Jellal.

"Yeah," replied Doranbolt. "Why don't we go take a job?" Jellal got up, hesitated, and then sat back down, causing to sigh again.

"I know you want to wait to see her, but the Council's not covering meals and utilities, and we have to eat," said the Council mage. "Besides, she'll probably be here when we get back."

"Probably?" repeated Jellal in annoyance.

"Well, she could be tired, she may want to take a nap..." said Doranbolt. Jellal gave him a look.

"I'll go find us a job," said Doranbolt. "It'll do you some good to get out of the guild." He then walked off to the job board.

Jellal got up and stretched, amazed at how lethargic he'd become due to either prison or his general lack of activity when he first arrived. His pondering was interrupted by a black-haired boy slamming into his back.

"NATSUUUUUU!" the boy screamed as he charged the pink-haired object of his fury.

"GRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!" Natsu screamed back, ready to give the same to his rival. Suddenly, they both stopped.

"Hey, isn't this usually where Erza punches us and yells at us to stop fighting?" asked Gray.

"Yeah, you're right," said Natsu. He turned to a red-haired young woman and said, "Hey, Erza, you're slacking on the job!" in a teasing manner.

"Don't make things worse for us, idiot!" Gray hissed. What he didn't know was that Erza had stilled herself in shock at the familiar sight of blue hair and a facial tattoo.

This was just about the action that Jellal had expected Erza to take. She still feared him, and he couldn't blame her for it. He expected Erza's survival instinct to kick in and make her shy away from him.

"Jellal!" Erza happily exclaimed. She hugged him and said, "It's so good to see you again!"

Or she could give him a bone-crushing hug. Yeah, that worked too. "You… too… Erza…!"

"Erza, stop it! You're suffocating him!" yelled a panicking blonde. Lucy, if Jellal remembered correctly. Erza took her words to heart and released him.

"I can't believe the Council saw fit to release you!" said Erza in, well, disbelief.

"Well, do you remember Doranbolt?" asked Jellal.

"Who?" asked Natsu, slightly confused.

"Mest? He infiltrated the guild to find an excuse to disband it?" said Jellal.

"Oh yeah, that jerk!" said Natsu.

"Never liked him," said Gray.

"Yeah, well I never liked you either, Gray," replied Doranbolt, who had appeared behind Gray. The exhibitionist simply flipped him off.

"Ah, perfect timing!" said Jellal. "I'd like to introduce you all to my jailer, Doranbolt." The Fairy Tail mages simply glared at him. After his attempted sabotage of their guild, they didn't particularly trust him.

"After Jellal's arrest, Lahar of the Fourth Custody Division had reported your claims of his amnesia to Guran Doma," said Doranbolt, essentially taking over Jellal's explanation. "Erring on the side of caution, I was ordered to scan his memories and found a gap of eight years, which led us to believe that he was brainwashed, and therefore not responsible for his crimes.

"The original plan was to keep Jellal locked up until we had recovered those eight years, which we could potentially use to gather information on the dark guilds, most notably Tartaros and what remains of Grimoire Heart. However, reports of prisoner abuse had reached the Council's ears, at which point it was decided that if Jellal was to trust us enough to help him restore his memories, a prison cell wasn't the best place to do it. So now," he put an arm around Jellal. "This bastard's here under my protection!" he said with a grin.

Fairy Tail's strongest team gave him deadpan looks. Apparently, they didn't really care for his attempt to relate to them.

"However," Jellal continued. "I was once one of the Ten Wizard Saints, so they didn't exactly want me running around unchecked, just in case I'm repressing my memories in an elaborate plot to continue my evil work-"

"Are you?" asked Natsu dangerously, cracking his knuckles as he spoke.

"NO!" bellowed Jellal.

"Okay, okay! Jeez, learn to take a damn joke!" Natsu complained.

"How is that a joke?" Erza growled.

"…You're right, it wasn't that funny…" said Natsu meekly.

"-SO!" Jellal exclaimed, and Team Natsu refocused their attention on him at once. Satisfied, Jellal continued with his explanation. "My magic is bound to a high-ranking officer of the Magic Council until such a time when I'm deemed no longer a

"And so enters Mest, right?" asked Natsu.

"Right," said Mest. "And it's Doranbolt, actually."

"One syllable versus three. Which is easier to remember?" asked Natsu.

"...Well, I guess that's how I was introduced to the guild..." mumbled Doranbolt.

"At least, being Jellal's probation officer is the official reason I'm here. As I said, I'm working with Jellal to recover his memories."

"Really," said Erza. "How's that going?"

"Not well, Erza," said Doranbolt. "Not well." Erza looked disappointed, but no one said anything about it.

Changing the subject, Doranbolt said, "Anyway, I found us a job, Jellal. We'll leave whenever you're ready."

"Actually, can you take this one yourself? I want to spend some time with Erza and her friends," said Jellal.

"Well, we could always come with you," said Erza brightly.

"Erza! We just got back from a really tough mission! I'm exhausted!" Lucy complained.

"There is no way I'm getting on another vehicle today!" said Natsu resolutely.

"I agree with Lucy. I'm beat," said Gray.

"Well, if you're absolutely sure," said Lahar. "The job's not urgent, so I'll have Mirajane hold onto it, and we can go tomorrow if you're ready."

Jellal and the members of Team Natsu watched Doranbolt leave. "He seems nice enough," said Erza.

"What a tool," said Gray.

"Hey, I just had a thought," said Lucy. "Why don't we do something nice for Jellal to welcome him to the guild? Maybe take him out to eat or something?"

Erza smiled. "That's a wonderful idea, Lucy! We'll all meet up at that new restaurant on the corner at eight!"

"Aye!" the group exclaimed, except for Jellal, who couldn't help but notice a member of their group was missing.

"Didn't you guys have a cat as part of your team?" he asked. "Happy, was it?"

Natsu's only reply was to jerk his thumb in the direction of said cat, offering a fish to a white cat similar to himself.

Satisfied, Jellal took Erza's hand in his own. "Until then," he said simply.

As the group went their separate ways, Jellal thought he heard Natsu growl into Erza's ear, "You have to tell him. Tonight!"

Lucy washed her hands in the restroom sink at the steakhouse they had taken Jellal to celebrate his release. The former Wizard Saint had been on her mind ever since she and her team had gotten back from their latest mission.

She was one of the only people who knew that Natsu and Erza were dating. Truth be told, it still felt weird to think of them as a couple, no matter how far away she saw it coming. In all the time Lucy had known Natsu, he had never shown any signs of hatred towards anyone. Not Gajeel who had crucified three of their guildmates, not her father who had set into motion events that conspired to separate her from Fairy Tail… hell, not even Gray after he held his heirloom scarf for ransom in exchange for an admission that he was better than the Salamander in every possible way except for sucking. And even then, he just forgave, forgot, and kicked the ice mage in the groin as hard as he could. That memory still made Lucy giggle.

But when Erza mentioned Jellal's name during the Oracion Seis battle, Natsu seemed to be overtaken with anger. It was clear that he could not forgive what the blue-haired man had done to Erza at the Tower of Heaven. Thinking of that incident made Lucy think of the looks of longing the Titania had given the pink-haired man in the days that followed. Lucy didn't know much about love, but if those two elements were any indication, the two of them were head-over-heels in love.

But from what she knew about Jellal, Erza was literally his everything. And Lucy was not stupid – naïve, maybe, but by no means stupid. The same could be said about Natsu, and from the tone of his voice, she knew exactly what Natsu meant by "Tell him tonight."

Her hands clean and dry, Lucy left the bathroom to head back to the table, when she spotted flashes of blue and scarlet hair. Against her will, her legs stopped moving, rooting her to the spot and forcing her to listen. Both parties tried to speak, but Erza relented to Jellal.

"Erza," he began. "You've been at the forefront of my mind or as long as I can remember. Your scarlet hair gives me hope for the future. It is a future that I hope to share with you, now and forever. Erza…"

"Don't say it, Jellal!" Erza snapped, but the blue-haired man just ignored her.

"…I think I'm in love with you."

Erza stood stock still, not daring to breathe. Lucy could hardly blame her. The blonde wanted to just duck back into the restroom and let all of this blow over, but apparently, her body wouldn't let her leave the scene until she saw how Erza handled the confession of love from her childhood friend.

Finally, Erza spoke. "Jellal… I was going to tell you first, but… Natsu and I are… together."

And there it was. The bomb was dropped. Jellal flinched, the words like a blade, and tears threatened to spill out from those magnificent emerald eyes.

"Damn it, Jellal, don't do this to me!" Erza yelled, causing blonde and blue to jump in surprise. "Do you think I'm doing this to hurt you? That this is all some elaborate ploy to break your spirit? How dare you think so little of Natsu, and more importantly, me!

"It's obvious to me that you're not the same never-say-die Jellal I remember from our days of slavery," Erza spat. "The Jellal Fernandes I remember wouldn't start to cry if something didn't go the way he expected it to! No, he would grin, bear it, and soldier on! In my heart, that's who Jellal Fernandes is!"

When Jellal didn't reply right away, Erza spoke up again in a much kinder tone. "I'm not telling you to cast me out of your life, nor would I ever cast you out of mine. And as much as I dreamt that someday the two of us would find happiness together, that day can never come for… obvious reasons…"

Lucy had some idea of those "obvious reasons." Hell, if her childhood crush had become a psychotic slavemaster bent on reviving a powerful dark mage, she would've thrown any possible romance out the window long ago.

"I understand," said Jellal. "Natsu is lucky to have you. Or are you lucky to have him?"

Erza laughed. "That's an eternal question worthy of our guild," she said. Jellal replied with a hesitant laugh of his own.

"Sometimes, I lie awake at night, thinking what it would be like if our roles were reversed, and you had become the villain that sought to revive Zeref. Would I have had the power to stop you? Would I have even had the courage?" Erza looked at Jellal worriedly.

"Just kidding," he said with a smile. The two embraced for a moment, and Erza went back to the table.

Lucy smiled. Though the situation seemed to be resolved, there was something about Jellal that drew her to him. Was it his loneliness? After all, she was just as lonely as she imagined Jellal to be in his prison cell once upon a time, before she ran away and came to Fairy Tail. Erza, Natsu, and everyone else had made it clear that she was a member of their family, and they went out of their way to treat her as such.

Was it his sadness? That made sense, since Lucy hated to see her friends cry. But did she consider Jellal a friend? Well, they had a mutual friendship with Erza, so she supposed that was something she could work with. Maybe she could take him out on some sort of friendly date, just to cheer him up. Yeah, that sounded like a good idea. Her mind made up, she appeared from behind the divider.

"Lucy?" said Jellal, a little surprised. He had sensed a magical presence, but he didn't know Lucy well enough to realize it was hers.

"Hey, Jellal," Lucy greeted him nervously.

"So I guess you heard all that, huh?" asked Jellal, already knowing the answer.

"Yeah," she said. "I'm sorry things didn't work out for you tonight, but-"

"Actually, I'm perfectly satisfied with how things turned out," said Jellal. "It's not the happy ending I was looking for, but it's a happy ending for Erza, and that's enough for me. Besides… I have every confidence that Natsu will be able to take care of Erza in a way I can't."

"Well, maybe when Natsu starts treating her like his girlfriend and not the spawn of Satan…" said Lucy.

"Actually, all guys treat their girlfriends like that. But you didn't hear it from me," said Jellal. Both mages burst into fits of laughter.

Being the first to calm down, Lucy said, "If you wanted to go out for drinks or something tomorrow, or the day after, or whenever you have time…"

"I'm free on Wednesday," said Jellal. "We can do something then."

"All right, Wednesday it is," said Lucy. "See you then." She left to rejoin the team.

Jellal couldn't believe it. He had a date. Not even 24 hours after Erza shot him down he had agreed to a date with her teammate. Maybe his luck was starting to turn around. Then again, he could lose it all in one fell swoop.

He'd just have to wait until Wednesday.

And thus have I committed Fairy Tail shipping blasphemy. I await the flames of hell from you, the readers, though I shall always welcome positive feedback. I do plan on continuing this, though I would like at least five reviews before I post the next chapter. I don't plan on making a habit of setting a review quota, but I want to know that there are people who are willing to give this pairing a chance.

Just as a heads-up, I will have to replace my laptop battery in the near future, which may or may not affect my writing. As soon as everything's all set, I'll let you know what the situation is.

Anyway, that's about it, so until next time (whether it's this, another project, or even all the way in November after the "ABCs" hiatus is up), peace and love from Nightlingbolt. Bye!