The rain was coming down in sheets, a proper, soul-drenching Magnolia downpour. You’d booked the room specifically because the roof over unit seven didn’t leak. A small victory for a freelance mage between jobs. The mission was simple: retrieve a stolen lacrima from a rogue trader holed up in this very motel. The pay was decent, the weather was awful, and you were looking forward to a quiet, dry evening of planning.

Then you saw the name on the ledger.

The clerk, a bored man with a permanent sniffle, had left the check-in book open. Right above your scrawled signature, in elegant, looping script, was Juvia Lockser. Guest in room five. Affiliation: Fairy Tail.

Your heart did a funny little stutter, a relic of a different life. You told yourself it was just surprise. Coincidence. A professional crossing of paths. You took your key, walked back out into the deluge, and made for your door, steadfastly ignoring the soft, blue glow emanating from the window of room five.

The plan was to wait until nightfall. The plan evaporated the moment your door creaked open and you saw her standing there in the covered walkway, sheltered from the rain but not from your memory. She was leaning against a pillar, arms crossed, watching you. Her hair was shorter now, her coat a different cut, but the intensity in those dark blue eyes was exactly the same. No, it was sharper.

“You’re tracking Garron, too,” she stated. It wasn’t a question. "Juvia is involved,” she said, pushing off the pillar. A puddle near her feet rippled without a drop falling into it. “The client was… impatient. They hired multiple parties. A lack of faith.”

You finally got the door open. She was suddenly closer, the scent of ozone and clean rain cutting through the motel’s smell of damp carpet and mildew. “We were never good at being competitors,” she murmured, a ghost of her old, emotionless smile touching her lips. “You always won.”

The past rushed in like the storm surge. Finding her, a soaked and silent wraith of a girl, in the ruins of her life. Bringing her to Phantom Lord. The way she’d latched onto you with a quiet, terrifying focus, following you like a shadow, studying your every move. You were her sun, and she was the desperate planet in your orbit, long before Gray Fullbuster ever chilled a drink. Then the guild fell apart, and you both went your separate ways. You’d assumed the obsession—you called it a crush, she called it destiny—had dried up.

You were wrong. It was just lying dormant, waiting for a spark of proximity. You step inside your room. She followed, of course. The door clicked shut behind her.

“Is it just a job for you?” She looked around the sparse room, her gaze lingering on your open mission scroll on the rickety table. “You have the same floor plan. Juvia knows you prefer the room farthest from the ice machine. You still use that awful sandalwood-scented ink.” She turned those deep blue eyes on you. “Some things do not change.”

You sighed, running a hand through your damp hair, sign that she won.A slow, genuine smile spread across her face, one you hadn’t seen since her Phantom Lord days. It was beautiful and slightly unnerving. “Juvia proposes a temporary alliance. For old times’ sake. We subdue Garron together, secure the lacrima, and split the reward from Fairy Tail’s client.” She took a step closer. “It is… efficient.”

Her smile turned enigmatic. “You were Juvia’s first love. A girl does not forget her first… obsession.” She let the word hang in the air, charged and deliberate.

You couldn’t help it. You sighed but nodded anyway. It was going to be a long mission.