Draco felt herself breaking as she saw Fenrir backing away, guilt eating at her as she realized that he was reliving memories of the first time he lost his team, all because of her. Moriko ran over to Fenrir when he collapsed and something about the sight of the green haired maiden cradling Fenrir in her arms made Draco's chest feel tight. Draco couldn't help but grip at her chest, the feeling of breaking starting to overrun her head. Draco didn't know when she started running, but she knew she couldn't stop, she had to do something to fix this.<br/><br/>Draco ran for hours, her speed taking her far outside of Fiorre, running, running, running, she had to keep<span style="font-style: italic">running</span>. Draco didn't stop until she tripped over something in her path, skidding across cobblestone pavement that tore up the arm she landed on. Draco didn't know where she was until she heard a rough voice asked, "The Hell is Salamander's kid doing here?" Draco looked up and saw several former dark guild wizards around her, each one sporting a guild mark that she knew well. Draco sat up and tried to stop herself from making a bigger scene in the middle of Crime Sorcière's guild hall but she just felt herself breaking, breaking, breaking,<span style="font-style: italic">breaking</span>,<span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="font-style: italic">breaking</span></span>,<span style="font-style: italic"><span style="font-weight: bold">she was bReAkInG</span></span>. Draco wasn't sure what she should do to stop herself from breaking. What brought her<span style="font-style: italic">here</span>of all places? How could going to Crime Sorcière help her? She felt as if her mind was filled with static, or she had been submerged in water because everything around her felt muffled and distant; like she wasn't even in her own body. Draco hadn't noticed she was hyperventilating until a man with black and white hair told her to breathe; the look on his face telling her that he had probably been trying to get her attention for a while. She felt his hand rubbing circles on her back as he took deep breaths of his own to help her by setting the pace. Draco eventually found breathing becoming an easier task for her, the tight feeling in her chest uncoiling, allowing her to calm down. Draco looked up at the black eyed mage and said, "Thank you." The former Oración Seis member helping her up and leading her to the infirmary as he said, "Come on. We should patch up your arm so you're not bleeding all over the floor, that was a pretty nasty fall." Draco nodded and allowed the man to lead her to a bed to sit down so that he could get a better look at her arm. The man said, "The name's Macbeth. I'm not sure if you've ever heard of me but everyone here knows about you. Jellal told us all about you over the years as well as the other youngsters in your guild." Draco shook her head and replied, "I know who you are. You were known by Midnight when you first fought the Fairy Tail guild. I've done research on as many historical events in the magic world as I could so that I could find more dark magic to create counter spells for..." Macbeth simply said, "I see." Before he went back to treating her arm using rubbing alcohol and bandages.<br/><br/>Draco didn't move even after Macbeth was finished treating her arm, she was staring off into space, her mind racing as she tried to figure out what she was going to do. Draco wasn't sure what to do or even how she found her way to Crime Sorcière, none of the other guilds ever found out where their guild hall is, not even the members of Fairy Tail knew. Draco was brought out of her thoughts by Macbeth saying, "I'll let Jellal know you're here. He'll be able to assure your guildmates that you're safe for the night." Draco looked up at the black eyed mage in confusion at his words as she asked, "What do you mean 'for the night'?" To which the laid back man replied, "It's almost 10 in the evening. You're not going back tonight, it's not safe." Draco nodded in understanding, her mind going blank as she stared at the floor. Draco didn't know how long she sat there trying to keep the static from overwhelming her again but she was startled when she heard another voice say, "So we finally get to meet the Fairy Tail wizard that has been providing our guild with spells to protect against dark magic. I honestly thought you were a little older kiddo." Draco looked up and saw a tan skinned man with dark brown hair and a scar over his right eye. Draco eventually found herself saying automatically, "It's nice to know that at least one of my main subjects of research didn't end up causing just misery." Draco's eyes widened at her own words and she looked away at the man's stunned expression. He then said, "I heard you talking to Macbeth, since you already know him I assume you know who I am too." Draco nodded and replied, "You're Erik, formerly known as Cobra of Oración Seis." Erik nodded and said, "Jellal should be here soon. I'm sure he'll want to talk to you about what happened and how you found your way here." Draco didn't know what to say but she was surprised when he sat down in a chair on the other side of the room to keep watch of her, Macbeth coming back to do the same while carrying her bag that had apparently been dropped in the guild hall at some point during her panic.<br/><br/>Moriko held Fenrir's hand while he lay unconscious, but she could hear Lucy and Natsu talking along with the other guild members about what they were going to do to help Draco as well as finding out where she ran off to. Moriko whispered, "Please, Fenrir and Draco, when you're in pain it throws the entire guild into disarray. We want to help you both so much, you've already suffered enough. We need both of you to make the guild whole again." Moriko felt tears dripping down her face and landing onto the back of Fenrir's hand as she held it.<br/><br/>Lucy was trying to get Natsu to understand that beating up Zeref wasn't going to solve the problem. Violence wouldn't help their daughter, that was something that had become painfully clear over the years. Lucy shouted at the retreating form of her husband as he started to leave the guild hall, "Natsu, we should focus on finding where Draco ran off to! Not berating your brother about this; you know Draco wouldn't want you to do that! Please Natsu!" When it became obvious that he wasn't listening to her pleas, Lucy turned to look at Lyon and Gray before saying, "Help me stop him!"<br/><br/>Draco eventually rummaged around in her bag because it got unbearable to sit in the silent infirmary with the two Oración Seis members watching her. Draco dug around and pulled out a special Lacrima that was made for people who didn't have Archive magic to access the Magic Databases(much like laptops and home computers) for private use. Draco pulled out her field journals on magical creatures and began entering the data into Lacrima. Draco was in the middle of entering information on a species that called itself the Drakulri when Erik decided to ask, "So what brought you here? I'm pretty sure none of the official guilds know our location, and you seemed pretty upset when you practically dived through our front door." Draco ended up typing in a wrong word while distracted by Erik's questions and shook her head to clear her mind, trying to focus on transferring the written data as she simply stated, "They don't, I didn't either, I was running too fast and tripped on something. That's what brought me here, I'm fine." Erik hummed and waited for about five minutes before nudging his half-asleep guildmate to say something to her, Macbeth letting out a quiet grunt before immediately saying, "People that are fine don't have panic attacks or hyperventilate." Draco paused typing after pressing down a little hard on one of the keys at the man's comment. Draco shot back, "Well this one does." Erik shot back almost as quickly, "You should get that checked out then because that's not healthy." Draco growled in frustration at the two former dark wizards and the shiteating grin on Erik's face. Draco continued typing while trying to ignore them however it was hard when Erik roped Macbeth into helping him "interrogate" her in one of the most annoying ways possible. Macbeth got up and walked over to the pile of field journals beside her as he asked, "Were you running from one of those..." He paused to read the species name of the first creature he came across in the book, "Gee...ran...trals?" Draco tried to snatch her book back from him but was intercepted by Erik, who flipped to another page in the book. Draco said, "It's pronounced Grantrals and the answer is no. They're one of the more playful forest nymphs that people see commonly. They aren't anything to be afraid of despite their grotesque appearance, the most harm they could do is snatch your underwear from your luggage." Erik cut in, "Well, how do we know that you didn't have your underwear stolen and you were trying to chase one?" Draco sighed and gave them an unamused stare as she said, "I did not get my underwear stolen from my bag, I wasn't even planning on taking a trip so there's no spare clothes." A wizard that was passing by peeked her head in the room and quipped before she left, "So that means it was stolen off your ass and you're going commando." Erik's jaw dropped in playful disbelief as Macbeth clicked his tongue saying, "Tsk, not good. That's not very ladylike." Draco squawked indignantly as she said, "I'm not going commando! This has nothing to do with stolen underwear; mine or anyone else's." Erik laughed and practically purred, "So you admit that there was stolen underwear?" She ground out through gritted teeth, "There's no stolen underwear!" Draco managed to get her journal back and continued typing while the two tried to rile her up enough with playful banter to get her to tell them what happened.<br/><br/>Draco managed to get through 3 magical creatures when she finally had enough of the jokes and playful questions and shouted, "Stop bugging me! Unlike you, I'm trying to get as much of this done before I die because I only have a few months left to live! And you wanna know why?! Because apparently the only reason I'm alive is because some Goddess decided to use the body of the Salamander's miscarried child to break Zeref's curse since the one who cursed him made it impossible for it to be broken by any God but himself. Now that I've completed the spell for saving him that I wanted to create my entire life I've only got a few months to live because this body died before it's own soul could be developed! I've been trying so hard to help other people my whole life! Creating spells, documenting and understanding magical creatures no one else has ever seen or survived meeting, creating art, helping people change their ways, and even trying to befriend the Demon of Hatred despite the fact that he's harmed my guildmates because I truly believe everyone can understand each other and live in peace. I've done all these things, and it seems like it's all going to amount to nothing because I'm dying! I've tried so hard to keep the people around me happy, to fix this situation, I wanted to see that future with my own eyes, but I won't ever get to!" Draco turned off the Lacrima during her rant and tried not to start hyperventilating again. Everything was silent for a moment before Draco croaked out in tone that indicated she was close to crying, "I tried... I mean I really, really tried... I tried to fix things on my own because I thought I could, because I had been able to for so long, like when I was creating the spells you guys now use against dark magic... I thought I could do it alone because I didn't need any help when making the spells or doing a lot of the things that I'm proud of... I tried to hide it and shoulder the knowledge for so long and today I reached my breaking point... Now that I think about it I guess I had already reached it a long time ago and didn't even realize it... But I can't keep pretending that everything's alright... Because it's not." Draco didn't know when the tears started falling but she soon found she couldn't get them to stop. Draco felt hopeless, she had hurt the people she loves in her pursuit of knowledge and the power to save others, it wasn't fair. It wasn't fair that all she ever seemed to do is either hurt the people she cares about or make them worry about her. It wasn't fair that every time she tried to make progress something came and tried to turn the momentary hope brought by her success into despair. It wasn't fair that it seemed like everything she had achieved in the name of science and helping others only brought pain, taking one step towards hope and turning it into two steps towards suffering. It wasn't fair and she<span style="font-style: italic">hated</span>it.<br/><br/><br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="font-size: 75%; line-height: 116%;"> She hAtEd it?</span></span></span>