Mavis yelled and managed to use her magic to grab hold of one and keep it close but the others went off into the distance and out of sight.
"Everyone…" the First Master grimaced. "Please… be safe…"
...
And abruptly… after about another minute or so of madness - it was hard to tell in this place - she suddenly felt a natural wind again as the island was thrown out into the light. The massive tree arced through the air before somehow… miraculously… the island landed right side up with a colossal splash into water.
A huge wave burst upwards all around the circumference of the island and washed across the shoreline, Mavis almost falling from her perch on the tree with a yelp. The world around her seemed to vibrate as the island was drenched in sea-water until finally the island came to a thumping stop as it touched bottom.
It took a while before Mavis could recuperate herself and when she did she sat up and shook herself slightly, clambering to her bare feet as she looked out across the island, inspecting it for damage. It looked to be remarkably intact considering what had just happened, but then again there was powerful magic interlaced with the island's very structure so that wasn't so surprising. And the water rose up a little higher around the island than it would have done were it in its proper place back home, but mostly everything seemed to be okay.
Except, of course, for the fact that the entire island where her natural body had been laid to rest had been zapped into a whole separate dimension.
There was no sign of the battling Dragons. Perhaps they were still wreaking havoc back in their true world. Perhaps Platinum had been defeated by that roar from Diamond - she hadn't actually seen whether the attack had hit him or not. Or perhaps their battle would take them right into another dimension - who knew if they were even from Earthland anyway. They had appeared rather abruptly after all. What they were and why they were fighting… perhaps she would never know.
But this was something that Mavis could never have predicted. Not once in a million years could she have expected something like this.
What universe were they in now? It was a universe of magic - she could feel that in the air. But other than that, she could say nothing about it other than the fact it had oceans apparently.
But then something else grabbed her attention and her eyes swung round in search of that one Fairy Sphere that she managed to keep close. Where was it? And what had been inside it?
She soon spotted it lying at the top of the giant stone cliff in the shape of a wolf's head and leapt from her place on the tree branch, floating her way down until she alighted gently on the ground, the grass tickling her bare feet slightly.
She could see faintly through the little spherical shield and she pressed her face up against it, squinting to try and discern the shapes she was seeing within.
"I see…" she sighed in relief. "Well, at least you four are safe."
She then looked out across the ocean, her wingtips drooping slightly as her expression turned grim.
"But the rest of your friends… where could they have ended up? Did they all even end up in the same universe? I hope to whatever gods might exist here that they did…"
She sighed. There was rather little that she could do for them now. But she could feel the power of the Fairy Sphere before her beginning to fade, so she settled herself down on a nearby rock to wait until it did.
...
The first thing that Wendy Marvell felt was pain. Pain rippling through her body seemingly from head to toe like a dull, throbbing ache, but it somehow felt far away as if she'd drifted outside her body but was still able to feel what it was feeling. She almost frowned to herself as she began to stir. That explanation made very little sense even to her. Jeez, her head must be muddled.
She groaned, turning her head and shifting her arm slightly, gritting her teeth as her head pounded and wishing not for the first time that she could heal her own wounds as easily as she could heal those of others.
She could feel grass beneath her hand as she moved it. Why was she lying on the grass? The last thing she could remember was holding hands with her fellow Dragon Slayer Gajeel and her Exceed partner Charla, as all her fellow Fairy Tail members formed a circle and tried to defend against…
"ACNOLOGIA!" Wendy shot up, her eyes opening wide as she looked around wildly, searching the skies for the massive, black Dragon. But there was nothing. Just white fluffy clouds against a blue backdrop, with some distant grey the promised rain somewhere.
The young blue-haired, twelve-year-old girl lifted a hand to her head, rubbing it in confusion. "I was… unconscious? What happened? How long was I out for?" She started looking around and her eyes immediately found her three companions, who were lying prone beside her. "Charla…" she crawled over to the little white cat and frantically started shaking her. "Happy… Lily…"
There was no response from Charla or Happy, but Pantherlily twitched and grunted, slowly beginning to push himself up and shaking his head as if to clear it.
"Wendy…" he muttered, when he opened his eyes. "What's… what's going on? Last thing I remember is… wait…" he sat up, looking around. "Gajeel! What happened to Gajeel! And the rest!"
"I don't know…" Wendy sniffed, holding up her hands and beginning to use her Sky Magic on Charla to try and heal her wounds. "I only just woke up myself and I can't see anyone else. But it looks like all of us here are still alive at least."
"Damn it," Lily muttered as he pushed himself to his feet. "I should… I should go take a look around… see if I can… nngh…" he flinched as his side twinged.
"Don't strain yourself, Lily," Wendy cautioned him. "You need to rest."
"No, I must do my duty. To the guild. Need to make sure everyone's alright…" Lily shook his head stubbornly.
"Everyone is fine," replied a voice that drew their attention around behind them. They both blinked in surprise at the side of the young looking girl sitting on the rocks above them in the long flowing pink-layered dress with red ribbon around her neck, blonde hair that fell like a curtain behind her right to her ankles and the wing-like projections behind her ears.
"Well…" said the girl. "I say fine. As fine as can be under the circumstances. They are all still alive at least, and they should be relatively uninjured."
"Um… who are you?" Wendy asked, as Lily's hand went to the little yet bulky sword strapped to his back warily.
"Who am I?" the girl smiled slightly. "I feel like I should be rather offended. Are there no pictures of me left in the Fairy Tail guild? There should be. I did found it…"
"You… founded it?" Wendy blinked, before her eyes widened. "Wait… don't tell me…"
"You can't mean it…" Lily agreed.
"I do," the girl nodded. "I'm Fairy Tail's First Guild Master - Mavis Vermilion."
"But… the First Master died many years ago," Lily protested. "How can you be her? Is this some kind of illusion or trick?"
Wendy, on the other hand, was staring at Mavis, to use the clichéd and yet highly appropriate phrase, as if she'd seen a ghost. Not least because if she was, this would not be the first time that she'd ever seen a ghost. She'd grown up with one, after all.
"Perhaps it would be better to wait until your companions have awoken before I fully explain," Mavis replied. "Save me having to do so more than once. But from what I've seen of my guild, it has become rather hardy. I'm sure you'll all be fine. In any case, Mister Cat, looking around for your friends would be rather pointless now. None of them are left on the island except for you four."
"What? But…"
"Like I said, I'll explain everything. But first, tend to your friends. I'm not going anywhere… I haven't the first clue where I would go."
Wendy slowly nodded, deciding to shove her questions aside for now and focused on her glowing hands, healing up Charla and Happy's minor injuries before a slightly suspicious but still able Lily helped her in waking the two of them up.
When Charla woke up she immediately moved to hug Wendy, thankful beyond words that her best friend and partner was still okay. Happy was the last to wake and when he did the first thing he did was ask for fish, while the second thing he did was immediately try and run off to find Natsu. This led to Lily having to grab hold of his tail to stop him, causing Happy to faceplant right into the ground.
Needless to say, the both of them were also shocked when Mavis introduced herself. Charla gasped and placed her paws over her mouth while Happy screamed, "EEEEHHHHHHHH!?" but they were soon calmed as Mavis descended to the grass in front of them and began her explanation, telling them everything that had transpired from the moment Acnologia had tried to blast them right up until the point where they had landed in this universe.
"Another world?" Happy asked, looking around him. "Could it be that we've landed in Edolas again?"
"Of course not," Charla huffed at him slightly. "Can't you feel it? There is definitely magic in this world whereas Edolas was totally stripped of all its magic."
"Hmm," Lily nodded. "I was there myself. I saw the Prince of Edolas send all of Edolas' magic to Earthland with my own eyes. This is definitely not Edolas. Yet it is true that it does not feel like Earthland either. The magic here… it is different than our own."
"At least we can still use magic here though," Wendy frowned. "But if the magic is different, does that mean when we run out of magic we won't be able to restore it?"
"That's a good question," Charla agreed. "After all, all magical beings of Earthland obtain their magic by absorbing Ethernano from the atmosphere and converting it to magical power. Does this universe even have Ethernano in it?"
"If it did not before, it does now," Mavis replied. "I felt it. The portal that sucked us here was absorbing absolutely everything from the surrounding space. Water, air, Ethernano, all of it. It's likely that it is now spreading across the world as we speak. You should be able to use magic here just as you could at home. If you couldn't I probably wouldn't be able to stand here talking with you."
"How are you standing here talking to us anyway?" Lily asked. "Not to offend you, of course, but are you not in fact dead?"
"Oh yes," Mavis nodded. "But there are ways, if you know how, to transcend your consciousness and magic past your death. I decided before I passed away to carry this out, in the hope that I could continue to watch over my guild from afar and see it grow and flourish, watch the ideals that I had laid down bloom. But I have been rather neglectful of that in recent decades, preferring to remain in isolation and enjoy the peace and quiet of my island. A decision I am now regretting, as it looks like I have missed a great deal."
"I see… So that's what Master Roubaul must have done," Wendy murmured.
"Master Roubaul?" Mavis blinked in bemusement. "Who is that?"
"Oh… he was the Master of my old guild, Caitshelter," Wendy smiled fondly. "A funny old man with really strange habits, who kept saying the word 'nabula' for reasons nobody understood, but such a kind and wonderful Master.
It… turned out that he had created the entire Caitshelter guild for me and that every single member except for me and Charla were actually illusions he'd generated to give me a family when he took me in. It was only when I gained friends outside the guild and his reason for remaining in the world no longer existed that he finally revealed the truth to me and passed on. I joined Fairy Tail soon after and I love it here."
"That's good to hear," Mavis smiled. "I'm so glad that we could provide the family you needed. It must have been hard though. To learn the truth."
"Yeah… it was…" Wendy sniffed, trying not to cry as old memories were re-awakened.