Ranor Days

The streets of magnolia bustled with life despite the quickly cooling weather. Kotone had been in town for about two days, and already the weather had changed quite a bit. It had just stopped raining, and a breeze that a certain young dragon slayer found incredibly refreshing. Kotone stood leaning against a wall as the busy streets filled with the people who had been waiting for the rain to stop. Kotone was damp. She'd been out in the rain for awhile before it had stopped. The wet teenager didn't mind though, since she didn't get cold. It was actually a bit refreshing. The downside was, she was going to have to wait for everything to dry out later. Wet clothes weren't all that pleasant if you weren't adjusted to them.

Sid was still rather dry. Kotone's backpack was water-resistant. and so the cat as well as her less water-resistant things were perfectly fine. She grinned at his head as he popped out of the bag with a soft mew. Kotone grabbed her long hair, wringing it out as best she could before forming an ice comb with which she could make herself look a little more proper. Kotone was surprisingly concerned with her appearance for her rough and tumble demeanor. It was a stark contrast to the rest of her personality. Snowflakes seemed to form in front of her as she exhaled heavily, letting the comb melt into nothing. She stood up. She'd seen several Fairy Tail wizards wandering Magnolia. They were a lively bunch. Annoyingly lively. Kotone was ironically a lot like them, though she didn't think about this fact as she had watched them go about doing what they were doing.

She was curious about Fairy Tail. It was unlike the other guilds in Fiore in that its wizards were the most spirited any guild had ever seen. And it seemed to be almost universal. Even the more collected ones had a certain spark to them. She wanted to know what made them tick. She'd wanted to know since she was fourteen, though she'd stopped for awhile. Until she'd come back to Magnolia with Roejaster. She paused to wonder what the outlaw was up to. Probably getting into some sort of trouble. It seemed to be his style. Though he could just waltz his way out of it unlike Kotone. She grinned, shaking her head. "Maybe Fairy Tail's board has something a guildless wizard can take care of. I suppose I could use the money," she decided offhandedly as she thought of her rapidly emptying bag of Jewels. She took off in the direction of the guild. Before long, she pushed open the heavy doors, immediately confronted with the noise of the rowdy guild. She winced, having not expected them to be so loud. Though she chided herself for not expecting it from them. The dragon slayer blinked as she looked around. She didn't know where the board was in the hall, so she'd have to locate it. Hopefully without drawing *too* much attention. Though girls who looked like they might freeze to death from wet clothing did tend to have concern thrown at them. She hoped no one would notice.

Ranor Taiga spun in his office chair, it was weathered, but at one time probably was a gallant piece of furniture. "Here yaa-a.. Go!" Vanix Tracy (the High flying Ace of Fairy Tail) dropped a stack of papers that was nearly tall enough to break eye contact between Taiga and his Ace. "What the hell are these?..." Ranor said with a slightly annoyed, yet cold look on his face. Vanix folded his arms and leaned on one of his sheathed swords "These are this month's damage reconciliation requests." Ranor gave and over exaggerated groan and sunk his forehead into one of his large hands "... You will all be the death of me..." he mumbled under his breath, "What was that?" Vanix asked as he turned to leave. Ranor simply waved it off with his hand. "You need to sign and have them verified by the end of the day!" Vanix tailed off as he left the office. The door shut with a loud thud Ranor looked up at the papers and then, picked up his pipe and spun his chair slowly to look out his window, onto a scene of a rainy Magnolia day.

The Fairy Tail GM leaned against the bar, one hand on his cane out right in front of him, the other holding a large flagon of ale. The guild hall was quite lively today, though it seemed a little lethargic today... "Must be the rain" he thought to himself. With a quick tilt of his head, a white plate narrowly missed him and crashed into the wall. He just sighed, took a long deep gulp of his ale, until he sipped back the last drop. "DON'T BREAK MY PLATES!!!" he bellowed and hurled the mug at the 20 something wizard who threw the plate, nailing the poor kid in the face and driving his whole body into the wall, leaving a crashed imprint of himself in the wall "Now you dented my walls." he shook his head and glanced around the hall "Definitely the rain" he thought again.

Ranor was smoking his pipe and telling a story of how he took down a whole cursed city by himself to some young wizards who were eating up the story. Just as he finished up the story a strange energy entered the room. His face went serious only for a moment. He nodded to his children and took a step past them. He made his way around a large pillar to find a small girl with a black coat and back pack on "Here to get out of the rain? Because it's not often a Dragon Slayer visits my guild hall." He said towering over the small girl.

Kotone blinked again as she watched the people having a good time fighting one another. She loved a good fight, but that didn't stop her from sighing and rolling her eyes at their behavior. Roejaster was probably used to this. It's probably how he was so good at fighting, she grinned as she disappeared behind a pillar with the intent to lean against it and avoid having a plate or spoon thrown at her like several other people. She'd disappeared behind it just in time to miss the kid get hit in the face by the guild master. She had begun to move again just as Ranor popped up in front of her, immediately guessing what she was. Or more likely her identity, since they'd met before.

"What, keeping tabs on me?" she asked Ranor, a hint of a cocky grin appearing on her face. She'd seen Ranor twice before. Once during her last visit, and once when she'd been much younger, only then she'd been cooped up inside from an injury during the war. She crossed her arms, reminded again that she was still wet. Maybe she *should* get dried off. Cold or not her clothes were less comfortable this way.

"I've been here a whole two days and I'll have you know I haven't caused any trouble. Not that it's usually my fault. Sometimes." She looked off to the side just in time to see another mug flying in their direction. She leaned back a few inches, the mug less than an inch from her face as it passed. She didn't even blink as it crashed beside her. She ignored it and continued. "So what's up, Taiga?" she asked, characteristically completely ignoring his authority with the way she addressed him.

The towering magic Warrior, kept a cool look at the seemingly ignorant kid "I like to keep tabs on who decides to stop by my town for a visit." As the plate crashed to the side of the little dragon slayer, Ranor gave a quick death inducing glance at the assailant, the guild mage froze in his place and sunk slowly behind another heavy set member. Ranor lifted his fist up to his mouth and then cleared his throat... With a 180 flip of emotion he reached down quickly with both arms and a big smile, bear hugging the young girl. He lifted her into the air with a big beaming smile "It's about time you came back to visit!" Setting the girl back down and looking at his own hands, they were drenched and so was she. His look settling to a stern grin "Come on, let's get you dried off." He placed his large hard hands on her back and guided her to further into the guild hall.

They came up to the bar where Ranor reached over and pulled up a full length towel, folded it neatly and leaned over to the little slayer "Here you go lass." he nodded his head towards a door with the little insignia of a woman "You should be able to find some clean clothes in there as well. If you don't mind wearing Fairy Tail colors until we can get your clothes dried out that is." he perked up the side of his mouth.

Ranor heard  little Meow echo from Kotone's back pack "Ah how could I forget you." He held his hand out and the little cat popped his head from Kotone's back pack and jumped onto Ranor's hand, walking up his arm and perching on one his broad shoulders.

Even Kotone was a bit surprised by Ranor's bear-hug. Not only was she soaking wet, but she wasn't used to touching people if it wasn't her fist, so it caused her to blush involuntarily even after he let go. She did her best to hide it, however. He offered to get her dried off, taking her over to the bar and getting her a large towel. Why they had a large towel she wasn't sure. She took the towel, trying to keep it from getting too wet at the moment. She then followed his instructions to go find something to wear until her own clothes dried out. There wasn't much of a selection, but at least she wasn't planning on going anywhere. She threw on a simple baggy button-up shirt and matching pants, both light blue. She was reasonably certain these were supposed to be pajamas, and had no idea why there were pajamas in the guild hall. But decided not to ask questions about Fairy Tail. They were already weird enough to her.

The seventeen year-old walked out of the room a few minutes later, drying her long hair with the towel, wearing her pajama-like clothing and sandals she'd found in there. Strangely, despite being baggy, everything actually fit pretty well. What, had he planned on a soaked Kotone walking into the guild one day? Somehow she wouldn't be surprised if he had. "That's better!" she said somewhat cheerfully, going and taking a seat at the bar next to Ranor. After a moment of staring forward at the wall across from the bar, she spoke up again. "I never considered you to be such a hospitable man when I saw you before. I suppose it makes sense what with you being a guild master and all," she reasoned aloud.

About this time, Sid was growing tired of being on the big man's shoulders, hopping back down into Kotone's lap. She grinned, petting him idly. "So what's up? Last time I saw you I believe I'd just kicked one of your boys in the face for embarrassing me with his come-ons," she chuckled, remembering the teenage boy she'd taught a lesson to. Fairy Tail had some of the best people in Fiore in it, but it also had its share of morons. The disadvantage of Fairy Tail was that they had no idea when to quit, and as a result she'd nearly died of embarrassment herself from the things he'd said.