You're the reason I come home

Planning is never easy and a battle is always raging

"Gajeel I can explain." Ella began but before she could finish Gajeel took Ella in his arms and nearly squeezed the life out of her in a hug so tight she thought he was going to squeeze her head off, Ella clung to Gajeel and the tears she had been fighting to keep at bay spilling over and soaking Gajeel's shirt.

"Ella it doesn't matter, you're alive and that's the only thing that matters. Do you know how many people have missed you." Gajeel said his voice trembling before Makarov cleared his throat making Gajeel release Ella and step back staring wide eyed at her as if he thought she would disappear if he looked away.

"Until Ella deems it necessary for the others to know, her identity will remain hidden." Makarov turned to Ella and nodded softly. 

"It is of course your choice alone as to when you'll reveal your true identity, however you may want to do it sooner rather than later." Makarov stated gently resting his hand on her calf in a calming manner. Ella nodded and smiled at her teammates.

"Alright Team B let's move we have games to win." She said leading them out the door, Team B following close on her heels as she raised her hood to hide her identity.

__________________________________________________________________________________________________

The games were going without a hitch and Ella still had her identity hidden though she desperately longed to reveal herself for Grey, it was now the final day and Makarov had just merged team A and team B together so now as it stood Team Fairy Tail was Ella or as the team saw the mysterious member, Gajeel, Natsu, Erza, Laxus, and Grey the final round had begun and as the members stood waiting for the starting sound to go everyone except Gajeel and Laxus had been looking at Ella trying to figure her out. As the alarm sounded and the members separated to finish the final game, every one caught sight of Ella as she ran and her hood fell down with the momentum as she ran to her spot in town. The battle raged on and as they finished up and Team Fairy Tail came out on top and had won the Grand Magic games, however before anyone had a chance to celebrate, the world began to shake and the dragons appeared; everyone had decided what it was they were going to do and Ella was in the middle of the square standing beside the other dragon slayers. Things were looking grim and then as she was fighting beside Grey who was clearly upset with her but still the two fought well as they always did together, until a dragon had popped up out of nowhere and shot Grey through the heart, Ella's powers exploded and she took out all of the dragons surrounding them as she ran toward Grey and taking him into her arms before he had fallen to the ground, Grey reached up and touched Ella's cheek and smiled softly. Something odd happened then and it seemed as if time had reversed and beside her Grey was alive, then Ella suddenly sprang into action to save him from getting hit by the dragon. 

The battle had been raging between everyone and the dragons and soon Natsu was fighting future Rogue not long after everything was at a stand still and the dragons were disappearing, the Dragon King Festival had finally ended. Ella jumped at the sudden touch on her shoulders as two strong arms wrapped themselves around them.

"We need to talk." Gray said softly in her ear, she bowed her head in guilt and nodded,

"I know, however we can't do this now we have to get things back together." She said clearly not ready to explain the situation, Gray spun her around in his arms; a smug smile plastering his face. 

"I can agree to that you need your rest" he kissed her forehead as the king called all of Fairytail to what was left of the town square.

"Tonight we rest, tomorrow we fix our town and when we have finished we will hold the banquet." The wizards in what was left of the town square cheered happily before going off to their respective areas however it was more of a camp out than anything else at this point due to all the damage. Gray led Ella to where what was left of her inn was standing and sat back beside her and let out a tense sigh of relief.

"I'm glad you're back and I'm certainly glad that you're okay Ella." He said softly as she laid her head on his shoulder but looked up at him as he spoke, she smiled innocently and shook her head softly at him. 

"I'm just glad we made it out of this in one piece together, I really should explain to you about what's happened and I'm willing to now if you want me to talk about it. I'm more disappointed in myself for my actions than I am embarrassed, I mean I should have known that I could rely on my guild." She said sitting upright and curling her knees to her chest. Gray turned to her and put his hand on her knee, she looked over at him then and saw that he had an unreadable expression in his deep ocean blue eyes.

"Ella I would like to know what happened to you on that long mission, did you succeed, did something happen?" He asked cautiously, she held a hand up and shook her head, 

"No I failed and that's exactly why I made myself disappear, I thought if I made it appear that I was dead than I wouldn't bring shame on myself or worse onto the guild. I couldn't bare to see how upset my friends or family would have been were I to fail and so I faked my own death and disappeared. I should have known that U could trust my guild and still I chose to take the cowards way out so that you wouldn't know that I had failed but then I realized that I couldn't live without you and I heard about the Grand Magic Games and then spoke to master and that's when we discussed all of this and I was so scared that you'd hate me for leaving like I did and I," Gray stopped Ella's worried rambling by kissing her, she pulled back her eyes wide and tears dripping softly down her rosy cheeks as she stared at Gray in shock as she curled up in his arms and felt him hold her close and brought his lips close to her exposed ear as he whispered softly.

"Ell I could never hate you, I mean at the time I was so angry with you but never in all this time could I be mad at you." his arms got tighter around her as he laid back with Ella in his arms and they both fell asleep so they could be refreshed the next day for the work that would surely be going on around Crocus.