Thank you so much for such a fun prompt! I, uh, hope you don’t mind that I took some creative liberties with it. I’m not sure why my brain said “Make Jellal a former hitman and Gajeel his rival” when you gave me this prompt but that’s what happened. im so sorry if this is incredibly out of character I hope you like it! Merry Christmas :D

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The breeze was biting as it howled around Jellal, tearing the black hood from his azure hair and whipping it across his eyes, effectively blinding the scope he was peering through.

Winter jobs. He hated winter jobs.

With an angry huff, he pulled the hood back up over his head and tugged the scarf around his neck up over his nose before he returned his eye to the piece atop his rifle. Once this was over, he was going to march up to Makarov and tell him he was no longer taking any jobs between October and February unless they happened well south of the Mason-Dixon Line. He’d find a way to stretch his earnings to last, lord knows he made more than enough to hibernate.

After all, it wasn’t like there was ever a shortage of bad guys that needed to be killed.

Sighing loudly, Jellal watched the door of the bar tucked between two unassuming bodegas deep in the heart of the city. Eventually his target— mob leader code named Zero— would walk through those doors and receive one bullet to the temple. It would be as swift as possible to ensure Jellal could finally get out of this damn cold.

“Come on,” he snarled to himself, his words carried on the fog of his breath and briefly misting over the scope’s lense. There were very few things that could have made this job any worse.

Rain, snow, a bust, or—

“Ya look like ya could use a break, how about you get outta here and let me finish the job?”

Him.

The universe seemed to have jokes tonight, and if Jellal was a more pious man, he might need to have a stern talking with whoever was in charge. That was the only explanation as to why Gajeel Redfox was on the same rooftop as him in the middle of the night as he was about to take out the second highest ranking mob boss in the city.

“What are you doing here, Fox?” He hissed, not even bothering to look away from his mark. With his luck, Zero would walk out the exact moment he turned to shoot the second hitman a patented glare.

“Well don’t sound so excited to see me, Mystogan,” Gajeel said, voice filled with biting sarcasm, his steps coming closer to Jellal as he crossed the roof. Heat radiated off the other man as he stopped just to the right of him, presumably eyeing the exact same spot he was. If he was there, the only explanation would be that he was there to take out Zero before he did. Which only managed to make Jellal angrier.

“It’s funny how you just happen to keep showing up at the same jobs as me. It’s almost like you’re following me,” the blue haired man said through gritted teeth as he fought every urge to pull away from his rifle just long enough to throw his unwelcome company over the side of the building. Gajeel’s unique and ever annoying laugh made him cringe.

“You’ll have to take that one up with Gramps. If we happen to keep getting the same targets, that isn’t on me.” His words were annoyingly over confident, filled with the bravado of youth. Up until Gajeel had joined the team five months earlier, Jellal had been the youngest member at the tender age of 23. Now, just 18 years old, Gajeel had quickly made a name for himself and become one of the most requested hitmen out of the group. Second only to Jellal, which only seemed to stoke the flames of the fiery rivalry they’d managed to cultivate in the short amount of time that they’d known each other. He’d tried to befriend the new assassin, but he knew how to push every single one of his buttons.

It was a deadly combination, especially when Jellal was certain he had frostbite on his ass and a rifle clutched in his hands.

All he had to do was focus on the mark. Zero would walk out those doors, Jellal would take him out, and then he could go home. He could do this. Taking a deep breath, he started to countdown from ten.

“Maybe he doesn’t think you can finish the hits anymore.”

Or maybe tonight would be the night he finally did something about his biggest problem. Tearing away from the eyepiece, Jellal glared upwards at Gajeel one hand leaving the rifle and flying to the dagger sheathed at his hip. As if he wasn’t about to be on the business end of a blade, Gajeel laughed, lifting his hands in quiet submission. Jellal didn’t miss the the Desert Eagle in his right fist.

“Alright, Mystogan, sorry. I take it back,” he said as he waggled his fingers in a half assed attempt to alleviate the tension.

“Don’t take it back, just get out of here,” Jellal growled, fingertips still brushing against the leather handle of his dagger as he considered how easy it would be to still rip it free of its sheath and throw it at Gajeel. His life could be so much easier if he just did.

“Can’t do that, I--”

Gajeel’s words died in his throat as his crimson eyes flashed, catching the light of the street lights as they shot from Jellal to the door he’d been watching. As if in slow motion, he watched the way his rival’s fingers twitched over the gun’s grip before he leveled it at his target. Turning quickly, Jellal pressed his eye back to the scope, only allowing himself a moment to ensure he was looking at Zero.

With a steadying breath his finger pulled the trigger as twin shots rang out through the otherwise silent night.

***

Winter. God, did Jellal hate winter. He pulled his jacket tighter around him as he made his way up the stairs of the house he’d inherited from his parents when they’d died four years earlier, leaving him a 16-year-old sister to take care of, a pile of bills, and no means to continue his line of work. His forced retirement hadn’t necessarily been a bad thing. With what he had saved, and what the Guild had paid him to ensure he was comfortable-- We’re family after all-- he had managed to survive well enough. It at least was enough to bide him and Levy time for him to become a well adjusted member of society again and get a job that didn’t involve killing gangsters in the middle of the night.

All things considered, he didn’t miss it. Though his current accounting job didn’t hold the same adrenaline rush, at least he knew he wouldn’t ever need to worry about not returning home to his sister. Not to mention he didn’t have to worry about sitting on a roof in this weather.

The front porch light was on, and the living room glowed with a golden aura that alerted him to the fact Levy was already home. She had been away at her third year of college, and had been unable to come home before their Christmas Eve dinner. A smile tugged the corner of his mouth upward as he took the steps two at a time and thrust the house key into the lock, making quick work of it so that he could make his way into the home. The smell of ham and a blanket of warmth welcomed him as he pushed the door shut behind him.

“Levy?” He called as he stepped towards the dining room to the left of the entrance. “Hey Le--” The rest of her name lodged itself deep within his throat, nearly choking him as he crossed the threshold of the room. A thick silence fell over the room as if time and space themselves had frozen at the sight that lay before him.

This had to be Hell.

Jellal was certain that was where he had managed to find himself. He must have died of an aneurysm and been sent straight to its lowest level. That was the only answer as to why Gajeel Redfox was sitting beside his little sister at their dining room table.

Holding. Her. Hand.

If a blood clot in his brain hadn’t already taken him out, he was certain it was about to as he felt his blood pressure rising. It suddenly felt unbelievably hot as he tried to get any words out passed the shrapnel that had imbedded itself into his throat.

I invited a friend over for Christmas Eve dinner because he doesn’t have anyone, so be nice.

At the time Jellal had imagined this friend she had mentioned would be one of those two that always tagged behind her like besotted puppies. Drone, Jay, whatever their names were. He could handle those two, having already struck the fear of God into them but casually dropping that he was a trained hitman that knew an obscene amount of ways to make people disappear. They’d assumed it was just the joke of a crazy big brother, unaware that the best way to hide the truth was buried behind the confines of laughter.

Gajeel, however, was an entirely different story. The last time he’d seen the ever present thorn in his side had been shortly after the Zero incident, when the Guild had given him a proper send off. After the same niceties and condolences he’d heard from everyone else, the other hitman had disappeared from his life. Much to his delight.

He should have known he couldn’t have been that lucky.

Jellal’s eyes darted from the couple seated at the table towards the numerous items that sat within reach that he could use to take Gajeel down and get Levy away from him. A vase to the back of the skull; a fork to the eye; and if things got particularly desperate, he could probably work something out with the ceiling fan if he needed to.

“Jellal!” Levy’s voice was bright as it pulled his attention from the dark corners of his mind and back to his sister and her guest. She smiled at the black haired man just to her right, her fingers tightening in his grip before pulling free from his hold as she stood from her seat. As she made her way to him, her smile stretched wide, she missed the way Gajeel’s eyes flickered between the two of them. One of his studded brows shot upwards as he attempted to make the connection between the two. The corners of his mouth turned down as he finally rested his glare on Jellal. He looked displeased.

Good.

“It’s about time you got home!” Levy said as she threw her arms around his waist and pulled him into a hug. He returned the gesture as he glared back at Gajeel over the top of her head. Wars waged for dominance in the space between them as they held each others gazes, both oblivious to Levy’s words as she continued to speak.

“--boyfriend Gajeel!”

Jellal shook his head, breaking the bitter tension zinging between him and the unwelcome man at his dinner table as he turned his attention back to Levy as she pulled away from their hug.

“What?” Eloquent as ever, he admonished himself.

“I know I should have said something earlier, but I didn’t want you to say he couldn’t come. But I wanted you to meet my boyfriend,” Levy’s words were rushed as she gestured to the only other person in the room she could be referring to. “Gajeel.”

The moment stretched in an unending pause as the two hitmen mentally plotted the course of the rest of their night. Jellal saw the moment Gajeel chose his path, cementing his choice with a grunt and curt nod before standing up from his seat and offering a hand over the table for him to shake.

“Nice to meet you, sir.” He didn’t miss the way Gajeel winced as he spoke, and he had to bite back a smile at the obvious discomfort it had caused him.

Now it was up to him to play along.

“Call me Jellal,” he said, pulling away from Levy and crossing the short distance between him and the table, taking Gajeel’s hand and squeezing it tightly in an overly firm handshake. Outwardly, he looked every bit a good older brother meeting his little sister’s boyfriend for the first time. Inwardly, he was trying to figure out what exactly he had done to warrant this kind of karmic retribution.

Aside from the whole hitman thing and the lying to hide it from his family, of course.

“Jellal,” Gajeel said through gritted teeth as he pulled his hand from the tight handshake, testing that he still had full range of motion as he spread his fingers wide before closing it into a fist. His sister made a small, happy sound as she watched them, apparently pleased by the false show of niceties before she started to head towards the kitchen.

“Good. Dinner is pretty much done, so let me just go start grabbing that,” she said over her shoulder as she strode across the room.

“You need any help?” Jellal asked, pleading filling his voice. Either Levy didn’t hear the plea, or she didn’t care as she shook her head and gestured to the both of them.

“Not at all, you two get to know each other.” Her voice was filled with the same sunshine as her smile as she turned to leave. Steel shuddered over the olive green of his eyes as he glared at their guest who returned the look with matching ferocity.

“Be nice, Jellal.”

With the warning hanging in the air, his sister pushed open the door to the kitchen and disappeared inside. Before it had even finished swinging shut, Jellal was reaching across the table and grabbed Gajeel by the collar of his shirt.

“What are you playing at, Fox?” He growled through gritted teeth, other hand clutching a fork that he was ready to use to maim and destroy if the other man made any false moves. Hell, he might do it anyway just for the relief of being done with him. Jellal didn’t miss the way Gajeel’s own hand had closed around a knife.

“I’m not playing at anything, Mystogan,” he spat in response, Jellal’s codename dripping with venom as it fell from his lips. “Now get your hands off me before I have to take them off for you.”

Instead, he pulled him closer as his eyes narrowed. Like Jellal would believe him so easily. Barring some sort of cosmic interference that wished to see him suffer, he couldn’t imagine any other reason as to how Gajeel of all people found himself in his house for Christmas Eve dinner.

“Why are you with my sister?” He asked a bit more forcefully, flipping the fork in his hand and holding it to the other man’s pulse point. Gajeel rolled his eyes at the show of force, flicking the knife and mirroring Jellal’s pose as he pressed the point into his throat. A beat of silence passed between them as they sized each other up, the cool silverware warming against their skin. The soft clinking of Levy in the kitchen was the only thing that disturbed the intensity of the quiet in the room before Gajeel finally sighed and pulled the knife away, hand opened in surrender in an all too familiar gesture.

“Put the fork down, Myst, unless you wanna explain to Lev how blood got all over the dinner table,” he growled low enough to be heard only be Jellal. “Something tells me she doesn’t know what you used to do for a living.”

The threat was barely veiled beneath a tone of nonchalance as Gajeel leveled him with a quizzical look.

Choose wisely.

Exasperation colored Jellal’s moan a careful shade of resignation as he let the collar go and pulled away. With a quick flick of his wrist, he flipped the fork over in his hand and pointed the dulled butt end of it at the smug man opposite of him.

“If you tell her--”

In that moment, Levy came bursting back into the room with a ham perched on a large, silver platter.

“Tell me what?” She asked, golden gaze flicking between Gajeel and Jellal’s tensed forms. The corner of her mouth bent downwards as she read the strained silence. Panic roiled in his stomach as he looked between Levy and Gajeel, mind racing to find a perfectly acceptable ending to that statement that didn’t involve the words “hitman,” “kill,” and “will shove your face into a microwave.”

“That this will be my first real Christmas,” Gajeel said with a shrug, the ruby of his eyes bouncing imperceptibly from Jellal before returning to Levy as he spoke. The implied message was loud and clear.

You owe me.

Maybe Jellal would still consider something with that microwave idea.

“I wasn’t gonna tell ya,” Gajeel continued, standing to take the plate from Levy and setting it down onto the table. “The foster system isn’t exactly a festive topic.”

They both watched as Levy’s mouth turned down ever so slightly at the edges, her golden eyes casting a saddened glance over their guest before her hand ghosted over his shoulder in a reassuring touch.

“I’m so sorry, Gajeel,” she whispered, her attention solely on the hitman as if Jellal wasn’t even there anymore. He watched as Gajeel smiled at her, dropping a kiss over her knuckles before she pulled her hand away.

“It’s alright, Shrimp. I couldn’t think of  a better way to spend the first one than with you,” he replied lowly, voice brusque with emotion. It almost felt intrusive watching them, which only served to annoy Jellal even more. He felt his eye twitch slightly as Levy turned away and disappeared back into the kitchen. Gajeel’s shoulders stiffened as he sat back down, eyes cutting through the blue haired man opposite him, daring him to say something.

Jellal rested an elbow on the table, pointing at his unwelcome guest with a stern look, voice even harsher as he spoke.

“I’m watching you, Fox.”

***

The worst part about the night, was that Jellal couldn’t actually find any fault in Gajeel’s affections towards Levy. Much to his dismay, he was actually a completely different person when his sister around. Where he’d been a hardened, smartass killer whose sole purpose most often had seemed to annoy the piss out of Jellal, he was softened by her mere presence. Jellal had watched in almost abject horror as they’d moved together, completely unaware the way each of their movements seemed to influence the other as if caught in each others gravities. Even worse still were the small touches and secret smiles as dinner had progressed, each lingering a little longer as time passed. Somehow Jellal had become the third wheel in his own home.

And somehow, he hadn’t minded at all.

Jellal couldn’t remember the last time Levy had smiled like that, if she ever had at all. It was almost as if she glowed as she spoke to Gajeel, unaware just how brightly her eyes shone while all else fell away. A small voice in the back of Jellal’s mind told him exactly what it was that he had a front row seat to.

Love.

If Levy hadn’t looked so happy, he would have blanched at the thought, taking care to tear her away from Gajeel and the whole damn situation.

But as she snuck a small glance sideways, smiling around a timid bite of food with a flush coloring her cheeks, Jellal couldn’t even bring himself to hate his former coworker.

“That was delicious, Lev,” Gajeel said, rubbing his stomach languidly as he smiled at her, breaking Jellal’s concentration as he watched them carefully.

“It certainly was, sis,” he agreed as he stood, eyes falling squarely on Gajeel. “So delicious that I think you earned the evening off from dishes. Me and Gajeel will take care of this, won’t we?”

His final words came out pointed as he quirked his eyebrow. Agree or die, the look said. Nodding curtly, the dark haired man stood, leaning down to press a kiss to the top of Levy’s hair.

“Are you sure?” She asked, her eyes bouncing back and forth between the two, trying to decipher the look that had passed between them. Worry colored her tone as she made to stand.

“Of course, Levy, I think we can handle some dishes,” Jellal said as he stacked their plates and made his way to the kitchen. He heard her soft mumbling before the door shut behind him, making him laugh quietly to himself.

Placing the dishes gently in the sink, he turned his back to the counter, leaning against it and crossing his arms over his chest as he waited for Gajeel to appear. After a moment, the hitman followed, the platter of ham clutched between his hands as his steely eyes narrowed at him. The door clicked softly behind him, signaling him to stop on the opposite end of the kitchen.

“Is this where you kill me, dispose of my body and tell Levy I ditched?” He said gruffly, glaring at Jellal and widening his stance as if prepared for a fight. In another world, hell even just a couple of hours earlier, he would have happily obliged. It had been years since he’d fought anyone, and though Jellal might be rusty, he was certain her could still kick the younger man’s ass.

At least, that’s what he told himself. Instead, he shook his head.

“I love my little sister, Gajeel,” he said lowly, not moving from where he was leant against the counter. “She’s why I left the Guild, and sorted my life out. Levy deserves the world.”

Gajeel’s mouth fell open as if to protest, causing Jellal to wave his hand to silence him.

“She isn’t a child anymore, and I don’t need to protect her. And for some unimaginable reason, you make her happy.” His eyes flashed over his companion, offering a small peace offering of a smile. He watched as Gajeel did an impression of a fish out of water, mouth opening and closing wordlessly before he settled on a nod.

“That being said, if you break her heart, my S&T Motiv K14 is in the attic.” Jellal flicked his gaze up towards the ceiling as if to reiterate how close Gajeel was to certain doom. “Do not think for a second that just because I have been out of the field for four years I won’t kill you.”

The threat earned him a good natured laugh as Gajeel finally stepped closer, putting the platter in the sink before turning and offering Jellal his hand.

“You won’t need to worry about it, Jellal.” Sincerity rang in his words as the older man shook his hand.

“Good. Now go keep our girl company,” he said.

Watching the door shut behind Gajeel as he took his leave, quick to take up the offer before Jellal could change his mind. Soft laughter floated into the kitchen from the dining room as Levy and Gajeel’s voices melded together. Sighing lowly, he turned towards the sink, pushing his sleeves up and turning on the water.

Maybe I’ll teach Levy how to shoot, though.

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