[FT] Zancrow AU

This is a design for a Crime Sorciere!Zancrow. It's from an idea for an Alternate Universe I had roughly 7 months ago.

As you may know I like Zancrow a lot even though he is only a minor antagonist who died the same arc he was introduced in
and I absolutely loathe any stories where he just "turns good" and becomes a morally upstanding person just because (or bc he is ~in luv~ with s.o)
FUCK. NO.
Zancrow ain't doing that. Sure, he could be on the side of the protagonist but he would always be a morally grey person because he enjoys hurting others, has killed many, many people and 100% does not look like someone who'd do a 180 and suddenly regret all the crimes he comitted. No.
My idea is somewhat different.

In this AU Zancrow survived Zeref's attack by a hair. Instead of just standing there when Zeref wakes up, he reflexively kicks him away and takes a few steps back because bad feel™ comes from the guy. This brings enough distance between him and Zeref so he doesn't die but he is rendered unconscious for a fairly long time.
When Ultear comes she and Meredy take Zancrow along bc of a very convincing reason I can not think of yet.
Zancrow stays unconscious for the entire time it takes Meredy and Ultear to solve their conflict and get back onto the main land. Once awake he of course goes to attack the two because they have betrayed the guild. It is then that Ultear and Meredy break the news to him that Grimoire Heart was disbanded and that Hades and most of the other guild members are either dead or missing.
Zancrow doesn't believe them first but they manage to convince him that they are in fact telling the truth, somehow.
Zancrow, to whom Grimoire Heart was his life and who was undyingly loyal to Hades, doesn't know what do. Meredy and Ultear offer him to come with them, if only because they want to minimize any damage Zancrow could do and maybe because they pity him and don't necessarily want to kill him.
So when Crime Sorciere is founded Zancrow is there too. Ultear and Meredy ask him to join them. Because a powerhouse like Zancrow seems like a good ally to have.
But Zancrow is less than thrilled and refuses. It is only when Ultear says that their ultimate goal is to destroy Zeref and that it was Zeref who killed Hades that Zancrow reconsiders and, reluctantly, decides to join.
But for the first few days Zancrow downright refuses to change anything about his appearance. Not his clothes and most definitely not his guild mark.
It takes Meredy and Ultear a long time to convince him. When he finally removes his old guild mark he wants to be alone. When Jellal asks Ultear and Meredy if he should follow Zancrow they tell him it depends on "how much he wants third-degree burns"

(Alternatively, Meredy and Ultear left him on Tenrou and some members of the Magic Council find him and take him prisoner before Acnologia shows up, while he is still unconscious. He is taken off the island with the ships of the Magic Council and is put into prison, just like Jellal (potentially also ending up in a cell right next to him). So when Meredy and Ultear come to bust Jellal out of prison, they meet Zancrow too. Ultear thinks it might be a good idea to get Zancrow to join them because he powerful as shit. She is strengthened in that idea when Zancrow proclaims that he wants to kill whoever killed Master Hades, which just so happens to be Zeref. Someone who Crime Sorciere will also be very interested in offing. As a proof that Zancrow is not going to try and kill them once out of his prison cell Ultear forces him to remove his Grimoire Heart guildmark, which Zancrow at first refuses but then budges when he realized that if he doesn't his possibly only chance to not rot in prison is ruined. And after that this story unfolds just like the other)

His relationship with Jellal is rocky. Zancrow doesn't respect Jellal, refuses to even learn him name and is not interested in his "repent for your sins" talk at all.
In the following 7 years of the timeskip Zancrow gets a little more chill and begins to forgive Ultear and Meredy for betraying Grimoire Heart, if only because they are the last remaining (ex-)members whose whereabouts he actually knows and he desperately clings to whatever reminds him of Grimoire Heart (bruh if y'all would know how hard I headcanon Zancrow to be extremely dependent on GH)
When the main gang meets Crime Sorciere after the timeskip, the first thing Zancrow does is fucking deck Natsu on the head so hard he kisses the floor. Kind of as a revenge because he dared to fight (and win) against Hades. Meredy and Ultear forcibly hold him back so he doesn't punch all the other people who were involved in the Hades fight.

...and I think that's enough for now! Hope you enjoyed reading about my little AU ;D

PS: In this AU Zancrow's age post-Tenrou time skip is 32 years, because I hc him in his mid-twenties during the Tenrou arc.


I also want you all to know that I have an alternative AU in which Zancrow also survives the attack from Zeref but instead of ending up in Crime Sorciere he ends up in Tartaros with his good ol' buddy Jackal and is turned into an Etherious and he and Jackal have 7 years of fun, doing whatever the fuck they want, before the Tartaros arc happens and they both die.
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Art © Amadere
Fairy Tail © Hiro Mashima