Title: The Bet
Date: 7 March, 2014
Words: 2140
Main Characters: Gray, Natsu, Lucy, Erza, Happy, Mirajane
Pairings: Gray & Erza, Natsu & Lucy
Inspiration: An entire week of too much Fairy Tail and not enough sleep, and way too eager to write something again.
Summary: Gray makes a bet with Natsu. Who will win, and who'll have to wear a super mini miniskirt for two weeks?
Rating: T
A/N:Hey guys! Thanks for reading. It's just a little one-shot I cooked up. I hope you find something here you like here. Some of you know me from my Bleach fanfics (I'm guessing. It is a pretty big world out there, though, so maybe not). I haven't abandoned them. I just needed a break from them for a while. And well, this developed. It seems like I always end up liking the underdog, if you will, in pairings. Oh well. Gray and Erza just has so much more potential than Gray and Juvia, as far as storyline. Whatever develops in the canon storyline will be fine, but for now, I'm going to lead the way for team GrayZa! (Right? Oh, I am so terrible at all these pairing monikers…)
I always reread my fics before posting, but that doesn't mean I didn't miss something. I appreciate critique. I don't appreciate bashing. :)
Review if you like. I always do my best to respond if you review under your username. I'll be uploading a chaptered fic soon, too, so if you like what you see here, keep an eye out for it!
-Rachel Noelle
oOoOo—RN—oOoOo
"Tch. She's just gonna turn you down, man," Gray gritted out. When exactly Natsu's request for help went from an honest "bro talk" to their usual friendly rivalry he didn't know. He thought it might have been Natsu whining "Oh, man, who am I kidding? It's never going to work!"
That whining usually caused Gray to start using the reverse psychology trick ("Of course it's not you idiot!"), which usually led to the positive results the team needed from Natsu. Make Natsu angry enough, he'll defeat whoever (and whatever) stands in his way. Or die trying.
"Oh, like you're so experienced. Ha! You can't even get up the guts to talk to Erza," Natsu started, singsonging the red headed wizard's name, then, imitating a girly sounding and wimpy version of Gray, "Oh, Erza! You're so pretty! But please don't beat me to death! I loooovvveee you! Erza, you're so scary!"
Gray fumed. His face turned redder than said beauty's hair. Natsu was really playing some chords that stung. He did like Erza. Or as Happy would put it, "He looovvveeesss her!" But she was obviously not interested in him. And, he had to grudgingly agree with Natsu, she was scary as hell when she got mad. But Natsu's teasing was hitting below the belt. Gray growled a deep warning growl. "Shut up, Flame Brain! Or I'm gonna make you a popsicle!"
"Oh yeah?! Is that a challenge, Ice Princess?" Natsu countered, growling his own warning.
Gray and Natsu were beginning to butt heads when Lucy called out across the room, having only been aware of the yelling about Erza, "Hey, would you two shut up? She's almost here!"
A cold shiver ran up both young men's spines and they locked arms in a friendly embrace as Erza walked through the doors of the Guild Hall, blissfully unaware of what had just transpired. She sat herself at the bar with Lucy, Mirajane, and Levy, and descended into a conversation with the other girls.
"I tell you what, Natsu, since you don't have the balls to ask Lucy out, either, let's make this a challenge. Whoever gets their girl to agree to go out with them first wins. And the other one has to run around the guild hall wearing a maid outfit – one with a super short miniskirt, helping Mira for a whole week," Gray declared. Neither one would have simply agreed to a "first one wins!" contest. And, Gray, being equally stubborn and bullheaded as Natsu, knew he had to make it worthwhile.
Natsu grinned his creepy challenge grin, and said, "Make it two weeks, cause you're gonna lose, buddy!"
"Fine. Deal," Gray accepted.
"Um, do you two know what you just agreed to?" Elfman asked, worried.
"I sure do. I just gotta get Lucy to agree to go out with me before the stripper here can convince Erza to go out with him! She'll never say yes! I can take all the time in the world, and I'll still win," Natsu laughed evilly.
"Then why don't you act like a real man and go ask her already?" Elfman provoked.
"Oh, I'm gonna," Natsu growled happily. As though the reality of what he'd just agreed to finally hit him, he turned a funny shade of green and ran off, saying, "Right after I go do something."
Gray sighed and slumped into a chair. He was an idiot. Natsu was right. Erza would never say yes. Even if he could tell her about the challenge to try to convince her just to go along with it for a short time just so she would also get to laugh at Natsu's discomfort, she would probably beat him to a bloody pulp and tell him not to make bets he didn't stand a chance of winning. Always the voice of reason on their team. Always the enforcer. Always ready to beat him or Natsu to the ground just for looking at her wrong.
Okay, maybe she wasn't that terrible, at least not anymore. But, still. She was still scary as hell when she got mad.
Gray trudged over and sat at the other end of the bar opposite the gathered females. He crossed his arms on the counter and rested his head on them. He roused from his depressive state momentarily when someone, probably Cana, hollered, "Gray, your clothes?" Some time later (it was all of fifteen minutes, but it felt like an eternity) Mira came up to talk to him, as always, bringing her insight and cheerful attitude.
"You won't lose unless Lucy agrees to date Natsu before Erza agrees to date you, right?" she asked, smiling brightly.
"I guess so," Gray replied dejectedly.
"Well then, I have an idea. Even if it doesn't work, you technically can't lose unless Lucy says yes, so it should still buy you some time. Maybe by then we could up the ante a little, you know, and alter the bet." Mirajane smiled again.
"I'm going to regret this, but what are you thinking?"
oOoOo—oOoOo
Natsu paced nervously in front of Lucy's house. Happy fluttered above him, growing concerned with each step Natsu took. "What's the matter, Natsu?" Happy asked.
"What? Oh, nothing," Natsu replied, still pacing.
"It's about Lucy, isn't it? You know I don't care if you date her. I like her a lot, too! Even though she can be mean to me sometimes, but, I probably deserve that. I'm kinda mean to her, too. I bet she'd make a great girlfriend for you!" Happy chirruped.
"Yeah, she would," Natsu replied wistfully.
Happy landed on the pavement in front of Natsu. "So, why don't you wanna go in yet? It's not like we haven't been in her house hundreds of times before. We even stay the night sometimes!"
"Yeah, I know. But… I dunno. Now it seems different. Gah! Why am I so worried about this?" Natsu moaned.
"Typical Natsu. Not scared of the meanest, ugliest monster. Gets done in by a girl…" Happy sighed.
Natsu growled angrily. "Let's just go home, Happy…"
oOoOo—oOoOo
The next mid morning Gray walked into the guild hall, searching for Erza. She did not appear to be there yet, so with a sigh of relief he made his way to Mira. "Well, don't you look handsome," she complimented.
Gray let a light blush settle on his cheeks. He put a lot of thought and effort into picking out his clothes for this. He wanted to look masculine and a little intimidating. And he needed all the ego boosts Mira could give him right now if he ever hoped to pull off their plan. A few of the other wizards commented on his clothes (and Cana kindly refrained from teasing him about usually being without any). He soaked up the compliments like the cold he was so familiar with, and let his confidence boost as much as possible.
Most of the guild members had filed into the guild hall by the noon hour. Natsu was lounging around pitifully, looking like he was suffering his worst case of motion sickness ever. The bet notwithstanding, he felt bad for Natsu. He was suffering the same illness, just less dramatically.
Gray started pacing in front of the bar until Mira gave him the scariest glare he'd ever seen from her and told him to sit. Gray swallowed hard. "Yes, Ma'am."
"Good! Now, how about a bite to eat before she shows up?" Mira smiled cheerfully.
"No, thanks," Gray shook his head, "I don't think it'd last long."
"Chin up, Gray!" Mira encouraged him, "She'll have no choice but to say yes. And don't worry, we took care of Juvia." Mira wiggled her eyebrows. Gray decided he was better off not knowing.
Erza stomped into the guild hall at about half noon. Gray did not know what Mira had done to get Erza there, but he started regretting his decision to let her help. Erza was furious.
"Gray Fullbuster, what is the meaning of this?!" Erza cried across the room. She held up some piece of paper in her hand, glaring daggers his way.
Gray swallowed his pride and put on his best acting persona. He could do this. He had costarred in a play, and been a lot better than Erza, at any rate. Acting as tough as he could muster, he began yelling back, "You know what, Erza? I'm tired of messing around like this."
"Like this?" she bellowed back, "You're tired of helping me on jobs and apparently tired of saving my ass, so now you're billing me for it?"
"That's right. It's always 'Oh, Gray, help me with this job,' or 'Gray, help me walk because my leg is broken'," Gray retorted, trying to ad lib expertly. His attitude would either win the war or end his life. Either way, it would be over and done with today.
Erza stood near a wall. 'Perfect,' thought Gray. He covered the distance between them quickly, with Erza apparently too pissed to even move. He could feel her magic energy building up and tried to quickly get to the point.
Gray shoved his hands in his pockets as he strode the last few steps. Pulling a move he had seen work for Loke a few times, he slammed one fist into the wall just above Erza's shoulder, inches from her head. He inwardly wrenched in pain. Loke had never slammed the wall, just casually put his palm there.
"Let me tell you what, Erza. I'm tired of all this 'friends' business. I don't get any kind of benefit I want out of it. Instead it's always guilt trips and death threats. So yeah, I tallied up a bunch of stuff I've done for you the last few months, and now, I want my payment. Cause you see, I don't want to be your friend anymore," he growled, leaning close to her ear, dropping his voice to a whisper.
Erza still had enough magic power gathered to beat the shit out of him if he made one wrong move. She seemed to be too stunned as yet to do anything.
"You see," he whispered, his low growl (he hoped) changing from threatening to seductive, "I'm tired of just being your friend." He grabbed Erza's face in his hand, more forcefully than he intended, and with all the gentleness and courage he could muster pressed his lips to hers. She remained stoic and cold, and he pulled back after only a few moments.
He really was a fool.
"You're tired of helping me, of your own free will, to complete missions and get healing after I've been injured, and you want me to repay you with my body?" Erza spat, disgusted and deeply hurt. "I thought you were a better person than that."
Gray's eyes widened fearfully. "What?! No! That's not what I meant! Erza, I swear! Please put the sword down and let me explain!"
Still glaring in disgust, she conceded. "You have ten seconds, Gray. Explain."
Gray quickly spilled all the details of how he had made the bet with Natsu, and Mirajane had overheard, and then the plan she'd devised, "And I really just thought I'd look cool and strong if I pulled that lame move, and I swear I didn't know what you had in your hand!" Gray was nearing tears now. "I should have known. I was such a fool." He backed away from Erza a pace, his pained and likely broken hand falling limply to his side.
Erza, losing patience, demanded, "Get to the point, Gray."
"The point? Erza, I just told you. I bet Natsu that you'd agree to go out with me before he could get Lucy to agree to go out with him. Like I said, I don't want to be just your friend anymore. I'd really prefer to be your boyfriend." Gray sighed, his voice and body feeling small. "Okay, you can kill me now."
"So, let me get this straight. You went to all that trouble to try to make yourself look stronger and more masculine and worthy of me?" Erza tightened her fist on the hilt of her sword and gripped Gray's shirt collar tightly in her other hand. Gray nodded. "Tch. You could have just asked me without the theatrics." She closed the short distance this time, eliciting a cheer from the gathered crowd. Mirajane cooed in excitement for the two.
"I'm still going to give you a thrashing for all the bullshit," Erza told Gray. Gray laughed nervously. "Going to have my cake and eat it, too, today."
"Ten second head start?" Gray whimpered.
"I'm feeling generous. I get to beat you and kiss you. I'll give you twenty," she replied, her smile widening into a dangerous grin.
The only thing left behind of Gray was his clothing.
oOoOo—RN—oOoOo
