New Year, New story! Yay! I don't know why, but one day I was watching spiderman and then this story kinda built up in my head and I just had to start writing it. I wanted to start this story up before I go back to my classes later this month! Chatper 2 will be posted very soon! Happy New Year!

Superhero AU

Rated T for some language.

Son of Dragons

His knuckles clenched as he heard her bloodcurdling cry.

"NATSU!"

If only she wasn't so stubborn like him to go out into the battlefield. He told her to stay away from the fight, it was way too dangerous! She knew of the dark entity that hid inside the man he once knew. She saw the twisted acts he committed, and now there she was, in his tightened grip, seconds from her death.

"LET HER GO!" Natsu snarled. Flames erupted from his fists like a powerful volcano ready to burst. He never wanted it to come to this, he was like his brother, but he wasn't the same man. No, he was far from who he used to be.

"Or what?" Gray mused, "You'll kill me?"

"I'll do it if you I have to, don't make it go down like this."

Gray dug is fingers over her throat, making her cry in pain. "NA-A" she choked out.

"Come and get me, Son of Dragons."

Chapter One

No amount of heavy music could drown out the banter behind him.

"Laxus is definitely going to win homecoming royalty." He heard someone say from behind.

"No," someone else scoffed, "It's obviously going to be Sting, and rumor has it that he just got promised a spot on the varsity football team.

"Idiots." Natsu thought as he silently judged the students behind him.

Natsu clicked for his volume to go higher, but the music was already at its maximum strength. You could hear the bassline echo from his cheap earbuds that he got from the General store.

He sighed as he settled for how loud his Ipod would give him. Next time, he'll save up for those Beats, like he promised he would. For now, he would have to endure his classmates talking.

Natsu hunched over his seat, fiddling with the wimpy bendy straw that came from his juice box. It was the beginning of the seond week of school, his final year at Magnolia High, and he couldn't be more anxious to get it over with.

Ever since he started high-school, Natsu always found himself hating everything and everyone. Who could blame him? Every so often he would get teased or questioned about his past, even more so when word spread that he lived in an orphanage. Some meant well, and truly did feel bad to what happened to him. "Poor boy, he shouldn't have gone through that." He would hear some of teachers say. Others weren't as understanding. They would hang his past over him like a dark cloud, mocking that if only his father was strong enough, he would still be around.

Just before the next song began to play, a lunch tray slid in front of him.

"Took you long enough." He muttered, yanking his earbuds off.

"Yeah, Yeah." Gray said, taking a seat in front of him. "You'd think after the first week of school, the freshman would stop running to the damn lunch line." He said picking at his food, "Anyways, how'd you get here so fast?"

Natsu held up a sad, crinkly brown paper bag with his name on it. "Homemade lunch." He smirked.

"How the hell did you get that?! Makarov doesn't let us into the kitchen before seven!"

"I have my ways." Natsu said with a smug smile. "Momma Mira has my back." He loved knowing that he got some sort of special treatment back at the home.

"Whatever." Gray said sounding all kinds of jealous, "So, Erza told me, to tell you, that you have to stay behind after school today."

Natsu's face fell to the floor. Staying late after school? God, what did he do to deserve such misfortune? Erza knew how much he hated school, and the people in it, why would she even bother having him stay a minute longer?

"Like hell." Natsu glared. His eyes were practically shooting darts at Gray as if he were Erza. "What do you even have to do anyways?"

"Football conditioning." He replied, making Natsu groan. If there was anything he hated more than school, it was the school's activities. "Look, its only two-hour's after-school." Gray continued to say, "Go to the library or something."

"And do what?"

"Gee, I don't know, use your brain and finish your homework for once."

"I just don't understand why Erza keeps treating me like a baby." Natsu frowned, "First she wouldn't let me go out past nine, then she started having us walk together, and now I have to wait for you? Where's the sense of trust?"

"You lost that when you got into that fist-fight with Gajeel." Gray said, munching on his food, "Erza specifically gave you one last chance to redeem yourself from the bus incident and then you got into a fight with Gajeel. Don't blame her for wanting to treat you like a five-year old."

"That was last year though, it's not like it was my fault. Metal-face should've kept his mouth shut in the first place."

Thinking about that little brawl made Natsu slump in his chair. He and Gajeel would always go at it with each other, but one day last year, Gajeel went over and started picking a fight with Natsu. Little did anyone know that he was bringing up Natsu's home-situation, which hit a real nerve that time, and out of nowhere, Natsu hit him at the gut. Everything rolled down hill after that. By the time Erza got word of what happened she raced over to the scene of the fight, only to find Natsu covered with bruises, and a black eye, trying to balance himself up.

"You did get your ass whooped though." Gray replied, taking another bite from his food.

"I'll give Erza a piece of my mind when we get back home." Natsu growled, making his pink hair bounce. "I'm not a freaking kid!"

"Do it, I'd love to see her rip you a new one." He chuckled.

Natsu scoffed as he got up from his seat to throw away his trash. He offered to toss Gray's but he declined. As soon as he left the table, he began to see some heads turning around to face him. It was the students from earlier who were talking about their precious homecoming.

"What about Natsu? Think he'll make it on to the list?" he heard one of them say.

"Nah, even if he does get on it, it'll probably be pity point."

His jaw began to clench with every stab of their words. He desperately wanted to tell them that they could go fuck off, but doing that would cause a scene, and he couldn't afford getting in trouble again. Instead, he shrugged them off and threw away his trash.

Why did he grab everyone's attention? Couldn't they leave him alone?! He wanted to snarl whenever someone began to turn and look at him, and began to start whispering at him... He swore the next person to say another word about him would get sucker punched in the face.

"Just ten more months." He tried to calm himself from the rising anger building inside, "ten more months and I'll be out of this hellhole."

"-Excuse me!"

Natsu was caught off guard as he almost collided with the girl in front of him. "Whoa, watch it." He said putting a hand on her shoulder. "Almost knocked you over."

"Could've said the same to you." The girl backed up a bit, before readjusting herself. "Sorry," she said brushing a blonde strand away from her face. "I just want to get to my class before it starts."

Natsu raised a curious brow, "Class doesn't start for another fifteen minutes. You don't have to rush outta here." He said getting a better look at the girl. She was average sized, proabably 5'5. Part of her blonde hair was pieced together up in a ponytail while the rest dangled a bit over her shoulders. An odd hairstyle, Natsu thought, but who was he to judge since he had pink hair.

Her outfit gave Natsu the impression that she associated with the prep clique. Her tall brown riding boots and navy blue skirt didn't fall far from what the prep group dressed like. Her top however caught his attention. It was an average white shirt, but the way it made her chest look-

"I'm new here." She said popping is thoughts. "I just transferred from out of town."

Natsu gulped a little trying to ease away his previous thoughts. "T-That's probably why I haven't seen you here before."

"Yeah," she said, holding her messenger bag close, "Sorry, I should introduce myself…I'm Lucy!" she smiled, sticking out her hand for a shake. "It's nice to meet you."

"Natsu." He replied, gently shaking her hand. It was weird, no one had ever introduced themselves to him. People knew Natsu, and a lot about him, but no one ever really said who they were. They would just pop up, say what they needed to say, and leave. He had to admit, he kind of liked the fact that Lucy was new here. One new person meant that a least someone here didn't know his story.

Natsu glimpsed down at her bag, noticing that a paper was ready to fall out. Lucy saw it too, and snagged it right before it was about to fall.

"Is that your schedule?" he asked.

"Yeah. It's a pretty long one too. I have zero and an eighth period. Talk about a long day huh?"

Zero and an eighth? And Natsu thought just several hours after school was bad.

"Jeez, what classes are you taking?"

Lucy began to list all her classes to him. She made it a point to say that she was in a few honors classes but that didn't seem to surprise him, she looked like a smart girl.

"We don't have any classes together," Natsu crinkled his nose, "But I can warn you about . He's a hardass and doesn't change grades for shit. Trust me, you'll want to do all the homework in that class."

"Thanks for the tip." Lucy curved a small grin, "I better get going then, I have his class next. I'll see you around Natsu."

"See ya around." Natsu forced a smile on his face.

When he spun around, he could already see Gray's smug face. He knew that look. It was the exact same one he would give him whenever Juvia talked to Gray.

"Hey Icebox, if you keep grinning like that, you're going to look like a dumbass for the rest of your life."

"Funny." Gray said, flicking some food at him. "Since when were you acquainted with Lucy?"

"You know her too?"

"She's in my stat's class." Gray answered, "I can already tell she's probably going to be some author since she's pretty smart and likes to write a lot. She carries this journal and randomly plops it out and writes something down. I heard ask her for a spot in the journalism club, so that oughta tell you something."

"Here's anothing too, I've heard she's super rich. Her dad runs some kind of company or business. Tha'ts why she moved down here to Magnolia."

Natsu only nodded his head. Wow, so much has been spread about Lucy and she had only been here for a week.

"Anyways, another thing I heard it that Loke has a little thing for her."

"What?! Loke?! But it's only been a week since school started." Natsu exclaimed.

"That's what I heard," Gray shrugged. "She's the new girl, what'dya expect? Everyone is going to be all over her since she's the new one here. It's like some new fancy toy."

"They'll get over her." Natsu retorted. He tried not to feel so stinged at the fact so many guys were hitting on Lucy already. She seemed pretty nice, and she knew nothing about him. Just that little bit sparked some kind of interest in her, but he wouldn't say that aloud.

Natsu tried to brush the weird feelings off by the time the bell rang for dismissal. "I'll meet you at the Library. You better be there, Dragneel." Gray said before heading off to his class.

He nodded his head and began to walk to his classroom.

After the bell rang, Natsu found himself wandering throughout the hall with his headphones on. "Fire and the Flood",a song he was oddly fond of, was on replay ever since lunch. He watched as the students rushed home on their skateboards or on their bikes. He even saw some students race towards the bus. That's something he never missed.

All this would be gone soon, he thought as he turned into another hallway. No more rushing to the next class, no more write-ups or trip's to the principal's office, it will all be over.

In the future when his grandkids (if he would have any) would ask if he would redo his school years, he would say hell no. Natsu wasn't the man to live with regrets. Once something was done he would move forward. There wasn't any point in looking back on the past, it was done. This included even the darkest of his past.

He pulled up is scarf when he caught a quick breeze from outside. It was cold and slightly damp. Probably a sign that it would rain later. Natsu loved this cold weather, despite his name meaning summer. It meant change. A change in weather and the color of the leaves. He admired how something that was once so olive…so green, changed into the rustic colors. The leaves were red and orange and they would look beautifully contrasted with the brown leaves.

Thinking of the word brown suddenly brought back a clear image of Lucy. He didn't realize he stared at her that long to recall the color of her eyes. They were a chocolaty brown, he remembered. He never seen anything like them. Sure Erza, and Cana, and even Wendy had brown eyes, but nothing really compared to Lucy's.

"Oh no." he thought, "These feelings are coming back again!" Natsu shook his head, headphones flying out, thinking that would solve these unwanted thoughts. "What the hell?!" he said banging his hand against his head, "I only met her for like ten seconds, I can't be thinking about her-"

"-Met who for ten seconds?"

The pinkette sprug back from the startling voice behind him. He spun around and nearly lost his breath when he saw that the voice belonged to Lucy's.

"U-Um nobody." He lied with panic In his voice.

The blonde laughed a bit, "For a sec I was thinking you were talking about me."

"Ha, nooooo." Natsu nervously chuckled, "its Lucy right?"

"Yeah that's right. You met me earlier in the cafeteria."

"Oh yeah," he tried playing it off, "I literally almost rammed into you."

Lucy nodded her head, "What are you doing here so late? Do you have an eighth period too?"

"Nah." Natsu said, putting his hands in his pockets, "I'm just waiting for my brother, Gray, to get out of his stupid football conditioning for Football."

"You're brothers with Gray?" she raised a brow. He could already hear the next question. It was the same one he was always asked.

"Well, we're technically not brothers." Natsu began to explain, "Our orphanage, I guess you can say, makes us call each other brother and sister. It was Gramps bright idea."

"Gramps?"

"Yeah, he's the one that takes care of us all."

"What kind of home is it?" she began to ask while walking down the hall with him. Gosh, she sure like to talk a lot, Natsu thought, but apparently she was into journalism so that might have something to do with these consistent questions.

"Well if you're asking if there's any kids there, than no there aren't any." He replied, scratching the back of his head, "We do have a preteen though. Her name's Wendy, she's the only middle schooler we have at the home. For the most part, it's just teenagers."

"Sounds like you have a big family with all those brothers and sisters." Lucy smiled, "I wish I had something like that."

"Why you don't?"

She shook her head, "Nope, I'm an only child. I was raised by my dad, but I hardly ever see him anymore since he's always away on some kind of business."

"That really sucks." He said, "It must be kinda lonely."

"Yeah, but I get over it. The quiet usually help me concentrate on my writing. I will admit though, it is lonely after a while, especially when I haven't seen anybody all day. Most time's like that I'll go wander at night. Y'know, look at the stars."

Her eye's reminded him of stars, but that's something he would never dare say.

"You know, I heard you got into the Journalism club." He continued the conversation hoping it would never end. "Congradulations on that."

"You heard that? How'd did anyone find out so fast?"

Natsu cracked his knuckles before folding his arms behind his head, "Thing's spread like wildfire here, Lucy. There's no secrets here in this school."

The blonde began to look down at her feet, which completely threw Natsu off. He began to wonder if he said something wrong or anything that would upset her. He was about to ask what was wrong when she commented how she found something out about him. That's when Natsu realized that his secrets would never be unspoken about.

"Someone told me all these stories about you." Her voice began sound flat. He could feel his stomach flop. She was probably already judging him. Maybe this was a setup for one of journalism articles. Some kind of big exposure on what his real story is. If that was the case he wanted nothing to do with her-

"-I don't believe them though."

"Oh." Was the only thing he could mutter out.

Natsu's heart practically pounded out of his ribcage. She didn't believe them? That was the first. Another thing was that she didn't judge him. She still approached Natsu in the friendliest manner.

"You don't?" he softly said when he gathered his mind.

Lucy shook her head again, "I only believe something when it's said by that person. It give a sense of reliability."

Natsu took a big gulp of air. He didn't expect her to find out so soon about him, let alone did he even think he'd run into her at all. However, he couldn't explain why, but he felt like he could just trust her. He had already felt so comfortable with her to share that he lives in a home. If she was going to hear rumors, he wanted her to know the truth.

"I don't mind telling you what really happened." He began to say, "I don't want you to think of me as some kind of weirdo."

"Even though you are, since you practically rammed into me at lunch." Lucy tried joking around.

Natsu forced a smile, "Yeah, well there's that." He said, "Anyways the real story is that I was coming home from school one day when I found my father heavily bleeding and short of breath. My father's research partner, Acnologia had seduced my older brother, Zeref to kill my father. He wanted to find my father's research, and Zeref didn't know, my father wouldn't tell and then there's was me. Acnologia tried to strangle the truth out of me, but he and my brother took off at the first ring of police sirens."

He could see Lucy's eye's widened with. It was obvious that she didn't know what to say after hearing all that and he didn't blame her. All the other rumors were sugar-sweented and made up. There was one where people thought his father was killed by a mugger, but that didn't even come close to what she was just told.

"Your brother killed your father?" her voice shook

"Yes, and no. When investgators got ahold of Acnologias motives, they told me that he used a hidden spell he and my dad researched to hypnotize anyone to do their wishes. Almost like a puppet. I haven't seen him since."

"N-Natsu…I'm so sorry-"

"You don't have to apologize." He said cutting her off. "It happened a long time ago, and now it's over. Now we just gotta move on."

Suddenly he felt a warm hand on his shoulder, he was taken back a bit by the random gesture, but he liked it, it made him feel warm and relaxed.

"If you ever want to talk to anyone you can always talk to me." Lucy said softly. "I don't mind being a listening ear."

Natsu could feel his heart swell, something he thought he would never feel. "Why don't we hang out tomorrow during lunch." He said before he even realized it.

"T-tomorrow? I thought you hung out with your brother?"

"Psh, he'll be fine! He has his girlyfriend to talk to." he said. Hopefully she'll say yes, he didn't want to seem too pushy on the idea. He just told her his traumatic expierence, he could't blame her if she didn't want to hang out with him.

"Sure!" Lucy's eyes lit up. "I wouldn't mind hanging out with you."

"Are you serious?" Natsu said so surprised, "You don't have to if you don't want to, it's just an offer."

"No, no, no! I want to. I really do. Heck, I'll text you where we can meet up." She said shuffling though her bag. She took out an old worn out journal. The spine had tears at the bottom, and he could see the aged paper as Lucy flipped to find a clear page. She handed him the journal to write his number down.

When he handed it back, Lucy draught down her number on his hand. He preferred it written that way. He could show it off to Gray once they met up.

"I'll see you tomorrow, Natsu." Lucy smiled waving him goodbye.

"See you tomorrow."

When he saw that the coast was clear, Natsu pumped a fist in the air. He felt so unexplainably happy, and nothing could make him stop feeling this way.

Just then he felt a vibration come from his pocket. Could it be her already?

He took out his prehistoric flip-phone and groaned. It was Gray.

Gray the Stripper: 4:15 P.M

Conditioning later than expected, go home. I'll explain to Erza.

"You don't have to tell me twice." Natsu snickered. He walked out of the school grounds feeling pretty content with himself. What would be an even better day is if Mirajane made Natsu's favorite home cooked meal. He could smell the fried chicken and baked potatoes already. Thinking about the smell made Natsu race forward to home. However to get home, he had to cut through the bad side of town.

The muggy air made Natsu's stomach curl. The sticky sidewalk was already unbearable but did it have to smell like murky old water all the time? He passed by some old street vendors and business paying no attention to them at all. Something else occupied his mind.

He hadn't spoken about his father to anyone in a long time. He never even told Gray what really happened to him. Natsu wondered what life would be like if his dad was still around. Would he still be the same person like he was today?

Just then he felt a tug at hoodie. He groaned to himself, another street vendor, he thought.

Natsu spun around only to see an elderly woman standing in front of him. She had crinkles under her eyes and very pale skin, though he noted that she was very tall. She was clothed in a crimson cloak, making Natsu's gut feel uneasy.

She mouthed something, but he couldn't hear it. He took out his earphones once again today and asked her what she said.

"You have a gift." she said with a crooked grin.

"I don't have anything, sorry." Natsu said trying to dismiss the woman.

"No!" she halted him, "YOU have a gift."

Natsu rolled his eyes now feeling more annoyed than normal.

"Alright, what's my gift?"

"It's a rare kind of possession to obtain." She smacked her lips, "Very rare indeed."

The old woman crept closer to the pinkette making Natsu feel totally weirded out. If there was something that totally creeped him out, it was people bursting his personal bubble. Out of nowhere the elderly woman pulled out and opened Natsu's hand, exposing his palm.

"What the hell are you doing?!" he shrieked, trying to pull away

She began to trace the tip of her fingers over Natsu's lines, "Strong, Independent, Loyal,...a bit reckless and carefree...you take after you father, Natsu."

"You know my father?" Natsu snapped his hand back, completely ignoring the fact she knew his name. So many burning questions built up in his mind. Who the hell was she? How did he know his father?

"The time has come to discover your true power, Natsu." she began to say, "Open your eyes and unleash the power in your soul. Only then can you truly feel the fiery depths of your abilities."

Natsu now more than freaked out began to back away from the woman, "Who are you?!"

She began to creep forward but Natsu had enough of this nonsense. He began to run away from the freaky woman and sprint towards the home. His mind was racing, his body felt dizzy. Who was that woman, how did she know who he was? His heart began to beat fast and his body began to drench itself in sweat. It was as if his entire body was locked in an internal flame.

"We'll meet again, Son of Dragons."