Short, cheesy one-shot from my beginning days as fanfic trash. (I was born fandom trash. My dad was the one who introduced me to anime and video games, my mom to the nerdiest of sci-fi fantasy.) This is like six- or seven-year-old unbeta'd crap, people.
I really should be working on Accidental, Gaki-sempai, and Squad Seven... and I swear I am! I kind of mildly hate myself, because I said I'd try to update in a month... and it's been five or something. But I have 60-something handwritten pages (so, like, 30 ish typed) for Gaki where all my characters are doing inexplicable, crackish things that came out while I was pretending to pay attention in class, and Accidental is trying to turn me into a slug, I just know it. And as for Squad Seven... well. Better not to go there. (Sorry, Kessapearl.) The ideas are there, but I'm having a really hard time not hating myself for turning into one of those writers who pumps out multitudinous pieces of relative crack-waste for every golden nugget (if I even have any of those) in the name of experimenting with my writing style.
(Deep, heartfelt sigh.)
Ah well, it can't be helped. For now, enjoy (or attempt to tolerate) a random, overly dramatic ficlet hardly worth mentioning that I wanted to post simply so it would stop poking out of my "papers to sort" pile on my desk.
Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail. I'm not even up-to-date on the current arc, people: this was written back around the time of Edolas. As in, I spent much of the time around the period I wrote this in sneaking down the stairs to my computer, checking to see if the next sub was out yet because I freaking had to know if it was our Erza or the Other Erza who got out of the craziness alive, and cursing the weeks in between episodes, sadly filling them with pirated manga and brooding plots. Don't expect me to know what the crap I'd have to do to get my hands on the rights; I'd probably end up in jail. Best not to even try.
And now, without further ado: voila.
Charle sat by Wendy, who was talking with Mira about something. The white exceed let her eyes wander around the guild in a bored way, until they came to rest on Lucy, and she noticed a pink tinge on the blonde's cheeks. She followed the celestial mage's gaze and saw who the girl was looking at: Natsu. She looked back and watched as Levy caught her friend staring and said something that made the pink turn to bright red. Turning back to Natsu, she saw him glance at Lucy. It was just a glance, taken in the middle of a fight, but it was significant. He was checking to make sure she hadn't been hit by flying debris.
The premonition hit Charle like a tidal wave, and there was absolutely nothing she could do about it.
A blonde mage kneels in the rain, surrounded by friends. She clutches the lifeless form of a young man with spiky pink hair. They are all injured greatly, but it is obvious that he is the worst.
Several long, metal poles seem to grow from his chest, he has multiple compound fractures, and worst: there is a gaping hole in his stomach. He is not breathing.
"NO!" the blonde woman screams, sobbing. "DON'T YOU DARE DIE, NATSU DRAGNEEL! IF YOU DIE- IF YOU LEAVE ME- I'LL... I'LL..."
"Who said … I was gonna … leave you … Lucy?" the man suddenly gasps out through his ravaged lungs. "I … couldn't … do that ..."
"Natsu!"
"I might … die … a couple of times … but I'll … always … come back … to life … " He coughs up blood onto the woman's already soaked skirt. "Until … you leave … too … because I … Love you … too much … to leave you … "
As the man closes his eyes again, the Woman leans forward quickly, resting her head on his chest before beginning to cry again. This time, though, she smiles; these are tears of joy. He is alive again. Critically injured, hair dyed red with blood, but alive.
Charle came back to the present with tears in her eyes. She glanced up at Wendy to ensure that the young Dragon Slayer had not noticed before turning back to Natsu and Lucy. For some reason, she remembered an incident in which Natsu hadn't come to the guild all day, worrying Lucy sick, and then shown up the next day as though nothing had happened. When asked to explain his absence, he got a pink tinge to his cheeks and said he had been busy. Happy had later told her that the boy had been asking Lisanna for advice on how to tell a girl he was in love with her and how to ask her to marry him. Nobody had even suspected that they might be in the same place, because the Animal Soul Take-over mage had been out on a shopping trip that she had literally been planning for months.
This time, Charle was expecting the vision, and welcomed it with open arms.
A large group of people is sitting in a chapel. One man stands at the front, obviously a groom waiting for his bride. He has pink hair, and is wearing a white scarf that somewhat ruins the effect of his formal suit.
As the bride enters, her long, blonde hair braided into a crown on top of her head, she seems to glow with happiness. Nobody has to wonder why.
When the groom is finally told that he may " Kiss the bride", No one has any doubt that the couple are madly, head-over-heels in love. It's going to be a long, happy marriage.
As Charle returned from the future, she chuckled to herself. The lucky ducks would get a happy ending after all, like in a fairy tale.
As if to contradict her thoughts, she was pulled into yet another preview of future events.
A large group of people sits in a hospital waiting room. All are displaying mixed emotions of tension, excitement, and fear, on varying levels. One man paces back and forth, back and forth, sweating, trembling, and occasionally putting out the fires that seemed to randomly pop into existence all around him, be it on things or people.
"Calm down, Natsu!" a short old man exclaims as his mustache bursts into flame for the umpteenth time. " Lucy and the baby will both be fine!"
"How can you be so sure? She had five miscarriages, gramps! Five! And three stillborn or sick before that! After Haru... and Fuyuki... and Sakura... I think I have a right to be scared, Okay? Do you realize that none of our children have ever survived for more than a few hours? If this one dies too, I don't think-"
The man cuts himself off and goes back to pacing for another few minutes. His pink hair, usually so spiky, seems to have wilted during the waiting period. Finally, the nurse comes in and says, "Mr. Natsu Dragneel?"
"Yes!" the man all but shouts.
"Your wife is ready to see you."
She has the kind of poker face that he must have grown used to after losing three children, but still loathes. The problem with that kind of look is that you can't tell whether it's because she can't bring herself to tell you the bad news or because she's been running on nothing but adrenaline and caffeine for the last 120 hours.
The man trembles as he pushes past her, only to freeze when he finally reaches the door to his wife's room. He sniffs the air once, and enters.
A blonde woman sits upright in a hospital bed. On either side of ehr, a woman stands, facing the wall behind. On one side, an old woman with pink hair. On the other, a teen with navy blue. The blonde is looking down, and her hair hangs in front of her face.
The man hesitates, sniffs the air again, and then finally bursts out, "I can smell tears, Lucy. What happened?" His voice cracks on the last word as raw terror claws its way up his throat.
The blonde finally looks up at him. She is crying, but smiling at the same time.
Suddenly the navy haired teen says, "Congratulations, Natsu-san!" She turns around holding a pink bundle in her arms. "You have a daughter-"
"And a son," the old woman finishes, also turning around, and revealing herself to be holding a blue bundle. They move toward the pink haired man and simultaneously place a bundle in each of his arms. He stares down at the squirming babies and blinks in astonishment a few times, then moves over to sit on the side of the bed.
"T-twins?" he asks, more to himself than the others.
"Perfectly healthy twins. Not premature, no lung problems, no umbilical cord wrapped around the neck, just... perfect, healthy twins," says the woman beside him.
Still in a daze, he turns to her and asks, "What should we name them?"
She looks thoughtful. "Well, we've already had Spring, Winter, and Cherry Blossom... oh, I know! I've heard that on the western continent, they have two names for the third season; Autumn- Aki- and Fall- Ochiru. How do you like those names?"
He nods before turning to the nurse, who has been standing in the doorway the whole time. "Is it okay if I take them out to meet everyone?"
The poor tired woman simply nods.
He thanks her, kisses his wife and tells her to get some rest, and then stands and walks toward the door.
In the other room, a man with long, spiky black hair stands next to his wife and children. He turns to look at the door, bracing himself. He can smell tears.
The door bursts open, and the pink haired man comes through, tears streaming down his face. A wide grin splits the same face, though. He is holding two bundles of blankets, one pink and one blue.
"Everyone come meet Aki and Ochiru!" he says, and they all realize that for the first time, he is crying tears of joy.
"They're just fine. Healthy, happy, normal babies," the nurse states, having been told of the family's past complications.
"Happy and healthy..." the pink haired man whispers to himself. "Happy and healthy."
As Charle's vision ended, she realized that for Natsu Dragneel and Lucy Heartfilia, marriage wouldn't be a happy ending. It would only be the next beginning.
She smiled, sinking a little lower in her seat to dodge a flying bottle and thinking that perhaps that was how it was meant to be.
Yeah, I don't even know. I literally just added the last line tonight; the rest was the ramblings of my sad, drama-needy, eleven-year-old self. I often find myself surprised that I never choked on my own writing at that age.
Forgive the crappy writing and other things, I just really needed to get this fic off my chest. It's been sitting on me (or I on it?) for far too long.
Follows, Favorites, and Reviews are my inspiration. I wrote an entire paragraph in Accidental last time I got a Follow. JSYK.
I'm sorry. I really shouldn't post when sleep deprived.
~Rick