I suppose I'll contribute to the Natza archives again. The idea for this story was quite interesting... I really don't know what to think. What do you think, guys?
Erza had a headache. A really BIG headache, and its name was Natsu Dragneel Son of Igneel. She hated headaches. Currently, they were on a train ride home from a successful mission. Well, semi-successful.
"Natsu…" Erza began with a frown. "I need to talk to you."
"Urgh…" Natsu replied, facedown on the other side of the train compartment. Erza sighed. His motion sickness won't save him today, though. She grabbed his pink hair and yanked him up into sitting position.
"Ow!" Natsu yelled in surprise, then immediately turned green due to motion sickness.
"Natsu, stop dozing around and listen to me!" Erza growled.
Natsu instinctively cringed and snapped to attention. "Aye sir!"
"Natsu," Erza said angrily, "Do you know how frustrating it is whenever we complete a mission and we have to give most of our reward money towards rebuilding the town due to your lack of self-restraint!?"
"Um… 27?" Natsu answered the question, thinking it was arithmetic.
"Natsu!" Erza glowered dangerously, making Natsu fear for his life.
"Er…" Natsu sweated bullets, "Y-yes?"
"Then explain to me how," Erza asked with a demonic apparition emanating from her body, "YOU BLOW UP THE ENTIRE EASTERN PART OF ONIBUS ON A SIMPLE DELIVERY MISSION!?"
"...G-gray started it?"
"..." Erza stopped glowering and sat stock still for a moment.
Natsu sighed, thinking he avoided his imminent doom.
"GRAY WASN'T EVEN WITH US ON THE MISSION! IT WAS JUST YOU AND ME!" Erza screamed like a banshee.
"SHITERZAI'MSORRYPLEASEDON'THURTMEISWEARI'LLBEBETTERNEXTTI-" Natsu screamed jibberish
Erza leapt over to Natsu side of the compartment, leering over him like a spawn of satan. Natsu nearly fainted in fear, his wide eyes darting between Erza's evilly beautiful face and the door of the compartment, his poor tiny brain calculating if he could reach the door without losing both his legs first.
"Natsu…" Erza smiled eerily as she walked her fingers slowly up his bare chest. In a different situation, Natsu might've blushed from the intimate action, but right now he was near a fear induced catatonic state.
"Y-yes?" Natsu squeaked out.
"Would you describe the sensation of getting your face carved off by a giant jagged mace to me?" Erza asked as if it were the most normal thing to say.
"Eh?" Natsu shrank down lower in his seat.
Erza then suddenly requipped her Purgatory Armor's Mace into her hand, which promptly destroyed the table separating the compartment. Natsu paled in fear.
"Smile, this'll only hurt a… lot." Erza grinned crazily as she slowly lifted the mace up to Natsu's chin.
Suddenly, something in Natsu's body snapped and he let out a primal screech of fear. He pushed Erza violently of his chest and backed up against the compartment wall, panting raggedly.
Shocked, Erza look down at her HeartKreuz breastplate and touched the hand-shaped imprint that was indented right in the middle of her chest. She then looked up at Natsu to see him shivering feverishly, the whites of his eyes flashing, and a tiny bit of foam gathering at the sides of his mouth.
"Jeez, Natsu I was only joking." Erza sweatdropped and raised an apologetic hand. She frowned slightly as Natsu flinched at her gauntleted hand, as if he expected her to strike him.
"Uh… Natsu? You alright?" Erza asked slightly worried. She got up and advanced slightly towards him.
Natsu growled feraly, halting Erza's movement and adding to her growing concern. "Really, Natsu I didn't mean it. I'm really sorry."
Natsu mumbled something incoherent and pressed his back against the wall, trying to create more space between him and Erza.
"Uh… Natsu, what did you say?" Erza asked in a quiet, soothing voice, while on the inside, her stomach fluttered uneasily. What had she done to Natsu?"
"D-, d-..." Natsu stuttered, his pupils zigzagging all over the room. Erza frowned worriedly.
"Demon…" Natsu finished. Erza's face fell, did she really scare him that much?
"Look, I'll make it up to you. Let me h-"
"STAY AWAY FROM ME!" Natsu let out an unearthly howl, "DEMON! DEMON! DEMON DEMON DEMON!"
Erza's eyes widened as she slowly backed away from his fit. This wasn't good.
"Is something the matter?" a voice sounded from behind the scarlet mage and she whirled around to see a conductor. He had walked over to see what the commotion was all about.
"HELP ME!" Natsu screeched as he leapt at the startled conductor like a wild animal. Erza quickly knocked him out of the air and smashed his body onto the train floor, rendering him unconscious.
"Everything is fine, mister." Erza smiled faintly at the conductor, who sweatdropped and backed away slightly. He had no intention of becoming involved in this… whatever it is. He walked away rather hurriedly.
"Good," Erza murmured, "He went away. I thought I might've had to headbutt him out the window."
She stared down at the twitching Natsu. "What is wrong with you?" She sighed. She requipped some rope out of her pocket dimension and tied Natsu up with it so he wouldn't flail around when he woke up and then sat down for the train ride home, stroking Natsu's pink hair along the way.
Natsu groaned as he woke up from his unconscious state. Where was he? The last thing he knew was that he was on the train ride home from a mission and…
"Damn it, I have to get off this train or-" Natsu started.
"Hey Natsu," a distorted, demonic voice sounded from above him.
Natsu slowly turned his head and looked fearfully into the eyes of a demonic Titania, who's yellow Devil eyes were staring straight into his soul. Screams of people in pain and dying suddenly resounded throughout the train compartment and Erza grinned, revealing multiple needle-thin, pointy teeth.
"I'm hungry." She hissed, her narrow tongue flicking out of her jaw like a snake.
"DON'TEATME!" Natsu screamed incomprehensibly and struggled out of her lap, burning the ropes that restrained him off his body.
As he looked around the room, he noticed that darkness started to engulf the compartment, and the shadows seemed to be emanating from Demon-Erza.
"Wait… Natsu…" Erza drawled in a thin tone. "Commmmme baaaaaaaack."
"No way! I'M OUTTA HERE!" Natsu retorted and smashed through the compartment door and out a window. Luckily, the train had reached the station, or else Natsu would've been ground to a bloody pulp underneath the train's pistons. The frenzied dragonslayer quickly dashed through the busy trainstation on all fours, knocking people aside and leaving behind a very bewildered Erza, who really wasn't a demon.
"All I said is that I was hungry." Erza whined as her stomach grumbled. "And now I have to chase after him.
Meanwhile, Natsu had already reached the guildhall and burst through the large wooden doors. Multiple members looked up in surprise at the speeding pink-haired blur.
"Welcome back, Na- KYA!" Mirajane was cut mid-greeting as Natsu tackled her and hid behind her.
"HIDE ME!" Natsu begged from behind Mira's pink dress.
"Ah, Natsu?" Mirajane asked confusedly.
"She's evil!" Natsu whimpered and tried to hide behind Mira more.
"What the hell are you doing, flame brain!?" Gray asked, standing up from his seat and at the same time taking of his shirt. "Did you get into trouble with Erza again?"
"Wait, Natsu!" A voice came from outside the guild hall. Soon, a very tired looking scarlet knight stumbled into the hall, breathing heavily. "Why'd you run away? Seriously, stop it!"
What Natsu saw, however, was a monsterfied version of Erza with bloody foot long claws and spitting out purple flames, panting in anticipation of dismembering him. He shouted in fright and tried to hid up Mira's dress, who of which promptly screamed in embarrassment and tried to dislodge the intruding fire mage. This made the entire guild fall down in either shock or embarrassment.
"I know Erza can be scary," Mira said with a red face and a sweatdrop, "But is this really necessary?" She finally managed to untangle him from herself and threw him out the window, and he promptly sprinted out into town to hide from Erza.
Mira then turned her gaze over to Erza, who was still red faced at Natsu's… antics.
"What did you do to him for him to act like that?" Mira asked, wide eyed.
"Er…" Erza's face fell, "I kinda threatened to carve his face off with a mace on the train ride home."
Everyone either sweatdropped or jumped out the window to escape from the psycho red-head who was threatening to maim peoples' faces.
"Er, Natsu can be annoying and all," Lucy started with a rather scared looking face, "But you really didn't need to go that far…"
"I know…" Erza sighed, downcast, "I went a bit too far… Someone please hit me."
"That won't help, Erza." Mira frowned, "We need a way to solve this."
"Gihihi, so Salamander is so afraid of Titania that he's running away like an animal." Gajeel snickered.
"Shut it, Gajeel!" Erza glowered at him.
"Hey!" Gajeel smirked, "I was going to tell you what exactly happened to Natsu, but…"
"You know?" Mira asked.
"Yes, actually." Gajeel's smirk enlarged, "Dragonslayers, when met with an extreme threat, can sometimes revert to primal dragonic instincts and go into an extreme fight or flight reaction. What Salamander is doing right now is the flight option."
"Fight or flight?" Erza repeated, "But… that doesn't seem like something Natsu would do… Wouldn't he want to fight?"
"Normally, yes. However, he does consider you his nakama, so he his only other option was to flee." Garjeel sneered as he added, "It doesn't help that your are a crazed psychopath bent on annihilating him. I'm surprised you didn't break him sooner!"
Erza glared lasers at him.
"So… how do we fix him?" Mira asked.
"Easy," Gajeel smiled uncharacteristically as he stared Titania down, who sweatdropped and became unnerved, "You gotta show him some love!"
…
…
...
"N-no what?!" Erza stuttered and blushed insanely at the implications. Her and Natsu… in a bed… sharing a passionate kiss… a-and…
"No! Nothing like that!" Gajeel snarled, amused, "Get your head out of the gutter, Titania!"
After Erza had calmed down significantly and her near hair-color blush had cooled to a light pink, Gajeel continued, "What I mean is just show him some affection. Hug him, soothe him, you know, give him some chocolates or something."
"...Alright, I'll do it!" Erza exclaimed with a determined nod. "Off to fix Natsu!" She then leapt out the same window Mirajane threw him out of so she could track his footprints. The guild slowly returned to its normal activities. Mirajane sighed and returned to cleaning the bar. She then had an amusing thought. Natsu and Erza? What an interesting pair. She giggled at the thought of it.
Erza tracked Natsu to his small cottage in the woods. She took a breath, steeling herself to confront the scared Natsu before trying to open the door. But, it refused to budge. Erza frowned and put her weight on it. No matter how much she strained, the door wouldn't open. She gave up and collapsed onto the doormat, her back against the door.
"Geez, what am I going to do?" Erza grumbled to herself.
"Aye!" Came a voice from above her head. She looked up and found Happy flying above her.
"Happy! Are you stuck outside, too?"
"No, actually I'm out to get some fish from the market!" Happy commented happily, his tail waving excitedly.
"Really? How'd you get out?"
"Oh, I flew through the chimney!" Happy smiled, "See ya later, Erza!"
The flying cat left the scarlet knight so he could get some precious fish.
"...The chimney, eh?" Erza said, "Might as well try."
As she clambered onto the roof, she spot the small brick chimney that extended lopsidedly out of the roof. As she lowered herself into it, she encountered three problems. One, stupidly enough, she couldn't fit through the tight opening. Her, uh, assets were too large. Two, the chimney was lit, as she could feel the heat emanating from below. Three, she was now stuck.
"RAWR!" Erza yelled as she struggled to free herself from the chimney. After a moment or two, she noticed ABSOLUTELY NOTHING changed. Then she came to a stupid realization.
"I should've just used my Giant's Armor to push open the stupid door in the first place!" She groaned.
"Requip: Giant's Armor!"
CRASH!
Erza sweatdropped as she clambered out of the now destroyed chimney. "Maybe he won't notice. Then the roof collapsed under her weight and she fell through with a loud "KYAAAA!"
She coughed as she requipped out of her armor and waved away the soot and dust.
After the debris cloud cleared, she saw a very bewildered looking Natsu looking at her from the doorway, which he was leaning against and blockaded with multiple shelves and pieces of furniture. She sweatdropped at the way Natsu scrambled to get out the door and hit his head off a shelf.
She walked up to him as he was writhing in pain. She knelt down, which brought her to his attention.
"Hey…" Erza smiled.
Natsu shivered in fear. Then his eyes widened as she hugged him.
"I'm sorry I scared you." she whispered in his ear in a soft tone.
NATSU POV
Natsu froze in fear as Erza's spidery limbs encompassed his body.
"NaTSu… i'M STilL huNGRy!" Erza's distorted growl put him in a cold sweat.
"NO!" Natsu screamed as he pushed her away, making Erza's three horned heads roar in frustration as they began shooting out acid.
NORMAL POV
"NO!" Natsu pushed a stunned Erza away and backed up rapidly.
"What am I doing wrong?" Erza muttered, looking slightly frustrated. She let out a pent out breath and frowned. Then she realized she still had to give chocolates.
"Requip!" Erza magically summoned a box of chocolates from her pocket dimension. "Natsu! I have an apology gift!" She smiled as she slowly opened the box.
NATSU POV
"NaTSU, i haVe a GIfT fOR YoU!" Erza cackled as she held up a large coffin and opened it.
Natsu stared in horror as heads rolled out of it, their necks spewing out blood and their facial expressions grotesque.
Natsu felt himself snap again. Suddenly, the coffin vanished, the heads all vanished, and Erza returned to normal. Everything was normal!
…
…
…
But he felt rather strange. And then a red haze overtook him.
NORMAL POV
Erza smiled in relief as Natsu blinked once, then twice. The fear in his eyes left and he gazed normally at her. He then walked forward and hugged her. She was happy, but something felt off. Then, as Natsu finished the hug, she found her hands somehow bound behind her back with metal cuffs.
"N-natsu?" Erza asked nervously, slightly confused.
Natsu's hair cast a shadow over his face, "...Neutralize the threat…" He said almost unemotionally.
Erza's eyes widened when she thought back to Gajeels explanation of a fight or flight response. Somehow, she must've toggled Natsu from fleeing to fighting!
"Natsu!" She repeated, this time a bit more urgently, as she stared frightened as his fist lit on fire.
"Damn! Why can't I requip!" Erza screamed as she struggled with the cuffs binding her hands together. It dawned on her that these were magic-negating cuffs. How'd Natsu get his hands on these!?
"Fire Dragon Iron Fist!" Natsu shouted, his fist hurtling over to Erza. The knight quickly leapt up and flipped over his outstretched hand. Landing on her feet, she quickly leapt out the hole in the roof she created.
"Fire Dragon Spiralling Sword Horn!"
Erza's eyes widened as a large explosion knocked her off kilter and pushed her down into the grassy floor. She avoided a faceplant by quickly flipping over and sprinting all out in the direction of Magnolia. She may have beaten Natsu before, but not without her magic or both of her arms restrained! And it seemed like Natsu was really bent on eliminating the scarlet mage from the face of the Earth.
"Natsu, stop!" She commanded, glancing back at the charging dragonslayer as she ran through the woods.
"Eliminate… the… threat…" Natsu droned, his iris gradually turning from stark onyx to flashing crimson.
Shit, he's not listening! Erza screamed mentally as she avoid tree branches and roots, Natsu, who of which, promptly burned right through in his demented charge. Suddenly, Erza skidded her heels on the forest ground to avoid a Natsu who somehow got in front of her and dropped down from a tree, causing her to tumble down onto her bottom with a small yelp of surprise.
"Eliminate…" Natsu droned again as he cocked back his fist.
Erza's eyes widened in fear as the flaming fist approached her face. With the skill of an expert gymnast, she quickly latched onto his hand with her two knees and with inhuman strength performed a backwards somersault, sending Natsu flying into a tree trunk. Erza utilized the time given to get back on her feet and start sprinting towards the guild again. With any luck-
Crunch!
Erza turned around at the sudden noise and gaped as Natsu uprooted the giant tree he headbutted into and prepared to throw it at her. Caught like a deer in the headlights, Erza knew she wouldn't be able to outrun a flaming tree hurled from Natsu. She turned around to face Natsu, giving her a better chance to dodge the humongous log of death.
Natsu reared back, preparing to throw the log when he was suddenly knocked to the ground by a Iron Dragon's Demon Logs attack. Erza blinked once in surprise as she turned to see a smirking Gajeel and a frantic Wendy who hurried over to a very unconscious dragonslayer.
"You're welcome," Gajeel said arrogantly, crossing his arms. Erza made no comment and instead walked slowly up to him. She stood there a couple seconds, just to make it awkward, then roundhouse kicked his face straight into the ground.
"THE HELL WAS THAT FOR, TITANIA!?" Gajeel yelled as he whipped his face out of a three foot deep crater.
"You knew that Natsu would change into an aggressive state, didn't you?" Erza said simply, devoid of emotion. For some reason Gajeel felt a chill run along his spine as he stared up at Erza, whose eyes seemed to stare straight into his mind.
"Hey, Natsu's up!" Gajeel exclaimed and pointed to a very disconcerted Natsu, eager to divert Erza's attention off of him. Fortunately for him, it worked as Erza walked over to Wendy and Natsu.
"You… okay Natsu?" Erza asked warily, not wanting another attempt at her life.
"Don't worry Erza-chan, I used a spell to revert Natsu back to his normal self." Wendy smiled as she patted Natsu on the head, who winced and moved back slightly to avoid more pain the Demon Logs attack inflicted.
"Don't worry Erza, everything is fine!" Natsu said, "Sorry about trying to destroy you or something like that." He chuckled.
"And I'm sorry for trying to maim your face off with my mace." Erza apologized back. Wendy sweatdropped, as she was not in the guild when Natsu and Erza arrived and didn't hear the commotion.
"Well, I better get those cuffs off you." Natsu stood up and wrapped his arm around Erza's own, making her blush slightly at the intimate gesture. It wasn't as if she would deny him, in fact she couldn't as her hands were still cuffed behind her. As the two walked off into the distance towards Natsu's house, Wendy frowned, worried slightly about something.
Gajeel noticed and raised a questioning brow.
"I… think I forgot something…" Wendy murmured, distracted, "Like I mixed something up… maybe my spell…"
"Forget about it," Gajeel grunted, "I think Erza can handle any problems."
Wendy shrugged and the two dragonslayers walked back to the guild, oblivious to what was about to happen.
Meanwhile, back with Natsu and Erza:
Erza frowned as she felt as if something was still off with Natsu. His actions, they were too gentle. Normally, he would've rushed forward to get to his house, dragging a displeased Erza along, but now he was taking his time and walking amiably down the road. Second, Natsu seemed to become a little too close over the past few minutes, his head almost touching hers and his arms clutching hers closely to his body.
"Natsu… You can loosen up now, my arm is falling asleep."
No answer.
"Natsu?"
Suddenly, Erza was pinned against the a tree by Natsu.
"Natsu!" Erza shouted, afraid that Wendy's spell failed and Natsu was still going to attack her.
"I've always wondered…" Natsu whispered as his warm breath wreathed around Erza's bare neck.
"N-natsu?"
"If you tasted like strawberries." he finished as his lips closed in on a scarlet-red Erza, her face nearly indiscernible from her hair.
"Dear Kami!" Erza squeaked, her mind quickly falling into the gutter thanks to the smut she reads.
Wendy's spell worked alright. It just wasn't the right one.
Just to clarify, Natsu was seeing figments of his imagination when he was around Erza. And the reason why Natsu became so... intimate by the end of the story is that Wendy botched it up and used the wrong spell on Natsu, having undesirable consequences.
Read and Review! Seriously, tell me what you think.
~Recluse