Chapter 2: A Worrying Discovery


"Happy, you in here?" Natsu called out as he entered the cabin that he and the cat shared..

No answer.

He looked around until he found his small friend, lying on the floor. His tiny tummy looked like it had doubled in size and a moan of suffering drawled out of his slack jawed mouth.

"You ate too much didn't you." Natsu huffed, picking up the small body and taking him to his bed.

"Your fault." Happy moaned out, "You were the one that gave me those three giant mackerels."

"You didn't have to eat them all at once."

Happy only moaned again as the covers were pulled over him.

"You better get well before tonight, so you can come to the celebration." Natsu said with a grin.

Happy opened one eye in confusion.

"Gray's back. It's a welcome home party, of course." he stated like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

If the blue cat hadn't been weighed down by the contents of his stomach, he probably would have leaped into the air with excitement. Instead, he gave Natsu his biggest grin.

"I'll tell my digestive system to hurry up."


"Hey Gray" Cana slurred as she staggered up to the ice mage and leaning heavily on him, "When you going to tell us the reason you ran off?"

"I already said I can't answer that yet." he said while cringing away from the drunken woman. He had already been asked that question a total of twenty-six times that evening and had given the same answer to each one.

"You're no fun." Cana whined.

She let go of him, waited a minute until she was steady on her feet, then moved back to the bar and ordered another barrel.

The welcome party was in full swing. Everyone was laughing, eating, drinking, and all around having a ball.

Gray breathed a sigh of relief, then moved to sit on one of the bar stools. Mira took note of this and walked over and set a drink in front of him.

"You seem kind of stressed." she said with a smile.

"I'm fine. Still pretty tired though. Couldn't get much sleep in." he explained before taking a sip.

She nodded in understanding "I'm glad you're here anyways, tired or not."

"Thanks." he said, putting a small amount of mirth in his voice.

She smiled at him before moving on to refilling everyone's glasses.

Gray downed the rest of his drink before standing up and heading towards the door. He stared out at everyone. Somehow a fight had broken out between Elfman and Natsu, their brawl distracted everyone for a moment, giving him the change to slip out into the night without notice.


"Is Erza back yet?" Lucy asked, glancing around the guild.

"I haven't seen her." Wendy replied. She was sitting on one of the benches with Carla resting on her lap.

"I wonder if she ran into trouble. What was her mission again?"

"Probably not." Carla said, "It's more likely that she stopped at a dress shop on the way back."

Lucy had to agree. Still, she wished everyone from her team could be there to welcome Gray back. It just wasn't the same without the red head's loud voice booming above the crowd. She let out a sigh and scooted in next to Wendy on the bench.

Just then the wooden doors swung open and the redhead herself entered.

"Must we have a giant party every other week!" she yelled, immediately gaining the attention of everyone in the room, "Not that I do not enjoy our merry making, but it drains all our energies for the next day and we have too many requests pouring for that."

"B-but this is a welcome home party, Erza." Elfman stammered. The big man was clutching at his freshly bruised cheek.

Erza froze for a second, then her face it up. "Gray's back?".

Everyone nodded and cheered in confirmation.

"Gray!" she called out, her gaze darting around the room in search of her old friend.

It grew very quiet as everyone else joined her in looking for Gray.

"He's not here?" Someone said.

"Where did he go?" Erza demanded. "Did anyone see him leave?"

There was a series of negative mutters as everyone glanced at the people around them. Erza huffed, then ran back outside.

"Come one Natsu!" Lucy called. She quickly spotted her pink haired friend sitting at one of the booths nursing his split lip. She grabbed his arm and hauled him after Erza.


"Can you pick up his scent, Natsu?" Erza asked as she and Lucy followed behind the dragon slayer.

Natsu sniffed the air, then nodded. "This way!" he called and started off.

To their surprise, they only had to travel three blocks before they found Gray, slumped over on a bench, looking out into the night, seemingly oblivious to the world. He looked up when he heard them coming and stared at them blankly.

"Gray, you scared us! Why'd you just leave like that?" Lucy asked.

"Sorry." he said with a yawn. "My head was starting to hurt so I came out here to get away from the noise for a little bit. I feel better now so-"

His sentence was cut short as two strong arms pulled him off the bench and into an embrace.

"H-hey, Erza." he stammered.

Erza didn't say anything, and hugged him tighter.

"Is that all you have to say?" he growled. "Aren't you happy to see her again?"

Erza turned her head to look over at Natsu without loosening her grip on Gray.

"What do you mean?" she asked, her brow furrowed, "Of course he's happy."

She turned her head back to look at Gray. Her eyes widened as she took in his features more clearly. He really did look tired. His eyes were sunken in and he was cringing slightly as if in pain.

"Gray, are you all right?" she asked.

"I'm fine." he mumbled and pushed himself out of her embrace.

Erza let him go, but kept her gaze fixed on him.

Gray turned his head away. "Maybe not actually. I think I'll go home and rest. Tell everyone I said good night will you."

With that, he turned and started walking away.

"Wait a minute! You can't just walk away from this!" Natsu started to rush after him, but Lucy grabbed his arm and stopped him.

"Let him go." she whispered and Natsu reluctantly complied.

"Good night!" Erza called after the ice mage. She then turned and glared at Natsu. "That was extremely rude! You better be prepared to give him a good apology first thing tomorrow."

"Can't you tell he's been acting strange?" Natsu growled in exasperation.

"He's been acting tired, which is expected after coming home from such a difficult mission," Erza said, putting her hands on her hips, "And since when did you pay any kind of attention to these sorts of things."

"What's that supposed to me?"

"She means you don't normally pick up on peoples moods." Lucy explained.

"That's not true. I can pick up moods just fine." Natsu defended, "And Gray is definitely in some kind of funk."

"He's just tired, Natsu." Erza insisted, "We should send Wendy over to her place in the morning to see if she can make him feel better."

Natsu growled out in frustrations, clenching his fists and holding back the urge to punch something.

"We should probably go back and tell everyone he went on home." Lucy said with a sigh.

They all turned around to head back, but Natsu could help glancing back at the way the ice mage had gone, a distrustful look in his eyes.


Gray shot straight out of bed, sweat pouring down his back and breath coming in hard. He shook his head, trying to force away the vivid images in his dream, but they refused to leave.

He heard a knock coming from the other room and realized what it was that must have woken him up. He quickly checked his state of dress and threw a shirt on over his naked torso before heading to the front door and swinging it open.

"Good morning Gray-san." Wendy greeted him with a small bow.

"Erza-san said that you weren't feeling well so she asked Wendy to come over and check on you." Carla explained. The white cat was standing just behind the girl.

Gray nodded slowly, as if he wasn't that what was going on before him was real. He moved aside to let the girl in, then went over to sit on the sofa.

"Well, this place sure is a mess." Carla tutted, glancing around at the various objecst that had been scattered about."

"Sorry, I was looking for something." Gray explained, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly.

"What were you looking for?" Wendy asked.

"My journal."

"I didn't know you kept a journal." The girl said in surprise. "You don't seem like the journal keeping person." she admitted.

Gray's face fell at that. "You think so?"

"Whether you have one or not you're going about looking for it in the wrong way." Carla informed him, "If you want to find something you need to clean your home, not trash it. The thing you want will get lost in all the clutter."

"That makes sense."

A long silence fell between them as no one knew what to say next. Wendy stiffly moved to sit down on the cushion next to him.

"How are you feeling?" she asked.

"I'm-" he hesitated, "I'm just tired."

Wendy nodded. "I have a spell that can help ease fatigue. Would you like me to use it."

Again he hesitated, then nodded.

The girl smiled at him, "It' be best if you lie down."

She stood up so he could have the whole sofa to himself and he twisted his body until he was lying long ways across the cushions. He closed his eyes and she set to work. He stretched out hand started to glow as her magic began to seep into him, easing his tired muscles.

She started down at his feet and slowly worked her way upward. When she reached his head, she suddenly froze. Her magic faded and she quickly pulled her hands away, a look of confusion on her face.

"Something wrong?" Gray asked, opening his eyes.

Wendy shook her head, but her expression didn't change. "That's all I can do." she said, "I'm sorry."

"No problem." he smiled at her, "That you. I feel much better now."

Wendy bowed again, "Well... goodbye then." she hurriedly said then walked over to the door and left.


"What was that about?" Carla asked was they made their way over to Fairy Tail.

"I-I," The girl stammered, "I don't know. But for some reason I couldn't touch his head. I could tell his mind was very strained, but my magic couldn't enter it." she shook her head, "I don't know how to explain it."

When they got back to the guild, Lucy, Erza, Happy, and Natsu were already there, waiting for them.

"How is Gray?" Erza asked.

"Um... he's doing fine." Wendy mumbled.

"There's something wrong with him isn't there?" Natsu interjected.

"Natsu." Lucy hissed that her friend's lack of tact.

Wendy sighed, then nodded her head. "

"I knew it. What it is?" he asked, taking a few steps closer to her.

"He," Wendy gulped before continuing, "He was really stressed, and his mind seemed to particularly be under a lot of strain. When I tried to use my magic to help ease the strain it was under I couldn't get in; it had no effect. I don't know why that could be, I can't make sense of it."

She bowed her head in shame. "I'm sorry I wasn't more helpful."

Natsu gave her a reassuring grin and patted her head, "You've been plenty helpful."

He then straightened up to glare at Erza. "See, I told you something was wrong with him."

"All right, all right." Erza said in defeat, "So what do we do now?"

"Isn't it obvious? We go over there and beat the answers out of him."

"That's a terrible idea." Lucy snapped, grabbing hold of Natsu's arm in case he decided to take off right then, "Can't you tell how uncomfortable he is around you."

"Interrogations aren't supposed to be comfortable." Natsu protested. "Ow!"

"Enough!" Erza said after bopping him over the head, "We shall approach this like civilized people. Gray is our friend after all. If there is truly something bothering him, then he'll come to us eventually. We should at least give him a day or two before trying to force anything out of him."

"Erza's right, Natsu," Lucy assured him, "Gray will come around."

"But he didn't even tell us why he left in the first place." he growled, "And we don't even know what any of this is so how can you say he'll come around? At least someone should confront him."

Erza shook her head at this, but Lucy seemed to consider it.

"If someone's going to confront him than it can't be you." she said.

"What do you mean?" Erza asked.

"And it shouldn't be you either, Erza." She started to explain, "He seems to be most on edge around you two. At least that's what I've seen from the few times you've interacted since he got back."

"So who would you suggest we send?" Natsu asked, irritation clearly evident.

"It should be someone who's not threatening. He seemed fine with you wasn't he Wendy?" Lucy asked.

Wendy nodded, "Yes, but I don't think I would be very good at interrogation."

"Great, then who else are we going to get?" Natsu asked

"I could do it!" Happy chimed, jumping up and down on the floor, eager to help out in any way he could.

"Good idea." Natsu said with a grin.

"I'm not so sure about this." Lucy muttered.

"It'll be fine," Happy assured her. "Gray's my friend too."

"But I don't think Gray has seen you since he got back. Weren't you out on a solo job then? We can't predict how he'll react."

"And how do you think he's going to react?" Erza asked, raising an eyebrow at her.

"I don't know." Lucy huffed, "Maybe it'll be fine. Go ahead and try. But we should wait a day at least. He only got back just yesterday."

"A day then." Erza nodded.


The next day, Happy went over to where Gray lived and knocked on his door. He could hear Natsu rustling in the bushes behind him. He had insisted on tagging along to make sure nothing happened.

He waited for over a minute and was beginning to wonder if the ice mage was even home before the door finally swung open to reveal a very disgruntled looking Gray.

"Good morning!" Happy chirped, raising up a paw in greeting.

Gray stared down at him and blinked several times.

"Who're you?"