(A/N: Yes, yes, here I disclaim: not mine, never has been, but I love it anyway. Oh, well.)
Igneel dropped his barrier, grabbing a quick hold on Layla and dropping her atop his head. "Hang on," he warned her.
The woman only had a heartbeat to comply, wrapping her arms around one of his fewer spikes, before both dragons were racing through the forest. She squeaked slightly in alarm, but they somehow managing to avoid the trees as they briefly took to the air. For a moment, her keys pulsed comfortingly and she felt like she could almost touch the stars—but then they were landing again, and she had more important things to be concerned about.
Her little nine-year-old daughter was there, dress in tatters and with crudely bandaged knees, together with two dirty little boys about her age or a bit older. There was a small fire still burning, and evidence of a meal, but the three youngsters weren't sitting around it. They actually appeared to be fighting, considering how her delicate little Lucy had just landed a sturdy kick to the little pink-haired boy's jaw and sent him flying towards the treeline.
"Lucy Heartphilia!" she shouted, sliding off the dragon's forehead without even asking for his help. "What in Spirit's name do you think you're doing?! You will cease that behavior immediately and apologize!"
The tiny blonde cringed, but both boys rushed to stand in front of her protectively.
"We was jus' teachin' her how to fight!" the pink-haired boy whined, his black eyes big and imploring as he rubbed at his forming bruise sheepishly.
The slightly taller, raven-haired boy just glared at the woman and growled.
"'S okay, Gajeel-kun," she murmured, touching her hand to his shoulder as she docilely came out from behind the two. "She's my Mama."
The smaller of the two boys relaxed a bit, but Gajeel did not.
"Well, she shouldn'ta fuckin' lost ya in the first place!" he hissed, refusing to take his ruby eyes off of the woman—whose own had widened slightly at the sight of such a young boy cursing so fluently. "'N then she went an' yelled at ya! Nuh-uh. Don' think so. She can't have ya." He maneuvered her back behind their backs with one arm, barely shooting the dragons a glace.
Said dragons stared at the trio incredulously. When they'd left, the boys kept alternating between ignoring each other and fighting.
"Natsu, Gajeel," Igneel scolded as he shoved off his shock to stalk closer to them. "This little girl belongs to Layla, here. You need to give her back now."
Natsu wilted slightly, but stepped aside. "Sorry, Luce," he mumbled.
Gajeel just growled even louder. "No way!" he barked, shooting Natsu a nasty glare for his betrayal. "That lady fuckin' lost her, an' then I found her, so that means she's mine now! An' I ain't gonna share with the flaming bastard 'nymore, either!"
The little girl's eye started twitching, but it went unnoticed.
"Now you listen here, brat!" Metallicana growled at his adopted son. "That ain't the way the world works, an' the little female brat is still the woman's whether she lost 'er or not!" But then, his adopted son's previous words began to process and he froze. "Yers?" he repeated slowly.
Igneel started laughing hysterically.
Layla gritted her teeth. "I did not lose my daughter," she informed primly. "She managed that on her own quite nicely. And I would not have yelled if she were not engaging in violence. Lucy, come here."
The tiny blonde's jaw dropped. "It wasn't violence, Mama, they were teaching me!" she scowled as she shoved her way out from behind the overprotective dragon slayer before her. "And I wasn't lost, I was taking a walk. You tol' me to wait by the fountain and we'd go for a walk after Papa's meeting—but then Papa's meeting was over, an' I asked 'n everything, but Supetto-san said you were busy an' wanted me to go back to the library for lessons—but you promised I could go on a walk this afternoon, an' Celestial Spirit mages never break a promise, so I went on my walk without you! But then I fell, and scraped my knees, and Gajeel found me and brought be back here 'cause it was gettin' late and I was hungry, an' him and Natsu had caught some fish earlier and shared it with me. And if I really was lost, I coulda just asked Hologorium which way was home!"
Natsu backed away from the girl nervously.
Gajeel stared at her with something akin to awe.
The red dragon's hysterics continued.
"Lucy... I never said that we wouldn't go for a walk this afternoon," Layla sighed tiredly. "I simply wanted you to wait for me in the library because my business with your father and his partner was going to take another hour or so and I was worried about you sitting outside alone for that long."
The little girl looked scandalized. "You and Papa wanted me to sit with Prince Junelle again, didn't you?" she accused, horrified.
The woman winced, giving her all the answer she needed.
"Mama, he likes my dolls more than I do!" the tiny blonde screeched. "He's creepy, and he smells funny, an' you can tell Papa that I am never, ever gonna marry that weirdo! Not in a million, billion years!"
Again, Layla winced. "Lucy, calm down," she tried to sooth.
"What's 'may-ree' mean?" Natsu interrupted the exchange curiously, his nose wrinkling in his confusion.
"It means I'd hafta kiss the nasty guy!" Lucy informed agitatedly.
Gajeel growled low, too low for the humans to catch the sound and Natsu was too busy asking what a kiss was to notice—but the dragons heard.
And Igneel's laughter continued, despite his scales taking on an almost purple hue.
"Fuck," Metallicana groaned, dropping heavily to the forest floor and covering his face with his forelegs. "Fuck. Why now? Why not in a few more years? Ten? Five? I'da taken three. Fuck."
Little Lucy temporarily forgot her ire to stare at the dragons with wide eyes and a rapidly paling face.
Natsu approached the red one, who had finally fallen over in his laughter and knocked down a nearby tree. "Dad? What's so funny?"
"What'sa matter with you, ya shitty lizard?" Gajeel demanded of the gray one, his brows furrowed slightly in concern.
Seeing that her new friends knew the behemoths, the tiny blonde forced herself to calm down.
Besides, they were kinda pretty... in a scary sort of way.
The two boys, after awaiting an answer for several minutes, decided that they weren't going to get one and went back to playing with Lucy—though Gajeel tried his best to keep Natsu from getting too close, calling the pinkette a traitor and claiming that the girl was his alone.
"Oi, woman!" Metallicana barked tiredly as he shoved himself back onto his feet. "We, uh... need to talk 'bout somethin'. Let Flint-for-Brains watch the brats for a bit an' follow me."
Layla turned to check on her daughter; but the tiny blonde was already being entertained once more by Gajeel and Natsu.
Slowly, the blonde woman nodded and followed him into the trees.
Gajeel stared up at his adoptive father slack-jawed, unable to believe that the shitty lizard had been keeping something like this hidden for so long.
The dragon in question just stretched out and yawned, glancing over at the sun where it was drifting closer and closer to the horizon. He pushed himself to his feet, turning back around and heading for his cave.
"That's enough for today," he called over his shoulder. "Come back in the mornin' an' I'll tell ya the rest. Oh, and bring me some fuckin' iron."
