Disclaimer— I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United Fandoms of Fanfiction. And to the lawyers for which law stands: one franchise, I'm under oath with a lack of invisibility...with...wait— okay, I don't own Fairy Tail or any of the characters included in said anime-package. Please, don't sue me...

I got you under my skin

— Mirotic by TVXQ

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Day II, 11:04am

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"Knock knock."

A surprised yelp. "Who's there?!"

"Me."

A suspicious hum. "...me who?"

Lucy smirked, pressed a pointed ear against the cool wood of the bathroom door, and whispered, "your new best friend."

A resounding thump and a litany of oddly sequenced curses. "No. Nonono—it's real. She's real. You're real. You're really really real," came Natsu's muffled reply and Lucy rolled her eyes at the blatant fear laced between each word. "Didn't I tell you to leave? Why didn't you leave? I'm sure I told you to leave."

"Hm." Lucy absentmindedly traced hearts and circles and swirls onto the polished door. "If I recall correctly, you didn't exactly tell me to leave. You threw spritz of cold water at my face and started chanting some weird prayer. What was it again? God is grace, God is good, let us thank him for our foo—"

"I was trying to banish you from my premises," Natsu snapped, his tone defensive. "You are an evil, murderous thing and you should not be allowed to freely roam this earth."

"You sound like my ex-boyfriend."

Natsu sputtered, "that...that literally has nothing to do with anything. I didn't even ask."

Lucy shrugged despite the fact that he couldn't see her (you know, because he was being a little punk and hiding from her in his bathroom). "Yeah, I guess you're right. You still sounded like him though. Except instead of you trying to kill me like he did, I ended up...killing you." She was silent for a moment, fingers now drawing flowers and squares and zig-zaggy lines. "Sorry about that, by the way. I was sorta depressed last night. And starving, and maybe a tad bored. You just so happened to walk on by and unintentionally became my very own miracle buffet on legs."

The pinkette grumbled something unintelligible and Lucy didn't even bother mentioning that she'd heard every word (something along the lines of "crazy women with their crazy emotions and crazy, fucked up cravings"). Instead, she lazily scuffed the beige hallway carpet with her toes. "I'm sorry, okay? Totally sorry. No, I'm more than totally sorry. I am super mega totally sorry. But...you've gotta admit, you were pretty stupid to offer me a place to temporarily crash. At first I thought you were a cop when really, you were just an overly generous dolt."

Natsu pretended he didn't hear that last bit. "First off, I don't accept your apology, no matter how many words you throw in between I'm and sorry."

Lucy pouted.

"Second, I will never admit that any decision I have ever made is wrong. For you see, young bloodsucker, I am never ever wrong. So you can just toss that little thought of yours out the window."

Lucy sneered and roughly kicked the door. She reveled in the squeak that echoed off the tiled walls from the other side.

Natsu, frazzled and sweating and pulling at his collar, cleared his throat. "A-as I was saying," he wheezed, "third, I would like to make a deal with you, Miss Hardfeelya."

"Heartfilia."

"Bless you." He cleared his throat again. "I am a man known for being quite fair, so I expect you to willingly accept this harmless, mutually beneficial deal of mine."

The bottle brunette tugged at her bottom lip with a fang. "Mutually beneficial?"

"Mutually beneficial."

"Meaning it won't be of you asking me to jump off a cliff or hand myself into the police for homicide?" Natsu hissed a shit, that would have been smart under his breath and Lucy took that as affirmation. "Go on..."

"Right, well. Err, it's simple, really. I will lend you a home to stay in until your roommate returns with your keys—" because her roommate had called a few hours ago and said she would give back Lucy's keys when she was damn well ready to before powering her phone off— "and in return, you find a way to bring me back to life. See? Simple, right?"

Lucy nearly choked on her saliva. "No. That is the total opposite of simple, Natsu."

The human-gone-zombie chuckled, shaking his head as if what Lucy had said was the dumbest mix of sounds he'd ever heard. "I've been raised to be a passionate optimist, Miss Luigi—"

"Lucy."

"That's what I said. Now please, trust me when I say that anything is simple if you try and make it so."

A thought struck Lucy's mind then. "Anything, huh?" she asked, eyebrows quirked and lips tugging into a playful grin. "So it wouldn't be a problem if I added a tiny smidgen of a proposal to this deal of yours?"

Natsu audibly gulped, trying (and failing) to mask the noise with a delighted croon. "Of course, of course~ I often accept additions to my verbal contracts with business partners. Doing the same for a dangerous, unprincipled vampire girl like yourself shouldn't be too hard."

"Thank you?"

"No. Thank you."

Lucy shook her head. "Anyways. I'm sure my awesome addition will be even more mutually beneficial than yours. And it's even more simple, almost painstakingly so." Lucy took a step back, followed shortly by two and three more. "You see, Natsu...all you have to do is..." She braced her shoulder, sharpened teeth glistening in the fluorescent hallway lights as her expression contorted into one of pure and utter, unadulterated mischief.

"What? Do what?" Natsu asked, growing suspicious at the sudden silence. He reluctantly opened his mouth to call Lucy's name (the right name this time) when out of nowhere everything's in slow motion what the hell's happening, his bathroom door came crashing in on him. A speeding blob of brown and red torpedoed through the spacious room of expensive toiletries and ceramics and straight into his defenseless chest.

"Oof! My lung!" The pinkette screeched as the impact of Lucy's body sent him tripping backwards into his bathtub. She laughed mockingly when his head banged against the wall and a bar of soap nearly lodged itself down his throat. "What—why—ow—my door—you—my door!"

"All you have to do is date me," she interrupted, chocolate eyes shining and arms encircling his waist. "Date me and, in return, I'll be your girlfriend."

Natsu gaped. "Do whatnow? B-be...be my whatnow?"

"Date me," Lucy shamelessly repeated, voice louder and more demanding, before sitting up to straddle him. She poked at the twin bite marks along the side of his neck, tracing hearts and circles and swirls around them. "Look, if you date me, life will become a lot easier for the both of us. I really need a boyfriend and you look like you haven't dated a girl since never. So this all works out for both parties, no? It's a good deal. A simple deal."

Natsu's non-existent breath hitched, ebony eyes widening and neck pulsing with each gentle touch of Lucy's fingertips. "This is so random."

Lucy snorted. "Just accept the deal. Weren't you a kind and concerned citizen like twelve hours ago? Be him again and accept it."

"But...butbutbut—" Natsu straightened his back, hands pushing Lucy's away. "Why do you need a boyfriend? No one needs a boyfriend."

"I do."

"Why? You can't just offer up such a deal and not explain anything."

Lucy's eyebrows furrowed, nose wrinkling and a frown replacing the wide deceptive smile she wore only seconds before. "Because."

"...because?" Natsu probed.

"There's...an old friend of mine coming for a visit." Natsu attempted (and once again failed) to wrestle Lucy's hands away as she began drawing flowers and squares and zig-zaggy lines across his wounded skin. "Her name is Lisanna and she's this girl I used to work with. Basically, she's this perfect being with a perfect body and perfect hair that doesn't need to be dyed a different color every week like mine—that fucking sun and it's dumb natural-vampire-hair-singeing qualities—and the boy I was crushing on since forever confessed to her with roses and chocolate and a poem and they started dating and then she moved overseas to become a collarbone model for a fancy necklace company and he went with her and she's hella successful and now she's coming back here for a month to see her family and she's probably going to bring my old crush along and I need them to see that I'm cool and way better than them with a cool boyfriend and a cool life and you're my miracle buffet on legs and now I need you to be my miracle boyfriend so I can shove it in Lisanna's face that I can be successful too without having to steal other people's crushes and flaunt my collar bones and shit. Plus, you're cuter than my old crush. That'll really hit her."

After Lucy's ridiculously lengthy rant—most of which he hadn't even caught because damn, could she talk fast—Natsu slouched over, sighing heavily and forcing himself to process every coherent word he could remember. His brain groaned in agony (now a metaphorical brain with metaphorical pain, thanks to somebody's lack of self-control) and Natsu wasn't sure if he should be grateful or royally pissed off that it was his day-off from work and he actually had the time to thoroughly deal with this bullshit.

"So," he monotonously began, "you want me to sell my soul to your wickedness...in order to make some Mary Sue I don't even know jealous?"

"Yep."

"And in exchange, you'll erase this single since birth air that supposedly radiates off of me?"

"Sure."

"What a shitty deal," Natsu deadpanned. "We aren't even friends. How could someone of my status possibly date something like you?" He critically looked her up and down, from her disheveled locks to the layers of sweatshirts and pants she wore. "Wait, why are you wearing my clothes?"

"That's not the issue," Lucy said with a dismissive wave. "If you accept my deal, I'll accept yours."

"My deal is actually mutually beneficial though—we agreed on mutually beneficial. Yours is practically one-sided!" Natsu shouted in exasperation.

"Dude, you're asking me to bring your nasty-blood ass back to life! Do you know how hard and outrageous such a request is? It's nearly impossible!" Lucy shot back.

"You're impossible! It's not my fault you killed me!"

"I was hungry! You can't blame me for being hungry!"

"I can and I will, you aren't the boss of me, vampire."

"I sure as hell am since I'm kind of the only supernatural being you know who can probably bring you back to life, zombie."

"Fang face."

"Lump of flesh."

"Hemoglobin harlot."

"Brain eater!"

Natsu inhaled sharply, a hand to his chest and face stricken with disgust. "I do not eat brains."

"You will soon, pal. Just wait until that gut of yours starts grumbling." She jabbed at his stomach. "You'll be eating the brain of your mailman before he even rings your doorbell."

"Not before you suck all of his blood dry, you mosquito."

"I bet it'd taste better than yours, you empty-headed moaner."

"Dracula!"

"Cannibal!"

"Yellow!

"Pink!"

Electricity seemed to zap between the heated pair as they glared at one another, narrowed orbs of brown clashing with identical orbs of coal. The tension was palpable, thick enough to be cut with a spoon, and it only seemed to grow as the duo continued their silent battle.

But it was only after one soundless heart's beat, and one airless breath's pass, that the atmosphere suddenly...changed. The tension changed and somehow (he lost his mind, he must've lost his mind) Natsu found himself inching inching inching closer to Lucy as she inched inched inched closer to him. Their gazes were still tightly interlocked and one inch eventually became two and another and another, closer and closer and closer and suddenly—

"Ah..." There was Lucy. Holding his face with clammy hands as he similarly held hers, lips firmly against his own and yeah, he'd definitely lost his mind.

Lucy's lips were soft. Her kisses were even softer, nervous—light—cautious maybe.

Natsu's lips were chapped (how romantic). But his kisses were just as warm, just as nervous—light—cautious definitely.

Their first kiss was chaste, quick and over before Natsu had even realized it happened at all. And as soon as they pulled apart, eyes brimming with awkward confusion and maybe a little itty bitty sliver of something else, they were instantly kissing again.

The second kiss was wild, bruising and just fucking amazing and Natsu couldn't help but wonder if he'd actually died-died last night and had gone to Heaven. Because if that's the case, he silently mused, then the after-life is the absolute best. The kiss deepened and neither held back as Lucy's fangs nipped at Natsu's lip (drawing faint drops of blood tainted black by death) and Natsu's tongue roamed every corner of her mouth while his shaking hands did the same to her body. From her hips to her sides, from his shoulders to his hair and everything felt like it was burning and freezing all at once and—

They yanked apart.

And could only stare at one another.

What the actual hell...?

Minutes passed and it wasn't until Natsu exhaled, fingers drumming against Lucy's thighs, that the heavy silence was broken by his shaky whisper of, "I...um, I accept your deal."

She hesitantly smiled in return, a wide and toothy smile, and her eyes (now a fiery red and clouded over in lust) sparkled with relief and happiness. "Then I accept yours."

"C-conclusion," his voice cracked, "you work on bringing me back to life and be my housemate...until further notice."

Lucy nodded. "Second conclusion, I'm your relationship teacher of sorts and you—" kiss "are—" kiss "mine...until further notice."

Natsu lamely grinned as Lucy's fingers then trailed slowly from his messy hair—touch ghosting across his ear, his cheek, his lips—and finally to his neck. "Deals made," he managed to croak, "meeting adjourned."

"That wasn't simple," Lucy mumbled as she leaned her forehead against his. "If anything, that was an absolute mess. I don't even understand how that all even started. The whole conversation went from 0 to 100 to 69 really quick."

Natsu pursed his lips in order to hold back his laughter. "Whatever," he said, "just be happy I'm such a reasonable guy when it truly comes down to it...girlfriend."

Lucy scoffed not even a second later. "Reasonable? Spontaneously acting on built-up sexual tension and-or frustration doesn't make you reasonable, boyfriend."

"Lucy?"

"Hm?"

"Shut up."

She grinned. "Make me."

He grinned. "Deal."

He frowned. "No deal."

"Oh, come on," Lucy drawled. She tugged impatiently at his sleeves. "You have to let me do this. It's in the handbook."

Natsu snatced his arms away. "What handbook?"

"The handbook," Lucy emphasised and at his painfully blank look, she huffed, "look, I'll explain all that jazz later. Right now, you need to be...reinforced." She reached for his sleeves again and Natsu scowled.

"Don't try and sugarcoat what you're about to do—" tug "you said you have to—" tug, tug "sew my—" tug, tug, tuggity tug "okay, can you stop that?!"

Lucy growled, ripping the costly fabric in half (Natsu almost cried at the sight), "stop being a baby and let me reinforce you!"

"I'm not being a baby, I'm being human," he corrected and Lucy's eyes narrowed. "No sane human would want to have someone sew their body parts, Lucy. It's insane."

"But that's the thing, Natsu. You aren't human, and you sure as hell aren't sane." Natsu brushed off the insult. "You're dead now—a zombie—and according to the handbook, zombies need to be reinforced!"

"What if I don't want to be reinforced, huh? What if I want to be un-inforced?"

"That's not a word."

"That wasn't the question."

The brunette laughed, dry and humorlessly, before thumping her head against Natsu's chest. "How many lamps do you own?"

"...uhh," Natsu looked around the living room they were now sitting in, mentally counting, "about five? Maybe six. Why?"

"Well, unless you want your hands or your feet—or both at the same time—to go soaring into those precious lamps like they did last night, I highly suggest you sew them in place."

Natsu shivered at the recent memory (because before he'd run to go cower in his bathroom for the night, it had taken him hours upon hours to clean all of that blood from his carpet). "That can happen again?"

"It can happen again if you don't sew your weakest limbs. Meaning wrists and ankles and your neck. That's all, okay? Nothing too severe."

"Sewing my neck sounds pretty severe."

"Childbirth sounds severe too but people do it anyways."

Natsu grunted, "that...that literally has nothing to do with anything. I didn't even—"

"Just let me do it!"

"Let me at least think about it!"

"No!" Lucy exclaimed. "Lisanna will be here very very soon and I will not let you meet her with those flimsy parts of yours! What if we go out to eat and your hand goes soaring into her wine?! Then what? How will I explain to her why my supposedly cool boyfriend has a missing hand? Do you want to embarrass me?!"

"Do you want to embarrass me? What will my co-workers, my dad, say if they see wires woven through my flesh?!"

"I'll use enchanted thread!" she assured but Natsu remained skeptical. "Enchanted thread will only be visible to the sew-er and the sew-ee. No one will ever see it so pleeeease, Natsu. Please let me reinforce you!"

"Why—"

"Please?"

"Lucy—"

"Please?!"

"But my flawless body—"

"Please."

"Alright!" Natsu boomed, shoving Lucy out of his face and off of his couch. She fell onto the carpeted floor and rolled around beneath his coffee table, squealing in victorious laughter. "I'll...I'll do it. It's sort of a part of your deal, right? And I don't half-ass the tasks required of me in deals I agree to."

Lucy cackled as she finally unzipped and removed the multiple hoodies she wore. "This is going to be so fun," she cried, balling up the stolen clothes and throwing them into Natsu's lap. "Lisanna's gonna be so jealous when she's see us. A zombie and a vampire couple? Ugh, we're straight out of a teen novel, Natsu!"

"Yay for us."

She ignored his sarcasm and clapped giddily. "Very yay for us. Super mega totally yay! Now...sit tight," she stood before him, pushing at his shoulders until he relaxed into his seat, "and promise you won't freak out."

He stared at her.

"Promise me."

"I promise I won't freak out...when you stick a needle through my skin and damage it beyond repair."

"Perfect," Lucy chimed brightly. Natsu glowered at her. "Alright, this will only take a second. Maybe an hour. Maybe half the day. But don't worry, my best friend was a seamstress a few decades ago, thus making me a seamstress by association. You are in professional hands." She fished through her bra for a moment before pulling out a sharp needle and a small spool of beige wire thread. "Trust me?"

"I guess."

"Good guess, boyfriend. This won't hurt at all, it'll only tickle."

"Don't fuck up, girlfriend. If that needle strays from where it's supposed to go, I'll sue you so deep into debt, you'll wish you had a grave."

"Hardy har har—you talk big but are you ready to back it up?"

Natsu swallowed, eyes closing and mind emptying and knees shaking as he nervously responded, "...ready."

"Set?"

"Set."

"Go..."

Pinch

A strangled gasp. "Is it in?"

"It's in."

A choked whimper. "Are you moving it?"

"I'm moving it."

Natsu trembled, forcing an eye open as he peered down at Lucy's kneeling form and dancing hands. Her tongue was poked out in concentration, and Natsu begrudgingly acknowledged that he would've found the image cute had she not been licking at the blood—his blood, his blood, that was his blood, oh my god—squirting onto her face from his wrist.

"Ah...ah..." he quaked and Lucy peeked up at him curiously. A drop of black blood dripped from her chin. "ah...aah—aaaaaaaAAAEEEEYAAAAAAAAAH—!"

"Hey, you promised you wouldn't freak out!"

"I'm not freaking—" squirt "—oooOOOOOOAAAAAAAAYAAAAAAH!"

Lucy gawked at him. "Y-yes you are!" she hollered over his shrieks. "Natsu, calm down! Calm the flying fuck down!"

"—AAAAAAAAAAAAH—!"

"Stop freaking out!"

"—AAAAAAAAAAAAH—!"

"You're hurting my ears, you spineless moron! And you're making reinforcing you impossible. If you would just stop screaming, your blood would stop flowing so quickly and—"

"—AAAAAAAAAAAAH—!"

"That's it." Lucy abruptly stood, leaving the needle poking out of his heavily bleeding wrist and making Natsu go cross-eyed at the grotesque sight. He continued screaming at the top of his lungs, never stopping, never taking a breath because he was a zombie and zombies didn't need to breathe and zombies apparently had black blood and his black blood just wouldn't stop gushing out like a damn fountain and it was streaming between his fingers and staining his pants and holy shitshitwowshit.

He probably would've screamed some more. Probably would've went beyond freaking out. Probably would've prompted his neighbors to call the police at some point. And probably would've torn his voice box into pieces (if he'd still been alive) had Lucy not taken the liberty to saunter over to his bookshelf, grab the largest encyclopedia she could find, and slam it against his head.

He was unconscious in seconds.

And Lucy's frustrated grumbles about crybabies and man-wimps were the last things he'd heard before thinking, damn. The after-life is the absolute worst.

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Day II, 2:06pm

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💀 ɞ 👿 To Be Continued 👿 ʚ 💀

Author's Note: Three months later! Haha, sorry everyone. I wonder if you guys are still reading after all this time...it has been a while. Woops. Pardon my laziness, folks. My summer has been full of sleeping, eating and more sleeping. But I guess now that school is right around the corner (my senior year! Omgasdf), I'm suddenly feeling so write-y. Does that make sense? Whatever. I'm here now and hopefully I won't run away again. I passed all of my exams with pretty decent scores. A 95 in Spanish, a 90 in History, a 70 in Trigonometry (I cried), a 65 in Chemistry (I had no idea what I was doing throughout this entire exam, but I still magically passed~), a 1720 on the SATs (I want higher) and an average score in English.

My brain was fried.

But hey. At least I didn't fail anything! All of the luck you guys gave me really helped~ Thank you all so much. As a gift, here is an update! Hooray!

Also...what's up with me and having Lucy and Natsu make out in a bathtub? Gee, I am super creative *thinks back to that one chapter of PMO*

Author's Responses:

of the deep sea — lol thank you~ I am definitely continuing it. I like these characters for Natsu and Lucy the most out of all the ones I've written so far so I am like...binge typing this entire story right now. As for Juvia, yes she will be in it, but I have no idea what supernatural thingy I want her to be. Any ideas?

Guest — here you are~

j blackstar13 — well, I didn't update soon but I did update. Expect better update times from now on. Does once a week sound good? :)

SamanthaRoseHeartfillia — Yes I aaaaam~ I have more ready to be uploaded soon!

Meowie07 — thank you! Le story has been updated~

Nihice — haha, it's been months but it's back. Hope it's still sort of good...

The Siege — I make him suffer too much. :( I'm sorry Natsu, I love you~ And yay for B.A.P! That's one of my friend's favorite groups as well. I saw them in concert last year! But can you believe they went back to TS Entertainment?! I'm still pissed off about that...

Guest — thank you! Hopefully it still is. Lol, it would be awkward if I screwed all its amazing-ness up because I ignored it for so long. Sassy!Lucy is the best Lucy. More characters will be introduced in the next few chapters. I think Gray is going to be next. Then Mira. Then Lisanna...then Erza, I think. And Lucy's mystery ex-boyfriend will make an appearance too~

NaLu x Buckets — woops. I didn't hurry up at all. Here's my late ass update, lol. Sorry~

Leluciana37 — ugh. I miss you and your reviews. :( I'm back now and I have no more important exams until June so yaaaay!

Now...remember, everyone: stay tuned for chapter three (three right?) and review if you wanna!

chu~