"So which way kid?" Natsu asked.

"Blueberry Street," Newkid answered.

The party set off, Newkid rode on Erza's shoulders without complaint. He didn't feel like talking, yet a certain over romantic celestial spirit insisted on asking him questions. "So Newkid this date of yours, is she pretty?" Loke asked. Newkid didn't say anything. "She must be, if you're willing to endure those wounds to see her. So then is this casual date or do you need dress formally, if you need a suit I can furnish one that's just your size in instantly, really it's no trouble at all." Newkid still didn't say anything.

It was Gray who finally said something useful, "Loke shut up, you're annoying the brat."

Newkid snapped at Gray for that comment, "Who you calling a brat pervert?"

Gray snapped back, "who you calling a pervert BRAT?"

"I'm calling the guy with no shirt or pants a pervert, PERVERT!"

"No pants?" He looked down, to see that he was wearing nothing but his chain and boxers, "Damnit not again!"

Erza shot Gray a fierce death glare, and a menacing demonic aura seemed to surround her. "Seriously striping in public!? Can you possibly humiliate us further!? You're lucky I have Newkid on my back right now, or I'd give you pounding so hard your clothes would be glued to your skin with your own blood." She cracked her knuckles as she said this. "Instead I'm going to give you till the count of three to go back and pick up your clothes. One...'

Gray didn't even need to wait for Erza to get to two, he bolted right then and there, running so fast he left a dust trail in his wake. Everybody laughed, even Newkid, unfortunately.

"Hahaha," Newkid's laugh was hearty and innocent, a small inkling of the child within him that he'd worked so hard to keep suppressed. His laugh was so heartwarming that everyone diverted their eyes to him with smiles on their faces. It was a minute before he caught himself, "damnit!"

Lucy smiled at him and playfully mussed up his hair, "aww, for such a serious little kid you have a very cute laugh you know."

Newkid shut back up, and screwed the scowl back on his face. "Oh don't be that way, it's good to laugh and smile, especially when you're surrounded by friends."

"Friends? You don't know anything about me you…" Newkid searched his imagination for the best insult he could think off, "orange sea urchin."

A wave of shock ran through Loke, before it sank into everyone else what Newkid had just said. "AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" The laughter went off like fireworks.

"Loke's hair is orange, and it's spiky like a sea urchin," Happy explained.

"I think we get it Happy, hahahaa," Natsu said between laughs.

The only one who wasn't laughing was Loke, who frowned at Newkid, "just for that I'm not lending you one of my suits."

Lucy saw that Loke was upset, so she gave him a sweet kiss on the cheek to cheer him up, "ahh, come on Loke be a sport. Besides we're not laughing because his insult is accurate, we're laughing because it's just so hilariously bad. I mean seriously, orange sea urchin? Where do you get something like that?"

Loke in the meanwhile was just ecstatic to have gotten a kiss from Lucy, "YOSH! TO MAKE LUCY HAPPY I WILL ENDURE ANY INSULT!"

Newkid in the meantime buried himself in Erza's luscious scarlet hair, too embarrassed by his botched insult to face everyone. The Fairy Tail bunch on the other hand just continued laughing as they walked along to Blueberry Street.

"You know you made a good point earlier Newkid," Erza said.

He didn't look up, he just grunted, "hmm?"

"You said we don't know anything about you, so...tell us."

"No," he answered bluntly.

"Oh come one," Lucy begged, "you'll never make friends if you keep closing yourself off."

He finally lifted his head up, "friends are for people who can't stand on their own."

"You mean like you right now?" Loke asked sarcastically.

"Shut up, I never asked for your help in the first place."

"Honestly kid what happened to you to make you so freakin bitter?" Natsu asked nonchalantly, while simultaneously picking his nose.

"What happened to you to make you start sticking your nose in my business instead of using it to give your fingers a workout?" He grinned at this line then thought himself, "Haha! Perfect comeback! Newkid you nailed it again."

"Do you honestly have to have a snappy comeback for every question someone asks you?" Loke was getting annoyed at Newkid's attitude. "Seriously what kind of manners did your parents teach you?"

Newkid immediately clammed up at the mention of parents. His unease was discernable by everyone. "I struck a nerve didn't I?" Loke asked, almost ashamed.

Lucy started puzzling things together. "Hmm, come to think of it, it did cross my mind that you had to be in some kind of financial problem if you were already working as housekeeper at such a young age. Do you have an unstable living situation at home?"

Newkid went back to being quiet again. "Do your parents argue a lot at home?" Lucy asked. Still he remained quiet, a shadow of anger and sadness cast by his raven colored bangs masked his face. "Do they not pay attention or care for you?" she asked. Still no answer. "Newkid? Are they dead?" Tension was clearly building in his body, the frustration and urge to confess were clawing for a way out, but still he sat on Erza's shoulders completely silent.

Finally Erza asked him, "Newkid, where are your parents?"

"I DON'T FUCKING KNOW OK!" His scream was so shrill, so angry, the very air seemed to swirl in response.

Everyone was quiet for a minute then Natsu spoke. "What do you mean you don't know?" It was Natsu who asked this, his tone contained the rare seriousness that only came forward when he was speaking about a heavy subject.

Newkid reached into his pants pocket, and pulled out a neatly folded note that was a bit frayed around the edges. He handed it to Natsu who unfolded it and perused. He shook his head, disgruntled at what he was reading. "What's it say?" Lucy asked.

"Here," Natsu passed it to her. When she was done she passed it to Loke, who after reading it passed it to Erza. And in this way all the present Fairy Tail mages viewed the sad and cryptic note that read...

Sorry but now you have to make your own way in the world. But here's some essentials.

Your birthday is whatever today happens to be.

Your blood-type is AB+

You're six years old.

You have no family.

You have no name.

Everyone was quiet for a minute before Erza finally asked, "what is this?"

"The only link I have to my 'parents' if I have any at all. The very first memory I have is waking up in an alley on the east side of town. I had no clue where I was, or who I was, and the only thing I had to explain it to me was that note, which I found in my pocket when I woke up. Anyway some adults found me and brought me to an orphanage where I spent the last six years of my life. Since I didn't have a name everyone just kept calling me the new kid, and finally it just compounded into what became my name, Newkid."

Lucy caught something in his speech, "spent?" she asked.

"I ran away last week, I got fed up with being treated like shit. So I left, now I'm trying to etch out an honest living for myself, without having to rely on anyone else's charity."

It finally dawned on Lucy, "and that's why you're working as a housekeeper!"

"Yeah, the landlady wanted to send me back to the orphanage, but she said she admired my will to be independent, so we struck a deal. I'll clean the apartment for the tenants, and she'll let me live in the basement rent free."

"That's it just free rent? You're not actually getting paid?" Lucy asked.

"Naw, the landlady says she can't afford to pay me, the tenants only pay an extra 200 jewels each to have my services added to their rent, so it's not enough to earn me a payroll."

"What do you do for food?" Lucy asked.

"I haven't worked that part out yet," he answered.

"What about clothing?" Loke asked.

"I haven't worked that part out yet," he answered more annoyed this time.

"You really should have thought this through," Lucy said.

"DAMNIT DON'T YOU THINK I KNOW THAT!? I'M NOT STUPID!"

"Ok geeze, calm down." Lucy said, gesturing for him to cool down.

"Sorry, but you've got no idea what it's like to be treated like you don't matter, and yet watched and corralled like a sheep. At the orphanage they like to venerate how we're all weeds and urchins, gutted out and tossed away, and that it's only by god's good grace that we survive. I just can't stand the idea of being so weak that I have to pray to some control freak in the sky everyday just so that I could get some bread and porridge. And what's more even if I got adopted and some nice family took me away from all that, it would still be the same scenario, I'd still have to depend on someone else to sustain myself... Do you have any idea what it's like to see the disappointment in a kid's face when he finds out that he was passed over for adoption because someone else was cuter or younger than him? Well I do, I saw it in the faces of every kid who got his hopes when a nice looking couple came in looking to adopt, and these kids, many of them had been at the orphanage as long as me, some even longer, they somehow kept it in their heads that just maybe they were gonna get lucky, just maybe all the patient waiting they did would finally pay off, and then, they get crushed when they see that the new baby that arrived just a week ago is already on its way out. And the whole time I'm just thinking what's the big deal anyway? Why do you think you need parents to survive? You have two feet don't you? You have two hands don't you? Can't you just work to be able to live on your own? I asked one of the sisters that question and she just shrugged me off and said it was because we were children. And I thought that that was one of the biggest pieces of bullshit I ever heard. Just because I'm young means I can't take care of myself? So I left, I left behind 'god's good grace', I left behind those sad disappointed faces, and I left behind that teasing redundant concept of parenthood."


A/N: Ok so I was actually planning to have Newkid and Minnie's dinner date in this chapter, and end it with a cool fight scene. But somehow it just took on a life of its own. I honestly do not know how I got to this point, but I cannot tell you how much I love it. I wrote Newkid's monologue and realized, "I have to stop it here. This speech is amazing, a single word after this and it's ruined." So anyway I hope the lack of action in this chapter doesn't put you off from the story. The next chapter will have an awesome fight scene I promise.