Thank you all so much for the kind words! You really are the greatest and I feel so happy!
Hope you all enjoy this chapter!
XOXOX
Lucy still couldn't believe her eyes as she reread Natsu's message to her from last night for the umpteenth time that following morning.
"I like your voice a lot too."
She could almost hear him saying it.
She wondered what she should reply back, but figured nothing was probably the best thing.
Was she crazy for taking a screenshot of it?
"Ahh I'm so neurotic," she cried into her sweaty palms as she walked to school.
In the midst of her petty tears, she saw that Levy and Wendy had posted their accent challenges.
She fervently clicked play after she put on her headphones.
"Hii, I'm Levy, but you all probably know me as SolidScriptMage and I was challenged by the adorable CelestialMage. Thanks for challenging me, Lu-chan!" Without even realizing it, a huge grin had formed on Lucy's lips. It was official, Levy was both cute in the virtual world and the real world—with talking at least since Lucy had no idea what the girl looked like.
"Levy, you have the cutest voice in the entire world omg," she commented.
Then she listened to Wendy's audio, "Hi, everyone. My name is Wendy, my blog URL is SkyMagicDragon. It is nice to meet you all! And I was challenged by CelestialMage! Thank you so much!"
"Sorry, SolidScriptMage," she tagged Levy, "I lied. Wendy…YOU HAVE THE CUTEST VOICE IN THE ENTIRE WORLD!"
Wendy's voice was so light and polite. Lucy nearly drowned in the cuteness.
"Why can't I be as cute as them?" she sighed staring up at the abyss of blue in the sky.
XOXOX
When Lucy arrived home from school, she quickly went on her laptop to reblog as much Fairy Tail stuff she could find within an hour.
Down her dashboard she went, until she came across a post by Natsu, which was about him updating his blog. She quickly clicked on him to see his redesign, but to her bemusement, it looked exactly the same.
What was even stranger was SatanSoul's post, "Ooooh looks like NaLu is in the lead!"
Lucy scratched her head as she typed a reply, "Ummm?" before she closed out of Tumblr, deciding she better get off now before things get weirder.
Besides, she had a history paper that was calling her name. Sighhh.
XOXOX
After Lucy finished her homework and ate dinner, she quickly logged on and noticed she had reached over a 1000 followers, "Oh my God," she gasped. "Why are all these people suddenly following me?"
She made a text post, "Did someone promo me or something because I just had a random surplus of followers O_o. Greetings new followers!"
She got a reply almost immediately from SolidScriptMage, though it was through the message system instead of a public reply, "Might have something to do with you being a new proud owner of a salamander ;) ."
Lucy gaped, "How does she know about that?" Unable to shake herself from the shock, she could only reply, "Ehh?"
"You might want to check out DragonSlayer's about section," Levy cryptically sent back.
She frantically typed in Natsu's URL and the second the page loaded, her eyes shot to his melted about section.
Yo! I'm Natsu. 17 years old. Part dragon, part pyromaniac, part dragon slayer. Co-owns a salamander with CelestialMage.
Lucy sputtered. "Why would he add that to his blog?!"
If even possible, her eyes' widened more, "Oh!" Now Mira's text post made sense…
Ackk! What if people think we are dating? her face scorched.
"Ahahaha oh right," Lucy nervously replied to Levy.
But then a thrill shot through her. She hastily clicked her Customize button.
She changed her old about, adding in 'Co-owns a salamander with DragonSlayer.' and then made her own text post, "Updated my blog ^^ ."
A few minutes later someone replied, "Looks good to me :D." It was Natsu.
"Thanks ^_^ ," she beamed and then asked, "How is Happy doing today?"
"I'll show you!" he then uploaded another photo of Happy and tagged her in it. This time Happy was crawling on top of a lightly tanned arm, which Lucy assumed was Natsu's arm.
Happy was interesting looking, to say the least. Black with electric blue spots. He was both wide and a bit flat-looking and really contrasted with Natsu's skin.
Happy almost looked like he was smiling.
She reblogged and cooed in a comment, "Aww he looks so happy! :3 ."
IceMakeMagic had reblogged the photo and added, "Am I missing something here? When did you two become parents of a lizard?"
"Happy's a SALAMANDER, you Ice Dope, not a lizard, sheesh," Natsu reblogged back.
"Same thing," Gray wrote back.
"No! A salamander is an amphibian and a lizard is a reptile. And you call me dumb?" Natsu lectured.
Lucy blushed in her own embarrassment. She had thought a salamander was a lizard as well and who could blame her and Gray? It did have a lizard-like appearance with its long tail.
"Tch, whatever," Gray reblogged back, "So when did you two start parenting one?"
"Why do you care?" Natsu shot back. "Jealous?"
"Pshhh," Gray replied. "Why would I be jealous of someone co-owning a lizard with you?"
She broke out in a fit of giggles. She liked how Gray turned Natsu's statement against him.
"SALAMANDER! GET IT RIGHT!"
"LIZARD!" Gray typed back.
"SALAMANDER!"
"LIZARD, LIZARD, LIZARD!"
"SALAMANDER, SALAMANDER, SALAMANDER!"
She had a feeling this fight was going to go on for the rest of the night considering no one who usually stopped them was online…
And seeing as nothing was going on, on her dash except for Natsu and Gray's argument, Lucy logged off for the night.
XOXOX
Another week went by and nothing much had really changed in Lucy's life except for now Natsu tagged Lucy in daily pictures of Happy, which never failed to make her smile, no matter how bad her day was.
She was glad it was Friday.
But she wasn't glad that her friends were begging her to hang out.
"Lucy, you have to go!" they begged. "Everyone's going and we all miss you! And you never go out anymore! It's like you became some kind of recluse."
Lucy exhaled in defeat, "Fine. I'll go."
"We'll pick you up at 7!"
"Okay."
Her friends ran off and left Lucy by her locker. She carefully stuffed her backpack making sure not to forget anything and with a hefty sigh, she headed home.
Lucy had to say yes because she has been a bit reclusive as of late. It wasn't Lucy's fault really. It was just that she has more fun with her online friends than with her real life friends.
Was it terrible to not like your friends in real life?
"Now I'm going to miss the new Fairy Tail episode," she sulked, crossing her arms over her chest. "Levy's gonna kill me."
Lucy moped the rest of the way home.
XOXOX
"I really hate being home alone," Lucy posted on her blog. She had just gotten back from hanging out with her friends and it was really late, but that's not what scared her. What scared her was returning to a pitch black house. She quickly turned on all the lights and grabbed her father's bat as she did rounds around the house.
A bit of fear still lingered as she made her way to her bedroom.
She logged on the internet and clicked her inbox because she saw that she had a new message.
It was from DragonSlayer, "Want me to keep you company again?"
Lucy's heart stuttered as she typed back a, "Yes please ^^."
"Yosh! Let's talk on Skype," he sent back, "because it's easier to message back and forth. What's your username?"
Her heart pounded. She only used to Skype to talk to Levy…She wasn't sure how comfortable she felt adding someone else...But she is co-owning a salamander with this boy so how bad can it be?
"My Skype is my URL," she replied back and then she logged onto Skype.
"Kk. Sent you a request."
And Lucy got the request from DragonSlayer. So his URL was his Skype username as well, she took notice as she accepted the request.
Now what appeared on her contact list below Levy was Natsu.
A new conversation appeared.
"Yo, Lucy!" Natsu wrote.
"Hi, Natsu ^_^ ," she wrote back. She couldn't believe she was doing this; Skype chatting with Natsu.
"So why are you always home alone?" he inquired.
"My dad goes away on business often," she explained. "And he's going to be away for the entire weekend :/ ." She bit her lip, wondering if that was too much information to give away…
"Wish I could give you Happy to keep you company," he wrote.
Her stomach slightly fluttered.
"Me too," she wrote wistfully. "So how was your night? Or day? Or afternoon? Depending on your time zone…"
"Night," he replied. "It was boring. I skipped hanging out with my friends and no one was online." And before she could reply, he added, "Usually you're the only person on at night."
"Sorry," she replied. "My night sucked too. Had to hang out with my anti-anime friends _ ."
"Well then I guess we should make do something to make this night less crappy, huh?"
"Okay," she licked her lips and grinned.
"Do you own Super Smash Bros for the 3DS?" he asked.
"Yeah."
"Let's vs each other," he typed.
"Okay." Lucy pulled out her 3DS from her desk drawer and took out her Pokemon game and replaced it with Super Smash Bros.
Her laptop panged, indicating a new message, "I hate playing video games with someone without talking because then it just feels like I'm playing against a NPC." Non-Playable-Character.
"Yeah, I get what you mean," she replied, thinking back to their Pokemon battle. Sure it was fun, but it also felt like fighting a player that was already programmed…
"Great! So let's do a Skype Call."
Lucy's eyes bugged just as her heart stopped. What did she just agree to? Skype Call? Does he mean… "You want to video chat!?"
"No, you weirdo!" he instantly sent back. "You don't know what a Skype Call is?"
"No :3," she blushed. "I'm sort of new to Skype."
"Oh well a Skype Call is like a phone call, except it's on Skype," he explained.
"So we would only hear each other's voices?"
"Right! That's not a problem is it?"
She swallowed thickly, "No, no problem at all."
And then a ringing sound rang from her laptop. Her stomach twisted into knots. What was she doing? Agreeing to something like this? Stupid, Lucy.
It was too late to back out now…With a deep breath, she answered the call.
She opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out.
"Yoo, Lucy!" Natsu's voice rang through her speakers.
Her heart stammered and she was no longer breathing.
Breathe, Lucy! she commanded.
"Lucy?"
She repressed a shiver.
"Hi, Natsu," her voice came out breathy. Not the best idea to breath while talking…
"Ready to be crushed at Smash?"
How is he able to talk so causally?
"I think it's you who will be crushed," she managed to tease back.
"We'll see about that!"
XOXOX
"QUIT USING THE DAMN GROUND POUND EVERY FIVE SECONDS!" Natsu roared.
"No way!" Lucy smirked. She was playing as Yoshi while Natsu was using Fox. Despite, Natsu's complaint, she used Yoshi's Ground Pound move again, and this time she knocked out Fox, meaning Natsu lost.
"DAMN IT!" he cried. "THAT WAS A CHEAP SHOT!"
"No it wasn't!" she insisted. "If you want to talk about cheap shots, let's talk about our Pokemon battle, where you used a whole line up of legendries!"
"There ain't anything wrong with using legendries!" he haughtily stated.
"Then there isn't anything wrong with me using Ground Pound over and over again," she pointed out.
"Grrrr, fine!" he reluctantly gave in. "Let's change characters each round so that we have none of this nonsense."
"Fine by me," she smirked. "But just be warned I'll kick your ass with any character!"
Natsu chuckled, "If you say so."
For the next round, Natsu played as Little Mac and Lucy played as Zelda and Natsu completely destroyed Lucy.
"HAH! IN YOUR FACE, CELESTIAL MAGE!" he cheered.
"Hmph," she selected her next character, Luigi.
"That's ironic," Natsu laughed as he picked Mario.
"How is that ironic?" her brows furrowed, slightly confused.
"Hehe, well when I first found your Tumblr, I read your name as Luigi instead of Lucy so whenever I saw you posting in the tags, I mentally referred to you as Luigi."
Lucy's eye twitched. "Lovely," she muttered. "Ohhh take that!" Luigi was destroying Mario. "And that! And that!"
"Oi!" he groaned. "Cut it out! I can't even get an attack in!"
"Sucks to suck!" she laughed as she flung Mario off the course.
"DAMN IT!" he yelled.
"You're a sore winner and a sore loser," she mocked.
"Am not," he indignantly said.
"If ya say so, DragonSlayer," she teased.
The next round, Lucy used Pikachu and Natsu used Charzard.
"Yosh! A Pokemon battle!" She could hear the smile in his voice.
She giggled.
"STOP DOING THAT!" Natsu nearly cried.
"Stop doing what?" Lucy asked innocently.
The sound of Pikachu's CHUUUUU echoed through her 3DS and through her laptop from Natsu's game.
"THAT!" He yelled. "THIS IS WORSE THAN YOSHI'S GROUND POUND!"
"I think so too," she mischievously laughed.
"No fairrrrr!" he moaned as he lost another round. "I don't like you anymore."
Lucy's insides jolted at the word like. She knew he didn't mean it in the romantic sense, but a little part of her hoped he did.
"One more round?" she pleaded.
"Yes!" He sounded eager. "I'm going to win this one!"
Lucy chose Samus while Natsu chose Link.
It was tough battle for Lucy. Samus was a bad choice for her considering Natsu was destroying her.
"Heh," he laughed as he went in for the finishing blow, "you lose—HAPPY! WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?"
Lucy chuckled because whatever Happy did, he caused Natsu to not attack.
"QUIT IT!" he yelled. "HAPPY! NO, GET OFF! GAHHHH! I CAN'T SEE!"
Tears streamed down her cheeks from laughing so much and with Natsu distracted, she beat up his character.
"NO, HAPPY! YOU CAN'T LAY ON MY DS! ARGGG I THINK I LIKED IT BETTER WITH YOU ON MY FACE!"
"Yay! I won!" she cheered.
"LUCY, THAT DOESN'T COUNT!" he wailed.
"It count!"
"Happpyyyy, whyyyyy?" Natsu whined in defeat.
"I wish I could see what Happy's doing to you!" she said through her laughter.
"You want to video chat?" his voice suddenly perked up.
Her eyes widened as she sputtered, "Wh-what? No!"
"I never video chatted with anyone before…it could be fun?" his voice was softer now
"No," she gulped. "I mean, it's late and-and I should really go to bed. I don't know what time it is for you but it's one a.m. for me…so I should go…umm good night, Natsu."
"Err…Night, Lucy," was the last thing she heard before she logged off.
She mentally cursed herself for freaking out.
But then her body went stiff as a board.
Realization hit hard.
She talked to Natsu.
Natsu talked to her.
And it felt so natural too…
Lucy gulped as she got ready for bed, unsure of what to think about all this.
And she was certainly unsure of what to make of the message she awoke to…
XOXOX
Hehe bit of a cliffy!
I have a love-hate for this chapter…Like I liked the first half, but I don't know how I feel about the second half…
Did you like it?
Thanks for reading!
