I couldn't think of a pun today. Oh well. But this my explanation of how Natsu found and joined Fairy Tail. Please review and tell me what you think.
Lucy sighed. It had been a week later. Natsu has accepted Cana's challenge of a drinking contest that afternoon. He's going to get drunk again, she thought. Oh, well. Not my problem. She made a mental note to herself to lock all of her doors and windows in case Natsu came around afterwards.
"Lucy, will you give me some fish?" Happy pleaded as she got ready to leave after watching the first few rounds. "Your fish is tasty."
"No," she said. "You stay here and make sure Natsu gets home safely. I don't want to find out in the morning that he's burned down Magnolia while drunk."
"Aye, sir!"
"Don't 'aye' me, cat!"
Lucy took a long walk in the park until twilight, then went home. She opened her door to see Natsu sprawled out on her floor fast asleep. Well, crap.
Happy's excuse was "He wouldn't go home. He insisted on coming here." She sighed. A fire was burning in her fireplace. That wasn't there when she left. After writing for an hour, then getting a snack, he was still asleep. She sat down next to him with a book she had been meaning to finish. He lifted his head groggily when she sat. He said something that she supposed was her name, then he planted his head in her lap. She was startled, but he looked so peaceful that she left him. Despite herself, Lucy found herself stroking his hair. It was very fine, very soft, and very thick.
She felt something strange under it. Long cord-y put down her book and frowned. What on Earth-Land? she wondered. Lucy parted his hair to see… scars. They were a lot like something had been broken over his head. Erza? No, these have a pattern, and I doubt that he would hold still long enough for her to do this. Maybe Gray? Was it even a guild brawl? Maybe it was on a job? Who knows? I'll ask Mira in the morning.
In the morning, after kicking a bleary Natsu out of her bed and house and making her way toward the guild, she asked Mira.
"Hey, Mira, what's with the scars on Natsu's head?"
Mira giggled. "Which ones?"
Lucy laughed. "The ones on top, under his hair." Mira paled.
"Could we talk about this later?" she asked.
"Uh, sure?"
After Mira pulled her towards the library fifteen minutes later, she pulled a stone out from the floor.
"You guys really like hiding things under rocks in the library," Lucy commented.
Mira just gave her a look and pulled an album from the hole. Lucy looked through it. "'Kapral vs. Fairy Tail'? A custody battle?" Mira nodded.
"Yes. Over Natsu." Lucy glanced up in surprise.
"You had to fight for Natsu?" she asked softly.
"Uh-huh. It wasn't easy; we lost the first round. But we got him in the end."
Lucy frowned. "Wouldn't he need a guardian?"
"Yeah," Mira replied. "Macao is his legal guardian. But he just lets Natsu run wild." She laughed. "We all know that Erza does a better job with him than Macao could."
Lucy chuckled. "But that still doesn't explain the scars on his head."
Makarov and Gildarts had heard tale of a powerful young wizard who could eat fire. Actually eat fire. Deciding to investigate, they both traveled to the nearby town where he was said to live. Not too far from the train station, they saw a large crowd. The center turned out to be a one man carnival - or rather, a one boy carnival. He wasn't very old; no taller than little Gray back at the guild. A lot skinnier, though.
He was juggling five flaming torches; the concentration on his face was intense. He finally threw them all up in the air, reared back, and ate the fire. Just sucked it right up. The use of Magic was obvious.
Catching the torches, he gave a small bow then fled behind the curtain. A slightly sleazy-looking man came out with a small box, donations most likely.
"Do you think that that's the wizard?" Gildarts asked. "He seems powerful. He has a very strong magical presence."
"True, true," Makarov said gruffly. "We should talk to the boy." They could hear the man yelling at the boy about something.
"Excuse us," Gildarts began. The man jumped and turned.
"Ah, greetings, good sirs. My name is Kapral, and this is my son, Natsu. What may I do for you?"
Natsu muttered, "Foster son."
"We'd like to talk to young Natsu, if that is alright." Judging by his body language, it was not alright, but he said, "But of course. Natsu?"
"I know," the boy said a bit too quickly. He was nervously messing with his scarf. There's something not right here, Makarov thought.
"Hello, son," Makarov said cheerfully. "Natsu, wasn't it?" He slowly nodded. "How old are you?"
"I don't know," he replied quietly, shifting from one foot to the other. "I think I'm eleven."
"I'm curious, son, how did you eat the fire?" Natsu glanced nervously at Kapral. When he nodded at the boy, he said, "Igneel taught it to me. He taught me lots of things."
"Like what?" Makarov encouraged him.
"I'm sorry," Kapral interrupted, "is this some sort of interrogation? Natsu, did you burn something down again?"
"No!" he exclaimed quickly. The boy's terrified of him, Makarov realized.
"No, he didn't," Gildarts said. "We just wanted to talk to him. Thank you for your time."
"Of course," Kapral said through gritted teeth. When they turned to leave, Makarov caught a glimpse on a shiny piece of metal of Kapral wheeling on the boy and him shrinking away from his foster father.
While getting a meal at the local tavern, the serving woman overheard them talking about Natsu.
"Oh, you met Natsu?" she asked.
"Yes, do you know him?" Makarov asked in return.
"Uh-huh. He comes here every now and then, so I give him a meal if he has time. He always eats like he's half-starved."
"He did seem pretty thin," Gildarts said over the brim of his cup.
The woman shook her head. "The poor boy is starved and beaten pretty often. But nobody can prove it, so Natsu isn't taken from him.
"When he comes over, I give him a meal - goodness, does that boy eat - and the occasional bath. Kapral never seems to treat him right. I actually just gave him something a few minutes ago."
They left the tavern. "Give it back!" they heard Natsu yell.
They turned the corner to see him pulling on his scarf, trying to take it from another, larger boy. They were surrounded by several other boys.
"Give us the grub, then," he demanded. Trembling with either fear or rage, Natsu pulled a small loaf of bread from his shirt and shoved it into the other boy's hand.
"Now give my scarf back," Natsu growled. The lead boy laughed.
"Nah, it ought to sell nicely."
"No!" Natsu screeched, grabbing at it. "Give it back!" He got shoved in the face for his troubles. The boys started to run off, but Makarov reached out and grabbed the boy with the scarf.
"Give it back," he directed. The wide-eyed boy dropped the scarf and fled.
Natsu had scooped up the scarf and wrapped it around his neck. "Thank you," he whispered.
"Anytime," Makarov said warmly. His grandson was a teenager now, but it wasn't too long ago that he was this boy's age. "You said earlier that Igneel taught you magic. Is that right?" Natsu nodded. "Why didn't you use it?"
The boy shifted. "He said that I shouldn't use it unless I needed to."
"It looks like you needed to back there."
Natsu nodded. "I was about to. But… Kapral gets mad at me when I use magic. He hi-" He realized that he probably shouldn't have said that.
Makarov looked thoughtfully at him. "Would you like a meal?"
Natsu's eyes widened. "Really?"
Gildarts ruffled Natsu's pink hair. "As much as you want." His face broke into a large smile.
The boy ate a lot. He was a bit more open with them, though he refused to say if Kapral hit him or not. The bruise on his hand spoke for him.
"Are you guys wizards?" Natsu asked. "Like the kind in guilds?"
Makarov chuckled. "I'm a guild master, son." They boy's eyes became huge.
"Really? I want to join a guild someday. That is, if Kapral lets me."
"Do you think he has legal custody over the boy?" Gildarts asked under his breath to Makarov.
The boy had sharp hearing. "What does that mean?"
"It's the care, control, and maintenance of a child, as given by the law," he told him.
"Oh. He doesn't." They looked at Natsu.
"What do you mean?" Makarov asked.
"Well, he just found me. He told me that I should stay with him, because there were a lot of really dangerous things, and he could teach me more magic." He frowned. "I don't think I should have listened to lied about the magic. And I could take whatever was out there!" Then his face lit up and he leaned forward. "Could I join your guild?" he asked eagerly. "I can use magic, and I can -"
"Whoa, calm down," Gildarts laughed. "Unless there's proof that he doesn't have custody of you, you can't join without his permission." Natsu's face fell.
"Are you able to take in orphans?" he asked with a crafty look on his face. "Igneel was my father, but now he's gone."
"I think so," Makarov chuckled. He knew what the boy was thinking. "Of course, I would never tell you that if you wanted to join, you shouldn't meet us tomorrow at the train station. If you didn't do that, you would not be able to join the guild." Natsu grinned. His teeth were very sharp.
"I would never do that," he chuckled.
What do you think? This is going to span over another chapter, maybe two. REVIEW.
