On the third day after Natsu's second disappearance Sting admitted for the first time that letting the idiot believe he'd run off had not been his best idea.
"Not that he didn't deserve it." Gray threw in. "If that flame head went and got himself kidnapped again it's his own fault. He should have been careful after the first time."
Erza nodded. "Natsu was worried for your safety, but his own should have also been a concern."
"That's a little harsh, don't you think?" Lucy asked.
Natsu changed his mind every couple days on if he wanted Erza or Lucy to be the godmother. Sting didn't know either of them particularly well. More than Rogue had disliked Natsu, he felt Erza didn't approve of him, and Lucy was… blonde. He guessed. She was a blonde female who seemed so completely unimpressive that she hadn't really registered on his radar before he learned she was a candidate for godmother. She seemed like she might be the more sane one to leave his son with should anything happen, but Rogue was sane enough for four or five people, and Erza seemed better at taking things in stride.
Of course, he wasn't really comfortable with the thought of anyone in Fairy Tail taking care of the baby in his steed. It killed him to imagine his own kids being as downright insane as the guild could get at its worst. As it was, he was hiding out on the second floor with Natsu's friends while a brawl raged below.
"Happy went out looking for him again this morning, with Laxus this time." Erza assured him. "No one's going to try and jump Laxus."
"I should be helping. Even if it's his fault I went outside it's my fault he thought I went further out than I did."
"You can't fight."
"I can still use my roar." Sting said stubbornly. "And punch. Dodging is just getting tricky."
"We'll handle Natsu. You take care of the baby." Lucy told him.
"Rogue's taking care of the baby. Yesterday he sent Lector over to let me know he'd found eight professional doctors who were willing to take me on as a patient. Today Lector showed up again saying he'd narrowed it down to two based on more qualities than he should have had the time to asses in one person, let alone eight… or six, if he just hasn't gotten around to rejecting the last two yet."
"Well that's… dedicated." Lucy admitted. "For someone who doesn't come of as very social, he seems like a good friend."
"Yeah. I guess so."
Sting would have liked it if Rogue could be a slightly worse friend. He appreciated the effort that went into helping him hide from the media, but he didn't appreciate all the nudges and reminders to take care of himself or the kid. He'd even been forced to put on weight. Thankfully, the only people who'd gotten enough of the 'pregnant male, look at his huge stomach' thing were Rogue and Natsu, so they were the only ones who stopped gaping at his beach ball sized stomach and noticed that he was, in fact, larger everywhere else. Not by much, he hoped. Rogue had settled for calling him slightly chubby-when Natsu had made the mistake of saying 'fatter.'
He could have sworn he'd told Natsu he had to put on weight too. Sting sighed.
"Are you alright?" Erza asked
"Fine."
"You're not supposed to be stressed." Erza told him. When he didn't respond she glared and rephrased it as an command. "I order you to stop being stressed."
Before an argument could start over how ridiculous it was to expect Sting to suddenly stop stressing out over his weight and his shattered reputation and his missing boyfriend and that he actually had to see a doctor soon and the fact that he was even pregnant at all, Erza shifted her attention to the door. Even though she went a little pale her eyes still lit up.
Sting followed her and the others' gazes to see three mages standing in the doorway, looking a little baffled by the chaos of the first floor. He vaguely recognized their faces, but couldn't have put names to them if he tried.
Erza hopped over the balcony, knocking over several people who got in her way as she ran right through the battle grounds to greet the three. Gray went down at a less rushed pace. Lucy and Sting were both content to wait for the brawl to actually wind down before going to see the visitors.
"You don't recognize them? The blue haired one is an old friend of hers." Lucy explained when she saw Sting gawking at how fast the scarlet haired demon had rushed up to him. "The other two are… also people who are close to certain guild members, I suppose."
"And they are…?"
"The independent guild, Crime Sorciére."
"Oh. I've heard of them. That's not the whole guild, is it?"
"They're… not in the best situation to recruit members." Lucy admitted. "Don't tell anyone you saw them here."
The blue haired one's name still didn't come to him, but the face clicked. "That's the guy who tried to raise the dead with that tower, right?"
"Jellal."
"I knew it was something stupid. The other two are also criminals?"
Lucy sighed. "It looks like everyone's more interested in hearing if they found anything about Shadow Alp then they are with beating each other up. Go down and meet them."
There was no good reason to tear his arm from her grasp when she tried to lead him down the stairs, but Sting did it anyway. She huffed and stormed down ahead of him without saying another word.
Jellal didn't pay Sting much heed, as he was busy trying to duck Mira's onslaught of question about his fiancée, but both girls noticed him. The older one just grinned, while the younger dared ask "Can I feel your stomach?"
"No."
"He doesn't let anyone." Juvia informed her.
"So you're the one Natsu got pregnant." The older girl said, bowing. "My name is Ultear. It's a pleasure to meet you." Sting may have returned her bow if he wasn't worried he'd tip over.
"Wait. What?" Jellal finally looked over at him. "Natsu got… who is she?"
Erza hit him on the head. "Does he look like a girl?"
"Well… no, but they look pregnant." Jellal argued, opting for a gender neutral pronoun.
Erza noticed. "He is pregnant. Don't be so insensitive."
"I just-"
"Are you and Eva going to be having kids soon?" Mira asked, Eva having been the first name to pop into Jellal's head when the white haired lunatic had begun her interrogation.
"Oh, yes!" Meredy smirked. "Jellal's a little shy about it still, but Eva just goes on and on about how many kids she wants. We'll have to send photos once they get around to it." She paused for a moment to let Jellal realize what she meant by it. That would definitely not be happening with an imaginary girlfriend. "You will send Fairy Tail photos, right? It's not like you have a whole lot of friends to send baby photos too."
"Go away." Jellal ordered. The command was nearly lost under Mira's squeal of excitement and Ultear's laughter.
"Would you like me to do that before or after we tell them about Natsu?" Meredy asked.
At the mention of his name all bickering stopped. Everyone looked either at Meredy, hoping for news, or Sting, trying to gauge his reaction. When Meredy followed their gazes to the blond he scoffed and looked away. "They probably just tied him to a raft again."
"So you can't act concerned when everyone's looking at you." Lucy muttered.
"It's more serious than that." Meredy said before Sting had a chance to hit Lucy. "We ran into him this morning."
"That sounds much less serious." Gray told her.
"He attacked us." Meredy clarified. "He didn't say a word. He just came at us with several wizards at his side. They all had the Shadow Alp mark on them."
Before anyone could say anything, Ultear spoke up. "We couldn't find any evidence that it was an illusion, and even if that was the case then they have both a very powerful illusionist and their own fire dragon slayer. If we captured him I could see if he's been brainwashed. I have some…" she glanced to Jellal, who was smiling pleasantly at her "…uh… some experience in brainwashing, so I may be able to undo it if that's the case."
They started talking about how they could go about trapping Natsu then. A few mentioned possibly using Sting to draw him out, but those were quickly shot down by people concerned with the baby's safety. When it became obvious to Erza that Sting was going to continue arguing his way into plans she excused both of them. Extracting him from the guild was tricky, since she couldn't just knock him out with a swift punch to the gut and carry him off. She had to get a good grip on his arms from behind and drag him out.
His protests were already giving her a headache by the time she got him out of the guild. When he saw she was dragging him all the way to the girls' dorm they became unbearable.
"If they have Natsu that puts you at risk." Erza told him. "We'll contact Rogue and let him know what happened.
"But-"
"You will wait with Rogue." Erza said more forcefully. "We will handle Natsu."
STA: Originally the fake fiance was going to be named Eve, which I think is an awesome girl's name. Then I remembered there's a boy named Eve in this series, and this story already has enough gayness without that added implication.
