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Chapter 9
(In which Natsu finds a secret in the cabinet and Gray gets a checkup.)
Natsu woke to the smell of burning food and grimaced. Only he was allowed to burn down his house. Yawing and stretching groggily, he prepared to go chew someone out, but as he made to stand up, the blankets tangled around his limbs sent him crashing to the ground. Blinking slowly, his mind still trying to wake up, Natsu pushed himself upright and looked around uncomprehendingly. He could have sworn that he had fallen asleep on the floor outside of Gray's room, but he had most definitely just fallen off the couch. Untangling himself from the blankets, he dumped the offending fabric back onto the sofa. His best guess was that either Happy or one of the Sabertooth mages had found him sleeping on the floor this morning and had moved him to the couch. Well. That was a little embarrassing.
But Natsu would worry about that later, because right now it smelled like someone was burning down his kitchen.
He walked to the other room and leaned against the doorway as he took in the scene. Sting was cursing colorfully as he stood by the stove with a pan of charred bacon, waving a hand through the air in a vain attempt to dissipate the cloud of smoke curling through the room. Rogue was standing beside him with a smug look on his face, and Happy hovered in the air behind them as he laughed his head off. Gray was seated at the kitchen table watching the trio with an air of indifference. He was wearing some of Natsu's old clothes, so the dragon slayer assumed that Happy must have been helping him get ready.
"Minerva makes it look so easy," Sting grumbled, scowling at the blackened remains of their breakfast. "I don't get it."
"Even Natsu can cook bacon," Happy taunted gleefully.
"Are you sure you don't just want me to do it?" Rogue asked dryly.
Sting's scowl deepened. "No, I can do it."
"Oh really?" Natsu drawled. Everyone looked over at him as he pushed himself away from the doorframe and sauntered across the room to stand by Sting and take in the bacon in all its blackened glory. "Honestly, you can't even burn things right."
He snatched up the crumbling strips and lit them up in a dazzling blaze of fire that died out after a few seconds, leaving nothing behind. Natsu watched the ruined food disappear with a sense of satisfaction.
"Showoff," Happy muttered.
Natsu smirked over at the little cat. "Don't be so jealous, Happy."
"I'm not," the Exceed insisted with a pout. "You're just sore because you were the last one up."
This was the point where Natsu expected someone to jump in with a teasing remark about how they had found him sprawled across the floor, but Happy seemed content to stick out his tongue and drop the subject. Neither Sting nor Rogue commented on it either, and Natsu decided not to press the issue. He was perfectly fine with sweeping that incident under the rug like it had never happened, and he was grateful that whoever had found him wasn't going to make a big deal out of it.
"Is that normal?"
Natsu twisted around to look at Gray. The ice mage was watching him with an unreadable expression, but his tone was almost curious.
"Maybe not for other people, but it is for me," Natsu answered cheerfully. "I do have fire magic, along with my super awesome dragon slaying skills."
Gray just eyed him for a moment before shaking his head slightly. Natsu wondered what he found so interesting about magic.
"It suits you, I suppose," Gray murmured after a moment, as whatever faint interest he had been harboring faded away like it had never been there at all.
Natsu frowned a little at that, unsure of what his friend was talking about. "What do you mean?" he asked.
Gray shrugged. "You seem to always be making something out of nothing. You did it in the void, you do it with fire, and I think you're trying to do it with me."
Natsu considered that. He supposed he could see the other mage's point. It would seem like he kept making things appear out of nothing, from Gray's perspective. After all, Gray had been stuck in a void of nothingness for a long time before Natsu had appeared and dragged him back into the real world where existence was the norm. Natsu could understand that. He could even see why Gray might make a connection between that and Natsu's fire, since the dragon slayer could use his magic to create fire at will, seemingly out of thin air.
It was the last assertion that gave him a moment's pause as he puzzled it out. He wasn't quite sure what Gray meant, until he recalled part of their conversation from the previous night. Gray had asserted that he was no one, and Natsu had made it clear that he was determined to change his mind about that. The dragon slayer supposed that Gray could see that as Natsu trying to take the nothingness he believed himself to be and turn it into something that existed. Gray thought he was no one and nothing, and Natsu was trying to make him into someone again. That thought sickened Natsu a little bit, because he didn't want Gray to feel like nothing.
However, he was fairly certain that trying to start an argument with the ice mage wouldn't be very productive right now, so he took another tack instead.
"Well, you can do it too, of course," he said finally, with forced cheerfulness.
"I don't understand," Gray said flatly, his eyes blank and uncomprehending.
"You're a mage too," Natsu explained. "You can make and manipulate ice." He grimaced slightly and looked away. "Although I guess you wouldn't remember how to do that now."
Gray shrugged again and hummed noncommittally, unimpressed by that assertion. It wasn't clear whether or not he actually believed the dragon slayer, or if he even cared one way or the other. With nothing else to really be done about the matter, Natsu decided to leave it at that and he turned away, noticing the time on the kitchen clock as he did so. His eyes widened.
"It's already after eleven o'clock?" he asked, aghast. "Why didn't someone wake me up?"
Sting and Rogue exchanged uncertain looks, but Happy was uncowed.
"You haven't been sleeping very well with all the excitement these past few weeks," the Exceed said, his eyes daring Natsu to disagree. "You could use some extra sleep."
The two friends locked gazes in a staring match for a few seconds, but Happy was determinedly unapologetic, so Natsu finally sighed and gave in.
"Alright, alright. But you must know that everyone at the guild will have been waiting for us to show up with Gray. I'm sure they expected us to arrive a long time ago. Juvia will try to drown me if she thinks I did anything to Gray."
"Oh." Happy winced involuntarily. "I should have thought to send them a message, but there's nothing for it now. I hope Erza isn't too angry."
That thought made Natsu wince as well.
"Oh well, they'll just have to wait. But this means that we don't really have time for amateur cooking lessons," he added, smirking over at Sting. The other dragon slayer threw his hands up and rolled his eyes. "I'll make breakfast."
He nudged Sting out of the way to take a look at the mess on the stove. "Well, your first problem is that you were trying to use a pan that's way too small for all this bacon," he said dryly, waving the offending pan around.
"We couldn't find a better one," Sting grumbled. "Your cabinets are a mess and it's impossible to find anything."
Natsu began opening up various cabinets to look for a more suitable skillet, searching through teetering stacks of random junk in his quest. "Why didn't you ask Happy? He can find things."
"He was helping Gray around and finding him clothes," Rogue volunteered. "Sting thought he would make some breakfast while he was busy."
He gave his friend a pointed look, and Sting groaned a little.
"Okay, okay, I'll say it: you were right, and I can't cook. Happy now?"
"No, but it's very satisfying."
Sting rolled his eyes. "But seriously, how do you ever find anything in here?" he asked, deciding to ignore his friend in favor of harassing Natsu some more. "You wouldn't believe the things we found while we were digging through your stuff. All sorts of mismatched dishes, a half-melted cookie sheet, a pan with like three years' worth of dried grease on it, an old magazine, a bunch of cracked eggshells, a block of cheese so moldy we couldn't tell what kind it was, something that might have been a shirt at one point, and…What was that other weird thing we found?"
Sting frowned in concentration as he racked his memory.
"A mousetrap," Rogue volunteered.
Sting's eyes lit up and he nodded enthusiastically. "Yeah! A mousetrap. Why would there be a mousetrap in your cabinets?"
"Because Happy is a bad cat and won't eat the mice," Natsu mumbled absently as he sifted through a pile of junk in one of the lower cabinets.
There was a brief pause.
"You have mice?" Sting asked apprehensively.
Natsu smirked as he shut the cabinet and moved to the next one. "No, but I bet the look on your face was priceless."
"It was!" Happy crowed, cackling wildly.
"Ha ha," Sting grumbled. "So why do you have mousetraps then?"
"Why not?" Natsu asked flippantly. "Honestly, I have no idea. We find the strangest things in here sometimes. Like this, for instance." He pulled a half-empty box of crackers out from where it had been squished under a pile of bowls, and reached up to deposit it on the kitchen counter without standing up. "Neither Happy nor I eat crackers and I've never seen that box before in my life, but here they are. Makes life more interesting, at least. These cabinets are one of life's great mysteries. You call it inconvenience, I call it adventure. Same thing."
"I'm not sure I follow your logic, but do whatever makes you happy," Rogue said dryly.
"I will, thanks," Natsu answered cheerfully.
He rummaged around a little more. Pushing aside a pitcher and a gigantic metal mixing bowl he'd never used once in his life, he finally spotted what he was looking for. Pulling it out of the cupboard, he waved it in the air triumphantly.
"I found the bacon pan!" he announced in victory.
"About time," Rogue muttered.
Natsu laughed and was about to stand up and get to cooking when his sensitive hearing picked up a slight clinking sound as a small object fell to the ground, displaced by all of his shifting things about. He reached down to pick it up and replace it in the cabinet, but when he saw what it was, he froze.
"Happy," he said, his voice suddenly devoid of humor, "what is this doing here?"
Happy had been laughing and making a silly comment to the Sabertooth mages, but when he heard the sudden shift in Natsu's tone, he immediately sobered.
"Natsu? What is it?"
"You tell me," the dragon slayer said, his voice wavering dangerously.
He stood up, the skillet forgotten on the floor, and turned slowly. The others took in his white face drained of blood and their worried expressions deepened. Then they all looked at the object he was holding. Natsu didn't look at them. His gaze was fixed on the necklace held in his trembling hands too.
"Oh," Happy said quietly. "I knew I should have found a better place to hide that."
Natsu finally tore his gaze away from the familiar necklace so that he could stare at Happy instead. "Why do we have this?"
Happy's tail drooped and he slowly drifted to the floor, his wings folding back and disappearing as his paws hit the ground. He couldn't quite meet Natsu's eyes.
"The others…They thought that you might like to have it, since you weren't here when Gray…Well, I guess they tried to give it to Lyon, but he told them to give it to you since he had other things to remember Gray by and because he knew you'd be upset when you came back and found Gray gone. Now that Juvia told us how he kept everything in the apartment, I guess that's what he meant."
Natsu wasn't interested in why Lyon wouldn't want the necklace or what other things of Gray's he might have, and he definitely didn't want to hear all of Happy's stalling.
"If they wanted me to have it, then why did they give it to you?" he asked flatly.
Happy shifted uncomfortably, and Sting and Rogue backed up a few steps as they watched the exchange with wide eyes. "Because it was right after you came back, and you were still hiding here instead of going to the guild. They asked me to give it to you."
"Then why didn't you give it to me?"
Happy finally met his eyes, and Natsu could see the indecision and anguish written on the little cat's face. "Because I didn't think you could handle it."
"You didn't think I could handle it," Natsu repeated numbly, his eyes drifting back down to the necklace.
"Well you couldn't!" Happy burst out finally, suddenly losing all his guilty hesitation as his voice hardened with determination. "You wouldn't eat, you couldn't sleep, you had terrible nightmares even when you did sleep so that you'd wake up screaming, you didn't want to leave the house, you were always distracted thinking about those stupid memories and how guilty you felt, and you cried for weeks! And you were scaring me because you would pretend to be perfectly fine but then you'd start saying things. You were falling apart, Natsu. Between everything that happened with Igneel and Gray, you couldn't handle anything else."
Natsu stared at Happy dully, his gut twisting uncomfortably. He remembered those days, back in the beginning when he had first learned what had happened to Gray and had realized what he had done and lost. He had always felt bad for frightening Happy, but he hadn't been able to help it back then. Those had been dark times that he had had to claw his way out of, and it had been a hard fight the whole way. It had taken him a long time to start functioning semi-normally again and even afterwards, once things had finally started getting a little better, he hadn't really been the same. He had felt so guilty about leaving Gray to die, and he hadn't been able to let go of that. And it was true that he would sometimes say some…out of character, possibly frightening things. He knew that it had worried Happy a lot.
But still.
He opened his mouth to protest, but Happy beat him to the punch.
"And then there was that damn flower!"
Natsu felt his expression instantly close off, and he stared at Happy guardedly. "What flower?"
Happy threw him a scathing look. The Exceed didn't seem very apologetic anymore, now that he had gotten all worked up.
"'What flower?'" he repeated with a sharp laugh. "You know perfectly well what flower. The flower you brought back from the grave."
Natsu blinked at the feline, his mouth twisting into a pained grimace. He hadn't realized that Happy had noticed how caught up he was with that stupid flower. He had thought that he was pretty careful to keep it to himself.
"You really think I didn't notice?" Happy asked, correctly interpreting his friend's expression. "You put it on the windowsill and you'd just stare at it. Sometimes you'd try to be sneaky about it, but you'd always end up watching it again. You pretty much stared at it for days until it died. And then you buried it in the garden and cried over it. You cried over it."
Natsu recoiled a half-step and looked at Happy with a faintly horrified expression. "I thought you were asleep," he said numbly.
"I was," the Exceed agreed. "But when you left you woke me up, and I watched you through the window. But really, that flower had only the weakest of connections to Gray. If you got that obsessed with a flower, then what do you think would have happened if I gave you that necklace?"
They stared at each other for a moment longer before Natsu's shoulders slumped and he seemed to shrink into himself.
"Okay," Natsu said quietly. "You're right. I couldn't have handled it. I'm sorry."
He was still shocked that Happy had been keeping such a big secret, but he could also understand why his friend had done it. Happy was right: Natsu would have gotten obsessed with the necklace, just like he had been obsessed with that silly flower. And it would have been even worse, because the necklace was intimately linked to Gray and it wouldn't have shriveled up and died within a few days. It would have been a permanent, all-consuming fixation.
Happy deflated as well, his furry features melting into an expression of concern and sadness and guilt.
"I'm sorry too," he said tiredly. "I thought it was for the best."
"I know," Natsu murmured, rubbing the necklace's chain with his still-shaking fingers. He tried to give Happy a smile, but that turned out shaky as well. "I guess I deserved it for lying to you about the fishing trip," he added, trying for a more lighthearted atmosphere.
Happy's ears flattened again. "Except that I hid this from you a long time before the whole fishing incident. Knowing that, I guess I shouldn't have been so mad at you for lying."
"Oh well," Natsu said with another wobbly smile. "Why don't we just call it even now?"
"Okay," Happy whispered.
They all stood in silence for several seconds longer. Then Natsu looked back down at Gray's necklace clutched in his hand and found that his entire body had started shaking.
"God," he breathed, his voice cracking. "I shouldn't have left."
Hot tears pricked at the corners of his eyes and he blinked rapidly in a vain attempt to push them back.
"Oh, Natsu," Happy said sadly.
"But you came back," Rogue interjected quietly. "And you were the one who came up with the whole crazy plan to save Gray. And it worked."
"Maybe everything isn't back to normal yet," Sting added, "but everyone will keep fighting until Gray remembers everything again. Everything will be okay."
Natsu let out a breathless laugh and swiped at his tears. "Yeah," he whispered. "Okay."
He jerked back in surprise as he realized that Gray had risen silently from his seat at the kitchen table and made his way over to stand in front of him. The ice mage was still a little wobbly, but he was doing much better than last night and didn't need any help crossing the floor. The pair stared at each other for a few seconds. Gray's expression was completely unreadable, but after a moment his gaze drifted down to the necklace Natsu was holding, and he slowly held out a hand.
Natsu hesitated for a moment and then dropped the necklace into his outstretched palm. He watched Gray with bated breath, hoping against hope that an object that had once been so precious to him might awaken some kind of memory. He thought that the others might feel the same way since no one dared to speak as they watched Gray to see what he would do next.
The ice mage examined the necklace with flat eyes, turning it over in his hands and rubbing the silver sword with his pale fingers. He didn't say anything, but after several long moments, he looked back up at Natsu. The dragon slayer let out his breath in a disappointed sigh, seeing that no new light had entered his friend's eyes.
"It's yours," Natsu said quietly. "Keep it."
Gray hesitated and looked back down at the necklace uncertainly.
"Put it on," Natsu urged. Gray still didn't move, so the dragon slayer felt the need to clarify himself. "Over your head, around your neck."
Gray remained motionless for a moment before following Natsu's directions and slipping the chain over his head. Natsu let out another shuddering breath and smiled at him tearfully. It was good to see him with his necklace again, even if he didn't remember it yet.
Gray blinked at him for a moment. He didn't return Natsu's smile, but he brushed the dragon slayer's arm with the lightest of touches before dropping his hand and turning away. Natsu watched him return to his chair at the table, rubbing absently at the spot Gray had touched. It would have been almost a comforting gesture, if Gray had still understood emotions. Perhaps it had been a remnant of unconscious memory that had guided the ice mage, but even if it hadn't been intended as or understood as a gesture of comfort, it still gave Natsu a spark of hope. Maybe there was still something left of Gray in this body.
After Gray sat back down, he fixed Natsu with those expressionless eyes again, as if nothing had happened. Natsu stared back for a few more seconds before he leaned down and picked the skillet up. Turning back to Happy and the Sabertooth mages, he offered them a small smile. Then he fixed his gaze on Sting and raised an eyebrow.
"Now let me show you how to cook breakfast properly."
"Prepare yourselves," Natsu advised grimly as the five of them stood outside the doors of the guild hall half an hour later.
"Just do it fast, like a band aid," Happy suggested. "If we survive the first two minutes then we should be okay."
Sting and Rogue exchanged half-amused, half-concerned glances. They probably thought that the Fairy Tail mages were overreacting, but they also didn't know just how frightening Erza and Juvia could be. Gray looked neither amused nor frightened, and he said nothing. In fact, he hadn't said a word since the necklace incident. Technically he hadn't said anything then either, so the last time he had really spoken was back when he asked Natsu about his magic. But he also hadn't been very talkative to begin with, so Natsu chose not to worry about it. The ice mage had managed to walk all the way here on his own, and for now, that progress seemed to be enough to outweigh his reticence. Sure he had stumbled quite a few times and his movements still had a strangely mechanical jerkiness to them, but they could work on that.
Pulling himself out of his thoughts, Natsu turned, took a deep breath, and slammed the doors open with as much force as he could muster. If they were going to be late anyway, they might as well make a flashy entrance. He stepped into the guild hall, apologies already on the tip of his tongue.
"Sorry we're so late," he babbled hurriedly, his eyes quickly searching through the sea of faces to look for Erza and see just how much trouble they were in. "But you know, we're here now and—"
"You have some nerve making me wait on you so long," someone griped.
Natsu did a double take, immediately tearing his gaze away from Erza to see Porlyusica sitting at one of the tables with a sour expression on her face.
"Huh?" he asked stupidly, surprised to see the healer already sitting in their guild hall. "What are you doing here?"
Porlyusica gave him a withering glare. Natsu withered appropriately in response.
"You all asked me to come, didn't you?" she asked him scathingly.
"Um, yeah," Natsu stammered, still bewildered by her sudden appearance. "I just didn't expect you to be here already."
"Charle and I went to ask her to come early this morning," Wendy told him. "And she was kind enough to come with us right away."
Porlyusica made a disgruntled sound at Wendy's nerve in daring to call her 'kind', but she seemed to have lost interest in the dragon slayers already. Her eyes were fixed on Gray, who was standing between Natsu and Happy. She studied him carefully, emotions Natsu couldn't read flickering in her eyes. He was reminded of how everyone had said that she was upset about not being able to save Gray. Perhaps that was why she had come here in such a hurry.
"Well let's take a look—"
She was suddenly cut off as Juvia and Meredy walked in the side door and immediately took stock of the situation.
"Gray-sama!" Juvia cried, abandoning Meredy and running towards her beloved at full speed.
Gray hadn't appeared interested in her appearance or her calling of his name, but her sudden movement certainly caught his attention. Something vaguely reminiscent of alarm or discomfort crossed his face. Taking a half-step back, he inched closer to Natsu. If Gray had still understood the meanings behind different emotions and gestures, Natsu would have said that he was seeking protection from the dragon slayer. As it was, the ice mage didn't seem fully aware of his instinctive actions or the meaning behind them, but Natsu decided to intervene anyway.
"Hey, calm down, Juvia," he said hurriedly, holding out a hand to make her stop. Juvia skidded to a halt a few feet away, looking hurt. "Sorry," he told her. "Just slow down and don't get too…clingy. You remember how easily he gets overwhelmed now."
Juvia deflated a little. "Juvia is sorry," she apologized contritely, her eyes still fixed on Gray with a hungry expression. "How is Gray-sama today?"
Natsu waited for Gray to give her an answer, even if it was just one of those flat, noncommittal responses he was so prone to give now, but he said nothing. The dragon slayer frowned over at him.
"How are you feeling?" he prodded after the silence stretched on a little too long.
Gray tore his gaze away from Juvia and looked at Natsu instead. He blinked at the dragon slayer for a moment before something resembling comprehension flashed in his eyes for a brief instant. He shrugged.
"I don't know."
"What do you mean, you don't know?" Lucy asked worriedly, edging forward to peer at Gray.
Gray shrugged again. "How would I know?"
Natsu decided that it was high time to intervene again.
"That's his new favorite answer to everything," the dragon slayer explained. "There are still a lot of things he doesn't really understand. Even if something seems like a really basic question to you, it might not be so obvious to him."
No one seemed very pleased at that, but they accepted it because it's not like they had any other choice. Erza stepped forward as well, studying Gray carefully.
"I'll forgive your tardiness this time, Natsu, but only because we have more important things to worry about right now," she said absently. Natsu breathed a silent sigh of relief as she continued on. "How do you think he was doing last night and today, Natsu?"
Natsu let his gaze rest contemplatively on Gray as he considered the question. The ice mage seemed completely unfazed by the fact that everyone was staring at him, even though the old Gray would have quickly gotten uncomfortable with the attention.
"It's very…complicated," Natsu said finally. "He still doesn't remember anything, there are certain concepts he doesn't understand, he doesn't know how to use his magic, and he's very…flat. Like…He's not very emotional and he isn't interested in much of anything, but sometimes he'll display some kind of muted emotion or be briefly interested in something. I mean, there are good things too though. Sometimes he'll do things instinctively or unconsciously, even if he doesn't realize that he's doing them or understand why. And his motor skills have improved a lot. He still moves strangely, but he walked all the way here mostly on his own."
Erza nodded thoughtfully. "And how did he do with having so many people around him? Did he get too overwhelmed?"
Natsu shrugged. "It's kind of like how he is now. He isn't always bothered by people paying attention to him because he doesn't really care enough, but sometimes he'll get overwhelmed if he tries to process too much information at once or if you surprise him with sudden movements and things. But on the bright side, he seemed to get along alright with Sting and Rogue, even though Sting talks a mile a minute."
Sting made to protest, but paused as Gray spoke up.
"I don't understand," the ice mage said flatly.
They all stared at him. Natsu frowned a little as he searched back through his words, looking for whichever concept had puzzled Gray enough to actually convince him to speak up. He was about to ask what it was that was so confusing, but then a thought struck him.
"Oh, you mean you don't understand who Sting and Rogue are?" he asked.
Gray blinked at him for a moment before shrugging and nodding slightly.
"Man, I completely forgot that you wouldn't remember anyone's names yet," Natsu groaned, facepalming. "You should have said something. That's Sting and that's Rogue." He pointed out the respective dragon slayers. "And that's Happy," he added, gesturing towards the Exceed. "We're going to have to do introductions for everyone."
Gray's expression didn't change and he didn't respond, making Natsu feel a little uncomfortable.
"Do you remember my name?" he asked after a moment.
"No."
Natsu grimaced slightly. He supposed he shouldn't be surprised. He had only given Gray his name once, back in the void. "I'm Natsu."
"Hm."
Natsu was going to leave it at that, but something in Gray's blank, uninterested gaze made him uneasy. He felt a sudden sinking sensation.
"Who's that?" he demanded, pointing at Sting.
The other dragon slayer leaned back slightly, looking a little nonplussed at the unexpected gesture. No such surprise appeared on Gray's face. The ice mage glanced over at Sting and then returned his unsettling gaze to Natsu.
"I don't know," he said expressionlessly.
Someone sucked in a sharp breath behind Natsu, but the dragon slayer's attention was focused entirely on Gray. A sickening suspicion was forming in the back of his mind.
"Is it really that hard for you to remember names?" Lisanna asked curiously, her eyes sad and a little bewildered.
Gray looked at her and shrugged. "I don't know."
Her confused frown deepened. "Why wouldn't you know? Unless…"
"Unless he didn't try," Natsu finished flatly. Gray looked over at him again, and Natsu stared at him with a fierce intensity. "Why didn't you try?"
Gray shrugged apathetically once more, and Natsu ground his teeth together. That stupid shrugging thing was getting on his nerves.
"Names are for distinguishing things," the ice mage answered. "I have never had any need of names."
"You mean, you can't tell us apart?" Lucy asked, her eyes wide with horror.
"I can see the differences," Gray said, his eyes wandering away as he lost interest in her. "I distinguish between you as much as I need to, but I don't need names to do it. Names are useless if there's nothing to name."
"What is that supposed to mean?" Lucy whispered, still stunned.
"It means that nothing existed in the void, so names weren't important," Natsu answered, his eyes boring into Gray's head. "You guys don't understand. There was nothing there, so what good were names? And I think he's still half-convinced that nothing exists, so why would he need names for things? He still doesn't know how to care. You all didn't feel what I felt when I was in the void. He literally does not understand how to care about things. Nothing has any meaning for him. Right now, we don't mean a whole lot to him, so why would he bother learning our names?"
Everyone looked horrified. Gray shifted slightly, and if he didn't know better, then Natsu would say that he was actually looking a little uncomfortable.
"Names don't seem very important," the ice mage muttered.
Natsu frowned at him. Recalling the conversations he had had with Gray last night and back in the void, and considering the more recent time when the ice mage had ignored Juvia a few minutes ago, Natsu took the next logical leap.
"Do you know your name?" he asked slowly.
Gray stared at him with those dead eyes. "No. I told you, I don't have one."
Natsu's mouth twisted into a pained grimace. "Because you're no one? Because you're nothing?" he asked softly.
Gray nodded. Natsu laughed darkly.
"Gray. Your name is Gray. I told you that I was going to change your mind about all of that, and I meant it."
Something like understanding flickered in Gray's eyes and he glanced over at Juvia for a moment before returning his gaze to Natsu.
"You never did listen to me," he said, the barest hint of dry amusement touching his voice.
For a moment Natsu couldn't breathe, because that sounded almost like something Gray would have said back when he still had his memories. But he knew that his friend was just talking about how stubborn Natsu had been back in the void and last night, not about anything that had happened before this whole mess. And he doubted that Gray was feeling much of anything, much less amusement. Maybe Natsu was just projecting the emotions and thoughts onto Gray that he wanted his friend to feel.
"Are you quite finished yet?" Porlyusica interrupted irritably. "Do you want me to do this checkup or not?"
Natsu looked over at her in surprise, having already forgotten that she was there. In all honesty, he was surprised that she hadn't interrupted them sooner. Perhaps she was just as interested in learning about Gray's state of mind as the rest of them were.
"Sorry," Erza apologized. "Go ahead and take a look at him."
"Come here," the medicine woman ordered Gray, beckoning sharply.
Gray hesitated for a moment and then looked at Natsu. The dragon slayer wasn't sure why he seemed to be looking to him for permission or guidance, but he nodded his head anyway. Gray looked back at Porlyusica and slowly walked over to her, his movements jerky but good enough to get him across the room without sending him crashing to the ground. Porlyusica watched him carefully, and Natsu wondered if she had called him over to her instead of going to him because she had wanted to assess the current state of his motor skills. Gray stopped in front of her.
"What are you looking for, exactly?" Erza asked curiously as she drifted over to the two of them.
Porlyusica shrugged. "I'm not sure I'll be able to do anything about his memory loss or mental state, but I can check for any physical problems. I wouldn't be surprised if I found something, either. His body was in the ground for a year and a half, not to mention the fact that he was coughing up blood and having seizures before you buried him. Even if those were all effects of the curse, it might have left some real, lasting damage."
Natsu grimaced. He hadn't even really considered that. Well, he had been vaguely aware of the possibility, but the whole memory problem had taken over everyone's focus so that no one had really paid much mind to any potential physical issues. He watched Porlyusica closely as she examined Gray. She poked and prodded and listened and asked Gray to do simple tasks. Natsu had no idea what exactly she was doing, but he was content to let her do her thing in peace. Even if he wanted to know, he had enough of a sense of self-preservation to keep his mouth shut.
Gray obediently followed all of her instructions, but when she started asking him basic questions, he was far less helpful.
"Have you been experiencing any physical discomfort?" she asked as she prodded at his arm with a frown.
He stared at her blankly. "I don't know."
She blinked up at him and tried again. "Are you in any pain?"
"I don't know."
"How am I supposed to work with this?" she asked no one in particular, a scowl creasing her face.
"He's not trying to be difficult," Natsu explained, trying to soothe her. "There are still a lot of things he doesn't understand."
Porlyusica was not so easily soothed and would not be deterred by such a setback. Ignoring Natsu, she continued on her line of questioning.
"Have you been having difficulty breathing?"
"I don't know," Gray repeated again, watching her with polite disinterest.
"Look," Natsu tried again. "He still doesn't understand how he should normally feel, so he doesn't know if anything is out of the ordinary. You should really—"
Porlyusica switched her irritated glare to Natsu. "Have you noticed anything off about his breathing?" she demanded.
Natsu blinked at her, taken off guard by the unexpected question. "Uh…" he said stupidly, racking his brain for the correct response.
"Great," the healer growled in exasperation. "Not you too."
"Sorry, I just wasn't expecting the question," he said defensively. He thought back to how Gray's breathing had been so quiet the other night that he couldn't hear it at all unless he concentrated very hard with his superhuman hearing. "He was breathing really quietly?" the dragon slayer offered uncertainly.
Porlyusica fixed him with an unimpressed look. "Would you say that his breathing was like that from the beginning or did it change at some point?"
"Um…" Natsu saw the annoyance flash over the woman's face and he hurried to answer before she snapped at him again. "I don't know. I wasn't paying attention because there were more important things to worry about, but I know that it was really quiet around the time we went to bed last night."
Porlyusica nodded and turned back to Gray, who had watched the exchange without even the faintest trace of interest.
"Is there something wrong with his breathing?" Erza asked, her eyes filled with concern as she glanced between Natsu and Porlyusica.
"He's breathing very shallowly," the healer said shortly. "It could indicate that something is wrong with his lungs, or perhaps it's an indication that he's in pain and is breathing shallowly to minimize his discomfort. Alternatively, the functioning of his internal organs and muscles could be impaired just like his walking and other voluntary movements are."
"That doesn't sound good," Lucy whispered.
Porlyusica sent her a scathing look and the blonde shrank back a little, inching closer to Natsu. The healer turned back to Gray, muttering something about 'stupid humans' under her breath.
"I want you to take a deep breath," she instructed him. "Breathe in deeply."
He blinked at her uncertainly for a moment before glancing back over at Natsu. The dragon slayer frowned a little but made an encouraging hand gesture. Gray looked back at Porlyusica and obediently drew in a deep breath. The response was immediate. An almost pained look flitted across his face as he winced, and then he grimaced and doubled over as he started coughing violently.
There was a flurry of movement as everyone panicked, but when they tried to approach him, Gray shot them a baleful look and edged backward a few steps.
"Stay back," Porlyusica snapped as she studied Gray's reaction carefully.
Everyone reluctantly paused, although they still looked like they wanted to go running to his aid. After a few more seconds of coughing, Gray's fit subsided and he straightened up. Removing his hand from his mouth, he studied the appendage with an almost curious expression. Natsu didn't know what had caught the ice mage's attention at first, so he took a few small steps to the side so that he had a better view. He sucked in a breath as he saw the crimson substance dripping slowly down Gray's fingers.
"No," he breathed, his eyes widening.
This couldn't be happening. They had already done the hard part of finding Gray and bringing him way. There was no way that he had brought Gray back just to watch him die again. Gray looked up at the sound of Natsu's voice and blinked at him in an unconcerned fashion. Natsu wished he could be half as calm.
"He's coughing up blood again?" Cana asked, her voice rising in pitch as panic crept over face.
"Calm down and wait," Porlyusica barked. She had still been watching Gray, but now she looked over at Natsu and began firing off questions in rapid succession. "He hasn't had any seizures since you brought him back?"
"No," Natsu said absently, still in shock.
"Have you noticed any trembling in his hands or any other part of his body?"
"No."
"Has he been experiencing any more temperature fluctuations?"
"I…don't know," Natsu admitted, frowning a little. "I tried not to touch him too much in case he got overwhelmed. But when I was helping him walk around I didn't notice anything strange about his body temperature."
"And this is the first time you've seen him cough up blood?"
"Yes."
"Hm." Porlyusica returned her gaze to Gray and studied him thoughtfully. He remained impassive. "It doesn't seem like he has any of the other symptoms from before. I'd say that you mostly broke the curse's hold on him, but there are probably some lingering side effects. My best guess is that there's still leftover blood in lungs from before, which might be making it difficult for him to breathe. We'll have to make sure he gets it all out soon."
She stepped forward and offered Gray a tissue. "Go ahead and clean off the blood."
He hesitated for a second with that same momentary delay that seemed to precede all of his actions these days, and then slowly wiped at his fingers to clean off the blood. Natsu watched, a cautious sense of hope flaring within him. If Porlyusica thought that these were just temporary effects then maybe Gray would be okay after all.
"So it's nothing to really worry about?" Juvia asked hesitantly.
Porlyusica scowled. "I wouldn't know. He's not giving me a whole lot of information to work with here. It's hard to make a diagnosis when the patient can't even tell me how he's feeling or if he's in any pain."
"Maybe he can't tell you," Meredy said slowly, "but if I put another sensory link on him, you might be able to feel it. Now that his soul is united with his body again, there shouldn't be any danger in using the links."
Natsu brightened up considerably at that suggestion.
"That's a good idea," Wendy agreed. "I think that you should link me to him because it will give me a better feeling of what's wrong with him and maybe help me decide if my magic can help this time. I can relay any important information to Porlyusica-san so that she can give a second opinion, and it will be easier for me to do that since I have a better understanding of possible medical problems than the rest of you do."
No one could find any real reason to deny the request, so Meredy linked her with Gray, although the pink-haired girl still looked a little nervous after what had happened last time. Wendy immediately gasped and sucked in a breath, her eyes widening.
"What's wrong?" Charle asked in concern.
Wendy doubled over, gasping for breath as she waved at her Exceed to give her a minute to collect herself. Everyone watched her with varying levels of worry until she straightened up again. Even though she seemed to have adjusted to whatever she—and Gray—was feeling, there was still a pained look on her face and Natsu could hear her unusually shallow, rapid breaths. Gray didn't display any of the same signs that Wendy was, but he watched her with something approaching interest.
"I take it there's pain then," Porlyusica muttered, nodding to herself.
"Yes," Wendy agreed. "But it's very…generalized. I can't feel pain radiating from a specific source or anything, so I don't know where it's coming from. I'm not sure if there's actually anything wrong. I think it might just be an echo of what he was feeling from before. Maybe the curse isn't completely out of his system yet.
"And you're right about his lungs." She grimaced and took another shallow breath. "No wonder his breathing is off—it feels like I'm drowning. It's really hard to breathe normally. I can't believe he can act like he's not in any pain."
Natsu winced. He didn't want to hear that his friend was hurting. Perhaps Gray didn't see a problem with it because he still didn't know how he should feel, but Natsu didn't want him to think that this was normal. The dragon slayer didn't know what Gray was feeling from Wendy, but although he didn't say anything, the ice mage was displaying more interest than he had in a long time.
"No major medical problems to report?" Porlyusica asked.
The healer asked Wendy a few more questions, but the ending opinion seemed to be that nothing was physically wrong with Gray, despite the lingering pain and the issue with his lungs. As Meredy removed the link, Natsu noticed that Wendy seemed to shrink into herself, suddenly looking lost and small.
"Wendy?" he asked cautiously. "Are you alright?"
She looked up at him with haunted eyes. "It's a terrible feeling," she whispered. "It's so empty and cold when nothing matters."
Natsu grimaced. Having been linked to Gray once before, he had a pretty good idea of what Wendy was talking about. He had hoped that Gray would start returning to normal already, but he supposed it was still too soon for that. There wasn't any point getting discouraged when Gray had only been back for less than a day.
"I know," he told Wendy quietly. "But we'll get him back."
She took a shuddering breath and nodded. Then a determined look crept into her eyes as she turned back to Gray. "My magic didn't really work against the curse, but maybe I can at least take away some of the pain."
Gray watched her emotionlessly as she approached. He didn't look like he particularly cared one way or the other, but he didn't protest when she put her hand on his arm and began channeling her magic into him. She pulled away several seconds later, a disappointed look flitting across her face.
"I'm not sure it did much," she admitted with a heavy sigh. "I could still feel some of the resistance that I felt when I tried to heal him after he first got hit with Memento Mori. I suppose that would make sense if the pain is still a residual effect of the curse, but it might mean that my magic is going to be entirely useless again." She studied Gray. "Do you feel any different?"
Gray shrugged indifferently, but Natsu thought there was the tiniest spark of warmth in his eyes as he looked at her.
"I don't know. Maybe a little."
Natsu wondered if temporarily feeling her emotions had made Gray soften towards Wendy a little. The fact that he had tagged on a 'maybe a little' to the end of his usual 'I don't know' suggested that he might be trying to soften the blow of her magic's ineffectiveness. Then again, Gray didn't seem too concerned about people's feelings these days, and even if he had felt something towards Wendy, it seemed to be draining away rapidly. Whatever faint emotion had been reflected in his eyes had already disappeared.
"Right. I'm not sure how much I'll be able to do then," Porlyusica said bluntly. "But there are a few things we can try. First of all, I'm going to take him to the backroom. I set up all my supplies in there and I'll brew up a few potions that might help with the pain and some other problems he might have. It's always good to have some kind of backup in case of emergencies. I'll also get him to get rid of all that excess blood in his lungs and I'll take another look at his motor functioning. Then we'll talk about where to go from here." She turned away and began walking towards the back of the guild hall. "Come on," she ordered Gray.
The ice mage glanced over at Natsu again. The dragon slayer frowned. He didn't understand why Gray kept looking at him like that, as if he were the authority to listen to.
"Go ahead," he said.
Gray shrugged and trailed after Porlyusica obediently. Natsu watched them go with a slightly puzzled expression, before turning away to answer the barrage of questions from his guildmates. Everyone wanted to know everything about what had happened with Gray since they had seen him last, and Natsu obliged them with as much patience as he could muster. He answered questions for nearly an hour, until Porlyusica and Gray emerged from the backroom again.
"Well, I made him cough up all the blood he could," Porlyusica said briskly without preamble. "His breathing is a little better, and it should keep improving over time." She turned her sharp gaze on Natsu. "I also fixed him some potions. Now pay attention to what they're all for, because I don't trust him to take them properly."
Natsu didn't know if Porlyusica had noticed how Gray kept looking to him for guidance and that was why she had decided to make him the focus of her attention, but he was forced to spend the next half hour memorizing the uses and dosages and side effects of half a dozen potions. Several other guild members had joined in on the lesson as well, but Porlyusica refused to move on until Natsu could recite everything back to her verbatim. All of the information was making his head hurt, but he knew it was important that they remembered it all, because Gray probably wouldn't take the medicine on his own and had shown no interest in memorizing the directions. So they all studied potions until Porlyusica was satisfied.
"Alright," she said finally. "I'm going home. I'll come back up in…let's say three days. I'll need to give him another checkup to see how he has improved. I expect to see rapid improvement over the first couple weeks or so. After that, we can make his checkups once every week or two. But until then I'll check in on him frequently, not only to monitor his progress, but also because if anything is going to go wrong, it's most likely to go wrong within the next few weeks. This is the critical period—he'll either get a lot better or a lot worse.
"If anything happens—if he starts having seizures or the trembling comes back or he coughs up more blood or anything else—then send for me immediately." She turned to leave, but added one last comment as an afterthought. "If he coughs up a little bit of blood, that's probably okay. There still might be a small amount left in his lungs. But if he coughs up more than a few drops then you should start to worry."
And with that she swept out of the guild hall and was gone. They all stared after her for a few seconds.
"Well, at least it was mostly good news," Happy said finally.
"Yeah," Cana muttered.
Natsu looked back over at Gray, who was sitting at a table watching them impassively. Some of the others followed his gaze, but they hesitated as they decided what to do next. No one seemed to be sure of where to go from here.
"Oh!" Lucy said suddenly. "You gave him his necklace back."
Everyone else peered closer, to see the glint of silver around Gray's neck. The ice mage hadn't tucked the necklace under his shirt like he normally did, back before he had lost all his memories.
Natsu gave Happy a wry look. "Oh yes," he said dryly. "I gave it back to him just as soon as I found it."
"Huh?" Lucy asked in confusion. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"I said I was sorry!" Happy wailed.
The necklace suddenly reminded Natsu of something else Happy had said back when the dragon slayer had first found it in the cabinet. He frowned over at the others.
"You contacted Lyon, right?"
A few people exchanged looks.
"Yes," Erza answered, her eyes uncertain. "I'm not sure he's taking it very well. He was very…surprised, to say the least. But he's coming down. He was practically out the door before we even got off the lacrima with him, and I would honestly expect him to get here at any time."
"And he's going to be a pain in the neck to deal with," Gajeel muttered.
"Be nice," Levy admonished. "He was one of the people who was hardest hit by this. It's not surprising that he's so worked up."
Natsu wasn't sure that that sounded like a promising sign, but he settled back to wait.
Note: I have no medical experience and did no real research on possible medical conditions for this story. The physical component is minor at best, and not terribly important. Also, Lyon will show up next chapter, so yay for those of you who have been waiting for that.
I also have some not-so-great news. Lately I've been having second thoughts about posting this story. I'm not going to stop posting it, but... I'm a self-conscious person to start with, and my writing is very personal to me. I don't usually like sharing it, and sometimes posting makes me really anxious. Lately my anxiety has been coming back full force, to the point where posting day just makes me feel anxious and reluctant. I'll continue to update this in a timely manner, but I just want to give you a heads up that updating may or may not become a little more sporadic. Hopefully I'll keep on schedule and this warning will have been for nothing, but I'm sorry if things don't work out like that.
emmahoshi: All I'm going to say about the sofa right now is that I have a habit of setting up scenes way in advance ;) Ha ha, yay for the reappearance of the magical IV line. That makes me snicker every time. Natsu wasn't the one to say anything about Lyon because he wasn't in the guild when they contacted Lyon via lacrima. Gajeel was just a random pick, although I think I remember choosing him specifically because the comment was kind of blunt and not terribly nice, which is more like something he would say. Yeah, you're right that a big part of it is just that the things I write are intensely personal, plus I have pretty severe anxiety. I'm not usually worried about getting negative reviews since everyone has been pretty supportive, but I'm really self-conscious and it feels weird to bare part of my soul, so to speak. In any case, thanks again for the support, and I will do my best to keep the updating on track :)