Disclaimer: All Fairy Tail characters belong to Hiro Mashima

Chapter 11: I Want To Help You, But I Don't Know How

Wendy awoke to find herself alone in Natsu's room. She got up quickly not liking the feeling. She walked out of the room and saw Zeref's door was open. She peered inside but it too was empty. She heard noises coming from the kitchen and made her way there. She saw Natsu, busy trying to make what appeared to be breakfast. He didn't seem to be having much luck if the mess surrounding him was any indication.

Natsu noticed her and gave her a helpless look. He was covered in ingredients, flour covered his hair and his shirt along with bits and pieces of other things that Wendy did not care to identify. Wendy giggled at him and asked, "What are you doing?"

"What does it look like? I'm trying to make you breakfast." he groused, "I just forgot that I'm not very good at it."

Wendy laughed at how pathetic Natsu looked and grabbed an apron to put on over her pajamas. "Why don't I help you then? Maybe we can figure it out together."

"What were you trying to make?" Wendy asked curiously looking at the messy kitchen.

"Well, first I tried to make pancakes but I got distracted and kind of burnt them all." Natsu said sheepishly, "Then I remembered you liked it when Mom made you oatmeal from scratch so I tried that but I guess I must have set the temperature to high because it all stuck to the bottom of the pan. I was about to move on to eggs."

Wendy sighed, "Let's just clean up this mess first. If we wait too long everything will be that much harder to clean."

Natsu agreed and they set about cleaning up the enormous mess he had made.

"Where's Zeref?" Wendy asked as she wiped down the counters.

"He said we're on our own for today. He had a bunch of errands to run and a doctor's appointment." Natsu shrugged and pointed at the note that was still on the refrigerator door. He had been relieved when he'd found it as it gave him a little more time to think about everything.

"We are so ordering pizza for dinner tonight, I don't think the kitchen can handle another one of you attempts at cooking." Wendy teased her brother before becoming serious. "Natsu, what happened to you yesterday?"

"Silver said I had a panic attack, nothing to worry about." Natsu smiled at his sister trying to assuage her fears. "I'm sorry if I scared you. He also said that neither of us have what Mom and Zeref do, so you don't have to worry, ok?"

Wendy nodded, that was nice to know although it didn't change Zeref's situation any. She looked at the ground before asking "Natsu, what's going to happen to us?"

"Silver said we will go live with them." Natsu tried to make his voice sound reassuring even though he was still a little wary of trusting the change that had seemed to come over Silver in the last few days.

"Oh. I guess that's good, right?" Wendy asked not sure how she was supposed to feel about it. On the one hand she loved the Fullbusters dearly but on the other she felt uncomfortable with the idea of replacing her parents.

"Yes Wendy, that's good." Natsu said as he patted her hair, "They're nice people and Mom and Dad trusted them to take care of us."

"But they're gone." Wendy wailed, "And now Zeref is going to go too! It's not fair!"

"I know, sweetheart. Even though he's a pain in the ass most of the time, I don't want him to go either." Natsu gave Wendy a small smile. He wrapped her in an embrace and let her cry as he tried to comfort her as best he could.

He remembered Silver's words from the previous afternoon

"All he has ever worried about is you and Wendy. He has been dreading this day for the last year and now that it's here he really needs to know that you'll be ok. He's been braver than you can imagine. So please, even if it's a lie, give him that much."

He let her cry for a few more minutes before he kissed the top of her head and gently pushed her away from him. "Hey, let's not cry anymore, ok? Zeref's still here, let's work on making the most of the time we have left with him. There will be plenty of time to cry after he's gone."

"I'll try." Wendy sniffled as she tried unsuccessfully to remember when Natsu had cried. "Can I hug you for a little longer?"

"You can hug me for as long as you need to Wend, I'm not going anywhere. I will be right here for you whenever you need me."

After awhile Wendy let go of him and they finished cleaning up the last of the mess. Neither one of them was really hungry by that point so they each settled for a bowl of cereal with milk.

"What would you like to do today?" Natsu asked his sister. "It's the first day of summer vacation."

'Can we look at old pictures?" Wendy asked hopefully.

"I don't think that's a good idea, not today." Natsu replied quickly, "You're already upset enough as it is. Why don't we get out of the house instead? We can walk around and maybe get some ice cream later?"

"I miss them." Wendy said quietly, eyes once again brimming with tears.

Natsu sighed in defeat when he realized she wasn't going to give up easily. "I miss them too. Why don't we go buy some flowers and go visit them?"

Wendy went into her room to get changed while Natsu took a shower to clean up from his failed attempt at cooking. He was ready before she was so he sat on the couch to wait. When she finally came out she was crying once again and she ran at him and hugged him tightly.

"I just read your story." Wendy said in between sobs. "Thank you."

"I mean it." Natsu said seriously as his sister continued to squeeze the air out of him. "No matter what happens, I won't leave you again."

She finally let go and they left the house hand in hand. They stopped at the flower shop on their way to the cemetery where their parents were buried.

o-o

After Zeref left, Silver went back inside. He found Mika in the kitchen making dinner and as he stood behind her he wrapped his arms around her and placed his head on her shoulder.

"Hey, hon. How did everything go with Zeref? Did you find out what you wanted?" Mika asked absently as she continued to put the ingredients together for their meal.

"Yeah, he told me what I needed to know." Silver answered not wanting to discuss it with her yet. He still had not really wrapped his head around what he had been told. He needed to do research, needed to understand the situation better. "Hey listen, what would you think about my taking a year off from the hospital?"

"A year off? What are you talking about? We're starting construction next week, we can't afford to do that." Mika turned around and looked up at her husband. "What's going on?"

"I got a call a few days ago from the medical school. They have a professor who is taking a sabbatical for a year and they need someone to take his place until he returns. I had been planning on turning it down but now I think it might be a good idea. The pay would be a little less but I would have more regular hours and I wouldn't have to be on call. I could still treat Zeref and I'd be around more for Natsu, Wendy and Gray... after." He couldn't bring himself to say that Zeref would die soon, it felt like giving up and he wasn't quite ready to do that yet.

"Are you sure that's what you want to do? You love working at the hospital." Mika asked with concern. "You've been working towards Chief of Cardiology, won't this hurt your chances?"

"I can always go back to the hospital at the end of the school year and I'll still have privileges there." Silver shrugged. "I think our family is more important at the moment and to be honest I think I'm going to need it as well."

Mika smiled at her husband and hugged him tightly. "I love you, Silver. I know this whole situation has been hard on you but I'm proud of how you've been handling it. You should do whatever you think is right, I'll support whatever you decide."

Silver smiled at her, "Thanks. I'll talk to the hospital and the medical school tomorrow." He added seriously, "I think it's time we tell Gray what's going to happen. It affects him too."

"You're right, we'll tell him at dinner." Mika said and Silver nodded in agreement although he was anything but hungry at the moment.

"I'm going to go do some work on the computer, call me when dinner's ready." He kissed his wife and made his way to the basement where a small area of the game room had been set aside for work or the occasional playing of board games. There was a large table with drawers for writing supplies as well as art supplies for Gray, although these days he preferred to do everything digital. Silver reminded himself to look at Gray's devianart account to check out what he had been working on lately. Both he and Mika were very proud of Gray's talent and they hoped whatever he decided to study allowed him to incorporate his love of art.

Silver looked around for his son but he was not there at the moment. He grabbed his laptop from his charging dock and opened up a search window. He plugged in child on child sexual abuse and began to filter through the results. Twenty minutes later he got up and got himself another beer just to be able to walk away from what he'd read and to prepare himself for the next step. He drank his beer and thought about some of the things he'd read. His anger towards Igneel had grown the more he read. He could have stopped it, if he had just talked to Natsu that first day instead of sending him away and leaving him to fend for himself.

He looked up conversion camps next. Page after page describing the horrible acts that were committed in these places. They were parent sponsored modern day torture chambers claiming to be able to fix something that was never really broken in the first place and Natsu had only been ten when he had been sent to one. What must he have thought to find himself there alone? How many of the awful things that Silver had read about had been done to Natsu? What could have happened to cause him to forget everything? Silver felt a sudden jolt of pain and noticed with surprise that his fists were clenched tight enough for the nails to almost break the skin.

He turned off the computer and made his way outside to try to calm himself down before Mika or Gray noticed how upset he was. He made the decision then to not tell Mika about what had been done to Natsu. He would shoulder that burden on his own and try his best to help Natsu through it when he was ready.

He walked around the backyard until his eyes fell on the punching bag he had hung up for Gray from one of the trees. He unbuttoned his work shirt and hung it up on a different branch. He found some tape and used it to wrap his hands. He let all of his anger at Igneel flow out through his fists and onto the bag as he pelted it with hit after hit.

'You stupid bastard!' Silver thought as he punched the bag using a combination of cross punches.

'Why didn't you ask for help?' - Left hook.

'I would have helped you! ' - Right hook.

'How could you do that to your own son?'

Jabs, uppercuts, front punches. He used them all, after a while he was able to release most of his negative feelings and get himself into some semblance of calm. He held the punching bag with one arm as he tried to catch his breath.

"Dad?"

Silver turned to see Gray coming out the sliding door of the basement. "What's up?"

"Is everything ok?" Gray looked at his dad with concern. His mother had sent him to tell his father that dinner was ready.

"Yeah, everything's fine." Silver assured him, "Just getting out some excess energy.

Silver smiled at his only son and ruffled his hair playfully. He threw some mock punches and then pulled Gray into a tight hug and said "I love you kiddo." before letting go. "Is dinner ready?'

Gray nodded a little surprised by the unexpected affection, he knew his dad was a hugger but he'd thought he was in trouble earlier. He couldn't help but feel that something was going on with his dad and that it had something to do with the Dragneels.

Silver grabbed his shirt and put it back on as he followed Gray back towards the house. They entered through the sliding door on the deck and once they were all sitting down at the table he said, "Gray, there's something we need to tell you."

Gray's forkful of food stopped in midair as he looked at his parents nervously. He could hear the seriousness in his father's tone and felt the tension begin to build in his muscles as he waited to hear what this was about.

"When the time comes, Natsu and Wendy will come live with us and we will all have to do our best to help them through what will be a very difficult time."

o-o

A/N I'm so sorry, I have held on to this chapter for weeks. I wanted to include Gray's reaction to the whole situation but he is being an elusive bastard at the moment and I feel guilty continuing to wait to figure this out. You have no idea how many times I wrote and rewrote his part only to be disappointed with my efforts. There's just no sense in trying to force it. I don't want you to think that I have given up on this story, I haven't at all. In fact I have a lot of things that I want to have happen and I would like to get started on the vacation chapters ASAP. A good amount of stuff should start happening there. Gray's reaction can wait, it's not like he's going anywhere.

I think I will probably work on this story for awhile, I have spent way too much time on To Save A Dragon lately, especially considering the complete and utter lack of feedback I've received on it. I was pretty proud of the last chapter too, oh well. So it goes I suppose. Of course as I write this someone just favorited it. Typical.