A/N: Gatchin! Kimi wa Dekinai ko by Hatsune Miku AU drabble~! Please prepare for feels...

Please enjoy(or try to...)~!

You're Such A Useless Child(But I'll Protect You Anyway)

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Lucy loved going to work with her mom.

Even though it was hospital work, and she kinda wasn't supposed to wander around the halls(actually, there was a lot more that she wasn't supposed to do, but got away with anyway), it was still fun and she could do her homework and play in the children's ward, and all sorts of things as long as she didn't cause too much trouble.

Her mom was a pedia...pedaia...(pediatist? Pediatrist?...Pediatrician?)special kids nurse, so that's why she got to play in the ward area.

And that's where she met him.

The boy with the cherry-blossom-pink hair and the white scarf that he was always constantly nuzzling into.

Lucy had finished all her schoolwork, shoved all her pencils and crayons into her star-shaped backpack as neatly as possible, and put it away in the cubby-hole. And as she was getting ready to jump onto the giant foam block like she usually did, she spotted him against the wall, whereas all the other children had already claimed toys and spots for playtime. Why wasn't he playing? Was he unable to, like he broke one of his bones and he couldn't play like the others?

She waited until her mother happened to walk into the room with a snack tray, tugged on her uniform as she asked,"Mama, Who's that boy over there?"

"Hm? Who do you mean?"

Lucy gestured once more towards the boy at the wall,"The pink-haired boy. With the white scarf."

Her mother smiled,"Ahh, that one. That's Natsu-chan, he doesn't really play well with others."

"Huh?" Lucy asked,"Why? What's wrong with him? Does he have broken bones or something? Why doesn't he want to play?"

"Lucy! We don't use the word 'wrong'! There's nothing wrong with him or any of the other children,"she sighed, and took a breath,"It's not that he doesn't want to play, but that no one else wants to play with him. They don't like him, because they think what he has is weird, and they haven't seen or met anyone else like Natsu-chan. Even though they're all sick and in here to recover, they won't bother with him at all. And the other nurses and I have tried, but they all refuse to accept him, so Natsu-chan is usually very lonely,"her mother sighed again, this one more sorrowful than the other,"That poor boy doesn't have anyone else."

As she listened to her mother explain, Lucy stared at him for quite a bit. He watched the others with sadly blank eyes, and his face burrowed even deeper into the muffler.

She tugged again on the uniform,"Mama,"she pulled her mother down to her height so as to whisper in her ear,"Can I bring him his snacks?"

Her mother smiled, handing her a tray with napkins, chocolate chip cookies and two plastic cups of milk. Lucy was delighted, and almost tripped as she made her way towards him. She set the tray down on a nearby table and walked right up to Natsu.

"Hi! I'm Lucy! Are you Natsu-kun?"

He looked up, his face slightly rising out of his scarf. His onxy eyes were wide with shock, and perhaps a little bit of fear,"..."

Lucy waited for him to answer, but not a single sound came,"...Can you not talk? Is your throat working okay?"

"..."

She decided not to push him,"Hey, it's okay! You don't need to talk if you don't want to. But I brought some snacks with me, do you wanna share some cookies?"

Natsu glanced behind her, gazing at the tray of sweets longingly before nodding. And that was all Lucy needed to see.

"Yay! C'mon then!" she grabbed his hand, making him jump, and pulled him towards the table, forcing him into a seat.

Lucy began divvying up the tray between her and her new companion,"My mom gave us...six cookies...so that means...um...I have to divide them in half...so...oh! So I get three, and you get three! 'Cause three plus three equals six, so that's exactly half, right?"

He didn't say anything, but stared hard at the cookies, as if he was trying to discern for himself whether or not it was true,"...Mm..."

"'Mm'? Does that mean 'yes'? Ah! You spoke! Do it once more, please!"

"...M-mm..."

Lucy was was giving him a sparkly look,"Ahh~! Natsu-kun spoke! Yay for Natsu!"

His cheeks blushed with a creeping red that shot down his neck, and he tried to dig into his scarf once more.

"Aw, don't hide again! Look, I'll stop now, so can you come back out?"She clasped her hands together,"Please~?"

He stopped to look at her, and brought his face back out. Lucy cheered again and handed him a cookie to start with,"Here!"

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He got really close to her after that. Whenever she happened to visit the children's ward, they would immediately find each other to play with, and Lucy got to see him go from sad and lonely to happy and playing. She would even try and teach him some of what she was learning at school, because she heard he hasn't been able to go to school for a long time, but Natsu couldn't really get the hang of math or reading very well, but he could kind of write, so at least to Lucy it counted! Also, he seemed to really love dragons, his room was covered in them! And he was really super strong! He could lift the giant foam block even while she was sitting on it! It was really cool~!(Her mother fainted when she saw, so they had to be careful not to do it too many times...)

Even if sometimes he couldn't respond well to her, Lucy didn't mind, as long as he wasn't sad or lonely anymore, it was fine. Even if he was smart enough to count past ten, it didn't matter, as long as he tried, it was fine. Even if when he tried to speak it was all a jumbled mess of sounds, as long as he could smile, it was fine. For Lucy, as long as she could keep that goofy-looking toothy grin on that pink-haired boy's face, it was fine.

Her mother even noticed that Natsu smiled more when he was playing with Lucy, so she made doubly sure to keep her visiting. For the sake of recovery, of course, and not because she was a pure romantic at heart...

Lucy found out from another nurse that Natsu had a 'problem' in his head. His head didn't learn things the same as everyone else's, the nurse said it was because he couldn't process things as quickly nor as well, so it made a lot harder for him to function, made him appear slow and he probably could've been taken for dumb or stupid.

It was because of this that others preferred not to interact with him, and rather took advantage so as to make jokes and throw insults.

Lucy didn't like it. Because it made Natsu sad when they all said mean things.

"Look at that stupid kid, doesn't he always have that dumb look on his face?"

"What's wrong with you, can't you even speak right? What an idiot!"

"And what's with that girly hair color? My daddy said that means that you're a pansy!"

"He never lets go of that scarf! It's probably dirty by now, just like him!"

"Oh, look at him now! See his face? Hey, are you gonna get mad now? What can you do?"

"He can't do anything! He's just sits there all day, he's so stupid and useless!"

"He's so useless!"

"He's useless."

"Useless."

"Useless!"

"So Useless..."

"Useless."

Lucy didn't like it at all. So of course she said something when she noticed how tight his grip was on her hand.

"Don't call him that! The ones who're useless are you guys! Just leave him alone! He didn't do anything to you!"

"Tch! You're just as stupid as he is! Acting all tough just because you're the lead nurse's kid! You don't even belong in here!"

Her mother happened to walk in,"Children! Please be quiet, a lot of the other patients are sleeping. C'mon, now, I'll walk you all back to your rooms. Some of you should get as much sleep as possible, so that you can go back home, okay~?"

Lucy stuck her tongue and pulled her eyelid at the retreating offenders, one of them glaring back and mouthing the words,"Lucky. I'll get you."

Lucy just huffed, and turned around to face Natsu, giving him a serious look in the eye,"Hey," she put both hands on his shoulders,"Don't listen to any of that, you hear me? Them and their stupid words don't matter. And, besides...,"Her cheeks tinted,"I like your hair, it's pretty...not in a girly way, in a boy way...It doesn't matter at all, so don't listen to them, okay!?"

She didn't let go until Natsu nodded,"Good. C'mon, let's go find the puzzle box. I bet there's one in there we haven't done yet."

Natsu obediently followed.

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The same thing happened again, this time with the exception of tears. Natsu's tears. Lucy stood in front of him to shield him.

"Oi, didn't I tell you guys to leave him alone!? If you don't stop, I'm gonna whup all of your butts!"

"You can't do anything, you're just a girl! Just a girl who plays with a girly boy!"

"I SAID DON'T CALL HIM THAT! LUCY KICK!"

"What kind of attack is tha- oww! You really kicked me!"

"I said I was gonna kick all your guys's butts! Anyone else wanna go!? Huh!?"

"Crap! She's scary! She's really gonna beat us up! Run awaaay!"

"You better hope I don't tell the nurses!"

"Go ahead and tell, and then I'll tell on you! Bunch of bullies!" She stood there long after the event, eventually speaking,"Hey, Natsu...,"she kept her back to him and continued,"Even though you can't study well, can't play outside games as well, can't make friends with others well; even though you're are just a little bit stupid, can't speak well, or behave well, it doesn't matter. Even if you're a little bit of a crybaby, that's fine. If all you can do is just eat drink and play with me, that's fine. Even if you're really the most useless kid in the world, that's fine! Then just ignore everything else. Because," She finally turned, hard tears stuck in her eyes as she enveloped him in a warm hug,"I'll protect you...I'll protect you and we'll just stay together, okay?"

Natsu's arms slowly came up to return her hug,"...Mm...hm..."

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Before visiting hours were over for her and she had to go home, she helped Natsu back to his room, because it was also time for the children's ward to sleep. She waited until the nurse left the room to say good night to him,"Natsu, I'll sing you a lullaby before I have to go, it'll help you sleep better! Do you think you can sing with me?"

He hugged his red dragon plushie and nodded.

Together, they made a lulling tune that lifted all the bad things away.

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"Don't worry... I'll make sure I'll always save you..."

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That was a long time ago...they had moved on past that.

Natsu had finally gotten out of the hospital, but had to go into Fairy Tail Foster Care Institute, and they were actually all really wonderful people. They helped further his progression, and Lucy didn't have to worry about him being made fun of or bullied, because Fairy Tail was that kind of place. His speech was improving, his hand-eye coordination, and he'd even made a few of his own friends(he'd expressed to her not Gray, for the sole reason that Gray was and idiot...)

The problem got really bad when they entered high school, because adolescence is ruthless.

The names...the wretched name-calling was worse here than ever. they went as far as to call him things like 'monster', 'alien', 'ghost man', and even worse.

He would come to her when he couldn't take it anymore, and let everything out in his stronger, but still garbled, voice. He'd tell her every one of his cruel thoughts of returning harm, even though he'd never actually do it. And Lucy would sit there and listen for him, listen and take it for him when he couldn't anymore. Her poor, dense, slow and useless child that she thinks she's fallen in love with.

After he releases his anguish, he's back to himself and smiling, and as long as he smiles, that's all Lucy needs, all the reasons ever for her to protect him, even though he's stronger than her, and protects her too.

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Time has a way of going far too quick if no one's looking, because now they're in their final year, and then they're done with cruel places like that forever. He's still bad at studying, and there's not enough time for him to properly make up the lost grades; overall, he's probably lacking, but never in her eyes.

"They said it's too late, huh? That's okay, Natsu. Besides, you're still my favorite person in the whole world~!" My most precious person..."Wow, my favorite person is such a good kid, huh?"

"Mmm~!"

Lucy laughs, and stands up taking Natsu with her, holding hands like they're dancing, and she hums the song she sang to him from so long ago, that drowsy, sleepy feeling following right along,"Natsu...Sometimes, I wish we could go forever like this..."

She wishes she could go on forever with this lonely, sad, dense and useless boy.

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She can't believe it.

Did their classmates truly hate him this much? For no reason?

Why?

Natsu didn't do anything...

He didn't do anything wrong!

HE FUCKING DIDN'T DO ANYTHING WRONG!

So why!?...

They pulled them into the alley, and no matter how hard she desperately tried to keep ahold of him, tried to shield his body with her own, Natsu was taken from her grip, and Lucy was forced to watch. Forced to watch as they held him down and wailed pounding fists into him, unable to fight back, and her becoming completely and utterly useless.

They ran when she finally freed herself and made her right hook and leg power known...

But...

It was too late.

Natsu was barely breathing, eyes glazed over and blood running.

Even as they rode the ambulance, and she kept praying through tear-filled eyes and tear-stained cheeks and sobbing cries and shaking hands, even as he was admitted in and the doctors and nurses tried to stabilize him, even as her mom held her back while she screamed, not once did he wake, and there was the telltale beep...beep...beep...beep...beep...

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Long after the time is called, Lucy sits there cradling her most precious person in the world like she's his mother and not like she was in love with him. She holds him and holds him tight, because he might slip away even more than he has, and she just wants to make sure that his body is still here even if he's not.

"...I'm such a worthless...useless...stupid...stupid..."

"Because...because we took a different way...because we weren't careful..."

"My most...important person is...not here...anymore..."

"I failed...I couldn't keep my promise to you...I couldn't protect...I couldn't save you..."

"...and now...no one...will save me either..."

If only she could turn back time...

Lucy sang.

A/N:...okay...I know you all hate me right now...but let's just consider this for just a moment...

I will write uber fluff! and that will fix it!

please let me know what prompts will fix it, and I will do it!

I SWEAR! I'LL FIX IT! I PROMISE!

In celebration of this being the 12th chapter, special review thanks goes to~

The very first review from the Guest - Thank you for your patronage~!

The second from the Gray/Cana Broship Guest - Kyaah~! My first request~!

The amazing Pielover139 - *winks* Ayyyy

AnimeOnCookie

CopDog

thefourteethdarkone

SakuraPetal91

That'sRidiculous

OgaxHilda

And the rest of you who read but don't review(-FOR SHAME! -Shut up, Luny!)

R&R goal: 16!