Something Evil in My Eyes
"What?" asks Lucy blankly before she bursts out laughing.
"I'm E.N.D.," Natsu repeats. He's not sure what reaction he expected from his friend, but laughter was not it. Lucy composes herself, wiping tears from her eyes.
"That's not funny," she says plaintatively before bursting out into laughter again. Natsu looks at her, vaguely confused.
"I'm not joking," he says rather than questioning her reaction. At the serious note in his voice, Lucy takes a second to really look at him.
"You're E.N.D.," she finally accepts. "How?" Natsu knows better than to question her quick change in mood.
"When I fought Zeref, he told me. I was his brother, and he tried to save me by turning me into a demon when I died." Lucy starts looking at him blankly again.
"Isn't he over 400 years old?" she asks finally. "And why exactly would he think that turning his brother into a demon would be the equivalent of saving him?" In the face of his blonde friend's questioning, he feels a bit ridiculous.
"I time travelled?" It's more a question than a reply. Zeref's explanation seems to have flown far away from Natsu's mind. Meanwhile, Lucy looks at him thoughtfully.
"The Eclipse gate," she concludes after a second. Right. That was what Zeref had said.
"Yeah," he confirms. "The Eclipse gate. He made me to kill him. But I'm also a demon so I'll do more than kill him."
"You'll wreak wanton havoc on all of Fiore," Lucy decides.
"Pretty much," Natsu replies. He pauses. "Friends still?" Lucy hits him lightly on the shoulder and pulls him into a tight hug as she laughs.
"Idiot," she says rather affectionately. They part and stand there for a few seconds before Lucy asks, "What will you do? If you turn into E.N.D.? You won't hate yourself then, but I know you and right now you hate what you'll become plenty for your demonic state." Natsu hesitates, brow furrowing in thought.
"I kinda made Gray promise to kill me if that happened," he finally blurts out. Last night rushes vividly back to him, the fear, the panic, and the uncharacteristic self-hatred. And Gray. Everything felt intense and too much in the shadows, and now, with the best friend he's made since the Haven, excluding Gray and Erza, of course, all the emotions that had run so high feel ridiculous.
Lucy stares at him again, understanding starting to spark in her gaze.
"He will. For you," she says, and it's a fact of life. Natsu just nods.
Erza approaches him a few hours after he told Lucy. The redhead looks furious, never a good sign for Natsu's health, but she thankfully appears to have come straight from training, and is wearing her usual outfit for it: loose-fitting red and orange pants and bandages wrapped around her chest. He still braces himself for the inevitable pain that comings of invoking the wrath of the Titania, and is surprised when he simply recieves a fierce hug. He's long since been desensitized to having his head squished into Erza's chest, but it's awkward. Still fearing for his safety, Natsu remains stock still.
"Natsu," Erza says commandingly, releasing him from her grasp. He stands at attention by instinct, spine straightening, one arm snapping into a salute that would be mocking if not for the fear on his face.
"Yes, sir!" he says pointlessly. To his horror, Erza chooses to requip into her favorite Heart Kreuz outfit. He braces himself for impact, and isn't disappointed when he feels her gauntleted arm strike his head. It's a softer blow than usual.
"Lucy told me you talked to her," she says. Natsu allows himself to relax, realizing that there will (probably) be no more violence.
"I'm E.N.D.," he confirms.
"How could you?" she demands with light fury. "How could you force the burden of your death upon Gray?" Natsu slumps at that.
"He'll stop me," he says simply, much to Erza's ire.
"Natsu, this is a guild. We are your nakama, and you are the heart and soul of Fairy Tail. You push us to be a family, to fight for one another, and you have taught us all, taught me to depend on your family. To never, ever give up." Her words are filled with all the fierce love Natsu knows she holds for the guild, for him, for Gray. It's times like this that he remembers why Erza gets the title of 'the Titania,' the queen of the fairies. It's not solely for her power, which is beyond great, or her guild, but for her leadership. She's strict and harsh, and her methods are far more violent than they need to be, but let it never be said that Erza Scarlet does not have her heart in the right place. She is truly a queen of the fairies, benevolent and loving.
"Tartaros was made for me," Natsu says instead of saying that what she just said is why he asked Gray. His boyfriend, his mate, knows his heart better than anyone else ever could, and that is why Gray will undoubtedly finish the job if need be. God, Natsu hopes it never comes to that. "In a way, I am responsible for the death of his father. E.N.D. was. He swore vengeance on me. It."
"Trust in your nakama, Natsu," Erza says firmly. "We won't let one of our fairies fall."
"I'm not releasing Gray from his promise," Natsu replies to what she's really saying. "He's determined at this point. He wouldn't be able to let anyone else do it." Erza sighs.
"I know," she says, and doesn't push it any further. Sometimes, Natsu reflects as she walks away, sometimes he thinks that had he not had his honorary siblings to support him, had he been totally alone the day the dragons left, alone the day he joined Fairy Tail (because he knows in his heart that no matter what the circumstances, he would always be drawn to Fairy Tail), Erza would, without a doubt, easily filled in the role his fellow Dragon Slayers do now: as an elder sibling and a younger one, a best friend and a reason to keep getting stronger.
Natsu tells the rest of his siblings next, and their mates. With the destruction of the Magic Council building and prison, Cobra has been hanging around Magnolia alongside his former guildmates from Oraceon Seis. Newly in charge of Sabertooth, Sting, and by extension Rogue, are, ironically, now able to make more frequent visits to the rest of their honorary siblings.
"I am E.N.D," Natsu decides to spit it out bluntly now that the other Slayers are gathered. Wendy and Gray are there for support. He's getting a bit tired of saying the brief confession over and over again. Cobra's reaction is oddly visceral considering his reserved nature.
"What?!" spits out the Poison Dragon Slayer, jolting upright.
"Cobra-nii?" asks Wendy, looking confusedly at him. "What's wrong?"
"Tartaros is what's wrong!" Cobra replies in a tight voice. "A buncha demons from the Books of Zeref, and their reason for existing walked away after soundly kicking their asses. More than that, their reason for existing is a very well-known Fairy Tail mage!" His voice rises in volume with each word, and Natsu can't tell whether he's worried or mad.
In true Natsu fashion, he simply asks, "So?"
"So if this ever gets out, half the guilds in Fiore and most of the dark ones will be after you!"
"They already are, though. 'Cause of the destruction I've caused," replies Natsu. He's only partially being purposefully oblivious.
"You don't get it," Cobra argues agitatedly. "Oracion Seis, our goal wasn't always to wake the Nirvana. In the beginning, Brain did research on powerful, dark magic which, of course, led him to Zeref. Unlike Grimoire Heart, he didn't focus on finding Zeref, he focused on his demons. You told me what happened on Tenrou Island, and they were all willing to kill just to get to Zeref. Brain wanted to do the exact same, only he went a step further: he wanted to enslave a demon. He gave up the idea when he failed at enslaving a test demon, but that's not my point. A lot of people will do anything to get to E.N.D., whether to kill it, enslave it, or something else." It's worry that drives the Poison Dragon Slayer, then.
"Only Fairy Tail will know," Natsu replies. "And you guys of course. But I have to tell the guild, they're my nakama and it'd not be right to keep secrets from them." He glances at the rest of the group to see the others' reactions, and is not disappointed. Freed and Levy already seem to be discussing research plans, Laxus and Rogue are fairly impassive, Sting looks worried, Kinana uncertain, and Gajeel simply discontent.
"Flamehead," Gajeel finally says, "you're an idiot."
"Huh?" Natsu asks, fists lighting on instinct. "Wanna say that again, rust bucket?" A touch on his arm from Gray and a quelling look from Wendy make Natsu stand down reluctantly.
"You were afraid of our reactions," Gajeel says as though he hadn't said anything insulting. "An' you're an idiot for expecting the worst. We're family. We're not gonna turn on ya just cause you're some demon." The others nod their agreement. Natsu is Natsu is Natsu, and always will be the obnoxious, obnoxiously likeable, hotheaded, flame-fisted, fight-revelling, thoughtless, loyal, fire-hearted idiot brother they might as well have known since birth.
"Anyways," throws in Sting, "wasn't it the same case with Rogue?" His partner gives him an annoyed look for bringing up what he so despises being brought up, but the blonde presses onwards, heedless of, or perhaps because of, his mate's discomfiture. "I promised Rogue that he wouldn't be the person he saw in the Grand Magic Games, and if he did, I would stop him."
"As much as I dislike Sting bringing that up," Rogue says with a pointled glare, "he is right. If the potential for me becoming a power-hungry, vengeance-obsessed madman in the future wasn't enough to drive you all off, being a power-hungry, destruction-obsessed demon in the future won't be enough either." There's a touch of his characteristic wry, dark humor in his statement, but the words are sincere.
"Fairy Tail ain't all gonna like it," Laxus says bluntly, as he does best. "The oldest Strauss may well've been a demon when she was younger, though, an' she wasn't rejected. Jii-jii sure as hell won't let 'em drive away one of his children."
"I know that Gray promised to stop you," Wendy says softly, "but we all promise that as well." She knows she can speak for her brothers, who all nod their agreement, but she isn't surprised when Freed, Levy, and even Kinana join in as well.
"Guys…" Natsu says wonderingly. He doesn't hug them, but he gives them the brightest grin he can muster, and they all understand how much this means to him. Natsu was truly worried for his future, even having exacted a promise from his mate, but he especially could never stand against his own siblings for long, even as a demon, he's sure.
Laxus is right. Not all of Fairy Tail accepts Natsu's news gracefully. But his siblings have, and so have Erza and Lucy, so do the Rajinshuu and the Strausses, and Gramps, Romeo, Macao, Wakaba, everyone else who matters.
Fairy Tail's greatest strength has always been its heart, its loyalty. Perhaps those are also its greatest flaws: never being able to give up on a member, no matter how fargone they may be. Perhaps Fairy Tail is horribly idealistic because of that. Naive, certainly, in the eyes of some.
It doesn't really matter to its members, and that's all that matters to the guild.
A/N: Title is from Grim Determination by Blue Gillespie.
