Here is the chapter 23 for all of you! Hope you like it!

And as always I LOVED your reviews! Reading them always puts a smile on my face.

Hiro Mashima own Fairy Tail and I just play with the characters.

"That was delicious!" Natsu shouted swinging his arms in the air and letting the momentum pull his back against the floor. All this was crowned with a barf. And not long after a content snoring filled our small hut.

Gray, who was picking his teeth with toothpick, didn't as much as blink his eyes at the bad manners of his team mate. He too lied down sighing satisfied. "That sure hit the place." He hummed closing his eyes.

I shook my head disgusted at the two of them. This is exactly why our guild is looked down on. Lucky for them I was in a good mood and stomach full or I might have given them what they deserved. A nice smack on the backs of their heads. The idea was tempting, but I didn't want to ruin my mood, instead I got up and headed to one of the three beds prepared for us. I took my torn shirt off and fell to the bed in front of me. I couldn't help the pleased sigh that escaped my lips, when my body sank into the softness of the mattress. This day had been illegally long...

I turned around facing the slanting ceiling of the hut. When Erza finally returned from crying - no one said anything but the redness of her eyes spoke for themselves - we decided to head to Cait Shelter. Wendy wanted to go see that everyone from her guild was alright. No one had anything against the girl's request as we all agreed that getting some rest, and food, was the best course of action. Master Bob's villa was too far away to reach with the night approaching. Even with full energy and without injuries ramming trough the dark woods would have been dangerous. Plus we couldn't leave behind the one that had crashed down with Christina. So we decided to sleep at Cait Shelter and in the morning we would head out to search them.

For our surprise when we arrived to Cait Shelter the trio from Blue Pegasus, Lyon Vastia and the chick from Lamia Scale were already there. Apparently the members of Cait Shelter had seen Christina come down from the sky and had rescued the five of them. Thanks to Cait Shelter's fast acting they had been saved from severe injuries.

After fast greetings we were guided in to huts some of the guild members had been generous enough to lend for the night. Each guild had gotten their own one, but our girls had decided to go and spend the night with Wendy. Then Cait Shelter's doctor visited each hut and patched us up, which after we were served food. I don't know was the guild just being overly generous or had someone hinted that our hut would need extra servings, but the amount of food that was carried in our hut could have fed the whole guild of Cait Shelter. Still not even a single bred crumb was left eaten as there was two Dragon Slayers - other a real gluttony on top of that - to devour the mountain of food.

Now stomach full and bed under, I felt my eye lids getting heavier. With no reason to resist I let them close waiting for the sleep to come. However, the moment my sight went black my mind started to wander on its own. And second later a certain blonde haired beauty appeared. The corners of my mouth turned up to smile as I recalled the small moments I had shared with her today. If someone had told me all those years ago that I would fall in love with the snotty brat I met by the river that day, I would have laughed and threatened the person to stop just a tasteless jokes before I would make them pay.

As the sleep didn't seem to want come, I turned to lay on my side in hope that it could help. It didn't. Immediately when I tried to chase after the sleep, Lucy's face appeared in my mind. With those devilishly sweet lips she whispered the new favorite phrase of mine. I love you. A ticklish feeling spread inside my chest and I had to change my side. I still couldn't believe the girl actually liked me. Of course, I had had my hunch, but to now it for sure was definitely something else. The ticklish feeling spread and got stronger the more I thought about Lucy and her feelings for me. I switched my side again in hope it would help. And again. And again. And again. After couple rolls more I couldn't take it any longer. I jumped up to sit. 'What the hell am I?1 A fucking school girl?!'

I rose from the bed and headed out of the hut to cool my head. The ticklish feeling had reached all the way to my head and i felt like I could start giggle any second. Me, the great Laxus Dreyar, giggling? Never! The thought alone made cold shivers run up and down my spine. Luckily the cool night air seemed to help the more I breath it in. This definitely had to be the first time I had to calm myself down because I was to happy.

I took one last long breath in, feeling calm enough to return back in to the hut. But right as I breath out the sound of giggle reached my ears. I slammed a hand over my mouth, before my sleep debt brains could tell that the sound hadn't come out of myself. It had been way too feminine for me - or there would have been something seriously wrong with me. All my muscles relaxed as I realized that the melodious sound had belonged to no other than the most beautiful blonde girl there is.

A smile spread on my lips as I spotted the said girl two huts away from our hut. Lucy stood in front of Wendy's hut, one arms wrapped around herself and the other hand over her clapped over her mouth. She was smiling. I was sure of it even if I couldn't see it. 'A school girl number two, eh?' I unconsciously lifted my own hand to hide the growing smile on my lips.

Probably sensing my gaze on her, Lucy turned to my direction. When our eyes met my heart skipped a beat and then sped up. The pattern repeated when Lucy lifted the hand covering her mouth to a shy wave, revealing a warm smile. I gave the spot over my heart a rub with the heel of my palm. 'Arrhythmia?'

Lucy seemed to hesitate a little, then she started to approach me. I didn't even realize that my feet had started to move too, before I reached the girl on the midpoint of our huts. "Hi." She whispered, the smile on her lips only getting brighter.

"Hi." I answere with equally quiet voice. "Can't sleep?" I asked automatically. It wasn't really my intention, but the boy inside me changed my tone to more teasing one. It was like I was telling her directly that I knew exactly the reason why she was still up and that that the reason was me. To my surprise, instead of getting all flustered and embarrassed, the girl countered the question with a remark, which could almost be called sly.

"I see I'm not the only one." Lucy graced me with a rare smirk. I made me smile a bit shocked, because for a second I though that the girl had gotten immune to my teasing now that she knew what I felt toward her. But then I saw the red on her cheeks. Seeing the favorite color of mine was reassuring. At least the girl wasn't completely immune yet.

Feeling little cheated I pinched her nose. "Cheeky." I chuckled.

"Hey!" Lucy cried out and grabbed my wrist with both hands. Without fighting back I let her remove my hand from her nose. I just enjoyed the feel of her soft touch and admired how light colored it looked. My skin wasn't anywhere near dark, but in the dark of the night it made Lucy's shine like a pearl in comparison. It was like freshly fallen snow in moonlight. 'Look what you make me do... To think such a cheesy lines...' I mentally shook my head at her.

Lucy lowered my arm, but didn't let go. Slowly she slide her hands around mine sandwiching it between her palms. She stared our hands a short moment and then she lifted her eyes to meet mine. Her gaze made my heart beat irregular once again, raising the urge for me to rub my chest. Her eyes moved between my eyes as she had hard time picking which one to stare. I had learned that usually it meant that she had something she wanted to say.

A silence fell over us as I waited for her to speak her mind. To me the silence wasn't unpleasant, but the blonde beauty seemed to find it uncomfortable for some reason. Or maybe she just found my stare pressuring, because she ended up lowering her eyes with a tiny blush appearing on her cheeks. She opened her mouth, but then she froze for a second her eyes widening and finally when she spoke, what came out of her mouth was more than likely something else than what she had planned to say. "Where's your shirt?!" She squeaked, while her eyes shot up, the blush on her cheeks darkening.

I couldn't help the amused snort that the cute reaction caused. "Don't you think it's a bit late to get that flustered over my bare chest? Especially when you have already been caught ogling at it once?" I might say this to tease the girl, but I definitely preferred Lucy, who is affected my body, over Lucy, who wouldn't react in anyway after seeing me half naked.

"I wasn't ogling then!" The girl denied cheeks flaming.

"Sure. Sure." I smirked, while rolling my fingers around one of her hands. I got I feeling that she might have pulled her hands away soon, so I made sure that she couldn't pull away from me completely. I lowered my face a bit closer to hers, smirk playing on my lips. "Don't worry. You can ogle as much as you want." "-But it doesn't mean it's free.' My smirk grew a little as I inched closer to her face.

I halted my advance as I saw Lucy's reaction. Her cheeks didn't get more darker and her expression, which I assumed would have turned more embarrassed or maybe bit shocked or happy or the mix of all three, reverted back to the one she had on before noticing my missing shirt. The girl looked like she wanted to say something. She kept her eyes averted a second longer, then locked them with mine. I could see a bit of hope flash in those brown orbs of her just before she opened her mouth. "Are we- I mean... Does that mean we-"

"FIRE DRAGON'S ROAR!" A loud scream cut off rest of what Lucy tried to say as a massive pillar of flames burst trough the roof of our hut and rose to the sky.

"What the fuck?!" I spun around, shielding Lucy behind my back. 'What the hell is that Flame-brain doing?!' I cursed out loud and internally for many reasons. One being the fact that for the second time today the brain dead little shit had interrupted my moment with Lucy. I even have a feeling that what she was trying to say was something important.

Not a couple seconds later after Natsu's scream Gray's shout echoed trough the night air. "Ice make:ICE GEYSER!" At command a geyser of ice erected from the hut. It put out the flames that were starting to eat away the straw roof, but at the same time it also destroyed all that remained of the roof and a bit of the hut itself. Inside the frozen geyser was no other than Flame-brain, trapped inside the icy. It sadly didn't hold the flame-spitter for long and in seconds he had melted his way free from the ice.

"What's the big deal, Gray?!" Natsu growled down to the hut. The guy sounded way too seriously confused for it to be act. And if he didn't no why he had deserved the cold treatment, it could only mean that what he did, he did it while sleeping. On the corners of my eye I saw Lucy shaking her head, hand on her forehead. Apparently she had come to same realization.

The commotion easily been loud enough to wake the whole guild up and one by one heads started to pop out from the huts around us. Of course the two head idiots of our guild din't notice this and started their normal cross words, which could escalate to all out fight in mere seconds. Taking pity on the members of Cait Shelter I decided to take care of the two before it could happen. I squeezed my hand into a fist couple time testing how much magic I had recovered by now. Thanks to the ten or so course meal I had plenty for teaching the idiots a lesson. Natsu especially.

I gathered my magic up and then with a devilish smirk I summoned a lightning from the sky. It was a direct hit to Flame-brain. Spitting the ice tower in two it made its' way all the way in to the hut hitting the Icicle there. Both guys let out a pained scream, followed by a beautiful silence, the only sound being the birds singing in the woods and the sound of Natsu smacking on the floor of the hut. 'See? If taking Natsu out is that easy, beating Zero would have been a walk in a park.'

"Was that really necessary? Now the whole guild is awake for sure..." Lucy cupped a hand around her mouth and whispered toward me. I glanced toward her and nodded. Damn right it was necessary. Consider it my little revenge on Natsu for stealing Zero's beating from me and for not only once but twice ruining my moment with Lucy. So, yes. It was necessary.

"The whole guild was definitely up already and if there was still someone sleeping those idiots would have definitely woken them up after starting fighting, which would have happened if I hadn't intervened."

Lucy stared me with slightly disapproving expression, mouth pouting and brows drawn together. But with a long sigh she relaxed. "Good point..."

A comfortable silence fell over us as we watched people gather around the destroyed hut. Most of them were from Cait Shelter, who were either confused, shocked or in case of the hut's owner: in tears. The poor man was pouring out his heart and soul in form of tears. The pretty boys of Blue Pegasus also came to see what was the racked all about. Same was with Lamia Scales's Lyon Vastia. Erza too stepped out of Wendy's hut, but when Lucy motioned her to go back to sleep, the woman didn't refuse, seeing that the two idiots of her team wouldn't cause any further problems for a while.

After a short while the crowd started to scatter leaving me ad Lucy alone once more. "Well," Lucy flashed me a smile. "We too should probably go back to sleep."

"Mm." was the answer I gave the girl, before she headed back to the Wendy's hut. On the hut's door the blonde beauty stopped. As she turned to face me one last time everything went on slow motion. I could clearly see how every strand of her hair swung, how they glistered when the moon light played on them. Her hair shined like silver instead of the normal gold color hey had under the direct sun light. The sight formed a lump in my throat preventing me from breathing le alone speaking. Lucy mouthed 'Good night!' before disappearing in to the hut.

'That surprised me!' I placed a hand over my heart and tried to grasp the fabric of my missing shirt. That kind of slow motion moment hasn't happened since forever. This time it wasn't ticklish feeling that filled my chest. No. It was something stronger, which squeezed my chest and it hard for me to breath. It was a want, an urge, to wrap my arms around the girl's petite frame and never let go. To press my lips against hers until both of us would be out of breath. The feeling hit me so hard and suddenly that I had to crouch down to let my head cool.

After I had dropped the temperature of my head back to the normal level, I glanced toward the hut I was supposed to sleep in. 'Oh yeah...' I thought as I saw the condition of the hut. It had completely slipped my mind. 'Where am I supposed to sleep now?' I stayed down a second longer then with a sigh I stood up and headed to the hut. If the bed was still intact, I could sleep in it. I, after all, didn't have anything against sleeping under the stars. To my pleasant surprise like a miracle my bed had survived unharmed. I skipped over all the debris and melting ice to my bed and without delay I fell on it. The last thing on my mind before sleep finally caught me was the question 'What did Lucy want to say to me?'

So, how was this chapter? I have to apologize, if there was more mistakes than normally. I was super tired when finishing this, but I just had to get this out.

Please review! Nothing makes a novice writer like myself happier than hearing your thoughts about the story.

See ya!