Chapter 2

Driving down the street was an old gas guzzling, dirty black 1974. It drives down to a bad part of the neighborhood in Hollywood. In the front seat are two young fellas, who were wearing both cheap black suits. The driver had long wild black hair while the passenger had spiky pink hair. Their names are Natsu Dragneel and Gajeel Redfox.

Natsu and Gajeel were in the middle of having a conversation. What they were discussing had to do with hash bars.

"Okay, now tell me again about the hash bars?" Gajeel asked Natsu. "You said something about it being legal."

"Yeah, it's legal, but it's not exactly one hundred percent legal," Natsu told him. "I mean you can't just walk into a restaurant, roll a joint and start smoking away. You're only supposed to smoke in your home or certain designated places."

"And those are hash bars?" Gajeel asked, once more.

Natsu continued on. "Yeah, it breaks down like this. It's legal to buy it, it's legal to own it and if you're the proprietor of a hash bar, it's legal to sell it. It's legal to carry it, but that doesn't matter. And here's something crazy. If you get stopped by a cop in Amsterdam, it's illegal for them to search you. I mean that's a right the cops in Amsterdam don't have."

"Really," Gajeel replied, making a small laugh. "If the cops really don't have those rights, I might as well live in Amsterdam."

"But you know what the funniest thing about Europe is?"

"What?"

"It's the little differences. I mean they got the same shit over there we got here, but over there is just a little different."

"Example?" Gajeel asked.

Natsu explained. "Alright, well, you know you can walk into a movie theater in Amsterdam and buy a beer. And don't mean beer in a paper cup. I'm talking about a glass of beer. And in Paris, you can even buy a beer at a McDonald's. You know what they call a Quarter Pounder with Cheese in Paris?"

"What?" Gajeel asked him. "You're saying they don't call it a Quarter Pounder with Cheese?"

"No, they call it a Royale with Cheese," Natsu told Gajeel.

"A Royale with Cheese," Gajeel grinned. "Almost sounds like a type of fast food if you were living in royalty. If that's what they call it, what do they call the Big Mac?"

"Pretty much the same thing, but they refer to it as Le Big Mac," said Natsu.

"What do they call a Whopper over there?" Gajeel asked him, once more.

"I don't know," Natsu replied. "I didn't go into a Burger King. But you know what they put on French Fries in Holland instead of Ketchup?"

"What?"

"Mayonnaise."

"Mayonnaise?" Gajeel questioned. "Who the hell wants to eat their fries with mayonnaise. I'll take the ketchup anytime."

"I tried to see how it tasted and let me tell you, fries do not go well with mayonnaise," Natsu said to him. "Whoever invented that ship must have been on something."

Natsu and Gajeel finally stopped at their destination. Gajeel opened the trunk to the car and Natsu was surprised by the large ammunition he had.

"Holy shit, where did you even get all this?" Natsu asked. "And don't you think that this is overkill."

"My dad used to have an old saying that you can never be too careful," Gajeel told him, loading his weapon and handing Natsu a shotgun.

"So how many guys are we dealing with here?" Natsu asked.

"About three or four," Gajeel replied.

"I don't know what those guys were thinking," Natsu said. "I mean anyone who heard the name Laxus Dreyar should know that if you steal from him, you already have a death wish."

"Honestly, they weren't thinking," said Gajeel. "They just thought they could get away with it. Only thing is they didn't count on us having friends of our own to tell us where they're hiding."

Closing the trunk to the car, Natsu and Gajeel walk through the courtyard and head inside towards a Hollywood apartment building.

"By the way, what's Laxus' wife's name again?" Natsu asked.

"Mirajane," Gajeel replied.

"How did Laxus ever get a girl like that?"

"How should I know? However, people meet people. But from what I gather, she used to work two jobs. She works as an actress and a model for this swimsuit magazine."

"Actress, huh?" Natsu said, surprised that Mirajane was an actor. "Has she come on anything popular?"

"I think her biggest deal was that she starred in a pilot," Gajeel told him.

"A pilot?" Natsu asked, puzzled. "What the heck is a pilot?"

Gajeel explained it to Natsu. "Well, the way they pick TV shows is that they make one show called a pilot. And they show that one show to the people who pick the shows, and on the strength of that one show, they decide if they want to make more shows. Some get accepted and become TV programs and some that don't become nothing. Anyway, she starred in a pilot that became nothing."

Gajeel continued on. "By the way, you know that big shot photographer named Eve Tearm? The blonde pretty boy who works with Mirajane?"

"I wouldn't know who he is," Natsu said. "You know I could care less about these swimsuit models. To me, all women look the same. What about him?"

"Well, Laxus blew him away and he's sleeping with the fishes," Gajeel informed Natsu. "They say Laxus did it because it had something to do with his wife."

Getting inside the building and taking the elevator, Natsu asked, "Jeez, what did he do to face the firing squad? Was he messing with Mirajane?"

"No, it wasn't that," Gajeel said. "More likely, Laxus freaked out when he caught the dude giving Mira a foot massage."

Raising an eyebrow, Natsu replied, "That's it? A foot massage?"

"Yep," Gajeel nodded. "You won't believe what Laxus did to smoke that guy. He went over to his apartment and shot him off his balcony and fell 4 stories down in the greenhouse. After that, he took his body and tossed him into the ocean."

Natsu was surprised by that story, but he should expect it from someone like Laxus. He and Gajeel walked down the hall once the elevator reached the floor they needed to be on.

"Well, you know what they say," said Natsu. "You play with matches and eventually you get burned. You flirt with Mirajane and you're going to feel the wrath of Laxus."

"Still, I think he overreacted," Gajeel thought.

"Overreacted?" Natsu questioned. "Okay, yeah, Eve probably didn't expect Laxus to react like he did, but he should have expected a reaction if he was going to mess with Mirajane."

"It was a freaking foot massage," Gajeel told Natsu. "You make it sound like he had his lips all over her. A foot massage doesn't mean crap. I tried it with Levy and it didn't amount to anything."

"So, what do you do to get Levy's attention?" Natsu asked.

"I tend to mess with her, make her a little angry to spice things up," Gajeel said, making a small smile "Honestly, she looks a little sexy when she gets mad."

Following the numbers to the room down the hallway, they finally came across room 777.

Natsu asked, "Is this the room?"

"Yeah, it is," Gajeel replied. Before they could go in, Gajeel still continued to debate about how Laxus reacted. "Look, I just think Laxus acted the wrong way. I mean how many guys do you know flip out because they're giving your wife a foot massage. Levy gets them at this SPA she goes to and you don't see me pushing some poor bastard off the balcony. That shit ain't right. Some asshole did that to me, I'd come back and kill him off."

"Hey, I'm not justifying what Laxus did," Natsu argued. "You may not think a foot massage means nothing, but they do. Even Laxus knew it because to him, he saw this pretty boy trying to get fresh with his wife. It may have looked like a foot massage, but there was more to it than it seems, which is why Laxus went scarface on him. Eve Tearm should have known better when he shared that laugh with her and to Laxus there was nothing funny about it."

Thinking that through, Gajeel knew Natsu had a point. "That's fair enough. Alright, you ready to do this?"

"Ready as I'll ever be," Natsu replied, getting ready as he and Gajeel got prepared to pull their guns out. "Speaking of Mira, I've got it worse for me tomorrow."

"Why's that?" Gajeel asked.

"Well, he's going out of town and Florida and he asked me if can watch over Mirajane and show her a good time while she's gone," Natsu explained to Gajeel.

"In other words, you're taking Mirajane on a date?" Gajeel asked.

"It's not a date," Natsu corrected him. "I'm just trying to keep her company. Besides, I'm too busy with my job going out on dates."

Gajeel looked at Natsu, seeing as the guy has never gone out with a girl and replied, "You seriously need to get out more."

They were ready to go inside.