Note: My mom used to watch a lot of Food Network, and around Christmas they do these gingerbread competitions where people make whole scenes, and sometimes quite large ones, out of gingerbread and candy. There are lots of rules about how much has to be edible vs nonedible supports, etc. Anyway, it's been ages since I've watched any of those, but apparently I wrote this around Christmas a couple of years ago. It's definitely not Christmas now, but gotta go in order lol

Ravenous

1. extremely hungry

2. (of hunger or need) very great; voracious

Lyon might have bitten off more than he could chew when he invited Fairy Tail to see Lamia Scale's magnificent creation for the sole purpose of rubbing it in Gray's face.

"It's all gingerbread," Lyon said, sweeping his arms out to encompass the life-size replica of Margaret Town, with the guild hall perched in the place of honor. "And other candy and foodstuffs, of course, but mostly gingerbread."

"Foodstuffs," Natsu said with a snort, but the gleam in his eyes quickly overrode his derision. "This is all food? It smells good. Can we eat it? I'm starving."

Lyon drew himself up to his full height and jabbed a finger at Natsu's chest while sweeping a glare across the entire Fairy Tail team. He should have known it was a bad idea to invite them all, but he wanted to gloat to Gray, and his idiot brother's idiot team followed him everywhere.

"Absolutely not!" he said. "Do you have any idea how long this took the guild to build? This is a detailed, life-size replica of the entire town. Everything is perfect. We're winning the gingerbread competition for sure, and it's serving as a holiday event for everyone to walk through. You will not ruin it just when we've finally finished."

"But there's so much gingerbread. Surely, no one will miss one little building?"

Lyon felt as if he might explode. "What do you not understand about it being a perfect replica? Keep your teeth to yourself."

Erza smacked Natsu upside the head. "Behave yourself."

Natsu squealed and then fell to sulking at the back of the group while he rubbed his head and glowered at everyone.

"It's really impressive!" Lucy said, gazing around the gingerbread town in awe. "It's crazy how you managed to get this all up… I can barely keep a tiny gingerbread house from falling down. This must have taken ages."

Lyon, while gratified by her awe, was more interested in showing off to Gray. Unfortunately, Gray seemed significantly less impressed and only surveyed the guild's handiwork with crossed arms and a flat expression.

"Isn't it awesome, Gray?" Lyon asked pointedly. "You couldn't do anything on this scale."

"Nah, Natsu would eat it before we got anywhere near finished," Happy said cheerfully.

"I'm starving," Natsu grumbled.

"Oh, why don't you let him take a bite?" Gray asked. "The only way you got this up was by using construction-grade gingerbread, and to make anything this massive, it has to be rock hard. Maybe he'll break a few teeth and it'll teach him a lesson."

"Helloooo? Dragon teeth," Natsu said, rolling his eyes. "I'll show you that–"

"You will not eat our work," Lyon snapped, before switching his glare to Gray. "But for your information, everything is edible, per contest rules. And the gingerbread is delicious."

"Or would be if you had any teeth left afterwards. And how are we defining 'edible' here? I'm sure you have some internal supports to keep up all that weight, so…"

Lyon scowled. "Per contest rules, each display has to be ninety-five percent edible," he said reluctantly.

"Uh-huh," Gray said, looking supremely bored by the whole thing.

Lyon knew that underneath his façade of nonchalance, Gray was secretly in awe and terribly jealous. Still, it was frustrating how complete his armor was. Lyon would relish even the slightest slip.

"Can we look around?" Erza asked. "This is really neat. Maybe we should suggest a competition for Magnolia too, although it's a little late if we wanted to finish everything by Christmas… Maybe next year."

"Sure," Lyon said magnanimously. "I'll give you the tour. Keep your eyes on the walking stomach."

"I haven't eaten all day," Natsu complained. "I could eat this whole stupid gingerbread town right now."

"Well, don't."

"You ate twelve pancakes, five eggs, and half a side of bacon three hours ago," Happy said.

Natsu frowned. "Really? Feels like I haven't eaten in a week."

Lyon rolled his eyes and set off down the street, which had been paved with gingerbread cobblestones outlined with icing mortar. He glanced back every few steps to make sure Natsu wasn't slobbering on the gingerbread, but everything looked just as he'd left it.

He presented the shops and houses and guild hall, their walls built from gingerbread and windows glazed with poured sugar and eaves decorated with pretzel and frosting icicles. He pointed out that every shingle was an individual square of gingerbread cemented into place with icing, each bush lining the road was made from hundreds of green gumdrops painstakingly speared on twisting licorice branches, and every shop sign was handcrafted with mosaics of different candies.

Considering how surprisingly heavy candy and gingerbread was, the entire thing was an engineering marvel. When he pointed this out with a sly glance his brother's way, Gray only snorted.

"Got some help from Jura, did you?"

Lyon scowled. "We didn't use magic for–"

"More than five percent?" Gray suggested dryly.

Lyon could strangle him.

He still felt quite cheated of his triumph by the time the tour had concluded and he'd sent the troublesome Fairy Tail mages on their way. Gray had not once complimented Lyon's hard work or seemed impressed or slipped up even when Lyon was pretending not to watch. That boy was insufferable. Literally everyone else who walked through was enchanted, but Lyon really only wanted Gray's jealousy.

"I know you're faking it," he grumbled to himself as he watched Gray disappear back into the actual city to find the train home.

Huffing out a breath, he turned back to the guild's gingerbread creation and froze. As far as the eye could see, one sharp-edged bite had been taken out of the back of every building and tree, leaving the façades intact from Lyon's previous vantage point but decimated from behind.

Lyon gaped at the destruction. The judging was tomorrow, and there would be hordes of civilians and children walking through each display to cast votes and marvel. There was no way to repair that much damage in time. Jura would be livid, and Ooba would make him spin until he hurled.

Unless he could pull off a miracle. Which he could only do with help.

"Hey!" he yelled, taking off after Gray's retreating team. "Get back here right now! You're going to fix this if it's the last thing you do!"