Cobra's apartment was half the size of Lucy's and utterly disgusting. Being a slight clean freak he felt himself starting to itch looking at his bathroom, the walls were covered in damp, the toilet was, well, to him, unusable and the shower consisted of an attachment onto the tap, and no cubicle.
'Thank you very much magic council for this 5 star accommodation.' He thought sarcastically.
Finding a bottle of cheap bleach behind the toilet he took a quick sip, spitting it out onto the floor he exclaimed in disgust.
"That is the worst shitting bleach I have ever tasted in my life, some shops best be open." Marching straight back outside into the night air, he went to the shopping district to find some quality cleaning supplies to ease his creeping anxiety.
Cobra had a small amount of jewel that Master Makarov had given him to live off until he went on a mission to earn some for himself, since bleach was a poison of sorts he could clean with it and drink it.
'Who needs food anyway.'
After the third place he checked, he found one that was open. His legs carried him straight to the cleaning section and he quickly filled his arms with antibacterial goodness. Dropping several disinfectants and
scrubbing brushes into his basket, he felt something vibrating against his leg. Glancing down he saw this snowman mutant looking thing making weird noises and hugging his leg. Shaking it off he stepped away "What the hell are you, get away, trust me you don't want me around you." Cobra said looking back at different bottles of bleach.
"Pun pun punnn" The weird thing said holding it's arms up in the air, as if asking for Cobra to pick it up oh hell no "Look snowman I ain't your mum, go back to where you came from." He growled at Plue causing him to start whimpering.
'Where the hell has that damn spirit gone, I should be fast asleep in my warm cosy bed right now, not dealing with Plue having a damn paddy because I didn't save his lollypop from earlier.'
Cobra's ears picked up a sweet voice, one he had heard a couple of hours previous, he picked up the, what he now knew was a spirit, slowly turned around while holding him in his arms and said smoothly "Have you lost something princess?"
Lucy walked into the only shop open near her as this was where Plue always went when he was having a hissy fit as they stocked his favorite sweet that he would make her buy him to make up for upsetting him.
She hadn't managed to get any sleep, she had summoned Plue to play with, after walking back with Cobra, she wasn't even slightly buzzed anymore and after telling him she forgave him, her body flooded with adrenaline and sobered her up completely.
Almost immediately after being summoned Plue held his hands out expectantly "No Plue no lolly pop it's too late"
"Pun Punn."
"No Plue it doesn't matter what time it is in the celestial realm, you're in my realm right now and I say it's too late for a lolly, besides I don't have one for you."
Plue placed his paw on his head "Pun pun pun punn." Lucy shook her head "No I threw that lolly pop away, it had been on the floor, please don't be angry and-"
'Run off.' She watched his retreating form and sighed.
"Here we go again." She pulled on a coat and trudged out the door after her spirit.
"Plue come on I don't have time to play this game, don't make me force close your gate mister." Lucy said as she walked into the shop, the clerk who was used to this happening pointed down the household cleaning section, indicating that that was where Plue was.
"Thank you, I'll pay you for whatever he's eaten." Lucy said bowing her head as she passed him and went down the aisle to see her spirit in the arms of, Erik?
'How the hell-'
"Have you lost something princess?" Plue squealed in fear and hid his head under Cobra's arm which caused him to drop the spirit onto his head.
"Goddammit I said stay still, now look what you made me do, you're not hurt are you? Stupid little snowman." Cobra knelt down and gently righted Plue, putting him onto his feet. Plue latched onto Cobra's hand and pulled him to his favorite part of the store.
The dragon slayer could do nothing except allow Plue to pull him along.
Once they were around the corner, Lucy peeked into his shopping basket, curious as to what he had to desperately buy at this time. Seeing it was all cleaning products she was slightly shocked and concerned for his mental health.
'Why the hell is he wanting to clean at this time?'
"To answer your question, my new apartment is un-livable, I can't sleep knowing the grime monster lives in my bathroom, you wouldn't understand. I thought I sent you to bed anyway, what are you doing here?" Cobra said with Plue hugging his leg, a new lolly pop sticking out of his mouth.
Lucy sighed, pushing her messy hair out of her face.
"That little idiot decided to storm over here for a lolly because I didn't have his one from earlier, honestly it's like having a child. Goodbye Plue." She said as she sent him back to the celestial realm, this time with his lolly. "Thank you for not scaring him, he's a bit of a baby."
"Get back to bed blondie, some of us have got stuff to do ya know." Cobra mumbled gruffly, walking past her and back to his basket. She watched him bend over and appreciated the way his jeans cupped his firm-
"I can hear you, thanks for the compliment but please, don't eye fuck me in here." He smirked as he left her standing there with her mouth hanging open.
Shaking herself out of her daze she caught up to him at the doors, quickly stopping to place some jewel on the counter for Plue's sweet.
"Erik wait! Do you want to go back to yours? Maybe I can eye fuck you there a bit and we can have some fun."
"Be careful princess, you don't want to tease a snake, it's not safe." His eye twinkled with mischief as he started walking back to his apartment.
'And what if I want to tease you?'
"Trust me, you don't."
Lucy smiled sneakily and picked up her pace so she was walking alongside the dragon slayer.
"All I meant was I would help you clean up, I was a maid once upon a time."
Slight exaggeration of the truth, she went on a mission that required her to be a maid when she first joined fairy tail, but she always used to clean Natsu's house, it couldn't be worse than that surely?
"Oh fuck, it's awful!" Lucy exclaimed when Cobra opened the door to the bathroom for her.
"I can't believe they got you a place so horrible!" laughing he said "I told you, why would you willingly come here to help someone clean that you hated not five hours ago, you can't leave now, we have a long night ahead of us sweetheart, hope you got your big girl pants on, it's going to get dirty."
Six hours had passed and they had finished the bathroom and started on the kitchen, they were both covered in grime and sweat.
Lucy was laughing, sitting on his raggedy sofa as she attempted to tell Cobra a story.
"And then he squealed like a little girl as I took a picture of him naked, it was hilarious."
"Ah so that was the dreaded picture you were threatening to show me yesterday and then blind me. I'm glad I'm on your good side now, you're quite the feisty one aren't you?"
Standing up she winked at him "This kitty has claws." Her eyes caught the time on a clock that was hanging on the wall behind Cobra and her heart hit the floor. She was late.
"Shit, I've got to get to the gym, Laxus and Gajeel are probably waiting for me, you can tag along if you want? Sweat off the rest of this mold that came from under your toilet seat, or if you want to sweat it off some other way I'm game." Her voice was full of playful banter as she began waggling her eyebrows at him.
Cobra burst out laughing at how ridiculous this girl was.
"I think i'll pass on the gym, I can't wait to sleep in an actual bed. By myself." He said pointedly.
"You might have even pulled off being sexy and convinced me on sharing it with you if you didn't keep doing that thing with your goddamn eyebrows, stop it!"
The blonde started waggling them even faster until she too burst out laughing, wiping the tears from her eyes she let out a sharp burst of air and tried to compose herself.
"Ok well you enjoy your sleep Cob- Erik, I'll be thinking of you as I'm being forced to do 100 sit ups by Gajeel, sweet dreams of my sexy ass."
"Bye Princess" He said as she watched her smack her ass as she left.
Walking into his bedroom he collapsed onto his bed, face first and screamed into his pillow. The last thing he heard her soul say as she left was running through his mind and his underwear.
'You can have me in your bed anytime.'
"That damn minx still wants to have sex with me after everything I've done to her, we really did fuck her up. Good job I like my girls slightly unstable."
Quickly stopping at her house to change she ran into the guild gym and was met by the angry stares of two very unhappy dragon slayers.
She smiled innocently.
"Where the hell were you?" Laxus growled
'Uh oh.'