Summary: Once again, Natsu is very unprofessional. Luckily, Lucy is used to it all by now.
Pairings: Natsu/Lucy-ish.
YouTube Prompt: A general Fairy Tail tribute to Empress by Snow Patrol.
Lucy doesn't even know why she bothers sometimes.
If there was no imminent threat of death or emotional turmoil of someone from someone's past coming to haunt them or no major fight between Natsu and Gray (and Erza violently interfering), and if for once they complete a job without even just a teeny tiny bit of property damage, then of course a really awful name has to be thrown at them to test Natsu's non-existent maturity.
And, of course, Natsu failed immediately.
At this point Lucy has given up being cross with Natsu. It has honestly reached a point so beyond ridiculous that Lucy herself was convinced the universe was out there to screw with them, so what was the point in blaming Natsu?
There they stood, fully dressed, not even a scratch on them, and the job completed fully with no horrific nightmare story to retell. The town mayor was beaming at them and the town cheered on their behalf as he shook their hands.
"Thank you so much Fairy Tail," he said cheerfully, "It's so wonderful to meet the heroes of the hour. I'm the town mayor, Mr Boocock."
"Pfft!" Natsu snorted immediately.
Lucy herself choked on her own saliva at that and instantly collapsed into a very loud and melodramatic coughing fit to disguise her own hysterical (almost in tears from sheer despair) laughter.
"Boocock," Natsu repeated in his usual loud and rather obnoxious voice, "is that because it's too scary to look at or is it because you're one of those perverts that like to jump out at people naked?"
There was a moment of horrifying silence as the cheering crowd's smiles fell into furious frowns and the poorly named Mr Boocock's mouth dropped open in disbelieve. A small beat of pure, unadulterated silence, and then instantly the booing started.
"Oh I see," Natsu grinned, "it's because your cock always gets booed at!"
Lucy face palmed at that.
It was then they were pelted with fruit. Natsu might have retaliated at that, he certainly looked annoyed enough to make things worse by shouting more rude things at the angry crowd (and it certainly wouldn't be the first time or the last time Natsu accidentally incited an angry mob who chased them out of town with pitchforks), but Lucy refused to let it get any worse than it already was and hurriedly ushered Natsu out of town while dodging many rotten tomatoes flung her way...
….but she did make sure to swipe the purse full of their reward money from Mr Boocock's hand before they left. After all she was a professional and she needed the rent money.