And then the most embarrassing moment of Laxus' life:

Laxus found himself sitting in a crowded train station, trying to travel with two toddlers, one of which was already very fed up with the idea of 'vacation.' Yuri remained optimistic about the idea of going to a place he did not know, but Layla was cranky as hell and she didn't mind letting everyone know, especially her parents.

Chelia and Wendy were a part of this trip, due to the fact that they needed someone to watch the babies while they had their own time and Wendy could fix up the dragons with a troia spell to make sure Laxus and Yuri didn't puke all the way there. It was also sort of a getaway for them as well, and all was good and fine.

Yuri had to go to the bathroom, so his father took him and then afterward, he seemed pensive. It made his father nervous, because it meant Yuri was thinking very hard about something that happened in between when they went to the bathroom and when they boarded their last train.

The mind of a toddler, they'd learned, was actually a scary place.

So after the spell was cast and they were settling onto the train, Laxus looked down at Yuri and asked, "What are you thinking about right now?"

"I dunno," he answered as he stared out the window.

"You don't know what you're thinking about."

The toddler shrugged. "Maybe I'm hungry."

"Are you hungry? Or no?"

He shrugged again, this time more dramatically. "I dunno."

Laxus sighed and looked over at Lucy. "I'm going to take him to the dining car. Are you hungry? You want me to take Layla?"

Lucy shook her head. "She's about to fall asleep, so let's leave her alone if she'll stay that way."

The dining car was packed, but they managed to find a small booth to sit in. Laxus ordered a grilled cheese for his son and while they waited, Yuri looked up at him and asked a question while he was sipping at a glass of water.

"Daddy, how come you have so much hair where your penis is?" he loudly asked.

The dragon slayer very literally choked.

People stared, and laughed quietly.

Yuri pulled the elastic band on his pants out and looked down. "I gots none, Daddy. You have so much. Like a lot. How do I get some? I want lots and lots of black hairs all around my penis just like you."

There were at least fifteen people in range of them who overheard this and the toddler's father stewed in thinly-veiled horror for the better part of a minute.

"...well? How come, Daddy?"

Laxus said, "Yuri."

"Yes?"

"Remember what I told you? When is it okay for you to about that?"

"About what?"

"Your privates."

Yuri looked up in confusion. "I didn't say privates. I said PENIS."

This was toddler logic; he knew not to talk about his privates in public. He did not, however, correctly connect the idea that his penis was part of that group. He was indignant that his father was trying to silence him since he wasn't breaking the rules, and stared up at his father.

Yuri pinched his eyebrow and wiggled it. "Your face is doing this."

Laxus was well-aware that his eyebrow was twitching furiously, which was evidently his body's natural reaction to waiting to crawl under the table and hide from everyone currently watching and laughing.

"Son, we don't talk about our penises either. It's a private part. We keep them private."

The waitress brought a grilled cheese to his son and Yuri momentarily relented from trying to kill his father with embarrassment as he tore into the sandwich.

Yuri had been told this on more than one occasion. "But...Layla doesn't have one. Did a dinosaur bit it off?"

Laxus tapped his fingers on the table and wondered what the inside of his son's brain was actually like. How had Yuri gotten from penises, to his sister, to the conclusion that if his sister did not have a penis, a dinosaur attacked her and bit it off? "Son, is this what you've been thinking about all day?"

"Yeah."

"Okay. When we get to where we are going, you and I will have a man-to-man talk. But not before, and if you say the word 'penis' one more time before then, you're going to go bzzzt. Got that?"

Yuri nodded.

Was it safe or recommendable to discipline a child with small amounts of lightning? Probably not. But Laxus had been raised by a man who slapped him upside the head when he got out of line and he didn't feel it was ineffective or cruel to use physical punishment to teach children.

Lucy found spanking, shocking, thumping, and other forms of aggression as discipline to be unnecessary and wretched. This was a bone of contention between the husband and wife.

Laxus was so incredibly embarrassed as his son ate happily, unbothered by the people still giggling and whispering about them.

They returned to their compartment and Lucy saw Laxus was red in the cheeks.

"Are you alright?"

He rolled his eyes. "Your son…"

"My son? Who said, 'let's make a baby?' I think that was you. Remember?"

Her husband looked out the window, grateful at least to not be sick to his stomach as was the norm. "You didn't have to say 'yes.' One of us has to be the adult, and think it's usually not me."

"You think?" she sarcastically asked, "He's my responsibility because I didn't tell you no?"

"Yes, and you can talk to him about his penis."

His wife shook her head furiously. "Oh no indeed, mister. That's your job as his father."

Laxus grumbled under his breath and reached for Layla's shoes as she slept in her mother's arms.

"Laxus, your daughter has finally cried herself to sleep. I swear if you wake up this baby, I will throw you off the train myself," she threatened.

"If she wakes up and starts crying again, I'll jump," he answered as he felt his son curl up on the seat.

Yuri was now well fed and therefore ready for a nap. He spent most of the rest of the trip sleeping with his head on his father's lap.

They were still groggy when they arrived at the mountain resort, and Laxus found himself dragging tons of luggage around while Chelia and Lucy carried the kids. Wendy carried their things, and trailed behind with him until they got to a cabin that was part of a cluster of little log houses that had paths leading to a large spa and restaurant with various other amenities.

It was a good place to vacation.

Cranky kids awoke to a cold winter wonderland that looked nothing like the greener, temperate city of Magnolia.

Blankets were switched for thick coats, boots, scarves, gloves, and hats.

The proper use of a coat was a recurring struggle with Yuri, who, in his attempts to 'be just like Dad,' refused to put a coat on properly. Lucy estimated they'd had at least a thousand wars with him over whether or not he had to put his arms in the arm holes. Laxus had yet to answer his son's important question on this matter: why does Daddy do it?

The time finally fame to bring the kids out to play in the snow, and they brought the excited toddlers onto the porch of the cabin.

"Cold," Layla said as she toddled about toward the ocean of white that existed just at the edge of a covered patio area. She looked up at Lucy, and grabbed her hand, squeezing it. "What's it?"

'What's it' and 'why' were two of the most common phrases spoken in their family. She'd learned some of her peculiar enunciations from her brother, such as 'Gams,' 'Goomomo!', Caihave (can I have), and making words plural for no reason.

"It's snow. It's like ice, only fluffy."

Yuri let go of Laxus and ran full-force to the snow, then took cautious steps into it. He patted it with his hand, and tasted it. Then he flopped down in it and thrashed around a little before he got up and tried to run in it.

"Son, that's not food," Lucy said.

Layla also attempted to eat it, but spit it out. "Coooold!" She held up the handful of snow to her mother expectantly.

Lucy shook her head. "I think our daughter wants us to warm up the snow so she can eat it."

The baby nodded.

"You want some water?" her mother asked.

"I want dis."

"But warm?"

Layla nodded.

Lucy knelt and said, "Baby, when snow gets warm, it turns into plain old water."

"Noooo!"

Her mother and father looked at one another in resignation as she threw herself face-first into the snow and threw a temper tantrum because they couldn't make her snow warm without turning it into water.

Lucy scraped her off the ground and reasoned with her and after a few minutes, she calmed down and accepted the fact there would be no warm snow. And just like that, it was as if nothing happened and she was happy and free to go back to business as usual.

Yuri ran to her and held out his hand. "C'mon!"

The toddlers trudged through the shallow snow, fell, got up laughing, and went a little further. Just moving around in the snow seemed like fun to them, and the whole world was different - nothing but white and the green of trees that dotted the landscape.

Yuri inadvertently stepped in a hole and vanished completely for a moment, causing his sister to shriek and their father to rush to his aid.

"So you guys want to build a snowman with me and Mama?" he asked.

"Snowman?" Yuri asked.

While the family started to work on a massive snowman, Laxus' mind drifted continuously back to his father. He had a few scattered memories of his father that weren't awful, but by and large, most of his time with his father wasn't particularly good and it was rare to start with.

Laxus remembered learning how to fish with Ivan one night when they were camping in the woods. Ivan spent all night telling him crazy stories of wizarding, and he felt like a son. But when he woke up the next day, Ivan had left him in the woods by himself and he ended up spending a few days lost and upset.

But during the brief time it lasted, it had been kind of fun.

The snowman might have gotten a little out of hand as he and Yuri rolled up an enormous ball of snow, but the kids were having a good time, and Lucy was having fun. He really did feel a little guilty it had been so long since they got to go anywhere together.

Lucy stood on her tiptoes and pulled him down for a quick kiss. "Don't forget to talk to your son about his p-e-n-i-s because you know if you don't answer his questions, he'll just ask someone else. Probably his Gams."

Laxus sighed. "That would be a nightmare. I've had all those kinds of talks with Gramps. It never goes well. I think he taught me about gonorrhea when I was ten. To this day, I don't know if he was speaking from fear or experience."

Laxus carried his daughter to a clump of trees where some branches that had broken off were on top of the snow. "You wanna pick the arms?"

Layla chose giant branches that actually made their snowman look a little scary and monstrous, but the kids were pleased with it and then they let Layla press his candy mouth on, and Yuri put his eyes and nose on.

"What are we going to name him? We could name Frosty, or Icy, or Snowy," Lucy asked.

"Uncle Gray!" Yuri said.

Lucy was a little surprised by this. "That's actually smart. Why?"

The blonde was expecting her very intelligent son to say it was because Gray used ice and snow was like ice. But instead, this:

"Cause he's not wearing clothes," their son matter-of-factly answered.

Layla nodded insistently.

That made sense too, just in a way that made a parent shake their head and laugh quietly.

They made another snowman, which Yuri named Juvia, and then a little snowbaby. Lucy knew Gray probably wouldn't appreciate that Yuri was making him a whole snow family, but really it showed Yuri was starting to understand people a little better. He had observed that Juvia likes Gray like Mom likes Dad, so naturally, he thought of them as a family unit.

Yuri named the Fullbuster snowbaby 'Wormface.'

Layla went along with this insanity like a trusted sidekick, offering agreements and help as she could.

Lucy stood there as the family admired their work and said, "I feel like our son is more emotionally mature than Gray is right now."

"You wouldn't give him that much credit if you heard what he said on the train," Laxus answered.

Lucy found all of this quite cute, but suddenly it felt like Thunder Baby was growing up really fast. She could still remember quite clearly when she found out she was going to be a mother, and not long after when she felt him moving inside of her. Now, Yuri was walking and talking and thinking. He had his own opinions about things and his own personality.

Secretly, she bemoaned that he'd lost most of his baby fat over the past few months because she loved her cute little chubby Thunder Baby. Yuri also unveiled during this process that he was hiding Laxus' chin and cheekbones under his cute little squishy face, so he looked a lot more like his father as he transitioned from looking like a huge baby to looking like a little boy.

Laxus sat in a chair on the porch to watch over the little ones as they played and she sat in his lap, leaning against him with a sigh of contentment. When she tilted her head up, he gave her a quick peck on the cheek.

"This was a good idea. They're having a great time," he said.

Lucy said, "I'm having a good time too. I'll make sure you have a great time later, okay?"

"Can we try that thing?"

"NO," she emphatically answered.

Laxus huffed, "Where's your spirit of adventure?"

His wife glared at him. "It's not going to be in my butt, and neither are you."

"You might like it."

The blonde shifted on his lap in a way that was kind of uncomfortable for him and she knew it. "You might like it too. Where's your spirit of adventure?"

Laxus paled a little. "I'll never speak of this again."

"Thank you. I'm glad we've been able to clear that up."

That night after a round of hot cocoa, smores, dinner, kid baths, story time, and tucking babies in, they finally made it to bed and fell asleep happy before they got around to their own little 'vacation.'

XXX

The next morning, Yuri was up at dawn as was his custom and after Cherrios, he wanted to go straight outside and play in the snow. Laxus decided it was probably a good time to address his questions, and after bundling him up properly, took him outside.

Laxus knelt in the snow and made a snowball.

"You making another man?" Yuri asked, thinking he was preparing another snowman.

Laxus perfected the snowball and stood. "The one man I made is quite enough for me right now. You know what else you can do with snow?"

"What?" Yuri innocently asked.

His father hit him squarely in the chest with the snowball and probably more due to surprise than anything, Yuri fell on his butt, looking wounded, surprised, and shocked.

"You hit me!"

"You've had that one coming."

Yuri stood up and dusted the snow off his jacket and then tried to replicate his father's actions. He made a lopsided, loose snowball and threw it at his father's shin.

Laxus found a nice little hill of snow and started to fashion it into a snow fort, giving his son instructions to pack the snow with him.

"So, about my hair," he said.

"Your penis hairs?"

"Those."

Laxus cringed a little. "They're called pubic hair. You'll get them eventually, when you grow up. Maybe in like ten years."

Yuri had a pretty decent idea of his basic numbers, but a year was an incomprehensibly long period of time. "Will they be dark?"

"They'll probably look just like mine."

"Will my penis get big?"

"It grows like the rest of your body."

"And scary?"

"I guess? That's kind of a disturbing question."

Yuri seemed pleased with these answers, and Laxus moved on to his other question. "Girls are born without them. It doesn't involve dinosaurs."

"Oh," Yuri seemed almost disappointed by this answer.

Laxus was supremely grateful that he had no further questions on the subject of girls. Then again, Yuri was deathly terrified of all little girls besides his own sister. "I have a question for you, Son."

Yuri looked up at him.

"Is Gajeel scary to you?"

"No."

"Is Natsu scary to you?"

"No."

"Erza?"

"No."

"Mirajane?"

"No."

"How about Anna, that little girl at the park?"

Yuri stopped smashing the snow into a wall and looked down. "Ummm…not scary but…"

"But what?"

"...ummmmmmmmm…"

The boy thought somewhat intensely about how to attach words to his social anxiety toward his female peers. "I forget how to talk," he finally said.

One of his father's brows quirked up in question. "You forget how to talk."

"Yeah."

"Oh, I get it. You're not weird, you're just shy around girls your age. That's kind of a relief."

Laxus wondered if maybe Laxusism was a real thing.

Yuri gave him a bit of a dirty look and rubbed a handful of snow in his father's hair as they worked.

Laxus returned the favor in kind, and within seconds they were slinging snow at each other.

When it was over, they sat behind the fort and started making snowballs and plans together that would inevitably enrage the two women of the house entirely. But Laxus loved getting on his wife's nerves and like his social anxiety, he'd passed this along to his young son.

"Hey look," Yuri said.

He took a really deep breath and made some constipated-sounding groan as he exhaled. A lightning bolt came out of his mouth and extended about three feet.

Laxus asked, "I think I'm not ready for you to be able to do that."

"How 'bout this?"

Yuri reached out and touched his leg and a jolt of lightning coursed through Laxus. It was light, but it was enough it probably would have startled if not hurt an ordinary person.

"Definitely not that. Don't ever do that to anyone else, okay?"

He leaned in and whispered. "Can I see your lightning, Daddy?"

For a lot of reasons, Laxus had never really showed off what he could do to Yuri. Outside of giving him little shocks and occasional light household use, Yuri had never seen it. Laxus had never breathed lightning around him, so he'd pretty much figured out what he knew on his own.

"Just this one time. And you can't tell your mom."

"'K."

"Promise?"

"Promise!"

Laxus took a deep breath and let out a full force dragon's breath that extended from where they were to the top of the mountain and then onward into the sky. The conical shape meant that at the top, it was wider than the peak of the mountain, and it was ferociously huge magic that made his son tremble at his side in pure wonder.

And then, there was what Laxus would later call a 'minor avalanche' that caused snow to slide down the mountain. It wasn't a lot, but a small avalanche is still an avalanche. The snow was mostly stopped by a cliff, but some dumped over the edge and cascaded a foot of snow down against the cabin but completely missed the snow fort.

He heard the patio door open one minute later and Lucy rammed it open, pushing a couple of inches of snow out of the way.

Lucy's glare was furious as she looked up at the sky. "Good morning, Thunder Baby and Bigger Thunder Baby. Can one of you please explain to me what you are doing a seven o'clock in the morning causing an avalanche?!"

Yuri pointed. "Daddy did it!"

Laxus reached for a snowball and threw it, hitting her right on the side of her head. "Good morning."

Lucy stood there, barefoot in the snow in her robe, and she stared her husband down until any ordinary man would have crawled on his belly to beg for forgiveness. "Let me get dressed, and we'll settle this."

Laxus waited for her to go inside and said, "You little traitor…"

He decided to forgive him because his mother's wrath was nothing to sneeze at, as evidenced by the fact she brought with her to the snowball fight: Chelia, Wendy, Layla, Virgo, Aquarius, Aries, and Lyra.

The Dreyar men were pelted with snowballs made by Virgo at hyperspeed and lobbed at high velocity mostly at Laxus by Aquarius because snow is technically water.

By the time it was over, the men were practically buried in snow and Lucy yawned, picked up her daughter, dismissed her spirits, and went back to bed.

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