The hotel was really nice. Fati had brought them to the hotel entrance, told them their room numbers, then promised to be back in the morning. She returned to the city building to report on the mission progress.
They all went to their rooms, tired from a day of traveling. Lucy and Erza went into one room, Natsu, Gray, and Happy in another. The second Natsu dropped his things he ordered room service. Gray was hungry too, so he allowed him to order a ridiculous amount of food. It arrived quickly, requiring two people to carry all of the plates.
Happy sniffed out a fish meal and quickly began to gorge himself on it. Gray found pasta, and Natsu grabbed a steak with his hands. They ate in silence, completely focused on the food in front of them. They really needed it.
Happy was the first to tap out, pulling a blanket onto a chair and fluffing it into a makeshift pet bed. He flew into the fluffy pile and immediately fell asleep. Gray and Natsu, meanwhile, were trapped in an eating contest. Both were reaching their limit, but they were absolutely not going to admit that to each other. They were shoveling food into their mouths at an ungodly rate.
A plate of deep fried chicken proved to be too much for Gray. His final bite went down as a hard lump in his throat, nearly choking him. He coughed loudly. Natsu took this as a sign of Gray's defeat and pumped his fists in the air, his victory yell muffled by a large mouthful of food. Gray groaned and fell forward, clutching his stomach.
"You're a beast…" He mumbled into the floor. He didn't move anymore.
"The bed's mine!" Natsu yelled. "You can stay on the floor, ice princess!"
Sluggishly, Gray stood. "Like hell I'm gonna let you take the bed without competition!" He stumbled to the edge of the bed, pushing Natsu out of the way in the process. Natsu, significantly more limber at the moment, knocked him off of his feet. Gray fell to the floor, and Natsu jumped onto the mattress.
"Two losses in a row. Must feel great to be you, Gray!"
Gray crawled onto the bed, using the bedposts to hoist himself up. He attempted to push Natsu off, but he instead rolled away from the attack. Thoroughly spent, Gray collapsed into the pillows.
"That's horseshit, Gray. You lost, fair and square." Natsu grumbled.
Gray mumbled something indiscernible into the pillow. Natsu gave up. He fell back into the mattress as well, complaining quietly. It took less than a minute for Gray to pass out— potentially into a food coma. His muffled snores were the only sound in the room. Natsu allowed his eyes to close. Soon, he fell asleep as well.
All three of them awoke simultaneously when an impossibly loud thunderclap shook the building. Natsu yelled and bolted upright. They heard people yelling in other rooms, too. Natsu stood and hastily ripped open the curtains. He saw rain pounding at the window, shaking the glass pane in the wall.
"What was that?" Gray asked, groggy and shocked. Happy nodded to his question, wanting the answer as well.
"Thunder, I think."
"That was a hell of a lot louder than thunder usually is."
More lightning struck nearby, as if to prove Gray's point. They all jumped as the sound boomed throughout the entire room. Natsu and Happy, both particularly sensitive to loud sounds, covered their ears.
"What are you–" Gray started, giving them a confused look. "Oh, right. I forgot. Well, whatever. I'll go check on the girls. I'll be back. You guys, uh… keep doing what you're doing, I guess." Gray turned and left, mostly so he wouldn't have to deal with the pair, then softly closed the door behind him.
The girls' room was just next door. He knocked, hearing shuffling from inside the room. A few seconds later, Lucy opened the door.
"Hey, Gray. Are you all okay?"
"Yeah, we're fine— we were just a little startled at first. You two okay?"
"I was just shocked, too. Erza didn't even wake up."
Gray followed Lucy into their room and confirmed that Erza really hadn't woken up. "I swear, she's not human." Gray then noticed something completely unexpected. "Loke? What are you doing here?"
Lucy sighed loudly and dramatically. "I promised to call him back in exchange for leaving us at the boats."
"It's just you and him in here?"
Lucy blushed from head to toe. "A-And Erza! We're not doing anything, I swear!"
Gray simply smiled and left, trying to make Lucy as embarrassed as possible. The door shut on a very red Lucy and a very smug Loke.
"Don't worry, Gray, we won't be doing anything." Loke called after him. Lucy screamed jumbled profanity at the both of them. Gray was chuckling as he re-entered his room. His smile faded as he saw the two annoyances. Happy had curled back into his blanket bed. Natsu was on the mattress, a pillow clamped over his head. Happy had seemingly relaxed some, even dozing slightly. Natsu, however, had not. He was flinching whenever lightning struck. He acknowledged Gray's entrance with a small murmur.
Gray sat on the edge of the bed, looking at Natsu. "What do you need?"
He didn't receive much of a response. So, and possibly not the best decision, he violently shook Natsu's shoulder.
"C'mon, Natsu. Help me out here." No response. Gray sighed. "Okay, Natsu. I'm just gonna do whatever I think is best."
Slowly, deliberately, Gray brought the blankets up and over Natsu. He didn't need the warmth, but it might bring comfort. He fought to take the pillow from Natsu's head, who really didn't want to let it go. Gray couldn't remove it without getting particularly violent, so he didn't. Instead, he tried to think of a better way to soundproof the room.
Gray had an expectedly stupid idea. His hands came together, and within seconds, the entire room was encased in ice. It looked like an ice cave— clear icicles adorned the ceiling, the floor was marbled with blues from the pure density of its ice. The temperature dropped sharply, but so did the noise of the storm. What were terrifyingly loud booms turned to soft rumbles. The room, however, was much smaller. Ice had swallowed at least a foot in all directions, encasing the bottoms of nightstands and the legs of the bed. Natsu, finally, removed the pillow from his ear. He gasped.
"This is…" He trailed off, but Gray got the idea. He had come to learn that ice could be a lot of things. Powerful and intense, for sure. But it was pretty, too. He had always known how to make little sculptures from his ice, but it took time for him to learn more refined skills. Density was a major one. Glacial ice, very dense, is blue. Less dense ice could be clear or white. Adding air pockets to his ice also changed its appearance. Cultivating the skills to create these effects, and the knowhow of when to use them, turned his ice from a tool to an artform. It was this practice that allowed him to make this room absolutely beautiful.
Natsu stood from the bed, the ground now significantly closer to the mattress. He thought he would slip on the ice, but Gray had made the floor rough to create traction. Natsu checked on Happy, still asleep in his blanket cocoon, smiling to himself.
"Thanks, Gray."
"Eh, the sound was annoying me, too."
"Still… thanks."
Gray paused before answering. "Of course, Natsu."
Natsu beamed at him. They both returned to the bed, but didn't sleep. Natsu was lost, staring at the ceiling, the way the light fractaled into the ice, the patterns of swirls in the deeper sections. Gray was lost, too. He stared at Natsu, inexplicably happy that he was able to create such joy within his teammate.
Natsu felt eyes on him. He turned his head, locking eyes with Gray. Embarrassed, Gray tried to quickly look away, acting as if he hadn't just been caught staring.
Natsu laughed. "What were you doing?" He asked, no accusatory notes in his voice.
"Nothing."
Natsu playfully hit his shoulder. "You were doing something, you moron."
"Ugh, fine! You just… looked happy. Which made me happy." There was a significant blush on Gray's cheeks, likely not from the cold.
"That's adorable."
"Oh, shut it." Gray grumbled, turning onto his side, away from Natsu. Natsu, however, sat up.
"I'm serious! That's cute." He hesitated, debating his next words. "It's just… I like that we can be friends sometimes."
Gray turned back around, nervously meeting Natsu's eyes. "I like it too." They laid there, holding their gaze, for almost 30 seconds, giving credence to this exchange. Then, Natsu spoke.
"I've known you the longest out of anybody in the guild, I think. I remember meeting you outside the guild. You were getting chewed out by Erza for god knows what. Makarov introduced us." Natsu's sudden story was met fondly by Gray. He remembered it along with him. "I think I immediately challenged you to a fight." Natsu added, laughing softly.
"You totally did." Gray snorted. "I thought you were the cockiest bastard out there."
"Then I went in. I met everybody else. They all seemed so fun." Natsu closed his eyes, savoring the mental image for a moment longer. "The next day I fought you. We both got pulverized, then Lisanna patched me up afterwards."
Gray was pretty sure he knew what was coming next.
"The day she died, y'know, I was crushed. I remember you letting me cry into your shirt. It wasn't on you, of course, it was in my hands. But you were there, next to me. Patting my back, telling me to breathe. Once I felt better, I knew we could be friends. Being friends didn't mean I didn't want to fight you, but… that we could have moments like that. Like this."
Natsu stopped himself, realizing that he had gotten real sentimental real quick. "Well, that's my long-winded way of saying that I appreciate it."
"Thank you." Gray finally said.
"For what?"
"Just… putting it all into words. I feel the same, Natsu. I'm glad." Both fell silent at this. The air was slightly awkward. They both stared upwards at the ceiling.
"Don't worry, we can go back to fighting tomorrow." Natsu joked, attempting to ease the tension.
"Thank the lord. We're friends, but that's not enough to stop fighting you." They laughed together. They fell back into silence, this time not uncomfortably.