Hello! MY WRITING INSPIRATION HAS RETURNED! I've been somewhat busy with everything like worrying about school starting and all that stuff. You don't need to worry though! I'll still make PLENTY of time to write fanfiction since it gets rid of all my stress and lets me forget about things like, you know, reality. Enough of my author's note, on to the story! Enjoy!

Special thanks to gruviaislife for the wonderful review! It just makes me so happy that you like my writing, and it means so much to me when I wake up in the morning to be greeted by an awesome review! Enjoy the rest of the story, and by the way...your username is so true!

Disclaimer- Do i have to keep putting this? I mean, come on. Everyone already knows that I don't own Fairy Tail because it belongs to Hiro Mashima. Can't a girl dream though?

Summary: Natsu and Lucy go on a mission where a dangerous group of bandits ambush them. What happens when Lucy decides to protect Natsu?

Lucy's POV

"Ughghghgh." I groaned, laying my head down on the cool bar counter.

"Is rent money troubling you again?"asked Mirajane who was currently cleaning out a glass.

I simply nodded, taking a quick sip of the drink she set in front of me to try and lift my spirits a bit. As much as I love her specialty lemonade, it just wasn't doing the trick in making me feel better today. What I really needed...no...WHO I really needed was a certain pink haired fire wizard. He has been slacking off for the past few days claiming that he had enough money for food. Good for him! That doesn't mean I have enough money though!

"You wanna go popsicle?!" I heard a familiar voice yell.

"Anytime flame brain!" another familiar voice replied.

My head snapped up at the two bickering once again. Leave it to Gray and Natsu to get in a fight for no reason. I thought.

Of course, ever since Gray and I played that trick on Natsu, the dragon slayer and ice wizard haven't really been seeing eye to eye on things lately. Maybe Gray went a little too far to peck me on the cheek and call me beautiful. Oh well, it's not like I felt anything for him when he did it. Even though it was just a harmless joke, Natsu would still shoot angry glares at Gray whenever he approached me, and stay by my side whenever I was having a conversation with him.

I was interrupted from my thoughts by Natsu coming up behind me.

"Hey Lucy! Found a job we should go on! Look, the reward is 280,000! You'll be able to pay your rent for 5 months if we split it equally between the two of us." He said proudly, thinking his math was correct.

"Actually, I'll be able to pay my rent for 2 months, but yeah, I'm up for it." I replied.

"Alright! Hey Mira! Lucy and I are gonna take this job." Natsu said to the barmaid, slamming the paper onto the counter.

"Are you sure you want to take that job? It may seem easy since you just need to catch some bandits, but I heard that this particular group is quite dangerous. Are you sure you don't want to wait for Erza to get back from her mission? I think it would be a lot safe-" Mirajane was cut off by a laugh from Natsu.

"We'll be fine! Right Luce? As long as I'm here to protect you, you'll be safe." Natsu said.

"Yeah..." I trailed off.

Sure he had good intentions, but it still bothered me that I was so weak that Natsu needed to protect me.

"Pwetty pwease Mira?" Natsu said with his best puppy dog eyes.

Mirajane chuckled. "Okay you two. Be careful."

"Yes! Happy! Come on, we've got a mission to comple-" Natsu turned around only to be met by air instead of a flying blue cat.

"Oh, right! Happy wanted me to tell you that he went on a job with Carla and Wendy." Mirajane informed the dragon slayer.

"Traitor." Natsu grumbled.

- \(' _ ')/ -

"Eep!" I squealed, dodging the ball of lightning magic the bandit sent flying my way.

"Lucy!" I heard Natsu yell.

"I'm fine! Don't worry about me! Worry about yourself!" I reassured him.

"Open, gate of the golden bull, Taurus!" I yelled, summoning my perverted celestial spirit.

"Hey Luuucy. You're body is looking great as always. Why don't you come give me a smooooch!" The celestial bull said.

"Taurus!" I shouted, blushing. "Just get those bandits for me please!"

"Sure thing Luuuucy." He said, swinging his double sided axe, knocking out multiple bandits.

While Taurus was busy, I turned my attention to Natsu only to see the same lighting wizard that tried to hurt me, now sneaking up on the dragon slayer who was busy fighting four bandits at once.

The lightning wizard smirked while he chanted, "Oh, great skies! I call upon thee to lend me strength, and use your mighty lightning to defeat my foes!"

No! Natsu is going to be struck by his lightning! I thought, running towards him.

"Natsu! Watch out!" I tried to warn him, but instead he turned towards me with a confused look on his face.

"Lucy? What's wro-" He started.

I pushed him down, just as the lighting was about to strike him, causing it to hit me instead.

"Lucy!" I heard him yell as I fell to the ground.

- \(' o ')/ -

"Lucy! Lucy!" Someone was calling my name and shaking me.

I slowly opened my eyes to see a worried Natsu.

"N-natsu?" I sat up rubbing my head.

"What were you thinking?! Why did you do that?!" He scolded me. "You could have been seriously injured!"

I looked around, noticing that all of the bandits were gone, as was Taurus.

Natsu must have noticed the confusion that was clouding my features since he answered my question before I could even ask it.

"Some soldiers came and picked up the bandits after I knocked the rest of them out, and Taurus went back to the spirit world. Now that I've answered your questions, you need to answer mine." He explained.

"I did it because you could've been hurt too." I whispered quitely.

Natsu looked at me for a minute before his eyes softened. I took that as a sign to continue, my confidence building.

"I'm tired of you always protecting me since I'm so weak, so I thought I'd protect you for a change." I said a bit louder.

Suddenly, his eyes grew angrier again, and I panicked, wondering what I could've said wrong.

"Don't ever say that you're weak because your not! I protect you because I want to, not because I have to. Even if I wasn't around, I know that you could fend for yourself and be just fine since you have your celestial spirits and all." He paused, pulling me into a hug. "But as long as I am around, I will protect you no matter what, even if you don't need to be."

My eyes widened in surprise and I returned the hug.

"Thanks Natsu." I said gratefully, breaking the hug to look at him.

"No problem." He replied while giving me his toothy trademark grin. "Now what do you say we go get some grub? I'm starving!"

I smiled. "Sounds good to me!"

He took my hand and pulled me behind him while we ran on the path to the closest town.

You know what? I thought to myself, my smile growing larger. Maybe being protected by someone once in a while isn't so bad.

There you have it! What did you think? I personally liked writing this one. Pfft...it's not because I like the NaLu pairing or anything...*looks the other way guiltily, whistling to break the awkward silence*. Haha enough of my weirdness, hope you liked this one shot, and don't forget that I love to see your reviews. See ya later! :)