AN: Hey guys! Sorry this chapter took a while! I like how this one incorporates some comic relief. Also... twenty chapters! Woot woot! That's awesome for me, and I can't thank you all enough- people who review, follow, favorite, or heck, just cruise on by and stop for a read- you are all awesome! Also, super big thanks to The-Fallen-Guardian for adding my story to their community! You have no idea how much I appreciate all of you. So! I won't bore you any longer. Please enjoy!

Notice: I am not Hiro Mashima, and I don't own Fairy Tail.

Chapter 20: The Terror of Salamander

"Fire dragon… Roar!" Natsu's breath attack charred the seventh horde of yellow jackets Flik had sent at him. This was going nowhere. Natsu couldn't land a hit on this guy; the air was just too thick with bugs, and if he tried to get close, the guy's body would automatically sting him. Natsu had learned that the hard way: his entire body was covered in small cuts, scratches, stings, and bruises.

Flik cackled even more after seeing Natsu's attack. "Hahaha! Cool attack! I should try it!" He opened his mouth and sucked up some of the insects from his locust swarm shield. "Locust Dragon… Roar!" He drenched Natsu and Happy in a torrent of bug guts.

"Ack! Ew! Ugh! Blech! What the hell, man? This is so gross! And that was NOT a dragon roar, goddammit!" Natsu REALLY didn't like people who made fun of dragons. The raging blaze of his soul built and released, in the form of a Fire Dragon's Brilliant Flame.

The massive fireball was enough to take out about a third of Flik's substantial creepy-crawly air force. When Flik emerged from the smoke, his entire cloak and hood had been burnt off, exposing a VERY disturbing body.

He was a fairly slim man, who looked to be about twenty. His hair was light green and slicked back over his head. The disturbing parts started with his abdomen. He had no arms. It was a normal human body, aside from the fact that its form was constantly shifting. His skin was a sea of writhing insect forms, all of which seemed to bubble in and out view. It formed an ever-changing hypnotic green pattern. His face was even worse. Pincers jutted out from either side of his mouth. But worst of all were his eyes. They were like human eyes but… compound. Just looking at them made Natsu shudder.

"How. Dare. You." Flik growled. "You've seen this… this monstrosity. You cannot be allowed to live!" He opened his mouth and sucked in every last one of his insect horde. "My friends won't get to eat you, oh no. I'm going to use their power to eat you myself!"

Natsu didn't know what the hell was going on with this guy, why he suddenly got so mad, or why he'd gotten rid of his bug shields. However, there were two things Natsu identified with and approved of: a challenge to fight one on one, and anger. Maybe this guy wasn't so bad after all.

"You're on, bug boy! I'm gonna roast you till your guild begs for mercy!"

Flik scowled at being called "bug boy." "Insect form technique! Mantis style!" A pair of arms shimmered into existence on his body- however, these were long, green scythelike appendages with razor sharp edges, similar to those of a praying mantis. With a shrill shriek and a chattering of his pincers, Flik slashed wildly at Natsu, who did his best to defend himself. The attacks were furious, delivered only fractions of a second apart from one another. Happy tried his evasive maneuvers as best he could, but Natsu was still left with multiple deep gashes. His body was getting more sliced up by the second.

"Pull back, Happy! I need to counterattack!" Happy managed to draw Natsu out of the line of fire, before rushing back in, Natsu leading the charge with a defiant roar. "Fire Dragon…"

"Insect form technique! Stag beetle!"

"Iron Fist! Gaahh!" Natsu finished lamely as his punch glanced easily off Flik's new armor-like shell. Flik's body, newly buffed up, was now encased in a suit of insectoid armor, and a large three-foot-long forked horn jutted out from his forehead.

Flik grinned evilly and smashed his horn into Natsu's side. He and Happy were sent flying and barely righted themselves before crashing into one of the ship's towers. "Haha! My diversity springs from the entirety of the insectile race! I can't be bested!"

Natsu's eyebrow twitched. "Oh yeah? Fire Dragon… Brilliant Flame!"

When the flames cleared, Natsu was stunned to see that Flik was unharmed. Not only was he unharmed, but… he was now a large cockroach curled into a ball.

Flik uncurled from his ball and morphed back into his normal form. "My cockroach form is incredibly resistant to attacks. Now… Insect form! Dragonfly jet!" A pair of fast-moving, gossamer wings appeared on Flik's back. He immediately began to zoom around at blinding speeds. Natsu couldn't possibly keep up with him. Flik spun circles around Natsu, landing blow after blow after blow on his body. Natsu was powerless to move. Flik backed up, and his wings started releasing powerful sonic booms. Each one battered Natsu's body harder than the last. He felt one of his bones break.

Flik cackled maniacally again. "Yessss… yes… no one will ever know my true hideous form! No one will see the monster I've become!"

Natsu gasped, trying to fit his words in between the spasms of pain throughout his body. "How… how did you get… like that?"

"How did I become an abomination of nature? Well, I believe it was the result of a dark guild's experimentation upon my body! They made me part-human, part insect! Oh, great power, sure… but I was to be forever cast out of society, forever shunned because of what I looked like. My own wife would never speak to me again…" Tears were starting to form in his compound eyes. "No one would! Not until I came to Hydra Claw! They accepted me for who I am! They respected my newfound power! Grant teamed up with me not because I was some freaky bug, but because he wanted to be my friend! That's why I have to prove my loyalty to my guild! That's why I have to crush you Fairies into the dirt!"

Natsu had a solemn look on his face. "So you think you're a monster, huh?"

"Of course, you dolt! Do you have eyes?"

Natsu grinned and flashed a peace sign. "Really? 'Cuz I think you look kinda cool!"

"Aye!" Happy chorused.

Flik's jaw dropped. His wings faded, and his attacks ceased. The tears that were in his eyes started to fall. "You… you really think so?"

Natsu grinned and punched him right in the gut. "'Course I do," he explained matter-of-factly. "I'm a dragon. And dragons versus monsters always make for the coolest fights. I'm all fired up!" Natsu ignored the pain of the stings on his hand and forced it to ignite. He and Flik descended as part of a raging fireball towards the hull below.

On the deck below, the Thunder Legion was having a tough time. None of their attacks landed on the guy. Evergreen's fairy blasts were all tasty snacks for Maw. Bickslow had to be extra careful with his sprits- he couldn't risk another one of them disappearing down that monstrosity's gullet. And Freed's enchantments just weren't able to stick around- Maw could eat all of them. In fact, they all got the impression Maw could've taken them out already if he'd wanted to, but he was letting them attack him because they were providing him with so much free food.

"Evergreen! Can't you turn him to stone?" Bickslow inquired. "Stone! Stone!"

"No! His eyes are too small and beady! I doubt he can even really see us!"

"Oh, how I wish Laxus was here!" Freed said with a needy-fangirl pose.

"Get a grip, Freed! Come on! The Thunder Legion shouldn't give up at a time like this!" Bickslow roared. "Evergreen! Maybe you can seduce him?" "Seduce him!"

"WHAT?" She roared back.

"Maybe you can just pretend he's Elfman. He's got roughly the same body type," Freed said, giggling uncontrollably.

Evergreen's face turned red as a tomato from embarrassment and anger. "I swear, when we get out of this, I'm gong to…"

Maw interrupted their banter. "I'm STILL HUNGRY!" he boomed. The massive mouth man raised his beefy arm to swat them aside like bowling pins. However, before he could strike, the entire hull rocked with a massive force that knocked everyone there right off their feet.

Freed stumbled to his feet first to see Natsu emerging from the wreckage, standing over a man with… oh. Best not to look too closely at that. Natsu was covered head to toe in countless bruises, stings, cuts, scratches, blisters, and scars, but the grin on his face couldn't be wider. "Oh, man, that was awesome! I just beat a bug that could turn into a man!"

"…I think it was was the other way around, Natsu," said Happy, also emerging from the wreckage.

"Ah, shut up! Don't start this again! This is just like when you said that cross-dressing time guy was actually a girl!"

Everyone facepalmed.

"NO ONE INTERRUPTS MAW'S MEAL! MAW ANGRY!" the galoot had finally gotten back up.

Natsu turned around. "Aw yeah, I get to fight Mouth Guy next? This is my lucky day, Happy! Fire Dragon… Roooooar!"

The stream of flames erupted from Natsu's mouth and went right back into Maw's. "Hmmm… now that's spicy! I wanna try your trick!" Maw leaned forward and, to everyone's dismay, he released his own Fire Dragon Roar right back at Natsu with double the intensity. Natsu, of course, sucked it right back up.

"Alright! No one's been able to compete with me in a FIRE eating contest before!" Natsu yelled and released it back to Maw. The intensity had doubled again.

Thus begun a strange game of hot potato, as the flames were passed back and forth in rapid succession. Those witness to the scene ran back and forth, trying not to become the monkey in the middle. Of course, every time the flame was roared back, it doubled in intensity.

"This is the weirdest fight ever!" Happy shouted frantically.

Natsu grimaced in pain from trying to absorb the next blast. The inferno had grown so large, his stomach visibly jutted out two feet in front of him. "Oh, man! NOW I've got a fire in my belly!"

Natsu's next Fire Dragon Roar should have been renamed "Fire Dragon Apocalypse."

Maw tried and tried to suck up the flames, but although his massive mouth could suck them up extremely quickly, there was only so much space his belly could contain, and he'd already spent the last hour eating nonstop. Try as he might, he could not completely stomach the flames Natsu breathed on him.

When the inferno cleared, Maw had collapsed on the ship's deck. His body began to shimmer, and was quickly replaced by a much smaller body- that of a frail old man. His clothes were dirty and ragged, those of a street beggar.

"So… the transformation spell was broken, huh? Fitting…"

"Wow… and we barely even did anything…" Freed muttered to himself in disgust."

"I just wanted a… bite to eat…" he rasped.

"Now where's the power source?" Natsu asked. Everyone sweatdropped. He's not even fazed…

"Well, actually… there's something very important for us to attend to right now," Freed explained. "We've got to check the-"

Before he could finish his sentence, there was a primordial hiss, accompanied by the grating sound of uncoiling metal. From each of the towers emerged hydra heads, two from where there had been just one before. The heads glared at the wizards balefully.

"…Towers," Freed finished.

Natsu can really be such a beast sometimes, it's insane. Anyways, I really hope you liked this chapter. Thanks so much for reading, and I hope you have a wonderful day.