Ohiya! The present chapter! And in the next chapter will be the future! Also, Happy late New Years! Thank you to all those who reviewed, favorite, and followed! Please leave a review and favorite! Farewell and Enjoy!

-Let there be midnight

ME NO OWN FAIRY TAIL!

The Present

"Greetings Natsu. I'm Salamander, I am the present and future you." he spun around only to be met face to face by himself.

Salamander gave him a friendly grin, his eyes twinkling in the darkness around them. His arms were behind his back as he stared at Natsu with his smile, seemingly at peace. Natsu returned the smile nervously as he watched Salamander, afraid that the other would make a move that might harm him. "Don't worry!" Salamander said, surprising Natsu. "I'm not going to hurt you! It would be like hurting myself, and I can't do that, now can I?" Natsu remained silent, the tenseness in his shoulders disappearing as the words seem to wash over him like water, making his worries disappear. "That's more like it!" Salamander said cheerfully. He was far more cheerful than Natsumi was—Natsu's past self.

"S-so you're supposed to show me my present and future, huh?" Natsu asked shakily. Seeing what his past was shook him up a little, he just wandered what would happen if he saw both his present and future. He just hoped it wouldn't shake him up as much. Salamander smiled at him warmly, nodding his pink head.

"That's why I'm here!" He then put a finger on his chin as he thought about something. "But, I won't show you your present since it's kinda pointless, but I'll show you something in the present that needs to be known." Natsu nodded, biting his lip as Salamander gave him a slight wave and his surroundings changing as he did so.

He now stood in an empty alleyway with no one around him. It was dark out and the rain came heavily down, making it nearly impossible to hear anything with the noise it caused. He turned, trying to see someone through the haze of the rain as he squinted his eyes. He finally saw what he was looking for. Out of the rain's haze came a girl and a boy. The girl was about nineteen-years-old with snowy white hair that framed her face and fell all the way down to her waist. Her eyes were scarlet and sharp, no emotion lay in them whatsoever. Her skin was like porcelain, pale and flawless. She wore a black dress with sleeves that went way past her hands and down to her knees. It was a simple dress except for a golden chain that wound around it and stopped at her hip where a beautiful fob watch hung, dangling and shining dimly in the little light that was found in the alley way. She also wore white boots with no heels that went all the way up to her knees, a black snake like pattern circling them.

Next to her was a boy younger than her. He looked to be twelve-years-old. He had shaggy bright blonde hair that covered half of his blue/greyish eyes that shinned with childishness—an exact opposite of the girl's emotionless eyes. He wore a plain bright green hoodie and grey shorts with purple boots. He didn't seem to be very color coordinate, but he also probably didn't care at all about him mismatching too.

"Luke," the girl beside him said in a monotone, her eyes never straying from the path. Luke looked up at her curiously, shaking his wet hair out of his eyes so he could get a clearer look at the girl. "You do remember why Master has sent us on this mission, right?" she asked. Luke closed his eyes in thought, his lips pursed together.

"Hmmm…" he hummed as he stuck his tongue out. "Let's see… Nope!" he replied happily. The girl's finger twitched slightly at her side in annoyance at the answer.

"Do you have an idea what it is?"

"Nope!"

"Did Master tell you what it is?"

"Yup!"

"Did you pay attention?"

"Nope!"

"Where you daydreaming about chocolates again?"

"Nope!"

"Lollipops?"

"Right on the nose!" This time the girl's eyebrows twitched, a low growl coming from her. "But I don't need to know what the mission is! You'll tell me anyway, right Pandora?" Her faced relaxed as she closed her bright scarlet eyes, opening them again. She seemed to be more calm and at ease than she was when she was questioning Luke.

"We are supposed to assassinate Natsu Dragneel who was once the king of dragons. Master wants us to make sure Dragneel doesn't have a chance to wake from the magical coma Dafinc had put him in, nor does he want him to regain his memories." Pandora explained in her emotionless voice. Luke skipped a little, his lips drawn in a frown as he thought a little.

"Why does he need both of us to do so? Just one of use alone could kill Natsu-san." Luke pointed out, looking up at Pandora.

"Yes, but Dragneel is within the guild Fairy Tail. We can't just kill him and leave. That would be impossible since their Master—Makarov Dreyar—can sense us just inside the building, and escaping him will impossible when he knows that we are there to harm his member." Pandora replied, her eyes looking at Luke without turning her head. "So we need a distraction for the mission. And that is you. You are supposed to enter the guild feigning as a boy who wants to join under the name Kandri Ter. And while you distract everyone's attention away, I will kill Dragneel and leave while you are to stay there till nightfall." Luke nodded, understanding the mission fully now.

Natsu looked at Pandora and Luke in horror. They were planning to kill him. They're going to kill him and he can do nothing about it. All he can do is just sit in his head and wait for it to happen. Wait for his final moments until he was no more.

Out of the corner of his eye, he finally noticed Salamander standing there. Either he had been there the whole time or just appeared there without Natsu noticing, he will never know.

"W-why…" Natsu asked shakily, his heart drumming harshly in his chest. The rain that had filled his ears was replaced by his own frantic heartbeat. Could Salamander hear? Could he hear his fear?

"You must know," Salamander told him softly, looking down as if he felt ashamed of himself for showing Natsu this.

"B-but I don't want to die…" Natsu's voice cracked as he spoke, taking a step back as tears filled his eyes. "They're going to kill me! And I can do nothing! Why show me this?! What's the point?" Salamander sighed, looking at Natsu with fire in his eyes.

"Do you really believe that they're going to kill you?" he asked a little too harsh. "Do you not trust in you guild, or in yourself? Do you really believe that your friends would leave you in your bed without being watched?" Natsu looked down, his ears turning red as he bit the inside of the cheek.

"How can I trust them without having memories of them? They could be deceiving me without my knowledge." he replied softly, barely audible over the drumming of the rain against the alleyway. The next moment was a blur for Natsu as he found himself being pushed roughly against the wall, Salamander's hand fisted in the front of his shirt, holding him up. He gulped at the furious face Salamander gave him. It was so different from the one he had received when he first met him. And it shook him up.

"Do you really believe that?" he growled, his voice rougher and deeper. "Do you have no trust in them even though you just met them? Even though they showed you kindness and treated you with care, you still think they're trying to deceive you?!" Natsu nodded meekly, his breathing coming out uneven as his heartbeat raced in his chest. Salamander scared him to no end, and he was sure it was making itself known to his duplicate. "Are you just going to turn a blind eye to your gut feeling on trusting them?! After everything they have done for you and after everything you have done for them, YOU SHOULD ALWAYS TRUST YOU FRIENDS!" He was now shouting, shaking with anger as spit flew onto Natsu's face. "You shared memories with them, you fought, cried, laughed, joked, shouted, everything. You lived with them and you having no memories about any of that doesn't give you a single fucking half-assed excuse to not trust them. It would break their hearts knowing that the friend they had trusted for so long doesn't trust them back. They were always there for you and even right now they're trying to help you. So don't ever tell me again that you don't fucking trust them. Hear me?" Salamander was looking at him with so much anger, that his pupils had turned into that of animals. Shakily, Natsu nodded, gulping nervously as Salamander let go of his ruffled collar making him fall to his feet.

"I-I-I'm sorry…" Natsu whimpered, pressing his back against the cold wet brick wall, afraid of being near Salamander.

"Come on, we're done here. It's time to show you what will happen to your future if things go bad." Natsu didn't see his face as he had his back to him, but he could still see that he was furious with began to walk off, Natsu hesitantly following him, fearing that one word he might say will make the pinkette blow up in his face again.