Much to Natsu's annoyance, Gray was there first thing the next morning. But that turned out to be something of a blessing.

"I forgot to give you this last night," Gray told him, holding out a recipe for Porlyusica's tea. "You're supposed to take this daily, right?"

Natsu nodded absentmindedly as he skimmed over the instructions. "I don't have all of the ingredients…"

"I can go with you to buy some."

Remembering why he'd gone out on that job to take down a dark guild, Natsu grimaced.

"You're broke, aren't you?"

"Maybe I can convince Gramps to let me go on an easy job. Something in town that doesn't make me fight much." That would be okay, right? Taking it easy. Not traveling too far. He ought to be allowed to do basic work in the general area.

"He told us you would be helping around the guild," Gray told him. "Mira was going to look for tasks you could help her with."

"Oh."

"Here. Give me that." Gray snatched the recipe from Natsu's hands. "I'll buy the supplies for you, just this once. Porlyusica said you need to take this stuff, so I can't make you wait until you get a paycheck working around the guild before you start taking it. You make yourself breakfast. I'll be back soon."

"I don't have anything to make breakfast with." He'd been planning to get breakfast at the guild, though now that he thought of it, he wouldn't be able to afford one. Makarov had brought him lunch for free while he 'wrapped his mind around the news', and since Happy had cooked up the last of their food to make dinner. He really had no idea he was going to eat until the next time he was paid.

"Then I'll buy eggs too. You wait here. If walking home tired you out last night, then you are not going anywhere on your own on an empty stomach."

Natsu growled and tried to step out, but Gray pushed him back into his house with far more ease than Natsu liked.

"I mean it."

Gray shut the door, and when Natsu tried it, it wouldn't budge. That didn't make sense. His door didn't have a lock on it. Going over to his window, he saw that the whole front of his house was now encased in ice.

Now what? He was willing to bet he could break the door down, but he would have to pay to have a new one put in. Or build a makeshift replacement. The back window was stuck shut, and he wanted to break it even less. It was right above his bed, and cold air would get in throughout the night if he took it out.

Makarov had another job lined up for him, so Natsu decided he could risk breaking the door. Not that he had anything he wanted to do while waiting for Gray to come back with food, but he hated to think that he could so easily be trapped. That Gray wanted to keep him in only made him more determined to get out.

Fists ablaze, he positioned himself in front of the door and punched. The door bounced slightly, and pain jolted up his arm. Nothing broke. He barely even left a scorch mark on the door.

Natsu started stupidly at that mark. His flames should have been hotter than that. His punch should be been stronger. It had all felt so much more powerful.

This was what had happened to him while fighting. This… this… disease wasn't just tiring him out faster. It was making him weaker, and the added drain everything had on his body made it feel like he was still putting as much work into what he did.

Fine. If a punch like that wasn't enough, he'd use twice the power. Even if it felt like way too much, it should be just right.

He set his fist on fire again, reared back to punch, and—

"Natsu?"

"Eh?" The flames dispersed. "Happy?"

"What are you doing?" Happy asked, sitting up in bed and rubbing sleep from his eyes.

"Uh… I'm… going outside."

"Can't you open the door normally? We don't have the money to fix it yet."

"Gray sealed it."

"Why would Gray seal our…" Happy trailed off, the memories of yesterday coming back to him. "Why doesn't Gray want you going out alone? Did he have to carry you last night?"

Natsu scoffed. "No! I can still walk. Walking isn't hard. I might have been a little tired at the end of the walk, but it wasn't a big deal."

"Then are you planning to do any walking before we go to the guild?"

That gave Natsu a pause. Happy had been nice enough not to point it out, but if walking to and from the guild was tiring, then he might not be able to wander around the area before heading out. At least not before he got to work on that therapy that Porylusica had said would help him recover.

"Nah. We can wait until Gray comes back with breakfast stuff."

And the ingredients for that tea. He would need to make sure to have that exactly as often as instructed. He wanted to get back to taking jobs as fast as he could.

He passed the time waiting for Gray testing his new limits, and wasn't happy with the results. He couldn't lift a fraction of the weight he used to. Generating flames hot enough to do much more than boil water was exhausting, He already knew from the door that his punches were weak, and taking a few swings at the air, decided his kicks weren't in much better condition.

The tests had worn him out. He had crawled back onto his hammock, and couldn't be troubled with getting out when he heard a knock on the door. It was Happy that let Gray in.

"You okay?" Gray asked when he spotted Natsu. He tried to make it sound casual, so Natsu tried not to be annoyed.

"Mm."

"I got eggs. How do you want them? Scrambled? Fried? Omelet?"

"Soufflé."

"Scrambled it is."

Natsu wasn't so weak that he couldn't make his own breakfast, but he wasn't sure Gray would take his word for it, and being pushed back by Gray so easily earlier that morning had been humiliating. Thinking of it made him blush with shame, and he pulled his blanket over his head to hide his face.

"Are you going back to sleep?" Happy asked.

"No."

"I can come back later if you aren't up for going to the guild now."

Natsu hesitated in responding. If he lied and said they should do that, he might be able to slip out and walk on his own when Gray was gone. Or he might be trapped inside a frozen over house again.

"Natsu? Do you want me to come back later?"

"We can go after breakfast," Natsu murmured.

"Speaking of which," Gray pulled the cleanest looking plate he could find from a precariously perched stack and dumped the scrambled eggs on it. "Eat up. I'll get that tea started for you."

Neither spoke while Natsu ate. From time to time, Gray would glance down at the fire slayer, making sure he didn't look like he might keel over. Natsu was too focused on his food to notice, testing the weight of his bites to make sure he wasn't so weak that he couldn't even lift his own food to his mouth. Once he'd assured himself that there was no need to worry on that front, he picked up the pace with his eating. The aroma of the spices for his tea was filling the room as the water heated up. He wanted to hurry and be done with his eggs so Gray would have nothing to tell him to finish first when he asked for the tea.

"This stuff smells terrible," Gray muttered to himself.

"You think?"

"You like it?" Gray asked. "With your nose, I figured it would be too much."

"It's nice," Natsu said. "It smells kind of spicy. But it tasted creamy yesterday."

"The last step is to mix in cream, so no wonder." Gray pulled the tea of the stove and looked around for a clean mug. Seeing none, he grabbed one to clean.

"Can we go soon?"

"Soon. Natsu, you did nothing the past two weeks. Why did you not take that time to clean this place up?"

"I know where everything is, so it's as clean as it needs to be."

Gray shook his head in disbelief. "You're impossible."

"Is that tea ready? I want to hurry up and go."

"Hm? Oh. Just a second." He poured it into the mug and mixed the cream in. "Here. Drink up."

Natsu took the mug and happily downed his tea. "Okay. Guild time."

"You sure you can manage the walk?"

"It's a stupid, short walk. Of course I can manage it."

-o-

Natsu needed to sit down first thing when they reached the guild. He stopped at the first table, plopped down, folded his arms over the table's top, and rested his head between them. That meant he didn't notice the curious looks from his guild mates, or the warning look Gray shot them.

He still heard Erza ask, "How is he?"

"Not awful." Which wasn't the same as saying 'good'.

Since it meant everyone would direct their questions to Gray instead of him, Natsu feigned sleep. He kept his head down, listening to everyone interrogating Gray on just how bad his disease was affecting him. He'd rather not have to tell everyone all the things he couldn't do. With the hesitant way Gray spoke, he must have thought he was doing a good job of softening his responses, but Natsu thought he was being alarmist. It was a relief when Erza interrupted to insist that, actually, Natsu ought to be able to go on jobs with them again soon.

"He recovered from the first attack fine."

"No he didn't. He collapsed on the very next job he took."

"But he took out several dozen men before that happened. Give him a few weeks to recover again, and he'll be alright to work again. We just need to take lighter jobs and carry a little more weight until he's back to normal."

"Erza, Natsu wore himself out walking here. It's going to be more than a few weeks."

Natsu bit his tongue hard enough to draw blood in order to keep himself from protesting that. He wasn't that worn out! Even if he was pretending to be asleep. And Erza was right. He'd been on the mend after that first attack. If he'd only had a little more time to recover, he doubted the second would have happened.

"Well, let's leave him alone for now," he heard Lisanna say. "If the walk here was tiring for him, then he can rest for a bit."

"We should probably move him to the infirmary. It can't be comfortable to sleep in that position," Lucy said.

Natsu took that as his cue to stir. He'd spent all of the day before hiding in the infirmary. So long as people weren't going to try and start too many conversations about his diagnosis, he had no desire to spend another day hiding in a back room. After all, what was the point of even coming to the guild if he did that?

He lifted his head and yawned, then rubbed the sleep from his eyes before giving everyone a tired smile. That the smile was tired wasn't something he'd done deliberately, but it went with his act. And given a few weeks he was sure he would be well again, especially with the tea and the exercises, so he didn't let himself think about it too long.

Mira returned his smile with an enviably bright one. "Good morning."

"Morning."

"The master says you're helping me starting today. Shall we get started, or would you like to rest first?"

His legs still felt a little tired…

"Let's go." Natsu stood.

"If you aren't up to it—"

"It's just work around the guild. I can do that." Makarov already wasn't letting him go out on jobs until further notice. He wasn't going to let Mira bar him from helping around the guild too. Besides, he had to work somehow. He needed the money.

She took him back to the kitchen first.

"I'm not sure how much magic you can use right now. Does it wear you out to keep things warm?"

He would have loved to tell her no, but he could see eight plates of breakfast food lined up to carry out to other guild members, and given his testing earlier that morning, wasn't certain he could handle producing enough heat for that and still have the energy to stand.

"Kind of."

"We'll wait on that until you've had some time to get back to your old self, then." She handed him a plate. "This is for Jet. Come back for the next once it's delivered. If you need a break, don't hesitate to sit down and rest. The point of having you work here was to give you time to recover, so don't overwork yourself."

At the start of the month, Natsu would have laughed at anyone who told him not to overwork himself carrying plates one at a time. After delivering a third person breakfast, his arms were starting to shake, and he sat down in the back of the kitchen to give himself a few minutes to recover.

Twice more he got up to deliver a few meals before needing to rest again. His legs ached as if he'd run a marathon, which was the most annoying part of it. Mira had been kind enough to let him carry Droy's third helping of breakfast, saying that they should test him with a little heavier of a dish if they could. When she finally started up a conversation on his condition, he found he was barely bothered by it.

"Is it that things feel heavier, or do you not have as much energy? It's energy, isn't it? You've been unusually mellow this morning."

"It's both. It feels like I'm lifting a lot of weight, or putting a lot of force into things. But then I see I'm not holding that much, or that my grip is loser than it feels."

"Was it like that after the first time you collapsed too?"

"It wasn't as bad. I still couldn't do as much as I should be able to, but I could do more than I can now."

"Well, you didn't fully recover before you had another attack. Let's be careful not to overwork you so things don't get any worse. However," she handed him a knife, "I still intend to keep you busy. If you don't use muscle, you lose it. Help me cut these cucumbers. Our cook doesn't come until lunch, so any prep work we can have finished for her will help her get everyone's meals in time."

"Oh! About lunch…"

"Were you planning to order something?"

"I'm broke."

Mira's knife paused only a moment before she resumed her quick, thin slices of cucumber. "Well, we'll see what we can do about that. I'm sure we can let an employee eat for free while he's helping in the kitchen, but if not, we can work out a plan to subtract the cost of meals from your pay. If that's the case, lunch today is on me. What did you do for breakfast?"

"Gray bought some stuff."

Mira watched Natsu as he made a few clumsy cuts, then studied Mira's automatic hand motions and tried to imitate her slices. The cucumber he cut off came out too thin, and he held the knife at the wrong angle, so it slid out of the cucumber when it was only half way down as often as it didn't. He looked intently focused on mimicking her work, and there was no shame on his features for having taken charity from Gray.

"Do you have to pay him back?"

"He didn't say to."

"That was nice of him."

"He also cooked. It was alright. He made that tea good too."

"Oh!" Remembering Makarov's instructions, Mira pointed to the fridge, "We have some stored, if you need it. Are you tired now?"

"I'll manage."

"It wouldn't be much effort to heat it up."

Natsu shook his head. The tea had been delicious, but Porlyusica's instructions had been first thing and then as needed. Good as it was, it was medicine. He didn't want to be overly reliant on medicine. "Can I eat the slices that come out wrong?"

"We need enough to make salads," Mira scolded. "Wait until we're done. We'll use the oddly shaped ones last, so you can have whatever's left over."

He grinned. "I'll hold you to that."

-o-

He hadn't needed to take a break and rest while cutting, and eating the leftover cucumber and tomato slices that he hadn't been able to get right had Natsu in a good mood. The warning look Mira gave everyone as they came out of the kitchen, keeping them from staring too openly, helped keep that mood from dampening too. He'd helped with tasks around the guild once or twice in the past, and it was easy to convince himself that he was only lending Mira a hand because she needed one, rather than because simple tasks around the guild were about the limit of his capabilities.

They ended up in the records room beneath the guild. Mira had been tactful in telling Natsu that she would be the one climbing the ladder and carrying books down without telling him that she was nervous about what might happen if his grip on the ladder wasn't strong enough.

The two of them started off working near the front of the room. Mira scaled the ladder and tossed books down one at a time for Natsu. With a table right beside them it was easy for him to catch them and set them down. But as Mira moved further and further along the bookshelves and further and further from the table where everything was to be stacked, Natsu found himself having to pick up the pace. He could easily hold two books. Three was pushing it. So he would catch two and rush back to the table, then hurry to catch the next one from Mira.

For all her effort to keep from overworking Natsu without seeming overbearing, Mira had become caught up in the task. Pulling out old records for monthly review was a monotonous task, and one she'd learned to do without giving much thought to. Usually, Elfman was the one to catch books for her, and he could hold a whole shelf's worth. She didn't even realize she was working too fast until she heard books clatter to the ground.

She looked back to see five spread across the floor. The seam of one had come apart, and pages were everywhere.

Natsu trembled slightly as he bent down to pick one up. He'd only lifted it a foot off the ground by the time Mira was down the latter to make sure he was alright. He paused, stared at the book, then released it, watching it fall back down.

"Sorry." Mira picked the book up for him. "I wasn't paying attention."

"It wasn't your fault," Natsu told her, which only made her feel more guilty. Because it certainly wasn't Natsu's fault, and there was only the two of them that could have been at fault.

"I'll pick these up. You can rest a minute and—"

"I'm going home."

"Stay. We'll have lunch soon."

"There's some food left over from what Gray bought," Natsu said as he stood. "I can cook. Sorry to leave that mess for you."

"But—"

"I feel weird. Like how I did before those times I collapsed," Natsu lied. "So I should rest, right? Happy can carry me back."

"Oh… Okay."

Unsure whether or not he would care for any help, Mira decided to watch until Natsu had ascended the stairs out of the records room, ready to run and grab him if he collapsed. When he shut the door behind him, she took it as a sign that he was done seeing her for the day. Someone else from the guild would have to make sure he was alright.

-o-

Up on the main floor, Natsu surveyed the guild hall. Everyone had gotten into the swing of things, and only a few glances were now cast his way. He forced a smile and kept his steps slow, steady, and deliberate. It helped him keep the trembling under control, and to look like he was doing exactly what he was supposed to. He didn't feel like one of those awful headaches was about to come on again, but running back and forth and carrying all those books, he did feel drained.

Happy was sitting beside Gray. He couldn't call one without getting the other's attention. And he really, really didn't want Gray smothering him just then.

He hesitated a moment as he passed the kitchen door, remembering the tea. But taking time to warm it up would give Mira time to come after him an apologize for overworking him again. Because carrying a few books now qualified as overworking.

He picked up his steps as he passed the kitchen, and slipped out the front door without a word.

The plan had been to get home without anyone reminding him of how much effort that had become recently, but it wasn't working out. His legs didn't want to move. He felt fatigued just standing. He had to stop on a bench only a block from the guild, and while he was resting, he discovered that he hadn't been as successful in sneaking out as he'd thought.

"Hey." Gray's shadow fell over him. "You needed fresh air, or are you going home?"

"Fresh air."

He didn't look up, but he heard Gray's sigh of relief. It would be a nuisance to have to stop what you were doing to walk a sick person around town, wouldn't it. Natsu's throat constricted.

"Alright. You take it easy."

"I am," Natsu said, and the moment Gray was back inside the guild hall, he got up and started walking towards his house again.

Gray must have decided to peek back out at him, because he heard a cry of "Hey! Natsu!" from behind not too long after.

He didn't want to deal with it just then. He didn't need Gray hovering over him like he might fall apart at any minute. His legs felt heavy, but Natsu gritted his teeth and took off running.

Two blocks down the street, he tripped. He didn't know what his foot caught on. Most likely, it had been nothing at all. He threw his hands out to break his fall, but the force needed to stop one's self was more than he'd remembered it being. His arms gave out, and he crashed to the ground.

"Natsu!"

A growl rose in his throat as he tried to pick himself up. He was tired. His body hadn't been up for running, which was stupid. He'd hardly done anything. There was no good reason for being so worn down when he hadn't even had a chance to work himself up.

And something felt wrong.

The second he noticed that vague sense that something was off, Natsu froze. This was the feeling that had preceded both of his attacks, and Porlyusica had claimed that Suraci's Disease got worse each time an attack happened.

Even if there were supposed to be ways to reverse the damage, he was only halfway through the day and already so worn down that he was afraid of what might happen if he tried to stand. He couldn't risk another attack. Not for a reason as petty as avoiding Gray. He didn't want to get even worse.

He was blinking back tears as Gray caught up to him.

"What was that for, you idiot?"

"I can get home on my own."

Maybe Gray could tell from the tightness of his voice how constricted his throat felt, with Natsu trying not to break down emotionally on top of physically, and tried and failed to be encouraging. Maybe Gray was an asshole and decided to prove a point. Natsu decided it was the later that had Gray stand over him, waiting a minute to see if Natsu might manage to rise to his feet, before saying "Good job with that."

Natsu ducked his head down so Gray couldn't see his face. "Shut up."

"Look, no matter how much you want to, if you can't…" Gray trailed off, seeing a drop of water land on the street beneath Natsu.

"I just need a little break. Then I can do it. I'm fine. Go away. Please."

Another drop.

Gray bit his lip, unsure what to do now. Natsu's pride wasn't an easy thing to leave a lasting mark on, but if he'd reduced the roset to tears, he might have succeeded at that as well. An important part of getting Natsu to agree to the restrictions his condition put on him was to not make him feel restricted. But if he couldn't walk he couldn't walk.

After weighing his options, Gray squatted down in front of Natsu. "Get on my back. I can carry you."

"I don't… need…"

"Put your chin on my shoulder and pretend to be asleep, and I'll tell anyone who asks that you drank too much or something. No one else in the guild needs to know you fell. Your head doesn't hurt, right? You're not in the middle of another attack?"

Natsu hiccupped, cheeks burning from the shame of having gotten so weak that Gray's offer sounded appealing, and rubbed one of his eyes. "I… I don't think so. My head doesn't hurt."

But it might soon, Natsu realized, if he tried to do too much on his own. Gray had already seen him, and turning down Gray's offer would only result in more people seeing him on the ground. With the guild only a few blocks away, it was only a matter of time before someone else who knew about his diagnosis saw him sitting there. He hated himself for it, but he put his arms over Gray's shoulder, and let Gray grab his legs and hoist him up.

As per Gray's instructions, he feigned sleep as he was carried home. They were stopped twice. Once by someone Natsu couldn't recognize from sound and smell. Once by Levy. Gray made up a story for the first of a fight he'd won that ended with him being required to drag the idiot he knocked out home. For Levy, he said only that Natsu fell asleep, ought to be somewhere more comfortable, and the infirmary bed was occupied.

It wasn't until they were a little past the town's edge, with no one else in earshot and Natsu's house in site, that Gray spoke to him again.

"You sure you didn't have another attack earlier? I swear, my heart missed a beat when I saw you on the ground."

"I tripped," Natsu admitted. "If it'd been an attack, my head would have hurt."

"It's just a headache?"

"It really hurts," Natsu mumbled, opening his eyes halfway to look at his house. Feigning sleep while tired might not have been a good idea. But Gray could set him in his hammock, and then he could rest. Resting sounded so nice.

"Hurts how?"

He could humor Gray's conversation a little longer. It would up his chances of being set in the hammock if asked, rather than dropped on his couch. Natsu wasn't sure he could drag himself from one to the other.

"It felt like someone set off a chain of bombs in my head. It hurt too much to stand or focus. I saw doubles, and everything tilted and rocked like I was on a…"

"A what?"

"A boat," Natsu muttered, feeling a little queasy at the thought.

"And you don't feel any of that now?"

"No. Just that strange feeling."

"What strange—Whoa!" Gray almost dropped Natsu as he fumbled to open the front door. "What strange feeling?"

"The one I got both times before I collapsed." Natsu paused, thinking about it as Gray carried him in. "But I got it a few times before we did that monster hunting job and nothing bad happened then. Oh. Put me in the hammock."

Gray had been positioned to set Natsu on his couch, but was more than happy to oblige that request if it meant Natsu kept talking. "I'm going to sit you down here, then pick you up in a better position for lying you on something that unstable."

"Okay."

"So you had this feeling before?" Gray prompted while he changed positions he carried Natsu in.

"Yeah. A few times. Before the monster hunting job, I never thought much of it." Natsu scowled, not at thoughts of his condition, but at how Gray picked him up princess style. "I think the first time was when we did that two man tournament. Maybe."

"Maybe, huh?"

"Maybe."

Gray set Natsu in the hammock, careful to make sure he didn't tip out of it on one side or the other. "Well, you get some sleep, alright? I'll tell Happy to come back. Don't you dare try and go anywhere on your own again. None of us want you to have another attack."

"Aye, sir," Natsu muttered. Whatever would make Gray go away so he could sleep.

"Good."

Natsu was snoring before Gray reached the door, and since the flame brain was asleep, Gray decided to linger in the house a few minutes. He didn't know how long Natsu would need to sleep for, but he pulled out a can of tuna and mixed a quick salad with it for when the idiot woke up.

On his way out, he stopped to look over at Natsu one last time. Something about hearing that the first time Natsu felt any symptoms of his condition being when Gray dragged him into a small, quick tournament made him feel bad. It was silly, because Natsu's condition would have developed anyway, but Gray felt at fault.

"Sorry," he muttered to the sleeping boy before shutting the door.

-x-

STA: I liked this chapter. This chapter was fun. I don't know why, but Natsu is my favorite character to see cry.

Defendedclond: Here's hoping I can make this bromance a satisfying one, then.

Daygon Yuuki: I do love Zeref... but for what this story is, I think it would jumbled things up a little to try and work him in.

Guest: Thanks! I'll do my best!