Gray wasn't an idiot. After setting Natsu off first thing in the morning, he knew that there wasn't anything comforting he could say that wouldn't sound completely false.

The roset stared at the wall, pale faced, deaf to Happy's concerned questions and uncertain assurances. Whether or not he heard Makarov and Porlyusica talking on the far side of the room, debating whether or not he could shadow other guild members and what type of work was safe to watch, or whether he should even carry on as part of the guild instead of finding some other workable trade.

The real issue, Porlyusica thought, wasn't what Natsu was or wasn't capable of. It was the possibility that he might be forced to push himself too hard, should a job go wrong, and that he might thus induce another attack. "He already can't run. What if he can't walk unaided after the next one? What if it starts attacking his senses? You really think it's worth that risk? Just to let him watch others do what he can't?"

Ah. No. He was definitely listening to them. Gray saw him flinch when she said that.

"Let's give him some time alone." Gray suggested. He made a point of giving only Makarov and Porlyusica a meaningful look when he said it, and while it got the two of them to notice Natsu's distress and nod in agreement, it also made Happy climb off of Natsu's lap and jump down to the floor. He'd thought Natsu would have appreciated the cat's company.

Makarov shut the door, heading for his office to continue his debate, then stopping and saying to Gray, "The whole guild doesn't need to hear it yet, but your team might like to know."

Because one of their members was never again going to be a proper member of the team. Gray had expected as much, but some part of him hadn't been willing to fully process that when it was only a prediction. When Porlyusica hadn't yet looked over Natsu's recovery. They were going to be short a member.

Natsu was done with active duty forever.

Gray could only imagine what must have been going through Natsu's mind, having heard that. He found himself reeling at the thought, and he wasn't even the one who'd been told the cornerstone of their life was gone.

What would Natsu even do? Anyone with one working eye could see he wasn't happy with the work to be found around the guild, but that was the only guild work he was still fit for, and Gray couldn't imagine Natsu not being a part of the guild. Had Porlyusica really meant it when she said he should look into another trade? What other skills did Natsu even have, if not magic? It was his livelihood. It was his life.

No wonder Natsu had been so frustrated with him, telling him he couldn't do anything. Gray hadn't ever stopped to fully consider what he was forbidding Natsu from.

He told Erza, although he didn't pay much attention to the exchange. He knew he ought to tell the whole team, but he didn't think to gather them all together, and the mere thought of saying it all more than once was too draining.

What if they'd known sooner? If they'd been on the lookout for any signs of the disease before anything went wrong. If they caught it before the first attack, if Natsu hadn't skipped out on sleep and worn himself down fighting those monsters, then maybe he could still go with them on all of their jobs. Or at least most of them. If they'd at known what happened after the first time, he might still be able to do easier jobs. He'd held his own against a few opponents back then.

Was Natsu thinking about that? Gray hoped he wasn't beating himself up over failing to tell anyone about his symptoms. They'd had no way of knowing to be on the lookout for them. It wouldn't have hurt for him to admit that the job they picked after his first attack was more than he was able to handle, but none of them would have guessed things could go so wrong if he pretended he was okay.

Gray sat at a table away from the rest of his team, trying to ignore as they discussed how horrible a development this was. Natsu could probably hear them from inside the infirmary. Unless the disease had done sensory damage, and Natsu's senses had been so sharp before that they didn't recognize a deficit yet. Was there a subtle way he could test that without making Natsu think he was looking for more weaknesses?

He wasn't sure if he hoped Natsu's hearing had suffered or not. On the one hand, it would be hard to lose that as well. On the other, it couldn't be easy to hear every last thing the guild whispered about you. Gray could already hear a few guild members who overheard his team talking about what a shame it was that Natsu hadn't mentioned anything was wrong before things got too bad. Surely, they thought, he would have realized something after the first time.

What if Natsu heard that? What if he believed it? Gray knew he'd been the one to insist they give Natsu some time alone, but he hadn't meant completely alone, and he couldn't stand the thought of Natsu sitting by himself, listening to Fried and Bickslow discussing how he should have done something about his health before the second attack.

Finally, unable to take the thought anymore, Gray stood and marched over to the infirmary, opening the door and drawing breath to tell Natsu something, anything, to assure him that whatever else might be said of the situation, it wasn't his fault this had happened.

Natsu was gone.

The window was open.

For a moment Gray could only stand there, stunned. He'd been told that Natsu asked to leave through the window after first learning he was sick, presumably not wanting to fact the guild when he might be asked about it. It had never occurred to him that Natsu really might do just that. Honestly, he'd half suspected Natsu couldn't, which was silly of him. Natsu wasn't quite that weak.

Not yet. If he did anything reckless, he might be.

Turning back towards his team, Gray strode over and plucked Wendy up, carrying her back to the infirmary with no explanation beyond, "I need to borrow your nose for a moment."

The girl squeaked, but made no protest. When he brought her back to the room, she took one look, and understood immediately.

"His scent is still strong. It won't be hard to follow him."

"Thanks."

They followed his trail out the window and down the street, where Wendy had to stop and bend down to sniff the road. The town, used to such antics, mostly from Natsu, politely ignored her behavior, and the two made their way through the streets without much incident.

More than once, they came to a false stop. If the trail Wendy picked up was anything to go buy, Natsu stopped at the cathedral first, making it to the front door before changing his mind. That didn't surprise Gray. It looked like a good spot to run to with a problem, but Natsu wasn't exactly the sort who prayed when things went wrong.

The trail led through a bakery next, where the baker confirmed seeing Natsu linger in the window so long that he nearly offered the boy a pastry. There had never been an official statement about Natsu's condition, but he was one of the guild's stand-out members, and most of the townspeople had noticed something amiss after a month of him acting subdued. The specifics weren't common knowledge, but that Natsu's health was in decline was something that far too many people had deduced.

"What as he looking at?" Gray asked.

The baker pointed out a berry sweetened cake, and Gray bought a slice.

From there, Wendy led them to the river, and here Gray was relieved to see Natsu. Not just because it meant they'd found him, either. They'd traversed across enough of the town that he'd worried about the possibility that Natsu had worn himself down without anyone to look after him.

He didn't raise his head as Gray and Wendy approached, curled up at the water's edge, knees held against his chest and hiding his face. Gray sat beside him and silently held out the piece of cake.

Natsu didn't take it. Didn't even lift his head or acknowledge their presence.

Unsure what else to do, Gray asked the most painfully obvious question he possibly could. "Are you okay?"

The response was muffled by his scarf and legs, and was distinctly un-Natsu-like in its phrasing, but Gray was certain he heard, "Given the limitations to my mobility? No."

Gray and Wendy exchanged looks, unsure what to say to make the situation sound better than it was. Anything that crossed Gray's mind was either dismissive, or offered false hope.

Wendy, to Gray's horror, went the second route.

"Don't be discouraged, Natsu. Maybe when Porlyusica sees your magic, she'll change her mind."

Not likely. Gray was willing to bet all the money he had at the moment that there was a good reason no one had seen Natsu spell cast all month. That Natsu, after a pause, swung and arm out and knocked the cake to the ground in response only further solidified that belief.

Picking up the half of the cake that wasn't in contact with the grass and dirt, Gray said, "We're still here for you."

"No. You're going to go on jobs and I'll be here on my own."

"We're not going to completely abandon you for work. I've hardly worked at all."

Gray didn't need to be told that Natsu wished he'd been around a little less, and wasn't surprised when Natsu said something in response. He did wish, however, that Natsu could have at least lifted his head to glare.

"We are here for you," Gray insisted. "No one is going to make you leave Fairy Tail, and you're still a part of our team, whether you're active duty or not."

"That's right!" Wendy cried. "And even if you can't take jobs, you can still come with us to whichever town work takes us too. And if Master forbids us from letting you follow along for the actual work part as a member of the guild, we can't forbid anyone from going anywhere as a citizen of Fiore."

Gray winced, and was momentarily grateful that Natsu had yet to look up at them.

"That's nice, Wendy." Natsu said after a moment.

"Oh. I thought… You seemed excited by the idea of shadowing while you recovered…"

"While I waited to go on active duty again. And it doesn't matter, because I'm not recovering."

"You recovered some," Gray insisted. "You… don't need me to walk you everywhere."

Natsu lifted his head then and fixed Gray with a flat look. His needing to pause to think of an example, a sad example, had not been missed.

Gray had honestly expected that Natsu would be crying by this point, but his cheeks were dry. He still looked pale, although less stiff than before. His eyes, rather than looking wet, were dulled. He looked almost as if he'd skipped over sadness and anger and every other painful emotion that one might feel and gone straight to numb.

And Gray had already used the only sincere words of comfort he could think of.

At a loss for what else to tell Natsu, he heard himself saying, "Let's go shopping."

"No."

"You wanted to buy groceries, right?"

"I want you to leave me alone."

"Gray," Wendy whispered, gesturing for them to leave.

"You go ahead. I'll be right with you."

Wendy shot him a skeptical look, but turned and headed back for the guild.

Once she was out of earshot, Gray hooked an arm under Natsu's and stood, forcing the boy to his feet, and said, "Let's get lunch."

"It's past lunch time."

"And I know you missed lunch, so we'll find a place that's still serving and stuff you silly. I bet you we can find a diner that specializes in comfort food. Come on. My treat."

"No," Natsu said. "Stop doing things for me. I can buy my own food."

"When have I ever bought you food that I didn't eat my share of?" Gray asked. "For that matter, when did you ever turn down free food? You've gotta eat, Natsu. Do you want me to treat you to a comfort food diner, or do you want to go back to the guild and order something there?"

Natsu glanced down at Gray's arm, still wrapped around his. They both knew he wouldn't be able to break free of it on his own, and Gray wasn't sure he'd let go if Natsu tried. Giving Gray a weary look, Natsu sighed and said, "Diner."

-o-

They ended up in a small place called Heart Food, tucked between an art gallery and a recruiting center for Magic Council Rune Knights. It had struck Gray as a good location not just for its menu, consisting of things like pancakes all day long and root beer floats, but also because Natsu might enjoy snickering at the people going in and out of the adjacent buildings. As far as attempts to get Natsu to emote went, it was too far on the juvenile side for Gray's tastes, but then juvenile was Natsu's bread and butter At least, it had been. Back when he was healthy.

With some prompting, he coaxed Natsu into getting the float, as well as a plate of bacon wrapped meatballs and a basket of garlic bread. The bread and float arrived immediately, but the bacon meatballs, as well as the stack of pancakes Gray ordered for himself, needed time to cook.

Gray waited until their waitress had walked away before telling Natsu, "If you don't eat that yourself, I will shove it into your mouth for you."

"Go ahead. I can't stop you."

It was eerie how Natsu sounded in monotone. Gray missed having everything muffled by the scarf.

"Natsu, you'll feel better if you eat. Trust me."

"No I won't. I'm never getting better." He blinked, and for a split second that emotionless look seemed to crack, despair flashing through his eyes before they went dull again. "Someone is going to walk me home every evening forever, and I can't go on adventures with everyone anymore. Garlic bread isn't going to fix that."

"Obviously. But it's going to taste good, so eat it. You need to have at least one good thing come to you today."

"I'm not hungry."

"Eat."

With a sigh, Natsu reached out and grabbed a piece of bread. He tore a piece off with his teeth, but made no effort to chew.

"It'll stop tasting good if you let it sit in your mouth too long," Gray warned.

He'd never seen someone make chewing look like such a burdensome task before, but Natsu managed. Gray almost worried he'd choke on the bread, or need prompting to swallow, and was relieved when Natsu not only managed to get it down without help, but took another bite without being told to.

"Is there anything you want to talk over?" Gray asked. "I don't really know what to tell you to make it better, but you're usually pretty good at… um… getting out whatever you're feeling. I'm told that's healthy."

"I don't think anything about me is healthy," Natsu said. "Which is stupid, because I felt fine a month ago."

"Your still healthy in a lot of ways. You don't have any injuries. Or a fever. You can breathe just fine. You've got years and years to go before you need to worry about going senile."

Natsu had already looked pale to Gray, but somehow he went paler. "I have years and years to go like this."

"At least you made it this far without Suraci's giving you any trouble, right? It sounds like you're the only person who can say that."

"Most people can say they made it their whole lives."

A quip about all the things Natsu could still do that plenty of people lived their lives fine without—walking, for instance—passed through Gray's mind, but he held off on saying as much. Natsu didn't need to be told to suck it up.

When Gray said nothing, Natsu took another bite of his bread, then gave in and ate the whole slice. He grabbed another, raising it to his mouth, then hesitated and set the bread back down on the table.

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"I should have said something," Natsu said. "I thought you'd gloat if I admitted to how easily using magic tired me out. Or that everyone would fuss over me and that head injury when I felt fine. So I tried to cover it up. I tried to cover it up, and now…"

He blinked, rapidly this time, and Gray noticed that his eyes looked glassier than before. Good. Well, sort of. Natsu crying was still bad. But Natsu expressing some sort of emotion was an improvement.

"If I'd admitted something was wrong…"

"Don't tell me sorry for that," Gray said, trying not to think of the fact that fear of him giving Natsu grief had been a motivating factor in hiding his condition. "You're the one who's suffering for it now. It's not like we would have guessed you had a rare disease that never manifests after the age of three anyway. If you want to blame anyone, blame that monster that hit you right when you had your attack. That's what really kept us from noticing anything was wrong."

Natsu nodded, still trying to blink back tears. He opened his mouth to say something, but couldn't seem to get the words out, and quickly shoved the garlic bread in to try and cover this up. Once his bread holding hand was free, he used it to rub his eyes.

"You don't think I really won't be able to go on jobs with everyone again, do you?"

Gray forced a smile, and didn't answer. He'd told Natsu what he thought on that front before Porlyusica had made her declaration.

"I don't want this…"

"None of us do," Gray said, and hoped that Natsu wouldn't call him out on the fact that having the disease was way worse than observing it.

Natsu crushed his hopes. "None of you have someone telling them they're too weak to sleep in a hammock."

Biting back the urge to ask Natsu how often he fell out of his hammock when trying to get up—or in—Gray said, "How about we just lower it down for you? You can still sleep in it, and if you fall again, it's not as far to the ground?"

"Yeah. Okay."

"Really?"

"It'll keep you from taking the hammock away, right?"

"I won't if you don't want me to."

"Liar. All you do is things I don't want you to. You make me walk home with you or chose where we go around town, and you dragged me here."

That last bit might have had more impact if Natsu hadn't picked up his spoon immediately after and scooped a bite of ice cream out of his float, but the rest of the accusation still stung. It wasn't like Gray was trying to control Natsu's life. Sure, maybe any time they'd disagreed lately, Gray had made sure he got his way in the end, but he was only looking out for a friend.

He sighed. Taking care of Natsu didn't just mean keeping anything from going worse physically. Nor did it mean giving Natsu just enough control to keep from rebelling. It also meant keeping Natsu happy. At least content, but preferably happy. Having it rubbed in his face constantly that he couldn't enforce his own will didn't make for a happy Natsu.

"How about this then. You don't want to go back to the guild?"

"No. They're all talking about me. I don't want to hear it."

So his hearing was still sharp as ever. And he'd probably heard Fried and Bickslow too.

"So rather than head back there when we're done eating, we can go wherever you want." Wondering if Natsu might pick somewhere far, Gray added a hasty, "But Porlyusica will wring our necks if we miss the second half of your assessment, so it you want to leave town, it'd be safer to wait."

Natsu studied Gray's face, trying to pick apart the sentence. Technically, there was no forbidding that they leave town that afternoon, only the suggestion that they not. He clenched the sides of his mug, internally debating over seizing the freedom to do something he shouldn't, and having his health tested properly.

"Lucy's," he finally decided. "I want to break into Lucy's. Through the window."

He still looked like he might burst into tears at any moment, and watched Gray with such fearful expectance. There was no saying no this time.

"We'll work that out. Do you want me to get Happy first?"

Natsu shook his head. That meant going back to the guild, where everyone was talking about how unfortunate it was that he hadn't said anything sooner. They'd all fall silent when he came in, and start asking him how he felt and offering their condolences. People in the back of the room would whisper, not realizing he could still hear them, saying they couldn't believe he was never going to go on a job again.

He was never going to go on a job again.

The shock of the news finally gave way, and Natsu threw his hands over his face to keep Gray from seeing when the tears began to fall.

"Natsu?"

"I can't run!" he said. "I can't run. I can barely use magic. I can't fight anymore. I can't… I can't…"

His head dropped down, hand's moving from his face to rake through his hair as he sank to rest his forehead on the table, shoulders shaking with every sob. Gray reached out to put a hand on his shoulder, planning to say something comforting, but nothing came to mind, and he pulled his hand back.

What was he supposed to say? That it would be alright? Natsu was going to spend the rest of his life under heavy restriction. They both knew it wouldn't be alright. The only honest consolation that came to mind was that he'd get used to it, and Gray didn't think for one second that Natsu wanted to hear that he would have to learn to live with his condition.

Natsu still hadn't lifted his head, and Gray decided to wait until a break in the sobbing to suggest that, at least in the short term, finishing his float might feel good. When Natsu quieted and Gray opened his mouth to speak, however, what he heard himself say was "Let's go down to the beach."

It was an absurd enough statement in the situation that Natsu looked up at him, baffled, and didn't even glance the waitress's way when she brought their bacon meatballs and pancakes. Gray, fumbling to recover from the unexpectedness, said, "I-I mean… I don't have any vacation money set aside right now, but I need to take a job soon anyway so I can save up real quick. Lucy could help when needed while I'm away with work. I'm sure you'd like that. If you don't want to put up with everyone from the guild worrying over you… I know it's mostly me doing that, but it's still a break from everything, right?"

Natsu blinked, slowly, and pushed himself upright. He rubbed his eyes—which were still producing water despite his deepest wishes that they stop—and continued to stare at Gray.

"And if Porlyusica isn't sure about it, we can tell her we're testing how well you handle transport before we take you anywhere riskier. If you have to take it easy, you might as well do it somewhere meant for taking it easy, right?"

Gray continued rambling, going off about beach activities and how it would be nothing at all to build a sand castle or comb for beach glass. Natsu, still staring, picked up his first toothpick-skewered meatball as the waitress dropped them off and placed it in his mouth, trying to focus on the first bit. The part where Gray was going away for a few days and Lucy could take over for him.

He wasn't sure what Gray meant, saying he'd like to be with Lucy. Unless he meant that Natsu would like the break from Gray, and it wasn't really a break if someone else came to take Gray's place as the overbearing caretaker. It did occur to him, vaguely, that Gray might think there was something going on with him and Lucy, and maybe whatever Gray had going with Juvia made him think that, but anyone who saw Natsu's relationship with Lucy as anything more than friends was… Wait a second.

Since Gray was still rambling, Natsu reached forward slowly, grabbed one of the pancakes, and shoved it into the ice wizard's mouth. It was immediately successful in shutting him up. With a break in the chatter to get a word in edgewise, Natsu asked, "Would Juvia come with us?"

Natsu assumed he'd imagined Gray paling when he asked that.

Tearing off what of the pancake wasn't in his mouth and swallowing the rest, Gray said, "No. I don't feel like secretly being groped when I get in the water. Or being dragged off to make out in some secret cove you can't see from the hotel. Or going to wash off and finding her waiting in the tub for me. Or…" He trailed off, realizing Natsu didn't care about all the Juvia-isms that made a getaway so much less of a getaway. "I mean… do you want Juvia there?"

Natsu thought back to their day around town, and shook his head. Gray was doing something special for him, and he didn't want to share the ice mage for that.

"Then no Juvia. How does that sound? We can leave as soon as I can afford a room."

Natsu rubbed his eyes one last time, and managed a smile. "Yeah. It's a date."

-o-

STA: Writing about food is weird for me. I've gone over a year now with eating habits that are vastly different from your standard American diet, and most of the things that I describe people eating are things I wouldn't eat anymore. The meatballs were the only thing in this chapter that aren't off limits to me. I used to love sweets so much that in the absence of candy or deserts, I'd just have a spoonful of sugar, but now I can't relate to liking root beer floats. I do still miss bready things-especially bready things with butter and garlic, but the pancakes almost sounded like an abstract to me.

If any of you get the chance, though, I strongly recommend wrapping meatballs in bacon and throwing them in the over. It is delicious.

Daygon Yuuki: Zeref's added enough emotional baggage to canon tbh. I don't really plan to include him in this one. I mean, I do have an idea for how, but it would vastly shift the plot and make the story more about him and Natsu than Gray and Natsu and… that's just not the story I set out to tell. I definitely have a critical lack of Zeref on my account, though. I think Inhuman and a few drabbles are the only things I've included him in.

Anonymous Person: Yyyyeah. It's a situation that I can't see Natsu realistically taking in stride.