3. Hyperthermia
Natsu stormed into Gray's apartment through the window.
His eyes widened at what he saw. His friend's home was nearly empty, having been cleared of most of his belongings. In the middle of the small hall was a pile of neatly packed boxes, no doubt containing the belongings. He clambered down from the window sill and saw Gray turn to face him. They looked at each other wordlessly for a while before Gray averted his gaze and continued arranging some of his possessions into a backpack.
"Gray," he said quietly. When his friend did not even look up, he said louder, "Gray!" And then he wished Warren was here with them now – for the ice mage had merely glanced up briefly, his expression showing clearly what he thought of Natsu's insistence that he answered.
He sheepishly scratched his head. "Uh. Sorry. I forgot you can't talk..."
His friend shot him a I'm-not-surprised look and proceeded to zip up one of his backpack's pockets securely. Natsu frowned and went forwards. "Hey, Gray..." The dark-haired boy tilted his head questioningly. He reached out to close his fingers around the other's wrists. "I – I'm sorry I hit you earlier." He brought his friend's hand up to his chest. "Here, you can punch me back."
As expected, he got a roll of eyes in reply. He chuckled – then staggered back in surprise as Gray's fist connected solidly with his skin. He stumbled backwards at the impact. He rubbed his aching chest gingerly and threw the other boy a faintly reproachful look. "Man, I didn't think you would actually do that."
Gray smirked, his dark sapphire eyes expressing how much of an idiot he thought Natsu was.
He smirked back and promptly crushed his friend to him in a fierce hug. "Thinking of leaving without me?" He murmured in the other's ear. "Not a chance, droopy-eyes." The dark-haired boy began to struggle, trying to break free. He hugged Gray even tighter, restricting his movements. The other boy's skin felt cool. Maybe that was because the other was an ice mage, so he had a lower base temperature. Or it could be because he was a fire mage and his body temperature was higher than the average human's. Either way, he did not think he wanted to let go.
"Erza is going to kill you, you know." He sighed, his chin resting on the other's shoulder. The hands splayed against Gray's bare back started to unconsciously stroke the plane of smooth skin in a comforting manner. He only realised his actions when the boy in his arms stiffened and ice crystals began to bridge the little gap between them, latching on to him. With a yelp he released the ice mage from his embrace. The ice was dislodged and met the wooden floors with a light tinkling sound. He scowled at Gray, who scowled back and waggled a forefinger reprovingly.
Both noticed their scowls lacked conviction.
Natsu rubbed at the chilly areas on his skin. He watched as Gray conjured a solid ice tablet out of thin air in his hand. Before his amazed gaze, letters began to form on the surface of the tablet. His friend was removing ice from the tablet in shapes approximate to the desired letters. The letters spelled out a sentence: I can talk to you better this way.
The dragon slayer grinned inwardly at the other boy's ingenuity. Creation magic, indeed! Trying not to show how impressed he was, he glanced around at the bare apartment and asked, "So, why are you moving out? Where are you going?"
I am going on a journey to become stronger, wrote Gray. His brow was furrowed as he concentrated on etching out the characters on the tablet with his magic.
"How? To become stronger, I mean."
I will train under a dragon.
The fire mage stared at his friend, dumbstruck. "Under a dragon?" He exclaimed. "But there are no dragons in Earthland. They've all disappeared. There's no way you will be able to find one."
Lyon has and he will show me where the ice dragons are.
Natsu shivered a little at the threat behind the words. It looked like Gray was not going to accept a "No" from Lyon. He was taken aback at his friend's answer though. "The dragons are still around? They're alive?"
Yes. Gray's sapphire eyes met his, showing understanding at what he intended to ask. Lyon is now an ice dragon slayer. He has to have trained under a dragon if he is. That is why I am leaving. To find Lyon. After that I will find an ice dragon. The surface of the ice tablet smoothened out. Gray was replacing the ice as there was no space for more words to be etched out. Letters started appearing again after a second or two. If I find out anything about Igneel and his whereabouts, I will definitely tell you.
But Natsu was not too bothered about finding Igneel for right now he was more concerned about Gray. "But in your condition, wouldn't it be dangerous to journey by yourself?"
The ice mage raised an eyebrow and wrote: I can most certainly take care of myself, thank you very much.
He frowned at the sarcastic tone. He did not like what Gray wanted to do. Try as he might, he could not deny that the thought of the dark-haired boy travelling alone in his vulnerable state made him feel exceedingly uncomfortable. He could almost name this unusual feeling as protectiveness. "No, that won't do," he declared. "I'm going with you."
Gray bristled, obviously unhappy with that. No, he wrote. You will stay here. What if Lyon decides to attack again? Who will defend Fairy Tail?
"Erza can handle him!" He argued, although when he met his friend's gaze he knew that they both knew reality was the exact opposite of his claim. The last skirmish with Lyon – only two days ago – proved that. Only Natsu had any hope against Lyon in his ice-dragon form at all. "Or... or Gildarts. We could try and ask him to come back to Fairy Tail – and we have Wendy and Gajeel to help." Just then, he remembered something and his eyes lit up. "Gray, we still have gramps! Gramps can definitely beat Lyon to a pulp."
The ice mage's response to that was so instantaneous that he instinctively opened his mouth to speak, forgetting that he could not. With an irritated glare in Natsu's direction, he shoved the tablet in the fire mage's face, writing, No! Do not bother the master with a trivial issue such as this.
"What?" Natsu demanded, unable to believe his eyes at what his friend was saying. Lyon – trivial? Ridiculous! Erza had been wounded badly and he himself had quite a tough time beating the man. Lyon was a problem that was anything but trivial. But the dark-haired boy looked at him critically through narrowed eyes, as though re-evaluating his opinions on his intelligence.
"What?" He demanded again, this time defensively.
Gray sighed and wrote: What if the dark guilds, or even the Seven Kin of Purgatory, came after us again? Only with Gramps can we defend Fairy Tail, and even then, barely!
He bit his lip. Gray was right. Compared to Lyon, that would be cause for greater concern and needed to be addressed first. Master Makarov needed to conserve his magical power for the critical fights, for the battles that really mattered. If that was the case, then he and Erza would have to be the ones to stay and defend Fairy Tail in the mean time. Gray would have to go on his journey alone.
But he still refused to entertain the idea of his friend playing hide and seek with Lyon and dragons in his current state. He felt uneasy at the thought of Gray wandering around strange lands all by himself. Not to mention if he were to truly find an ice dragon. He knew very well how volatile and temperamental dragons could be, as well as their low tolerance towards humans. Not all dragons were as benevolent as Igneel or even Metalicana, Gajeel's dragon mentor.
"Gray, you do know there is a ninety-nine percent chance that an ice dragon – if you even find one – would kill you rather than take you under its wing, figuratively speaking?" Natsu crossed his arms over his chest and gave the other boy a hard stare. "Most dragons regard us humans as inferior and cannot be bothered to interact with us. Unless you find the dragon that trained Lyon, it's highly unlikely a dragon will consent to train you. Plus, a real dragon is much stronger than a dragon slayer's dragon form. You'll be dead before you could even ask it anything!"
And you know I don't care.
He twitched at Gray's careless reply. His friend did not seem to be taking the consequences of his decision seriously. It was quite unlike the dark-haired teenager, whom he knew to be a sensible person. What's more, his advice was much food for thought as he knew considerably more about dragons than Gray did. But the ice mage seemed unreceptive at the moment. His desire to hunt down and defeat Lyon with his own hands was clouding his mind.
"Well, then, at least bring Lucy or Wendy along. Heck, you could even have Gajeel go with you! As long you aren't journeying alone, anything's fine!"
This I have to do alone.
With that, Gray vanished the ice tablet, signalling the end of their conversation. He watched as his friend went about his packing silently, not meeting his gaze even once. He felt anger growing within him at the other's senseless tenacity. This left him with no choice. Stupid actions of friends required drastic measures – he would have to verbally and physically restrain Gray!
"Gray," he growled. "Stop your idiocy or I'll have no choice but to knock you out and kidnap you back to Fairy Tail!" At that, the ice mage instantly jerked his head up in his direction. A challenge shone in the other's sapphire eyes: I dare you.
Natsu scowled. Gray was really pushing it, wasn't he? It was common knowledge that the dragon slayer would not hesitate to pick a fight with the ice mage – who was both his best friend and arch rival – and vice versa. Though Gray was currently being unusually daft, both mages were more or less equally wilful. Worse case scenario would find their conversation degenerating into a brawl. He did not want that to happen. Not now, anyway.
"At least bring someone along with you," he insisted.
Gray shook his head, pursing his lips. Natsu ground his teeth together, trying not to put a fist through that dim-witted head of his infuriatingly obstinate friend. He was hanging on to the last shreds of his patience. "Gray," he warned. His tone was sinister enough to set bells ringing and get it into his friend's head that he was being deadly serious about this.
The raven-haired boy's response was to raise a scathing eyebrow, shrug on his backpack and saunter out of the hall.
"Damn you, Gray!" Natsu fumed. "You leave me with no other options! You made me do this!" A fiery magic circle expanded around his hand as he prepared to attack. "Wing slash of the fire dragon!" He leapt at the ice mage, his clenched fists and arms trailing plumes of red-hot flames. The temperature of the air in the small hall shot through the roof.
Before his blow landed, however, Natsu saw his friend's face turn pale and his entire body shudder. The black-haired boy swayed unsteadily and then began to topple over backwards, the heavy weight of his backpack too much for his weakened body to handle. Natsu immediately pulled back his punches and caught the other before he hit the ground. Lowering him to the floor, he quickly unstrapped the backpack and roughly shoved it aside.
"Gray!" Natsu said urgently, shaking the boy's shoulders lightly. "Gray, what's wrong? Gray!" His panic augmented as his friend began to murmur unintelligibly. What the hell was going on? Why did Gray just collapse like that without warning? He had not even hit him yet! Then his hand brushed against the other's face and a wave of understanding crashed down on him.
He cursed. This was bad. Hooking his arms under his friend's neck and back of the knees, he lifted the boy up with some effort. He dashed through the hallway. When confronted with the front door, he kicked it down without missing a beat. He had to get Gray to Wendy as soon as possible. He sped through the cobbled streets of Magnolia Town, running as fast as he could with Gray a deadweight in his arms.
Halfway to Fairy Tail, he glanced down at Gray for a quick check and swore. His anxiety mounted. The ice mage was already unconscious, his body limp and his expression slack; his face, neck and arms were flushed. It seemed that the dark-haired boy had been more affected by his battle with Lyon than he let on. It frightened him to think that Gray might succumb to death for real this time, with the injuries he had accumulated and all. He could not let that happen. He would not let his friend slip away this time.
"Hang on, Gray." He tightened his arms around his friend and ran even faster.