When Gray woke up the next morning, the first thing his sleepy mind noticed was that both his hands were encompassing something warm. He wondered what it could be, so he moved his hands slightly and found that this thing was not only warm, but also soft. And it had fingers. Five, to be exact. The only logical explanation was that it was a hand he was holding. Why was there a warm hand in-between his?

When realization hit him, he jerked awake and snapped his hands back. He sat upright in his bed and stared at Natsu's hand. It had not even been close to Gray's side. In fact it was lying close to the face of the fire mage. While sleeping he had reached over with both hands and had taken the hand of his best friend in his, intertwining their fingers. His heart was racing. He hoped Natsu hadn't woken up since then and noticed what he had done.

The hand of the Dragon Slayer made grasping movements but it didn't find what it was searching for. He let out a disappointed sigh and cuddled his hand up to his face. Then he let out a content sigh and murmured something Gray couldn't understand, try as he might. He couldn't help but smile and continue staring at his sleeping best friend. It was just too cute.

After some minutes, Natsu's cozy dream seemed to be changing into something unpleasant. His facial expression changed from smiling into something sour. He stirred uncomfortably, letting out displeased sounds. Gray wondered what he was dreaming about.

Just a few moments ago he and Gray had been cuddled together, kissing, naked and about to lose their virginity to each other, the person they loved. It had been perfect.

Then a naked woman had entered the room and suddenly the room around them had morphed into something else. Where they had been lying on a comfortable mattress before was now a cold and rough tarred floor. Where there had been white curtains before were now flat tiles and iron chains.

The woman ripped them apart, threw Natsu to the floor and created an iron prison around him. He tried to fight the bars but they were too strong and for some reason he couldn't use his magic. She tied Gray up with handcuffs and inspected his body thoroughly.

"You're already that hard, good boy. This is gonna be fun." She laughed wickedly. Then she strode over to Natsu's cage and eyed him with a conceited smile. He recognized her face. It was Becca.

"And you better watch closely as I make mine what should be yours, Salamander."

He tried to shout, but nothing came out of his mouth. Gray watched in horror as she came closer again. She leaned down and stroked his erection hard and quick. He couldn't hold back a moan but he was glancing over to Natsu in horror. He opened his mouth to say something, but nothing besides moans came out.

Becca slowly lowered herself onto him, positioning herself so that Gray's erection could slide into her without problems. Gray's mouth was wide open in a silent scream for help that never came out. His cock was already touching the sensitive skin-

-when he was slapped hard in the face and jerked awake. He saw Gray sitting on the bed beside him, a worried expression on his face and his flat hand still lifted, ready to slap him again.

"Whoa! Stop, I'm awake!" he exclaimed. His heart was beating rapidly, his body trembling heavily and he had a sour taste in his mouth. He was in sheer panic due to the aftermath of his lively dream. Gray seemed to be relieved that he was awake and lowered his hand.

"You had me worried, idiot. Saying 'no, no, no' and 'hands off' and 'bitch' and some other things that I couldn't understand. I tried to wake you up for some minutes now, but you didn't react on anything and your dream seemed to become more and more uncomfortable, so I figured I'd try to slap you awake if nothing else helped..."

Natsu gulped. He was ready to vomit but he didn't want to do so while Gray could listen, so he tried to control it.

"Thank you... it was a really terrible dream..."

"I could guess. What was it about? Did you dream of being... forced?"

Natsu hesitated. Telling Gray the whole truth was not an option right now... but lying to him was neither.

"So- something like that..."

"Well... whatever it was, it's not real, it's over now."

Gray thankfully didn't push the topic and was trying to comfort him... And in a way he was right; the dream was not real... not yet... it hadn't felt like just any dream. It had felt so real and he had a real bad feeling about this. He would have to be careful. If they ever met that offensive woman again, he wouldn't take his eyes off Gray for one second. He'd protect his mate from whatever harm there was to come. Plus he was greedy. He wouldn't tolerate somebody else touching his mate.

"Yeah..."

Natsu got up from bed and refreshed himself in the bathroom by splashing cool water in his face. He couldn't let the nightmare get the best of him. Plus he already had an idea for the next step of his love plan and he didn't want to let negative feelings get in the way. He straightened himself and went back to the bedroom.

"Hey, ice princess. Yesterday I overheard people talking about a festival in this town. Wanna go there with me today after our work finished?"

Gray eyed Natsu suspiciously. This sounded like a date... again. His heartbeat quickened at the thought.

"When did you overhear that?"

Why couldn't he just say 'yes, let's go'? That was what he originally wanted to answer, but the words just didn't come out like planned.

"Yesterday in the restaurant. A couple was talking about it, it sounded like fun. And it seems like there are many food stalls!"

He sighed. Food, of course...

"So? You wanna go or not?"

"You'll make me go anyway, right?"

A shadow crossed Natsu's face and then he quickly closed the distance between them, hopped on the bed so that he was sitting right in front of him and grabbed Gray's shoulders. He looked right into his eyes.

"Listen... I think you've got the wrong idea of me... Even if I sometimes seem to be inconsiderate about many things and also about the feelings and opinions of my friends... I do care... It's just... not my character to show such things. But I care about your opinion. If you don't want to go, then we won't go, easy as that. So, do you want to go there with me or not?"

Gray's heart was racing uncontrollably and he was sure his face was blushed heavily. Coming from Natsu, this had sounded nearly like a love confession. He gulped and tried to keep his voice steady.

"O- okay... let's go then."

Natsu smiled happily. Then he picked up his clothes and headed to the bathroom again. Before entering, Natsu looked over to Gray one last time.

"I'm looking forward to it, snowflake." Then he closed the bathroom door and Gray was left alone in their bedroom.

He let himself fall back on the mattress, one hand clenched into the fabric over his rapidly beating heart and the other arm covering his eyes. His head spun. Natsu's voice had sounded so genuine. 'I care about your opinion. I'm looking forward to it, snowflake.' He only barely managed to fight back the tears that threatened to well up as realization slowly dawned on him.

"I also don't like to see you cry..."
"I've also run from my feelings way too long and I finally noticed that's not the way to go. I'll act on it, make him fall in love with me."
"Because you're Gray. You're strong, clever, good-looking, charming, funny, sexy, adorable... you're just the type to make somebody fall in love easily..."
"How about we eat dinner at some restaurant today?"
"Nope, we're going alone. You've got a problem with that, popsicle?"
"Somewhere you can spend a nice evening." - "You mean, like a date, eh?" - "Something like that, yeah."
"I swear if she tries something fishy on you, I don't know if I can control myself."

Could it really be true? Was it really him Natsu was in love with? Had Natsu romanced him since... when exactly? Since when was Natsu treating him so kindly? They hadn't fought with each other since they went on this mission together... But while playing Truth or Dare, Natsu had claimed he wasn't sure whether or not he was in love... and shortly after that, Gray had run away, refusing to kiss the Dragon Slayer on his lips... Did he figure it out because of that? Had he been hurt by his refusal?

But then again, he was Natsu. He did all kind of stupid stuff all the time without thinking it was something unusual. But just some moments he had claimed that he was far more considerate than what everybody thought of him. Was Natsu really trying to woo him? If yes, he did a damn good job. If not... well, then he still did a damn good job unknowingly...

Now that the idea of Natsu being in love with him had settled down in his head, he felt the pressing urge to find out if it was true. If it wasn't true... he'd figure out later what he would do in that case... But if it really was true, god would he be happy! He decided that, starting now, he would throw himself into it. He'd take every chance to flirt with Natsu, get closer to him or even tease him.

When he heard the handle of the bathroom door being pulled down, he spontaneously jumped out of bed and stretched his body thoroughly, exposing his muscular body to Natsu while pretending he hadn't noticed that his friend had entered the bedroom. After some moments he heard a chuckle.

"You can use the bathroom when you're finished with your morning gymnastics."

He turned around and saw Natsu leaning against the door frame and watching him with a lewd grin. Shit, that was hot. He wanted to retort, but he couldn't come up with anything. Instead he just blushed, fetched his clothes and strode to the bathroom door, snarled a "pervert" to Natsu in passing, earned an "exhibitionist stripper" in return and slammed the door shut.

He sighed. It was pointless to tease Natsu when he wasn't at all prepared for the reactions and would end up shying away from him. He didn't know what kind of reaction he had anticipated, but Natsu grinning lewdly at him was something he had never dreamed of.

He felt his member grow hard in his pants and cursed under his breath. There was no way he'd jerk off now, with Natsu listening. He would just have to wait until his arousal subsided.

"Hey, ice princess? I'm gonna leave, we're actually a bit late, please don't take too long, I'll tell Erza you'll be there soon."

He heard the door open and close and then the faint sound of somebody running down the corridor. He smirked. Had Natsu smelled his arousal and done that on purpose? Or were they really late? He had completely forgotten to check the watch after he had woken up. He had been too distracted...

Gray stripped completely naked in less than a second and entered the shower cabin. He didn't bother to turn on the water before touching himself - Natsu wouldn't be able to listen anyway. He closed his eyes as pleasure spread in his body and let his back sink against the cold tiles, kneading the sensible tip of his penis. Pre-cum was already leaking, so he spread it around the tip and along the shaft and began stroking up and down slowly. He imagined Natsu doing it.

His daydream quickly evolved into hot sex with the fire Dragon Slayer and he started humping in his hand rather than just stroking himself.

"Naahh... ttsuu... ngghhh..."

After a few more quick movements, he reached his climax, shooting his hot seed against his bare chest and stomach, coating his hand in white sticky fluid.

When his breath had evened out, he took a quick shower and got ready for the day.

But when he arrived at their meeting point, he found only Natsu waiting, smiling apologetically at him.

"Sorry, I misread the clock; you are punctual to the minute."

Then he winked at him. Gray blushed and punched him hard on the shoulder.

That cocky bastard!

They ended up brawling and when the two girls and Happy approached them, Erza beat them up for not obeying her prohibition to fight.

For the rest of their working day she made sure that Natsu and Gray didn't even have the chance to do as much as looking at each other for more than one second.