Here's to a Chapter 7! Yay 7! Another 7!

Seven is a really important number in Fairy Tail. Lots of sevens in Fairy Tail... Lots of em. I don't really have anything in particular to say other than that I still think Sting is really awesome. Like really awesome. Especially when he has his cheery personality that's similar to Natsu's. That's why I'm going to make sure he's an important character in this story. Because Sting is like a Natsu Dragneel with blond hair. Seriously, after Natsu and Lucy, my favorite character in Fairy Tail has to be Sting.

Natsu immediately turned his attention to his friend Lucy. She looked so helpless. He couldn't help but feel bad for her as she saw how scared she was. With her eyes just barely above the blankets on her bed, Natsu was able to see all the fear that built up within her. He recognized it immediately, it was thunder and lightning she was afraid of. Thankfully he didn't show his Lightning Flame Dragon mode when she was near him. That probably would have freaked her out and scared her into never wanting to see him again.

Slowly he approached Lucy. She could tell he was slowly coming closer but she did nothing to prevent it from happening. After all, even if she wanted to, she was stuck, unable to move, completely petrified. She wanted to hide herself. There she was, looking weak in front of her only friend. But when she thought back a bit, she really looked weak a few times before. In fact, she'd cried in front of him twice in one day. She began to think that Natsu would only see her as a weakling if she kept this up.

When he got to her bed, she tensed up. Here it comes, she thought. She didn't want him to come closer, to see her so weak and vulnerable. She did trust him, but she didn't want him to think that she was emotionally unstable. When he opened his mouth, something completely different from what she'd expect came out of his mouth.

"It's okay, Lucy. I understand, you're afraid of thunder and lightning. Why though?" He gently helped her to sit up so that she'd be sitting next to him and put his right arm around her back that pulled her closer to him and left his hand on her right waist. She leaned her head against his shoulder before she spoke.

"W-when I was y-younger, a-after my m-mother died, I w-would spend lots of t-time alone because m-my dad w-would i-ignore me. When it w-would th-thunder I w-would be r-reminded of h-how lonely I w-was. I h-had n-noone th-there f-for me." It took her almost all of her energy to say that, which wasn't much after the long day she'd been through.

"Well I'm here Lucy! Why would you be afraid of being alone when you got me right here? I won't leave! Promise!" Natsu said, a little louder than he probably should have. At first she shook after hearing how loud he was but she was comforted when she heard the words he spoke.

"Th-thanks, Natsu. I pr-probably look like a w-weak girl who cries over about just anything." Lucy said, feeling sad that her friend probably thought this way of her.

"No way, Lucy! You got fighting spirit, it's really scary! You're just having one of those days! The ones that uh... don't go your way... as the that stripper would say. Damn stripper... he's probably talking trash about me right now. I bet he's making fun of me!" Natsu said, completely changing topics.

"YOU'RE FRIENDS WITH A STRIPPER?!" Lucy asked, no screamed, at Natsu.

"Yeah. That frosty-ass can't learn to keep his clothes on. Every time we go on a mission, he's always losing them. He doesn't even know when he does either. His real name is Gray, but I usually call him snow cone or popsicle or ice freak or frosty ass or or or..." Natsu began thinking of more nicknames he had for the ice mage until Lucy cut off his train of thought.

"Why do all of his nicknames involve cold things?"

"Well his magic is Ice-Make, so he can make just about anything that doesn't move from imagination. He's got another friend or rival or something that makes moving stuff but not the still things like snow cone." Natsu explained.

"And what'd you say about missions? Are they like jobs?"

"Yeah, I guess you could say that. We accept requests and do them for money. I usually go with Happy, stripper, and Erza."

"Erza's the really scary lady you keep telling me about right?"

"Yeah, she's super powerful and if you make her angry she will punish you. She always stops stripper and me from fighting too which is annoying. But one day, I'm going to beat her! I SWEAR TO IT! Yeah and don't touch her cake either, she flips if you do." Natsu said.

"Wow, so you've got quite an interesting group of friends, I'd love to meet them." Lucy daydreamed about meeting Natsu's friends, wondering how they'd react to a person who didn't use "magic".

"Oh yeah they're all really nice, like family. Actually now that I think about it, I didn't say bye before leaving Earthland."

"Did they know you were coming here?"

"Nope."

"So they're probably worried that you're lost or something? What if they thought you died? Did you have a girlfriend? I bet she'd miss you."

"No, I don't have a girlfriend, and no don't worry, they think I'm off on some really long mission that's far away. Actually I was supposed to leave for it the day I ended up coming here, so they won't suspect a thing."

"What about the mission?"

"Ah, it'll be okay. The client will probably just hire someone else. After all he didn't give us much of a way to speak with him letting us know we accepted the job. All there was was an address for a town on the other side of the country."

"So you're going to stay?" Lucy asked, cheerfully, hoping that he'd say yes.

"Of course, I'm not going anywhere for a while!" Natsu said.

"Awesome!" Lucy responded before hugging Natsu.

"So tell me Natsu, what's life like in Earthland..." Lucy asked.

For a while, Natsu described his life in Earthland. Lucy knew the general story of how he was orphaned and found Igneel before ending up at Fairy Tail, but she wanted to know what Natsu's life was like. She had never known someone with magical capabilities and it was all a shock for her, after all, she probably only knew a handful of people personally. As Natsu explained his stories of his foster father teaching him his magic, she began to wonder what it was like to possess magic. Natsu would tell her stories of how he'd beat up tons of people with his fire and how they stood no chance against him. That, she could believe. Eventually, Natsu got to a part about his guild-mate, Laxus Dreyar.

"So about a year ago, Laxus tried to take over Fairy Tail. Luckily, we managed to stop him, but it still didn't excuse the damage he caused to our town and the guild. So the master expelled him. Though he ended up returning a short time later, thanks to a friend of mine, Gildarts Clive. He's like the strongest mage in the guild, and he and I are really close. I swear I'm going to beat him one day! Anyways, with Gildarts and me pleading to Gramps, he finally gave in and let Laxus back into the guild. As a reward, Laxus gave me the ability to use Lightning Dragon Slayer magic along with my Fire Dragon Slayer magic."

"L-lightning Dragon Slayer Magic?" Lucy asked, remembering her fears.

"Oh yeah, forgot about that. Would you like me to show you?" Natsu said.

Lucy glanced over at her clock and read the time, 11:30pm? Wow! She's been talking to Natsu for three hours!

"You remember I'm afraid of lightning right?"

"Yeah, but you're not afraid of me, right? I'd never hurt you! I promised! So my lightning shouldn't scare you at all!" Natsu said with a big grin.

Lucy was convinced when Natsu said it was his lightning and that he promised not to hurt her. After all, among the many things she learned about Natsu, the most important was that he'd protect his friends with everything he's got.

"Let's go back to that alley we were at earlier, since it's close to your house." Natsu said.

"How about you just show me in the bathroom, there are no smoke detectors in that room."

"Ok then!" Natsu walked to the bathroom and Lucy followed him in. Then, Natsu began to cover his body in flames.

"I thought you were supposed to show me your lightning dragon slayer magic" Lucy asked.

"Well I can't use it without my fire. It's more of a boost to my fire than anything. I can't use lightning on its own, I have to have the fire." Soon enough, he was completely covered in flames. And then it happened, the sound of electricity filled the room. Natsu's fire was cloaked with lightning.

"Woah that's... so awesome! How come you didn't use this against Dan?"

"Well I don't have unlimited magic power, and having the lightning just makes me drain it faster. Plus Dan was waaaay to weak for me to need to use my lightning."

"Can I feel it? Or is it dangerous?"

"It's not dangerous, just not as good feeling as the fire."

Lucy put her and against Natsu's arm and couldn't help but agree. Surely, Natsu's lightning didn't feel as good as his fire. It was fuzzy feeling, not calm and soothing like the fire.

"Yeah I can't help but agree, I like when it's just the fire more. But when you have both it's more powerful, so I guess that's why you use it."

Natsu extinguished his flames and walked back to Lucy's room. Then she remembered, they had school tomorrow.

"Hey Natsu? You know we have school tomorrow, right?"

"Yeah why?" Natsu answered.

"You know it's the middle of the night, right?"

"Yeah, though I'm not so upset, why?"

"Shouldn't you go to sleep soon?"

"Well I was having a lot of fun spending time with you that I forgot about that. But I guess so. I'll see you tomorrow." Natsu said as he headed for the door.

"Yeah, I guess so. See you tomorrow!"

As Natsu opened the door, Lucy saw that was still raining. She was glad there was no more thunder but she didn't think she'd be able to handle it if the thunder came back and Natsu wasn't here. And she definitely wanted to get some sleep.

"Actually, Natsu you should probably stay, it's really wet outside and I don't want you to ruin your clothes."

"Well it's okay, I can use my flames to dry myself off."

"But if you get a cold outside I don't think I'd be able to forgive myself."

"Fine, I'll stay, since it'd make you sad if I didn't." That was partially the truth. Yeah, Natsu wanted to stay to make Lucy happy, but at the same time Natsu would have done anything to stay. He loves her house, because it meant more time with his best friend Lucy. That and he absolutely loved the smell... vanilla, his new favorite smell.

"Here you can take the bed, I can sleep on the couch." Lucy said.

"No way! You can have the bed." Natsu said.

"Well are you going to sleep on the couch then?"

"I'll figure something out Lucy."

With that the two got ready for bed. Lucy was already in bed while Natsu was brushing his teeth with one of the spare toothbrushes Lucy had in case she went traveling. When he finished he crawled into bed next to Lucy.

"Natsu, what do you think you're doing?"

"Going to sleep, what does it look like?"

"I thought you said I could have the bed though."

"I did say that."

"So why are you in my bed?"

"Well because it's comfortable and smells a lot like you." Lucy blushed at Natsu's second reason for staying in her bed. Does she really smell good? She never noticed it. But still, he was in her bed and she only knew him for a day, so she had to kick him out.

"Get out! Natsu get out!"

"But Lucy! It's so comfortable and smells soooooooo good!"

Just then thunder once again shook the house and Lucy's entire body jumped. She completely forgot her argument with Natsu and was filled with fear. Natsu ended up putting his arms around Lucy's waist and falling asleep. Lucky for him, Lucy was totally consumed by fear. It was comforting to know he was here, but at the same time, she was going to kill him in the morning. For now though, she's going to enjoy his company. It's not like he was trying to pull anything perverted on her.

"Night Lucy." Natsu said in his sleep.

"Night Natsu."

With that, Lucy fell into a calm and relaxing sleep.