Wow!
I didn't know so many people would review!
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Natsu held back a sneeze as he had his arms out at a perfect ninety degree away from his body, the dressmaker muttering measurements to herself.
"Hold still, dumbass!" Evergreen growled up at the fidgeting prince from around the multiple pins in her mouth. "If you want to impress the maidens coming tonight, you'd better sit still before I rip your balls off and staple them to your forehead!"
Natsu shivered in fright under her frightening glare. Evergreen was a scary woman, especially since she had this ability to make her glares so impossibly powerful, it made anyone freeze in fear like stone.
Natsu hissed lowly when she pinned a piece of red cloth too tight around his chest.
"Too much?" Evergreen asked, flicking some caramel brown hair out of her eyes.
"I can't breathe!" Was his wheeze of a response.
Sighing, Evergreen pushed her glasses up her nose before continuing on to his pants. Men. They had absolutely no pain tolerance.
After another two hours of Natsu standing there bored to his death - he tried to sing to keep himself entertained but when Evergreen threatened to shove a pin up his ass he shut up - he was finally released from the warden's - ah, Evergreen's, hold.
Natsu rotated his arms and neck, his shoulders and back awfully sore.
"Natsu-sama,"
Natsu stopped at his name and turned to frown at the bowing servant, a nice young boy named Romeo.
"Romeo," Natsu groaned. "You know I hate that."
"R-Right," Romeo stuttered in embarrassment, straightening his spine. "Um, lunch is rea - "
He didn't even get to finish his sentence, for Natsu had taken off down the hallway at the word 'lunch'.
"... dy." Romeo sighed.
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Lucy was sobbing hysterically as the ambulance arrived.
"Ma'am, we need to take the girl!" One of the men shouted as he tried to tug Lucy's arms away from Wendy.
"B-But - She - " Lucy sputtered, her eyes and cheeks swollen red.
"Ma'am, your sister will be fine," a woman came up, before starting to stretch on some gloves. "Alright, someone get a stretcher over here!" She shouted behind her.
The next hour was absolute torture for Lucy. It was chaos, a mix of bright colors and the sirens.
All Lucy could remember was clutching onto Wendy's hand tightly, the flash of white walls, and that horrible smell only hospitals seemed to obtain.
There was one vivid memory. As they wheeled Wendy away, Lucy became hysterical once more, screaming and fighting against several doctors and nurses as she tried to reach her sister.
Finally, she calmed down, and for the next five hours she was in dispair as Wendy underwent surgery.
"Miss Heartfilia?"
At the sound of her name,Lucy's head shot up. "Y-Yes," she stuttered, her voice slightly raw from all of her crying and screaming. "That's me."
The doctor nodded and smiled gently at her. "I'm Doctor Rogue Cheney, but just Rogue is fine. As of now, your sister is in stable condition."
Lucy felt her heart finally start to beat, and she let out a large gasp of relief.
"However."
That made Lucy snap her head up once more.
"There were some difficulties. Three ribs were cracked, and one of them completely out of place. It punctured her lung, and she will have to be on life support for a few months. She's also lost a lot of blood, but hopefully, with care and lots of fluids, she will recover the blood lost. Moving on, her chest was widely gashed along with her right leg. Her left ankle is broken, and her shoulder was out of place so we had to pop it back in. The last thing is the problem with her radius. That is, her arm. The bone was not fractured, but was actually shattered. We will have to surgically insert a metal rod in order for her to use her arm fully again." Rogue's ruby eyes stared at her, a small frown tugging at his lips. "It is your wish, Miss Heartfilia."
"Yes. Yes, please." Lucy breathed, brushing away the few tears that had once again sprang up. "Do anything you can to help her. Please." She whispered the last part, and her brown eyes widened. "She's the only one I have left."
Rogue nodded, and determination filled his face. "We will do our best, Miss Heartfilia. Meanwhile, I reccomend you return home and come back tomorrow. We will be finished with the operation by then."
Although Lucy was horrified at the thought of leaving Wendy behind, she nodded anyway, and sent Rogue a watery smile.
She stumbled to the elevator, her hand slightly shaking as she pressed the button that said 'lobby'.
Lucy leaned against the metal wall, her heart racing. She took in large gasps of air, trying to control herself, but immediately regretted it after. That sickening hospital smell consumed her, and Lucy wiped away a few more tears before stepping out of the elevator.
She walked home that night in the dark, and she stopped suddenly. A group of girls dressed as sparkly and frou-frou-y as they could rushed past her, the sound of their giggles ringing in her head.
She wondered what on earth they were up to, and eager to do something other then grieve over Wendy, she followed them.
Finally she saw where they were headed.
With eyes wide, she stared up in awe at the magnificent castle where the royal family lived.
Lucy didn't know much about the king and prince, despite her mother teaching her and Wendy when they couldn't afford school.
All mother said was that, 'King Igneel is a generous man, Lucy. I don't doubt that he will bring our lands to happiness.'
Lucy's eyes wandered over to the group of girls she followed, before frowning when she didn't see them anywhere.
Frowning, she glanced over at a flyer attached to a nearby telephone pole.
She read it, and finally understood the commotion.
Prince Natsu was looking for a bride.
Lucy briefly wondered why on earth anyone would get married at such a young age, but she shook it off and looked up at the sky.
It was late.
She should get home and sleep to see Wendy tomorrow.
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"Next," Natsu grumbled, leaning his cheek against a hand.
The girl sitting across him burst into tears before running out of a nearby door.
"Oi, you should actually give them a chance, flame brain." Gray snapped from behind him.
"Shut it, ice princess. Why do I have to do this anyway?"
Gray blinked at him before throwing his hands up in the air from exasperation and disbelief. "YOU'RE the one who did this, dumbass!"
"... Oh yeah. I forgot."
Natsu groaned and laid his head on the plastic white table. "Just go get me some food, ice cube."
Gray stomped away to get said food, muttering under his breath about 'stupid prince' and 'why do I even work for that asshole?'.
Natsu laughed at his friend's misery, before the door cracked open once more.
As soon as the busty, beautiful brunette sat down in front of him, any trace of a smile was wiped off of his face.
Let's get this over with.
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The next few days was a complete wreck for Lucy.
It was the same routine over and over again.
Get up at sunrise, feed the pigs and check the hens, make sure no one was eaten because of a fox (this happened once and Lucy had to clean up the mauled body of a chicken), collect brown eggs from the chickens, and so on and so forth.
It's been a week since Wendy was admitted to the hospital, and finally Lucy felt some hope squirm into her heart. Doctor Rogue had said that she was starting to recover and that all of the surgeries were successful.
Lucy dug up another potato, smiling. They were looking good today, and could maybe get her some extra money when market day came.
She tucked each brown vegetable into a sack, until three out of five of them were full.
"Ugh," Lucy groaned as she dragged two over to the house and leaned them against a wall. She took a moment to breathe before straightening up and digging up potatoes once more.
Lucy raised her eyes to the sky, blinking at the beautiful blue with no clouds in sight.
"Just a few more hours and I can go see you, Wendy." She muttered to herself, reaching down to brush some dirt off of another potato. She wiped her forehead to get rid of the sweat, not bothering to clean the dirt off her skin. "Just a few more..."
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Natsu was in absolute hell at the moment. The last seven days he had been frantically searching for a not unicorn girl who he could live the rest of his life with without too many complaints. And the result? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
The prince decided that he was going to hold one more party in hopes of finding that not-too-annoying girl. Deciding that he was way too tired to even think about going to do those stupid royal lessons ("NATSU! YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO READ THE BOOKS, NOT BURN THEM!"), he didn't even look at his regular fancy schmancy attire and instead pulled on his most comfortable clothes.
An open black vest with golden trimming which let his arms move freely, baggy white pants that actually let him walk like a normal person instead of a penguin, and some sandals that didn't pinch his feet.
"Yo! I'm going out for the day!" He shouted around the hallway while he exited his room.
Knowing that some person had heard him, Natsu held a boyish grin on his face as he strolled out of the castle grounds and took a step in the city of Magnolia.
Natsu took an hour to run around from place to place, trying delicious foods and avoiding the press.
As Natsu gulped down some deep fried butter on a stick, his sensitive nose picked something out.
It was weird, and made his face scrunch up in confusion. The air was filled with all sorts of smells. Car exhaust, fresh veggies, and the small tint of fish from the market place.
But that wasn't what made him so bewildered. It was vanilla... He took another sniff. And strawberries? What? Strawberries weren't in that season, and he wasn't even close to an ice cream shop to smell the vanilla.
Feeling the excitement of an adventure bubble in his chest, he quickly ate the rest of his butter and followed the trail.
It made him walk for thirty minutes, but he didn't mind.
As he kept walking, the tall buildings and numerous cars thinned out, until eventually he was walking by a single deserted road with no other signs of life.
But he kept pressing through, until finally - finally! - he made it to what seemed like a very large farm.
His jaw dropped as he stared at the endless rows of fields, and he slid down the grass hill to take a closer look.
That vanilla and strawberry smell was getting stronger, so he teared his eyes away from fresh stalks of corn and continued to follow the stench.
His onyx eyes eventually landed on a girl crouching beside a row of potatoes, digging one up before putting it in a bag.
He wondered why a girl with yellow hair would be working so hard, but all thought flew out of his head when he saw the freshly picked strawberries.
Abandoning his stealthiness, he pounced on them, eating them happily. They were so sweet and delectable, not like anything he's tastes back at home.
"Y'know, these are pretty good," he said to the girl who had her back to him, popping another fruit into his mouth.
What he didn't expect was for her to suddenly scream, and he held his ears in pain. She jumped to her feet and whirled around, a bag clutched tightly in her grip.
"Who are you?!" She barked, brown eyes furious while backing away slowly.
Natsu shrugged, just thankful for the screaming to have stopped. "Natsu," he grinned, reaching down to pick another strawberry. "The name's Natsu Dragneel."
"That's stealing, you ass!" She shouted, stomping her foot childishly.
"But it's so good!" Natsu whined, eating another.
"You... You..." She sputtered. "Leave before I - I - hit you with my sack!"
They both paused, and the girl's face heated up in embarrassment while Natsu burst into laughter.
"I didn't mean it like that!" She swung the bag around in her hand wildly. "I mean it! Leave before I call the police!"
Natsu suddenly paused. He tilted his head slightly to the right, and stared at her. She had dirt smeared over half of her face, hr hair was a mess, and she was threatening him with a potato sack. A grin started to form on his lips. Perfect.
The girl lowered her bag slightly and glared at him, before nervously asking, "W-What? Stop staring at me you per - "
"Wanna get married?"
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Lol I just imagine Natsu saying that when he tries to propose to someone.
The next chapter will be out soon, so watch out for that.
Anyway, please review!
PEACE!