A/N: I am the worst and I am so sorry.

Over the next few days, Lucy noticed Natsu paying far more attention to her than he had before.

The moment she walked into the guild his gaze would snap straight to her and he'd seem to take a moment to asses her well-being before he'd offer his customary grin and greeting. And throughout the day she'd find him checking up on her.

She wanted to be irritated - she wasn't a child, she could look after herself - but she honestly couldn't be. It felt... nice, having the weight of that concerned gaze on her again. And maybe that was wrong of her. But it wasn't like he was wrong in what he was doing.

Because, while she could hide it fairly well, she wasn't doing as good as she'd hoped she would. It was small things that would get to her. A table crashing as a fight broke out and she would flinch so hard she'd almost fall from her chair. A nakama's voice would call out and all she'd hear were their death screams and she'd have to close her eyes and take a deep breath. Someone would order cooked meat and she'd have to excuse herself for a moment so they wouldn't see her controlling her convulsions.

She was able to hide it from most of them. She was sure Mira had noticed a bit but had decided to just keep an eye on it. The Master might have but she hadn't really spent much time around him just yet.

But Natsu. Every time she had any reaction at all, Natsu was suddenly there and ready to intervene on her behalf if need be. He hadn't asked any questions yet, hadn't demanded to know why she was hurting like this. But he'd obviously made it his mission to protect her where he could.

And she couldn't help but feel warmed by that.

.

.

Their eyes were staring, but unseeing. There was blood, so, so much blood, everywhere.

She could hear Levy screaming behind her, an animalistic noise of grief and pain and rage. Could hear Gajeel trying to hold her back, to calm her as much as he could, to keep her from stepping forward and witnessing the aftermath of the latest battle. She didn't need to see this, didn't need to see them like this, please, Levy.

She'd never heard Gajeel beg before, not ever. But this. It didn't surprise her that he'd beg for this. Because Levy was one of his most treasured nakama, they'd grown to be close friends after a lot of hard work together. And you couldn't really grow close to Levy without growing close to Jet and Droy as well.

Jet and Droy who were currently spread out on the ground, their lifeblood painting the concrete, scattered in pieces. Jet's severed head lay at her feet, his blank eyes staring up at her in seeming condemnation. His mouth hung open, likely to shout a warning to the others, but it had been too late.

They were always too late, lately.

She shoved a hand over her mouth, trying as hard as she could to muffle the sobs. She had to collect the pieces - they were in pieces - had to gather them all together so that they could be properly laid to rest. She had to. Like hell she was letting Levy or Gajeel anywhere near this.

As she steeled herself and began to reach down, she met Jet's dead eyes one last time and saw -

"Lucy!"

She shot up with a gasp, her eyes barely open but already reaching out on instinct. There was a hand on her shoulder and before she'd even thought about it, she had it in a vice grip and was twisting. There was a shout of surprise as she threw her assailant's weight to the ground and straddled atop them, holding them down by their throat.

After a moment of blinking the sleep from her eyes, of blinking Jet's dead face out of reality and back into the recesses of her mind where it belonged, life and color slowly filtered back in and she found herself staring into wide eyes halo'd in pink hair.

"Lucy -" His voice was rough, her hand still wrapped tight around his throat, but it was enough to jolt her fully back into wakefulness. She flinched back, snatching her hand away like she'd been burned even though he'd made absolutely no move to harm her or even throw her off.

"Natsu, oh Mavis, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry -" Lucy could feel her breaths coming in faster, uncontrolled, as she continued to scuttle backwards until her back hit her bed frame. She plastered herself to it, trying to get as far from the dragonslayer as she could. She'd hurt him. She'd hurt Natsu. How could she ever -

"Lucy! Lucy, it's okay, I'm okay!" And he was there, cupping her face in gentle hands, his own face faintly panicked. She couldn't help but flinch back from him again.

"No! I hurt you, I choked you, I could've killed you!"

"You didn't! You wouldn't, Lucy, c'mon, you gotta breathe!" His grip on her face tightened as his own panic began to rise. She hadn't noticed, too focused on self-recrimination, but he was right. Her breaths were coming in in shallow puffs, not nearly enough. Black was dancing across her vision, closing in on the edges and if she didn't get a hold on this she was going to pass out. And Mavis knew how he'd probably react to that.

And so she forced herself to take in a deep breath, tried to hold it to five and made it to three before she had to let it back out. Tried again. Kept her gaze locked on Natsu's, his own panic fading with hers to be replaced by pure concern.

"Lucy?" He asked quietly, hushed in the sudden silence of the room.

"I'm okay," her voice was still a bit breathless, but she was slowly getting it under control. Exhaustion was crashing into her as her breathing evened out and she leaned her head back, resting it against her mattress. She glanced at her clock from the corner of her eye and saw that it was nearing ten o'clock at night. "What are you doing here?"

He was quiet for a moment, seeming to squirm in place before finally admitting, "I wanted to check up on you. After you talked to Shadow Gear you seemed upset. You were really quiet and fidgeted a lot and you didn't even eat anything! You barely said goodbye when you left! So, I thought I'd come see if you were okay."

Lucy considered this for a moment. He had a point. Levy had been, and hopefully would be, one of her closest friends. And after Jet and Droy were killed she became hard. It was like their death ripped away everything that made her, her. There were glimpses every now and then, when she was with Lucy or with Gajeel. But after Gajeel died, there wasn't even that. There was nothing of her left, just an expressionless face and shadow-filled eyes.

It was no wonder she'd had that dream.

"I was having a nightmare," she told him quietly, "and when you woke me up I reacted on instinct. I thought you were attacking me."

His eyes widened in realization before narrowing again, a look of anger on his face. "Who attacked you? To make that an instinct?"

She sat quietly for a moment, surprised once more on just how smart Natsu was. Nobody ever really noticed, it was always hidden behind his hyper, childlike personality and his penchant for rushing in half-cocked and blowing everything up along the way. But he truly was very smart. His sudden leaps of logic were astounding at times.

"A lot of people have wanted me dead," she said after a moment, which was true. Even when she was just the heir of her father's company, people had wanted her dead. "And I was on the road for a year before I met you. A sleeping girl is an easy target, to most."

Which was also true. The first time around she had made sure to take plenty of money with her so that she'd be able to stay under a roof at night, no matter what. This time, while she'd still taken the money, she hadn't much cared about where she slept. Sleep wasn't something she had regularly, plagued by nightmares as she was, and those first few months had been horrible. Nothing she wasn't already used to, but still. A bit different when you don't have other's watching your back; when you don't have anyone to shake you awake when you begin to cry out.

And so she'd spent the majority of that year sleeping just off the side of the road, tucked away behind bushes or nestled in the roots of trees. But her shouting would inevitably draw attention and to most a young blonde and busty girl, crying and shaking from the vestiges of a nightmare, made the epitome of 'easy target'.

Of course they soon all found out that she really, really wasn't.

"And..." she hesitated. She wanted to be honest with him, never wanted to lie to him if she didn't have to. But it wasn't like she could say 'oh, I was involved in an all out war. You wouldn't believe the times I woke up to the sounds of battle to find someone reaching out to slit my throat!' Yeah, no. Maybe she'd tell him the truth, one day. But right now that wasn't possible. "Where I came from, my father, he was really important. Very wealthy. And when you're important and wealthy, you have a lot of enemies. They tried to kidnap me a few times, usually at night."

Thankfully they'd never succeeded. She couldn't imagine her father actually paying a ransom for her.

"Kidnapped?" Natsu demanded. His expression had grown darker throughout her explanation, as if enraged by the very thought that anyone would try to hurt his nakama like that.

Lucy shrugged. "It wasn't a big deal. It happened only about five times."

The first time had been when she was eleven, just months after her mother had died. She'd been terrified when she'd awoken to a strange man holding her down, a cloth held over her mouth. She'd fought as hard as she could, but she'd only been a child, and she'd slipped into unconsciousness fairly quickly. She'd woken up the next day in a different room but still in the mansion, Spetto by her bedside.

She'd learn much, much later - years later, in fact - that she'd unconsciously called on Aquarius that night and that the spirit had been the one to save her. At the time she'd only been thankful to not have been taken. She'd begun to sleep with her Keys within easy reach after that.

"I'm sorry," Lucy's attention snapped back to Natsu as he muttered the apology, his shoulders slumping. "I keep trying to help, but every time I do I just make it worse."

"What?" She asked in surprise. "No, Mavis, no! Natsu, you do help! You helped me to calm down!"

"But if I hadn't woken you up like that, you wouldn't have had to calm down in the first place!" He countered fiercely, his face scrunched up in anger towards himself. "And if I'd given you more warning on the mountain, maybe you wouldn't have reacted so badly then, either."

"Natsu," Lucy sighed before reaching out to ruffle his hair. When he met her gaze again her hand slid down to cup his cheek. "That wasn't your fault, I told you. You had no way of knowing I would react that way. You had no way of knowing how I'd react when you woke me up. That's not your fault."

"But I should," he looked away petulantly, crossing his arms. "You're my partner now, and my nakama, and I should know how to protect you. I should know how not to hurt you."

"Oh, Natsu," she couldn't stop the smile coming to her face at those words if she tried, so she didn't. Instead she leaned forward and wrapped her arms around him, resting her chin on his shoulder. She stayed like that for a moment, until his suddenly stiff posture relaxed once more and he wrapped his arms around her waist. She took the opportunity to snuggle closer and to tighten her grip on him and after a bit of hesitation he did the same.

"You've only been my partner for a few days," Lucy spoke to him quietly as she reached a hand up to stroke through his hair gently. "You can't possibly be expected to know everything about me in that time. If anyone is at fault here, it's me."

"But -" He began to protest, his shoulders stiffening.

"But nothing," she interrupted, her fingers not once pausing as they continued to brush through his pink locks. She could feel him slowly going boneless at the action, as she knew he would. "You're a fire mage. It was pretty stupid of me not to mention that I might have a bit of an adverse reaction to the smell of burning meat. And as your partner you were bound to see me having a nightmare at some point. I should've told you about them, and what to expect."

"...Do you have nightmares a lot?" His voice was small, as though afraid of the answer. Lucy wished she could say no, that she could at least bring him this comfort. But lying about it now wouldn't help anyone.

"Yeah," she whispered, tightening her hold on him briefly, "Yeah, I do. Not all of them are bad. Like the one tonight. I would've woken up scared, or sad, but after a moment I would've been fine. But sometimes..."

She had to let him know. What if she had a really bad one while on a mission with him? That first night with him she'd been able to stifle her screams, to remain quiet, but she couldn't expect that all the time.

"Sometimes, they're really bad, Natsu. Sometimes I'll start screaming, or I'll wake up and not know where I am. I'll call out for people who aren't there and..." she took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "And sometimes I'll hurt myself. I won't know I'm doing it but... but it's happened before. I'll wake up covered in blood, having scratched myself raw."

He'd become tense against her again, his grip on her tightened almost to the point of pain.

"It's... It's okay to wake me up. But you have to be ready to jump away from me, okay? I wouldn't ever hurt you like that when I'm awake, but like that I'm not fully aware yet. I don't know that it's you, and I will attack you like I did tonight. And I could really hurt you, Natsu."

She finally leaned back so that she could look him in the eyes. His face was pained, upset by the very idea that she experienced this kind of pain and there was nothing he could do to help.

"So, if you want to wake me up, that's fine. But you have to be ready to get away from me. You have to, okay? I can't... I can't be responsible for hurting you, Natsu. Okay?"

It took a moment, but slowly he began to nod his head.

"Promise me," Lucy insisted, grabbing his chin so that he had to look her in the eyes. "Please."

"I promise," it was mumbled, quiet, but a promise nonetheless. Lucy felt herself relax again instantly. Natsu didn't make promises he didn't intend to keep.

"Thank you." And then, because she could, she leaned in to wrap her arms around him again. He complied instantly this time, not hesitating to embrace her back, and she smiled at the action. "Thank you."

"Of course. You're my nakama." His tone implied that his statement was the only explanation required and, for him, it probably was.

Still, as her eyes grew heavy and she found herself leaning more and more of her weight against him, knowing that sleep would take her again soon, she couldn't help but feel warmed from the inside out at his care and concern for her.

She didn't dream again for the rest of the night.

.

A/N: This chapter isn't as long as I usually make them, but it's also full of completely original content and nothing from canon so hopefully that balances it out for now. I apparently picked one of the worst times possible to start writing and posting a fic, because my schedule has since then become completely swamped. I had meant to get this posted like a month ago and I've actually had the first part of the chapter written out for even longer. But I honestly just couldn't find the time, and when I could I couldn't find the energy. But I am not, NOT, giving up on this fic. So even if it takes awhile, I will always post a new chapter eventually. I just have to ask that you be patient with me.

Yes, Lucy is meeting Shadow Gear earlier than in canon. Two reasons for this. One, she won't be writing a book for Natsu and the others to find so that can't really be a conversation opener, now can it? Two, this is how the chapter ended up and refused to be written any other way, so that's that.

To everyone that favorited, followed and especially to those who reviewed, thank you so, so much. You are all beautiful and I love you.