Author's Note:

Hello all! Gosh, it's been FOREVER since I posted... I'm so sorry for making you all wait so long for part three in the 'Princess and the Arsonist,' 'Runaway and the Rebel,' trilogy. I wanted to get this out spring of last year, but... well... life happened. I was working on this story as well as my own novel (amongst purchasing and moving into our first house), and let's just say that I ran into a little thing called 'burnout' for the first time.

For any writers who are reading this, if you haven't experienced burnout yet, please don't take it lightly. That stuff is no joke. It'll steal more than your lunch... it'll suck all the joy out of your life, and in my case, it literally stole my ability to write. I'd heard about burnout before, but I had no idea that it could do that. By the end of it, I could barely string a single sentence together... I mean seriously, talk about a nightmare. (┬┬﹏┬┬)

But anywho, enough about that. Things are better now, and I've finally got this story ready to post! I'll try to put up a new chapter every weekend, and I really hope you all enjoy it. ;D

Buckle up for a fun, hyjink filled ride... with a couple big surprises down the road. On with the show!

Oh, and obviously I don't own Fairy Tail... otherwise I wouldn't be posting this story here. XD

"… Oh yes, that's perfect. Uh-huh… no, maybe five more crates of flour. That would be great. Thanks so much."

Currently, Lucy was finishing up what felt like the hundredth lacrima conversation she'd had that day, making sure that all the relief efforts she had helped set up in Pyracantha were running smoothly.

Ever since she returned home from Balsam a few weeks ago, the celestial mage had definitely been more heavily focused on organizing assistance programs for the kingdoms in need under Fairy Tail's protection. Her little tour through the island of 'nope' (specifically Eisenwald's slums) had really lit a fire inside her to get their plans into action as fast as possible.

Luckily, the trickiest part had simply been laying out the groundwork with Warren, but after a lot of initial headaches and late nights, they'd been able to create a format that they could work off of. Obviously it still required plenty of hard effort – which included a visit or two to the kingdoms in question and WAY too many lacrima phone calls – but thanks to their strategy and Warren's network, things were going smoothly.

So far, they'd managed to help out two different kingdoms. Of course, Lucy had wanted to start with Balsam and Lampro Capnia, but she'd restrained herself and tackled the kingdoms on Master Makarov's list in order of highest priority. And it was a good thing she had… because the ones they'd ended up assisting had been much worse off than the other two. Like Pyracantha for example; they were having to arrange for an enormous amount of burn creams and healing ointments to be provided for that kingdom, thanks to Queen Azula burning down half the castle city.

"Uh-huh… yes. Oh good! So, you found a supplier for aloe vera and plumeera sea-blooms? Excellent, those were the only ingredients we were missing; now we can have the potions mass produced," she sighed with relief as their contact gave her the good news. That was something they'd been stressing over for the past several days.

Her conversation with them lasted a few more minutes after that as they discussed a couple other items on the to-do list, but soon enough, it was over (much to her relief). Lucy groaned as she hung up the lacrima phone, stretching and feeling her back pop in several places. "Alright, that just about does it. I think we're all set."

"Good job, Angel," Warren congratulated.

She blushed and laughed, a little embarrassed whenever someone used her new codename. "I still can't believe that's what stuck. It makes me sound so… I don't know, full of myself."

"No it doesn't! You're running the relief program. It totally fits."

"Sure," the celestial mage huffed and rolled her eyes. "If you say so… but it's going to take me a while to get used to."

He laughed and shrugged, quipping about how that was the case for a lot of the Fairy Tail members who hadn't picked out their own codenames, and Lucy chuckled along with him.

This wasn't the first time they'd talked about this, and she snorted, remembering some of the amusing things she'd learned about her guildmates. Apparently, Gray thought 'Silver' was too fancy, Gajeel complained that 'Iron Fox' made him sound like an old horndog, and Bixlow wanted something more creative than 'Seith.'

"Well, anyways, I'm glad we were able to get this all set up. Now, I don't have to worry about anything while I'm on my mission," she stated once they'd finished joking around.

"Oh yeah, you're heading out this evening, right? Who else was going with you again?"

"Natsu, Happy, Wendy, and Carla."

Warren grimaced and leaned back in his chair. They'd set up a little desk for her in the guild's communications center – a medium sized office off the work hall – and Warren's much-larger desk sat across the room from hers.

"It must be a doozy if they're having Wendy and Carla tag along. I guess it's an emergency situation?"

"Yeah, the mission came in yesterday," Lucy agreed in a solemn tone of voice. "It's pretty urgent. According to the brief, there's a group of wild monsters that are ravaging Heath Star village in Bryophyta Kingdom. The kingdom's guards have already abandoned them for dead, and the villagers are barely hanging on. There's a lot of casualties... I just really hope that Wendy can save some of them while we hunt down the baddies."

"Ohhh… yikes… that's rough. Good luck," he offered with another sympathetic wince, and she nodded gratefully.

"Thanks. See you when I get back."

After saying goodbye, she left and headed out to the guildhall, planning to get lunch. Her bags were already packed and ready for the short trip, so all she had to do now was fill her stomach and wait for her friends to arrive.

When she got to the bar, Brandy was there, and Lucy joined her old friend with a big grin. "Hi, Brandy! How are you doing today?"

"Oh, good. And you?"

"Busy…" Lucy sighed as she sat next to the greenette.

"As usual."

The celestial mage cringed slightly and quickly apologized. "Yeah… sorry we haven't been able to hang out much lately."

Brandy just shrugged, seeming unconcerned. Ever since joining, she'd spent most of her time lazing about in the guildhall or around town… aside from one mission that the greenette had taken a week ago. She'd completed it with flying colors, and Lucy had been so proud of her friend when everyone complimented the size-mage on her cool and powerful magic.

Meanwhile, all the extra work with the relief efforts had sucked up a lot of Lucy's time, and she still had her own training regimen and star charting to do on top of that. So, even though she tried to make sure and catch up with Brandy and her other guildmates whenever she could, she hadn't been able to visit with everyone as much as she would've liked.

Luckily, her greenette friend had very quickly made other friends here in Fairy Tail – which meant that Lucy didn't feel too badly about leaving Brandy to her own devices more often than not.

And speaking of…. "By the way, I heard from Levy that you've been hanging out with Cana a lot lately," she commented with a smile.

Brandy's lips quirked up slightly on one side in a nearly imperceptible grin of her own. "Yeah, we've been playing cards and drinking. It's fun… you should join us sometime."

"Thanks for the invitation! That does sound relaxing… I'd love to take you up on it."

"Sure, anytime. You could probably use a chill girl's night after the crazy stuff you've been up to lately."

"Definitely," Lucy groaned and nodded dramatically, pulling a small chuckle out of Brandy.

"That sounds fun! We should all get together sometime soon!" a new voice chimed in, coming from the white-haired woman who appeared out of nowhere in front of them behind the bar.

The celestial mage yelped and tipped on her stool for a second, almost losing her balance. "Woah! Mira! Sheesh… you nearly made me fall out of my seat! How do you always pop up out of nowhere like that?"

"It's just one of my many talents!"

Lucy snorted at the response and rolled her eyes. She was a little annoyed that Brandy hadn't batted an eyelash, while she'd practically jumped out of her skin.

"Well… anyways… yeah, I think it'd be fun to have a girl's date of some sort with everyone. We'll need to put that on the calendar," she huffed after a moment, mostly amused but still slightly ticked off.

Mira nodded and agreed enthusiastically before suddenly changing the subject. "Absolutely! But setting that aside for now… Lucy, you're about to leave on the mission to save Heath Star village, right? Would you like something to eat before you go?"

"Oh, right! That would be fabulous. Thanks, Mira."

"Coming right up!"

The white-haired woman disappeared into the back again to gather together a plate of whatever food she'd prepared today.

After she was gone, Brandy asked, "Do you think your newest keys are going to come in handy?"

"I don't know… maybe. I've only had Horologium for a little while, and I'm still not sure what all his pocket watch is capable of."

Lucy had made that contract a week ago. She and Natsu had used the last of her mother's keys to open their way to the celestial realm, and everything had gone as usual… though there wasn't anything 'usual' about the place they'd exited into. Even for celestial realms, Horologium's world had been a truly surreal space. With platforms and stairs floating in every possible direction and arrangement – upside down, right side up, sideways – the only sense of direction they had was gravity. Ornate lamps of all kinds floated along through the air as well, providing warm gold illumination for the crazy place that looked right out of Alice's wonderland or a mad labyrinth painting.

It could have easily made her anxious, except everything was so fantastical and eccentric that she'd been amused, amazed, and curious instead. However, there was still a downside… namely that the room's layout hadn't just been for show. They'd wandered around, exploring the impossible maze in greater detail, and quickly discovered that there was no obvious way out.

For the first hour, poking around and hunting for the exit and/or solution had almost been fun, especially with Natsu cutting up at her side and literally bouncing off the walls. But then it had started to become monotonous, and Lucy had grown more and more worried that they were doing something wrong. Since there were no clues how to pass the trial, the best theory she'd been able to come up with was that Horologium was either testing her patience or her cunning… 'and if it had been my intelligence on the line, I would've been up a creek.' At that point, she hadn't had any idea how to solve the maze or if there even was a way to solve it.

Luckily, her first guess had turned out to be the right one, and after what felt like hours of persistence (and several temper tantrums from Natsu), they'd finally met the spirit of that realm.

He had appeared out of nowhere. One minute there was nothing, and then suddenly an earsplitting gong had sounded as a massive clock popped into being next to them. The face and pendulum hung in midair, free of any sort of frame, while gears floated around it, turning and clicking in an almost ominous way. Of course, none of that had compared to its monstrous size… they could have easily sat on one of the hands as though it was a bench.

Both Natsu and Lucy had gaped at the thing for a few moments, and when the pendulum abruptly bent up, twisted, and landed on the same platform they were standing on, the two of them had stumbled back in alarm. Thankfully, rather than attacking them somehow like they'd halfway expected, it just morphed into a man.

He was naked when he first transformed – letting them see that he still seemed to be largely mechanical, with plenty of golden metal parts and smooth brown skin that looked almost like living wood. But he'd quickly snapped his fingers, and a sharp tux had covered his cyborg-esque body. A chain had still connected him to the gargantuan floating timepiece, though after a moment, it'd shrunk down and turned into a pocket watch, which he caught neatly in his hand.

The way he smoothed back his black hair and clipped the watch to his pocket had come off as practically 'dapper'… if Lucy had needed to pick a word for it. Then, he'd fixed them with his mix-matched eyes (one red and one a golden, glowing clockface) and politely greeted them. "Hello, it's a pleasure to meet you finally. My name is Horologium, and congratulations on passing my first trial."

Of course, Natsu had blown a gasket and fussed about how long and boring wandering around had been, and Lucy had laughed when Horologium replied with, "It's a good thing that you aren't the one who's trying to make a contract with me. Your patience is a little lacking."

"He's right!" she'd agreed, and after a little more griping from her partner, they'd soon moved on to the other trials Horologium had concocted for them.

In the first test, the clock spirit had asked them to cook multiple dishes simultaneously, which required an insane amount of time management. The kitchen they'd ended up in had also reminded Lucy of something out of Alice in Wonderland, with crazy otherworldly ingredients and fantastical kitchen gadgets of all shapes, sizes, and colors… not to mention the insane recipes.

That was one trial that they had to attempt several times before they managed to pass, and every new attempt came with new recipes, so there was no getting used to it. At least Horologium was nice enough to let them take breaks and eat some of the food in between rounds.

Next up, once they'd finally finished their stint in the kitchen, their task master had challenged them with a timed obstacle course. It'd started with a wide pool of water, where they had to jump from rock to rock to get across… but of course all the rocks immediately began sinking as soon as they'd leapt to the first one. The stony protrusions sank at different rates though, and if Natsu or Lucy got wet at all, they had to start over from scratch.

Naturally, her athletic partner had aced the challenge without any problems, but she didn't quite make it the first time around, thanks to getting stuck on a quickly sinking foothold. She passed on the second try, however, and they had gone on from there… into a room that quickly sealed shut and began to fill with thick, black oil. A puzzle had sat in the middle of the room on a pedestal, and she'd needed to solve it before the dark liquid reached the top of the puzzle's stand.

Adrenaline and a quick heartrate had made her fingers tremble slightly, but somehow, she'd managed to complete the puzzle in the nick of time. And as soon as the last piece had slid into place, the oil disappeared – thankfully – and a door had opened for them.

Then, they had entered the last room of the trial, which had been yet another puzzle. However, that one had been underwater, and they'd been forced to dive down and hold their breath while they worked on solving it. Even trickier, the puzzle had involved moving two large marbles along a track, so it'd taken both of them to complete it, and whenever they came up for air, the marbles had slowly reverted… making them lose some progress every time.

By the time they were done, the two of them had been red in the face and wheezing. Though, on the plus side, the water had washed them clean of leftover oil.

It had been a relief to leave that room, especially when the exit had spit them out in the most normal-looking room so far, where Horologium had been sitting at a table sipping tea and waiting for them.

"Oi! What the heck was up with that last trial?! It was a huge pain in the butt!" Natsu had immediately complained loudly, and the clock spirit had chuckled.

"Indeed. I'm sure it was. But it also served as a perfect illustration to show how precious time is, don't you think?"

Lucy had had to agree with him, and even Natsu had grudgingly admitted that, yes, it'd definitely done that. But both of them were very happy when Horologium had said, "Congratulations are in order… you have cleared my trial, Lucy of Fairy Tail. I would be pleased to form a contract with you now."

Of course, she'd eagerly accepted his offer, and unsurprisingly, his vessel had turned out to be his pocket watch – which he'd held out for her to touch.

The blast of power that'd gone through her then had been one of the most insane so far. It had almost felt like an infinite galaxy had opened up in front of her, showing her the true enormity of time… thousands of years passing in an instant, and a mere second seeming to take eons. Horologium's magic had turned the universe into an impossible origami project that was ever expanding and folding in on itself, and the contradiction had made Lucy's head hurt.

She wasn't surprised that she'd come out of the experience dizzy as heck, but it'd been worth it. Now, she had a contract with the time spirit, and despite not fully knowing what all his vessel could do yet, she was able to tell it had a huge amount of potential.

"I thought you'd already figured it out," Brandy drawled, cutting into her thoughts. "Didn't you just tell me the other day that you used it in some kind of experiment with fruit or something?"

That was true. For several days after receiving it, Lucy had tested Horologium's pocket watch against a lot of things (including a strawberry), and she'd finally had success after some trial and error. It could speed things up or slow them down, as well as make time go forwards or backwards… and in the case of the fruit, she had made it go from a flower to a rotten blob and then back again, over and over several times.

But that wasn't exactly what she'd been referring to.

"Right, yeah, I generally know how to activate the power and use it now, but I haven't really been able to figure out all the ways I can apply that power. It definitely seems like it could be useful in a lot of different situations. For example, I could probably repair something that was broken by rewinding its time… but I'm not sure how I could use it in a fight, aside from maybe slowing down my opponent."

"Couldn't you fast forward something's time and turn it into dust? That seems like it would come in handy in a fight."

"True… maybe I could even turn someone into a child and then turn them back after the fight's over," Lucy mused. "Although, it seems like I might have to have physical contact with the thing I want to alter, so that could make it tough.

Brandy chuckled. "Turning your opponent into a child would definitely tick them off. I'd try that for sure… and there's always a way to get physical contact if that's what you need to activate the power. Don't overthink things too much."

"Ha! That's like asking me to stop reading books. You know I over-analyze everything," Lucy snorted, fully aware of her character flaws, and the size-mage guffawed.

Before she could say anything though, their conversation was derailed by a leonine spirit. For some reason, Leo picked that particular moment to pop into being next to them with a flash of light, and Lucy almost fell off her stool again.

"Oh, hi, Leo," Brandy greeted calmly, not surprised at all to see him, and then she commented to Lucy, "You're a little more jumpy than usual today, aren't you?"

"I guess I am a little tense… hello, Leo."

"Aww, why are you tense? Would you like a shoulder massage?" the man-shaped feline asked in his typical flirty tone.

"No, I'm good, thanks. It's just that I'm about to go on a mission, so…."

"Oh! I guess that would put you a bit on edge. Does it look like it'll be a difficult one?" Leo asked while smoothly parking his behind on the stool next to Lucy.

"It definitely could be, especially since there's a whole village with major casualties involved. I just hope we can finish the monsters quickly…"

"You'll be fine, don't worry."

That was Mira, who'd returned and brought Lucy's dinner with her. Of course, before the celestial mage could say thank you, Leo struck again with, "Well, hello there, Mira. You're looking beautiful today, as always."

By now, everyone had gotten to know her socialite spirit and his flirty ways, so nobody was surprised by his form of greeting. Lucy and Brandy just rolled their eyes while Mira smiled and said, "It's good to see you too, Leo. How are you doing?"

"Much better now that I'm in the company of three lovely ladies."

All of them chuckled, and they chatted a few more minutes, until a very exuberant pink-haired boyfriend and his equally excited feline friend bulldozed into the conversation.

"Hey, how's it goin'? You ready, Luce?"

"Luuuushy!"

As usual, the blue cat flew right into her chest and hugged her boobs. She hugged him back, even though she knew he was taking advantage of his cutesy form to get female attention. After all, despite that, he was still genuinely sweet and cuddly.

"Hello, guys. Give me just a second, and I'll finish up here."

"Ooh, you having dinner?"

"Don't even think about it. You just said that you ate an hour ago, remember? If you start eating now, we won't leave for another hour." That particular prissy voice belonged to Carla, who came prancing up behind Natsu.

She was accompanied by Wendy, and the bluenette looked a little chagrined – probably because of the way Carla had scolded the fire mage.

"Aww… come on, Carla. It won't take that long," Natsu whined, but he immediately perked up again when Mira said that she'd make him a sandwich for the road.

"Awesome! Thanks!"

The white-haired woman disappeared into the back again, and while they waited for her to return, Natsu parked himself next to Leo, and the two started chatting, which let Lucy wolf down the rest of her food in record time.

"Alright, done!" she said with a sigh and stood. "I'll go grab my bags really quick. Just wait here."

"Sure thing!"

It only took her a few minutes to jog down the hall to her room, scoop up her bags, and hustle back out to where everyone was waiting for her. Luckily, they hadn't been waiting long, because Mira was just returning from the kitchen bearing snack bags for all of them.

"Here you go! Something for the road."

"Wow, thanks, Mira!" Wendy said, and the rest of them followed suit, with Natsu and Happy being the loudest (as usual).

Then, once they were all ready to go, their party of five headed out to try and help the village of Heath Star find some sort of relief.

…

.

…

"Thanks, buddy. You've been awesome."

"No problem! It was a lot better than having to watch you throw up for two hours…." Happy snickered, and Natsu laughed right along with him.

His blue friend had flown him the whole way here, so he hadn't had to ride the train or rental wagon with everyone else. Which was a huge help, 'cause Wendy's potions only went so far, and the more he took, the less they worked.

They landed as the lacrima vehicle screeched to a stop outside the village, and their teammates spilled outta it. The poor driver was obviously freaked, and as soon as they'd snatched their bags from the back, the wagon spun around and drove off.

"Wow… looks like he was in a hurry," Happy commented as they all watched him zip away, a big cloud of dust behind his butt.

"I don't blame him," Wendy said with a pulled face. "He's probably heard about what's going on in Heath Star. It makes sense that he'd be scared to stick around."

"Yes, and speaking of, we need to head into town and see what is going on. There's no time to waste."

Realizing Carla was totally right, the five of them hopped to it.

And right away, they could tell things had gone south as they walked through downtown Heath Star. The streets were straight up abandoned, and buildings had been busted up pretty good. Claw marks scarred the walls, windows were broken, doors hung off their hinges, roofs had been caved in. It was a disaster zone.

"Wow… this is awful…." Luce commented eventually, looking worried and creeped out, and Natsu nodded.

"Yeah. Looks like they've really taken a beating."

Wendy was clearly super worried too, and added, "We should find the villagers as soon as possible so they can take us to their wounded."

Happy bobbed his head while Carla simply said, "Indeed."

But as they kept at it, they still didn't see anybody in the streets for a while. 'Til finally, after wandering around a bit, they spotted a woman hurrying towards them with an extremely tense look on her face. "Excuse me, but are you the mages Fairy Tail sent?"

"Um, yeah. We are. What's going on? Where is everyone?"

"The village elder will explain. Hurry, come with me. We have to get to shelter before the sun sets."

The lady whipped around and practically ran back the way she'd come, making them scoot along after her really fast.

"Woah, what's the hurry?"

"If we stay out here, the gargoyles will swoop us up and devour us! They come as soon as night falls, and we only have a few minutes left!"

"Sheesh… sounds rough," Happy commented from where he was riding Natsu's shoulder.

The rest of them agreed with his buddy, and they followed the lady at top speed through the village… all the way to the biggest building, which Natsu figured was probably some kinda townhall thing.

She knocked and called, "I've brought them!"

There were a couple clicks, and then a big burly guy swung open the door and started fussing at them. "You're cutting it really close, Brianna!"

"They didn't show up until now," the woman argued back as they all slipped inside.

Once the door was shut and locked behind them, their guide woman introduced the new guy. "This is Brandon, my husband. And as you heard, my name is Brianna. Welcome to our village…. I'm sorry about the way I greeted you earlier."

"Oh, no, it's fine. You obviously had a good reason to rush like that," Wendy quickly said and waved her arms around in a nervous, 'don't worry about it,' sorta way.

"That's for sure… stupid idiots showing up this late…." the big guy grumbled under his breath, still acting pretty grumpy, and Banana smiled kinda tightly.

She elbowed him hard and then changed the subject. "Yes. Um, let me take you to the village elder now, he's right this way."

Natsu snorted, thinking that she'd been pretty smooth handling her husband's temper like that.

They followed her again, and she led them through a massive hall that was filled with a bunch of people laying on blankets who looked like they were in rough shape. Wendy and Carla stayed behind to get started on healing all of them while he, Luce, and Happy continued on.

Apparently, the village elder lived in a set of rooms at the back of the hall, and he was waiting for them in a sitting area/meeting room off of that. He said hello, and they all introduced themselves and stuff, and then they got down to business.

"So, how did this happen?"

"Well, starting a month ago, for no apparent reason, a flock of gargoyles appeared and started attacking the village every night. We don't know where they came from or why, and we can't fight them either. Our kingdom's guard tried, and they failed. We have also attempted to hire several guilds, and they've failed as well."

"Okay, cool. So, we just have to kick their butts, right?"

"Um… yes…?" the old guy answered with a question in his voice. He seemed pretty shocked, but Natsu didn't pay him much attention.

"Then, let's go, Luce! We'll be right back; this'll be over in no time."

His partner dug in her heels though, and her complaint was mixed with the village elder's.

"Wait! You can't go now. If you open those doors to leave, the gargoyles will fly into the building and attack everyone inside. One of the previous guilds tracked down their nest, and someone can show you the way there tomorrow once the sun has come up. For tonight, please stay here… I'll provide you rooms to sleep in."

Natsu tsked, kinda annoyed that they had to wait. He liked to get stuff done as soon as possible, but if it risked the safety of everyone in the village hall, he guessed he didn't really have a choice.

"Alright, then. We'll wait until morning. Thank you for the assistance," Luce said, pinching his arm as though he didn't already know.

"That's our line. Thank you. We would be lost if you hadn't come to help us."

"Not a problem!" Natsu answered with a grin, already over being annoyed. Now, he was back to just being glad they could help out these people.

After Happy added on his, "Aye Sir!" the three of them headed back into the main hall and gave Wendy and Carla a hand bandaging up folks and giving out potions 'til everyone had been treated.

That took a while, and they were all pretty hungry and tired by the end of it. So, when Banana handed them some tasty soup and offered to take them to their rooms, they all gulped down their dinner and eagerly followed her.

They were given two rooms for the night. Wendy and Carla staggered into one of them after they'd said goodnight, and Natsu, Happy, and Luce nabbed the other. 'Course, the blue exceed had wanted to bunk with Carla, but she'd nixed that real quick, and he had to settle for second best.

"Sorry 'bout that, Buddy. Nice try though! Just keep at it," Natsu comforted his best friend as they headed into the room and plopped down on the bed.

Happy grumbled for a sec, but he was used to getting turned down by Carla. So, his sour mood disappeared real quick, and he answered, "Aye Sir!"

Then, he yawned, and Natsu joined him with a jaw-cracker of his own.

"Hey, Luce! Aren't ya coming to bed?" he called at the open door once his teeth clacked back together. She'd stayed behind to thank Banana again for the rooms and was busy saying, "… we really appreciate it. I know you must be low on bed-space right now…"

And like clockwork, the other woman basically repeated what Village Gramps had already told them. "It's the least we could do with all the help you're giving us."

"Oi, both of you guys already went over this earlier, ya know. No need to keep repeating yourselves."

Luce must've not liked that, 'cause she shot a sharp look over her shoulder and scolded him. "There's nothing wrong with saying thank you more than once, Natsu! Shut it!"

"Alright, alright…" he huffed under his breath, and then snickered as he heard Banana laugh a little outside the door. If he had to guess, he'd bet that she was comparing them to herself and her husband… which was pretty cool in Natsu's opinion. He didn't mind being compared to a married couple, as long as it was with Luce.

"Sorry about him, he's just tired."

"No, don't worry about it. I understand," Banana chuckled, and the two women finished up their goodnights and closed the door.

"Natsuuu… that was embarrassing. Can you please think sometimes before you say something?"

"Huh? What do you mean? Why was that embarrassing?" he asked, sitting up on the bed to stare at her. He really didn't know what she was going on about.

"Really? Just… guhh. Look, please don't argue with me when I'm trying to thank someone, alright? It makes you sound really ungrateful."

"Uh… okay. Sure. I guess I can sorta see that."

"Good," she sighed, and plopped her bag on the one chair in their room.

While she started messing around with her stuff, he laid back on the bed – getting a snort from Happy, who'd already curled up in a ball next to him. After a bit, Luce glanced over and asked, "Is Happy asleep?"

"Yep. He's out like a rock. It'll be impossible to wake him up now."

"Okay, good."

It was pretty obvious why she'd asked when she started stripping outta her clothes, and Natsu blinked at her, suddenly a whole lot less tired and a lot more of something else. He was glad that she'd gotten comfortable enough around him to take off everything but her panties, but now didn't exactly seem like the time to get frisky.

"Uh, Luce? What're ya doing?"

"… Changing?"

The answer sounded like a question, and she looked at him again, this time with an expression that said, 'can't you tell?' Sure enough, she was holding a long sleepshirt and some shorts – which she slipped on real quick.

"Why?"

"What do you mean 'why?'" she asked as she came over to the bed. "I don't want to wear travel clothes in bed."

He didn't get it and just sorta stared at her blankly, wondering what the heck she was talking about now.

"Speaking of, aren't you going to change?"

"Nope."

She sighed and pinched her nose. "Did you even bring a change of clothes?"

"Nope."

That made her shake her head, and she sighed again. "Figures. I should've known. Well… whatever. Let's just go to sleep."

After some rearranging to get Natsu under the covers too, they both crawled into bed without waking up Happy. As her back snuggled into his front, Natsu was whacked with a face-full of her hair, and like always, it smelled great. He took a deep whiff, but the tickly feeling against his nose started to bug him after a minute, so eventually, he batted it up above the pillow.

They'd been sleeping like this for about a week now (with her being the little spoon), after she'd opened up and told him a bit more about why she got nervous when he was behind her. As usual, he'd wanted to replace those bad memories with good ones – in a way that wouldn't freak her out – and this was what they'd come up with. For the first couple nights, he had put a pillow in front of his hips, so she wouldn't feel his boner if it popped up. But now, they didn't even worry about that. She still got a little tense whenever she felt him rubbing against her butt, but she didn't get scared anymore.

Which was good, 'cause he got hard a lot lately. They'd been able to do sexy stuff a few times since their mission on crab island, but it hadn't been enough in Natsu's book. 'Course, he wanted to do stuff every day, so… yeah. Luce definitely wasn't gonna be up for that. But they'd been fooling around even less than usual lately since she'd been so busy.

Normally, he would've pestered her until she gave in and made out with him, but she was doing a lot of good stuff, like training to get stronger, and he didn't wanna get in her way. Besides, she'd been so tired that he would have felt bad about messing with her.

"Um… Natsu?"

Luce's whisper snapped him outta his train of thought, and he realized he'd been grinding against her butt a little.

"Oh, whoops. Sorry. I was just thinking about how we haven't really done anything in a while…." he confessed, feeling kinda dumb for getting carried away like that.

There was a pause, and then she laced her fingers through his. "Yeah. I guess you're right. Sorry for getting so wrapped up in my projects."

"Huh? You don't have to apologize, weirdo. Everything you're doing is super cool and important."

She snorted and squeezed his hand. "Okay. But I promise as soon as we get back we'll have some alone time."

"Really?! Awesome!"

"Shhh! You'll wake up Happy!"

He snorted and kissed her shoulder, then gave it a nibble for good measure. That got a cute little squeak outta her, and she let go of his hand to grab a fistful of his hair and tug on him.

"Stop that!"

Instead of doing what she'd asked, he reached up and got her hand again. Then, he tugged it back down to where they'd been before and kept kissing her shoulder. She fussed and grumbled about it for a while, but eventually kinda gave in.

"You're a pest, you know that?" she huffed, but didn't sound too annoyed, and he grinned against her t-shirt.

"Yep."

Sneak Peek

Natsu cranked his arm back, and Lucy could feel the wave of heat come off him as more and more fire wrapped around his fist. In several seconds, the flames had licked all the way up to his shoulder, and then he snapped his knuckles forward in a punch that launched all that fire magic in an enormous explosion down the tunnel towards their enemies. Some of the gargoyles dropped out of the air instantly, but a lot more survived this time, which confirmed her fear that they were a little tougher than the last group that had attacked them.