"As one of the oldest elements in the known universe, i҉r҉o҉n҉ is theorized to be one of the rarer Etheric elements that allow some dragons to experience ?b҉e҉y҉o҉n҉d҉?." ~ Dragon Historia, damaged pg ?1?

Chapter Thirty-six: Dragon Force, pt 3

Gajeel knew that voice.

"Dad?" his own voice, now higher, cracked.

And he suddenly found himself younger, suddenly a kid again staring up at scales of scored iron and thick bladed wings lazily tucked back. Looking into beady silver eyes set too deep into an anvil-shaped skull set under a helmeted crest of iron.

"I was the last time you checked," Metalicana's rough voice echoed.

Gajeel looked at his hands, and they were small and scraped; his nails chipped and black with dirt from digging. His wild, ear-length, raven hair was wet and hung down into his face. His damp, roughspun smock clung to him, stuck-fast brambles scraped his skin in places. He sat on the edge of a carved-out alcove bed, nestled amongst soft sand and jagged trophy pelts.

Blanks in his mind filled in. His dad had come home days early from the flight's hunt. The darkening storm outside was the likely culprit, flooding the den with the scent of autumn leaves and mud.

But… he had been raising his voice at someone, before. Not his dad. He was sure of it. Before the dark, before the fog. Soreness still tickled the back of his throat. He was supposed to be older, wasn't he? But the more details he recalled from the den of the original iron dragon, the harder it was to remember how big his hands were supposed to be…

"Why can't we live closer to the rest of the flight?" Gajeel finally asked, head falling back to look up at his father again.

"You'll see 'em again when it's time," Metalicana rumbled from his resting spot, already knowing where the conversation was going.

"Wouldn't bother you so much if you let me stay and play with the others," little Gajeel muttered, crossing his arms with a big pout.

His father blew a sharp breath from his nostrils. "We've been over this before," he said. "You're the oldest of the brood. That means, fer right now, that you're the biggest and the strongest. I don't wanna hear complaints about you getting excited and cracking eggs or squishing runts."

"I'll be careful, promise!"

"You're not the best at bein' careful. You got yourself stuck under all that rubble… can't even begin to guess how long it took ta dig you out."

And Gajeel's thoughts rushed, a blurry halo of red coming to mind. The color red was important. And the warm scent of lavender tinged sharply by the smell of decaying plants - of natural rot. Though not remembering why those details held his attention made him feel like there was a cold hole in his center. Like something was missing and it was all he could do to grasp at the edges of the memory.

His eyes clenched shut and he shook his head in an attempt to focus. "It was an accident."

"You're lucky someone else was there, I was-"

Puffing out his chest, Gajeel growled - the sound high and upper-throaty - in rebuke.

Metalicana craned his neck down so that he was at eye level with his scowling son. "Oh, that's a terrifying growl. Maybe one day you can ward off a bunny-rabbit with it instead of acting like a brat."

Gajeel retaliated with a nasally snarl and struck his father's nose, yelping in pain when still-morphing soft flesh collided with hard scales and little fingers bent ways that little fingers should not.

Unimpressed, Metalicana shook his great head, his plated tail flicking. "Scales first, then strike," he reminded. "An attack isn't much good if you get hurt more than you can deal out." But seeing his son tearing up at the self-inflicted injury, the original iron dragon let out an sympathetic chuff: "Let me see it."

With a big, wet sniffle, Gajeel hopped down from the ledge he had been sitting on. Stubbornly nursing both hand and pride, he padded towards the mouth of their den. Big, wet red eyes glaring over his shoulder at his father the entire time.

"And where do you think you're going in this storm, Metriacanthos?" Metalicana called after him.

It was a dragon's name. His name, he recalled. At the sound of his full draconic name, tiny Gajeel only scowled further.

"You can't go off like that, you're going to get yourself killed."

A heavy, plated tail thudded down between Gajeel and the exit of their den. He whirled around, little studded nose wrinkled.

"I'm tired, Dad!" Hot tears pricked the corners of his eyes. "I'm tired of still bein' 'too big' but 'too weak'! I'm tired being kept apart from everyone else! I'm tired of being alone for days on end, only fer you to come back and keep me prisoner!"

"I'm not keeping you prisoner, I'm keepin' you safe." He frowned. "And I never said you were weak, I said you're not the best at being careful. If you were weak, I wouldn't harp on you about it. Just don't want you to get ahead of yourself and end up badly hurt for no reason. Especially on the days I come home early."

Metalicana's tail herded his sulking whelp into his outstretched right foreclaw. Gajeel sat without enthusiasm in his father's palm and was brought up to the original iron dragon's eye level.

"You know why I come home so soon, why we stay hidden for days."

Holding his injury close to him, tiny Gajeel began to mutter his parroted reply: "Ac-"

"Stop." It was a clear command that sliced right through the fog clouding his mind, if only for a second. The name vanished from the tip of his tongue, as if wiped from Gajeel's thoughts. "Don't speak the name of the Dragon King, you don't need to attract an immortal's attention. Not right now."

Gajeel rolled his eyes. Errantly, he wiped his nose along his working hand and arm.

Metalicana's other foreclaw held up a small nugget of iron, holding it for his son to take and eat. "Let's see how good you're gettin' at absorbing the element from your food to heal up."

He gingerly took the apple-sized iron chunk and bit into it - it had the texture he was familiar with, but he was taken aback at the complete absence of taste. Still, he ate it. His hurt fingers cracked and straightened out, going from broken to merely bruised.

"I can't be here every time you do something reckless," his father said, watching him.

Slumping forward, Gajeel curled his knees close to his chest. "Whatever."

"Don't 'whatever' me." Metalicana lowered his hand, rolling his son back into his bed. "You wouldn't be here without me, whelp. You really need to learn to control yourself and be more careful."

"Wow, thank you so much, Dad," Gajeel bitterly mocked. "I'm so glad I'm here because of you. And only you. So I can be care-ful. And alone."

Metalicana wrinkled his snout. "I don't remember you being so damn sarcastic," he said.

"Funny, I just remember waking up and you were gone."

A wave of vertigo hit him and he held his head in his hands. Gone…? That wasn't right… his dad was right there with him.

Rain continued falling outside, background static to the silence of the den.

"If you ain't gonna be careful for your old wyrm, then what about the Fairy Tail flight or your mate?" Metalicana finally spoke again. "You've got a duty to them to not be reckless and stupid and runnin' head first off the mortal coil. Can't very well take your place in your flight if you've gotten yourself killed from losing control."

Fairy Tail… flight? Mate…?

"Don't tell me you forgot. Maybe you hit your head too hard, knocked a few too many screws loose... But forgetting your mate's a pretty big screw to knock loose, 'specially fer a dragon."

Flight… Mate… Flashes of red and twin amethysts peering at him from the darkness. A link, a connection - their bond! He could feel it settle into the reaches of his mind and body, as if his being were emerging from a calm pool.

"There ya go," Metalicana approved. "Knew you weren't that dense."

It all came back in a rush of memory, his sense of self correcting. No more tiny hands. No more little Gajeel. No more storm outside the den.

And his father… His father shouldn't have been there. He had disappeared those seven long years ago.

Metalicana's form had vanished when Gajeel turned to look, leaving nothing but a big, empty space in the den. The blow of losing him, though still present, had numbed. Gajeel knew there were others now, waiting for him - Cobra, Wendy, Ryos, Natsu, and even Laxus. He wasn't so alone anymore.

He approached the entrance. It was time to leave the den behind.

Before he left, his father's voice fondly snickered: "Ya got Rhia's eyes and temper, my blood and magic, and yet no one's brains. It's almost tragic, kiddo."

The muted light of dawn greeted his eyes more like a flashbang than a gentle rousing as he was thrust back into consciousness.

Thick, heavy, dark curtains hung over all the windows around him, obscuring the outside world. Above him, an unfamiliar ceiling of timber rafters and branches. Underneath him was a thick futon mat, just long enough for most of him, with only his feet sticking off the edge. His limbs stung and thrashed, his limb studs getting stuck in something binding - tangling himself further in an old blanket.

"Gajeel." His name came from beside him, the voice raspy and strained. "Gajeel, stop."

To his left was an old loveseat, the pattern fuzzy to his eyes but overall orange and brown. A cocoon of mismatched blankets had been broken so that the person inside could sit up and slide onto the floor next to him. Dazed as Gajeel was, he knew his mate's outline anywhere.

It was not a pleasant sight, seeing Cobra's right arm stiff in a sling once again. Both his wrists wrapped in bandages; an icepack sliding down off his bruised neck, the collar of a too-big teal t-shirt exposing the skin just above his collarbone. A pad of gauze stuck to his brow, covering a particularly nasty scrape that had started to bleed through a little. Red hair greasy and not pushed back into his usual style. Cobra looked… tired. So tired.

Cobra saw the other man was breathing hard, as if out of breath. Gajeel's eyes were darting around the room, looking - yet not seeing. And sweat - so much sweat. Drenched, like he'd just gone swimming.

"What- where's-?!" the iron dragon flummoxed, trying to get his bearings.

"We brought you back to Rockrose," the poison dragon explained. He moved slowly - sorely - to his knees. "You brought Phantom Lord's base crashing down. Porla's… injured. No signs of him or the last fetch since."

Red eyes stared wildly at him, uncertainty painting his face.

"I haven't heard anything Phantom-esque anywhere near us. It's safe. It's over."

The explanation took a moment to sink in before Gajeel finally relaxed back into the futon mat. His head rolled against his pillow to stare back up at the ceiling - which he now noticed had little glow-in-the-dark stars and draconic shapes stuck to it.

"We're in your brother's cabin, in the village," Cobra added further, calmly giving his partner more information to settle him. "You're on the floor because you're too big for the Exceed's infirmary beds and the couch wouldn't be good with your injuries. Plus, the other cabins don't have blackout curtains."

"Ryos…?" Gajeel asked.

"Went with Pantherlily down to Shirotsume to pick you up some clothes from one of the shops."

His studded brow wrinkled. He hadn't noticed before, but it did feel a little drafty. "... C-clothes?"

"What was left of your pants got shredded when you went Dragon Force. You had a big hole from your tail. Right on your ass." A sly, small smirk and chuckle escaped the redhead, which caused him to wince. He played it off by scooting closer, lowering himself down on the edge of the futon bedding Gajeel's form didn't take up.

"You're hurt," Gajeel said.

"Broke a couple ribs and my arm's out of commission again," the redhead mumbled, snuggling closer. Doing his best to lay his head carefully on Gajeel's shoulder.

"... Should you be layin' like that, then?"

"Probably not," Cobra dismissed. The full weight of his head rested on Gajeel, and a familiar warmth blossomed in the iron dragon's chest from the feeling of his mate on him. "But it's been too quiet, I almost missed the sound of your inner voice when you're awake."

His eyelids blinked closed as he sunk into the warm feeling. "Sounds like you got some brain damage, too," he mumbled.

"You give me brain damage," Cobra tossed back.

A weak tch slipped out past Gajeel's lips. "S'not new news, you snek."

His body, his mind wanted to go back to sleep. But he was still awake, the room felt like it was slowly spinning around him, like he was floating in water and circling a drain.

"My dad," Gajeel slurred. "He's… a dick."

That… was going to be something to deal with later, Cobra quietly decided. Another item for the list of things they should probably talk about. "I'll take your word on that. Go to sleep."

"My head hurts," the iron dragon weakly rambled. "My teeth…? Hurt?"

"You had a building dropped on you and turned into a bipedal steroid lizard," Cobra sleepily reasoned, "So that makes sense."

"Will you… still be here, when I- when I-I wake up… again?"

"Unless you wake up while I'm taking a piss, yeah."

"Mmh," Gajeel accepted the terms. "Good. I dun wanna be alone…"

"You won't be. Promise."

The next time Gajeel awoke, he still ached. He was also much hotter… and clothed in some itchy sweatpants. Exhaustedly, he kicked the blanket off him in a small fit.

His arm tingled, the muscles asleep, from Cobra's sleeping weight on it - even if he now rested his head more in the crook of Gajeel's elbow. With his free hand, he scratched his hip under the hem of the cheap tourist sweatpants. Still, he didn't move much more for fear of waking his mate.

As he lay his arm back down on the bed mat, his fingers brushed someone's hair. A smaller shape, another body, was curled up not on but next to the futon. Ryos was half-buried in a child-sized sleeping bag, the fuzzy green potato known as Frosch taking claim of what was once the shadow dragon's pillow.

Gajeel rolled his head and looked back to Cobra, then back to the ceiling of faint plastic stars and shapes.

Branches swayed outside the treetop cabin, the padding of cat paws in the distance fading as Gajeel's attention fell to the soft breathing of those beside him.

Heat welled behind his eyes and he pressed his mouth in a flat line trying to contain the dam that was starting to break, failing as hot tears spilled down and got lost in a sea of messy black hair.

A/N: Haha, Gajeel - get CARED about! Get fucking VALUED! No going back now~!