Chapter 3: A Little Walking Disaster

It had only taken 12 hours. Just 12 long hours for Lucy to regret her decision.

She didn't quite understand how things went so wrong so quickly, but she did know that half her furniture was broken, there was food scattered everywhere, and that a massive looming cloud of flour and smoke was threatening to suffocate her. Put it all together, and her once humble home could easily be mistaken for a disaster zone.

She glared holes into the root of the destruction, who was tightly bound to a chair in her living room by thick rope. Although he initially fussed and squirmed about it, he had long since resorted to pouting and glaring at the floor.

"Is this… really necessary?" He mumbled.

Lucy crossed her arms tighter. Aside from her wrecked kitchen, there were papers, plants, and varying furniture strewn all over the living room. Splotches of an unidentified substance were dripping down the walls. Hell, she was pretty sure her stove was still smoking. SMOKING.

Angrily, she squatted down to his little eye level.

"Hmmm… Is. It. Necessary?" She repeated, motioning to the chaos behind her. "Let's think, shall we?"

xoxox

A few hours prior…

Lucy hummed to herself as she swirled a bowl of pancake mix together. Though the circumstances were strange and a bit worrisome, she was secretly happy to have a companion to cook for—even though he wouldn't be there for long.

The smell of cooking pancakes stirred Natsu from his tired daze. He practically floated over to the door, cautiously peeking his head out from behind the frame. He watched in awe as Lucy flipped a fluffy mass into the air and caught it with the pan.

Quietly, he tiptoed over to her side and watched as she plated a few finished pancakes before methodically pouring more batter into her pan.

"Hey, hey," he began, tugging at her clothes. "What is that?"

A little scream escaped her lips, startling him as much as he'd startled her. She just barely managed to avoid dropping the bowl to the ground.

"Goodness! You scared me!" She fussed as she placed the bowl on the counter. "Natsu, right? Shouldn't you be sleeping?"

"It smells too good to sleep." He said, eyeing the food in front of him with greedy eyes. "What are those… fluffy… sweet… tempting masses?"

Lucy giggled and patted his head. "These, um, 'tempting masses' are called pancakes. They're a very popular human breakfast item." She couldn't help but notice the glint in his eyes and the drool leaking out of the corner of his mouth. She forced an awkward smile. "I was going to fix bacon too, but you must be hungry after all you've been through."

Natsu nodded his head vigorously, spilling a bit of drool to the floor in the process. Gross.

"Alright, fine, fine." She pointed at her small wooden table. "Go, sit. I'll bring you some pancakes."

Natsu scrambled over to the table and hopped into the chair with ease. "Hey. Do you have any fish?"

"Only raw fish."

He licked his lips. "Oh, that would be perfect!"

Lucy sneered her nose in pure disgust. "No way am I giving you raw fish!"

"Dammit." Natsu pouted. His poor attitude changed completely no sooner than the moment Lucy set a small stack of pancakes in front of him. Hesitantly, he poked and prodded at them, marveling at the sticky brown liquid coating them. Slowly, he brought his finger to his lips and his eyes instantly lit up in realization. "Rainbow tree sap?" He asked.

"N-No?" Lucy answered, taking a seat across from him. "It's called syrup and it's made from sugar." She'd never heard of a 'rainbow tree' but perhaps that was a question for another day.

"Oh." He said, stretching it between his fingers. "Tastes kinda like sap." He pinched a piece of the pancakes off, savoring it before grabbing an even bigger piece. Lucy watched his strange behavior in amusement, and was shocked by how quickly he cleared his plate. "More?" He asked.

"Uh…Sure." She said awkwardly, fulfilling his request. He barely waited for her to move away before messily shoveling his food into his mouth with his hands. She barely managed to avoid a stray chunk of pancake whizzing by her head. "Have you ever seen—no, heard of—a fork?"

"What is 'fork'?" He managed between chews.

Lucy placed her head in her hands. "I'm going to have to teach you some manners."

"What are 'manners'?" He asked.

"You're telling me, at twenty years old, you've never heard of manners?"

Natsu shook his head. Exasperatedly, Lucy explained to him what manners were in the briefest way possible.

"I mean, I guess we have some rules on being proper, but they're much less strict than that. And we don't use…'utensils' to eat our food—at least not in my villag—"

Confused by his sudden silence, she looked up from her food to find his entire body tensing up as if he were being would like a clock. "Natsu…?"

Unable to answer, the strange being began to quiver and fold into himself, his shaking building up to what had to be an explosion.

"Nat-su…? What's wrong?" She asked, hesitantly reaching her hand out to him.

Without warning, he blasted out of his chair and leapt to a nearby wall, splashing Lucy with crumbs and water in the process.

"Hey!"

"WOO!"

At a loss for words, she watched in despair as he literally bounced around her home, jumping from floor to wall to ceiling to wall and back again.

"More…tree sap!" He roared—and if Lucy didn't know better, she could've sworn literal flames shot out of his mouth. She didn't have time to contemplate that, however. She had to stop this somehow.

"Natsu! Stop right now!" These words, of course, fell on deaf ears.

She couldn't help but notice he appeared to be…sniffing for something as he bounced around in his crazed frenzy. At last, he paused in front her ramshackle cabinets, giving them a huge whiff before smiling psychotically. He flung her cabinets open and grinned even more maniacally at his findings: two full bottles of syrup!

"Natsu… don't you touch that syrup."

The little shifter smirked in defiance as he grabbed his findings and popped the bottle caps.

"Don't. You. Dare." Lucy growled again.

He downed the entirety the bottles in the blink of an eye—said action seeming to serve as a strange power up that only further spurred his wild antics.

Caught up in shock, it was all Lucy could do to look on at the unstoppable humanoid ball as he left even more destruction in his wake.

xoxoxox

Honestly, she should have kicked him out right then and there.

"It was just a little sugar rush…" Natsu mumbled, avoiding the fiery glare Lucy was directing at him. "We don't have stuff like that in my village, how was I supposed to know it would make me do that?"

"Just a sugar rush?!" She hissed, making him wince. She sighed. "Okay. Well, how do you explain your next offense, mister?"

"Next-? Oh."

xoxoxox

Shortly after Natsu calmed down…

"What did I do to deserve this?" Lucy moaned, burying her head into her lumpy straw pillow.

After the incident, she'd spent all morning keeping an eye on the mysterious shifter. Well, she had to, lest he get curious and break her potting plants, or spill the remnants of her good flour all over the floor, or literally light something on fire.

Worst of all, he was an insatiable little—or was he big? She didn't know anymore—beast. Post pancake incident, he rummaged her fridge and somehow ate 75% of her meat supply without her noticing. In her defense, she was attempting to clean.

Unfortunately, she quickly discovered it was hard to fuss at him in his childlike form—when he hit her with that pouty lip and those big puppy dog eyes she couldn't bear to try and kill him, let alone hurt his little feelings. Secretly, she suspected that was the real reason why he wouldn't change back.

Needless to say, she. was. exhausted. And she'd given up on salvaging her living room.

"Lucy… I said sorry." Natsu said, peeking his head over the side of the bed.

Ah, yes. The reason for her exhaustion. She painstakingly dragged her head from her pillow to meet his gaze. "Just, sit in the corner and be quiet, okay?" Her tone was overly sweet. It sent shivers down his spine.

"Okay." Natsu agreed.

She took a couple deep breaths, the uncanny smell of straw and wool tickling her nose as his little feet paddled off into the distance. Finally, some damn quiet.

CRASH!

"Oh… no."

Lucy shot up out of bed and immediately froze. Just feet away, Natsu stood panicking in front of her now broken desk and a mess of tan papers scattered everywhere. Her legs buckled as the full gravity of the situation hit her—that was her novel scattered everywhere.

"Oh… my… gods!"

The little pinkette looked like a cornered deer.

"Natsu." Lucy growled, stalking over to him.

"L-Lucy, I can explain…" Natsu said, backing away from the crime scene slowly. In the process, he accidentally kicked over an ink jar that had miraculously managed not to spill. The black liquid immediately soaked the sheets, damning the papers to death.

"My novel!" Lucy cried, falling to the ground and grasping feebly at the drenched papers.

"Yikes!" He shouted, accidentally kicking up a flurry of papers as he darted from the room.

Distraught, she cradled the stained papers in her arms. Months of work, unsalvageable in mere seconds.

xoxox

Lucy leaned dangerously close to his face, her menacing aura growing larger by the second. Natsu didn't dare make eye contact.

"Does that answer your question, shifter?"

"Y-yes…" He whispered. The poor boy looked absolutely pitiful. Amusing, but pitiful.

"I should set you outside and leave you to the animals as food, but that would weigh too heavily on my conscious."

Natsu swallowed, finally meeting her gaze. The look in her eyes was pure evil. He was terrified. "I'm really, really, really, really, really sorry Lucy! It was just an accident I swear… please forgive me!"

"Forgive you…? Hmm." She stared him down as he sheepishly glanced at her with those signature puppy dog eyes. She shouldn't forgive him for his actions by any means, but perhaps she could make him work for the damage he's caused.

Satisfied with his level of fear, she smiled and sat on the floor in front of him. He flinched at her actions. "I will forgive you… but on two conditions."

"Conditions?"

"Yes. One—never touch the things in my room without permission." She paused to glare at him. He nodded. "And two—since you've literally demolished my house, you're going to help me with a few home improvement projects while you're recovering. Oh! And three—"

"You said there would only be two."

"Hush. Three, no more sugar for you. Ever."

He nodded. "Okay, I swear!"

"Good. Now, are you done running around my house like a wild animal?"

"Yes ma'am." He answered.

"Are you sure?"

"Yes ma'am."

Lucy shook her head and untied the ropes binding him.

He stretched dramatically and cast a dirty look at her. "I'll report you for child abuse."

"You're not a child."

"Shifter abuse."

"You'll get us both killed."

"Touché."

He rubbed his sore wrists as he sat on her couch. "I'm sorry. It's just been a while since I've been in such a nice place. I was too excited."

Lucy frowned a little at that. All of a sudden, he seemed so fragile he could break all over again. Cautiously, she sat next to him. He turned from her, doing his best to look at anything but her face.

The silence was thick enough to be sliced with a knife. Damn her big mouth.

"Can I ask what happened to you?" She asked finally.

Slowly he turned to look at her. There was a mix of all sorts of emotions on his face.

"It's... it's kind of hard to talk about..." he answered after a moment.

Lucy nodded. "Of course it is. Um, I'm sorry..."

He stared at the ground, all sorts of thoughts running through his head. "I guess it's hard to ask to stay here if I can't even tell you why I'm here." He ran his hands through his hair, wincing as his hands once again grazed the injury on his scalp. "Well… To make a long story short... my home was burned to the ground a few weeks back. Somehow, I managed to escape, but not undetected. An angry mob tailed me for weeks until they finally ran me off a cliff... and then you found me. There's a bit more, but that's all I want to say for now."

Lucy's eyes pricked with tears. "Oh, you poor thing…" A part of her wanted to wrap him in a huge hug.

"H-hey please don't cry again, weirdo. Tears freak me out."

Lucy almost laughed at that. She wiped the liquid from her eyes. "You're one to call someone weird."

Natsu stuck his lip out as he surveyed the semi-wrecked house. "Can I start helping you clean up? If that's okay?"

"Oh, um, sure, of course."

He didn't need to be told twice. Soon, he found himself in the middle of the dilapidated kitchen.

"Don't just stand there." Lucy said, handing him a broom.

He eyed the strange contraption suspiciously. It was much longer than him in this form.

Unsure of what to do with it, he put it down and began to lick the pancake batter from the walls.

"Hey! That's disgusting!"

"How else am I suppose to get this stuff off?" He asked with a frown.

Lucy placed her head in her hands as she took a very deep breath. At this rate, they had a very long day ahead of them.

xoxox

That night, Natsu stared up at the living room ceiling from her straw couch. He couldn't lie, he was vaguely annoyed she stuck him out here, but he also vaguely understood. He appreciated that she didn't kick him out despite how he absolutely wrecked her kitchen and book—but oh man, was he embarrassed.

"Stupid. Stupid. Stupid." He pulled his blanket taut over his head in a poor attempt to suppress his intrusive memories. He was sure he'd never forget the despondent look on her face after he kicked over that stupid ink jar. It hurt his pride.

If he could just get to sleep, tomorrow he'd show her he could be the best damn houseguest ever. However, between Lucy's snoring, the lumpy couch and his racing mind, he wouldn't be getting to sleep anytime soon.

What seemed like hours passed as he tossed and turned on the couch.

"I can't sleep like this." He groaned finally, sitting up.

He stared down the distance between him and her doorway deep in thought. After bit of contemplation, he cast off his blanket and set his feet down on the cold, wooden floor. He winced as it creaked under his weight.

It was a short walk to her bedroom, but his anxiety made the walk seem like an eternity. Carefully, he tiptoed across her floor, praying to all the gods and every star in the sky that she didn't wake up and catch him in the act. Thankfully for him, she didn't remotely stir—not even when he joined her under the covers.

Even more surprisingly, she pulled him into a tight embrace, her loud snores being traded for much gentler ones. He blushed slightly, fully aware that if she weren't sleep, he would be beyond dead. He would take his chances, however—that couch was no place to sleep.

As he stared up at her bedroom ceiling listening to her soft snores, he basked in the warmth of another body. It was a luxurious warmth he had not experienced in years…

He pushed those sad thoughts down as deep as they could go, instead opting to think of his next moves. He couldn't stay here long, after all—he didn't want to over stay his welcome or risk putting Lucy in danger. Knowing his pursuers, they wouldn't give up that easily.

He needed to find that village, and fast.

xoOox

A/N: Happy new year everyone! I am so sorry this chapter took so long to get out. Truthfully, I just kept overthinking it, and I realized that I will keep overthinking it until I publish it, so I'm just gonna put my foot down and put it up! Lol. I've rewritten it like three or four times, so even though the wait was long I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I'll try to have the next update out sooner, as I just took time to plan the story out from start to finish.

Also, some of these inventions probably don't exist in that time period (like bottles of syrup lol) but hey, it's okay lol.

I know I suck for not updating, but please review if you have any thoughts on the chapter :D And much more importantly, please stay safe and healthy.

Until next time,

AF1-chan