Second Life

Chapter 10: A Job To Be Done

A/N: here's a new chapter for you all! Your feedback has been amazing guys and 4k reads?! Thank you so much! Not to many chapters left now, I'm thinking about 5-6 left, maybe a little more. On that note, please go to my Fanfiction.net profile (same name: Lunarnix) and kindly vote on what project you may like to see next.

As always, please enjoy!

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Minutes passed, then hours, and before Natsu knew it, morning had come. The sun warming up their camp from the chilly night. A light fog that had been covering the forest floor began to dissipate. The various early morning creatures calling out to one another like a chorus of greeting. For once, it was actually peaceful and Natsu took the opportunity to take a moment to stretch and rub the exhaustion out of his eyes. A yawn escaping him as he did so. Staying up all night like this was something he hasn't really planned on doing but it shouldn't affect him to much. Or so he'd hope.

Natsu glanced around the camp, noting that it may still be awhile before the others wake. All the more time to himself he noted. On a normal day, he and Happy would take an early morning stroll just a little ways away from camp but seeing as Happy had gone on a mission with Carla and Wendy the day before, he figured there would be no point to just sit around. Even if his little buddy wasn't here with him this time, it didn't mean he couldn't go for a walk.

He could almost see it now, Happy flying to them and bawling his eyes out that he missed a mission with the team once they walked in the guild doors. A chuckle escaped his lips as he took one last glance around the camp before standing. As he stretched; his bones popped, releasing themselves from the position he'd sat in for several hours straight. A sound almost like a moan slipped past his lips as they did so. What a feeling it was to move after his previous position, it was almost euphoric.

Natsu spent a moment just standing there, enjoying the chill of morning against his burning skin. He could hear the different scattered calls of the various early morning birds. Their chatter blaring loudly in his ears although they may very well be a good while away. A smile graced his lips as he glanced over his work from the night, his little notebook then being tucked away in a pocket inside his vest as he began to walk away from camp.

About ten minutes of walking later and still within earshot of camp (as Erza was not one for quiet wake up calls), Natsu found himself standing at the edge of a fairly large lake. Of course, he had seen plenty that were larger but this one struck a cord in him. The waters were clearer than any he'd seen, well, at least since he still lived with Igneel. Just the way the lake was shaped alone hit him with nostalgia. He couldn't help but smile as he could almost picture his young self jumping about the water, laughing and carefree. Completely oblivious that he would find himself alone one warm summer day with only a scarf and his magic to prove that the time he'd spent with Igneel had been real.

If Natsu actually thought about it, that may have been the true start to his life. The time he spent training with Igneel was just like a transition. It prepared him for the life he was leading now as one of the strongest mages in Fairytail. In fact, after he'd woken up that morning he would never have thought he would be as he was now. He'd been so hell-bent on finding Igneel that he didn't have time to think about his future. Even his first year of Fairytail had been that way.

"I was such an idiot." Natsu chucked aloud. It was only natural though. He had been idiot since Igneel had never really left him. In a realistic sense, such a large dragon as Igneel was wouldn't have been able to up and leave without waking him. But as a child that believed that his father had abandoned him, he had never thought about that. So when Igneel appeared at the grand magic games during the fight with the dragons, it came as a definite shock. It almost made him want to lash out at him for making him believe that he'd been abandoned and for all the years he'd spent searching on vain.