Time After Time

It'll all be okay now

{NASHI'S POV}
All I remember is unleashing that, if I do say so myself, awesome fire dragon's roar and fainting into Storm's arms, although I don't think anyone else noticed Lexi's subtle push.

Now, I'm staring at Mom and Dad, the real Mom and Dad from our time, who remember me.

"W-Woah, Luke?!" I hear Mom-from-this-time's startled voice, and look over to see him struggling to get to them. Reiki is also giving Uncle Jellal a hard time slightly further away.

"It's okay. Let him go." My voices cracks. Confusion written all over her face, Mom sets him down.

"Mommy!" He wails and runs towards Mom. She kneels and scoops him up, causing the younger Mom to pale then blush bright red.

"Wha—?!" Younger Mom watches as Luke bawls his tiny heart out and clutches her future counterpart like his life depends on it.

"Shh, shh." Mom pats Luke's back comfortingly. "You must've been so scared. It'll all be okay now. I won't ever let you get lost like that again."

Uncle Jellal finally takes the hint and lets Reiki down. He immediately runs and does the same thing to Aunt Erza, causing the younger version to turn the color of her own hair.

"Wh-What are you doing here?" Storm finally manages to sputter, voicing what's on all us kids', and probably everyone else's, minds.

Storm's cheeks are flushed and wet with tears. I'd tease him, except I'm pretty sure mine are the exact same way.

Uncle Gray looks looks over at his three children. "This is our job." He gestures to the person in the cloak. "She's been tracking the Way Back for years, and finally caught up to it in our time. Since our time was it's present, it could be hurt by us, so she made an emergency S-class quest to subjugate it."

"So all those wounds..." Nova trails off.

"Came from us. Unfortunately, it fled into the past after a few seconds." Aunt Erza tsks.

"A few seconds?!" I think of how many wounds were on it.

"How'd you travel back in time?" I ask.

The mystery person in the cloak steps forward. "I can answer that."

We all gape at her. "Sarai?"

"The one and only." She pulls back her cloak to reveal violet hair and a warm smile. "Although I guest I'm not the only one in this time period."

"Wait just a moment." Present Graham, who I'd honestly forgotten about because of Future Graham, steps forward. "You shouldn't exist in the future because future me said that you died."

Sarai crosses her arms and juts out her lower lip, making her look like a pouting child. Which is rather strange, because with the twenty year time gap they're almost the same age. "About that. You just assumed I was dead and started traveling around world searching for time travel magic. I even tried to hunt you down! But noooooo, you had to go back and try to change the past. Well guess what, you did! You and your meddling did in fact change my fate, but not the way you hoped. Instead of going from one who dies to one who doesn't, I went from one who doesn't die to one who does!"

Present Graham looks horrified. "I-I almost killed you? But then, how are you alive?"

Sarai sighs. "Luckily, my fate was reverted back at the very last second when Nashi warned me." She turns to me. "Thanks for that, by the way."

"No prob."

She turns back to the younger version of her father, moving her hands to her hips. "I will never forgive you for pulling these kids into this mess, even if it did save my life."

"Um, Sarai-san?" Gale steps forward. "Are they the only people you brought from the future?"

I realize that neither of Gale's nor the twins' parents are here and suddenly feel very guilty because I have both of mine. Sarai, Mom, Dad, Aunt Erza, Aunt Wendy, and Uncle Gray scratch their heads sheepishly.

"About that," Aunt Wendy says. "It was supposed to be just us, but then we got a frantic call from Mira on the lacrima saying that all you kids had gone on a easy job but hadn't come back, so she, Levy and Juvia had gone to check it out and found traces of magic similar to the Way Back's. We assumed they were connected, and when they heard we were going into the past too, they—"

Aunt Wendy is interrupted by the guild hall's doors bursting open to reveal Aunt Levy, who immediately runs and bear hugs Gale, as well as she can being an inch or two shorter. "Gale! Do you have any idea how worried I was?"

She's followed close behind by Aunt Mira and Aunt Juvia, who each run and tearfully embrace their respective children.

Their younger counterparts, meanwhile, look like they're having brain aneurysms.

It's like a flood is unleashed, quite literally for the Fullbusters. All us kids surge forward in a huge wave, running towards our parents.

We're all thinking the same thing. They've come for us. They realized we were missing and we can go home. It'll all be okay now.

I run and hug Dad, who lifts me up easily and spins me around like when I was a toddler. I tell him about Luke's first signs of motion sickness, to which we high five, because Dad and I both bet he'd develop it and Mom bet he wouldn't.

It's Dad who ruins the reunion. Younger Dad anyway. "Wait, so Nashi and the others are our kids from the future, right?"

Everyone sweat drops. Younger Mom facepalms. Older Dad just looks plain embarrassed.

"If that's so, then why is Lucy holding Luke while his sister is hugging me?" Younger Dad asks.

The entire guild stares at him, dumbfounded. I hold back a giggle. Dad is kinda hard on the uptake sometimes. Before anyone can say anything though, Younger Mom raises a shaking fist, tick marks on her hand and bright red face.

"Natsu," she growls, "you idiot!" She punches him, partly because he's dense and partly because she's embarrassed. Older Mom nods approvingly.

"What?" Younger Dad asks, genuinely not understanding. Younger Mom lifts her fist to punch him again.

Except the roof of the guild hall is blown to smithereens. Oh right. The Way Back. In all the excitement, we totally forgot about him.

Older Dad cracks his knuckles, staring up at the monster. "It's time to make you pay for messing with my kids!"