With Great Power Comes Great Responsibilty

Chapter 40

Gray went to meet Natsu after his classes so he could talk to him about his encounter with Juvia. He wasn't too happy with the idea of him making rude comments and being perverse with Juvia.

"What's the big deal?" Natsu asked when Gray confronted him about it. "It's not like I said she was unattractive or anything."

"You said she had a nice rack."

"Well she does."

"You don't say things like that. At least not to her. It's rude."

"Sounds like you're jealous."

"Jealous?"

"Hey you had your chance with her and chickened out. Not my fault if other guys try to make a move including myself."

"Excuse me but last I checked you only had eyes for Lucy."

"I still have the hots for her by why limit myself to one woman? I might even be able to use her to make Lucy jealous."

He turned to walk away, Gray put his hand on Natsu's shoulder to stop him.

"Hey!" Gray said sternly. "If you wanna move on to another woman be my guest but don't you dare try to use Juvia as some play thing. She's our friend remember?"

Natsu flinched and glared at Gray in a way the made him feel like a mugger or murderer was looking at him, waiting for the exact moment to attack him.

"Don't you ever touch me!" Natsu snarled in a voice that was unrecognizable. "Ever! You got that Fullbuster!"

"Bro what's wrong with you?" Gray asked stepping back. His eyes then spotted the black ooze moving under his jacket. "Natsu are you still wearing that weird suit?"

"So what if I am?"

"I thought you said you were going to take it off and get it examined."

"And I thought you said that you were going to get those damn pictures!"

"I was. I still am. It's just taking me some time."

"Well we're tired of waiting. If you can't fix this then we will."

"We? We who?"

Natsu didn't answer. Instead he went into alley to change into his suit and started to climb up the wall of a building.

"Wait a minute where are you going?" Gray asked.

"I'm going to fix my reputation."

"What do you mean? What are you about to do? Stop! Come back!"

When he didn't return, Gray changed into his suit and tried to go after him but Natsu had become much faster due to his new suit. Gray managed to get close once and he reached out to get Natsu to stop but he missed Natsu's arm and accidentally tore off a part of his suit. The piece of the suit turned into ooze and tried follow Natsu but Gray had a tight grip on it.

"Alright I don't know what the hell you are or where you came from but I do know that you're responsible for why my best friend is acting different. So why don't we go get some answers huh?"

The ooze moved as if it could respond to Gray's words. It was now more desperate than ever to get away from him but there was no escape. Gray sealed it inside of a glass jar with strong lid and took to Erza for examination. He explained the situation to her and she started to study it immediately.

"And you say that ever since Natsu started wearing this thing his abilities have been changing?" Erza asked during her study.

"Not just his abilities. His personality, his behavior, at first I thought it was stress but stress doesn't make you look at someone that way."