Dragon's Thoughts

The second time, he's still pretty new to the guild. It's those first fights with Gray, after they've punched out the worst bits of their friction with each other, but before Natsu figures out that trying a proper dragon's roar when Gray's got his back to him and isn't expecting it will make him freeze and his face go bloodless. Before Gray figures out that trying to yank at Natsu's scarf instead of his hair will get him clawed.

That one gets resolved pretty fast—Gray grumbles at him for a bit, scratching at the bandages all over his face and shoulders. Natsu gives him the silent treatment for a couple hours. But when one of them provokes the other into another brawl, Gray yanks out one or two strands of his hair, smacks him, damn near bites his nose off—but he never goes for the scarf again.

Good riddance. (… Good. Not that Natsu would ever say that Gray can do decent things, once or twice in his life.)

It sends a message to the rest of the guild too, apparently, because he never has to deal with anything like that with any of the other members. Laxus tosses him by the back of the shirt, not his scarf. Elfman tries grappling with him and never goes for it. Erza corrals him with a vise grip on the back of his head (… alright, and some sheer intimidation), and never so much as moves a threatening hand towards the ends of it flapping around.

(No, he doesn't lay awake at night, practically vibrating in place, wide-eyed and wrestling with the greedy dragon in his head that wants to herd his—the guild into the guildhall, plant himself before the front doors, and hiss-click mine-mine-miNE-MINE at anything that so much as looks at them wrong.

… Mira will toss water in his face and harangue him for blowing his cover as a relatively normal human like she's been trying to teach him to mimic from her, if he tries that again.)

So the third time, it's not a guild member. It's some thug that doesn't do the nice scruffing like Laxus does, the kind that makes him instinctively go limp in the split-second before Laxus chucks him into the distance. No, he latches onto Natsu's scarf, lifts him and chokes him and doesn't let go of dad's scarf—

Natsu claws the hand holding him up, not at all holding back like he barely remembered to do with Gray, and when the man finally drops him, he doesn't hesitate to turn around, bite into the guy's arm, and spitefully spit the chunk of flesh he tore out at the fleeing thug.

The fourth time, it's a slippery little asshole of a fighter, one that's a lot more agile and fast than he hasn't become yet—and one that likes to taunt. Dancing away from his flames, tweaking and pinching at his skin instead of proper punches, smiling that smug grin, going, "Oh, so close, little boy!"

When his hand sneaks for the trailing end of Natsu's scarf, Natsu lets his building rage snap, and the man reels back, screaming and trailing flame from the omnidirectional blast Natsu lets out. It ruins his clothes, but it's worth it for the way he finally gets to clock the jerk in the jaw.

The fifth time, it's a client, being whiny and stingy about payment, and she tries to get intimidating about it, physically loom over the Fairy Tail members that completed her stupid job for her.

They're in a guild with Erza, so the intimidation doesn't do much—up until her hand shoots out to grab Natsu's scarf and just as quickly recoils, the woman nearly taking out Natsu's eardrums from how loud she shrieks when he nearly bites her finger clean off her hand.

The sixth time, the seventh, the eighth, ninth, tenth—he claws, he singes, he punches, he burns, he bites, he bites, he bites.

He gets better about it. There's still no sympathy for any dark wizards or garden-variety enemies that try for his scarf, but clients don't get mauled anymore, just glared and growled at until they back off with blanched faces. Any accidents that happen with guild members (because mistakes inevitably happen, during the daily brawl) don't even get that—Natsu jerks back, the fairy lets go, they either yell out a quick apology or try to tackle him at the midsection instead of anywhere near his head again. Or both.

He doesn't mind other fairies touching his scarf, not anymore. He knows that they'll treat it gently. But it's still a shock, if he's not expecting it. So. It's … good.

He's lost count of the times that people try to grab or yank at his scarf on a job until people start calling him Salamander and stop touching it. They only pale at the moniker they call him, eye his scarf with some terror, and proceed to do their best to ignore it.

Natsu is years past trying to count by the time someone finally tries it again—and when it happens, it's in the middle of him grabbing at the obvious, flying banner of Black Steel Gajeel's hair.

He gets a handful of it in his fists, wonders for an instant why it feels like there's nails in the other Dragon Slayer's hair, then makes a noise (not a yelp, thank you) when the strands turn cold and silvery and sharp in his hands, slicing his palms to shit. Then there's an unrelenting grip hauling him by the neck, wrenching the iron-hair out of his grasp and it sears like it's cutting down to his finger bones, as Gajeel snarls something halfway to Draconic swearing and hurls him by the scarf.

By the time Natsu's done bleeding off momentum, spinning to a skidding stop practically all the way across the top floor of Phantom Lord's headquarters, he's worked up a pretty good snarl of his own.

"Don't touch my scarf, you flea-infested rustbucket," Natsu seethes, clenching his hands back into tight fists and ignoring how they drip red.

Gajeel bares fangs right back, an expression that not even the most brain-dead normal human would call a smile. "Same to you, Salamander," he says, nearly friendly except for how he flexes his fingers and each of them lengthen into curved knives with edges that catch the dust-choked light. His hair bristles with the languid movement, subtly curling—the ends are gleaming with Natsu's blood. "Don't touch my hair. I won't be so nice a second time."

Natsu makes … some kind of furious sound that he'll look back on later and realize that he's never made before in his life. He only holds eye contact with Gajeel for another moment before he charges forward, flame-laden and already-healing hands leading.

They land hits. They punch, kick, claw; Natsu sees a bite mark trailing blood on Gajeel's shoulder at one point and knows he did it, even if it all blurs together. Char and iron and copper-scent—all of it's the same, up until Natsu gets up again and Gajeel can't.

But he never feels the wire-silk of Gajeel's hair sliding through his hands again. And Gajeel never lunges for his scarf again.