Note: And here I present you with: An Interesting Stylistic Choice that No One Wanted. In other words, the parentheses are back XD I thought it would be a neat little trick to help tie the epilogue into the prologue, although they ended up working a little...differently. But the basic idea was that I wanted to have some things linking the beginning and the end, so you might notice that there are a lot of parallels between the prologue and epilogue, as well as to some other stuff as well. Because.

Uh, sorry that the sentences in parentheses are broken up, but they're like that for a reason. Each piece is related to the part below it, although some of them are more obvious than others. I'll go ahead and reproduce all the sentence fragments at the end of the chapter, if you want to see them all together.

Epilogue

(In which Natsu needs some reassurances.)

(Because You Told Me to Go…)

.

Natsu should really be in the guild hall with everyone else right now, since there was still a lot of planning to do before they went off on their newest mission. After all these months, they had finally gotten a tip about Makarov's location from a reputable source, so they would be heading off to the Alvarez Empire soon to find out what the hell it was doing with Jii-chan. And hopefully the master would also be able to explain why he had ordered Fairy Tail to disband in the first place, because neither Natsu nor anyone else had managed to figure that out yet. He had just told them to all go their separate ways—would have told Natsu to as well, if the dragon slayer hadn't already left—and Natsu didn't understand why. Although at this point he was less concerned with the explanation and more impatient to get Jii-chan back. It had been a while since he had seen the old man.

Now that Gray was finally back, it was time to find and bring back the other missing member of their little family.

Natsu wasn't really one for planning, but he had at least attempted to participate in the debate over how to best go about this mission. Although he perhaps hadn't been very helpful since his idea of a plan was to just run straight into the action with as little forethought as possible. Erza was not impressed by this idea, so the discussion had continued and had dragged on for a couple days now. Natsu was impatient to just go straight to Alvarez, pound whoever needed pounding, and fetch Jii-chan, but it wasn't his impatience that had made him leave the hall today.

.

(…I left.)

.

He didn't know why it had hit him so hard today in particular, but he had just felt the sudden urge to get out of there. So he had quietly slipped out of the hall without attracting anyone else's attention, figuring that it wasn't like they'd miss his fabulous contributions to their planning session anyway. It was a pretty impressive feat considering how terrible he usually was at being sneaky, but he had really wanted to be alone right now so he had managed it somehow.

He didn't know why he felt compelled to come here after everything that had happened, but here he was.

It was silly, it was stupid, but he had come back anyway. There was no reason to. Gray had his memories and he was back for good this time. At first Natsu had been afraid that maybe Gray would just slip away again, that this was just another temporary reprieve, but he had quickly been able to see in Gray's eyes that his friend was here to stay. It had been a relief to be sure. At first there had been a lot of crying and then a lot of celebration, and no one had wanted to leave Gray's side for days.

It had been a few weeks since that glorious day, and they were still figuring out how exactly they needed to adjust to these new circumstances. They were still figuring out what was the same and what was different and whether or not there was still anything to worry about.

Oddly enough, it seemed to be the rest of them who were having a harder time adjusting to the abrupt change, even though Natsu thought that maybe it should be Gray who really needed to sort things out. Lyon was still hanging around and would likely stay until Fairy Tail went off on its rescue mission. Natsu wasn't terribly surprised by this—it wasn't like he had expected the older mage to go running back to Lamia Scale the moment Gray recovered. Still, part of Lyon's reluctance to leave undoubtedly stemmed from a difficulty adjusting to the sudden shift, a difficulty figuring out where to go from here now that Gray didn't need him quite the same way anymore, and he wasn't the only one. There were things in everyone else's behavior that were carryovers from Gray's time as an amnesiac as well.

At times someone would be telling a story and then abruptly fall silent and give Gray a worried look when they mentioned something about his past, before realizing that it wouldn't make him so uncomfortable anymore. Gray would just smile reassuringly or pretend that he hadn't noticed their slip. One morning Erza had walked into the guild and immediately asked Gray if he was ready to go on their walk, before flushing as she remembered that was no longer necessary. Gray had just smiled crookedly and said that he would be delighted, sweeping an embarrassed Erza back out to take a morning stroll. A couple times Natsu and Happy had walked Gray back to his apartment in the evening or gone to pick him up in the morning. Gray took it all in stride, not commenting on the out of character behavior from his rival. Lyon and Natsu were still often a little overprotective as well, before remembering that Gray could take care of himself again. Gray would sometimes chide them gently, but mostly he just smiled and made a joke to lighten the atmosphere.

It would take a while for everyone to settle back into a pattern of behavior more reminiscent of how they had acted before the mess with the void. Natsu got the feeling that Gray was being very patient with them, and he suspected that part of it might be that the ice mage felt bad about the ordeal he had put them through, even though it wasn't his fault. Even more than that though, Natsu knew that Gray understood them and why they treated him the way they did, and that made him more compassionate.

In many ways, Gray was much like he had been before everything had happened with the void. In fact, he had gone back to being so normal so quickly that Natsu sometimes wondered if he was hiding things. His personality was mostly normal, teasing and sarcasm included, although Natsu noticed that Gray was perhaps a little gentler than usual. His teasing was fonder and he didn't always follow up with a verbal jab if it would make someone uncomfortable about something that had happened while he was an amnesiac, even when it was Natsu or Lyon he was messing around with. Perhaps especially if it was Natsu or Lyon.

All the same, Gray was maybe a little quieter, a little more thoughtful and distracted at times. Luckily none of his memories had faded again, at least. Out of curiosity, Natsu had asked him how well he could remember his time as an amnesiac. Gray had said that some of it was a little hazy, the first few weeks in particular, because his thoughts had been so unorganized and alien that they were hard to understand. But he did remember most all of it to some extent and had near-perfect recall of the past few months, even though he didn't seem to much like talking about those times.

Natsu also asked about the curse, because Gray once said that he could still feel it lurking in the back of his mind. Gray's memories were back so everything should be okay, but Natsu had wanted to be sure. Natsu could tell that something wasn't quite right because Gray's mouth had immediately twisted in a way that showed a reluctance to speak, but the ice mage had grudgingly admitted that every once in a while he could still feel a hint of the curse for a moment. Gray had hurried to say that it was barely there at all and was fading away more and more as time passed. Natsu believed him, to an extent, but something in Gray's eyes warned the dragon slayer that it wasn't so simple.

On the bright side, Bickslow had said that Gray's soul was in much better shape than it had been, although he had also admitted that it wasn't the same as it had been before the void. Natsu had asked if it would ever heal completely, and Bickslow had just pursed his lips and half-shrugged as he shook his head slightly. Natsu was perhaps a little disappointed, but it only confirmed what he had already known: Gray would never be quite the same.

.

(I only left because I expected you to still be here when I came back…)

.

"I thought I might find you here."

Natsu was jerked out of his musings abruptly and half-turned to look over at where Gray was walking up to him. The ice mage was smiling faintly, but it was a sad smile because he obviously had a good idea of why Natsu was here.

"Gray?" Natsu asked reflexively. "What…? I didn't know that you knew about this place."

Gray nodded slightly and shoved his hands into his pockets as he stopped by Natsu's side. "Yeah," he said quietly. "Erza showed me most of the city, but I started getting curious when I began getting memory flashes, so I started poking around and exploring more on my own. I guess I realized that the river was an important place that had linked me to a few people, you and Erza most notably. Maybe I thought it would jog my memory."

He shrugged slightly. Natsu stayed quiet and watched him with bated breath, willing him to go on. If amnesic Gray hadn't liked to hear talk of his past, Gray now didn't much like talking about his time without his memory. Well, he didn't seem to mind talking about some of the events or conversations that had taken place during that time, but he rarely offered any explanation of what he had been thinking or feeling. Natsu hoped that maybe Gray would eventually open up more, but for now he didn't press for too many details because he suspected that Gray was still coming to terms with some of the things that had happened to him over the past several months. Hopefully Gray would be more willing to talk when he sorted things out.

"So I was walking up and down the river one day," Gray continued on, his eyes a little unfocused as he considered the memory in question. "It was after you moved out of my apartment, so I could run around in the evenings without you hounding me. At one point I was poking around in the bushes and trees along the side of the river, and I just happened to run across this." He smiled faintly. "Threw me for a loop at first."

Natsu shifted a little awkwardly and tugged at his scarf to loosen it a bit since it was getting hot and uncomfortable. "Yeah…I wanted to put it somewhere that had been important to us," he murmured. "And the river seemed like a good place, given all the fights and things we had here." He laughed a little, although he was only half amused. "Sounds silly when I put it like that, I guess, but I always really enjoyed our fights and we had a lot of good times here, so…Well, I made sure to hide it in an especially thick tangle of trees and shrubs so that no one would randomly stumble on it."

"You mean so that Fairy Tail wouldn't find it?" Gray asked shrewdly, a knowing look gleaming in his dark eyes.

Natsu sighed and glanced away. "Yeah," he replied. Then he smiled a little ruefully. "Although I guess I didn't hide it well enough if you managed to stumble on it anyway."

"Hm."

The two friends stared at the object in front of them in silence for a few long moments.

.

(…but you weren't.)

.

The gravestone wasn't really anything special to look at. It was made of a nondescript gray stone—Natsu had initially toyed with the idea of using white as a tribute to Gray's ice, but had eventually decided to go with gray so that he couldn't describe it without using Gray's name—and lacked any kind of adornment except for the word 'Gray' scrawled across its surface.

"What?" Gray asked finally. "The grave Fairy Tail set up for me wasn't good enough?"

He was half teasing, trying to drag Natsu out of his melancholy mood, but his eyes were still tired and sad despite the half-smile.

Natsu looked away and scuffed his foot on the ground. "I made one for Lisanna too, after she 'died'. Why did you think that I wouldn't make one for you too?"

Gray didn't say anything for a long moment and when he finally replied, he didn't really answer the question at all. Which was probably just as well. Natsu wasn't sure that there was really anything to say to that.

"Funny," Gray mused instead. "It seems like every time you make a tombstone for someone who 'died', it turns out that they're not really dead after all."

Natsu bit his lip to keep from responding that Gray very nearly had died, or disappeared or whatever. Bickslow's opinion was that if that they had waited even a few more months to pull Gray out of the void, the ice mage would have probably disappeared entirely. Natsu didn't really want to think about that.

"Maybe raising the dead is my secret ability or something," he replied, although he was still too out of sorts to really sound convincingly upbeat. "I should go into the magical gravestone business."

Gray shot him a look, obviously aware that Natsu was still in a mood. "You might need some more practice first, seeing the state of this one," the ice mage teased, trying to get the dragon slayer to lighten up. "Most people would expect some kind of inscription, or at the very least, their last name."

He smiled to show that he was teasing rather than offended, but Natsu just pursed his lips and looked away again. He appreciated Gray's attempts to get him back to his normal self, but Natsu didn't feel like joking about this.

"I spent a lot of time thinking about what I should write," Natsu said finally, his voice quiet. "I mean, it had to be perfect, you know? It had to say everything you meant to me, everything that I hadn't gotten to say to you, in only a few words. And I've never been that good with words to start with."

"Natsu—" Gray started, his voice regretful and sad.

"I started getting frustrated, to be honest, because nothing I came up with sounded quite right," Natsu continued, ignoring his friend. "It wasn't enough. I figured that I might as well start with your name since that had to be on there anyway, but as you can see, I stopped right after 'Gray'. Because I was just looking at it trying to figure out what I could possibly say, and then it hit me.

"I mean, it was an impossible task from the start, wasn't it? Because a handful of words would never be enough, no matter how pretty I made them. And I was looking at your name right there and it occurred to me that I couldn't really say anything better than that, could I? What could I possibly say that would be more meaningful? What could I say that would be more important? What could I say that would hold more meaning for me, be more important to me, than you?"

Natsu swallowed hard and stared at the chiseled letters on the stone's surface. "So in the end I just left it like that, with just your name, because that was all I needed. To me, it was better than all the fancy words in the world."

He fell silent and continued to stare at the gravestone moodily. He didn't look over at Gray, and the ice mage stayed quiet for several long moments as well, before clearing his throat quietly.

"Not good with words, huh?" Gray murmured finally with a soft, breathy laugh. Natsu glanced over at him and saw his dark eyes shimmering with unshed tears for a second before he tilted his head to let his hair fall in his face and hide his expression. "Thank you, Natsu," he said quietly.

Natsu sighed. "In the end, it still wasn't enough," he muttered, his guilt and grief and pain flaring up again even though Gray was standing right next to him.

.

(I came up with impossible plans and fought impossible odds to get you back…)

.

"No, a rock in the ground is never enough, no matter how fancy or simple it is, no matter how elegant or meaningful the words are," Gray agreed after a moment. "But Natsu…Isn't it enough now? Isn't it enough that you came up with a ridiculous scheme that never should have worked and managed to get me back anyway? That you spent months fighting to fix things?

"I know that what happened was terrible and that you were upset over it and that you didn't feel like you could do anything good enough to make up for it, but that's only half the story. You did everything you could to get me back in one piece, and I still can't quite believe that you managed it, but you did. Is that not enough to make up for whatever guilt you feel about leaving in the first place?

"Why are you still standing in front of a rock that you've already admitted was never enough? I'm right here, Natsu. Am I not enough?"

Natsu's eyes filled with tears that he hurriedly tried to blink away. He understood what Gray was saying, understood that he needed to hear it, but he wasn't quite sure if he was ready to just move on yet. Which was a little silly considering he'd always been pretty good at putting the past behind him and looking to the future. For some reason it was harder to let go and readjust this time, after so much had happened. Things had been wrong for so long that it was still hard to believe that they were right again.

He already knew that there was no point in him being here now. Gray was back, so Natsu had no reason to be moping around a grave for someone who wasn't even dead. The dragon slayer had used to come here sometimes, back when he thought that Gray was dead, but it had made sense then. He had pretty much stopped coming entirely after Gray had returned from the void, partially because he had been too busy taking care of Gray and partially because he hadn't seen any need to come back when his friend clearly wasn't dead after all. Which raised the question of why he had felt such a strong desire to come here now, because he knew that Gray was right.

"Of course you are," Natsu whispered.

Gray sighed. "It's not that I don't understand," the ice mage said, his voice subdued. "Because I do. But I'm not dead and you're only hurting yourself by dwelling on the past. You need to let this go, Natsu."

Then Gray arched an eyebrow and gave Natsu a mischievous look that was at odds with his earlier somberness. "You know, as much as I appreciate the sentiment behind this lovely tombstone, it's weird to have it here when I'm not dead, and I kind of want to dump it in the river," he said, his voice teasing but laced with meaningfulness.

Natsu nodded slowly, understanding Gray's point. This tombstone was nothing but bad memories and it was a link to the days when everyone had thought that Gray was dead. It was a touching memorial in its own way, but it was also a reminder of how bad things had gotten. And if it hadn't been enough then, it certainly wasn't enough now.

Natsu didn't know if it actually bothered Gray to have a gravestone lying around for him, but he suspected that the ice mage had proposed the idea as a way to help Natsu let go. The dragon slayer had come here to dwell on the past and mourn despite the fact that there was nothing left to mourn over, and Gray wanted him to let it go and move on. It wasn't easy to just let go of months of heartache, but Natsu would manage it eventually. Getting rid of the tombstone wouldn't magically make everything better, but it was a symbolic first step.

"Alright," Natsu decided, nodding his head firmly. "Let's do it."

Gray smiled faintly and moved over to one side of the stone slab. Natsu adjusted his scarf, loosening it again because it really was hot today, and then moved to the other side. The two mages each grasped their side of the stone and heaved it upward, and Gray grunted in surprise.

"Damn, this is heavy," the ice mage groaned. "How the hell did you get this all the way down here by yourself?"

Natsu winced slightly as the heavy stone tugged at his muscles painfully, and the two friends began staggering slowly towards the river.

"Took a long time," Natsu grunted. "And wasn't a whole lot of fun."

He cursed under his breath as he stumbled over some undergrowth and almost toppled over. Luckily, he managed to keep his hold on the stone and the two mages kept moving. They didn't say much, too focused on not dropping their burden, but slowly worked their way out of the copse of trees and down to the riverbank.

They paused for a moment at the river's edge and met each other's eyes over the top of the slab. Gray nodded, and the two mages swung the stone slightly and leaned forward to toss it into the water. The weight of the stone and then its sudden disappearance served to throw Natsu off balance, and for a moment his arms windmilled in the air as he teetered on the edge of the river. Gray hurriedly grabbed his arm and dragged him back a step to prevent him from toppling into the water.

Natsu opened his mouth to thank his friend, but it was at that moment that a sudden gust of wind blew past them. The dragon slayer had already loosened his scarf because of the heat, and that combined with his sudden movements and the wind put his most precious possession in a precarious position. Natsu's attention was promptly directed away from Gray as the wind snatched up his scarf and carried it out over the river. The dragon scales were heavy and the scarf was already starting to drop towards the water.

Natsu cursed. He had just been saved from taking an unplanned bath but it looked like he'd be getting wet anyway, because his scarf was just out of his reach and there was no way he was going to let it get swallowed up by the river. He reached out a hand, but the scarf was just beyond his grasp. He was going to have to jump for it.

.

(…because you told me once that if something is important to me, I shouldn't lose it.)

.

Gray hurriedly yanked him back, startling Natsu with his suddenness, and then reached out himself. He was closer to the spot where Natsu's scarf was drifting downward towards the water, and by leaning out dangerously far, he could snag it with the very tips of his fingers. This time it was Gray's turn to teeter on the edge, overbalanced by how far he was leaning out over the water. Natsu quickly grabbed his wrist and pulled him back.

Gray turned back to the dragon slayer and arched an eyebrow as he handed Natsu the troublesome scarf. "What is it with you and losing this thing?" the ice mage asked dryly, shaking his head a little as Natsu hastily grabbed the scarf in question.

The dragon slayer hesitated for a moment, staring at the precious gift he held in his hands, and then looked back up at Gray.

"Funny," he said quietly, "but every time I lose this, you always seem to bring it back for me."

Gray gave him an odd look. "Of course," the ice mage said dismissively, his tone making it clear that he thought Natsu was making a big deal out of something painfully obvious. "It's important to you, isn't it? It's not like I can just ignore it when I see you losing it."

Natsu shook his head slowly. He understood why Gray always returned the scarf when he found it, but that wasn't what Natsu had meant.

"No, I mean…It always seems to be you," Natsu explained, trying to figure out how to convey his thoughts. "You're almost always the one to bring it back. And even more than that, it's like you…Well, you're always the one who reminds me of what's important when I lose sight of it."

Gray stared at him in silence for a moment and then let out a breath. "Yeah, you've always done the same for me, especially over these past few months," the ice mage agreed. "But it's not only me, Natsu. All of your friends help remind you of what's important. You don't have to count on me to do it for you. We all remind you of the important things, just like you help us remember them when we forget. You're so focused on me that you've been paying too much attention to the things I've done for you and not enough to all the things everyone else has done. When someone loses something important to them, all of Fairy Tail will fight to help them get it back. That's how family works."

Natsu considered that quietly as he wrapped his scarf back around his neck snugly, making sure that it was tight enough to stay exactly where it belonged this time. He knew that Gray was right, of course. Maybe it had been losing Gray that had caused him to forget about how much everyone else helped him too, because for a long time, all he had been able to see was the hole Gray's absence had left in his life. But it was true that everyone had really helped him out a lot. They always had, but especially after he'd come back and found Gray 'dead'. He'd always known that, but it had been too easy to overlook at the time, when he was distracted by his own grief and guilt. He really owed them a lot. As much, he supposed, as they owed him.

.

(And now, after all these months, we're together again, you and I…)

.

The two friends stood side by side in companionable silence for a couple minutes, watching the water flowing by in the river. It was a little too murky to make out the gravestone in its depths, but clear enough that Natsu could at least see the rough outline and shadow of the stone. He was suddenly glad that it was gone. It felt a little like a weight had been lifted off his chest, because it suddenly made it seem all the more real that Gray wasn't dead, wasn't an amnesiac, but was right here next to him.

"I'm glad you're back," Natsu said absently after a moment. "I missed you a lot."

He glanced over at Gray as he sensed his friend shifting. The ice mage had turned a little to look at Natsu again instead of at the river.

"I know," Gray replied with a soft sigh. He smiled a little wistfully. "I would have missed you a lot too, if I could have."

Natsu winced automatically, not liking the reminder of what Gray's mental state had been like. Gray noticed the dragon slayer's involuntary reaction and grimaced faintly, an apologetic look shining in his eyes.

"Sorry," the ice mage said, his sigh heavier this time. "There was nothing I could have done while I was in the void or when I didn't understand anything afterward. Towards the end I still didn't really remember you all, but I wanted to. So I actually kind of missed you in a way, just not the same way you—"

He broke off suddenly. For a moment his eyes glazed over and he stared blankly at Natsu without seeing him. His head cocked slightly to the side as if he was listening to something that Natsu couldn't hear. Then Gray winced and shook his head slightly as he forced his eyes to focus on the dragon slayer again.

This was something else that had changed. Gray did it occasionally, and although it only ever lasted a few seconds before he pulled himself back again, it still scared Natsu. The dragon slayer hadn't pressed too hard for answers because he was definitely afraid of what he might hear, but he couldn't quite shake the feeling that he recognized the gesture. Because although Gray had always laughed it off as nothing and had never come out and said exactly what it was, Natsu thought that he knew.

.

(…but there's still some part of me that's terrified that I'll wake up one day and you'll be gone.)

.

"It's the curse, isn't it?" Natsu asked, his voice wavering as he finally forced himself to address the issue that had been haunting him. Gray's face immediately closed off and he seemed reluctant to speak. "Please, Gray, just tell me. I just need to know."

Gray let out a breath and looked away. "Yeah," he said finally, after several long beats of silence. "Usually I'm not even aware that it's there, but every once in a while it will make its presence known. It's really not that bad, Natsu. It's too weak to do anything now."

Natsu grimaced. He didn't really want to hear that, didn't want to hear that the curse was still lurking around. It made him even more nervous that he might lose Gray again.

"Is it trying to take your memories again?" he asked, although he was afraid of the answer.

Gray smirked, a hint of vicious satisfaction sparking in his eyes for a moment. "Oh, it can try, but it's got nothing to sink its ugly little teeth into anymore. It's too weak and I understand my memories too well for it to get a good grip on them now. Don't worry about it, flame brain. It's not going to be screwing around with my memories again."

"Then what is it doing?" Natsu pressed, sensing that there was still something Gray wasn't telling him.

Gray's satisfaction bled away and he looked uncomfortable and unwilling to speak again. "It can't do anything," the ice mage said firmly.

That wasn't a real answer.

"Gray. Please."

Gray hesitated for a moment, but then finally sighed in defeat. "It calls me," he said reluctantly. "It calls me to the void."

Natsu's heart shuddered to a stop. "What?" he breathed fearfully.

Gray pursed his lips and looked back out over the river. "I know that you all think that the void was a terrible place, and it is. And you think that the important thing is escaping from it and never looking back, and that's true too. But…" He sighed heavily. "I don't think that you can really understand because you weren't there long enough and you never really experienced it the same way I did.

"I don't think you can understand how enthralling the void can really be. The curse calls me back to nothingness and I know that sounds terrible, but it's also more tempting than you can imagine. Now that I'm back for good I don't need that anymore and I can just brush it off, but before…Well, what did you think that the drifting was?"

Natsu stared at him in horror, but Gray kept his gaze fixed resolutely on the river.

"It can't—It can't actually force you back into the void, can it?" the dragon slayer asked, wringing his trembling hands together.

Gray winced and finally looked back over. "It can't force me to do anything right now," he assured Natsu. "It forced me back when I first got hit by Memento Mori because it was still strong then and it could do that, but it's been a lot weaker since I've gotten back from the void. That's why it calls me instead. It tries to tempt me instead of force me, because it knows that it's too weak to make me do anything unless I want to. And I'm not really listening to it right now, so it can't do much of anything."

"Back when you were drifting, could it have…?"

Gray grimaced faintly and shrugged. "It was stronger then, so I don't know if it might have been able to do something," he admitted. "And I was still pretty disoriented and felt too much of a connection to the void. But I don't think that it was strong enough to have actually dragged me back into the void even then. And now it's much weaker and it gets weaker every day. I don't think it's ever going to completely die—I think it's probably always going to be part of me, just like the void is now part of me—but you're worrying too much over something that isn't a real problem.

"I have too much tying me here to even consider giving in to the curse and seeking out the void. The only reason I could be content in the void in the first place was because the curse cut all my ties to this world. I'm not vulnerable to the curse anymore and I've got too much to live for now. I'm not going anywhere."

Natsu let out a shuddering breath. He sure hoped so. He could feel that Gray was right, but it didn't change the fact that Natsu still worried terribly sometimes. The dragon slayer logically knew that Gray was safe and wasn't going to just disappear again, but sometimes he'd still get scared or worried for no real reason.

There was even one time, a couple days after Gray had gotten his memories back, that Natsu had been woken up late at night by a nightmare of Gray dying, Gray losing his memories, Gray getting sucked back into the void where they could never find him again. It was amazing that he hadn't woken Happy up as well, with all his thrashing about. But the little cat had still been sound asleep, and although Natsu tried to go back to sleep as well, he was too fidgety and ill at ease. He had needed to see Gray right now to know that his friend was still here.

So Natsu had run all the way to Gray's apartment in the dark. He had broken in with the spare key and gone to check that Gray was there, because even though he logically knew that nothing was wrong, he still needed to reassure himself. His first instinct was to just bust into Gray's room and make sure that the ice mage was alright, but he had managed to restrain himself since it was late and Gray was undoubtedly sleeping.

Instead he had just pressed his ear up against the door until he could hear Gray's slow, even breathing. He'd calmed down a little after that. Maybe too much, because apparently he'd fallen asleep there again. It had given Gray quite a surprise when he woke up later that night and opened his door to find Natsu there.

That was how Natsu had found out that Gray still had nightmares of the void memory sometimes, since the ice mage hadn't been awake enough to come up with a better excuse for why he'd gotten up at three in the morning. So apparently there were plenty of nightmares to go around for everyone, and Gray had just given Natsu a blanket and told him to at least sleep on the couch if he was going to insist on staying over. Gray had been a surprisingly good sport about it the next morning as well, just telling Natsu to remember to put the spare key back behind the loose brick so that the dragon slayer could find it the next time he felt the need to come back over. Natsu had understood and appreciated the implicit invitation. He hadn't taken Gray up on it yet, but he knew that he would eventually. Although next time he'd try not to do it in the middle of the night, because Happy had freaked out when he woke up in the morning and Natsu was gone.

.

(You're important to me and I don't want to lose you again…)

.

"You'd better not," Natsu replied finally, his voice soft.

Gray bit his lip, not liking the dragon slayer's persistent melancholia. "Don't you worry," the ice mage said with a laugh, trying to sound more cheerful than he was. "It's not like I could possibly leave now. Who would fetch your scarf for you since you keep losing it?"

For a moment, Natsu couldn't make himself say anything past the lump in his throat.

"Stupid ice block," he whispered finally, his voice wavering slightly. "This isn't about the scarf. This is about you. I don't want to lose you."

Gray's eyes dimmed. "Natsu…"

.

(…so let me hold you for a moment, let me reassure myself that you're really still here.)

.

Natsu couldn't take it anymore. He turned and lunged for Gray, throwing his arms around him and holding on for dear life, as if the ice mage might slip through his fingers if he didn't hold on tightly enough. Gray made a surprised sound in the back of his throat, but after a second he wrapped his arms around Natsu as well. Natsu buried his face in Gray's shirt and tried to fight back the tears at the corners of his eyes as Gray carded his fingers soothingly through the dragon slayer's hair.

Just for this moment, it didn't matter that they weren't the hugging type, that they'd hate getting caught doing this, that they'd most certainly deny that this ever happened if anyone asked. Gray didn't push Natsu away like he normally might have and Natsu didn't let go like he normally would have.

Natsu still didn't know what had brought on this sudden melancholy, this desperate fear for Gray and worry about what could have happened and what might still happen. It was still silly because Gray was right here, but just for a second, Natsu needed to be able to convince himself that Gray was here and wasn't going to disappear again and was here to stay. Dumping the tombstone in the river hadn't been quite enough, because like they had said, it had never really been enough for anything. But Gray had been right. Yes, it was only Gray that was enough right now, so Natsu clung to him for everything he was worth. The only way to truly accept that things were going to be okay was to look to Gray himself.

"I'm sorry," Natsu whispered.

He wasn't exactly sure what he was apologizing for. Maybe for how Gray had taken Memento Mori to protect him, maybe for how Natsu had turned around and left, maybe for how he still seemed to be unable to let go of everything that had happened even though Gray was finally back, maybe for how he was currently having a meltdown on Gray for no apparent reason, maybe for something else entirely. Perhaps Gray understood that, because he tightened his grip on Natsu and stayed silent.

"I'm sorry," Natsu repeated, his voice quavering, "but please, please, don't ask me to leave again when you know that you aren't okay. Please don't ask me to let go and give up on you again. God, Gray, please don't leave me again."

Gray let out a breath and somehow managed to hug Natsu even tighter. Then he let go and pushed Natsu away gently, holding the dragon slayer out at arm's length. Natsu sniffled and rubbed at his face to get rid of the few stray tears that had escaped. Gray watched him with solemn eyes.

.

(Give me a sign that you're here for good and things are going to be okay…)

.

"I have something for you," the ice mage said, instead of verbally acknowledging Natsu's words.

The dragon slayer's brow wrinkled in confusion as Gray began rummaging in the pocket of his coat. After a moment, Gray produced a small object and handed it to Natsu, who carefully took it and studied it with no little bewilderment. It appeared to be a small flower made of ice, which seemed like an awfully odd thing to give someone like Natsu.

"A flower?" the dragon slayer asked, puzzled. "What kind of weird thing is—?"

He broke off suddenly and looked at the little ice sculpture more closely. Something about it seemed kind of familiar. It almost looked like…

Natsu's head jerked up and he looked at Gray with wide eyes. "You went to your grave then?"

Because this was a perfect replica of the type of flower that grew on the vines around the grave Fairy Tail had set up for Gray. It looked almost exactly like the flower Natsu had brought home with him all those many months ago, the one he had watched die and then had buried.

The ice mage shrugged and nodded. "I went last week," he confirmed.

"When?" Natsu asked with a frown.

Because everyone had pretty much been glued to Gray's side since his memories had come back, and Natsu couldn't think of a time when Gray had been gone long enough to have traveled all the way down to his grave and back.

"I went late at night and then stayed until very early morning before coming back." Gray shrugged dismissively. "I was back before I normally go to the guild."

Natsu looked back down at the flower. Okay, so that explained how Gray knew what the flower would look like, but what would have possessed him to realize that it had been important to Natsu? Natsu hadn't even really thought about the flower in months since he had been so busy caring for Gray and because he hadn't really needed to mope over it once Gray was back from the void. It's not like he had ever told Gray—or anyone else, really—about the flower because it had seemed silly and it wasn't something that he particularly wanted to share with anyone else. So how would Gray have known?

Unless…Natsu frowned back over at Gray. Several months ago—Natsu thought that it might have actually been the day after Gray had first come back from the void—when Natsu had found Gray's necklace hidden in the kitchen cabinets, Happy had brought up the flower as part of his defense for why he hadn't given the necklace to the dragon slayer. It had never been mentioned since then, so Gray must have…He must have remembered it this whole time, even though he hadn't cared about much of anything in the beginning and hadn't bothered paying attention to most things. He had remembered it because it had been important to Natsu.

Natsu swallowed hard. "This isn't going to melt on me, is it?" he asked, instead of voicing his thoughts.

"Nope, that ice isn't going to melt." Gray hesitated a moment as something seemed to occur to him. "Well, it will melt if I die," he conceded, "but I'm not planning on doing that for a long time." He gave Natsu a meaningful look. "So as long as you can hold on to that, you'll know that I'm okay. Which would be a lot easier than trekking all the way to my apartment and sleeping on the floor every time you start getting worried again. I mean, not that you can't do that too, if you need to. You know that you're always welcome to come over if you need to, as long as you keep your grubby hands off my kitchen cabinets."

His smile widened and took on a teasing edge. Natsu snorted, but his gaze drifted back down to the ice again.

The original flower had been all about death, had symbolized Gray's death and burial since Natsu hadn't been there for them. This flower was a lot more about life, a sign that Gray was alive and alright. Natsu kind of liked that, how it was overwriting something that had been unbearably sad with something comforting and a lot more beautiful. And he did appreciate the gesture. He liked knowing that he could just check to make sure the ice flower was still here in order to reassure himself that Gray was okay. He rather thought that he'd stick it on his windowsill right where he'd kept the other one, so that he could overwrite that part of the memory too.

He knew that this would never be enough in the same way that the tombstone never had been, but it helped. It made him feel a little better, a little calmer, a little less scared. And in the meantime, since this would still never be quite enough, Natsu would stick with Gray anyway, because nothing could replace his friend—not a dying flower or a slab of stone or a pretty little ice sculpture.

He looked back at Gray and smiled a little. "Thank you," he said.

Gray smiled back. "No problem. Now, I think you've been sitting around out here with the past for too long now." His smile faded for a moment. "I'm sorry that I asked you to leave and give up, and I'm sorry that I was giving up too. But that's in the past. You don't have to worry about me so much now. You came back for me, Natsu, and I'll always come back too. So what do you say we leave this place behind and go back to the guild? Let's go home."

Natsu stared at him for a moment, before nodding slowly. "Well, luckily you stopped me from burning down the guild hall last time, so we still have somewhere to go back to," he said, finally allowing himself to fall back into the teasing that Gray had been trying to start this whole time.

Surprisingly, this time it was Gray who sobered at the banter. He stared at Natsu somberly, his dark eyes serious.

"Not the guild hall, Natsu," he said quietly. "The guild hall is just a building. If you burned it down, we could just build another, no harm done. Home isn't about the places—it's about the people. Don't you see? That's why you don't have to worry about me leaving again. I found my way home, and you and Lyon and Fairy Tail are too damn important to me to lose again. We could always build a new guild hall, but we can't ever just replace each other. Home isn't the guild hall. Home is the guild."

Natsu blinked at Gray for a moment as he considered the words and turned them over in his head. They felt right. It was something that Natsu had always known, but it was also something that was easy to forget sometimes if no one reminded you. Luckily, Natsu had Gray and the rest of Fairy Tail to remind him whenever he forgot.

Natsu had come out here because he wanted to be alone, but he suddenly realized that he really did want to be with his family again. He smiled widely at Gray.

"Alright," he said. "Let's go home."

.

(…Because I Need You to Stay.)

Note: Congrats to those of you who made it all the way to the end - I'm impressed how many of you are still here. I'd like to say thank you, because you were all very supportive throughout this whole process and I greatly enjoyed hearing from you all. And I'd also like to point out that this story was greatly improved from my posting it here, because some of the comments and suggestions you guys left inspired me to tweak things. I even added some scenes, and even an entire chapter, that I came up with after thinking about some of the things you said. So those of you who have been commenting should feel like you contributed something to this project, because you did. And I also heard a lot of really neat stories from you guys, be it through reviews or over PM, and I loved hearing them. So again, thank you guys for sharing your stories and helping me think up new ways to improve this. You all have been great.

And on to other news: Some of you may recall that I said there would be two sort of after-stories to this. The epilogue gives some closure, especially for Natsu, but it also leaves some things unanswered that I eventually decided to flesh out a little more. I had the basic idea of the epilogue planned out for a while, long before I realized what a key role Lyon would play in the story, so it wasn't really tailored to include him. Since he did play a much more important part than I'd anticipated, I thought he deserved a little extra closure. Also, I think Gray needs more closure. It's kind of hinted here that things aren't quite the same and something might still be eating at him, and I decided to go ahead and write something to address that. So there will be two one-shots that take place after the epilogue, one in Lyon's POV and one in Gray's. I'm going to post those in a separate story called "Because I Never Told You" (because I obviously needed to follow the naming pattern, ha ha) because I don't feel like they'd fit quite right tacked on after the epilogue here. Not sure if that's the ideal situation, but I thought about it and that's what I decided to do.

Anyway, thanks again for sticking it out with me, and for those of you who want to see all the parentheses pieces together, here they are:

Because You Told Me to Go...I left.

I only left because I expected you to still be here when I came back…but you weren't.

I came up with impossible plans and fought impossible odds to get you back…because you told me once that if something is important to me, I shouldn't lose it.

And now, after all these months, we're together again, you and I…but there's still some part of me that's terrified that I'll wake up one day and you'll be gone.

You're important to me and I don't want to lose you again…so let me hold you for a moment, let me reassure myself that you're really still here.

Give me a sign that you're here for good and things are going to be okay…Because I Need You to Stay.

emmahoshi: Oh yeah, everyone having trouble adjusting is totally understandable. It would have been more unrealistic to say everything magically went back to normal. "but the thing is with everyone acting this way gray will not have time to face things on his own and work on his own emotions and feelings regarding this matter, he will be forced to put on a happy normal mask in front of everyone so that they wouldn't worry when he should be using the time to heal instead." - This exactly :D That's one of the reasons I eventually decided to write one last closure piece for Gray, because I think he really needs it. "this theme is being overused that nowadays whenever this or that character is in danger, fans aren't worried because they are expecting these characters to make a full comeback" - Again, totally agree. FT way overuses this, and it's just happened way too many times to take it seriously now. When Gajeel got sucked into that portal to "die", I just laughed. The Gajevy fans were all riled up, and I was just like, chill out, he's gonna come back... I'm glad you liked all the different references - I can't seem to help myself; I have to make them, ha ha. I was wondering if anyone was going to bring up the FAQ lol "Health bar". Love it XD I'm glad the parentheses worked for you (and yeah, I thought it went along with that "overwriting bad memories" thing the flower had going on). I debated back and forth for a while over whether or not I should include them. Anyway, thanks for sticking with me to the end : ) It's been fun.