Title: The Bet

Pairing: NaLu

Summary: One evening, a portal to hell opens at the foot of Lucy's bed. A demon passes through, rips off her covers, and drags the heiress through the portal by her ankles. All this just to settle a bet.

Rating: T

None of these characters are owned by me, they are all owned by the wonderful Hiro Mashima!

Author's Notes:

I'm struggling with the new Friction chapter, and saw a nifty writing prompt on tumblr so I went for it my dudes. Now, here we are a quick one shot. I'm going to post this as a kind of collection story here on ff. So, all prompts in this collection will be NaLu related. Some of them may have triggers, or may be nsfw. Those will be marked as such in the author's notes so please always read the notes section so you know what's ahead! Thank you.

Prompt 1

It was dark, and there wasn't a single noise in her room except for tree branches scraping against her window. There was a storm travelling in from the west according to the weather channel, which was known for its inconsistencies, and it was an honest surprise to her when the weather took a hard shift from 90 degree scorching heat to 50 degree drizzling rage. Still, she powered through her work shift, and now there she was, finally tucked comfortably into her sheets. The blonde laid for what felt like an eternity in the darkness of her room. It had been another long day of nothing. She was used to her life being boring, unfulfilling, really any combination of words meaning disappointment. She was yearning for… adventure. Meaning. She hadn't found any of that over the course of her entire life. Maybe she was having a midlife crisis. She cursed internally, before turning over to hide her face in her pillow.

Then, a flash came from the corner of her bedroom. She sat up slowly, and stared into what looked like a black hole near her closet. Whatever it was, it better not be sucking her clothing in. She had a pair of apple bottom jeans she bought 3 years ago buried in there. She pulled her sheets closer to her body, and waited as a clawed hand phased through the portal. Her eyes flitted to the table where 12 golden keys rested, and she wondered if she'd make it on time.

"I'm telling you it'll be fine. We're just gonna borrow it, and then we'll put it right back!" the voice sounded like it was trying to make a valid argument, but she honestly could not tell what the excuse was even regarding. Which made sense considering there was an open portal in her apartment leading to who knows where, and a grumbling demonic hand coming out of said portal. So, she stared. She should be moving to grab the keys on the counter, they were her best defense against a demon, but her brain wasn't exactly doing cartwheels at 3 AM.

Finally, the demon stepped through the portal. It was humanoid, she noticed, unlike the other 2 demons she'd seen in her lifetime. His skin was a shade of golden tan that closely resembled the maple syrup on her kitchen counter, and his hair was a dusty pink. He had scales from the tips of his clawed fingers all the way up to his elbows where it then faded to human skin. Scales dusted across his cheeks, and down the sides of his neck before running across his collar bone. He was shirtless, a common theme with demons, and the pants he wore were white, and baggy. They were tightened at his calves which made them look more like capris then actual pants. What drew her eyes the most were those scales. She was entranced by them, they were the purest red she had ever seen. It felt impossible to look away.

"Ah. You're already awake. Great." The demon was facing her now, and she knew it was over. Whatever it was he wanted her for, she couldn't get to her keys even if she wanted to. And she wasn't even sure that was what she wanted. "You're coming with me."

Before she could even react to him he was throwing the blankets to the ground and grabbing her by her ankles. Her body left her bed in a flash, and she was being dragged towards the portal. "You're gonna help me settle a bet."

She looked to the side as he keys were being lifted by a faded silhouette, "Lucy! Catch!" and then they were soaring through the air. Her trusted spirit Loke was trying to help any way he could, but his power had been significantly weakened in a ladder related incident earlier that day, and he still couldn't hold his form in the human realm. Still, she appreciated what he could do as she caught her keys, and held tightly to them. Her skin chilled as she passed through to the realm of hell, and she thought that if she survived this she'd have to tell Cana that hell wasn't actually a steaming firescape. She'd heard there were various levels of hell, though, and that could be what she was seeing now.

The pinkette flung her body into a pile of snow, and waited for her to get up. "Hey!" she screamed as she stood in the vast white landscape, trying to gain awareness of her location. "Where the hell did you take me!? You can't just kidnap people from their home!" she threw her hands in the air.

"I'm a demon, and the first thing you do is argue about my moral compass?" he genuinely looked confused by her antics, and he probably was, but she was cold, and wanted to be asleep.

"You're a demon? No way. I had no idea. Wow. Color me shocked. Take me home." She was not in the mood to be kidnapped, and thrown in the snow by some crazy demon with cool hair.

"Yer the most annoying human I've ever met. Just be quiet. I'm gonna take you back you just hafta help me with something first." A devious grin graced his features, and she immediately felt her skin turn to fire. Just his grin had her weak in the knees, and threatening to fall right back into the snowy hellscape she'd be been deposited into.

"See. I've got a whole mountain of fire riding on this bet with frosty the snowman, and we need a judge to finish this out. Then. You can go back." It felt wrong to her that such a slick sweet tone was being used with that devilish face. She shivered as a spark ran up her spine.

"A.. whole mountain?" she whispered, averting her eyes, but then turning to make eye contact. Milk chocolate met with mint, and she hadn't realized how beautiful his eyes were until that moment. "Your eyes are pretty." Her voice came out softly, and barely audible, but still he moved away from her abruptly.

"I'm a demon. Demons ain't pretty." He muttered, turning to look anywhere but at her. "Look. Will ya settle the bet or what?" he held out his hand to her. It took her several moments to decide what to do, but her body felt overwhelmed with two things. One, she wanted to figure out what kind of bet had a whole mountain on the line, and two. Well, she'd been looking for an adventure, and maybe, just maybe, she'd found it. She took his hand, and he gave her a grin that said it all. She knew that she'd just found her story, and she just had to hit the starting line. Her cheeks burned as a smile spread across her face.

"I never said you were pretty. I said your eyes were." She smirked as he pulled her forward, and they started running through the white landscape before them. This was their beginning.

"Whatever! Let's go, weirdo."

"It's Lucy!"

"What?"

"My name. My name is Lucy."

"Well, Lucy, nice to meet ya. I'm Natsu. The Fire Dragon's Prince Natsu."

Oh. Of course she'd be dragged to hell by the prince of the fire dragon's clan. It was no surprise, because somehow this was just how her luck worked. 'Lucky' Lucy Heartfilia makes her appearance in hell, and the first thing she does is make sorta friends with a dragon prince. Still, the smile didn't leave her face, and she felt that if it had been with anyone else she'd have gone down fighting rather than get dragged into some feud. But it had been Natsu. He'd brought her here, and she damn well was staying by his side. After all, she already felt that it was more fun when they were together.