Introductions

For a solid week after adopting their daughter, Mirajane and Laxus did nothing, but spend time with her. He took no jobs and she stayed away from the guild, just so that they could all get to know one another.

And, after only a week, Laxus had to admit, Aurora was pretty much everything he'd ever wanted in a kid.

She was still rather nervous around the two of them, as Laxus was around her, but in the past seven days, they were beginning to get acclimated. He'd taken her out to eat, that night before, just the two of them (Mira had taken her to lunch and spent the day out shopping for, oh, the third time; Laxus was trying hard not to complain about the jewels Mira was spending, as he wanted the girl to get everything she needed as well and knew it would be expensive, but eventually he'd knew he'd have to be the one to tell Mira to cool her jets on the spending side) and it had gone rather well. They went somewhere nice and she wore a new dress that Mira bought he and he really liked the idea of it, him being out with his daughter, but he could almost immediately tell something was wrong, as they sat down.

"You don't like it, do you?" he asked as they glanced over their menus.

"Like what?"

He nodded across the table at her. "The dress. You don't like it do you?"

"W-Well, it's a little different," she admitted softly. "But Mirajane was so happy about buying me dresses that I-"

"It's okay." He was even able to grin at her. "I'll talk to her about-"

"Don't. Please." She wasn't able to look at him either. "I'll learn to like them. I-"

"Aurora, you're not here to please us." And he meant that. "We're here to take care of you. If you don't like something-"

"I just don't want her to be upset with me-"

"Tell you what," he said then, knowing that he wasn't getting through to her any other way, "if something bothers you, you tell me, huh? And I'll tell Mirajane. She won't be upset with you either way, but if it makes you feel better for me to be the middle man, I will." Then he said, "Now pick what you wanna eat. Anything you want."

Needless to say, Mira had been more than a tad disappointed at the fact that her daughter wasn't as into dressing up as she was, but Aurora did tell her that she thought some of the dresses were nice and that she might wear them sometimes.

Laxus though went ahead and checked another mark on his side and deducted the already negative points he was giving Mirajane. Clearly, he was the better and favored parent.

It was pretty dang obvious.

Still though, the week went fast and, once it was over, well, Mirajane had to go back to work. And Laxus sorta hadn't seen any of the Thunder Legion in that week, so it was as good a time as any to introduce Aurora to them.

As not to overwhelm her though, the day before she went to the guildhall, Mira took her over to Lisanna's apartment (where Bickslow was sorta staying some times and completely flaking on the woman the rest of the time) to meet her sister and niece, which went alright. Aurora seemed to like Lisanna's baby enough and it wasn't like Lisanna wasn't going to like her.

She was kinda hesitant around Bickslow though and Laxus picked up on it immediately.

"You," he grumbled as he took the other man to the side, "are banned from my daughter."

"W-What? Boss-"

"Banned." He glared at the seith. "Until further notice."

And that was final.

Things over at Evergreen and Elfman's (sometimes shared, sometimes just hers as Elfman crashed on someone else's couch) apartment didn't go as well.

The two were in a heated fight when they arrived and kinda just ignored Aurora as they tried to get Mirajane and Laxus to settle their argument for them. Mira tried hard to be helpful, but their dismissive attitude towards his new daughter pissed Laxus off and, well, that was the end of that.

"They're better on other days," Mirajane assured Aurora as they left. "Today was just a bad day."

"More like a normal day," Laxus grumbled as Aurora only glanced up at him. To her, he said, "You just wait till we meet Freed. He's great."

Mira rolled her eyes at that. "He's only saying that because the man worships him, Aurora. Don't-"

"Freed the Dark?" Aurora nodded. She'd heard of him before. She actually had heard of the entire Thunder Legion.

Not that it made Bickslow any less creepy…

"Yeah." Laxus grinned at her. "You guys'll get along great."

She wasn't introduced to him, however, until she went up to the guildhall with Laxus. Mira had left for work before then and was already working, up at the hall, when they got there, but Laxus was steering Aurora clear of the woman.

It was his time with the girl. Not hers.

Rather, he led her right over to the table where Freed was drinking a beer and looking over a map of some sort. At the sight of his idol, however, he sat right to attention.

"Freed," Laxus began and Aurora, who was still taking in the sights and sounds of the place (it wasn't very busy that afternoon, it seemed, and was more or less in a lull, but still rather imposing regardless), kinda hid behind him a bit, but that made Laxus feel good. That meant she felt safer with him than just a bunch of random strangers. That was definitely something. "This is Mira and my daughter, Aurora. Aurora, this is- What is it?"

He frowned down at her too as the teenager tugged at his arm. Freed, who was getting up to shake her hand or bow to her or something else over the top because he was just over the top, noticed immediately what it was.

"Ah," he said as Laxus just frowned at his daughter's excitement. "You've noticed our peers."

He was speaking, of course, of Romeo, who was by then very much so twenty-one years old and not at all Laxus' thirteen year old daughter's peer. At all.

At the moment, the man was messing around with Natsu, happily being obnoxious to the others in the hall by using the entire bar area to play an odd game of catch in which Romeo would form fireballs in his hands and toss them up for Natsu to bounce around and swallow whole.

Freed thought, of course, that Aurora saw this as amazing that Natsu could eat the fire and that Romeo could control it in such a way, but Laxus knew better. He hadn't had a daughter for very long, hadn't really spent much time around teenage girls to begin with, but he knew. Oh, he knew.

And he didn't like it one bit.

"That's Natsu Dragneel," Freed was saying as he only sat once more, going back to his map. "And Romeo Conbolt. They're both-"

"Hey, you!" Laxus was thinking fast then and rushed over to a table nearby. Gajeel was there, grumbling something or other to his Exceed, but Laxus didn't care. Only came to snatch the cat right up.

"What the- Hey! Unhand me!" Pantherlily demanded as Gajeel slammed a fist on his table.

"First I gotta put up with the damn Salamander actin' like an idiot and now you're tryin' to steal my kitty?" Gajeel was growling too as he got to his feet. "Look, thunder fraud, I'll give you one shot at droppin' Lily before I-"

"Shuddup." Laxus completely ignored him, taking the struggling Pantherlily along with him. To the cat, he said simply, "Calm down. I ain't makin' off with you. I just want you to meet my daughter."

"And why would you want to do that? Better question; why not just ask?"

Laxus only grunted though because he answered to no man. Which meant he also didn't answer to cats.

Shockingly enough, he did answer to demons, but that was another story for another time.

At the moment, he had the most important fatherly task there was in front of him; distract Aurora with cute little kittens and away from way too old for her (or even perfectly aged for her) boys.

It was very important, he felt.

"Here," he said, coming to drop Lily on Freed's table. The Exceed wanted to keep glaring at Laxus, but Aurora turned her attention (at least somewhat) away from Romeo and onto the cat.

"Oh, wow," she exclaimed, grinning widely at the Exceed. He'd been the one, after all, that she'd requested her new father introduce her to and, well, there he was. "You're Pantherlily!"

"Well, yes," the Exceed said, voice a tad tight as he adjusted the blade he carried on his back. "I am."

Aurora took to gushing then, rather excitedly, over how she'd always liked the Exceed and, once, she even traded some of her things, back at the orphanage, to get a poster of him and that she still had it and it'd be really cool, she thought, if he'd sign it, but it was okay if he didn't, and if she was being weird, she'd stop talking to him, but she just really liked him and that was okay, right?

And Lily was a good sport (Laxus was ready to pummel him if he hadn't been) and even transformed for the girl, into his battle form, which completely erased Romeo from her mind and gave Laxus a chance to go over to the request board and check it out.

A lot could happen in a week, after all.

While he was perusing, he saw out of the corner of his eye that Romeo and Natsu finally pissed off the wrong person, it seemed, as they both took their game outside.

More room to goof off, anyhow.

Happy, however, didn't go with them. Instead he only fluttered from the table he was at with Lucy and Levy and over to where Pantherlily was being bragged upon. He had, after all, been Fairy Tail's first Exceed (and by far the most important, he frequently deluded himself into believing) and was not going to be one upped by Lily.

Landing upon the table, he immediately greeted the girl before saying, "Hey! If you think that Lily's cool, you should check me out!"

Aurora frowned, glancing at him before greeting him as well, but just as quickly was questioning the still in battle ready mode Lily about something or other, effectively ignoring Happy, it seemed. This crushed the little blue Exceed, but Laxus only grinned over at the request board.

Until, well, he heard what sounded a hell of a lot like Gajeel coming over to brag on his cat too, to Laxus' daughter and, well, that just wasn't allowed.

Aurora could like Lily all she wanted (because if the stupid animal ever hurt her feelings, Laxus would just make it thunder until the stupid thing apologized), but Gajeel wasn't a part of that picture. At all.

"Hey, numb nuts," the electric slayer growled as he turned to head back over there. "Why don't you back away from- Mira!"

She'd been walking passed with an empty tray that had recently been housing mugs of beers, and grabbed his arm to stop him from going over to bother Aurora.

"You knock it off," she ordered with a slight frown up at him. "Aurora can talk to whoever she wants."

"Gajeel isn't just a whoever," he growled softly at her as she drug him up to the bar with her. "He's a… He's Gajeel! And she's not going to be influenced by that blowhard. She-"

"What did you bring her up here for then, Laxus? Just to follow you around and be in awe of you?"

"And to meet Freed."

"Oh, dragon."

Things only got worse from there. While Laxus was busy bickering with Mirajane (it was her favorite part of the day, when they got a chance to do such a thing), Romeo came back in to get Happy as he and Natsu were leaving and wanted the Exceed to tag along (not that Natsu would ever phrase it that way), which meant that the man had to go over to where Aurora was trying to be kind to Happy and listen to him explain how much better he was than Lily (phrased carefully, of course, for fear of Gajeel or Pantherlily hurting him over such a statement).

The dark haired girl froze up immediately at the sight of the man, but Happy only bounced a bit.

"Romeo!" He launched himself onto the man's head. "This is Laxus' daughter." As the guy got ready to speak though, the Exceed continued. "Now tell her about how great I am! I mean, I only single-handedly took down Phantom Lord. Did you know about that? How I totally beat Gajeel's old guild which, like, makes me way-"

"What the hell did you just say?" Gajeel growled as the Exceed only scampered off Romeo's head and took to the air with his wings. "You little-"

"Maybe we should just, uh, take off, Happy," Romeo laughed as the slayer looked about ready to strangle the blue cat.

"Way ahead of you," Happy yelled as he flew right over to the guildhall doors. "Bye, Aurora!"

But she was way too tongue tied, standing so close to Romeo, to say anything. The man in question was only snickering at the sight of Gajeel getting so worked up before rushing after the Exceed, as not to be left behind by him and his best friend.

It was almost after he was completely gone that she mumbled out something that might have been a goodbye, but was so jumbled and soft that really, only Pantherlily caught it. He distracted her, however, as he suddenly poofed back into his typical form.

As Lily was hopping back up on the table, ready to either address Aurora or have Gajeel brag on him some more, Laxus appeared once more, laying a hand on the teen's shoulder.

"Come on," he said, Aurora only glancing up at him. "You saw Fairy Tail and the cat."

"I'm not a cat," Pantherlily complained. "I-"

"So now let's go back home." Laxus wanted to get her out of there before she saw any other stupid guys for her to make stupid eyes at and it was just stupid! Damn Romeo. "We have to take Raid on his walk."

"W-Well, okay," she said slowly as he only gave Gajeel a slight snarl because, well, he couldn't remember why exactly he was pissed at the guy, but he usually was, so it was safe to assume that he was regardless."I was just-"

"There's no job that I want," the man went on. "So come on. Let's-"

"Wait, Laxus." That was Mirajane, coming by with another round of beers for another table. "You're not getting out of here already, are you?"

"Of course I am," he grumbled to her as Lily only waved slightly to Aurora, as if in farewell. "What's she wanna do spending all day around here? Huh? A non-wizard loitering around the hall? That's completely boring. Use your head, Mirajane."

"Someone," was all she sang, mostly speaking to their new daughter, "wants you all for themselves, I think, Aurora."

"Stop being weird." And Laxus was stomping off then, leaving Aurora no choice, but to follow. She bid Lily goodbye and mumbled something of the sort to Gajeel who just snorted in response, and that was the end of Fairy Tail for awhile for her.

As far as Laxus was concerned, at least.

Stupid Romeo.

"I know what we can do," Laxus said as they left the hall that day, glancing down at Aurora once they were passed the gates. "We can go see Gramps. I mean, if you want, Aurora. I-"

"I thought we had to take Raiden on a-"

"He's fine." That came out with a slight grumble. It had just been an excuse, before, after all. "Stupid mutt."

"We can go see your grandfather," she told him softly, staring up at him. "But, um..."

"What?"

"Is he...nice?"

Grinning then, Laxus moved to pat her on the head. "He's the nicest guy around" Then, with a soft sigh, he added, "To everyone, but me."

Makarov was luckily home when they arrived, mostly doing the whole lot of nothing he'd been doing since he retired. Laxus usually would berate him for this, but at the moment, with Aurora there, he didn't want to seem like an asshole.

She made him not want to be a douche.

Huh.

Maybe he should have adopted a kid years ago.

Makarov was happy, however, to meet the girl and was most concerned with making it clear to her that, no matter what, she should never follow a single example Laxus might set.

"He's an idiot," he told her as the slayer tried hard to bite his tongue (again, didn't want to seem like a jerk). "Completely and utterly."

"And you," Laxus growled, trying hard not to let his emotions go, "are just upset because I wouldn't loan you that money to-"

"I would have paid you back."

"Gramps, you don't need new furniture! You're, like, a billion. What use would it have been?"

"That's a very rude thing to say, boy."

"Yeah, well, I-" Then he bit his tongue and glance at Aurora who was just standing there, in her new great-grandfather's living room. Clearing his throat, the slayer only said, "Anyhow, Gramps, I just wanted you to meet Aurora. So now that that's done-"

"Actually," the man said, heading right out of the living room then and into the kitchen. Aurora seemed interested, but Laxus only groaned, because that meant they were going to get stuck there even longer.

Why had he decided to introduce her to him again?

"I made you cookies."

And Gramps was coming into the room with a plate full of cookies that, obviously, the man had not made. Moreover, he must have bought them and taken them out of their box, only to put them on a plate and present them as if he were the one who made them.

It was so stupid and Laxus wanted to yell at him, but Aurora was completely conned and happily took one, thanking the man profusely. And Gramps was beaming and damn, Laxus wanted to knock him in the head and tell him the consequences for lying to his daughter, but what good would it do? Not to mention, Aurora seemed so thrilled by the idea of the man baking for her and, well, hell, Laxus wouldn't be the one to ruin that dream for her.

No way.

"I can't believe he gave me the whole plate," she told the man as they left the little house and set out for their own. "You were right, Laxus; he is nice."

"Yeah." Laxus swallowed, trying hard not to ruin her image of the man for no real benefit other than he loved ruining things in general. "Gramps is real great."

"Do you think that he..."

"That he what?"

"That he liked me?"

"Oh, Aurora." He sighed, glancing down at her. "Everyone liked you. They always will. You're really...great."

"You use that word a lot," she told him, blushing a bit as she looked down at her plate of cookies. "Great."

Only when he was with her, trying to make the world seem great and everything great and that her life with him and Mirajane would be great too and she would be a great person and a great mage and all of that hinged on him keeping her away from Romeo, which was just silly, because Romeo would definitely not see her as anything more than what she was, a thirteen year old girl, but that wouldn't stop Laxus from trying to make everything just great and keep him the hell away from her.

Hmmm. Aurora made him ramble.

"Yeah, well," he told her as they continued on down the road, "it's a crutch word, I guess."

The rest of the day went by rather slowly. Aurora spent a lot of time playing with Raiden, their dog, and Laxus mostly just sat around the house and hoped she'd ask him to do something together.

She didn't. She did, however, share her cookies with him, which Laxus was sure Makarov would hate, so he enjoyed every last one he ate.

They made dinner for themselves that night, as Mira was working, and Aurora found out first hand the very limited list of things Laxus could make.

"I know how to put together sandwiches," he began as she sat at the kitchen table, watching him stare into the fridge, "eggs, omelets, fried potatoes, and I can also make spaghetti."

Aurora frowned. "You can make spaghetti?"

"You just boil noodles and then dump some tomato sauce in there." Then he coughed. "And Mira's showed me before, like, ten times, so yeah."

They settled on fried potatoes though, with cheese on them and Aurora seemed more pleased, Laxus thought, with his dinner than she had anything Mira had cooked in the past week.

Not more pleased than she was at the thought of Makarov making her those cookies, but hell, that had been cookies; potatoes can't compete with that.

They just can't.

She insisted that he was wrong though and that Raid definitely needed at least one walk a day (Mira held the same thought, but she worked so much the task usually fell to Laxus and he typically just locked the doggie door behind the pooch and made him go play outside for two hours before bed; problem solved), so Laxus went with her that night, after sundown, to get that accomplished.

He felt like he was smothering her a bit, as she was more than old enough to walk the dog around the block a few times, but if she wasn't going to push for those boundaries, he was fine with confining her in them.

Raiden was certainly thankful though and showed this by pooping in the neighbor's yard. Which, considering it was dark and no one was around, Laxus was willing to pretend like didn't happen. But Aurora had come prepared with the little plastic bags Mira was always using to bag the disgusting beast's duties and, well, she made Laxus get down there and do it on threat that if he didn't, she would.

Leave it to his kid to try and make him a better person.

Heh. Too bad it was working…

"Now you, Ralph, you're just perfect," Laxus complimented the cat as he cleaned his litter box that night, out in the garage. The orange cat was lazily rubbing up against Laxus' long abandoned motorcycle that sat in there (he only ever got on it when he was feeling perfect; it gave him motion sickness otherwise) and mostly ignored the man as he scooped up his poop. "Goin' in this little box here like a good kitty. Aren't you just the best kitty ever?"

Laxus deemed him so and therefore, definitely.

Aurora seemed tired that night and didn't stay up very long. Raiden was disappointed in this, as that meant he got shut up in her room a lot earlier than he'd have enjoyed, but his box of toys had been moved in there the other day, which meant he had tons of things to preoccupy himself with if he got bored.

Oh, and he could always just pounce on Aurora and force her to get up and pay him loads of attention.

She loved doing that.

Err, well, he loved forcing her to do that. Which was pretty much the same thing.

Laxus only sat up in the living room, partially awaiting his wife's return, but mostly just being there in case Aurora needed him. By the time Mira got in at one in the morning, he was more than ready to follow her off to bed.

"I think something's wrong with me."

And have a conversation with his exhausted wife, apparently.

"What do you mean?" Mira asked as they entered their bedroom, keeping their voices down as not to awaken Aurora or Raiden, who seemed to be snoozing peacefully down the hall. "Dragon?"

"I was up at the hall and Aurora was meeting the others and she..." He scratched at his head. "I dunno. She was staring over at Romeo and I-"

"Oh, Laxus."

"What?"

"Romeo's cute."

"Mira."

"He is. And for a thirteen year old, I'm sure he's very cute." She headed over to the dresser where she started to get ready for bed. "I remember when I-"

"I don't want to hear about you and your creepy...you shit that you were doing when you were thirteen." He made a face at her as he went to fall into bed, being careful to not land on Ralph, who was curled up in the center of it, awaiting his parents. "Aurora's different."

"You've known her for-"

"I just didn't like it. That's all. When she was staring at him and ignoring how great Freed is-"

"How great Freed is? Or how great Freed thinks you are?"

"Whichever."

"Oh, Lax-"

"I hate," he grumbled, head buried in his pillow, "when you say my name like that."

"If you're going to be this annoying after only a week," Mira chided, heading into their adjoining bathroom then, "I'll hate dealing with you for the next few years."

Groan. Then, "I hate Gramps too. He lied to her, you know. Gave her these stupid store bought cookies and claimed he made them for her and-"

"Why does that bother you? It sounds incredibly cute to me." Mira hummed, leaving the bathroom door open as she stood at the sink, taking off her makeup. "Almost like someone coming home with arms full of ice cream."

He rolled onto his back. "It's just a shitty thing to do. I mean, what happens when she gets older and asks him for the recipe and he has to admit that he never made them? Not even once? In the entire time growing up that he gave them to you?"

"I'm so lost." Mira spared him a glance, out in the bedroom. "I'm gathering from that that Master did that to you, which makes sense, and that you want to keep him from doing that to Aurora too, but I'm also getting hints of jealousy, perhaps? That Master has a new grandchild? Or-"

"I don't know." He threw an arm over his eyes. "I think I'm sick or something. I haven't had a drink in days and it's probably slowly killing me or something. Aurora's making me do all these nice things like take Raiden for walks-"

"You should be doing that any-"

"-and picking up his poop-"

"Have you not been?"

"-and then she has me all frazzled constantly and I think that I'm making her like me, but maybe she's just naturally nice and she actually thinks I'm lame."

Mira groaned from the bathroom. "You have to get out of the house, Laxus. And go do something else for a day or something. You've spent too much time worrying about things that are taking care of themselves."

"Says the second favorite parent."

"Laxus-"

"Don't say my name like-"

"How could you think that you're the favorite," Mira challenged, glaring from the bathroom at him, "if you also think that she doesn't like you and finds you lame?"

"I guess that just shows how much I think she likes you, huh?"

That didn't get his name thrown in his face. Rather, just the bathroom door shut and him alone in the darkness.

"Mmmm, Ralph." Laxus sighed as the cat jumped up on his chest, enjoying that spot above all others. "You're the only one who gets me."

Hardly. The problem was that Mira got him too much, more over than she didn't get him at all.

When she came to bed finally, it was with her back to him and he probably should have apologized or something, but he knew that she wasn't really upset with him. If she was, they'd be arguing. Rather, she was ignoring him which meant she must truly be tired.

He knew he should let her sleep, but…

"I think tomorrow," he told Mira softly as she only laid there, "I'll ask Aurora if she wants to start learning magic now. She mentioned it to me before and-"

"Laxus, don't you think it's too soon? I mean-"

"Me and her can only play so many board games, Mirajane," he told her simply. "And the only other option is for me to go out on a job and I don't wanna yet. I wanna stay home for a bit."

"And that's you're choice, but-"

"Oh, and by the way, could you cut it out on the damn shopping excursions?" He frowned over at her then. "I'm not made of jewels, woman, and-"

"So about this magic learning." Mira rolled over suddenly, to stare at him with wide eyes. It was an obvious diversion, but Laxus was willing to accept it. "What sorta magic do you think she's interested in?"

Laxus glanced at her before taking a deep breath and going over the list of things he'd envisioned his daughter doing as Mira tiredly tried to listen without falling asleep.

Anything to keep him from reigning in her shopping trips.

Anything.

And the next morning, when Laxus awoke alone in bed to the sound of giggling from somewhere else in the house, he only laid in bed, listening to the sounds of Mirajane and Aurora making breakfast as well as Raiden running around, getting in the way, and Ralph hissing when the dog no doubt came to bother him too.

Sighing loudly, he eventually shoved up and skulked off to go take a shower. Maybe he'd put off learning magic for another day. Mira had the morning and afternoon off, after all, and, well, if he got the day before, it was only fair that Laxus offered up Mira a chance to spend some time with her.

Just so long as they didn't go shopping again.

And besides, Laxus had to go make up with Bickslow again. And explain to him once more that he definitely wasn't allowed around Aurora.

Because he was creepy as hell.

Oh, and somehow convince Romeo and Natsu to take some super long job and get the hell out of Magnolia for awhile. And take the cat and Lucy too. Just because.

Now, if only he could somehow kidnap Pantherlily, get rid of Gajeel, and find Aurora the perfect magic to learn, he'd not only be a good husband for giving Mira the day with their daughter, but also definitely the favorite parent for gifting her with an Exceed.

Hmmm. Decisions, decisions.

I honestly was working on the next chapter of Accidents and Incidents, but I just couldn't get it started the way I wanted, so I went to this instead. One more one-shot from this series, I think, and I'll probably be content with it for awhile.