Disclaimer: All Fairy Tail Character Belong To Hiro Mashima

Chapter 1:

I sat in front of the computer staring at the screen in front of me. The top of the screen read Fanfiction | Unleash Your Imagination followed by a Sign Up dialogue giving me multiple login options I can use to create my account.

I looked at it some more, asking myself for the hundredth time if I was really going to do this. My thoughts went back to the situation that had led me to consider signing up to this site in the first place.

My brother Zeref, being the nosy older brother that he was he took it upon himself to make some phone calls to the high school that I attended, Fairy Tail High. He made an appointment to speak to the principal Makarov Dreyar, as well as the school counselor Gildarts Clive about his dearest younger brother Natsu Dragneel. That's me in case you haven't figured it out yet.

Why you might ask yourself, would an older brother do this instead of leaving it up to the responsible parental figure in the family? Well, that would be because there is no longer one. Zeref is it, older brother and father all rolled up into one gloomy, sardonic, insufferable bastard. At least he cares about us I guess, and is old enough to be able to keep us together.

Our father, Igneel Dragneel, was murdered by his long suffering rival, Acnologia. One day he was there, the next the police came to our house to alert all three of his children that he would never be returning to our home. Did I mention I also have a younger sister? Her name is Wendy and she is twelve years old. She might be the only thing Zeref and I agree on.

The policeman that informed us of the matter must have lost his heart years ago because he informed us of our father's murder like he was reciting what the soup of the day was at our favorite restaurant. I was so angry I punched him, as Zeref and Wendy looked on horrified. Thankfully, the man did not press charges for my having assaulted a police officer. After he left, Zeref whispered that he had never been more proud of me. I don't think I was meant to hear it but hell, at least I can say he was proud of me once.

Anyway, I digress. Zeref attended said meeting and next thing I know I was getting pulled out of my English class by the loudspeaker requesting my presence in the principal's office. I grabbed my belongings, ignoring the curious faces of the other students including the group that I used to call friends, but that's a story for another chapter. I made my way to the principal's office, hands sweaty because I figured nothing good could come of this heart to heart. I mean I knew Zeref was coming, he had told me. I arrived and took a deep breath before I opened the door. The school secretary Laki gave me a reassuring smile and I nodded. I opened the door to resounding laughter.

I don't know what I was expecting but clearly I had forgotten how good Zeref was at acting normal and getting people to like him, something I myself lacked. Zeref sat at a chair looking relaxed but I could seem him quickly analyzing my mood as I made my way inside. He'd been doing that a lot lately. I suppose I never mentioned why he felt the need to make this appointment did I?

Zeref and Wendy were worried about me. According to them ever since Igneel was murdered I had changed. I would like to point out at this time that that is not at all true. I have not changed at all, I have just lost the will to pretend around people. I suppose you could say I had let my true inner demon out. Where before I would spend a lot of energy trying to control my fiery temper, and act in ways that would make people like me I was now done. Let's face, it's not worth it, because one day you could be making your kids favorite meal only to be murdered the next. What was the fucking point of following all these rules and social conventions when life was so very fleeting?

I suppose more well adjusted kids would make bucket lists that they would try to complete before life was taken away from them. They would take up a cause to make themselves feel important and like they'd had some impact on the world. They'd go find the person they love and confess, desperately trying to carve some meaning from a senseless tragedy. Not me. I had firmly just stopped caring about anything. Academics, friends, family, life. Done.

Zeref thought this was an unhealthy method of coping and as we were nearing the end of the school year and my GPA had gone from a 4.0 to barely a 1.5, he felt that something needed to be done before I failed my junior year of high school. He had suggested therapy but that talk had not gone over very well. I suppose if I wasn't being such a selfish self-pitying bastard at the moment I would feel bad for the guy but honestly I just wanted him to get the hell out of my business.

To my dismay I saw Wendy sitting in the chair next to him. Zeref had taken her out of school to attend this meeting, tired of our skirmishes he had finally brought out the big guns. That was my first hint that this was not a simple talking to by my principal and counselor. This was a full fledged intervention. Fuck! I wanted to escape I even started moving back, my hand desperately fumbling for the door handle but I grabbed a handful of Gildarts Clive instead. He pushed me into a chair and remained standing in front of the only exit.

Wendy smiled at me gently, in the way that only she can manage, as she tried to reassure me. I imagine she must see the deer in headlights look that must be on my face. I don't care, I don't care, I kept repeating to myself but of course I knew better. There is one thing I still care about and that is Wendy Dragneel. I would do anything for her. Even submit myself to a half assed intervention.

I looked from one person to the next as they all seemed to be trying to figure out the best way to start this circus. Makarov, probably more used to these things than anyone else in the room cleared his throat and grabbed a piece of paper from a folder that lay on his desk and handed it to me.

"Natsu, these are your grades since freshman year." he began, "Up until this year you had a perfect 4.0 GPA. Right now you are barely passing and you are failing English. Sadly, if we can't remedy this situation you are going to have to repeat your junior year."

I looked away, I knew I had been blowing off school but I had not realized that things had gotten this bad. Maybe repeating wouldn't be so bad. New people, new beginnings.

"Even more concerning than your grades dropping is your attitude. You are rude to teachers and students, you're constantly in here or in the infirmary due to your incessant fighting with Gray Fullbuster. You skip school, and when you are here your teachers report that you mostly sleep through their lectures. I am ashamed to say that until I met with all your teachers I had not realized things had gotten so bad with you. I understand you are going through a difficult time since your father's death but-."

"Don't bring him into this!" I yelled angrily.

"Natsu, calm down!" Zeref said, "We're not the enemy here."

"You're right son, this is not about him." Gildarts spoke for the first time, "It's about you, and your inability to deal with what happened to him in a productive manner. Let me see your arms."

I instinctively held my arms behind my back and glared at him defiantly. Daring him to force me.

"Why do you want to look at his arms?" Wendy asked in confusion.

"Well, little miss sometimes in cases like this people who are going through a lot of pain become numb to it." Gildarts explained to the young girl, "They can't feel anything and so they can resort to different ways of feeling the pain they need. They might begin to use sharp objects to cut themselves, I just want to make sure that he has not done that. We need to figure out what kind of help he needs."

Wendy's eyes began to water as she looked at her brother.

"Natsu?" Wendy looked at me, her eyes holding a sadness that was too old for her years.

"Show him your arms." she commanded firmly. Her eyes never left my face.

Before I knew what I was doing I took off my shirt and stood before them, my eyes never leaving hers. I needed to see it, needed to see her reaction to the mostly healing cuts on my arms. I wasn't disappointed, there was the pain I couldn't feel. Even as I felt like an asshole for causing her tears I was almost jealous of her ability to shed them.

Gildarts examined me and wrote some notes down. "I don't see any new ones. Do you have any marks anywhere else?"

I shook my head. "I didn't like it. I didn't like the blood."

Gildarts stared at me for a minute probably trying to figure out if I was telling the truth and then nodded to himself. "Alright you can put your shirt back on now."

I complied and sat back down.

"Your brother tells us that you refuse to get any type of therapy." Gildarts continued, "Care to tell us why?"

"Just don't see the point." I replied as I tried to keep my temper under control for once. I wanted out of this office and the only way to do that was to come off as reasonable.

"I could try to force it as a condition of you attending this school, but I don't think that would really help you. Therapy is something that you need to be an active participant of for it to work."

"I think it's clear that you need help." Makarov added, "I would like to see you get it. Your English teacher had an interesting idea that Gildarts and I have discussed with your family. Gildarts, if you please?"

"First of all you need to maintain a passing grade in all your other subjects, there is no way you can pass English at this point. You have not handed in a single assignment all year. However, Mr. Conbolt has suggested a summer project that will allow you to pass the course."

"He mentioned that you are an excellent writer. He believes that writing can be a great type of personal therapy, it's a way to explore ideas and feelings at your own pace. I happen to agree with him."

"You will create an account at a writing site, there are several out there. , Archiveofourown, wattpad…. There are some others, take your pick. Once you have a username you will give it to Mr. Conbolt and myself so we can follow and monitor your progress. You will submit all your work to this site. You can write about any topic you want, including fanfiction. We don't care what it is but you have to do it all summer. You must publish something at least once a week. At the end of the summer Mr. Conbolt will give you a grade. If you pass you can return as a Senior."

I stared at them. All I had to do to pass English was write about whatever I want all summer? Is this for real? I watched my siblings smile at me encouragingly and I immediately rebelled.

"This is stupid. I'm not doing it, fail me if you want."

"Natsu Dragneel, you will do this." Zeref yelled angrily, "I am tired of your bullshit, if you don't help yourself I will have no choice but to intern you somewhere over the summer to force you to get the help you need. Is that what you want?"

What? Interned, like a loony bin? My anger was rushing up, like the flames of an uncontrollable inferno until I saw her. She was still staring at my arms. My Wendy, looked at me with those big brown eyes. Her lips trembled and her voice shook as she uttered words that would break my heart if I was still in possession of it.

"Please Natsu-nii, if you go I'll be all alone."

She rushed over and hugged me tightly, her tears soaking my shirt. The sobs that wracked her body letting me know the leaving she was talking about was more final than a summer trip to the insane asylum.

'I would never leave you Wendy.' I thought, not wanting to give voice to the thoughts she was having.

All I could do was look down at her and at the quiet desperation that I glimpsed in Zeref's eyes before he hid it.

That's why I'm sitting here, a week before school lets out for summer vacation trying to think of a username for my account. I quickly thought of one that brought back memories from my childhood, when everything was happy and both my parents were alive.

I chose to log in through my Gmail account and when it asked me for my username I entered:

Flame-Brain.

A/N I seriously have no idea where this came from. I was taking a shower and mulling about how slightly addicted I have become to these sites and this popped into my head. I'm not even sure what it is at the moment but it intrigued me enough that I wrote this chapter in one sitting. I'm guessing that means I want to explore it. Heh, I should be working on so many other things but I am ever the great procrastinator with a short attention span. There might be some self-mocking elements in this piece *grin*

The fanfiction might be fairy tail based, although in his mind he made it up when he was a kid and it was sort of stories he told his friends for fun. He was sort of always a writer :-) and yes his friends will be the usual suspects.