Disclaimer: Fairy Tail © Hiro Mashima

A/N: My first Fairy Tail! Gazille Levy! Happy Valentine's Day everyone! Hope you enjoy the story!

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TROUBLE
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The moment he looked up and saw the block of iron created by Levy's solid script, Gazille knew he was in trouble. But not the kind of trouble when being surrounded by two powerful mages and a dark guild army quickly approaching. No, it was the kind of trouble that a heart in the middle of an iron O could do to a man's insides. The kind of trouble that sets a soul on fire, makes a heart go wild and causes a man to lose all sense of reason.

Gazille went insane.

He ate the iron to replenish his strength, but it did something else to him too. It changed him. Not noticeably, though he did feel a lot stronger after eating the love-filled iron, it was something subtle but powerful. Something inside of him exploded. Gazille mistakenly believed it to be rage and anger, the only thing he had ever before known to be that intense and powerful. Fueled by it, the iron dragon slayer fought with all his strength, gave himself over more completely than he had ever given himself to anything before. And the last thing he saw, as he defeated the two Grimoire Heart mages that had been beating him only moments earlier, was an image of the blue-haired little bookworm who he had partnered up with.

'Levy'

Never in his life had Gazille felt anything for anyone. Fairy Tail was the first place where he had felt welcomed, though even then it was not entirely a home for him. The master had allowed him to join his guild, despite having played a crucial role in the war between Fairy Tail and Phantom Lord; despite hurting his nakama. He had joined the guild under suspicion and fear, none more so than from the blue-haired girl he had pinned to a tree the first time they met. That same girl, however, was the first to forgive him. The first to actually make him feel welcomed, to make him feel less like a monster, and more like a man.

"Levy..." his raspy voice whispered softly as Gazille's consciousness began to leave him.

Through the slits of his eyes, as they closed into darkness, the iron dragon slayer could see three people rushing towards him. The tearful, whispered words he had been told moments earlier ran through his mind, as he drifted off, "please don't die."

And he didn't. He couldn't.

When next he woke up, Gazille was less than pleased to discover that he had missed the fierce battle on Fairy Island, against Grimoire Heart and the dark mage Zeref. His rage was short lived however, as he looked around the clean white room where Fairy Tail took care of it's injured mages. He saw the Master, sleeping soundly in the bed next to him. Across the room, Natsu, bandaged from head to toe so that only his spiky pink hair poked out, was snoring like a beast next to Elfman and Mirajane on either side of him. The rest of the room was filled with the others who had joined in the S-class trials, all of them injured to some degree or another, but less so than Natsu, Elfman, Mirajane, and the master. The only person Gazille couldn't see in the room, much to his dismay, was his blue-haired companion.

"LEVY!" he jumped to his feet, yelling loudly enough to wake the other injured Fairies. He didn't care though. Just as he didn't care that his injured body screamed out in protest for him to lay back down. The bandages around his torso, covering his stitched up wounds, turned red with his blood as he forced himself out of bed. "Where is she?" he demanded, pulling the coat of a started Fried who had arrived moments earlier to accompany Evergreen who was still in denial about her feelings towards Elfman and didn't want it to seem like there was any special meaning for her visit. "Where is she?" Gazille demanded once more, releasing his grip of the green-haired man's coat as he stomped towards the exit, fear and panic clearly showing on his ashen face as he searched desperately for the petite girl.

None of them could seem to answer his simple enough question, and it troubled him. He noticed the moment after his eyes opened that something was not right, and it sent him into a tremendous panic.

"LEVY!" he shouted, pushing passed Gray and Erza, who tried to get him back into bed, telling him it was dangerous for him to move around with his injuries. But he didn't care. He didn't want to listen. All Gazille could think about was the blue-haired girl and fear what could have become of her after he passed out from his fight against Yomazu and Kawazu.

Had something happened to her? Gazille didn't even what to imagine it. But the two dark mages he had fought had mentioned they were only the first scouts. The Seven Kin of Purgatory were supposed to be stronger and more powerful. If she had been left to fight against them... no, he didn't want to even imagine it.

It wasn't that Gazille thought she was weak. Far from it. Levy couldn't have been weak if she had been selected for the S-class mage trial. As harsh as he was in telling her she needed to get stronger, the iron dragon slayer already knew she was strong; much stronger than she gave herself credit for. Though it wasn't the kind of strength that he or Natsu, Gray, or Erza possessed, it was still strength nonetheless.

Levy was intelligent. She wouldn't have faced any unnecessary dangers, Gazille was certain of that. But what if she had had no choice? He knew, even without anyone telling him that it had been her who had come running towards him when he passed out. He knew she had been the one to carry him away, as he drifted in an out of consciousness.

If he had been a burden to her... caused her to fall into danger... to be hurt... Gazille would never forgive himself...

"Hey!" a small but powerful voice yelled out from behind the Iron Mage, as he struggled against Gray and Erza, who had managed to turn him around and drag him back towards his bed. "What are you doing?"

Gazille's heart nearly stopped. Trouble brewing in the pit of his soul as he turned, his stomach in a knot, be relief quickly washing over him as he came face to face with the blue-haired bookworm. "Levy," he breathed a heavy sigh, somehow finding the strength to pull away from the two mages that were restraining him. Without thinking, he ran to the short girl's side, and wrapped his arms around her tightly, squeezing her as if trying to make sure it really was the script-magic mage and not some figment of his imagination.

"What did I tell you?" the Iron dragon slayer whispered, as he held on to her tightly. "Don't ever leave my side."