The night was still, save for the occasional creak of the house settling and the soft hum of the heater kicking in. The moonlight filtered through the curtains of the Todoroki nursery room, casting gentle beams across three cribs.
Natsu, or rather Yakuto Todoroki as everyone knew him, lay on his back in his crib. His stormy grey eyes stared up at the ceiling, unblinking, pensive. He should've been asleep. Everyone else was. But his brain was whirring.
"Flame brain," he mouthed silently, lips twitching. He gripped his sheets tightly.
That word had been gnawing at him ever since Haise said it. It was a throwaway insult, slurred through baby babble, but the tone, the inflection, the insult itself… It was him. The Gray Fullbuster he remembered from his past life. He only knew one person that ever had the balls to call him that.
It couldn't be a coincidence, but he had no other proof.
'What to do… what to do…' he pondered.
Natsu sat up in his crib, chewing his lip. For the hundredth time that day, he told himself it could have been some kind of fluke, but the memory was crystal clear. He knocked over the blocks and out came the insult.
Natsu had frozen. It wasn't the baby insult itself. It was the feeling that had followed. Like something in his soul had clicked. Like the air had gone static.
And it was driving him nuts.
He glanced over at the other crib. Haise was curled up like some overdramatic ice princess even in baby form, white hair flopped over his face, drooling on his pillow like he didn't have a care in the world.
That smug, frosty bastard. 'It's definitely him'
Natsu glanced toward the door. No sounds from the hall. Rei had gone to bed an hour ago, after double checking all three cribs were safely locked and secured. But she was foolish if she thought it would stop him.
He stood, tested the rails, then pulled himself up using a combination of sheer willpower and possibly minor reincarnated muscle memory. He huffed once at the top, balancing on the railing like a tiny ninja, he wobbled a bit and then flipped himself over the edge.
He fell with a plop that was thankfully cushioned by his absurdly poofy onesie, suddenly thankful to his sister who gifted it to him.
"Ugh… stupid baby legs," he muttered, dragging himself to his feet. He waddled like an angry penguin across the room, nearly tripping on a plush All Might pillow someone had dropped earlier.
Finally, he walked past Shoto's crib and reached Haise's crib. He glared up at it, and it looked higher than normal. Still, he managed to grab hold of the rail and haul himself up just enough to peek over.
"Pssst," he hissed.
Haise didn't move.
"Pssssssst. Ice dumbass. Wake up!"
Nothing.
Natsu narrowed his eyes, puffed out his cheeks, and reached over to grab the bars. Then he shook them. Not hard enough to knock the crib over, but enough to jostle the sleeping occupant. But he wasn't strong enough or the crib was too high quality because nothing happened. It was probably the latter.
'God damn it, whatever! Here goes nothing.'
"Gray!" he whisper-yelled.
Haise bolted upright, smacked his head on the back panel, and flailed like a startled cat.
"Wha—mrrph—Nats—?!"
"Don't you 'Nats' me!" Natsu hissed. "You called me flame brain earlier!"
Gray blinked groggily. "So?"
"So?!" Natsu slapped a tiny hand on the rail. "Only one person ever called me that! And he was a stripping, ice slinging, annoying jerk!"
Gray froze. It was barely perceptible, but in that pause, in that blink, Natsu saw something.
Recognition.
Natsu whispered, eyes going wide. "It is you."
There was a beat of silence. Gray looked down at his blanket, then back up, eyes still half closed.
"…You didn't have to wake me up like that."
"You called me flame brain," Natsu shot back.
"Yeah beca- wait how do you remember me???!!" Haise whispered loudly.
The two stared at each other, both standing on their respective sides of the crib, both processing the impossibility of the moment. Of memory. Of names long buried under layers of baby fat and reincarnated lives.
"Wait, I am climbing in…" Natsu said as he slowly and eventually plopped into the crib. He fell head first, thankfully cushioned by the small mattress.
"Idiot. I could've just climbed out…" Gray grumbled.
"…Your hair's still dumb," Gray said eventually.
"So is your face," Natsu replied, eyes narrowing.
Then slowly, almost inevitably, both boys cracked a smile. Small. Tired. But real.
"Flame brain," Gray whispered again, this time with a hint of something warmer.
"Pervert." Natsu whispered back.
Gray sat up, staring at Natsu.
"But seriously, how do you remember me?"
Natsu looked at him like he was looking at an idiot, which Gray found insulting.
"What the hell kind of question is that?! No shit I'm going to remember you!"
Gray sighed.
"I-" Gray didn't get a chance to finish before Natsu pounced at him.
"Wait! How dare you die!" Natsu grew angered. He grabbed at Gray's light blue onesie.
"Me?" What about you idiot. How did you die?" Gray retaliated, grabbing Natsu's collar and shoving him back. Thankfully the crib was big enough.
"I don't remember. All I remember is defeating Acnologia and then it went black and then I was here."
"You did what?? You- you managed to defeat him?!" Gray's voice trembled, from anger and relief. Relief that the guild was safe from Acnologia. Anger that Natsu went and got himself killed for it.
Natsu shook him back. "What about you, how did you die?"
Gray sighed. There was no reason to lie anymore. "I-I was fighting Zeref. I used Iced shell with the lost attribute to seal him forever. It was far stronger than normal, but the price was that it would also erase everyone's memory of me."
"You did what?!" Natsu's whisper grew into a shout. "Dammit if I didn't die fighting Acnologia I would have stopped you like I always have!"
A look of realization formed on Gray's face. "You died fighting Acnologia…it makes sense now. You were already dead before I did Iced Shell…so the condition never applied to you."
"Everyone in the guild…even though we died, we're supposed to live on in their hearts! But you won't because of that stupid crap you pulled!" Natsu gripped Gray's shirt as hard as he could, his hands trembling. He shoved against the back of the Crib, making a loud thud.
Shoto stirred to the noise and wiggled around. Natsu looked over and became quieter. He didn't want to wake him.
"It was the only thing I could do. It was either that or let him kill our family." Gray said after a few moments.
Natsu tried punching him, but just stopped and sighed. What was the point? He did the same thing. Given the chance, he would do it again with no hesitation. How could he blame Gray for what he would've done.
"This isn't over." he grumbled before climbing out of the crib. He tried hanging off and dropping from the crib this time, but still landed on his back. He rolled over and stood up and waddled back to his crib.
–Age 2 years—
Two years seemed to pass by in a blur for Gray.
It still felt strange to say it, even in his head.
He'd been born again. No magic. No guilds. Just steel towers, glowing screens, tiny rectangular boxes people pressed against their ears to talk to someone miles away without using magic. It was terrifying and fascinating. The house he lived in was quite huge. The family was influential and he found out their "father" was the 2nd ranked hero.
There were still a few things he needed to learn.
Language had been the first thing. But he was lucky. The one they spoke here, Japanese, he now knew, shared some linguistic roots with the language spoken in his old life. Learning to speak again had been slightly challenging, but it wasn't difficult. Even Natsu managed to learn it. Within the first year, he could say a few phrases easily. By now, at two years old, he was able to speak it fluently.
What struck him most about this new world wasn't just the tech, the sprawling cities, or even the talking vegetables he'd seen on TV once, it was how common abilities were. Here, everyone had quirks. Not everyone was strong, not everyone flashy, but it was normal. Power wasn't rare the same way magic had been in Fiore. It was commonplace. Even their servants had quirks.
But even in this new world, with all its marvels and noise, something still felt… empty.
He hadn't felt a single pulse of magic since waking up here. Not a sliver.
He'd tried. Meditated. Focused. Stared really hard at a puddle once.
Nothing.
The only other thing that brought him some normality was Natsu.
Or Yakuto, as everyone else called him.
Gray didn't know what cruel twist of fate had reincarnated them together, let alone as literal toddlers, but he wasn't complaining. Having a familiar face, loud, obnoxious, and dramatic though it was, helped keep him grounded. Even if Natsu's idea of intellectual contribution so far was, "I put my finger in one of those strange slanted holes in the wall and got zapped. I think it's cursed."
Currently, the two sat together cross-legged on the nursery floor, surrounded by crumbs and cookie debris. It was supposed to be snack time. Shoto, their ever quiet triplet, had eaten his half a cookie and gone off to reorganize his colored blocks, probably.
Natsu, meanwhile, had shoved his mouth full and was now trying to talk around it.
Gray sighed, brushing crumbs from his shirt. "Okay, so here's what I've figured out."
Natsu blinked and pointed at his mouth like I can't talk right now.
"I know, just listen," Gray muttered. "This world, there's no magic. It runs on technology and 'quirks,' which are like physical mutations. People have powers, but it's not the same. It's… genetic. And most people get theirs by age four."
Natsu chewed, swallowed exaggeratedly, then licked a stray bit of chocolate from his lip. "Huh. Neat."
Gray started. "That's your response?"
"I dunno, man. I've just been hangin' out. I tried to use the toaster, but it just zapped me again."
"You absolute moron! Stop putting your finger in the outlets…" Gray rubbed his forehead. He picked up those strange phrases from our cousins no doubt.
"I've been trying to gather information for months. What've you even figured out?!" Gray said, attempting to bring them back to topic.
Natsu shrugged. "Food is good. Fire kinda tastes bland though. Did you see the fancy car? It's like the one in Edolas. Also the TV thing is awesome. They have this great show about ninjas. The main character is this guy who wears orange."
"…I give up." Gray sighed.
They sat in silence for a moment. Gray leaned back against the wall, mind drifting back to the fragments of his old life. He didn't know what to do here.
He stared at the last cookie between them. He hadn't even realized he'd reached for it until it was in his mouth.
"By the way, did you–" Gray started. But before he was able to finish
WHAM.
"OW—WHAT THE HELL?!" Gray yelped, falling sideways as Natsu socked him right in the cheek.
"You ate the last one!" Natsu shouted.
"You just hit me over a cookie?!"
"That was my cookie, Snow Cone!"
"There are more! Go ask Rei!"
"But that last one was mine!" Natsu yelled.
"Why does it matter, stop acting like a child damn it!" Gray countered.
"I am a child!" Natsu yelled before he pounced on Gray.
They devolved into a full blown war, the kind only two stubborn, reincarnated toddlers with way too much history and zero impulse control could manage. Natsu launched the first attack, an open handed smack to Gray's arm that made a sound far more dramatic than the sting it left. Gray retaliated with a shove that knocked Natsu back into the couch, which only fueled the fire.
"Hey!" Natsu squeaked, red-faced with betrayal.
Then came the barrage. Tiny fists flew in every direction, smacking into chubby arms, tummies, and occasionally air. Neither had the physical capabilities to actually deal significant damage, but they made up for it in spirit. Every swing came with a grunt or a hiss, little battle cries echoing through the living room like wild gremlin snarls.
A block soared through the air, Natsu's, and hit Gray's shoulder with a thud. Gray picked up another and chucked it back, missing by a mile but clearly making his point. Plastic cluttered the floor like debris from a battlefield. The couch trembled under their weight as they climbed, wrestled, and rolled.
A couch pillow met its untimely demise in the fray, ripped from its spot and flung like a shield. Natsu grabbed it with both hands and swung it at Gray.
"I will end you!" Natsu screeched, his tiny voice cracking.
"Bring it, flame for brains!" Gray snapped back, grabbing the pillow mid swing and pulling. They tumbled off the couch together onto the floor.
Natsu, now thoroughly fed up, let out a wordless yell and bit Gray.
Right on the arm.
"OW!!" Gray shrieked. "You bit me, you asshole!"
"You ate the last cookie!" Natsu shouted, mouth still full of Gray's arm.
Gray kicked him in the shin. Natsu slapped him in the face. Hair was pulled. At some point, someone stepped on a Lego and cursed in a language that definitely didn't belong to a toddler.
They rolled apart, panting, disheveled, and full of righteous fury. Their hair stuck up in every direction. Their shirts were rumpled, one sock was missing between them, and there was a suspicious dent in the wall made by a plastic toy car.
Rei appeared in the doorway, seemingly out of nowhere. The sight caused her soul to nearly leave her body.
"Boys!" Rei's voice cut through the chaos like a divine intervention. The air got cold.
Both froze mid-swing. Despite being adults mentally, something about Rei reminded them of a certain red haired knight. Must be a mom thing.
"What do you think you're doing?!" She loomed over them with a furious expression.
"He ate the last cookie." Natsu pointed at Gray, immediately selling him out.
"You had like 90% of them." Gray snapped back.
"You said you didn't want it and started grabbing some anyway."
"I said no such thing!" Gray yelled. The two prepared to go at it again.
"Enough!" she barked, snapping her fingers. "Both of you, stop fighting or no more cookies or any snacks for that matter!
Natsu's jaw dropped. He tried to retort, but one look from Rei immediately shot down any words he was about to say.
"…Truce?" Gray whispered, eye twitching.
"…Truce," Natsu muttered back, dropping a stuffed rabbit he'd been about to use as a bludgeon.
Rei smiled lightly and placed the refilled tray of cookies down with the practiced exhaustion of a mother who had long since accepted that 1/3 of her children were feral. She placed her palms on their heads and shook their heads.
"Why can't you two be more like Shoto?" she muttered as she left, ignoring the identical smirks forming behind her.
"Remember, no fighting!" She said as he left the room.
The moment the door closed again, the boys dug in like starved wolves. Between bites, Natsu looked over, eyes gleaming.
"What were we talking about again?" Gray asked.
"I don't remember." Natsu replied without looking up, still focused on the snacks in hand.
"Well, whatever. We have time to worry about it later." Gray sighed.
"Do you ever get that weird feeling about Endeavor?" Natsu suddenly said.
Gray paused. The question came out of nowhere. He glanced toward the hall where their father was likely pacing and muttering about training schedules.
Gray had been observing Enji Todoroki as well, piecing things together in the quiet way he'd always done. Despite being a father of six, it was painfully obvious who held the spotlight. Shoto. Everything revolved around him. Future training schedules, diet plans, future private tutors, Shoto would have it all. Enji hovered like a shadow. He was always there watching and always preparing something for him. It wasn't subtle, not even a little. The rest of them, Fuyumi, Natsuo, Toya, even Natsu and himself, seemed to orbit somewhere outside that intense pull. Rei was different. She was the constant. She fed them, played with them, soothed scraped knees and tantrums with the same soft voice and patience, whether it was Shoto or Natsu screaming about who stole a crayon. Even Fuyumi, still technically a kid herself, stepped in more than their father did, making bottles and changing diapers without complaint. Gray wasn't bothered by it. He'd learned long ago not to crave attention from figures who didn't care to give it. After all, family didn't always come from blood relations. Natsu, as far as he could tell, didn't seem to mind either; he was too busy causing chaos and demanding snacks.
But Toya? Toya noticed. And Toya hated it. Gray could see it in the way Toya's eyes followed their father, not with awe, but with something else, resentment, jealousy, pain. Lately, Toya was distracted. Quieter. Like something was eating at him from the inside, and Gray, for all his reborn experience, wasn't sure how to stop it, or if he even could.
"…Yeah," he said finally. "He's a strange one. He cares about Shoto a little too much. Does Shoto even understand what's happening?"
"Thats not what I meant. I mean his strength. He's powerful." Natsu replied.
"I agree. Even without any magic to feel, just his presence is quite overwhelming."
Natsu nodded, cheeks still full. "I'm gonna fight him someday."
Gray blinked. "Why."
"Because he's strong," Natsu said simply. "And I wanna see how strong I've gotta get to punch him in the face."
"Why do you want to punch him in the face?" Gray asked, even though he probably knew the answer.
"He looks annoying."
Gray sighed, expecting nothing less.
"You know there are more important things to do right now, right?….like… figuring this world out. Also we don't even have a quirk yet. Did you even think this through" Gray rubbed his forehead.
"When have I ever?" Natsu stared at him like he was stupid.
Gray was stunned for a moment.
They both just stared at each other, looked down and continued eating.