Seven years ago everyone on Tenrou disappeared. 

No one knew what happened although there were plenty of conspiracies. The friends and family of those lost were devastated by the loss of reason. It seemed that they had all simply, vanished.

All those years later, a fisherman saw a glowing fairy tail symbol beneath the waved. Alerted immediately, the members of Fairy Tail raced to the beach where a giant sphere with the fairy tail symbol emerged from the waves. Slowly it washed onto the beach; in it was a giant black dragon.

"Acnologia!" everyone cried in happiness, but the true joy came when Acnologia, unconscious opened his wings and uncovered the remaining fairy tail members asleep in his claws.

Acnologia had awoken in a hospital bed. He rubbed his head and looked around at the unfamiliar surroundings. He walked out and came face to face with the Fairy Tail members. Immediately there were tearful embraces and cries of joy. Acnologia was confused as to why some people looked so much older and why others had hardly changed. Finally, Makarov, sensing Acnologia's confusion, took him aside and explained.

Acnologia had questions. Some Makarov could answer, and some he could not.

"What happened those seven years? How long have I  been out? Is everyone alright? What happened to Zeref? How the hell did seven years go by? How's everyone? What happened to the guild? Do you know what happened to Serena!?"

Makarov explained each one as best he could. Fairy Tail had fallen from its grace through the years, Acnologia had awoken only a few hours after he had, everyone from Tenrou was fine, Zeref was gone, he didn't know how time had worked, and Serena was alright. When he got to what he knew about Serena Acnologia listened with a blank face. Makarov had only gotten bits and pieces about the new world and most of them weren't good news.

Acnologia listened to the jubilation in the guildhall and sighed, "Now is not the time to worry about it. We have time to make up for."

Time was made up. Eventually. 

Those lost in the seven-year gap explored the changed Magnolia in wonder. Wendy ran from store to store eyeing the many knick-knack shops with wonder. Gajeel was nearly lost to a new music store. Natsu, Sting, Lector, and Happy ran around gasping at everything. Rogue and Erik seemed rather overwhelmed while Laxus looked unconcerned. Acnologia looked at everything with interest, it was almost like returning to civilization after his one-hundred-year long mourning.

"Hey look, isn't that our house?" Sting asked stopping in front of a run-down building.

"No way, our building was way more betterer" Natsu disagreed.

"Natsu-san, I don't think that's a word," Wendy pointed out.

It was their old apartment complex. There were so many memories in this place. The steps where Erik would listen to the world while petting Cubellios, the garden that Natsu burned down... twice, the support beams Gajeel had put in himself, the lightning rod Laxus had played on in the horrid storms. He opened the door to the empty building and smiled at the light and dark stains caused by playful games of tag played by Sting and Rogue through the halls. The air vents that Wendy would play hide and seek in. He walked back out and looked up towards their old apartment, there was the window that Natsu broke playing soccer with Sting, Gajeel, and Rogue. The window Wendy broke when she tried to fly... and succeeded. That other window broke by Laxus when Natsu knocked over his bottle collection. The dozen other windows that were broken due to his children.

"Wow, it is our old house," Natsu realized.

Someone was running through Magnolia, their feet slammed on the stone roads. Their breath came out in pants.

"Man, it's a pity it's so run down," Gajeel sighed rubbing the back of his neck.

"Maybe we should buy the place back," Erik pondered.

"Yeah, I'm sure we could fix it up!" Wendy giggled.

Someone shoved themselves through the bustling streets of Magnolia running frantically.

"Well, first things first we need our old guildhall back. Then we'll get money to get this place," Acnologia chuckled at his kids and their antics.

"The foundations are still fine," Gajeel said proudly, "probably due to their iron support beams."

"Let's do it," Laxus shrugged.

Someone turned a corner and froze when they saw Acnologia and the seven dragon slayers.

The world seemed to melt away as Acnologia turned to face the person. Standing there, panting heavily was Serena. Acnologia felt a strong pang of sadness as he looked at his eldest drake... he wasn't a drake anymore.

The dragon slayer stood there shaking with his eyes wide. He had grown into a dragon Acnologia noticed with pride.

Serena's eyes misted, he ran forward and launched himself forward slamming into Acnologia. He gave out a pitiful wail and began to cry as he hugged Acnologia. Acnologia couldn't tell what the man was saying but Acnologia's heart was being pulled apart as Serena cried into his torn cape.

"You're back," he sobbed finally saying something intelligible. Acnologia wrapped his hands around the mage and hugged him back.

Serena must have felt so alone Acnologia realized. He hadn't left the nest, the nest had been taken from him. He had been floundering through the world all alone with no promise of safety, a drake that hadn't learned to fly trying to survive all on his own... guilt crashed into Acnologia as he hugged his eldest.

"I'm sorry," he whispered. His words just seemed to make Serena cry harder.

Serena cried something that Acnologia couldn't understand. Erik smiled painfully as he heard Serena cry it in his mind, "Dad!"

After a few minutes, Serena pulled away from Acnologia and looked at the dragon king his eyes still watering.

"I knew it... I knew you'd come back," he choked.

Serena stood there grinning and crying all at the same time.

"Serena!" Wendy smiled hugging Serena. 

"Wendy," Serena smiled picking up Wendy and hugging her. "You're back," he cried. He embraced Gajeel who was startled by the sudden act of affection, and then he moved to Natsu who gave him his cocky smile and hugged him back. Sting and Rogue came in and hugged him as well. Serena hugged Laxus who was a full foot taller than him before moving to Erik. As he hugged Erik the dragon slayers decided that one hug wasn't enough. They tackled each other in an embrace.

"DRAGON PILE!" Sting cried.

"STING!" Erik roared angrily as he was sent to the ground.

Serena lay in the center of the pile still crying. A huge grin was on his face lighting up everything around him.

"I knew it," he whispered under his breath.

 Serena went back home, he had finally picked a place and had settled down. Of course, he had stayed for two long weeks of happiness. He was immensely light-hearted and immensely happy.

He would've stayed there forever, but he felt that it was wrong - he wasn't a hatchling, he wasn't a drake, he had a nest of his own and that was where he belonged now. When he left, he held a new photo in his hand, it had been taken only a few days ago. In it, Serena was now in the center, Acnologia standing above him actually smiling. Wendy stood in the front one hand in the air as she cheered, Sting lay on the floor comically and was grinning like an idiot. Rogue was secretly giving Gajeel bunny ears and was somehow keeping a straight face. Gajeel looked ticked at something Natsu had said and was grabbing the grinning fire mage by his scarf as Erik desperately tried to separate them. Laxus stood next to Acnologia and had a smug look on his face. Pictures never worked out for the dragon slayers. Serena got home and slipped the photo into a different frame before setting that frame next to the old photo.

"Thanks, Acno," he smiled looking at the photos, "thanks for coming back."

Makarovhad tried to give the guild over to Gildarts... the old fool; that didn't go well. He was made guild master... again, and Gildarts hit the road.  Lucy's father had died and so she went to mourn him, she also got her old apartment back. Erza and Mira had beat up Twilight Ogre and everyone was wondering how to receive enough money to buy back the old guildhall.

There was a lot of time to make up for and just not enough apologies to fix it.