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dearlymrme · 14 hours ago

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Twitterpated (Fushichou Marco | Phoenix Marco/Reader)

Part of Schrodinger's Shooting Star series.

Summary: Marco knows you don’t belong here—...yet the evidence lingers in whispers, in instinct, in a song etched too deeply to ignore.

Everything about you sings of irrational decisions, and Marco the Phoenix prides himself on being rational. Yet, frustratingly, your mere proximity unravels his calculated thoughts, reducing them to the chaotic emotional awareness of a five-year-old.

You fell from the sky as a shooting star, and they fished you out of the depths as if dredging for gold, expecting treasures worthy of legends. Diamonds bright enough to rival the stars or pearls strung like constellations? But what they pulled from the deep defied all imagination.

You looked so ordinarily human.

Despite the fact that Marco had never heard of any falling star being tangible enough to hold, there is something about you that just feels right. An unfamiliar kind of familiar, tugging at his instincts. Despite the ever-present dangers, a quiet whisper in the back of his mind insisted that everything was going to be okay.

It’s an attraction hard to place, as if crafted from fragments of dreams and nostalgia, he shouldn’t possess. A strange scent that is unfamiliar yet comforting, wrapping him like a blanket of nostalgia when the breeze catches his nose. The way he inexplicably knows where to touch to make you laugh, what to say to make you smile. It unsettles him. Marco doesn’t believe in fate, but this feels dangerously close.

Pops, who had also seen so much in this life, claimed that while he had never encountered anything like you before and he was quick to command Marco to aid you. Worry in his voice like the father figure, they all know him to be fretting over one of his children.

Yet, the rational part of Marco’s mind marked you in red ink: a clear warning, a calculated assessment. Dangerous. Your ordinary appearance did nothing to quiet the alarms in his head.

You were unresponsive for a long amount of time. When they dragged you out of the water, you were unconscious but breathing. Carrying you from the deck to his med bay had already exposed him to elements he couldn’t begin to understand. His suspicions were confirmed within minutes simply by being in the same room as you. Light shifted around you whenever he glanced away, only fully visible in his peripheral vision.

The shimmering light clung to him like glitter—fleeting but undeniable. His mind scrambled for an explanation. Bioluminescence? A heat mirage? No natural phenomenon could explain the way it rippled around you like a living wave, flickering just beyond his comprehension.

Though its lingering effect faded within seconds, the lack of pain or lasting presence wasn’t enough to stop him from isolating you out of sheer caution. Quarantining you wasn’t just protocol. It was the only way he could keep control of a situation that already felt like it was slipping through his fingers.

But the damage was already done.

Even as quickly as he’d called code ‘get the fuck away until more was learned’ you’d already infected the crew with an insatiable curiosity: whispers in the halls, stolen glances, and outright defiance of his orders. More than once he’s had to rush them away from your door, nearly having to sweep them back with a broom.

But since when did pirates ever respect a sign saying ‘stay away’? Rules weren’t their strong suit. Boundaries, borders, and caution signs? It was all pointless when danger was involved. There was a reason deadbolts had mysteriously appeared on all the bathroom doors lately. Marco could already feel his patience wearing thin.

The day you finally woke up had him coiling his muscles. He watched your feverish awakening with equal parts clinical precision and irrational unease. Dazed and feverish, the intensity in your fearful eyes darting erratically around the room reminded him of a trapped animal. Desperate, terrified, and unpredictable.

That’s when you locked gaze with him and let out a stressed giggle that bordered hysterical. Your complexion goes clammy, and you begin to tremble. He made the assumption that your panic and recognition of him had made you realize just how much hot water you were in.

Clearly, you came from a life where keeping up to date of new world pirates was either essential to survival or a hobby that would drive one to making foolish decisions. Like, say, attempting to commandeer the Moby Dick.

But then your reaction turns to further bash his logic and expectations with a brick of misunderstanding.

“I shouldn't be here.” You muttered, bowing your head in your quaking hands. “This is all wrong.” A miscalculation, perhaps? But then your next statement flows out of your mouth with visceral anxiety.

“Oh god, I'm going to die.” Your words carried the same weight of a harrowing admission of war on the horizon, a storm brewing in the distance, a call to seek higher ground. Your dropped shoulders and submissive posture, the tears creeping down your chin signaled your acceptance of fate.

It wasn't the realization of being surrounded by the Whitebeard Pirates that weighed on you. Something heavier pressed down. A sense of circumstance conspiring against you. You looked at him less as an enemy and more as a symbol of your misfortune. That only serves to cast more fuel to his fire of curiosity. Giving him all the more reason to drill you for answers. As far as hostages or captives went, you were more than cooperative. Upon your first response, however, he was using Observation to pick for any lie justifying your ridiculous answers. Marco had expected falsehoods, but…

His heart leaped in his throat when you betrayed no dishonesty. Genuine and true to your alibi, you either were a master liar or genuinely believed your own situation to be true.

He refused to accept it even though a part of him rattled the cages of his brain and convinced him to give you at least a beneficial shred of doubt.

“You mean to tell me you just tripped over your own ass into another world?” Summarize your unbelievable narration.

“Your guess is as good as mine.” You had huffed, crossing your arms as he carefully pokes and prods with a pen. “I was just on my way home, and the next thing I know, I was falling forward when I tried to catch my fall I’m suddenly underwater. Like I fell through the ground.”

Your fingers twitch for something more distracting to play with than fiddling with the sheets of the bed. Your shoulders were bunched up at your ears, your head bowed so sharply it made his own neck ache in sympathy.

You appeared to make yourself smaller than you already were at the moment. A kid curling in the corner trying to avoid punishment for nothing they even did wrong. Your whole being cried for help, and although you managed to tame your tears, there was still the shine of desperation in your eyes.

The Zoan instinct flared, a primal force Marco hadn’t felt in years. It clashed with his rational mind, clawing at his thoughts, urging him to act before he could question the impossibility of it all. That same little instinct told him to doubt himself, to hear you out.

The phoenix within him recognized something in you. A shooting star, defying the laws of nature with a grand bird of blue fire chasing the dust of your tail. Those were two forces already defying reason. Two impossibilities drawn together by powers neither of them could comprehend.

As much as he tries to argue it, It seems he’s unconsciously claimed you before logic could intervene.

He immediately called for Pop’s when he realized just how far out to ocean you were without a paddle. Presenting you and allowing you, in your own words, to explain just what you had told him.

His captain tested you, grilling you for honesty beneath the weight of Conqueror’s Haki, and yet...

A few of the newer brothers, unaccustomed to the stress, collapsed within seconds as their captain overshadowed you with his will.

It made many raise a brow of sheer surprise as you remained standing. You had even looked at them in confusion when bodies dropped in shock and concern. A flash of realization, you knew what this was. You look back at their captain in shock as the tension mounted higher.

And you cut through it as easily as the greatest swordsman of the sea.

You took a knee.

Uncompelled as you went down too carefully and smoothly.

And Marco’s sense of awe lingered, clawing at his logic like an itch he couldn’t scratch as you tip your head down in a respectful display of trust and compliance. No force demanding respect but your own.

Pops’ Conqueror’s Haki flitted away like a startled bird, and he tipped his head back, laughing harder than the crew had heard in a while.

”I swear, I’m telling the truth. I mean you and your crew no harm. If you’ll have me…I’d like to join. I’ll earn my keep. Anything I don’t know I’ll learn if you’re willing to teach me. Anything you want to know about my world, I’ll be happy to tell you.”

“Quite the otherworldly treasure you are then. As far as I’m concerned, you’re one of the family.” And he tipped his cup towards the crew. “We’ll be sure to take good care of ya, won’t we lads?”

The following cheer was like permission to give into his instincts. No longer with the hesitation of expecting a split second attack.

Marco had always been told to look for flaws; they were there if you dug deep enough. But now Pops was urging him to look for the good instead.

So Marco gives into that undeniable urge to tuck you under his wing. The words slip through his teeth before he can stop them rattling off anything, any excuse, just to keep you near. Exposure to foreign elements. Weakness to new diseases. Lack of immunity.

There is so much to learn and so little to go off of. He says it for your best interest, which, given your differences, is the truth. They learned your bone density, lack of healing factor, and needing to keep a critical eye on everything you eat.

When that excuse was becoming outplayed with time, he quickly offered to step in as your teacher instead. Which, if he's being honest, he needs to keep a pleased trill from traitorously escaping his throat when he agrees.

Ace introduces you to fighting, and although your hands shake, you grip the metal bat they had procured for you with the familiarity of an old friend.

Thatch keeps telling him to quit hogging the new kid as he’s still on the mission to cross out every dish in his cookbook that lists foreign ingredients. Still trying to find your favorite while trying to supplement what you’re missing.

Izou helps introduce you to Haki, and you eat his lessons like a five-star buffet. You take off at a speed that will have them betting you’d master at least one and be coherent in the others by the end of the year.

And Marco panics because logically, this makes no sense. He wasn’t one for paranoia, but the crew’s behavior was starting to feel… off. Each gesture, too precise. Each interaction, too familiar. It was as if they were in on a secret he hadn’t been told. But the inconsistencies were a siren's call of their own, demanding he stay close. Not out of trust, but necessity.

Haruta somehow knows your favorite color without ever being told.

Vista is the one who gave you your bat in the first place, claiming it felt right.

Jozu knows what you like, bringing you little inexpensive trinkets any time they make land.

Ace stargazes with you despite not being prompted.

And Marco knows your songs.

This pull wasn’t rational. It wasn’t practical. And yet, it clawed at him with an intensity he couldn’t name, a gravity he couldn’t deny. Logic told him to step back, to let go. But something deeper, more primal, urged him forward.

It was as though you had some memory warping ability, and until he has further proof, he needs to stay close. Is what he’s telling himself anyway, yet the crew gives him sly looks like knowing something he doesn’t.

That’s when you start singing. The sound curled through the air, unassuming yet insidious. It settled in his chest, knocking something loose. It wasn’t like the sirens or lorelei he’d known. It was worse. It felt… personal.

He knows better. He’s met such creatures, heard the haunting calls, and seen men lost to the pull of the sea. Your soft whistle hooks his ears, drawing his steps forward before he even realizes he’s moved. Damn it.

Today, you show your bravery by doing their laundry. You commit to your promise of being useful and volunteering for anything and everything. You try to take care of them as well, and while heartwarming, it often comes at the cost of you neglecting to take care of yourself.

As most of the crew were exchanging shifts or down in the mess for lunch, where you should be, you were singing under your breath in a voluntarily quiet tone of voice. Someone who didn’t necessarily want to be heard but couldn’t stand to be silent.

He stands there, a tray of food in hands courtesy of Thatch, who shoved it at him with a knowing grin. The pompadour-sporting chef gave him a thumbs up, a wink, and a cheeky, 'Go get 'em, birdy!'

A comment that would’ve earned him a smack if it weren’t for the tray holding your newly(?) discovered favorites.

The chef knew exactly what he was doing.

When the tune hits his ears, it freezes him in place with its unexpected power. He tries to say something, but he can't. His tongue goes thick in his mouth, stumbling over words that sound familiar. Before he could join in the chorus, a hum caught in his throat, you turned to place something in the basket. Your eyes met his.

You had the audacity to squeak at him.

You ducked behind the sheet you had so carefully folded. Letting the cotton loose and fly in the breeze. The heat from your face was hot enough to match any flame, and your lip pinched between your teeth as you looked everywhere but at him.

And he found it…so…Cute.

And it's so...

He cleared his throat and held out the tray of food for you because while he knew you said you’d get a plate after finishing laundry he didn't think you still really understood that it'd be gone by then. It was nearly by Thatch’s powers alone that you even had a portion left after the bottomless pit of crew Ace ate it all.

And he's glad because as you reached for the tray, heat was still wafting from your face. He couldn't help but smile for the opportunity you had given him. He licks his lips and tries to find the words, but his words could spell heartache later.

You're not even from the same world as them. You’re not even from the same sky or the same sea. There is so much of a difference, and the work it would take to build those bridges would be hard and exhausting.

Stars weren’t meant to linger, he reminded himself. They burned bright, fell fast, and disappeared into nothing. But this time, he couldn’t help but want to catch one before it was gone.

Maybe that’s why he’s so attracted. Like truly recognizing the pull of potential charge. Maybe he knew some version of you in a past life. Half-seen memories rippling across the fire, fading into ash before the snuff.

It clicks. That may very well be the case. Memories just at the corner he can’t bring to his eyes but now he has the power to acknowledge them.

Some part of him shouldn’t want this. He shouldn’t even think about wanting this. Too much history repeating itself, be it good or bad in a way, he doesn’t feel like he has much of a choice but doesn't hate it either. Now self-aware it’s too late to take it back.

Despite growing past childhood fantasies, he chooses to wish on a shooting star.

“You should sing more often,” he said, quieter than intended. So quiet, he almost wished you hadn’t heard. But the truth slipped out, raw and unguarded.

“I’d like to hear you sing again.”

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