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toraodwaterlaw · 3 years

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Heart to Heart

Part 1, Part 2; Part 3 of a four part AU fic set just after Marineford.

2416 words, angst with a happy-ish ending

Ten Days Later

Rosinante sat in the heart seat. It was about the last place he wanted to be but his brother had insisted and he wasn’t about to push his luck. He’d learned long ago to pick his battles when it came to Doffy, especially when he was in a mood. And, oh, what a mood he was in.

He’d returned to Dressrosa that way, equal parts amused and furious. It wasn’t all too unusual a mood to find Doffy in but it was always a dangerous one. Many members of the Family avoided him. The Executives mostly took the opportunity to spur him on to new heights of depravity. The Colosseum grounds were drenched with blood and more toys appeared on the streets every day.

Viola kept Rosinante appraised of all of it. It was probably a bit masochistic of him to insist on it, given he knew he could do nothing about it from his palace prison. He wanted to know, though. He needed to bear witness to his brother’s crimes and, more importantly, he needed to try to use what he heard to gauge what was in store for Law when he returned. He knew Law would scold him for both. How many lectures had he received for trying to shoulder Doffy’s crimes? How many more for worrying more about Law than himself?

What else was he supposed to do at a time like this? He couldn’t remember the last time Law had so thoroughly disappointed Doffy. That was the word Doffy had used. Disappointed. Only he could make so mild a word sound so terrifying. After that, Rosinante was willing to do anything he could to temper the storm to come, even if it meant sitting in the damnable heart seat.

Doffy turned on his heel, having completed another angry loop of the room. “Do you know the trouble he caused with this stunt?”

Rosinante did, in fact, know. Doffy had talked of little else. What could Law’s actions mean aside from how they benefited or inconvenienced the king of Dressrosa? Not that it mattered whether the question was rhetorical or not. Rosinante couldn’t speak even if he’d wanted, not with his lips sewn shut. His decade long punishment for the crime of pretending to be mute. Twice a day he got a supposed reprieve during Family meals. It was paraded as a kindness but all it meant was that Doffy would try to taunt him into saying something he’d regret and that his lips would never have a chance to scar or heal.

So Rosinante sat silently, as he always did. As expected, Doffy got back to pacing without so much as waiting for a shrug in response.

“Of course I have my ways of smoothing things over.”

He flashed a quick smile that said he knew Rosinante understood full well what he meant. Rosinante resisted the urge to roll his eyes. That was a skill he’d honed well over the years. He might not be able to speak but Doffy delighted in trying to provoke a reaction. It was never worth the minimal effort of a raised brow or the skin pulling sting of a frown.

Doffy, as usual, didn’t care. He enjoyed poking at things, whether he got a reaction or not. He stalked over to the heart seat and put a foot up on one of the arms to steady himself as he loomed. “But I don’t like going through the trouble just because that brat got ideas in his head. Just what was our dear Corazon thinking, do you suppose?”

Rosinante expected this to be more of the same but then Doffy pinched his fingers together and pulled. The effect was immediate. His lips stung as they were freed from their prison. He opened his mouth and then closed it.

“Well?” Doffy asked, leaning in closer.

Rosinante put one hand on his throat and with the other, touched his lips delicately. The strings were really gone. He couldn’t think of a time in eleven years when Doffy had removed them without an audience to amuse himself. Did he want an actual conversation? Rosinante wasn’t inclined to answer his brother but he was too shocked to refuse completely.

“Well what?” he croaked.

“I know you imagine you understand him better than anyone else, so tell me— Why did Law do it?”

Rosinante hadn’t a clue how he was supposed to answer that. There was no safe response, for him or for Law. There was likely a way to spin it in his brother’s favor but he didn’t trust his voice beyond a word or two. Doffy surely knew that and hoped to get the blunt and easy truth.

“I don’t—” He coughed and Doffy frowned. He waited through the burn in his unused throat. “I don’t know.”

“Come now, you must have a guess. What would he want with a small-fry like Monkey D. Luffy? Is it that cursed middle initial? What does he know?”

“Doffy—”

Doffy leaned in closer so that his razor sharp smile was so close it could have cut. “I’ve never let him in on our little secret. So what have you told him, little brother? Trying to sow dissent, eh?”

Rosinante felt his heart thud heavily in his chest. Trafalgar D Water Law. Perhaps it was well past time he told Law the truth to keep him safe. For the moment, though, he was happy he hadn’t done so yet.

“I haven’t…told him…” He swallowed over the pain every word brought. “Anything.”

Doffy just stared at him and, not for the first time, Rosinante cursed those infernal sunglasses. All he saw was his own frowning face reflected back at him. There were times when he felt like he didn’t know his brother at all. He couldn’t begin to guess what was going through the elder Donquixote’s head.

Not that he had long to wonder. Doffy’s silent interrogation was cut short by the call of the den den mushi in his pocket. Rosinante could tell at a glance that it was Trebol. That man made even snails look extra slimy.

“Doffy, Doffy, little Corazon is on his way.”

The already dangerous curve of Doffy’s smile sharpened further. “Make sure we aren’t disturbed.”

It seemed Trebol had more to say but Doffy had already hung up on him. He strode over to the door and waited. Rosinante wanted to rush in front of him, to intercept Law and let the boy rest rather than face whatever it was his brother had waiting, but he knew how well that would go. He instead waited in place with his heart in his throat.

The familiar clack of Law’s heels heralded his arrival. He looked small standing between the massive doors of the throne room and far younger than usual. Rosinante’s fingers dug into the arms of the heart seat.

“Corazon, do come in."

“Doflamingo,” Law said, curt as ever.

His long, even steps became abruptly clipped when he saw the heart seat was occupied. It was the only sign he gave that he was bothered. He leaned easily against a window ledge and waited for Doffy to speak first. He was careful not to look over to Rosinante but Rosinante had no reason to resist himself.

The dark rings under Law’s eyes were more pronounced than usual. His usually well groomed jawline was dusted with stubble and punctuated by the sickly green of healing bruises. If he looked that bad where they could all see, Rosinante didn’t want to imagine what Law was hiding.

Doffy stalked over. Rosinante might have been imagining things but he swore his brother intentionally positioned himself to avoid blocking Law from view. More likely, it was meant to keep Law’s view clear and let the boy stew in concern over what was planned for them both. What part of this hadn’t been contrived? Doffy was ever the puppet master.

As if he knew Rosinante’s thoughts, Doffy used a string to tilt Law’s chin up. He examined the bruises while turning Law’s head this way and that. “Straw Hat repaid you well for your kindness. It’s not often that you let someone else get the better of you. No good deed goes unpunished,” he said with a chuckle. "Isn't that right?"

“So it would seem,” Law replied. “I assume I’m here to find out just how true that is.”

Doffy threw back his head and laughed. “That depends— what exactly was your intention, Corazon? You’ll find that I don’t enjoy a fire quite as much when it comes back to burn me.”

Law kept his features carefully schooled. Nothing about his face or his posture gave away unease. “I didn’t mean anything by it. It was a whim, nothing more.”

Doffy’s fingers played with unseen strings. “A whim? You don’t act on whims.”

Law shrugged and inclined his head. “It’s as simple as that. I didn’t intend anything against you. I just acted. Call it… a doctor’s instinct, if you need an explanation.”

"And what if I had needed my doctor? You were at Marineford for me."

Law raised an eyebrow. "Are you saying anyone there was an actual threat to you?"

Doffy laughed. This time nothing else painted the sound, only honest amusement. That didn't make it any more pleasant to listen to. The things that amused Doffy rarely were. In this case, though, it granted Rosinante the smallest sliver of hope. Perhaps Doffy's anger had lost its edge. Maybe he remembered why he was so fond of the boy he'd chosen to be his right hand man.

Then, just as quickly as that anger had subsided, it came rushing back. It showed itself in the protruding vein on Doffy's temple, the glint of strings between his fingertips. He stood up straight. When drawn up to his full height, without his usual slouch, it was even more apparent that he was nearly double the size of Law.

"You were there for me- under my flag, my name- whether I needed you or not. I don't care if it was a whim or open revolt, you put eyes on me I'd rather not have. I had to pay for your whim and I expect repayment."

Law let out a slow breath and let his shoulders slump. There was something akin to relief in his features. Law had surely been waiting for this exact moment for weeks. Whatever was to come, that wait was over. Rosinante only wished he could feel anything other than dread. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen his brother so furious. He would spare Law the brunt of that anger if he could. He’d failed Law on Minion and he would never do so again.

“I understand,” Law said with an even voice.

“That’s good to hear. What I want from you—” Doffy bared his teeth, the expression too vicious to be called a smile. “—is my brother’s heart.”

The careful facade Law had constructed fell away in an instant. “He has nothing to do with this,” he shouted. “This was my decision. My mistake. Let me pay the price.”

He clutched a fistful of Doffy’s coat when the older man turned to walk toward Rosinante. Doffy grabbed hold of his wrist hard enough to make Law cry out when he wrenched the young man off.

“He has everything to do with this,” Doffy growled. “He’s the reason you’ve become the sort of soft, sentimental fool who would act based on a feeling. So you will pay the price and I’m naming the payment.”

Law flicked his wrist and formed a Room around him. It was enough to get Doffy to stop in his tracks. Law’s golden eyes took on a flinty edge. He formed his hand into a sort of claw and held it before his chest.

“Take my heart instead.”

Strings snapped onto Law’s arm before he could complete the operation on himself.

“You’re testing my patience,” Doffy said. With one hand still controlling the strings, the other reached for the gun tucked into the band of his pants. He pointed the pistol at Rosinante. “I could make you pull the trigger. I could make you carve the heart out without the use of your powers. Now do as I say or I’ll ask for more than just his heart.”

Law fought against the strings. At this rate he was liable to break his wrist, if not lose the arm completely. Rosinante knew he should be more concerned for himself. There was no saying what Doffy would do when he had control of his heart. However, he couldn’t spare a thought for that with Law in pain before him and threatening to push Doffy over the edge.

“Law.”

That single syllable was enough to put a stop to Law’s struggles. He stared, wide eyed. “Your mouth. Your voice. But when...?”

Rosinante waved him off and crossed the room to kneel before Law. He ignored the way Doffy smiled, all of this no doubt going according to his plan, and took Law’s hands in his own. He could feel them trembling. Those weren’t the hands of a killer— of a Corazon— but the boy he’d watched over for the last fourteen years.

“Do as he asks.”

There was no way Law would have cried if he was aware of doing it. As it was, the tears pooled and fell unheeded while he searched Rosinante for an answer. He squeezed his eyes shut so that the last of the tears were forced out. When he opened them again, the gold had lost its shine. He pressed close, wrapped one arm around Rosinante’s back, and poised the other with the hand at his chest.

“This won’t hurt,” Law muttered.

Even if he hadn’t known how Law’s powers worked, Rosinante wouldn’t have doubted it. No matter what Doffy tried to make of Law, that would never change.

It was over before he was even aware anything had happened. He only knew because the blue haze of the Room fizzled out and he saw his heart beating steadily in the palm of Law’s hand. Law’s fingers curled protectively around it. Rosinante felt it as a comforting squeeze.

“I’m sorry you forced me to this point,” Doffy said as he took the heart from Law.

Law said nothing, only nodded and left the room when Doffy asked for nothing more. Rosinante felt a shiver that started from somewhere outside himself and curled into the empty cavity in his chest.

#one piece #one piece au #one piece corazon #corazon #donquixote rosinante #trafalgar law #doflamingo #donquixote rocinante #donquixote doflamingo #trafalgar d. water law #corazon!law #fic

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misc-headcanons · 4 years

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(The Straw Hats and Scabbards at the castle ruins, as well as Katakuri's children and O-Tama are eating dinner. The large dining room in the castle has been mostly cleaned of dust and cobwebs, but it's clear that it's been abandoned like the rest of the area for years. Vanilla is talking excitedly with O-Tama, Fritter is keeping to himself, Dochi and Ube are eagerly listening to Luffy talk about his previous adventures, and Maple is expertly eavesdropping on every conversation at once while she eats.)

Vanilla: Wow, you're a ninja-in-training, O-Tama? I'm a witch-in-training! Or, well, I dunno if "witch" is the right word. My momma always says that not everyone who uses magic's a witch, but I like saying it. Papa says I'm too cute to be a witch, but I think witches can be cute. Ninjas can be cute too, right?

O-Tama: I guess so. But I wanna be strong and stealthy as a kunoichi, not cute. I'm training to be a force to be reckoned with!

Vanilla: Yeah, but I think you can be a great fighter AND cute. I mean look at Mr. Chopper! He's a member of Luffy's crew so he can fight really well, but he's super fluffy and sweet too.

Chopper: Awww, who're ya calling a good fighter and cute? How dare you, hehehe~

Vanilla: See? Cool AND cute, just like you, O-Tama!

(Sanji notices Fritter's silence so far and gently puts a hand on his shoulder.)

Sanji: How do you like the soup, Fritter?

Fritter: Oh! Um, it's...it's really good. I'm happy I finally got to eat something you made, even if it wasn't at the castle. You really are a good cook, Uncl--Um, Not-Uncle Sanji.

Sanji: I think I remember Pudding saying you wanted to be a chef one day when you grew up, right?

Fritter: Uh-huh. Dochi and Ube wanna be fighters, and Maple's gonna be in charge of communi--um...comm-you...

Maple, offhandedly: Communications. What Uncle Monty does, remember?

Fritter: Yeah, that. So everyone in the family can talk to each other easy and not get messages wrong. And she's probably gonna be a really important Minister too, since she's so smart and good with magic. But I just wanna cook and bake in the kitchen with the chefs. They like to let me watch while they work, and I have my own chair where I sit and watch and everything!

Sanji: I bet you'll be a great chef, just like your Aunt Chiffon with cake and your Aunt Pudding with chocolate.

(Fritter smiles up at Sanji.)

Fritter: Thanks. I'm gonna make people happy whenever I cook something, just like you!

(Dochi and Ube are seated next to each other, practically bouncing in their seats as they hear more and more about the Straw Hats and the Scabbards)

Dochi: Wait, Miss Nami, you managed to make Zeus YOUR familiar!? Holy crap, that's so cool! I mean, Grandma probably doesn't think it is, but still...wow! Do you use magic like mom?

Nami: Well, I dunno if it's how your mom does things, haha. I mean the people I learned from were called "weather wizards", but it's more about science and learning about climate and stuff than spells.

Maple: Mom always says that "magic is just science turned sideways." Both have solid theories on how they work, and experimenting with both makes you more knowledgeable and powerful. Plus, even if it isn't powered by magic specifically, your staff seems like it has similar functions to mom's.

Ube: And Luffy, I still can't believe you fought Papa and didn't like...die! He's never fought anyone like you before. And the way you two weaponized your softer powers with rubber and Mochi with Armament Haki!? That was so cool!

Dochi: Yeah! Me and Ube were going nuts the whole fight while we watched through one of Auntie Brulee's mirrors. If Mama hadn't held us back, we woulda definitely tried to watch in-person.

Ube: And WE wouldn't ruin it the way Flampe tried to, either. I can't believe she thought Papa needed her help. OOOH, and when she started making fun of Papa's face--

Dochi: Yeah, that was WAY out of line... Mama had to put me and Ube into our own bubbles so we couldn't hop in there to kick her ass!

Vanilla, in a scandalized tone: Dochi! Don't say that! Auntie Flampe was really mean, but still...

Ube: You're right, 'Nilla. We were ready to kick Flampe's butt. And with that dress she wears all the time, it woulda been easy to kick that big, stupid, floating BUTT of hers!

(Fritter, Vanilla, and O-Tama snicker and try to hide how much they're smiling and giggling behind their hands.)

Luffy: How is Katakuri, anyway? I didn't really get to see if he got taken care of or anything before I had to get to my ship. That Mirror Lady probably got to him, right?

Ube: He had to stay in bed for a few weeks, but Mama and Auntie Brulee worked hard to make him better.

Vanilla: And me and Fritter, too! I helped with healing magic on his little cuts and scrapes, and Fritter always fluffed his pillows and stuff.

Fritter: Yeah, and I helped the chefs make donuts for his Meriendas too!

Ube: Oh. Uh yeah, they helped too. But most of it was Brulee being a good nurse and Mom being good with her magic. The day we fell through the portal here, he was taking walks and stuff every day.

Dochi: Heh, and practicing with his trident whenever he knew Mom wasn't around to scold him for getting too carried away.

Luffy: Aw, I get that. Chopper's always saying I'm not healed up enough to do stuff sometimes after a big fight, but I just do it anyway. I bet Katakuri's the same way with your mom.

(Maple's attention is turned to Law.)

Maple: So, I imagine that if you and Luffy are allies, you're the one with a plan to take Kaido on. You seem more...um, strategic than him.

Law: That's one way of putting it...Yes, I do have a plan.

Maple: Hm. You know, now that I know you two were planning to target him, some of the news about you makes a bit more sense. Destroying the main resources for SMILE production in Punk Hazard; kidnapping that idiot scientist to use as leverage in Dressrosa; defeating Doflamingo, Kaido's most powerful ally outside of his own crew and a major source of intel, manpower, and influence...I had a feeling that there was something tying it together.

Law: You're pretty sharp for someone your age. I'm not surprised your Uncle Mont-d'or would want you as the head of communication and intel for the Big Mom Pirates after he's gone.

Maple: Thanks. I'm just glad that there's some explanation for why you and Luffy's crew were seen traveling and fighting together so often. Though to be honest, I was surprised to hear that Doflamingo was sent to prison; if what I'd heard and seen about your history was true, I was expecting you to kill Doflamingo in Dressrosa. But Luffy doesn't seem to support killing your enemies if you can help it.

Law: How do you--

Maple: Don't worry, the Big Mom pirates don't know about that. Not even Uncle Monty does.

Law: And how do you?

Maple: The same way I know the Scabbards over there got sent through time and how they're the surviving retainers of Lord Oden, and that they're trying to defeat Kaido and this Orochi guy so Momonosuke can take his rightful place on the throne. Keeping secrets from me is a pretty hard thing to do.

Ube: Yeesh, quit acting so mysterious. You know everyone's business because you know Mom's spells on reading someone's memories and the All-Seeing Eye and--mmpgh!

(Maple's uses a quick spell to make Ube's tongue stick to the roof of his mouth. She narrows her eyes and frowns at him.)

Maple: And how to stop brothers from sharing too much with strangers. For someone who wants to be a leader within Big Mom's pirate crew, you'd think you'd remember that loose lips sink ships, Ube.

Vanilla: I thought most of Gramma's ships sank after people shot a bunch of cannons and bombs at 'em...

(After she stops giggling, Dochi uses some of her own magic to free Ube's tongue. Ube glares at Maple before turning to ask Zoro about what it's like to fight with a sword in your mouth.)

Maple: Look, I know you're a smart man and you clearly have a talent for strategy. But I just want to make what the backup is in case things go wrong.

Law: You're a newcomer, you don't even know the full extent of the plan, and you're demanding to know more? Just because you're a clever kid with magic, that doesn't mean I'm going to reveal every step of this to you. Your uncle had to have taught you that only one person should ever know the full strategy plan, and that's the one who planned it out.

Maple: Yeah, he did. I'm not asking you to trust me that much; if I were in your position, I certainly wouldn't. All I want to know is what my siblings and I can do to help and ensure that when things go wrong, we can be useful and get things back on track. You've just been handed a very valuable wild card, and I want to make sure you use us wisely.

Dochi: Whaddya mean 'when things go wrong', Maple? With Law's crew, the Straw Hats, the Scabbards, and all the allies they've got here, we're all super strong and you said that Law's really good with strategy.

Maple: True. But when it comes to HIM...(Maple gestures to Luffy, who's gulping down the last of his soup) you have the wildest card of all. And he seems to blow through any well-laid plan without any second thought. (She leans back in her chair a bit and crosses her arms) Whatever plan you have in mind, Mr. Law, it's pointless if you really haven't got a backup in mind for whenever he manages to completely ruin it.

Kin'emon: Do you really think someone as young and inexperienced as yourself could come up with a better idea?

Maple: I'm young, not inexperienced. Believe me, as the eldest in a family of five siblings imbued with magic and various forms of Haki, I'm an expert in making plans that are bound to be thrown off course by the chaotic whims of someone close to you. So, Mr. Law...what have you got in mind?

#one piece #one piece oc #dochi #maple #ube #vanilla #fritter #oc #wano #wano spoilers

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trellwords · 7 years

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wip amnesty from (mostly) years ago; 9000 words, law/luffy, monet/law, law & bonney, would-be psychological horror that never got around to it

Bonney said, "But it was a victory."

"A pyrrhic one," bit out Law, and in the window's reflection Monet saw him finish his drink and reach for the bottle, take a swig straight from it instead of pouring himself another. "My whole life, Bonney."

Monet was the first to wake when Penguin rapped her knuckles on the door. Law was only stirring beside her when she called, “Yes, Penguin,” just loud enough to hear outside, and received the following report:

“Land in sight of the scouting submersible, ma'am. Perhaps an hour out from our position.”

“Very well,” said Monet, and, “we’ll be right out.” Then, before she forgot: “The weather?”

“Snowing,” said Penguin, and left, rubber boots ringing in the hallway.

Beside her, Law rolled over and scrubbed a hand over his face, leaving it pressed over his eyes. “I almost wish land had waited until daybreak,” he murmured.

Monet smiled, teased: “Having a good dream?”

“No,” said Law, “no dreams,” and Monet understood: for both of them, the only good dreams were none at all, dreamless nights a respite from fouler things.

They rose slowly, by their standard—Monet had seen Law jump out of bed and be ready to charge out almost instantly, sword and hat and clothes summoned from the closet with the blink of an eye. Not so today. While he brushed his teeth in the next room Monet tied back her hair and dug out warmer clothes, a sideways vest made to fit over her wings; once Law returned, long coat donned and covering him right down to the ankle, he stopped beside her and fastened the latches, silent.

“Lucky, don’t you think?” she said, while he worked. “Landfall before your birthday. Maybe you’ll be able to celebrate somewhere, after all.” It would be his twenty-ninth.

Law said, “I don’t mean to,” and she felt his fingers pause before moving onto the next latch, could feel his frown. “It’s very strange,” he said, “birthdays being something other than a countdown.”

She did not ask, still? said only, “Good strange?”

“I don’t know,” said Law, and finished the last latch, tying a knot at the end. She flexed her wings; the vest sat snug but not so tight she couldn’t move, and she nodded at him, satisfied.

Law stepped back. Monet, struck suddenly by the lack of reciprocity—his own coat was steadfastly utilitarian, nothing to fasten at all—reached over and tucked an errant tuft of his hair back behind his ear.

They trekked out onto deck together. It was cold enough in the hall outside their quarters for Law’s breath to mist the air (Monet’s never did, no matter how the temperature dropped). When they stepped out past the airlock she heard him exhale, hard: cold enough to burn inside one’s nose.

Icicles hung from the hatch.

Penguin met them just outside. So long out at sea, the Heart Pirates didn’t work hard to hide their faces, and with the girl’s hat pushed back Monet could see that her wide nose had gone red from the cold. “Captain,” Penguin said, as soon as Law was within sight at Monet’s shoulder: “Shachi’s on the transponder from the submersible, if you’d like the details.”

“Yes,” said Law, and followed Penguin to the command chamber, boots crunching over the layer of frost and snow that had already deposited itself over the surface of the deck. Monet detoured to the commissary, pausing only to tap Law on the shoulder and say, “Coffee,” getting a nod in return.

By the time she rejoined them in the control room—humming with low-key excitement borne of expectation, manned by two members of the crew and Bepo, who hovered like a nervous iceberg in the corner while Law craned over charts spread on the central table—the transponder was already on, and she could hear Shachi’s tinny voice: “Very large landmass, captain. The log pose could take weeks to set.”

She saw Law drum his fingers against the table edge. Monet knew he didn’t like the thought of being stuck anywhere so long, suspected he liked the thought of being dragged to bars by the crew to celebrate his birthday even less.

Aloud, he said, “That’s fine.”

“On my way back to the ship, captain,” said Shachi, and Monet leaned over Law’s shoulder to see the transponder snail seated on the table blink sluggishly in the candlelight. Transponders didn’t do well in harsh weather. “Over and out.”

Bepo, who had been silent with an intensity that was only one degree of separation from loud, spoke up the moment the snail cut the connection. “I’m concerned about navigating the coastline while above the water level, captain! Shachi’s report about the terrain—”

Law said shortly, “Use your better judgement. Landfall can wait until day,” and strode back out onto the deck.

She caught up to him at the starboard bow, looking out at where the black water was lit by the searchlights peering out of the hull. She didn’t ask before pressing the second mug of coffee she’d procured into his hands, only drank from her own and said, “Not enough sleep, or misgivings?”

“Both,” said Law lowly, but drank the coffee. “Neither being unusual.”

This much was true. Monet offered, “Look at it this way. Any longer without shore leave and half the crew would be out of their minds.” She didn’t add, those that haven’t lost them already. It had been two months since the last island, nothing but open sea and sudden storms; Penguin was running a betting pool for the boxing ring the crew ran in the hold, and she and Law spent so many nights at poker that Monet very nearly thought only in terms of suits.

“You’re right,” said Law, but the line of his shoulders didn’t grow less tense.

Monet stood beside him at the railing and waited, eyes trained on the same brightly lit patch of rushing water past the bow, land still too far out to see in the pitch dark beyond.

It was her third year sailing with the Heart Pirates, not quite four since she’d met Law.

When he’d walked off the Thousand Sunny she had gone with him, and when they departed Zou she was aboard his ship; and just like that, without discussion, without deliberation, she was one of them.

Or maybe not one of them, exactly, because when she’d come aboard Law had left the door to his quarters open, and she had followed him in. There she’d stayed, someone outside his crew but still at his side. They’d accepted her quickly enough at his say-so, though for a long time she felt among them a sort of awe that refused to abate; a stranger so close to their distant captain, close enough to share his bed, for all that none of them had ever so much as crossed the threshold of his quarters.

He’d given her heart back, after Dressrosa. It was a gesture of trust greater than the one that so baffled his crew: it had been his leverage, his safety, something to put them on equal ground. Without it in his grasp he was an easy target, and she’d said so.

Law had said only, “He’s dead,” and Monet hadn’t needed a subject to know what he meant.

She’d given him his heart back then, too, while they were still onboard the Sunny. What he did with it she didn’t know, but his heartbeat never did return.

Six months later he’d tried to kill himself.

She had been the one to catch him, and there was something the crew didn’t know all over again: she’d barged in while he leaned over the sink with a knife, taken it out of his hands and gripped his wrists until he was shaking and she was shaking worse. “He’s dead but he’s not gone,” he’d said, voice all wrong and gasping, and she’d understood that, too, wished that she hadn’t.

Monet had said neither are we, and we have to outlast him, even now, stayed with him. In the years since Law hadn’t tried again, but she knew Dressrosa plagued him, haunted every step: he still shuddered and cried out in his sleep, and when she woke at night from troubled dreams often as not he was already wide awake, arms wrapped around himself and breathing ragged.

He’d saved her on Punk Hazard; that night when she’d grabbed the knife away she had saved him, and it was only then she felt that they were truly even.

What they were beyond even—

What they were beyond the superficial she didn’t care to define. He did not love her, she believed that much; but he trusted her more than she thought he trusted almost anyone else except the boy with the straw hat, the one that would be pirate king and the one that they’d left years and leagues of sea behind.

(He missed Strawhat achingly, she knew; knew also that it was him that Law loved, unreservedly and completely, right up to I would kill and die for you, thought that anyone who had ever seen Law look at Luffy knew it, too.)

She did not begrudge him for it; what Law had with Strawhat was something separate from what he had with her. It was her Law spent every night with—every day, too—and it was Strawhat that he’d follow to the end of the earth without thinking, pulled along as surely as though by gravity.

Not mutually exclusive, these things; and not so narrow her view so as to believe anyone’s heart only capable of one form of love, and towards only one single target.

[missing sections]

2: whiskey is god’s way of telling us he loves us and wants us to be happy

Had she been anyone else, Monet would have hurried back from the bathhouse in the face of the frigid outdoors, doubly cold after the water's heat; snow was still falling, thicker than before, icy wind kicking up the occasional flurry.

As she was not anyone else, however, she stood outside and savored the frozen wind, far preferable to water and stifling heat both, less likely as it was to melt her away altogether.

Eventually she got together the willpower to trek back inside and pushed her way through the back door of the inn. The din that had overwhelmed the inside before she'd left had died down, and the light coming through the door leading into the commons was dim; evidently the party had come to an end, or else changed venue.

She was almost in the commons when she heard the two remaining voices.

"When we were out there, at the docks," Bonney was saying, "you said y'weren't interested in the One Piece. That really true?"

There was a pause, and then Law's low voice in answer, hoarse with—something. "I meant what I said."

"Why?" Bonney was blunt, and Monet felt suddenly very aware she was eavesdropping, for all that there were few enough secrets between Law and herself. Making her presence known now, though, seemed a worse crime than listening in; an intrusion that would halt something important, stop dead something Law maybe needed to say.

For the space of a second she considered ducking back outside, but then Law spoke again and she froze instead, rooted by foul curiosity, listening.

"It wasn't my goal, even to begin with."

From where she stood Monet could see the two of them reflected in a window in the far side of the room. They were sitting at the empty bar, Bonney hulking, Law—hunched, oddly small next to this giant, doubly so low over his glass. (That was a surprise, too: Law rarely drank, something Monet thought stemmed from a combination of paranoia and doctor's sensibility, more the former than the latter.)

"Now," he continued, voice even quieter than before, so much so that Monet strained to hear, "now there's not even a reason to keep going, except that it's what the crew wants, except that he'll be there." His voice went strange and pained at the end, and Monet realized that he was drunk, or else near it; that an admission about the would-be pirate king escaped him so easily was sign enough of that.

"'He', repeated Bonney. It didn't take her long to guess, for all their years of separation: "Your boy with the straw hat. The one you allied with, years ago?"

"Yes," said Law, not quite slurring, "oh, yes."

There was a brief silence, and the slam of a glass against the counter; in the window, Monet saw Bonney join him in this strange unspoken toast, no name given mention.

When she'd finished off her glass Bonney picked up the bottle nearby and poured the contents into her glass without looking at the label, topped off the drink in Law's hands. "What happened to you?"

There was a horrible sort of noise, and Monet realized Law was laughing. Bonney overrode him with, "Really. You didn't use to be like this. What happened?"

"Did you read the papers?" Law asked, when he'd ceased wheezing. "After Strawhat took down Joker, after what we did on Dressrosa."

Bonney snorted. "I was busy. What everyone else was doing didn't matter so much. I only heard about the revolution by word of mouth, later."

"Good," Law said firmly, drank again. "They wrote a lot of shit about me. Lies and things I didn't want anyone to know, all sorts of things to explain our attack on the Donquixote family. Suffice it to say that what happened there, on Dressrosa, it was . . . "

"A lot," supplied Bonney, dryly, though Monet didn't think she was laughing.

"It was everything I'd worked for," Law said. "My whole life, everything, that was supposed to be the end of it."

Bonney said, "But it was a victory."

"So you accomplished what you wanted," Bonney parsed this, "but it didn't make you happy, just took away your purpose?"

Law tipped back the bottle again, said lowly, "I tried to kill myself, after. Twice. Because Joker couldn't finish the job. Because Strawhat stopped him."

"Jesus," Bonney hissed.

"So," said Law, "so. Since then . . . "

"And snow girl," said Bonney, "what about her? What's her place in this? Are you . . . ?"

Monet went even more still, knew she shouldn't be here ever more surely but couldn't budge, stayed at the doorway. Law said, "She is a bastion, and a partner. I'm grateful for her presence, immensely so, but we aren't . . . anything."

"Strawhat," said Bonney, evidently sure at last. "You're in love with Strawhat."

In the reflection, Law lowered his head against the table, didn't answer. The silence stretched, deep enough that Monet thought they might hear the beating of her heart.

"How long has it been?" Bonney said finally. Her voice was surprisingly soft, more careful than Monet would have expected from her boisterous demeanor.

Monet hardly heard him when he said, "Three years," barely more than a sigh.

Bonney let out a low whistle, said, "Not until Raftel, huh."

"I got lucky," Law said, "I was lucky, meeting him again in the New World. Only time I've been lucky."

"Not likely to be lucky again," Bonney understood.

"No.”

Bonney drank. After a while, she said, "When I first met you I thought you were a gloomy bastard with a scathing wit. Remember, you lobbed a grenade into a World Government base—"

"Smoke grenade," mumbled Law, but Bonney went on,

"Whatever. What ‘m saying is, you grinned after you did it. I miss that version of you."

Law's muted reply was no less bitter for the alcohol. "So sorry to disappoint you."

"I didn't mean it like that," said Bonney, and Monet wondered how else it could possibly be meant. "Just that it isn't fair, Dressrosa taking so much away from you. And that—surely like you've still got it in there, somewhere."

“It was a mask, Bonney. When I met you I was spending nights in the corner of my quarters, armed and hiding, sure Joker was going to be there any moment, sure he would capture me and torture me until he couldn’t do it anymore without killing me, start again when he could be sure I wouldn’t die . . . ” Law was slumped against the table still, curled around the bottle, talking into his sleeve.

Monet’s heart clenched with how raw the admission was, a statement without derision towards what he used to think; a truth, his truth, certain of what he would have endured.

It was dauntingly familiar, so like her own fears and her own knowledge of what Joker did to traitors. Betraying the family, that eschewed all mercy, no chance of forgiveness.

Joker had explained it to her, once, casually, as though it hardly even deserved an aside. His family was his body, he’d said, and any act against it like necrosis in the limbs, amputation his one and only choice. No return from such a surgical removal, not for anyone.

And if Monet had been his left hand, his operative—and she had seen what he’d done to operatives that so much as failed him in a task, even with unfaltering loyalty—then what he would have done to his designated successor . . .

Had done, she reminded herself. In a contracted time frame, perhaps, but all the same, hours of agony on Dressrosa and years of their echo. Law hadn’t ever told her about it, not really, not anything more than she could have guessed from the scars he hid under long sleeves and high collars, from the spasms in his right hand that so vexed him.

In the reflection in the window, Bonney threw her arm around Law’s shoulders, half-hugged him as best she could from where he was seated. It very nearly hid him under her fur cloak, and she said, “That’s impressive, you know that? Holding together after whatever it was he did to you. Pulling together a crew like yours, doing all those things you did.”

“Didn’t do anything,” Law said, “not what I had to, not . . . ”

“Bullshit,” Bonney said. “That bloody-minded ostrich would’ve never gone down without you, right? And all those idiots out drinking to your health in their damn matching boiler suits, I know what you did for them, too.”

Law made an indeterminate noise. Bonney went on,

“Strawhat. You saved him, too. I watched the whole thing, you know, your stupid mad stunt at Marineford—doctor’s orders in the middle of five armies, out of nowhere.”

“I know,” moaned Law, “I know, I know, I don’t know why he forgave me.”

Bonney said, “What?”

“Saved him,” said Law, “him, one, there were two of them, I con—“ the alcohol doing its work, “con, condemned him to surviving alone. Cruel of me.”

Bonney straightened, left him clinging to the bottle. “You’d have rather they died together if you couldn’t have both? When what you want—“

“What I want,” Law interrupted, “not what he asked for. The things I did, no matter that I didn’t know why I did them then, in the end they were selfish. Greedy, monstrously so.”

“If he doesn’t see it that way,” Bonney said, “and I’ll be damned if he does, then you did a good thing. No matter who you did it for.”

“He forgave me,” Law sighed, like he hadn’t heard. “I never forgave him, but he forgave me. Fool.”

“The point is,” Bonney said, louder, “You’re not a monster and you’re not a waste. An idiot, yes, and a prick, and a lawless heathen, but not—not any of those things you said. Hear me?”

There was a pause, and Monet held her breath—thought thank god, thank god that someone has willing to talk to had finally said so. She prayed he wasn’t so drunk he’d forget it, prayed it would get through and stick.

In the room, Law said levelly, “If I spend the last hours of my birthday sobbing into my whiskey, Bonney, I’ll kill you.”

Bonney’s sudden bark of laughter broke the tension that had built with the conversation’s progression, eased something between them. “Maybe you should. The first part, not the killing.”

“I don’t know why I let you talk me into drinking with you at all.”

“‘Cause you miss me,” said Bonney with confidence. “And ‘cause no one can keep everything in, all the time, without telling ‘nyone or even crying into their whiskey.”

Law didn’t look up, but his words were light enough. “I’ll be sure to tell that to tomorrow’s hangover.”

“Do,” Bonney said. “Whatever keeps you from trying to scatter me into pieces.”

“There’s an idea,” Law said darkly. “I’ll try to remember that, too.”

“Told you you still had a sense of humor in there somewhere,” grunted Bonney.

At length the two of them got up and bid each other good night, Law staggering blearily up the stairs—nearly pitching over—and Bonney out the inn’s front door, leaving the lights in the commons to die out on their own. Monet stayed in the doorway until she was sure they were gone and Law asleep, still guilty for listening in for all that she was glad she hadn’t interrupted; then she, too, followed up the stairs.

3: you throw a rock in the air, you’re bound to hit someone guilty

Law was still asleep when she woke the next day; when she got out of bed he only cracked open one eye, mumbled “Not getting up,” and turned over, away from her and the window’s pale light.

Monet took this to mean that the hangover was just as bad as he’d predicted; she left him to it, only pausing to close the curtains before she crept out the door.

[missing sections]

Monet tapped on the door to announce her return, said, “It’s only me,” and pushed her way in when she heard an affirmative noise. (She always waited and always announced, even if she hadn’t been gone long; all these years later and Law still wasn’t any less hair-trigger wary, wasn’t any less likely to have his weapon drawn and ready if anyone barged through the door unannounced.)

He was awake and changing into clean clothes when she came in, seated on the edge of the bed with his long legs kicked all the way out, his boots—he’d slept in them, his coat too—thrown uncarefully aside. Monet asked, “Feeling better?”

“Something like,” mumbled Law, and pulled the shirt he’d been wearing since the day before up over his head.

She stopped, her gaze drawn helplessly to the grisly mess of scars that started at his stomach and trailed upward. That he was willing to do this with her there was surely a sign of how worn-out he was as much as it was of the time they’d spent together; so much of his energy was spent intently concealing the marks he’d carried ever since Dressrosa. Ever since those few bloody hours, which she knew so little about and which haunted him so deeply.

There were the imperfectly round marks of bullet wounds there, half a dozen at least; and scars where something sharp had been driven through his chest again and again above those, marring the pattern of the heart-shaped tattoo. Coarse jagged scar tissue stood out on the whole of his right shoulder, the worst of the damage and the most poorly-healed; and lower, on both wrists, less obvious but no less chilling, faint rings where restraints or shackles would have been. Where he must have tried uselessly to twist and pull free with such desperation that he’d torn all the way through the skin, and kept going.

Monet didn’t want to think about that.

Only two scars were ones that he’d gained by of his own will, two thin horizontal lines on his chest from the surgery he’d done to himself before they’d ever met. They hadn’t talked about those, either, but she thought he didn’t despise them like he did the others; they at least were a sign of something he’d wanted and got, something he’d done and not something that had been done to him.

Law tossed the old shirt aside, and she looked quickly away. For all that he let her be in the same room it felt like a breach of something unspoken to stare; she knew full well he didn’t want her thinking of the source of his injuries anymore than she did.

She busied herself with stoking the weak fire in the hearth instead, pushing fresh logs into the fireplace while he finished dressing behind her. After a minute, still crouching next to the fireplace with eyes fixed on the flames, she said, “I need to tell you something. To apologize.”

There was the sound of him resettling. After a moment, he said, “What is it.”

Monet took a deep breath, stood and turned to him. He was leaned back, braced on both arms, expression tired. “Yesterday,” she said, “last night, I listened in while you and Bonney were talking. I didn’t mean to, but I did, and I’m sorry. I don’t—I know it was wrong of me.”

For a long moment he didn’t move. Then he pulled his knees up against his chest and grasped his ankles, looked away. Said only, “I see.”

That stung. She hadn’t expected him to forgive her so easily, of course, but the guilt that had been clinging to her since the night didn’t ease; that he wouldn’t look at her now—

“It feels like,” Law said lowly, studying something in the corner of the room, “all my secrets get passed around before I’ve even had a chance to say them.”

“I’m sorry,” she repeated, stupidly, thought again of how profoundly it had shaken him when the papers had written about him in the wake of Dressrosa. And then, knowing she was digging herself deeper but unable to refrain: “For what it’s worth, everything Bonney said to you—I think she was right.”

[incomplete]

He gasped under her—he always did—watched the ceiling and didn’t say anything at all, only breathed faster when she touched him, ran her hands over ribs and sharp hip bones. No matter how many times they did this he was tense, jolting every time she lifted her hands and touched him elsewhere, yet insistent if she stopped. It’s all right, keep going, please.

(And she worried, because for all he said it never seemed to her as though he wanted. When they’d spoken about it frankly he’d said I would never do anything I did not choose to do, and Monet had wondered whether she was right in seeing a difference there, between choosing and wanting, between saying it was so and feeling it—

But they kept finding themselves here, and he didn’t avoid it, didn’t resent her. Just remained distant, whether it was him touching her or her touching him. Like the motions of it didn’t matter. Like the end was all that counted, not the means, no matter how uncomfortable for him they might be—and Monet understood that, hadn’t ever expected anything deeper. If she did it to forget herself then surely so did he, and it was only fair she let him. Took the chemical rush and let the rest go.)

This night was no different. No more intimacy to it than there had been the very first time, the terms they’d come to in the beginning unchanged, the two of them this close and no closer. And if she’d grown to want more she only had herself to blame for having started it; and if this was what she’d got then she’d keep it. Better than nothing, better than ending it.

She didn’t ask for what she knew he couldn’t give. Didn’t blame him, either, because the ache that had settled in her heart over the years wasn’t his doing, only her own.

And she wondered, later, when he was panting harshly above her shoulder, head cast back against the bed; who he was thinking of, if he was thinking at all; and whether there was any chance at all that she entered into his thoughts, taken as they were with the man that she knew he loved.

“Explain,” Law said, flatly, “how it is that two of my senior crew ended up in critical condition by what I am reliably told was your doing. Truthfully. In order.”

The three pirates standing middle of their inn room that morning shifted uncomfortably and exchanged glances. None of them met Law’s gaze; Monet, who was well-used to subzero temperatures and wouldn’t have noticed if hoar frost had been forming on her person, could have sworn she felt the temperature in the room drop down to arctic.

“The sooner you start talking, the sooner I might get started,” Law suggested. Started patching them up, he meant.

The most alarmingly battered-looking of the three looked tempted. Two young men and one woman, they were all newbies, recruited on recent islands to bolster their numbers for the raid they’d carried out on a naval base directly on their route. The woman—nearer a girl, Monet thought her name might have been Rae—was holding her awkwardly against her side and boasted several impressive bruises; the worse-off of the two men was holding his bloodied left hand in his other and standing with all his weight to one side. The last looked to have nothing broken, though his bruises were no less vivid.

All of them stayed intently blank-faced. Only the girl struck Monet as more defiant than guilty-scared.

Law’s voice became, if anything, still more toneless. “The last one to speak can find their own way off this island.”

This drew forth a response. All three spoke at once; Monet supposed being stranded on a backwater didn’t hold much appeal for newly-minted pirates hot-headed enough to sign on for a World Government raid. With all three speaking over each other, though—

Law said, “Stop,” which silenced them better than Monet might have expected, had she not seen dozens of crew members wither under his glower. Pinning the less-battered young man with a look, he said, “You, start talking. Your name is Dion?”

The one identified looked startled, said, “Yes, captain,” gave one last awkward look to his compatriots (carefully avoided by both) and began, “We were out drinking . . . ”

Beside her, Law breathed, “I never would have guessed,” so low she didn’t think any of the others could have heard.

“There were maybe twenty of us, and some of Captain Bonney’s guys,” Dion went on. We went down to the alehouse on the south side of the harbor. Someone told us the booze there was better than the swill they’ve got up here.”

Law, who had become intimately acquainted with said swill and spent the subsequent day nursing the hangover it bestowed, neglected to comment.

“Turned out the place was the favored watering hole of the local government dogs. From the marine outpost they’ve got over in the next port, I guess. Dragging their rotten hides down the road to somewhere their officers can’t see ‘em fucking around.” Monet frowned; Law absorbed this without change in expression, save perhaps that the furrow between his brows grew deeper.

When Dion didn’t immediately resume his story, Law said, “I don’t intend to take ‘pirates and navy, it happens’ as an answer.”

“Why not?” burst out Rae, from behind Dion. Law looked over to her in surprise, and she added fiercely, “They had it coming. You know they did, Captain, just for putting on the damn uniform, you hate them too, you’ve got to understand, you know you’d’ve done the same—“

“Don’t presume to know what I would’ve done. Tell me what happened,” Law cut her off.

“They were talking about the news,” Rae said. She was red in the face with this sudden anger; Monet was impressed with how well she’d hidden it before, no more than a clenched jaw to suggest it. “About how they’d put down another rebellion, killed the people and burnt the slum they’d been forced to live into the ground with everyone left still inside. Talking about it and laughing, toasting to the Red Dog for doing such a good job, like they’re not deck scum the Celestial Dragons would slaughter just as gladly if they weren’t so useful.”

Law said, very quietly, “And?”

“I got Dion and Toj together,” the third man’s name at last, Monet noticed in passing, “and told those bilge rats exactly what I thought of them and their navy, and that I’ve killed enough of them to know they’re no different on the inside than any of us lowlives.”

“You started it, then.”

Toj and Dion spoke at the same time. “I hit one of them with a chair,” Toj admitted, and, “I spat in one of their drinks,” said Dion.

“And everyone else, all of ours,” Law said, “they just joined you.”

“Not exactly,” said Dion.

“Penguin and Shachi,” Rae again, the first time she’d sounded the least contrite and not merely furious, “they tried to stop it and haul us out of there.”

“They hit Shachi from behind while she was trying to keep one of the other marines off me,” said Dion. “Penguin got up in the—I guess he was the leader, ‘cause he talked the most—face and tried to get him to get him to back down, said we were just trashed, that it wasn’t worth it. He hit her over the head with a full bottle.”

Monet, who had seen the head injury when she’d accompanied Law down to the submarine medbay to take care of the worst hurt, winced.

Rae said, “By then everyone else had got into it, too. ‘Cause they knew we were right, and for what the scum did to Penguin and Shachi.”

Law digested this. At last he said, “What you did was very, very stupid.”

“It was necessary!” Rae snapped back. “Shachi and Penguin shouldn’t even have gotten involved, and they shouldn’t have turned their backs on—“

“Shut up,” Law snarled, and there was that anger his flat affect had hidden, a flicker of that absolute fury licking the surface. “They tried to keep you from starting an incident near a marine base, an incident that announces us here after what we did, puts all of us in the crosshairs. You endangered the crew. They tried to run damage control.”

“But we could take them!” Rae tried to protest, but Law bulldozed over this:

“But not a fleet, when they report to HQ that we’re moored here and damn near everyone on shore leave. You didn’t think, and you got better pirates than you hurt. And if the marines get their reinforcements here before we leave, the number of people you got hurt’ll be a lot higher than that.”

Monet would have expected another rebuttal from Rae, another biting reply. Instead, Rae clenched her teeth and grit out, “Fine. You want to leave me on this rock, leave me.”

“I damn well should,” Law said. “But no. You’re confined to crew quarters, and your share of the loot from the next battle is void.”

Looking to the other two, “Same for the both of you, for being stupid enough to help in starting this.”

“Yes, Captain,” said Dion, and Toj nodded vigorously.

“Your injuries, now.” Law motioned them to come closer.

And despite his anger, despite everything, Monet watched as he spent a better part of an hour patching these members of his crew back together. Realigning and sealing their fractured bones with his power, disinfecting surface injuries with more conventional medicine, bracing that which needed to keep still even in the wake of his supernatural surgery. Dion and Toj ducked out quickly, after; Rae followed without so much as looking back, just shut the door with a slam.

The moment they were gone Law bent his head down into his hands, his shoulders sinking. Monet—not having wanted to interrupt the interrogation, that was between captain and subordinate, she was neither—said with concern, “Are you all right?”

“What I am,” Law said, and he didn’t sound angry anymore, just tired; the kind of drained and bone-deep tired that clung to him more often than it should, these days, all the more so when he’d been using his ability. “What I am is a hypocrite, all the way down.”

“You did a good job. Even a pirate crew needs discipline, pulling a stunt like that.”

“What she said,” and she saw Law work his fingers into the thick of his hair with anxious frustration, “about what I would’ve done, about how I would’ve acted, she was right. At her age I would’ve done the very same and worse, taunted those marines into a fight no matter who got caught in the crossfire because I was angry and I didn’t care what happened to me, because I couldn’t see past my own pain to anyone else.”

This was rather more words than he tended to say about himself, and Monet nudged him in the shoulder with a wing. “But you wouldn’t now. Everyone hates their past self, that doesn’t make you wrong to berate someone for doing the same thing. Better she learn now.”

“If I hadn’t made a promise, I might have. If I didn’t owe a debt to this crew that I have to repay, I might have.”

Monet’s heart sank. She knew better than anyone he didn’t just mean starting a fight; knew, too, that the promise and the debt were to different people, though she suspected that to him the promise was just as much of a debt.

Law lifted his head, tipped it back the way people did when they were trying to hold back tears, only he wasn’t, never had any to spare. After a while, he said, “We need to get everyone back onboard by tomorrow. Cut shore leave short.”

“They won’t be happy,” Monet echoed his unhappy resignation aloud. “They needed this.”

“Yes,” said Law, and stood, unfolding himself from the hunch he’d fallen into his full height, made imposing by the harsh lines of long, high-collared coat.

He left without saying anything more. This time the door closed in silence; more final than Rae’s slam, Monet thought, a period that didn’t invite anything further.

She sighed, and wondered if she ought to try the local swill, too.

They started their organized retreat—not quite a rout, so long as marine reinforcements hadn’t yet arrived, Monet thought—the next day, rounding up crew members around town.Everyone they could get ahold of was told to find anyone else they knew the whereabouts of and bring them back to the ship, too; Bonney’s pirates rapidly got roped into the same.

No one wanted to be there when the marines arrived, whether or not they were the cause of the call.

Law and Monet spent the morning making their way from pub to pub for the search. No one was happy about their long-awaited shore leave being cut short; still, most of them complied without complaint. Law was bleakly flat in being the bearer of bad news, his demeanor not inviting argument.

By the afternoon, when the process was well under way and largely out of their hands, the missing figure in the picture was clear. They were walking back to their inn when Law said, “I’m concerned that no one’s seen Bonney.”

None of Bonney’s crew had heard from her since the night she’d spent drinking with Law. “Me too,” Monet admitted, “though she can certainly take care of herself.”

“Yes,” said Law, trudging intently through the street’s dense snow, “but if she was reckless—or targeted—“

“You think it might be something to do with yesterday’s fight?”

“I don’t know. If she never got back to her ship that night . . .” Law trailed off, frowning.

Monet, who knew by now how his mind worked, said, “Don’t you dare start blaming yourself for her choices. That’s not how responsibility works.”

Law looked momentarily startled, glancing over his shoulder at her, then said: “No. You’re right.”

“What do we do,” Monet said, after they’d made their way out from the snowed-in side-street and onto a busy main road. Here the foot traffic from the harbor to the uptown had melted the snow and left filthy slush, instead, all of it running into overflowing gutters. Monet had to pause while they stood aside to let someone pass, trying to keep themselves to the high part of the road. “If Bonney doesn’t show by tonight. Her crew needs to get out of here, too.”

Law scowled. “We leave,” he said. “We put the crew first, and we leave.”

Monet’s heart sank at the dreaded answer. She thought to say something—try and ease the bitter set of his shoulders—but didn’t, opened her mouth and shut it again. There wasn’t, after all, anything she could say that he wouldn’t have already told himself.

That night the headcount put nearly the entire crew on the ship or at the inn where Law and Monet were still staying. They’d considered going back to the ship themselves, but decided to remain so as to direct the stragglers; those that had been staying at the inn beforehand were also allowed to remain and enjoy one last night in real beds rather than hammocks, to provide numbers.

Law was restless, in his particular way where the frustration with inaction went straight through unsettled jittering and back around into motionless brooding. While Monet went to the commons for dinner he stayed in their room and glowered at nothing; he hadn’t budged by the time she came back. She left him to it for upwards of an hour, went out again and spoke to everyone who’d gone looking for the crew still remaining, added two to their headcount.

When he still hadn’t moved when she returned, she made her decision and pushed back a chair to sit down across from him at the table by the fireplace. “Talk to me?” she said, hopefully.

He looked up from where his gaze had been fixed on the fire. Didn’t speak right away; looked away again, and finally pushed out, “This feels like—a moment laden with the future. Like what I choose to do now I might regret for a very long time.”

“Leaving,” Monet guessed. “You’re still worried about Bonney.”

Law looked up at her. “I don’t have a lot of friends,” he said bluntly.

“Can count them on one hand,” she agreed.

“Not enough to be careless about keeping them,” Law said. “If I leave now and I don’t see her again, that would be . . . but abandoning the crew might be just as foul.”

“You’ve left the crew alone before,” Monet said.

Law winced, said, “Not a decision that holds up to scrutiny.”

“That’s not the point,” Monet said, “the point is, they were fine, and they’ll be fine now. Send them under the waves and we can rendezvous with them when we find her.”

“If we find her,” said Law darkly. For a moment he didn’t say anything else; then he rapped his knuckles against the table and said, “All right. Tomorrow I’ll send them out and you and I can start asking around town whether anyone’s seen her.”

Monet felt gladdened, for all that she’d been ready to go with his decision before. “We’ll find her,” she said, mustering an assurance she didn’t quite feel. “She’s tough—she’ll have held out.”

“I hope so,” said Law.

They left it at that.

Both pirate crews cast off in the morning, nothing so dramatic as Law and Monet waving farewell to speed them on.

Predawn fog clung to the Heart Pirates’ ship when they pulled up the anchor and left, announcing their exit from the half-moon harbor over transponder. They would wait at a distance from the island, hidden deep underwater while Law and Monet searched for Bonney; both parties would check in periodically, to make sure everyone was still safe and unsighted by the marines.

Three days, Law had said firmly, that’s how long it’ll take for reinforcements to arrive. We won’t be longer than that.

They began their search in earnest once the sun rose, though the sky remained gray and the fog didn’t thin. Even on the busiest streets the figures of passerby looked faceless and ghostlike, failing to resolve into anyone they might recognize until they were very nearly face-to-face. Monet thought it bad luck, but supposed it mattered little enough; wherever Bonney was, she wouldn’t be found by chance happenstance in the streets.

The bars and the inn houses were their first target. Tracking down anyone that worked there regular or worked nights, asking how to get ahold of those who weren’t on shift, Bonney’s description repeated again and again; all of it fruitless. No one at the inn where she’d stayed had seen her since the night she’d gone drinking with Law. No one at the surrounding watering holes had, either—nor heard or seen any sign of a struggle, no clues to her whereabouts at all.

The open market came next, muddy and crowded despite the weather, fishermen hawking their wares at double the volume to make up for the way the soupish haze in the air dampened the sound. Law’s boots sank inches into the ground. No one here had seen or heard from her either, nor noticed any more on-duty marines than the usual few that came down from the base over the hill.

It was, Monet thought with deep irony, as though Jewelry Bonney had vanished into thin air—a scenario that seemed all the more likely the more time they spent wandering through the unabating mist. When they paused at midday, having combed the bazaar and everyone that came with it and stopped at its dockside terminus to eat, Law voiced similar frustration: “It shouldn’t be so easy to lose a giant.”

Monet, leaning against the low fence that served to mark off where the market ended and the docks began, grunted agreement. She was chewing her way through something fried and fishlike, bought from the last vendor they’d questioned; Law had turned away any thought of lunch, whether from nerves or habit she wasn’t sure. Once she had swallowed, she said, “Docks next. Then what?”

“Knock on the marines’ front door and ask if they’ve got her?” Law suggested, blackly. “I’d hoped we’d have found some sign, by now, something to at least tell us if we’re even looking in the right place.”

“Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence,” said Monet, as hopefully as she could manage. Nothing, she was discovering, drained one’s morale as quickly as slogging through bog-like streets to ask questions that lead nowhere.

Law scowled at her and looked away, towards the docks. More quietly, he said, “It’s worse to think that it might’ve been something stupid. Not a retaliation by the marines or a thought-out capture but a robbery—how much did she drink, while I . . . ?”

Monet chewed and swallowed the last of her food. “Didn’t we decide,” she said, unwilling to let him pursue this train of thought even now, “that you can’t be held responsible for her actions? Never mind the actions of some unknown assailant.”

This time Law only sighed and scrubbed a hand over his face. Rolled his shoulders, shifting his scabbarded sword from one to the other, and said, “Let’s get on with it.”

Monet tossed the paper she’d been eating from aside into the muck, and they started on their way down to the pier.

By the time they finished their interrogations at the docks it was growing dark and still colder. The dockworkers had proven as uninformative as everyone at the inns and the bars and the market, and damn near anywhere else in between; Law’s mood, already poor to begin with, had soured further into a dark, dense silence by the time they made it to the moorings furthest from where Bonney’s ship had been.

At this end there were only fishing boats, local ones, nothing commercial. Law glowered at them, expecting disappointment. Monet only barely kept her expression neutral but felt no less drained, couldn’t help but wonder if it was worth the bother. Their inn room beckoned, with all its luxuries of rest and food and much less mud.

Only one man appeared to be present, tying up a boat that hardly deserved to be called a dinghy. Monet looked at Law, whose return look said, last one, and raised her voice to call out, “Excuse me, sir!’

The man that looked up at them was wrapped in so many layers that it was near-impossible to make out his face. Peering out from between fur collar and a hat that covered his ears and most of the rest of his features, he watched them approach and said, warily, “What do you want?”

“We’re looking for a friend of ours,” said Law from beside Monet, not quite keeping the accumulated growl out of his voice. “She went missing two nights ago on the way back to her inn. We want to know if you saw her, or saw anything suspicious.” He gave Bonney’s description, tersely.

The fisherman listened to this, and said, “Ain’t seen her or heard nothin’.” Monet, who had been hoping, in the way that one did when coming to the end of one’s options—wasn’t the very last place one looked supposed to be the one that yielded results, in every story?—felt her heart sink.

Law started to turn away. He’d cut any attempt at thank you out of his conversation some hours ago, when the fog had at last begun to clear only to be replaced by a needling frozen wind. Monet opened her mouth to say it herself, in an attempt to cling to civility, when the man added, “Disappeared at night, you said?”

And maybe Law wasn’t immune to that desire to believe in life being akin to a story, because he stopped, turned back and said, “Yes. Have you remembered something?”

“Not like you’re hopin’,” said the man, “but you oughta know. People disappear off the docks all the time, come nightfall—one or two a month, more’n drunk sailors fallin’ ’n’ drownin’ accounts for.” And there was that awful possibility that they’d been trying to avoid so much as thinking about; death by stupidity or accident instead of capture by design.

“What do you mean,” Law said. He walked the few steps he’d distanced himself from the fisherman and confronted him, looming. “What are you talking about, spit it out.”

“Law,” said Monet, worried that now when someone had something to say at last Law would scare them into reticence. He ignored her, but at least he wasn’t fisting his hands in the man’s collar yet—though maybe that was more a consequence of not knowing where to grab, given the layers of furs and oiled leathers.

The fisherman, apparently unperturbed by Law leaning over him, said, “Some of us in this town, those of us that’ve been ‘ere long enough, figure there’s something livin’ on this coast. Something that’ll pull anyone out on the docks late at night into the water. To drown ‘em or eat ‘em, who knows, but—there’s an awful lot of disappearances just ‘ere, and some’ll swear they’ve seen strange things movin’ in the low tide on the beach out past the end of town.”

There was a beat, and Law said flatly, “You can’t be serious.” Monet saw his free hand flex at his side. “‘Something’? No description, nothing, just ‘something’, and I’m supposed to believe in it?”

“Not enough local flavor for you?” said the fisherman. “You got any better leads?” And, answering his own question, “Wouldn’t be askin’ me if you did.”

Law stared at him. Monet could just about hear the gears in his head turning. Waited with morbid curiosity to see whether he’d fall on the side of last-ditch, fuck-it acquiescence or on the side of anger, not knowing which she felt more of herself.

Then he said, “Where’s this beach?”

The fisherman gave them directions.

They decided not to make that trek last night, too tired and cold and reasoning that it’d be too dark to see anything in the tides, anyway. Slogging back to the inn in the dark was a near-silent affair, and it wasn’t until they could see the inn house not far down the road that Law spoke. “It occurred to me,” he said, “that not all pirates are human. Not all bandits, either.”

Monet said, “What?” too tired to follow.

“Renegade mermen,” Law clarified. “Suppose they’ve got a base underwater, and rob anyone unfortunate enough to be alone on the docks at night—‘fell in ice water drunk’ is a good a cover as any, and there must be plenty of fools with coin in their pockets going between their ships and the taverns.”

“Oh,” said Monet, digesting this preternaturally practical notion in the face of her own thoughts. Her mind had been manufacturing the kind of fantastical monsters that featured in any sailor’s stories, sirens and kelpies and who knew what else. “That’s possible.”

“I’ll call Bepo and arrange for them to start searching the coastline for an underwater hideout in the morning,” said Law. They were approaching the inn, now, and looking at him in the light of the lanterns at the gate she thought he seemed less wreathed in gloom now that they had a lead, even a weak one. “With the submersible. You and I will try the beach, in the event that it really is something more sinister. Cover our bases.”

“And if neither search yields anything?” Monet said, wrenched back into practicality. Three days.

Law smiled mirthlessly. “Then,” he said, “we go and visit the marines.”

And pushed through the gate into the inn courtyard without saying anything more.

[scrap from a later scene]

#an APPALLING AMOUNT OF TEXT for a fic that was never once good #one piece #trafalgar law #harpy monet #lawlu #wip amnesty #fic

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petite-neko · 7 years

Text

Guardian - 13

Fanfiction: Guardian Story Summary: Somebody had to protect their protector after all. Characters: Zoro, Luffy, Law Pairing: Eventual LawLu Rating: T Warnings: swearing, alcohol use A/N: I have more written BUT ITS ALREADY SO LONG AND IM TIRED AND LAZY AND THERES STILL A SHIT TON OF EDITING TO DO SO YOU GET THIS AND JUST WAIT TILL NEXT WEEK. LOOK GUYS ITS EARLY.

//goes to die until Saturday

(PS: I hope you all like some humour :3)

.xxx. - Scene jumps

Chapter 1 || Read on Ao3

Chapter 12 || Chapter 13 || Chapter 14

Zoro stared at the two just wondering: what the hell?

The others didn’t really notice it. Maybe they were too busy being relieved that the issue had been resolved. That Luffy wasn’t mad, that yes, Law accepted that he did something stupid, and there wasn’t going be a fight over this.

(Maybe he should have confronted Law in private…)

And while there wasn’t really any tension in the air, it had suddenly relaxed as the two captains wandered off and away from him.

They sat down (within reach of some food, which Luffy grabbed almost immediately) and it didn’t take long at all for Luffy to be clinging to Law’s side. But that was usual, and Law, well, he didn’t protest at all. Again, normal.

But, there was just the way that Law’s arm lingered at Luffy’s back. (Normally it would be there for a few moments before receding away.) And while Zoro didn’t really see that as too odd, it was unusual. (Considering the progression of things and the way Law was when he was asleep against Luffy however, this did seem normal)

Chopper on the other hand, well he had his medical bag and was rushing on over to the two captains before he just stopped and stared. His gaze travelled towards the arm at Luffy’s back and he rubbed his eyes and stared some more, tilting his head before shaking it, and walking the rest of the distance to the captains.

“I think you have a concussion Torao.”

Choppers words were worried and he started pulling out various instruments and papers out of his bag. “Luffy – was Torao acting strange when the two of you were talking? Did he throw up – or look spacey, or–”

“Tony-ya! I’m not concussed!” Law interrupted. “I’m perfectly fine!”

Law was tense again.

“Well something tells me otherwise.” Chopper’s eyes slid once more towards the arm that was still at Luffy’s back.

…Okay, this was hilarious.

“You’re not acting like your usual self.”

“What the fuck? How are you suddenly an expert on what my ‘usual self’ is! You’ve only known me what? A few days?”

“Irritability as well. Another symptom.”

“I’m always irritable dammit!”

Zoro glanced sideways at the Hearts Pirates only to see them silently nodding in agreement. So Law back on Dressrosa was Law without filters then…

(How amusing.)

“My coordination is fine. My speech isn’t slurred. I haven’t vomited. The only pain in my head is minor tissue damage and not a headache. I’m not sensitive to light or noise… need I go on?”

Law was sounding quite annoyed right now, and Zoro was suppressing the grin on his face from turning into laughter.

“Well if you have a concussion.” Chopper started, using his professional sounding voice. (Mom-mode it was then) “Any points or comments you make aren’t reliable. Confusion, even delirium, memory difficulties, personality and mood changes… those are all symptoms of a concussion that can affect your judgement Torao.” He was writing something down on that notepad of his. “Luffy, was Torao acting strange earlier? Did he have any unusual behaviours or changes in his personality? Did he seem unusually tired at times?”

A worried expression reached Luffy’s face.

“W-Wait, if Torao has a concussion, the things he says might not be true?”

…Zoro didn’t know somebody could sigh that loudly.

“I do not have a concussion Luffy-ya!”

“B-B-But what if you do Torao!” Luffy was pouting, lip quivering and… why the hell did he look like he was going to cry?

“If I do – which I do not,” Law gave Chopper a glare, “it wouldn’t change shit Luffy-ya. Otherwise I would have had to have a concussion for a week. And while, yes, it is still plausible that I had received one from my injuries in Dressrosa, the majority of concussions have physical manifestations at some point in time. And I have not been swaying, or throwing up, my speech has been perfectly fine.”

Luffy was still pouting. “B-But you’ve been sleeping a lot!”

Law groaned and brought a hand to his face.

“We’ve already gone over that Luffy-ya. Not to mention I had used my abilities far beyond what I should have. I needed to recuperate my strength which had been sorely taxed, and I have been healing from my various injuries – which rest is good for. Besides, were you not the one who suggested it?”

“I-I-I… you promise Torao?”

Law sighed, but this time it was quieter. “Yes, Luffy-ya, I promise.”

Luffy’s face went from sorrowful to grinning and he wrapped both of his arms around Law, a few too many times than needed.

“Luffy you’re not being any help here, siding with Torao…” Chopper sighed but with this scolding tone.

“I-I-uhh… he was thinking a lot?” He almost seemed to be hiding behind Law now. “B-But like he normally does?”

(…Since when was hiding behind Law a smart thing to do?)

“…Dammit Luffy-ya…” And for some reason, Law had pulled on the brim of his hat again.

“Concentration difficulties?” Chopper was writing more on his pad.

Law straightened up almost immediately. “I don’t have a fucking concussion! You’re just going to fucking worry Luffy-ya dammit!”

But Luffy wasn’t worried at all, no, he was just laughing and placed his head on Law’s good shoulder. “Shishi, he’s just worried Torao~”

Law just decided to put his hand back on his hat.

Chopper on the other hand had moved over to the Hearts Pirates now. He was looking up at the bear mink – Bepo, wasn’t it? “Bepo, does Torao usually cuddle people?”

“Who said anything–!” Torao’s voice became incoherent as he yelled out in frustration.

(Part him wondered just how Luffy could handle being right next to the other captain, but his captain was just sitting there, a big grin on his face, head still resting on his shoulder)

Zoro, too, was snickering from time to time. Usopp had given up trying long ago and he was rolling over in laughter, feet flailing.

They got to see the true Trafalgar Law in action:

Trafalgar Law really was a grump. A highly irritable grump.

And fuck, was Zoro enjoying the hell out of it!

“Uhh… he cuddles me? I haven’t seen Captain cuddle other people though.”

An inhumane sound left Law.

“…I’m sorry Captain…”

When Chopper returned to the two captains, Luffy had decided that simply resting his head on Law’s shoulder wasn’t enough. No, he stretched his neck so his chin was atop Law’s head, chuckling softly. One hand was patting the unfortunate soul’s shoulder, arms still wrapped around multiple times around his body.

And there it was, the return of the expression of doneness on Law’s face.

Zoro couldn’t hold himself back anymore – he roared with laughter.

When he focused in again, apparently Chopper was running some tests on Law. Asking him to recite things or pointing at visual charts and colour charts.

“Choppppeerrr this is booorrriiinngg” Luffy was whining. Chopper had told him to let go of Law while he was running the tests, it seemed. So he was just sitting there on his stomach, legs moving in the air as he nibbled on some food. “Is Torao done yeeeeet?”

“Patience Luffy!”

“Good luck with that Tony-ya.” Law snickered softly.

“But Torao’s fiiiinneee! Just ask Zoro. Or Usopp. Torao and I do this all the time, right Torao?” Luffy was staring up at Law, wide eyed and grinning.

“Certainly, yes, you would always insist at being at my side Luffy-ya.” Law said idly before pointing at something after Chopper asked him a question.

“But the cuddling Torao.” Chopper insisted and flipped to the next portion of whatever test he was doing.

“You’re the ones calling it cuddling!” He growled out.

Luffy was whining again. “Just ask Zoro Chopper!”

Chopper had glanced over towards him, and Zoro could only sigh. Luffy, Luffy, why did you have to bring him into this? (Although he supposed that they just would get nowhere as long as Chopper used the term cuddling.)

(Trafalgar Law didn’t cuddle after all.)

Part of him wanted to refuse to answer just to drag this whole irritated Law bit out more, but he supposed he might as well let Luffy go back to cuddling his ally. He was getting all pouty on them as it was already.

He could also feel a glare from Law’s direction.

“Well,” he started, “I wouldn’t exactly call it cuddling,” he appreciated his limbs in their proper places thank you very much, “but yes, this type of behaviour has been the norm on Bartolomeo’s ship.”

And queue both Nami and Chopper’s shocked expressions and reactions. Subtlety, he glanced over to where Law’s crew was and they were whispering amongst themselves.

Huh, apparently even they hadn’t expected this type of behaviour from their captain.

“Satisfied Tony-ya?” Law was grumbling. “Can you leave us in peace now?”

Luffy made a strange sound.

“One more- Law!” When Chopper was digging into his bag, Law had used his abilities and just transported both Luffy and himself to Bepo.

“I’m sorry Captain…”

“Just shut up and lay there.” Law murmured and proceeded to get himself comfortable.

“He’s comfy Torao!” Luffy spoke up enthusiastically, and was practically snuggling the bear. “I can see why you like to sleep on and cuddle with him!” He was chuckling softly.

“It’s not–” Law protested.

But Luffy cut him off and pushed himself so that he was also atop Law. “But Torao’s comfier!”

Surprisingly, Law shut up.

.xxx.

The morning was panic.

It was Franky, Robin and Brook who had woken them all up (actually shaken them) and raving about the samurais and---

Shit the samurais!

Well, not quite all of them. Bepo, Luffy, and Law were still asleep, and, yeah the captains fell asleep atop the big fluffy bear.

“…I almost want to take a picture of it…”

No Nami, that wasn’t the problem here.

“I doubt you’d be able to blackmail Law with it.” He said with a shrug. “They do it all the time.”

“Boo! And here I thought I could get some money. Doctors make lots of money, right?”

(He could hear the Hearts Pirates sneering at her.)

“Why don’t we concentrate on how we are going to get our captains awake without getting sliced into pieces instead of blackmailing them, shall we?”

However, Law’s crew seemed to be scheming something and after a few moments they were snickering. “We think we got a way, and one that won’t get any of us in trouble!”

Zoro took a few steps back. “It’s your limbs guys.” He said, giving them a wide berth on enacting their plan.

And then suddenly, all twenty of them took a step back, hands cupped to their mouths and screamed out in synchronisation.

“Look! It’s a beautiful female bear!”

And then, suddenly, the captains’ pillow shot up, spouting out an enthusiastic ‘where!’ and the Hearts Pirates all fell over, holding their stomachs in laughter.

Meanwhile, the unfortunate captains were groaning and looking around, wondering what the hell just happened.

“What the hell Bepo?”

“I’m sorry Captain…”

#monkey d luffy #trafalgar law #lawlu #one piece #roronoa zoro #fanfic:guardian #petiteneko:story #tlaw #luffy #onepiece #zoro

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