Title: Stop
Type: Oneshot
Pairing: Luffy/Ace
Rating: NC-17
Warning: AU, lime, character death.
Length: ~1,200
A/N: Because it's February 10th.

"You, really need to stop it with those gang wars", Ace sighed as he took out the first aid kit.

"What, is my big brother worried for little me?" Luffy joked as he took his shirt off, "and really, no one is going to listen to you if you use such a tone."

"Luffy", Ace stared at his younger brother, "seriously." When Luffy did not say anything, Ace quickly grabbed the disinfectant and disinfected the wounds that marred Luffy's skin "Luffy, you do know that most of our savings goes to buying new shirts to replace your bloodstained and ruined ones…and the medicine, all the bandages, they're not cheap."

Rolling his eyes, Luffy inspects the bandages, patting softly at his brother's handiwork.

"Luffy, promise me you'll stop fighting?" Ace asks as he places the last bandage on Luffy's arm.

The younger brother rolls his eyes, "don't you think you're asking for too much?"

Ace walked over to the kitchen to grab a glass of water for his brother, "I just think it's about time you stopped being so immature", the elder brother placed the glass of water on the coffee table in front of Luffy, "nothing good comes out of fighting aimlessly like that"

Luffy stared hard at his brother.

"The only thing that will result…are the scars that you have to carry with you for the rest of your life", Ace returned the stare.

Smiling just softly, Luffy took a sip of water before placing the glass down, "Ace, you need to stop letting the ghost of the past haunt you."

"Luffy, fighting such dangerous and childish fights isn't going to get you anywhere", Ace kept on insisting.

Walking up to his brother, Luffy almost effortlessly pushed Ace against the wall, "you're still hung over Sabo's death?"

Ace bit his lips and looked away, there was no way he could forget, after all, if he hadn't been so crazy about fighting all the time when he was younger, Sabo wouldn't have died.

"I'm not going to disappear", Luffy reassured his older brother, "I'll always be here with you", Luffy leaned forward to whisper into Ace's ear, "I promise".

Biting his lips, trusting those words Luffy uttered were one of the last things Ace wanted to do. He was scared of the words coming back to haunt him. However, Ace's thoughts quickly came to a halt when a warm pair of lips started sucking on his neck.

"Luffy, I'm not in the mood", Ace regained his senses and tried to kindly push Luffy off of himself, "please."

"The fights do have meaning", Luffy stated as he worked his way to Ace's lips, his own lips gliding over softly before pressing on passionately, "they're not immature", and as though Luffy wanted to prove that he himself were not immature, he skilfully grabbed the back of Ace's backside with his free hand, groping to his satisfaction.

"You know they don't have meaning", Ace panted as he tried to reason with Luffy, "what are you going to do when they pull out a gun? I don't want to face another Sabo-tragedy."

"It won't happen again, not anymore", Luffy said with confidence, and where he got that confidence from, Ace was not sure at all. Gently, Luffy slipped his hands under Ace's shirt and started caressing skin, "all these scars, I'll remove them from your memories".

"And if I don't want to forget?" Ace asked, knowing that his cheeks were already red from Luffy's touching.

Luffy blinked back at Ace's question before he sighed and answered, "then just temporarily, I'll make you forget"

"But if you strain yourself, your wounds…" Ace tried to tell his brother the consequences only to have his words cut off with a searing kiss.

"A little touching is no harm", Luffy whispered before he let one of his hands drop into Ace's pants, squeezing tightly onto the other's erection, "plus, if it's anyone that'll be straining, it'll be you."

Gasping, Ace pressed his head against the wall even harder, and he rasped out hoarsely when Luffy's other hand pulled down his pants and underwear and joined in with the hand that was already pleasuring his lower half, "Lu! Your fingers!"

Smiling crazily cheerfully, Luffy watched Ace's variety of expressions dance out before him as his fingers prodded into Ace's hole, his other hand working up and down Ace's erection.

When Ace came, Luffy licked his fingers clean before pulling his trembling brother's head down so that he could place a kiss on the other's eyebrows, "you know I love you right?"

"I do", Ace closed his eyes and wrapped his arms around his brother, "you know I love you too right?"

"Yeah", Luffy breathed deeply and pet Ace's hair softly, "yeah, I know."

"Then, can't you stop involving yourself in gang fights?" Ace asked worriedly.

Luffy did not say anything.

The next morning, Luffy for once, woke up early and left the house. There was a meeting he had to attend to. By the time the meeting finished, it was already dusk. There was nothing out of the ordinary until Luffy spotted the series of police cars outside of his home, his home with Ace. He had probably stood there for a while, dumbstruck as he stared at the scene before reality hit him hard.

"What's going on here?" Luffy asked hurriedly as he grabbed an officer by the arm.

"Do you live here?" The officer asked, pointing to Luffy's house.

"Yes, yes, I do, I live with my brother, what's wrong!" Luffy suddenly felt panicked, as his grips tightened.

"According to neighbours, there was a gang fight, some adolescents got hold of a gun and stormed up to your house looking for a 'Luffy', you wouldn't be that Luffy now would you?" the officer gave Luffy a stern look.

"I am", Luffy responded without really letting the information sinking in, "I am that Luffy, I'm Ace's brother, nothing happened to my brother right?"

"I'm sorry", the officer tugged on his hat, "but I'd like for you to confirm the identity of this young man", silently, the officer brought Luffy to the back of the ambulance

"What is this?" Luffy asked as he looked at the face that clearly belonged to Ace before looking back at the officer and repeated, "what is this!"

"The body found in the house, died from a shot to the heart."

An immense wave of guilt swamped over Luffy as he continued to stare at Ace. His brother, now gone, like Sabo, forever.

Luffy didn't even need to look twice to make sure that the corpse was indeed his older brother, his hands naturally went to caress cold cheeks, "your cheeks aren't soft…Ace", Luffy didn't bother holding back his tears as he wrapped his arms around the body that no longer had a heartbeat, "how could you leave earlier than me?"

A million 'what ifs' suddenly questioned themselves in Luffy's mind, and Luffy didn't have a single answer to any of them, there were too many possibilities, yet one of them remained certain, Ace had died because he was shot by people who were after Luffy. In the end, all Luffy felt was regret, more regret and guilt, as thought his time had stopped.