Moya bol'shaya Zhar-Ptitsa (My Big Firebird)
His eyes disappeared beneath the rim of his straw hat. She never thought of it like that, not with his little brother's moniker becoming so famous, but right now it was as like she was really noticing it for the first time. Portgas D. Ace was a lot of things; Hot-headed…stubborn for sure, but out-shown by his hat? Never. She had known and loved him for 3 years and she wasn't sure she'd even known what it was made out of before this moment.
Her own eyes swept over his now diminutive figure. His shoulders seemed slumped with the weight of the world. What could he possibly have to confess? Her heart stopped.
He didn't love her anymore.
That had to be it. He pulled her from the party on deck so quietly, he took such care to make sure no one noticed as they slipped into the shadows of the starboard bow. He was ashamed. The dancing light and sounds of their family were blocked by the massive masts and navigation room. Her eyes had adjusted to the darkness and her body shivered as the last of the warmth from port bow left her.
The memories of warm nights they stole away together heated her cheeks as the coldness restricted her breathing. Ace had held her when the rest of the world forsook her, and she sobbed into his arms when they were betrayed by a brother and almost lost another.
She looked over the man in front of her now, his face refusing to meet hers, and she was sure he had never seen him look so defeated. Even if she had first laid eyes on him after seven days in the ring with Jinbe.
The woman felt her own shoulders stiffen as she watched his form slink even further away from her outstretched touch guiltily. "Zhar-ptitsa?" His nickname, her native tongue for firebird distracted him.
"I, uh." He stopped again when his eyes finally met her yellow glimmer in the dark, a realization flashed over his vision at her shiver. His warmth radiated further from his body, wrapping her in its balmy security. "I never told you where I came from."
Her body relaxed into his warmth. "Of course, you did. Dawn Island in the East Blue." She filled in nervously, before he could continue. Where was he going with this?
"Uh, yeah, but no. I mean…" He looked her over for the first time since they'd made their retreat into the darkness. His eyes swept up from her boots, over her torn shorts and loose shirt that framed her perfectly balanced cleavage. He'd have appreciated it more under different circumstances. When the words that hung from his lips with foreboding destruction finally fell, he'd never get the chance to really look at her this closely again. She'd refuse to be near him. He just knew it.
She felt her fear turn to anger, "What is all this? If you are cutting it off, just do it. I don't need all this…" She paused to find the word in English, but couldn't find it, "Chush' sobach'ya." She turned, but something hard and hot grabbed her arm and spun her to face him.
"What? That's what you think this is?" His hand was rigid in its place, his shoulders broadening at the insinuation.
She tried to pull from his grasp, but he only jerked her into his grip. His lips seared against her own, all memory of cold dissipated as his love coursed through their embrace. Her doubts seemed down right insulting under the weight of his kiss. When she finally surfaced for air, his eyes were watching her, his grip never loosening.
"I have to tell you," He paused again, his black orbs bore into her, "I have to tell you who my father is."
She wanted to point out that she knew who his father was. They had the same Father; Whitebeard. The man she pledged her allegiance had found her in a pile of dead bodies when she was practically a child, her mind slipping into madness at the isolation and power surging through her veins. He made her whole again, gave her a family and taught her how to use her power. He was the only father she cared about, but she nodded for him to continue.
"It's…" He just couldn't do it. He couldn't say it out loud. Once it was out, he could never take it back. She would know he was cursed, she could never want him. He tried to pull from her shamedly, but she only followed him, and he shifted to lean against the railing. Her head rested on his chest, shielding his face from her scrutiny.
"You cannot change my feelings over such an insignificant fact. You think there's a man alive who could eclipse you?" She pushed closer into him, relishing in the invisible evidence of his flame, a small smile forming as he wrapped his arms around her tighter.
He let out a hollow chuckle at her choice of words and took the moment to pull the band-aid, "Gol D. Rodger."
She laughed, a hardy belly laugh that caught the man off guard, as she stood up straight to meet his confused eyes, "My ass!"
"I'm being serious. My Mother kept me hidden at the expense of her own life." His face held no joy, no hint that his words sparked the humor inside his core that it had in hers.
Blyad.
Her face fell to match his intensity. She looked over him for a moment longer, the silence smothering him like thick smoke. This was it, the moment her face would change and never looked at him with the same love she had poured into him a moment ago.
"That's pretty badass." She nodded into the thought.
Ace felt anger spark inside him, like an explosion, and he didn't know why. He should be relieved, maybe even confused, but he was furious. "Are you insane? I'm cursed. I can only bring you death. Don't you know what they did to all those women and children they thought could even possibly be related to Rodger? What will they do to you when they find out who I am? What if… What if you get pregnant?" A silver glint caught her eye in the darkness as it slipped down his clenched jaw. His fist, white knuckled and shaking at his side relaxed suddenly and pushed into his pockets with a, "Hmnf. You should be terrified. You should hate me for carrying on his poisoned blood line and pulling you into it. You shouldn't be impressed." He spat the last word in his disgust, but her fierce hawk-eyes splashed the fire in his core.
"The man who impregnated my mother is a pirate. I'm haunted by his eyes every day I look into the mirror, but I do not let his genetics define me. I was sold to buy my Mother's freedom, doomed to become another shlyukha in my Islands . But look at me now, fucking the prince of the pirates. For free!" She winked, her accent tickling his ears as a hallow laugh escaped her lips. His anger sparked like his flame and he held back his fire.
"This isn't a joke, Nat!" His voice boomed, "Our children will be hunted and murdered in cold blood!"
"I can't have children." She didn't look away from his burning gaze, even as the fire behind them turned cold. "The slavers of the Archipelago didn't give away live-stock for free." She shook the thoughts from her head and looked up at Ace with a smirk that was more for her own benefit. "As I see it, the marines already want me dead and there's no children to curse," he heard the shake in her voice she tried to hide, "There is no man who could seal my fate, that is in my own hands."
He broke. He was sure he looked worse than Luffy with snot hanging out of his nose and tears streaming down his face in water falls but he couldn't help it. All the emotion he held back, the years of terror and shame evaporated in minutes. She didn't hate him. She didn't want to kill him or turn him over to the Marines.
She still wanted to be with him.
"Oh, zhar-ptitsa." Her arms found their way around him, pulling him into her and pulling his face into her neck. She could feel the slimy accumulation, but she didn't budge. The soft sounds of sobs were soon replaced by sounds of snoring and the female pirate let out another bellow that would rival a giant. The years she had watched him, the fights he had won, the adventures they'd shared… She would have been more surprised to find out he was the son of a no name merchant than the King of Pirates.
Her legs brought them comfortably to the deck, her back against the wall of the Moby Dick and her eyes overlooking the calm sea of the New World. After a while she looked down to the sleeping man in her lap.
Gol D. Rodger, huh?
People have had worse in-laws.