Marco was very anxious (or very afraid; not that he´d ever admit it). The reason? Oh, it was pretty simple. They were huddling together. As if that wasn´t bad enough, he had two very good reasons to be suspicious (terrified).
One: Every time he was within sight they would cast him a glances.
Not looks, but glances. Glances meant he wasn´t supposed to know. Which means they couldn´t enjoy the fear they inflicted on their victim (him), which, however, they usually did gleefully as well as taking huge amusement out of said victims attempt to escape whatever they have planned and watch him (or her; women weren't save) get paranoid after the first few minutes of being careful (running or hiding, actually), since he theoretically didn´t know about anything. This was out of the ordinary and in the best case that was just bad.
Two: His birthday was in a week.
It went without words that it wouldn´t get over quietly. Not one birthday had been quiet ever since a certain date where the Whitebeard Pirates got new siblings. And Marco had more reason than anyone else to look at his birthday with strain (angst). It was him, who caught them preparing something they would call creative art (prank), who gave out punishments, who assigned chores (he never gave either of them kitchen duty for obvious reasons) and who (though this only concerned one) assigned positioned in battle.
And those were (still) glances.
Not good.
What to do?
Abandoning ship is out. Asking for transfer? Oyaji would never let him. Hiding? Not much to hide on the open sea. Running? Same as previous. Asking for help? Blackmail material. Dro-
A glance.
He was so done for.
Over the coming week Marco repeatedly wished that he had just chosen to drown in the sea back then and there.
Why?
It got worse.
For some reason or another Marco had been forbidden from entering a certain part of the ship. By Oyaji´s order. It just so happened to be the do-it-all part. The part, where creative ones gathered and put their fantasy to work. It frequently supported them with tools.
With only four days left till deathday Marco was downright creeped out. One by one the group walked up to an unsuspecting crewmember and led (dragged, beat or otherwise forced) them under deck into the (to him) forbidden zone.
To make the whole matter worse still, every sibling of his exited whistling happily.
Once Marco had gathered his courage (he did not want to know) and asked Luffy, the most innocent, naive and oblivious member of the group in hopes to get some answers. Sometimes Luffy forgot he was supposed to keep a secret and babbled away, but even if he remembered not to talk you always knew when he was lying. So Marco had walked up to him (when he was alone, of course) and asked him innocently in a by-the-way tone if he was planning something with Ace recently (Luffy like talking about his brothers).
Luffy started sweating, avoided eye contact, made his eyes round tried whistling (failing miserably) and said that he was not planning anything with Sabo, Ace and Thatch and that it was definitely not for his birthday.
On the bright side however now there was a limit to Marcos imagination. Oyaji was in on it which guaranteed him some kind of safety. Problem there was that Oyaji also enjoyed good jokes and with that a good part of the group´s pranks.
With three days left a literally more burning warning arose.
Marco had no idea about the how or what (who was obvious), but explosions on deck got him on guard. At different places (even under deck), with varying sizes and sometimes more than one.
The first time Marco noticed one was when Sabo screamed. He had been leaning at his favorite spot at the main mast and he had watched him out of the corner of his eyes to maybe catch a hint as to what they are planning.
Then suddenly something had blown up in his face and Sabo had screamed. Sabo only had a few singed hairs, half an eyebrow left, a scowl on his face, but it had alerted the entire ship and sent them scrambling, thinking they were under attack.
At least until he ran past Ace, who was staring at Sabo, mumbling to himself in concentration and Thatch and Luffy who were laughing so hard they couldn´t stand upright anymore.
Ever since explosions were happening at random. Especially at night.
Macro awoke with a feeling of utter dread which was only fueled when nothing, absolutely nothing out of the ordinary happened when he exited his cabin ( he hadn´t slept a wink). No complex trap, no land mine, no (un-)friendly note, not even a single drop of water from above.
This continued and by breakfast Marco was ready to poison himself with rotten food to get a free pass to the infirmary (faking didn´t work with those nurses). Problem was the cooks were too good. There was no such thing as a remotely unhealthy looking crump of bread. He had checked. Repetitively.
He accepted the congratulations smiling and just wanted to get over with this.
Then the group entered. Chatting peacefully (Sabo and Thatch) or asleep on their feet (Ace and Luffy). Only with utmost effort Marco kept himself from bolting right then and there. Instead he opted for staying in place and trying to hide behind Jozu who sat across from him. But naturally it was no good. Even if his siblings had not formed the hugest blob of people in the mess hall in an attempt to congratulate him, Marco wouldn´t have let himself hope that they just wouldn´t have found him anyway.
As if Marco needed anything else to make him weary of what was yet to come, the tiny little fact that the group simply walked over to him and got in line most certainly would have been it.
When it was Thatch´s turn he eyed the hand suspiciously from different ankles then shook it quickly and pulled his hand back at lightning speed.
If Thatch noticed his particular behavior he didn´t show it. He just smiled (smiled! Not a cunning grin).
"Happy birthday, Marco. Enjoy your day until I´m gonna drink you under the table tonight."
Sabo didn´t let go of his hand until he almost broke it from too much shaking. "Hope ya´ll have a good year and much fun and even more fun for us."
Ace was still (or again, you never know with him) pretty much sleep, if his yawning in midsentence was any indication. "You should lo-fuaa~-osen up some more. Or you´ll lose what´s left of your hair."
After Luffy dropped his loud and happy congratulations Marco was about to enter a downright comatose state. "We are going to have so much fun today! Look forward to it!"
They then merrily went to eat their breakfast, leaving Marco and everyone else starring after them. Seven hours since midnight and not one humiliating moment since.
Marco shuddered.
After by sunset still nothing happened Marco came to the conclusion that nothing was planned until dinner. It had to be, because if he thought back on it he could definitely see how they had hinted at it during breakfast.
His siblings apparently thought the same since they had abandoned their policy of remaining within sight but not close enough to be in a danger zone. In the last few hours Marco already had a conversation with Haruta, Izo and three of his subordinates. The only interaction he had today other than during breakfast. Oyaji, of course was an exception from the stay-far-away rule, but he hardly moved from his seat; partly because he was too lazy and partly because his medication didn´t let him stand up.
Birthday children were left off duty so he didn´t even get to shout orders.
So he couldn´t just say he was tired and go to bed right about now. No way he would be allowed to sleep through his party. Flying was no good either; he was ordered not to look at the preparations and checking out the entire ship was kind of unavoidable while landing or circling in the sky.
Hench Marco leaned against the railing and watched the dark grey sky, counting down the minutes he had left of peace and dignity.
On the Moby Dick feasts always started after dark. Immediately. He listened to the splashing of the waves and loud laughter as his siblings prepared. He was lucky about one thing, though. No tables, of course, no chairs. Which means no ways to cut his chair´s legs or change drinks. Or other countless possibilities that were ruined just they couldn´t predict where he was going to sit.
But Marco had to be careful none the less.
The last grey dots disappeared and only seconds later hands clapped over his face. The only he didn´t run was, because the hands blocking his eyes were way too soft and not elastic for them to belong to a member of the group. He resigned himself to fate and obeyed one of the laughing and chatting nurses as she lead in the direction of Oyaji.
She could laugh. She had nothing to fear. Marco, on the other hand, got tenser with every passing step. Sweat ran down his forehead.
He could already hear the muffled whispers as the crew talked while waiting for him to put the approximately ten steps behind him.
He didn´t want to. And for a last time the idea of running popped into his brain. It told him with Thatch´s vice that now was the last moment to avoid losing the last bit of respect he had left.
Despite knowing better Marco told it to shut up.
When he was told it was fine to open his eyes he hadn´t been sure what to expect, but being faced with a fancy white birthday cake a head taller than him with definitely more candles than he was old (how many were those? Hundred? Thousand and a half?). It looked like a bonfire.
His expression must have been pretty stupid. The crew broke out laughing; Oyaji´s deep boom overshadowing everyone else and flashes lightening up the night indicated that he would soon gat to see just how ridiculous an expression he had shown.
He smiled.
Taking his time blowing the candles (and feeling like a little kid again) all terrible thoughts about what was definitely had to come disappeared. It didn´t matter. They were only jokes (or at least that´s what he tried to think).
Blowing out the last ten he noticed that there were no torches or lamps. Instead only few candles were distributes between all the masses of food and drinks (it was almost twice as much as last year). He wondered if it was a hint at his ability. Everyone always liked to tease him with it (roasted chicken or something).
After he was done he pushed it aside so that he could actually see his family as they were celebrating him.
Oyaji put his oversized mug aside with a thud that immediately commanded all the attention. Oyaji laughed, grinned his smug smile and gave a little easygoing speech.
He talked about how it was nice to have a reliable commander, praised that Marco did his job good and reminded them that tomorrow was another day and that they did not get off duty, but otherwise encouraged the celebration.
It was only after Oyaji finished and emptied another mug Marco looked away from his father. It was then that he noticed that no candles were burning and that yellow glow had been replaced with green. Pale green dots were flying around at it took Marco a while to recognize them from the Summer Islands they had visited as fireflies. The little insects were buzzing around, giving the light life and fun while the shadows danced outside their party.
How long had they been planning this? The last one was already a few months ago.
One figure out of the hundred and some stood up, raising a bottle.
Marco stiffened and the warm and fuzzy feeling he had paused.
Thatch cleared his throat loudly, but everyone had already been quiet since they identified him as a member of the group.
"I´m sure everyone is wondering why the hell we still haven´t pulled anything today." He already slurred lightly, Marco noted with amusement, but he was still more than just cautious. "The answer is simple.
We decided that our working bee Marco needed a day off. So no creative art today.
Hope you relaxed just fine, Marco!
Everyone but Marco knows this already, but we also decided that we don´t show you enough our appreciation. You don´t know how grateful we are that you don´t let these two," he waved with his bottle in some direction where Marco guessed the three brothers were," anywhere near the kitchen. However since we are Pirates and only have so much space on ship and giving presents is hence just bothersome, we thought about some other way. Which is why we planned this!" He pointed with a finger up to the sky.
There was nothing. Only stars. No moon. Not even clouds.
But then a one firefly left the crowding masses and flew upwards. Higher and higher until it almost wasn't visible anymore.
Then the green was replaced by red and finally exploded in all kinds of colors.
Don´t take chicken jokes too seriously –Namur
The crew didn´t break out into laughter this time, Marco heard some snorts, but he never took his eyes from the sky were already another little green dot disappeared.
I do work, Commander, you just don´t see it – Anna
Another fly rose.
Thanks for taking that cannonball for me – Nick
One more.
Thank you for keeping Oyaji´s drinking in line – Hannah
The messages continued brightening the sky and damn he wasn´t the sentimental type, but Marco tried really hard to keep his happiness from spilling. Over the eyes.
It was then that he noticed a quiet noise. Searching with his eyes quickly (he didn´t want to miss a note) Marco found Luffy. It was hard to see with so little light, but he and Sabo were stretching one of his fingers and shooting something round upwards. Marco followed it fly and saw it collide with a firefly.
It exploded and left another message.
You´re a good Battle Commander -Ace
Marco looked back to Sabo and Luffy. They shot another ball. Fireworks, obviously, which explained why he had been forbidden from entering the Creative Zone.
If they had only planned it in this few days, how did they get their hands on fireflies?
Looking at another insect as it went to set off a new explosion it hit Marco like a brick. The fireflies didn´t make any noise. No, it weren´t even insects.
His eyes dropped to Ace.
Amazing.
Marco smiled wide and content. What a cute little brother (but he really shouldn´t say that aloud).
For the first time in a week he felt absolutely relaxed, happy and at peace.
In case you didn´t understand, the random explosions happening on Deck were a result of Ace experimenting with his ability; he developed his Hotarubi and Hidaruma attack. :)
And about what Marco saw at the end and what he thought to be amazing; use your imagination. Maybe Ace´s hands were glowing in this green light or something.
Another of the 'Moby Dick´s Tales' series and i hope you enjoyed it. Please comment so that i know what you think.
If you have scenes or ideas that you want to see written, just mail me. :)