A/N: If you like amnesia stories and aren't reading Anjelle's Within yet… go read that. Now. It's great, to say the least. And it had a heavy hand in dragging this depressing drivel out of my head. It's because of Within I was thinking about the implications involved with people changing from memory loss and how they interact with people who knew them before… And, after a while, the concept of this takes root and forces me to write it. Hey, Anjelle! I know you're reading this! Stop bringing deep, thought provoking philosophical themes into your stories right now or I'll gomu-gomu-no-pistol your ass! (I kid, that's what I love you for.)
Ace's brother was in a coma. He had been for two years.
For those two years, every day, Ace came in to the hospital for visiting hours and sat at Luffy's bedside, waiting. For two years, Ace spent every free minute waiting, alone but for the doctors and their unconscious patient.
Ace did not have many friends. It was a price he could easily pay, Ace thought, because every moment was worth it to him. And some days, some small fraction of the days, he found signs that Luffy was recovering. One day, while Ace was waiting at the bedside, holding Luffy's hand in his own, something marvellous had happened. For a second, his brother's limp hand was not so limp anymore; it twitched, then gave Ace a small squeeze, and then it went lax again. That's the kind of thing that happened on the exciting days.
But most days, it was just waiting.
A little over two years passed — seven hundred thirty-eight days, Ace counted — without much more. But on the seven hundred thirty-ninth day, everything ended and everything began again. Luffy woke up, and Ace was overjoyed. He didn't see it for what it really meant for him: the end of waiting and the beginning of something worse.
When Luffy's eyes opened, Ace had been at his side. He had seen, first hand, the panicked confusion in them as they gazed out from above the oxygen mask. He had seen it, and he had ignored it. Perhaps if he had not things would have been much easier.
The doctors rushed him out of the room quickly, but not before he had said a few things to his brother.
Luffy, you're awake! Oh God, I… I missed you. You've been asleep a long time.
Luffy had not responded.
The doctors had him sit in a stiff, wooden chair outside the room and left him there. They left him there for hours while they examined Luffy, but he didn't mind. He was long used to sitting and waiting.
Ace was called into a private room so the doctor could talk to him about Luffy. Ace was not so interested in his brother's condition; he was finally awake and Ace hadn't been allowed to see him since the very instance of it. He hadn't been able to properly hug his brother in so long.
The doctor worried and fretted and generally came across as nervous. She glanced at her papers so often Ace got the feeling she was talking more to them than him. Memory loss problems, the doctor had said. Whatever that meant. Ace wanted his brother and he wanted him now.
But then the doctor said he doesn't remember you, or anyone, or anything. And it looks like he won't be able to form new memories either…
Ace wondered what that last part meant, and hoped he wouldn't have to find out.
Once again, Ace sat at Luffys bedside. It was Luffy's seven hundred fortieth day in the hospital, and the first one awake.
It was not so touching a reunion as Ace had imagined. Luffy made no attempts at speech, merely staring at his hands and fidgeting with a small toy he had been given. Ace found he did not have anything to say.
Suddenly, the toy — a cheap, puzzle-like thing — clicked into place, solved. Luffy set it down and rubbed the blanket between his fingertips.
Ace was unable to take it anymore. Leaning forward, he caught his brother's chin and forced Luffy to look at him. Luffy met his stare with surprise and some wariness, and still, no words were spoken. Ace surveyed him closely, looking for some, any sign of recognition. He found none.
Eventually, the doctors allowed Ace to bring his brother back home with him, under promise that he would bring Luffy to a professional for help — and truly, he would, if he could only afford one. The hospital bills were cutting it close as it is.
Luffy remained blank in the face of his past, not even blinking to hear the place was the very apartment they grew up in. When Ace told Luffy about how they used to live here before, together, Luffy responded with only a quizzical gleam in his eye and a Who are you again?
Ace did not know how to answer, that first time. He would learn.
Ace had been cooking a large breakfast when Luffy wandered in out of the blue and asked him who he was. It was a question he was still only getting used to.
That day, Ace took Luffy aside and explained to them that he was Ace, and they were brothers, but Luffy had a memory problem so he couldn't remember all the good times they shared in the past.
Luffy felt uncomfortable and strangely ashamed, though he did not think he had any reason to. He let Ace hug him then, even welcomed it. If they fit together more awkwardly, less easily, than the two of them had once in the past, Luffy did not know it.
Ace did.
The next morning Luffy wandered into the kitchen, found Ace cooking a large breakfast, and asked him who he was.
Ace gave a short answer, and did not try to explain as he had the day before. Luffy accepted his I'm Ace; I'm making you breakfast answer at face value and did not pry.
They never did try to embrace again.
One day Ace found Luffy standing in the middle of a room, his brows furrowed as he stared at nothing. Ace approached and offered his brother his help.
Luffy startled and looked around wildly.
Where am I? Who are you?
I'm Ace, your brother; we're at home, you're in the kitchen, you probably wanted a snack. Are you hungry? I can fix you something.
Ace was very used to this sort of thing by that point. He couldn't even imagine how it must have felt to be Luffy, to never know what was going on around you, or even what was wrong with you. And if you did, you would never know for long, because you would always forget.
Ace is your name? …Ace. I like it.
He said that every time.
Even though Luffy was currently focusing on something else, Ace could still tell from the quick side-glances and the guarded posture just what terms he rested on in Luffy's mind at that moment (Whoishewhatishedoingherewheredidhecomefrom?). It didn't matter so much anymore; that was nearly perpetual.
The thing Ace was worrying about at that particular moment was that Luffy was looking at his most prized possession, the old straw hat, with the same unseeing, slightly curious but mostly disinterested eyes.
Luffy looked up finally, fixing his impassive gaze on Ace. Later, Ace would recall that his brother only spoke three words in that entire day, the first of which being, in the form of a question, Mine?
Ace nodded, and for some reason, Luffy frowned.
Luffy strode forward then and, with a sort of conviction, placed the hat firmly on Ace's head.
For only a moment, Ace choked, one hand flying up to feel the worn straw under his fingertips. For the old Luffy, him parting with his hat was unthinkable, and him asking you to hold onto it for even a second was an act of great trust and care.
Ace looked back at Luffy hesitantly. Could it mean something?
No.
This Luffy's eyes were just as unseeing and disinterested as they had been before, nothing at all like the kind of fire Luffy had been able convey with his. Still frowning, Luffy said his final two words of the night before walking off: Not mine.
This was just his way of getting rid of something he didn't want.
Every night, when it was late and Luffy was asleep, Ace went to his brother's bedside. It was just like the days, the hundreds of stretching days in the hospital when he did nothing but wait as Luffy slept on. But now, Luffy had no cold, clinical mask forcing him to keep breathing. Now, Luffy had no doctors to watch over him, only Ace. Now, he knew for certain that Luffy would wake up soon.
What he didn't know for certain was which way of life had been better.
Ace entered Luffy's room one night to find him already awake, sitting up in bed and simply looking around at everything. When he saw Ace, he asked where they were.
You're at home. This is your bedroom.
Luffy had been even more confused by this. He didn't have a bedroom, and he told Ace that.
Well, why not?
I don't remember ever having a bedroom, so how can I have one now?
Ace was very, very quiet for a moment. It made Luffy feel unnerved. How about a brother? Do you have a brother?
After a moment's thought he had said No, I don't.
Luffy is my name? …I don't like it.
Luffy would always forget, again and again. He couldn't help it. It wasn't his fault. He would always forget, no matter what happened. Nothing could stop it or change it. So, Luffy always forgot. Every time he did, Ace found it a little harder to love him, and he hated that. He didn't want to be turned against his brother for something neither of them could control.
But Ace couldn't help it either. On one day he looked at Luffy and saw his brother, and on another he saw his burden.
One day he looked at Luffy and felt nothing at all.
Luffy was no longer Luffy to Ace. Gradually he came to realise they couldn't be the same person at all. Everything that made Luffy Luffy was gone.
Now unable to remember them, Luffy had lost all connections to the things that once defined him. A hat, once prized, was now simply a hat. Its purpose was now void. Meaningless scars, now merely surface wounds, told nothing of their owner's character. His oldest friends forgotten, unfamiliar faces in a sea of thousands like them.
Luffy, once loud, carefree, and friendly, was now at unease with the world around him. He was withdrawn and wary; every single thing he saw was foreign to him, as though he had been displaced from his life-long home when he had in fact been there the whole time. He acted as if he were in enemy territory, and why shouldn't he? Everyone he met seemed to know far more about him than a stranger should. He was scared.
Luffy had been the bravest person Ace knew, once upon a time.
They did not have a routine. They could not have a routine, not when one of them was destined to routinely forget it.
No, they had no routine. The closest they had was a pattern.
Some days, Ace would find Luffy standing in the middle of a room, staring at nothing. He would offer help.
Where am I? Luffy would ask. Who are you?
And Ace would sigh and sit Luffy down and start explaining from the beginning. It was no easier on either of them to say everything, for obvious reasons, but at some point Ace decided it was how he preferred to do things. Perhaps because he wanted to remember his once-devotion to the Luffy-who-had-been, and perhaps because he wanted the now-Luffy to know of this as well.
Because Luffy had once been a glorious, shining star instead of this empty shell.
The original Luffy, the real, whole Luffy, had been Ace's reason to live, and now he was practically gone. All that was left was a fraction, the outer layer, but it was still Ace's self-given duty to protect it.
Ace would find his brother some day — someone like Luffy couldn't just be gone, couldn't just fade like that. He was somewhere, and Ace would find him. Until then, he had something to fill the time.
Ace is your name? …Ace. I like it.
And everything began again.