A/N: This is a story that goes along with Her Heart. It takes place in the same universe, but sometime after the events of Her Heart. They don't have to be read together, but this first chapter will definitely make more sense if you read the other one first. Thanks. Also the pairing in Her Heart is Fem!Law X Corazon. Thought you should know. ^_^
Ace woke up slowly, the rocking of the ship soothing him. Upon fully waking up, he found himself confused. The last thing he remembered was beating Jinbei, and loosing to Whitebeard. He sat up, and made sure that he had all of his stuff still on him. He sighed in relief when he found the dendenmushi that his sister, Law, had given him when she'd left Foosha Village more than four years earlier. He got up, and exited the cabin he found himself in. He looked around, his shirt fluttering in the breeze that came off of the ocean.
He heard a laugh behind him, and whipped around. A figure dressed in a white chef's uniform, and sporting a ridiculous pompadour waved at him. "Hi. My name's Thatch. We should be friends." he said.
Ace raised an eyebrow at him, "Where am I?" he asked.
"On the Moby Dick of course. After you lost to Oyaji, we picked you up. Of course your crew came back to save you, so we have them too." Thatch said still smiling.
Ace felt his heart plummet. Hadn't he told those idiots to run? Ace growled, "Give them back, and let us go. They don't deserve to be prisoners!" he hissed. He could feel his flames getting close to the surface, as he got angry.
Thatch smiled, "You guys aren't prisoners, but we can't let you go till we make port again. So what do you say? Be my friend?" he asked, then promptly had to dodge a fireball. Thatch fell onto his back on the other side of the roof he'd been sitting on. He looked up into the eyes of the first mate, who happened to be his best friend, and ginned, "He didn't take to kindly to me asking if we could be friends. Thinks that he and his crew are prisoners. Imagine that Marco." Thatch laughed.
Marco rolled his eyes. He had yet to see the kid that everyone was talking about. He'd been asleep when Oyaji had went out to meet him. Night watch was good for him missing all the important stuff. If only Haruta hadn't gotten sick... Oh well, nothing he could do now.
He helped Thatch back onto his feet, and was about to walk away when suddenly a black blur rushed past him, and over the side of the deck. He looked over the edge of the deck to see what it was. There was a splash, and Thatch was in the water swimming after what looked like a black haired person. Marco tossed a rope down when Thatch resurfaced carrying a body over his shoulder.
The kid coughed and sputtered when he hit the deck, then he seemed to panic for a second, until he reached into his pocket and calmed down. Marco watched him look around, before his eyes found Marco. The boy's black eyes were hard with anger. Marco couldn't remember the last time he'd seen anger so intense. He settled his bored gaze on the kid's angry one, and didn't look away.
The kid stood up, and fished in his pocket, the same one that had calmed him down. "Don't fucking lose this." he said before turning away muttering viciously about killing 'the old bastard'. Thatch ran off after the kid, but Marco looked down into his hand. The kid had handed him a small dendenmushi, not yet fully grown. He frowned, wondering what was so important about the small snail. It looked like fire, all red and orange and yellow, but it had a black shell. On the corner of the shell he could see two small scull and cross-bones. One had a strawhat, and the other had a heart. He puzzled over it, as the kid came flying back, once again going over board. Marco watched as Thatch dove after the kid again.
This happened about three more times before the kid, after coughing up a bunch of seawater, turned to Marco. Marco noted that the glare hadn't lost any strength due to the beatings he'd received. If anything the glare had intensified as he approached Marco.
Without a word, Marco handed the small snail back to the kid, and Ace's glare lost some of it's intensity. The kid's hand came up to his chin, palm up, before pushing out towards Marco, and then the kid ran off. Marco was stunned. The kid had just thanked him in sign language, he wondered if it was because the kid hadn't wanted to speak to him, regarding him as an enemy, or if the kid thought he was deaf. Either way, he fixed his bored look onto his face, and turned to Thatch, it was time to get some info on the kid.
Ace ran back to the cabin he'd woken up in, and looked over his snail. It was peacefully sleeping, he smiled. Maybe the blonde was one of the not-so-bad enemies on the ship. He debated calling Law, but he didn't want to worry her. She'd tell him that this was stupid of him, and that he didn't have anything to prove, but damn it, he did! He huffed, and set the snail on a small trunk beside the bed he'd woken up in. He stripped off his wet clothes, and hung them from some pegs he found attached to the wall. He quickly dove under the blanket to warm up. He felt exhausted, and fell asleep.