Title: Uncertainty and Cigarette Smoke
Pairing: SmoAce
Rating: PG
Words: 1'444
Universe: OP-ish, not following current storyline
"Being indecisive is so much harder than being determined."
The boy had said the words so suddenly as if they had been talking and discussing for hours, when in reality they hadn't exchanged any words for quite a while now.
Smoker looked up from his paperwork which had spread itself in an unchristian way over his massive wooden desk, light grey eyes fixed on the other man in the room.
He had grown used to the boy suddenly continuing long gone conversations, picking up long forgotten or stored memories and simply restarting them again. As if time wasn't an issue.
Then again, Ace's mind didn't follow normal paths, or rules.
And like always, Smoker didn't have any problems following the other man.
He cocked an eyebrow critically, scrutinizing the boy warily. Waiting for an explanation.
Ace rolled over on Smoker's bed he had been contently lying on, and sat up, his legs swinging over the edge, feet dangling only a few centimetres over the floor. His hands he had folded under his knees, a posture that made him look strangely young, like a little boy, waiting impatiently. An absent-minded smile was hovering over his face, showing the older man how far away in thought the other really was. The grey-haired man sighed silently.
"Being indecisive means being unsure." The black-haired boy's voice broke through the silence that made Smoker unconsciously hold his breath. It was a silence that, ever since Ace had forced his way into Smoker's life, had become almost unbearable for the older man. It wasn't the nice type of silence, the type where the younger man would thoughtfully sit next to him, and there simply was no need to share any words. It was peaceful. This type of silence however told Smoker something was wrong. Some of the thoughts on Ace's mind where too much for the boy and bothered him.
Smoker still wondered when that had started to bother him.
"Black or white? Good or bad? Rum or lemonade?" Smoker had to suppress a snort when he heard Aces last words, to not stop the brat talking. What a random and utterly unfitting comparison.
"Being determined is easy." Ace looked on the floor, his words didn't even seem to be aimed at Smoker, didn't seem to be aimed at anyone, as if he was the only person in the room.
"Human. Monster. Marine. Pirate. Loved. Hated. Untruthful..." for a second their eyes met, and Smoker almost thought he'd read something like uncertainty in the brown eyes "...Just."
Smoker's paperwork was long forgotten. With a soft click the pen that he was holding in his hand until now landed on the desk.
"Being just isn't always easy." The grey-haired man's voice was always so much more menacing, intimidating than the younger one's. Then again, Ace had dared to advance into dangerous ground. Justice. Smoker's territory.
But the brat just smiled, seemed surprised even, that he had gotten an answer at all.
As Ace shook his head slightly, Smoker knew there had been more to his words.
"To act just might be hard sometimes", the younger man agreed, and his gaze wandered through the room "...but knowing whether or not something is just. That's easy."
Surprised, Smoker paused, the ease with which the boy distinguished between these complex things made him frown.
A small giggle, a mere chuckle only let him return his gaze to the other.
"Would be quite a bother if it were not so, ne?", Ace said, the playful flicker in his eyes not quite as annoying as usual but still there, still enough to educe a faint growl from the other "...if the Marine couldn't even tell right from wrong, law from crime... where would the fun be for us pirates?"
Smoker already launched into a snappy comment, he hated it when Ace brought up that huge, dividing gap that was between them... that should be between them, without any hesitation and with a subtle shrug, even emphasizing it.
But Ace, presumably sensing Smoker's tension, quickly proceeded:
"But somehow not everything is as easy as that, ne?" His voice suddenly became so heavy and his gaze seemed so distant. "Somehow not everything is always that easy to distinguish."
"Somehow..." Ace's voice trailed off, as he seemed to be struggling for words to describe his thoughts "...somehow... not everything is always just black or just white. Sometimes it's white, but there's also a little bit of black", he drew a circle in the air with his fingers, frowning thoughtfully "...white, with just some black blobs", and he added the blobs to his imaginary circle.
His eyes were fixed on his invisible oeuvre then he suddenly looked back at Smoker. "And sometimes it's all just grey."
Smoker looked at the boy and even though the majority of his mind was concerned about Ace's sanity and his mental well-being, a small part of him couldn't help but smile at the naive, child-like way the black-haired boy depicted his world. It was the moments like these that reminded the older man of the fact that Ace and his idiotic little brother actually were a family. Apart from their distinctive grins, there wasn't a lot more the two idiots had in common.
Ace's voice, now back to its serious and thoughtful tone, pulled him out of his thoughts:
"Where do you go when everything is lost? Who do you punish when no one's at fault? Do you listen to your mind or to your heart? Leave or stay? Talk or remain silent?"
And suddenly there was a pain in Ace's eyes that Smoker had never thought to be possible. Not in his eyes. It seemed insane, that such cheerful, prankful eyes could also hold such deep sorrow and chaos. Smoker stayed silent.
"Being indecisive is so much harder", Ace said again, and then he fell silent too.
It was after a very long time that Smoker finally got up and walked over to the bed, where Ace was still sitting quietly.
There was only a slight rustling of the bed sheets and the blankets as the older man sat down next to him. Only as close so that their knees would touch. But it was enough.
"For some things there is no answer." Smoker's voice was strong and firm, the type of voice you wouldn't dare to disagree with. He looked up at the ceiling that had been drenched in a red-golden light as the sun was starting to disappear behind the horizon.
"Some things just happen, and we do not ask whether they're black or white or good or bad." He felt that Ace had turned his head towards him, and watched him closely.
"It's those kinds of things you don't need to make decisions about. You don't need to wonder what you're going to do about it." He reached into his pockets and eventually held a cigarette and a lighter in his hands. With a gesticulation he had grown used to he lit it silently, leaning back. The clicking of the lighter. The slight crackle of the burning paper. Released smoke. Both men just listened to the small sounds Smoker's actions made. Habit, a soothing feeling.
At last, Smoker turned back to Ace, and continued:
"We are way too unimportant as that we could contribute something to everything that's going on in this world. After all we are just minor chess pieces on a vast chequerboard."
Smoker watched how a small smile crept back on the other man's face, and couldn't deny that he was relieved to see the pain in Ace's eyes slowly fade. "We simply gather around whatever is important to us and fight for it so it can stay there."
After a while he felt Ace shifting closer and then his head resting slightly against his shoulder.
A small smile also tugged and dragged on the corners of Smoker's mouth, but he didn't cave in. He put an arm around the other's slender form and pulled him closer. He wondered when all of this had started, when they had started to have these conversations. When they had started to look past the façade of an unswerving Marine captain and a sneaky Pirate. He wondered how he could've ever let that tedious brat get closer to him than it was healthy, how he could've ever let him play his little mind games.
Neither of them had forgotten on which side they were standing on, yet still... here they were, and Smoker knew very well that right in this moment he would never let the brat leave.
"And then, sometimes others make decisions for us. And it's good that way."