Thank you so much for the good reception this story has had ^^ I'm happy to see you're interested, as I'm having a lot of fun working on this :)

And here is chapter 2.

Chapter 2

Ace groaned, raising an arm in a futile attempt to block the light assaulting his eyes as he turned around just to get his face full of sand.

That woke him up instantly.

He sat up, opening his eyes and closing them again at the glare of the sun, covering them again with an arm.

Ace groaned again.

Using his free hand to feel the ground he was sitting on, and by the salty smell assaulting him, it was easy to guess he was at a beach.

He guessed that was to be expected after falling into the sea, provided the two most likely options of drowning or being rescued and hauled back to the ship didn't happen.

"You awake?"

Ace jumped at the unknown voice and turned around, managing to open his eyes as soon as the sun rays weren't falling directly on his face.

There, standing mere feet away with a serious expression and a roll of thick wire held in one hand, was none other than Marco the Phoenix.

Ace's mouth fell open.

Marco smirked slightly.

Ace closed his mouth and glared.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" He ground out.

The pirate didn't have the decency to stop smirking as he answered.

"Same as you: almost drowning."

Ace couldn't tell if it was the shock finally fading, some remaining emotion from the previous battle or simply that damned smirk and the pirate's completely calm attitude, but, whatever the reason, he jumped up and went straight for the man, fist raised with clear intentions. Marco dropped the wire, stopped his punch and delivered a kick to Ace's stomach that sent him backwards.

Growling, Ace covered his arms in fire and went for another attack, but before he could react he found himself on his back, part of his body submerged in inches of water that reached to his ears on the head, and two hands holding his arms, a kairoseki cuff pressed against his skin. The unpleasant emptiness that came with the sea and the metal filled him, and the fire wouldn't come no matter how much he called for it.

"Don't be stupid." Marco said, and Ace glared up at him. "I may not be able to use my power, but I can still beat you."

"Wanna bet on that?" Ace challenged him.

Now it was Marco who glared.

"Do you really want to get in a fight? Take a look around."

The man moved away from on top of him, a hand still holding Ace's arm and pressing the kairoseki against it.

Ace tried to pull away from it, but when that didn't work he reluctantly did as the pirate told him.

As he had guessed, they were at a beach. A small, beautiful beach with almost white sand, some rocks covering it until they disappeared in a nearby line of trees of what seemed to be the beginning of a forest.

Covering the sand were scattered objects, most of them broken pieces of wood or scraps of metal, but sometimes there were other things, like the roll of wire Marco had been carrying, a wooden crate or a cannonball. Most of these objects were piled next to the biggest rock and, a little further in the sand, three other men lay: two marines and a pirate.

"Are they unconscious too?"

"No."

Ace fell silent, the curse words that came to his mind too shallow to utter.

It was stupid, he was used to men dying in battle all the time, he had no doubt that dozens of them, if not more, had died at the battle between their two ships, and still, the sight of the three bodies laying there, looking so peaceful in such a place, no blood, weapons or burnt marks marking the ground as proof of a battle, was both sobering and disheartening at the same time.

If anything had been even the slightest bit different, he could be one of them right now.

After what seemed hours but couldn't have been more than a few minutes, Ace finally spoke.

"It's ironic that the two devil fruit users are the ones to survive."

"Yeah." Marco said, his hold on Ace loosening slightly.

All of a sudden the marine didn't want to fight.

"Shouldn't we… bury them?" Ace asked, turning his head to look at Marco, who nodded.

"I found a nearby clearing on the forest."

"Good."

Marco let go of him, probably sensing Ace wasn't going to attack him, and both men stood up, a silent truce between them as they headed toward the three dead men that should have had more chances of survival, none of them being dead weight in the ocean as they were.

Marco rubbed his forehead with his sleeve as he stood up once the last grave had been refilled with the soil they had removed earlier and marked with several stones.

The labor itself shouldn't have been that hard, but the waves hadn't brought to land anything remotely similar to a shovel, and that meant they had been forced to dig with wood pieces and occasionally with their hands, but finally it was done and the three dead men were as properly buried as the situation allowed it. Which was a provisional arrangement, at least for poor William, who the crew would bury properly once they were all here. The least he deserved was a coffin.

Marco could feel his companion's restlessness even before the young man spoke.

"Well, that's it, I'm leaving." The marine said gruffly, throwing the wood piece he'd been using to the ground.

"Don't bother, this island is uninhabited." Marco said, guessing what the other intended to do.

The dark-haired man blinked.

"What?"

"I've been here before, no humans have lived on this island for years."

It had taken some time, but Marco finally had guessed in which island they had ended. It was a small place, barely more than a rock, almost completely covered by a forest. A beautiful but not friendly forest inhabited by not so friendly animals. The good thing was that there was more than enough food and drinking water.

"Yeah, and I'm just gonna believe you." The man almost spat, crossing his arms moodily over his chest.

If he hadn't been convinced before, the current display would be enough to prove to Marco that this marine was one of the most stubborn people he had ever met.

"You can check it yourself, this island is small enough to walk from one end to the other in less than half a day. I'll be right here when you see I'm right."

That comment earned him a glare.

"As if I need your help. I know how to survive in a forest just fine." And, without another word, the boy turned around and left.

Marco chuckled at the kid's retreating form. He was an interesting piece for a marine, and with the strength he had displayed at the beach the pirate didn't doubt the young man would survive perfectly at an average forest.

But Marco was sure he couldn't survive in this particular forest, not as he was right now at least.

Deciding the brat needed a blow to the face from reality to get his pride down a notch or two, Marco turned to go to the beach in search of some things he didn't want to abandon for the island's inhabitants to trample on.

Ace sucked the last crumbs of meat off the bone he held in one hand. Had he been Luffy, he would have eaten the bone along with everything else, but he threw it on the ground as he had done with all the others.

He had barely stopped to catch a meal and had cooked it with his power as he ate. If the pirate had been right, which Ace was very reluctant to consider, then he still had a couple of hours to walk before he reached the coast again.

Ace was inclined to believe, as much as it pained him to admit, the other man's words about the island's lack of inhabitants, but unfortunately he still wasn't used to his haki enough to tell for sure in such a big place, he could barely tell apart the presences in half of it, but he would be damned before admitting that to a pirate, much more to take said pirate's word for true without checking.

And he didn't need the man's help.

Eyes opening like saucers, Ace threw himself to the side just in time to avoid a huge and fast paw that collided with the place where he had just been with enough strength to create a crater.

What the-?

This time Ace had to duck from a hind leg belonging to a ridiculously huge bear with way too big teeth.

Annoyed, Ace turned his arms into fire and threw two columns of it at the bear, but right before they impacted the beast vanished from its place and Ace would have been crushed if he wasn't a logia user that wasn't caught completely unaware.

Ace tried to surround the bear this time, but again it evaded him, and this time it tired to bite his arm off, jumping back the moment Ace turned it to fire, and the man frowned when he noticed the bear hadn't burned itself.

Then the bear's eyes opened wide and it fell in a boneless heap to the ground.

Ace stared at the blond pirate standing behind the bear, a hand up and an almost lazy expression on his face.

Ace glared.

"What are you doing here?"

"Saving your ass, apparently." The pirate answered nonchalantly, and Ace's glare intensified.

"I didn't need saving."

"Really? And here I'd got the impression if you weren't a logia you'd be dead already."

"But I am a logia."

"And what will you do? Stay awake all the time to make sure nothing gets you or risk it when you fall asleep that nothing stronger than you will attack?" The man asked in a clearly mocking tone, and Ace grit his teeth.

He wasn't an idiot, he knew that bear had been stronger than him, and what the pirate was saying was without having in account his little issue with sleep.

"I guess you have a better idea?" Ace asked, fists clenched at his unspoken admission of defeat.

The blond man smiled, and though Ace felt surprised that it wasn't a mocking smirk he didn't show it.

Raising his right hand, the pirate asked:

"How are you at picking locks? It isn't really my thing."

"As if I would get that thing off you!" Ace snarled. "You'd fly off and leave me here the moment it'd be off!"

The other man just shrugged, and Ace had the impression he had been expecting that reaction.

"Then what about this? We stick together, as I told you I've been here before, and in exchange you act as my personal heater." Ace flushed indignantly but was cut off before he could yell anything. "Not like that." The man gave his body a very obvious once over. "Though I wouldn't complain." Ace's retort was cut again. "I meant with your powers."

Ace blinked.

"Oh. But it's warm here."

A raised eyebrow.

"You're a walking heater. But you're right, the day is warm enough, but this is a spring island and, if I'm not mistaken, in its spring season. Nights are bound to be cold, and without my powers I'm exposed to it just like anybody else."

Ace had to concede that the explanation made sense.

"So now what? We go to the beach and try to stop a ship?"

That comment earned him what probably was the man's equivalent of an 'are you stupid?' expression.

"This is the New World, brat. You really think that's smart?"

Ace thought of it. Most pirate ships, at the sight of a marine and a famous Whitebeard pirate with kairoseki handcuffs would try to kill them. Marines too, probably branding Ace a traitor for not killing the criminal. As if he hadn't tried. Ace didn't doubt they could beat a good part of those people, that if the pirate didn't turn against him, but any ship sailing this ocean, if it survived the battle, couldn't be handled by just two men.

"Then what?" He asked reluctantly, crossing his arms.

"I'm going to wait for my crew."

Ace blinked, now utterly confused.

"Your crew?"

"They should be looking for the missing men by now."

Ace would have commented on the absurdity of that statement, not even the marines looked for the men lost to the sea, but he knew of the Whitebeard Pirates' uncommon view of their crew, but he hadn't expected it to be like this. Marco had sounded so sure of his statement that Ace didn't want to contradict him.

Instead, he said:

"I guess I'll have to build a raft then." A raised eyebrow was his only response, and Ace felt compelled to clarify: "And don't think I trust you just because I'm agreeing to this."

The pirate smiled.

"I didn't doubt it."

To say Edward Newgate was worried would be an understatement. He had ordered his ships to turn around the moment the call had arrived. It had come as soon as the other ship managed to escape the storm, and they were still counting their losses, but some things were already clear: they had eleven confirmed deaths, and several men were missing, Marco being amongst them.

Whitebeard wasn't the only one worried, the whole crew was, and they were already calling their allies to tell them to keep an eye out for any member of the crew as their ships headed to the approximate area where the battle took place.

Several feet in front of him, Thatch paced in circles.

"Calm down, son."

"I can't calm down!" Thatch practically spat, a proof of how anxious he was, and continued pacing. "What the fuck was that idiot thinking?! First he gets shackled and then thrown into the ocean?! He's an anchor!"

Whitebeard agreed wholeheartedly with his son's words, but he had known Marco long enough to know the man wouldn't die that easily.

He had to remind himself of that almost every minute.

To be continued

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