kyoudai

He remembers. (Chapter 751)


Author's Note: I ship Koala/Sabo something fierce. It's very definitely implied here. (kyoudai means brothers)


He remembers the day the newspaper came.

He remembers the picture of Ace's Wanted poster, and the one below it – Luffy staring into the sky, eyes white and streaming tears, mouth slack in a silent scream, and their smiling brother lying on his lap, bleeding, broken, dead.

He remembers screaming and screaming and screaming, Koala's arms like vices around his chest as she dragged him away from Dragon, dragged him back to their room so he could rage and break things and finally shatter into her arms, sobbing for his brothers.

He remembers days of self-hate enough to crush a hundred men, of bitter guilt that leaves a wake of shattered mirrors in his wake – WHY WASN'T I THERE?! - and of standing on a cliff and wondering if even the sea could clean a soul stained black with grief.

He remembers Koala telling him that what he lives for, what he's always lived for, and what he will continue to live for, and he steps away from the edge, because if anyone would know his grief, it would be her, with eyes that are as full of guilt as his, guilt for the man who gave her the sun and died in return.

He remembers Luffy's pictures in the next newspaper, bandaged, bruised, but not broken, eyes closed with flowers in his arms, the next of him ringing in the new era, ringing a bell no pirate has ever dared to touch.

He remembers the day Nico Robin comes to Baltigo, bearing stories of a Luffy who smashed shut a Crocodile's jaws to protect a friend's kingdom, a Luffy who declared war on the World Government to save the "Demon Child", a Luffy who took on Impel Down for his brother, a Luffy who made a group of outcasts one of the most feared and insanely loyal crews in all the world.

He remembers pride.

He remembers seeing Luffy again, in the New World. He remembers the tears in his little brother's eyes. He remembers the warmth that his entire body had become as the Mera-Mera no Mi settles in his stomach and the way the ring explodes beneath his fiery fist. He remembers sitting at Ace's grave with tears streaming down his cheeks.

He faces down an Admiral with blind eyes who see far more than most people ever could and he smiles like the rising of the sun as he remembers two boys who gave him the world and three cups of sake to forge a bond even stronger than blood.

"After this, we will be brothers."