The Sun and Sea - Chapter 9
'Unafraid'
Main character(s): Ace.
Set: Marineford.
Disclaimer: Don't own it.
It's funny how, whenever the thing you fear most happens, you don't feel afraid. In fact, you're often quite brave. When a person is stripped of everything they believe in, when they don't have anything to lose, they can fight like animals to their last breath and still be unafraid.
There were many reasons why Portgas D. Ace feared death like any common man. He was afraid of losing his identity; being lost in the pages of time and completely forgotten. He was afraid of leaving Luffy behind to fend for himself. He was afraid of leaving his crew, afraid of the devastation his death was bound to cause and how reckless his crew mates would become to avenge him.
And he was afraid of what lingered beyond the gates of death.
But when he threw himself in front of his brother, Fire-Fist Ace was proud to say that he was completely unafraid. Unafraid, because of how natural it felt to be standing in front of his brother once again, protecting him from harm, keeping the thing that was most important to him in the whole world alive.
Unafraid, because the things that we love the most are often, in a way, the things we fear most as well. Or maybe that was just the blood loss getting to him. Maybe he was actually terrified, but he didn't know it.
Content to fall asleep without knowing the answer, Portgas D. Ace, the brother of Mugiwara Luffy, closed his eyes.
Portgas D. Ace died that day, and it was always known that he died completely unafraid of what was to come.
Such was in Fire-Fists's nature.
Such was the Will of D.
