Ghost of the Past

Chapter 9: Return

The next thing that happened was that he fell into darkness while a strange numbness spread through his entire body. He could not move. He could not see. It was completely confusing. He knew something bad had just happened, but he did not seem to be able to remember what it had been.

Then suddenly, his body came to a halt. There was a strange humming noise and he realized too quickly that what he was hearing was his own blood rushing through his body and that was also when he became aware of his heartbeat as well. It was painfully loud and way too fast.

He tried to remember what had happened. But his thoughts were completely distorted. It felt like walking through a thick fog that would not even allow him to see his own hands if he held them in front of his eyes.

Then suddenly the fog seemed to clear up. He opened his eyes. They were heavy and it took him a while to lift his eyelids. But once he managed to do it, he could make out a person standing in front of himself.

It was Marco. He was wearing a weak and utterly sad smile, continuously whispering something he was unable to understand acoustically.

Ace tried to reach out his hand to touch the other man, but his body failed to listen to his command. In just that moment however, Marco seemed to finally notice him. His look was almost piercing through him and he then said a little louder. "I'm so sorry Ace. I can't. I just can't." His voice was shaking, his whole body trembling as he lifted his arm. With horror Ace noticed the gun the blond was holding in his hand. "I'm so sorry. But there's someone else I love." As he pulled the trigger his eyes widened as if he was going crazy. "You have to go, yoi." Marco's voice was no longer weak or shaking, instead it was simply cold and hard.

The bullet flew too slowly and as it pushed inside Ace's body he could feel his skin tear apart and his insides burn from a hotness he had never felt before.

Then only a moment later he awoke from his nightmare with a gasping sound. His whole body was in so much pain, he felt like he was actually dying. His vision was hazy, his eyes only opened a gap wide, but he could make out a person that was leaning over his body, pressing down on him. "Please don't die on me Ace." A strained, but familiar voice was saying. "We are nearly back, you can do it."

He wanted to smile, but of course he failed. The pain was too much, but he knew that there was a hole ripped into his body after all. He wondered if he would actually die now. Maybe Marco would cry for him, or maybe he would be glad because that would mean one of his problems had resolved itself after all.

His vision blurred again, his eyes dropped shut a second after. It was too exhausting to keep them open. He really just wanted to sleep now. Just a little nap would not be a problem after all... He could feel darkness getting a hold of him once more as his mind slowly slipped away, back into the pitch black nothingness of his nightmares.

...

A few minutes earlier Thatch had had his own worst nightmare come true. His partner in a seemingly easy mission had been heavily wounded.

He had lunged forward towards the attacker, but as he had knocked the marine soldier out he had already heard the inauspicious sound of a body falling down behind him. Ace had been shot. And it was Thatch's fault. He had been responsible for their mission. What was he going to do? He had to get the raven haired man out of here quickly, hope that he would not...

He did not dare to follow that thought completely to the end. If anything he absolutely refused to believe that Ace would not make it through this, no matter what.

So he quickly peered around the corner of the door before himself, seeing a few other marine soldiers run towards him that were yelling at him that he should not move. At least he could not make out any higher ranked marines, so he could probably get away without any further conflict. Getting into a fight now was too risky and would take too much time, so he decided to ignore the marines if somehow possible.

He quickly turned around and with swift movements he was at Ace's side. And as he had feared, the raven haired man had been hit by the bullet and the bullet had definitely been made out of sea stone. Crap. If only they had not talked so much he could have told him about the documents he had been able to find. There had been a lot of information concerning sea stone infused weapons on it and actual notes concerning the ability to create them more easily, too. It had not been too hard to guess that the marines were trying to spread them among their lower ranked soldiers as well. But why here and now? Why did he have to be cursed with such bad luck?

He lifted Ace's body carefully in his arms and went over to the window. At least Ace was still breathing, even if he did not look too well. He would need to be quick. Get back to the Moby Dick as fast as possible. He had to save his friend no matter what. He would not allow Ace to die on such a mission.

He jumped out of the window, bouncing off a few ledges as he did, before he reached the bottom of the island where their ship was at. There was no need to take this slowly anymore, they had already been discovered anyway and he would rather like to leave this island before the marines got down here to slow him down.

As he carefully lay Ace down onto the ship, bullets started flying down towards them. Luckily, the marines were still further away and unable to aim correctly this time thanks to the distance, so he actually managed to get away before any more damage was done.

...

He reached the Moby Dick panting from exhaustion. They had made it back quicker than he had ever thought was possible, especially remembering how long it had taken them to get to the marine base in the first place.

Once the ship had come to a standstill, he carefully lifted Ace's body up. There were already people assembled on the Moby Dick, looking down to him. Seemingly aware of the fact that something was clearly wrong.

"Get the nurses!" Thatch screamed, as he made his way up to the ship. People started to gather around him, there were gasping sounds of shock and some asked what had happened. He heard a few questions of whether Ace was dead and he could understand why. The body of the younger man he was still holding in his arms seemed lifeless, but he had no doubt that Ace was still alive and would make it through this. "Make way!" He barked angrily and people quickly stepped away from him to allow him to get through. The nurses had already made it to where he was and they had brought a stretcher, too. So once he reached them he carefully placed Ace's body onto it. "He was shot. The bullet's made out of sea stone." He said quickly, still gasping for air. "Hit his head as well." He added, knowing that there was little else he could do for Ace. But at least he knew that his friend was in capable hands now.

"We'll do what we can." One of the nurses assured him and then turned around to follow the others that were quickly bringing Ace to the infirmary.

Thatch did not know what else to do now that the responsibility was no longer in his hands, so he thought of following them, hoping that just by being close to his friend that would somehow make a difference, but he suddenly felt a big hand firmly grip his shoulder.

"Son." He heard Whitebeard's voice behind him. It was calm, but strong and questioning. He did not turn around. The word had painfully pierced him as if it was an accusation and it made him sorely aware of the fact that Ace's injury was his fault alone.

"Stay here, there's nothing else you can do, son."

He swallowed hard and slowly and then finally turned around to the man he called his father. He did not dare look him in the eye, however. "I'm sorry." He said, glance still directed at his own feet. "It's my fault he got hurt. I know I was in charge, I should have protected him..." The words nearly refused to come out, he felt his voice cracking. He was ashamed. And scared. If only he had not let it happen. What if Ace would not make it? What if he died? The thought was so prominent on his mind, by now he was almost completely sure his friend would not make it. And it would be his fault alone.

"Come." Whitebeard said, not reacting to his son's words at all. His hand had moved to Thatch's back and he carefully pushed him into the direction of the side of the ship, waving his hand as a gesture to tell the other crew members to leave them alone for a moment. After a little hesitation they did as they were told although they all wanted to know what was going on. But it was clear to most of them that Thatch definitely needed a moment to himself.

"Sit." Whitebeard said shortly. Thatch reluctantly took a seat as he was told and his father sat down right next to him.

"You weren't the one who hurt him, right?" The old man suddenly asked and it made Thatch lift his head and widen his eyes in surprise. "N-no." He stammered.

"Then it's not your fault either." Whitebeard said with a mild smile on his lips. "Tell me what happened."

Thatch suddenly felt more at ease then. His father did not blame him. Even after something like this he did not doubt his son. He gave him the chance to explain. He understood. It did not take the guilt or fear he was feeling away, but it helped him to calm down a little.

So after he had taken a deep breath he told Whitebeard everything that had happened and that he knew and he did not dare to leave anything out. Even though he knew that what was going on between Marco and Ace was their own matter, he even told his father about that. And he also told him how he had failed to restrain Ace and how he had failed to tell him about the imminent danger before it had been too late.

Whitebeard did not interrupt his son while he was talking and when Thatch was done, Whitebeard thoughtfully stroke his chin with one of his hands. "I knew something like that was up. That's why I paired them up for the mission in the first place."

Thatch looked up to him. Had he hear correctly? Whitebeard had already guessed all of that and he had been trying to support them?

The old man considered saying some more for a moment, but then decided to leave it at that. Instead he patted the back of his son in a comforting gesture and before he got up to leave him he said: "Ace is strong. He will get through this."

And Thatch only mumbled his reply. "I hope he will." He still felt completely at fault for what had happened. And it seemed like there was nothing anyone could say to convince him otherwise.

By now the news had spread among the crew as well. The atmosphere on the ship had quickly turned into a gloomy one. Most people were just sitting around, not daring to say anything and simply hoping for news regarding Ace's condition.

Thatch was still sitting at the place where Whitebeard had left him, arms propped up on his legs, absentmindedly chewing on the tip of his thumb as a thought suddenly came to him. Marco. Where was Marco? Did he already know? He quickly looked around the deck of the ship but did not see him anywhere. What if Marco was in his room and had not heard of what had happened yet? Someone had to tell him.

Thatch got up slowly. He had a bad feeling in his gut, but he knew this had to be done. Someone had to tell Marco. And if he told him what had happened himself and the blond would blame him for it that would be fine. He was really at fault after all and he was completely aware of that so there was no way he would run from this responsibility.

But even after looking for Marco nearly everywhere, he was unable to find the first division commander on board of the Moby Dick.


I feel kinda bad for writing that last time now. But many of you were very nice and I really appreciate all of your efforts to review this story! Thank you so much!

Well this chapter is kind of boring. Nothing much happens. :( The next one should hopefully be better.


aqua-empress: I'm sorry, I guess I was being a little selfish there. :( But thank you anyways!

Guest: Thank you. I was actually a little worried about the characters being IC or not. I'm glad someone thinks they are :). The writing style might be because English is not my native language either, but I'm glad if it's a good thing :)

RoosaCoretta: Thank you :). Yea, I know that feeling all too well myself. Never a good thing. Poor Ace :(

A touch of: Thank you, I'm really glad you like it so far :).

sairakanzaki: Thank you! Here's an update now :D

davidsm5: Thank you, I really appreciate it. I'm actually very happy someone even wrote a review although they usually don't do it. So thank you again :)!

bloodytears87: Yeah, I'm sorry, I'm updating it now :)

idkidctbh: Oh no, please don't apologize for your English. I'm German as well, so that would be kinda weird, right? :) And your comment means a lot to me, hearing someone actually created an account just to review this story makes me really happy.

Concealed Shadow: I like your way of thinking! But I already have stories were I make Marco suffer in that precise way. I might just try to be a little bit nicer to him this time. Just a little though.