An update, lovelies! And it hasn't even been that long since the last :D I'm making good time, I'd say. So I'll TRY to get in another update before I go back to school Monday (if I have to I have a chapter of Divide finished) because I obviously won't have as much time as I did during the break. I won't go on an actual hiatus until midterm, though.
ALSO! Got a MarcoAce fic started called Born in Fire (though I'm trying to think of a new title - feel free to make suggestions) if anyone's interested :D
Enough of this boring stuff! Enjoy!
The cell was cold. Damp rock chilled his burning flesh as he lied on the floor, a mesh of dark blurs his only vision. He panted loudly, unevenly as his body temperature continued to rise, his blue flames white-hot as they burst to life unwillingly on his arms and legs. The marines were standing on the other side of the bars, moving white blobs as they stared at him.
"That's supposed to be their phoenix?" one scoffed. "I don't believe it."
"I don't care who it is, long as it's one of theirs."
The voices faded, drowned out by the pounding in his head. Suddenly the world didn't seem to matter. He couldn't think—didn't worry about his capture, wasn't scared about what they would do to him. It didn't matter. It couldn't matter.
He felt like he was dying.
Ace peered out into the morning light, yawning as he tossed and turned in bed. He cocked his head to the right, staring blearily out the window as he tried to register what time it was. Midday—he overslept. Shit.
Groaning, he shifted over and sprung up, stretching his arms toward the ceiling. "Hey, Marco," he started as he stared blankly at the wall, "think Thatch'll be mad we didn't meet him?"
No answer.
"Marco?" He looked to the space on the mattress next to him, eyes widening as he was met with empty sheets. Jaw going slack he touched the bed, feeling no lingering heat.
The pirate jumped off the bed and spun around, checking every inch of the room frantically as he called for the boy again. "O-oi, Marco, where are you?"
Cruel quiet was all that greeted him.
The blond sighed, falling from the pain he was so accustomed to. The heat left his limbs, fire extinguishing instantaneously as he sat up and sighed, rolling his shoulders. Each episode seemed to be getting shorter and shorter, but he couldn't be sure. Time never seemed to pass down there. In the cold, wet prison he was kept there was no night or day—no sense of beginning or end. He grabbed the rock at his feet, dragging his tired body to the wall. A familiar screech met his ears as he began the arduous task of carving a line into the stone alongside twelve others, marking the only thing that proved time was still moving—his episodes.
Drip. Drip.
He'd listened to that sound ever since being put in there, almost like a clock. Tic. Tock. Tic. Tock. How many seconds had it been? How many hours—days, weeks? What did he know? He was just a damn phoenix.
Phoenix.
Ace called him that once. Was that what he was? He knew he wasn't like everyone else—knew he was different. The crew would stare at him sometimes, eyes unblinking as they watched him do something abnormal, something that set him apart from everyone else. Did that mean he wasn't human?
What was a phoenix? What did it mean?
A loud growl escaped him and he pressed his palm to his stomach. How long had it been since he last ate? It hurt, the pangs telling him to eat. He missed Thatch—missed his cooking. That man was amazing. It was like he could take any ingredients, any in the world and make them into some of the best meals he would ever taste. Back on the Moby Dick, Marco never went hungry. They made sure he was fed. It was fun, eating together with everyone—with the people who liked him regardless of whatever he was.
He was starting to understand why Oyaji never allowed them to waste food. He understood the repercussions of his actions. Wasting food was bad. When they came for him, he would be sure to apologise for stealing the eggs.
Because they would come for him—would never abandon him.
They were his family.
The mark was carved and he allowed his hand to drop to his side, spinning around to sit with his back to the wall. He closed his eyes, taking in the welcomed chill that cooled his still-heated skin. It felt nice, his only comfort in a world of rock and metal.
Ace would probably be mad at him. It was his fault he was caught, after all—for not being able to protect himself. He felt useless, being taken by the marines so easily. Sometimes, when the quiet started to get to him, he would wonder if he really wanted the crew to come to his rescue. It was his fault. He shouldn't have gone outside. He should have stayed in the room with Ace where it was safe. But he didn't. Why should they suffer for his stupid mistake? What if they got hurt?
He didn't want that. If it meant his brothers would stay safe, he didn't want them to come.
But staying there was so hard.
So what did being a phoenix mean? The marines called him that, too, if he recalled correctly. How was he different from a human? Come to think of it, they mentioned it when his flames appeared, right? And those appeared when…
Blue eyes glanced down at the rock in his hand, gazing over a sharp, protruding edge. He raised it curiously to his opposing finger. It lingered for a moment, hovering above the digit as he thought. The blond winced when he allowed it to puncture his skin, watching as flames came to life, healing the minor injury he'd inflicted upon himself. He couldn't get hurt—or rather, couldn't stay hurt. Was that what made him different? Ace could get hurt. He could die. Marco remembered when he was little, seeing bandages covering the older pirate's chest. It took a long time for those wounds to heal. In fact, the last day he saw Ace some were still closing up.
By now they would be gone, right?
Looking back, he had thought that Ace was the same as him. He had fire, too, after all. He thought the man was safe—that he was the same—because of those flames. But warmth accompanied his fire. Warmth and security. Marco didn't have that.
A loud clang broke his thoughts and he looked up from his unmarked finger to the dark hall, listening as footsteps bounced off the walls. He felt his heart quicken as the sound increased before a marine officer appeared from behind the wall, glowering down at him. He met the look evenly, watching as the man's eyes enlarged for but a moment before he stopped at the bars.
They remained still, unflinching in one another's gazes before the marine removed his hands from behind his back. Marco's expression lost its intensity when a small loaf of bread was dropped into his cell. He scrambled closer to it, picking it up to examine it further, before turning questioning eyes to the other.
The man looked away. "You haven't eaten, right?"
Cautiously he shook his head.
"Then eat," he commanded in a low, hesitant voice. "It wouldn't do us any good to see you die."
Marco's stomach constricted and he hurried to take a bite, lip quivering slightly at the taste met his tongue. He couldn't remember his last meal. He heard the man's boots hit against the ground at he left but couldn't bring himself to care, food being the only thing that mattered to him at the moment. Still, in the deepest reaches of his mind, that man had his thanks.
As he swallowed the last of the loaf he felt a familiar heat rise beneath his skin and huddled against the back wall, bracing himself for the pain that was soon to follow.
They would come for him soon, right?
Ace slammed his fist against the counter in the kitchen of the Moby Dick, glaring as his friend ignored his outburst and continued to chop vegetables. He groaned in distaste, brows furrowed in anger. Still the redhead ignored him, going on with the preparations for lunch.
"It's been four days!" he shouted, causing the man to flinch. "What the hell are you doing in here?"
Still Thatch didn't look at him, that systematic chopping never once breaking rhythm. "Oyaji sent the first and third divisions to gather information. We can't do anything until we find out where they took him. Now sit down."
The fire user growled, disbelieving of what he was hearing. How could Thatch just stand there and cook? How could he stay still, waiting on the ship while their little brother was who-knows-where with the damn marines? Ace beat the information out of the hotel clerk where they stayed that first night—found out they'd called the marines to inform them of their arrival. Fire Fist wanted to go find them and tear their heads off then take back his little brother. But what had Oyaji said? He told him to wait. He'd waited long enough, damn it!
"How can you just accept that? What if he's hurt? What if they're going to ki—"
The word never left his mouth as Thatch slammed his knife against the cutting board, spinning around viciously to face the other commander, the stress of the past few days showing in the form of discoloured flesh around his eyes. His glare turned sharp as he made eye contact, never once glancing away. "What do you suppose we do, Ace?"
The brunet swallowed, taken aback by the ferocity in his tone. He didn't know what to say.
"There weren't supposed to be marines on this island. There never were," he explained, the volume of his voice still bouncing off the walls. "We didn't even know they were here and we couldn't find their base. Until we find out where it is we can't do anything for him."
Ace bit his lip, looking away. He knew that. He knew that but still it felt wrong to just sit there and wait. He wanted to do something. They'd found a marine the day before—took the liberty to 'persuade' him to tell them where they'd taken the little phoenix but the man stayed quiet even bloodied and bruised from the commander's fury.
"They shouldn't recognise who he is," Thatch continued much softer this time, "He should be safe, at least for a while. They won't hurt a kid; we're supposed to be the bad guys, remember?"
Reluctantly he nodded, hoping his friend was right. Still, Ace was a man of action; he couldn't just sit there. It felt wrong. There was one thing he knew he could do—one thing that would get him closer to seeing his brother again.
He just hoped Thatch wouldn't hate him for it.
His body started to cool, sweat beading down his neck. The more it happened, the more numb he became to the pain. He didn't care if it hurt anymore. Huddled in the corner of his cell with his arms hugging his legs, he didn't bother to carve another line—didn't see the point.
Lifting his head slightly, blue eyes stilled on his sleeve, no longer covering the entirety of his arm. He still remembered the day Izo first had him try it on, smiling when he realized he'd made it just a little longer than necessary. He was a growing boy, Izo claimed, so it was good that it was a little big on him. Now look at it.
Those days seemed so far off. How long had it been? Months?
Years?
Being in that cell gave him time to think. A phoenix, he decided, probably couldn't die. If it could, it wouldn't be easy to kill. He was given bread to eat so rarely that he thought of meals as gifts, not rights. He lost weight yet still he survived. Maybe that was why he couldn't tell how much time had passed; with no external cues and no threat of death, it was hard to keep track. All he had were his episodes—those long, enduring periods of heat and pain.
His stomach cried out again. It was becoming a common sound.
The blond looked to his hand, covered in dirt and grime. He wondered, would Ace recognise him like this? Would he remember? It'd been so long…
Closing his hand, he dropped his head into his lap, biting his lip.
Drip. Drip. Drip.
By then he knew: no one was coming.
Ace cringed as he was thrown to the ground, the slam of the cell door screeching to a close echoing throughout the room. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea. He took the marine they'd captured (the one he happily beat to a bloody pulp for so much as touching his little phoenix buddy) off the Moby Dick when everyone went to the mess hall for lunch, promising to go with him quietly as a prisoner if he promised to take him to the blond kid they'd snagged—because mentioning his name might set off alarm bells if the bastard marines hadn't figured it out yet.
He hadn't counted on the seastone cuffs. Damn you, hindsight!
Groaning as he lifted himself up, he felt the sickly drain of those cursed things as they zapped him of his energy. Well it was only a slight inconvenience in his master plan; he'd 'infiltrated' the enemy base and as soon as he could find a way out of that damn cell he could start looking for his kid brother. Question was: how would he go about doing that? Maybe he hadn't thought it through so well.
When he looked up at the back wall he felt his eyes widen, finding himself staring at carved lines on the surface of the stone. The little scratches completely covered the bottom half of the wall, almost resembling some sloppy sort of unfinished pattern. What…
"…Ace?"
The pirate's eyes doubled again, his attention snapped from the wall to the vaguely familiar voice to his left. He fought against the draining energy in his body and turned, jaw falling slack as he stared at the figure huddled in the corner. He didn't know what to say.
When awkward silence stretched between them, the boy restated his question. "You're Ace, right?" His voice was shaky, almost scared.
Ace held his tongue, eyes roving over the very different boy he'd been searching for. He was older—a lot older. This went well beyond the few centimeters he was growing regularly, encompassing years of growth, at least five. His clothes were small, his body thin and his eyes tired—almost dead looking.
Trying not to let his shock show, he swallowed. "Marco…"
A/N: So yay! A chapter! :D Hope you guys liked it. I know, I know, still missing the fluff. We'll get there! Eventually.
To my lovelies~
xXxWolvesInTheNightxXx: They're doing their best :D Though Marco's a little mixed up and thinks he hasn't seen them in years...
scatteredPhilosopher: Well he's beaten one bloody so far XD More marine bashing next chapter, I promise ;) Lol his headache when he saw his older self has NOTHING to do with remembering, if that's what you're thinking. Yes, puberty will be fun XD I have so many things planned, so many things... (I caught up and actually I didn't freak out over it ._.)
shadowmarialove: I was so surprised I got 89% on my final biopsych exam o_o I actually did good! And I'm a horrible student! Made me feel like I was less incompetent :D Lol yeah, the poor marine's are going to be in a lot of pain...
G: Here's an update!
pilvenpiirtaja: Hehe sorry ^^; There was a pretty big delay before the last chapter was updated, huh? Guess that's what I get for starting so many stupid fics... -_-;; Awe, no more reviews? XD Well I appreciate you bothered with at least this one.
Magic Morgana: He's alive! Worse for wear and kinda messed up, but alive none-the-less!
94Insane: Yeah, he freaked out alright - and that poor marine got the brunt of it. He shouldn't have, but he didn't know any better ^^; Wow, 7? Most people can't handle reading that many of my nonsensical stories XD
Ujvari: And now you know! Here's an update!
Yvonne Park: Hehe nah, I just like to leave you guys off right when something interesting happens :P I will most certainly keep going~
buslimpan: Ace talking to a pineapple was something that just came to me and I was like "YES" XD Marco's having very bad luck :/ But at least Ace found him! You guessed correctly! 4 inches in 1 week was nothing-now he's grown 5 or 6 years worth in 4 1/2 days :P
Vergina-spva: Well here it is! :D It was a faster update than usual, at least!
hensonmakenzie: Here's an update!
(There you go, lovelies. There's your update! Now if you'll excuse me I'm going to go back to writing the very fun oneshot I've been working on about Marco working in a prison XD Adieu~)