AN: this is my favourite chapter this is my favourite chapter THIS IS MY FAVOURITE CHAPTER

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They left town quickly after that, not wanting to hang around in case the man – Burgess, Ace had supplied – took an offense to Sabo and Marco's messy rescue, or anyone else found out about Ace's new bounty. It wasn't until they'd been travelling for a few days, however, that Marco realised Sabo was no longer being openly antagonistic. In fact, Sabo kept his usual barbs out of his mouth, and whenever Marco caught him alone he always seemed to be turning thoughts over in his head.

It made being so overly clingy with Ace lose some of its appeal, when Sabo wouldn't turn red and glare, and while Marco still couldn't help himself from letting his fingertips brush the back of Ace's hand, nor tucking Ace's hair out of the way whenever the chance arose, he became more subtle about it.

That, in turn, made Sabo start to stare at him more often. Marco couldn't say he appreciated the scrutiny at all.

If Sabo was going to accuse him of getting ready to sell Ace out now that Marco knew Ace had a bounty, he'd rather get it over with. At least then it was an excuse to bring up sharing his tent, one that wouldn't have Sabo yelling about Marco wanting to murder them in their sleep. It was starting to get colder, and neither of them were likely used to sleeping in the cold - Marco could easily market it to Sabo as being "easier to protect Ace" when Marco would have to step over at least one of them to run away.

But Sabo hadn't bought it up. Not even when they found a description of Ace, and his bounty in bold numbers beneath it, nor Sabo's own bounty poster, a similar figure below one of his old photographs.

They'd skipped the next city, cautious about Burgess and how the bounty poster might've travelled, but after that point they'd started running low on supplies. A small town became their next stop point, but Marco found that unlike before Ace was hesitant to explore without either of them by his side.

When he'd noticed the trend, Marco almost wanted to run straight back to the city, find Burgess and rip him to shreds. He would have, as well, had it not been for the fact that the wound on his side still twinged every time he so much as stretched, and the ones on his feet ached. No matter how quickly he could heal, walking on the injuries hadn't been his best idea, and wearing boots was probably an even worse plan.

He'd managed to keep it hidden from Ace, thankfully, but neither the cut on his side or the ones on his feet were healing as fast as he'd first thought they would, his body preoccupied with the other injuries Ace had gotten. Half of those were internal, and he hadn't mentioned any to Sabo, but-

Somehow, Marco had a feeling he still knew. Sabo had been helping Marco keep them a secret – though Marco wasn't sure if that was coincidental or on purpose – distracting Ace so that Marco could slip away and let his feet rest as he cleaned and bandaged anything that had bled through. He almost hated the fact that the cuts wouldn't scar – only Ace would carry around the memories, even if Marco had healed him.

He was working on cleaning out some of the travel dirt and stinging sweat when Sabo found him holed up in the bathroom off their room. Marco looked up at the sound of the door opening, whisking a towel from the rail next to him to hide his wounds just in case it was Ace, but only Sabo poked his head in, and Marco abandoned the towel over the edge of the bathtub.

"Where's Ace?" he asked, refusing to give Sabo more attention than was needed, grabbing the small hand towel he'd requested from the innkeeper and letting hot water wash away the worst of the dirt.

"Got him to take a trip down to the bar to grab dinner." Sabo said, watching Marco for a moment and then moving to sit on the rim of the bathtub. "His trip will suck shit if he's too afraid to explore without one of us by his side."

"Save him from getting kidnapped again," Marco muttered mutinously under his breath, and only just barely heard Sabo's tiny laugh.

"The only person allowed to do that is you, huh?"

Marco couldn't help but look up then, turning to stare at Sabo with no small amount of confusion building in his chest. "You'know with you I can't tell if that's a joke or not, yoi."

"Probably for the best," Sabo said, and there was a hint of a smile around his eyes that Marco only frowned at, staring at Sabo suspiciously.

"What have you done?" he said, eyes narrowed. For a moment, he could see Sabo's lips purse in automatic anger; then, the steadying breath that made his features go slack.

"That's fair," he mumbled, lips barely moving and his gaze on his knees, but when he looked up his face was completely serious. "Swear I haven't done anything, though. At least, nothing to put me on your shit list."

"You're being nice. Excuse me for being suspicious."

Sabo blinked rapidly at him, face flushing just momentarily. He could probably put Ace to shame in the easily flustered department, Marco mused as Sabo stammered, "I- A few weeks back, before we left Luffy- I promised Ace that I'd make an effort to try and get along with you."

Marco held back a laugh through sheer force of will. "If that's you trying to get along with me, I don't want to see how you act with people you're notgetting along with, yoi."

Sabo's face flushed even further, red crawling straight down his neck and making his scars turn blotchy. "That's my point," he said, tone almost snappish in embarrassment. "I promised him, and I didn't do anything that'd let me keep my promise. I just-"

"Thought I was going to gallivant into the sunset with him?"

"My thoughts were more centred on you madly cackling as you made your way into the darkness, but yes."

Marco could feel his lips twitch at the mental image, trying to imagine himself doing anything that involved mad cackling and finding only ridiculous thoughts of alcohol, his brothers, and possibly small children.

"So what's made you change your mind?" he asked, and couldn't deny the quiet curiosity that invaded his voice. Water dripped down his leg, but Marco hadn't been paying attention to the cloth since they'd started this conversation.

Sabo paused, lower lip between his teeth, and Marco saw him take a deep breath and swallow to ease a dry throat before saying quietly, "You were as worried as I was."

"When- when we were searching, I was angry. I still thought you'd done something. And I thought I could get Ace to see that, if I found him first, but- but when we actually found him- and what you did-"

"You healed him, even though it hurt you. And then you didn't tell him- you don't want him to know - because it will hurt him. That's- that's something I didn't think anyone outside me or Luffy would ever do."

Sabo's hands were twined tight in his lap; Marco could see them fidgeting from the corner of his eye, but he couldn't look away from Sabo's face. Silence filled the bathroom, broken only by the dripping tap, until Sabo heaved in a sigh and his tight fingers unlaced.

"I still don't like you very much," Sabo said, and Marco couldn't help the appalled sound in the back of his throat.

"What?" he said, and he squeezed the towel too tightly, water gushing down his leg and making him pull a face. "What the hell was the point of that whole speech then? I thought you were going to tell me we were over this, yoi!"

"You called me replaceable, " Sabo said, and though anger still tinged his tone, Marco could now find the long-buried hurt. "Also, you kidnapped my brother, and made him walk on bleeding feet. That doesn't really go away."

"I apologised for that," Marco said, teeth bared in a snarl and regret churning in his stomach at the memory. "I hadn't- Ace didn't tell me, so I hadn't realised. And I know that doesn't make it better, especially not to you, but I swear that I never meant to hurt him."

"Thrice?" Sabo asked, the glint of something hard in his eyes, and Marco nodded.

"Swear it thrice that I never meant to hurt Ace. He looked rich, and I needed the money. It's not like fae ever get honest work."

Sabo bit his tongue, eyes moving to the tiles on his left, and Marco heaved a sigh. With a low growl under his breath, he cleaned the water off his leg, and rinsed out the small towel, before trying to arch his leg so he could properly clean off the cuts on his feet.

They looked a bit like they'd been made by a whip and a knife, an alternating pattern that made Marco wince every time he saw them, and even though it'd healed quicker on him than it ever would have on Ace, the bottoms of his feet were still tender and hard to walk on. He couldn't imagine the pain Ace had gone through when this had happened.

"He got beat up real bad, didn't he?" Sabo asked quietly, and Marco gave a careful nod. Sabo's touch against Marco's bare foot made him tense, however, unsure on whether Sabo would flick one of the worse-looking cuts as revenge against doing it to Ace.

Maybe the Sabo before Burgess would have done it. This Sabo only retreated immediately, an apologetic look on his face. He stood and Marco expected him to leave and go back to Ace, now that what he'd come to say was finished with. Instead, when Marco rinsed out the towel again, Sabo held his hand out for it.

"Not a hundred percent sure you won't whack my poor feet, yoi," Marco said, but handed the towel over anyway, biting the inside of his cheek. Sabo sat down on the bathtub rim again, making a motion for Marco's foot, and was surprisingly gentle when he maneuvered it into his lap.

The first touch was a bit too rough, and Marco couldn't help but hiss in a sharp breath. Instantly, Sabo pulled away the pressure, and Marco couldn't help but stare openly, now, confused and shocked that Sabo had listened to his quiet noise of discomfort.

Sabo was concentrating fully on his job, a tiny furrow on his forehead as he worked on keeping his touch as careful as possible, and for the first time since they'd met Marco actually took the time to study his features.

He looked well bred in the same way Ace was, but there was no mischievous tilt to his eyes or lips, nor the slight point to his ears that came with fae blood. Unlike Ace, he was fair skinned, easily shades lighter than Marco, with his constant travel through the outdoors, but Marco could see where tan lines had worn through Sabo's skin. It made his scars stand out even more; jagged, uneven lines obscuring one side of his face and travelling across his neck and under his shirt. Those had been easy to notice, but the subtle shift of noticeable muscle was much harder if you lacked a trained eye, and Sabo wrung out the towel with the ease of practice.

A fighter then, someone who'd had experience patching up people's wounds, and Marco had seen him heft a sword with little trouble and rote muscle memory. Maybe the second son of a noble then, someone who'd joined the knights to try and make a name for himself and curry favour with the Council through wars instead of politics.

Then again, his relationship with Ace would've put him against the Council; Ace had kept it no secret that the Council hated him, though for what Marco wasn't sure. Ace was no war hero, and Marco had no memory of anyone that looked like Ace attempting to overthrow the council. He seemed too young for it, anyway, to young and to gullible to have been outside that tower.

Only questions occupied Marco's head as he surveyed Sabo's hunched figure, trying to figure out how they fit together, how he could solve any of the mystery that was Ace – and now, any of the mystery that was Sabo.

He understood, almost better than anyone, why someone would keep their past a secret, but he couldn't help but entertain a tiny dream of one day being close enough to understand. To figure out the things that Ace still guarded from him.

And part of figuring out Ace would involve figuring out Sabo, too. Or, at least, getting Sabo to trust him at least marginally more. All the questions he could think of to start a conversation, however, seemed too sensitive to touch on, and would only leave Marco back where he started. At least now Sabo was kind of opening up.

"Why're you so protective of him?" he finally decided on, leaning forwards and resting his chin in his palms. "I know he's never been outside the tower and all, but Luffy seemed fine leaving him behind."

"Luffy knows Ace can take care of himself," Sabo said, attention solely focused on the bottom of Marco's feet.

"Don't you, yoi?"

"I know he can protect himself," Sabo said, and there was a fraction of a second when his eyes narrowed. "I also know that sometimes he won't take care of himself. And Luffy's never been one of the people who's good at fixing that."

"But you are," Marco said, and he knew there was a hint of accusation in his tone when Sabo's eyes flicked up, a challenge in the set of his frown.

"He's my brother," Sabo said in lieu of explanation, and Marco knew that to anyone else those words may not have made sense – but he'd had his own family, a long time ago, and so that explanation was all he really needed. On top of that, however, he knew-

"And you love him."

Sabo's eyes flicked down again, almost instinctually, and this time he didn't answer. For a moment he worked in silence, and Marco heard him take a deep breath, then sigh.

"Doesn't matter," he whispered, one shoulder falling into a shrug. "Doesn't matter if I do, or I don't. My job is to-"

"Keep him safe?" Marco parroted back mockingly, because he'd heard Sabo say it more than enough times to be able to know what came next. "You'know, no job I've ever seen involves this much loyalty, yoi." He got gifted with a short glare, and Sabo nudged the side of his ankle with a pair of pale knuckles.

"Gimmie your other foot." Sabo said, and Marco obliged; dropping both his foot and the subject. It felt weird to have the dried blood washed from his foot by hands that weren't his own, so Marco racked his head for another question to distract him.

"Why'd you join the guards? Or the knights, or whatever." he asked, and Sabo looked at him in surprise.

"How'd you-?"

"Calluses," Marco said, nodding to Sabo's hands. "Plus, you grabbed a sword at Burgess' place, even though there were knives and knuckle busters around, and you wielded it like you knew what you were doing." He paused, and felt a tiny smile on his cheeks at Sabo's obvious look of amazement. "Also, on the night we met Luffy, you told Ace you quit the guards."

Sabo stared at him, then Marco saw his mouth drop open. "That's cheating ," he said, sounding scandalised, but his lips were pulling into a grin. "Here I thought you were just using your powers of observation."

"Listening is a power of observation," Marco said, shrugging innocently, and then Sabo laughed.

It stunned him for a moment, making him stare unabashedly, and he could tell when Sabo noticed; his mouth snapped closed, and his grin vanished. Awkward silence invaded the air.

"Feel like one of my ears just got broken," Marco blurted, trying to recapture the ease of the conversation before. "Never thought I'd hear you laugh. Unless it was at my misfortune, yoi."

Sabo's smile flickered on his lips, and Marco almost breathed a sigh of relief when he said, "Don't worry, if it makes you feel better I'll laugh then too."

"Thanks," Marco drawled, and Sabo emptied out the bloody bowl, filling it with more water and rinsing the towel. He turned his attention back to Marco's feet, and for a moment Marco almost thought he was ignoring the question. However, Marco caught him pausing before he'd finished, studying the injuries on Marco's feet like they'd bought back memories.

"I- don't like my parents." He finally said, and Marco stayed quiet instead of asking who does? He could tell how carefully Sabo was picking his words, and knew any snarky comment would easily have Sabo pulling away again and refusing to share the story. "I'm the first son, so my father had always wanted me to take over his company, and he'd trained me, but I was- I just never got it."

I was too stupid to get it, went unsaid in the silence between those words, and Marco grit his jaw, swallowing hard. It struck almost too close to home, those feelings of inadequacy, and though Marco had long since figured out he wasn't as dumb as he'd once been told, he could tell Sabo still struggled with such a thought.

"I went to join the knights instead. My parents left me alone up until I became a squire, then tried to tell me I had to go home , like they hadn't near kicked me out years before." Sabo bared his teeth, a brutal laugh falling from his lips. "I didn't, but- I suppose it never mattered to them that I never went home, in the end."

"They replaced me," Sabo said with a small shrug, and Marco had time to give an internal wince, remembering the words he'd spat the first night they'd met. "By that point I already had Ace and Luffy though, so I didn't care so much, I guess. They're definitely a better family than my old one."

Marco watched Sabo pull on a shaky grin, hurt still in his eyes. He'd pulled down walls to tell the story, even if he'd only kept to the bare bones of fact. It left Sabo looking vulnerable, in a way that Marco hadn't expected he'd ever see.

Hesitantly, he pulled his foot from Sabo's lap, and then leaned forwards, folding him into a hug. Sabo stiffened, even if he'd seen it coming, but he didn't fight to pull away. He merely sat there for a moment, then awkwardly returned the favour, his arms snaking around Marco's middle.

"I could totally stab you right now," he said, voice oddly muffled, and Marco shrugged.

"Eh, I'm bruised up enough. I'm sure you'd at least wait until I looked less like I'd been in a brawl."

Sabo scoffed, his grip tightening on Marco's back, but Marco didn't make a move to run a soothing hand down Sabo's spine. No matter what Sabo had shared, that wasn't them; too much animosity existed between them for such a simple conversation to have fixed it all.

Unwilling to push his luck, Marco leaned away a short moment later, propping his elbows on the back of his chair and making no mention of anything out of the ordinary occurring. Sabo, after a second of shrewd observation, did the same, grabbing the disinfectant Marco had bought from the innkeeper and grinning.

"Oh, I am going to enjoy this ," he said, waving the small bottle, and Marco groaned before moving his feet back to Sabo's lap.

AN: Please review! I hope y'all enjoyed! ;u; We're going back to biweekly updates again, but I have 6 (almost 7) chapters written, so there won't be any unexpected hiatuses for at LEAST the next month unless something drastic happens in RL and I can't get any internet!