Chapter 10

By the love I have for you

"By the love I have for you, I swear it! Would that you could render this extermination unnecessary by accompanying me back to civilization!"

Thatch ran over to Ace who stood around with a dark red coat, black trousers and old, brown boots that matched his hat. He threw his arms around the guy, jumped up and wrapped his legs around Ace's waist, causing the black-head to stumble back a few steps.

"No, it cannot be.", Ace called out. He pushed Thatch off him onto the floor and stroked his rouged beard. "I... I shall live and die a Pirate King!", he suddenly stuttered and Thatch broke laughing.

"Fail." Marco smiled smugly as Ace grabbed his hat and tossed it at Thatch who still laid on the floor.

"Damn it! I nearly got it, right? Those sentences just freak me out! That's the cheesiest scene in the whole operetta, I swear!", he swore and kicked his pirate boots with the nice pendants that glittered and jingled, off into the next corner, just slightly missing Marco. His tantrum would subside soon. He inhaled a few times deeply and helped Thatch onto his feet.

"Okay, just once more. I'll get it this time. And Thatch, you don't have to... uh... press yourself so close, you know?" Ace had crossed his arms and sighed as he retrieved his shoes.

"Ey, it's not as if I'd like that! And besides it's your fault that we had to repeat the scene for the sixth time. I can do my text unlike someone else.", he retorted sourly and readjusted his t-shirt with the printed word 'pirate' on it.

"You know the text? 'I don't think much of our -" "'Profession', yeah, I know." Ace pulled his hat back on his head, deep over his eyes as Thatch went back to the begin of the dialogue. Marco had the text-book in his hands and read the third character, the pirate king's lieutenant along.

It was Thursday, that evening there'd be a small concert with a few parts of the operetta, meant for the staff of the hostel and some parents who thought it was necessary to see if their kids were well and healthy and behaved. And of course to see the progress with the music.

Mr Shanks had kindly asked Marco if he could take special rehearsals with the two guys, for once because Marco was reliable, calm, patient and silent, aka everything the two pirate idiots were not – according to the red-haired teacher.

He had agreed, it was always interesting to finally know what the guys were actually singing or talking about. There often were certain problems with hearing the text in the pieces when you were surrounded by violins, brass and woodwinds.

Aya too had sneaked out of orchestra, normally curiosity killed the cat, but it was too funny to be dangerous for her and if Mr Whitebeard found out... he would rather put a bowl with milk on the floor for her... just to stay in the cat picture.

Whitebeard was never angry with any pupil, no matter how irritable she or he was, he always laughed it off with his weird, booming laugh. Besides Hina had given her a clear sign to stay away from her.

As she had cuddled against Marco, the pink-haired drama queen had rushed by, her shoulder effectively hit Aya's and ripped her from the embrace.

Then she had apologized as loud and ironic as she could and teetered to Smoker, not without giving her a poisonous glare. Well, it wasn't much, but more than enough for Aya to take her heels and rather watch her friends goofing around.

She sat on a desk when Marco strolled over to her, reading along the dialogue in the fat text-book. Thatch was just explaining how much he loved his pirate brothers. He swooped himself up onto the table as well and made himself comfortable next to her so she could see the text, too.

"What's with the solemn look?", he murmured and Aya blinked. "Solemn?"

"Staring at your fingers, chewing on your lip and not laughing when Thatch jumps at Ace?" She laid her head down onto his shoulder and sighed. "I just thought... if there was somebody who... didn't like you and... you somehow know that he or she is going to do something... what would you do?"

The subject with the long pink hair and the high heels plagued her mind since morning. "Who is it?" Marco's eyes had hardened and fixed on hers, but she avoided his gaze.

"No,no! It was just an 'if' – question. Nothing real or stuff... do you think I'm paranoid?" Marco looked back into the book.

"I do." Ayane gaped at him and poked his side. "That's not something to say to your girlfriend, you know?", she huffed and crossed her arms and he chuckled.

"What, no. It was my cue for the text.", he murmured and wrapped one arm around her waist. "As long as you don't think that Gollum is chasing you everywhere you're going or something like this, I think you're normal. And I would ask the person what the problem was. And now stop lying and tell me who it is."

Marco had put the book aside since his voice wasn't required anymore and as Aya shyly wrapped her fingers around his, he pulled her to his chest. "It's nothing, really...", she mumbled and he shook his head. "At least tell me the problem?"

"Mhm... it's... about..."

"Yeah?"

"Us...", she murmured and blushed under his scrutinizing gaze.

One of Marco's eyebrows vanished under his blonde hair, but Aya didn't continue. "And that's all. No more stories, concentrate on your text, mister lieutenant." To her relief he didn't ask anymore, not that she would have given in, but his brow stayed up at least for two more minutes until Ace threw Thatch's t-shirt against his head to remind him of his job.

"Ey, no stripping in front of my girlfriend!", he called back and tossed the offending piece of fabric onto the ground. "Why, does that make you look like a wimp?", Ace shot back and rubbed his fake beard.

"Orphan or not, I'll have you walking the plank, mister!" Marco jumped up to personally strangle the pirate king while Aya sat left behind, flushing.

"Miss Ayane, where have you been, girl?" She shrunk down in her seat and her fork fell onto the plate. Mr Whitebeard walked straight towards her and he didn't look pleased. He was a friendly guy, but on the few occasions when he found a reason to get annoyed, nobody dared to do any kind of resistance.

He was an intimidating, tall man and the big white beard made him look even more dangerous. More than Aya had thought he could be. "I – I've been with Marco, sir.", she brought out and tried to ignore all the eyes on her and the orchestra leader.

She shivered under his gaze that somehow told her he could do much more than just to swing around a baton and clap a rhythm.

She gulped, but still Whitebeard just wouldn't say anything. Until he broke out laughing and Aya felt her shoulders slump down in a relieved position. The other pupils began to eat and talk again, the previous tautness dissolved and some of the students rolled their eyes at the 'old man's' attitude.

"And you kept an eye on her, eh, Marco?" Mr Whitebeard grinned and reached down to ruffle Marco's blonde hair and Aya grinned as she felt the hand that had sneaked over hers squeeze tightly as his hair resulted in a mess.

"Really, that's not necessary, Mr Whitebeard...", he replied weakly as the conductor straightened up. "Found yourself a nice girl, eh? I expect to see you two the next rehearsals, okay? After all today's the concert. "We were just helping Ace and Thatch out.", Marco threw in and his friends nodded, but Whitebeard waved it aside.

"It's alright, don't worry. No harm done. Except for poor Smoker maybe, but he's been handling it well, alone." Whitebeard stroked his beard and shrugged. "We'll be there." The conductor nodded and strolled off to talk to a few other student and instantly Marco's face changed to one of pure horror.

"Please fix my hair, just what did he do?" He let Aya smooth out his hair and she seemed to enjoy it quite well.

"It's in all directions.", she laughed as she tried to get it back into its former place. "I told him at least ten times to stop that. But at least I'm not the only one, look." Ayane looked up and saw Whitebeard still standing on the next table, his hand in Smoker's gray hair, the guy's expression a scowl.

"Ha, he deserves that. Poor Smokey, couldn't play his double bass alone. A round of sympathy for him." Marco grumbled and went back to occupy himself with his dessert. But it had dissolved into thin air. "Ace...", he growled dangerously and his friend lifted his hands.

"Whoa, it's not my fault, this time." Marco's face snapped over to Shin and she squeaked, trying to hide the second empty cup of a former dessert. "Traitor.", she mouthed to Ace, but he merely shrugged while Marco sighed.

"Man, I wanted to eat this. Don't you think you're already chubby enough without my cream?" Shin's eyes glowed red at the words and she swallowed down the sweet stuff. "I'm not chubby! I'm not even close to this possibility! You stupid deer!"

Ace instantly tried to stop her tantrum and Marco sighed again, he didn't even listen to the profanities Shin threw onto his head. A bony finger poked his side for the second time that day and as he looked to Aya, she shoved her own dessert in front of him.

"Here, I didn't want it anyway...", she murmured, but her eyes were fixed on the fruity liquid on top of the sweet thing. She did want it, but he was a guy and guys needed to eat more than her. Besides he was her guy. He took the cup after a few moments and dove in with his spoon, digging in the vanilla cream that made Aya want to drool all over the table.

"Here." To her surprise he balanced the stuff over in front of her face and as she hesitantly tried to grab the spoon, he pulled it back. "Open up.", he smirked and she averted her eyes embarrassed.

But she did it anyway, the dessert was too luring to say no. Marco fed her with the cream and used his tongue to lick her lips clean. It made Aya a nervous wreck to know that her friends were watching. And other people, too.

"Why don't you do that with me, too? Are you a wimp or what? Where's the Ace I took as my boyfriend?", Shin complained loudly to get the attention off the two and besides it was getting boring with Marco and Aya just kissing and stuff. Ace snickered and rubbed his fake beard again. It was something he did often this day.

"I don't know what you are talking about, my fair maid. But I'm sure I, the pirate King, will be as able to please you at least as well as this Ace you're talking about." She grabbed his collar and pulled him close.

"Oh, what did you have in mind, my King?", she grinned seductively and ignored Thatch's sigh as the two also began to make out.

"Aww, poor Thatchy-bear..." He scowled at the stupid words that repeated in his mind over and over again.

He was no bear. And his name was Thatch.

He pushed his hands into his pockets as he strolled down the way back to his room and friends, Vista and Rakuyo. Mr Shanks had given them a short twenty minutes break. And since he had nothing else to do...

He casually watched the snowfall through the large windows, it had gotten more and more snow since Monday, when they had arrived- Thatch yelped as something crashed against his chest and landed on its buttocks with a cry.

"Oh hey, are you okay?" A girl had run into him as he had been to occupied with the snow and stuff. She was one of the orchestra, viola or something, maybe flute? Cello? Oboe? Thatch just noticed that he didn't even know her name. She obviously was about the same age as him, the same grade.

She had very dark hair, some kind of black with a blue shimmer to it, and the glasses fit perfectly into the picture. She picked herself up with a little help from Thatch, before she caught her balance and stood in front of him, readjusting the eye wear.

"Yes, thank you, I'm so clumsy, please forgive me. Thatch, right?" She hopefully looked up to him to see if she had caught the right name. "Yeah..." He raised an eyebrow as she held her hand out for him to grab.

"I'm Tashigi, nice to meet you and thank you again."

"Uh, you're welcome...?" He was perplexed by the girl, he never had really acknowledged. Or seen for that matter. Tashigi also wore rather unimpressive clothes.

"I gotta go now, Mr Whitebeard will be fuming if I'm too late again, bye!" She took off in a run and barely dodged other student before she slid around the corner. Thatch looked after her and crossed his arms. What a confusing girl. She certainly had some looks, but the bits of character he had experienced made her weird. But she was kinda interesting, kinda.

Aya swirled around in her black dress that she wore for the small concert. The whole orchestra would wear black, just like always. Most of the guys stuck with white shirts though. It didn't really matter, but Mr Whitebeard wanted them to come representable.

And Marco had reassured her that she was. She was in a good mood that day, resulting out of the happenings of the week and that they would get home on Friday didn't stop her from smiling and being happy.

She was on her way back to the orchestra room, where the teachers had put up a few chairs and made room for Thatch, Kidd and Ace and the other soloists. Most of her fellows sat already in front of their notes, occupied with playing some of the more difficult cues to kill time until the others came.

Aya had left Marco at the soda machine. He and Ace had put up a fight with it since it had dared to swallow all of their loose cash without giving them a refreshment back.

She slipped through the chairs and halfway on her way to her notes, Hina squeezed past her. Without making a remark or even looking at her. Nothing. Then Ayane noticed that the concert mistress' face was paler than usually, her lips set in a firm line. She almost looked worried if it wasn't for the lip stick.

She stood and watched as the pink-haired girl rushed to Smoker who sat next to his double bass, occupied with making cigarettes. She tugged at the guy's arm and talked to him until he put his stuff away and accompanied her outside.

Aya shrugged, Hina's problems were not her own, right?

She sat down on her chair and browsed in the notes until she had found the first piece. Then she noticed that something was missing. Her violin. She couldn't play without it, of course. So Aya rushed up again and strolled to the case.

She took the beautiful instrument, plucked on the sides to hear if the sound was still correct, then she went to retrieve her fine bow. The one that her mum had given to her as a present.

The one that now laid broken in the case.

author's note(s): Good night to you! I'm sorry I didn't update in the last ... euh... three weeks? Really? I'm really devastated. I'm plaing too much MMORPG. Don't blame me, it's great. And I'm not addicted.

I hope you liked the chapter. Yes, I know, this is NO action story. And I didn't write it as one. Besides I noticed that I kinda think I'm writing not like usual when I'm extremely tired or depressed. Also the music I'm listening to is important. Radio is fine. I't 00:09 AM and I'm still listening. I got school today lol

But hope you enjoyed it still. :3

- Your Cleric Shara