A/N: Here you go. A day early. A few people seem to be reading this, so I hope you enjoy it. Slight warnings. Some sweetness for Law (and Marco) mostly. But remembered past features at times.

Chapter twenty-five: Lion and Blue - The Myelin Incident: Parts 1, 2, 3 & 4

Blue on blue, their powers in tandem, quite a beautiful thing. Low-tidal suction, murky sands, clams hastening into the sludge - an ache washed over Law at times and it was difficult to raise a Room when it happened, his hand and arm almost paralysed; some long-term damage from Doflamingo's torture, some reflection still seen through the sheen of a sharp-toothed saw. They worked together to ease away the discomfort. Debilitation.

Side by side, Law's head pressing into the Phoenix's own, his breath easy with his own, Marco sent a lick of fire along Law's arm; around the thicker, puckered, paler skin where it had been amputated and reattached; into the grooves left by restraints; anywhere his limbs had been stretched, shackled, bound, beaten – anywhere movement had been restricted. The hoped-for result was to impede the impediments, transform friction to flux.

The first time Marco saw it was during a game of mahjong. Law reached to move a piece and then could shift his hand no further. Annoyance and an aftertaste of fear – maybe that Marco would finally beat him at a game he'd mastered long ago – crossed his face. He'd been relaxed, albeit occupied with strategy, up to that point.

The second time they'd been side by side, idly discussing the finer details of pirate life, when Law's unexpected quiet and then the dead weight on Marco's hip told him something had gone wrong.

The boundaries for intimacy were still under construction, so it didn't help things the time after that when Law, giving Marco a handjob, swore under his breath and suddenly stopped with a shudder of pain. And it had promised rapture. He was that fucking good.

At that time, once he'd resigned himself to the fact that another thing blue between them were his balls, Marco had taken Law's arm. Law couldn't even curl his fingers into his hand's grip. Marco had needed to lift the limb from across his groin.

A tentative flicker sent from the Whitebeard pirate, flames encasing skin, allowed the Heart to start up a Room, and to work on loosening the muscles into mobility.

When he could, Law stood, apologetic, annoyed, angry, embarrassed. Not at Marco. At himself. But not solely at himself. How had he let himself get captured? How could they have bound him for so long? With such fucking disregard? Some idle pastime for them. Some bibelot for their collection. Who objectified him the most? Those fuckers, or himself?

In such a desensitised state, other fucked-up things, people, had screwed him up. Literally. And now he could not see straight.

Marco's arms wrapped around his waist. Law froze. His mouth worked perfectly fine. Did Marco want him to finish some other way? For a second he waited for the huge palm behind his neck, pushing his head down. You know what to do, na, Law?

But the Phoenix pulled him to the bed beside him instead, and not onto his lap. This dead arm couldn't even pick up his nodachi – one of his matchsticks – though he had minimal mobility now.

They sat on the edge of the mattress. Marco had drawn up the waist of his cut-offs, redressed himself. He kept an arm around Law, and if Law had his full motor skills, he would have shrugged him off.

"Hey. Things happen, it's okay. Another time," Marco said to the tenseness, his lips in Law's hair.

Law swallowed. What could he know about Vergo's grip, his body behind him? This embrace now was casual, Law told himself. Vergo's grip always held challenge; ownership, expected obeisance, wilful ignorance. This touch, it wasn't the same.

"Let me try something." Marco dropped his hold and picked up Law's almost useless arm. "I'll run the flame over you for just a bit longer, then build a Room. We'll work together."

Law looked down. His heart was beating stupidly fast. Fear.

"I think it's permanently damaged." They'd restrained him so much it had trouble healing.

"Light up your room, Law. I'll work within it. Let's see what we can do."

oOOo

After the battle — Benn and Shanks and the crews celebrating, the marines dispatched, Lucky Roo eating another huge drumstick of chicken somewhere, fully recovered — Marco wanted to see Law's arm. Now that they'd done this a number of times, Marco asking nothing more than their relationship allow him a closeness not accessible to others and, both understanding there were limits to that, Law let him check. It was still a lot to give, but they had to let the other in somewhere.

Law trusted this process now, and had regained some of the dexterity he'd lost since the captivity. True, he could still use his fruit mostly no problem, but there were times when it faltered, when everything seized up, like it had on deck.

Of course that was more than problematic in battle, but, more so, what if it happened in the middle of a surgery? A surgery on the scale of the operations that Luffy and Jimbei had undergone, or if he were in the midst of dismembering and reassembling a group of people like the kids on Punk Hazard? If he lost access to the restorative or attack functions of his power, his moniker might end up more than just a government ploy.

They sat in a small room, hands together, and Marco encircled the scar on Law's upper arm with a ring of blue fire, again – within Law's dome of blue – and they both used their skills to try to isolate and put together the nerve endings that just weren't on good terms with one another.

It was peaceful. Marco loved that Law rested against him, not a tense muscle, other than the ones they were working on. He knew part of it was just how much effort it took to use and sustain his energy, and Shanks had thrown him against a wall, but it also showed just how far they'd come, were coming along. His lips brushed the top of Law's head where it now rested lightly on his shoulder, but were his eyes closing? No, they had to work on this together.

"Five things, Law. Blue."

Law opened his eyes to the two devil fruits intersecting, crossing from violet-infused to green through spectrums of blue. Any fruit-user and pirate worth their salt knew the layers of the sea. "North, South, East, West, Grand Line." Marco's flame was afire within Law's room, healing, not harming, as was its purpose.

Law's gaze flicked over the prisms, the light show, their own aurora. At that intersection, there, the blue of snow, hardened by ice.

Closer to the floor, south, Franky's aqua pompadour. The waters were incredible there. When his crew could watch his back he'd wade in the shallow depths.

East, Sanji's desire, burning with determination. His displaced geographical compatriot.

West, the tint of night that shone through Robin's hair as it did his own.

Then the Grand Line surrounded by the calm belts, like the man next to him who wanted to see this arm working without hindrance, and not just because he benefitted in bed. Or maybe that was a reason, but it wasn't a demand, a definition. The Calm Belt was stagnant and Marco was anything but, but he was composed, unruffled. No-one could dispute it.

.

"Four," Law breathed, his lips against Marco's cheek. He was tired, damn it.

Marco reached across and rumpled Law's hair. "This mess. Always think it's soft as floss, and it's as rough as fuck, and shot through with midnight."

Law laughed, exhausted. They were on the same page. Marco gripped his hand tighter. "Feel that?"

"Mmm."

Good, the Phoenix thought. He hadn't lost circulation then. He turned Law's face, and kissed him lightly on the lips and lifted his hand to his own lips, then lowered it to his lap. "These and these are a little too blue for my liking."

"It's just the reflection," Law murmured. He'd resisted the urge to slip his tongue between Marco's lips. When he was tired like this, it was defence. Capitulation to encourage gentle abuse rather than brutal. To fold to their wants. "Yours are blue too."

Marco looked down, and Law was right. He ran a hand down and along the doctor's thighs, knowing he shouldn't distract him from the therapeutic process too much.

"These crazy-arsed jeans."

"What's wrong with them?"

"They're like a seal's skin."

"You seen any blue seals?"

"I don't know the colour of seals in the North Blue." He thought of Jimbei, not that he was a seal, but that was some shade of blue.

Law just curled his fingers slightly to indicate he was regaining capability. "True. The water is icy cold. They're blue from freezing half to death."

"You're making that up."

"Tshh."

Marco smiled. "That a happy sound?"

"It's not unhappy. Most don't make it past twenty-five."

Law enjoyed The Phoenix's laugh. Liked him right there, to his side.

.

"Okay, you capricious, tenacious, laggard, three things."

Law wondered why he wasn't the one helping Benn with his crosswords.

"Ocean."

They could hear it today. Or the designators. Seagulls, waves against the hull, Men falling in the water. Just as well Shanks and Benn were incredibly powerful without fruits.

Law turned to Marco, and with his better hand, first grabbed Marco's sash and rubbed the cloth between his thumb and forefinger, a soft cotton. Then placed his hand over the tattoo near his heart.

"Sash. Heart."

Marco looked down. What was Law playing at now?

"Mawkish much? How do you hear blue from my sash?"

Law thumbed the cloth again. A quiet rub of fabric against flesh.

"Heart?"

"This close to someone, hear everything."

Law's smile was worn at the edges, but he wasn't gearing up to do a runner.

Marco held him a little tighter.

"How's my heart blue?"

"Tattoos." Law pressed into the area again, covered by one of Whitebeard's tusks, inked in indigo.

.

"Smell?" Law asked.

"You're never far from pungent."

"Why does it always cycle back to my personal hygiene with smell?"

"Just like your voice. You're all corrugated iron, rust, sweat and heat."

"Thought I was cool as a cucumber."

"That too, but," and Marco kissed Law at his Adam's apple, on the side of the neck, "Your voice melts things."

"Inflames?"

"Makes them all hot and bothered. And, because of that I'm never that far from being a bit whiffy myself." He guessed that made two and met the requirements of the task.

Law felt his eyelids closing again as he found himself still against the Phoenix's chest, finding comfort in the pungency. It sure beat losing your powers on a crumbling bridge in Green Bit, Doflamingo shooting bullet strings at you. The Zoan withdrew his power, Law his Room, and the only thing now joining them was their own flesh. He worked his arms to hold Law upright.

.

"Your turn. One thing."

Law looked at him, fighting sleep. Vulnerable again for a second. Grey eyes flickering. It would be so easy to lock lips and trade the taste of the other as payoff for grounding, except Law didn't think it would ground him.

Marco read a fleeting panic and wasn't sure what it was about, except that Law never got upset over trifles.

"Later's okay, sunshine. Can you move?"

"Not much."

"Want me to leave?"

Law nodded.

"Can I put you to bed?"

"Yeah, but . . ."

"I'm not them, Law."

Again, the Heart pirate nodded weakly against him. His hand was again on Marco's sash. He knew Marco understood what it felt like to be grasped by unwanted appendages at least. Eight of them, forty-eight knees.

Occasional murder still killed. Occasional restriction of freedom still caused fear of captivity. Especially when you couldn't save those you loved. But for some it was easier to shake off falling once as an anomaly, rather than leading to the triggering routine of systematic brutalisation.

"I know." His voice a quiet thing. He did know. Feeling it was different. And did he know? "Just tell me what you're doing."

"Okay. You lie down, I'll put a blanket over you, give you a farewell peck like a powdered great auntie, walk to the door, open it, walk out, and close it."

Law did as instructed.

Marco, as he said he would, threw a blanket over the spent Heart Captain, sat on the side of the bed and grazed Law's cheek with his fingers only, not his lips, noticing the flinch Law tried to suppress. "I'm not them."

He stood, wondering at the lack of reply, walked across the room, and left. None of them had infinite reserves of power, and Law could sustain his for a good while, but once they powered down, they went from functioning to empty in a hurry.

Maybe there was nothing in the back-up tank, and the lack of response was just a sleepy pirate who needed to recuperate, and everything would be fine. And once he had, maybe he'd realise he'd fallen asleep on Marco's bed and not his own.

oOOo

Law had slipped out by the time Marco returned a good many hours later. He'd left a note inviting him to his own cabin that evening. That could mean absolutely anything with Law, and Marco didn't bank on it being carnal, though it wasn't out of the question, but there were still a lot of demons to bypass before they consistently got anywhere.

.

The blue of a Room bathed Law's cabin when he entered after knocking.

"Is it safe?" Marco had brought a bottle of rotgut, and he left it on the side table.

"For whom?"

Marco lit himself up in a light flame. "That reply doesn't fill me with confidence."

Law stood, walked to the door, grabbed the edges of Marco's jacket through the fire, tipped his head and kissed the Phoenix, open-mouthed and with appetite.

Once they drew away from one another, Marco pushed him away a little with his fingertips.

"Yet I have to ask permission?"

Law tilted his gaze. "Not always. Not even often, really."

Marco knew he was right, and cupped the back of Law's head pulling him near once again.

It seemed to be Law in response. Autonomous Law. Marco loved this guy. The Whitebeard's hands were strong against the Heart captain's hips and lower back.

Law moved back. His room was still up. "Do you trust me?"

"Hmm. Nine times out of ten."

"Well this is one of those nine." Happy at that strike rate, Law sat Marco at the small table where they'd shared rum and possibilities about six months before.

"I'm going to increase the myelin in your brain for a short while. It's reversible. I've done the same for myself."

Marco baulked. His flames were still at a low ember. "Hold on. You're going to do what to what?"

Law's grin was clever, but not calculating.

"Taste. Synaesthesia. People who have this usually associate sound with colour, but some associate actions, smells, words even, with both taste and colour. It wouldn't surprise me if Sanji had some form of this, and might explain his wish to see All Blue."

"Mmm," Marco indicated that Law should sit in the chair nearby. "What's that got to do with us?"

"If you could taste our power working together, if you could taste the stars clustered above."

Law was almost animated.

"What's wrong with a kiss? You taste pretty good."

Law had a knife. Not always a good thing. Just a bread and butter number from the looks of things that he was casually twisting between his fingers.

"I've tested it on myself. The more myelin you have, the faster your neurons communicate, and the more real a situation seems."

"You're adapted like that now?"

Law shook his head. "No. too dangerous to have us both altered at the same time."

"There's some danger?"

"Not much, but if my hand seizes. If my neurons decide to communicate about incapacitating things. You'll be in my Room. Few things remain altered in perpetuum."

"You mean dead."

"That too." Law had poured them both a drink and knocked his back with a wide, happy maw.

"For you. I'll do it for you."

"For you, Phoenix." Law said. "It's almost healed." He placed a hand over the scar on his arm. How many years had passed? He'd thought this disability, and others, were permanent.

"Can I keep up my flames?"

"Best you drop them. Not sure how they'll affect the process."

Marco nodded, and they subsided.

"Keep me in the Room, okay?"

"I promise. We'll kick in your powers once the procedure is finished."

They'd worked hard on healing, and Law had slept, so no sudden seizures were likely.

oOOo

Benn and Shanks looked across at Law and Marco on the deck, both encased in Law's blue dome and the Phoenix's fire for some reason, both staring out to sea. Marco sought Law's spare hand, and the doctor didn't pull away. Marco waved his other hand in front of his face. Spheres and nanometres of colour, various shades of blue, all flying between them. He kept touching his lips. Laughter. Intimate, raucous, giggling school boy sniggers between them.

"You think Law's fed him coke?"

"The cocaine type?"

Benn nodded.

Shanks considered it. The world around the two definitely held wonder. "Nah, too calm. Maybe something trippy. Looks like they're rolling with the ocean sprites."

"You think they can see them?"

"Fruit users are a strange bunch."

oOOo

Law returned Marco's neurons to their usual state before his ability powered down, but still high, they lay together on Law's bed. The Phoenix's arms wrapped tightly around his magical partner, and he felt none of the tenseness from before. He understood why Law wouldn't want to keep that ability. As stimulating as it was, he imagined the opposite. Knew that Law already had trouble with sensory recall. Had tasted just a second of it when he'd noted those needle marks around Law's lips.

He was flexible, Law, coiled around him.

"That was hell of a one thing," Marco said.

"A rose by any other name would taste as sweet."

"Smell."

"But we were doing taste."

Marco pushed Law's hair away from his brow. "Calling yourself a flower now?"

"A delicate pansy."

"More like a cactus that rarely blossoms."

He hooked his hands behind his neck. Law sat on top of him, straddled him.

"That was amazing, kid. I want to taste your kisses in that state."

Law leant down and he started on the side of Marco's mouth, a quiet butterfly of his lips.

Marco turned his head toward him so that avoiding direct contact was an impossibility. Law threaded his hands through Marco's spiky hair, and kissed the other corner of his lips, which parted slightly, and then the lower lip, using his teeth minimally to tease it open, tongues meeting.

And then it was fine to taste and compare tastes, this one thing. Law's kisses flavoured with rum, as much as Marco expected his own were. Law didn't fire up the myelin exchange again, but that was fine, because very few things compared to the opening up of this death-encrusted bastard; could compare to the gold sluicing through the slate of his eyes, sparking the Phoenix's skin.

oOOo

He'd heard Pedro the Mink had called his crew the Nox pirates, known in some areas as Nyx. Nyx, one of the ancients, brought the world into being, and took it out, through the darkening and lightening of the sky. She existed in its dusky, gradated plains.

And like that phenomenon, the very nectar Law imbibed to bring Marco into wholeness was the resistance and drag of earth and soil cracked and watered to deprive moisture and loosen habitat into gulfs and crevices and fissures and slides that promised lakes, rivers and the sea.

Drowning or dehydrated, this man had hitched a ride with decay on so many occasions that sleeping with him was an act of pure fuck-you-survival, rebirth, confirmation. Law was terrifying — his arched back driving home the inevitable fall of a bloom at its pinnacle — such a shade of night — that Marco couldn't help but dig his fingers into his skin, hoping to waylay its demise.

The Heart leant down, elbows pushed into the pillow, either side of Marco's face, as he gripped the blond's hair and stared him down, the Phoenix pushing up into him, Law rocking over him, willing him to go on, allowing him to. Some stamina required, it wasn't an easy position, Marco already coated with Law's seed, breath a commodity between them.

Law ground down until the convergence of his fate line with the heart was guaranteed and, for a second, pleasure masking the frantic pursuit of the same imbued both pirates with a sense of grace and the divine. Chasing breath already expelled, neither let the other go.

No matter how many tea-towels collected, matchsticks spliced, Marco knew that sleeping with his Nana could destroy him. Handled right, it both gave and took away. Mishandled, it only took. Who feared Law so much they depleted him of all he had, not all he had to give, and disguised their weakness as desire, as hate, as their due?

Law was not supernatural. Abuse crippled him, but the poison secreting into the veins of Law's torturers as they denied access to equity, identity, had to be something else. How had he managed to maintain his rough and shaky version of good?

Law eased himself off Marco, and cleaned the both of them, as he liked to do, as training dictated, with nearby towels, and then he lay on his chest, hands under his chin, words rumbling through the Whitebeard as he spoke of things only ever mentioned within the resetting of log poses. Gone and gone and gone and gone. Oyaji, Ace, Law's childhood, Marco's own. Present: Law. Present: Marco. The pirate's body fit so well against his own.

.

Five: Ink, muscle, eyes, chests, hollows.

Four: Skin, sheets, towels, (sweat, semen, steam)

Three: Laughter, thanks, wonder

Two: Pungent — the two of them — stank to high heaven.

One:

A/N: About ten more chapters to go on this.

I know I'm a bit early time-wise with Law's tea-towel collecting, as he doesn't pick it up until after Doflamingo's demise in Repossession. That line might change. He's in full-flight with the matchsticks though, I just want to work in the nickname.

I hope it's coming together. This chapter ties back into chapter eight and chapter eleven of this fic, where Law slices off Shanks' arm (accidentally), and Marco and Law experience the myelin incident part 5.