Sorry this took forever. Major writer's block right around the 500th word.
August 2nd and 3rd
"What have you two idiots been up to?" Whitebeard demanded.
"Oh, nothin' much. Wee bit o' mischief. Nothing indiscreet," Ace said.
"If that's the case, I dread to think what a large "bit o' mischief" might mean for you," Whitebeard said.
"As do we all," muttered Marco. "Any third-world countries annihilated the last time you got up to proper mischief?"
"Countries? No. Uninhabited islands? Weeeeeeeeeeeell…"
"You concern me."
"I try. So I take it everything of interest is done and over with?" Ace asked.
"No(!) The battle is still ongoing, it's just that everyone who is still fighting is invisible(!)" Norma said.
"No need for that," he muttered. "Sorry I got sidetracked, Oyaji. I really did mean to be here on time."
"I'm certain you did. Don't bother with apologies, though. Have you any regrets?"
Ace shrugged. "I don't think so, no."
"Then there's nothing to worry about. You'll have other opportunities for battle. You need a multitude of reasons to take a life, but none to save one." Ace grinned up at Whitebeard and scratched the back of his head.
"Oh, er, speaking of which, I think Marco mentioned Danny?" he asked.
"Who?" Marco said.
"Danny. It's the name of the kid. The one who told you where we were. Short, probably around six or seven years old. Blonde. Ringing any bells?"
"Oh, him!" Marco turned to look behind him, searching the rubble-strewn courtyard for any sign of the boy. "I could swear I told him to stay near Jozu. I figured if anybody could keep the little blighter out of trouble, it'd be him."
Jozu heard his name mentioned and trotted over. "Anything amiss?"
"Remember that kid I asked you to look after real quick?"
The massive armoured man cocked an eyebrow, not that it was too visible from the viewpoint of everyone who was a normal size and only came up to the bottom of his ribcage. "Kid? I remember you mentioned one and flew off in a hurry, but I looked around and there was no child."
Marco stiffened. "He was right there, I swear!"
"Taichou! Marco Taichou! Sir!" cried one of the men from the First Division.
"What?"
The man ran up, shedding dust as he went. "Sir, we were clearing out the rubble as best we could, but… there was this… Well-"
"Oh dear God, just spit it out!"
He swallowed nervously. "We found a body in with the wreckage, sir. It looks like a child's body."
Marco unconsciously turned to Ace, who had gone incredibly pale. "I swear to God," he breathed, "there was no other kid there. Nobody mentioned there being another kid and I never saw one."
"You better come with me, then," Marco said.
Ace fell in beside the blond man, staring at the ground with wide eyes, clearly searching his memory for any indication that maybe he had missed something. Marco belatedly wondered if it was a good idea to bring Ace along. He was only 18, if memory served, and knowing his personality, he would probably blame himself for the death of the child no matter what. Inviting him to see the corpse… it might only make the whole thing infinitely worse. Those kinds of images were the things that haunted you late at night, and Marco rather thought that Ace had enough of those to contend with as it was.
"Are you sure you want-" he began.
"Yes," Ace said.
"Because whatever you see down there probably isn't going to be-"
"I know."
"And you're okay with that?"
Ace swallowed. "As okay as I'll ever be."
Together, they trudged down the last set of stairs before hitting the entrance to the very lowest floor, the basement that had caved in. Their guide handed them each a lantern and gave them directions for once they entered the mostly-cleared room before hurrying away, clearly very keen to get away from the area.
"And the little room's towards the back?" Marco asked.
"Yeah. Off to the left in the corner."
Ace must not have realised it, but he was hanging back, eyeing the wooden door with no small fear and guilt. Marco tried to pretend he hadn't noticed and maneuvered his way around the still-present wreckage to get to the door. He hooked two fingers in the hole where the doorknob should have been and cautiously opened it, shining the light from his lantern in.
The little room must have either been an old walk-in closet or a pantry at some point, but it was barren now. What remained was a scene from a nightmare. There were shackles lining the three walls, about at the height of Marco's waist, and most of them were empty.
Most.
At the very back, deep in the shadows, was a small, crumpled body, impaled on a large beam that had pierced not only the boy, but the wall behind him, as well. Marco shuddered and closed his eyes, turning away as quickly as he could. Ace should not see this. Definitely not.
"Oh, God," he whispered.
"What?" Ace's voice was loud and nervous.
"Ace, let's just go back up. You really don't need to…" He saw the look in Ace's eyes. The guilt. The pain.
"I really do. This… this was my doing," Ace said, quiet as death.
And suddenly Marco couldn't bring himself to tell his junior no. He breathed as deeply as he could in the dusty air and nodded. As Ace began forward, he put a hand on the young man's shoulder. "I'm here. Just so you know… If you need me."
Ace smiled wanly and nodded.
Ace threw the door wide, just because he felt the suspense of opening it slowly was too torturous. Marco saw him flinch back as though struck, a hand covering his mouth, and knew exactly what was going through his mind. They both stood in place as though frozen, unable to so much as say a word.
Marco eventually managed to speak. "It's not your fault, you know."
Ace's hand lowered from his mouth, as though he hadn't realised he'd been doing it. "Yeah… I know," he said.
"I'm being serious," said Marco.
"So am I. Look again," Ace said. "There's almost no blood. He was dead before the beam hit him."
Marco could only bring himself to glance quickly at the child before seeing that Ace was right. Wait… was that…?
"You notice that, too? So I'm not imagining it?" Ace asked.
"So it really is…?"
"It's Danny," Ace muttered. "I don't know how it's possible. By God, I had him in my arms. He was real. He spoke to me. I didn't see his face too well before the lights went out, but… I'm pretty sure that's him."
"Same here. I don't know why I didn't recognise him before. I mean, I talked to the kid, too. He felt pretty damn solid to me."
"Yeah… So what the hell is going on?"
Marco shook his head slowly. "I don't know. If that was a ghost we saw… Hell, I've never come across anything like this. It just isn't natural."
"A child was chained up and left to die in a small, cold, dark room. No part of this is natural," Ace said. There was nothing Marco could say to that.
"Hey, guys! You back so soon? By Celestia, you look like hell. Especially Ace. What did you do, fall in a pile of fiberglass?" Thatch asked as soon as they all filed back aboard the Moby Dick, mission complete and then some. When they didn't answer (save a mild glare from Marco), he asked, "So, how did it go, if I dare ask?"
"Swimmingly," Marco said.
"But neither of you can swim."
"Exactly."
He winced. "That bad, huh? Hang on, I'll fix you guys something to drink and then we can talk about it. Am I correct in assuming nobody feels like eating right now?"
"Yeah," Ace muttered. "I'm not hungry in the least."
"Meaning you want two apples and a slice of French toast, right?"
"Right."
Thatch was back almost as soon as he'd vanished, juggling three mugs of hot chocolate and a plate for Ace, ushering them to their usual table in the corner of the mess hall.
"So," he said, "if you feel like talking about it, can I know what happened?"
Ace nodded and told his part of the story from the beginning. Once he got to the collapse of the building, though, he handed it off to Marco, since he had no idea what had gone on while he was trapped. Thatch's mouth had at some point dropped open and stayed slack, eyes rounded in concern. Marco, with worried glances towards Ace, had finished with describing the fate of the boy, Danny.
"Mother of God," Thatch said. "Who the hell would do something like that to a child?"
"I'm not so sure they meant to," Ace said. "When someone's arms aren't by their sides, like when their arms are secured above their heads by shackles, breathing gets ever-so-slightly more difficult. Within a few days, you suffocate to death under the weight of your own lungs. Most people don't know that, though, and whoever put him in there probably gave him food and water and just assumed he'd be okay."
"That's awful," Thatch shivered. "You... you didn't have to tell his parents, did you?"
"No. We looked for them, but he was an orphan, it seems."
Thatch was quiet for several moments, but then he looked up, an uncharacteristically serious look on his face. "Hey, you don't think…"
"Don't think what?"
"That you guys saw his ghost because he wanted to help Ace?"
"Huh?"
"Well, think about it," Thatch said, "Ace tried to save him, and maybe his last act on earth was returning the favour."
Ace stared into the liquid at the bottom of his mug. "Maybe," he muttered, as though he hadn't quite realised he was saying it out loud. "Maybe."
"Meaning that kid Danny saved your life and Teach's. He saved two of my brothers and no-one back in that town is going to mourn for him?" Thatch slammed down his mug. "Never! Come on, you guys. We're going to do this the right way!"
Ace hadn't been to a real funeral before, and technically, without a body to bury or even a working knowledge of the child's religion, he still hadn't.
Thatch had assured him that at funerals for children, most cultures in the Grand Line sang songs of prayer and hope throughout the night, to celebrate the innocence of childhood and help guide the inexperienced soul to Heaven. He wasn't sure if he believed it, but it sounded good all the same. He had sung every song of prayer he knew in the common tongue was starting to work his way through whatever other languages came to mind. Eventually, he was almost out. It was nearly dawn.
"Ace, come on. You need to go to bed. When did you last sleep?" Marco asked, trying to tug the younger man off of the ship's railing.
"One more song, Marco. I've only got one more song, and I'm done. Promise."
"Fine," he sighed. "Go for it."
"I don't know that much of it, so I'm probably going to screw it up, but you know what? I don't think Danny'll mind too much.
Baba Yetu, yetu uliye
Mbinguni yetu, yetu amina
Baba Yetu, yetu uliye
Jina lako litukuzwe
Ufalme wako ufike utakalo
Lifanyike duniani kama mbinguni amina
Baba Yetu, yetu uliye
Mbinguni yetu, yetu amina
Baba Yetu, yetu uliye
Jina lako litukuzwe"
"What the hell does any of that mean?" Marco asked.
"It's the Lord's Prayer in… Swahili, I think. Although the title given the particular musical arrangement is Baba Yetu."
"And why did you pick that?"
"Well," Ace said, "for one thing, it's one of the most beautiful pieces of music ever composed, in my opinion."
"And is there another reason?"
Ace smiled. "Baba Yetu translates to 'Our Father'. Point of interest: it's also a euphemism for 'God'."
(A/N): You learn Mandarin Chinese, common explosives, ways to kill people, physics, and Swahili in this fic. You'd think your respective tax districts would be sending me money from their education appropriations.
Depressing chapter. Sorry. Oh, btw, a ghost boy named Danny? You can't tell I'm reliving my childhood at all…(!) There's another show I referenced, however subtly, and if you can tell me what it is you get a giant cookie. That shit won't even fit on your monitor.