Hello!

I only just got my computer back and I'm behind on... pretty much everything. Work is eating me alive right now, and I'm very upset about this wait. Sorry to all of you. I hope you've had a great start to your 2021.

I'm trying to sort out my life, but updates will be slowed. I was counting on using the holiday break to get ahead on my writing, but as you've probably realized, this was impossible for me. I'm aiming to update J&F and WoSA weekly. Once WoSA wraps up, I'll pick up another one of my WIPS to give it attention too, but I just cannot focus on all of them right now like before with the way things are now :(

That being said, I hope you enjoy the new chapter :D


Last time: an executive meeting takes place in Fleet Admiral Sengoku's office to discuss the loyalties of Monkey D. Luffy and his crew, and the procedure to transport Marco the Phoenix.


Luffy knows something is different immediately. He's always been... perceptive, in a way, but this is different. When Luffy listens, it's a little like forgetting a word and having it at the tippy tip of your tongue, he knows, but at the same time, he doesn't. It's an invasive certainty that boggles the mind a little because since when did he know all this? The voices, or rather, the song they insist on singing... well, it's a bit slippery. Like eel! You think you've pinned it down, but then you wake up and... and what was it you knew again? But Luffy's always been simple, all about going with the flow of things (as long as he makes it to Laugh Tale, anything else are just details), and so he leaves, filled and empty of the world's secrets, ignorant and knowing of the ways of the sea.

The knowledge settling in his bones at the infirmary of Baterilla is different, almost malicious, hunger or, rather, gluttony. Rotten milk, poisonous fish. The taste of betrayal, of thinking something is delicious only to get a stomachache later on.

(Something's not right.)

Luffy wakes up with an empty stomach and annoying light in his eyes. He blinks and then blinks again to bring the colorful swirl of sight into reality, make out the shapes of wherever he's ended up now. The raven feels weary, stretched too thin, woozy like when he's out in the sun too long without anything drink. His limbs, usually so ready and nimble, seem to weight the entire ocean combined. Even as his eyes show him what appears to be a doctor's office, with a cluttered desk and kind pale yellow walls, Luffy also has no idea where he is. There are a couple of beds besides his own, even though the place is not really spacious, and some curtains seem to half-heartedly hang around some of them. Chopper is asleep at the foot of the bed, antlers laying inches above Luffy's legs. The younger boy is unmoved from Luffy's groggy stirring. (Luffy knows they're safe. Even through the chills in his teeth, there's a soft humming in the back of his ears. Nakama, it can be translated as.)

The disorientation is hardly unfamiliar.

He's never been thrilled about it, but Luffy regularly pushes himself to the utmost limit and needs really long naps afterward; it's just how things work out. He trusts his Nakama to handle the rest when the bad guy is gone, and they always, always do. Luffy's a little iffy on which bad guy it was, but he's sure it was fine, but... His first -of many- stays at the infirmary of Baterilla had a different ring to it, he'd realized. Luffy feels... absolutely awful.

Worst than he ever has if he's honest. His chest feels tight and sore, hot like a brand skewered right through him, heat spreading inside him.

It's bad enough that attempting to sit up is agony; dark spots in his vision almost send him right back to sleep.

He must groan because suddenly, Chopper sits up. Instantly, the doctor takes a look at Luffy, who is confused but smiling softly at him. It happens a little in slow motion, and it's silly because nothing really happens except... Chopper seems to freeze up, eyes roaming over every inch of Luffy: his laid back state, the pained pinch to his brow, the kind, lucid eyes. The little reindeer hiccups once, and then once again, and it takes the disconcerted Luffy too long to understand what's happening. When he does, Chopper is already crying.

Sobs wrack through him in a way that twists at Luffy's heart.

He somehow knows that this is his fault and grimaces. Being Captain is really hard sometimes. Luffy tries to reach out a hand to his Nakama, but the limb doesn't seem to cooperate. He stretches a finger until he's poking Chopper over and over.

"Stop that, motherfucker!" the reindeer exclaims indignantly. He's making the strangest sound, eyes still streaming with tears and breath much too fast, but angry giggles and snorts escape him every few seconds. It's really stupid, but it lifts the corners of Luffy's mouth. Finally, Luffy stops his assault as Chopper truly runs out of breath. He looks at Luffy again, shoulders drooping as he tries to offer a wobbly smile. "Luffy..." he mumbles.

"Hey," Luffy comforts. He's still not really thinking about what happened (and he should soon because it was clearly bad), but regardless, one thing is true: "It's okay, Chopper," he grins, ribs flaring up, "we won, right?" Another voice disabuses the notion waspishly.

"No person in their sane mind would consider what you did back there as winning, you stupid idiot."

At that moment, the world positively comes to a standstill. This is a person Luffy does and does not know but that he could never, ever forget. Luffy was much too young to understand Sabo's voice, his radio station, back when they were kids. Still, it's familiar, the way it dips and curls, filling the space between them and bringing Luffy back to a time where the forest was a playground, Grey Terminal a treasure trove, and he earned the first people he could call home. Luffy doesn't remember the last time he cried, and he feels devastatingly powerless as he's unable to rise from the bed, eyes burning with emotion.

"When did you get so tall?"

He's not sure why that's the thing that comes out, but Luffy doesn't care.

Reflected in his brother's eyes, Luffy finds the same wonder and care he must hold in his own. I love you. I missed you. Where were you? Many thoughts and feelings hang in the air, but Luffy doesn't need to say them. Those things, those feelings, those questions... he's sure, from knowing Sabo who grew up with so much and so little, who planned and overthought, who feared the way only the smart can... his brother understands.

"...I'm sorry, Luffy." Sabo stands straight, tense, and worried with his features drawn and not quite meeting Luffy's gaze. Ah. This look Luffy knows, though Ace wears it so much more often.

"Sabo... did you find your freedom?" Luffy's tone is purposeful, neither the condemnation his little brother expects nor dismissive. He can't understand why Sabo thinks Luffy would be mad at him; Luffy's so ridiculously happy at this moment he can almost not feel the pain in his chest with the way he warms up in absolute delight.

Sabo chokes up immediately. He rubs away at his face with the crook of his elbow, the same way he hid his tears ten years ago, and without really looking up, offers furious nodding. Luffy's grin is painful on his face as it scrunches up all the way to his eyes.

"I'm glad." As it's prone to do amongst siblings, the softness lasts only a second.

"You're still a reckless idiot, Luffy!" Sabo's still crying, but there's something haunted in the way he looks up at him. An expression Luffy has worn well, and that's when he understands what Chopper's face was before: the eerie filter of death. He swallows, feeling a little angry all of a sudden, choked up in a way that has nothing to do with the blazing inferno carved in his ribcage.

"Did someone die?" He can barely look up, and he's unsure whose eyes to meet. Chopper bites on his lip, and just as Sabo means to answer, the reindeer interrupts.

"You did, Luffy." The doctor tells him. He's not looking at his Captain, the words embedded with accusation and raw pain. "Twice," he elaborates, his hoofs grip at the sheets, trembling. "For two entire minutes, you laid in the operation table just... gone." Chopper has to swallow around the world, but he gags on it anyway.

"Nothing about Enies Lobby was a victory," Sabo joins in.

Enies Lobby starts ringing bells in Luffy's head, the smell of burning rubber sharp in his nostrils, a phantom ache in his throat. His fingers curl, impotent in their itch to trace a hand down his neck, they stay weakly laying on the scratchy infirmary mattress.

The feeling of something-being-not-right sharpens. Luffy swallows. One more hard question he needs to ask.

"I..." he frowns. He's never considered himself prideful, and yet... "Did I..." he hesitates, "lose?"

Chopper and Sabo exchange a sobering look. His brother, blonde and in blue, with his tophat and fancy neckerchief, holds no punches as he looks Luffy in the eye and answers:

"Pretty much." Luffy... is going to have to do some thinking about that. He thinks about Zoro and his Nakama, and he's... afraid. "If my team and I had been a minute too late, we would've never reached you. Akainu..." Of course, it was Admiral Magma. "well, he was determined, is all I'm going to say. Though he's not exactly in a right state, I refuse to call it a draw between you, especially with... well, I think Chopper should explain this part."

'Diminished lung capacity,' as Sabo and Chopper would explain to him, sounds a little too innocent for the way Luffy's entire chests seizes on his way to the bathroom two days late. It's not that he's not breathing, he thinks, collapsed in the cold tile. He is, the air warm and dry as it grazes in and out his throat. Instead, it's that air coming in and out uselessly is all that happens. Whatever air is supposed to do inside him, his lungs -lung- are... is not doing. Or not doing enough. Despite trying to calm down enough to take even breaths, Luffy still cannot articulate a sound to explain anything to his revived brother's face, and he flinches when only whimpers come out instead of words. There's just no air to talk.

(Luffy wonders if he's dying.)

And the world whispers to him that he is.


The marine's ship holding Marco is as average and discreet as they come, but what awaits Luffy inside it is anything but. As soon as he can, the raven extends a hand to the edge and -giving Shanks a grin- launches himself up into the air and out of sight. In autopilot, the Shark Submerge moves under Shank's feet, trailing the marine ship's path, slicing through the waves hidden in the vessel's blind spot, an illegal vessel mounting the sacred current, the back entrance of Mariejois. (Shanks hopes he doesn't regret this.) The Sea Emperor waits for the impeding ruckus kickstarted by Luffy's arrival, holds his breath for a moment, and then two.

The sound of rushing waves and whistling sea breeze is potent in the ship's shadow, but no other sound fills the vast ocean they sail on.

The older pirate is hardly one to panic, well known for his even-temper, but Luffy has only the best or the worst luck as far as Shanks is concerned.

...The redhead did technically come all this way to make sure the younger man made it back.

Shanks boards, boots straining as they catch his weight on deck. He has only been aboard a marine vessel a handful of times, but all of them are always the same. Expensive wood, encumbered with sea stone. The sails an immaculate white, they taunt him, trying to prove something.

(He's never wished to entertain what.)

He's barely fast enough to latch on to Luffy's trail.

It shouldn't be surprising how Luffy is swift and efficient as he systematically dismantles the security on the navy ship. He's brutal in ways Shanks could've never associated with the ever-smiling seven-year-old he called his friend over a decade ago. He wonders if this willingness to do whatever it takes, or perhaps this disregard for morality and the law, are marine or pirate traits. The lines have always been blurry for Shanks, but they have never been murkier than when interacting with Luffy.

In their last briefing, Sanji had carelessly stated that Luffy could take the ship on his own. Shanks did not wait on the submarine, because how could he? He realizes that Luffy is an unstoppable force bursting through patrols and checkpoints like a fist through wet paper. The carefully laid protocols meant to assure the vessel's safety might as well not be there at all. Why would they work, though? Against someone who knows them intimately. Initially, the pirate expected Luffy to brute force his way into finding Marco, but nothing could've been further from the truth. Shanks, experienced and sea-worthy, feels almost clumsy compared to Luffy's measured tip-toes and impeccable timing. He finds himself hanging back to avoid tripping him up.

More intriguing than his decimation of his former colleagues is Luffy's honing on Marco's location. Shanks isn't sure how Luffy knows where he's going, vivre card nowhere in sight, but he doesn't hesitate. Twenty minutes in, they stand before the stairs to the last level of the ship. Luffy's gaze on him is focused, bordering on angry.

"We'll make a ruckus from now on." It's a warning. Shanks, still picturing Luffy's trembling form and desperate tears, feels the proclamation as it sinks into his stomach, but he nods decisively. He's not supposed to be here, and he'd initially just wanted to gauge if Luffy's really battle-ready. He has no excuse to not turn around and return to the submarine, wait out the titanic clash that is soon to come. In the palm of Luffy's hands, previously unseen to Shanks, Marco's vivre card pulls them forward.

"Don't try to hog all the fun." Luffy doesn't buy his flimsy dismissal, Shanks can tell, but the other man smiles anyway.

"Let's kick ass then." His smile is as blinding now as when he'd greeted a band of unknown pirates into his home. There's something to be said about a man who can do the things Luffy has done and still smile the smile of a child. Something good and evil, so fair it's foul.

They're stopped before they can continue.

"I don't think there'll be much of that, Straw Hat."

Shanks knows there's trouble when the presence catches him off guard; he pivots on the back of his food to turn around. Coming down through the same stairs Luffy and he had descended through is a new player. It's been a while since anyone snuck up on the redhead like that. It's an unfamiliar figure, tall and broad, with a nasty scar running down the side of his face, a trail of smoke trails his words. The marine officer might be a stranger to Shanks, but out of the corner of his eye, he can quickly tell that is not the case for Luffy.

He's suddenly really glad that he decided to stay.


'Till next week! and thank you for your continuous support.

much love,

dee