A/N: Hello, WheelofArgos here with the finale of Roger's courting. Sorry, not sorry for the angst because it was a joy to write. Starting next chapter we'll get into the aftermath of this romance.
So this is the last of the chapters I have already written at the time. I got inspiration during spring break and wrote the last two chapters after leaving this story alone a few months. I'll try to keep my momentum but I have other stories I'd like to work on and so many more obligations (my first job, set building for theater, 20 credit hours at college, and my friendships). Life is busy and crazy but that's part of what makes it beautiful.
"Good job, Garp," Senny said. "I was beginning to think you'd never find him."
Garp grunted, unwilling and unable to say anything else as she watched Roger being led on board in chains, seastone not because it weakened him but because it was the hardest to break. The marines weren't taking any chance with the Pirate King. Ironic that all their effort wasn't needed. For once, Roger wanted the same as the Government, a public execution.
"How are you?" her friend asked, side-eying her. Garp supposed Senny expected her to be exactly the opposite that she was, given that she'd finally caught Roger. She wondered if he'd be right had Garp captured the man that first night in the cave. Probably not, since he admitted he would've surrendered after fighting to a standstill as they had if Garp tried to arrest him instead of sitting at the fire. It was weird to realize things could have gone so differently.
"Tired," she told her friend. For all she trusted Senny for orders and in battle, the past year, like her ongoing calls to her son, was not something she could tell him. First and foremost, Senny was a marine. First and foremost, Garp was a Monkey D.
Garp focused on her haki, on the shield that used her own monstrous strength to hide her precious treasure. She needed to keep it up for the next few months, then…
Right now, she had to talk with Tsuru.
"What's Tsuru assignment?" she asked, turning away from the sight of the soldiers trying to force Roger below deck, unable to move him but for him going willingly. Would he see the sun again before the day he died?
"She's stationed at Marineford," he replied. "Doing her best even with all the paperwork."
Garp huffed a laugh. Tsuru had danced that dance for years. A good number of the dragons' yes-marines were so obedient because it covered their own corruption. The Great Ones' lackadaisical orders to keep those compliant marines in uniform ended with Tsuru, with her judicial record of success, often inundated with paperwork to keep her busy. She then used the paperwork to find evidence of more corruption, resulting in a vicious cycle that kept her off the field more often than not.
"Think I could get a few weeks with her?" she asked. Garp knew Senny wanted her to stay as guard detail for the Pirate King but… she just couldn't. She didn't know what she would do if she saw another moment of Roger in chains.
"I'm sure I could spin the Great Ones some story, have them thinking it'd be better to have the Hero close by in case Gol's allies decided to take revenge," Senny agreed quietly. Garp wondered how bad she looked, for her friend to acquiesce despite the serious hole it poked in security. The greater threat of attack by Roger's allies laid where the man was, yet Senny wasn't even protesting her absence.
Garp wouldn't look this horse in the mouth, however, and headed for her ship with a nod at Senny. Her soldiers congratulated her on capturing the Pirate King while Bogard stood silently by her side. She ordered the ship to head for the Red Line, trusting Senny to have everything settled by the time it arrived.
. . .
"You better not have eaten all my chocolates, Garp," Tsuru scolded the moment she caught sight of the vice admiral in her chair.
"Tsuru!" a smile broke out across Garp's face, feeling unnaturally stiff after the last few days. She subtly returned the box of truffles she'd just grabbed back to its drawer. "Good to see you, my friend!"
"And you as well," Tsuru's face softened, though Garp had no doubts she would be receiving the check to replace the half drawer of chocolates she had gotten to before Tsuru arrived. Though for now the pink-haired woman's expression turned probing, "Capturing the Pirate King is quite the accomplishment."
Farewell, smile. "Yeah, well…"
"You had been on his trail for a while."
"Hmm"
"I hadn't heard from you in over half a year."
Garp sighed, remembering that conversation well.
Tsuru took the visitor's chair, sending out a pulse of Kenbunshoku to sense anyone nearby. She must have been satisfied, because she leaned forward onto the desk and addressed Garp, "What happened? First the call on new year's and now you're turning in Roger to be executed. Talk to me, Garp."
Assured by her friend, Garp allowed herself to relax a little, just enough that Tsuru in front of her could feel the secret she hid from everyone else. Tsuru had continued to observe their surroundings with Kenbunshoku, so she noticed right away.
"Garp, what…" Tsuru paused her surprise, taking a good look at her friend. "Oh Garp."
"He's sick, Tsuru," Garp whispered, knowing that Tsuru's office, with Tsuru in it, was one of the most secure places in the world. "Been sick for years and wants to go on his own terms."
"This wasn't a one-night stand, was it," Tsuru asked, but it wasn't a question.
Garp answered anyway, "No, it wasn't. The guy f(92 6)king courted me! I'd be half convinced he got over his stupid crush and he'd start talking about me like I was the Empress of Amazon Lily. But he didn't treat me different, he'd still fight me like a rival, pound me into the dirt as soundly as I pounded him. He was so careful, not a single intimate touch even though he clearly wanted to, leaving everything up to me, and I… I kissed him first."
"How far along are you?" Tsuru questioned, gratefully not saying anything about Garp's fling with the Pirate King. Garp didn't feel ready to talk about it, not when she didn't even have a plan to keep her son safe (she had noticed her baby's gender a few weeks earlier).
"About three months," she replied, knowing the day she'd felt that tiny life form within her but not bothering to spare the energy on figuring out what day it was now.
"I just want to be sure, but do you want to-"
"I'm keeping him!" Garp cut Tsuru's question off, having heard too much of the same from other officers during her first pregnancy. The life inside her was her child; it didn't matter how it would change her life or how much danger they would be in if the father was ever known, she was keeping him. Her anger at Tsuru's query quickly faded, however, because Tsuru was the one who'd never asked it over 30 years ago, when they'd both been officers with much more of their futures to lose. She knew Tsuru's thoughts were circling around the World Government laws and navy codes that would condemn Garp if the truth ever came to light, regardless of her service and popularity among the people.
"I figured," Tsuru said, a small, apologetic smile cracking her stoic mien. "Do you have a plan?" Garp felt something in her chest loosen, that small part of her that worried over how Tsuru would react, if her friend would have her back or turn her in. She felt like she could breathe a little more, now that she had an ally.
"Don't let anyone find out?" she tried, squirming under Tsuru's critical stare.
Tsuru sighed, "Right, no plan. I expected this." She shooed Garp out of her seat and lowered herself onto the unassumingly soft cushions, then leaned forward to brace her elbows on the desk. She eyed Garp, making her sit at attention like a new recruit.
"You're not wrong," Tsuru said. "But what do you think that means?"
"Say it's another Dragon," was her answer, because even Garp hadn't thought 'Don't tell anyone' would cut it.
"In most circumstances, that would be the ideal plan," Tsuru responded.
"I'm sensing a but here…" Garp prompted.
"But that won't work here," Tsuru gladly provided.
"Why not?"
"Think about it, darling. You're too far along to say it didn't happen while chasing Roger. Anyone who puts two and two together, not that there's too many of them, will be suspicious. And it's not just the Government we have to keep this from."
"Would Senny really…" Garp didn't finish, unsure if she wanted an answer.
Tsuru frowned, a touch of sad guilt pooling in her eyes. "I think there's a reason neither of us have told him you keep contact with Dragon, why he became Fleet Admiral while we refused promotion. I honestly don't know what he'd do if he knew, and for you and my future nephew, I'm not risking it. Considering you came to me, it's the same for you, isn't it?"
Now it was Garp's turn to sigh, "Yeah, you're the first to know outside of… you know, though Bogard just knew."
"Then, you agree," Tsuru said, eyes heavy. "That no one can know this child exists."
"Tsuru!" Garp exclaimed because she very much hadn't thought that. As a mother, she wanted to shout from the rooftops, let everyone know about her son as she had with Dragon. But to keep her child a secret…?
"Garp," Tsuru ordered. Garp stalled meeting her eyes, because Tsuru's tone told her that if she listened, she would be convinced without room for argument or compromise. Garp had seen the same happen many times, often with herself or Senny. But prolonging only works so long, and Tsuru had long mastered patience. When their eyes finally met, she continued. "There's too much circumstantial evidence, evidence we can't hide because stories of your year-long search for the Pirate King have already reached the papers. If anyone learns you're expecting, your kid will be in danger. Keeping him secret it the best way to keep him safe."
Garp frowned, actually thinking about any way to keep her son safe and be able to claim him as hers. Inspiration struck her like a lightning bolt. "If the issue's that I got knocked up on Roger's tail, how 'bout I hold off popping him out till that doesn't seem the case!"
Tsuru blinked once, twice, sat there in stunned silence for a good five seconds. All at once, she moved, using every inch of her smaller frame to lean over the desk and grip Garp's shoulders tightly, "No! Jones's curse, don't do that, Garp!"
"But it's perfect," Garp argued, gaining confidence in her own ingenious idea. "I'd just have to keep him in an extra three months, plus one or two more to be good. Not even Senny would think he's Roger's!"
"He might not be yours at that point!" Tsuru shouted, a desperation in her voice that pulled Garp from her planning. Garp looked at her closest friend and realized that fear swam in her eyes. Garp had never seen Tsuru afraid, not when she couldn't punch the source of that fear.
"Neptune, help me, because I don't doubt that you could pull it off." Tsuru released Garp and slumped back into her seat, leaning her weight on her forearms like nothing else was keeping her up. "But Garp, keeping a baby in is an impossible feat already. Add that to giving birth and you might not survive."
"But I was fine soon after having Dragon," Garp protested.
"It's medically proven mothers don't remember the worst of labor. I helped you give birth, Garp; I remember. You were fine because you have an insane recovery rate. You'd be fighting your own body for months, constantly, and then put it through that. Recovery only works if you don't die from the wound."
"But-" Garp couldn't think of anything to refute Tsuru with.
"Please, Garp. Don't take the chance of making your kid an orphan."
Garp hung her head. "Okay," she told her friend. "But then what can I do?"
"You'll have to request time off," Tsuru said, straightening up, plans swirling behind her eyes. "Cash in all those vacation days you've never taken. Get out of the public eye before you start to show. At least a year, six to finish and another six until he won't need to be breastfed. Is there anyplace, anyone you could go to who won't snitch, who could care for him when you're back on duty?"
"Dawn Island," Garp answered, feeling a little redeemed given she's at least thought of this.
"Trina's getting a little to old to handle a baby and the bar, isn't she?" Tsuru asked, talking of the motherly bartender who'd civilized Garp and been Dragon's primary caretaker. She was in her eighties now, still stubbornly serving drinks with a bad back and various other conditions of age. No one in Foosha expected her to make it another two years, so Garp estimated death might finally get her in five.
"Naw, she's already got little Makino tripping her up," Garp responded, thinking fondly of the eight-year-old. She'd been the quaint village's generational tragedy, losing both parents at two when they were out fishing to a sudden storm. Trina had taken her in and no one had had the spine to argue. "I was thinking Dadan could keep him alive." She considered that, "The forest would be a better place to hide him, too."
"Dadan," Tsuru said flatly. "Am I correct in assuming this is the same Dadan who runs a gang of bandits on the mountain, who you refuse to imprison because she ran around with Dragon when they were kids."
"Yep, that's her."
"And you want her to raise your kid?"
"Well, I want to raise him, but you convinced me otherwise," Garp pouted, feeling that she deserved some childishness. With Dragon, she had been able to dip into maternity leave and other privileges to visit him a few times a year; she would be grasping at straws to get even half as many visits this time.
"Is there anyone else you can think of, Garp?" Tsuru pleaded. "Anyone?"
"What's bad about Dadan?" Garp defended. "She takes good care of her men and only kills when necessary."
"And she'll raise your son like a bandit!" Tsuru exclaimed. "The Government might as well roll over and beg. If Trina wasn't too old, she'd be perfect, with her stubbornness she may as well be related to you."
Garp's eyes widened, Tsuru's words causing a light to go off. The judicial queen, Tsuru caught it. "Did you think of something?" she asked. Garp didn't take the doubt in her voice personally.
"I have some relatives living on an island in South Blue," Garp mentioned casually, unaware of the slight meltdown her words were causing her friend. "Well, just one now."
"There's another Monkey running around?" Tsuru asked, breathless horror escaping her mouth. Garp thought she could only make Senny sound like that.
"Nah, she's on my mother's side," Garp waved her hand. Tsuru heaved a sigh of relief, soon adopting a contemplative expression.
"I thought you didn't know your parents," she asked, question within her statement.
"I didn't," Garp affirmed. "I got stationed there and this lady walked up to me, asking for my mother's name. Told her I had no idea so she asked for mine. When I said, she up and hugged me; I nearly tossed her to the ground. Turns out she was my mom's older sister and I looked enough like her to recognize even though she ran away decades ago with a sailor. Both her and her kid have passed, but she's got a granddaughter still there. Should be in her mid-twenties now."
"Can you trust her?" Tsuru asked. "Can you trust her with this?"
Garp thought for a moment, then nodded. "Yeah, I can."
"Perfect," Tsuru smiled. "Guess you have a vacation spot."
. . .
"Yo, Senny!" Garp called as she busted through the wall right next to the door. Honestly, Garp didn't understand why people used doors; they made it more difficult to exit a building in case of emergency. She never needed them growing up and she certainly didn't need them now. But contemplating the stupidity of doors was for later, she had a mission to complete.
"Garp," Sengoku forced between gritted teeth. "The door. Is right. There."
"I know," Garp told her longtime friend, wondering why he thought she would use it after decades of destroying his wall.
Sengoku sighed, because even if he hadn't learned to give up on Garp using his door, he'd given up on lecturing her about it. "What do you want?"
'Stuffed jalapeños,' she almost said, because this baby had been making her crave spicy food
"I want to take a vacation," she said, sticking a finger in her ear to keep the rest of her from fidgeting. Garp was bad at lying, but she was better at protecting. "When could I get a year off?"
Garp waited as Sengoku turned pale, then red, an impressive shade of purple, finally forcing his face to a normal color; she had a lot of patience with this, much practice. In the end, all he could choke out was "Why?"
Garp shrugged, "Haven't since Dragon left. With Roger not on the seas I figured I could take some time, visit some family in South Blue." She watched Sengoku for his reactions but didn't know what to make of his shellshocked horror.
"You… have other relatives?" He asked, mirroring Tsuru's response.
"Yeah," she replied. What was with her friends about her having family?
"There are more Monkeys running amuck?!" he whispered.
It didn't really feel like a question for her but she answered anyway, "No, she's from my mom's side." Sengoku slumped like a puppet with its strings cut, muttering gratitudes under his breath. Garp wondered if she should start feeling insulted.
"So when can I take some leave?" Garp brought the conversation back on track.
"You've never asked for leave without a kid to visit," Sengoku mused. Garp carefully kept her posture loose, second checking that her haki shield was going strong. "How come you're asking now?"
"I just said, didn't I?" Garp reminded her friend. She wasn't concerned he might be going senile early because Senny had always been like this, asking pretty much the same question and thinking he'd get a different answer. "I want to visit some family, maybe head over to Dawn to see Trina and little Makino." Garp remembered Tsuru telling her the best lies came from truth. "I just need some time."
"A year?"
"If I'm taking some time, might as well take a year. Come on, Senny, I know I got that much stocked up."
Garp could see the moment Sengoku caved in, his shoulders slumping and a softness entering his eyes. Over the years of duty, all three of them had grown closer, so much that Garp saw them as her siblings. She hated having to lie to Sengoku, but she had no other choice.
"Leave doesn't work that way," he muttered sourly under his breath. To Garp he said, "Fine, but wait until Gol's dealt with. I've got orders for the both of us to ensure it goes smoothly."
Garp smiled, in victory and to hide the hurt Sengoku's words caused, and agreed.
"When's he being executed?"
"In two weeks."
. . .
"So, when are we moving to Loguetown?" Garp asked Sengoku, petting Ari with one hand while munching on sriracha rice crackers with the other. She muffled a snort when she remembered Sengoku threatening her with the spicy flavor oh so long ago in that cave; now she ate them near constantly. It kept Sengoku from taking them in retaliation for decades of stealing his rice crackers.
"Three days before the scheduled date," Sengoku answered absentmindedly as he focused on the pile of paperwork in front of him. It was times like these that Garp thanked the seas for Bogard and his willingness to do almost all the paperwork. Sengoku didn't argue what could be considered dereliction of duty because Garp completing paperwork was sometimes worse than her not filing it at all. Don't ask how.
That meant four days until Roger was moved to his final destination. It was a sort of bittersweet irony that Roger's life would end where it began.
Garp stifled a yawn, thinking she should soon go back to her quarters and take a small nap. Fortunately, this pregnancy wasn't giving her morning sickness like Dragon's had – if anyone noticed, it would have been difficult to explain why the Hero of the Marines was throwing up – but it was making her more exhausted. Good thing she had a reputation for taking naps.
All her exhaustion disappeared, replaced by adrenaline when a strong presence came into her range. She looked at Sengoku, and he met her gaze equally alarmed. They exited Sengoku's office, Garp leaving through the hole she'd made on her way in, and headed for the exit. Before they reached outside, a marine – his patches identifying him as a commodore from West Blue – ran up to them, quickly saluting before repressing his hand over a bleeding slash wound on his arm.
"Sirs!" he reported. "Shiki the Lion is on a rampage in the town! We need assistance!" Garp cursed.
"Get to the infirmary, soldier," Senny ordered as they ran past. "We'll handle this."
In moments, they reached the town. It was a massacre.
In that short time, Shiki had decimated an entire army. He looked enraged, shouting at the soldiers he was killing. "… wimps like you could capture Roger! You wanna kill him? Bring him here and I'll kill him myself!"
Sengoku stepped forward, barely restraining his rage as he pulsed his haki to draw Shiki's attention. Garp stayed back, knowing that he needed to make contact first. As Fleet Admiral, Sengoku had dealt with the widescale destruction Shiki's armada had caused before and after Roger thinned them out. He had given her orders to capture Roger that had come from above, but to bring in Shiki was something Sengoku had worked for a long time.
"Shiki," he growled, voice resonating with the unconscious use of his devil fruit. "You are under arrest for charges of piracy, murder, theft, assault of navy soldiers, anarchism, rebellion against the World Government, and many, many other crimes. Cease your aggression and come quietly or we will use force."
"My old friend Sengoku," Shiki mocked, dropping the soldier in his hand. Garp could not feel life from the man's corpse. "Just the man I was looking for. I hear you have Roger in custody, primed for execution. Bring him out and I'll save you the trouble."
"If you expect me to comply with the demands of a pirate," Sengoku retorted, taking his usual stance. "Then you're sorely mistaken. I will not give Roger the chance to escape through defeating you. Within a week, he will be executed in Loguetown, the Town of Beginnings. The fall of the King will send a message to all who sail under the skull and crossbones, that their time is coming to an end. A new age is beginning."
"You intend to end the Legend of the Pirate King, Roger in the East Blue, the weakest sea?!" Shiki shouted, anger and indignance clouding his face. "There are no limits to how far you'd go to insult his legacy, are there? I expected no less from navy dogs."
Oh, so Shiki was brining Garp's home sea into this, was he?
"The East Blue is not the sea of the weak, but of peace," Garp said, stepping forward to stand with her friend. That peace was what allowed its people not to be strong, but it could hardly be called weak when people like Roger and herself came from its waters. "Loguetown is a fitting grave for Roger, to end his journey where it began." Roger had told her himself that if he could die anywhere, he'd like it to be his hometown. He found it poetic. It seems the Government thought the same.
"The Lady Marine," Shiki drawled, hate dripping from his wide mouth. "Your strength is respectable, but I never understood what Roger saw in you. He spoke of you highly and here you are, leading him to his death."
Garp didn't rise to Shiki's baiting. It was what a cunning man like he wanted and what Garp didn't want; she knew the biggest threat to her secret was her own mouth. Sengoku continued the back-and-forth, unwittingly saving Garp from having to respond.
"This execution will happen," Sengoku stated. "We will not allow you to interfere. The only fight you'll get is with the jailors of Impel Down."
"If you won't cooperate, I'll find Roger myself," Shiki warned, a flick of his finger causing corpses and pieces of rubble to float. Garp snarled, mentally promising the brave men that she and Sengoku would defeat Shiki quickly and lay them to rest.
By the time the Golden Lion was shipped off to Impel Down in seastone cuffs, half of the town was destroyed, victim of the fuwa fuwa no mi's landscape altering ability and the traces of their battle. Rescue and restoration efforts began immediately, the dead steadily increasing. After identification, they were taken out on ships and returned to the sea with a full navy sendoff. For the four days Garp remained at Marineford, she assisted in the clearing and reconstruction of the town, listening to the echoes of gunfire.
. . .
Four hours remained till Roger's execution. The stand was already set up, built of metal so it could last as a symbol of the Pirate King's end. The crowd continued to grow, stretching into the streets past the plaza as marine squadrons served as security, patrolling the perimeter and keeping the crowd back a ten-meter radius around the platform. Garp saw a flash of red next to blue and ignored it.
Senny had already told her she wasn't on any set patrol but to keep an eye out for any trouble. She had spotted a number of up-and-comers, including her own son, but none of the major players, no one who might attempt to free Roger. She wondered if it was because so much navy strength was here to prevent such an event or because they didn't want to see Roger die.
Garp couldn't decide if she wanted time to stop or for everything to be over. The past few weeks, she stared at the mirror every morning, assuring herself her stomach had yet to show. She was going on four months; it would start soon. For the past two months she'd had to bind her chest, breasts swelling with milk. Tsuru had sent a binder, which helped a lot. But Garp was pushing the line; too much longer and she'd have to leave, vacation or not. Every day, her baby's life felt a little stronger and Garp promised to protect him all over again.
All day, her crackers had sat in her desk drawer, untouched. It wasn't that Garp wasn't hungry – she was always hungry – but she couldn't force anything down her throat. Even water felt like it was being shoved through a clogged pipe. Each heartbeat was the ticking of a clock.
She needed to see Roger.
She sensed Sengoku in his office, distracted by his never-ending paperwork. Knowing her friend, he would be absorbed until two hours before the execution, at which time he'd shift that focus to ensuring Roger was secure and everything was proceeding smoothly. To be working on paperwork at all meant he trusted his men and herself to hold the fort until then. The idea of using that trust to see Roger one last time made guilt ripple through her chest, but it did nothing to diminish the feeling that she needed this.
She knew from Senny's rants and mumbles about security that Roger was being held in a solitary cell outfitted with seastone. Two guards, both with alarm dendens, stood sentry at the entrance but none were stationed inside. Sengoku wanted no chance someone sympathetic to Roger could sneak in. Designated highly ranked officers personally selected by the Fleet Admiral delivered meals at morning and night, which weren't needed anymore.
She relieved the two men stationed of their duties for a half hour to get a lunch break, who quickly agreed and left the cell unguarded but for herself. Probing the area with kenbunshoku, she waited until sensing the two men happily enter the mess hall then opened the door. It led to a small hallway, along one side of which were cell bars. She walked down the hallway and faced the prisoner inside the cell.
It had been a month since she last saw him, healthy as a horse as he was led off in chains expect for those who knew where to look. His captivity had affected him: he looked paler and his shoulders slumped more than before. Garp also noticed the tremors in his hands and the slight sunkenness to his cheeks, though that could be from the two normal-sized meals he got daily. For D's, that was not enough. Sengoku knew this, so Garp knew it had been a deliberate measure to weaken Roger in the chance he did escape.
But all this did not dim Roger's smile when he saw her.
"Garp!" he exclaimed, keeping his voice at a normal level. "It's been ages since I last saw you!" Inside his cage, outside of anyone's view but Garp's, he tilted his head in an unasked question.
"It's been a month," she answered, shaking her head to say no one was watching or listening.
"That's too long, Amazon," he said. He had tried numerous names for her over his courtships, most of which were rejected soundly. He knew this one, which he'd come up with after she'd told him the Kuja Empress had appointed her an honorary member of their tribe whether she'd agreed or not (she had), was her favorite.
"We went longer before a year ago," she said in reply. Coming had been a mistake, Garp thought, but her feet wouldn't move.
"We did," Roger agreed. "But we didn't have then what we have now."
Garp breathed in sharply through her nose, holding her breath before letting it out slowly, under control. She could feel her baby, his life pulsing with each beat of his heart.
"Talk to me, Garp," Roger asked, because not once had he ever tried to take away her choice. Always asking, requesting, explaining, never ordering. Never trying to make her someone she wasn't.
"I got a year of leave," she started, because she knew he worried about her and the baby. Not because he thought she wasn't strong enough, but because some things can't be solved with fists. "Going to visit Rogue. Tsuru came up with the idea. I'll… I'll have to return to duty once he's eating but I'm sure I can visit at least every year, say I'm visiting Rogue. No one knows except Tsuru and Bogard, not even Senny."
"Thank you," Roger said, and it was so, so warm. "Thank you for fighting me all these years, thank you for listening to me all those months ago, thank you for giving me a chance, thank you for sharing your heart, warmth, and mind, thank you for dealing with my selfishness, thank you for telling me, thank you for being there for him. Would you grant me a final favor?"
"What?"
"Tell him I love him. And if he asks how, tell him it's because I love his mother."
"Did you practice that?" she asked even as she nodded. Roger's compliments had been more stilted than that, crafted from his thoughts as soon as he thought them.
"A little," he admitted.
"You knew I'd come?" Garp hadn't known she'd come!
"Hoped it," Roger corrected. "I'm not that good at kenbunshoku."
Garp sighed, half-kneeling half-falling to lean against the bars. Roger mirrored her, creating a space between them that was only for them.
"Why do you have to be dying?" she whispered, knowing Roger couldn't give an answer.
"I guess that's something I'll have to ask whoever's in charge in the afterlife," he chuckled, smiling like the buffoon he was.
"Stop smiling!" she ordered, making a sour face at him. "You're going to die in a few hours!"
"Ah, but you see, my dear," he replied, wagging his finger back and forth dramatically. "I've lived. I've seen the deepest depths and highest skies, traveled the farthest reaches of the wildest sea, learned secrets guarded by people and centuries of ruins. I've built a crew up from a fisherman and his boat and celebrated as they found their dreams. I've fought grand battles and earned the respect of the strongest of men and women. I fell in love with the greatest of women, so great that she accepted my love. Together, we have a son. My only regret is that my life must end before I meet him, but I know you'll love him for the both of us. I've lived, Garp, and that is why I can die with a smile."
Garp pulled Roger between the bars, crashing their mouths together. Into their last kiss, she whispered three words.
. . .
When the sun was at its highest, the life of the Pirate King ended. Garp, watching from the roof of a building surrounding the square, felt Roger's desert sun disappear. She tore her focus away from the void to the firelight inside her womb and turned away. She knew Sengoku would return his body to the sea, for he gave even enemies that respect. Garp had to go. She did not have the time for tears, not here.
And for the third of my headcanons: Garp's kenbunshoku haki works in that she feels people's life signatures as a sort of mental touch. Here's a small list of what some characters feel like to her: Roger, the desert sun; Ace, like holding your arm close to a fire; Luffy, the crisp but warm autumn sun; Sabo, a crashing wave with warm spray but cool undercurrent; Makino, a dew-covered leaf; Tsuru, cool wood; Dadan, beer foam; Rogue, a velvety rose; Sengoku, cool gold.
Please feel free to comment, especially about your opinions on the characterization of female Garp and with suggestions for future events. So much of this story is still unplanned!