You set fire to my heart

by ibraamal43

Zeldris was looking for his elder brother Meliodas. Meliodas is the crown of the demon realm and was said to take the Thorne and become Demon king but he has been missing for about a month with no leads to where he has a gown. But the only his knows is that his lover Elizabeth has to with him going missing. So Zeldris goes to Edinburgh because he can't find goddess Elizabeth...

3. 1

"Would you come with me?"
Makino blinked, taken so aback by the question she almost dropped her hand from his. Her voice sounded breathless when she said, "Please don't joke about—"
"I'm perfectly serious."
And as she took in the set of his brows and the gaze that had seized hers, steady as steel, she found that he was, in fact, entirely serious.
Her heart leaped in her chest, and she gaped, at a complete loss of how to respond. And so staggering was her surprise that when she finally managed to locate her voice, what fell from her lips wasn't the familiar, teasing title, but something else entirely.
"Shanks—"
"There's room on my ship," Shanks continued, the earnestness of the offerstrengthenedby the fact that he wasn't even pointing out that she'd let his name slip. "It would be my bunk, but you're already familiar with that.And the guys wouldn't mind. As far as they're concerned, you're already one of us. All that's missing is for you to join us."
Still gaping, Makino didn't know what to say. She honestly hadn't considered it, in all their time together. She'd known he would be leaving, but even a closet-adventurer at heart, she'd never once entertained the idea of actually going with him—or that he'd ask her, for that matter.
"Speechless?" Shanks asked, smiling now. "It's good to know I've still got it."
She shook her head, scrambling to collect herself, and her thoughts. "I—"
When she couldn't muster a reply, Shanks' smile softened. "What do you say, my girl?" Her heart skipped at the endearment; her favourite among the many he'd given her. She felt his grip on her hand tighten, and heard how rough his voice sounded when he asked her,"Are you up for a real adventure?"
She considered her hand in his; the thick fingers tucked around her own, scars and sword-callouses over her gentler ones, wrought from her small, land-bound labours. She couldn't imagine what a life like his would make of that hand, never having held a weapon, or even a ship's rope. She had no way of knowing if she'd be cut out for it—a seafaring life, let alone a pirate's.
She thought of the bar that had been left in her care, and the quiet, day-to-day routines she could do in her sleep. The rows of glasses gleaming in the sunlight, stacked behind the counter, and the row of bottles, not a speck of dust in sight. Little cares taken, to keep her home tidy and her hands busy.
And her life was one of quiet, of routines, and ofsafety.Or at least it had been, before he'd showed up and filled the quiet; before he'd disrupted her routines with lazy morning kisses, always tempting her to stay a little longer, her once-restless hands too preoccupied to even remember glasses that needed polishing, or shelves that needed dusting. And the life he promised her now didn't promise safety.
But it promised him, and for all that she'd never been one for following her gut, at least not with the ease that Shanks did, Makino found herself doing it now—choosing, when the choice was put before her. And even a turbulent, seafaring life seemed an easy truth to swallow, with the prospect of facing it with him.
Raising her eyes from their hands, Makino sought his, calm and assessing where they held her from across the counter. Eyes that had seen the far corners of the world, and all the seas between them, but that looked at her now as though nothing could have mattered less than her, and the answer she'd yet to give him.
And watching him, she found it, settling in the lull between one steady heartbeat and the next. And she saw as realisation alighted across his face, delighted and so terriblyhopefulas she drew a breath and said—
"Okay."
The crew's reactions ranged from poorly-feigned surprise to unabashed delight, and Makino had a mind to wonder if this had been in the workings long, finding a glass pushed into her hands before Shanks had even finished making the announcement, followed by more than one promise that the sea didn't know what she was in for.
But even with their collective cheer and celebration filling up her bar, she couldn't seem to shake the clinging nervousness, wondering suddenly what she'd gotten herself into. All she'd ever heard of the sea had come from these people, after all, and she'd revelled in the stories, safe behind the counter of her bar. Now that she was going with them, all the danger that awaited them also awaited her, and for the life of her, Makino couldn't picture herself fitting into any of the stories they'd told her.
"Nervous?" Ben asked, after she'd spent a little too long staring into her drink.
She wasn't surprised that he'd noticed that something was off, or that he'd known exactly what it was. And it wasn't because she was a terrible liar that she said it, but because this was her crew now, and they deserved her honesty, including whatever doubts she'd bring with her.
And so, "A little," Makino admitted, raising her eyes from her glass.
Ben didn't smile, but something in his gaze softened a bit. "It's not a small decision you've made."
She laughed a bit at that. "No," she agreed, worrying her fingers around the tumbler in her hand. She hadn't taken a single sip, afraid it would all come back up. "It's not."
"Is he worth it?"
She didn't even have to look to find her answer, and with it, the certainty that had moments before been slipping between her fingers. But then she thought Ben might have known, and that he hadn't asked out of curiosity or lack of understanding, but because he'd already anticipated the answer, and what Makino would find in speaking it.
And looking at him now, she found her smile reflected in the barest curl of his lip, and knew that he found her gratitude in her expression, as bared as all her other feelings tended to be.
From across the room, she caught Shanks' laughter, the warm pool of it in her stomach sharper than the drink as it chased down the back of her throat, both leaving her a little lightheaded, but her smile didn't waver as she put her glass down with a steady hand, the calm waters of her drink settling, along with her resolve.
"More than worth it."
Next time, we're setting sail for the Grand Line, Shanks had told her, standing at the docks to see them off, in the tranquil spell of a gentle afternoon with the sun dipping towards the sea, the light touching the corners of his smile as it had stretched along the words.Are you ready?
She'd felt the tremor of anticipation at the question, watching the horizon behind him and knowing that the next time he stepped off the docks of her quiet port and onto his ship, she'd be going with him.
But even if she couldn't quite wrap her head around it yet, just what it would mean for her to do that, her heart hadn't even stuttered in her chest as she'd tucked her fingers around his, and said, calmly:I'll be ready.
He'd hid his smile against her knuckles, but he hadn't made a point of tempering his joy, worn without shame the way he wore all his feelings, and when he'd pulled her in for a kiss she hadn't felt his departure in it but his return—and more than that, the promise that insofar as parting kisses went, it would be their last.
And she hadn't known what awaited her when they returned next, but she'd prepared as best she could, arranging to leave her tavern in good hands, and seeing to small, private matters. She had no way of knowing what the sea would demand, but there wasn't anything more for her to do than face it, whatever it turned out to be.
The loss of his arm was beyond any of their predictions.
It ranked at the very top of the most terrifying experiences of her life, although they were few, and desperately kind things compared to the heart-sickening feeling of sitting on her hands as the long hours dragged by, and there was no word on his condition. And like her fear that he wouldn't make it, the relief when his survival had been declared a certainty had been without equal.
And she'd been so caught up in it—had been so busy feeling relieved that she hadn't lost him, Makino hadn't even thought to anticipate the question when it was offered, sitting by his bunk and with his only remaining hand caged safely between her own.
"Still sure you want to come with me?" Shanks asked, and she might have been tempted to accuse him of teasing, if it hadn't been for the look on his face. And maybe whatever Doc had given him for the pain had loosened the few inhibitions he had left, prompting a question that he might not have allowed himself if he'd been in complete control of his faculties.
But he had asked it, and he watched her now, waiting for her answer. And Makino was surprised to find that the expression that met her wasn't one that anticipated what it would be. In fact, he looked to be bracing himself for what it might well be.
And with a man that confident,thatwas difficult for her to come to terms with. "Did you think I'd change my mind?" she asked. "Because of the arm?"
He tried to shrug, but the pain that chased across his expression cut the gesture short, and he sank against the pillows she'd propped behind his back. "I don't like making assumptions," was all he said.
The words escaped with a breath, "Fool man." She gripped his hand, and watched as the pressure caught his attention, dragging it back from the haze of pain that had tried to claim it. "You'll have to try a little harder if you want to get rid of me."
Her attempted levity was ruined by the tears she was struggling to hold back, wrapping her voice in a sob, and the quip fell with awkward weight between them.
But instead of offering a joke of his own to salvage the attempt, Shanks only matched her honesty with his, and Makino couldn't tell if it was the medicine's doing now, or something else. "And here I was trying my hardest for the opposite," he said, before the corner of his mouth tugged upward. "Although I see how the sea king could cause some confusion."
The sob that fell from her held a laugh, and she pressed the heel of her hand to her eyes. But his humour was a desperately welcome thing, after having spent so many hours suffering that yawning void ofsilencethat had followed him losing consciousness on the docks.
And even with the physical assurance of his wellbeing, felt in the strong grip of his fingers around her own, Makino sought it in his presence as well; that familiar, warm-bright sensation that was only a little more subdued than usual.
"You're tired," Shanks said then, the hand wrapped around hers tightening, but Makino shook her head.
"It's just been a long day."
"You're telling me. I don't even know what time it is."
Makino knew, but then she'd been counting the hours, but she kept from mentioning that, and scrambled to distract herself from the fact by worrying his fingers between her own.
"I had so many plans for today," Shanks mused then, drawing her eyes back up. "So much for that."
Despite her attempts at holding her tears back, she felt her smile tremble a bit. "Plans?"
It was hard telling if the grin he shot her was due to the pain or the medicine, but the slightly delirious slant to his mouth gave her an idea of what was coming, even before he said, "All of them included you. Some were very creative." He raised his brows. "Just a few included an actual bed."
Her laugh shuddered out. And oh, she wastired, but she'd endure the exhaustion twice over for a few minutes with him awake and talking. After today, she felt like she'd never needed anything quite as much. "We'll have to do a rain-check."
"A good thing you're coming with me, then. There'll be plenty of opportunities."
And it was offered teasingly, but for some reason the playful assurance helped settle her heart in a way even his presence or the grip of his hand hadn't managed, and she drew her conviction from the promise—not just of those opportunities, but everything else that was implied in the offer, confirmed a second time now, and perhaps more for Shanks' sake than her own.
"That said, I think it's a good thing you're coming with me, period," Shanks said, with that same note of honesty that she couldn't help but wonder was just his own, or due to the painkillers. Head tilted on the pillow, he watched her, the light of the cabin's lone kerosene lamp shifting across the sharp angles of his face. "What would I do without you?"
"I can think of a number of entirely reckless things," Makino said. "But I have a feeling you'll manage that even with me around."
"Mm. That's entirely possible."
"But I'll be there to yell at you for them."
"Ben will appreciate being relieved of that particular duty."
Her hands shook where they held his, but Shanks only curled his fingers around hers, until he'd covered them whole. She very deliberately didn't look at the empty space on his left side, or the bandage cinched so tight around his chest and shoulder.
"And you'll need someone to help you button your shirts," she said, voice thick. "Although you've never really bothered with that."
He grinned, a lazy thing, although the fleeting pain gave it a sharper edge. "For you, I'd bother," he said honestly, before adding, "Although I'm surprised you'd want me to, given where your eyes tend to go when we talk. And it's not my face, I can tell you that much."
Despite the sob still lurking at the bottom of her throat, seeming one word away from falling, along with the tears she'd been holding for half a day, Makino laughed at that. "You've caught me."
"Hmm, yeah. I still ask myself how I managed that."
She wiped at her eyes, but the tears were pressing in earnest now, and she was too tired to try to keep them at bay.
"Hey," Shanks said then, the quiet utterance drawing her attention. "I just remembered another plan I had."
The look she threw him was patiently fond, although she had a feeling the tears ruined the effect somewhat. "Did this one involve a bed? It better, for your sake."
His answering grin was so bright, for a single second it banished the pain from his features. "No, but Ilovethat your mind went there."
Makino shook her head. The tears wouldn't stop coming, but she found her smile without effort. "You're a little off your game tonight," she said. "I felt I should fill in for you." A beat, and she had no idea where it came from, but before she could stop herself, "Since you won't be filling anything tonight."
Helaughedat that—then winced, and she was nearly out of her seat when he tugged her back down. She didn't bother wiping at her eyes, and despite the pain now clinging to his features, that laugh had loosened something in her chest; some tightly woven knot she hadn't realised had been there, until it wasn't anymore.
"Tempted as I am to take that as a challenge," Shanks told her then, the low rumble of his voice carrying a promise, even as the rasp of pain softened the teasing lilt a bit, "I was thinking we might do something else."
"Oh?"
Nodding to his desk, "Top drawer," he said, and Makino blinked. But when she furrowed her brows in question, all it did was make his smile widen.
"There's a parcel. Get it for me?"
One week later, they were ready to depart.
It had taken surprisingly little effort to part ways with the village that had been her home for twenty years. Although watching it from the wharf, the townhouses sitting pretty under a sky that seemed to go on forever, Makino sensed it had little to do with the actual village, and more to do with the fact thathomehad a different meaning now, not found within four walls in a safe port, but in the enclosure of a single, strong arm, and a presence that she could seek with her eyes closed.
She sought it now—picked him out from among the rest of the crew crowding the docks, and turned to find him standing further down the wharf, red hair freed from his straw hat, the colour seeming even brighter than usual, burnished from the molten sun that hung suspended above the port.
He'd recovered surprisingly quickly from his amputation, although Makino suspected his unique brand of stubbornness had a hand in it, as he was still prone to fevers if he didn't pace himself.
She made a mental note to coax him into his bunk after they'd departed, and pursed her mouth with a smile, already anticipating what his answer would be to that suggestion, something entirely too glib, but if he was tired enough he'd submit to her small nudges without too much protest, and without making too many lewd suggestions.
Then again, the latter was vastly preferable to the alternative, the thought of which brought back memories of the odd moments where he'd been too fever-wrought to even talk.
A shiver crept up her back, but she rooted her heart in the sight of him now, his own back straight, and the ease in his posture. If he was faking it he was doing a convincing job, but at least he had the strength to attempt it. And Makino didn't think he was just doing it for his own sake.
As though sensing her inspection, Shanks lifted his eyes, and the smile that found hers twisted slightly with regret. And she knew what he was asking, even as he dropped his eyes a moment later for emphasis, to the little boy with his hands pressed down over the wide brim of the straw hat, now in his keeping.
And she knew then that even if saying farewell to Fuschia had required little of her heart, saying goodbye to Luffy would not be nearly as easy.
She made to cross the docks, and caught Shanks' look as he retreated, the touch of his gaze one of familiar assurance, before he turned to make for the gangway. Leaving Makino with Luffy, stifling his sobs, the hat pulled down as far as it would go.
Sinking to a crouch, she considered the hunch of his shoulders, and the tears she could see, gathering at the corners of his mouth. He'd always been such an expressive child— like her, in so many ways, not just unable to hide his feelings, but so often entirely unashamed of them. She'd always admired that.
And watching him now, she found herself brought back seven years, to the happy baby she'd held, tucked to her chest where she'd crouched at the top of the landing as she'd eavesdropped on the conversation in the common room below; Garp's voice a low drum under the quiet, and her Mistress' rising above it, her tone a sharp cut, steel wrought from anger rather than resignation—
Left?
Yeah.
Just like that?
I don't know what to tell you, Em.
If that boy of yours was here I'd wring his neck! And what about his—
She didn't make it.
What the hell does that mean?
Garp had been silent. Makino had wondered who they'd been talking about, but,She didn't make it,Garp had repeated, evenly.
What aren't you telling me, Garp?
Garp hadn't answered, and Makino remembered thinking they'd both give her an earful if they caught her. But the baby had been quiet, busy chewing on her fingers, smile stretching, a wide, drooling thing that had no mind for the rising tension in the room below.
Then answer me this,Emiko had said, when Garp had made no move to speak.Why did you bring him here? I already have my hands full with the last one you brought me, and Dadan with the other one. Who's to take this one? Suze is out of the question, I can tell you that much.
Don't even joke about that. And hells, it's just for a little while, Em. Until I figure something out. I need to go back to Headquarters to deal with this mess.
Garp,she'd said, her voice hard.If you go back to Headquarters, who does he have left?
Makino remembered looking at the baby, that gummy smile that had looked too wide for his face stretching around her fingers, and thought, her heart calm:you'll have me.
"Luffy."
"I'mnotcrying."
The words were thick, and the tears running down his cheeks betrayed him. Makino smiled. "I know. The sun is really bright today. Brings tears to my eyes, too." She touched her fingertips to the brim of the hat. "A hat's a good thing to have, on days like this."
His shoulders shook, and when she touched her hands to them she felt his rigid posture caving, but he kept himself upright, as though from pure stubbornness alone. "I'll show you," he told her, swallowing, and his voice quavered with the vow as he added, "I'll showboth of you."
Makino felt her smile trembling, touching his cheek, and the scar curving under his eye. And her own voice shook, although with something kinder than conviction, when she said, "I know you will."
Gathering him into her arms, she held him tight, but where she'd expected another protest all she got were small arms winding around her midsection, squeezing with enough force to hold her breath captive, and when she smiled Makino felt her own tears, but didn't hold them back.
"Take care, Luffy. I'll see you on the high seas."
Luffy didn't respond to that, just muffled a wordless sound against her collar, and Makino hugged him as close as he'd come, begging forgiveness in an embrace she'd thought would one day see him off to sea, not her. But he'd make it without her, she knew.Thereshe found her conviction, even as her fingers shook where they cradled the back of his head.
But of the sea, she didn't beg anything. Instead she demanded, a silent vow wrought from the quiet surf of what had once been her home, that those same waters would one day bring him to her, safe and sound.
Because she might not know much of the sea, but she knew this: that it didn't matter how strong you were, or how cunning. The sea answered to only one thing, but wherewillwas concerned, Makino had a whole world to offer.
"Any regrets?"
She felt him stepping up beside her, and drew her eyes away from Dawn Island, now a small blot on the horizon in the distance, gleaming pewter under a low-hanging sun.
It hadn't fully sunk in yet, the choice she'd made, but it was starting to as she observed the ease with which Shanks held himself on deck; the comfort that was the livingtestimonyof years as a captain. Hers now, and in more ways than just a teasing nickname.
But, "No regrets," she said, gaze finding his, and her smile came easy despite the small discomforts that had seen her off from Fuschia.
She rubbed at her arms. With the sun sinking towards the sea-line, the air had turned cooler, although the sharp kiss of the breeze was a small mercy on her upset stomach. And of course she'd be prone to seasickness, as though her earlier vow to the sea had been accepted, but at a price. And if even the East Blue could turn her stomach, with her gentle temper…
"Just a few concerns," Makino added at length, watching the water frothing against the hull below the railing. She had no idea how long it would take them to reach the Grand Line, but had the sudden sense that she should enjoy the smooth sailing while she could.
Shanks stepped closer, a silent invitation offered, and his warmth was a welcome thing as she slipped her arms around his waist, the cloak offering respite from the chill. "How's the nausea?"
She didn't know how he'd picked up on it, but found she wasn't all that surprised. "Manageable."
She felt his arm where it curved around her back, and heard his smile now when he asked, "And the sea legs?"
Searching out that sensitive spot below his ribs, she felt his laughter, and, "Steady, so long that I stay in one place," she countered.
His hand was warm where it cupped her hip, and, "I can help with that," came the murmur. "Until you get your bearings." A kiss beneath her ear then, prompting a shiver to dance up her spine. "And then I can see about helping you lose them again."
She pressed her laughter into his shirt, but her heart felt lighter than it had, lifted by his good humour, and even her persisting nausea felt bearable with the light, soothing circles rubbed against her lower back.
Makino drew back a bit to look at him, arm and cloak still tucked around her, only to find a strange expression on his face. But before she could ask—"You're a pirate now," Shanks told her, tone musing, but his smile stretched wider at the words, as though he could follow that statement into the future, and what he found pleased him. "The Grand Line won't know what hit it."
She sighed, "You like to joke about that, but I doubt I'll make so much as a ripple."
The smile she got for that seemed prompted by something only he could see. "I'll take that bet."
Her arched brow told him what she thought aboutthat. "Aren't there enough betting pools on this ship?"
"Don't ask me—I'm not the one with the ledgers. I'm pretty sure that's Ben."
Makino shook her head, smile gently marvelling, and she wondered what the future would bring, aboard this strange ship with its rowdy crew, and the man at her side.
The thought kindled another, and her smile fell a bit. "I hadn't really thought about it," she said then, fiddling with a button on his shirt. "That being with your crew, I might—" She paused, and suddenly it was all she could think about: the fact that, even if she wouldn't cause a single ripple by herself, just being associated with Shanks' crew might well earn her a reputation. Maybe even a bounty.
Oh god."Garp is going to kill me," Makino said evenly.
She felt Shanks' arm tighten around her back. "If it helps, I'm pretty sure I rank higher than you on that list. He'll be too busy thinking up creative ways to end me to remember that he's even mad at you."
"That does help a little."
His grin widened; that ever-optimistic smile that wouldn't allow for defeat, even small, personal ones. She wondered if she'd ever cease to be amazed by it. "See? I can be very helpful," he said. "In numerous ways." He wiggled his brows, but where she might have slapped his chest for his suggestiveness, Makino found only a smile now, looking at him.
"I couldn't do this without you," she told him.
Shanks inclined his head, a single brow raised now, and his smile had a wry slant. "Don't you mean you wouldn't be doing this if it weren't for me?"
"Maybe," she said. She didn't look at the horizon behind her, but she knew Dawn Island would be out of sight now. Instead she looked at Shanks; the living, breathing embodiment of the life she'd chosen, and all that came with it. "But that's not what's important."
His look softened a bit, the wry smile exchanged with one of understanding. The hand on her hip drifted up her back, the sketch of his fingers along her spine an easy, effortless thing. "No?"
She tilted her chin, the request silent but clear, and when he bent his head to kiss her she let it take her last, remaining uncertainties, sinking out of her shoulders with a sigh, and she let him take that, too, feeling the pleased curve of his grin as he pulled her closer to deepen the kiss.
And instead of the seasickness and her unsteady legs she focused on the promise she felt in the press of him against her; the solid shape under her fingers never wavering, even as the deck under her feet shifted and swayed. One certainty that she could hinge her life on, in all its newness, and without a single shred of doubt.
"I think that if you're planning on helping me lose my bearings, I'd rather it not be out on deck," she said then, the low murmur tucked beneath the din of the busy ship. "Or the others will get a bigger show that they have already."
God, he couldlaugh, and Makino tried to remember what her life had been like without the sound of it, but came up short. Although watching Shanks, wheezing as he tried to catch his breath and yielding some of his weight for her to carry now, the realisation was anything but a loss.
He asked her to marry him before they'd even reached the Grand Line, and Makino thought that if anything was proof of what dangers awaited them, it was that: the desperately hopeful light in his eyes, tempered by the sobering weight of honesty in his voice as he told her that, whatever the sea had in store for them, he wanted to greet it with her beside him. Properly.
"Partners," he said, gripping her hands in his own, big enough to dwarf them both with ease. Behind him, the sprawling rooftops of Loguetown basked in the sun, the slanting tiles catching the light where it poured from the open sky, to spillacross the winding streets. She'd never set foot in a town this big—or atown, period. And it had been a feat dragging her eyes away when they'd stepped off the gangway.
But then Shanks had tugged at her hand, drawing her attention from the towering buildings, and under the thriving din of the docks had dropped his voice for her ears and said:marry me, Makino.
Going by the entirely knowing smiles that left them standing by the ship as the crew left to make the most of their shore leave, the only one who hadn't expected the proposal was Makino, and it had taken her a full second of just staring at him before she'd been able to manage a reply.
"Are you sure?" she asked now, even as she couldn't quite tempt her heart back from where it had leaped into her throat at the proposal, offered out of the blue, as was his way. "This is more than just asking me to join your crew. This is—'til death do us part."
"Yeah," Shanks said, not a single beat missed. The smile that had stretched across his face dared the sun to outshine it. "That's what I'm counting on." Then, a twinge sheepish, "Although hopefully, it'll be a long life together before that happens."
She was only vaguely aware of all the people around them, the milling crowd of dock-workers and sailors, and other pirates preparing to set sail for the Grand Line. What held her attention was the gentle grip of his fingers around hers, and the weight of his gaze, revealing more of the thoughts behind it than he no doubt wanted, she knew, from the look on his face.
The anticipation was the brightest, but the one she found underlying it was what made her decision—the calmer waters of his conviction, running deeper than his teasing humour suggested, but she felt it in the way he looked at her, all the way to the bottom of those calm depths.
This wasn't a decision made lightly, no matter what its out-of-the-blue offering suggested, but then he wasn't the kind of man who made his decisions without first considering all the outcomes.
She realised she hadn't spoken in a while, when Shanks said, "I didn't ask you to join my crew just because you cook a better breakfast than our chef. Or because you've somehow managed to learn how every single member of my crew prefers their coffee. And it wasn't because you keep a more organised ship's log than I've ever managed. Or that you keep better track of our supplies than even Ben does." He blinked, before his brow furrowed. "What did wedowithout you?"
At her barely-repressed smile, his grin widened, and he squeezed her fingers. "I asked you because whatever future lies ahead, I want you in it. And if you're willing, I'd want it to be as my wife."
The effortless way he said it hinted at a prospect that had been given much thought, and Makino was surprised when she mustered the voice to say, "Nothing less, huh?"
His eyes crinkled at the corners. "I don't do things by halves. Ask anyone."
She shook her head, as though to clear it. "I think you've already demonstrated that sufficiently. And then some."
His hand was warm where he'd tucked his fingers around hers, and she considered them, all their sharp contrasts, and the people they belonged to, who, although different, had more in common than their outward appearances suggested.
Because she knew his heart, as strong-feeling as the one she'd known her whole life, although hers gave quietly while his gave with loud, unabashed proclamations. And she knew his temper, a thing not easily ignited, and his sense of honour and duty, which, although manifesting in different choices and actions, weren't all that different from her own. He was bright— like the sun was bright, the kind of relentless warmth it would take nothing short of an ocean to contain; dark, quiet waters to swallow up the sunlight, to keep it.
She caught his frown then, and realised she'd been staring at him without saying anything. "Makino, if you'd rather not—"
"No," she cut him off, and wasn't surprised at the strength in her voice now, for all that it had seemed beyond her just a moment ago. "I just—you need to give me a second," she laughed, a little breathless. "I wasn't expecting a proposal when I woke up this morning."
That only made him smile, although some of the uncertainty that had bled into his eyes remained. "You know I live to keep you on your toes."
She was about to answer—something clever seemed fitting, like a soft quip about how he could now look forward to doing that for the rest of their lives. Or maybe that just sounded clever in her head, and she should go for something more heartfelt instead.
But she wasn't given the chance to decide before Shanks was saying, eyes sparking with an old joke that only managed to mellow his nervousness a little, "This might finally suffocate those murmurs of mutiny. You'll be my equal, and even Ben can't complain that he's the one doing all the captain-wrangling. Unless you decide that you'd rather have the post all to yourself." He raised his brows. "You'd get the whole bunk."
Her smile had only grown wider, and it hurt her cheeks now, looking at him. She knew he ran at the mouth when he was nervous; a rare occurrence, but the thought slipped in, an intimate detail among many that were hers, that she'd collected and treasured since those first months where all she'd known about him had been his name and his preferred drink.
And she felt a pang of regret for making him doubt what her answer would be, although it was hard holding on to it, with the rambling speech that let slip so much of all that lay behind the proposal. But Makino knew that her expression had given him her answer, from the look that had settled on his face now.
She tasted the hum on her tongue, feigning consideration. "That's a tempting thought, given that you take up the whole mattress."
"And I snore," Shanks pointed out.
"Mm. And you're too warm."
"I hog the blankets. And the pillows. Andyou."
"And you sleep completely naked."
His brows shot up at that. "This is the first complaint I'm hearing aboutthat."
Her stupid grin gave her away. "It's very distracting."
"Is that right?"
"I don't know how you expect me to get any sleep at all."
"Sounds like quite the situation you're up against," he mused. "That's a lot of things to accept for any one person."
And even if she knew he was teasing, there was a note of earnestness there, nothing to do with him as a bunkmate or his sleeping habits, but numerous, unspoken things that she found between the lines.
And so, "Maybe for some. But then," she said, softly, voice little more than a murmur, "I don't take up a lot of space. And you're too warm for me to need the blankets. We're a good match, that way."
Shanks' eyes glittered, and oh, she'd be hearing about that quip about him sleeping naked, Makino knew, and had to fight to stifle her rising blush. "That we are," he agreed.
It was far from that simple in truth, but it was a fitting description, she found, and maybe the truth didn't have to be complicated.'A good match' implied more than it suggested, after all. A heart might seek its kindred, but differences could make good matches, too, like a presence that claimed space, and one that welcomed it. And he might be loud where she was quiet, but she had a whole soul's worth of room to fill the sound, and peace to offer in turn, to a weary soul who craved it.
She looked at him then—considered him where he stood, the sun at his back, on the wharf of a strange port that she'd only ever heard about before today. This pirate that she'd only known for a year, who'd whisked her off to a life she'd never imagined for herself outside of her books, but faced with the reality of it now, on the threshold of the Grand Line and with his offer in her hands, Makino found she couldn't imagine a different life than this.
"Yes," she said. Nothing clever, and no grand declaration of her feelings; just a quiet acceptance, but she knew it was enough as his grin widened, prompting her own, and when he pulled her to him her laughter was so loud it soared above the din of the wharf, a sound almost too bright to come from her.
But then his relief was a quiet thing; a soft, laughing sigh pressed to her ear. And maybe that was the biggest testament to their match—the small things they'd imparted on each other already that hinted at a greater truth, the full scope of which it would take years yet to see in its entirety.
"I don't know what Garp is more likely to be angry about," Ben told him, twosakecups into his wedding. "That you spirited her away to be a pirate, or that you somehow convinced her to marry you."
Shanks lifted his third. The galley was awash with familiar sounds of celebration, the sheer volume of it paired with the sake and the temperature serving to make him more than a little lightheaded.
His new wife wasn't helping, the tiny shape of her a small warmth against his side, and going by the roses in her cheeks, either one or two cups ahead of him.
"The second," he said, cutting his first mate a droll look as he downed the cup. "The first doesn't imply that I spirited her into my bed." Then with a glance at Makino, who met his look with a tipsy smile that couldn't seem to decide if it wanted to be embarrassed or coy, "Although to be fair, I wasn't the one doing thespiriting."
Ben grinned around the rim of his own cup, but it was Yasopp who cut in, throwing an arm around Shanks' good shoulder, "I think Garp would appreciate that excuse as much as he'd appreciate knowing that it wasn't your bed so much as the floor of her bar."
Makino choked on her drink, before rounding on him. "Youtoldthem?"
Shanks winced, then threw a glare at Yasopp. "That is the last time I tell you anything." Makino was gaping now, but her expression seemed to have finally settled on a feeling, althoughmortifiedwasn't exactly what he'd been hoping for, today of all days.
"Don't worry, he skimped on the details," Yasopp assured her, cheerfully unaware of Shanks' plans of tossing him overboard later. He slapped him on the back then, and Shanks' drink spilled over his fingers. "And in Cap's defence, the poor bastard was pretty heartsick. Can't blame him for reminiscing."
Shanks made to reach for him, but he was quick, and he lamented his only arm when he received a cheeky grin in return, before Yasopp was making his way across the galley, to where an off-key chorus was in the midst of butchering a sea shanty too quick for drunken tongues to follow.
"Sorry," he said, the word escaping under his breath, and he saw as Makino lifted her gaze to his. Her cheeks were still flushed, but it was hard telling if it was from the drink or Yasopp's declaration. Knowing her though, probably a little of both. "I swear I didn't tell him anything incriminating."
Her expression softened a bit, the mortification giving way to that too-patient understanding he wasn't sure he deserved. "It's okay."
"You sure?"
Her eyes gleamed at that, lovely and dark in the low light. "I think it helps that I've had three of these," she said dryly, lifting what Shanks was pretty sure was her fifth cup, but he tucked that fact under his tongue, and tried not to smile too much.
He watched the bob of her throat as she drank, and it was an effort dragging his eyes away when her tongue darted out to lick her lower lip as she put the cup down. And he'd lost count of how many cups he'd had, although he had a feeling it wasn't thesakethat was making him so dizzy.
He had a mind to suggest they retreat from the party, feeling that acute, near-breathless need to touch her and knowing she wasn't comfortable with too-public displays. But something made him pause, watching her now where she considered the empty cup held between her palms, slender fingers curved around the rim and her gaze far away, as though she was seeing something other than just the bottom of her empty drink.
"Good wedding?" he asked then, and watched as her eyes lifted to his.
The combination of that smile and the bright flush to her cheeks was making it hard to concentrate, at least beyond the fact that he was hard. "Averygood wedding," Makino agreed.
"Was it far from what you'd imagined it would be?"
He didn't know where that question came from, only that it was suddenly there, pushing off his tongue, seemingly of its own volition. And it had been a running joke between them, that she might have preferred a quiet melon farmer for a husband, and the life that came with him. That although his arrival in her life had invoked more than one of her favourite romances, the real thing had subverted her expectations somewhat.
But he couldn't help it now, watching her, newly married but her wedding amounting to little more than a simple exchange of vows before a Loguetown magistrate who hadn't asked questions, and a party that was still ongoing. No pretty dress, just a loose shirt and trousers, the former one of his, and although the sight kept threatening to claim his breath every time he looked at her, Shanks had the thought that, insofar as every woman's dream went, it was probably vastly off the mark.
Makino shrugged, and Shanks watched as she fiddled with the cup in her hands. "I'd never really given it much thought," she said. Not a lie, but he could see by the soft slant to her brow that she was thinking about it now. "If I'd married someone in Fuschia, it wouldn't have been much bigger than this." She cast a glance about the galley, and the tilt of her eyes was a pleased thing, for all that he could tell she was imagining it; what a different wedding might have been like. "Probably a lot smaller, actually. And not nearly as loud."
She didn't sound upset about either of those things, and maybe that was what gave him the incentive to ask, "How would it have been?"
Her smile was quick, embarrassed. She was considering the droplets at the bottom of her cup, worrying the small, ceramic disk between her hands. "It would be at sunset," she said at length, a small smile playing along her mouth. "I'd wear flowers in my hair."
He felt a pang of regret at the words. She didn't ask for much, but he had the thought then, that he could have managed those things. Would have, if she'd asked.
But she hadn't asked, because of course she wouldn't. And heshouldhave asked, and would have, if he'd had a thought to think past the mindless, self-centred happiness that had claimed all his focus when she'd accepted his proposal.
A small hand covered his then, the curve of her palm unbearably soft but her grip surprisingly strong, and his expression must have let slip some of his thoughts, because then Makino was saying, "I'm happy, Shanks."
Extracting his fingers from hers, he touched them to her hair, curling below her ear. Free of her kerchief, she was growing it out. He tried to imagine it with flowers, and what it might have been like, the embers of a Fuschia sunset burning on the horizon, and the deck of his ship under the open sky. In another life, and maybe that would have been the case.
But watching her now, that rosy flush to her cheeks and her dark eyes alight, it wasn't regret he found. Not in her expression, or within himself.
He refilled their cups, and tipped his against hers, the softclinkfalling under the din, caught in that strange pocket of quiet that had her at its heart, and that always seemed to follow her around, as though her presence could will all the noise in the room to relent, just a bit. "Wife," Shanks said.
"Husband," Makino named him in turn, and when she lifted it to her lips, was grinning so badly she spilled most of it down her chin, and the quiet strained against the sheer volume of his laughter at the undignified display.
But it didn't shatter, just made room for more of the sound, smoothing out the harder edges, and he wasn't surprised that what he found where they converged waspeace, at once shameless and unassuming. It was just there, a truth as simple as her presence at his side, although for all its simplicity, Shanks suspected it would take time yet to fully wrap his head around the magnitude of her choices,himbeing only one of many, but also, undeniably, the crux of them all.
The Den Den Mushi stared up at her, no judgement in its blank gaze, but Makino felt it anyway, that coiled ship's knot of blame and guilt in the bottom of her stomach that seemed to tighten with every breath as the prolonged stand-off with her indecision continued.
She'd thought it would get easier—that the more distance they put between themselves and Fuschia, she'd finally gather up the courage and make the call.
Her hand hesitated over the receiver, lip worried between her teeth until it hurt. Her wedding ring sat, still a foreign sight against her hand, the simple band telling a complicated truth.
She knew Garp's number by heart, but beyond that she had no idea how to go about this conversation. What would she even say, to the man who was as good as a father to her, and who'd only ever wanted her to be safe, with a kind, boring husband and a gaggle of kids in tow?
I'm sorry for falling in love with a pirate.
I'm sorry I ran away with him to be one.
Her hand shook, poised over the snail, and she knew the source of her guilt wasn't either of those truths, because even considering them now she couldn't make herself regret the choice she'd made.
No, the source of her guilt was something else, andthereshe found regret, bright and living, and the knot tugged and twisted, tighter and tighter until it was hard to draw breath.
I'm sorry I didn't say goodbye before I did.
She left the receiver where it was, and dragged her eyes away from the Den Den Mushi as she made for the door, the lump in her throat feeling too thick to swallow past.
And the excuse might be petty, but Makino didn't think she could have found the voice to speak, even if she knew the words that needed saying, seeming to ring a hollow echo in the space in her heart that remembered gruff laughter, and a hand ruffling her hair, tugging at her kerchief andyou'll be a damn fine woman, Makino.
I'm sorry.
It took time, adjusting to a life at sea.
She'd expected it would. Having never set foot off the Fuschia docks, she hadn't expected to take things in stride. That was Shanks' forte, and Makino had known even before they'd reached their first port that there would be more to contend with than bouts of nausea and a persisting sunburn.
Of course, there were things that had taken little effort to adjust to: small routines that she made her own, and she was nothing if not a creature of those, and happy to claim something familiar for herself, in a life she was still learning to live.
There was waking up beside him every morning, and that quiet lull spent coming awake to the sound of his snoring, a body used to rising earlier but unable to shake off old habits, however tempting the warmth beside her, and the enclosure of his arm, which always seemed to find her during the night.
But she didn't mind what her new mornings were like—that first, brisk walk from their quarters to the galley rousing her fully, and those rare, entirely quiet hours spent with Ben before the rest of the ship stirred to join them. A cup of freshly brewed coffee always waiting for her, and the morning song of the ship coming slowly awake. A book in her lap, and the kiss to her hair that would lure her back from her mind's wanderings, to find the sun risen and her husband putting a plate of food before her.
Those things had been easy, but there were others, still, like ever-shifting weather that gave no warning, and a sea that had no sympathy for those whose legs were still adjusting to not being on land.
And they'd run into their share of trouble so far. Inevitable, Makino suspected, with a crew like theirs, and the sea they sailed. But they hadn't suffered any major casualties, barring some damage to the ship, and a sprained ankle when she'd taken a tumble during a close encounter with a small navy platoon.
But she knew it wasn't going to be any safer where they'd set their course. The New World, Shanks had called it, and on their whole ship there were just a handful, her husband included, who'd actually sailed it.
And Makino was revisiting the realisation every single day, looking out across the open water beyond the bow and feeling just how woefully unprepared she was, to face that sea.
She was returning to their quarters after breakfast, the tempting promise of a scalding bath seeking brittle limbs. They were sailing close to the magnetic field of a winter island, and the temperature had dropped to the point where she could see her own breath. Beyond the railing, a thick cover of mist lay draped over the surface of the sea, beneath which she could spot the occasional sheet of ice bobbing in the near-black water. The navigator probably had his hands full keeping them clear of any bigger icebergs that might be lurking in that same mist.
She didn't want to think too much about that, and the warm safety of the cabin was a welcome distraction as she closed the door behind her, and she'd just put the book away when she paused.
There was a parcel sitting on their bunk.
It seemed cheerfully inconspicuous, and had it been sitting anywhere else Makino thought she might have missed it, but the placement of it seemed too deliberate to not have been meant to catch her eye.
She hesitated, considering it from across the cabin, before moving closer. Long and rectangular, it was wrapped in layers of brown paper, but with no further ornamentation, and nothing to suggest what was inside. She couldn't even make a guess.
The door opened then, a cut of the chill sneaking in from outside raising the hair on her arms, before Shanks closed the door behind him. "Shit, it'scold. I'm actually considering buttoning my shirt."
She turned to find him grinning. "I'll see it before I believe it."
Coming up beside her, she felt the touch of his fingers brushing over her hip, before the weight of his palm settled on it. "You know, gifts are much more fun when you open them."
When she looked at him, she got a wink. "It's for me?"
Features bright with familiar eagerness, "A belated wedding gift," Shanks told her, nodding to the parcel. "I wanted to give it to you in Loguetown, but I had one of the guys tweak it a bit first."
She blinked. "Tweak it?"
Dark eyes curving with a grin, his nod this time of the 'have a look and you'll see what I mean' sort, before he squeezed her hip, a half-teasing gesture telling of an eager gift-giver's thinning patience.
Curiosity having sparked in earnest now, the look she shot him failed at being convincingly wary as Makino moved to pull off the wrapping, the paper yielding no clues, before she'd lifted off the last layer and her hands stilled, along with her heart.
It was a sword. Small and dainty, it was no longer than the length of her arm from hilt to tip. For a moment, Makino was so surprised all she did was stare at it.
She raised her eyes to Shanks then, watching her curiously, his expression betraying nothing, for all that he hadn't bothered to curb his earlier excitement. But he seemed to be gauging her reaction now, searching her face, which Makino was sure conveyed everything. "A sword?"
His eyes shone with that gentle mischief that was so uniquely his. "Unless you'd rather learn to shoot? Yasopp offered, but I was kind of hoping you'd let me teach you."
For a whole heartbeat, all she did was look at him, before she turned her gaze back to the sword, looking up at her from its confines within the brown paper. It was laid outalongside its scabbard, made of black lacquer and a beautifully burnished metal that shone a deep, dark green, and set with silver details. Around the scabbard had been tied a length of red silk rope, braided in an intricate knot.
She hesitated, a single second where uncertainty reigned over her actions, before tentatively slipping her hands beneath the sword, pausing only at the strange sight of her palms, soft and pale under the naked blade, utterly perfect,before pulling it towards her.
It weighed less than she'd thought it would, and she spent a moment just looking at it, the hilt in its tight wrappings of sea-glass green, a carved lotus blossom in the metal crowning the top, and the whole of it small enough for her to curve her fingers around it without trouble.
Brushing her fingertips over the silver collar, she considered the engravings beneath, near the hilt. She almost hadn't noticed them at first, before the blade had caught the light as she'd tilted it, revealing the hair-thin lines in the polished metal. Atfirst it seemed to be a random design, but at further inspection she found her eyes widening, recognising the delicate lacework of waves, seamlessly intertwined with a figure that was now very clearly a sea-siren.
It was breathtakingly intricate work, and no wonder it had taken time, if he'd bought the sword in Loguetown,weeks behind them now.
Her mouth worked. "This is—"
"Do you like it?"
She looked at him. And there was something acutely familiar about the whole scene, down to the detail where she couldn't seem to make her mouth form words, but, "It's beautiful," she said.
And it was. Like that priceless book he'd given her that she'd read to him while he'd recovered from his amputation. And she'd wondered where it had disappeared off to, but had her answer now, the engravings invoking the cover, although it still bore the obvious personal touch of the engraver. She wondered who'd been the one to do it.
But, "Shanks," she said then, lifting her eyes back to where he was watching her. "I don't know the first thing about using a sword."
He gave her a patient look for that. "Hence the teaching," he quipped.
Her mouth snapped shut, and she found his smile widening, unduly pleased at having caught her so off guard with the gift—and the offer.
Makino considered the weapon—the gentle weight of it in her lap, and the delicately curved blade. The slender hilt, which she curled her fingers around, tentatively testing the grip.
She couldn't even picture herself using it, but for some reason, it didn't look as out of place as she'd thought it would, when she'd first picked it up. It was obvious a good deal of thought had gone into the choice—the size and the length, and the weight. Not to mention the careful details, which had nothing to do with practicality, but which Makino knew he'd included just because he knew she'd like it.
There was something that felt like a lump in her throat when she raised her eyes to look at him again, still regarding her with that carefully searching look, but she saw how it softened as he read her reaction across her face.
And she shouldn't be surprised. A year at sea, and a year as his wife, she shouldn't be surprised that he thought about things like that.
And even if she still couldn't picture herself actuallywieldingit, "Okay," Makino said, and watched as his smile brightened. Then, "Wait—you'llbe teaching me?"
Shanks lifted a brow. "You doubt my teaching methods?"
"Aren't you still adjusting to using your right hand?"
"Doesn't mean I don't have some basic skills to impart," he countered. Then, eyes glittering, "And right hand or not, I'll still pose a challenge in a fight."
Makino huffed a laugh. "I wasn't implying that you wouldn't. Or that I'd somehow pose a challenge foryou."
He hummed at that, his smile quietly musing. Like it had been over a year ago, Dawn Island behind them, when he'd looked at her and saidI'll take that bet."I'll wait to make my judgement where that's concerned."
She didn't know how he managed it, that seemingly effortless faith in her, when she could barely muster up a shred for herself. As though he could see it clearly, all the things she could be. Or maybe it was just that he saw who she was, better than what her insecurities allowed herself to do.
She looked at the blade in her lap, running a fingertip over the waves, following the design where it overlapped with the siren. Such a wholly personal gift, and given with the full belief that she'd learn how to use it. Like the man himself, it was difficult wrapping her head around it.
"Shanks, I don't know if I'm cut out for this," she said then, looking up to find his eyes. "What if I'm terrible at it?"
She could picturethatwithout trouble. It involved a lot of stumbling. Accidentally impaling herself wasn't beyond imagining.
Kneeling before her where she sat, he curled his fingers over hers, and Makino realised she'd been worrying the tight wrappings around the hilt. She considered his hand, large and broad against her own; a swordsman's hand, for all that he was still adjusting to using it. And she glanced at Gryphon on his hip, taking in the wide, curved handle, and the wide hilt it would take both her hands to wrap around.
But...she looked at her own hands then, curled loosely around the slender hilt of her sword, like it had been forged with them in mind. They didn't look wrong. Not exactlyright, but not wrong, as she'd first thought.
"Practice makes perfect," Shanks said then, and her breath caught with her laugh. "Wasn't that what we agreed on?"
Despite herself, Makino found her smile refused to be contained. "So the same rules apply to sex as to swordsmanship?"
He gave her a droll look for that. "I'm tempted to make a really lewd comparison. It's taking so much restraint."
"I'm surprised you haven't already. I've given you so many openings."
His grin flashed, wicked with sudden promise. "Oh, I'm tempted to make an evenlewderone from that," he rumbled, and when he reached for her she came, laughing into the kiss. "Something about swords," he mused, grinning against her mouth. "And sheaths."
The gentle weight of the sword left her a moment later, but before she could question where it had gone he'd threaded his hand into her hair and dragged a soft, shuddering sound from her chest.
"Or I could just demonstrate what I mean," he murmured, the curve of his smile marking a path down the column of her throat, seeking the soft dip of skin at the juncture of her collar.
She'd tilted off the edge of the bunk, braced against his shoulders, but it was hard deciding if she wanted to sink into him or pull him onto the mattress with her when she couldn't seem to think past his mouth on her neck. "If this is your idea of training I don't see how you expect me to improve."
She felt his grin, holding an open-mouthed kiss, and the warm ghost of laughter that followed the deliberate attentions that had her slowly unravelling. His arm tightened around her back, and when he gave a tug she followed, sinking against him. "Maybe not in handlingthatsword."
Knowing him, Makino thought she should have expected something along those lines, but the remark caught her so unawares she snorted against his mouth, before her laughter followed suit, until she was collapsing against him, unable to hold it back, but all he did was match it with his own, kisses sloppy from her giggles and the grin that wouldn't stay off his face.
"I'll refrain from pointing out how that could be taken as an insult," she said when she'd reclaimed her breath, before it hitched as he slid his hand under her shirt, the warm cup of his palm around her breast making it suddenly difficult to remember what she'd been about to say, and when she spoke her voice sounded too breathless for convincing cheek, "Suggesting that myhandlingneeds improvement."
"No insult intended," came the rumble against her skin, the light scratch of his beard drawing a small, contented noise beckoning a whimper, only to catch with her breath as he moved his mouth lower. A tug at her shirt saw the buttons yielding, the kiss of the cabin air making goosebumps rise across her chest, before he covered them with his mouth, warm and inviting, and another offer that had nothing at all to do withteaching—
"But I'd be happy to beg forgiveness."
Teaching her turned out to be more fun than even he'd anticipated.
"Shift your weight a bit—no, that's too much. You won't recover in time."
"In time for what?"
Grin flashing, he moved, and her startled yelp was an endearing thing when knocked the wooden blade out of her hand and swept her legs out from underneath her in the same breath, the softoof!that pulled from her punctuated with the sound of her back hitting the deck.
Shanks grinned down at her, and chirped, "For that."
He got a glare for his cheek, but she didn't move to get up immediately. "You're enjoying this way too much."
"I am enjoying this exactly the right amount."
"That's the fourth time you've done that exact move!"
"Well, then you should know it's coming by now."
She huffed, and he laughed, discarding his practice sword to help her up, the tuck of her small hand in his a softer truth that the rough wood, and when he pulled her to her feet he stole a kiss before she could bat him away, although the smile on her face betrayed her attempted irritation completely.
The sun bore down on the deck, and Shanks watched as Makino wiped the sweat from her brow, a ragged sigh loosed that lamented more than just the exercise. The callous caress of the heat had left a bright red testament across her cheeks and shoulders, and he spared a moment of sympathy for her complexion, still at the tender mercy of the sun on the open sea.
But she looked...there were no words for it, one of his shirts hanging off her tiny frame, unbuttoned to the heat. Her hair was gathered at the nape of her neck, a few loose strands clinging to her sweat-slicked skin where it had escaped the cord. Her breaths weighed heavy with exertion, and the slight parting of her mouth as she ran her fingers through her fringe pushed an exhale past her lips as she tried to work a kink out of her shoulder.
It brought to mind entirely different thoughts than training, and he had to take a moment to remind himself what they were supposed to be doing.
"Shanks?"
He blinked, and when he focused on her it was to find Makino watching him. "What?"
The smile sitting on her lips told him that he wasn't being very subtle in his ogling. But then, was he ever? "I asked if you wanted to go again, but now I'm thinking you might have something different in mind."
Clever girl. "Hmm, no. Nothing different."
"No?"
"Just thinking about stances."
"Stances?"
"Mm. Weight distribution. Flexibility."
Her mouth had pursed with a smile that hid absolutely nothing, and her eyes looked bottomless in the soft reprieve of shade offered by the main mast. "Flexibility, hmm?"
"It's very important."
"Oh I bet."
"Could give you the upper hand." She'd stepped closer now, and it was an effort not to reach for her. "The element of surprise, if you're quick." He let his smile tilt, tellingly crooked. "And creative."
Yasopp's voice drifted towards them from across the deck, "Where this conversation is going, I'm wondering if I should take my chances in the galley."
Makino's cheeks flushed, the combination of sunburn and embarrassment a brilliant thing, and Shanks stuck his tongue out at Yasopp. "I don't remember inviting you to watch."
Yasopp just grinned. "Keep it to the bedroom, Cap. The swordplay, at least."
"Oh god," Makino murmured, pressing her palms to her cheeks, and Shanks threw his head back with a laugh. But when he glanced at her she was smiling, although it seemed to be in spite of her better judgement.
Giving her a wink, he caught the fond roll of her eyes as she made to put down her practice sword, tugging her hair loose to retie it, and he watched, slightly mesmerised by the movements.
Her eyes flitted to him then, a look stolen from under her raised arm as she worked the cord around her hair, and the knowing grin he shot her had the colour in her cheeks deepening, before she ducked her gaze. With the warm weather, he'd forgone wearing a shirt, and although she was far subtler in her appreciation than he was, it was no less earnest for it.
A small marvel, maybe, but Shanks didn't look at the stump as the thought resurfaced, keeping his eyes instead on the girl who looked at him as though she didn't even see it. Or maybe it was that she did, but didn't consider it to be any less a part of him than anything else—or any less desirable.
Strange, that. But the awe he found was too familiar to prompt disbelief, watching her now.
Hair securely in place, she seemed to consider the practice blade she'd put down, and the one he'd given her, sitting next to it. Then, that little hand hesitating only a moment, she made to reach for her blade, and Shanks watched as she took a moment to consider the different weight, and the grip.
He had half a mind to tell her that just that gesture alone suggested a growing ease with the weapon, but he tucked the impulse away. He wanted to see if she'd notice the changes for herself, and how long it would take her to pick up on it.
She raised her eyes to his then, the light of teasing dimmed, leaving an old worry. "I still don't know if I'm cut out for this."
He didn't answer. Instead, stepping towards her, he reached to adjust her stance, offering gentle nudges at her posture that she submitted to with less resistance than she had when they'd first started out.
He allowed his hand to linger, her skin soft and inviting, and there was another ease in the way she yielded to those touches, but this, too, as though instinctually. The realisation made him smile.
"Give it some time," he said, eyes on the blade in her hands, and he wondered suddenly how she'd look when she'd mastered it—all that lithe grace, honed and sharpened, as though its own blade's edge. She was tiny, and had the advantage of size and speed on her side. She might not have the disposition for seeking battle, or a thirst for competition, but if she could protect herself if the need arose—
As though having read his thoughts, "I just can't see myself actually drawing it," Makino said. "At least not—not outside of practice, anyway. And not with the intent tohurt."
And if you're the one at risk of being hurt?But he kept the words to himself as he reached to cover her fingers where she'd curled them around the hilt. A slant of sunlight caught the delicate lines engraved on the blade, giving the illusion of gold plating.
It wasn't a sword designed to do damage, although Shanks knew that even a dull kitchen knife could do damage if the intent was there. An easy grip and a light wield, it might well amount to little more than a kitchen knife to some of the people he knew on this sea, good for blocking and parrying, but little else. But his intention in giving it to her hadn't been to force her to change to adapt to the sword. He'd wanted to give her something that would suither.
"It's not the times you draw your sword that are important," he told her then, brushing his thumb over her knuckles, bleeding white under her skin where she clutched the hilt, and he felt her grip loosening a bit under the touch. "It's the ones where you choose not to draw it. But sometimes, knowing when to draw, that half-second between fight or flight, might mean the difference between life and death."
She looked up at him, eyes seeming to swallow him up, but he saw as understanding came to settle in them. And they'd been lucky so far, but he knew what awaited once they made the crossing into the New World. And he saw the same, sobering awareness in her eyes, even if she didn't know just what they were up against.
"What if I can't draw it, even in self-defence?" she asked then, her voice quiet, and the question tucked between them where they stood. A private fear, Shanks saw, and understood. But like the sword he'd had made for her, he hadn't asked her to come with him hoping she'd change who she was.
Still. "You don't give your instincts enough credit," he said, considering the small hands tucked around the hilt, her wedding band catching the sunlight. Seeking her gaze, he allowed a smile to touch his mouth. "Take it from someone who's constantly on the receiving end of your pinches. I rue the day you discovered that I was ticklish."
Her smile stretched, and she ducked her head, as though embarrassed by her own satisfaction. Of course, Shanks had no such qualms, wholly pleased at sparking that reaction, and when she looked up to meet his eyes again he let her see it.
"You don't draw your sword often," Makino said then, eyes dropping to where he'd put it down earlier.
She was right. And even if they'd been at sea well over a year together, an occasion had yet to present itself requiring him to go all out. And once he might have been glad of it. Back when their worlds had been different ones, there'd been no urge for her to witness that part of him, and what he was capable of.
But his world was hers now, and even if he had no desire for bloodshed, she deserved to know that he didn't shy from it.
"Only if I have a good reason," he told her, and knew even before her breath caught that she heard what he didn't say: that there was one thing that would always answer to that description.
To emphasise his point, all the while holding the wide eyes watching him from an expression of such earnest surprise (and if he hadn't been so intent in showing her, he might have derived some satisfaction from the fact that he could still catch her so wildly off guard), Shanks reached to tuck her hair behind her ear, fingers lingering by her cheek, the gesture wholly deliberate, and utterly unapologetic.
"Haki?"
"You know what it is, right?" Yasopp asked.
Makino frowned, considering him where he stood; that too-eager expression that promised nothing good, and that usually had Ben reaching for his cigarettes. But a glance at Ben found no suggestion that stress-smoking was imminent, although somehow, that didn't make her feel better.
"Shanks explained the concept," she said, warily. It hadn't been in much detail, but she'd gleaned the basics, and from it, a small relief that it wasn't something she would have to contend with, at least not beyond others using it against her.
Yasopp nodded. "Then you know there're different kinds, yeah?"
She wondered where he was going with this. He seemed strangely intent. "Yes."
"Did he also tell you which one you have?"
She blinked. "I don't have haki," she told him.
Yasopp was grinning now. "I'll take that as a 'no'," he said. "Mah, he probably didn't want to overwhelm you, given that he's got you suffering through his teaching already." He nodded to Siren at her hip, and her hand flew to the hilt—a strange act of comfort that had somehow manifested since she'd taken to wearing it.
But, "Yasopp," Makino said, patiently. "I don't have haki. Where would I even have learned something like that?"
"Not always something you learn," he said with a shrug. "Sometimes it manifests on its own. Observation's like that, at least. But the subconscious stuff needs work if you want to use it for all it's worth."
She shook her head. It seemedabsurd. She'd seen Shanks use it, and for different purposes, and even though she knew the kind he threw about him wasn't the same as most people had, it still seemed like such a fanciful thing. Like devil fruit powers; a part of the world that was hers now, but that didn't really have anything to do with her. "I still think you've got the wrong—"
"Where's Boss now?" Yasopp asked.
A bit taken aback by the question, Makino felt her brows furrowing, but all Yasopp did was watch her, as though waiting to hear her answer.
Then, "Belowdecks," she told him, carefully. "Towards the stern. What—" She looked at him, struck suddenly by a question that didn't make any sense, and she knew her expression gave her away, wariness yielding to genuine surprise. "You can't sense him?"
"I can," he said. "But that's because my observation's one of the best on this ship, barring the Bossman himself."
"You—wait, what? But I thought everyone could sense him."
Yasopp shrugged. "If he's actively using his haki, yeah, but when it's idle? It'd take another proficient observation user to pick him out as fast as you just did."
She stared at him. When she tried to locate Shanks' presence again, the familiar warmth of it all but leaped out at her. She couldn't understand how anyone could ignore it, let alone not pick it out. "But—it's soloud."
Yasopp grinned, and shared a look with Ben. "Did you know?"
Ben had been observing their interaction, a familiar, assessing expression on his face, along with a hint of amusement sitting at the corner of his mouth. "I had my suspicions," he said. Then to Makino, "That's why you couldn't bear to be on the ship during the surgery. You couldn't feel him anymore."
She closed her mouth, whatever protest she'd prepared forgotten at the mention. And she remembered that night all too well—the pressingquietthat had seemed so wrong, weighing down over the galley, as though the only thing missing was for the planks to groan under the pressure. She'd assumed they'd all been able to sense it, and that she'd just been the only one who hadn't been strong enough to bear it.
"Describe it," Yasopp said then, sounding curious. "What it feels like."
"Bright," she said, before she could think. It wasn't so much that she sought his presence anymore, it was just there, seeming always at her fingertips. "Like a sunburst." Then, the corner of her mouth lifting, a small smile of bemusement, "And a little like a hangover, sometimes."
She looked between them, taking in Yasopp's ever-widening grin, and Ben's now open amusement. "Are you sure you're not just pulling my leg?" she asked, gesturing in the direction of where she could still feel Shanks. "It's right there. It takes effortnotto notice."
The grin that had stretched along Yasopp's face seemed more delighted than teasing, and turning to Ben, asked, "Who gets to tell Cap she's a natural?"
The Den Den Mushi perking into awareness dragged him away from the report on his desk, and he rubbed at his eyes. The sun sinking beyond the bank of windows alerted him to the fact that he'd missed lunch—and dinner, and his stomach responded in turn, a sinking clench that twisted in a grimace across his face.
The snail was still warbling, and he shoved the report into the nearest stack, reaching for the receiver as he rifled through the bottom desk drawer for the sandwich he had a vague notion he'd hidden there somewhere.
"Yeah?"
There was a long pause, and Garp felt the fragile patience already worn thin by hunger shooting cracks as he turned his eyes on the snail.If it's that damn goat again, Sengoku, so help me...
Then—"Garp."
It might be ironic to say he saw red, but there was a second Garp thought he might have blacked out, the unbridled fury that shot through him short-circuiting his brain for a single instant.
He was so angry he felt breathless. "You've got somenervecalling—"
"I know,"came Red-Hair's voice, cutting him off."But I am calling, so either take it or leave it."
"Brat," Garp said, entirely calm. The edge of the desk strained under the pressure of the grip he had on it. "You better give me a damn good reason why I shouldn't hunt you down like the crook you are and toss your ass in the deepest level of hell in Impel Down."
There was another beat. Then,"She's doing well,"Red-Hair said, breezing right past the threat, and if it hadn't been for what he said, Garp might have pointed it out.
But as it was, the mounting tide of fury that had felt like it had been about to burst through his chest released him, and so fast he was left reeling from the momentum.
"I thought you'd like to know,"Red-Hair continued, when Garp hadn't spoken.
It was hard to breathe again, but it wasn't anger clogging up his throat this time. And it wasn't hunger now, the sinking hole below his chest. A year and a half without so much as a word, but he didn't know ifreliefwas the right name for the feeling that cinched tight around his insides. Relief didn't bring so much pain.
"If she's doing so well," Garp said then, and knew his voice was too rough for even the static over the line to hide what sat in it. "Why the hell isn't she the one calling?"
A pause followed, and there was a moment where he didn't think Red-Hair would answer. Then,"She holds you in high regard,"came the response, and Garp was tempted to call it damn diplomatic shite, but Red-Hair didn't sound like he was faking.
And that was all he said. There was nothing else, no further explanation offered, just a single string of words that said more than Garp was willing to deal with. Because he heard the implication behind those words as clearly as if Red-Hair had shouted it.
And if he'd been a bigger man, Garp might have told him he wasn't angry. Not with her. And if she'd been the one to call he might have, but Garp couldn't overlook the pirate on the other end of the line, who swept in wherever it pleased him and without a mind for the wreckage left in his wake.
He didn't want to think about it—the girl whose thirst for adventure had never gone beyond the books she'd always had her nose in. The kind-hearted little thing who'd been too sweet for Emiko's temper, but who'd flourished in spite of it. The girl who deserved a doting husband and a quiet, peaceful life, far away from the horrors the sea dredged up in abundance on the Grand Line.
"I've been teaching her,"came the voice then, and he didn't specify what, but Garp had a fair idea, although he had a hard time picturing it."She's not going into this unprepared."
A laugh sounded then—a soft thing that seemed at odds with the loud, cheeky brat Garp remembered from Roger's ship, and, "She's got a knack for observation haki,"Red-Hair said."It's a little terrifying."
Garp stared at the snail. And he thought of the girl who'd only ever been gentle, hands and heart and disposition, and wondered what would be left of her, when Red-Hair was done, and the sea had settled on the choice she'd made.
But he remembered then, the girl who'd fancied herself a princess in disguise, who'd climb down the drainpipe to skip her morning chores, and who'd asked him once if he could teach her how to throw a punch, just because.
There were things that needed to be said, but he didn't have the energy to look for the words. And so he stared at the snail instead, and tried not to think about that little girl who'd never known the world of pirates from those in her books, and who he'd hoped never would.
"There's one more thing,"Red-Hair said then.
"What?" Garp snapped, but he thought it sounded too tired to make much of an impression, even over the line. And he felt tired, long beyond his years.
Another pause followed, but this one was different, and for a single, terrible second, Garp thought he knew exactly what words were about to come out of Red-Hair's mouth—
"I married her."
He slammed the receiver down so hard cracks shot through the desk. And there hadn't been a shred of gloating in Red-Hair's voice, but the silence that tolled between the walls of his office left an imprint, like a loud, mocking cackle.
The sun sank into the sea beyond the windows, but Garp didn't move, no mind for hunger and reports forgotten. He wanted to be angry, craved it, but even the craving felt half-hearted, as though he just didn't have it in him.
He wished he had, because even resentment would have been kinder than what he was left with; the memory of a girl who hadn't been his, and a wide, yawning hole that felt like it would never be filled.
Two whole years spanned their crossing of the first part of the Grand Line, before they docked at Sabaody, on the threshold of the New World.
Evening's quickening approach threw long shadows across the deck as they set about shoring the ship to the wharf, the sun hanging low in the sky's cradle beyond the looming grove spilling dappled light on the grass. A brilliant necklace perched on the sea's lovely collar, bathing everything in gold.
A deceptive vista, Makino knew, because she'd heard the stories. Being a port that all pirates had to come through who had their sights set on the New World, Sabaody was a confluence of unsavoury truths, the greatest of all being the human market, the existence of which she could have lived a long and happy life without knowing about.
She watched from the deck as the crew disembarked, the promise of an extended shore leave sitting bright in eager voices and in their laughter as it nipped at their heels, following them into the grove. But even longing for solid ground under her feet, Makino couldn't muster the same cheer, remembering Ben's uncharacteristically sharp warning that if she was going anywhere at all, to get someone to go with her.
There was a prickling across her arms now as she considered the massive trees, roots buried deep in the seabed, and the milling people going about their lives as though living souls weren't being bought and sold in their midst.
She felt Shanks approaching, before the steady weight of his presence wrapped around her, and she welcomed the relief it offered, and the anchoring touch of his hand to her elbow, both tentatively asking, and reassuring.
"Ben is off making arrangements for supplies," he told her, when she turned to look at him. "The guys will probably find somewhere that serves drink and make camp, since we'll have to wait until we've got the ship coated before we can set sail."
She nodded absently, and tried not to let her thoughts latch onto the last bit—what it would meant to set sail this time, remembering what Shanks had told her about ship's coating, and Fishman Island. She'd resolutely decided to greet that obstacle when it was upon her, and not a moment sooner, fearing that if she did she might just go back to their quarters and refuse to emerge until the crossing was over.
Fingers wrapping around hers then, and he gave a tug at her hand, drawing her out of her thoughts, and when she looked at him there was a strange smile on his face. "Come on."
He was leading her towards the gangway, a destination clearly in mind, and her earlier reluctance lingered only a second before it let go, the promise of his company dispelling her worries, as it tended to do. But she still stayed close—a little more than usual, and she doubted it went unnoticed, but Shanks only tightened his grip on her hand as he helped her onto the wharf.
"Where are we going?"
He threw a grin over his shoulder. "We need a ship coater, and there's only one person I trust with that job."
She tilted her head in question, and whoever he was talking about, Makino saw from his smile that it wasn't just any old ship coater.
"Also," Shanks said, giving her hand a squeeze, something at once fond and clever in that word, along with something she couldn't quite put her finger on. "I want to show you off."
She blinked. "Show me off?"
His smile was still that nameless thing, the one she'd never seen before, but, "You remember I told you about Rayleigh?" he asked, as they made to cross the sprawling expanse of green, no streets to name, but there were little buildings tucked between the towering trees, lining the path.
Makino tried not to let herself be distracted too much by the scenery, although the sight of a bubble rising out of the ground at their feet startled her so much she let loose an involuntary yelp, a wholly undignified reaction to which Shanks had the grace not to laugh. Too much.
Having gathered herself enough to coax her heart back down from where it had lodged in her throat, she paused, remembering his question, and the name, recognisable from so many of his stories. "Your old captain's first mate?"
Shanks smiled. He let go of her hand, but she felt the touch of it a moment later, a warm weight against her back as he directed her towards a small house sitting by itself some ways off. Although Makino had the sense there was more to the gesture, as they passed a group of what looked to be sailors, although their ensemble hinted at another truth, and she felt more than saw several leering gazes sliding her way.
Shanks didn't even falter in his step, and, "Yeah," he said, and his voice let nothing slip but its usual warmth, even as she felt the reassuring press of his fingers to her lower back. And he didn't even bat an eye, but she felt the sinking pressure—and the tell-talethud-thudof at least two unconscious bodies slamming into the ground behind them, followed by a shout of surprise from whoever was left standing.
She didn't turn to look, but tucked the glib remark under her tongue, remembering those leers, and Ben's warning, and found no sympathy—or even the urge to tease him for his penchant for dramatics.
The reprieve of the group felt palpable, but she pressed herself a little closer, anyway, welcoming the distraction of his familiar frame, as they walked deeper into the grove.
"He settled here a few years back," Shanks said then, as though nothing had happened. "He's a ship coater now." Catching her gaze, his eyes twinkled. "Well. Ostensibly, at least. You know, I'll just say he's 'retired', and that should cover all the things he gets up to."
She frowned. "You make it sound like what he 'gets up to' is trouble."
The grin he gave her said enough. "Something like that."
Makino looked up at him, brows still furrowed. "But from all your stories he always seems so—serious."
She'd heard them all, every anecdote spanning the gap from mild reproaches and choice words to more serious forms of punishment that usually involved someone suspended by their ankles from a considerable height. All from the man who'd been his captain's counter-weight, and who'd taught Shanks everything he knew.
She had a thought to say that she was glad Rayleigh hadn't imparted all his teaching methods, as she didn't think she'd take well to hanging upside-down from the rigging for her mistakes, but curbed it, already anticipating what his response would be. And Makino didn't think she was up for facing this person who Shanks clearly held in high regard, wearing a brilliant blush and all her thoughts on her face.
Of course, thinking about it now, Makino knew she gave herself away, but if he found her poorly-contained smile at all telling of the thoughts behind it, Shanks kept his thoughts to himself. For once.
"I think retirement allowed him the teenage rebellion he never allowed himself," he mused instead, prompting her laugh, a softly startled sound.
"And he's the one you'll be showing me off to?"
He looked at her, his humour giving way to something suddenly earnest, and when he paused in his step Makino followed suit. The sinking sun caught in his hair, gold bleeding into copper, and the sight distracted her eyes from the trees. Around them, the gentle cacophony of a hundred bubbles popping at intervals softened the other sounds of the grove; a muted, almost cheerful susurrus at odds with all the dark truths the island promised.
"I don't have any living parents left," Shanks said. His thumb did a sweep across her knuckles, a gesture she recognised from when he let his thoughts wander, as though mapping the shape of them helped root his mind in the present. "I told you about my mother, and I don't know what happened to my old man." He nodded towards the house. "They're the closest thing I have. But then it's more than most people have on this sea."
She tilted her head curiously. "They?"
He only grinned, and raised his eyes to the sign mounted above the front door. Makino followed the line of his gaze, taking in the large letters cheerfully announcing the proprietor's not-at-all subtle intention of ripping off their customers.
She felt a pang of something in her chest, thinking of her own bar—her mother's business that had been left in her care, but that she'd left behind, along with that whole life, and everything it might have brought her, good or bad.
"You okay?"
Dragging her eyes away from the sign, she found Shanks watching her, and from the look on his face Makino knew he must have realised where her thoughts had gone.
"Homesick?" he asked, the lilt of his voice giving him away even before the slight furrow of his brow did, and Makino let a smile touch her lips.
"No," she said, shaking her head. "Just—thinking about how things turned out."
He didn't look convinced, and, "Shanks," she said then, fingers twisting to curl around his, so small in comparison, and two years hadn't changed them much. Her callouses might be harder, her tentative attempts at learning to wield a sword having left their mark, although they were still gentler than the ones pressed against them where she'd tucked her palm to his.
She felt his wedding band, the metal warmed by his skin, and rubbed her thumb against it. "My home is wherever you are. I've never doubted that."
His unease surrendered to a flicker of something that promised nothing good, and, "Never?" he mused, the corner of his mouth quirking. "Not even when we hit that first cyclone right after entering Paradise?"
She pressed her lips together. "I—you said you wouldn't bring that up."
"Did I say that?"
"Youpromised."
He grinned, but when her frown deepened, his mirth softened into something kinder, although it didn't wipe the smile off his face. "Hey," he laughed, lifting her hand to brush a kiss to her knuckles. "You've been nothing short of remarkable on this voyage so far. I know people who've sailed these seas for years who would have pissed themselves at that cyclone. The fact that you spent most if it yelling atmewas pretty impressive."
Makino turned her eyes away, cheeks warming at the memory. She'd been so terrified that day she'd spent an hour throwing up afterwards. After she'd screamed herself hoarse at his recklessness. "I apologised for that," she murmured.
Releasing her fingers, she felt his own under her jaw, thumb sketching a familiar path along the curve of it, before pausing at her pulse-point. "I don't remember asking you to," Shanks said. "I'm pretty forgetful, but of that I'm fairly certain."
Before she could say anything else, he'd let his hand drop, and then he was holding the door open, allowing her to step through it and into the establishment.
It was empty, no customers seated at the tables or at the bar, behind which stood a woman reading a newspaper, a cigarette tucked between her lips.
She glanced up at the sight of them, dark eyes widening, before a smile bloomed along her face, and, "Red-chan," she greeted, something bright and pleased turning her surprise warm with delight.
She was beautiful, dark hair framing her features in a sleek, simple cut, although Makino couldn't have placed her age if she'd had a gun to her head. It seemed an indeterminable thing, shifting like the soft shadows playing on the floorboards, one moment young, but a flicker of the light and she'd find a different truth in the gentle lines writ at the corners of her eyes, which again looked older than her outward appearance suggested.
"Shakky-san," Shanks said, a smile stretching along the greeting, and Makino felt his hand on her back, warm through her shirt. "Are you open?"
Makino recognised the name as the one from the sign out front, and the woman's smile widened. "For you, Red-chan? Always." But she put two glasses down on the counter, an invitation to take a seat found in the silent offering, and Makino curbed the flicker of nervousness as Shanks nudged her towards the bar.
Sliding the glass into Makino's hand, "And who is this that you've brought?" Shakky asked, her open curiosity punctuated by the elegant sweep of her hand before she rested her elbow in her palm, the cigarette plucked from her lips and perched between her slender fingers.
Makino wasn't sure if the question had been directed at her, although she thought the woman already had her answer, from how those dark eyes lingered on the ring around her finger, before they shifted, spider-light, to Shanks' hand where it was wrapped around his tumbler.
But if she was expecting a verbal answer to confirm what she'd probably already gleaned from observing them, they weren't given the chance to provide it before the sound of footsteps reached them through the door behind the bar, followed by a large shape ducking beneath the doorway.
Silver hair gathered at the nape of his neck, and the round glasses perched on his nose lifted with the smile that stretched across his face, and, "Oh?" came the laughing remark, warmth kindling in a kind voice, and Makino watched his smile widen, emphasising the weathered lines of his features.
"A rare visit to an old man," he said to Shanks, before his eyes went to Makino. They crinkled behind his glasses, curiosity winking in quiet waters, but where the barkeep had eyes older than her face suggested, Makino found his to be the opposite case, something startlinglyyoungand mischievous in the gaze holding hers. "I don't think we've met."
Shanks was practically beaming. "My wife," he introduced her, smile as wide as it would go, and even if she'd had two years to grow accustomed to the epithet, which he made use of often and liberally, Makino still felt her cheeks warming, followed by that entirely-too-silly smile that needed so little prompting where he was concerned.
It didn't help that Rayleigh threw his head back, a loud laugh rolling out of him, a sound of unbridled delight, and when he looked at her next his eyes had curved with a smile that held a whole lifetime of different things, but his words held only fondness when he said, "Is that so?"
"Makino," she offered, and fought against the urge to fiddle with the tumbler in her hands. She'd never been good at introductions, and the implication of this meeting felt suddenly momentous, remembering Shanks' words.The closest thing I have.
But she shoved down her rising nervousness, and was glad her voice didn't stutter when she said, "You must be Rayleigh-san."
Those eyes hadn't lost their too-clever gleam, as though he read all the stories Shanks might have told her into that greeting. "I am." Then to Shanks, "The tide has brought more than one rumour about you, but this one must have slipped my notice," he said, taking a seat beside them. He shared a look with the woman behind the bar, who only smiled around her cigarette, and lifted her brows, as though to saydon't look at me.
Makino watched his gaze shift towards Shanks' left side then, and thought he might ask about the arm, but what he said instead was, "I sense that there's a story here."
"It's a long one," Shanks said, sounding entirely pleased by the fact.
"Only because you go into exaggerated detail," Makino pointed out, before she could stop herself.
But Shanks only threw her a grin. "Then you can steer me back on course when I digress."
Rayleigh laughed. "I see some things haven't changed where you're concerned, Shanks."
Shanks was still looking at Makino when he said, smile private and knowing, "Some things."
Sensing Rayleigh's eyes on her, Makino wondered what he saw, and wondered what she looked like to these people, who lived in this thriving conjunction of the sea, where pirates came through every single day. She'd been a pirate only two years, and it was easy among her crew, to feel like one of them, and to feel like shebelonged, but she had to wonder now with these strangers, what they saw when they looked at her, still-soft callouses and no notoriety to her name.
She felt Shanks' fingers brushing against hers, and some of her nervousness fled at the contact, leaving a smile. And she watched as Rayleigh's eyes curved further, a look stolen across the counter, to the woman who was quietly observing everything, delight dancing over her ageless features as Shanks geared up for a story.
"So we arrive at this village in the East Blue…"
"She's lovely."
Shanks dragged his eyes away from where he'd been watching the ship—or to be more specific, the girl busy going over the supply list, who'd just shouted an order down the deck that had left what felt like a permanent grin on his face.
"Your wife," Rayleigh elaborated, eyes crinkling behind his glasses, no doubt at the sight of the smile. "I never thought I'd live to see it."
Shanks threw him a look, grin still in place. "Yeah, I remember you saying something like that, once. That it'd take nothing short of a saint to put up with me."
Rayleigh laughed, a loud, keenly pleased thing. "You know," he mused, "I said the same thing to Roger." His smile held a long life in it. "I guess all it takes is the right sort."
Looking back towards the deck, Shanks felt his smile softening. "She's pretty incredible."
Rayleigh seemed to take a moment to observe him, no judgement in that old gaze, but something like curiosity. "I forget sometimes, how many years have passed. You're not a kid anymore," he said then. "You were always restless when you were. Too much energy to sit still, and already eager to move on before you'd even set foot somewhere. There's a calm about you, now." His eyes twinkled. "Her doing?"
Shanks' smile twisted, something rueful pulling at the corner of his mouth. "Not entirely, but I wouldn't disregard her influence completely." A pause followed, and then, "You're right, though. When we parted ways, I was...restless. Angry." He shrugged. "Didn't sit still for five years. Got into a lot of trouble for it."
He didn't mention the scars, but he felt Rayleigh's focus, and wondered if he'd heard the story. "Some of that anger is still left," Rayleigh said.
Shanks sighed, "Yeah." He didn't reach to touch the scars, but he could feel them, the way they pulled on his skin if he furrowed his brow. Sometimes when he smiled, which seemed the cruellest punishment. But always, they seemed to sit on the edge of his awareness.
"I don't need to tell you to be mindful of that," Rayleigh said.
He found a smile at that, but it held no derision now, remembering softly calloused fingers tracing the grooves in his skin; touches that had become as familiar as the scars. He thought of the gentle cadence of her voice that had carried a note of anger he doubted she'd even been aware of, andyou're not done with this fight, are you?
"Makino said the same thing," Shanks said. He'd told her of that fight; had told her everything there was to tell, and she hadn't shied away from any of it; had just dug her heels in and told him to be careful.
And he didn't know where Teach was now, but he carried this knowledge like he did all his other ones, and didn't question it, the sense that there was unfinished business to be dealt with, but in what capacity Teach figured into all of it, Shanks couldn't yet guess.
Rayleigh was watching the ship now, having followed his gaze. The morning sun perched high above the grove observed their preparations, the light dancing off the tell-tale gleam of the coating, giving the impression that it glowed.
"There's a quality of quiet about her," Rayleigh said then, making Shanks look at him. "Roger would have the same, sometimes. Moments of utter stillness, like everything around him held its breath." He tilted his head, a small smile lifting the corner of his mouth. "Hers is different."
"It's the opposite."
Rayleigh looked at him, and Shanks shrugged. "Nothing ever stops, but around her there's…room to breathe." And then, wryly, "And for the record, Captain Roger's moments of quiet were terrifying."
Rayleigh laughed at that. "You might be right." He looked at the ship again, and something chased across his expression, an old thing Shanks had no name for, before Rayleigh said, "There aren't many on this sea who'd welcome the pirate's life." He looked at him, the weight behind his eyes meaningful. "However much they love the pirate."
"No," Shanks agreed, quietly.
"I take it you're aware of the position you're putting her in."
Shanks lifted his eyes to the deck again. Ben was, for once, enjoying a cigarette break instead of trying to make sure all the preparations were underway, and happening as they should. He had a thought to marvel at the small change, one of many that had slipped in without his notice.
But he'd caught the underlying warning in Rayleigh's words, and, "Yeah," he said at length. And he didn't wonder at the conviction in his own voice when he said, "But I've got her with me. And if anything should happen to me, she's not alone."
Rayleigh was quiet a moment, although Shanks had the feeling he knew where his thoughts had gone. "A wise decision," he said then.
Shanks felt a smile tug at his lip. "I can think of several people who'd call it the opposite."
Rayleigh looked at the ship, and for a moment seemed to see something else. "Perhaps. But I'm old. I'm allowed to say things like that and get away with it."
Shanks grinned. "You've changed, Rayleigh."
Rayleigh only smiled, and said, wryly, "I retired."
Shanks laughed at that, and watched as the sound of it drew her gaze from the deck above. At his widening grin, she gave a small wave, before her attention was claimed by one of the crew, busy securing the rigging for the crossing.
"Turbulent waters ahead," Rayleigh said then. "But I take it you're prepared."
"As well as can be, given where we're going," Shanks said. He cut Rayleigh a look. "And you?"
Rayleigh's expression didn't budge. "I'm just an old man enjoying his retirement."
"Coincidentally settled on the one island every pirate has to pass through to get to the New World."
"Nothing on this sea is a coincidence."
"Those are Captain's words."
"Are they? You'll forgive an old man for forgetting."
Shanks shook his head, but kept his thoughts about that to himself. There were things the future promised that they had no answers to, and he'd hinged so many of his choices on his gut. The sense that he had something to do, that he had somewhere he needed to be, when the time came. He had no idea when it would be or how he would know it, just that he would.
And looking at Rayleigh now, he had a thought that he wasn't the only one. Or maybe Rayleigh knew more than even Shanks did; that it wasn't his gut he followed, but something else.
And maybe that was the one legacy of Roger they all shared; the last of the Pirate King's crew.
"The kid you told me about," Rayleigh said then, expression brightening, and surrendering whatever thoughts had weighed on his brow a moment before. "I'll be interested in seeing what becomes of that one."
Shanks felt his own grin widening, seeking Makino's presence on deck, somewhere beyond sight now, but easy for him to pick out. And he thought of what it might have been like, if she'd turned him down two years ago; if she'd stayed behind, to oversee the legacy he'd left on the Fuschia docks, as he knew she'd considered.
He wondered sometimes, if their choices made lasting effects, or if the sea had a plan that would come to fruition, no matter how many ripples made by individual decisions. But he had no way of knowing. All he could do was follow his gut, and hope that whatever future lay ahead, they would be granted some measure of peace when the coming storm had settled.
Whatever shape that coming storm took remained to be seen, but Shanks had a fair idea of what it might be.
"That makes two of us."
"Ready?"
She was glad he didn't mention the death grip she had on his arm, although Makino thought she detected amusement in the question. But she wasn't the only wary soul on deck, and there was some comfort in that, if in nothing else beyond the solid assurance of Shanks' steady frame beside her.
A nod was her answer, which was all she could seem to manage, the morning's preparations complete and her fretting hands having nothing else to occupy themselves than digging into Shanks' arm. Because only now had she let it sink in, exactly where they were going, and how they were getting there. Down under the sea, as though it didn't completely beggar belief.
Shanks made the order to drop the sails, and Makino kept her gaze resolutely fixed on the figurehead rising beyond the bow, wondering if she could just keep her focus on that, then everything else would fade beyond her notice.
But as the ship began its slow descent into the water, she felt her carefully contained panic rising, pushing up her throat in what she prayed wasn't vomit, the sense of the whole ocean closing in the single most claustrophobic experience of her life.
She maintained her regal composure of obstinate dignity for a whole, proud minute, before her face fell, and, "I'm not ready," she croaked, clenching her eyes shut as she hid her face in his chest, pressing herself close until she'd shut out everything else and all that was left was the steady beat of his heart and the enclosure of his strong arm where it came to wrap around her, the tight press punctuated by the laugh that lifted from his chest, to fall against her ear, not in mockery but in delight, and she felt it like she felt his warmth, the only thing she cared to feel in that moment, as the dark enveloped them.
And the sound of his laughter marked their passage into the deep, but Makino was glad of it as the sea swallowed the sun whole, and the bright lilt of his mirth cleaved through the dark and the eerie silence that descended over the deck, heralding their passage with the promise that whatever awaited them on the other side, it would take more than a little rough sailing to shake the man beside her.
Chapter 2: the second, a sharper tune
Notes:
This fic was originally meant to be just the one part, but then the idea ran away with me so thoroughly, before I knew it I had this monster on my hands, so I've split it into three.
Chapter Text
The New World greeted them with about as much gentleness as Makino had expected, which was despairingly little, although it had no effect on Shanks' cheer, which remained boundless, and without equal.
That first year they stirred up so much trouble, if she'd ever harboured any ideas of living in obscurity with this crew, the very last had guttered out by year's end. And for a while Shanks' name seemed to grace the front page of every other newspaper, at which point she'd thought, if a little naively, that things would have to calm down soon.
Until a certain event, and the word began to flourish—Emperor, and one of four. A balance of powers on a scale she didn't know if measured strength or something else entirely, but if the usurping of the seat itself hadn't raised enough brows, the ease with which he held it saw to the rest.
Because for all that his far-reaching reputation suggested at least some measure of strength, Makino knew there were those who only saw the one arm, and who couldn't reconcile the handicap with the position he held.
But hold it he did, and the scale remained even, although there was little comfort to be found in the fact, and the tense accord that existed between them all; the mutual understanding to each keep to their separate corners. And there weren't many drastic changes, at least insofar as the affairs of their own crew were concerned. They were still pirates, growing notoriety notwithstanding.
But her first wanted poster brought with it the full, sober realisation of some of the things that came with choosing the life she had.
And the husband she had.
Shanks laughed for a solid minute, and even pinching him didn't help matters—or still the mounting tide of mirth as it rippled across the crew on deck, watching the spectacle unfolding.
"I haven't even done anything!" she protested, voice sounding oddly shrill as she proffered the wanted poster, and the obscene sum of money printed in large, ominous black numbers under the picture. And how they'd gotten their hands onthat, Makino had no idea, but the two things seemed so fantastically at odds with one another—the ludicrous bounty, and the sweet, unassuming smile sitting above it, looking like it belonged more to the barmaid she'd been than the pirate she was now.
Although to reiterate—she hadn't actuallydoneanything to warrant the Government's attention as the latter. She'd considered the possibility of a bounty, of course, but she'd assumed it would reflect her actions, and that as such, it would be a small, unremarkable sum.
The number staring up at her from the crumpled wanted poster in her hands was neither small, nor was it unremarkable.
Shanks was still laughing, and she had the sudden urge to suffocate the sound of it with the poster, when he lifted his eyes to look at her, tears of mirth gathering at the corners, before he righted his shoulders and told her, wholly serious, "I am so proud, I'm a little turned on."
If she hadn't been so distracted by the bounty (herbounty, gods), Makino thought she might have managed a mortified blush at the casual remark, but as it was, she was having trouble gathering her voice into something that wouldn't escape with a shriek.
She looked to Ben for help, only to find him curling his fingers around a coin, a little too late to hide it from sight.
"What was that?"
He shot Yasopp a look, but the latter's grin was too shameless to bother hiding anything, and so, "Ben Beckman," Makino said, voice carefully level now, no shriek in sight. "Did you bet money on what my first bounty would be?"
Ben said nothing, but cut his eyes sideways, as though to say 'I wasn't the only one', but before Makino could comment on that, "In our defence, Ma-chan, it was only a matter of time," Yasopp said. "And hey, it's bigger than what my first was!"
A cheerful chorus of agreement rose in the wake of that statement, along with more coins changing hands, without reserve now that the cat was out of the bag, and Makino could only gape. Behind her, Shanks was still laughing.
"That doesn't make me feel better!"
But the wanted poster was only the beginning, and once the waters had first stirred with the rumours, there was no stopping the ripples.
Have you heard?
Red-Hair's wife?
That tiny slip of a thing from the papers?
Don't be fooled. They say she's ruthless.
Doesn't even flinch when he lets his haki loose, and you know what Red-Hair's like.
You know they say she's the one who lopped his arm off?
I heard it was a lovers' spat.
Yeah. Shows what happens when you give a woman a weapon. Damn temperamental creatures. And I heard he's the one who trained her.
Bet he regrets that now.
I heard she did it because she caught him looking at another woman. A reminder not to let his hands wander from the marriage bed. Well— hand. You get what I mean.
Yikes.
Hell hath no fury, huh?
Yeah, but she's so—
What? Cute? You think Death can't wear a pair of doe-eyes if it wants to? Shows how much you know. You'll find fell things in these waters wearing beautiful skin. Don't for a second think they won't drown your gullible ass.
Devil take me, what kind of dark recess of this hell-wrought sea did Red-Hair drag her out of, anyway?
I don't know, but I'm betting it's nowhere any sane man has ever set sail. But then he's not known to be that.
A fitting match, then.
Aye. God help us.
Unsurprisingly, Makino didn't find the rumours nearly as amusing as Shanks.
"What," she asked, endearingly articulate.
He doubted his grin was helping matters. "You're making a name for yourself."
"I'm—"
"A pretty fanciful one, too. I don't know which rumour is my favourite—the one that claims you're some kind of sea-creature that seduced me, or the one that says I'm just a front for the real captain of this crew." He gave her a look. "Now, I know I've joked about you usurping me, but please don't let this inspire you."
The purse of her mouth wasn't holding back a smile this time, and Shanks tilted his head, his own smile sheepish. "Not funny?"
When her frown still didn't relent, he reached for her hand, running his thumb over her knuckles to loosen the tense grip of her small fist. "You know," he said then. "I seem to remember a bet we made—"
Makino closed her eyes. "Oh god."
"—that a certain someone wouldn't even make a singleripple."
She'd ducked her head, his attempt at making light of things failing, and he had the thought that maybe there was more to it than simply a desire to stay out of the spotlight. She'd never wanted fame—or as was now the case,infamy, and to which his reaction probably could have been better. Or he could have at least curbed his amusement somewhat.
"Hey," Shanks said then, and when he squeezed her hand she lifted her gaze, reluctance sitting bright across her features. He'd dropped the smile now. "Does it bother you that much?"
Makino sighed, but her fingers had loosened from their white-knuckled grip, and he pressed his thumb into her palm, feeling how they curled around it. "It's not having a reputation that bothers me," she said. "It's just—I haven't actually done anything to warrant those rumours." She looked at him. "Other than marryyou."
"Which is reason enough to doubt your sanity," Shanks offered, not missing a beat. "And your judgement sense."
When all she did was look at him, he let his expression ease into something softer. "I've never doubted either," he told her. "But people who don't know better will grasp for some pretty far out theories to explain what they don't understand. Maybe it makes more sense that you are some devious sea creature, given that they can't seem to decide what to make ofme." He let a hum sit on his tongue, "Is he a real redhead? What is he hiding under that cloak?" He lifted his brows, then purred, "You might know the truth, but there's something to be said for keeping people in suspense."
She wasn't even trying to hold back her smile now, and he grinned, finding that thrilling flutter of satisfaction that never got old, at making her smile.
He felt her reaching up, and the light caress of her fingertips as she touched her hand to his chest. "If keeping people in suspense is your intention, you're not doing a very good job, flaunting everything like this."
He winked, grin impish with delight at the look in her eyes now, cinders of desire in them despite her endearing attempts at masking her reaction with humour. And they'd been married several years, but she was still so terribly bad at hiding her feelings.
His own desire asserting itself, Shanks made no effort to hide it—or the suggestive edge to the words as he said, raising his brows, "There's still something left to the imagination. Like the full size of my—"
"Bounty?" Makino offered dryly.
"—charm." He let his grin stretch, as wide as it would go, full of feigned innocence. "My sweet lady wife, where have your thoughts gone?"
Closing his hand over the one pressed to his heart, he kept it from reaching lower, aiming for the side of his stomach, and her eyes narrowed with a spectacularly unconvincing glare, which was only further ruined by the blush colouring her cheeks. And there was another marvel—that he could prompt those kind of reactions now as easily as when he'd first walked into her bar and she hadn't even been able to look him in the eye.
He ducked his head to kiss her cheek. "But speaking of bounties," he murmured, grin a shameless stretch along the skin at her temple. "Want to cash it in?"
The giggle that lured from her was the most delightful sound he'd ever heard, and Shanks was almost sorry there wasn't anyone else around to hear it. "I can't tell if you're just being figurative, or if you're suggesting some kind of dirty role play," Makino said.
"That's the perk of being married to me: you never know which one it is. Keeps you on your toes."
"That'sthe perk?"
He grinned a kiss against her cheekbone, and rumbled, "That, and impressive notoriety."
"That's not another euphemism, is it?"
His attempted seduction was ruined by the roaring laugh that pulled from him, but he couldn't help himself, or feel very sorry when he found her own lifting in turn, although a far gentler sound. And he felt lightheaded from it, wanting her, like there wasn't enough air to breathe; a delightful paradox, with her presence usually offering the opposite.
"You know, thinking about it now, I think the one about the seductive sea creature is my favourite," he laughed into her skin. "It's not that far from the truth. Falling in love with you did feel a little like drowning."
He thought she might have had a protest ready, but lost it when his lips grazed that spot under her ear and a sigh shuddered out instead. And even if he delighted in drawing laughter from her, and quick remarks to parry his own, there was something to be said for being able to render someone utterly beyond words.
Her burgeoning reputation brought more than just rumours.
She didn't know just what it was that stirred her into waking, if it was the missing warmth beside her or something else, but after the first breath of wakefulness Makino was blinking into the dawn-light, reaching across the mattress only to find the space empty, her husband missing, although the sheets were still warm under her fingertips.
Rubbing at her eyes, confusion accompanied the sight of the grey light creeping into the cabin. Shanks was rarely up this early, and the fact that he hadn't woken her—
She felt it. A presence she didn't recognise, manifesting between one breath and the next, and then she was awake and sitting up on the bunk, gaze dragged to the door, and the main deck beyond it.
Between Shanks and Yasopp's efforts, she'd been improving her observation haki, but Makino didn't think she would have needed training to sort this presence from the rest of the crew, feeling it now where it pushed back against her seeking touches, like a foreign, immovable object had been dropped onto the ship.
It was—different. Heavy, like Shanks', but it wasn't the same kind of weight. Instead of the relentless warmth that leaped out at her, the one that always looked for spaces to fill, and that always seemed to be reaching for her, this wasn't a presence thatmoved. Instead it perched in her mind, suspended in utter stillness—a feeling that invoked the night sky pressing down from above, the way it sometimes felt out on deck with nothing but the naked horizon on all sides. It was that curious, almost vulnerable sense of being without anywhere to hide; like a field mouse caught in the killing scope of a bird of prey.
She felt Shanks then, the steady assurance of his presence settling her heart somewhat, although it was impossible to overlook the tension seeming strung up between it and the new one, as though in near-anticipation. It was the kind that often marked the prelude to a fight, as though it was just a matter of seconds before the tethersnapped.
Having pushed off the bunk, she got dressed, hands shaking a bit in her hurry to pull on her shirt and trousers, but she had no mind for appearances, finding it suddenly hard to think beyond the fact that he hadn't woken her.
And even if there was a thought following that, wondering ifhe might have had a good reason not to, if it was an enemy who'd come aboard, Makino shoved it down. Because even if the tension in the air suggested a stand-off, there was no killing intent accompanying it.
She paused, fingers twitching with sudden indecision, but then she was reaching for Siren, fastening it at her hip as she made for the door.
The whine of the hinges sang into the morning quiet, and she watched as several heads turned her way, including Shanks', and, "Ah, speaking of what keeps my heart afloat," he said, and if the warmth in his voice hadn't already alerted her to the fact that it wasn't an enemy they were dealing with, the smile that greeted her approach eased her remaining concern out of her shoulders. "There she is."
But even ifenemywasn't quite the right word for it,frienddidn't seem an effortless fit—at least not going by the lingering note of tension that sat, suspended between them.
The man standing on deck didn't even lift his chin, but Makinofeltwhen his gaze shifted towards her, the grip of it almost physical, and part of her was surprised that the sight of the sharp golden eyes that latched onto hers didn't root her heels to the deck.
The bird of prey comparison seemed suddenly all too accurate.
Coming to stand by Shanks, she didn't reach out to touch him, although her fingers itched to do so. But she kept them at her side, fingertips brushing Siren's sheath once, and resolutely kept her gaze from dropping from the one holding hers.
Only for the span of a breath did those eyes leave her, to glance off the sword at her hip, but the shift of his gaze was so brief Makino wondered if she'd imagined it, when that too-sharp focus was suddenly back on her again.
What he'd gathered from his observations remained a mystery, but, "Hawk-Eyes," Shanks said, brightly. "Meet my wife. The terror of the sea herself."
Makino winced. "Shanks."
"Scourge of the sea?"
"Shanks."
"Yes, my heart?"
She shot him a look, to which she only got a widening grin for her trouble, but he offered no further quips about terrors and scourges, and when she looked at the man in front of them she had the uncanny impression that his look had turned decidedly dry, akin to the shared understanding of the long-suffering.
Wait. "Hawk-Eyes," she said then, the name clicking into place.
Those keen eyes flitted to the man at her side, and even though his expression hadn't so much as twitched, at least not beyond the now acutely dry note that seemed to have taken up residence, Makino had the sudden sense she knew what was coming.
"I can see from your face that my reputation precedes me." His brow furrowed a bit, and to Shanks, who was still grinning, "I will regret asking why."
Makino wisely tucked away the remark begging on her tongue now, faced suddenly with the person behind so many of Shanks' stories—at once exactly like she'd imagined, down to the flamboyant hat, but at the same time, nothing like what she'd expected. That death-calm grace and stillness felt so wildly at odds with his apparent brand of flair, and the dry, even baritone betrayed nothing, at least not beyond what he wished.
But however irreconcilable his many outward qualities, the sword on his back, the jewel-clad hilt of which she could see glittering under the first slant of sunlight stretching with a cat's languid grace across the deck, carried a heavier promise than anything else, and fixing her eyes on it now, Makino had the feeling Shanks' stories hadn't exaggerated his skill where that was concerned.
But the other stories…
"If you'll disregard the rumours about me, I'll do you the same courtesy," she told him, and watched as a dark brow arched, the entirely economic gesture ripe with suggestions. Not quite intrigue, and yet...She let a smile sit on her lips, demure but knowing. "You can set the record straight, and I'll do the same."
"Set the record stra—are your implying that I've been feeding youlies?" Shanks asked, laughing.
Makino just looked at him. "You embellish the truth to the point of blatant exaggeration."
"Only because it makes for better stories!"
"Scourge, Shanks?"
The look he gave her was carefully innocent, but it was ruined by the gleam in his eyes. "I wasn't the one who sent those navy rookies running for the hills last time we stopped for supplies. That wasyou, my beautiful scourge."
"They were running because of groundless rumours!"
"I wouldn't saygroundless—"
Ignoring him, and the pout that followed, Makino turned to Hawk-Eyes. "Would you care to join us for breakfast, Hawk-Eyes? I'll make it worth your while."
That dry light hadn't guttered out, and observing her, she caught the corner of his mouth twitching upwards, the barest hint of a smirk. Then, "Mihawk will suffice," he told her, striding past her towards the galley, and past a gaping Shanks. Even Ben looked surprised.
Makino followed suit. She'd forgotten to put on shoes, but if a man like that could command that level of authority with a feathered hat, she didn't see why she couldn't do the same, barefoot on her own ship. And groundless rumours on not, she wasn't about to sell herself short. Just set the record straight.
A beat followed, and then—"You've never givenmeallowance to call you that!" Shanks called after them.
A few hours later, the sun spilling in through the portholes in earnest and breakfast having transitioned into early morning drinks, the galley was a tumult of noise, as was the way of their crew, but for all that his reclusive nature suggested an aversion to sound of any sort, the man seated across from him suffered it all without complaint.
"So?" Shanks asked around a grin, gaze moving across the galley, seeking Makino, now in the midst of discussing something in the morning paper with Ben. She was listening attentively, mouth pursed in that moue of concentration that she got sometimes when she was reading, and had no mind for the world around her.
After setting her own record straight—meaning she'd promptly told Mihawk to tell her exactly what he'd heard about her, and then proceeded to kill every rumour with the truth—she'd left them to their own devices, cheerfully undaunted by Shanks lamenting the death of the theory that he'd dragged her up from the depths somewhere.
But it was difficult maintaining a convincing show of regret, given what she'd just done. Because even with all the stories he'd shared about his old rival, he'd forgotten to tell her that most people didn't lift their chins prettily and order Dracule Mihawk to tell them things. Or if they did, they didn't live long enough to regret it.
"Scourge," Mihawk said dryly, raising his glass to his lips, a rare smile lifting one corner of his mouth as he followed Shanks' gaze across the galley, "Seems an apt epithet."
The uproarious laugh that dragged from him drew Makino out of her distraction, but Shanks countered the bemused little frown between her brows with a grin he was pretty sure couldn't get any bigger, and marvelled not for the first time in the years spanning their marriage, that her origins might not be as fantastical as the rumours would have it, but her presence in his life would never cease to be a point of amazement. And she could say what she wanted about his penchant for exaggeration, but he'd never exaggerated that.
"Yeah," he sighed, around a much softer laugh this time, finding her bemusement easing into a smile.
"Tell me about it."
Mihawk became a regular visitor (or as regular as the sea allowed, anyway, with its quick, wilful temper and changing tides), but there were others, too, and to Makino's relief, only a few of them came with her in mind.
But even if it wasn't her they sought, thatdidn't mean the sea excluded her from its schemes.
Seven years since she'd left Fuschia behind, and a part of her old life found her in the form of a young man that Makino didn't even recognise, until he tipped his hat to reveal familiar, freckled cheeks, and a smile that hadn't stretched so wide when she'd last seen it.
"Ace," she blurted, startled, the name dragged from somewhere deep in her memory. Then, calmer, although with no more eloquence, "You're—tall."
She could practically feel Shanks' grin, and found its twin on the face in front of her—the one she was trying desperately to connect to the little boy in Dadan's care, who'd freckled so badly under the sun, and whose small features had always seemed to be pulled into a frown too old for his years.
"Makino-san," that boy said now, no longer a boy, and no frown in place. Only the freckles were the same as she remembered. "It's been a long time."
Makino could only stare, suddenly aware of the hush that had descended on the cave, as though they were waiting for her to speak. And maybe they were, but even with the pressing expectation of one, she couldn't seem to manage a response.
She knew, of course, that it had been a long time. Logically, she knew it had been seven years since she'd left Fuschia, and that little boys didn't stay little boys forever. It wasn't just the tides that changed, but people too, and no matter how quiet and uneventful the village, the life she'd left behind hadn't stagnated in her absence.
But looking at Ace, Makino wondered suddenly what Luffy looked like, and if she would even recognise him now, if she met him.
A warm, rough-palmed hand covered hers, big and familiar, and she was brought back to herself—and the cave and the cold. Shanks had removed his glove, and she drew some comfort from the touch, allowing it to anchor her mind in the present; the life she'd chosen, not the one she'd left.
"I'm surprised you remember me," she said then, and tried for a smile. And she heard how her voice quavered and hated herself for it. Seven years as a pirate hadn't made her a better liar, and she knew they'd all caught it; the unspoken things that sat in the deceptively mild words.
But the words themselves weren't meant to be a lie, because there was part of her that was surprised that he did remember. She'd watched him sometimes when he was a baby, but Dadan had been his caretaker, and Makino had only seen him on her rare visits.
Ace smiled, and furrowed his brows a bit, as though seeking some old memory. "I remember you singing," he said then. "And I think you patched up my shirts a few times. Dadan can't sew for shit."
Something clenched behind her ribcage; a fist-sized knot that seemed to have lodged itself in place.
She heard herself asking how Dadan was doing, but couldn't seem to grasp his answer when he gave it. And when she didn't respond to his question in turn, having failed to even catch it, she heard Shanks' voice filing the silence, tinged with warmth and familiar amusement, even as she felt the grip of his hand, caging her own, which she realised belatedly were shaking in her lap.
She heard Shanks asking about his intention in seeking him out, the teasing suggestion of a fight being imminent, and Ace's laughing retort that he'd come with something rather different in mind.
Then:my littlebrother, he said, and it took her a moment to realise it was Luffy he meant. And to Shanks:I came to offer my thanks.
"You're Luffy's brother?"
There was a smile in her husband's voice, and she felt him glance her way, and the implied question in his next statement seemed directed at both her and Ace, "I didn't know he had a brother."
If she'd had the voice to speak, Makino might have agreed, but as it was she was trying her best to wrap her mind around this new piece of information, and with it, the full realisation of the things she'd missed.
Seven years. Two boys who hadn't known each other when she'd left, but who now considered themselves brothers. Ace had set out to sea, and Luffy was due to follow soon. He'd be fourteen now, in Dadan's care, with Garp busy at Headquarters.
And—Garp, she thought then, and for a moment it was hard to breathe past the name.
Having caught on, Shanks steered the conversation into safer waters, loudly declaring the necessity of a party, followed by the crew's chorusing agreement bouncing off the walls of the cave. And when they scrambled to scrounge together a feast from what they had at hand, it allowed Makino the chance to slip away.
And she didn't for a second think that it hadn't been their intention, the sheer volume of their good cheer distracting from her poorly concealed distress, but she had no mind to offer them her thanks as she stole towards the cave's entrance, needing air, or just space to claim it, the cave suddenly claustrophobic where it closed in around her.
The embrace of the cold welcomed her without mercy, but then Makino didn't feel like mercy was what she deserved right now, as she shuffled through the knee-deep snow, until she was far enough away that she couldn't hear the revelry from inside the cave. Around her, the heavily overcast sky was darkening into night, and the flurries tossed up by the wind made it hard to see anything beyond the tip of her nose.
She should go back inside, she knew, but for some reason, couldn't uproot her heels from where they'd dug into the snow—to go back inside the cave, where Ace was. The devil of her choices come to collect his due after seven years, bringing a boy who hadn't been hers, although he might as well have been, for what she was feeling now.
She felt Shanks approaching before she heard the snow crunching under his boots, and when his hand curved under her elbow Makino allowed the tight cross of her arms to loosen, along with a breath that held a sob, but before the next had had the chance to follow he'd tucked her against him, and she muffled the sound in the fur-lining at his collar.
And for a moment all he did was hold her, sobs muffled by his coat and the howl of the wind, and even if the cold had offered no mercy, the one she found in her husband's embrace wasn't asking for whether she considered herself worthy of it. But then that had always been his way of doing things, and the gratitude that swelled behind her breast loosened the knot a little, at least enough to feel like she could breathe again.
When her sobs had quieted, Makino felt him draw back a bit—enough to look down at her, although he was so tall, she had to crane her neck to meet his eyes. He had her pressed flush against him, but the cold was relentless, and although the fact thatShankswas feeling it should have been reason enough to convince her to go back inside, he didn't seem to be in a hurry; and even with the promise of a blizzard threatening in the flurries around them, the privacy it offered was suddenly hard for her to relinquish.
"Do you think about it a lot?" he asked her then, something like sympathy in his eyes now, observing her. The wind had dragged loose some of her hair from her hood, tossing it about her cheeks, but she didn't have the strength to bother with it.
She looked up at him. "About what would have happened if I'd stayed?" Her tears were like ice on her cheeks, and his hand was a shock of warmth when he reached up to wipe them away. She felt the release of the pressure from around her back, but only pressed herself closer in response, and felt the smile he tucked against her forehead.
"Sometimes," she admitted then. It was hurting her neck to keep looking at him, and so she dropped her eyes to his collar. "But not—not as much as I probably should. I think maybe that's the problem." She drew a breath. "I've beenhappy. And they've—"
She stopped, not sure what she'd planned to say, or who she was even talking about. Luffy, who hadn't been hers either, and who'd gained a brother in her absence. A brother who'd sought out the man who'd saved his life, just to saythank you.
"Haveyou been happy?"
She looked up at that, startled, only to find Shanks watching her, nothing condemning in his expression, just curiosity.
"Have you ever doubted that?" she asked, and wasn't surprised to find his smile quirking at the force behind the words. But of course, that had been his intention in asking, Makino realised, and had to shake her head a bit.
"I just—it was all just a little overwhelming," she confessed. "I mean, I knowit's been seven years—"
"Yeah, Ben's hair is a daily reminder—and if you're trying to pinch me through my coat, I hate to disappoint you, but it's not going to work. This thing has three layers. You should know: you're the one who forced it on me."
She glared, but Shanks only countered it with a grin, the sight of it cheerfully at odds with the weather, which seemed to only have gotten worse since they'd stepped outside.
Then, his look softening, "It's not a crime to choose happiness, Makino," he said. "You might be a pirate, and the Government might have a whole list of things they consider worthy of punishing, marrying me being only the most prominent of the lot, but choosing to be happy isn't one of them. Even Garp would agree to that, I think."
She tried not to flinch at the mention, finding in it a conversation seven years overdue. But what was she supposed to say? Just call him up to chat, seven years after she'd set out to sea to be a pirate? At least Garp knew she was still alive, with her rise into infamy, although she doubted he considered it a relief, given that the reason for that infamy was the man she'd married.
A kiss to her brow then, warm against her freezing skin, and she allowed her breath to shudder out, the sigh ghosting white before her lips. Her cheeks burned from the cold, and she pushed closer to Shanks. "Thank you," she murmured.
She felt his grip tightening around her, and his voice had dropped low when he tucked it under her ear. "For?"
"For braving a blizzard to deal with your emotional wife."
"I thought I was the emotional one in this marriage."
She hid her smile against his chest. She couldn't hear his heart through the thick coat, but let the weight of his presence settle over her shoulders instead.
"And you say 'deal with' like it's a chore," Shanks said then, pulling back a bit, seeking her gaze. "And you are many things, my girl, but you've never been that."
The lump in her throat was back, although Makino suspected it had a different reason now, but couldn't seem to manage a response that wouldn't be another sob.
Thankfully, Shanks didn't demand a response, just let the truth speak for itself, that entirely effortless offering of himself without requiring retribution that never ceased to amaze her, even after seven years.
"I'm sorry I had no tact back there, asking you if Luffy had a brother," he said then. "I should have realised that if you'd known, you would have mentioned it earlier."
She shook her head. "I was just surprised. I only ever knew them separately, but things have apparently changed." She drew a breath, but it didn't hurt this time. "But change doesn't mean for the worse."
"No," Shanks agreed, the corner of his mouth lifting, and from the way he was looking at her, Makino didn't think he was referring to Luffy. "It doesn't."
"And hey," he said then, smile brightening. "Think about it this way. Whatever you're wondering about, Luffy or the state of the local melon crop—" Makino sobbed a laugh, as Shanks grinned, and continued, "You have the chance to ask him now. He'll probably tell you."
Her smile was a wavering thing, but no less genuine for it, and when he reached for her hand, giving her a tug towards the cave mouth, Makino moved to follow.
"Come on," Shanks said. "Three layers or not, if we stay another minute out here I'm pretty sure you'll have to carry me back inside, I'll be frozen stiff." Inclining his head towards her, he lifted his brows. "And I have so,somany dirty directions I could take that, but I'm going to save them all for when you've got some warmth back in your bones."
Less than half a beat later, and then, "Or in my bone. I'm sorry, it was too good to pass up!"
And if their crew had found her silent retreat curious, there were only knowing smiles that greeted them when they returned, Shanks' grin speaking volumes on its own, and Makino's laughter louder still.
The years brought more changes their way, manifesting in different things—new crew members and new routines, and they adjusted as was necessary, on a sea that had little patience for those unable to adapt.
Parting with their old ship was more difficult than Makino had thought it would be; the place that had been her home for nearly a decade. But the years and the sea had each taken their toll, and with an ever-growing crew, the decision was eventually made to commission a new one.
"Red Force?"
"What?" Shanks dragged his eyes from the new ship to look at her, an almost boyish delight sitting bright across his whole countenance. She sat by the wharf, nearly complete, and Makino allowed her gaze to follow the elegant curve of the dragon figurehead where it arched from the bow. "It's a cool name."
"Red Force," Makino repeated, and let her inflection speak for itself.
His grin was glibness given shape, and she found familiar challenge kindling in his eyes as he arched a single brow and declared, "It's what I am."
There was a full beat of silence, the tight press of her lips prevailing only for a second, and then she was laughing, hands braced on her knees as her back bent from the onslaught, the sheer force of her reaction startling a dock-worker enjoying his smoke break two paces off, but she couldn't have found the mind to care that she was making a scene.
"What?" she heard Shanks laughing, somewhere above her. "It's true!"
Muffling her laughter with her hands, she lifted her head to look at him, only to find him grinning, looking wholly pleased with himself. "Only you, Shanks," she sighed, but saw from the way his eyes crinkled that her intended teasing had yielded entirely in favour of unabashed fondness.
"Hey, I wanted something completely different, butyouwere the one who refused to let me name her after you," he told her. "So unless you've changed your mind—"
"Red Force is a good name," Makino said. "Really."
"My heart, you are the worst liar I know," Shanks told her, still grinning.
"Beats being the worst name-giver," she countered.
"Well, you're the woman who married said name-giver, so I don't know what that says about you."
There was a quip on the tip of her tongue—that any children they had should count themselves lucky she'd be present to salvage whatever outrageous suggestions their father was entirely liable of making—but she swallowed it before she could speak it.
They hadn't been trying, exactly, but they hadn't exactlynotbeen trying either. But it had been nearly ten years, and she'd reconciled herself with the fact that maybe that particular happiness wasn't meant for them. The sea had given them so many things, after all; it would only make sense that it took something in return.
She tried not to think about it, but she was almost thirty, and Shanks older still, and she might not have medical training, but she knew enough to recognise that if it hadn't happened yet, there was probably a reason.
They'd discussed it only once, at least to the extent that if it happened, they would consider it a blessing, and take it from there. But when the years had passed and there'd been nothing, Makino hadn't been able to bring herself to broach the subject again. She couldn't even approach Doc with her questions, fearing that she might break down if she did—if she put words to the thought that gripped her now, that now-familiar ache in her chest, imagining what a child of theirs might be like, and that she would never know.
Shanks hadn't brought it up since that first talk, although given that she could hide absolutely nothing from him, Makino thought it was likely because he knew she bore the loss so heavily, he didn't want to burden her further.
But she wondered sometimes, if he thought about it as much as she did.
Her earlier spirits having trickled out, she knew from his frown that it hadn't escaped Shanks' notice, although whether he'd caught onto why, Makino didn't know, but before he could speak—"Picked a name yet?" Ben's voice cut in, as he stepped up beside them.
"Red Force," Makino said, and had to clear her throat, realising how hoarse the words sounded. She tried for a smile, and felt how it wavered. "Apparently, it's what he is."
And it didn't escape Ben either, she saw, and even though Makino knew he wouldn't pry, she was still relieved when all he did was lift his cigarette back to his lips, and said, wholly deadpan, "I was expecting something worse."
"Hey!"
Modelled after their last, the new ship didn't demand many changes to her daily routines, but for a creature of habit, even the smallest changes require some readjustment, and so it took time, getting properly acquainted with her new home.
Dark mahogany bleeding red when the sun caught in it, the veneer still fresh, she had few scars to speak of, the pale filigree of salt on the hull her only mark yet, given by a sea that seemed curiously reverent in its attentions; not a gentle lover by any means, but a doting one.
She sat on the waves differently than their old ship—with more ease, Shanks said, no old planks weary from sailing and long, hard years. And there was aspiritin the soul of her; a heart that saw challenge in traitorous straits, and that welcomed shifting currents with near-eager anticipation. Lithe and reckless, she cut the waves with serpentine grace, cresting the very largest with an impression of taking flight; a fitting illusion, the dragon figurehead arching with regal dignity, and just enough dramatic flair to suit her captain.
It took a little time, learning to know her; a little effort, to familiarise herself with her shape, and her temper. But as for loving her, it took no effort, Makino discovered—and no time at all.
There were other changes, too. Their new quarters were bigger, although between the two of them they'd never needed much, but she appreciated the extra space, for the books that ten years had seen accumulate. And they got a bigger bunk, although it made no difference to Shanks, who claimed most of that, too—and her. And in that, at least, little had changed in ten years.
She woke before the sun, roused by habit. Once it had been necessary, when she'd had a bar to run, but necessity had long since eased into personal preference. She loved the atmosphere of the ship first thing in the morning, the new as much as their old one; that pause for breath just before its heart stirred into waking, and the familiar pulse of noise and laughter drummed through the planks.
The naked body wrapped around her was warm and heavy with sleep, and the soft snores muffled into the crook of her neck tempted her to remain—to forget about her small routines, and let sleep lure her back. She did that, sometimes; spent an extra hour watching him sleep, too comfortable to be bothered with doing anything else. It was a pirate's freedom, Makino supposed, to be allowed that leisure, if she so pleased. And no matter how many small things remained of the barmaid, ten years had long since made a pirate of her.
Her languid stretch saw him stirring, and a kiss to his shoulder marked her intention before she tried to shimmy out of his grip, but he just tightened his arm around her and rolled her over, tucking her against the wall as she muffled her laughter against his chest. "Shanks."
A grunt was her answer, and she huffed, kissing until he yielded his grip enough for her to slip away, and she evaded the fingers reaching for her, laughter trailing soft and drowsy in her wake as she made to dress.
In answer—or cheeky retaliation; with him it could be either of the two—Shanks rolled over on his back, the whole bunk commandeered and the sheets kicked off, and she shook her head at the display as she made for the door, a murmur ofgrown mantucked under her breath that had him sticking his tongue out.
The morning was touched with a chill, a cold dampness in the air that promised rain, but she welcomed it with a deep breath as she stepped out of their cabin and onto the main deck.
As expected, the ship was quiet, and Makino greeted it with her own, fingers dancing along the railing as she made her way to the quarterdeck, feet bare on the planks and her sword in hand. She liked to do her morning stretches before breakfast, and the little exercises she'd worked into her daily routine, out under the open sky. By the time she was done, Ben would be up, and the promise of coffee put a skip in her step.
It didn't take long to loosen the knots from her muscles, small aches that required only a little prodding before they yielded, easing with her stretches into a kinder ache, driven deep with her breaths. And it was easy to lose herself to the familiar movements, and the sea—a sharp cut of salt and cold in the air, and the vast weight of it beyond her mind, anchoring her senses where it stretched towards the horizon.
She lost track of how long she kept it up, but the sun had yet to rise when she caught the sound of a door opening, somewhere across the deck.
She felt him approaching, and turned, surprise making her brows lift, along with a smile, and she didn't bother trying to hide either as Shanks stepped onto the quarterdeck.
"You're out of bed," Makino blurted. She'd let her stance slip completely, stretches forgotten. "The sun isn't even up yet."
He was quick, stealing a kiss to her shoulder, the slip of skin bared by her shirt, and there was still the telling roughness of sleep in his voice when he rumbled, "Youare."
She tilted her head, feeling the tuck of his nose beneath her ear, and the grin that followed. He seemed cheerfully undaunted by the fact that she was covered in sweat. "That doesn't usually stop you from sleeping in," she pointed out.
"Maybe I felt like shaking things up," Shanks countered, drawing back to look at her. "But speaking of uncharacteristic behaviour,youslept in just yesterday. Three whole hours, might I add." He lifted his brows."I thought you were sick."
Like the look he gave her, the words were innocent, but his smile told her he knew exactly what had kept her in bed so long, and Makino poked him in the stomach. "I allow myself the occasional indulgence," she said. Then, chin tilted cheekily, "And slip in judgement."
"Oh, is that what I am?" Shanks mused. "Slip in judgement, huh? You know, your pet names could use some work. And for the record, you could do with sleeping in a little more often. It's good for the soul." He grinned, and chirped, "And for me. You know I miss you when you're gone."
"Hmm. I don't know if I believe that, given that you take the chance to sleep spread-eagled." At the wolfish smile that chased across his face, she added primly, "And at least one of us should be awake to make sure the ship stays afloat."
"But that's what we haveBenfor," Shanks told her patiently, and with only a hint of familiar glibness. "Although with how much you spoil him, he's slacking off more and more. Then again, it might just be old age getting to him." He frowned, as though in contemplation. "I can never be sure."
It was her turn to stick her tongue out, and she reached to pinch his side, but he'd stepped out of her reach before she could, catching her hand to tug her close, and startling a laugh from her as she caught herself against him.
"So what about it, my early bird? A duel before breakfast?" he asked, that bright gleam of laughter in his eyes, now cleared of sleep.
Makino cocked her head, then said, slightly marvelling, "Married almost ten years, and I can never tell if you're in earnest, or if you're being suggestive."
Shanks only grinned. "I'd be disappointed if you could. Or I'd have to up my game, at least."
"As if you need an excuse for that," she countered smoothly, and saw from the quality his smile took on, that he had a mind to prove her right.
But intentional ambiguity notwithstanding,she proffered Siren, the hilt resting in the cradle of her palm, and watched his grin widen as she tilted the tip at an almost lazy angle. Silver and sea-glass, the grey morning light softened the delicate engravings on the blade, the waves bleeding into the steel, fogging with the chill from the sea.
His hand touched the pommel of his sword, and Makino was moving before she'd drawn her next breath, their blades meeting when it rushed out of her, and his laughter following at its heels, to brighten the morning with sound.
"Wasting no time," Shanks marvelled, side-stepping her with far too much ease, even as he added, "I feel I should remind you that I'm not a young man anymore."
"You seem to have no trouble drawing your sword," Makino countered, advancing again, feet quick across the planks and her breath steady in her chest, but her smile betrayed her attempted coyness.
Shanks raised his brows, grin delighted and shameless. "Now who's being suggestive?"
The look she shot him earned her a laugh, and when he moved towards her it was to steal a kiss, which Makino deflected by giving his hip awhackwith the flat side of her blade. Predictably, that only had him laughing harder, and redouble his efforts, and she was suddenly hard pressed to decide if he was trying to best her, or to get that kiss.
Her breath rushed out of her in a laugh as she danced around him, steps sure-footed and sea legs steady after ten years, and his delight in both demonstrated in the way he retaliated, seeking to catch her off guard, and making no point to hide it.
She always enjoyed sparring with him. Ever since those first, stumbling sessions where she hadn't even been able to hold her practice sword right, they'd developed an ease, practice making perfect, and showing in little things, like an intimate knowledge of weaknesses, and strengths, along with where to apply pressure, and where to yield. She was familiar with his tells, and knew he could pick out hers with his eyes closed, and it was an awareness that matched them well together in training, a near-practised dance, even if her skill wasn't a match for his in a real fight.
But he'd never treated her as inferior for it, had only been endlessly patient (and, true to form, just a little bit insufferable), and had greeted all the hurdles in her path along with her, allowing her time to grow, and to hesitate, but never humouring her. He'd taken her teaching seriously, and his efforts had paid off. Ten years had seen her become more than proficient, and a formidable opponent, in the right setting. She didn't have a thirst for battle, or a competitive nature, but sparring was different. And with Shanks…
She was vaguely aware that they were attracting a growing audience, despite the early hour, and once she might have felt self-conscious at the attention, but ten years had seen to that, too; had wrought familiarity from shyness, and into something that felt curiously like ease.
She caught the amused murmurs from across the deck—thoughts on form and bets making it into Ben's ledgers, and the occasional holler for Makino to give as good as she got, and to stop favouring her right side—but didn't let it tempt her focus away from the man in front of her.
And anyway, it was distracting enough, watching Shanks, in his element and with that grin on his face. A unique grace of hard, controlled movements, and she'd never seen anyone who fought like he did. When they'd first met she'd had him pegged as a reckless fighter, an assumption based on nothing but his personality, but she'd soon come to realise that the opposite was the case. He was fiercely strategic, even more so in the heat of battle, and risky gambles were only made with an unshakeable surety of what would follow.
Of course, he was prone to the occasional, exaggerated flourish, but only if he thought he could get away with it. Or if he'd had too much to drink. One usually followed the other.
But it wasn't hard to see how he'd received his reputation as one of the greatest swordsmen in the world. And she didn't know what he'd been like before he'd lost his sword arm, but watching him now, it seemed an entirely inconsequential thing—the people they'd been once.
Her shirt clung to her back now, but the strain she felt was a good sort, and she was grateful for her earlier efforts. She always lasted longer if she'd warmed up first.
Shanks didn't seem to be having trouble, despite the fact that he'd rolled straight out of bed, but Makino knew he'd be regretting it later. And lamenting it. Loudly.
She let her smile sit, carefully innocent on her mouth. "How are you holding up, old man?"
He drew back at that, a laughing splutter pulling free of him, to fill the space he'd put between them. "Old man?God, that's a low blow. And you didn't even use your sword. I don't know if I should give you points for creativity or cruelty."
"She's just telling it like it is, Boss!" came the shout, followed my several voices rising in cheerful agreement, one of which sounded distinctly likego for the knees, Ma-chan!, and Shanks angled his sword in the direction of the speakers, a crude gesture accompanying it.
"This old man is holding up just fine," he muttered, sounding almost convincingly put-off, before hemoved towards her, barely giving her time to react, and Makino had a mind to wonder if the demonstration wasn't meant to underline his rebuttal.
But she knew that move, and stepped aside with ease, slipping under the arm that sought to trap her, and driving her elbow into his ribs, shoving a breath past his teeth, along with a laugh.
Drawing back, "You're fightingdirtytoday," he told her, delighted grin ruining any attempt at convincing reproach. And she knew that smile, too—and what it usually heralded. And his voice was a low purr when he added, "I'm tempted to suggest we take this duel to the bedroom."
Makino huffed a laugh. "Stop trying to distract me!"
"Who, me? I wouldn't dream of it. If I was, I'd take off my shirt."
"Keep your pants on, at least."
"Why, my girl, is that a challenge?"
Their blades met. Siren sang, and Makino felt a muscle in her arm cramping under the strain. She was smaller, quicker, but even with one arm, Shanks had her vastly beat in raw strength.
"You still put too much weight on your right leg," Shanks told her, when he shoved her back, before smoothly parrying her next strike, and she ducked out of the way to avoid his counter.
Her hair was escaping her braid, the damp strands clinging to her cheeks a small distraction. She was thoroughly soaked through with sweat now. "You still talk too much when you spar," she huffed.
"You say that like it's restricted to sparring," Shanks offered back breezily. "Which you know it isn't. I talk in my sleep." Parry, strike, parry, and the gleam of his eyes finding her before his next remark did, a wholly knowing thing. "I talk duringsex."
She stumbled a step, cheeks flushing despite her better efforts, and despite the fact that she'd known it was coming. And his grin widened, before he moved, quicker than she could keep up, a single step eating up the distance between them until he'd put himself flush against her, his sword angled, pommel-out to tip her backwards and off kilter.
The opportunity found her between breaths, and she'd seized it before she'd even had time to consider it fully.
She let him tip her off balance, and feigned a drop, watching as he righted himself, pleased at the familiar victory. But before he could recover, or even react, she'd twisted, leg sweeping in a sharp, decisive arc across the planks, knocking his feet out—
—and sending Shanks sprawling on his ass.
There was a moment of absolute quiet; a full second of complete, stunned silence where no one spoke, and where all he did was lay there.
Having pushed to her feet, Makino looked down at him, flat on his back and wearing an expression of such earnest surprise, if she'd even for a second considered the thought that he'd allowed her take him down, it didn't last longer than that, banished by the look on his face.
And then she was laughing. "Ten years!" Makino exclaimed, voice sounding nearly shrill where it bounced off the quiet. "Ten years you've used that trick on me, andfinally!" She shrieked, laughter carrying across the ship, bright with unrestrained delight,"Retribution!"
Her reaction shook loose the silence from its shocked paralysis, and she heard more than one voice raised in support from across the deck, along with a rising chorus of laughter.
Shanks still hadn't moved. "Did my back give out?" He blinked up at her, his surprise so genuine Makino was tempted to tell him it was the most satisfying thing she'd ever seen. "I'm a little afraid to move."
"Oh, don't be so dramatic," she sighed, but her laughter couldn't be held back, and she felt it as it poured out of her, breathless with a pleasure that made her wonder if she didn't have a small shred of competitive instinct after all.
A grin lit his face now, pride taking over his expression—a fiercely honest thing that came to settle in the laugh-lines at the corners of his eyes, which looked up at her with unbridled wonderment. It had something warm and pleased filling up her chest, pushing against her ribcage with a flutter.
She held out her hand, and when he took it he was laughing, sword discarded as he lifted himself to his feet, and she wasn't quick enough when he tugged her close to steal a kiss this time—"I want a rematch," he told her, voice low and grin wicked against her mouth. "A private one. You're not the only one who can fight dirty."
She gave him another whack with her sword, but it did little to remove his grin, or hers. "Restrain yourself for two seconds," she chided, her laughter softened with familiar fondness.
"Okay.One—"
She proffered her blade, a playful warning, the tip angled at his chin and catching the first, pale shaft of sunlight where it fell over the deck, but Shanks only grinned, eyes still alight with that marvelling pride that had come to sit, deep within them.
"I have one thing I need to do first," Makino said, and at his raised brow, pursed her mouth with a smile as she turned to the crowd. The ship having come awake, she felt it stirring, the tremor of laughter and footsteps, like blood through the veins of a great beast, shaking off its slumber.
Then across the deck, seeking that amused expression and finding it, along with a whole tableau of shameless grins—"Ben Beckman!" she called, meeting his gaze, and saw the smile that had curved along his mouth, no doubt already anticipating the words about to come out of hers, accompanied with the sweep of her hand, calloused palm open to the still-grey skies—
"Pay up!"
Ten years had come and gone, when the news they'd been waiting for finally reached them.
"I've never felt soold," Shanks declared with a laugh, holding up the wanted poster for her to see, and Makino was almost inclined to agree.
The grinning face looking back at her was familiar, and recognisablyLuffy,those big,owlish eyes curving from a grin that went on forever, and with enough shameless cheek that the sight of it alone somehow seemed to warrant the bounty printed out beneath the picture.
Shanks was shaking his head, and she was tempted to say that with his delight worn so openly like that,oldwasn't the word that came to mind. "Thirty million, huh? I don't know why I'm surprised." He threw Makino a grin. "A lot of a big names coming out of that little village."
She huffed. "At least his reputation is based on some measure of truth."
"Most reputations on this sea have at least a shred of exaggerated fancy to them," Shanks pointed out. "Right, Hawk-Eyes? I'm pretty sure there's a rumour floating around that you can turn into a bat."
"A rumour of your making, if memory serves," Mihawk said, lifting his mug to his lips.
"Was that me? Man, I forget how clever I am sometimes. But in my defence, you lend yourself to that kind of stuff way too easily. You're the one sailing around in a coffin."
Makino curbed her temptation to agree, but from the look Mihawk shot her, knew it hadn't escaped his notice.
"And your wife?" Mihawk asked.
Shanks tilted his head, as though to ponder the question. "I don't think I'm the origin of any of those rumours."
"You haven't exactly done anything to disprove them," Makino pointed out.
Shanks didn't seem to hear her. "Oh, wait, I think one of them might be mine—the one about you being the reason Ben's hair turned grey so fast. I might have let slip that it's because I bartered with you to keep my own mane intact, and you took Ben's as payment. But that's a very small rumour. I doubt anyone's even heard it."
"The one that says she's a sea witch?" Yasopp spoke up, grinning. "I've heard that one."
A camp-wide murmur of agreement followed the declaration, and Shanks threw his head back.
Makino sighed, and wordlessly nodded her thanks as Mihawk refilled her drink with the dry look of an old understanding.
Taking a sip, she wiped a hand over her brow. The heat on this island was unrelenting, seeming to hang in the air, which didn't yield so much as a sliver of a breeze. And she wasn't the only one feeling it, going by the near-lethargic quality to their celebration.
The only one who seemed entirely unfazed by the weather was Mihawk, who sat, back straight and with his drink perched on his knee, which, given the heavy black hat and the long drape of his coat, was nothing short of a marvel to Makino.
As though sensing that his name had passed her thoughts, "You have been improving your technique," Mihawk said.
It wasn't a question, or even an observation based on any kind of knowledge on his part. It was just a statement of fact, as though he considered it self-evident. Which skilfully implied that she would be foolish indeed, if the truth turned out to be a different one.
Biting down on the inside of her cheek, "I train regularly," she told him. Siren hung at her hip now, although she didn't reach to touch it. And there wasn't any need for her to wear it among the crew, but ten years had seen her grow so used to the weight, not wearing it left her feeling oddly exposed.
Mihawk glanced at Shanks, whose expression revealed nothing of what he expected from this conversation. "You should take efforts to train her more often. With what is coming, she will need to improve."
Makino blinked—then bristled. "You say that without even having seen where my skill is at."
Those sharp eyes swivelled her way, but Mihawk's expression betrayed nothing. And there'd been a time, at the very beginning of their acquaintance, where she'd found the full focus of that gaze almost too much to bear, but now she met it without flinching. Shanks was wearing a smile of unabashed amusement.
"Skill matters little if you lack the conviction to use it," Mihawk said. "That is where you need training. If faced with the opportunity to land a killing blow, you will hesitate."
Shanks' smile had an edge to it now, and the camp around them had gone quiet.
Makino only squared her shoulders. "And?"
"And it will mean your death."
Somethingpassed over the crew at that—a ripple that felt distinctly like a hundred hackles rising, and she felt the tremor in the air, a palpable tension, as though the words had been received as a threat. Shanks' smile had dropped.
Nothing in Mihawk's expression suggested he'd even felt the change, although Makino knew he must have. "Recognise the position you are in," he told her. "Your choice of life speaks for itself. However delicate your nature and appearance, you will not be shown mercy."
The camp was quiet, the tension still strumming in the air making the hair on her arms rise. But however protective their reactions, Makino knew there were those who agreed with Mihawk's assessment. Because those who knew her heart knew that what he said was true; she didn't have it in her to take a life, even if self-defence.
But then, those who knew her heart also knew that she'd never considered that truth a weakness.
"Maybe not," Makino said, and though the words were calmly spoken, they were offered with steel. Her own kind, not seeking to cut, but to endure. "But that's not going to stop me from showing it, if I can. Even if it means I'll hesitate."
Shanks was smiling now, eyes crinkling at the corners, his look the curious progeny of pride and something she couldn't quite name.
And when Makino offered one to Mihawk, not prideful but still unapologetic, the tension fled—andhe feltthat, Makino knew, for all that the only outward suggestion was the barest arch of a single dark brow.
It didn't take long for the celebratory mood to fill the void left by the tense conversation, but then that was their way, and for all that Mihawk's silence still hinted at disagreement, there was a note of begrudging respect there that was entirely significant, however reluctant its offering. But then, however much he disagreed with her reasoning, in standing her ground Makino hadn't hesitated, and there, at least, they found an understanding.
Shanks was speaking then, asking about Mihawk's encounter with Luffy, the eagerness behind the questions lifting her spirits back up, and Makino turned her eyes to the wanted poster in her lap.
She thought back to the boy she'd left on the docks ten years ago, eyes full of tears but his determination too bright to be dampened by sorrow. She didn't know everything that had happened to him since that day, although Ace had filled in some of the gaps—had answered all her questions, even those Makino hadn't known she'd had. He'd told her about Dadan, and Sabo; a bigger loss than two small boys should have had to carry between them, but the fond smile on his face when he'd recounted the story told her the years had shaped that sorrow into something else.
And he'd told her about Luffy, and about the vow he'd made, to become a better pirate than Shanks and Makino both. That he'd talked about her often, and eagerly.
A mug nudged against her own then, and she looked up to find Shanks grinning, that too-young-for-his-years smile that made it suddenly hard to remember it had been ten.
"To small-town troublemakers," he toasted with a wink, and her lingering insecurities fled, leaving a smile in their wake. His expression still held that softly marvelling pride, and she wondered if he knew how much that meant to her. That even if he would rather she didn't hesitate, he'd never once given the impression that he thought her weak because of it. Rather the opposite. "Let's see if this one can't stir the waters enough to put your own ripples to shame."
She hummed, brushing her thumb along the scar in the picture. "With what he's managed so far, I don't think it's a question ofif."
The face on the wanted poster grinned back at her, as though in agreement, and even if she hadn't been there to watch him grow, and to see him off to sea, Makino claimed the pride she felt now, without apology.Show us how far you've come, Luffy.
We'll be waiting.
But the tides brought more than just good news.
"Ace is going after Blackbeard?"
To say the sound of that moniker on her tongue made something in himrecoilwas putting it mildly, but Shanks kept from physically flinching as he inclined his head to find Makino in the doorway to their quarters.
She had Siren sheathed, but the tendrils of hair plastered to her brow and the bright flush to her cheeks told him she'd just been sparring—and with Ben, given that she'd heard the news.
It was an achievement dragging his eyes away from the way his shirt clung to her tiny frame, and the slightly breathless quality to her voice when she spoke. But if anything could have provided a distraction, it would have been that news.
"That's what they're saying." Pushing away from his desk, he ran a hand through his hair, finding it damp between his fingers. They were skirting close to a summer island, and the temperature was bordering on unbearable.
"But he's—" She didn't finish, but Shanks caught what she didn't say. And Ace might be making a name for himself, and might flaunt a commanding post under one of the strongest pirates in the New World, but Makino wasn't a stranger to the man he was hunting. Shanks had told her the stories, after all; the rare exceptions in his extensive repertoire she hadn't accused him of exaggerating, and had never asked to have repeated.
He watched as her gaze flickered to the scars. And she'd never once looked at them with distaste, or as anything but a part of him, but the anger he found brightening in her eyes now made his breath sit, suddenly light in his chest.
Stepping closer, he brushed away the hair clinging to her brow, tucking it loosely behind her ear. She had her lips pressed together, and he watched as the thoughts behind her eyes shifted across her features, pulling at her brows, and her mouth. Still the most earnestly expressive face he'd ever seen, in all his years on the sea.
"Isn't there anything we can do to stop him?" she asked. And he saw from her expression that she recognised the futility in that question. Ace wasn't family, and he wasn't part of their crew. They had no say in his actions, or even a right to intervene.
But the stubborn press of her mouth spoke of a heart that refused to surrender without a fight, and there was an inkling at the back of his mind now, watching her. A fruitless venture, maybe, and yet…
"There's one thing we can try," he told her, glancing at the pen and parchment on his desk. And it was a long shot, appealing to Whitebeard, but looking at Makino now, Shanks felt that curious certainty that sometimes accompanied his wife; the one that felt kin to his gut-reactions, although it sat a bit further up in his chest.
Her brows furrowed a bit, but if he hadn't already felt it, Shanks suspected the naked hope sparking behind her eyes would have made the decision for him.
"What?"
"Are you sure this is a good idea?"
She watched the approaching ship, the shadow of the massive hull thrown far and wide across the water as they drew up beside it.
Having hailed it earlier, their arrival was expected—or at least, Shanks' arrival was expected, but Makino didn't want to think about what it might mean for her to step aboard. Among all the eddies of rumours that carried her name on this sea, their partnership remained one of the few truths, although she didn't know if it was a comfort to wonder if her presence was anticipated by a man she'd only ever heard about, but whose name was known by everyone in the world.
To think there'd been a time where all her authority had amounted to was running a single bar in a quiet, uneventful port.
Rough fingers covered hers on the railing, the weight of his hand drawing her thoughts back, and when she looked at him Shanks was smiling, although the tilt of his mouth was too sharp for convincing cheer, and the slight furrow to his brow spoke volumes on its own. "If you want to stay on the ship—"
"No," she said, and thought she detected a brief, genuine smile slipping past his hardened expression at the force behind the declaration. "Where you go, I go," she told him, the words familiar things, and punctuated with a breath. "And it's for Ace. I can't just sit back if—if there's something that could be done."
Shanks didn't voice his agreement, but Makino felt it in the way his hand tightened around hers, before he spared a glance at the jug of sake they'd brought for the occasion, the top of the cork towering above her head.
When she'd questioned bringing so much, Shanks had just looked at her and said, dryly,he'll call it a mouthful, and then call me 'brat' for good measure.
Watching the enormous jug now, Makino didn't feel particularly inclined to linger on what kind of man would consider it amouthful, but then given his ship, she already had a fair idea.
She looked at the vessel in question, the sheer size of which had made a cold sweat break out across her back when she'd first spotted it on the horizon. And she'd only heard stories of its captain, the strongest man on the sea, but she'd gathered enough to realise they weren't likely to be greeted with a feast, as was their own way.
And given what Rockstar had said, about how Shanks' letter had been received… "Do you think he'll listen?"
Having followed her gaze, Shanks lifted his good shoulder in a shrug, a deceptively casual gesture, with the expression that had settled on his face. "He's letting me come aboard, so there's that. But knowing Whitebeard, I'm not getting my hopes up. He might be known as the strongest man in the world, but I would rank him pretty high on the list of the most stubborn, too."
Makino worried her hands on the railing. She thought about Ace, once captain of his own crew, now a commander in another's, on a hunt for the same man who'd given Shanks the scars on his face. She'd never met Teach in person—Blackbeard, as he called himself now. But she'd heard enough, and Ace might be strong, but he was a boy, still. And Shanks' scars were testament enough to what he was up against.
And maybe it was futile, appealing to his captain when he might not even bother listening to what Shanks had to say, but the alternative of sitting on her hands made something within Makino physically shove back against the thought.
They'd pulled up close enough to come aboard now, and Shanks looked at her, a last, silent offer to stay behind, because he was the sort to offer a last out, no matter the situation. But Makino only met his look with her own, unwavering, and when he made to pick up the sake jug without another word, braced herself for what was to come.
She caught members of Whitebeard's crew leaning over the railing, observing their boarding with expressions of varying degrees of anticipation, some bordering on outright shock. Not that she blamed them. She knew it wasn't just any meeting between captains—they'd fought their way through a marine blockade to get here, after all. They were right to be wary, as were the crew at their back, and she caught Ben's last, warning look before she made to follow Shanks.
Siren weighed heavy on her hip, the constant awareness ofenemy shipsitting in every taut and straining muscle in her back, clenched tight with the knowledge of what was coming even before she felt Shanks unleash his haki before he'd taken a single step aboard.
And despite the nervousness that had plagued her all morning in anticipation of this very meeting, watching the reactions of the crew as they completed their boarding settled her nerves somewhat, finding realisation dawning across some expressions, while others barely had a chance to look surprised before they'd slammed into the deck.
She tucked a small sigh under her tongue, and was surprised to find that she had to keep herself from smiling. It was about keeping up appearances, as Shanks had told her, and Makino knew his efforts would be ruined if she rolled her eyes and let slip under her breath that wasn't this a tad too dramatic, even for him?
Still. Exaggerated dramatics aside, there was something chilling about the sight, even if she'd witnessed him demonstrating the full scope of his power before. His easy-going attitude didn't help matters, giving off the cheerful impression that he wasn't even making much of an effort, even as the ship groaned in protest to the abuse, and her crew fell, one by one as they passed.
Makino felt the pressure bearing down upon her, but she knew the weight of his presence intimately; knew how to bear it, and so kept her chin lifted and her gaze carefully level as they walked down the length of the main deck, towards the man seated at the end.
And it was an almost morbid thought—that the doughy slump of unconscious bodies littered in her husband's wake couldn't even tempt her surprise, and she knew it had to show on her face, because the pirates who weren't gaping at Shanks were gaping at her.
She caught some of the murmurs that followed them down the deck, the ones holding her name in some form or another begging her attention more than others, and she didn't look at Shanks, but wondered how much effort it was taking him not to smile. Probably more than it did lugging that enormous jug behind him.
They came to a stop a few paces away from where Whitebeard was seated, observing their arrival with an expression Makino couldn't have hoped to decipher if she'd had all the time in the world to observe it, but if the heavy press of his brow didn't suggest at least some form of disapproval, she hoped it wasn't anything darker.
She very carefully kept her eyes from drifting to the medical equipment stacked around him, even as shameless curiosity resurfaced, and with a vengeance.
Shanks was the first to speak—a greeting offered, along with an apology for putting on a show that Makino was tempted to point out didn't sound even remotely convincing.
"I didn't come here to fight," Shanks explained. "But I did bring some healing water. And I was hoping you might take a moment to listen to what I have to say."
There were some murmurs from the crew, and Makino watched as that old gaze came to land on her. And it felt like it took every ounce of willpower she possessed not to drop her eyes under the weight of that brazen observation.
But she'd chosen to come here—like she'd chosen to be a pirate, and to marry the man standing at her side now, casual-as-you-please, as though it didn't even faze him to bear the attentions of a whole crew and its captain—and she wasn't going to cower from a single man's scrutiny.
Then from across the deck—"Oi, Red-Hair!"
Makino followed Shanks' gaze to a man standing off to the side, who swept his arm towards the cheerful destruction left in their wake. "Bastard, look what you did!"
Undaunted, Shanks breezed right past the accusation, before blatantly propositioning an offer to join their crew that had Makino fighting the urge to stifle a scream with her fist.Fool man, now is not the time!
The offer wasn't well received, although why would it have been? Poaching the members of someone else's crew was bad conduct even when you hadn't been invited aboard their ship, and there was a split second where she feared they might draw their weapons on them.
Her fingers itched for Siren on her hip, but she kept her arms slack at her sides, and hoped her expression hadn't just displayed every single one of her thoughts to the whole ship.
Going by the amused flicker in those old eyes still regarding her, her hope was short-lived.
But before a fight could break out, Whitebeard was waving them off with an order to give them some privacy, but Makino felt the eyes on her back as the crew retreated, and the reprieve of their collective attention lifted from her with a breath. The whole atmosphere aboard the ship felt different now, with Shanks having shoved a lid on his haki, although a note of tension remained, as though there to stay.
The offer to take a seat was given, the words bitten off with the impatience of an order, but Shanks only looked at her with a smile, his own offer a far kinder thing, and waited until she was seated before taking a seat himself.
And Makino tried very hard not to think about just how small she felt, sitting down in front of a man whose presence and stature seemed to claim more of the world than had been intended for him.
Loomingwas a good word for it, she decided.
"I'd heard you got married," Whitebeard said then, gaze releasing Makino for a moment, to shift to Shanks at her side.
Whatever he found in that statement, Shanks only grinned. "Going on ten years now."
Whitebeard snorted. "A lot, for a brat like you," he said. Then, gaze sliding back to Makino, "Although the honour is probably hers, for putting up with you."
Despite her attempts at keeping a straight face, she couldn't school her expression fast enough from letting slip a smile, and she watched as Whitebeard's brows lifted in something she couldn't decide was amusement or surprise.
"It's been a long time since I've seen a face as honest as that," Whitebeard declared, then snorted. "Take that however you will. I'd say it was a compliment, but for a pirate, you're revealing far too much."
She didn't flinch at the jab. It was too familiar to prompt much of a reaction anymore, but she didn't speak, either. Somehow, she felt it would be better not to.
Shanks had none of her qualms. "I've always liked an honest face." Then with a wink at her, dark eyes holding a familiar grin, "They let so many delightful things slip."
Oh god, if you blush now you might as well throw yourself overboard.
Thankfully, she was spared having to make the decision by Whitebeard letting loose a guffaw—a loud, grating sound that trickled into a rasping cough. "Keep it in your pants while you're on my ship, you shameless brat!"
And even though the remark had Makino quickly revisiting the idea of jumping ship, it loosened some of the tension a fraction. Not nearly all of it, but enough to breathe past it, at least.
The sake was offered then, and she observed their interaction—the veiled conversation that rested, heavier than the weight of their combined presences—and tried to ignore the numerous eyes on her back from the crew who'd retreated under the guise of leaving them alone, but who were all doing a rather poor job of it. For some reason, no one seemed to be watching the two captains, and Makino didn't know whether to feel exasperated or restless, struggling to keep her hands from twitching as she forced her gaze to stay level with the towering pirate seated opposite.
Those old eyes drifted to her on occasion as Shanks spoke of West Blue and sake's unique healing properties, but she couldn't for the life of her decide what Whitebeard made of her—or didn't, which was probably the worse alternative.
But when the conversation turned to Blackbeard, something changed. The pressure in the air seemed to solidify, and she couldn't stop the shiver that crept across her skin as Shanks' voice dropped into that rarely-heard quality of utter gravity that both managed to sound like him, and someone completely different.
And they weren't touching, sitting far enough apart for her knee to just avoid brushing his, and she tried to keep from focusing on the sudden, almost unbearable need to reach for him. Theirs was a marriage forged on physical contact, and he was a man free with his touches, and so the utter lack of which felt suddenly all too prominent to ignore.
But she kept her hands tucked in her lap, because they were a unified front and had been for ten years, and she wasn't about to undermine that by projecting an image of the weak, cowering wife, which, barring all the rumours to the contrary, was often how people saw her. Most pirates scoffed at the notion of an Emperor bringing his spouse with him anywhere, after all.
And even though Shanks had never once questioned whether he could or even should—rather the contrary, as he was entirely too happy to demonstrate, by bringing her everywhere—there was something to be said for selling the part. And if she was an Emperor's wife, she was not going to be a weak one.
"What do you want me to do?" Whitebeard asked then, the question offered in the lull following Shanks' speech, outlining Teach's cunning, which had left what felt like a veil of unease along her veins, her blood chilled with the familiar promise of what Blackbeard was capable of.
Anticipating his response, Makino looked at Shanks now, dragging her eyes away from the pirate seated in front of them as he brought up Ace, and the likely outcome if he managed to track down his quarry. And she watched as the furrow of his brow tugged at the scars, sitting bright against his skin even after so many years, and the simple truth of that fact ringing louder than whatever words he might have offered, to convince Whitebeard to call off Ace's manhunt.
"That's my only request," Shanks said, and she felt it when the pressure yielded a bit, her chest caving from the surprise. She hadn't realised she'd been holding her breath. And he didn't look at her, but she had the sense that he was aware that he'd let his haki slip without thinking.
Then—a rumbling laugh, just stirring the air at first, before it rose in volume, louder and louder like a gathering storm, until the full, booming sound of it had filled the air to bursting.
Shanks didn't even flinch, but Makino saw his eyes narrowing, and knew already then that what was coming wasn't acceptance.
"You won't even consider?" she heard herself asking, but wasn't surprised to find her voice clad in steel now, thinking again of the boy who'd found them on that cold evening; who'd tilted his head, dark eyes curving, and told herI remember you singing.
Whitebeard looked at her, but if he was surprised to find her speaking up, he didn't seem inclined to share his opinion on it. "The murder of a son is not a crime I look on lightly," he told her gravely, the deep rumble of his voice holding an unforgiving edge.
"Isn't Ace also your son?" she asked, before she could stop herself. "And yet you'd send him to his death to avenge this murder."
His eyes narrowed at that, and if she'd thought his attention was hard to bear when she'd first walked onto the ship, it was nothing compared to what she felt now; an assessment that sought to see beyond her, somehow. Or at least beyond what he thought she was hiding.
But Makino had nothing to hide—had never been able to, and so she allowed him to see it, the whole truth of her being, bared as she always wore it, with her too-honest face.
The silent stand-off lasted a long, tense second, and then Whitebeard was looking at Shanks, who'd been watching quietly, features drawn and pensive.
And if he'd been another kind of man Makino might have felt worried for speaking up, but her husband had never given the impression that she shouldn't, and so she wasn't surprised when she found no reproach on his face, just a wary sort of distance that told her he was waiting for things to go sour, and seeking a way to salvage it to the best of his ability.
"He broke the iron rule," Whitebeard was saying then, and Makino felt the drum of his voice through the planks beneath her as he raised it, before it struck across the deck like a thunderclap, "It's my responsibility as a father to show Teach the consequences of his indiscretion!"
He took a large chug of sake, as though to punctuate his resolve. Then to Shanks, "Do you get it now, brat? You're a hundred years too early to lectureme!"
The jug was sent flying before she'd had time to blink, but before her next breath had had the chance to leave her she'd moved—but not of her own volition, and it took her a moment of blinking in confusion to understand what had happened.
It wasn't until the sound of the jug rolling across the planks at her back that she realised Shanks had pushed her out of the way. She hadn't even seen himmove, and if it hadn't been for the fact that he was extracting himself from her now, the touch of his hand to her shoulder a small assurance, she might have thought Whitebeard had missed on purpose.
But even with the touch to her shoulder, Shanks wasn't looking at her, and there was a rare weight to his presence now, not anger but terrifyingly close, and sitting just under the surface. Makino realised she'd broken out in a cold sweat.
He reached for the sake cup that had up until now been sitting untouched before them, throwing back the contents, before tossing it aside. And when he rose to his feet Makino followed suit, muscles taut and heart in her throat, fearing how this might play out.
Hand on the pommel of his sword, he'd angled himself in front of her, and without realising it, the minuscule gesture had prompted Makino to draw Siren, the blade's unsheathing melody a keening lilt where it sang through the air.
But, "Go," Shanks told her, biting off the word, and she caught the rare edge of fear in it, turning it a harder order than it would have been, but she didn't linger to question it as she made to retreat.
She'd barely taken a single step when Whitebeard drew his blade, not a song but a booming drum where it cleaved through the air, the sheer force of it threatening to knock her legs out from beneath her, and the sudden, shrieking pressure in her eardrums startling a shout from her lips as she watched Shanks raise his own to meet it.
Blue flames lapped at the edge of her vision, and she caught the sound of running footsteps on the deck behind her before a warm hand gripped her elbow, and the support kept her from falling to her knees.
And then the man from earlier—the blond one Shanks had offered to join their crew, Makino thought his name might have been Marco—was pulling her away, something suddenly urgent in his expression. And he said nothing, but Makino allowed him to take her, just in time for that great blade to come down, and she was allowed a single, panicked glance over her shoulder to Shanks before the shockwave made by the impact shoved against them.
She couldn't breathe, the air wrapped like a vice around her ribcage, but the arm cinched tight around her back didn't let go. And she couldn't see where they were going, something that felt like a storm building whipping the wind about her face, but she pushed her legs into moving, allowing him to lead her down the deck.
Then—"Shit," came the oath, and Makino glanced up, only to find that they'd stopped, back towards the stern of the ship where the others had gathered. And she was about to ask him what he was referring to, when she saw it—the sky, seeming to have split in half, and for a moment all she could do was gape.
"Name's Marco," he greeted her then, dragging her attention back, his voice raised to a shout above the din; the sound like an endless roll of thunder tearing across the sky. "And you're the crazy woman who marriedthatguy," he added, with a nod in the direction of where Shanks was holding off Whitebeard.
Then, his grin stretching, "I'm tempted to say that makes you the scary one, but I'm pleased to meet you anyway."
She'd sheathed Siren, and she was about to respond when a sharp note keened through the air, the pressure building, as though the atmosphere was straining against the assault, before another wave of undiluted power washed across the ship. But before she'd had time to close her eyes against it her feet had left the deck, and her eyes flew open a second later to find it disappearing beneath her as Marco catapulted them into the broken sky, wrapping her world in blue fire, until she couldn't tellup from down.
And if her shock hadn't been as great as it was, Makino thought she might have managed a rather impressive scream.
Feet slamming into the main deck and flames extinguished in the same breath, Makino barely had time to stumble out of Marco's grip before her stomach was shoving its contents up her throat, and then she was scrambling for the railing, heaving over the side.
She caught the surprised shouts as they rippled across the crew, but didn't have a mind for them as she emptied her stomach, the combination of the relentless onslaught and the persistent ringing in her ears enough to make her feel like she was about to pass out.
"Oi, oi, don't look at me, I'm just bringing the missus back!"
A hand on her back then, warm through her shirt, and she felt Ben, but didn't have the words to offer anything even resembling assurance, or anything else that might be a better response than uncontrollable retching. Now that it had started, it wouldn't stop, but she yielded to the demand without resistance, until it had finally relented, leaving her slumped against the railing, curled in on herself.
There was a light drizzle of rain in the air, soft against her cheeks, and Ben hadn't moved from where he'd kneeled down beside her. She was vaguely aware of people talking around her— voices raised to shouting, anger and distress mingling together, as palpable as the rain prickling her skin, and she allowed herself a single minute to catch her breath before she pushed back to her feet.
Ben didn't reach out to steady her, although his nearness suggested he would if she toppled, but Makino was glad of the offered independence as she made to walk back towards where Marco was standing, arms crossed and glaring at the crew.
"Marco-san."
His brows lifted a bit at the sight of her, and Makino wondered how she looked—slightly bedraggled from puking her guts out no doubt, but a stubborn dignity claimed in spite of it, as she lifted her chin and said, "Thank you for your assistance."
A small smile teased the corner of his mouth upward. "Don't mention it." He glanced towards the ship at his back. There'd been no further clash of swords, at least going by the sudden quiet, although the sky still sat, cleaved open like a wound above their heads, bleeding rain in earnest now.
Makino welcomed the reprieve from that overwhelming pressure, taking a moment to let the sea air fill her lungs, hoping it might clear her head a bit, although it was only a minor relief, with the acrid taste of vomit still in her mouth. She hadn't thrown up that badly since her first year at sea.
It wasn't long until she felt him, as though the ship itself sensed his presence aboard, and her chest caved with a breath as Shanks stepped onto the main deck, gaze seeking hers through the gathered crowd. And right on the heels of her relief followed another, twice as potent, upon finding him without any visible injuries.
"That's my cue," Marco was saying then, and with a strange smile thrown in Makino's direction, made to leave, but not the way he'd come, plummeting through the sky, and there was a moment, watching him walk away, his hands shoved in his pockets, that Makino wondered if she'd imagined it all—the blue fire and the soaring dive.
Familiar fingers touched her face then, and she blinked, lifting her eyes to find Shanks, features heavy with worry. He tilted her chin, as though to get a better look at her. "You okay?"
Now she really wondered how bad she looked, but she managed a nod. "I'm fine. I just...took an unexpected route back to the ship."
She caught Yasopp's snort from across the deck, and the corner of Ben's mouth lifting, but Shanks only smiled, bemused. The rain had darkened his hair, some of it clinging to his brow, and she followed the trail of a stray droplet as it marked a path down his nose.
His gaze flicked to the side for a second before seeking hers again, and when he tucked her hair behind her ear Makino had the sinking realisation that there was probably vomit in it.So much for dignity.
She sighed, "I need a bath."
His laughter fell, a too-soft sound, like the drizzling rain, before his lips brushed her brow, and he dropped his voice for her ears, "I'll join you."
"What happened?" Ben asked then, and Makino felt Shanks' hand dropping, fingertips lingering at her neck, as though to assure himself that she was there, before he was turning to Ben.
"Tentative truce," he said simply.
"Truce?" Ben asked, openly dubious.
"Emphasis ontentative." He shot Makino a look, eyes gleaming. "My lovely wife's doing, that."
She blinked. "Me?"
His answering grin chased off some of his remaining pensiveness. "Yeah, he said 'you're still a damn cheeky brat, but your wife has an honest face'. And then he told me to get off his ship." His eyes fairly glittered with amusement. "I thought he'd never yield without at least tossing me in the ocean first."
He tilted his head then, something begging at mischief kindling in his gaze. "If the sea wasn't already churning with rumours about you, I'm pretty sure this was the last nail in the coffin of your hopeful obscurity." At her long-suffering look, his grin only widened, and he added, musingly, "I wager in a few years I'll only be known as your husband—Red-Hair whatshisface."
"I'll take that bet," Yasopp said. "But I wager it won't be that long."
Makino pressed her palm to her brow. God, shesmelledlike vomit. "Please don't joke about that," she said. "I might just throw up again."
Shanks laughed, and it dispelled the last of the tension—banished it from the air, as though it would have no more of it, and her next breath came without effort.
They were pulling away from Moby Dick now, and she spared a wary glance at the yawning chasm in the sky, unease drumming a pensive tune along her veins as she considered the sheer amount of power it had taken to split it in half. And it wasn't that she was a stranger to the power her husband possessed, but he so very rarely demonstrated it in this capacity—not to mention, it had been years since she'd seen him go against an opponent of Whitebeard's merit; a fellow Emperor, and one who'd held the title far longer.
Watching the sky now, she wondered idly if it would leave a scar.
"Hey," Shanks said then, drawing her eyes back, only to find an odd smile on his face. "Thank you."
She frowned, tilting her head. "For?"
The smile in his eyes deepened. "For wanting this life."
She turned towards him fully. The rain was soaking through her clothes now, and she saw how his cloak clung to his frame. Around them, the rest of the crew had begun to disperse, those not preoccupied with getting the ship out of the immediate vicinity of the Whitebeard Pirates heading for the galley to get out of the rain, no doubt seeking a much-needed drink to chase down the events of the day.
Thinking about it, the realisation sank within her now, that what they'd come to do had yielded nothing in the end, and there was part of her that would never understand this cutthroat world and all the rules that governed it—and to talk ofmoralsandhonourin the same breath asmurder.
"It's not this life that I wanted," she told him, tucking her palm to his cheek. His skin was cold from the rain, but she felt the scars under her fingertips, dear and familiar to her after so many years, even if it made her hands twitch, thinking of the one who'd given them to him. "But I'd make the choice ten times over if it meant I could have the man."
Closing his eyes, Shanks shook his head, as though he couldn't understand her, but had never been happier for it. "For wanting me, then," he told her, quietly. "If we're being specific."
Smile trembling, Makino didn't trust herself to manage anything more than that, but Shanks didn't ask for it, and when his arm came around her back she followed, surrendering her weight with a breath she felt shake loose of her whole body. And when she sank against him, arms tucked under his and her hands buried in the wet cloak at his back, all he did was tighten his grip around her in turn.
And it was what she needed,sorely, after those tense minutes aboard Whitebeard's ship, seated at his side with her hands bound by the necessity of maintaining an image, and her back so straight she felt it bemoaning the abuse now, a deep ache in her muscles that begged for relief.
She really could use that bath, but for now it was enough just to touch him, and to have him touching her back; the physical assurance that had been out of her reach, ever since stepping aboard their enemy's ship.
"For the record," Shanks said then, voice a low rumble against her ear, "I'd happily be known as just your husband."
She sighed around her laughter, brow pressed to his chest now, where his heart leaped, a dearly welcome truth. "Not that I don't appreciate the sentiment, but I sincerely doubt that will ever come to pass."
"Don't speak too soon," he told her, punctuating the words with a grinning kiss, on that spot just beneath her ear that hitched a sigh from her chest. "You once claimed you wouldn't make a single ripple. I'd say today was a pretty big one."
Makino shook her head. She still felt the weight of those old eyes, assessing her merit, but couldn't say for sure what he'd found it to be. "I'd rather not think too much about that right now."
"A hot bath, then," Shanks promised, pressing a tender kiss under her jaw. It took some of the tension in her back with it. "I could use one. Well—I could useyouin one."
Smile tucked against his chest, she only shook her head, but before she could offer some kind of comeback to that, he added cheerfully, "And you have vomit in your hair."
Laugh a little helpless but unwilling to be held back, Makino pinched him, until she found it echoed in his own, that deep, genuine mirth that allowed her to remember that even if she'd chosen the pirate, she had also chosen the man, and even if their world was a ruthless one, there were small comforts to be found, in the breaths between battles.
Chapter 3: steelsong
Chapter Text
They'd been married ten years when it came for them, and unexpectedly—parenthood.
"What?"
Doc looked at her, brows lifting with a smile that softened his rough-hewn features more than Makino had seen anything else manage in all the years of their friendship, and, "Pregnant," he repeated, kind voice rumbling over the word.
She didn't realise she was crying until she had to blink her eyes against the tears, and reaching up to wipe them away showed her hands shaking. But it was a detached sort of realisation, as though the hands she was looking at weren't her own, but someone else's.
She looked at Doc again, watching her silently where she was seated on the bunk in the infirmary, the familiar, clean and sterile smell mingling with the sea-breeze drifting in through the open port-hole.
That lone word turned in her head, over and over. It seemed to have lost all meaning.Pregnant. "Are you—"
"You came to me pretty late," Doc told her, eyes twinkling now, and his tone a tinge dry. "So even if you're not showing much, I'm certain in my diagnosis. That pain pressing against your kidneys has a very good explanation."
Her breath rushed out of her in a sob, nearly taking her whole body with it. And she couldn't tell her relief from all the other feelings that were scrambling for the surface, all of them seeming to push against her chest, until she couldn't breathe past them.
A large hand on her shoulder, the grip gentle but firm, and, "Easy. Breathe through your nose."
She did. One large, gulping breath, and another, even as it felt as if the effort might break her ribcage. And even as she got her breathing under control, her mind was still reeling, seeming unable to come to terms with what had been put before her; to make the connection that would allow her to accept it.
But she remembered then, weeks ago now, the bouts of nausea that she'd brushed off, even though it had been years since it had been a problem, and she was only ever bothered by seasickness now if the sea was particularly volatile.
Shanks had teased, asking if the new ship required some readjusting, but even as a joke, she hadn't discounted it as a possibility. The thought that it might have been something else—that it might have beenthis—hadn't even crossed her mind. Even that day, after their audience with Whitebeard, she'd chalked it up to nerves, and taking an unexpected dive through the sky.
The thought found her then, that she'd gonemonthswithout realising, and that she hadn't known, or even considered it a possibility, that she might be carrying a child. And then she was frantically searching her memory for any events where she might have endangered herself, or eaten something she shouldn't have, or—
Large hands covered her own, dragging her back to the infirmary, and it took her a moment of staring at them before she'd regained control of herself again, at least enough to keep forcing her breath through her lungs.
But Doc didn't let go, and Makino fixed her eyes on the tattoos on his forearms as she tried to dredge up the voice to ask the question pressing at her mind now, presented as she was with something she'd wanted for so long, and with it, the chilling realisation that she might have—
"Doc," she croaked, lifting her eyes. She realised she was still crying. "What if it's—"
"As far as I can tell, everything seems to be in order," he told her, and she swallowed the sob before it could leave her this time, but the relief was beyond what Makino felt she could bear.
And she didn't know if he'd suspected—if he'd known that it was something they'd thought hadn't been meant for them, and that it was something they'd long since stopped hoping for.
But she thought he might have known, from the way he was gripping her hands now, shaking fingers dwarfed by his own. The calm and careful manner that he'd given her the news, and offering his answer without forcing her to ask if there might be something wrong with her child—and that it might be her fault.
"Want me to go fetch Captain, or do you need a moment?"
She shook her head, then realised it didn't specify just what she was declining. But she couldn't seem to summon her voice to answer, although Makino felt from the way he squeezed her hands that he'd gathered what she was saying.
Pulling his hands back as he rose to his feet, she heard him exit the infirmary, the door swinging open letting in some of the morning noises from outside—familiar sounds to ears that sought them, and she knew them all and the people they belonged to, each individual laugh and voice—before it swung shut again, leaving her in the infirmary with a suddenly deafening quiet for company.
Her hands were shaking almost uncontrollably, and it took Makino a moment to realise she'd pressed them over her stomach. But even looking at it now, and knowing what Doc had told her, it was hard wrapping her mind around it:a baby.There was no apparent physical indication, at least not beyond a slight weight gain that she hadn't even given a second thought, but Doc had told her it was the way of it, sometimes; that she was small, and that sometimes, both with ailments and kinder truths, the body didn't yield all it secrets at once.
The door was thrown back open, and then Shanks was in the doorway. And she caught the sounds slipping in from behind him, not laughter now but murmurs of unease, and with good reason, given his sudden entrance. She spied Lucky on the deck behind him, and Doc, but didn't drop her gaze from the one regarding her intently, from an expression wrought with so many different things, she couldn't name them all.
She still had her hands pressed to her stomach, and Makino watched as the sight drew his eyes, his brows furrowing, before they lifted back to hers, as though for confirmation. And she saw when realisation dawned, and heard the breath it dragged from his chest, seeming to take something from him with it.
Her mouth was working, but she couldn't seem to find the words. "I'm—"
He'd pulled her to him before she could choke them out, and when she sank against him, tipping off the bunk where he'd dropped to his knees, there was a moment she wondered who was supporting who, before the shaking press of his hand to her spine tightened, and when her next sob dragged loose of her he bore it, and every single one that followed. They rang out; loud, racking things bouncing off the quiet even where she muffled them against his chest, but Makino couldn't find a single thought to care, gripping his shoulders until her fingers hurt.
Shanks didn't say a word, but the shaking fingers cradling the back of her head said enough, although they didn't speak nearly as loud as the tears she felt, hot against her throat.
And there were no words for that—the mindless,boundlesshappiness that found you when you'd given up hope, only to be proven wrong. But there were no words needed for it, either—not in explanation, or in apology, or even just to bask in it. At least not yet. That would come later, when they dared to allowed themselves to feel anything beyond the relief.
The sobs were cut off by the door sliding shut, but even muffled, the sound was too loud to be silenced completely, and the staggering hush that descended on the deck only saw to emphasise it.
Ben watched the closed door, something cold having crawled up under his skin, akin to the ocean's grip before dragging a drowning man under. His heels felt rooted to the planks; the cigarette tucked between his fingers forgotten.
Yasopp looked at him, sharp features wrought, and his voice rough when he asked, "You don't think—"
Ben turned to Doc, a demand on its way off his tongue, before it let slip something different, "You're smiling."
Doc said nothing to that, but his smile widened; a sight that would have looked out of place on his hard face, for anyone who didn't know him.
But Ben did know him, and so realisation wasn't far behind, rushing out in a shuddering breath of genuine surprise.
"What?" Yasopp asked, a question that was echoed by more than one voice, from the crew who'd crowded outside the infirmary door their captain had just shoved through with enough naked fear the imprint of it still lingered on the air. "Ben?"
The door opened again, and then Shanks was there, looking at once like he'd aged a few years and then lost them all again in the span of ten minutes, and if Ben hadn't caught onto the reason he would have been hard pressed to read anything conclusive from the look on his face.
"Makino okay?" Lucky was asking then, and it was what dragged him out of the daze—that half-believing, harrowed expression breaking, revealing a grin that wasfelt.
"Yeah," Shanks said, voice hoarse, before a laugh pushed past it, an almost delirious sound that was accompanied by tears that did nothing to touch the ridiculous smile that was splitting his face as he declared, to the rousing cheer of a crew who'd now all caught on—
"We're going to have a kid."
The crew took adjusting to her pregnancy in stride.
Meaning they were becoming a bit overbearing.
"Should you be doing that?"
"Should you be carrying that?"
"Should you be carryinganything?"
"I can pick that up for you, Makino."
"I can pick you up if you don't want to walk, Makino."
"Lucky, don't youdare—"
The last had seen a startled shriek chasing off the gulls on the rigging, before she'd been transported across the deck and cheerfully deposited by a table in the galley.
Ben hadn't even batted an eye, just calmly turned a page in his newspaper and pushed a cup of coffee towards her—decaf now, a sour truth underlined by a raised brow that dared her to put up another fight about it.
It was safe to say she was one sweet and well-meant gesture away from bending over the railing and screaming into the seabed.
The door to their quarters closing behind her, she leaned her back against it, taking a moment just to gather herself, before pushing off and making for the bunk. She had half a mind to take a nap, the mattress suddenly beckoning. Just because the morning sickness was behind her didn't mean there weren't other perks to contend with—like odd bouts of sudden lethargy, which more often than not saw her falling asleep in the galley, or out on deck. The latter prompted far too much amusement, but at least most of them were kind enough not to demonstrate it too openly.
Most, meaning almost all of them barring Shanks, who had no such reservations.
Fingers seeking her stomach, Makino found a smile through the exhaustion and lingering irritation, an entirely silly thing as she chased the small flutters that asserted themselves on occasion, and that tiny, brand new presence that felt at once apart of her, and something all its own, quick and fleeting and hard to pin down yet.
She wondered what it would feel like when she could—if it would be like hers, calm and unassuming, or like Shanks', that bright, laughing warmth. Or maybe it would be something else, something new; a little bit of both, or nothing at all like either of them.
She was showing now, far enough along for her condition to be more than evident. On her most recent check-up Doc had estimated that she was about six or seven months, and although that was still a feat to wrap her head around, having gone most of them without so much as an inkling, Makino had suffered his own amusement when she'd stutteringly confirmed thatyes, that sounded like a correct estimate.
She remembered one night that might well be the one in question—or at least hoped it might be, if only because she'd been laughing so hard she couldn't breathe, and if anything, she liked the thought that it should have been a joy and a loving like that that saw their child conceived.
It had been a warm night, Luffy's most recent wanted poster in their keeping and too much of that old whiskey they'd been saving, and she'd teasingly quipped that Shanks should pace himself, now that he was closer to forty than thirty. Which he'd taken as a challenge—twice, and the result of which had seen her blushing to the roots of her hair in Doc's infirmary seven months later, her stomach rounding beneath her palms with a quickening life that she still couldn't believe was a fact.
And looking at it now, Makino conceded that the added reminder of her growing belly might be the reason for the crew's exaggerated attentions lately.
Of course, she knew their fretting had other reasons, the most prominent of which being that her reaction to the news, not to mention Shanks', had both been glaring testaments to the fact that, although unexpected, their child had been very much wanted, and for a long time.
But she thought about that enough without the added burden of their worries to top it off—the fear that something might go wrong, even as far along as she was. That this might well be their only chance, if the past ten years had been any indication.
The door to the cabin opened then, revealing Shanks, smile lifting at the sight of her, before his eyes dropped to her stomach and it changed—shifted into that entirely new thing that she had no name for yet, but that always left her a little breathless.
"Nap?" he asked, eyes twinkling with something far too knowing, and Makino narrowed her eyes.
"You tease, but I'd like to see you handle this with more grace."
His grin was adoring, and making no point of hiding it. "I think you're handling it with staggering grace," he told her, as he came to take a seat on the bunk beside her. "And I'm only teasing because it's so muchfun." He raised his brows meaningfully. "You have a temper now."
"Why do you sound sopleased?"
"I can't help it that I'm fascinated by what this is doing to you." Then, expression darkening with something that had Makino forgetting every single thought she'd ever harboured aboutnapping, he dropped his voice a notch, "And when I sayfascinated, I mean that exactly as the inflection suggests."
Bumping her brow against his shoulder, she felt his chuckle as it rumbled through him, and it did little to subdue the persistent lap of heat at her core, which was making it hard to focus on anything but the shape of him on the bunk beside her.
Oh, yes—and there was that, too. An embarrassing sexual appetite, although between the two of them, Makino suspected she was the only one mortified by that particular change, if for no other reason than the fact that she couldn't seem to control herself. Shanks, as always, took everything with staggering ease.
"I take it those wandering hands are a sign that you've forfeited that nap?"
The laughing purr fell into her collar, and she gave a tug at his hair, but her rebuttal lacked conviction, and when she felt his hand fisting in her hair in turn, the sound she yielded against his mouth carried no reproach, a soft whimper of sudden impatience that found its all-too-eager match in the tongue pushing back against hers.
She felt the laughing hum that sat, low in his throat, and the fingers that had released her hair to sketch the dip of her waist, then back up. Seeking, half-reverent touches mapping new, rounder curves, and it was a wordless appreciation he offered now, a fascination that was anything but teasing, and she felt the effect, like she'd grown too big for her skin, too much warmth within her to contain it all.
The buttons on his shirt offered little resistance, and she felt his laughter again, a sound never far from where he was, delighting in her impatience as she pushed her hands up his chest, greedy where he was reverent and not seeking but claiming, warm skin and every hard line of corded muscle beneath it, and all the scars between them.
The hand on her hip slipping under the waistband of her trousers had her breath hitching, searing warm against her skin, and she shifted in her seat, pushing closer, the position awkward but her need to have him touching her leaving no room left to desire elegance. And for all his teasing about her impatience, he didn't seem inclined to let her suffer, the graze of his fingers across her hipbone carrying a promise, and she felt her body's response as his thumb brushed against the apex of her thighs, and the need that pushed a moan up her throat—
A rap on the door, a sound sharp with intent, and Shanks stilled. But it took Makino longer to follow, and to blink past the dizzying anticipation that had nudged her close to breaking, the near-intolerable need for release leaving her without thoughts for anything else, and if he justmovedhis hand, she could—
Then Shanks drew his hand away, and the whimper that pulled from her at the interruption sounded obscene, it was so wanton. Which probably didn't help matters, if the twitch of his fingers was any indication. And if she'd had her mind with her, Makino might have remembered to feel embarrassed at the display.
She heard him drag in a breath, fingers pinching the bridge of his nose, as though to gather himself, although neither action dispelled the telling roughness in his voice when he asked, a bite to the word, "What?"
The door opened, and then Ben was there, the morning paper in his hands and a grave look on his face. And Makino doubted it had escaped him what he'd interrupted, and so the distinct lack of amusement of any kind told her enough about what manner of news he was bringing, and with a breath, the lightheaded daze that had kept her enthralled dissipated, something cold taking over in its place when Ben proffered the paper and said, evenly,
"You'll want to see this."
The announcement of Ace's impending execution ripped a hole through the haze of happiness that had seemed to envelop everything ever since she'd had the news of her pregnancy confirmed.
She couldn't see the words in the newspaper, crumbling in the shaking grip of her fingers, her palms stained black—couldn't seem to grasp the conversation that was going on around her, the muted babel offering no comfort, only the beginnings of a headache as she stared at the black and white photograph, andI remember you singing.
Not even the soft push of movement against her hip could steal her focus back from where it had slipped from her grasp, leaving her feeling adrift on waters that had once been familiar, but that she could no longer recognise.
"Whitebeard will act," Ben was saying, voice seeming curiously far away. It was like someone had dunked her head underwater.
Shanks' voice rose in answer, the word weighed heavy, dragging her down further. "Aye."
"The others won't stay out of this. Not if Whitebeard intervenes."
"Big Mom won't bother."
"Kaidou will."
Shanks didn't answer, or if he did, Makino missed it, and she had no mind to spare them as they discussed what they should do; had only a mind for the boy in the paper, a coiled knot wrapped tight around her insides, and her hand shook where she pressed it over her belly.
Excusing herself, she pushed away from the table, and avoided Shanks' worried look as she made for the galley door, a murmured request for privacy left in her wake that she wondered if he'd even caught. But he didn't move to follow, although even with the offered solitude of their empty cabin, Makino didn't know if she felt relieved that he hadn't.
Sinking onto the mattress, she stared at her fingers, stained from the ink. She curled them into her palms, feeling how they shook—somehowneedingto feel it.
She couldn't stop thinking about the baby—not her own, heavy and safe in her belly,but the first of two that Garp had brought to her mother's doorstep, and had suffered an earful for it. But having no siblings of her own, Makino had delighted in the soft little shape, who'd slept so soundly in her arms. Nothing like Luffy, who'd wiggled and laughed, and smiled around her fingers.
She remembered sitting by the table in Party's common room, and the calm that had crept in after its proprietor had stormed out, Garp's ear in an unyielding grip the wordless promise of a fight that didn't want an audience. It had just been the two of them, and the seagulls beyond the window, and the whole hour she'd sat there, Ace hadn't stirred. There'd been no freckles on his cheeks yet, and he'd been so brand new, the world hadn't known what to do with him.
Now the world had decided it would take him, for no other reason than being a pirate, and all she could think about were the two babies she'd rocked to sleep, neither of which had been hers, and wonder if the same fate waited the one growing beneath her heart.
Or maybe Makino was the one that fate awaited, and that in the future there would be someone else rocking her child to sleep, nothing left of her but a vague memory, growing fainter with every passing year.
I remember you singing.
She must have fallen asleep, because when she stirred the cabin was dark, and there were fingers brushing her hair away from her brow.
Blinking through the dark, Makino looked up to find Shanks seated on the bunk where she'd curled herself up on the mattress, right in the middle, a wordless claim to the whole of it. She found a smile, closing her eyes as he carded his fingers through her hair, no demand in the gesture, just a lazy sort of distraction that suggested it could go on forever.
And underthose touches, it took a moment to come back to herself, and to remember the thoughts that had sent her off to sleep—to recognise the deceptively unhurried touches as those he sought when there was a difficult subject that needed broaching, and when he grasped for small, solid truths to anchor his thoughts.
Makino knew he felt her come into full awareness, by the way his hand stilled against her temple.
"What are you going to do?" she asked, inclining her head on the pillow to look up at him. The pressing dark made his features stand out, hard lines sharpened to cutting, and the shadow of his beard looked more severe than usual. He hadn't bothered to shave today, the thought slipped in, amidst all the others.
She felt his hand moving, before it came to settle over the curve of her belly, rough fingers slipping under her shirt, seeking bare skin. The baby shifted, and she watched Shanks' hand follow suit, chasing the movement, his expression looking for a single moment utterly enraptured.
Then, the slant of his brow deepening, "We'll keep our interference to what's absolutely necessary."
"What does that mean?"
He looked at her. "Kaidou," he said simply, and Makino heard her breath rush out. And he hadn't specified what he meant, but then he didn't have to. There'd be no audience this time— no negotiation, at least not the verbal sort. And she knew enough about Kaidou to know it wasn't a decision made lightly. Which meant the reason had been deemed worthy of taking the risk.
"And Whitebeard?"
His large hand was a warm weight across her stomach where he wrapped it around the bump. She wondered if their child felt it—if it could feel his presence, and the safety it had always offered her. She hoped it could. "He'll go to Marineford to stop the execution."
The knowledge sank in her chest, like a stone dropped in still waters. "The Government will retaliate," she said. She looked at Shanks, who'd raised his eyes from her stomach to meet hers. "There'll be a war."
He nodded. "Aye."
She was almost afraid to ask, fearing that she'd already found the answer, in the entirely calm press of his hand over her belly. "And what will your role be in that?"
Shanks looked at her, and for a long moment, that was all he did. Then, "Whatever it needs to be," he told her evenly. And it wasn't an attempt to lighten the gravity of the answer, or even meant to be intentionally vague, because he'd never made a point of keeping her in the dark; had always shared everything, from the day she'd first stepped aboard his ship as a member of his crew.
Which meant that he didn't know yet, exactly what role he would play, although Makino found the uncertainty offered less comfort than if he'd told her he'd join in the fighting from the outset.
It brought her back ten years, to a time when they'd been younger people and he'd looked at her and told her that the sea had more planned for him than it had revealed to him yet. And she'd saidokay, and had accepted that burden, and him, even when she hadn't known—even when she'd been sowoefullyignorant as she had been at twenty—of what that choice might one day mean for them.
But looking at him now, with all her years of experience behind her, and all she knew of the sea and this crooked world that was theirs, Makino found she would have made the same choice again in a heartbeat.
She didn't know if it was the sense of impending doom or the pregnancy hormones, or some potent combination of both, but then she was reaching for him, surrendering her claim to the mattress as she pulled him down, not spurred by impatience now but aneedstill, to feel him, and all of him, around and inside her.
And she thought she wasn't the only one who felt it, in the way Shanks responded, seeking bare skin to kiss without pause for breath, as though he would have all of her and nothing less. Ten years had done little to dampen his particular brand of ardour—that wild, unabashedenjoymentwhen it came to sex, and having her, his touches like his kisses, over-eager and desiring her, and always willing to demonstrate it.
But there was something different about him. Still eager, and still so earnestly desiring, but no laughter rising up under his chest now, to hitch with his breath at her touches. But then she had no laughter to offer in turn, and the sounds she yielded to the quiet were sharper things; her pleasure a fact but lacking the tinge of half-delirious, breathless mirth that his own always prompted, and with such ease.
It wasn't a night for laughing, but she wanted it for herself, anyway—wanted his big hand on her hip holding her steady, his thick, callousedfingers leaving an imprint on her skin, and the scrape of his beard against her breasts as he kissed them, her pulse throbbing beneath her skin where his mouth met it, hot and claiming as he took her roughly. All of them little reminders, that war had no patience for tenderness.
But even with all those things, the growl of his breath and the grip of his large hand as he pushed inside her,the weight of him above her was poised with excruciating care, a constant awareness in his movements, and his hand releasing her hip to reverently trace the heavy swell of her stomach, and their unborn child caged between them.
There were no interruptions. Makino thought she might have screamed if there were, or even worse, not given a damn, which seemed curiously enough the least embarrassing prospect, having him above her, warm and always-willing, the flex of his hard muscles and his thick bicep where she clawed at it with white-knuckled fingers, begging him closer, and the cage of his large, heavy frame a desperate comfort.
She couldn't completely shove away the awareness of what loomed ahead, feeling it in the harsh quality of his breath as it dragged from his chest, and the near-bruising kisses that invoked a last-time desperation, tempted by a rare cynicism that had no place in a heart like his. And Makino might have told him just what she thought about that, but when hethrust inside her again she had no thoughts left for anything else, not war or worse yet, and no room for shame at the fact, his thickness within her filling her, a warmth pushing up, under her breastbone, under her skin.
And so instead of shame, she took the reprieve as he offered it, and greedily, each thrust allowing her to forget one more worry, until they'd all bled out of her and all that was left was Shanks, his broad back arching under her small hands, her sword-callouses catching on a map of scars, and an invocation laid at the soft altar of her throat that had her tipping her head back with a moan, accepting it. One of her many names,girlandheart, and both of them his,terrorandwife, she couldn't tell which it was now, but she answered to all of them, and when he came undone within her, his hand wrapped around the bump and their baby within,half-protective, half-claiming,she vowed to hew a truly terrifying creature from the whole of all her truths and rumours, if it would allow her to keep him, beyond what the sea had planned for them both.
"I don't think it's a good idea."
His voice found her on her way to sleep, the familiar cadence having dropped an octave, the way it only did on the rare occasions he had no mind for humour, and it had Makino blinking past her exhaustion and into the greying light of their cabin.
It was too early for even dawn yet, and the fact that he was awake at all was telling enough. They still had a few hours before they reached their destination, and she'd managed to convince him to rest in the meantime, even though she was the one who'd felt the greatest need. She hadn't had a good night's sleep since they'd announced Ace's execution.
"Marineford," Shanks said then, the word an echo of her thoughts as he sought her eyes, squinting through the soft shadows. The pull of his features was serious, and it took her a moment to gather herself enough to realise what it was he was saying.
She braced herself on his chest, lifting her head to look at him, brows dipping as understanding dawned—and denial. "I'm not staying behind."
"Makino—"
"No," she said, and was surprised at how hard her voice sounded where it fell into the quiet. When Shanks looked ready to protest, she forged on, "I've been at your side ten years," she reminded him. "And we've always faced things together. How could you think I'd let you do this alone?"
"I'm not going alone," he told her, with an enduring patience that had something in her bristling. "The guys will be—"
"And where would I be?" she asked. "On the ship? That won't be much safer."
She was aware that she'd raised her voice, and just how loud it sounded in their quiet cabin. And she wasn't usually one to snap, or to interrupt someone speaking, but there was something like panic pushing up her chest now, imagining the scenario he was putting before her. She'd stood by him when he'd expressed his decision to intervene in the war, and when he hadn't voiced his concerns, had assumed it was because her presence at his side was expected—that it went without saying.
"I don't know what we'll find on that battlefield," Shanks told her. "It would be better—"
"We've been a unified front for the past ten years," she told him. "And you know I don't care about glory, or—or notoriety, but what kind of message will it send if I'm not there?"
He didn't answer, and she pressed her hand to his chest, seeking his heartbeat, but also to emphasise her words. "They'll know, Shanks," she said. "They'll know that something is either wrong, or that there's a reason you asked me to stay behind. And if I'm on the ship—"
She didn't finish, but the implication rang, loud and clear like a death-knell. War was a thriving hotbed of opportunists seeking to further their own goals, and there'd be no shortage of that in Marineford. And all it would take was a single, cunning mind catching on. Unless she gave them no reason to think there was anything amiss.
Shanks' reluctance was palpable where he watched her, the red of his hair a stark truth against the sheets, invoking the moniker that rang with enough authority on this sea, to tempt even the tide of battle into submitting. Or at least that's what they were hoping for.
And with his brows pulled down, the scars on his face stood out, a truth starker still, but she didn't reach to touch them now. Instead she kept her palm pressed above his heart.
"You said it yourself," Makino reminded him. "You're counting on your presence tipping the scales. That you'll stop the fighting without needing any further bloodshed."
She saw the protest as it shifted across his features. "I can't guarantee it. Even Sengoku—"
"What does your gut tell you?"
The pause that followed was answer enough, but she saw that he wasn't happy with what it meant.
"I didn't marry you to stand on the sidelines, Shanks," Makino said. "And you didn't ask me hoping that I would."
The sigh that left him didn't carry regret. But it wasn't a laughing sigh either, although however much she might have preferred that, she hadn't expected it to be.
"No," he agreed at length. The truth, and one he stood by, she knew, but he derived no pleasure from it now.
He touched his fingers to her stomach, curving under the fall of her shirt; one of his old ones, and the warmth of his hand was a comforting pressure where it came to rest above her hipbone. And she saw from the way his features drew together, what he was thinking. "The first sign of danger—"
"I'll be out of the way," she said, voice gentle but her resolve firm. "I promise, Shanks."
Sinking back against his side, she sought his hand with one of hers, their fingers bumping where it came to rest beside it on her stomach, the taut skin catching under her palm. Her callouses were harder things than they had been once, when they'd been softened by wash-water and gentler routines. She didn't draw her sword often, but the hilt rested with ease in her grip, after a decade of training to wield without thinking.
And ten years as a pirate had changed a lot of things, but not that—the heart that would see peaceful resolutions attempted before her fingers reached for her blade. The same heart that had found its kindred, in the one she felt beneath her ear now, where she'd pressed it to his chest.
And even if she was a pirate and not a barmaid, they were her hands, still—were her slender, bird-bone fingers and small, pale scars. And as the small movements beneath her palm rose up to meet her touch, pushing against her stomach where their hands were resting, as though reaching for them, she thought that, however small her hands and gentle her methods, she'd use them to bend the sea itself to her will, if that was what it took to keep their child safe—the little life that had no scars yet, and no callouses to speak of. The heart that was still just a flutter, and that had yet to make its choice, of what kind of life it wanted.
But she'd make sure the choice was there. Whatever the sea demanded of her as a pirate, or as a pirate's wife, as a mother Makino answered only to one thing.
She was well on her way back to sleep when there was a sudden commotion on deck—a thunder of running footsteps and voices raised, and she felt Shanks moving even before the door to their quarters ripped open, revealing Ben.
He hadn't bothered to knock, and Makino's heart plummeted, all thoughts of sleep forgotten at the implication suggested by the uncharacteristic breach of privacy, even as Ben's face revealed nothing but a hard press.
"What's the situation?" Shanks was asking, having pushed off the mattress to hunt down his pants, but Makino didn't move to follow. Because for all her earlier conviction, the look on Ben's face told her to stay put even before he met her eyes, and the significance of that look had Shanks' biting off an oath.
And Makino knew he'd sensed it, the same thing she did—that massive, near-oppressive presence, like an unyielding wall had slammed down in her mind—even before Ben confirmed it, and with a name that cinched around her heart with enough fear to make her breath lodge in her chest—
"We've caught up with Kaidou."
Ben was making for the deck a moment later, no further explanation needed or offered as he let the door swing shut behind him, and then Shanks was turning to Makino.
She'd pushed herself up on the mattress of their bunk, his shirt large and loose on her tiny frame where it hung off her small shoulders, the unbuttoned front baring her stomach where she cradled it with her hand,and he derived some measure of relief from the fact that she didn't look she was gearing up to join him.
"You won't fight me on this," he told her, and it might have been a full order if it hadn't been for the plea that clung to the back of the words. "Kaidou doesn't do peaceful negotiations. There's only one way this is going if we want to stop him. Promise me you'll stay put. No matter what happens."
And even if his order didn't succeed in sounding like one, Shanks hoped the touch of his hand to her belly would emphasise the urgency behind his words, as he wrapped it around the bump. Beneath his palm,he felt their child kicking.
Her brows drew together. "What if—"
"No matter what happens," he repeated, voice hard and brooking no argument now, and he saw how she drew back a bit at the sound of it. "Ben has his orders, if I don't make it out of this. He'll come for you before anything else."
"Shanks."
He expected a protest, but it wasn't what he found on her face now. And he had the sudden thought that he should tell her—that sitting there in nothing but his shirt, with her heavily pregnant stomach and her long hair tumbling around her small shoulders, squared as though she was going into battle, she didn't just look like a pirate, she looked like an empress among them.
"You better not lose," Makino said, and if his order hadn't quite managed to sound like one, hers fell with enough iron-clad conviction to drive a startled laugh from his chest.
And he thought he'd never loved her more than in that moment, but didn't think he could have managed the voice to speak the words, so he kissed her instead, sinking his hand into the fall of her hair as he claimed her roughly, or as much of her as he could, with the promise that loomed beyond the cabin door. He took her breath, and didn't care that it wasn't tender, because if this was the last time he ever kissed her he'd make it worthy of the woman she was, gentle heart clad in steel; his beautiful terror of the sea.
Releasing her, he pressed his hand to her stomach, not an order but a last, desperate request, and when the baby shifted, he drew back, not bothering to button his shirt as he grabbed his sword and made for the deck, the door closing behind him. A pathetic shield, given who they were up against, but just having her away from the deck helped settle his unease somewhat.
For about the span of a breath, at least, and the sight that greeted him was about as sobering as he'd expected it to be.
"Shite," Yasopp said, sharp eyes trained on the horizon. "Kaidou doesn't half-ass things, does he?"
"No," Shanks agreed, taking in the approaching fleet. Not even near what he knew to be the whole of it, but given the Beast's resources, it was far from a half-hearted attempt.
Hand tightening around the hilt of his sword, he allowed his breath to settle, a calm weight in his chest, not even a stutter to stir the quiet waters within him. Out of the corner of his eyes he caught Lucky rooting around in his pockets, likely for something to eat, and beside him, Ben lit a cigarette, movements staggeringly unhurried.
The corner of his mouth lifted. The waters sat, untouched.
"But neither do we."
The battle had dragged on for too long.
There was an awareness at the back of his mind, that any hopes they'd had of reaching Marineford in time were trickling out as the stand-off with Kaidou persisted.
"He's biding his time," Ben said, watching the fleet across the water. The hulls of several upended ships lay, bobbing beside their still-standing comrades, like the bellies of dead fish reaching for the sun, but Kaidou had yet to join the fray. "Why?"
Shanks didn't take his eyes off the main ship idling straight head. They'd intercepted in time, but the way things were progressing, he was beginning to wonder if it might have been Kaidou's plan all along to keep them occupied, not Whitebeard.
Ben bit off an oath. "Here he comes."
The near ridiculous speed Kaidou possessed shouldn't be possible with his stature, but Shanks had seen stranger paradoxes on this sea, and so didn't let it distract him as he braced for it. Ben spat out his cigarette, grip tightening around the pistol in his hand.
The impact as Kaidou's feet hit the deck was felt through the whole ship, and Shanks spared a thought to Makino, but wasn't given long before the groaning planks settled once more, along with the sea where it tossed and pushed against the hull.
An eerie hush fell across the deck, in time with his shadow as Kaidou righted himself, rolling his shoulders once, as though warming up for a stretch. Shanks hadn't moved, and he caught Ben lighting a new cigarette, ostensibly calm, although Shanks found a different truth in the sharp edge that cut off the gesture.
"You know what to do, Ben," he said, voice low, and the reminder as calm as the heart in his chest.
A match flared to life, and Ben took a long drag of the cigarette, before exhaling. He didn't so much as glance towards the cabin, nor question what Shanks meant, or why he was repeating it now. The reason stood before them, a single enemy on deck, but the implication was anything but a comfort. "Yeah."
If it's one-on-one, Kaidou will win.He knew the saying, as did any pirate who'd ever sailed the same waters as the man who stood before him now, towering almost taller than the main mast.
"There are more cordial ways of coming aboard an enemy ship," Shanks said then. He kept his hand on the pommel of his sword, but made no move to draw it. "I hear an offer ofsakedoes wonders."
Kaidou hadn't moved to attack either, and Shanks counted the seconds—sharpened his focus to a blade's tip, until everything else faded away, nothing disturbing the waters.
Then—"Where's your wife, Red-Hair?"
A single ripple shivered across the surface, but Shanks caught himself in time to react. Beside him, Ben had his hands shoved in his pockets, but the furrow of his brow had tugged the scar taut across his temple. There was a murmur of unease from the crew, slipping under the tense quiet.
Then, allowing a smile to stretch across his face, "Taking a nap," Shanks said. "I'd like to join her, if you wouldn't mind wrapping this up."
"I want to meet her."
Something went very still within him. He thought a whirlpool might have been preferable. "What?"
Kaidou snorted, but made no move to step closer, or do anything other than incline his head. "You heard what I said. A meeting, and I'll decide if I want to wrap this up, or keep you occupied a little longer."
It was taking an increasing amount of effort keeping his expression from revealing what he was thinking—or rather, that he didn't know what to make of the request. And knowing Kaidou, he wouldn't be given long to consider it, or whatever motives might lie behind it.
Shanks looked to Ben—for an answer or just the wisdom to find it, he didn't know, but felt like he would take either, as he found himself suddenly at a complete loss.
And when Ben nodded once, it was testament to Shanks' trust in his judgement, that he accepted after only a single beat of hesitation. And Ben didn't need telling, just what it meant for Shanks to place the lives of the two he held dearest in Ben's hands.
Not a single word had been exchanged between them, but Ben turned smoothly on his heel, making for the cabin, and Shanks kept his gaze trained on Kaidou, who watched him back with something akin to boredom, touched only with the barest hint of intrigue.
The seconds ticked by, the longest in his life, but it didn't take long before he heard the door to his cabin opening again. He felt her presence, that familiar calm as it reached toward him, as though in question, but Shanks didn't turn to look at her, waiting instead until she'd come to stand beside him.
She'd dressed, a simple shirt and trousers, her feet bare and her hair loose; the way she was on deck most days, a small and comfortable authority in the demonstration, and one that wasn't likely to be missed. This was her ship, the gesture said. She wouldn't put on airs, even for an Emperor.
A fleeting glance saw that she carried Siren in her hand, not on her hip. Not a threat, and Kaidou wasn't likely to take it as one, but Kaidou wouldn't have expected anything less, as Ben had no doubt informed her.
She met his gaze then, and for the briefest of seconds he caught the flicker of fear in them, but hoped she understood—and knew that she did, when that fear settled into trust, that he wouldn't have put her or their child into this position on a whim.
And it was testament to her trust, Shanks realised—in him, in Ben—that she'd gone along with it without question, even after what he'd told her in the cabin earlier.
Drawing a breath, he allowed her proximity to ease his mind, the calm quality of her presence allowing him to breathe, and to try to keep one step ahead.
Makino lifted her eyes to Kaidou then, the shade of his enormous bulk thrown large across the deck, and Shanks knew she wasn't bothering to hide her reaction—knew that she couldn't, but looking at her now he found a stubborn determination pushing past the naked fear on her face, warping it into something else; that dark, terrible thing that was a mother's conviction.
There was a full beat of silence, and Shanks saw where Kaidou's eyes had gone, to the round curve of her stomach, straining against the shirt—not one of his, which might have hidden it better. But if Ben had thought she should hide it he would have told her to, and although it offered little comfort, Shanks rooted his fleeting certainty in that fact.
And then Kaidoulaughed.
The full, belly-deep roar of it carried across the deck, and Shanks felt Makino tense beside him. And before he'd had time to think, he'd stepped in front of her, hand on the hilt of his sword, but before he could draw it—
"Mah, I'm done here."
Laughter cut off with a snort, Kaidou shook his head, but before Shanks was even given the chance to ask, he was saying, "This world is running out of people I'd give a damn to fight. It's all old men and blustering rookies. No skill. No drive. I'mtired."
Then with a look at Makino, his expression sparking suddenly withinterest, Shanks had his sword drawn with his next breath, but what Kaidou said was, "Let's see if your wee beast has some merit when it grows up, Little Empress." Another snort, and then, "Maybe it'd be an opponent worth fighting. Hell if I know—this world's going to shit anyway."
And without another word, he'd turned and leaped off the deck, the propulsion making the ship heave in retaliation, and Shanks caught Makino when her knees gave out, and wondered if she felt the breath that ripped loose of him, the wild surge of uncheckedrelief enough to make him sink to his knees along with her.
She was shaking, and he wrapped his arm around her back, cradling her head where she'd pressed her brow to his chest. He felt her stomach where it pushed against him, and regretted his one arm when he couldn't reach to touch it, but shifted instead until he could feel them both.
His voice was rough when he spoke, the word dragged out with a breath that didn't quite manage to be a laugh, "Sorry."
The one that fell against his shirt didn't fare any better, carrying a half-hysteric note, and he felt how her hands gripped the fabric at his back. "Whose idea was that?"
"Kaidou is unpredictable," Ben said, and Shanks looked up. He'd put out his cigarette now; he didn't smoke around Makino. Some of the tension had eased off his brow, but his eyes were still narrowed, his gaze trained on the fleet. "Unpredictable people are susceptible to unpredictable forms of retaliation." The corner of his mouth quirked, just a bit. "Predictably."
Shanks felt her breath as it shuddered out of her, but couldn't tell if it was another laugh or something else. "I don't know what I feel about being a form of retaliation," Makino said.
Fingers buried in her hair, he pressed her closer. "You were great," he told her, but felt his attempt at lightening the mood was spoiled by the way his voice shook. Still, he tried for a smile; pressed it against her crown with the words, "You should have seen it. All tiny, terrifying motherhood."
She only shook her head at that, and Shanks didn't know if she was disagreeing with his appraisal, or if she was shaking her head at his poorly attempted levity, but it didn't matter which it was. And he didn't think it was possible to pull her closer, but he tried anyway.
"Kaidou is pulling back. We should get moving," Ben was saying then. "If we want to get to Marineford in time."
"Yeah," Shanks said, his earlier relief having sobered into something manageable at the reminder, and when he rose to his feet, he pulled Makino with him.
Her hands were still shaking, and she had one of them pressed to her stomach, but whatever she'd sought she found, for a moment later she expelled a breath, and when she looked at him there was that same determination on her face as when she'd faced down Kaidou—that mother's resolve that had no equal, on any sea he'd known.
Lips pressed together, Shanks rooted his own conviction in the sight. "We have a war to stop."
In the end, they were too late.
Keeping Kaidou off had taken longer than they'd anticipated, and by the time Red Force drew into Marineford's icy waters, the worst scenario Makino could have imagined had already come to pass.
She felt the surge of power as it washed across the battleground, the effect of two great forces colliding—not unlike that day on Whitebeard's ship, but her knees didn't buckle beneath her this time, and she kept her back straight as they stepped through the crowd of pirates and marines to follow Shanks.
She heard the ripples of surprise that rose as they passed, a wave of realisation cresting in the wake of the shockwave, tearing across the ruined plaza as its occupants became aware of just whose ship had slipped into their midst.
Siren idled, quiet at her hip, her hand on the pommel as she came to take a stand beside Shanks, Ben on her other, and more still flanking them. Their strongest as the vanguard—and Makino, who was so laughably far from that, but whose appearance among them had an entirely different significance.
She heard Shanks raise his voice then—felt the shiver that shot up her spine at the sound of it; that stark, commanding lilt that held no trace of humour. "If anyone still wants to fight, then come! We will be your opponents."
She was keenly aware of the eyes on her, and knew how she must look, with the group at her back, but for once Makino rooted her conviction in the rumours that flourished around her, and without shame. Let them think her some fell creature from the deep, come to drag them all to the seabed. Let them think she could call the waters to her if she wanted to, to drown them where they stood.
Because with her unborn child giving small pushes against her hipbone, Makino needed them to think theworst.
She had a thought to wonder if Garp was somewhere in the crowd. He must be, but she couldn't look for him without giving the impression that she was looking, and so she kept her gaze level and tried not to think about what he thought, if he could see her now.
"Oho," a pleased curl of intrigue slithered into the quiet they'd brought, and Makino stiffened. She felt the men around her stepping closer—nothing exaggerated about their reaction, but it spoke for itself. A threat, received and answered.
Shanks' reaction was nothing more than to shift his weight, but from where Makino was standing, it spoke even louder than the rest. Angled just a little, but enough to shield her—or, as was more likely, her stomach. Her cloak hid it well, but with the eyes that had latched onto her from across the chasm in the ground, she felt suddenly exposed.
And the grin that split Blackbeard's face was one she'd remember, Makino thought—that wild, wicked mirth that seemed to delight in the destruction around them, but in their arrival more than anything, and the latter fact a bone-chilling thought that had her breath lodging, hard in her chest.
The baby kicked, and it took all the willpower she possessed not to touch her hand to her stomach.
"Teach," Shanks said then, and there was a whole new quality to his voice when he spoke now, one Makino hadn't heard before, and for a moment she was so surprised all she did was blink at the cloaked back in front of her. The inflection was entirely level and the enunciation deliberate, but there was something dark sitting in it, as though the name was barbed, and he was holding back from spitting it.
But if he heard all the things that sat in the speaking, Blackbeard didn't seem to take offence. On the contrary, those wild eyes only brightened further, and the laugh that loosened from him, a low, harrowing sound of mounting excitement, made a cold sweat break out across Makino's back.
Those eyes found her again, and she fought to keep from physically stepping back at the suddenintentbehind that look. Then—"You have good taste, Shanks," Blackbeard said, rolling the words around on his tongue, as though finding their taste to his liking. His grin stretched wider. "I was wondering if she'd be as pretty in person."
Not even a single breath before Yasopp had drawn his weapon, but Makino couldn't tell if he'd been the first to draw, reading a threat from Blackbeard's words, or if he'd done it in response to the gun cocking across the chasm and beat it to the punch.
But it didn't matter which it was, because then the rest of Blackbeard's crew were following suit, and Siren was in her hand before Makino could think, the song of the unsheathing keening across the chasm, the tip of the blade seeming to hold the final note a moment longer, letting it linger on the air. For a single, breathless moment, it seemed the only sound in the plaza.
Shanks hadn't moved, straight-backed posture yielding nothing but ease, but she caught the clench of his fingers around the hilt of his sword. And seeking his presence found it entirely still—all that boundless warmth contained, not a warm, leaping fire reaching towards her, but a white-hot ember that didn't invite her touch.
There was a trickle of fear within her then—a whole, terrible second where Makino wondered if Shanks had been wrong, and all their arrival would achieve would be more casualties on either side; that Blackbeard wouldn't yield, but see an opportunity presented and claim it for all it was worth. She felt it, icy waters pooling in her stomach, more than she could contain within her; the fear that she'd been wrong, and that she wasn't getting off this battlefield alive. That their child wouldn't—
Then Blackbeard was laughing, and it was like facing Kaidou all over again, except this laughter held a different kind of promise, even as he announced, "We're done here. I got what I came for." He grinned, seeming pleased with the turn of events, even as he said, "It's still too early for me to fight you guys."
His gaze shifted to Makino. "I hope to see you again, nee-chan," he declared, laughter rolling over the words.
Then, that dark humour winking in his eyes, like a twisted kin to what she so often found in her husband's, he purred, "Andcongratulations."
Her heart stuttered in her chest, and her fingers tightened around Siren's hilt, but Blackbeard only laughed, seeming delighted by the sight.
And she couldn't see Shanks' face, but she knew her own must have confirmed Blackbeard's suspicions, and dispelled his last doubts if he'd had any, because he was still laughing as he turned to leave, motioning for his crew to follow.
She felt Ben's hand on her shoulder and started, but the rare offer spoke louder than anything else he could have said or done, and when he gripped it, Makino dug her heels into the ground and forced herself to be calm, and to not think about what anyone else might have gathered from Blackbeard's parting words.
The silence that reigned in the wake of his departure was a tremendous thing, but Makino kept her gaze fixed on Shanks' back, the familiar shape of it offering some comfort, even if she couldn't see his face.
Somethingloosenedthen. She felt it in the air, stirring, as though something dormant had come awake, blinking into the terrible light of the war, to see it for what it was. She sensed it in the people around her, pirates and marines, weapons drawn and poised to attack lowering, as though they'd sensed it, too. A single, small ripple.
Then Shanks was raising his voice, and although the firm edge of command remained, that dark note from earlier was gone, and Makino loosed the breath she'd been holding. "Everyone…"
"For now, please respect what I have to say."
"Why are you always showing up where you're not wanted, Shanks you bastard?!"
Shanks smiled. After today, it felt like a relief just to manage it. "You haven't changed, Buggy."
The shrill, inarticulate sound he got in response to that only had his smile stretching wider, but before Buggy could shriek something else, "Hey, I got married! Did you hear?"
"Everyone heard, you asshole!"
"Ah, right, right. You probably would have; it's been ten years. Time sure flies, huh?"
Buggy glared. Then with a snort, "You haven't changed, either. You're still too casual. And who the hell would marryyou, anyway?"
Seeking her presence, Shanks looked toward where Makino was standing, and found her with Ben and Lucky. She had Siren sheathed now, and seemed to be at ease—or at least, as much as anyone would be, in her position. Observation users always had it the hardest in places like this, where the loss of so many lives lingered, long after the fact, and the wary press of her brow said enough about what she was feeling.
The encounter with Teach had shaken her—had shaken Shanks, and he knew he wasn't the only one who'd been caught off guard by Blackbeard's reaction. And he didn't want to think too much about the implication behind his parting words—congratulations—but knew it was something he would have to deal with sooner or later. Whatever leverage Teach thought he could garner from that information…
Buggy followed his gaze across the plaza, and his voice had lost that shrill note of irritation when he asked, "Her, huh?"
Shanks smiled, watching the animated pull of her expression as she talked to Lucky, something almost regal in the slight lift of her chin, and the heavy fall of her long braid down her back. The short cloak tucked around her shoulders shifted when she moved, water-like; a lovely thing of sea-green velvet wovenwith delicate silver at the collar. An old gift he'd given her, like the sword at her hip; a pirate's ensemble, carried with ease now by the woman who'd been his wife for a decade. The woman who'd walked into a war with him.
And even if the cloak hid her stomach, the rounder lines of her small frame and the healthy flush to her cheeks told another story, and for a moment it was hard tearing his eyes away. "Yeah."
A snort from above. "You're ridiculous."
His grin only widened, and his laugh was a softer thing this time, "Yeah."
Buggy said nothing to that, and in between breaths Shanks was suddenly brought back twenty years, to the deck of a ship that had long since sailed its last voyage, and the quiet lull between petty disagreements that had always ended in a truce, grievances forgotten; a ceasefire acknowledged with the cheerful clink of glasses, and laughter to chase down the drink. And even with the terrible truth of the war spread out around them, and all it had dredged to the surface, the memory of an old friendship was a happy discovery, even after so many years.
"Hey, Buggy," Shanks said then, voice lowered so as not to be overheard, but he couldn't have tempered his grin if he'd wanted to as he said, gently, "I'm gonna be a dad."
There was a pause—a full beat of complete silence where surprise chased over Buggy's expression, wiping his features clean of derision and annoyance, before something that looked like the beginnings of a genuine smile alighted across his face.
Then his smile dropped, and his voice rang out, a keening shriek of familiar disbelief that had Shanks wincing—
"You brought your pregnant wife to a war!?"
She found him in the rubble, a hunched shape, grey and battered like the jagged rocks scattered around him.
Indecision gripped her before she could take a single step, and under that unforgiving hold she couldn't uproot her feet from the ground. Ten years without word, without a single call, because her cowardice had held her back; the fear that he would look at her and not see the woman she'd become, but the shadow of the girl she'd let die, the day she'd decided to become a pirate.
And of all the stories the sea carried with her name, some of them inching closer to the truth than their creators realised, this was a truth Makino doubted any of them had gotten right—that more than anything else, she was a coward.
A hand touched her back then, the familiar warmth of his presence wrapping around her. Gone was that white-hot ember, and she drew some strength from the gentle lap of it, where it reached for her now. A kiss to her hair, and, "Go," Shanks said.
He'd gone with her when she'd expressed her wish to find Garp. With the ceasefire brokered, Makino didn't think anyone would attack her if she went alone, but Shanks hadn't seemed inclined to take any chances.
"I'll be here," he told her, when she looked at him. Then, wry smile quirking, "At a safe distance. If I remember right, Garp has a mean right hook."
Her own smile wavered, and she felt the brush of his fingers along her cheek. No hair to tuck behind her ear now, having braided all of it back, but she leaned into the touch, and with a breath, said, "I'll just be a moment."
"Take your time."
Makino squared her shoulders, and felt something like a laugh threatening, thinking suddenly that she'd stared down Edward Newgate and Kaidou both, but faced with the man who'd been the closest thing she'd ever known to a father, shequailed like a child.
Time to own up to your choices, Makino.
One more second for courage, and then she was pushing through the rubble, mindful of where she stepped, but steady in her course as she approached Garp where he sat, shoulders heavy and his eyes staring into nothing.
She came to a stop in front of him, and her hands shook where they hung at her sides, but she curled her fingers into her palms and pushed a breath past her lips.
"Garp," Makino said, voice soft.
He blinked, as though coming back to himself, and then he was raising his eyes to look at her. And it took all the strength she had to keep her back straight as that tired gaze focused on her, although it wasn't the hard, accusing scrutiny she'd expected.
Something flickered across his face, some emotion that even the blood and the grime couldn't mask, pulling the hard angles into an expression she'd never seen before.
His hair was grey, she saw then, the thought leaping out at her. There'd still been some dark left it in, when she'd seen him last.
Ten years,she thought then, the full weight of that realisation settling, and the two words lodged in her throat, each holding a sob that she couldn't get out.
Garp was still looking at her, as though he couldn't decide what he was seeing, but the terrible weight of emotion that passed over his features made something clench around her heart with enough force that it drove her breath from her lungs. "Makino."
She watched as he took her in, everything that was different from what he'd known once. And maybe he was trying to reconcile the image of her now with the girl he remembered— the barmaid with her flowery kerchiefs.
Now his gaze lingered on the long braid, hanging heavy down her back, no kerchief and no flowers in sight. The dark velvet cloak and the leather boots,and the sword at her hip, carried with an ease she couldn't have imagined when she'd first taken it into her hands, ten years ago.
"You look well," he told her then, his voice rough, but the words were genuine. He didn't even sound surprised; it was just a statement of fact.
And whatever she'd expected to get from this meeting, it hadn't been that.
She realised then that she was crying, fat tears blurring her vision, rolling down her cheeks, to gather at her jaw and the collar of her cloak. And she watched his mouth quirk, just a fraction, as though he saw her now, the woman she'd become, but found some of the girl still left in her.
Her sob broke off, but then she was moving, covering the remaining distance at an almost-run, hindered only by the weight of her stomach. But he didn't stop her, and didn't push her away when she sank to her knees, hands tucked under his arms as another sob tore loose, muffled against his jacket.
He smelled like blood and gunpowder, nothing at all like she remembered, but Makino didn't care, only fisted her hands in the jacket at his back, and when her next sob came, it held the words she'd kept with her for ten years, hoarded like an ugly secret, and when she spoke them it felt like something broke and mended within her all at once, "I'm sorry."
Strong arms wrapped around her, gripping with enough force that she felt her breath rush out of her, and for a moment she was so startled she forgot that she was crying, but Garp didn't release her, and when he pressed his brow to her shoulder she felt the back under her palms heave, once, even as no sound escaped him.
She thought she might have said something more, if she could—if she'd had the voice to speak the words, she might have told him, all the things she would have when she'd been a girl and he'd come back from Headquarters and told her he was sick of the world, but he'd like her to tell him about the books she'd read since he'd seen her last. Had there been any daring battles, or princesses in disguise? Any handsome kings, and dragons that needed slaying?
She might have told him about her king now, and their fourth of a kingdom. Her many disguises, every fanciful rumour to her name, and some of the truths that had slipped in over the years. She could have told him of a hundred daring battles, and facing down beasts in different shapes. Her sword that sang.
But she couldn't find her voice, not for the words that needed saying, or those that could be said. Although it didn't seem to matter to Garp that she didn't speak, and for a while all he did was hold her.
The sigh that pulled loose of her had her sinking against him, but before it had even had a chance to leave her fully, Garp was suddenly pulling back, hands curved around her shoulders as his eyes dropped to her stomach. And even with the cloak hiding it, Makino realised he must have felt it.
The words dragged from him, a rasp, "Are you—"
He didn't finish, but she saw now as realisation took shape, although the expression that came to settle on his face didn't give her any hints as to what he thought about it.
But in this, Makino found that it didn't matter what he thought, because no matter how much her choices had hurt him, she would never, ever feel sorry about her unborn child.
And so she lifted her chin, and with a smile that dared him to say anything at all, said simply, "Yes."
There was a moment where he looked at her that Garp seemed to be looking beyond her, as though he was seeing something else entirely, before his gaze cleared, and he seemed to take her in, all of her, and where they were sitting.
Then, familiar anger sharpening the words, "You realise you just walked into awar?"
And somehow, out of all the things he could have said—out of all the things he could have offered, condemnation and disappointment, disbelief and sorrow—concern for her wellbeing, and the wellbeing of her child, and in such a Garp-like fashion, was almost more than Makino could take.
She was crying so badly she couldn't see, but her smile had come to stay, it seemed. "I hear when you get married, it's common to support your spouse in their endeavours," she said, voice too thick for glibness, but she didn't care. "And I know you were hoping that all that would amount to for me was to stand at some boring farmer's side at the melon harvest." She wiped at her eyes, smile trembling, and nodded, as though to herself. "I don't think my husband would make a very good melon farmer, though. Better he puts his skills to use where they're needed."
From the look Garp was giving her, Makino couldn't decide if her attempted humour was making things better or worse, but, "If it helps," she told him, "He put up a fight about it."
At that, his brows furrowed, and she could read his expression without problem when he grumbled, "Not a big enough fight, if you're here."
Makino raised a brow. "You'd rather he made my decisions for me?" She met his eyes. "I always had a choice with him. And I stand by all those choices. Him included."
She wondered, as she had so often during that first year after leaving Fuschia, if Garp had ever fully accepted that she'd left on her own. The villagers would have told him as much, if he'd asked; after all, Makino hadn't exactly made a secret of her intentions to join the Red-Hair Pirates. And several of them had been on the docks to bid her farewell.
Then again, maybe it would have been an easier truth to bear, to believe that she'd been spirited away, even if she knew that if Garp really had thought that she'd been taken against her will, they wouldn't have gotten far. But to himself, privately, maybe it had helped to believe that.
"Have you been happy, Makino?"
She blinked, and looked up at him. He still had his hands on her shoulders, and the comforting weight was easier to bear that the one behind the eyes looking at her now, searching her face, something desperate suddenly in his gaze, as though he couldn't decide what he wanted her answer to be.
She sought out Shanks' presence then, and found it without thinking, still where she'd left him. And she found the others there, too—Ben's steady calm, and Yasopp's; that sharp point of focus. And all the others she could single out with her eyes closed, even with so many people around them, marines and pirates both living and dead. Her family, and another choice that she'd never once regretted.
It's not a crime to choose happiness.Shanks' words, and she remembered them as she remembered the cold winter evening that had seen them spoken, and the boy who'd showed up, and who'd been the embodiment ofchoice. To choose a father, and a little brother's life.
And she knew her smile answered for itself, but she said it anyway, because if anything deserved saying, it was this."Yes."
The tear-tracks through the grime were silent testaments, but then Garp's shoulders heaved, and the hands gripping hers tightened. And he wasn't looking at the crew behind her, or the battlefield, or anything else. For a moment, all he seemed to see was her, but even with the tears, the grin that pushed through the grief, which had always been a little terrifying, was as genuine as the words that followed.
"Glad to hear it."
The graves rose from a bright cradle of colour, the smaller of the two sheltered in the shade of the other. Above, the sky swept an endless blue, and the smell of flowers permeated the air, the sheer intensity of it almost overpowering, but it had claimed the lingering smell of blood and gunpowder that had clung to her nose since Marineford, and so Makino welcomed the change, and with a deep breath that she let fill her whole body to the brim.
The funeral over, the pirates were dispersing, some dragging their feet, others striding with purpose in their step. And that was what death did, Makino supposed—it forged different hearts from the grief left in its wake, and only time would dull the very sharpest edges; the ones that might have accepted, but whose acceptance came with a price.
The promise she found in those sharp edges now, backs ramrod straight and knuckles white-capped, not gripping their weapons but never far from them, left a wary unease in its wake, like the sea pulling back before a great wave, except it just kept pulling, further and further away from the shore. She wondered when it would finally break.
"It's not going to be any better, is it?" she asked, lifting her eyes to Shanks at her side. "What's coming."
His expression hardened. He was looking at the graves when he spoke, "No."
A truth without embellishment, and one they'd both known, long before Marineford—before Whitebeard and Ace, and Blackbeard. And Makino offered no further comment, knowing it wasn't needed, although she knew it was a subject that would have to be broached, and soon.
She thought back to Blackbeard's words in the plaza, and glancing at Shanks found her thoughts reflected on his face, the sharp pull of his features highlighting the scars.
Palms pressed to her stomach, she felt the baby moving, and Makino turned her eyes to the smaller of the graves—to the hat, and the name carved into the stone. Another breath sought the salt drifting in from the sea. The sun warmed her cheeks.
"Ace," she said then, with a smile that had no care for death. "If we have a boy."
Shanks looked at her, surprised, and it was as though the words had broken some kind of spell—had shattered the hard expression that had been on his face, leaving something that looked for a moment so genuinely startled, Makino felt her smile widening.
Then, surprise easing into something softer, Shanks smiled. "Ace, huh?"
She didn't ask if he liked it—could see it in the smile that mirrored her own now, and felt it when he reached for her, wrapping his arm around her back to pull her close, until the curve of her stomach was pressed flush against him, as though he needed a moment just to feel them both at once.
And they hadn't talked yet, of what had happened at the plaza—that one, terrible moment of doubt before Blackbeard had pulled back. They'd barely had a moment's rest between the ceasefire and the funeral, and neither of them had been sleeping well, nights spent seeking the assurance of skin and pulse and breaths, and the release that left no room for doubt about either.
But now there was rest—waspeace, where they came together. And for a brief, bright moment Makino thought of that sunny day on the Loguetown docks, the quiet lull between teasing quips about sleeping habits and an uncertain future, and an answer that had accepted both.
"You think it will be a boy?" she heard then, the words a low murmur against her hair. She thought he sounded pleased, although she had a feeling he would have, regardless.
She pressed a wavering smile to the warm skin at his collar. "I found the ledgers. Ben has his money on it being a boy, so I'm fairly certain."
A soft laugh; she felt it under her hands, and when she pushed herself closer she felt his arm tightening around her. "Can't argue with sound logic," Shanks said.
Nose tucked into the hollow of her throat, she felt the breath when he drew it, the unyielding spine curved under her palms that only ever gave in at her small touches, now righting itself again as Shanks drew back to look at her.
Warm fingers wrapped around her own, and, "Come on, my girl," he said, the words simple, but holding a whole world of truths, heralding a return she'd almost been afraid to hope for, when he'd first declared his intention of intervening in the war. And a promise, that whatever was in store for them next, they'd be facing it together.
"Oi, missus."
The unexpected address drew her attention, only to find Marco having approached from across the grass. But before she could respond, Shanks gave her hand a squeeze, something like understanding in his eyes before he drew away, toward where they'd anchored the ship.
Makino watched him go, before turning to the pirate who'd addressed her. "Marco-san."
He was looking at her stomach. Without the cloak, it was painfully evident, but they hadn't bothered with pretence. Not around this crew. And he wasn't smiling, but something in his expression changed, the grief lifting, if only a little.
"Congratulations," he told her, raising his eyes to hers. "To you and Red-Hair both. Meant to say it earlier."
Her smile was small, and she laced her fingers together over her stomach. The baby was quiet. "Thank you."
"It's good to see there's more than death to deal with," Marco said then. "Hard to remember sometimes, with this sea." He didn't glance at the graves behind her, but then Makino doubted he had to look at them to be reminded.
He looked at her stomach again. "Your husband's a good man. Rare, that."
She smiled, remembering the greeting he'd given them when they'd stepped aboard Whitebeard's ship. "He is."
Marco lifted his gaze then, and she saw that a deep furrow had wedged between his brows. "With the old man gone, there'll be a vacuum. Someone's going to try to fill it," he said then. Makino didn't need him to tell her who he thought would be the first to try; the hard slant to his mouth said enough. "The New World won't be the same after this."
Makino felt her hands clenching, knuckles bleeding white where her fingers interlaced. "What will you do?"
He didn't answer, but she found it, in those sharp edges. Acceptance, but at a price. He wouldn't be dragging his feet.
But, "If you ever need anything," he said then, and for the briefest of moments, those sharp edges smoothed out. "Don't hesitate. I owe Red-Hair a debt. That extends to you and the little one."
"He won't ask you to pay it," Makino said.
She thought he might have smiled at that, had it been any other day than this. "Somehow, I'm not surprised," Marco said. "Mah, the offer still stands."
She nodded. Under her hands, the baby shifted. "I'll keep that in mind."
Then, the barest of smiles tugged at his mouth, but it was enough to make her brows lift. "And I promise I'll give you a warning next time, if I take you flying," he added.
She laughed at that, a wet, trembling sound, but it wasn't a broken one, and when he lifted his hand in a parting wave, Makino bid him farewell.
She watched his retreating back for a moment, before turning to the graves one last time, seeking the name, and the movements under her palms.
I'll sing to him,she thought to the grave.Or to her, if it's a girl. It doesn't matter.
Her hands tightened, once, before she let them drop from her stomach, touching her fingertips to Siren's hilt.And if necessary, I won't be the only one.
She felther swordwhere it rested, heavy on her hip. Like her resolve, a comfortable weight now.
She wouldn't hesitate.
Then, a deep breath claimed, lungs filled with the sea air and the flowers, she turned to follow where Shanks had gone, finding him by the ship where it sat anchored to the shore. Behind it, the horizon sprawled forever, and when she approached someone hollered for the anchor to be raised.
The baby kicked, and Makino patted her stomach.Calm down, you. You'll be back on board soon.
Shanks smiled as she came close, eyes curving against the glare of the sun. "Ready?"
Hand falling from her stomach, the kicking persisted, and Makino tucked it into Shanks' when he reached for her, finding it warm to the touch. Sword-callouses seeking their kin, and smaller, gentler knuckles fitting themselves into familiar grooves; the rough heart of his palm, and the lace of his fingers. Her resolve sat, unwavering.
"I'm ready."