Sticks head out of barricade Uh, hi I'm back. Glad nobody, at least nobody I know of, was upset at what happened with the cliffy last chapter.

Ichiro - pushes glasses up nose so light glints sinisterly off them I for one am glad that the young man is out of the way, though I do hate having to kill if it isn't necessary.

What are you doing here?

Ichiro - Aside from dear Luffy and his unfortunate brother, I am the only other important character to really appear in this chapter so it is fair I get to appear. Now, hurry along with this chapter so I can comfort my dear Luffy and bury Ace, since a warrior like himself deserves such.

You know what, I will start the chapter now, after all you asked for it.

Ichiro – Things always go my way, Author. I'll thank you though for making it easy for me.

Yeah, yeah whatever. I don't own One Piece; I just own this story's plot and any OCs, no matter how much they annoy me at times.

"ACE!" Luffy struggled weakly in the arms of the two men holding him, desperate to reach his older brother. Ichiro sighed, before pulling out a handkerchief and wiping Ace's blood off his sword before sheaving it. "Such a waste, but it was unavoidable." He walked back over to the struggling Luffy, using an unbloodied part of the handkerchief to dry Luffy's tears, "Now now, there's no need to cry. Your brother died in battle, like any real warrior would like too. We'll even bury him, as he deserves respect for putting up such a good fight earlier. You have my word." Luffy was struggling to hold onto his consciousness as whatever Ichiro had done to him earlier was taking effect as he could feel a numbing pain slowly taking over his body. Already half of his body was numb and black spots were appearing on the sides of his vision but he refused to fall into unconsciousness, he couldn't…he had to help Ace. That's when he started to feel a strange warmth building in his chest, getting stronger and stronger and as he looked up, Ichiro appeared startled as Luffy looked at Ace. His vision was fading faster, and the strange feeling in his chest suddenly expanded then disappeared. Luffy was absolutely exhausted and everything faded to black.

"I wasn't expecting that, his power is even closer to awakening than I thought. I was a little worried, but it looks like he finally passed out before he managed to do anything." Though he had to admit, when his eyes had glowed they were very pretty. The boy was rather adorable and feisty as well, how he couldn't wait to tame the boy. "Bring the ship round, and inform our doctor that we have injuries to treat. Make sure my dear Luffy's room is ready as well." 10 of the soldiers bowed and left and he turned to the remaining 20. "We shall bury the young Ace here on the shore, as I promised Luffy I would. I do keep my promises; I am a gentleman after all. The ship should be here by then. Once we have done that, we will head to the ship and return home." The men saluted and Ichiro pulled on his collar, "It is unusually warm today; I guess I didn't notice due to my excitement." However, he was proved wrong bare seconds later by the crackling sound. He slowly turned to look at Ace; fire was starting to crackle to life on Ace's body as Ace started shifting on the sand before he began to get up on his hands and knees. Blood began to drip from the hole in his chest and side as Ace began to stand up, the fire on his body growing as sparks fell off his body, landing and igniting the ground around him. When Ace stood to his full height, the hole in his chest was still there along with other injuries he'd gained from his earlier fight, but his eyes and face were blank and emotionless. "Don't…" His eyes locked on Ichiro as parts of his body began to steam and all his wounds closed up. "Don't touch Luffy." Fire exploded, almost white hot which he threw forward in massive pillars of fire in an attempt to burn Ichiro and his men to ash.

The two holding Luffy were forced to drop him to the floor as Ace wildly launched the fire at the group, avoiding Luffy by a few inches at most. The fire was far too intense for anyone who was conscious enough to feel it, forcing them all back. Ichiro could see the fire was so intense that Ace was in fact beginning to sustain some burns on parts of his body. There was no physical way for them to retrieve Luffy from the surrounding blaze. "Everyone, we will leave now. As things stand, we will be engulfed in these flames long before he runs out of steam." "And what of the boy?" "Sadly we must leave him here for now." He turned to Ace and spoke, "I will allow you this victory, Portagus D Ace but rest assured I will return for what belongs to me soon. I am only temporarily letting you keep him, besides I managed half of what I came here to do and I am content to leave it at that for now." He returned his attention to his men, "We retreat now, I would prefer to keep any casualties and fatalities as low as possible and it won't be possible if remain any longer." He took one last look at the man in front of him before leading his men in retreat. Ace finally stopped throwing fire and stood still and after a few minutes, in which the fire began to calm then Ace began to blink and groaned before life returned to his eyes.

Ace really didn't know what the hell was going on. He'd died right? Stabbed by that bastard Ichiro who'd done something to Luffy. But he was now standing on a burning beach, and Ichiro and his men were nowhere in sight. Wait, where was Luffy? Ace started franticly looking around for Luffy before suddenly wincing as whatever high he'd just been on was wearing off and he was now beginning to feel pain. "Damn it, got to find Luffy." A burning pain in his shoulder made him look to see what was causing it and his eyes widened. His shoulder was on fire, and he could smell burning flesh. He, the guy who'd eaten the Mera Mera no mi, was being burnt. He proceeded to pat it, and other flames on his body, out while searching for Luffy but the fire surrounding him made it difficult to see. At one point, he tried to put out the fire with his powers, but he couldn't control them properly. He had to concentrate on the fire so hard; the effort of putting out the fires was exhausting him. But finally, all that was left was a few small flames on the beach and Ace found Luffy lying sprawled on the ground. He knelt next to his brother, a relieved smile gracing his lips. "That guy didn't take you away; I was so worried they would after they…" He began to check Luffy for injuries and began to frown. Something was different about Luffy, but what it was he just couldn't put his finger on it. He gently flipped his brother over, in case of injuries on his front and Ace spotted something. He lifted Luffy gently, supporting him with his arm to get a better look. He'd hoped he'd imagined it, but he hadn't and Ace had a feeling that it wasn't over yet.

Luffy groaned, his whole body tingled and his head was swimming. What in the world had just happened? He thought back: he'd been really bored and this island had appeared as if responding to his wish for adventure. Then, he'd run into Ace who was going to be staying with them for a while which was great, he could meet Robin, Franky, Brook and Sunny too. Then they'd gone to go get Ace's boat, which they were going to take to the Sunny. Luffy'd never been on Ace's boat so that would have been fun but then they'd got to the beach and those weird guys had attacked them. They'd tried to fight them off but they used sea stone to weaken them, which sucked. Then that stuck-up guy had come, and he'd punched him which made his body feel weird. Then Ace got mad and tried to attack the guy then he'd- "Ace!" Luffy shot up, before the world started to spin and he fell back down. "Luffy, don't scare me like that. Are you alright?" Luffy blinked a few times before the form of his older brother finally appeared in his vision. "Ace! You're alright!" He threw his arms around Ace's neck and buried his head in Ace's shoulder, letting out a sob. "Don't tell me you're going to start crying, Luffy. You're still a little cry-baby." "But…Ace…I thought…" He hit Luffy on the head, "Idiot, like I can die with a little brother like you to worry about. Though right now, that statement isn't entirely correct." Luffy looked up, blinking away tears as Ace gently eased Luffy's top backwards. "You might want to look down Luff'." He does, blinking like an idiot before poking one of them through his shirt. "What this thing doing here?" "Luffy, it looks like that Ichiro guy…turned you into a girl." "What?!"

See, I didn't kill Ace…just temporarily but he's 100% alive and will stay that way, damn it. I also gender bent Luffy, at least someone saw it coming but no secret fem!Luffy.

Ichiro – I was so close, but I got careless. I must have miscalculated something, I best go over my calculations again and revise my plans due to this debacle. walks off muttering

I think it was forgetting to take into account that both brothers are D's but he'll probably that figure it out later, I certainly don't want to make things easier for him. But on to other things, the next clue is:

The style of fighting he uses is completely unique to himself; no one else currently uses a style like it in the One Piece verse (unless someone uses it in an anime-only arc that I haven't seen).

Well, better sign off and go into hiding; I don't think Ace is too happy about the last 2 chapters especially seeing as he spent most of this chapter dead. Bye now!