Family

To be perfectly honest, Ace had thought he was dead when the Burrowing Hagfish emerged from the cell wall next to him. The jawless eels were a real menace on the sea floor: their acidic saliva ate through everything, so they were a serious risk to any ship passing through Fishman Island. They were also scavengers, eating everything they came across including stone and steel. Ace hadn't been in Impel Down for very long but he'd already heard the horror stories of prisoners who'd had one crawl through their cell and been eaten alive. What made Burrowing Hagfish so dangerous was not their acidic saliva, but the incredibly viscous slime they secreted when they felt threatened. The hagfish could move through it easily, but to any other living thing it may as well have been wet cement. Added to their ability to extrude many hundreds of times their own body mass of the gloop in a matter of seconds, Burrowing Hagfish were a serious problem for anything trying to survive on the seabed. The wardens however didn't care if a few prisoners got eaten; it kept morale down and the hagfish automatically closed their burrows behind them so the prison never sprung a leak.

However instead of eating him as the inmates in the cell opposite were screaming about, the four foot hagfish tried to eat the chain attaching his left arm to the wall. It failed, the chain being Kairoseki and practically indestructible, so instead it ate the wall around where the chain was attached. Ace' left arm dropped; he pulled it into his lap so as to avoid getting dissolved.

"Oi! Fire Fist!" one of the other inmates shouted. "How'd ya train that fish?!"

Ace ignored them, instead keeping his eyes on his new cellmate as it wriggled closer, curling up on itself just inches from the pirate's knees and shrinking down into a scroll. "Fox?" he breathed, barely able to believe it. Of all the possible people who might be able to get a message into Impel Down, Fox had not even been on his list. Carefully he lifted the scroll into his lap and opened the seal, shaking out the coiled paper so he could read what she had written.

Hothead,

You moron! Have you any idea how worried I was when Beastie brought me your hat?!

Oh, Beastie was alright! And so was his hat! He'd worried the prison wardens might have confiscated it, along with his knife.

Looking after your crazy baby brother is enough of a challenge without having to bail you out as well. Oh, and don't even think of saying something stupid like "I'm not worth it," or "don't risk yourself for me," you twit! You're my nakama and I'm going to rescue you if I have to kill every last marine on the planet!

Note that I didn't say, "even if I die". I have no intention of dying so you don't get to either, d'you hear me Portgas D. Ace? No dying! I've sent letters to everyone who knows you and cares about your wellbeing so there's a good chance someone will try and break you out before I make my move. Probably your big sis, since she's the only one who can move through the Calm Belt without being eaten. She'll likely rip you a new one for not calling for help while you had the chance –idiot! That stupid pride of yours will get you killed and then where will we be!– but I'm sure you'll survive it.

I repeat, you do not get to die! How would you feel if any of your family went and died on you? Not good, hm? Well that's how we feel too, so suck it up and get used to it, mister damsel-in distress!

See you soon,

Limpet.

P.S. Bow to my mad skills, peon!

The letter hissed, then burst into flame for an instant and fell to the floor as so much ash. Ace sat utterly still for several seconds. Then, just as his fellow prisoners started to think he'd been eaten after all, Ace started to wheeze. The wheezing turned into deranged giggles, then into full-blown mad, manic laughter. He laughed and laughed and laughed, the sound echoing off the stone and multiplying as it rang around the lowest level of the most secure gaol on the planet. He ignored the fearful cries of "He's snapped!" and "Fire Fist's lost it!" and clutched his stomach helplessly, tears running down his cheeks as the laughter faded into hiccups and sobs.

Fox had always been good at snapping him out of what she called his 'pity parties'; he had almost been able to hear her exasperated voice snarking at him as he read her words. Leaning his head back against the wall, Ace smiled peacefully. What would be, would be. But if he got a chance to make a run for it, he would say the magic words and scarper.

Though when he was out of this mess he really would have to coax Fox into telling him how exactly she'd managed to make paper that self-destructed when you finished reading what was written on it, not to mention prank her something terrible for calling him both a peon and a damsel in distress. He was Portgas D. Ace, dammit! Not some pansy!

Zoro had been expecting Fox to take a while picking an outfit to wear on Sabaody, but he hadn't expected her to take quite this long. He himself didn't exactly have much choice in what to wear; he only had one shirt left that wasn't either burnt, missing pieces or neatly darned in several places. Fox however had explained that here she was better off dressing as her father's daughter: her mother was quietly infamous for having had a fling with the Shichibukai back in the day and trying to hide her identity would only make it more likely that she would expose it. Here on Sabaody Dracule Lisska was known for her neutrality regarding pirates, so being seen with Zoro wouldn't be a problem.

Besides, it wasn't like Aokiji hadn't seen her with the Straw-Hats before.

Then the cabin door opened and Zoro's jaw dropped slightly. He'd known she would pull out the stops but he hadn't expected anything like this.

Fox had her hair piled up on the back of her head with long bangs looping down the sides of her face and shoulders to join the elegant knot at her crown, held in place with about a dozen hair sticks, all of which were probably very, very sharp. She had no makeup on –not that she needed it– and wore a fabulous kimono in pale blue with long, wide sleeves and decorated with thousands of silvery bubbles. The kimono was slightly translucent, hinting at the indigo hiyoku beneath it that ended halfway down her calves. Her collar was wide but not scandalously so, her obi neat but extravagant and on her right shoulder was the shikom-zue umbrella she'd somehow conned out of Admiral Aokiji. Calla was coiled loosely around her throat like a highly poisonous scarf and Zoro knew there would be more knives hidden in her clothing that seemed feasible, but that was just how she was.

"You look stunning," he admitted.

"Then let's get going, shall we?" Fox told him with a smile. "Remember to call me Lisska from now on, though."

Zoro scoffed; as if he'd forget!

As her mother's main tea house was in grove twenty two, Fox and Zoro had to pass through more than half of the lawless area to reach it. Not that the incognito assassin minded; she and Zoro beat up any bounty hunters trying to bring him in with ridiculous ease and there were plenty of shops along the way to keep them both interested. Fox had warned Zoro against getting in the way of the 'goldfish people' as she privately termed the Tenryuubito, though she wasn't certain he'd paid attention. Or maybe he hadn't cared despite her warning him they could call on an admiral if they wanted to.

Fox had paused in a shop selling silk thread in grove twenty four and was just paying when she felt her swordsman's killing intent spike just around the corner. Suddenly fearing the worst, Fox shoved her purchases into her obi and hurried towards the ruckus, arriving on the scene just as violence faded into puzzlement down the connection. Then Fox saw the Tenryuubito and instantly wrapped her Colour of Concealment around her like a cloak. While the white-haired woman acknowledged the futility of openly opposing the World Nobles, that did not mean she would allow them to soil her skin with their filthy eyes.

Walking calmly through the space the fat goldfish had created by his presence Fox stopped at her lover's side and waited for the noble to move on.

"Thanks for looking out for my idiot," Said a voice right by Jewelry Bonney's ear just as she was about to lay into Pirate Hunter Zoro, making the female captain almost jump out of her skin. The pink-haired pirate darted away from the speaker and spun around.

"Wha?"

It was a very tall woman with white hair and piercing golden eyes in a floaty blue kimono with an umbrella balanced on her right shoulder. The woman smiled, the expression friendly with an undercurrent of cool fearlessness: Bonney suddenly knew this was a big player, never mind that she'd never seen or heard of the woman before.

"I said thank-you," the woman repeated before turning to the Pirate Hunter and handing him a handkerchief. "Honestly Zoro, I let go of you for all of ten seconds and you try to get yourself pulped again. Should I be worried about your masochistic streak?"

"He couldn't have laid a finger on me, the fat bastard," the swordsman grumbled, wiping his face. The woman sighed, folded her umbrella and thwacked the Pirate Hunter across the back of the head with it.

"Were you even listening when I told you the Noble Goldfish could summon an admiral on a whim?" she asked, her tone suggesting interest while her body language screamed threat. The green-haired man wisely did not answer, taking a sudden interest in the ground. "I thought as much." The woman rolled her eyes and turned back to Bonney. "My name's Dracule Lisska; thanks for sticking your neck out, Jewelry Bonney."

Bonney shook the hand, feeling slightly shocky. "Dracule Lisska? As in..?"

The woman –Lisska– smiled. "Yes, as in my father. Now I need to introduce my lover here to my mother before said father catches wind of him, so we'll be on our way."

"What about that guy?" the Pirate Hunter asked, pointing at the man the World Noble had shot. Lisska sighed.

"Bring him along; one of mother's girls can fix him." She turned to meet the eyes on the pirates across the street. "Oh, gentlemen?"

Capone Beige, Urouge, Basil Hawkins and Scratchman Apoo all gave the deadly lady their attention.

"My mother runs a very discreet teahouse in grove twenty-two, so I'm sure you would all be welcome provided you mind your manners and leave your differences at the door." Lisska smiled, sweet as cyanide. "As Madame Pearl has been known to geld people who try to start fights, I'm sure you can keep your egos in check for that long, hm?" She turned and left, umbrella twirling as the swordsman beside her carried the wounded man away down the road.

Jewelry Bonney swallowed hard. That was Roronoa Zoro's lover? The man had to be insane, sleeping with the daughter of someone like Hawk-Eyes!

I've missed writing Ace.