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oriigami · 4 years ago

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we’re running against the wind

[Part two of my One Piece Wing AU, this time focusing on the Strawhats and their histories. Read it on AO3 here!] [Part One]

“I can’t fly,” Kuina told him, one warm and dusky night, sitting on the porch step and staring down at the grass. Arms wrapped around bony knees, bruised and grass-stained. “Did you know that?”

Zoro blinked, and sat down beside her, baffled for a moment. “What do you mean? Cause your wings haven’t grown out yet?”

She sighed, heavy and tired, and stretched one wing out at her side. It was simple, plain black, small for her age. “You know what a rail is?”

“A rail?”

“It’s a kind of bird. The kind I am. They live on the ground,” Kuina said, staring down at the grass between her scuffed shoes. “They don’t fly. They’re no good for it. Their wings are too small. Even if they try, they can never get too far off the ground.”

She shot him a sideways look, and halfheartedly tugged on one of his feathers. His wings were still growing, but already much larger than hers, big and brown, almost gold in the sunlight. Eagle wings. Wings meant to soar.

“You’re lucky, Zoro,” she said, looking up at him with a terribly sad half-smile on her face that he never, ever wanted to see again. “Someday, you’re going to fly.”

Zoro woke up with her voice still ringing in her head.

Consciousness hit him with an unpleasant jolt, and he had half a second to process the dusty courtyard- not Shimotsuki dojo- before a half-dozen different varieties of discomfort hit him all at once.

The hunger pains were practically screaming in the back of his mind, and he was parched from dehydration. He was half-numb from the ropes digging into his skin, cutting off blood circulation. He shifted, trying to prop himself up as best he could, and grit his teeth against the sharp, stabbing pain of blood starting to flow again.

As soon as he moved, his wings pulsed with pain, and he had to bite back a yell. They’d been lashed roughly to the pole at his back at an uncomfortable angle that had started as barely tolerable and progressed, over the course of the days, to maddening. The dusty ground all around him was scattered with fallen dusty gold feathers, both those that had been pulled loose by the ropes and those that had shed on their own as starvation had taken its toll.

It was fine, though. What was a few feathers lost? It wasn’t like he was going to die here. It wasn’t like he could.

He had a promise to keep, after all.

Arlong never clipped Nami’s wings. They were too useful for quick getaways. To him, they were just some of the features that made her such a valuable tool, such a clever, profitable little thief. So, no, he never damaged her wings.

But he loved to remind her that he could.

If she disobeyed, if she tried to run away- well, fishmen were so strong, and wings were so fragile. She learned to bear the fear, though she always kept her wings folded close and tight to her back whenever she walked through Arlong Park. If there was one thing she could be grateful for, at least, it was that he never thought to threaten to hurt Nojiko’s wings instead.

She could still hear the crunch of Bellemere’s wingbones when Arlong had stomped on them.

Fishmen didn’t have wings. It made sense- what sure would undersea creatures have for them? But she couldn’t help but suspect, every now and then, that Arlong was envious. He could rule their towns and beat them into the ground and proclaim himself and his brethren superior over humans in every way- but he would never, ever fly. That was something Nami would always hold over him.

Nami’s wings were simple at first glance- black, with splotches of bright white at the shoulders and tips- but under the sunlight, the black glittered, turning to dark iridescent bluish-green. They looked nothing like Bellemere’s wide, long-feathered osprey wings had.

“Would you cut it out?” she snapped, one wing stretching out to swat Luffy’s curious hands away from the straw hat resting in her lap.

She’d known him for more than a day now, but she still couldn’t really make up her mind on her temporary captain. He was annoying, but good-hearted, but stupid, but honest- and she’d never seen wings like his either. They were bright red and featherless, looking more bat than bird. Overall, he was a frustrating enigma, for how open he was.

Not that it mattered, really. She’d be parting ways with them soon enough.

“Are you done yet?” he asked insistently, leaning around her shoulder to peer at the mostly-repaired hat cradled in her hands. The wide, ugly knife cuts Buggy had left in the golden straw were mostly hidden now, though you could still see the scars if you knew to look- the replacement straw she’d had to use in places was brighter and cleaner than the worn, aged material of the rest of the hat.

She wondered idly just how old this stupid hat was. There were other repairs worked into the straw here and there, some more recent and some much older, hand-stitched with varying levels of neatness and expertise.

“Nearly,” she said, not for the first time. “Be patient.”

The sun caught on the mended straw, and all of a sudden she remembered a question she’d wanted to ask. “Hey, Luffy,” she said before his attention could drift. “What’s with this feather?”

She’d noticed it when they’d first met, and wondered at it. It was tucked into the red ribbon that ran around the hat, and when she’d taken the hat to repair it and gotten a closer look, she’d noticed that it was carefully stitched into place. It was striped black and sapphire blue, with a tiny splash of white at the tip.

“Oh!” Luffy said. “That’s Sabo’s!”

Nami blinked. “Sabo?” she repeated.

“My brother!” Luffy said.

Zoro blinked one eye open from where he’d been napping on one of the little boat’s benches, lifting his head. “You’ve got a brother?” he asked.

“There’s more of you?” Nami said at the same time.

Luffy snickered. “I’ve got two big brothers!” he explained. “They both set out to sea before me, though. Sabo first, and then Ace second. Sabo had bluejay wings. Yours kinda remind me of them, Nami!”

Had, Nami thought, and thought of Nojiko- solid blue wings, tipped with black. Thought about the osprey feather tucked away in the very back of her dresser in Cocoyashi. “Yeah?”

“Yeah!” Luffy said. “They’re really pretty! And glittery and blue, like the ocean!”

“Oh,” Nami said. “...Thanks.”

...So maybe she liked her temporary captain, just a little. It wouldn’t change anything, in the end.

Usopp lied about his wings. He kept them tucked close to his back, and whenever someone asked, he’d come up with a new species, something big and intimidating. Hawk, eagle, falcon- something flashy, impressive, worthy of a brave warrior of the sea.

Of course, none of those were true. (Nothing he said ever was.) Everyone in the village knew it, too- they’d known him since he was a kid, after all. The truth he never wanted to admit was that his wings were unremarkable, just like him. Plain black, medium size, with a thick stripe of white running through the middle of each. He only ever opened them when he was with his friends, or with Kaya.

The first time she’d seen his wings was when he threw his arms open too wide when telling a story, caught up in the fantasy inside his head, and unbalanced himself from his perch on the tree outside her window. They’d snapped open on instinct to break his fall and let him catch himself midair, and he’d flapped back up to her window to see her beaming.

“Look,” she’d said, and stretched her own wings open- big beautiful crane wings, wide and white but with a thick band of black on the inside of each. Just the opposite of his. “We match!”

Over time, Kaya’s sickness had taken its toll on her wings, just as on the rest of her. She was always shedding drifts of feathers, leaving her wings looking scrawny and patchy. They were beautiful nonetheless, though, wide and graceful, the surviving feathers bright white.

“Someday,” he told her, “We’ll go flying, once you’re better and your feathers grow back. And I’ll show you the island where everything is made out of candy, and the trees talk to you!”

She laughed into her hands, wings curling around her. “Do they?”

“They do!” Usopp confirmed, nodding emphatically. “And they sing, too. But only for kind-hearted girls with white wings. So if we went there, they’d sing for you for sure!”

She smiled, big and warm and honest. “That sounds lovely, Usopp!”

Usopp grinned back.

A couple days later, the pirates came.

And it was sudden and violent and terrifying, and Klahadore’s massive black vulture wings seemed to block out the sky, and Usopp was sure a dozen times over that he was going to die, but-

But he didn’t.

By the time it was all over and it was time to set sail, Kaya’s wings were already looking healthier.

“Kid,” the old man had said, the first day on the rock, voice gruff and thick from coughing up seawater. “You still alive?”

Sanji didn’t say anything, pulling skinny knees to his chest and glaring over the top of them at the old man’s back. The old man had a long piece of driftwood balanced over his knees, and was methodically shredding his shirt into long strips. One of his wings was awkwardly bent in a way that made Sanji cringe to look at. The pain must have been terrible, but the old man’s voice didn’t even shake.

“C’mere. I need your help with something.”

Sanji didn’t move. “What?” he asked, and almost winced at the croak of his own voice.

“Can’t reach my wing. Busted it against the rocks, and if I don’t set it now it won’t heal right.”

“So?” Sanji muttered sullenly. “What do I care?”

“You stupid, brat?” the old man asked tiredly, and didn’t even give Sanji time to bristle before he continued, “Your wings ain’t big enough to reach land yet, but you’re little enough to carry. If my wing heals right, I can get us both off this rock. Hopefully before we starve to death.”

“...How do I know you won’t leave me?” Sanji had asked suspiciously.

The old man looked at him askance over his shoulder, holding himself stiffly so as not to jar his injured wing. “Shit, kid, I might be a pirate, but I’m not a monster. You think I’d just ditch a little kid to die?”

Sani blinked. Oh.

(It had made Judge so, so angry, that Sanji was the only one of his brothers with wings. It was an embarrassment, an infuriation, that the failure could fly unassisted when the perfect sons could not. It was why he’d been locked away, in a cell where he could never see the sky, where there was no hope at all of flight.)

He inched his way across the craggy stone to the old man, lips pressed tight. He took the stick of driftwood and makeshift bandages and quietly set to work, following the old man’s terse instructions. He wasn’t used to being on this end of it. Normally it was Reiju bandaging his injuries, setting his sprains and broken bones.

(“You deserve to fly,” she’d said through desperate tears as she shoved him towards the ship, grey-and-violet wings pulled close to her back. “Go!”)

One he had the last clumsy knot tied, the old man gave him some of the food- so little- and they split to wait. For the old man’s broken bones to heal, or for a ship to come. Whichever came first.

And they’d waited, and waited, and waited.

After the third week, Sanji had started to lose feathers. After the makeshift shelter he’d managed to scrounge together fell apart, his wings provided the only protection from the elements. He huddled behind their shade as the weeks crawled by, agonizingly slowly.

Fallen black and white feathers littered the stone around him by the time desperation drove him to curl shaking fingers around a knife, and drag himself to the other side of the island, and discover the terrible truth. The knife clattered to the stone, and Sanji collapsed along with it.

It was twenty more days before the old man was well enough to fly. Sanji was half-unconscious with delirium by then, and all he knew of the flight was hunger, and wind, and endless, endless blue. The ocean below, and the cloudless sky above, and nothing at all between.

It never did quite leave his mind.

“Have you ever heard,” he said, leaning against the railing and turning to look at the idiot in the straw hat, “of the All Blue?”

Chopper had never had wings.

It was just another reason he knew he’d never fit in. No matter how human he could make himself look, he would never have wings, and that would always give him away.

He did know how to treat them, though. Of course he did. A great doctor needed to know those sorts of things. Doctorine had taught him- about wing breaks and sprains, the sort of injuries that could be crippling and the ones where the patient might fly again, her own grey parrot wings flaring dramatically whenever she made a point.

At the moment, Doctorine was leaning over the unconscious bodies of their three newest patients- the blonde man with the back injury, the girl with the fever, and the black-haired boy.

“Let’s see here,” she hummed. “Secretarybird, common magpie, and- hm.”

Chopper blinked up at her, intrigued by her sudden silence. Her expression was hard to read. “Doctorine? Is it about that boy’s wings? I saw they were different, and he hasn’t got feathers, is that normal for humans? Is he sick?”

“Not normal,” she agreed absently. “But not unprecedented, either.” She chuckled. “It’s been some time since I last met a D.”

“A… huh?”

Doctorine waved it off. “Oh, nothing. Get him to a warm room and then prep Mr. Secretarybird there for surgery, will you? I need to find the antibiotics for Miss Magpie, she’s the most urgent of the three.”

“Ah- yes, Doctorine!” Chopper agreed, and bounced into action, and questions about feathers and wings and Ds were quickly forgotten.

Franky didn’t have wings.

He had had, at one point, though he’d never really cared much about them either way. After all, Tom-san hadn’t had wings, and neither had Kokoro. And it wasn’t like they were any use for shipbuilding, and he didn’t have many places to fly to, anyways.

Iceberg had taught him how to fly, even though he’d always insisted he didn’t need Iceberg to teach him anything. But it had been useful for getting up to high places that needed construction, or making a quick getaway after breaking something, and- yeah, okay, he could admit it. It was fun. Flying had been fun.

And then there had been the sea train. And wings were so very fragile.

By the time he hauled himself aboard the scrap ship with broken hands, he already knew he wouldn’t fly ever again. His wings were wrecked beyond any dream of repair, skin shredded and bones shattered into fragments. Even if he had the ability to create prosthetics lightweight and detailed enough to replace them- which, not to sell himself short, he probably could, given time and materials that he didn’t have- he never would have been able to attach them to the nerves properly, not at that angle.

No, better just to amputate, and cauterize, and focus on the things he did need: his hands, his eyes, his organs.

And he’d gone on, and it had been fine, and most of the time he barely missed flying at all.

“Look,” he said, as the Agua Laguna raged outside and the dumb pirate kid refused to listen to reason. “Listen to me, bro. I’m serious. You listening?”

The kid didn’t answer, but he did pause in hammering away at his dead ship for a moment, which Franky decided to take as a yes.

“Your ship’s crippled,” Franky said bluntly. “She can’t sail anymore. It’s like- okay, you saw my wings are gone, right?”

“...Yeah.”

“Taking that ship to sea,” Franky said, “would be like pushing me off a cliff. There was a time I could’ve survived that just fine, but now it’d smash me to pieces. Your ship’s lost her wings. And no matter what, you can’t fix that.”

The kid stared at him, biting his lip so hard it looked like it might bleed, something cracking in his eyes, black and white wings curling protectively around his shoulders. Franky felt for him, he really did- he knew better than most what it felt like to fight something you couldn’t possibly win to try and save something you loved- but truth was truth, even when it hurt.

He was just starting to hope he might have finally gotten through when the door crashed open and suddenly, they all had bigger problems to worry about.

Robin’s wings were nondescript. It was useful, in its way, when it came to living in hiding. From the slanderous stories told about her and the people of Ohara, people expected crow, raven, rook- something dark and threatening. Or even featherless demon wings, much like those of her new captain.

Instead, her wings were simple, uniform dark grey with tawny orange-brown patches spreading from the shoulders. Robin wings.

Her mother’s had looked much the same, she remembered. It was one of the only details that had stuck in her head about Nico Olvia, as the long years had worn away at the few memories of her mother she had. Most of her mother’s face was a blur, now, but she still remembered a few things: white hair, sad eyes, wings of a mourning dove.

As Spandam dragged her down the Bridge of Hesitation, hands and powers bound, she flapped her wings frantically as hard as she could, even as the chains around her shoulders to weigh her down and stop her flying broke feathers and gouged at skin with every movement. She didn’t even need lift, just to push herself backwards a meter, a foot, an inch-

If she could buy even a minute, even a second-

Spandam spat an ugly word at her as he was jerked backwards, stumbling for a moment and nearly face-planting onto the bridge before he managed to find his balance. He snarled, grabbed her by the shoulder and hurled her to the ground, driving the air from her lungs with a painful gasp.

He stomped down hard between her shoulder blades, pinning her down.

“You know,” he said, sounding almost gleeful, “the Tenryuubito cut off the wings of their slaves. To be sure they’ll never escape. Maybe I’ll recommend that, as part of your judgement. Or…”

He moved his shoe from the center of her back to press lightly down on one of the delicate wing-joints in her right wing, and her breath caught.

“Or maybe I’ll just do it myself,” he said. “What do you think, Nico Robin?”

Nico Olvia, with white hair and sad eyes and mourning-dove wings that had been bloodied, perforated by rifle-shots, ruined to stop her from flying away-

They’d aimed for the wings, first. They’d wanted to be sure that not a single scholar could escape. Not one was left uncrippled by the time the marines evacuated the burning wreck of Ohara.

(Except Robin.)

“It’s not like you’ll be flying ever again, where you’re going,” Spandam continued, starting to press down, and Robin closed her eyes and grit her teeth against the pain and the rising plea for mercy alike. She refused to beg. Her mother had fought to the end, and so would she.

Then there was a blaze of light, and a crash, and a fireball caught Spandam perfectly in the head, and Robin was saved.

(Though, perhaps, if she was honest with herself, she’d been saved a very long time ago.)

When Brook had been alive, his wings had been soft, plain uniform brown.

Nightingale, Yorki had laughed, one late night when they were sorting through a wing glossary one of the crewmen had picked up on the latest island, trying to place everyone’s wings. Oi, Brook, no wonder you’ve got the best singing voice on the ship.

Brook had warbled out a few notes in response, as horrifically flat and off-pitch as he could physically manage, and Yorki had nearly cracked a rib laughing.

But wings rotted away just like all other flesh, and by the time Brook crawled his way back to the world of the living, they were nothing but bones and a drift of soft brown feathers, shed on the rotting planks. He tucked a few of the feathers away in an inside pocket of his coat, just in case they helped Laboon to recognize him, someday.

Catching the remnants of his wings in the corners of his eyes (ah, but he didn’t have those anymore-), grasping and skeletal, always caught him off guard, almost worse than catching sight of his reflection. The bare, bright white stood in such contrast to the soft brown he was so used to seeing that he thought he would never truly get used to it. He couldn’t imagine anyone else would, either.

And then-

“Your wings are awesome, Brook!” Luffy said, bright and enthusiastic and entirely sincere, sprawled on his back on the piano. His wings were splayed out beneath him- featherless and red, entirely unlike any Brook had never seen before. “They’re so cool!”

For a moment, Brook couldn’t find words. (How unsuiting, for a songsmith.) And then he said, “Why, thank you, Luffy-san. I should tell you, though… I’m afraid they’re not good for much. I can no longer fly.”

Luffy blinked, and then said, “So? I can’t, neither.”

“...You can’t?”

Luffy snickered, grinning. “Nah! My wings only sorta work. Something ‘bout my devil fruit and my bones or something. I don’t really get it. But it doesn’t matter! I mean, I can just rocket to places. And you too, right? You can run on water! That’s so cool!”

Brook looked at Luffy’s beaming grin for a long moment, and couldn’t stop the urge to smile back, even though he had no lips with which to do so.

And then he said, “May I join your crew?”

Luffy laughed like the best song Brook had ever heard. “Sure!”

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eisiramdeus · 4 years ago

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FOR WEEKS ON END THE MC HAD BEEN PLAGUED with pointed fingers and unneeded retribution – they’d had their own fill of BODY BAGS in and out of the club house, had SHED more blood than their President could remember. But that of INNOCENTS had never been his wont – not for a millennia, and that hadn’t changed with this new age. Yet it was EASY to place blame upon the rugged outsiders, who lived on the EDGE of society and dabbled in the dark dealings of VIOLENCE. Modi was many things, but he had never been a LIAR. Especially when it came to honing RESPONSIBILITY for his antics, for the lives lost beneath his watch. And these random, bloodless murders ?? They WEREN’T his doing – and there was only one man he TRUSTED enough to call, so the problem could be dealt with.

Though he APPEARED alone, there were several pairs of claws that lingered within the darkness, ready to strike should their LORD come into any trouble on his travels. He HUNG BACK as the presence of the sheriff lingered within the home – since he was already being blamed, it wouldn’t be WISE to linger in the company of those who wished to lock him up AGAIN, now would it ?? But DEFIANCE had ever been embedded into his psyche as the Fury, and he purposely crosses paths with the very man in QUESTION as he saunters up the driveway – eye contact made and lasting until Modi disappears into the THRESHOLD of the home. A sigh rattles through the bone - cage of his chest at the sight, roach of his own JOINT tossed out through the broken glass

❝ Then ya better tell me – but i’ve got my OWN ideas, ❞ there were few creatures that would leave their prey DRY and parched as this ( and he and his own were hardly among them ). ❝ Think these little shits’re gettin’ BOLD, and the boundaries of MY TERRITORY clearly aren’t being respected anymore, ❞ that in and of ITSELF was reason alone for confrontation. But the added INSULT of blame being placed upon his MC was ENOUGH to ignite the smoldering flame of agitation within his core. Icy, celeste hues flicker from the body, toward Alexander. And he ALLOWS a subtle simper to TUG at the edges of his lips, ❝ been better – can’t escape the throes of BATTLE no matter how hard I try, ❞ time had changed NOTHING ( but that had always been his wyrd, hadn’t it ?? blood and battle were all he would ever know ). The offered hand is TAKEN and clasped against his own, and he makes no attempt to conceal his claws. ❝ Thanks for COMIN’, can’t bring my whole crew into this. But CLEARLY it needs to be dealt with. How’ve YOU been ?? ❞

✯ DON’T GET HIM WRONG NOW, THIS IS FAR FROM A BLOODLESS MURDER. LOTS OF BLOOD, ACTUALLY, CAN SENSE THE TRACE AMOUNTS OF IRON ON HIS CLOTHES, SKIN, CARPET, WALS [...] IT IS JUST A VERY THOROUGH CLEAN UP JOB. THOUGH NOT THOROUGH ENOUGH. Something about being too professional in the way you clean. LETS THEM KNOW WHO YOU ARE. EVERY MASTER WITH AN AMATEUR AT HEART. REMEMBER TO MISS EVERY NOW AND THEN LEST THEY THINK EVERY SHOT WITH CERTAINTY IS FROM THE BARREL OF YOUR GUN. Surely, I killed the man in nineteen sixty three. MUST HAVE BEEN ME.

If nothing else, Modi, happy to be the one and only man for the job. Always am. That is unfortunate. ❝IT’S MY TERRITORY already now, is it? Dallas n’ Forth Worth can only seat so many Kings these days.❞ A jesting remark as they shake, hand to hand, claw to... whatever is gracefully analogous. Lion’s fangs? Eagle’s talons? I am unsure. Don’t mind it, there are more pressing implications—FOR ONE, the ease at which they do this. No effort to conceal his claws, even in the presence of other people, the sheriff, for one, who moves aside and gathers his thoughts amongst his crew, who will inevitably hit their heads on an infinite series of dead ends trying to untie this one. Nothing leaves a man so high and dry like a vampiress. Poor bastard probably thought he would score, too; invited her in through the front door. Now that is unfortunate. Yet your secret and your claws are safe with me, and amongst us, these hands fit for a king, at ease. The cigar blows out the draft in the window, he cuts into the citizen’s trashcan, a little crude for the scene but surely, he’s got work to do now. Time to stash the toys away back into his shirt’s front pocket and perform God’s work with his hands. FOR WHEN THEY ARE IDLE, THE DEVIL FINDS WORK FOR THEM. In this case, though, it seems Modi found work for them.

❝Yeah, I hear ya. Not the kind a’ MURDER ya solve with a whole crew anyways. The, uh—❞ he points to the shattered window with his eyes, a slight tilt of the eyebrow toward it. ❝MISSUS out the window 'ere? Not a fan of crowds. But fer two gentlemen with a lot o’ meat on their bones an’ full o’ blood in... well, also their meat? Sure she’ll make the exception. Three’s the lucky number, am I right?❞ EMPUSAS, vile vampiresses, shape-shifting beasts and seducers of men ( too close to home? ) made her first move tonight. That we know of. At least the one that’s been brought to Modi’s attention, and thus, to Alexander’s attention. In any case, this is your end, madame. ❝The irony of it all, though, Mod? The missus is a vampiress. Ten to one it’s one o’ Hekate’s. It’s just that season o’ year they come out o’ hell like this. But I don’t think she even knows yer name; really just looking for her fifteen minutes o’ fun every October. Puttin’ the blame on yer pack o’ boys? That’s just what the folk want to see. Good news is, ain’t no frame job ‘gainst ya. Bad news is, this ain’t the last you’ll get the blame thrown ‘round, buddy.❞ A CHUCKLE AND A FIRM PAT on Modi’s shoulders, lighthearted grin, shaking his head. You’ll live. Sucks to be the center of the wrong kind of attention, though? Deep breath, detective hat’s off, case solved, exterminator’s hat on. The cooler part of the job. Identifying the nature of the beast to the trained, old private eye was the easy part. Now it is fun.

❝Wait on me awhile, will ya? Just gotta... wrap this up with the ol’ sheriff an’ the whole county, else they’re gonna be at it all damn night an’ start graspin’ at every straw.❞ IT’S ALMOST CHILDISHLY CUTE, like a father watches his son fail to ride a bike. If you know, you know, if you don’t, you scrape your knee until you get it right. In this case, you won’t. He leaves Modi’s company for a minute to hit heads with the increasingly desperate Sheriff as he hears the midnight News channel vans already pulling up outside the crime scene. What will he tell them? The vacuum cleaner killer strikes again? Victim, male, 27, claw marks at the carotid, bled dry? In the distant conversation, he seems to yell at the federal agent but that’s hardly Alexander’s problem. A tip of the hat to the men working the midnight shift, and his work here is done. BACK AT MODI’S SIDE, he adjusts his jacket, grin of excitement on his face. This one’s on the house, Modi; been too long since he’s had a hunt that requires a bit of planning rather than just a one-two that punctures the beast’s lungs with his trident. ❝Think ya can point us to the nearest sleazy bar in town? Somewhere a pretty girl might find herself an easy score. That easy score; that’s you, partner.❞ That’s his plan. Draw her out. Let the vampiress lead you someplace only we know, eye to eye, cheek to cheek, one thing leads to another and then [...] just kidding. Just bait the demoness out to the nearest dark corner of the world and remove the nuisance. But St. Alexander cannot wait to see his reaction to the plan. ❝Has to be ya. She’d know my face if she saw it. Real shame, right, bein’ the revered monarch? Otherwise I’d totally do it. Sure you’ll do mighty fine, Mod.❞

#𝐈. IN CHARACTER.#𝐗𝐈. VERSE. MAIN.#maegtig

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whirlybirdwhat · 5 years ago

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Sea of Monsters - Chapter 15

You want 5.8k of Sabo? Have 5.8k of Sabo

Sabo makes promises and promises (its in his nature) but he finds two promises he’ll never break (the circle of Goa can’t trap him anymore)

Or: Sabo finds his brothers and a dream

Edit: THIS NOW HAS A PODFIC TO GO WITH IT THANKS TO THE AWEOSME @oceanaromantic!!!! Please go check it out, its absolutely awesome to listen to! (Part 1 Part 2)

Read the entire series on Ao3 for better quality and authors notes! Gen, creepy, featuring all of the Straw Hats, multi-chapter story. (Tag “Ficart” on my blog should also show some fan art for this fic!)

“The East Blue has a different nickname to those in the Grand Line, and those who hail it as home have a few… unique traits.”

Promise? - Sabo

The walls of Goa have stood for a thousand years, and will stand for a thousand more – or so the legends say, whispered in the allies of Edge town and declared loudly from the pedestals of high town.

They aren’t wrong, not entirely.

Goa’s walls, old, decaying, but uncracking (somethings locked inside), have stood for a thousand years, and maybe a thousand more.

Sabo, three and watching from besides his father’s knee as Edgetown inhabitants walk near the walls and never come back, knows it will hardly last a hundred more.

(There’s old magic in the walls, entrapping and tangling, like something got trapped there and never quite managed to find the key out. It’s something not quite dark and not quite light – sometimes, on moonless nights, Sabo feels as if it is watching him.)

His parents tell him that the walls keep him safe – bad things are out there Sabo; don’t you want to make Mommy and Daddy happy and stay alive? - but Sabo always wonders why they don’t tread near it.

Why no one does.

(Is it the presence? The not quite thing that stares at him in the night and sings songs of breaking and ruin, of young kings and ruined empires?)

Hightown is not a real town. Or at least, Sabo doesn’t think it is. Everything’s pretend here, hinging not on their own politics, but the outside world they don’t ever speak of.

They don’t speak of harsh words to perfect children behind golden doors, they don’t speak of the occasional too hard slap, and they certainly don’t speak of the pointed ears adorning each of their heads, or the wings shifted under clothes.

Or – they do, and its applauded and praised if you have gold lining your pockets, and cursed if you have a single smudge of dirt on you.

Its pretend, because Sabo doesn’t know what is real or not.

(Does he do as the king does, and shed his cloak and sleeves to show the world the wings upon his back, crafted of gold and iron and a metal of not here, show them the spots of glowing blue dancing along his shoulder blades and how pointed his teeth can get if he smiles just so? Or does he do as his parents do, as the rest of the country does, and hide, hide, hide -)

There’s a man Sabo sees when his family rides a carriage to the docks, to greet some royalty or other. Sabo wasn’t paying attention, too distracted by the itchy cloth tying his wings to his back and hidden under a weighted cloak.

But he does see the man – because the man is so very different.

Sparks of gold and shimmering elsewhere scatter across his limbs as he walks bare-chested towards the gate of the city. His back is bloody – two gouges, flesh torn and horrendous, are placed in the spot where Sabo’s own winged limbs attach.

There’s no pain in his face, eve as people shout at him from the street corners, young children tossing rocks at his face. It’s only a serene calmness as he looks straight into Sabo’s eyes.

His mother doesn’t even try to hide him from sight.

“Ah. He didn’t follow the rules. Shame.” She sniffs, and the carriage continues onward.

Sabo suddenly gains the sense that something is terrible, near irreversibly wrong. (Everything’s a contradiction)

He doesn’t wonder if should bare his back anymore.

His parents have always told him to be quiet, to listen, to obey, to put your wings down and stand up straight, can’t you follow the rules for once, you summoned child?

And Sabo hates it, but can’t protest against them, because rules and laws are what keeps the society of High Town together, and if someone were to break it, well, someone always wants to try children’s blood to keep them young.

Sabo understands it all now, because he’s five, and he’s figured it out – he’s figured it all out.

(Have you ever been trapped inside a faery ring? An old one? No? Well it goes something like this.

There’s a circle of rocks, incomplete and alluring, inviting travelers in. In the circle is a wondrous life of peace and serenity, so people go and dance and dance.

But then, so suddenly, somebody decides to shut the entrance, slide a rock into a place that should never be filled, let the power wash over and drag the darkness in.

Suddenly, the people aren’t dancing anymore. Suddenly, they are puppets on a string, dancing because stopping means death, and continuing does too, but maybe if they are pretty enough, perfect enough, they will be the exception?

(They never are)

Suddenly, there are rules and laws. Suddenly, a promise is binding by the soul not just the heart, and wings are wrong and lights are bad. Suddenly, the people aren’t happy being themselves, being the people who wanted to dance in the light in life, but want to be like them instead.

Those outside the circle.

Suddenly, only the powerful are worthy to have limbs of freedom and rules bind everyone else, because if there is no order, no truth then this kingdom of deceit shall eat itself in its wild dance of slavery.

Thus, the circle is endless around Goa, making more within itself, because the people keep on wanting to dance and dance and dance, but oh, they never truly will.)

Sabo doesn’t want to dance anymore.

In the dark of the night, Sabo shucks off the heavy long shirt his parents swaddle him in, and looks at the mark between his shoulder blades in mirror. It glows, ever so faintly, and Sabo remembers what his parents like to call him when he’s being impolite.

Summoned child.

He touches his ears, and wonders what his parents try to imitate, what race exists beyond these walls that they try to be so bad that his mother cut her ears and bound her wings.

Why do they try to pretend?

Three circles mean three gates to break, but Sabo has been nothing but persistent since the day he was born.

(Oh, Outlook, look he has the markings!

What! He was summoned, he should be like the Outside! Witch, what is this?

I told you, my powers are limited! The witch of the mountain has all the true capabilities!

Damn you! Out! Didit, kill the thing.

What?

You heard me!

But we already told the neighbors that we were with child, what happens when there is no child?)

He’s lucky enough that the highest one doesn’t bind him (yet, if his father has anything to say about it,) but Hightown likes to call him back at night.

Sabo knows, though, he knows the weakness within.

He runs away to Edgetown on a moonless night, and that is his first mistake, because the next night the pale moon bright beams are just enough to illuminate what stands at the edges of the outer wall.

The streets aren’t safe at night, and not because of any human(?) presence, and Sabo spends the night walking the line between known and unknown. The alley he nests in has a view of the sea, normally a comfort for Sabo, but tonight, as he wraps his wings around him, he can only think of the haze of mist looming over the Watergates like a resting tiger.

The white lights blinking lazily at him from the harbor do not help either.

(The harbor lights are normally gold)

A night in the cold and a night in the streets, a night of using a blade of iron and cold silver to chip a small whole in the wall, (break the barrier break what has been set and Sabo will be free from what call him back,) and Sabo is ready to venture out.

He has never been out before.

(What will it be like? A shining paradise, like his parents fantasize when they invite foreigners to dine? Or a terror born of hell, like his parents whisper about in the shadows? Wil it be warm and inviting or freezing and alienating?

Sabo wants to know.)

No one notices him as he approaches the ivy-covered gates at the edge of the city. They are rarely opened, even by Edgetown inhabitants, and the bronze along the edges has eroded. With age.

There are no guards, nothing to prevent Sabo from cutting his hand open and pressing it against the wall.

(There’s a creature in the walls, don’t you know? Faery circles aren’t just made of stone and magic.)

I promise, he whispers in his mind, feeling like any audible noise would break the eerie silence that has fallen over the land around him, I shall bring ruin.

A shift, and his hand isn’t there anymore – blood drips from his open wrist, plinking against the stone ground.

Drip.

There is no pain, only a numbness settling deep within Sabo’s chest as he stares at the empty place.

“Oh,” he says, the first audible word he’s said in this realm tonight, and takes a step forward.

He didn’t expect the shadows to be warm.

(A promise made, a promise kept, break these walls and passage shall be granted.)

He wakes up surrounded by fire and screams. A brief thought crosses through his mind, wondering if he awoke in hell, but a look at bright sky destroys the notion.

He’s not in hell – he’s Outside, and all that remains of his promise is the scar wrapping around his wrist, like it’s been there for years not a – a – how long has it been?

Whatever. He’s outside and it’s so much more than he thought it would be.

Here are the rules, unspoken and followed in the circling kingdom of Goa.

One – do not rebel.

(Broken)

Two – do not bare your back in public. Only the king is worthy.

(Broken. The coat falls from his shoulders like water.)

Three - do not go outside the walls.

(Broken - he’s free)

It takes him a month to get used to the outside. In that time, a time of starving of cold and terror, Sabo learns and sees, and doesn’t mind not being seen anymore.

In Grey Terminal, there are people, who have washed up on the. Shores and never quite managed to. escape, instead hiding underneath homes of broken logs, and People, like Sabo, with the blood of darkness running through their veins.

It’s easy enough to tell the difference. In Goa, traits such as theirs were shunned and hidden (though they could never quite manage it -), a curse that only royalty could wield, and the absence of it was praised in children.

Outside, the people thrive with it. Tails and scales and claws and wings creepy by Sabo’s hiding spot every night, glowing eyes in every corner, and the hazy mist of Goa’s walls never quite manages to seize them in their grasp. The people are starving and dirty and terrible but they are prideful.

(They scare Sabo, because Sabo’s been trapped for so long that he’s so weak, but he’s learning he’ll be proud too – can’t you see how sharp his teeth are getting?)

Despite this though, they don’t leave the Terminal. There’s something in the woods, they whisper, something dangerous, and the Lord of the Coast patrols the waters for any tasty snack. Sabo doesn’t disagree – he sees the looming beast and glowing red eyes that don’t dare tread past the torches on the edge of the trash heaps, and the foot prints (five times as large as anyone in Grey Terminal) that do.

He doesn’t sleep much for that first month.

But Sabo also learns that they know how to enter the kingdom without getting caught up in its tangling web. (An underground passage hidden under Trash Heap Mount, a gate guarded by a sleeping dog that can be bribed with the right type of meat to get in.

There are a lot of disappearances in Grey Terminal.)

He doesn’t dare go back, not yet at least.

Not until he meets Ace.

In a place like the Terminal, the people have nothing better to do than eat, sleep, fight, survive, and talk to remind them of something other than their miserable existence.

It’s no surprise that rumors run rampant – but one does more than others.

(Hey – you hear it happened again?

Damn, Devil child is back?

Burnt down a shack – killed a man – stole our goods – beat up twenty men – isn’t he only five?-)

There’s a child, they say, that lives in the woods. He’s half beast and half monster, half hellfire and half killer. He has eyes like the pits of hell and hands that burn anything he touches, and if you give him an answer he doesn’t like, he’ll kill you.

(He likes to go into the city a lot. Passage is needed after all.)

Sabo doesn’t want to meet him, but at the same time, he’s so goddamn curious that it's killing him not to seek him out.

In the end, though, it’s not a choice, because Ace takes one look at his shiny wings and socks him right in the face.

Its stupidly strong for a five-year-old, and maybe Sabo should be smarter than this but instead of running away he punches right back.

“What did you do that for, you asshole!” Sabo waves the pipe he found threateningly at him. The person (creature?) in front of his is his height, but with half charred tan skin and fire licking up through cracks in his skin. His hands are sharp, and the freckles that would have made him childish are a glowing hot red. Black hair, matted with blood (his?) covers his eyes slightly, and there’s dirt all over him, but what Sabo can’t look away from is his eyes.

He looks just like Sabo did when he looks in a mirror.

“'Cause I felt like it, asshole! Now give me your goggles!”

“What! Hell no, back off you dick!” He doesn’t care about his eyes anymore, just beating this idiot into the dirt because in hindsight that punch didn’t hurt that much, just stung a little.

“No!”

“Then I’ll just take them!”

Sabo readies his claws and twirls his pipe with little skill. The blue patches on his shoulders glow and wings flare threateningly from where they hover over his back.

“Try it flame freak!”

The dust doesn’t settle for another two hours.

“You ain’t half bad.”

“Neither are you.”

“Truce?”

“Truce.”

(A promise made, a promise kept.)

Ace doesn’t attack Sabo anymore. In Grey terminal, it seems to be a form of protection – people still try to gut you if you talk to them or tread too near to their territory, but Sabo doesn’t have to worry about people attacking him unprovoked.

(Unless it’s the pirate gang that’s settled on the shores. But he’s too underneath their notice anyway.)

It’s a nice life – fun even.

He and Ace team up sometimes to get more loot, to grab food, or to even fight. Its less like a truce, and more like an alliance now.

Sabo learns some more.

(He knows when Ace’s grip will burn and when it will crack, when he’s safe to touch and when the fire inside heats up the world outside. He understands will Ace will punch and when he will kick, how to move in tandem, how Ace will shift ever so subtly to keep from hitting his wings, and how Ace likes staring at the glowing things when they see the sunrise together.

He learns.)

But it not until they start sparring on the cliffside that he learns the truth.

(“Do you have a dream Ace?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“'Cause I think I figured mine out”

There’s a book hidden underneath Sabo’s hideout, old and fraying, but sturdy in his cover and pages. It’s a captain’s log, a pirate captain’s log, and suddenly Sabo has an inkling to what he wants.

“Yeah? What is it?”

“I think I’m going to be a pirate.”

“Really? Me too…”

“…”

“Hey Sabo? I have an idea.”)

And a friendship is formed.

(His first– and it’s a so much bigger promise than any he’s ever made before.)

The first thing Ace does it take him into the forest. And the first thing he tells him is don’t look back.

Sabo doesn’t question it, and follows him in

It’s quiet at first, normal, but Sabo notes. the wide berth Ace gives the pawprints in the path and copies him.

Soon the path isn’t there anymore, and the sky isn’t either, tall trees consuming it all. There are odd sounds Surrounding him, creeping in, hot breaths running down his back but Sabo doesn’t look back, even when one of the voices sounds like a human scream.

Ace looks back at him, gives him a wicked smirk and presses a finger to his lips and dashes off. In silence, with completely wild grin, Sabo dashes after him.

He ignores the deer he sees three times, each time more rotted than the next till all that’s left is bleached bones, and ignores the giant wolf with six eyes in the caves they play before. Ace jumps to the trees in the game of impromptu tag. They started, and in a spur of instinct, Sabo flies after him, wings beating with a. power he didn’t know he had. Ace laughs, and it’s like the spell is broken – it’s like acceptance, like the final binds that tied him to the circle of Goa have broken and he’s free to be free in this monstrous jungle of half-dead things – he can look back now, but he doesn’t feel like it anymore.

Sabo laughs too, and tackles Ace to the ground, tumbling in the weirdly red mud together.

He could get used to this.

He does get used to it, for the next five years. He and Ace know the best way to get to Edgetown and all the food there (apparently, the dog likes it when its offerings are. drunk and confused), know to combine heat with flight and claws with claws. Sabo knows Ace uses the lights scattered across his limbs as a nightlight, sometimes. He learns Ace lives with the Witch of the Mountain, that he has a Grandpa with wings different that Sabo’s with a thousand eyes and Fists of Love that are really Fists of Pain. He learns whose son Ace is, and Ace learns his heritage.

They don’t care though – but if Sabo will a little more brutal to anyone who curses the child of the Pirate King, and Ace will subtly cover up the mysterious appearance of Outlook’s second child (the same night his other fled – faery circle faery rules, soul for soul and child for child – this one is a much better fit anyway), then no one is going to say anything.

Sabo gets used to the forest, the jungle, with its Trees that blot out light anywhere but the deadliest center, with its alligators with three mouths and tigers that sometimes have human hands and face (but still so bloody.) He gets used to the scratches (gouges more like) that appear in the wood around their pirate stash, and the drags in the dirt that are bigger than anything he’s seen so far. He looks back, sometimes, when he’s feeling brave. Each time he gets the feeling that he’s barely escaped death.

Sabo gets used to flight, the way he can’t quite get above the trees (are they endless in this forest?) but he can fly Ace over trash heaps and stone walls. He gets used to wings being free and not bound to his. Back, and. The claws along his finger tips that he can bare proudly without fear.

The people of Grey Terminal start whispering about two Devil Children now, one of the woods and one of the city, born of hell and hell raisers who don’t have the morality even people in the East Blue have.

(Sabo’s oddly proud the first time he catches the whispers – they call him fallen and fae, and can’t you see how his wings have turned from gold? He’s just as feared as Ace now – maybe more, because unlike Ace, he sleeps in the same place as the Grey Terminal folk.)

It’s all good - Then it all changes when Ace comes back with stories about a new boy in the mountain witch’s hut, made of rubber and hunger more than anyone can satisfy.

The kid starts chasing Ace through the forest – Sabo is surprised he hasn’t died yet. He, meaning the brat (Luffy, was that his name?) of course. Ace tells him how he falls down ravines and gets crushed by falling longs and eat by crocodiles, but every time he comes back alive, ugh.

(In whispers, Ace tells him how he kicked the kid down the ravine, the one with the wolves at the bottom, the ones who limbs are too thin and claws to long. How he came back a week later, covered in blood, too much just to come from the scratches along his limbs. He whispers how Luffy’s movements are often too quick to see, and how the shadows bend toward him, how Luffy not quite monstrous in the same way there.)

It’s fine, until Luffy finally manages to make it to the edge of the woods and hears about the treasure. Of course, the brat would want to be a pirate, shouts it out to the world. They time him to the tree, and it’s as he’s crying for them not to kill him Sabo starts to see him.

His teeth are sharp, and even though the Veil shouldn’t really affect him, Sabo can’t really focus on him entirely. His limbs are weird, but Sabo’s sure that’s just the rubber, but there’s the oddest haze above his head and his teeth are as sharp as daggers. His skin tends to fade out of focus (is he scaled or furred? Sabo can’t tell) and his tears aren’t quite the color they should be.

But he’s loud, so they have to shut him up, but as he prepares to kill him, the men from Bluejam’s crew, the one people who aren’t afraid of the Devil Children, round the corner.

And there’s nothing Sabo can do as they take Luffy, who refuses to spill their secret, away.

They move the treasure, but no one’s come to check the hiding place. Sabo’s always been a smart child, that was the one thing his parents got right about it, so he easily puts two and two together and –

“Oh no.”

Shit.

They arrive in crashing commotion, but when they look around only Porchemy’s still standing. There’s red smattered all over the room and several limbs without bodies on the floor. Porchemy’s terrified, his spiked gloved hands bloody, but so is Luffy, blood in his mouth and many, many bleeding holes and cuts ooze sluggishly.

He’s hanging from the ceiling wrapped in chains that dig into his skin. Seemingly over kill for a seven-year-old, but –

“YOU KILLED THEM! YOU ATE THEM! YOU MONSTER! YOU’RE THE WORSE OF ALL THE BEAST HERE YOU UNATURALFREAK -DEVIL FRUIT TEETH AND WHATEVER’S GOING ON IN THAT WEIRD BODY OF YOURS – HOW DARE YOU!”

BY Porchemy’s words, it might not be.

Whatever. Luffy clearly hasn’t spoken, even if he is terrifying, so Ace and Sabo have to save him – a debts a debt.

He goes down easily enough, a huge bite mark in his leg slowing him down. He’s not dead, not yet, but maybe he’ll pass on the message to Bluejam that they’re called the Devil Children for a reason.

Sabo feels Luffy smile blindingly into his back from his position on Sabo’s back and thinks maybe it’s worth it.

Luffy becomes their friend and makes Ace want to live (only a little) in the span of five minutes, after they patched up his bruises and holes and cuts, so he’s not that bad. They carefully don’t mention the three other thugs that were with Porchemy, and only ask about his devil fruit power.

(Sabo wonders why being alone hurts him so much, so much more than anything. The pain in his eyes was something he hadn’t even seen in Ace.)

They make their way to the Witch’s hut after that, because if Bluejam isn’t terrified of them, he will be after them, or maybe even make a hunt (it’s been done before) for them, so Sabo can’t live in Grey Terminal anymore.

(It’s a good thing he and Ace put their most valuable stuff with the pirate stash, or else Sabo wouldn’t have his log book anymore.)

The Witch of the Mountain has been said to live there for 1000 years. Ace tells Sabo that’s a lie, because Dadan’s just super ugly not super old, but seeing the mountain hut, strong and sturdy with marks of age in the old corner and a power wreathing about its borders, a sense powerful and dark, he has some doubts.

Doesn’t stop him from calling her a hag to her face though. If he’s gonna live here it’s gonna be on his terms.

She’s mad, tells him she’s a bandit not a hag or witch, but he doesn’t miss how she whispers something over him at night, something that makes the pressing sense of the border disappear.

It’s good.

Soon, the people speak of three Devil Children, start calling them the Three Devils, and Sabo can’t help but laugh in joy at it.

Here out in the forest, surrounded by two children with dreams just like his, he can finally breath without the force of Goa’s circle pressing down on him – not even a memory can hold him back.

With Luffy and Ace, he trains his skills, becomes stronger than he ever was before.

Ace is still on equal footing with him – but Luffy has absolutely no control over his devil fruit. Its comical at times, other times terrifying because he rockets himself into the river the idiot, but that’s okay.

Ace and Sabo will help him.

(What they don’t mention is how Dadan takes him away sometimes, when the bandits are going on a raid. How Luffy isn’t afraid of the beasts of the jungle, how the rotting deer bows its head at him as they go past, how Luffy gets quiet when they mention he can’t that much, how he’s always, always hungry, how he can move faster that Ace and Sabo if he so wills it occasionally, and how his claws leave huge gouges in the dirt. How his eyes flash red and he becomes a little less Luffy and a little more beast.

They don’t like to talk about it.)

The useful thing about Luffy is that with a third person they can look like an adult when they sneak into Edgetown and get free food.

Dine in dashes are great - actually cooked food – could it get any better? Something that wasn’t Magra’s cooking?

(The secret useful thing about Luffy is that they don’t need an offering anymore to get passed the guardian of the hidden gate. They tried, the first time, but Luffy chomped at the beast, the flesh-eating beast, and it cowered before him and let them through. Luffy was kind enough to let the beast still have its snack.)

This time they’re eating at a place that Ace swears is fantastic, and it is, so they’ve eaten through a hundred bowls and they’re on their hundred and first when the tentacled cook finally discovers them.

Sabo’s laughing as he shoots out the window, flapping wings to keep him above his brothers as they crash to the ground, food still shoved in their cheeks.

He’s flying, flying, flying, and everyone’s staring and laughing, but he doesn’t care so much but then – oh but then-

“Sabo?”

He tells his friends who he is, fearing the crash and fall – these kids he stares at have been feral from birth but Sabo was a part of the Faery Ring, of the curse of Goa, where everyone’s trapped but- They don’t care.

And Sabo knows he’s found something great, so he tells them of another great secret, of how he’s going to see the world as a pirate and write it all down and publish his captain’s log, and maybe, just maybe, change the world so that nothing like Goa exists.

He shouts it to the cliffs, to the sea, to island and worlds itself, and he thinks the hazy being lounging on the walls of Goa nods in approval.

Ace goes next, voice just as proud, and vows to be a famous pirate, with his name spread across the world.

Then Luffy goes, face brave and bold and declares in a voice and tone Sabo’s sure he will hear a thousand times again –

“I’M GOING TO BE THE KING OF THE PIRATES!”

And well, doesn’t the world shake at the flames Sabo sees above Luffy’s head?

An hour later, and Ace is pouring sake out for all of them.

“Don’t you guys know,” He says, proudly, finishing the last pour, “That when men share a drink, they become brothers forever?”

Luffy grins, eyes wide, and Sabo can’t help but mirror it, taking a cup for himself.

“TO BROTHERS!” Ace cries, and holds out his cup.

“TO BROTHERS!” Sabo cries in return, the same as Luffy, and then they throw back their drinks, laughing like they have nothing to worry about.

And inside – Sabo feels the promise taking place, wreathing around his heart and binding him tight to these people beside him – no, he won’t ever forget them, lose them, be without them.

This vow is his promise, and it’s the one rule Goa has that Sabo hasn’t been able to break.

(A promise made, a promise kept, after all)

Now that they’re brothers, Sabo also has a new grandpa.

He doesn’t like his new grandpa, but at least he’s officially part of the family?

Garp – Gramps, sorry- makes a good pillow anyway. His wings are super soft.

They run wild and rampant still, even more than before. Goa kingdom, Hightown, everything is a far-off memory now.

No one ever tries to reign them in, lets them be feral and free as they please.

Makino’s the only one who really tries anyway, but no one ever wants to make her mad so they listen to her. (Mamakino, Luffy calls her sometimes, Mama, and Sabo wonders if it’s what a motherly touch should feel like.)

Sabo figures out how to coexist with his brothers, more than just sharing a room, but now a tree house, everything.

He knows that Ace likes to use his glowing spots as a night light (nothing new), and Luffy is endless fascinated with his wings and his stories. He knows that the biggest piece of meat, even if it’s not the best one, should go to Luffy or else he gets twitchy, and you can’t let Luffy be the last one in the tree house or else the beasts will creep in. He knows that Ace is dumb, and will try to start fights with the true beasts, but if you chuck Luffy at him they won’t always fight back (and if they do, and they can’t take them down, they should run to Dadan’s as fast as they can.) he learns that words hurt, and his brothers have some bad views on themselves (he’ll curse Porchemy for the rest of his days) but he’s here so that’s okay.

Sabo knows that he (they) can be free.

(But – the people of the Grand Line whisper about the East Blue – say that it’s a sea of monsters, and they aren’t wrong, not at all.

But that also means even the smallest ones are monsters as well.

There’s one winter, a harsh one, when Sabo is eleven. There’s not enough food to go around and people would rather starve to death than face the cold. He and Ace fail to notice Luffy getting twitchy, fail to notice how his eyes are crazed and how he doesn’t meet their own eyes and instead remains fixated on the ground, don’t notice till Luffy lunges at one of the visiting bandits and Garp is too slow to catch him and oh hell-

The blood.

Sabo’s not proud that he can’t look at Luffy or be defenseless against him for a month after that.)

Faery Rings don’t like it when their prey escapes, don’t you know?

His father sends out lackeys, threatening his brothers and he has no choice but to let them lead him back to the dance as they shove him over the gates.

(A promise made, a promise kept.)

He’s back, he’s back in hell, and there’s someone in the place that was never meant for him (Stelly-) So why do they want him back, why can’t he be free, he made the deal didn’t he?

(A promise made, a promise kept.)

His wings are bound so tightly and his shirts covering up what can glow, and Sabo feels like he can’t breathe.He can’t – he can’t, is he the only one who hears the screams outside as they burn the terminal down? Don’t they know that the monsters are inside not outside?

(A promise made, a promise kept.)

Sabo’s not a part of Goa anymore. He can’t be, not like this. He’s decided, he had a plan, a promise, but now there are only two promises he swears he’ll keep.

One – to the being of the circle, that’s been so quiet now that he’s back and not half-feral - I shall bring ruin.

And two – the most important (To brothers!)

He sends a letter off, and prepares to leave, trusting that he’s brothers will live and he will meet them both out on the Grand Line.

(A promise made, a promise kept.)

(But what happens when the promise breaks?)

He has a flag above his head, a compass in hand, and a boat and waves beneath his feet. He sails out of Goa’s harbor, the only safe one, sure that he can make it past the big ship that’s rolling past him. He waves at the island, and ignores how the shadows reach back for him.

The wings on his back stretch, and finally, finally finally he is Fr-

Fire.

There’s so much fire – it burns, oh god it burns help and he’s drowning water everywhere, his dream no- Ace Luffy HELP!

Darkness.

“Who am I?”

(A promise made, a promise unkept.)

(Who knew a fae who didn’t keep to the rules?)

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