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“Well well well, what do we have here?”
It takes Ace a moment to turn his head enough to see, to realize Bluejam isn’t just making some stupid joke about finally catching the three of them. No, the big man is looking down just at Luffy - or rather, just at Luffy’s hat, which he plucks off the seven year old’s head a moment later.
The kid yells “HEY!” but that’s not enough to stop Bluejam from turning the woven straw back and forth, looking intently at the band of red that loops around it. Ace thought it was just a ribbon, when Gramps first brought Luffy up the mountain and dumped him at Dadan’s place. Wasn’t until a month later, after Porchemy and sharing sake and building a treehouse, that Sabo became the one to notice and point out what’s sewn into the fabric.
The same thing Bluejam has noticed now.
Luffy yells again, wordless and angry, as the pirate rips the ribbon right off, to hold it up high, so sunlight can better glint off the unbroken line of blood red scales. Mer scales. “Hmm. Nice collection here, pipsqueak. Rare color, too. Where’d you get ‘em?”
“Didn’t.”
Bluejam snorts, and crouches down, still looming over Luffy where a different pirate has him pinned to the ground, the way all three of them are pinned, and no matter how badly he squirms and kicks and tries to bite Ace can’t get lose can’t get over there to put himself in between this asshole and his stupid little brother- “Alright, then who did get these?”
“Dunno.”
And the thing is, Luffy isn’t lying. Ace knows damn well what he looks like when he tries, can spot the obviously forced innocent expression from a mile off. Right now? Luffy is not lying.
But it’s also pretty damn clear he’s putting an extra ‘fuck you’ behind those responses.
And Bluejam isn’t the kind of guy to believe something’s the truth unless a person is scared when they say it. “Aw, come on now, I bet you do know, don’t ya? Maybe one of your parents went and made friends with a mer, eh?”
“Don’t have parents,” Luffy huffs, scowling even deeper. “Just give it back and go away!”
“Nuh-uh, can’t do that, pipsqueak. See- these here are gifted scales.” Bluejam runs a finger down the line of them, making the ribbon flutter. “Most times you find a shed scale, it’s washed up on the beach, cracked and worn and dull with age. And harvested scales, well, those are always cut along one side, where they got sliced off in a right hurry.” The bastard’s grin gets bigger. “But these are nice and shiny, uncut too; must have been plucked free by the mer’s own hand, and given as a gift, right? Which means there’s a touch of magic to ‘em, and whoever was given the gift is able to call that mer back.”
Oh.
Oh, shit.
“So, little pipsqueak,” Bluejam says, a jerk of his chin getting the guy pinning Luffy to sit up, to drag the seven year old onto his knees, closer to getting face to face with the pirate captain. “You tell me who these scales were gifted to, and I’ll let you and your little friends go, hm?”
Luffy glares, with a stubborn, grim set to his face. It’s out of place, on Ace’s stupidly cheerful brother. “No you won’t.”
He sounds certain. Sure of his words, and sure of himself. Porchemy beat up Luffy for hours to find out where Ace and Sabo hid their treasure, and the kid never broke. Maybe Bluejam is thinking of that too, meeting Luffy’s glare. His wide, gap-toothed smile turns into a sneer, and his other hand goes for the dagger on his belt-
“Shanks!”
Bluejam pauses. Turns, along with Luffy, and with Ace, to look at Sabo. “Oh?”
“That’s who Luffy got the hat from,” Sabo spits out, his face scrunched up with a scowl too, but he’s not trying to hide the fear in his eyes. Ace kind of wants to both yell at him to shut up and agree with his brother at the same time - Luffy might be staring at Sabo with horrified, betrayed eyes, but he isn’t getting hurt. “Some guy named Shanks. And wherever he got it from, and the scales, Luffy doesn’t know, so just leave him alone!”
After a moment, the pirate captain starts laughing. The rest of his gang join in (not a crew, not a real pirate crew, they have a ship anchored by the shore but it’s not like they actually go anywhere in it) but they sound confused. Not sure what the funny part is. Ace tries thrashing one more time, hoping the two guys kneeling on him are distracted, but no dice; he just gets his face shoved deeper into the trash-littered dirt for his trouble.
“Well now, this is our lucky day, lads!” Bluejam stands back up, mockingly dropping the straw hat so it lands against Luffy’s chest, drawstring looped around the back of his neck. “Time to go do some fishing.”
Ace sees the ocean all the time, whenever he climbs a tree or a trash heap or a particularly tall building in Goa. But it’s rare he ever comes this close; the one warning from Gramps and Dadan both that he’s willing to listen to, that baths in freshwater are okay as long as he doesn’t stay wet for too long, but even just a little exposure to the salty ocean waves would mean big trouble.
The Bluejam Pirates wrap him and Sabo up in ropes around their lower legs and forearms and then tie them back to back, a thick cloth gag shoved in each of their mouths, and leave the two of them at the top of the cliff overlooking the narrow inlet.
It’s far enough away from the water Ace isn’t worried about his secret being exposed.
But it’s just close enough to hear Luffy’s cry when Bluejam cuts him with that knife.
Ace lurches, and Sabo shoves too, trying to help him, trying to get close enough to one rock in particular with a hard edge that might be sharp enough to saw through their ropes. But there’s still one pirate standing guard at the clifftop, who kicks them both back down with a snigger.
Right as Ace manages to twist enough to see what’s happening, one of Bluejam’s taller guys throws Luffy. He doesn’t go far, maybe about halfway down the inlet towards where waves hit the edge of the island and surge through the narrow opening, where more pirates are waiting with- with nets and harpoons. Luffy doesn’t bob back to the surface. He doesn’t need to. A different guy than the one who threw him pulls on a long rope going into the water, and a few moments later Ace’s little brother appears, tied at the far end by his wrists, coughing as he’s dragged up over wet rocks to dangle midair directly in front of Bluejam’s smug smirk.
And Bluejam cuts him again, blood spilling down Luffy’s other arm.
The first guy throws Luffy a second time.
The other one hauls him back.
Another cut.
Another throw.
Again, and again, and again, until Luffy’s hanging limp, too tired to shiver let alone struggle, covered in a faint sheen of red, most of his blood seeping out into the ocean waves.
Ace wants to scream. Wants to yell and shout and go down there to kick all their asses, but he can’t, he can’t move and he can’t fight, he just keeps choking on his own stupid tears, and from the sounds directly behind his head Sabo isn’t any better off.
Luffy isn’t screaming or crying. Not anymore.
Luffy might be dead at this point, hanging so still and small when they drag him out of the water again.
“Boss!”
Or not- at the excited shout, the seven year old’s head rolls a little to one side. Ace’s heartbeat kicks up a notch.
The pirates don’t throw Luffy again; the guy who’s been pulling the rope takes a few steps back, taking the kid with him, while Bluejam and the others bring out pistols to aim at the water. For an achingly long moment, nothing happens.
Then Ace spots a blur of red.
Too fast for the men at the far end of the inlet to catch in a net, although they do drop a few to block the exit once it surges past. Seconds later, a head of bright red hair bursts out of the water, followed by sun-tanned skin and equally crimson scales, and the merman snarls, deep and vicious and very, very angry.
He’s only got one arm.
Shanks saved me from the Lord of the Coast, Luffy said, the sole time Ace asked what was so great about this guy he always mentioned anyway. I was sinking in the water before he caught me, and then the Sea King showed up, and bit his arm off! It was really scary, until Shanks told it to get lost, and it did!
Bit off his arm.
Shanks.
The hat came from Shanks.
And apparently so did the scales, because Shanks is a mer.
Shanks is a mer with big claws and pointed fangs and a huge red tail that propels him halfway out of the water, right within swiping range of Bluejam, and he only stops his blindingly fast charge when a pistol is pointedly aimed right at Luffy’s head. “Let. Him. Go.”
“Maybe later,” Bluejam grins. “After we’ve stripped you of all those valuable scales, Red-Hair.”
“I don’t think so,” Shanks growls, right as the entire inlet explodes with motion. A dozen more merfolk erupt from the water, all different shapes and sizes, launching themselves straight at the startled pirates everywhere they stand. Within seconds, the air is full of screams and blood, bodies and separated body parts collapsing on the rocks, falling into the sea. Two mermen in particular, armed with guns that do not look like normal wood and metal, rear up on either side of Shanks, shooting the guys holding and threatening Luffy before either of them can react.
Luffy drops.
Bluejam tries to grab him.
Shanks gets there first.
He may only have the one arm, but the mer’s tail is long and thick and fast, striking Bluejam hard enough to knock some teeth out as he goes flying into the waves, Luffy caught and cradled against a broad chest with just one careful twist.
And just like that, Ace can suddenly breathe again.
The pirate standing over him must have a similar moment of realization, except in the opposite direction. He jerks, scrambles like he’s about to run away, but the quick motion just draws unwanted attention. Another shot from one of those weird sea-guns, and he topples down over the edge of the cliff. Probably dead, or else about to be. Ace doesn’t really care one way or the other.
What he does care about is how Shanks is looking up, now, right at him and Sabo.