Chapter Text
"I hear congratulations are in order.”
All form of coherent thought left him, along with his breath, and he watched Ben tense at his shoulder. The crew at his back had gone eerily silent.
“You so much as touch either of them, Teach, and it’s the last thing you do.”
The words were calmly spoken—too calmly for anyone who knew him to take comfort in it, and he felt the protesting creak of the planks straining under pressure, the ship’s familiar warning that he should rein in his haki, but he was light-headed with the soft threat sitting in Blackbeard’s words.
"Hey, hey, that’s not a very nice thing to say to someone who just wanted to congratulate you on your pretty wife and—”
He’d slammed the mouthpiece down before he could finish speaking, and punched in a new number before Blackbeard’s laughter had stopped ringing in his ears.
“Rayleigh,” Shanks said, before the man had the chance to so much as utter a single word.
"Kiddo,” came the greeting now, surprised laughter spilling into the quiet, but this was a different kind of mirth, and some of the tension in his shoulders relented, although not nearly enough to allow him to relax. “What’s got you calling this old man?”
“I need you to do something for me.”
—
There was someone in her bedroom.
She became aware of the fact long before she felt the touch to her shoulder, although Makino couldn’t tell if it was continued exposure to Shanks’ presence that had attuned her so keenly to that of other people, or if it was something else that had woken her; some subconscious form of self-preservation, but with her next breath she’d curled her fingers around the flintlock pistol tucked beneath her pillow and turned, tossing the covers off—
“Whoa!”
The shadow backed away, gloved hands raised in surrender, but she didn’t lower the pistol. Her late mother had taught her to shoot, back when she’d been twelve and had just read a book about a princess masquerading as a sharpshooter and fancied herself one, and Yasopp had painstakingly helped her dust off her mediocre skills. And it wasn’t anything to brag about, but at close quarters with her heart in her throat and her baby asleep in the next room, there was a certainty sitting within her that she could have landed a killing shot with her eyes closed.
The intruder must have felt some of the same surety, because with his next breath he was lowering his hands carefully, and, “I have to say I’ve had kinder greetings,” he laughed, the sound far too mellow for what she’d been expecting. “Although I realise that I could have gone about this differently. Or had Koala do it—she’s better than I am at these things. She has more tact, anyway. At least that’s what she says.”
Her pistol still raised, Makino blinked into the dark, trying to make sense of what was happening. He wasn’t attacking, or giving the impression that he planned to do so. He was just talking, although she wasn’t about to let her guard down because of it.
“Who are you?” she asked, and was glad when her voice didn’t waver.
He didn’t move, and with her eyes still adjusting to the dark, it was difficult picking out any clear details, but she could discern enough—a man, clad in a long coat and top-hat, a white cravat at his collar, and there was something familiar about the ensemble, but she couldn’t put her finger on what it was.
He smiled, then—she caught it stretching beneath the dark brim of the hat. “It’s been a long time, Ma-chan,” the stranger said, and if she didn’t know better she’d say he sounded fond.
She figured her confusion must show on her face, because then he was laughing. “You don’t recognise me?” he asked, but didn’t seem surprised by the fact, or insulted. Instead he only tipped his hat back to give her a better view of his face.
Loose blond curls tumbled over his cheeks, touching the edges of a vicious burn scar, and there was an inkling at the back of her mind now, a stray memory of a smile, missing a tooth, and apple-round cheeks scuffed and dirty. She remembered two loud boys competing for her attention, and a third, too polite for his years and happy to let his brothers have the spotlight.
The stranger’s grin turned sheepish, and he touched a hand to the back of his head, the gesture apologetic—and also keenly familiar. “I guess I can’t blame you. It’s been twelve years, and I was a lot shorter back then.”
It clicked, somewhere between the gesture and the sheepish smile, although she couldn’t seem to make the pieces fit. It was as though she could accept what her eyes were seeing, but not understand how it was possible.
“Sabo…?”
The name felt awkward on her tongue, after years without use, but she’d lowered the pistol now, although she hadn’t relented her death grip on it.
His smile softened a bit at that, and she thought he looked pleased. “Hey,” he greeted. Then, “I know—I died. And there’s a good explanation for everything, that included, but we need to leave,” he said, voice dropping into a matter-of-fact tone that was so at odds with his earlier good humour, Makino could only blink.
She was still trying to catch up with the events of the night so far. “What—”
“I don’t have time to explain right now,” Sabo was saying then, cutting her off, although the look her gave her was apologetic. “But I promise I’ll tell you everything once we’re on the ship.”
“Ship? What are you—”
“We have intel,” he said, although he didn't specify what. “I’ll explain it all later. All you need to know right now is that it’s not safe for you to stay here. So we’re getting you out—all of you.” But before she could ask what he meant by that, he was forging ahead, “But we’re running a bit short on time.”
There was that quiet urgency again, and it made her feel cold all over, but, “Trust me?” he asked then. And even if she felt in every bone in her body that she should deny the offer—that she should demand he explain what was going on before she agreed to anything—there was something else, an uncanny sort of surety that had come to settle in her heart, urging her to yield.
She thought of what Shanks had said before he’d left, and what Garp had told her so many times, over and over until she’d almost stopped listening. But she listened now, and she saw the gravity of the situation on his face; in the hard press of his mouth beneath his kind eyes.
She turned towards the corridor, and the door sitting ajar. “Ace—”
Sabo grinned at that, and before she could finish speaking—“One step ahead of you,” he declared, before he’d ducked through the doorway, leaving Makino standing in the middle of the room, thoughts still racing to catch up with the rest of her.
She considered her bedroom, the night sky beyond the open window, and the gentle shadows draped across the furnishings. Shanks’ shirt hanging over the back of the armchair, and the calm she couldn’t reconcile with the urgency that had been sitting in Sabo’s voice.
Sabo, she thought, rubbing at her eyes. But she heard him moving—heard the quiet murmur of his voice as he roused Ace, and suddenly the full weight of the situation was bearing down on her shoulders all at once.
She made for the nightstand before she could even think about what she was doing, discarding the pistol and digging out the book in the top drawer, to fish out the sheaf of paper tucked between the pages. Carefully folded, there wasn't so much as a tear in it, and she took a moment to root her heart in the sight, and the surety offered by its undamaged state. And she hesitated only a second before she put the book back, shoving the drawer closed.
She realised that her hands were shaking, but her body seemed to be moving of its own accord, and she was in the process of pulling on her dressing robe when Sabo re-entered, a fussing Ace in his arms.
“Someone wasn’t happy to be woken,” he declared, his laugh a terribly gentle thing as he gave the baby a bounce. “A lot like his namesake that way. It’s probably a good thing he hasn’t learned to talk yet. I remember Ace would cuss up a storm every morning.” His expression softened a bit at the words, and if she’d had her mind with her, Makino might have managed a response.
“Come on,” he told her then, making for the staircase, and she wasn’t left with much choice but to follow.
This isn’t happening, she thought, as she descended the stairs and made to cross Party’s empty common room, rubbing her hand across her eyes again, although she was wide awake now. This is a dream. You have dreams like this all the time, and this is just a very vivid one.
Her heart beat painfully in her chest, fear manifesting in earnest now that she was finally catching up. This can’t be happening.
But it was difficult convincing herself as she pushed past the swinging doors and into to the cool air, only to find a chaos of movement and sound that was so vividly at odds with a regular Fuschia night, for a moment all she could do was stare.
There were others. She caught sight of Woop Slap, a local fisherman, and the owner of the flower shop, all being herded out of their homes by people she didn’t recognise. One of them turned upon catching sight of Sabo—a girl, Makino saw, a large hat and goggles perched on her head, her expression one of concentration, before irritation replaced it, making her cheeks puff up.
“Sabo-kun! Mou, could you give me a heads up before you run off? I’m supposed to keep track of everyone!”
Sabo’s smile was a quick flash of teeth. “Ah, sorry! I’m here now.”
If she noticed the baby in his arms, the girl didn’t bat an eye. “Just get to the ship!”
There was a hand under her elbow then, pulling gently, and despite her better judgement Makino allowed herself to be whisked off, not down the street towards the docks but across the fields that sprawled beyond Fuschia proper; a route she’d run many times in her childhood, shirking her chores with her Mistress at her heels, but the panic pushing her forward now was an entirely different sort, threatening her knees to buckle. She caught disgruntled murmurs from the people around her, all in similar states of undress, but there was fear too, sitting in their sharp gestures, and with her own lodged like a stone in her chest it was all she could do to keep moving.
The night was dark and pressing, just a few rogue stars keeping watch over the island with the sickle moon, as though the sky knew more than they did and saw to keep them hidden as they ran. There was a ship waiting beyond the shore, Makino saw, sails black and inconspicuous and no jolly roger in sight, but she didn’t stop to consider it, following the young man carrying her son, and trying in vain to connect the image to the one in her mind—to the boy she’d barely gotten to know before he’d been gone. But she remembered Luffy’s stories; his sorrow perhaps most keenly.
She wondered if he knew that Sabo was alive, but the question slipped from her mind as she was helped into one of the dinghies idling by the water. It was quiet, the water still and black, stroking gently along the shoreline, a dark lover's touch. It soaked through her thin slippers, a shock of cold against her ankles, but with her mind still scrambling to follow, it barely fazed her.
There was a moment of panic where she couldn’t see where Sabo had disappeared off to, before a touch against her arm had her turning, only to find him offering a hand. Wide awake now, Ace was quiet on his arm, eyes large and round and taking in the commotion with silent awe. And Makino was suddenly, desperately glad he was too young to understand what was happening.
Although she had a thought, as she focused on not tripping over her own feet when the dinghy tipped with its new burden, that it wasn’t as though she was any wiser. Just old enough to know fear at her own ignorance.
“I know this is a lot to take in,” Sabo was saying then, dragging her gaze from the shore, disappearing behind them. The sea beyond stretched, a vast and inky darkness on all sides, and for a moment it made her feel claustrophobic, sensing the movements of the small dinghy beneath her but unable to spot even the ripples in the black water. She couldn't even tell where the shore began, only that they were drawing further away from it.
Before he could continue, a baby Den Den Mushi tucked into his collar perked up, drawing his attention, and when he spoke into it Makino heard the girl from before answer, "—them all. Hack is bringing the rest, and I’ll tell the Big Boss. Don’t—”
She felt the explosion before she heard it, the night lit white for the span of a single second, and the sheer intensity of it had Makino squeezing her eyes shut. Except the brightness was still there, as though burned into her retina, and the sudden pressure against her chest and her eardrums was enough to make her choke for breath as the boat pitched beneath them.
There was a flurry of movement—voices raised around her, and the water shoving against the sides of the boat, the once-quiet waters beneath seeming to heave, as though in retaliation, but Makino remained in her seat, and the dinghy didn't tip over.
Her eyes watered, and when she forced them open her remaining breath left her in a rush, shaking hands gripping the side of the dinghy, rocking in the now-rippling sea.
“Koala!”
“—hit, I’m okay! Phew, that was—”
The line crackled, and then Sabo was speaking into the Den Den Mushi, words rushed and clipped, but what they were saying went beyond her as Makino watched the shore, far behind them now, but she could see it clearly, the night illuminated by the hungry flames and the smoke climbing greedily into the dark sky in the distance.
Ears ringing, she was dimly aware that Ace was crying, but she couldn’t tear her gaze away from the bright spot against the island they'd left—and what remained of the village on the other side of the rise.
“Makino?”
She thought of the bed she’d been sleeping in only moments ago, and the bar she’d spent the past twelve years running; the only home she’d ever known. The only home her son had ever known, now—
A hand on her shoulder, gripping it, and she turned to find Sabo, Ace on his arm and a wordless question in the slant of his brow. Her son's eyes were wide, frightened tears clinging to his lashes, and the sight dragged her bodily out of her shock and back to the cold night, and the boat rocking gently beneath them.
Small hands reached towards her, and she pulled him into her arms, his little body stiff with shock. He was wailing in earnest now, and there was a tremble that threatened like a sob at the bottom of her throat, hearing it. But she couldn't afford to fall to pieces now, and she felt the hard truth of that realisation in the little weight in her arms, warm and breathing but clawing at her dressing robe, too young to put words to his fears but feeling them all the same.
And she drew whatever strength she could from the other faces in the little dinghy, and those she saw drifting further ahead—people she knew, who were still alive. And houses could be rebuilt, she knew. Her bar could be rebuilt, but people…people’s losses weren’t so easily restored.
But the thought that they could have been lost just as easily as the village, any one of them, drummed an uncomfortable knowledge against her ribcage as they drew further away from the island. And the events of the night were finally dawning on her, creeping with a sudden, terrible cold across her skin. But she didn't give herself the chance to break, unwilling to lose herself now, even as she felt her whole body shaking, and Ace's murmured cries pressed into the hollow of her throat. Instead she dug her heels into the bottom of the boat and forced her breath through her nose, the familiar smell of the sea sharp and bracing, even as the tang of gunpowder drifted to her on the breeze.
And when she’d gathered herself enough to lift her gaze, Makino hugged her son as close as he could get, and watched her home burn.
—
It was a long time before anyone came to speak to her.
She’d been tucked away somewhere belowdecks, in a dry and warm cabin with a bunk, but sleep eluded her, seated on the worn mattress, her wet slippers cold and drying slowly. She had no mind to remove them.
Exhausted from crying, and thankfully too young to share his mother’s troubles, Ace had fallen asleep against her, and Makino threaded her fingers through his hair now, if only to give them something to do. The bright red strands were soft under her palm, and she touched her thumb to the corner of his mouth, wiping away a small pearl of drool, ever mindful of the fact that her hands were still shaking.
And sitting there in the restless quiet, her thoughts drifted to her husband, and all the warnings she’d been given. And she felt sick to her stomach now, realising just how woefully unprepared she’d been to face the world she’d known existed but whose ripples she’d never thought would reach all the way to her little island. She’d considered it of course, but for all her overactive imagination, to find it happening this way…
Unease sat like an itch under her skin, and she cast a furtive glance towards the cabin door. All she knew of what went on beyond it was the muffled sound of footsteps above her head, and the occasional muted sliver of conversation passing by outside. She didn’t know who these people were, if they were pirates or something else entirely. Having checked up on her immediately after boarding, Sabo had disappeared, and she hadn’t seen him since. She couldn’t even tell how much time had passed or where they were headed, could only tell that the ship was moving, the muted groan of the planks occasionally disturbing the quiet.
The thought sat, an uncomfortable weight in her chest, that she ought to get her hands on a Den Den Mushi. Shanks should know what had happened, and preferably from her. And—
A knock on the door made her jump, and she looked up to find it opening, admitting a tall man with a dark cloak wrapped around his broad shoulders. He had his face bared, his dark hair long and pulled back from his brow, and he’d barely ducked through the doorway before Makino realised that she recognised him. Anyone who’d ever opened a newspaper would, and there was a strangled noise caught in her throat that she couldn’t get out, taking in the severe pull of his features, and the red-inked tattoo.
Dragon the Revolutionary. The most wanted man in the world, and according to the World Government, the most dangerous. But even more than that—
“You’re Luffy’s father,” Makino said, before she could stop herself.
A small smile lifted the corner of that stern mouth, and in that moment he looked so much like Garp it was unnerving.
“I am,” he said, his voice a deep baritone, and lacking the tinge of good humour she associated with the rest of his family, but it wasn’t an unkind voice.
“You don’t remember me,” he was saying then, closing the door behind him, before coming to a stop just beyond the doorway. He towered almost as tall as the ceiling; Makino thought he seemed too big for the cramped cabin. Or his presence did, anyhow. “But I remember you," he told her. "Granted, you were younger when I saw you last, hiding behind Emiko’s skirts.”
The casual mention of her late mother had her breath stuttering, but when she looked for her words she couldn’t find them. And all at once there was too much to ask—too many questions that needed answering, and under any other circumstance Makino might have pried into the things she’d always wondered regarding Luffy’s family that Garp had never shared, but tonight, with what she’d just witnessed—
“Who did this?” she heard herself asking, and it was the closest she could get to voicing the full truth that sat in her heart now, that her home was gone, and that if it hadn’t been for these people she would have been gone along with it. Ace would have—
She didn’t allow herself to follow that thought any further, and drew her certainty of his survival from the little heartbeat pushing against her palm, steady with earnest slumber where he lay sprawled on the mattress, his small limbs akimbo.
Dragon had been quiet for a long moment, and Makino was beginning to wonder if he would answer her at all when he said, “Blackbeard thrives on upheaval.” Her eyes widened at the name, but before she could say anything he'd continued, “Once I might have commended him for the trouble he’s caused the World Government, but his particular brand of chaos is a dark fire that destroys everything in its path. I would have the world standing, once all is said and done.”
Her chest caved with her breath. “Blackbeard?” And she knew that name—of course she did. She’d read the newspapers, and she’d heard the stories; Shanks’, and Ben’s, the latter's the most unforgiving. A regular storybook villain, and that might have been all, if it weren’t for how closely interwoven he was with the people she held most dear.
She thought of Shanks’ scars, and Ace, dropped on the Government’s doorstep without a backward glance. Luffy.
There was a hot coil of anger clenching deep in her gut, and it had to show on her face because, “I see I don’t have to explain his motivations,” Dragon said then, that deep voice entirely level, and she couldn’t have guessed at his thoughts if she’d tried.
Makino shook her head, although it was hard to say what exactly it was she was refuting. “I don’t understand,” she said, feeling strangely breathless, but her voice was hard enough to convey the weight of her frustration. The constant struggle for power between those who didn’t care about the civilians who were caught in the crossfire—or worse, those who wilfully sought to destroy whatever little pockets of peace still existed in the world, for whatever reason…she’d never understand that, no matter how hard she tried.
At the heels of that thought came another, and when she lifted her gaze now she found that the question came without hesitation. “What about your motivations?” she asked Dragon, still regarding her coolly from across the cabin.
Before he could speak, Ace made a noise, and Makino looked down to find him blinking awake, small features drawing together with familiar consternation at the rude awakening. Running her hand over his head, she murmured gentle assurances she didn’t feel, and lamented that being too young to understand what was happening meant she couldn't explain. All she had were her small mother's things; little comforts that all felt like pitiful offerings now.
“I have my share of grievances with the Blackbeard Pirates,” Dragon told her then, and when she looked up it was to find that something dark had settled across his features, and the downward slant of his mouth sent a shiver shooting up her spine. “But as for saving you,” he continued calmly, and there was a moment where he appeared to retreat within himself, but it lasted only a second before it was gone.
“Twelve years ago,” he said then, meeting her gaze, his voice a deep, resonant drum, but unreadable insofar as what he was feeling was concerned. “A pirate saved my son from the jaws of a sea king.”
It took Makino a moment to realise what he was saying, and—Shanks, she thought then, startled, but before she could open her mouth to speak that sharp gaze had flickered to Ace, awake and fussing on the mattress. “Consider this a favour returned,” Dragon said. "Or a debt repaid, if you would rather."
She realised she had to be wearing all her emotions on her face. And she was tempted to press the issue—to say that it didn’t explain why they’d taken the whole village, if that was indeed all it was; a favour for a favour. And if he knew the story, he had to know that Shanks' actions had never asked for retribution in the first place. But even if she couldn’t read his expression, she had a feeling she knew the answer to her own question: that there was more of Luffy in this man than his demeanour suggested.
But—there was something else, a tremor of unease within her as she watched him now, his shadow thrown large over the bulkhead by the cabin’s lone kerosene lamp.
“Something tells me there’s more to it than what you’re telling me,” Makino said, tone wary. Ace was fully awake beside her now, dark eyes blinking curiously into the low light, and she rested her palm across his stomach, worrying the fabric of his pyjamas between her fingers.
She thought she saw something like a rueful smile ghost across those severe features, although it might just have been a trick of the light.
“I had hoped you might stay with us a while,” Dragon said, the words offered with unusual care, although this wasn’t out of any courtesy to her, Makino felt, but she couldn't discern just what it was that felt off about the way he said it.
“Stay?”
But watching his expression now, she had a terrible suspicion that she knew where he was headed.
Her breath felt light in her chest, and it was hard keeping her thoughts on a straight path, but, “I think I’d like to talk to my husband,” she said, the words surprisingly forceful. Shanks’ vivre card sat, tucked away in the pocket of her dressing gown, and it was like she could feel it, weighing heavy as a stone against her heart.
Dragon’s expression didn’t so much as twitch. “I don’t think that will be possible at this time," he told her.
She didn’t know if it was anger or something else that pushed up her throat, but the words came, and she was relieved when there was no hint of a quaver in her voice. “What do you mean by that?”
He was looking at her now, and she had the uncomfortable impression of being assessed—as though he was judging her merit, although she couldn’t for the life of her even guess what her use might be for someone like him.
“We are all pawns, Makino-san,” Dragon said then. “It’s been a slow game, and it’s time certain pieces stopped being idle.”
Nerves frayed, she was almost tempted to snap that she didn’t have the patience for metaphors when he continued, no doubt reading the look on her face for what it was. “There are pirates on these seas with the power to change the world, but all they do is keep the scales from tipping, complacent in their quiet corners while the rest of us fight. And so long that they don't overstep their boundaries, the World Government leaves them be. In that regard, they are no better than the Warlords.”
He met her gaze then, and it took all her strength not to drop her eyes with the sheer weight of the conviction she found in them. “You’re not ignorant to the sway your husband holds,” he told her. “Or what he could accomplish, if given the right incentive.”
Incentive. And the way he said the word had her heart dropping into the pit of her stomach.
Her chest felt heavy, and it was difficult forcing her breaths out. And his words were slow in settling, but it was dawning on her now just what it was he was telling her, and when realisation finally sank into her heart—Fuschia burning bright against the night sky, an image she doubted she’d ever be able to wipe from her memory—it was with a terrible, damning weight.
“Red-Hair has been biding his time long enough,” Dragon said. Ace’s heartbeat sounded suddenly loud in the cramped room. Or that might just be her own, Makino realised, the thought oddly detached. “And I suspect,” he added, with that eerie calm that left her short of breath—
“That this might be what is necessary for him to finally act.”