Chapter Text
On an island in the weakest of the four Blues, a boy stands on a cliff facing the sea, two gravestones in front of him. He looks ruefully at the camera in his hands before raising it up and taking a picture of the graves, a brilliant sunrise rising up behind them. “Hey Sabo, hey Luffy.” Ace spoke bleakly, looking forlornly at the graves in front of him, “I know it’s still too early for me to set out before the promised age seventeen, but...it’s not like either of you kept your promises either. Besides, it’s not like I’ll be leaving much behind.”
“Luffy, I promised you I would live, and I plan on keeping that promise for as long as I’m able. One of us has to live to tell the tale and explore the world, don’t you think? But don’t think that the first time I meet someone stronger than me I won’t let them kill me, I didn’t deserve to be born anyway. If I were never born, maybe neither of you would’ve died.” Ace said softly, eyes dull.
He gently places the camera into the watermelon-patterned bag by his feet and pulls out three red small cups and a bottle of sake before he tightened the strings. Slinging the bag over his shoulder, Ace placed the three cups in between the two graves and poured a decent amount of the alcohol in each before placing the bottle next to the cups. He made his way down to the beach, where a lonely raft bobbed in the shallow water. Looking around, Ace carefully surveyed the area for any sign of people. He noticed a big woman with crazy red hair standing on a cliff next to a slender woman with green hair tied back with a yellow bandanna. The women waved at Ace, and the teen waved back lifelessly.
Ace walked towards the raft, and as he got closer, he noticed a piece of paper nailed to the mast. He ripped it off to get a better look at it, and froze, before he shoved the paper into his bag and unfurled the raft’s sails. He untied his raft to start his journey, and his lips quirked up slightly, though his eyes still held immense sadness in them as he reread the letter in his mind. ‘ Dear Shitty Grandson, I know I can’t stop you from setting sail. It’s the one thing all three of you wanted, so I won’t stop you. Enjoy your journey, live with no regrets, and most importantly, be safe you shitty grandson. Don’t head off with a death wish. Please don’t make me have to bury another grandson. I don’t think I would be able to. Yours truly, Grandpa.’
“It figures Gramps would get sentimental in his old age.” Ace mutters softly to himself, “If he becomes more soft I might have to start wondering what hit him so hard to actually give him brain damage...well more brain damage than he already has.”
The boy sat down on makeshift bench on his raft and waited for the waves to carry him farther and farther away from Dawn Island, and farther from the two graves that got smaller and smaller as he sailed further away, before they disappeared entirely from his sight.