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By now, everyone had heard of the War of the Best. It was a great victory for the marines as one of the greatest pirates to sail these seas fell in battle, but it was also the execution of the late Pirate King's son Portgas D. Ace or by now some know him as Gol D. Ace. Not only that but rookie pirate captain Straw Hat Luffy had come in and joined the war after causing a mass breakout of 241 prisoners.
It's been two weeks since that day and no one has heard a word from the rookie that was last seen fleeing the scene with the former warlord Jinbei and another member of the supernovas During those two weeks Perona has been trying to convince Zoro to stop and rest before he makes his injuries worse.
"I can't stay here! I have to find my captain!" Zoro shouted at her.
"It's been two weeks! Not a word has come out about your captain. She could be dead for the world know." Perona told him.
"No! Luffy couldn't be dead!" Zoro yelled back. He refused to believe that there was the faintest possibility that his captain could be dead. He couldn't believe it, nor did he want to.
"You might have to accept the facts!" Perona screamed now in his face before sighing. "Fine, it's not like I care if you die or anything." she said floating away.
Zoro was gone for about a day, before Perona found him lying on the ground again but this time she was holding a newspaper. "What do you want?" Zoro groaned in annoyance spotting her come up to him.
"I came to make sure you weren't dead." she told him.
"Well, I'm not so you can go away now." he responded.
"I thought you would've wanted to see the paper. It has your captain in it." Perona stated calmly.
"What! Give it here!" Zoro suddenly said trying to get up but to no avail and Perona ended up holding it up over his face for him to read it.
"Can you hurry up! My arms are getting tired!" Perona yelled at him.
Zoro's eyes searched through the article and picture trying to find whatever it was that Luffy was leaving for them to find but at the same time he couldn't help but stare at the bandages around his captain's body. It was his biggest failure, he wasn't there at Marineford to help protect his captain, he wasn't able to help protect the crew that's why they got separated at Sabaody.
Except this picture was different from the one that Mihawk had tossed him about a day after the war. The dreaded picture of Ace and Luffy will forever be engraved in his mind, but you could see the physical exhaustion written in Luffy's body. Luffy had pushed her body way beyond its limits just to save her dear older brother and all for what? To watch as he was killed right before her eyes by that admiral. Now, while grief spelled out in her stance. She stood tall, paying respect to those that had fallen in the war.
"Hey! What gives!" Zoro yelled as the paper was dropped on his face.
"I told you! My arms were getting tired!" she shouted back at him yet again.
Zoro then paused as he saw the writing on his captain's right shoulder and Perona picked up the paper from his face. "Okay, I understand now." he said.
"Understand? Understand what?" she asked him.
Zoro looked at the paper before sighing deciding to stay silent on the matter.
Zoro paused as Mihawk stopped his instructions and turned in a direction. Perona seemed to also stop what she was doing and hovered over to them.
"What is he doing?" she whispered to him.
Zoro shrugged a bit as Mihawk seemed to just wait as a man approached them.
"Red-Hair, what do I owe the displeasure?" Mihawk asked him.
"Don't be like that Hawky!" he had grinned. "I see you have a student now." he continued before pausing. "You're Pirate Hunter Zoro, aren't you?" the man asked addressing him.
"I don't remember calling myself Pirate Hunter." Zoro told him.
As the man laughed Mihawk rolled his eyes slightly. "Roronoa, this is Akagami no Shanks. He is one of the four yonkos of the New World." Mihawk explained.
"Wait! You're the one that Luffy told me about." Zoro commented.
"Anchor talks about me to her crew as well!" Shanks grinned.
Zoro nodded slightly as Mihawk interrupted them. "What are you doing here Shanks?"
Shanks' grinned faded a bit as another man approached them and he seemed to be carrying something or someone. Zoro couldn't hold back the gasp when he saw who it was either.
"You do realize I'm a warlord, right? I could easily finish the job here." Mihawk stated.
Shanks and Mihawk seemed to stare each other down for a moment before Shanks spoke up. "That might be the case Hawkeye, but I won't let you do that. Besides you owe me a favor." he told Mihawk.
"Why'd you save him?" Mihawk suddenly asked.
"He is my captain's son and my daughter's brother. Do I need much more of a reason than that?" Shanks asked him.
"I thought Mugiwara's father was the Revolutionary Leader Dragon?" Perona suddenly spoke up.
"Boss claimed her as his daughter when they met when she was a child. Dragon wasn't around and Anchor looked up to a group of pirates that just so happened to get just as attached to the ball of sunshine." the other man said.
Zoro couldn't blame the man for getting attached either. While Luffy was a force of nature, but if she has claimed you then she'll give you everything and Zoro had assumed that she was the same way as a child when it came to Ace but now the member of a yonko crew had confirmed his suspicions.
Zoro saw Mihawk sigh as he gestured to the castle. "Bring him in."
Shanks grinned. "Thanks a bunch Hawky!"
"I thought I would have met Anchor's first mate when we finally saw each other again." Shanks stated approaching Zoro who was finishing up a set that Mihawk had sent him to do.
"Luffy had mentioned a promise when we had first met." Zoro started. "I'm assuming that was with you?" he continued.
"You'd assume correct. When I gave Anchor that straw hat, we had a promise that she wouldn't return it until she became a great pirate. While that also means I haven't seen her in about a decade. Though, we have been talking through letters." he explained.
Zoro hummed slightly. "Did you see her during the war?" he suddenly asked. He watched as Shanks' cheerful persona dropped.
"I only caught a glimpse but of all the adventures I've been on and all the reckless stunts I was scared but mostly I was angry." Shanks admitted.
Zoro quickly turned to him. "Angry? Why?"
"If I had been there a little earlier then maybe that wouldn't have happened. Anchor wouldn't have had to watch her brother's body get mutilated right before her eyes. What if I brought Anchor with me then maybe she would have been safe and none of this would have happened." Shanks listed before pausing. "According to Emperio Ivankov, Anchor had almost met death on several occasions. Before she had even left Impel Down. I was frustrated that Anchor did something so reckless, but I was angry that I was helpless in the war. Now Whitebeard is dead, and Ace is teetering over life and death." Shanks continued.
"You said was? Are you not angry anymore?" Zoro asked him.
"No, how can I be? My daughter is alive, her brother is as well while he isn't out of the woods just yet. I believe that he'll be okay." Shanks told him.
Zoro hummed again.
"I believe Benn wants to talk to you as well. So, I'll let him do that." Shanks told Zoro before he paused, and Zoro turned his head to him. "Don't you ever hurt Anchor, or I'll make you regret ever it." Shanks told him.
Zoro nods at the yonko who's frown quickly turned to a grin as he walked off and Benn approached him instead.
"You probably feel like a pile of shit right now." Benn told him bluntly.
"That's a way to put it." Zoro told him. "I failed my captain. I let our crew get separated, Luffy nearly died because I wasn't there." Zoro listed.
"The job of a first mate can be a grueling one." Benn told him. "Our position is the closest to the captain. If our captain can't handle the problems alone, they come to us, to help shoulder that burden, but sometimes the first mate also shoulders his own burdens. Mainly of keeping the crew safe and that can include our reckless and idiotic captain." Benn continued telling him.
"Why are you telling me this?" Zoro asked him.
"It's okay to fail. Shit just happens. The Straw Hats weren't ready for the struggles of the New World at least not, yet they aren't. As long as you don't let those failures repeat then what's to say that we can't once." Benn explained.
For a moment Zoro looked over at his blades, then he turned his head back to Benn. "I'll keep that in mind." he said.
"Good." he nods standing up.
It was a few months before Ace had woken up and when he did, he was weak. It was clear that his body need the time to heal and regain the muscle that had been lost. The medication has kept him docile but there were nights where Zoro would wonder that he'd hear Ace muttering in his sleep while he twists and turned.
"Where's Luffy? Is Luffy okay?" he asked Zoro one day as the swordsman stopped by to check on him.
"Luffy isn't here but I'm sure where she is, she is okay. She is training." Zoro answered.
"That's right, Lu thinks I broke our promise." Ace said.
"Well, you didn't. You simply needed time to come back and surprise her." Zoro told him.
"Is she alone? She can't be alone, it hurts her." Ace rambled.
Zoro had chalked it up to the medicine, but he couldn't help but feel that was a punch to the gut.
"How'd you and your crew get separated?" Ace suddenly asked Zoro who was sitting on the floor nearby with some onigiri. "Luffy was fighting with prisoners from Impel Down at Marineford. She was even fighting with Crocodile and the last time I saw you guys; you were in Alabasta just to kick his ass." Ace explained. The former commander was put under strict bedrest by Shanks doctor Hongo, as his body need time to heal, especially since he didn't have access to his devil fruit anymore. Hongo would stop by at least twice a month to give him a checkup and then would leave the remaining things up to Perona, informing her of his strict diet, and other essentials.
Zoro hummed a bit looking up at him. He had bandage covering one of his eyes, so he took a quick second to adjust his vision. Originally, he thought learning to see with one eye was going to be a little bit easier than this, but it was proving to be a little more complicated than that. "When we were in Sabaody, Luffy had warranted a navy admiral to come after us because she had punched a Celestial Dragon."
"What!? Why the hell would she do that?!" Ace asked. While part of him was happy that she had punched a Celestial Dragon after what they had done to Sabo, another part of his felt terrified.
"He had shot one of our friends and you know how Luffy can get. It pissed her off, so she turned around and punched him. I must admit though it was a satisfying punch." Zoro told him with a slight grin at the end. "Anyways, I was still injured after our fights in Thriller Bark, so I wasn't much help during the time Silvers Rayleigh was actually the one that had saved us from Kizaru. But we had encountered Kuma and using his devil fruit powers he sent me and the others flying to different parts of the world or at least that's what I'm assuming given the fact that I am here." Zoro explained to him. "When Luffy had realized we were out matched, she said that we needed to split up and when we would reconvene in three days. Obviously that plan was changed." the swordsman continued.
"It changed? What'd it change to?" Ace asked him.
"After Marineford, a paper came it had an article discussing Luffy's return to Marineford before she had disappeared off the face of the planet. Anyways, with the former warlord Jinbei and Rayleigh, she went to Marineford or at least what remained of the place, rung some bell 14 times before dropping a bouquet of flowers down a massive crack. Photographers had gotten a picture of it." Zoro paused grabbing the paper and handing it to him.
The paper was over a year old, but Ace felt guilty about everything that his sister had to endure to try and get him out of Impel Down and then everything that went down at Marineford.
"On her right shoulder there is writing that says 3D2Y. It was a code that only we would understand. So instead of meeting up in three days, we would be meeting up in two years. So, everyone is out there somewhere getting stronger and waiting for the day that we will return to Sabaody." Zoro finished.
Ace looked at Zoro before turning back to the paper and smiling. "That will be a sight to see won't it." he simply said.
"Don't get cold feet now! It's been two years!" Perona suddenly told Ace who was now nervous as they approached Sabaody.
"What if she is made at me!" Ace argued.
Zoro snorted a bit. "That'd be the day the world is ending." Zoro said. "Luffy loves you so much. If she knew that you had survived this entire time, then I think she'd be extremely happy." Zoro told him.
Ace contemplated what he had said before nodding. "I can't step foot in Sabaody. No one can know I'm alive yet."
"Then you and Zoro will stay here on the boat while I'll go find you a disguise as soon as we reach the island." Perona reasoned.
"Why do I have to stay on the boat?" Zoro asked her.
"The moment I let you off this ship you will get lost in the matter of seconds and I'm not spending three days looking for you!" Perona yelled at him.
"I don't get lost! Everything just moves!" Zoro yelled back.
Ace sighed a bit watching them bicker yet again, but he couldn't help but smile a little. As nervous as he is to see his little sister again, he was excited and happy that he can finally see her. The two years had felt like an eternity.
Before Luffy had departed they had spent three years separated, and it was the first time since that night after Bluejam that they weren't attached to the hip. Then when they finally saw each other in Alabasta two years ago, Ace had only spent two days with them before he left again to go search for that traitor Teach. Two days wasn't enough time at all, then everything that went on during the war, he was happy that he'd get to see his little sister again.
Ace saw the moment that Luffy realized he was there. Due to all the commotion when the Straw Hats were getting away from the marines, he didn't have much time but now as they sailed down to Fishman Island, things were settled and calmer. Ace couldn't be prouder of her, that hat suited her well, she has become a captain of her own and has really turned the world upside down while still being just a rookie.
Zoro glanced over at him pushing him forward slightly so when Ace turned back to Luffy he found her staring at him and at first, he couldn't read her at all.
"A-Ace?” Luffy called out.
“Hey, Lu. I’m sorry that it took so long.” Ace simply said.
“ACE!” she cried out as she ran over to him.
When Ace felt her collide with him. Ace wrapped his arms around her hugging her as tight as he could.
“Ace! Ace! Ace!” Luffy chanted through her broken sobs of relief and unresolved grief that she had kept in her body.
”I’m here Lu, I’m right here.” he told her. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry, that I almost broke our promise.” Ace repeated with his own tears falling onto her hair. When he looked around there were new and unfamiliar faces, but those that he had met before, had their own tears in their eyes but they had smiles on their faces.
“My my, what a lovely reunion.” the skeleton said to them.
“Woah, the skeleton is definitely new.” Ace claimed raising his head looking at them all earning a small laugh from his sister.
“Ace! You have to meet all my nakama!” Luffy told him.
“Actually Lu, do you mind if I stay. I don’t exactly have another crew I can go and join.” Ace stated.
”You want to join my crew?” Luffy asked him.
Ace carefully nodded. “It can be like old times when we talked about becoming pirates. Me, you, and Sabo.” he stated resting his forehead against hers.
Luffy smiled at him nodding her head. “Okay.”
Ace grinned “Great! Now stop crying you crybaby. You’re back with your crew and you’re going on adventures again.”
“Shishishi!” Luffy laughed before standing up and grabbing Ace’s arm. “Sanji! We are having a banquet to celebrate!” Luffy told him.
“Of course Luffy-chan!” the cook called out.
Ace chuckles a bit as he lets himself be dragged around by his favorite person.
“Not to bring up sad memories, but how’d you even survive Ace-san?” Brook had asked him.
Ace and Luffy both looked over at him as Luffy had stopped eating. “I’ll have to agree, the picture that they had put in the paper, you shouldn’t have survived. But somehow you did?” Chopper asked him.
“Well, I think before I lost it at least, my devil fruit had saved me or what kept me alive long enough. Afterwards, Shanks’ crew rescued me and treated me. He brought me to the same island that Zoro was training on so I could recover and stay hidden from the world.” Ace explained.
“You and Zoro were on the same island?” Nami asked.
“Yeah, apparently Mihawk owed Shanks a favor so I stayed there until it was time for you all to reunite.” Ace told her.
“You trained with Mihawk!” Luffy suddenly yelled turning to Zoro.
“He just so happened to be living on the same island that I landed at.” Zoro confirmed.
“How’d you even convince him to train you?” Luffy asked her swordsman before pausing a looking at him. “You didn’t.”
“I did.” Zoro nodded.
“Zoro!” Luffy yelled before the Zoro covered her mouth with his hand.
“If it was to get stronger so what happened two years ago wouldn’t happen again. Then I’ll lay down my pride for you captain.” he told her. Luffy pouted about it not happy with it but Franky and Usopp were grinning away like a bunch of idiots.
“Ace-senpai is alive!” Bartolomeo shouts and is quickly hushed by the older who had came over to see where Luffy had been after she disappeared.
“Quiet, no one knows that I’m alive. Only the Straw Hats know. I’d like to keep that way until I can get my devil fruit back.” Ace told him.
“Wait, if Ace-senpai is trying to get his devil fruit back then why are you also here Luffy-senpai? Is because you couldn’t let your brother do it alone!” he shouts.
“More like we both ended up here on accident.” Ace said. “I heard my devil fruit was here but Luffy wasn’t with me at the time and well she ended up here too.” he told the fanboy while shaking his head.
”I told you I was sorry. Besides, I couldn’t let you have all the fun anyways.” Luffy commented.
“No wonder we got in so much trouble. There is one brain cell shared between the both of you.”
The trio turned to the new voice in the room before Bartolomeo stepped in front of him. “I don’t know who you think you are buddy but that is Hikens no Ace and Mugiwara no Luffy.” the man stated again.
“I know who they are. We go way back.” mystery man stated to them simply pushing past Bartolomeo.
“Look buddy, whoever you are, you aren’t getting that fruit.” Ace claimed.
“I can’t believe you alive brother. You really are an idiot.” he said.
“Brother? I only have two brothers. One of them is dead.” Ace glared.
“When we claimed to be brothers. Luffy referred to all three of us as brothers because that’s we took an oath on. It was also your idea to steal a bottle of sake from Dadan.”
As quickly and defensive as it appeared the glare on Ace’s face vanished while Luffy had a face of realization.
“That’s impossible! He died a long time ago because of a Celestial Dragon!” Ace yelled.
“Sabo?” Luffy whimpered.
“Hey Lu, hey Ace. I know I took a while but I promise I’m alive.” Sabo told them. That seemed to be all it took before his sister had stretched over hugging him and that seemed to stop Ace from punching him before hugging him as well. “I’m so glad you both are alive. Thank you, thank you so much.” Sabo said with a smile.
“You such a jackass! You know that! A jackass! Where have you been?!” Ace yelled.
“I promise, I will explain later. Lu, your friend needs help right? I’ll take your place and help Ace.” Sabo stated.
“Right!” Luffy whimpered.
“Lu, don’t cry. You know we hate it when yo cry.” Sabo told her.
“Shut up! I’m so happy that both my brothers are alive!” Luffy shouted at him.
Ace and Sabo both grinned hiding their own happy tears.
“Hikens no Ace is alive!” one of the marines shouted.
“Man, you really have everyone shocked today don’t you.” Sabo grinned looking over at Ace.
“What can I say. It’s shocking to see a dead man walking.” Ace told him.
“I see why Portgas D. Ace is here but why the Chief of Staff here as well.” Fujitora asked them.
“Chief of Staff of the Revolutionary Army! Really!” Ace yelled.
“Oh come on! It can’t really be that surprising.” Sabo told him.
“You were supposedly dead for twelve years. Give me the benefit of the doubt.” Ace deadpanned.
“You were supposedly dead for two years.” Sabo fired back at him.
Before a a small brawl could break out between the brother Fujitora interrupted them. Realizing they hadn’t answered the admiral's question, Sabo straightened up.
“Well, I’m here to make sure that you don’t lay a hand on my sister.” Sabo told him.
“What!?” marines started shouting.
“That’s insane! Mugiwara no Luffy, former Second Division Commander of the Whitebeard Pirates Hikens no Ace, and the Chief of Staff are siblings!” another one shouted.
“What a deadly set of brothers.” Fujitora simply stated.
"Are there anymore brothers that you have?" Usopp asked.
Luffy shook her head sitting between her older brothers as she laughed. "No! It's just Ace and Sabo!" she told Usopp with a grin.
"Ace-bro! Did you get your devil fruit back?" Franky asked.
"Weirdly enough, both Sabo and I got it." Ace commented.
Luffy turned and looked at Robin when she hummed a little. "What is it Robin?" Luffy asked her.
"There is a legend or a popular myth you could say. Basically, it states that two people with a strong bond a both granted the power of the same devil fruit." she explained.
Ace and Sabo looked each other.
"Shishi! Well, we are brother obviously. Even in death our bond will never break." Luffy grinned. Without rustling their sister's injuries both Ace and Sabo pushed her head down slightly flustered as she laughed.
"Three brother favored by fire." Kinémon pointed out.
Zoro looked at the three of them sitting on the bed before looking back at the samurai nodding in agreement.