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Law wasn’t exactly sure how long they had been in the ocean.
He tried to keep track of the days by the position or absence of the sun in his foggy, revolving moments of consciousness. Sometimes they floated, his head on Bepo’s shoulder as his crewmate tread water and caught his breath. Mostly they moved forward, the relentless up-down roll of the waves monotonous and nauseating, breaking over them and leaving Law constantly spitting bitter seawater.
On what Law thought could be the third day, or the fourth, who the hell could really say, the sea was calm. Fog fell over the world. Bepo floated on his back, taking advantage of the still water to rest. One arm held Law tight, the other cast out, distributing their weight.
It was a truly miserable way to go. Law couldn’t be entirely sure he hadn’t already drowned or died from his injuries. The water and low, ethereal clouds were Purgatory gray, dreamlike, hard to tell where the ocean stopped and the overcast sky began.
Both of them slipped into a doze. They would likely have drowned thereafter, but a bow wave hit them.
Bepo spluttered awake, lost his grip for a few heart-pounding seconds, enough for Law to take on water. He gagged, salt-stung eyes blurry.
The infinite gray expanse was blocked by a dark mass. A sea king, maybe, come to put them out of their misery.
A distant cacophony of voices raised in alarm. Someone called for a rope. A ship , Law amended, fighting to clear his lungs.
There was no need for a rope in the end. A hand stretched down, impossibly far, to seize Law by the arm.
When Law blinked back into awareness he was on his back and looking up at the grey sky, partitioned by swoops of silhouetted rigging, darkness and indistinct shapes pressing in at the corners. His vision tilted, hands turned him onto his side and a fist thumped his back until he coughed up seawater and choked in air.
From his new angle he could see Bepo, a vague orange and white pile, back visibly rising and falling.
At that, Law’s consciousness receded. He was faintly aware of being lifted from the deck, then nothing.
The ceiling was strange. Law dragged his eyes along the knots and grain of the boards, head heavy and confused.
It wasn’t the metal and rivets he was accustomed to seeing. No cool, underwater turquoise glow. Golden daylight streamed in from somewhere, the room suffused with it, and he felt smothered, too hot.
He tried to raise an arm to push back the blanket covering him. Flinched. He rediscovered his nerves in a throbbing, distant ache.
Law studied what he belatedly recognized as an IV stand. He followed the tubing down, down, perplexed to find it attached to his arm, kaleidoscopic with bruises and bandages.
The sudden recollection of his new reality clenched like a fist around his heart despite the sedation. Sitting up, or trying, propped up on one shaking arm, sent bolts of agony through his shoulder and side. His vision dampened, wavered. He let out a strangled sound.
Large hands pushed him flat; a hulking brown figure loomed over him. Law clawed at its wrists in a panic until the blurry form in front of him resolved into the image of none other than Tony Tony Chopper—the Strawhat’s doctor.
Law went slack.
The Strawhats.
Out of everyone, across those miles and miles of ocean.
If this is divine intervention, better late than never, I guess.
Law barked out a hoarse, hysterical laugh at his absurd fortune. Strawhat unexpectedly plucking him out of the sea in his hour of need. Of course. More rough, uncontrollable laughter bubbled up.
Chopper looked extremely concerned. He said something that Law couldn’t really hear, pulse roaring in his ears. Law turned his head away.
Looking across the infirmary, he could see Bepo nearby on a pile of cushions, snoring, graceless, mouth wide open. It calmed him a little. He tamped down the delirium.
“-orao? Can you understand me? ”
Chopper’s mismatched voice and body were bewildering. He kept his hands firm and flat on Law’s chest.
“Torao?”
Law nodded stiffly.
“Okay.” A beat. “Don’t do that again, please.”
Law nodded a second time.
Chopper shrank back down to size, satisfied that his patient wasn’t going to bolt upright and tear himself open. He placed a little hoofed hand on Law’s forehead to feel for a fever.
Law didn’t think he was sick. It was just the painkillers and the sheer improbability, the Strawhat-ness of it all, getting to him.
“Um. If you say so,” said Chopper, in a tone suggesting he did not at all agree.
Law didn’t realize he was speaking out loud. He conceded that he might be unwell.
When he slept again, he dreamed in fitful stretches of burning streets and trembling earth.
Law drifted through the next day in a tranquilized fog. His fever had broken in the early hours, at least, bringing some relief and lucidity.
Every now and then would come knocking and concerned voices—the Strawhats’ little doctor quietly shooed away the visitors, accepting only a mug of rich broth from the cook that Law tried to ignore and Chopper eventually browbeat him into drinking.
A lilting, soothing sound of a violin drifted at intervals from somewhere outside.
Bepo, naturally, refused to leave the infirmary at first. When he woke from his marathon sleep, well deserved after a serious fight and several straight days of swimming, he hovered over Law tearfully, wanting to crush him into a hug but unsure how to do so without it hurting.
Law endured Bepo’s fussing—he couldn’t do much else—but found it almost impossible to look at him. Of his whole crew, he had only managed to hang on to one of them. He was relieved when Bepo was tempted enough by lunch that he accepted Law’s weakly waving him off and left for the galley.
Law watched the wavering pool of sunlight from the porthole window wander across the floor and up the wall through half-lidded eyes. Rifled through a mental inventory of his injuries, dull through the painkillers—shot, once? Twice? Busted ribs. Concussion, probably. Slashed there, and there, cut, bashed, bludgeoned. Altogether a sorry mess. And beyond that, the profound bone-tiredness, the pulled-apart feeling of vastly overextending his abilities— but not enough, not enough— laid over him like the crushing mantle of an entire ocean.
When the dimming light from the porthole turned to sullen evening, Chopper gave Law a once-over, sat him up gingerly, alert for any spots of blood through the dressings. There were none; he did good work. Law said as much.
Chopper looked extremely flattered even as he stuttered out curses and dismissals, shuffling his feet. Not flattered enough to let Law get away with lying down before drinking more water, though, IV be damned.
By the third day, Luffy wouldn’t accept “go away and let him rest” for an answer, barging in and planting himself in a chair by the infirmary cot over Chopper’s protesting. Law’s head was turned away as he pretended to sleep, but he could feel himself being watched.
It was some time before Law finally had the will to turn and look.
Luffy’s face was stormy. He leaned forward with feet planted, hands white-knuckle tense on his knees.
It was not unlike the look of grim determination Law had seen him level at Doflamingo, at Kaido, at anything and anyone making a serious attempt to get in his way, or lay a hand on something he was set on protecting—glaring not at Law but through him.
Luffy’s voice was flat and low as he spoke.
“Tell me what happened.”
Law had to avert his eyes, look anywhere else.
What happened?
They were taken by surprise, outmanned and outgunned, and outmaneuvered in the end.
In his mind’s eye he imagined the Polar Tang violently coming apart under the sea, muffled grinding and shrieking of metal—he heard it even from where he had lain on shore, bleeding in the dirt.
How could he begin to justify it? His first major challenge with the alliance behind him, and Law had folded. Forced into a humiliating retreat, surviving only through sheer luck and Bepo’s quick thinking.
Left the crew.
Maybe he had gotten complacent; secure in the unlikely victories the Strawhats had carried him to. Shame squeezed his chest and throat, pressed on the back of his eyes.
His voice was still brittle from all the screaming and saltwater. “I lost,” was all he could say.
Law wore a shirt that must be Sanji’s, going by the faint cigarette smell. Gray, soft against his dressings, quietly left for him by Nami along with some sandals and too-short slacks. Law had no idea what happened to the clothes he arrived in. Beyond salvaging, probably.
He thought of the rest of his worldly possessions, tangled in the submerged wreckage of the Polar Tang along with—
Law cut the thought off at the knees. If nothing else, all the Heart Pirates besides himself were strong swimmers.
Whether they survived after reaching the surface was a whole other nightmare.
The clink of ceramic and silverware brought him back around. A plate had been placed in front of him where he sat at the galley table.
It had been almost a week since the Strawhats first hauled Law, half drowned and three-quarters dead, out of the sea. Chopper had finally deemed Law fit to leave the infirmary for short stretches—carefully, maddeningly supervised. He was chaperoned (carried, more or less) to the galley and deposited on a bench for his first dinner not eaten in bed.
Even as Sanji fawned over the women, presenting their plates with a flourish, he regarded Law out of the corner of his eye. All of the Strawhats snuck glances at him, curious, concerned, some more subtle than others.
Luffy just stared at Law without pretense.
So Law forced himself to eat, and that seemed to satisfy Luffy, who tore into his own heaping dinner. The other onlookers were soon occupied with chastising under their breath and slapping their captain’s wandering hands away from their own plates.
With Law tentatively upright and unlikely to drop dead, the Sunny glided out of its holding pattern in the open ocean and set a course for Winner Island. Besides the obligatory fretting from Usopp, Luffy, this is Blackbeard we’re talking about, the Strawhats seemed in almost immediate agreement.
Law for his part snarled and demanded to be let loose with a rowboat, or something — I’m your enemy, remember— and was ignored completely.
His attempt at storming off was sabotaged by a sudden rush of vertigo that nearly swept his feet out from under him. Zoro steadied Law with a firm hand on his arm.
The Strawhats seemed more careful around him than usual, which somehow felt more grating than the teasing and general antics he had come to expect. They organized themselves into a sort of informal, rotating watch, and Law—barely graduated to walking unassisted—was almost never out of arm’s reach.
Zoro dropped him in a deck chair unceremoniously. He had the nerve to look the slightest bit smug as Law glowered up at him.
Nami turned the corner, exchanging a quick look with Zoro, which seemed to be his cue to go. The changing of the guard. She sat, opened a logbook on the folding table, and began to write.
Law stayed where he sat, fuming but not willing to risk a humiliating repeat of his near-fall. He looked across the grassy deck to where Bepo talked animatedly about something with Chopper and Usopp. Bepo had latched onto the Strawhats while his captain was indisposed, and they accepted him into the fold without missing a beat.
Law found himself the slightest bit grateful for that at least, his own battered, guilty heart struggling to be fully present. For all Bepo’s confidence in the crew, it was clear he missed them terribly.
Law turned to Nami.
“How did you even find us?”
He supposed the navigator would know. Nami made an inquisitive sound, not looking up from her writing.
“We left Wano going in two completely different directions. You shouldn’t have been anywhere near that island.”
Nami sketched in some coordinates, tapped the pencil on her chin reflectively.
“Well, it made the front page—you guys and Blackbeard. They rewrote the whole issue the night before it went out, apparently, since it was breaking news. We turned around right away.”
“Was there anything about my crew?”
“Erm. Not really. All it said was that the Heart Pirates were all, uh, unaccounted for after the fight. Robin should have the paper in the library if you wanted to see.” Nami paused, made a few more quick annotations. “Anyways, we changed course, to look for you guys. The rest was just crazy good luck, I guess.”
Unaccounted for could mean a lot of things, including ‘dead on the ocean floor.’ Law refused to pin his hopes on it.
“Why?”
Don’t look for a reason , Sengoku’s voice reminded him. But he couldn’t help probing at it, like a sore spot in his mouth.
Nami looked up at him then. Her expression suggested the answer was stupidly obvious, but she deigned to tell him anyway.
“Luffy was worried about you. Well, we all were. But.”
Her brow wrinkled, remembering something unpleasant. Nami’s voice dropped, low and confidential, “…after what happened with Ace, Luffy’s brother, you know? And Blackbeard? No way he would let it go.”
Law had forgotten about that. The Marines may have killed Fire Fist, but only after Blackbeard caught him in the first place.
Still, at their stage, a few days—nevermind a week or more—could make all the difference in being the first to Laugh Tale. Especially since Blackbeard presumably had all of Law’s Poneglyph prints.
“Our alliance is over,” Law reminded Nami, cotton-mouthed.
She laughed and shook her head, incredulous.
“You’re still hung up on that? We tried to tell you, Torao . When it comes to Luffy, this sort of thing—”
She made a flippant, shrugging gesture with a wry smile.
Law looked away.
As anxious as Luffy had been to see and talk to him in the early days, he was present and watchful, but mostly kept his distance. Law wasn’t sure what to make of it.
Sanji appeared from the galley and spent a minute simpering over Nami before handing her a glass of something tropical-looking over ice. She thanked him and walked off with her logbook.
Sanji set down plain water and a peeled tangerine for Law without comment, stood nearby, and lit a cigarette.
As it happened, Blackbeard had already moved on, presumably having gotten most of what he wanted. A rival brutally crushed, and three Poneglyph prints closer to Laugh Tale. Out of caution, an advance party took the Sunny’s satellite boat to scout the island, leaving the mothership anchored a safe distance from shore.
The eastern side of the island had been all but shattered by the intense fighting—huge rifts, massive slabs of earth lifted and skewed by the power of Blackbeard’s tremors, uprooted trees and debris everywhere. Here and there were perfectly circular craters; Law’s doing, the sphere of his Room carving through the soil and bedrock.
Jinbe dove to look around where the Polar Tang had broken up. Law supported himself on the starboard railing, stared out across the restless water, and waited. Bepo fidgeted at his side.
Nearly two hours passed before Jinbe called. Law pounced on the Den Den Mushi the instant it rang.
Jinbe described the sharp drop-off, strong and unpredictable currents and eddies complicated further by the web of new crevasses in the sea floor, stretching from the epicenter of the action down into the depths.
He had found the wreckage of the Polar Tang . It was scattered across many tens of yards, tumbled and scoured across the sharp rocks by the ocean’s indifferent power.
“Down there, were there any—did you find anyone?”
Jinbe replied quickly, “No.”
No bodies. It was cold comfort. Between the currents and scavengers, any corpses would be long gone. It didn’t prove anything.
“That’s—that’s good! That’s good. Right? Captain?”
Bepo trailed off, uncertain.
“Yeah,” Law replied, schooled his expression into something less grim. “It’s a good sign.”
Jinbe did find something he felt was worth bringing back, however.
He folded the Heart Pirates’ Jolly Roger into a clumsy damp triangle and held it out to Law, like a parody of some Marine’s widow being gifted the World Government pennant her husband died for.
Law sat with Bepo in the dappled shade of Nami’s tangerine grove, their backs against the rear mast. It was one of the few spots on deck where Law could reliably escape from the eyes of the Strawhats for a short while.
The Sunny cut through uneasy water, following the lead of the Log Pose.
They found nothing else on Winner Island, though not for lack of trying, circling the island by land and sea, scouting the dense forest, through the ruins of a village ransacked by one too many gangs of invaders and long given up for lost by whoever had lived there.
A flock of distant white sails—a patrolling Marine fleet, maybe coming to sniff around the scene of the battle—eventually pushed them out. It wasn’t worth the time or risk to start a fight. At any rate, in what Law privately considered the very unlikely case that the rest of the Heart Pirates survived, they weren’t on the island anymore.
He could sense the energy onboard had shifted since the failed search.
On reflection, he supposed all the Strawhats knew something about the uncertainty of being separated from their crew after Bartholomew Kuma had scattered them to the winds for two long years. But he didn’t like the looks of quiet understanding, the gentle claps on the shoulder. Casual touches, checking in, trying to engage him in their own ways. It mostly reminded him of what he was missing.
Law had encountered washed up, hollow-eyed pirate captains before, crews taken by disease, raids, sea monsters, Marines. He’d wiped out a few crews himself, or might as well have, carving out their living hearts to buy himself the fleeting goodwill of the World Government.
Despite all his power, caution and planning, there he was. Another Grand Line burnout.
Bepo fiddled with his claws and looked sidelong at Law.
“Captain?”
Captain of what, Law thought bitterly. A wreck on the ocean floor and a pile of corpses?
“What will we do now? I mean—for now, while we wait to hear from them?”
Bepo had been putting on an optimistic face about the crew’s survival despite everything. He had promised that they could look after themselves, after all, as he dragged Law into the sea. But Law could tell he was less certain by the day. His own demeanor probably wasn’t helping.
“We’ll stay here, for the time being,” Law said, as if they had other options. “I’ll figure something out.”
He almost winced at how small and unconvincing his own voice sounded.
Still, Bepo scooted over until their shoulders touched. Leaned his head on Law’s.
“Sounds good, Captain.”
Law found it bizarre how little things seemed to have changed, at least on the surface, when it came to Luffy.
Luffy had defeated the seemingly indestructible Kaido in a cataclysmic brawl that just narrowly missed destroying an entire nation’s capital city.
Luffy had been crowned a Yonko, a certified World Government scourge of the highest order.
Luffy still got kicked in the skull at breakfast for trying to snatch half-done bacon out of the frying pan. (Hard enough to bounce his head off the floor, then the ceiling, then the floor again.)
At face value there seemed to be no daylight between Luffy the pirate and Monkey D. Luffy, Emperor of the Sea, newly awakened into some ridiculous power and fresh from the victory of a lifetime—another in a long chain of what Law categorized as miracles.
He had a front row seat once before, on the palace rampart of Dressrosa, for a blast of Luffy’s Conqueror’s Haki and a new Gear debut. He was half conscious for a lot of it, but saw enough. Saw his worst enemy smote down into the dark underground recesses of the island. But whatever happened at Onigashima was something else entirely.
“Your abilities—those gears. They take a lot out of you.”
“Mm.”
“What about this one—Gear 5?”
“Hm?”
“What’s the side effect?”
“Hmm.” (A grin.) “I thought maybe I was going to die, but then I woke up like that. In Gear 5. My heart felt weird, but good, too. And then once I got tired again, I got old, and my heart stopped beating.”
“…What?”
“Then I told it to beat again, and it did, and then I kicked Kaido’s ass. Isn’t that funny?”
“What?”
(A laugh.)
“You have a lot of questions today, Torao.”
It confirmed what Law had suspected—that Luffy may have actually died on the rooftop, though temporarily. That knowledge sat with him like lead in his gut. He thought back to that moment of realization, the strange sense of silence and absence despite the clashing combat and hissing flames all around.
Of course, Law should have known better. It seemed that the very moment he felt a hint of doubt, a great hand reached down from the heavens to snatch up Kaido like a loose length of rope. Oh ye of little faith. Law couldn’t see much from the palace courtyard after that besides flashes of light, thunderous impacts, an immense fist cocked back against spiraling flames.
As he sensed the fight reach its peak, he had bowed his head and said something dangerously close to a prayer. But Law didn’t do prayers anymore.
“I said just two more minutes , can’t you wait even that long? Geez.”
Luffy scurried out of reach, complaining as Sanji brandished his foot again.
Law looked down at the pale steam curling off of his coffee. He reflected on Luffy’s new bounty poster with its wild white hair, wreathed in clouds, hand clamped over his eyes in mid laugh, looking so different yet still somehow so instantly recognizable as Luffy. There was something strange about all of it. The awakened Paramecia users Law knew of—himself, Doflamingo, Eustass Kidd—none of them had changed .
What are you, exactly? What did you become?
A plate slid in front of Law. Bacon, eggs, shredded potatoes.
Luffy’s own plate was clean within seconds—the table around him not so much, covered with tiny bits of breakfast shrapnel. His cheeks ballooned absurdly. He caught Law staring, gave a little wave.
Law didn’t care much for regular sailing ships. It wasn’t so bad last time he rode on the Sunny , being just temporary. But the sky and open sea stretching leagues in every direction somehow felt both oppressive and exposed, moreso every passing day.
He thought of the corpse of the Polar Tang shattered on the ocean floor. He missed the vessel like a limb. The feeling of being insulated, hidden, hydraulics sighing in the bulkheads like the respiration of some massive living thing. Knowing every rivet and square inch of the steel walls like an extension of himself. It had been truly one a kind, his home of many years, and its loss was a bone-deep ache to accompany the raw wound of his missing crew.
Being stranded so long above water made him wary. He sat with his back to a wall, in a corner where stairs met the deck, checking the horizon. Of course, even being under the waves hadn’t been enough protection in the end.
The heavy wingbeats of something approaching unseen made Law’s skin prickle. A shadow passed quickly overhead; just a News Coo, circling the ship, looking for a customer.
Nami stepped out of the galley, whistled and waved. She licked her thumb and leafed through a stack of bills as the gull landed awkwardly on the port railing. She tucked the payment in the bird’s satchel and waved in passing acknowledgement to Law as she took the newspaper back into the galley.
Law watched the News Coo fly off and resumed looking out over the water.
A few short minutes later, he half-startled at an exclamation from inside the galley.
It was Nami, talking loud in some mix of alarm and excitement. He couldn’t make out the words. The galley door slammed open, heels clattering on the deck as Nami rushed over.
“Hey! Torao! Hey, you have to see this–”
She thrust the unfolded newspaper into Law’s face, jabbing her nail into one of the headlines. Law blinked at the bold print.
Heart Pirate Crew in Marine Custody, Captain Trafalgar Law Still At Large
His heart somersaulted behind his ribs.
A small, grainy photo accompanied the article—he recognized the bulky, glowering figure of Jean Bart taking up most of the frame, the back of Ikkaku’s thick head of hair, the frozen grin of Hakugan’s mask, other faces farther away he couldn’t quite identify—other than Penguin, by his hat. All framed by iron bars.
Law almost didn’t dare believe it. He snatched the paper from Nami and scanned the article,
feeling unsteady on his feet as he quickly rose.
Not only had the crew all survived, but they had somehow evaded Blackbeard and made it off the island, only to be intercepted by a passing Marine fleet. Law was a little proud, extremely relieved, and sick to his stomach all at once.
The reassurance of his crew’s survival quickly faded. Getting them back was a new, massive problem of its own. The Marines’ lack of confidentiality on their location in the article seemed very intentional. Surely they guessed if Law was alive, he’d come for his crew, and they would no doubt be ready for him.
They were right that he would come. But Law found himself unable to imagine succeeding. He could think only about being on his back in the dirt, in the sea, on the deck of the Sunny.
The edges of the newspaper crumpled in hands tightened to fists. Bepo appeared, drawn down from the upper deck by the commotion. He took a few seconds to read and reread the headline before he blubbered, loud and overcome by joy, hugging Law around the neck nearly hard enough to strangle.
“Oh? So they made it?”
Luffy had leaned in suddenly from the stairs to read over Law’s shoulder.
“They did,” Law managed.
Luffy looked at Law out of the corner of his eye, seeming almost expectant.
“Ah. And the Marines got them?”
“Yeah.”
They looked at each other for another awkward, silent moment.
“Hm. So what are you going to do?”
Good fucking question.
“…I’ll figure something out.”
A flash of something— disappointment? —wrinkled Luffy’s brow, so fast Law almost didn’t catch it, before his face split into his trademark grin. He pulled back and gave Law a hearty clap on the back.
“Well, it’s good that they’re alive! I’m glad!”
He strolled away, arms swinging casually.
Nami looked after him. She opened her mouth as if to speak, but faltered. Glanced at Law, and back, expression confused.
Law had been steeling himself to scoff at whatever scheme Luffy inevitably came up with—if one could consider deciding on the spot to go find the Marines and kick their asses sophisticated enough to call a scheme. Part of him expected, maybe even hoped on some level that the weight of making further decisions would be taken from him.
The much-abused newspaper crumpled further. Maybe Luffy had finally decided to start taking his dismissal of the alliance seriously after all.
Bepo snuffled wetly into his shoulder, still hanging onto his neck. Law gave him a few perfunctory pats on the arm.
He slipped away to the infirmary, ignoring the indignant sounds from Nami as he took her paper with him.
It was well past midnight, but Law was wide awake. He sat on the edge of the infirmary cot and stared at the paper again in the lamplight without really reading it.
After a few aimless weeks of recovery and uncertainty, finally, he had some direction. He felt restless. But for the first time in a long time, Law, ever the strategist, found himself drawing a blank on the particulars of any kind of plan.
The paper drifted absently to the floor. He rested a hand on his flag, draped like a dead thing over the cot’s metal headboard.
The Heart Pirate Jolly Roger smelled of the sea. Salt had crusted white on the wrinkles of the black fabric. He threaded his fingers through open holes gouged out by sharp edges on the ocean floor.
Usopp had offered to repair it—trumpeted his mastery over the craft of sewing, how he’d bested a giant spider in a knitting contest, how he’d personally tailored for royals from a distant kingdom, how the flag would be in good hands, you’ll barely even remember it was torn when I’m done, guaranteed . Nami even sincerely vouched for his skill, the obvious lies aside. Still, Law declined.
It didn’t feel right to restore it, things being as they were.
A light knock came at the door. The handle turned, clicked.
“May I come in?” Robin asked, but she crossed the room without waiting for permission. Bepo twitched, but didn’t wake.
Law eyed Robin warily. She set down a cup of something steaming—tea, he supposed—within Law’s reach. Sat in the spare chair. Her smile was warm, a little rueful.
“I don’t always sleep well. I thought you might be awake too. It’s been an eventful day.”
She looked over the edge of her own cup towards the head of the bed frame, and the wretched flag hanging from it.
“I’m happy to hear they’re alive.”
“Mm.”
Law tried to get a read on Robin as she sipped quietly, eyes closed. There was a calm wisdom about her that he had always appreciated. It wasn’t for nothing that he confided in her back in Wano. But Law suspected he was about to find himself on the wrong end of her perceptiveness.
“What do you know about the incident at Enies Lobby?” Robin asked without preamble.
Whatever question he was expecting, it wasn’t that. Law thought back.
He had seen the headline, raised his brow at the skyrocketing bounty of some East Blue rookie—a kid with the defiant guts to burn a World Government flag, declare war, spring some dangerous woman from custody, make fools of the Marines right on their doorstep. He figured there was much more the article didn’t say, the invisible hand of the World Government editing away some of the embarrassment. The story was still damning on its face. Satisfying.
In hindsight, it was the first of Strawhat crew’s many miracles he’d heard of, back when the other captain was just a distant second-hand curiosity.
“I read about it in the paper.”
Robin hummed.
“Then you might not know that I turned myself in, in the first place.”
Law looked at Robin blankly. The Marines, of course, had taken full credit for apprehending Nico Robin at the time, no mention of surrender—but walking straight into their hands was a suicidal move for someone so uniquely dangerous to the World Government.
“Why?”
Robin blew gently on her steaming cup.
“I know you’re interested in the Poneglyphs, and the Void Century. So I imagine you’ve learned something about Ohara by now. I’m sure you can guess what it was like, knowing what I know, being from that island.”
Law nodded. He had come across official accounts of the destruction of Ohara, stinking of the same censorship and propaganda that defined the annihilation of Flevance.
“So, it made sense at the time. Better to just be done with running than live looking over my shoulder forever, being skeptical of everything and everyone, trouble following me everywhere.”
Law thought back to nurses and doctors cringing away from him as if he were poisonous just to look at. Like he infected the very air around him. The panicked flights from every hospital the very second his origins, his condition, were exposed. Fully believing he was beyond saving, but letting Corazon drag him through the motions anyways.
He could relate.
Robin sipped, tapped a finger on her cup reflectively.
“I didn't want to explain myself. When you forget how to trust other people long enough, you do unnecessary things.”
“So. You changed your mind.”
Robin hummed an affirmative.
“And then Strawhat rescued you.”
“Yes. Well, I suppose technically he saved me first, and rescued me after. That’s generally how it is, with Luffy.” Robin smiled, fond, remembering. “It would have saved a lot of trouble had I just been honest with him, and myself, from the beginning.”
“Why are you telling me all of this?”
Robin finished her tea in one long swallow, stood, and turned to leave.
“You told me something important about yourself back in Wano. I’m just returning the favor.” She paused and considered Law from the corner of her eye. “And because I know that look.”
Law bristled.
“What look, exactly?”
Robin smiled.
“Goodnight, Torao.”
She slipped out of the room. Law’s tea slowly went cold on the bedside stand.
Law laid awake in the dark for a long time, turning what Robin said over in his mind. The wood walls creaked at intervals as the ship nodded through the gentle swells.
He knew very well she was telling him to admit he was stuck, in her cryptic way. But the very idea of asking for help snagged in his throat.
In the entire time they had worked together, Luffy had subverted Law’s expectations, ignored his requests, tore up his careful plans, and generally defied logic in his actions. Of course, as it generally happened where the Strawhats were concerned, things had a way of working out for the best.
But. Law knew better than to expect a miracle just because he asked.
After a time, Bepo rustled, gave an audible yawn. He sat up, silent at first, pawing at his eyes. He eventually asked the quiet room:
“Hey, Captain? Are you awake?”
“Mm.”
Law could just see the outline of Bepo against the moonlight from the window. He leaned forward, shoulders rounded. Bepo hesitated a moment before speaking.
“Hey, have you thought any more about–do we have a plan?”
Still working on it, Law wanted to say, but it felt like lying through his teeth.
“I was thinking, maybe—well, I wondered if—”
There was a long pause as Bepo worked up some resolve. He dithered, picked under his claws.
“...we could ask Strawhat for help?”
Law wondered if Bepo had been awake earlier after all. He thought back to Luffy, congratulatory and smiling, but giving no indication of further intervening in Law’s affairs.
“When has he ever listened to what I say? If he wants to do anything, he’ll just do it.”
“You think he wouldn’t help if we asked?”
“He’s helped enough. And we’re not allies anymore.”
“I mean.” Bepo sighed through his nose, a little exasperated, “You say that, but the Strawhats went out of their way, and are letting us stay on their ship right now, and—“
“ Leave it , Bepo,” Law snapped, and was instantly sorry when Bepo visibly recoiled. It wasn’t like Law to get mean and pull rank to win an argument with his own crew. He was floundering as a leader in ways he never had.
But Bepo was patient with him still. Somehow.
“Okay. Sorry, Captain.”
“It’s fine. It’s just—we can’t just change our minds when it’s convenient. We’ll find a way.”
Nevermind that it was really only Law who had decided the alliance was over in the first place. He wouldn’t have made it off Winner Island at all if Bepo hadn’t asked Chopper for a favor between ‘former’ allies. Not to mention being plucked out of the sea by the Strawhats, afterwards.
There was a rustle and a deep sigh as Bepo laid back down. A few minutes passed. Law thought Bepo had gone back to sleep until he spoke again, quietly, almost to himself.
“I just want to see them again.”
Law thought of the grainy, creased faces in the newspaper lying somewhere out of sight in the dark, where he left them.
Yeah. I know.
In the dwindling hours before dawn, Law dreamed of fire, and could have been forgiven at first for thinking it was Flevance.
The clashing of steel brought the scene into better focus—the dome of Onigashima, bodies crossing swords all around him, wraithlike and indistinct silhouettes against the burning palace.
Then there was the sound he remembered so well. Distant howling laughter. The air crackled, dense and electric with Haki.
Law looked up from the pit of hell.
Luffy, or whatever he had become, stood up on the roof facing away. He towered above the scattered spires of rock in the cold light of the swollen full moon. Clouds, white and unruly as his hair, wreathed his colossal body. His shoulders shook with mirth.
There was a spine-tingling awareness within Law that he was in the presence of something otherworldly, divine, even. Something that could crush him if it wanted to.
If it even noticed him at all.
Law made up his mind to leave the following night.
Every passing moment he imagined the Marine warships cruising at a leisurely pace, dangling the carrot and giving him all the time in the world to try his luck. Thought of his crew in chains.
A half moon shone faintly through the porthole. It was a clear, still night—maybe not the best conditions to make an escape unseen. Law’s plan was extremely half-baked by his usual standards. But he couldn’t stand to wait another day.
He stood for a long, silent moment, looking over at Bepo where he slept on the floor.
Law also couldn’t tolerate getting the last member of his crew captured or killed in the likely scenario that he failed to rescue the rest. The Strawhats would look after Bepo in any case, he was sure.
You’re out of your mind trying this alone, warned the last sensible part of him.
Law ran his hand lightly over the stiff wrinkles of the flag one more time before he went.
He conjured a Room and felt around blindly for a loose object below deck. The soft glow of the infirmary was replaced by near darkness; the Strawhat’s Waver took his place above, and knocked lightly against the mattress.
Law paused with hands on his knees, out of practice, half winded by just a single jump and disoriented by the sudden dimness. After a minute adjusting, he opened the single door. Stepping into the central hub of the Soldier Dock, he peered at the numbered rooms.
Law had been given an enthusiastic tour of the Sunny’s features on the route to Dressrosa. As Franky led him around, Law tried giving him an out—trying to be fair, since some of the Strawhats didn’t seem to understand the concept of a temporary alliance with someone who would ordinarily be their enemy. He suggested Franky keep some of the ship’s secrets to himself.
Franky just laughed.
The third Dock, Law knew, held the Shark Submerge . He slowly turned the knob and slipped inside.
The grinning mouth of the submarine caught the faint light in sharp points. Law studied it and the surrounding room, considered his options. Cut out a piece out of the hull, maybe, something small, just enough to have something to switch the Shark with. Put the piece back if he was feeling charitable.
Of course, if he couldn’t pilot the submarine, he’d fall straight to the seafloor and potentially crumple like a metal can from the water pressure. It was sink or swim, literally.
Law wracked his brain for the details of the Shark’s features and operation which Franky had described in loving detail—your ship is a submarine, yeah? I bet you’ll find this super.
He peered in the porthole window at the control panel. His experience as a submarine captain would have to let him muddle through.
Depth range of five thousand meters, backup wind dials with 72 hours surplus air supply, the control scheme is probably unconventional compared to the Polar Tang but—
“Torao, if you want to borrow the Shark, you should ask Franky about it first.”
Law nearly flinched out of his skin in surprise.
Luffy leaned on the frame of the open Dock 3 door, arms loosely crossed. He looked in no way bothered to find Law skulking around in the dead of night and obviously up to no good. It made Law too furious to even try to lie.
“I’m not borrowing it, I’m stealing it, ” he hissed.
Luffy just looked at him patiently. Law gritted his teeth.
“What part of ‘our alliance is over’ don’t you understand? I told you when we left Wano. We’re enemies now. You shouldn’t be helping me.”
The words just bounced off. Same as they had in the throne room in Dressrosa, same as at Tokage Port. Law recalculated.
“I’m going after Laugh Tale. Did you forget? I’m a pirate too. Looking for the One Piece, same as you.”
Maybe it didn’t hit a nerve, but it did get a response.
“I’m not worried about that. You won’t beat me,” said Luffy, serene.
No, Law conceded. Especially with no ship, and no Poneglyphs. Or a crew.
More importantly than that, being a D notwithstanding, Law knew full well that Luffy’s exceptional will eclipsed his own. Luffy was something else entirely. After what he’d seen and felt in Wano, there was no question.
Still, as a matter of principle, Law wouldn’t go down without a fight. He flexed his hand.
He didn’t expect Luffy to suckerpunch him.
It wasn’t particularly hard, not even a fraction of Luffy’s immense strength, but enough to knock the wind out of him. Law saw stars as his head bounced off the wall. He doubled over on his knees, clutching his still-tender ribs.
“You want to go after your crew, right?”
Luffy walked across the dock, sandaled feet coming into view as Law hunched and fought to inhale.
“I get it. You miss them a lot, and it hurts, but. What can you do for them like this? Torao, be serious.”
The mild, slightly disappointed tone made Law want to scream. There was no clearer indication of how far he had fallen than Luffy acting as the voice of reason.
“You of all people don’t get to tell me to be serious,” he wheezed. “We already did everything we agreed to do together. Took down Doflamingo. And Kaido, so—“
“So?”
Law looked up, exasperated.
“ If you’re in trouble, call for us. That’s what I said after Mingo. Remember? To everyone. And that means you, too.”
“I’m not part of your fleet,” Law said pointedly.
It was Luffy’s turn to act annoyed. He rolled his eyes.
“Well yeah, I know that. But—”
“Why even make me ask?” Law hissed. “You’ll just do what you want, anyways.”
“Because we’re friends,” Luffy said, like it was as simple and obvious as the sky being blue.
“ Allies.” Law fumbled. “And not even that, anymore.”
On some level Law understood he was acting irrationally. But it went further than just pride.
It was one thing, proposing an alliance as equals towards a mutual goal—or accepting help freely given, a concept upon which his grasp was still new and tentative.
It was something else entirely to reach out to a greater power, vulnerable, with nothing to exchange but faith.
“Uh-huh. Okay.”
Luffy did not sound remotely like he agreed with Law, or was listening that closely at all, digging idly at his ear.
“Anyways, friends can ask me for things. So—”
Luffy crossed his arms. Tilted his head a little to the side.
“What do you want?”
Law looked down, breathing shallow.
He had prayed back in Flevance. After Lammy collapsed, when the fences were raised, when gunshots began ringing out in the streets. Had looked up helplessly to a black and red sky swirling with embers and begged for relief. Received no reply.
Despite that, in the end he had prayed for Corazón, too, desperate when it became clear nothing on earth could possibly protect him.
The merciful hand he hoped for never came.
When Law finally renounced that faith, the heavens’ silent indifference cut deeper than any divine retribution imaginable.
He thought of the remote, towering figure in his dream.
What do I want?
Law wanted— needed his crew, whole, at his side. He thought of their faces in the newspaper, his heart in a vise. Another chance felt like too much to ask for with empty, selfish hands.
Miracles, Law had called the many improbable victories of the Strawhats. Even knowing that, he had walked into the alliance with Luffy naively thinking he could wield it as he saw fit.
Only while being quite literally dragged across the whole of Dressrosa despite calling things off had he begun to realize the full gravity of what he signed on for. But in the end, Luffy worked in mysterious ways, and Law got more than he bargained for, even dreamed of.
With blood in his teeth on the palace roof, Law swore to Doflamingo that he couldn’t beat Strawhat Luffy. In the end, Luffy proved him right.
And the night of the raid on Onigashima, Law stood in the light of the cataclysm shining down through the roof, closed his eyes.
Believed.
And, well.
What had Luffy ever done in return for Law’s faith but reward him?
Law crumbled. The prayer tore its way out of him.
Help me. Please. Help me get them back.
The words hung in the close stillness. Law trembled like he was on his knees in the streets of his burning town, in the stifling silence of a shut treasure chest, all over again. Dampness threatened his eyes as he looked up.
Luffy’s smile was radiant in the dim room, standing above.
He held out his hand.