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Marineford had led them here. A war that fed itself into another conflict, regurgitated and bloody, thirsty for more lives than the thousands it had already claimed upon the land of justice. A disaster – although, it could not be that, could it? It hadn’t happened suddenly; everyone had planned for it. Neither had it been a natural occurrence. There had been men on the sea who’d seen it coming.
Shanks, for example. Possibly, Pops as well, but decided freedom for his sons was more valuable. Maybe, Marco should’ve predicted it too.
Or, perhaps, it was inevitable.
An event with world-shaking magnitudes that was bound to happen sooner or later. Lives whose sentences had already been written for years just because of whose side they chose, of whose blood they carried and whom they called loved ones.
Piracy or justice.
Had either of them truly won?
Marco did not think so. Although, that was irrelevant now, was it? All he’d been left with was a gaping, devouring loss and a hunger for revenge. A revenge that, had he been a better man, perhaps more like Pops, he would’ve been able to abate, to control, but he wasn’t. He would never be.
So, he led his brothers onto the battlefield to the marching sounds of pain, wrath and vengeance. He took their hands and with a terrible broken hole in his chest for Pops and for Ace, he guided them. For all that he was sure each one of his brothers would say they’d chosen this path for themselves, that it was their responsibility, their freedom too, Marco was still aware of the role he’d played. He was supposedly their captain now, no? Their safety fell on his shoulders, their dreams, and he’d taken them straight to the slaughterhouse.
Now, with wide stubby fingers wrapped around his throat and his feet hanging in the air, Marco wondered if this massacre was by his own doing. Marshall D. Teach’s booming laugh broke through the air in a cruel gesture of power.
“Marco! What do you say we end this now, yeah?” His words dripped with a put up front; because the First Division Commander knew that’s all it was, because Teach was nothing more than a coward. A traitor. “Should we end it with Pops’ power?”
The blonde man spared a desperate glance towards the battlefield. It was horrifying. The blood. The smell. The losses and the wounded. Those still fighting, as if they’d be happy to die here. He’d made such a grave mistake. He’d doomed them all. The brothers he had left. His hands struggled, trying to free himself from Teach’s choking grip. Nails digging beneath the skin and drawing blood, wetting their skin in a crimson color they both shared.
He saw Izo, still holding his pistols with a bleeding gash across his forehead. The red decorated his face and he looked like an omen of death itself. He saw Jozu, half turned into a diamond to protect himself from any attacks. Vista, as well, was fighting, his normally easy-going behavior now turned into exhaustion as the battle stretched on.
Teach laughed again and the clash between pirates stopped. Everyone was drawn in by the cackle pouring like a river from the large man who held in his hand – filled with darkness, void and empty, and wet with blood – the struggling figure of Marco the Phoenix.
It seemed a standstill had been reached, a decisive point.
Victory or defeat .
The blonde tried fruitlessly to summon back his blue flames, his talons and wings. Again and again, tiring himself out in a mindless circle of resistance. The eyes of his brothers stared at him in despair. He could imagine disappointment in them too, a cruel kind of disappointment; all he’d done as a captain was condemn them and himself to an execution that would be anything but kind. Was that what the remnants of the Whitebeard pirates were without their father? Vengeful souls, blood-thirsty and suicidal? Or was it simply a family following their older brother, consumed by rage at what one of them had done?
The air crackled, the very earth itself shuddered at the caress coming from Teach who was gathering a tightly formed sphere of quake in his left hand. Marco knew it wasn’t a killing blow; he’d survive it, because Teach wanted him to and he was stubborn enough. What would happen to his brothers if they saw him die in front of them? Another disappointment. Another loss.
Teach swung his arm.
The fist connected with Marco’s head.
A strangling scream escaped his throat as best it could with the grip Blackbeard had on him. Silence filled the battlefield, bloodshed interrupted by the agonizing cry of the Whitebeard’s leader at the mercy of Marshall D. Teach.
It felt like his head was scrambling from the inside out. He clenched his teeth, grating against each other. Eyes closed in a poor attempt at withstanding the pain, in an attempt to not let them spill out from his head and limbs flailing, uselessly. Marco would have believed his brain to be destroyed enough to drop piece by piece from inside of him, bloody and wet, splattering against the floor along with everything that made up his head; flesh torn in a grimace of anguish, bones cracked like a fragile vase, flesh muddled together in indistinguishable pieces.
The terrible quake – nevertheless – passed.
His arms dropped by his side, unresponsive. His thoughts felt confusing as if they’d been half-erased, messily and leaving traces behind, but not quite enough to decipher what the original author had meant.
“Is that really all you had in you?” A low, playful voice teased. It sounded far away. His throat was snug against a warm, calloused touch. Whose? The sudden urgency of having to free himself washed over him. For some reason, he needed to get out of here now.
“Marco! Fucking snap out of it!” Someone else yelled. Both voices were familiar, one filled him with anger while the other sounded too desperate for his ears. The whistling of two bullets passing by made him snap out of it.
The war.
Teach.
Izo.
Izo had screamed.
Teach swung his arm again when he saw clarity creep back into the blonde’s eyes – there was panic in Blackbeard’s face. He couldn’t allow the other man to recuperate, it’d meant the end for him. For them.
Marco had to die here.
The fist caressed Marco’s head wrapped in a hit that broke the air around them.
The war resumed, like a starting shot, as a second cry left Marco.
Marco’s head lulled to one side, gaze bleary. Different shades of red mixed as far as his eyes could reach. His brothers’ blood spilled from his own orders; they had followed Marco, chosen to do so, yet, now, that choice seemed meaningless if it meant the breaking of a promise to protect them.
“Pull back! Retreat now!”
“Marco…” The plea did not reach the ears of the blonde commander, although the Wano-born samurai wished it did. A defeat. A surrender. Was this any better than death?
“I said pull back!” The commander yelled again. His voice was firm, more calm than a man without half a face should sound like.
“You’re matching with Pops now.”
Teach swung his arm again.
The fist crashed against Marco’s face with a horrible crack. Blackbeard’s hand was stained with red, wet and lumpy flesh that was not his own sliding in between the cracks of his fingers.
Izo could only find it in himself to stare. Stare and stare as Marco ordered them to flee. To retreat. He didn’t say it, but “ For Pops, for Ace” was implicit enough. The samurai turned around.
His back faced Marco.
A silhouette he did not longer recognize as Marco, a piece of him missing against the stark sun that rained on their defeat, screamed once again for the safety of his- their crew. Izo ran, avoiding bullets and returning some of the shots. He ignored the pain in his legs, in his arms and his joints and he ran.
Not out of fear. Not following an order. But, for a promise.
A promise of life.
To his father, to his brothers.
To escape this battlefield and have the privilege of living another day.
To not waste a sacrifice.
To not put the consequences of an inevitable vengeance on the shoulders of a single man.
To be free.
***
Two days later, Izo returned.
He’d seen Jozu, Vista and Haruta escape in different directions, a look the only goodbye they’d been able to spare each other. The understanding that they might not see one another again settling deep in the samurai’s gut. He could lie to himself as to why he’d come back, but he didn’t. He wanted to see if Marco was alive. Although, he wasn’t sure why he knew that if the blonde had survived, he’d still be here.
The remnants of the sixteenth division that had followed him out of the island that housed their war, now, fiddled anxiously about the boat, doing mindless chores. They wondered why their commander stubbornly decided to return to a place that had only seen their defeat and their entrails. None of them wanted the remainder of what they’d lost. Still, with shaking legs, they followed their leader.
“I’ll be getting off the ship by myself. None of you are allowed to follow me, understood?” Izo’s voice wasn’t loud, neither was it firm as an order should require. Perhaps, because he was doing them a favor by uttering those words. There were no protests about the decision. So, when the keel of their ship threatened to brush the beach’s sand, Izo disembarked by himself on a small canoe.
The sand jumped up and down over his sandals and bare feet as he walked. His haki spread around the island in a desperate search for something living.
It found something.
A beating heart at the center of the island, where their blood had seeped down into the earth, feeding it. Izo could only hope it was Marco, for if there were any members of Teach’s crew still around, he’d have to face a broken promise. Without a rush, pacing himself with every step, he advanced towards that presence.
A wide clearing – one he was familiar with – spread around him, greener than he’d remembered. Perhaps, the illusion his mind had made up of finding nothing but red decorating the tree leaves and ground had been nothing but that, a fabrication. Yet, his eyes had only been able to focus on the way a pair of hands, bruised and bloody, tightly held a shovel, digging again and again. Hands that connected to a body with a tuft of blonde hair upon his head.
Marco.
Slowly, the scene focused in front of him, as if it was a photograph clearing as it developed, captured by the sentient eyes of a den den mushi.
Marco stood in the middle of the old battleground, shoulders squared and tense, digging deep into the earth. The field was covered in several holes, some of them better filled than others, some still open to the warm air of midday, at top of the squares of stirred earth stones and carefully cut wooden sticks stood proudly; markings. Graves. Marco was digging graves for their fallen brothers, must have probably been at it for those two entire days given how many Izo could count.
The man was still badly bruised. The side that had been repeatedly abused by Teach’s fist was a horrible purple and yellow stain spreading across his face and down his neck, disappearing between the unbuttoned shirt that covered his torso.
Why hadn’t he healed them?
“Marco.” Izo spoke, snapping the First Division Commander out of some strange reverie. The samurai hadn’t been noticed by the blonde it seemed, and it worried him. Terribly so.
“Izo. Why are you here?” His voice was hollow, like when they’d lost Pops, when they’d lost Ace.
“You stupid fool. Of course I’m here, Marco.” There was always a special lilt in Izo’s voice when he spoke the blonde’s name. Not at the beginning though, but now, it’d been years since it had sounded like this. It was an old dance for them. Izo spoke again.
“What are you doing?” A useless question.
“Burying them.” An obvious answer.
“Do you want me to help you?”
At the offer, Marco stared long and hard at Izo. It reminded the samurai of the one time he’d caught the blonde gazing at him, they’d still been young back then; there’d been a party, a quiet place on a beach, alcohol and they’d been barely twenty. The First Division Commander had whispered by Izo’s ear that he was the most beautiful person he’d ever seen and Izo had stained Marco’s mouth with lipstick well into dawn.
“There’s only this one left.”
“Let me.” Izo’s hand found Marco’s, gently taking the shovel away from the taller man, almost having to dislodge it from the blonde’s fingers, stiff and tense. The samurai caressed the other’s hands with a gentle squeeze before taking the tool for himself. “Go sit down, Marco.”
A protest was bubbling up on the blonde commander’s lips.
“Just shut up, Marco.” His lips shut together at the samurai’s words. Like gospel, like an order from god itself, the man obeyed. “You haven’t even healed yourself enough. You always do this, you know? Just heal yourself enough, never completely.”
“Well, I can deal with a couple of days of pain. I do get exhausted, you know?”
“I know, Marco. But I also thought I’d left my brother to die back there, you know?” It wasn’t truly an accusation, but it felt bitter – whether Izo meant it to come out that way or not, was something that Marco would never quite manage to figure out –. “Half of your face was missing, you know what that looked like? Do you have any idea?” The samurai’s usual soft voice raised, index finger digging into Marco’s chest.
“I suppose I don’t. Would’ve been quite hard to see m-”
“You don’t.”
“Alright.” A pause. “I just wanted you to surviv-”
“I know. Stop talking, you’re gonna start sounding too much like Pops.” Both of them laughed, a sad chuckle, at Izo’s statement. Their eyes met each other and Izo saw a sorrow so deep, it felt like he’d drown in it. It felt suffocating, thickening the air around them, wrapping its ghostly fingers around Izo’s neck; ready to strangle whatever relief seeing Marco alive had brought.
Marco gave a small nod. His hands finally untangled their grip fully from the shovel, giving it willingly to Izo. A concession.
So, Izo dug. Marco helped him put the body in the shallow grave and look for a proper marking. Silence accompanied them as they puttered about, putting together with shaking hands scraps and the bare bones of what a funeral for a pirate should be.
It should’ve been at sea, with the body wrapped in the sheets of their hammock, or their resting place, with a couple of coins and some belongings, to help them pass by, to help them rest. With the goodbye of their family, perhaps on their home soil. Yet, now, here, in the aftermath of vengeance, Marco could only offer this to his brothers.
The blonde’s knees shook, giving way. His joints met the soft earth with a quiet thud and Izo followed, hands cradling Marco’s face. The ground felt wet, whether it was from rain, moisture or the blood of fallen pirates, Izo and Marco wondered, quietly in their own minds. The samurai knew what would happen now, he’d seen it when Pops and Ace died. The broken sobs Marco let out that night still haunted his dreams sometimes – they certainly had the past two –, yet, what else could he do?
Was it unfair for them to keep on living while they died? To survive?
“I led you all here, knowing it would end with bloodshed-”
“We followed you, Marco. We decided to follow you. Do not take responsibility for choices we, ourselves, made.”
“That does not change the massacre that I led you into.”
“It does not, but I do hope it eases the burden in your heart.”
It doesn’t, Marco thought, although he did not answer.
The tears Izo had expected did not come, and the samurai was unsure if that was a good thing or not. Yet, Marco did move forward, his arms did embrace Izo. He felt Marco’s face find refuge in his shoulder and, as selfish as it might be, thanked the sea for not having to hear the blonde man crumble.
“Marco, heal your bruises…” Izo whispered by the man’s ear, a soft sigh the only response he got before blue flames rippled over both of them. They were always just perfectly warm, yet, the expectation of heat always left Izo with a shudder crawling up his spine. The samurai’s hands reached to cradle Marco’s face and separate it from his shoulder.
“Thank you.” Izo whispered, unnecessary, yet, freely given, as Marco stared back at him, no traces of destruction upon him.
When Izo had joined the Whitebeard Pirates, Marco had already eaten the fruit. Inevitably, the samurai could only wonder when he’d eaten it. Had he been a kid? How small? Had it been just a few days before they reached Wano? Had Marco been born as a defiance to destruction? To death itself? Born to be marred, waiting for any scars to stick? Again and again and again? To continue surviving, as penance for something no mortal could comprehend?
Izo had gotten lost in Marco’s blue eyes, hollow, yet present; aware of everything that had transpired.
“Can I kiss you?” The blonde spoke, dragging them both back to the abandoned island they had settled in.
“Depends.” Izo’s reply came easy. A kiss was not only a gesture of love, of affection, but also a farewell. An unavoidable one, given how much they’d fed this earth with the cadavers of their brothers. Would it be a dead man’s kiss? To selfishly take one last good thing for himself?
Marco, in an uncomplicated gesture, pressed their lips together. It still felt familiar, even after so many years, the way they fit together with open mouths. They sank into each other, with open palms and open arms, too.
A farewell, whether Izo wanted it or not. Staying together would only serve to paint targets on their backs, on everyone else’s back, besides, Marco had already made the decision. Now, in the arms of a lover, and bloodied, in the arms of a traitor.
The Whitebeard pirates would disband.
Izo would leave Marco unbruised, yet, the first mate would never truly grow out of not healing small scraps; it always felt silly.
They wouldn’t see each other for more than a year.
Until they both returned to Wano.
The samurai knew it to be another farewell, he confessed it so to the pirate, that, perhaps, selfishly, he’d be a survivor once again.
He’d been able to provide a beautiful funeral for Izo with the help of the Akazaya Nine, in Izo’s home, with his family and holding his sister in his arms the best he could. The snow settled into every little corner of the landscape as it fell, it was cold. Was Izo cold as well?
Marco wondered why the samurai had always been so concerned with him not fully healing small wounds. Was it such a sin? Something to keep a mortal soul awake at night about? After all, he’d been the one surviving once again.
Was that why?
Was his survival a bad habit? Or precursor to all of them?
These losses are not as easy to heal as a bruise, you know, Izo? The phoenix wondered, quietly, to himself; almost swearing he could hear Izo’s answer. An affectionate smile, a kiss, and I know, that’s what I tried to tell you.
Marco’s hand gently pressed against the wood of the shrine, firmly and tenderly.
“Rest well, Izo.” He whispered to himself, to the snow, to the quiet field.