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Something Worth Dying For	By : slj812000 Category: +M to R > One Piece Views: 10730 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece, nor the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 12
- 13
- 14
Chapter Thirteen: Ace
It was quarter to five in the morning on Thursday when Ace spied Luffy trying to stealthily hop the fence for their yard in order to sneak in the back door. Admittedly, after three weeks, he’d gotten better at it. He wasn’t all bumps and whispered curses as he fumbled up the stairs and down the pitch black hallway to his room anymore. But that didn’t mean that Ace didn’t know Luffy was still doing it.
The first night he’d done it, Luffy had acted suspiciously the entire day. Luffy had been commandeered to participate in a block by block search for Nojiko’s little sister Nami along with himself and those other idiots Luffy hung out with. Luffy had sulked about it; complaining that he should at least be allowed to search with someone (he mentioned Zoro by name and listed occasions when the boy had gotten lost in his own school) so he had someone to talk to.
The old man had denied that, saying that more ground could be covered if they went out individually, but Ace had wondered if Luffy should have been sent out with someone. He had a tendency to lose his train of thought and become easily distracted. Case and point, Ace had seen Luffy running down the street as fast as he could that same afternoon chasing after a bread truck when he was supposed to be on the other side of town looking for Nami.
Ace really thought that Luffy would be more concerned about the fate of the friend he had gone to dinner with, and incidentally, had talked non-fucking-stop about for several weeks. But no. Not only had he ditched out on searching for her, Luffy had not responded to any of the texts or calls Ace had made for the rest of the afternoon and then suddenly showed up for dinner, asking for money.
A lot of money.
Two hundred thousand berries to be exact. The old man said no instantly, telling Luffy he needed to earn money and not just expect it, and then droned on for like twenty minutes about how youth today had no idea what it was like to have to earn the things they wanted. Ace had ignored the speech, having heard something of the like several times before. Luffy had looked positively crushed at the denial.
Curiosity had burned a hole in Ace’s stomach, though, wondering what Luffy could possibly want to use that sum of money for, and he had followed the boy to his room after dinner. There, he watched in amazement, as Luffy scoured his entire room for berries. In the end, he had only managed to scrounge up about a hundred and twenty thousand berries.
“It’s not enough,” Luffy muttered, frowning at the money in his hand.
“Not enough for what?” Ace prompted. Luffy gave him a miserable look.
“I want to hang out with my friend tonight,” Luffy replied. “I don’t have enough money to do it.”
Ace frowned. Five thousand berries to go hang out at the arcade, Ace understood. But what could he possibly need two hundred thousand for? “Your friend?”
“Yeah,” Luffy nodded. “I want to see her, but I can’t unless I pay two hundred thousand.”
Her? The whole thing rankled of something odd. It almost sounded like Luffy was going to pay for a stripper.
“Where is this friend?” Ace asked.
“Downtown,” Luffy answered. Ace racked his brain. There was nothing downtown except for some office buildings, a couple of over-priced restaurants, and…a strip club.
“Is your ‘friend’ at a club?” Ace prodded further. Luffy thought it over for a moment before shrugging.
“I guess,” he told him. “There was lots of guys there, and this big ugly guy said I couldn’t come in unless I had money.”
Ace let his face fall into his hand as he shook his head in dismay. “Luffy, is your friend a stripper?”
“Stripper?” Luffy repeated, puzzled. “No, she’s a messenger.”
“A messenger?” Ace asked.
“She takes messages around for work,” Luffy explained. “I asked her once.”
Taking messages around…Ace tried to translate what Luffy was telling him. Damn, how he wished Sabo was here. Sabo had always been great at understanding Luffy when Ace couldn’t. But Sabo wasn’t answering any of his texts or calls, so Ace assumed that the blonde had probably gotten a new phone again. Either that, or had finally found himself a girlfriend.
Racking his brain, Ace tried to come up with a reason someone would take a message back and forth in a strip club. And then it hit him: she was a waitress. She would take orders (messages) from men and take them to the bartender.
Well, at least Luffy wasn’t trying to ‘hang out’ with a stripper. Still, why was this club even considering letting a fifteen-year-old into it? If anyone busted Luffy there, the club would see some serious fines. That must be what the two hundred thousand was for.
“Luffy, is this person your girlfriend?” Ace asked outright. It was the only explanation Ace could come up with to explain why Luffy was so distracted by this other girl to forget about his friend Nami.
Luffy shrugged again. “Yeah. She’s my girlfriend.”
Despite himself, Ace grinned lewdly. So his little bro had his first girlfriend, eh? This was big news. Luffy was growing up. Ace had thought he’d have a couple more years before he’d have to explain the mechanics of sex to his younger brother. Now he absolutely had to get a hold of Sabo. They would also have to video the explanation, because Ace was sure Luffy was going to say some hilarious shit and made some really goofy faces. They would be able to laugh at it for years to come.
“Here you go, Luffy,” Ace offered, trying to hold back a laugh. He’d dug into his wallet and pulled out the remaining eighty thousand berries and handed it to his brother. “Go have fun with your girlfriend. But this is a one-time deal. You can’t go see her all the time if it’s gonna cost you this much every time. Plus, you don’t want to be a bother to her at work.”
“Okay,” Luffy quickly agreed. “Thanks, Ace!”
And like that, the boy had bounded down the stairs and out the door, not coming home until close to dawn.
A couple of times in the last few weeks, Ace had tried following Luffy to catch a glimpse of this girlfriend of his. But all through summer break, Luffy had slept in past noon and spent his afternoons in the company of his three friends. Not once did Luffy ask for money again, but neither did a girl ever show up to spend time with the guys. Ace had tried following his brother downtown, but the boy always became distracted by something, whether it be a restaurant or an arcade or even a stray dog, and Ace would lose sight of him. A couple times, Ace had even tried hanging out in front of the strip club to intercept his brother, but Luffy never showed. Yet every day, between four-thirty and five in the morning, Luffy returned home and went straight to bed.
But today, Ace was determined. He was going to follow his brother around the whole day and see this girlfriend for himself, or at least, find out what was keeping Luffy out until half past four in the morning.
.o0o.
Ace expected Luffy to stay in bed past noon, as per usual. He had plans to spend the morning, while waiting for his brother to wake up, helping Nojiko put up flyers with her sister’s face on them across the city. Again. The flyers seemed to disappear from the message boards and telephone poles as fast as they were hung. It was more than a little suspicious.
The orange-haired girl that was Nojiko’s adopted sister had gone missing after a burglary turned homicide at a restaurant. At least, that’s what the police were officially calling it. No one, including his damnable little brother, was opening their mouths about what really went down at that restaurant, but Ace knew something more than a burglary had gone down.
It had taken almost four weeks to be able to convince the old man that Noji’s sister Nami needed to be reported missing. The old man had thought it more likely that she had just run away. But statements taken from witnesses that had been around the restaurant during the incident indicated that not long after the first shot was fired, a young woman appeared to be forced into a car by four men.
“Thanks for doing this with me,” Nojiko spoke up as they walked towards downtown. It had the most foot traffic, therefore was the best place to put up the fliers, but they always disappeared the fastest, too.
“No problem,” Ace told her. “I don’t like to sleep all day like my brother. This gives me something to do until he wakes up and I stalk his ass around town. I’m going to meet his girlfriend tonight; I’m bound and determined.”
“Still. You’re really too nice,” Nojiko praised with a half smile. “Helping me paper the entire city in exchange for a few tutoring lessons.”
Ace gave her a brilliant smile and threw his arm around her shoulder. “Hey, thanks to you, I probably won’t have to repeat year my last year of school. That’s pretty fucking important to me. And this is important to you.”
Nojiko leaned her head against his shoulder briefly. “It is important to me. And you seem to be the only one willing to do it.”
She took on a sour look and Ace knew she was thinking of Luffy or the old man, and their lack of effort to do anything concerning her sister.
“Not true,” he contradicted, trying to lighten the atmosphere. “I bet that guy Smoker has not worked half as hard under my old man as he has under your mom’s command.”
It worked; Nojiko smiled. He liked her better that way.
Oh, who the hell was he kidding? He’d like her if she were cross-eyed and drooling. Hell, he’d really like her pushed up against that wall over there, her legs wrapped around his hips, her hands pinned above her head as he stuck his tongue down her—
Focus, Ace. Focus.
“He really does bend over backwards for her,” Nojiko admitted, breaking the hold he had on her shoulder to go hang a flyer. Ace hated letting go, but it wasn’t a bad view to watch her walk away from him.
“I know, right?” Ace chuckled, trying not to be caught staring. “Those two are meant for each other. I don’t know why they don’t see it. You can practically cut the sexual tension between them with a knife.”
Nojiko laughed. Like, really laughed. He hadn’t seen that in almost four weeks. It made his chest feel warm.
Aw, shit. He was catching feelings. Son of a bitch!
“I don’t know,” Nojiko admitted as she returned to his side and they continued on. “I don’t think Bell-mère’s even knows that she loves him. She probably knows that she cares for him, maybe, but not to the extent that he does. I think poor Smoker is a man who might spend the rest of his days regretting not doing something about it.”
Shitty, mother fucking feelings! Ace absently rubbed at his chest before catching himself. He sure as hell knew what Smoker was probably going through. Forever friend-zoned by the person who would be perfect for him. Sounded pretty damn sad.
‘No way in hell I’m gonna end up like that,’ Ace vowed to himself. ‘Oh well, nothing ventured, nothing gained.’
He put his arm around her shoulders again and angled her body towards his. He had half a second to take in her confused look before he kissed her. It wasn’t the balls-out, tongue down her throat showcase he’d been fantasizing about, but rather a short, two-second test-the-waters deal. She looked stunned when he pulled away.
“Just so there are no misunderstandings in the future,” Ace clarified, resuming walking and pulling her along by the hand. “I don’t want to ever regret anything, especially not kissing a pretty girl.”
It was silent for a long time as they continued on, occasionally stopping to post more flyers. Though Nojiko would no longer look him in the eye anymore, there was a really sexy pink tinge to her tanned cheeks that made him hold out hope that he hadn’t completely ruined their relationship with each other. At least, she didn’t mind his holding her hand.
They finished posting flyers by noon, and Ace expected to make it back to his house before Luffy had rolled out of bed. Much to his surprise, Luffy’s bed was empty. Ace had cursed himself vehemently for already losing track of Luffy before heading out to check the usual places for his little brother.
He struck out all around. First, he checked with Ussop. The boy with the long nose (which was finally out of its splint and bandages) had said he’d only seen Luffy briefly around mid-morning when he had come by asking to borrow money. He got the same story from Zoro when he tracked him down at the dojo, except that Luffy had seen him close to noon.
Finally, at the Baratie, which had reopened now that the repairs had been made, Ace heard from Sanji that Luffy had come by and extorted a meal out of them along with all the berries they could give him, saying it was an emergency.
“An emergency?” Ace repeated. Sanji nodded, lighting a cigarette as he stood outside the restaurant on a break.
“Wouldn’t say what for, but he looked desperate,” Sanji told him.
“So you just gave him money, no questions asked?” Ace surmised.
“Like we could say no,” Sanji scoffed. “We’d probably be six feet under right now if it weren’t for that air-head.”
“Oh?” Ace prompted. He knew there was more to what went down at the restaurant! “What did my brother do that you think you owe him your lives?”
Sanji looked panicked for a second, trying to cover it with a long drag on his cigarette.
“Sanji! Get in here, you lazy, ungrateful piece of shit!”
“Eat shit, old man!” Sanji barked back through the door of the restaurant, tossing his cigarette to the ground and stomping on it. He gave Ace a sheepish look. “My old man’s not quite back to a hundred percent yet. Excuse me.”
Damn it. Ace was getting nowhere. Annoyed, he returned home, hoping Luffy would end up back there at some point. He had to wait until nearly seven o’clock to see his brother. And that’s all he did: see. Because Luffy didn’t even venture two words until he had food in him. And then, it was some ridiculous ramblings about needing more money.
“What do you need money for this time?” Ace asked, watching his brother root through his wallet to count how much he had.
“For my friend,” Luffy answered grumpily. He had cuts and forming bruises on his face and arms. Had he been fighting?
“Your girlfriend?” Ace guessed, wondering if the girlfriend was making demands for money.
“Yes!” Luffy snapped. “It’s important!”
The kid was agitated. That was unusual for Luffy. He was generally a mild tempered kid unless someone went after someone he cared about.
“Is she in some trouble?” Ace prodded. Luffy hesitated. It seemed like he didn’t know how to answer the question.
“She asked for my help,” is what he finally settled on.
Ace gave Luffy a hard look. Did he dare tell the kid that his girlfriend was probably just into him to see how much money she could get from him? But then again, Luffy hadn’t asked for money in three weeks. Maybe it was a coincidence.
“How much do you need?” he asked.
“Ten million berries,” Luffy stated, looking distressed. Ace could understand why.
“Ten million?” Ace repeated, half shouting. “The fuck? That’s not a small amount of money, Luffy.”
“I know!” Luffy groused back. “And Gramps probably won’t give it to me, even if I begged.”
Hell no he wouldn’t!
“I don’t have anyone else to borrow it from,” Luffy muttered. “I guess I’ll have to steal it.”
Ace was dumbstruck. What had his brother just said?
“You’ll what?” he demanded.
“She said, ‘beg, borrow, or steal,’” Luffy reiterated. “I can’t beg or borrow anymore, so I’ll have to steal.”
Ace’s hand made a solid connection with the back of Luffy’s head.
“The hell are you thinking?” Ace ranted at him. “Your grandfather is a cop! A pretty fucking important one, at that, and you say you’re going to just steal some money for your bimbo girlfriend?”
Ace didn’t know what he had expected in terms of an answer from Luffy, but it sure as hell wasn’t a fist to the face. For the first time in probably a good four or five years, Luffy and Ace had an all-out fist fight. In the kitchen, no less.
Four or five years had been good to Luffy, too. Ace was close to getting his ass handed to him by his three-years-younger brother. They both had gotten a few good hits in, and were starting to huff a little bit.
“You shut up!” Luffy growled at him. “You don’t know anything! And if you’re not gonna help, then leave me alone! I don’t need your help anyway!”
That hurt his pride, a little. Luffy had always had big, admiring eyes for his older brothers. To be told he was no longer needed was sort of painful. Ace had jokingly thought that his little brother was growing up when he got a girlfriend, but this was more…physical. Ace looked at his younger brother again with new eyes and saw that he wasn’t a boy or kid anymore. Luffy was practically a man.
It stung.
“Fine, whatever,” Ace dismissed, lashing out against the internal pain. If he was a man now, he could deal with things like a man, including being swindled by his gold digger girlfriend. “Don’t come begging me to dig you out of a mess, though.”
Luffy stormed out of the room without another word, stomping up the stairs as Ace slumped disgruntledly into a chair at the table. Ace listened in irritation as Luffy’s feet carried him not to his room, but to his grandfather’s.
The hell?
Ace was back on his feet and taking the stairs two at a time as he made his way to the old man’s room. He made it to the top of the stairs in time to watch Luffy exit the room with a fat wad of cash in each hand: the old man’s secret stash. There were probably a good five million berries in the stash that the old man kept for emergencies. Luffy had just taken it without batting an eye.
Following Luffy to his room, he watched him pull a cram packed duffle bag out of the recesses of his closet. When he unzipped it, Ace saw that it was stuffed with money. More now, since Luffy was stuffing what he’d borrowed and stolen into it.
Warning bells went off in Ace’s head like a vengeance. That was no small amount of cash. Where the hell had Luffy gotten it? And why did someone need that much money, anyway? Something was wrong. Very wrong. He had a bad feeling about this.
“Luffy, you need to tell me what’s going on,” Ace insisted, watching him zip the bag closed and hoist it onto his shoulder.
“I’m busy,” Luffy dismissed, shoving past Ace in the doorway.
“Luffy, I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s going on,” Ace tried again. Luffy hesitated at the top of the stairs.
“She said I couldn’t tell anyone,” Luffy quietly admitted. The bad feeling only grew at that explanation. “She said that it’s secret, like Gramps’ work.”
And then without another word, Luffy descended the stairs. Ace stood dumbstruck for a moment before heading downstairs himself. Oddly, Luffy seemed to be waiting for him at the bottom. But rather than say anything else, he just walked out the front door.
Ace trailed behind, puzzled. Luffy wouldn’t tell him what was going on, but he was very obviously not making any attempt to hide where he was going. Ace took it as a sign that he should follow.
.o0o.
Ace stared up at the tall, unmarked building that was two blocks from the strip club Ace would have bet his life on that Luffy would enter. Instead, it was this building. Ace followed only a few steps behind as Luffy went straight to the reception desk and dropped the duffle bag on the floor.
“I need to see the ugly,” he proclaimed, earning incredulous looks by the two men who manned it. “I want to buy her.”
“You know the rules,” said one of the men. “It’s two hundred thousand for the night. You don’t need to see the boss for that.”
Ace stared down the two men at the desk. They were not rough looking per se, but they did not scream professional receptionists either. These men were more like the bouncers Ace had pictured when he’d first thought Luffy was going to a strip club.
“No, I mean forever,” Luffy corrected. The men shared an amused look.
“Kid, there’s no way you have the money to—”
Luffy lifted the duffle bag onto the desk and unzipped it, giving both men a glimpse of the money inside. The story changed right away. One was on the phone in seconds while the other began escorting Luffy towards the main elevator. The escort gave Ace a wary look as he followed.
“Who’s that?” he inquired.
Luffy glanced briefly back at Ace. “He’s with me.”
That was all the explanation that was needed, apparently. Ace joined the two on the elevator for a painfully silent ride up to what was the sixteenth floor of the building. When the doors of the elevator opened, Ace felt a heavy atmosphere descend onto him.
Luffy didn’t hesitate. He headed past the grizzly, hardened men that glared at him towards the large ornate desk that was obviously the head of the room. A dangerous looking man sat behind it, looking amused.
“I hear you’ve come to make an offer on my little Mikan,” the man spoke up. “You caused quite the flurry down stairs.”
Luffy dumped the bag onto the man’s desk unceremoniously.
“I’m buying her. For forever,” Luffy declared as Ace make it to Luffy’s side. The man cackled.
“She tempts you that much, eh?” he mused. “Buying her nights every night isn’t enough now?”
“I want to be her boss now,” Luffy stated. Again, the man was amused.
“Oh, I bet you do,” he agreed. “Why don’t you go ahead and head on upstairs while I have my men count this. We’ll see if your offer is valid.”
Luffy shrugged and headed towards the elevator again. Ace followed, tense as a bow string. Things were much different than he’d ever imagined. What Luffy had misinterpreted (misrepresented was more like it) as a club was actually an organized crime syndicate. All these men had brass knuckles and guns on their person and he and Luffy had walked in armed with only shorts and tee-shirts.
They boarded the elevator again and were escorted up one floor. Exiting the elevator, Ace’s eyes immediately fixed on a large sign that was posted on the wall in front of them. Luffy walked past it without a glance.
THE RULES:
HOURS: 2PM – 4AM DAILY
ALL SERVICES PAID FOR IN ADVANCE
NO GAGGING*
NO BEATING*
NO CHOKING*
NO URINATION/DEFICATION*
NO PHYSICAL MARKING WHATSOEVER
CONDOMS MUST BE WORN FOR ALL ACTS EXCEPT FELLATIO
*May be added to experience at extra cost, given special permission
Ace’s mind swam. They were in a whore house. Ace stared at his brother’s back as he walked down the hall. He’d been going to a whore house every night? This was worse than thinking he’d been going to a strip club!
Taking a few quick steps, Ace caught up to Luffy, but still walking a few steps behind. They passed several unmarked doors; some open and some closed. In the ones that were open, Ace spied a variety of women who were in various states of dress. A couple winked or waved as he passed by, but Luffy paid them no mind.
“Luffy, what do you do here every night?” Ace asked, afraid of the answer he’d get. He wasn’t sure he would be able to handle it if his little brother started reciting sex tales that put his own sex life to shame.
“Hang out,” Luffy answered without hesitation.
“Hang out?” Ace repeated. He needed clarification, hoping it wouldn’t be ‘hang out with my cock out.’
“Yeah, hang out,” Luffy affirmed. “Watch movies. Play video games. Thumb wrestle. You know, stuff you do when you hang out.”
Ace was a little relieved, but even more confused as they continued down the long hallway. Without warning, Luffy ducked into one of the unmarked rooms near the end of the hall, calling out an easy greeting. Ace approached the door slowly, deliberately eavesdropping.
“Luffy! You’re here! Did you get the money?” a woman’s voice asked.
“Not all of it,” Luffy admitted. “But I got a lot. The ugly is downstairs counting it.”
“And he sent you up here to wait?” the woman guessed. She sounded agitated.
“Yep,” Luffy answered. “What do you want to do while we wait?”
“I—I don’t know,” the woman confessed, as if she were flustered. “I just keep wondering if it’s going to be enough. And I worry because I dragged you into this.”
“You asked for help,” Luffy pointed out. “I wanted to help.”
“Yes, but you have no idea what you’re getting into,” she dismissed. “This is some really bad stuff, Luffy. If by chance my boss says yes, we’re going to have to run away.”
What? First this bitch has his brother shelling out ridiculous sums of money just to see her and now she wants them to run away? This was too much. Ace took the final steps towards the room, ready to put an end to this farce.
“Run away?” Luffy repeated. “Where?”
“I don’t know,” the woman admitted. “But we’ll have to go. Tonight, if he lets me go with you. We’ll have to stop and pick up my mom and sister—”
The woman stopped speaking. Ace stared at her as openly as she stared back. No, it couldn’t be…
“Oh, yeah,” Luffy spoke up, breaking the shocked silence. “This is my brother, Ace. He wants to help, too.”
It was Nami. Clear as day. She looked exactly the same as her picture in the fliers he’d been hanging for a month except maybe she was a tiny bit thinner. And panicked.
“Luffy, what did you do!” she cried, grabbing his brother’s shoulders and shaking them. “I told you, you couldn’t tell anyone I was here! It was secret!”
“I didn’t tell him,” Luffy clarified, though chagrined. “He followed me.”
“This is bad! Very, very bad!” she declared, not appearing mollified in the slightest by the clarification. She looked to be on the verge of tears as she dropped her grip on Luffy and began to pace back and forth in the small room.
This was why Luffy wasn’t looking for Nami at all, Ace realized. Why he’d been so flippant about her disappearance. Luffy had found her awhile ago (probably three weeks ago, if he had to take a guess at it) and had been coming to see her every night. And for whatever reason, Nami had sworn him to secrecy about it.
Ace supposed the old man was right; she had run away after all. But to become a prostitute? Ace needed some answers.
“You need to tell me exactly what’s going right now,” Ace demanded, grabbing her pacing form and stilling her in front of him. “Everything. How the hell did this happen?”
He gestured inauspiciously to herself and the room. Nami took on a defiant look.
“It’s none of your—” she started.
“Don’t you dare say it’s none of my business,” Ace interrupted fiercely. “I have spent the last three and a half weeks combing this fucking city and papering it with your sister. It’s become my business. Start talking.”
Nami remained silent for a long time and Ace began to think she was never going to answer him. But then she looked guiltily over at Luffy.
“I didn’t lie,” she told him, but her guilt said otherwise. “When I joined, I was just a Messenger. I held that position for six years.”
Luffy didn’t look like he was bothered by the statement. He seemed as perplexed as Ace at her shame on the matter.
“But I was promoted,” she went on. “And like I told you before, I can’t quit. So I had to become a Mermaid.”
She looked up at Ace expectantly.
“Do you know what a Mermaid is?” she asked.
“I figured it out along the way,” Ace answered snappily. Holy fuck. Mermaids belonged to Fishman Village, the largest yakuza in all of East Blue. He and his brother were standing in the middle of Arlong-fucking-Park. The secret base of operations that the old man had been looking for—very unsuccessfully—for probably five or six years. And his brother had just stumbled upon it. “Why in the hell would you join them?”
“My mother,” she answered. “And my sister. They’re safe because I’m here.”
Ace took a guess that Nami had bartered away herself for protection for her family. But was there really that much danger to Nojiko’s family that required Nami to make a deal with the yakuza? Nami apparently seemed to think so.
“Fine. You made a deal with the yakuza,” Ace summed up, tasting bile in his throat. “But then, what’s all the money for? Why are you making my brother steal for you?”
Nami looked pained at the accusation. She didn’t deny it, though, he noticed.
“Things changed,” she hesitantly explained. “A bid to permanently buy me was put in by someone and accepted. I didn’t know what else to do. If I leave Arlong Park, the protection I ‘pay’ for disappears. I needed Luffy to outbid my buyer so we could get my mother and sister and get out of here.”
Actually, it was a solid plan, if Ace had to admit it. But that was only if it worked, and Nami didn’t seem too confident about that.
“How much were you sold for?” Ace asked. There was a shit-ton of money in that duffle bag. Surely not more than what was in there.
“One hundred million.”
Ace’s eyes threatened to bulge out of his head. How much?
“There was around ninety-eight million in the bag before I asked Luffy to—to add to it,” Nami stammered. “I think for Arlong to even consider it, he would have had to come up with at least ten million more.”
Ace’s jaw dropped. She’d asked Luffy to come up with ten million berries in a day?
“I didn’t get that much,” Luffy admitted glumly. “I think I got around six.”
The defeat in Nami’s eyes was clear. Somehow, though, she managed to smile.
“It’s okay, Luffy,” she assured him. “You did the best you could. It just—it just means you won’t get to be my boss.”
Still, Luffy looked upset at the prospect. “Can I still come see you?”
Nami shook her head. “No, you can’t. But I have one last request, if you’ll listen to it.”
Luffy’s attention was rapt on her.
“When my boss tells you no,” she spoke, “ask to buy the protection of my family instead.”
Luffy made a sour face. “What for?”
“Please?” Nami requested, ignoring his question. “You said you would help me. This is the help that I need.”
Luffy sighed heavily. He was clearly displeased with the whole situation. “Fine.”
And to prove just how upset he was, Luffy crossed his arms and took on a petulant look. Despite that, Nami tugged at his arms until he loosened them and embraced him. Though he still held a sour look, Luffy didn’t hesitate to hug her back.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“What a sorry sight.”
All of them jumped at the voice that spoke up. Ace turned to see the dangerous looking man from earlier; the one Luffy had insisted on dealing with directly. This, Ace realized, had to be the infamous crime boss, Arlong.
“I come up here hoping to see a show as titillating as the sight from last night, and I find everyone standing around, still fully clothed,” Arlong complained with a disapproving look. Nami paled at his statement as she untangled herself from Luffy.
“I was just explaining to my regular that tonight was the last night,” Nami told him. Ace realized that she was very adept at manipulating situations. She hadn’t lied, but had omitted enough truth that the situation turned to her favor.
“Indeed it is,” Arlong agreed. “Though, not without an attempt at otherwise. Your regular put in a bid for you.”
Nami gave Luffy a look of wonder. She was very good at acting, too, Ace admitted to himself.
“Sadly, only a hundred and four million is not enough to buy you out from under someone like...” Arlong trailed off. “Well, let’s just say, if I sold you from under that man, it better be for ten times the sum he’s paying me. I’d need that much to keep him from flaying me.”
Ten times a hundred million? A billion? Really? Ace cast a glance at Nami and saw her surprise too. For some reason, he didn’t think she was acting in that moment. She blinked and then looked meaningfully at Luffy. He stared blankly back. Damn it, he’d forgotten already.
“The money,” Ace spoke up. Arlong looked at Ace, giving him a measuring glance.
“Yes, yes,” Arlong dismissed with a wave. “Aside from tonight’s fees, the money will be ready for you when you leave.”
“We’d like to buy something else,” Ace contradicted.
“Oh? Has one of my other Mermaids caught your eye?” Arlong guessed with a smug look.
“No, we want to buy protection,” Ace clarified. Arlong took on a suspicious look.
“Protection,” he repeated. Ace nodded.
“For two women in the Conomi district,” Ace explained. “A woman named Belle and her daughter, Nojiko.”
“I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised,” Arlong grumbled, his eyes narrowing. “When the boy started coming here, he asked for Mikan by her real name. So you want to take over the cost of keeping those two alive?”
Ace nodded.
“I’m afraid you’re going to have to make a choice, then,” Arlong shrugged. “You only brought me enough money to buy one woman. Not two.”
All the acting in the world couldn’t stop Nami’s face from taking on a horrified look. He knew she’d never be able to make the hard decision between her sister and her mother herself, so Ace made it for her.
“Nojiko,” he said without hesitation. Yeah, part of the decision was based on selfish feelings, but Ace also knew that Belle would have Smoker and his resources on her side to help protect her, whereas Nojiko had no one but him.
“Done,” Arlong agreed, smiling smugly. Ace could imagine it stemmed from getting such an absurd amount of money without having to actually do anything except not kill one person. “Now that business is done, how about that show?”
What? What did he just say? Ace felt his stomach sink as he realized what Arlong expected them to do next.
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Something Worth Dying For