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Ace couldn’t have stopped the animalistic growl from leaving his mouth if he had tried. He bared his teeth in an attempt to appear threatening, squaring his shoulders while staying still on his knees. Then Sabo let out a small, pitiful cry of pain from behind him, and the noise only made him fight more against the tight ropes that were biting onto his wrists and ankles– all of his instincts screaming, howling at him to fight, to protect his brother.
The dozen of unknown men who had managed to sedate them for long enough to tie them up and throw them in a cage like some circus animals only laughed at them, some of them even shooting stones in the kid’s face just to see him growl twice as loud.
Sabo finally managed to sit back on his knees from the the lying position he had been forced onto by one of the men’s kicks moments before, and he settled his forehead on the back of Ace’s neck– trying to get as much comfort as he could from his twin without giving the adults any reasons to put them in separate cages by making them believe that they were somehow trying to free themselves. Understanding what his brother was doing without needing words as usual, Ace slightly leaned back onto him without stopping his low growling.
One of the men –a creepy guy with more fake teeth in his mouth than remaining hairs on his greasy skull– gave him a slimy smirk, a disgusting glint shining in his eyes. Ace’s pupils shrunk as he felt a shiver grow down his spine.
He knew that kind of look– had been on their receiving end since he was five and running around in the Grey Terminal for the first time, thought he thankfully never had to understand exactly what it meant before he was able to fight back for long enough to run to Dadan and her bandits’ hut while losing the pervert in the jungle for the predators to find and feast on. And that had only been the first out of the numerous times he had ended up running back to the only relatively safe space he had known at the time, only to spend hours in the bathroom scrubbing his skin bloody red to stop feeling like countless bugs were swarming under his skin.
So yes, Ace was familiar with the uneasy feeling creeping onto him.
But that didn’t mean that he had any idea how to get away from the bastard’s slimy hands here, caged and without any ways of running back to the forest.
Then the man settled his eyes on his brother’s blond hair, his tongue darting out of his mouth to slowly pass over his chipped lips as a glint of what Ace had learned to recognize as lust took over his eyes; and the boy immediately felt every single one of his muscles tense in uncontrollable fear as realisation washed over him.
No. No, no, NO! Not Sabo– NOT him!!
Feeling how his twin had suddenly tensed and was now panicking, the blonde let out a small worried trill, lightly rubbing his cheek on the back of his brother’s shoulder to try to calm him down. But the movement only made Ace’s protective instincts act up even more, and the boy squared his shoulder once again, standing as straight as he could to make himself look bigger and scarier than he felt while hiding his brother behind his back as much as he could.
The slimy guy tsk-ed, giving Ace an annoyed look as the other men only started to laugh again– not understanding, nor caring, about why the boy was growling again, but amused nonetheless.
The silver-eyed boy didn’t budge from his protective stance even as his brother snuggled up against his back as much as he could when his arms were still tied up painfully tightly behind his back. Sabo wasn’t sure why his twin was being so protective now specifically –after all, this wasn’t the worst situation they had been in, and yet Ace had never had such a visceral reaction–, but he trusted his brother to know what he was doing. Ace knew that he wasn’t weak, that he could protect himself from most of the things the World decided to throw at them just fine; so for him to react like that, he must be thinking that the threat wasn’t something that Sabo had ever had to face yet.
The blonde was pulled out of his thoughts by one of the men calling out to his boss, his voice sounding so disgustingly slimy to his ears that Sabo could almost feel insects crawling under his skin.
“Oi boss, would’ya let us have su’m fun wit’ t’e brats before sellin’ ‘em?”
Ace’s growling grew twice as loud and thrice as panicked, and Sabo felt his blood run cold.
Oh. Fuck.
❇❋❇
Luffy had been back from his hunt and waiting for his brothers to come back from their ‘secret trip’ to the new Grey Terminal for almost three hours now, when suddenly all of his instincts flared up and screamed at him that something was going wrongwrongwrongwrONGWRONG WRONG –
The teenager didn’t think twice. He immediately was on his feet, jumping from the window of the Treehouse seconds later, not caring about landing correctly since his little siblings weren’t here for him to worry about them trying to copy him and hurt themselves; instead letting himself fall on his back, only to bounce back on his feet the next moment. Then he was gone, alternating between running as fast as he could and throwing himself from tree to tree using his arms as portative lianas to go fasterfasterfasterfaster– toward the trash mountain.
❇❋❇
Sabo was honestly not fully sure about what was happening.
One moment he and Ace had both been screaming, spitting and biting as the men were trying to catch one of them to have their fun with– and the next he had been grabbed by the collar of his shirt and pulled back, his head violently hitting the cage’s iron bars and pulling a cry of pain from him, before he felt something piercing through the skin of his neck, and then– nothing. He just felt nub.
❇❋❇
Sabo!!
Feeling his fear and panic grow twice as bad when he saw his brother go limp in the corner of the cage he’d just been pulled into, Ace bit down harder onto the arm that was trying to put him into a headlock; and then some more– he didn’t let go until he felt blood flow down from his mouth and heard the man’s bone crack.
Then the guy screamed, and Ace threw himself in his twin’s direction, a whine leaving his mouth as he saw the blank look in his brother’s eyes.
Then he felt a hand around his throat and something piercing through his biceps, and he only had enough time to let out a loud, terrified howl, before the numbness took over him.
❇❋❇
When Luffy finally arrived at the Gray terminal, the first thing he heard was a long, terrified, howl in the distance. He didn’t even stop to think about it, just kept running in the scream’s direction.
And after what felt like hours –toolongnotsafehurthurthurtnotsafetoOLONGNOTSAFEHURTHURT HURT –, he finally saw it.
The ship looked unassuming, common even, and yet– yet, it felt wrong-slimy-evil-bad, and Luffy could feel in his everything that his brothers were in there and hurt.
So, he stretched his arm to catch the boat’s mast and slingshooted himself on the deck, only actually lending there by sheer luck and experience from doing just that on the Red Orora back when he still lived on Foosha and the Red Hair crew’s ship was still anchored in its shores.
Then his instincts bawled at him, and the teenager immediately refocused– for once not letting himself get distracted by the fact that he was on a ship. Instead, he followed the Voices in the back of his head and went under the deck.
❇❋❇
One of the most important things to know about Luffy, and also coincidentally one of the least known things about him, was that he got angry.
Not often. Not for long. Not enough for most to realise it wasn’t just a one-time thing, a simple slip of his temper. Not enough for them to know that the anger, the rage, had always been, and always would be, a fundamental part of Luffy’s character, as dormant and easy to ignore as it was most of the time– eased into near-nothingness by the love of the people he called Family, draped like a cotton sheet around the Wild Thing howling for blood in the back of Luffy’s mind.
But the thing is that, sometimes, sheets tear apart when you pull too hard onto them.
And then, nothing else could stop the Wild Thing's anger, not until the sheet was carefully, lovingly, sewed back together in one piece, strong and soft enough to hold it, to lull it back to sleep– until the next tear.
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When Sabo finally managed to shake off the mushy mess his mind had been feeling for some time now and regained at least some of his senses, his nose immediately got overwhelmed with the metallic smell of blood. Lots of it too, considering how strong the unmistakable smell was.
Still very out of it from what he assumed was some sort of drug, the boy let out a small whimper and gripped onto the first thing he could find– which ended up being someone’s shirt. A very blood-drenched shirt. An annoyed whine left his mouth at the disgusting feeling of something's – someone’s? – insides being smudged in his hand.
But then, a familiar face nuzzled in his hair, whispering soft reassuring words–
“Chhh, calm, minha Lua… I’ve got you, calm, safe..chh..”
–and Sabo let himself be lulled back to sleep by his older brother’s protective presence.
❇❋❇
When Ace finally woke up from what felt like years of drug-induced coma, the only thing he could feel was pain. It was everywhere, from the back of his head to the tip of his toes. He felt as if he was nothing but a living, breathing bruise. The boy couldn’t help but let a pain-filled whimper out as he tried to move his head– the sudden movement making his whole self hurt.
Then, a familiar hand carefully ran through his hair, slowly, as to not to pull at the numerous knots he could feel in them. A gentle voice whispered soft, protective words–
“Chh…’ve got you, minha Estrela, calm..safe..chhh…”
–and Ace let his older brother’s reassuring presence cradle him back to sleep.