Ikari ][ One Piece ][

Chapter Thirteen

~Ace's POV~

          My skin was crawling, my heart was racing and there was a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. Coming to this island was a mistake. I found myself in the living room of the home she'd killed to leave. Thatch was sitting on a sofa opposite me his eyes wide in horror and his skin at least three shades paler than usual. Doll Face was in the kitchen preparing tea or cyanide, I wasn't entirely sure which.

        "She seems relatively calm." Thatch noted his voice an octave higher.

        "That's what worries me." I noted dryly.

         "Tea?" Her soft voice chirped gently from the doorway causing both Thatch and I to nearly jump right out of our skins. She ignored our reactions and set a tray on the table before us with a beautifully painted porcelain teapot and matching cups on the coffee table. "You both seem a bit disturbed."

         "We're the disturbed ones?" Thatch laughed nervously.

           The beautiful girl was unfazed. Or so she seemed. Deep down I knew it was eating her up inside being back in the home where it all happened. She acted calm, but I knew it was just that, an act.

           "We could stay at an inn; we don't have to stay here." I noted softly.

           "I'm not wanted here. No inn would accept us. You can try if you like but they will all tell you they're at maximum capacity." The doll like girl answered tonelessly.

            "You were the victim, why would they treat you like this?" Thatch stared at me in terror as the words left my mouth before ducking behind a pillow.

          "I suppose they didn't like learning the truth that many of their husbands, sons, fathers liked to pay money to take advantage of a little girl." Ikari noted tonelessly as she plopped onto an armchair away from Thatch and I, "Though it may be the manner in which I killed them all."

         Thatch grimaced. "You don't seem to have any qualms with killing people."

          Her smoldering eyes were ablaze with rage, "They didn't have any qualms breaking my body. No matter how much I cried, no matter how much I begged them, they didn't care." She trembled whether from rage or overwhelming sorrow I wasn't entirely sure.

         Thatch flinched.

         My body moved on its own, I wouldn't be weak this time; I wouldn't let her shoulder the burden alone anymore. Before I knew it, I was on my feet and opening my arms to engulf her in a warm strengthening embrace.

       Ikari threw me a wary look as she easily dodged my open arms, "What the hell are you doing?" Her blazing eyes ensnared me.

       "I-." I was at a loss for words. Thatch was shaking his head at me and looking as if he wanted nothing more than to jump out the window and leave this place behind him forever.

      "I'm not such a simple fool that a hug would fix everything. I don't do hugs." She shot at me icily, "Now drink your tea."

       Wordlessly, I sat back down and reached for one of the perfect porcelain teacups. Was I still not strong enough? Could she sense it? Perhaps I was approaching this wrong.  One look in her tortured gaze and I knew there was no way I could support the weight of it all.

        Thatch offered me a sympathetic smile before turning back to the doll like girl as she crossed the room in silence. "So, where should we sleep?" He asked to break the silence, not that any of us were going to be able to sleep a wink. This house was too haunting, the painful memories of the past lingered everywhere and it was more terrifying than ghosts.