Sons of Beasts Part 2

Life Apart

Luffy fell asleep and stayed asleep for a very long time. He didn't get hungry or thirsty, as time seemed to stop in the darkness. Yes, he was tired, but that was the only thing that really seemed to be normal. Usually, he'd be starving. He didn't know he'd missed multiple meals while he was in there. If he tried to keep track of time, it would only last so long before his mind wandered and he had to start over.

Sleeping was the only real thing to do in there, as he could barely move and couldn't make contact with Ace or any other creature.

He missed his brother. Very much. Even in his sleep, he was lonely.

-x-

For the next week, Ace had trouble sleeping. They were going towards the next island as fast as they could, but even if that merchant ship was at or heading to the island they were, he had over a day of a head start. One day could make or break it. Storms were untimely, and Marine or pirate attacks lost precious time.

No Marines attempted to attack the ship, as Marine bases weren't as common in the New World, but they did run into some idiotic pirates. Ace didn't get to fight, though. He wanted to take out his anger, but he was still feeling the side effects. His non-human body was reacting strangely to the drugs.

The nurses didn't know what was happening with him. The effects had lessened, before they came back, worse than before. They didn't know this for the first two days, as Ace hid it. Kept a straight face no matter what his vision looked like. The drug's effects were supposed to be gone by then, even with his extremely heavy dosage.

No one knew when Ace would be back to normal, and he hated that he had to trust this crew to get things done and find Luffy while he was stuck in the infirmary. But he was sick of it. When it was night time, and the nurses were gone and the lights turned out for the night until it was time to see how Thatch was doing, he sat on the wooden ground. He would will his body to beat the drugs.

He sat on the floor and imagined, if he was made out of flesh and blood, fire coursing through his veins, burning the drug out. He couldn't let an almost lethal dose of sedative hinder him. He'd already wasted over three days being in this room, useless.

It hurt, a lot. And he hadn't been hurt in a long time. When he couldn't handle psychologically burning the drug out, and whatever it was actually doing to his body, he passed out on the floor. It was charred underneath him, but not on fire.

He only woke up when Tami saw him on the ground. She woke him up by saying his name, not trusting to touch the kid in his sleep when he was made of fire and could have a temper. And he was in a perpetual bad mood, extremely stressed which elevated his temper.

"Ace? Ace, are you alright?" she asked in concern. His eyes snapped open and he quickly stood up. He felt fine. Tami tried to get him to stop jumping up and down to test if he felt nauseous, but he just grinned.

"I'm all better. Can I leave now?" he asked, already putting his boots on to leave.

"Wha- what do you mean all better? You're very sick! You can't leave yet," she said sternly. But, Ace was sick of being here, and he wasn't about to let her confine him in this place. He'd already spent three days too many in it.

He strode to the lightswitch and flipped it up so the lights were on full force. He looked straight at the lights, which would have left him with a painful headache before. But, now he was fine. He looked back at Tami. "I'm fine. I burned the drugs out."

"What do you mean?" she asked. Ace grew impatient. He wanted to leave! Middle of the night or not, he wanted out.

"I destroyed the traces of the drugs. I don't have a normal body, I have a devil fruit. I should have tried this three days ago," he grumbled the last part. "Shine the flashlight in my eyes if you want, but I'm leaving the infirmary now."