Posting on old prompts

[eiliem.livejournal.com]

Back again, this time without angst

Title: When in the Jungle
Rating: G
Media: fic
Characters: Ace and Luffy
Pairing: Luffy/beetle
Word Count: 300
Prompt: Fear
Author’s notes: I blame naye, who encouraged and inspired this



When in the Jungle

The old man is trying to kill them.

Not only has he dumped them in some godsforsaken corner of this jungle – he’s left them without food. Luffy, cowed as he is by their grandfather, wilts when he realizes there’s nothing to eat. So Ace, faced with a panicking Luffy, scrounges up a beetle to distract his brother with while he addresses the problem of their empty stomachs.

“Ace! Food!” Ace only has time to turn around before Luffy takes a large chomp out of the mushroom in his hand.

“Luffy! NO!” But his brother has already crammed the rest of the mushroom into his mouth and Ace’s heart stops as Luffy reaches for a second.

They’re in the middle of nowhere, alone, and no idea of when Garp will return. If Luffy just poisoned himself...Ace doesn’t know anything about medicine, or poison, or mushrooms. His brother could die.

And then every one of Ace’s worst nightmares comes to life as Luffy drops to the ground convulsing.

It only lasts a second (a horrific, heart-stopping, world-ending second that Ace will never forget) because Luffy starts laughing. And as worried as Ace was before, now he’s furious because dammit Luffy, that wasn’t funny. And hurt, because he’s never known his brother to be cruel.

But when Luffy doesn’t stop laughing after Ace yells at him – laughs harder when he stuffs the second mushroom into his mouth, Ace starts to feel…bemused. Because maybe he knows what’s happening here. And when Luffy finally stops laughing, only to start again when he eats a third mushroom, Ace’s worry and anger give way completely to familiar exasperation...and amusement.

They’re in the middle Garp-knows-where, for who-knows how long, and Luffy is high as a kite

Ace takes the offered mushroom, sits back, and laughs.


AN2: This is the chopped up, editing version of the slightly longer original which is posted to one_piece.