Chapter Text
They call it heartshine, in North Blue. There are other words for it – soulmates being the most common of them, used by those born and living on the Grand Line – but that isn’t how Law remembers learning about it, the soft golden glow that used to fill the living room when his father sat next to his mother and took her hand, a constant in his life even before he knew to put a name on it.
He’s six when his parents explain to him that the glow is the happiness of two hearts meeting, two hearts that are meant to beat together, that will always shine in each other’s presence. He remembers liking it, the name, asking question after question about the science behind it, remembers feeling frustrated when his father had simply laughed and told him it was as big a mystery as the devil fruits.
He's eight when he first wonders whether his heart, too, is meant to beat together with someone else’s. His mother, her smile soft and voice softer, assures him that it will, that no one is born without a matching heart, that it may take him some time to meet them but he will, of course he will. That the heart that will shine together with his will be strong and beautiful. That it will start as white as trees and grass in their garden, but will surely turn, eventually, sky-blue or bright gold like his parents have.
He’s ten when his curiosity about soulmates burns in a violent fire along with his home, and after, there’s only a hollow cavity where his heart used to be, nothing left but embers and a cold rage.
He doesn’t wonder, anymore.
He doesn’t wonder for a long, long time.
The number one rule aboard the Polar Tang is don’t talk about soulmates near the captain. It’s not a rule Law himself has instilled, or even enforced – but it’s one everyone adheres to, nonetheless, courtesy of the Swallow Island trio and their memories of all the times Law, when prodded, had snapped at them about the topic.
That doesn’t mean they don’t talk about it, though.
Law is on his way to the kitchens when Shachi’s voice filters out into the corridor, echoing from the metallic walls, bringing him to an effective but sudden stop.
“That doesn’t mean he’s not got one,” Shachi is saying, a contrary answer to something Law hasn’t heard but can guess all too well. He makes a full one-eighty, immediately, but before he can power-walk his way back to his quarters, the conversation continues.
“I mean, captain’s twenty-two now, right? That’s just two years over the usual age. That he’s not found them yet doesn’t mean he doesn’t have one, just that… you know, he might be one of those who take a bit longer.”
“But he’s not even looking!” Penguin is loud in his dismay. “You’ve seen what he’s like, right? Makes a point to touch as few new people as possible, stays in his quarters when we go drinking…”
“Yeah, but he doesn’t have to. Look for them, I mean. If he’s got one, fate will bring them together. That’s how it goes.”
There are no words to describe how little Law wants to overhear this, his crew – friends, Law, you can call them that in your own head, says a deep, familiar voice in his mind, and Law grits his teeth and squeezes his eyes shut until they hurt – speculating about his supposed soulmate. Supposed, because Law doesn’t believe they exist; if the man he keeps hearing in his head wasn’t it, the bright blue of a familial bond he’d have been more than happy to accept, then they don’t exist. He’s one of those belonging to the one percent, a statistic anomaly, a heart without a match.
“Do you think… he might have lost them?” Ikkaku asks, and a yawning abyss of pain and loss opens at Law’s feet, and he sways at the edge of it, Cora-san’s voice bleeding into fire and screams and his throat is full of the smell of bodies, everywhere, of fresh blood spattered on the side of a treasure chest, and Law staggers away, then, doesn’t remember how he gets back to his room, only hears the door slam shut behind him.
Through the haze of the panic holding him in its grip, Law thinks, I can’t lose what I’ve never had.
He doesn’t have a soulmate, heartshine, because he can’t have one; because he can’t become close to yet another person and then lose them, like he loses everyone he loves.
His love is a death sentence.
A good thing, then, that he no longer has the capacity for it.
Law is twenty-four when Doflamingo’s emblem grins at him from the back of the auction room.
Law is twenty-four when a flying fish crashes through the wall and a young man with a straw hat emerges from the rubble, the force of his character shining like a beacon as he yells at his friend, chaos chasing his steps as he runs towards where the mermaid sits in her glass dome.
So this is Straw Hat Luffy, Law thinks, a faint tug of interest in his chest for the boy who has caused so much mayhem, doling out equal amounts of destruction and salvation at once, at every turn, every island. He’s been following the exploits of the Straw Hat crew like one might read about natural disasters in the newspaper, and the chance to see their hurricane at work in front of him draws a smirk from him. They’ll cause chaos, surely, and if nothing else, it’ll upset the auction, which will upset Joker, and an upset Joker is always something that puts a smile on Law’s face.
The smile gives way to incredulity soon enough.
He, along with the rest of the auction house, watches Straw Hat as he kneels beside the bleeding, fallen body of the fishman. Watches him rise, ascending the steps like every slap of the ridiculous flip-flops he wears is the fall of a guillotine, or perhaps a drum, beating loud and clear.
Doom. Doom. Doom.
Straw Hat’s eyes are frigid, dagger-sharp. There is no hesitation in them, not in the way he draws back his arm, fist so tight it shakes. This is a different man from the one that had burst through the wall of the auction house mere minutes ago, and Law can’t tear his eyes away.
Surely not.
There are rules, even in a pirate’s world – and even Law, loathe as he is to admit it, holds to those rules, obeys them, because not doing so means a death wish and he doesn’t want to die – not yet, not here.
Straw Hat moves.
The Celestial Dragon flies back, back, back –
He’s crazy. Absolutely insane. An actual goddamn lunatic.
And yet, a sound bubbles up in Law’s chest, finds it way around the incredulity mixing with begrudging admiration; amidst the panic and chaos of bodies pushing into each other in their haste to get the hell out of the auction house, Law sits back and laughs.
“Set sail, immediately!”
“Where, Captain?”
“Marineford.”
When they surface, Law makes his way to the deck, heart pounding in his chest – and there is no reason for it, absolutely none, none except for the strange dread that made its home in his spine on Sabaody and has resolutely refused to leave since.
What if we’re too late?
What if I’m too late, he thinks for the twentieth time in as many minutes, the urgency almost palpable, nipping at his heels.
For what? another part of his mind counters, and Law finds he can’t answer; all he knows is that he needs to be right there, right now.
He stops wondering when he sees the clown in the air, holding Jinbe and Straw Hat, both out for the count and grievously injured – because even if he never finds out what drove him there at least he’s made it there in time for this.
“Leave him to me!”
The words are out of his mouth before he can stop them, and he doesn’t think, just acts, declaring that he’s a doctor while the clown yells at him and what is wrong with him, can’t he see time is of the essence, that if they delay even a little longer they might both not make it –
What do you care? Why do you care?
Law snarls at his own internal voice, locks it into a box and throws it deep into the ocean currents of his mind. He doesn’t have time to think. He doesn’t have time, period. Every moment brings Straw Hat closer to death, and he –
He lingers, still, as if something is holding him back –
And then, a hat, the hat, hurtles into his hand through the air and he grips it, the straw crinkling under his fingers as he finally hurries inside the ship.
An interesting surgery.
That is what he predicts it will be, what with the way Straw Hat’s chest is caved in, flesh charred, the air thick with the smell of it, and Law can see his lungs, feel the way his organs are two seconds away from perishing right then and there –
If it was anyone else, anywhere else, Straw Hat would be a dead man.
If it was anyone else, anywhere else, they wouldn't even try to save him.
Law isn’t anyone else, though, and the infirmary in the Polar Tang is far, far above any common hospital. Law’s made sure of it, to have only the best equipment, his cabinets stocked up on supplies – but, in the end, nothing holds a candle to the ope-ope fruit. It had been Law’s salvation, once, and now it will be Straw Hat’s. That is the only possible outcome, Law thinks, and his mind catches briefly again on the question of why, why exactly is he here, so determined to save a man he doesn’t even know, but it is easy to bury the questions, decide to deal with it later, because Straw Hat has both feet in an open grave and the only thing holding him from sliding there fully is Law.
He pulls the gloves on and goes to work.
Five hours in, Straw Hat’s heart flatlines.
Fuck, Law thinks. He glances around – they have a defibrillator, of course, but it’s too far, takes too long, and the steady beep from the machine is deafening. There’s nothing else to it; Law rips the gloves from his hands and calls out, just in case, “Stand clear, everyone, restarting heart in 3, 2, 1 –”
He flips his thumbs against Straw Hat’s heart.
“Countershock.”
Lightning flashes in the room, a careful current directed through Law’s hands, painting the metallic walls blue.
Straw Hat’s body jolts on the operating table. Law grits his teeth, his breath trapped in his ribcage, exhaustion pushing down on him. It can’t end like this. He won’t let it end like this.
Straw Hat’s heart pulses once, twice –
And the entire room is washed in white, a brilliant glow erupting from not just the boy on the table, but from Law’s own heart, a bonfire of pure ivory so bright it hurts to look at. Law stumbles back, and the second his hands leave Straw Hat’s skin the glow is gone, but the machine beeps steadily, now, indicating a successful restart, and Law—
Law’s first thought is, if this was a real hospital, I’d be benched from the operation right about now.
Law’s second thought is, no. Then, fuck.
He can hear Penguin and Clione talking to him, maybe asking him something, and Law says, “I’m fine,” or thinks he says it; he’s sure he says something, though whether it’s in any comprehensible language is another matter entirely.
Mechanically, Law takes out a new pair of gloves, snaps them on, turns back to the table. He can’t – he can’t think about this, now, or maybe ever, but especially not now, not when the surgery is barely halfway through, when there’s still every chance he won’t be able to claw Straw Hat back from death’s door. He shuts out the noise of the room, the presence of his crewmates working on Jinbe on the table next to him, and throws all of his energy and concentration into saving the impossibility that is Monkey D. Luffy.
Sixteen hours later, his hands and shirt soaked in the blood of his – no, he can’t even think the word, shuts away the entire memory of the white glow of two hearts, pulsing together – his patient, yes, that’s a word he can accept, Law stumbles to the bunk on the side of the operating room and falls into it, face-first, the sweet embrace of unconsciousness dragging him in before he even hits the mattress.
He sleeps for over twenty hours.
When he wakes, the room is dark and quiet, the only sound being the heart monitor on Straw Hat’s side. Law groans – his head is pounding and he still feels exhausted, the prolonged use of his abilities hitting him particularly hard, and yet he can’t keep lying down, either. With a bit-off curse, he pushes himself up, heading for the door, hoping that there is coffee in the kitchen to keep him awake until he’s washed off all the blood and grime. Only, once he makes it to the door, he finds himself halting there.
Law looks back. Straw Hat lies still and silent, both adjectives that sound entirely too wrong when associated with him.
Without meaning, as if his body moves without his consent, he retraces his steps until he stands by the table.
His hand hovers over Straw Hat’s chest. Was it all just a hallucination? His mind breaking under the stress of the operation, the strain of his devil fruit ability? He must have imagined it. There is no way –
Gently (because Law spent sixteen fucking hours putting him back together, he’s not going to undo all his hard work, that’s the only reason), he lets his fingertips touch Straw Hat’s skin.
The light is no less blinding, the second time around.
Law all but runs out of the room.
He doesn’t come to see Straw Hat even once, after. His crew change his bandages, bring him daily updates while sending him glances that he pretends not to see; his crew are the ones to try and calm Straw Hat down after his rampage, too, while Law sits down, frozen in place, unable to reach out, to do anything more than grip that damn hat in his hand like he’s swept into a current and it’s the only thing holding him aloft.
Even that he leaves behind, eventually, with Dark King Rayleigh, along with strict instructions for his patient that he knows will be disregarded all too soon.
“Captain,” Shachi says when they prepare to leave, “are you sure? Shouldn’t you, I dunno, say something to him?”
Behind him, Penguin and Ikkaku are nodding their agreement. Bepo just looks at Law with sad eyes full of something that borders on understanding, which is so much worse, so Law looks at Shachi instead.
“And what, pray tell, should that be?” His voice drags like gravel, like knives against porcelain, and so do the words against his throat, leaving him wounded and bleeding.
Because – and here’s the kicker – he truly, genuinely doesn’t know what there is to say. That they’re, what? Fucking soulmates?
What a joke. Straw Hat is in mourning, half-dead still, a ghost of the bright, laughing thing he met in Sabaody. There’s no way Law can just waltz up to him and profess that the universe has apparently decided that they’re meant for each other.
Not when there is an expiry date on his own life.
Shachi doesn’t respond. Neither do Penguin or Ikkaku.
Law spins on his heels, ignores the way the bleeding has spread from his throat to his heart, and orders the Tang to submerge.