Scarred Memories And Hidden Truths | A One Piece Fanfiction

Chapter 5: Time Skip

The group of pirates watched as the small family walked around the festival, seemingly having a great time. The family had food, played games and at the end of the night, they watched as the sky lit up with fireworks. 

"I can see why this would be a core memory for Ace and Luffy" Nami says with a small smile. "This is beautiful." 

The rest of the group nods along while looking at the scene. It was a welcome change from the stress of surviving on the seas and the pirates wouldn't take it for granted even if they weren't directly there.

Suddenly, the memory started fast forwarding at a incredibly fast pace. 

"Woah! What the hell is going on here?!" Marco yelled.

"It seems that it was getting a bit boring for whoever or whatever was controlling their memories." Robin says with a soft chuckle.

"They could've just skipped to the part they wanted from the start." Zoro grumbled.

The memory slowed to the regular pace but this time they could tell that Luffy was at least 5 years old while Ace looked to be around 8 years old. 

"Hurry up Luffy! We're going to be late for dinner!" Ace yelled from on top of a rock. 

The group could see that he was looking over a clearing where Luffy seemed to be trying to catch a dragonfly but he currently wasn't too successful. A few people laughed at the amount of concentration that seemed to be on Luffy's face as he chased after it.

"Hold on, Ace! I'm so close to getting it!" Luffy said with a huge grin. Then, right as he was about to put the dragonfly in the jar, Luffy fell flat on his face. The dragonfly flew away while Ace ran down to check on Luffy.

"Luffy, are you hurt?" Ace asked as he crouched down next to him.

Luffy raised his head and everyone could see his teary eyes and bloody nose. 

"Oh no no no no" Ace whispers," Uncle Dragon's going to kill me."

Whitebeard chuckled while some of the other pirates were in shock that Ace was being so soft with Luffy.

"Hey Luffy, can you look at me?" Ace asked with a soft tone. 

Luffy lifts his head and seems to be trying to hide his sniffling. Ace puts his hand on Luffy's head and smiles at him. 

"Let's go to Uncle Dragon and get you cleaned up okay? We can try to catch another dragonfly tomorrow."

Luffy sniffs one more time and nods. Ace smiles a little wider and helps Luffy up. Then he crouches and looks behind to Luffy with a smirk.

"C'mon Luffy, get on!" Ace says.

Luffy wipes his tears and smiles widely before jumping on Ace's back. Ace takes off running to the house the group had seen earlier while Luffy laughs as the winds blows his hair back.

The boys enter the house and yell "We're home!" before running off to the living room. They see Dragon sitting at the table seemingly looking over some kind of document but as soon as he sees the boys, he puts them back into the file. 

"Luffy, what happened to your face?" Dragon asks while picking Luffy up to wipe off his face. 

"I was tryna catch a dragonfly but it got away." Luffy said with a small pout. 

"Luffy, what have I said about that?" Dragon asked. 

"To not do it because it's dangerous.." Luffy said with a small pout.

Dragon chuckled as he cleaned of Luffy's face. "And this is exactly what happens when you don't listen. I'm not saying it to be mean, I just want you to be safe."

Everyone watching was shocked that this man was supposed to be the world's most wanted criminal. They could all see that he wasn't a bad person so they were trying to igure out what in the world could have made Dragon go against the World Government.

The  memory sped up again as it just showed the daily life of the small family. The scenery slowly changed as more and more decorations started showing up for the festival. 

Finally the night of the festival came and it was amazing for the boys. They were running all over the place, playing games, grabbing food and overall just having a good time. 

The scenery slowly shifted to later in the night when the family was getting ready to go home. Luffy was on Dragon's back and Ace was holding onto part of Dragon's kimono trying to stay awake. 

Luffy was looking around just enjoying the view, when suddenly he saw someone in the treeline. He made direct eye contact with the person as if they had been watching the family for some time. As soon as it happened, everyone watching the memories got a sudden feeling of stomach dropping anxiety. They watched on nervously as Luffy subtly tapped Dragon on the shoulder.

"Papa, who's that watching us?"  Luffy asked in a quiet, tired voice.

"What do you mean, Luffy? There's no one watching us." Dragon said quietly.

"Yeah there is. They're looking at us from the forest." Luffy said yawning.

Deciding to give it a chance and looked around the treeline. Dragon tensed almost immediately as he made eye contact with the same person Luffy had seen.

"Don't worry about it, Luffy. Try to go to sleep, alright? I'm sure you're tired from playing all day." Dragon said quietly, all while not breaking contact with the person.

"Okay, Papa." Luffy said, snuggling into Dragon's back in an attempt to get comfortable.

 "Was that...a marine?" Nami asked hesitantly. "Why would a marine be watching them? From what we know, Dragon hasn't done anything yet, so they can't be after him..." She says as she trails off.

Usopp pipes up, "Maybe they knew that Ace was Roger's kid? I might be wrong, but I don't see any other reason as to why they'd be around them."

The other pirates looked at each other nervously as the memory continued. It skipped forward to when the boys looked to be around 7 and 10. They've definitely grown and the pirates could tell something big was about to happen...

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A/N: Um. Hi? It's been quite a while since I've last updated this. Sorry about that! A lot has happened and then writers block took over so I didn't have much motivation to continue. Anywho! Let me know what you guys think of this so far! Love y'all and hopefully more chapters will be coming soon!