[Slowly, he lets his hand fall and rests his forearm across his bent knees instead.
That accusation hurts more than he thought it would, even if it was one he had predicted. For so much of this past year, and the first few months after death especially, he had wrestled with what he had done and what the outcome might be - not for the world so much as for one little boy. As much as he had betrayed everyone else to protect Law, he had essentially betrayed Law too in order to make that happen and he deserves the backlash.
He'd still do it all over again, though, or so he had thought, until this moment. The papers had called his crew the Heart Pirates, which he had indeed noticed and thought was an endearing and unexpected homage. Going after his brother was insane recklessness that he would never have encouraged, but getting him and every one of those monsters that he called family locked up was more than just dedication to freeing a country - even through the limitations of publicly-consumable news he could see the revenge for what it was. On noticing Vergo wasn't listed among those apprehended, he had dug back farther in the stack of papers and found an obituary tied to an accident at a government science facility, for the death of a vice admiral was no small thing (and how it made his blood utterly boil at the thought of him staying undiscovered for so long that he attained such a rank!).
Law had, without knowing, sent a message across time and space and it had been optimistically received as love. He had worried, because none of this was necessary and all of it was far too dangerous and why couldn't Law have just taken a quieter path and become a skilled surgeon without feeling so tied down by my failures, but he thought that surely now Law could be satisfied and move on. He wasn't in a position to have the perspective he needed in order to see how much pain he had left Law in.
His mission failed because he gave up on it, but he can't argue without making Law feel even worse, so he doesn't protest. And yes, he lied, to a lot of people about a lot of things, all in the name of trying to achieve a greater good, and what could be greater than giving back life and hope to a kid who thought he had lost both?
Why is Law dead now? He's frightened by what the answer might be, suddenly.]
Law... I'm sorry.
[He doesn't think an apology will cut it, but it's all he has. Explanations, justifications, won't change how Law feels.]
I gave everything I could to make sure you had a real chance at life. You deserved that. I - couldn't stand the thought of a world where you didn't even get to grow up and follow your own dreams.
no subject
That accusation hurts more than he thought it would, even if it was one he had predicted. For so much of this past year, and the first few months after death especially, he had wrestled with what he had done and what the outcome might be - not for the world so much as for one little boy. As much as he had betrayed everyone else to protect Law, he had essentially betrayed Law too in order to make that happen and he deserves the backlash.
He'd still do it all over again, though, or so he had thought, until this moment. The papers had called his crew the Heart Pirates, which he had indeed noticed and thought was an endearing and unexpected homage. Going after his brother was insane recklessness that he would never have encouraged, but getting him and every one of those monsters that he called family locked up was more than just dedication to freeing a country - even through the limitations of publicly-consumable news he could see the revenge for what it was. On noticing Vergo wasn't listed among those apprehended, he had dug back farther in the stack of papers and found an obituary tied to an accident at a government science facility, for the death of a vice admiral was no small thing (and how it made his blood utterly boil at the thought of him staying undiscovered for so long that he attained such a rank!).
Law had, without knowing, sent a message across time and space and it had been optimistically received as love. He had worried, because none of this was necessary and all of it was far too dangerous and why couldn't Law have just taken a quieter path and become a skilled surgeon without feeling so tied down by my failures, but he thought that surely now Law could be satisfied and move on. He wasn't in a position to have the perspective he needed in order to see how much pain he had left Law in.
His mission failed because he gave up on it, but he can't argue without making Law feel even worse, so he doesn't protest. And yes, he lied, to a lot of people about a lot of things, all in the name of trying to achieve a greater good, and what could be greater than giving back life and hope to a kid who thought he had lost both?
Why is Law dead now? He's frightened by what the answer might be, suddenly.]
Law... I'm sorry.
[He doesn't think an apology will cut it, but it's all he has. Explanations, justifications, won't change how Law feels.]
I gave everything I could to make sure you had a real chance at life. You deserved that. I - couldn't stand the thought of a world where you didn't even get to grow up and follow your own dreams.