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Despite the chill of the wind off the water, the captain's quarters are warm. Your body heats beneath the heavy blankets, the waves lulling you into something just shy of sleep over the course of hours. When the ship quiets at last, the skin pressed to yours begins to retain some of the life you share with the man beside you.
He had ended a war in seconds with no more effort than extending his hand. But it was the grief, after, that had leveled him. Shanks had buried Whitebeard and one of his precious sons, and he had used all of himself to do it. He had wanted to be alone, to honor one of the few men who had ever made him feel less singular in the decades since Roger's death. For his incredible effort, he had made it only to the ship's edge before hitting his knees.
Haki depletion, Hongo had said. Common enough, just not for the captain. He had, so far as anyone on the crew knew, never expended enough to touch upon the seemingly bottomless well of power he commanded — not to prove himself, not to save his crew, not to end the war. He hadn't needed to.
But to say goodbye, to create a peaceful place, to erect monuments, he had reached into those reserves and drawn and drawn until he had nothing left.
He had been taken to his bed, and you had been a silent sentinel at his side for hours. Now, his breathing finally begins to deepen, anxiety lifting from your own lungs. As though your dreams needed you to know that he is only sleeping, this change in the tide of his breath pulls you under.
Rest is gentle at first, all sunlight and the soft voice your lover reserves for lips at your temple.
Brow furrowed in sleep, you see a press of scarlet power like a storm before it hits, hear screaming despite the alarming calm that overtakes the beach. Blood pools in the water, splatters onto the sand.
You wake, already half-upright, chest heaving and eyes burning. Of all you've seen, it is always this.
The day Shanks had saved the little boy from the sea king, the sky had been so clear.
It's raining now. The weather hits the deck as constantly as the ocean laps at the hull. The room's grown dark; the ship's gone quiet. The sky and the sea wash the nightmare back into memory.
It is such an old wound.
Your hair is brushed from your face. Gentle fingers arc over your brow, down your nose, across your bottom lip. As you separate yourself from sleep, Shanks makes a small noise — part comfort, part question.
Perhaps not entirely, but he is awake, his hand slow and attentive in the soothing flow of his skin over yours.
"Just a bad dream," you manage, feeling as though your heart wishes to leave your chest and hoping it chooses to stay.
Like he can hear it, Shanks lets his hand drift down your throat, tapping at your clavicle with all the force of a raindrop falling into the sea.
It isn't his touch that hurts. That old image — the fear. It exists in perfect reflection of the affection he offers. Even after waking, the memory rends everything your ribcage seeks to protect.
"I'm here."
He wears no shirt to tangle your fingers into, so you settle for the sheets. His hand leaves your chest and even this minimal distance sets you adrift.
Here. As if he's never gone elsewhere. With you, not gone, sharing what he can of his unshakable peace. You will this knowledge to press you back against your pillows, back into sleep, but remain upright and wide-eyed.
"Do you want to lie down?"
You don't think you can, not when your pulse rises to meet you. But Shanks begins to push himself up against his headboard, which seems a horribly tiring process for someone so deeply exhausted.
"It's been hours," he says quietly.
It's been years.
"It'll be alright." This, at least, is constant as the tide. He's sure.
And then he is seated and a bit too far from you, but his extended arm is steady. "Come touch me, darling." Leaning back, Shanks is an invitation at ease.
You mean only to curl into his side, but his arm comes around you, settling you over his thighs. He wants your warmth, your weight. If you need his assurance, he is just as adrift without yours.
To be face to face like this requires you to look down, for him to gaze up, for the light to catch the shadows beneath your eyes and the flames still burning in his. Your fingertips find the three scars that start above his brow, ghosting over the claws' paths as he closes his eyes. Those pretty crimson lashes flutter beneath your touch, and when you pause at his cheek, he leans ever so slightly into your hand. His eyes open, and the earnest intensity you find there cracks something open. Seas, it aches.
The only thing for it is to close the distance — not entirely — enough to share his breath.
In the lantern-light, his hair flows between your fingers like blood on your hands. It's grown out a bit — too long between ports, too little confidence in your little pair of fabric scissors. You smooth it back, anchoring the longest pieces behind his ears.
His own hand traces soothing arcs over your back, slipping beneath the thin shirt you'd stolen for sleep. Tension bleeds from you into the tide pool of his body where he curls around you, and when you lean in, your fingers are still tangled into his hair.
He lets you make a memory of this moment, gaze falling to your lips as his breath ghosts over them. And then your own eyes are fluttering shut, your mouth a desperate thing in the wake of your control.
Shanks receives the relieved hunger in your kiss with an exhausted but patient kind of grace. Pulling you tighter to his chest, his hand pushes your borrowed shirt up over your shoulder blade.
"Shouldn't," you manage against his lips.
As if in answer, his fingertips follow the curve of bone beneath skin.
Releasing him, you lift your arms. He has to pull away to raise the fabric over your head, swearing softly as it comes away, revealing no layers hidden beneath. Your straightened spine changes where your bodies meet, giving him the opportunity to lean forward: forehead against your sternum, nose grazing the swell of your breast.
His arm curls around your body, one hip against the crook of his elbow and his fingers splayed over the other. The surety in his hold encourages you to settle against him, finding him hard where your thighs open around his waist. Still, the feverish sheen over his brow is a separate burn from the building heat.
He must see concern in your widened eyes, a question on your parted lips.
"I'm drained, not dead." His touch is persistent, entreating despite his easy grin. "And not dying, either. You'll be good for me."
Not your touch will be good for me, which he surely means. Not you are always so good to me, which he is sure to groan into your skin.
It's shorthand you know well enough for a shiver to work its way up your spine, chased by the warmth of his hand. The sensation pushes you closer, ribs against his chest. The beat of his heart washes the image of his blood from your mind on its way into your bones. You take one last shaking breath, then meet his waiting lips again, entirely decided this time.
For a man with nothing left, Shanks moves with a languid attention that feels very much like pouring himself into you. Where his mouth had been upturned before, he opens for you, arm tight around your back as he reclines — exhausted, certainly, but bringing you with him. You settle him, thick and reddened with want, where the subtlest tilt of your hips spreads slick between your folds and down your thighs.
The wet weight of you, so close but never near enough, encourages Shanks to clench his jaw, attention split between your his cock, drenched beneath you. "Sea swallow me."
"It won't," you whisper, sure now, hand pressed hard over his heart. "Though I could."
Even as the words form, you're rising onto your knees rather than falling to them, staying close, close, close.
A little lift is all that's left, then a fall. He supports you through it, as though you're already one. You take him with the ease of a deep breath, slow and stretching until you need release as desperately as you want more. Skies, the feel of him. With a rightness as familiar as the rocking of the ship, the waves lapping at the hull, you settle into a pace that does not rush. It will satisfy, in time, and until then, it suits you to be close, to melt into him as he sits back, hand trailing, no teasing left in your touches.
His thumb drags over a nipple, first this way, then that, then back. The contact frenzies your sparking nerves until, even with your face so close to his, your miss his lips entirely and drag your tongue from the base of his neck back up to catch him in a kiss.
Your hips roll against his, the plush of your thighs pressing harder into his lap. When he moans, his head falls back, leaving a shining, wet strand to thread you together.
"Darling." His voice has gone to deep waters and coarse sands.
He gazes up at you. The string of spit snaps. His mouth falls open.
Lips drawing together as though to kiss him, you allow your collected saliva to pool and fall.
The sound he makes is an agonized sort of groan — so close, so close.
Your fingers are gentle at his throat, no pressure, just enough touch to feel him swallow.
Where he had fallen back, he surges forward, lays his temple over your collarbone, pulls you into him harder, deeper, closer. Your hands reach for each sensitive place you've mapped over years of warming his bed and holding his heart. Worn down to the rough rock but vibrant under your hands, he anchors you to him and moves both your bodies together.
"Come for me." You have none of the power that he does, so it is just this, these murmured words, that toss him into the deep.
As you continue to move through his climax, your walls clench tightly enough that his moan turns tremulous with sensitivity. Still, he does not need to tell you to continue.
Your fingers weave into his hair, holding him tightly against your pounding heart. Your other hand cleverly slips into the scant space between your hips and his.
"You always feel—" A moan breaks in. "Gods, so good. You always feel so good, darling."
The tension gathers tighter — a knot tied once more — and you feel his mouth open against your sweat-damp skin, lips and tongue tasting you as he murmurs:
"You're going to come."
Sure and certain, so soon after that taught pull. You had not felt his power return, but he was so much more adept at subtlety than expected. "Was that—"
"Just your heartbeat." His palm mirrors it against your back. "And your cunt." He catches you just right as you grind against him, pushing himself fractionally deeper from beneath.
Your fingers slip over the bundle of nerves that seems to center your need, gliding around the bit of his shaft still visible between you. You sigh, feeling him still hard, still deep.
The next time he kisses you, he's batting your hands up and away, leaving you to pass your own wet fingertips over the undersides of your breasts and higher. Shanks' hand glides over your thigh firmly, fingers massaging the muscles there before finding the slick skin where you're joined. His thumb circles your clit, his hand stretching up to stroke the flesh above.
His exhausted voice is constant in your ear now. Quietly, roughly, rambling about how deeply you're taking him, how well you're taking care of him, how good you are, always. The words only pause when his mouth is on your neck, tongue teasing a nipple, lips open around your fingers.
The sensations build, every wave strengthening the current that drags you further from shore.
You come with his lips on yours, hips pressed tightly to his. When he curses, you hear it as though underwater, aware of him surging up, stilling, softening as you breathe against his shoulder. The hard pulse in his throat slows in its fluttering against your cheek.
Shanks takes a deep, shuddering breath. You mean to pull away, to give him air, but he only clutches you closer, drawing you in as though he wants to share what's already in your lungs. A pirate through and through.
"Stay," he whispers into your ear, heedless of the sweat plastering your hair to your temples and cooling over your bare back.
"I will," you answer, hands in his hair. "Though your bed is one of the few dry places on this ship, and I'd love for it to stay that way."
He considers this, pouting, letting you lean away only as far as you must to reach the damp washcloth on his nightstand, once intended for laying over his forehead. You kiss the crown of his head instead, separating your bodies enough to clean away most of the mess.
"Sit up."
He complies, watching you curiously. "Kind of thought I was comforting you. You're going to take care of your captain?"
You cock your head, one finger tracing his grin until the corner twitches. "I thought you were drained."
Still depleted and practically intoxicated from two orgasms, he beams at you as though he has stamina to spare for whatever you might have in mind.
Sitting behind him, you bring him down to lay in your lap, holding him the way you had when Benn had first dragged him onto the deck. Now, his eyes are heavy but open, and he looks up at you with something like awe despite the familiarity of your affection.
It's almost enough to have you reach around him, go trial your hands over his body and hold him close between your thighs as he writhes.
But his heart is slow, his voice nearly gone. The night still stretches into the sea, promising only sweet dreams from the stars to the sunrise.
"Sleep, Shanks," you whisper, already anchoring your limbs around his body. "The crew will want to see you in the morning, I'm sure."
He nods, turning, muffling a soft groan against your naked stomach. Even now, so much of his heart is outside of him, so much of the ocean bears down on his shoulders.
"But tonight, yes, I'll take care of you, Captain."
In your sleep, he is strong, so much more than a story.