Author's Note: Yes, another angst piece. So sue me, I'm grieving Ace. Spoilers for up to chapter 582.

Disclaimer: I own nothing recognizable from One Piece.

Just

The World Government preached values like justice and mercy, and the naive believed them. Unfortunate were those who happened across the wrong place at the wrong time, for they were the ones to discover that justice, righteousness, equality, mercy—such concepts were fake. An illusion, created to blind the people whilst the government took control.

Even the World Government had no faith in such simplistic concepts—they were constantly making use of underhanded methods and twisting truths to suit their interests. No, even the World Government did not believe in the ideals it preached.

Neither did Hancock. In fact, she was quite sure that she distrusted the government more than anyone else out there. She, after all, had born the brunt of the hypocrisy of their system. Slavery, rape, assault, abuse, even murder—not only had she seen them all performed in the flesh and even experienced them, but she had watched first hand as the government officials had turned a blind eye.

Falsehoods. Hypocrisy. That was all that the World Government stood for, and Hancock knew it.

So why did she cooperate with them? Because she was no fool. "Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer"; perhaps that quote was an exaggeration, but there was merit to it. As a cooperator of the World Government, she was far safer than an opposer of it.

Perhaps it would not have mattered if it had been a matter of only her. However, there were her girls to think about. She was not going to let them be used and abused by the men of the world whilst the government turned a blind eye. Better that they remain happy, in the blissful oblivion that was ignorance.

Amazon Lily was her sanctuary, and being there always put her heart at ease.

Yet as of late, it had not been so much of a sanctuary for her at all. First, the man on the loose. Then the man's defiance of her.

And then she had fallen in love with him.

She had believed that all men of the world were the same—selfish bores who saw women as tools, and used and abused anyone available.

Luffy was not like that at all. He was naive; when she had met him, he had seemed entirely oblivious to the evils of the world. Though a pirate, he seemed to have all the ideals that the World Government preached…

And he believed in them.

It had been a shock to Hancock to realize that she had never expected to ever meet anyone who would be able to believe in those ideals that she had given up on so long ago. Of course, Luffy didn't quite believe in justice, or mercy, or equality in the same way as the World Government preached it. He didn't go after the "bad guys" to show them justice, and he didn't try to make rules and doctrines preaching equality.

He never preached anything, really.

He simply believed.

So how could she not have helped him when he declared that he wanted to save his brother? It reminded her vividly of those days in slavery when she had thrown herself at her master for touching her sisters. She had sported that scar for half a decade afterwards, but the only thing she had ever regretted was that she hadn't managed to change a thing.

She had desperately hoped that things would be different for Luffy.

They had been. He had saved his brother, and Hancock had smiled in relief and joy. And Luffy had looked even handsomer than usual as he stood, still battered and bleeding but grinning and confident as he fought side-by-side with his brother.

But Ace had died. It had happened so suddenly, so unexpectedly—Hancock was forced to admit, in horror, that she had actually been glad in that moment when a blur of movement had shot in between Luffy and his attacker. In the next moment, Hancock—and Luffy, and everyone else on the battlefield—had registered what had happened.

Hancock remembered that moment like it was still happening, when everything had stopped for a moment.

And then Ace was gone. And then Luffy was frozen, lifeless, as though his soul had left his body to follow his brother's.

Hancock could only bring him back to her sanctuary, and promise not to see him until he was himself again—she knew, better than anyone, how much it hurt to let people see her when she was out of her mind with suffering.

Sometimes, her sisters had to restrain her from rushing to his side.

But now, she stood motionless at her window and listened to the screams of pain and anger and suffering and despair that echoed from the forest.

She would not let herself do anything but stand tall and proud as the one man dear to her suffered. Then, when the screams had died away, she would allow herself to cry. She would collapse to the floor by the window, and there she would sob for Luffy, in the hope that her tears today would mean that much less for Luffy tomorrow.

As a particularly heartbroken scream echoed through her window, she could not help the shudder that wracked her body for a moment. A tear threatened to fall. She did not let it.

She let each scream enter her heart and fuel that anger and hatred that she harbored towards the World Government. What mercy? What justice? What equality?

The next scream steeled her resolution. Hancock swore there and then on everything that she loved that one day, the World Government would see the justice that they preached. And she would make sure that they saw it in Luffy, if she had anything to say about it.

Dimly, she heard a gloomy voice at the back of her mind wonder if the World Government would even recognize justice; that in all likelihood, they would be as likely to call it "crime" or "terrorism."

She quashed the voice ruthlessly. If they didn't recognize justice, then she would beat it into their face until they did if it was the last thing she did.