Chapter Text
“...Nasty business.”
“Yeah.”
“ Disgusting, really.”
“...Yeah.”
You eyed the report Kuzan had placed on your desk with disdain. Not a week had passed since the Summit War of Marineford, and you sat in your makeshift office in one of the Navy’s makeshift interim headquarters, surrounded by box after box of complaints and excuses. The Marines admitted no wrongdoing in regards to the war, but with the guilt and desperation that bled through in their poorly-written accounts of what actually happened, it didn’t make much of a difference.
Few people could walk away from watching a kid of no more than 20 bleed out in his younger brother’s arms and feel good about it.
Akainu was one, you supposed.
Kizaru was impossible to read as ever.
And the third admiral—
The third admiral was standing in front of you now, eyes pinned to the title of a report on another stack of almost-identical reports that you were meant to review and edit for grammar and style.
You couldn’t help the flood of resentment that struck you upon remembering that the man in front of you was out in the field, capable of influencing the course of events in real time while you were stuck cowering behind your desk, praying for his safety and for the whole situation to somehow disappear.
You stared at Kuzan a moment longer and gritted your teeth. “You agree, but you participated,” you hissed.
His eyes snapped to you. He looked mildly startled, but not particularly surprised, already aware of your shared proclivities and the gray area in which both your loyalties lay. “Don’t be like that. You know I didn’t have a choi—you know I had to.”
“But you did have a choice.”
“I caught myself already; thank you very much.”
You barked a bitter laugh. “One more ‘just following orders’ to add to the stack, eh? Somehow you struck me as better than that. Well, sometimes.”
“...Sometimes. When I can be better.” Kuzan turned away once more, and the hideous fluorescent lighting of your office caught on the dark circles lining his eyes. His face seemed gaunt, the sharp angles of his cheekbones cutting more insistently at his skin. “I’m fighting, you know.”
The battle between your sympathy for the colleague you had grown to love and your sense of justice—just the word left a bad taste in your mouth now—was settled with an inconclusive sigh. “I don’t think I can ask whose battle while we’re within these walls.”
His lip quirked when he looked at you, but the exhaustion didn’t leave his face. “Quite a bit thinner than the walls at Marineford, eh?” After a long beat of silence, he ripped a corner off another useless report and leaned over your desk to jot something down. “Meet me there. Tonight at 8.”