This Bites! (One Piece SI)

[tarrangar]

actually if we think about it if devil fruits cared about range then bearglove would not have been able to talk on the sbs. I think.
and if I am wrong that would mean that soundbites do effect areas through the sbs at least.

Click to shrink...

Why not? The SBS is sent though Soundbite, the sound of whoever is talking get sent to Soundbite, he says it out loud, and then his rig send it on to everyone who are listening in on the SBS, considering Soundbite understand animal's when an animal call the SBS Soundbite just say the translation of what they are saying, instead of the animal speech.

Soundbite is the vessel the messages is coming though, and he's fully capable of translating in real time, so he's just translating what animals who call the SBS are saying, while he says it out loud, Soundbite has no delay on the translation effort, so just like he can seamlessly translate what other animals say, in realtime and without an undertone of their real voice, he can also do that to himself, allowing him to mask human voices, and substitute human speech for animal speech, Soundbite letting animals speak on the SBS, is just him translating for himself instead of for others.

On Terry's end they still heard Terry make bird sounds, it's just on Soundbite's end it was translated to human sounds, and it's Soundbite's end that's being sent out to the world.

 

[Xomniac]

Chapter 53​

Cross-Brain AN: The following arc shall be a unique one: As the Straw Hats enjoy themselves a blissful little bit of shore leave in this mini-saga, so too shall you readers enjoy a break… from Cross! Hit it!

"Hammer."

Tool pressed into his hand, Usopp slipped his goggles down, kneeled in the grass of the Thousand Sunny's pavilion, and carefully maneuvered the hammer to just the right spot. He hoped. Sea prism stone, for all its hardness and the fact that it was a metal, was very brittle fresh from cooling down from forge temperatures. He and Franky, who was watching closely behind him, had found that out the hard way, and neither was very eager to wait for another island where they could heat a forge hot enough to melt the stuff.

Finally locating the spot, he raised the hammer and brought it down, the clay covering the hook cracking and flaking off. Underneath, the stone was pristine, and Usopp breathed a sigh of relief.

"Well, looks good," he reported, straightening up as he wiped his forehead. "Even if the heating function doesn't work, Boss'll be able to brain people just fine."

"It'll super work," Franky stated with all the certainty of most conspiracy theorists. Taking the hook, he slotted a Dial into an open crevice, clicked a panel into place, and tapped it on the anvil, a telltale heat haze rising seconds later. "See?"

Usopp whooped victoriously and pumped his fist. "Finally! Man, this was taking forever!" The tinker-sniper grinned eagerly as he wrung his hands. "The next ones should be super easy now!"

"Don't steal my line, long nose," Franky chuckled in warning, absentmindedly reaching for their cache of weapons. His hands closed on air and sackcloth, and he glanced over at the limp, sad, empty sack. "Hey, Usopp, where are the next ones?"

"Huh?" Usopp glanced over at the bag before snapping his fingers. "Oh, yeah, I decided to wait on getting those because of how tricky I thought it would be to make the materials cooperate."

"Well, you were right, but we've got it now. So, where's—aha!" Franky exclaimed, leaning out of the pavilion and pointing upward.

Usopp followed his finger to the sleeping form of Cross, lying on a few ropes tied between two of Sunny's lines. He frowned. "Hey, Franky, did you consider putting some hammocks on Sunny's masts during the design process?"

"Nope," Franky replied. "But I'm not surprised Cross improvised one anyway. Honestly, I'm amazed that the whole thing hasn't come undone yet."

"And… for curiosity's sake, where's the control panel for those lines?"

A grin slowly came over Franky's face as he jabbed a thumb at a nearby section of paneling. "From what I've managed to get out of Merry's modifications? Third panel from the right, right over there," he said, voice brimming with anticipation.

Usopp nodded, and then eyed Cross snoozing contentedly in his makeshift hammock. He looked back at the hidden controls for the Sunny's lines, and then at the tactician again, an evil grin growing on his face, joined by an equally evil glint in his eyes and a silent thumbs-up from Franky. Creeping up to the controls, he took a few seconds to examine them and then rapped his knuckles against the panel.

To Usopp's alarm—and a little amusement—Cross was not flipped onto the deck by the lines suddenly unraveling as he'd planned. What did happen was arguably even better: a pulley came falling out of the sky and did verily smack him right on the forehead. Letting out a cry of pain, Cross clutched his forehead and immediately flailed himself out of his resting place and onto the deck with a meaty thump.

"Sonnuva—what the hell, Merry!?" he yelped, clutching his forehead.

"NOT IT!" Merry called out from the helm, more amusement than offense in her voice.

"Sorry, Cross!" Usopp called back as he vaulted out of the pavilion, hiding the urge to snicker. "That was me! I was just trying to get the ropes to flip you onto the lawn!"

"Same question!"

"Fastest way to wake you up, and it would have been a soft landing, plus it was going to be, and still was, funny," was the shameless answer. "And now that you're up, I just finished confirming that sea prism stone doesn't interfere with Dials, so I need to borrow your hat and armor so I can upgrade them."

Cross blinked, and then he flipped himself into a sitting position, his annoyance and frustration visibly gone. "Sea prism stone upgrades? That's what you were working on?" he asked.

"What the heck did you expect after that fiasco on Thriller Bark?" Franky replied, slipping his fist's skin off and displaying his new (literal) brass knuckles. "If we had some of this on hand when Moria woke up, it wouldn't have been half the nightmare it was. I doubt that's the last time we'll get blindsided, but thanks to the Accinos and Enies, it is the last time we'll be completely unprepared. Any Ability-user that messes with us in the future is gonna be in for a nasty surprise."

"And so will you unless you can explain why you didn't think to consult anyone else about this."

The trio turned to Zoro, who was climbing down the mast, his usual scowl even more pronounced than normal. "I was willing to go with the salt paste because it was a one-time thing and easy to get off. But I'm not going to lace my swords with—"

"Oh, give it a rest, Zoro, we all know how much of a purist you are," Cross stated flatly, waving away the objections.

"And we took that into account," Usopp added, tossing some bottle cap-like objects at the swordsman, who caught them reflexively. "We designed caps to go on the bottom of your hilts. They're not touching the blades, so no problem there, right?"

Zoro looked from the caps to his swords and then to Usopp. Eventually, he nodded in acceptance.

"I'll need to think about practicing pommel strikes…" he muttered. "Haven't done those in ages…" With that, he stalked off, probably to start training. With his back turned towards them, Usopp visibly relaxed.

"Whew… thank goodness that worked, I saw my life flash before my eyes…" Usopp sighed in relief, before turning his eyes to the third mate. "So, Cross?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'll get them to you in a second," he groused, knocking on the mast to bring down a rope. "And for the record? Watch your head."

Usopp swallowed nervously as the tactician shot up and out of sight before glancing around. "A-Alright, now, where's Nami?"

"Right here," Nami called, emerging from the back of the ship and walking towards him. "What do you need?"

"I need to borrow your Clima-Tact to refit it with sea prism stone."

Nami blinked, glancing at her staff, then back at Usopp. "Not gonna question it, I'll just roll with the good fortune. How long will it take?"

"Two hours to fit the entire staff, or one if I just do the orbs or the rods."

"Just go for the orbs, then," Nami said, handing over the staff. "I'd rather not have it out of reach for longer than I need to, and we're better off leaving some space so that if someone other than me needs to grab it, they don't get conked out."

"Ditto there!"

CLANG!

"GAH!" Usopp yelped, his heart rate spiking as a mass of armor sailed inches above his head. He immediately turned on Cross as the third mate rode a line back down to the deck, his limbs wrapped in bandages. "What was that for!?"

"Oh, lighten up, it was funny!" the transdimensional traveler said in a god-awful imitation of Usopp's own voice. "But, ah, in all seriousness, I'm with Nami. I'd prefer it if Chopper could actually touch me while he put me back together."

"And if we didn't conk right out whenever he grabbed us, that'd be great," Lassoo added from where he was snoozing in the sun.

"Don't worry, I'll just give him Sea-Stone knuckles along with a few traces on the inside for reinforcement," Usopp assured them. "They won't be anywhere near you."

"Then in that case, do your best!" Funkfreed chimed in.

Light glinted off of Franky's teeth as he flashed them all a thumbs-up. "You can super! count on us!"

"Well, while we're counting on them…" Cross mused thoughtfully, shooting an eager grin at his larger partners. "You guys wanna touch up on me dual-wielding you? It'd be nice to get some input on how to coordinate using the two of you at the same time!… Y'know, outside of pitched combat."

"Wha—Seriously!?" Lassoo barked eagerly, scrambling to his paws and loping up to his wielder with an eager whoof, nearly bowling Cross over in his slobbering enthusiasm. "Hells yes! Let's see some action!"

"WATCH IT, ODIE!" Soundbite gagged as he snapped into his shell. "I CAN TAKE SOME FOREIGN SLIME, NOT A FLOOD!"

"Gah! Alright, alright, down boy!" Cross laughed, holding the dog away by his chest. Once he had some breathing room, he eyed the dog with an appreciative whistle. "Eesh, boy, watch it, you almost flattened me! Seriously, have you put on weight or something?"

"The better to blast them with!" Lassoo crowed, fangs flashing.

"He's got a point there!" Funkfreed said as he used his trunk to haul his fellow weapon off. "But, ah, first, before we get into it, maybe we should talk a little first so that we can hash things out?"

"Ah… eheh, right…" Lassoo smiled sheepishly, one hind leg going up to scratch at his ear. "Fair 'nuff…"

"LET'S GET TO IT!" Soundbite commanded.

And with that, the quartet moved to a corner of the deck and started to talk.

Franky, meanwhile, had gone back into the pavilion, and as Cross and his partners went to work he'd hauled a large bag out and dropped it on the lawn. "Alright, that's all the Dial-based weapons except for Conis's—"

"And I've already got enough non-Dial weapons of hers outfitted, along with some ammo that I'll be splitting with her," Usopp finished, digging through the bag and handing out the appropriate equipment to everyone as they passed by. "For everyone else, we've got a new pipe for Luffy with the ends reinforced—!"

"WOOHOO!" Luffy whooped as he swung by and snatched the pipe out of Usopp's hand. The marksman, to his credit, didn't miss a beat.

"—two pairs of detachable soles for Sanji, four scalpels for Chopper, a butterfly knife for Robin—and I still say it's freaky how good she is with those things, former assassin or not."

"Well, I am from the West Blue," Robin chuckled, spinning the blade through her fingers with terrifying expertise. "And… 'former,' hmm? Cute."

Usopp gulped audibly, tugging at his collar. "R-Right… anyway, the blades for Vivi and Carue's weapons have been tempered, along with Raphey's shuriken and sai, and we've reinforced Mikey's nunchucks and Donny's staff. With all that, we don't have a lot of sea prism stone left unless we wanna cut into the half-dozen pairs of cuffs we have left—"

"Hell to pay if you do!" Cross called over.

"Noted!" Franky shouted back before cocking an eyebrow at his partner-in-forge. "So what else do we need and can we pull it off with what we have left?"

"Uh, let's see…" Usopp muttered. "A few of Donny's Kunai if we can manage it… and we still need something for Brook and Merry. Brook is easy enough, we can just reinforce his sheath, but what about Merry?"

"Easy enough! But first!"

CLONK!

"OW!" Usopp yelped as the ship's helmsgirl dropped out of the rigging and bounced off his head.

"Leggo my Big Bro! Got it?!" she ordered, puffing out her cheeks with an adorable scowl on her face. "It was funny that time, but you could have done something really dangerous! Or stupid! Or stupidly dangerous or dangerously stupid!"

"Noted…" Usopp groaned as he poked at the growing lump rising from his scalp. "Anyway… you were saying?"

"Oh, right!" Merry brightened up. "Yeah, it's easy: just make some sheaths or casings or something for some hooks and pulleys. One or two oughta do, and then I can let Big Bro do the rest!"

Usopp and Franky exchanged looks, then turned back at her. "And what about if you're not on the ship?" the marksman asked.

Merry's expression fell flat, and she cast a pointed glance to the side. "Then someone screwed up, and someone is going to get their ass kicked."

"Love you too, Merry," Cross called back, rolling his eyes at the not-so-subtle warning. "And fair warning, you two? Brook should be indisposed right now, so you'll have to fetch his blade yourselves."

"Indisposed? Doing wha—? OK, stupid question, not like anyone's doing much else today," Franky said. "What kind of training is he doing, then?"

"Eh… well, you already know that Brook was in the Florian Triangle for fifty years before we met him," Cross began, grimacing. "But in all that time, he never tried exploring the limits of the Revive-Revive Fruit. Coming back from the dead granted him a few powers that he hasn't explored, and once he unlocks them he's going to get a major boost in abilities. But it all depends on him getting back to the basics of his power first."

"Aaaand… he's doing that how, exactly?" Merry slowly queried.

Cross's grimace deepened, and he glanced to the side and scratched his cheek. "Weeeell…"

-o-

"I am experiencing many conflicted feelings at the moment…"

Brook shivered, shaking the bag he was trussed up in as he uneasily eye-socketed the barrel of water sitting under him.

"Trust me, this isn't my idea of fun either," Chopper groused, furiously scribbling his stream of thoughts into a notebook. "But, as uncomfortable as this idea might be, I can't fault Cross's logic. So unless you'd rather go for meditation or something like that—?"

"Grk!" Brook's jaw set uncomfortably, teeth clicking. "My, ah, m-my mind is not exactly the kind of place I would like to willingly delve into, no thank you."

"Then this is the best option we have to get the best results in the shortest amount of time… no matter how much I might not like it…" Chopper sighed in conclusion.

"Not exactly having a fun time here either, ya know!" Donny piped up, gritting his teeth as he shifted his grip on the rope that was keeping Brook suspended above the barrel of seawater. "And why is it that you picked me for this, anyway? Half the crew, including all of my bros outrank me in muscle, and Merry, Robin, and even Luffy outrank me on Devil Fruit knowledge on top of that, and none of them were busy last time I checked!"

"Simple, Donny," Chopper stated, locking eyes with the dugong. "Effective five minutes ago, you're my assistant."

Donny's brain froze up, unable to process the reindeer's statement. He just managed to catch himself before he let Brook's rope slip, but he was still left staring blankly at Chopper with his mouth slightly open until the doctor elaborated.

"The crew is taking too many and too serious injuries for me to handle on my own anymore, and while Merry has the skills to help me, she's got muscle memory but not much else," Chopper answered, not looking up from his note-taking. "She'll do for first aid, and nursing with a little training, but I need someone else for a more permanent position, and until further notice that's going to be you, unless you're going to tell me that you don't want it."

Donny blinked several times as he thought it over. He was always the smart one among his siblings, and often was the one who told them how to patch up their injuries with the local remedies back in Alabasta. All things considered, he wasn't really opposed to the idea of standing by Chopper, and he was reasonably sure that Boss would allow it (however grudgingly) It was still a big a decision to make, though, and he frowned in contemplation as he weighed the pros and cons.

"And before you ask if you can have more time to think it over, know that I very nearly defaulted to pinning you with a needle of paralytics before dragging you up here; you do not want to live with me if I need to spend a week in sedated sleep again," Chopper added.

Donny snapped his flipper into a salute. "I accept this position with—GYAH!" he yelped as his one-handed grip on the rope promptly slipped and he was awarded with a painful rope burn. Immediately, he scrambled to get the rope back under control, earning more rope burns in the process.

"ACK! CAREFUL, CAREFUL!" Brook cried as he jerked downwards and swung precariously over the watery coffin.

"Watch it, we need to be careful about how we do this!" Chopper chastised his newly chosen apprentice.

"And what exactly is 'this'?" came another voice.

The trio all turned their attention to a corner of the quarterdeck, where a previously sun tanning Perona had lifted her sunglasses onto her forehead and was regarding them with a cocked eyebrow.

Chopper and Donny exchanged uncertain looks, silently considering how much information they could or should divulge, only for the choice to be taken from their hands when Brook spoke up.

"Per Cross's advice, I am attempting to explore the capabilities of my Devil Fruit powers," he casually explained.

Both hybrids looked at the skeleton in askance, to which he responded with a light shrug, inasmuch as he could manage in his sack. "She's a young girl who had no active part in either parts of my torment, I see no reason for a grudge or secrecy." He then turned back to Perona. "You see, as you've no doubt already guessed, I am as I am thanks to my Devil Fruit: the Revive-Revive Fruit, which, upon my first death, allowed my soul to return to the mortal coil and repossess my fallen body… if in a degraded state."

Perona blinked in legitimate surprise. "…Wow. Somehow, I'm actually still surprised by just how BS Devil Fruits can be," she deadpanned. "But how is dunking you in the water supposed to help you get a better grip on your powers? I don't need to why that doesn't make sense, I hope."

"Simply put, I'm returning to my power's roots," Brook explained. "As you'll recall, I said I returned to this world as a soul and then repossessed my body. According to Cross, this possession was not permanent, and I am fully capable of returning to my astral state, which could be useful for a variety of reasons. Most of all, disassociating myself from my body and ignoring such limitations as pain or injury to my corporeal form, which should rightly have no effect on me so long as I acknowledge that my skeleton is a mere shell. A convenient and dear shell, but just a shell. However…"

Brook's jaw twisted into as much of a grimace as it could manage. "Returning to my astral form is not as easy as it would sound. It has been fifty years since I returned from the afterlife, fifty years since I regained my body…"

Perona's expression fell into a deadpan. "And… you forgot how."

"Less that I forgot, more that I never knew that I could return to my soul state in the first place, in addition to not thinking there was any advantage to such a 'devolution', as I initially viewed it," Brook shrugged.

"Hence, this undertaking," Chopper spoke up, tapping the barrel. "Cross suggested this as an alternative to long hours of meditation, and as much as I don't like it, I agree with the train of thought: By slowly dunking Brook into the water, his instincts as a Devil Fruit user will make him desperate to escape, but his restraints will leave him only one possible means of doing so. In essence, we're going to be scaring him from… his… body…" Suddenly, Chopper turned his full attention to the ship's guest. "Unless you have any better ideas?"

The self-titled Ghost Princess snorted derisively as she flicked her sunglasses back down and leaned back into her chair, snapping her reflector board open. "None I'm going to share with you, furball."

"What!?" the doctor yelped in honest shock. "But we just—!"

"Lemme take a flying guess at her next words," Donny interrupted as he affixed the stowaway with a cold glare. "'Pirate', right?"

"You really struck gold with blubber-butt, Doc Hatchet," Perona sang, a smirk clear despite the reflector in the way. "He's already smarter than you."

Chopper glared at her for a second longer before snapping his head away with a harsh click of his tongue. "We're beginning the experiment. Donny, lower him in. Just a half-foot, we'll start easy."

"Aye," the purple-marked Dugong nodded, loosening his grip and slowly allowing his rope to slip through his flippers. Brook tensed as he lowered closer to the barrel. Water soaked into the fabric, and then through, engulfing his bony feet and prompting him to squirm.

"Anything?" Chopper called up with no small amount of concern.

"Ah…" Brook flinched uneasily as he shifted about. "A bit uncomfortable, and I'm trying my best to… to go up, as it were, but, well…"

"If you want to stop—"

"No, no, I can continue," Brook assured him.

"Alright then…" Chopper nodded slowly before glancing at his assistant. "Donny, another half-!"

"For the sake of my being able to relax without your pathetic whimpering, let me give you some advice."

"Wha—GAH!" Chopper yelped when a foot was suddenly planted in his back, sending him sprawling him to the ground to be swiftly pinned.

Perona sniffed haughtily as she ground her heel into the Zoan's spine, casting a dispassionate glare at the skeleton. "The key to separation? You just need to let go, numbskull. And on that note…" An unearthly cackling aura suddenly bloomed in her palm. "Good luck because you're gonna need it. NEGATIVE HOLLOW!"

It would be untrue to say that Donny didn't have the reflexes to dodge out of the way of the speeding specter. However, the fact that he was holding a rope that was keeping his crewmate out of hot water—or water, period, as it were—caused him to hesitate for a moment. And that moment was all the time he had.

Donny moaned and fell to his 'knees' as the specter passed through him. "I wish someone would just cook me into a—!"

SPLASH!

"GAH!" Water splashed onto Donny's body, knocking him out of his depression with a flash of horror. "BROOK!" Donny cried, staring in horror at the water sloshing from the barrel.

"BROOK, NO!" Chopper yelled, snapping into his Heavy Point—which was actually unnecessary as Perona had already stepped back as soon as she'd cast out her Negative Hollow—rushing over to the barrel and plunging his hand into the water, in spite of how it took a good chunk from his stamina. "Shit-shit-shit-shit—!"

"Hurry, Chopper! You have to get me out before I drown!" Brook pleaded desperately as he hovered over Chopper's shoulder.

"I'm trying, I'm trying!"

"Please, I can't hold my breath!"

"You don't have any breath to hold, numbskull. More than usual, even," Perona deadpanned, casting a dispassionate glare over her reflector.

"Eh?" Brook blinked in confusion, turning to stare at the Ghost Princess. "What are… you…?" He blinked again (even though he lacked eyelids), and turned back to his crewmates, who were staring at him in shock. "Ah… why are you looking at me like that?"

Chopper, devoid of words as he was, could only weakly point his finger into the barrel.

Tilting his head in confusion, Brook followed the Zoan's finger and stared into the water. Beneath the water's surface, a skeleton was slumped lifelessly. And reflected in the water's surface was—!

"AH! A ghost!" Brook recoiled with a shriek of terror. Then, just as swiftly, he calmed down as realization struck him. "Oh, wait, that's me. AH! I'm dead! Oh, wait, that's not new… OH! A cute woman!" The spectral pirate grinned eagerly at Perona. "Say, could you show me your—?"

"Could someone give Grampa his body back before he goes completely senile?" Perona demanded impatiently.

"But… isn't his brain already dead?" Donny questioned weakly.

"Yohohoho! That was funny! I think I'll call it a Skull Joke!" Brook chortled before jerking back in shock. "AH! A talking animal! Oh, wait, you're my crewmate… AH! Where am—!?"

Moving fast, Chopper shot his fist into the barrel, yanked the skeleton's afro out and effectively slapped the spirit upside his astral head with his own skull.

Brook yelped in shock, his skull vibrating slightly, his mood quickly ratcheting down to a relieved sigh. "Ah… ack… wow… that was… hoo…" the newly re-undead skeleton sighed in relief. "Well, at least I'm back to normal."

"Uhh… For… a given measure of the term anyways…" Donny hedged uneasily.

"Huh? What are yoouuWAAAAGH!" Brook's question devolved into a terrified shriek when he suddenly realized he was missing his body, and was in fact just a talking head in Chopper's shaky hands. "I'VE BEEN DECORPITATED!"

"And yet, much to my misery, you are still very much alive and still very noisy," Perona grumbled irritably. "Looks like loudmouth was right: You're just a soul, you don't need your body… well, you still do for now, until you manage to get ahold of yourself in astral form."

His breath back, Chopper slowly turned a wary but pleading look to the girl. "Do… could you please tell us what just happened… Ghost Princess?"

Perona blinked at the usage of her title, but then leaned back in her chair with a careless wave of her hand. "Eh… it's no big deal, really. It's just that going astral can be really disconcerting. Without your body, your mind gets set loose or something and you can lose track of yourself pretty fast. You just need to make sure you've got a good sense of self before you try, otherwise?" She shrugged carelessly. "You'll devolve into a will-o-the-wisp and scatter into dust on the aetherial wind."

Chopper and Donny both shuddered fearfully at the Goth's sheer nonchalance at some serious existential horror, but Brook… Brook's gaze, however expressionless, softened somewhat as he regarded the Hollow-girl. "Personal experience, I take it?"

Going by how Perona's body locked up in frigid fury, that was the wrong thing to say. "Get out. Of my light," she grit out through a scowl that had twisted her face, and a trio of cackling Negative Hollows slowly started to orbit around her hand. "Or I will make you idiots wish you were never even conceived, let alone born."

For a moment, the trio stood stock still. As it turned out, that was a moment too long.

Perona snarled murderously, her eyes rolling up into blankness. "You asked for it."

-o-

From her position on the quarterdeck, Merry was well-positioned to both monitor the sea ahead and catch the first screams wafting up from the main deck below. Curious, she quickly confirmed that she could leave the helm at least briefly, and left the wheel to go poke her head over the railing.

She was thus just in time to see Donny, carrying a sloshing barrel of water, and Chopper, carrying Brook's still-undead head, run below her in a panic, all three screaming their, ah, heads off. The cackling, grinning specters heading after them answered the question forming in her mind before it was asked. She blinked a couple of times before sighing fondly and leaning against the stand holding the wheel up.

"This crew never ceases to amaze, do they, Big Bro?"

A soft purring vibrated beneath her fingers and feet, causing her smile to grow. She made to head back to the helm, only for a familiar sound to cause her to head significantly faster in the opposite direction.

"Puru puru puru puru! AW, dang it!" Soundbite groused, his ringing drawing the ire of everyone else under the tree he and Cross were under. "For once, THEIR TIMING—Puru puru puru puru!—bites."

"Well, if you really wanna split hairs, you're the only one who really needs to go," Lassoo snorted dismissively. "I've got an idea for a new attack I'd like to try out."

"I've… got one, too, actually," Funkfreed said tentatively. "And I think you'll like it, Cross."

"BLOW IT OUT YOUR TAILPIPE, flea-bag, I've got something up my—Puru puru puru puru!—shell too, and you'll wanna hear it SEEING AS IT—Puru puru puru puru!—INVOLVES YOU LUGS! THE SNAIL STAYS!"

The tactician glanced between his partners, visibly hesitating. "I… suppose I could skip one call…?"

And that was when Merry decided to intervene. "Orrrr you could rely on someone else for a change!" she called down in a 'what an idiot' kind of tone.

The quartet all blinked and looked up at her in surprise. "Huh?" Cross questioned. "What are you—?"

"It's easy: Soundbite can shunt the call over to Brain and I'll handle them! If your input's critical, Soundbite can still hear me if he needs to. If not, no harm lost! Easy, right?"

"Hmm…" Merry watched as Cross visibly chewed on his cheek. After a moment of thought, he looked up at Merry. "Anything well-and-truly critical—"

"Five alarm call-out, on the double!" Merry agreed, saluting. "…I'm being literal, I can trigger five alarms at once from the lounge."

"…eh, alright, fine then," Cross sighed, snapping his fingers. "Soundbite, can you—?"

"PATCHED THROUGH—Puru puru—klack!—NOW, TO BRAIN IN THE LOUNGE! HAVE FUN, GIVE 'EM HELL!"

"Got it! See ya!" Merry said with a grin, giving them all a final wave before kicking open a trapdoor right below her and dropping into one of the many boltholes she'd installed in her Big Bro.

As Merry clambered through her personal passageway, she reveled in the sense of sheer exclusivity she always felt when she used them. The network stretched everywhere throughout the ship, but they were damn small; Chopper's antlers and the Dugongs' blubber meant that even they couldn't enter, leaving only the shipgirl and Su at the right size and physical capability to properly navigate them. It wasn't purely hers, true, but Merry could think of worse comrades to share her network with (She liked Robin well enough, loved her even, but if that woman's incessant patting of her head resulted in a bald spot…) than the cloud fox.

After a minute of travel, Merry emerged into the Aquarium Lounge. Once she confirmed that the room was indeed empty of any of her crewmates, and in fact of any living thing besides herself, Brain, and the large octopus lounging in an upturned helmet at the bottom of the tank, she sealed the room with a quick knock on the wall and loped up to the ringing chubby snail sitting on one of the tables.

She had just been reaching for the receiver when she paused and, after a moment of thought, adopted a devilish grin that she quickly banished in favor of her cutest look possible. It was with this cute look that she clicked Brain's button. "You've reached Minnie's Maid Service Manor! How may I help you, Master?"

"Bwuh—!? Er, ah, I-I-I am so sorry, I think I have the wrong number—!"

"MWAHAHAHAHA!" Merry burst out cackling at the poleaxed expression the snail was wearing by proxy. "Now I see why Cross does this so often, it's hi-i-ilarious! MWAHAHAHAHA!"

Brain's gobsmacked look suddenly swapped to deadpan. "And now you see why I wanted you to be the first on the line instead of me."

"HAHA—eh?" Merry's laughter cut off in a confused blink. "Wait, Tashigi? But if I didn't prank you, then who—?"

"Ah, t-this is Lieu—geh, force of habit… Seaman First Class 'Ironfist' Fullbody. I, ah… I actually ran into your crew back in the East Blue. Do you… remember me?"

Merry's grin creaked into wooden brittleness, and her fingernails started to dig into the table's veneer. "You mean do I remember the raging asshole who tried to sink me on a whim in order to impress the bimbo he was carting around? Even though my crew didn't have a single bounty to its name at the time?" The shipgirl's grin started twitching murderously. "I think I might have a vague recollection of you."

"…I never thought I'd be un-happy to be remembered," Fullbody gulped audibly, glancing very nervously to the side.

"We'll discuss this later, Seaman," Lieutenant Junior-Grade Tashigi frigidly informed him. "Alright, moving on from what was even less funny than I expected, Cottonmouth, is Ophiuchus there?"

"Indisposed with training, along with Knucker and pretty much everyone else except Callie." Merry informed her. "I mean, I could get them if you need them, but—"

"It… depends," Tashigi said hesitantly. "This is a status report for the most part, though there is one thing I'd like to get his input on if possible, just to see if he knows anything about it."

"Priorities first, what may or may not need his know-how?" Merry inquired.

"Ah, ahem! That's actually why I'm here!" Fullbody offered. "As you'll recall, my superior, Captain 'Black Cage' Hina, wasn't available for the last meeting of the Masons that was convened. The reason for that, and the reason why I'm here now instead of her, is that at the moment, Captain Hina and the rest of the Black Cage Formation are on an assignment in the East Blue, investigating something rather… disturbing."

The shipgirl cocked her eyebrow. "In what way, exactly?"

"Picowana Island," the Seaman started solemnly. "Up until, as near as we can estimate, a month ago, it was an uninhabited tropical island. No valuable resources, no notable native species, just jungle and not much else of interest. And then, a month ago, somebody or something destroyed it."

Merry couldn't help but swallow slightly, a sheen of cold sweat coming into being on the back of her neck. "…care to, ah, clarify that statement a bit?"

"The island itself is still there, if that's what you're asking, the physical rock has not been touched… but that's essentially all that remains." Fullbody's gaze became somewhat haunted. "It was… I'm honestly at a loss to describe it. The entire island, the whole of the jungle, was savaged. Trees were uprooted, crushed, sliced to pieces, the animals were all ripped to shreds in every way imaginable, blood was everywhere, and that was the conventional damage. Some tracts of land were burnt to cinders, there were dozens of animal skeletons that looked like they'd been picked clean, and there were even several swamps of literal poison bubbling away! The carnage, it was just…" Fullbody slowly shook his head. "It was absolute in ways I've never seen before."

"Holy hell…" Merry breathed softly.

"We wanted to ask Cross if he knew anything about this," Tashigi picked up, voice solemn. "We know this isn't technically Mason business, but we—the Marines, that is—have no idea what caused or could have caused that kind of destruction, and we want to find it before it can do so again on another island or, God forbid, one that's actually inhabited."

"No, I understand, and I'm sure Cross would too…" Merry slowly nodded before transitioning to a shake. "But… while I'll pass this on to Cross, I'm afraid he won't have anything to contribute."

Tashigi grimaced unhappily. "You're sure about that?"

Merry let out a slight 'bah' of apology. "Cross said our next destination was the Sabaody Archipelago, and that as far as he knows, we're not due for any more big fights for awhile. I'm pretty sure that if he knew anything about this, he'd have said. So, either this is something totally new or, more likely, it's something that came up outside of his Straw Hat-centric scope of knowledge. And if that really is the case…"

"He'll have jack to tell us, right, right," Tashigi nodded reluctantly before heaving a sigh. "Damn, and I was just getting used to getting anything other than a few vague, unsatisfying answers out of him… bah!" She shook her head and nodded again, this time with determination blazing in her eyes. "Whatever! We did fine without Cross in the past and we'll be fine now! We Marines have our pride too, you know!"

"Aye-aye, Lieutenant!" Fullbody concurred eagerly.

"You go, four-eyes!" Merry pumped her fist encouragingly.

Tashigi maintained her prideful expression for a minute or so. Then, she blinked in honest surprise. "Wait… so… you're not going to point out some eensy weensy flaw in my logic or jab another hole in my uniform and let all the air out of my renewed confidence and pride in my flag?"

"Uhhh… nnnoooo?"

"…I've gotta call while Cross is away more often, I don't think I've ever been on the line with you guys for so long without wanting to stab something before."

Merry kept her smile in place even as she mentally pinned a note to tell Cross to haul the hell back on his heckling of the Lieutenant, lest he earn himself a semi-justified shanking when next the two met in person.

"Woo, I-I'm actually feeling quite good right now," Tashigi breathed euphorically. "Alright, what else were we gonna talk about?"

"Uh… general status update, ma'am?" Fullbody asked, a slight twitch in the corner of his mouth.

"Ah, right, right!" Tashigi nodded confidently. "Cottonmouth, do you want to get a pen and paper or…?"

"Nah, 'sfine," Merry waved her off. "Robin's memory supersedes Vivi's, my mind's a steel trap."

"Right, well, it's all basic stuff anyway. First off, Ox and Goat have both deployed men and supplies to Skelter Bite; Ox's have already landed thanks to their proximity and are greatly contributing to construction efforts as we speak, go giants, and we've made sure that Goat's men are aware of Marine patrol routes on the way, so weather permitting they should arrive within the next three weeks," Tashigi summarized. "According to Rabbit, Skelter Bite will be open for business in a little over a month. Nowhere near the peak it'll reach in a few years, but they'll certainly be able to accept patrons."

"Sounds great!" Merry chirped happily. "Maybe we'll even be able to visit before we hit up Sabaody! What else?"

"Next on the agenda… word from Navarone," the lieutenant continued. "Their first batch of recruits just shipped out for assignment. The majority will be bolstering bases up and down Paradise, no surprise there, but we did get lucky. Two dozen or so, all loyal to us, have been split between the West and South Blues. They'll work on getting us footholds in the Blues. It'll be awhile before we have anything as major as an actual base turned to us, but it's still a start."

"This all sounds great!" Merry pumped her fist victoriously… before hesitantly lowering it as she caught sight of the dark look on Brain's face. "Or… not?"

"No, no, that news is great, but the news that's coming up is notably less so," Tashigi sighed grimly.

"There have been rumors coming down from Marineford," Fullbody pitched in. "Bege's raid on Fort Lumose hamstrung our budget, to be certain, but apparently the higher ups are still finding funding from somewhere because they're amassing the money for an undertaking whose true form we can only guess at but whose bones are… already uncomfortable in nature."

"Have you ever heard of 'privateers', Merry?" Tashigi asked.

Merry's expression devolved into an offended scowl. "The proper name for those salty bastards would be 'low-priced scum who dip their flags in tar', thank you very much," she stated in a voice that would have given a yeti frostbite.

"You pirates never cease to amaze with how much pride you take in being criminals," Tashigi sighed, though her true feelings were clear in her light smile. But she was quick to sober up. "Anyway. The reason I bring them up is that from what I hear, funds are being pooled to hire them. Now, mind you, the Marines have hired privateers in the past, to help bolster security in particularly rough waters, but this…" She shook her head uncertainly. "I've never heard of the numbers that are being tossed around, and certainly never from Headquarters. We'll get back to you when we have something more concrete, but for now—"

"Enemy movement on the horizon, most likely something Cross isn't aware of, got it," Merry confirmed. "I'll pass it along ASAP."

"Well, that's everything really important on our end, what about you?" Fullbody asked. "Anything on the Straw Hats' mobile stormfront that we should be aware of?"

Merry opened her mouth to reply—

SMASH!

—and only just managed to dodge biting her tongue off when the ship was suddenly rocked by a massive impact, followed swiftly by the sounds of a small-scale war erupting out on deck. The only reason she didn't go on full alert and instead skipped straight to exasperation was that amidst the sounds of battle she could hear the usual insults between the two usual suspects being bandied about, punctuated by the snide commentary of their new arrival.

"Well, I was going to say that it's been business as usual lately, but it looks like Perona just decided to incite a riot or something. Other than that, no, nothing critical."

Brain's mouth opened with a look of panic, but it just as swiftly clamped shut as though someone had slapped a hand over his mouth, and his expression swapped to Tashigi's deadpan. "Low-hanging fruit, Merry, and I'm not rising to it. Just make sure she's either out of the way when you dump her or decent if she stays, got it?"

"Aye-aye, mon ami!" Merry saluted in a chipper tone. "Cottonmouth, over and out!"

"Pisces, same. KA-LICK!" And with that, Brain gave her a final condescending glare before retreating into his shell with a defiant snore.

The ship-girl fondly rolled her eyes at the snail's grating personality before spinning on her heel and grinning eagerly as she rammed her fist into her palm.

And really, who could blame her for being enthusiastic?

It was time for her to bear witness to whatever new insanity her crew had fallen into! An endeavor she charged into with open glee.

-o-

Robin watched the ongoing brawl between the crew's usual suspects with scarcely-hidden glee and amusement, her amusement especially intensified due to the addition of an unusual but not unwelcome element in the fight.

It was almost admirable, honestly: every other day, barring exceptional circumstances, Zoro and Sanji fell into brawls like clockwork, and every other day they somehow always managed to keep their clashes as fresh as the first time she saw it. Truly, there was an art to it.

Why, even their banter still managed to remain current and engaging for all those observing!

"What the hell were you thinking, you two-bit fry cook!? Tossing out my weights!? I'm gonna peel the flesh cleaner off your bones than you could ever hope!" Zoro roared.

"Go ahead and try, your slices are gonna be as rough and shoddy as they ever are!" Sanji scoffed with forced casualness. "And you should be thanking me! Not only is it an honor for a seaweed-wrapped gorilla like yourself to give up your room for a cute and charming princess, but you needed to up your game anyways! You call these things weights? More like—!" Sanji hopped back, hefted a gong-sized ring of metal on his foot and flung it at the first mate. "Paperweights!"

Zoro ducked the impromptu discus with an infuriated snort. "If even one of these goes overboard, I'll replace it with your corpse, you bastard!"

"Hey!"

That exclamation originated from the aforementioned 'unusual element', prompting Robin to switch over to where Mikey and Leo were dueling, Mikey having only just managed to dodge the ballistic weight.

"Watch it, I'm on your side!" Mikey protested, finishing a good octave higher as he caught one of Leo's sabres in the chains of his nunchucks.

"Why are you helping him anyways?" Leo questioned, entirely casual as he pressed down with enough strength to make his fellow disciple strain. "Pick up an interest in cooking or something?"

"Not by choice!" Mikey sobbed as he shoved the blade back and retaliated with a wide sweep of his clubs. "Bastard said that if he didn't find a sous chef, he'd cut down on how many mouths he had to feed and pick up some spare ingredients at the same time!"

Zoro paused in his slashes to grace first Mikey, and then Sanji with a flat look. "You really scraped the bottom of the barrel for a protégé," he dryly stated.

"Not a lot of options to work with, and in his defense, I wasn't completely joking," Sanji grumbled.

"I can't tell either way, so like hell am I taking any chances! So do me a favor and lay down and die before I get turned into lunch!" Mikey howled as he renewed his onslaught.

Robin's gaze slid away again, this time to the last bit of entertainment: Raphey blocking an onslaught of punches from Boss, a look of intense concentration on her face much akin to Nami writing a map or Chopper with a medical mystery or Luffy trying to think at all.

"You sure I can't take a break to watch this?" she grunted, the question costing her a half inch of ground.

"You're the one who wanted to practice counters," Boss replied, his own concentration failing to waver. "If you want, we can do the Nori Arts training you also requested instead."

"On second thought, I love practicing counters!" Raphey hastily backpedalled. "In fact, I—yow!"

That last exclamation was due to one of Boss' punches finally slipping through and clocking the female dugong right on the snout. She flopped backward, clutching the injured body part as she let out a string of expletives, while Boss frowned in thought.

"Hmm, this isn't working as well as I thought," he mused to himself. "Take ten, Raphey. I'll try and think of a better training method."

"Yay…" the female martial artist bemoaned as she let herself go limp.

Robin chuckled at the exchange, reveling in the fact that she didn't have to hide her amusement anymore. Honestly, the only thing better than being free to laugh free—

"What's the context for this tête-à-tête, my dear devious… damn, can't think of a good D-word."

Robin's smile widened eagerly. Indeed, the only thing better than laughing free was laughing with friends. Case in point, she turned her smile on the white-haired friend that had strolled up next to her. "Damsel, perhaps?"

Merry snorted derisively, her smirk not shifting an inch. "Not on your damned life." She then shifted her attention back to her clashing crewmates. "And you haven't actually answered my question."

Robin chuckled as she returned her attention to the main attraction, observing with keen interest as Sanji actually managed to backflip off of the flat of Zoro's new blade. "On the surface, it's quite simple really: Sanji and his shanghaied sous chef emptied the crow's nest of all of Zoro's training equipment, and our first mate… took offense, if you will. Most likely because he and his living training dummy—"

"I RESENT THAT!" Leo roared as he shot by, in hot pursuit of a fleeing Mikey.

"—were ejected in the same movement."

Merry blinked in surprise before tilting her head in a confused motion. "That's… new. Usually they butt heads when they cross paths, they don't actually antagonize the other. Why would Sanji go out of his way to provoke him?"

That got a frown out of the archaeologist, the circumstances of the situation serving to sober her up. "Because he himself was provoked."

Merry looked up at her in shock. "By who?"

Robin opened her mouth to answer—

"Well, I would say me, but I resent the wording. 'Provoke' is such an uncute way of putting it."

—and instead closed it just as fast as her answer floated by.

Merry huffed and frowned up at Perona. "Shoulda guessed… well, how would you put it, then?"

Perona smiled beatifically as she ever so casually flipped onto her back. "Why, I just asked that gallant knight in shining armor if he'd be so nice as to clear the ugly troll's junk out of his cave so that I could have a room all to myself!" She folded her fingers under her chin as she tilted her head to the side. "Is that so wrong?"

"I'M GONNA MAKE YOU INTO A REAL GHOST, YOU LITTLE—!" That was as much as Zoro managed to get out before Sanji shut him up with a boot sole that had to be blocked.

"I'LL BE DONE WITH THIS MOSS-RIDDEN MENACE SOON ENOUGH, MY PULCHRITUDINOUS POLTERGEIST PRINCESS!" Sanji whooped as he erupted into a full blown amorous inferno.

Robin cocked her eyebrow at the moniker, glancing up at the phantasm. "Your idea as well, I take it?"

Perona didn't seem to hear her, content to hum a chipper tune to herself as she walked away on the air, spinning her parasol on her shoulder.

Merry whistled herself, a low, appreciative tone. "And I thought we had issues…"

Robin's frown deepened as she watched the Ghost Princess wander off. "Yes, but most of us have a handle on our neuroses, whereas she's making herself into an active threat." She and Merry both turned her eyes towards Cross, who currently occupied with looking his cannon over while Usopp talked with his sword, gesturing animatedly at the pachy-blade's sheath.

"Well, threat or not, whatever Cross foresaw was enough to give her a chance. I mean, once he got over the shock, he didn't even hesitate," Merry reflected. "But… how do we get to the point where she's our ally, let alone our friend?"

Robin pushed off the mast she'd been leaning on and cracked her neck in anticipation. "Simple enough: we fix her."

Merry snorted in amusement as she started to wander back towards the helm. "You want to make someone on this ship sane? Good luck to ya."

"Do recall, Merry," Robin chuckled confidently. "I'm a Straw Hat. We don't rely on just any luck…" And with that, she started to walk towards Cross. "We make our own."

Cross didn't look up as the archaeologist approached him, more engrossed with shifting Lassoo around on his shoulder and trying out different grips and positions for the dog-cannon. "Something tells me you're not here to spar," he mused as he shifted the weapon's weight around.

Robin hummed in confirmation as she came to a halt behind him, facing opposite him with his right scapula knocking against hers so she could keep an eye on the soon-to-be topic of their conversation. "I believe our guest is in need of some attention," she started without preamble.

Cross smirked as there was a spike in the clash of rubber on steel. "Sanji's got that covered in spades."

Robin smirked right back at the quip. "Female attention."

That got Cross to pause and glance dubiously over his shoulder. "…are you sure she swings that—?"

Robin didn't even bother to grace him with her unimpressed deadpan. "She needs a friend, Cross."

"Ah, heh, right, right…" Cross coughed, a blush dusting his cheeks. "And… yes, I can see how that'd be an issue… Vivi sure doesn't like her because of how she's been throwing that 'Princess' moniker around, and Conis considers her a bit too creepy to handle… what about yourself?"

Robin clicked her tongue in amusement. "I'm afraid that she finds me a bit creepy."

Cross snorted. "Of course… moving on, Raphey's not interested in someone who can't throw a punch to save their life, and Perona's opinion on 'cuteness' runs counter to Merry, which leaves…" The Voice of Anarchy trailed off into a grimace. "Yikes."

"You see my dilemma," the Devil Child sighed. "Any thoughts on how to create an opening?"

"Hmm…" Cross glanced upward, tap-tap-tapping a thoughtful beat against his cannon's barrel before snapping his fingers. "One: she had time to sneak aboard at her leisure, so that means she probably brought some of her possessions on board, with which she'll be filling her new room. If you can find a giant bear somewhere onboard? That's your opening." He poked his thumb towards the snail that was on top of his sword's head, nodding along with whatever it was Usopp and Funkfreed were talking about. "Want any help with it?"

"Thank you but no," Robin allowed herself a smirk as she crossed her arms. "I believe I'll be able to handle myself. Ojos Fleur."

Robin filtered rapid-fire through her rapidly blooming viewpoints, analyzing them at a glance before moving on.

'No, no, good blackmail material but no, no, still looking forward to Luffy finding that, need remember to warn Sanji that the dill has gone bad, no, no—ooh, black lace.'

"Feeling confident today, your majesty?"

"OUT!"

Robin chuckled as she withdrew the eye before the Cutter could make an eyepatch necessary. 'She's getting faster, good for her. Now, where was I… ah yes. No, no, n-wait… ah, there you are.'

The flower-woman harrumphed with grudging respect as she returned to herself. "Credit where it's due, for all that she's a brat she does indeed have a brain. It's hidden in a compartment in the crow's nest."

"Smart, hidden in the place she's already taking over," Cross nodded in agreement. "Now all you need to do is get the witch to pity the princess."

Yet another liberty her friends had granted her: Robin could smile with honest eagerness whenever she chose, a fact she indulged in as she flipped her newly acquired knife out and ghosted her fingers just over the blade. "I love a good challenge," she purred eagerly.

-o-

Ensconced within the Thousand Sunny's aft-cabin library, Nami was hunched over a table, slowly and intently drawing her fountain pen over the sketch lines of a new map. This one was of Jaya—and briefly, she lamented how behind she'd gotten with her maps—and it was really quite astonishing how obvious it was that half the island had just been… chopped off. Yeah, yeah, eliminate the impossible and all that, but it was the Grand fucking Line, for Aeolus' sake!

Shaking her head, Nami dispelled the thought rather than descend into another rant over the stupidity of the common person, which was pleasantly easy these days, and refocused on her inking.

"KYAAAAAAA!"

"SONNUVA—!"

Nami snarled venomously as she recovered from her heart nearly jumping clean out of her chest on account of a sudden feminine scream shattering her concentration. Her rage originated from the fact that the shriek had caused her hand to spasm from shock and tear a long line of ink across the paper before she'd flung the pen against the—

She blinked. Actually, make that through the wall, with almost a quarter of the pen lodged in the wood.

"Huh," she remarked, glancing down at her arms and flexing them. "All that work with Donny is actually paying off…"

She then scowled as she clamped her hand into a fist. "The better to give someone a piece of my mind and actually have it stick for once!"

So saying, Nami stomped out of the library to find out what catastrophe had resulted in such a scream and, more importantly, ruined her map. And while 'life-size teddy bear stuck in the rigging' wasn't even on the list of possible reasons, Nami wasn't much surprised; it was positively mundane compared to the typical Grand Line insanity.

What did surprise her, however, was the sight of a very frantic and, more importantly, very corporeal Perona trying and failing to scramble her way up the lines after said bear. And by 'failing', Nami was honestly unsure how she'd managed to tie herself up that way without any help. Were she of a more liberal disposition, she'd say that Perona had somehow managed to truss herself up like a cured ham prepped for shipment.

"—prepped for shipment!"

That drew her gaze back down to the deck, where a small crowd of crewmembers was busy snickering up at Perona's attempts to get at the bear, with more than a few bills swapping hands. "And you guys aren't helping… why?"

"Hey, she said she could handle it," Franky said, a touch defensively. "And none of us want to find out what getting hit with those Negative Hollows Cross mentioned feels like."

"Spoiler alert: it sucks!" Donny concurred with a frantic nod.

"AGREED!" Chopper and—Brook's head? Apparently? Eesh, this crew—piped up fearfully.

"That still—ERGH!—stands!" Perona snarled viciously as she yanked at the lines pinning her leg behind her back. "I'll—GRAH!—dance on each of your graves before I let you—SONNUVA!—TOUCH MY BEAR—WAGH!"

The Ghost Princess's tirade devolved into a terrified shriek when the lines suddenly unwound and unceremoniously dumped the hollow-girl clean overboard.

"WHOA, WATCH IT!"

Or rather, nearly dumped her overboard, thanks to Nami being close enough to dash over and grab her wrist before she could hit the drink.

The navigator wheezed with exertion as she braced her foot against the bulwark in an effort to keep her balance. "You really take that 'let them eat cake' stuff to heart, I take it?!" she grit out.

"You freaking—!" Perona snarled venomously, a Hollow bubbling into existence in her palm. "Let me go, you uncute—!"

SPLASH!

Her protests, Hollow, and composure all died at once as a spray of sea foam blasted her. "PULL ME UP! PULL ME UP!"

"As you wish, your highness," Nami ground out with all the snark she could muster. With one final yank, the navigator hauled her load up, grabbed her other arm, and then yanked her up and over the side and onto the deck, where Perona immediately began kissing the lawn.

"I never thought I'd be so happy to be back on your crummy—!"

"AHEM!" Merry 'subtly' intoned from where she was standing on the foredeck's railing.

"Er, I mean delightfully cute ship again?" Perona hastily corrected.

"Better~!" Merry sang as she returned to her duties.

"Yeah, well…" Nami huffed as she got her breath back in her, not used to exerting that much of her strength. "If you pull anything that stupid again, you'll be taking the express route off our 'cute ship'. Seriously, what the hell were you thinking!?"

Perona got to her feet. It looked like she then tried to jump back to the lines again, but she didn't have the strength for it, her body almost entirely devoid of energy due to her struggles. The end result was that she staggered on her feet as she looked back up at where her bear was caught in the line, her expression more anguished than angered. "I-I couldn't—! I had to—! I-I need to get Bearsy, I need—!"

Nami rolled her eyes in exasperation, pointedly ignoring the Princess' melodrama. "Ergh, if you want that ratty thing so bad then I can just get it for you. Hang tight."

"Wha—NO!" Perona spat viciously. "Don't you dare touch my—!"

"Oh, do you ever shut the hell up?" Nami groaned more to herself than anything, ignoring the Hollow-girl in favor of clambering her way up the Sunny's rigging. The navigator might not have had the muscle of the rest of the crew, nor anywhere near as much experience working ship lines, but she was still familiar with the workings; you had to be to properly direct a ship. As such, it was child's play to reach the threadbare bear—Nami took a second to slap herself upside the head for the mental pun—unwind it from its bonds, and drop back down to the deck. "There, done. You happy n—?"

"BEARSY!" THWACK!

"GAH!" Nami grunted in shock when she was suddenly bodychecked into the ground. She raised her head with a snarl the second she had her bearings back. "What the hell is your—!?" Said snarl died in her throat when she actually saw Perona.

The guest on the ship was on her knees, trembling miserably, hunched over the ragged bundle of cloth that was almost twice as big as she was, a millimeter away from breaking out into full-blown sobs as she ran her fingers along the tears in his cloth. "No… no, Bearsy… n-not again… p-please, not again… B…Bearsy…"

Nami's jaw worked up and down at the display, trying and failing to come up with a proper reaction to what she was seeing. Finally, her heartstrings twisted in just such a way that she knew she didn't have any other option. She slowly got to her feet, inched her way over to the Princess, and tapped her on the shoulder. "Hey…"

Perona jerked Bearsy away and snarled at the Straw Hat. "Don't you fucking dare—!"

"I can sew… him up for you."

And just like that, Perona froze in place, blinking tearfully at the pirate. "Y-You… wait, wha—?"

"I was the first woman on this crew of psychotics," Nami continued in a placating tone. "If I didn't know my way around a needle and thread, we'd have been buck naked in days. I can stitch Bearsy up for you and get him good as new. And… he's hollow, right?"

Perona sniffled, nodding jerkily.

"Then I can probably turn him inside out somewhat, store all his mass inside himself. That way, you can carry him around with you without any problems and you won't have to worry about losing him." Nami smiled kindly as she rested her hand on the ex-pirate's shoulder. "Does that sound good? Is that alright with you?"

A weak hiccup was followed by an almost inaudible mumble from the ghost girl.

"Alright, then," Nami said, taking Perona's hand and slowly helping her to her feet. "Come on, we'll go to the women's room. It's where I keep my supplies and we'll have some privacy there."

As they started to make their way across the deck, Nami subtly glanced over her shoulder to glare at her crew, and instead blinked in surprise to find that they'd all long since dispersed, with only Robin looking even remotely in their direction. Upon noticing Nami's gaze, the archaeologist simply smiled and winked before walking away.

Briefly, Nami considered puzzling out whatever was going through crewmate's head, but she just as swiftly dismissed the notion with a shudder. She wanted to keep what little sanity she had left, thank you very much!

Perona was silent as they entered the ship and settled in the women's room, sitting on the bed and practically strangling Bearsy as Nami retrieved her sewing kit. She considered putting him on her desk, but once she realized how white-knuckled Perona's grip on the bear was, she instead conceded to laying him out on her bed instead, with the Hollow-girl reluctantly swapping her grip on the deflated doll for a pillow that she hugged to her chest.

After a few minutes of examining the damage, Nami retrieved a soft brown thread that matched the animal's coat and began threading the needle through the first tear. As she continued sewing, she turned the bear's appearance and condition over before coughing politely. "So… Bearsy, you said his name was?"

Perona made a slight sound in the affirmative.

Nami nodded. She looked the bear over again before glancing at the Ghost Princess. "So… he's… a bit of a creepy little guy, huh?"

Good news, bad news: Good news, that actually got a new reaction out of Perona. Bad news? Said reaction was a vicious twitch and an even more vicious scowl. "Bearsy isn't creepy, he's cute," she bit out.

"Sorry!" Nami hastily placated. Really, what else could she say to that? The girl looked ready to bite her head off. "I didn't mean anything by it, there's nothing wrong with it. Some people like creepy—!"

"He's not creepy he's CUTE!" Perona suddenly roared out of the blue, her face a rictus of rage.

"Okay okay, he's cute, he's cute!" Nami nodded rapidly, keeping a wary eye on the astral matter that was starting to bubble from Perona's body. "You're right, I'm wrong. He's very cute."

Perona stayed frozen in place, chest heaving as she slowly came down from her outburst, re-burying her face in her pillow. "He's cute," she repeated weakly, though at this point Nami wasn't entirely certain who Perona was speaking to. "Bearsy is cute, he has to be cute. He has to be… He… creepy… creepy has to be cute… because… if he isn't…" She lapsed into silence, shuddering and clutching the pillow like a life preserver.

Nami kept a wary eye on Perona, but she kept working in diligent silence for the next few minutes, carefully removing what traces of flesh remained in Bearsy and stitching up the more obvious rips in his fabric and pelt.

After she finished resecuring the bear's arm, Nami cast a tentative glance towards Perona. "I… I really am sorry, you know," she tried softly. "What I said was insensitive, and I should have known better. I…" Nami faltered slightly, but after a moment's debate she made her decision. "I know… how important something like Bearsy can be."

A derisive snort sounded out, and Nami was suddenly doubly thankful for what Kalifa had put her through, because if Perona had snorted like that in front of the old Nami, she'd have had her head ripped off.

As it was she calmed herself down with a slow, methodical breath before nodding her head at a nearby dresser. "The top drawer, there's a false back."

Perona eyed her doubtfully but nevertheless complied; she got up, worked the drawer open and jimmied open the back. And what she found within made her tilt her head in confusion. "Uh… what… is…" She held up the tiny shirt she'd found and looked over the design on its chest. "Is this supposed to be a sunflower or—?"

"It's a lion," Nami replied softly, her fingers continuing their work even as her voice was quivered with emotion. "We… my family… we didn't have a lot… of anything except love and tangerines, really. That shirt, it used to be my sister's before she outgrew it. My mother redesigned it for me, and…" Nami shook her head with a sardonic chuckle. "Brat that I was, we got in a fight over it. I was an idiot, I said such stupid things and then…"

Nami was forced to come to a stop as her shivers became too much, her fingers bunching up the bear's pelt. "And then… Arlong and his crew came and took over my village. And I had… barely enough time to apologize to my mother before…" Nami lapsed into silence as she shook her head; some pain was too deep-seated for anything to wash away.

"…Go figure," Perona finally responded, gently returning the shirt to its place. "And here I was thinking you were an idiot for wanting to get rich all the time."

Nami turned to look at Perona, whose face had darkened some as she looked to the side. She didn't elaborate, and after a few moments, Nami returned to her repairs, the silence far more comfortable. Finally, as she moved to the last tear, the ghost princess sighed.

"I was born the youngest daughter of a wealthy family," she said without preamble. "Four older sisters, and five older brothers. Nice and uniform, just the way my parents liked it. I had anything I wanted…" Perona's face twisted up in a scowl. "Except anyone who actually cared about me, all because of what I liked."

Nami glanced at her in polite askance.

Perona narrowed her eyes scornfully as she twisted up the sheets in her fists. "While my sisters all dressed up in their ugly dresses and played with their ugly dolls… I liked cute things. I liked cute dresses, cute dolls… but everyone else hated them. They said they were ugly, that they were creepy…" The pinkette raised her hands and gazed longingly at the Hollows that swirled up around her, cackling and giggling obliviously as they lavished brainless praise on their Princess. "And then I ate my fruit, met my friends… and things became so much worse."

Perona curled in on herself as her friends hovered around her, laughing as they raised their arms in a facsimile of a hug, though they kept well away from actually touching her. "They moved my room to the lowest basement… took Bearsy away and…" She trailed off listlessly for a moment, her gaze far off. "Said that I would only get to come out if I got rid of the creepy toys… that it was a shame because I was so cute…" She dug her fingers into her legs. "But… but they just didn't get it. They didn't understand that my friends… my toys, my clothes, everything… they were cute. I chose them because they were cute, I chose them because… because…"

"Because they reminded you of yourself."

Perona glanced at Nami in surprise, but after a second of silence she nodded in tearful confirmation.

Nami shook her head sadly. "Creepy is cute. What others call creepy has to be cute. Bearsy has to be cute, because if he isn't…"

"Then I'm creepy too…" Perona completed weakly, nodding in confirmation. "And nobody loves a creepy haunted freak." the girl then unwound slightly and knocked the back of her head against the wall. "Nobody except the giant twisted bastard who came to town one day, wrecked the mansion, and said he found my powers interesting. Who cares if it was only because I was useful to him? He was the one person in the world who actually cared for me… for me. That's…" Perona let out a cracked chuckle. "That's gotta count for… for something, right?"

Nami seriously doubted that Cross knew any of what she had just learned. But regardless of what he had seen, she now understood a lot more why he had given Perona a vote of confidence. Smiling softly, she finished the final stitch and held out the repaired and minimized bear to its owner. "There's at least one other person who cares about you, Perona," she said.

"BEARSY!" Perona cried, snatching the doll and hugging him to her chest with a joyful sob. "Oh, thank you thank you thank you so much…"

"No problem," Nami nodded with a polite smile before dropping her hand on Perona's shoulder. "And… I did say at least, you know." Her smile grew fond as Perona looked up at her in shock. "I've gotta admit… now that he's not a giant murderbear, Bearsy really does look very cute."

"I… ah…" Perona fumbled around slightly with her words before glancing away with a cough. "Your… mother did good work with that shirt, too. Your… your mom must have loved you a lot."

Nami glanced away. "…More than life itself," she confirmed, a tear slipping down her face. Shaking her head lightly, she turned back towards the ship's guest, a change in subject mercifully jumping out at her as she took in the look of her skin. "Hey, your tanning technique is, ah… kind of impractical, you'll end up looking all lopsided. If you want, I could… teach you, maybe, or…?"

Perona perked up eagerly. "R-Really? That'd be great, thanks! I'll go wait for you near the- ah, by your tangerines!"

"Alright, be right there!" Nami waved with a smile, before slumping and sighing to herself as the door closed. Still, she'd wait a couple of minutes to compose herself before she got changed and headed out. After that… well, it looked like her maps would have to wait for yet another day, though damned if she could find it in herself to be resentful of the fa—

Nami sat bolt upright as she realized what had been bothering her the whole time she was working on the bear: the library was soundproof. The door had been closed and the windows shut, so the only way that the sound of Perona's scream could have gotten in was… Cross's… pipe system…

And just like that, everything clicked as she remembered what Robin's new weapon was and how smooth the slits in Bearsy had been. Then there was the fact that Perona couldn't have possibly gotten that tangled or tired in the lines in the time it took her to get there…

She sighed again, shaking her head in exasperation but incapable of hiding her fond smile. "Those devious bastards…" Nami lamented to herself. "It takes a special kind of sneaky to not only manipulate a person, but make that person not care that they're being manipulated…"

Nami then looked up intently. "Soundbite, do me a favor and tell Robin and Cross that I'm still going to kick their asses for this later."

"Done and done!"

"Thank you~!" Nami singsang as she started to get changed.

-o-

"Well, we knew that that was bound to happen," Cross said cheerfully, not pausing in his swinging of Funkfreed in his sword form as Soundbite laughed his non-existent ass off. "Good thing that for once, it wasn't my idea, and that Nami hardly has a prayer of getting one over on you."

Robin smiled sweetly back at him. "For your sake, Cross, I hope that you are not trying to jinx me," she simpered.

"Maybe," Cross responded. "Or maybe I have the thought in mind that most of the people on this ship have seen me humiliated and comically injured more times than I can count, whereas you have been all but untouched since Water 7, and maybe they'd be interested in a change of pace."

Robin's smile remained fixed even as a sheen of sweat formed on her brow. Wordlessly, she turned away and entered the ship, closing the door behind her. Cross snickered shamelessly, wondering to himself if that was a bluff before resuming his training. Though in his defense, it was a bit hard to concentrate due to the show going on at the other end of the deck.

-o-

Raphey panted as she strained her hearing for the telltale sound of rubber stretching, wishing as she did so that it was only something as trivial as Usopp's rubber bands. But noooo, Boss had to kill two Bananagators with one punch by having Luffy combine his pipework with her reaction training. It wasn't a bad idea… you know, other than the fact that it meant she was being hit by a metal pipe with ends as hard as diamonds that was being swung by literally the strongest person on the crew.

The only thing that kept her from complaining, loudly and insistently, was the fact that, like all of Boss's training methods, it was actually working, as evidenced by the fact that she managed to block an attack from the side with a sound of clanging metal thanks to one of her sai, following which she locked the pipe in place with her second sai.

This turned out to a supremely bad idea when Luffy demonstrated his status as, to reiterate, strongest person aboard when he swung his pipe, dugong and all, and launched Raphey tail-over-skullplate into the ship's railing.

"Owww…" the female dugong whimpered, her flippers twitching minutely.

"Shake it off, Raphey!" Boss barked before turning his attention to the matter he himself was currently occupied with. "And as for you, Conis! Put your hips into it! No, not just your hips, put your whole body into it, whole body!"

And there was the other reason why Raphey wasn't complaining: because rather than handling him herself, Boss was occupied with willfully taking a few lumps of his own. He was playing defense against Conis, simultaneously blocking her weapon strikes and offering up a continuous stream of criticism. And that was working, too. Even just the glimpses Raphey had managed in between getting her ass handed to her by the, third time's the charm, strongest person on the crew showed the angel exhibiting a far tighter and more effective usage of her firearms in melee combat than she'd ever exhibited before.

And Boss wasn't just standing still during this fight either, so as to offer some training to another crewmate at the same time.

"Right snap!"

Conis swung her bazooka around and used it as a barrier to catch the snap punch Boss lashed out at her.

Boss whistled appreciatively. "Niiiice! You're getting good at this, Su!"

"And just in time for the feeling to come back to my legs! I really appreciate it!" Conis concurred with a sunny smile.

Su snorted, smirking at her friend from her shoulder perch. "I can't tell if you're being sincere or if you're finally learning how to sarcasm. Either's likely with you."

"What can I say, I'm just really happy you're getting better with your cold reading!" Conis folded her arms behind her back and started to swing back and forth on her heels. "After all, you've always had a bit of an issue with poor judgement…"

Su froze and her fur started to fluff up. "Conis, sweetie… don't. You—!"

Conis' smile didn't waver an inch. "Remember the chicken?"

"Moremoremoremore TELL ME MOOOORE!" Soundbite cackled out of the blue.

"NOOO!" Su wailed miserably.

"YES!" Conis pumped her fists and jumped for joy, her half-ton bazooka bouncing in her grip. "Finally I managed to get one over on you! Hahaha!"

"THAT'S NOT FAIR! I DON'T KNOW WHAT THAT CHICKEN WAS ON, BUT IT WAS ON SOMETHING!" Su yowled as she ground her pawpads into her temple. "YOU CAN'T JUST—Boss is open."

"Wha—?" Said senior dugong blinked in confusion as he was broken out of concentrating on Raphey and Luffy's exchange.

"Sorry, Boss!"

THWACK!

"GAH!" Boss yelped as Conis sent him flying as she thwacked him with her bazooka like he was Tiger Woods' golf ball on a 500-yard tee-off.

Any other day, that small victory would have been the end of it.

This particular day, Luffy was going a bit overboard in his training, winding his arms up and letting loose on his poor training partner (read: punching bag) with a killer wind-up.

"GUM-GUM HOME—!"

THWACK! "YEEEAAARGH!"

"—run? Eh?" Luffy blinked in surprise as his body stopped rotating. "What was that?"

"A load of pain and trouble for me and my bros once he gets back…" Raphey whimpered tearfully as she traced a black dot's course through the air.

"Whoops," Luffy had the good grace to wince and scratch the back of his head with his pipe as he joined her in watching. "Nami was right, I really should start paying attention to what I'm doing in a fight. My bad!"

"Oh, dear…" Conis covered her mouth in shock. "I didn't mean for that to happen! Do you think he'll be okay?"

"Eh?" Raphey blinked as the question drew her out of her terror before waving her flipper with a scoff. "Oh, yeah, sure, he'll be fine. We dugongs are tough and he's stupid strong. So long as he hits the water—"

It was at that moment that something rammed into Boss in midair.

Conis slowly blinked in shock. "…oh, my."

Su, meanwhile, was grinning like a white devil. "This… is an unfortunate situation," she summarized, sounding like she was on the verge of breaking out into mad cackling.

Raphey swallowed heavily in agreement before raising her voice to address the rest of the crew. "Uh, hey, guys? Juuuust for the record, the next time we see a beetle?" She gestured weakly out at the insect that had hit Boss midflight. "That is the current largest that we have ever seen. Just for the record."

Cross gave the display a flat look as he walked up to the group, a sweat-soaked towel slung over his shoulders. "Why do I have a feeling that this is going to get way worse before it gets any better?"

"SO COOOOL!" Luffy finally burst out, stars beaming from his eyes. "I'm gonna go and catch it! Franky! Get a cage ready!" And just like that, before anyone could say or do anything, he shot his fist out and was gone.

Cross rolled his eyes and kept walking with a fond chuckle. "Called it."

Xomniac AN: And that's all for now, folks!

Cross-Brain AN: Those of you who speculated that we were including Strong World? You were right. However, that brings us to an issue that we need to resolve.

Last time we wrote in a movie, as you recall, we published it as one monster chapter, and unlike last time, we haven't been planning out said chapter for months with only a week or two's worth of finishing touches to put on to make it publishable, so whatever happens, it's going to be a while before we publish it.

So, we have two options: either publish it in two to three chapters, depending on length and plot progression; or publish it all at once. The latter option will take more time, but there won't be any cliffhangers part of the way through; likewise, the former option will seem to come faster, but we'll probably cut off at the best parts of the action. You know we will. But the choice is a difficult one, so what shall we do?

Why… leave it to you, of course. A poll is now open on Xomniac's profile. We will only accept votes cast there, and the poll will remain open until we publish the next chapter, which will cover the Little East Blue filler arc. At that time, the decision of the majority will stand. Until then…

? AN: So. This would have been out last night, but I insisted on looking through it and making a few last-minute suggestions. Apologies for the twelve-hour delay, however unannounced before this note. I look forward, dear readers, to meeting you all very soon.

Hornet AN: Oh, and for anyone who's been watching the news, Xomniac is currently safe from Hurricane Irma, have no fear.

 

[Anon-Echo98]

Huh, in hindsight, all Straw Hat members have some fucking depressing backstories, so yeah, Perona would fit in just right.

And ooh boy, I wonder what- ah, no wait, it's probably just Shiki, or one of his crew faffing about.

 

[tygerbright]

I'm just going to say two things.
First the section with Franky and Usopp feels alot more stereotypical fan fic-y than what usually come you guys, though the rest of the chapter was quite enjoyable.
Second just for anyone else who checked Xomniac SV profile looking for a poll, it is only on the Fanfic.net profile.

 

[GameDragon]

A, yes. Perona's backstory. Come right in, this crew welcomes you with open arms. Careful though, the long r you stay, the harder it will be to leave.

 

[Cyberweasel89]

Huh. There's a fourth member to the Cross-Brain now? I wonder who it could be. One of the omake writers, perhaps? Better question... why are they keeping the fourth member under wraps for now?

 

[CV12Hornet]

Huh. There's a fourth member to the Cross-Brain now? I wonder who it could be. One of the omake writers, perhaps? Better question... why are they keeping the fourth member under wraps for now?

Click to shrink...

Because the Cross-Brain are a bunch of trolls and like to see our readers squirm. Duh. You don't hang out on the SB thread, do you?

 

[Xomniac]

Xomniac: Avast ye scurvy landlubbers! We of the Cross-Brain be having a special treat prepared fer all of ye on this most honorable and wondrous o' days!

...and it's not a new chapter so you all can stop grinning like idiots.

?: Well, our dear readers, I did say I looked forward to meeting you all. And our good friends in the Cross-Brain told you no lies. There is not, in fact, a new author joining the Cross-Brain. [grinning intensifies]

DRAMATIC CURTAIN-RISE

Neuro: There's three of us, and we're artists.

Tactile: Hey, I'm not an artist.

Visual: Writing still counts. But you're not a visual artist, Aural.

Aural: Okay, fair enough, not like you are. But I am helping with the colors, yah?

Visual: But you're still not really a visual artist, and Tactile's not either.

Aural: Alright, alright. Ruin the entrance why don't you. One of us is an artist, another's kind of supporting everyone, and the third is the living encyclopedia.

Visual: And you two are both authors.

Id: All right, you three, enough banter. We've been waiting for this for months, and while I can be patient as long as I need to… well, quite frankly, I don't need to anymore, so if you please?

Aural: Alright, if you insist. Great to meet you all properly, I'm SpokenSoftly, the Cross-Brain's Aural Neurofeedback! Ideas guy, proofreader, humor consultant, and colorist. We've been working with the original trio for most of a year now, mostly on some behind-the-scenes stuff and some future fragments, though there's been humorous touches from one or the other of us since around Chapter 45. It's a great feeling to be able to come out like this and work openly with them now, and I look forward to interacting with you all in the future.

Tactile: Hi hi! I'm Cyberweasel89 (VictoryBuster89 on SB), the Cross-Brain's Tactile Neurofeedback! Researcher, romance expert, morale officer, mascot, and resident cinnamon roll! Sup sup?

Superego: That doesn't mean we're changing our stance on romance anytime soon, just so you all know. And while I have you here, go read our Weasel's fanfic, The Few, The Proud. It's a good fic that deserves more views.

Tactile: *flails* Hornet, why you do dis to me?

Aural: Because you're worth it, and it's cute to see you flail?

Visual: Hi, I'm Lukan, the Visual Neurofeedback of the Cross-Brain. I'm the main artist for the comic, but unfortunately I'm extremely tired right now from putting some last-minute touches on, so I'll be off to bed by the time this post goes up. I don't have a presence on Spacebattles, but feel free to contact me on SV.

Aural: Sleep well, hon. Now, on the topic of said comic…

Cross-Brain: [HERE IT IS!]



B&W pages will be released publicly on a regular basis, Patrons will get the full colors when they're finished. The prologue and title page are fully-colored as a preview to the public of what they can get their hands on.

Id: Oh, yes, and before I forget? Shame on you all for not knowing about this a long time ago. Spoken, Lukan, and Weasel have been with us since the start of the year, and you all would have known that… if you had only paid more attention to our beloved sponsor, one Flux Casey of the Fandom Flux Podcast.

Aural: Lastly, mad props to Arthur2light on SB for his naming suggestion during the speculation after last chapter's tease. It's a damned sight better than what we were going to do before, mate. Kudos.

 

[tarrangar]

Superego: That doesn't mean we're changing our stance on romance anytime soon, just so you all know. And while I have you here, go read our Weasel's fanfic, The Few, The Proud. It's a good fic that deserves more views.

Click to shrink...

Already read it it's a good fic, seems to have stopped updating though, are you sure you aren't giving him too much work here?

 

[Cyberweasel89]

Already read it it's a good fic, seems to have stopped updating though, are you sure you aren't giving him too much work here?

Click to shrink...

Chapter 4's delay is largely due to a busy life and other projects taking up my time. I've regrettably gotten back into roleplaying and have some demanding partners in this hobby. Not the fault of the Cross-Brain's at all, purely my own.

 

[SpokenSoftly]

ATTENTION FRIENDS!!!!!

The Cross-Brain have created an official This Bites! Discord server. Anyone who has pledged any level of support on Patron, additionally, will get access to a special Patron Chat room, where we'll be able to answer questions directly. Finally, any Patrons who have pledged enough to access the full backstage pass perk will get access to view our live planning chat. Even if you can't afford to pledge, however, the Discord chat still has a public room where you can chat and discuss the fic, the comic, the original One Piece manga, or whatever else comes up. This link will take you to the server, we look forward to seeing you there!

 

[SpokenSoftly]

Good news, everyone! The Cross-Brain are proud to announce the Translation Team, multilingual individuals who will be translating This Bites! into new languages. Please contact us if you are fluent in multiple languages and are willing to help with this effort.

 

[Xomniac]

Chapter 54​

Xomniac AN: A little something for the Rare Sentences: "[TPO], think you could edit in Largo strumming or tuning his guitar menacingly?…dear god that's actually a thing in this instance."

"Uhhh…" Sanji blinked slowly, taking in the scene before him as he walked across the deck, fresh from his most recent brawl with Zoro. "Yeeeaaah, I got nothing. Someone want to fill me in on what just happened?"

"Oh, we're training!"

Sanji turned his head towards Donny and felt his eye twitch at what he saw.

"Is that Brook's skull?"

"Yep!" Donny nodded in confirmation. "Like I said, training. Got a bit… eh, weird, but, hey." He shrugged dismissively. "Devil Fruits, right?"

The Straw Hats' cook slowly pinched the bridge of his nose as he felt a migraine coming on. "Please tell me that this training didn't end up killing our musician."

"Actually, if we want to be pedantic, I was killed by the first poisoned arrow that struck me. Went clean through my knee! I eventually walked it off, though! I have no idea why so many people make such a big deal out of that kind of injury."

Sanji pointedly ignored the plaintive "Soundbite…" and taunting "STILL NOT ME!" that wafted over from the quarterdeck in favor of cracking his eyes open and taking in the fact that Brook's skull was literally smiling up at him. "Dare I even ask where the rest of you is?"

"My skeleton came apart when I lost my head, so Chopper is reassembling my bones as we speak, and wiring them together for good measure," Brook glibly informed him. "Until then, Donny has been so kind as to grant me mobility! It's actually quite nice!"

"…It's a wonder that I actually find the sight of one of my crewmates carrying a talking skull around to be normal," Sanji deadpanned.

"Oh, I dunno!" Donny piped up, an eager grin slipping across his face. "I think there are some advantages to the situation! Observe!" The dugong proffered the afro'd cranium with dramatic flare. "Alas, poor Yorick!" he declared in a grandiose tone as he gesticulated with his free flipper.

"I knew him, Horatio! A fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy!" Soundbite piped up happily.

"Oh, please stop, you're making me blush! Even though I have no cheeks or blood to blush with! YOHOHOHO! SKULL JOKE!" Brook cackled in Donny's palm.

A very prominent sweatdrop bloomed on the back of Sanji's skull as he watched the scene. "This is just morbid."

"You say morbid, I say hilarious!" Donny sniggered as he casually bounced Brook from flipper to flipper. "And Mikey says I don't have a sense of humor! HA!"

"Horohorohorohoro," Perona giggled behind her hand as her spirit floated by, causing Donny and Brook to fearfully glance up. "I have to admit it, that is funny."

"I beg to differ," Vivi huffed as she came up from below deck, clad in a sundress and taking it all in with a flat expression. "At least it was better than the stunt Cross pulled…" Her expression fell even flatter. "Though I'd just like to make it known that I find it deeply disturbing that both times that part has been re-enacted by this crew, it's been with separate, genuine human skulls."

"Noted, my most dearly beloved of princesses!" Sanji sang rapturously before snapping back to serious and jabbing his thumb over his shoulder. "But, ah… seriously, I was more asking about the giant bug that our captain is riding?"

"Captain and captain of the ship's guard, to be specific," Cross offered with a cheery smile as he came over, having changed into a fresh hoodie. "And if that weirds you out, I suggest you not delve further. It's just as weird with context as without, so you're not missing much."

"Delightful," the princess deadpanned. "So, anything to tell us, or—?"

"Hey, don't look at me," Cross raised his hands in casual surrender. "Until we hit the Red Line again, you all are outta luck for spoilers from me."

"Oooh, so the smartass isn't quite so smart anymore?" Perona chuckled tauntingly as she floated in Cross's face. "I'm both disappointed and delighted!"

"Ya ever hear that saying ABOUT KEEPING YOUR TRAP SHUT IF YOU'VE GOT NOTHING TO SAY?" Soundbite sneered at the ghost, before blinking as everyone stared flatly at him. "HEY, WHAT GIVES!?"

"We're just all surprised that you know that phrase, you undercooked hors d'ouevre," Sanji said.

"OF COURSE I KNOW THAT PHRASE!" Soundbite sniffed indignantly. "I just CHOOSE NOT TO FOLLOW IT."

"Hypocrisy at its finest," Zoro scoffed from across the deck. "So, now what?"

Nobody noticed the impish smirk that flashed across Perona's face, but they did see the angelic expression she adopted. "Well I do hope something is done about that big mean bug soon enough!" she lamented in a pretentious tone of voice. "After all, when you Straw Hats are involved, who knows just what could happen!"

Cross cocked his eyebrow at her as he slowly took a step back. "You do realize that that phrase is like painting a big fat bull's-eye on your face, right?"

To that, Perona just smirked harder. "Mm, I don't think so. I wasn't very specific, after all."

Before Cross could respond to that, the insectoid buzzing that had formed a constant white noise for the past five minutes suddenly picked up in intensity, suddenly joined by grunts of dugong exertion and Luffy's joyous whoops. All eyes turned seaward to find the massive beetle making a beeline for the deck—and more importantly, to fly right over Cross' head.

"And you do realize that I'm intangible right now, right?" Perona shoved her smirk in Cross's face.

The strategist paled in terror. "You little—!"

"HEY, GUYS! NEED SOME HELP UP HERE!" Luffy yelled down at his crew.

And before anyone could react, a rubbery hand shot clean through Perona's chest and latched onto Cross's collar.

Cross stared blankly at the fist for a moment as the arm it was attached to started to go taut before heaving a tired sigh. "Luffy, you might have gotten smarter, but you are still a dumb son of a—YARGH!"/"WAHOOHOOHOOIE!" Cross and Soundbite wailed in unison as they were yanked clear off the deck and up onto the writhing insect's back.

The crew all watched, silent, as the titanic beetle zipped back into the air with a particularly rapid-fire aileron roll.

"Ooooh, he is not going to like that…" Brook breathed… well, breathlessly.

"Different story for me~!" Perona sang, and before anyone else could say anything, she soared back through the air to the quarterdeck, where she landed in her bikini-clad body and promptly set about hugging her Bearsy, the cloth only barely muffling a squeal of mirth.

"What's got you all cheery?"

Perona glanced over to where Nami was looking up from her own seat with an expression that was equal parts curious and concerned. Normally, Perona would have just scoffed and dismissed the woman with a flippant comment or an offhanded Negative Hollow, but…

"Oh, I just got Cross to get snagged onto the big buggy up there by your captain." Perona jabbed her thumb upwards with a confident smirk.

Nami glanced up—

"Snrk!"

And promptly had to cover her mouth to suppress a snort of laughter. "Oh, man, that's a good one! But, uh…" She then trailed off into a nervous grimace. "I hope you do remember that Cross is a vindictive bastard and that he's going to see that you pay dearly for that."

"HA! What do I have to worry about… from…" Perona trailed off, her expression falling flat. Then her face grew slightly ashen, and she chuckled nervously as she slowly pointed towards the main deck. "Uh… I, ah… Imma just… gonna go and stash my body, if that's alright with you."

"You go do that if you think it'll do you any good," Nami chuckled. "Just hope that Cross's landing is a good one, otherwise he's going to be really—!"

Out of nowhere, the giant beetle suddenly bucked like it'd been kicked in the face before turning over into a nosedive face-first into the cliffside of a nearby island, really just a spire of rock poking out of the horizon at this distance.

Nami sat up and blinked in surprise. "Huh, wouldja look at that, they found land. Lucky us." She then directed a sympathetic wince at Perona. "Unlucky you."

The Ghost Princess let out a sound not unlike a whimper.

-o-

"Urgh…" Boss groaned as he sat up on his tail, head pounding like the entire Royal Army was using it for marching maneuvers. "Where's the flying Sandora Dragon that body slammed me?"

He glanced to his right, where a familiar giant beetle was sprawled on its back, eyes spinning. Beside the beetle was Cross, lying face-down in the dirt and Soundbite's shell spinning wildly on its back with the snail's eyes sticking out and spinning dizzily. Oh, and Luffy trying to yank his head out of where it'd gotten lodged in the cliff face, naturally.

"Oh, right," he drawled, shaking his head as it all came back to him.

"S'ndb'te…" Cross muttered into the dirt before weakly pushing himself onto his back and spitting out a few strands of grass. "I just want you to know… I both applaud and disdain your idea to blast that thing in the face with a Gastro-Blast."

"I AIN'T THAT proud of myself, either, DON'T WORRY…" Soundbite gurgled as his spinning slowed to a halt.

"Good, good… and just out of curiosity, have you ever wondered what rubber tastes like?"

"Well, now that you mention it…"

"You'll have to get your pound of flesh some other time," Boss cut in as he slowly slid into a fighting position. "Because right now, we're still a bit busy! If a hit that weak took down that big lug, then I'll eat my own flippers!"

"Eh?" Cross tilted his head over to look at boss. "The heck are you—?"

Out of the blue, the giant beetle regained its senses and flipped back to his (and it was definitely a he, if its tone of voice was anything to go by) heavily armored legs with a flanging roar. At the same time, Luffy ripped his head out of the cliff and brought most of it down with him as he loosed a bestial roar all his own.

"NOW I'M FIRED UP!" the rubber-man bellowed. He then donned a viciously eager grin as he raised his fists into a ready position and squared off against his insectoid rival. "Man, you're a really tough beetle! Really cool too!" Luffy's grin slowly doubled in size as he lowered his stance. "And… you really want to keep fighting, don't you?"

The titan-bug hesitated slightly, and then his mandibles curled into a grin and he bucked his head in an insectoid approximate of a nod. He let loose a warbling, eager-sounding cry as he pawed at the ground, his wings literally buzzing with eager, pent-up energy.

Luffy blinked in surprise before glancing at his third mate's partner in confusion. "What'd he say?"

"DAMMIT, CAPTAIN, I'M A MOLLUSK, NOT AN arthropod!"

"And since when has something as trivial as species ever stopped you before?" Cross snorted, having yet to shift from his prone position.

Soundbite, meanwhile, abruptly stopped his spinning and flipped onto his more stable and sticky side, casting a bemused look at his armored cousin. "BEFORE, YOU'D HAVE A POINT. NOT IN THIS CASE. I can't make heads or tails of what he said… OR ANYTHING HE'S SAYING FOR THAT MATTER. I'd say it's all Greek to me, but I know that too!"

Cross blinked in surprise before leaning up into a sitting position. "You… can't translate him? Not even with his Voice?" he said in surprise.

"Oh, well, of course THAT works… but that's like looking at the binary for a piece of digital art! IMPRESSIONS, EMOTIONS, THE GENERAL GIST."

"Well, what're those, then?" Luffy asked, almost oblivious to the increasingly annoyed beetle.

"Uhh…" Soundbite's eyestalks crossed inquisitively. "Ignoring the mounting temper at being ignored… you're a good fight, BOTH YOU AND BOSS ARE A LOTTA FUN TO BRAWL WITH, he's looking forwards to grinding you two into the dirt—"

"You're dead," Boss stated as he slammed his flippers' 'knuckles' together, drawing a warning growl and glare from the insect.

"You're gonna fit right in!" Luffy cackled eagerly, gearing up to launch forwards—

"WHOA, RED FLAG ON THAT PLAY!" Soundbite's eyestalks suddenly snapped to attention in alarm as pure fury flashed through his cousin's being. "LUFFY, THIS ISLAND IS THE BUG'S PROUD HOME AND DUTY IN ONE, IT CAN AND INTENDS TO DEFEND THIS PLACE until it's dead and gone! No way in hell you're getting him off this island!"

Luffy and Boss both blinked in surprise at that comment, followed by Luffy sagging despondently as the beetle snorted and nodded in clear agreement. "Aww, really? There's seriously no way?"

"PUT IT THIS WAY: MERRY WOULD HAVE AN EASIER TIME getting you to let her swallow your hat," Soundbite vowed solemnly.

Luffy's eyes darkened for an instant, his hand shooting up to his treasure. Then he sighed in disappointment. "Alright…" Then his bad mood evaporated as he turned back to the beetle with a sunny grin. "Hey, we're not here to hurt anyone or steal anything. If you don't wanna fight anymore—"

That got a particularly irritated-sounding roar and some earthshaking stomping.

"Did you forget the parts about 'FUN TO BRAWL WITH' and 'grind you into the dirt'?" Soundbite deadpanned.

"I'm with him there!" Boss cut in, a few degrees down from snorting out a blast of steam. "Sorry, Captain, but you're just gonna have to get in line, because I've got a reputation to defend! I haven't lost a CQC brawl yet, and this oversized fly ain't gonna break it!"

"WHAT ABOUT literally every fight with the other Mon—?"

"THOSE ARE DRAWS!" Boss snapped without missing a beat. "I ain't gone all-out and beaten those guys to a bloody pulp yet because the costs outweigh the benefits in terms of training and the Sunny couldn't take it. But beetle-boy here?" He grinned fiercely as he rolled his shoulders. "He doesn't have that advantage to him, so I'm not gonna hold back on him!"

"Hey, no fair, you're stealing my fight!" Luffy whined… and then he blinked as something hit him. "Wait… you've fought Sanji and Zoro!? But we haven't fought yet! RAGH!" The rubber-man started stomping and swinging his arms furiously. "C'MON! YOU'RE ONE OF THE STRONGEST AND COOLEST FIGHTERS ON THE CREW! I WANNA FIGHT YOU! AND I WANNA FIGHT THE BEETLE! RAAAGH, WHO DO I FIGHT FIRST!?"

Said beetle snorted and shook its horn in an unimpressed manner.

"Big boy's got a good point, YOU'RE AN IDIOT," Soundbite deadpanned. "WHY THE HELL CAN'T YOU just go battle royale AND BE DONE WITH IT!?"

Beetle, man, and dugong all froze, and a significant look passed between them.

"Y'know, Soundbite…" Boss said, in a voice akin to having seen a unicorn. "That's actually a really good idea."

"WHY DO YOU SOUND SO SURPRISED?!"

Cross, meanwhile, snorted and cackled in honest—if still tired—amusement. "Oh, I love when that happens to someone who's not me!"

"Anyway…" Boss slowly cracked his 'knuckles' as he grinned at his soon-to-be opponents. "No more delays. Let's find out… who here's the real strongest Monster in these seas!" The dugong then slammed his tail into the ground, cracking open a decently sized crater around him. "LET'S GO! THREE!"

The beetle threw its horn back and roared, the primal sound requiring no translation.

"ONE!" Luffy cackled, snapping his arm back in such a way that it was clearly angled towards the beetle. "GUM-GUM—!"

"LEAVE HIM ALONE!"

"—GWAH!?"

Out of nowhere, a three-foot and change tyke in a pastel pink and yellow shirt and shorts along with a Marine cap and coat that were a few sizes too big for her, leapt onto Luffy's back and started going to town on his head with a thick-ended branch. The makeshift club didn't do any damage, obviously, but it did tilt his hat down over his eyes, and in the confusion Luffy's fist went out of his control—

THWACK! "GWAGH!"

And slammed clean into his own cheek, sending both himself and his impromptu passenger tumbling in the dirt, though that didn't hinder said passenger from continuing to wail on him in the least.

Cross's eye twitched slightly as he took it all in. "Oh, what fresh hell is this."

Boss cocked his eyebrow at his crew's third mate in surprise, the sudden show having knocked him clean out of his battle lust. "Since when are you this snippy?"

Cross let out a garbled grumble as he scratched at his hat with both heads. "Since our idiot captain batted you onto the giant bug over there, followed by said idiot captain then stretching himself up to said bug, and finally our resident Ghost Princess—who I still need to swear vengeance against, by the way— tricked said idiot captain into dragging me up to said bug, which culminated in our high-fiving a cliff with our bodies. Final count?" The tactician's eyes rolled up in his head and he flopped onto his back in a spread-eagled position. "Blame the idiot captain, leave me to my pain…"

"…It is a wonder that that whole series of events actually makes sense to me," Boss breathed. He then grimaced and kneaded his brow. "It also gives me a raging headache and pisses me off for some reason, why the hell am I pissed off?…ah!" The dugong pounded his flipper in his palm in realization. "Sonnuva seahorse! I lost my cigar!"

Soundbite boggled at the dugong. "HOW ADDICTED TO nicotine ARE you?"

"Tchyeah, like you don't eat lettuce almost religiously you little mrgrfrkr…" Boss trailed off into grumbling as he patted down his shell, followed by his perking up joyously as he withdrew one of his cigars. "Got one!" A few more seconds patting, however, got him sagging in dismay. "Don't got my flints and my weapon's back on the Sunny… damn it, anyone got a light?"

"Ah, here you go." There was a flick of metal, and a lighter was held before the Dugong.

"Thanks!" Boss hastily lit his cigar and took a greedy drag, which he snorted out with a contented hum. "Ahhhh yeah, that takes the edge off… thanks for that!" He then took a slower drag, and let the smoke hiss out slowly as he glanced up at the portly, gray-mustachioed old man wearing a boater hat and carrying a pipe who'd offered him the light. "And if you're expecting me to jump in surprise from you showing up like that, you're sorely mistaken."

"Hahaha, no worries, I wouldn't dream of it!" the old man chuckled good-naturedly as he waved the dugong down. "And it wasn't like I intentionally snuck up on you! I just wanted to say hello, and also to confirm something! You four, you're all members of the Straw Hat Pirates, correct?"

"Considering you had enough respect for Soundbite to count him as a crewmate?" Cross said. "I feel like you're nice enough to warrant an honest yes."

"Then in that case, allow me to introduce myself!" the old man laughed as he held his arms out invitingly. "My name is Fabre; I'm the mayor of these parts! Allow me to be the first to welcome you as the honored guests of Kansorn Island!"

"Well, I guess that means we don't have to introduce ourselves," Cross remarked. "But you'll understand if I take your warm welcome with a grain of salt."

"Just say HE'S SUSPICIOUS, DON'T MENTION THE SALT!" Soundbite snapped.

The mayor laughed again, waving a hand. "I understand your concern, but I promise you have nothing to fear from us. I was going to save this for when you reached our humble town, but once we confirmed that it was your ship on the horizon that Boss had buzzed, I decided to come here alone to ease your suspicions. You see, the reason you'll find you're quite welcome here is that most all of this island's inhabitants hail from the East Blue, where your crew originated. And even beyond that, quite a few of us actually hail from islands your original crewmates came from! Throw in your SBS sessions chronicling our exploits and, well…" Fabre beamed proudly. "Suffice to say that much of the island's been set up as a shrine to the Straw Hat Pirates, and everyone on the island is a big fan of your crew!"

"OWOWOWOW! GET OFF OF—!"

"NO, YOU GET OFF MY HOME!" CHOMP!

"—AAAARGH! LET GO LET GO LET GO!"

Everyone flinched and turned to watch in half bemusement, half sympathetic pain as Monkey D. Luffy, one of the strongest and most renowned pirates of his generation, ran around screaming his head off in pain as a little girl bit and scratched at his head.

"IIIII'm going to go out on a limb and say that you're going to tack on a 'most' to that last statement of yours?"

Fabre's weary sigh was all the answer the Straw Hats needed.

The beetle's reaction, meanwhile, seemed equal parts exasperated and fond, and it was with heretofore unseen delicacy that the titan stepped towards the squabbling pair. Then, with the same amount of delicacy, the beetle stretched its leg out, hooked the barbed tip in the back of the girl's shirt and pulled her off of Luffy, leaving her struggling in the air.

"Ah-hah-hah-haoooow…" Luffy whined, massaging his bite marks. "Why does stuff that shouldn't hurt me always hurt so much mooore…"

"Because the muse of comedy has Haki," Cross informed his captain.

"Oh, okay then…"

"Yoko!" Fabre spoke up, addressing the girl in a chastising tone. "I know you're not happy with this, but please! Surely you must understand that just attacking a person like that—!"

"I wouldn't ever attack someone like that, but I will attack a pirate like him each and every time!" the newly named Yoko spat venomously, swapping her glaring between Luffy and the mayor. "You and everyone else on the island might have gone crazy, but I haven't! No matter what you or anyone says, pirates are pirates! I won't let them hurt my home, no matter what!"

"We're not gonna hurt your home," Luffy said, much akin to saying that the sky was blue.

"I SAW YOU ATTACKING BOSS!" the girl roared, swinging in the bug's grip.

Luffy and his ship's guard both blinked and glanced at one another in confusion before the dugong slowly raised a flipper.

"Uh… I wanted him to attack me, and I was going to return the—" Boss Dugong started hesitantly, unfortunately missing how the local mayor was desperately chopping his hand across his neck in a plea for silence, which unfortunately came to naught when the rebellious girl interrupted him.

"Not you," Yoko snapped, her anger freezing over as she glared bloody murder at the amphibian pirate.

"Boss… was the name we gave to our large friend here when he came to us," Fabre clarified, drawing a friendly wave from the insect.

"But ever since your stupid show started, everyone's started calling him Boss Kabuto!" Yoko hissed, as though the words were heresy. "It was his name and you stole it! Boss is Boss, and only he can ever be the real Boss! You're just a dumb, smelly, pirate fake!"

Boss-the-Dugong blinked in surprise at the sheer vitriol in her words, and then he closed his eyes solemnly, his cigar bobbing up and down. "'Zat so…"

"Hey, you're wrong!"

Three of the present Straw Hats and the local mayor all winced at the sound of one of the few things that could escalate matters worse than Cross opening his mouth: Luffy opening his.

"My Boss is way stronger than your Boss, so that makes him the real Boss!" Luffy stated, accompanied by a foot stomp. "The other dugongs told me how he got his name! Only the strongest person around gets to be called… Boss… wait a second…"

Several confused glances were shared when Luffy suddenly trailed off, his head bowed and his face screwed up in intense thought. Cross, the lone exception to the above, leaned up into a sitting position and gave his captain a half-lidded stare. "Oh, this is bound to be good."

"The strongest fighter is called Boss," Luffy muttered under his breath, grinding his finger into his temple. "And I was gonna fight two other guys named Boss… and I was going to beat them too…"

"OI!" Boss Dugong barked indignantly, with the Kabuto edition giving an annoyed grunt of his own.

Several more seconds passed, and then… "AH!" Luffy's head snapped up in realization, and he pounded his fist in his palm. "When I beat the two of them, I'll be the Boss!"

"That's what he got out of this?" Fabre asked, his tone equal parts amazed and amused.

"A Boss Dugong, a Boss Kabuto and a Boss Monkey; did I stumble into a myth of some sort when I wasn't looking?" Cross questioned with familiar amusement.

"That's 'IF' you beat me, Captain!" Said Boss Dugong shook his fist defiantly at the rubber-man. "You can come at me with all barrels blasting, but I'm not gonna go down without giving you one hell of a fight!"

"And you're not fighting the real Boss at all!" Yoko cut in. If looks could kill, Luffy would have keeled over with a dozen stab wounds in his skull. "He's going to kick your ass so that you leave our island and never come back, but he won't fight you for fun! You might be a brainless thug, but not Boss!"

The beetle let out an offended sound, to which the Straw Hats looked at a frowning Soundbite. "UH… difference of opinion here, he's both as eager as a hound with a scent… and nostalgic as all hell?" Soundbite gave his odd sort-of shrug. "DON'T ASK ME."

"You're wrong, lying, stupid, or some combination of all three!" Yoko snorted. "Boss isn't like that! Right, Boss?" She smiled proudly at the titan bug, only for her face to fall when he failed to meet her gaze. "B-Boss?"

The Kaiser-sized kabuto gave out a lilting, apologetic rumble, gazing at the girl with regretful eyes.

"B-But why?!" Yoko demanded, anger and a little bit of betrayal coloring her voice. "You've always been by my side, protecting this island from pirates like them—" That last barbed word was accompanied by the girl jabbing her finger at Sunny, which had sailed closer over time. "—and now you want to—!"

Whatever rant Yoko had been working up to died in her throat when Boss Kabuto suddenly perked up and snapped his gaze to the ship. He then dropped the girl from his leg, lifted off, and buzzed a bee—er, beetleline straight towards the Sunny. And the reason it died became clear when she turned a smug grin on Luffy, Boss Dugong, and Cross.

"Hah, looks like you guys were wrong!" she crowed with way too much eager pride. "Now Boss is gonna go sink your ship, and you're all gonna leave crying, just like all the others!" She glanced back out to sea, where the titan-beetle was circling above the Sunny. "Any second now." A long pause, Yoko's foot tapping on the stone. "Aaaaaany second now…"

"Eh, do you think he's lost or something?" Luffy asked, head tilted in confusion.

Yoko snapped an affronted look at the rubber-man, ready to yell.

"Nah, there he goes," Boss Dugong interjected.

The girl then snapped her head around with a massive grin as the beetle dive-bombed the ship. "HA! See, I told—!"

Said beetle then merely buzzed the deck of the Sunny before pulling up and soaring straight back towards the island.

Yoko blinked in confusion. "What?"

Within moments, the beetle had returned and had plopped itself right back where it had been previously. And the blue and white trunked fish flopping incongruously from his mouth was both new and utterly impossible to miss. Once it was certain everyone had gotten a look at his prey, Boss Kabuto tossed the fish up into the air before swallowing it all in a single gulp. He then followed this move up by giving them all a cocky grin and pointedly licking his mandibles.

It didn't take long for everyone present to put the pieces together.

"Was that an Elephant Blue-Fin Tuna?" Fabre wondered.

"Did that come from our ship!?" Luffy demanded.

"Did that thing just eat our lunch in front of us to spite us!?" Boss fumed.

"Were those assholes fishing while we fought for dear life!?" Cross raged, his gaze focused more on their own ship.

Yoko didn't say anything. At least, not anything with words. Following the wordless scream of frustration she let loose, the girl stomped off. Boss Kabuto tried to trot after her, but the scathing glare she snapped at him halted the ten-ton insect in his tracks. When she tromped into a cave in the cliffside, he didn't follow.

In fact, he stayed in that position for a solid few minutes before glancing guiltily at the other fighters and warbling regretfully.

"No need to translate that, it's clear he's not that keen on fighting anymore," Boss said, waving his flipper dismissively.

"Actually, that's only half THE EXPLANATION," Soundbite informed him, staring at the titan Kabuto in awe. "That… That big guy, BOSS KABUTO… his Voice, his being, HE'S… HE'S changing…"

"Oh, it's that time already?" Fabre perked up and shot an inquisitive look at Boss K, who grunted and nodded in confirmation. "Huh, the tuna must have pushed you over the edge. Well, if it's a fight you boys want, then you came at the right time! See, Boss Kabuto here? Every month or so, he molts his skin and becomes bigger and stronger than he was before! He's easily twice as big now as he was when he first came to our island! You're going to be literally fighting him at the peak of his strength!"

"So… a delay for a spike in quality?" Boss's grin widened with bloodthirsty eagerness. "Perfect!"

"Wow, you're actually going to evolve!?" Luffy squeed, stars sparkling in his eyes. "SO COOL!"

"So impossible, more like!" Soundbite sputtered incredulously. "LUFFY, THIS BUG'S GROWING BEFORE MY NON-EXISTENT EARS! Even by Grand Line standards, nothing breaks the rules of biology so blatantly, not like this! Cross, back me up here!"

The Voice of Anarchy in question blinked as he was taken out of his thoughts, having been focused on other matters from the moment Yoko had yelled. "Eh? Ah… I guess? Sorry, Soundbite, I've got more important things to worry about at the moment."

"LIKE WHAT!?"

Cross directed a glare at his partner before regarding the local mayor with a compassionate expression. "Which parent, how bad, and how long ago?" he asked sadly.

That got the snail choking on his tongue.

Fabre, for his part, blinked in surprise before sighing heavily, his pipe bobbing up and down as he worried at it. "You really are smart…" he muttered. "Her father, bad, and a few years but to her it might as well have been yesterday. A damn shame, really; he was a good man, both as a father and as a Marine. And she'd already lost her mother before that, so Boss—er, Boss Kabuto is the only family she's got left." The statement drew a regretful warble from the bug.

Cross hung his head and scratched at his nose's bandage, sighing. "Yeah, I figured that last bit… and my words haven't reached her at all?"

The old mayor winced and glanced away sheepishly. "Yyyyes and no. At first, when she heard you say you were a pirate, she took off running. Ours is a small village on a much bigger island, so it's been easy for her to make herself scarce whenever you start to broadcast, and she just won't listen to us when we tell her you're different. The yes… doesn't actually help. See, we insisted she at least listen to one broadcast, she conceded…"

The pirate cocked his eyebrow at the mayor. "And…?"

The mayor coughed into his fist. "You started talking about corruption in the Marines and she took off like a bat out of hell."

Cross slapped his hand to his face with a groan. "I'd say that God hates me, but that's already public knowledge."

"Mm," Fabre nodded. "Either way, I'm quite sorry to tell you this, but it's likely she'll do her level best to make your stay here with us… difficult, to say the least. I apologize for her in advance."

"Fan-frickin'-tastic," Cross groaned as he grabbed the brim of his cap and yanked it down over his eyes. "Why can't this shit ever be easy?"

The mayor cocked an eyebrow at the pirate. "If… you don't mind my asking, how did you…?"

"The coat and her own condition. If she had anyone left or if the owner were still alive, she'd have let the coat get tattered and worn out like any old family keepsake. But it's unique and irreplaceable, so she maintains it religiously and keeps it immaculate. She, meanwhile, is picking up bruises and scabs that no one looks at, and her other clothes and her hair are getting worn out and dirty because they don't matter as much as the mission. The mission, her father's mission, comes first ever and always while she lets herself slowly fall to pieces. Which—" Cross pushed himself to his feet with a huff, casually dusting off the seat of his pants. "Is where we come in."

Fabre blinked at his island's guest. "Oh? How so?"

Cross smiled impishly as he slammed his fist into his palm. "Simple," he chuckled. "We're the people who help her put the pieces back together." He then blinked and looked down at his hands. "Oh, now there's a thought…" After a moment he shook his head, eyes refocusing. "Eh, we'll see how it goes. For now…" He looked back at Luffy. "So, orders, Captain?"

Luffy grinned as he looked at his third mate's shoulder. "Soundbite, call the Sunny. We're staying here until I get my rematch! It's, ah, what's the word… SHORE LEAVE!" He threw his arms up victoriously. "Tell the crew we've got shore leave!"

"Ah, Straw Hat? Make sure they dock on this side; our village is on the other side of the island, but there are reefs that prevent all but the smallest ships from reaching us from… the…" The mayor trailed off at the looks that the Straw Hats were giving him, but he swiftly recovered once he realized what it was all about. "Ah, my apologies! I'm an old man, I forget things! If the famous Weather Witch asks, tell her I meant no disrespect, alright?"

"Done and done, old man," Soundbite confirmed. "Done and done."

-o-

"It was bad enough that the entire village became fans of a bunch of pirates," a certain young girl muttered murderously as she stomped through the island's labyrinthine caverns. "But Boss… he was the only one I could rely on to help protect the island, and now he's gone over, too… and now… and now…"

Yoko vented her frustration in a singular howl of primal fury as she kicked a nearby wall. She held her ground for a few seconds before she began hopping around in pain, clutching her shoe. "OwowowowOW, dang it!" she cried. After a minute or so, she regained her composure, and made her way to the highest point of the village. Looking down, she shook her head in disgust as the mayor and Boss led the pirates into Little East Blue.

"Those pirates… they may have fooled everyone else, they may have even fooled Boss, but they can't fool me. And I'll prove it to all of them!" she declared triumphantly. "I'll keep track of those criminals and everything they do, and when I tell the mayor what I've seen, he'll have to see sense!"

With that plan in mind, she made her way back to the main level of the village, binoculars in hand as she began looking around for the first pirate to stalk—oh, sorry, observe. "No matter what happens, I will take down these pira—" She froze briefly before shaking her head and starting again. "I will do my duty and protect this village, even if I have to do it alone."

Soon, the young girl burst out of the trees surrounding the village, though still raised up on the bluffs surrounding the town. From there, she had a good view of the Thousand Sunny as it nosed its way through the reefs that helped defended the town.

"Mark my words, Straw Hat Pirates," she muttered as she crouched down and put her binoculars up to her eyes. "I'll see you run out of the Little East Blue before the day is out! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! MWAHA—GAH!" Yoko cut herself off with a harsh slap to her cheeks. "No, no, no, I'm supposed to be the good guy here, they're the bad guys!" She shook her head firmly, clearing it of all impure thoughts before putting her binoculars up to her eyes. "Right. Lot of targets. Where to start?"

"WHOA, YOU GUYS HAVE A WINDMILL!? AWESOOOOME!"

Yoko blinked in surprise as a blur of red shot across the island's verdant fields, but she promptly swapped her dumbstruck expression for a determined grin.

"Asked and answered," she nodded to herself before jogging after the pirate captain as fast as her young stature allowed. To her chagrin, she wasn't able to keep pace with him, and fell behind quickly, but the fact that she knew exactly where he was heading meant she did little more than frown in annoyance.

She arrived at the village's symbol a minute or so after the rubber captain, who had secured himself to one of the windmill blades and was riding it around and around. Blinking several times, she tried and failed to parse how the pirate wasn't falling off when it looked like he was just sitting cross-legged on the top of the blade.

"How is he…" she began, before shaking her head. "Nonono, more important: what is he—?"

"WOOOOW!" the pirate captain called down in a clearly awed tone of voice. "You can see the whole town from here! This is so cool!"

Yoko blinked at the statement before scowling grimly. She then dug a notepad and pencil from her fath—her coat and started scribbling on it. "'Captain… surveying local geography… for more efficient pillaging…"

She shoved her pencil behind her ear as she shot a final glare up at the laughing menace. "He'll probably be up there for awhile, and that dumb blond with the stupid lying snail and that smelly blubberbutt that were with him looked like they were just a pair of muscleheads, so they probably won't be doing anything too bad just yet…" She nodded decisively. "So I should make my way to the shore and follow the rest of them as they come into the village."

Nodding, Yoko was about to do just that when a roaring crashing sound, like a martial artist unleashed on a lumber store, sounded out from the trees. She flinched at the familiar sound, and any thought of going down to the shore was tossed out the window.

"Whatever that is," she said through fire screams bangbangbang clenched teeth. "It needs to be stopped. Now."

Sprinting into the woods, she quickly picked up the trail, not that that was hard. She'd barely gotten past the tree line before being confronted with a line of stumps and sawdust that terminated in—

"Agh, stupid!" she berated herself, smacking herself a few times. "Muscleheads can be directed! Stupid stupid stupid!"

Boss Dugong, going to town on the hapless trees surrounding him. And not like a lumberjack, either. More like a saw mill, not that Yoko'd ever seen one. It was a simple pattern: Boss would chop a tree down with his bare flippers, the attack somehow tossing said tree in the air, and as it fell he attacked it even more fiercely, stripping off bark and branches and simultaneously turning the wood into perfect planks. And judging from a pile of split logs that Yoko had instinctively ducked behind, that wasn't the only type of wood he was producing.

There was only a single sane conclusion that could be drawn from the dugong's actions.

"FAIRY GODPARENTS!"

Yoko whipped her notepad out and started fiercely scribbling in it. "'Smelly Blubberbutt is… denuding island… of trees… for spare wood for their ship… and to keep us from rebuilding… after they take everything…'" Peeking up and grimacing out of disgust, she continued. "'Also super smelly… chemical warfare, maybe…'"

With that noted down, she left the area, her vendetta against that particular member of the crew keeping her more focused on defacing her sketch of the dugong rather than where she was going, up until a familiar voice broke her out of her haze.

"Look, I'm grateful for what you've done, but for the love of syrup, why the cannons?!"

Dreading what she would see, Yoko slowly turned and started jogging towards the façade of Luigia's house—not a mansion no matter how much the old woman insisted otherwi—!

Yoko skidded to a halt and stared up in awe.

Correction… it wasn't a façade anymore. It wasn't even a house anymore.

No, Luigia's… dwelling was now a true, sprawling mansion in resplendent brick and glass. From her admittedly hazy memory of the few photographs Luigia had managed to get of the original, it looked mostly accurate.

'Mostly' being the operative term. The two stone turrets sprouting from corners of the mansion and bristling with cannons, Yoko knew she would have remembered from the pictures. She squinted at the structures, but from what she could tell, they looked authentic. And it looked like they were complete, to boot!

Though, the manor itself was still in the process of being constructed, as currently said manor's apparent owner and its apparent builders were clustered around the side of the building, near a gazebo that was halfway completed. And one of the figures was responding to Luigia's protests.

"'I'm Franky, super! shipwright extraordinaire! I can build anything!' Yeah, sure! You're the best! You also can't resist putting cannons in every damn thing you build!" the long-nosed sniper, Usopp, shouted in exasperation.

"I'll keep telling you, these guys need better defenses in case the worse kind of pirates show up," said pompadour'd cyborg shipwright stated, not looking up from his work.

"If you want to build us a militia or a garrison or a fortress or whatever, fine, by all means!" Luigia griped, throwing her hands up as she stomped furiously on the pile of planks she'd gotten onto so that she could be at the pirate's height. "But save that for the cove, not the highest hill where my house is!"

"With these cannons!?" Franky boggled at the senior citizen as though she'd gone mad. "This is the best place for it!"

"But—!"

"Sorry, but that's our shipwright for you," the shipgirl helmsgirl, Merry, sighed with a fond tone and smile from where she sat next to the oldest woman on the island, her legs swinging lazily. "Stubborn to the point that not even having his coconuts crushed will change his mind. Buuut, if we really need to, I could go find Robin."

"GAH!" The shipwright crossed his legs with a panicked yelp. "Please don't!"

Luigia cocked her eyebrow at the reaction, and then she hung her head with a sigh. "Oh, never mind. If nothing else, it'll make a nice conversation starter…" Her demeanor then softened as she looked up at her newly acquired manor. "Seriously, though, I just can't thank you brats enough! I mean, to live in a manor, the manor like this… this is literally my dream coming true here!"

Usopp perked up instantly, smiling proudly as he rubbed a finger beneath his nose. "Not a problem! I was a bit iffy at first, but in the end, it was the right thing to do! After all, we need to stick together, we lia—ACK!"

"Shut. IT!" Luigia growled venomously as she clamped her hands over the sniper's mouth.

"And as for us, our reasons are easy too!" Merry raised her hand eagerly. "I just wanted to see my maker's and old mistress's home, and Franky wanted a challenge! His speed made it all a bit anticlimactic, sure, but you can't deny he gets results!"

"Mm, that he does…" Luigia nodded approvingly, before side-eyeing the structure Franky was working on. "Though it does beg the question as to why this is taking so long? What, is it gonna get up and eat people or something?"

"But of course!" Usopp proclaimed, puffing his chest out with grandiose pride. "After all, it's only natural! Gazebos are vicious, bloodthirsty creatures! They're difficult to tame, but once you manage it, they're loyal for life! Neat, huh?"

Yoko stiffened at those words, and hastily scribbled in her notebook. "Planting… vicious attack gazebo… within defenses…"

Luigia, however, merely gave the sniper a decidedly unimpressed look. "Kid, what part of my wrinkly, liver-spotted ass looks like it was born yesterday?"

Usopp flinched before smiling sheepishly. "Ah… so you knew I was lying?"

"He was lying!?" Yoko hissed to herself in shock, pondering the revelation for a second before hastily scribbling out her latest note with a blush on her cheeks.

"Heheh, yeah, that's Usopp for you: Great at telling tales and sniping… not so much at lying convincingly," Merry snickered. She then ignored Usopp's indignant spluttering in favor of shooting a curious look at Franky. "Though there is a good point raised: Why didn't you complete this thing in a flash?"

"What are you, nuts?!" Franky reeled back from his companion as though she'd blasphemed during a Sunday service. "Merry, please! This is a gazebo! You don't just rush one of these things, it's not right! No, you take your time, you work it with finesse and subtlety. There's a lot of art to making one of these, you know."

"…of course, what was I thinking." The second the cyborg got back to work, Merry spun her finger around her temple with her tongue stuck out the corner of her mouth.

Meanwhile, a ways away, Yoko's brows were practically attempting to merge as she tried to puzzle out why the pirates would be doing something as seemingly altruistic as building an old lady a mansion.

And then it hit her like a bolt from the blue, prompting Yoko to snap her fingers and adopt a disgusted look as she scribbled the realization into her notebook. "Wiling… their way… into Old Lady Luigia's will… to steal her fortune."

Nodding firmly, the young do-gooder moved on from the mansion. She didn't get very far before a scream of terror in a familiar voice assaulted her ears.

"Mendo!" Yoko hissed, sprinting for the dojo.

Yoko wasn't sure what she expected to find at the dojo, though a series of increasingly lurid slaughterhouse visions led her to assume the worst. Worse, a part of her mind—a part she was really trying her best to ignore—was loudly proclaiming that such a scene would be good, since it was a surefire way to convince the mayor.

When she arrived, however, she was rather relieved to see that Mendo was alive. Though bemusement overpowered that relief, as both he and the Straw Hats' green-haired swordsman, Zoro if she remembered correctly, were currently all but mummified in bandages, and a pint-sized bipedal reindeer was pacing before them as he stared down the dojo's students, who were all sitting seiza and regarding him intently.

"Now, let's review," the reindeer—Chopper, that's what his name was!—stated, holding up his hoof. "For a minor closed wound, what's the right treatment?"

One of the boys slowly raised his hand. "Uh… ice on the skin for twenty minutes?" he said tentatively. Chopper frowned, and he hastened to amend. "Uh, I mean, with a cloth between the skin and the ice!"

"Good. And?" Chopper asked, pointing to another apprentice, who froze.

"A-Ah… bind it tight? B-But take it off if it looks like it's doing more harm than good?" he stammered.

"Exactly." The pirate nodded in confirmation. "What else?"

"If you can, prop the injury up so the blood doesn't flow?" another student ventured.

"And what's the most important part?" This time, Chopper turned to glare at his crewmate.

"Rest the injury, don't aggravate it," Zoro said through gritted teeth.

"But what's also an important part of maintaining good health?" So said, the Zoan turned his attention on the other bandage-mummy.

"Uhh…" Mendo glanced away sheepishly as he used what little mobility his plaster-covered arms granted him to scratch at his cheek. "Don't do something stupid like challenging someone way above your weight class in a spar?"

"Or in simpler terms?"

Mendo hung his head in defeat. "Don't be an idiot and get hurt in the first place?"

"Precisely," Chopper nodded, clapping his hooves. "Anyways, that's basic first aid for minor muscle strains, and if you have trouble remembering it, just think RICE: Rest, Immobilization, Cold, Elevation. And what do you do for major muscle strains?"

"Call a doctor," the students said together.

"Preferably one who's sane," the pirate swordsman muttered under his breath.

"Sane doctors don't do well with insane patients," Chopper shot back, his eye twitching slightly as his hoof inched towards his pack. "Wanna see how we deal with the rowdier ones?"

"Shutting up!"

"Huh…" Yoko muttered as she took in one of the pirates apparently teaching the students first aid. Still, it wasn't too hard to divine the purpose to this whole charade: Mendo and the green-haired swordsman must have really gotten into a spar, which was a bit odd for the former, but oh well.

"Testing… our best… defenders…" she quickly scribbled down, though she also noted down the mnemonic that the reindeer had said. Good info was good info, no matter the source (the irony of her avoiding the SBS didn't occur to her). Once she was done, she moved on from the dojo, frowning as she considered where else the pirates could be.

"The library!" she exclaimed, several nearby villagers sending her odd looks. "They'd want be trying to get all the information they can on us!"

So saying, Yoko turned on her heel and jogged towards the building, scanning around for other pirates as she did so. She was almost to the building when something out of the corner of her eye caught her interest. She slowed to a stop, and for a moment, she considered pretending she hadn't seen what she knew she had. Ultimately, duty overruled sanity, so she gritted her teeth and turned to take in the impossible sight before her.

Despite that determination, she still blinked several times, trying desperately not to believe what she was seeing. But unfortunately, the group of library books that had sprouted human feet and were walking single file into the woods did not vanish in a puff of logic. As such, Yoko had no choice but to sigh, close her eyes and count to ten while silently reminding herself that she was in the Grand Line. She knew about Devil Fruits. She knew about strange things. This was entirely possible.

None of that made her feel any better.

'At least they're not heading towards that smellyhead,' Yoko mused to herself as she followed the waddling books into the woods.

Away from the fake-Boss's impromptu saw mill, as it turned out, was towards a relatively recent addition to the village: the Grove of Unusual Animals. The Marine-girl hastily hid behind one of the trees surrounding the area, and she tried not to frown again (it was starting to give her a headache) at the sight of three of the female pirates standing within the grove. She wasn't able to stop a grimace, though, as she took in the angelic wings on one of them, and the former royal state of the other. How could pirates corrupt even the most wonderful people?

Then again, the image before her provided a decent answer: all three of the pirates were looking over the animals and reacting like any animal lover would, cooing over the cubs, hatchlings, or whatever else they were. The angel and princess were both cuddling the cuter animals, and the giant duck alongside them was preening as he lorded his size over the other birds in the grove's pond.

The source of the walking books, on the other hand, was leaning against a nearby tree with a book in hand. Beside her was a steadily growing stack of books, and through the foliage Yoko spotted a hand sprouted out of the ground on the other side of the tree, out of sight of the other pirates and tickling a pig-pug… pug-pig? A dog-faced piglet. Whatever it was, it had a face that would send even a mother screaming the other direction.

"Ooooh, these little guys are so cute!" the blue-haired ex-princess, Nefertari Vivi, squeed as she held up a turtle-duck and nuzzled its adorable beak. "It's like when Carue was a duckling all over again, all downy and adorable! No offense, Carue."

"None taken!" the duck, Carue apparently, replied. "Ah'm nawt adowable anymoah, but that's just because Ah'm badass now!"

"When you're not acting the coward and panicking, of course," the reading woman, Nico Robin, chuckled in a teasing tone, which drew an angered squawk and a bout of flapping from the duck.

Vivi snickered, most likely at her crewmates' antics, before giving the angel—Conis—a curious look. "What about Su, Conis? Was she this cute when she was younger?"

"Hm?" Conis glanced up from where she was dangling a foxtail over a fish-tailed cat-fish that was batting at the fern from within the pond. "Oh! Yes, she was, maybe even more! Just about the most adorable little ball of cotton you'd ever seen!" The angel glanced around the glade before puffing her cheeks out. "Now if only Su were around to be properly embarrassed…"

"Oh?" Vivi glanced around, starting in surprise as she noticed what was missing. "Hey, where is Su?"

"Oh, I saw her wandering off about… a half hour ago, I think?" Conis shrugged indifferently. "It's fine, she does this all the time. She'll be back when she feels like it. I just hope she's having fun!"

Yoko frowned at the information, and she toyed with the idea of jotting it down, but dismissed the notion with a shake of her head. After all, it was just one fox. What kind of trouble could the dumb animal get into?

-o-

Out on one of the rocky outcroppings that formed the island of Little East Blue's 'mandibles', a seagull was perched on the water-worn stone. Well, a lot of seagulls were perched on the water-worn stone, but this one was unusual. Mostly, it was the fact that it was wearing a trenchcoat, fedora and a pair of too-large sunglasses. Or maybe that it had its beak buried in a newspaper. Still, despite how much it stood out from the rest of the flock, it was still anonymous to the casual eye by dint of its apparel obscuring any distinguishable features.

Then again, it was a seagull. What were 'distinguishing features' for its kind might as well not exist in many other species' eyes.

Regardless, the seagull continued to casually read its newspaper, unflinching as waves broke against the outcropping and lightly misted it with saltwater, and unmoved as a small shadow trotted up from behind him and sat at his side, sending seagulls skyward in a cacophony of caws.

For several minutes, Su pointedly kept her gaze away from the seagull, her attention on the horizon. Suddenly, she asked, "How's the 'catch of the day'?" in a casual tone, as though the two animals had been discussing the weather since her arrival.

The seagull ruffled its feathers slightly, attention still fixed on its paper. "Still 'medium-rare' at this time, but…" The bird glanced at the fox from over the paper. "If the madam allows, the chef can have it as close to 'well done' as possible with time."

If the way the cloud fox snarled and snapped her head around to full on glare at the bird, that was the exact wrong thing to say. "Tell the chef to hurry," she warned him. "Or else my tastes will turn to a more…" She lunged forward and pinned the gull's tail feathers under her paw, so fast he couldn't even flinch. "Avian variety."

The incognito News Coo swallowed heavily and hastily nodded his desperate understanding. "S-S-So noted, I'll inform the chef at once." The second Su let his feathers go, the Coo tossed the paper into the ocean and flapped off as though its tail feathers were on fire.

Su watched the bird fly off before turning away and trotting back to the island-proper, an annoyed sigh escaping her lips. "So hard to find good help these days…"

-o-

Putting thoughts of the fox out of her mind, Yoko pulled out her notebook again and scribbled down the obvious reason the pirates were here. "Scoping out… unusual animals… for poaching… and black market sale…" After a moment of consideration, she added another note. "Possible… morale boosting… effort…"

Her recon complete, Yoko spared a half-moment to give the animals a determined look, silently vowing that she'd see the adorable animals rescued from the pirate's heinous clutches, before she turned around and made a beeline for the village, intent on discovering what other nefarious schemes the pirates had in store.

-o-

"She's gone," Robin reported. "Honestly, you'd think if she were taking the time to form a vendetta against us she'd also take the time to learn our capabilities. Ah, and just to clarify, she was apparently unfazed by our innocuous behavior. Apparently, we are planning to poach and sell these adorable creatures to the highest bidder."

"Oh, what terrifying fiends we are," Vivi deadpanned.

"Well, we could hardly expect it to be that easy," Conis sighed. "It's times like this that make me miss the lack of overt discrimination that we had on Skypiea."

"Washn't that onwy because of how hawd it was foah anyone down hewe to adapt to sky wahfayah?" Carue asked.

Conis blinked at the duck in confusion. "Uh… I'm sorry, what was that last word, Carue?"

The supersonic duck grumbled something under his breath and then glanced skyward. "Tone it down a nahtch, would ya? And I said 'warfare'."

"Ah, yes. That probably did help, from what I learned in training."

"Either way, we'll leave that mess to the ones who can actually clean it up," Vivi said. "In the meantime…" she stood up and brushed her dress off before walking over to her older crewmate. "Robin, I've been meaning to ask you something for a while."

The archaeologist glanced up from her book and hummed a curious hum. "Hmm?"

"How hard was it for you to learn to read the Poneglyphs?"

Robin blinked twice, her whole body twitching slightly. Slowly, very slowly, she closed her book, eyes staring vaguely in Vivi's direction but really off into the distance. "I… will need a second."

"Ah, i-if that's a bad question—!"

"No, no, nothing like that," Robin assured, pausing to take a deep breath and pull herself together. "It's just, ah…" She gave the princess a sheepish smile. "You are… literally the first person to ask me that. I… I need to think about my answer."

Vivi nodded flashed Robin a sympathetic smile, stepping up to sit next to her. "Please, take your time."

Robin nodded absentmindedly. Her gaze remained unfocused for a bit longer as she mouthed a few calculations, and then she turned her full, somewhat unsettling attention to the princess.

"It took me roughly two years to learn, and that was with my already phenomenal IQ and… plenty of free time. The Void Language is not an easy tongue to learn. The alphabet is incomparable to any modern lexicon, and their grammar is… circuitous, to say the least, with as much emotional connotation involved in translation as clinical denotation. It's a feat, to say the absolute least."

Vivi nodded slowly, giving the Oharan a contemplative look out the corner of her eye. "Save that that was from first principles with limited reference information, in hiding, and nobody helping you, right?"

Robin nodded her head side to side, humming contemplatively. "Yes, I suppose you have a point there…" She then chuckled and glanced over at Vivi with a curious smile. "But why do you ask? Were you interested in learning the language for yourself?"

Robin's chuckling intensified at that, only to die a swift death when Vivi failed to make a sound. Eyes wide, she grabbed the princess' shoulder.

"This is the part where you tell me that that notion is entirely ridiculous, which it is," Robin said in a tone of voice that was more fearfully desperate than threatening.

Vivi's expression was pointedly neutral at first. Then it changed to solid determination as she fully faced the archaeologist.

"No, it isn't," she whispered solemnly. "You're exactly right. I want you to teach me the language of the Void Century…" Vivi's composure shook slightly, but she a steady inhalation restored it. "And I want you to teach me using the Alubarna Poneglyph."

The inscrutable Nico Robin paled in shock and horror. It wasn't a full-on sheet-white pale, but any shift in her expression was dramatic. The furrows her fingers dug in her book's leather hide spoke volumes, too.

"Vivi, that information—!" she started to protest in a weak voice.

"That information is my heritage," Vivi interrupted in a heated, almost desperate tone of voice, her expression taking on a pleading demeanor. "And I don't just mean my heritage as a person born in this world, I mean me, personally. My ancestors were in the dead center of whatever the hell happened 800 years ago, and they had that stone in our family's crypt. And what was written on it…"

Vivi paused, biting her lip, and shook her head. "My ancestors… they knew. They knew, they had to know what they'd taken custody of, what they dedicated themselves to protecting, until the end of their lives, and even after that." Her gaze returned to Robin, eyes blazing. "And I want to have that knowledge, too. I want to know what was worth the lives of my countrymen. Mine… and yours. I want to know the knowledge of what happened in that lost century, what my ancestors did. I want to know what was so horrific that the government my ancestors helped found decided to kill an entire island to erase it. I…" Vivi trailed off helplessly before bowing her head. "I-I need to know. And I'll do whatever it takes to learn. So, please…"

Nefertari Vivi, Corsair Princess of Alabasta and descendant of one of the Twenty Kings who had founded the World Government, got on her knees and bowed her head before Nico Robin, the Devil Child of Ohara who posed one of the greatest existential threats to said government, and spoke blasphemy.

"Teach me the Void Language," she pleaded. "I beg of you."

Robin did not respond for a few moments. And ultimately, it was neither she nor Vivi who broke the silence.

"Actually… I'd like to know, too."

Devil Child and Corsair Princess both snapped their heads around to stare at…

"Conis!?" they chorused in disbelief.

The Skypiean bit her lip and shuffled nervously at the attention, but she still nodded an affirmative. "I'm sorry if this is out of place, but the war that shaped all of Skypiea's culture for the past four hundred years… I thought it was over the vearth, and on my ancestors' part, it was…"

She wrung her hands and looked to the side sadly. "But I talked to the Shandians during the victory party. And the whole reason that they fought for so long was to safeguard the Poneglyph in the Fire of Shandora. I may have only recently learned of the Void Century, but it's as much a part of my life as it has been yours, even if it was for a completely different reason."

Conis stepped forward and looked Robin in the eye, her earlier nervousness gone. "So many people suffered for so long for a single stone… and I want to know why. I want to know what was so important, I want to know why it existed to begin with, I want to know it all. So I'm sorry if this is forward…" Conis bowed as low as she could. "But I have to learn why, and to learn I need your help. So… please…"

Robin didn't move, didn't even blink, just staring incredulously at her two crewmates. This lasted for several seconds… and as those seconds stretched into minutes, Vivi and Conis exchanged looks. Silently coming to an agreement, Conis stood, planning to snap Robin out of her stupor.

Then, all at once, Robin burst out laughing.

"DERESHISHISHISHISHISHISHI! DERESHISHISHISHISHISHISHI!"

And this laugh wasn't like Robin's previous, if still genuine, bouts of laughter. Those, for all their sincerity, were still mild and controlled, easily muffled by a hand and closed jaw. This bout had Robin bent over, both hands clutching her gut and another pair sprouted from the tree she was leaning against holding her up. Tears streamed from her eyes, and if it went on much longer they'd probably be running from her nose. And a six-inch dragonfly could have flown in her mouth with room to spare, let alone a common housefly.

"Dereshishishi! Not just one, but two people asking me, of their own free will, to teach them the Void Language for the genuine pursuit of knowledge!" Robin giggled with ecstatic mirth. "And I honestly consider those same two people my friends! Ahh…" She wiped a wistful tear from her eye. "Life as a Straw Hat will never fail to reach new heights."

The would-be students perked up eagerly.

"So does this mean—?" Vivi queried.

Robin nodded at the princess, a hint of steel entering her gaze. "I warn the both of you: if you undertake this task, it will be like nothing you have ever experienced. I will not merely teach you, I will hold you to the standards of Ohara. I will work your eyes until they are little more than shriveled husks and drill your minds as they have never been drilled before. I caution you!" She stared at them with the utmost seriousness. "There will be pop quizzes. Are you truly prepared to live up to the standards of the greatest academic institution in the West Blue, if not the world?"

"Absolutely," Vivi said at once, her being brimming with confidence. Conis took a moment longer to nod firmly.

"Excellent! Then in that case," Robin said, an earnest smile on her face. "Let's begin!"

Without warning, simultaneous impacts to the backs of Vivi and Conis' legs brought the women to their knees, and in the same second they found their arms locked behind their backs and their heads yanked to attention.

"What the—!?" Conis exclaimed as Robin's expression contorted into an expression of childish bliss.

"Ohhh, this is going to be so much fun!" Both women straight-up froze with existential dread as Robin actually squeed with enthusiasm, a notebook suddenly in her hand with a pencil in the other scribbling furiously in it. "I just need to jot down what we'll be starting on, and I can update my lesson plan when we get back to the Sunny!"

"H-H-How do you haf a wesson pwan if you nevah thought you'd be teaching anyone?" Carue stammered out.

"Why, I've had this lesson plan since I was a little girl, of course!" Robin replied, a perfectly sunny aura surrounding her as she continued to write. "I've always wanted students of my own, whom I could groom and teach and help mature into wonderful archaeologists! Every young scholar's dream!"

Vivi paled as the pieces all came together. "Oh, dear sweet Horus, we're her dollies," she squeaked.

Conis glanced at Carue in terror. "Help!"

The supersonic duck took one look at the humming archaeologist before affixing the newly minted students with a flat look. "Yeeeaaah… you two bwought this on yoahselves, and wheah Vivi is concewned, my job descwiption expwicitwy excwudes pwotection fwom tutahs. And on that note!" The pond exploded with displaced water as the duck shot away.

"Traitor…" Vivi sobbed tearfully.

"Lesson one!" Robin suddenly announced, smiling brightly as she flipped the notepad so that her students could see. "Basic forms of the characters. I expect you to pay close enough attention that you'll have no less than half of it done within the next five hours. Perhaps then we can take a break for dinner. Isn't that great?"

So far out in the woods, nobody could hear the girls' pleas for mercy. Well, nobody except a certain cloud fox, who immediately perked up and lost her bad mood upon hearing the sound.

"That sounds like Conis," she mused. "Maybe I should go check on her." As she considered that, her survival instincts fairly screamed at her to stay away. "On second thought, maybe I should go find someone else to bother…"

-o-

"I guess this is supposed to be flattery?" Perona deadpanned, looking at the haircuts and shirts of the four adolescents she and Nami had reluctantly followed into the island's cave system at their… enthusiastic insistence. "This is still the 'attraction' stage, right?"

"I wouldn't know," Nami replied with surprising calm. "I spent most of my adolescence away from teenage boys."

"Lucky."

Nami gave her… she would be generous and term the spirit a 'friend' a flat look. "Because all through puberty, I was a slave in all but chains to the bastard who killed my mother."

Perona had the good grace to cough heavily in her fist and avert her gaze so that she was looking anywhere but at the navigator. "…my condolences?"

The Straw Hat maintained her flat look for a few seconds more before raising her hands in a dismissive shrug. "It's fine, it's fine, you couldn't have known." Perona's guilt alleviated, she turned back to the four boys who, quite admirably, were visibly suppressing their excitement in light of what they'd just heard. "Same for you guys. Now, are we almost where you wanted to show me something?"

The members of the—Nami hid her grimace with expert ease—Orenami Fan Club all perked up at the reminder of why they were there, and picked up their pace. "Just a little farther, Lady Nami! Right around here!"

The four of them rounded another few columns before coming to a stone structure covered by a large sheet. Both women looked with a bit of apprehension as the boys, with a flourish, removed the cloth. Then they blinked.

It was an intricately carved, life-sized statue of Nami, apparently going off of the image on her wanted poster. The sunny but mischievous smile on her face, the tattoo on her shoulder, the revealing clothes, even the Clima-Tact and clouds were all carved with all the skill that the navigator would expect of an artist like Usopp.

"Oooookay, screw attraction, this is obsession…" Perona whistled. She then glanced at the subject of the teenager's 'admiration'. "Hold off on the lightning till I'm out of the line of fire. I don't know how that stuff affects my astral projection, and I don't want to know."

"Mmm…" Nami mused with a slight frown, her Eisen Tempo shifting around and her fingers playing with the other sections of her Clima-Tact.

And then, the cloud stilled and she brought her other hand up to cup her chin as she observed the statue. "To be honest… I don't really mind this. It's actually kind of flattering."

Perona straight up boggled at the pirate, her incredulous "Really!?" syncing up with the teenagers' eager remix.

"Well, sure," Nami nodded kindly, walking up and giving the statue an appreciative once-over. "It's a skillfully rendered version of me at my most badass, why wouldn't I like it? It's so good… you know what?" She clapped her hands and beamed at the nearly swooning fan club. "I think I wouldn't mind autographing this! Free of… of…" Nami trailed off, her mouth working but no sound coming out. Grimacing, she coughed into her fist and held her hand out, a blush staining her cheeks. "Five hundred berries for the autograph. For all four of you."

"Worth every bit!" one of them declared, counting out the bills and laying them in her palm.

"What, no pencil?" Perona snarked.

"Of course not!" another member of the club snorted pridefully. "Lady Nami is the world-class navigator who'll chart the world! She has a writing implement on her at all times!"

Nami smiled and blushed bashfully as she confirmed the words by drawing a pencil from her back pocket. "These boys have my number, alright." And with that, she signed her name on the statue's un-tattooed shoulder with a flourish. She then stepped back so that the fan club could admire it. "Enjoy, boys!"

And enjoy they did, crowding around the statue and admiring the signature with glee. Nami, for her part, stood back and watched with an inflating sense of pride while Perona floated off, her interest in the ongoing spectacle expended.

"We actually got an autograph from Lady Nami! The Lady Nami!"

"Do you think the island'll have good weather all the time now? I bet it will!"

"I told you guys showing her this would be awesome, I told you!"

"Good thing she didn't find the other one, huh?"

And with that one line, everyone in the cavern froze up.

After a moment, Nami said "'Other one'?", one brow climbing towards her hairline.

The teenager who'd spoken winced miserably. "Whoops…"

"Duuuuude."

"Yeaaah, about that…" Perona droned.

Seeing the expression on her face, Nami followed the pink-haired woman's gaze to where, tucked into an alcove of the cave, there was another statue. This statue had two main differences from the one on the pedestal: first, it was by all appearances a nude statue, though thankfully without much anatomical detail… and second, the face looked like one of Luffy's paintings.

She honestly wasn't sure which was worse.

"Some fans you've got here," Perona deadpanned.

"Boys?" Nami asked tightly, her Eisen Tempo starting to writhe, though it still maintained its white coloration.

The boys' survival instincts promptly showed their worth, as they immediately fell to their knees, pressed their foreheads to the stone, and began pleading for forgiveness.

"We're so sorry, Lady Nami!"/"We couldn't get it right the first time, so we succumbed to our whims!"/"We swear we didn't mean any offense!"/"Please forgive us!"

Nami glared at them for a few moments longer before turning on her heel with a huff. "Because the final draft is this good, I'll let you off this once. And I expect you to destroy that abomination ASAP."

The teenagers all sighed in relief.

"Thank you most merciful Lady Nami!"/ "You are a goddess!"/ "We're the luckiest bastards alive!" /"It's a really good thing she didn't find the rest!"

And hello freeze again.

Perona shoved her fingers in her ears with a defeated sigh. "Oh, this is going to be loud."

"DUDE!"

Before the other three teens could lambast their friend, all four were frozen by the reek of ozone suddenly ramming its way into their nostrils.

Shivering in terror, the boys returned their attention to Nami, to find that not only was she trembling and scowling with fury and not only had she deployed her Clima-Tact to its full length, but her Eisen Tempo was looming over them all like a tempest born of hell itself.

"'The rest'?" Nami repeated in a frigid tone.

"I'd say it was nice knowing you boys, but…" Perona trailed off as she slowly backed out of the zone of fire.

"'THE REST!?'"

The flickering lights from her clouds served to illuminate another alcove. And this one had at least a dozen statues in it. And while the face improved steadily with each one… every last one of them was nude, with the craftsmanship of the chest and pelvic regions particularly impeccable.

And the instant that Nami comprehended that sight, the boys' world became light, sound, and pain.

-o-

Yoko blinked rapidly, trying to get rid of the spots in her eyesight as fast as possible. It had been a long time since she had been on her father's ship, since she had dealt with an assault on her eardrums like a cannon going off beside her. Too long, judging by the fact that her ears were ringing as badly as the first time she remembered, but going by how she could almost feel the latent charge crackling in her clothes, the endurance would have been something of a cold comfort even if she still had it.

"Any comments, Perona?"

Yoko hastily silenced a curse, pressing herself further behind the stalagmite she'd been using as cover as she watched the pirates pass by. The one who'd spoken was the ginger, whose mood was still quite stormy.

The girl took a second to muffle a snicker at her pun before listening in as the ghost girl gave her reply in a faux-pleasant voice.

"…Well, off the top of my head, I wanna say that this isn't normally what they mean by the 'destruction' stage, but—!" The ghost girl trailed off into a coughing fit as the weather-woman's cloud started to darken. "Ah, I mean, no, no comment."

Yoko's eyes twitched at the exchange, and she waited for the pair to pass before doubling back to check the stretch of cavern she'd evacuated.

Within a minute, she reached the scene of the carnage. She took in the charred, still-groveling forms of the four adolescents. She took in the stretch of cavern that had almost certainly been magnetized from the lightning and the rubble that had once been finely carved stone. She glanced back in the direction of the pirates who were stalking off, obviously responsible for the devastation and clearly devoid of remorse.

And, once she'd taken it all in, she shook her head as she calmly tore the page she'd been working on out of her notebook and threw it away. As much as she hated to admit it, in this case the fact that that cloud woman, Nami, was a pirate didn't matter. What she had done was a fair reaction from any decent member of their gender, and Yoko herself was honestly happy with the results. Even ignoring the fact that the boys had been obsessing over a pirate, that level of interest in anyone was just… creepy!

Ugh. Boys.

-o-

Meanwhile, as they walked out of the cave system, Perona and Nami glanced at one another.

"So," Nami started politely. "How'd you realize she was there?"

Perona gave her parasol a polite twirl. "A decade of experience recon-ing a dank and dark hole," she answered, along with another twirl. "You?" Twirl.

The navigator spun her finger in the air. "Air currents. I can't read too much, but a little girl a few feet away is child's play."

"Impressive."

"You too."

-o-

A half hour later, Yoko found herself skulk—infiltrating! She was infiltrating the less visible parts of the Little East Blue's only and spread-out population center, maintaining her stealth so as to better observe the interlopers in her home.

Yoko was quite pleased with herself, if she was being honest. She'd already gathered copious amounts of evidence against almost all of the pirates, evidence that was sure to show everyone just how dangerous these pirates were, and how they needed to get them off their island and sunk to the bottom of the sea yesterday.

Still, as good as what Yoko had right now was, she still felt she could do better. If she wanted to do this and do it right, she'd need to peg the whole crew, every last one, to a T. She was already well underway, thankfully enough; after all, she'd even managed to start with the cap—!

Every curse her father and his men had ever let slip near her shot through Yoko's mind as she spun around and confirmed her worst suspicions: the windmill's blades were devoid and the Straw Hat's captain was nowhere to be seen. He'd disappeared when she wasn't looking!

"Damn it damn it damn it!" Yoko spat, all notions of subtlety lost as she broke out into a dead run. She had-had-had to find that pirate, and fast! He was the leader of the bunch, so if he decided to start anything on her watch, then it was on her conscience!

Her panic only intensified as she failed to find any sign of the pirate, despite running all over the village. The possibility of him going back to his ship was brought up and promptly discarded; no way was the captain going back with all his crew still scattered throughout the village. So, the question was, just where was—?

"No! Please! Have mercy upon this poor soul! Please, no more, no more!"

Yoko's head snapped towards the Little Baratie's pond as a terrorized scream shot through the air. "Mitsuboshi!" she cursed, panic filling her veins as she ran towards the floating restaurant. Her feet thumped across the bridge to the restaurant, and she nearly burst through the front doors, but at the last moment the girl's self-honed sense of stealth and self-preservation kicked in and diverted her to the nearest window. She took a moment to brace herself for a gruesome scene, and then stood to look through the glass, braced for a scene of carnage such that she hadn't seen since her father's death.

If she hadn't braced herself so much, she would have face-faulted rather than stared in flat disbelief, one eye twitching furiously.

Before Yoko's eyes, in Chef Mitsuboshi's beloved restaurant, said chef was looking rather panicked. The source of that was clear: the captain had apparently gotten tired of the windmill after a short while, and was currently sitting in the middle of the restaurant, clinking together a knife and fork and grinning widely, a large stack of dirty plates already right next to him. The sharp-dressed pirate chef was also there, a hand on Mitsuboshi's shoulder that was as much comforting as it was dragging him along to the kitchen.

"'Eating all of our food'," she growled, carving the words into her notepad. She glanced back up into the restaurant, and flinched.

Easily the most disturbing member of the Straw Hat Pirates, and the only one that everyone else in the village was as ignorant about as she, was also in the restaurant. The angle she was at and the fact that his back was turned hid his skinless face from the girl, thank goodness. All she could see of his deathly form were the bony fingers that held a violin, upon which he was fiddling away a tune that she couldn't quite keep herself from tapping her fingers in rhythm to.

Yet, she was having trouble determining exactly what the point of the song was; it was too upbeat to just be accompaniment for eating…

And then Mitsuboshi and the pirate chef walked back in and put new plates of food before the gorging captain, setting the dishes down to the music's tempo, and things became far too clear to Yoko.

"Employing… mind control… through music…" she bit out as she barely refrained from putting her pencil through her pad. She no sooner finished writing the words down than she sprinted away, with no intention of subjecting herself to that mind control.

She shortly found herself near one of the older settlements on the island, a place known as the Dragon Shrine. The old man who lived there was apparently the brother or cousin or something of the elder from his home, Warship Island, and he offered free history lessons about the place's history and the Millennial Dragons. Yoko had stopped by the shrine a few times in the past, but the only thing she ever remembered was waking up on the floor after sleeping all day.

But seeing a familiar being in front of her, she trudged grimly up to the shrine, wondering what the fake Boss's lackeys were up to. Coming closer, she eyed the four dugongs standing before the old man as he gave his lecture, and settled in to watch whatever nefarious deeds they were committing.

Unfortunately, this also meant she had to listen to the dragon priest, but she was sure she could manage. After all, how bad could he be?

"—and so it was that in the fifth era, Miriola XII replaced his father, Miriola XI, as the high priest of the island. Five years later, his son, Miriola the XIII, was born. Three years later, a fire burned down the east dormitory, which you will recall was built by Jisro VII. Several were killed in the fire, but the most notable lives lost were those of Inzi LII, Kisa XXII, and die filthy pirates, die die die—!"

"SNRK!"

Yoko snapped her head up, ripping herself out of the dream she'd been drifting into. 'For the love of—!' the girl cursed silently as she wiped away what little drool she'd let slip. 'How can a man known as a dragon priest from a place known as Warship Island be so damn boring!?'

Still, in spite of the shame she felt at herself for letting her concentration slip, Yoko felt sufficiently absolved of any wrongdoing by how the dugongs hadn't moved an inch while she snoozed, and they didn't look like they were going to move at all anytime soon.

"I see, I see. So that would mean—! Fascinating!" the one in the purple bandanna muttered to himself, his pencil moving so fast that smoke was wafting up from the notepad he was, by all appearances, gleefully taking notes in.

The blue-bandanna wearer, however, seemed to disagree, if the way he was scowling and swinging a pair of wooden boken through a series of elaborate katas was anything to go by. "It… should be… a crime… for something… to be… this boring!" he grit out.

And as for the final pair…

"Zzzzz…"

The other two dugongs were leaning against one another, skullplates knocking together as they blatantly and openly snored. Though… 'blatantly' was a bit of an understatement. In truth, their mouths were hanging open and literally overflowing with drool.

And if the birds that were bathing in said basins of saliva were anything to go by, they'd been that way for awhile.

Yoko stared at the scene for a few seconds longer, but that short time was enough for the Sandman to start ensnaring her mind again. Now that she was paying attention she could feel it coming, and so she slapped her cheeks a couple of times before turning on her heel and bolting away until the shrine was no longer in earshot. She looked down at the page of notes she had scribbled—

"'The cat in the hat smells like a rat that's way too—' Oh for the love of—!"

—and expressed her exasperation at the nonsensical content by tearing it to pieces. She shook her head in dismissal; the worst that those blubber-butts could do with whatever they were getting out of that history lesson was lull innocent civilians to sleep, and she doubted that any pirates would have any reason to be that patient or subtle, and that went double for pirates as destructive as these.

One more skim of her notes brought a smile to her face as she saw how close her endeavor was to fruition; despite the two hiccups, she had enough evidence that she was sure they would run the pirates out of their town. Her mind filling with increasingly vindictive fantasies, Yoko resumed her run back towards town, intent on finding the… final… pirate…

Yoko suddenly halted in her tracks, a horrified realization sinking into the pit of her stomach. She'd run through the entire crew, she'd seen each and every last one of them, gotten dirt on them all… except for one.

The one she hated the most for insulting her father's service, the one who was the entire reason that the entire village and even Boss had been brainwashed into thinking that any pirates could be considered good people: The Voice of Anarchy, Jeremiah Cross himself.

And if she'd already run through the whole crew, then that could only leave the blonde guy she'd completely dismissed as a harmless musclehead. It was with that thought that she remembered that said man was also famous for always having a talking snail on his shoulder!

"STUPID, STUPID, STUPID!" Yoko raged, slamming her notebook against her face repeatedly. She then spun on her heel, ready to go looking for him, only to fall flat on her face out of dizziness. Dizziness, perhaps, that came from too many blows to the head?

"Stupiiiiid…" she groaned.

The young girl spent the next minute or so getting her head re-centered. That done, she slowly climbed to her feet and began to look, picking up speed as fast as she went, and straining her eyes and ears while trying to narrow down the search a bit. She'd checked the library, the dojo, the windmill, the Mini-Baratie, so where else—?

"HONK-HONK!"

Ah, right. A talking, very loud snail.

Yoko immediately made tracks towards the source of the noise, bracing herself for whatever horrors she might behold…

And was forced to fight down a blisteringly strong urge to cuss out a blue storm when all she 'beheld' was the sight of the blond pirate, the loud mouth who was shattering the world, Jeremiah Cross… sitting at the table of a local café, with his snail on the tabletop across from him, a dog devouring a steak at his feet, and an elephant of all things sitting to the side and digging its trunk through a bowl of fruit.

Now, it should be clarified that the reason for Yoko's outrage? It wasn't entirely because of the pirate's apparently peaceful demeanor; it played a part, sure, but the lion's share of her fury came from the pirate's location for relaxation itself. The café he was offering patronage to was known as the 153's Pride. It was named after the 153rd Marine Branch of Shell Island, and it was run by a Marine who'd left active duty and come to live out his glory years in the Little East Blue.

So, basically, the pirate was sitting at a café whose flag-adorned wall blatantly announced the establishment's affiliation, and the owner, who was one of Yoko's best friends on the island besides Boss, was standing next to said pirate's table, clearly ready to take his order, though he was looking at the snail with clear confusion.

"I think," Jeremiah Cross informed the owner, an eyebrow cocked at his snail. "That that translates to him wanting a hard-boiled egg, which we will not be having as I will not be paying for anything more than lettuce for this joker."

"FINE BY ME," the snail grumbled, rolling his eyes. "FOR SOME REASON, that gag wasn't as fresh as it could have been."

"Heheh, of course," the elderly Marine chuckled kindly. "So, to confirm… lettuce for the snail, French toast, sausages and hot chocolate for you?"

"And another rib-eye for me!" the dog barked eagerly, lapping up the last of the juices on his plate.

"And an even bigger hole in my pocket for me…" the pirate lamented. "Least I'm not in debt anymore…"

"Don't worry, son, you won't be with me either," the old Marine reassured the pirate. "And before you protest, one of the first things your captain did after going to sea was doing good by the 153rd. As far as I'm concerned, any Straw Hat who eats here has had their tab paid ten times over…" He then grimaced reluctantly. "So long as that Straw Hat isn't Luffy himself, I mean. I'm generous, but I don't want to be bankrupted, either."

"Yeah, that's more than fair," Cross replied, waving the owner off. "In that case, thanks, the order you gave me will be just fine."

"Alright, I'll get right on that. You boys hang tight!" And with that, the old Marine went back into his establishment.

Once the old man was gone, the elephant chuckled and glanced over at the happily panting hound. "Eesh, you want to slow down there, Lassoo? You're starting to match Luffy steak for steak in terms of appetite!"

"HAHA! He's right, you know!" Soundbite cackled. "We might be loaded, but the saying is 'FAT CAT', NOT 'FAT DOG'!"

"Stick and stones might break my bones, but I'll eat them and your words any day!" Lassoo shot back at his fellow animals. "This diet isn't anything new, it's normal for me! And just so we're clear here, I'm not fat, I'm hefty!"

"Hmm…" Cross hummed thoughtfully, rubbing his chin. "I don't think you're wrong… but I also think Funkfreed and Soundbite have a point, too."

"I'M NOT FAT, I'M HEFTY!" the dog barked.

"What happened to 'eating our words', huh?" the elephant asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Alright, alright, I was agreeing with you!" Cross backpedaled with an untroubled smile, warding off the angry mutt with his hands. "I was…" He leaned back in his seat and looked at his dog, an apparently thoughtful look on his face as he gave the canine a once over. "Just looking at it from another angle is all."

The dog, Lassoo, raised an eyebrow at Cross before laying down with a dismissive wuff.

As she watched the scene, Yoko, for the life of her, couldn't divine the nefarious purpose behind Cross's actions. He had to be up to something; he was wearing armor on his arms and legs, for crying out loud! And besides that, he was punching his right palm with his left fist, repeatedly. That screamed 'itching for a fight', but he wasn't doing anything active.

But this was Jeremiah Cross, Voice of Anarchy. He was the Plan Guy. She could concede that some of the pirates were not immediately doing nefarious things, but not him! Even that talk of 'another angle' was no help. What other angle?

When the answer did come to her, her spine suddenly felt like it'd been replaced by a chunk of ice. "He's operating at such a higher level…" she breathed, despair coloring her voice. "That I can't figure out his plan!" That despair was promptly chased away by renewed determination. "Well, fine! Sooner or later he's going to enact his plan! I just need to follow him, and react when I need to!"

As it turned out, however, that point in time would arrive sooner than Yoko expected. Or rather, it would arrive immediately.

Without warning, the snail, Soundbite, snapped its eyestalks to attention, an alert look suddenly on his face. Barely a second later, Cross glanced at him with his own serious expression, and slipped his earphones over his head. After a few seconds of listening, the pirate's expression darkened and he turned his gaze to his suddenly attentive pets. "Gear up," he ordered sharply.

To Yoko's shock, the dog and elephant transformed before her very eyes; the dog morphed into a titanic cannon that was only slightly larger than his original mass, while the elephant shrank into a somewhat ornate saber. And then, to her terror, Cross picked them both up, slinging the dog-cannon into a strap on his back and slotting the blade into a sheath that was on his back as well, angled opposite the cannon, and then placed his snail on his shoulder.

And finally, to her horror, the pirate started walking towards the door of the café. Before she even knew what she was doing, Yoko found herself running full tilt at the pirate. She couldn't let him harm anyone, she couldn't lose anyone again, she couldn't—!

Cross leaned his head into the storefront. "Hey, old man!"

The slide onto her ass, a result of trying to stop fast and hide on wet grass, would probably result in grass stains. Yoko didn't care. She just strained her ears to listen.

"Yeah? What's up, kid?" she heard the owner call out.

"I, ah," Cross glanced over his shoulder before continuing. "I'm gonna need you to put my order on hold for a bit. Just 'til I get back is all."

"Eh? You goin' somewhere?"

"Just for a bit," Cross assured him. "I've got some business I've got to take care of real quick of is all. It's…" Cross glanced to the side, his finger tapping on his thigh. Yoko wasn't any expert on reading people, but even she could tell when someone was lying out their ass. "It's nothing serious, should just take a second or two. Just hold off on the cooking until I get back, alright?"

"If you say so."

"Thanks!" And with that, the Straw Hat drew back from the establishment and Yoko hid herself even further behind her vantage point, prepared to bolt or scream as was appropriate as he… started walking away from the town and towards the shore!?

"What the…?" Yoko breathed to herself. The Marine girl glanced around uncertainly, weighing her options. After all, for all that she was something of a fanatic, Yoko was not stupid enough to be ignorant of the risks of a young girl like her running after a pirate—especially one as dangerous as Jeremiah Cross—all on her own.

But… But if the alternative was to just stand by and do nothing, to watch as a pirate ran rampant, on her island, again…

Yoko sent a silent prayer for forgiveness to her father before sneaking after the pirate.

Thankfully, the local topography worked in the girl's favor. The short cliffs that were arrayed between the town and the shore allowed the girl to stagger out her observation without any risk of being spotted or losing sight of her quarry. And once the pursuer and pursued hit the tree line, it only got easier.

However, it was much to Yoko's surprise that her quarry defied her expectations, in that rather than heading straight for the shore, the pirate suddenly stopped in the middle of the woods for no apparent reason. Cross glanced at his snail, the pair speaking too softly for Yoko to hear. Once they finished, the pirate leaned himself against a tree, his head bowed, cap tilted down to shadow his eyes, and arms crossed over his chest. He didn't move from that position, and Yoko didn't move from where she was watching him, trying to figure out what he was doing. Waiting for something, obviously… but what?

It was a minute more before she got her answer. Cross looked up from his position and raised an arm in a wave. "¡Eh! ¡Buenos días! ¿Que pasa?" Despite the call being in Cross's voice, Yoko didn't see his lips move until after the call went out. Straining her ears, she caught the exchange that followed:

"I hope you didn't provoke them right away."

"Give me a little credit! All I did was GREET THEM."

Before Yoko could start to puzzle anything out, she got her answer: Footfalls, and lots of them, approaching their position.

Yoko tensed as a large group of sombrero-clad men in western outfits filtered through the trunks, led by a comparatively short luchador clad in a sombrero that was as wide as he was and a decorated poncho. All of them looked mean and were packing heat, and it didn't take long for Yoko to come to the correct conclusion. For all that, however, Cross neither flinched nor spoke. The luchador did, however.

"You… You're Jeremiah Cross, right?" the luchador questioned, giving the blond pirate a onceover. "Third mate of the Straw Hat Pirates?"

"Pfheheh, yup!" Cross grinned brightly as he thumbed up the brim of his cap. "And seeing as you already know me, it's only fair you return the favor, no?"

The other pirate chewed his lip briefly, before nodding. "Corto." He nodded his head at the mariachi-outfitted men with him. "Vice Captain of the Amigo Pirates." The newly named Corto glanced around hesitantly for a second before looking back at the armored pirate. "The ship we saw on the coast when we landed, it was yours, sí? Meaning… the rest of your crew is on this island as well?"

"Yep," Cross casually answered. "Just stopped by for a bit of shore leave on our way to Sabaody before we hopped the Line. It's a nice place, nice people. Pretty sizeable too, I'm sure they could handle catering two crews at once."

Yoko bristled viciously at whatever the hell the Straw Hat was getting at, but when the larger pirate shook his head with a dismissive grunt she shoved it down. "Nah, we're here on business, not pleasure. We've got a job to do, and it's here on this island."

One of Cross' eyebrows shifted up. "Oh? 'Zat so? Anything we could help you with? Y'know…" He tilted his head to the side slightly. "Help you get on your way without any problems?"

Corto paused, visibly weighing his options before slowly nodding. "Well… if you're offering… You seen a giant beetle anywhere 'round here?"

Yoko's whole world froze, but even through her nascent panic, she still saw Cross' jaw twitch slightly, and she also heard Corto continue.

"We're not gonna hurt it or nothin', no se preocupe," the luchador assured the Straw Hat with a smile that almost managed to look sincere. "It's just that it's, ah… it's lost is all. Its owners lost track of it awhile back, and we're just lookin' to get it back to where it rightly belongs. So, think you can help us out?"

Cross didn't answer immediately, his arms crossed and head bowed. After a moment, he looked up and tapped his chin thoughtfully. "Hmmm, beetle, beetle… you mean a big ol' bug, about…" He held his hands apart in demonstration. "Ten tons heavy, armored to the nines, with a massive-ass horn in the middle of it's face?"

"Yeah, that's the one! You seen it?"

Yoko did her utmost best to burn a hole through Cross's skull, and she was certain she would have succeeded—

"Nope!" Cross chirped, a pleasant smile on his face. "Sorry, can't help you!"

If it weren't for Cross saying that, throwing both the foreigner and the local way off their game.

The luchador sagged with disappointment. "So… you haven't seen it?"

"Oh no, I did see it," Cross clarified, his smile unflinching and his tone of voice as pleasant as ever as he raised his arms in a helpless shrug. "But I forget the details of it, and am thus incapable of helping you. So~rry~"

Apparently Corto was smarter than he looked, because from his visible fury he clearly smelled the rat that was all over Cross. "Listen, you—!"

"No, you listen."

The tension that Yoko had been feeling since entering the forest abruptly intensified as Cross's expression suddenly sobered up and he stood from the tree he'd been leaning against, his face taking on the visage of the bloodthirsty pirate she knew he really was.

"If you know what's good for you," Cross warned the Amigo's First Mate. "I'd suggest you and your pack of banditos forget about that beetle. Monster-hunting is a dangerous sport, you see. Very…" He rolled his fingers in the air. "Very treacherous. It's just, you never know just what beastie might get in your way and decide to tear a strip out of your hide…" Cross cocked his head to the side with a tight smile, and slid an inch of his sword's blade out of its hilt, so that it could glint in the light. "If you catch my drift."

Corto tensed at the move, eyeing the other pirate before him in disbelief and, to Yoko's surprise, more than a little trepidation. "You… You really think that we're scared of you?" he grit out. "That an overhyped, big-mouthed wannabe like you can beat us?"

The Straw Hat gave the Amigo Pirates a onceover before snapping his head down with a derisive snort. "No no noooo, that's not right. See, what I think is that you're little more than a fat bully who's never once in his life had the guts to pick a fight with someone who could actually defend themselves."

Then, before Corto could react, Cross stepped forwards and shoved the tips of his fingers in the larger man's chest, forcing him to take a step back.

"What I know," Cross bit out venomously. "Is that I can kick your tub of lard ass right back to the shoreline and clean off this island. And something tells me that somewhere in that fat skull you're hiding behind that mask which you are disgracing by wearing, you have just enough brain cells to know that if you try and do anything to me, one way or the other, you'll be spending your next few siestas sipping your horchata through a wired jaw."

"SO!" Cross barked, taking a step back from the Amigos. "I'm going to tell you this once, and only once, before I get madder than I already am: do the smart thing. Forget you ever heard about that beetle…"

Out of the blue, Cross lashed his left arm out, slamming his fist into a nearby tree—

SMASH!

And causing everyone nearby to jump when the bark splintered readily, creating a wide crater that was almost deep enough to compromise the tree's stability.

"And get the hell off this island," Cross finished coldly. "Before I throw your ass off it."

The Amigo Pirates all glowered ferociously. Corto especially looked to be supremely ticked off, and so close to taking a swing at Cross. But in a show of restraint atypical for people his build, the large pirate's only response was a derisive snort before he spun on his heel and marched off. His underlings glanced between him and Cross for a moment before electing it better to follow their First Mate's lead than take their chances with the Straw Hat.

A minute after the last of them had disappeared into the tree line, Cross spoke again. "Soundbite, warn the rest of the crew. The first mate looked to have half a brain, but if a captain who's so cocky he doesn't lead from the front doesn't come back to try a better assault, I'll eat a biscuit."

"YUCK," Soundbite gagged.

"Oh, yeah, and you should probably warn the village, too."

"…was that last part to me?"

Yoko stiffened.

"Nah…" Cross nonchalantly replied, to the point of digging a finger into his ear. "That last part was to the person who failed to consider that listening to the SBS would give knowledge about our fighting abilities." He then glanced straight towards Yoko and her hiding spot. "Like, say, the fact that Soundbite can hear everything that goes on within a one-mile radius, even if it's no louder than a heartbeat?"

Yoko abruptly remembered that all of those animals had been talking throughout her vigil, which she knew was the snail's doing…

"Or the fact that I could smell her a few meters away?" the dog-cannon added.

A dog-cannon. A dog… and of course it would have the nose of a freaking bloodhound!

"You're really not good at the whole clandestine thing, are you?" the sword finished flatly.

Her face red as a brick, Yoko finally hit her limit for how much bullshit she could handle, turning on her heel and bolting for the town, heedless of any attempt at stealth.

As soon as she was out of earshot, Cross grimaced at his primary partner. "IIII'm gonna guess that that all could have sounded better?"

"Liiiiiittle bit, yeah," Soundbite snarked. He then glanced aside. "BUT, MOVING ON FROM THAT…" The snail flicked his eyestalks at the mutilated tree. "WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?"

Cross dismissed Yoko as well in favor of ghosting his fingers over the crater he'd made in the tree. "Me acting out a hunch that I'm actually surprised paid off…"

"OKAY, LEMME TRY AGAIN: since WHEN could you do that?"

"If my hunch is right?" Cross grinned eagerly as he turned and started to walk back towards Little East Blue. "Probably for awhile now."

-o-

The mood inside the Xibalba was at once impatient and reluctant.

On the one hand, Captain Largo was still enjoying his siesta, and everyone had had the consequences of interrupting said siesta thoroughly impressed upon them long ago, which left them waiting for him to wake up on his own. On the other hand, they weren't exactly delivering good news, either, and every instant that they lingered on the island's shores after being told, explicitly at that, to get the hell out by one of the last crews anyone on the Grand Line wanted to piss off was an instant closer to them all getting their asses kicked seven ways from Sunday.

So great was their trepidation that Corto was actually entertaining the idea of suffering his brother's wrath if it meant they got off the island sooner, but the decision was taken out of his hands when Largo's snoring suddenly snapped off in a harsh snort.

For a full minute, the inside of the Xibalba was frozen, nobody breathing, nobody even twitching.

And then every one of the Amigo Pirates save for one flinched, as that 'one' lifted his head just enough for a single eye to glare out from under his sombrero at the person who acted as his First Mate.

"I believe," Largo intoned. "I told you… to go out and get me that beetle. And that unless you had a love for pain, you had better not even consider the idea of returning without it. This leaves two options. Either that beetle is both invisible and utterly silent, in which case mis disculpas… or you are just itching for me to introduce you to a whole new world of agony. So. Tell me."

Shivers wracked the pirates as Largo slowly rose from his resting position, looming over his brother and towering over the rest, and gave him a lazy yet no less lethal glare.

"Which is it," he inquired frigidly.

It was a credit to Corto that he managed to refrain from dying on the spot of heart failure, or even show terror to his older and seriously dangerous brother. Instead, he swallowed minutely (both saliva and his nerves) and met his brother's gaze. "We have a problem. Recovering the beetle has been rendered impossible."

"This had better be the best explanation of your life," Largo sneered.

The heavyset luchador swallowed uncomfortably, still looking his brother in the eye even as his mask became increasingly muggy. "We are landed," he whispered in a hoarse tone. "Directly beside the Mil Soleado."

Those words actually got Largo to pause, and it was to the Amigos' immense relief that their captain slowly sank into a sitting position on his bed. "The Straw Hat Pirates," he confirmed. "You're sure."

Corto nodded with almost frantic desperation. "Completamente! I spoke with Jeremiah Cross himself, and he made it clear, in no uncertain terms, that we weren't welcome on this island! The beetle is here, sí, but the Straw Hats are protecting it! And before you say it, sí, I could have absolutamente punched the little weasel's head off his shoulders, but then I'd have gotten the whole crew down on our heads! I might be afraid of failing our employers, and I might be terrified of failing you, hermano… but one thing I absolutely am not is estupido enough to anger the pirates who invaded Enies Lobby and lived to tell of it!"

By the end of his diatribe, Corto was panting and staring at his brother in outright terror, silently begging him, begging him, to do the right thing, and for once, let them just walk away.

And for a few glorious seconds, as Largo was thoughtfully silent, Corto felt hope that that would happen.

Finally, Largo spoke. "You are right about one thing, hermano… To tangle with the Straw Hats is to court disaster."

Corto let the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding slowly leak out of his nostrils, relief flooding his being.

"But."

And just like that, all that hope and relief turned to dread and bile.

Largo slowly rose from his bed and cast his gaze out over his crew. "We will go through with our mission nevertheless."

Terror overrode his survival instinct—or more accurately, half his survival instinct drop-kicked the other half—and Corto did the unthinkable and grasped his brother's shoulders to shake him furiously. "¿Estás completamente loco? I repeat! Straw Hats! Enies Lobby! We have one Devil Fruit, yours, and not only do they have almost half a dozen of their own, but their unpowered members have managed to take out almost a dozen total ability users on their own! They will chew us up and spit us out before you can even ask '¿Quieres leche con tu horchata?'! Hermano, I respect you and I fear you, and I will die for you… but not like this, man! Not like—"

"Corto."

The larger pirate froze under his older brother's half-lidded stare. It was a stare that he'd seen many times as they'd grown up together and had thankfully seen less and less as the years had gone by. It was a stare that screamed—

"Are you done?"

Yeah, that, only a lot less politely.

"I… think so?" Corto hesitantly squeaked, before reasoning that yes, he was indeed done. "Yeah, I'm done."

"Thank you," Largo deadpanned. "Now, you all listen to me, and you all listen good."

Every last sombrero-clad man nodded, facing their captain with complete and terrified attention. Largo graced them with a flat gaze before he spoke again.

"The Straw Hats are strong. Stronger than most crews, and undoubtedly stronger than us. I acknowledge this, sí. They are also insane, insanely lucky, and all around some of the most dangerous pendejos to sail the Grand Line. This too, I acknowledge…" Largo nodded slowly, before giving them all a chilling glare. "But you all must acknowledge this: that if there is one man who the Straw Hats are not stronger than, it is the man whose patronage we seek. Whose favor we have garnered."

The tall bandito started to pace back and forth. "That man is not merely a New World veteran. He was a contemporary, a rival, of the Pirate King, Gold Roger. He was feared by Marines and Pirates alike the world over, and he clawed his way out of the blackest pits of Impel Down itself, a feat never accomplished before, or after. That man…" Largo let loose a grim chuckle. "He is, without a doubt in my mind, the single strongest human being in all of Paraíso. And we are working with him. Do you truly believe that rookies like the Straw Hats, no matter how strong, can stand up to him?"

"Yeah, sure, they'd fall before him of course, hermano!" Corto agreed before grimacing as he tugged at the collar of his poncho. "But we aren't him! We're just… us!"

"Sí, sí, we're us…" Largo grinned venomously as he jabbed a thumb to his side, indicating a crate stored in the corner of the room. "And in case your memory fails you, we have in our possession the trump card our benefactor left us. A means through which our victory shall be confirmed. In light of this detail… do you still think we have any chances of defeat?"

Corto looked aside, thinking furiously. A good amount of the crew's fear melted away in favor of confusion and amplified respect for their captain. There were some, however, who were still nervous.

"Ah, but of course…" Largo spoke up again, apparently noticing the hesitation. "I am not without mercy. Should anyone still harbor any doubts as to the chances of our victory, feel free to speak up, and I shall hear you out as I would any other."

A moment of silence, and then…

"Ah, w-well—!"

BANG!

A mariachi-themed pirate in the back of the room crumpled with a cry of pain as a ball of lead tore through his knee. Nobody saw this on account of the fact that all eyes in the room were glued to the pistol that Largo had drawn and fired near-instantly.

"Anyone else?" he queried, his voice cool enough to give a polar bear frostbite.

Dead silence.

The man spun his gun back into its holster.

"Didn't think so."

-o-

Yoko's breath came in ragged gasps as she sprinted back into town. She had to warn them all… not just about the Straw Hats and their nefarious plans, but also the far more imminent threat of these new poncho guys.

It was disappointingly easy for her to locate the mayor, considering that he was in the village helping set up a party to celebrate the presence of the Straw Hats. Well, she'd see to it that that didn't last. She quickly came up to the portly man, and spent a few moments catching her breath.

"Yoko?" Fabre asked in confusion. "What's wrong?"

What the girl tried to say was something along the lines of, "I've got proof the Straw Hats are actually hostile, and there's another pirate crew that's trying to kidnap Boss!" What actually came out on account of her lack of breath was "Proof-Straw-host-pirate-kidnap-Boss!"

The town's mayor blinked in surprise before slowly heaving out a sigh as he brought a hand up to massage the bridge of his nose. "Yoko, I know you don't like them, but I thought the Straw Hats made it very clear that they have no intentions on kidnapping—!"

"Not the Straw Hats, someone else!" Yoko snapped, oxygen finally refueling her lungs. "The Straw Hats are evil pirates, but there are other pirates that just came to the island looking for Boss!"

Fabre's relaxed demeanor vanished in an instant. For a brief moment, he looked panicked, before covering it up by attacking his pipe. "Blast it all… they just had to show up when he began molting."

Any thoughts Yoko might've had of a continued rant fled once she processed that statement. "Wh-What? But that wasn't supposed to be for—!"

"Dooon't worry about it."

'I… am getting very tired of all this mood whiplash,' was the incongruous thought Yoko had as that voice brought her anger back to life at full cylinders. Spinning around, she glared bloody murder at Jeremiah Cross as he approached, weapons crossed on his back and a casual grin on his face.

"There's a pirate crew coming up, sure, and they look to be utter bastards, sure," the pirate continued, waving his hand dismissively. "But we'll handle them. Although…" He then gave Yoko a flat look. "I'm guessing none of that is going to make you hate us any less, am I right?"

Yoko initially confirmed the accusation in a nonverbal manner by flushing furiously and sputtering. It took a moment for the actual words to come out. "You… You bastard! Idiot! Murdering, bloodthirsty… shiitake!" Admittedly, her true feelings were a bit garbled due to her not having even hit puberty yet, but at least she was trying.

Cross blinked before slowly tilting his head in confusion. "I'm… a homicidal mushroom that's delicious with noodles?" he asked in honest, bemused confusion.

"Never call someone a word you don't understand, KID. That's Insults 201," Soundbite helpfully informed the Marine child.

"What, it's not 101?"

"NUH-UH!" Soundbite shook his head with a shit-eating grin. "101 DEALS WITH sentence structure, run-on sentences and the like. I COULD GET YOU A COURSE CATALOG IF YOU—?"

"WILL YOU TWO BE FUCKING SERIOUS FOR ONE SECOND!?" Yoko practically screamed, several veins bulging in cross patterns on her brow.

"Language, young lady," the pair deadpanned at her, before breaking down into uncontrolled snickers. "Nah, we're just fucking with you," Cross chuckled.

Fuming impotently, Yoko whirled around to glare up at Fabre. Her mood did not improve when she saw that he too was muffling chuckles. "Mayor Fabre," she grit out. "I have evidence of the fact that the Straw Hats are no less the same scum than every other pirate alive! They are not good people because good pirates don't exist!"

Fabre's good cheer evaporated at the announcement. "Yoko…"

"And she decides to tell him this in front of the very pirates she's denouncing?" Soundbite stage whispered to his partner.

Cross could only shrug in response. "It's probably desperation. She's not thinking straight and all that, you know?"

"Fair point. YOU'VE DONE SOME STUPID THINGS YOURSELF."

"I choose to take that as a compliment."

"EVIDENCE!" Yoko furiously repeated in an effort to retrieve the attention she'd lost, jabbing her notepad at Fabre, who eyed the paper with no small amount of dread. "Evidence, right here, that every last one of these pirates is up to absolutely no good!" She flipped the pad open to the first page. "My first piece of evidence, pertaining to their Captain, is that he was—!"

"Surveying the local geography for more efficient pillaging."

"Surveying the—Wha?!" Yoko boggled at Cross in shock when he answered before she could.

"Don't worry, you're not that predictable," the pirate assured her with an impish grin.

"But you ARE kinda careless!" his snail snickered.

"Soundbite was listening in on you talking out loud while you were writing," Lassoo informed her. "Don't take offense, he does it to all of us."

"Th-This just proves my point!" Yoko jabbed a finger at the uniquely packed quartet. "They're not denying my point, they—!"

"Actually, I am denying your point, based on a supremely relevant fact that renders your suppositions null and void." Cross smirked as he folded his arms behind his head. "It's simple enough: Luffy doesn't know how to pronounce even half the words you had written down on that page, much less their meanings."

The girl swore she pulled something with how hard her eyelid twitched. "You're telling me," she grit out. "That your excuse is that your captain is too stupid to be evil!?"

"It's a good excuse!" Cross protested with almost honestly affronted indignation.

"Er… one that I can confirm," Fabre cut in, weathering the betrayed look she gave him. "Straw Hat Luffy has a good heart and a healthy appetite, but I wouldn't exactly call him… ah, well…"

"To reiterate: the excuse that Luffy's too stupid to do something is a valid excuse," Cross said.

The eye-twitching intensified. "They. Are. Pirates. You can't believe anything they say!" Yoko snapped.

"We're not here to cause trouble," Cross droned.

"YES, YOU ARE!"

"We've never killed ANYONE," Soundbite added.

"LIKE I BELIEVE THAT!"

"Your name is Yoko," Funkfreed piped up.

"NO, IT'S NOT!" Yoko roared, before grimacing and slapping a hand to her face. "Dang it."

"Yoko, you really need to try listening a little more," Fabre pleaded.

"No, you need to listen to me!" Yoko protested, rapping her finger on her pad. "He might have an excuse for that instance of his captain's actions, but I have dozens of pieces of evidence! He can't explain them all!"

"Oh, you would be surprised," Cross hummed pleasantly, his mouth never shifting from the smirk that had been there the whole conversation.

Sighing, Fabre gave his town's guest a long-suffering look. "I am so sorry," he apologized.

"Don't be, I'm having the time of my life!" Cross laughed, waving his hand in a gesture that was both dismissive and good-natured. "Trust me, I've heard worse, and once this is all over, it'll be good for a laugh."

"You won't be laughing once I'm done with you!" Yoko swore, flipping to the next page in her pad. "Second instance of nefarious wrongdoings!"

And so it went: Yoko ran down her list of dastardly deeds and nascent plans of varying levels of notoriety…

"The smelly blubber-butt faker that calls itself Boss has been denuding the island!"

"You're planning on poaching the Unusual Animals!"

"Your captain's eating all our food and that… that skeleton is using his music to control people's minds!"

And every time, Cross and his compatriots had answer after answer to reply with, all delivered with varying but invariably elevated levels of teasing snark.

"It's called a training exercise. Maybe you've heard of them? If this boggles you, know that normal people split mere bricks for training. It's just that Boss—Boss Dugong, I mean—has higher standards than most when it comes to his strength."

"Yeah, because we haven't seen way more unusual animals during our journey. Oh wait. Hwee hwee hwee!"

"TRUST ME, that's nothing new. Luffy tries to eat everything he can get his teeth on. BUT, AH, WE ARE GOOD FOR IT, just to clarify. AND AS FOR BROOK… huh, interesting trivia. He says he was helping that cook, Mitsuboshi, keep pace with Sanji. Apparently it's an old trick used by SHIP'S MUSICIANS THE WORLD OVER!"

Suffice to say that by the time Yoko had reached the bottom of her list, she had truly bypassed 'infuriated'… and was more than a little desperate, to boot.

"Mrgrggh…" Yoko grumbled furiously as she flipped to another page in her book. "T-T-Then what aboooout… ah, the sniper, the cyborg and the girl!?" The glare this time was challenging. "They're building—well, they built a mansion for Miss Luigia! They're obviously trying to wile their way into her will so that they can steal her fortune! What do you have to say to that!?"

That actually got a change of expression out of Cross. He boggled at the girl for a moment before slowly exchanging wide-eyed looks with his snail. "I… am honestly stumped," he admitted in a blank tone. "Congratulations on accomplishing that. Seriously, I… am kind of at a loss for how to respond."

"That's where we differ…" Fabre groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Yoko, up until today, Luigia lived in a shack that had a mock-up of a mansion nailed to it. You acknowledge that, yes?"

"Uh… yeah, why?" Yoko nodded in confusion, pointedly ignoring Cross's outburst of "Wait, we've met two loonies with the same delusion!?"

"Great. So tell me this!" Fabre swept his hands out in frustration. "What fortune!?"

Yoko sucked in a breath to respond as she raised a finger… then bent her finger and let out a choked gurgle as that one week the old woman had eaten nothing but miso soup forced its way into her conscious mind. "Gugh…"

"Yoko," Fabre said kindly, kneeling before the girl and grasping her shoulders in his large hands. "I understand your pain; I knew your father well, and I miss him, too. And I will admit without reservation that most pirates are the same kind of monsters that took him from us. Even the Straw Hats admit it!"

"True that; we're an exception, not the norm, and we know it," Cross piped up, and his voice was no longer playful.

"But even so!" Fabre forged on. "You cannot continue denying the truth! The truth that we have all accepted, that the world itself has accepted!" The mayor pointed at the pirate. "The Straw Hats are not just good pirates, they're good people. Yoko, please, I am begging you… enough is enough. Just in this one instance, for this one crew… please, see reason and acknowledge that these are the last people in the world that we need to be protected from! For your own sake, if nothing else!"

A tense silence fell over the small gathering, everyone's breath held in tense anticipation of the girl's answer.

Finally, with tears welling in her eyes, Yoko gave a dry sniffle and began to shake. "Dad… Dad would never forgive me if I collaborated with criminals," she whispered as tears slowly dripped down her cheeks. "It… It goes a-against everything the Marines stand for."

For a long moment, Cross just looked at her, apparently considering something, before glancing up at Fabre, expression questioning. Once the older man nodded hesitantly, he spoke.

"Yoko, you need to understand that when you heard my broadcast, you heard it out of context," Cross gently stated. "I wasn't talking about how the Marines are corrupt, I was talking about how there is corruption in the Marines. Being a Marine doesn't automatically make someone good, even if it should… just like being a pirate doesn't automatically make someone bad, even if it should. Underneath the black and white, we're still human." When he saw how Yoko was considering a response, but also that she looked thoughtful instead of hostile, he pre-empted the words. "Consider: Would your father want you to carry on with this vendetta, or would he want you to reconsider in the face of evidence?"

Okay, now the attention was hostile. "You never knew my father," she spat with surprising venom. "So don't you dare say you—!"

"No, I didn't know your father," Cross cut in. "But I do know Marines like him, Marines who would sacrifice everything for the sake of the ones they swore to protect, for the sake of the spirit of their oaths, not just the word. And I know that all of them would tell you to think, not blindly follow. That's all I want you to do: listen to what your eyes and ears are telling you, and draw your own conclusions."

Yoko's body shuddered as her gaze fell to the ground, indecision and hesitation literally wracking her body. Finally, she looked up at Cross, and he was gratified to see a glint of reason in her eyes, but he could only wince at the far more prominent haze of deep-seated pain that clouded her gaze. "Even if what you say about the Marines is true," she whispered harshly, tears gleaming in her eyes. "I will never trust a pirate."

A swift chomp on his cheek silenced an aggravated grumble, and instead Cross settled for a conciliatory waving of his hands. "Mah mah, that's fine," he chuckled tightly, barely masking the disappointment in his voice. "I'm pretty sure you'll be singing a different tune when we cast off to leave. Everyone does. But for now, you're entitled to whatever you want to think."

Yoko… didn't respond to that. Couldn't, really, and as a result an uncomfortable silence settled onto the small group.

Thankfully, Fabre was unburdened with any serious thoughts, and thus quickly clapped his hands to break the silence. "I!" he announced in an almost grandiose tone. "Have just realized that I am famished, and I'm almost completely certain that neither of you two have had much to eat all day, either. And if there is one thing that I've learned in my meager career as a politician, it's that talking about important matters on an empty stomach is an idea that's destined for disaster. What say we all go to the Mini-Baratie and treat ourselves to what little Luffy hasn't gorged himself upon, hm?"

Yoko twitched slightly at that, but wiped her eyes clear with a petulant grumble. "Food's always your answer to everything… 'ts why you're so… big."

Fabre let out a jolly chuckle as he patted the girl on the back and slowly led her towards the island's premiere restaurant. "Yes, I suppose that's true, isn't it? But if anything, I'd like to think that my girth is a testament to my success rate! And as such, I take pride in it!"

"Eh, makes sense to me," Cross commented, his arms folded behind his head as he walked alongside the two. "I mean, I've been on over a dozen islands and I've certainly seen and heard people take pride in weirder things."

"Heheh, if that ain't the damn truth!" Soundbite chortled in agreement with his partner in prime. "SERIOUSLY, THIS ONE TIME—!"

Yoko and Fabre both looked at the snail in confusion when it suddenly belted out a sharp violin-sting, which in turn drew a scowl from Cross. "Are you fucking—!?"

"USOPP, EXPLOSIVE ORDNANCE! INTERCEPT NOW!"

"Say wha—?" Yoko started to question.

"FIRE MAIN CANNON!"

KABOOM!

"—GYAH!"

Before she swapped to a shriek of shock as the air suddenly ripped itself apart in a blast of air pressure and fire a few meters away.

Yoko's hearing cleared before her vision un-blurred, just in time to hear the current bane of her existence roaring in the air.

"Hey! You just stole my shtick, you metal asshat!" Cross roared towards the newly built mansion overlooking the village, which currently had a plume of smoke rising from it.

"What the heck are you talking about, Cross?" the pirate's shipwright's voice asked in honest bewilderment.

"What am I talking about? You just stole number three on my list of things I want to say!" Cross fumed as he tapped his foot in irritation. "I had it all lined up for when we pulled out that trick! It was going to be all badass and awesome and you just stole it!"

"Are you really comparing that to a standard turret!?" Franky asked, his tone now offended.

"Of course not, but what I'm pissed about is you stealing the line! It's the principle of the matter, man, the principle! And you—"

"What's going on, Cross?"

"…We're not done with this," Cross growled at nothing before rolling with his captain's sudden presence. "A group of fakers are here to kidnap Boss the beetle. I gave their crew and first mate a chance to run, but apparently their captain is determined to carry out their mission or die trying."

Luffy frowned, tossing the bone he'd been picking his teeth with into the air and swallowing it in a single chomp. "Need any help?" he asked seriously.

Cross blinked at his captain in surprise before frowning in thought. After a moment, he nodded, slowly and hesitantly at first but picking up speed. "I… think I can take them."

"Then they're all yours."

The tactician shot his captain a thumbs up, and walked forward to put himself between the smoke cloud rising over the lower reaches of the island and the village. "Keep everyone back," Cross called over his shoulder to Fabre. "These idiots might fire full blast and the last thing anyone wants or needs is to get caught in the crossfire."

"Hey, wait, what do you think you're—!?" Yoko started to belt out—in indignance? Confusion? Not concern… right?—before she was cut off by a hand landing on her head.

"Just shut up!"

Yoko looked up in confusion, and could do nothing but blink dumbly as she stared right into Straw Hat Luffy's dumb, but somehow still proud, smile.

"Shut up and watch!" Luffy chuckled before turning his beaming expression towards his third mate. "This is gonna be so cool!"

Yoko blinked, trying and failing to reconcile what she was seeing with what she knew, knew to be fact about pirates. All she could do was default to following Luffy's gaze, which fell on Cross glaring bloody murder at the swiftly clearing cloud.

When the cloud finally cleared, the girl swore she felt her blood freeze in her veins.

Over fifty pirates, all arrayed before the village, all dressed like mariachi, all packing sizable firearms that they had at the ready and were visibly ready to use. And then there were the two at the front of the horde; she recognized the heavyweight luchador, Corto, who had now unveiled a pair of large-bore Gatling guns of all things he was dual-wielding without any apparent strain, and then there was him.

She could only assume that the tallest pirate around was the Captain of these 'Amigo Pirates', but that man… that man. The look in the tall man's lazy eyes, his coldness… for whatever reason, the man's lack of a weapon made him all the more menacing.

And now, this man, this… this monster had come to Yoko's island, set his sights on her village, set his sights on Boss—!

Yoko's breath hitched as the thought tore through her like a bolt of lightning. 'Boss! Oh, no, he's still in his chrysalis, he's still evolving! They could find him, they could take him away! T-They'll take everything… I'll lose e-everything ag—!"

"I thought I made myself damn clear to your first mate!"

Once again, Yoko was wrenched out of her spiraling thoughts by the voice of a pirate, and she returned to reality to the sight of Cross unwaveringly glaring down the horde.

"I told you all, explicitly, to pack up and hit the horizon," Cross stated, his voice packed with steel. "You mind telling me just why the hell you decided to do something so asinine as to attack the village we're blatantly protecting!?"

The tall man blinked slowly before staring down his nose at Cross. "Yes, I do mind, tu patético insecto."

Cross's whole being twitched, his jaw setting in a downright vicious smirk that was emphasized by a throbbing vein just below his right eye.

"Oh, this should be good," Fabre said with obvious relish, prompting Yoko to throw him a brief but incredulous glare.

Either ignorant or entirely dismissive of Cross's ire, the tall man turned his gaze just pass the most wanted of the Straw Hats and almost gave Yoko a heart attack when he looked at her… no, above her.

"You," he spoke in a dry tone, staring at the pirate at Yoko's side. "You are the capitan of the Straw Hat Pirates, 'Straw Hat' Luffy, sí?"

Luffy raised his hand in response, his expression blank. "Yo."

"Hmph," the other captain sniffed disdainfully, raising his admittedly impressive nose. "Let me be as clear as possible, so that even one as imbecilic as you might understand: I am Largo, captain of the Amigo Pirates. My crew and I are here to retrieve the giant beetle we know to be on this island. If you hand it over without trouble, then we will only masacrar some of the people on this island, and leave your ship in a salvageable condition. Try to resist, however…"

Largo's smirk turned vicious as his stout brother raised his arms and spun his weapons' barrels menacingly. He himself hefted his guitar and strummed a few tunes, Yoko flinching at the discordant sound that the instrument produced.

"And we shall turn this place into an isla de los muertos." Then he frowned, eyeing the guitar, and began tuning and testing it, though on the same discordant chords.

There was a tense pause as that murderous sentence hung in the air, broken only by the menacing vibrations of Largo's guitar as he tuned it. Then the person most capable of the job broke the silence.

"When I met your brother, I expected his captain to be just as stupid, if not worse," Cross growled out through a rictus smile. "But I damn well didn't expect you to be suicidal."

That actually drew a reaction from Largo, though it was merely an annoyed snort and a roll of his eyes. "Cállate, mestizo. I'm talking to your capitan. I won't lower myself to address a parásito like you."

The number of veins bulging on Cross outright tripled. "Arrogant piece of—!" he ground out through his increasingly tight scowl, but Largo ignored him in favor of Luffy.

"Oh, definitely good," Fabre stated, now outright grinning. "Kinda wish I had some popcorn."

This time, Yoko found herself nodding along. 'Yeah, if these two groups can break each other…'

The Straw Hat captain, meanwhile, silently returned the flat look before bowing his head. "This island is Boss's precious home, that he cares about more than anything. You're not going to take him from it."

The spike of terror she felt as Largo's gaze hardened squashed Yoko's conflicted flare of agreement. "So you have decided to fight us, then? A pointless sacrifice…" He then smirked slightly as he bowed his head and plucked a string on his guitar. "But then, you Straw Hats are reputed to be a band of noble fools."

"Nope." Luffy shook his head in denial.

Largo glanced up in honest surprise. "¿Perdón?"

The Straw Hat tilted his head slightly, looking at the tall mariachi in a matter-of-fact manner. "I'm not gonna fight you."

The reaction was instantaneous, everyone in the vicinity staring at Luffy in shock and confusion.

"What!?" Yoko and Fabre belted out.

"¿Qué?" Largo queried incredulously, his composure broken. "Completo idiota, did you or did you not just tell me you would not let us take the beetle? Do you think we'll just leave you alone because… what, you asked nicely?"

Luffy's response was a half-lidded deadpan. "Geez… everyone calls me an idiot, but you're the one who isn't listening to what I'm saying." The Rubber-Man pointed at himself. "I said that I'm not gonna fight you, 'cause I'm not." He then pointed forward. "Cross is."

There would have been dead silence, if not for the sour note Largo suddenly struck. "What," he spat.

"Well, duh," Luffy shrugged as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. "Cross told you guys to get lost or else and you didn't listen to him. So now Cross is gonna kick your asses."

Largo glanced at Cross, giving him a onceover before returning his flat look to Luffy "…you realize that we are going to rip him into a millón pieces, sí?"

"Nope." That flat response actually caused an outbreak of raised veins on the other captain's forehead. "'Cause Cross is stronger than all of you and he's gonna kick your asses." Luffy turned a massive grin on his third mate. "Right, Cross?"

Cross's look of cold fury faded as he returned his captain's grin and slammed his fist into his palm. "They won't know what hit 'em, captain!" He then turned back towards the Amigos and cracked his neck, his smirk taking on a near-manic tone. "You heard the man!"

At this point, Fabre, no longer looking eager, leaned in close to Luffy. "Uh, are you sure Cross can take them?" he whispered nervously. "I mean, no offense to Cross, but isn't he…?"

The look Luffy shot him should not have made the mayor feel stupid. There ought to have been a law of the universe against it. "Of course?" he said, sounding confused that it was even a question. "He's my crewmate. No way he'll lose."

Yoko glanced between the two in confusion. "What are you talking about?"

Fabre gave the girl an uncertain glance. "Well… you see, Yoko, while Cross might have the highest bounty of the Straw Hats, that's only for the verbal threat he presents. In terms of combat, he's admitted himself he's one of their weakest. Him alone against that many pirates…?" The mayor gnawed on his thumb in worry. "I… actually don't know if he'll be alright."

"Man, you guys really are idiots…" Luffy sighed with a tinge of annoyance. "I just told you, didn't I? He'll be fine. They won't beat him." He grinned with honest eagerness. "Just shut up and watch! This is gonna be awesome!"

Upon hearing those words, Yoko could do naught but clamp her mouth shut and stare at the slowly brewing fight. For all that she was outwardly quiet, however, her mind was in chaos as she tried to resolve the tripartite conflict raging in her head.

"Oh no!" wailed a Yoko, dressed in a full Marine uniform that actually fit her small frame. "He's gonna get massacred! And then there's gonna be no one between these assholes and our town! No way we can count on the rest of the Straw Hats fighting them, not with their captain like this!"

"Yessssss…" another Marine-Yoko cackled, rubbing her hands gleefully as the bloodstains on her uniform gleamed radiant crimson. "He's gonna get massacred! And he's a Straw Hat! He's going to take so many of those filthy pirates down with him!"

The last Yoko just stood there, silently gaping at the conflict still paused outside of her head. This Yoko was essentially identical to the one standing in the real world, save that she had no coat, no burden. This Yoko wasn't a Marine… just a normal girl. "He's going to be killed," she whispered. "I… I don't want him to be killed…"

"Traitors!" Justice!Yoko howled right as Marine!Yoko fired off a "MORONS!" of her own. The two immediately locked gazes, and then jumped each other, biting, scratching, and pulling at hair. The third Yoko merely continued to stare.

Out in the real world, Yoko whimpered, "I am… conflicted…"

Meanwhile, Largo proudly jutted his chin out as he looked down on his opposition. "I expected more from the infamous Straw Hat Pirates," the captain sighed lazily, sparing Cross only the barest of glances. "I come ashore expecting the fight of my life, and I find that the only one who's even going to put up a fight is some spineless smartass of a pendejo who only got his bounty for talking."

The Amigo's captain swept his arm out to indicate his men, his face never losing its condescending expression. "You do realize that we are not playing around, sí? These aren't your usual fun and games, hombre. You Straw Hats, you might play at being piratas… But we are the artículo genuino. We are actually going to kill you, in cold blood."

Cross couldn't help but scoff derisively at that. "Men both better and worse than you in every way have been trying and failing to do just that for almost a year. And with more men, too. But hey, if you insist…" With that, he tucked one arm behind his back and raised the other with his palm up, tweaking his fingers towards himself. "Come test your luck."

Largo snorted, raising his hand and snapping his fingers. "Men. Kill this gusano."

As one, the Amigo pirates roared and charged the lone man and his weapons, rattling their sabers and muskets like noisemakers. Cross, for his part, just stood there, even when the musket-wielding mariachis brought their weapons down and fired from the hip.

After all, not only was firing from the hip a decidedly inaccurate endeavor, but Cross only needed a second to draw his sword from his side, and Funkfreed only needed half a second to shift into his hybrid form and encircle his wielder, deflecting the few on-the-mark slugs.

"Pachy-Shield!" Cross called out as Funkfreed unwound and hovered at his side, grinning proudly. "Neat, no?"

"Coward!" one of the pirates shouted. "Put down your Devil Fruit weapons and face us like a man!"

For a moment, there was silence. And then… and then Funkfreed returned to his natural form and Cross smiled the smile that toppled governments. "Sure," he said, before planting Funkfreed blade-first into the ground and tossing Lassoo, who was in his gun-form, at one of the Amigos charging him. Said Amigo reflexively caught the cannon—and was promptly thrown backwards and into his comrades by the gun's weight.

That brought the pirates up short, their charge screeching to a halt as they all stared at their groaning comrades pinned under the gun-dog.

"Hey! Idiotas!" Corto barked. "The hell are you doing, he's right there!"

Their first mate's shout brought them out of their paralysis and almost got them charging Cross again, except that the blonde caused them all to freeze again by strolling up to one of the Amigos—one who outweighed him two-to-one—and grabbing him by the throat.

"See, a funny thing happened while I've been wielding Lassoo. You know, my dog-cannon?" Cross stated conversationally, even as the Amigo he was holding by the throat gurgled and scrabbled ineffectually at Cross' armored fingers. And that scrabbling only intensified as he was slowly lifted off his feet by Cross's single, apparently scrawny arm. "As you'll all recall, he's a living weapon. This is important because as it would so happen, as time has passed on our journey, he's gotten heavier. I'd say he's even heavier now than he was when he was serving Baroque Works, let alone after we lightened him."

The gun-dog in question promptly snapped into his hybrid form, teeth gnashing. "YOU ARE CALLING ME FAT!" he bellowed indignantly, all while ignoring the pirate he was still crushing with his mass.

"DO WE REALLY GOTTA DO THIS NOW?!" Soundbite snapped, as much amused as he was annoyed.

"The point being, I've been wielding two tons of gun-dog exactly like I wielded a half-ton. Or, in layman's terms… I might not have realized it until now, but over time? I've. Gotten. Stronger." Cross' grin turned positively feral at the sudden looks of fear that produced. "So, yeah. I'm not what my crew would call 'Monster Trio' material, by any means, but I'm strong enough to swing around a literal two-ton cannon like it's nothing. And that means… I'm more than strong enough to take care of you mooks." He cracked his neck side to side. "Sucks for you, don't it?"

"Will someone just kill him already!" Corto belted out in a tone that was a decibel short of a scream.

That was the cue for the Amigos to shake their paralysis and charge the Straw Hat. Considering they surrounded him on three sides, the conclusion should've been a no-brainer.

Unfortunately, they failed to consider that Lassoo and Funkfreed were their own thinking beings. Hence, nobody saw it coming when Funkfreed joined his fellow weapon in adopting his hybrid form and the pair plowed into the rear of the crowd, sending Amigos aflight and the front crowd around Cross looking over their shoulders instead of at their opponent.

The smiling man in question eagerly took advantage of that fact by throwing the poor bastard still held in his hand hard enough to bowl over a good third of the crowd he hit, the front line collapsing in an unconscious heap and the rear struggling to rise. Almost immediately after, Cross whirled around and planted his fist square in the nose of the Amigo behind him, cartilage crumpling under the metal and the pirate also flying into and bowling over his comrades. That left just one cluster of Amigos left both standing and un-distracted by rampaging Zoan weapons.

To their credit, they immediately tried to close to melee range. Key word being "tried", because Cross immediately counter-charged them. The first Amigo took an armored elbow to the noggin and dropped like he was made of wet cardboard. The next took an uppercut to the gut. The third took Cross's shin between his legs.

And so it went, until that group of Amigos was no more than a carpet of groaning carcasses. Cross took the moment of calm to catch his breath, which was coming in ragged gasps.

"DOOOOOODGE! Blade, top-down."

Spinning, Cross brought his arm up in time to catch a sword on his gauntlet, and followed it with the toe of his armored boot meeting his opponent's chin. That also gave him a good look at Funkfreed and Lassoo chasing the remaining Amigos still on his feet right at him. The ones in front had looks of hope, as if they thought that Cross would be easier to beat than the elephant and dog at their heels.

Morons.

The Straw Hat merely grinned wider and raised his fists, before pausing and looking down.

"You know what?" he mused as he crouched down and grabbed one of the unconscious Amigos by his ankle. "I'm going to try something. Something I never thought I'd get to do but that I've always wanted to." And with that, he hefted the unconscious Amigo and charged again.

Unfortunately, limp bodies, as it turned out, didn't make very good bludgeoning weapons. After the third Amigo took three hits and several steps back to put down (not to mention nearly got Cross brained three times by flailing limbs), Cross mentally shrugged and tossed a body at his opponents for the second time that day. Much like the first time, it succeeded in knocking over the front lines, at which point the people running up behind them tripped over their downed comrades and wound up piling into a spectacular traffic jam.

And that wasn't the worst of it. Cross winced in sympathy as Lassoo and Funkfreed eagerly joined in on the scrum. "Okay, now I feel a little sorry for them," he said.

He then turned to eye the Amigo's Captain and First Mate, both of whom were watching the scene with poorly disguised disgust and fear, respectively. "Though whether that's because they're all pathetic or because they have exceedingly poor leadership, that remains up for debate."

"You're going to pay for that, gringo."

Both partners glanced at the tall captain indifferently, who, judging from the deathly calm expression on his face and the way he was strangling his guitar's neck, had bypassed the "steaming rage" stage entirely.

"Is he talking about his bad leadership, or me beating up all his men?" Cross muttered.

"Does it matter?" Soundbite shot back. "LET'S JUST KICK THIS INTO high gear." His eyestalks shifted back up to Corto, and the snail ostentatiously cleared his throat. "YOU DIPSHITS CALL THAT AN INSULT!? THIS is an insult! ¡Tu padre era un chupacabra y tu madre era su merienda de medianoche!"

Lassoo promptly collapsed into a fit of giggles, crushing the last few conscious Amigos. "HWEEHWEEHWEEHWEEHWEE!"

"NOBODY SAYS THAT ABOUT MY MOTHER!" the large first mate bellowed, and before Largo could say anything to stop him, the luchador charged the tactician.

Cross immediately sobered up and blew out a sharp whistle. In response, Funkfreed and Lassoo abandoned their mauling and leapt at their partner, shifting into their weapon forms mid-flight so that Cross could catch them and brandish them against his opponent.

If Soundbite's intent in insulting Corto was to make the first mate forgo his Gatling guns in a blind rage, it worked perfectly. Instead, the man first tried to bash Cross' skull in with one of the guns, and when the Straw Hat fluidly leaned away from the blow, Corto tossed one of them aside, massive swinging cannon strikes mixed in with surprisingly fluid jabs.

This worked only somewhat better, because while Corto had power in spades, rage had badly deteriorated his form, and he was nowhere near as nimble as Cross to begin with. The Straw Hat made sure to stay in the gun's arcs rather than face the jabs, and after the first two gun swings sailed wide, Cross slipped under one of his opponent's thick arms and spun Lassoo's butt into Corto's side.

Insulating fat and a thick, padded shirt under the poncho mitigated the impact, but it was more Cross' one-handed grip on the dog-gun and a lack of proper momentum that kept Corto from outright having the wind knocked out of him. As it was, the blow 'merely' rattled his whole body. Teeth grinding, Corto wrapped his right arm around Lassoo and brought the gun in his left hand down on Cross' skull. Funkfreed promptly met it on the flat, the elephant-sword hastily flipped into a reverse grip.

Stalemate.

Well, for two seconds before Cross introduced his knee to Corto's gut. This time, the padding wasn't enough; there was too much force concentrated on a small point right above the man's diaphragm. Corto's breath whooshed out of him, and he slumped over, arms slackening. Miracle of miracles, he stayed standing. He was just getting his breath back when he felt a cannon muzzle ram into his back.

"Lemme introduce you to the latest tool in my mutt's arsenal. Cani-Blank!" he heard Cross intone. There was a click of a trigger—!

And nothing happened.

Nobody spoke. Nobody moved. The only sound was a gull flying overhead, cawing for food. Only when the gull was gone did anyone move, and Cross pulling his index finger against the trigger again only barely qualified as 'movement'.

Once again, there was a click, but nothing came out of the big gun's muzzle. Cross, his face utterly devoid of emotion, simply clicked again. And then again.

By now, Corto had his breath back, and he clenched his fists. 'I've got you now.' He tensed, and all of a sudden he spun around, shoving his now-spinning gun's barrel into his opponent's face—!

"Time out!"

And could only freeze in dumbfounded shock. Said opponent had his hands in a T-shape and an expression of total seriousness. Then, while Corto was still frozen, he turned and held out his dog-gun, and all of a sudden Usopp was at his side, with Merry hanging on his back.

In less than a second, the pair had a panel open in the cannon's side and were fussing over the mechanical innards, arguing and fiddling about in hushed tones and tossing out more than a few rude gestures, before finally the ship-girl just slammed the panel shut and gave the cannon a harsh rap. Somehow, that, of all things, served to satisfy the pair, and Usopp gave Cross a thumbs-up before zipping away again.

Cross nodded in satisfaction, then smiled at Corto in a manner most unkind. "Time-in!" he chirped, before jerking forward, jamming Lassoo's muzzle into Corto's gut and pulling the trigger.

FWOOM!

"GUH!" Corto let out a whoof of pain he was blasted off his feet, and could only groan in pain once his back slammed into the ground. He blinked blearily at the sky. "What the hell just hit me…?"

"Apparently, a cannon shell of air."

Corto choked on his tongue as the last face he wanted to see at the moment loomed over him. "A-Ah, is that—?"

"Why the hell did you give him time do whatever he wanted, idiota?" Largo questioned in a tone that was harsh and flat at the same time.

"A-Ahhh…" Corto's mind flatlined as he tried to come up with a response, and the only thing he could respond with was, "…Straw Hat bullshit?"

"…hurry up and kill this cabrón and maybe I'll let you get away with that pathetic excuse."

Hastily nodding, Corto noted that he'd landed next to his other Gatling gun. It was a mistake he would gleefully take advantage of.

"Alright, pendejo," he declared as he picked up himself and his other gun. "Now we—"

"CANI-BLAST!"

"Yow!" Corto yelped as he dove away from the pillar of flame that nearly cooked him. And not medium rare, either. Turning that tumble into a roll, he sprang up and pulled the triggers on his guns. After a brief few milliseconds to warm up, bullets flew out of ten barrels of death.

Ten barrels of death that did absolutely nothing against Funkfreed's Pachy-Shield. Nor the cannon muzzle that poked out of the snake-like folds.

But this time Corto was fighting smart, and he'd already been moving even as he'd opened fire. Flames and blast and the tremendous recoil of his weapons buffeted him, but he continued to stay one step ahead of the explosive shells that lashed out. Unfortunately for the luchador, however, he couldn't keep firing forever on account of the sudden searing against his knuckles.

The luchador snapped his barrage off with a hissed "¡Mierda!" There was only one thing to do: stop firing and let his gun's glowing barrels cool before they set off the ammo or melted. And that had been exactly what Cross was waiting for.

All of a sudden, Funkfreed's serpentine coils vanished, and Cross had drawn back his arm, the elephant-sword's tip pointed right at him.

"Pachy-Charge!" the Straw Hat declared, and Corto almost wet himself at the sight of a dozen tons of bladed elephant shooting at him at breakneck speeds.

Still, no one could say the man lacked courage. The luchador held his ground as the massive blade shot towards, and then, at the last possible second, he slid out of the way.

'Now's my chance!'

This was, indeed, Corto's chance. His only chance. The Pachy-Charge pulled back as fast as it shot out, and while Corto didn't know how long that was, he was gambling that it'd be enough to get close before his opponent could reform the Pachy-Shield. So he ran. He ran like he'd never run before. Faster even than when his grandmother had made her famous tamales for the neighborhood kids and he had to run there before she ran out. And…

He made it. Cross had just pulled Funkfreed back into sword form when Corto skidded to a halt in front of the Straw Hat, guns aimed. The luchador had to frantically bat away an explosive baseball, but one of the guns was still aimed. It would have to be enough. Corto pulled the trigger, the guns spun up—!

And then, with a loud, ominous grinding sound, came to a halt, and stayed halted no matter how many times he pulled the trigger. Which was many times. Glaring at his own gun, Corto demanded, "Are you fucking with me?!"

"Somebody is!"

Before Corto could react, hands grabbed the collar of his poncho, and then his head was pulled in for a meeting with Cross' skull. Oooor at least, a meeting with the iron plate in Cross's hat.

THWACK!

Everyone watching, even Largo, winced as the two fighters staggered back. Corto was clutching his nose, blood flowing freely between his fingers. Cross looked mildly dazed, but otherwise was in far better shape.

"I have several questions," Yoko stated flatly during this short lull. "Where's the fat bastard getting all that ammo?! And how did his gun just… jam like that?! People aren't that lucky!"

"I'm not really an expert on combat…" Fabre demurred.

"I dunno," Luffy shrugged.

"Estoy rodeado de idiotas," Largo growled, grinding his palm into his forehead before raising his voice. "Corto, if that bastardo isn't dead in the next minute, Lo juro por Dios—!"

"Quítate de encima, hijo de un—!" Corto growled under his breath, shaking his head to clear away the latent dizziness. Once that was done, he pinned Cross with a furious glare. "Alright you pequeño bastardo, let's—!"

"Hey, I know how to end this!"

He was cut off by Cross suddenly laughing in amusement, and he and everyone present watched, puzzled, as Cross suddenly tossed his weapon-partners away and took off his jacket, waving it off to his side. That puzzlement lasted as long as it took for Cross to open his mouth.

"Toro, to—! Oh, no, wait, my apologies!" Cross slapped a hand to his face with almost honest regret before resuming the motion, his grin positively shit-eating. "Allow me to be more appropriate: fatso, fatso!"

Corto straight-up saw red. "THIS IS ALL MUSCLE, YOU BASTARD!" he howled, stomping his foot for emphasis.

Cross lowered his head, letting the shadow of his cap emphasize the smirk he was wearing. "Prove it, meathead."

And that was all he could take. Pawing at the ground and snorting like the bull he wasn't supposed to be, Corto charged straight at Cross, bellowing in inarticulate rage. Cross, for his part, neatly sidestepped the charging luchador, jacket flapping as Corto passed through it.

"Olé!" Cross proclaimed, the pronouncement ratcheting Corto's fury up another notch.

Seeing as the first charge hadn't worked, the natural response was to wheel around and charge again. Equally natural was Cross sidestepping Corto again.

"Olé!" And that was another roar.

And, of course, that simply meant Corto began gearing up for a third charge.

Largo was just about to tell his absolute imbecile of a brother to take this seriously when he noticed that Cross wasn't tensing up to dodge again. Fabre and Yoko missed this, but Luffy also spotted the change, and his grin widened even more as he leaned forward.

Corto, of course, was way too far gone to notice anything of the sort. All he noticed was that that damn thing wasn't moving. Good. Now he could trample it underfoot and finally end its bleating—

Was that a snail in front of his face?

SPLAT!

The luchador stumbled in shock when the ball of slime slammed into the middle of his face, and before he could truly set about wiping it off?

"OLÉ, BIOTCH!"

And Corto's whole world became pain.

"The wheels on the bus go 'round and 'round…" he gurgled through a mouthful of bloody foam, all his brain was capable of as it tried to cope with a fair amount of his skeleton fracturing at once.

The issue was only compounded when, after retrieving Soundbite from his face, Cross planted his boot on Corto's chest with a cry of victory, shaking his clasped hands in the air in a self-congratulatory manner. "And the crowd! Goes! Wild! Raaah, raaah!"

"And that's another stunning victory for Jeremiah Cross and Soundbite of the Straw Hat Pirates!" Soundbite proclaimed in a grandiose tone. "Tell me son, anything you wanna say to your ADORING MASSES?"

"Well for starters I'd like to thank the Academy, as well as offer them my most sincere apologies. I did not mean to ram that antique car into the side of the building, I was aiming for the Dairy Queen next door! Furthermore—!"

Thnk.

"Ghgrk…" Cross trailed off into a gurgle, his eye twitching frantically. "S-Son… of a…"

"CROSS!" Soundbite yelped.

Luffy perked his head up in concern. "Cross, are you alright?"

"Uh… aheh… that's, uh… that's up for debate…" Cross grimaced weakly as he stumbled back from Corto, actively working to keep his feet under himself. "How, uh… how bad does this look to you guys?"

And with that he turned around. Perfect way to show off the dagger lodged in his back.

"Ooooh, yeah, that'll hurt," Luffy winced sympathetically.

"Son of a—!" Fabre gasped.

And Yoko… Yoko shocked herself when she jerked forwards and screamed out a panicked "CROSS!"

"What, not 'pirate bastard!'?" Cross chuckled. "Hear that, Soundbite? We're making progress!"

"You realize that you're a special kind of TWISTED, right!?" Soundbite frantically demanded.

"Hmph."

Soundbite winced at the sound of a derisive snort before turning his eyestalks to glare bloody murder over his friend's shoulder. "AND THEN THERE'S YOU, WHO REDEFINES THE FUCKING WORD!"

"Cállate, bichos," Largo stated indifferently, another dagger twirling in his fingers. "In the end, your owner's loud mouth was truly the only formidable weapon he had. One knife thrown into his back and it's already over; I think I'll enjoy living like a king once I turn his head in for a bounty. But for now…" He leered viciously at the onlooking civilians. "I'll settle for taking that damn beetle."

And with that, the Amigo's captain stepped forward, intent on claiming his prize.

"Pfff… are you… kidding me…"

And froze when Cross suddenly started to chuckle. The tall man shot a glare at the world-infamous loudmouth. "You're still not done?!"

Cross ignored him in favor of continuing to laugh, chuckle escalating to full-on cackle. More, his footing had stabilized. "Pfff… PffhahaHAHAHA! Are you… kidding me?" The Straw Hat smiled malevolently at the enemy captain. "You absolute idiot. Buddy, I ate several million volts of lightning because I wouldn't stop verbally defending my personal beliefs!"

Cross then spread his arms wide. "So when I'm standing here… defending a village of innocent civilians, kind and generous people who welcomed us with open arms, from raging bastards like you and your brother, what the hell…" There was a furious scowl on Cross' face as he reached over his shoulder and grasped the handle of the dagger in his back. "MAKES YOU THINK THAT A LITTLE PIECE OF METAL IS GONNA MAKE ME EVEN FLINCH!?" And with the final word, Cross tore the dagger from his back with a somewhat impressive spray of blood and tossed it away. He then pinned Largo with a furious glare. "What else you got?"

"Cabron!" Largo cussed, scowling at Cross in open outrage.

"YOU'RE NO RAY OF SUNSHINE EITHER, JACKASS!" Soundbite snarled.

"And a liiiitle bit overenthusiastic to boot," Lassoo scoffed, rubbing one of his toes under his nose.

"Yeah, one tiny dagger?" Funkfreed chimed in. "If it were something me-sized, I'd be worried… but it wasn't, so I'm not."

"Shishishi! Kick his ass, Cross!" Luffy cheered from the sidelines.

"Forget kicking his ass!" Fabre roared, jabbing his pipe at the pirate. "Shove your boot so far up there that he's choking on the leather!"

Yoko only hesitated a bare second before Girl!Yoko slammed Marine and Justice's skulls together and joined in. "Get these pirates offa our island!" she shouted, shooting her fists in the air.

Sighing at the enthusiastic cheers, Largo stepped over to the prone form of his brother and leaned over him, his back obscuring whatever it was he was doing. To the shock of the onlookers, Corto shot up with a nasal yelp, a hand clamped over his neck.

"What the hell—?" Cross breathed in shock while Corto began cursing up a storm.

"Mierda, eso duele como un—GAH!"

Said cursing quickly devolved into a strangled yelp when he noticed his brother glaring down at him.

"That," Largo scowled. "Was patético. And I'm already going to kick your ass once we're done here. Help me kill these shits and maybe you'll be able to walk again in a week, rather than a month."

"Sí, señor…" Corto wheezed, shakily pushing himself to his feet. And in a further surprise to the onlookers, in little to no time at all he managed to steady his footing. Still, the luchador looked to be in bad shape.

Cross, meanwhile, hastily shook off his surprise in favor of re-brandishing his partners and shifting back into a combat stance, heedless of the blood dripping down his back. For a second, no one moved. And then Corto silently charged Cross, Gatling guns brandished but not firing.

"Really?" Cross sighed. "I'd cite the definition of insanity, but…" Ducking under a wild swing, Cross planted Funkfreed and used the sword as a platform to swing around and plant his foot in Corto's gut. Apparently, though, the luchador was expecting that, because he didn't get the wind knocked out of him, and instead aimed one of his guns at Cross.

"Shit!" Cross bit out. He tried to counter whatever was coming, he really did, but his earlier kicked left him half-sprawled on the ground with one hand occupied using Funkfreed to hold himself up. The best he could do was put Lassoo in between himself and some of the gun barrels.

But what came out of one of the barrels was not a bullet.

KA-BOOM!

Instead, it was some sort of explosive, flame and smoke engulfing the combatants.

"Cross!" Yoko and Fabre shouted. Luffy said nothing, but his fingers dug into the skin of his arms.

Then Corto staggered out, scorched and covered in soot, and Cross tumbled out the other way, coughing and burnt himself, but more stunned than injured. The audience breathed sighs of relief. Relief that was short-lived as Largo suddenly began ostentatiously clearing his throat. To the disgust of the onlookers, Largo then spat out a glob of saliva and mucus… that suddenly bloomed into a wide net that lofted up to envelop Cross.

"Devil Fruit!" Fabre hissed.

Cross, thankfully, saw it coming, giving him a chance to—stand up and punch the net? The confusion only intensified when the net suddenly… unraveled, for lack of a better word, into a glob of snot that landed on his coat and covered his gauntlet.

"That," Cross blandly stated as he waved the mucus off. "Is disgusting,"

"¡¿Qué diablos?!" Largo spat, his face set in a murderous scowl. "How the hell did you do that!?"

The tactician adopted a smirk as he held his fist up and flipped his middle finger at Largo, flashing his armor's off-color knuckles in the process. "We've run into Devil Fruit users on pretty much literally every island we've hit since we entered the Grand Line! Did you really think we wouldn't wise up and grab some sea prism stone!?"

"Very well," Largo growled. "Then we'll just have to make sure you can't use it! Corto!"

"On it, hermano!" Corto replied, firing another explosive shell at Cross. This was met by one of Lassoo's own explosives, resulting in another, larger blast.

The two settled into a brief exchange of artillery, one that Corto came off the worse for. Lassoo simply had a greater rate of fire with his baseballs than Corto's banged-up Gatlings, and the luchador was soon driven back lest he get blown up again.

Worse, the exchange didn't distract Cross as much as he'd hoped; while Lassoo managed his own aiming, for the most part, Cross kept Largo in his peripheral vision, and so when the captain upended a can of oil in his mouth and tossed a match in, the Straw Hat was ready. A net made of fire flashed out… and splashed harmlessly against Funkfreed's ballistic steel hide.

"Y'all realize you're just using a knock-off of the Munch-Munch Fruit, RIGHT?!" Soundbite chortled tauntingly.

"And you realize that you can't keep this up forever, así?" Largo shot back. "Sooner or later—!"

"I'll have to go on the offensive or lose stamina and slip up and die, yes, yes," Cross dismissively replied. "You want offense?" He grinned malevolently as he held both his cannon and blade at the ready, Lassoo baring his fangs and Funkfreed rearing up to his full height. "Here's some offense: Pachy-Cani Combo: Superhot Hell Riot!"

Fire and water blasted out of Lassoo's maw and Funkfreed's trunk respectively, meeting at a somewhat equidistant point between the three combatants. Upon contact, the water reacted as it usually did when sprayed on fire that hot: it immediately vaporized in a massive, spreading cloud of steam.

A cloud of steam that Cross ran headlong into.

"Come and get me!" his disembodied voice jeered. Said jeer was followed up by a barrage of explosives and a ballistic elephant-blade that withdrew as swiftly as it shot out. "Or I'll just take you down from here!"

Grinding his teeth, Largo shouted into the mist, "Find him, hermano! I don't care how, but find him!"

"Already on it!"

'Already on it', in this case, meant that Corto had run into the haze with absolute recklessness and was blindly swinging his Gatlings through the mist. Not a smart way to search, but in fairness to the man whatever Largo had done to him couldn't completely erase the concussion he'd sustained, and did absolutely nothing for the 200% strength rage coursing through his veins.

After a few exhausting minutes, Corto slumped over, panting, and felt someone tall and skinny press against his back.

"Ah, hermano, good," he panted. "Just you wait, I'll find him, and when I do—!"

"Well, in that case, congrats! You found me!"

Nearly shrieking in surprise, Corto jumped up and spun around, Gatling swinging around with him. It struck, right in Cross' palm, and when he tried to move the weapon he found he couldn't. "You little—!"

"Hold that thought," Cross's voice leered before he cleared his throat and started speaking again… in Corto's voice. "Hermano, I found him! Get him!"

Corto paled in realization, but before he could react a grid of dark lines became visible through the mist—

SNKT! "AAAAAARGH!"

And the luchador howled in agony as a net of piano-wire sliced into his body.

"What the—!?" Largo's voice called out in confusion.

"IDIOTA!" Corto roared, his pain fuelling his indignant rage to unparalleled heights. "YOU HAVE THE GALL TO CALL ME AN IMBÉCIL!? WHO'S THE RETARDAR THAT USED HIS EARS AGAINST THE FUCKING 'GOD OF NOISE', EH!?"

"But wait, there's more!"

Corto spun towards the source of the voice, intent on inflicting pain, and then he paled as he realized that all that was visible through the fog was Cross's arm and two glowing dots where his eyes would be.

"Ay caramba…" the luchador whimpered, right before Cross brought Lassoo down on his head with as much force and momentum as he could muster.

CRUNCH!

And that was all the luchador could take, collapsing back into the sweet embrace of oblivion.

"And then there was one," Cross's voice wafted out of the murk, practically looming over Largo.

Largo immediately spat out another net, this one green and studded with both sharp thorns and red flowers. Unfortunately, another combined gout of water and fire lashed out, incinerating the net and enveloping more real estate in obscuring steam. By now, Largo's confidence and anger alike had vanished, his head on a swivel as he tried to catch a glimpse of something, anything.

"Do you even realize how screwed you are?"

Largo lashed his arm out at the voice that sneered behind him, but all that accomplished was to disturb some of the steam.

"I see right through you, Captain Largo of the Amigo Pirates. Corto's not used to having to fight someone who can fight back, but you?" That voice chuckled disdainfully. "Oh, you're not used to fighting at all."

The tall captain muttered out curse after curse as he tore his gun out of its holster and fired one, two, three blind shots into the mist—

CLANG!

—before crying out in pain and shock when the gun was suddenly smacked out of his hand.

"You're not a bully, you're an armchair commander. A commissar. You sit back and relax while everyone does your bidding for you, and if ever things get out of hand, then you just stand up, flash your powers and smack down whoever's in your way, and all goes right back to normal. Well guess what, hombre?"

Desperation ruling his mind, no matter how much he tried to deny it, Largo lashed out a reckless punch. He then hissed in pain and panic when his fist was suddenly crushed in a grip of metal and he felt a significant portion of his stamina just vanish.

Cross loomed out of the swiftly fading mist, glaring viciously at the bandito. "Today," he announced. "The only one getting smacked is you. And you're not gonna get back up from it either."

Largo tried to wrench his fist free, but it was an exercise in futility. Still, he found the courage somewhere to sneer in Cross's face. "You think a rinky-dink punch from you will do anything to me? I train with Corto! I might be thin, but I've got a body of steel!"

"Good for you," Cross snarked, before grinning as he reeled his right arm back, his fingers splayed and palm on display. "But how do you think you'll handle the force of a punch from Corto…" Cross's grin became downright sadistic. "Combined with every single time I've punched my fist into my palm, full-strength, over the last few hours?"

The blood shot straight out of Largo's face.

"I gave you one chance to walk away. You should have taken it." And with that final line, Cross slammed his palm into Largo's gut. "IMPACT!"

BWONG!

In a final blast of pure force, Largo was blown clean off his feet, flying almost halfway across the field before he was lodged through a tree down to his waist.

Cross scoffed as he adjusted the brim of his cap. "Tsk tsk… say, if you ever come after us again, do me a favor." He flipped the brim up with his thumb, unveiling a cocky smirk.

"Try and give me an actual challenge."

That final line was punctuated by the tree giving out the ghost and collapsing completely, giving Largo a final thump on the head on the way down.

And with that, Cross allowed himself to relax, his body un-tensing and one hand flashing to the bleeding wound in his back. It didn't seem to be life-threatening or anything, it just hurt without the adrenaline rush; and all his movement hadn't done his torn muscles any favors either.

"YOU OKAY?"

He flashed his partner a somewhat weak smile. "Not batting at a hundred, but I don't think I'm going to keel over anytime soon."

A moment's silence, and…

"MEH," Soundbite shrugged inasmuch as he could. "I'll take it."

"Hey, what about me?" Lassoo whined. "I took that bomb point-blank! I've suffered way more than you!"

"Yeah, if you call scorch marks and burned fur suffering…" Funkfreed muttered under his breath.

Straightening somewhat, Cross chuckled and began to walk back over to his audience, the slight hitch in his walk almost unnoticeable.

Luffy met him with a proud grin, punctuated by a finger scratching under his nose. "Heheh, you got badass, Cross!"

That drew a derisive snort from Cross. "Luffy, on the last island, you managed to pancake a shadow-dragon into the dirt. Compared to you? I am not hot shit! I am just a perfectly decent Paradise Pirate!" He then grinned proudly, his thumb jabbed towards himself. "And honestly, that's badass enough for me!"

"Shishishi! Well, so long as you're happy!" Luffy laughed. He then sobered up and tilted his head thoughtfully. "Though… I did see one or two places you slipped up. Mind if I give you some tips?"

"Luffy giving tips…" Cross chuckled, shaking his head. "What is the world coming to? But hell, you're the one who's got the highest kicks-to-ass ratio of the whole crew! Hit me with your best—!"

"LOOK OUT!" Yoko suddenly shrieked, genuine panic and concern written across her face.

"MEXICAN INQUISITION!" Soundbite swiftly added.

Cross spat out a curse and spun around. "Damn it, shoulda seen this coming!"

In all fairness, Cross probably couldn't have foreseen both of the Amigo brothers charging him with weapons drawn and their eyes rolled into their heads in signs of pure berserker rage, with how banged up they were. Cross braced himself for the oncoming clash, wincing as the motion pulled against his stab wound—!

WHAM!

And then he could only stare in dumbfounded shock when Corto was suddenly blasted into Largo on account of a white-and-gold pommel slamming into the stouter man's cheek with all the force of a cannonball.

For a moment longer, Cross stared dumbly at the now completely—and more importantly, effortlessly—pummeled bodies who'd once been his opponents. He then turned an indignant eye on the source of said pommel strike.

"I had that handled!" he protested in an almost whiny tone.

Zoro blinked at the lower-ranked mate in surprise. "What, were these guys important or something? Sorry, I was just looking for some training dummies I could practice my pommel strikes on, and they looked like they were convenient. Still…" He jabbed his thumb over his shoulder. "You gonna have a problem with it if I take them on too? Repetition and all that, you know."

"Take…" Cross followed the direction Zoro was indicating, and paled when he saw the Amigo Pirates' mooks all staggering to their feet. "What… What the hell?! The captain and first mate I can buy, barely, but I know that I put them down! How the hell are they still—?!"

"Dunno, don't care," Zoro grunted indifferently. "Come on, can I take them or—?" He suddenly cut himself off and scowled skywards. "Ah, damn it. Too late."

"Say wha—ah hell…" Cross groaned, looking up himself. Those dark clouds had most definitely not been there two minutes prior.

"Hey, boys!"

The sound of fingers snapping accompanied the cheerful greeting.

KER-ZAP!

And then came a shower of lightning that struck down every last one of the Amigos.

"How're things?" Nami continued pleasantly as she walked up to her friends, as though she hadn't deep fried several dozen enemy combatants at once.

"You… sonnuva… killstealer!" Cross blurted in offense. "I had dibs on those S.O.B.s!"

"And I needed the practice!" Zoro scowled.

Nami glanced between the two before waving them off with a sheepish smile. "Ohhh man, sorry, sorry! I didn't mean to jam you up, really! I just thought I was taking out some trash is all, honest mistake… But…" She stuck her tongue out, her Eisen Tempo swirling into an aura most angelic. "You'll forgive me because I'm so cute, right?"

Cross and Zoro exchanged flat looks, before bringing their fists down on top of her skull. "Not on your life," they deadpanned.

"OW!" the navigator yowled, clutching at the growing lump on her skull and sticking her tongue out further as she glowered at the other two officers. "YOU MADE ME BITE MY TONGUE, ASSHOLES!"

"Bitch!"

"Grinch!"

"Morons!"

"Can't we all agree YOU'RE ALL JUST TERRIBLE PEOPLE?"

"SLIMEBALL!"

"And they completely ignore the bleeding wound," Fabre sighed indulgently. "That's the Straw Hats for you. I'd better go find that doctor of theirs…"

A few feet away from the bickering, Yoko could only stare on in shock. She stared at the leaders of the Amigo Pirates, who'd essentially been swatted like pests; she stared at the small army of pirates that had been deep-fried in moments; she boggled at the trio—quartet if you counted the snail—of pirates who were lobbing insults at one another all while sporting massively teasing smiles.

And finally, the girl could only fall back on her ass as her grasp on reality flatlined.

"Wh-What are you people?" the Marine girl stammered weakly.

"Shishishi! It's obvious, isn't it?"

The thump of someone sitting next to her drew Yoko's gaze, and she beheld Monkey D. Luffy shooting a wide smile at her. "We're the Straw Hat Pirates!"

"B-but… but!" Yoko sputtered incredulously, waving her hands frantically. "T-That's not… not right! Pirates, they… they aren't like that! They're not like you! They-they don't protect people, they aren't cool or awesome or… or nice! Pirates are… they're…"

Luffy's smile slowly fell into a frown, and he glanced at the tenderized brothers. "You think pirates are meant to be like them, right?"

Yoko bit her lip, but she slowly nodded in agreement.

"Well… yeah, I know what you mean," Luffy said, his arms crossed and head nodding. "I don't like it, and I always say those guys are fakers, but… I'm dumb, but not that dumb. I know that most pirates are like that. I know that to the rest of the world, we're not really traditional pirates, y'know? It's stupid, but it's the truth."

Luffy took off his hat and looked at it, smiling wistfully. "But… I made a promise, see? I promised, on this hat, that I'd become the King of the Pirates. The one who gave it to me is the greatest man I've ever known, he saved my life when I was a kid… and he was the strongest pirate I've ever met."

Yoko gaped in stunned disbelief as Luffy looked back at her with a grin on his face. "I'm never gonna break this promise. I am going to become the King of the Pirates… but I'm not going to change to do it. I'm not going to let the world change me so that I can achieve my dream. I won't let the world change my dream. So, if the world says that my dream is wrong, impossible?" He pumped his fists with a confident nod. "Then I guess I'll have to change the world to fit my dream!"

Though Yoko's jaw still hung open, it was now a case of awe rather than disbelief that was the cause. "Wh-What are you talking about?"

"The way I see it?" Luffy said as he shoved his hat down. "While I become Pirate King, I'm gonna do one traditionally pirate-y thing." He shot Yoko a massive grin that was full of pure steel. "I'm going to steal the word 'pirate'." Upon seeing Yoko's look of confusion, he elaborated. "Well… not the word… the… the idea? Concept! I'm gonna take the concept of pirates for myself, and change it! People like me, people who just want to see what the sea have to offer, we'll be the real pirates. And all those assholes just in it for the treasure and other stupid stuff like that, they'll be the fakes, playing around at things they don't understand. How does that sound?"

"…you're weird," was the only thing Yoko could finally muster.

"Duh!" Luffy laughed uproariously. "I mean, c'mon! What's the fun in being normal? You know what I'm talking about, right? I mean, you're friends with a really cool giant beetle!"

Yoko's expression wavered slightly at the reminder of the last time she'd seen Boss, but ultimately she decided to just look away and try to get her thoughts in order.

Seeing her confusion, Luffy frowned thoughtfully before nodding his head at Cross, who was now snorting and butting heads with Zoro, while Nami off to the side consumed by giggles. "If you're still having a hard time getting it… I dunno, maybe talk to Cross? He's really smart, and he's always talking about morals and stuff on the SBS. He'd know more about it than me."

Yoko looked towards them just as Zoro scoffed at Cross. "Didn't you say you were happy with how badass you were?"

"I did and I am! But that!?" Cross stabbed his finger at the carnage arrayed behind them. "Shit like that makes me feel inferior! And also, this is when you guys show up!?" Growling wordlessly, he swung his arms out. "I was going up alone against several dozen bastards here!"

"Eh, it wasn't that big a deal, you had it handled," Zoro waved him off.

Cross's eye twitched as he spun around and gestured at the bleeding wound in his back. "I got shanked!"

"Like I said, no big deal," the swordsman rolled his eyes.

"Didn't you even boast that it wasn't that big a deal?" Nami asked with a thoughtful frown.

"It is the principle of the matter!"

"…Since when do you have principles?"

"Now see here—!"

"AHEM!"

"GRK!" Cross froze mid finger-jab, his face paling dramatically as he slowly turned to see that Fabre had just returned with a glaring Chopper in tow. "Aheh… hiya Chopper… how's tricks?"

The human-reindeer cocked his eyebrow in an unimpressed manner. "What's this I hear about you getting, oh, what's the word you used… shanked?"

"Ah…" Cross waved his hands defensively as cold sweat coated his brow. "I-It was nothing, really! So very shallow, barely even a scratch, I swea—!"

Chopper jabbed his hoof downward, his glare unwavering. "On your knees, shirt and jacket off. Now."

"Yessir," Cross yelped, swiftly following the orders.

Chopper gave the stab wound a single look before redoubling his glare at his patient. "Cross, you're savvy, you know stereotypes and tropes and such, right?"

"…right?"

"So you know how absolutely boneheaded it is to remove a penetrating object from a stab wound, right?"

Cross swallowed heavily, positively refusing to meet Chopper's accusing gaze. "Twisting the knife would cause more damage and I was moving around too much to be sure it wouldn't?"

"Nice story," Chopper crossed his hooves firmly. "What's the truth?"

The streams of cold sweat intensified further. "…Half intimidation factor, half adrenaline is both a steroid and an anesthetic."

Chopper snorted as he laid down his bag and started getting out his tools. "Well, if that's the case, then I'm sure you'll be able to go without my anesthetics for a bit."

"Wait, say wha—GAH YOU FURRY LITTLE BASTARD!" Cross howled as Chopper started to sew him up without warning or painkillers.

"Oh, suck it up, you took a dagger to the back, this is a sliver of metal, plus I need to ration out how much anesthesia I use with how fast you guys are burning through my supplies," Chopper said, rolling his eyes as he continued to work. "Meanwhile, let's focus on more important matters! You know, like how it's absolutely incredible that that thing didn't hit anything more important? Like your aorta. Or spine. Or a kidney. Or your lungs. Or liver. Or—!"

"Alright, I get it, there's a lot of important shit in my torso and I should stop blocking things with it, get off my—BACK!" Cross yelped at a particularly harsh tug.

"Unless you're going to get more armor, you probably should," Nami admitted.

"Psh, wishful thinking," Cross grumbled. "I might have just realized I'm stronger than I thought I was, but no way in hell am I strong enough to lug around a full suit of the stuff."

"Awww, that's too bad," Nami teased. "After all, isn't wearing a suit of armor a—?"

"MAN'S ROMANCE!"

"GO, BOSS, GO!"

"GAH!" Nami reeled in shock when Boss and his merry band of nitwits suddenly put on their usual show. "Where the hell did you all come from!?"

"I was summoned!" Boss shot a thumbs-up at her (somehow), a sparkling smile decorating his mug. For a moment, an illusion of a bowl cut and black, bushy, caterpillar-like eyebrows superimposed themselves over Boss' face.

And then, thankfully, it was gone.

There was a haunted expression on Cross's face as he clamped a hand over his eyes. "This ocean is going to kill me before we hit the damn Red Line again…"

"Like how this crew's shenanigans and blatant disregard for their own health is rapidly killing my childish sense of wonder and amazement?" Chopper asked flatly as he finished tying a knot in Cross's stitching. "Because I am far too intimate with you people's innards for comfort. Done, by the way. And I swear, if I check this again later and find it split—!"

"Hey, don't insult me! I am not Zoro!" Cross glared over his shoulder in offense.

"Bite me," said green-hair snorted.

Cross responded by holding out a leering Soundbite. "Don't tempt me. I will use this."

Soundbite opened his mouth—

"Arghghgggrgh…"

And then shut it just as swift with a blink of confusion. "UHHH… that wasn't me?"

"No, it was him," Zoro said, jabbing a thumb towards Corto. Following his gaze, Chopper's eyes widened; the luchador was shuddering on the ground, gurgling on the blood and foam that was shoving its way out of his throat.

"What did you do to him!?" the reindeer demanded, rushing over to the large pirate's side and starting to look him over.

"I did jack shit!" Cross growled. "Damn it, I knew them getting up was suspicious. I think they all dosed themselves with something to keep fighting, but Corto's ODing because his brother of the year gave him an extra dose earlier so that he could walk off a Gastro-Blast!"

"Damn damn damn damn…" the doctor cursed, intently looking the pirate over. "Fever, low blood pressure… Cross, did you see where he was injected?"

"Uh… he grabbed his neck when he first got up."

Chopper gently tilted Corto's head back and forth, and his eyes widened in shock when he beheld a visibly growing discoloration on his neck. "What on… this rash looks like toxic shock syndrome, only it's on steroids! What the hell did he take?!"

"Going by how they all managed to get up after Cross kicked their asses? Something stupidly effective that doesn't like to be double-dosed?" Nami hesitantly offered.

Chopper's eyes darted about in frantic thought. "Shit shit shit shit, and I can't give him an antibiotic if I don't know what that was…" Suddenly, he clicked his hooves. "Ah! I can still see the infection spreading, meaning it hasn't had time to circulate yet! Still dangerous though…" Chopper eyed Corto for a moment before shrugging. "Meh, he can survive losing a pint or two."

"A pint or two of wha—HURK!" Yoko's question promptly died in her throat as Chopper suddenly withdrew an empty and very large syringe from his pack and jammed it in Corto's neck. Slowly, he pulled the plunger out, along with a considerable amount of the luchador's blood.

"Alright…" Chopper nodded with a relieved smile as he observed that not only had the luchador's seizure abated, but his rash had stopped spreading. "That seems to have done it, now let's see just…. What… the hell…" Chopper's jaw slowly dropped in shock and horror as he held the syringe up to eye-level and watched as the blood held within visibly shifted its coloration.

"Ah, holy hell…" Cross brought his fist to his mouth with a sickly moan. "That just can not be right."

Chopper stared for a moment longer before scowling in utter fury. He then marched up to one of the less fried Amigo mooks, grabbed their collar and wrenched them up to stare into his infuriated eyes. "Who gave you this drug!?" he snarled. "You bastards aren't smart enough to have made it on your own! Who gave it to you?! Who gave you this—this poison!?"

The Amigo pirate gurgled in terror, visibly struggling to stay conscious. "I-It… b-but that's not… i-it was… h-he told us—!"

"A NAME!"

Shivering like mad, the pirate stammered out a single word. "I-I-In… di… go…" And with that, the pirate's eyes rolled up into his head and he collapsed entirely.

"Useless!" Chopper swore. Dropping the pirate, the doctor went still for a solid minute. When he turned back to Cross, the cyan anger was still there, just… buried. "Please tell me you know this 'Indigo'."

"If this is the shit he's peddling?" Cross scowled down at Corto's ravaged body. "I wish I did, if only so I could let you dissect his most assuredly twisted ass." He shook his head. "The only guy I know of who could come up with something like this has a totally different name, didn't use aliases from what I saw, is on the wrong side of the Red Line, and is more into weapons than boosters anyway. Sorry."

"Tsk…" The human-Zoan ground his hoof into his temple before heaving a deep sigh and glancing at the onlooking mayor. "I need help hauling these morons back to their vessel, where I can make sure none of them are going to get melted from the inside out before we send them on their way. Could you spare a few of your townsfolk or…?"

"Oh, no, that's perfectly fine!" Fabre nodded hastily. "I think we have a few carts we can use, too! We'll fetch them right away for you."

"I'll come with you," Chopper nodded morosely, following the mayor back into the town.

The rest of the Straw Hats could only watch as their doctor walked off in silence, his shoulders slumped and speaking of considerable stress. Once he was out of sight, though, the captain of their ship's guard heaved a massive sigh and clapped his flippers together. "Well!" he announced in a lamenting tone. "Not that this hasn't been fun, but I've worn my flippers raw splitting trees all day, and I wanna put that practice to practical use. Either someone gives me a good fight, or—!"

"CAREFUL WHAT YOU wish for, blubber-brain," Soundbite snickered.

The dugong glanced at the mollusk in confusion—

"GWOOOOOGH!"

And then grinned in absolute elation as an insectoid war cry warbled out, and a massive shadow shot over the meadow. Before the onlookers' eyes, Boss Kabuto, even larger than he'd been when the Straw Hats had first laid eyes on him, landed on a nearby hill, roaring and snorting as he pawed at the ground and swung his beady eyes around in search of a good brawl.

"HE CAME THIS WAY BECAUSE he smelled a load of strangers AND HE WANTS TO TEST OUT HIS NEW UPGRADES…"

Boss Kabuto's gaze latched onto the downed Amigo Pirates, and as soon as he processed that there was no fun to be had, he slumped with a disappointed warble.

"AND that SHOULD REQUIRE NO TRANSLATION."

"Boss!" Yoko cried, running forward and embracing her friend's horn. "You're looking great! But you shed so early, are you alright?"

The beetle grunted reassuringly, though his demeanor was tense. It didn't take Yoko long to realize, and she looked down. "I'm sorry about earlier, Boss. I was… I was being stupid."

Boss slowly blinked, and then began rubbing her gently with a couple of feelers. Before long, Yoko was laughing uncontrollably. "HAHAHAHA! S-S-Stop it, Boss, that t-tickles! A-And!" She shoved the feeler away with a tearful smile. "I-I still have to say something important…"

The feelers pulled back, and Boss followed, his expression one of confusion. "I… I'm sorry for being prejudiced," she apologized sincerely, soothingly rubbing his carapace. "The Straw Hats… they were right, I was wrong. About… a lot of things. The most important thing being that not all pirates are bad." She glanced over her shoulder and gave the Straw Hats a sad smile. "Especially not these ones."

"Don't worry about it," Nami cut in, waving off her concerns with a kind smile. "Many of our crew members used to feel the same way, myself included."

Yoko nodded in acknowledgement. "Yeah, I was wrong about you guys…" Then, sloooowly, she allowed a wide grin to spread over her face. "But there was one thing I wasn't wrong about!"

And with that, she spun back around and used Boss-K's horn to make him look her in her eager eyes. "My best badass bug-friend in the whole wide world can still kick the asses of your rubber brained idiot and your smelly blubberbutt, at the same time and with every single last handicap you can think of, all without breaking a sweat! Isn't that right, Boss!?"

Boss Kabuto only hesitated long enough to give his best friend a look of shock before rearing up on his hind-legs and roaring his defiance to the high heavens.

"THAT'S A FIGHTING ROAR RIGHT THERE!" Boss Dugong cackled euphorically, unwinding his rope-dart and spinning it into a blur.

"GO, BOSS, GO!" The TDWS cheered as one from a safe distance.

"FINALLY!" Luffy whooped, shooting to his feet and windmilling his arm just as fast as his aquatic Boss. "I'M STUFFED, I'M PISSED AND I'M READY TO BRAWL! LET'S DO IT!"

"Back the hell up!" Zoro called out, leading the charge away from the prepping fighters. "These three aren't going to stop until this whole field's a crater!"

"And it's going to be glorious!" Nami cheered, beri signs flashing in her eyes even as she used her Eisen Cloud to cart away the fallen Amigo Pirates in a… less than gentle manner. "All three fighters are local celebrities, and this is the prize fight of the decade! I'M GOING TO CLEAN UP WHAT PROFIT THIS TOWN HAS TO OFFER! FIVE PERCENT OF THE HAUL TO WHOEVER HELPS ME WITH THE BETTING!"

"AYE, MA'AM!" the TDWS barked, hot on Nami's heels as she charged into town.

Yoko was no exception to the general evacuation, and she only paused as she ran to glance up at Cross. "You think… that we're… far enough yet?"

The tactician opened his mouth, before almost choking on his tongue as an earth-shattering impact, an ear-shattering roar, and a skin-blistering blast of blazing air washed over them. "Signs point to nope!" He glanced over his shoulder with a cocked eyebrow. "And just for the record, your badass beetle breathes fire?! I am officially jealous."

"Hey, what's going on?! Are you idiots stressing your—?! IS THAT THE GIANT BEETLE YOU GUYS TALKED ABOUT EARLIER!? AND IS IT BREATHING FIRE!? SO COOOOOOL!"

"Oh, that's nice!" Cross sighed with an honestly relieved smile as a euphoric squeal sounded out. "Chopper's been so serious lately, it's a relief to know he's still got some kid in him, you know?"

"Heh, if you say so! And you didn't see Boss's fire before? Yeah, he's awe—wait, what?" Yoko glanced at the fight, and then did a double take as she saw what her friend was doing, a massive grin splitting her face. "Whoa, that's new! It was just fireballs before, not an actual flamethrower! Boss is even more awesome now!" Said grin slipped as she started to lag behind. "Or… not if I wind up getting roasted by it…"

"Can't have that, can we? Alley-oop!"

"Say wha—WAGH!" Yoko yelped as she suddenly found herself getting scooped onto the pirate's back. "Watch it, you stinking pirate bast—ah…"

Cross, meanwhile, just barked out a laugh. "Make me, you stuck-up Marine brat!"

Yoko blinked in surprise before snickering right back. "Swashbuckling ne'er-do-well! Ah, but, before you reply," she hastily cut him off with a sheepish grin. "While an insult back-and-forth would be fun, your captain said something about you, uh, being smart and knowing a lot about how the world works and stuff?"

Cross immediately perked up, adopting a truly devilish grin. "Ooooh, a chance to corrupt the mind of the youthful, ignorant and innocent?"

"'TIS AS GOOD AS OUR BIRTHDAY! WOOHOOHOO!" Soundbite chortled in agreement.

Yoko swallowed heavily as her face drained of blood. "I suddenly regret absolutely everything ever."

"Too late!" Lassoo and Funkfreed laughed from where they were bringing up the rear.

Cross started to nod, before suddenly casting a glare over his shoulder at Funkfreed. "And we're not riding you why exactly?!"

"…yoooou never asked?"

"If you make me, so help me, ivory farm—!"

"Up and at 'em!"

"WHOA!" Yoko could only gape in shock as she suddenly found the pirate she'd been foisted on himself foisted onto the back of his elephant sword. She blinked slowly before gracing Cross with a goofy grin. "…I take it back: you guys aren't weird. You're fun!"

"All that and more, little lady!" Cross swept his hat off in a mock-bow before giving her a toothy smirk. "Now… where would you like me to start?"

And so, with a brawl for the ages as the backdrop, another soldier in the war against immorality and injustice was slowly and surely forged.

-o-

A world away, a large and imperious man puffed on a cigar, his eyes scanning over the dominion he had claimed for himself. The dominion that would be the vehicle of his conquest… and his vengeance.

At the sound of farting rubber behind him, said man cocked an eyebrow but didn't look away from his view. "Something you need to tell me, Doctor?" the Imperious Man rumbled.

"Piro piro piro," a high-pitched voice chuckled behind him. "Oh, nothing too critical, I assure you. I just thought I'd inform you that I've just gotten a report: the Amigo Pirates have been soundly defeated."

"…the who?"

"Piro piro, I'm not surprised you don't remember them." The Laughing Man grinned as he crossed his arms behind his head, his shoes flatulating quite loudly as he shifted his weight from side to side. "They were the crew that applied to be our 51st Division. You set them the condition of retrieving an old prototype of the Kaen Kabuto line that managed to escape a few years back. Long obsolete by now, but it would have been nice to dissect it, see how time affected its evolution. But, ah well."

The Imperious Man was silent for a few seconds before scratching his head and grunting. "Ah, right, I remember 'dem now. Eh, no big loss, they were just intended to be cannon fodder anyway. Still, so long as we have an opening…" The Imperious Man reached a hand into his jacket and held a sheet of paper over his shoulder. "Send an invitation to them. They've quieted down recently, but they did raise some impressive hell in a short amount of time. They'll fill in our ranks quite nicely."

"Piro piro~! As you order, Captain!" the Laughing Man sang as he snatched up the paper.

The Imperious Man glanced back at the laugher. "What's got you in such a good mood?"

"Two things, sir!" The Laughing Man donned a massive grin as he held up a gloved finger. "First, even though they were total failures, the plant I had in the Amigo's crew has sent me back some excellent data on a project I've been working on!"

"Which would be?"

"Behold!" The Laughing Man proffered his hand, displaying a pair of vials that contained a viscous, reddish-orange solution. "Booster IQ, or BIQ for short. Basically IQ Serum for the common footsoldier. Heals wounds, replenishes stamina, the whole nine yards. In essence, a supersoldier elixir!"

"Hmmm…" The Imperious Man took a long drag from his cigar before side-eyeing the Laughing Man. "And I take it the reason you had yet to tell me about it is that it's still incomplete? And you used these… Amiibo Pirates or whatever as lab rats?"

"PIRO PIRO PIRO PIRO PIRO!" the Laughing Man cackled, eagerly tossing the vials in the air and juggling them about. "The morons never suspected a thing! Bought my spiel about it being 'a sign of our allegiance and trust' hook line and sinker and didn't even ask for change! Ahh, but for all that they were weak idiots, at least they gave us some valuable data!" The Laughing Man's grin then became downright savage as he clutched the vials. "In more ways than one."

The Imperious Man snorted out a cloud of smoke. "How could a bunch of weaklings who couldn't even capture a single obsolete beetle be good as anything other than warm bodies?"

"Why," the Laughing Man sneered as he replaced the vials in his pockets. "Precisely because it wasn't the beetle that defeated them."

"Oh? Then what did?"

"Who, sir, not what. And in this case'…" The Laughing Man withdrew a sheet of paper from his lab coat and held it out to the Imperious Man, displaying the picture printed upon it to him.

The picture of a widely smiling kid.

"The 'who'," the Laughing Man chuckled grimly. "Was none other than the Straw Hat Pirates."

The air around the Imperious Man suddenly tensed as he stared at the bounty held before him, and it was with slow and deliberate movement that he grasped said paper and for himself. "Is 'zat so?" he asked in the rumble that was his version of quiet.

"I'm completely certain," the Laughing Man nodded politely. "In fact, it was the Voice of Anarchy himself who personally dealt with the lot of them. Hard to mistake that voice when it's throwing out taunts, you know."

The Imperious Man tuned out the Laughing Man's words, instead focusing all his attention on the bounty. On a single aspect of the picture.

An aspect that had been burned into his mind on that fateful day twenty-two years past.

"That… damn… smile," the Imperious Man snarled, the paper crumpling in his grip.

"Pi~ro pi~ro," the Laughing Man sang, swinging back and forth on his flatulent heels. "I take it this means we're taking a detour after we reintroduce ourselves to the good soldiers of Marineford?"

The Imperious Man exhaled a malevolent rumble of smoke, his mouth set in a deep scowl. "You've got that damn right, Doctor."

"PIRO PIRO! Wonderful!" the Laughing Man sang gleefully as he clapped his hands together. "I'll go and prepare that which I can for the festivities! If we don't sink them outright, then they'll make wonderful whetstones for my creations! See you later~!" And with that, the Laughing Man turned to swagger off.

"Hold it."

Before suddenly freezing in place, cold sweat coating his body as existential terror filled his body.

"Relax, relax, you're not in trouble," the Imperious Man waved his hand dismissively, causing the Laughing Man to relax. "I'm just curious is all. You haven't been miming your responses lately, Doctor. Why is that?"

And just like that the Laughing Man tensed up again, but for a completely different reason, as his tense smile revealed. "Forgive me, sir, if I've been a bit serious lately. But I've quite simply had no other choice but to double down and focus on my work. After all…" The Laughing Man's hands snapped into trembling fists, his teeth starting to grind against one another. "At the cusp of the unveiling of my twenty-year masterpiece, I'm at risk of getting shown up by a little pirate brat who hasn't been on the sea for more than a year, and who hasn't even reached the age of majority! Why do you think I came up with BIQ, hm!? I need to prove that that little furry rat doesn't have shit on me! I—ah…piro piro piro…"

The Laughing Man trailed off into a grim chuckle, a hand hiding his murderous grin. "My apologies, sir, I lost my composure for a moment. But. Rest assured, my mind is still as on-task as ever. And if you do indeed miss my dancing, well. Rest assured, you will see it once more in this lifetime. I shall dance anew. Oh yes, I shall dance…"

The Laughing Man spun around, his face the mask of insanity that spewed forth maddened laughter, a pair of viridian flames dancing in the palms of his hands. "I SHALL DANCE IN THE PHOSPHOROUS-CHARRED ASHES OF THE ACCURSED EAST BLUE! PIRO PIRO PIRO PIRO!"

The Imperious Man adopted an evil smile of his own as he watched the mad doctor. "That's an excellent answer, Doctor…"

The Imperious Man then turned to face his dominion and spread his arms wide with a raucous roar. "A MOST EXCELLENT ANSWER INDEED! JIHAHAHA! JIIIIHAHAHAHAAAAA!"

-o-

"…and as we left, his last word to us was congratulating us for beating him at his own game. Last I heard, the base got rid of any lingering budget problems thanks to relocating a nearby training grounds to inside the base. They certainly had the room for it, from what I saw."

Cross sat up from his reclined position against one of the barrels set up to be loaded onto the Sunny, a soft smile on his face. "But anyways, yeah. Decent Marines are those kinds of people, and anyone who puts their life on the line like that has my respect."

Yoko nodded slowly, her expression carefully neutral; the differentiation between good and decent Marines was even more eye-opening for her than the way Cross had fought off the Amigo Pirates, and the countless examples he had cited of the nicer sorts of pirates like Whitebeard and Shanks, and the wicked Marines like Nezumi and Onigumo…

Her image of her father remained as untarnished as it had always been. Improved, even, seeing how he'd managed to stay moral and uncorrupt in a world like this, but the fact remained: beyond him, her black and white view of the world had been forced into color.

"Wow…" she breathed softly, her mind awhirl as she contemplated the new information she'd been granted. She then glanced up at Cross as a thought struck her. "But, wait… I-I'm just a kid. A kid who spent the whole day trying to get you and your friends kicked off this island! Why… Why tell me all this? Why… spare me a second thought?"

Cross blinked at her in surprise before quirking up a smile, standing and adjusting his cap. "That, little lady," he chuckled. "Is a question whose answer is entirely up to you."

Yoko frowned thoughtfully, but before she could ask anything further Cross had already walked off, intent on doing one last round through his crewmates before they set off.

His first stop was the most prominent feature to be found on the beach: a titan-sized beetle that the crew's human-reindeer doctor was keeping drugged into drowsiness. Once he was close, Cross looked over the makeshift barrel-turned-IV that Chopper and Donny were making use of. "Lemme guess… you never thought you'd wind up in a situation like this, am I right?"

Chopper sighed, shaking his head with a wry smile. "Well, while I never could have foreseen having to use my new Cherry Blossom Slumber on my captain, a kung-fu fighting dugong, and a giant beetle because they were at risk of splitting the island or each other's heads in half, I'm not complaining. At least Project Panacea's gotten a lot more data out of the deal!" He then graced Cross with an honest smile. "Plus, in between the heart-pounding, life-threatening situations, it's been really fun too!"

"PLUS THE TERRIFYING STUFF IS FUN TOO!" Soundbite laughed, though he just as swiftly waved his eyestalk dismissively. "Yeah yeah, I know, different opinions. By the way, on the bash brothers, didn't you give them a chance to CALL IT OFF?"

"Whether you were listening to me when it happened or not, you should know that they wouldn't, and didn't," Chopper responded with a roll of his eyes, tugging the mega-sized needle he was using out of a chink in Boss-K's armor and giving his carapace a final pat farewell. "Anyways, I estimate this one won't have his dose wear off until we're past the horizon, even though his immune system is insane, and I have our own crazies chained up in my office and drugged to the gills. So we should be good to go."

Boss-K warbled morosely as he shifted in place, trying and failing to get his dizzied legs under himself. "Gwowowooooooooot fair, I just wanted a… good…" Boss trailed off, blinking in surprise on account of how he'd actually started talking, in a deep voice. "What the—!?"

"Finally!" Cross shot a look at his partner out the corner of his eye. "Nice choice for Andre, but still, took you long enough, didn't it?"

"LICK MY SLIMY ASS, it took me hours to get a start on just WHAT HE WAS SAYING!" Soundbite tsked sharply.

"I'm with the wild-tongued wonder," Chopper concurred.

"SASSY! YOU'RE LEARNING!"

The reindeer-human flashed a sign at Soundbite with his hoof before continuing. "Boss's dialect, whatever it is, is as foreign to me as it is to him. For once, I can only understand one of an animal's voices."

"Well, I for one am perfectly happy with the results!" Boss Kabuto rumbled happily, rubbing a leg beneath his horn. "I'm still a bit sore that I can't finish one of the best fights of my life, but this is a close second!"

"Hmm…" Chopper frowned inquisitively as he looked the titan-sized beetle over. "Yeah, speaking about that, you were going at it pretty rough. Boss and Luffy are no pushovers, and you look good, but are you sure you're alright?"

"Oh, yeah, I'm perfectly fine," Boss said dismissively, tapping a leg to the underside of his thorax. "I've gone through way worse in the past. They're tough, sure, but a couple of lightweights like them aren't going to cause me any kind of permanent damage. When I was younger, I'd have been food. But now, after all this time…" Boss bobbed his head side to side. "Way I am now… probably take a hit from an Alpha or something to really ding my shell."

Chopper's frown deepened. "And… you know that how exactly? And what's an 'Alpha' for that matter?"

Boss froze in place, staring at nothing. "U-Uhhhh…"

"UNASKED QUESTION, BIG BOY: WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU FROM?" Soundbite unabashedly queried. "SERIOUSLY, YOU'RE GRAND LINE-NATIVE, that much is clear, but you're completely out of synch with this island's ecosystem! Everything else has East Blue as a BASELINE, BUT YOU'RE WAY ABOVE THAT LINE!"

"Final count," Cross brought up the rear, though his tone was far more cordial. "How… exactly did you come to live here?"

"I… ah… I…" Boss blinked dimly, bringing a leg to his armored brow. "I-It was so long ago, but I… I remember, I… I-I fell. I fell, to the island. From high up… farther than I could ever fly, going either way?"

Chopper and Cross exchanged surprised looks. "A… sky island, you mean?" Cross clarified. "An island made of clouds?"

Boss rumbled uncomfortably and shook his head, his gaze slowly turning skyward. "No… it was… it was normal. There was earth, there were trees, there were… there were…" The beetle's voice hitched, his mandibles clicking together.

"…other… animals?" Chopper offered warily.

Boss warbled again, this time mournfully, and it was with no small amount of alarm that the pirates watched the beetle's eyes slowly cloud over. "So many…" he whispered. "So many… always fighting… never stop, can't rest, can't stop. Stopping means dead. Weak means starving. Means dead. Have to fight… have to live…" Boss suddenly hunched over, chittering furiously as his wings fluttered and spasmed beneath his shell in obvious panic. "Have to… have to run… have to have to have to… can't stay, can't… Had to leave… had to leave madness… had to leave the… had to leave the… the…"

At that point, the beetle's newfound eloquence vanished, replaced by the feral rumblings as he sunk into what all present could tell was a PTSD flashback. It was only allowed to last for a couple of seconds before Chopper managed to replace Boss's IV and put him back under.

"I think I'll let him drain the barrel," Chopper stated sadly.

"Smart move," Cross nodded before glancing at his partner. "What was he saying at the end?"

"Same thing, over and over. COULDN'T GIVE YOU A DIRECT TRANSLATION, SO I think IT WAS A NAME. Closest I can give you…" Soundbite gave Cross an honestly morbid look. "He was saying 'Realm Ruled by Power', over and over again. AND I DON'T THINK YOU NEED ME TO TELL YOU THAT HE WAS TERRIFIED OF THE PLACE."

"Completely traumatized," Chopper shook his head sadly. "I shudder to think what could have scared someone like him so bad it's still fresh in his mind, even now."

"Easy money says we'll be finding out soon, little guy."

All three of them looked up in surprise as someone made their presence known.

"Sanji?" Chopper asked.

The cook blew out a cloud of smoke before gesturing at the other blond on the crew. "Walk and talk, Cross."

Perplexed, the tactician followed the chef away from the reindeer and beetle. His perplexion grew when the chef led him to where Zoro and Nami were relaxing and drinking as the TDWS loaded the supplies. Before Zoro could open his mouth with a customary insult, Sanji spoke.

"It's obvious that you don't know about any of what's going on here, Cross," he said sternly. "But whether you saw it or not, this world is still part of the story you read, and while I was growing up, I learned way more about comic book plotlines than I ever wanted to."

Zoro remained silent, while Cross and Soundbite both seemed bewildered. Naturally, it was Nami who leaned forwards and spoke up. "What are you saying, Sanji?"

"I'm saying that it's no coincidence that we wound up here just in time to keep this place from being blown off the map and that beetle from being spirited away to who-knows-where," Sanji huffed around his cancer-stick. "This is just a preview for us; I'd bet my best shoes that whoever this 'Indigo' is, we're going to be running into him soon. And I'd bet just as much that he and whoever he's with is no pushover if he could hire an entire pirate crew to act as mercenaries. More importantly, that beetle isn't normal even by Grand Line standards, and when you couple that with those faulty steroids that the Amigo Pirates had—"

"Indigo was behind Boss Kabuto, too," Cross finished, frowning. "And if you add that to the PTSD, Boss wasn't the only monster he created…"

"In short, Cross," Sanji finished. "If you don't have a plan, you need to make one."

The first and second mates both contemplated that for a second before turning their own gazes on the tactician.

Cross stared at Sanji, and it was several seconds before he spoke. "I'll admit that that's good reasoning, Sanji, but there are two problems with that assumption. First, Oda acquired the nickname of 'Goda' and the phrase 'Goda never forgets' for his brilliance in the form of long-term plots. Things like meeting Brook and happening to have befriended Laboon, or meeting Oimo and Kashi and happening to have befriended Dorry and Broggy, or whatever Lola's Vivre Card will do for us in Totland. Pft, hell!" Cross shrugged casually. "Easy money says that one day, the fact that you're a North Blue native'll rear its head in more ways than just familiarity with the tale of Noland."

Sanji's jaw tightened to the point that he almost sliced his cigarette in half, the back of his neck suddenly soaked in cold sweat. "Looking forward to it," he mumbled.

"But anyway, that's beside the point. The more important implication, for me, is that all of this just screams 'New World' to me. I mean, seriously…" Cross waved his hand at the slumbering beetle. "An island full of that? And a normal island in the sky at that? Apart from Upper Yard, I can only see that happening on the other side of the Line. The story didn't show much beyond a few islands, but what it did show? There's a reason this half of the reason of the Grand Line is called 'Paradise'."

Sanji frowned, clearly not satisfied.

"There's just one problem with that theory, Cross."

Everyone looked at Zoro, who had his arms folded and was staring with narrowed eyes at Cross. "Everything you know is based off of a world where you never existed, where the SBS never existed. In this world, we've been letting the entire world know about our adventures for months. We can't assume that we haven't given anyone that side of the Red Line any ideas with everything you've broadcast. Just look at Chopper."

"…fair point," Cross nodded his head in concession. "But there's also a counterpoint—!"

"And I know it!" Soundbite piped up swiftly. "LEMME SUMMARIZE WHAT YOU'RE TELLING US: Something could go down somewhere in some way at some point in time, SO WE NEED TO LOOK SHARP!" The snail adopted a flat look. "I trust you see the issue?"

Sanji and Zoro's faces reddened, and the former lit a cigarette while the latter took another swig of sake in attempts to shake off the blunt statement of the issue with their points.

"Yeah, I see the problem, too," Nami sighed, shaking her head. "We do know just how hard it is to fight a ghost-enemy."

"I could give you a few pointers if you want~!" came a sing-song ethereal voice above their heads.

Cross's response was to flash the faux-princess a specific finger. "Keep moving, phantom bitch, I'll deal with you in a moment."

"Right!" Perona yelped, shooting off into the distance.

Nami watched her go with a cocked eyebrow, then gave Cross a chastising look. "She's not that bad, you know."

"Mountain! Faceplant!"

"Alright, alright," the navigator said, her hands raised in surrender. "Just don't hurt her, okay?"

"Hurt? Oh, no, never." Cross grinned as he splayed his fingers against one another. "Majorly inconvenience, however? Pfheheheh…"

Nami shook her head, then turned her head in the direction of the Dugongs, who were just finishing up. "Alright, looks like we're just about ready to go. Soundbite, who else is out on the island besides Chopper?"

The snail took a moment to concentrate before answering. "Just Vivi, Robin, and Conis, AND THEY'RE ALL HEADING THIS WAY with their respective partners. PLUS, CHOPPER'S FINISHING UP WITH BOSS TOO."

"Perfect!" Nami got to her feet and dusted her hands off. "Let's get going, then."

"Ah, just one second," Cross said, then looked at his partner. "Connect me to Fabre and Yoko."

Soundbite didn't question it, nor did anyone else. As soon as the snail nodded, Cross spoke a few soft sentences before chopping his hand across his neck. No sooner was that done than the pirates boarded their ship.

As he passed by Robin, Cross couldn't help but notice how there was a slight… no, a visible spring to her step. "What's got you so happy?"

Robin's response was to beam in the most childish, endearing, and un-Robin-ish manner possible, which almost incited a straight up heart attack from the poor bastard and his partners. "Oh, I've just finally achieved one of my most cherished dreams. …er, well…" She tapped a finger to her chin. "Not the one you're thinking of, a cherished childhood dream. But still, very near and dear! I'd love to stay and talk, but I'm afraid I have things I must attend to, so if you'll excuse me~!" And with that, she was gone as fast as she'd come.

Cross stared after her in slack-jawed horror before slowly turning his gaze on Conis and Vivi, and at the dead look in their eyes he suddenly understood on a primal level what a thousand-yard stare was. "…dare I even consider asking?"

Su and Carue gave their partners comforting pats on their shoulders before glancing at Cross. "You really don't want to know,"

Cross nodded in understanding, but before he could say anything further a sharp whistle cut across the deck, snagging his attention.

"ALRIGHT, YOU BUMS!" Nami shouted from where she stood positioned next to Merry and the helm. "MUSCLEMEN, WEIGH ANCHOR! THE REST OF YOU, I WANT THOSE TOPSAILS AND FORESAILS DOWN TWO MINUTES AGO! WE'RE BURNING FOAM FOR SABAODY, THEN FISHMAN ISLAND!"

"AYE-AYE, MA'AM!" most of the Straw Hats crew chorused.

"And I'm still our communications officer why, exactly?" Cross muttered to himself.

"WHAT WAS THAT!?"

"YOU HEARD THE WOMAN! WEIGH ANCHOR, DROP MAST! LET'S GO GO GO!"

And so the Straw Hats leapt to action, maneuvering their vessel up and out through the island's reefs…

"HEEEEY! STRAW HATS!"

But they all paused when a voice suddenly sounded out, and some quick maneuvering allowed them to see that the whole of the island's population was arrayed on the shore, waving them farewell, but none more animatedly than Yoko, the girl seated on a still-bleary Boss's back and waving her arms like a girl possessed.

"THANKS SO MUCH FOR EVERYTHING YOU DID FOR US!" she called out. "WE'LL NEVER FORGET IT! AND… I KNOW WHAT I'M GOING TO DO WITH WHAT YOU TOLD ME! I'M GOING TO DO MY FATHER PROUD! I'M GOING TO FIGHT FOR JUSTICE! HONEST, TRUE JUSTICE! BUT…"

Yoko smiled from ear-to-ear and crossed her arms over her chest, which puffed out in pride. "I'LL STILL BE A MARINE, AND YOU'LL STILL BE PIRATES! THAT MEANS THAT IF WE CROSS PATHS, I'LL BE ARRESTING YOUR ASSES IN A HEARTBEAT, SO WATCH YOUR BACKS!"

In response, Cross plastered on a cocky smirk and signaled for Soundbite to amp him. "YOU'RE GONNA HAVE TO MOVE FAST TO DO THAT, SHORTSTACK! THERE'S A WHOLE WORLD OUT THERE THAT'S GOT AN INTEREST IN OUR HEADS!" He then turned and pointed at the horizon. "WHAT SAY WE GO MEET THEM!?"

"YEAH!"

And with that final resounding cry, the Thousand Sunny and the Straw Hat Pirates departed from the Little East Blue.

Though, it should be noted that before they truly departed, Cross ambled up to the Ghost Princess's astral form and smirked up at her. "Just for the record," he purred in a too-innocent tone. "I'm not going to torture you by holding my vengeance over your head the whole time we're together."

"Oh-thank-God!" Perona allowed the non-breath she'd been holding to whoosh out. "You're serious?!"

"Eeeyup!" And then suddenly, Cross's grin lost all of its innocence. "I'm gonna have it right here, right now."

"Oh, well, that's al—WHAT!?"

But before Perona could say anything else…

BOOM!

An explosion of discolored smoke erupted from the Sunny's crow's nest. Perona stared up at the structure in blatant horror, choked noises crawling out of her throat. "Did you just… bomb my body?!" she squeaked.

"Bribed Merry to plant it!" Cross thumbed his non-existent suspenders as he swayed back and forth on his feet. "And… technically yes? I used a specific bomb, as it was."

That was when the pieces fit together. "You. Stinkbombed. My body," Perona wheezed in horror.

"And my room is not only airtight, but I don't mind wearing a gasmask to sleep to boot!" Cross walked off, laughing all the while. "Enjoy, Ghosty!"

Perona was an inch away from draining every bit of happiness from that insufferable young man, but somehow, she retained enough mental capacity to realize that that would lead to a cycle of revenge. And getting involved with one of those with the Voices of Anarchy was not something she had any desire to do.

…And ultimately, that reasoning wasn't quite enough to keep her from sending a Negative Hollow rocketing his way.

Or at least, she tried sending a Negative Hollow at him, but she found that she… just couldn't find the will to do it. She just… couldn't draw up the sheer 'will to terrorize' she needed to do the deed.

Perona stared in horror at her hand, the implications sinking, before she slowly drifted away with a haunted look on her face. "I need to get the hell off this ship as soon as possible…" she muttered to herself.

-ONE WEEK LATER-

"Captain, land ho! Kansorn Island is coming up on the port side!" called down the watchman.

"Very good," the captain rasped, approaching the edge of the ship to observe the island. His eyes narrowed almost immediately, picking something out of the air a moment before the watchman identified it.

"Captain, incoming! Gigantic Hercules beetle heading straight for us… with a girl in a Marine uniform on its back? And... I think the beetle has our symbol painted on its flank?!" he added questioningly.

"Typical Ophiuchus: no shortage of help, no chance of normalcy," remarked one of the grunts.

"Indeed," Captain T-Bone agreed as he stood to his full height, his men clearing a large spot on the deck to allow the beetle to land.

The courtesy turned out to be unnecessary, however, as the beetle instead buzzed clean over the deck before circling around to hover in front of the deck, snorting and bucking its horn in defiance. The girl riding the mega-insect showed just as much nerve as she stood upon the beetle's back, folded her arms and fixed the Marines with a severe stare. Not quite a glare, but certainly far from inviting.

"State your business here!" the girl called out. "And I'm warning you, don't just take our markings for granted. If you're anything less than perfectly polite..."

The beetle snorted out a gout of flame from its horn, punctuating the point.

The display cowed most of the Marines, who lowered their weapons and stepped well back from the not-quite-hostile megafauna, while others drew their arms and prepared for combat.

Captain T-Bone did none of these things, and instead stepped forwards to regard the girl and her beetle with an even gaze. "Your name is Yoko, yes?" he rasped out over the buzz of the beetle's wings. "Daughter of Captain Ryudo? And your friend would be Boss Kabuto, correct?"

The pair of them gave no visible reaction, and after a moment, T-Bone continued. "My name is T-Bone. Captain 'Ship-Cutter' T-Bone. I'm here on a personal recommendation from a..." T-Bone hesitated slightly before sighing with a defeated smile. "From a friend of mine."

"And I should care why exactly?" Yoko questioned neutrally.

T-Bone allowed what little mouth he had left to quirk up into a smirk. "Because I think you know this friend of mine. One… Ophiuchus?"

It took all of three seconds for that knowledge to process, following which Yoko and Boss's jaws promptly dropped open. "Holy shit," the girl breathed.

"And that's proof enough for me that you've met the man in person," the Captain chuckled good-naturedly, a sunny demeanor shining through his gaunt visage. "Now, if you no longer suspect me…?"

"Ah!" Yoko gasped, hastily dropping to her knees and slapping Boss's shell, which in turn got the beetle dropping down onto the ship's deck. "I-I-I'm so sorry, Mister Captain T-Bone sir, t-t-that was, I-I-I was just trying to—!"

"Fahahaha, it's fine, it's fine!" the good Captain waved off the child's pleas, his smile unwavering the whole while. "I understand, I myself have recently come around to the same line of thought you hold, I can hardly fault you for exhibiting some measure of caution. But, for now!" T-Bone clapped his hands together. "We have business to attend to. I'm led to understand that your island's leader is one Mayor Fabre, yes?"

"A-Ah, yeah, that's right, but… Why do you ask?"

"Why, because I'd like to meet him of course!" the gaunt Marine laughed pleasantly. "And, more importantly, I have a proposition for him—and you, for that matter—that I believe you will find to be mutually beneficial."

-o-

In short order, the ship was docked, and Yoko and Boss had informed Fabre of the situation. The mayor promptly welcomed the Captain publicly, leaving his men to shore leave while leading him on a tour. Almost immediately, Fabre led him to Boss's burrow, where the beetle and Yoko already waited. Leaning against a tree, the portly man cautiously regarded the captain.

"I don't know what I was expecting when he told the two of us as he left that he'd be sending long-term help our way and to trust anyone who knew that name, but the fact that he told us with utmost seriousness not to repeat it to anyone we didn't trust with our lives made me expect something much more… under the table, I suppose," he stated.

"I assure you, our work requires the utmost secrecy, and simply the knowledge of our existence is dangerous," T-Bone responded gravely, shaking his head. "And in any event, that's hardly relevant to why I am here; apart from my reference point, this is strictly Marine business. When I said mutually beneficial, I was referring to the terms of this island and the Navy as… well, not a whole, but a large amount, at least."

"How so?" Yoko tilted her head questioningly. "I mean, it's a small island with not a lot of people, it doesn't have any natural resources, it's far from patrol… routes…" The girl blushed and shrank in on herself as the mayor and Marine looked at her in surprise. "I, uh… I looked up the criteria for Marine bases. I hoped I could put in a petition for the Little East Blue, but… yeah."

"Heh," T-Bone nodded with a kindly chuckle. "You are indeed as smart as Cross claimed."

Yoko's blush deepened even further.

"In any case," T-Bone continued. "It is, in fact, exactly because of your island's qualities, which Cross listed to me, that I believe the Little East Blue would be perfect for what I have in mind. A small island out of the way of patrols is indeed not a terribly convenient location for a base…" He smiled, his melted skin pulling taut across his skull. "But it is the ideal location for a way station."

That got the island's natives gaping in shock.

"You... want to turn the Little East Blue into a Marine vacation spot?" Fabre confirmed in an amazed tone.

"An idyllic island in the hell of the Grand Line, with absolutely no environmental issues and a perfectly normal populace? But of course!" T-Bone nodded. "Weary Marines will come by the battleship to relax and take in the taste of the East Blue..."

"And only an absolute moron would think to attack an island with a half-dozen battleships at a time floating in its port! A-And even then they'd be met with a wall of blue!" Yoko finished in an eager rush. "Little East Blue wouldn't ever have to worry about pirates again!"

"Precisely," T-Bone confirmed. "All we would require would be a good number of Eternal Poses we can put to use, and those can be fashioned with all due swiftness. Unless I'm ill-informed, so long as you agree, you'll see your first visitors within the month."

"You're damn right we'll agree!" Fabre cheered, before standing up and shaking T-Bone's hand. "Thank you so much, Captain, this is beyond anything we could have ever imagined!"

"Yeah!" Yoko nodded eagerly, a motion that Boss mirrored. "There'll be loads and loads of Marines here all the time and—!" Yoko's cheer suddenly died mid-word, and her previous enthusiasm slowly drained out of her. "And they'll... all be able to meet... Boss..."

Boss glanced up at his friend, warbling inquisitively.

Yoko's head drooped for a long moment, before she looked back up to the Marine captain. "We can't go through with it," she said sadly. "If we did, other Marines would see Boss, they'd see how strong he is..." The girl splayed her fingers out against the beetle's shell. "And they'd take him away, wouldn't they? To use against other pirates?"

T-Bone pressed his non-existent lips together and nodded solemnly, a sad look in his eyes. "That is the most likely scenario, yes."

Fabre stiffened at the admission, and Yoko sighed sadly. Her head drooped again, brow coming to rest against Boss' horn, which drew another concerned warble from the beetle. "Thank you for your offer, Captain," Yoko mumbled despondently. "But... if it's a choice between my dream and Boss, then... there just isn't a choice."

"...and what if I told you that I could give you both at once, no choice needed?"

Yoko snapped her head around so fast she came within a half-inch of whiplash. "R-Really!?"

Nodding, T-Bone began to pace, a finger held up in a clear sign of an impending lecture. "It is true that under normal circumstances, the Navy may express an interest in the unusual nature of your friend, and take him away to research him. However, there are times when Marine Headquarters makes allowances that subvert typical ordinances. These allowances are in respect to…" The Marine waved his hand airily. "Shall we say, eccentric officers and their oddities. Examples include being permitted to wear a helmet and cape over a standard uniform, using a non-standard issue weapon, or being able to recruit a former pirate…"

The gaunt Marine smiled at the local guardians. "Or a giant beetle." All present could only gape as T-Bone continued. "Though, of course, recruiting one such as Boss Kabuto would be exceedingly difficult without also happening to have someone who was capable of working with him. Someone who knew him well."

At this point, Yoko was practically vibrating with joy, and Boss had his best grin on his face.

Fabre, however, was chewing on his pipe, clearly deep in thought. "Captain T-Bone… I have no doubt that you can train her well, and that Boss will be more than enough to protect her in the meantime. And believe me, I know better than anyone that Yoko is more than willing to protect and serve but…" Growling in frustration, he threw his hands up. "But she's still only a child! Would your superiors honestly be able to accept this?"

T-Bone's mood visibly darkened, and his head tilted down just enough for his helmet to shadow his eyes. "There is a… specific clause in the Navy's procedural rules. This clause allows minors to enlist in the Marine Corps… provided they have seen a loved one die before their eyes." He paused, a cold silence hanging over the group. "It is known… as the 'Bloody Tragedy' clause."

A breath hissed past Yoko's teeth, some of them biting into her lip hard enough to draw blood. "…that clause," she breathed. "It's supposed to breed indoc—uh, brainwashed soldiers who'll kill without asking any questions, isn't it?"

"It was penned by the most ruthless Marine alive today, Admiral 'Akainu' Sakazuki, to forge ruthless, vengeance-thirsty killers out of war-torn orphans," T-Bone confirmed with a ferocious glower. "As such, I feel it is only fitting to apply that policy in the pursuit of bringing about a kind, honorable, decent Marine." The glower turned to Yoko, softening into a mere stern gaze in the process. "I do warn you, I will not go easy on you because of your age, or your partner. Your training will be harsh, rigorous and thorough. I was trained in the methods of a strictly traditional branch of Marine culture, and I will put you through the same gauntlet through which I once walked. Are you truly, honestly willing to follow in the footsteps of the countless others who came before you?"

For either an eternity or several seconds, Yoko kicked the idea around in her head. Finally, she looked up at Boss, looked him in the eye, and when he smiled down at her, she smiled back, and as one they smiled at the Captain.

"We're in," she said, Boss warbling in agreement.

Fabre promptly heaved out a heavy breath. Walking over to Yoko, he patted the girl on the back. "I honestly can't say that this is what your father would want," he stated. "But I can tell you that he'd be proud. As am I."

"And I," T-Bone concurred. "There will be more pomp and circumstance…" The Marine winced as a thought struck him. "And paperwork… at a later date. But at the moment?" The skeletal man held his hand out to the girl. "Allow me to be the first to welcome you to the illustrious ranks of the Marines…" His grin widened noticeably. "Seagirl Recruit Yoko."

Yoko outright squealed with joy, leaping up to hug Boss's horn as he warbled just as happily.

"I suppose I'll leave you two to become acquainted," Fabre said, turning to walk away. "I need to inform the rest of the village of the way things will be from now on anyway."

"My second-in-command is Warrant Officer Knalf, he will assist you with spreading the word," T-Bone called after him. Once the mayor was off, he turned back to Yoko and Boss, looking serious as a heart attack. That sobered up the two in a hurry. "Now that you're in my chain of command, however informally, there is another matter to attend to—"

"Puru puru puru puru!"

T-Bone's face twitched minutely, and he quickly retrieved a ringing snail from his jacket. Just as he was about to pick it up, though, he hesitated, and then looked at Yoko. "And that would actually be it. As you will be joining me as my protégé, you are entitled to certain… privileges. But I caution you, this is not for the faint of—"

"Sign me up," Yoko said firmly. "I've spent my whole life blindly chasing an ideal, and you can damn well bet I'm willing to fight to make that ideal into reality. I don't know what Cross is mixed up in, but if it's the right kind of pirates and the right kind of Marines, then I definitely want in."

T-Bone smiled wryly. "Glad to hear it, except for one detail. Mixed up in? Hardly… he's the founder."

The captain hid a smirk as the girl's jaw dropped briefly, only for her to click it shut and mutter about how that made too much sense.

The smirk fell from his face almost as soon as he picked up the receiver; his codename had barely crossed his lips before the snail adopted a dead-serious expression, and Black Cage Hina's voice sounded out in the same tone as a death knell.

"We have a situation."

A Crisis of World-Shattering Proportions

"Close to a dozen islands annihilated in less than a month, all in the East Blue, and recently islands with civilians have started getting hit as well. Whoever's doing this—and I am confident that they are a who—they're only getting started."

"I think it goes without saying that the threat being presented is all too dangerous and all too real."

An Odyssey into the Pits of Pandæmonium

"This place is insane…that's not a generalization, I'M BEING LITERAL! THIS WHOLE PLACE HAS LOST ITS MIND ON A PRIMAL LEVEL! Everything we've seen, everything we've experienced, it's all trumped by THE SHEER MADNESS OF THIS HELLHOLE!"

"Damn… whoever's doing this has to be some seriously special brand of twisted."

All orchestrated by an Old Threat intruding upon the New Age

"You actually think you can hurt me? Jihahaha! Oh, this oughta be good for a laugh. Go right ahead… give me your best shot."

"Well, at least we ain't going into this shitshow alone, right? All for one, one for all!"

With Salvation and Devastation hanging in the balance, it's All Hands on Deck

"Looks like the Straw Hats have entered the building…"

"Which means that sanity can exit stage left! Kyahahaha!"

"Hehahaha! Ain't that the fuckin' truth right there!"

"No matter what might come, we won't back down until the job is done and it's done right!"

One Rallying Cry can be heard on the Killing Ground: No Retreat, No Surrender

"…Captain. I can give you a hundred and one different plans, right here, right now, but only you can tell us what direction we're headed. Only you can tell us our destination. So… what's the play?"

"…I want to make him pay."

"Then we'll make him pay."

"Everybody watch their backs. Something tells me that we're venturing into something this world has never seen before."

In this War for the Right to Live, the only Law that reigns is Survival of the Fittest

"So. Final count, it's us two, a loud-mouthed third mate tactician with his partners and a first mate swordsman, against fifty of the strongest captains in Paradise, along with the top fighters in their crews. Close to five hundred pirates against two."

The Name of this Hell where the Only Options are to Fight or Die is…

"…bring it on."

STRONG WORLD

"In the end, no matter who rises or who falls, the facts remain the same. All this…"

"A dozen. TWO DOZEN. FIFTY, A HUNDRED, TWO HUNDRED… Sonnuvabitch, I THINK THE WHOLE DAMN ISLAND WANTS TO TRY ITS LUCK!"

"Cross, do you have a plan?"

"Well, Luffy, considering how we're surrounded on all sides, vastly outnumbered, and have no way out and no hopes of backup or rescue… yeah, I think I have one."

"What is it?"

K-CHK!

"How does 'make a stand' sound to you?"

"IT SOUNDS GREAT! BRING IT ON!"

"Is nothing but a prelude of the days to come."​

Xomniac AN: Shoutout to TPO's beloved Vikingr, her factoid about musicians keeping the pace on ships helped us give Brook something to do in this chapter! Kudos, most brilliant writer!

 

[Finagle007]

IT'S ALIVE!!

Now to actually read it.

 

[Fate/Online]

Um, question before i start reading. Largo, as in one of the protagonists from Megatokyo?

 

[CV12Hornet]

Um, question before i start reading. Largo, as in one of the protagonists from Megatokyo?

Click to shrink...

... No.

 

[Charlezany]

This was a great one, can't wait for the movie one to come out, since strong world is one of the best OP movies.

 

[Anon-Echo98]

Luffy's eyes darkened for an instant, his hand shooting up to his treasure.

Click to shrink...

I just imagined Luffy's eyes hardening with sheer hatred....scary stuff...

"Heheh, yeah, that's Usopp for you: Great at telling tales and sniping… not so much at lying convincingly,"

Click to shrink...

And yet, his lies predict the future.

...T-They should probably dismantle the mansion.

"Good thing she didn't find the other one, huh?"

Click to shrink...

...Ooh, you boys done fucked up.

"It's a really good thing she didn't find the rest!"

Click to shrink...

Wow, that lad's just a glutton for punishment, ain't he.

"He's operating at such a higher level…" she breathed, despair coloring her voice. "That I can't figure out his plan!"

Click to shrink...

Oddly enough, that is both absolutely correct, yet utterly wrong.

'¿Quieres leche con tu horchata?'!

Click to shrink...

Don qua?

he clawed his way out of the blackest pits of Impel Down itself, a feat never accomplished before, or after.

Click to shrink...

So? Luffy's going to BLAST that joint open.

"That your excuse is that your captain is too stupid to be evil!?"

Click to shrink...

...Yes, at least on purpose.

"We're not here to cause trouble,"

Click to shrink...

At least on purpose.

"We've never killed ANYONE,"

Click to shrink...

...I'd argue that point.

"The Straw Hats are not just good pirates, they're good people.

Click to shrink...

Arguably, the Straw Hats are bad pirates, in fact, some of the worst, what with the somewhat lackluster amount of money they have, considering their bounty.

¡Tu padre era un chupacabra y tu madre era su merienda de medianoche!"

Click to shrink...

...Translations please?

"The way I see it?" Luffy said as he shoved his hat down. "While I become Pirate King, I'm gonna do one traditionally pirate-y thing." He shot Yoko a massive grin that was full of pure steel. "I'm going to steal the word 'pirate'." Upon seeing Yoko's look of confusion, he elaborated. "Well… not the word… the… the idea? Concept! I'm gonna take the concept of pirates for myself, and change it! People like me, people who just want to see what the sea have to offer, we'll be the real pirates. And all those assholes just in it for the treasure and other stupid stuff like that, they'll be the fakes, playing around at things they don't understand. How does that sound?"

Click to shrink...

...And now I'm imagining a Persona 5/One Piece crossover...

"I was summoned!" Boss shot a thumbs-up at her (somehow), a sparkling smile decorating his mug. For a moment, an illusion of a bowl cut and black, bushy, caterpillar-like eyebrows superimposed themselves over Boss' face.

Click to shrink...

He's back BIIIITCHES!!!

And then, thankfully, it was gone.

Click to shrink...

NNOOOOO, GAI-SENSEI!!!

"First, even though they were total failures, the plant I had in the Amigo's crew has sent me back some excellent data on a project I've been working on!"

Click to shrink...

...Please tell me that that's not a literal plant, like, say, an off-spring of certain little "flower"

"That… damn… smile," the Imperious Man snarled, the paper crumpling in his grip.

Click to shrink...

Old man's reminiscing about Roger, ain't he?

 

[Krazyfan1]

BRILLIANT as always!
WELL worth the wait!

 

[Delerp Turtle]

Seriously gotta ask, how does cross know literally nothing about Strong World? The mini east blue arc even had its own episodes, and the movie was written by Oda, right? At the very least you should've seen trailers or something.

Edit: Those trailer lines? The "We make a stand," one made me immediately think that This Bites was suddenly a crossover with JJBA.

...You know, with all the references you guys pack in there, I wouldn't be at all surprised.

 

[Xomniac]

Seriously gotta ask, how does cross know literally nothing about Strong World? The mini east blue arc even had its own episodes, and the movie was written by Oda, right? At the very least you should've seen trailers or something.

Click to shrink...

Cross has only ever read the manga, and in case you forget, One Piece is ill-advertised in America. Cross barely paid attention to the anime and trailers of it. Most he's got is a vague recollection of Chapter 0, emphasis on vague.

 

[Valor XIV]

Hoo boy. Time to figure out who that laugh is...

EDIT-
Well, I can see a very fast way to jailbreak his powers. Let's hope he doesn't Awaken...

Oh, who am I kidding? This is going to be something amazing!

Keep up the good work, and don't keep us waiting too long!

 

[Orez Lanrete]

Well, that last bit wasn't ominous at all, noooooppppeee. Not ominous at all.

 

[Reinholdt]

"Which parent, how bad, and how long ago?" he asked sadly.

Click to shrink...

This is kind of the go-to tragic backstory for any minor (and sometimes major) characters in One Piece.
It's not hard to guess if you have any sense of Pattern Recognition. Surprisingly a lot of variety though. Mostly for the 'how bad' portion, but still.

 

[edmantgoog]

Great chapter but was confused bybthr bit at the end