Buggy stayed at the back. His knees were doing something he would not have admitted to under any circumstances.
The Marine blocked Lucien's kick to his head by simply raising one hand, caught the leg cleanly, and threw him into the wall of the nearest building with enough force to plant him into it. Lucien hit the stone and dropped. Then the Marine turned and caught Shanks' kick to the waist with his body, absorbed it, and slid half a step from the impact.
He looked down at where Shanks' foot had connected. Then back up at Shanks.
"That one stung a little," he said, with what appeared to be genuine appreciation. "Let's see how you handle the other direction."
His fist came around at Shanks' head. The man was built on a scale that made the proportions wrong, the closed fist nearly the width of Shanks' entire skull. Shanks got both arms up in time and it made no difference whatsoever. The force went through the guard like it was decorative and Shanks hit the wall beside Lucien with the same result.
The Marine looked at both of them embedded in the wall, then turned slowly toward Buggy.
"So," he said, taking one step forward. "It appears only those two are actually from the Pirate King's crew." Another step. "Or perhaps the great Roger also keeps members aboard who hide at the back during a fight. What do you say. Want to be smarter than your friends and surrender now."
Two things happened inside Buggy simultaneously. The fear, which had been considerable since the moment this man stepped through the wall, increased sharply as he watched how casually he had handled two people who were both stronger than him. But underneath the fear something else caught fire when he heard that last sentence, something that had always burned hotter than was strictly sensible in him.
The rage won.
He picked up two swords and ran.
The right sword swung at the Marine's face and was caught one-handed without the Marine appearing to move quickly to catch it. The return came as a kick to the stomach that should have ended the engagement and sent Buggy tumbling backward across the cobblestones.
But Buggy was smiling when he landed.
The Marine looked at him, trying to locate the source of his confusion, and then felt it. A small but specific pain in his back. He reached around and pulled out a knife, and attached to the knife was a hand, and the hand was attached to nothing. He looked at the boy across the street and registered for the first time that the left arm ended at the wrist with nothing beyond it.
The hand detached from the knife and floated back to its owner.
"Devil Fruit," the Marine said. He looked at the small cut on his hand from pulling the blade free and seemed to find it more amusing than concerning. "Lucky throw. Borsalino would laugh himself off his feet if he heard I bled catching a pair of apprentices and a child." He shook his head slowly.
Then he felt the strike at his back.
Not a knife this time. Two pairs of hands, simultaneous, coordinated, driving into the pressure points at the back of his knees with enough combined force to buckle his stance. He caught himself, turned, and found Lucien and Shanks both back on their feet behind him. Bloody, damaged, moving with the careful deliberateness of people who had very little left but had chosen to spend it anyway.
The Marine looked at them for a moment.
"You got back up," he said.
"Several times a day for a year and a half," Lucien said, breathing carefully around what felt like a cracked rib. "It is basically a habit at this point."
The Marine rolled his neck once and set his feet. The civility in his expression was still present, but the patience behind it had changed quality. He was done being interested. He was ready to finish it.
He came at Lucien first, which was the tactically correct decision because Lucien was the one who had just hit him from behind. The first strike came low and Lucien took it across the forearm rather than the ribs, which was better but not good, and the force drove him back three steps. He kept his feet. Shanks drove in from the side and the Marine redirected him one-handed without looking, sending him skidding across the cobblestones.
Buggy threw his detached hand at the Marine's face as a distraction, which bought approximately one second.
They were running out of road.
Lucien's vision slowly became blurry, which told him the back of his head had made harder contact with the wall than he had accounted for. He slowly tried to clench his hand but could feel his forearms screaming in pain.
He looked at Shanks across the street, who was getting back up again with the expression of someone who had decided that by any means he would not get caught and would rather die trying.
But their next attempts were completely thwarted. Lucien was thrown with enough force to destroy the wall behind him and have it bury him in the rubble. Shanks was similarly slammed to the ground, his eyes slowly rolling back.
"Finally, you little pests." The Marine reached down and grabbed Shanks by the ankle, then walked toward the rubble where Lucien was buried and stretched his arm in to pull him out.
He stopped.
The strike came from nowhere. He had raised his arms to block on instinct but was still sent tumbling into another building. Lucien, barely conscious, blinked through the blur and made out a very familiar skinny figure standing in the street, rubbing his wrist, his knuckles unusually dark in colour.
Cael looked at the building the Marine had disappeared into and said, "I do not understand why this one had to come all the way from North Blue. I thought it would have been Borsalino, but that lazy boy would have found a reason to stay in his room."
He looked down at Lucien.
"Up," he said.