"Doubling the ship's serving area?" Shakky whistled in surprise, clearly impressed. "Are you sure? That's a serious boost!"
"Nyuu, it's not like we have much of a choice!" Hachi chuckled as he scratched the back of his head with one of his hands, the others waving around in embarrassment. "The combination of good food and the SBS being readily available has been bringing in a lot of customers. I thought that the Davy Back Fight attracted a huge crowd, but Enies Lobby? The rush was insane!"
The octopus fishman then frowned and crossed his arms as he considered matters. "And of course, chances are that the Straw Hats are going to get into more big fights like that as time goes on, so if I want to be able to keep up with the demand, I need to make a big investment into the business if I want to keep it going."
He sighed as he accepted a glass from his old friend. "I'm also going to have to see about getting an extra pair of hands or two on deck as well, pun recognized; Keimi and Pappug are great, but there just aren't enough warm bodies on Takoyaki 8! We're being stretched way too thin."
"Sorry, Hachi," Rayleigh replied with an apologetic smile. "But this grove cost us an arm and a leg, and we've already got our business and our niche going strong. I'm not sure a merger would be that good an idea."
Hachi sighed. "Yeah, I know, just thought I'd ask. But in that case, who else could I—?"
The ex-pirate suddenly cut himself off, his eyes and mouth slowly widening in realization. He hesitated for a moment as a flash of doubt shot through him, but he mustered his nerve and looked back at the bartender. "Shakky, where do you keep your Transponder Snail?"
"Don don don don!"
"Over there," the bartender replied flatly, pointing at the ringing snail while Hachi slumped.
"Nyuuuu… sometimes his timing is awesome," the octopus groused as half his thumbs popped a thumbs-up, while the others jabbed downwards. "Sometimes it really sucks."
"Oh, don't worry about it, Hachi. I'm sure that after Enies Lobby, this one won't be nearly as long," Rayleigh chuckled as he stood up from his stool and ambled towards the snail.
"Nyuuu…" Hachi groaned as he massaged his face. "Well, at least there's a bright side: with any luck, the SBS will put him in a good mood so that when I call, he doesn't immediately rip me a new one…"
"That's the spirit!" the Dark King laughed as he picked up the snail's speaker.
"…Broggy, you're no better at faking an accent than I am," an unfamiliar deep voice deadpanned.
"Seconded," Cross echoed flatly.
"GO GARGLE SOME MAGMA, YOU BASTARDS!" another unfamiliar voice barked.
"Hmm?" Shakky cocked her head curiously. "A couple of guests this time?"
"With one of them being named 'Broggy'…" Rayleigh mused suspiciously.
"Bosses, please, stop bickering!" two more familiar voices pleaded.
"And there are Oimo and Kashi," Hachi noted. "But what do they mean by 'bosses'? They're not working for the Government anymore."
"Unless they mean… ohohohoooo…" Hachi and Shakky looked at Rayleigh in surprise as he began chuckling. "Why am I even remotely surprised at this point?"
"They have a point, you know. You should be somewhat careful with what you say. After all—" Cross began.
"You're both live on the SBS!"
"DON'T STEAL MY SHTICK!" Soundbite roared angrily.
"DON'T STEAL MY SHOW!" Cross followed up.
"Sorry, but I'm just not sorry! Consider it as payback. And besides, that was fun," Usopp snickered.
"Gegyagyagyagyagyagya!/Gabababababababa!" The show's guests laughed uproariously at the exchange.
"Ah, it's good to see that no matter how much things change, they always stay the same. Right, Dorry?" one of the pair asked with a nostalgic smile.
"Right you are, Broggy, right you are!" the other enthusiastically concurred.
"HA!" Rayleigh barked as he slapped the table in amusement. "I knew it! Damn, those rookies must be some of the luckiest bastards on the seas if they actually managed to find them and live to tell about it!"
"We've already established that they have the sort of luck to throw a hundred and eleven dice and have them all come up sixes," Shakky smirked fondly. "Now come on, come clean, who are they talking to?"
"Wait for it…" Hachi muttered to himself.
"Ergh… well, anyway, moving on past that little bit… yes, everyone, we of the SBS are back in action! Now, I imagine that you're all probably wondering who I have as guests with me, right?"
"There it is!" the octopus-fishman laughed.
"Yeah, yeah, laugh it up…" Shakky grumbled good-naturedly, rolling her eyes.
"Well, I believe I'll let our resident expert on the matter handle that particular introduction. Usopp, care to do the honours?"
"WHA—who, me!? A-Are you—!? Ah… You know what? Sure! Ladies and gentlemen, it's my honour as the sniper of the Straw Hat Pirates to introduce you to the biggest role models in my life aside from my father. Hailing from Elbaf, home to the very greatest among those fit to be called Brave Warriors of the Sea, I present the co-captains of the legendary Giant Warrior Pirates—!"
"Weighing in at 100 Million apiece!" Cross commented.
"'Blue Ogre' Dorry and 'Red Ogre' Broggy!"
"To clarify, I'm Dorry!" one voice spoke up.
"And I'm Broggy!" finished the other.
"AND IT'S AN HONOR TO BE HERE!" they finished as one.
The introduction had barely finished when Rayleigh fell into gales of laughter, dangerously close to tipping over in his chair. Hachi's eyes, meanwhile, were nearly popping out of his skull as he gaped at the snail. "THE GIANT WARRIOR PIRATES?! I thought they were just a myth!"
"Ohooooh no, Hachi," Rayleigh chortled. "The World Government only wishes they were a bad nightmare! They were and apparently still are as real as you and me!"
Shakky swapped her gaze between her male friends in confusion. "Um… care to clue me in here? I've heard of pretty much every crew on the Grand Line, but the only time I've heard of a crew known as the Giant Warriors was the other day, when Cross named Oimo and Kashi as members. Heck…" She scratched her chin thoughtfully. "Come to think of it, I've never heard of a Giants-only crew, period. They usually fight amongst themselves too often to maintain any kind of stability."
"Ooooh, there was one alright," Rayleigh informed her, his laughter dying down to a chuckle. "And it's no surprise that you haven't heard of them, either. After all, they haven't been operating for a while!"
"'A while' my ass!" Hachi scoffed incredulously. "Shakky, according to the legends, the Giant Warrior Pirates disbanded over a century ago! The only reason I even heard about them was Rayleigh, and I thought he was just yanking my arms!"
"Nope, real as real can be," the Dark King confirmed. "A few of my older and… well, bigger drinking buddies told me about them. Had no idea whether their captains were actually alive or dead, though, or where they were." He smirked as he nodded his head at the snail. "Guess we know the answer to the first of those questions, right?"
"Aaaanyways, ladies and gentlemen, allow me to clarify how this happened and what's happening now!"
-o-
"See," I swayed back and forth a bit on the crate I was sitting on as I considered my words, watching the workers of Galley-La as they went about their work. "We first met up with the good captains early in our pirating career on an island that will remain unnamed for obvious reasons—!"
"COUGH—MARINE BASTARDS—COUGH!" Soundbite insinuated not-so-subtly.
"And I decided that hey, seeing as I recently managed to finagle the number of the snail they recently acquired, we might as well have ourselves a nice little interview with two of the most prominent figures in pirate history!" I then jabbed my thumb over my shoulder. "Also joining us, besides our giant-enthusiast sniper, are two of the crew's heavier-hitting grunts, Oimo the Boar and Kashi the Hawk."
"Hey, ma! I'm still alive!" Oimo laughed happily.
"Brontus, if you can hear me, I haven't forgotten you owe me a load of Beris! Watch your back!" Kashi concurred with just as much enthusiasm.
I snorted lightly at the sheer banality of their reactions before nodding. "Alright, that's enough wind-up, so I'm just gonna go right ahead and jump in with a question concerning some relatively ancient history: Dorry, Broggy, it's safe to say that as the captains of one of the only Giants-only pirate crews to date, you two were quite infamous in your day, right?"
"Gabababa! You better believe it!" Broggy laughed proudly.
"Our crew was relatively small, only thirty all told, but when it's thirty giants? Giants from Elbaf, no less?" Dorry grinned. "Well, let's just say that we didn't take long to stop counting how many Marine bases we toppled."
"Though that was mostly because only half of us knew how to count!" Broggy snorted.
"That too!" Dorry laughed in agreement.
"Well, then, in that case, I just have to wonder…" I tilted my head in confusion. "How come your bounties were only ฿100 million each?"
"ONLY?!"
That turned out to be a mistake as the two captains bellowed through Soundbite, nearly bowling me over with their volume, although their tones were more incredulous than offended.
"What alien world are you living on, you dope?!" Broggy demanded.
"Yeah! Don't you know that 100 million is nothing short of a fortune!?" Dorry concurred.
"B-Bosses, hold on!" Oimo spoke up hastily. "I, ah, I don't understand all of it, lots of big words and we were stuck on Enies and all, but apparently the Government's changed its policies on bounties in the last hundred years. We talked with a lot of people while we were standing guard, and a lot of the more decorated guys said that 100 million was selling you both short."
"Plus, you were out of commission for a full century, and considering how the world's economy is primarily fueled by human interests, then the value of the Beri has probably changed over the years, too," Usopp mused.
"How the hell do you know that, LONG NOSE!?" Soundbite questioned incredulously.
"He got tutored by someone who knew what she was talking about!" I cut in with a smirk before Usopp could respond, causing him to splutter furiously.
Before he could say jack, however, a distinct whistle coming from Soundbite interrupted him.
"Ohohoh, what's this? The Brave Warrior of the Sea has a little lady friend waiting for him back home?" Broggy smirked mischievously.
"GEGYAGYAGYAGYA! No wonder he wants to become so impressive!" Dorry guffawed.
Usopp fell silent as his face matched Chopper's hat hue for hue, Soundbite providing a whistling noise from his ears in between his cackles.
"Heheheh," Kashi snickered into his fist as he tried to sober up. "A-Anyway! Getting back on topic! Boss Dorry, Boss Broggy, going by what the Marines told us in their spare time, your bounties to modern standards should be somewhere around, eh…" He waved his hand side to side. "Somewhere around 300 mil? Apiece."
Silence reigned as we processed that particular tidbit.
"Holy shit," I whistled in awe.
"NO DOI!" Soundbite concurred.
"That's three times Luffy's bounty!" Usopp exclaimed, before cutting himself off with a hesitant look. "Er… what his bounty was before we burned Enies Lobby to the ground, I mean."
"Three hundred million…" Broggy breathed in awe.
"That's the biggest bounty I've ever heard of…" Dorry concurred in the same tone.
Soundbite then fell silent as he adopted an oddly pensive expression.
"Uh…?" I hedged in confusion.
"No thinkin' about turnin' each other in, collectin' each others' bounties and breakin' out, bosses!" Kashi warned hastily. "It didn't work out the last five times!"
Usopp and I promptly faceplanted in shock.
"So much for the Warriors of Elbaf having any brains between them…" I groaned.
"My beloved world image…" Usopp sobbed miserably. "It's shattered… Tinkling away into stardust…"
"Oh, come on, that was a hundred years ago!" Broggy protested. "And it looks like the Marines have only gotten stupider while we were gone! I'm sure it could work this time!"
I glanced up with an irritated glare. "Maybe so, but even stupidity has limits when you double dipsticks just broadcast it to the whole world."
"…Blast it all," the pair muttered despondently.
"AS IF IT WOULD ACTUALLY WORK IN THE FIRST PLACE!" Usopp and I barked indignantly.
"YOU BRATTY LITTLE SON OF A—Dot dot dot dot!" Soundbite suddenly cut himself off as he started ringing with a cackle. "Dot dot dot dot! Heh, how much ya wanna bet that—Dot dot dot dot!—this is AN INSULT?"
I pulled myself together just enough to give an indifferent shrug. "Eh, maybe, maybe not. After the near-miss with that smiling lunatic, I think it's pretty clear you can never be sure who's going to call in. Still, though, could be fun!" And with that, I clicked the appropriate button. "Hello, you've reached the SBS!"
"Glad to be here," said a gruff voice. "But sorry, this is about as far away from an insult as you can get; I never thought I'd have the chance to speak to the great Dorry and Broggy."
"Oh?" Broggy asked curiously. "And who would you be?"
"My name is Hajrudin, another giant born and raised on Elbaf. I'm 79 years old, so while I'm after your time, I've grown up hearing the tales of the Giant Warrior Pirates, and I've always looked up to you two."
I managed to suppress my surprise at hearing exactly who we were talking to as the co-captains responded to his statement.
"Gabababa! Glad to hear that the next generation is getting a decent education!" Broggy bellowed proudly.
Dorry, meanwhile, was somewhat more skeptical. "Who exactly has been telling our stories? Because if any of them are from Loco Lokos, I am telling you now that I was drunk out of my mind and from behind that guy looked like a—!"
"T-There are a lot of different stories from a lot of different warriors!" Hajrudin coughed hastily. "But, ah, there's one tale that none have ever decided to share: where did you two disappear to all those years ago, and why? Oimo and Kashi went looking for you fifty years ago, but the original reason for the dissolution of the greatest crew to sail from the shores of Elbaf yet remains a mystery! Would you be so kind as to honour us with what you've been doing?"
A pause fell for a moment, to which the two Ogres let out wistful sighs.
"Well, in all honesty, it wasn't fully by choice that we disbanded the crew," Dorry said. "It was great fun and excitement sailing the seas, fending off any man or beast who would seek to fight us. And the parties! Oh, Elbaf's best grog was the perfect end to a day of battles."
"But we had no choice in the end," Broggy sighed longingly. "For you see, one day Dorry and I came to a disagreement. Neither of us was willing to back down, and we placed our pride on the line to prove ourselves right! As such… we had no choice but to engage in a duel of honour. We fought each other with as much strength and valour as we could bring to bear!"
"But unfortunately, a problem arose," Dorry shook his head solemnly. "As it turns out, Broggy and I were equally matched in strength, so our duel ended in a draw. But as you well know, that will not suffice to satisfy the might Elbaf! So we fought again… and it resulted in yet another draw. Realizing that this would not end anytime soon, we sequestered ourselves on an uninhabited island so that we might settle our duel in peace! And so, for the past century, we have remained faithful to the laws of Elbaf. 73,770 duels have we fought!"
"And 73,770 draws have they brought," Broggy concurred.
"And so it will go until we determine a victor!" the two finished in unison.
Silence reigned for a bit as everyone processed that proclamation. It was Hajrudin who finally broke it.
"You disbanded the Giant Warrior Pirates… for a duel…" the younger giant breathed slowly. "It seems that the stories I heard were not accurate."
My heart skipped at least three beats as I heard Hajrudin, future commander of the Straw Hat Grand Fleet, say those words. If I had in any way managed to screw up the dreams of a future comrade—!
Then Soundbite burst out sobbing tears of manly joy. "FOR TRULY NO MERE WORDS CAN DESCRIBE JUST HOW TRULY THE BOTH OF YOU MANAGE TO ENCAPSULATE THE MIGHT AND HONOR OF ALMIGHTY ELBA-A-AAAAF!" Hajrudin wept rapturously.
My head jerked downwards as a sweatdrop suddenly hung itself from my skull. Right, this was a future Straw Hat we were talking about here, however tangential his membership might have been. I had been worried about why, exactly?
Ugh, whatever. I could berate myself for stupidity later, right now I needed to focus on the entire reason I'd tapped these two for an interview in the first place.
"So, if I may interject?" I spoke up. "As a human with little to no knowledge of the laws of Elbaf, I was wondering: is there really no way to end the duel until one of you wins? And it's only to the death?"
"Mmm… well, there is one alternative," Broggy admitted. "It hasn't been used in centuries because of how uncommon it is for a duel to go beyond a single match, and the last instance I can think of resulted in both participants dying at the same time, but nevertheless, the laws are clear: in the event of a draw… the duel can end if both combatants are willing to concede. If Dorry and I both stood down and recognized the other's honour, that would be sufficient for Elbaf."
"But that's not an option at this stage," Dorry continued with a snort. "For over the course of the past century, we have forgotten why our duel began in the first place! For us to concede without knowing what we were willing to stake our honour on would be the epitome of disgrace. But we can be reasonably sure that it must have been something important if neither of us was willing to stand down in the early years of our duels."
I huffed in aggravation at the expected answer and shot a look of askance up at the giants physically beside me. "Oimo, Kashi? What about you two?"
"Mmm… honestly, I can't remember it either," Kashi admitted.
"We giants might live long, but even our memories have limits," Oimo shrugged helplessly. "Sorry."
I exhaled sharply, and to Usopp and Soundbite, it was no doubt obvious that I was resisting the urge to simply spill what I knew. But still, if I couldn't get them to remember matters the direct way… "Alright, alright…" I muttered to myself before speaking up in what I hoped was a convincingly chipper tone. "Ah, well, it was worth a shot! Seeing as we've hit a wall on that subject, let's move on to other topics! Now, while I can't share the name of your island, I do actually have some questions about it! Like, say…" I grinned as I slowly tilted my head to the side. "Those 'mountains' the two of you live in! They look pretty weird, if I'm being honest, and I say that by Grand Line standards! Do you have any idea what that's all about?"
"Ah, yes, our homes away from home!" Broggy chuckled proudly. "Quite impressive, aren't they? Majestic and imposing, just how we like them back on Elbaf! And they're huge even by our standards, nearly spanning the entire length of the is… land… huh. Ya know, now that I actually take a second to look at them, they actually look kinda familiar. Like… skulls, maybe?" Broggy frowned in confusion. "…Wait a second, that's ringing a bell…"
"Skulls… and that hunting contest between your crewmates sounded familiar as well…" Dorry murmured, clenching his eyes shut as he tilted his head to the side.
Silence fell, and I kept my hope hidden behind a carefully neutral expression. At least, up until Soundbite began quietly humming the damn Jeopardy! theme, and he responded to my acrid glare with a silent cackle.
Still, I suppose that music was somewhat appropriate.
"THAT'S IT!"
Because not a second later, we all jumped as the two Ogres shouted in unison.
"Of course, now I remember! Those aren't mountains at all!" Broggy bellowed victoriously. "Those are sea king skeletons! Way back in the day, we both killed a sea king in single combat, and while we were celebrating our victory at a nearby human village—!"
"—That little farm girl came up and asked us which one of them was bigger!" Dorry picked up eagerly. "We laid them side-by-side on Lit—ah, on this island, to figure it out, but neither of us could agree on whose was bigger! And since neither of us was willing to back down, we began duelling!"
"And that's how it all started!" they concluded in unison.
I sighed in relief, not bothering to conceal it, though I promptly fell over a moment later due to a sudden earthquake. Looking around, I saw that the cause was Oimo and Kashi having face-faulted… along with Usopp, Soundbite, and probably everyone else who'd just heard their little tale.
"WE WENT THROUGH FIFTY YEARS OF INDENTURED SERVITUDE BECAUSE OF A FISHING COMPETITION?!" the pair roared indignantly.
"I have to say, even I'm sort of disappointed in hearing that such a glorious duel had such a mediocre catalyst," Hajrudin muttered despondently.
"My world view… shattered… again…" Usopp wept sadly.
"SERIOUSLY, who would be willing to fight for THAT LONG OVER SOMETHING LIKE THAT?!" Soundbite barked.
"Zoro and Sanji," I deadpanned.
"…Withdrawn."
"I feel better now," Usopp said as he snapped back to his feet, looking none the worse for wear.
I took a second to snicker at the actions before refocusing on the task at hand. "Alright, so, now that you've remembered the origins of your duel, do you think that you can move on?"
"HELL NO!"
I wasn't even surprised at this point, because of course, there was no way in hell it would be that easy.
"There is no way in all the six seas that I will ever concede to the idea that Broggy managed to catch a sea king bigger than mine!" Dorry protested indignantly.
"You wish!" Broggy fumed proudly. "Mine was clearly the larger of the two; I am the obvious victor!"
"NEITHER OF US AGREES TO CONCEDE! THIS DUEL WILL CONTINUE!"
"Oi vey…" I bemoaned, pinching the bridge of my nose as I tried to work things out. Great, with the two of them so gung ho and the Sea Kings long-since rotted, there was no way in hell we'd be able to come to a conclusion in a straightforward manner, so how—?
…now there was a thought…
"Before you two start beating one another's faces in!" I spoke up hastily, cutting into the pair's argument. "Do you mind if I at least try to change the basis of your conflict a bit?"
"Eh?" The Red and Blue Ogres paused in their argument in favour of looking at me in confusion. "Whaddaya mean?"
"Well, look, you guys have been pirates on the Grand Line for a while, right?" I posited. "And that means you've no doubt fought many humans who've been able to give you a run for your money. As such, I think it's safe to say that it's not size that matters when it comes to combat, but rather the sheer strength and power that something has withi—"
"POWEEEEEEER!"
I jumped at the sudden voice bursting through Soundbite, who seemed just as shocked. "TERRY? I DIDN'T EVEN RING!"
"BEAR GLOVE IS TOO POWERFUL TO BE SLOWED DOWN BY MERE TECHNOLOGY!"
"Would you kindly silence yourself, you musclebound buffoon? We're witnessing something only slightly more momentous than my own incredibly lustrous plumage," Isaiah's baritone cut in.
"BOTH OF YOU SHUT IT!" Drake bellowed indignantly, followed by a decisive KA-LICK.
I ground my fist into my forehead. "I never thought I could feel so much annoyance towards Old Spice," I hissed. "Ugh… anyway, where was I?"
"Something about strength meaning more than size in combat," Hajrudin provided.
"Right, thanks. Anyway, do you two agree with me?"
"But of course!" Dorry snorted in an almost insulted manner. "We have fought many opponents over the years, larger than us and smaller alike, and all too often have we felled larger beings with ease while almost dying at the hands of mere humans!"
"It is not size that matters, but the strength held within an entity's frame, no matter how big or how small!" Broggy asserted firmly.
I grinned victoriously as I recognized that I had them where I wanted them. 'Jackpot.' "Well, then, in that case," I spread my arms calmly. "I'd say that it's pretty damn obvious that your duel's been a draw right from the onset!"
"…come again?" the two asked, confused.
My grin widened bit by bit as I felt my blood pressure ramp up from my ever-approaching victory. "Honestly, you two, think about it. Soundbite, what did they say the count was?"
"Seventy-three thousand seven hundred and seventy," he responded in Dorry and Broggy's voices.
"Exactly. That many duels, day after day, for the last 100 years, and in all of that time, neither of you gained any headway? If there's one thing obvious from a track record like that, it's this: you're perfect equals in strength, and always have been. As such!" I snapped my finger up. "We can equally assume that those two Sea Kings you defeated were also perfectly equal in strength, with neither being any stronger than the other!"
Dead silence fell as my words sank in. Oimo and Kashi's jaws slowly dropped as the penny hit, and small squeaks were escaping from Usopp as he twitched in place. From Soundbite's movements, it seemed as though Dorry and Broggy were slowly turning their heads to stare at one another. The silence stretched on for almost a minute.
Then, I turned my attention to my fellow crewmates. "Usopp… and you too, Hajrudin. Would you care to do the honours?"
Credit where it was due, the pair was quick to get their collective acts together.
"I-I, Hajrudin Hammerfist, a-as an impartial witness and a proud warrior of Elbaf—!"
"A-A-And, I Usopp, a-a-as sni… as king of snipers, crewmate of the Straw Hat Pirates and a Brave Warrior of the Seas—!"
"We declare that in light of new information, the honour duel between Red Ogre Broggy and Blue Ogre Dorry…"
There was a moment as they sucked in deep breaths, and then… they said it.
"WE HEREBY DECLARE THEIR DUEL!" they roared as one. "TO BE NULL AND VOID! IT'S A DRAAAAAAAAAW!"
Of course, the second those words escaped their mouths, several other people began roaring as well. More specifically?
"GEGYAGYAGYAGYAGYAGYAGYAGYA/GABABABABABABABABABABABA!"
The subjects of the duel in question. Soundbite was nearly tearing his own jaw out with how hard he was laughing, but furthermore, he was also sobbing his little heart out.
"W-W-We're free, Dorry!" Broggy hiccupped gratefully. "Y-Y-You hear that!? W-WE'RE FREE-EE-EEE!"
"W-We don't have to kill each other!" Dorry wept through his smile. "W-We can go back to the sea! Back to our adventures! WE CAN GO BACK TOGETHER!"
"B-B-Bosses…" Oimo blubbered euphorically. "D-Does this mean—?"
"A-Are you sayin'," Kashi wheezed out. "What we think you're sayin'!?"
"Say it!" I goaded. "Say it here and say it now, loud and proud for all the world to hear!"
-o-
"GLADLY!" the Red and Blue Ogres chorused. "HEAR US, PEOPLE OF THE WORLD! AS OF THIS MOMENT, AFTER NEARLY ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF ABSENCE, OUR MIGHTY CREW, RENOWNED THE WORLD OVER, THE GIANT WARRIOR PIRATES…"
"Ohh, dear," Kizaru muttered as he fingered his neck brace with the hand on his cast-free arm. "And I thought they couldn't possibly follow up with another massive attack so soon after Enies Lobby." He turned his wheelchair to the side, angling his cast-encased leg in such a manner that he could glance out the window of his office. "I wonder how much impact this will have…"
"HAS OFFICIALLY BEEN REFORMED! RAAAAAAAGH!"
"RAAAAAAAAAAGH!"
Kizaru felt a line of sweat break out on his brow as the Ogres' battle cry was echoed from several places across the seat of Marine power. "Guess that answers that, huh? Tsk, damn demon and his damn big mouth, he's nothing but trouble. It would really be a good idea if I just warped over to the island and killed him before he even saw me coming."
He shrugged, shifting his limbs about in their casts as he sighed, leaning back in his wheelchair and letting his eyes drift shut. "Too bad I had to injure myself this badly. Ah, well. At least Sengoku can't be mad at me for this."
"BOOORSAAALIIINOOO!"
The light-man cracked his eyes open with an unnerved expression. "Then again, I have been battin' pretty badly so far…"
-o-
"HAJRUDIN!" the co-captains barked suddenly.
"S-SIRS!" the 'young' giant responded.
"As it stands, even with our old crewmates returning to our flag, chances are that we will be left somewhat shorthanded," Broggy summarized solemnly before donning a massive (you know what I mean) grin. "As such, we are currently recruiting. Interested?"
Hajrudin's jaw practically cracked the ground in shock. "A-Are you serious?" he whispered in awe.
"We'll take that as a yes!" Broggy guffawed. "Spread the word to all of Elbaf's new generation, whoever hasn't already heard us by now: as of now, we're accepting new blood with open arms!"
"Ah-I-I… I… I WOULD BE HONORED, MY CAPTAINS!"
"Gababababa! Excellent! Now, Oimo, Kashi—!"
"Ah, actually!" Dorry interjected hastily. "Would you mind if we took a break? We need to plan this out properly, and bullheaded as we might be, allowing the whole world a peek at our playbooks probably wouldn't work out as well for us as it does for you."
"My faith is restored," Usopp breathed in euphoria.
"Heh, sure thing, you guys," I waved my hand casually. "Ladies and gentlemen, time for an intermission, and I think we know the best way to fill that space, don't we?"
"Yay! Time for SOUNDBITES music cor—KCH! HEY, WHAT THE DEU—KCCCCH! OH, NOT THIS AGAIN—K-K-KCCCCHHHHHHHAPAPAPAPAAAAA! DID YOU MISS ME, WORLD?"
I hid a snicker behind my fist. "Good timing," I muttered sotto voce.
"What can I say, an entertainer's got instincts!" Apoo whispered back. "Anyway, I'll call in to talk with you later. For now, though… APAPAPAPAAAA!" My 'rival' roared at full blast. "YES, WORLD, IT'S ME, APOO, THE ROAR OF THE SEAS, HERE TO DO AS I PLEASE!"
"GET OFF my frequency, you long-armed WANNABE! I WANT MY MUSIC CORNER!" Soundbite half-roared, half-whined.
"Apapa! I have a better idea! WHY DON'T YOU TAKE A HIKE?!"
"NONONO—KCCCCCHHHHH!"
"There we go!" Apoo laughed victoriously. "Alright, now that that pest has been dealt with, we can finally begin! The show you've all been waiting for, Apoo's Music Hour!"
"Well! Now that that's dealt with," I said, smirking and clapping my hands as Apoo began playing his song. "You were saying, Broggy?"
"Uh… right…" The Red Ogre hesitated momentarily before shaking his head and getting back on track. "As I was saying! Oimo, Kashi, for starters… at a guess, the Valhalla—?"
"The best mead hall in all of Elbaf!" Kashi boasted proudly.
"But, uh…" Oimo waved his hand before his face with a wince. "Not seaworthy anymore. Sorry."
"Bah, we suspected it after the first few decades," Broggy sighed fondly. "At least the old warrior is resting in peace with happy warriors in his belly. That's all we can ask."
"But if that's the case…" Dorry muttered thoughtfully. "You two are still in Water 7, correct?"
"Aye, sirs!" the pair saluted.
"And their quality hasn't dropped over the years?"
"If anything, sirs, it's gotten better!" Hajrudin cut in swiftly. "Even in the New World, Water 7 is acknowledged as the capital of shipwrights! None surpasses it!"
"Perfect!" Broggy barked joyously. "Stay put there, then, and Hajrudin, bring our new recruits there as well, and spread the word to the old guard while you're at it! The Giant Warrior Pirates will reunite on Water 7, our first task being to commission a new vessel for a new era!"
"What's a pirate without a ship?" Dorry agreed. And then his face fell. "Though, uh, we might be a bit late. It'll take some time for us to build a raft big enough to hold both of us, and the only Log we have is the Eternal one to Elbaf, so…"
"Don't even worry about it!" I reassured them. "I'll call in a favour from one of my friends and get them to swing around and pick you up! There should be no prob—OW!" I yelped as Soundbite chomped on my unarmored fingers. I glared at him for a moment, but his own glare got his point across. "Ah… right, almost forgot. See, these friends of mine might seem disconcerting at first glance, but I swear to you, if they say Ophiuchus sent them, you've got nothing to worry about."
"You… You'd really be willing to do that for us?" Broggy asked incredulously.
"Of course!" Usopp spoke up before I could. "We're allies and we're fellow Warriors of the Sea, why wouldn't we be willing?"
"What he said," I concurred with a smile. "Anyway, I'll take care of everything once we're done, but for now… You guys up for continuing the interview?
"But of course!"/ "No question!"
A glance at Soundbite prompted him to let out a quiet series of clicks, and Apoo subsequently began winding down his track.
"Apapapapa! That should do for now, time to get back to the spoils of the Marine ships! Nothing tastes better than someone else's food!"
"—DAAAAH! Huff… huff… WELL, HE'S GONE! I'm back. NOW, we return to the regularly scheduled—"
"—interview with Dorry and Broggy."
"I'M BEING GYPPED!" Soundbite snarled.
"'Cut' might be more appropriate, seeing as for all that I'm your partner, I'm also your boss," I snickered.
"I resent that!"
"Not talking to you, literal-leatherneck!" I called out, not even bothering to turn to look at the inadvertently-named Dugong as he passed by, re-donning my smiling and clasping my hands together. "So! Where were we?"
-o-
The rest of the interview was certainly interesting, especially from a historical perspective, but overall it proved pretty uneventful, and I ended the SBS soon after it concluded. From there, Oimo and Kashi had resumed helping Galley-La rebuild the city, as well as passing on a request for them to start drawing up blueprints for a ship worthy of giants. Iceburg had had an odd gleam in his eye as he heard that request. I put it off as a unique challenge.
Usopp had left after that to actually make use of his ฿2 million in spending money, while Soundbite and I had decided to simply return to our living quarters, where I learned both good news and… well, not bad, but unexpected.
Good news, Merry had feeling back in her legs and was up and out of her bed, even if she was on crutches.
The unexpected news, however…
-o-
"Nononoooooomph!" Merry grunted, lying prone for a moment before opening her eyes and glaring at the floorboards. "This is embarrassing…" she ground out irritably. "I'm a child, not a baby. Why am I having so much trouble walking?"
"Because," I huffed as I slid my hands beneath her shoulders and lifted her back onto her feet. "Just like Conis, you've only ever had sea legs your entire life. Even without the crutches, you'd still be tripping from trying to overbalance and from trying to learn how to walk at all. I know it sucks, but…" I clapped her shoulders reassuringly before taking a kneeling position before her. "All we can do is press on, right?"
Merry grumbled melancholically beneath her breath before heaving a weary sigh. "Yeah, I know, I know. No pain, no gain…" She was silent for a second before cracking a slight smile. "At least I know you'll always be there to catch me, right?"
"Unless it's funny," I corrected with a smirk.
"THEN WE JUST STAND BACK and laugh!" Soundbite cackled.
Merry twitched slightly at that, a scowl flashing across her face before she suddenly let loose with the waterworks. "Coooooniiiiis," she whined in a distinctly childish tone. "Cross and Soundbite are picking on me!"
I blinked in confusion. "Eh—?"
"Sorry, Cross."
"Wait, wha—!?"
THUMP!
"YEOW!" I yelped, clutching the goose egg I was suddenly sporting.
"But to be fair, you are making a little girl cry," Conis sniffed as she hefted the bazooka she'd been polishing.
"Merry used Fake Tears!" Soundbite chortled. "It's only halfway effective!"
"Wanna bet?"
"Say wha—AAAAAGH!"
"Tseeheeheehee!" Su cackled as she lay on her back and spun Soundbite in her paws. "Punishing you guys is fun!"
"PUT ME DOWN! YOU WOULDN'T LIKE ME when I'm REVENGENING!"
"Seriously, you wouldn't," I smirked at Su. "You weren't here at the time, but Merry knows just how deep Soundbite's ire goes. As an example… Jaya?"
"AAAGH!" the erstwhile ship howled in agony as she grabbed her ears. "Damn it, Cross, I'm already suffering from physical trauma, don't pack mental scarring on there as well!"
"Don't mentally scar kids, Cross," Boss noted absentmindedly as he carefully detailed the scroll of seaweed he was inscribing.
"I beg to differ!" Donny barked indignantly as he rubbed his skull. "I say that mental scars will match perfectly with the remnants of my concussion!"
"My fractured ribcage agrees with—YEOW!" Mikey yelped as a metal hook bounced off his skull.
"Less talking, more working on your flexibility," Boss ordered without looking up. "Either you manage to pull off the Nori Arts by tonight, or I'll limber up your skeletons myself."
"But Booooss!" the orange-bandanna'd fighter whined pitifully. "This is totally impossible! You pulled off bending that way because you're a total monster, but we're normal! We can't just—!"
"Woohoo, this is fun!"
"—abuhwah?" Mikey said intelligently as he snapped his gaze over to Raphey in shock.
The dugong in question was flowing like a strand of seaweed caught in a current around Mikey. "Heck, it's more than fun! It's easy!"
"But how!?"
"Eh, I guess that girls are just more flexible than boys." Raphey shot a violent grin at Boss. "Hey, mind if I help Mikey loosen up?"
"Yeah, sure, whatever makes you happy," the older dugong replied dismissively.
"Wait, wha—!?" CRACK! "YEARGH!"
"Thaaat's right!" Raphey cackled as she bent Mikey over her shoulders, eliciting more than a few pops and snaps from his joints. "Just loosen up! Let aaaall the tension flow right out of you!"
"THE TENSION IS RIPPING ME IN HALF!"
"Sounds like a 'you' problem. Maybe if I pull harder?"
"AAARGH!"
Donny's eye twitched fearfully as he watched his comrades go at it. "I don't know what scares me more, that this is normal for them or the idea that I might be next."
"Personally?" Leo mumbled out through the mummy's worth of bandages he was wrapped in. "I'm more concerned about ever being able to move at all."
"Don't think you're excluded just because of your injuries, Leo," Boss commented. "I want your Shell Body up to specs once you get out of there."
"Yes, sir…"
"Attaboy."
I rolled my eyes at the dugongs' interactions before turning my attention to Boss. "Say, not to tell you how to teach your students, Boss, but could I suggest having them change their focus?"
"Why?" the older Dugong asked, finally glancing up from his scroll.
"It's just, well," I shrugged helplessly. "Between the Full Shell Style, your hook and your all-around strength, you have all ranges from long to short covered, whereas they—"
"—are confined to short, damn it!" Boss cursed furiously as he shot to his tail and hastily stuffed his scroll in his shell. "Alright, boys, change of plans! Raphey, drop Mikey and grab Leo! We're going out now, and we're not coming back until we've got your bases damn covered!"
"HA!" Mikey barked joyously as he slipped out of Raphey's grasp. "Now I have the upper hand!" He snatched his pistols out of his holsters and spun them by their triggers. "I've already got long-range covered, so I can just kick back and—WAGH!"
"Practice on your all-around proficiency with those things until you're about as good as Conis or Usopp?" Boss finished as he hauled Mikey along by his tail. "Couldn't agree more! NOW GET A MOVE ON!" And with that—
"YEARGH!"
—he flung his student out the window, Paulie had already broken earlier, and followed after him, with Donny and a Leo-carrying Raphey right behind him.
I blinked slowly as I tried to process what the hell had just happened before turning back to Merry. "So, you still ready to go?"
Merry shifted uncomfortably on her bed before plastering an uneasy grin on her face. "Does… anyone else have anything they can do to delay things a bit longer?"
Silence.
She sighed wearily as she prepared herself. "Yeah, didn't think so." She swung her legs off her bed, positioned the crutches on the floor, and slowly put her weight on her legs. She grimaced with visible pain and effort, but she stood. Then, slowly, she put one foot in front of the other, moving her crutches appropriately as she did so.
"Two," she muttered as she took another step. "Three. Four. Fivvvve… siiiaaaah!"
I caught her as she pitched forward, smiling proudly as I patted her back. The part that wasn't a mess of scar tissue, to be specific. "That was great, Merry!"
"That was six. Lousy. Steps…" she muttered acridly into my shoulder.
"And when you try again, you'll manage seven, then eight, then ten, and then you'll start doing it without crutches," I continued for her. "Come on, you'll make it with hard work, you know you will! I mean, just look at me!"
"W-Well…" Merry glanced hesitantly to the side.
"Come on, you know I know what I'm talking about!" I scoffed as I helped her back onto her bed. "I mean, look at the aftermath of Eneru! First, it took me a while to get my limbs moving again without agony, and then it took me a while to get over my astraphobia, flash by flash and rumble by rumble, but look at me now!" I spread my arms confidently. "Ain't no phobia got no strings on me!"
It was at that instant that the door to the house slammed open with a thunderous rumble. "Cross."
I promptly snapped to attention, cold sweat streaming down my face. "I did nothing wrong and/or am being framed."
"Bullshit," Lassoo promptly scoffed.
"Malarkey," Merry nodded solemnly.
"I don't twust you as faw ash I can kick you," Carue spoke up, pointedly twitching his cast-bound legs before falling back into his snoring.
"I'm sorry, Cross, but they do have a point," Conis smiled apologetically.
"TSEEHEEEHEEHEEHEEEEE!" Su cackled unapologetically.
"I love this crew!" Soundbite breathed.
I twitched viciously as I swept a glare over my crewmates. "You're all dead to me," I vowed before spinning on my heel and plastering a smile on my face. "What's up, Nam—eep!"
My false smile shattered into shards of terror in the face of our navigator's expression. Sure, she looked perfectly calm and peaceful, smiling with a serenity befitting of Vivi herself, and I might have even bought it too… were it not for the roiling storm front looming around her, snapping and crackling from where it was hanging over us.
I swallowed fearfully before looking at Nami's… general direction, because for the life of me I could not look her in the eyes. "I-I-Is something wrong, Nami?" I squeaked in a tone of thoroughly forced calm.
"Cross," Nami repeated as she crossed her arms and tilted her head to the side just so. "Would you care to explain exactly why, in the middle of my shopping with Sanji and Usopp, we were delivered a literal half-ton of rugs in your name?"
My fear faltered in the face of the sheer randomness of the statement, prompting me to blink at her in confusion. "Rugs? Uh… sounds like a prank to me, I don't remember buying anything in the city. I mean, I didn't even get a chance thanks to the—ohh, that's right." I scratched the back of my head with an embarrassed grimace. "Look, I'm sorry, but it was an accident, alright? When the Unluckies jumped us a few days back, I crashed into that guy's stall and going by the shotgun he was sporting, he had a 'you break it, you buy it' policy, and he did not like people skimping on the bill."
My dread gone, I shrugged apologetically instead. "Look, I'm sorry that I used money from the briefcase, alright? I know it was for our new ship, but it was an emergency. You can take it out of my share of the money; I doubt I'll be buying too much with it anyway. And besides, it's not like we won't have anyplace to put them, right?"
All throughout my explanation, Nami nodded along and hummed in agreement. "Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, that's exactly right, Cross. I've already deducted that charge from your cut. All of what you just said is fair, but you see…"
Soundbite and I flinched in terror as the clouds above us rumbled ominously.
"You're overlooking one little detail," Nami chirped pleasantly as she loomed over us and held a paper up for me to see. "You still have to pay for the rest of the damages."
"The rest of the whaaaaaaaah shite," I started to parrot before finishing in a squeak as I scanned over the paper, which turned out to be a table of said financial damages.
"Ohhh, you know," Nami slowly tilted her head to the side, her paralyzed smile remaining ever-present. "The damages that resulted from your little romp with your little friends? Now, of course, Iceburg is covering all the property damage, since he's dealing with that anyway from CP9 and Aqua Laguna." Her smile stretched to truly Cheshire-ish proportions. "But that still leaves the merchandise."
"Hohoho, this is hilarious!" Merry chuckled eagerly. "Just how bad is it?"
"Lemme take a looksee!" Su hastily scrambled up my back and peered over my shoulder. "And the final count is—!" The cloud fox stared at the paper for a moment before affixing me with a flat look. "You're fucked."
"Su!" Conis gasped as she snatched up her companion. "I'm sure that's not even remotely true! Now, let me just take a look and…" Conis lapsed into silence as her jaw steadily dropped. "…Holy shit, Cross."
A strangled wheeze dragged its way out of my throat. That… was not a small number I was looking at. Rather, it was a big number. A very, very, very big number.
"THAT MUCH FOR CABBAGES?! No wonder his CART WAS FULL!" Soundbite spat indignantly.
"Maybe so," Nami admitted with a shrug. "But we still need to pay. And when I say 'we'…" The storm rumbled and crackled as she leaned in close.
I shivered in terror before hastily snapping a finger up with a panicked grin. "May I have a moment? I'd like to consult my legal counsel."
"Sure!" Nami said pleasantly. "Even death row allows final requests."
I shuddered at that before spinning on my heel and crouching down, huddling up with Lassoo and Soundbite. "What the hell do we do!?" I hissed desperately, hiding my mouth behind my hand.
"What the hell is this 'we' shit, KEMOSABE!?" Soundbite hissed indignantly.
"Yeah!" Lassoo snarled from behind his paw. "You're the one whose head they wanted!"
"And you're the one who was blasting left, right, and center, so you're in it as deep as me!" I shot right back, directing a glare at the snail. "And you know as well as I do that whatever hell I go to, I'm dragging you there with me, so maybe you should get off your ass and think of a way to save our skins!"
"Oh, yeah!?" Lassoo bit out. "Well, as your 'legal counsel', I formally advise you that we are screwed!"
"YEAH!" Soundbite spat. "WE CAN'T PAY THAT FORTUNE WITHOUT tapping the crew fund, and that means going through Nami!"
"Well…" I scrambled for options. "Maybe we can just make a break for it and wait for this to all blow over?"
As one, we all glanced back at Nami… and promptly snapped our gazes forward with renewed cold sweat at the sight of the lightning snapping around her.
"Hell no," I summarized.
"Not a chance," Lassoo whined.
"We are going to die," Soundbite whimpered. "We are GOING to DIE!"
"Maybe so…" I nodded slowly, clenching my fists, "But at least we can take our last option like men. You guys with me?"
"As if I had a choice."
"EVER AND ALWAYS!"
"Then let's do it."
With that, I stood up, and we all turned to face Nami with determined expressions…
And then we all fell flat on the ground.
"PLEASE SPARE OUR WORTHLESS SOULS, OH MIGHTY MISTRESS OF WEATHER!" we sobbed as one.
Nami's expression didn't change at all as she observed our grovelling. Then she opened her mouth—
"Puru puru puru puru!"
And snapped it shut, also snapping her Eisen Tempo back to her usual cloudy aura as Soundbite began ringing and the three of us slumped in relief. "Damn."
"I never thought I'd say this straight up, but God bless the Marine Corps!" I proclaimed as I got to my feet. "Well, now that that's over and done with—GRK!" I was cut off by a vice grip clamping down on my shoulder.
"We will continue to discuss this later," Nami promised me.
I whimpered in agreement, and Nami thankfully released me. I took a moment to get my heart rate back below jackhammer levels and glanced around the room. "Conis, Su, if you wouldn't mind taking a walk for a bit?"
"Oooh, more secret political maneuvering, eh?" Su said. "Count me—ACK!"
"Sorry about her," Conis apologized as she held her struggling companion up by her tail. "I'll make sure to keep a close eye on where she is."
"Thanks," I nodded gratefully before turning to the duck in the room. "Carue, since Vivi's not here right now—?"
"Count me out," Carue squawked with an airy wave. "Gawding evewyone's my job, Ah'll weave the powiticaw schtuff tah, you guys."
"Fair 'nuff. Conis, would you mind—?"
"Heave-ho!" the angel grunted as she lifted the duck to his feet and supported him.
"Alright, and Carue, do you think you could carry—?" THACK! "MMPH!?" A sudden pillow hitting my face cut off my question.
"I already know everything, dingus," Merry said, crossing her arms with a petulant pout. "Let me outline this for you: I want in, and if you want me out, you'd better be willing to bring one hell of a fight."
I opened my mouth to tell her exactly why that wasn't happening, then clicked it shut when I realized I didn't really have an answer, did I? "Alright, fine, you can stay if you want."
"Yes!" she crowed, pumping her fist.
"But no… not too much screwing around."
"Aww…" she groaned, plopping back onto her bed.
"Well!" Lassoo barked up hastily. "If she's free to stay, then I'm free to go. Politics bore me. Among, ah…" He glanced at Nami and shivered. "Other reasons… seeyawouldn'twannabeya!" He hastily belted out the last part before scampering out the door.
"TRAITOR!" Soundbite howled after him.
"TRAITOR WHO'S GONNA LIVE!"
I grimaced as the dachshund escaped before picking up the receiver; with any luck, this would have enough good news that the blow Nami struck would be softened. Though as my greeting showed, my hopes weren't high.
-o-
"George's Morgue, you stab 'em, we slab 'em!"
"That is awful," Tashigi deadpanned, regarding the snail before her and her superior with a flat look.
"What, you haven't noticed yet?" Cross scoffed indignantly. "I'm what the world would consider an awful person! It's in my nature!"
"Awful person or not, don't you think you could try and stay serious for half a second, Cross?" Smoker sighed wearily.
"…I'll do you the courtesy of presuming that you took a blow to the head in the past twenty-four hours and ignore that question."
"Honestly, Smoker, you really should know better by now," Nami lamented with a slight grin.
"Heheheh, yeah! No wonder we always manage to get away from you guys, you're actually pretty dumb!"
A new voice caused the Marines to pause in shock.
"Was that—?" Tashigi started to ask.
"Yep, Going Merry in the flesh!" the girl-ship crowed. "And before you guys even think of booting me out of this, remember that I've listened in on every one of you bozo's meetings up until now, so I'm about as deep in this as you, so there!"
The two Marines exchanged glances before sloooowly examining the walls around them. "So, the walls really do have ears," Tashigi stated in a distinctly unnerved voice. "Good to know."
Smoker pinched the bridge of his nose as he heaved out a fume-laden sigh. "As if the snail and the princess weren't bad enough…" he grit out.
Cross snickered for a bit before swiftly sobering up. "Amusing as chipping away at a person's sanity always is, we can joke later, so for now, let's touch base and get to work. First things first: got any news from behind the white-and-blue lines?"
"Oh, only enough to fill a newspaper cover to cover," Tashigi dryly replied. "While your crew was burning down Enies Lobby, Goat, Rooster, and almost a dozen other big-named rookies in the Grand Line were causing trouble of their own. The quick version is that the Corps has lost a quarter of its liquid assets, at least three bases to mutiny or civilian rebellion, and a dedicated training ground for Marines ranked Rear Admiral and higher has suffered significant damage. And that's just from the rookie pirates."
"Meanwhile, where your comrade's little…" Smoke started drifting up from the Commodore's body as he spied Tashigi's knuckles turning white as she gripped her sleeves. "History lesson was concerned, 90% of the Corps' giants mutinied when they heard about Ohara. Admiral Aokiji subdued them with… relative ease, but the remaining loyalists in Marineford are recovering from either being attacked or trying to stop the fight."
He gave a snort, tapping the ashes off his cigar. "Once all was said and done, a headcount showed that at least five of the mutineers went AWOL in the initial battle. As for the rest of them, they stood down and reaffirmed their loyalty to the Corps when Akainu convinced—"
"Read, threatened," Tashigi clarified.
"—them, though they're still under observation."
"Ah… wait, I'm sorry, did you just say 'Akainu threatened them'?" Cross blinked in confusion. "Akainu doesn't threaten, he immolates."
"Not in this case, he doesn't," Smoker scoffed. "Sengoku was… insistent on the extent of his actions, and is still insisting right now. Still, even with the scrutiny on them, we're going to be looking into all of those giants for potential additions to our number. While half of them were most likely just caught up in the rush of it all and are still sincere about their loyalties to the Corps, I don't doubt that the other half were just gritting their teeth so that they wouldn't give the mutt an excuse."
"…HOLY SHIT," Soundbite summarized succinctly.
"No kidding," Cross agreed.
"HA! And I thought we caused enough chaos in person!" Merry chortled.
"Ah… wait, hang on a second…" the Straw Hats' navigator spoke up in confusion. "You said that only the Giants mutinied at that? Why only them and not other soldiers? Well, what made them mutiny en masse, I mean."
"Ah… gimme a second here…" Tashigi muttered under her breath as she withdrew a notebook from her jacket and started flipping through it, finishing up by tapping one of the more recently filled pages. "Ah, here it is: according to intel we managed to suss out, former Vice Admiral Jaguar D. Saul was exceptionally popular among the Marine giants, and in spite of his death being two decades ago, his friendship was still fresh in their mind. As such, they took offence to his manner of death, as well as to the Corps hunting Nico Robin, who they apparently consider to be his ward."
She then flipped to the next page and cocked an eyebrow in surprise. "Furthermore, there were also apparently a few veterans of the Giant Warrior Pirates among those enlisted, due to the Corps being more generous when it comes to recruiting extra-human soldiers, and they were already upset when they heard about Oimo and Kashi. And with both of those in mind, it seems that the breaking point was when Vice Admiral John Giant said that Saul deserved his fate. That's when the riot started, and matters just seemed to escalate from there."
"Typical for a D.," Smoker muttered under his breath. "Raising seven different kinds of hell even from beyond the—!" The smoke-man snapped his jaws shut, growling, when Merry started howling with laughter.
"Hrm…" Nami mused thoughtfully. "If that's the case… a suggestion for whoever you have watching the giants you think might be good for recruitment: tell them to drop Saul's name and watch for a reaction. If they're not totally onboard with the Marines, they'll show it."
"You're sure?" Tashigi asked in confirmation.
The navigator's expression darkened. "I've had more than eight years' worth of practice hiding the fact that I hate a person while being within shooting distance of them at every hour of the day. I know."
A harsh silence fell as Smoker and Tashigi both grimaced at that particular reminder. "I'll pass on the recommendation," the commodore said at last.
"ALRIGHT, CHANGING THE SUBJECT NOW. QUESTION FOR THE TURNCOATS: the hell's got you down in the dumps, FOUR-EYES? We just kicked ten kinds of ASS AND GAVE THE WORLD GOVERNMENT THE big mama of black eyes! SHOULDN'T YOU BE cheering from the rooftops?"
Tashigi bit into her lip as she slowly bowed her head, her expression shadowed by both the lights of the room and her bangs. Given how the snail's expression sobered and grew somewhat hesitant, it was clear that the message had gotten across. Smoker made to say something…
"It's hard for me to get enthusiastic about anything…"
But it was interrupted by Tashigi's dull voice.
"When I can still hear Nico Robin, a woman I thought knew was a monster, outlining each and every last detail of the horrors that the World Government inflicted on Ohara. It's hard to really feel much of anything knowing that I supported an organization responsible for something like that…"
Silence fell again, at least until Cross put up a (shaky) grin over the connection.
"H-Hey, come on, Lieutenant, you know that's not true," the pirate insisted. "You're not part of that organization, remember? You're part of one that's dedicating itself to preventing shit like that from happening ever ag—"
"Anymore."
"…eh?"
"I'm not a part of that organization anymore, Cross," Tashigi clarified through grit teeth, tears brimming in her eyes. "I still actually joined them, I still served at their behest… because I had faith in them. I had faith in the Marine Corps, in the World Government. And even after you helped show me what you did, I still had faith in them, in that there was some measure of good left in the Marine Corps, in spite of the corruption obviously infesting it! But now…"
She reached beneath her glasses and pinched the bridge of her nose. "Now I know the corruption runs to the very top, to the Fleet Admiral himself. I…" She let out a pained groan as she shook her head. "I honestly didn't see it coming. I just…"
"None of us did, Lieutenant," Smoker said, softer than any present had heard from him. "We all thought that Sengoku of all people would be the unyielding pillar of Justice we all see him as, that he wouldn't resort to these methods." The Commodore then directed an acrid glare at the snail. "So, unless you're going to tell me that you lied about Sengoku's name being on that many entries in the black book, in which case there will be consequences—!"
"Commodore Smoker."
A sharp, ironclad interjection from Cross interrupted the Marine's accusation.
"In the history of the SBS, the only time I have ever lied was when I said that the golden bell on Sky Island was lost, and that was to prevent a second genocide over its possession," Cross replied venomously, before slumping and heaving a dejected sigh, his expression downcast. "No… no, as much as I hate to admit it, Sengoku's signature was indeed on at least a third of those pages, with Kong's, the Elder Stars', and any of the Admirals' on the rest. Granted, the pages Sengoku approved were relatively more acceptable than the examples I listed, but…" The snail shook its head in defeat. "Well, by their very nature, nothing CP9 did was ever pretty."
Tashigi knocked the back of her skull against the wall, groaning as she ground her fist into her forehead. "Damn it…" she bit out. "I feel like such a—!"
"But!" Cross hastily interjected, his demeanour swiftly reversing itself. "That being said, I still have faith that Sengoku isn't corrupt."
The Marines stared at Cross's proxy in confusion.
"But…" Tashigi started hesitantly. "I thought you said—?"
"If you'll recall my words at the time, anybody in Sengoku's position would have no other option but to make some tough, ultimately morally compromising choices. We all knew it; the only reason we're actually taking issue with them is that I aired them all," Cross explained. "Put it this way, all I did was reveal he's human. Chances are that he isn't beyond hope. If all else fails, I know one secret that could change his mind, but I'm not going to be able to use it anytime remotely soon."
Smoker narrowed his eyes accusingly. "Cross, any other time, I'd put up with your cryptic BS. But after the hell of a day we've had, which you've caused, I'm not willing to take your word for it without details. Spill. Now."
Silence reigned for a moment until Cross sighed. "Alright, it's… innocuous enough… just don't go spreading it around, alright? Mention one name in all of this to the wrong person, and you are beyond screwed."
"We won't," Smoker snorted.
"Well, alright, then, where to start… remember a while back, when I said that Vergo had beaten a mole within the Donquixote Pirates within an inch of his life?" He didn't wait for an answer. "That mole was Donquixote Rocinante, Doflamingo's biological younger brother… and he was pretty much Sengoku's adopted son."
The silence in the room was deafening as the Marines gaped at the snail.
"…you're serious," Tashigi flatly stated.
"As a bullet," Cross confirmed. "It's a long and… seriously messed up story, but the end message is that Rocinante died at his brother's hand, protecting a boy he himself had adopted, which Sengoku doesn't know, and that nobody besides us here and Sengoku himself knows of his relation to Rocinante. If nothing else, my even mentioning his name should give him one hell of a pause."
"…And what's Sengoku's unknown grandson doing now?" Smoker inquired.
"Eh… that depends. You mentioned that a bunch of rookies recently went nuts, right? Do you know where the Heart Pirates were in it all?"
Tashigi and Smoker exchanged shocked looks before the former thumbed through her notebook. "Uh… they… teamed up with the Bonney Pirates and invaded base G-76. It seems that besides looting the place from top to bottom, they paralyzed the Marines positioned there and used them for a… game of… Jenga…" she said, green creeping onto her face.
"…Well, then, I guess Law just spent the day playing Jenga."
Tashigi's strangled squawk was mirrored by Nami's.
"Oh, we are not even getting close to that psycho."
"Trust me, this is tame by his standards," Cross reassured. "And just to be clear here… we're getting allied with him."
"Of course we are!" Merry cheered eagerly. "In this kind of situation, the only options are alliance or destruction!"
"Or getting chopped into a thousand pieces while staying perfectly alive and unharmed," came a cool female voice that caused Tashigi's old wounds to throb.
"Mimicking Robin's voice does not give you carte blanche to be creepy!" Nami snapped irritably.
"EH? THE HELL ARE YOU talking about, I DIDN'T SAY—!"
"MOVING ON!" Cross barked hastily with a somewhat panicked expression. "What's the next question here… AH! Right, what are you guys' current marching orders?"
Smoker glanced at Tashigi in puzzlement, and the only response she could muster was a confused shrug, so for the sake of the last frayed threads of his sanity, he decided to ignore whatever the hell that was. "My ship is currently en route to the G-54 base. Most of the surrounding bases have either mutinied or been attacked, so they're sending me to handle anything that comes up while they send a higher-ranking officer from HQ as a permanent replacement. It'll be a short assignment."
"As for everyone else," Tashigi continued. "T-Bone's been summoned back to Marineford for an after-action report, though the scars he's gotten should speak louder than anything he has to say, which is a good thing. Jonathan, as you can expect, is holding down his fort and mainly keeping the gates open as a makeshift rest stop for any Marines near them. And finally, Hina is currently heading for the Twin Capes to start cutting down on the number of psychos that our Blue bases are reporting headed for Reverse Mountain."
"Perfect!" Cross said happily. "If Hina's heading that way anyway with her full fleet, she can handle what I was going to ask; do me a favour and pass along a request to her that she either swing by Little Garden herself or that she send… eh, two battleships? One of her ships is big enough."
Tashigi frowned in confusion. "Officially, Little Garden is a prehistoric wildlife preserve, and unofficially, it's a death sentence to all who land there without an Eternal Pose. Why would she need to go there?"
Cross donned his usual shit-eating grin with immense eagerness. "Ooooh, no reason, it's just that for the past century, Little Garden has also been the arena for Blue Ogre Dorry and Red Ogre Broggy's honour duel, and they need a lift to Water 7 so that they can rendezvous with their crew."
Tashigi's expression promptly fell flat. "Of course. Because why not," she droned, and started reaching for the snail. "Look, Cross, I've had a hell of a week, and I just want to get some sleep, so if there isn't anything else—!"
"Wait!"
Tashigi froze mid-motion when Merry suddenly spoke up again.
"Lieutenant Tashigi…" the young girl started with uncharacteristic hesitation. "I… look, I know a lot about my crew's past stunts and whatnot, but admittedly, there are quite a few gaps in my knowledge, centred around when my crew was on shore. But from what I've pieced together… You saved Cross's life in Rainbase, right? When you took down Mr. 3?"
"Ah…" Tashigi hedged slightly. "Yes, against my better judgment. Why?"
"Well, in that case…" Merry adopted an angelic smile as she beamed at the Marine. "I just wanted to thank you for saving my life, too, is all."
Tashigi blinked slowly as her mind tried to process what she'd just heard, the words bouncing around in her skull without sticking. "…huh?" she finally managed to get out.
"Well… yeah," Merry nodded as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. "I mean, after all, if you hadn't been there, then he would have died, and then I would have died. But because you saved him, he was able to save me. Which means… You saved me, too. So…" She nodded again. "Thank you. Thank you for giving me the chance to live. For letting me fulfill my dreams. I… I owe you everything, Tashigi, just as much as I owe Cross, and I'll always be grateful for this chance you've given me. Just… thank you."
Tashigi's jaw worked itself silently, but she eventually clenched her mouth shut. "…Permission to excuse myself for a moment, sir?" she whispered softly.
Smoker didn't even hesitate to jerk his thumb at the door. "Go on and get the hell out of here, Marine."
The swordswoman was out of the room before he was even finished. The smoke-man waited a few seconds after the door swung shut before turning back to the snail. "That was a load of bull, and you know it."
Merry's smile took on an apologetic tinge. "Yeah, I know, but can you honestly tell me that even mattered a little bit, and that she didn't need to hear that?"
Smoker was silent for a second, and in that silence, he listened to the light, hiccupping, sobbing wafting through the crack in the door.
The corners of his mouth turned upwards. "…no. No, I can't," he admitted quietly.
After a minute or so, the noise died down, and Tashigi re-entered the room, furtively swiping at eyes that were pointedly not red or puffy.
"T-Thank you very much for informing me of that, Merry," she said, a small smile on her face.
"Thank you," the girl-ship chirped virtuously.
"Heh. Glad to have you back, Lieutenant," Cross nodded happily. "Anyway, while I have you, I did have one more question before we wrap this up: do you two have any idea why Akainu and Kizaru weren't at Enies Lobby? I expected Sengoku to throw everything at us, and while Kizaru could be expected to duck out from sheer laziness, I wouldn't expect Akainu to miss us burning Enies down for the world."
The two Marines exchanged glances of perfect understanding, but before Tashigi could say a word, Smoker snapped a finger up and silenced her. "You seriously lucked out with Kizaru," he grunted. "A training accident sent him flying into the Red Line when he tried to use his abilities to reach you. He'll be recovering from it for a few days."
The lieutenant stared at him in confusion before the commodore drew the word 'ego' in the air with his smoke, prompting her to pale and nod vigorously.
"What? How the heck did that work? I mean, I know the general mechanics of the Glint-Glint Fruit as a Logia, but how did he—"
"Mirrors," Tashigi deadpanned.
"…How did I not think of that sooner? Nami, if we end up meeting Kizaru, be ready to throw up a mirage; play it right, and he could end up on the other side of the world."
"I will absolutely remember that," Nami promised fervently.
"Damn ri—eh? Hey, you two alright?"
"F-Fine, Cross!" Tashigi wheezed as she recovered from a rather ragged coughing fit. "A-Anyway, I'll let Rooster fill you in on the details himself, but suffice to say that where his actions were concerned, they were more than enough to warrant Akainu going after him personally. He avoided him by sailing into the Calm Belt, but then Boa Hancock of the Seven Warlords was sent after him. Capricorn confirmed that he's still alive and free, but…" She shrugged helplessly. "We're not sure of the finer details."
Cross slowly blinked in shock. "…Huh. That's… unexpected, to say the least. No clue how the hell he'd outrun her in the Calm Belt… I will definitely have to ask him about that. Easy money says that it'll be one hell of a story."
"I'm inclined to agree in this case, Cross," Smoker grunted in agreement. "But we'll be learning it for ourselves soon enough. This call was just a status report so that we could touch base with you before we get into our assignments. As I said, it should be short, no longer than a couple of days, but we'll be out of touch in that time."
"But once that's done, we'll have the opportunity to get in contact with you in earnest," Tashigi promised, "Get ready, Cross, because this will almost certainly be the most important meeting of MI6 to date."
"Sounds good to me," Cross nodded solemnly. "I'll arrange matters with our own allies, and when the time comes!-" The pirate trailed off, stiffening in shock. "Wait a second, did you just say MI-6!?"
Tashigi blinked as she realized the cause for Cross's confusion, and she made to answer before an impish smirk slowly spread across her face.
"You know what, Cross?" she simpered sweetly. "I think that this time, I'll leave you with the unanswered questions. Buh-bye!"
"What are you—!? NonononoWAI—KA-LICK!"
Tashigi hung the snail up before the pirate could get another word in and started howling with laughter a moment later.
"Ohohohoooooh, that was fun!" she cackled as she shot her fist in the air. "Woo, I am feeling utterly pumped!" She spun on her heel and snapped a salute at Smoker. "Permission to go on deck and practice my flying slashes on the cloud, sir?"
Smoker cocked his eyebrow at her before waving his hand dismissively. "Get out of here, Lieutenant."
"Thank you, sir!" And with that, the swordswoman shot out of the room with a whoop of glee.
After a moment, Smoker left the room as well, heading for his quarters. 'I guess the rumours really are true,' he reflected silently, the corners of his lips turning upwards ever so slightly yet again. 'There's just no end to the Straw Hats' capabilities.'
-o-
I blinked slowly as I processed what the hell had just happened before leaning back on the bed I was sitting on with a weary sigh. "Damn. Beaten at my own game. And by her, of all people! Could this—aaand I'm stopping right there," I declared in a suddenly cheerful tone as I shot to my feet. "Because I have no desire to suffer! Well, if you'll excuse me—!"
I made to stride out of the house, and was promptly halted by a hand clamping down on my shoulder and the barometric pressure in the room nose-diving so fast that my breath caught in my throat.
"Did you honestly think I'd forget about this much money?" Nami asked in an honestly insulted tone.
"WERE YOU SERIOUSLY LEAVING ME TO HER MERCY!?" Soundbite howled indignantly.
"…every sapient for himself?" I whimpered pitifully through the tears cascading down my face. "And honestly, I was hopeful that with how rich we are, and the fact that I'm responsible for it, the two events would even one another out?"
There was a moment of tense silence as Nami thought it over before the storm looming over us dissipated, and she patted my shoulder with a chuckle. "Alright, Cross, alright, I'll foot the bill out of our coffers. Given how much we have, even with what we'll be paying Franky once Sodom and Gomorrah are ready to set out, it's really not that much in the long run."
I heaved a sigh of relief, and I was about to thank her when she patted my shoulder again and walked past me.
"I'll just do one thing once all's said and done," she stated, popping a single finger to go along with the announcement.
For some reason, I couldn't help but feel a stab of existential dread. "And… that would be?"
Nami turned on her heel and proceeded to smile the most innocent and yet utterly evil smile I'd ever seen in my entire life.
"I'll put it all on your tab."
The last thing I heard, as everything went black, was Merry howling with laughter.