Sailing through that damn storm, Captain Whellmar thinks, was both the dumbest damn thing he had ever done, and the smartest. Dumbest, because this damn close to the Calm Belt, a storm could have simply shoved them up into it and leave them stranded until they starved. Smartest, because the Marines had taken one close look at the storm they were sailing into and bailing right the fuck out, cowards they were.
His crew cheered as they pulled into the bay, Sister Gray groaning as she pulled up to the docks.
His navigator, Ballio, takes a few looks at the shore, then grunts. "Poseidonis, I think. Minor kingdom of some sort. They do have a shipyard, so odds are high we can get some repairs before the good Sister sinks on us, cap." Ballio runs his hands through his beard, sighing, then resting his hand on his sword. "Odds aren't good that we can get away from here, though. Marines are probably crawling through this area - World Gov'n'ment territory as it is."
"And you'll be lucky if they're willing to trade with us at all." A voice from behind says, and Whellmar turns to see his first mate, Jacob. "These people were the ones those damn Blacksuit Pirates invaded a few years back. They probably don't take too kindly to pirates."
Whellmar sighed. That seemed about right - there was no one down on the docks to help tie up the boat, and the few people he did see as they sailed into the port were staring at them with fear or outright hostility in their eyes.
"And we're too damn hurt to force them to, even if we wanted to." He muttered. "Six Marine ships, two storms and one curious sea king - our crew needs to rest up, not go looking for more trouble." His hands tighten on the railing in front of him, knuckles white on the wood. "We'll have to hope someone in this city is willing to help us, or Sister Gray will sink in the harbor, and then we're sitting ducks for the Marines."
"Well, you're in luck, Captain." A voice says from right fucking next to him and he jumps. Jason pulls two pistols and Ballio yanks his scimitar free, but Whellmar just eyes the red-headed girl who perches on the rigging behind him, standing on the swaying ropes by just balancing on the balls of her bare feet. She has a tiny knife in hand, and as she grins down at him she slices off a piece of the apple in her hands - our damn apple! He realizes, seeing the open top of the barrel behind her.
She takes a bite of the apple slice, then lets herself fall forward, neatly flipping as she falls, landing on her feet right between him and the rest of his crew. The crew eyes her warily, hands on weapons - but regardless of how she got on board, she can't be more than fifteen years old.
"And who would you be, then?" Jacob asks, after staring at her for a moment. He doesn't lower his pistols - smart man - but he relaxes. Slightly.
"Someone in this city willing to help you." She says with a smirk, then takes a big bite out of the apple. "Name's Melody. I hear you guys need some repairs. Maybe some supplies. We may not like pirates much here, but - your Beri spends as good as everyone else."
He eyes the girl, then sighs. "What do you get out of this, girl?"
"A spot on your crew, hopefully."
His eyes widen in surprise at the sheer gall of this brat. Sneaking onto his ship, eating his food, then demanding a spot on his crew in exchange for repairs?
Smart lass. He likes her already.
"And why, pray tell, would we bother with a little girl like you?" Jacob asks, but his eyes are calm and calculating as he eyes her. Her red hair is bleached by the sun, her skin is tanned, her palms are calloused, her knuckles are scarred. "What could you possibly have to offer?"
"Thirty thousand Beri towards repairs. A good word with the locals. Someone who's been sailing for years and willing to do work you lazy louts don't want to. Knowledge of the Grand Line, if you plan on sailing any further." She raises an eyebrow slowly, then smirks. "Eye candy." Ballio chuckles, sheathing his sword.
"I like her, captain." he says. "And someone who knows a fair bit about this damn sea would be useful - loathe as I am to admit it, we weren't ready for the Grand Line." Then he scowls. "My maps are wrong and the compass doesn't hardly work for shit. I say we take her a board."
Whellmar hums under his breath. Jacob suddenly starts asking her questions, rapidly - things about ships and boats, names, different types of winds. She remains unflustered, answering the questions as quick as they come. Jacob nods, then turns to the captain and smiles.
His navigator and first mate seem to be fine with her. But something about this seems... off, to Whellmar.
"What's in it for you, girl?" He asks, and she turns to him, surprised. "What could you possibly get out of this?"
"A way off this damn island, for starts. A chance to sail on something bigger than those damn fishing boats. Adventure. Is that not enough?" She said, peevishly.
"No. There's a reason why we sail. For a dream, for an adventure, for honor, for friends. Why do you want to sail?"
She's silent, for a moment, looking him in the eyes, before she turns away.
"I'm looking for someone."
He nods. "That's reason enough, I suppose."
She starts, and he smirks to himself, the movement pulling at old scars. Good to see her knocked off-keel for a moment. "Girl, I dare say I don't want to know a thing about you that you don't want to tell me. We've all got stories, and most of 'em are no good - no one who flies the skull and crossbones does so for a fleeting reason."
"We'd just like to make sure that you aren't one of the types who does it because they enjoy the sound of wood splinter or revels in causing havoc." Ballio says, running a hand through his short-cropped black beard. "Too many of those under the black flag, sadly." He sighed. Ballio was an older man, and this beard and hair were slowly growing more white than black with age - a fact no one on the crew who valued their toes dared mention. "Back when the Pirate King sailed, the jolly roger was a badge of honor - a way to speak of freedom and life on the seas." He spat over the railing. "Now it's just an excuse for mad men to pillage and plunder to sate their bloodlust."
Melody is quiet, and eyes him, expression unreadable. Then she smirks. "Do I pass, Captain?" She says, turning to him.
Captain Ravio Whellmar smirks again, before lifting his hand off of his sword and extending it towards her. "Aye, lass, I suppose I'll have to make do with you. Now, you were saying something about repairs?"
Her smirk becomes a full grin, as she jumps up to the railing, perching on it with her knees bent. "If you've got a few days and a few hundred thousand Beri to spend, I can do you one better. How would you like to be one of the handful of crews that can sail through the Calm Belt?"
---
"They're coming, Cap'n." Leonardo, their sniper, says nervously as he hangs from the rigging by one hand, telescope in the other. "Three ships, eight masts. Looks like some of the same from before."
Melody whistles slowly from next to him, and he rolls his eyes. "What did you guys do to get three Marine ships on your tail?" She asks, legs swinging from her spot on the railing overlooking the wheelhouse. "They usually don't bother coming out in force this early on the Grand Line unless you tweak their noses reaaaaal good."
"We may have, ah, intercepted a mechant ship headed for a Marine base back in North Blue." Ballio says for him. "Got ourselves most of our current treasury and some expensive cargo out of it. Must have been something they really wanted, because damn near three days later we had practically a whole damn Armada after us. Hoped we could lose them up that cursed mountain, but 'twas not meant to be." He sighed, then turned to Melody. "This blasted plan of yours had better work, lass."
She scoffed. "Bally, I'm hurt, truly." She said, raising a hand to her breast, then smirking. "Trust me, this will work. Just so long as your men are willing to put some effort into it."
"Our men now, Melody. This is your crew as much as it is mine. At least, that's what I'm telling the Marines if they catch up to us - if I'm going to the block, you're coming with me." Whellmar said, grimly. "We should have left two days ago, when our hull was fixed and we had enough provisions. Could have lost them on the horizon and been long gone by now."
"You and I both know your crew isn't ready for more of the Grand Line yet, captain." Melody said softly. She sighed. "No offense to any of you, but I don't think you would last much longer - hell, I could take you all out myself if I needed to."
Whellmar would have taken offense to that if he hadn't already seen the girl prove that, dozens to times over. While loading the ship and adding... additions... to it, the girl had nonchalantly lifted up blocks of wood, rope and chain that he knew for a fact would take his crew ten men to lift and hauled them aboard herself.
Grand Line fuckery. He was so damn ready to get back to North Blue, where everything was cold and shitty but made fucking sense.
If they made it, that was.
"Sail out, Jason." He said to his first mate, quietly. "Lets get going."
"Where to, sir?" Jason asked, and he didn't have to meet his first mate and best friends eyes to know what question he wasn't asking. Are you sure about this?
Captain Ravio Whellmar prepared to give what could possibly be the last order he ever gave as captain. Their tests in the bay had worked, sure, but that was a whole kettle of fish compared to actually sailing on open seas.
"Into the calm belt, Jason."
To his credit, his first mate didn't even hesitate, calling orders to hoist sails and turn the ship about until it pointed directly at the stretch of calm sea. Even from here, the strip of ocean was unnaturally still - no waves, no currents, no wind lived on that patch of dead sea.
Whellmar looked at the girl perched on the railing next to him, and she nodded once before flipping off of the railing and moving to prepare for their journey.
Why did I let her talk me into this... He thought, looking to the sides of his ship, at the massive waterwheels that had been hastily installed to the side of his hull. If this didnt work and they ended up stalling halfway into the calm belt, they were looking at either a quick death while the Marines took shots at his ship while they sat dead in the water, or a slow death as they starved.
It had seemed a good idea at the time, at least when she explained it out. "Have you guys ever seen a steamboat in action?" She had asked, and Jason looked confused, while Whellmar was contemplative. Ballio, however, had nodded and then frowned.
"Aye, I have. Was but a small ferry on an Island we stopped at in West Blue. We have niether the time nor the money to install an engine onto our ship - if we could even find one big enough for Sister Gray."
"You don't need an engine, though." She said, her smirk widening into a grin. "You see, I recently came up with the designs for what I like to call a man-power wheel system. It uses a bunch of compound pulleys to distribute the force they generate equally. Provided your men are willing to put their backs into it - don't worry, I'll help - we can replace the steam engine with thirty or fourty men pedalling at once."
The list of things she needed to make it work seemed mostly reasonable - two water-wheels from the local granery, fourty seats with eighty bycicle pedals to match, an amount of rope she referred to as a 'Metric Ass-ton,' hundreds of planks of wood, dozens of pully systems, and - oddly enough - a single drum, almost as big around as he was tall, and two massive mallets to beat it with.
He chalked it up to more Grand Line foolishness. If she wanted to make music while they sailed, that was her business.
A few hours of paddling about in the bay had ensured that the crew wouldnt mutiny when they sailed directly into what had been the death of hundreds of other crews, bu Whellmar still worried. The two water-wheels loomed over the main deck of his ship, and the hundreds of pulley systems criss-crossed rope over the heads of his men, connecting the two wheels to the two rows of seats that had been installed on the center of his ship. She had assured him that she could come up with a cleaner solution once they were somewhere safer, one with less chance of tangling up in his rigging if a storm came.
A massive boom shook him out of his revery, and a shout came from his crew as a cannonball landed dozens of knots away, sending up a massive spray of water they could see even from this distance. A warning of what was to come. The three ships began to split - one Marine vessel heading directly towards them, the other two splitting to cut them off on either side of them. With the Calm Belt at their back, they should have been trapped against a wall.
Sister Gray didn't seem to realize this, sailing directly towards said wall. Her sails creaked with wind, and his crew roared insults and japes at the Marines, even though they were too far off to hear.
"If any of you sorry bastards has every wanted to moon a Marine ship before, I'd suggest you take your chances now, before we need to put your sorry asses to work!" Melody shouted from the forecastle, where she was seated on a pedal system of her own, one that hooked to both of the wheels. In front of her was the massive drum she had purchased, and she held the mallets in either hand.
"I'll be having words with her later about talking to my crew like that." He muttered, and beside him Ballio chuckled. Some of his crew even took her up on her offer, dropping their pants and revealing their pasty whites to the chasing marines, to the hoots and hollers of their crewmates. He rolled his eyes.
"You did say it was her scheme, after all, and that she had to make sure it worked - I believe your words were 'if this fails and the crew wants heads to roll, I'll have yours trussed up like a soccer ball before you can blink.'" Ballio muttered, eyeing him with a knowing grin.
"Eh." Whellmar muttered, blushing slightly. "Something like that, I suppose." Not that he would - Melody was fast growing to be the crews sweetheart. She was snarky and sarcastic enough to give just as good as she got, stubborn as a mule, strong a bear and sharp as a whip. The fact that she was teaching his crew how to do some of that crazy Grand-Line bullshit he had heard of in rumors also helped - hell, just yesterday she had blocked a bullet with her arms to prove a point, and then jabbed a hole in a boulder with her finger. If his crew could learn to do that sort of thing...
Yeah, she was growing on him.
The sails suddenly stopped creaking in the wind, and Sister Gray sagged in the water. The cheers and jeers of his crew came to a sudden halt, and the ship floated forwards slowly, her momentum dying off.
They were in the Calm Belt now, whether they liked it or not.
"Well? You going to just sit there with your thumbs up your asses and wait till the Marines come save you?" Melody's dry drawl rang out over the deck, and fourty nervous men slowly scrambled to their spots on the chain of pedals and seats.
Melody raised one mallet, then brought it down. A massive, high-pitched BUM rang out over the deck. The other raised and fell, and it rang with a deeper sound, a baritone DUN ringing out.
"You know your lefts from your rights by this point, aye?" She asked, half-teasing. The men just eyed her nervously. "When I make this noise -" BUM - "You press down with your left foot. When I make this noise - " DUM - "You use the right. Those of you who can't quite figure it out, just watch those around you that look like they have a clue what's going on." A half-hearted chuckle swept his men, and Whellmar gripped the wheel tight.
BUM. She pressed down on her own petal with her left foot, and the ropes strained, but didn't move. The men hastily moved to follow, and the wheels slowly, so very slowly, began to turn.
DUM. The men were clearly struggling, and his heart sank. This wasn't going to work. The ship was far, far too heavy for them to push along with just a couple of shittily-applied wheels. He should have known better, he should have -
A breeze ruffled his hair, as the Sister Gray, as if hearing his thoughts, began to cut through the water.
A cheer rose from his men, and Melody grinned, picking up the pace of her drumming. Now that the wheels were in motion, keeping them going was much easier - inertia did most of the work.
BUM... DUM... BUM... DUM
The wheels began to turn faster, and the island began to shrink in the distance. Powered by nothing other than the strength of her crew and their determination, the ship cut through the water at about three knots - decent enough, he supposed. Enough to get them through the Calm Belt in a few days.
Melody began to pick up the pace, instead, and his men laughed, relief and adreniline pouring off of them.
BUM. DUM. BUM. DUM. They began to really work at it, and Sister Gray lurched, before setting into a much faster eight Knots or so - enough to get them across the calm belt before nightfall.
The beat was loud, the men were happy, the seas were calm but Sister Gray sailed on. Rope creaked as they pedaled, sweat beginning to run down their brows. They would be damn sore later, but that was why they were operating in three shifts - twenty men rested now, but in a few hours they would swap off with twenty others, cycling through so that everyone got a few hours to rest.
Then Melody began to sing, her high voice cutting through the air like a bell, in time with the beat of her drums.
"When I was a little lass, and so my mother told me~!" It was a common enough song - a shanty, to keep men focused on the beat as they worked. A way to pass the time. Her voice was nice enough, he supposed, fitting her name.
The crew cheered, joining in.
"WAY, HAUL AWAY, WE'LL HAUL AWAY, JOE!"
She grinned, drumming and singing. Whellmar grinned with her, hands on the wheel, as his voice joined in the chorus.
"That if I did not kiss a lad, my lips would grow all moldy -"
"WAY, HAUL AWAY, WE'LL HAUL AWAY, JOE."
She sang along with them for the chorus, and Whellmar and his crew joined in happily.
"WAY, HAUL AWAY, WE'LL HAUL AWAY FOR BETTER WEATHER. WAY, HAUL AWAY, WE'LL HAUL AWAY, JOE!"
They passed the next few hours singing shanties and the like, and by the time his crew felt the need to change shifts, they could see clouds moving on the horizon, and before they knew it there was a salty breeze on their face as the sails snapped in the wind.
If the men had been in an uproar when they saw the ship move earlier, they were downright rioting now. Someone cracked open one of their last remaining kegs, and Whellmar honestly didn't feel like fighting them this once.
The Calm Belt was theirs to claim, and Whellmar saw a very profitable future in it.
He stood next to Melody, who grinned a tired grin up at him, her bangs stuck to her forehead with sweat and her arms and legs sore from pedalling and drumming.
"You did it, kid." he said, and the crew cheered. "You sailed us straight through the Calm Belt. If you were older, I'd kiss you!"
She guffawed at that. "If you were prettier, I'd let you!"
The men all jeered, and for the rest of the afternoon they partied, only doing enough work to put down anchor and ensure they wouldn't float back into the Calm Belt overnight. Drinks were chugged, shanties - much dirtier than the ones Melody had sung earlier, making the red-head blush dark as her hair - were sung, a few scuffles broke out, and it was a damn old great time had by all.
Ballio came to stand next to him sometime after nightfall, stumbling slightly. "You better keep ahold of that girl, Ravio." He muttered, bracing himself on the railing. "She may look stern and solid but she's skittish as a damn long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs." He sighed, leaning his head on his arms. "Poor girl has been through a lot, not to mention the customary Grand-Line madness - she needs a place to feel safe and at home. You better give it to her, or we'll likely not see her again."
The captain just smiled, scars pulling on his face, his grey eyes locked onto the form of the red-headed girl, hanging upside down on the rigging by the mainmast, eyeing the chaos and revelry below her with a grin. "Trust me. I plan to."
They sailed all the way to Rubeck within a week, and with the wheels working alongside the sails, it was the fastest damn time he had ever made. The night before they made landfall, he took Melody aside and asked her what it would take to make the two water-wheels a more permanent part of Sister Gray's arrangements.
"Well, you'd have to swap to chains instead of ropes, for starters." She said. "They may rust, but that can be taken care of - ropes may snap in the middle of a journey, and with the amount of tension we put on them, they could kill a man when they whip."
She thought for a moment longer. "Also, if you're going to make sailing in and out of the Grand Line a regular thing, she's gonna need some upgrades. Sterner hull, steel-enforced keel, some ironwood to deflect cannon shot, more cannons, stronger masts - storms come out of literally nowhere out there, and pirates can do damn near the same."
"If we have the chance, I'd say we take her to Water Seven and get her fitted there, but that would require a lot of travel past marine checkpoints - not to mention, a little more Beri than you've got."
"How much would that be, then?" He asked, curious. Water Seven was that Grand Line shipyard, right? He'd seen a ship built there once when he was a boy, sailing on his fathers ship - cannonballs bounced right off of the wood, and it was easily triple the size of Sister Gray and at least that much faster.
She told him exactly how much, and his eyes nearly fell out of his head.
"Thats - thats absurd! No one I've ever met in the North Blue even has a bounty that high, much less that much money to spend!"
She shrugged. "Quality costs, sadly. For about seven million Beri I suppose we can fix her up enough to make it work for a year or so, but don't be fooled - Sister Gray is a fine ship, but she's no Grand-Line ship. We can add enough to her to cover the difference for a while, but the Grand Line is harsh on ships."
"Seven million is already more than I've got." He muttered. "How would you suggest we make that much?"
"Well... The Calm Belt tends to claim dozens of ships a year - from idiot merchants to unlucky pirates to even marines caught in the storm. We can raid em while they're dead in the water, rescue or ransom em for a pretty penny, or - if we come across a dead ship - loot and sell whatever they had in cargo and sell the ships." She grinned widely. "Lots of money to be made in the Calm Belt, you see - other than Boa Hancock, some Sea Kings, and a few of the ships run by people with devil-fruit powers, it's a damn dead zone."
"You've been thinking about this for awhile, haven't you?" He asked, eyeing her curiously.
She scoffed. "Let me put it this way - the only reason I was still on that damn island was because no other pirate ships had come through yet."
He stared at her for a moment, then sighed and smiled. "Well, I'm glad we were the ones lucky enough to be first. Welcome to the Whellmar Pirates, kid."
She smiled, and it was a hardy thing, fierce with confidence and joy and determination. Whellmar held out his hand, and she grasped it, firmly.
"Glad to be aboard, Captain."
So. Any idea what this blasted thing is made of?" Ballio said, heaving the chest up onto the table. "Swords break on it, the lock bent our cutters out of shape, we can't smash it no matter how high up we drop it from, and the hinges are on the bloody inside. Can't pick the damn lock - its a blasted combination lock, it seems."
We had docked in Rubeck a few hours ago, and everyone was taking inventory of what they had left to sell. Most of their loot and Beri had been spent fixing and upgrading Sister Gray - not that the crew seemed to mind in the slightest - but they had enough to stock back up, and a few odds and ends no one on Poseidonis wanted to buy. Art, jewelry that was clearly stolen, pillaged clothes, trinkets - the kind of shit pirates take when they loot rich merchants ships with no cannons and no guards.
Seriously, what kind of merchant ship sailed with no guard and no cannons in this world?
I sighed, nodding. "That's a seastone chest right there. Probably just coated in it, otherwise there's no possible way you could have lifted it by yourself." The chest was about two feet by three feet wide, and two feet deep - a bulky, square thing with an ugly green coating, not unlike sandstone. "Stuff is near impossible to break - damn near as hard as diamonds. Whatever's in there, the Marines really wanted to keep safe."
"Got any ideas?" Whellmar asked, and I hummed noncommittally. He tipped his hat back on his head, and I eyed him as I thought.
Whellmar was a young-ish captain, barely thirty years old. He had three long scars stretching from his left temple, over his eye, and down to his chin - a tiger attack when he was young, he told me. He was lucky it didn't take his eye. He had shaggy, dirty-blonde hair he kept in a ponytail, and a bit of stubble, seeing as he didn't bother to shave.
"Papers are the most likely bet." I muttered. "Would explain the massive Marine force they sent after you - us." My crew now, need to start associating myself with them. My heart was a little giddy at the thought of being part of a real pirate crew, but I pushed it down as I stared at the chest. "Maybe information on fleet movements, fortifications, things like that. Can't be too important, seeing as I don't see your ugly mug on a bounty poster yet."
Ballio chuckled. "Aye, and don't that upset him." I grinned at the portly older man, and he smirked back at me. "Cap'n here promised some dumb bastard on Spider Mile that he'd come back with a bounty to rival his."
Ravio rolled his eyes, elbowing his navigator in the side, and Jason chuckled. "Yeah, Bellamy can shove his opinions somewhere where the sun don't shine. All talk and nothin to back it up, that brat is."
I quietly put away the fact that Bellamy the Hyena was a known enemy of my crew - or at least a rival - which meant we were opposing Motherfucking Doflamingo and focused on my captain.
"What else might be in there?" Whellmar asked. I frowned, biting my lower lip, a habit that had carried across from my past life. "Papers are the most likely bet, you said - but I don't think we can sell them, not without associating with the Revolutionaries, and I have no desire to stir up that kettle of fish."
I leaned back in my chair, hands behind my head, balancing on a single leg of the chair. I liked being superhuman - well, compared to my old self, at least. Stupidly good balance and strength was par for the course in this world. It was fun.
"Honestly? A devil fruit." Ballio stopped smirking, and Jason stared at the chest, wide-eyed. "It's the only other thing that could fit in there, it's the only thing that could draw Marine attention, it's the only thing worth securing in a sea-stone chest."
"Feh. Devil fruits." Jason said, spitting on the floor, only to have the captain dope-slap him. "If it weren't for your insistence, I'd say the damn things were just myths." He rubbed the back of his head where the captain smacked him, staring at the chest longingly. "Wonder what it might be."
I groaned. "Life would be so much easier if they just were myths. Damn things are more trouble than they're worth - when anyone can munch a fruit and suddenly be superpowered, life gets so much worse for the smallfolk."
Jaso shuffled. "Ah, sorry." I waved at hand at him, shrugging. Jason was tall and lanky - almost twice as tall as I was, damn One Piece men being stupidly large. He was black-haired and clean shaven, with a cleft chin. He wore a massive blue jacket that went down to his knees, and I knew that under it his vest and inside of the coat were filled with dozens of pistols, like the dad in Boondock Saints times a thousand.
"No worries, I never saw the Blacksuits in person. It's not the fruit that makes the man, 'sides - its how it gets used. Captain bloody Cardson could have made his living running a prison that was inescapable, or a ship no one could attack, or any other sort of useful ways to make himself a profit - instead, he got it into his head that he was a god amongst men because he munched a glorified pumpkin." I sighed. "Not that I wouldn't mind having a fruit of my own - they're useful buggers, no doubt. Damn near every person worth knowing on the Grand Line has one."
"Well." Whellmar said, sighing. "Not that it matters if it is a fruit or not, because we can't open the blasted chest." I chuckled.
"Let me see the thing, i'll open it up for you."
Ballio raised an eyebrow, but pushed the chest over to me, and I sat my chair down and stood up. "See, Seastone is damn near impossible to work with - doesn't melt properly, doesn't like to be molded. Making a sword out of it is damn near impossible, making anything complicated is even worse - the only things capable of doing something like that are Devil Fruits, and this blasted rock robs them of their powers when they touch em."
I focused on my arm, tensing my muscles as hard as I could, focusing on Tekkai. I struck down as hard as i could, right on the dial of the lock. "TEKKAI!" I shouted as I struck down, the palm of my hand slamming into the lock. It barely budged, and my hand smarted like hell, but I raised my arm and tried again.
"The lock may be made of seastone - at least, the face and the bar are. But making the actual internals of it - TEKKAI! - fucking ow -" I rubbed my palm after I struck down again, but I swore I felt it shift under my hand, and raised my hand to strike again. "- is too damn hard. So the insides have to be steel of some sort. And steel - TEKKAI -" I focused, bracing, then shouted as I struck down again. My hand smarted like all hell, but Tekkai prevented my hand from breaking as I smashed down on the protruding dial.
The face of the dial fell off in a crunch of broken metal, and the lock popped open.
"-Steel breaks with enough force."
Ahhhhhhg. Ok, maybe I should have waited for a hammer or something, because god fucking dammit this hurt.
Whellmar eyed me, concerned, and I waved him off with my non-smarting hand. "Nothing broken, just some pretty bad bruises. Owwww."
Ballio chuckled. "Fool girl. We have crowbars, you realize." Ah... that would have been easier, yeah.
I raised a finger at him rather than responding, and Jason slowly lifted the chest to reveal -
A stack of papers.
We all sighed in disappointment. Jason actually swore, and I groaned. Whellmar just grabbed the papers up, rifling through them, then grunting. "Coded, it looks like. Leonardo might be able to crack it - he's got some training in that sort of shit, working for the syndicate on Swallow as he did." he sighed, moving to place them back in the chest, when Ballio stopped him.
"Does this chest seem a little shallow to you?" He muttered, placing a hand on the empty bottom then eyeing it from the side. "Yeah, false bottom of some sort. It's got about another foot underneath here."
"Good eye." Whellmar muttered, and Ballio grunted. "I see that your old age did, in fact come with wisdom."
"Uppity youngsters." The navigator grumbled, but he was grinning through his grey-spotted beard. "No respect." He turned to me, eyebrow raised. "So, do you want to punch through this one too?"
I sighed, then raised a single finger - my index finger, this time. Grabbing hold of the side of the seastone chest, I pointed it at the very corner of the bottom, focusing, then struck down, shouting "Shigan!" as I did so.
My finger punched through the simple wood bottom with ease, and when I raised it back up, it was wet with purple goo. I stared at the liquid, and it dripped down my raised finger slowly, sticky on my hand.
"Probably should have checked that it wasn't a seastone bottom first." Whellmar said, and I grinned sheepishly, before licking my finger off.
"I mean, it worked, and oh my FUCKING GOD THIS IS DISGUSTING." Why did I lick my finger? Why? It looked like grape juice, sure, but why. Why would you do this, Melody, this tastes like literal unwashed asshole and garbage.
Jason pried up the false bottom using the hole I had made, revealing -
A red-and-yellow fruit with a zig-zag pattern and green dots covering its surface. As we watched, it rapidly shriveled and decayed.
We stared at it for a moment, then turned to look at my newly-cleaned finger. "Oops." I muttered. "We could have sold that for enough money to upgrade the ship."
Of course, that's when I felt a sudden sense of fatigue, like all my stamina was suddenly gone. It was like I had been training for hours on end with no rest, and my muscles just - gave up. My legs faltered from under me, and I held onto whatever I could as I fell. Which happened to be the seastone covered chest I had been gripping, and it fell on top of me as I fell on the floor.
Oh, this sucked so much ass.
Whellmar sighed as he pulled the chest off of me, and I groaned a thanks out. "Idiot girl." He muttered, and I weakly attempted to raise a one-finger salute at him, but decided that raising my arm would be too much effort.
"Well. It was a devil fruit, it seems." Jason muttered, and I groaned. "Not that we had much chance to examine it, because someone apparently can't keep their hands out of their mouths."
Ballio sighed, before picking me up, his arm under my armpits as he raised me up to my feet. "Goddamnit Melody." He muttered, but his voice was more amused than upset. "Impulsive, idiotic brat."
"Stupid... old codger." I muttered, my legs refusing to settle under me. I couldn't keep them from shaking, and I sighed. Oh god, this was going to be my life every time I touched salt water, wasn't it?
"There goes any chance of recouping any of the money we lost from the repairs." Whellmar said, his tone dry. "At least it's not a total waste."
Jason grunted, then abruptly turned and left. I felt a pang of guilt - ah, he wanted a Devil Fruit power, didn't he? - but that was suddenly drowned out by the fact that holy shit I had a devil fruit power.
I sat down in the chair that had toppled when I fell, Ballio settling me down, before grunting and walking out. "I'll talk to Jason." He muttered, sighing, before shooting me a glare. "He's going to be shooting at birds all night, lass. I'm gonna make you eat every last one, raw." I flinched, and he muttered under his breath as he left.
Captain Ravio sat across from me at the table, and I looked away from his glare. He sighed.
"Damnit girl." he muttered, then sighed again, louder. "Ah well. Shit happens I suppose. You're on mopping duty for the foreseeable future, Melody. That was going to be our entire haul - we could have auctioned it off for millions of Beri."
"Sorry." I muttered.
"We'll survive." He said, reaching out to ruffle my hair. "Just... apologize to Jason in the morning, and I'm going to make sure the crew understands exactly why we're not making any money in town today." He grinned, then. "Any idea what that fruit was?"
It... hadn't been one I'd seen before? Honestly, most of the pictures of fruits in the manga had been in the back of the books or in filler arcs, and neither me or my past self paid much attention to them. I knew that some of the Logia and Paramecia fruits had shapes like what power they granted - Ace's Fire-fire fruit had flames, Blackbeards dark-dark fruit had purple wisps that looked like dark smoke, but red-and yellow stripes didn't call much to mind.
I tried focusing on myself, similar to meditating, and I felt... something? Mixed with the fleeting energy I knew was my Haki, was some sort of... impression. I tried to focus on it, and it spread through my body like a welcome friend.
It felt like something I could push or pull, I guess? I opened my eyes and stared at myself, and tried to push it outwards.
The chair broke underneath me with a massive clatter of wood, and the ship suddenly rocked, sinking feet down into the ocean. I heard shouts from the crew, and Whellmar eyed me with a shocked glance. I was flat on the floor, completely unable to move at all, no matter how much I struggled - it felt like my arms were made of lead, and my muscles screamed as I tried to lift them. I was starting to get light-headed as my blood rushed down to the ground, and I hurriedly pulled it back in. My vision almost immediately began to clear, and the ship popped back up like we had thrown ballast overboard. Whellmar and I were hurled up into the air as the ship popped back up like a cork, and I smashed my head off the ceiling.
When the ship finally settled, I was floating a few inches in the air, but slowly falling back down. My arms felt weirdly loose, and when I moved them it felt like I was flailing lengths of rope instead of my limbs. Floating on my back like this was damn scary, so I let the weird energy go, and I stumbled as I fell back down to the ground, my feet landing unbalanced. I fell on my ass as the ship continued rocking, and Whellmar gripped the table, as it was nailed into the floor.
He stared at me for a moment, and we both began to chuckle with relief. "I'm telling them that was your fault too." he said, and I shrugged.
"That's fair."
He sat down carefully, and I began to gather the splinters that my sudden weight-gain had caused. "So, besides being literal ballast, any idea what that fruit is?" He muttered, and I grinned.
"Pretty sure you're looking at the new owner of the Kilo-Kilo no Mi, a fruit that can increase or decrease your mass at will."
He frowned. "That... doesn't sound that useful." he muttered, and I snickered.
"Oh. You have no idea."
I had taken physics before in a previous life, after all.
This... I could use this.
"No more using that on the ship, though. And you're also cleaning the head for the next month as well as mopping." Whellmar said, and I sighed.
"...Also fair."
---
A/N: As far as I'm concerned, the Milo-Milo no Mi and the Kilo-Kilo no Mi are the same thing. It doesn't make sense to me that two fruits would have literally the exact same powers, just stronger in one case. I'm going with the fact that it increases the user's mass by magnitudes, and the reason Machvise got so much heavier than Mrs. Valentine was because he weighed much, much more than she did. Seeing as Machvice has been shown to be several feet taller than Doflamingo in this picture (and Doflamingo is ten feet tall -), we can assume he weighs at least four to five times as much as the tiny Mrs. Valentine does, meaning the Kilo-Kilo no Mi makes him four or five times as heavy as she was when she used it.
The fact that it is explicitly stated in the manga, anime and the wiki that the Kilo-Kilo fruit increases mass and not just increases weight boggles my mind. Yet another instance of people with Devil fruits who use it in incredibly stupid ways.
Also the fact that it increases mass without increasing weight (shown by the fact that Nami can hit Ms. Valentine while she is using her Crescendo Stone on Usopp and making her move) is dumb and Oda needs to go back to highschool physics class.
Or we can just handwave it with 'Mystery Fruit,' I guess.
...
Lets go with that.
Love you Oda plz no sue.
The sea wind on your face is a lovely sensation. I hummed to myself as I floated in the air, my legs hung over the bar of the hang-glider I had made myself a few months back. I liked hanging upside down, so sue me.
I'm very glad that sea-spray doesn't turn me into a pile of mush - it seems that you need to be up to your ankles in water before it kicks in. Which I'm very pleased about - having to stay below decks constantly would be a major pain in the ass. Being unable to assist during storms and high seas is already annoying enough.
I tilt myself to the left a bit, and my glider makes a lazy circle in the air, floating around the ship in a slow circle. I can hear drum beats from below me, and the crew is singing some sort of shanty I can't make the words of - knowing Blake, our musician, something either very sappy or very crude. Maybe both.
Being upside down is fun. The ocean looks like the sky when you do this, and having my mass decreased like this makes my blood light enough to not pool in my head because of gravity. It's silly, I know, but I spend more time upside down than right-side up when I'm up here - hanging by my arms is boring.
The Parrot's Perch - Ballio said my 'sky-ship' needed a name, no matter how tiny it was - catches the wind easily, the updraft from the seas keeping it tugging on the hundred or so yards of rope that keep me tethered to the main-mast. I could untie it and actually fly a ways away from the ship - but I usually wait until we're over land to do that. Doesn't make sense to risk it.
I hum a little song to myself, to the beat of the drums below us. We're sailing along the edge of the Calm Belt, making laps up and down either side. We tend to stay out of the Grand Line itself, unless someone wants something delivered. The 'Waterwheel Pirates' have made quite a name for ourselves over the past year, and Captain Ravio 'The Vulture' Whellmar has a bounty of a whole ten million on his head - pretty damn high for someone who doesn't even travel the Grand Line. Not that he can flaunt that over Bellamy's head anymore - the Hyena and the rest of the Jokers left for the grand line shortly before we first sailed back to North Blue. Thank fucking god.
I absently muse on the fact that captain's name matches up with our crews name -Whell, Wheel. One Piece things, I guess. I take out my spyglass and peer at the 'sky' underneath me, looking first behind us, and then at the Calm Belt.
Nothing but waves and a few islands on the horizon behind us - being this high up gives me a pretty damn awesome view of the horizon. Turns out being a One Piece human also makes my eyesight better, somehow. I can see about... fifteen miles out from this high up? With the spyglass that is.
I keep humming to myself as I scan the 'sky,' muttering. "Come on, little stranded fools. Come to momma -"
There! A tiny strip of white pokes down from the ocean, and I hurriedly turn myself right-side up to make sure I'm not seeing things.
Nope. There it is: a ship. From this distance I can't make out how many masts it has, but it's definitely in the middle of the Calm Belt.
"We're eatin good tonight." I mutter, grinning. "I'm gettin real tired of jerky and hardtack." I yank on the rope tethering me to the mast, and I can hear the little chime of bells as I yank three times. One ring means 'trouble, get me down.' Two means 'I need to use the head,' and three means 'ship on the horizon.'
The shanty stops as cheers go up from below, and men rush to the winch, starting to pull in the rope to the Parrot's Perch. As I get lower down, I gradually increase my weight- from one thousandth of my normal to one tenth - and I start to sink, still slowly.
When I'm about ten feet up, I drop down to half of my standard weight, and the glider floats down to the ship much faster. I land on my bare feet with a light tap, only then increasing myself back to normal. The men keep winding up the rope, and I hand the glider off to Leonardo with a grin, darting in to kiss him on the cheek. The teen - he's twenty and thus five years older than Melody, I know, but I'm technically older than him - blushes scarlet and stutters as he starts to disassemble my glider, folding up the scaffolding and the sails.
He's so cute when he's flustered. Shame he's too shy to take me up on my flirting - he's pretty well built, and tall as all hell. I eye his biceps for a bit, from where his bare arms protrude from his t-shirt, with the sleeves ripped off. Tan and sweaty and firm. Hot damn. I wink at him and he drops the length of wood in his hands, and the crew laughs at him as I skip away. If I put a little sway into my hips, well, that's my business, alright?
Captain did ban me from having sex on the boat, and I agree totally. I don't want to make things weird for the crew, but god damn did I want to make things weird.
Gah, fuck puberty. It was shitty enough the first time, thank god I have the mind of a semi-rational adult to remind me that life was not just what my hormones wanted me to think it was.
Whellmar said he just didn't want to deal with the noise when he was trying to sleep, seeing as I slept in the room right next to his. It was probably also because he was looking out for me, in a way - he's filled the role of my missing father-figured pretty well. Jason is a big brother who won't stop calling me Ballast (asshole), and Ballio is like an uncle. Or grandfather.
Grandfather makes him the most angry, so I'm gonna go with that.
Does that make me the captain's daughter? Hm. I ponder that as I make my way to the quarterdeck, taking the stairs three at a time. It would explain why the men stopped singing shanties about the captain's daughter, if they thought that applied to me. Then again, captains daughter can also refer to the Cat-o-Nine-tails on Marine ships (we don't use that shit here, if you're being a dick we'll just punch you), so what do I know.
"How's the view up there, songbird?" Captain Whellmar says, leaning up against the railing, spyglass in hand. I point him to about three o'clock, at the masts in the distance. He grunts. "Can barely see them. You sure that's a ship and not a gull?" He says, and I roll my eyes.
"One time. Mistake a bird for a ship one time, and he never lets you down." I mutter, and Ballio chuckles from where he mans the wheel.
"I distinctly recall four or five more times than that, Melody." I stick my tongue out at him, and he just chuckles, before changing our course. "Forty-five degrees starboard! Ship stranded in the Calm Belt!"
The men cheer as they begin to man the the rigging and set the ship into turning to the right, and Sister Gray groans happily with the strain. That trip to Water Seven had done the old girl good - two months ashore hadn't been good for any of us, but by god was the new hull a wonder. She was now a dark gray color, in line with her name, and the two water-wheels were much better attached to her sides, each easily twice the size of the originals. The Orlop deck was full of pulleys and wizzing chains that were so much smoother than my original mock-up. Some of the architects on the ship-building island had praised me for my ingenuity - and also called me a fool for some of the mistakes I made.
Hey, it worked to get us there, ok?
On the downside, the Marines now had a few ships that could sail the Calm Belt. None quite as fast as us, but pedal or even engine run ships attempting to ambush us were a bit too common for our liking.
Sister Gray was still the best one of them all, though.
"I'll keep an eye out for flags and sails, Melody." Captain said, seriously. "You go get the chain-gang started up - we've got a ship to plunder."
I made a sloppy salute, before flipping over the railing, landing on my feet. "Show off." I heard from above me, but I'm sure I was just imagining things.
What? I liked being all acrobatic and stuff.
I raced up to my seat on the front of the rows of pedals, and the forty men that made up our 'chain gang' went to their seats behind us. Once we were pointed in the right direction, the crew actually started taking the sails up - they just increased drag when we were in the Calm Belt.
The drum roared under my hands, much, much faster than it had been when we started. The crew was stronger than before - hell, most of the crew knew Tekkai at the very least by this point, and while it didn't exactly help them pedal, the muscle density that learning the Six Powers required certainly did.
BUM DUN BUM DUN BUM DUN BUM DUN BUM DUN BUM DUN
We raced forwards, easily fifteen knots at this point - and this was half speed - and you couldn't even tell when the Calm Belt began, because the wind on our faces as we cut through the still air ruffled our hair and clothes.
The only way to tell we were ignoring the winds was the lack of yaw or pitch, because our ship wasn't hitting any waves to move it up and down. If we could make it fast enough I bet it would bounce up and down like the speedboats my dad used to own when we took them on the pond. Sister Gray wouldn't exactly like that though - that kind of speed would be horrid on her.
Not for the first (nor the last) time, I heavily debated turning my drumming into the Jaws theme song. It would screw up our pacing, sadly, and without the rest of the orchestra it wouldn't have as good of an impact.
It sure would be cool though.
My seat on the ship was still attached to both wheels, however, but my pedals were much more re-enforced than the others - for good reason. Every time my foot came up, I reduced its weight - and every time it went down, I increased it by a factor of ten. Increasing specific parts of my body was easy by this point, even though some people had these fruits for years (cough cough WTF Mrs. Valentine/Machvice) and didn't progress beyond 'I'm gonna drop myself on people.'
Like... that was the absolute lowest of what I could do. It was like riding a bike and deciding that keeping yourself upright was as far as you were going to do. Not going forward at all, much less doing complicated things like wheelies or bunny hops.
This was sadly common when it came to Devil Fruits - for every Paw Paw or String String user, there were a dozen Chop Chop or Bomb Bomb users.
Bluh. You can't fix stupid, sadly.
At least there were people like Law and his usage of the Ope Ope fruit, or Luffy and his fruit. That was less of 'learning and going beyond the limits of your fruit with practice' and more 'screw this I'm gonna do what I want.' Because Luffy don't care about pesky limits and other nonsense.
Sadly for me, making it so only a single limb at a time was heavier or lighter at once was my limit right now. Hopefully with practice I could make just a single finger or hand weigh a ton - Tsunade flick, please? - but for right now I'll survive with just limbs.
We chugged through the Calm Belt towards our target, and as we approached the crew prepared their weapons. It was a three-mast galleon, it looked like - Merchant ship ahoy! "Look sharp!" Leondaro shouted from above, peering through the scope of his rifle. "She's got six cannons to stern."
"We'll stop outside her range, then." Captain shouts. "Any sign of Sea Kings? And actually look this time, Leo! If I end up inside a giant whale-shark-lizard again, I'm making you wash my clothes!"
There's a chuckle from the crew, but it's a grim sort of humor. Sea Kings are stupidly abundant here - not as abundant as they are at the inside of the Grand Line or Reverse Mountain - but they are an unfortunate issue.
I'm mostly sure by this point the that Calm Belt is their breeding grounds. Sea Kings are too damn massive for eating ships like ours to be anywhere near enough to sustain their diets, so the fact that they tend to attack ships outside of boredom or sport didn't make sense to me. I'm pretty sure the smaller ones - like the one that ate Shanks' arm and Luffy punched out for a right of passage - might eat ships for meals, but the absolutely massive ones that make the Calm Belt their homes are easily hundreds of sizes larger than Sister Gray.
An orca-looking Sea King had pulled a Jonah on us a few months ago, when we were smuggling some fruit and vegetables of the non-devil variety through a Marine blockade. Smuggling produce is pretty damn profitable and mostly safe, barring standard Grand Line weirdness.
We had been chugging straight through the line, waving merrily to the Marines who had tried to chase us to the Calm Belt, when a giant maw easily a quarter-mile wide had surfaced from beneath us without warning or even a chance to respond. Before we had a clue what was going on, a massive mouth lined with millions of razor-sharp teeth had clamped closed around us, and we were swallowed like a breadcrumb or a particularly crunchy candy.
We weren't even what the Sea King was going for, if the tens of thousands of fish that were in that things belly with us were any indication.
Getting out was a chore in a half - have you ever set fire to a half-ton of peppers and spices while you were standing next to the fire? My bandana was not nearly enough to keep it from stinging my nose and eyes. On the plus side, after that level of spice has infested your nose, nothing else really holds a candle. Spicy food of any sort was like a warm breeze.
We had ended up going out of the Whale-Shark-Thing's blowhole instead of its mouth, and had rapidly invested in a sonar addition to our ship that repelled all but the most stubborn of Sea Kings. We kept it off most of the time - because hello, brodcasting sonar 24/7 was a great way to make ourselves beacons to the Marines - except for when we spotted a Sea King.
Thankfully, the waters were clear, and we drifted to a slow stop about half a mile away from the Merchant vessel. She flew unfamiliar colors - a salmon or some other fish colored red and blue with white trim fluttered off her main mast. She was a six-decker, by the looks of it, with a good three dozen cannons on her sides. None on her stern, and with no wind there was absolutely no way for her to turn and broadside us.
Sitting duck. Or, if their standard was any indication, fish in a barrel.
I tried, yet again, to force my Observation Haki into working. Whispers, the sound of distant conversation, a seagulls cry, waves on wood.
Nothing useful.
I needed a teacher, damnit.
"She's armed, but not pointin' her guns at us, Cap'n!" Leonardo shouted from the crows nest. "People aboard - they look the rich and fancy type. Easy pickins."
"Why don't you go knock hello, Melody?" The captain shouted to me, and I gave a sloppy salute, before decreasing my mass to the lowest I could get it to go currently - about 1.28 Kilos, I had measured - and jumping, grabbing a length of rope as I went, the same one that attached my Parrots Perch to the main mast.
I lept an easy hundred or so feet in the air above Sister Gray, grinning. Gravity took hold and I began to fall, quite a ways short of the other ship. My size made some drag that slowed my decent, but not that much. The ocean approached rapidly, and I wondered if I was far enough out to drown before they tugged me in with the rope.
Then I jumped again, my feet making a shockwave in the air under me and propelling me another hundred or so feet up and forwards. Didn't take that much effort, even - just cup your feet a bit, and kick both feet rapidly towards each other, like a frog-kick or swimming a demented breaststroke through the sky.
Turns out, Geppo is super easy when you weight next to nothing. As a matter of fact, most of the Rokushiki are stupidly easy to use when I increase or decrease my weight. Tekkai and Shigan, being a matter of pure muscle training, get much stronger when I up my mass. Granted, I can barely move when I go to 300% mass, so its not quite usable in combat unless I feel like falling on people.
I could pay homage to Mrs. Valentine by making a super-strong version of her attack. Float up really high with Geppo, then increase my weight while using Geppo downwards to supplement my acceleration? Use Tekkai to harden myself for the impact, then max my mass once I hit the ground.
...If I ever feel the need to level cities or other massively large targets I'll put it in mind. So Mariejois, Sabaody, Akinu's ego mostly.
Focus, girl. Focus.
Rankyaku is one I'm still working on - I can move really fast with my mass at its lowest, but having no mass means the force I exert is pretty minimal. I can maybe make a little cut in the water if you give me a lot of time to focus? Not useful.
I'm hovering above the ship now, making tiny little jumps to keep myself aloft. The people below me are gawking, screaming or praying alternatively. Nice clothes, fat merchants, gaudy jewelry - looks like some Merchants with more money than sense. How they got into the Belt is a mystery, but I know how they're going to get out of it.
"Now. How hard do I want to knock?" I mutter. "Mostly civvies, so not too hard. Maybe... six hundred percent or so?" I grin wickedly. "Ship looks sturdy enough."
I focus on the energy within me that makes up my Devil Fruit power, before flexing it through my body. My mass increases suddenly, massively, and I start to fall. The air whips at my face, my hair flails around me, and I grin as I plummet like a stone.
"KNOCK KNOCK BITCHES."
I hit the deck of the ship with a crunch of broken boards and a splash of water as the ship suddenly bobs several feet lower, lurching like it has been struck by a barrage of cannon shots rather than a 50-kilo bear-foot teenager. Well, 300 Kilo bearfoot girl, I suppose.
I land with my knees bent, driving one fist into the floor as I land in a crouch. The splinters of wood and the sudden rocking of the ship are almost as satisfying as pulling off a text-book three point superhero landing.
People scream, and I feel a little bad about that - not too much, though. We are probably saving them from a quick death by Sea Kings or a slow death by starvation - a little gold isn't that big of a price to pay, is it?
One of the women faints, and I eye the absolutely ridiculous amount of jewlery she is wearing.
Well, maybe more than a little.
A gun fires from somewhere behind me, and I grin as I go light and simply float out of the way, the bullet passing me by and embedding in the planks below me.
Kami-e is super easy when you're really light - the wind from blows literally just pushes me out of the way. I tap the deck a few times with some well-placed kicks - my current record for Soru is six, but I suffice with just four right here - and launch myself at the gunman, a decently fit man in blue and red captains uniform.
"Soru!"
His eyes widen as, to his point of view, I suddenly appear in front of him. I quick palm-thrust to the solar plexus sends him to the ground, wheezing, and I casually rifle through his jacket. A gold-encrusted pistol that fires... are those really silver bullets? Are you shitting me?
He moans in pain as I reach through his pockets. "Hey, you deserved this shit, trying to run a cargo ship through the grand line with this sort of crew and no escort." He just whimpers, and I roll my eyes before jabbing the captain in the kidney with a single finger - not even that hard!
I pocket the pistol and the bullets, then pull the ceremonial sword on his hip out of the silk-covered scabbard. Gold sword, too. You've got to be shitting me. I snap it in half, not even bothering with Tekkai or weight enhancement. A gold sword, silver bullets. Christ on a cross, what's wrong with these guys?
I nudge the man with my foot as I stand up, but he appears to have passed out at some point. Whimp. Ah well. Easy pickings is easy pickings. I slug him onto my shoulder, before setting my weight at a comfortable 200%. I can move more than fast enough to deal with these punks like this, and have enough mass to punch a little heavier. Not that I think I'll need it.
Jumping down to the main deck, I land with a thud of feet on wood, before setting the man down carefully, then unwrap the rope from around my waist.
Twenty or so men and women in rich clothing stare at me, fear in their eyes, and I grin. "Afternoon, ladies and gents. Sorry to drop in unannounced(I think I can hear Jason groaning back on Sister Gray.), but I noticed that you fellas were in a bit of a situation. Now, me and my crew - being the lovely people we are - decided we'd help you out."
I begin trying my rope around the main mast, and the people scurry to stay out of my way as I do so. "Now, one of the issues of being in the calm belt is - as you can guess - an absolute lack of wind. So we're going to have to tug you out! Problem is, we do this by manually pushing the wheels to get us through the water." I tie the knot around the main mast as best as I can - sadly, knots are not my strong suit. I can't even tie my shoes without them coming undone - probably why I don't wear them, to be honest.
"See, my men are already preetttty tired from getting all the way out here. And you're ship is sitting a little heavy on the water. Pulling something like that would be a major pain, so I'm gonna have to ask that you move some of the things off of your ship and put them on ours! Just to make pulling you guys easier, you see." I grin at the rows of shocked faces, before turning and waving to my ship. There's an answering wave from Leo on the crows nest, and in a few moments Sister Gray begins her approach.
The rope creaks as they begin winding the winch, and the drum pounds at eighth speed as the chain-gang cuts closer in. Sister Gray approaches slowly, like a cat with cornered prey or a jaguar prepping for the kill.
"That... that doesn't make sense." Someone says behind me, and I turn to see a portly man in a burgandy three-piece suit. "The weight would be the same on either ship." He stammers as I turn to him, a grin on my face, and I skip towards him.
"Look at the brains on this one! Smart one, aren't ya. How did you guys get caught here with a brain like this on the ship?" I say, and he scowls at my mocking tone.
"Storm separate us from our escort ships, and pushed us over here. You won't get away with this, pirate." He spits the word out like a curse, and I flinch back as he spits. "The Marines that were escorting me will surely find us, and you will go to the blocks for this!"
I scowl. "You know, I was going to reward you for being smart by letting you keep one piece of jewlrey for yourself. Now, however..." His face goes pale as I lean towards him, and he moves to take a step back. I lash out and grab the front of his ugly shirt, pulling him off balance and down to my level. I can see the dawning realization on his face as he realizes that yes, the Marines might come save him, but they sure as hell aren't here right now.
"...Now, you get to hold the bag."
His face screws up in confusion, and I snicker before letting him go. He stumbles back and lands on his ass, and I toss a burlap sack at him.
"All the jewelry goes in there, folks. And if anyone wants to hide anything on their person, allow me to phrase it this way - there are quickly going to be sixty men on this ship, and if they think you're hiding something, they will be more than happy to frisk you. Thoroughly." I say, pointing at the red-clad man with the sac on his lap.
Sister Gray comes to a halt a few dozen yards away, directly behind the ship. There's a clatter of grapples on wood, before men come scurrying down the lines, daggers held between grinning teeth. I smirk, before heading below decks, shooting a grin at Whellmar as he lands on the deck.
Lets see what goodies this ship had that were worth a Marine escort, shall we?
---
Turns out, the answer is 'Priceless art that a Celestial Dragon wanted delivered quickly.' And by 'priceless art' they mean a portrait someone drew of one of the fat slaving fuckers. Not anyone I recognize, thankfully, but I still want to punch him in his flabby gob
Paintings of some fat noble in gaudy clothes, mounted on a dragon with a sword glimmering with light, or in the 'Washington on the Delaware' pose. Ugly things if you ask me, but then again, I might be biased.
I save a shred to wipe my ass with later, then burn the rest. They make pretty colored smoke, so I guess that's one thing they have going for them.
The rest of the hold is full of clothes of the finer sort - this season's fashion, straight from some south blue clothes designer. Dresses with weird cuts and suits with stupid stitching.
It might sell, maybe? If we make a stop on one of the Grand Line islands, but seeing as we spend most of our time in North Blue we may as well burn the stuff.
Ah well. At least the two sacks full of rings, necklaces and other goodies will sell for a pretty penny. Thats the problem with sacking Merchant ships, to be honest: you have to actually sell their cargo, they don't carry around cargos full of Beri. The World Government actually has a pretty decent banking system up, so the odds of a Merchant ship carrying anything Beri-related other than cheques or notes of sale is sadly minimal.
We tugged the ship back into the Grand Line, after we cleared most of their goodies and made sure the cargo bay wasn't hiding anything really important. Nope, just the paintings. Apparently the businessman - not my loyal bag holder, surprisingly, he was just a guest - in charge of this expedition actually was part of a bidding war to determine who would ferry the garish paintings.
As in, he paid money for the privilege of carting a Celestial Dragons' paintings through the Grand Line. I was super tempted to disable their rudders when I learned that - fucking sycophants - but Jason managed to talk me down to just snapping a mast.
I can feel my fist clenching as I think about the fucking Dragons and I force myself to focus on the crew underneath me, enjoying their celebrations.
I sigh heavily, hanging upside down from the railing of the Quarterdeck. It's one of my favorite spots on the ship - I can see the crew partying it up, guzzling down the expensive wines we took. I might join them in a bit - some alcohol would be nice.
A pair of booted feet clomp next to me, and I hoist myself up, sitting on the rail. Captain leans on it with a grin on his face, his hat tilted back, a bottle of brandy or something in his hand. "Good day, eh?" He says, passing another bottle of something to me. I pop the cork out with my teeth, taking a swig - wine, I think? Tastes fruity. Probably some really expensive aged shit, I couldn't care less - and shrug.
"Good enough, I suppose. Nothing worth much sadly, but we've got a good six, maybe seven million Beri all told. Maybe an extra half mill if we can find someone on Rubeck to buy the poncy clothes." I say, spinning myself around on the rail to face back out on the crew. Leonardo - the lightweight - has his pants on his head already. Every damn time that boy drinks, they end up on his head within minutes, and he parades around the deck in his boxers.
Not that I mind...
"Eh. I was considering headin' into Spider Mile for this haul." He says, and I freeze, bottle halfway up to my lips. He notices and sighs heavily. "Doflamingo and his crew left a long time ago, Melody. I don't see why that still worries you."
Because you don't know enough about that monsters tangled web to be scared. I think sardonically, then force myself to relax and chug down the rest of the bottle.
Yeah, probably wine. Rum is better.
"S'not that big a deal, I guess." I mutter, and he grunts before rasing his own bottle to his lips.
We sit there in silence for a bit, watching the crew parade around the deck. I guess I qualify as... second mate? Not really sure where I fit into the crews dynamic. 'Grand Line Person' isn't really a title, but it's what Robin did on the Straw Hat's crew. Did? Does? Is doing?
I've got... three years, I think, till he sets out? Pretty sure he left four years after Ace did. I can remember characters and events pretty well, but One Piece didn't really have a fantastic timeline.
"What's really bugging you, Melody?" He asks suddenly. "It was a good day - good haul, no one even got injured, you got to scare the pants off of some, what did you call them, 'Bottom-feeding Noble Lovers.'" He reaches out to put his hand on my shoulder, and I let him.
"I shouldn't be here." He sighs, chugging back another swig, and I continue. "I should be on the Line, Ravio - every day i spend free is another day she spends a slave, and I can't -
He groans. "Don't give me that shit, Melody, you've said it a thousand times yourself. You are nowhere near ready to fight your way into Paradise. I told you we would help you search, but you're dead-set on beating it out of the Dragons."
"I can't just drop this, Captain!" I say, spinning on my seat. "I need to rescue her, and I should be out there now, safety be damned -"
"Funny, because I'm pretty sure you don't need to fight to save your mother, Melody. A few million Beri and you could bribe a Noble or Marine Captain into finding and selling her to you." He throws his bottle down, and it shatters on the wood floor, before he reaches into his jacket and pulls out another. "You don't just want to rescue her - you want to save her, and you want revenge on the people that took her. And I'm sorry, but I can't let you do that just yet."
I glare at him, then swipe the bottle out of his hands. He sighs, grabbing another - fucking drunk. "Fighting the World Government is suicidal, and I can't let you do that." He says, lowly, and I growl before hopping off the railing.
"I'm taking the Parrot. I'll see you on Rubeck."
He just sighs. "Stay safe." By this point my temper is known to the crew, and they stay out of my way as I assemble my glider, before leaping straigh up into the air.
Six Geppo is enough to get me high enough in the air to glide the rest of the way to the island, and I sigh before hooking my legs in the hang bar and flipping upside down. Rubeck is a tiny blip on the horizon, but the night air is calm and warm, and the winds keep me aloft.
The ocean is quiet, and I can hear the shouting and carousing of my crew from behind me as I slowly drift over the ocean.
It's a familiar argument at this point. Whellmar fully believes that fighting the world government is a suicide mission, and I can't really blame him for it. He refuses to get his crew involved in the sort of open warfare I desperately want to engage in - we make a decent and safe enough living darting through the Calm Belt, and he doesn't want to change that.
The crew is willing to help me find my mother, sure. They've picked up my disdain for the Celestials, and every bit and scrap of information that they have found about them - about Nobles movements or what they buy or slaves that get traded or even who ate when and where - they collect and pass to me.
A two years of scraping, of digging through dozens if not hundreds of reports, sales, receipts, gossip and newspapers. Two years of hunting for every scrap of information I possibly can, two years of sneaking onto Marine ships and merchant houses to find records. Years of talking to escaped slaves or captured traders or people who venture past the human sales house.
Fifteen million Beri, scrapped and saved over two years of raiding and pillaging and ransoming, bought me copies of eight pages of records. Eight pages, with the sales information of every slave with the last name starting MAR who passed through that slave house.
Two years, and all I've managed to get is a number and an island.
The number is 00062895. It's branded onto my mothers thigh - that's where they put the mark on the female slaves. Male ones usually have it put on the arm or back, but apparently the female slaves are too important to mar their beauty with such an ugly mark in a visible place.
The island is Mariejois.
My mother was the 62,895th slave to pass through that particular island. And she was shipped to Mariejois.
I raise my bracelet to my lips - it sits comfortably around my wrist, rather than on my forearm like when I first got it. I press a soft kiss to it, before holding it against my forehead.
"I'll save you, mom. I promise."
---
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Feb 27, 2018Report
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