Cherry paused is her faux revelry. 'Did he really just pass out?'
It was almost laughably absurd. Even more so since the lion was still awake, slowly dragging Holdem's unconscious form towards her. The implications of that were strange, to say the least.
Holdem knocking himself out wasn't part of the plan, though. "Hmmm…"
Cherry pranced over to a food stall and snatched a knife from the hands of its proprietor. Cherry saluted the man, then made her way over to Holdem.
The lion growled at her, but she paid no heed to the half-beast and got to work on… shaving it bald.
It put up one hell of a fight, but it could not match Cherry for strength, nor could its non-haki enhanced claws or fangs do any harm to her.
She took a step back and admired her work. She'd feel bad about this if the lion hadn't been attached to this loser; but as it stood, it was just very funny. Something that the townsfolk seemed to agree with, even as they quickly fled the area to not get roped into trouble.
After leaving the final touch, planting a big flag proclaiming Ushimitsu Kozo's flawless victory and depriving Holdem of his silver, she left the area and ditched her yellow disguise. She didn't reckon the man, whoever he was, would mind her using his identity for this.
Or if he did, she didn't really care. It would only matter if he got caught, and he was probably bound to be executed for his actual crimes anyways.
Checking around the town again, she frowned. "You gotta be kidding me."
Luffy, Zoro, and Law were all heading away from Bakura town with Okiku, Tama, and their new beast pirate ally(?). What surprised her was that Hawkins seemed to be perfectly fine, not lying in a ditch covered in his own blood.
Luffy's habit of not killing his enemies after kicking their asses was fine, the practice had certainly gained him some unlikely allies in the past.
Not fighting them at all when he was in the middle of hostile territory and he had them dead to rights was another thing altogether. What if Hawkins grouped up with more, stronger enemies later and used his odd abilities to turn the tides against him?
"Foolish," Cherry said.
It wasn't ideal, but fortunately Cherry was here to rectify the issue.
*splat*
Cherry wiped the bird poop from her face with a scowl. This was going to get way more annoying before it got better.
When Cherry arrived at the place where Hawkins had been shortly before, she saw several beast pirates that were lying on the ground as well as several of those straw dolls that Hawkins used to save his own ass. The dolls were in a small pile and looked as battered as the men, painting a picture of how they all popped out in quick succession.
"He must have run out of extra lives and decided to flee instead of following them, huh?" Cherry noted.
It was as prudent as it was cowardly.
Cherry began tracking the man down quite quickly as she ran along the rooftops; he didn't have the benefit of that stupid card this time. She wouldn't give him the chance to draw another either.
"Hm?" Cherry paused and dropped to the street below her where she picked something familiar up off the ground.
"HA!" Cherry barked a laugh. In her hand she held Hawkins' deck of cards, proof that her meddling in fate wasn't without worth. She pocketed the cards and continued the chase.
She just so happened to run into him when he turned back to find his lost belongings. No doubt the cards were very important to him now that he only had himself and no men to take his hits for him.
*slip* Blam!*
A roof tile popped loose as she trod on it, sending her tumbling to the street below and tackling Hawkins' off his mount in the process.
"Wha-?!" Hawkins exclaimed, before Cherry clamped a hand over his mouth.
"Looking for these? Hehehehe~" Cherry taunted him with his deck of cards, watching his eyes widen in realization. "What are you going to do now, I wonder? All out of dolls. All out of cards. All out of luck."
"MmMmMmMmm…" Hawkins mumbled, lifting his hands as if to surrender.
"What's that? You'll never give up and fight to the death?" Cherry asked with a devilish smirk.
Hawkins tried to shake his head in denial, only for Cherry to push down harder and prevent any movement.
"You're one stubborn guy, Hawkins. Who knew you were so loyal?" Cherry snickered as his eyes darted about in search of anything or anyone that might save him from this crazy woman. He found none.
"Good night~" Cherry torched the cards and slammed her fist into his head hard enough to pulp a lesser man, but Hawkins' desperate attempt at armament haki saved his life. "Still awake? Try another!"
*BAM!*
This time Cherry hit him hard enough to plant his skull into the cobblestone road beneath it. She had to give him credit where it was due, he was still breathing if very much unconscious. He wasn't counted amongst the worst generation for nothing.
"Now what?" Cherry wondered, rubbing her chin. "He's got that weird scarecrow thing, so breaking bones won't do much good as keeping him out of battle…"
She didn't really want to kill the guy, to be honest. Sure, he tried to take Tama hostage, but without further information she couldn't know if he'd actually have hurt a child. She couldn't just assume the worst because he was a pirate since, well… she was a pirate too, wasn't she?
'He's definitely a chicken who got forcibly recruited, too, so I can't just assume he was awful by association with Kaido…' Cherry was quickly cornering herself by overthinking things.
"Right, I'll just do that!" Cherry nodded, picking Hawkins' up by the collar and taking him somewhere less open.
Instead of sealing his devil fruit, which would alarm the Beast pirates greatly, she would just put a little something extra in there to muddy the waters. The next time he fought somebody, who was most likely to be one of her own allies, then he would be in for a nasty surprise!
"Hehehehehe, I should have thought of this earlier~! This is so much funnier than just sealing them!" Cherry muttered to herself. The best part was that it wasn't even as complicated as the seal was, so she finished it even faster.
Cherry hoped she'd get to see what happened when he did try to use it next. She had no idea herself, only that it would be messy and probably wouldn't kill him. This was mostly due to the nature of paramecia fruit, with their wildly different effects compared to logia and zoan types.
She finally started back to meet up with Luffy and Zoro, racing over land and arriving back in Okobore where an impromptu feast was taking place, courtesy of Luffy and his stolen treasure barge covered in food.
"See, I told you she'd be fine, Zoro!" Luffy said when he saw her.
"I didn't doubt she would be fine. I just didn't know whether to trust that woman's words or not!" Zoro pointed at Okiku semi-accusingly.
"Surely your companion has communicated with hand signs before, no?" Okiku defended herself.
"Hand signs? What hand signs?" Cherry tilted her head in apparent confusion.
"Eh?" Okiku yelped.