parting is such sweet sorrow
It's the end of the road for her, but not for them. (Chapter 430)
Author's Note: Oda made me cry over a goddamned pirate ship. I hate that bastard. (but he's a fucking genius)
When she sees the ship coming, a shudder runs through her frame. She knows she cannot go any further, but she has saved her family. She breathes, and then there is pain, a cracking, horrendous noise and she splits almost in half, while her family screams her name, and her captain begs a man on the bigger ship to save her.
She wishes she could take them to the ends of the sea and back. The fire rolls up her mast as she apologizes to her crew, to her captain, who cries unashamedly, apologizing himself.
"But I was happy," she tells them. She never once regretted it. She wore those scars as proudly as any of them, because they marked her as indelibly a Straw Hat as any flag ever could. She wishes she could go further with them, be with her family until the end but she has gone as far as she can.
She got them this far, and she hopes there will be another ship, stronger than her, one that can get them to the ends of the earth. She hopes they will remember her.
Crystalline flakes of snow fall in lazy circles from a sky that's a deep shade of gray, and the water reflects the flames that consume the straw hatted Jolly Roger flying high, and its ashes dance crazily in the breeze.
She sees them all standing there on the boats beyond. Her sniper, her navigator, her swordsman, her doctor, her historian, her cook. And her captain. Her captain who will be the King of the Kings, and sit upon the throne of the sea.
"Thank you for taking good care of me until now," she tells them. "I was so happy."
It's the end of the road for her, but not for them.
"I love you," she whispers, and then there is darkness.
And that is enough for her.
