Chapter 2

Painful Decision

"Luffy!" A second shout tore in the air after Chopper's earlier shout at his captain, who had already made a huge splash as his body came into contact with the huge, vast sea that lay beneath him.

And the green-haired swordsman found himself running towards the edge of the ship, prepared to save his captain, who was already in one of the worst positions a Devil Fruit user could find them in. Naturally, devil fruit users had gotten their abilities at the price of not being able to swim in water. That meant that Robin, Chopper and Brook were already deemed unable to save the rubber man. All that was left was the swordsman, Sanji, Nami or Franky. However, ever since Luffy had saved Zoro from execution two years ago on East Blue, the swordsman had owed him a debt to his life, a debt that he felt he had not paid fully until date. Of course, on Thriller Bark, he had exchanged his life for Luffy, but still, his sense of honor and loyalty towards his captain was not something that he felt could be easily repaid with one or two actions. He personally felt that he owed Luffy more than that, since the boy was the one who enabled him to make his dream come into fruition. By joining Luffy and going on an adventure around the world to find One Piece, he was able to encounter a lot of strong swordsmen and fighters that he may not have been able to encounter if he remained cooped up in East Blue his entire life. Zoro was thankful to Luffy for giving him the chance to be able to expand his horizon on the world, and with that, strengthen his resolve to become the world's strongest swordsman.

Behind him, he could hear the rest of the crew move around in determination to save their captain. Usopp was already preparing the ship's cannons to counter attack at the enemies; Franky and Nami were in the ship's navigation room, preparing to release the Shark Submerge III so that they could go and retrieve Luffy from the depths of the water in which he had fallen into, and Sanji, Chopper and Robin were standing behind Zoro, preparing to warn him in case of any movements by the enemy ship. Zoro lowered his kimono, preparing to dive into the sea with all his three swords attached to his waist, when he suddenly sensed it.

Quickly drawing his Shuusui, he immediately thrust the blade in front of him towards the enemy ship and there was a loud "Gong!" as another bullet made contact with his sword. Sanji looked alarmed as he noticed Zoro's upper body had moved, ever so slightly, in resonance to the collision between his sword and a bullet. Zoro had barely managed to sense the bullet just minutes away as it was from contact with his head, and even then, the bullet had managed to produce a force of collision with Zoro's sword that caused the able-bodied swordsman to be pushed back a little.

The green haired swordsman's one eye widened in surprise, as he looked towards the blade of his black sword, at the point where the sword had made contact with the bullet. There was a small wisp of smoke originating from that area, and Zoro faintly heard a small plop of water below his feet. He looked astonished, as he realized just what this had meant. He had not been able to cut the bullet at all, instead being able to barely parry it as it attacked him from one of the enemy's firearms. In the past, whenever he cut enemy bullets he made sure to cut them cleanly in half, leaving the bullet to continue moving past him in two. But this time, things were different. Entirely different. More so, the force from the bullet managed to overpower the force from the swing of his sword and thus send him reeling backwards, even if it was for a millimeter.

"Oh no you don't," Onigumo softly spoke from his comfortable seated position within the ship. He had been watching the entire ordeal with the Strawhat pirates that bad been ensuing for the past five minutes or so, and once he saw Luffy falling into the water with blood oozing from several places of his torso, he had smiled satisfactorily. It was rare to see a smile coming from the Vice Admiral, who was known to be one of the harshest Marines there ever was in the Navy. He seldom smiled, only choosing to shout out his approval whenever he saw something that pleased him. However, this time, he had smiled once he realized that they had managed to successfully ensnare Monkey D. Luffy into their ploy. And the boy, being the idiot he was, had fallen for it hook, line and sinker.

That bubble of joy that the Vice Admiral had felt had threatened to be burst violently immediately he saw the Pirate Hunter move into action to save their fallen captain. He would have been surprised, but he had already expected this course of action from the Strawhat Pirates. Seeing them on Enies Lobby waiting for their captain to rejoin them so that they could manage to escape the Government Island after his fierce fight with Rob Lucci spoke volumes to him regarding the crewmate's loyalty to their captain. However, this time, he had decided he would give them no such leeway. They were not going to be able to retrieve their captain. Immediately ordering for an attack on the swordsman, he was confident that they would be able to obtain more than one head that day. Even if they had originally come here for Strawhat Luffy, there was nothing that stated that the rest of his crewmates, who also had large bounties on their heads, were exempt from their onslaught on the Pirate Crew. He was confident in the power of their latest weapon, after having seen it sink a man who had a bounty of 400 million berries on his head.

To his dismay however, the swordsman had been able to react well in time to parry the bullet away. They had been so close, since Zoro had been able to only detect the bullet when it had been inches away from his head. He wasn't one of the most skilled swordsmen to grace the Grand Line with his presence for nothing, Onigumo thought as he watched the swordsman's perturbed expression with a smirk on his scarred face. He wasn't quite done yet.

Immediately, he ordered for another attack on the ship. The man who was next to him, who had fired the previous bullet at Zoro, immediately readied his gun again. There was a "Boom!" as the speeding bullet made its way from the mouth of its gun and headed steadfastly towards the swordsman, who seemed too distracted in his thoughts to be able to make a rational decision to dodge the bullet.

If there was one thing that Onigumo should have realized by now, it was to always expect the unexpected from the rookie pirates.

"YOU DAMNED MARIMO!"

Sanji shouted these words as he rushed forward, and leapt into the air to deflect the bullet that was heading straight for Zoro. Seeing how his captain and vice-captain had been overwhelmed by the enemy's firepower made him realize that these enemies came here specifically prepared to take them down. They weren't just your regular old marines that always seemed to pop out of nowhere and launch an attack at their ship, as was the case in several islands that the Strawhats had been to in their tour of the Grand Line. In addition to that, they had some really good snipers in their crew, probably better than Usopp in that regard. He had already sensed the bullet as it made its way towards Zoro, having developed and matured his Observation Haki in his time on the Kamabakka Kingdom during the crew's two-year separation. He was probably better than anyone else in the crew in that department.

Sanji quickly spun in the air to generate friction with his legs as he activated his Diable Jambe, preparing to deflect the enemy bullet. From what he had seen regarding Zoro's and Luffy's earlier events, he had realized that this was probably a new technology that was developed by the World Government to aid them in the capture of pirates, especially after the increased number of pirates heading out to sea ever since the War of The Best two years ago. It was the same case with the Pacifistas that had been unleashed onto Sabaody Archipelago to enable the Marines there to capture the Supernovas that had all gathered there in preparation to set sail into the New World. After encountering Bartholomew Kuma and one of the government's own artificially made Pacifistas, PX-4, and having his leg nearly shattered in each instance with the attacks he made on the cyborgs, he had come to realize that he shouldn't underestimate any new methods that the government developed to stop pirates. Deciding to counter this new weapon they had, whatever it was, with his strongest fighting style, he kicked at the medium-sized bullet, hard.

Sanji's shout as he fell from the air immediately invaded the tense atmosphere that had been already there for a while in the Strawhat Pirate ship.

The bullet stung, hard. The fire that had been on his legs early dissipated as quickly as it had enveloped them and the blonde man immediately fell towards the water. His teeth gritted in air as blood gushed from his bullet wound, that had appeared on his right leg, he looked down to see the ship a few meters away from him. He must have jumped out quite a distance, he thought, and with the remaining strength in his left leg, as his right leg had been rendered numb now, he kicked at the air using his Sky Walk, heading towards the ship's direction. The amount of blood gushing out of his wound was increasing with each mile he fell through the sky, and the cook knew that he couldn't remain conscious for much longer. Drifting in and out of consciousness, as he expected himself to crash into the grassy field at the ship's top floor, he felt himself being grabbed by a firm pair of hands. He feebly looked up to find himself staring into Zoro's stunned expression, and with a sigh of relief, he passed out.

"Wrong move, Black Foot. After realizing the effects that Sea Prism has on Devil Fruit users, I don't think the effects would be the same with a normal human. The Pirate Hunter had the advantage in that he could use his swords, which are all Meitou, to deflect the bullets. You, on the other hand, weren't so lucky. You might probably not be able to use your right leg for a while," Onigumo thought, as he watched Sanji descend from mid-air where he had leapt into a few moments earlier to save Zoro.

On the Strawhat ship, there was general panic as the crew's cook had been knocked out and lay amidst the field atop the ship's surface. Nami and Franky had come up from the ship's command centre, after having heard Sanji's shout a few moments earlier. They had been halfway through managing to prepare the Shark Submerge to go and rescue their captain, the process having to take some time as the ship had remain mostly untouched for the two years of time they had been away from it. The only person who had come into contact with the ship was Silvers Rayleigh, and the former first mate of the Roger Pirates had only been to the ship to coat it. He had not handled any other of the ship's features, and therefore they needed a bit of revving up before they were back in normal functioning state again. They had been stopped halfway though, and with extremely good reason to.

Usopp had also rushed quickly from the position he was in, where he had been currently been preparing the ships cannons to counterattack the enemy. Having ignored Luffy's earlier orders, since they needed to fight tooth and nail to get their captain back, he was steadying the cannons in the enemy's direction, when the crew's cook collapsed onto the ship's surface.

"SANJI!" This was Chopper's voice, as the doctor currently studied Sanji's unconscious form. His eyes then came to rest upon his right leg, where most of his black trouser had been stained red by the wound that lay near his ankle.

"SANJI-KUN!" Nami screamed, as she descended towards the blonde man. She had been shocked to see him in such a state, as Sanji had never been in such critical state before. Actually, none of the crew's top three fighters had been in such a state before, even after life and death matches such as against Oars on Thriller Bark, or against PX-4 on Sabaody Archipelago. His face was rapidly becoming pale as he was slowly creeping towards death's door.

"What is with this wound?" Robin asked, as she looked towards Sanji's bleeding leg. She had clearly never seen such an injury caused by a bullet before. Before she could say anything further, Franky had hoisted the man on his bulky shoulders, and without a word, immediately rushed him to the ship's Medical Ward. Chopper was still dazed at everything that had occurred, opting to believe that it was something out of his worst nightmares. Such as when Bartholomew Kuma separated the crew on Sabaody Archipelago two years ago, whilst before they had been rendered powerless in front of a Marine Admiral, his nephew and two Pacifistas.

"Fire!" Onigumo gave out the order, and then, the floodgates were opened.

The Strawhats were going to learn just how harsh the New World was.

The flurry of bullets made their way towards the ship in swarms, each round being fired consecutively after the previous one. There was the sound of a 'Screech' in the air, and Zoro immediately jumped into action. He had to, being the Vice-Captain after all.

"Get down!" Zoro immediately shouted, and immediately, Nami and Chopper hit the deck. Brook followed suit afterwards, having been stunned too by the recent developments too himself, that he found himself too speechless to even make a comment. It was the worst time to even pull out any of his Skull Jokes, which he usually dished out once the general mood in the ship was down. However, this was clearly not one of those times.

Zoro and Chopper then stepped forward onto the deck, and Chopper felt a bit uneasy from the aura emanating from Zoro at that moment. Looking beside him at the man who he had looked up to ever since he joined the crew, he saw from the expression on his face, he looked ready to kill. Killing intent was leaking out of him as he tied his bandana to his forehead, and placed the third sword into his mouth. Of course Zoro was furious at the moment. Two of his crewmates were down at the moment, one of them fighting for his life in the ward, while the other one, the crew's captain's fate was still unknown. Zoro still held a flicker of hope that their captain was still alive and in a position that they could be able to rescue him, once they had managed to get through this ordeal. However, he felt ashamed of himself, since the second accident with Sanji had been caused by his moment of hesitation after he had barely managed to fend off the enemy's first attack.

What am I doing?

The green haired man mentally bashed himself, then with his spirit anew, he stood on deck to fend off the attacks that were steadily heading their way.

Beside him, the crew's doctor immediately took a Rumble Ball, and then shouted, "Guard Point!"Chopper immediately increased in size to as large as a hot-air balloon, with his fur growing exceptionally thicker and thicker.

Zoro poised himself beside the doctor, then shouted, "Santoryu; Three Thousand Worlds! As the rain of bullets reached them, there was a huge gust of wind from Zoro's attack, having put all of his strength into that attack, and the wind was enough to be felt by the Marines in the Navy ship that was quite a distance from them.

"We can still feel the force of his attack from here? Hoo, most impressive, I have to admit," Onigumo commented, putting his hand to his chin to rub it in a form of amusement.

Quite a number of bullets had been blown away; however, it had not proved to be quite enough. A fair share of bullets ran themselves into Chopper's skin, causing the reindeer to wince slightly in pain as he felt the force of the bullets colliding with his skin. It stung a little, he had to admit, but the force of the bullets impacting with his skin caused him to be pushed off the deck of the ship and onto the lawn, where the other members of the ship were taking cover. His thick fur was doing a good job of keeping most of the ammunition away from his skin and thus exposing him to a whole world of pain, unlike any he had seen before.

The ship took the brunt of the remaining attacks, and the effect was not pretty. The Thousand Sunny was indeed an impressive ship; of course, being eons better than the previous ship owned by the Strawhats, however, the sturdy ship was rendered all but powerless against the might of Sea Prism. The only type of ship in the world that could have been able to stand against the current onslaught of the special bullets was probably the Marine's own battleships and warships, and that was saying something. They had clearly thought this out through while preparing these bullets, Nami thought, and the only man in the world who was able of such a feat was Dr. VegaPunk.

There were cracks of wood all around as the residual bullets that had not been blown away by Zoro's long distance attack, or absorbed by Chopper's Guard point, hit the ship at various points. The white stair lining on the deck was almost completely blown away all around Zoro and Chopper, as the pieces of wood rained upon the Strawhats that were currently sprawled on the floor. Nami yelped when a small piece of debris scratched her arm and drew a small amount of blood.

"There's no time to even reorganize ourselves and form a counterattack against them," Usopp exclaimed as he covered his head from the flying pieces of debris that fell on and around him.

"At this rate we can't even manage to get the Shark Submerge and go rescue Luffy," Nami shrieked from her position on the ground.

The rain of attacks came to a halt, and in the wake of their cease they left a whole lot of damage and destruction, especially on the side of the Strawhats.

"Sir, we need to reload the guns with the bullets, "one man said to the Vice Admiral, who was watching the entire ordeal with the Strawhat pirates with glee. Clearly, things had turned out even better than he had expected, and this was proving to be a really good day in his books.

"Very well. But hurry up with it, we don't want them to escape whilst we are busy reloading our stuff," Onigumo replied sternly to the Marine that had told him about the state of the firearms. The short, stout man immediately exited the scene alongside his comrades, to the cellar where the bullets lay.

"We'll finish them with the next round," the Vice-Admiral thought, then thought to him just how pleased the current Fleet Admiral, Akainu, would feel once he heard that the man who he had failed to kill in the previous war, Monkey D. Luffy, had been successfully captured, and his crew obliterated at the hands of the Vice Admiral and his ship.

On the Strawhat ship, things were hectic, and it was certain by the looks on everyone's faces that they had definitely seen better days. Zoro was breathing a tad too heavily for using only one of his techniques, whilst the ship itself was a wreck and almost a shadow of what it used to be. It wouldn't be able to survive one more attack.

Robin, who was hunched over the ground next to Brook, uncovered her head and immediately poised her hands in a cross formation towards her chest.

"Zoro, I'll handle blocking the next set of attacks. Get back to the sheep and get some rest. I don't think you'll be able to handle taking care of one whole set of attacks by yourself, and Chopper himself doesn't look too good next to you," the older woman commented. True enough, Chopper had managed to revert into his original childlike form, but he was dangerously wobbling as he walked, trying to get a steady hold of his body. His hair had been roughed up in several positions of his body, the unaffected areas having more hair than the ones that were hit by the bullets. All around him, the bullets that had been absorbed by his enlarged form earlier lay scattered, but there was not a single sign of damage on the bullets, or even a dent.

Usopp however, had more pressing concerns at the moment, rather than those bullets that he had never seen before. With worry etched all over his visage, he looked over at Robin, and immediately protested to her suggestion earlier. "That's crazy, Robin! You can form a really good shield if you use your abilities, but have you seen the effect of those bullets? By the way Chopper is wobbling, I think they are Sea Prism bullets, and I have no idea how these things are even real. He was able to withstand the attacks by a milestone because of his Guard Point, but I don't think any of you Devil Fruit eaters should be going anywhere near those bullets!" The long-nosed man finished his statement, throwing a look at Brook, who had remained silent the whole time.

The skeleton nodded in affirmation to Usopp's request, seeing the truth in his words. Even if by chance he was able to withstand the bullets and be in a position where he could be able to assist Zoro in defending the ship as much as possible, Brook did not have any long-range distance attacks that he could use to fend off the bullets as well as Zoro did. All of Brook's attacks involved making contact with the enemy.

"Can't you just shoot at them, Usopp? I mean you are a sniper like them and I think it's impossible for you to miss at this distance," Robin suggested. She had clearly seen the logic behind Usopp's words, and had lowered her arms from her chest, but there was still this one issue she had not addressed regarding Usopp.

"That's a bad idea. Usopp won't be able to hit them. They have some really skilled snipers on that ship, and Usopp's attacks can easily be snuffed out by their heavier and more resilient attacks, "Zoro explained, having sat down next to the crew to take a breather. He was sweating from the additional effort that he had put into blocking these strange bullets, and breathing quite heavily. "The cannons are not even a choice, they have guns, those are easier and faster to reload than cannons, so we'll be sitting ducks after a while even if we decided to use the cannons to fire back at them," the swordsman added to make his point clearer.

"Then, what should we do?" Nami immediately shot up, having managed to sit upright herself. She had been devastated by all that was happening so far and more so by the fact that she could not do anything to help the crew in this situation. Frustrated since her attacks weren't strong enough to take out enemies of the caliber that they were currently facing at the moment, she desperately turned to her crewmates for an answer, hoping that they could be able to find a way out of this situation.

The looks on their faces told her otherwise, and she immediately regretted asking them.

Usopp was the first one to speak, after what seemed like an eternity of silence between the crew. He gulped, after thinking about the situation closely and regarding each and every factor. There was only one solution to this, and Usopp knew that the other members would definitely not like it. Still, he had to speak up. For the sake of the crew. For Luffy's crew and friends.

Clearing his throat, he opened up his mouth," I think we should….."

"I think we should leave this area with Coup de Burst immediately while the Marines are having their hands full at the moment," a voice suddenly spoke up from behind everyone, and all heads in the area turned to come face to face with the ship's shipwright, Franky.

There was general outburst of course after his suggestion, but somewhere deep inside, Usopp felt relieved that someone else shared his point of view. It really was the only way, and the sniper was glad that someone as strong-willed as Franky had suggested it.

"What are you talking about?" Robin and Brook immediately spoke up, thinking that they had misheard the blue-haired man the first time. No, he couldn't have been serious, Brook thought, as the words from Franky's statement replayed in his mind like a broken record.

"That's not even something to joke about," Nami immediately chided in, all her previous feelings of nervousness and tension having been dispelled by Franky's over-the-top suggestion.

"That's unacceptable," Zoro was the last one to put in his input, looking at the shipwright as if he had just seen the man for the first time. Franky stared at the swordsman as sternly as he had when he had made his suggestion, and none of them looked as if they were going to change their minds anytime soon.

Franky closed his eyes a little as if in thought, then said, "Listen to me carefully. Right now we are sitting ducks. We can't even manage to coordinate a proper counterattack; Zoro already has his hands full on deflecting all the enemy attacks."

At this point the swordsman intervened, taking what Franky said as a personal insult to his pride as a swordsman and the first mate of the Strawhat Pirates. "Oi, what do you mean by that?" Zoro asked, focusing his gaze away from Franky. "I can handle their entire attacks fine by myself, in case you haven't noticed," he added on, making sure to put special emphasis on each and every word he uttered. He was growing irate with the shipwright, and he intended to have Franky see that.

Franky however, still retained the same dangerously calm tone he had been using this entire time, which was quite a feat regarding the perilous situation the crew had found themselves in. "Yes, you can defend well against the bullets. But not all of them. The ones you can't get to are hitting the ship and at this rate this ship is going to sink. Forget saving Luffy, we'll practically be sitting ducks against the Marines if that happens."

Zoro opened his mouth again to protest and his words got caught in his throat. Franky was right, he realized it, and in the end no matter what it looked like it was a lose-lose situation for them. He could probably enter the water and swim towards the enemy ship to land a surprise attack on them, but in this situation, he was not even sure if he would be able to take out all the enemies, much less make it to their ship in the first place without drawing attention to himself.

He looked at the rest of the members to see if they could manage to wiggle a solution that would save the entire situation, but the solemn looks on their faces told them all he needed to know.

"I don't think Luffy would want us to die here. No matter what. Even if it means leaving him behind, if we all went and died here, he wouldn't be able to forgive himself. After losing his brother in that dreadful war, if he loses us I think there'll be no one left to stop him from taking his own life," Usopp explained, finally finding the courage to speak up after Franky had unknowingly given him the confidence to explain his point of view to the crew.

"Sanji is in critical condition right now, after losing too much blood from the wound he got earlier, and Chopper is currently seeing to him. If we continue this charade he might not be able to be treated properly, and he will die too. So I suggest we first get out of this place, then once we are in a safe position on the sea we can find a way on how to get Luffy back. I don't quite think he's dead yet. The Marines will obviously retrieve his body from the sea; he is a valuable bounty to them, after all, so there will be a definitely better chance to save him when that happens," Franky added on, and each of the members of the crew began to come round to his method of thinking. They each looked at him with a resigned look on each of their faces, but their eyes spoke volumes about the dedication they would have to save their captain once they had gotten to safe ground.

And with that, Franky turned his back to them, heading back to the ship's control centre so that he could manage to send them all off with Coup de Burst. It was just as hard for him as everyone else, he thought, as he saw the stream of tears making their way down on their navigators face, as she held her mouth to silence the sobs that would have broken out otherwise. A painful decision had to be made in times like this, and most times, it did more good than harm, as they would soon come to realize.

On the Navy ship, the snipers that had gone to reload their firearms with ammunition returned to deck and Onigumo regarded their return with a satisfied look. They had taken a bit longer to reload their weapons, but he could not blame them. They still had to get adjusted to their new weapons, part of which included reloading them as careful as possible. However, they still managed to get it done, so Onigumo had no complaints.

The men positioned themselves on the deck as they had before, and readied their guns, awaiting the command from their Vice Admiral. However, just before Onigumo opened his mouth to voice his approval of what would be their final wave of attack before the Strawhats were completely obliterated; there was something that sounded like a rocket in front of them, and once the Vice Admiral had turned his head to see where the commotion was coming from, his worst fears were confirmed.

The ship was already in the sky, and pieces of debris fell loosely from it to the sea that lay beneath them. They probably wouldn't be coming back there for a while.

A/N: To be continued.