"Then we don't need to sack the village?" one of his crewmen asks while the Straw-Hat Boy stares dumbstruck at this latest development in the battle for the village. "We just gotta kill the girl, right?"
"What a lovely surprise, Miss Kaya." Klahadore pushes up his glasses. If he's not mistaken, it feels like a bit of sweat is on his forehead. This wasn't supposed to happen. His primary target is his crew—Kaya might have survived before from his softened heart—but now there's no easy way to save her. If she survives, she'll never trust him again…and neither will the villagers…unless he plays it off as fever-induced hallucinations. "What brings you here?" he asks as if simply bumping into her at the local baker's shop. For now, saving her is only a secondary goal, as from the very beginning.
"Merry told me everything" Kaya tells him.
"Merry? He lived?" Kuro is actually stunned that he left the other butler alive. "I thought…" I must've held back… "I had killed him." Kaya's face betrays utter shock. She entertained some hope of my innocence, he realizes. Even after finding me red-handed, with my claws out? She must have hoped he would be protecting her friends, or would have a change of heart and save the village. Too bad.
Klahadore zones out while she and Usopp share a dramatic exchange. They're both willing to risk their lives for their home. He faintly notes that she apologizes to the village liar for not believing him.
How ironic, he thinks. Not only does she have every reason to justify herself, but Kuro remembers a time when she would have hesitated to apologize for anything.
"Klahadore! If you want my fortune, I'll give it to you!" Kaya screams in an attempt to negotiate. Clearly, she is in a fever with cold sweat dripping all over her body. "Just take it and leave the village alone!" Klahadore remembers what he said to Merry the night before about preferring her whole estate as a gift. Here she is, offering it to him freely…yet it's not really what he wants, he realizes. He wants peace of mind, and there's only one way to get it from here on.
"Not good enough, Miss Kaya. Yes, I want your fortune, but I also want peace of mind. I spent three years earning the trust of the villagers here." Kuro decides to confide in her, like she always does in him. She used to talk, but now she must listen carefully. "I've grown comfortable; I can even relax." Without his realizing it, a fond half-smile plays across his lips as he recalls someone casually greeting him as he strolls absent-mindedly down a street. The more he speaks, Klahadore realizes he already has what he wants…and all he has to do is secure it once and for all. "Only when I have that peace of mind and your wealth…" even as he says it, Klahadore realizes he really does no longer care for the latter as much as he used to, "will my plan have been accomplished" he spreads his claws as if stating a perfectly logical chain of reasoning. Still, Klahadore bows his head and secretly berates himself for his blindness when he continues. "Thus the pirate attack on the village…and your accidental demise…are both quite essential." The last statement seems almost counter-productive. The only thing standing between him and his true goal is his past, and the way to get rid of it has always been to eliminate his crew…but without the village, he would have to regain trust elsewhere if too few people survived. Why not stay happily where he is? He wouldn't have to worry about finances or robberies as a butler…
"Kaya, run! Don't waste your breath on him! He's not the man you knew!" Usopp yells for the sickly girl to run. A pathetically flawed strategy. Does she have a better one?
Kaya draws the pistol Klahadore had given her parents the year they took him in. He frowns, not only because of her defiance, but because her facial expression—the way her mouth curved into a frown and her eyebrows slanted over cold eyes—reminds Kuro of himself.
"Leave this village alone!" she yells at the top of her fragile lungs.
"Hmm, you've really grown in the last three years…" And Captain Kuro follows you around, too. "And I've been at your side for all the changes, haven't I?" Indeed, Klahadore wonders if his influence may have kindled a darker side of generous Miss Kaya. "Even before you lost your parents and became ill…you and I spent a lot of time together. We went sailing together…" At a time when I was loath to go back to the water. "Took trips into town…When you had a fever, I stayed at your bedside day and night…" as Kuro speaks, Kaya's face contorts the way it does when she's about to cry. She must be remembering, too. "I suffered with you…I laughed with you." The manipulation is painful…but perhaps it's time to take a less honest approach. "I was ever your humble servant! I humored you, Miss Kaya, in all your silly dreams. And I endured it…"
Miss Kaya's eyes plead with Kuro not to continue, but he has to drive the nail in. He has a new plan now, one that involves demolishing any hope Kaya may still hold for him.
"All for today! The day I could kill you!" That does it.
Kaya bites her lips while tears stream like a river down her face.
"I, who was once the dread Captain Kuro…" if she was paying attention earlier, she might realize he refers to himself as that which he strove to get away from; thankfully, the act is convincing enough to make her lower her hands in increasing sorrow. Kuro sees Usopp growing angrier in his peripheral vision. "Bowed and scraped to a spoiled little girl…and catered to her every whim day and night." Kuro has to look at his claws and smile. His new plan is working brilliantly, but he can't look Kaya directly in the eyes anymore. She looks the way she did when her parents died. "Can you fathom my humiliation?"
Kaya's pistol falls from her shaking hands onto the ground beneath. So, she's still a soft heart.
"Kuro!" Usopp tries to attack him, but of course he dodges.
"Usopp…that reminds me…" The hard part is over, Kuro tells himself, now to incapacitate Usopp. "I still owe you for hitting me. You hit me with all your might!" It's a feeble excuse, but at least it gives him a reason to strike him down so he's out of the battle. At the expected time, something unexpected happens.
Of course, Kuro knew someone would rescue Usopp…but he didn't expect a stretchy rubber arm to fly at his face and knock him off his feet!
Ah, Kuro, infamous for his intricate, confusing plans…I knew we had something in common!
Sadly, I do not own him or One Piece. I would wish I did…but if this is the artist's mind, it's a place I simply cannot replicate!