Familiarity
Having been a part of his Pops' crew for about twenty years, Marco the Phoenix, the First Division Commander of the Whitebeard Pirates, was confident in his own abilities, those of his captain and those of his crew. After all Whitebeard had been known and feared as 'the Strongest Man in the World' since the death of the Pirate King and the aging pirate captain chose strong and good folks to join his crew and become his sons and daughters. In fact, there were so many strong pirates on the crew now that Whitebeard had decided to create a new Division again and as of the previous month there were now eleven divisions and eleven Division Commanders. Marco didn't think Kingdew would be the last new Division Commander created either: the so-called 'Golden Age of Piracy' was in full swing and there was plenty of room on the Moby Dick for more crew. Even if they couldn't fit everyone on the flagship Pops wouldn't turn people away, as there was always room in the fleet for another ship or three. That was a logistics and supervising nightmare to put off until it actually happened though.
However arriving on deck to supervise the shift change to find there was a total stranger slouched at the base of the mast cleaning a spear and being ignored by everybody bustling about was a bit disconcerting. Marco walked over to stand in front of the man, automatically stopping just out of the reach of the weapon resting across the stranger's lap.
"So who might you be, yoi?" The blond Zoan asked mildly, one fist propped against his hip.
The man glanced up from his work and grinned. "You must be Marco; I'm here to see Pops."
The First Division commander canted his head to one side as the stranger ran a polishing cloth over the almost two-foot long, double-edged blade at the top of the wooden shaft balanced across his knees.
"I know I've never seen you before, so I'm not sure why you seem to think you're part of the crew, yoi," Marco responded, voice still calm and pleasant. There'd be plenty of time for violence later, should it prove necessary.
"I never said anything about being part of the crew," the stranger said easily, rising to his feet and swinging the spear over his shoulder before glancing down to look Marco dead in the eye. "I'm just here to see Pops."
Marco was about to say that the man had to do better than that when something about the stranger's face made him hesitate and he took second, more assessing look. The man was slightly over eight feet tall with wavy dark blue hair that hung loose past his shoulders, amber eyes, freckles scattered across his nose and cheekbones and a rather wide grin. However it was the slightly hooked nose and massively muscular build that gave Marco pause, along with something ineffable in the shape of the man's face. Could it be…?
"Does he know you're here, yoi?" the phoenix Zoan asked as a sudden suspicion bloomed in the back of his mind.
"Nope." The stranger's cheerfully toothy smirk as he tilted his neck to look over the First Division Commander's head rang all sorts of alarm bells in Marco's mind. Sighing, the blond shrugged.
"Well, I may as well take you over, yoi." He turned and walked back down the deck towards his Pops' cabin, the large stranger ambling behind with his hands hooked over the belts that were slung around his hips.
Pushing the door to his Pops' cabin open, Marco nodded to the nurse before turning his attention to his captain.
"Pops, you've got a guest, yoi."
"Oh?" the massive pirate with the white crescent-shaped moustache turned to look at the blue-haired young man in his twenties who had ambled in after the Zoan. "So who might you be, brat?"
The 'brat' turned to face Whitebeard, swept off his black top hat and bowed politely.
"M'name's Edward D. Spadille, or so my half-sister told me after mother died and she took over raising me," he said, straightening up to look the pirate captain in the eye. "I just came by to introduce m'self, as it seemed the thing to do." He then planted his fists on his hips and waited for a response.
Spadille had been sitting on deck all morning under Concealment Haki and fretting about how he was going to introduce himself, but when he sensed Marco coming up on deck he decided to just wing it, thinned the veil masking his presence and waited for the First Division Commander to challenge him. Now he was standing in front of his Pops having said his piece he was feeling a bit nervous. What would happen if Whitebeard didn't believe him?
"You're my son?" the old man asked, fixing him with a piercing stare.
"So I was told," Spadille said shortly. "I wouldn't know if it really was you who knocked up my mother, seeing as I wasn't there at the time and she's dead now so I can't ask her. My half-sister said you were our father but she isn't around anymore either so I thought I'd stop by and find out for myself." This was the story he'd decided on, with Tempest being the half-sister who'd raised him to explain the various persistently mer-like habits he'd picked up over the years. She didn't even exist here, so claiming she was dead dealt with that possible loose end.
"Your sister was my daughter also then?"
Spadille smiled softly, remembering Tempest. He missed her terribly, almost as much as he missed Zoro. "Oh yes. She was kick-ass with a bisento, you know. The Marines didn't know what hit them."
"Marines?" Whitebeard asked sharply.
Spadille scowled, folding his arms across his chest. "You know how it is, people find out your father is an infamous pirate and they can't sell you out fast enough," he muttered. "She got me out of there and then went back to buy time so I could escape properly. Never saw her alive again; saw the body though." The story was based on the truth of several different encounters with Marines that he'd had over the years in his own world and the fact that he knew he was never going to see his big sister here, ever. That hurt still.
"I am sorry for your loss," his Pops rumbled quietly.
"Tempest was cool," Spadille said quietly. "Really weird for a mermaid, but that just made her more special. I miss her." He sighed, fiddling with the goggles on his hat as he stared at the floor. "Even though it was years ago now."
There was a short, awkward silence. Spadille broke it.
"Well, now what?" he asked, raising an eyebrow at his Pops. The old pirate laughed.
"Gurararara! You are my son!" he roared cheerfully. "Today is a good day! Will you join my crew, my boy?"
"Thanks but no thanks, Pops," Spadille said with a happy grin. "I'm gonna make it big by myself, just to prove I can. Just you wait a few years and I'll be a Yonko!"
"Who are you planning on replacing, yoi?" Marco asked curiously. Shiki's territory was disintegrating more slowly than anybody else had expected but falling apart nonetheless, making it easier pickings than anywhere else, but there was also Kaido and Big Mom to consider.
Spadille's grin sharpened, giving him a slightly crazy look. "I think I'll flip a coin when the time comes," he informed his audience. "I've got plenty to be getting on with before then."
"Gurararara! I wish you luck!" his Pops chuckled. "What kind of things will you be doing?"
Now for the fun part. "Oh, you know," Spadille said casually, "picking out a good crew, getting them up to scratch, visiting my wife and kids, tracking down my husband, the usual." He grinned. "After all, what's life without family?"
Spadille was introduced to all of the Whitebeard Pirates currently on board by Whitebeard himself, who then announced they would be celebrating his son's existence for the rest of the afternoon and evening. This news was greeting with cheers, much alcohol was produced and within the hour the blue-haired man was laughing and chatting with the Division Commanders as though he'd known them for years. Spadille was very charming and witty, had an uncanny knack for picking up on things that people found embarrassing and certainly had his Pops' capacity for alcohol: Marco had to wonder if he was even capable of getting drunk after seeing the younger man drink Kingdew under the table and then bounce off to join in the dancing without his feet so much as faltering.
As the party progressed Marco learnt a number of interesting things about Spadille. Firstly that he didn't seem to consider gender to be a particularly significant criterion for choosing potential bed partners, as Marco witnessed his cheerful flirtation with Thatch, a recent addition to the Fourth Division who didn't seem to be able to decide if Spadille was serious or not. Secondly that he was an incorrigible flirt, as right after making Thatch blush and retreat he homed in on a cluster of Pops' nurses and started chatting them all up completely shamelessly.
"I thought you were married, yoi?" Marco asked, coming up behind his new brother as three of the nurses giggled and a fourth blushed.
"My wife has no objections to my picking up beautiful women so long as I share them," Spadille said cheerfully, leaning over to kiss the cheek of the nearest nurse, "which is the same condition I have for her picking up hot men. She's got higher standards than me though so that doesn't happen too often."
"I suppose it's all right for some, yoi," Marco conceded, wondering where on earth Spadille had found a woman that accommodating. Not that he was interested in getting married, but most women expected a long-term partner to be exclusive.
"Hey, I'll have you know that she picked me, not the other way around," Spadille informed him with a smirk, "and marrying her was the smartest thing I ever did. Saved my life too: Precious really doesn't like it when people try to kill me and she's way more dangerous than I am."
"Why is she at home raising the kids then, yoi?"
Spadille gave him a look that suggested the blue-haired man was wondering if the phoenix Zoan had lost his brain somewhere. "Children are important," Whitebeard's son said slowly, enunciating every syllable clearly. "Children need to be protected and nurtured until they are old enough to manage by themselves. So the strongest, smartest, most ruthless parent is the one who needs to raise them, as everything else is secondary to caring for the children." He sighed and pouted before continuing normally: "I miss spending time with my kids but we're not going to be able to hide forever, so I need reliable people to hand for when the Marines finally catch on and an island to house my family on."
"So you're becoming a pirate to protect your family?" one of the nurses asked, leaning into him and fluttering her eyelashes. "That's very sweet."
"Well there isn't much else I could be with Pops being who he is," Spadille pointed out with a wry grin, "so I may as well make the most of it. I do miss my husband though; I'd rest easier knowing he was keeping an eye on the kids as well."
"What happened to him?"
Spadille shrugged. "The three of us had an accident in the Florian Triangle about ten years ago and we haven't seen him since."
"Accident, yoi?" Marco probed curiously. The Florian Triangle was a total mystery. People disappeared there all the time.
Spadille's eyes went distant. "No idea what happened but I found myself on an empty island in Paradise six years later."
"Six years?" Marco repeated in shock.
"Yeah," his newest brother said quietly. "No idea what happened in the between time. My wife wound up in South Blue just four months after the accident and being completely without means of support wound up staying there through the Purges. Hearing about that really scared me." He shivered. "She could have died."
Marco whistled lowly. Spadille's wife had to be something special to have kept herself hidden from all the Marines storming around South Blue in the year after the Pirate King was executed. Some Marines had killed every single woman of child-bearing age and all the children in the range decided by their superiors as a way of being 'thorough'. "So your husband's still missing I take it then, yoi?"
"Yeah," Spadille said sadly. "I miss him something fierce and I think Precious is starting to go a bit crazy as it has been longer to her than it feels like it's been to me. We've been together for so long that managing without feels like being crippled. I can't imagine what it would be like to be all alone without either of them." He shivered again, eyes haunted.
Marco wondered how long the three had known each-other to be so co-dependent; from before even entering their teens, most likely.
"How old are you, yoi?" He asked curiously.
"Er," Spadille's eyes crossed. "Twenty five. I think. At least, I should be twenty-five. Precious is twenty-four." He paused. "Do I look twenty-five?"
"Just about, yoi," Marco agreed, slightly amused. He supposed losing six years of your life could mess with anyone's mind but Spadille certainly didn't look nineteen, so he had at least aged during his Triangle-induced absence.
"That's a relief; my wife still looks seventeen!"
Marco twitched. Lucky bastard.
Over the following week Spadille hung out with the Division Commanders, chatting, sparring and helping out with various ship-board duties. In that time Marco determined that his brother was a smart, thoughtful and unbelievably strong man who was far more mature and experienced than his age suggested. He also discovered Spadille was slightly narcoleptic, a truly terrible tease and completely and utterly shameless. The latter discovery was made after some bright spark dared him to kiss Jozu, which Spadille promptly went for right then and there. Jozu took it pretty well, but the unfortunate wit who'd dared Spadille to do it had not enjoyed what the Third Division Commander did to him afterwards. Jozu was slowly gaining a reputation for being able to straighten out even the most troublesome of the new recruits the Whitebeard Pirates picked up, making use of creative cruelty, patience, hard work and no small amount of pain.
Sparring against Spadille had been an interesting experience: Marco's newest brother carried a yari and clearly knew how to use it, but when invited to spar by the First Division Commander he put the weapon aside and fought with his fists. The phoenix Zoan found out the hard way that Spadille was a master at using both Busoshoku and Kenbunshoku haki in combat, smoothly pre-empting attacks and landing devastatingly powerful hits that would have put the First Division Commander in the infirmary had he not been able to both use haki himself and regenerate damage with his Devil Fruit Ability. Spadille's combat style was a mix of instinctive brawling, Fishman Karate and at least three other styles Marco didn't recognise, but the blue-haired man shifted from one form to the next with the ease of long familiarity. He also grinned the whole time, which suggested he wasn't fighting all out. Marco couldn't bring himself to be offended; he wasn't fighting all-out either and he'd enjoyed the spar despite the damage he'd taken.
When Vista had asked for a spar too Spadille had picked up his long spear, twirled it between his hands and then demonstrated how superior reach can be used to thwart a highly experienced swordsman even if that swordsman was slightly quicker on his feet. Spadille finally ended the fight by catching both of Vista's blades with the sharp end of the spear, side-stepping and spinning the shaft to catch the Fifth Division Commander across the side of the head. The speed of the blow made Vista stagger and by the time he recovered Spadille had his spear-point resting in the hollow of the other man's throat.
"Yield," Spadille suggested.
"I yield," Vista said agreeably. "You're very good at fighting swordsmen."
"My husband is a swordsman," Spadille replied, "and I've yet to meet a better one."
"Well, when you find him again bring him around so I can fight him too," Vista said, taking his defeat with aplomb.
"I will do," Spadille promised, holding out a hand. "Good fight."
Vista shook it. "Is your spear blade made of Sea Stone?" he then asked. "It has a certain sheen."
Spadille smiled. "The blade and the final two feet of the shaft are both Sea Stone," he admitted, "but the rest is Adam Wood."
Vista whistled. "Very effective against Devil Fruit Users I imagine."
Spadille's grin was not remotely reassuring. "I love surprising people," he purred wickedly, spinning the long polearm like it weighed nothing at all, "and nothing surprises a Devil Fruit User like twenty inches of Kairoseki through a vital organ. Logias are the best: they think they're untouchable even while they're bleeding out on the ground."
"You don't like Devil Fruit Users, yoi?" Marco inquired carefully.
"I've got nothing against them," Spadille said lightly, "but the arrogance of some of them is mightily tiring. And they're generally so lazy, too, thinking that because they've got a special trick they don't need to work at winning. To properly be considered a master of anything takes research, practice, hard work, ingenuity and finesse. Most Devil Fruit Users wouldn't recognise finesse if it danced in front of them naked waving a flag."
Marco chuckled at the mental image that conjured up. "I'd have to agree with you," He confessed, "as most Fruit Users do seem to go for brute force over strategy. Even among Pops' crew, yoi."
"Sometimes I wonder if there's something in Devil Fruit that destroys peoples' common sense," Spadille grumbled good-naturedly, "but then I remember that arrogance is a universal human condition."
"Who taught you Fishman Karate?" Namur asked abruptly.
Spadille turned to look at him. "My sister and my wife," he said evenly. "Well, my sister taught me a little of merman combat that can be made to work for people with legs but there isn't all that much of a difference."
"Who taught your wife?"
The blue-haired man shrugged. "One of her sensei I believe. She was trained from an early age in all manner of things and only passed a few of them on."
"What does your wife do?" Blenheim asked.
"You mean, what did she do before I married her and she started raising our kids?" Spadille clarified.
"Yes."
"She was a child assassin."
"What?!" All five Division Commanders present exclaimed.
Spadille shrugged. "By the time I met her she'd had four years of intensive training and nearly that long again of part-time training alongside taking contracts and I knew her for nearly three years more before she married me. I love her to pieces but for the longest time death really was all she knew. It makes her a bit odd sometimes but everyone's got issues."
Marco calculated that –if Spadille had married his wife when she was fourteen as his various hints suggested– he'd likely met her at eleven, so she'd been killing people since she was seven and in training from the age of three. That painted a rather frightening picture considering Spadille was perfectly open about his wife being more capable in combat than he was.
"But she's sane, yoi," the phoenix Zoan determined, hoping it didn't sound too much like a question.
"Very much so: her shishou was very careful to ensure she kept a relatively healthy emotional balance," Spadille reassured him. "She's surprisingly normal and well-adjusted considering and is perfectly happy with not killing people if it can possibly be avoided."
Well that sounded much, much better than how the rumoured CP9 were supposed to be.
"Will we meet her?" Jozu asked.
Spadille shrugged. "Probably not for years yet. The kids are still too young to be left alone for any amount of time."
The conversation then moved to lighter things and when Spadille vanished a few days later Marco was left rather looking forward to his next visit.
Long Tew, bastard child of a noblewoman and a slave, raised amongst wealth and hardship to serve his better-born siblings, lay on his back on the deck of the Morning Glory and panted harshly, his sword loosely gripped in one fist. His new captain was a much kinder man than his former one had been and much more interested in the lives of his crew, but right now the swordsman wasn't in the mood to appreciate that. The newly returned Spadille had just taken him apart in a spar and then made him pick up his rapier and try again. And again. And again. Then as he'd tired his form had started to suffer and his captain had taken to just dodging and whacking him with the butt of his spear every time he left an opening. He was black and blue, his lungs were on fire and his muscles ached like never before. He felt the deck vibrate slightly as his captain walked over to stand next to him.
"So what have we learned?" Spadille asked brightly, leaning on his spear and tilting his head down so the exhausted swordsman could see his face clearly.
"You are a monster," Tew panted, "and a much better fighter than I am."
"True," his captain conceded judiciously with startlingly little arrogance, "but not what I was hoping for. You are a speed swordsman rather than a power type Tew, and while you aren't very fast at the moment you may well get faster. Faster than me, even. But you play around, you tease and feign and that gives me time to watch, defend and plan a counter-attack. If you'd gone straight for the kill you might have landed a hit."
Tew considered it. It was true that he liked to get a feel for his opponents before attacking properly, but what his captain was saying was that it also gave his opponents time to get a feel for him. This, if they were stronger than him, could be fatal. "So I need to be more decisive?" he managed, his brain already gnawing at the problem and how it could be solved.
"Exactly," Spadille beamed. "Of course you also need more speed and stamina and experience, but those will come with training. Changing your style to fight more decisively can only be achieved within your own mind and heart." He chuckled. "At least you have good form to begin with. I had so many bad habits when I started learning with this," he patted his spear, "that my teachers despaired of me some days."
"Sir," Tew groaned as he levered himself into a sitting position.
"Go take a bath," his captain advised him kindly, "then stretch and practice forms for a few hours so your muscles don't cramp. Sagi, your turn."
As Tew stumbled off belowdecks he saw the Longlegs woman launch a barrage of kicks at their captain, who had set his spear aside and was fending her off with his bare hands and no obvious difficulty. Yep, his new captain really was a monster.
Alvel, the Fourth Division Commander, watched in quiet amusement as Spadille neatly wrong-footed Marco again. Their captain's only biological son did this to all the Division Commanders and quite a few of the crew as well, but it was always funny watching Marco fall for his tricks because until Spadille had shown up nobody had ever teased Marco like that. Or Jozu for that matter, but the Third Division Commander managed to fend off his new brother with greater aplomb and dignity than Marco ever achieved. Not that Spadille was deliberately cruel or truly unpleasant; he just seemed to get a kick out of needling Marco into losing his composure even for just a fraction of a second. The blue-haired man had corrupted one of Alvel's own Division to his cause and Thatch had taken to chatting to Marco and the rest of the Commanders even when Spadille wasn't there. None of them minded in the slightest: Thatch might have been a relative newbie but he was smart, very skilled and easy to get along with. Unlike Spadille he didn't feel the need to tease in every single spare moment and he was charismatic enough that Alvel was thinking of recommending him for Division Commander the next time Whitebeard decided to expand their ranks.
Initially Spadille had seemed like a friendly, polite and charming guy, but familiarity bred contempt and Alvel now knew that his brother was a reckless and wicked tease with a very nasty temper hidden under his usual cheer. He was capable of being serious and responsible but he preferred not to be, poking at the self-important dignity and narrow-mindedness of people like Zymon the Second Division Commander, who was a bit of a stick-in-the-mud for a pirate and had trouble dealing with Spadille's equal-opportunity flirting.
Alvel knew Spadille wasn't seriously interested in most of the people he teased, complemented, charmed and flustered: his new brother was just a very tactile and social person who either disregarded or had somehow failed to acquire a normal understanding of other peoples' boundaries. He was also very open about all kinds of things that people generally weren't, like if he thought you looked good today. A lot of it wasn't even intended as flirtation, leading Alvel to believe Spadille had not had a remotely conventional upbringing. The way he touched the people around him without even noticing was definitely a massive clue, as was his frank, honest appreciation of other peoples' skills and physical beauty, his total lack of body modesty and willingness to take people as they were regardless of their appearance. In fact, he didn't even seem to notice that some people –even on the crew– found Blenheim's size a bit intimidating, or were slightly put off by Namur being a Shark fishman. To Spadille they were all just people, which made him just like his father really: Whitebeard had welcomed them all into his family without hesitation after all.
Balis shifted his foot back in line as his captain tapped his calf with the butt end of his spear, slightly embarrassed at having misjudged his stance again and determined to do better. Captain Spadille didn't think his being big or a fishman meant he was stupid or vicious: Balis got the same treatment everybody else on board did, tailored slightly for his size and skill-set. His captain was teaching him Fishman Karate because it was his heritage, but Balis was also learning lots of other things because his captain talked to him about other things while he was practicing different blows, blocks and stances. Things like the various types of islands on the Grand Line, how Log Poses worked, all the various different roles found on board ship and why they were important. His captain wanted him to be able to choose what he wanted to do with his life rather than just go along with what other people had told him to do.
The wotan was working very hard at learning Fishman Karate because he knew how powerful the style was and he didn't want to be a liability to his captain. He was also thinking hard about all the things his captain had shared about giants and fishmen in general in the past weeks and months and was gradually working out how he felt about some of them. He was also learning lots of new words because Spadille didn't talk down to him, yet was willing to explain anything Balis asked about. It was a good experience: the wotan was happy with his new life.
Kobold loved his new guns and loved practicing with them so he could learn how to reload quickly and smoothly. What he didn't love were his lessons with Albatross, the ship's Log-keeper, who had been ordered to teach him reading, writing, mathematics and a host of other things that just didn't seem important. But his captain had ordered him to learn as well as ordering Alba-san to teach, so Kobold was trying. It was difficult but at least Alba-san didn't call him stupid or shout at him when he made mistakes.
The pistachio-skinned boy was also learning a bit about Albatross herself, which was actually interesting because she'd joined Spadille when she was thirteen and she was going to be eighteen in a few more months. When he worked hard or wanted to know why he needed to know something or other Alba-san would sometimes tell him about a thing Spadille had done that he couldn't have managed without knowing the stuff Alba-san was teaching. Kobold wanted to say he would never do any of that stuff, but being able to if he wanted to would be rather cool so he knuckled down and tried. Alba-san didn't make him write out the answers to her questions or insult him when he had trouble holding the brush properly, which made her way better than the other people who'd tried to teach him stuff.
The subjects that interested Kobold the most were geometry, physics and meteorology, because knowing them would make him a better sniper. They weren't easy but he could see for himself how useful they'd be so worked hard at them. Being able to read the books the captain had on those subjects properly did make finding useful stuff much easier, not that he'd ever admit it. Alba-san would smile her knowing smile that said she was laughing on the inside if he did. Well, even more than usual: she often smiled like that.