AN: My deepest apologies for not updating sooner on any of my stories. At first I had exams for Uni, and then my grandfather's cancer took a turn for the worse. Rest assured that I am working on SnI:CttMoT, but it may be a little longer before it is updated.

Birthday: Tony Tony Chopper- December 24th: Experimental Toxicologist

Grunt….clink….rattle….thump….ugh….

In a dark, silent room a man slowly roused from unconsciousness. Had he known what awaited him…he would've fought every step of the way.

Drest (1) was born to a pair of basket makers. Having no other skills, he followed in their footsteps…until he heard of the treasures waiting to be found. From that moment on, he came to resent his perceived poverty and took steps to change his fortunes through petty theft. When the thefts became obvious and accusations began to fly, he stowed away on a merchant ship and from there joined the first pirate crew he found. He was a typical pirate- he was scruffy, dirty, and smelly and had a slightly pinched face. At the moment, however, he looked completely different- a shaved head, and very pink skin, like he had been scrubbed raw.

When he opened his eyes he saw a large dark room. Naturally, he was very confused; after all, the last thing he remembered from last night was entering a bar. Waking up groggily, he attempted to stretch and got a very unpleasant surprise.

"Wha….wha' tha 'ell..? Where da 'ell am I? Som' kinda sick 'ospital? Snit, wha' be wit deese c'ains? Oi! Oi, lanky boy! Wake up, lanky boy! Wha's goin' on, lanky boy? Don' be ig'norin me! I kno' ya ain't sle'pin, lanky boy! Up ya da'gum boyo!"

Bloodshot eyes opened slowly, pupils dialated and cloudly. They wandered across the room, finally landing on the source of the bright. 'Bright…so bright,' the eyes thought, 'must have bright. So much bright…need bright…need….' The eyes reached out, clawing the air, reaching for the bright just beyond their grasp. Drest eyed the curling hands warily, trying not to see the crazed eyes behind them. Even though he couldn't really move while lashed against the wall of the room, Drest still made an attempt to inch away as fast as possible.

"No use talkin' to him freshie." A raspy voice sounded out from the gloom, "He hasn't got a lick of sanity left; been here too long. We all have. Ya just can't see it sometimes." Drest's head whipped around, ringing, and tried to find the one who spoke. "Here freshie. Right across from ya." Drest's eyes landed on the indicated person and he flinched in surprise. The man opposite him was broad-shouldered and muscular, tattoos proclaiming his loyalty to the navy up and down both arms. He was also bald, and his eyes, unlike the insane man's, were a piercing blue. The man smirked lightly and Drest scowled at him. "What are ya glaring at me for freshie? I didn't put you down here."

"Ya a marine ain't ya? Ya good as did den. Dey put ya 'ere fer slakin on tha job or wha mari boy?" the marine frowned at Drest, expression twisting into disbelief, like he couldn't understand why Drest wouldn't like him.

"What the hell are you talkin about freshie? You think this is a Marine operation? Are you insane? I'll admit, there's some things the Navy does that are sick, but we'd never do this." The man grimaced, "Never in a million years." He shook his head roughly, fighting back nausea. "The navy experiments in medicine, but we don't use innocents or the unwilling…unless they're pirates. I mean, look over there. That guy, on the right, two down from you? He was a fisherman from Pedrosa. Loved fried shark, but hated grilled tilapia. Had an Uncle Jon who could fit 12 olives in his mouth, and a cousin Lana who could burp the alphabet after a cup of tea. He got picked up as he was walking back home after a day fishin. Don't believe me? Ask him; he's not so far gone that he won't answer." Drest looked at the marine in disbelief and then shrugged. Drest called out, looking, but unable to see the man he was addressing.

"Oi! Fish boyo! Where ya from boyo?" The almost inaudible murmur Drest had been trying to place since he woke up rose to an understandable volume.

"Hmmm …ahhh… I'm a liddle tea, tea pot and is a glass full, full, full and I know my mother loves me… til our pants all fall down… under the sea… where life is wetter to you and me… and we burn our feet… and fly so high in the sky and go fishing for roses! HeeHEee. Too looOOOng. Hee…hee…hahhHHH!" The ramblings grew from a whisper to an ear-rending screech and then cut off abruptly as footsteps echoed down from above them. Drest's eyes widened as he turned back to the marine. They exchanged what-the-crap looks and after a few minutes without any other noises, they relaxed slightly.

"Wha tha 'ell was that mari boy! Ya said he was sane! Tha't ain't sane boyo!" Drest hissed, unnerved by the gibberish. The marine shook his head, bewildered.

"He was sane!" the marine snapped, "He wished me a good night right before…" the marine paled, "Those bast…. They put me under so they could break him! Snit! Those depraved…." The marine let loose a string of curses that were so creative that Drest started committing a few of the more gruesome threats to memory. "I never thought…should've figured that those … would do something like this! Snit!" aside from the treats, one thing caught Drest's attention.

"Oi! Mari boy! Who's they? You've seen 'em righ'? Who tha 'ell are dey? Some kinda cult? Pi'rates? Revi's?" as Drest rattled off possibilities, the marine kept shaking his head. "Fin'. I don' know. Ya do righ'? So who is it? Start talkin mari boy!" the marine sighed as Drest became more and more angry.

"The Strawhat Pirates. That's whose ship we're on. That's why no one will find us. And why no one will save us. Happy now?"Drest's jaw dropped. They were on the pirate king's ship? But…but they weren't like that! Even a low-end Blue Sea pirate like he was knew that! They didn't kidnap people! Everyone knew that!

….Right?...

Three days later….

Drest was hanging limply from the chains, not that he could do much else. That monster who they called a doctor had tested a poison on him. Just from listening to the monster mumble, he knew that the poison was called Furux (2). Since it was his body though, he could firsthand what exactly it did. It ate certain parts of his body and while the monster muttered about 'cartilage decomposition' and 'disjointing', it made it so he couldn't move. That was nothing compared to what happened to the insane fisherman though. He'd been injected with something that caused his stomach to devour itself and continue up his throat (3). Ugh! The man he had first spoken to when he woke up had died the day before, bleeding out glowing yellow blood through his nose, tear ducts, and ear canals (4). He died without a sound though and Drest could have sworn that he saw relief in the man's face as he went. The ship had docked two days before and before he could attempt to call out, the marine (whose name was James Kelly) had told him that the room was soundproofed.

James had apparently been a sergeant in the Marinesat base 72 when the Strawhats had sacked it for no apparent reason. They had taken many of those on the base as prisoners and used them to test different chemicals. James was the last one left as the man with glowing blood had been his commanding officer, Lieutenant Thomas Marn (5).

The doctor had injected something into James while Drest had been asleep, but nothing had changed. After a few more hours, however, James began to cough violently, shaking and spitting up traces of blood. The monster entered the room quickly, pulling out a clipboard and pen and began taking down notes on James' vitals as they continued to drop. After about another hour, James flatlined, and the monster took samples, completely apathetic to the violent death he had induced. The last words the monster uttered before he left the room included Hebenon and finding a way to delay the effects (6).

As the door slammed shut, and Drest could do nothing but hang limply from the chains binding him to the wall, he closed his eyes to block out the sight of the cadaver before him. 'If only…' he thought in despair, 'if only there was some way to block out the smell.'

(1) Pictish name meaning riot, tumult
(2) from Jack Vance's The Palace of Love
(3) Tears of Lys from George R.R. Martin's Song of Fire and Ice
(4) Luminous Toxin from D.O.A.(film)
(5) chapter 3
(6) poison from William Shakespeare's Hamlet

AN2: Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukkah! Happy Kwanzaa! And a very Happy New Year!