A/N: Hey, ya'll! It's yo boy Evan back at it with another chapter of the hit SI! Before we begin, I'd like to take a moment to once again thank EXNativo for his work on discussing plot points with me and helping edit this fan fiction; without him, this story wouldn't be anywhere near as good as it is. Once you're done with this chapter, please go ahead and check out his own SI, Will-Powered, if you want a hilarious read that's well-worth your time. I'd also like to real quickly shout out The Patient One, whom you no doubt know from his work on This Bites!, for his own suggestions and input into the makings of this chapter. Several things were caught that would've been very confusing otherwise due to his help, and I am very thankful for that.
Don't forget to help the cause and check out my Patre0n if you want to help raise money for some official commissioned artwork! You can find the link on the story's TV Tropes page.
Disney may own many things, including ERB, but one thing they do not own is the scene with a song and dance in it. And one thing I do not own is the rights to One Piece. Sadly. *sighs whistfully* In a parallel universe...
Chapter 13: Gift Horses Are Entirely Overrated
In hindsight, I really should've known from reading a certain fan fiction about a blond kid and his talking snail that a Straw Hat plan is destined to never work. But I had high hopes for this one; like, Mount Everest-level high. Sadly, the One Piece universe really loves Murphy's Law far too much than what must be healthy.
It all started smoothly enough. The first stage of the plan was put into motion directly after Sanji served us our lunch. Usopp was more than happy to put his art skills to use, although we had to promise to fully reimburse him for any debt he might accumulate from Nami for two months in order to stop him from asking why we wanted him to make a believable, fake bounty poster within two days. That accomplished, Nojiko dragged me back to the deck by the ear, duly ignoring my protesting that I had two perfectly good feet to walk with, and at last released me in the center.
I rubbed my ear tenderly, despite the fact that it didn't actually hurt very much. "I could've walked here by myself perfectly fine, you know," I mumbled, tossing her a hurt look.
She raised her eyebrow, as unimpressed as Chuck Norris watching One Punch Man. "Which is why you've been actively avoiding training lessons with me, despite the fact that training with me would mean you don't have to have Zoro breathing down your back?"
"...Point taken," I conceded with a weary sigh.
King Kong snickered on the railing, and I sent him a withering glare.
"That aside," I growled, "why isn't the banana drainer training alongside me?"
"Because the 'banana drainer' doesn't need the proper techniques of fighting constantly drilled into his head in order to grant him even the slightest of possibilities of survival in a mass brawl, due to Devil Fruit bullshit," supplied Nojiko, cracking her knuckles while King grinned cheekily, "unlike a certain Barnacle Head I know. Now pull out your nunchucks and stop wasting time."
"Yeeees, mother," I groaned sardonically, relenting under her beatific gaze and reaching down to my belt. My pitch-black Drowned Iron nunchakus still hung on it by their chains. I closed my fingers around the dense weapons and slipped them out of my belt, holding them out in front of me and slipping into the horse stance I'd learned from the years of karate I'd taken a decade ago. It was the proper starting point for a nunchakus-user.
"Now, should all go well," said Nojiko with an approving nod, "you won't have to do any close-range fighting until at least Alabasta. But just in case things go south, you're going to need to know how to turn those farming tools you bought in Loguetown into actual weapons. So, first of all, let's start with your defensive maneuvers…"
We spent the next few hours running ceaselessly through katas and movements, Nojiko correcting every little mistake I made like Picasso teaching a kindergartener how to paint. It was exasperating, it was infuriating, but most of all, it was informative. I may have been half-assing it during my fights with Fullbody, but by the end of my physically exhausting training session, I felt like I could actually hold my own in a fight… or at least three-fourths-ass it. Nojiko wasn't correcting my stance or arm positions quite as often, at any rate.
When Nojiko decided I was panting hard enough and was far too sweaty to remain around any longer, she at last called it a day. I collapsed to the deck, wheezing and thoroughly exhausted. King had retreated to the guys' cabin sometime ago. To do what, I had no idea. Luffy had returned to his spot on the goat figurehead, staring in silence out at the sea, while Nami had managed to rope Mr. 9 and Miss Wednesday into completing all of our chores. Sanji had taken over control of the helm. Meanwhile, Usopp was hard on work at his commission for Nojiko, King Kong, and I. Zoro was up in the crow's nest keeping lookout, and Nami was standing on the boat's front, keeping an eye on her Log Pose to make sure we didn't stray off course. Finally, Nojiko slipped back up to the tangerine orchard to water her precious fruits.
As energy slowly returned to my muscles, I sat up and cracked my back, groaning in relief. I rubbed my head, wondering what to do with the rest of my evening. Without books, video games, or an Internet connection, I was lost on how to spend free time. Restless, jaded, I at last rolled over and picked myself up off the deck with a sigh. Now would make as good a time as any to do a little physics breaking, i.e., training my Devil Fruit powers so that when we would make land at Whiskey Peak, I wouldn't be completely useless.
I stretched as I contemplated my Avatar-esque powers. What could I do to absolutely screw up physics in the most bullshit way possible, while staying within the limitations of my Fruit that I already knew? I stared out to sea as though it could reveal the answers to me through my eyes, and I swore I saw it throw me the middle finger. Of course, with the absolute shattering of sense we'd just sailed through, this was hardly the strangest thing I'd seen the ocean do lately.
I chose to ignore the sassy ocean and instead focused on coming up with new ways to improve my application of bullshit. My mind strayed back to my fight with Fonti, where I'd stood myself up and forced my worn-out limbs to move through controlling the water in my body. While I was fairly certain I could pull off the same thing on someone else, something about taking away a person's freedom to move as they please and basically making them a robot just didn't appeal to me. It felt far too "Evil Dictator" for my tastes. Maybe I could use it as an absolute last resort to stop a friend from getting seriously hurt, if I had to, but that still made my stomach feel uncomfortable. On the other hand, though, if I could somehow do much the same thing with inanimate objects… Now that I would be perfectly fine with doing.
An idea formed in my head; an idea that, once it was born, had me giggling like a girl in a clothes store.
I rushed up the steps and into Merry's bowels, headed for Usopp's Workshop. "Oi, Usopp!" I said, peeking in the door and grinning widely at the sniper carefully stenciling in letters on a sheet of aged parchment. The bandanna-wearing young man blinked and looked up. "I've got another request for you, and it's one I can actually help with this time. How many cannonballs do you think we could spare and still have enough to use in a battle without worrying too much? Also, do we have something that could drill through iron?"
"Ummm…" Usopp spared a moment to consider the questions. "About… three or four. And I think so. Why do you want to know?"
My grin widened, making me look so evil that Usopp scooted back several feet away from me. "Because I just thought of something to completely confound and terrify our enemies."
Oh, yes, what I'd said before was truer than true: Whiskey Peak was going to be fun.
Our first sight of land came at around three o'clock that evening. Upon Zoro's bored shout that the next leg of our adventure was in sight, we gathered around the bow of the ship. Luffy still sat giggling like a madman on the figurehead, Nami grinned proudly at having navigated us safely to our (officially) first island, Sanji lit a cigarette and smoked it with a serene expression, Usopp trembled like a flag in a twister, and Nojiko, King Kong and I stood together, frowning at the island as we prepared ourselves for the night to come.
As for Mr. 9 and Miss Wednesday?
They dashed to the railing and decided to straight up book it.
"We thank you for your kind services, helping us back to our island!" said Mr. 9 amiably, his falsetto voice grating on my ears.
Miss Wednesday half-curtsied, half-bowed, and then straightened up so that her sky blue hair bounced on her back. The action was quite the feat, enough to make my eyebrow rise a little. "But now we must be off, for duties await!" the fake bounty hunter chirped in, her faux smile as easy to read as a lying Luffy.
"Farewell!" they chorused in sync, and just like that, they performed a perfect four backflips off of the railing, stretched their arms together in perfectly streamline upside-down v's, and broke through the water's surface without so much as a splash.
I blinked and my mouth hung open. I'd been on the swim team of a town near my own for over ten years, and I'd never completed so much as a single front flip without belly-smacking fiercely into the water. Jealousy coursed through my being. They might be lying butt-faces (for the moment, at least, in Vivi's case), but goddammit if that hadn't been utterly fabulous. Had I had a permanent marker and a square of poster board, I might have held up a sign with a perfect "10" inked on it.
"Uhhh…" said Usopp, blinking rapidly, "why exactly did they just dive off the ship?"
I shrugged. "Because YOLO," I proposed with a poker face.
"YOLO?" Nami repeated, staring flatly at me like she was doubting my sanity, while at the same time hating the fact that she didn't know what I was talking about.
"It's a… 'popular' saying from my world," I said, my poker face stretching on. "It means you only live once, and serves as perfectly reasonable justification for doing stupid shit that normally has no justification."
Luffy turned his head at me, eyes shining with interest. "Hmm? Really?"
Aaaaand it suddenly felt like I had just signed my own death warrant. I really needed to choose my memes more carefully around these special people. "Uh… heh heh… welllll…"
Usopp was still staring at the island as though it might turn into a dragon and eat him. "Ah… Evan, can that YOLO thing be used as justification to not do crazy things as well? Because I, for one, am very concerned that there might be insane monsters on that island."
I stared at him, genuinely taken aback as the voices of Akiva and Jorma whispered in my brain. Unless it was my imagination, synthetic music drifted through the air without any source. "Well," I said slowly, "you only live once, that's the motto. So take a chill pill, ease off the throttle. Never go to loud clubs, 'cuz they're bad for your ears. Your friends will all be sorry when they can't hear!"
"Are you singing or talking really fast?" asked Nojiko, frowning and tilting her head.
"Some vile form of both, I think," King Kong signed, scooting away from me.
"Forget monsters at the island," moaned Usopp, while tears streamed endlessly from his eyes and a cloud of depression hung over him. "We have the most traumatizing one right here on the Merry."
Our bickering continued as the ship drew steadily closer to Whiskey Peak, its landscape quickly coming into full view. As our figurehead began to push into some fog, I couldn't help but stare at the green bulbs that jutted out into the sky. It really did look exactly like a cactus some Minecrafter had decided to build as a pastime, and then taken Up to Eleven. It was kind of nuts to think about how each of those hundreds upon hundreds of spikes represented a single pirate's death upon the island. It was enough to make my skin crawl, even though at least half of those lives probably more than deserved to be ended. After all, piracy couldn't have gained its infamy for murder and pillaging through word of mouth and fake news alone.
My confidence gained from training with Nojiko, as well as having created several new weapons/techniques for myself to use dropped like a sack of potatoes. These were professional bounty hunters we'd be dealing with tonight. Me, on the other hand? I was just playing at piracy. Not even a month ago, I hadn't even punched a kid outside of karate practice and tournaments. Hell, the most I'd ever stolen in my whole eighteen years was a single Tootsie roll from Giant Eagle at age seven, and my mom had caught me before we'd even left the store.
I might have just barely survived against Fonti, and I might have completely wiped the floor with Fullbody, but against a solid one hundred, fully trained Baroque Works agents? I was completely out of my league.
No, I told myself. I swallowed down the tight ball of fear that formed in my neck and gazed sternly at the island. You won't be in the center of the battle. If all goes according to plan, the most you might have to deal with would be the Unluckies, and assuming we take them all out quickly and quietly enough, we shouldn't even have to deal with them.
"I don't care about monsters," grunted Sanji, and a smile spread across his lips. "All I'm wondering is if they have beautiful ladies at this island!"
"Of course you are." Zoro snorted and folded his arms, clearly unimpressed. "Damn Love-Cook."
"What was that, Moss-Head?" snarled the blond. His head swiveled an impressive distance to glare at the offending swordsman, eyes narrowed and cheeks hornet-sting red.
"Girls, girls, you're both pretty," said Nojiko dryly. "Now shut the hell up." and although the wandering punching bag of the two glared savagely at her, Sanji swooned and collapsed to his knees.
"Anything for you, my love!" he cooed, hands clasped together.
"Shishishi! Sanji's hilarious!" Luffy chortled, kicking his legs out into the air as he clutched his stomach with laughter.
I rolled my eyes and rubbed my forehead. That cook was whipped. Then again, I could kind of see where he was coming from. Nojiko was quite beautiful, and smart as Velma Dinkley to boot. I'd always had a thing for smart and cute women. I'd tried to ask out my class's valedictorian at my school's Spring Fling dance when I was in my freshman year. Sadly, that day I was a much less cute and much more male Rem in episode 18 of Re:Zero. In other words, utterly shot down.
"Hey, uh, guys?" Usopp spoke up, voice quivering. "I think I've come down with a rare case of I-can't-go-to-the-island-itis. We should just skip this one."
"We can't," Nami snorted. "We have to wait for the Log Pose to reset, but Lord knows how long that could take. Could be days, could be months."
"We might even have to wait a year!" I piped in.
"Huh-wha!? So wait, if we see an island filled with terrifying beasts and monsters, we still have to land on it until the Log resets!?"
"Yep!" Nojiko said, popping the 'p.'
The poor sniper wilted, crumbling to the floor with tears streaming from his eyes. "Guys, this disease is really chronic… I think I might die…"
A faint sound like a hundred happy voices caught my attention. "Hey, does anyone else hear something like… cheering?" I queried, tilting my head and squinting through the heavy fog.
"I hear cheering all the time," grunted Usopp sagely, looking up from Merry's deck to nod his head, "for I am the great - -!" I rolled my eyes and sent my thoughts to the ocean, sneakily splashing him in the face with water. "SHIT!"
The crew snickered at the new nickname he'd just unintentionally coined for himself, but our laughter died down and turned into stupefied disbelief upon the fog's clearing. As if someone had lifted a blindfold and taken us someplace unknown, we quite suddenly found ourselves in the middle of a massive river between two portions of the island. On one riverbank sat a long dock system; floating boards, nailed together and outlined with sturdy posts, pointed out over the water like fingers. Behind it was a sprawling town, most of which rose up out of the flatter stretches of land, although some buildings swooped up part of the hills that formed the island's significant cactus bulbs in the distance. And on a massive cobblestone pad between the town and the docks, it seemed as though the entire population of the island stood cheering us on, waving and shouting and exploding those weird party streamers that everybody always seems to have except me. Ribbons and glitter floated from the sky.
"Uhhh…. Haaaaah?" I said intelligently, despite the fact that I knew this was coming. All the party and good feelings after the dense silence of the fog was really overwhelming for my poor, cold soul.
Sanji's cigarette dropped from his mouth. "Okay, did not see that coming," he gasped.
Zoro's eye twitched. "They do realize the Jolly Roger on our flag means that we're pirates, right? So why the hell is there so much cheering!?"
"Hey, wait, this means that pirates are heroes on the Grand Line after all!" concluded Usopp, grinning widely, his eyes shining. Okay, how the hell was that genetically possible? I could put up with insanity like that from Luffy, because he's Luffy, and with Sanji's eyes turning into hearts every time he saw Nami and Nojiko, because he's Sanji, but what the hell, science!? Do you even exist in this world, or did you come with a self-destruct button that someone had pressed by accident? Actually, that was a hell of a lot more likely than I'd meant it to be. If that was what had happened, it was probably a Monkey D. who'd done the pressing.
"WELCOME, PIRATES!" chanted the cheering townsfolk. "WE LOVE YOU!"
"Shishishi!" giggled Luffy, grinning wider than what was possible for literally anyone else. Except maybe Nami when she came across loads of treasure. "I like this town!"
"Of course you do," moaned Nojiko and I. King Kong bayed mournfully in concurrence since he didn't have the proper vocal chords to make coherent human speech.
Great. Well, this just got a whole lot harder. It wasn't like we weren't expecting this, though, so it was fine… operatively speaking.
The resident pervert chef made a weird strangling choke. "Look!" he cried, pointing out at the crowd, his eyes switching to pink hearts. "There are tons of amazingly cute girls!"
"Well, we have to dock anyway," groaned a slumping Nami. "We might as well let the love chef go out and flirt…"
We docked at one of the empty portions of the port and dropped anchor, hoisting our sails and generally ensuring that the Going Merry wouldn't get caught in a current and drift away. Then we lowered our gangplank and all of us save for King disembarked. Curiosity filled the gazes of those of us who weren't aware of the circumstances, as we were ushered forward into the crowd of grinning, exuberant people. Sanji, however, skived on the curiosity in favor of gazing amorously at the surprising number of females mixed in with the males. Actually, the population of the island in general was quite shocking; I'd thought there were only a hundred people there, but there seemed to be quite a bit more than that. Maybe it was just me being bad at judging, though.
"Ahem!" said a voice that was a mysterious mixture of high and low pitches. "Ma-ma-maaaa!" Its owner entered our view as he stepped out from the crowd we were walking into. It was, of course, Igaram in his 'disguise.' I hadn't quite expected him to look like someone straight from the Capitol in The Hunger Games, but that was exactly what my mind linked him to. He had an outrageously long head, and huge, flowing gold hair pulled up in six big curls that really were not fashionable in the least. And this was coming from a warm-blooded Ohioan male.
"Who're you, old man?" Luffy asked bluntly. He tilted his head, smile not fading.
"My name is Igarappoi," lied Igaram, and in the back of my mind, I heard Donald Trump saying fake news. "Welcome, brave heroes of the seas, to the beautiful town of liquor and music - - Whiskey Peak! I am sure you all must be quite stunned by this strange hospitality, but here, we believe all pirates to be legendary warriors greater than anything the Marines could put out! You all must be quite hungry and thirsty from your fight through the first storms of the Grand Line. Please, feel free to wine and dine with us at our banquet! Alcohol flows in these streets like rivers."
"Alcohol?" Zoro repeated, interest piqued.
"Food?" moaned Luffy hungrily, saliva dripping from his mouth.
"Nonsense," Nojiko said amiably. "We wouldn't want to use your hospitality for our own gain when we have plenty of food and drink aboard the Merry. We'll just be going - -"
"WHAT!?" cried our captain like she had just said she was canceling Christmas. He turned to her with wide, hurt eyes. "How could you say such a thing, Nojiko!? Where's your sense of respect!? Of course we're gonna eat all of his food!"
"But - - Luffy - -" she hissed low enough that Igaram couldn't hear, searching desperately for a proper excuse, "don't you remember Mr. 9 and Miss Wednesday said they were hunting Laboon because their town was running out of food!? Isn't the fact that these guys would be throwing us a banquet when they're already low on food a little suspicious to you!?"
He paused, blinked, and then said, "Suspicious? Is that meat? Can I eat it?"
...Cue two massive sweatdrops on the back of Nojiko's head. "It was worth a shot," she groaned to me, while I simply facepalmed at my captain's simpleness.
"I think I'm more shocked at myself that I couldn't have foretold Luffy doesn't know the meaning of suspicious," I told Nojiko just as dryly.
"Hey, by the way," Nami said to Igaram, "how long will it take our Log to reset?"
The blond man stared at her like she was spouting nonsense. Then he reared back and guffawed. "Oh! Ma-ma-maaa! You're making a joke!" He wrapped an arm around a mystified Nami and pulled her into a tight one-armed hug, lifting his arm up cheerfully into the air. "Come, don't worry about privy details like that; let's party!"
"YEAH!" roared the island, and any Straw Hats not named Luffy, Sanji, Usopp, or Zoro sighed wearily and resigned ourselves to following through with the oncoming evening.
Alright, I have to give it to them: even as the backstabbing Baroque Works Agents they might have been, the Whiskey Peakers sure knew how to throw a damn good party.
It lasted a good four to five hours, and showed no signs of stopping for as long as it went. It took place in a large town mess hall of sorts. I wasn't really one for alcohol, but Igaram was right; despite the food shortages, they had seemingly endless supplies of sake, vodka, beer, and so many other liquors I would never be able to even hope to name them all. Zoro was in his own little heaven, sucking down wooden mug upon wooden mug of anything within his arm's reach like the world would run dry tomorrow.
Endless mountains of food were piled on a vast array of dishes, everything from chunks of cooked meat still on the bone, to succulent pasta that would make the proudest Italian's mouth water, to lush hills of salad, and even to some strange dish whose name I had absolutely no idea of but which looked distinctly Australian. Music drifted gaily through the air - - now that was something I could get behind. My body moved to the beat without me realizing it, my foot tapping in time with the perfect percussion.
King Kong snuck through the mess hall doors near the beginning of the party, the agents unaware of his presence due to attempting to distract the rest of us with festivities. I watched him out of the corner of my eye as he slipped over to the long tables upon which sat the mountains of food prepared for us. He leaned up to each meal, sniffing and breathing in the scent, and occasionally flashing a thumbs-down. This was a signal for spiked food we'd decided upon after I'd confirmed that King knew the smells of sleeping drugs (he'd been in the piracy business previously, of course, so he'd encountered the sort many times before).
Occasionally, a stray agent decided he or she was hungry, and went over to the table; whenever this happened, my partner would hastily duck behind a crate or barrel nearby, or anything that could hide him properly.
I made careful notes of every bad meal. When the vervet monkey had finished his deed at last and had scampered undetected out of the mess hall, I got to my feet, stretched, and groaned loudly.
"Mm, I'm starving!" I declared. I raised my voice loud enough for most of the mess hall to hear, which was less hard than you might think; I tended to be quite loud regardless, without even knowing it. "All of that food looks delicious. I might just have some of everything!"
Truthfully, I was quite hungry. Ever since the Conomi Islands, actually, my appetite seemed to have increased dramatically, and yet despite this, I hadn't gained a single pound - - that I could tell, anyway. I wondered if it was due to having eaten a Devil Fruit. Did all Devil Fruits turn their consumers into Big Eaters, whether they were that way before or not? It was something I would have to have Chopper research into whenever we met up with him.
Bah! There I go rambling off again. Stupid ADD.
Anyway, quite conscious of the Baroque Works agents' eyes on my back, I maneuvered through the party guests to the food table. I exaggeratedly examined the vast array of dishes, sweeping around the table and making large gestures with my hands as I pretended to be having a hard time picking. That wasn't very hard, either. I really was having a hard time picking; while none of the meals presented were quite as scrumptious-smelling as Sanji's, it was enough to make my stomach want to dive straight into the piles. I purposefully ignored it, instead taking a large scooper from one of the spiked dishes, and stuck it into a plate piled with more strands of spaghetti than Paulie had ropes. I then swept my arm so quickly over to my food that the boulder of spaghetti dislodged from the pile was flung clear across the table, tons of little strands falling into many of the other buffet items.
"Oops!" I said to the agents who were staring at me with wide eyes and slackened jaws. I dropped the scooper back into the spaghetti and rubbing my head in a falsely apologetic manner. "Please excuse my klutziness! It's a really bad habit!"
I could feel the hatred wafting from the fake pirate lovers. And it only made me grin widely.
Sanji blinked. "What the hell, Evan!? You're never klutzy like this. Why'd you waste perfectly good food?"
"And we don't have any more to replace that once that's gone…" I heard someone mutter dejectedly, just inside of earshot. My grin widened.
"I know, Sanji, I feel really bad," I said, really laying on my apology. I dug into my pocket, and withdrew from it the poster I'd had Usopp draw earlier. It was a Wanted Dead or Alive poster, complete with the image of me rushing at the viewer, a wall of water behind me. I must say, it looked pretty damn badass. It claimed that I'd earned a bounty of 20,000,000 belli. "How could the 20,000,000 belli man let something like this happen to adoring fans…?"
Silence fell around much of the party, except for the corner where, luckily for me, Usopp remained loudly telling a group of guys and girls alike mangled versions of our adventures.
"20,000,000 belli…?" Nami said, tilting her head in confusion. "Wait, what? Since when did you have a bounty poster, anyway? And… why is your epithet The Rock?"
"Nami, Nami, you sweet summer child," I sighed, shaking my head, "you forgot to get the mail this morning. Well, luckily, I did, and this baby was included it!" I waved the sheet of paper around for good measure. "Wanted for beating up two marine captains, saving Straw Hat Luffy from capture at Loguetown by the hands of Smoker, and obnoxious singing," I recited, reading from the margins at the bottom of the faux poster. I'd have to thank Usopp later; this thing looked damn near legit. From a distance, no one would be able to tell it was counterfeit.
I saw the bounty hunters exchange glances, and Igaram's countenance switch to confusion. According to canon, he'd done background checks on our crew when we'd arrived, so he probably knew that I was talking out of my ass. Before he could call shenanigans, however, Luffy piped up, grinning widely.
"Evan! Sing us something!" he shouted, grinning widely.
I paused. Well, it would be the perfect distraction to delay Igaram's reaction, and maybe make him forget about it altogether. Grinning as some cheerful tunes played in the back of my head, I nodded. "Hmm… alright, captain, I'll take that as an order. A little help, Author?" I added under my breath.
My Nokia buzzed, and I pulled it out behind the food so none of the bounty hunters would see.
Already gotcha covered, man, the email read.Say, can your friends do… this?
Cheerful Disney music played out into the crowd, and many people glanced at each other in confusion, wondering where the hell it was coming from. I grinned widely, stuck my phone back in my pocket, and leaped over the table, carefully avoiding touching the food so that my leather jacket wouldn't get gunky. As my cue quickly came, I took a deep breath, and made my voice low and loud at the same time.
Well, Ali Baba had them forty thieves,
Scheherazade had a thousand tales.
But master, you're in luck, 'cause up your sleeves,
You've got a brand of magic never fails
As my voice rose and fell, I ran through the crowd, pointing at Luffy on 'master' and rolling up my sleeves. A grin spread across his face, and he giggled excitedly.
You've got some power in your corner now!
Some heavy ammunition in your camp!
You got some punch, pizzazz, yahoo and how!
See, all you gotta do is rub that lamp, and I'll say:
"Mr. Aladdin, sir, what will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, jot it down?"
You ain't never had a friend like me! No, no!
Water coiled up behind me as I sang, lifting from people's glasses and startling a few of the victims into dropping their cups. It formed into guns, firing into the ceiling, before quickly morphing into a lamp that hovered to my land. I rubbed it twice in two exaggerated motions, grinning widely and imitating a French accent. Nestled between the twenty women he was flirting with, Sanji huffed a little at that, but didn't say anything. Inwardly smirking, I dashed back over to the buffet table and grabbed a random plate off of it. It just so happened to be piled with a certain Balkan pastry.
Life is your restaurant, and I'm your maître d'!
Come on, whisper what it is you want;
You ain't never had a friend like me!
"Yes sir, we pride ourselves on service."
You're the boss, the king, the shah!
Say what you wish; it's yours, true dish.
How 'bout a little more baklava?
"Have some of column A, try all of column B."
I'm in the mood to help you, dude.
You ain't never had a friend like me!
At this, I swaggered over to Igaram, who was near the drinking contest between Zoro, Nami, and Sister, aka Miss Monday. Upon reaching him and ending the verse, I thrust the plate of tainted pastries to him, and he reluctantly accepted it. He eyed one rather hungrily, looked back at the buffet table, looked back at the now-spiked baklava, sighed, and popped it in his mouth. As the chorus started back up, I swooped back to the buffet table and returned the baklava to its rightful place, at the same time indicating one half of the table as column A, then motioning to the other half for column B.
Oh, my! No, no! My, my, my.
Can your friends do this?
The water following me coalesced into two clones of myself that linked arms with me and formed a kick line. I gave both of the clones top hats, which they tipped slightly off their head upon each kick.
Can your friends do that?
Slowly making my way over to Luffy, I passed by Nami and Zoro. As I went, I grabbed the mug that Miss Monday was currently on out of her hands. She gave a squawk of indignation, jumping up and reaching for it, but before she could take it back, I tilted it upside down. The sake spilled out of the mug, and as it fell, I forcefully stopped it in midair, knowing that all liquids have water mixed in with them. I then closed my eyes and felt out the water particles. Upon finding them, I ripped them away from everything else in the sake, leaving a floating ball of water and solid particles of sake falling to the floor. I then scooped the water back into the mug and handed it back to a rightfully stunned Miss Monday, my grin unstoppable.
"Holy crap, that… he just turned sake into water…!" gasped Nami, eyes popping out of her skull.
Zoro shrugged indifferently, although his eyebrows had raised slightly. "Eh, he's still a shit-ass comedian."
My brain hurt like hell, and exhaustion stole over my limbs, but it was definitely worth the unadulterated admiration on many of my captive audience members' faces.
Can your friends pull this
Out their little haaaaaats?
I finally arrived back by Luffy's side, reached up and snatched his hat off of him. He might have protested, but in between lines, I whispered in his ear, "I'm going to borrow this a sec, alright?" and he nodded his acceptance. I then flipped it over and sneakily forced streams of water into it, and with a magician's flourish, reached in and extracted the water in the form of a little bunny that hopped off and darted into the crowd. Laughter dotting the mess hall, I flipped Luffy's straw hat over and plopped it right back on his head in one smooth motion.
Can your friends go poof?
The two water clones I'd made leaped up into the air. My concentration was really straining right now, especially with the pure exhaustion from pulling my Jesus moment, but I forced them to explode and shower over the crowd. Many of the admiring looks quickly turned to disgruntled glares, but I flashed them a blindingly white smile and a peace sign. Ignoring my pounding head, I sang on, the exhilaration from pulling off my various tricks stronger than my tiredness.
Well, looky here!
Can your friends go abracadabra, let her rip,
And then make the sucker disappear?
So don't just sit there slack-jawed, buggy-eyed,
I'm here to answer all your mid-day prayers,
You've got me bona fide certified;
You've got a genie for your chargé d'affaires.
I flashed through the crowd, leaning in close to random people and patting them on the back, earning myself a few laughs. I then took charge of a random table centered between three perpendicular couches, leaping up on it so the whole crowd could see me. Thankfully, there were no cups or plates in my way, so I could jump up without worrying about knocking anything over.
I've got a powerful urge to help you out,
So what-cha wish? I really wanna know!
You've got a list that's three miles long, no doubt,
Well all you've gotta do is rub like so, and oh—
Many of the people gathered in the mess hall were openly cheering and whooping now, feet tapping to the otherworldly (literally!) music. I was getting really into it; the Genie had always been my favorite character in Aladdin, and not just because Robin Williams voiced him.
Mr. Aladdin, sir, have a wish, or two, or three.
I'm on the job, you big nabob!
You ain't never had a friend, never had a friend,
You ain't never had a friend, never had a friend,
You ain't never! Had a! Frieeend liiiiike meeeeeee!
Never had a friend like me!
My voice went so high I felt it waver threateningly, my vocal chords straining to just barely reach the note. I threw my arms out and my head back, droplets of water flying through the air around me before exploding like fireworks above my head. When I stopped holding the note and reached the final line, I let the water flow back to wherever I'd pulled it from, and sank into a low kneeling bow towards Nojiko. With the accompanying final beat of music, whistles and cheers rang out from the crowd.
Even as I panted for air, my exuberant smile could not be wiped off my face. I hadn't had that much fun since The Music Man in my freshman year of high school. I would've been in my school's performance of The King and I, as I participated in the school plays each year, but I hated the fact that the directors put down for the captain of the ship. I was not going to put up for any role that I would barely get a full scene in for my senior year play, so I had just simply quit. I had missed the stage, had missed the thrill of performing for an audience; and good Lord did having a Devil Fruit make said performance so much more fantastic!
Under intense clapping, I got to my feet and bowed to the audience several times. With bent knees, I hopped off of the table, and my feet produced a small thump upon striking the carpet. The bounty hunters' cheering gradually died as it became clear I wouldn't be performing an encore, and the previous party antics retook the guests. Luffy shot me a double thumbs-up and a classic rubber-person grin. My gaze shifted to Igaram, nervous whether he'd call shenanigans on my counterfeit bounty poster, but my fears were immediately quelled. I didn't know what the hell was in the sleeping drugs they'd spiked our food with, but Igaram was already out cold, slumped over in a couch.
Huh. Well, that was one problem solved. For now, anyway.
As the party dragged on, the Baroque Works agents were forced to thin out their numbers by eating the now-completely tainted food in order to keep up appearances. Luckily, all of the other Straw Hats except Luffy were now full, and so didn't return to the buffet table. As for our captain himself, Luffy seemed to be just fine eating the spiked food. He didn't get any sort of drowsy and instead continued to inhale plates upon plates of grub, so much that the cooks collapsed just from the sight of it. By the third hour of the festivities, he was more bloated with various foods than a tick in a blood drive.
Finally, the Sun sank over the horizon, and worn out from all our partying, the other Straw Hats fell into happy slumbers.
"Hey, where's the closest restroom?" asked Nojiko to the nun agent, appropriately nicknamed "Sister."
The secretly violent nun pointed to the door. "Go out and head to the town library next door. We've been meaning to install one here, but this building's newer than the rest, and we haven't gotten a lot of merchants selling toilets brave enough to cross the Red Line just to sell their wares in forever."
"Thanks," said Nojiko, and she got up and headed out.
That was my cue. Yawning, I put a hand over my mouth and leaned back into the couch which I currently was resting upon. "Well," I groaned, my eyes fluttering shut, "I'm… feeling really…" I didn't even finish the sentence, and instead made the loudest, most realistic snores I could. My head lolled to the side and my breathing slowed, the almost-perfect picture of a sleeping man.
Thus reclining in the couch, I faked my slumber, my hand slipped into my pocket alongside my Nokia. Around twenty minutes passed before the last of us pirates were apparently judged to be fully sleeping, a point I was able to judge since the still-awake agents turned off the lights.
"These pirates are very dangerous," I heard Mr. 9 say, a deep, concerned growl in his throat. "They have two Devil Fruit eaters, both with extremely high bounties for having come from the East Blue. On top of that, that Nojiko has a bounty as well. We need to dig into the seastone cuffs and lock up the Hammers; if they wake up and cause trouble before the Unluckies arrive… 0 will have our necks for sure."
My eyes cracked open, and I examined the agents with their backs turned to me. Sister (Miss Monday), Vivi (Miss Wednesday), and Mr. 9. Igaram, who was Mr. 8, remained in peaceful slumber.
"Seconded," said the groggy voice of Miss Monday, who must have been starting to get sleepy with all the ale she'd inhaled as a result of challenging Nami and Zoro. I knew in canon she'd switched out her ale partway through for a similar-looking, non-alcoholic beverage, which was probably the only reason she remained on her feet as was. "The captain's eaten enough that Hypnos won't release him from his clutches for a good while yet. We'll start with Evan; he poses the most danger of waking. Since 8 is currently incapacitated, I'll be assuming responsibility until those drugs he consumed wear off, as is normal procedure."
I tried to not grin. So far, the plan was turning out extremely smoothly. Even Igaram was out of fighting condition, something we actually had not thought about ensuring. However, I had to act fast to put the next course of action into motion. In the very short time I had before they turned around and saw me, I slipped my Nokia smartphone out, turned it on, opened up and started the voice recorder, and then shut it off and slipped it back in my pocket.
"If we earn all this cash for Baroque Works," Vivi supposed hopefully, "the boss will be sure to forgive us for not completing our mission."
"Your mission," corrected Miss Monday, casting the secret princess a pointed glare as they stepped towards me, unaware of my wakefulness. "Don't lump 8 and I in with your failures as a Baroque Works assassin."
"Their captain and this damn Water Boy took us by surprise!" snapped Mr. 9. They loomed over me, and the clinking of metal handcuffs rose to my ears as I felt his calloused hands grasp my wrists gently. "If it wasn't for their abilities, we could've taken them, no sweat."
"0 doesn't like excuses," Miss Monday pointed out. "You'll still be punished in some method or another."
"Yeah, but it won't be as badly as it might have been," argued Vivi.
The snapping of cuffs resounded into the air as I felt cold, hard metal chafe uncomfortably against my skin. An urge to flex my knuckles and wriggle my hands out of their restraints rose up, and I had to fight it hard. Even as I did so, I felt all of my energy drain away from me into the metal. Fucking plot points where stones and metals and shit are able to take away people's superpowers. That has to be like, the worst idea in the book. I'm Aquaman, I don't need fucking Kryptonite bullshit!
…Actually, Aquaman's really stupid. I don't think I want to be Aquaman anymore.
Being shackled in seastone handcuffs as a Devil Fruit eater was a strange experience, rather akin to drowning. It was hard to breathe, terror and panic seizing my heart, my lungs feeling as though they were filling with some non-existing liquid. At the same time, my senses dimmed and my thoughts, already prone to go off on a tangent, became about as wild and random as a fanfic author on crack. Or after an intense bout of insomnia; either or, really. Despite the three bounty hunters being close enough to pick me up and carry me to some unknown location, their conversation drifted at the very edge of my hearing, and I absolutely could not concentrate on it enough to make out anything important.
As I internally grumbled about that, a thought struck me across the head. Maybe that was how seastone and the sea itself worked upon Devil Fruit eaters: it jumbles their perception and power of focus until they can't even lift a finger, let alone activate their ability. With my connection to the water, I might be able to trai… to…
I nearly cried out in frustration, locked away in my own scrambled mess of a mind. I'd just been on the verge of a possible HUGE epiphany, but the damn seastone! I understood Luffy's reaction to the door of Arlong Park, now; I just really wanted to break something, dammit!
The Baroque Works agents' words fought into my brain in a warbled, alien language. I fought desperately against the seastone's restricting powers, Helen Keller trying to hear her first sound. The one thing that I was aware of was that they were still carrying me somewhere, and even that knowledge was rendered useless by the sudden encompassing, stiff chill of a cold stone floor. Great; they'd reached whatever location they'd been heading to. I prayed that Nojiko had evaded their sight and memory long enough to successfully trail them, alongside King Kong. Otherwise, shit had just escalated from a curbstomp to your average Dark Souls playthrough.
Try to take on an island of at least one hundred bounty hunters, they said! a very exasperated little voice whispered in the back of my mind. It'll be fun, they said!
After several irksome minutes of intense devotion to straining the hell out of my ears and waning concentration, I finally managed to pick up on enough of what the Baroque Works agents were saying to actually link some shit together. Excuse my French; I get feisty when I'm tired and stressed.
"-how do you - an ideal country - can't -ill a whale?" the voice of Miss Monday drawled out like a TV on extremely low signal.
Relief crashed over me like a wave, even through my ridiculously crazy mind. I filled in the blanks, guessing that the Amazonian woman had just spoiled the truth of her organization live on voice recorder. Not that she could have been aware I was recording their conversation,, of course. Our plan was almost close to completion. Now all I had to do was raise the alarm for Nojiko and King to come in and sa…
Shit! I was locked in seastone handcuffs! I couldn't flash the skull-and-crossbones of water that would signify when my friends should come in!
Ohshitohshitohshit what do I do!? My mind scrambled through plans and ideas. How could I bring in the backup without endangering myself? Within the space of several seconds, I settled on one choice. It would have to do.
Fighting with all my power against the energy-sapping metal linking my wrists together, I struggled to my feet, and my skin flamed with uncomfortable pain as the handcuffs scraped against it. I cracked my eyes open and tried to examine where I'd ended up through hazy vision. My abductees appeared to have taken me to a warehouse; the floor was made of stark grey stone, and barrels upon barrels of what I guessed to be beer and wine from the smell lay on the floor. Significantly un-warehouse-like, however, was a giant rectangular window inlaid within the wall directly to my left.
"A-Actually," I slurred, managing a vicious smirk despite my utter lack of energy, "it doesn't mah…" I stumbled and my words caught in my mouth. A grimace later, I continued, "It doesn't matter what you've fudged up and what you haven't. Because this isn't your tale."
Jumping with surprise at my first word, the three agents all whipped around, glaring nervously at me until they saw I was still handcuffed. They all visibly relaxed, although their hands still fell down to grasp at the various weapons hidden on their persons.
"And whose tale would this be, then?" queried Vivi with a semi-confident smirk.
I took a deep breath, as deep as I possibly could, and thought back to my years of choir. Channeling all of my vocal power down into my gut, I leaned forward and my grin turned crooked. "Well, you see," I said, allowing a second's pause before I threw my head back and belted out, "THIS IS THE TAAAAAAALE OF CAPTAIN JACK SPARROOOOOW! PIRATE SO BRAAAAVE ON THE SEVEN SEEEEEEEAAAAS!"
Silence.
"What?" said Miss Monday blankly at last, blinking in complete confusion as my voice resounded throughout the building, and I sang at a high enough volume that the dead could probably hear me.
"THIS IS THE QUEEEEST TO THE ISLE OF TORTUGAA - -!"
CRASH! RATATATATATAT!
"WHAT THE HELL!?" squawked a trio of voices.
All three of the high-ranking agents present on the island screamed in terror as the window to my left shattered without warning, and machine gun-fire ricocheted through the air. They scrambled for safety, and by some stroke of dumb luck, managed to avoid all of the oncoming bullets. Some pinged off the floor, while others lodged themselves into various barrels which spewed miniscule streams of various brands of alcohol. The angry baying of a monkey rose above the gunfire as my savage grin turned much more relieved and exhausted. I'd never been so happy to see a blue-haired crazy lady and a monkey in my entire life.
"Nojiko! King Kong!" I exclaimed, letting loose a tense breath I hadn't realized I'd contained.
"Where th - was y - ter?" grumbled Nojiko, wielding her miniature machine gun and cocking it as she landed lightly among diamonds of shattered glass. I had to fight to fill in the blanks. Next to her, King Kong's feet struck the ground, and he leaped forward onto a wine barrel. As he soared through the air, he performed a perfect six front flips, and upon landing, he dropped into a Jackie Chan-esque karate pose, right paw flung out forward and left paw raised behind him. Nojiko rolled her eyes at his antics before frowning at me. "An- what the heck - song?"
I turned awkwardly and shook my handcuffs at her, still struggling to stay afloat in the sea of exhaustion they flooded me with. "I couldn't do shit because of this seastone; it blocks Devil Fruit powers. That song was the most I could do like this."
She rolled her eyes. "Whatev - Water Boy." She hefted the heavy weapon atop her shoulder, frowning down the barrel under the dim light in the warehouse to the barrels which the Baroque Works agents had disappeared behind. "- you get the dirt - guys or no-?"
"I did," I huffed, slightly irked that she'd doubt me, "which I'd prove if you'd get on with it and get these cuffs off of me!"
"Well, it's not like we have the keys or anything," pointed out King Kong, momentarily breaking his pose to make the signs.
Now it was my turn to roll my eyes. "Yeah, yeah, just finish them off…"
For a few tense moments, nothing happened. The agents peered out from behind their makeshift shields, and Nojiko and King Kong stood waiting patiently for them to make a move. Finally, Vivi apparently couldn't stand the tension anymore, for she growled in exasperation and stepped out from behind her barrel. She placed a hand on her hip like a teen taking a selfie, a cocky grin on her face. "Alright, I'll admit that surprised me a little," she said, "but a woman worth a mere ten million and a monkey aren't any match for me. Now just take a quick look at my body… And a nice, quiet sleep..."
Both Nojiko and King Kong's noses wrinkled with their confusion. "Huh…?"
Wait, what's she - I began to think, frowning at her as she lifted her arms up and started a slow, sultry belly dance. Some weird, calm aroma filtered into the air, and my already bleak vision swam even more as the endless black-and-white helices on her shirt started to… spin…? Oh, dammit, I forgot she'd used hypnotism! I cursed mentally to myself, even as I felt myself slump uselessly to the floor. The sweet smell filling in the air, like desert strawberries laced with warm spice and something my hazy mind had trouble naming, was overpowering.
"Urgh… my head… feels murky…" groaned Nojiko. Her miniature machine gun slumped out of her hands as she swayed on her feet, raising a hand to her head wearily. The bulky weapon struck the floor with a sickening clank.
"Not good…" I growled, even as I watched King Kong slump to one foot, his eyes fluttering. "It's… it's too much…"
My eyes went hazy, my vision blackened, and I felt myself slip away into the dark void of slumber.
Fucking Kryptonite metals, I grumbled blearily to myself. Fucking hypnotists.
The growl of a deep, battle-hungry voice made my head tilt slowly to the left. "Heh. Amateurs."
Slipping into a heavy slumber, the last thing I saw was Zoro stepping eagerly through the window, three swords out and held at the ready, eyes glinting like a demon. Even as I fell from wakefulness, I couldn't help but smirk to myself. These guys didn't know what the hell they were getting themselves into!