Yay an update! I know a lot of you were looking forward to Luca coming back and I finally finished it after I read the current chapter. Prayer circle, guys. Prayer circle.
Enjoy the chapter!
-x-
"If there's one thing no one likes on this sub, it's cleaning duty." Penguin complained from down the hall.
"That so?" Luca absentmindedly replied. She was only half-paying attention to Penguin's gripes as the both of them mopped a hallway.
"I mean, I know Captain's really particular about cleanliness—you should see how he examines his operation room. If anyone misses any spots then God help you."
"Sure." Luca dipped her mop back into the bucket and swirled it around.
"But really, Shachi and Maurice already cleaned this hallway!" Penguin finished.
"There's really not much you can do about it." Luca said as she mopped the last bit of her end. "Done." She announced and dropped her mop back into its bucket. That part was finished. Now it was the wall's turn.
"You're done?" Penguin cried and hurried over to examine her half of the hall. "How?"
"Penguin, I worked in a bar for four years. I've cleaned worse than this." Luca started to wipe the wall with a wet rag.
"Really? Like what?"
She turned to Penguin. "Vomit and piss, mostly."
"Ew."
"Yup." Those were the days. The nights of numerous pirates drinking themselves into drunk stupor. Some would make it outside to empty their stomachs into the water below but others wound up puking on the floor of the bar. One time, someone threw up on Luca's shoes (and she promptly threw them away.)
An ache formed in her chest. Since seeing Gill, Luca couldn't deny the fact that she was homesick. She missed Tez and the Sea King. She missed her small house, her hair dyes, but most of all she missed Cayenne.
Cayenne was her best friend and the fact that they never got to say goodbye (or even see each other) before joining their respective crews left her with a deep wound in her heart.
I'll see her again. Luca silently swore to herself. I'll see her somewhere in this New World.
"Hello? Luca." Penguin poked Luca's side and she jumped slightly.
"What?"
"You spaced out." Penguin walked back to his side to continue mopping.
"Sorry." Luca muttered and continued on with cleaning.
"I don't know what you're complaining about." Luca said after a few minutes of silence. "This isn't bad."
"You haven't been asked to clean Captain's medical rooms yet." Penguin deadpanned. "It's the worst. Sometimes it's like he's breathing over your shoulder, making sure you get everything sanitized. And then there's Bepo too. When we get too close to underwater volcanoes, he can't do anything because he's so hot. He sheds sweaty fur and cleaning it up is a pain!"
"Sounds gross." Luca grimaced.
"Yeah!" Penguin agreed enthusiastically. "But everyone suffers when we're in hot places."
"It's probably the suit." Luca scrubbed harder at a particularly stubborn stain on the wall. The white (orange in Bepo's case) boiler suits looked hot. Summer islands had to be torture.
"Aw, they're not bad! Rather stylish in my opinion. I'm sure you'll warm up to it once we get yours."
Luca abruptly pulled back from the wall. She turned to Penguin, her mouth hanging open. "Get my what?"
"A uniform!" Penguin said proudly. He put a hand on his hip and struck a pose as if modeling his suit for her.
What? They were going to make her wear the uniform? Well it was a uniform. "B-but Jean Bart doesn't wear one." Luca blurted.
"We don't have any uniform in your or Jean Bart's sizes so when we find an island with a town, Captain's going to get you guys one."
Something in Luca's chest shriveled up and died. She wouldn't be as opposed to a uniform if it wasn't a shapeless and stuffy boiler suit. "Lovely." She ground out. "Let's just get back to cleaning." She turned back to the wall and resisted the urge to hit her head on it violently.
-x-
Law calmly watched the New World Log Pose. Specifically the shaking middle needle. How close where they to Punk Hazard? But even then, after years of searching, he only knew the rough location of the secret government facility. His goal was so close but he had too much to do before he approached the island.
His first step was to raise his bounty even higher and then make his way into the ranks of the Royal Warlords in order to get a pardon. Then he'd have a full reign to start his plan.
Luca would have a part to play in it too. Since Marineford, he had slowly begun to reorganize his plan to accommodate her and her different form of haki. The detour to Perun Isle would be necessary for them so Luca could get stronger. If the World Government feared her haki, then he had good reason to make her stronger.
Knock, knock.
"Enter." Law coolly commanded and set the Pose down on his desk.
The door opened and Bepo stuck his head in. "We're coming up on the island, Captain."
"Good." Law stood up and picked the pose up again. He tossed it at Bepo on his way out. "Get the sub ready to surface."
"Aye aye!"
-x-
"What kind of island is that?" Luca heard Shachi cry as she and Penguin walked onto the deck (since they were the last ones out—they had to put their cleaning supplies away.)
When Luca looked out at their next destination, she knew what Shachi meant. "Is that—lightning?" She asked, stunned.
Sure enough, lightning was striking down onto the mountainous island in front of them. How were they supposed to land on that?
"Um, Captain? You sure you don't wanna try somewhere else?" Penguin tried to offer.
"We're going to land there." Law said simply, smiling as always.
"No offense but how?" Luca stated dryly. "There's lightning going wild all over the place."
"We'll find a way."
Leave it to him to be unperturbed by anything.
"Maybe we should sink underwater and go in that way?" Shachi suggested.
"Or we pick another island on the log pose and head for that one?" Luca suggested quietly.
"No. We're landing on that island." Law somehow heard her.
"Uh, Captain?" Penguin called uncertainly. "There's a boat coming up on our starboard side."
They swarmed the right side of the sub and looked over into the sea. Sure enough, a tiny boat was floating their way covered by an umbrella.
"My, my, my." A voice croaked from the direction of the small boat. The umbrella moved to reveal an elderly woman standing in the middle of the boat, surrounded by closed umbrellas. "Would you like to purchase an umbrella?"
"Will it get us to the island safely?" Law asked, getting down to business.
The woman's smile widened. "Of course it will! No one can land on Raijin Island without an umbrella."
Raijin Island? Luca could've guessed; the island was surrounded by lightning.
"How much for an umbrella?"
"Five-hundred beli each."
"Two-hundred." Law bartered.
"Four-hundred!"
"Three-hundred."
"Deal." She gathered up several umbrellas and in a single leap, she landed on the deck of the sub. "Pay first."
"Shachi, go get the beli out of the treasury." Law ordered.
"So how do the umbrellas prevent us from getting hit by lightning?" Luca asked as Shachi disappeared back into the sub. Last time she checked, lightning was more likely to hit anything sticking up, like a lightning rod.
"Just use it like you would a regular umbrella. It will keep you safe." She turned to Luca and then her eyebrows furrowed.
The old woman grabbed Luca's left hand and pulled it towards her. "Would you like a palm reading while you wait?"
"A what?"
"A palm reading!" The woman said cheerfully, turning Luca's hand over in her own hand. "I used to do them when I was younger and I haven't come across many candidates. Come now, let old Kasa read your palm!"
Well, there was no harm in it, was there? She nodded briefly, all too aware of the eyes of everyone on deck watching her and Kasa.
"Oh good. I miss doing this." Kasa led Luca over to one of the lights on the sub. She held Luca's hand under the light and examined it carefully, tracing the various lines etched in her palm.
"You have a long and curvy heart line." She reported. "You freely express your emotions and feelings no matter the consequences."
That wasn't surprising. Luca always had a bad habit of blurting out what she thought of people. But maybe that was because of working in Tez's bar. She had to be and sound tough.
"But," she pulled Luca's hand closer to her eyes. "You have some smaller lines intersecting your heart line—you've experienced some emotional trauma before."
Her mother. Luca's heart seized for a moment, thinking back to her mom.
Kasa moved onto another line on her palm. "You have a strong head line. It's separated from your life line—she tapped a different line—"you have a strong enthusiasm for life and adventure."
How long before she met Law did she talk about leaving Sabaody for good? She talked constantly with the friendlier pirates in the bar about the Grandline and the New World and dreamed about seeing it for herself.
"Now your life line—it's curvy, deep, and long meaning plenty of energy and you will need it in the New World. Here there's a break, signifying a sudden change in lifestyle."
Being sold into slavery, press-ganged into the Heart Pirates, and unable to say good-bye to her best friend in the entire world could count as sudden change.
"And now my very favorite line on the palm." Kasa said. "Your fate line." This time she took a longer time to examine the line on her palm, regarding it carefully. "Hmm." The woman frowned.
"What is it?" Luca asked.
"Your fate line is very faint." Kasa finally spoke.
"Is that a bad thing?"
"Not necessarily no. It means that your fate is in your own hands. You will make your own decisions—some may help you grow but some will change your life forever." Kasa regarded Luca seriously. "But there're some breaks in your fate line."
"And that means?"
"Your life is prone to change because of external forces."
Her parents separating, Luca and her mom moving to Sabaody, being captured by slavers, Law. None of those things happening were by her choice.
"And here," Kasa tapped Luca's palm at a singular spot. "The fate line joins with the life line which is most troubling. There will come a point when your interest must surrender to the interest of others."
Luca felt a troubling feeling deep in her gut. No doubt Kasa meant her debt to Law that Law had yet to make her uphold yet. "Okay." Luca tried to take her hand back but Kasa held on tighter.
"Listen to me, Luca."
Luca tried to hold back a gasp; she never told Kasa her name. "There will come a time when you will have to make a decision: to go back to the past or to stay with the present. You must learn which is most important to you. Because when the time comes, you will have the abandon the other for good."
"What do you mea—?"
"I got the beli!" Shachi burst out of the submarine door, holding a bag aloft.
"Excellent!" Kasa beamed and in a moment, she was by Shachi's side holding her umbrellas.
Luca chewed on her lip, thinking about Kasa's warning. What did she mean, making a decision between past and present? She wordlessly accepted an umbrella from Kasa and stood by the railing. Honestly, she didn't know what to think. She didn't even know what it was that she making the decision about.
"Was it enlightening?" Law smoothly asked as he joined her at the railing, his own umbrella in hand.
"Sort of?" Luca ventured. "I'm not sure if I believe in the palm reading-fortune telling stuff." Sabaody had been full of fake fortune tellers who had been nothing but frauds. Locals were wise to never spend a beli on them.
"I don't."Law said bluntly.
After handing out umbrellas, Kasa jumped back onto her own ship. Without speaking, Law and Luca opened their umbrellas as the sub lurched forward heading for Raijin Island.
-x-
This is kind of a filler chapter. But I wasn't kidding guys. I'm running out of ideas. I've got two years to fill here until I catch up to the plotline. I'll leave a blurb on my profile so be sure to check it out. So please send me ideas!
My main goal is to spend as much time as I can with Cayenne because it will be Luca-centric when I catch up (Y'know, the alliance and all.) So keep that in mind when you spend me ideas. But you can give me ideas for Luca—I won't reject them.
It's also come to my attention that some people on Tumblr that Heart Pirate OCs should wear the boiler suit uniform. What're you're opinions on it? I just want to know who'd be in favor and who would not be. I'm curious. (To me, it doesn't matter.)
Reviews, favorites, and follows are love! See ya in chapter twenty-one!