Xanxus' Adventures in Parenthood Piracy by InsaneScriptist
Beta'd by the delightful Umei no Mai
Summary: Xanxus could only blame the damn scientists for stranding him in an alternate dimension. However Xanxus could only blame himself for allowing that woman to foist her child onto him. Drabble fic.
Parade
In his marine guise, Xanxus was with the other officers from the base as Garp disembarked from his ship. To cover his facial scar this time he was wearing a flesh tone band-aid, stolen from the marine's medical wing with the rest of the box against future need. Varia quality meant being prepared, after all. He unlike the other marines noted who was important in the officers immediately under Garp were and realized that the Vice-Admiral had one very sharp second.
The second was in a dull-colored suit, but well tailored to allow for sword fighting. The scowl, the hat and calm air gave him the feel of a veteran hitman. That guy was good in an understated way that said he had nothing to prove about his own strength as he knew it well and knew he was better than anyone who looked at him and just saw a non-entity. It reminded him of Squalo, who didn't brag about his accomplishments but that still didn't stop Squalo from having been the Sword Emperor from the age of fourteen.
Monkey D. Garp was a large and well-muscled man, with slowly graying hair cut short, a curious scar on his temple and laugh lines. The man was well-dressed and adorned in medals; clearly parade officer dress that would get discarded as soon as this bit of the media circus around the execution had finished.
Garp disappeared into the depths of the Lougetown Marine Base, and the lines of marines were dismissed in an orderly fashion.
Xanxus' opinion of the local marines dropped further. How had they not questioned his presence? There really should be a limit to stupidity, and not knowing the number of officers present, their identities and their ranks was one of them.
Observe
Xanxus's alias, by dint of his rank and supposed familiarity, was more or less ordered to show Garp to an office for all that he wasn't known at this base at all. It was then that Garp's more eccentric habits started showing, and it neatly explained why a few of his subordinates were carrying around crates. Yes, they were supplies but building supplies had been unexpected and inexplicable up until this point.
He crashed through walls. Not just the plasterboard, drywall crap. It wasn't even wooden walls either. These were brick walls, made with the concrete cinder blocks. He seemed to enjoy it far too much.
Garp was clearly not one to care for doors and preferred to make his own. The crates were full of supplies to fix the walls that Garp broke by virtue of being stupidly strong for all that he and the rest of this dimension's inhabitants used their flames without properly manifesting them as flames or using proper equipment to boost a flame's wavelength so the active effects could be used. Passive abilities were good and all but they only effected the user. Xanxus had to admit that despite the fucking retarded way the natives used their flames, just boosting the passive effects to absurd levels clearly could be useful.
Garp ordered the walls fixed, his second sorted out who would be doing it this time, to answers of 'yes, Bogart-taisa!' from the minions.
That made Bogart a Captain in rank but probably not in ability. Having a higher rank would likely have Bogart given his own ship to command when the Powers That Be wanted him following Garp around ensuring he didn't leave too much mess in his wake. His day-to-day mess was a bit absurd anyway. Captain was also higher than his own false rank of Warrant Officer by several levels. Xanxus knew from his looking around as part of faking his own documents that Garp went through officers at an absurd rate, some even higher than a mere Captain in the latter half of the Grand Line, so for Bogart to still be attached to Garp and practically unscathed beyond minor injuries when Rear-Admirals were getting killed said phenomenal luck or superb skill.
The assassin's instinct and experience said skill was more likely. Bogart was just too composed to not have the skill to match his easy confidence.
Garp was shown to an office, where the Vice-Admiral made himself at home by ordering food from the den-den mushi and supposedly doing the paperwork that his second -Bogart-taisa Xanxus reminded himself- brought in for a bit only to leave to deal with the details that his boss either couldn't or wouldn't.
The Vice-Admiral looked at the papers, tossed them on the desk. Garp then leaned back in his seat, placed his feet on the desk and went to sleep, leaving Xanxus standing there caught between fury and ironic bemusement. Xanxus would much rather be at home doing the same, but with less destroying walls and more throwing things.
Impressions
Looking at Garp as he snored, Xanxus was reminded of that Sawada brat's Sun Guardian, who was a boxing obsessed idiot. The similar crew-cut made it more obvious even if Garp was greying from the sides up. This was someone who got things done out of sheer force of personality and remarkable physical strength. Garp had likely bulldozed any detractors out of sheer strength and outlasted them with stubbornness.
Bogart-taisa was likely assigned to 'manage' Garp initially, but eventually followed out of earned loyalty which proved that Garp was a good man for all that his impulse control was worse than a child's and his usual maturity not much better; this didn't mean that Garp couldn't be appropriately serious when necessary but his day to day actions were distinctly childish from what Xanxus could tell. No one got promoted that high up without being able to make mature, intelligent decisions. Other officers had even higher casualty rates, which was disheartening. It was also informative about the propaganda the World Government was capable of; fudging those statistics would be very difficult if they got out.
He might just cope with the job by being childish; there were far worse coping mechanisms. It was annoying but not nearly as much as Sawada's bratty Lightning Guardian who had been part of the reason that he wound up in this dimension as it was modified ammo to the scum's bazooka that had stranded him here. The bazooka wasn't even used, which could be the worse part of the fact that the entire fucking mess.
As first impressions went, Xanxus had to admit that his weren't all that articulate. If Xanxus had to sum it up quickly though, it went: 'Fuck, this guy is too much like Sawada's Sun Guardian and fucking-Iemitsu to be thought of as sane. A sunny sky!'
Doze
The Vice-admiral's nap was stupidly short for an actual nap. Having seen the eyes flutter meant that Garp was dreaming. There was only one medical condition that Xanxus knew of that dropped a person straight into dreamland like that and that was narcolepsy. It was probably a very mild case, because a more serious one could impair combat capability. The condition meant that at any time, any where, they could be knocked into dreamland for a spin.
Dangerous and concerning. Any guardians would have a bitch-fit... Wait. How did the Vice-Admiral not have Guardians beyond Bogart? They could be assigned elsewhere, but if they harmonized even the slightest they would want to be around Garp as much as possible. He supposed that Garp could be like the Bucking Horse in some ways; Dino harmonized with all of his fucking huge famiglia on some level or another so not having them around threw him so off-balance that he was a complete and utter klutz. Dino's second-in-command Romario was Dino's only proper guardian. That didn't quite fit but he could think about it later since Garp was showing signs of waking up.
The nap as short as it was seemed to have recharged the Vice-Admiral, as he actually noticed Xanxus. The Vice-Admiral frowned as he looked at him in puzzlement.
"You seem familiar. Have we met?"
"Warrant Officer, Furia Sanshou. I've served under you previously." Xanxus said blandly, naming his alias. None of the Varia had much of a talent for naming living things, so fake identities were just odd enough to pass as unfortunate. Still, Sanshou had a bit of an authority problem that was about to show its head. "Are you senile already sir?"
"Bwahaha! I don't know how I would forget someone like you! When were you under me again?"
Xanxus gave his file's history. He had decided on the day that he had requested his own 'replacement' den-den mushi to artificially age the new paper his files were on, which required a curious balance of Storm and Rain flames. It had taken a lot of discreet running around on base, as everything had been properly filed, which required the files to be found again and aged one at a time. He'd have to forge and repeat the same process later, at Marine Headquarters which would be nerve-wracking to make the fake identity stick.
Sanshou's mood worsened as Garp waved off his careful back story without question and jovially insisted he help with the paperwork, which the Warrant Officer couldn't refuse too much without suspicion. Then Garp's ordered food arrived. Sanshou then discovered that Garp had the manners of a starving man, which is to say none at all.
Snap
As head of the Varia, Xanxus could deal with a lot before his patience actually snapped. Most thought he had a far shorter temper than he actually did because if benefited him to have people tip-toe around certain topics and kept the worst of their behaviors toned down which prevented the insane asylum that was Varia Headquarters from turning into a ticking bomb. Acting as the touchiest person in the building meant everyone was far too busy trying not to aggravate him to be interested in messing each-other around. Usually anyway. Bel always liked to test the boundaries.
Xanxus was however nearing breaking point, as Sanshou had been with Garp for the better part of an hour, which was far more time spent with Garp in close quarters than sane people wanted to spend. It really wasn't a surprise that Xanxus' temper snapped in a way that made Garp laugh that irritating laugh at his verbal torrent of furious abuse. Falling into old habits, the orange fruit almost hit Garp in the face, whizzing past as the Vice-Admiral dodged to splatter against the wall.
Sanshou took a deep breath and tersely excused himself to return to the 'vacation' he had already mentioned to Garp, marching out of the room before the man could agree.
Once outside of Garp's temporary office, Xanxus took a deep breath and thought about his incredibly risky plan. It was all riding on Garp's friendship with Roger. If Garp paid a covert visit to Roger, Xanxus was planning to tail the Vice-Admiral and eavesdrop on that conversation before having his own.
It was stupidly risky, full of holes, but he could make it work. He'd worked miracles with worse odds before. If not, he could always find another way, but this was the safest. Varia Quality existed for a reason.
I know that Garp probably visited Roger while Roger was in Impel Down but the only evidence for that is the brickwork. Bricks made of seastone, which could feasibly exist on any warship capable of transporting prisoners since so many have Devil Fruit...