Dyan, who was waiting by the ships, blinked in surprise when he saw me returning to the Dying Dream with someone new, and Raz and Cala nowhere in sight.
"Uh, did you lose somebody? Or two somebodies, maybe?" The ex-king asked cautiously, green eyes flickering around to see if he could catch sight of the Zoan or the purple-haired doctor. "Or did you trade them out for an upgrade?"
I snorted, shaking my head. "The Dying Dream needed a new member," I said slowly, locking my hands behind my back when Dyan's gaze shot to mine with lightning speed. He knew something was up. "Don't be like that. You know we plan battles based on the people on each ship and what they can accomplish. The Dream crew needed a new heavy hitter to fill in the gap that Lin has left. And I found her," I gestured to the new recruit, the redhead smiling shyly at the boy.
"I, uh, didn't know there were kids on the crew," The woman said slowly, clearly unsure of what to think. I chuckled, and Dyan sighed.
"I ate the Child-Child fruit. I'm actually an adult," Dyan explained patiently, gesturing to his small body. "I'm just stuck in the body of a kid."
"Oh," something in Azalea's body relaxed at that, oddly enough. She probably wasn't comfortable with the idea of a real kid on a pirate crew. I coughed into my fist.
"We do have one member who might classify as a kid still," I said slowly, attracting the magician's attention. "She's thirteen, though she joined a little more than a year ago. She can take care of herself, so don't worry too much about her in a fight. But if you're uncomfortable with a kid being—"
"It's not that," Azalea was reluctant to interrupt me, probably because she still wasn't sure how formal to be with her new captain, but went through with the interruption anyway. "It just makes me uncomfortable to imagine kids like Adrian in the same situation as me."
Ah. I smiled lopsidedly in understanding. "Ah. The world's a bitch."
Azalea laughed at that, clearly not expecting my blunt reply. It was a little sad, but still a laugh all the same.
"And can you buy me new shoes?" Dyan asked, making me look down and blink at him for his random ass question. I just stared for a long moment, confused.
"Uh," me and the new magician ended up saying at the same time.
"Don't you still have your own allowance?" I settle on asking in return after a moment, eyebrows furrowed. Then I relaxed my face, realizing that Dyan probably wanted to talk to me alone about our new member. "Oh," I said after a second. "Azalea, why don't you get on the ship? It looks like Yalla and Kilik are back. They can show you the ropes," I reached into one of the pockets of my dagger belt and pulled out an extra eternal pose for Hopeless Island (I always carried around a spare in addition to my personal one, just in case). "If you show them this, they'll know what it means. Ask them to explain it to you, too. It's important."
A little flustered and confused, our newest crewmate slowly took the item from me and looked at it for a moment before nodding and dazedly walking up the landing platform to board the Dying Dream.
Dyan met my gaze when I looked down at him and we began to head to the market street.
"So… shoes?"
"I need shoes," The small man replied easily with a shrug, glancing up at me in the corner of his eye. "And you decided to bring in someone to… fill Lin's spot?"
I hummed in thought, not meeting his stare. "We really did need to bring the Dream crew back up to ten members," I replied softly. "Azalea is a magician, someone with skills as good as hers is bound to be a very helpful addition to the crew."
"Ah huh," Dyan replied skeptically at my side when I stopped talking. "Keep going, I know that isn't it."
"I hate how well you guys know me," I complained with a grimace. "Azalea has cancer. Apparently, as she told me not long ago, it's everywhere."
Silence reigned over the two of us as I let that news sink into the newly stunned ex-king. We had gotten used to running into terminally ill people and sob stories became routine for us to listen to merely because of the nature of our crew. But people with cancer that we found generally were too far gone or in too much pain to travel with us. Lin had been the first and only for a long time. Now we met another person with enough endurance to come along, and only a little more than two months after Lin's death.
"Maven," Dyan finally breathed, voice barely above a whisper. "It wasn't your fault. You need to stop blaming yourself so much."
"I know," I said simply, keeping my voice light and purposely cheerful. "When I redeem myself, I can stop with the self pity. Lin would forgive me, even if she blamed me, if I corrected my mistake."
"... We're at the shoes," Dyan changed the topic, bringing my attention to the stalls lined with clothing, and more importantly the stalls of children's shoes that we had been about to pass since we hadn't been paying attention.
It didn't take Dyan long to pick the pair he wanted, and manipulate me into paying for him. He didn't even use his powers (I think) he just guilt tripped me into it. Maybe the world was lucky he wasn't a king anymore.
"HOW DARE YOU DITCH ME LIKE THAT?!" A familiar voice screeched, making me and my short companion turn to see Cala sprinting towards us, Raz strolling, relaxed, behind him.
"Oh, and we should run," Raz added, pitching his voice just loud enough for me and Dyan to hear. "Hina's behind us."
I twitched instinctively, leaning to the side and looking around my crewmates. Sure enough, I saw a streak of loose pink hair through the crowd behind them, and other splotches of white between the gaps in the group of caught-off-guard civilians that suggested marine uniforms somewhere back there.
"What the hell?!" I yelled, annoyed and shocked. "Did she go to school for stalking or something?! How does this happen all the time?!" I asked nobody in particular, turning and swinging Dyan over my shoulder before running in the direction of our ships.
When we got to the ship, Kilik was up and waving to us with both arms, easily catching our attention. "You're the last ones unaccounted for!" He yelled over to us. "So hurry up slowpokes! Before Yalla decides to gift wrap one of you for Hina so we can escape!"
"Stop scaring the newer members!" I retorted when I got close enough, easily leaping onto the ship and putting Dyan down. "They'll think she'll actually do that."
"She won't?!" The newest members of the Hope crew shouted, shocked. I narrowed my eyes, looking over at the youngest member of our crew, who was rocking on her feet trying to look innocent.
"You were playing along with Kilik's prank?"
"Kilik said pirate kids are supposed to act tough and mean or else they'll get taken advantage of…" she defended herself, making me scoff as Katie and Cala began steering the Dying Dream out of the harbor, the members of the Dying Hope following suit behind us.
"Yeah, good try," I told her, not believing it for a second. "You haven't been that naive for two months."
"Tch," She tsked, knowing she was caught and looking away from me moodily. I chuckled, shaking my head and turning to look around our surroundings in case Hina popped out.
"USURPER MAVEN!" The familiar voice ran out not long after we got our ships onto the open water. I groaned. "HINA WILL CATCH YOU!"
"How did you make her your— our— enemy?" Azalea asked, her eyes wide in shock but her voice carefully schooled to sound casual. I grinned at the redhead as we pulled farther into the open ocean, Hina's infamous fleet behind her and loading harpoons.
"I didn't do it on purpose," I explained back just as casually, leaning against the side of the Dying Dream and not even pulling out Stormfall. "We ran into her back in East Blue, when we were only a six-person, one-ship crew. She's been stalking us ever since," I told our new recruit cheerfully, watching as Yalla leapt up with her ribbon-arms blazing and tossed each harpoon easily away from us. Gino walked up next to her, taking the water that splashed onto the deck from each deflected weapon and sending high-speed water droplets from it to send any harpoons the thirteen-year-old missed off course. Azalea watched the effortless teamwork with wide eyes, slowly turning her gaze to me after we had escaped.
"Welcome to the family," I said softly to her before she could speak, putting a hand on her shoulder and giving her a wide smile. The magician stared at me for a long moment, and didn't speak until right as I pulled my hand away and was about to retreat into the kitchen.
"This is real magic," I heard her whisper, turning my head to look at the source of that soft, awed voice. "I ate the Feel-feel fruit. I'm an Empath," she confided, making my eyebrows rise. "My powers don't play a direct role in my tricks, but they keep the crowd happy. All I've ever wanted is to keep people happy and fill their day with wonder," the waves her hand to indicate my crew. Everybody, on both ships, was smiling and trading stories or doing chores while humming. "But you spread comfort. Nobody here is scared. Nobody is sad— those emotions are pushed so far back in their minds that I can barely feel them. Their contentedness overpowers every other emotion they are experiencing," she turned her wide eyes back to me. "That's real magic. Making dying people feel healthy."
I rubbed the back of my head, not sure how to respond to something like that. Azalea chuckled, most likely feeling my very confusing meld of emotions. "I'm just a selfish idiot," I argued softly, stuffing my hands in my pockets. "I wanted to do something that made me look good, that made me feel like a hero. That's all."
I found it harder to take compliments with a friend in the grave because of me. I refused to be considered a hero anymore. I sure as hell didn't feel like one. I walked away before she could respond, it was my turn to cook dinner.
—*—*—*—*—*
Azalea turned out as a sort of counselor/quartermaster. She was fine giving orders (after she settled in) and keeping track of everyone and taking care of tedious lists and chores. She also helped out whenever someone was having emotional issues, quick to sit them down and chat and use her devil fruit abilities if necessary to help them recover and sort out their problems. She also performed magic tricks for us quite often, taking center stage and switching off with Synalla as the two distracted us with their respective talents. Right then, we were headed to Water Seven to get our third ship a month after she joined us, we were running out of space on just the Hope and Dream when Azalea decided to put on a show to take up some of our travel time.
"Ladies and Gentlebrats!" She said dramatically with a snarky smile on her face, making everyone on both ships roar with laughter. Azalea occasionally teased the crew like that if she thought it would make them laugh. She could be quite the comedian. Even worse (for everyone but me, heh) was that she would sometimes team up with Raz to pull pranks on more than one person at once.
"Once again!" She threw her arms open wide, "Enjoy the wonders I will rain down upon you!"
"Run," Kilik said, stiffening up next to me where I was sitting on a crate. My smile twitched, Kilik must have guessed that whatever Azalea was going to 'rain' down on the crew wouldn't be completely benevolent. Yalla heard him and nodded; now that she was a teenager, she was no longer restricted to Raz's "cute" pranks and got the same treatment as the rest of the crew aside from me.
Not wanting to miss Azalea's show and feeling fairly safe, I let the adoptive siblings run past me and into the kitchen, where they hoped the shelter would save them. But with Azalea being the one they were trying to escape from, there was no guarantee that the closed space would be devoid of her sneaky influence.
"Ah!" Sure enough, not even two minutes passed before Kilik yelled in surprise and horror. "Hurry! Save the leather before the glitter and paint ruins it!"
"You get the metal!" Yalla yelled back, similarly panicked. "Oh no, gas is seeping from the fridge! Quick, hide everything before whatever it is takes effect!"
I tilted my head at what I had just overheard, furrowing my eyebrows. Metal was common enough for Kilik to be carrying around, he was a weapon smith. But he didn't work with leather all that often. But then I remembered that sword and dagger handles were almost always wrapped in leather, and relaxed at my deduction. He was probably just getting ready to wrap the handles for those hand-shaped daggers Dyan had told me Kilik was going to work on. Apparently the weaponsmith had wanted to use my hands as the shape for them, and I had let Dyan trace my hands since I was already used to Kilik's odd ideas for weaponry.
Mystery solved, I leaned back against the wall behind me and focused again as our crew's magician magically whisked away all of the hair dye she had sprayed over most of the crew, leaving behind only their wacky colored hair. Apparently Raz had engineered this batch to only stay on the hair in the pattern of kissy lips. Seeing Gino with bright lemon-yellow lip shapes on his short hair was enough to send me into helpless laughter even as I felt the rest of the crew glare at me for my immunity to their pain.
"We'll be arriving at Water Seven tomorrow by noon!" Cala said slowly, clearly trying to remain calm. Apparently he was starting to get used to his bad luck with being the butt of the joke with me, Raz, and now Azalea. But the way his hands were clenched into trembling fists gave away that he wasn't completely adjusted. The bright glow-in-the-dark neon pink lips on his hair really didn't help bring any intimidation to his next words. "We better look normal by the time we get there or we'll be laughing stocks!"
"Oh?" Azalea hummed, looking absolutely innocent. "Is this inconvenient for you? Alright!" She snapped her fingers, and one-by-one the patterns on everyone's head disappeared as if by real magic.
Except Cala's. He waited, mirror handy, for a long moment in anticipation. But nothing happened. He looked back up to a grinning Azalea and the smug Raz standing behind her. "Oh, so sorry!" The magician said with false regret. "It seems the glow in the dark formula takes three days to wear off. Perhaps you should stay on the ship tomorrow?"
"WHY ME DAMN IT?!"
—*—*—*—*—*
I stood on the middle Cerberus head of the Dying Dream, which was currently sailing in the very back of a triangle formation formed by the three ships making up the Hopeless Pirates. I liked the Junk style, and even though I planned on having a lot of ships and generally a larger crew like the Yonko, I also wanted it to be a bit different. Instead of large ships with maybe thirty people per ship minimum (closer to a hundred of you were looking at Whitebeard), I wanted a lot of ships with small, elite and well balanced mini-crews on each. Ten to fifteen to a ship max, to create what was likely to be one of the smallest but strongest pirate fleets in the future. For now, just our three ships was doing the trick.
The Dying Hope and Dying Rabid were easy to see where they sailed not far ahead of the Dying Dream, and I took in the fresh appearance of the month-old ship with the silver sails on either side of the purple center sail, and the bright green strip circling the outside walls of the beautiful vessel. It was barely six in the morning, I had just finished an hour of my usual push-up and sit-up routine, pushed farther by the addition of a thousand-pound weight on my back for the pushups and five hundred on each leg for my sit-ups— ones where I held my legs in the air for the entirety of the exercise. My disease was speeding up, so my routine had to keep ahead of it.
The brisk morning air seared by lungs as I took a deep breath, relishing the cool, half-darkness that came right before sunrise. The short moment of time where everything seemed to shimmer blue right before the sun broke the horizon.
Only me, Cala who was checking our heading, Katie who was at the helm, and Yalla who was on watch on top of our middle sail were awake on our ship for the moment. The gentle lap of the waves against the side of our ship and the splash of ocean creatures were all that could be heard, nobody feeling quite up to breaking the tranquil silence for a conversation just yet. Being left alone to our thoughts and crew tasks was peaceful for the moment.
I filled my mind with simple thoughts. Of the weights I would pick up in a few minutes, of the fact that we needed five more members for the Rabid crew before each ship had ten people, of the fact that I had five months before my bi-yearly meet up with Whitebeard and Ace. Four months before my nineteenth birthday and two year anniversary of setting sail.
My left hand went to my pocket, easily meeting the lump that was the glasses case inside it. Gently, reverently, I slipped it out and ran my fingertips over the fancy green L on the cover.
"Another day," I whispered to the air as I stared at the bright letter. I wasn't quite ready to look at the poster inside yet, though I made myself do it once a week at least. Sometimes more if I got hit with an especially harsh blast of melancholy from missing her.
"Maven," Katie's voice made its way to me from her spot at the helm, where she lazily leaned over the table-like wheel. "Sunrise. Why don't you kick off the day with a song?"
My crewmates had found my long-repressed habit of singing while I exercised. I usually did it when they were all asleep and we were anchored in spot, but a certain sneaky weaponsmith had gotten up for a midnight snack, overheard me, and decided to bring the whole crew up to spy on me until I finished the whole workout and five songs. Since then, despite admitting I was just a decent singer and not anything world shattering, they still wouldn't stop begging to hear me sing.
In hindsight, it's probably because I sang songs from my old world that I had relentlessly memorized as my last real reminder of it besides my faded memories of the One Piece anime. None of them had ever heard those songs before, of course, and liked hearing me sing them.
I grinned at my blond first mate, straightening up and stretching my arms. "I guess I can stall my weight training long enough for one song," I reluctantly agreed. Katie was lucky I was in a singing mood.
"A fire needs a space to burn, a breath to build a glow," I started, sitting on a crate and tapping out the beat on my knees to the best of my memory.I've heard it said a thousand times, but now I know," of course, I wrote these songs down frantically once I was two and able to hold a pen so that I didn't forget them. And after dying, being reborn, and being diagnosed with a terminal illness in my new life? Yeah, all the songs I remembered were pretty sad.
"That you don't know what you've got, oh you don't know what you've got, No you don't know what you've got," I took a deep breath, closing my eyes and tilting my head back. I could feel the gentle warmth of the sun pass over my face. "Until it's gone… Until it's gone… Until it's gone!"
Footsteps sounded as my voice carried across the ship, gently stirring sleeping bodies and telling of the new day finally having arrived. Synalla was the first person to walk out from the cabin area, rubbing her eyes as she listened to me.
"I thought I kept you safe, I thought I made you strong," I continued, closing my half-opened eyes again and releasing me to the song from my past life. "But something made me realize, that I was wrong…"
Oh Linkin Park, I thought I continued belting out the melancholy lyrics. How the hell had they written a song so perfect for my current mood? I slipped the glasses case back into my pocket as I sang. Soon enough, my feet and hands stopped patting the beat and my voice trailed off after the last few lyrics.
Peeling open my eyes, I ignored the dull burn in them from my pupils trying to rapidly adjust to the sudden increase in brightness. The sun was now fully over the horizon, having just finished rising. I took another deep breath of the crisp morning air, letting it out softly as I realized the whole Dream crew was now up in various degrees of awake and stumbling across the deck to start their morning activities. I saw Synalla slink into the kitchen, and a warm scent rose up a few minutes later.
I felt my lips curl into a small smile as I made my way to my weight, choosing the three-ton one I had picked up in Water Seven and raising it above my head.
I let my eyes roam around as I swung my weight, softly huffing out the number of each rep to keep track of myself. Kilik was stumbling his way up the middle sail with a bag over his shoulder as he tried to make his way to Yalla. I smirked as he slipped only to be rescued by Yalla's pink ribbon arms around his waist, and shook my head even as I continued training at the face he made when Yalla reeled him up like a dead fish and set him down next to her.
"Another day," I whispered out, wishing it could continue to be just like this even though I knew that was impossible. So I said the thing I had been pleading for ever since Lin's death woke me up and things had settled down. "Just one more day like this. Please."
—*—*—*—*—*
There were three more months of relatively peaceful days like that. Of course, relatively peaceful was something odd in the Grand Line. Some days, it meant absolute boredom. Other days, it meant taking down two rival private crews and sinking three different marine ships all before dinner. Still other days, it meant running into Hina four times in one day. Why? Just. Why?
I stared at the pink haired marine captain, my face blank since I honestly had no fucking idea how the hell that woman kept popping up. We had sunk her fleet before breakfast, landed on an island and had to beat her and her crew up right after lunch, sank half of her brand-new ships in her fleet before dinner, and now it was approaching midnight and she had miraculously shown up out of nowhere with her three remaining ships.
Just. How?
Kilik, who was standing next to me on the left Cerberus head on the Dream, was similarly deadpanning towards the marine.
"Does she have someone capable of tracking us?" He asked me incredulously, not even bothering to take his clock blades from his hips. I just shook my head, honestly baffled.
"I. I just," I couldn't even say a full sentence, I was so confused. "I am just so done. She hasn't even come close to capturing us in over a year, why does she keep trying?"
"She did catch Conill that one time like, what, five months ago?" I shook my head at Kilik's question.
"No, no," I corrected. "It was two weeks after we got Azalea, remember? Before we got the Rabid," I nodded to the ship. Conill being the bunny mink that I had picked up not long before Lin's death. He had really proven himself useful and eager, and was currently the leader of the Dying Rabid crew. Kilik nodded at the memory, snapping his fingers.
"That's right! Poor dude was just getting over an ear infection and Hina was able to sneak up on him," he mused out loud. The Dying Rabid was directly on our right though, the black bunny mink standing on the front of it in a similar position to me and Kilik and thus within earshot.
"I got out on my own!" He squeaked indignantly. The leader of the Dying Hope, which was on our left, snorted. She was somebody I had been surprised to recruit just a month or two before Conill— probably because she was familiar. Who knew her name and most famous aspect was because of a dangerously fast metabolism that was actually terminal— it kept speeding up as time went by and would eventually kill her.
"Usurper Maven! Lilly the Glutton! Shadow Conill!" Hina's voice rang across the water separating our three ships from hers, bringing us out of our comfortable chatter. I sighed, tilting my head to look at Lily, who was only a couple inches tall at the moment from her place on the Hope.
"How can she even see—" I cut myself off, realizing what was going on. "Shit," I turned my attention back to Hina, who hadn't fought much in the past three battles that day. Surprisingly, she and I hadn't even clashed personally because she had always managed to stick back and direct her troops, which was definitely not normal for her now that I was paying attention.
I might have just made one of my, and possibly Luffy's one day, enemies stronger. Because there was no way she knew Haki before the timeskip in the anime, and Observation could be the only way she could see the tiny Lilly from so far away.
"Observation?" Kilik asked from next to me, seemingly unbothered that he had been ignored by Hina. He threw quips at her every time he got near the pinkette, so she had taken to ignoring him as often as possible. I nodded, turning my head to the Dying Hope's crew leader.
"Lilly, go ahead and size up. Might as well make this quick, it's late and I'm tired." I ordered easily, turning my head to look over my shoulder instead of watching the green haired girl grow up to her Giant's height. If Hina has a good enough Observation to track us even though we had sailed out of view, then I would need to step up my game. She had to have been training for at least the past several months to get so good at it— and had been hiding it from me too, the asshat. She wasn't even the right rank for it, she was still a captain. I smelled shenanigans.
"Your grandfather decided I should be a bit more well equipped if Hina was going to chase after you," Hina told me, sounding suspiciously smug. "He also said to tell you that a little challenge will do you good."
"That shitty geezer!" I growled, realizing she had probably been trained by him in Haki for almost a year, maybe even slightly more if she told him about her run in with us back in East Blue right after it happened.
"Your Family is cutthroat, Big Sis," Conill mused, one of his ears twitching as he used the nickname they had decided would replace "Momma" (though Raz stuck with the original nickname because he was an ass). I wished the Big Sis nickname would catch on outside the crew though, because for some reason there seemed to be someone making a mention of "Momma Maven" every time I happened to show up in the newspaper. For some reason, I had the feeling a certain redhead was behind it— and not Azalea.
"You don't know the half of it," I said back, rubbing the back of my neck. "Gramps is just a pain in my ass, though. Okay, Lilly you take the ship on the far left. Conill, take a partner and take the one on the right. Me 'n Kilik got Hina and hers," I instructed. Lilly's size alone could take care of most small marine ships in Paradise, and Conill was fast and good at teamwork. He got the nickname shadow because that was usually all people saw of him, after all. And because he was covered completely in black fur, but, ya know. At least they didn't mistake him for a pet. Most minks unfortunately were. Even Trafalgar Law's first mate was mistaken for a pet, poor guy had a miserably low bounty because of it.
"Go!" I shouted, and all at once the four of us hopped to our respective targets. In mid leap, I hissed out of the corner of my lips to Kilik: "try to sink this thing ASAP, Hina has a trick up her sleeve. I can just feel it."
"Sure thing, Sissy," he said with a smirk, making my eyebrow twitch since he was simultaneously managing to call me sister and weakling with just one word. Jerk.
"You're cleaning the bilge for the next three days."
"Damn it."
—*—*—*—*—*
Three hours later, bruised and exhausted, I was sprawled out on the deck and let it a heavy sigh of joy when Katie climbed down from the top of the center sail with her spyglass to report that Hina was not going to catch up anytime soon.
She and I had fought for a whole hour. Her Observation was almost perfect, and it was annoying as hell to combat with my own decidedly inferior Observation— the only good thing was that she didn't have Armament. But Lilly and Conill had easily taken down their own ships, and my warrior ethic refused to let anyone help me in my fight against the idiot pink haired marine. Result? I won. But I was also beat and sore and sick and tired of hearing somebody talk in third person. If anyone said that woman's name out loud again, I'd lose it.
"We're about an hour from the next island on this hopping route," Cala said as he strolled over and sat his small ass down next to me, seemingly unbothered by my exhaustion. "But unless we want another late night visit from H—" my glare got the Zoan to clear his throat and continue. "From the marines, then we should go to a different island. We have plenty of eternal posts after all— should reach Jaya by morning."
"Then we go to Jaya," I said easily, knowing Hina probably would have no power over that place anyway since it was notoriously overrun by pirates all the time. "Raz has been talking about seeing if their old rainforest has the herb he's looking for for a concoction to nullify the venom Kilik's body makes.
It wasn't long after that brief conversation that I dragged myself back to the cabin, gave Stormfall a quick sipe and polish before putting her blade cover on and setting her down, and let myself fall asleep among the other women that were settling back to sleep also, if they weren't like Yalla and Azalea and already back to snoozing.
I woke up at eight the next day, three hours later than usual to make up for my late night, and decided to get out and begin my morning exercises.
"You should do a compressed version for our training today," Dyan said as he walked past me. "The rest of the crew wants to go out at noon for a day of drinking."
"Noon?" I asked, eyebrows raised as I picked up one of my smaller, five hundred pound weights and started tying them to my calves. "Why so soon?"
The small man ran his hand through his dark green bangs, brushing them back. "You do realize new year's is your birthday, right? And that's only a month away. They want to get some holiday celebrating in early before the islands get crowded and annoying for Christmas and everything."
I sighed, laying down and lifting my legs up, bent at the knee with my feet parallel to the ground, to begin my sit-ups.
"I suppose that's okay. I'll just train until then, four hours isn't bad. I'll just add an extra hour tomorrow."
Dyan shook his head, watching as I crunches my body upwards, eyes lingering on the weights attached to my legs.
"Honestly," He said softly. "Only you. Only you can keep this kind of routine up for so long."
I was silent for a long moment, grunting every now and then and counting my crunches in my head. When I finally responded, my voice was as cool and casual as I could get it. "This is for survival, Dyan. Pure survival," I glanced up at him, double checking my count in my head so I didn't get lost. "I can't be the only one capable of doing this to live. I'm just the only one with that kind of willpower that's gotten Usurper's."
The small ex-king shook his head again, walking away without a word.
I smiled to myself and continued my training.
—*—*—*—*—*
Nine hours later found the whole crew at one of the larger bars on Jaya. The twenty-five crew members filled about half the bar, and somewhere through our (mostly alcohol free, though no less crazy) drinking and eating marathon and partying another pirate crew had come in to fill up the other half. We had been too far in our early holiday celebration to pay attention to who they were, though none of us really cared since we could still defend ourselves extremely well if we were ambushed, even those of us who were plastered. I wasn't that far gone, too careful to avoid a hangover that might inhibit my training to get truly drunk, but I was feeling a nice buzz as I sipped a large mug of sake.
And then Kilik started coughing. At first, none of us paid attention— until the shakes started. Me and Raz instantly had our eyes locked on the weaponsmith, whose hands shook as he held his booze.
"Kilik," Raz said slowly, "You haven't drank any alcohol today right? You know that can speed up the venom," the doctor asked as he put down his water and I put down my wine. Kilik shook his head, his cinnamon hair flopping into his eyes. Trembling fingers brushed it away hastily.
"N-nope. J-j-just some water, a little juice earlier but I made sure none of it w-w-was al-alcoholic."
"I'll get the stuff ready on the ship, you need an extraction," Raz got up without hesitation, speed walking towards the ship— his version of running. My buzz thoroughly gone, I threw my chair back as I stood up, seeing Kilik trying to stand follow him.
"No, sit down!" I ordered sternly, about to grab him and force him back on his seat when he lost balance and fell. "Shit," I cursed lowly, carefully pulling him out of the awkward position he had fallen in, his legs having still been on the wrong side of the chair. I straightened him out, checking his pulse to see that it was a little too fast. I cursed again— a sped up heartbeat meant the venom would spread through his system faster. I looked up to my crew, who had also sobered at the haunting sound of Kilik's body dropping onto the floor. "Conill, you're the fastest. We need to get him to the infirmary ASAP—"
"Let me help," a smooth, deep voice said from my left. I turned just in time to see a tall man kneel next to me— but I froze as I got a look at his face and the iconic white spotted hat that sat on his head. My eyes darted down to the tattooed hands that started inspecting Kilik before I could even respond, but when I looked up again I saw the man's eyes looking at me to gauge my reaction.
The bar was dead silent. My crew recognized the man just like I did, and it seemed like they were all holding their breath. I could feel a vein in my jaw leap as I grit my teeth with stress. I looked up at Conill.
"Go tell Raz where we'll be," I ordered, the bunny immediately hopping out the door and I returned my gaze to the doctor in front of me. "... I'm trusting you here," I whispered softly, warning laced behind the worry in my tightly controlled voice. "Don't make us both find out what I'm capable of when it comes to revenge."
A long second passed where we just stared each other down, but the man nodded and slipped his hands under Kilik's passed out body.
"Follow me," he said tersely. "I can help him better on my ship."
I took a deep breath, nodding. But I wasn't stupid enough to go alone on a stranger's pirate ship, and glanced over my shoulder. "Dyan, Yalla, come on," I said, running my gaze over the rest of the crew. "Katie, you're in charge until I get back. Behave," with that, I hurried after the man we had unknowingly been sharing a bar with for the last few hours— Trafalgar Law— with Yalla and Dyan close behind.
"You're bringing kids?" He asked when he saw them, his brows furrowed. I wanted to smirk, but the situation was not allowing my lips to curve up.
"Dyan is stuck in a child's body because of his devil fruit, he's actually older than either you or me," I responded, keeping the explanation vague just in case. "And Yalla is Kilik's adopted sister, there's no way in hell she wouldn't come. They won't get in your way, though," we reached his submarine, and he began to lead us in and through the surprisingly twisty hallways in the massive vessel.
Law just rose his eyebrows at me, but made no comment. It wasn't long before we reached the operation room, and I banished Dyan and Yalla to the hallway as I watched Law lay Kilik out on the sterile metal table.
"Previous medical conditions?" The man asked easily, going through a brisk overview of my crewmate. I let out a dark chuckle, crossing my arms. Stormfall was still on my back, but I leaned against the wall anyway despite the discomfort.
"Oh yeah. Chemically induced terminal illness, causes his body to produce venom directly into his bloodstream. Our doctor has been closely monitoring it and doing extractions of the venom to keep the harm to his body a minimum, but his body increases venom production over time."
Law's hands momentarily froze and he looked up at me, his face locked and unreadable. "What? Why would you have someone terminally ill on your crew?" He asked slowly, carefully.
"He's a hopeless case," I hinted heavily. "Just like the rest of us."
Sure enough, the quick witted pirate caught on almost immediately, eyes widening. His jaw clenched as he refocused on the problem at hand, holding up a scalpel.
"As payment for my help, I want to talk to you about that later," his tone offered to room for argument. "For now, you might want to leave. This will get disturbing."
Having a good idea of just how disturbing, I reluctantly nodded and left. But I didn't stray from the other side of the closed door, leaning against the wall across from Dyan and Yalla as the pirate doctor worked on our friend. Raz came down the hall soon after carried by Conill, and joined Law so the two doctors could work together.
That was the longest two hours of my life.
—*—*—*—*—*
Trafalgar Law and Raz came out of the room, both wiping their hands and looking calm and collected— even though worry was in Raz's eyes if you knew how to read them like I did. Law was still too new for me to be able to read, but he exuded control and calm.
"He's stable for now, I removed all the venom from his bloodstream, besides whatever his body had just created as I was finishing up."
"And I found the right plant to create an injection to lower the toxicity of the venom to a tenth of where it was previously. That's the good news," Raz filled in, making me take a deep breath and collect myself for the inevitable bad news. Yalla tensed beside me, and Dyan has a stormy look on his face.
"The bad news," Law spoke up. "Your doctor told me that he had been careful not to order anything alcoholic, but there was definitely alcohol in his system expediting the venom's effects. His body is permanently damaged by the venom's effects, and several of his body's processes are almost shut down. He's going to be bedridden for at least a month, if he ever recovers which is unlikely."
Yalla clenched her hands into fists. The alcohol was an issue— none of us would spike Kilik's drink and only a very small handful drank at all in the first place. So that left the waitstaff, who might have been used to pirate customers and decided we were stuck up for deciding to drink normal stuff, and who might have decided to spike some drinks behind our backs. Yalla had obviously come to the same conclusion, the thirteen year old's face dark.
"I'll be right back," her words were laced with anger and venom that I had never heard from her before, and she stalked off. I glanced at Dyan.
"Go make sure she doesn't go too far," I ordered the ex-king calmly. He nodded, taking off after the younger girl. I waited until they were out of earshot before turning back to Law. He was staring at me, as if trying to read my thoughts.
"No offense, I'm grateful you helped us out, but why?" I decided to get my questions out first before he started asking his.
"A man dropped unconscious in the middle of the bar. My appetite was ruined," he deflected. I knew he was definitely not one of the most warm and cuddly people from the anime, and always seemed detached and cool. But even before I died I had known he was kinder than he let on, he helped people without needing to be asked. He wasn't the most welcoming person in the world, but he saved Luffy's life in the comics without prompting so I was willing to give him a chance.
"So, just being a good doctor?" I shot back, seeing the corner of his mouth lift up in a grin at the subtle disbelief and knowing tone in my voice. I met his gaze evenly for a moment before sighing and shaking my head, letting it go. "Alright. You said you wanted me to answer some questions for you, right? Got anywhere to sit?"
Five minutes later, we were in the large (and empty) cafeteria sitting across from one another, Raz at my side. I shrugged and made a gesture for Law to go ahead and start asking.
"All of you are terminally ill?" The man didn't pull his punches, going straight for the big questions.
"I believe I hinted at that, so yes. We are."
"What do you have?"
"Usurper's," I replied easily. Law did a quick double take, and then let out a short snort.
"That explains a few things," he admitted, his eyes flicking to Stormfall on my back even though I knew he was probably thinking about my pirate name above all. "How long have you had it?"
"I was diagnosed when I was one."
That got a blink out of Law, and slowly his eyes widened a small fraction and his back straightened.
"Devil fr—"
"Nope. Lots of training. At least five hours a day, every muscle possible. I increase the difficulty every two weeks."
"Every member is terminally ill?"
"No exception," I confirmed. I smiled then, our gazes once again locked. "Why do you think we're already making a name for ourselves as impossible to intimidate? You have the same look in your eyes."
Raz straightened next to me, his eyes observing the pirate across from us anew. "The hat is North Blue fashion," my doctor said slowly, realization creeping into his purple orbs. "I see."
Law regarded us both silently, seemingly caught off guard that we had pieced it together so quickly. "How?" He asked next, just as steady as before. I chuckled, knowing that was actually several questions phrased at once.
"How do we know that you cured yourself of something most likely terminal and most likely related to a certain white city? A mixture of deduction, familiarity with terminal illnesses, knowledge of what your devil fruit is capable of, and the intuition that can only come from someone in a similar situation. How can we get by as a dying crew? A hell of a lot of determination, and a whole island reserved for our caskets. It helps that Raz is one hell of a doctor and constantly finds new herbal remedies to help us out," I shrugged at the end of my answer, nonchalant even as I felt Law's heavy gaze burning into me.
"...Why?"
"We all have things we want to do before we die," I replied lowly, crossing my arms and leaning back on the bench. "I didn't think I was going to live to even be five years old, let alone old enough to set sail and become a pirate captain. But I know others won't be lucky enough to stave off their illness for eighteen years, so I give them a chance to forget that they're sick as much as possible. I give them a chance to get as close to their dreams as they can," I felt my hand palming the glasses case in my left pocket. "We're dying. But we aren't gonna be left on the side of the street or in a bed to rot. We rather die fighting."
"I guess we have that in common," I looked up to see Law's small smirk directed at me, a complex web of emotion on his face keeping me from reading him very well. I lifted my head in acknowledgement of that statement.
"I suppose we do. Are those all your questions?"
"For now."
"Good, my turn," if Law was surprised, he didn't show it. I leaned forward, putting my arms down on the table in between us and pinning him with my gaze. I wasn't trying to intimidate him— it wouldn't work. We knew that firsthand— he might have been healed, but he had once been terminally ill like us. He stared death in the face just like we did, I wouldn't be able to intimidate him. Good thing I didn't need to.
"There are a few people with similar illnesses to me that you probably won't be able to help much. But if you would look at those that you can help," I paused, my hands clenched so tightly into fists that my knuckles were turning white. Oh good, I was subconsciously exercising my grip. "I'd owe you. I'll do anything to keep my crew alive as long as I can. The fact that we're dying doesn't mean we need to rush into the grave."
"Okay."
I froze, blinking blandly at the man for a moment. Did I— did I hear him right?
"Did you just..?"
Law nodded. "I'll help. But you owe me a favor for every person I completely cure, and a favor for every two people that I mostly cure."
Figures. He was secretly kind, not secretly stupid. But that many favors might come back to bite me in the ass— I needed something more concrete for a few things. I drummed my fingers on the table for a moment in thought.
Well. Law was supposed to be an ally, at least up to as far as I had gotten in the anime and manga. We'd probably have to fight him for the throne eventually, but by then a little head start on Law's side wouldn't cause much of a difference.
"I'm glad I have a habit of writing things down," I said out loud, reaching into my right pocket as the other captain stared at me. "I'll give you a favor for every person you can completely cure. That's likely to only be one person in the first place. But, for every person you can even halfway cure or more, I will give you ten pages from this book," I held up the small journal in my hand. "This book has all my notes and personal experiences on Haki, which is a very important skill to know if you ever plan on heading into the New World. One type of Haki can counteract or even nullify most devil fruit abilities if used correctly," I held out my arm to him, gauging his calculating but slightly distrusting gaze. "I can prove it. Watch."
I was wearing my usual purple crop to, so my arm was completely bare. That made it easy for him to watch as my arm turned jet black from fingertips to elbow. I glanced up at him. "To prove this isn't a devil fruit ability, Raz can also demonstrate," I flicked my eyes to my crew's doctor, who nodded and held out his own arm, which also turned black with Armament. Law's eyes flicked from one arm to the other, and then up to mine. We stared at each other for a long moment, long enough for Raz to drop his Haki and let his arm relax.
"Do you mind?" Law asked as he held up a scalpel, though he didn't wait for an answer before he slashed the object in the air towards my Armament-sheathed arm. I clenched my muscles to avoid flinching, watching as the wave of his devil fruit abilities swept through us. Nothing happened to my protected limb. Law's eyebrows scrunched, and he tried once again to use his abilities to cut my arm. After a third and final attempt, he sighed and leaned back and the scalpel disappeared somewhere. I let my Armament fade and put my arm back onto the table.
"Okay, Maven-ya," I felt myself twitch at the verbal tick he had when he said my name. It was cute. That was bad, bad Maven. No thinking of dangerous rival captains as cute in any capacity. But the verbal tick was adorable, not annoying like Hina's habit of talking in third person. "Deal."
—*—*—*—*—*
A/N: Okay. A slightly abrupt ending? But if I continued the scene then this chapter probably would have approached or exceeded ten thousand words, and I still have comments to reply to! Also, this is my first time writing Law. I hope I did alright. I think people forget that he actually helps a lot of people without even being asked or anything, he just goes over and does his doctor thing and never mentions it again. Sneaky kind hearted bastard that doesn't want people to know he is kind hearted. He's still a calculating and scheming mastermind don't get me wrong, but the dude probably wouldn't stand by and let a random person die unless he didn't like them. And he totally walked into that bar and noticed Maven right away and went into "rival assessment" mode. Let's just say, he definitely noticed that hardly any of them were drinking and was definitely intrigued.
Frey The Mouse: Oh. My. God. You didn't! X'D that won't happen, but now I can't get it out of my head.
Guest (ch.19 review): Thank you! I'm glad you like my writing, I work really hard on this because I fell in love with this thing XD. And oh YES. She will be very messed up, poor thing. It will be a slow thing and she'll hide a lot of it, but you'll eventually see the toll that all of this takes on her. And yes, I agree on the devil fruit thing. I know a lot of people want to see it because Devil Fruits are the biggest staple of One Piece, but I also don't want to make Maven OP. I do have an idea just in case, but if she does get a devil fruit then it will be after the timeskip, and I have already decided on it. Bittersweet indeed, my poor hurt little baby! I'm so glad you enjoyed the story and I hope you continue to enjoy it!
EverlastingXTC: THANK YOU FOR READING I AM SO GLAD YOU LIKE IT! :D
YasmineXanime: definitely not. I don't know where the mythical Zoan thing came from— I think I mentioned how rare they are but I don't think I ever said she'd get one. That would be way too OP for her. But no, even if I did it wouldn't be something humanoid unless it was like a Naga type thing. But no, I have already decided on the only devil fruit she is likely to get, and even that isn't 100% right now. Hint: it's a Paramecia.
Lobisomen616: I see, that does make sense. I have decided though, there is only a 50% chance of her getting a devil fruit and only one option rn. You'll just have to wait and see :P
Sweetlights: Hello! 9:19pm or 21:19 that I am responding to this also overdue reply :P I like how you predicted the reply would be short, but it wasn't lol. I love long replies too much omg XD
I agree, Raz should have titled her instead lol. Or Shanks. Don't worry about what just happened, her crew might say "Big Sis," now, but that will be covered in an Omake. Raz is still a little shit and says Momma Maven, and Shanks isn't letting that die either lol. Stupid Yonko and his large net of influence XP Her crew totally still calls her Momma Maven behind her back though tbh.
And yes, Sanji is such a great character but the manga/anime doesn't seem to pay enough actual attention to him unless it's for comedic effect which bums me out. The nosebleeds did get old fast at Fishman Island, but glad he got that under control. I wish he would get more action! Well, maybe in the highly anticipated Wano arc.
I DON'T WANT ONE PIECE TO END! I will probably die. Or submerge myself in the massive amounts of fanfics that will likely come out right after the end. Maybe both. And summer assignments suck, I'm glad that's not a thing for me anymore. I've been to community college and will hopefully be going to a full University soon, once I get the money stuff sorted. Ugh. Scholarships and everything is a pain. I wish you luck though!
I did have fun at San Japan btw. I met a guy who had the PERFECT cosplay for Sanji. I think I died a little. He looked like Sanji crawled off the manga pages and came to life. There was a female Zoro and a couple Laws (which I laughed at because SO MANY LAWS in a room of PIRATE cosplayers. Haha wordplay~) there was even a really good Bepo and Perona! I was in heaven. But I was the only cosplayer not dressed a one piece character in the One Piece fan meetup, and I got hit with a wave of painful shyness so I didn't really do much talking… I kinda ended up wallflowering it out sadly. But I liked just sitting back and watching everyone else talk. Thank you for being awesome!
Girl-luvs-manga: I think people forget how often Law helps people out just for the hell of it because he never draws attention to it. It's kinda funny.
Bloody-asphodel: Law is hard because he hides most of his emotions. I will probably need to do a portion of the next chapter from his POV to get a better effect. But yes, I fucking love him and this will be great!
Avisian: lets all take a moment to appreciate the fact hat Yalla is the only child I am likely to kill in this story. We all love children. I fell in love with Adrian too .
KMbrun: Omg, reading all your comments gave me life. Thank you for reading, I'm so happy you like it!
LordKirkleton: Yay! I'm so glad you like Maven, I've put a lot of effort into her! The design of the women in One Piece has also bothered me for a while. Isn't he very beginning it wasn't nearly so bad, Nami actually looked realistic sometimes. But as time went on, they gradually grew more and more exaggerated and after the timeskip it just got blown out of proportion (literally). So yeah, I definitely wanted to make Maven a bit different physically as well as mentally and personality wise, especially since this endgame is for her and Zoro, and Zoro has never expressed real interest in any girl so far. I definitely think he'd need a girl that could hold her own and didn't look like she'd snap under a stiff wind for sure. If he even wanted a girl, but hey that's what we're going with in this fic. Also, not many girls through most of the manga have been very strong, and that kinda pissed me off. Even if they are physically strong and skilled fighters, it's usually the enemies and not the ones on Luffy's crew which bums me out. So here you go; Badass Female Strawhat who has Actual Muscles!
Omg I actually slipped into a rant too, sorry! Glad you like the story though!
Iluvstories: huh, that's an interesting idea. But no, I don't think it would be a big deal. Her willpower is what gets her to do all the exercise and training necessary to keep herself alive, and I feel like even if Haki absorbed it that she'd recover it after some rest and maybe a motivational speech. And don't feel bad for getting attached! That was my goal :) MUAHAHAHA THE FEELS! Sorry, I'm evil. Lol but I'm happy you like the story!
As always, thank you guys and see you next chapter!~