A meeting in the dark. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece. If I did, I would be busy drawing instead of writing Fanfictions

25: Shuffle

It was rapidly approaching night time now.

Monkey D. Luffy lied on his back on the deck of the Thousand Sunny, staring up at the more prominent crescent moon. His expression was that of a blank stare, as if he was thinking of everything and nothing at the same time. His breathing was slow and calm, as if the bright light of the moon had some kind of mystical sway over him.

Most of his wounds were healed now. Whoever was the doctor on Ivankov's ship certainly did a good job in patching up (and even Luffy knew he needed a lot of patching). Over the course of his time being alone, he took off more and more bandages all of the time when he realized he was healed. He was now down to a few bandages on his chest and a rather large swath of white cloth on his right cheek acting as a bandage.

Sighing, he turned his head lazily to the left to see his famous straw hat lying right besides him. Internally, he was grateful it wasn't lost after he blacked out at the Battle of Marineford. After a few seconds, his stare lingered, and he went back to looking up at the crescent moon.

He had been alone on the Thousand Sunny for a while now (Luffy wasn't sure of the exact day, but he was thinking somewhere around a week or maybe longer), and more and more he felt himself getting lonelier. With each passing day, he wished just a little more that his crew would show up out of the blue on the ship, and act as if nothing had happened; he wanted that more than anything now.

Dark King Silvers Rayleigh, a.k.a. First Mate of Gold Roger the Pirate King, had stopped by periodically throughout the days with a bottle of alcohol in one hand and a box of coating supplies in the other. Once or twice Luffy had enquired why his schedule on coating the ship was so shoddy and all over the place, and he simply smiled and replied:

"I get caught up gambling and drinking. What can I say?"

Normally, Luffy would have found this hilarious, but due to the circumstances, he could only nod listlessly and leave Silvers to his work. During the day, he spent most of his time in his room. Whenever he got hungry, he went over to Shakuyaku's (Shakky for short) "Rip-Off Bar" for food and drink (it was at this point that Luffy missed having a chef on hand).

Other than his visits to the "Rip-Off Bar" to eat and converse with Hachi, Camie, and Pappug (who were all recovering splendidly), Luffy stayed secluded in his ship, patiently waiting for his crewmates return. He also dare not leave the island to go searching, lest he either get lost or miss out on finding any of his crewmates. The best he could do is stay on the ship and trust that his friends are on their way now.

To anyone who knew Luffy for even a minute, this type of behavior was strange. Normally he wouldn't be fine with "being patient" or "being secluded," but if anyone knew the circumstances Luffy was in and had recently been through, they would understand his sudden change of character.

But that would all end tonight.

Luffy couldn't deny the fact that he missed Ace dearly and felt responsible for his death—as his last few days of sadness and crying would account for—but he knew that at some point, the pity-party would have to end, and he would be forced to move on. He said to himself that tonight, he would just lie out on the deck of the Thousand Sunny and stare up at the night sky. He promised himself that at the end of this, he would come to a clear decision that he wouldn't regret.

He picked up the hat at his side and put it on his head. He had resolved that he would no longer beat himself up over what had happened, or spend his days moping around and crying. True, he would feel sadness and sorrow for years to come, but the way he was dealing with it now was not the way Ace would have wanted it. Therefore, he resolved under the crescent moon that he would live his life to the fullest in respect to his lost brother Ace.

Luffy slowly sat up and scratched the back of his head. Surprisingly, he let out a massive grin. "Sorry Ace," he said aloud. "You know I miss you, but I also know that you know that what I'm doing is wrong. So I hope you understand that I don't beat myself up over what happened anymore."

"What truly touching words."

Luffy was immediately up on his feet when he heard these foreign words. He looked around the ship and saw Victor, perched atop the side of the ship, looking down at him with his piercing blue eyes and smiling at the young Captain.

Surprisingly, Luffy didn't react angrily, but more with curiosity. "Who're you mister, and what are you doing on my ship?"

Victor hopped off the side and onto the deck, walking towards Luffy with an extended hand. "Pleased to meet you, hope you guess my name."

"Huh?"

Victor shook his head. "Never mind. I'm Sir Prize, and I hope we can get to know each other later."

Luffy shook Victor's hand and smiled. "I'm Monkey D. Luffy, but people know me as Straw Hat Luffy."

"I know," Victor replied. "I've been keeping my eye on you for quite a while Mr. Straw Hat."

"You have?"

"Like when you were able to elude Blackbeard and his forces and make it up to Skypiea. Thankfully, we were able to discover Enel and his incredibly useful Rumble-Rumble Fruit powers."

"Hey, how did you—"

Victor continued. "Or when you went against CP9's Rob Lucci after challenging the entire marine base on Enies Lobby; and all to save Nico Robin, the woman who is a plague to any established organization."

Luffy took a step back and demanded, "How the hell do you know all of this?"

"Or when you fought against Gecko Moria's legions of undead—without a shadow no less—all for the sake of a poor skeleton with a bond for a whale."

"Answer me dammit!"

Victor smirked at this, but continued anyway. "Or would it be your most recent break in at Impel Down in an attempt to free your brother Ace. Oh, but you were a bit too late weren't you? No matter, you just need to go to Marineford with all of your break-out buddies to try and stop his execution. And…I think we all know how that turned out don't we?"

"Shut up!" Luffy roared, throwing his fist back and launching it at Victor. "Gum-Gum Pistol!"

Before Luffy could connect, Victor appeared only a few paces behind him. "You see," he explained, "like Blackbeard, I also have an eye for talent; I suppose you could say my years of experience led to that. Ever since I've heard about your escapades in Alabasta and how you beat Crocodile, one of the Shichibukai…well, I just had to keep following your story, seeing what you would do next."

Luffy swung his arm around, but Victor disappeared and was now in front of him. "And now is the time for me to finish you. I can't be having you go into the New World and getting One Piece now can I? So I'm afraid your journey ends here."

Before Luffy could strike, he pointed his fist at him and yelled, "20 Million Volt Vari!"

A large electric blast shot out of his arm and hit Luffy dead-on. Fortunately, his rubber body was a natural insulator and he appeared unharmed (albeit the Thousand Sunny took a hit).

Surprise was clearly evident on Luffy's face when he Victor stared quizzically for a second. "That's strange…" He suddenly hit his fist on the palm of his hand saying, "Of course, you're a Rubber-Man, so electricity won't do anything to you. How silly of me."

"That was Enel's move," Luffy said somewhat quietly. "How can you do that?"

"I think it should be obvious," Victor mocked. "But don't worry, if it isn't, it all will be soon."

Luffy didn't take anymore as he leapt in the air and shot several fists at Victor. "Gum-Gum Gatling!"

Unfortunately, all of the blows seemed to go through him, but he wasn't transformed into lightning, it was something else. "Let's try this," Victor said, as Luffy landed on the ground again.

Before Luffy could move again, Victor rushed at him with a tremendous speed

(of light)

and as soon as Luffy knew what it was, it was too late; Victor lifted his glowing leg up to Luffy's shoulder. "Hey, that's—" he started, but was cut off when Victor delivered the kick to his face, sending him flying across the deck.

"That's one of Kizaru's moves," he said, now uninterrupted. "How can you be using both Enel and Kizaru's moves?"

Victor made a taunting movement with his hand and smirked, "Attack again to find out."

Luffy couldn't think of a better option, as he rushed in again. He stretched his arms back and started, "Gum-Gum…"

"Slow-Slow Beam!"

Victor pointed his hand at Luffy and shot out a purple beam, hitting him dead-on. Completely caught off guard, Luffy was frozen for thirty seconds. Victor nonchalantly walked closer to him, saying:

"Scary isn't it? Getting caught in the grip of such an attack again. Of course we learned about Foxy's power through your Davy Back Fight with him, but that's a story for another day. For now…I understand that you're weak against sharp attacks, not blunt ones."

With that, Victor raised his arms in a fighting position and as Luffy clearly saw, his entire arm and fingers were turned into blades. "Another favorite," he grinned, "and completely effective!"

He struck Luffy with the blades several times all over the front of his body. When Victor was done, he started to walk away and stated, "You have four seconds left."

When those four seconds passed, pain immediately sprang from Luffy's body, as all of the cuts opened up and blood sprayed from every cut he received. The pain was so great that he collapsed on his knees and started breathing heavily. Victor had turned around at this point.

"Not too fun is it?"

Luffy's breath was ragged as he eventually asked, "What's…the name…of your devil fruit…?"

Victor's grin got even bigger. He clapped his hands several times before finally saying, "Bravo! You figured it out! Most people would guess that I somehow imitate them through some kind of scientific advancement, but they'd be wrong…dead wrong."

"What…does it do…?"

"You asked for its name first, and let me just tell you, that my devil fruit has no name."

It took Luffy a second to take this in, before Victor continued.

"As for what it does, well, if you were to ask me, I'd say it's the most powerful devil fruit on the planet. Its powers are quite simply really; you see, it allows me to reach into a live devil fruit user's body and steal the fruit right out of them, just like that."

He snapped his fingers.

"But wait, that's not all! You see, this is one of the very few devil fruits that cancels out the rule of 'you can only eat one devil fruit per person'. Indeed, I am able to eat as many devil fruits as I please, and all of their powers are bestowed upon me. Pretty neat, huh?"

Luffy only sat there, continuing to breath raggedly.

"But talk is cheap right?" he continued. "Even without all of the powers I just showed you, I have a much much more, so let's get right down to showing you so I can steal your devil fruit as well."

Luffy struggled to get to his feet, panting, "I'm not gonna…let you take my devil fruit. I'd rather die than have that happen."

"How ironic," Victor laughed. " 'Cause that's exactly what will happen."

Smoke suddenly appeared around Luffy as he said, "Gear Second!"

Victor continued to grin as Luffy took off and appeared to the side of Victor. "Gum-Gum Jet Pistol!"

Unfortunately for Luffy, he didn't hit Victor, but rather, he hit Victor's shadow, which he switched places with. Luffy grunted as Victor pointed his arm towards a metallic object on the ship and lifted his hand up. It flew towards him and as soon as he got it, he threw it towards Luffy, who caught it on instinct.

"Here, hold onto this for a second."

"Huh?"

Victor held his hand out at Luffy and used Kidd's devil fruit powers of magnetism to attract the metallic object over to him. Luffy sped towards him, not thinking to let go of the object in panic, as Victor cocked back his free fist, turning it into lava.

"Hey! Don't tell me that's Akainu's—"

It was too late as Victor released the blow with deadly force, hitting Luffy square in the chest. His rubber body bounced back to absorb the shock, but the heat of the lava utterly demolished his shirt and burned his chest badly. Luffy screamed in pain as he flew far and landed on his back, staring up at the crescent moon in pain.

Victor slowly walked over to the still Luffy. "You know, I really would have liked to have your brother's devil fruit powers as well…" He stopped right in front of Luffy. "…Oh well, guess I'll have to make do with you."

"You bastard!" Luffy said, quickly throwing himself up and throwing a punch at his enemy.

Victor was ready, however, as he caught his arm and used his other hand to put over Luffy's face, slamming him back into the ground with dizzying efficiency. Still holding him down, he used his now free hand and started to bring it to Luffy's chest.

"Just accept your fate," he said, bringing his hand even closer still.

Then, Luffy saw the strangest thing he'd ever thought he'd see. As soon as Victor's hand touched Luffy's chest, it began to almost…melt into Luffy's body, as his arm continued to go in deeper. Not feeling any pain, but realizing what was going on, Luffy let out a massive cry of panic.

"There we are," Victor said with a grin, as he was about to pull his arm out, presumably with Luffy's devil fruit in his hand.

Before he could, however, he felt a strange force and before he could react, he was kicked in the side of the head, and sent flying out of Luffy, pulling his arm out without the devil fruit, leaving Luffy safe. Luffy looked up to see Silvers Rayleigh standing there with a grimace on his face.

"I come for some late night coating and this is what I find…"

Victor was up with blood streaming down the side of his head. This time, he had no humorous retorts or sayings as he realized who it was. "You!" was all he barked in anger.

"Still, I didn't think it would be you, Victor…" Silvers said with a tone of seriousness.

"I thought you died a long time ago Rayleigh!" he shot back, clearly angered.

Rayleigh looked like he'd almost laugh at this, but kept it in. "Unfortunately for you, that's not the case." He struck up a fighting stance. "Now you'll deal with me instead of the boy."

Victor did laugh at this, however. When it died down, he said, "As if I'd fight against you and nearly die to your damned Haki! The boy isn't worth that!"

Silvers succeeded with his threat and said, "Then you'd better go quickly, before I decide to strike you again."

Victor only growled at this, saying, "You can only protect him for so long, and when he's finally out of your sight, I'll be ready!"

He was about to leave, but Luffy raised a weak hand up. "Wait!" he tried to yell, but only got off with a louder-than-normal voice. "Tell me…who are you?"

After several seconds of silence, Victor turned his back to Luffy, but finally answered. "I'm the man who is going to change the entire world…Victor D. Capere."

With that, Victor disappeared, leaving Luffy and Silvers alone in the unquiet dark.

And the Act left off...

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