Chapter 28
The figure, that was looking as if it was made of molten rock, was starting to move.
Slowly the brightly glowing substance was forming the shape of a human being, a man.
He was watching around, taking in his surroundings. It had been a long time. He knew this. Even if he could barely remember anything.
He knew he had died.
He remembered how he was hit by Strawhat´s attack, how the ship was being crushed around him, how his own body was shattered, how he fell into the sea, drowning, helpless. At this point he had known that the battle was lost, that the fleet was lost.
Strawhat, he was responsible for this, the man thought, he and Dragon, both of them. Father and son, he should have known it. This was the reason their entire blood-line should have been wiped out a long time ago. But they had failed.
Anger, terrible anger was burning inside of him.
What had happened to the Marines, the World Government? Did anything of all what was important to him even still existed. Was there anything left?
Beside him, the woman, the one who had freed Selena and who was responsible for everything that had happened here, stepped forward.
Then she sank to her knee in front of the man who had just returned from the dead.
"Father," she greeted him.
But the man she had spoken to was only starring into the empty space, not paying any real attention to her. Of course he recognized her, his daughter, a captain of the Marine forces for a couple of years. But he had other, far more important things on his mind.
"Father?" she repeated, a bit more unsure now.
Had their attempt to bring him back actually worked? she suddenly had her doubts. Was he the same man as he had been before his death?
"Daughter," he finally ackknowledged her. "Tell me," he asked, "what is the state of the world?"
"The state of the world?" she asked incredulous. "Father you have been dead, for months now. I...we have gone through great lengths to bring you back."
"I am aware of that," he replied sharply, not sounding as if he particuarly cared. "Now tell me, what had happened while I was gone?"
"The World Government had been overthrown," she informed him, "a short time after you..." She didn´t bothered to end this sentence.
It had happened, he thought. They had actually overthrown the world. Monkey D. Dragon and the cursed Monkey D. Luffy. Criminals and scum were now ruling what was left. Everything he had ever worked and lived for had been destroyed and it all happened right under his watch.
They, no he had failed.
He, the former Fleet Admiral Sakazuki, also known as Akainu, the Red Dog, wanted nothing more than to scream his entire anger out at the world. But he was too disciplined to do that. He was restraining himself, barely.
"And the Marines?" he asked her.
"The most of them had sworn loyalty to the new government that Monkay D. Dragon and his followers have created."
"Traitors," he growled, "all of them", to have actually joined this criminal, he thought. It could not be. "But you have staid loyal," he commented.
"Me and my crew and a few others we have heard of," she informed him.
"Good, you have staid true to justice," he stated.
"Of course," she replied. "You are my father, I wanted to have you back," she said.
"This doesn´t matter," he hissed. "We are Marines. Our ony obligation is to justice and to the order of the world. Even our blood relation is meaningless compared to that." He grabbed her by the throat.
"Tell me, are you loyal?" he asked her.
"Yes...yes father," she replied.
"What was that?" Akainu tightened the grip on her.
"Yes Fleet Admiral," she brought out, struggling for air.
"Good." He let go of her throat. "Then proof yourself to be worthy Yui," he said to her.
Worthy, she thought. She had heard this her entire life. Her father had always been demanding, strict and distanced. She was the daughter of Admiral Sakazuki after all.
She had truly hoped that his attitude would change a bit, after she had done all this to return him from death. But it seemed her hopes were in vain.
"And this is the woman who has brought me back," he observed. "Selina, the Ghost Whisperer, another criminal."
"She is useful," she replied.
"Useful yes," he repeated, "and I hope she will continue to be useful in the future. Otherwise we might have not much reason to keep her alive," he said with a dangerous look at her.
Akainu started now to truly take in his surroundings.
"What town is this?" he asked her.
"Water 7," she answered.
"Water 7, another nest of traitors that should be wiped out," he replied. "Well, when the time comes we will finally take care of this. Now tell me, where is Strawhat?"
"He is here, in this town."
"Here?"
"Yes, we needed his presence to bring you back," she explained. "That is the way her power works."
"I understand," he replied, "very interesting. And Strawhat is here. That means it is time for the beginning of revenge."
"Revenge? the Strawhats and their allies outnumber us," she said. "We have neither the strength or the numbers to take them."
"Yes, but we have her," he responded, pointing to Selena. "With her ability, she can bring back as many fighters for us as we need.
"But she has already over-exhausted herself. Even with Blute strengthening her powers, she is at her limit. I could be dangerous for her."
"Dangerous you say?" he asked. "Is there a chance that she might die right now?"
"That is unlikely, but there is no telling what it will do to her in the long run."
"And why should I care what happens to a criminal? As long as she does not die before the job is done."
"She is the only thing that is keeping you in this world father," she replied.
He was looking at her for a few moments without saying a word.
"You will start preparing her right now," he ordered then, seemingly unfaced by her statement. "And you should better hope that you will be able to do it, for you sake, criminal," he said to Selena.
xxxxxxx
Things had returned to normal in the town, at least at the first look. The Strawhats were currently about to regroup, together with their friends and allies. They all had a very good idea what was behind the latest events.
It was a devil-fruit power and it´s owner was a certain woman. They had met her before during their last adventure as one of their enemies. The Strawhat Pirates had seen a demonstration of what her powers can do first hand. There were only the questions, how had she escaped the Marines who had captured her, certainly not alone for sure, and who was with her now.
The question was should they go and look for the source of the problem right now. Of course it was not really a question, not with this crew.
Luffy thought it could be a interesting thing to go after the ones who were responsible and find out more. With other words he was acting exactly like he usually did.
The Strawhats had made their decision within minutes. As much as you could even call it a decision since their captain had already made his choice. A few of them, especially Nami, had of course voiced their concerns that they might be walking into a trap.
Luffy had only answered that with a grin and said,
"well, maybe," and began to laugh.
Mayor Iceburg on the other hand had told them that he would try to contact the government to find out if and how this certain criminal had escaped. In that way he was finding out about the attack on the Marine transport-ship and that Vice Admiral Smoker was on the way to them.
But at this time the Strawhats had already started to swarm out and search the town in small groups to see if they could find something. They all were using their haki to look for suspicious presences.
xxx
Nami and Usopp had volunteered to stay behind and guard the ship. Of course, if they wanted to find a `suspicious presence´, they wouldn´t even have needed to look that far.
The woman who was calling herself Shila was in this moment sitting on board. She was burning from anger at the situation she was in. Originally she had only intended to use the hated Strawhats as a mean to get away from that goddamned fortress-island. But now somehow she just wasn´t able to get a chance to get away from them.
For some crazy reason they refused to just let her go from board. They claimed that it was because they had promised to bring her to Dressrosa and wanted to keep it. Bullshit, she thought. She had actually started to use terms like that from time to time, despite her heritage. Before, things like `human trash´ or `scum´ would have been the worst to ever come out of her mouth. Well, many things had changed during the last months, this was clearly the least notable of it.
The Strawhats, they all knew that she hated them, this haki that they all possessed had told them that. Even she knew so much about these things.
No, the Strawhat Pirates just had some sort of perverse pleasure in keeping her here.
And now it actually looked as if she was being dragged into one of their idiotic `adventures´ that she had heard of so much. Not that it was the first time that she got a good impression of their insanity. She remembered this complete debacle on Shabaodi and she felt how the rage nearly overcome her as she thought about all what had happened later.
Sometimes she thought they all only existed to make a mess out of her life. Everything had been perfect before they had appeared, everything.
How she wished she could get her revenge on them. But she was smart enough to know that it was impossible. Even this two who were currently on this ship. She would not even manage to kill them while they were sleeping, no matter how tempting it was. But she knew she would never succeed.
All what was left to do for her was to sit here and wait.
xxxxxxx
Meanwhile the rest of the crew was walking through the different streets of the outskirts of Water 7. They had separated into three groups. Luffy, Robin, Rebecca and Brook were in the area of the docks, Zoro and Chopper and Bartholomeo were the group closest to the harbor where the Sunny was anchored and Sanji, Franky and Jimbei were at the other side of the town.
They all were concentrating their haki. Their senses were sweeping the entire area and finally they found something. It was just outside of the town. At first they barely noticed it. They obviously didn´t want to be found.
Well, that didn´t quite work out. They all were getting on their way to the place.
