Xanxus' Adventures in Parenthood Piracy by InsaneScriptist
Beta'd by the knowing 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.
Contacts
After his proclamation of intent of not being a midwife, Xanxus actually had to work to find a way to obtain competent and trustworthy medical care in advance for Rouge to prevent him from having to do it last minute or worse; have to rely on his own shaky knowledge as reading a few books didn't make a person an expert. The last six months would be the tricky ones, especially since her technique to stall her pregnancy would be ending. Timing would be tricky and difficult.
Rouge's technique worked best in the early months, as there was less to slow down in terms of development and hormones. It didn't make it any less complicated to time things right though. Rouge wanted to have her child on the first of January like she planned to, as that was the first 'safe' day to do so; keeping a child over long like that was not good for her continued health after all. It was already an official order that no more cullings of babies and mothers would be taking place after that date. Thus her baby had to be at 'full' term by then, for all that it was probably the most dangerous day to be born on. Official orders could be ignored, delayed or forgotten about and any medical professional affiliated with the World Government were highly suspect anyway.
The problem was that Rouge's child was solidly in the second trimester in terms of development and the projected birthday was six months away. Any competent doctor with the right equipment could pick up the difference in growth should Rouge be examined now.
This meant they either had to find an actually trustworthy medical professional or rely on Xanxus' own skills and knowledge -he knew he was lacking here- for a few more weeks until both Rouge and her child had synced the development to the projected day. Then they could gain medical help without excessive worry or complications.
Which still led to the question of who to trust?
Xanxus smiled.
Rouge may not have revolutionary contacts in person but Momo, Sable and Blanc did. Some of those rebelling against the World Government were very fond of them. Xanxus also had his own contacts under various guises.
"Let me comb through the Revolutionaries for the next few weeks. If I need to, I'll kidnap a pirate doctor."
Transition
Most of that late morning and early afternoon, Xanxus spent jumping around from island to island, finding the various revolutionaries and checking in with them. This was after he had spent most of the morning checking every marine base, the occasional ship and skimmed minds or spoke with the dead haunting the marines. He had to have a reason to visit them after all for all that he had Rouge inform the resistance groups for him, unless he was going to expend more energy on keeping himself invisible and unnoticeable; disguises took less effort. He had liked the system he and Rouge had set up; he had forgotten how exhausting doing things this way was.
Then because he was there and so was the opportunity as he visited the World Government's lackeys, Xanxus decided to look a little deeper mentally on those that knew haki. Xanxus remembered he could detect Rouge's technique like that and wanted to avoid such notice. His forays into it reminded him to practice too.
Over the spread of all the minor revolutionary groups in South Blue there were some fairly skilled surgeons scattered about, but a large number were generalized practitioners. Some of those were the kind Xanxus could tell were good at a glance while others were less than ideal. A few of the better ones had taken apprentices which was good for them but less so for him. Apprentices made kidnapping their master even for a few hours and getting away with it so much harder.
A few that were involved in smuggling those families away from the World Government's intolerant gaze were also unlikely to give up their work even if it meant only a few meetings for examinations and take a few hours of time maximum until the day of the birth which could take actual hours on end. Some of those doctors worked on the smuggling ships, and they were never left alone like their escort was never unarmed. Some of these rebellious doctors worked in an actual underground make-shift hospital, hidden in a cave system. It was a nice set up with a generator, plenty of space, and fresh water.
He supposed that he could take Rouge to them as he knew how to get there and get in but he wasn't sure if that would be a good idea either. Transport to there would be an issue since he was pretty sure that his usual way of getting around South Blue was not meant for pregnant women. They had travel restrictions for a reason even if he wasn't sure on the exact specifics of what and why. Then there were the other issues to be dealt with.
Rouge would get proper medical care but more people would see and remember her, plus they rationed materials here as much as they were able to. Removing memories of a birth would set up panic as numbers and supplies wouldn't line up, and altering memories was something he didn't have much skill in. Xanxus knew he didn't think like most people did, so he remembered things differently than others did.
Still, this dimension was conspiring against him or it could just be his fucking usual luck. Of the thirteen he judged to be nearly as good as a modern civilian doctor none of them were specialists of the obstetrics variety. The others that he judged as med-school drop-outs and experienced nurses could work but they generally had other commitments or weren't what he considered trustworthy; shaking hands before your hair was grey was suspicious and a sign of drug-use or medical conditions. Plus stealing any of those doctors for more than an hour wouldn't work; doctors and medical professionals were watched because they were important so any of them going missing would be noticed.
Fuck. It looked like the doctors of the revolution weren't going to be very helpful unless he wanted to get permission to borrow one, so it was down to pirate doctors and investigating Dr. Duvet. Xanxus supposed that he could always kidnap a doctor and remove the memory but doing such things didn't exactly make anyone cooperative, plus there would be potential fall-out from the missing memories. He could ask to borrow a doctor, but that would reveal more of his capabilities than he wanted to show to the small-fry rebel groups.
A pirate doctor at least was used to the threat of violence and could work under pressure well, but that didn't mean it would be to the best of their abilities either. Dr. Duvet was someone Xanxus had previously written off as a hick doctor, and so hadn't investigated further. That he was good at hiding in plain sight implicated a lack of trustworthiness and eventual cooperation; blackmail rarely made people cooperative to the fullest extent, especially since Dr. Duvet could easily disappear again and reappear with a new face. Those two options were the only ones left. If those didn't pan out then he'd have to do it himself and he'd hate to have to do that because he didn't have the time to actually study obstetrics in depth, much less gain any experience. He didn't want to do so either.
He hated doing this, but it looked like he was going to have 'copy' memories if only to get the knowledge he needed to be a half-decent last resort. He hated doing that.
Copy
The mind processed information like colors, distance, scents, sensations, tastes and more every second of the day, and even while a person was sleeping. Actually it could be said that your brain processed more while you were asleep since it reviewed all that happened over the day and filed it in a more orderly fashion, like a computer defragging.
Generally it would then compute this information, make neural pathways and did things with chemicals that even the mafia wasn't sure how it worked to create memories. You didn't have to know exactly how it worked to an absurd depth to access, alter or copy them after all. Mists and hypnotists -not the charlatans that often convinced civilians to hand over money to help them quit smoking or stupid shit- did it all the time.
Reading information off of someone's mind wasn't exactly easy, but it could be made simple with a few tricks. Even civilians knew of the 'don't think of' trick and so it wasn't something a person should mentally suggest. Instead a small prompt using Mist Flames of 'what were we supposed to be doing?' would bring that information up to the consciousness. It made it pretty damn easy to get superficial information, especially since civvies didn't have any training to defend from that sort of thing.
That was practically eavesdropping on thoughts using Mist Flames. He had learned haki that way, but that's because thoughts were both sensations and abstract ideas. The 'I feel uneasy' to 'I'm happy!' to 'I know, I know the answer to this question but I can't think of it!' Haki was very much a 'thought' skill.
Making copies of memories was practically mentally hacking someone's mind. It was magnitudes of difference in difficulty. Finding the memories was difficult enough, more so to get the right ones and made more frustrating because it was more than a single idea and associated feeling. Then you had to copy and bring all those thoughts and information to your head. In effect, copying someone else's memories into your head was very much like attacking your own mind psychically. It had quite a backlash.
In theory it could be used to learn languages overnight but as a person got older, the backlash got worse and worse. Language was an enormous abstract idea connected to memories, which compounded the issue inducing mental stress and potential personality quirks depending on how strong the associated memories were and who from. Due to the backlash some things didn't get processed right so the data could end up corrupted, creating verbal tics even if it explained why the mafia had a number of people had a similar 'accent' and way of speaking something that wasn't their native language. They even lacked the native accent corrupting a different language as they also got the memories of how to say things, which included pronunciation; something that many people found difficult unless they had extensive practice with another fluent speaker.
Xanxus learned two languages like that when he was eight and spent three days with a killer headache that made it nearly impossible to focus his eyes, much less walk. Every other language Xanxus learn after those two was due to his own hard work. A number of higher class mafia famiglias who had proper Mists used it to teach their upper ranks on occasion and their heir languages with a sort of ease when they were younger. A couple of retired Mists made a living off of teaching languages like that to anyone that could pay for it. It was something of an open secret, like how Lightnings were used by various famiglias. Most lower and middle ranking officers sought them out to learn languages; Japanese had always been pretty popular in the Vongola and among its alliance thanks to Primo's Rain Guardian.
Those who learned all their foreign languages like that were pretty easy to spot in the Varia. Levi did, but he was the only one out of the Officers. Lussuria was too old to learn more than Italian like that unless he wanted to risk being rendered comatose by the time he joined the Vongola, much less the Varia. Squalo had learned five languages like that in between all the sword training as a brat and couldn't remember not ever being able to speak those languages; the rest of the languages Squalo learned how to speak and read was all on his own effort. Bel was actually a genius and so found learning languages easy enough which is why Xanxus ended up with reports in obscure languages.
While the backlash was bad enough, it didn't help that the entire process of copying memories was fucking difficult because of how everyone processed things differently. Some people remembered emotions and connected them to memories, so if they were feeling happy they'd think about other happy things. It made them disturbingly mercurial but those people were also some of the most dangerous when it came to using Flames. Others remembered things sequentially so they knew what they were doing at this point in time, with startling clarity even years later. Still more connected what they were doing with what people more than to any sense of time. Most people were pretty haphazard unless they had appropriate mental discipline and training to make notes and observations that would be remembered, and even then memories were usually laid out in networks rather than being clearly linear.
Most people gained a measure of mental discipline as they grew up but a few professions required more than just that. The more people-oriented and mentally demanding job, like being a doctor or a even a policeman the more likely it was that they'd discipline their mind and emotions. Doctors and the police had to stay calm in trying situations. They were trained to keep their calm for the benefit of the public.
That his 'targets' were doctors was good because it meant all the memories and associated medical knowledge would be easy to copy over together. It was bad because it wouldn't be simple information so much as ideas, sensations and emotions all woven together in a way that was always going to give him a headache. It would be all phantom sensations and loose information that would have to settle in his brain before it could be called up and usable.
Xanxus knew his mind well, since bosses also had to stay calm and be able to think quickly and clearly in tense situations for the benefit of their famiglia. He also knew that his mind didn't exactly connect some things like they should. It made copying memories over more painful, as he could practically hear the incompatibility.
He was going to put that off for a time. It was best to just copy those memories, get somewhere safe and then knock yourself out for a few hours. Xanxus knew he'd wake up feeling like he was hungover but at least it would spare him the migraines.
He wouldn't be able to copy all those memories at once after all, so if he was going to be a half decent last resort option he needed to know it and plan this stuff out now. His current penultimate resort was kidnapping a marine doctor, giving the entire base a mental suggestion of avoiding the stolen doctor and then abusing his knowledge of psychology with Mist Flames and re-writing the doctor's mind suit his specifications. It would only take an hour or so of work, and then after the birth, the doctor could be disposed of, possibly by the marines themselves for being a 'traitor.'
Spar
One the of the better things about being Sansetto was the fact he had competent employees and had minimal paperwork because of it. He probably shouldn't push it all off onto Squalette but he knew that she had her siblings to help her out on they days she needed help.
Melrose had Squalette's signature and more copied so well that it was hard to tell the difference between what they had written. Clearly, he had expanded his talents to include forging while Xanxus wasn't looking. Cordelia on the other hand was a bit shakier on forging her sister's signature but she generally managed the employees, their schedules and the like, so she rarely actually needed to.
This meant when he was there, he could do the paperwork with an ease to be envied as the result of lots of practice in the Varia with fewer language difficulties. The Clydes weren't going to write up a report in Welsh of all things. That meant with him doing his work, Squalette had the afternoon off.
"Up for a spar?" Xanxus asked.
"If I murder you, I get the company." Squalette stated firmly.
Xanxus smirked and just cloaked their trek to Machina's junkyard style wilderness.
Capabilities
Squalette was an amateur when using the blade. She at least knew how to hold it right and swing, so talented was out. That was about it. Her footwork was pretty horrible. Oh, she could 'parry' but Squalo would have killed her for how horribly it was executed. He did however find out that it was pretty easy to predict what Squalette was going to do; if that was due to using haki, Xanxus wasn't sure. Squalo had spoiled him when it came to swordsmen and the level of ability he expected to see from them.
The sad thing was that the pathetic excuse for swordsmanship would have worked in East Blue for self-defense purposes. It was not good enough for an actual spar unless Xanxus wanted her to kill herself by going against him. She probably wouldn't trip and chop off her leg -her blade wasn't sharp enough for that- but that was about that could be said for her competence.
Xanxus decided that while he would never pass beyond proficient with a blade despite years spent with the Second Sword Emperor by his side, he could at least teach her well enough to not be an embarrassment to him by the time Varia members started showing up. Whenever that would happen. He had thought that Squalette was better with a blade than that.
The first thing he'd teach her was about her center of balance and how that effected how she should fight. The second thing he'd teach her was how to move. After that he was going to teach her how to defend herself. However, he was not going to be nice like he had been over the auction and scamming stuff.
The most annoying thing about teaching amateurs and those who thought they knew what they were doing was breaking bad habits and replacing them. A kind teacher would show her all the steps, how to attack, how to defend, what works and why it does. Xanxus however was not a kind man and an impatient teacher, especially for physical things. Squalette would learn what works and what didn't first hand. She'd then learn to adjust her own stances and practices after that or continue to get injured.
While he wouldn't kill her -good help is hard to find- it didn't mean that injuries wouldn't occur. They were both using steel blades so actual injuries were possible even if Xanxus took care to not cut her in half or flay her open. Trips, spills, pratfalls, and just plain uncoordinated flailing could happen in their chosen sparring area since the land was hard and rocky, the vegetation surprisingly thriving using rusted junk as something to climb on. The footing here was just terrible. It was perfect.
As their brief spar proved, she at least already knew how to fall safely. He thankfully didn't have to teach her that.
Or why Colonello says 'kora!' all the time when it's not his favorite word and how all the mafia shown -even the mooks- can speak Japanese without issue. Plus, Xanxus is biased about swordsmanship. Squalo is KHR's 'World's Greatest Swordsman' in sheer knowledge, technical skill and ability; a sword prodigy in all sword arts from fencing to broadswords since childhood. Yamamoto in comparison sticks to his family's sword style, even if he's a 'natural born hitman.'
