Chapter 51: The Battle of Marineford
"You may not care about dying, Luffy!" Chopper shouted out furiously, "But we all do!"
"Yeah!" Usopp added loudly, but the effect of anger was ruined as he broke into sobs. He couldn't help it though. They may not be related by blood, but the bond that Luffy and Ace had was so much stronger than anything else that he could think of, it just seemed to make the tragedy that's destined to come feel that much more tragic. "I mean… just imagine how crushed Ace and the rest of us would be without you, Luffy!"
"He never thinks about himself when it comes to saving someone else," Nami said as she wiped her own eyes. "That's always been one of the biggest things that I can't stand. Why is he so selfish?!"
"We will worry about that later," Brook said soothingly, though he also wished that Luffy would care about his own life more than this. Even if it means destroying himself, he'll do it without a second thought if it meant saving someone else he cared about! If they weren't more careful then he could easily get killed one of these days… and what would happen to the rest of them if that day did come? Their crew was nothing without Luffy as the glue to hold them all together. The captain is always the leader of any crew, but Luffy was more than that… he was their very heart and soul. He couldn't imagine the Straw Hats without Luffy there with them!
His own heart ached painfully, though it the physical organ he had rotted away long ago, his feelings remained strong as ever. No, he wasn't going to let that happen. He had already sworn his second life to Straw Hat Luffy, and he was going to follow him to the ends of the world if that was what he wanted.
"That kid…" smirked a voice not too far off and they looked behind them to see that a large man standing over them. He was a huge, muscular, broad-chested and heavily armored man. He looked pretty battle-hardened and wore the armor that some kind of ancient warrior would've worn.
"Jozu," Robin said in surprised.
"You know him?" Franky asked in surprise.
"Only by reputation," she answered, with an impressed smile on her face. "Diamond Jozu. He was the Commander of Whitebeard's Third Division. Though I shouldn't be surprised to see him here."
"Odd name, why do they call him Diamond?" Franky asked curiously as Sanji and Zoro were looking at him with new interest, suddenly having an urge to fight this guy.
"Something to do with his Devil Fruit, I suppose," Robin stated, "I heard that he ended up losing his arm in this battle, though I can't say if that's true or not."
"That's a heavy loss," Sanji said, shivering a little as he looked down at his hands, not sure what he could possibly do if he ended up losing them.
But the other Whitebeard Pirates were all cheering as well, as if in agreement to what Luffy had said.
"Only Straw Hat could get away with saying that!"
"We're Ace's family to!"
"Show us that you can save him!"
"It looks like it's not only Luffy who has a talent for bringing people together," Usopp said, wondering just how Ace could ever have wondered if he deserved to live in this world or not. Look at all these people who had showed up just for the sake of trying to save him? He was one lucky guy…
"Marco…" Whitebeard's deep voice stated above them, and they glanced up to see that he was talking to a lean, muscular and blonde-haired man with a rather sleepy look in his eyes. Dress in a similar style as what Arlong wore, his chest tattooed with the silhouette of Whitebeard's Jolly Roger, he stepped forward with a smirk as Whitebeard ordered, "I won't forgive you if you let that kid die."
The man, Marco, just smiled as if he had developed a similar opinion and liking towards Luffy, merely answered, "Roger."
"Another commander guy?" Chopper asked, looking up at him and how Whitebeard addressed him.
"Yes," Robin said, and she sounded deeply impressed here. "That is none other than Marco the Phoenix. And he was Whitebeard's First Division Commander."
"The First?" Franky asked at once, "So he was like the First Mate here?"
"And the same guy who took over after Whitebeard died?" Nami asked.
"I can't say for sure what he has been doing since Whitebeard's death, but there's no doubt in my mind who he is," she confessed, but she was surprised to see that Whitebeard was assigning his top commander as Luffy's sort of… bodyguard. Even going as far as to say that he won't forgive him for letting him die. Was this simply because of Ace? For some reason, she didn't think so.
"Wow, and he must be really strong to be the First Commander!" Chopper said in wonder as all the New Kamas were standing around Luffy, praising him for having just brought down the giant with a single hit. Luffy, who had shrunk down for a few seconds after using his Third Gear, had just grew back to his full height before the New Kamas informed him that he was attracting too much attention.
"Luffy? Attracting attention? No…" Franky said sarcastically. "What makes them think that one-hitting a giant would be enough to get everyone to look at you?"
"Makes you wonder," Zoro spoke up with a shrug as several hundred marines suddenly had Luffy and his group of New Kamas's completely surrounded. They were all huddled in a small pack as the marines each held up a weapon, determined to take them out.
Up at the execution platform, Sengoku suddenly ordered out loud and clear, "Don't give them an inch! Don't let some rookie foil our plans!"
"What plans do they keep going on about?!" Usopp cried out in wonder, thinking that it had to be pretty big for them to be putting so much faith into it.
"Like everything else here, it can't mean anything good for Luffy!" Nami called out. "Luffy needs to get to Ace as fast as possible!"
"Yeah, I agree," Zoro shouted at her, "But don't tell me that you think that they're gonna let him go charging up there with a smile do you? This isn't going to be easy! If not downright impossible!"
"And that's thinking optimistically at best," Sanji added, chewing on the end of his cigarette.
"Why can't you guys be more supportive?!" Usopp shouted, already feeling as depressed as he thought it was possible to get and their talk wasn't helping him.
"It's not that we want to think like that!" Zoro yelled back, "We're just being realistic here!" As much as he hated to admit it, he knew that this whole rescue was going to fail in the end, but was it wrong to want to hope that they could see it turn out differently? That Ace could somehow survive just because they were watching it now?
"CHARGE!" a marine shouted, getting their attention and they looked up to see that the marines attacked them from all sides, their guns blazing and their swords raised high. But even though they were hopelessly outnumbered, the New Kamas's were far from weak. Their years of being in Impel Down, and maybe even training with Ivankov, had made them all strong enough to fight off at least the lower level marines.
The Whitebeard Pirates all joined them, charging ahead without any signs of fear, and together the groups were clashing with the marines, everything happening so fast that it was all a blur. The sounds of swords clashing with steel or cutting open someone's flesh filled the air as the cries and screams of pain made their eardrums ring painfully. It was almost as bad as seeing it all… all the people around them fighting and killing each other, with Luffy right in the middle and trying to avoid the swords while bouncing off the bullets.
Most of the Straw Hats couldn't stand the sight of all this blood and death going on around them, and were looking everywhere, but at the bodies on the ground. Nonetheless at one point, they looked up to see Ace's face, now close enough that they could clearly see his expression, but that was almost as bad as seeing all this fighting.
His face was twisted up into guilt and horror, as if he was wishing that they would all just go away and forget about him. He wanted to get out of this, to help protect them all, and it even looked like he was trying to get out of the chains that were wrapped around his wrists. At one point several gunmen fired cannonballs at Whitebeard, which called Ace to cry out in worry—but Whitebeard just smirked as he waved his bisento around as easily as if swinging a pocket knife and blasted the black balls right back and wiping out the gunmen.
"That thing's gotta weight at least a ton!" Usopp cried out in amazement, staring at the bisento in astonishment.
"Please, if he's strong enough to create earthquakes, I doubt that thing will be much of an effort for him," Franky pointed out.
"He's still awesome though!" Chopper whispered, his eyes wide and sparkling.
"That I can admit," Zoro agreed, looking at Whitebeard and he could see that he earned his reputation of a monster.
With a cry of anger, a marine had tried to swing blunt mace at Luffy, who caught it with his stomach and bounced it right off before he rammed his fist right in his face, knocking him out.
"Go for it, Luffy!" Nami cheered out as Brook jumped up and down in excitement.
"You think that the marines will have learned by now that attacks don't work against rubber," Robin pointed out, watching as Luffy was already going for another marine before the one he just punched hit the ground.
"I always thought that those marines were hard headed," Zoro stated, wondering if that was one of the reasons that Hancock was able to turn them to stone.
"Get him already!" one of the marines declared, more charging at him, with Luffy forced to duck—missing the blade so narrowly that the very tips of his hair was sliced clean off.
"Damn, they just keep on coming!" Sanji hissed as Luffy was now forced to keep on jumping backwards, doing his best to avoid the swords and choosing to punch them from a distance. At one point, one of them jumped up and managed to get close enough to leave a deep cut slashed across his stomach and they saw blood fly.
"Luffy!" Chopper cried out in terror.
"He managed to avoid the worse of it!" Zoro declared, watching as Luffy slugged that marine and he was out before he hit the ice. "He moved back enough to avoid it being fatal!"
Chopper just cried anxiously, biting on his hooves again, wishing that he was there to treat any and all of Luffy's wounds. He knew that normally an attack like that wouldn't be anything for Luffy to worry about, not seriously anyway. But his body was already pushed to its limits and it was only going to be a matter of time, and not much of it, before Luffy finally collapsed of exhaustion. He was already badly injured and he longed for someone to tell him to just rest, even if it's just for a moment. But there was no point. Luffy was going to keep going even if it meant he'd die in the process…
"Move it!" Luffy yelled, still barreling straight forward, "I'm going to save Ace! Get lost!"
And there was nothing more painful for a doctor than this. That was the reason he couldn't hold back his howl of misery, causing the others to jump in surprise, and try to comfort him. Though the only thing that could make him feel better is if they got a doctor for Luffy right now.
Just then, there were cannons aiming at him from way up on the wall, with some of the New Kamas trying to warn and protect Luffy but they ended up getting hit by the cannon-fire until Luffy used his Gum Gum Balloon to send them back and destroy the cannons.
"Yes! Victory!" Usopp cheered.
"Hardly!" Franky shouted back, now so mixed up and turned around that he was having trouble telling which way was right anymore.
"There's just too many marines here," Robin stated grimly, "At this rate, it could take them all day just to get even to the wall."
"But they don't have all day!" Nami cried out, looking up in fear at where Ace was. "They don't even have those three hours anymore!"
"They can kill him at any time they want to," Robin said, a hint of anger in her eyes. "But they're willing to draw this out for as long as possible. They have the whole world watching, but as soon as it looks like that there's even a slight chance that they get to close to them they're going to kill him."
"So why are they waiting?!" Usopp asked her quickly.
"To taunt them," she answered, her arms folded up, but they saw her hands clenched tightly, shaking a little, "It's as if they're telling them, 'Here's your friend, come and get him before he dies'. Or something along those lines."
"A display of power," Sanji said in disgust. "They want to show just how easy it is to kill a Whitebeard pirate. Well, I'm sure that it is if they're handcuffed and can't move."
"The longer they draw this out though, the more time they have to get to him," Brook pointed out hopefully, trying to forget that this plan went horribly wrong. "There's still hope!"
"But the real problem is that there's too many of them," Nami had to speak up over the noise. "How is he supposed to get through all this?!"
However, as luck turned out, they ended up finding a way. As Luffy was busy punching what had to have been the hundredth marine away from him, a familiar voice called out from above, "Death WINK!"
"Iva?!" Chopper cried out happily, glad to see him there again. Ivankov came from the sky, bursting out of nowhere and his wink ended up taking up a long line of marines in the direction that he was looking.
"He's good," Franky whistled, all he has to do is bat an eye and he takes on everyone standing in front of him. "One hell of a way to let you know if he likes you or not."
But that attack seemed to give Luffy an idea. After the New Kamas all let out shouts of delight to see Ivankov was alright, Luffy turned to him and yelled, "Iva!" When he got Ivankov's attention, he announced, "I need to make a straight path to Ace!"
"Yeah, but how are you planning on doing that?" Usopp shouted, wishing that Luffy could answer him just once, "You can't walk five feet without a marine in front of you!"
Luffy looked around and he spotted Jimbei not far off. "Jimbei?!" he cried out, getting his attention. When Jimbei—who had just finished taking out several marines at once—turned to look at him, there seemed to be some kind of understanding passing between them. No words, but Jimbei seemed to understand at once what Luffy wanted him to do and he nodded firmly at that.
"What are they…?" Chopper began as some of the others smiled, realizing what was about to happen. All three of them lined up side-by-side as the largest wave of marines yet came charging right at them in an enormous hoard.
"Fishman Karate…" Jimbei began, holding up his fists, ready to strike.
"Death…" Ivankov began, opening up an eye as wide as he could make it go as Luffy stretched out his arms behind them.
"Gum Gum…"
"5000 True Tile FIST!"
"WINK!"
"BAZOOKA!"
The blast combined with these three powerhouses was enough to cause some kind of explosion. A ferocious blast of energy and wind so great that it blew the marines in front of them around as if they were seeds from a dandelion. Helpless, they were flung aside and the Straw Hats could see the wide path that reached clear to the wall.
Marines were tossed around in the air, in fact, as one of them went flying by, Ivankov reached out and actually grabbed him by the family jewels and held on tight even as the marine screamed in agony.
"Oh man!" Usopp shouted out, his eyes wide as Nami actually let out a startled laugh. "OWWWW!"
"I hurt just looking at him!" Chopper gasped.
"Oh, that's low…" Franky winced in pain, his own hands going for his jewels and trying hard not to cry at the sight of it all.
Sanji was looking a little blue in the face, knowing that did seem like something that Iva would do, and he gave a prayer that he never tried that move when he fought him. He never would've lived it down.
"Advance!" Ivankov cried out as the marines all hit the ground hard.
"My eyes are about to burst out of my head from amazement!" Brook gasped, "Not that I actually have eyes of course, yohohoho! Still, it's amazing how well they work together isn't it?!"
"After all they went through together, even though they barely know each other, it doesn't surprise me," Zoro chuckled a little. It's funny… yet he had a guess after seeing how creative, if not crazy, that Luffy could be they had just decided to go along with whatever he had in come up with.
"ACE!" Luffy screamed out as he ran forward, everyone else right behind him. They had to make it fast though, for these marines weren't average ones, even the weakest ones were strong enough to get back up and start yelling out orders not to let them move any further. But that wasn't the big problem at the moment…
Moria had suddenly reappeared in front of them, determined to block them this time.
"You won't be getting past me, Straw Hat!" he cried out sinisterly when he saw him.
"I thought we already left him behind!" Usopp shouted out in panic.
"For a fat man, he sure does move fast, remember?" Nami panted, remembering how they were forced to keep running after him in the Thriller Bark memories.
Moria only cackled when he saw Luffy there as Luffy glared up at him. He looked ready to fight him until Jimbei's voice spoke up, "Fight me, Moria!"
They turned around to see Jimbei marching straight up to Moria, with Luffy looking back at him in surprise. "Jimbei?" he asked him.
"I am more than a match for you!" Jimbei spoke to Moria, holding up his fists, readying for a fight.
"Think he can do it?" Chopper asked worriedly.
"Of course he can!" Nami said confidently.
"Moria has no choice but to fight him one-on-one since his zombie army is useless against him," Robin reminded him. "All Jimbei has to do is bring up another wave of salt water to finish them off. Moria won't risk losing anymore shadows at the moment."
"And Moria's also lazy," Zoro added, not worrying either. "He's strong, but he's out of shape. It won't even be a challenge for him."
"But Jimbei's at a disadvantage on land," Brook added worriedly.
"And Moria's at a disadvantage without shadows to do the fighting for him," Sanji spoke up with a shrug, lighting up another cigarette, wishing that he didn't go through them so quickly.
"You wanna fight with me, Jimbei?" Moria laughed, as if he couldn't believe that there was anyone out there who thought that they could match him, "Very well! I can't use my zombie minions on you after all!"
Without looking away from him, Jimbei said to Luffy, "Keep moving, Luffy! Don't waste any more time!"
"Looks like we owe him yet again," Robin smiled. "I can see why Luffy grew so fond of him."
"Yeah, I know," Chopper nodded, really hoping that Jimbei will join their crew soon. He knew that he promised to join the next time they saw him, but he was wishing that he was there with them right now. He would be able to help tell them more about everything happening here. They could use someone who was at Marineford that day to help them all understand why it all had to happen that way.
"Thanks a lot, Jimbei!" Luffy yelled back as he ran passed Moria, still going forward.
Moria glared at Luffy's retreating back, looking ticked off at the thought of letting him go. But he turned to Jimbei, beginning to taunt him, asking if he really thought if he could stand a chance against him on land.
"I see that the beating he took from Luffy has done nothing for his ego," Sanji muttered, having stopped running. They had been going after Luffy, but for some reason, they stayed back long enough to see the battle begin. As the two faced each other, the marines around them were watching in amazement at the thought of two Warlords going at each other… at least until they realized that their shadows were moving.
"He can't do that!" Chopper shouted out furiously, "I thought that they were allies!"
"Warlords are still pirates, Chopper," Robin reminded him. "And no Warlord is ever truly loyal to the Government. They seek the title merely for the fact that it is more convenient for them. No other reason."
"But…" he tried to argue back, but she merely shook her head, letting him know that she understood but there was nothing that could be done right now. When Chopper looked at the sad look in her eyes, he stopped, having just remembered that she was one of the few of them who had her shadow stolen before, so she would understand what it was like. Chopper lowered his head, his emotions already stretched to the breaking point by all of this… and he looked miserably up at the warzone around him, wishing that there was something he could've done to have stopped this insanity. That was all war was to him, and he remembered back in Alabasta how it had become a kill or be killed world… he couldn't stand it… was there even a reason for all this madness?
Moria was laughing louder than ever as he held up his fist, that was full of captured shadows, all of them struggling to get free from his grasp. But he just cackled as he pulled out his pair of giant scissors, cutting them off and causing the marines around them to collapse.
"Those poor men," Brook whispered sadly, looking down at his own shadow fondly. He was never going to let that happen again, to him or his crew… the fear of living in the light. No, he would rather have every bone in his body broken before he let that come to pass. And in his case, that really would be a bad thing wouldn't it since he was nothing but bones.
As for Jimbei, he didn't react at all as he glared at Moria. Even as Moria absorbed each and every one of those shadows into his body, growing larger and taller until he was as least twice as tall as before, roaring with laughter the entire time.
"Looks like he at least learned his lesson about absorbing too many shadows," Franky muttered, "But…?"
"But that's not really gonna help him since he's still just stealing the powers from everyone else," Zoro said crossly.
"Did you know that I grow even stronger when I absorb people's shadows?" Moria cried out, his voice sounding more demonic than before. "You don't stand a chance against me, Jimbei!"
"So you've gotten bigger," Jimbei taunted back, "However, your own strength will never increase by stealing the skills of others Moria!"
"And the only different with larger fighters is that they whine louder when they're beaten," Zoro smirked.
"Take him out, Jimbei!" Nami cheered eagerly, ready to see Moria get more of his due.
"Be silent!" Moria called back, holding up his scissors once again. "As long as I win, nothing else matters!" And then he broke the scissors into two pieces, holding them both up like a pair of knives before he spun them around expertly in his hands, much like how Sanji would show off before he was about to cook up a big meal.
"Now, I'll be taking your shadow!" Moria declared gleefully, with Jimbei still not reacting at all. "You'll spend an eternity in the gloom at the bottom of the sea!"
"That's gotta sting," Sanji snorted, "Even when you feel like you're on top of the world, your enemy doesn't react at all. I think we can all agree how frustrating that is."
"Yeah, but here, Jimbei can back up his threats," Usopp said, his fists held up in front of him excitedly, wanting to see this fight. It happened so quickly that he wasn't sure that he had seen it happen however. As Moria struck forward with one blade, Jimbei moved sideways, but it was all over in a blink of an eye. All that Usopp could see for sure was that Moria had brought his weapon down onto the ground where Jimbei had been standing, yet the Fishman was standing right next to it, as if Moria had missed.
Angry, Moria raised up the other half of the scissors and swung again, though this time Jimbei jumped back until he was just out of Moria's reach.
"Wow!" Franky shouted out, "I didn't even see that! Damn, just how is he able to move like so freaking fast?"
"Yeah, how are you guys able to move faster than blinking?!" Usopp suddenly asked Zoro and Sanji, who both looked over at him in mild surprise that he would ask them now of all times. Perhaps Usopp realized this and turned away with a sigh, "Never mind. The training you guys go through probably would kill me."
"That's a cheerful way of looking at it," Sanji said with a smirk.
As for Moria, he was looking angry that he had missed twice in a row and exclaimed, "You move pretty fast for a man of your size!"
"What's that say about you since you're bigger than he is?!" Nami demanded hotly.
Jimbei seemed to be thinking the same thing for he stated, "You're one to talk about size!"
"Burn!" Franky laughed out, clapping at that. If nothing else, he loved this guy's taunts… even if the funniest part was that he was just telling the truth. "I love this guy! You tell 'em Jimbei!"
Really angry now, no trace of laughter on his face, Moria struck forward once again, with Jimbei forced to keep moving back to avoid the blades. But when he saw his opening, he took it by slamming his fist against one of the scissor halves with such force that he knocked Moria off balance. Moria stumbled and fell back just as Jimbei leapt up and rammed his fist right below his neck, the exact same place where Luffy had struck him before when he defeated him at Thriller Bark.
The Straw Hats cheered at the sight of it all, the shadows inside him spat out and floating up to the sky as if they were lost souls, already returning to their true owners bodies.
"There's just no love for Moria these days is there…?" Robin laughed.
"It took us all night to face him and fight him!" Usopp roared out, his jaw falling open. "And Luffy had all of us backing him up! But Jimbei took him out in less than five minutes!"
"True, but most of the night Luffy was stuck running after his shadow rather than fighting him," Robin reminded him, still smiling. "And back then, Moria had a giant zombie backing him up as well as a thousand shadows inside him. Here, he was forced to fight all on his own… well, almost anyway."
"Yeah, that explains it," Zoro nodded in agreement as Moria dropped the scissors, falling to his knees and shrinking back to his normal size as he coughed violently. Jimbei stood tall, as if nothing had stopped him from advancing forward and Moria was a mere bump in the road.
"All that work and the shadows have left you…" Jimbei informed him in an almost piteous way. "You don't have enough skill. Now step aside, Moria. I'm in a hurry."
"Maybe he'll see that," Zoro said, remembering the hard lesson that he learned from Mihawk that day he was defeated back in the East Blue. How weak he truly was, and how far that he had to go before he became a true master of the sword. Though you think that Moria would've learned that lesson before… he remembered that mad glint that had been in his eyes as he talked about the New World in that last battle with him. Just what happened to him to make him like this?
But that wasn't important now, Jimbei went forward as Moria attempted to argue, looking ready to get back up, yet the Straw Hats were realizing that they were wasting time here and started to move forward again, glad to see that Luffy had already made it good distance towards the wall. The New Kamas that had formed a kind of wall around him were knocking out and taking on stray marines as Ivankov stayed at Luffy's side and kicking out as many people as he could.
Things were cautiously looking up for them, however they should've known that it wasn't going to last. For something came barreling out of nowhere and slammed into Luffy with such force that he was sent flying.
"What was that?!" Brook gasped in horror, "All I saw was smoke!"
Luffy had sensed something was coming and looked up, but he couldn't stop it in time before a thick cloud of smoke charged into him, causing blood to burst from his mouth and rolled painful a distance away. As he regained his footing, the cloud slowly formed into a solid form and their eyes widen in recognition.
"Smokie?!" Usopp shouted out in shock.
"I haven't seen that bastard since Alabasta," Sanji said, sweat dripping from his forehead, suddenly remembering how easily Smoker was able to overpower Luffy back in Lougetown.
"Can't say I'm surprised that he's here either," Robin frown. "Luffy's grown much stronger since their past encounters but…?"
"But he still can't fight him like this!" Nami cried out in panic.
"Run, Luffy-san!" Brook cried out, "Leave him to someone else!"
"I don't think that Smokie's gonna let that happen," Zoro said knowingly as Luffy wiped the blood from his mouth.
"That hurt!" he cried out in bewilderment that something could hurt him even though his body was made of rubber. When he looked up and saw Smoker standing there with his jutte pointing at him, his eyes widen in understanding. "You're… Smokie!"
"Wow, it's like a reunion here!" Usopp said, shaking his head at all the people from the past just keep coming back. He was scared now of who else could possibly show up here and make it even harder? Damn, was the universe just against Luffy trying to save Ace? Why was it making everything so damn difficult for him?!
"So we finally meet again, Straw Hat," Smoker spoke up, raising his jutte up, getting ready to strike again.
"Straw-Hat-boy!" Ivankov shouted, and they looked up to see that he was halfway towards running over to help, but that was when he went flying off by another laser from Kuma, who had stepped up for a fight now.
"Shit! Luffy's on his own here!" Sanji cursed, hoping that someone will come in and help Luffy out.
Luffy was looking at Smoker's jutte with a cautious look, muttering to himself, "That's right, that stupid weapon has Sea Prism Stone in the tip."
"Crap, I forgot about that too!" Chopper cried out, trying to think of a way out of this.
"Ok, options…" Brook said at once, "Luffy-san's up against someone whom he cannot hit, and he has a weapon that will steal his strength… meanwhile his brother is about to get beheaded up there and…?"
"YOU'RE NOT HELPING BROOK!" Usopp yelled at him furiously. But Luffy was throwing all caution to the wind as he shifted into his Second Gear once again.
"This is the end for you!" Smoker declared as Luffy started things off with using his Jet Gatling technique. But the entire time that he was releasing the storm of punches, his fists just went through Smoker's body as if he was one of Nami's mirages. Smoker then flew up into the air, leaving a long tail of smoke behind him, and dove straight at Luffy.
"He's gotten a lot stronger than before!" Luffy yelled, watching him fly up above them. With his attention on Smoker, he almost missed seeing Tashigi charge in and attempted to slash her sword at him.
Zoro's eyes narrowed. And she called herself a swordsman? She could at least have the guts to fight him on her own instead of with Smoker there. But Luffy spotted her and disappeared, and she almost ended up stumbling, staring around wildly and wondering where he went.
"Up there!" Usopp hollered as Sanji let out a cry of joy at seeing Tashigi again. He was pointing overhead and they looked up in time to see that Smoker's confusion had vanished when Luffy reappeared right behind him and went back to trying another Jet Gatling attack.
"That's not going to work, Luffy!" Nami screamed up at him. "He's make of smoke! It doesn't matter how many times you punch him, it's never going to hit him like this!"
"Is there any way that Luffy can hit him?!" Usopp asked them, "I mean, like with Crocodile when he found out about how he can't turn to sand when he gets wet? What hardens smoke?!"
"That's a good question," Franky said, not having the slightest answer to that. The nearest that he can figure, maybe something cold…? But that's a long shot if ever there was one. Without Haki, he honestly couldn't think of any other way that you can try and deal with smoke.
Smoker moved through the sky easily and fast enough that Luffy was stuck striking the trail of smoke in his wake. But Smoker suddenly broke up into a barrage of smoke clouds and rammed into Luffy, and even from here, they could see that he had knocked the wind out of him.
They Straw Hats could only watch in fear as Smoker's jutte was jammed into Luffy's throat, his hand next appearing to grab his arm, closely followed by his face. "It seems that you have grown stronger as well," he acknowledged, before he brought Luffy straight down and they crashed through the ice.
"Oh, that had to hurt…" Usopp cried out, with Chopper looking like he was going to lose his mind in terror, hanging onto his leg. The rest of the smoke and dust cleared enough for them to see that Smoker had Luffy pressed down on the ground, the tip of his jutte still at his neck. Luffy gasped and spluttered, trying to push himself up, but they knew that damn Sea Prism Stone had robbed him of his strength and he had been knocked right out of his Second Gear.
"Not good! Not good!" Brook cried out, staring around for Jimbei or Ivankov to come in and help. "Someone do something here!"
"Logia Devil Fruit Users are such a pain to deal with," Zoro growled bitterly. He looked at Smoker, wondering just what was his reason for attacking anyway… he remembered how he had chased them all the way to Alabasta from the East Blue. Why was with his fixation with trying to arrest Luffy?
Smoker dug his boot on Luffy's stomach as he stated, "You can't hope to beat me like this."
"Sad fact is, he's right," Nami said, hating that fact. "All these pirates and no one's noticing this?!"
"Kind of hard when they're all trying to avoid dying as well," Robin pointed out, watching as several pirates were taking on a pirate with a club and trying to avoid getting their heads bashed in. But that was when she spotted something speeding along as fast as they could towards Luffy and Smoker and her eyes widen at who it was.
"Damn… that jutte of yours…" Luffy spluttered out, struggling just to breath here.
Smoker glared down at him as he confessed, "I finally understand now why Dragon saved you back in Loguetown, Straw Hat." And he pressed the jutte down a little harder so that Luffy let out a horrible rasping noise as he couldn't get any air at this point.
"Dragon got in my way before, but he's not here to save you this time!" Smoker declared.
"No, but someone else is," Robin smiled as Luffy still continued to struggle.
"What do you…?!" Nami gasped out before she saw her as well.
"Could it be…?!" Sanji cried out, hearts bursting back in his eyes. "The Goddess herself?!"
"GET YOUR FILTHY HANDS OFF OF HIM!"
And out of nowhere a high-heeled purple shoe came out of nowhere and kicked Smoker so hard that he was flung backwards, right off of Luffy and slide on the ice a few yards away.
"Hancock!" Nami cried out in joy, never happier to see her there.
"She kicked him right in the kisser too," Franky said, smiling a little again. "And with a heel? Ow! That had to leave a mark!"
"My love!" Sanji cried out, forgetting all about Luffy for the moment. "You're as beautiful as ever! Such an angel, no the Queen of Angels, shouldn't be forced to be in such a terrible place!"
"I don't know… she looks pretty scary at the moment if you ask me," Chopper whispered from behind Robin. And it was true…
She was now in a long, purple dress that bore the patterns of her mark, and purple heels to match as her snake companion Salome slithering up right next to her; with neither one baring so much as a scratch despite the fact that they were in a war. But the look on Hancock's face was one of pure fury. Her eyes were wide and the pupils dilated until they were looking as though she was trying to set fire to Smoker if she glared hard enough. Her entire body seemed to be shaking with rage while her teeth were bared… making her look terrifying.
"Looks like she came to help Luffy out again," Robin said as Brook had feel back, holding onto his ribcage, stunned by her beauty so much that it was like he had gone blind for a moment.
"Pathetic," Zoro hissed, shaking his head at Brook in disappointment. But still, at least he wasn't drooling over Hancock like the cook was. He looked over at Sanji so that he could see that sickly loving way he was looking at Hancock and he rolled his eye. Seriously, what was wrong with that idiot?
"How did she hit me when I'm smoke?" Smoker muttered, glaring right back at Hancock.
"She shouldn't have been able to kick him like that!" Tashigi added, bafflement all over her face as the marines around them were staring at Hancock in shock that she would protect Luffy like that.
Robin realized this as well, and looked at Hancock in worry, hoping that she was going to be ok here. She could get herself into a lot of serious trouble for defending Luffy out in the open like this. But at the moment, Hancock looked as if she could care less what anyone thought of her as she moved so that she stood in front of Luffy protectively, daring Smoker to try attacking again.
"It's always good to see a piped-up Devil Fruit User see that they aren't as invincible as they think," Franky said, Smoker still looking as if he wondered if there was some kind of trick involved here.
"Hancock!" Smoker barked at her, standing up and pointing his jutte at her, letting her know that if she was going to fight him, then he would show no mercy for her. "What are you playing at?! Do you intend to quit being a Warlord too?!"
"If you so much as touch her, I'll burn you alive you shitty ashtray!" Sanji yelled, looking like he was about a second from running in and fighting himself. The other Straw Hats were about to point out that he couldn't do anything here, but Hancock had spoken up.
"SILENCE!" she roared out, causing them all to jump; they had never heard her sound as furious as she did right now, and she suddenly looked like some kind of angel of death the way she glared at Smoker. "I am so infuriated right now that I don't care what you say here! But how dare you attack my beloved?!"
"Her beloved?!" Sanji repeated, tears falling at such a declaration. "No! NO! Why is this happening? It's like some kind of nightmare!" He fell to the ground, beating his fists against it as a flood of tears pooled around him. "It's not fair! It's just not fair! What does she see in him?!"
"That's the sweetest thing I've ever seen," Robin smiled. "I think that they make a beautiful couple, personally."
"How though?" Usopp whispered, shaking his head. Just what did Luffy do to get her to fall for him like this? He has her eating out of the palm of his hand and he didn't even see it?
Robin only chuckled at that, knowing that Luffy was safe from Smoker now. She knew that there were some out there who could never see it. But she had a thought that maybe Luffy was the first and only man that Hancock had ever met that treated her like a real person… not as some queen, a prize, or some kind of party favor… maybe that was why she had fallen for him so deeply. He cared about her… not in the same way that she did for him, but he saw her as at least a friend and she knew that he would be prepared to fight to protect her if she needed him.
It's hard not to like Luffy.
"You are so lucky, Luffy-san," Brook said fondly. "I am jealous. But… I am also happy for you."
"SHUT UP!" Sanji yelled at them all, before glaring at Luffy. "YOU AND I ARE GOING TO HAVE A LONG TALK WHEN WE GET YOU BACK YOU RUBBER-BRAINED IDIOT!"
"I won't let you leave here alive!" Hancock went on, now ranting as Luffy rolled over and was attempting to catch his breath. "I have never been as angry as I am now! I will tear you to pieces and feed you to beasts!"
"So cute…" Robin smiled fondly. "First love…"
"Love is a scary thing," Chopper whispered.
"Beware a woman in love," Franky blinked. "You might want to watch your back, Sanji. She might kill you if you do anything to Luffy here."
"If I could just confess my love to her, then I could die happy!" Sanji moaned out, still crying hard, and he looked so dejected on the ground, that even Zoro was feeling sorry for him.
As for Smoker, it was clear that he still didn't have the slightest clue as to why she was so angry here. But he looked at her hard for a moment before he muttered, "I see… that is the Haki of the Kuja, is it?"
"Did he not just hear her?" Usopp asked, looking around, wondering if he heard right. "Hancock had just declared that Luffy's her beloved and he's… asking about Haki?"
"Men…" Nami whispered with a roll of her eyes. Seriously, what was it about males that make them emotionally stunted?
But when Luffy was breathing normally again, he looked up and saw her there. "Hancock!" he cried out happily, his face breaking into a big smile.
"Yes?" Hancock asked, looking back at him, and at once the furious look was replaced with one that you would expect for a young school girl to have. Her voice had nothing but pure bliss in it and a bright pink blush came to her face as her eyes twinkled like stars. "You called me Hancock again!"
"Ok… she's gone," Franky said, laughing out loud as Sanji only howled like a wounded hound. "You lucky dog, Luffy. She's happy just because you got her name right."
"What's happening here?" a marine suddenly called out, staring at the two as Hancock turned her back on them all completely, ignoring them as if they weren't even there. "Why is the Pirate Empress protecting Straw Hat?"
Hancock looked long and hard at Luffy as he got up and looked up, wondering what she was doing now. Hancock didn't say a word as she slowly raised up her hands so that they formed a little heart, and softly began to glow.
"Wait… what's she doing?" Brook asked, looking at her in confusion. "I thought that she was protecting him?"
"She was, and her powers don't work on him, remember?" Robin told him.
"So then…?" Nami began but it all made sense when a marine yelled out behind her.
"No!" he told everyone around him, "That's not what she's doing! She's not protecting him! She wants to petrify him herself!"
"Oh, I get it," Usopp said, hitting his fist with the palm of his hand. "She's just pretending to attack Luffy here."
"Yeah, but you think that they would still be wondering about that, 'beloved' part?" Nami whispered to herself. Maybe Zoro was right… marines were all just hard-headed.
She looked back at Hancock, who blushed again sweetly. "I always believed that you would make it here," she whispered to him softly before she dropped her hands, her powers fading. She then reached down the front of her dress and pulled something out before she bent over to show him what it was. A tiny, silver key…
"Take this," she whispered, the key glinting softly. "This is the key to your brother's handcuffs."
"The key?!" Nami gasped, her own eyes wide.
"Right…" Zoro smiling widely. "It's like with you, Robin. He has Sea Prism Stone handcuffs on. And that is as hard as diamond right?"
"And apparently the only way to get it off was with the key," Robin nodded. "I don't know how she got it, but I have to say that she really is amazing. She truly had faith that Luffy was going to be ok and make it here when she learned that he wasn't able to make it in time to break him out of Impel Down. And so, she managed to get her hands on the key…"
"Wow!" Chopper cried out happily.
"Wow, is right," Franky spoke up. "Too bad that she didn't fall for Luffy back at Enies Lobby. She could've stolen the right key and we'd have been out of that dump a lot faster."
As Luffy heard what it was, his jaw fell open and he stared at it. The marines all backing away, gasping in fear that it was too late for him.
"That's it! The Empress's witchcraft!"
"Straw Hat's been petrified!"
"Did she turn him to stone?!"
"Does he look like a statue right now?" Nami asked, rolling her eyes before she barked at Sanji, "Would you stop crying?"
"I can't…" he whimpered. "My heart is broken in a thousand tiny pieces!"
"Let him cry," Zoro stated, "Just proves that he's a wimp to begin with."
"SHUT UP!" Sanji bellowed at him, the effect slightly ruined as he was still crying. "I'M ALLOWED TO MOURN OVER MY BROKEN HOPES!"
"You fall for every girl that we see! You'll forget all about Hancock the next time a girl shows up! Just get over it!" Zoro yelled back.
"Hancock!" Luffy said, snapping out of his stupor and staring at her in wonder.
As soon as he spoke up, that bright blush was back in her cheeks and she gasped, "You said my name again!"
"Yep, she's got it seriously bad," Brook whispered sadly.
Even Usopp sniffled, "I wish I was you, Luffy!"
Hancock almost jumped back when Luffy reached forward and took hold of her hand in his as he got the key, staring at it joyfully as she blushed even redder than before and turned her head away.
"Luffy's hand…" she muttered almost dreamily to herself. "Luffy's hand… touched mine…"
"Why is she so happy that he touched her?" Chopper asked, tilting his head at a complete loss.
"It's something that is hard to explain," Robin giggled and patted him gently on the head. "I'm sure that when you fall in love with someone, you'll understand."
Chopper still looked confused as Luffy held the key tightly and whispered, "Hancock…" And suddenly he jumped up with a cry of happiness, and for a second he was his old self again, before he hugged her tightly. "You're… You're…!" and he just couldn't seem to find the words to tell her how much this meant to him.
"Wow… if she thinks that just because he got her name right then he loves her back, she's probably gonna think this he's asking her to marry him here," Franky joked, watching as Hancock froze. Her hands were twitching and she was letting out tiny squeals and gasps as if she was about to have a heart attack. The marines behind them were all freaking out, wondering just what was going on.
"Get your hands off her, Luffy!" Sanji yelled out, his hands reaching out and he was longing to hug and hold Hancock in his own arms as well, as he told her how beautiful he thought she was.
"Sanji… enough," Nami whispered, shaking her head, wondering if Chopper could give her something for the headache that Sanji was giving her.
"Thanks a lot!" Luffy cried out, "I really owe you one!"
"I'll say, she's done so much for him… I mean, I know that she hates all men but Luffy, but I really wanna thank her someday for this," Franky told them all.
"Me too…" Nami nodded with Robin, who was privately thinking that it might be safer for them to let Hancock know that they didn't have romantic feelings for Luffy.
"It's… it's alright, it's alright…" Hancock stuttered, her face redder than ever and looking like she didn't know what to do. "Do not worry about it… you just have to keep going, Luffy!"
Luffy blinked, suddenly remembered what was going on. "Oh, yeah!" he cried out as he let go of her and hit the ice running, but made sure to holler back, "THANKS!"
The Straw Hats were about to give chase when Hancock fell to her knees, breathing hard as if she had just been close to being crushed to death instead of just getting a hug.
"What's wrong?" Chopper asked in worry, knowing that even though Luffy was unnaturally strong, he would never have hurt someone like that. "It didn't look like he hurt her!"
"Oh, he didn't…" Nami smiled. "I think she's just shocked that he hugged her like that."
"But it was just a hug," Chopper said, wishing that someone could just tell him what was going on.
"To us, it was…" Brook sighed. "But to her…?"
"I can't believe how gullible these guys," Usopp muttered, pointing to the marines, who were staring at Hancock in shock. For a second, they were worried that they had realized what was going on, but they were giving them too much credit. Rather, they seemed to think that Luffy had just overpowered her through sheer strength before he was turned to stone and he had just left her beaten.
"So stupid…" Nami sighed wearily.
"Something tells me that they never would've believed the truth anyway," Zoro smirked with laughter. "I mean… I still don't believe it."
"So… So… So… his embrace was so strong…" Hancock whimpered to herself, still breathing hard, her hand shaking a little as she touched her breast, as if remembering the feeling.
"So this is… So this is…" she gasped, slowing raising her head. "So this is what I've heard so much about… marriage?"
"WHHHHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!" Sanji screamed out, jumping to his feet at once.
"I was just kidding when I said that she would think it was a proposal," Franky blinked in astonishment.
"THIS CAN'T BE HAPPENING!" Sanji screamed out, his hands pressed over his ears as if he couldn't hear a word. "WAKE UP! WAKE UP ALREADY! THIS IS A NIGHTMARE! OH, HURRY AND RISE SUN!"
"I'M ABOUT TWO SECONDS FROM KNOCKING YOU OUT!" Zoro roared at him as his screams were making their eardrums bleed.
"Dude, just face it. You don't stand a chance with her," Franky poked at Sanji, whose fire was burning so greatly that some of them were actually wondering if he was going to melt from his own fury.
"Oh, let him be," Usopp whispered to him. "He's been trying for years and so far I haven't met anyone wanting to marry him. And Luffy's not even trying… but look at the girl that he's caught?"
"Lucky bastard that Luffy," Franky whispered as Usopp and Brook nodded sagely next to him—both of them filled with envy.
Hancock looked completely lost in some kind of grand daydream—at least judging from how red her face was. Yet, she snapped right out of it when Smoker's voice seemed to cut through whatever fantasy was going through her head.
"I'm not letting you go, Straw Hat!" he hollered, and they looked up at once to see him flying straight at Luffy.
"Luffy! Look out!" Chopper cried out, but Hancock had stepped in. She had looked up irritably to see who had dared to speak up, and her eyes widen with fury when she saw Smoker.
She leapt to her feet, spinning through the air with a cry, "PERFUME FEMUR!"
She landed right between Luffy and Smoker, landing on her hands. Furious that she dared to try and stop him a second time, Smoker raised up his jutte and was about to strike her this time around. Yet, much like how Sanji attacked, she spun her legs out until it hit his weapon. The part that collided with her leg had turned to stone before it broke right in half—Smoker stared at her as she slowly stood back up, brushing her long hair out of her face.
"WOW! That's amazing!" Chopper cried out.
"Such beauty and power!" Brook added, and a heavy nosebleed started up for him now.
"Looks like it's not just because of her powers that she was made into a Warlord," Nami whispered, her eyes bright.
"Yes," Robin nodded. "Most of the time, it's not just because of your powers that you are given the title of Warlord. Hancock is strong in her own right, her powers only help to increase her already impressive strength."
"And now, not only can she hit Smoker, but he doesn't have that Sea Prism Stone there to back him up!" Usopp cheered out excitedly, jumping up and down.
"Not only that, but I don't think that she's going to let him go and chase Luffy again," Nami laughed. "I really wanna meet her now!"
Just then, Hancock pointed threateningly at Smoker before she bent her head all the way back, looking so far down her nose that she was looking up, but it was also so that she could keep Luffy's form in her sights for a second longer.
"Insolent one!" she cried out, "I shall not let you pass me!"
"I'm sorry, but I just can't get over how weird that looks," Usopp whispered.
"I think you look absolutely adorable, dear Hancock…" Sanji mourned out.
Smoker looked angrier than ever as he demanded, "Don't you know what will happen if you get in the Navy's way?"
"If you dare to threaten her then I swear you are gonna regret ever being born!" Sanji shouted furiously at Smoker.
"Sanji?" Nami asked, batting her eyelashes and trying to look as sweet and innocent as Hancock would look, "Would you please stop talking about that for now? We have a much more important reason for being here, remember?"
"Yes, my love!" Sanji cried, turning back at her and his eyes returning to the forms of hearts. "Your wish is my command! You're… you're so perfect… so cute… I…" and suddenly he fell backwards, in so much bliss that Chopper cried out in worry, thinking his heart stopped again.
Nami blinked. She couldn't believe how easy that was… even easier than usual. Yes, there was certainly a lot that she could learn from Hancock if she ever met her.
"Hmph," Hancock scoffed at them. "No matter what I do, I shall be forgiven…" she said, raising her head up so that they could all see her face, "for I am beautiful!"
"Amen to that!" Brook gasped lovingly as the Straw Hats dragged him and Sanji away, Sanji acting the part of a rag doll and didn't even seem to notice that he was being dragged along the ground.
"Please…" Zoro groaned out, "Can't we leave that idiot here? We can find a new cook, can't we?"
"Don't tempt me," Nami sighed tiredly. "But I might have to start thinking like that if he keeps this up for much longer."
"Nami-swan… you are beautiful even when you are being cruel to me…" Sanji moaned lovingly from where he continued to lay there bleeding from where his head kept hitting the ground.
But they kept pressing on, soon catching right back up to Luffy, who was still staring at the key in his hands. "I owe her big time again!" he muttered as he clenched it tightly, "I'm really grateful for this!"
"We… we all are," Chopper said, changing to his Walk Point to keep up with this pace. They were starting to near the wall now, and even though Ace was in their sights, he couldn't ever remember seeing a place that was so close yet seemed so far away.
Luffy seemed to realize this as well as new determination glinted in his eyes as he ran faster than ever. "Wait for me, Ace!"
"Not really much else he can do," Brook stated miserably, wishing that there was something that he could've done to help him. But as Luffy ran, shoving the key safely into his pocket and punching every marine that jumped in his way, they ended up coming across a couple unwelcome people.
Ivankov was already there to confront the two, and though they recognized one of them as Kuma with no problems, it was the other they had no idea who he was. He was a very tall, at least as tall as Aokiji was, blond-haired and lean with tan skin… but it was his clothing that really stood out. They were brightly colored with a hot pink feathered coat, and sporting a pair of curved sunglasses. He walked with an odd, bow-legged waddle as he stood next to Kuma and seemed to be greatly amused by seeing the interaction with him and Ivankov.
"Who is that?" Nami asked.
"That, my friends, would be none other than Donquixote Doflamingo," Robin commented, having seen his picture a few times before. "The last Warlord that we had yet to meet here."
"THAT'S DOFLAMINGO?!" Usopp cried out in panic.
"I gotta say, he's not what I expected," Sanji said, finally getting back to his feet and spitting out a mouthful of blood. "From what I've heard of him, I expected someone a lot freakier looking."
"I think that coat alone counts for freaky," Nami whispered.
"Don't be fooled," Robin frowned. "If what I've heard of him is true, and I see no reason why it shouldn't be, then he's supposed to be deadly. He's brought the rule of several towns under his command and has almost an army of loyal subordinates. Not only that, but he's something of a big shot even here in the New World."
"Ok, good to know," Franky said, "This guy is bad-ass. Take him seriously no matter how stupid he looks."
"Iva!" Luffy suddenly shouted out and they looked to see that he was staring at Kuma, and trying to warn him about what he could do. And after that horrible flashback of Sabaody, they couldn't blame him for that. "It's that bear guy again! You gotta be careful Iva! He can blast you away!"
But Iva didn't even look back at him as he answered, "Vi'll be fine." He spoke in a very different kind of voice this time however, instead of the teasing and confident voice that they were used to hearing, this one was calm bordering on the line of intense. "Now, Kuma! Move!"
They were glad to see that they weren't the only ones surprised by how Ivankov was addressing him. Luffy was so surprised by this that he actually stopped running and stood next to him to look at Kuma and Doflamingo himself. As for Kuma, he didn't react at all, as if there wasn't anything happening around him… like they weren't even there.
"Kuma…" Franky said softly, thinking of what he had learned of the man. "He ended up losing his free will just before the war I seem to remember telling you all. I guess this is the result."
"In other words, he is no longer going to worry about Luffy here," Zoro said. Though bitter about the fact that he had separated them all the way that he had over the last two years, he couldn't hide the fact that he was grateful to him for saving them when he did. If he had to choose, he would rather that they were separated and still alive than all of them getting killed. At least this way they found each other again after all this time.
But he just couldn't forgive Kuma for separating them all right before the war so that it was impossible for any of them to help Luffy when he needed them. That was cruelty on a grand scale in his book.
"Iva?" Luffy asked him, looking from his friend to Kuma and back again, "You mean you know him?"
"Yes," Ivankov admitted, but his eyes narrowed a little. "But something's wrong. He's not himself."
"I just don't want to know how he lost himself…" Nami gulped, not liking the very thought of how something like that was even possible.
"I have some theories…" Franky muttered under his breath, "But none of them are pleasant to think about."
But Doflamingo seemed to know as he chuckled at the pair of them, their images reflected in his sunglasses. "It seems that both of you know Kuma to some degree. But the Kuma that you once knew…" he then pointed to the Warlord next to him, "And this Kuma are two different people!"
"If what Franky said about him is true, then he's right," Zoro said, looking almost sympathetic at Kuma. "He's as good as dead now."
Luffy couldn't have looked more confused as he stared at him. "Different people?" he asked, and they weren't sure if he was asking Ivankov or himself that question. "What's he talking about?"
"No!" Ivankov shouted out stubbornly. "That's not possible! This is, without a doubt, the man who ate the Paw Paw Fruit!" He then looked furiously at Kuma and demanded with real anger this time, "He's Kuma! Kuma, answer vme!"
But like they all thought, Kuma might as well have been a statue for all the answers they got out of him. He just looked at Ivankov with empty eyes, and they knew that this really was a different man from before. At least the Kuma they first met had some kinds of emotion even in those blank eyes… but here, it was like a corpse was staring back. There wasn't anyone in there…
They weren't natural and they gave them all the creeps.
Ivankov seemed to be growing more and more vexed with every second that Kuma stayed silent.
"This is so irritating!" he snarled before adding in an afterthought, "But, then again, he was always been a man of few words…"
"Yeah, I got the feeling that he was the strong silent type," Usopp couldn't help but add as well.
"I keep telling you, it doesn't matter how much you talk to him, it's pointless," Doflamingo said with a sadistic grin as moved his sunglasses just a bit. "You see, just a few days ago, the government's head scientist, Doctor Vegapunk, had finished his modifications on him. He has now become the perfect human weapon! In other words, this is the former Bartholomew Kuma!"
"Modifications? Weapon? What are you talking about!?" Iva screamed at him furiously.
"That's gotta be tough for him," Zoro said, his eye closing as he thought it over. "Imagine seeing someone you called a friend… becoming something like that thing?"
"That's terrible," Chopper whispered, sniffling a little. "But what I don't understand though is why. Why did he do something like this?!"
"That's something that I think that only Kuma could answer," Robin said, not looking at any of them. "But… there's no point in trying to talk to him now. Zoro's right. That's not the Kuma that we all know."
"What I'm talking about is that he volunteered himself for a human weapon project," Doflamingo went on, clearly enjoying seeing Ivankov's reaction. "They started only with his hands and legs, not touching his consciousness. Over a long period of time however, the scientists began to replace the rest of his body part by part."
"Is that what happened with you, Franky?" Usopp couldn't help but gulp out.
"For me it was different," Franky said, shaking his head hard. "I had no choice cause I was dying… I had to replace my dying organs with metal to save me. But no matter how much my body changed, I was never able to change my personality! Well, aside from when someone's dumb enough to put anything other than cola in my body… but even then, that's only temporary! Here, it's like someone just rewritten Kuma's personality completely! Not just rewritten… just… erased it all!"
And that seemed to have been proven when they saw Kuma's blank eyes glowing slightly…
"Don't lie to me!" Ivankov yelled, refusing to believe anything that he heard. "Kuma hates the World Government! He'd never offer up his own life like this!"
"And he proved it by letting all of us go more than once," Brook reminded them all. "He spared us back at Thriller Bark, and went out of his way to make sure we escaped from Sabaody… as well as taking care of the Lion-chan for two years. I don't see any other explanation but that Ivankov speaks the truth."
"I have no reason to doubt that," Nami said, agreeing completely with what Ivankov said. And she could understand if Kuma became a Warlord to spy on the Government… but this made no sense to her. Just what was going through that bear-guy's head?
"Well," Doflamingo admitted as he barely glanced back at them as he walked away, "Can't say for sure what kind of deal this guy made with the government. And there was definitely some human left in him up till a few days ago…?"
He plopped himself up onto a pile of pirates that he had clearly just beaten, though it was impossible to tell if they were dead or just unconscious. "But now, he's forgotten that he was even born a human. He's as good as dead and is nothing more than a mindless killing machine that follows every order from the World Government. The Pacifista, PX-0!"
No sooner had he finished speaking, Kuma opened his mouth, the beeping sound of his laser starting up and they were momentarily blinded by the light. Panicking, Luffy and Ivankov were both forced to dodge, barely avoiding getting blasted into pieces as Doflamingo continued to laugh.
"The past is over! Just forget it!" he cackled wildly as Ivankov hit the ground on his face and went sliding across the ice as Luffy had been forced to cover his head as he rolled so that the attack just barely grazed him.
"L-Luffy!" Nami cried out fearfully as Doflamingo just sat there with a wide, insane grin on his face and Kuma's mouth continued to smoke.
But Ivankov was far from over. He got back to his feet, shaking off the ice shavings that covered his face like a mask, and he looked angrier than ever before. "Kuma! What happened to vyour body these past years!?"
They had gone over to check on Luffy, who was panting hard as he pushed himself up and stared at them both, his mind looking like it was racing. "Now that I think about it…" he muttered softly, "The last thing he said to me was…"
And they all thought back to seconds before Kuma had sent him flying. They didn't think too much about it at the time since they were all thinking only of how miserable they had felt when they saw each one of them being torn away from the crew like a living nightmare. But they heard it now… echoing over the memory…
"We will never see them again… farewell."
"So that's what he meant…" Usopp whispered. So Kuma knew, even from them, that he wasn't going to be able to remain himself. But if he knew, then surly he would've tried to stop it…?
Ivankov marched forward as he demanded, "What's wrong with you, Kuma!? It's me, Ivankov!"
But faster than blinking, Kuma suddenly disappeared, and they were all staring around in shock, trying to figure out where he went. They were expecting that he would appear behind Iva and strike him there… and they were half right. Only instead of Iva, they heard screams coming a short distance away and they turned to see that Kuma had reappeared amongst a group of New Kamas, already pulling off his gloves.
"Crap! They need to get out of there!" Franky shouted, remembering how he was hit with one of those shockwaves with painful clarity.
"Be careful guys!" Luffy screamed out in warning, "He's dangerous!"
But his cry came too late. With a single sweeping motion with his hand, he blasted everyone around him far back. They hit the ground, wheezing and nursing wounds—something that every Straw Hat could sympathize with. Even before his change, Kuma was still deadly… and now even more dangerous than ever before.
Ivankov's eyes were filled with rage as he charged ahead recklessly, shouting out, "Damn vyou, Kuma!"
That was when he did something almost as scary as him turning a man into a woman or growing his head big. As he ran, he seemed to split his face into countless other ones, surrounding Kuma so that not even he could tell which one was real.
"Vyou scared vyet?!" the many heads cried out together.
"I know I am!" Usopp shouted as Chopper screamed in terror.
"He's not normal!" Sanji shouted out, trying to get the image out of his head. "Even by Devil Fruit User standards! He's a freak!"
"Funny thing is, it's not even his Devil Fruit abilities that's doing this, its raw speed…" Robin chuckled, "At least I think it is."
Ivankov then cried out, all of his head talking and winking at the same time, "GALAXY WINK!"
The blast came from all over, hitting Kuma with such force that he was sent flying back and ended up crashing into a mound of ice. It was disturbing to see that he hadn't reacted at all, not even letting out a cry of pain as Ivankov landed on his feet, pulling his many heads back together so that his face was the only one around them. But that same face was now torn for a brief moment, a look of guilt and pain before he let out a rather forced, "Yee-haw…!"
"This must be so hard on him," Robin said, her heart going out to him.
"Yeah, Kuma isn't an easy opponent," Usopp said, still unable to get over just how out of their league he was.
"That's not what I meant," Robin told him patiently. "I merely meant it must be hard for him to be forced to fight against his old friend… it can't be the easiest thing in the world."
"But that's not really Kuma though… not the one he knew anyway," Chopper pointed out.
"Maybe," Zoro said, glancing behind him where he could just make out Tashigi's face and sighed grimly. "But how can you attack someone if they look exactly the same as someone you called a friend?"
The reason that he just couldn't bring himself to fight against that pathetic excuse for a swordsman was because she looked too much like Kuina. Sure, he secretly yearned for a chance to fight with his childhood friend again, but fighting Tashigi was like an insult to Kuina's memory. He just couldn't stand it.
"When you put it like that, it would be very painful," Brook said sadly.
Kuma's head looked up very slightly as Ivankov seemed to be shaking in fury.
"How dare vyou attack vmy adorable candies?!" he demanded as Kuma pushed himself up. With a running start, Ivankov started right at him as he declared, "Don't think Vi'll hold back any longer! TAKE THIS!" With a great kick, he rammed both of his feet right into Kuma's chest, sending him flying back even farther and harder than last time.
"And it took everything we had just to fight him together!" Chopper gasped in amazement as Sanji looked deeply annoyed.
Well, this certainly explained why he wasn't a match for him when he challenged him to that fight. Damn that pervert… he wasn't even seriously fighting him from the beginning!
Kuma had dug his feet deep into the ice to try and prevent himself from going anywhere, but he ended up leaving two long ruts in the ice before he was rammed into a large mound of ice, leaving an imprint of his body in it.
"You go, Iva!" Usopp and Chopper both cheered as the New Kamas were marveling and praising how strong he was. It was impressive to say the least, and they were getting ready for some more of the fight, but there was something wrong with Ivankov.
He landed behind his 'Candy Boys', shaking worse than ever. "This is the first time anyone Vi have met…" he said before he began stamping his foot, as he chanted, "Forgotten… Forgotten… Forgotten… FORGOTTEN MY FACE!"
"THAT'S WHAT HE'S UPSET ABOUT?!" Usopp screamed after he and half the Straw Hats fell over at that declaration. "HE'S ANGRY THAT HE FORGOT ABOUT WHAT HE LOOKS LIKE?!"
"Guess so," Zoro said, thinking that it's nothing less than insulting for your own renown to be brushed off like it was nothing.
"This has never happened to vme before!" Ivankov sobbed before he fell forward to ram his fists onto the ice.
Sanji had to agree with that statement. He couldn't see how it would be possible to ever forget that freak… he tried all the time but to no avail. Oh, how he wished that he could just burn those terrible memories.
The New Kamas stared at him, wondering what they were supposed to say to that, but Iva seemed to get over that quickly enough for he leapt back to his feet. "However! Vi don't know if it's because vyour memories are gone, but if vyou've forgotten how terrifying Vi can be…" he pointed a finger at him, anger in his eyes, "then Vi will beat that fear back into vyour body! GET READY!"
"He's scaring me now," Franky said in amazement. "You go bro! You know, I'd like to meet that guy. Sure, he's got more nuts in him than a good chocolate bar, but he makes life interesting!"
"Right, because that's the most important thing we need to deal with," Sanji hissed, privately thinking that there was no way that he was ever gonna allow the others to meet him if he could help it. If he let slip to them about how he had been brain-washed and running around the island like a pervert, then he couldn't ever bear to look at his dear Robin or Nami again… and life with Moss Head would become a living hell.
No, even if it costs him his life, he will make sure that dark moment in his life will never come to surface again.
The New Kamas stared at their leader before he barked orders that they were to leave Kuma to him and they were to support Luffy in any way that they could. They cheered in understanding and ran on ahead as Luffy watched the two fight. He didn't look the least bit happy about any of this, and seemed ready to go charging in and help, but one of the New Kamas's clapped a hand on his shoulder and told him to go.
"He'll be fine, Luffy," Nami said firmly. "Don't worry, he can take care of himself here. You just have to keep going forward."
As if he heard her words, Luffy nodded in understanding before he called back to Ivankov to thank him for his help before he went running off with the others. Luffy now had a wall of New Kamas's surrounding him as they all made a mad dash for the execution platform, and making up for lost time. The New Kamas were strong enough to take care of most of the Marines for him, running forward and beating them out of the way for Luffy, who kept going. But then another showed up…
Up ahead, there was a thick cloud of dust, but through it shone the slashing blades of light and a large group of New Kamas were knocked back with deep wounds. Zoro's one eye widened at once when he saw those wounds. There was only one person he knew who could do something like that so effortlessly.
"I almost forgot that he was here," he whispered.
"Why? Who? Who's here?!" Franky yelled, his eyes wide, but he got his answer at once when a hauntingly familiar voice—though they only heard it once before—spoke through the dust.
"Forgive me for this, Red Hair…" he said as the hilt of a black sword appeared first followed by the rest of the man appeared. "But I will not go easy on him."
"NO!" Usopp screamed in absolute terror when he saw who it was, "NOT HIM! OF ALL THE PEOPLE THAT HAD TO BE HERE, HE'S ONE OF THE LAST I WANTED TO SEE LUFFY FACE!"
And the Straw Hats all felt sick to their stomachs when the man, who looked exactly like how they first saw him, with his yellow eyes sharp and deadly glanced at Luffy—whose own eyes widen in fear.
"He's… HAWK-EYE!" he gasped out.
"Oh, shit!" Sanji cursed, staring around for someone to step in and take control of this fight. "It just had to be a swordsman he's up against! And not just any swordsman either! No… they just had to put the best in the world right up in his path!"
"But you guys left on a good note didn't you?" Nami asked at once, her own heart feeling like it was about to burst right through her chest from fear. "I mean, sure he almost killed you, Zoro! But you said so yourself that he spared your life and everything!"
"I doubt that he truly wants to fight Luffy like this," Zoro said firmly, "But this isn't about what they want and don't want."
"AND WHAT'S THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN?!" Nami cried out as Mihawk slowly raised up his sword so that they could see those cold eyes reflected off the black blade as if in a mirror.
"Now then…" he said calmly, "Let's see what fate has in store for the promised rookie from this new generation. Will it end here… or will he be able to escape from my Black Blade."
"Luffy! Just run past him!" Brook cried out, still remembering how easily he was able to fight against Zoro's monstrous strength with a small knife. And blades were Luffy's greatest weakness in a fight! This couldn't look grimmer to his eyes, and he was so worried that he didn't even bother to joke about that.
"I hate that morbid curiosity of his," Zoro hissed.
"What?!" Usopp shouted at him, biting hard on his nails.
"He's fighting him, not because he wants to," Zoro explained bitterly, all of them still running at him at full force. "But because he wants to see if fate will step in and allow Luffy to live… or die here. In either case, it's fine by him."
"YOU THINK YOU COULD SOUND A LITTLE MORE WORRIED FOR OUR CAPTAIN HERE!" Chopper screamed at him in terror.
"COURSE I AM WORRIED YOU IDIOT!" Zoro shouted back in frustration, causing Chopper to jump several feet high from the tone of his voice. "OUT OF EVERYONE HERE, I KNOW WHAT MIHAWK IS CAPABLE OF MORE THAN ANYONE!"
Chopper stared up at him and remembered that deadly wound that Mihawk had given him. Zoro came very close to death… but the blade that Mihawk swung cut him so precisely that he cut him just deep enough to deal injury and to scar him… but stopping just enough to make sure that it wasn't lethal. He looked and could just make out the scar that Zoro still carried on his chest and looked away in shame. He would've apologized for his outburst, but there wasn't time for that.
"I don't have any time trying to fight someone as strong as him!" Luffy yelled, "I need to hurry to Ace!"
"So think of something here, bro!" Franky shouted, cursing inside his head. This was far from good… there was no way that a simple trick was going to beat Hawk-Eye. That man was deadly at the best of times, and there simply wasn't time for Luffy to spend hours fighting him and figure out how to beat him… just one stroke of that sword would be enough for Luffy to say goodbye to his head.
Luffy jumped up, sliding on the ice before he shifted into Second Gear as soon as he hit the ground and disappeared in a flash.
"Alright!" Nami sighed in relief, glad that Luffy thought simply to get away from a fight that he couldn't afford to fight with at the moment.
"Did you forget all about Haki?" Zoro asked her crossly, "Luffy's not getting away that easily, especially since he's still too close."
"What do you mean, 'too close'?" Brook croaked weakly.
But he didn't have to answer back for Hawk-Eye only had a hint of surprise to see Luffy move as such speeds. But his eyes narrowed slightly as he barely glanced up, as if he could feel something on the wind. In fact, so intense was this focus, they hardly noticed how there was a fireworks of an explosions right above them and Ivankov fell from the sky to hit the ground comically.
"Where does he keep coming from?" Sanji couldn't help but asked in annoyance just as two swordsmen New Kamas charged at Hawk-Eye, yelling if he remembered defeating them before they crush him. Yet all Hawk-Eye had to do was raise his sword in single stroke, the steel almost singing as he moved it through the air. Without even moving from this one spot, he took them both out in a gush of blood.
"I don't remember the face of every insect I crush," he said coldly, barely batting an eye and they all felt their stomachs sink at those words.
"Such beauty…" Brook whispered in awe as he watched the power vibrating the ringing sword. "It is like art the way that he uses that sword. I never would've believed it if I had not seen it with my own eyes, though I have no eyes being a skeleton, but that gentle grace that he uses when fighting is staggering!"
"Gentle grace… but deadly…" Zoro said, having to agree with that remark as well, but his senses were on high alert. For he knew that Mihawk hadn't forgotten about Luffy and was still searching for him right now. And he held his breath anxiously when he saw those yellow eyes widen a fraction of an inch before bright his sword down in one specific direction, near the wall.
"Damn, he found him!" Zoro shouted as the attack created a green burst of devastation in its path. Yet he hit it at such a point that it created a straight line, aiming directly for the target without even touching one of the countless people that were standing around them. And he saw Luffy at the last second, almost at the wall where he could enter the plaza when the wave of green energy slammed him from the side and lifted him right off the ground like the heart of a tornado.
But the brief half second before the attack hit him, Luffy turned his head and saw it coming before moving just in time to avoid the full impact. But still, it was more than enough to send him flying and crashing right into the wall.
"What happened?!" Chopper cried out in shock, having not seen anything that just happened.
"A flying blade attack," Zoro answered calmly. "Though he wasn't in sight, he was more than able to track him and deal a deadly strike.
"He had to have been at least a hundred yards away though!" Nami cried out in amazement.
"Yeah… but still close enough to be in striking range," Zoro said firmly.
"LUFFY!" Usopp shouted out and they all bolted straight to where the damage was, the smoke clearing enough for them to see that he was stuck in the rubble, upside down, and his limbs all trapped.
"Damn…" Luffy hissed in pain. "That hurt… he cut me!"
"Is it serious?" Franky asked as Chopper went over and saw the wounds he got from that. Though they were bleeding a lot, the cuts didn't look to be that deep, but had that attack been more head-on then it could've easily have sliced him in half. He told the others this and Brook and Usopp both shrieked at the idea of Luffy being cut apart like that.
"He sensed it coming and managed to avoid a fatal blow," Robin said, looking up as Luffy weakly struggled to pull himself free. "Otherwise he'd be dead right now."
"Ok, so I think that should prove that fate wants Luffy to live, right?" Usopp asked, knowing better than to hope that would be the end of Mihawk coming after him. "So Hawk-Eye can go and fight someone else… right?"
They all looked at him and he sighed. "Doesn't mean that I can't hope for that," he groaned out.
"Well, you might get that wish after all, brother!" Franky suddenly spoke up and pointed a distance away to where Hawk-Eye still was. They looked to see what he was talking about, and they were relieved to see that someone had stepped up to try and fight Hawk-Eye himself.
"Alright Jimbei!" Usopp cheered, punching the air as the Fishman stepped forward, positioning himself right between the swordsman and Luffy, who was continuing to struggle to pull himself free. Now the Straw Hats were too far away to hear what Jimbei was saying, but Zoro didn't need to hear to guess exactly what it was about.
He had known Hawk-Eye long enough to know when he meant business. He could see the two of them having an almost calm conversation, but soon he was pointing his sword right at Jimbei. Zoro had also seen that far too many times to know what it meant… he was warning Jimbei once and only once to move or else he would have a price to pay. But naturally, Jimbei refused to move, holding up his fists, ready for a fight.
"I don't like this," Nami said nervously, "I mean, I know that Jimbei's strong! But…?"
"But the fact is he's up against Mihawk!" Brook finished, not liking where this was going either. And it turned out that they had a right to worry. For as Jimbei struck forward, several cannonballs came flying at him from all over. But the force that he created through the air was so great that the cannonballs froze around them, just hanging in midair. Hawk-Eye slashed his sword at them, causing the black balls to explode around Jimbei, creating a thick layer of smoke that they couldn't see through. But Jimbei smashed through it, dashing across the ice with such force that he ended up leaving deep imprints when he stepped down. Hawk-Eye charged at him as well, his sword aloft…
The Straw Hats all held their breaths, wondering just how this fight could possibly go… but they had their answer quickly enough. The two just barely passed by each other… it was a stand-off for a moment before the shockwave from the sword was so great that Jimbei was sent flying back, crashing right through the ice and sunk out of sight.
"HE BEAT JIMBEI JUST LIKE THAT?!" Usopp screamed out at the top of his lungs, unable to believe that someone as strong as Jimbei could be taken out so quickly.
"DUDE!" Franky gasped out as Chopper and Brook screeched in fear. "HOW STRONG IS THIS GUY?!"
"Is Jimbei alright?!" Nami gasped at once.
"Yeah," Zoro said with a nod. "He's definitely feeling the effects from that. But I would guess that he's more winded than anything else. That was just the repercussion from that attack coming from the sword. It would hurt… but he's far from out of this war."
"Oh, thank goodness for that," Nami sighed, glad that it wasn't anything serious.
"If there was water around, I have a feeling that the outcome would be very different," Robin reminded her gently, "Jimbei said so himself that he's at a disadvantage on land, so it's only going to make sense that someone like Mihawk is able to fight him without such a handicap."
"Though even if Jimbei was in the ocean, this fight would be far from one-sided," Sanji said firmly as he looked over at Hawk-Eye. "That guy is anything but a pushover. You know… he's gonna kill you, Moss Head."
"Shut up," Zoro snarled back at him as Hawk-Eye slowly turned his attention back to Luffy, who was still stuck in the wall. "Oh, crap…" he hissed when he saw that look.
"He really is strong…" Luffy croaked having just seen the battle himself, and he was looking worried about Jimbei as well, but Hawk-Eye was far from over. He suddenly jumped up, almost flying, into the air, high over the battlefield and Luffy's eyes widen in terror as he guessed what he was going to do. Mihawk brought his blade down, ready to impale Luffy right then and there. The Straw Hats were all suddenly terrified that moment, just as Luffy pulled himself out at the last second, dodging it just in time.
"Go, Luffy!" Chopper cheered out fiercely, "You can do it!"
"Are you nuts?!" Usopp demanded, pointing a shaking finger at Hawk-Eye. "He doesn't stand a chance right now! He's gonna get himself killed if he doesn't get away from here! I think it's clear that guy isn't holding back and is really trying to kill him! Luffy can't stay here like this!"
"I know!" Chopper cried mournfully, "But I just don't know what to do! This is scaring me!"
He looked ready to cry all over again, but before Robin or Nami could step in to try and give him some forms of comfort, Luffy bounced off the wall and slid a short distance away, anger boiling in his face as he faced him.
"Oh, no…" Sanji said, his eyes wide as he dropped the cigarette, "The blood's gone to his head and he's lost it…"
"And angry people do stupid mistakes!" Robin answered him, already seeing what Luffy was going to do.
"Wait!" Brook cried out at once, "What are you talking about?!"
But Luffy had already threw his arms behind him, cursing as he looked ready to fight once again.
"LUFFY!" Zoro shouted out at once. He knew better than anyone what anger does to you when fighting that man, but that's just what Hawk-Eye does to you. He remembered how he had lost his mind while he fought him that first time, and almost ended up paying for it with his life. If Luffy was about to do what he thought he was gonna do, then he would have to pay a heavy price as well. "DON'T DO IT! HE'LL CUT YOUR ARMS OFF!"
"WHAT?!" Nami screamed, her eyes wide as she looked ready to go running in and tackle Luffy herself if that was what it took.
"If he can hit an opponent over a hundred yards away without hitting anyone else, you really think that he isn't capable of cutting someone's arms off if they come flying at him?!" Zoro demanded. There were screams from all over the crew as Hawk-Eye raised his sword at Luffy, who was just about to attack… they all thought for sure that Luffy was really going to lose his arms there, but just before Luffy finished crying out his attack something happened.
It was as if there was a sudden white light around them, blocking everything else out around them accept for the shadowy forms of Luffy's arms stretching forward before both were sliced off like a hot knife through butter.
"GAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Usopp screamed, falling backwards into Brook, who almost dragged Sanji down with him as they both fell. "WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?!"
But no one answered for Luffy's eyes suddenly widen with fear and he almost seemed to choke, gasping as if he couldn't believe what he had just seen. It was too late to call off his attack, however he instead slammed his fists into the ice, breaking it apart into nothing more than ice cubes before he jumped a little farther back, phasing out of his Second Gear and breathing hard as he tried to understand what happened.
"What… I don't get it. what was that?" Brook gasped, shaking from what he had seen. "I-I don't understand? Luffy-san's arms… I… I saw them getting cut off! But he's fine…? What…?"
But it was Robin who had guessed it first. "That is truly fascinating," she said, looking at Zoro and Sanji. "So that is what it's like to use Observation Haki?"
"Observation Haki?" Nami choked, her hands over her heart, and able to feel it pounding hard. "You mean…?"
"It sure is useful in a tight spot," Sanji nodded, "And that's exactly what it's like to use it. You get a kind of insight to what your opponent is planning on doing and what will happen if that attack hits you. Which means…?"
"It doesn't surprise me at all," Robin said seriously, "That Luffy would awaken more of his Haki with everything that has happened to him up to this point… and with Ace's execution about to happen…?"
"You can't get any more stressed out than all this!" Franky said, still shaken up from that vision. But damn… that was freakin' cool!
"I have never been so happy to see something bad about to happen!" Brook sighed, lying back on the ground and breathing in relief. "If that hadn't happened when it did, then…?"
"Luffy would be short two arms right now," Robin nodded, also feeling a great weight leave her. His Haki couldn't have picked a better moment to awaken to such a point that he could see a warning when he needed it.
Luffy looked from his hands, and up at Hawk-Eyes, muttered softly to himself, "That was too close! If I had stretched my arms, he could have cut them off!"
"Yeah! So don't scare us again like that!" Nami barked at him, wanting to hit him all of a sudden for scaring them like that.
As for Hawk-Eye, if he was surprised, he hid it well. Though maybe they could see a little bit of what looked like impressment in his face.
"You're remarkably clear headed," he complimented, but almost at once he slashed the swords at him, forcing Luffy to have no other choice but to bend over backwards to prevent him from chopping his head clean off this time. They felt the impulse of the sword ringing out across the battlefield and hit the mountain of ice that was the frozen wave that they had come crashing down from. The incident seemed to draw everyone in the memory and out to stare up at it…
And what they saw made them all feel sick to their stomachs. The faint, greenish line in the form a clean cut suddenly cracked its way across half the mountain of ice. The top half suddenly broke right off it, actually rising up in the air before it cracked and shattered apart, covering the battlefield right below them with large chunks of ice and forcing people to run for cover.
Nami seemed to lose it as she fell to her knees, her hands covering her mouth before she screamed out, "I DON'T UNDERSTAND! HOW CAN ONE PERSON DO THAT WITH A SWORD?!"
"With just one slash… he… he cut a mountain-size wall of ice!" Usopp croaked, his eyes practically bursting out of his head.
"Yes…" was all that Zoro could say as he watched. He certainly had a long way to go even now if he was ever going to match Mihawk in strength. He couldn't stop though… he wouldn't stop until he reached the top… he was going to defeat that man the next time they met and he would take that title after a long, hard struggle. That was his plan and he was going through with it till the end.
"Freaks…" Nami croaked out, shaking her head and feeling waves of cold wash over her. "Everyone here is a freak! Causing seaquakes… slicing up mountains…? It makes everything we've seen since coming to the Grand Line look like kid's play!"
Luffy seemed to grasp this as well for he tried to run again, but Hawk-Eye wasn't letting him go that easily. He cut him off with another blast from his sword, and began to force him back farther and farther from the wall.
"Now what are you going to do?" Hawk-Eye asked him in passing as Luffy was forced to duck and dodge just to keep his body parts connected. "You're going farther and farther away from your brother," he reminded him, sending out countless flying blades at him.
"Does he have to taunt him now?!" Franky demanded angrily. It's bad enough that he's stalling Luffy here while Ace was right in front of him, but to mock him while he's doing it…?
"He's not taunting him," Zoro sighed, "He's just stating a fact. He wants to see if Luffy has what it takes to escape him… if he is destined to live, he will live. He's just reminding him what he's fighting for and seeing if it gets any kind of reaction."
"Either way, I think I liked him better when he wasn't talking," Sanji hissed. "Just like you, Moss Head."
"Would you shut up, Nosebleed?!" he snarled at him, his hand going for his sword.
"Would you both just shut up?!" Nami snapped at them both, looking close to banging their heads against the other. Honestly, what was wrong with them? Now wasn't the time for their stupid arguing!
"Damn it!" Luffy cried out, seeming to have just had enough and went charging straight at Hawk-Eye, clearly no longer caring what happened.
"IS HE MAD?!" Usopp yelled out, not wanting to see another vision of Luffy losing body parts. "DIDN'T HE LEARN HIS LESSON FROM THE LAST TIME?!"
"For once I have to agree," Zoro growled through gritted teeth. "Just running in there is gonna get him killed."
"What do you suggest that he do then?!" Brook cried out, tearing up his feathered boa once again. "Luffy-san! Please stop!"
"Unless he has a plan here, he's not going to live longer than sixty seconds," Robin muttered, holding her breath as Luffy neared Hawk-Eye. No one spoke a word as they watched, unable to warn him or help in any way as Mihawk raised his sword.
"So this is how it will end?" he asked as he pointed the sword at him, "Your skills has increased considerably since we've last met. But I've already seen through all your tricks. There isn't even a ten thousand to one chance I will miss from this distance."
Zoro knew that he was close to cracking some teeth as he grinding them together, wanting to step in and block the attack. He knew that Mihawk was right… from that distance and coming right at him, there isn't any chance that he could hope to miss his mark this time. If Luffy didn't think of something right now then he was…?
"HELP ME! STOP THIS RIDE!"
The sudden scream shocked them all so much that they couldn't help but look straight up to try and find the source of it. And it turned out that it had come from a giant sand twister that they recognized at once as one of Crocodile's… and trapped inside it were Buggy, Mr. 3, and many other of Buggy's followers from before.
"Where the hell did they all come from?" Franky couldn't help but ask, completely distracted for a second.
"Why is that moron always there?!" Sanji groaned, wishing that stupid clown would just go away. But what happened next actually made them all glad that he was there for once.
Luffy was also distracted from his charge long enough to look up and spot him. And he seemed to come up with an idea at that second as he stretched out his arms, reaching up to grab hold of Buggy when he spotted him next.
"What's he…?" Usopp began just as Hawk-Eye slashed his blade at him.
Several things happened at once…
Buggy let out a cry of relief having just been rescued from the tornado as the flying blade went straight at Luffy.
"GUM GUM…!"
And in a blink of an eye, Luffy brought Buggy straight down and in front of him and ducked as the attack hit Buggy instead. The Straw Hats only stared as Buggy was disconnected from his lower half and screamed in either shock or pain…
"Jet Substitute!"
"Well… that's something you don't expect coming," Franky said, his voice oddly blank as they continued to stare ahead.
"…what the hell…?" Sanji asked and each one of them had sweat falling from their faces at the sight of it all, "…was that?"
"You took the words right out of my mouth," Usopp whispered, feeling as if he was dreaming for a second. Did that really just happen?
"Not the first thing I was thinking of him doing, but it works," Robin muttered fighting hard not to laugh at the sight of it all.
"Whatever works for him I say," Nami added as Zoro clapped a hand to his forehead, looking like he was torn between laughing and sighing.
"Hey! What the hell are you doing, Straw Hat?!" Buggy screamed furiously as his upper half turned around to grab Luffy by the front of his shirt.
"Well, you can't blame him for being upset, Yohohoho…" Brook offered, seeing that Buggy didn't look to be any worse for wear even after getting sliced in half.
"You mean he didn't die?" Sanji asked grimly. "Guess there are some things that not even the mighty Hawk-Eye Mihawk can't cut. Shame…"
"Why are you yelling at me?" Luffy demanded as he waved his hand right between the places where Buggy was disconnected from his body. "He's the one who cut you! Besides, I thought you wanted to help me?"
"How diluted is your hearing?!" Buggy screamed, shaking him hard. "You only hear what you want to hear!"
"Annoying, yes… but used like this… I think it's downright funny," Franky snorted as the others all nodded at those words.
But Luffy seemed to have sensed that he spent enough time here and grabbed Buggy by his coat. "Gum Gum… Jet Substitute!" he shouted, tossing his upper body right at Hawk-Eyes. Instinctively, and faster than the eye could see, Mihawk sliced Buggy up into tiny ribbons.
"Oww…" Chopper winced, though he would've felt a lot more sorry for Buggy if he didn't know that he would be coming right back. And he was right, for Buggy had just pulled himself together, looking more ticked off than ever.
"You know, if he wasn't so pathetic, he'd be a dangerous enemy against swordsmen thanks to that ability," Brook said, thinking it over.
"Well, like you said, if he wasn't so pathetic," Sanji said as Hawk-Eye blinked in slight confusion as to what had happened. He was suddenly looking at Buggy with new interest, like how Robin would in a new book about history… and he was curious as to what kind of trick that Buggy was using if he had clearly cut him up.
If nothing else, Zoro felt a little bit better that even the best swordsman in the world couldn't cut that clown up. Though, that was before he knew of that ability… he personally doubted that Buggy could save himself if he used Haki in that sword.
"That was unforgivable!" Buggy bellowed in Mihawk's face. "You're Hawk-Eye, right?!"
But to their udder amusement, Buggy's lower half jumped up, shooting out a one of his Muggy Balls right at him and Franky asked, "If that thing didn't even work against a stupid Minotaurus in Impel Down, what makes him think it will work any better here?"
"Brain rot?" Robin offered and Zoro and Sanji smirked at that idea.
Barely reacting at all, Mihawk raised up his sword and it bounced off the steel as if it were a rubber ball and went flying right back at Buggy, whose angry look was replaced by one of stupid surprise.
"Ok, maybe not…" he whimpered with that same dumbfounded smile there as the little ball flew at him. "Do you know why my Muggy Ball is so popular with plumbers?"
"I don't know, why?" Chopper asked as the others all looked on pitifully
"All together now," Buggy said, "Because it goes…"
BOOM!
And the little ball exploded into a thick cloud of flames and smoke, clouding their vision.
"I am really starting to become afraid of him," Nami whispered, wondering just what Buggy was to do so many stupid stunts here. "If not for him."
"I don't get it," Chopper said in confusion. "That punchline made no sense to that joke!"
"He's like a punchline to a bad joke," Sanji said darkly.
"Thanks, Buggy!" Luffy's voice suddenly cried out and he went running out of the cover of the smoke and back towards the wall once again. "I'll never forget you!"
"That's almost mean…" Franky said, shaking with laughter. But he knew it was too much to hope for that Buggy did end up dying there… hell of a humiliating way to go… done in by your own attack? Lame.
But Hawk-Eye stepped through the smoke, his attention back on Luffy.
"Oh, come on, give me a break! What's with this guy?!" Usopp shouted, "Go fight someone else already!"
"He doesn't give up that easily," Zoro said, knowing that like a hawk, he won't stop going after his prey unless a better target comes along.
"This is far from over!" Hawk-Eye called as he slashed his sword once more, the energy from the sword side-swiped Luffy this time, knocking him down, and forcing Luffy to keep rolling to avoid getting killed. And once again, Mihawk ran forward, his blade held high, ready to impale Luffy this time for sure…
There were screams from the Straw Hats, wondering just how Luffy could get out of this mess this time… but they got their answer immediately for someone stepped in once again. He was a very tall man, around Jimbei's height, and very muscular with a curly black mustache and dark blue top hat that sat up on his curly black hair. He was dressed much like how Brook used to, in a sort of gentleman's attire, complete with white gloves and even a cape on his back. In each hand he wielded a saber, and he classed swords with Mihawk, causing an array of rose petals to fill the air.
"Wow! He stopped him!" Chopper cried out, his eyes sparkling at the show of strength.
"But how?!" Nami cried out, wondering how anyone could be able to stand up to someone who could cut a mountain.
"I don't know," Zoro said, a smile on his face and a wild glint in his eye as his hand went to his swords, "But I'm suddenly aching to fight this guy!"
"Another Whitebeard Pirate I'm guessing?" Sanji turned to Robin at once, who nodded.
"Though I've only ever heard of him by reputation, I can't think of anyone else it could be," she answered, a hint of a smile there on her own mouth as she looked at the man with great interest. "The Commander of the Whitebeard Pirates' Fifth Division, Flower the Blade Vista."
She ended up saying his name at the exact same time that Mihawk had, causing Vista to grin wide right back at him.
"Nice to meet you, Hawk-Eye Mihawk," he said politely, as if they were just having a friendly chat over some drinks. "So, you've heard of me?"
"Now it would be strange if I hadn't," Hawk-Eye confessed just as calmly and that only seemed to increase Zoro's urge to fight this guy even more.
"Wow, he must be good if he's recognized him as a swordsman," Brook gasped out, thinking about what he said before to those two New Kamas… 'I don't remember the face of every insect I crush'. He'd shiver if he still had skin… the way he said it in that cold voice scared him to the bone. Which was easy for him now that he thought of it.
"And this will be a good change for me," Zoro promised, moving his sword a little so that the steel glinted when he flicked it out. He made a mental vow to try pit his skills against this guy should they end up crossing here in the New World.
Luffy gasped as he finally looked up, staring around, as if amazed that he wasn't dead right now. "I'm saved!" he gasped before he looked back and spotted the two swordsmen there. "Who's the old man?"
"You think he might be a little more appreciative to someone who saved his hide," Usopp whispered with a roll of his eyes as Hawk-Eye now had his hands full and had no choice but to let Luffy go. Zoro glanced up at him one more time and he could see the acceptance in those yellow eyes that he acknowledged that fate saw fit to let him escape this time and there was no grudge there. But there was also a slightly curious look in those eyes as he watched Luffy get up and go running off, shouting back a quick thanks to Vista.
Zoro didn't say anything to the others as he went running with them to keep up with Luffy, leaving Vista and Hawk-Eye behind them to continue their battle, which they knew might take a while. But Zoro had been aware of this for some time… though he had to confess that he didn't know when he knew or for how long… but over the last two years, Mihawk had told him something that he knew was right.
It wasn't a Devil Fruit ability, or some trick. But somehow, one by one, Luffy is able to turn the people around him into his allies—including former enemies, villains and even Whitebeard himself.
And the shouts around him only confirmed that.
"Keep going, Straw-Hat-boy!" Ivankov shouted.
Jimbei, finally able to break through the ice and reappear, glanced around to see Luffy still going. "Seems he made it through," he said in a relieved tone.
"Luffy!" Hancock's voice shouted from a good distance away, "You must save your brother!"
Zoro watched Luffy continue to fight his way through, not letting any marine stop him as he charged ahead, his eyes only focused on Ace. It was at that moment that he fully agreed with what Mihawk once said… more than anyone else sailing these seas… Luffy processed the most dangerous ability.
It looks like Ace was right all along that there was a mysterious charm that drew people together. Not too surprising though… that his brother would know Luffy better than anyone.
Onwards their group ran forward, hoping that Luffy didn't have to deal with anymore Warlords at the moment, but that was when things got even worse for them. Two executioners had just stepped up onto the platform, their swords in hand, and once the Whitebeard Pirates saw them, the scramble to get into the plaza had turned from serious to desperate.
"Damn, those cowards!" Franky yelled furiously, glaring up at the two executioners.
"There must be something they can do!" Chopper cried out, his eyes wide with fear, "I don't want to see Ace… to see…" He couldn't go on anymore, too horror-stricken at such a thought of seeing Ace die. Yet everyone seemed to feel the same way, and were now rooting for Luffy to hurry and keep going, though they knew this would never change the outcome.
"NO!" Luffy cried out in terror as the two executioners positioned their blades right at Ace's neck. "They're really gonna execute Ace early!"
He put on another burst of speed, running harder than ever, but that was when several explosions almost shattered their eardrums behind them.
"What else is happening now?!" Usopp screamed, looking back, not thinking that it could get any worse. Boy was he wrong…
Lasers of light were being fired all over behind them and there were screams ringing out throughout the bay. Some of the pirate ships from Whitebeard's allies suddenly blew up in giant blasts of light, and for a moment they thought that it was Kizaru's doing… but that was also wrong. Instead, there was a large army of Pacifistas marching towards the pirates, blocking their way out of the bay right behind them, and even from this distance they could see that it was Sentomaru who was leading them all.
"Can't that guy fight without those things to back him up?!" Sanji demanded angrily as they were just forced to keep going ahead. Though it didn't look to hopeful for them. Warlords and Admirals in the front, with Pacifistas and fire in the rear…
Yet, to their surprise, the marines in front of them all bolted, most of them having made it up to the wall and leaving the bay with only a few stragglers to buy them time to get off the ice.
"What's going on here?" Zoro asked suspiciously, not liking how the enemy was retreating all of a sudden.
"I suppose they want to try and regroup in the plaza," Robin offered, yet that didn't seem right to her. If they all left at once, there had to be a reason. Because they wouldn't want to let the Whitebeard Pirates inside the plaza at any costs if they could help it, but then why leave the way almost clear for them to get there. Unless…?
She suddenly gave a sharp intake of breath, which caught some of the others off-guard.
"What?" Usopp asked at once, "That's not good. You don't look like something good is going to happen! I know that look! Something really bad is happening and you figured it out! Don't tell me…"
"I thought that it was a good thing that they were falling back!" Chopper chirped up, jumping up and down wildly, "So why is that suddenly a bad thing?!"
"It's bad because they're trying to trap all the pirates in the bay," she said firmly.
"What do you mean trap them?" Nami asked before looking around. Sure, the pirates were all still on the ice out here, and that wall separating them was tall… but after seeing all these powerhouses, those walls weren't going to hold for long. They could easily break right through it, so how could they become trapped?
She tried to explain this to the others, but Robin held onto that belief that this was all one big ruse, not calming down at all. Now they knew that she knew all about how the marines work, having evaded them for over twenty years now, and so they trusted her judgment… but that didn't mean that they had to like it.
Panting hard, Luffy was tossing aside the few marines that still attempted to stop him. "Ace is in trouble," he said to himself like a chant, "I gotta hurry!"
But when he was nearing the wall once again, someone else stepped in in a flash of light, momentarily blinding them all.
"HIM AGAIN?!" Brook screamed out in terror, having seen who it was.
Admiral Kizaru just smiled calmly at Luffy before he raised up his leg. "Back to square one!" he called and he rammed his foot, kicking Luffy so hard that blood burst from his mouth. Luffy hit the ice hard and was flung backwards, bouncing violently on the ice.
"They just keep showing up! One after the other!" Franky shouted out in panic. "How the hell is anyone supposed to get anywhere like this?!"
"That's the point! You're not supposed to!" Sanji shouted, wincing in pain when he saw Luffy flying back, and even he could tell that had to hurt him this time.
"Luffy!" Jimbei's suddenly shouted, running right in Luffy's path and held up his hands to catch him. He caught Luffy like how one would catch a ball, but the energy from that kick was enough to force Jimbei back a few feet, before Luffy hit the ice.
"Luffy! Please don't keep pushing yourself like this!" Chopper pleaded, wishing that he could step in and restrain him by force if that was what it took to get him to rest.
"Like that's gonna be enough to stop him," Zoro said firmly as Luffy spat out a mouthful of blood and looked up to see who had stopped him.
"Jimbei…" he croaked out, sounding worn out, and struggling to breathe before he glared up at Kizaru, whose sunglasses were glinting in a malevolent way. "One of the admirals are here… dammit!" he huffed, trying to recover from that last attack.
"He is a formidable adversary, but there's no time to lose," Jimbei said calmly, looking at Kizaru and was readying himself for a fight. "You always knew that strong enemies would stand in your way before you came," he added to Luffy, wanting him to remember his reason for coming here at all. "And yet you still came."
"I don't think anything short of dying was going to stop him from seeing Ace again," Sanji sighed before he smiled a little. "You thick-headed captain."
"DAMMIT GUYS! ARE YOU TRYING TO MAKE ME CRY?!" Franky yelled out at him, his bottom lip quivering and he was fighting the waterworks that kept threatening to spill over.
"If we were, it wouldn't be hard now would it?" Nami asked him as Luffy pushed himself up a little, shaking a little… but this time it wasn't from anger… it was from fatigue. Not that they were surprised, even a monster's strength had to run out sooner or later.
With everyone's focus and concern on Luffy's health, they didn't notice that there was someone pointing a rifle right at Luffy's head. Robin noticed however, and looked back at him, wondering why he was even bothering to attack when he should've already know that bullets didn't work on him.
But it was what he said that infuriated her.
"Die Dragon's son…" he snarled, ready to shoot.
As soon as she heard those words, it set a fire in her heart that she couldn't remember having in a long time. She gritted her teeth, remembering similar words spoken to her throughout her life. Angrier than she had been in a long time, she raised her arms, forgetting all about the fact that this was a memory. She wanted to make that marine pay for those words and was going to stop him one way or another… however a gun had fired before she could do anything.
Yet it wasn't from the rifle that the marine was going to shoot with… for he had been the one shot and was now lying on the ice and was bleeding from the wound. Robin blinked, looking back to see that there were several men, even a Fishman, having just joined with Luffy, standing in front of him like a protective wall. The man who held the smoking pistol in his hands was dressed in a long kimono, with his hair done up in a rather elegant bun, and even wore make-up on his face.
"Ace's brother," he said, glancing back at Luffy before he taunted, "Has your stamina run out?"
"I'd like to see you go through the kind of day he's been having you jerk!" Usopp snapped, with Brook and Chopper nodding fiercely beside him.
"Who do they think they are anyway?" Brook demanded angrily, yet it was Jimbei who answered.
"Oh, it's the commanders! This will make things easier for us!" he stated confidently.
"More of Whitebeard's top bunch, huh?" Sanji asked, looking over them all. "Makes sense that they would try to get Luffy angry enough to get back up."
"Doesn't mean I have to like it!" Usopp barked at him, and his negative feelings only deepened further when the man went on to say, "You can't let one Admiral stop you. Follow us!"
"Funny enough, but I don't see you guys doing any better!" Nami called as Luffy's eye twitched angrily at the guy's words.
"Alright!" he shouted before he added, "Bastard."
"Took the words outta my mouth," Nami said darkly as the two followed right after the commanders, all of them forming another wall around Luffy, as Jimbei stayed right behind him, protecting his back from anymore pursuers.
"Now's our chance while the marines are fallen back! Let's break their defenses!"
Seeing the marines continuing to make their retreat was a serious increase to their morale and they were more wild up than ever before. Even Kizaru, looking at each one of the commanders calmly, almost as if this was all a waste of time, came out to admit that they were a tough bunch to deal with.
The fight between them looked ready to clash at any second, but at that moment something happened that shocked both pirates and marines to the core. Though it was almost silent compared to the guns and battle cries around them, the sound had echoed across the landscape and drew everyone's attention to just one spot.
All of them looked to the sound, right behind them to where the Moby Dick still stood. Standing up front were two people, one of them was Whitebeard, but he was joined by a man they hadn't seen before.
A bald top but with light-pink wavy hair that flowed long down his back, as well as a spider design on his forehead with a spiral set in the middle. But what they were staring at was what was in that man's hands… a long sword that had just been impaled right into Whitebeard's chest.
"W-Whitebeard…?!" Nami cried out, her eyes wide as the others all gapped at what they were seeing.
"What happened?!" Chopper cried out in shock. "That was one of his allies right? Why would he do something like that?! I thought that they all looked up to him as their captain!"
"I'm more surprised that he was able to stab him at all," Zoro stated, not having a clue as to what was going on here.
Brook was just shaking his head, his mouth wide open, unable to believe it. How could anyone do such a thing? To raise your blade against your own captain like that? That was like one of them stabbing Luffy with a knife! He couldn't ever imagine what would possess a man to do such a terrible thing!?
The man in question pulled his sword out, blood dripping down from both the sword and the wound in Whitebeard's chest, even a dribble of it leaking from a corner of his mouth.
"Old timer…" Luffy whispered in shock from next to him as Jimbei and the commanders were all gasping in horror at the sight of it wall, disbelief in their faces. There were yells and screams coming from all the Whitebeard Pirates and allies, all of them outraged and shocked to the core.
"Who's done it?!" someone screamed.
"I think it's…"
"SQUARDO!" a man screamed and Marco the Phoenix flew down from the sky, blue flames licking his body in the form of a bird, causing some of the Straw Hats to shriek in surprise at it, but no one dared to ask if he was a Devil Fruit User at the moment. For Marco bolted straight towards his captain and the traitor named Squardo before he slammed his face right onto the deck.
"Why would you do such a thing!? Answer me, Squardo!" he demanded, screaming furiously.
"S-shut up!" Squardo shouted back, "You're the one who forced my hand!"
"Forced his hand?! Can someone tell me what this is all about?!" Usopp shouted out, his mind feeling as if someone was beating his head with a bat or something.
"What? What in the hell are you…?" Marco demanded before Whitebeard fell to his knees with a crash, his hand over the wound. Marco completely forgot all about Squardo for the moment as he jumped up and ran to Whitebeard's side.
"Old Man, if you keep pushing yourself like this then…?" he began, sounding terrified, even as Whitebeard held up a hand to stop him, silently telling him not to worry.
"He's in bad shape," Chopper whispered, able to see it even from here.
"Well, he's got a hole in his gut, I don't suppose that he would be feeling alright would he?" Franky asked him, still trying to wake himself up from his own stupor.
"That's not what I meant!" Chopper shouted back, looking ready to go into a rant, but Squardo had already gotten up and was glaring at Whitebeard, even with his back to them all they could almost feel the hatred radiating off him.
"Just drop the act already, Whitebeard!" he screamed at him, "You made a deal with those marines, haven't you?! You made a deal to make sure that Ace and the other Whitebeard Pirates would leave this place alive!"
He then turned to address everyone in the bay and declared, "Listen to me everyone! This is all a trap!"
"What?!" Zoro cried out, unable to believe what he was hearing. "What a load of crap that is! If any part of that is true I'll eat my bandana!"
"So you don't think it's true?" Chopper asked him at once.
"I've heard the stories of Whitebeard even back when I was still hunting pirates for a living," he answered, "Whitebeard cared about each one of his crewmates as if they were family. Look at all he's doing for Ace here! If he's not going to abandon a single crewmate like this, what makes you think that he's sell out his own men?!"
"Not only that," Robin added, "But Ace is Roger's son. There is no way that they would ever consider letting him go even if any of that was true."
"Then… then where did he…?" Nami began but Squardo was far from done.
He was practically breathing smoke in his anger as he snarled out, the now quiet battlefield, now able to hear his words, "I didn't know… that Ace was Gold Roger's son!"
"What does that have anything to do with this?!" Usopp asked but Robin's eyes widen a little at those words. She had a very good idea… she had a feeling that Squardo didn't really believe that Whitebeard had betrayed them, but his anger and hatred were clouding his better judgment.
"I'm sure you know why I was alone!" Squardo went on, true pain in his voice now, his voice shaking from either grief or anger they weren't sure. "It was you who found me! It was because Roger killed my cherished comrades who I fought side by side with for so long! They were killed by him!"
"No…" Franky croaked out. "Roger did that?"
"But Roger always seemed like he was an amazing guy!" Usopp shouted out, "That doesn't sound like something that he would've done!"
"I see no reason why he would be lying about it," Sanji pointed out, not understanding it either. But then again, hadn't they taken out several crews on their own as well? Sure, they did it to jerks who deserved it, but they didn't go as far as to kill them all did they? He couldn't remember anymore.
"I don't know what happened, but whatever the case is," Zoro said firmly, "Squardo blames Roger for the loss of his old crew. Whether it's true or not isn't the case right now."
"I thought you already knew of my hatred for Roger!" Squardo screamed up at him, and he was also sounding choked up, as if he started crying. "You could've at least told me that Ace was his son!"
"If this is his reaction, I don't blame him for keeping it quiet," Nami muttered, seeing how Squardo was half mad in his fury of finding out that Ace was the son of the same man who had killed his friends before.
"Besides," Zoro added darkly, "It wasn't anyone's business but Ace's who he chose to tell who his old man was and I don't see how it matters anyway."
"You could have told me that you planned on making him the next Pirate King!" Squardo started screaming furiously which struck them all with shock.
"Make…? Whitebeard… he wanted…?" Usopp asked, his eyes wide.
"But I thought that Ace wanted to make Whitebeard the king!" Chopper cried out, pointing his hoof at Whitebeard. "What's he talking about?"
They were all just as lost as he was to that declaration, and even Luffy looked shocked by those words. "You mean… the old man wants Ace to be the King of the Pirates?"
"So… he didn't care about being king from the start?" Brook asked quietly.
"I thought that there was something here that didn't make sense," Zoro said softly, "I mean… after Roger died, everyone expected him to become the next king. But it's been over twenty years and he hadn't bothered to even try. I think it's clear that he doesn't care about that title."
"He must've lived one hell of a life," Franky said, wondering if he could expect to live like that old timer. That would be something else to him… to have seen and done so much that the idea of becoming known as a 'king' would mean next to nothing to him. What a man…
"But why would he want to make Ace the king instead of some of his other crewmates?" Usopp asked in confusion. "I mean, I thought that Whitebeard hated Roger?"
"No, like any rival, I think that he respected him if nothing else," Sanji said with a shrug. "But even if he did hate Roger, Ace isn't him remember? If I had to guess, I would say that he believed that Ace had what it took to be the next king if he really wanted it. And if that was what he wanted, then I have a feeling that he'd be there to help him if that was what he asked for it."
"But then… what did Ace want?" Chopper asked, still trying to grasp what was going on.
"That's something that I think only Ace can answer," Nami said with a shake of her head sadly.
"But even back then, you betrayed us!" Squardo continued to shout even as more explosions were going on around them. "You let us become friends and mocked me the whole time! But then he was captured and you made a deal! The Whitebeard pirates are in the bay and we allies are trapped along the shore! You traded the lives of all forty-three captains from your alliance all for Ace's life!"
"Where the hell did he come up with that crap?!" Sanji scoffed. "It sounds ridiculous even to me! Who would dare to make a deal like that to the marines? Everyone knows that they can't be trusted!" And he thought bitterly as to how Robin was so brave to make a deal with them on her own, and look at how they betrayed her in the end? Those damn marines were mocking the same 'justice' that they claimed to represent.
"That was the deal from the very start!" Squardo went on, pointing a shaking hand at Whitebeard as the allies around them were staring in shock at the two of them. "You and Sengoku agreed that the allied crews would all be executed while Ace and the Whitebeard Pirates go free!"
"Oh, use your head!" Nami shouted, staring wildly up to where Ace was still chained, forced to just watch helplessly. "Now that they have him right there, does he really think that they'll let him go?! There's no way that Ace would just go with them if he knew that was the truth! He'd rather stay behind and fight to the death with everyone else!"
"And that is proof that this was all one lie," Robin added. "Ace never would've chosen to follow a man who would leave his own crewmates to suffer like this. If I had to guess, I would say that he had been lied to about this, I mean, who better than one of the people who Whitebeard trusts to get close enough for an attempt on his life?"
"But you think that he would've seen that attack coming if he's so powerful!" Usopp pointed out, thinking of all the times that the Monster Trio on their crew were always aware of everyone around them, even when they were asleep. How could Whitebeard not have sensed that attack?
Chopper closed his eyes, knowing the truth already. Though he didn't get a good look at him, and though the way that he stood here, at the head of the battle so that you could never guess otherwise… Chopper was still a doctor. And he could see the sad truth about Whitebeard even from here.
"But how did he even come up with this story?" Nami asked them.
"If I had to guess, he heard it from some marine," Franky muttered, not having any idea as to how else he would even think of attacking his captain like that. Damn, and you would think that marines wouldn't resort to something so low… too bad that he already had bad experiences with those unprincipled worms.
"We came here for Ace and Whitebeard's sakes! Prepared to lay down our own lives for them, but what do you know? We were the ones deceived from the start!" Squardo screamed louder than ever. "Look at the proof!" and he pointed to the Pacifistas continuing to march towards them and their ships on fire.
"It's as he said! We're the targets! We're the only ones the marines are attacking here!" he shouted out.
"Because you guys are fighting them? Does he not get how a war works?" Zoro asked exasperatedly.
"And look! Those monsters are attacking us from behind while our flanks are blocked by walls of ice! We can't escape!" Squardo shouted, and as he pointed this all out to them, some of the pirates were also looking at what he was talking about, fear in their faces that what he was saying was actually true.
Whitebeard didn't say a word as he let Squardo go into his rant. But he was listening to every single word he said, hearing the hurt and the fury in his voice as the man seemed to actually convince himself that it was all true.
"That I hit you once is practically a miracle that I hit you even once!" Squardo acknowledged, and then he held out his arms, as if ready to accept whatever kind of punishment that Whitebeard had in store for him. "Go ahead! Kill me! I didn't want to believe it! I still don't want to! But how could you betray us, Old Man?!"
No one dared to even squeak as they watched the scene, truly believing that he was going to kill the man for his words. Whitebeard just continued to look at Squardo, not saying a word and it was Marco who seemed to have snapped first.
"You damn idiot!" Marco screamed, grabbing him by the front of his shirt and shook him hard. "Wasn't he the one who took you in?! Squardo, do you have such little faith in the Old Man?!"
"You have no right to say anything, Marco!" Squardo shouted right back at him, shoving him off. "You're the Commander of the First Division! There's no way that you didn't know about Ace or the deal he made with the marines!"
Robin merely shook her head. That was really what this was all about. Squardo harbored a deep hatred for Roger and was now transferring that hate towards Ace, being Roger's son. That was blinding him to everything else around him, even overshadowing the fact that he had come here because he wanted to help Ace… it was as if he had completely forgotten about the fact that they were friends the second that he discovered who Ace's father was.
"It is true that Ace is Roger's son," Whitebeard admitted, his voice very calm despite the fact that someone whom he had saw as his own son had just stabbed him. He then raised his head and looked over to see Sengoku still at the execution platform, without a shred of surprise. "Looks like their plan was one step ahead of my own," he added thoughtfully.
"You are a disgrace, Whitebeard!" roared a voice in pure fury that took them all by surprise when they looked to see Crocodile standing at the foot of the Moby Dick, looking like he had been trying to fight his way to Whitebeard but had been forced back several times. But his face was filled with more anger than they had ever seen… even when Luffy had confronted him in that tomb and the battle ended in his loss, they had never seen him look as angry as he did here.
Crocodile was practically seething as he roared out, "I didn't realize I had lost to such a weak man!"
"Ok, he's got more issues than I thought," Franky said as the others all looked at each other, trying to take those words in.
"I don't know how or what happened… but it sure sounds like this 'fight' he lost to Whitebeard must've been a heavy one," Brook whispered, wondering if this loss had something to do to turn Crocodile into the man he was today… or maybe the monster that he had become.
He wasn't the only one who was thinking that, for Robin was looking long and hard at Crocodile as if she had never seen him clearly before. From what she gathered, Crocodile met Whitebeard in the New World and was so badly beaten by him that it continues to haunt him to this day. Hearing about it now… she almost felt sorry for him.
Though she never saw eye-to-eye with him, though he had once plotted to kill off an entire nation as well as attempted to kill her as well, she felt nothing but sorrow for him. She blinked at the realization and she actually smiled a tiny bit… maybe being with the Straw Hats for so long have changed her more than she thought.
Still down on one knee, still listening to what Squardo was saying. But when Squardo finally said his piece, there was anger in his face as he glared down at him.
"Do you realize what you have just done?" he asked coldly, "You turned your blade against your own father. You foolish son!"
And then he raised up his hand, looking like he was about to crush him—in fact several of the Straw Hats covered their eyes, thinking that it was going to be a horrific death. Even though this was just a memory, the power radiating off of Whitebeard was so thick that they could feel it. Even Squardo seemed to sense that his life was over and closed his eyes, readying himself for death. But instead of attacking him, Whitebeard did something that none of them saw coming. He pulled Squardo to him and hugged him tightly as he said in a gentle voice, "Though you are fool, I still love you, my son."
No one said anything as they stared at the scene for a long time.
"Oh, wow…" Chopper whispered, tears willing up in his eyes as he remembered how the Doctor held him tightly like that when he came back with that poisonous mushroom. It was just like that… even though what he thought he was doing was good… it did more harm to the man he saw as a father than good.
"That's… that's… I DON'T KNOW WHAT ANYMORE!" Franky sobbed out, falling forward and his tears soaked the ground as he writhed around in pain. "WHITEBEARD! YOU ARE ONE HELL OF A GUY!"
"The Whitebeard Pirates were as close as family," Robin smiled sadly, having to envy Squardo for having a parental figure who loved him no matter what he did.
Squardo just froze there, looking like he couldn't understand what was happening here. Having been ready to accept his death, he never expected to be forgiven like this and even told that no matter what he had done, he was still loved. "Don't…" he stammered out, "Don't try to… trick me! You… you sold out your own…!"
"Who had dragged your pure and loyal heart into such a lie?" Whitebeard asked him, still in that same soft and gentle tone.
"A marine insurgent," Squardo answered, sounding as if he were in a daze. "He said… he said that he would spare the allied pirates if I killed you. Akainu said…?"
"Akainu?" Nami said, feeling numb. "He's one of the Admirals… right?"
"He was the third, yes," Robin answered, "Before he took over as the Fleet Admiral." She shook her head as she added, "Though he really is a fool for believing that. Out of all the Admirals at this point in time, he was by far the most ruthless. Much like Rob Lucci, anything that he saw as 'evil' didn't deserve to live in this world. Even if this 'deal' was true, there wasn't any possible way that he would've spared the pirates here."
"So it was a lie all along!" Chopper cried out at once.
"It's the only logical thing here," Zoro said in disgust. "And marines accuse us pirates of fighting dirty."
Whitebeard sighed as he said, "I am also aware of how deep your hatred goes when it comes to Roger. But Squardo, it is wrong to resent a child for the sins of his father. Tell me, what did Ace ever do to you?"
Squardo froze, as if he had never once thought about that question.
"Akainu must've been aware of what Roger did to Squardo in the past," Robin said softly, "And he used that against them. By informing him of who Ace's father was, it put Squardo into a blind rage that he didn't think things through… never once bothered to wonder if what he was told was a lie."
"But Ace wasn't even born until after Roger was killed, right? So…?!" Usopp pointed out, "I mean…"
"That doesn't matter," Sanji said darkly. "Just the fact that he has Roger's blood is enough to make Squardo angry. We just got through talking about this didn't we?" he added, looking to Robin. "That you three have as much right as anyone else to live in this world, regardless of who your parents are?"
"Yes," Robin said softly. "For some, that hatred runs so deep that they cannot see that much however. I think that Squardo had been longing for a chance to get revenge on Roger for what he did to him. So much so that he decided to take it out on Ace, but is only now realizing what he is doing."
She looked back to Whitebeard, who had a deep look of understanding in his eyes.
"Together, you and Ace have fought through pain, joy, and difficulty," Whitebeard reminded him gently, "Always fighting and rising above each challenge with your friends beside you. It doesn't matter who Ace's parents were. For we all got a chance to meet on this big, wide ocean. Not only you two, but I see you all as my children."
His words, though simple, rang throughout the entire bay as everyone listened to his words. After hearing how much he cared for his crew and allies, some pirates were tearing up and looking ashamed at having ever doubted the old man in the first place. Even some of the marines were looking amazed that even the infamous Whitebeard was even capable of loving his crew like how a father would.
Chopper couldn't hold back as he broke down sobbing alongside Brook, who was crying out apologies for ever thinking that Whitebeard had sold out his men. Even Nami was crying, thinking of her mother and how she gave up all the money she had to protect her and her sister from Arlong. How she looked right at them and her last words had been that she loved them.
Nami's heart suddenly began to ache so much it felt as if someone was squeezing it. She hugged her body, yearning to see her mother's face just once more. To have her here and hold her like when she was little… she could no longer fight the tears and let them drip down her cheeks.
"So Squardo, try to get along," Whitebeard finished, as if he were a father telling his son to play nicely with the other kids. "Do not think that Ace is a special case. You are all my family."
At those words, what he had just done seemed to hit Squardo all at once for the sword slipped from his hand and he stood there still as a statue. Whitebeard held him tightly for just another moment before he stood tall and looked right over at Sengoku's direction.
"Still," he spoke up loudly, "You haven't changed a bit, Sengoku. You sure duped him."
"That's it?!" Sanji cried out. "He gets a sword in him and all he can say is that he was duped?!"
"What a pirate!" Usopp whispered in awe, "Gets stabbed in the chest and is still going strong!"
"I gotta say, it's an honor to see the legend himself in life," Zoro stated, watching as Whitebeard walked forward, before moving in a horse stance like how Luffy did before going into Second Gear. "He really is as amazing as the stories say about him."
"Me, sell out my own children's lives?" Whitebeard asked darkly before they saw him slam his hands against the air and to their amazement they saw glowing cracks appear around them, as if he was breaking through glass.
"He's… he's cracking the air itself!" Nami cried out, her jaw falling forward as the cracks burst and the mountains of ice that surrounded them broke. They came tumbling down in giant chucks, opening the view so that they could all seen the shore and ocean around them.
"HELL!" Franky gasped out, amazed that anyone could destroy mountains by just hitting the air.
"Alright!" Sanji cheered, grinning wildly, "And here's the proof that him selling out the pirates was all a big fat lie! He opened up an escape route for them!"
"So now they can leave whenever they want!" Brook added, understanding at once what he was saying. "In the end, he did end up saving them, didn't he?!"
"Whitebeard!" Franky declared tearfully, his face still on the ground as his tears flooded their feet. "You're really something else!"
Whitebeard suddenly stood once again, holding up his weapon high as he declared to everyone, "If you are pirates, then decide for yourselves what to believe!"
Those words seemed to be too much for Squardo as he fell forward, his cries of grief and remorse could be heard echoing around the entire bay, making it seem all the worse.
"The poor man…" Brook said, his heart aching for him even if he no longer had one. He could only imagine just how much pain that he would be feeling right now at the thought of attacking and doubting his captain like that. It must feel as if he was the one who had gotten stabbed.
Across the battlefield, all the Whitebeard pirates and allies were all screaming out words of apology for doubting him and shouted how they would follow him for the rest of their lives. And that was when the Straw Hats knew that it wasn't just the man's strength that caused all these people to follow behind him… it was his heart.
Even Luffy was staring up at him with a new respect in his eyes, a hint of a smile on his own face as he seemed to understand what he was saying.
"Those who wish to come with me," Whitebeard declared, his voice booming louder than ever, "Follow me even if it costs you your lives!"
And the cheer that broke out among the pirates was so great that it felt as if the entire world was shaking, and they all looked more eager than ever to fight to the death if that was what it took.
"Those marines never learn their lesson do they?" Zoro asked, shaking his head. "Every time they try to put pirates down, their actions only increase the fire in them."
"Why complain if it's a good thing here, bro?" Franky asked, raising up his head at last. But he looked tearfully up at Whitebeard, blood still dripping out from the hole in his chest. "But that's not gonna stop that bleeding, ya'know?"
"He needs a doctor to look at it!" Chopper said firmly, yet he might as well have stayed silent for all the good that it did. Whitebeard ran with thunderous footsteps before he leapt from the ship and to the icy warzone below him.
At the sight of it all, Sengoku shouted out his orders. "Attack! He's come at last! The Strongest Man in the world!"
Any few marines that were either brave or stupid enough to try to face him didn't stand a chance. For as soon as the pirate hit the ice, the impact alone was enough to knock over anyone just standing too close to where he landed. He then held up his enormous weapon and pointed it directly at Sengoku, as if challenging him personally, as the rest of his army charged ahead, more fired up than ever before.
"Do what the old man says!"
"Open up a path for him!"
Everyone seemed determined to do whatever it took to make sure that Whitebeard got to front without running into anything that might seem even remotely like a problem. The cannonballs were all aimed and firing directly at Whitebeard, who merely punched the air in front of them, causing them to be sent flying right back and blowing up the cannons.
"Holy cow!" Franky shouted, his blood racing as he stared in amazement at the old man in action. "And he's ancient? Dude, just thinking about how strong he was in his prime scares the shit outta me!"
Luffy was also staring ahead as he exclaimed, "That old guy really is amazing! Even with that wound…?" But he looked right back up at the wall, putting his awe out of his mind for a moment. "But I gotta focus on Ace here!"
"That simple brain of his sure does cut to the point doesn't it?" Usopp asked, really starting to worry about Luffy's mind here. This obsession, however admirable it is, really seemed to be pushing Luffy close to insanity here.
But Luffy wasn't thinking about any of that as he started to run forward again. The last of the marines, either terrified by the roar of pirates barreling right at them or for some other reason, had already made it to the wall, the last few of them slipping inside before the entrances were shut, leaving no one but the pirates inside the bay.
"Something wrong," Zoro said, knowing that this couldn't be good.
"We've been so focused on Whitebeard that we didn't notice how many were leaving," Robin frowned heavily.
"But what can they do to them on the other side of the wall?" Usopp tried to point out, not able to think of any way that they could continue attacking like this.
"Don't underestimate your enemy," Robin said firmly, her voice icy. "Especially if your enemy is as ruthless as the marines. They won't stop until either the pirates are all dead… or they're killed themselves."
"So whatever they're planning had to be worth the risk of leaving them in the bay," Sanji nodded, not liking this at all.
"AND THAT'S IT!" Chopper screamed in terror, pointing up wildly to see a giant stepping over the wall. This giant was wearing a very richly dressed marine clothes that could be seen from miles away, and was covered in medals all over his front as he marched over to the pirates.
"That's their plan?" Zoro asked, highly doubting it. Sure, giants were tough and strong, but there was no way that they could expect a single one to take on Whitebeard and all these pirates could they? He looked back to the massive giant that still laid on the battlefield, not even sure if he was even still alive. That giant was more than twice as big as a normal giant and he was brought down like this…?
From the wall, cannons were being fired at them, taking out anyone who got to close, while the giant raised up his sword, swinging viscously at them all.
"Don't think I'll let you reach the plaza, Whitebeard Pirates!" he declared.
"So that's what he's doing…?" Nami frowned.
"What are you talking about now?" Usopp asked her nervously, not envying anyone who had to fight a giant like this.
"He's not the plan," Nami told him, her hand shaking as she pointed up at him. "He's just trying to buy some time for whatever it is that they got planned!"
"So they aren't ready yet…" Robin whispered, liking this less and less with every minute.
"You gotta admit though, if you're gonna need some spare time, it's hard to top a giant," Brook pointed out.
"Yeah, unless you're up against Whitebeard!" Sanji added, pointing. As the giant attacked everyone around his feet, stomping down hard to try and squash as many people as he could, he finally came across Whitebeard, who looked up as if bored at him. The giant raised up his massive sword and brought it down, ready to slice him in half. But all Whitebeard did was hold up his bisento to stop the blade from touching him… the impact so great that his feet sunk several feet into the ice… but he barely batted an eye as he held off the giant.
"Just when I thought that he couldn't get even more freaking awesome!" Franky cried out.
"He stopped a giant with just one hand?!" Usopp screamed out in awe.
"He would've been something else to fight if we had the chance," Zoro said, shaking his head mournfully that he never would have a chance to test his strength against one of the very strongest.
"I honestly don't know how to react," Sanji said, staring up at the giant's shocked and terrified face. Unable to believe that one man could stop him, almost mocking his strength.
"You're in our way," Whitebeard said causally before he brought his bisento up, actually knocking the giant off-balance. They had thought for sure that he was going to attack him with the blade, but he let it fall to his side, instead grabbing hold of something… that was when they realized that he was seizing the very air itself. They could only watch as everything around them began to shake as if there was an earthquake.
"What the hell…?!" Sanji shouted out as the ground began to tilt under their feet. Screams were going on from the Straw Hats as giant cracks split the ice as if stone.
"What's that maniac doing now?!" Nami screamed, falling to her knees as the ground began to rise up underneath them. The noise was deafening around them, blocking out everything else but the roar and cracking of the world seemingly falling apart. Luffy, still trying to run, ended up slipping and had to hold onto the ice as he winced in pain. They went to check on him, but that was when they saw something that defied all imagination. Even Luffy's jaw dropped and his eyes were so wide that they looked like dinner plates.
Right in front of them, the world was left in giant chucks, like a broken puzzle. The ground beneath them was tilted at a slant, forcing the pirates to hang on for dear life… but that wasn't what they were staring at for the very ocean was also sliced right up. Large pieces of the water was rising up like the stone that they were on. It was like they were in some kind of dream, or more like a nightmare, as the sea rose steadily up, leaving a path of devastation as it felt like the entire island was about to sink from the force of nature.
The Straw Hats were dumbfounded that anyone could have this kind of power… making the Warlords and even the Admirals look like weaklings compared to it all. The pirates around them seemed to have guessed what was going on for they were running to flanks and held on tightly as they cheered Whitebeard on.
Luffy just gapped like a fish out of water, his expression looking like the rest of the crew's as he stared at what Whitebeard was capable of. In fact, he couldn't hear the noise of the ice breaking up underneath him until it was too late. He looked down as the ice opened up like the jaws of some beast and he ended up tumbling right inside. The Straw Hats all called out to him as Luffy let out a startled scream, continuing to fall as he stretched his arm to make a mad grab for the ledge. Yet he was too far from it already and came just short of it.
Zoro, Usopp, Brook, and Franky all ran to the ledge and tried to help by grabbing his hand, but their hands were as good as smoke for all the good that they did. And all they could do now was watch their captain's face disappear into the ice below them. Fear gripped each of their hearts at how helpless they were, but then a blue, webbed hand shot out right through them and grabbed hold of Luffy's hand for them.
"Luffy!" he cried out and they saw Jimbei there, having grabbed onto him just in time.
"God, I'm losing track of how many times we owe this guy!" Usopp shouted, relief flooding his voice, and he wanted to hug the big guy right then and there for a moment.
"Jimbei!" Luffy shouted out when he recognized who it was.
"Don't worry! I got you!" Jimbei called as he pulled him with just one heave. Luffy's arm retracted and he shot up, clear over Jimbei and landing safely on his feet right behind him. He caught his breath, recovering from the fall before he smiled at Jimbei, "You saved me… thanks a lot!"
"Really, thank you so much, Jimbei-san," Brook croaked as he dabbed at his forehead with his feathered boa. "I wish I could tell you that in person."
But Jimbei didn't seem to think that it was anything special for he answered, "You needn't thank me."
"I think we do! Deal with it!" Franky smirked a little, his entire body still shaking as the world around them seemed to try to return to its normal state once Whitebeard's attack was finally over.
"So that… was what someone who had the Quake Quake power is capable of…" Robin whispered. "Something that I'll never be able to forget."
"I know that I never will!" Brook gasped out, his whole body trembling. "I can't stop shaking! Is the earthquake still happening?"
"No! You're just too scared!" Chopper yelled at him, his fur standing on end so that he looked like he had shifted to his guard point by accident. "That Whitebeard though… was he trying to kill everyone?!"
"He just wanted to make his opinion known," Zoro said, breathing hard as if he had just run a great distance. "Damn… that strength… was unreal."
"You can see how he earned his reputation after that display," Sanji added, his senses overwhelmed by everything that just happened. "Hell… that was…?" He couldn't even find the words to describe what he was feeling right now. Not that it was needed, everyone seemed to be in agreement as they stared ahead, their minds looking like they were still trying to grasp what they just witnessed.
Luffy stared around at the destroyed island and asked, "Jeez, doesn't that guy know his allies from his enemies?"
"His crewmates knew to take refuge by the flanks," Jimbei answered without any hesitation.
"I guess… after all, we're so used to Luffy's strange powers that we know better to avoid them when he's planning something stupid," Nami gulped down, silently glad that his powers don't scare her like Whitebeard did. The chaos slowly calmed, the shockwave from the quake earlier having disappeared though left its mark like a deep scar. Most of the island was destroyed, with only the Navy main building the only thing that remained standing, though taken heavy damage. Even now, everything seemed to stay at this slant…
Like someone had just gone through stomping right through this place and broke the pieces in its wake. There was hardly anything left standing.
"So this is how the strongest in the world fights," Zoro said, shaking his head. "I've got a long way to go before I reach that level."
"Not if I get there first," Sanji dared.
"Please! Next time you see a girl you end up half dead!" Zoro taunted back.
"ARE YOU TWO REALLY ARUGING ABOUT THAT RIGHT NOW?!" Nami screamed at them both, hitting them hard over the head.
"Yohohoho… and maybe they'll be able to stand up to Nami-san when they do get that strong," Brook whispered.
Even the giant was on his knees and shaking like a puppy who just got kicked. "W-What destructive power…" he croaked, struggling to get to his feet, and they were startled that he still wanted to fight. "But… the marines Absolute Justice is at stake and I cannot let you pass!"
"Some people just don't learn," Franky said in bewilderment. Really, he thought that it was spelt out clear by now. That guy just got his ass handed to him, and he was in for a world of serious hurt if he kept trying to fight.
Whitebeard seemed to have had enough of the giant continuing to try and stop them. He suddenly jumped up, punching the giant in the chest with a single punch like how he had done to the air before, and the tremor from that punch was more than enough to, not only bring the giant down, but to create a shockwave right through the air, a burst of power aimed straight for the execution platform.
For one moment, they thought that the platform would be destroyed, but just as it reached the wall it seemed to split in two and was the two halves went to the already destroyed city around them.
"What happened now?!" Brook cried out, his eyes would be bursting out of his head if he had any. "How could that attack miss like that?!"
"That's because it didn't miss!" Sanji shouted, pointing forward as the dust cleared. And standing there were the three Admirals, their hands held up as if they had performed a kind of shield, but they knew that there was no doubt who it had been to stop that attack.
"What… what did they do?!" Usopp shouted, his eyes wide. "HOW COULD THEY STOP THAT?!"
"They created a kind of barrier from Armament Haki," Sanji explained, "Couldn't stop it completely, but it was enough to veer it off."
"One thing's for sure, this is really showing us how weak we all were two years ago," Zoro said, shaking his head. This was a kind of battle that legends were made of, and he was sure that those who did survive this war would never be the same.
The attack may have failed, but that didn't stop anyone. The pirates started to charge ahead again, Luffy out right in front, having already, finally, reaching the wall and stretched out his arms so that he could grab the top of it. He pulled himself back, ready to launch himself up into the air again.
"Ace, I'm coming now!" Luffy yelled, and he was flying up into the sky once again—with all of them sure that this was his chance to finally make it over the wall… but why can't things go right for just once here?
For just before he reached the top, something suddenly broke through the ice just under their feet and they jumped back.
"Now what's happening?!" Brook cried out, for what felt like the millionth time, knocking into Usopp and they both fell over in a pile on the ground.
"Metal walls?!" Nami cried and she was right for out of nowhere, walls made of solid metal rose up, blocking the main wall and pushing up towards the sky so that they could barely see the main building anymore.
"No way," Franky said, staring up at it. He worked with metal before… hell, he was made of the stuff, but he had never see a kind of metal like this stuff. What was it…? Sea Prism stone perhaps…? But more importantly, what were they going to use it for?
"No," Robin groaned out in understanding. So simple… but so ingenious at the same time… why didn't she see it coming?
"What? Robin what's wrong?" Chopper asked her at once.
"The trap…" she moaned, "Can't you see? This was the plan from the start. They wanted to lure them all inside the bay far enough so that they could seal them up in here. And they have that army of Pacifista's to guard the way out behind them. They're all stuck in here."
"But why would they do that?!" Usopp cried out, not liking this at all, yet Robin didn't seem to have an answer for him and that scared him more than anything else at the moment. Not that it stopped the pirates. For now all of them were trying everything they could think of to break through the walls, but nothing budged them even an inch. Weapons broke on impact and left no sort of scratch on them… and they might as well been shooting water balloons at them for all the good that their bullets and cannons did.
"Ok, I know that this looks bad!" Usopp shouted out, "I know that they can't hurt them from behind that wall, but the marines can't either right?"
"Wanna bet?!" Zoro shouted, pointing forward to where they saw the openings of hundreds of cannons being pointed right at them. They were preparing themselves to start firing and that was when they knew that things just got even worse.
"They're gonna be killed like rats!" Franky shouted in panic, realizing that this was just as cruel as it was cowardly.
"Not just yet, there might still be one way outta this mess!" Zoro pointed out, and they looked at where he was looking. And just in front of them they saw that there was still one opening left. It was right where the fallen giant lay, right over the wall, and they knew that it had to be because of him that there wasn't another slab of this metal wall rising up to completely cover their way.
"So that's their way out!" Chopper cried out, glad that there was still a chance after all.
"Yeah," Sanji said darkly, "Right out of this death trap into the waiting arms of all those marines and Warlords waiting for them on the other side!"
His words seemed to scare Chopper even worse than ever and Robin glared at him which made Sanji freeze up at once and tried to apologize.
"The way I see it there's not much choice though," Brook said, trying to think of another way out of this mess. But it really did seem that every way out seemed less likely at every second. But before anyone could speak, before anyone could say another word, there was bright lights being shot up into the air from the other side of the wall.
They all looked up and they saw what appeared to be some kind of flaming balls…? No wait… it was lava! As if a volcano had erupted, great burst of lava was being shot up into the air and disappeared into the clouds themselves.
"Why's lava shooting up in the air?" Luffy asked himself, his eyes wide as he watched the magma disappear from sight and the sky darkened as if a terrible storm was coming.
"I don't like this…" Nami croaked out, sweat pouring down her face. She knew about weather alright… but not even she knew what was going to happen if there was actually magma was up in the sky like that! In either case, it couldn't be good.
"That has to be Akainu's doing," Robin said firmly, moving her sunglasses down and they could see the fireballs reflected in the lenses. "He has the power of the Magma Magma Fruit. He's a Magma man…"
"So he can use fire like Ace can?" Chopper asked her worriedly, unable to tear his sights away from the sky.
"No," she answered grimly. "It's hot, yes… but fire isn't the same as magma."
Chopper was about to ask her what the difference was, but everything around them suddenly turned so silent that it was as if he had become deaf. The clouds were as dark as a storm out on the Grand Line, but none of the storms they faced since coming to this sea made them feel as sick as this one did. The rumbles went on to sound like a thunder booming throughout the sky… yet what came through wasn't rain.
At the sight of it, most of the Straw Hats screamed in absolute terror, panic making them run in circles as if the world was ending. Even the normally calm Zoro and Robin were staring up with fear in their own eyes at what fell towards them.
Enormous chunks of magma was falling, each one in the form of a fist, and it fell like a meteor shower on the bay and the pirates trapped inside. A fraction before the fists hit them, they heard Sengoku's voice echoing from inside the walls that seemed to make them feel as if they were being judged by some kind of demon…
"We will never let you escape here alive! Melt the ice and take away their footing!"
"THAT'S GONNA DO A LOT MORE THAN JUST MELT THE ICE!" Franky screamed as the lava hit the ice and fire exploded out of it and struck everyone and everything around it. The force of the explosion was so great that it knocked them off their feet. There was nowhere for anyone to go and no cover as the magma crashed around them.
No one even saw what hit them as the pirates tried to protect themselves from the onslaught. Nami screamed at the top of her lungs as she closed her eyes and covered her ears before she fell to her knees, wanting to just wake up already. Usopp and Chopper weren't much better as Usopp hugged a sobbing Brook and Chopper buried his face in Robin's shirt, trying not to hear the sounds of the lava falling, the sounds of the screaming pirates before they died.
"THEY'RE ALL SCREWED! THE WORLD'S ENDING!" Franky shouted out as even Zoro and Sanji stared ahead with horror on their faces.
Not even Luffy could do anything as he was on the ground, trying hard to keep himself from getting killed. His eyes were filled with a terror that they had never seen here as he just stared ahead at the display of power and cruelty. Here, he was scared out of his mind, but not a one of them could blame them for it.
As for Robin, she looked close to having a heart attack as she stared ahead, a violent flashback coming back to her when she was a small child and seeing her beloved Ohara being burned alive right before her eyes. She hugged Chopper closer to her as if she were still that child holding onto a favorite toy to keep her grounded and connected to reality. She knew that look in Luffy's eyes anywhere… for that look had haunted her own face from the nightmare of that hellish day.
The sounds of cannon fire that the marines were suddenly adding to the rain of magma only continued to bring back that terrible memory for her and she had to look away, burying her face on the top of Chopper's head as she fought the cry of terror that was fighting to passed her teeth.
'Luffy…' she thought, 'Please, don't let this nightmare break you.'
There was nowhere safe on the battlefield that had become a massacre now. They were being fired at from every side, the cannons firing from the front and sides, the army of Pacifisitas were shooting at anyone desperate enough to try and run to the sea, while the magma continued to rain down death upon them all.
They was nothing that they could do to get out of here. They were trapped and pirates continued to die and be burn alive. It was annihilation on a grand scale as the magma destroyed the ice and turned the water below so hot that you could see it starting to boil. Those who were lucky enough to avoid the fire but fall into the sea were literally being cooked and screamed in agony as they struggled to pull themselves out.
"Luffy couldn't have seen all of this could he?!" Usopp shouted as Nami continued to cry from all this hellish landscape.
"There's no way that he could make all this up inside his own memory!" Zoro shouted back at him, wanting to hit him, but was unable to tear his eye away from the scene.
"I always knew that it was hell in a basket that day at marineford, but I didn't think that it was this horrific!" Sanji shouted out.
Luffy looked ready to curl up and just try to pretend that he was somewhere else, but was spending all his focus trying to keep himself from being hit by the rain or even falling off into the water.
"TURN IT OFF!" Chopper screamed, waving his hooves around. "I WANNA GO BACK TO THE SUNNY! I CAN'T STAND THIS! SOMEONE PLEASE…!" He just broke down completely, unable to take it anymore as he tried to pull himself out of Robin's arms so that he could run away, but she held him too tightly and he just cried wildly.
"Luffy-san…" Brook cried, falling forward and hugging his body as if he were cold. "I'm so sorry… I'm sorry you had to see this…"
"Cowards…" Zoro whispered, glaring at the wall. Those marines may see themselves as the 'good guys' here, but they should at least face these 'devils' like men on the battlefield. This was just a cheap way to get rid of the 'trash' of the world. In a lot of ways this reminded him of those damn nobles back in Goa who had ordered the fire on the Grey Terminal. They couldn't do it themselves and just let the fire do all the dirty work for them… and they went on with their daily lives as if nothing happened… as if they had no blood on their hands. And they say that pirates were cowards…
Whitebeard raised up his fist and made a last-ditch effort to try and get everyone out of this mess by breaking through one of the walls. But to their amazement, not even his Quake Quake powers could break down a portion of the wall. He left a deep scar and even dented it, but other than that, it stood strong.
"What? What kind of wall is that?!" Nami screamed, still shaking in terror.
"They knew about his powers and were prepared for that!" Zoro shouted, still trying to keep his balance from the shaking around him. "He was their biggest threat from the start! They had those things made just for him!"
But then the biggest raining magma chunk yet struck the Moby Dick, fire bursting out and began to burn the rest of the ship.
"Not the ship!" Franky shouted, his heart feeling torn at the idea of seeing such a work of art being burned liked this. The Whitebeard Pirates shrieked in fear and outrage that they dared to attack the ship and they all understood. For the Sunny was their home and their friend… the idea of something like that happening to her was enough to infuriate them all. And they didn't blame the pirates trying to stop the devastating from spreading, trying to put out the fire with anything at hand. But Franky knew that the fire was just too big to be able to do anything to save her. Already, the fire had spread to the insides of the ship and even the frame of the ship, collapsing and breaking apart even as he looked.
Tears fell from his eyes as he just stared ahead and watched as the beautiful ship crumbled inwards and continued to burn it to ash. Though he didn't look at them, he knew that the others were all thinking of their beloved Merry and how she had been given a burning at sea. But here, it was an enemy who dared to kill something that was a dear to them as any of their comrades.
"WHITEBEARD!" a horrible voice filled with malice shouted over the roar of death. "YOUR ERA IS AT THE END!"
They were trying to look around to see who had dared shouted that, but couldn't see anything but fire around them. Whitebeard's form appeared though, his back to them as he stared at the beloved ship slowly burn… their flag burning off from the main mast and fall caught their eyes as the ship was now no more than ashes.
"Monsters…" Franky whispered in disgust.
The air around them was filled with smoke and steam from the hot and cold air around them. Most of the ice had melted around them until there wasn't anything but little glaciers for them to try and keep themselves upright. The Straw Hats had found a large slab of ice and had tried to regain their footing, gasping for air as they tried to grasp what happened.
Flaming powder fell around them, drifting in the wind and they could almost taste the ash on the air as their hearts tried to calm down and find Luffy. The air was so thick from that last attack that they were having a difficult time trying to make anything else out, including their captain.
Sengoku's voice suddenly rang out over the beaten pirates as they tried to nurse their wounds and climb out of the boiling sea. "The plan is proceeding smoothly! And now the execution of Portgas D. Ace… will proceed… immediately!"
"NO!" Usopp screamed out. "PLAN? THIS IS MURDER! YOU MONSTERS ARE ALL KILLING EVERYONE HERE!"
Luffy pushed himself up at once when he heard Sengoku's words, desperation quickly setting in and Ace's execution was almost here. He was looking around wildly, trying to see if there was some way out of this mess, but that was when they heard the Whitebeard Pirate's words echoing right in front of them and they stared up.
"We can't even see what's going on!"
"There's no way we'll let them execute Ace!"
"Yeah," a wounded pirate called, holding his arm and looking straight ahead of them to where the giant continued to lay. "There's still one way. One single path… the path Oars made for us!"
Luffy looked to where they were looking and they recognized that mad look on his face.
"Luffy… don't you dare think of it!" Nami cried out, thinking of running out and grab him and hold him back, about to do so when she let her arms dropped, knowing that it was useless here.
"What do you suggest that they do?" Franky yelled over the fire, wondering if this was how a roasted turkey felt when put in the oven. "It's either run forward or stay here and either get burned or boiled alive!"
"I don't think I'll be boiling lobster for a while," Sanji said, shaking his head miserably.
"But he can't go forward either! That's what they'll be expecting!" Nami shouted as the Whitebeard Pirates all hesitated to charge forward as well. They all seemed to be thinking the same thing that Nami was, that the marines were sure to be waiting if they went and they were sure to be killed if they went that way.
But naturally, there was one there who didn't care about any of that. Luffy had pushed himself up to his feet again, staring ahead to where the road ahead truly looked like a rode to hell, fire and smoke billowing out in front of him… but there was still light. Where his brother was still waiting for him.
"Luffy… don't there's got to be another way!" Nami warned loudly, but with a cry, Luffy had already run forward. He took a running jump and cleared over everyone else's heads and landed with a loud thud right in front of them so that his way was cleared.
"He's got to be the bravest, and the craziest person I've ever known in my life…" Usopp gulped in awe.
"I won't disagree with you there," Robin nodded as the Whitebeard Pirates all stared at him in shock, wondering what he was going to do. Running ahead would be no different than a suicide, but Luffy had thrown any kind of thoughts of his safety out the window a long time ago.
"ACE!" he screamed out before he went charging ahead of them all with a battle cry, with the Straw Hats letting out cries of shock and anger before running after them. They left the pirates staring in shock after Luffy, as if they couldn't believe that anyone would do something like that in this situation. Yet at the same time it seemed to light a fire in their bellies.
Though they were loathed to admit it, this was the only choice they had left. And so they ran forward as well, following after Luffy as the fists of lava and exploding cannonballs fell around them, taking more out—yet they kept charging with no fear on their faces.
"No! Don't do it!" Nami screamed out. "That route's far too obvious!"
But Luffy just kept going forward, all common sense completely gone as he just charged ahead, the rain of magma continuing to fall around them.
"But there's nothing else to do!" Usopp screamed, covering his ears as the screams of pain and death pounded his eardrums and more people continued to fall around them. "It's either that or stay here!"
"But there's no way that they'll just ignore the only opening!" Nami shrieked back, "It's bound to be a trap!"
"Too late now!" Robin called, Luffy still running forward, at least until one attack finally got too close. A cannonball had come so close to hitting him that he missed it by less than a foot, but the hit definitely took its toll. Luffy stopped running, blood dripping down his face and the memory around them almost blacked out. They could barely see anything in front of them expect the path that was red from the fire and blood.
"Luffy! Stop! You're gonna kill yourself!" Usopp screamed out, "You can't take it anymore!"
But onward Luffy walked, but it was much slower, almost a shuffle as he forced himself to keep going forward. He needed to rest, but he ignored his body's urging to stop. The Straw Hats felt like their entire world was crashing down at the sight of all this madness.
Luffy soldiered on, refusing to stop, mumbling his brother's name over and over under his breath, the only thing that kept him going. The cannonballs continued to fall around him, muting everything else out until Luffy's body suddenly seemed too stopped, refusing to go any further and Luffy finally lost it as he screamed, "ACCCCCE!"
And through the fire in front of them, the dust and smoke, Ace's face suddenly became clear as he raised his head, having heard Luffy's cry. The two made eye contact for only a moment before another blast from a cannon covered everything in a blinding right. All they could see was Luffy's eyes widen in shock before it blasted right in front of him. The boom was so loud that it was enough to make their eardrums feel as if they've burst, but no one paid any attention as Luffy's scream of pain ruptured through everything else.
They made to run forward until the scream suddenly stopped and Luffy's body became limp as he was sent flying into the air. The Straw Hats eyes all widen in shock as Luffy hit the water and sank out of sight.
"LUFFY!" Nami, Chopper, and Usopp all screamed in terror, running forward until the darkness clouded over.
After being left in the dark once more, Nami collasped, shaking so badly that her whole body was trembling.
"That… that…" she whispered hugging herself as she tried to keep a grip on reality.
"A nightmare!" Usopp said, curling up into a ball on the ground with Chopper hanging onto his shoulder. "This is all a nightmare! How could Luffy not lose his mind from all that?! I wasn't there and I won't be able to sleep right for months after seeing all that!"
"I doubt that Luffy had peaceful nights after this day," Robin said softly, thinking about all those sleepless nights, how she had been haunted by the memory of her homeland going up in flames and losing everyone she ever loved. And Luffy had been forced to love the person that he cared about more than anyone else in the world die right in front of him… no, she was sure that it had to do a lot of damage to his mind.
"I'd be shocked if he did," Sanji nodded grimly, the image of all those people dying were stuck in his eyelids so every time he blinked he could see those bodies.
"So what are we supposed to do about that?!" Usopp asked them all, wishing that someone would give him answers. "How could we do anything to have helped Luffy even if we were there?!"
"Just being there would've been a good start," Brook said miserably.
The memory eventually came back, yet everything was so faded out and muffled that it was very difficult to tell where they were exactly. But they could see that Luffy was soaking wet, lying on a slab of ice that somehow missed the bombardment of Akainu's magma. Luffy was lying on his back, coughing for air as blood dripped from the side of his face with Jimbei and Ivankov's faces blinking in and out of focus.
"Luffy!" Chopper cried out terrified as he flung himself at his side with Nami the only one who beat him there.
"You idiot!" she cried out, starting to cry all over again. Her hands were shaking as she curled them up into fists as she glared down at him, just continuing to bleed all over. "What were you thinking doing something so stupid?! Even you should've been able to see it was a trap!"
"How bad is he, Chopper?" Franky asked anxiously as Ivankov and Jimbei, who was also wet and showed that he had to have been the one who fished him out, looked over him anxiously.
"I don't know!" Chopper cried out, hitting himself in the head at how he couldn't treat him here. "I can't tell like this!"
"Are you alright, Luffy-kun?" Jimbei asked as the two knelt next to him, trying to make out how badly injured that he was.
"No, he's not!" Chopper screamed out, pulling his fur viscously. "He shouldn't even be here! Please! Someone just get him to a ship and get him treated!"
"There's no way that he'll take that lying down though!" Usopp shouted, though he agreed with what Chopper was saying and wished that someone would take Luffy away from this place.
"You think I care about that?!" Chopper screamed at him, losing it completely. "I'M A DOCTOR DAMMIT!"
His outburst shocked them all, but he couldn't remember hating himself more since Impel Down where all he could do was watch as Luffy was strapped to a table and scream in agony. And the worst part was that he knew that even if he had been there, there was nothing that he would've been able to do to help him. He was going crazy from watching all this.
Luffy wanted to save Ace more than anything else, but won't stop killing himself to make sure that he got there.
Robin bent down, understanding his pain perfectly as she gathered him gently into her arms once again and he sobbed into her shoulder as she patted his shoulder gently.
"Really, how reckless can you be!?" Ivankov demanded hotly as he glared at Luffy, still struggling just to breath.
"He just keeps raising the bar for that doesn't he?!" Nami demanded furiously, and she probably would've smacked Luffy if she could right now. Luffy didn't bother to answer either of them as he fought for his air, but that was when they felt a large shadow over them. Terrified that the magma was falling from the sky once again.
However it came from the shadow of the massive giant that had finally woken up.
"You mean he's still alive?!" Usopp shouted in shock, his eyes wide as he stared up at him. The giant was barely alive, even Oz looked like he was in better state after they found him in that freezer. But he now understood what had caused the rain of death to stop. The giant, with yellow-green skin and orange hair that reached down to his legs was dripping with blood, yet he was looking around with a dazed expression—as if trying to figure out what happened to him.
"Oh wow…" Brook whispered in awe that anyone could be alive after suffering like that.
"Giants are some of the most amazing warriors in the world," Usopp whispered his spirits rising slightly at seeing this big guy continue to get up even after being beaten so badly.
"He's another one who's too badly injured to keep fight!" Chopper cried out, squirming in Robin's arms to get a look at him. "No one here is human! How can they all keep going even with all these injuries?"
"Because they're all monsters," Nami said, glaring up at the wall to where the marines still were, still shaking from how they were trying to kill everyone here. "Some… more than others."
The marines were all so shocked at seeing the giant there, but they were quickly getting over that and began to start firing at him now, knowing that as long as he was awake, then they would have to go through him first before reaching the pirates. Seeing how much trouble that their friend was, all the pirates began to scream in fear of what the Marines were doing to him.
"They need to focus on getting out of there," Robin said, understanding their fear for their friend, but they were still trapped inside the bay with no other way out. "Otherwise the bombardment will continue after they're done with him."
Luffy obviously thought of that as well for he suddenly gasped out, "I've got to do something…" They looked down at him, so dazed and battered that he seemed to be having a hard time focusing on anything. Yet, there was only one thing on his mind and that was getting over that wall to where Ace was. Just the effort of raising his head to look at his friends seemed to take a lot of effort out of him, a wild look in his eyes as he declared, "I've got to hurry! They're gonna kill Ace!"
"Yes," Jimbei agreed with Luffy, looking just as scared as Luffy was at how their time was almost up.
"Jimbei!" Luffy screamed, forcing his wounded body up and grabbing hold of the front of Jimbei's kimono and looked up at him wildly as he cried out, "I've… got a favor to ask!"
"I don't like that look in his eye!" Nami cried out, standing back.
"He's really starting to lose it here," Franky said, thinking back to the madness that gripped him when he stood in front of that Sea Train to try and save Tom. He knew better than anyone that insane desire to save someone… but if he wasn't more careful, Luffy was going to lose a lot more than his sanity here.
"What is it?" Jimbei asked as Luffy looked a few yards away to see a part of a broken mast laying on its side. Clearly from one of the destroyed pirate ships and had been thrown quite a distance. Luffy looked from it and up to Jimbei and begged that Jimbei use his Fishman Karate to throw him right over the wall.
"Is he crazy?! He'll be trapped in water, and be up against every marine over there on his own!" Usopp shouted, pulling at his hair violently.
"I think that it might be safer to stay here and risk getting burned alive than go over that wall," Zoro said, but then again, this was Luffy. Both Jimbei and Ivankov both argued against it, saying that it would be too dangerous to do something like that. The Straw Hats were hoping that Luffy listened to them, but he merely staggered to his feet and went to the broken mast, telling him that he'll hold onto that part to keep him steady and asked again and again for Jimbei to do it.
Jimbei still looked hesitate but Luffy insisted…
"I trust you! I know you can do it!" he said without a shred of hesitation in his tone. The words seemed stop Jimbei for a moment as he listened and Nami was looking like she wanted to hit him for even listening to such an insane plan.
"If we don't do something, then Ace is gonna die!" Luffy shouted at him, looking half mad as he screamed at Jimbei. And at last, Jimbei seemed to just throw caution to the winds.
"NO! PLEASE STOP!" Brook cried out as Jimbei ignored Ivankov's words to trying to snap some sense back into Luffy's head. Jimbei went to the sea and instead, seemed to wrap Luffy up in it like a blanket before he grabbed hold of the waves, diving deep below. The memory suddenly darkened around them before it became blurry and they felt like they were trapped inside of some kind of pipe of rushing water. The memory twisted and swam before their eyes, though they could see enough when they were launched into the air.
Some of the Straw Hats were screaming in alarm as they were rising up into the sky, high over the battlefield and looked down to see the wall and the giant right below them. It looked like a vast serpent current rising up above them, practically glowing in the dark light… with no one sure what to do as it hovered above them.
There was dead silence all around them as the water spun through the air and crashed down, landing right in front of the giant and in front of the execution platform. And then the world became clear again. They had just realized that they hadn't been breathing at all since Jimbei first launched the water up and over the wall, but each one of them was sucking in a lungful of air.
"LU…" Ace choked. "LUFFY!"
Luffy stood there, the mast tucked under his arm as he breathed hard, and raised up his head to see who was daring to stand in front of him this time. And it couldn't have been three worse people…
"THE ADMIRALS!?" Brook screamed at the top of his lungs, though he didn't have any.
"Of all the people here…?" Nami said through quivering lips, almost falling over by a dizziness. "The three worst people that it could've possibly be!"
Ace's mouth was ajar as his eyes were wide and full of a primal fear that they had never seen before, but they couldn't blame him in the slightest when they saw who they were staring up at. Aokiji and Kizaru… both looking just like the last time they saw them, with Aokiji looking mildly surprised that Luffy made it over in the first place, and Kizaru was almost… looking at him curiously, like wondering what he was going to do now.
But it was the first time that they had seen the third Admiral up close. He was just as tall as the other two Admirals, and very muscular with a hard—almost chiseled face. While Aokiji wore blue, and Kizaru in a yellow striped suit, Akainu wore a red—crimson red suit with even a pink flower. But there was something different about this guy. There was something… dark… almost a haunting aura hanging around his being. His face held no emotion, only a coldness in his eyes that was more frigid than any ice. And it was that cold darkness in his face that scared them more than anything else.
"Why couldn't Jimbei throw him farther…?" Usopp croaked as he started to cry once again, really getting sick of all these tears. He just wanted to go home now, he would be happy if the memory ended here.
"He… He's going to die!" Brook screamed, wanting to run and hide somewhere himself. Not even Luffy could stand a chance against a single Admiral when he was at full fighting strength! But here, not only was his body a wreck, he was up against all three of them! Yet the look on Luffy's face was far worse than anything else. There was a primitive, beast-like look in them as he glared up at the three powerhouses.
Even Robin was startled by this madness that seemed to consume Luffy, her hand covering her mouth as she whispered Luffy's name. He was betting everything on this fight, no matter what the odds, he was going on ahead until he reached his brother… or died trying.
Luffy was almost snarling as he breathed hard, fighting the urge to pass out again, as the Admirals looked down at him.
"So…" Aokiji said, in a rather impressed voice, "You finally made it this far."
"That's quite an entrance, son of Dragon," Akainu said, his voice full of loathing that they didn't like.
"This youngster is starting to scare me," Kizaru added, and he actually sounded somewhat amused here.
"Well, I know that he's seriously scaring me!" Chopper moaned out, "In more ways than one."
Luffy didn't even answer them as he continued to breath, his eyes never leaving them as the Admirals stood there and watched, and that was when the Straw Hats realized that they were waiting to see what else he was planning on doing. They had his brother, his life in their hands, and they wanted to see just what he was going to do about.
"If nothing else, I praise your tenacity," Akainu complimented, though the way he said it made it sound almost as an insult.
"But are you ready for this stage just yet?" Aokiji asked in a wondering way, like he was asking himself that question more than Luffy.
"You do know that you cannot hope to beat us, right?" Kizaru added, reminding him of their vast power levels.
"Ok, options… someone tell me that he's got a plan?!" Sanji called to them all.
"The only thing that he can do right now…" Zoro said, though he had gone very pale. "And if he does it, he's gonna get himself killed."
"CAN'T YOU THINK OF SOMETHING THAT DOESN'T INVOLVE GETTING HIM KILLED?!" Usopp screamed at him.
"DON'T BLAME ME! YOU KNOW LUFFY AS WELL AS I DO WHAT HE'S LIKE!" Zoro shouted back as Luffy seemed to just ignore him and stared up ahead of him. They all knew the truth, that Luffy didn't stand a chance of beating one Admiral, let alone three. But his reason for fighting was so much greater than their 'justice'. He looked up and they followed his gaze to see Ace, almost directly above him, the fear still in his face as he stared down at his little brother. The memory darkened around them and all the sound became mute until all they could focus on was Ace's face.
"Give…" Luffy snarled before he jumped up, spinning the mast around and finished screaming, "ACE BACK!"
And that was when he did that something stupid they were sure he was going to do. He just threw the mast right at the three of them, no longer caring if it worked or not.
"Stupid…" Zoro whispered.
"As reckless as ever…" Robin added, as Whitebeard's voice sounded off from the other side of the wall.
"Oars!" he cried and that was when the giant slowly turned his head to look behind him and Whitebeard's voice went on, "Stay where you are! We'll need your strength!"
"Old man!" the giant, Oars, grunted out.
"Jozu! Time for our trump card!" Whitebeard declared, louder than ever, "All men, prepare yourselves! We're breaking into the plaza!"
But his words became deaf to them all once again as Aokiji's arm turned to ice and he reached up to touch the mast that flew at him, freezing it at once. However, Luffy seemed to expect that as he jumped up high into the air, right over them. He let loose a loud battle cry as Aokiji threw the frozen mast right back up at him.
"GUM GUM… STOMP GATLING!" he screamed, looking even crazier than ever as he kicked out wildly, hitting the frozen wood until it broke up into chunks. His screams drowning everything else around him as the pieces fell and back at the Admirals, not one of them reacting at all but a sudden understanding came at them.
This was Luffy's way of declaring war against them. If they were prepared to sacrifice everything for their 'justice', then he was going to do the same.
(Sorry for the wait, but see it was my birthday last Friday and I hadn't had any time to myself since then. Thanks for all the words of encouragement and my cat, whose name is Gordy, is doing just fine right now:) Anyway, hope that the chapter was good and please tell me what you all think of it.)
