/_\ Story 1 /_\
Short Story: A Strange Mark
Character Focus: Jackdaw Rob
Canon?: Yes
Time: Pre-Main Story
(A Small Warning, this story is fucked up in a few ways. It was created by my brother, who also created Bipo the Clown. This idea is his doing, not mine.)
A bright, hot, clear, sunny day on the white sandy beaches. A cold drink resting on the shady sand hidden under a colorful parasol. The calm and clear blue sea gently washed ashore before slowly retreating to where it came once more. The crashing of the waves and the chatter of locals nearby was all that could be heard along this peaceful sandy shore.
Rob lay on a beach lounge chair by the shoreline under the shade of the parasol, leaning back, his hat resting over his face. He lay shirtless, sockless and shoeless with only his trousers remaining, his scars and body visible for the world to see.
But that didn't matter right now, right now Rob was more preoccupied with his thoughts more specifically about what his last bounty job entailed. It had to be one of the strangest and somewhat creepiest jobs he'd taken since becoming a bounty hunter in the North Blue. Not that he was creeped out by it personally but you'd be stupid not to realize how creepy that bastard was.
He was referring to Bipo the Clown, a wanted criminal from the East Blue. Now that doesn't sound all that threatening but his name truely doesn't display how truly horrific this bastard was but his twisted actions and crimes on the other hand? A seemingly harmless name for an undisputable psychopath.
Bipo the Clown was a notorious, murderous clown, his actions are the stuff that would give parents nightmares, even trained soldiers at times. One could picture some marines turning pale at the tales of this bastard. However, Rob took the job to take him down, the money was decent and it would actually help a few people to boot, taking down a murderer was always a plus in the eyes of society.
However, what was rather odd about this job, besides the fact he was going after a homicidal clown, was the fact the marines wanted him alive. What could this insane, murderous clown have that the marines or world government wanted to keep him alive?
Rob didn't know, especially after thinking about the job itself in greater detail. Bipo seemed…
Unhinged...
-Flashback Begins-
Rob marched through the jungle, tearing down any vine or piece of shrubbery that got in his way, a steady but strong pace the whole way. Climbing over various logs and obstacles that blocked his path toward his destination. He'd gotten some information on his target from the locals, they'd encountered the murderous clown a few days prior so they did what every normal civilian would do when faced with a murderous clown.
Run, scream and call for marines and bounty hunters deal with the problem. Sounds about right, doesn't it?
And here he was, doing just that, dealing with said problem, or at the very least heading to the problem to deal with it.
Rob continued to push on, the heat of the day and jungle not really being much of a bother to him. His mind mostly focused on getting the task at hand done, he'd dealt with murderers before but not one that dressed as a literal clown, that was a new one...
A faint sound caught his attention ahead, the crackling of a raging fire.
That wasn't normal in a jungle, that's for damn sure. Robs' eyes narrowed in the direction the crackling came from, close by and still somewhat obstructed from view by the jungle greenery.
Not caring for subtly in any way, Rob tore through the jungle canopy in the direction of the sound. It took him mere moments to reach the epicenter of the noise, he'd been right about the crackling of fire being the source but what he also found stunned him for a brief moment, something not so easily done for this young bounty hunter.
What he found was an open clearing in the jungle but not a natural one, the ground was scorched, charred and blackened by what could have only been a fire.
It was pure incineration, devastated landscape, the land itself might never see life grow from it again.
Pushing on, the redhead moved further into the field of destruction.
But it wasn't just destruction that lay around him among the carnage, for death was there with it.
His gaze traveled from each and every single corpse among the chaos and carnage. All of them victims to his target.
First, his eyes moved over three people that hanging from balloon animals, merely a foot off the ground at most, a colorful cloth rope tied into a noose was used to hang said victims. They were all men, as far as he could tell since they were covered in colored powders and dust with tore and ripped clothing.
Second, he found the rusted, broken, and twisted remains of what appeared to be a clown car. Inside the car were a number of burnt and charred bodies, the car only seemed to be able to hold two comfortable but it seemed that there were eight, or more, stuffed and hogtied inside. The burnt and frayed rope only confirmed the idea that they were tied together in there and left to burn.
Third, he saw a single body lay, sprawled out in the open, some trails of what Rob thought was steam. He figured it must have been something else because the body seemed to have been melted drastically as if doused in a powerful acid. A clown joke spray bottle lay not too far from the body as if dropped and left there by the victims' attacker after he'd finished with them.
Fourth, his gaze moved to a body slumped up against a tree, the face of the victim was a mix of blue and purple, a length of colorful cloths tied together was wrapped tightly around their neck. Strangulation was the most logical conclusion to come to.
Fifth, was a corpse squashed, broken, and splattered across a large, sturdy wooden table. A massive, blood-stained hammer rested not too far from the remains. This poor bastard must have been beaten to death, having their bones broken in the process no doubt. Not at all a quick death.
And finally, but perhaps most disturbing of all, was in the center of all this chaos, anarchy, and death stood a tall twelve-foot cross.
The final victim had been crucified.
And standing in front of the cross, a mere ten feet from his final victim, was the psychopath himself, the reason for all this death, the reason Rob had come here, the man with a bounty on his head.
Bipo the Clown
His back was to the bounty hunter, his face toward the crucifixion. Rob couldn't make out many details from here but he could make out part of his appearance.
He wore a brightly colored, full-body clown costume. Frilly at the sleeves, ankles, and neck. His hair was done into a rainbow afro, his hands covered in blood-soaked gloves, his shoes were the classic long clown shoes.
His attire would seem friendly to many, but that's how he got close.
Appearances are deceiving, this clown was a complete, mass-murdering, psychopath.
Rob had seen enough. He knew what he was getting himself into a bounty hunter. Whilst this was no doubt disturbing and utterly disgusting to see, the bounty hunter, unfortunately, had seen worse before in the past.
This was nothing new to him.
So, he brushed past the canopy and moved toward his target. This sick bastard was going down, and if he had his way, it would be permanent too.
As the bounty hunter moved, the rustling seemed to have alerted his target because he'd seen his target flinch ever so slightly.
It didn't stop Rob from advancing but as he closed in the clown began to turn to him slowly. The clown turned to reveal a blood-stained face, a satisfied smile across his face, and a twitching eye.
Honk Honk
The honk of his clown nose was the last straw, Rob stared the clown down and readied himself for a fight.
The bounty hunter charged his quarry.
Dragon Claw!
-Flashback Ends-
Rob leaned back in his beach chair and sighed. The fight had been easy enough, he was a tricky opponent but by no means a strong one. There were traps, tricks, and various defenses to contend with but Rob had pushed through them all and bested the psycho.
Rob had been tempted to finish the job his way but the local law enforcement arrived as the battle had reached its climax. He didn't have much choice but to hand him over to the authorities and take his pay.
He'd been told they'd take him by ship to the Grandline and hand the psychotic clown over to the Marines since he was indeed wanted by the Marines, and dealt with appropriately.
The young bounty hunter had no choice but to accept it and move on. He would have liked to deal with the clown himself and remove that piece of work from the world but he got lucky.
Every time Rob thought back on this job it only reinforced the same idea.
This was the strangest mark he'd ever taken on.
/_\ Story 2 /_\
Short Story: In the name of Science!
Character Focus: Markov Sebastian
Canon?: Yes?
Time: Pre-Main Story
Sebastian was never one to shy away from uncertainty, danger, the unknown, he was a scientist after all, so why would he do so now?
Well, put simply, he wouldn't.
Some might call him daring, others would probably go with insane which was a far more appropriate description, even he had to agree but was it not a scientist's duty to tread the waters?
Test the unknown?
Push the boundaries?
Absolutely!
Science was there to prove facts from fiction, solve the unknown, and improve what we already know. And all that came with testing!
Running diagnostics, tests, algorithms, and experiments all helped one understand what, how, and why things are as they appear.
And that's exactly what Sebastian wanted to do with this recently formed chemical compound! The young scientist had just discovered the island he currently resided on, for the time being, had a cavern not too far up a nearby mountain, or rather mostly inactive volcano to be precise, that had an abundance of nitrogen gas within its structure.
Clearly, this meant there was some source of nitrogen within the caves deep inside the mountain. He just had to find out how much was in there! A large supply of nitrogen could be quite useful as both profit and for further research.
But that was for a later thought, in the here and now, Sebastian currently worked on examining the cave walls and structure, taking note of sulfur patterns on the rocks and erosion markings.
On his belt sat various test tubes, conical flasks, swabs, scrapers, and chemical bottles. The young scientist had already run several tests, including sample analysis, swab testing, and chemically washed the walls to check for other trace elements and to also reveal what was underneath, seeing how far cracks and leaks run.
Sulfur trails ran along the walls, sprawling across the surface as it went into the depts of the cavern.
He'd come to the conclusion that the nitrogen in the cave was bonding together to create new compounds. The sulfur and nitrogen being the most obvious two to compound, however, there were trace elements of carbon involved with this mixture.
Sulfur and nitrogen on their own were extremely dangerous. Combustible and reactive at times, however, the introduction of carbon made things interesting.
Carbon and nitrogen together formed 1-Diazidocarbamoyl-5-azidotetrazole, a heterocyclic inorganic compound with the formula C₂N₁₄.
Through multiple tests, he deduced that this compound had formed deep within the caves.
Now, you may be wondering what's up with this compound for Sebastian to be sound interested in. Well, this compound happens to be highly explosive and highly reactive, often reacting and exploding without the introduction of any stimuli.
What interests the young scientist is how much of this compound has formed within the depts of this cavern and why has it not reacted as of yet.
Sebastian was going to run a risky (stupidly so) test to see how much of the chemical compound resided in the somewhat volcanic cavern.
He was going to detonate it.
Tests were run by the researcher before, experiment on volume and quantity of the chemical compound to the explosive reaction. He'd measured the quantities of chemicals used, added stimuli and examined the explosion, taking measurements of the explosion.
Power, shockwave, radius, chemical make up, etc.
Now was the time to step back, detonate, and observe. He would measure the resulting explosion, compare the size, force, radius, and power to previous results and deduce the amount of the compound that had been ignited.
But would it really be that simple? With Sebastian? Not a fucking chance…
"Preparing stimuli." The young man muttered to himself as he lit up a small, portable burner. He was going to introduce a flame to the sulfur on the wall, allow the sulfur to ignite down the walls of the cave into the depts where the carbon-nitrogen compound was located.
He'd spent the last hour adding reactive chemicals to the walls in areas he suspected the sulfur would pitter out and put out the flame. He needed the flame to reach the depts of the cavern and ignite whatever it came in contact down there.
Sebastian moved over to an area of the wall near the entrance of the cavern, placed the burner near a trail of sulfur on the wall and stepped back.
A few moments later the fire sparked the sulfur, the sulfur burned, and seconds later the trails of sulfur ignited and rapidly burned across the flames.
Sebastian watched as the light of the flame made its way further into the cave, disappearing out of sight.
Moments is all it took before he heard a rather large explosion.
Sebastian measured the force created using a smaller portable Richter scale, the ground shook from the explosion. Other equipment remained in the cave, using a camera and temperature gauges to measure other aspects of the explosion without him having to be in the cave itself.
"Man, I love science." Sebastian grinned to himself as he watched the results of the Richter scale.
His reading was interrupted by another, an even bigger explosion rocked the ground for a moment. Nearly knocking Sebastian off his feet.
He turned to the cave, no doubt the source came from there.
Before Sebastian could come to any sort of conclusion a series of even larger explosions shook the ground violently, coming to earthquake levels of shaking.
The violent shaking toppled the young scientist, knocked his equipment over, and breaking various glass objects on Sebastian's body as he hit the ground.
A massive explosion nearly deafened Sebastian, making him flinch in surprise or shock, but it didn't come from the cavern nearby. His gazed turn to the volcano in the distance as huge chunks of rock spewed from its top. Molten rock and lava spewed out violently while creating quite a display, thick black smoke rose from the volcanoes depts.
Sebastian's eyes were glued to the mesmerizing sight before his mind caught up to him.
The volcano was erupting.
"Hmmm, noted." He responded calmly. Too calmly some might say.
He glanced back to the cavern he had been experimenting with and saw the same thick black smoke begin to eep out the opening. The faintest glow of molten lava lay near the very back of the cavern.
It didn't take a genius to put two and two together.
His eyes traveled between the two sights, the violently erupting volcano, and the toxic smoke spewing cavern, multiple times before coming to a conclusion.
"Whoops…"
And that's a wrap for the first two short stories.
I'll be using Short Stories as a way to introduce/see characters who have yet to be shown in the main story. Everyone gets a slice of their character at some point.
The main chapter will be posted soon. Hopefully within the next few hours, if not due to reasons, then within the next two days at most. I hope...
Anyway, that's it for now.
AlcatrazDGold - Peace!