Just some slices of life/interlude scenes I wanted to make while the MC and the freed-slaves were still at peak isolation insanity and tension/fear/confusion respectively.


When Baccarat gave up on teaching Senju civility:

A week or so after chapter 11.

In front of the door of one of the three cube homes that rested on a compound far from the village, Baccarat rubbed her forehead.

She is a swindler, a con-artist and a thief, she isn't supposed to play administrator or peacemaker damn it!

Unfortunately, considering that most of the other slaves had been captured long before she was and were in far worse psychological condition, and that most of the other most recent ones were either shell-shocked, insane or kids, that had ended up as her job.

She had taken a couple of the most seemingly stable freed slaves to help her with the administrative and diplomatic work of settling down a bunch of traumatized refugees.

Putting an always smiling old-man named Kotatsu as the head of the administrative paperwork on the simple logic that no way she was doing paperwork, so she needed someone to throw work on, and someone old should know more stuff.

The said oldman, had proved to be a god send, being a rather capable administrator. One that could've and should've been great, if not for the fact he did absolutely nothing without orders.

She had discovered that on the third day, when she didn't show up at their self-designated office for the day and found the old man sitting on his usual spot on the next, after he had stayed up there all night staring at the wall waiting for her.

At least it was clean, as he could use the bathroom without orders… after having expressly asked for permission to her to do so on the first day of them working together.

The calm smile that he had while he explained a situation that would've angered most was what truly creeped her out. She had kept him busy with various tasks since then, and with predetermined times and things to do to relax after. He would work himself to exhaustion if there weren't.

She didn't feel bad for him. She didn't. Really. She swears it.

With a sigh, Baccarat clapped both hands against her face and decided to stop stalling.

As forcibly appointed administrator and with control over the plant-soldiers, Baccarat had ended up as both a familiar and respected person in the village.

And she hated it, being respected just meant that people went for you with their problems, especially when their problems involved the mad-man that was their savior, as while they had relaxed somewhat, most were still scared to approach him.

So, after being related his latest blunder, people expected her to confront him.

Well, most just wanted her to say any platitude to calm them down.

A few were more outgoing and showed less signs of their trauma, but the majority of the freed-slaves were lost and frightened. Used to a life without control, whenever a strong wind blew or the morning fruits took a bit longer to form, they searched for someone to tell them things were going to be okay.

That trauma and search for stability didn't do much to convince her -'it's not my problem, damn it!'- but she personally agreed with the current complainer. It was unfortunate, it would've been much easier to ignore it if she didn't.

Taking a deep breath and preparing herself, Baccarat loudly and quickly opened the door with an accusation half-way through her mouth. She had quickly learned that she needed to keep the momentum in any conversation with him, lest he go off on a random and strange tangent.

"You can't just solicit an ex slave!" A red-faced Baccarat -both from anger and embarrassment- yelled at a frowning tree-man for his newest transgression against common sense and property.

"Why not? She was pretty, I was curious. And it was just a question, I left her alone after she panicked." Answered the frowning treeman, frowning not from the demanding redhead or what said redhead was talking about, but from concentration as he focused on what was laid open in front of him. "She was even at the orgy."

Baccarat froze, her answer of 'how the drug-fueled orgy was not healthy to anyone that participated, especially not to the female ex-slaves of the Celestial Cunt' died on her lips as she took in the scene before her.

The inhumanly tall man was currently seated hunched over two bodies. One of a human, a browned haired, nondescript man wearing only Marine issued pants and the other group of thousands of dark green vines shaped into a human-like body.

Said vine-"person" was one of the human-like plant lifeforms that he had created during the last four years and the one that currently made up all of the new village's police-force. Since there had been no crimes besides one or two minor fights, they mostly helped the freed-slaves with menial labor, like hanging clothes to dry and such.

Though Baccarat couldn't be sure of its origins, the corpse was likely from one of one of the Marines that had died in the ships' capture, with the mad scientist attempting to figure out the difference between the two constructs and how to best breach them.

Seeing the blood-covered form of the hair and vegetation covered madman, Baccarat froze and fought against her instinct to bail for the door, run and not look back.

Meanwhile, after responding Senju had gone straight back to paying attention to the bodies.

He hadn't intended to kill any of the Marines besides Onigumo, but since he had done so, he might as well put their remains to use.

Besides the one he was currently studying, there were other corpses used for various experiments these last few days, some 22 Marines had been killed in their fights against my vines. Senju would rather not be happy that people were murdered, but those dead Marines had been a treasure trove of information.

He had made more strides on how to create more sentient lifeforms and how to replicate animal and human-like functions with plants this last week than he had in the last year. The differences between a human and threerilla's brain were astounding.

Senju hadn't succeeded yet on making plants with human-like intellect, but he had managed to make parasitic -that grew within the island's animals- or carrion life forms -that grew over the corpses of the Marines- with an intelligence comparable to a threerilla's.

Right now he was simply making another check of the human nerve system to try and figure out the best way to apply something similar to his creations, maybe even how to augment his own.

Various hair-thin vines ran through the open-air guts of the dead Marine while his other hand grasped one of the vines that made up the vine-man, connected to both as he was he furthered his insight into-

"...yet you keep doing things like this, why can't you- Are you even listening to me?!" The red haired roared into his ear, the loud noise distracting him and causing him to tense the various vine-tentacles, which gripped the nerves with too much strength, causing the body to flop like a fish out of water for a second before going back to inercy, the nerves destroyed.

The cast-away child of Hashirama and Orochimaru growled at the wasted test subject. "No, I wasn't. I was in the middle of something." He answered through gritted teeth.

Knowing the difference in strength between the two of them, Baccarat normally wouldn't dare speak so boldly.

She wasn't a meek or fearful person by nature, but she would consider herself to be smart enough not to annoy people that could kill her. Not too much at least.

But she was also smart enough to notice that the man, however deranged he may be, hasn't replied with force to any insult so far -at best knocking out a particularly raving mad freed slave-, and she was brazen enough to take advantage of it.

So taking a deep breath and with both as much surety of her safety as one could have in an isolated island with a mad man and the knowledge that if he was murderous there was not much she could do against it either way, she continued to speak unfiltered by fear.

"Oh ho, I realized that." She said calm growing scarcer by the minute. "I realized that, as I came to speak to you about your harassing of rape victims, you were in the middle of HUMAN EXPERIMENTATION! Can you try to not be insane or an ass for more than five fucking minutes?"

Knowing that this test subject was now useless for his intended purpose and that Baccarat won't leave him alone to get anything done if he doesn't reply, the thin tentacles retreated to Senju's fingertips and he turned around to face the redhead.

"I'm trying." He answered through gritted teeth. "Despite me not owing y'all anything, despite me saving y'all asses, despite me being able to kill y'all with a thought, am I still fucking trying to be accomodating." He said, towering over the redhead, who suddenly grew quiet under the shadow of 14 feet of man-eating plants and insanity. "I was curious, I asked her a question, she panicked, I went away. The hell ya complaining about?"

Baccarat, opened her mouth to explain why a 14 feet unstable man soliciting a recently freed sex-slave would be wrong and severely uncomfortable regardless of a lack of insistence by him, then she looked at the mass of hair and writhing tentacles glaring at her and decided to remain quiet.

The silence stretched for a while longer, seeing no answer forthcoming, the forestman turned back around to tinker with a new Marine corpse that rose from the ground, carried to him by the sea of underground roots.

Baccarat remained frozen for a second, split between standing up for her complaint or bailing out, then the wet and crunchy sounds of him opening the corpse's rib-cage with his bare hands removed any doubts for her, and she ran back towards the village without looking back.

"Ah, I really don't get people, give them free food and houses and they still complain to me." He said to the nothingness as the hair-thin vines once again grew from his fingertips. "Ya have any clue what that was about?" He asked the corpse beneath him, who shook its head as he poked at the right nerve…

"Hm." then he hummed to himself as he stopped to actually look at what he was doing, elbow deep in an unknown young man's innards.

With his lack of human contact and his overly violent home-island, Senju did not understand what people generally expected from him, and the fact that they seemed to expect him to know it without explicitly saying anything annoyed him greatly.

When he did get what he was supposed to do, the majority of those things bored him, so he didn't do them as well.

Threerillas were far more direct and simple about things, the solution to almost every issue was a well placed punch.

Still, despite his only memories of civilization and human interaction being from strange 2D series, he knew that human experimentation was always shown in bad light, most of the characters that did them in the strange series he called memories were ones that even he disliked.

So, after Baccarat had left and with his arms still firmly grasping the unknown Marine's trachea from the inside, Senju decided that he probably did need to tone down a bit on his habits, make a greater effort to socialize and be more normal and all that, he did want to meet more people after all.

'As soon as I figure out how to make a brain.' He thought to himself as he focused back on the corpse.


Saw a few complaining about him not caring or not acting serious or wanting him to get over his madness. Well, he will. Eventually.

He won't just wake up normal. He is a guy raised by hyper aggressive gorillas and uncaring plants, gorillas and plants which he has both killed, experimented on (the corpses… mostly) and eaten (yes he could feel every fruit he ate, it was strange). It doesn't set a good precedent or mindset for social interactions, he needs time to tone it down, with a small timeskip next chapter helping a little.

Either way, he will grow from a more eldritch Inosuke (Demon Slayers) to a more Hashirama or Warrod (Fairy Tail) type of character through time. Though he will always like fights.


XxXxX

The little white shadow:

A week or so after chapter 11.

Senju's closed eyes twitched as laid in the grass that made up his bed, the presence in the corner of the room somehow both quiet and loud at the same time.

Likely because while its Voice was quiet, Senju was used to living with homicidal birds and gorillas who he would never let into the house while he slept, so any presence close-by when he was trying to sleep felt dangerous. That he could feel the presence's constant stare also didn't help.

"Ya know, I made pretty clear that this wasn't needed." Senju said to the room without getting up.

"I apologize, master. But that is one order that I must insist against." The familiar cold voice replied from the corner as Kimimaro, my tiny shadow, sat with his legs folded beneath him. "One is at his most vulnerable while sleeping, I shall remain vigil." He said with a nod.

Senju put his hand over his face and groaned into it.

"And I already told you that my plants will take care of that!" He said somewhat loudly, before sitting up in bed and properly yelling at the brat. "And to stop calling me master! Sen-Ju, it's not a difficult name!"

There was a moment of silence as Senju waited for a response and Kimimaro thought on what to do, Voice cold and quiet as ever, revealing nothing to the plant-man.

"If I've failed you in any way please dispense the appropriate punishment." The prepubescent kid said, going from kneeling position to full on dogeza in expectation of his punishment.

"Hurgh." Senju only groaned in response and fell back on his bed. "Don't ya need to sleep?" He asked the far too serious brat.

"I sleep during the periods that you submerge yourself into your plants." He answered with the same monotone.

Senju once again put his hand over his face and rubbed his temple. He did not submerge himself daily these last few days, hell, not even every two days. Just how little had the brat slept?

"Go to sleep." He groaned again, a bed growing between the two, close to the corner Kimimaro was kneeling in.

"I must remain awake and vigil." The kid replied simply, shaking his head.

"Ya need to sleep, that's an order." Senju groaned from his bed. He generally avoided giving the kid orders in the hope that the brat would stop believing he needed them. But they were useful when needed, Kimimaro never refused them.

The kid hesitated for a second, before slowly climbing into the bed in front of him and laying down.

"I can hear your stare…" The low groan cut through the silence of the late night.

"I apologize again, master." Was the monotone reply. "But I cannot sleep knowing you would be defenseless."

"Senju! Sen-ju! If ya can't relax on order, ya can at least say my damn name!" The loud roar woke the nearby threerilla troops and murder-toucans flights.

"I apologize to have failed you again." He said as he once again went into dogeza position above the bed, offering the back of his neck.

He did not need to vocalize his offer of his life as recompense, for he had already given it to the man. Now it would be taken for his failures, even if he doesn't really understand what the failures were.

"Hah." Quietly sounded out a groan of frustration. "Just call me by my name, close your eyes and go to sleep."

Nodding seriously, Kimimaro did as ordered, closing his eyes and turning his face upwards in a perfect sleeping position.

But much like when he had tried it before, sleep would likely elude him, tense as he was as the only one awake in the room capable to protec-

His thought process was stopped by a hand the size of his torso gripping his head. The kid instinctively formed bone blades on his forearms, but stopped before cutting off the appendage holding him when he saw that his master was its owner, instead blinking at the glaring green eyes above him.

"And I can Hear your tension now, sleeeeeep." The man ordered while making a light but noticeable pressure on the kid's skull.

"If you are trying to knock me out, asphyxiation is a better option." Was the kid's monotone reply as the pressure continued.

"Aaaaaaaah." The kid's self-imposed master let out a sigh that sounded more like a scream of frustration. "What's the problem now?!" Senju asked, frustrated from the kid's inability to both leave him alone and sleep.

"I am attempting to follow your orders, but I simply cannot sleep knowing you're left defensele-" The hand over his cap moved to cover the albino's face, covering his mouth and cutting his answer short.

Senju took a deep breath, he was tired, he just wanted to sleep and all of this was giving him a headache.

"Hah~" He sighed before plopping into the bed besides the white-haired insomniac. "There, now even sleeping ya technically guarding at least one side of me." He said as the bed grew to accommodate his larger size, hopeful that this would be the end of it.

It, of course, wasn't. Senju soon felt a pressure above him and slightly opened one eye to see the kid splashed above his oversized torso, arms barely reaching the forest-man's shoulders while the feet rested a bit over his waist.

The kid's lifeless green eyes blinked at him, his own deeper green eyes blinked back.

"This way I offer more coverage." The kid replied to the unasked question. "In case of any attack." He added when Senju continued to stare at him.

With another deep sigh, the larger man just patted the kids head, mumbled a go to sleep and closed his eyes.

Kimimaro stared for a little longer before once more trying to comply with the order to go to sleep, after a few more moments of tense readiness against sneak attacks that never came, he eventually passed out without his notice.

Hours later, he woke up once again nested into the left side of the strange man he had sworn allegiance to, instead of splashed above said treeman's uncomfortable rib cage as he had been when he slept.

Kimimaro thought it odd, considering that he had long mastered not moving, even while sleeping. But the grass mattress felt incredibly soft beneath him and he felt more human heat nested between his liege's left arm and person-sized torso than he had in his entire life.

'It feels nice.' with that thought, Kimimaro snuggled a bit further in and slept until late for the first time in his life.


First just to confirm that there WON'T be any yaoi in the story. Still not sure about any pairing, but I can guarantee it definitely won't be yaoi. Probably not Hancock too, but that's a whole other thing.

Just wanted to put some… well, wouldn't call fluff, but a more caring interaction after all the insanity and conflict of the last chapters. And it helps groom that loyalty with the most dedicated subordinate.

… but it's mostly because I had given Naruto's young-Kimimaro's scenes a look to write the last chapter, damn does that kid need a hug. The MC is unfortunately still too unstable to realistically help people emotionally, but I needed to put something in here.


XxXxX

Fishing for fights:

Stalking through the dense underwood of the strange and lethal island that he found himself on the blue skinned swordsman called Kisame kept an attentive ear and Observation to his surroundings and a tense hand on his sword/friend's handle.

His tension paid off, as minutes into his walk he felt a presence behind him, reflexively turning with a swing of Samehada, its Armament covered spikes dug into a wooden wall that rose from ground between his sword and the man/creature that had saved the swordsman.

The wooden wall folded to grasp the sword in its hands, bending under the large living sword, but not breaking. Many of the spikes managed to pierce through the arm, but none reached the source of it, branches growing from the wall and snaring each spike individually.

"So, we doing this again?" The plant-covered man asked with a raised brow at the shark fishman baring his teeth at him.

The fishman ripped Samehada off the wall and rested it on his shoulder. "No, just don't sneak up on me." Kisame answered with a forced grin, even as he directed an analytical stare at the interloper.

The man that the normally not serious fishman was taking so seriously just snorted back at Kisame's cautious face. "Did I spook ya?"

Kisame blinked at the man who had supposedly defeated two Vice-Admirals at the same time, followed by a small fleet of Marines. "Are you ten?" Said fleet-killer just snorted again.

"Technically four if you're counting living memory." The man waved off the insult before throwing one of his own. "So, how is it being saved and beaten by a four year old? I'm afraid I ain't old or weak enough to know the feeling."

Despite the juvenile nature of the insult, Kisame was never the most composed person. The fact there was some truth to it didn't help. His grip on Samehada's handle tightened, but he did not attack for a change.

"Tch." He sounded out instead. "It's none of your business what I'm doing, go bother one of your insane followers." Kisame glared at his savior and headache.

"... huh, I thought you were looking for me, but since that is not the case, you're searching for the Marines ain't ya?" The forest-man asked as he leaned towards the fishman.

From how said fishman's grip tightened even further and his eyes narrowed, he had hit the nail on the head.

He had simply guessed it out of the knowledge that the fishman hadn't seemed to be focused on him and that as far as Senju knew the sword/clubman didn't have beef with anyone else on the Island besides the Marines.

"Yeah, are you stopping me?"

"That depends, whatcha planning on doing with them?"

The fishman just stared deadpan at him.

"Ah, then yeah, probably." Senju replied, actually getting the meaning behind the human (fishman?) expression for once.

Literally for once, as with less than a week of human contact, this was the first time that he managed to understand an unspoken human (sharkman?) cue. Yay for progress.

Kisame just kept Samehada at the ready.

Senju stared at the fishman in a fighting stance and sighed. "Didn't ya just say we wouldn't be doing this?" He asked the fishman with a raised brow. "Again." He added in a deadpan.

The fishman just tightened his stance. "I didn't intend to. But if you stand in my way, there is no other solution is there?" Kisame asked back.

The forest-man had gone after Kisame mostly to convince to have another spar, as he had been fun to fight against, so this was exactly what he was here for.

Still, Senju had hoped that, considering his last defeats, the fish would've learned to not throw hands for whatever minor reasons. Maybe instead try to talk it out, be reasonable.

Something hurt in his chest. It was probably his hypocrisy getting too much for him to handle.

Okay, maybe that was a little hypocritical. But Senju had bothered to actually think of reasonable points for why they should spar! Let him use those points and train his social skills damn it!

"Can't ya like… just fight it out with them? Beat them up a little?" The walking forest tried again.

He kinda hoped for a more friendly spar rather than a deathmatch, he already had the Cipher Pol agents for those.

"Hah! Beating them up? And then what?! Leave them alone because they've learned their lesson?!" The fishman roared, fighting stance broken by sheer indignation at how Senju was minimizing his issue. "You don't know the hell in disguise that is Mary Geoise, or the scale of the atrocities committed by the Marine dogs that keep that den of sin afloat!" The swordsman roared at the tree-man.

He refused to consider any Marine, Noble or Government worker innocent. Every and any of them were guilty by association.

As a member of the Sun Pirates, and one who joined after being saved by Fisher Tiger's attack, he knew first hand of the sins of the World Government.

The forest-man had saved him and killed some Marines, which put him in a better light than most humans in the fishman's eyes. But Kisame could never trust the man, his eyes were dead and he was too volatile to be trustworthy.

Kisame felt something hurt in his chest. It was probably his hypocrisy getting too much for him to handle.

Still, savior or not, good or bad, sane or crazy, Kisame wouldn't allow anyone to stand in the way of his one man crusade.

He knew that he likely couldn't kill every Government employee, but he sure could die trying.

Meanwhile, Senju scratched at his beard.

Well, he did have some idea of the Government's sins with all the information that One Piece gave him, but he also knew that it was incomplete info and that either way it wouldn't mean much compared to one who lived it first-hand.

"Eh, then sorry but Imma have to stop you from getting to them." He answered with a shrug. He couldn't think of a way to pacify the fishman, but he wouldn't just let him murder the captured Marines in order to calm down. "I'm still thinking of what to do with them, ya know?"

"Killing them would be my suggestion." The fishman pointed out the obvious through gritted teeth, tensed in preparation for the coming fight.

The two stared at each other for a while, Kisame tense and with his sword poised, Senju relaxed and with his hands on his hips.

The fishman studying his opponent for openings (which there were many) and weaknesses while the forest-man tried to think of how to pacify freed-slaves with a lot of justifiable hatred. Besides beating them up, that was the backup solution, good ol violence.

Then Kisame exploded into motion, rushing forward towards the thinking Palmtree.

Said thinking tree, instead of gassing the place or using one of the various pre-made, mountain-sized, steel-strong branches that surrounded them, covered his arms in bark-armor and Armament and rushed to meet the swordsfishman in the middle.

Might as well get some fun out of this.

Senju's longer range meant that he launched his attack first, a left armored fist flying towards the fishman's head.

The fist was swatted out of its path with an upwards swing of Samehada, Kisame followed the swing's motion, twisting his whole body to spin himself inside the taller fighter's guard, in position to land an elbow to his ribs, or a sword strike, if Senju tried to gain distance.

Instead of gaining distance, the forest-man used his free, also armored, right hand to block the attacking elbow and stop the fishman from completing his turn to bring Samehada back down on the forest-man's head.

Unfortunately, Senju wasn't used to fighting fishman karate, and so wasn't ready for the air-wave that hit his stomach despite the block, causing him to release the swordsman's elbow, who completed his turn and brought Samehada down on the forest-man, Senju quickly sinking into the ground to avoid the hit.

The shark-skin sword hit the ground, breaking the dirt covering and some of the writhing roots that hid beneath, but no half-mad forest-man came out.

Kisame stood in the middle of the forest, tense and ready as he tried to use his super-human instincts and subpar Observation to find his foe.

That readiness was the only reason that he was able to turn to block the punch that came from behind him when Senju burst from the ground.

The punch sent him skidding back a little, but Senju didn't allow him to get too far, following the fishman with a low kick to the shin, which the fishman jumped over and counter it with a mid-air spin slash with Samehada.

Senju ducked under the shredding blade and before the fishman could finish turning or landing, he reached with a hand grasping towards the swordsman's head.

Kisame was barely able to lean back while still mid-air to avoid the torso sized hand that almost grabbed his head, falling awkwardly after his aerial slash and dodge.

But as awkwardly as he had fallen, the moment that he planted his feet on ground, he pushed himself forward, using his smaller size to once more get under his opponent's guard, still open after his over-extended grabbing attempt.

And though the space was too small to use Samehada, he was able to land a proper palm-strike into the forest-man's torso, cracking the fungi armor covering it -and some ribs behind it- and sending him flying at one of the surrounding trees.

There was enough strength in the strike to send him flying through at least three of the clearing's large trees, but the forest-man sunk into the first one he hit as if it was water.

"Huh." A voice came from behind Kisame a moment later, making him quickly turn around to see the forest-man coming out of a tree at the other side of the clearing, holding onto his stomach but looking uninjured. "I guess I lose in a fist-fight even with my armor on." The man said, loudly but seemingly for himself.

Then he smiled far too widely and started laughing. Loudly.

It had been too long since he has been competing with Bob unarmored. They were almost matched then, but that was without using any of his powers.

But being defeated while using his armor and ability to merge with the surroundings? Senju's heart was beating almost as loudly as when he had fought the Vice-Admirals or when he had started fighting Bob.

Then his loud laugh irritated his newly cracked ribs and he started coughing and groaning in pain with each cough as they rattled said ribs even more.

Kisame stared at his unstable saviour, now coughing uncontrollably after an unhinged laughter, and lowered Samehada just a smidge.

"It's for things like this that I just can't trust you." He said with a sigh to the laughing mad-man.

"What?" The man asked as he stopped laughing/coughing to look at the fishman. "For having fun or for coughing?"

"No, for being unable to take any of this seriously!" He roared at the forest-man.

He was on a one man suicidal crusade for revenge against the World Government, he had neither the time or the patience for mad-plant-men!

Said mad-plant-man stared at him for a moment before scratching at his brow and heaving a heavy sigh.

"Hah~ Ya want me to take this seriously? Fine."

Before the fishman could reply that yes, he wanted his knowingly suicidal mission and various valid critics about the Government to be taken seriously, he heard a *puff* all around and suddenly his vision was covered in purple.

Kisame reacted instantly, a slash of Samehada and an application of Fishman Karate's air manipulation techniques into swordsmanship easily clearing the air around him of toxins, but his vision was already swirling from the single breath he had taken inside the poisonous cloud.

He took a step forward to try to attack the talking palmtree again, but all of his muscles burned and refused to move properly, so he simply fell face first into the ground.

The purple cloud subsided the moment its target was taken down.

Hearing a flop besides him, the fishman was barely able to turn his aching head towards the sound and glare at the brown haired man now seated cross-legged by his fallen form.

"Not that fun when I take things seriously, huh?" Senju asked the fishman with a far too smug tone of voice.

Kisame would've answered. But somehow furnaces had taken the place of his lungs, he hoped that his seizuring in the ground somehow seemed hateful enough to convey his anger.

"If I was the serious type I would've even killed ya now." The seizures became a bit more intense as Kisame tried even harder to fucking move! at that remark. "Ya know, cause of the whole refusing to listen and fighting to kill me two times now." Senju said casually even as Kisame started frothing at the mouth. "Ain't ya happy that I don't care enough about it now?"

… Kisame just gurgled as his vision started to darken from the lack of oxygen.

"Hm, it seems to get ya worse than the threerillas." The only response was the rattling of the grass as the fishman continued to flop around like a fish out of water. "Here." Senju said vaguely, before a cloud of green pores was released from the surrounding vegetation, covering the clearing in gas once again.

After a few seconds the seizures slowed down and Kisame managed to breathe again, they eventually stopped altogether with the fishman lying face first on the floor.

"Fuck you." Were the fishman's first words as the seizures subsided.

The burning and locked muscles replaced by ice cold and unresponsive ones, he was not sure if it was an improvement.

Well, he had managed to force out the words and -despite feeling as if they had burnt their way out of his trachea- that he could move his mouth and said trachea enough to form an answer was an improvement.

"No thanks, still trying to get a woman to guarantee which team I am on." Was the far too casual answer. "Unsurprisingly hard to find a willing one amongst traumatized ex-slaves coming out of a fruit induced high into a really dark low."

"Hurgh." Kisame groaned back uninterested.

"I mean, there were two from that new cult about me that sprung up. But boy they were creeeeepy."

"Hurgh." Kisame made sure to make an especially uninterested groan to see if the mad-man would stop talking with him.

And it seemed that it worked.

The blessed silence stretched, and the fishman allowed himself to relax as the green cloud slowly removed the feeling in his burning muscles. He wasn't sure if he was dying or being healed, but at least it was quie-

"I can guarantee that I ain't into you though… Nor into gorillas, panthers, toads, insects or birds." Of course it couldn't last, Kisame's luck wouldn't allow it.

"Hugh" Was the groan of both pain, from the blood that burned and froze in his veins from the poison, and disgust, over the image. "I did NOT need to know that." Kisame said as loudly as his collapsing lungs allowed.

His only answer was more cough filled laughter.

The green cloud continued to cover both of them as the conversation went on, Kisame feeling less and less of his extremities, only really registering an exhaustion as his body tired itself out fighting the poison. Not feeling most of his body, the fishman terrorist closed his eyes.

"It seems that I'll be seeing you soon, Tiger-san. Though I'm probably not going to the same place as you, I hope I can talk to you one last time." Were the ex-terrorist's resigned thoughts as he got ready for death by poisoning.

After a few moments of still feeling exhaustion and some remaining pain -which meant he was alive-, the fishman opened his eyes to stare at the brown-haired human smiling back at him.

"So, I ain't dying?" He asked uneasily.

The damn human was looking expectantly at him, and Kisame was not sure if he was waiting for him to say something or if the gas would make him explode in a minute and the mad-man was just waiting for it to take effect.

"Pft, of course not. Why would I go to trouble of saving y'all and not murdering you the first time ya attacked me just to kill ya now? This is just an antidote and an anesthetic, are you an idiot?"

Kisame did not know what annoyed him the most, the question or the look of pity on Senju's face as if he genuinely thought the fishman to be 'special'.

"Maybe if you didn't look like a drug-addicted hobo and talked like an insane castaway I could actually understand what you mean!" The swordsman roared back as the strength returned to his lungs.

"Oi, I'll have you know I'm rocking this beard… and I kinda am an insane castaway though." Was the casual answer, it was not like Senju wasn't aware that the isolation and lack of memories probably made him… 'different'.

He was offended about the hobo thing though, he probably should actually brush his hair now that there were people around, but the beard made him look wise, not insane damn it!

"Wise my ass, you look like a raving mad-man, not a sage." Was the fishman's answer, letting Senju know that he said at least part of what he was thinking out loud.

He also needed to work on that now that there were people around.

"Yes, you do."

"Oi!" Was the exclamation of annoyance followed by a light slap to the downed fishman's head.

Kisame would've fought back, if his arms weren't completely unresponsive right now.

Technically he could still move his left hand's little finger, but even as both confident and lowkey suicidal as he was, he wasn't about to fight the fleet-killer with just his head and little left finger.

Senju meanwhile was still meandering over why having a bushy beard didn't make him look wise. All of his memories -made up of anime or uncaring plants and gorillas- said that it should've worked, so what the hell?!

A somewhat awkward silence settled in, as Senju was both immersed in his thoughts and had no idea how to talk with people and Kisame was just tired and closed his eyes as the exhaustion from being poisoned settled in again.

"So, ya cooled down now or do ya still want to throw down?"

"Hurgh. Too tired now, I'll just kill those Marines later." He replied with his eyes still closed.

"Or never."

"Huuuurgh, I'll beat you up later too."

"Uff, that one is a definite never."

Kisame just took a deep breath, and didn't bother replying.

….

The silence stretched again between the two antisocial battle nuts, before the fishman broke it for a change.

"Why the hell do you care about what I do with the Marines either way?" He asked instead, both to change the conversation away from him and to see if he can't solve his issues diplomatically for a change.

His issue being that his murder spree was being stopped… it felt a little hypocritical to solve anything related to that in a non-violent way, maybe he should just rest and try violence again tomorrow.

"Hm? Ah, I wanna to see if I can trade them for a Devil-Fruit. And killing them while they're unarmed, caged and defeated feels kinda cheap." Senju answered with a shrug, while Kisame used the limited control he currently had over his muscles to frown as hard as he could.

"You're stopping me from killing the people that guarded my cells on the way to a live of torture and slavery at Mary Geoise because 'killing unarmed people feels cheap'?" The fishman managed to force out through gritted teeth.

"Oi, don't try to make me sound like the unreasonable one for stopping ya from killing people."

"They deserve to die!"

Senju just sighed.

"... Kinda, yeah." He admitted after being unable to find a counterpoint that could calm a recently freed slave, or an at any time freed-slave. "Still not letting ya kill them though. They could be useful to me and at least their leader isn't that bad a person, and I ain't going through the trouble of judging each one of them and passing adequate, individual sentences."

"You're letting the slavers live because you're too lazy to pass sentences?!"

"Well, you're the same. Only I want to pardon everyone and you want to murder everyone, just two sides of extremism really."

"Fuck you."

"We just went over this. I knew goldfish forgot stuff pretty quickly, is that a shark thing too?"

"Hurgh. You're fucking exhausting."

"Hello kettle, my name is pot."

"Huuuuurgh."

Senju chuckled at the frustrated groan.

"Bah, relax. I doubt the Marines will give me a pardon after the whole dead Dragon thingy, so I'll probably run over a Marine base with the Island soon enough." He said patting the downed and immobile fishman's head. Who glared at him for the condescending act.

"I'll hold you to that." The fishman finally answered after a moment of silence, before letting out a tired breath.

Finally they agreed on something! Senju could already see how this would be the start of their life-long friendship.

The silence stretched once again as the fishman was too tired to talk and Senju was now paying attention to the wooden carapace he was constantly and slowly growing around the underwater outside part of the Island, before the fishman broke it again after resting his eyes for a minute.

"I'm still killing those Marines and beating you up after I wake up." The fishman interrupted Senju's positive thoughts with some final words before the exhaustion caused by the anesthetics and his body fighting the poison earlier made him pass out.

Truly, the beginning of a life-long friendship… Senju was just not sure whose life it would be yet.


… No idea what to do with Kisame to be honest. I thought of him as a character for far ahead scenes, Shichibukai-MC with years of rehabilitation into society ahead scenes. And he doesn't mesh too well with the current -Tarzan fresh out the jungle- MC.

Either way, he will always be somewhat standoffish and overly both violent and stubborn. But he will tone down a little on the standoffishness, especially with Senju. Over time... which will probably be 300k words in at the slow-ass pace I'm going.