Title: Peace Like Bubbles
Author: AppleL0V3R
Beta-reader: N/A
Fandom: Naruto and One Piece
Pairing: "Red-Haired" Shanks and Haruno Sakura
Other Characters: Red Hair Pirates, Silvers Rayleigh, Shakky, Kizuru
Part: Three
Summary: Barely mid-twenties and Sakura's sure she's had a full life—shinobi, marine, shopkeeper—but apparently, she hasn't really lived until she runs across the Red-Hair Rookie.
Word Count: 2,350
Rating:
Type: Three-shot – Complete
Genre: Crossover, Canon Compliant (One Piece), Canon Divergent (Naruto), Pre-timeline (One Piece), Post-timeline (Naruto), Humor, Pre-relationship
Warning: N/A
Disclaimer: If you've heard of it before, then it's obviously not mine.
Started: March 23, 2020
Completed: N/A
Lasted Edited: November 25, 2020
Notes: Yes, I am finally, finally, finishing this sucker up. Jury's still out on whether or not this will get an afterwards sort of piece, but no promises on continuances. This also fell through the cracks when I was updating on Ao3 so a thousand apologies and thank you to the lovely reader who reminded me to post this last part.
Also, I've tried to look it up in as many fact based places as I can without going back through the whole Naruto manga, so I've decided that the nature types listed on her wikia page (water, earth, yin, and yang) are proficiencies rather than affinities--and I'm considering proficiency in this case to being able to use high level element based ninjutsu. If you read any of my other fics, I will re-add this disclaimer but that's what I'm going with. If anyone can point to the actual answer/provide me a link that would be awesome!
The Sabaody Amusement Park was where they held the festival, it was the only place on the giant mangrove that could hold so many people without dividing out over different grooves, and because, as far as Sakura can gather, it was tradition. The saving grace, she had always found, was that the tenryuubito would not, had never, attended the annual festival—deeming it for commoners and lesser humans.
Not that any of the residents and tourists alike would complain about that any time soon.
The festival was all set to proceed like any other year, full of cheer and chaos and the promise of more merriment than was probably wise. Sakura had managed to drop off all of the custom instruments she had finished and had secured her favorite area to play the piano--a space that allowed the notes to echo off all of the bubbles and trees in a way that created a chorus of dozens. If she picked the right tune and tempo, the resound reached every edge of the groove and bounced back.
Shakky and Rayleigh had both come by to dance to the mildly romantic pirate song she knew they both preferred and to catch up with each other. Neither mentioned Red-Haired Shanks, but both made the vaguest illusions to having their hands full and hoping the festival went better than normal this year. Knowing futility when she saw it, she did not bother to follow up on either comment. Instead, she allowed the conversation to take it's turns and stole the sweet ale Shakky had mistakenly left in her reach--which resulted in the couple leaving to acquire another when rather than attempt to wrestle Sakura for her stolen treasure.
As they moseyed along, the former shinobi caught sight of a handful of pirates wearing sashes of solid, rich color pass by, and when they glanced her way they nodded directly at her. She smiled and wriggled her fingers despite not recognizing the individual faces. How big was the Red Haired Pirate crew? As one of the new Rookie's, and given the number of new and repeat faces she had seen over the past few days, she would bet it wasn't a particularly large crew. Which spoke to the quiet might of them and their leader.
She didn't catch sight of said leader until day began to fade into night but full twilight had not quite set in. Striking despite the relaxed posture, he was impossible to miss when he finally sauntered over to her piano and dropped onto the bench beside her and facing the people passing by.
"Shanks," she greeted him with a smile but did not pause in her playing. "Glad you stopped by."
He sent her an infectious grin, the likes of which she had only ever been so influenced by when it belonged to a blue-eyed, blond-haired knucklehead. It followed suit that the charisma and strength of character would be mirrored between the two. She would be lying if she said her heart had not twinged with grief and yearning. But the moment was quickly swallowed by his good cheer as he told her of the antics his crew had gotten up to leading up to that moment. She laughed along with the tale he spun and let the tune she played reflect the lighthearted atmosphere.
So caught up in the story and the moment, she nearly missed the steady gathering of marines. Not that they were subtle by any means, they moved like they were attempting to command the spaces they entered and like there were more in wait. The formation hinted at the possible presence of one of the three Admiral--and given the current rotation, that was likely Kizuru.
She saw Shanks note it too, though that was as unsurprising as the fact that he did not miss a beat, until there was no denying what was going on.
The tenryuubito had decided that this year, of all times, was the year to finally make an appearance at the festival.
The near immediate fall out seemed to happen both in slow motion and in a fast forward--slow motion in the reactions to the tenryuubito and fast forward in the reaction of the marines who insured people bowed and or were removed for the nobles to continue both unimpeded and with deference. Sakura could see the bloodshed before it happened and had to force herself to keep playing the bouncy tune she had started. Stopping now, given her position for her sound to carry like an amphitheater could inadvertently signal to the people the extreme shift in tone.
Beside her, Shanks gave no outward signs of having noticed the newcomers other than to straighten his posture some and shift to make the sword on his waist easier to access, but his attention remained solely on her. "Looks like we got party crashers."
Sakura tipped her head and hummed noncommittally, "Know your exits, before you start any trouble?"
The flippant question garnered a surprised laugh, but when she glanced at him, the glint in the redhead's eyes were unmistakable. "If I did, would you come with me?"
She hit the next note a half-beat late out of sheer surprise and had to focus to settle back into the tune. "Go with you? On your ship--and headed for the New World?"
The determined look that was at once casual and cutting, pierced right through her. "As the musician on my crew."
This time she stopped playing all together while she stared back into those serious eyes. She'd bet this was not how he intended to ask, but clearly he had intended to offer her this. In the stretching moment between them, she missed the confusion of the people around them beginning to wonder why the music had stopped.
Unfortunately it was enough to draw the attention of the nobles as well.
There was no missing the way the crowd tripped over itself to make way for the pudgy teen boy astride a collared and branded human like someone else, someone with shred of humanity, might ride a horse. Especially since the entitled tenryuubito was beelining straight for them.
Tempted to ignore the noble like the spoiled brat he was, Sakura nearly kept up her eye contact with Shanks, who had steadily grown something of a subtle but devious smile that spoke of the world of trouble he was about to rain down on them all. Sakura shifted info to hint at the hilts of hidden blades before she turned deliberately to close the thin, worn wooden case attop the keys.
The clear slight had the boy gasping in outrage, and she heard boots thud against the ground indicating that he had dismounted from his human carrier. But before he could lay a hand on her, she leaned out of the way at the same time that Shanks had the tip of a thin blade poised to pierce clean through the noble's hand. The abrupt change in position unbalanced the noble enough for him to stumble a step backwards and trip over the leg of the slave he had ridden over.
Between Sakura's snub and Shank's clear warning, the combined outrage and embarrassment had the teenager scrambling to his feet and yelling for them to be shot for their insolence.
Naturally, that was when the newly minted admiral Kizuru decided to show up--in a burst of pointed light that had both pirate and former marine dodging to the sides while Sakura's favorite piano shattered down the middle. The debris of wood and wire and keys gave her the opening she needed to grab the collar of the human and crush it while simultaneously erasing the brand that marked him as property of the nobles. In the same instance, Shanks had already shifted into a fighting stance, sword at the ready and waiting for what Kizuru would do next.
The complete chaos that ensued gave her the chance to set an illusionary trap and encourage the human to get gone--an urging that didn't take much to send him scrambling for the crowd of civilians somewhere behind them as the rest of the people hustled to get out of range of both marines and pirates before they could become collateral damage. And with the civilians rushing out and the marines rushing in, the Red-Hair Pirates were stuck individually attempting to forge a path to their captain. Sakura could see newly familiar faces already making headway with the low-level officers.
But at the center of it all remained the four of them, the noble still on the ground, Sakura and Shakes both in battle ready stances while Kizuru slouched across from them, looking like he had all the time in the world--and as a Light Logia, he did.
Red-Hair Shanks was a Rookie, and Sakura knew what she could handle, which meant they stood a reasonable chance of getting away alive. But if it came down to an actual fight to the finish? She wasn't nearly so sure that would skew in their favor. However, she still remembered how Namikaze Minato had used his lightning flash abilities to their fullest during the Fourth War, and how Madara had fended him off.
She was mostly sure that no one in Shanks' crew were Devil Fruit Users, solely because the signature of one left a discernible mark on a person's signature, and therefore water release ninjutsu and basic genjutsu would be her best defense. And on an archipelago like Saboady, there was an abundance of water to use. A glance at Shanks caught his eye, and she tried to discreetly signal toward the safest exit--one that required them to get past Kizuru and head northeast toward's Shakky's Rip-Off bar where she hoped Rayleigh had finished coating Shanks' ship. The slight nod she received in return told her he was on the same page.
Turning her full attention back to the admiral, she took an intentional step towards the noble, still scared stiff in his place, and drawled, "That wasn't very nice, Kizuru, you could have killed someone with that."
A snort from the man who moved like he dragged his feet about everything. "Couldn't let you threaten a tenryuubito; especially not a former vice admiral, like you."
She took another calculated step and had to jump back before fully setting her foot down as another slash of light shot between her and the noble. But as she had hoped, Kizuru had followed his attack--appearing almost squarely between the pirate captain and herself and in front of the noble. Which also put him in the middle of the trap, she had laid just under the surface of the ground that triggered an illusion that affected perception.
In the next heartbeat she turned the abundance of bubbles into a mesh water prison and used another genjutsu to replace herself with a clone while her real self body-flickered to Shanks. To his credit, Shanks rolled with the techniques she'd chained faster than Kizuru realized she'd acted, and that gave her the split second opening to activate a second perception twisting genjutsu that would allow them to virtually disappear until they were past the mesh seawater wall and on track towards the exit.
Fortunately by that point they had also gotten two of Shanks' crew who had made a decent sized circle amongst the marines, and they adapted to the change in direction just as quickly as Shanks had. Fortunate, because Kizuru had already slammed another light slash in their direction, destroying her mesh barrier and basic illusion in one go. But this was the lead they needed to put distance between them and the admiral, and Sakura drew up another barrier and shifted her genjutsu to make it look there were no less than five sets of Shanks-and-Sakura pushing their way through the marines in all different directions. It was another distraction that would grant them precious seconds to get to the edge of the groove with Shanks' crewmates in tow--which she cloaked in invisibility genjutsu so as not to give away their location.
The whole thing was over in less than a minute, but they had made enough distance that the lazy Kizuru would not follow them without a reason, and Sakura had made sure not to give him one. No doubt a fussy noble would keep the amoral man busy as it was.
With the coast clear, but the urgency to get off the island no less, Sakura caught Shanks' eye one more time--"I'm gonna need a new piano, if I'm gonna be your musician." She cracked a grin a his widening eyes and tacked on an insouciant, "Captain."
His infectious laughter had his whole crew lightening up and laughing right along. "Then we'll set sail as soon as Rayleigh gives me my ship back."