Disclaimer : This chapter contains a brief description of child abuse.
Chapter Six
As if dismissing mosquitoes, Whitebeard swatted away whatever came his way while laughing. He then grabbed a flying barrel of beer, popped it open and took a long swig. "I want you to join our crew," he said at last, "our family," he added, this time earnestly, "to be my daughter."
Following his statement, the barrels and brooms froze mid-air. They dangled unmoving, silent as if time itself has stopped. Ashley looked at Whitebeard with wide eyes, waiting for him to tell her that he made a tasteless joke. A mistake. But what she inferred from his serious demeanor said otherwise. Suddenly, the barrels and brooms fell all at once with a cacophony of clatters as magic retreated and gravity took the lead.
Ashley found his choice of words ironic and she started laughing. Her laughter grew louder and harder by the minute, bordering on hysterical. Her sides burned, breathing turned to gasps and tears dripped down her nose. She took a deep breath before saying : "Daughter?" She straightened with a tilted head, her laughter dying in the wake of her boiling anger, "What's that supposed to mean?" The Captain and his commanders immediately had an acute sense of a deja-vue. "Do I look I need another jailer, another torturer, another executioner?" Her scars still burned and ached like salt on open wounds. She could still hear the hiss of her father's whip as it descended on her back, the crackle as it tore her wounds, new and old, open over and over again. By the end of it, she would be no more than a bloody mess. Even then, she was forced to kneel and say 'Thank you, sir.' The chortles of her father, a devil incantation in her ears. "FUCK NO!" She screamed, her body trembling from head to toe.
If Whitebeard was shocked, he didn't show it. Though, the barrel on his hand leaked liquor from all the pressure exerted on it. His eyes as determined as ever.
Ashley willed her limbs to stay still, as she raced to catch her breath. Whitebeard had certainly touched a raw nerve and she had overreacted. Making a spectacle out of herself, how embarrassing. "I have nothing against pirates," she said with feigned nonchalant, "Heck, I'm indebted to some of them," her own name was giving to her by a pirate, her 'family' had only ever called her a 'wench' or 'cursed little thing' when pleased. "Take me back home and in exchange I'll show you the gold veins there," as she understood it all pirates loved shiny things, right? Then they can extract as much as they wanted.
Whitebeard drained the rest of his alcohol before putting down the now faulty barrel. He hummed as if weighting his options and Ashley sighed in relief. Between a useless person and a mountain of gold, what would he choose? It was obvious.
"Why didn't you use the gold yourself?" He asked at last. Facing such an easy question, Ashley fidgeted and stammered in search for an answer. "What is it that you desire?" He didn't intend to ask this question aloud but he watched transfixed as she flinched. He, albeit by sheer coincidence, has found out the crux of the matter.
Desires. One word capable of invoking so many emotions in the pit of her stomach. It made her hot and cold all at once. She was trained to want nothing. From the moment she learned to speak, desires were beating out of her. They were no more than a guilty pleasure she indulged herself in only when alone, in the deepest recesses of her mind. Her fingers would itch to touch the soft blankets, her mouth water at the sight of the warm dinner prepared and eyes brighten whenever she walked past other kids playing together.
Her father, a wealthy merchant in their community, never failed to bring his legitimate daughter and son all kind of gifts and presents. One day, he brought back bags of small multicolored sweets. They glimmered like stars freshly plucked from the night sky and a four years old Ashley, standing in the corner, couldn't keep her eyes from following their path. From her father's hand to her sister's palm. Her sister made a show of eating a mouthful and with a wide grin she yelled 'yummy' over and over again, jumping in pure bliss. Ashley knew she had to look down as per the rules, but before she could avert her eyes her sister caught her.
"Sis,"she called sweetly and Ashley doubted her ears, she stood dazed as her sister extended her cupped hands full of candy, "If you want take some," she beamed an innocent toothy grin. Ashley smiled back, her heart about to flutter out of her chest. She rubbed her filthy hands on her tattered clothes before reaching for a yellow glimmering candy only for her sister to open her hands. The candy fall and scattered on the floor while her sister cried and screamed "Papa! She tried to take my candy!" That day she wasn't whipped as usual. That day she was burned with a hot iron stick and it was only the beginning.
"Nothing," she answered, eyes devoid of any emotions, "desires means suffering," she whispered. Sweat dripped down her back, reminiscent of blood that traveled the same path, hot and ticklish. She wanted to claw at it.
This, however, wasn't the answer Whitebeard was searching for seeing as his face hardened with disapproval.
"If you hold no desires then what's the difference between you and a rock at the bottom of the sea?" Hearing what he said, Ashley's face bloomed red with shame. "Suppressing your desires doesn't mean they don't exist. To be, to have, to reach…Is what drive us forward." He added, his hands balled into tight fists."Muddling through life without goals is finding comfort in the unpleasantness. While others grow you're making yourself smaller, unnecessary, pathetic," his fist hit the armrest of his throne so hard, it splintered, "this way your carving lessen and ease."
Everyone could, literally, feel his anger rolling off him in waves. His sons' advice to calm down falling on deaf ears."However," he yelled over the voices of his crew, effectively quieting them down, "you're destroying the person you could be," the woman standing in front of him was a failure of her own making. Her own greatest enemy.
Ashley froze. Living day by day, hour by hour, and minute by minute she had never thought of the future. They said that she shouldn't have existed. A mistake. A monster. A transgression. "What person can I be?" She whispered a tinge of a child curiosity and hope coloring her voice.
One peek into her shining eyes, made Whitebeard recoil. His anger wavered then ignited hotter than ever with the promise that if he ever met the sperm-donor of this child, he'll make sure to break every bone in his body before forcing him to walk the plank.
Prior to this scolding, Ashley didn't want to acknowledge what she felt so far. The emptiness, loneliness and dullness of her life were building up to new highs everyday and she strained under their weights. Something's has got to give! Now, faced with other possibilities, she felt the anticipation of something on the verge of unraveling like a word on the tip of her tongue. There, but successfully evading her thoughts. She believed the answer to her question 'What person can I be?' Will give her some insight.
Regrettably, this moment wasn't her 'finally she understood' moment, it was an 'almost' because the second Whitebeard opened his mouth, a battle cry rang and a fella with a huge ax charged toward the captain. With a sigh, Whitebeard stopped the attack with his bare hands. Ashley yelped when the attacker didn't even flinch but instead turned his fists into balls of fire and threw them the captain's way.
The specifics of the battle were totally lost on her because the fire burned hotter than a summer day and she could only cross her arms in front of her face to protect it from the heat. However, the fight concluded with the youngest falling flat on his back. He groaned, before jumping to his feet.
"Whatever," Ace said as he rubbed his neck. No shame or anger over the failure of his 186 attempt apparent on his face. In fact, he seemed bored with the whole ordeal. He calmly put on his hat, dusted his clothes and seized Ashley's hand before walking away with her in tow. Marco's eyes warily followed the two.
The process seemed so natural that Whitebeard laughed. Ultimately, the fiasco's objective was to get the girl out of a tight spot, which the captain found downright cute.
"Weren't you harsh on the lass, pops?" Said Fossa as he played with his lit cigar, tilting it from one side to the other.
Whitebeard crossed his legs, and rested his check on his hand. "Was I?" The commanders nodded, even Loki mewled. The captain hummed, eyes set on the sea, "Long ago someone told me that witches are born under the star of misfortune," the man said they needed a mixture of anguish, rage and terror to truly awaken their powers. They were damaged in ways few can understand and that's why they preferred seclusion. "When a bone is broken and not fixed, it'll heal crooked," Whitebeard said, mostly to himself, "to set it straight, sometimes another break is needed."
When he turned and saw the flabbergasted faces of his sons, he scoffed. "Didn't this work just fine with Whitey Bay?"
"Em, about that-" Thatch wanted to answer only to get elbowed by Marco. Izou and Rakuyo were glaring daggers at him. However, no one could stop Haruta from putting his foot in his mouth since he was far from his elder brothers.
"Yeah, it worked sooooo fine, she actually went rogue on our asses," the little shit said, missing his father's flinch. "She left the crew and become a captain in her own right, God only knows which sea she's sailing now."
In a flash Marco and Izou were by side and they delivered Haruta a double wack he won't forget for weeks to come. Even so, the damage was done and Whitebeard looked somber.
Marco cleared his throat and tacitly changed the subject. "Leaving Ace and Ashley both on the main ship is spelling a disaster," he said, voicing his misgivings, "They'll be blowing each other's fire, yoi. How about sending one of them to the the second Moby?"
"Nah," Whitebeard said with a chuckle. He wanted to observe the process of them giving up and joining him, to be the first to hear them call him pops. "Don't worry. Everything will be just fine."
With a frown, Marco made to interject but his brothers and pops weren't listening. To his utter vexation they called him 'worrywart' and 'mother hen' which effectively stopped him. "Look here yoi," he said, glaring at each one of them, "If- wait, no. When they do something, don't come crying to me." They'll regret it, Marco's instinct told him so.
Hello, everybody! How're you doing?
So, here we catch a glimpse of Ashley's past and what shaped her character and of course Papa!Whitebeard has to give his advice and steer his children in the right path. Cute!Ace snatching himself an ally and Marco, the voice of reason, being ignored.
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