Chapter 19
"You!", Rogue shouted at the uninjured form of Itachi, tears in her eyes, "Are such an asshole!"
"Kaha", Kuromu barked in a laugh at the exclamation, amused at the woman her summoner had picked up this time. Their introductions had officially yet to happen since she had been too busy navigating her way out of the storm and rain to speak much until now, but she could already tell she'd like her.
The upset woman sitting haphazardly on the feathered back of the summon behind him punctuated her cries with weak hits to -his whole, not bleeding, thank Kami- shoulders, still too busy shaking due to the cold air up above the clouds to put any real strength into it.
"I thought we were going to die!", she finally said, half sobbing as she wrapped him into a tight hug from behind.
"Don't panic. I'll get you out of here in a second so, don't resist.", the illusion told her quietly. Suddenly, Rogue could move again, the effect of whatever 'Coma' had used to keep her limp having disappeared.
With a relieved sob, Rogue could only turn accusing and confused eyes up at him as he loosened his hold on her, smiling weakly.
"Get ready", 'Coma' warned, his voice strained due to the pain the wounds in his back were radiating, agitated from the mixture of seawater and rain splashing into them.
Before she could even comprehend what was happening, a pale hand reached up from below and yanked her out of 'Coma's hold and off the surface of the rock they had been abandoned on.
"Uw-", her shocked scream was cut off as she felt herself once more enveloped in familiar arms, their freefall soon broken when they landed on a soft, feathered surface.
"Kaaa! Itachi!", Kuromu cawed in dismay as the rain pelted down on her beautiful plumage, ruining hours of careful grooming as soon as she was summoned.
"Kuromu. Quiet. Go south, close to the surface for now, then take the chance to fly above the clouds when the clouds allow.", he instructed.
Kuromu grumbled something unintelligible but did as told, quickly gaining speed as she nearly dipped her claws into the ocean with each rising wave.
Moments later, they heard the faint thundering of cannons going off in the distance, followed by the unmistakable sound of crumbling rocks. Itachi flinched unnoticeably and bit back a grimace.
"So cruel", she sniffed, "I really thought you were hurt. Why would they do that? And you! You knew! Why didn't you tell me!?"
She let go of him and accusingly poked him in the back instead.
"Hn", he grunted. Itachi turned around to fix her with a serious look, unsealing a warm cloak to drape over her shoulders as he did so, now that the rain wouldn't soak it through instantly.
"I'm fine. The one on the rock was only a clone I made", he assured her. Well, it had been a blood clone and he'd still felt the pain once the clone had expired but she didn't have to know that… "I didn't say because your acting is appalling. You could've made them suspect something if your surprise and panic weren't genuine."
She angrily crossed her arms over her chest after slipping into the warm fabric, instantly feeling better.
"You can make clones? Never mind that, so you made me think things had gone south and all our efforts were for nothing?"
Itachi raised his eyebrows and merely gave her a pointed look.
Okay, he hadn't. He had warned her that something would go south and had asked her to trust him. She just hadn't been able to help it, OK!? What kind of shitty warning was that? It was basically the same thing as not telling her anything at all!
"I can promise not to do anything like that again, once your acting is up to snuff", Itachi finally offered. He himself had hated doing that to a team member, withholding vital information was rarely a good idea, but her improvements in that regard were abysmal at best, so he really had been left with no choice, if he wanted 'Coma' to be considered dead. Keeping cover personas alive for a long time was always a chore and a half and this way, they wouldn't be officially wanted if they didn't crawl back to Baterilla and lay low, perhaps changing Rogue's image and looks a little so if they accidentally ran into an acquaintance she wouldn't be recognized.
"Well, you aren't wrong", Rogue sighed, defeated, "but still, you nearly gave me a heart attack."
"Hn. Yes, I can make several different kinds of clones", Itachi finally switched the topic. It was now safe for her to know about them.
"Some of them are just constructs made from elements that look like me, but some, like that one, are more sophisticated."
"Wow… Do you use them a lot?", Rogue easily went along with him, silently showing her forgiveness, even if the fright had taken what felt like years off her life. He had come through after all.
Itachi nodded.
"They make great distractions and allow me to do more important things while performing menial tasks."
"Does that mean… all that time on the field when I worried you may get a sunstroke, it was really just a clone?", Rogue said, face carefully blank. 'Menial chores is it…'
"No. Surprising as that may be, I didn't really consider our friendship a menial chore", Itachi dryly admonished.
"While I did sometimes leave a clone with you instead, I was there in person most of the time."
Sheepishly, Rogue ducked her head at that. She had jumped to conclusions there. Still, shed have been hurt if he hadn't contradicted her.
"Sorry", she apologized.
With a fond shake of his head, Itachi turned his attention to the front once more, not really upset in the first place. It had been a legit concern after all.
"As for the reason behind their actions", Itachi said, answering the last question she'd asked earlier, "From what I could gather during the short time we were there, the one who ordered our deaths was the Rear Admiral currently in charge at the facility. His name is Daizo and he's apparently decided to bite down on Zena and not let go until the man either resigns or is on equal rank with him, like a mad dog. Perhaps not even then. He's of the opinion the Captain isn't suited to be a Marine due to his ideals and thus will make trouble as much as he can. Basically, we 'died' because a spoiled brat couldn't get his way."
"That… that's horrible… then does that mean the other women will also…!?"
"No", Itachi contradicted before she could fall back into feelings of guilt, "he's not authorized to do that. He could only do so in our case because technically, Zena violated orders by allowing me to come along, even if those orders didn't exist yet when we set off."
Rogue breathed a sigh of relief at that.
"Just to make sure, I've hidden another clone in the facility. If they do randomly decide to kill them all, then he will take action and save them then."
While Itachi could steel himself and kill women, children, and babies if necessary, senseless deaths were the number one reason to make it on his shit list. He understood duty and loyalty well, yet, those concepts didn't only go one way in his mind.
The citizens under the world government were bound by duty to inform the Marines of dangers and cooperate but that in turn meant, the Marines had the duty to protect them in turn. Yet, this relationship of giving and taking was heavily out of balance, from what he could tell.
Their own experience just reaffirmed the assumption, really.
Rogue buried her head into his back and hugged him tightly once again to show her thanks.
"Thank you", she quietly said. They sat like that for a while, Itachi indulging her as she reassured herself that he was fine, they were fine, and she didn't need to feel responsible for those poor patients being held prisoner down there.
"So, here are we going to go now?", she finally asked.
"You probably won't get to see Baterilla again, but I do have contacts there now who'll let me know if anything happens", Itachi said, so she wouldn't feel too bad about leaving Ross without as much as a by-your-leave. Not that she'd been allowed to, but still. Maybe this would even do the man some good and give him a dose of reality regarding the Marines.
"For now, we'll continue what I have been doing and keep our ears to the ground in this Blue. In a few months, when the time I specified with the others is near, we'll pack up and go to meet them. After that, we will start exploring the Grand Line, if no clues lead us elsewhere."
He fixed her with a serious look.
"That means we must first create a permanent disguise for you, so at least at first glance, you aren't recognizable as Portgas D Rogue. At least not for quite a while."
He scrutinized her with narrowed eyes as he said that, already coming up with several possibilities.
"Eh?", Rogue blinked in honest surprise. It hadn't occurred to her until now, but yes. She was now considered dead, she couldn't be seen walking around without a care in the world, right?
"Hn. Your body type isn't actually that unique. The muscle tone you will develop will alter your proportions enough to not be too similar. The shape of your face can be altered through minor surgery, we can remove your freckles the same way. Those are one of your characterizing features. Next, your hair. It's a unique color. We'll need to change it. Either temporarily through a dye or permanently. There's a technique I can perform that can permanently remove pigmentation. With your light color, only white would work with that technique though. And it'd be irreversible. So, the decision is up to you."
Rogue felt overwhelmed at the barrage of words the usually quiet ninja graced her with, hands carefully running over her face and staring at her own hair.
She gulped.
While she wasn't particularly narcissistic or really put much effort into her appearance, she'd still been comfortable in her own skin to an extent, so to hear it analyzed in that matter-of-fact tone of his left her slightly flustered.
"As for your eyes, brown is a pretty common color. Their shape is unique but that's a risk we can take. Altering them in any way would be more effort than it is worth."
Rogue was pretty relieved to hear that. It had half sounded like she'd need to change completely after all, if only temporarily and she wasn't sure how comfortable she'd have been with that.
She then thought back over his words, rolling a strand of her pink-blonde hair between her fingers experimentally.
While Rogue was lost in her own world, Itachi quietly updated Kuromu on the situation and had her alter their course toward his next target's direction. It was a kingdom located on a small island, which was famous for its many excellent Martial Arts schools. Many of the best of the best of the Marines had learned their unarmed combat skills there, making it a must for Itachi to investigate. That also meant it was under close scrutiny by the Marines.
He'd need to come up with a good, believable cover for them soon. Something Rogue's meager acting skills would support.
It didn't take long for Rogue to come to a decision.
"Alright. I agree. Please also permanently change the color. I… think some change will do me some good anyway."
If she'd start over, then her altered appearance would serve as the markings of that fact. Plus, in the end, all the precautions they took now, would keep her baby and her safer. She felt warm as she thought about it once more. While she loved Roger, she really did, the Marine he had placed his trust in had never shown up until they executed their plan. Had the man ignored his request? Or would he simply leave her to suffer in pain, fear, and uncertainty, all alone, until it was nearly too late?
She didn't know. And she didn't wish to find out either.
In any case, if the man bothered to look, she'd now be labeled as dead in the Marines' database. If the man couldn't even bother to contact her at all, she decided to stop worrying about him as well. She didn't even know his name either, Roger never told her.
Thus, any precautions she could take, she would. If the reward was to watch her little one grow up, she'd even become Itachi's twin or something equally outrageous.
Itachi nodded at her in satisfaction.
"Then, where will we go for the surgeries? Won't that leave traces behind?", she asked curiously.
"Hn, normally, it would. I'd usually rather not tamper with memories, but I can erase us from their minds once we are finished. We'll pretend to fill out the paperwork but leave it blank instead. I'll just cast an illusion to make them believe we filled it in."
Rogue stared at him as if seeing him for the first time.
"You… can alter memories?"
"Hn. Only the most recent ones and then only to an extent. It's not something I'm well practiced in."
Rogue could only blankly stare once more.
"Itachi… you scare me sometimes.", she said matter-of-factly, "but I don't think you'd go around using something like this lightly, so I'll go along with this plan. Unless we somehow want to do the procedures ourselves, that's really the only option that doesn't involve murder and coercion I can think of."
Itachi's lips twitched.
There were other options, of course, there were. They were just too… troublesome. Itachi wondered if he was turning into a Nara.
Meh. Worse things had happened.
As long as his hair didn't turn into a pineapple…
Rogue's voice brought him out of that disturbing train of thought and he quickly banished the ridiculous image his head had conjured to the back of his mind.
"So, how long do you reckon we have until we reach the clinic?"
He hummed in thought.
"Kuromu", he said.
"Kaaa! At current speed around 3 hours"
Rogue only now recalled that Itachi had randomly summoned a talking crow that was big enough to carry several people comfortably. Did she mention it could talk?
"Itachi, who's this?", she asked sweetly.
"Hn, Kuromu of the Crow Summoning Clan", he introduced, then patted Kuromu's plumage as a sign to the bird he was talking to her.
"Portgas D Rouge, team member."
Introductions thus out of the way, Itachi assumed the issue was closed. It wasn't.
"Nice to meet you, Kuromu! So you can summon intelligent crows? What else can you do?", Rogue asked curiously, slightly exasperated. Itachi just seemed to pull those abilities out of thin air somehow.
Itachi hummed.
"The energy I use is very versatile. Can do almost anything with it if you master it enough."
"With anything… you mean anything?", she asked.
"Hn. Control fire, water, earth, wind, make clones, summon things, illusions, heal, enhance muscle strength… anything."
"That… those are all things used in combat, aren't they."
Itachi shrugged.
"I grew up as a warrior."
"Grew up as… when did you start training?"
"…"
"You… you don't remember, do you?"
Right. His being 16 inevitably meant that he had to have learned combat and subterfuge from a very young age. She just… hadn't quite realized what that truly meant.
A child soldier… was basically what he was.
Then again, many recruits joined the Marines when they were still children as well. She… had no right to judge him for that. She still felt sad though.
"So, what about your eyes? They change color sometimes…"
The Q&A session between the three went on all the way until they nearly reached their destination. It was currently night, so they didn't have to bother about approaching from afar and just directly flew over the island, Kuromu's wings silent as a ghost as she swooped down.
"How do we get down?"
"We jump."
"Wha-!"
Without waiting any longer, Itachi simply scooped her up and hopped off his feathered transport and onto a nearby rooftop, landing silently and gracefully.
She would never get used to this, Rogue silently lamented. She didn't even have enough energy to get mad anymore.
