Writer: I have bad news people, Oda hasn't given me the rights for One Piece so it's still his and I can't make a living of writing this. So bloody sad.


She wore her bests for the night, from her steel tipped boots to the wine-red long coat that had belonged to Itse and she had oh so stealthily appropriated. Hair combed and still loose and wild as a lion's mane tucked away in the back of her shirt, save for two long locks that bared her face in a frame of dirty gold that shined with the stray pins of light. This would be the best time to have her photo taken, she looked enrapturing with the face of courage and the poise of victory. She had nailed the walk, and Puma wasn't too far off with his chest puffed up and strutting right besides her with claws out and clicking against the stones.

They walked as they counted the blocks so that they wouldn't miss the house of the Mondos, according to the men she had shot and broken there was a barrack of sorts they used twelve blocks past the butcher's shop. And as they were nearing the tenth she could already see their colours, the building sat hunched on a corner with slanted roof almost falling over and covering half the windows of the first floor all painted red and black and yellow. A wild Jackson Pollock spew out of it as the people milled inside it, talked, laughed, and drunk, their nature tainting and coating the whole place.

A dry spell hit her mouth as anticipation mixed with excitement as they edged closer, twisted the cap of her cute, little flask.

"Maybe we should skip town," said Nicolas, sighing long and hard and tiredly.

"No, no, no. We can't," she snapped as she turned on her heels, walking backwards and looking at him, "You can't just career through life while leaving mistakes and insults unanswered,"

A silence as they walked and reached a corner from where they could see all the half-covered windows.

"What about when you dropped someone's motorcycle taking a photo? That was a mistake, wasn't it?"

"Well… you know-" Martina thought. "That's just my point! We can't keep on doing it, you know what they say: New World, New Me,"

"I see, so what about this? We go in, we speak and make things clear and we leave?"

"How about no. When people try to kidnap you, you don't go up to their boss and ask them why they did that. Now do you?"

"I wouldn't know, no one has ever tried to kidnap me,"

"They would need a freighter to kidnap you, Nicolas. And since I am the only one with experience on the matter, let me tell you what we will do, yes?"

"When you say that I get this bad feeling about all this, like there are going to be wrecks all around," He jerked his head left and right as if to make a point.

"And what would you call the state you left those two yesterday?" She countered, trying to show him a little bit of his hypocrisy. How everything was right when he did it but wrong when she planned it.

"I would call that-" he lapsed into silence, trying to find a word that might stretch the truth,"-incapacitated,"

"They looked like a wreck. Once they were unable to tell which limb was whose, you would call them a wreck, no?"

His lip lifted as she shoved the ugly truth in his face, and then began to walk again when he realized that he just couldn't beat her when it came to words. Martina smiled at that. One had to know what battles to choose, and Nicolas simply sucked at that, he threw himself at every chance he had to disagree with her. No matter if he was in the wrong, the insufferable man just never learnt.

She strode forward, it wouldn't do for the Captain to be left behind, walking right in front of her brother as he sulked and sighed. Such a downer, it was a festive night, it was their very first raid and he was sad about not getting to parley and know the enemy. This wasn't the time for speeches and lies and cloaks, that time was before trying to kidnap her, now was the time for retribution and steel. Her heart was almost skipping out of her heart as she reached the entrance, a cocktail of hot fire in her chest blurred her mind as she sprang up the steps, raised one boot, kicked the front door splintering from its hinges and strode inside, the red tails of her coat flapping after.

Then she blinked. Slowly took in the place choked in people, the smell of smoke and sweat, of spilled drinks and sprayed vomit, of desperation and wasted chances. And realized how very out-numbered they truly were when you took away the one guy that was flattened by the door.

It would seem, she thought as her hands came to her weapons, that its bad to mix alcohol and fights. And then smoke and steel claimed their place that night.

[O.o]

Orillas watched the boy he thought of as a son pace in his office. Well, office was too kind a word, it was a small room cleared for him to use to discuss business or deal with it, a token really, just a piece of something for being an officer of the family. Or at least one of its oldest members, he didn't think there were many that could say had stayed as long as him, maybe Bires, he thought before remembering that Bires had died two years before. A snapped rope brought a pulley on his head fast as a whip and all that he was became jam on the deck. He sighed long as grief, the thing about becoming old was remembering everyone that had left.

"You will wear down you soles, Coltello. I don't want you to spend another monthly wage on shoes," he spoke trying to bring the boy out of his brooding, he was taut as that rope that killed Bires and he hoped he could pulled some of that strain before he snapped.

"It isn't funny, uncle," he replied while chewing on a finger that was about to turn into bone if he kept at it, "Father is about to ship me away for last night. Fuck,"

"You did make a mistake," Orillas thought about what Diena had told him and tried to iron out the scowl that formed against his will. No one had taught him that, not even close, "almost went against the family's rules and Lotta has to be fair when it comes down to it,"

"I know. I know. I know what I did, and I can't regret it enough," he bit his finger and drew blood this time, "Tero got his arm broken because of a stupidity of mine. For a fucking tantrum he got hurt,"

Orillas wasn't happy with that answer, tried to put some iron in his voice, a barb in his mouth, but he gave out at the last moment. He had watched him grow and make trouble, watched him go through scraps and change the wooden sword for the gun, watched him change that innocent smile for a sneer. And in the end the words died in his chest.

"You should apologize to your father. Find these people and talk to them too, make things right before its too late,"

"I don't think I can, he doesn't want to see me. Much less hear what I have to say now,"

"Oh, boy don't be silly. Lotta loves you to a fault, he has always said how you are so much smarter than him, that he is proud of you,"

"He never said that to me, never even said a thing that wasn't a complaint," Coltello sunk into his chair, depressed and rejected.

"But he is proud of you, just thinks you have things you need to learn,"

"Things? I have learnt everything for the family, there's been no raid I have failed in. No mission he sent me in I have twisted,"

"Do you know why he sent you to these places?" The old man asked, hoping to show at least a piece of what the boy had to learn.

"Made it clear every time he sent me, Get this, Talk to that person, Take that. Always an order somewhere,"

Orillas watched him bite and bite until he winced at it and he smacked his hand out of his mouth, the boy looked like a calf stuck to a pacifier, "It hurts me watch you do that-" he fished into his pocket and pulled a marble of hard candy, "Eat this. Don't talk, just listen and eat and relax if you can,"

Coltello took it in his hand and gave him a half smile, "Ha, a King Can, didn't think they still made this. Where did you buy it?"

"Just found it in my pocket, now listen to me. Your father thinks you are smart, a genius if he could say it, but you put all that brain into war, into raids," the boy nodded at him, "that's a waste for everyone. For the Family most of all,"

"But-" he stopped him with one raised hand.

"Eat. Listen." He stated and nodded to himself when he saw no more talk coming from Coltello, "You are using half your head here, okay? We send you to talk to someone and you threaten them, collect something and you steal it. You are making a bloody name for us when you should be securing yourself a name, make it a brand. Something with a price and a guarantee tied to it,"

"Your Father thinks if he sends you to enough islands you might get that, Diena thinks if we send you on your own you might get it beat into your head. I try to make it clear now that everything failed,"

Coltello bit down on the candy, impatient, arrogance had made its way to his heart now and he didn't take to lectures. "I will see what I can do to make yesterday right, uncle,"

Orillas combed the patch of beard that was supposed to cover his cheek, traced the scar all the way to his ear. How tiring it was to spell things out for others and watch them trounce the opposite way, how tiring it was to try to do the right thing in a bad world.

The sound of a door slamming, a shout, and a gun scream reached him all at once. They had just changed that door, had just paid for it that morning and they would have to do so again. It was so very tiring, he thought as he got up his chair and shouted for someone to call Diena, he wore the battered brass knuckles and wondered just how long they had spent in his hands.

Too long.

[O.o]

Martina kicked a table and made it spin in the air as a drizzle of bullets ripped it to splinters and old nails. She caught someone by the neck and shot him twice in the gut, making them drop hard on the floor, her [Critical Eye] Skill registering a pair of cracked ribs in him together with some lung rot. A lovely combination.

She ducked under an airborne thug and watched him pile on top of another to her right, she took aim and shot one in the head, the slug tickling Nicolas' nose and making him sniff. It was a game, a game to see who exploded first because of each other's blows coming so close and she was in the lead until her brother threw a bowl that broke on someone's shoulder and showered her in ceramic splinters. She hissed as the pieces dug into her mane and were lost to the world, it would take her hours to pick everything off her hair.

Raising her revolver once again she put the iron of her sight on another target when a blur caught her attention, she froze in place, Tekkai toughening her muscles and rooting her in place. It should have been enough, it should have been all she needed to stop a barrelling cannon ball. Yet, it wasn't. Her feet left two trenches along the tiles before they were clean in the air, her chest clamped in a hug of iron and muscle.

Nicolas screamed high and horrible as Martina watched everything turn into a blur, as she felt her bones groan and grind against her flesh as she was smacked against a wall at full tilt. Bricks and mortar crumbled as the bonds came undone by the force of her assailant and how solid she was. Her armour had left her stiff as a statue, one arm stuck close to her side and the other still outstretched holding her gun.

She had missed the bastard, missed him completely until it was too late. He had charged her in silence, his mind a pool of nothing but rust coloured exhaustion and not a speck of the violent red or gloom black that she had gotten used to in her Observation Haki. Her irritation at herself mounted the anger of her pain and she released the Tekkai on her forearms, with her wrist now mobile she twisted her hand and pulled the trigger.

The iron slugs clapped against the man's back twice before her drum was empty, and yet the bastard had the gall to ram her against the corner of a house before body slamming her against the cobble stone. She tucked herself neat and tight, shoulder bruised by the fall but her head was in mint condition and that was what mattered. Her Soru brought her half a block away from her enemy, a man old as dust and that in all his years had never stopped growing, with hair silver as coins that reached his shoulders and a beard that tickled his chest. He looked an old Viking stuffed in a suit.

"You are sneaky, for an old man," She hissed at him, her gun's drum slapping to one side with one twist of her wrist.

"You are tough, for a woman," He answered back as he squared his shoulders and brought his ham like fists up in a boxer's stance, feet wide apart. And she wondered what kind of idiot did he take her for to think she would close the gap, feeling at her face she touched upon a smile and a spot of dust. Slotting one cartridge at a time she began to hum, eyeing the old man as he took one step and dug his soles in the cracked stones. One firm step at a time, one solid second at a time, he looked like a wall inching forward and she had just the right thing to bring it down.

One heel clicking against the ground, her chest jerking forward and head snapping, fingers working around the explosive rounds and giving the drum a spin for flare as the lyrics exploded from her.

See me ride out of the sunset, On your color TV screen

The old man kept one eye to peek over his fists, adorned in brass and scarred as a chopping block. A fighter then, an old hand at their job. Her smile grew as the beat grew hot.

Ain't got no gun, Ain't got no knife

She showed her hands and the heavy instruments in them. The irony.

Don't you start no fight,

Almost there, the gap was but a ten steps walk. They were so close now that a run would make them meet head on, her breath quickened at the thought of being tackled again but the excitement of a slug fest made her burn with anticipation.

Cause I'm T.N.T.

She screamed at the sky, chest rumbling, windows clinking and rattling as her voice exploded like artillery. Her gun was brought to eye level and she let it rip, her thumb bringing the hammer back for a second before she squeezed the trigger with a mad smile. The first slug was a firefly zipping in the night that bloomed with a shockwave and a shower of pebbles. She didn't stop, the boom of her explosives goading her to sing ever louder, ever higher.

Watch me explode!

Her song finished, her gun squeezed dry, and the streets mauled by force and fire she stood there a little winded by her performance. But she was beyond herself with the results, the cloud of dust hadn't settled yet and neither had the excitement and battle joy. Because he still stood. That old pool of patient rust stood unscathed where her bombardment had ripped the place to pieces, and when the curtain to their first round started to fall, he moved.

Quick as a snake he crossed the gap and swung one bastard of a fist at her head, Martina fell backwards without moving her feet, her whole upper body horizontal and hinged on her knees. She came back up and whipped him across the face with the blunt stud in her knife's pommel. His neck didn't even move when she caught his chin with a blow that could crack stones. Tough bastard that he was he managed to knee her in the stomach as she was hitting him, her leg kicked his chest and used it to jump back.

"Nice blow," said Martina trying to get her muscles to unclench and let her breath a little more easily.

"Same to you, kid," he said while rubbing at his chin thoughtfully, "What's your name? I don't think someone this strong should stay nameless," the brass around his hands moved up as he got comfortable.

"The name is Doctor Esquirla Ana Martina, Captain of this two-man crew. A pleasure," She flapped back the tail of her coat as she holstered her gun and gave him a bow. She knew manners, just didn't think everyone deserved them.

"I am Orillas, just Orillas," He answered.

"Now that's just insulting, you are more than just Orillas. Surely you have a title or something, I can't think someone this strong should be nameless," She shot back as her eyes roved over his body, her Skill showing not a single recent wound. No trauma, no lacerations, no nothing apart from a tattered dress shirt. That meant one thing, and one thing only.

"Surely a Devil Fruit User can't be just Orillas,"

The old man looked at her and let a half smile appear. "No name is freely given, only right I say mine then," He stood up and squared his chest and pulled his chin up, suddenly he didn't look half as tired or half as old. "I am Orillas. The Stalwart,"

Her lips quirked upwards as she brandished both her knives, hands held outstretched and armed as if to hug him and stab him in the back.

"This will be a fine fight then!" Martina screamed at him, words that shook the sleeping city.

"As fine a fight as any!" He bellowed back.

And there it was, the rust started to scab and fall, crumble and flake, as something older took its place. The climbing thrill and the towering ferocity burst out of him like waves breaking a dam and they threatened to drown her.

Martina threw herself at him, a comet with a red tail, she sunk under a cross and struck his shoulder with a downwards cut with all her strength, all her excitement, all her training.

But instead of slicing flesh and grinding bone the bitter edge of her knife slid clean through the first layer of skin and left a red line. A cut as shallow as a stranger's compliment. His answer was a blow that was caught by her blade, backed by her Tekkai he still managed to move her, her steel tipped boots raking the ground. She stabbed at him from below, trying to catch his ribs and was blocked by an arm that was tight against his side.

Failed the attack she jumped back, but halfway there she noticed her foot wouldn't budge, stuck under the great weight of the old man's own sole she struggled to free herself as he rained blows upon her. She shrugged a cuff to her forehead and drove the point of her knife into his leg, blocked a hook to her ribs and winced as she was forced to exchange blows. Too late her Observation picked the straight aimed at her head, too little to be done when her foot was caught, twisting her neck she avoided breaking her cheekbone but traded flesh instead.

A gash that opened along her face, from the tip of her mouth to just below her eye everything was red. Anger mounted, battle joy driven, and pain fueled Haki coated her knife, the steel lost in the dark she cocked her fist and punched with a guard of black. Confident in his iron hide the old man didn't move, he returned fire at the same time thinking it a fair trade until his jaw was jarred aside. His neck twisting to follow the force as his fist missed its target and he was knocked aside.

How long had it been? He thought. How long since he had been uprooted so violently, so finally from his place. His legs shot out from him as he threw himself aside to avoid the blades that sunk into the stone, he looked sadly at her smiling face and swallowed a sigh. If only he was twenty years younger. If only he was in his prime what a fight this would be, but at fifty years old his knees were trembling from one punch through his armour. Pitiful.

How regretful it was to grow old.

She cut and diced, her Armament now strong enough to cut whatever Devil's power he possessed and still the old man made her fight for every mark she left. He fought unlike anyone, not like Itse who toyed with them and crushed them through foresight. Not like Nicolas that kept his blows straight and true every time, unchanging no matter how much she dodged and retaliated. No. He fought with tricks, with feints and weaves of his arms, trying to gouge her eyes or break her wrists and elbows, aiming for her toes and ankles.

He was traitorous like a scorpion and with half the mercy, kept her sharp at all times and she loved it. They exchanged trickery like pleasantries, she would aim for the space between his ribs, at the bundles of nerves in the legs and for the balls. And he would answer with a punch to the tits, a kick at her ankles and a headbutt to her shoulder.

It was a bloody dance. A red ball! She bit down her lip as she fought down the urge to keep going, to keep learning, and stealing his tricks. There had to be a winner, there were things to be done tonight and the old man was already breathing hard.

She would give him a proper end, with everything she had.

Retreating she prepared, she stood at a distance with both fighting knives in an overhand grip.

"This is the end," She remarked sadly.

"Yes, to be true I surprised myself by lasting this long," He answered between breaths. "Now show me, show me what you were holding back,"

She nodded and began jumping in place, warming up her legs for the last part of their dance.

"Brujeria:" she chanted, and her voice struck the buildings and echoed down the street.

She kicked out once, then twice, dust began to cloud the ground and hide her feet and where there was one appeared two then three.

"Los Fantasmas," the three of them finished together, three apparitions that mimicked each other.

"Now Orillas, tell us, which one is the real one. Which of this three will stab you?" they smiled at him, a genial gesture.

"No need to keep me in suspense like this, lass. Let's do this," He charged as a striker upon its prey, swung one fist through the right most of the ghosts and kept going until it reached the last. All of them disappeared and a burning pain blossomed in his leg and arm, and when he looked down, peeking from behind him Martina was holding both blades that were buried to the hilt in his flesh.

"The answer was the fourth one," She finished and pulled the steel free, flourished them in the air and flicked the blood away as they went into the sheathes.

"Sneaky little thing," He spoke as he held one hand over his wound, already he was feeling faint. Too much exercise on this old thing. "Would you do me a favour? From the victor to its victim?" Didn't matter how much he enjoyed himself, he still had a job to do.

"Sure thing. If you answer me a question," He wasted as much time as he could before he nodded, had to buy as much time as possible. That was his job, either win or use as much time before you loose.

"Would you join my crew, Orillas The Stalwart?" Eyes open wide, mouth hanging open he stared at her and then he laughed. He belched all the humour in his dying body as she waited.

"Fifteen years ago my answer would have been an undisputed yes, but now even if I wasn't half dead my answer would still be no. I may be a gangster, a ruinous man, but my loyalty still holds," Her answer was unlike anything he could have thought of, she clapped, she laughed, she hooted as she shouted.

"That was incredible, an incredible speech. And it just makes me want you even more! Come on, join my crew, I know how to get you back to your prime, to make you a young bull again. So what do you say?" Eyes sparkling as if she had seen a toy, a naïve look on her face that was jarring against the memory of the determined killer she had been a second ago.

"Still no. Will you listen to my request now? Before I croak if you wouldn't mind?" She snorted at his words, and he could already feel his breathing coming lighter, blood loss was setting in.

"You aren't dying old man, what kind of Doctor would I be if I just let you die," With thread and needle and a mad glint in her eye she threw herself at him. Cuts and gouges and scraps disappear as they were sewed together, bleeding was staunched as she took a flask from her hip gave it a taste and grabbed another with salve. She gave the little bottle a few more tastes as she worked on him. Both hands on him while she tipped it up with just her lips.

"After seven days you should be able to get someone to pull the stitches, unless you want to do it yourself," Giving it a final shake she threw the glass against a wall and watched it shatter as she spoke.

"Will you still listen to my request even if I am not dying?" He had to try it at least, might save a life, might save two. Might make things right for this crook.

"Depends, I only listen to what my family has to say. But I might as well consider your word, if for the nice time we spent,"

Orillas dug his hand into his one remaining pocket and pulled from inside a wrapper of metal green, a little marble that was even smaller in his fingers. A candy, a plain and simple ball of sugar. Martina watched with interest as he offered it to her, hand outstretched, she thought of poison and trickery, of a last gamble, yet she reached for it. Her head was screaming but the rest of her was at ease, something older than her Observation told her there was no danger.

"A candy?"

"Yes, I would like for you to stay with me for as long as that candy lasts," The wound on her cheek creased as her lips were pushed back in a wide arc.

"And if I bite down on it? It wouldn't last long that way,"

"If you do then that will be it, I guess,"

Crumpling the wrapper in one hand she put it in her pocket and ate the hard candy, rolled it from one side to the other.

"Its minty," She said after careful consideration, "I hate mint. Don't you have coke flavour?" He hacked a weak laugh.

"I will consider buying a bigger variety after this,"

"Do try, this tastes terrible,"

Orillas watched her eat, trying to put the words together to ask. Piecing over the details and questions he had and wanted answered, but in the end his mouth moved faster than his head. Might have been the little blood he had doing tricks or maybe the fatigue had reached him.

"What do you want with the Mondo Family?" He said directly, no roundabouts or anything.

"To get even, of course," She frowned and considered her words again, scratched her chin and spoke again, "To cash a debt actually. Yes, to take our due,"

"What kind of debt are you talking about?"

"The kind with the highest interests, a debt of honour! Your boys tried to kidnap me, tried to take a young lady from her room with the sun still out," Her hand over her face she looked affronted, insulted.

Suddenly, Orillas felt so tired. So very tired. Kidnapping? Fifteen years he had spent setting boundaries, setting guides of conduct for his men and for all he was just an officer they applied to the Family as a whole. Fifteen years that someone had decided to spit on, it seemed.

"If I brought you whoever it was, bound and gagged, would you two stop?"

"No," The Doctor answered, "We wouldn't. It was an insult that we received, and we need to make sure there is no repeat. A message must be sent, to everyone," Spoken like a true underworld dog, Martina fought to keep a straight face through the giddiness building up in her chest. The man deserved respect, it was a serious moment for him and she had to play her part in this theatre.

"I guess I was the same when I was your age, only time can make a person see the value of turning a fist into an open hand. You finished your candy already, my wish is over, just try not to bully them too much, they are my family after all," The old man reclined his head against the rubble and let go a breath.

"I wouldn't call it bullying, this is simply overwhelming retaliation," I need a hat, she thought, the man deserved a little tip of acknowledgment, would have nailed it right there.

Martina didn't get further than a block before she was jumped from an alleyway, an ugly thing ran at her and crept up until it managed to perch on her shoulder. Rumbling loudly.

"And where have you been?" She questioned her tomcat.

Fight. Not Hunt. Not mine. He purred lazily.

"Not your fight? Then I guess when Nico attacks you it ain't my fight either, right?"

Not fight either. Game.

"Then you are going to be playing that game alone since you can't fight with me,"

No! Game of three. Puma defended, trying to come out innocent after abandoning her. The damn thing was so much like her that it was dangerous.

"Make it of two or start fighting, your choice," Was her final answer and the cat began mewling pitifully until she gave it a warning glance and it huffed and rested his head on her shoulder.

And as she walked down the street plagued by shadows her Observation called for her attention, the fiery breeze called for her. Nicolas was distressed, she could feel it now that her battle joy was over and her anger was gone, she could feel him calling and reaching out for her. She sighed as she turned towards his direction, a smile that stung her hurt cheek bloomed in her face, the needy bastard was waiting for her.


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