I did not sleep well that night.

Even if I hadn't had another dream that consisted of a disembodied voice screaming in my head, going to bed early screwed up my schedule. I snapped awake at some ungodly hour as soon as I felt the air pressure drop hard enough to make my ears pop, then sat up in my hammock with a groan. The Moby Dick was anchored for the night, but storms bothered me for a reason totally unrelated to seasickness or barometric pressure.

I stretched far enough to crack every vertebra that would allow it, then wandered up toward the deck as usual. My roommates were variously asleep, reading, or elsewhere, but no one commented as I left and wandered out for some fresh air.

Once there, I sat down where the railing had previously been destroyed. The carpenter—shipwright, they called him—was a champ about battle damage, apparently, since there was no sign it had ever been.

"Can't sleep either, Thatch?" I asked of my erstwhile insomniac companion.

Thatch shrugged, still engrossed in staring at the purple hell-fruit he'd brought back to the ship. As I watched, he rolled it around in his hands. "I just have job to do and a decision to make. You?"

"...I'm just really homesick." When Thatch looked at me askance, I went on, "Storms like this remind me of people back home." Then I dragged my hand over my face and sighed again.

"Do you want to talk about them?" Thatch asked. I looked up past my fingertips and he gestured with his Devil Fruit-laden hand as he said, "I don't know if it'll help, but otherwise we're just going to sit here moping."

"Well, I've probably done enough of that already," I admitted, resting my head against my upraised hand. "It's the thunderstorm, you know?"

"What about the storm?" Thatch prompted.

Out at sea, lightning struck a wave and lit the sea in an eerie green glow. The main mass of thunderheads loomed on the horizon, but that bolt was almost like Thor was conducting test-fires. We'd get hit with a killer thunderstorm shortly assuming that the New World's weather patterns actually followed normal rules. Or maybe we'd be hit by the business end of a cyclone when the local weather god threw a fit.

"Some of the most important people in my life remind me of storms. Or maybe storms remind me of them," I said quietly, rubbing one of my eyes and dislodging sleep dust. I flicked my fingers and a loose eyelash flew over the edge of the Moby Dick and out to sea.

Thatch rubbed the scar on the left side of his face in a nervous gesture I'd last seen with Iruka. He sat down next to me, hooking one of his legs around the nearest railing post and putting his Devil Fruit down on the deck.

I side-eyed the evil-looking death-fruit, but didn't say anything about it. Instead, I kicked my legs idly as I thought. "One of them is—he's like a bolt of lightning all on his own. I thought that when I first met him. I even called him 'Sparky' before he introduced himself."

Kakashi and I were both bad at first impressions. He came across as a cool, collected badass when really he was a giant dork. I was a giant dork from start to finish, S-class shinobi or not. And I missed just the two of us reveling in our bookworm sessions so much it almost burned. Having him by my side, feeling his warmth and knowing if either of us stumbled, we'd be together—

I'd get back to that as soon as I fulfilled my quest conditions. For now, it couldn't hurt to be optimistic.

"He's a huge fan of these cheap romance novels and he got me into them, too," I said fondly, since it wasn't like Thatch was going to tell anyone I was a sucker for the Icha-Icha series if he didn't know what they were. "He wants to just read them, but I like pulling them apart and arguing with the author, so we have to pick what times we can do either one."

Thatch snorted, and after a second I found myself smiling faintly. With any luck, I'd see him soon. I'd even let him sit with his feet in my lap instead of the other way around when we got into our book battles.

"There's my kid brother, too—though maybe I shouldn't call him that anymore," I went on. "He's twenty-three and likes to tell me he's not a baby anymore, so I can't tell him what to do." I rubbed my arms to calm the goosebumps struggling to rise under my sleeves as the thunder rolled closer. "That feeling, when the world's standing on a razor's edge and all your hair stands on end…" I paused. "Well, maybe not your hair."

"That would be the power of hair gel at work," Thatch said, which honestly raised more questions than it answered about the tech level of this place.

"I can see that," I said after a while, eyeing Thatch's pompadour. I shook my head. "But I feel that kinda thing now, and it reminds me of him. When I get back, I'm going to probably have to make up for being gone with so many training sessions. Or promise to pay for all the takeout he'll order for the next year."

If he—if he lived long enough to even decide on a punishment like that. The Chūnin Exams could still screw that up.

"The last one is one of my students," I said, trying to stay on topic for one last hurrah. I leaned back, pointing at one of the biggest, angriest-looking clouds on the horizon. "See that cloud, with the lightning that keeps doubling back?"

"Yeah, I see. I wanna hear how this comparison goes," Thatch said, attempting to hide a snicker and failing. "Somehow, I can't see you as a teacher."

"I didn't say I was any good," I muttered, but it was just simple humor. I felt a smile creep onto my face anyway as I finally let the urge to pace and talk overwhelm my reservations. On my feet, I felt more in control and not like I was floating around at someone else's whim.

Without apparently really thinking about it, Thatch mirrored me, but leaned back against the railing and let me gesture as I needed to without getting anywhere close to accidental hitting range. Describing any one of my students always required movement.

"Kaito's a handful. Soaks up everything I teach him, keeps up in any exercise I can think of, but the second he gets riled up, oh man. As much as I love the kid, his temper's a bit…" I twisted my hand in midair, at a loss for the exact word I needed. "But, hey, when I get home I'll be able to help him with that."

...Kaito, Aiko, and Roku were going to break me in half through the force of their hugs alone when I got back.

It was probably a bit messed up that I was looking forward to that almost as much as deconstructing Jiraiya's works with my boyfriend or owing my brother six months' worth of sparring matches.

"So," I said after my mental daydreaming fog wore off, "what are you doing sitting out here, Thatch?"

"Me? I'm on first watch." Thatch grinned at my disappointed frown. And after I'd poured my heart out—well, a small fraction thereof—to the sea and a sympathetic ear, too! "Sorry if you wanted any longer stories, but sometimes the reason is pretty simple."

"And you took that with you as a snack?" I joked, jabbing a finger at the Durian of Doom.

Thatch laughed. "No, no! Besides, everyone tells me these things taste horrible." He bounced the thing in his open palm, as though juggling one-handed. "It's a big decision, you know?"

I stared blankly at Thatch for a long moment before giving him my best clueless shrug. "I really don't. So, I guess I can't give you advice or anything."

"That's fine; I wasn't looking for any," Thatch quipped easily, rolling the Devil Fruit along his arm like it wasn't some kind of weird superpower-imbuing food. Even if it was to taste what nails on a chalkboard was to hearing, the motion struck me as a careless gesture.

My gaze followed the faintly glowing thing as though nailed to it. "Do you plan on getting rid of it?"

There was no chakra—and I cursed myself for thinking danger would have that much of a blatant warning around here—when I got hit.

If I hadn't been standing, I would've been crushed against the deck or the railing. Instead, the hammer-blow that slammed into my side sent me sailing right over the edge of the Moby Dick in an arc just as a bolt of lightning illuminated the deck.

I caught a glimpse of Teach looming over Thatch before I fell.

And then I was falling.

What is happening?! Isobu demanded in shock, his chakra whirling in the distance and changing direction. Neither of us had expected to be attacked. He was on the other end of the island, out of immediate reach.

I didn't have time to answer him.

Years of training kicked in, sending chakra toward my hands and feet as I twisted with the force of the hit. I only needed one hand sign properly formed to use my countermeasure, and I did so without reservation. If I hit the water, it would take me too long to get back to the fight.

Down below, the waves surged up to meet me in the form of a roiling, glowing waterspout, shedding water like flecks of foam from slavering jaws. A fraction of a second later, two glowing yellow eyes peered out of the mass, and the head of the waterspout contorted to form the Water Dragon Bullet's signature shape.

It roared like a living creature, joined by the distant snarl of Isobu breaching the surface of the waves kilometers away. Isobu's voice rolled across the water before being swallowed by thunder, but the message was clear: He was on his way.

The dragon's head caught me around the waist, flinging me back upward and arcing onto solid wood just above the first row of cannons. I hit the hull with three limbs at the same time, let the dragon dissipate into harmless water, then dashed directly up the side of the ship with hardly a pause to form chakra scalpels around my fingertips. In my left hand, I carried my unsealed emergency kunai for what good a real blade might do.

I threw myself up and over the railing again, cataloging changes and reassessing the situation almost automatically. Thatch: Down and bleeding on the deck. Teach: Already running for the other edge of the ship. With Teach retreating, I defaulted to my oldest training: in absence of other help, I was a first responder.

I hurled my kunai at Teach with as much Water and Wind chakra as I could coat it with. I was already turning my attention to Thatch by the time Teach yelped, stumbled, and plummeted off the other railing and into the dark.

I darted back to Thatch, assessing his injuries even as I stripped off the bolero jacket Izo had given me, using it to bind the bleeding man's arm. I couldn't do the same for what looked like the second stab wound, since it was on Thatch's torso, but I could put pressure there. I could do something.

Speaking of something. Isobu, if you see that bastard in the water as you get close, kill him.

Show me exactly what happened, Isobu said, even as he surged underwater toward the Moby Dick.

I sent him as many of the confused images as I could bring to mind. There was no continuity, not like a proper film, but Isobu could link it all together. I just tried to focus on making sure as much of Thatch's blood stayed inside his body as possible.

The entire time, I never used chakra. I couldn't risk it.

Even if I hadn't been specifically banned from using medical ninjutsu back home, I didn't know enough about local human anatomy to risk going in blind. I hadn't sensed any chakra besides mine and Isobu's in the entire time I'd been here, and I couldn't assume that anyone just happened to have a chakra circulatory system they weren't using. My world had been shaped by the Ten-Tails's rampage across it, as had the people living there. These people—there was no way that they had any resistance.

People belowdecks had started running around starting from the time Isobu roared. Someone kicked a door open—against the hinges and splintering the wood—and then there were people all around me and Thatch. Mostly Thatch.

I snapped my gaze up and met the eyes of a nurse named Janey, saying as if by rote, "Teach stabbed Thatch and ducked over the edge of the ship. I'm keeping pressure on the injury, but someone needs to find that bastard before he hurts anyone else."

Ace, who had just arrived, burst into flames and stalked toward the other railing. I noticed, then dismissed his rage as not my immediate concern. A blue flare overhead a moment later told me Marco had joined him in the search for the traitor.

"Let me take over," Janey suggested, and I spotted two more pink-uniformed nurses over her shoulder.

Good enough. I let Janey get past me and put pressure on the wound as people shouted for stretchers, doctors, and the rest of the nurses who generally tended to Whitebeard. Pirates scattered around the ship, shouting orders at each other and trying to do too many things at once.

Thatch was bundled up in a stretcher and taken into the ship without much specific fanfare.

Which direction did he head in? Isobu growled, half to himself. I was sure I heard him mutter something dire about New World weather and rains of frogs, but was already getting to my feet and trying to figure out what to do next.

I have no idea. Do the best you can—but make sure you don't attack Ace or Marco.

How you think I could mistake a fiery blue bird for a man on the run is a question I do not need answered. I am not nearsighted.

No, you're farsighted.

Maybe that wasn't going to work out. Already the wind howled overhead like a monster Isobu's size, lightning spewing everywhere. And the Moby Dick was the tallest object around, with the main mast getting struck repeatedly.

I stopped the nearest Division Commander, Namur, and almost forgot the awkwardness between us as I said, "Teach should be wounded. I threw a knife at him before he went off the port side."

I didn't just throw a knife at him. But I wasn't sure I'd compensated for his body mass correctly. What would have killed a normal-sized man might not have been enough for him.

"We'll get him," Namur snarled, but he was already looking past me and darting toward where, belatedly, I realized Teach had left a blood trail before falling off. A shark fishman would be able to track him even in a storm, right?

He couldn't have gotten far away, could he?

Isobu, watch out. Namur's in the water. Make sure you don't kill him by mistake.

I understand.

"Kei, are you all right?" asked a rather sleep-rumpled Haruta. His sword was stuck in his belt without its sheath and the Shakespearean collar he wore normally was entirely missing.

I looked down at myself, because I wasn't sure of the answer to that question. My hands were covered in blood, as were the knees of my pants from Thatch's blood pooling on the deck. My left side ached where Teach had hit me, but my healing rate would take care of that problem practically before bruising started. Still, I wasn't hurt so much as I was angry at myself for not expecting something to happen, and for letting Thatch get stabbed.

And not to mention I was missing my holdout weapon. One last cherry on top of this terrible sundae.

"None of the blood is mine," I told Haruta, sighing. "Worry about Thatch and Teach."

"Oh, we're well ahead of you there," said Vista as he passed by. "And Haruta, get up in the crow's nest. Marco went out without checking in."

"Fine, fine," Haruta said, and was gone in an instant.

I drifted over to where some members of the Sixteenth Division were starting to clean up the blood, with Izo supervising. Mops and heavy-duty cleaning agents made their first appearance in maybe twenty minutes.

"Let me help," I suggested quietly when Izo turned toward me. Without anything to do, I was just spinning my wheels in place.

Izo took one long look at me, gripped my shoulder, and then said, "You saved Thatch's life. Thank you."

Running on reflex alone, I might've denied it. All I'd done is keep a bit more blood in him and wound the man who'd attacked him. We didn't know if Thatch was going to live or die. That was down to his will and local medical procedures. So really, Izo was being a bit optimistic.

But it didn't feel right. So instead, I merely said, "I did my best."

Izo patted my shoulder and let me go with a vague suggestion to sit down somewhere.

All we could do was wait. Wait for Thatch to recover or die, wait for Teach to be captured or escape…

I sat down in an unoccupied corner of the deck, nearly curled into a ball with my face hidden under my hand. Not because I was afraid, or even tired. No, I was doing my level best to suppress my adrenaline-enhanced chakra and be productive about it instead of burning someone.

Isobu? If Thatch dies, we're adding "killing that fratricidal bastard" to the to-do list.

If he escapes, I will have no objections. Isobu was already around the tip of the island and searching for any swimming shapes that didn't belong to Namur. In fact, I will see to it personally. No one strikes you and lives.

"THAT BASTARD!"

It was probably for the best that Whitebeard's cabin was reinforced. I'd never seen Ace lose his temper (without a target), but he was currently burning up and not in the figurative way. I surreptitiously stepped to the side as he raised the ambient temperature by an uncomfortable amount. Marco's flames were neither active nor hot, but being a phoenix apparently gave him the leeway to just stand next to Ace, hand on his shoulder, and not melt.

Whitebeard sat on the edge of his bed with a jug of sake at his knee. The jug itself was probably as big as the barrels he'd been using as mugs earlier, but none of the nurses had taken this particular vessel away from him before the meeting.

Probably for the best, too.

"Thatch is still alive," Marco reminded Ace, and though Marco's hand was fried to a crisp more than once, the blue flames overrode the damage time and again.

Kinda masochistic of him, I thought.

I suggest you listen to their conversation rather than thinking up witty asides.

Ace took a deep breath and the flames finally went out. Shortly after, Marco's hand stopped needing to regenerate. I caught a glimpse of hideous blisters and desiccated flesh before the blue flames swallowed it up again and left whole skin in its wake. Not something I wanted to see again.

"And meanwhile the guy who stabbed him in the back is still out there," Ace snarled, looking like he was ready to burst into flames again at any moment. "And he was one of my men."

"It's not your fault," I said, finally speaking up. The only reason I was even here was because I was the last person to see Teach, since Thatch was still unconscious. When the others noticed I was still there, I said quietly, "I was the one there. I was careless."

"You already suspected Teach?" Marco asked, his eyes narrower than usual. It wasn't quite an accusation, but I didn't want to push my luck either.

"I didn't expect him to do anything," I corrected him. "I just didn't trust him. But I think people already knew that."

"You were worried about how it'd sound if you accused him of something," Marco suggested, but I was already shaking my head.

"Commander Marco—" He'd never given me permission to not use his title, right? "I'm not a part of your crew. Teach was. It wasn't my place."

As though drawn there by a magnet, all three of our gazes drifted to Whitebeard.

The old captain was...I didn't know the exact word I was looking for. While the initial reaction to Teach's betrayal had been only subdued compared to that of his commanders, the old man wasn't the type to maintain a boiling rage. He was proud, sure, and stubborn, but he was experienced enough to calculate risks. I could see the same number-crunching that he'd gone through earlier on the deck of the Moby Dick, with Thatch's blood still trapped between the boards.

Whitebeard had wasted no time making Teach the first son he'd ever disowned. Teach, any allies he'd ever find, and all of his deeds weren't going to be scrubbed from the records or anything like that, but if he ever appeared again he'd certainly need to watch his massive back. He was an enemy from this day onward.

Or at least that was how Vista explained it to me.

But Whitebeard had made his judgment and now his first and second mate were trying to hash out the details.

"At this point, it's more your place to say things like that than it is his," Marco commented darkly, and I had to admit he had a point. Though I still wasn't truly involved in the pirates' affairs, an enemy deserved far less consideration.

"And you're sure it was the Devil Fruit that started it?" Ace asked, though I'd already said more or less just that.

"I only know what I saw," I said, though I had my suspicions. It was never quite that simple. There had to have been a confluence of factors the Whitebeards had never put together, one of which was simply that Teach hid far more ambition than anyone suspected. The Devil Fruit was just an excuse. A trigger at worst.

It's just like Orochimaru before he started experimenting on children, and look where that got us. But it wouldn't help if I said that, so I kept my trap shut.

This silence did not seem to go over particularly well. The longer it went, the longer everyone stewed, and then the tipping point arrived.

"I still should have known!" Ace growled. He looked almost like he was going to explode into flames again, but he instead ran one hand through his hair and knocked his hat off. "He was up for promotion before I was, but he's been with us for years and I didn't see this coming."

"None of us did," Marco reminded him. The were-phoenix looked up at the ceiling for a moment, then said in an attempt to change the topic, "Kei, how did you get away unscathed? Thatch is a division commander. You're…not."

"You're right, but…" I raised my left arm, so he could see the bruises there better. They already looked like they were three days old, even under my Isobu tattoo. "Teach hit me, but I heal really well. The second…" I made the Tiger seal with my fingers.

Both Marco and Ace jumped back as water spiraled out of the air and condensed into a puddle a foot to my left. Then it sprang up into a humanoid shape, still transparent, before turning into a proper Water Clone. Then there were two of me standing in that room.

"What the hell?" Ace demanded, flames flaring along his shoulders. So much for self-control.

"You see," I said, as both my clone and I turned to face the pirates, "water is my weapon. I can't use it for everything, but when I got thrown off the ship, the sea tossed me back up." I shifted my weight, then twisted my wrist. The Water Clone popped and dispersed into ordinary, inert water that I gathered into a Rasengan-like ball above my upraised right hand. "Teach didn't know I could do this. So he just smacked me around and actually fought Thatch."

"But…you can still swim." Ace strode my way, then reached out and touched the ball that was about as dangerous as a water balloon. Under his flaming hand, the ball quickly started to boil. It was, after all, only ordinary freshwater. "I checked that right when you got on Striker with me. If you'd eaten a Devil Fruit, you wouldn't have been able to do anything as soon as you touched seawater."

"It's not a Devil Fruit power," I said, closing my fingers under the water ball and letting it flash away into steam under Ace's fire without my reinforcement. I turned my face toward Whitebeard and simply said, "But I survived Teach hitting me thanks to this. The fall would've killed me otherwise."

Only if he had managed to actually stun you, and thus render you incapable of catching yourself on the water's surface. And even then, I would not bet on the ocean. Isobu said it like he didn't harbor a vicious streak a mile wide and a grudge toward Teach for activating it. He could have been discussing the weather.

Teach thought it would kill me. It's the only reason I can think of that he didn't bother, say, stabbing me like he did Thatch. It seemed that my goofball tendencies had served me well. Given how I'd been acting over the last week, no one would have guessed that I was a deadly fighter when I wanted to be.

No one would have guessed that Teach was a murderer, either. Other than those who read the dictionary definition of his career choice.

And we'd both blown our respective covers, both with regard to each other and in general. I hoped his stab wound ached at least as much as my arm did, if he hadn't just shrugged such a tiny projectile off.

"Devil Fruit or not, the important thing is that everyone is alive," Whitebeard said, either no longer angry enough for it to show in his voice or pushing it aside for more productive emotions.

I closed my eyes, bowing again for lack of any better options. "I'm sorry I couldn't stop him from getting away, and for any trouble I've caused you."

My shoulders twitched as Whitebeard laughed. "There is nothing to forgive. As long as my sons are alive and well, what do I care that a guest of ours has strange powers? This is, after all, the New World."

I still wasn't all that sure what it meant, but I could understand the general sentiment. The Whitebeards were accepting my choices even if they didn't agree.

Marco stepped back, and I watched his sandaled feet move across the floor toward me out of the corner of my eye. "Go ahead and stand up. You did well."

Ace sighed aloud as I looked up. "Besides, it wouldn't be fair to be angry at you for keeping secrets. Everyone here has a few."

"I'm not so much keeping secrets as not mentioning things," I muttered, but I relaxed anyway. Meeting each man's eyes in turn, I finally said, "If that's all, I'm going to go change and then maybe visit Thatch, if it's allowed. Thank you."

I left Whitebeard's cabin silently, since I was no longer hiding at least some of my skill level.

"Wait up a second," Ace's voice said, just before I turned the corner toward the medical bay—which was where I was bunked anyway.

"What is it?" To be perfectly honest, I wanted to just not deal with the various Whitebeard commanders for a while. A vigil with a guy who was unconscious from blood loss felt about my speed.

His face was as placid as the thunderstorm that had raged outside barely an hour ago when he rounded the corner himself. But he managed to achieve something more akin to equilibrium by the time he was close enough to talk.

What he said next was a perfectly neutral, "I'm gonna visit Thatch, too. Maybe if he hears us, he'll wake up faster."

But I remembered what I'd seen.

I watched Ace's face carefully for any further warning signs. Not of rage directed at me, but anger and loss twisted around on itself like a double-edged kunai. Even if I hadn't been from Konoha—and therefore the home of the fucking Uchiha clan—I doubted I would have had a lot of respect for vengeance as a motive. Maybe I was too wishy-washy to commit, but my relationship with vengeance was pretty hit or miss. Either I got my payback sorted out immediately, or I let it lie.

Call it a hunch, but this was not over.

"Okay. Let's go."

I later kicked him out of the medical bay and adjoining areas so I could change, but hey, he really should have expected that.

I didn't leave the Moby Dick the next day. Or the one after. Or the one after that.

The first couple of days were frantic. The various commanders scoured the sea and the nearby islands for any sign of Teach in shifts, while Isobu swore that he would control the capricious ocean of the New World if it was the last thing he ever did. Given his immortality, he had plenty of time to practice with his chakra control and make the sea obey him.

It didn't make Teach any easier to find in the meantime.

As strange as it sounded, the thieving backstabber—because it turned out the Devil Fruit was gone, too—had successfully gone to ground. I would've thought that he wouldn't be able to blend in when all fifteen active Whitebeard commanders were out and about with their divisions and chasing him where they could, but apparently the New World was wilder than I'd given it credit for. And it was already breaking the bank.

Somewhere in the back of my head, I'd expected to be thrown off the ship because I was the only one who'd seen Teach's betrayal and could talk about it. The situation as it stood was effectively my word against that of a man the Whitebeards couldn't find. But Whitebeard believed my account of events, as did his commanders.

I was still a bit wary.

"We don't even have a brig, not really," Vista said, when I hesitantly broached the idea anyway. "It's more of a drunk tank. Sometimes crewmates get out of hand, so we stick them in there until they sober up."

"I imagine the hangovers would make them easier to manage after that point," I muttered, rubbing the back of my neck.

Vista grinned. "You're not wrong." Then he paused, looking down at me since I was more than four full feet shorter than he was. "Were you really worried we'd lock you up?"

"Ace said Teach was on the crew longer than he was, and no one expected anything like this," I explained, still a bit uncomfortable. "I've been here for less than two weeks. It'd—it'd make sense if people were angry at me."

"It's a little difficult to be angry at someone who clearly saved a crewmate's life," Vista pointed out reasonably. "If it wasn't for you, Thatch wouldn't have lasted long enough for the nurses to get there."

More like if not for Isobu. His roar had woken the entire ship and sent them scrambling for battle stations. My awareness had narrowed just to Thatch and his injuries, for all the good I would have done without Janey and the others.

"Anyone else would've done the same thing…"

"But no one else was in the right spot," Vista said, and I had to nod in agreement. He reached down and patted my shoulder. "I'm on my way out. Did you want to come with?"

I blinked. "Uh, I haven't really been off the ship..." Nor had I gotten a chance to replace the bolero Izo had given me, what with the ongoing manhunt. I hadn't actually seen Izo since Teach's betrayal.

"An excellent time to start, then." Vista apparently viewed this as the end of the conversation, and walked off.

"...Okay then," I mumbled, and went to go find a spare coat just in case.

The coat I ended up retrieving from the spare clothing bin was apparently designed for someone about a foot taller than me, so the rough red material went a fair bit past the ends of my fingers. It also had the Whitebeard Pirates emblem displayed proudly across the shoulders, which mostly ended up reminding me I was a bit of a fake for using it.

Still, Vista seemed to approve. "Now you look like one of us."

"I suppose I do," I admitted, as we headed toward the starboard side of the deck. "Is anyone else going to, uh—"

"Foodvalten," Vista supplied.

"—Yeah, that place," I finished, since it wasn't like I knew where anything was out here.

"I think a couple of members of the Second Division are coming along," Vista said, finally answering my question. "Supply runs need to be completed whether we have other problems to deal with or not."

I thought that over. "And if you just so happen to run into Teach along the way…?"

"Then we'll get to cut the manhunt short, won't we?" said a new voice, and I turned to find Eastwood and Sinbad among the group milling around on the deck. I didn't recognize most of the pirates around them, who seemed to be part of Vista's Fifth Division instead.

Vista gave a noncommittal shrug, though his eyes hardened. "Let's concentrate on our jobs for right now."

"Where's Commander Ace?" I asked, while the Fifth Division pirates got a couple of smaller scouting vessels ready to go. Landing vessels? Anyway, they were more rowboat than anything, despite the sails.

"He's staying with Thatch," Eastwood said, checking his pistols one last time. "So, any idea what you want to get on Foodvalten?"

"...If I had the slightest idea what was there, maybe," I said somewhat sheepishly. "I just need something to do and Commander Vista invited me along."

"Well, I hope you like being a manual laborer for the day," Sinbad said, "because food runs always take elbow grease."

"I think I can handle that," I said, flapping a dismissive hand—and sleeve—at my skeptical pirate friends. "I might not seem that tough, but I'm not a stranger to hard work."

It was very difficult to both be Gai's friend and unaware of the concept, at least. Sinbad and Eastwood just exchanged shrugs and helped me into the boat despite my lack of need for it. I probably could have walked down the side of the Moby Dick to about the same effect, but still didn't have any interest in exposing more of my tricks to anyone.

Foodvalten was a…really, I would have called it a rock formation more than anything. It looked like a free-standing chunk of stone that had been eroded away via rivers instead of an ocean, topped generously with bird-delivered plant life and also a small town somewhere in the middle of the bay. The people on the island wore feathers on their heads—which made me give Eastwood's cowboy hat a sidelong look yet again.

While someone in Vista's division oversaw the bulk purchases—flour, pickled everything, and so on—the rest of the Whitebeards fanned out to search for whatever they wanted.

"What are you getting?" Sinbad asked, having founded and purchased some kind of knife set from a local shop. There wasn't a weapon shop on the island for what I needed, so I held off on that front.

I shrugged. "I don't have any money, so probably not much."

Eastwood snapped his fingers. "Right, you don't get a share of the loot. I forgot about that."

The Whitebeard Pirate emblem on my back was probably messing with him. It certainly messed with everyone else.

Sinbad frowned. "I could cover what you want. You don't need to pay me back unless it's really expensive."

"Thank you, Sinbad," I said, bowing just a bit. "I'll try looking around."

I ended up buying a number of small paintbrushes. Nothing like the ones that Fossa's division used, which were more for the ship-suitable paint that went toward re-varnishing the Moby Dick, but instead my choices were delicate. The thinnest one was best-suited for particularly finicky watercolors, while the thickest of them would work for fūinjutsu as long as I carefully maintained it.

I immediately snatched the case up as soon as Sinbad bought them for me, tucking them carefully into my borrowed jacket's inner pocket. I poked and prodded at the packet, almost giddy with excitement at having found something I could use for fūinjutsu even this far out into the middle of nowhere.

Of course, my traveling companions noticed. After the second time Sinbad caught me fidgeting and taking the brushes out to marvel at them, he said, "...Um, you seem kinda attached to those."

I felt my cheekbones start to color a bit, and coughed. "It's been ages since I've had my own brushes. I, um, I do calligraphy sometimes."

"...Okay," was all he said, even as he edged away from me.

"If I can find some paper, maybe I could write a poem or something for Thatch," I mused aloud, "or maybe copy one down. Maybe a thank-you letter? For when he wakes up."

"I don't think Thatch is one for poetry, Kei," said Eastwood.

...Crap. Maybe a painting? I wasn't a particularly good artist after a lifetime of mostly not practicing, but I could probably come up with something. Oh, and I could even sign it with a tracking seal. I'd definitely find the Moby Dick again if I could get one of them to work.

"Ask Vista," Eastwood suggested.

I didn't actually get a chance to, because someone in the Fifth Division gave a shout and drew all of our attention back to the bay. As one, all of the Whitebeards rushed out of the town and toward the landing boats.

Marco, in full phoenix form, landed neatly just on the edge of the docks and perched on a post. In a burst of blue flame, he reverted his head, torso, and legs to human form and turned to Vista, saying something before taking off again.

The message, when Vista turned to all of us, turned out to be, "Thatch is awake."

Before I knew it, two weeks passed.

I painted a grayscale landscape scene, of the Hokage Mountain and the four somewhat silly-looking heads carved into it. Instead of depicting any of the buildings resting in its shadow, I did my best to portray a placid lake that, really, looked more like something out of the Valley of the End before Rin and I battled Sasori in it. The lake certainly didn't look like that now.

The Whitebeards mostly didn't know what to make of it—Jozu mentioned that it didn't quite look real—but they hung it up in the galley for Thatch to see when he finally returned to the kitchen. I wrote a little get-well note on the edge of the bastardized sumi-e painting, and hid a tracking seal underneath the canvas. Then it was just time to wait for Thatch to see it.

And man, were the Whitebeards eager to have him back.

While Thatch was effectively banned from the kitchen because of his injuries, I had been helping the Fourth Division volunteers in the kitchen for the most part. The results…well, they spoke for themselves. Even Ace balked at eating some of the things we'd come up with.

Sitting in the medical bay with Thatch—who was getting one last checkup for the sake of his spleen—and Ace let me know that quite clearly. Especially during lunch.

Ace set down a spoon still laden with food. It had an unappetizing pudding-like consistency and similar looks. I was mostly sure that part was not my fault. I'd been working on slicing meat, so tapioca had not featured anywhere on my workstation. If it had, I would have been very confused.

"If I didn't have actual proof that someone wanted me dead…" Thatch trailed off in a warning tone, looking at the food like it would rear up and try to kill him.

"You're not allowed to joke about that," Ace said flatly.

"I'm the one who almost died. I can make all the jokes I want," Thatch argued. He said to me, "Kei, are you sure the guys in the kitchen actually want me to live?"

"Everyone else does," I deadpanned, picking up the spoon and twirling it in the…yeah, that was probably gravy. It was thankfully inert. "You should hear them complain."

"Well, then. Let me out of here and I can fix that right up!" Though mollified by the thought, Thatch was still a bit faded-looking. While people on this ship seemed to heal much faster than normal, the medics around here were taking no chances. They kept yanking him out of normal duty rotation.

"Do it before your side heals and I'll kill you myself!" yelled Janey from across the room, and Thatch wilted immediately.

Case in point.

Ace and I exchanged looks while Thatch moped on the cot with his poor pompadour drooping down over his face. He was the saddest seven-foot puppy I'd ever seen.

On the other hand, I'd long since learned to never argue with medics of any stripe.

"I look forward to eating your food again soon," I said to Thatch, before slipping off the side of his bed.

Ace was well ahead of me, and the last thing I heard from Janey was, "Hey, didn't you get smacked around by that—GET BACK HERE!"

Hell no.

Neither of us stopped running until we reached the deck, and immediately hid behind Jozu and Vista to avoid any scalpel-laden reprisal.

"Did you two do something?" Jozu asked, lifting his arm to get a look at Ace using him like a human shield.

"Not me," Ace refuted cheerfully.

"It's more about what I didn't do. Which was visit them after Thatch got hurt. Janey just remembered," I said from my vantage point behind Vista. After we sorted ourselves out and pretended that the last five seconds hadn't happened, and I said, "By the way, where do you get your swords?"

"Hm? On the next island over, actually." Vista scratched the base of his second-only-to-Whitebeard mustache. "We never did get those replacement swords. If we do, do you plan on sparring with us?"

I held up my hands. "Hey, no, I'm just trying to get all my ducks in a row. I need supplies if I'm gonna be able to complete my mission."

"You're still leaving?" Ace asked, and I got another punch in the heart.

Why were grown pirates so good at guilt-tripping me just by making sad faces at me? I was a total sucker, wasn't I?

"You barely know anything about sailing, though," Ace insisted. "You said it yourself. If you head out to sea unprepared, you'll die!"

I scowled. "I can handle things myself, one way or another." I still wouldn't tell this secret, but it was rather an important one. Does my inexperience really matter when you're navigating using all the world's currents?

In a word: No.

"How about this, then?" Vista suggested, before Ace could spontaneously combust again. He drew one of his swords and said, "If we can find you a sword and you can prove you can make it out there on your own, then we might let you go."

I stepped back to eye Vista's slightly oversized…well, it was a sword, but the finish on it was more "cutlass" than "katana." The blade part looked like the razor's edge of a katana, but the hilt was too short to be of use, and I didn't like the hand guard in the slightest.

"Only if I get something that is a bit less…gilded," I said at last, still skeptical.

Vista was too dignified of a man to develop an eye tic. Or so he thought. "What's wrong with my swords?"

"They're not what I use," I explained, but perhaps not very well. If I stayed on the Moby Dick any longer, I'd become the world champion of sticking my foot in my mouth. Hm. "My preferred sword is a katana with no ornamentation. I sometimes use the sheath too, but for the most part I fight two-handed with one blade."

Vista twisted the ends of his mustache in thought. "I could find you one of those easily enough. But don't they break in your hands?"

I'd have a lot fewer intact tendons if that was the case. "I've only gotten my blades broken by other people. Doesn't really slow me down too much." I paused as an idea struck me. Maybe I'd have a chance to get off the ship if I played this right… "Would it be possible for me to spar with someone, to prove I can take care of myself?"

"Oh, I could take you on. I've been getting bored around here," Ace said, raising his hand, which got a raised eyebrow from me. Cocky firebug.

Perfect.

"Ace, I could drown you in four seconds," I said flatly.

There was a collective "oooooooh" from the nearby pirates. Really, they wouldn't be pirates if they weren't easily amused by the silly things happening in their vicinity, and already money was changing hands.

Ace's hackles rose right on cue. "I'd like to see you try!"

"Wait until Vista finds me a sword, and then I'll show off." I crossed my arms. "Not before then."

Funny how when I was being mild-mannered and not confrontational, I couldn't get anything done or find any supplies for what I really needed. When I challenged a Whitebeard commander, though, the game was quite different. The sword I wanted appeared within two days, and there was none of the "Oh, Haruta broke everything" runaround going on.

It was a conspiracy. And I was done being jerked around.

I attached my sword to my hip thanks to a fashionable belt, but already was making plans to include enough pockets for any incarnation of Batman I'd ever heard of. Once I managed to fill in the gaps in my arsenal—via reconstructing every storage seal I had ever needed—I would be the world's most terrifying user of a really basic technique.

Then again, I was the only ninja around. That made me the most terrifying by default.

"You're still sure you want to do this?" Haruta asked as our boat landed on the shore.

Haruta wasn't a Devil Fruit user, so he and I and the rest of the pirates on this particular rowboat could have probably swam to shore. Apparently, though, everyone wanted to look their best for this particular mess. Even Captain Whitebeard was on the little deserted island where Ace and I would be beating each other silly, sitting next to Thatch so the nurses could fuss over both of them at the same time.

I hoped it would be a bit shorter than all that. Most fights didn't last long enough to justify rowing half the crew out to spectate.

"Commander Haruta, I said I need to leave because I have things to do," I reminded him in an even tone. "If this gets me off the ship without having to swan dive off a railing in the middle of the night, I'll take it."

"You wouldn't actually do that, would you?" asked Sinbad, who had also been in the boat.

My eyes narrowed. "I might be tempted."

But really, I wasn't trying that hard. If I had been determined to escape, I would have taken off immediately after the medics said Thatch would live. Or else disappeared before then and…missed the moment when Teach betrayed them, and Thatch would've died.

I tried not to think about how close that had been.

"Liar," said Haruta. "You know you love us."

I shrugged and moved on past Haruta, stalking toward the fateful stretch of beach where Ace was already waiting. Well, time to play.

The new battlefield was, if I was being honest, actually perfect. A gray, sandy beach that Ace would probably turn into glass on one side, and beautiful blue ocean on the other with so few large waves that I'd be able to have the run of the place. Aside from errant seabirds that were going to have to learn how to get the hell out of Dodge before being roasted, it was free of any occupants other than Ace and—after I took a few more steps—me.

Once I arrived, the assembled pirates started chattering again. I heard a few more bets being thrown around, with the men of Ace's division most totally behind their commander's victory. There were a few people holding out to make a killing when or if I scraped a win, but they were in the clear minority.

I had no intention whatsoever of making this a fair fight. Given that everyone around me was a pirate, I had to assume that Ace wouldn't either—the question was merely if he believed he could win without fighting dirty due to sheer power.

We could make it even more imbalanced if I were to join in.

Don't think I'll need it, I thought, even as I placed my right hand on the hilt of my borrowed sword. But hey, if I lose you can say "I told you so."

You say that as if I needed your permission for doing so.

I sighed internally. Point.

"We fight until one of us can't anymore. Sound good?" Ace suggested though from about ten meters off. We were both fast enough that a starting gap didn't make much of a difference, but there was such a thing as social niceties to observe.

"Sounds pretty normal to me," I said neutrally, glancing toward Whitebeard. He wasn't actually officiating our match, but Marco, who was, stood right next to him and would listen to his captain's ruling. Unofficial or not.

Whitebeard looked…nostalgic? How many times had members of his crew fought weird upstarts, anyway?

"Begin when ready," Marco said, sounding about as interested as he ever looked. Which was…not. Ever.

Then it was time to give Ace my full attention before he turned all the local wildlife into barbecue.

Fire crawled along Ace's shoulders as I made the Ox hand sign and then raised my left arm skyward, fingers of both hands forming the Seal of Confrontation.

The nearby ocean hissed, and then I blanketed the entire area in mist thicker than pea soup. Hidden Mist technique, detection style.

I couldn't navigate using my chakra sense when no one else had any, but I could swamp the entire area in mine and figure out where Ace was based on the dead zone he kept boiling away. So I crept around the battlefield unseen as my fog made the world very, very gray. Channeling chakra through my feet, I passed unseen toward the edge of the marked battlefield without even leaving any footprints.

"What the hell?" demanded what sounded like Janey's voice. "We can't see anything like this!"

Ace laughed aloud, his fire burning off another chunk of the mist. "You're seriously hiding from me?"

Like I'd dignify that with a response.

"Heat Haze!" And then Ace was blasting the mist apart in the direction he thought I was with a stream of fire. Which, thanks to the power of both weather anomalies and my shinobi sneaking skills, ended up actually being in the broad direction of the audience before the flames curved up and away.

…Had no one ever taught him not to call out what attack he was using? Sure, it didn't matter since I didn't know what he could really do, but that was a very bad habit.

I dropped a Water Clone in the midst of the mist even as I pumped still more of it into the air. Unless Ace managed to evaporate the ocean, I could maintain the mist with minimal chakra cost pretty much until I didn't want to anymore. While I was not Zabuza and therefore specialized in silent killing, I had enough chakra in my coils to put him to shame by far.

Hm. Technically speaking, if Ace set the entire battlefield on fire, none of that would matter. He only wasn't because there were so many flammable people around.

"Hiding isn't gonna win this fight for you," Ace said, while I sent my Water Clone ghosting past his shoulder as the mist swamped everything again.

"Isn't it, though?" my clone asked cheerfully, ducking under the reflexive punch Ace sent its way. The clone wouldn't touch him, not when he could boil it to death in a second, but it could distract the hell out of him pretty easily.

My clone wove around and sidestepped every unpowered strike, by a hair's breadth at most because while Ace was a brawler he was good at it. He just didn't use nearly as much technique as the fighters I'd been dealing with recently, including my own students.

…Well, I also happened to be the kind of person who preferred dodging by practically nothing. And my clone was going to move like me even if it was working off one-tenth of my strength at most.

"How,"—punch— "the"—and a miss! — "hell"—another miss—

My clone whirled on the spot and launched a roundhouse kick at Ace's head, but Ace's blocking arm and shoulder hissed away into fire. The retaliatory strike ("Cross Fire!") boiled the clone's top half away in an instant.

Oops.

"What the hell, seriously?" Ace shouted as the clone's remaining volume splattered across the sand. "You're not even fighting me yourself!"

I shot out of the deeper section of mist and sliced Ace's arm from his body.

The total lack of chakra in the strike meant my sword mostly just made Ace's bicep tattoo look somewhat uneven as the fire sorted it out. He looked over his shoulder, grin widening, and then he dissolved entirely into a man-shaped blaze.

I swapped places with the second Water Clone I had made and felt it pop into an inert puddle, and then immediately created two more from the mist right in front of Ace. They were close enough to jump him, and did so.

And as I got my feet under me again, I sent Water chakra streaming down the length of my katana to form a place for a supercavitation bubble to form. I spun the blade once in my hands, testing for air resistance and, thanks to the mist gathered all around us, picking up more water to use as I went.

I dropped the Hidden Mist technique for just a second, collapsing its mass into a single extended wall of water that led directly from me to Ace. He was already whirling around to face me, right fist aflame, when I got the attack off.

Water Release: Displacement Wave Sword.

More of a passing fancy than anything real, I'd wondered once upon a time what would happen if I used the Curve of the Moon kenjutsu technique underwater.

This wasn't that. This was me basically forcing a shockwave through the water as hard as possible to see what would happen. Theory into practice, and frankly I didn't expect much of the result.

What happened was Ace ducking as the still-sharp slash kept traveling even as it emerged from the other end of the water wall, tearing through a sand dune on the far side and then splitting three palm trees in half in sequence. The attack pattern made no sense to me—I hadn't been using Wind chakra at all—but clearly the pirates knew what was happening.

"Oh, an air blade! Looks a bit like the Tempest Kick, but not as polished…" said someone. Probably Vista. "Hey, Ace, still feeling like this is gonna be easy?"

…Not what I meant to do. At all. I could have killed him if the hit connected because of the chakra behind it.

Ace just tipped his hat forward, then his hands started glowing green as he held them out in front of him. It almost looked like the opening stance of the Kamehameha. "Firefly!"

Hidden Mist! The mist swirled in and around us, but this time it was punctuated by little green orbs of lights that flowed out of Ace's hands. Frowning, I sent a Water Clone to investigate one and slowly retreated to the waves.

The clone ran right into one of the little glowing things, and then a three-meter fireball was where an innocent-looking green orb used to be. My clone exploded into water droplets, briefly disturbing the mist before it flowed back over the site and the scorched beach sand.

I couldn't maneuver with those things around. But I was also pretty sure that out of the two of us, I was the only one who could tell where everyone was without having to blow the mist apart.

"Come out, come out, wherever you are," I heard Ace taunt me.

How old did he think I was? Five?

Still, I needed his fireballs off the field.

One of them randomly exploded due to hitting one of its counterparts, which at least proved that they were not stable. It didn't mean Ace couldn't control them, but the slightest touch could set them off.

While I knelt offshore, using the mist like a sort of spider web, Ace apparently decided that patience was for other people and shouted, "Fiery Doll!"

The green fireballs all started to burn their way through the mist, homing in on a clone I'd left standing around doing nothing other than being a convenient target. It wasn't even a solid, but seeing its silhouette in the mist near him must've given him enough of a heading to work from.

I let him destroy the plain clone in front of him with a massive blast of fire reminiscent of Obito's if Uchiha fire was brilliant, eye-searing green. It saved me the effort of launching explosive rocks all over the place to clear it out the hard way if he detonated everything on the battlefield himself. Circling slowly around the perimeter of the battlefield, I closed my eyes and left him to it.

Once again, my mist swallowed the fire the instant Ace stopped using the little fireballs as cluster bombs, effortlessly calling up more water from the ocean. Sure, the mist smelled like burned seaweed and old fish, but it was still obscuring Ace's vision.

"Do you want me to take this seriously?" Ace demanded, while another clone once again darted into the mist. This one was solid, again, but I couldn't keep wasting energy on that kind of thing and not attacking.

…Well, I could, but not if I wanted to win.

Almost there…

"Should I?" asked my clone, slightly to the left, and Ace immediately swung and blasted the entire immediate section of beach into glass. My clone boiled and flashed away into nothing but steam, but once again the mist flooded back in to fill the gap.

…Not heading over there, then.

I could assist you if—

I'm not trying to kill him, Isobu.

Still, Ace was in the near-center of the battlefield, and he still needed to be dealt with. I directed the last clone to expend its chakra a little differently, then tightened the mist into a thickening ring around myself even as more rushed in to hide the movement from Ace.

"Screw the mind games. Fire Fist!" Ace roared, and then the air itself was on fire and heading rapidly in my actual direction.

The first layer of my mist shield flashed away into uncontrolled water vapor, but the rest joined a rising wall of water that met and deflected the leading edge of Ace's flame. Behind it, I had my fingers locked in the Tiger seal and continued to blast torrents of water outward from my mouth to maintain it. It probably sounded a little like a waterfall in miniature.

Water Release: Water Wall.

It met the expanding burst of flame in a steam explosion that caused people around the fight to start screaming. I didn't know if they were hurt or if they were just freaking out, but I didn't have time to wonder.

And then I Replaced myself with my remaining Water Clone.

I blinked back into reality under a foot of beach sand and water, with heat still seeping down from overhead. Holding my breath, I reestablished the mist the second Ace's fire stopped being quite so prominent—perhaps as he stopped to pant or wonder where I was—and then I yanked all of the water within my range.

The mist froze in place, the waves stilled, and then I tore the water up out of the sand and snapped those metaphorical jaws shut around Ace.

There were a hundred voices screaming at once, audible even under the sand.

"Wh-what the hell? Is that water?" asked someone who sounded like Eastwood, though there was still some sand in my ears.

I popped out of the sand a second later, feeling like the world's least fortunate groundhog, and surveyed my work once I gave myself an impromptu rinse via the remaining uncondensed mist. Of which there was maybe a handful left.

My arm was embedded up to the elbow in my Water Prison, and Ace…was completely failing to float in my watery fishbowl of a technique. While his eyes were still moving, he was unable to so much as lift a finger in my direction.

Just as planned.

Seawater stuck my hair to my head and dripped off the end of my nose as the remaining loose threads of the technique splashed the sand off of me. I probably looked like a total mess. But I had accomplished my goal.

"WHAT JUST HAPPENED?" demanded two hundred voices at once.

I flexed my hand and the Water Prison deformed slightly. Inside of the technique's depths, Ace's hat drifted off his head and a stream of bubbles escaped his mouth. He didn't move one bit, though I had specifically relaxed the physical bindings of the technique. Devil Fruit users really couldn't swim, could they?

"The match is over," Whitebeard said, his voice carrying easily across the suddenly silent crowd.

I glanced up, surveying the mostly-stunned pirates, then jerked my hand out of the Water Prison.

The bubble collapsed instantly, leaving a stunned and coughing Ace lying on the sand with no idea what the hell had happened.

After a second's consideration, I made the Tiger hand seal and the remaining water clinging to both of us streamed away into silvery ropes in midair. After a little longer, I sent all of it splashing back into the sea proper, shrugging to myself and sticking one hand out to Ace to help him up.

Ace coughed as he sat up, spitting up more water, then brushed the back of his hand across his mouth. While his eyes were a bit reddened, all he did was dry out his hat with a burst of flame before looking up at me again. "Four seconds, huh?"

"Five minutes with no banter, really. I was pissing you off on purpose," I admitted, as he took my hand and I yanked him back to his feet. "I know how to fight angry fire-users, so once I knew I'd need to fight I was kinda hoping you'd volunteer."

"And I fell for it completely," Ace said wryly, shaking his head. He shifted his legs into fire and then back, after which he was entirely dry. "Not bad for someone who still doesn't know anything about anything."

"I guessed your abilities pretty well, I think," I countered in a teasing tone. In a firmer voice, I said, "I can take care of myself."

Or we can do so together, as usual.

Of course.

In the end, Whitebeard allowed me to go. A deal was a deal, even if I'd ninja'd my way into the easiest fight I could manage to find and then cheated like hell. After all, pirates were contractually obliged to be scoundrels on some level, and they didn't tend to protest that same process going in reverse.

Much.

I took the little boat they gave me, some supplies, a transponder snail number (after refusing a snail for the animal's sake), and a dozen tearful goodbyes even though I was really just getting back to work. Without the pirates running around all over the place, I could commune with Isobu and finally see what the other jinchūriki were up to—and hopefully they'd actually be in the mind-skype to answer. I would be able to get home.

I still cried a bit when I left.

I only flew the Whitebeard flag until I passed out of the Moby Dick's (and Marco's) sight around the curve of an island. Then I carefully retrieved it, folded it up, and stored it in the waterproof travel chest in the bottom of the boat. While I was grateful to the Whitebeards, I didn't want to get them in trouble with anyone or anything if my path crossed into unfriendly territory.

And so, the second I was sure no one was watching, Isobu lurched up from underneath my little boat and swallowed that entire section of sea.

The inside of Isobu's belly was…weird. Now, I'd heard that Tailed Beasts didn't have organs and to be perfectly honest I had assumed it was mainly because chakra constructs—or personifications—didn't have any need for them. Why bother, right?

But the thing was, the Gold and Silver Brothers got their weird cheek marks by messing with Kurama's innards after he ate them. So there clearly was some kind of weird shit going on.

Isobu's belly contained a terrifying range of spiked edges reminiscent of a chasm in Konoha that not even Gai would use for training, shell-like shapes so Isobu's insides matched his outside, and an eerie red-orange light. And, where ordinarily I expected acid from biological beings, Isobu's stomach was strangely dry aside from the water I'd brought in with me.

No, instead it was populated by miniature Isobu clones.

"Uh, hi everyone," was about the only thing I could think to say when my little boat and its cushion of seawater finally arrived on the…shore. I called it a shore solely because I'd used up my seagoing vocabulary earlier, and now I was in metaphor land. It looked like a shore, okay?

The hundreds of little Isobu clones all cocked their spiky heads in the exact same way. Each one was about the size of a cat, with three perfectly formed tails and bulky shells and blunt-fingered hands. They were more grayish than their biggest counterpart, but in my opinion they were all rather cute. The bigger ones in the back, with sizes ranging from "bear" to "elephant" to "small whale," cocked their heads in the opposite direction as my voice reached them.

Isobu, did you know you have a lot of little-yous in your belly? Was there something you wanted to tell me? I asked him nervously.

In exactly what universe would I have the slightest reason to understand the mechanics by which my stomach works?

In this one?

I let my mind wander a bit while all of the little Isobu clones looked at me. The main question that came to mind went thus: "Are they carnivorous?"

Then, all at once, the Isobu-clones bowed just before I dragged my boat onto the nearest bit of flat "ground" I could find.

"Um," I said.

They are only there to kill unwanted intruders. They will not attack you or your possessions.

That's nice to know. I dragged the boat up and, with some help from a few of the tiny Isobu clones and a rope, secured it. I was pretty sure the word was "mooring," but it wasn't like there was a convenient pirate around for me to ask. Do they mind if I spend some time meditating in here?

I do not mind, and therefore neither do they.

…Reasonable point. I sat back down in the boat and crossed my legs one over the other. I held out my hands, clapped them together, and started my controlled breathing exercises.

Or I tried. When I felt a tug on my pants, I looked down and spotted one of the smaller Isobu clones sitting in the boat, trying to climb up my leg without using its tails for leverage.

"Aw, you're so little," I cooed, holding out a hand so it could climb up onto the bench with me.

It latched on with its little hands, encircling my entire wrist, then coiled its tails too so it got a good grip. I helped it balance with my other hand, then pulled it up and onto my lap. While its spiky chin was not comfortable against my leg, the little beastie made such a cute noise in response that I was okay with that.

You have strange tastes in companions. I know enough about humans to know that the typical response to my appearance, no matter how small, is not the one you are having now.

I rubbed my knuckle against the soft spot in the joint between the little Isobu's head and neck. Societal expectations of cuteness can take a hike.

Isobu's entire body trembled as he laughed. Inside of him, I had to glue myself to my seat with chakra to keep myself in place. The little Isobu just wrapped its tails more firmly around my arm and hung on to avoid being unseated.

Say, I thought once things settled down again, if I needed to throw someone down here, like for a quick escape, could you avoid tearing them to shreds?

Possibly. The little Isobu in my lap looked up at me and I got the oddest feeling it was mirroring Isobu's body language. I do not know who you expect to need to rescue at this stage, however.

Maybe another jinchūriki? I thought that over, grimacing. Only, no, they probably would have one of your siblings with them. I hope they're sticking together…

We could check to be certain. The mini-Isobu twitched all three tails at once. I will let you get back to trying to contact the others.

You don't want to join in?

I will once I find a safe section of seabed. There are too many creatures here so far.

I nodded, then sat with the tiny Isobu in my lap and tried to reach down through my mind for the first hint of—

A voice saying, NOT THIS WAY.

—PAIN, ow, ow! I shook my hand out as the phantom pain of getting it slammed in a door ripped through my brain.

Kei?

Pain radiated up my right arm, then shot across my head like a live wire being dragged through my brain. I clutched my hand and then pressed my temple into my knee, swearing furiously under my breath.

The little Isobu's spikes dug into my stomach and chest, but none of them punched through. In fact, I used the discomfort to force down my reaction to the psychic feedback. As soon as I could manage it, I coughed to clear my throat and stopped crushing the Isobu clone.

So, that's not gonna work, I concluded grimly. Without the range of the Tailed Beast mind-skype, I was back to using just my sensing range and hoping I hit pay dirt. In an entire ocean. This was going to be such a fun adventure. Looks like we're doing this the old-fashioned way.

Isobu and his clone both stilled for a long moment. Then the walls around me rumbled as he growled. Then we had better get started.