I am never going to remember to post this whole fic here on fanfic dot net. Seriously, this is just a formality at this point. You can look at the illustrations if you go to A03.
KARAI BARI ISLAND : LILITH'S TAVERN, APPROXIMATELY 10 YEARS AGO
"FULL SQUAD TO THE SOUTHWEST PORT OF KARAI BARI," Helmeppo shouted into the den den mushi. "PIRATES ARE FLEEING THE PREMISES, DO NOT ENGAGE IN THE TAVERN. ARREST ON SITE, DO NOT ENGAGE IN THE TAVERN."
The mere handful of Buggy's crew that had lingered was dragging Cabaji's body out the door.
"GALDINO! GET MY FEET!" yelled Buggy. The man with the flaming hair scooped Buggy's feet off the ground and Buggy soared into the air like a giant curtain. "WE'RE GETTING OUT OF HERE!" he shouted, swooping out the door.
"WHAT THE HELL?!" screamed Alvida. "YOU BASTARDS!"
Galdino ran for the door, Buggy's massive fabricated form blocking the doorway. Alvida had thrown off her sandals in an attempt to follow them, but a soupy white substance quickly sealed the door shut behind them.
"How convenient," said Helmeppo, quickly stepping in front of the door, running his finger along the seal. "Looks like, wax? Guess we won't have to worry about anyone barging in to hear something they shouldn't, for now."
Alvida was staring them down now, her hand locked around her mace.
"Is it really you then, you little brat?" she said slowly, her voice the deathly calm that sent chills down Koby's spine. "After all this time, you've come for me. Is that it?"
"I-I have," said Koby, his hands raised next to Helmeppo's knives. "Your crew has abandoned you, Alvida. You can make this easy on yourself and come quietly."
She laughed, high and mirthless, revulsion tingeing her voice. "You think I'm about to stand here and take orders from my worthless, little cabin boy? You think that uniform gives you the right to talk to your old Captain that way? You're out of your damn mind, child."
She swung the mace high, and Koby threw himself sideways with Soru as it came crashing down into the floor, shattering the floorboards in a flurry of wood, spikes and splinters.
She raised her mace at Helmeppo who quickly countered with his knives, but she was strong and the mace was twice as heavy. She flung him to the floor, the knives flying.
"Soru!"
The kick Koby had blitzed at her glanced right off her body, and he went skidding across the floor into several chairs.
"Hitting me isn't going to work, cabin boy," Alvida snarled, raising her flintlock. "Try something better."
Koby dodged the bullet, his Observation alerting him to duck.
"Helmeppo, catch!" Koby shouted, flinging the knives back at him, as Helmeppo hoisted himself up from behind the smashed bar.
Helmeppo caught the knives in mid-air and spun, slashing Alvida in the arm.
Helmeppo froze, bewildered, as Alvida held her arm fast against the knives, staring him down.
Nothing had happened. The knives could not penetrate her skin.
She was blocking the blades with her own arm.
"Are you done?" she deadpanned.
The mace hit Helmeppo in the stomach, her other arm that wasn't blocking his knives finding an easy opening.
"Helmeppo!" Koby yelled, as he dropped.
Koby ducked as Alvida sent another bullet his way, and he quickly activated Soru to duck behind the bar as another bullet tailed him.
Come on, he thought, focusing all of his energy into his right fist.
"You couldn't even come to face me one on one, could you, cabin boy?" laughed Alvida, bringing her mace smashing down upon the bar, shattering it into pieces around Koby. "Had to make it two against one? Now that's hardly fair!"
He dodged another swing from her mace, his Observation desperately trying to maintain emotional balance against her terrifying, snarl of a voice that sounded far too familiar. He ducked behind a table, willing his hand to harden.
"Still running and hiding? Haven't grown out of being a coward?"
Come on , Koby willed desperately, channeling every ounce of focus into his fist. Please….
A heated sensation suddenly filled his fingertips, a slick black sheen spreading down to his wrist.
"Yes!" he cried. "Let's see your devil fruit handle this!"
Koby leapt up to face her as she swung the mace where he had be crouching seconds before, ducking beneath her arm and striking her square in the jaw.
Her head snapped back and she whirled backwards, skidding on her slick feet as she fell and slid across the floor.
"YES!" Helmeppo yelled, hauling himself upright against the bar, clutching his stomach.
Koby stared triumphantly, as the black grit of armament faded from his fist. She was sprawled across the floor, several broken chairs scattered in her wake, unmoving.
"Helmeppo…" Koby whispered, disbelieving. "We-we…"
He stopped, the words halting in his throat.
Alvida slowly stood up and stared at him down, her hand tight around the handle of her mace.
Koby suddenly felt his hand go very cold.
"No way," whispered Helmeppo.
Her face was perfectly clear, unmarked by the iron-clad fist that Koby had just struck her with.
"She shouldn't be standing," said Helmeppo, gaping. "Someone like her doesn't take a haki-coated punch to the face and stand."
Alvida spat on the ground, tinged dark red.
"Oh dear, you made me bite my tongue," she said, disdainfully, digging her mace into the ground. The floorboards cracked.
"Did you think Armament would work on me, Koby?" she said, her voice dark. "You're not playing with a logia, boy."
"But...but we've seen haki users punch Luffy-san," said Koby. "What…?"
"Oh please, don't compare my powers to someone like that rubber brat," said Alvida, slowly withdrawing several bullets from her coat and reloading her flintlock. "Rubber is strong, flexible, but not impenetrable, not immune to damage."
Koby stared, dumbfounded, as she stretched her arm and aimed her own pistol at her chest. She fired, and the bullet rocketed off her body, grazing Koby's hair as he ducked out of the way.
"But I am."
She was in front of him suddenly, the speed of her slick feet astounding, catching his Observation off guard. Koby tried to dodge, but he knew he was already too late, as she slammed his head into what was left of the bar.
"The New World is so fixated on who can throw the biggest punch," she laughed. "Rokushiki, Armament, Haki, Goken, all a battle for the sharpest blade, the strongest fist…"
She smashed his face into the bar and the wood splintered underneath Koby's scrabbling fingers. His vision was swimming, as she yanked his hair, her fingernails digging into his scalp.
"They all mean nothing if they cannot strike their target," she hissed in his ear.
Helmeppo lunged and grabbed Alvida by the hair, the one thing part of her that was not slippery, yanking her off of Koby. She shrieked and spun on the spot, smashing her mace again into Helmeppo's stomach, sending him flying back into Koby against the bar, which was little more than a pile of wood now.
"How dare you! This is not some petty children's squabble!" she snarled, running a hand through her hair.
"What was it we said about her not being a threat?" groaned Helmeppo, hauling Koby to his feet.
"Y-yeah, just some nobody from the East Blue," Koby muttered, blinking rapidly and trying to clear his head. Blood was streaming down his face.
Koby suddenly floundered and dropped to the ground. Baffled, he tried to stand. His legs didn't seem to want to support him, sliding out from underneath him. He grabbed hold of a bar stool that had been knocked amongst the debris for support, but he couldn't hold it, it slipped free of his hands and he fell onto the ground, slick and slippery.
"What the hell?" yelled Helmeppo, trying to stab one of his Katakuri knives into the floor for support, only to have them glance off the floor, before he too fell, his legs slipping out from underneath him.
But the floor was wood.
Koby stared perplexed at Alvida, who was still standing, barefooted on the strangely glossy floorboards.
Even she looked surprised. And then Koby felt a great surge of rage from her, of determination, and the slickness spread across the floor, the walls, the scattered tables and chairs, coating them in a glossy sheen.
There were those that said that devil fruits harbored actual demons in them.
If such was the case, the demon inside of Alvida was reacting out of instinct.
It had Awakened.
Alvida shot at the two of them, whirling her mace like a flail, and Koby barely had time to blitz out of the way, dragging Helmeppo with him. He tried to duck behind a table, but the slick floor sent them both toppling over each other, as Helmeppo barely managed to deflect a pair of bullets with his knives.
"I'm reloading again boys," said Alvida, haughtily, twirling her flintlock and spinning the chamber. "Why don't you take a breather, you look tired."
"This is no good," said Helmeppo, clutching his stomach. He had been struck by the mace twice now. " We literally can't touch her. Armament is worthless if it can't actually hit her skin. She's not a Logia. We need to subdue her."
"Helmeppo," Koby whispered. "I think I have an idea. Can you get out of here? Get back outside?"
"I can try, we can't even stand up in here!"
"Get back to where we were, listen -"
"Times up, cabin boy!" The bullet narrowly missed Koby's head, had his Observation not alerted him in time.
"Sky Walk!"
If the ground was unable to support him lest he slip and fall, Koby would take the battle to the air. He certainly couldn't do very much indoors, but he could stay off the ground, as Alvida's glossy territory of slickness expanded with each step she took.
He darted in the air to the back of the tavern, grateful for the reasonably high ceiling.
She was tailing him, smashing stools, tables, chairs, everything in her path, the glossy sheen spreading before her like ice. Koby was astonished she could keep up with him.
Just a little farther... he thought.
He reached the back wall of the tavern as Alvida swung her mace and he darted out of the way at the last second. Her mace struck the back wall and the wood shattered into a fray of splinters. The wall collapsed, sunlight streaming in.
"GET OUT!" Koby yelled to Helmeppo. Helmeppo was desperately trying to claw and stab his way out of the increasingly slippery bar with his knives. He flung himself outside.
"And where do you think you're going?!" hissed Alvida, flinging her mace after him.
Koby shot down from the ceiling and kicked the mace out of the way. It smashed into the wall, widening the opening.
"Hey! Your target is me!" shouted Koby as he touched down to the floor.
He fell, completely unable to hold footing, and lunged out the hole after Helmeppo.
He jumped back into the sky, grateful for the fresh air and an expanded battlefield where he wouldn't be bound by a ceiling.
Just follow me, he willed her.
If he could not take her on the ground, he would stay in the sky. Sure enough, she emerged from the splintered wood. Without the limitation of the tavern roof, Koby now shot ten, twenty, thirty feet into the air and spun his leg down, diving for her.
She did not move as he came careening back to earth towards her, every ounce of focus willed into his leg. He could feel it tingling, hardening, maybe, just maybe Armament could -
The kick slipped against her shoulder, and he went crashing to the ground. His extended leg met slick, glossy dirt that immediately repelled him, and he cried out as he heard his ankle crack.
Alvida smashed her mace into his shoulder, pinning him to the ground, and he shouted in pain.
"Know your place," she snarled, digging the spikes into his shoulder. "On the ground."
She drew her pistol, and aimed it at Koby's head.
"I'm ending this, cabin boy, " she said.
And then she screamed, as Helmeppo flung an entire wine barrel's worth of seawater onto her.
She dropped the gun, gasping and heaving, her sodden clothes clinging to her.
Blood was streaming from Koby's shoulder as he pushed himself back to his feet, his broken ankle barely holding him. He could stand again though; the seawater negated the effect of her Awakening, washing the ground clean of the slick glaze.
With the last strength in his good leg, blitzed from the ground.
"Sky Walk!"
He was above her now. She was disoriented, between the seawater and trying to see where he had gone.
"FIGHT ME HEAD ON, YOU COWARD!" she screamed, swinging her mace wildly at Helmeppo.
"HELMEPPO!" shouted Koby as he flung himself downwards. "THROW ME!" He had no grounding foot to kick from, nor could he kick with a broken ankle.
Helmeppo grabbed him, catching his momentum as he plummeted from the sky, and swung him straight for Alvida.
Koby thrust his one good leg into her chest, slamming her into the ground.
She gasped, all breath expelled from her as she clutched her ribs through sodden clothes.
Her hand went slack on the handle of her mace.
kay so yeah...this is probably the chapter where people might disagree with me the most on things.
Soooo until we have a definitive answer as to if Mihawk can cut Buggy with haki, why haki coated blades couldn't cut Doffy's birdcage, if haki can break Bartolomeo's barrier or not...then I'm banking on a fruit who's main component is that it is impenetrable (like Barty's barrier) being immune to armament.
Say I'm wrong but this question has split multiple discords, forums, threads, polls, etc.
Also its my fanfic. So I'm writing it my way. (Like having a flintlock that can fire multiple rounds.)
