"I can't believe anyone would be so stupid…" Kaku muttered to himself, watching as the burning projectile flew to the flag. For just a moment he considered that he might be able to intercept the attack, but in the end he chose not to try. Was it not human nature to gawk at tragedies? Burning that flag on this island was a response that the World Government would not and could not ignore. Their deaths would be a matter of pride now- the Straw-Hats would be wiped out by whatever means were necessary.
Most likely, those means would be CP9.
"ARE YOU BASTARDS CRAZY?!" yelled Spandam across the gap, "You think you'll survive having the World itself as your enemy?!"
"I WOULDN'T HAVE IT ANY OTHER WAY!" roared Straw-Hat Luffy.
There was a choked gasp from Kaku's side, and he glanced over at Nico Robin. Her face betrayed an unfathomable confusion, as if she were a lost child.
This was making him fairly uncomfortable now. It's not like Kaku couldn't empathize with this woman's plight, but there were limits. This had all been so avoidable. If she had laid low, changed her name, and never again gotten involved with all this forbidden knowledge stuff then they probably wouldn't be in this mess now, but instead it seemed as though she'd burnt that bridge a long time ago.
What was she going to do now? If she turned her friends away once more then they might conceivably escape. If not...
"Robin!" called Luffy, "I need to hear it from you! Say you wanna live!"
Robin's face was a tableau of confusion, sadness, and hope. She had been thirsting in the desert and had found an oasis; she had been starving and had found a feast laid for her; she was bone-weary and a bed had been made without question.
Her mouth slowly dropped open, forming words without breath as tears streamed down her cheeks and mucus ran from her nose. She was beyond the concerns of the world; beyond anything anyone else might think of her. She now believed in the words of the man across at her as firmly as if they had been chiseled in stone by the finger of a god.
Robin took a deep breath.
"I WANNA LIVE! PLEASE TAKE ME BACK WITH YOU! TO THE OCEAN!"
Despite his expectations, Kaku sighed. Just like that, she had condemned her friends to death.
Now the cyborg, Cutty Flam, was bawling his lungs out, too. "OHHH, GODDAMNIT! I LOVE YOU GUYS! DAMN IT!"
Well, that was that. Kaku saw when the point of no return was passed as the Straw-Hats moved into positions of readiness, and he automatically began assessing their strengths and weaknesses. Years spent as a humble shipwright had only strengthened that skill, rather than dulling it.
He looked and he looked, but he didn't see it.
He didn't see a way for the Straw-Hats to engage them. Not just with what they had. They were separated by an enormous gap over a deadly chasm, and only Straw-Hat Luffy himself had a way to cross that distance. Perhaps he could bring one other person with him, but...
Surely they didn't intend for Luffy and Zoro to fight them alone with only their sniper as backup? Or would they try to use the drawbridge? If so, Kaku was ready to destroy the mechanisms at a moment's notice. He or Lucci wouldn't even need to go over there to hit it with a Rankyaku.
Surely he didn't think he could just grab her from there? Hmm… a pirate like that might just be that stupid...
His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of his rotund compatriot, Fukuro, unzipping the yellowed zipper that served as his teeth. The man's disturbingly high-pitched voice offered his observations as he pointed into the abyss below the Tower of Justice.
"Hey, hey! CHAPAPA! Not that all that talking isn't neat, but what's that stuff down there?"
Kaku looked downward into the depths of the great waterfall. After a moment, he saw what his teammate had pointed out. "Two ropes?" he asked, puzzled by the new information, "They're connecting the two islands? But how would-"
He didn't get to finish that thought.
An explosive sound from out of nowhere blossomed around them into a cloud of acrid smoke. Just as it covered the balcony to the point where Kaku could barely keep his eyes open, a dark figure clad in black and blue darted in straight for Nico Robin. When Kaku struck out to stop him, an orange-jacketed arm thrust inward from the cloud, stabbing a knife at his face and forcing him to block. The dark-haired figure swept past unchallenged, grabbing Nico Robin like a passing breeze.
The last things that Kaku saw were a victorious smirk and two red eyes gleaming, and then she was carried straight over the edge of the balcony.
Those cheeky bastards!
Kaku cursed, preparing to jump after them, when an unexpected sound rose up from behind them. It sounded like ten voices all saying the same thing in unison.
[FUUTON: TAJUU KIRYU-HOU] - [WIND RELEASE: MASS AIRSTREAM CANNON]
Each CP9 member spun to meet the incoming attack, and then the smoke parted for a blast of wind that was so strong it felt like they were trying to stare into an impacting waterfall. Ten blond youngsters were the cause, each one blowing a hurricane from their lips.
Rob Lucci and the massive Kumadori weathered the storm magnificently, but everyone else was blasted off the side of the tower and into the open sky beyond.
Kaku had just a moment before falling to consider the amazing attack. If CP9 hadn't possessed the Six Techniques, then every single one of them might have died right then and there. Luckily for Kaku, the sky was exactly where he wanted to be.
The others immediately righted themselves, using their Geppou to kick off of the air itself, but Kaku let himself fall.
"AHHH!" screamed Spandam, plummeting down to the ocean below as he called for his two nearest rescuers, "KALIFA, KAKU, GRAB ME!"
Kalifa, jumping from leg to leg, spared a disdainful glance downward and said, "That's sexual harassment."
"IF YOU DON'T GRAB ME, YOU'RE FIRED!"
Kalifa narrowed her eyes. "That's especially sexual harassment."
Kaku ignored the interplay as he felt the wind in his ears. CP9 had never been big on teamwork, and he was used to solving his problems as best as he could with whatever backup happened to come his way as an added bonus. So, he analyzed the situation at hand. Three must-rescue targets. Cutty Flam, Nico Robin, and Spandam.
Cutty Flam was falling into the ocean, but Fukuro was already dashing through the air on his way to recapture the errant cyborg. As he watched, the cyborg's arm shot out on a heavy chain, grabbing onto a lower parapet of the tower and pulling himself towards it. No worries. He'd be captured soon enough.
Nico Robin was… hmmm…. Kaku glanced around for the young rescuer, and found him disconnecting from some wire-work on the side of the tower. To his surprise, the boy started running down the side of the Tower of Justice as if gravity simply didn't apply to him, holding Nico Robin on his back. Kaku nodded to himself. Since it seemed as though she would be safe for now, that left his boss, Spandam, who was falling helplessly through the air. Gathering his energy, Kaku pushed off the sky with a mighty kick.
[GEPPOU]
The young man carrying Nico Robin watched him as he went, his red gaze drinking in the scene with the fierce intensity of a hawk.
Whatever, probably not important.
Quickly, Kaku caught his superior, who was screaming about something unimportant. Now, though, his arms were full, which was a serious drag on his mobility.
"Hey, Sasuke!" shouted Sanji from on top of the Courthouse, "Be careful with Robin, you hear me?! These guys can jump off the air! How about that, by the way?! Eat a dick, loser!"
The young rescuer, Sasuke, laughed as he carried Nico Robin further down the tower. "Yeah, yeah, I was wrong, alright! Hey, Naruto! Looks like these guys can fly! Wanna help do something about that?"
Do something? What exactly did they think they could do about it?
[TAJUU KAGE-BUNSHIN NO JUTSU] - [MASS SHADOW CLONE TECHNIQUE]
Kaku had just halted his descent when a horde of several hundred identical black-and-orange-jacketed hooligans poured off the balcony of the tower. Lucci and Kumadori dispatched dozens of them as they passed, but it was nothing compared to the immense tide pouring by, leaping into the air like a cloud of locusts that blotted out the sun itself. Then they split up, each group diving towards a different target with a massed battle-cry.
A duplicator? He'd thought for sure the Marines had control of that fruit!
Now, what had originally been a mid-air rescue operation had turned into a mid-air brawl. Spandam's high-pitched screaming increased in volume as the clones collided with them and Kaku began spinning, kicking, and elbowing as best as he could, every other strike seeming to connect with a clone, dispersing it into a cloud of smoke. It just didn't seem to matter- he was surrounded on literally every side by this kid. Eventually, one of the cackling clones grabbed onto him, slapping both hands onto his shoulders and coming to meet him face-to-face. Kaku felt the added weight like a lead jacket.
"Heya, Square-Nose!" the blond hooligan shouted over the whipping winds, "My name's Naruto! Nice to meetcha!"
"My name's Kaku, young'n! Charmed I'm sure!" he responded, then sharply headbutted the clone into a puff of smoke. That was when two other clones used the distraction to grab onto his feet. Unable to kick off of the air, he plummeted right back down towards the bottom, causing Spandam's screeches of terror to take on a more urgent tone, mixing with the excited laughter of the clones.
Below, the water churned as it plumbed unknown depths at the bottom of this unusual ocean waterfall. They were now only a few hundred feet above the surface, and he'd drown if he touched it. After he and Kalifa had received a fruit, the only non-Devil-Fruit users among their number were Fukuro and Kumadori, and Kaku trusted neither of them enough to save them should he fall.
With a still-unfamiliar motion that felt like stretching a muscle inside his brain, he began the transformation into his Devil-Fruit hybrid form. He grew in size rapidly, his skin covering itself in the yellow fur and brown patches of a beautiful giraffe. In defiance of all commonly held knowledge on giraffes, he also began to grow more angular features and squared limbs, finishing with a tremendous rectangular snout.
"Holy shit!" shouted the Naruto grappled onto his left foot, "What the hell kind of monster are you supposed to be?!"
"The Majestic Giraffe," he grunted, now several times larger than he had been before. "And the Majestic Giraffe is an expert in mid-air combat in the wild!"
"Bullshit! Don't just make up animals that aren't even-"
[BIGAN] - [NOSE GUN]
Interrupting him, Kaku's long neck bent, his nose shooting downward like a bullet to bludgeon the two hangers-on at his feet, both of whom disappeared in poofs of smoke. Spandam may have been uncomfortably smooshed into the giraffe's mighty chest in the process, but that probably wasn't all that important.
Now, though, he was free to move again. Using his newfound strength, he halted their free-fall with a giraffe-enhanced Geppou that kicked up a spray of water from the vortex just ten feet below, then began lifting them back up toward the island, kick by kick. The smell of salt and the sea was strong down here, but slowly it began to recede.
Well, that was exhilarating! That was the second time the young man had almost killed him, but now the shoe was on the other hoof!
Kaku climbed rapidly, carrying the screaming Spandam in his arms. When he looked up, he finally saw what was going on.
It was an aerial disaster area. The clones had finally stopped pouring off the tower- which was probably Lucci's doing- though roughly a hundred still remained, most engaged on the tower or disrupting other recovery attempts. The air was filled with dashing assassins and wild long-ranged attacks.
Let's see… targets and strength assessment...
Cutty Flam was hanging precariously from one of the lower parapets on the Tower of Justice, firing shot after shot at his pursuer, Fukuro, who was in turn being pelted from the main island with explosions, long-ranged fists, what looked like slicing air currents, and, strangely enough, small lightning bolts. Kumadori and Lucci were presumably still inside dealing with the blond duplicator, and Kalifa and Jabra were attempting to cross the gap and attack the Straw-Hats directly, but were being stymied at every opportunity.
As he watched, Jabra landed but was immediately attacked by Luffy, Roronoa Zoro, and Sanji, sending him flying off the rooftop. As Jabra fell, several of the laughing clones jumped after him, two of them holding a swirling ball of blue-ish air. At the same time, Kalifa darted in for a landing, but was blocked by Chopper and then blasted away by a burst of wind from the Straw-Hat's female member.
Shortly thereafter, Kaku turned as a series of explosions rocked the Tower of Justice. Hmmm… that wasn't caused by Lucci or Kumadori, so that meant…
-Meanwhile-
Inside the Tower of Justice, Lucci shook off a shower of rubble from yet another of the so-far undetectable traps that they had just activated. The two young men who had attacked them on the balcony had spent their time riddling the place with trip-wires, strange sigils, and explosives, and Lucci was growing increasingly annoyed with his choice to pursue the duplicator that had evaded him at sea. Making everything worse, a more or less constant supply of clones was making tracking him through the halls infuriatingly difficult. Whatever power this person had, their duplicates were completely indistinguishable from the real thing- even down to the most minute of scents.
He caught yet another glimpse of a black-and-orange jacketed young man fiddling with something on the wall, and Kumadori moved to pursue, but Lucci paused.
All of a sudden their scents were no longer identical. Something was finally changing.
He smiled. One of these bodies was nervous, and that nervousness was just now reaching his sweat. The duplicates weren't feeling the fear of a mortal threat in the same way as the original.
He started moving faster, bulling through a number of explosive traps with a speed that surprised the various clones littering the Tower. Eventually, he saw the one he was looking for dodge out of sight down a hallway.
Rob Lucci blasted through two walls in the blink of an eye, thrusting a steely arm through a third. He felt the meaty sensation of connecting with flesh, then the satisfying snap of a broken bone. On the other side of the wall, the boy cried out in pain.
Losing his grip on the boy, Lucci tore through the rest of the wall with both arms, stepping out into the corridor.
No one was there.
Lucci scanned the halls, seeing a drop of blood in the distance.
"Kumadori," he called out.
"Yoi?!" came the distant response.
"He's wounded. Hunt down the real one while I return outside."
Outside, Kaku watched the ongoing battle with a professional shame.
This was disgraceful! Forced to fight like puppets on strings, CP9 was being endlessly sniped and nettled by the Straw-Hats, their strongest assets being distracted by recovery efforts.
Finally, Kaku had risen enough to gain the sniper's attention. From the Straw-Hat's positions, three small balls came flying his way. He dodged the first shot, but his mobility was so limited while carrying his goddamn boss that the other two homed in unerringly, one exploding in his face in a blast of stinging pain and burnt fur. Not wanting to take another hit, he managed to block the next attack by using his boss' body to absorb the blow.
Again, some more screaming from his boss, whatshisname, but it probably wasn't important.
"Hah! Eat it, you big dumb giraffe!" crowed the beaming sniper from above, "Oh, man! This is like a shooting gallery! You know what, guys? I think all our fights should have you keeping the villains off me while I shoot 'em down! I feel like I need a theme song or something!"
When the next shot came his way, Kaku cut it out of the air with a slicing Rankyaku, but the ball exploded into a cloud of red liquid that splattered over one side of his face. Instantly his eye began burning where it made contact, his depth perception ruined.
"YEAH! Bit too spicy for you, huh?!" laughed the sniper. "Oh, dammit, that's Sanji's line."
This wasn't going to work out. Kaku focused his attention on his still-whining boss.
"Boss, sorry, but I need my hands free. This might hurt a bit!"
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN, MIGHT HURT A BIT?! GET ME TO THE GROUND, RIGHT- AGH!"
Tossing his boss into the air, he drew his two swords then he leapt upwards to dodge incoming fire from the sniper.
"AHHH!" screamed Spandam, already falling back towards the pit below. Kaku responded by kicking him straight back up into the air.
"GUH-BLEHH!" cried Spandam, as he soared to new heights.
There. Like this, Kaku could retain freedom of movement and yet still lift his boss back up to the island.
It was the perfect plan.
Jump, dodge, kick, "HOR-BLUH!"
Slice, jump, kick, "DOOF!"
Rankyaku, jump, kick, "DO-GYEH!"
Now he was making excellent progress upwards!
He sliced an explosive out of the air and then fired one more aerial Rankyaku at the Courthouse that was intercepted by a slicing blast of wind from Zoro. As he did so, he had the strangest feeling that he was being watched.
Glancing over his shoulder, Sasuke was staring at him again with those irritating red eyes.
Oh well, probably not important.
Wait. What was important was that this Sasuke fellow had started to run across the ropes connecting the two islands. Despite being a nearly impossible feat of acrobatics, the young man was managing it at a sprint while carrying Nico Robin on his back.
What terrible timing! It was a pity they needed Nico Robin alive, or else any one of them could have directed a Rankyaku to sever the rope.
"Hey!" shouted Kaku, kicking Spandam upward once more, "We're losing Nico Robin over here!"
Hearing this, Fukuro suddenly gave up on his attempts to capture Cutty Flam. The rotund man took a long-ranged punch from Straw-Hat Luffy and used the impact to rebound off the cliff-side, leaping straight for the two escapees.
That was when Cutty Flam dropped off of his uneasy perch, and with an immense swelling of his nether regions he erupted in another horrendous blast of air.
[COUP-DE-BOO]
Suddenly accelerating like a rocket, Cutty Flam headed straight towards the fat, flying form of Fukuro.
"No one messes with Franky and gets away with it, shit-for-brains! SUPERRRRR FRRRRANKY IMPACT!" He slammed into Fukurou like the wrath of god, sending the CP9 member flying far away in a wild spin that skipped him off across the ocean surrounding the island. Then, the cyborg redirected his posterior and resumed his flight toward the main island, shouting, "Eat my farts, losers!"
Now, no one was there to stop the escaping fugitives. Just as it seemed Sasuke and Nico Robin were about to reach the other side unchallenged, something truly foolish happened. Nero, who had long been thought completely irrelevant, leapt back into the battle. Desperate to redeem himself, the weaselly man swept down through the air like a scythe, slicing through the rope as he passed.
Now at gravity's mercy, Sasuke and Nico Robin began to fall.
Then something happened that made Kaku's jaw drop.
Sasuke and Robin were just moments away from safety when their rope was sliced. Still about thirty feet from the island, they clearly weren't going to make it.
As free-fall began, Robin made a choking gasp of a noise, and then time seemed to freeze.
Sasuke had seen two very interesting things by watching the CP9 member in his mid-air battle. His Sharingan was even now desperately feeding him information on the movement of muscles and physical-reinforcement chakra involved in two of the most ridiculous feats of Taijutsu he had ever seen in his life. Some of it felt like it would be too hard for even him to manage, but...
Well, this was a bit earlier than he had planned to try this out, but it was do or die time.
Flaring his chakra and shoving with every bit of strength his training had granted him, Sasuke copied the CP9 member's muscle and chakra movements with exacting precision. His chakra shifted like crashing water, and his legs kicked down hard enough to painfully wrench them.
[GEPPOU]
It was just barely enough. He kicked off the air to clear the gap, then went sprawling onto the surface of the main island, wincing from a leg cramp as Robin collapsed to his side. In moments he had staggered to his feet, helping Robin back up into a piggy-back carry, and then he carried her off into the city streets.
Incredible! How in the world had he done that?! Kaku couldn't imagine being more astonished. Knowledge of the Six-Techniques training was strictly limited to a few exclusive World Government trainers, which made anyone able to perform Geppou a member of an extremely exclusive club, even if the boy was clearly inexperienced with it.
Still, he must have practiced for years to do that, and Kaku had never even heard of him.
All of a sudden, he realized that the bombardment he had been dodging had slackened, and he looked up to find what had been going on. Some of Cutty Flam's hench-persons had finally relocated one of the Grand Courthouse's high-caliber cannons to an accessible part of the roof, and the Straw-Hat's sniper was now aiming it directly at him.
Shit.
"Special delivery!" the sniper shouted, igniting the fuse.
This deserved Kaku's full attention. A full-body giraffe-enhanced Tekkai.
[TEKKAI: GOU] - [FIERCE IRON BODY]
The cannonball hit him and exploded, covering him in a cloud of smoke and iron, but dealing only minor damage to his hardened skin and muscles. The sniper, however, seemed satisfied by his view of the impenetrable cloud.
"HOW'DYA LIKE THAT, YOU FREAKIN' GIRAFFE ASSHOLE! NOW YOU'RE FIRED! THAT'S WHAT YOU GET FOR CHALLENGING USOPP THE GREAT! GREATEST SNIPER IN THE GODDAMN WORLD! YOU GOT WHAT'S COMING TO YOU, YOU- EEP!"
The smoke cleared, and Usopp could now see him clearly. Kaku roared his defiance at his opponent.
"You think to harm the Majestic Giraffe with explosives?! Your attack is meaningless! No giraffe has ever been killed by explosives in its natural habitat!"
Executing a mighty jump, Kaku leapt up into a forward spin, then brought his leg down into a thunderous Axe-Rankyaku that sent a blade of compressed wind straight at the tower. Usopp screamed and dove for cover, and the cannon was split vertically in two. The tower, however, remained intact.
Kaku cursed. It was damn impossible to get any leverage for a good kick while jumping around in the air like this.
"Come back out and fight me, fellow long-nosed one! Surely that can't have been all you've got!"
A voice called out from above. Roronoa Zoro was speaking to him.
"Hey! Giraffe-man! Your boss gonna be okay?"
"Boss? What boss? What do you mean- oh-" In a flash, Kaku realized he hadn't kicked anything for quite some time. Looking down, he saw their purple-haired superior plummeting and screaming into the depths of the sinkhole.
He didn't think, he just dove, dove at maximum speed. He kicked the air above him, each jump downwards pushing himself briefly above terminal velocity. He was a peregrine falcon. He was a giraffe in flight. He was a beautiful, yellow, spotted bullet, aimed straight for the man he was supposed to save. Closer, closer, closer he fell, seeing Spandam reaching up to his outstretched hand.
It was a pity he didn't make it.
Spandam belly-flopped into the swirling maelstrom that covered the bottom of the Enies Lobby sinkhole.
"GLUB-BLUB-GACK-BLUH-SPPTPSSHT-AARGH!" he screamed, flailing wildly in the violent waters.
Kaku pulled up out of his dive with a powerful kick that sent a spray of water in a curtain all around him. His boss was spinning closer and closer to the heart of the whirlpool, but he took a moment to consider the issue, idly jumping from one foot to the other.
"ARRRGH! KAKU- *SPHPHT* -HELP ME!"
Kaku crossed his massive arms, frowning. "Sorry, boss, but I don't think I can. You gave me this fruit, and now if I get in that water then I won't be able to jump any more. Even a giraffe has limits, you know."
"YOU'RE FIRED! *ARGH-BARBLR* FIRED!"
Kaku nodded solemnly, his long neck ducking far forward. "Your sacrifice will be remembered, Chief."
With one last sputtering noise, Spandam was pulled beneath the waves.
"Rest in peace, Spandley. We hardly knew ye."
Kaku retreated to the balcony of the Tower of Justice, landing heavily as he canceled his transformation, wishing he could sit down and massage his legs for a moment. Unfortunately, Lucci was glaring at him from the corners of his eyes, which wasn't a pleasant feeling. He knew how Lucci felt about people who failed and showed weakness, but Kaku also knew he had a bit of forgiveness stockpiled with the strongest CP9 member.
"My apologies, but Spandex drowned. Not much I could do," Kaku said, by way of an update.
"Who?" said Lucci.
The square-nosed man furrowed his brow, trying desperately to remember the name of their former boss. "...Spandham?" he suggested.
"Ah, I see," Lucci seemed to accept this. "A pity. Then I suppose that makes me acting commander. Now we can start doing this my way."
"I suppose that makes sense," Kaku paused, remembering something, "Ah, I forgot to mention, but apparently I've been fired."
"I don't recall giving any such order," Lucci said, with no trace of irony.
Kaku nodded, satisfied by this. That was when Nero returned from his earlier attack, panting from the exertion as he landed back on solid ground.
"Sorry guys… I almost got her, but I lost track of Nico Robin after she-"
Even Kaku found it difficult to follow Lucci's movement. One instant he was standing, arms crossed, by the balcony, and the next he was removing his finger from Nero's chest. Nero collapsed, dead in an instant.
"You're fired," said Lucci, blood dripping from his hand. He spared a meaningful glance back towards Kaku, then stepped back to the balcony.
Kaku nodded again as the members of CP9 gradually returned to the Tower. He wasn't at all surprised by Lucci's actions. He'd known Lucci for years, after all. He knew how he operated when he was displeased, and this time he was clearly infuriated. After all, in this skirmish CP9 had clearly lost on their home territory. The Straw-Hats were all on the main island, and the Franky Family was even now pouring off of the roof in pursuit of their escaping boss.
Not that it really mattered much in the end, since none of them would be getting off this island alive, but the only victory CP9 had had so far was that the rogue duplicator was still trapped in the Tower of Justice.
Moments later, Kumadori burst out of the Tower like an artillery explosion, and then he tried to act natural when he saw Lucci standing there.
A shape passed by overhead, and they tracked the red blur with their eyes. Seconds later, the leaping figure completed its arc, and a tremendous red toad landed on the Grand Courthouse roof with a tooth-rattling thump. The duplicator hooligan from earlier dismounted the toad, exchanged a few words with it- which Kaku thought was quite unusual- and then the toad disappeared in a puff of smoke.
Well, scratch that. The only thing they'd gained out of this was that Naruto's arm looked like it was broken, the sleeve of his jacket torn and bloody.
Lucci, however, had finally lost his patience. With a mighty spinning Rankyaku, he sent a humming blade of compressed air at the Grand Courthouse that cut straight through the top-part of the building. Everyone there stumbled as the building rumbled and shook before the severed rooftop settled down a few feet off-center.
Now, Lucci had everyone's attention.
"Straw Hat," the man's voice boomed, "What, exactly, do you hope to accomplish here? You must know you won't make it off the island, which makes all of this resistance utterly meaningless!"
Standing at the head of his gathered crew, Straw-Hat Luffy responded with a smirk, "I don't give a damn about how meaningless you think this all is. All I know is that we're going to get her off this island, get back to our ship, and continue doing whatever we want."
"So much effort over a professional traitor... You realize that the handcuffs she is wearing are Seastone? They are absolutely unbreakable, the lock is of the highest class, and only we have the key. With those sapping her strength, she's hardly able to walk, let alone fight. You really think you can protect yourselves with her dragging you down?"
Now, Luffy laughed, his grin wide. "I dunno! But one thing's for sure- You'll have to come after us to find out!"
Luffy yelled to his crew, and the Straw-Hats broke into a run. As they reached the rear edge of the Grand Courthouse roof, Luffy stretched out his arms, grabbing each of them in a fierce rubber bear-hug, then leapt off of the collapsing roof accompanied by a great deal of screaming. Then they were gone.
The rest of CP9 moved to follow, but Lucci stopped them with a word.
"No. They've made themselves very clear. The Straw-Hats aren't leaving without Nico Robin, and the Franky Family isn't leaving without Cutty Flam. Capture those two and we can force them to fight." He smiled. "They're not leaving the island alive."
"CHAPAPA! That sounds good. I can't wait to pay them back for the way they treated me. He farted in my mouth!"
"AH! Fukuro! I agree!" yodeled Kumadori, "When I think about my Deeeeeaaar Mother who watches over me from Heaven, I can't possibly make her cry in shame! YOYOI!"
"Silence," responded Lucci, "Fukuro. Do you still have a set of signal flares? Everyone take one and spread out around the edges of the island. Work your way in from the outside. When you see either of our two targets, fire off the flare. We also need to make sure those rats aren't scurrying around underneath the island like before. Kalifa, I want you to take a look down below-"
"That's sexual harassment," she said reflexively, then her eyes widened.
Lucci was watching her like a barely-restrained beast, his pupils constricted and filled with violence. Despite that, his voice was still cool. "I won't say it a second time. Don't test my patience any further. When you're done with your mission, join in the search."
Kalifa nodded, swallowing a lump in her throat, then disappeared, leaping into the void below the tower.
"Kaku, first make your way to the docks and destroy anything that they could use to escape."
Kaku nodded and disappeared.
"And where the hell will you be, huh?" interrupted Jabra.
"I'll be waiting to go after Nico Robin, of course. Find them and then start the slaughter. Now GO."
With a flicker of movement, CP9 disappeared, leaving Lucci alone to survey the entire island. It was time for the hunt to begin.
Several minutes passed without incident. Then, in the now silent air, a flare went up from the left side of the island. Lucci smirked and leapt into action, kicking off the tower and accelerating quickly across the gap. It was while he was passing over the Grand Courthouse that he saw the second flare from the opposite side of the island. Then a third. Then a fourth. A minute later, a fifth.
Lucci bared his teeth in a very, very unfriendly smile. Looks like they were planning to make things interesting for him after all.