"Vetica... Vetica..." A warm soft voice echoed. "Come on, Smartie. It's time to wake up?"
"Daddy?" Vetica whispered reaching out to touch her father's smiling face. However, no matter how far she stretched her arm she could not reach him. She frowned as the stench of smoke and iron filled her nostrils. Her father's face began to warp as he cried out in distress. She looked at her hands which now were covered in the thick, slick sensation of blood. "Daddy? Daddy what's happening?"
"Vetica," he rasped, reaching out a bloody hand to caress her face, eyes distant and clouded. He grabbed her hair and pulled her face close to his, as his other hand pressed a book into her arms. "… the secrets. They are here... you must tell him... he'll know what to do... tru-trust no one else..."
She could feel her heartbeat through the leather-bound tome, clasped tightly against her chest. Her father's chest falling for the last time, as blood seeped from the gaping hole next to his stomach. Smoke filled her lungs as she inhaled deeply in an attempt to scream. They burned; it all burned. And even when her breathing sped it seemed she could never get enough oxygen. Her eyes frantically darted about the small burning cabin, before landing on the back door. Her muscles screamed in pain, but she ordered them to move. She couldn't die here. Her father's work couldn't die here. She stumbled over her own feet, pushing forward with all her might, only one word resonating in her mind: escape.
Vetica startled awake in a dark room to the greeting of a throbbing pain in the back of her head. She winced as she reached up, expecting to feel a wound but instead finding a sloppily thrown on bandage. In a moment of panic she covered herself only to find that someone had dressed her in a large white shirt while she had been unconscious. Once her eyes had adjusted, she looked around at her surroundings.
The room seemed somewhat familiar, it was filled with haphazardly stacked crates and cans of paint. From the sound of water and smell of the sea air, she concluded that she was on a ship. Light trickled through a door a few meters away, but was partially obstructed by the bars of the cage she could tell surrounded her. No more than a few feet away, her clothes were jumbled in a pile.
"Oh thank god, you're up," a raspy voice sighed nearby. "That's a relief."
Vetica looked behind her to see a vaguely familiar looking, scarred man, sitting in the corner of the cage. Despite his words, he wore a surly expression. She noted that his hands though mostly hidden by his crossed arms, were bandaged. His clothes were tattered and garish, and his arm was heavily tattooed with a pattern that, much to Vetica's surprise, she recognized.
A wave of disgust and suddenly overcame her at the thought that this man had potentially touched her half-naked body. She pointed at the man with an accusatory expression. "You're part of Barty's crew."
The man scoffed, clearly displaying a similar level of distaste for her. "Don't disrespect Barto-aniki's name like that, wench."
Vetica raised her eyebrows at the comment, half annoyed with herself for still using the nickname guy who had stolen from her. The more important thing was that he had confirmed her suspicions about his identity, which meant that there were three possibilities as to where they were. The first and most likely in her opinion, was that they were in the brig of one of Twill's ships, and she had been mistaken for one of Bartolomeo's crew. The second possibility was that they were on the Going Luffy-Senpai, and this guy just happened to be in the brig for whatever reason. And the third was that somehow the two of them had been picked up by someone completely unrelated.
"Whatever, tats-for-brains," she snapped. "So where are we?"
The man grinned, revealing a unkept set of teeth, and let a barely audible rumble of a laugh. "Where do you think, woman? The brig of course."
Vetica felt her eye twitch in annoyance at his smug comment and briefly considered questioning him again about there location, but a part of her knew it would be met with more coyness.
"Fine. Different question," she said, before sitting up. "Who brought me here?"
"You don't remember?" Another deep chortle escaped the pirate. Then the man slowly pressed a thumb to his chest. "It was me."
Her body roiled as the ship rocked, as if it had hit an unexpectedly large wave. Though Vetica was unsure if the nausea was from the motion or from the revulsion that this disgusting man had touched her and the realization that it meant she was back on Bartolomeo's ship after all.
She clutched a hand to her head as she struggled to recall the events of her attempted escape.
"I wang-banged you pretty hard on the head when we met in the woods," the pirate said, clearly seeing her distress. "Captain wasn't too pleased about it, said for every day you were out he'd lop off a finger and tossed me down here. You'd think he'd be a bit more grateful considerin' I brought him his favorite catch."
Vetica winced at the sheer lack of concern on the man's face. It was almost as if he was completely okay with being punished as long as it was by Bartolomeo.
Vetica glanced down at his bandaged hands, for once a little anxious to ask for important information. "So how long has it been?"
The man held up a hand, very clearly missing an index finger. She grimaced. He smiled. "Lucky for me only a day and a half."
She sighed, relieved it hadn't been too long, but then froze as she realized that meant Rider and Commander Twill would likely be looking for her. That meant she would be considered kidnapped again, which wouldn't look great for her career, even though this time it was true. She would be questioned by the marines again about her connection to Bartolomeo, which wasn't anything she would have trouble talking her way out of, but interrogations were so annoying and time consuming.
Just then there was the sound of a door latch, and light flooded the room. Vetica scrambled to the bars of the cell as Gambia entered the brig carrying what looked like a small first-aid kit.
"Good, you're up," he said, going to place the kit by the bars. He nodded over to the other pirate. "Guess that means one less injury to deal with at least, ay Patch? Looks You gotta get back to work."
Patch let out a small grunt, making eye contact with Vetica.. "I was enjoyin' vacation."
"Don't act tough; you were crying like a little girl in here yesterday when we came 'n got you," Gambia said as he fiddled with the cage's lock.
Vetica made for the exit as it swung open, but found herself being held by Gambia's firm grip.
She to slip from his arms, but the man held firm.
"Let me go. I need to speak to Barty." She insisted. She could feel tears of annoyance beginning to build up.
"Chill out; I'll get him," Gambia assured her. "But right now I'm just here for him and to check you out."
He nodded to Patch as he disappeared through the door before gently lowering Vetica back into the cage. His full body blocked any possible escape while he messed with her sloppy head bandage.
Her head injury stung with each poke, causing Vetica to cringe. After a couple of clumsy prods, she slapped the man's hand away.
"Well," he sighed. "Sorry 'bout that... The idiot really knocked you upside the head pretty hard; thankfully it doesn't look too terrifying anymore. Barto-Aniki will be happy to hear that."
A knot formed in Vetica's stomach as she realized she hadn't received this gentle of treatment from Gambia since the time they all thought Bartolomeo had raped her.
Gambia began working on redressing her wound, Grabbing Vetica gently by the hair to ensure she wouldn't fidget too much.
"He isn't going to let me go this time, is he?" She asked.
Gambia let out a heavy breath, but continued working. "Barto-Aniki isn't the type to actively hurt people he cares about," he murmured. "Just so long as you're straightforward with him and apologize, he should let you go."
Gambia stopped, taking a moment to snip the new dressing. He then stared down at Vetica, his eyes barely discernible through his dark sunglasses.
"Just don't fuck around with him like that again. Call it off if you don't like him, but don't toy with heart like I know you've been."
Gambia tucked the end of the dressing into itself.
"So basically you want to me to break-up with him."
Gambia shrugged. "It'd be better for both of you."
As the man re-latched the doors and packed up the medical supplies, Vetica reached through to tap him on the shoulder. She put on her best smile as she stared up at him.
"While I'm stuck here could you bring me a den-den mushi ?" she asked. "Just to make some business calls."
Gambia picked up the first aid kit and without skipping a beat turned away and began to leave. "No."
She grasped at his pant leg through the bars. "Please, I just need to call Rider." She pulled her hand back and took a deep breath, realizing she was potentially begging. She steadied her gaze and straightened up. "If I don't call my partner the marines are going to come hunting for me."
However, he left without replying, leaving Vetica alone with her clothes and thoughts. She crawled over and began unfolding her clothes, sifting through to make sure everything was there. Her prized photo was missing, of course. It wasn't too surprising that Bartolomeo had taken the opportunity to steal it again. As she checked her skirt pockets she felt the lump of a small, thick envelope. Once removing it she could tell that it had gotten a little water damaged in the chaos of her travels, but the name on the outside was still clear: "Marlon".
Carefully she settled against the wall and removed the contents of the envelope and began to read. Her eyes grew wide.
"This is..."
Rather than a letter inside the papers Vetica found were logs: five full lists of dates, locations, and several other undefined numbers. She laid the papers side by side in front of her. For whatever reason some of the names seemed familiar, like the island of Ohara, though the young reporter could exactly remember where she had heard the names before. She was pretty sure her father had written about a plague in Flevance. She cursed herself for not taking a look at these notes when she could have referenced her father's research materials.
As she reached the end of the list, she saw some dates of what she could recognize as indicators of more recent events: the incident of Gilligen, where a full town had been destroyed in what was claimed to be a landslide; Iben's uprising, a rebellion of a small island in the South Blue resulting in no survivors; the fire at Kulla Kulla, a tropical island that her father had been visiting for an assignment right before he had died...
She sighed, as she looked over the numbers again. The number "157" was written next to Gilligen, which she figured could have been the population of a small town. Whereas Iben had "45" written next to it, which would make sense given how small the farming island had been. It was after she looked at the number next to Kulla Kulla that she was certain, the numbers stood for fatalities.
A cold chill ran down her spine, as she mouthed the names of each event and fatality that seemed to be listed. She knew that her father had been investigating whether or not the fire at Kulla Kulla had been set intentionally by one of the Marine Admiral's that had been dealing with resistant locals, and there had been rumors that Marines had actually started the conflict at Iben when one of them accidentally killed a local barmaid. Which meant if all these incidents were related...
She let her arm fall limply into her lap, as she stared absently at the storeroom wall. This was it. She wasn't certain but she was pretty sure, this was the story her father had actually been working on all along.
She took a deep breath as a new fire of resolve settled into her. "I have to get out of here."