A/N:Sorry for the long wait, but I have even more bad news for my update schedule.
I've decided to take part in the NaNoWriMo program this year, and I'll be focusing on that all through November, which means this story won't get my time of day for a while. At least a month. I'll spring back ASAP in December, but in the meantime, this is it.
By the way, NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month, where all these people (both amateurs and professional novelists) get together and challenge themselves to write a draft of an entire novel in just one month. If anybody wants to join, it's fun and it's free so, why not? :D
Well, in any case, here's the next chapter of Ghost Princess the Pirate. I sincerely hope you enjoy it!
Chapter 5: Princesses don't like idiots
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Over the next few days, Perona decided to stay on board the Baratie as long as she had money to burn. It was a vacation.
A vacation.
Peering into her hot pink purse, at the wads of hard-earned belies, she repeated the words like a mantra.
Vacation.
She'd brought all the money for spending anyways. With her income, she could afford to spend quite a bit of time comfortably on this luxurious restaurant ship. Worry about trivial things like transportation later, she had told Kumashi, and the faithful bear nodded in agreement.
During her leisurely (and expensive) dining experience, one way or another Luffy managed to introduce her to his crew. She didn't really care much for them, but, well, call it curiosity. He snuck away from the kitchen just long enough to bring (drag) Perona over to their table. Though the head chef came to haul Luffy back to work, Nami invited Perona to sit with them for dinner and completed the introductions in the captain's absence.
"Roronoa Zoro, our swordsman. And Usopp," she indicated. One man nodded at her stiffly, the other greeted her with a dashing smile.
"How do you do? I'm captain Usopp, the greatest pirate captain that ever lived in all the four seas! I'm sure you've heard about my great battle with the legendary Werecat down in South Blue a few years back. Oh, yes, everybody was talking abou it . . ."
"Hn."
She lost interest ever before he finished the first sentence. Not even sparing him a cursory glance, Perona turned her attention to the dessert sitting in front of her.
Both she and Nami had a bowl of parfait to eat, courtesy of the love-struck Sanji, and Perona busied herself admiring the cute little smiley face drawn with hot fudge syrup on the vanilla ice cream. She hummed a little. This first-class restaurant didn't fail to disappoint her tastes. Usopp, looking a bit put out, climbed back onto his chair, whispering furiously about the time he'd battled the gigantic octopus in the deep seas and managed to return alive.
"So, did that idiotic captain ask you to join the crew, too?" asked the green-haired man sitting next to her. Roronoa Zoro, Nami had called him. Marimo, Sanji had corrected. Either way, he still had green hair.
She didn't care much for green.
Perona studied him for a minute, then leaned back in her chair with a bored expression. "Your voice isn't cute. I don't want to answer you."
"Huh?" Zoro gave her a disbelieving look.
"W-wait, did Luffy really ask you to join our crew?" Usopp stuttered out nervously, eyeing the freakish bear that Perona hugged in her arms.
"If you get rid of that helmet that makes you look like a mole-hill, I'll considering answering you."
The long-nosed boy clutched his helmet indignantly, yelling about how it was the legendary helmet of immortality.
Hmph, immortality or not, it was still as ugly as a mole hill.
"Well, did Luffy really ask you?" Nami asked.
"No, he didn't," came the immediate reply. "Why would you all think he asked me, anyway?"
"Why are you answering her so easily!?" Zoro and Usopp yelled, but Perona barely gave them a glance.
"Hmmm . . . horohorohorohoro, but aside from that, Nami, you would look very, very cute in this newest dress that I've managed to finish last week. I designed it fresh this spring—it won't be available in stores for another month! Would you like to buy it on a discount?" Perona fished out a huge, frilly dress the color of cherry blossoms and eagerly looked at Nami, whose pretty face and slender figure had captured Perona's attention almost immediately.
Nami looked at the dress, then bolted up from her seat so quickly that her chair crashed into the table behind her. Amid indignant shouts and crashing plates, Nami clasped her hands together excitedly. Perona noted—with a bit of pride—the sparkle of admiration in the girl's eyes. "Oh my, isn't that the popular Princess Brand design that's going around these days? It's been all over the East Blue!"
Perona lifted her chin up with a smirk, glad that there was at least one person who appreciated her work around here. "So you've heard of it? I'm the one who designs and hand-makes every single one of these Princess brand items. What do you say? It's not to any old person I offer a discount to."
"I'll take it!"
"Horohorohorohoro, you've got good taste, Nami!"
Zoro stared at the girls as they began a lively discussion about dresses, about looped ribbons and how to tuck in hems elegantly, on the merits of scarves or lacy patterns . . . the swordsman went back to his tea in a somewhat dejected manner. "Girls are…mysterious creatures."
Usopp nodded in agreement.
Soon after, Nami went back to the ship to put away her newly bought dress. Perona didn't particularly feel like sitting at the same table with Zoro and Usopp, so she left to get some fresh air on the upper railings.
Come to think of it, she'd stayed here for more than a few days now. She had to start forming a plan: how to get off this ship and back to Loguetown? Sure, she could fly there—her Horo Horo powers could pull it off—but Loguetown was far away. It would be at least a 2 day trip.
"Hmm . . . I need my beauty sleep," Perona pouted, staring out into the ocean. "And I'll get sweaty, so that's not good, either. But, I can't afford to stay here much longer. And I'm tired of having to make my Hollows invisible all the time . . ."
She pouted, missing the goofy friends that would always float around her whenever she stayed in the solitude of her apartment. Usually she kept two of her Negative Hollows out at all times. On her boat or in the apartment, it kept her from feeling too lonely. And sometimes she liked to have 10 or 20 of them all over the room, and they'd have a nice party or a fashion show, where she'd try on her new designs and display them for the approval of her ghost friends.
But now but she couldn't see them, only feel their presence. She rolled her eyes around gloomily, and tucked her beloved Kumashi tighter into her embrace.
Remaining lost in thought, she stood oblivious as the figure of tall, dark, broken ship loomed over the Baratie on the other side of the restaurant. Its shadow cast forebodingly onto the smaller vessel, but she didn't notice. Nor did she hear all the commotion going on downstairs. Crashes, faint screams, angry shouts, they all blew past her head. Not until a massive stampede of customers came pouring out onto the decks did she startle out of her reveries and rush to the foredeck to see what was going on.
What met her eyes was . . .
"Where did this huge deck pop out from?" she asked, to one in particular, as she landed onto wide platform attached to the front of the Baratie. She didn't remember there being such a big deck before.
Also, what was this mess? All the chefs stood in battle formation, armed to the teeth and glaring at a gigantic ship. From its deck, battle cries echoed through the fog. Wait? A fog? Hadn't it been sunny just a while ago? And that ship, it towered over the small Baratie, its ragged sails blowing slowly in the wind. The rigs balanced precariously, on the verge of toppling down in a mass of rotting wood. It was, in all honestly,
". . . one of the ugliest ships I've ever seen," she crinkled her nose in distaste.
Other than that, she noticed a few other sights rather absent-mindedly. Those two pathetic bounty hunters from before seemed to be blubbering something about Nami and the Merry Go. They boarded a small boat, readying to cast off. Some of the chefs were muttering dark curses under their breaths, handling carving knives in a way that made Perona's parasol look like a toy. Luffy's small pirate ship seemed to be missing altogether, and Perona's latest customer—a certain orange-haired girl—was nowhere in sight.
Crash!
The roiling pitch of the battle cries pitched into a higher octave of terror. Huge waves rose up, foaming angrily, and creaking masts finally snapped in two as the ship gave out beneath them.
Perona blinked, and her jaw fell open in disbelief. The huge ugly galley. Cut clean in two! She felt her eyes bugging out at the unbelievable sight. It had been split exactly down the middle, smoothly sliced, and the ugly masts and ugly sails proceeded to break down into further pieces of debris. Bits of rotten wood slowly sank into the ocean waves. Who . . . wha . . . ?
"Why do you keep chasing us!?" yelled out a voice. She saw that a lot of men had fallen into the water, dog-paddling for dear life. Those, she presumed, were the pirates who had occupied that disgrace of a ship before it got split clean into pieces. Several of them had managed to cling onto what was left of their ship, and stood there, looking terrified of the lone figure who slowly emerged out of the mist.
"Why . . . ?" repeated the shadowy figure.
Perona narrowed her eyes. That voice sounded unsettlingly familiar . . .
On a small boat, almost too small to be considered operational, sat a man, his legs crossed and hands folded neatly in his lap. He might have been out fishing for all he seemed to care about the pirates around him. He didn't even blink at the sight of a dozen pistols aiming for his head. The man's eyes roved around the scattered figures before him, before simply stating, "Because I'm bored."
"WHAT!?"
"Just for that reason, you'd chase us all the way over here!"
"Why you . . . eat this!"
Perona heard the click of a gun, and then someone took a shot at the man responsible for cutting the ship.
How stupid.
Dracule Mihawk's blade smoothly deflected the bullet. No sound penetrated the air—to the casual eye, a black sword magically appeared in Mihawk's outstretched hand.
A shocked murmur ran through the spectators. Most began to back away from the clearly dangerous man. But at the same time, a lone man stepped forward into Mihawk's range, the clank of his sword sheaths echoing loudly in the stillness.
"You're bored, right? Fight me," declared Zoro as he tied a dirty old bandana to his head. Perona gaped again, this time in disbelief. So, here was another stupid man. Were all pirates these days as clueless as these?
"Oyyyy, you!" Perona called out, running towards the idiot who dared to challenge the greatest swordsman in the world. "Are you stupid? Get back or that man will kill you!"
Zoro barely gave her a glance before going into a battle stance, crouched, his three swords at the ready. Perona grinded her teeth. She was trying to help this barbaric man from being slashed to tiny pieces by an even more barbaric man, and here she was getting ignored. How dare he ignore a well-intended warning! She didn't give straightforward warnings like this often, you know! Her face turned into a childish scowl, and she furiously whipped her head around to give him her best cold shoulder.
"Hmph, do whatever you want then! Just don't blame me when you get cut in half by that sword-idiot, you idiot!"
Why should she worry about someone she barely knew anyway? If he hadn't been a crewmate of Nami's—a valued customer—she would have just stopped caring a long time ago. That's right!
Perona glanced back at Zoro, and seeing him still in battle stance, she 'hmph'ed and crossed her arms over her chest.
At that moment, Mihawk, who had been staring at Zoro quite expressionlessly, turned his head to look at her. Perona stepped back reflexively, then caught herself and scowled even deeper. Giving him a "what?" look in defiance, she tossed her curls into the air.
"I though I might run into you in East Blue, ghost girl," Mihawk commented.
"Well, I for one never wanna see you again! Go back to your gloomy island with your ugly baboon friends and don't come ruining my vacation!" she yelled back, unconsciously floating 4 inches off the wooden deck as she did so. She was too preoccupied with dealing with one of her most dangerous customers to notice her ghost powers take over.
Some of the onlookers, however, did notice, and rubbed their eyes to make sure they weren't just seeing things. Luffy's eyes began to take on a rather eager sparkle as he stared at Perona's airborne feet.
". . . I didn't intend to run into you during your holidays," replied Hawkeyes. He sounded almost apologetic, but his face remained too stoic for Perona's liking. She had never liked his looks anyway. They didn't seem to suit any of her best designs, and combining that with his unexpectedly stubborn personality, it made for a customer that was next to none in making her job so difficult.
Why was it so difficult, some may ask?
He always turned down her designs. Even minor suggestions got cut off with a sharp glare. So whenever she made clothes for him, they matched his preference, his tastes, and Hawkeye's personal choice of outfits were black, black, BLACK! Always black!
Just thinking about all the hours she spent laboring on depressing, black outfits made her seethe in indignation. How dare he reject her Princess Brand capes. They had been laced with red ribbons and trimmed with her most popular edging, the royal hearts! He'd even rejected her second-most popular design, the Ace of Spades, on his shirt! His excuse had been that they didn't suite his taste, but really, the only designs that did suite his tastes were those plain black and white ones with barely any trimmings on them.
The designer in Perona wept every time Mihawk ordered a new shirt.
Perona made an almost audible growl, wondering why she had ever taken the first commission from him a year ago anyway. "If you don't want to ruin my break any further, go back now! Right now. Don't kill anyone! Don't murder anyone! Like I want to end my long-awaited vacation sitting in the Marine investigation room—just because you decide you're bored or something!"
Mihawk's gaze turned sharp, and several gasps were heard all around, but Perona didn't let up her own glare. They both knew that Mihawk's blade would simply pass right through her body.
". . ."
Unless he used Haki. But . . . but, he had never attempted to use Haki on her after the first time. Not after having tasted 3 Negative Hollows in succession.
Ha. It had been quite satisfying to see Mihawk down on his knees, muttering about his own unworthiness. Of course, she had high-tailed it out of his sight before he recovered.
Mihawk let his gaze drift back to his little ship. "I've finished my business here anyway."
He got ready to board his ship, resheathing his sword. At this, Zoro flinched, and for some reason, sent Perona a deadly glare.
"Hey, woman!" Zoro gritted out to Perona, "don't interrupt my fight!"
She huffed a little at this. "What? How is it my fault that he's just too lazy to fight you, huh?"
But once again, Zoro didn't even bother to listen to her reply as he took a few steps closer to Hawkeyes, who paused and gave the younger swordsman a passing glance.
"You are a frog . . . at the bottom of a well," Mihawk began. "This is the East Blue—the weakest of the four seas. I don't know what sort of reputation you've built up in these parts, but you are no match for me. As a swordsman, you should be able to see it, right? The difference in our strengths."
"The difference doesn't matter," Zoro answered back. "I just know that I want to test my blades against the strongest. After coming this far, I won't let you leave as you please. Come at me!"
". . ." Hawkeyes gazed at him a moment longer, then turned to face him properly. Zoro smirked over the sword in his mouth. However, it quickly faded as Mihawk pulled out a small dagger as small as one of his fingers.
". . . ?" Zoro eyed the toy in Hawkeyes hands, confused. "What's that?"
"Unfortunately, this is the smallest blade I have. It should be more than enough to beat you."
Ohhh. Trust in that arrogant Hawkeyes to hit it where it hurts. Perona watched, mostly resigned now that Mihawk had a knife out, as the air around Zoro chilled dangerously. For the onlookers, the sight of the famed three-sword style pirate hunter in full-blown rage must have been quite a frightening sight. Perona just twirled her parasol.
With the green-haired man so angry, she knew for sure that he wouldn't beat Mihawk now.
And she was right. They exchanged a few blows, and the battle ended decisively one-sided. Even Perona flinched, biting her lip worriedy, as Hawkeyes slashed Zoro straight across the chest with his ridiculously big sword. That would definitely leave a scar . . .
As the green-haired swordsman fell into the ocean, Luffy charged straight at Mihawk, seemingly unaffected by the fact that one of his crewmates had been beaten so easily. Rather, he looked extremely angry, for the sake of his defeated swordsman. But Perona knew Mihawk wouldn't even be fazed by something like that. She floated up a bit more, face scrunched up in anxiety.
"You . . . you killed Zoro! I'll never forgive you!" he shouted in rage, aiming another punch at him. Perona's eyes widened again as the boy's arms stretched out an impossible length to try and hit Hawkeye's face. The punch missed, and Luffy went flying by to crash into the restaurant wall.
That. That had definitely been a devil's fruit of some sort.
Luffy bounced back up, ready to tackle again.
". . . stretch-stretch fruit?" Perona hazarded a guess, letting out a breath she had been holding.
"Wait." Mihawk held up a hand. "Your friend is not dead."
He glanced briefly at Perona as he said so. She frowned. What?
"I have not killed anyone."
Oh, is that so? Perona put her hands on her hips and flew over to where the elder swordsman stood, glaring down at him from the height advantage her ghost powers gave her.
"There's still blood all over the place," she frowned even deeper, than stuck one of her fingers regally up to point at the bloody green-haired swordsman, who had just been pulled out of the water by his panicking friends. "Just look what you've done! That cut will give him a scar for life! How do you expect someone with a scar over his chest to digest my Princess brand clothes. Are you trying to make all the swordsmen in the world ineligible for my designs?!"
She turned away and hurried over to Zoro, barely giving a glance at the 2 bounty hunters who gaped at the flying girl. Grasping the injured one by both his arms, she hauled him aboard their boat. Behind her, Luffy shouted out in concern for his crewmate. She hovered closer, clutching Kumashi tighter as she watched him breath heavily. His chest heaved with each breath, and he continued to cough up blood, some of it splattering onto Perona's stockings.
She bit her lip, then flew off overhead, now really not caring whether anyone saw or not. As she zoomed up into the sky, amid shouts of surprise from the useless bystanders, she hid behind her parasol as she yelled,"I can't believe you got blood on my clothes! And you're stupid too, to get injured like that! Serves you right, idiot bushido!"
Luffy flinched and looked up at her darkly. He looked ready to say something back, but stopped short at her next words.
"You better lie there and not move an inch until I get bandages. There's only so much blood the world can take before it becomes a pollution!" she turned around briefly to face her gaping audience, pointing a warning finger at the swordsman who stared at her in disbelief, despite the pain that wracked his body. "I'd rather gouge my eyes out than look at your sorry state for another second. I mean it, you better stay right there until I get back!"
And then she was gone. Silence reigned for a few moments as everybody tried to process what had just happened. Some of them wondered how heartless she must be to say such words to an injured man.
Surprisingly, however, it was Luffy who broke the silence. He grinned widely and gave a wave in the direction Perona had disappeared, yelling out, "thanks, Perona!"
Zoro, who had definitely seen the hint of worry flash in the girl's eyes when she made eye contact with him, turned his head to the side, only to flinch again as his wound throbbed. "Luffy . . ."
He took a deep breath. This time, he yelled with all his might, "Luffy!"
"Zoro-nii, please don't speak!" Johnny yelled, crying tears of worry. Yosaku, whose face was a picture of tears and snot, also shook his head as he tried to stem the blood flow on Zoro's chest. He paid them no heed. Instead, he lifted up his sword so that Luffy could see it clearly.
"Until the day comes when you achieve your dreams, I will never . . . lose again!"
". . ."
"You got a problem with that, king of the pirates!?"
"Shishishi, nope!"
Mihawk watched their exchange, then gave a small smile. "You two make a good pair."
He turned to leave, blatantly ignoring Don Krieg's half-hearted jibes at him, instead choosing to glance in the direction Perona had flown off. He really did need a new shirt—perhaps he would call her when he got back home to order a new one. As an apology for today's events, perhaps he would allow her to add one of her silly stitchings on the front as well.
How Perona would weep when she found out.
With a barely audible sigh, the strongest swordsman in the world disappeared into the fog, leaving behind a defeated but determined Zoro, a beaming straw hat pirate, and a peeved ghost girl who was currently flying through all the rooms in the Baratie—literally going straight through walls as she did so—in search of medical supplies.
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When Perona finally, finally found the first-aid kit she had been looking for, she almost cried out in joy. Why had this important thing been stuffed behind the trash can of the kitchen? She'd used her possession Hollows in all the upper rooms for nothing, when it had been down here all along. Too worried about Zoro's loss of blood, Perona had opted to release a fairly large amount of her possession Hollows to flip the contents of each room upside down, moving on to the next when she did not immediately see the familiar red cross. It proved much faster than sifting through everything by hand.
At last, when all the drawers in the kitchen had been upturned, when no room was left unraided, she glimpsed the first-aid kit and wasted no time in grabbing it and flying straight out onto the deck.
"Eh?" Perona skidded to a halt, bobbing up and down in the air in confusion at the sight of the pirate Gin holding a gun to the fallen head chef's head. Unwittingly, she had exited the kitchen at a very awkward moment. Currently, she hovered a few feet behind Gin and his hostage. Wait, why was Gin taking the chef hostage? What? With her view blocked of the outside deck, she had no idea why the chef lay subdued. When had Gin come back, anyway?
Perona cocked her head in confusion. Behind her, her two faithful negative Hollow companions cocked their heads too. She no longer bothered to hide them. Too many unexpected things were happening—she needed to be ready. Her Hollows just looked happy to be able to fly about in the open with Perona again.
"Why won't you fight back!?" Gin yelled to someone out on the deck. His hand that held the pistol shook. She heard a crash and a multitude of voices shouting out Sanji's name—there was a thud, and she faintly heard the blonde cook groan.
"I won't…let the old man die," she heard Sanji's voice mutter, right before another crash cut off his sentence.
". . ." Perona looked at Gin's back, still undecided as to what was going on, when Kumashi wiggled a little in her arms and pointed at the man. Perona looked down at her favorite plushie.
"Gun, bad," grunted Kumashi. Perhaps, he was right. If Sanji seemed to be in trouble because of Gin's hostage, she was willing to help out.
He had made her cute and delicious desserts every meal while on board, after all.
"Negative Hollow!" she commanded, and the Hollow on her right flew straight forward, passing through Gin's chest before the man even realized that she was behind him. There issued a few screams a moment later—actually, a lot of screams, high-pitched and terrorized—from the men outside. She could guess that the sight of the ghost as it circled lazily onto the deck proved a bit of a shocker, but Perona was more concerned about the old man with a broken peg leg.
"What's with you?" she questioned as she flew over to help Zeff up. "I thought you were strong enough not to be taken hostage like that. How pathetic."
She scowled at him, but despite her stinging words, got one of her possession Hollows to bring over a chair for the chef to sit on anyways. The man looked at her in bemusement, then shook his head. "What exactly have you done to that man?"
"Hm?" Perona blinked. She followed the old man's gaze down to the fallen figure of the pirate Gin, who was currently bemoaning his life down on his hands and knees. The atmosphere around him felt morbidly depressing, and as the flabbergasted cooks and pirates out on the deck watched, Gin began muttering, "I'm sorry I'm alive . . . . I should have died a long time ago . . . . I want to become a piece of dirt trampled on the sidewalk . . ."
"EHHHH!?" the pirates yelled in sheer astonishment, not knowing whether to run for their lives away from the transparent specter hovering over their heads or to figure out what had gone wrong with their confident first mate.
Perona sniffed haughtily. "Hmph. What do you mean, 'what did I do to him?' I put him in his place, that's what. It's a disgrace if you need hostages to win, you know. What happened to your pride, Gin? Did you throw it away along with the jean jacket I gave you?"
This last question was out of spite. Indeed, the jean jacket she had provided him was nowhere to be seen, replaced by that moldy training jacket he had on before. It made her shudder, to think that men could stand to wear that kind of thing and walk out in public. She turned away from the disgraced man and looked over at Luffy, who was currently gawking at the negative Hollow as it swooped down to take its place next to Perona. Its tail end wrapped around one of her legs, as it had the habit of doing, and Perona gave the Hollow a smile of approval before asking Luffy, "So, where's the idiot swordsman who dared put blood on my clothes? And why is the deck on fire?"
"Uh . . . eh?" Luffy, still preoccupied with the ghost, took a few more moments to notice the first-aid kit that Perona was trying to hide behind her back. Her efforts didn't do anything to obstruct it from view, though, since it was much bigger than her frame. Luffy scratched his head. "Eh, he left. Is that a ghost?"
"What!?" this time it was Perona's turn to gawk. She had specifically told him not. To. Move! What was wrong with him? Maybe he really did belong in the idiot category. "Where!?"
"He went ahead to get Nami back," answered the boy, only serving to confuse Perona even more. She stared at him for a few more seconds, but again he only asked, "Is it a real ghost?"
"Of course! Can't you even tell a real ghost from a fake one? Tell me where that bushido went before he manages to soil any more innocent young women with his atrocious state!"
"Ehm . . . uhh . . ." Luffy tilted his head this way and that, then turned to look at the other cooks. They looked badly beaten up as well. "Do you guys know which direction Zoro went in?"
The unanimous reply came as: "How should we know!?"
Both Perona and Luffy gave a frustrated sigh.
"Well, whatever," Perona flew over to Sanji, who she now noticed lay fallen with quite a few bruises of his own. A close look didn't reveal anything near Zoro's level, but it looked pretty serious nonetheless. "I'll start by cleaning this bloody mess here first. Honestly, do all you men enjoy having a bloodbath or something?"
As she got ready to open up the first-aid kit, and as Sanji eagerly prepared to receive treatment from a 'lovely lady,' Paloo stepped forward to loom over the ghost girl threateningly. The big man smirked down from his height as Perona took out a roll of bandages. "Hohohoho, and just what makes you think I'll let you save him, girly?"
Perona didn't even look up. "Negative Hollow!"
Swoosh.
Paloo fell forward, his giant frame crashing flat onto the ground as he let out a dejected string of mumbles. "I don't deserve to see the light of day. I was never meant to leave the jungle . . . please reincarnate me into a piece of moss . . ."
"Ahhh! Paloo turned negative!" there came a chorus of the man's pirate mates. One of them aimed a gun at the girl, panic written on his face. "You, what did you do to Don Krieg's best fighters!?"
A scowl overtook Perona's features. She turned swiftly around and suddenly flew right into the face of the outspoken pirate. The man yelped and fell backwards in fright; she gave him a disdainful look down her nose before saying, "your voice is the ugliest one I've heard in my life. Why don't you shut your mouth for the good of mankind?"
She swept that same glare onto the rest of his companions. "Negative Hollow—army!"
What happened next would haunt the Don Krieg pirates' nightmares for months afterwards. At least as many Hollows as there were pirates suddenly sprang out from the pink-haired girl's body, sprouting like water from a fountain. An endless stream of ghosts all swirled up into the air, blunt arms swinging as they rocked back and forth.
" . . . .!"
It was quite a sight to see. Perona gave a victorious smirk and pointed straight at the group of pirates mingling about the deck and in the waters. The Hollows looked at her, then at the pirates. Taking aim, the rose up higher, and dived. Straight down.
Whoosh! Whoosh!
"Uaghhh!"
"What in the . . . run! Argghhh!"
"What are these. . . !"
"Horohorohorohoro, wallow in the throes of your own pathetic selves!" laughed Perona, watching as one after another, the pirates fell onto their hands and knees in the very picture of suicidal thoughts. The groans of pure misery sounded almost overwhelming—many of the chefs themselves looked stricken, despite the fact that none of Perona's Hollows had hit them. Brief mutters such as "I want to die" and "Let me be a dead tick on the roadside" and "my life is the pits" filled the air as more than a hundred pirates fell into negativity. The Negative Hollows, their jobs done to Perona's satisfaction, vanished from sight once again, leaving the only the original two Hollows out to check for any survivors. One of them took a swing through both Gin and Paloo just for good measure.
"Wo . . . woooooooow! Coooooool!" Luffy exclaimed. The remaining chefs, Zeff and Sanji included, stared at the downed pirate crew. Whatever those ghosts had done, it had been done hard and fast.
"You, what did you do?" asked the head chef Zeff. Perona, instead of answering the question, simply gave the brigade of cooks an impatient glare.
"Hmph, if you've got time to ask me stupid questions, go and finish taking care of those guys. They won't stay negative for long, you know. I'm not doing you guys a favor twice, so you better do something before they all get back up."
At this, the chefs started. They won't stay negative for long . . . ?
"Onwards, men! Let's give those pirates a real beating!"
"Aye!"
With that, the chefs spent the next few minutes in an enjoyable game of whack-a-mole, smacking unconscious any and all pirates before they had a chance to recover. Even the giant Paloo, who managed to recover faster than the others, got taken down by a kick from Sanji. The blond cook began serenading Perona again, but before he could get very far, an unfamiliar voice roared through the air from across the water.
Now that Perona noticed, there stood another man on the ruins of the galley, his face contorted in anger. "What is going on here!? Useless men, do I need to do everything myself? Gin, hurry and get rid of that girl . . . whatever strange powers she used, make sure she won't use it any longer!"
At this, all eyes turned to Gin. Or, rather, where Gin had been standing only moments before. In the blink of an eye, the man had moved behind Sanji, delivering a crushing blow with his tonfas to the unsuspecting cook's back.
"Sanji!"
The weakened cook dropped without resistance, landing on the wooden deck with a thump. Gin retracted his weapons and said, "Captain Krieg . . . I would rather not take any more hostages, and attacking a young girl . . . just doesn't sit right with me. Would you allow me to finish this business myself?"
The deck fell silent. All eyes were trained on Gin as he stood over Sanji, ready to deal the final blow on Don Krieg's command.
The captain of the Krieg pirates wasted no time. "Uhahahaha, very well, then. Kill the chefs and take their ship!"
"Sanji-san, I'm sorry."
Gin gripped his tonfas and raised his arm, poised to bring it crashing down onto the cook's hand. But before he could, Sanji's boot shot up to connect with the man's chin with a crack. It sent Gin flying across the deck to land near Perona, and the girl promptly sent another Negative Hollow through him to render him useless again.
"I'm sorry. I'm worse than garbage. Please kill me now," Gin muttered.
"Ah . . . thank you, Perona-san," smiled Sanji. "but please step back. It's dangerous for a lady like yourself to be up here with all these dangerous pirates."
Even from far away, they could hear Don Krieg grit his teeth in fury. His men had been downed effortlessly, Paloo lay unconscious after having accomplished nothing more than setting his future ship on fire. It seemed that after that strange ghost-girl came on deck, nothing went according to plan. With a growl of anger, Don Krieg prepared the cannon on his right arm. "Prepare yourselves, worthless scum! With a blast of my MH5, I'll send you all to your grave. Even if you have some strange powers, none of you will be able to survive this! Uhahahaha!"
"C-captain . . .!"
"Don't do it, Captain Krieg!"
Some of the pirates who had managed to stay conscious, after hearing his words, began begging their captain to stop. Some of them started shouting in panic, while others fumbled with some strange-looking gas masks.
"What? If it's a cannon, I'll just bounce it back," said Luffy.
Perona gave him a weird look. "And how exactly would you do that?"
He looked around at her, then grinned. The next thing she knew, he had gripped his cheeks and stretched them out to an impossible length, saying, "shishishi, I'm a rubber man! Bullets and cannonballs can't do anything to me!"
Perona was taken aback a bit by this. It had been a while since she last ran into a Devil's fruit user. It was pretty rare. Especially in the East Blue, where all the bounties stopped at a pretty pathetic level.
But before she could say anything more, Krieg's voice rang out over the waters. "You, straw-hat brat! I'll ask you one more time. Between you and me, who do you think is more suited to becoming the king of the pirates?"
"That would be me," replied Luffy, crossing his arms confidently.
The other chefs glared at him. "Hey, why'd you have to say something like that!?"
"What? It's true."
Luffy seemed unfazed. Krieg looked really pissed off.
"Horohorohorohoro," Perona gave a laugh. This boy had absolutely no regard for the current danger; either he was confident and proud, or stupid and vain. She thought it might be the former, in which case she was willing to respect the boy a little more.
"Heh," Krieg had his strange shield held up in front of him now. "I'll show you the face of true power. Know the difference between a dreamer like you, and a real pirate like me! MH5!"
Something shot out of the shield and flew towards the Baratie. The pirates had either dived underwater or had gas masks covering their faces, and the cooks had all fled into the restaurant.
Luffy made to run towards the cannonball, but surprisingly, Gin's hand came up to halt the boy. "Stop! That isn't a regular cannonball. It's a poison gas bomb. Breath even a little of it and you'll end up dead in seconds!"
"What!?" Luffy began panicking then. "What do we do?"
"I have a mask, but only one . . . !" Gin grabbed a gas mask out of his jacket but glanced uncertainly between Sanji and Luffy, then at Perona, who stood a little distance away.
"Hmph, the best plan the men can think of is hiding behind some grotesque mask," Perona scoffed. She flew over so that she stood in front of Luffy, calling out a possession Hollow from her arm. No time to waste. The blue ghost hovered briefly, then followed her command and went flying into the face of the incoming bomb.
"Possession Hollow—rebound!"
In an instant, the Hollow disappeared inside the speeding projectile, making it stop inches in front of Perona's face. The bomb remained motionless for a moment. Then, at the wave of Perona's hand, it shot straight back the way it came from, this time aiming for its owner.
"What!?" yelled Krieg in astonishment. He quickly pulled out his own mask and ducked, just barely missing getting hit by the possessed bomb as it flew over his head to explode behind him instead. From the purple cloud of toxic fumes that spread over the galley's deck, the lone form of Perona's Hollow came floating back out. It appeared unfazed by the poison clouds bellowing around it. Krieg's tall figure had been obscured from view.
"What a crude shade of purple," commented Perona as one by one, the Krieg pirates resurfaced from underwater to gape at the poisonous cloud surrounding their captain.
Sanji and Gin stood silent, at a loss for words. Luffy ran up to Perona, staring at the blue Hollow beside her with stars in his eyes. "That's super cooool! How'd you do that, huh? Is that a ghost, too? How many ghosts can you make?"
Perona's parasol twirled gracefully over her shoulder as she flicked her hair. "As many as I want."
"Cooool! Hey, will you join my crew after I beat that guy up!?" Luffy pointed towards the purple mass of deadly fumes. The clouds were slowly dissipating into the air, revealing Krieg unharmed and angrier than ever.
She eyed the excited boy skeptically. "What makes you think I'll join your crew?"
"Because you're cool!"
The simplicity of the answer made Perona laugh despite herself. Luffy was really honest, if nothing else.
"You . . . !" Krieg gritted out, his anger beyond the point of measuring. Luffy looked over at him, then grinned.
"Alright! I'll beat that guy up, then Perona will join my crew with all her ghosts!"
"Hey, I never agreed to anything like that!"
But with a shout of "Gomu Gomu no Rocket!" Luffy had shot towards the older pirate, fully intent on defeating him and making the ghost-girl his nakama.
Perona sighed. What idiocy. Behind her, Gin and Sanji had broken out into battle again, and the chefs had come running back out to reengage the pirates in combat. All sides looked exhausted, with blood, sweat, and seawater running over their faces and soaking their clothes. Some pirates tried to spring an ambush on Perona as she stood smack in the middle of combat, but all their attacks simply passed through her body. She didn't even bother Negating them; it seemed more than shock enough for them that they couldn't touch or attack her body in any way.
Her frown deepened as Luffy's fist connected solidly with Krieg's cape of spikes. It might have made the fight simpler if Perona just sent her Negative Hollows through that Don Krieg scum, but a glance from Luffy made her stop. That's all he did, really. Just give her a serious look. But it was enough to refrain her from giving him a helping (ghost) hand.
"Hmph, that's why men are all idiots," Perona muttered to herself, twirling her parasol almost dejectedly. Luffy especially, and his crewmate Zoro, and even that cook Sanji, who had told her to get away from the battlefield despite the fact that she had displayed her capabilities just moments before. All of them, idiots who would rather die than have someone help them in a fight.
A smile crept up to replace her pout despite herself. As she watched Don Krieg's armor shatter under Luffy's Gomu Gomu no Bazooka, she decided that Luffy had been correct. Out of the two of them, the captain of the Straw-hat pirates was definitely more cut out to become the future King of the Pirates.
"The pride of the Pirate king, hm?" she said absentmindedly, "even if he's an idiot, I can respect a pride that big."
A/N: And that's it for now. See you all in a month or so!