April 1, 801 WG
Moondancer? was all Luffy could think as he stared at the apparition's eyes. Each one had to be bigger around than he was tall, and the red mist gathered to give the impression of lids and brows, the only part of the face that was required to produce a viable glare effect on the victim. Nothing else formed into anything recognizable as a head or body, something he could strike. But even at his most reckless, Luffy didn't think he would attempt to punch a ghost.
Scratch that, he definitely would have before death had injected a long overdue dose of caution to his nature. Now he stayed where he knelt his good hand holding his dislocated shoulder in place. The pain that pulsed through him in time with his own rapid heartbeat was the only then keeping him in the present and aware that this was not some hideous illusion.
"Luffy!" cried out the shipwright again. The Straw Hat captain could hear the helplessness in his friend's voice. Franky would have attacked by now despite his captain's orders if not for the fact that one could not shoot a ghost any more than punch one. The attempt would put their now unconscious friends in danger.
Luffy took a deep breath as he tried to settle his nerves. He was in unfamiliar territory. His friends, his niece, his friend and brother, and Law's sister were all in danger, yet he couldn't do a damn thing about it because he couldn't fight! Even if his arm wasn't injured, he still couldn't fight. Even if he had his Gum Gum Fruit and was one hundred percent, he still couldn't fight. This was not something he could punch his way out of.
Luffy's mind whirled as it tried to sort out all it knew about this thing. When in battle he could learn and determine an opponent's weakness and abilities to counteract them. He needed to do that now without fighting. His mind seized upon the realization that he had affected it with haki. It hadn't appeared until he had driven it from his friends' minds with conqueror's haki.
He spread his awareness out, trying to sense its actual form. Trying to find the place to attack it, how to attack it. The apparition only grew larger in his awareness, like a mass of people pressed together while all vying for attention. He felt the hatred and rage more keenly than before and he pulled back before he could be lost in the sea of churning dark emotions.
No good, thought Luffy as he gasped. The apparition had no physical form to strike, it was nothing but a mass of will. That was why his will had affected it but that was end of what he could do.
His mind stopped at another memory. The apparition had not only called him Moondancer and declared it was being thwarted again. Whoever this Moondancer was, they had managed to stop it once before. Once before? Luffy paled as he realized a terrifying truth. Roger had been here before. Roger had read the Poneglyphs before. Had Roger been possessed originally? Was that when it had been thwarted by this Moondancer?
If it was stopped once, it can be stopped again, thought Luffy as he gritted his teeth, determination driving him to his feet. It feels haki, maybe if I just blast it repeatedly it will return to where it came from. Luffy closed his eyes and focused his will, sending out a pulse.
The apparition hissed in what Luffy hoped was pain. He opened his eyes as he sent another blast out. The image of the eyes blurred, and it hissed again. I can do this, he thought, sending another pulse. Conqueror's haki wasn't something he was supposed to use frequently. Usually he only needed to use it once in a battle to cut down the chafe. It was not meant to substitute for a punch and the consecutive mental punches were turning out to be a double-edged sword. He felt a headache begin to materialize, threatening to break his concentration. The fourth blast lanced his forehead with white hot agony and didn't strike with nearly enough force as the first three.
The apparition that had almost dissolved into mist reformed with a malicious laugh. The eyes returned and now it formed a fang filled snout that opened wide as if to swallow him whole. Luffy was vaguely aware of Franky shouting for him but he could hear little and see less with his head feeling like it was about to split in two. He couldn't muster the will to strike a fifth time as the thing reached toward him with those terrible jaws.
"You're not Moondancer, you're just a child. We can use you to spread the word to all," declared the apparition as it closed its jaws around him.
Luffy raised his good arm above his head in a futile gesture of defense. Then he was in the maw. His headache turned to blinding agony as the dead began to invade his mind, trying to turn him to their view. The sensation was a hundred times worse than when Pudding had tried. He had managed to drive her probing hand back before she could grasp his memories and draw them out. This… They weren't trying to draw anything out, they were trying to push things in. His will, weakened by his failed attack, could do nothing to stop it.
Luffy mustered as much stubbornness as he could to stonewall the ghosts. They would not change his mind with false emotions he did not feel. It was all he had left to cling to in this maelstrom.
"So, you need convincing, Moonchild? An understandable stance," said the apparition. "Then I will convince you with eight hundred years of crimes."
Images and voices poured into him. Atrocities, scandals, deceptions destruction. Eight hundred years of World Government lies and murders were on full display for him. He came to know more about the World Government's actions than anyone living. He felt the pain and fear of the victims and his anger rose as the World Government continued to tout themselves the source of justice and order in the world. Worse, he began to recognize some of the events from his own travels.
He saw the fall of the Vinsmokes, a family of nobility and kindness in the past, to propaganda and deception of the World Government agents, eager to take their territory and remove the only rival to their rule. He saw them pit nations against each other to keep them divided. He saw them encourage depravity of the aristocracy against the commons. He saw Law's own homeland's tumble into ruin through greed and lies that damned the people. The destruction of Ohara and blackening of their good name. He saw the terrible truth of Dressrosa, the World Government had known Riku was innocent and yet they had allowed his fall and disgrace, not even trying to rescue the royal family because they feared the peace and stability he represented with his policies. The corruption of the Marines that they covered and encouraged to prevent the Marines from every following their oaths to move against them. More and more heinous acts continued. The bridge to nowhere that was worked by generations of slaves, stolen from unaffiliated nations that were simply too poor to join. He saw the tragedies of countless individuals through fake justice like Franky's master. He saw the murder of those depending on rescue by those that were supposed to rescue them.
Anger grew within the memories and the ghosts relived their worst days of their lives to him. However, he felt sorrow fill him. He could understand their anger. He could understand their hate. But what they desired would only grow these sorrows. They wanted vengeance but that would only make more victims. His mind, almost as a counterpoint, small as it was to all the terribleness filling him now, drew on his memories. Islands where people smiled, where people laughed, where people loved. People who were alive now. People and nations he had helped. He recalled Alabasta's desperation and their joy when they were saved. He remembered the darkness and fear of Skypeia and the celebration when their nightmare was ended. Water Seven, Fishman Island, Dressrosa, Wano. Mindless destruction was not the answer! He thought it. He felt it. He let his feelings fill him, not to drive out the invading ghosts but to make them understand!
They wanted him to understand and act on that understanding. But he understood them so well it hurt, now they needed to understand him.
The ghosts deepest within him, hesitated as he pushed back with his memories. Then the apparition pulled away as if he were a venomous creature able to do it harm. Maybe he was.
Luffy fell to his knees gasping, his head throbbed but his thoughts and feelings were clearer than they had ever been in his life.
"You understand…" it said in disbelief.
Luffy didn't say anything. He knew what the apparition meant. Luffy understood more than anyone how unfair the world was. How unjust it was. That was why he walked his own path, why he pursued freedom. He did not except the world as it was. And while he could only effect what was right in front of him, what was right in front of him would benefit from his view on things, his morals, his honor… dare he think it… his justice.
"I don't believe this world is lost," whispered Luffy. "There are still good people trying to live good lives in it. Would you really do to them what was done to you? What's going to happen to all of them if you get your way?" His mind flashed on Ann. "I still believe in the future. My father is fighting to overturn the World Government. There are those who love their people. And people who love their king in return. There are those who would change this justice of the World Government to what it should have been. To grant freedom to the people and true peace to the oceans."
"Your words are hollow, Moonchild," said the apparition with a snarl. "They have been spoken before by Moondancer. Moondancer spoke of a beloved that was working to change the justice of their Marines. Yet nothing has changed. Ohara, Dressrosa, Flevance. How many more nations must burn? How many more innocents must be slain before this ends?"
"How many will die through your actions?" countered Luffy.
"At least there will be an end," replied the apparition.
"Dragon is working on it, but he only got the Revolutionary Army together in the last decade. He's already liberated several nations. Freed hundreds!"
"Dragon?" the apparition cooed, sounding thoughtful.
"That's my father," replied Luffy, not sure what it had been questioning but deciding the answer the most obvious.
"Indeed. That is the one Moondancer spoke of, you are the child of Moondancer and Whitedragon. Within you, her tragic end is known."
Luffy froze. His mother was Moondancer? He had assumed Moondancer had been part of Roger's crew for the apparition to have been thwarted before it could do anything. But according to Lance, Maryanne had been a Marine. She wouldn't have been part of a pirate crew, much less Roger's.
"I thought Roger and his crew were the only ones to come here. Was my mother with the crew when they read the Poneglyph?"
"Moondancer was not with them, but she appeared before they could leave the island. With wings of light she returned their minds to clarity. The battle was fierce."
Luffy felt a blush enter his cheeks. His mother had done a better job of fighting with this thing. Here he was trying to talk it down because he couldn't do anything else and she actually beat it up first. It made him proud even as it reminded him how far he had fallen in terms of strength. Whatever those wings of light were, they must have been the key to her success.
Still in the end, it sounded like she had to talk it down as well. At least it was listening to him rather than shoving him aside.
"She relied on another to change the world and the world has not changed and she is gone," said the apparition.
"Tou-chan is working on it still and he has changed things," repeated Luffy.
"What will you do, then? Sit back and wait for the world to change, as she?"
Luffy paused. He didn't think his mother was passive as much as she had supported his father. But what did he know? He realized he didn't know anything about his parents. His grandfather had never even told him who his father was before Water Seven, and he never mentioned his mother. Ace had known more about his parents then Luffy had known about his.
Luffy knew one thing, though. He waited on no one. "I will not sit by and do nothing." He swallowed as it dawned on him what this would mean for him. He had set out to see to become the Pirate King because he desired freedom. He had chosen as he journeyed to aid various people and nations by extension because of the relationships he had developed. What the apparition wanted was a more active role from him. For him not to just passively travel and maybe intervene in a local crisis.
The apparition focused on him, its blood red eyes focusing on his brown ones. Within them, Luffy saw death and destruction on a scale he couldn't even comprehend. His mind reflected on his brother's death, hunted before he was even born for the crime of existing. His life as a pirate his last desperate attempt to grasp a fragment of freedom for a life devoid of it. He then thought of Ann and all her potential and that if the world ever learned of her existence, she would be just as scorned as her father.
Luffy gritted his teeth. "I will protect all I can 'til the world changes."
"Then protect the Grandline, Pirate King, to the best your mortal self can," replied the apparition. "But know this, if a third awakening should happen before the world has changed, then there will be no further hesitation."
"I understand," said Luffy, feeling he would be crushed under the weight that had just settled upon his shoulders.
The mist dissipated and everything returned to normal. Luffy sighed in relief then his body lost what little strength it had, and he collapsed as darkness took him.