'What the hell?'
That was the thought I have when awakened.

'What the actual hell!'
It was the thought I'm having now, disturbed.

If anyone suddenly became a three years old brat after their supposed death, the man was right to be disturbed.
However, when you woke up on the corpse of a mummified woman, it would be more than disturbing.
Especially, if said corpse was the mother of the brat you became.

"How very absurd."

I know the mummified body I made when I see one.
The woman, my mother, seems dead because of the power I had in the previous life.
Somehow, it follows me to my current life.

It makes me sick to look at the body.
This new, young body of mine is not familiar with the stress that follows after the murder.
Had I not regain my memory of the previous life, the ignorance might have cushioned it some.

But I have it.
It is the very reason I murdered my mother accidentally.

Mother was nursing me because I caught a nasty fever.
The fever was an effect of returning memory.
Memory that was nothing more than a horrendous nightmare for a ignorant young boy.

In the fit of the hysteria, the power lashed out at mother who hugged the son to sooth his anguish.

The memory, my awakening, caused this tragedy.

Hah.

Who am I kidding?
It's me I murdered mother, just as I had done it.
Difference is, the mother of my previous life had been raped to the brink of death by a Celestial Dragon, begging me to end her misery.

But this one?
Murdered by her son that was becoming someone else who slaughtered countless men and women as a pirate.

All because she was too caring to run away from him.
All because she was too loving to get away from me.

Fuck.

The previous life or no, my old body wouldn't be different to what I'm feeling from this young body.
I remember the warmth she gave me.
The affection in her voice doesn't let me be.

Fuck.

Get a grip, damn it!
I have to get a grip on myself!

Fuck this emotional body!
I will not wail or cry over spilt milk!

I'm the Crocodile, one of the seven warlords of the sea!
I never cried over killing mother before!
I will not cry over this now!

I had done it.
I have done it!

It's done!

What use the crying has!

Damn it.
Damn it!
Damn it all!

I'm Crocodile.

It's all that matters.

Fuck…...

I can't stay here.

Elizabeth is anxious.

Marilyn is not answering her call.

Last she heard from her was a call for help.
Her son, Tom, was having a fever and hysteric.

As her secret keeper from Ted the Wildcat, she is a only doctor Marilyn trusts with her son.
Right the moment Elizabeth received her call, she threw any trivial works away and started her way Marilyn's home.

Elizabeth is not the kind of person that lives by loyalty and will die by loyalty, but she has the fidelity her own.
She owed Ted when she kept his son's existence from her friend even though it was what Marilyn asked her back then.
It's the least she can do to assure his son's health.

But the house is a disaster zone when she reaches it.
RPD(Reno Police Department) officers are surrounding the area, stopping any onlookers from coming near.
There are whispers and murmurs about what happened to the house.

She doesn't have to listen to those or looks into the problem.
Everything's there to be seen.

Sand,
and sand,
and sand all over ground.

But nothing she comes to seek.

The house is nowhere to be seen.
The sand is everything she can see.

It is a miniature desert.
It can not be mistaken as a natural disaster.
It can be nothing but an attack by a metahuman.

Does a villain find out about Wildcat's son?

The med-bag slips from her grasp when a body comes out on a stretcher.
She is running toward the the body under the white sheet before she knows what she's doing.
She is shouting to people "Get out of my way!" and "I'm the family doctor, let me through, damn it!"

Lifting the sheet, she faces the body.

It is Marilyn.

Even as a mummified corpse, Elizabeth knows it is Marilyn.

The grief is great, but Elizabeth has to find Marilyn's son.
She asks one of the officers.

"Where is her son? Tom has black hair and pale blue eyes, and he's about three years old. His mother called me because of his fever."

Officers exchange glances among them.
The officer she asked answers her.

"Um, ma'am, uh, Doctor…...?"

She takes pity on him, who is obviously a rookie.

"I am Chapel, Elizabeth Chapel."

"Ah, yes, Dr. Chapel." he wipes the cold sweat with his left sleeve, "I'm sorry, we couldn't find any other body, let alone a boy. We come here about two hours ago, but the body you have seen is all we found in the sand dune. But that's before we know a boy was there."

He nods his head to his colleague.
The colleague of his is radioing for the search of the boy.

Dr. Chapel nods her head with a stiff smile.

"Thank you, officer."

Her fists is clenched.

'Whoever had harmed them,' she scowls at the sand field that was ones a lovely house with the well groomed garden, 'I will find her son and make them pay. But, first…...'

She looks at her car, grimaced.

'I should tell him about this.'