I do not own One Piece or any of that cool copyright stuff… oooooh…. Shiny –tries to touch copyrighted stuff and is slapped with a lawsuit- Oh well, this is the last chapter, enjoy!

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Chapter 4: Epilogue

DJ caught Apollo's fist under his arm. The king let out a frustrated growl and punched DJ in the shoulder that had already been injured in the battle with Zabi-maru. The speedy teen winced and made a small scream. "Are my injuries enough of a handicap for you? Or would you like me to put an arm behind my back too?" he grimaced.

Apollo yelled and threw DJ off to the side. The boy could feel his wounds begin to bleed again. "As if I need them to defeat you. I am a master of Hung Gar, I have studied Tai Chi, Ba Gua, Northern Shoaling style, Seven Star Praying Mantis style and many others… You cannot wi-" The king was cut of by a fast kick to the face from his opponent.

"That's called Speedy style, learn it!" DJ smirked and watched the king stand up again. "It doesn't matter what you've studied if you can't use it properly. Discarding other's lives, lives that should be treated with extra respect to prolong your own on a whim. You do whatever you can to win a fight, even hit in an injured opponent's weak spot you have no honor and therefore you cannot truly win." The teen got back into a fighting stance.

"Winning is all that matters in a fight!" the king rushed the boy and aimed for the bloody wounds again.

DJ easily dodged and closed his eyes. "How sad and confused this world is. Since I know where you are aiming for, I can easily anticipate and avoid your attacks." DJ jumped over Apollo and landed off to one side of the king.

Apollo smirked. "You should watch where you're going, punk."

DJ turned around and realized his back was against the wall of the chamber. "Kuso…" he whispered.

"Too late! Hammer Fist!" The king rammed his fist straight for where DJ was and was shocked when it went straight through the boy and into the wall. "What the hell!? An afterimage?"

"And that's why they call me the Phantom!" DJ appeared a few yards away from the king. Apollo tried to pull his hand out of the wall but it appeared to be stuck from the force of the punch. "You should be more careful before throwing those techniques around, they could come back to bite you, fool!" he crouched down and prepared for an attack. "Speed-Speed Dash!" he ran at the king and punched him hard in the face, dislodging him from the wall.

Apollo stood up and wiped some blood from his mouth. "I will do what I must… to survive."

"Every life you take is like a noose around your neck! You will soon die because of your own sins!" DJ pointed to the corrupt leader.

The king turned around to the back wall of his chamber. Hung on the wall was a decorative dadao (a really big knife) the king picked it up and pointed it at the teen. "This battle shall soon be over!"

DJ sighed. "I fear it will be, and one of us won't survive." He prepared himself for an attack.

"Damn straight you punk kid!" he rushed the boy and swung the dadao

"Speed-Speed Roundhouse!" DJ kicked the king only to be blocked by the flat of the large blade.

"I will live!" Apollo screamed and rammed the knife into his already damaged shoulder, deepening the wound.

DJ let out a piercing scream, "You had your chance, I've given you a chance to give up, it's time to end this." He winced.

"As if you could!" the king deepened the cut and smirked.

"Enough! Your reign is over! Speed-Speed Mach 4 kick!" DJ kicked Apollo hard in the stomach, dislodging the dadao from his shoulder and sending the king and his weapon flying. DJ turned his head as he knew where the large knife would land, having plotted how this all would turn out.

"But… why?" the king's eyes widened as he was impaled by his own weapon. A piercing scream was let loose that would haunt DJ for many years.

"I'm sorry… there was no other way…" DJ nodded to the dead king. "I hope in the next life you can find peace." He kneeled down and took the keys to the cells on the lower levels where Miyoko was being held prisoner.

He stood by the door with his eyes closed. "Ironic… the very desire to extend his life was the thing that hastened his death. Anticlimactic even, he wasn't killed by some hero from the town he oppressed, but by a stranger he had never known." He opened the door and walked through, back to the room where Ryu's body and the unconscious Zabi-maru were. He picked up Ryu's dead body. "The least I can do is bring you back to the town that loves you. Everyone deserves to be around loved ones when they die, I hope that I can achieve the same end." DJ began to walk down to the lower levels where the prisons were.

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DJ exited Apollo Tower with Miyoko on his back and Ryu in his arms. "Who are you?" the innocent child asked.

"Call me Phantom," he sighed and began waling back to heretic lake.

"Mr. Phantom? … Thank you." The child hugged him. "And be sure to tell Mr. Ryu I said thank you when he wakes up." DJ couldn't help but begin to cry upon hearing those words.

As he got close enough to the lake he saw an empty boat with a small note inside from Tazuro. I knew you'd make it kid.

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DJ smiled as he approached the town, he nudged Miyoko who had fallen asleep on his back. "You're almost home kid."

There was a surprising sight on the edge of town however, quite a few villagers were lined up along the border with swords and guns pointed at DJ. "Get your filthy hands off of our hero and the kid." A villager snarled.

Miyoko's brother stood there shocked at this entire scene. DJ calmly set Ryu down and lifted Miyoko off of his back and nudged her towards the people. "What are you doing? He helped us!" the little boy shouted.

"Shut up kid, you don't know what you're talking about." A townsperson with a gun held the boy back as Miyoko ran to his side. "This kid is a pirate! He's going to attract other pirates and bring military forces here! Look what he's already done at Apollo tower!"

"I was only trying to help..." DJ closed his eyes and began to walk around the defensive line of village people.

"If you wanna help, do us a favor and drop dead! You freak!" the man fired his gun, which was dodged by a super-fast step sideways without DJ even raising his head or opening his eyes.

The speedy teen disappeared and reappeared a few moments later with a katana and a matching sheathe, looking at a very surprised man who was holding the weapon just a moment before. "I'm borrowing this." He said calmly and firmly, heading back for the docks before leaving. The last sounds he heard of that town were the villagers shouting for him to leave and or die and the protests of the children he had helped.

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A few days later DJ held a newspaper in his hand, having drifted to the next town over and hearing the full story as the navy told it and as the villagers of that town understood it from the periodical.

A crazed youth with purposes unknown, stormed Apollo Tower late last night, murdering many soliders in cold blood, including beloved King Apollo and town hero Ryu Renduin. Witnesses described the teen as a brown-haired male. Further records indicate that this boy is known as Duncan Jeffery MacLeod from the island of Kaibyaku. Navy officials have reason to suspect he is in league with the pirate captain Red-Haired Shanks as a simple search on the island was met with resistance led by this boy which instigated forced warfare by the search party. Naval officers generously spared his life in an attempt to keep casualties to a minimum, apparently gratitude towards these men is not the boy's primary objective. MacLeod is considered armed and dangerous, report any sightings of the youth to your local Navy office and do not engage MacLeod unless absolutely necessary.

DJ smirked at the blatantly biased article, "They've been looking for an excuse to put a price on my head for over a year now." He had pissed off several naval officers and had no intention of standing by if he saw any injustice by officials. Attached to the article was a wanted poster, apparently the guard he had injured had managed to get a picture of him as he was exiting the tower. "Hmm, 30,000 beli, not too good for a pirate, although I'm sure they'll find a reason to raise it if I keep evading them and getting in their way." He chuckled.

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DJ stirred softly in his sleep and reawakened back on Dimitri's ship, still in his cell. They had indeed raised his bounty up to 70,000 beli because of his persistence in standing up to the corrupt Navy. He had stopped Navy officials from firing on civilians, murdering children, and raping women, killing the soliders if necessary.

"We live only twice it seems, once for ourselves, and once for out dreams." He sang out in his cell. He always seemed to sing to calm himself. "We laugh because we must not weep, smile because we must not scream. Fight for your dreams young children! Do not let anyone impede your pass. Stand up for what is right, and never lose sight of what's important." He sang the unrhyming, unfinished song.

"Damn, sounds better with my flute, or maybe I need to find a guitar." He chuckled and rolled over, drifting off to sleep one last time.

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His dream was darker and less lucid this time. He dreamed of the black-sailed navy ship that came to his island, of the navy soliders that killed his sister. He could see her screaming, dying, and he was unable to help her, he wasn't strong enough.

He tried to call out to her, but his voice fell silent, he could only watch in horror as his sister died.

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"SIRENA!" He shouted into the darkness. He woke up in a cold sweat. "She's not there…she'll never be there, because of me." He sighed and buried his face in his hands, sobbing.

"That doesn't matter anymore! There's nothing I can do about that now." He reminded himself. "The only thing I can do for Sirena now is fulfill my promise, help people who need me, help create a world where everyone strives for their dreams at all costs. I will be there whenever anyone needs me." He closed his eyes and remembered the legend he began reciting before.

Pirates sail the ocean to seek laughter and remember why they cry. A long time ago, when the world was young, there was a group of people who went against what other people said and followed their own beliefs, good of bad, they were all counter-cultural nonetheless. These people were not accepted anywhere by normal people. They were embraced only by this world's worst pain, the pain of loneliness. These people cried salty tears, the group cried so much that most of the world was covered in their tears. These salty formations of tears were called oceans and the people who made them were named pirates. Not accepted by anyone else, the pirates banded together into crews and grouped into the one place that was theirs, the place they had created. Pirates sail the seas to remember their history, their reason for crying, and to seek laughter and companionship in the face of such pain.

DJ knew this was all ridiculous of course, however there was an addendum to that legend. Those who ate the Devil Fruit were even rejected by the same ocean their tears had created. There was no one in the world who wanted him, not even the sea.

He had to get his mind off of this depressing subject. The pain in the back of his head helped him do that quite nicely.

DJ groaned as he felt the bump on his head. "Damn, I'm way to trusting when it comes to women, what was I supposed to do though? I can't hit a girl." He said to himself. As he listened closely and heard the sounds of a loud party very far away.

He smirked as he watched a greasy-haired man enter the room with a tray of food. "Dinnertime punk." the man chuckled and opened the cage just enough to slide the tray through.

"Bingo…." DJ grinned

As the man opened the cage, DJ quickly grabbed his arm and pulled him in, slamming his head against the bars of the cage. "By the way, that's gonna hurt when you wake up." He grinned at the unconscious man.

He ran through the ship and found his katana and flute. He stopped back at the storage chamber and looked around. "Damn, still no guitar," he sighed at the lack of his desired instrument. "Oh well, maybe there's one in town." He grinned. "First I gotta go give that furry Dimitri a piece of my mind."

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DJ stopped on the top of a large hill and sniffed. "Something foul is in the air." His eyes narrowed as he caught the distinct smell of alcohol and blood on the winds. He began to run towards the smell. "Someone who needs me perhaps?" he grinned broadly.

"No matter what happens I will keep protecting what is precious to me. I will keep doing what I see is right, even if people hate me for it. I will search for somewhere I belong. I will keep helping those who need me and inspire others to chase after their dreams. This is my promise, this is my dream. This is who I am…A PIRATE!"

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Hope you all enjoyed it, if you liked this then you'll just have to keep up with Kilnorc's Crew of the Axe and Desert Storm fics for more One Piece excitement and fun!