Restructer Revolution
Okay, apparently I need to explain the reasoning behind the poll concerning if Ace lives or dies.
I think that Oda killed off Ace as a major turning point in the One piece story, to show the choices Luffy has to make to continue after his ambition. Without the impact of Ace's death, Luffy wouldn't have gotten the determination not to lose any more nakama and train with Rayleigh, and the end result of an unprepared Straw Hat crew entering the New World would have been catastrophic.
Therefore, if in this story Ace dies, then it would read pretty much like the original One Piece storyline, and I try to respect canon as much as I can despite that this is a fanfic.
However, if Ace lives, then this will turn out horribly AU... not that it isn't already... but I can't really see myself making major changes to the storyline... although I am horribly tempted to do so... whatever, the One Piece canon is long enough. Very well then, I shall pull out a miracle!
Enjoy!
XI: Burst Return
Previously:
Tall and majestic, Stardust Dragon spread both its leathery, glittering wings wide out, prompting some violent rocking before it settled itself once more, watery blue eyes diverted to meet Yusei's own eyes. Its scales glittered blue and white, a backdrop of the jewels of the night against the velvet form of blue night skies as the dragon opened its sharp maw and gave a piercing cry.
"Stardust..." Yusei reached out a tentative hand which it quietly nuzzled. "Stardust Dragon..."
"Oi, Yusei, you know this dragon?" Usopp was hiding behind the mast again.
"Ah, yes," Yusei nodded. "This is my nakama, Stardust Dragon."
"..." it was the first time Yusei had ever seen the Straw Hat Pirates silent. Even Robin did not have a good comeback to that.
What happened next broke the silence in the Straw Hat crew. After all, dragons were hardly known to begin bawling in front of humans, in a clear, high piercing voice: "Yusei Dono! I was so worried!"
"...EEEHHHHHH? THAT'S YOUR NAKAMA?"
The swordsman and the cook of the Straw Hat Pirates were proud of themselves. They had every right to be; being a part of the Monster Trio of the Straw Hats meant that they had earned it. Even so, despite the staring from the bawling dragon to Yusei and back, it was almost impossible to equate this... overgrown lizard as the one that had punted a Shichibukai across the ocean.
"It's a trick." Sanji muttered.
"You know it's not," Zoro growled back.
"The biggest problem is..." Franky began to rage. "Oi, Yusei! Your dragon's unbalancing the Sunny! We'll all capsize at this rate!"
"Please, Stardust," Yusei was halfway through begging the creature. "Hane will be here, and she'll regularly report to you, okay, so, get back to your card, please? I can't recover if the ship capsizes."
Stardust began howling, and it would have been a sound to fear if the tone were not clearly audible as the dragon having a nervous breakdown.
"Stardust," Yusei was now talking to it not unlike how a parent dealt with unruly children.
Zoro turned slightly to Sanji. "Do you think...?"
"Yeah," Sanji blew another smoke ring. "He's so patient from dealing with that dragon on a daily basis that Luffy must be a piece of cake."
"For an injured man, he does good work," Usopp was going on about Yusei's contribution to the Rumba Pirates memorial on Thriller Bark; a small, hand-crafted ship done within four hours with quality even Franky was sorry to part with.
"Yosh!" Luffy yelled. "Now that Zoro and Yusei are awake, let's head out to sea! To our next adventure~!"
"YEAH~!" the pirates cheered.
"Eh? Zoro, you took off your bandages again, didn't you?" Chopper began fuming.
"Yeah, they're hard to move in, you know."
"They're there to make sure you don't move!" Chopper produced rolls of bandages from seemingly nowhere to attack Zoro with. "Stay still!"
"You guys sure are high-spirited," Lola remarked. "You're setting sail already?"
"You guys can use Brook's ship," Franky pointed. "I've already fixed the rudder and sails."
"Thank you. You're really helping us to the end here." Lola edged closer. "No matter how much I thank you, it still won't be enough! Will you marry me~?"
"You're a fine jewel, but it's too bad," Franky began combing through his pompadour. "I'm too super, so it won't work out."
"It's so hard to say goodbye to you guys! Wanna stay and party for a few more days?"
"We can't!" Luffy was literally sparkling. "We're off to Fishman Island next! I can't wait~! There's going to be some interesting guys there!"
"Some beautiful mermaids as well!" Sanji was again a melting pot of hearts and swirly brows. "I can't wait to play with them~!"
"I wonder if the mermaids would be so kind as to permit me to see their panties..." Brook remarked.
"Oi, oi! Don't go saying dumb things! Mermaids don't wear panties."
Yusei extracted handkerchiefs for Sanji and Brook almost immediately.
"If you're talking about a mermaid's beauty, it even rivals that of the Pirate Empress Hancock!"
"MERMAIDS~! MERMAIDS~!" the perverts all cheered.
"Isn't its lower half like that of a fish?" Robin murmured.
"Why do you guys know so much?" Usopp was asking another.
"Ah, well, before we came here, about three years ago, we went to Fishman Island! Fishman Island's the greatest!"
"Lola, you guys went to the New World?" Nami asked.
"We didn't go there, we were born there!" Lola remarked. "My mama's a pirate, you know! Ah, right! This is Mama's Vivre card. You can have it."
"Paper?" Nami stated, puzzled.
"That's great for you! Captain Lola's mama is an amazing pirate, you hear? Take good care of it! It'll surely help you later!"
"What's a Vivre card?" Nami asked.
"You don't know?" Lola blinked.
"Captain Lola! They only make Vivre cards in the New World!"
"Oh yeah!" Lola demonstrated. "This isn't any normal paper. You can wet it or burn it and it remains unscathed. If you take a piece of your fingernail to a certain shop, they can add in a mix and create a special piece of paper for you. And that's the Paper of Life, the Vivre card! You tear off a piece and give it to a friend or a family member that'll be going on a journey."
Nami blinked. "And so...?"
"This is the Vivre card I got from my mama," she placed it down.
"It moved!"
"This card will allow you to meet with the one that also has it no matter where in the world they are. So I'll always know which direction my mama is headed. Though it doesn't tell me the distance."
Stars danced around Chopper as he stared at the card. "How strange! So there's lots of things like that in the New World?"
"I think we have the strangest cards in the world aboard the ship already..." Usopp muttered.
"Handy, isn't it?" Lola agreed. "Since I signed this Vivre card Mama gave me, if you ever have a problem, you can use it to find Mama. If that ever happens do you think you could tell her that I'm doing well?"
"Thank you, Lola!" Nami received the card.
"I think I have one of those," Luffy blurted out.
"I was just thinking the same thing," Nami replied. "Wasn't that white paper Ace gave you the same thing?"
Luffy took off his hat to fiddle with it. "So that's what it was... this is..."
Yusei flinched as Luffy held up the burning paper, right hand immediately flying to the burning mark.
"It's burning a bit and getting smaller..." Luffy was saying.
"Ahh! Wait, you! Show me that!"
The small, burning paper in the large palm seemed very small then.
"This... is certainly a Vivre card..." Lola slowly murmured. "But I haven't told you yet that the paper represents the life force of its owner's! This belongs to someone important to you, doesn't it?"
"Yeah!" Luffy grinned. "It's my big brother's!"
Lola seemed to become blue in the face as she considered the diminishing paper.
"Lola?" Nami slowly asked.
"I'm sorry to say this..." Lola slowly began. "But this person's life... is vanishing..."
The Thousand Sunny went along its voyage, cheerfully sailing in the calm weather.
"Luffy." the captain turned to regard his navigator. "Is this really alright?"
"Oh, Ace's paper, right?" Luffy chuckled. "It's fine, don't worry about it!"
Nami just sighed tiredly at him.
" Luffy San, I wouldn't be bothered in the least if we took a detour." Brook remarked, having stopped playing. "Time has shown no obstacle to myself nor Laboon. To live and to meet one another is all that matters."
"Luffy, we're cool if you want to take a detour!" Usopp cheered.
"Cool, cool!" Chopper echoed.
"Yeah!" Franky agreed. "Let's go meet ol' brother whale!"
"Nah, it's really fine," Luffy smiled. "Even in he was in some kinda pinch, he wouldn't want me worrying about him. Ace hates being made to look weak the most." Luffy caught the tankard tossed to him by Sanji. "If we went to help him, he'll just get pissed off. If we do meet it'll be as enemy pirates. Ace has his own adventure to lead."
"About that Vivre card, apparently it doesn't just shrink when you're in danger," Sanji remarked. "It also grows when you're better."
"Yeah, I wanna meet him at full strength!" Luffy cheered. "That's why Ace gave me this paper, right?"
Up till now, Yusei had remained silent, only to break it now. "I have a bad feeling about this."
"Oh, yeah, Zoro, Yusei, you've both been sleeping all the time so ya missed out!" Luffy grinned.
"In that case let's redo this!" Usopp grinned, holding up his own tankard. "In celebration of two new nakama, Handyman Yusei, and Musician Brook, joining the crew!"
"Handyman?' Yusei blinked.
"A man good with almost every skill, but master of not many! Useful for every situation!" Usopp grinned.
"KANPAI!"
"Much obliged!"
"Thank you, everyone!" Yusei raised his own tankard.
"Alright then, onwards straight ahead!" Luffy yelled. "Let's get outta here with a Coup de Burst!"
"Yeah!"
"Coup de Burst!"
"WHAT ON EARTH IS THIS~!" Brook panicked as the ship flew into the sky.
Grinning madly, Yusei laughed as Hane chirped and cried and screamed beside him.
Life was not so lonely anymore.
"What the hell is this?" Yami groused as he fished a bedraggled something from the dark waters. "A zombie?"
Yami threw the body of Hildon back into the ocean before continuing on his way back into the Florian Triangle. The dark mists of the sea shrouded him as he passed, from one world into the next.
A few minutes later, Yami was swearing at a brown-haired youth in languages already long extinct. "This... was the only reason why...?"
A storm of curse words blew across as Yami swore at the other.
"But, I really thought-"
"Where exactly, does it say that this world was safe?" Yami yelled. "Because of you and your idiocy, Yusei wants to stay with them! How do you intend to fix this!"
"But, Yami San, maybe Yusei can do a better job-"
"This world will break him," Yami hissed. "The pain, the suffering, it will all break him!"
"Don't you have faith in Yusei?"
"I have faith in Yusei, I just don't have faith in that world!"
"But... he's passed the first trials, right?"
"That's exactly why!" Yami retorted. "For a soul like Yusei... can you bear to see him pulled into the darkness?"
For that he had no answer.
"Now that I look at him, I think our handyman has some very flashy clothes," Usopp remarked later on that day.
"How?" Nami asked.
"Well, there's the boots and the gloves and everything," Usopp mumbled, rubbing his chin hairs. "There's also that funny crab-hairstyle."
"This is a crew with a marimo, an afro and a pompadour," Nami pointed out. "Yusei must be comparatively normal next to them."
"He's not normal!" Usopp pointed to the large bath that the Straw Hats seemed to pull out at that time of the week, a.k.a Luffy's bath. Despite the Thriller Bark incident, Yusei had sustained no major injuries and so was put through the Straw Hats' hazing, Brook having escaped by virtue of his age.
So far, Yusei was winning.
"No!" Luffy had pouted with a firm grip on the mast.
Yusei had merely splashed oil onto the rubber fingers digging into the grain, before he pulled the rubber boy and dunked the stretched body into the bath. The rubber digits, unable to keep purchase, slipped, sending Luffy snapping into the bath. After that, it was a matter of suds and hand speed, which Yusei was apparently a master of, if the time taken to process Luffy being half the record on the Sunny was any indication.
"That bastard..." A depressed Luffy sat next to Usopp, smelling of soap and at least cleaner than in the past week. "I won't forgive him..."
"He's so reliable..." Nami sighed. "Speaking of which... where is he?"
"He was talking to Franky about something," Usopp volunteered. "Something about a ride and wheels. I think he wants to take Shiro Mokuba I out for a spin."
"So, what do you think of him?" Luffy mumbled. "That bastard..."
"Reliable," Nami replied.
"Poker face," Usopp mumbled.
"Nii Chan!" Franky yelled from below deck. "I don't believe you... oh, super! This deserves a celebration!"
All three of them blinked.
"Noisy," Sanji growled on the upper deck, lighting another cigarette. "He upgraded the stove to become more efficient. Franky's over the moon about it."
Luffy sighed dreamily. "I wonder if he can pick the fridge lock..."
"Don't even think about asking him to!" Sanji and Nami yelled at the captain simultaneously.
"Sheesh, a captain who only thinks about food and adventure..." Nami sighed. "We're approaching Spa Island already, so you can stuff yourself there as much as you want. Until then, don't even think about asking Yusei to break into the fridge for you!"
"He's with Franky on the Soldier Dock system, Nami San," Sanji drawled. "Look, there's Shiro Mokuba I."
"Sorry if I borrow this, Nami San!" Yusei called as he rode out on the modified Waver in only his pants.
"Don't worry about it!" Nami called. "If you break it I'll just put you in debt."
"And there's Nami's usual exorbitant methods..." Usopp muttered.
"Nami San, if I break it I can fix it!" Yusei called back as he rode out.
"...he does have a point..." Usopp mumbled.
"Shut it!" Nami yelled at him.
"Yusei Dono!" Running on the water beside him, Hane squawked. "Are you sure this is fine, Yusei Dono?"
"Yeah," Yusei very carefully handled a card from the deck box. "I have to see about a DuelDisk soon... Turbo Synchron, summon!"
"He's summoning more cool monsters!" Luffy cheered as the green car-like creature appeared. "He's cool! I forgive him!"
"Changed opinion so fast!" Usopp squawked.
"I wanna fight that dragon!" Luffy declared.
"Think about where the hell you are before you say that, dammit!" Nami yelled.
"If you damage Sunny, how the hell are we gonna sail?" Usopp supported her argument.
As the two were yelling at their idiot captain, Yusei was grimacing at the assembled Level Eater, Tuningware and Speed Warrior. "Seems like I have to actually say the whole words first to Synchro summon... can't be helped. Let's see how fast the Shiro Mokuba can turn. Although I have to see if we can get any Jet Dials... "
From above the crow's nest, Zoro and Brook looked down at the White Rocking Horse and its rider along with the following entourage.
"Oi, Yusei, do that Tuning thing again!" Usopp yelled.
"Do it! Do it!" Luffy called.
"Eh, Yusei's going to do that again?" Chopper poked his head through the railings of the Sunny. "Interesting!"
"It would seem so," Robin acknowledged.
"Quack, quack, Yusei Dono!" Hane called as she somersaulted to the ship, making a perpendicular turn towards the Sunny.
Yusei started. "Oi, Hane, what are you...?"
With a single leap, she continued to run up the hull all the way up to the railing before making a running jump from the deck railing...
...as a young man fell out of thin air and straight into the duck's red-booted foot.
"Ow!" the youth flew ass-over-tea-kettle onto the deck, wincing as he got back up to glare at the Sonic Chick. "When on earth did...? Damn that Yusei..."
Just then, a Sea King leapt into the air beside the Sunny, Yusei riding the Shiro Mokuba up its body all the way before flying back to land on the deck, the Shiro Mokuba skidding to a stop on the grass lawn as Yusei dismounted.
"Perfect ten!" Luffy, Usopp and Chopper held up signboards with '10' written on them.
"This isn't the time to screw around!" Nami roared at them before turning to Yusei. "Yusei, who's that guy?"
"Itte..." the brown-haired young man sighed, rubbing his head as he stood. "That's the last time I try to appear on a moving vehicle..."
"Judai?" Yusei blinked.
"Yusei!" the brown-haired boy in a red jacket cheered. "I got it right this time! No accidental trips into the ocean!"
"Ah... how...?" Yusei blinked.
"It's a mystery," Judai grinned. "So, anyway, I managed to steal your card collection, that funny emergency pack of yours, and a toolbox before your friends appeared from your funeral to divide your possessions-"
"Funeral?" Yusei echoed numbly.
Judai stopped, his expression concerned. "Oh. Well, you disappeared in the lab, and they couldn't find you, so... it was put down as an accident... back there, you're officially dead. Sorry."
The tears continued to fall.
The lone, tattered and slightly singed top was the only thing that graced the inside of the coffin in the absence of any body to put in it, perhaps even less, and yet the solemnity of the ceremony went untainted. The vigil might be a private event, but all of Neo Domino observed it quietly, with dignity, as the city mourned for its lost saviour. The wake itself went silent, broken only by the occasional sob or a sniffled cry.
The twins Rua and Ruka had paid their respects with tears glimmering in their eyes. Even Jack and Crow survived two hours of close contact with not a single argument during the mourning.
And Izayoi Aki...
Izayoi Hideo was not a man to scare easily, although the cracks appearing in the concrete were enough to send him to give his daughter askance looks during last rites. "Poor boy... so young, and with so much potential, too..." the senator muttered. "He would've been a good son-in-law and made that lucky girl happy..."
"Such a nice boy, Yusei Chan..." his previous landlady was crying. "He doesn't deserve to die young... it was the machines he always tinkered with that killed him..."
"I can't believe that of all things, it'd be the lab that killed him," Crow muttered sadly as he pulled at his black shirt. "I thought the lab loved him..."
"Of all the things that he died of, it was a lab accident with the very thing he created..." Jack muttered mutinously, one hand on the black armband. "Yusei... and you were getting ready for our next duel too..."
"Is that all you care about, Jack!" everyone turned to regard Aki with tears running down her cheeks. "Those duels of yours can't ever be conducted when Yusei is... Yusei is..."
"Oi, oi!" Crow called as the concrete beneath her black boots cracked further. "We're all sad about Yusei, but... if he was to see us like this, what would he think? There's no power in this world that can revive the dead, right...? And, he accomplished all his dreams before he died. He brought so much happiness to so many people... that we're all here in memory of him... right?" the Blackbird ignored the tears trailing down as he spoke. "It's shameful for a man to cry... dammit!"
"Yusei was always a thoughtful boy." All the former Signers turned to look at Martha, wearing a solemn expression and funeral black.
The elderly caretaker gave them a wan smile. "I've been named the executor of Yusei's will."
"He's not dead!" Aki protested.
"He's not, but he left instructions with the office to have it read if anything were to happen to him," Martha gently replied, pulling out a folder from her handbag. "There wasn't much anyway. Aside from the money in the bank being divided between Duel Academia, the orphanage and Fortune, he also left his apartment to Crow to do as he saw fit, to Jack his D-Wheel and to Aki... the Wrist Blader."
"Oi, doesn't that contain his deck?" Crow protested.
"Yes, but the lawyers found it empty when they inspected it," Martha sadly replied. "It seems from the others working on Fortune that Yusei had his deck with him when it happened... the police think..." Her expression turned uneasy. "That the deck... might have... gone with its owner..."
"Stardust Dragon... too?" Rua's expression was crestfallen, as was Ruka's own. "The card that saved us...?"
"I wish I could speak to Kuribon again," Ruka murmured sadly. "If Stardust Dragon was here, Kuribon could see it... and then... we'll know for sure."
"Yusei can't be dead!" wood splintered from where Aki's fingers gripped the wood of the coffin. "Yusei... Yusei..."
That was three hours ago, and now Aki held the steel device, complete with Duel plate, before her, still crying despite the tears having dried up. The men had left Aki to her own, feeling her need for space to mourn.
"Yusei... you took this witch... and transformed her into an angel..." Aki sobbed. "Are you going to leave me alone? Yusei... I'm so sorry... I'm so sorry..."
"He's... alive..."
"Who's there?" Aki jumped to her feet, hand trailing to her deck before she recalled that her powers were no more. "Who's there?"
"Yusei Sama... he's..."
A ghostly aura formed as a tiny figure materialised. This figure had long purple hair, was dressed almost like a Victorian doll complete with the tiny sceptre in hand topped with a purplish-black rose, porcelain features arranged in a wide-eyed look.
Aki gasped. "You're... Witch of the Black Rose!"
"Alive..." the tiny witch echoed. "Not here... but alive..."
Aki quickly focused on the Duel Monster. "Yusei's alive? Where? Why?"
"Fortune," the Witch answered. "Crimson Dragon... Yusei Sama is alive, but not here... not anywhere in this world..."
"Yusei's in another dimension?" Aki demanded. "Is he in danger? Is he alright?"
"Stardust Dragon says, that Yusei Sama is happy..." the Witch had a faraway look. "That the loneliness that followed him was now filled... that since his work is done here, he can leave the stage of destiny... and find life anew."
"How do I follow him?" Aki demanded.
"Ojou Sama, to follow him is to embrace destiny once more!" the Witch protested. "That mark, that mark of the red dragon... don;t you want to follow your dream?"
"That dream means nothing if this is a world where Yusei's not here!" Aki shot back, cat-eyes shining with determination. "Now, how do I follow him?"
"But, Yusei Sama is happy there!" the Witch protested.
"Yusei's happiness means much to me too," Aki replied firmly. "But, even if he goes to the ends of the earth, I... one way or another, I'll follow him! I won't let him go if I find him again!"
The Witch now looked even more solemn. "Even if you must turn your back on everything you know to enter another world where you will never know peace? Even if you will become a stranger in a world far larger than you will ever know? Even if you will never see those familiar to you again?"
"Yusei taught me to believe in myself and to challenge my potential!" Aki retaliated. "Even if I'm scared, even if I lose sight of it... I don't want to lose him again! To know that Yusei is alive, but unable to see him, unable to know how he really is, that is the greatest pain I know now! Please... tell me... how to find him! Yusei is the most selfless human being I have and will ever know... but I am a selfish woman! I won't let go of the one I love!"
A crash sounded, Aki whirling around, her hair falling like a sea of rose petals to flutter about her angered expression as she turned upon the unlucky man about to run off with Yusei's card collection, an emergency pack and the Yusei Go. In her hand, the Wrist Blader glowed as she activated it and pulled out her deck.
"What," she growled. "Are. You. Doing?"
Judai, seated in the Yusei Go, could only swallow. "Crap."
"And then... when he woke up... he couldn't tell apart trash from money!" Judai was telling Nami, Usopp and Chopper when Yusei awoke from the stupor that came over him the moment he was told that he was supposed to be dead.
"EEEYYYYAAAAHHH!" Nami screamed.
"Oi, oi, is it that terrifying...?" Usopp was waving his hand dismissively.
"When I was there, Izayoi managed to see the Witch of the Black Rose Duel Spirit," Judai murmured to Yusei once Nami was distracted with telling off Usopp and Chopper. "The Witch told her that you were in another world, but not dead."
"Aki..." the blue-eyed Duellist whispered the name like a prayer. "I have to... reassure everyone..."
"You already knew when you chose to stay, that you cannot turn back," Judai pointed out, face stern. "They will mourn you, but soon you become forgotten, a legend that Neo Domino will tell until the end of time. The pain won't last forever to them. Don;t worry. They'll be sad... but their lives will continue anyway."
"Then, why are you telling me this?" Yusei muttered. "As a parting gift before you leave me alone too?"
"Because you don't know the symptoms of a woman in love," Judai spoke nervously and firmly. "One way or another, Izayoi Aki would make her way here. Of that, I'm very certain. You didn't see her eyes then. She was ready to pull the whole Black Rose Witch thing on me if she needed, despite her lack of power. Truly, really, you're the only one capable of falling for a woman who would cross hell and high water and face down dragons for you."
Judai grinned. "You're so lucky, Yusei."
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