[Disclaimer: The following chapter contains a small torture scene that some younger readers might find a bit disturbing. Then again, no matter what your age group or [deity-of-choice]-fearing sensibilities, there's a good chance this warning will not stop you, and may even encourage you to read further thanks to the awfulness of the Internet. Either way, you have been warned.]

May wasn't exactly sure where she was at the moment.

Well, that wasn't entirely true. She knew that she was lying in a surprisingly clean and sterile holding cell, much better than the ones the Jellyfish Pirates occasionally had to deal with as far as imprisonment in enemy territory. Also, her arms were painfully restrained behind her back. The guards here might not have been too skilled, but they were quick learners. Not only did they put the captured pirates in separate cells, but after the initial escape attempt they did a full search as well, removing anything that could conceivably be used to pick a lock and break free.

That didn't stop May from using her inhuman strength to try and brute force the lock. After about a minute of struggling, the guards used the method of binding her arms behind her back all the way to the elbows and throwing her in a separate room altogether. Even though she screamed for Johnny to come save them until her throat became hoarse, and even though she potentially sterilized a young NOL guard for life a few minutes ago, she decided to calm down.

They bound her arms so she couldn't gather any momentum or strength to break through anything, and short of ramming the metal bars with her head she wasn't going to get another escape attempt any time soon. She hoped that the other Jellyfish Pirates were alright, but she was comforted by the fact that some of them did escape the enemy, and that they were probably working on a rescue plan right now.

Suddenly she looked up as a well-dressed man with green hair stood at the door, with one of the guards still nursing his arm with an ice-pack. May tried to remember the man's name. Someone screamed it out when she crushed his arm in an angry vice-like grip, but it just didn't quite come to mind. Maybe it wasn't even that guy's real name.

"Now Captain, are you absolutely sure you want to be alone with the prisoner?" The guard was asking the tall green-haired man. "I mean, you should've seen what that little bitch did to Joski…that guy's never gonna be a daddy after today."

"Please, call me Hazama." The green-haired man smiled. "And it was his own fault for not wearing a supporter down there."

"Yeah, but we usually don't encounter little girls that can bend steel with their bare hands and sheer willpower."

"Ah, but a soldier of the NOL must be prepared for any eventuality that might arise, is that not true?"

"Well, if you want to speak with her alone, I won't stop you."

"Your concern is appreciated, good sir." Hazama stepped back and allowed the guard to unlock the cell door with a keycard strapped to his waist. "Oh, and would you mind turning off the recording devices for the time being? I want this to be a private chat."

The guard chuckled. "Oh certainly, sir. Please take your time." Hazama stepped into the cell and waited until he heard the door click shut behind him. Soon, the guard himself walked out, but still, Hazama waited to see what the reaction from this odd little girl would be.

A few seconds passed, and May maintained an angry expression on her face. She didn't know who this man was, but when anyone asked not to be recorded like this, it usually meant that something even worse than standard police interrogation was going to take place.

"Hello little girl." Hazama extended his right arm forward. "As you probably heard outside the cell, my name is Hazama. But don't worry, I'm not going to hurt you, at least not unless you give me a reason to do so." May was about to respond, but Hazama chuckled loudly. "Oh that's right, we can't shake hands properly with you all tied up like that, now can we?"

Hazama tried to circle around May, but May backed up against the cell wall. She wasn't going to lose what little advantage she had.

"I see, so you're a little smarter than I would give you credit for." Hazama took off his bowler hat and idly spun it around his finger. "You see, there were quite a few things I wanted to ask you, but we didn't have much time to exchange pleasantries did we? I suppose that's my own fault, considering I'm the one who strangled you into unconsciousness after you crash-landed."

May gasped. "That was you?"

"Indeed it was." Hazama replied matter-of-factly, as if he was explaining that adding one and one made two.

May charged at Hazama head-first, trying to surprise him, but Hazama expected she would try attacking. A cornered animal like her could never accept when she was beaten. Hazama took one step back and delivered an elbow strike to the back of May's head, putting enough power in it to send her to the ground.

"You know how a boa constrictor hunts?" Hazama continued speaking in that same tone as he straddled May's back before she could recover. "First it strikes at the prey, really digs in with its teeth."

Hazama put his hat back on and slipped a knife out of his suit jacket. He started lightly caressing the back of May's body with the blade as he continued his speech, his voice sounding disturbingly more upbeat and happy as he spoke.

"And then it wraps its body around the prey as it struggles, just waaaaaaiting for it to exhale, and at that moment, it squeezes!" Hazama quickly wrapped one arm around May's neck and pressed the other arm into his back, making sure the knife wouldn't nick him by accident. As May struggled again to breathe, Hazama began to laugh. "Then this beauty of a snake just keeps tightening the pressure on the poor victim's body, continually squeezing, constricting, and raising the pressure until its soon-to-be-dinner just stops moving for good!"

May started seeing stars at the sides of her vision along with the metallic floor. She wanted to tap out, to beg him to stop, but there was nothing she could do. Her arms were bound, her legs were pinned, and her throat was being choked by this horrible man on top of her.

Suddenly, Hazama released his chokehold and May coughed violently in response, but Hazama didn't get off of her back. "You see, if I wanted you dead then we wouldn't be having this conversation. All I had to do was apply a little pressure to your carotid artery, and you were down for the count. A few minutes more, your brain would shut down from lack of oxygen. You would be a veritable vegetable, dead by most standards. Even the strongest human being alive cannot have a natural resistance to being choked."

May shut her eyes and tried to think of Johnny as she felt the knife run down her back. She could only hope that whatever this sadistic son of a bitch was planning, he would just stop talking and get it over with quickly.

"I know what you're thinking." Hazama suddenly whined in a mocking, high-pitched voice. "'Is the big bad man gonna ravish my cute, innocent, vulnerable body?' Trust me, the thought had crossed my mind, but you're not exactly my type. So here's the deal, my little pirate girl: you're going to help me with a little problem I need solved."

May gasped in shock, but then growled. "Why the fuck would I help you, you sadistic freak?"

"Indeed, why should you trust the man currently pointing a knife into your back? Well, there are a few good reasons. First of all, I happen to be in a good position where I could very well kill you, torture you, or turn you over to certain…unsavory figures who have even fewer moral qualms than I do."

May gasped in shock. How could this possibly get any worse?

"However, I also have the power to help you reunite with the rest of your crew, and that beloved Johnny you've been having orgasms over this whole time."

May suddenly felt the blood rush to her face in embarrassment. "I-I have not! What the hell…"

"Ah ah ah, don't get too excited little girl." Hazama rested the flat of the blade against her spinal cord as she pushed May's face back onto the cold, sterile, metallic floor. "It won't take much effort here to put you in a wheelchair for the rest of your life. But like I said, I can make sure that you and Johnny are reunited safe and sound. He's currently being healed by some of our best doctors. When he's healthy, instead of being thrown in jail I can ensure you that he gets off with a mere slap on the wrist."

"Really?"

"Indeed. And not only that, but we might be able to put in a good word with the NOL's Ports Authority Division to get your whole crew back doing whatever business ventures they were doing before."

"What's the catch? I know you're not just doing this out of the goodness of your heart."

"Of course, I had a feeling you weren't that gullible." Hazama returned to his normal voice, "You see, there's a certain troublemaker or two that needs to be dealt with as soon as possible, and I think someone with your skills and pent-up frustration could be just the person to deal with them. Allow me to explain…"

Meanwhile, at the small building with "Daidara's Ironworks" written on the sign outside and a small plume of smoke belching out of the chimney, a group of four schoolchildren collectively shifted their eyes left and right before holding their jackets tighter and scampering in zig-zag lines down the road. Jam gave them a curious glance, but then simply shrugged her shoulders and walked into the place along with two of the Jellyfish Pirates.

Racks of old weaponry and armor lined the walls. Some of them looked ancient and broken, others looked surprisingly high-tech, and one or two just looked out of place. In the middle of the shop, behind the counter, stood an old sweaty man with reddish hair who was counting his money as he noticed the three girls walking into his store.

"Ah, welcome, my beauties!" He bellowed in a surprisingly jovial tone that threw off Jam for a moment. "I must admit, I have not seen your kind around here. Perhaps you are travelers? Foreigners? First-timers? Well, whatever your needs, I'm sure you'll find that they will be filled here, at Daidara's Ironworks!"

"Cute speech." Marzo muttered in response. "Look, I heard you're in the business of creating…custom-fitting protection."

"Yes! Indeed! Perfect for the guy or girl heading into a party where the other side might want to stab you in the gut!"

"Why would anyone go to such a thing?" Jam asked out loud.

"Hey, I'm not allowed to provide too many details, but the body count was so high that the NOL had to spend tons on therapy for their troopers at that bachelor party when the incident was over." Daidara stopped and then changed his train of thought. "But enough about unintended consequences. What would you like? A witch costume? Perhaps a lovely shrine-maiden with darkmetal plating hidden underneath? Or maybe a sexy policewoman for taking down some punk from Sector Seven?"

"Do you have anything with a nurse or doctor motif?" The pirate with the unibrow asked.

"Ah, perfect for the medical profession! Let me go look in the back!" Daidara disappeared below the counter as Jam wondered if she should say that was technically in the direction of "down" and not "back." Still, she held her tongue until Daidara reappeared with three sexy nurse outfits. "Here ya go! Three wet nurse outfits, and as an added bonus you get the protection of studded leather sown right in, to protect you from whatever may come your way!"

Marzo and Jam studied the outfits closely, then asked, "Do you have anything less stereotypical? Like maybe a lab coat or something?"

"A lab coat? But lab coats are for males, and you're a girl! Showing off your cleavage is how you fight, right?"

Jam immediately punched him in the face.

"AH!" Daidara shouted as he stumbled back from the counter. "You cracked my nose!" He held his nose as he cried out in pain, though his words sounded more like "Yu craghed my nodez!"

"We'll do a lot worse than that if you don't give us what we want!"

"Okay, okay, sheesh!" Daidara went back down his hidden stairway mumbling all the while, "Should have just kept selling deadly shoes and metal folding chairs to schoolchildren, but noooo…"

A moment later, Daidara emerged with three medium-sized lab coats, though they didn't seem to have any extra protection. He did claim that they would provide maybe one second of extra time to say your prayers if you were choking on a visible mass of seithr. None of the pirates knew what he meant by that, but assumed it was some kind of local insult. Nonetheless, the girls paid with a few gold coins they had swiped from their last heist and went on their way. The first part of their plan to rescue Johnny from the hospital was in motion.

Once they were out of sight, Daidara made a call to a local NOL patrolman. They were going to learn the consequences of screwing with him. Now he was going to have to build a new device to keep his nose on his face. Maybe he could build a metallic one! With a hidden compartment he could hide a detachable LED inside! The ideas were already spinning around in his head as he went back down to the sweatshop hidden below to see how the kids were doing on the latest sword prototype.