Hey everyone! I'm back, even though I haven't been gone that long but in this chapter I'm going to be speeding things up and there'll be a couple of time skips because I don't want to put you guys through all of Faye's physical therapy and I'm sorry if all of my medical information on therapy isn't right, I did as much therapy as I could.
But please enjoy this chapter anyway!
Disclaimer: I don't own One Piece.
It had been about 2 months since Faye had joined and she seemed to be getting more annoying in Marco's opinion. Winking at him playfully, smirking at him playfully, and now she poked at him playfully. Marco would never admit this out loud, but Faye poked pretty hard. It wasn't as soft as the other commanders thought it was.
One time, Marco even tried to stop her from poking him, by poking her back. She responded by poking harder and then giving a strained giggle when Marco got her real good in the shoulder, making it sore for the rest of the day. Boy did Marco get an earful from Izou about hurting his dear Faye. From then on Marco wouldn't poke Faye back and tried to avoid her the best he could.
"I think she's just doing the poking as an excuse to touch you." Thatch considered, smiling with glee as he leaned on the railing next to Marco. "I'm telling you man, she likes you."
"Well I don't feel the same way! I want her to leave me alone. That poking of hers is annoying as hell, yoi." Marco complained grumpily, looking up at the night sky.
"That's why I do it. It's funny seeing you annoyed." Marco turned to see Faye in her wheelchair, but her legs were fidgeting slightly.
"What's wrong with your legs?" he asked, he'd never seen her legs fidget or move before.
Faye gave a big smile, "I was talking to the head nurse today and she told me that there's still a chance that I can walk. I just have to work up my legs a bit. I've been training for the past month." She sighed happily, her legs fidgeting even more.
"Congratulations!" Thatch cheered, patting the girl on the shoulder. "How long has it been ever since you actually walked?" he asked.
"I was eleven when I started having to use a wheelchair. So, about 14 years." She estimated, her face pulling into a deep frown, like she'd just remembered something despicable. Faye stayed like that for about a minute before snapping back to her senses.
"You want Marco to help you with exercises?" Thatch asked, smirking when Marco tensed up. Faye noticed and smiled before nodding.
"Of course! I'd love for Marco to help me." She cooed, winking at Marco.
Marco growled, a blush creeping onto his face, "Faye, take your evil ass somewhere else."
Faye rolled her eyes, giving a small laugh before wheeling away, "Fine, be that way. I'll just take my things and leave!" she said in mock sadness, sloppily spinning her wheels as she looked back at Marco with pouted lips. Thatch gave an amused look and elbowed Marco in the ribs again.
"C'mon man, you guys should just date already. You know you like her~." Thatch cooed, elbowing Marco even more until Marco jumped at him in a threatening manner making Thatch jump back in fear. Marco gave a victorious smile, the blush still on his face.
-Time Skip to the Next Day-
"This is hard as hell." Faye whined out tiredly as she tried to lift one of her legs up while she sat down in a chair next to Haruta.
"Yeah, I know it is. You did lose 14 years of muscle. Try again." She commanded, demonstrating the simple exercise to her feeble-legged friend again. Faye slowly tried to lift her leg up, her golden eyes shining with determination as she held her breath. Haruta silently chanted the blue-haired girl on as her leg almost got lifted up all the way until it dropped suddenly, Faye taking a deep breath and hissing in frustration.
"Don't get upset. You almost had it." Haruta coaxed, "You're doing really good so far. You'll be walking again in no time. With crutches of course." She added, smiling brightly at the girl.
Faye gave a nod and sighed tiredly as she looked up at the ceiling. "I can't wait." She muttered and smiled back at Haruta, "I think… that you guys just need one more step to my trust." She breathed out, giving a clever smile as Haruta's eyes widened in excitement.
"R-Really?!" she asked, clutching Faye's shoulders.
Faye visibly tensed at the slight pain as Haruta's nails dug into her shoulders, "Yes, really." She chuckled out, "And yes, this one will be just as easy to gain as the others." She stated before Haruta could ask anything else.
She'd enjoyed playing this trust game with everyone, too bad it would end soon. Faye just wanted to learn how to walk with crutches first before she told everyone about herself. It'd just be a matter of how long it took for her to gain enough muscle strength and control. She hoped that it would be pretty quick before a certain someone shows up and tries to pick a fight with Pops.
"Could you unclaw your nails from my shoulders now?" Faye winced as Haruta smiled sheepishly and took her hands down from her shoulders.
She ran a hand through her brown hair, her cheeks flustered slightly in embarrassment, "My bad, I just got really happy. You've been here for four weeks and we haven't learned a thing about your past or anything."
"Well… you will pretty soon." Faye said, lifting her leg up again. Except, she actually got it to go up all the way. "YES! SUCK IT!" she screamed, throwing her hands up in the air.
"You know you have to do the other leg right?" Haruta asked, sweatdropping at the blue-haired girl.
Faye shushed her as she stared up at the ceiling with a victorious smile, "Shush, Haruta, allow me to bathe in my victory." She whispered and stayed silent for a moment. "Alright, now I'll do the other leg." She said and tried to lift her right leg and, of course, couldn't get it up all the way. Faye gave a sad pout and looked over at Haruta.
Haruta smiled softly, "We can continue tomorrow. But I'll say this again, you'll be walking in no time."
-Time Skip to Next Month-
It had been about a month of going through exercises before Faye was finally given approval to be given forearm crutches along with having to wear pressure braces on the lower part of her legs, which helped her greatly.
"Alright, me and the doctor will help you stand up and then once you think you have your balance put some balance into the forearm crutches too." Haruta explained, strapping the crutches around the golden-eyed girl's forearms. Faye clutched onto the grip bars of the crutches and nodded.
"Ok, I'm ready. Let's do this." She stated and allowed Haruta and the doctor held Faye up and allowed her to balance her weight onto her crutches.
"Can we let go?" The doctor asked once she was sure that Faye was ready. Faye gave a determined nod and the doctor let go first, Faye faltered for a moment but gained her balance back and nodded for Haruta to let go, which she did.
Faye put on a big smile and smiled goofily at Haruta and the doctor. "Take a step forward." The doctor commanded, both her and Haruta standing nearby just in case the girl faltered in her footing. Faye took a deep breath and took a step forward, only stumbling a bit. Though that didn't stop Haruta from screaming out in fear and stepping forward before backing up sheepishly when she saw that Faye was ok.
That's the exact reason on why Izou was absent from this.
Faye let out a breath and took another step forward, using her crutches to help her out, then another step and another and a few more after. Walking right over to a bench nearby in the room and sitting down.
"Oh, my lord." Faye gasped out, smiling brightly at her accomplishment. "I can walk." She whispered out quietly, tears brimming in her eyes.
'All those years that I'd spent trapped in that wheeled chair. All those years not being to run away. All those years needing help from everyone for everything. That's all over now.' Faye thought, the warm tears flowing down her cheeks. Haruta smiled warmly at the golden-eyed girl.
"Let's go tell Pops." She suggested and helped Faye up as they walked to the upper deck, though it was pretty slow since Faye had to occasionally stop. She got tired every now and then but they made it soon enough. Faye stayed hidden behind a corner while Haruta went up to Pops.
"Pops, we've got a surprise for you." She said in a teasing tone, a big smile stitched on her face. Pops lifted and eyebrow in question when Haruta beckoned her hand for someone to come out and looked over at a corner to see Faye, slowly but surely, walking with crutches out of the corner and up to him, one of the biggest smiles he'd ever seen on her face.
"Well, I'll be!" he chuckled loudly, gaining the attention of everyone on the ship, "Looks like this calls for a party!" he bellowed, raising a large bottle into the air, along with everyone else. "In honor of Faye Shrider!" he shouted and everyone else cheered.
For the rest of the day, everyone just partied and congratulated Faye. She didn't seem as happy though and Haruta took notice to this, as well as Izou.
"Faye, who're you looking for?" Izou asked as Faye snapped her head to look at her with her dark golden eyes.
"Marco." She said simply as if it was the most obvious thing.
"Why're you looking for him? I thought he didn't like you?" Izou questioned and was surprised when Faye looked back at her with a blushed face.
"I know how he really feels and he knows how I feel. So could you take me to him, please?" she was practically begging as she clasped her hands together in front of her chest, looking up at Izou with puppy dog eyes.
"Erm… sure." He answered and allowed the girl to follow him to where Marco was. The blond headed man was currently at a different area of the ship, leaning on some railings, staring out at the sea.
Faye guestured for Izou to go on and leave and slowly walked up at Marco.
"Marco?" Faye called out and watched as the phoenix man turned around to face her.
"Faye? Why are you here, yoi?" he asked her, annoyance present in his voice.
Faye smiled softly, "I should ask you the same thing." She chuckled out and saw that Marco was staring at her legs, "Like what you see?" she asked playfully and poked him on the shoulder, softly this time.
"What do you want?" he asked her, squinting his eyes at her.
"I'm ready to tell you the truth about myself, Marco." She said, "So c'mon, everyone's calmed down now due to hangovers and drunkenness." Faye walked away and Marco soon followed after.
This girl made them suffer patiently for months, whatever secret she was keeping better be worth the time.
Once they made it back to the deck that everyone was partying at, you could see that everyone was sitting around or on the ground, waiting for Faye and Marco. Faye sat down next to Pops and he gave her a reassuring smile. Faye visibly took a deep breath.
"First off, before I tell you about anything else. Let me reveal to you my real name." Faye explained to everyone. "My name is not Faye Shrider, that's just my fake name. My real name is Euridice Justain." Faye revealed. Marco and the other commanders nodded at this.
"To be honest, the name did sound kind of fake." Ace commented, earning a smack from Haruta and Izou.
Faye smiled sadly, "Secondly, the mark on my forehead is the mark of a goddess." She explained, pointing to the mark with the waning and waxing moon with a full moon between them.
Marco raised an eyebrow, "So you're a goddess?" he asked skeptically. Faye's eyes widened noticeably as she shook her head vigorously.
"Oh, no! I'm nowhere near one. But my father thinks differently." She muttered the last part darkly.
"Alright, so your name's Euridice and you're symbolized as a goddess… by who?" Thatch asked carefully and Faye gave a long, stressed sigh. She ran a hand through her short, blue hair and her face slowly pulled into a sad frown.
"The people in my village. An island known as Honto Island." Faye exposed, many gave shocked looks as they recognized the name of the island.
Honto Island was another island that had its own democracy and was known for despising the World Government. They were known to have crazy beliefs, one of them just happened to be that one day a goddess would be born and 'save' this crazy world that everyone was cursed to live on.
"Are you?..." Pops asked with narrowed eyes as Faye nodded her head.
"Yes. I'm that so called 'goddess' that the island has been crazing over. I was born with a damaged nerves though and they forced me to eat the sacred devil fruit that allows me to know the truth of everything and make that truth visible to others." She revealed simply.
Everyone stayed silent at that. That was quite the power to carry, it shouldn't have been easy either. Who knows what Faye/Euridice went through to perfect her power.
"Wait… if you can find out the truth of everything… then you know…" Ace trailed off, his face molding into a frown when Faye nodded slowly.
"I've known that for a while now. But that's the truth about me. I know some of you had just gained my trust and some of you now think that I'm a danger, but that's all about to change tomorrow." Faye said sadly. Marco gave her a questioning look. "Turns out that my father has figured out that I'm here and has been slowly figuring out our location." She explained, loud enough for everyone to hear.
"So you're going to tell him the truth right?" Thatch asked, he hoped that was what the girl was going to do. If she did that then her dad would realize that whatever he's after isn't achievable, right. He felt his stomach drop when Faye shook her head.
"I've told him the truth hundreds of times but he won't believe it. He really thinks that I can 'save' this world and besides it doesn't matter anyway." Faye shrugged carelessly.
Ace and the other commanders tilted their heads, "What do you mean?" he asked.
Faye gave a soft smile, "He's going to kill me."
There you go! This is my longest chapter of this story and I hope the next chapter will be just as long! So were you expecting this kind of secret to be behind Faye/Euridice? If you want me to explain to you then I'll PM you everything about Faye/Euridice. Tell me what you think! Hopefully the next chapter won't take too long to make. Comments are appreciated! THANK YOU!
And thanks for the favorites and follows by Mermaid's Magic, LessTheNever, Bellacat95, and JayJayftw!