Hey guys! Sorry about the delay, I wanted to post this before I went on vacation but I guess that didn't happen! lol. But this chapter is a bit of a tear-jearker for me. I hope you guys like it too! Special thanks to Taiski, Phoenix, NamikazeMia, and kage kitsune 14 for the great reviews! I just love how much you guys like it! ;)
-yesiamweird
"Can people die this easily?" Nami whispered after the overhead Den Den Mushi stated the Franky Family and Gallery-La company members had all died. Kimi lowered her head softly only wishing she could do something but already knew their fate had been decided. They were too late...
"You don't see people on a map," Robin pointed out. "You only see the body of land. They wipe out the body but forget the people that inhabit it. That, is the destruction of the Buster Call."
Kimiko nodded knowing Robin was dead right. Humans can die so easily but with the help of an armada of Marine ships, it was even easier to wipe out an entire town without anyone knowing of the remains. She turned her focus away from the brick floor towards the staircase to the bridge of hesitation where faint shadows of the boys stood up at the top. They all had been waiting for Luffy in silence while the blasting and firing of Marine cannons sounded in the distance.
Suddenly a strange blast sounded in the distance at such a sharp pitch that Kimi had to wince from the noise stinging her ears. "What was that?!" Nami questioned as the ringing settled.
"Probably Lucci and Strawhat." Koroko answered still in her bathing suit top she had worn when protecting Kimi and the others from the flooding water. Not that the scientist had been conscious for the event, but after the group surfaced and she felt the chill of the drying water forced her to wake. Just looking at the old woman made the sweet and innocent Kimi shudder in horror. She couldn't possibly imagine what Sanji had to be thinking when he first saw her.
"I've thought about it sometimes," Chopper interrupted Kimi's thoughts, "From the beginning it seems like Luffy always knows who he has to fight."
Nami scoffed while brushing her hair back, "He just goes by instinct. Even more than you." Just then another round of cannon blasts sounded off in the distance and before the group's eyes, the bride of hesitation crumbled into the sea below.
"The first tower has been separated!" The voice on the loud speaker on one of the ships sounded. "In the first tower are both Rob Lucci of CP9, and Strawhat Luffy!"
One of the towering ships casted a shadow on the woman and Chopper resting on the safe ground, "The battleships…" Kimi winced while attempting to stand to her wobbly feet. "We have to leave soon...if we want to escape, that is."
"All ships! Battle formation around the Bridge of Hesitation and convoy the ship! On the bridge are wanted pirates, Pirate-Hunter Zoro and Nico Robin and the rest of the Strawhat pirates. We believe they are the main force responsible for the defeat of CP9 in the tower of Justice!"
Looking towards Nami on the side of the group, Kimi muttered, "They want Robin back." Pulling out her Climatact, Nami shook her head with a frown, "But we won't let them!"
Kimi nodded grimly attempting to fight back her nausea brought on from the loss of blood and wounds she had gained earlier. She could barely make out the boys yelling to Luffy over the sound of her heavy breathing. "Nami…" She huffed out breathlessly. "We have to protect Robin... Chopper?" She looked to the reindeer with her shoulders hunched forwards, "Protect Koroko and the others… as best as you can."
"But Kimiko, I-" The reindeer attempted to argue but Kimi breathlessly yelled back at him, "You can do it, Chopper-san! You are a fierce pirate!"
"I will not let them take me again." Robin stood alongside of the scientist with a sturdy and forceful stare. As soon as the Marines made their way onto the platform, the red-head took the initiative in the attack using her thunder-charge technique leaving the older woman of the crew behind. Not that Robin and Kimi were willing to charge right into battle after their injuries and weakness from earlier. But other than that, Nami seemed to be taking good care of herself. That was until the next wall of Marines took the lead.
Both Kimi and Robin came to her rescue with their devil fruit power techniques of multiplying. With a quick smile as gratitude, Nami and the women continued to run up the stairs towards the boys on the top of the bridge.
The more the woman fought, the more the men would keep coming towards them. Little did their enemies know they were in for a shock…literally! Nami would Thunderbolt all of the fallen Marines after Kimi and Robin would take them down.
"This is fun!" Nami smiled and then looked to Kimi who was fighting off the Marines attacking her real body with her clones while she walked up the steps. "Kimiko!? Where are you going?"
The blue haired woman stopped for a moment to look back at her comrade and then smiled grimly, "Luffy…I need to make sure he is okay…" Even though Kimi could hear Nami's question, the rest of her world was beginning to fade away. In honestly, she was trying to not pass out from all of the blood loss in her leg. If she made it out of this place alive then she would definitely need medical attention immediately.
A couple more men surrounded her and attempted to fight the blue-haired woman, but she only glared at them as her clones defended them off as she walked up the steps untouched. "Luffy…" Kimi muttered under her breath, "You better hurry up…I don't know how much longer we can last…"
As soon as she made it to the top of the steps, the woman quickly took in the situations occurring all around her fellow pirate members. The one that concerned her the most at the moment was Zoro, as a Marine wearing a strange mask and outfit began to rust and decay one of his swords. "What?" Kimi's eyes widened almost as much as Zoro's did after the sword decayed.
"You cannot defeat me. I'll rust all of the swords you own!" the Marine taunted the swordsman while holding his hand up.
"A devil fruit user." Kimi frowned trying to figure out a plan to aid her crewmate. Zoro quickly putt all of his swords into their scabbards and then picked up a Marine sword on the floor charging towards his enemy. Instantly after the attack, the sword decayed just like before causing the swordsman to panic in the moment of desperation.
"Clone clone-!" Kimi commanded under her breath and quickly made a copy of Zoro to intercept the Marine from attacking Zoro personally. Unfortunately for the scientist the rusting ability took over the clone as well as her mind freezing her instantly.
"Wha?" The Marine looked pass the clone of Zoro to the actual man and with one swift movement, looked to the bruised and battered scientist on the side. "Another devil fruit user?" He questioned as the clone rusted completely.
Kimi couldn't move, the rust ability was wearing to her mental capacity and affecting her body from attack of the other Marines. "Ah!" She coughed out briefly as a crusty feeling seemed to engulf her cheeks and neck.
"Kimiko!" Zoro yelled out for a moment running towards the man hurting her. By this point the clone of Zoro had disintegrated making Kimi next. But just before the buff swordsman could attack the enemy, a flame engulfed and threw the Marine to the side. Looking to the left, Zoro noticed Sogeking unmasked with his slingshot in his hand. "Ussopp?" Zoro questioned looking to him with a thumbs up. "Thanks!"
"No problem, Zoro-kun!"
With a moan of relief, Kimi fell to her knees after the crusty feeling of immobility left her body. She attempted to lift herself up onto her feet, but her injuries were proving to get the better of her. Unknowing to her, a Marine with a giant axe was on her back and ready to drop on top of her.
The sound of metal on metal chimed and Kimi quickly looked above to see a yellow jacket protecting her back. "Zoro!" She huffed seeing small black dots. "Thanks!" her smile was confident but admiring.
"Watch out!" He muttered through his grinding teeth and she jumped from underneath his legs. "Clone clone!" She yelled out holding her gloved hands out in front of her chest and copying three clones of the swordsman in front of her. The Marine was quickly defeated and the two pirates shared a smile in the moment of stillness.
That moment was short-lived as more and more Marines invaded and took over their position until a demanding noise in the First tower caused everyone to still. "Luffy!" Kimi smiled knowing her captain had defeated his enemy!
"Rob Lucci, of CP9…" The voice from earlier on the Marine ship announced, "Has been defeated by Strawhat Luffy!"
"Let's go back together," Kimi heard Luffy's voice screaming from the tower on the other side, "ROBIN!"
Her smile couldn't be contained as she continued to fight off the random Marines attacking her on the bridge. "Good job, Strawhat-san!" A voice on the den den mushi loudspeaker yelled out. "You idiots, everyone'll be able to hear us!" Another voice argued causing Kimi to giggle from the fight. "its fine, they need to know anyways...Aniki!"
"We already made 'em think we died while we ran away! Don't give them our position!" She recognized the voice belonging to Paulie and giggled even more until the cut on her leg was began to burn slightly causing her to grimace and wince from the pain. Looking up to her crew mates after settling down the pain to a minimum she noticed their reactions to the voices on the loud-speaker. Franky seemed to be very proud that his friends were still alive, that was until he began to cry profusely.
Zoro seemed to scoff Franky of his tears and instead convince him to continue to focus on the fight at hand. With Kimi still conscious she could still create clones and fight, but the more and more she continued to stay awake and ignore her body's wishes, the more she wanted to crumble into oblivion.
"The Pirate, Strawhat Luffy, appears to be heavily wounded!" The Marine over the other loudspeaker announced causing everyone to turn around and look towards the first tower. "He still hasn't moved from that spot!"
Kimi thought for a brief moment she could clone herself to bring Luffy to their location, but her plan was faulted in the fact of getting Luffy and her clone over the water to them. She blocked an attack quickly and then looked behind at the ship Chopper and Kokoro were waiting on. "Everyone!" She yelled towards her nakama, "Head to the ship, we can set sail and then bring Luffy on board!" But just as she finished revealing her plan a blast exploded the area and the ship engulfed into flames. "No!" She breathlessly whispered falling to her knees.
"Our escape ship!" Nami screamed horrified by the sight, the rest of the crewmates began to panic as well. "Kokoro-san, Chimney and Chopper! N-no…" Everyone stood in silence trying to embrace the hard truth their friends were taken from them in the blink of an eye and not to mention their only way of escaping.
That was, until they heard a scream from a certain familiar voice. "We made it!" Sanji yelled out holding onto Kokoro with one arm, Chopper in the other, and Chimney and her pet bunny holding onto his back.
"Thank goodness! Sanji-kun, where have you been?" Nami questioned as he dropped his passengers by her feet.
"Sorry, I just had to take care of something. But damn this is bad…"
Kimi had no time to pay attention to the two as they chatted and instead continued fighting off Marines that seemed to be twice the size of her figure. "Now now little girl, be good and-" One began to say just before he grabbed her arm but then stopped as the woman disappeared. He looked for a second and then yelled out as she twisted his neck until it popped. Then without a second warning another Marine came behind her, and Kimi had to quickly avoid his turbulent swinging of his sword to protect herself from meeting a deadly fate.
Tripping over her tired and careless feet, the blue-haired scientist screamed for a split second as the man raised the sword into the air but then gasped as she watched him crumble to the cannon fire that engulfed the back side of the bridge. "They are pushing us to move to the edge?" She questioned to herself but quickly scrambled back onto her feet running with the rest of her crew.
Eventually, there was no more bridge…they were surrounded by warships on the platform while overlooking their fallen captain in the next tower.
"Shit! They destroyed the bridge!" Sanji growled.
"We can't do anything else…" Zoro stated as well.
Nami spun her weapon quickly and frowned, "Well then we will just have to fight!"
"Don't be stupid!" Franky taunted the woman, "They will just send more powerful guys after us!"
"Like bait…" Kimi nodded looking around as the group came into a circle overlooking the situation. She could hear the den den mushi system on the boats saying to fire at the first tower. Blocking a hit from a Marine with a clone Kimi looked to the tower with Luffy lying on it, "Luffy! You have to get up!" She attempted to yell and then fell to her knees from the pain engulfing her body.
"Kimi-san!" Sanji yelled out kicking and defending her from another blow. "You okay?" He placed a hand onto her back and then patted her gently.
"They are aiming…at Luffy…" Kimi frowned with tears in her eyes just as the guns on the ships turned towards their new target: the captain of the strawhats.
"No. Luffy!" Sanji stood yelled out towards the rubber boy. "You have to get up!"
"Luffy! Hurry! WE have to GO!" Ussopp continued to cry some more.
"I am sorry," Robin shook her head softly, "but at this distance all I can do is drop him in the water."
Standing onto shaky feet, Kimi stood next to Sanji attempting to take in as much oxygen as her lungs would allow, "If I can just get him to stand…" She held her focus towards the tower while the cook blocked and fended off Marines from the woman, "Then maybe he can come to us."
Holding her gloved hands out in front of her chest while making her triangle symbol, Kimi used as much of her concentration as she could to copy a clone of herself towards her captain lying in the tower.
"Luffy!" The clone ran to the boy and then cupped a hand under his neck, "Luffy we have to get out of here!"
"Ah…" he moaned and winced, "Kimi… I…I just-"
But suddenly in the middle of their struggled conversation, a strange noise sounded. "What was that?" The clone questioned still holding onto the back of his head. "Below?"
"I heard…it too…Look below?" Luffy attempted to move his head but then the voice from the command ship brought them back to reality.
"Five seconds until firing at Strawhat Luffy!"
"No!" The clone wrapped a rubber arm around her neck and used all of her strength to pick him up into the air. "We have to do something! Luffy? Can you stretch at all? Please!"
"N-No…" He frowned trying hard to be tough in this drastic situation.
When suddenly the real Kimi heard from the edge of the bridge, "Jump into the ocean! Kimi can you push Luffy into the ocean below?"
"Four seconds!"
"What are you trying to do? Kill all of us?" Zoro muttered angrily. "There's no way that will do anything!"
"I can…" Kimi frowned and then looked below both with her clone and in her normal body. "But I…" She was about to finish with 'I don't understand why,' until she saw the thing below the broken bridge.
"Three!"
"We'll be okay! He came to save us!" Ussopp cried onto Zoro. "We still have another Nakama!"
"Two!"
With a big smile, Kimi threw Luffy and her clone into the sea while she and the rest of the Strawhats did the same. "TO THE OCEAN!" They all screamed with smiles as the sight of the Strawhat sailed Merry sailed below.
"Let's go, everyone! To the sea of adventure!" The spirit of Merry cheered happily as the crew landed on the deck. "I came to get you!"
No matter how many times Kimi and the Strawhats managed to escape, the logical brained scientist couldn't seem to comprehend how exactly they all did it every time. It was more than luck or magic, this was the destiny. Luffy's destiny to become the King of the Pirates.
However, at this current moment...Luffy and the others were about to do the hardest thing a crew must perform to a fallen member. And an important one at that.
After one last run though, Going Merry had enough. Once they were out of harms way he seemed to give up so suddenly as if he couldn't bear to take on the pressure of living (or rather sailing) any more. With his head and bow broken in half and drowning in the water, Iceberg stated it was time to let him go.
The crew and their guest all stood side by side in the medium sized dingy watching silently as Luffy rowed in his very small dingy towards their broken ship. In his hand, a torch.
"So," Luffy spoke softly "Are we ready?" No one spoke a word but only Sanji and Chopper offered a 'Mmmhm' as confirmation to the death of their precious nakama. "Merry, the seafloor is dark and scary. So we'll send you off." And with that, the torch connected with the ship bursting into flames instantly.
No one talked. Not even the Galley-La Company men on the large ship behind them. Only Luffy. "It's probably best that Usopp isn't here. He wouldn't have been able to handle this..."
"What do you think?" Zoro muttered to Sogeking on his side.
"That's not true." The impostor admitted. "Farewells always have to come."
The place Kimi called her new home was now a pile of erupting and uncontrollable flames. She didn't have as many memories on board Merry as some of the others, but she still had one too many for her not too be emotional watching it burn. With the smoke filling the air and traveling into the lungs of her and the others, Kimiko wasn't sure if she was tearing up from the smoke or the emotional state she was in.
Stuck in-between Sanji and Chopper, she tried her best to hide her glossy eyes by wrapping her arms around one another but she considered that a complete fail as Luffy spoke again. "Letting us ride for such a long time. Thank you Merry."
Suddenly, something white fell from the sky? Looking up, Kimi and the rest of the crew were puzzled how snow was falling in the warm climate. Her will power wasn't enough as a lone tear rolled down her cheek and then instantly stopped as a single snowflake crystalized the tear on her warm cheek. "Merry Go..." She thought as another tear rolled out of the other eye. "I know I haven't been here as long as the others...but I will never forget the memories that we have together."
She thought about traveling to Sky Island and then how they landed from the island in the sky to the Marine Base. She thought about the long nights that she stayed awake in the crow's nest for the late night watch. And then she remembered sitting near the orange groves while she experimented with different chemicals. Usually when that happened, Luffy or Ussopp would be curious and bug her into a million question and answers...she was annoyed at the time, but now hearing the crackle of the massive fire she'd give anything to have that moment again.
"Merry..." The tears rolled from her eyes but not pouring out of them like Chopper and Nami's were. As the mast and the siding of the boat collapsed, Kimi held onto her arms so hard that her small nails dug into the exposed skin. It was a hard sight to witness and Kimi wasn't the only one that knew how emotionally distressing the crew was in.
"Everyone..." The voice from before spoke out. It was Merry...Merry knew how sad he was to see them go without him. "I wanted to bring everyone just a little bit farther. I'm sorry. I always wanted to go onto adventures together."
"Merry!" Chopper cried out as Kimi watched Nami fall to her knees to the side of her.
"But I-"
"If someone's gotta apologize, it's us, Merry!" Luffy yelled out. "I'm bad at steering, so I ran you into icebergs. I ruined your sail too!" He gasped and then continued. "Zoro and Sanji are idiots so they broke a lot of things. And Usopp tried to fix them, but he wasn't very good at it. So if someone's gotta apologize..."
The air was thick, and not because the smoke from the flames filled it. No. It was the tension and sadness from Merry dying. And just when Kimi didn't think she could be any sadder, Merry spoke one last time.
"But I was happy... You always treated me nicely... Thank you. I was always...so happy...
...All because of you."
And with that final statement, his face faded away into the flames.
"MERRY!"
Kimi sighed not even bothering to wipe all of the tears from her cheeks. "Poor Merry..."