Disclaimer: One Piece is the property of Eiichiro Oda. Many of the characters in this story are property of me. Do not use this story or its characters without my permission. Thank you.


The sun was shining brightly at the top of the sky, at the apex of its fall-season run a little before noon, and the villagers were up and weakly rioting outside the fence. No one was strong enough to climb the wall, nor rattle the heavy iron bars of the gate, and not a single person was able to withstand the steel glaring of the strongest Buster Pirate crewmen standing watch over the dark iron hinged gate. They carried on nonetheless, supporting each other with swift food runs from the village and back, using twenty people in a marathon baton pass of bread so that five could eat and be well. They were weak but determined, and the Buster Pirates gave them the benefit of humor for their determination. They even went so far as to push them to do better.

"Come on!" the wide-jawed pirate called out. "Can't you do better then that, you weak-kneed little pansie-boy?" The boy he shouted at stood on quivering, weakened knees and fell over to scuttle away on his hands and feet back into the crowd. The pirate rose back up and crossed his arms victoriously. Ah, damn! He really was weak-kneed! I didn't want to scare him away like that!

"Shut thy mouth, brutish scoundrel!" a woman roared.

"We villagers" a man proclaimed "shall send upon thee the full wrath that thou hast incurred by killing our king! We doth swear our allegiance to our great liege, who is no more."

"Oh, woe to our fallen king" a woman called up from the crowd.

"Kill the heretics!" another shouted.

"We shall drive ye back to the swarthy ocean yond, never to return you to our land again!!!" the man shouted, pointing hard through the gate up the pirate's nose. The taunting pirate's comrade leaned over and whispered to him.

"Great job, idiot."

"Outta my face!" he hissed back with a demonically twisted rage face. He reset it and glared down at the villagers with his mouth parted and fangs bared. "You think you're tough? Climb this fence and shout me down man-to-man! I don't think you've got it in you! I don't think you're strong enough to even make it up past the first wrung here!" He leaned forward and pointed to a horizontal bar welded across the vertical iron spears that made the gate. It was about four feet from the ground. The man daring the challenge was over four feet tall by well over a foot, but even so he was one of the stick-armed mass completely deprived of the essentials for human growth over the years.

Still, the man tried. He grabbed the bar and tried desperately to pull himself up. His veins bulged out of his skin and against the thin cloth of his shirt. His face went flush red as he pulled his weight up with a heavy press and reached for the next bar up another four feet. He managed to climb up onto the first bar and held the second one. Now his weight dropped down and he forced himself into a weak pull-up with the bar. His legs kicked and pedaled through the air until they caught the first bar again and he jumped up, going chin above the second bar before losing his grip and falling onto his back.

He lay on the ground, eyes open and mouth agape in defeat, and was helped up by several villagers at once. The pirates had watched the act with the serious intent of showing him up by watching him tumble down after grabbing the second bar, but they were so damn impressed with his spirit that their eyes sparkled in admiration.

He's a true man one thought.

Fighting against all odds the other began despite the pain and defeat, trying and trying again no matter what against a true force, that's what a man is!!! Then their emotions sank a good sharp grade as they realized just what kind of men they were being.

We're the villains here, aren't we? They thought in tandem. They turned to each other with worrisome frowns. Realizing they were sharing the same sentiment they drooped their mouths and their brows, looking so terribly sad that their presence echoed a demonic appearance and stirred the villagers to riot even louder and more fiercely than before. The pirates were overcome with a heavy air of depression and nearly wept. We're scum.....

Away from the gate, near the edge of the garden and all along the bleachers, the recently recovered guards of the castle sat drinking warm, sterile tea with the healed pirates that had just fought them earlier. The mood was calm, possibly even complacent, but not as gentle as any casual group gathering would be from either one of the two groups. Now they sat together, the groups intermixed and spotted across the bleachers, and they were calm.

"Good" Kurateka said, observing the scene with her chest puffed out proudly and her hands on her hips. "As always, I've pulled through with my astounding medical skills! Not a single complaint of ache or injury all day! YEAH!" She swept her hand out and brought it up to her chin, pressing her thumb and grinning arrogantly with a sparkle in her eye. "I'm pretty damn awesome, aren't I?"

"Your chest is still a lie!" Rez called from the bleachers. Kurateka jumped in shock and clutched her chest, turning around with her one exposed eye, white and angled with rage.

"SCREW YOU!!!" she roared. "I'd like to see what all you've done to help out, useless gunman!!!" Rez smirked and settled his head down into his arms. She glared at him with heated contempt, holding her breasts away from his abusive eyes. A pirate came to her with a crate and laid it carefully down at her feet. The boards of the wooden box were blasted and shattered, and within only a few of the many bottles had stayed intact.

"How's that?" the pirate asked. Kura took one of the bottles and looked it over carefully, holding it up to the sun and swishing the deep-purple liquid around briefly. "Sorry, but most of the stuff is coming up totally smashed or broken. Right now that's the only one Zan got that wasn't completely shattered and leaking."

"That's fine" Kura said. "One bottle of this can do us well enough." She uncorked the bottle with a pop, turned away to hid her face and guzzled it down in a quick, trained swig. The pirate held his hand out, clutching the air with a shadow under each eye.

"Uhhhhh" he groaned, "just what was that, Doctor?" Kura turned and brushed drops of the lingering purple liquid from her lucious lips, hidden still by her bandages and tossed away the empty bottle.

"A potion of eternal youth" she said seductively. She added a wink to seal her alluring taunt.

"Aren't you forty or something?" Rez called, gazing up at the sky lazily. "Jeez, act your age, old bag."

"SHUT UP!!!" Kurateka screeched. "I'LL CUT YOU, KID!!!!"


A phantasmal hand melded out of the stone wall and pressed against the surrounding debris. Following it was the triangular point and melted face that rapidly gained detail and feature as it left the solid-surface it phased through. Zan pulled up a crate full of liquid with him through the collapsed stone wall. He sighed and grinned as he stepped up out of the solid ruin and posed himself at its apex, a great mountain that was once a turret atop a tower overlooking the entire island. He handed the crate down to the line of working pirates who passed it all the way to the first man willing to run it back. He took off, bounding over the wreckage and keeping his footing as solid and consistent as possible over the incredibly uneven terrain.

"At least" Zan began "it's a nice day for this kind of work." He looked up to the sky and watched the clouds roll by. He could see the detailed, minute rolling forms they took and felt the calm wind pushing them slowly breeze against his back. The rocks and rubble under him seemed just as soft and malleable as those clouds to him, just as easy to pass through and swim in as any water he was ever in as a child. He grinned nostalgically before hearing the grunts and cluttering of debris to his side. The stronger pirates were sifting through the heavy stones, searching for salvageable things, and one found a dented but not inoperable IV pole.

"Good find" Zan said. "Run that back to Kura. I'll try to find some empty, intact packs while I'm down."

"Right" the pirate agreed. Zan raised his arms up and swiftly descended through the solid stones once more, leaving the pirates who watched to gape in awe for a moment out of their time.

"That amazes me" one said "no matter how many times I see it."

"I know what you mean" the other agreed. "Devil Fruit users are pretty amazing people, aren't they?" As they talked Zan swam beneath them, far down through the mighty hill of ruins and rubble, searching in the open nooks and crannies of dusty, stagnant air for useful, unbroken items to bring back up with him. He looked around through the stone walls and into the wider, saved spaces, took deep breathes in and out, then swam on through the rock, moving his arms and kicking his legs imitating the motions of an un-cursed swimmer perfectly.

Just how much stuff did this woman store in here? He wondered wordlessly. I know it's a hospital wing, but so far I haven't found enough for even a singe person. The best I can hope for now is to find some metal-reinforced nook or closet where the most important stuff we kept in case of an attack. She's at least smart enough to keep some storage for her really important items. Suddenly Zan's head slammed against a solid surface that was impassible to him. He quickly shook himself well again and found an exit near the object. He melded out from the wall and lowered himself to the ground, still rubbing his head and grimacing at the structure. He had found a safe, that was certain, but the collapse of the castle hadn't jarred it open.

What's it made of? Zan wondered, conserving his limited breath. He walked toward it and placed his hand on the smooth, cold surface. He pressed hard and watched as his hand went slowly through it. He could hardly get his pal into the metal before he was stopped entirely and felt sapped of his strength. Sea Stone layering, eh? He thought. He pulled his hand back, leaning backward and nearly falling over himself in a stumble, but recovered and stayed locked onto the object. He grinned and made a jump straight up. He traveled straight for the surface as fast as he could, not stopping for breath, and arrived with a moaning gasp of air.

"Zan?" a pirate noticed. He saw the falling stone-colored skin of the mud-man figure that was Zan and watched him in horror rise up to his full form and kick away the loose, small rubble around him.

"Hey!" Zan called to the pirates. "There's a huge container directly below here I can't phase through. Can I get a digging crew quick?"

"Sure thing, Zan" a pirate said. He abandoned his job of turning over rocks and debris to seem busy and rushed in with a whole league of men behind him. "How far deep is it?" he asked as he began shifting rocks and chunk around. Zan slid down the side of the pile and winced as he landed on his bad leg.

"Ah, in terms of exact meters and depth?" Zan said, rubbing his head. "I can't say for sure, but it seems about twelve measures of my full body multiplied by the accelerated rate of my travel at approximately eighteen meters per minute of vertical travel which lasted all of sixteen seconds...so, somewhere in there." Zan looked at the pirate he was talking to. His eyes were cocked in different directions and his mouth was agape and drooling. His brain had broken. Zan cocked his eyebrow and slapped the sense back into the pirate.

"Eh?" he said in a panicked stutter. "So, um, where was I?" Zan pointed to the mound.

"It's huge and metal with a spinning combination lock on the door" Zan described. "Dig until you find it.

"Right!" the pirate said with a flexing salute. Zan brought his his fist up to his forehead and flexed his arm. They departed for their respective duties, the pirate to dig and Zan to simply pace about without another thing to do. He let his injured leg phase partly into whatever he walked across to give it a break in his walking and made his way slowly, leisurely, for the garden.

"Before I do anything else extraneous" Zan spoke as he readied himself to equip a cigarette, "I should get something to eat. I've been at this for a while." Zan struck a match against his leather harness top and lit his cigarette with a puff and a drag. He continued walking with his hands in his pockets and looked skyward at the rolling white clouds and the sparkling blue sky. "Maybe a nap would help me out too. It's been too long since I got to sleep under the sun on such a nice day...." So the Revolutionary assassin wandered off for a peaceful rest that was well deserved.


Gretta calmly paced herself through the garden, walking daintily in regal strides through the rows of bushes and plants and stalks of herbs. She wove elegantly through the patches and batches of barely-visible, very edible plant-life that was meticulously cared for most of its life by the gardening staff and maids and servants of the castle. Now the ground was bulged and up-heaved from the collapse of the colossal castle built so deep into the soft foundation of the ground. The imbalance that gave way to the castle walls also gave heaving thrusts of ground and dirt around the castle's outer boundaries. Many cracks and fissures had opened up from the tremendous crashing. Through one of those cracks Gretta saw the roots greedily clawing through the dirt of a powerful potato patch, like a colony of worms as thick and strong as fingers.

"So much mystery under the dirt" Gretta said. "I've never seen plants growing like that. They always came to me cooked and sliced and fully prepared. How interesting..." Gretta continued walking away and saw a tree split in half down the middle. She awed silently at that for moment then walked past it without a second periphery glance. "I didn't know trees could do that. Interesting...." As Gretta continued her lonesome analysis of the world she used to live so close to, she came upon the border of the pirate camp, just within an eye-shot of the astute doctoress Kurateka. Not wanting to be spotted or bothered, Gretta hid behind a nearby tree and leaned out stealthily.

There was a low rumbling of air near her. She became disturbed by a grave discomfort at her back, like the hot breath of an invisible monster stalking up behind her. She turned around slowly, keeping her pride and cold glare with her, and saw a man sleeping in a chair with his arms crossed in the shadiest area under the tree. Gretta's face fell flat for a moment and she turned herself around to him.

"Look at this" Gretta said. "While everyone is going around, working and carrying on, some pathetic soul has the gall to sleep so easily in the shade of a tree." Gretta leaned forward and examined the man's sleeping face. Some nerve in his arm twitched and and he rose his tired face up and began loudly snoring. She backed away and observed, hoping she hadn't woken him up. He continued to snore, utterly comatose. Gretta snapped her fingers at his face and leaned in again, snapping as fast as she could with the one hand.

"Wake up, you lazy good-for-naught" she said. "I command it." She kept snapping, her lips parted and her eyes flat in aggravation. "Wake up. Hey. Hey!" Gretta stopped herself short of shouting to keep her cover from being blown. She looked around and spotted a small stick from the branches of the tree lying on the ground. She took the stick and placed it at a perfect balance on the sleeping man's nose. She watched it bob up and down with the motions of his face and then saw the man's nose twitch reflexively. The stick was knocked loose of its balance and fell into his mouth. He coughed and gagged and shut his mouth. A moment later he spat the chewed remains of the stick out and at Gretta's feet. She backed away and looked with worrisome disgust at the man.

"What kind of man fights in his sleep?" she wondered. She looked around, a fist clenched up to her mouth, and dashed off for a moment. She returned, stood over the man's face for a while, working things over and under and into each other, and then departed with a full mask of sticks and leaves and rocks carefully balanced on the center-point of the man's nose. "At least he's entertaining..." Gretta walked away, keeping to the shadows along the wall to stay unnoticed, and ducked into a thick veil of ivy leaves. She brushed through them and exited the thick walls of the castle courtyard through a secret hole she remembered to exist.

Maxwell snorted and moaned. He had finally regained the semi-consciousness available to ascertain the conditions of the world he slept through. He was cool, but felt warmth around him so he assumed he was in the shade. His face was unnaturally itchy. He wanted to move his arm to scratch at it, but his condition required total stasis and he couldn't move.

........itchy he thought. ...help. Someone, please help. Maxwell was left there in the shade by his pirate comrades. He wasn't found and helped until much later....

And meanwhile, down in the grove of thick forests built along the salty marsh of land and alongside the cave-speckled clif walls of the great island, Marco and a select few from the whole crew arrived once more at their 'docked' ship. After a thorough inspection of all sides of the gigantic Galleon, Marco nodded his head and gathered up his handy crewmen at the bow of the ship wedged into the tight bank of sludge and dirt.

"Alright" Marco said with a wide smile and a heroic pose, one hand at his hip and the other glaring a thumb-up to the men, "we're not going anywhere, guys!" They just scowled and seethed in a silent disdainful disgust. Marco started wiggling his thumb, trying to get someone to bite, and agitated the horde of men even further.

"You're an ass, Marco" one pirate said.

"We came here to try and figure out a solution" another slack-jawed meat-head noted, "not listen to your sarcasm! Get bent, you bandana-headed old man!"

Whoops Marco thought, his pose frozen with nervousness. Looks like I shook things up a bit too much.

"At least be serious about this" another man said patronizingly. Marco sank his head down in defeat and his arm swung numb to his side.

Bard wouldn've laughed with me Marco thought.

"For now" one pirate wearing dreadlocks began, "let's just try and dig it out. We've got a lot of boat to break free and not a lot of cover to do it in."

"Should we get more of the guys to help out?" the slack-jawed one asked. The dreaclock'd one cupped his chin in his fist and thought for a second.

"Yeah" he decided. "It'd be a good idea to get as many of us in on this as possible."

"Mayhap we can assist thee?" a voice called from the trees. The Buster Pirates all turned with a start and struck unarmed combat poses reflexively.

"Who's there?" Marco shouted, taking the front line with his fists up. A group of men wearing black overcoats and belt-buckled felt hats walked out from the treeline. Their overcoats parted to reveal their bodies bound up by their tight clothing. They were men of wide, strong build and sported thick, work-hardy arms and legs. Many of them had rough stubble beards and a healthy blush to their cheeks, and all of them had a glimmering in their eyes of raw determination and distinguished honor.

"I dare speak for us all" one deep, gentle-voiced man began "when I say that we owest thou a debt of gratitude. The king Rupert Lioncrest was not the hero many though him to be."

"Certainly he was no 'Great King' at all" another said. The others of his group nodded in agreement. Marco shifted his eyes curiously and lowered his guard. The others followed suit and just stood as neutrally as they could.

"So" Marco began, "you're honestly here to help us?"

"We might ask of thee a greater favor than that" the speaker said. "May we pardon so much as to...ask to join thy cast of men and take with ye to the great, open sea?" Marco was stunned. He hadn't expected such an outright, or proper, proclamation to join a pirate crew ever in his life. Most people knew the dangers of life on the Grand Line, and only those with the reckless and lifeless ability to abandon all they knew they knew and had in their life as civilians would be crazy as hell enough to undertake the daunting journeys on the Pirate's Graveyard ocean. Still, faced with such an important decision weighed solely on his shoulders, Marco took himself to task and thought as Bard would, even growing a wide and pleasant smile as he looked up at the men in their line.

"There's always room" Marco said "in the Buster Pirates. Welcome aboard!" The men were taken aback in happiness. Some even began to tear up and wipe away the water with supremely happy grins. The dreadlock'd pirate nudged Marco in the back and leaned in to whisper to him.

"Actually" he said, "we're just about out of food for the lot of us already on board." Marco's nostrils flared and his eyes shot wide open. To keep his mouth from tearing his jaws as it started creaking even wider in his shock of surprise, he bit his lips into his mouth and sucked them into place.

"I hope you have a plan" the slack-jawed one said with a cocky grin. Marco just whined and kept his messed-up face out of nervousness.

"Thank you greatly, kind sirs!" the men in the group shouted.

"We're ever so greatful" another called. "Thank you so very much!" Marco's mind stopped working at some point. He was so nervous he stood shock-still and unconscious for a while...