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.


With her tale over and the mood set to a very dramatic tension, Vega fell silent and cast her eyes down at the floor. Araly had listened in from her sick corner and felt a strain of sympathy in her chest over her story, but Gretta had no expression to show. She was just staring ahead, absorbing the information and organizing it in her head.

"That's not all so bad" Gretta said.

"What!?" Vega exclaimed. "I-you-what are you-what are you TALKING about!?" Vega Void's calm composure had broken for just a moment as she shouted the princess out. Gretta just sat passively with her eyes aimed at her.

"You were abducted and swore yourself in to a life with people you barely knew" Gretta said. "I did the exact same thing. The only difference is that I haven't killed anyone yet, nor do I need to to prove my loyalty to my new family. And I don't hate them. At the moment, I don't really have much of a high opinion of them."

Way to represent the crew, Gretta Araly thought. She burped sickly and tried to begin as well.

"The same...happened to me...almost" Araly said. "I accidentally got swept up in all this...and by the time it was too late to turn back, I had already accepted myself as a pirate."

"How coincidental that all three of us would be in a room together" Gretta said "on such a notoriously fateless sea. All three of us were thrown a fate we didn't like and came to live it well. The only common difference between us is time within that life. You've been living it long enough to know your place, whereas she and I are still trying to find a good place to be in it."

"Oh?" Vega said, regaining the spotlight of the room. "You think you know it all, don't you?"

"Sometimes" Gretta answered.

"This life is a curse!" Vega said. "Especially for people like me, who never had any intention to adventure, or any want to be great or well-known! I was happy being where I was, but I forced myself to accept what I was thrown into so that I could just live, day-to-day, without a constant fear ruling my life!"

"I was happy being a princess" Gretta said "but I'm glad I'm not anymore. It's much more interesting for me to see the world."

"I'd be happier" Araly said "if we didn't have to be on boats. If we could just be on islands all the time, I think I'd be really happy." Vega looked between them, back and forth, feeling overwhelmed with opposing opinions. She backed her way to the door and glared Gretta, her real opponent, down venomously.

"You just haven't seen the real horror yet" Vega said. "When you see your friends and crew-mates start to die in senseless battles, and when you see the bloodstained grass that you have to walk upon wherever you land, then maybe you'll see how wrong you are in thinking this life will make you happy! 'Happiness'...I've given that up a long time ago. It's the only way I can carry on anymore, if I know that happiness is something out of my reach...That's why I've stayed here so long, because even though I wasn't happy I was safe. When I wanted to be happy, I couldn't be safe at the same time. When I was enjoying the ocean, we'd fall under attack, or have to attack someone else. And of course, that boisterous man never makes me happy. His obnoxious showmanship and his evil, it's all just so inexcusable! I know, near him, I can never be happy but I can be safe."

"But now he's gone, isn't he?" Gretta said. "Now you're alone. Does this mean you're going to try and find happiness?" Vega looked down at the floor for a moment, refusing to address Gretta eye-to-eye, but her confidence was restored and she rose up to meet Gretta's hard and apathetic gaze with an equal force.

"I have to live my life" Vega said "on my own. I'm not someone's pawn anymore. If it means war and fighting by myself, then at least I can be happy to move as far as I can alone. I'd rather die without anyone seeing my smile than have to be let somebody toss my corpse into the sea..."

"You're an idiot" Gretta said. Vega was startled at her bluntness and recalled, in her hand, the sword that she had been using to threaten her. She swung it forward and pointed it at Gretta's throat from the door of the room. "You're too straightforward. It's making you predictable. I thought that this was the sea of unpredictability, the infamously random Grand Line. How can you survive, with or without people, if you're so predictable?"

"Who are you to talk about this place?" Vega demanded. "I've seen numerous things that would send even that chuckle-head captain of yours sailing for his life away from this disastrous ocean!"

"I doubt that" Araly said. "Bard....in all his life, he's never considered running from a challenge. He's just incapable of it..."

"That's why so many people are behind him already" Gretta said. "Including me. I know that, whatever happens, he'll defend everyone behind him, because he wants all of us to be able to go on together, no matter what. He does it out of pride, and duty, and to show off his strength."

"Mostly" Araly said, "he does it...so that everyone behind him...can be happy..." Vega's eyes widened at Araly, and her blade drifted over to point at her. Gretta silently moved to try and subdue the threatening woman but Vega saw her effort and hammered the pommel of her rapier into Gretta's throat, toppling the innocent maiden right down to the floor, wincing in pain.

"What a childish wish" she said. "There is no happiness on this ocean. Only death and pain if you follow another. If you can't follow in your own path, and live life on your own, what good are you anywhere? The world doesn't need people who can't take care of themselves!"

"You're just short-sighted" Araly said, trying to push her self up off the floor to seem less subdued and weak. "Bard doesn't want people to follow him for his sake. He wants to help people go to their own dreams. He's not trying to guide all of us, we're just behind him because he's further ahead....than anyone else." Vega became infuriated at the intolerable amount of opposition she was amassing. Her own wisdom was shot down by two rookie young women, neither of them in any respect pirates worth having a name or being on a crew the likes that defeated the Top Hats. She resolved not to kill Araly but to stab her well enough so that she could know the same pain that she had been through.

Then the door exploded open. The entire lower half flew up and hit Vega in her shoulder and the side of her face. The sword was thrown from her hand and hit against the wall as she herself was thrown by the carrying force of the door itself into the opposite wall where she lost consciousness and slumped down onto the floor. Following the door's explosion was the heavy stomp of a leg as it fell down and crushed some of the broken wood underfoot. Then, in stepped Bard, his skin soaking wet and his black cape heavy from the water, as he peered into the room in confusion.

"Aha!" he exclaimed. "Here you guys are! I was looking all over this ship for you!" Gretta pushed herself up with her hand on her neck and looked up. Bard saw her and extended a hand to help her to her feet. When she took it he pulled her up off her feet and gently set her down on them again. Araly was in worse condition naturally, so Bard took off his coat and whipped the water off of it with one powerful swing. He laid it down beside her, rolled her gently onto it and picked it up, giving her a hammock to sit on as her stomach recovered.

"Thank you, Bard" Araly said.

"Aw, no problem!" Bard said. "I knew you two were in trouble, so I came to rescue you ASP!!"

"ASAP" Gretta corrected. Bard made a dumb face as he was corrected. Vega was still unconscious and huddled under a mass of broken wood between the bed-posts. Bard saw her as he turned to leave but paid her no mind. He wouldn't waste his time or emotions on someone who had inconvenienced him so much. Gretta left after him, taking a look back at Vega, then turned and walked toward her to gently touch her face.

She's almost exactly like me Gretta realized. I wonder...maybe there are only so many faced out in the world that people can have. If the world is truly as expansive as I think it is, it would be foolish to assume that there is a different face for every single person in the world.... Gretta drew away, taking Vega's sword with her, and left for the deck where Bard was waiting. He took to the helm and steered the ship full around, to meet with the distant but closing Imperial Dragon....


A long gangplank was lowered from the deck of the Dragon onto the Top Hat's ship and, one-by-one, the defeated crew was loaded off without any weapons and their ship thoroughly cleaned of any valuables by the Buster Pirates. No one was extemporaneously harmed, however. One beating was enough for the Buster Pirates, who still reveled in their victory. Talk had begun across the ship about disabling the Top Hats from going on, but it was ultimately dismissed by Bard who watched to make sure everyone got on the boat safely from the steep plank. Eventually everyone was there, save but one.

"Alright" Bard said, "cut him down. I'll take this personally." The pirates went to get Aleister down from his suspended prison. They kept the metal traps on his hands out of obvious safety, and Bard began to escort him off his ship. Aleister walked in front while Bard hung back with his arms crossed and his legs obviously ready to act on reflex. Aleister warily stepped on the gangplank and started walking slowly. It creaked and bent to his enormous body with the weight of the cages on his hands adding to it.

"You'll take these blasted things off, won't you?" Aleister asked.

"Maybe" Bard said. Aleister smirked, hiding it from Brad, as he continued. "Were you ever really out just to entertain? Has your whole voyage just been a search for people to trick and fool and otherwise screw over?"

"I've always been a brilliant man" Aleister said. "I wouldn't be so foolish as to act out of sheer good-will! In this age, my boy, such men are stricken down in an instant!" Bard scowled. "This is an age of hardship and war! The forces are always moving against us, the underdogs, the unlikely ones to keep us down. The Marines, the Shichibukai, and far out in the reaches you and I can't dare imagine, there are the Emperors, the Yonkou. Four of the most powerful creatures in existence, ruling the latter part of this dangerous world like demon kings! Do you really think a good deed would shine for even a second in such a world?"

"I'm not asking if you're a good man" Bard said. "When was the last time you didn't charge or steal for your show?"

"Ha!" Aleister laughed. "What's the point of perfecting something if you can't use it for gain? Look, my boy, the fantastic nature of magic is in its selectivity. Only so few people, like myself, are able to master it without external aid. Then, with such aid as I have, it only becomes that much easier to use my already perfect skills for myself! If I didn't want to make myself wealthy and powerful using magic I wouldn't have practiced it to the length that I have!"

"So in the end" Bard said "you're not really a magician. You're just an ass who knows a couple tricks." Aleister gave a sinister grin. Bard's blunt correctness had somewhat hurt his pride, admitting to himself that in reality, Bard's view wasn't private. What was a magician that didn't love the magic he knew? It was a sham, a scammer, just a showboater looking for some passing money on the sea. Aleister hopped down onto the deck of his ship, followed by Bard as the gangplank was mechanically drawn back up into the side of the ship.

"Well, my boy" Aleister began, "it's certainly been quite a show, hasn't it?" Bard glowered up at the man. He pitifully held out his boxed arms to be freed, and Bard obliged. He delatched the boxes and stacked them up in his arms , carrying them without any strain. Aleister's hands were free again and still with the same power constantly active. "Hahaha! Feels good to be free! Don't you agree, Bard? Freedom is wonderful, isn't it?" Bard smiled with his brows still tense and stepped forward. He tossed the boxes up with a quick flex of his back and whip of his arm and delivered a stepping high-kick to Aleister's stomach.

"Yeah" Bard said as he walked away, leaving Aleister buckled over in pain. "Freedom's awesome!" He caught the boxes, crouched down and then jumped clear from ship to ship, rocking the Top Hat's boat from the sheer force of his jump. Aleister was still in pain and groaned, unable to hold his hurt gut with either hand and instead wrapped his thick arms around his body.

"Captain!" one of the men shouted. "Are you alright? We don't have any weapons so....is this okay? Just letting them leave us like this in the ocean!?"

"Hehehennnn" Aleister laughed as he groaned. "Well played, that boy! A fantastic show he's put on! I may be upstaged yet by him! Hnnhnnhnnn!!!" Aleister managed to stand up and walk his way into the big doors that led into his room at the aft of the ship. His thudding footsteps awoke Vega whose room was just below her captain's. She sat up from her bed, remembering being covered by broken wood before, and looked around. Yet again, she was alone in the room and seemingly detained by her own crew. The door was shut, the beds were empty but hers, and some loose cords of rope were at her bedside. She got up in a furious huff and stormed out the door. At her breast under her clothes, the same feeling that she'd carried with her everywhere was still there. An old leather sheathe with an aged and faded dagger was still within her grip. She moved through the ship with the unflinching intent to use it, and walked straight to her captain's room.

"Vega!" Aleister exclaimed. "Where did you go? What were you doing? All of us were fighting for our lives and you sped off!" Vega glowered with a palpable rage that silenced the giant man for a moment. He broke a smile and scowled down at her in return. "Ah, you're a better assistant than I even thought! Disappearing from my sight is quite a feat. What will your next performace be, I wonder?"

"I'm done with magic" Vega said. She took out her worn dagger and charged. Aleister rose up his hands to defend himself and swung down at Vega....but he missed. His invisible hand drifted in the open air as Vega jumped at him, now with her left hand bracing the back of the dagger to drive it even harder forward. Aleister blocked with his hand, hoping to drown her in the abyss of his portal and keep her there. For a brief moment Vega felt a painful anxiety, a fear that kicked itself up from the dust of her past. Then it passed, as if it was nothing, and she powered forward with a gleaming in her eyes. Aleister was stunned and frozen in total fear. Vega stabbed her dagger into the palm of his hand and it sank with blood following soon after....

Vega fell back down, leaving her dagger blade in his skin. It had broken, leaving only the worn hilt for her to hold in her hand. Aleister looked down at her eyes, the gleaming red orbs of fury, and met them for a time that seemed to be eternal. A frozen moment of paralyzed fear. Then she left, leaving her rage in that room along with the wound in her captain's invisible hand, and he stayed sitting with his mouth agape and his eyes shallow with a total fear coursing through him. He slowly managed to move his hand and his head and he stared fearfully at the bleeding cut and the dagger still in his palm. Overcoming fear with the pain, he pressed the dagger with his fingers and it was gone, disappeared into the portal dimension he held, but the wound was still there and real.

That girl...! Aleister thought. He looked to his door and leaned over his bed to look out it. He saw her white hair and fair skin from across the ship. She was leaning against the rail of the bow while the rest of the crew set the coordinates and managed the ship to move in a direction away from the Buster Pirates. She continues to amaze me time and time again! But I wonder, does she even know what skills she possesses? Does she truly have such a powerful gift? Vega stared off into the horizon, thinking nothing of what she'd done but feeling it in her whole body. The weight of those that died that day years ago, all the karma that she was carrying in that single knife, it was all gone. She felt light enough to fly, to walk on water, but sadly she just stood against the ship that imprisoned her, finally seeing just how trapped she was with nothing but infinite sea to all her sides.

The true magic of the Grand Line....no doubt, she has 'that gift'!!! Aleister realized. He smiled wide and sinisterly. Now that he knew, his power had unnaturally grown, and his assistant's irreplaceable worth to him had become even more astounding.....


Many of the Buster Pirates crowded at the aft of the deck, with Maxwell being at their center, snoring over all of their chattering and forcing them to be even louder.

"Will this be okay?" a pirate shouted in curious exclamation. "I mean, letting them sail away like this? What if they chase us? What if we have to meet them really soon again!?"

"Who knows!?" a wiser pirate said. "That's just the way of this sea! It throws misfortune and fortune at you at once and forces you to choose between them in a split-second!"

"The clear path of weather" another man said "may be the route into hell! Letting them go free is the most merciful thing we can do right now, anyway."

"What!?" a pirate shouted, not hearing them.

"It's better to let them go like this!" the pirate shouted. "It's more merciful!"

"When's the last time mercy counted on the Grand Line!?" the pirate shouted in response.

"IT'S TOO DAMN LOOOOOUD!!!!" a muscle-head roared. Maxwell's snoring even went off louder than his shout, draining out his voice in defeat while the crowd just stood and watched deafly at the ship in the far distance.

"They're turning away!" a pirate with a spyglass shouted. "They're turning away!"

"They are!?" another pirate exclaimed. "Where are they going!?"

"They might have more than one pose" another pirate mentioned. "They're thieves, after all. They wouldn't make great thieves if they just wandered out in the middle of nowhere or if they hit the same place over and over again."

"They must've been to most of the beginning islands in the Grand Line already" another pirate said, well under Maxwell's snoring roars.

"GIVE IT A REST!!!" a man shouted, slapping Maxwell on his greasy head. In a second his wrist was jerked and his whole body was flung forward and off the boat. He screamed as he fell down and crashed into the water far below.

"GAAAAAAHHH!!!!" shouted the crew. "Someone save him!"

"I'm going!" Marco exclaimed. "Get some rope! A whole damn lot of rope!"

"Got it!" another pirate exclaimed. The men moved rapidly to necessitate their tossed comrade at the aft of the ship while the Paladins steered the ship and worked the sails from the Underdeck and the Captain's Crew sat up at the helm together. Rez, Zan, Gretta and Araly made up Bard's selective group of upper-ranked members, given the name of Captain's Crew by the rest of the crew. Rez stood behind the wheel and kept it steady, on route to the next island as marked by his log pose.

"I wonder how much longer we're going to be traveling" Rez said. "Today was just all kinds of hectic."

"If you watch a clock" Zan said "then time slows down. Don't fret so much and enjoy the ride."

"Is that how it is?" Gretta said, making quick work to jot down Zan's spoken word. "Well, I'm quite enjoying myself already."

"You're mad" Araly said.

"I'm actually feeling quite complacent" Gretta said. "I was, at worst, a bit irked that we were abducted, but never mad."

"No, I'm saying your crazy" Araly said to correct herself.

"Then" Gretta said "I suppose all of those men are crazy as well?" Araly looked back from her hammock, hung across the railing to suspend her just over the ship's actual wooden deck, and saw the men at the aft making a commotion and crowding all around each other.

"Not crazy" Araly said "but I wouldn't venture that they're the most brilliant pirates, either."

"They're strong" Bard said "and they're fearless! Like me!"

"If we had a whole crew of you" Araly exasperated "then this ship would be sunk!" Bard grinned and snickered to himself.

"I'm sure you made a good call" Zan began "in your own mind, but be aware we already have one powerful enemy on this sea. If all you do is build up your reserve of rivals, you'll soon find yourself faced with an armada of villains. The saying 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' works with everyone."

"I'll keep that in mind" Bard said. "Anyway, just leaving them out in the middle of the ocean wouldn't be the right thing to do."

"It'd be smart, though" Rez said.

"But it wouldn't be honorable" Gretta said. "Honor is something that they've all but lost as pirates. Showing them what honor can do is the least we can do to let them suffer alone."

"That's not what I had in mind" Bard said. "I thought about what to do that would be best for us. Taking their sail, breaking their rudder, even leaving with all their food and letting them keep their treasure to drive them mad and make them eat it!"

"That's what you might do...." Rez said.

"But no" Bard continued. "That's all wrong. If we're going to be strong enough to conquer all our foes, no matter who they are, then we need to train! And our enemies won't always be like us! In fact, I doubt we might meet a single person that's like us for a long time! For the most part, it's going to be strange and extremely powerful people with amazing abilities. There's no guarantee that the allies we met before will remain our allies forever, either. So, if we want to be truly strong, then we must fight everyone we can! However many enemies we make is just that many battles that we'll have to win!!!" As always, Bard's logic inspired both exasperated angst and courageous pride in those who heard it. Rez and Zan both smiled at his short speech while Araly rolled over and groaned. Gretta was motioning to write it down, but her hand froze up suddenly and she couldn't even jot down a letter.

"Is that so?" Gretta said.

"So it is!" Bard exclaimed. "We'll carve the mountain of our power with the bodies of our broken enemies!"

"That sounds kinda graphic" Araly said.

"How many bodies makes a mountain?" Rez asked Zan.

"Depends on what a mountain is to you" Zan answered.

This is getting too poor for my taste Araly said, unable to follow the men's logic any further. Gretta understood it, but was still making sense of it.

The bodies of our enemies...? Gretta thought. So then, I must make my own mountain after all? I think I was wrong....no, I was right all along, but I wish I wasn't. Bard is here to lead us to our selves. He's not here to help us or to achieve for us. He's the shadow that we all stand under together. United, we are separate. Together....we are alone. I suppose that.....is a 'warrior's way'....

Gretta snapped her pencil in her fingers and turned away. "I'm going to bed" she said. "It's been a long day for all of us...."

"Good idea!" Bard exclaimed. "When you wake up and you're body burns with the strain of work it means you've done an amazing job of fighting! Look forward to the pain!"

"Don't scare her with that talk!" Araly exclaimed.

"It takes a mad man to love pain that much" Rez said. Gretta continued away, into the Captain's room and onto the bed she had commandeered, sinking her face into the pillow before falling fast asleep.

The sun sets on the Grand Line. A vicious cycle repeats endlessly, waiting for a great rupture to break the ever-winding gears and chains that move the predictable fates of the unlucky many....