Hope you don't mind some Scottish slang thrown in here and there. As you've probably figured out, Moire is Scottish-based and as she gets more and more comfortable, her accent and old patterns of speech from before she was taken will become more pronounced. Don't worry though. There won't be too much writing "in dialect" that makes things nearly impossible to read, but you'll probably see some.
Sorry this took me so long. Life happened. The M rating is for safety; there is no citrus planned, but plenty of language, violence, gore, and general insanity.
Spoilers, as always. I suppose I'll actually start mentioning specific chapters/episodes if I ever manage to catch up more with canon.
The scene that greeted Moire when she reached the roof of the Drinker's Pub was an odd one, indeed. Dozens of pirates crowded around a man who must have been Buggy the Clown; literally, the man was dressed and made up just like a circus clown from the carnival that visited her island when she was a child. Several more were stopped mid-charge by Zoro's still-sheathed swords. Behind him was a girl she'd never seen before, and even further back was Luffy in a little square box of a cage. All of the pirates seemed to be gaping, dumbfounded, at Zoro, and only one set of eyes strayed her way: Luffy's.
"Mori!" he shouted, grinning with delight. And just like that, all eyes were turned on her.
She didn't notice all the attention right away through her annoyance. "It's Moire!"
"Whatever your name is, I thought you were leaving. I think I warned you about what would happen if you crossed us," Zoro cut in, his tone dangerous. He had thrown off the handful of pirates who had apparently been charging at the redhead behind him and was facing her with one sword leaned casually over his shoulder. The expression on his face perfectly matched the tone of his voice.
Moire raised a brow at the swordsman, a nasty retort on her tongue for a moment before she thought better of it. Instead, she said, "I don't plan to cross you. I have a bone to pick with him." She pointed at the clown captain, who scoffed in response.
"What could a drifter like you possibly want with me?"
Her attention fully on Buggy, Moire answered with a sneer, her rage returning. "You are despicable. Holding this town hostage and destroying the lives of those who inhabit it is disgusting. Only the lowest of the low would praise you for what you've done."
The clown pirate was taken aback; people didn't talk to him that way. If they did, they didn't survive for very long. Once he returned to himself, he glared, pulling red-painted lips back over gritted teeth in a snarl. "You'll pay for insulting me, drifter."
The standoff was interrupted when Luffy shouted, "Zoro! Get me out of here!" An instant hush fell over the previously rumbling pirate crew, a few whispering and wondering if this was really Zoro the Pirate Hunter. Buggy seemed to notice, as well, and he stood from his "throne."
"So, you're Pirate Hunter Zoro, huh? You must have come to take me in for my bounty."
Zoro's reply was completely indifferent, as if he didn't notice the sudden charge to the atmosphere. "I gave up pirate hunting; I have no interest in you or your bounty." Moire tensed, one hand straying toward the hilt of the sword rising above her shoulder.
"Well, I am interested in you. Killing you will only add to my infamous reputation." The clown had drawn several knives, four clasped between the fingers of his left hand and one spinning around his right. "As for you, drifter, I think I'll have my crew take care of you. Men!"
Moire missed the clash between Zoro and Buggy as several of the clowns charged her. Before they could react, she had drawn her blade, intercepting a knife attack and deflecting another all in one stroke. A long knife, drawn from a thin, smooth sheath at her thigh, appeared in her left hand as she began her dance of death. She was unaware of the dark eyes of Luffy following her as she fought, flowing away from and between blows from the clumsy pirate crew. Blood sprayed her face as she drew her knife across one man's throat just as she stabbed backwards with her sword to catch another in the gullet as he tried to come at her from behind.
With a half dozen of Buggy's crew down in the span of a minute or two, the rest that had attacked backed away warily as they tried to regroup and come up with a plan to deal with the surprisingly skilled opponent they faced. Some were trembling as they stared at her with wide eyes, while others tried to get the former to pull themselves together.
"No way! That was too easy!" Luffy shouted. Moire turned her head to give a look to the captain-in-a-cage and realized that he wasn't talking about her battle. The boy was fixated on something to her right, and she was brought up short by what she saw when she followed his gaze.
Zoro stood, his back to Buggy, who lay on the ground in pieces. As he sheathed his three swords, Moire frowned, her eyes taking in the entire rooftop scene once more. The remaining crew that had not attacked her looked smug, and no blood flowed from Buggy's wounds. Something was very, very wrong.
Meanwhile, the swordsman approached Luffy's cage, stooping to inspect the lock. Buggy's crew, seeming to have forgotten about the very real threat that Moire posed to their health, were all laughing uproariously.
"Very funny. Now hand over the keys before I get pissed off," Zoro snapped.
"Those guys are kind of creepy," Luffy mused, staring at the lot of them as if they were crazy.
Moire felt more than saw the motion out of the corner of her eye, but before she could call out a warning, Buggy's disembodied, floating hand had driven a dagger through Zoro's side. The swordsman hit his knees as the blood began to flow, staining his bright green haramaki a muddy red.
What? Moire whirled to face what had been a pile of body parts just as Buggy began to reassemble himself.
"The Chop-Chop Fruit," Buggy answered the chorus of shocked and angry questions flying about. "You can cut me up all you want, but you won't kill me! I'm a Chop-Chop man!"
He really is another Devil Fruit user in the East Blue. Huh, things just seem to get more and more interesting around here, Moire mused, keeping one eye on her former attackers and the other on the crazed captain in front of her. I can't do much against him, unless… Her left hand, still holding the knife, brushed the butt of one of the pistols at her sides.
"Roronoa Zoro, you never had a chance! Looks like I missed your vital organs, but that's a serious wound you have!" The tall, red-nosed captain loomed over his prey, one dagger still spinning lazily in his fingers. A chant of "kill him" was rising among his crew.
Moire didn't have any more time to finish the thought of drawing her guns as Buggy lunged toward Zoro, still on his knees and clutching his wounded side. She met the captain's killing attack head on, her sword and knife crossed to absorb the force. In the process, she was nearly pushed back over the very man she was trying to save. She didn't remember thinking of rescue until the time came to act; a very human instinct, long buried, had risen at that moment and ruled her body and mind.
"You again?" Buggy growled. "You would insult me and then stand in my way? I'll just have to take you out first!"
He was interrupted once again by a furiously screaming Luffy: "Stabbing someone in the back is a cowardly move, Big Nose!"
That was absolutely the wrong thing to say to Buggy, but it got his attention off Moire as the redheaded girl shouted at Luffy for being an idiot. "You dare to call me Big Nose?" His right hand flew out, dagger brandished, and detached from his arm, heading straight for Luffy's face. Like a bullet, it shot through the bars and hit its target head on.
"Luffy!"
When the boy looked up, it was to the shock of Buggy and his crew, and the relief of Zoro and Moire, who had begun to grow a bit of a liking for him. "I swear," he gritted around the blade in his teeth, "I'm going to kick your ass!" And he bit the dagger itself in two.
Buggy burst into laughter. "'Kick my ass,' he says! Don't make me laugh! I'm going to kill all four of you!"
"It's hopeless. We're going to die," the redhead murmured, as Luffy laughed and stated with certainty: "I'm not gonna die!"
Moire slowly sheathed the knife in her left hand, and, watching to see if she gained any reaction from Buggy's crew or the captain himself, slowly laid her fingers over the butt of her gun. Before she could make a move, Luffy was yelling again, drawing all attention back to them. Damn that boy and his timing, she thought.
"Zoro! Moor! Run away!"
The dumbfounded explosion from Zoro drowned out Moire's annoyance at Luffy screwing up her name yet again. "What?! I'm not going anywhere! They'll kill you the instant we're gone!" Luffy simply stared back, resolve and something Moire could only call confidence on his face.
"I got ya." Some message must have passed between the two because Zoro leapt into action just as a maniacally cackling Buggy leapt at him. He blocked the flying blows with one blade before slicing at Buggy's waist. While the clown flew apart, Zoro dove for the cannon.
The utterly mad plan snapped into place in Moire's mind and she moved just in time to knock aside a pistol being fired from one of the crew toward Zoro. The man was nearly cut in half for his troubles. She could hear Zoro behind her groaning as he lifted the massive cannon, turning it 'round on its hinges, as she stayed busy keeping Buggy's crew at a safe distance. With a great clang and shudder, the cannon fell into place, at which point Buggy and the pirates that were staring down the barrel lost it.
"He pointed the cannon at us!" one pirate screamed.
"And it's loaded with one of my Buggy balls!" the captain added.
The pirates around Moire ran with their leader just as Zoro demanded the redhead light the fuse. "Light this thing! Hurry up!"
"Look out!" Buggy caterwauled as the cannon fired, its payload tearing through the sky and off the roof. Smoke formed a screen in front of the four misfits.
"Now's our chance," Zoro panted. "Who are you, anyway?" The question was directed at the redheaded girl.
"I'm…a thief."
"Actually," Luffy piped in, "she's our new navigator! And Mori, your fight was awesome! You have to join us, too!"
"What the hell are you talking about? Are you insane?" the redhead exploded just as Moire shouted, "My name is Moire you idiot!"
"And shouldn't you be trying to get out of that cage?" the self-proclaimed thief added.
Luffy snickered, "Oh yeah, maybe you're right."
"You just stay in there for now," Zoro ordered, grabbing the cage just as Buggy burst through the smoke looking singed.
"You're not going anywhere!"
"Zoro, you can't do this, your guts'll fall out!" Luffy warned. The swordsman ignored him, hoisting the cage over his shoulders, blood running down his side.
"Don't lecture me. I do things my way," Zoro gritted, trickles of red running from his lips. Not bothering to sheath the blade in her hand, Moire darted after the swordsman over the rooftops. She vaguely noted the redheaded thief following.
Several buildings down, the foursome came to a halt. Luffy was tugging on the bars of his cage and complaining as Zoro slumped beside him. Moire looked between the two and couldn't help but admire the bond that had so obviously formed there. A kernel of respect began to grow for the annoying green-haired man as she fully realized that he had been prepared to die to save his friend. Another existed for the would-be king simply for inspiring such loyalty. In the corner of her mind, she noted the sounds of shouts as the pirates scrambled about searching for their prey. They hadn't thought to search the rooftops yet, but the clamor was getting closer.
"I think we should keep moving," Moire said. She looked around for the redhead as she did so, but the girl was gone. "We need to get further away."
Zoro shot an annoyed glare her way, sweat dripping down his face. "Do you want to carry this thing?" he asked, gesturing at the cage containing Luffy.
Irritation twisted Moire's lip a bit as she replied, her brogue thickening with ire, "That doesn't seem to be an option. Now drop the attitude and let's get out of here or we're all in trouble. That crew isn't much to speak of, but Buggy will be difficult to deal with, even with my guns. We need to regroup."
"I don't recall there ever being a 'we,'" Zoro muttered, but he lifted the cage anyway.
It was slow going as the trio made their way off the roof and into the streets. A trail of red droplets followed them down the white flagstones for several blocks before Zoro and Moire, bickering occasionally, finally agreed that they were far enough away to stop. Luffy's cage hit the ground with a resounding clank, followed shortly by the exhausted swordsman as he collapsed face down. Moire swept her gaze around them, finding nothing and no one but a small white dog staring at them from a few feet away.
"What's with this dog?" Zoro wondered from his prone position.
Luffy's interest piqued, he leaned hard against the bars, scooting the cage closer to the animal. "Doggy!" He started pulling faces at the canine but was rewarded only with a silent stare. "Hey, Zoro, I think this dog is frozen."
The swordsman had dragged himself to sit against the porch of the pet food shop in front of them. "I don't give a damn. He can sit there forever for all I care."
Moire regarded the animal with curiosity. She hadn't seen much of any animals for seven years, but as a child, she had grown up around them. The behavior - or lack thereof - of this particular dog was highly unusual. She idly noted the silent state of the pet food store, and wondered if the owner had skipped town when the pirates came. She was brought abruptly out of her musings by Luffy's howls of pain as the dog suddenly decided to do something. And by doing something, that really meant that he was trying to chew Luffy's face off.
"Luffy! Quit goofing around and get serious!" Zoro shouted, just before falling over sideways. The dog's attack had relented and he resumed his previous position.
"Damn dog," Luffy muttered.
Moire snickered in response. It felt good to smile. Her good mood was snapped away as light footsteps approached. She whirled, knife in hand, and had the stranger by the throat, blade poised, before she realized who it was.
"Hey! It's just me! Calm down, you crazy bitch!" the redhead coughed as Moire's grip on her throat loosened. The assassin's glare deepened, but she let the other girl go and lowered her knife.
Still rubbing her abused neck, the girl turned her attention to the men. "Is the middle of the street really the best hiding place you could find?"
"Hey! It's our navigator!"
"I never agreed to that! I just wanted to thank you for saving me." With that, she dropped a small, two-pronged key in front of Luffy and the dog.
"The key to the cage! Did you go steal it for me? Thanks Nami!" the boy cried jubilantly.
"I only did it so we'd be even. Now I don't owe you anything, so we're square, okay?"
"Yea, okay." Just as Luffy reached for the key, the dog leaned down and swallowed the thing. Before anyone could react with anything but shock, Luffy was trying to throttle the dog, yelling and cursing all the while. In the commotion, Moire missed the approach of another person.
"Hey, stop that!" an older man shouted. His shoulder-length, curly hair had turned a pale gray with age. His eyes were framed by round black glasses and deep wrinkles carved lines across his forehead and on either side of his mouth. "Stop picking on poor Chouchou! Leave him alone, you brats!"
Moire raised a brow at the man. He was dressed in a cobbled-together suit of armor, none of the various bits fitting quite right over his yellow plaid shirt, black shorts and sandals. An antique-looking spear with a wooden haft was slung across his back as if he was getting ready to throw himself into battle.
"And who might you be, old man?" Zoro questioned, looking upside down at the newcomer from his position on the ground.
"Old man?" he replied, sounding offended. "Why I'm the mayor of this town, Boodle! Now who are you, and why are you hurting Chouchou?" His demand was cut short as he noticed the blood staining Zoro's side and splattered across Moire's face. "That's a nasty wound you have. You must have had a run-in with Captain Buggy. We need to get you to a doctor."
Zoro protested - loudly - almost immediately. "I don't need a doctor. Just some sleep!"
Moire, feeling a twinge of sympathy for the annoying swordsman, added, "I have some first aid experience. I can patch him up with the right supplies."
Boodle regarded her a little more carefully than the others. It was as if he could feel something different about her, something a little more brutal and primal and a little less human. Unconsciously, she squirmed under his gaze; the scrutiny did not make her uncomfortable so much as what it implied when coupled with the fact that the other two did not receive such treatment. Almost sheepishly, she sheathed the sword and long knife still in her hands.
Ignoring Zoro's protests, Moire and Boodle hauled him off the ground and to a house the mayor said belonged to him. Moire had to keep herself from smacking the already injured man; his loud complaining was sure to garner some attention. Luckily, they made it to a second floor bedroom and deposited him on a bed. Boodle quickly left the room to gather up the supplies that Moire listed off, including a needle and heavy silk thread, much to Zoro's consternation. The assassin was more surprised that the mayor happened to have the proper materials; she wondered if he always stocked those things, or if he'd only begun after Buggy made his appearance.
"Hey, I don't need a nurse. Just leave me alone and let me sleep," Zoro grumbled from the bed.
Moire, who up until that point had stood facing the door, turned on him with a glare, eyes snapping. "What you need is to be stitched up before you bleed out all over the place. I'm no doctor, but I can at least try to keep you from getting a nasty infection on top of the injury. Now shut yer geddy and take the help I'm offering you."
Zoro blinked at the woman who loomed over him. Normally no taller than about his shoulder, she had a way of making her presence fill a room and seem more threatening. She had mostly kept to herself on the voyage, but he had seen her employ the same technique on Luffy every now and again. He wouldn't admit that he himself was intimidated, but it made him a mite uncomfortable to have a skilled, heavily armed fighter who he couldn't quite get a read on standing over him like that. What made it worse was that she was probably right, and he was being stupid. Fat chance he would ever say it aloud, though.
"Why do you want to help me in the first place? I thought you had family to take care of or whatever," he said instead.
The question seemed to catch her off guard and she paused, a thoughtful look flashing in her otherwise steady gaze. After a moment, she replied, "Mibbe I've come to respect you a bit. Or perhaps I don't want to see yer arse killed by a coward like Buggy. Mibbe a bit of both or sommat else entirely."
Boodle returned then, halting any response Zoro might have had, but he regarded the woman in a bit of a softer light than he had before. Not much softer, but a bit.
The mayor set a bowl of hot water, a pile of gauze, a roll of bandages, heavy needle, silk thread, disinfectant, and several shreds of what might once have been linen sheets for towels. "This should do it, if you can make him hold still. I'll go inform your captain that his swordsman is being taken care of."
Moire bowed her head in thanks and set to work sterilizing the needle and thread. She didn't once look at Zoro as she went about her task with quick, efficient hands. The swordsman watched her carefully, more intrigued than annoyed at the moment and entirely forgetting to argue about getting his wound treated. He could definitely tell that she hadn't been lying when she said she had first aid experience; she was much too businesslike not to have. He tensed when she once more turned her attention to him and ordered him to remove his shirt.
"I'm telling you, all I need is sleep!" he snapped.
Her gaze intensified, became a glare, and something prickled along his senses, something just out of reach that sent a shiver up his spine. The sensation was almost indescribable, more like the electricity in the air before a storm than anything else. "And I am telling you that you need to take your shirt off and be still."
He opened his mouth to argue, but another chill snapped through him and his jaw clicked shut. "Fine," he grumbled, doing as she ordered. Her expression relaxed just before she came at him with a rag soaked in disinfectant.
Outside, Boodle paused in the relation of Chouchou's tale as a pained howl reached their ears. Even the dog glanced at the second storey window.
"Think he's okay in there?" Luffy wondered, just before a feminine shout of "Stop bein' a fanny!" rang out, followed by a muffled crash.
"I think that answers that question," Nami muttered, blinking.
"I just hope they don't break anything with their bickering and fighting." With that, Boodle launched back into his tale of Chouchou, his departed owner, and the pet shop.
Back inside, Moire had Zoro pinned to the bed - much easier than she would have had he been in fighting condition - with one knee planted on his shoulder and the other trapping his chest. She was giving no thought to the awkward position it put her in, only thankful that her patient was finally still, but said patient was going red with embarrassment. He had a very up close and personal view of her rear and if he moved, he'd wind up planting his chin in a butt cheek. So, he stayed still, wincing only a bit as she jabbed him with the needle.
Once she was finished stitching, she allowed the swordsman to sit up, dabbing blood away from the newly stitched wound with a bit of gauze and disinfectant. One look at his reddened face brought her up short, however, and he flinched back as she reached a hand out to touch his forehead.
"I'm only tryin' to see if you have a fever, ya goon. Yer all flushed."
That only made him blush harder. This situation was getting to the point of no return. "I'm fine," he gritted out through clenched teeth.
"Sure ye are, with a great big hole in your side." She rolled her eyes at him and moved faster than he could react to check his temperature. "Don't seem to have a fever. Let me bandage you up and then I'll leave ye alone." Without so much as another word or glance his way, she wrapped him up tight.
Zoro very quickly replaced his damaged shirt and haramaki, forcing the redness out of his face to the best of his ability as he did so. Everything this woman did unsettled him in some way; he was by turns suspicious of her, baffled by her, angry at her, or utterly embarrassed just being near her. I need a damn nap, he thought as he collapsed back onto the bed. He was already drifting when she rose to leave the room.
"You're welcome," she prodded as she walked out of the door and into the hallway. He didn't respond, but she thought she saw him tense just a bit out of the corner of her eye. He was becoming quite entertaining to annoy, she thought while descending the stairs.
She was only halfway down when she heard a massive something approaching the pet shop with heavy steps. Whatever it was could only be trouble sent by the clown captain and she quickened her pace without really considering what she was doing.
Now what? she wondered.
Scots' slang in this chapter:
"yer geddy" - your mouth
"mibbe" - maybe
"fanny" - in this case, wimp/baby, but can also mean a stupid person or vagina