Chapter 8: For That Precious Someone.

Shanks watches in amusement as Yasopp tries to teach Devlin how to use a slingshot. The keyword being 'tries'...the poor girl keeps hurting herself with the wooden weapon. On her first attempt she releases the wrong end and the body of the slingshot smacks her in the face. On her second try, she drops the rock that she's using as ammo on her toes causing her to drop the slingshot and hop around holding her hurt foot in pain. Her third try is much better; she actually manages to fire off a small rock but, unfortunately, the rock ricochets off of a wall before coming back to hit her right between the eyes. "Dahahahaha!" Shanks burst out laughing along with the rest of the Red-Haired Pirates.

Dev chuckles and sits up. She rubs her forehead where the rock hit her, "Ow...I've decided that I really don't like ranged weapons. I think I'll learn to use a sword instead."

Shanks grins at her, "That seems like a very good idea, lass."

Dev gets to her feet then starts to jump up and down in excitement as an idea pops into her head. "Shanks? Will you teach me how to use a sword?"

The red-haired captain thinks for a moment before saying, "I don't see any harm in at least teachin' ye the basics."

"Yippee!" The little blonde shouts, jumping high in the air.

"But not taday, lass."

Dev's face falls in disappointment, "Aww." She slumps down into a chair beside Yasopp.

All of a sudden, one of the swinging doors to the bar is kicked in and a group of men walk inside. "Make way for the scourge of the mountains!" The leader of the group announces loudly while walking inside of the bar. The man is slender with long black hair that is pulled up into a top knot, a black goatee, and a scar in the shape of an x on the right side of his forehead. "Heh heh...So you call yourselves pirates, eh? First time I've seen pirates...you look like a sorry lot to me." The man says while walking past Devlin and Yasopp, the little girl's irises flashing yellow at the insult aimed at the pirate crew. The man walks up to the bar, standing beside where Shanks is sitting, and places his right hand down on top of the bar. "We're mountain bandits. Oh, don't wet yourselves. We're not here to bust up the place. Just sell us 10 barrels of grog, and we'll injure only the bare minimum."

"I'm sorry...we just ran out of liquor," Makino tells the leader of the mountain bandits, Higuma, sweating slightly.

"Hmm," Higuma hums and looks over his shoulder. "That's strange. What're all these pirates drinking?" He looks back at Makino, "Fruit juice?"

"It's true...I just served the last of it."

"I feel kinda guilty...I guess we drank up all o' the liquor," Shanks says to Higuma. "Sorry 'bout that." He picks up his own bottle of rum then holds it out towards Higuma. "Why don't ye have this? It's still unopened."

Higuma glares down at Shanks before hitting the offered bottle with the back of his clenched fist, shattering the bottle and drenching Shanks in rum. Makino gasps and covers her mouth with her hand. The mountain bandits are all grinning while Luffy's mouth is open in disbelief, a strange fruit in his left hand with a couple of bites already taken from it. An inhuman growl comes from little Dev's throat and she lunges forward only to be stopped by Yasopp grabbing her by the shoulders. "It's okay, Dev. The cap'n' has everything under control." He looks down at the little girl and is absolutely shocked when he sees her eyes. The sclera of her eyes are no longer white, but a pitch black. Her normally bright and beautiful ocean blue eyes are now yellow and seem to glow. It's clear that these aren't the eyes of an innocent little girl, but of a ruthless demon.

"What do you take me for? You can't make a fool of me!" Higuma shouts. "What good is one bottle of rum?"

Shanks looks down at the shards of broken glass at his feet. "Oh my...what a mess."

Higuma takes out a wanted poster of himself from the left pocket of his pants. "Look at this. My head's worth 8 million berries. I'm a wanted man. I've killed 56 people...mostly fools like you! Watch yourself...if you're fond of breathing! If you're smart you'll sail away from here so I never see you again."

Shanks gets off of his barstool and crouches down to pick up the pieces of the broken bottle. "Sorry 'bout the mess, Makino. Give me a rag and I'll clean up."

"Uh, don't worry about it," Makino tells the red-headed man.

Annoyed at being ignored, Higuma grabs the hilt of his sword. Devlin snarls loudly and manages to get out of Yasopp's hold, rushing towards Shanks and Higuma. Yasopp desperately tries to catch her, but fails. "Incoming, cap'n'! Little Dev got free!" Yasopp shouts.

Shanks' eyes widen in alarm and his hand goes to the hilt of his own sword. Higuma draws his sword and swings it over Shanks' head, but the blade is stopped mid-swing by a small white hand. Dev is now standing on the seat where Shanks was previously sitting her right hand gripping the blade of Higuma's sword. Her right forearm and hand are covered in an armor similar to Busoshoku Haki except that it's white instead of black while her fingernails are now black and claw-like. Everyone is startled by the girl's appearance. She tightens her grip on the blade until it snaps. The mountain bandit leader takes a step back in fear, "T-this brat...is a m-monster."

"Leave now," Dev says, her voice now an eerily deep baritone. "Or I will break every bone in your body like I broke that cheap piece of junk that you called a sword."

She stares Higuma directly in the eyes never blinking and the man physically recoils away from her. He looks at his men, "L-let's go. We don't need to waste any more time on these fools and their pet freak." Higuma turns and starts to walk towards the remaining door of the bar, his men following behind him.

As soon as the bandits are gone, Dev returns to normal; the white armor-like substance cracking then turning to dust. Devlin blinks her; now normal; eyes owlishly and looks around in confusion. She sees the Red-Haired Pirates all looking at her with serious expressions on their faces. She looks down and sees Shanks on the floor, drenched in rum. "Shanks! Are you okay? What happened?"

Shanks is surprised "Ye don't remember what ye did, lass?" Dev shakes her head. "What's the last thing that ye remember, Devi?"

Dev frowns, "The last thing that I remember is that stupid butthole breaking the bottle that you offered him." She sees Shanks looking at her in concern. "Oh, no...It happened again, didn't it?" Tears start to well up in her eyes and she throws herself off of the stool and into Shanks' lap. She begins to cry looking up at Shanks' face, "I'm s-sorry! P-please don't h-hate me! I j-just wanted to p-protect you. P-please don't h-hate me or c-call me a m-monster..."

Shanks hugs her tightly, "I could never ever hate ye, Luv. I would never hurt ye like yer family did...none of us would. I'm just worried 'bout ya." He takes her right arm and closely inspects it for any damage. He sighs in relief when he sees that she isn't hurt. "Are ye feelin' alright, Devi?"

By now her crying is reduced to sniffling and she nods her head. "I feel fine...I just don't remember what happened after I got mad at that bandit."

Shanks runs one of his hands through Dev's long blonde hair. "We'll work a lil' on controlling yer temper in the morn as well. But I want ye ta promise me that ye will never put yer life in danger fer me again, Devlin."

The little girl wipes the tears from her cheeks with the backs of her hands. "I can't make that promise, Shanks."

He raises a red eyebrow at her, "Oh? And why not?"

"Because you're someone who is precious to me and I will always lay my life on the line to protect those who are precious to me."

Shanks grins at her, takes his hat off of his head, then places it on top of hers. Dev grins in joy as the hat falls down to cover her eyes.

Suddenly, the pirate crew begins to laugh, "Har har har har! Cap'n! He got you good!" Shanks starts laughing along with them and poor Dev is just confused at why they're laughing.

Luffy walks over to where Dev and Shanks are sitting on the floor. "He made you look like a weakling!!! Why didn't you fight him?! Even Dev stood up to that jerk, so why didn't you?! Sure, they outnumbered you, and maybe they looked pretty tough, but what kind of man lets himself be treated like that then laughs about it? You're a disgrace to all pirates!"

Dev's eyes flash yellow and Shanks notices then gives her a gentle hug and she instantly calms down. Shanks looks at Luffy and tells him, "When ye grow up maybe ye will understand, lad. He just got some rum on me, that's all. Needless killin' doesn't make ye a man." Luffy huffs then turns around to walk away, but Shanks reaches out and grabs his left arm with his left hand. "Hey, where are ye goin'?"

"Hmph! To go find a real role model!" Luffy starts stomping off, but Shanks doesn't let go of his arm.

To everyone's great surprise, Luffy's arm begins to stretch as he continues to stomp away. Everybody's eyes widen and several pirates that had just taken a mouthful of grog, spit the liquor out. Those that hadn't taken a drink mouths drop open in disbelief. "WHAT!!?"

There's an intense look on Shanks' face, "His arm's stretchin'!!! Does this mean...did he-"

"He couldn't have!" Yasopp and a few other pirates shout.

"WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME?!!!" Luffy screams, panicking.

"IT'S NOT HERE!!" Lucky Roo yells while looking inside of a small treasure chest.

"HUH?!"

"THE GUM-GUM FRUIT WE TOOK FROM THAT ENEMY SHIP!!" Lucky Roo picks up a sketchpad then rushes over to where Luffy is standing. Lucky Roo shows the little boy a drawing of a strange purple fruit with swirl designs all over it. "Luffy! You didn't eat this fruit did you?!"

"Yeah...I ate it for dessert!!" Luffy replies, sweating slightly. He then makes a look of disgust and tells Lucky Roo, "It didn't taste all that great, though..."

Shanks picks up Devlin from his lap and places her down on a barstool before rushing over to Luffy and crouching down in front of the boy. Shanks puts both of his hands on either side of Luffy's face, his thumbs hooking into the corners of the boy's mouth and stretching his mouth. "THAT WAS THE GUM-GUM FRUIT!! THE FRUIT O' THE DEVIL! IT'S ONE O' THE SECRET TREASURES O' THE SEA! IF YE EAT IT, YER ENTIRE BODY BECOMES LIKE RUBBER! AND YE WILL NEVER BE ABLE TA SWIM FER THE REST O' YER LIFE!"

"WHAAAAAAAAAT!? AAARGH!!" Luffy screams, his jaw-dropping and nearly hitting the floor.

Shanks releases Luffy's face. He yells at Luffy, his teeth becoming pointed in anger, "Ye IDIOT!!!!"

There are stars in Dev's eyes, "That is so COOL!" She hops down from the barstool and rushes over to Luffy.

"How is never being able to swim cool, Dev!?" Luffy asks, crying a little.

"Of course, that part isn't cool, but being made of rubber? That's awesome!" Luffy just looks at her confused, "Think about it, dunderhead. Your body is made of rubber now, so when Mister Garp hits you...it won't hurt you! Or at least not as much."

Luffy's mood lifts at the thought, "Hey, yeah! You're right! And maybe now I can beat you and Ace in a fight!"

Dev scoffs, "I doubt it...but you're welcome to try." She reaches out with her right hand and pinches Luffy's left cheek between her thumb and index finger. She pulls at his cheek expecting it to stretch, but nothing happens. "Huh? What's the big idea!? Why isn't it working?" She lets go of his cheek.

"I don't know..." He reaches up and grabs both of his cheeks then pulls. His cheeks stretch out as wide as his arms can go. He releases his cheeks and they snap back to normal.

Dev frowns then reaches out to pull at his cheek again, but, once again, nothing happens. "Knock it off, Luffy! I want to stretch you out!" She then tackles him and knocks him to the floor. She sits on top of him and begins pulling at his right arm, trying to get it to stretch, but nothing happens.

"Ow! Dev, stop it! I'm not doing this on purpose!"

Shanks exchanges worried looks with Benn Beckman and sighs at this new development. "I definitely need ta talk ta Rayleigh now."

A/N: I'm so sorry that this chapter took so long. I got distracted by the cold and My Hero Academia. I promise that future chapters will not take this long ever again. I hope everyone is safe and well during this pandemic.