-Batoidea Island-
A woman on a remote island sits on the beach and braids leather into rope. The morning sunlight shines down on her and the pool of acid wash she had tanned the leather in. Several other hides are drying nearby. The water near her bare feet is disturbed and a smooth, flat fish appears on the surface. The stingray is twenty feet across and thirty feet long with an intricately swirling pattern of stripes and spots on its back. With a flip of its fins, it spits an airtight bottle onto the shore and dives back into the shallow water, swimming back out to sea. Inside is a newspaper depicting the events of the battle of Marineford. Her hands clench the paper so tightly that it tears. The events had long since passed and the survivors had all gone back into hiding. The ray that delivered this must have passed several Sea Kings just to bring it to her. They surround the island, as they should, here in the Calm Belt. The only problem is, it sure makes it hard to go anywhere else. The woman throws the paper aside and picks up the rope, tying off the end she'd been working on and cutting the excess with a small dagger. She had hoped to treat it a while longer, but time has just been restricted.
Coiling several hundred yards of leather rope and a few dull metal hooks, meant for holding not for injuring. The woman stands and walks up an animal trail to a cliff overhanging a deep pool in the water. She throws the rope down on the cliff. "Granny Kudra!" she yells. There is a low rumbling from the water that shakes the island and something the size of a small island begins to rise out of the water. Waves roll off it, welling up with destructive force and slapping against the shore all the way up to the treeline. Soon, the swell breaks to reveal a giant stingray. It's dark brown markings and white spots can be clearly seen around the three rows of vicious spikes protruding in rows framing its spine.
The woman picks up one of the hooks and ties rope to it. "Something's come up and I've got urgent matters to tend to," the woman continues. "I can't leave until I prove I earn your respect, right, dearie? Well here I come." She'd had the best fish-riding teacher in the world until two years ago when he had been shot and killed in front of her. He had taught her everything he knew beforehand and she feels it would be an insult to his memory if she failed with her favorite fish, no matter how big this one was. There is another rush of water and the Sea King ray rears its tail and stabs the poisoned barb into the cliff where she was standing. The woman barely had enough time to jump out of the way. Still holding the hook, the rope trails behind her as she quickly leaps from her new perch directly at Granny Kudra.
-Several months later, somewhere in the North Blue-
There is a mansion on Valcour Island. Rows and rows of grapes cover the surrounding five miles, fertilized with imported volcanic soil. Beyond this is what would seem like a small town to an outsider. To anyone who spent even a day in these few buildings, however, it would soon become apparent that all the smiling people therein serve those who live beyond the grapes. The real town of the island lies behind a smooth stone wall, thirty feet high and topped with iron pikes. There is only one official entrance to the lands within: a high, arching iron gate decaled with wine bottles and ropes. Two female goddesses face each other in the center and reach for the other as the gates open, embracing once again when they are securely closed. Unofficially, there is a trail leading down the cliffside and a pulley system used for sea cargo. All of these and a few key locations are heavily guarded.
New "servants" arrive once a week to replace the bodies thrown into the ocean, the mass graves long since filled. In these rows of chained and bomb-strapped people shambles one without restraint. She keeps her head down respectfully like the others and smiles warmly, taking small, careful steps as if her ankles are chained. As they approach the mansion, they are given varying uniforms to designate which duties they are to perform. The woman hangs back until the maid's outfit is pulled from the crate. When it passes into her hands, she notes the stiffness of an unwashed patch of dried blood left by the previous servant. The guard who gives her the uniform sees that there are no chains on her wrists or neck, but can't quite focus on her face. When he turns to raise his suspicions to his partner, he finds he's completely forgotten what he was going to say. When he hands off the gardener uniform in his hand to the next servant, he doesn't remember feeling perturbed at all.
Inside the mansion, as the people in various rooms discuss matters such as how the lady of the house has been absent for nearly half a year, they find that their surroundings have been cleaned to the desired perfection, and often beyond. Oddly, they do not remember anyone ever occupying the space with them. They do, however find invitingly warm cups of tea on a nearby table. It smells of honey and lilacs and has a pleasant taste of summer. After drinking, they settle themselves into nearby chairs or beds and take well deserved naps. By nightfall, there are only a select few people inside the manor and a few guards on the outskirts of the perimeter who are still awake, besides the servants, that is. A doctor with a severe burn on one half of his face and a tailor gather the servants from the small village and lead them to the side of the manor facing the cliffs, telling them and the guards who ask that the Lord and Master of these vast lands has ordered fitness assessment and new uniforms outside of work hours. Inside, pages carry sleeping people away from this side of the building.
There is no moon on this night and heavy clouds cover the stars. They coil and roll like venomous snakes threatening to multiply. That morning they had been a dark smudge on the horizon. Throughout the day they had encroached on the manor and now growl with menace, striking at each other with bright flashes of memory. At the wall, the night guard finds the gates have been fused shut, goddesses never to part again without brutal force. Red veins trace their way through the metal. An eerie quiet falls over the manor as the lanterns in the yard extinguish and the thousands of candles inside go out one by one.
In the study on the third floor, a middle aged man stands in front of a desk sipping wine. Hisk dark brown hair has been slicked back and a steady patch of gray is seeping up from the base of his neck. He has a thick moustache on his upper lip and wears thin half-framed reading glasses which he looks through at reports on his desk. Beside them sit a golden plaque reading Gallowcomb, E. H. I. His glass pauses at his lips as lightning flashes and all the candles in the room go out. He carefully sets the glass on the surface in front of him and turns slowly, taking off his glasses and discarding them with a carefree toss. Even in the dark his black eyes gleam with unhinged mallace. He sees only shadows. There is a flash from the window and one of the shadows becomes an ethereal woman in red.
"I knew you weren't dead." His voice is icy, not showing a hint of surprise. As she knew, he expected her to show up sooner or later.
"The woman you called daughter is dead." Karmen had imagined this meeting for two years, but now that she stands before him it's as if everything she'd planned had gone out the window. There is no anger or hatred. There is no fear or sadness. There's just an empty numbness, an empty hollow. She can deal with the nothingness. If anything, she felt tired and that this had been overdrawn. That's all that hangs between them now.
"You were never my daughter. I don't know why we ever agreed to the terms of that blasted government. I should have crushed your skull with my boot when they brought you to me as an infant. I'd love to have seen the look on your father's face. At least they aren't preventing me from killing you now, thanks to your own actions. Any use you may have had is no longer applicable. The deal is off." He scowls at her. "I should have worked harder on you as a child. I was so close to breaking you. Had that blasted bear not brought you his spy you would have made the perfect tool. For a few good years, you did. If only you'd been able to see how your father jumped and squirmed at the slightest request from the government when we threatened to harm you or your spy of a bodyguard." He chuckles darkly. "You'll never see your beloved drek again."
"I know exactly where Pierce is," she says, drawing two metal quills from her belt. They glow like blue steel in the lightning. "I came up here to deal with you. My captain gave me a long while to do what I will, and I decided that I wanted to take from you, like you take from so many." Two years to train and collect herself, if she had depicted his message correctly. Several parts of her are here on this island.
"If you think that pathetic congeries in the yard below will change anything you're more naïve than I thought. I'll simply kill them and buy more." So he had seen the slaves that Saaresto and Winston had gathered.
Karmen inhales slowly through her nose, her calm expression unwavering. "I realize that, which is why I'm following your example and sending them to the ocean." She levers a feather on each of her quills, filling them with a single drop of poison each. "I won't waste time telling you what I've been up to all this time. I'm sure you've heard rumors or don't care either way. Do you know what I learned most from watching you whip people to death in the basement? You enjoy hurting people. You love being drenched in blood that you've spilled with your own hands." Lightning flashes and Karmen synchronizes. He barely sees her move. Instinctively, he raises his hands to protect himself. "Scarlet Strike: Ultimate Necrosis." He doesn't feel the bits slice into his hands. They are already black and rotting. If it kept going, it would probably reach his heart and lungs before the poison ran out. With an anguished cry, she flicks new feathers and stabs his shoulders where black absence has already reached its dark fingers. The progression of the plague instantly stops. He feels the pain of dead flesh in his mid-bicep. "Consider yourself lucky, Gallowcomb. Because of you, I can't stand the sight of death. I leave you your miserable life, but you will never use your beloved hands to hurt anyone ever again."
She doesn't stay to watch the man she once called father collapse to the floor. She pockets her weapons and flies to the boiler room. Feeling for the echoing heartbeat beneath her feet with her Haki, she finds the hidden doorway almost immediately. Everyone hides secret rooms in the boiler room, Kuma had told her once. Ikaika and Willow are no exception. She turns a lever disguised as a pipe and it swings open. The damp smell of rot greets her. The stairs leading to the room below are stained a reddish brown from years of suffering. She can tell by the smell that she's about to ruin another pair of shoes in this basement. Her foot hesitates just for a moment with apprehension on what she'll find and then she plunges into the darkness.
There are thirty two steps to the bottom. The room is illuminated by two oil lamps mounted on the wall that flicker over several unmoving forms on the ground. Bodies. At least thirty of them. None of them are over three months old, but they've been laid in rows all across the floor. There isn't a man among them. It's just like Ikaika to prey on people who can't defend themselves and use their deaths to cause the suffering of others. Karmen has to step over carcasses of women and children to reach the far wall. The smell makes her dizzy and she's afraid she'll pass out if she breathes too deeply. Her stomach turns so violently that she's afraid to open her mouth. Are they all really dead? Maybe she can save at least one. She checks again. There is her heartbeat, one lose to the wall, and about thirty coming from a tub of electric eels to her right. She doesn't want to know what those were used for, but her imagination and knowledge of Gallowcomb paint a pretty clear picture. She can tell just by looking that all the bodies on the ground are stone cold. She turns to the source of the only one human heartbeat other than her own in the room which comes from directly in front of her. A misshapen form hangs from the wall from blue stone cuffs, blood-crusted toes dangling centimeters from the damp floor. Knife, whip, and burn wounds on his arms and torso fester and seep and one hip hangs at an inhuman angle.
She finds she can't breathe as she looks at this person. She nearly jumps when a pained grunt emanates from the man. His head rolls to the side a few centimeters. "I've finally died," he laughs weakly. "I can smell the flower fields of heaven opening up before me."
The guards who were still conscious that night all give similar reports to the government agents and reporters who came to investigate the incident on Valcour Island: All the servants are gathered on the cliff. Their chains and bombs have been removed and lined up on the patio. A half-dead man is carried out of the manor on a red mist. The ghost of Gallowcomb Jenevive Willow Karmen suddenly appears and orders everyone to jump off the cliff into the ocean, a fall sure to kill any who hit the water. Seeing the gold seal in her raised hand, however, everyone obeys instantly. The apparition puts on a red hood and veil and drags the dying man over the cliff. Some say they saw glistening stingrays ferrying their souls to the land of the dead. As they reach a certain distance out at sea the exploding collars on the patio detonate. When the ensuing fire is extinguished all the ghosts are gone. The only lingering trace that anyone unusual was on the grounds that night were the gates which had been fused shut, presumably with the vengeful fires of Hell, the arms that have to be amputated from Lord Gallowcomb's shoulders, a metal tipped quill stabbed into the dirt over a nameless butler's grave, and a set of bloody footprints leading off the cliff.
[Author's Note: First off, thank you all for reading this far and for all the wonderful reviews you've left for me. I'll be taking a short break from writing this story, but this is not the end. Some of you may be disappointed that the Straw Hats were not present for Pierce's rescue, but let me assure you that Karmen is not finished with the Gallowcombs by far and will rely heavily on them in the future. I know this last chapter may leave several questions and they will all be answered in future chapters. I need to focus on schoolwork for a while and make a few key plot decisions. I may also go back and rewrite some of the earlier chapters in the meantime. Thank you again for reading and being patient with me while I'm away.]