Chapter 1

Dull.

Dull and grey, that was the weather of the UK: a permanent state of grey colouring on the sky with clouds covering the few rays of sun. Sometimes it poured down rain from above and other times only a few droplets would fall.

When it wasn't raining, it was cloudy.

Permanently cloudy.

Eternally grey.

To the eyes of many British, it was normal and they wouldn't have it any other way but, to the foreigners that were used to warmer weathers, with bright sun and clear skies, it wasn't all that appealing when compared to their hometowns. Some would grow used to the gloomy aspect of the country while others would tolerate it and carry one with their lives.

Skyler was one of those who was not used to that grey looking weather. Growing up in California, where the sun would always shine bright, her mossy green eyes were used to the colour and life that the sun gave. She had moved to the UK because of work, taking up the decision in joining an English photography company. She was pleased with her work even though she felt something was missing.

As if she was lacking something.

Or maybe it was her surroundings that were lacking something.

Everything.

Anything to make an impact and wake her up to a new wave of creativity and motivation.

And what was she doing? Trying to entertain her tired mind with multiple activities so that she didn't have to worry so much about such troubling thoughts.

It was a quarter to seven in the afternoon and Skyler was sitting on the wooden floor of the dojo where she practised Muay Thai with her teacher. Her feet were sore and tortured from being barefoot for hours.

Although calloused, she still felt them damaged and tired.

"Sky, are you staying a bit longer?" A voice called from the doorway. Her hair turned to look at the source of the sound to find her teacher with a smile on his face.

"Yeah, I'll be out in a few minutes. Don't wait for me."

"Be sure to take care of yourself and any bruises you may have."

"Besides my arms and face?" She chuckled to her own question, her fingers instinctively reaching out for her swollen lips. She had received a kick to her face causing her lips to cut open, and her cheek to swell up lightly.

"Make sure to put ice on it when you go back home." Her teacher waved at her and abandoned the doorway, leaving Skyler alone.

She inhaled deeply as she let her sore body fall back on the floor, letting her raven black hair sprawl open on the wooden surface. She quickly found herself on her feet and headed towards the boxing bag for practice.

"Tae tad" She breathed out releasing a round kick against the bag "Tae pub nok" outside kick to the imaginary knee in her vision "Sok tad" elbow horizontally slammed against the bag. She kept this up for about five minutes before closing her eyes, inhaling deeply to concentrate. Slowly, noise started to rise around her.

Voices.

Loud voices and rushing footsteps, stomping on a wooden surface that seemed hollow.

Breathing out rapidly, she finished off with a tornado kick to the boxing bag so that she could see what the source of all the noise in the dojo.

But… Her leg didn't connect with the boxing bag. Instead of the bag sensation after the kick, she felt her feet hit a familiar surface which was someone's skull. She hadn't noticed anyone walking in the dojo when she started running through moves.

Skyler was quick to get back on her feet, her green eyes falling on the person she had just kicked. She found herself looking at a tall, grey skinned man with long light grey hair that waved down his back. His outfit was rather… unique to her eyes.

Somewhat dominatrix-like.

"I-I'm sorry…" She said but her voice faded slowly as her senses took in everything around her.

The clear blue sky above her.

The smell of sea attacking her nostrils.

She could feel the warmth of the sun on her skin.

The sound of waves kissed her ears gently.

She was disorientated, twirling quickly on her feet to look around her and properly process her surroundings.

Skyler had found herself on a ship.

An enormous ship indeed: wood covered the surface on which she was walking on, a purple pattern covering as if it was panelled; the head of the ship was adorned with a bat shape, a skull sculpture turned inwards, staring at her with the empty eye sockets; black sails high above her head casted a heavy shadow over the ship, hiding away the bright sun up in the sky.

She tried to swallow all the information she was receiving but didn't have much time when she found her back slammed against the railing at the edge of the ship, her head pointing downwards to the calm ocean.

"Who are you?" A deep male voice growled at her. The man's hand was holding her neck and jaw, pulling her back as his finger tightened on her flesh. She struggled to breathe for a second, attempting to kick the man away. She tried to look up but he was holding her hard against the rail, her eyes only fixed on the horizon ahead and the ocean bellow.

"Let… me… go." She managed to gurgle out from her mouth, her throat hurting more and more. She could begin to see spots on her vision as the air supply was beginning to deplete. She could hear the sounds of people running and shouting but it seemed muffled noise to her ears. She couldn't lose conscious.

"Who are you?" He shook her heavily against the rail.

The movement gave her just a small space to breathe in heavily and gain enough momentum to kick her attacker back.

Skyler held onto the railing, pulling her body down to the ship's floor, hand on her neck as she puffed air harshly into her lungs again. Finally she was able to look at her attacker finding, much to her surprise, a very tall man with a somewhat dominatrix-like outfit, wearing fishnets on his legs; Over his head and falling down his back was a long dark brown cape, that almost touched the ground; Next to him was a trident that may have fallen from his grasp when she pushed him back.

She was quick to get back on her feet, since she knew that being on the ground left her at a very vulnerable state. The raven haired woman was quick to change to her Muay Thai fighting stance, stabilizing her torso and arms, her feet gently and very lightly jumping, almost not leaving the ground.

"Who the hell are you?" She asked, trying to keep her cool within what was possible at the time. Her mind was running at max speed, trying to process what was happening: She had been in the dojo all that time. How could she, all of the sudden, find herself in the middle of the ocean, on a ship filled with men ready for a BDSM recording? "Where am I?" She could feel herself grow hysteric, her voice raising on tone and volume.

"Let's all calm down." A somewhat harsh hand was placed on Skyler's shoulder, making her twirl on her feet and jumping sideways so that both men could be in her line of sight. The one who had touched her had a blue and white mask covering his entire face; he had long spikey-like blond hair that reached his knees; he seemed to be wearing the most normal type of attire with a black blouse with white dots and blue pants.

Around her were multiple men in a half moon shape, preventing her from escaping.

Her moss green eyes scanned the faces quickly before raising up the sails and spotting a black flag with a skull.

"Pirates…?" She mumbled, her thoughts becoming an absolute mess but she had to get away from it since the flooring all too suddenly seemed to disappear from under her feet. The guy holding the trident has slammed his weapon onto the surface, shattering the floor and making her fall to the lower level.

"Oi, Wire! Don't ruin the ship!" The blond guy shouted from above her head.

The man called Wire had managed to make quite a number on the flooring, wood and metal scattered under her. She had splinters stabbing her hands and legs along with a couple of nails that got jammed in her flesh.

Instead of pain, she could feel her muscles burning from the damage taken.

"Who are you supposed to be?" Yes another male voice reached her ears, the source being from behind her.

So many different shades red.

His eyes, his hair, his lipstick… Even his nails were painted in a dark red that could easily pass as a warm black colour.

The man before her seemed to be an embodiment of fire.

Of blood.

Violence and burning passion.

Skyler felt shivers run down her spine from the intensity of his stare.

"I…" It was the only thing she managed to mumble out whilst looking at the tall man in front of her. Wearing nothing but a black shabby vest, open, revealing his torso; a pair of seemingly old dark coloured pants, the colour unidentifiable because of the age: could've been a dark green or actually black but she couldn't tell.

His scarlet hair was messy, a few strands seemingly glued to his forehead from sweat; the dark red lipstick was faded and lightly smudged; the nail polish old and with missing spots from lack of maintenance.

"Answer me, will you?" The red haired man demanded, this time with more assertion and… aggressiveness?

"I don't know how many times people have asked me that already…" She commented, getting up to her feet, kicking off some of the rubble. The woman found herself hissing from pain because of the nail and splinters. "Sorry about the flooring." She pointed upwards, a crooked smile on her lips that was quick to fade when the man approached her, his height towering over her.

"Who the hell are you?" He was getting fired up, revealing to have a very short fuse. His hand found her jaw, his painted nails digging into her cheeks. Her neck was still sore from earlier and this only made things worse.

She found herself acting off instinct, her hands reaching his wrists, her nails digging into his flesh, using all her force to try and pull his arm away.

He didn't even budge even though he was starting to bleed.

Using the momentum of a very small jump, she kicked his side, making him stagger off the side a bit, letting her go. Without a moment's ease, she was quick to get to him, unleashing a full house kick to his head with all the strength her wounded body could deliver.

She could hear people calling out to the fallen man from above her but she paid no mind to them at the time.

"Why is everyone so keen in grabbing me by the neck or jaw!?" She almost shouted at the man before her, her body starting to shake from stress. Quickly she reached a standstill when a curved blade was right as her neck.

"You may not want to move, if you know what's good for you." It was the blond man that spoke from behind her. "Now, answer me: who are you? How did you get here? What are your intentions?" His voice was calm, collected and that gave her a sense of safety when compared to the fired up look from the red haired man that got to his feet. He was so ready to hurt her.

He was ready to kill.

She felt the fear burning her insides.

"I don't know." She mumbled under her breath.

"What was that?" The blond man's blade got closer to her neck, the cold steel touching her skin when compared to the warm his body emanated. He was so close.

Too insanely close to her.

Skyler tried to get some space between him and the blade, feeling as if she was shrinking before those men.

Such auras…

Such powerful presences…

"I don't know how I got here…" She spoke clearer now, sensing the blond man nodding in acknowledgement to her answer. Meanwhile the red haired man stormed to her and, with a clenched fist, struck her stomach. Her reflex was to try and curl into a ball because of the pain but she didn't manage much since she still had a blade to her throat. Skyler could taste the metallic flavour of blood in her mouth despite the lack of it in such area. Maybe it was the ever growing fear in her gut that was making her hallucinate such taste. "Is this how you greet new people?" She attempted to sound confident in her words, knowing full well that showing fear would only feed those two men.

"You're the one that started fighting my men, little girl." The blond one spoke out, all too close to her ear.

"Hey Killer, why are you still talking to her? She doesn't know anything so she's useless." The red haired man nearly shouted, his raspy and furious voice reverberating in her skull.

"Memory problems, perhaps." The blond man known as killer shrugged, his blade rubbing against her neck.

"That's just a hassle. Kill her or throw her overboard. I don't feel like going through such trouble. I'm busy at the moment." The other man waved his hand in the air, sending Killer away. "I'll take care of all the damage you did to the ship." He looked over his shoulder at Skyler when saying the word "you". She didn't see hatred towards her but just plain annoyance and lack of interest.

The raven haired woman felt the lump in her throat getting worse as fear seemed to try and suffocate her before the untimely death the blond guy was going to give her.

"I'll fight!" She shouted out, catching Killer and the red haired man off guard, both jumping lightly in their places.

"What was that?" The blond man tightened his grip around her arm, pulling her closer to the blade still at her neck.

"I'll fight your best martial artist to stay in the ship." Blood was rushing to her ears, heating them, her brain throwing curse words at her for saying such an idiotic thing. What on earth she was planning on doing… Skyler had no clue. "Once you reach shore and there's civilization on land, I'll leave you be and you'll never hear of me."

"Hey, captain, you heard this, right?" Killer's voice was serious but verging on comical amusement.

The man that was called captain finally turned to her, a sadistic gleam in his copper eyes and an entertained smile on his painted lips.

"Alright. You'll be fighting me, then."

A/N:

Surprise! I'm kind of back? I can't promise I'll update this weekly since I'm still in college. Can write between breaks and come back to this. I'll eventually have to rewrite my other fics, and get them corrected and altered lightly.

Oh well…

I present to thee! Skyler! A new OC. I enjoy adding my characters to the universe I'm writing the fanfiction about instead of writing about recurring ships in the franchise _ It's fun

As per usual: I do not own One Piece or any characters in its universe. It belongs to Eiichiro Oda, magical man. I only own Skyler.