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"Day and night cannot dwell together." ~ A Native American Proverb.

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Story Title: Of Nuts and Deadbolts. (One Piece SI)

Story Rating: Rated M.

Story Genre: Adventure Drama.

Synopsis: On the path of mighty Kings, they shook at the sight of crimson swords, a thick trail of infamy, vanity, and gore in his wake. And with this, Death, and Hell followed hand-in-hand akin to sweet lovers on their last breath. The True Pirates way. What's that, some may ask? To pillage and murder, of course. What else could it be, but a life meant for those like me, folk simply teetering on the edge of more, when there had been nothing before?

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Chapter One: South of Heaven.

The Prologue.


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Let me set the 'scene'.

Vishtr Archipelago, (The ? Blue).

There it was for few to notice its cursed splendor. In the middle of bum-fuck stood a geographical anomaly. Tucked away from all eyes, as if timid. Vishtr was a bastard of a location, a mistake to the natural world—much less of a chain, cluster, or collection of other proper visiting paths and more akin to a cruel peninsula containing metallic spires that pierced the skies, constantly darkened overhead, and giant-sized mounds of looming iron with few splotches of genuine normalcy being hidden in a swarm of copper that stretched endlessly, for as far as the human mind would dare allow one to see with their own two eyes.

An ocean of smithwork stabbed, compared only to the visage of mountains, perhaps.

The stench of musk and sulfur fills the land, overpowering the senses. Too harsh and intense for the weak-hearted to face, a salty aroma gained from the uncaring sea bleeding into the surrounding environment, some contradicting antiseptic about, bitter, and with undertones of artificial fragrances from soaps and cleaners. An unwelcomed yet sharpened bastardization of the so-called "Hospital Smell". Sterile, too distinct in quality. Hardly able to be missed.

Vishtr had been abandoned. For one purpose or another. And mother nature had long since given up, on a glance.

No real sign of departure would have been able to be discerned upon stowaways being thrown there. Silently implying she had either stopped trying decades ago or painfully withered away with whatever green seeped past the melded folds of the roaming forge with caking rust taking place soon afterward in her death throes, wailing hushed as the waves launched on the false shore of the dying landmass, its decrepit, slimy waters like hands around the neck of someone struggling as the very air left them for good.

Overall; disgusting. Downright evil by proxy of it existing instead of being a concept in the minds of those deemed "sick". It was a place to be found by the fires of more. Smelted for use of some wiser eye.

Hell on 'earth' if it didn't already stand out as a place, shadowed things circling up high in case of a sudden meal. They would pick their prey apart swiftly, regardless if dead or alive.

And much like where born, it flashed the same colors and characteristics. Vishtr was, also, cold, distant, and homesick. A walking corpse.

Something that had little say but would endure, as enduring is all it has known. Strong. Mighty in the calls of always blistering winds and scorching heat.

An untouchable force.

I would be like the Archipelago. (For better or worse.)

I would do whatever I set my heart on. And do it for myself.


Moldy water filled Jason's lungs, and he came into sudden awareness, an inhale causing him to freak-the-fuck-out. His eyes widened as he soaked in his surroundings, literally, and seeing the landmass, and little else he moved, less he stayed and drowned.

His few visible muscles ached from overuse. His clothes were tattered, and trashy. He looked like dirt, so much so, that a bum would blush out of second-hand embarrassment. Jason almost sneered.

Meanwhile, the nearly blinding sensation of hunger sat in his gut as his limbs flailed in inexperience with swimming. Narrowing his brow, the poncho-wearing youth scowled angrily in deep concentration, keeping himself awake.

Sadly, for Jason, his rest would not last.


I'm half-sure that I had died… One moment I'm walking outside to check my mailbox, and the next, pure nothing. How I had though, was shockingly unfair. Wow, whining about death? Big fucking baby, am I right?

No. Fuck you. I shouldn't have died.

It wasn't right. But clearly, I had. It left no room for debate, regardless of initial hysteria and pleading. Yes. Begging. The stages of grief and what have you. Whatever, or whoever had brought me into this place was key, though clear as day, they were either bored or just flat out didn't think I was worthy of some answers.

First? Darkness as far as the eye can see… Bills would have been preferable, honestly. It boomed in my mind like thunder following the act of lightning in the middle of harsh storms. I remembered the pain that followed, the empty, sinking sensation as Lady Death snaked her fingers over what made me, me, intent on taking it away once and for good.

Fucking sinkholes. The idea that the floor would give out of the blue, ending my life made me internally seethe in blinding rage. Well... It had before I was forced to give up on the feeling of injustice toward my circumstances.

You're probably missing context to whatever the fuck was going on. Let me restate; I had bit the big one, the end. Met my maker. Slept with the 'fishes' or in this case, 'Sea Kings'. My entrance was nothing grand either. Then, it happened: 'Plop, waaaah! Oh, geeze, its a boy!'

I grimace at it to this day, too. Turns out being born as "Jason Di. Argo" meant that you had little say because of things out of your control and remembered everything. And I do tell everything, too. From the womb, all toward where being birthed led.

Kai Cove, (The North Blue). My home island. Where I'd been born was controlled by pirates. It was overrun. Totally. Like some dollar store Hachinosu. There, one man and his goons had been in control, total say despite the fact that in common fashion with this world, which was not my own, was a dumb piece of human trash.

He'd only got that far because he was a Devil Fruit user. Only one in his ranks. They called him Cawthburn 'Carcass' Kayden. Bounty of Twenty-seven million. Not higher, though it was only because he was too lazy and content with fucking my home over, and cared not to travel. I hated it. They held power and I did not. I'd been born the equivalent of a servant, duties thrust on me when my sole parent, a single mother would later collapse through overwork and the few beatings here or there. And as you would have guessed, I ran, ran as fast as possible with my fragile little ego carrying me as far as it could.

I won't lie. Leaving them all behind made me feel… hot shame. But I wasn't going to risk myself for others. But hey, at least at the end of it, I'd set their castle ablaze in the dead of night, but still, it rang hollow. Hardly a footnote. After all, Kayden had never even been a background character in the works of Oda himself. Yes, Oda, the bastard who made this god-forsaken deathtrap people called their world.

Characters once in black and white on pages, were all born and clearly made of flesh. It had rushed in, my memories, at the tender age of eight when a news-coo basically smacked me upside my head with a newspaper. Nothing crazy or world-shattering. Just mundane stuff. At least for them. He had likely burned though. Pleasure was taken knowing those fuck-tards were gone. It soon vanished like coming down from a high.

Orphaned, and clearly lost as he had no map and was no navigator, Jason Argo found his small rowboat swept away as a whirlpool yanked him and his things underneath. The majority of his things had found a new home on the sea floor. Destroyed. His past life was little aid. Jason had been everything but that. Was he dumb for sailing? Yes. Did he regret it? Yes. But only slightly so.

Meanwhile, he had gone on.

And, sadly, Jason had lived. Only to be trapped again. The sea herself would later curse this mistake, and the world would mourn.


Yeah... This was it. I'd been stranded for over a week or more, by now.

I lashed out kicking what could only be a 'bonded' sea vessel, only to wince and hop on my other foot as pain spread up, hot and burning. I muttered to myself as an angered expression came about. "Stupid ship."

The world that was One Piece fucking sucked if your name wasn't Luffy. Joyboy himself. That shit about people holding hands, and singing for peace was a load of horseshit. Most of that was a rare thing. Mr. Liberation and Red-hair Rat were to be blunt, outliers, not the set example.

People were far too comfortable with being a pirate and doing 'pirate' things. Like setting orphanages ablaze because that one nurse that hung around was way out of your league, and you made Blackbeard look good, so much so that women practically shriveled up and died a little whenever you came around. I could still see it now.

The lieutenant of the Cawthburn Pirates drowned in denial and copium as he was brutally ignored despite being there.

I grinned a little. It was the small things that made some men happy.

But I was not 'some' man. I wanted more. I wanted to get the fuck off this island. I wanted to strike out, to scream.

I want to be more… I grit my teeth, fists clenched hard enough that my knuckles went white. "I deserve more." Greed and something else clouded my sight. "I want my independence." Freedom. The name of the game.

It was then that I decided, vocalizing to only myself, the echo of a product of metal near me—a desire, though only two men would ever chase it. The words were a vow. Clouds twisted and roiled in shock at them.

I wanted to be that … "King of the Pirates."

Someone so free, even empires bawked in their shadow, cowering at the idea of their name. A title so great, that it had let someone willing to push for it stand among the 'strongest'. I had grinned like a loon at the idea, and over time, it settled in my head. I would reach that place. No more blank stretches of metal or endless grey.

Was my situation getting the better of me? No? Maybe. Regardless. Yes. I would rush for it, and no one would be able to stop me.

Luffy, Law, and the main characters be damned… I would take all the world had to offer, and more.

After I somehow got the hell off this island of sweet nothings… But how was I going to do that? My solution. It would later come to me. However, many weeks too late for my taste.

Though, when it did, I was sure that I was starving. I would not question how something grew in forests of nails. Which meant it didn't matter at that point. Even if it tasted like used tampons, and crusty cigars, and had the consistency of curdled milk.

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The Ocean had let a petty, hungry soul live. This was a mistake.