Cнαρтєя σηє
"Gah!" I gasped and sat up. Fun fact, that's also when the pain shot through my body.
It huuuuurts!
It felt like being thrown into a blender only to be defenestrated onto burning hot spikes and left there to bleed. Or maybe like I fell off of a 4 story high building… ehem… in other words: I felt like crap.
The pain did not subside with time as I hoped; instead I just got a throbbing headache from the brightness of the sun- wait what. How the hell did I turn up outside? I thought I died? Is this hell?
As my brain was catching up extremely slowly; my eyes opened completely from their half lidded state and took in the surroundings.
There's water in front of me, barely touching my feet, sand was below me and somehow in my clothes; which was very itchy and kinda really hurt, I'm pretty sure it's in my butt crack too… When I turned my head to look behind me, there were many, many trees making up a forest.
Speaking of clothes, when I looked down at myself, I was still wearing a purple and white sweater, the bottom and sleeves being purple and the top of the sleeves and top half being white, cat themed. My shorts were brown, my cat socks purple and my red shoes that look like I've had them for many, many years- still got them!
That's when my brain caught up to my eyes and I contemplated my surroundings. My eyes bulged and I spat out the food and water I never had but desperately needed. I froze. Unfortunately, my vocal cords did not. "WHEN DID I GET SO SMALL!" Could be heard throughout the beach and some birds could be seen flying off branches.
Though that did vocalize my shock of finding myself in the middle of nowhere and my body being very short; making my clothes baggy, it made my head throb more and the pain of my headache increased.
"Whyyyyyy! Argh! Bad idea. Bad idea. That was sooo stupid."
I whined and clenched my head in pain; rolling around like I was burning and I might as well be because after a while of rolling and clutching my head, I realized another painful and discomforting sensation.
"And whyyyy does it buuuurrrrrrn…!" I sighed out in exasperation as I stopped rolling to sit straight and look up at the sky. "..Can I just… stay here… forever… Or maybe in the shade.. Then the pain will be soothed and I maybe, just maybe- could think." I mumble to myself.
My head snapped back straight into place because of my sudden realization.
Where. Is. My. Lighter.
I started panicking. Probably not the smartest thing to do in retrospect… but in my defense, that lighter means everything to me. I would go farther than murder- or in this case, suicide- to save that thing.
Instead of laying back down- like my body would very much want- my stood up. I could almost hear my bones crack; the pain was excruciating, whatever, not the time. I have a leather lighter case to look for.
I continued to look down into the sand and at the water. My breathing quickened and teeth were gritted; my heart was racing and my movements became more frantic every second.
That was until I noticed familiar brown leather poking out from the sand. I quickly fell to my knees and started digging.
My panic was quickly cut short and relief hit me straight after; it was there. It was there in its weird-card-shape-and-brown-leather glory
let out a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness it's here with me." I mumbled to no one in particular before closing my eyes and holding it up to my chest.
"Guess I should go then." I have a hunch I'm starting to get a habit of barely audibly talking to myself. Great.
I stuffed the lighter, my current most expensive item in my pocket.
Was that paper? Or a three month old receipt from that one convenient store I forgot to throw out? Nope! Priorities! I'll find out later! I ignored that random sheet of paper in my pocket, stood and turned to walk towards the undergrowth, I took note of the size of the trees; massive and untouched. Most likely because of lack of human interference with their growth.
I sat on a rock, barely in light but still able to see the ocean.
Ok… so…
I fell off a roof. I wake up in the middle of nowhere in quite a bit of pain… There's no way that's it. So I have to be missing something… Wait- where am I? Are there any people or villages around me? The trees say no but there's no way this… island? is uninhabited- right?
-0-0-
"Why did I decide to do that- oh yeah- because 'curiosity killed the cat.' But satisfaction did not bring it back- not this time at least." A few days ago, after resting a bit, I decided it was a good idea to explore and see if there were people where I was- there were not- and if I was really on an island- I was.
The island I was on was more or less covered in trees and undergrowth, it was surrounded by sand and the only inhabitants were all animals that are prey and not predators (thankfully) like rabbits, deer, birds etc. or the occasional crab or starfish at the shore. The only thing that was even slightly different was the one side of the island that had wood scraps that washed up there; could be useful to leave.
It was really boring. Which I was slightly too grateful for because I needed sleep and better food than berries and half eaten vegetables.
So as much as I really liked my days on this island, I was still stranded, hungry, sleep deprived and very confused because of various reasons; Just because I'm stuck doesn't mean I have to stay stuck. Plus I need to find out where I am and why I'm small-... -er than usual..
Currently I'm laying down back at the beach and staring up at the sky; which was now clouded over and starting to become multiple shades of blue, peach, yellow, orange etc. much to my satisfaction; the burning sensation turned out to be a sunburn from laying in the sun too long… weird.
I'm an extremely patient human being. I reassured myself But there's no way I'm staying here and I'm not going to sit around and wait for someone to pass… unless someone just happens to come here.. I supplied hastily to myself again.
Nope! I keep getting lost in thought. I shook my head and abruptly stood to my feet, marching into the forest once again.
"I need to find out how to get out of this dreaded place!" I yelled out with no small amount of conviction.
Some time later, I was contemplating building a raft. Stupid. But fun. That idea was scrapped quickly 'cause of lack of tools.
"Hmmm." I pondered.
"Hmmmm." I continued in a higher pitch. "Hmmmmmm." slightly longer this time. "Hmmm-" I stopped paying attention to my surroundings after the first 'hmm' 10-20 minutes ago and now it's come back to bite me.
In the form of a vine. Right above my foot. Next to ankle deep drinking water. Covering a rock. Or two.
"AHHHH! TU PETIT PUTAIN PIÈCE DE MERDE!" Yeah that's right. Not so creative cursing aside, I know french. Are you happy now Mrs. Annoying-grade-6-teacher. Wait- hold on- I actually liked her- ahem… going off topic… Whoops.
I acted very appropriately and promptly started flailing up and down, right and left; running around like a headless chicken. Which I might as well be in this situation because I am really sprinting. From pain obviously. Definitely NOT because of that teeny tiny little spider now placed on my forearm. Terrifying little creatures that will crawl into your ears and mouth and nose.
"That's it! I'm building that stupid raft with my bare cut up hands! Or else I might as well say 'fuck it' and swim!" I yelled out once I got out of the water, the rocks out of my scared hands, and that *insert shudder here* spider.
Those cuts might get infected. Oops. Bacteria...Ew.
Presently, I'm walking to the trash filled side of the island with no tools so I gotta do it from scratch. Unless I just find a wooden board and actually go with my words and swim to the nearest land but.. I shuddered again. Who knows what's in the water.
Flashback
I was walking around. I remembered I was in desperate need of food and water and because I had absolutely no experience cooking wild animals from scratch or what plants are edible, I decided any and all edible food would probably need to be saved, much to my disgruntlement.
But when I went to the beach to try drinking the water (no matter how muddy it may be) I remembered I couldn't. Bad idea anyway, it's salt water. So I can't drink it because… I don't even know why, I just know I can't drink it(dehydration maybe?),and it would be a terrible idea to swim in because of what lives in the water.
So raft it is, and if I die, I die trying.
Flashback ends
Turns out, the trash was perfect for building with, even if a bit soggy or covered in moss or mold.
I explored the trash; picking up any useful scraps. That was until I realized how dark it actually was outside.
"Crap. If it gets any darker out I won't be able to see without wasting gas," the sun was barely peeking over the horizon.
I don't really know where I'm going but I haven't eaten since breakfast. But I don't even know if it counts as breakfast, just a couple berries, and I am hungry.
Instead I walked a couple routes I didn't earlier and ate a couple more of the same berries instead. I'm only half sure they weren't poisonous… but you do what you gotta do to survive- and I'm not dead yet so it's pretty justified.
Rather than making a bed with leaves like I have been doing, I fell backwards onto some plants that didn't seem like they wanted to stab me- and fell 'asleep' right there and then. Nothing there to disturb me.
-0-0-
The following few days, I have been building a raft. It isn't very big and would most definitely fall apart within the week of sailing, but I really need to get off this island. I'm about as healthy as a a tree on fire, alive but ready to die.
As I walked out do the edge of the beach, my makeshift raft dragging along behind me and my hands hurting with slivers and feet hurting from standing so long barefoot, I want nothing more then to let the fire burning the tree get me instead.
Now, I'm usually a lot more optimistic, but let's be real, I'm not going to live long on this pile of wood. I'm not even sure it floats!
I was nearing the water, my feet touching it, the coolness was soothing. My pockets full of berries and poisonous plants being squished and juices leaking through the fabric. I payed it no mind however because I ran to the back end of the raft and pushed making it go fully into the water.
It is gonna be a little lonely from now till I find people. Might as well take a nap when I'm out.
So I did, I pushed the raft till it was knee deep, grabbed the shoes and socks hanging from my shoulder put them on the raft with my lighter safely tucked into one of my boots and jumped on.
When the hell did storm clouds start rolling in?! It was clear a second ago I swear?!
It started raining. Fuck. Well... Now what? I'm soaking wet. Hungry. Bored. And worst of all! The island isn't even out of sight yet! What kind of messed up logic is this!? Why is the weather so fucked up! Then it stopped raining. What the hell!
There wasn't even a cloud in sight. All the irritation kinda got to me after awhile... So I took that nap... Yeah. Coulda died. But I didn't. Yay.
Then after that I got bored. Again. Hurray. So I decided to go through my smashed-berries-filled pocket for entertainment. I ate all the mostly not smooshed berries and the definitely-not-poisonous plants before finally reaching that one piece of paper. So I decided to see what it was.
The island was finally out of sight, not even a speck in the horizon and that paper- oh yeah that paper.. Fuck.
According to the paper in my hand that was covered in berry juice and nearly illegible, wait- lemme quote this. Ehem,
"You are in One Piece. You are currently about 10 years old. Only six Years before canon. Make sure to stay put on that island. I made sure it's not dangerous so your cute little child body doesn't die by the time the merchants I sent to that island get there and you can stow away on their ship. Live, die, doesn't really matter to me. I just want entertainment and you happened to be the only one falling from a tall hight at the moment. Don't mess it up. Or do. Have fun! *cue manic giggling*"
I stare down blankly at the paper. I don't even care that what half of that said and paid half attention to actually reading it because only three things stood out. "In One Piece, 10 year's old, merchants I sent to that island" seriously though. WHERE THE HELL ARE THOSE MERCHANTS! I'm actually gonna die.
I grabbed my stained lighter, flipped it open, lit the switch, put said lighter under the paper, and watched as it shriveled up into a pile of ash.
That paper deserves it. Who even writes actions on paper! Every book writer ever? Yeah. They even spelled height wrong! Why!
I think I'm going insane.
-0-0-
It was early the morning the following day, there was a ship coloured mainly in turquoise with some blue and black around it, there was a wooden brown deck and masts. The sails were white with the words MARINE pasted in magenta in the middle and a cannon in place of a figure head at the front.
It sailed right next to the raft, one of the guys on watch who actually did his job had spotted it and decided to tell the helmsman.
Turns out, there was a child on the ship. So they ended up having to tell the vice admiral meaning they had to wake her up, then tell a bunch of the lighter guys to hop onto the raft so it wouldn't break under pressure, then they had to wake up the more heavy lifters to help get the child, but that proved to be unnecessary because the guy that spotted the raft could do it.
So everyone was awake, tired, half asleep or cold because of being on the raft.
It was not a fun morning.
-0-0-
I awoke from my deep slumber. Heh. I love dramatics. However, if you were to ask me, I would tell you it wasn't long enough and hardly counted as some good, well needed, beauty sleep.
I was expecting-... actually… I don't even know what I was expecting, but it definitely was not a comfortable bed, with soft pillows. It was almost as shocking as waking up on a random island. Except, this time, I was in a different pain, and compared to how I felt days earlier, I feel great!
Other than the bandages on my tiny smooth hands from scrapes and band-aids littering my beautiful body from spots I managed to cut while hiking for food and dragging that raft, I am unharmed and perfectly calm definitely.. Haha..
But… I. am. not. on. a. raft. HOW THE HELL DID I END UP ON A BOAT!
Figuring out that I was on a boat was easy. There was swaying, wood all around me, looked like an infirmary, and the porthole a few feet away, showing the ocean.
While I was having an internal battle with myself, a nurse came in.
The young apprentice nurse quickly walked over to me, about to check me over and look at my injuries, but I was already awake. I didn't notice the nurse though, my soft pillows were too soft.
"Eep! You're awake! Let me go get vice admiral Tsuru! Are you up for talking? Are you going to be a marine? A pirate? Civilian? How were you on that island? Wait- VICE ADMIRAL!" She dashed out of the infirmary; thoughts going about 300 wpm, leaving me alone to ponder about her rambling which I only half understood.
Vice admiral Tsura? What. Vice admiral? Huh? Pirate? Marine? How? Is this a joke?
It wasn't. Proven by the fact a certain not-so-old vice admiral walked in soon after. Her navy blue hair was only barely peeking through gray but her pink shirt and tie contrasted against it along with her white marine coat hanging from her shoulders.
How the hell- my thoughts were incomplete as the woman in the room started talking. "Hello."
"Hi.." I sat up, deciding talking while laying down is very rude but using my hands to support me which earned a wince and annoying pain.
"Don't try moving." she told me. "How did you get on that island?"
So straight forward… Wow.
"Isn't it polite to give your name first before asking questions to someone you just met? Haha.." I gave my best sheepish laugh and awkward grin, these situations are not my forté.
"Right. I'm Vice Admiral Tsuru of the marines. You can call me Tsuru-san if you'd like. How about you? What's your name?"
Oh crap. Oh crap. Real name. Fake name. Sibling name. Yes, sibling name at least until I figure out what's going on. Even if this is one of the better marines.
Which sibling. Francis or Forneus… No. Too similar to mine. Remi it is then.
"Re-" no wait- last name first. "Remi. Jaromir Remi."
"hmm.. I would almost say you're lying because of how long it took you to answer me. Why's that?"
"Your rank is kinda intimidating Tsuru-san. My apologies."
"You're very polite Remi-chan. Now. Back to my question, how did you end up on that island?"
"Oh- I don't know… I kinda just woke up on the beach.." My expression became carefully somber.
"I see… Do you have any living relatives you could go to?"
"Two older sisters and an older brother; triplets. But they're all scattered across the world." technically the truth. Just not this world.
"Alright. Do you have anywhere to go?"
"No ma'am."
"An orphanage? You are obviously young enough to go."
"I don't think that'll be a good idea.."
"Hmm… A marine? You seem smart, we could use more young ones with brain and spirit."
A marine… Nah. I wanna be cooler if I'mma be in this world. And too many marines die for my liking.
"I'll think about your offer. I have plenty of time. Oh! Where are we going and when are we arriving?"
"We are headed to marineford, and will get there in…" she checked a watch on her wrist. "about two hours or so. You've been asleep for a while and we've hit good weather."
"Thank you Tsuru-san, is that it?"
"Yes. I'll leave you to think about my offer. If you have questions, I'd be happy to answer."
"Alright, thanks again."
Once the woman left, I began to ponder. I'm actually in One Piece… How.. Never mind. It doesn't matter now. There are bigger questions that need to be answered, like, what now? Marine? Pirate? Sailor?
Who's one person connected to the marines whose reputation needs to be ruined.
Sakazuki, no. I don't wanna die like that. Who else… I mean- there's Spanda bear… Oh! Spandam! Yes! He shouldn't be leader of CP-9 yet though because I'm a few Years before canon so according to many One Piece websites and curiosity, CP-5 is where he'll be.
Investigation and espionage means I can legally go and infiltrate places and they'll vouch for me and assassination means learning to fight, I WON'T DIE! WOOO!
Now… How do I ruin his reputation if it isn't already…
I can get creative. Hehehehehe. I started laughing maniacally. "YOU'LL BE RUINED SPANDA BEAR!"
From the other side of the door, the apprentice nurse sweat dropped before promptly turning on her heels and deciding not to deal with that.
-0-0-
The end was kinda rushed… buuuuuut I've been working on this for days, trying to decide whether or not to do do 3rd POV or 1st POV and got too lazy to add more details because of rewriting, I kinda just wanted to get it done and technical issues happened making me kinda frustrated. Sorry.
I apologize if you don't like the change of perspective but I did say it might be switched. Just read "he" whenever "I" comes up and it'll be fine, I did keep switching It back and forth anyway. It might be switched again depending on how future chapters go.
I wish I could make this author's note short and sweet but it might take a few chapters to start doing that.
If I go out and change parts to make it more out of my writing style, it's either me experimenting or me trying to make it closer to how it is in the anime, it'll probably be obvious too...
Again, I'll edit it later. When I get time and am inevitably bored.
I do a lot of research before writing something and manage to stumble upon facts and more facts and more facts but still correct me please.
Thanks for reading.