Author's note: please note that what the characters believe to be true and what may be objectively true, are not necessarily the same thing. That being said, please enjoy.

– Bellamy –

Things could be worse. They could always be worse.

"Stupid World Government and stupid Spandam, sending me to this icy, frozen corner of nowhere. It's a waste of my talents!"

"Yoyoi! It's how…how we can apooologize for our failure…at Enies Lobbie. If we cannot redeeeeem ourselves here, I shall commit hara-kiri as penance!"

In this world, there always seem to be bigger fish around the corner, so I could count my lucky stars that nobody like an Admiral had shown up. I can't imagine someone advocating unpredictable justice like Kizaru not holding a grudge. Or even if we don't go quite that far, the squad's heavy hitters could have been here too instead of being who knows where.

"But if we're all to blame for the fiasco at Enies Lobbie, why aren't Lucci and Kaku here? Better yet, why am I lumped together with you idiots?"

"Perhaps it's because someone got on the chief's bad side."

"Why are you looking at me, Blueno? I didn't do anything!"

"You insulted his son while we were out drinking after our last mission."

Like I said, things could always be worse. That being said, it didn't mean things were looking all nice and rosy. One Rear Admiral and six master assassins with an axe to grind against my companion did not make for goods odds. Especially when I was handicapped by having to protect a non-combatant.

"How would he know? We killed everyone in that bar!" Jabra exclaimed.

"Chapapa, I blabbed to Spandine that Jabra called Spandam a whimsical pansy with a daddy complex, chapapa!"

"Fukurou! One of these days I'm going to sew your mouth shut if you can't keep it zipped up!"

"That's sexual harassment!"

"I'm not even talking to you, Kalifa!"

"We should focus. It would not do for us to let our target slip through our fingers twice." Blueno interjected.

"Yoyoi! The sha-ame of our previous failure is so great I will must hara-kiri! Hara-kiri! Tekkai!"

"Yes, we do have a score to settle with the Straw Hats..how fortuitous that one of them dropped into our lap like this." Kalifa commented, leaning her face against one of her hands, completely ignoring Jabra and Kumadori's comedy routine.

"How regrettable…I can't die!"

"Just die already!"

The smart move would have been to cause a distraction and escape in order to group up with the reinforcements which were surely coming soon. There really wasn't a need to engage in an unfavorable battle against a numerically superior foe. And while I hadn't exactly fled from a fight before – unless one counted me not staying to engage in fisticuffs with Akainu – I was at my core a physicist, that is a being of logic and reason. So, imagine my surprise when I found myself becoming excited instead, my blood singing in anticipation of battle like never before. My whole being screaming one undeniable truth. I wanted to fight. But when Robin stepped forward, I temporarily suppressed that urge, difficult though it may have been.

"I see you survived the Buster Call." Robin commented, her face betraying no emotion, outwardly unfazed by the confrontation with her old persecutors. But the small enigmatic smile at the edges of her mouth was gone, her gaze unerringly fixed upon her foes, even as she pulled Aisa protectively behind her back.

"You and your band of idiots did too." Jabra scoffed, subsequently spitting onto the icy ground. "Of course, I would make it out with no problems."

"Jabra was crying for his mommy when Blueno saved him, chapapa!" Fukurou piped up helpfully before zipping his mouth back up. Pre-battle banter was helpful sometimes, people letting things slip that they never would under normal circumstances. And Fukurou was notorious for being the biggest blabbermouth on the planet. The potential intel was worth waiting a few minutes.

"If you guys are the former members of the CP9 who kidnapped Robin, I thought you'd all been cut loose after the events at Enies Lobbie." I said, joining the conversation. "So, what brings a group of former government agents to a place like this?"

"…"

"Not going to tell me?"

"…I suppose it won't matter. You're right that Spandam blamed us for his failures and placed bounties on our heads, but that's all in the past. We cut a deal with Spandine." Jabra answered me, the others deferring to his lead. "He uses his influence to reinstate us, and we don't kill his son while he sleeps for betraying us."

"Excuse me, but I'm having a difficult time believing that someone like Spandine would fold to such a threat."

"Eh, we also had to do some missions to prove our loyalty or some shit but it's not like it's something we hadn't been doing before anyway." Jabra shrugged indifferently. "Which is also why I'm here freezing my butt off."

"That's sexual harassment."

"Like hell it is! It's my butt!"

"That's sexual harassment."

"Raargh!" With Jabra too busy screaming in frustration to answer, I turned to Blueno instead, who met my stare with a disinterested one of his own.

"What does Spandine want? Or better yet, who does he want?" Were they after Robin or the revolutionary? Or did they read my movements like the celestial dragons had on Argent Isle?

"There was a report that a dangerous criminal had been found by the garrison. We were sent to retrieve the target. Nico Robin, by the authority of the Five Elder Stars, you are under arrest."

"I refuse." Robin replied, crossing her arms before her.

"You think you have a choice? You will come with us like you did on Water Seven or we will make you." Blueno threatened, his voice as monotone as ever. Jabra on the other hand was far less reserved. "Your crew is gone and cannot help you. You cannot fight us on your own. Like you have always been, you are alone."

"Sorry to burst your bubble, but Robin ain't alone." I interject, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. Truthfully, I probably didn't even need to interfere. Like the rest of her crew, Robin had grown emotionally during her tenure as a Straw Hat pirate and such a blatant attempt at emotional manipulation wouldn't faze her. Not after Enies Lobbie. Then again, just because it wouldn't be very damaging didn't mean that it wasn't unpleasant and knowing that someone was supporting you went a long way to negate any potential hurt. Plus, the free brownie points. "If you want her, you're going to have to go through me."

"We have no quarrel with you today, Springtrap. Hand over Nico Robin and you can go. Surely you don't want the death of a child on your conscience." Blueno demanded, his eyes briefly glancing at Aisa's head which was poking out from behind Robin. "We'll even allow you to keep the old man behind you."

"Yeah, not happening buddy. I don't abandon my friends." I told him, causing him to slightly frown, both of us slipping into our respective combat stances.

While he and I had a little standoff, the other members of the CP9 had not remained idle, slowly fanning out to encircle our little party. For, despite all their eccentricities, despite their tomfoolery, they were, when it came down to it, immaculate professionals. Individuals who would go to any lengths necessary to complete their mission. Ganging up on someone was the least of what they were willing to do.

"You will die." He promised me.

"You will try."

"Rankyaku!" "Rankyaku!" "Rankyuaku!" "Rankyuaku!" "Rankyuaku!"

Almost immediately, I pulled my compatriots closer to me, activating my coil chassis in the process and shapeshifting into a giant coiled spring, to shield them from the barrage with my body. Air blades which could sever steel and cut castles in half, screeched against the metal plate before being deflected away through a series of buildings. By then the first finger bullets were trying to burrow their way into my body.

"Goro goro no shock!" Lightning crackles as electric streams dance about my surface, rushing from within me to without, catching two agents by surprise and forcing the others to disengage in a hurry lest they be caught in the trap as well. But where most men would have frozen up, their body's nerves rejecting all central command, Jabra & Fukurou forced their muscles to move, successfully retreating, singed but not burned, joining their comrades from whence they settled for glaring at us.

First blood had gone to us.

"Aisa, charge me up!" Well, if they were not going to come to me, I'll just have to go to them, won't I? Let's get…flashy! "Spring Shave! Death Knock!"

"TEKKAI!" three voices shouted in unison, the agents working together to absorb and distribute the impact amongst themselves, while the other two counterattacked. True to form Blueno opened a door beneath my feet to manually hold me in place while Kalifa began soaping up, a threat I could not ignore. Personally speaking, out of all of them, she was the one representing the greatest threat to myself. But I wasn't alone, something Aisa decided to demonstrate.

"Lightning Punch!"

And as our attention was captured by the sight of Kalifa being sent hurtling by a tiny crackling black fist, none of them noticed the flower petals until it was too late.

"Seis Fleur: Clutch!"

– Sarquiss –

When Sarquiss and the others burst into town, they found themselves surrounded by pure chaos. The prisoners were accidentally going out of control, the guards adding to the confusion by bellowing out conflicting orders and shooting the "rioters" who did not follow their instructions, which just made matters worse. The revolutionaries didn't waste moment, leaping into the midst of the pandemonium, doing their best to calm both sides down though the individual methods varied from soothing words muttered into someone's ear to brutal beatdowns.

Sarquiss didn't care about any of that, his sole concern being the safety of his friends. Where were Bellamy and Aisa?

Thankfully, they didn't have to search for long, Aisa's El Thor acting as a clear beacon, visible for miles. Additionally, once they got a bit closer, their ears started to pick up the sounds of heavy fighting, the clash of steel, the crack of numerous rifles and the screams of injured men.

Skidding to a stop in what had once been a building, it doesn't take Sarquiss' eyes long to dart all over the place, registering all points of interest in an instant. Aisa's lightning storm fighting a battle of attrition against a giant green blob and a bubble monster spewing out wave after wave of soapy suds. Hundreds of guards lying in potholes, thrown through walls, hung out like dirty laundry across broken roofs, many with visibly dislocated spines.

Hollering for hell or high water a bit further down the road, a disheveled kabuki actor is engaged in a tug-of-war with a small army of dainty arms, struggling to free his hair while simultaneously warding off a set of hands continuously slapping him across the face before disappearing in a burst of flower petals, briefly obscuring the familiar figure of one Nico Robin. For her part, the archaeologist looks like she's been through the wringer, her prison robes in tatters to reveal a mass of livid bruises, but her face is locked in a look of determination as she shields two civilians, an old man and a child behind her back.

And last but not least is his captain in his full coil chassis, engaged in a fight against a rotund sphere, a wolf and someone doing a bad imitation of a minotaur. Like a pack of hyenas circling a metal lion, the agents are refusing to properly engage Bellamy, using soru to run away whenever one of his captain's punches get too close, while the others harass his captain from the back. It doesn't take a genius to recognize that they are playing for time, betting on their comrades winning their respective fights before they lose theirs. And they are losing, just very slowly, Bellamy's hands edging ever closer.

Then all of a sudden, the carefully maintained balance shatters when a young revolutionary catches sight of his formerly imprisoned commander. His subsequent loud promise to bring the elderly man to safety has every combatant take notice of their presence, who all react with varying amounts of surprise, though some recover faster than others. The ball is grabbed by Bellamy and suplexed into the ox, the elder man turns rapidly to order the young revolutionary to stay away, slightly bumping into Robin in the process. A single arm bursts out of existence, releasing a handful of black hairs, hairs which then plunge forward to try and impale Robin through the heart.

When they impale Bellamy instead, Sarquiss' world grinds to a sudden halt.

– Nero –

"You absolute fuckers!" It's as if Lily's scream of rage is the catalyst.

The Bellamy pirates scramble forward screaming battle cries, as if they're racing to be the first one to bash someone's head in. The enemy fails to react in time, frozen in surprise at the sheer recklessness of their charge, and are initially overrun by the pirates who did not care who they were hitting as long as it was a marine equivalent.

Starting with Lily splattering Rear Admiral Bonbon's saccharine body across the street with a wile haymaker and followed by Sarquiss repeatedly stabbing the largest patch of syrup like a man possessed, the rest of the pirates split the government agents up, forming little groups all over the newly flattened town square.

Nero wasn't exempted from the sudden berserker's rage that had overtaken his crew. If anything, it had hit him with a double dose, past memories rising unbidden to the forefront, most vivid the ones of his final moments on the sea train. The terror of certain death, the sneers of his so-called comrades, the disdain dripping from Lucci's lips as he proclaimed Nero to be worthless. That his entire life, all the blood, sweat and tears from his fifth birthday until then had amounted to nothing, that his desire to be counted amongst their number was but a pipe dream.

Not a day had gone by when Nero hadn't dreamt of revenge, drafting long speeches he would give to those who had discarded him, when he found them again. But now that he had one of the accursed members in front of him, all of his carefully crafted plans went flying out the window, leaving only a single thought behind. Revenge.

Revenge for the betrayal and for the man who gave Nero a second home, his softly smiling head cradled in Nico Robin's lap while Aisa stood vigil over his body. There isn't that much blood, from what Nero can see, but surely that was hidden beneath his captain's broad back.

Jabra grunts as Nero's leg slams into his guard, not having gotten his tekkai up in time, but by the third blow, Nero feels like he is kicking steel. But did it matter if his opponent's body had hardened to this degree? No. If Eddy could cut steel, Nero could too.

"Rankyaku!"

"Hey, aren't you the little pipsqueak who used to follow me around like a little duckling?" Jabra asks in apparent surprise, using kami-e to dodge the lone wind blade. "What are you doing playing pirates?"

"Fuck you! Geppou!" Nero growls back, his whiskers trembling in indignation. "And I'm not playing pirates! I am one! Rankyaku Storm!"

Individually, the individual flying attacks are weak, amounting to little more than pinpricks against the tekkai of someone like Jabra, but like they say, quantity has a quality all of its own. If ten aren't enough then a hundred, if a hundred aren't enough then a thousand…Nero fills the space between him and his prey with miniscule blades, making sure to cut off all avenues of escape until Jabra abandons dodging altogether, choosing instead to hunker down and take it on his hard outer shell.

"H-hey! Isn't this a bit too much?"

Too much? Far from it. This was not nearly enough to repay the pain and humiliation Nero had suffered at their hands. Back then and today.

"Geppou Rebound Stomp!" While Nero had spent much of his time teaching the Crew the rokushiki, it didn't mean that it had been a completely one-sided affair. Sparring against them and training alongside them had sharpened Nero's skills, and his frequent discussions with the c-captain had helped Nero gain plenty of inspiration to expand his repertoire. Like the concept of 3d combat embodied in Bellamy's Spring Hopper. "This is for the captain!"

Nero can feel a body give way beneath his boots, as he uses the visual screen provided by his storm of wind blades, to slam both boots heels-first into Jabra's abdomen, driving all the air out of him with a loud "Oof!"

"I'm not finished yet!" This still wasn't nearly enough. There was more that Nero had gained from Bellamy and the others, so many things which he would now use to exact vengeance. "IMPACT!"

The large wolf-man bounces on the ground a few times before rolling to a stop against a nearby fallen piece of wall, chin resting against his chest, almost as if he's inviting Nero to come finish him off. Nero doesn't, recognizing the obvious trap for what it is, and soon enough the agent wakes up.

"Ok, you're no longer a duckling, I'll give you that." Jabra pants, unsteadily pulling himself up. "You're a little weasel."

"I'm more than that, Jabra. I'm Nero, the rokushiki instructor of the Bellamy Pirates." Nero declares. "And I'll be the last thing you'll see before you die!"

Kicking off the ground hard enough to leave a crater, Nero closes the gap between them in the blink of an eye, leg drawn back to let loose the most powerful rankyaku of his entire life.

Jabra's grip stops him cold, claws clamping down around his leg like a vice and trapping Nero in place. A small part of Nero's mind notes that Jabra doesn't look nearly as exhausted or beat up as he did just moments ago, while the much larger part screams at Nero to move.

"Rokushiki instructor, eh?" A wide smirk spreads across the Jabra's canine face, threatening to split it apart. "A pipsqueak like you?"

"Let go! Shigan! Shigan! Shigan!" But no matter how hard Nero struggles, Jabra's grip doesn't loosen in the slightest, the wolf's grip unbreakable.

"That's not how you use the rokushiki, you pipsqueak!" Nero's sole standing leg is swept out from under him, Jabra's free hand slamming Nero's head into the unforgiving concrete bridge hard enough, that fireworks go off behind his eyes. Dazed, Nero almost doesn't feel his leg being released. What he does feel however are two fists being placed almost gently against his abdomen. "This is how you use the rokushiki, boy! ROKUOGAN!"

Author's note:
So the fight begins. The majority of the CP9 (Jabra, Blueno, Kumadori, Fukurou, Kalifa) plus Rear Admiral Bonbon (OC) vs the Bellamy pirates.
And if you couldn't tell from Jabra's rokuogan, they have all gotten significantly stronger since their defeat against the Straw Hats.
That and the fact that they were working really well together is why Bellamy didn't breeze through them.

Also, I'd like to reiterate that the characters are not completely rational beings and what they think they saw, may not be the objective truth.

As always, do please leave a like and a comment (and more importantly any and all criticism if you happen to have any). It really helps a lot.

See you on the next one.