Chapter 12: Mask removal
"Thanks buddy. Here, buy yourself some fish or whatever it is you guys eat." Daz said while handing over a little more than necessary to the delivery seagull, who cawed in thanks and handed over the newspaper to him.
After watching the bird with the delivery hat, and a drink fasted to his chest, take of into the sky, Daz walked over towards the table where the munchkin was munching away at a stack of carrots they had procured as a snack from the kitchen downstairs.
Even though she was her usual cheerful and discovery enthusiastic small self, Daz was still able to pick up on the miniscule amount of melancholy she held within her. But, after seeing him do what he had done so casually to another human being, he wasn't all that surprised and would give her time and space as much as she needed.
Their talk had gone as expected after the short skirmish, with most of what Daz was trying to explain to her going way over her head and in the end he had had to be satisfied by telling her that sometimes you simply needed to do stuff that you otherwise wouldn't, which didn't mean Daz didn't want to kill the little shit Lucci. No. He was fucked the moment Daz got his hands on the man, but to the munchkin something like that was unthinkable, so he had done what he could to make her understand the simple version and not his fucked up inner feelings.
Obviously, she had understood his simpler explanation somewhat, after Daz had given her a metaphor of some kind, but she still wasn't happy with what he had done, and had told him so also.
All he had done was shrug his shoulders in reply, which had concluded that little episode of their daily talks.
Still, not much had changed in the way the two acted with each other. The munchkin had slowly come to terms with the whole thing and Daz had, in his usual manner, simply shoved the whole thing to the back of his mind so his subconsciousness would deal with the mental backlash.
Now, two days later, the makeshift crew of social outcasts would soon reach water 7, and unexpectedly the whole group of former slaves was excited beyond believe.
Daz, after watching the group of misfits for a while, leaned back in his chair and opened up the monthly newspaper.
Why monthly you may ask? Well, the Grandline is big as fuck, and besides transponder snails being the only medium of fast paced communication, all messages had to be delivered by hand.
This, of course, made the job of the Newsco. all the harder, especially since they had to have agents stationed in literally every part of the Grandline, so they could get information whenever shit was hitting the fan.
Unsurprisingly, at least one reporter had been present when Enies Lobby had been sacked, and consequently seen the actions of Daz, though, since his identity was top secret, plus him wearing a mask and acting upon the defence of the ship of a Tenryuubito, would have made the whole debacle less hard to understand.
But, and that was a huge but, somehow it had been leaked that two Tenryuubito had been killed in their home the night before, while their guard of the CP0 went missing, along with nearly all the slaves held captive by said Tenryuubito.
Now, even the biggest moron could connect those dots, thus leading to a statement of the world government, labelling him a traitor and enemy of the world, because you know, attacking the world government highest authorities and all that, and subsequently issuing a hefty bounty on his head all the while.
Since the Cipher Pol knew exactly who was stationed at that particular house that night, it was easy for them to put a name to the otherwise masked traitor, such leaking his name to the press as well.
'Fucking hell man, I really could do without a bounty on my head…not that that happening wasn't expected, but still, it is pretty damn annoying.' After all, Daz had considered becoming a bounty hunter once he had reached the nearest island, but now that possibility had been thrown out of the window.
'Now, what to do, what to do…' He mused to himself while absentmindedly leafing through the newspaper, which led to him finally finding out the name of the moronic pirates that had attacked Enies Lobby.
'The straw-hat pirates? What kind of shitty name is that?' He thought with a snort to himself, but after finding the crews bounty posters on the next page, with a picture of their captain amongst them, he swiftly understood why they were named that way. Didn't make it any less ridiculous though, in his opinion.
One of the bounty posters of the crew though, caught his attention. 'Nico Robin? Wasn't that the girl that had sent Spandam salivating like a mad dog a while back? What's up with that whole thing?' He thought, but in the end discarded the whole matter as unimportant for now and kept on leafing through the rest of the paper.
His relaxed reading however was interrupted though when the lookout called down to them that water 7 was in sight, making him perk up.
With a small hum, Daz absentmindedly traced over the surface of his trusty white mask, knowing that he would soon have to take it off and walk without in public for what felt like eons to him.
'I suppose it was only a matter of time this would happen, and yet I can't help but feel a little reluctant to do so. Heh, how pathetic of me…' He thought with a small chuckle, swiftly removing the white mask from his face, only to come face to face with the munchkin, who had eyes like dinnerplates at seeing him without a mask.
"Can't you put the mask back on Mr. Mime? Otherwise, you aren't a Mime anymore…" the munchkin told him, while poking her fingers together as if embarrassed a little bit at her straight forwardness. That however made Daz's eyebrow developed a serious case of motion sickness, causing him to right then and there swear to never put the bloody thing on again, simply out of pettiness and spite, no matter if said spite was directed at a little munchkin.
He had a name, damnit! Completely disregarding the fact that he had never called the munchkin by her real name before, but so was the power of denial. And if he was honest with himself? He bloody loved it.
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