Bab 66: Part 6.19
People everywhere can say that they have been in pain sometime in their life. It happens to everyone. I think I may be the only person to have lived pain. It's with me every day, every minute, and every single damned breath. Aches, burns, cuts, and so much more.
I don't like thinking of my childhood very often. My memories aren't happy ones. There's like… four happy memories in my entire life. None of them are from when I was a child.
One of my unhappiest memories is from when I was an infant. I don't remember it well but it definitely happened. I don't have a clue if it's normal for people to remember things from when they were that young, but I remember it anyways.
After I was born I was put in this thing called the 'glass cradle' that's somewhere in Impel Down. Don't let the name fool you, it's only partially glass. The cradle is made of glass and metal, and it's hooked up to a whole load of fancy machinery.
I'm not the first child born in Impel Down. Turns out that that I'm just the first to be born and survive. Usually Impel Down weakens the mother's and kills the infant before they're born. For whatever reason Warden Magellan's predecessor, Warden Mephistopheles, built the glass cradle in case an infant survived. It's a cradle made of glass, but it's also a torture device. It's a torture device for newborns.
I don't want to go into exact details because it always gives me nightmares, but suffice to say it was bad. As worse as it can get in fact. It involved a lot of electricity and water. Some heat too.
That glass cradle is my first memory. It's nothing but pain on top of pain, with the rare moments of rest. Those moments came in the firm of Magellan entering the room and watching me. He'd pick me up with his huge hands and feed me himself. Sometimes he would talk to me and on occasion he would sing a few off-key notes. News flash, Magellan can't sing for shit. Every time he held me he'd whisper to me that it was a miracle I was alive and that he was happy I was. He'd cry so much his acidic tears ruined his face. Those moments where he held me when I was small, with my body hurting and I could feel almost nothing but agony, those moments we're the only time I could forget the pain. For those moments alone I would do anything for Magellan. I'd even take my own worthless life if he asked me to.
Over the years the pain came in different ways, and sometimes is was lesser or greater. But it was still pain. Pain I've lived with for as long as I can remember.
The pain I'm feeling from Sabo digging his fingers into my shoulders is nothing in the face of the pain I live with. Sabo has a surprised expression on his face as he squeezes. All he's doing is squeezing with his hand. Does he expect my flesh to rend beneath his grasp? Does he expect my bones to crumble to dust from the pressure? Does he expect me to double over in pain and become unable to react to his attack?
If he does expect any of those things than he is wrong. I'm stronger than that. I refuse to let him hurt me. I'm big and he's small, it doesn't make sense for him to hurt me like this. This pain he's giving me now is nothing to me in the face of all I've been through.
We're still in mid-air from that explosion Sabo had caused but we're already beginning to fall back down to the ground where we belong. He's still latched onto my shoulder, and I don't like that. I almost dislike it as much as the fact I'm falling towards the ground so fast it's going to hurt the way I am now. I decide to rectify both of my problems.
My hand is large, and my arm is long. Definitely longer than Sabo's. That means when I grab his skinny neck I can wrap my hand around the entire thing. His eyes bulge out for half a moment before his neck burns in my eyes again and becomes as black as his hands are. I'm still squeezing his neck as hard as I can to snap his neck but it's resisting me. So that means I move onto plan B.
With my longer arm length I spin Sabo around. Now he's between me and the ground. If physics decides to be kind to me I'll land on Sabo and my iron boots will squeeze his insides out of his mouth like a tube of chunky mustard. I've seen it happen before, and I've never wanted it to happen to someone else as much as I want it to happen to Sabo now.
Sabo realized what's about to happen a moment too late. He tries to use Will Of The Damned on his entire body before impact but he's not fast enough.
Like a Wet Charge on Level Four where prisoners produce the steel there's an explosion when Sabo impacts the ground with my feet over his stomach so I land on something soft. There's an explosion of rubble and Sabo let's go of my shoulder when we land. I don't feel any of his guts land on me so I have to assume he didn't die on impact. I'll give Sabo this one thing. He's tough, but he's not as tough as me.
I'm still holding Sabo's neck and he hasn't attacked me yet. I take this opportunity to do what comes naturally to me and throw him. There's rubble falling from the sky like rain from the Revolutionary's previous attack where he exposed the ground to make his little hurricane. A particularly convenient piece of stone road falls to the ground between me and a building in the distance. It makes a perfect target and I decide to throw Sabo at Hundred-Fold speed through it at the building far away.
He's still seems shook up from the impact, even if he's sadly not dead yet, and he doesn't fight back when I throw him. I twist my feet and wind my arm back holding onto Sabo the entire time. When I feel ready I let go and he goes flying.
The stone rubble from the road shatters into pieces and the building I was aiming for collapses when he impacts it. I take a deep breath and roll my shoulders. The one Sabo squeezed aches a little but that's it. My ribs that he smacked with his pipe hurt more than my shoulder. Speaking of Sabo's pipe, it looks like he's dropped it. It's laying a few feet away and I walk over and pick it up. I swing it a few times and decide that it's an okay beat-stick. Not as good of a beat-stick as my hockey stick was but I guess the pipe will have to do.
With the pipe in hand I cup my other hand around my mouth and call out to the ruins around me, "If you aren't dead, make a noise. If you don't feel like making any noise, just show yourself."
I count to ten and after that I begin to hear groans from all around. Including one by my foot. I take a step back and move what looks like a large planter away with my boot. Beneath it is a man with a cut on his forehead laying faceup with his eyes closed and groaning. I nudge him with my foot and his eyes snap open.
The first thing he sees is my hand down in his face. He blinks dumbly for a moment before he pulls himself together and grabs my hand. I pull him up to his feet and he looks around dumbly. I nod at him and he nods back. Then he takes a single step forward and immediately falls onto his face.
He doesn't move anymore after that. He must be tired or something. I'll just leave him there to rest.
The rest of the former convicts get up if they're alive and they leave their fallen brethren. I'd do the same if I was them. Krieg comes up to me dragging a leave blunderbuss behind him. The bayonet on the gun carves a line in the dirt behind him as he walks. He's breathing heavily and looking at me with a wild look in his eyes.
"Are… are you alive?" He asks me, his eyes wide in disbelief.
That's actually a good question. I place two fingers on my neck and feel my pulse beating. Yup. My blood is flowing, my heart is beating, I'm breathing, and that means I'm alive. You can't really be alive without those three things, they're kind essential to life in case you didn't know.
"I'm alive. It's not from any lack of trying on that Revolutionary's part though. Actually… he squeezed my shoulder with his fancy bullshit instead of my neck. I wonder why he didn't go for the kill?" I thought about it for a moment before shrugging. Who am I to judge what Sabo does or does not do. "Oh well. I'm going to go and see if he's alive or not. Any suggestions?"
Krieg smiles, and it's not a nice one. Blood vessels in his eyes burst and his pupils got really small and sharp. He starts to breath heavily, then he wordlessly holds out the blunderbuss. I place Sabo's pipe through one of the loops on my shorts to keep it in place and take the gun from Krieg.
I nod at him. "Good suggestion." I pat him on the back a few times and then gesture around us. "Take the men and get the wounded out of here. Them dying here in the middle of nowhere seems like a waste to me."
The inventor nodded his head and began barking orders to the crew that could still walk. I wasn't really paying attention to what he was saying as I was examining the blunderbuss Krieg gave me. It was one of those old school kind that takes three entire minutes and a piece of metal to load. So I would have one shot with it unless if Sabo felt generous in the middle of the fight and let me stand still and shove metal and gunpowder down the barrel of the gun.
That's okay. I'd probably only need a single shot if I got lucky.
I began walking to the building I had thrown Sabo at, blunderbuss in my arms and just taking my time. As I walked I noticed long lines drawn in the rubble. I took a moment to stop and squat down to examine them. I looked at the lines trying to remember what they seemed to remind me of before either snapped my fingers in realization.
I flexed my hand before placing my fingers in the grooves. If my hands were smaller, than the grooves could be explained by someone who was using there fingers to slow themselves down if they were going at high speeds. For instance, someone being flung through the air by an irate hockey player.
Mystery solved! Dang, that went very smoothly. Maybe I should start a side business where I solve mysteries and fight bad guys. What are those kinds of people called again? Oh yeah. They're called detectives… I kinda want to be a detective.
I stood up and brushed my hands off before continuing walking. I didn't want to keep Sabo waiting after all.
A few more uneventful moments of walking led to the building I had thrown Sabo at. Incidentally, Sabo was there sitting on a stone outside the building holding his hand to his mouth. I noticed that there was blood on his hand and the front of his shirt, but mainly I noticed how tired he looked. He still looked like shit.
I raised my gun and kept it trained on him as I kept walking. I ideally wanted him to be in the ideal range before I fired.
As I got closer Sabo snapped out of his funk and dropped his hand from hai mouth as he stood up and turned to look at me. When I saw his face, I couldn't help but snort a little. Then I grinned while I unabashedly told him, "You look ridiculous."
He just snorted at me. Then he took a deep breath and spat to his side. "Yeah. I guess I do Ferroh."
I couldn't help myself. When he spoke it revealed the source of my mirth and I laughed out loud because of it. Sabo was missing three teeth and it made him look ridiculous. One of his top teeth and two of his bottom teeth.
If I had known that throwing him would knock.out the poor guy's teeth… I would've thrown him harder!
Should I tell Sabo that? Nah. That would be rude… Actually, screw it. I will tell him that. Of I can only ever be one thing, I want to be honest.
"If I had known when I threw you that you would like some of your teeth, I would've thrown you much harder!" I gleefully told him a so continued to walk towards him. A few paces more and I would be in the perfect range to unleash a storm of metal and death. Mainly metal, which in turn causes death.
Sabo saw me getting closer with my blunderbuss trained on his body but he didn't dive for cover the same way I would. Instead he spread his legs slightly apart and got into some sort of position. Like he was waiting for me.
In my opinion this was a very dumb move. If someone had a gun trained on me the same way I had a gun on Sabo I would be diving behind cover. Doesn't matter if I was resistant to bullets, I could be fighting someone like me who can make bullets so deadly it wasn't even funny.
I got close enough and without wasting a single precious moment more I pulled the trigger on the blunderbuss. The little trigger sticking up on top of the barrel slammed down and… nothing happened.
I blinked twice in confusion. I wasn't expecting that. I don't think Sabo was either because he looked just as confused as I was.
"Give me a sec will yah?" I asked Sabo. He didn't react beyond his obvious confusion so I took that as permission. I flipped the gun around in my arms and began to examine it. What in the world could cause it to misfire?
A brief examination immediately gave results. The frickin blunderbuss was a matchlock weapon and it wasn't lit! What kind of pirate in their right mind uses a fucking matchlock?
"Fucking Krieg." I cussed.
That put me in quite the predicament. Without a match or some fire to light the fuze on the gun I wouldn't be able to fire the weapon. I'm going to have to improvise.
I flipped the blunderbuss around so I was holding the entire thing by the barrel and brandished it like a club. Instead of attacking Sabo with the blunderbuss I guess I was going to go ahead and attack Sabo with the blunderbuss.
"Moa Moa Giant Improv!" I screamed, then I quickly swung the gun and let go before it enlarged itself.
Sabo wasn't expecting it because he took the hit straight on and crashed through a stone wall. I though that would be the end of it, but then I heard a cracking sound like someone crushing walnuts with their knuckles. I looked down and saw that the noise came from a rock embedded in my chest.
"Ouch." I said.
The stone fell to the ground and it left an imprint on my chest as keepsake. I brushed it with my hand and friend in displeasure from the excruciating pain.
"Thank you ribcage. You've done your job today and protected my heart and lungs from things that want to hurt them. Skull, pay attention. You could learn something from the ribcage." I said completely seriously.
Sabo emerged from the rubble coughing. It didn't go unnoticed by me that there were flecks of blood on his hand when he had covered his mouth.
"Ha! You're coughing blood! You're organs are weak." I said triumphantly. Then I covered my mouth as my lungs spasmed and I coughed as well. When I withdrew my hand and to my great displeasure I saw blood there as well.
"I'm coughing blood! Damn it organs! I just said Sabo's organ were weak and then you start to wimp out on me. Screw you, you useful piles of flesh." I said angrily. Then I looked up to look at Sabo.
He obviously wasn't breathing so well, but he was still in his fighting stance. I don't have a fighting stance. It seems like a moment of vulnerability to me. I like to be either resting, or in the process of tearing someone's throat out with my teeth or hands. Being between those two states is an opportunity for someone to shove a shiv in your back.
"What's wrong Sabo? Are you feeling a little off?"
He lunges at me but I pivot on my back foot and avoid him. I try to return the favor with a punch to his throat but he begins to dodge before I know it and I miss completely. I'm getting the feeling that he's using Shiv Sense to avoid my strikes. I wonder how well he can dodge a nice hard pipe.
I pull Sabo's abandoned pipe from my waist and increase my speed Fifty-Fold while I attack.
Thus begins a great back-and-forth between the two of us. He's too shifty for me to hit because of his Shiv Sense, and I'm too fast for him to hit. It's a stalemate. A really shitty stalemate.
We must go on like this for entire minutes. We don't make any noise seeing as we're entirely preoccupied with trying to rip each other into bloody chunks. We each get a few glancing blows on each other but it's nothing substantial.
At this point I'm beginning to get irked and a wee bit tired. So I decided to shake things up. There's all kinds of rubble from ruined homes and businesses around us and their contents as well. I guess I'll try improv again to defeat Sabo.
I give a much wider strike with my pipe that makes Sabo have to leap away to dodge it. Then I jump to the side as well and run through a still standing alley at my base speed. Sabo follows close behind but that's okay, it's all part of the plan.
Immediately outside of the alley I see something shiny resting on the ground. Without stopping I lean and grab it. Then I pivot around and prepare to attack Sabo with whatever I grabbed.
"Moa Moa-" I stop and look at what I grabbed. Sabo stops as well to look. I guess he's just as dumbfounded by what I had grabbed as I am.
It's a dog. A small one, so small it fits in the palm of my hand. I don't know what kind of breed right off the top of my head. It has a smashed in face, bugged out eyes, and a curly tail. The shiny thing that I had noticed when I first saw it was it's gold and gem encrusted collar.
"Poor thing." Sabo said. "It looks like it's about to shit itself."
I looked at the dog, then at Sabo, the dog, Sabo, he dog, Sabo, and then back to the dog. I promised myself I would attack Sabo with whatever I grabbed, but I was really struggling to come up with a way to do it with this scared little dog.
Then it hit me. I knew what I was about to do. "I'm going to say this in advance. I'm not sorry." I told the Revolutionary.
I flipped the unfortunate little dog around so his rear was facing Sabo. The bedazzled mutt yelled in surprise, and then I gave it a gentle squeeze, which was all the encouragement it needed.
"Moa Moa Improv Technique! Poop Shotgun!"
There was a flash of brown, and then I dropped the dog. It ran off somewhere and I was treated with the sight of Sabo on his knees wiping dog shit out of his mouth and eyes while he gagged. It was useless though because he was using his hands and his hands were covered in poop as well. He was just spreading it all over the place.
Now was my chance. This was the perfect opportunity for me to strike, but I needed to make it count. When I tried to hit him before he would use Will Of The Damned to protect himself. I needed some way to bypass that defense and end his life.
What are the absolute essentials for life? Blood, air, organs, and a heartbeat. Without those a person will definitely die. There are other ways to kill people, but depriving them of one of those things will doubtlessly kill them them quickest. The question is, how do I take away one of those things from Sabo?
I don't have anything sharp to cut him and make him lose his blood and organs. I also don't have time to try and choke him, if I do he'll just recover and try to use Will Of The Damned to attack me. His heartbeat…
How do you attack someone's heartbeat and get rid of it? Using sound could maybe work but I don't have any time to test that or ask around to see if it her people know the answer? How in the hell would I attack his heart?
Wait. Attack his heart. Attack his heart? Oh, attack his heart! Heart Attack! I could do that.
Two short steps brought me right in front of him. My hand rested on his shoulder and he looked surprised and looked up. "You should've gotten some more sleep Sabo." I told him before I attacked his heart.
"Moa Moa Sheer Heart Attack."
My hand rested on his coat's shoulder. Beneath that was his actual shoulder. And inside that was a whole mess of muscle and veins that moved blood. So I increased the speed of the blood flowing through his body by Forty-Fold.
Blood sprayed out of his mouth and his eyes went blank before they rolled into the back of his head. He swayed back and forth slightly and as his head slowly began to lean further and further back, I let go of his shit encrusted shoulder and he fell backwards with a loud thumping when he hit the ground.
If I was right, his heart exploded and he was dead. Which was good. "That's really good. Just in time in fact." I tell myself.
I turn around away from Sabo and fall to my hands and knees myself. I begin to choke and gag despite my best efforts. I can't hold it back anymore and I vomit. But it's not my lunch that comes out. Instead it's a constant stream of blood so dark it's almost black in color.
Sabo only got a few good hits on me while we were briefly exchanging blows but his fists were encased in Will Of The Damned. That meant try counted for a lot more. I can handle pain, but I can't handle my body literally shutting down on me from damage. Stupid organs…
I rock back and forth but I manage to get back to my feet. It's going to take more than the Chief Of Staff of the Revolutionary Army and some damaged innards to keep me down for the count. I just a few days of rest and some meat and I'll be back on my feet in no time. As tough as this Sabo guy was, I've been hurt more before. That hunchback on Level Four Fah-Grah comes to mind.
I began to take a few steps back to where the men were so I could take some of their food. That would definitely make me feel better. Then I heard the crunch of gravel behind me. "No way. Just no way."
I turn around and sure enough Sabo is shakily on his feet. Somehow. "Your heart just exploded. Probably literally! How are you still alive?" I ask him in disbelief.
He coughs, and blood bursts forth from his mouth. He speaks, and his voice is raspy and hoarse. "I can't die. Not yet. Not until I see my brother Luffy again."
I scowl. "Yeah, well you should've thought about that before you attacked me trying to kill me."
What a guy. Saying he can't die. That's a pile of shit. Everyone can die at anytime without and reason at all. Me, Sabo, my crew, Elizabeth, even the whole world. The difference between life and death is thin. So thin, that a single bullet can make all the difference.
I sigh and pull my pistol from my waist. I pull the hammer back and give thanks to whoever invented flintlocks in order to replace matchlocks. Sabo can't move, he's barely on his feet as it is. If he can't move, he can't defend himself.
I pull the trigger.
*click*
The hammer slams forward but the weapon does not fire. I check it's chamber. To my surprise, it's empty. "I should've had two more shots left…"
I look up and Sabo is gone. There's not a single trace of him.
"You know what? I'm okay with this. I can live with this result." I paused to vomit some more blood and take a breath. "I need to rest anyways. Sabo can go and meet his brother, then I guess he can die like the rest of us."
I begin my journey back to where the battle initially took place but something makes me stop. I look at my gun again and run my hand up and down it. I aim at an intact window nearby and pull the trigger.
There's a bang, followed by the crash of glass as the bullet shatters tell window. I scrutinize the gun even closer. "How the hell does that work? They're weren't bullets, but now there are? Bullets don't just magically appear."
It's times like these that I wish there was a detective on hand. That would make everything so much simpler. I may not be a detective, but maybe someday I can find one to find out all of life's great mysteries for me. That would be nice.
The walk back to where all of the men should be goes without any problems. Except for me periodically stopping to vomit blood. But it's less blood each time, so I guess that means I'm already getting better.
When I find the men they're all huddled together in groups and muttering grimly to each other. There's a dank feeling in the air, and I don't like it.
"Hey. Who died?" I asked them all.
As one try all turned to look at me. Some of them had tears in their eyes. When they see me their faces light up and they call out, "CAPTAIN!"
"Yes. I'm your Captain."
Krieg is in the crowd and he steps forward. "You killed that bastard?"
I sigh and run my hand down my face. As I do I see Schmee step forward from the corner of my eye with my mask in his hand. He holds it out and I don't hesitate in taking it and wearing over my face again. I grew to miss it's familiar weight.
"Sabo got away. What did I miss? You all look miserable."
Krieg handed me a piece of brown paper with my picture and the number 900,000,000 on it. I turned it around a few times just to make sure my first analyst was correct. Yup. I still can't read.
I gave the picture back to Krieg. "So what?"
"So what!" He shouted. "Wanted Dead or Alive, The Destroyer of Worlds, Tennoh Thirteen, for nine hundred million beri! That's fucking ridiculous! That makes you the most wanted man in Paradise I think! We're going to have entire amadas of bounty hunters and Marines coming down on our heads! Several other members of the crew have received gigantic bounties as well! We're fucking doomed!"
Krieg was getting hysterical so I decided to snap him out of it. I raised my left hand, and quickly gave him a wholesome and heartening pimp slap. Just like the ones Kuzric used to give me all the time.
I didn't use my Devil Fruit power at all, but the force of the blow still lifted Krieg off of his feet and made him go tumbling. He took a moment getting up and he was bleeding from a small head wound. "Don't yell at me." Was all I told him.
He nodded. "Yes Captain."
"Don't worry about the bounty. It's all part of the plan." Not my plan of course. Keystone's plan. I think I remember Clair talking about them increasing my bounty before something important happened. Something Clair didn't exactly tell me.
I was broken out of my thoughts by a flapping noise, and something landing on my head. Last time I had thought it was a pelican, but it turned out to be a news-coo. "Is there a news-coo on my head?" I ask aloud so anyone could answer me.
One woman speaks up. The only interesting thing about her is that she is dark skinned and covered in tribal tattoos, but her arms are pale white. "No. That's some kind of bat with a pouch."
"Oh." They had bats in Impel Down. Except they were larger than me. It's safe to assume that this isn't the same kind of bat. I reach up and feel the furry head of the bat. It leans into my hand and I briefly rub it's head. It gives a happy squeak and makes a noise that I'd almost call a purr. My hand travels lower and I feel the pouch the woman was talking about. Inside is a piece of paper that I pull out to reveal as a letter.
I throw the paper at Krieg who catches it and tell him, "Read it out loud so everyone can hear it."
By now more of the crew have arrived, including all of the men that were on the ships. I see Klahadore pushing Elizabeth's wheelchair with her sitting in it looking smug, Gurry dripping wet, Lucky Ted flipping a gold coin through the air while smiling, and so many more people I recognize. Krieg pulls the letter from the envelope and begin to read.
'Dear Prisoner One-Zero-Zero-One-Three,
You are hereby requested to make your way to Marineford with the utmost haste. It has been decided that you shall receive a Letter of Marque and a position as Warlord of the Sea. Your might is formidable, and you inspire fear in those who hear of your name and deeds. We await your arrival.
Signed Commander-in-Chief Kong'
There's silence from the entire crew. No one has spoken a single word. Seeing clear over five hundred men and women in complete silence is unnerving to me. Then someone in the crew begins to chant.
"Tennoh, Tennoh, Tennoh, Tennoh."
Others pick it up and begin to chant as well. The noise gets louder and more fierce as the crew continues to chant. Soon enough, everyone but me is doing it.
I look to my left and Clair is there,wearing her Keystone mask. She nods at me and somehow over all of the noise I hear her speak.
"All. According. To. Plan."
Before she can say anything else dramatic I tear my mask away and vomit blood all over her. While she screams and waves her arms in the air like a mad woman I just put my mask back on and nod.
"If you say so."
End of Arc Six
Next Time: Arc Seven: Of Marines And Men
Status Power Mingguan
-- Peringkat
Power 
-- Power
stone