Chương 21: Celebration not long lived
On board a ship simply referred to as King's Warship, it was apparent that today was busier than usual.
People, partially stripped of their rough armor, were sprinting across the halls with boxes full of equipment, food, or both. Often, they encountered halls and doorways too small for two such broad-shouldered men to walk without bumping into each other.
If one were to observe how they resolved those countless situations, they would notice that the order of who goes first is determined in a sliver of a second.
They quickly calculated where the other person was coming from, gave a quick glance at the contents which the other carried, prioritizing books and different log posts, and took note of the direction where King and his current guest were located—his personal quarters.
Moving there, they spoke no words, just loud stomps in quick succession, never out of rhythm, creating an echoing sound of a machine throughout the metal ship.
Mostly, they carried items related to the ongoing celebratory feast, preparing their bodies with food for the upcoming battle and to celebrate their first rescue of a person, like heroes, like King does.
The kitchen was busy, with only a pair of people knowing how to cook something remotely edible. It was cramped with just a few people in it, but it seemed like it didn't concern superhumans much. They mostly just prepared food for King and events such as this.
One of the Grey Guard entered the room, still wearing slightly bloodied full battle armor and a chainsaw quietly rattling on his belt. As soon as he entered, he immediately tossed a bag of salt to the pile of bags on the kitchen counter, which already had a tower of bags, some torn and leaking salt everywhere.
"Brother, I don't need more salt. Just get me some tomatoes, like I asked before," said one of the two cooks when another person entered the kitchen.
And then, promptly turning around to leave, ignoring every single word, he sprinted to get more.
"JOSH! YOU WILL BE HAULING IT BACK! Damn."
The Grey Guard wanted to throw his knife into his salt "helper", but he valued his prized family knife more than he did revenge. Also, everyone knows that Josh is still replaying his heroic deed of saving a stranded person on repeat in his head, and can't act right; it can be forgiven for today.
Head cook Raul, on the smaller side of the crew, had just sipped a little of King's magic sauce, being a measly 8 feet 8 inches. As cooks should, he had his long and silky gray hair in a bun, his face that of an older guy who has seen things, always having that thousand-yard stare.
Raul was using one hand to slice, the other mixing a sauce, all with unnatural grace. In his distraction with thoughts about salt maestro Josh himself, he didn't pay attention to what his hands were doing and very accidentally cut off another cook's two fingers as they entered his side vision.
A small fountain of bright red blood started to flow into the sauce on top of the lost fingers, then promptly stopped.
The fingerless cook sighed and said, "Bro... Again... Please—"
"DON'T GET IN MY ZONE! Just remember personal space. What is so hard to remember? Tell me?"
Raul quickly fished the fingers out of the sauce with his knife and, without looking, angrily said, "Get back to work."
Another Grey Guard quickly caught the fingers and reattached them to their place, making sure this time he didn't mess up the order or the direction.
After pressing them into the flesh wound, he tried to move them, and they felt like new. He looked up and said, "I just needed some salt for the steak."
"ON IT!" a distant shout full of commitment and happiness echoed throughout the halls.
"ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME!?"
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Most of the Grey Guard, which originally consists of thirty-three people excluding King himself and their bald leader, gathered in the main training hall that was quickly transformed into a dining hall with a long makeshift metal table laden with food, mainly the meat of the Sea King that they had slain and butchered just moments before. They were celebrating their first official battle, hoping for many more to come.
The not-so-tasty parts, such as intestines, had already been eaten by the "puppies" that growled happily under the ship.
It was originally arranged in a very organized and tasteful manner in expectation, but it didn't last long after the feast started, and they weren't under any supervision.
They ate like savages, with clashes of the giant forks, crushing of beast bones, and metal armor banging against each other, all fighting for the "best parts", which were as follows: brain, bone marrow, and cartilage.
"GIVE ME THE BRAIN, I NEED THE KNOWLEDGE IT HAS!" shouted one of the Grey Guard as he tackled
another across the table, bending it in the process. His short spiky gray hair showed his explosive nature; he was overall the smallest in the crew, excluding King, standing only at 6 feet 9 inches.
"YOU BARELY LIFT 3 TONS, BEEF UP FIRST, YOU WIMP!" replied another as he snatched the "delicacy" away and started to push it down his throat as fast as a non-rubber boy could, his other hand handing out some nicely cooked steak.
His hair was long and silky, but still gray. As he started to slurp it down, he side-kicked the "Wimp" into the wall, creating a crater that made a dome shape appear on the ship's side.
"YOU ARE A FUCKING BASTARD!" said Wimp as he spit in the brain dish across the room with super precision. "NOW IT'S MINE! HA!"
"EW! NOW YOU DID IT!"
Similar scenes were all over. They started fighting, as they always do when they get the chance. No guns and chainsaws, everything else is fair.
One special kind of freak was peacefully munching on shiny uranium he stole from Edison's lab as he enjoyed free entertainment from his tranquil corner, and everybody in their right minds left him be since he was the third strongest on the team, obviously below King and their bald leader.
One Grey Guard swore he saw him growing another arm under his old one in the shower, which made him more similar to the likes of beasts and sea kings and not to the rest of the juiced-up freaks.
Once in a while, his veins pulsed bright green, making King afraid to the point of avoiding him as much as possible; he went as far as to order the throwing away of every suspicious shiny rock he had, but he always had more hidden in the walls of the ship. King already considered getting another ship just because he wasn't prepared to bear the responsibilities of a mutant just yet.
Wimp advanced for an attack every time but was kicked mercilessly over the table and into a nearby wall, making the metal stretch outwards more and more with each hit, proving its unnatural resilience.
On the side, one grey guard quickly ran up to another that seemed to be leaving the room.
"YOU KNOW TAKING FOOD OUTSIDE IS NOT ALLOWED. THIS IS YOUR RETRIBUTION," he yelled and used a heavy-duty fork to stab the other in the gap between plates on the other's back armor. The one attacked was taken by surprise and retaliated. He suddenly dropped the sneakily stolen food just as the other had suspected.
He turned around with his whole body launching a perfect technique punch, one which would make even The Fighting King of Providence Kingdom jealous, even before the food hit the ground.
A moment before the punch landed straight into the chest, the one throwing the punch twitched and instinctively stopped most of the power behind the strike, but the momentum was far too great.
The other pulled the best guard he could muster but was far too slow and got hit straight into his sternum.
The punch launched the grey guard into the table, bending it along the way into a single shape and throwing all the food to the sides, finally reaching the door where King, Archont, and their Commander were currently, slamming the normally very soundproof door with a terribly loud thud that made the entire ship quake.
They noticed too late. They stopped the fights in horror of what awful mistake they had made.
The door swung open almost breaking the sound barrier, by some miracle not flying off its hinges and making the unfortunate soul crash into the side wall, breaking it with his body and falling into the opening he made straight into the ocean below.
A giant figure leaned in just to fit into the frame. Bald, the most giant man on the ship. No nickname, just "Sir" and nothing but Sir.
They hurried to form a line, but a few were wedged into the walls and stuck in the chairs. They hurried almost as if they were weightless.
"QUIET THE FUCK DOWN OR YOU WILL GET AN EXTRA LOBOTOMY BY ME PERSONALLY!"
"SIR, YES SIR!"
Their faces and overall body language showed full seriousness, contrasting what they had just been doing instead of eating food like normal people would.
Fresh blood on them dripped in a terrifying way. Their open wounds closed, and bruises disappeared just a few moments later.
A serious atmosphere was felt by everybody, only a single thing distracted everybody.
Bubbling screams were currently heard from the hole to the outside.
"What happened?" asked King from the insides of the other room.
"Someone fell into the ocean. King, will you solve this as you did last time?"
"Ah, yes... Get him up here!" King shouted from inside the room. His voice sent ripples through the ship and deep into the water.
Spawns of Cthulhu took no time throwing the one overboard back inside, but he
looked crooked as his armor was twisted to the point of no return right on his torso, exposing some injured flesh. Also, there were little nibbles from the creatures from the great below, just cute ones though.
He was coughing out weakening sea water that had managed to seep into his helmet but ultimately managed to get up and get in line with the others, making sure to stand as far away as possible from the one who had managed to deal that kind of damage to him.
Sir looked around with a glare that promised pain and suffering and gently, as a giant could, closed the door behind him and once again left his subordinates alone for now, now better behaved.
Inside the room was a temporary office table with documents, maps, and papers piling on it, bookshelves were filled with ragged and old books. King sat on a chair behind the table while Archont and Sir stood before him.
Archont was covered from head to toe in bloodied bandages and medicine, yet he refused to sit down even when offered many times.
King thoroughly read various papers and books, doing so quickly. He was reading about devil fruits and searching the latest newspapers and skimming through maps of the West Blue.
Suddenly he stopped and leaned forwards, placing his palm to support his head.
"...King, did you find anything?" asked Archont, his face showing relief and hope.
King leaned forwards and locked his arms, placing them before his face in deep concentration. He shifted his gaze from the table to Archont, slightly shook his head, and asked:
"Please repeat what you just said. Be sure you have nothing left out, never mind how unimportant you may think it is. Can you do that? Please."
"The whole island was invaded and captured overnight. And nobody noticed? How does that make any sense?" Sir gritted his teeth, showing a mix of rage and disbelief.
"I'm telling you, it was too organized and convenient; I couldn't even do anything," Archont looked directly into King's unmoving eyes, and his face showed a hateful scowl and a hardly noticeable bit of fear. "I will tell you every single thing I can remember from that day."
Archont took a deep breath and looked down to delve deeper into his hazy memory.
"As you probably already know with your 'King Brain,' Captain McSheriff graciously allowed me to start working as an unpaid intern in the treasury department since my skill at managing funds and past meekness to unable to steal any money is what kept me working under filthy pirate scum. There wasn't much work to do, no documents to burn, no gold to wash from blood. After a while of work, I got enough money to buy some drug developed by Germa 66 that—"
King raised an eyebrow and interrupted him.
"Do you know the name? Did you smoke something?"
Archont bit his lip trying his best to remember.
"P-pro-protein? I think it was called protein, you consume it with your mouth. Made training easier. I'm very sorry, but I don't know the details, I just know that it didn't kill others."
"We have some here actually. It's better because we make it with the original Vegapunk's recipe. It has dolphin liver and—" Sir talked suddenly enthusiastically, his loud voice was shaking the table on which King was leaning. King slowly shifted his almost bloodshot eyes at him, and Baldie immediately shut up and bowed his head in regret and sorrow for his inconsideration for this serious situation.
"My day started at 6 hours and approximately 40 minutes standard time. As I woke up, I noticed that my room had unusually high humidity, but no signs of a break-in, since no dust that I placed the night before on the doorknob and windowsill moved. I chewed two scoops of my protein powder for breakfast and went on with my day; the taste and texture were regular if that's important, Sir. I do think it wasn't drugged. That morning, the weather was awful, it was a sign of a storm to come as it turned out. The whole Marine base was a mess, enforcing a temporary lockdown on all ships coming in and out as an anti-pirate measure, as they said.
This is a regular thing that happens, but this time it seemed like there were Marines I didn't see before, exactly 263 more, including 12 officers. They were carrying some of the newest guns and uniforms any Marine would fight over.
Command was given to build emergency barricades; they even provided the newest type of multi-use barricade, which was useful to contain both advances and retreat of enemy forces."
"And their placement? Just the portside?"
"I took a glance at the orders. Luckily, I saw that actually it was even at small docks people used privately."
Suddenly Archont coughed blood on the floor, and he lost the strength in his legs.
A moment later, Sir caught him midair with a single hand,
not allowing him to fall down. He gently placed him on a chair. Sir turned to King for the command.
"Man... I think we should ask for more pain killers. Is Lex here?" said King, clearly worried for the kid. He stood up and started hurriedly leaving the room.
"I'm sorry..." mumbled Archont quietly.
King turned around as he heard him.
"Just make sure to rest."
"I'm sorry, King. I had to make sure it was only you and me. I think your enemy is the devil himself, or someone with multiple devil fruits at his disposal. I'm not even sure if my finding you was accidental or done by him."
King leaned back in his chair, exhausted, and said:
"Let's speak about this tomorrow."
(AN: This chapter took over 20 rewrites. This one is just monumental for the story and it has an effect on how everything will unfold. I tried many concepts for characters, story progressions, designations, and so on.
Archont had like 5 different backstories and 3 different personalities, but most of them felt forced to the plot.
Gave my little super soldiers more personality since I didn't want them to be stoic and super serious all of the time without a significant reason to be so. They don't have any brainwashing besides looking up to King and maybe some additional chromosomes.
This took an ungodly amount of time. Mostly because I took huge breaks writing multiple times. And I'm just an idiot trying to make a story that I myself would enjoy reading.)
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