Liam gripped the den den mushi a little tighter. "The New World?" He repeated, as if he hadn't heard his captain right.
"Yes." Came the reply. "Our plans are changing a little. Is everyone in there with you?" Liam glanced behind him, seeing the stares of the other crew members on him. Swallowing, he nodded then shook his head because he was stupid to think the Captain could see him.
"Yeah, they're all here."
"Did you all hear that?" He asked, and there were several nods and affirmative replies. "Good. Now, I need all of you to start preparing for it."
"What are we gonna do about Kid, Captain? Are we still in an alliance?" Blake asked, scratching his head. Men nearby began to mutter, wondering the exact same thing.
"I'm still working on that." Law said, a little less enthusiastic. Obviously, their Captain was as much confused by the situation as they were. "The point is that you need to be ready for anything. Whether we stick to this alliance or not, you have to be prepared to do whatever I say at a moment's notice."
A resounding 'Aye, Captain' went through the room and Liam nodded to himself. He would stay loyal to whatever plan Captain had in store even when part of him was questioning the point of their actions.
"From now on, I want you all in the training room during your free hours. I need you to get stronger. We have to be our best to find Summer-ya."
"We'll definitely find her!" Penguin yelled, raising a fist in the air. His burst of confidence was inspiring. The rest of the men joined in, cheering their support for their missing nakama.
"Good. I'll keep you updated." Law hung up the den den mushi and Liam followed suit. There were still cheers going around after the call ended, and Liam let them celebrate for a few minutes. They needed to celebrate whatever they could for the time being. Something told him there wouldn't be much to celebrate in the coming weeks.
'Stop being a downer. You'll find her. Just have some faith, like Casper told you...'
"Alright, back to your duties! Those of you who aren't on the clock, I expect to see you training!" Liam yelled, ushering the people into the hallway.
Kat paced the railing of the ship, glancing back at Magneson every once in a while. "Are we almost there?" She asked. The captain didn't turn around.
"If you count six more days as almost there then yes." He scoffed. "I wouldn't. You'd be crazy to think so."
"I wanna see my sister! She's probably just dying to see me again. It's been so long!" Kat said cheerily. A breeze of hot air, laced with salt water, blew past the girl and she giggled from the feeling. "I wonder how much she's changed, and if her hair still looks the same, and if she's still smoking because I hope she has! It's really bad for her."
"Mmm." Came the captain's reply.
"Do you think Viper will be happy to see me again? He hasn't updated me on what's happening in a super long time! I hope everything's alright!" She swished up to Magneson in her flowy dress, watching the fabric flow back and forth as she walked. "So, what's the news anyway?"
"They have her." His monotone voice always came off as creepy to others but Kat thought it was adorable! Even the scar that ran from his temple to his right cheek was kind of cute.
"Oh, yay! So I did help! Hopefully Viper will be proud of me when I get back home!" She spun in a quick circle. "Do you think he'll give me some kind of a reward?"
"Probably not." He stated bluntly. The captain thought perhaps that his negative comment would discourage her from any further comments about anything, but he was sorely mistaken.
"My mother was so worried about me. She kept pestering me about how I would end up just like my sister and be a criminal but she doesn't know what she's talking about! We're not criminals." Instantly, the girl's face became hard and angry. "So I got rid of her." As quickly as the change in expression came, it went, leaving her face a bright and cheery pink.
"The sunlight is just so wonderful, Magneson!" She spun in her floral sundress, a colorful piece she'd found in the chest sent with Magneson's ship. She swayed back and forth just to see it flow around her knees. "Why don't you ever take off that coat? Let Lepus roam free a little!"
Immediately, Magneson's hand went from the ship's wheel to the bunny perched on his shoulder. Petting the small animal's head, his face remained stoic and stony.
"You must be crazy. Lepus is fine where she is." The bunny gave a purr of satisfaction. "Aren't you, Lepus?" He muttered to himself.
Kat watched the scene and smiled. Bunnies were so cute.
*One Week Later*
"Hey, wakey wakey, love!" Viper cackled, tossing the bucket of water onto the slumped over figure. Summer was startled awake, coughing and sputtering weakly. Her body shook from the cold and she heaved shaky breaths.
"Ah…" She hissed, barely able to utter a syllable. The sorry state the girl was in made the pirate captain grin wider. She couldn't have broken that easily.
"Don't tell me...you're sick of my company already? Now, love, you've still got a month to go! Ahahahahaha!" She winced from the loud noise.
Turning to his first mate, he gestured towards the girl. "Untie her."
The last thing Summer was conscious of was the pressure on her wrists suddenly easing and her body being tossed to the floor. Her numb body didn't register the pain, nor the impact. Just the sensation of movement through the air. Then, as her limbs very slowly began to gain feeling she could feel the wooden boards beneath her as her body was dragged across them.
There were muffled sounds from...talking? The ocean? Was it her nakama that she could hear? No, if it were her nakama she wouldn't be feeling this awful. Law would have fixed her up by now, would have made everything better again…
Then, the darkness went away and an intense light surrounded her, blinding her. Her eyes were squeezed shut but the light still filled her vision. Then her body stopped moving and she felt another impact on the deck.
She was lying on her back...or was it her side? Which way was the sky supposed to be? Slowly opening her eyes, all she could make out was blue. It was...so...blue.
"...sunlight...a bit...cage...can...pale!" Summer's consciousness only understood some of the words being spoken, but the voice alone made her cringe.
'That man...' She thought. 'He's still there.'
'Don't think. Don't talk. Just rest.' Part of her said. She grinned, or at least she thought she did. The feeling hadn't returned to her face.
'All my life...I've been fighting. And now...I'm supposed to take it easy?'
'Rest. Your body must recover.'
'Whatever...'
"Doesn't the sun feel lovely?" That voice said, and Summer felt a large presence settle beside her. A horrid smell wafter over her nose, but she was too weak to shy away from it.
"You've spent nearly two weeks in that cell. Two weeks in the dark! Surely a little sun would be good for you. So, take it all in!" Heavy thuds echoed around her as the presence moved. "You've got one hour."
And so Summer lay there, staring up at the sky for as long as they allowed. She could feel the vibrations of men as they walked by her, tending to their jobs on the ship. Sometimes, they would 'mistakenly' walk too close and trip on one of her limbs. A searing pain would flash through her nerves for a moment, but it would always dull soon after to a pulsing throb.
She tried several times to look at her injured wrists where the restraints had been. Her neck was so sore and swollen that she couldn't move it past a certain point, nowhere near close enough to look upon her hands. Finally, she realized she could bring her hand up and look at it that way. However just the thought of raising her arm was too painful to bear and so she dismissed the need to look.
Instead, she continued to stare up wards. At that big, blue sky.
'Hey...' She wondered to herself. 'We share the same sky...Law and I.'
She smiled to herself, just a tiny hint of a smile, finally able to feel her face move.
'Hey...Law...are you watching the same sky? Do you see how beautiful the blue is?'
Many miles away, on a ship that wasn't his own, a pirate captain stood watching the clouds pass by. He held a strangely patterned hat in his hand, gripped tightly by tense knuckles. His bear companion was below deck, obediently following his orders of leaving him be for a moment. He'd much rather be on his own vessel, surrounded by his crew and nakama. But it didn't feel right with one of them missing. It wasn't right. It wasn't home. He sighed for what must have been the twentieth time.
'Five weeks...' He thought. 'You've been gone for five weeks and taken my sanity with you.'
His eyes wandered upwards. In that moment, he thought about how little he had payed attention to the great blue expanse above him. He lived on the one below, it was familiar to him much like a second home, but the one above was as much a mystery to him as was the woman he was after. His eyes narrowed.
He could almost hear her voice, feel the vibrations of her speaking, calling him...But he shook his head.
'Stop imagining what isn't there.' He felt his fists clench of their own volition. A cool wind blew his unruly hair across his face, and he promptly placed the spotted hat back upon his head.
'Stop moping and find her, dammit...' Turning abruptly, he pushed his way back down to below deck.
Pururururu...pururururu...gatcha...
"Stop calling me, god dammit..."
"Nikki, that temper of yours will get you into trouble one day." Viper cackled, hearing the distinct sound of the girl blowing out the smoke from her cigarette.
"My life, my choices. Now, what the hell do you want?"
"I heard your sister called to be picked up somewhere. Has there been any sign of her?" He glanced out of the window, finding Summer still laying on the deck.
'Her hour is almost up.' He thought idly. Nikki sighed on the other end.
"No."
"Well, keep me informed." He moved to hang up the snail but stopped just short. "Oh, I almost forgot. Please let James know what's going on. I think he'll want to know about the death of your mother."
"Mom's dead?"
"Unfortunately, she has passed on from this world."
If Viper expected any sort of grief from the girl, he was sadly mistaken. "Good, she should have dropped dead years ago. Would've saved me a lot of hatred." She took another long drag on her cigarette. "I'll let James know, but not because you asked me to."
"Thank you, my dear."
"I'm not your dear, bastard."
She hung up the phone. Viper laughed.
Arriving in: 31 days
ns 15.158.61.8da2
