Chapter Text
Kid wasn’t exactly sure what had managed to convince him to join forces with Strawhat and be a part of their little suicide mission to attack the navy base of operations. Don’t get him wrong, this was definitely something he would do on his own, even without the execution around the corner, but not this soon after Wano. He wasn’t usually that stupid. . . and yet here he was. He knew that it definitely had something to do with the rivalry that was going between him, Trafalgar, and Strawhat. He couldn’t be the only one not involved with this whole thing, that would make them look better than him by default. There was also the fact that he liked to cause chaos and make things harder for the World Government, and this was the perfect opportunity to do just that handed to him on a silver platter. However, even that didn’t paint the full picture of why he was sailing straight for the plaza with Whitebeard allies flanking either side of his ship.
It was undeniably, in part, because he didn’t want Fire Fist to die. Not because he wanted to fight the man, though he would admit that was part of it, rather that he didn’t agree with the idea that the World Government thought they had a right to execute whoever they damned please for whatever damn reason they decided to pull out of their ass that morning. It wasn’t for them to decide when and how a pirate should die, that was to be decided by battle alone. Whether it be against marines or other pirates, they deserved to go down fighting. He also couldn't deny that the countless stories he had heard about the man during his time in Wano that had swayed his ultimate decision to fight for Fire Fist’s freedom. The general consensus on him was that he was a good man who did not deserved to have his life ended in such a pathetic way. He should have an honorable death.
Kid rolled his eyes at Whitebeard’s dramatic entrance, loudly telling his crew that the old man was being far too flashy for someone of his elderly status, but he was, in all actuality, rather impressed by it. That’s the kind of entrance he would want to have to this shitshow, if he hadn’t already agreed to do a certain job that restricted him from doing so. Some people get all of the fun, he thought as he crossed his arms. He drowned out most of the conversation that subsequently took place between Whitebeard and Ace, as well as everything said by the marines. He really didn’t care all too much. He was here to fight, not listen to anymore sob stories.
He was just about to mockingly yawn when Whitebeard lifted his naginata up and stabbed the weapon into the deck below his feet, raising his arms up high from where he stood at the helm of the Moby Dick. Kid leaned forward in anticipation, hands itching to take action. The old man crossed his arms over his stomach, closed fists pointed stiffly in opposite directions, before swinging them outward, punching the air on either side of him.
Cracks ran up the air, all originating from his clenched fists. The sounds of the marines exclaiming in surprise reached his ears as the cracks grew larger in size, and he couldn’t help but wonder how the hell these people didn’t know about Whitebeard’s power. The guy was a living legend, how does one simply not know anything about him? But regardless of their reasons for not knowing, Kid had to focus on what was happening instead of getting caught up on the marines lack of intelligence. As the cracks traveled further, the water below them became unstable and violent. He himself was able to stay upright just fine as the ship rocked, but he could hear multiple members of his crew hitting the deck and scrambling to grab ahold of something to keep themselves stable.
Kid felt a rush of adrenaline course through his body as Whitebeard brought the waves up over the whole of Marineford. One wrong move and they’d all be killed, but Kid wouldn’t have it any other way. Salt water sprayed onto the deck, all but soaking everyone below the ankle, and the ships rocked back and forth in a violent manner. The crew behind him were equal parts excited and horrified at the display of raw power by the Whitebeard Pirates captain, and Kid couldn't blame them. It truly was a sight to behold. The power to destroy the world indeed.
The rocking of the ship was put to an abrupt stop as the tsunami was frozen into long, overarching sheets of ice that covered the ocean in front of and below them, leaving behind an all new battlefield for which they were to fight on. Kid had to shift his weight the slightest bit as the ship was left crooked in the ice. So far everything was going according to plan, now he just had to hold up his end of the bargain.
“You ready to go, partner? About time we got things moving along.” His first mate said, coming up to stand by his side. Behind them, the crew were now also itching to get out on the battlefield. Gone was what little bit of nervousness and fear that they briefly felt, replaced by a blood lust all too common on his crew. Some of them swaying side to side or literally jumping with excitement, weapons and devil fruit abilities alike at the ready. Up ahead, he could spot marines jumping down from the plaza above, also armed to the teeth and ready to fight. Well, armed to the teeth for now that is.
“I was fucking born ready for this.” Is how he replied. Kid’s lips upturned into a smirk and he cracked his knuckles. Around him, the metal scraps he had collected on the way to Marineford began to twitch from where they lay scattered around the deck as his devil fruit came to life. He raised his hand and motioned for his crew to advance. They let out excited cheers as they rushed past him like a tidal wave, leaping for the ice below like animals descending onto prey. To the left and right of their own ship, he could spot other crews doing the same.
He and Killer exchanged twin nods before also jumping for the now battlefield. The two of them parted ways directly after their feet connected with the thick ice, his partner rushing to join in with the others on the ground battle and Kid himself preparing to act as air support. He marched his way further onto the ice, trying to get further away from the Victoria Punk so that she wouldn’t sustain too much damage. He punched the few odd marines that got too close, sending them crashing to the ground in motionless heaps, until he was standing on a relatively empty part of the now full blown battlefield. He was nearly halfway to the wall that separated them from the plaza. He was in the perfect position to do what he had to.
Smirk twisting into a jagged smile that his crew have told him countless times was “terrifying”, he raised his metal hand up into the air, purple sparks of energy dancing along the surface of his prosthetic. Several of the marines that happened to be close yelled out in alarm and horror as the weapons they had been holding were torn free from their grips to join the swirling vortex of junk high up in the sky. Why they still carried magnetic weapons to this war when it was known that he was going to be here, Kid didn’t know. He didn’t like to be underestimated so it pissed him right off, but he’ll do all his bitching later after he’s kicked all of their asses.
He jumped up onto the spinning saucer that would act as the base for his creation and let out a chuckle as it spun into the air to join the rest of the scraps that were swirling and combining together above him. The wiring sound of the massive arms assembling themselves signaled him to raise his own arms up to allow the bases to attach themselves to his own arm. He grunted at the added weight, but adjusted quickly enough to be ready for when the rest of the metal monstrosity formed itself around him, until he was sat perfectly in the center of Punk Rotten.
Sitting in the pretentious little thrones, Kid could see the three main admirals watching him. Their expressions were that of curiosity, rather than the fear it should be . Well that would change here real soon. Without missing a beat, Kid brought one of his big metal fists high up into the sky before swinging it with as much momentum as he could muster, right down onto the wall without giving any of the admirals so much as a chance to react.
An almost manic chuckle escaped his lips as he met eyes with none other than Admiral Kizaru, who was jumping right for him and readying an attack that was likely intended to bring Punk Rotten down. Now this was the kind of fight he was looking for. He didn’t give a damn about any of those small fry down there, he wanted a real challenge. Although he hadn’t been assigned to fight Kizaru during the debriefing, surely it wouldn’t hurt to trade a few blows. Besides, Pirate Hunter and Black Leg weren’t even over here yet, who else was going to hold him off? It had to be him, he reasoned to himself internally.
But before he could fight the other man, he had to finish his task. Dodging out of the way of the first attack aimed at him with as much grace as a giant metal monster could have, he detached several metal plates from Punk Rotten’s back and flew them down to the hole he had created in the wall. The plates stuck themselves together and then attached to the hole, effectively creating a ramp that the retrieval unit could use in order to get up to the plaza.
His grin widened when he spotted the disguised group rushing up the ramp, well on their way to rescuing Portgas. That meant his job was technically done and he could focus on the fight he was already halfway engaged in. He swerved to the side just in time to miss another beam of light that had been aimed directly at the heart of Punk Rotten.
“You don’t think that silly little opening is going to be effective for long, do you? Kizaru drawled. He hovered in the air a few feet away from Kid. His hands were in his pockets and his nose had a condescending upturn to it. “We’ve already given the order to raise the walls. You’re little crew and everyone else foolish enough to show up today is as good as dead once we’ve got them trapped up on the plaza.”
At this, Kid couldn’t help but laugh. He’d used his devil fruit to ruin those walls long before even Whitebeard had made his entrance, long before even he was close enough to Marineford to be seen. All without any one in the navy even having the slightest clue what he was up to. It had admittedly been hard to pull off with the amount of concentration needed to control the metal from that far away, but he was Eustass ‘Captain’ Kid, of course he was able to accomplish it. They would be lucky to get those things working within the next week, let alone in time to be of any use today.
“You’re dumber than I thought you were if you think we hadn’t already taken that possibility into account. Those walls ain't raising anytime soon and you ain’t winnin’ this fight.” Kid said after his laughter had died down enough to talk.
Kizaru lazily raised an eyebrow at the statement. “Oh?” He drawled. “I knew they were taking much too long to raise… Oh well…You people still won’t be winning. The odds are stacked against you.”
“Wanna bet?” Kid asked in a cocky manner. He didn’t give the other man the chance to respond as he swiftly brought his left arm up and swung deftly at the admiral in front of him. He, of course, wasn’t foolish enough to think that the attack would land on the first try. No, that had more of been a way to let the admiral know he intended to fight, not talk.
Kizaru disappeared into an explosion of light particles and reappeared above Kid, finger glowing and pointed down at him as he readied another attack. Kid swung around, bringing another arm up to attack the admiral, who simply dodged out of the way with ease and fired off his beam of light. It clipped the side of Punk Rotten’s arm with a loud, indescribable sound when Kid was too slow to react in time to fully dodge out of the way.
The damage meant little to him, though, as he had plenty of metal around him to quickly repair the gouging hole that was left behind in its wake. All it took was an upward tilt of his head to bring several more marine swords sailing up towards him to cover the hole with a loud metal screech.
“My, my…what a bothersome devil fruit you have.” Kizaru said. He kicked a glowing leg towards Kid, who rolled out of the way of the attack. The beam of light that was produced from the kick collided with a portion of the ice below and exploded in a spectacular glittering shower of ice and flashing lights. Below, pirates and marines alike yelled out in shock, outrage, and pain. Kid subtly gulped and thanked whatever, if any, god that was out there that he had managed to get out of the way of that.
“Not as bothersome as yours is.” He retaliated. He raised both arms and swung them towards each other faster than the admiral could dodge away. The loud metallic clap was accompanied by the crunching of metal as the force of the blow deformed several parts of the hands. “Punk vise!”
He exuded as much force as he could into smashing the two hands together, but it wasn’t effective for very long as the admiral shifted his form into that of light and slipped through the cracks in Kid’s metal fingers. He was at least a little proud to see that the man’s sunglasses and tie were a bit askew, a small, barely noticeable, trickle of blood leaking from his nose.
“Looks like I’ll have to get serious after all.” Kizaru said in an annoyed voice, as if he had expected taking Kid on to be child's play. How laughable. Kizaru fixed his tie and ran a hand through his hair before splaying one palm forward and closing his other hand into a fist, drawing it outward and producing a sword made of light. Kid reared his arm back for a punch.
Kid and Kizaru attacked each other at the same time. Three out of five of the metal golem’s fingers were sliced free, sending them flying and crashing into the ice below, but that didn’t stop Kid for long. Once again, the damage was instantly repaired, this time the detached fingers themselves came flying up from the waters and reattaching themselves to the hand with three loud clashes. He could tell that his ability to repair Punk Rotten so quickly was starting to get the admiral’s nerves, but honestly that was on him. He should have taken the threat of Kid seriously and not left him with an entire battlefield of materials to work with in the first place if he didn’t want this to happen.
Kizaru doubled down on his efforts to take Kid down, now focusing on aiming for Kid’s real body sitting high up on Punk Rotten’s back. He had obviously caught on to the fact that he was not going to get anywhere attacking the body of the Golem itself, not while Kid still had an abundance of metal available to him. Unless he was able to blow the whole body away with that leg attack of his, this fight would go nowhere.
They traded blows between each other, but neither of them seemed to be able to do any significant damage to the other. Kid was becoming accustomed to the older man’s attack patterns the longer the fight went on, making the stray blows that Kizaru landed on Punk Rotten fewer and farther between. Kizaru had also become comfortable with Kid’s (honestly predictable) method of attack, effortlessly dodging every single swing of the giant metal hands. Kid wasn’t too worried about the stagnant pace they had settled themselves into, though. The goal of this fight wasn’t for him to win this time around, he was just a distraction for now.
Speaking of…
He smirked over at the admiral as he dodged another attack. “Looks like our fun is over admiral, we should fight for real some day” He said.
The admiral opened his mouth as if to ask Kid what he meant by that, but he would never have the chance. From behind, both Pirate Hunter and Black Leg leaped over his head, their respective attacks ready. Kizaru didn’t have time to dodge as both Yonko commanders landed their blows to separate parts of his body, a flaming kick from the Strawhat’s cook connecting with his pompous face, and a three-sworded attack slicing through his middle. His parts went flying in opposite directions, but he quickly dissipated into particles and reformed several feet away.
“Sorry it took us so long to get here,” Sanji said. He landed on one of Punk Rotten’s arms with his flaming leg still lifted in the air, Zoro on the other with his swords at the ready. That irked Kid how buddy-buddy they were being with him, and it took all his willpower to not dump the two idiots onto the ground right then and there. They were lucky that they were his allies right now.
“We ran into an unexpected problem with a couple of giant commanders.” Zoro explained past the sword between his teeth. How that moron could still talk with that thing lodged in his mouth Kid would never understand. He did sound pretty stupid though, so maybe he couldn't talk perfectly afterall.
“I don’t give a damn. Just do your jobs.” He told them. He pulled Punk Rotten’s arms away from them aggressively, prompting them to jump down to the ice below. The two of them shared a brief look before rushing at Kizaru as one. The man was raising his sword of light to counter the two of them.
“Oh? Do you really think you can beat me this time, swordsman?” Kid heard Kizaru say as he maneuvered Punk Rotten away from the fight.
Just for the hell of it, he swiped at a few groups of marines, sending them screaming into the air. Raising a hand, he ripped the weapons away from those same marines, as well as those in his general vicinity and sent them spinning up into the sky above punk rotten. The marines yelled out in surprise, several of them jumping after their swords or guns in an effort to get them back, but they were unsuccessful in their retrieval attempts. The few dumb enough to not let go in time were cut and bashed by the weapons and scraps as they were pulled into the vortex, bodies falling down to the ice below soon after.
Though he felt like he could still fight as of this moment, Kid could feel himself losing energy the more metal he tried to control. He would not be able to operate both the vortex and punk rotten together for much longer. Fighting a navy admiral, even for the short amount of time that he did, probably hadn’t done much to lessen the workload he was putting in either. Well, maybe he should return their weapons to them for a little while.
“Repel!” He yelled, thrusting a hand down towards the battlefield. The hundreds, if not thousands, of swords he had collected immediately turned to face downward as they rushed back towards their original owners, who all screamed and scrambled to dodge out of the way.
“Ey! Be more careful! We’re down here too, ya bleedin’ moron!” He heard one of his crew members shout from somewhere in the crowd. It sounded vaguely like Slick, but he couldn't be sure.
“Sorry,” He called down, not all too apologetically. His crew knew how unpredictable he was, they could dodge if they really needed to. He wouldn’t use that move again though, just because he was so nice. Plus, their allied crews might not know to dodge like his would. It wasn’t very helpful if he killed his allies along with the enemies, there was strength in numbers right now.
He was just in the middle of side swiping a group of marines with one of his large hands when Sengoku’s voice boomed over a transponder snail, shouting, “They’ve freed Fire Fist! All units converge on him and use deadly force!”
Every one of the marines that had been rushing to attack him abruptly changed course, skidding to a stop and turning to rush towards the plaza instead. Kid followed the direction that the marines were running in with his eyes and, sure enough, he spotted the retrieval unit. They were down by more than half of their members, just as predicted, and they were rushing the man they were here to save in the direction of Trafalgars stupid sub. They were still up on the plaza, but he knew they would reach the ice in a matter of minutes.
His grin widened at the sight, impressed that their plan was working this well so far. But he had to remind himself that they’ve only gotten through the easy stuff up until now. The hardest part was still ahead of them; actually getting Fire Fist off of the battlefield.
“Don’t you ignore me!” He shouted out to the marines who had turned away from him. A few of them looked over their shoulders and screamed just in time to meet the metal surface of his open palm. He had to keep as many of them from going after Portgas as possible.
Below him he spotted two giant commanders going after Killer, and absentmindedly wondered if those were the same guys that Rororona and Black Foot got caught up with. They certainly had enough bleeding wounds for it to be them. Regardless, he figured he’d make things easier for his partner as he spotted that both foolish commanders were wearing thick metal accessories on their person. With a flick of his wrist, the two were suddenly pulled towards each other before they could reach Killer. They both screamed as one giant’s chain necklace became horrifically entangled with the others decorative wrist shackles.
“I could have handled them myself, Kid!” Killer shouted up to him.
“I know you could have.” He said simply. The giant commanders were struggling to pull away from each other, squirming like little worms and yanking on the tangled accessories uselessly, so he decided to be oh so kind and free them. “Repel!” Kid shouted. The tangle strained for a moment before the pressure became too much and the chain around the other man’s neck exploded, sending little pieces of metal in every direction. The two of them launched in opposite directions with enough force to send them crashing into opposite sides of the stone wall with resounding booms, clouds of stone dust shooting up around their fallen bodies.
“Show off!” Killer playfully yelled up at him before cutting down a group of marines that had tried to sneak up on him from behind.
“You love it!” Kid shouted back in a more taunting manner.
They both easily settled into a familiar joint style of attack, fighting side by side and only interfering if necessary. Though there was far more interference on Kid’s side than on Killer’s. Both because of the current difference in size, and the fact that Kid couldn’t help but knock aside any marines he thought were getting too close to Killer while he was occupied. His partner was capable, but this was an absurd amount of enemies to take on and he didn’t want to risk the other man being injured even minorly.
Kid could feel perspiration beading at his brow, breath beginning to come out in laboured puffs of air. He was really at his limit here, but the fight was not nearly over just yet. He could see most of the pirate crews retreating, sure, but that didn’t mean shit. The marines were still going to hunt them down and the big bads weren’t just going to let them get away without a hitch. Someone had to stay behind to help clear the path for the retrieval units, as well as do their best to hold off the admirals so that as many people as possible were able to get away relatively unharmed. Kid didn’t know how much longer he would be able to provide that support, but he would make do.
He heard a loud cry of “No!” from the ramp he had set up earlier in the battle and his head snapped in that direction just in time to watch Portgas and the Strawhat’s navigator free fall from the hole in the wall. The remains of the ramp were laying in a smoldering pile on the ice below, steam rising from the ground as the heat began to melt away the ice, and it didn’t take a genius to realize what had happened.
He jerked into action, intending to go catch them, but Big Mom’s storm cloud and Nico Robin beat him to it. Just before either of them could crack their heads open on the hard ice or fall into the pile of melted scraps, the cloud caught Cat Burglar at the same time that a pair of perfectly manicured hands spouted from the ice to cradle Portgas gently. He could see two more of Strawhat's crew members running towards the pair to help out. To make it easier on them, Kid gave a swipe of his own hand and the smoldering remains went flying in a different direction, giving them more room to assess the damage and carry on with the mission if at all possible.
Unfortunately a vice Admiral, some ugly bloke with a horrible mustache, took his distraction as an opening. He felt one of Punk Rotten’s arms fall to pieces just in time to turn and dodge out of the way of an attack that was intended for his real body.
“Rude ass piece of shit!” He yelled, enraged. He sent the man flying with a heavy punch to the head with Punk Rotten’s remaining arm. Out of the corner of his eyes he spotted Kaido’s son running through the marines with Portgas on his back. Even from here, this far up in the sky, he could see blood soaking into the otherwise white fur of the other man’s back. They would be needing some help if they hoped to reach Trafalgar before Portgas bled to death. He gave Killer a short jerk of his head as a way of telling him to take over the fight with the annoying vice admiral, who was already clambering to his feet and making his way back over on swift legs. Killer nodded in return and ran at the man, his manic laughter bubbling out of his throat and the blades of his punishers spinning.
Turning his attention back on the fleeing duo, Kid chose to not assemble himself a new arm for Punk Rotten and instead focus more on helping them escape. This whole thing would be for nothing if Portgas died now. Raising Punk Rotten’s remaining arm, he brought all of the weapons he had collected during the fight and sent them down towards the ground below. “Punk Corna Dio!” He exclaimed out as the familiar metal bull he had used in his fight against Big Mom assembled itself.
The bull let out a loud, metallic moo, beating its front hoof against the ice a few times before taking off running at one of the large groups of marines that had been attempting to follow after Kaido’s son and Fire Fist, knocking them down like bowling pins and trampling their bodies. It then redirected to charge at one of the giant commanders that Kid had sent flying earlier. The large man was charging towards the retreating duo with his weapon held high above his head. He didn’t even have a chance to react before the horns of the metal beast connected with his side and sent him, once again, tumbling head over heels.
Kid couldn’t help but let out a tired chuckle at the havoc the bull was causing. It wasn’t a permanent fix to the marines on their asses, but it would help for now. His vision began to grow fuzzy around the edges, his body now all but running on fumes at this point.
“We can’t hang out for much longer, Kid, we’re reaching our limits!” Killer shouted up to him. He blocked a blow from a random marine and sliced upwards across the man's chest, sending him crashing to the ice with an arch of blood. Kid took a tired look around the battlefield, trying to spy out his crew amongst the crowds and found that almost all of the pirates in general were beginning to grow sluggish with an exhaustion similar to his own. It was about time to wrap things up or his whole crew would end up dropping, as would everyone else.
He was just about to call for his crew to retreat when he felt a burning pain tear through his chest, followed by a flash of light that disappeared just as quickly as it had made its presence known. He grunted in pain, blood instantly bubbling up his throat and dripping from between his clenched teeth. He struggled to keep Punk Rotten stable in the sky as he shakingly lowered his gaze down to his chest, only to have his eyes catch sight of a large gaping wound now glaringly obvious through the left side of his ribs. It was bleeding rapidly, quickly staining the front of his shirt and running down Punk Rotten’s front
“Kid!” Killer and several other members of his crew shouted as one.
“That ability of yours is getting in the way far too much.” Kizaru’s annoying voice drawled as the man materialized in front of him, coat billowing out behind him and hands tucked lazily in his pants pockets.
“Get out of here you guys!” Kid shouted in a strained manner as soon as he spotted Killer getting ready to attack Kizaru. He knew his partner was far too exhausted to stand a chance in that fight. Kid leveled the first mate with a glare and the other hesitated for a moment before lowering his punishers and turning towards their crew.
“Everyone retreat to the Punk!” Killer shouted and the crew immediately moved to follow the orders. Kid painfully sighed in relief before turning his gaze to the admiral, who was preparing another attack.
“Couldn’t get enough of me, eh?” Kid asked, still managing to sound cocky despite the situation he was in. He coughed harshly, blood spraying from his mouth. His breath was coming out thready and his vision was now tunneled. Through rapidly fading vision, Kid watched as Kizaru raised a glowing leg and kicked it in his direction. His reaction time was slow, but he was still able to jerk Punk Rotten to the side just in time for the attack to only tear through the left side, taking out most of the skull, as well as part of the main body, but leaving Kid himself without any further damage.
"I told you that the odds were stacked against you, 'Captain' Kid." Kizaru said, lifting his leg for another attack.
If staying conscious was difficult before, it was ten times harder now. Blood was flooding out of his mouth and his lungs were gurgling with the effort to keep him breathing. He couldn’t go out without style, he reasoned to himself as he channeled every single bit of his remaining energy into one last attack that should buy the rest of his allies at least a little more time.
“Assign!” He yelled with a weak raise of his hand.
A big 'S' appeared in the center of Kizaru’s chest and he was just barely able to look down at it in surprise before his body was jerked backwards, rapidly hurtling towards the 'N' that had appeared on the plaza wall halfway across the battlefield. Kid let out one last, breathy laugh as the man crashed into the wall with a greater explosion than the giant commanders had created. He was relieved to see that the admiral was indeed stuck to the wall, unable to free himself no matter how much he strained against the force holding him down. Kid wished he’d done that a lot sooner.
With that done, he no longer had the ability to hold the metal golem together, finally well past the point of exhaustion. Around him, the metal beast began to fall to pieces and descend at a rapid pace towards the ice. All of the air left his body and a spray of blood exited his lips as Punk Rotten made contact with the thick layer of ice, breaking through the hard surface and sinking to the depths below. His ears were ringing and his chest was heaving as he began to sink along with the wreckage, unable to move his body so much as an inch without causing burning pain. He had pushed himself too hard and this was his reward.
He weakly forced his head to flop to the side despite the pain it caused so that he could cough up the blood that was attempting to choke him and caught sight of Admiral Aokiji advancing on Portgas’s still form. Kaido’s son was half frozen to the ground and crying out next to them, unable to move to interfere with what was about to happen.
Well damn, he thought to himself as his view of them was cut off by a thick layer of ice and his head was slowly submerged by the water. Their rescue mission hadn’t even been a success. He was only able to hold his breath for a few seconds before bubbles escaped his mouth and water quickly replaced air, joining with the blood in his lungs in order to suffocate him. His body was too weak to even struggle against the effects of the drowning, even as his lungs burned. With the sea water sucking the last of his energy out of his body, combined with the fluids rapidly filling his lungs, he finally lost consciousness. The last thing he saw before black consumed his vision was a figure, jumping into the hole he had left behind, illuminated by the sun shining through the rippling waters.
⚙️⚙️⚙️
He groaned the second his senses started to gradually come back to him. He was instantly pissed to find that he wasn’t on the good stuff, and was, in fact, in a fair amount of pain. He might honestly have preferred to wake up in the afterlife.
He wished he could say that he woke up slowly and peacefully from there, but unfortunately someone chose to jump into his bed at the same time he felt a throbbing pain settle itself into the wound on his chest, waking him abruptly and painfully. He wheezed and shot into a sitting position as the person who had all but crossbodied him latched onto his neck and hugged him tight, crying some nonsense about how they had thought they lost him. He awkwardly brought his weak hand up to pat them on the back as he slowly regained the rest of his consciousness. He blinked several times to get the blurriness out of his vision and a plain, white, undecorated room came into view. Must be some kind of infirmary, but it certainly wasn’t his. The whole Victoria Punk had a darker theme. He would admit that their infirmary had a bit of a…morgue look about it.
“Dive, you can’t do that to someone who is on bed rest! You’re the medical professional, you should fucking know that!” Killer’s voice shouted angrily. The weight of the other person was torn away from him. He grimaced in pain as he flopped back down onto the stiff bed he was laying on. He blinked lazily and turned his head to the side to catch sight of Killer holding Dive up by the back of her dress. The small woman had her arms crossed over her chest and a pout decorated her face, goggles askew across her forehead. He had just enough time to catch sight of Bomb running out of the room and knew that meant he would have the rest of the crew in the room in a matter of minutes.
“That hurt you little bitch.” He said affectionately, his voice coming out horse from underuse. He wondered how long he’s been out.
He briefed a glance at his own body to assess the damage and found that nearly his whole torso was wrapped in a thick layer of bandaging. There was thankfully no blood seeping out from where he had last seen the wound that landed him here. He had several large bruises running up the expanse of his skin and he suspected that he had even more underneath the blankets and the wrappings, if the ache in his body was to be trusted. His prosthetic was missing and he could only assume that had gotten in the way of whatever surgeries they had put him through, either that or whoever ended up fishing him out of the water couldn’t handle the added weight and had to ditch it. That was fine though, he could just make a new one.
“Sorry, boss, got a little excited.” Dive said sheepishly.
“That’s no excuse,” Killer interjected as he dropped her to the ground with little care. The little woman glared up at him as she fixed her dress and righted her goggle. “You could have reopened one of his wounds!”
“Psh, she’s fine,” Kid said with a lazy and dismissive wave of his hand.
“Kid, you had a hole shot through your lung and you drowned! You flatlined twice!” Killer exclaimed. Kid shrugged.
“Wouldn’t be the first time and won’t be the last.” He said with a grin. Killer sighed.
“You’re so lucky we put up with your ass.” He said with a shake of his head.
“Don’t be like that, you know you love me,” Kid teased. Killer didn’t respond, but he did sit down next to Kid's bed on a wooden stool that the younger man hadn’t noticed until now. Dive situated herself onto the foot of the bed. The woman was so small she barely took up any space. He took the moment of silence to ask, “Where the hell are we anyway?”
“Trafalgar’s submarine.” Killer responded. Well that explained why it was taking longer for his crew to show up than what was typical. He assumed that this metallic death trap had to have some sort of weight limit. Also explained the boring ass décor. Trafalgar was boring as hell.
“Yeah, we couldn’t get your heart to start up proper again and the damage to your lung was too large for me to handle, so we had to meet up with the Hearts a few miles away from Marineford.” Dive said. She said it in a nonchalant manner, but he could hear the disappointment in her voice. She was the ship's doctor and she probably felt as though she had failed him in some way because she hadn’t been able to treat him herself.
“Hey, I’m sure you did a damn good job with what you had. Not everyone can have fancy devil fruits to help them with surgery.” He told her. He waited until she cracked a small smile, and then closed his eyes, feeling worn out even from just this small talk. It was, of course, at that moment that the rest of the crew burst in through the infirmary door. Because why would he be able to rest?
Fortunately Killer was able to leap off of his stool and move to hold most of them back, which gave mostly everyone else the general idea that it would not be a good idea to dogpile Kid like they usually would. Those who did make themselves comfortable on his bed did so gently, settling themselves down comfortably around him instead of jumping on. Heat and wire sat on either side of his pillow, House sat at the end of the bed with Dive, and Slick and Bomb situated themselves on either side of his hips. The remaining crowd members of the crew settled themselves on the floor surrounding the bed, piling on top of each other in order to be closer to him and fighting over who got to sit on the stool. He was grateful to find that almost everyone was here and in relatively good health, less grateful that they all started talking at once.
He wasn’t able to distinguish what they were saying, voices all overlapping and merging into one big, loud buzz. Killer looked just about done with everyone, one hand on his hip and the other up on his mask as if to imitate the action of pinching the bridge of his nose. Kid leaned further back into the pillow, sighed deeply, and accidently made direct eye contact with Heat. The older man simply gave him a “not my problem” shrug. Bastard. He had to do all of the work around here, even on his sick bed.
“Oi! Shut up the lot of you!” Kid yelled with the little energy his exhausted body had. Their blabbering instantly stopped and the crew all looked at him expectantly. The fight for the stool ceased and Bubblegum fell on his ass with a yelp, Quincy taking full residence of the seat for herself while everyone was focused on Kid.
“We’re glad you’re okay, boss.” House said nervously. “Everyone else made it out too. . . In case you were wondering.”
“We’re a strong crew, of course we made it out just fine.” He said with his signature smirk. He then put on a serious expression, preparing himself to ask a question he needed to know the answer to. “I gotta know this, though. Did the mission fail?”
Whether or not they all made it out, the overall goal was to free Portgas and stick it to the government, all of the pain and the near loss of his own life would have been for nothing if the man had ended up dying regardless. However, instead of the room being filled with somber looks, or ones of guilt and regret, he watched as his crew all began to smile. Even House, with her timid nature, cracked a bright smile.
“Fire fist made it, he’s recovering just down the hall.” Killer piped up when no one else did.
“What do you take us for? Of course the mission didn’t fail.” Wire said in a haughty and dismissive tone. This caused Kid to let out a loud, fully bellied laugh that left his wound aching. He clutched his stomach in pain as he relaxed into the pillows.
“What am I saying? Of course it didn’t! We did amazing out there. We’re the best damn crew there is!” Kid yelled joyously. His crew cheered as one, their loud voices once again filling the room. “When I get out of here we’re throwing a celebration and getting drunk as hell!”
Killer’s yelling about how Kid wasn’t allowed to have booze while he recovered was drowned out by his crew cheering a second time. Some of them even pumped their fists into the air in glee.
“All of you off the Tang at once! Submarines have a weight capacity for a reason!” Trafalgar shouted as he burst into the room, looking frazzled and out of breath. Kid couldn’t help but laugh harder at the man's distress, but his crew seemed startled by the man’s entrance and some of them immediately pushed past him to escape the room.
Kid felt himself grow tired and his eyes began to droop with the need to sleep as his crew shamefully exited the room with their heads hung low, herded out by the polar bear, who looked just as angry as Trafalgar himself, if not angrier. Trafalgar was quick to come over and hit him over the head with a clipboard, ignoring Kid’s tired complaints about patient abuse, before conducting a quick checkup on his wounds and vitals. He, too, was then quick to leave the room, shutting the door lightly behind him with the recommendation to get some more rest.
In the end the only ones left in the small space were Killer, Heat, and Wire. His three oldest friends and confidants. Killer sat back down on the stool. Heat and Wire hadn’t moved from their spots on his bed. The energy in the room was a rare one, something he hadn't felt since he was a teenager back on their home island. It was quiet and comfortably familiar. He felt safe and content at the moment.
“You did a good job, Kid.” He heard Killer say just before he drifted off into a peaceful sleep.