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Chapter Text

 After several more days of sailing and a bit of drama involving which fishermen were doing the best fishing to feed everyone that led to Usopp dying his competition’s rods bright orange which somehow Bepo got blamed for before everything was sorted, it was decided by the strategists of the alliance that it was time to plan.

 Luffy was supplied with a large rib roast to at least keep him in the room to absorb the plan by osmosis and maybe make interesting suggestions that sane people wouldn’t think to consider.

 “The shelf from the island isn’t that long, maybe a mile out at most in places,” Kin’emon said, pointing at the map. “After that it’s a fairly steep drop into deeper waters. There’s an even deeper trench off the west side. We used to send divers down there in tests of courage.”

 “Also to collect really nice pearls from the deep-sea oysters,” Kanjuro added. “Oh, and to collect special mussels for food. We shall have to get Sanji some to cook with once this is over. Excellent ingredients.”

 “What about the mountain? What’s the terrain like?” Law asked.

 “The beaches are dark with volcanic sand,” Kin’emon said. “And the rich soil gave us vast jungles. The volcano that made the island fell dormant before the Void Century, and its mountains are in the center of the island. The north and west have some cliffs, but most of the coastline is made of beaches. There are no hidden harbors, which is why we shall come at night.”

 “We’re sure none of the volcanoes are active?” Nami asked.

 “Very, unless that Red Dog Admiral comes and wakes them up again,” Dogstorm said.

 Marco snorted at the description of Akainu. “He’s actually not a red dog anymore. He’s Fleet Admiral now, so it’s just Sakazuki.”

 “As the authority on dogs I’ll call him what I wish,” Dogstorm said.

 “If we can get to the Kid and Hawkins pirates they’ll probably side with us over Kaido. Kid’s crew especially,” Drake said. “Kid is still imprisoned the palace. We’ll need a group to get him out, probably separate from the Ponegylph team.”

 “Hmm…I should obviously be on the Poneglyph team and we’ll likely be working in some capacity with Pudding and her crew,” Robin mused.

 “The jailbreak crew should bring Chopper, to help with any injuries,” Jinbe said. “Law will likely be occupied with Kaido.”

  “So…Kaido,” Marco said. “What’s the plan for him?”

 “We’re going to try Conqueror’s Haki,” Ace said. “Luffy and I together are probably equal to Shanks by now. But we’ll need backup, so you, Luffy, Sabo, and Koala will come too.”

 “We’ve all got such different ways of fighting, one of us has to have something that works on Kaido, right?” Luffy asked. “Or at least come up with something when we’re doing it with smarty-pants like Marco and Traffy around.”

 “Point taken,” Marco said. “That leaves Dogstorm, Cat Viper, Kin’emon, Jozu, Drake, and Jinbe in charge down here…”

 “I vote Momonosuke stays with the Barto Club,” Law said. “That way Bartolomeo can protect him and the rookies stay out of the thick of the fighting.”

 Luffy gave Law a thumbs-up for that, too busy licking some rib bones clean to reply. Bartolomeo looked overjoyed to be given such an important job and began proclaiming his intent to do Luffy proud while the discussion continued.

 “Yes, keeping Momonosuke out of danger is paramount,” Kin’emon said. Ace nodded.

 “We know Kaido’s numbers aren’t at where he wanted them, because we stopped Caesar from giving him the artificial Zoans, right?” Nami asked.

 “Well…probably. We found evidence on Punk Hazard that he’d already manufactured some, don’t know how many, yoi,” Marco said, shaking his head. “Or how well they work.”

 “We have a lot of seastone bullets, so that’ll help,” Sabo said. “…Why only Zoans?”

 “Kaido likes Zoans best,” Marco said, shrugging. “It’s kind of a thing for his crew.”

 “So…we can assume a general lack of Logia and Paramecia?” Robin mused. “Outside of the press-ganged rookies, anyway.”

 “General lack, yes, total lack, no,” Kin’emon said. “There were a few likely Paramecia involved in the initial assault.”

 “Still, that gives us something to work with. We can bring things to interfere with enhanced animal senses, like Sanji and Penguin’s spices,” Law said.

 “Sanji might get mad at you weaponizing the kitchen,” Luffy pointed out.

 Law scowled, “It’s not wasting food, it’s wasting certain ingredients. That’s totally different!”

.o.o.o.

 It took Law three hours of arguing to convince Sanji it was totally different.

 “It’s like throwing sand in someone’s face, but the sand is cinnamon!” seemed to have been the winning argument. Zoro wasn’t sure if Sanji had actually agreed or just been worn down by the Law’s capital-D Determination.

 Zoro sipped his beer. The fight had gone on all through dinner preparations (with Sanji threatening to break Law’s pelvis like Yonji’s if he made Penguin, Sanji, and the other chefs late) and had honestly been a nice afternoon drama to doze to.

 Dinner was spread out on the decks, because apparently it was time to reveal the scheming to the crews at large, and their temporary Big Mom allies. Zoro wasn’t sold on them, outside Pekoms. Pekoms had been around enough to know him a little.

 And Pekoms only seemed to hang around Pudding. Huh.

 “We have multiple groups planned for this,” Marco explained. “Handling the Poneglyph, the Wano rebels, the other crews, and Kaido himself, yoi.”

 “All right, let’s pick teams!” Luffy said, punching the air.

 “…Are there, er, team captains?” Drake asked slowly. Zoro smirked at Drake’s apprehensive expression. This was going to be good.

 “Huh. That would make sense…but no!” Luffy said. Zoro, Law, and Franky all laughed. “Ace, Sabo, Law, Koala, me, and Marco are going to kick Kaido’s butt once we find him! But we need a plan before that!”

 “Which we have…to some extent,” Law said.

 “Some extent?” Drake asked.

 “That’s actually really good, situation considered,” Marco said.

 Drake looked to Dogstorm, Cat Viper, Kin’emon, Bartolomeo, and Pudding for help. None of them noticed.

 Point in Pudding’s favor, in Zoro’s opinion, to go along with this so well.

 “So anyway, when we get there we’re going to be really, really sneaky!” Luffy said. “So, everyone who can is going to crowd on the sub so we can do that! Then, being sneaky, we’re going to find the other samurai and Kid and Hawkings—but not Apoo. Drake says really, really not Apoo.”

 “He’s really on Kaido’s side or whatever,” Law said. “So, first we get our allies on the island and get some intel from them. During that time, the Scalpel will have made extra trips for reinforcements and Jinbe’s whale shark pals will hopefully have told us the best nearby spot to stash the other ships unseen. Once we have the intel, we’ll begin the assault. I don’t expect anything too organized out of this lot, but general coherency and remembering who’s on your side is important.”

 “We’ll have a few teams then,” Marco said. “Bartolomeo will be in charge of the ‘Protect Prince Momonosuke’ team. Kin’emon will be in charge of whatever team teams up with the Samurai. Robin will be in charge of the Poneglyph team.”

 “Um, I have a suggestion,” Pudding said. “Nitro and I will probably do best on that team, since we’re good at getting in and out of places. Oven, Pan, and Pekoms can fight out with the Minks or whoever else, but I do need to see the Poneglyph for Mama.”

 “Are you sure, Pudding?” Nitro asked. “Pan could-”

 “I got it,” Pudding said lightly, and Nitro shut up.

 Law frowned at the interaction. “I’m sure Robin won’t mind too much. I was going to suggest she take Sanji and Zoro as muscle anyway.”

 “See, Nitro, backup’s all covered!” Pudding said, patting him on the head. The jelly grumbled a bit.

 Huh. Now that Zoro thought about it, Law and Chopper had been really interested in that jelly, and no one was sure what it was…he wasn’t the sort to find out, but it had brought his attention back to the issue.

 “I’m good with helping Robin out,” Zoro said, reaching behind himself for another beer. “Cook and I should be decent muscle for almost anything, throw in Perona’s ghosts and scouts and we’re fine.”

 “All right, teammates!” Perona said, holding up her hands. Pudding high-fived one, and Robin grew an arm from the mast to get the other. “This is going to be awesome!”

.o.o.o.

 “This entire enterprise is going to be a disaster!” Oven said once he and his siblings were back along on their ship.

 “It’ll be fine,” Pudding huffed, filing her nails for something to do. “These crews are chaos, brother, if you expected a plan as orderly as one of Prospero’s you’re not paying attention.”

 “Still, Law admitted they’re not sure if they can kill Kaido!” Pan said. “Doesn’t that worry you?”

 Pudding shrugged, “Not really. We don’t need them to kill Kaido for me to read the Poneglyph, now do we? I’ll memorize it and when we get out, break for you guys. We’ll steal a ship and leave if things aren’t going well.”

 “If?” Oven asked, rolling his eyes. “Straw Hat Luffy has only every even tied with an Admiral of the Marines and now thinks he can kill Kaido, the Unkillable Beast?”

 “Seems like it,” Pudding said. “I mean, he is bringing help.”

 “He’s insane,” Pan muttered.

 “So are a lot of people,” Pudding said. Their family alone would make a good list. “Look, these crews do the unthinkable. That is their thing. We’ll just have to see it for ourselves and report to Mama, won’t we?”

 “There’s saying that, and then there’s them actually doing it,” Oven said. “And for now, I think they’re going to all die.”

 “We’ll see who dies,” Pudding said, idly twirling her nail file and fantasizing about sticking it in her brother’s neck. “What do you think, Pekoms?”

 “Why are you always asking Pekoms?” Pan asked.

 “He knows them. So even if he’s at the bottom here, he knows more than we do,” Pudding said.

 “…I think they’ll win, and it will be very interesting to see how,” Pekoms said slowly.

 “See?” Pudding asked, silently hoping he was very, very right.

 .o.o.o.

 The six slated to kill Kaido met up in one of the Scalpel’s med bays to discuss their plan.

 “All right, so, what was the analysis of the ‘can we kill Kaido’ team?” Sabo asked.

 “We had a few ideas,” Law said. “But frankly…this is going to fucking suck. I mean it. This is going to be awful. Very, very awful.”

 “Wow, Traffy, that’s…not good,” Luffy muttered.

 “Yeah well, you try analyzing all the things that haven’t killed this guy and trying to figure out how that works as a coherent set of defenses and immunities!” Law said. “There’s shit we know doesn’t work period and shit that maybe could have worked if done to a higher degree. We’re focusing on the latter.”

 “Like?” Ace asked.

 “Drowning, electrocution, asphyxiation, and burning are all of my preferred ones to try,” Law said. “I can try to apply electricity directly to organs with Radio Knife, for example, or Gamma Knife. Ace can probably reach higher temperatures than the Marines could, for burns and also for maybe depriving him of oxygen.”

 “Don’t know…Sakazuki could get pretty hot and he’s been with them for a while,” Ace said.

 Law scowled. “See if I ever compliment you again.”

 “I’m trying to help you plan!” Ace said.

 “Um, can’t Pudding’s bro control heat?” Sabo asked. “Because if heat would work, then Big Mom would have used that by now.”

 “Heat alone doesn’t deprive oxygen, fire does, and I’m talking of the heat mainly as an add-on to what we’re already doing,” Law said. “Which is going to be murdering this fucker, got me?”

 “…I just realized we should have been more concerned about telling Law to find ways to kill an unkillable person. It gives him too many ideas,” Koala said. “Also, interested as to why I’m on this team…Sabo to, even though I love him.”

 “Sabo is the only one of us with a ranged weapon. We wouldn’t inflict Kaido on Usopp. Also Robin would kill me for inflicting Kaido on Usopp,” Law said.

 “Plus, like Kaido, you two are hand-to-hand types with no Devil Fruit abilities. You might notice something the four of us wouldn’t,” Marco said. “And your observation Haki, Koala, is one of the best for pinpointing weaknesses due to your spy gig, while Sabo’s Armament Haki should let him survive whatever Kaido dishes out. Throw in how Fishman Karate manipulates the water within the body, giving us another avenue of attack and testing potential kill-strategies, and it’s just good for diversity, yoi.”

 “I see,” Sabo said. “…Hm. You know, that thing about him being a melancholic drunk could help…really it would be better to fight him drunk, if possible…”

 “So wait to strike til he’s plastered? That doesn’t sound too hard,” Luffy said.

 “Just wait, he’ll somehow be a master of drunken fighting or something. Wouldn’t surprise me with all the other shit he’s overcome…” Law muttered. “But yeah. Drunk is good.”

 “We’re just going to try everything?” Ace asked.

 “Aren’t we the best group to try that, though?” Luffy asked, grinning.

 Ace chuckled, “You have me there…”

.o.o.o.

 In the dead of night a small pole rose from the water near Wano. A yellow ship emerged from beneath the waves, and a metal dock extended from the ship to the shore. The doors of the sub opened, revealing a tightly-packed masse of people thatall scrambled to get out.

 “Fresh air!” several people cheered upon reaching the beach.

 Law took a deep breath, glad to be out of the crush inside the sub himself.

 “All right! Now what?” Luffy pondered, bouncing up and down on his heels.

 “This way,” Kin’emon said. “The jungle is dense. Any resistance would have formed in there, and we can wait for the later trips to catch up.”

 “Woo-hoo! Let’s—mmph!” Luffy scowled as Law clamped a hand over his mouth and his older brothers both shushed him.

 “If you get us killed before we even get through step one, I will never forgive you,” Law warned. “Rush in quietly, damn it.”

 Luffy nodded. Law stepped back, putting his hands in his pockets as his boyfriend ran off into the jungle.

 “…Really?” Pekoms asked.

 “Welcome to the Straw Hearts,” Bepo said, patting him on the shoulder.

Chapter Text

 “How is ‘jungle at night on an unknown island’ part of your plan?” Izo asked Marco.

 “Not unknown to everyone,” Marco said.

 “Yeah, I’m giving directions…I mean it’s night so it’s hard. But I’m trying!” Momo said from his place on Bartolomeo’s shoulders.

 “And I know this island well,” Kin’emon added, looking up from a chat with Nami and Bepo. “We’ll be fine.”

 “…Does no one care that Straw Hat Luffy ran off alone, at all?” Oven asked.

 “He’ll be fine,” Sabo said, shrugging.

 “It’s Luffy, he was going to do it anyway might as well get it out of his system now when it’s night and no one will see him properly,” Ace said.

 “Oh,” Izo said nodding. “So if he crashes into anyone, they won’t know it’s him and we’re here.”

 “Exactly!” Marco said.

 “…How is that the plan?” Oven asked.

 “Did you not hear that he’s Luffy and going to do it anyway?” Vista asked, smirking. Oven glared at him.

 “Seriously, there’s no getting him to stick with it. You just work around him,” Drake said.

 “Aw, you’re learning,” Law said.

 “Fuck you, man,” Drake said.

 “So…we’re hoping to find rebellious allies, right?” Pudding asked, trying not to laugh at Law and Drake’s bickering. “Do…do you know where they are?”

 “In hideouts in the jungle,” Kin’emon said.

 “…So descriptive,” Oven muttered. Pan rolled her eyes.

 “Okay, look,” Law said. “If any of us get picked off and captured, we don’t know what to tell anyone about finding the rebels. It’s perfectly good practice so quit bitching and enjoy this lovely jungle walk.”

 “…You hate jungles,” Bepo observed quietly. “In fact you’re pretty against nature in general.”

 “Bepo, be a good first mate and don’t let the people I’m suspicious of know that,” Law hissed back.

 The ragtag army proceeded forward until suddenly even the moonlight and stars vanished.

 “Ace!” several Straw Hats, Hearts, and Marco all requested.

 Ace lit up, illuminating several ninja about to attack them all.

 “Raizo!” Kin’emon cried out in joy.

 “Kin’emon!” a bigheaded ninja said, falling out of the tree in his hurry to get to his friend. “Are these your pirate allies?”

 “…How did you know he had pirate allies?” Nami asked suspiciously.

 Raizo pushed aside a bush…revealing a campground where Luffy was happily eating by the fire.

 “Hi guys!” Luffy said, waving. “The ninja has great soup!”

 The Big Mom and Drake Pirates stared in shock.

 “Is this…the Straw Hat’s true power?” Oven wondered as Law, Ace, and Sabo all sat down next to Luffy and some of their crew started to help themselves to the food. “Such luck…”

 “What can we say?” Vivi asked, shrugging with a smile. “Our captain makes friends everywhere he goes.”

 .o.o.o.

 After reunions all around and a handful of fights over seconds and thirds, everyone settled down enough to actually talk about the situation they were all in.

 That is, how to all team up and take this island back.

 “So the rebellion’s kind of just been in stay alive mode until now,” Nami said, moving some more pebbles onto a makeshift map of the island. “With us as backup and knowledge that Momonosuke is safe, there’s a chance of retaking the whole island.”

 “The main areas to concern ourselves with are the harbors and the main palace,” Raizo said. “The smaller villages that are being occupied have all been evacuated and mostly house average lackeys. The Calamities and such are here-” he gestured in a wide circle encompassing the jungle area in front of the palace, on the way to the royal harbor, “-which is easy enough to attack.”

 “Okay, but where do we fight Kaido?” Luffy asked.

 “Well, we’ll want him away from his ship and the palace,” Robin mused. “No need to give him an easy getaway, and he’ll likely have the palace fortified by now.”

 “We should try luring him to the cliffs, this way,” Marco said. “Gives me airspace to work, Ace won’t start a forest fire, and the rocks should give Law plenty to switch with.”

 “That’s a good plan. He likes to go diving off those cliffs,” a cat Mink said, joining the circle.

 “Ah, Faust! Back from your reconnaissance?” Raizo asked.

 Faust nodded, “No real signs they know we’re here. Looks like they’re holding Hawkins in medical still, seeing if he recovers.”

 “Recovers?” Luffy asked.

 “We already know Kid fought back…what happened Hawkins?” Law asked, frowning inquisitively.

 “He was serving grudgingly last time I knew what was going on,” Drake said, holding his hands up.

 Raizo frowned, “The word of some of our informants-” Faust coughed loudly, making it clear who Raizo meant, “-is that Kaido asked him for a card reading and didn’t like the answer.”

 “Card reading?” Luffy said. “You don’t read cards, you read books…well, those cards Sanji writes recipes on, I guess…Kaido didn’t want recipes though, I don’t think?”

 “Hawkins is a weirdo magician who sometimes uses a special set of cards to predict the future,” Law said coolly.

 Luffy nodded, “Oh. That. Yeah, I guess that’s a thing now, magic card reading. Go figure.” He shrugged and sipped his tea for lack of anything else to do.

 “That is…mostly correct,” Drake said, frowning. “But he doesn’t use them like other fortune-tellers. He makes them float and then starts guessing percentages which, if you ask me, really fucks with his mystical image, bringing in something in like statistics.”

 “We didn’t ask you,” Law said. Luffy elbowed him as Drake flipped Law off. Law’s tea spilled on Bepo, who shot Luffy an annoyed look. Luffy chuckled weakly and reached at Sabo, who begrudgingly passed his little brother a kerchief to lend Bepo to clean the mess.

 “So, Kaido received a ‘statistic’ he didn’t like and beat up Hawkins for doing the math for him?” Luffy asked. His nose wrinkled. “That’s…just dumb.”

 “Some people think they want to be told their future…and then do not like the results,” Raizo said dramatically.

 “There’s a saying like that in every culture, it’s very true,” Vivi agreed.

 “Well, good news for us. It means we have a chance,” Sabo said, tapping his chin.  

 “And that Kaido’s an asshole who attacks people he gets to do math for him,” Luffy muttered. “I hate math, but that means I have to be nice to the people who do math for me. Duh.”

 “And we all thank you for your kindness,” Nami chuckled.

 “So, what else do you have on Kaido?” Law asked Faust. “What does he really want with his Supernova Army plans? With all his Zoans?”

 Faust scowled, “I don’t even think he knows what he really wants, man. I’m not sure if he wants One Piece so much as he wants other people to not have One Piece.”

 “Sort of a ‘I win because you didn’t’ kind of thing?” Marco asked.

 Faust nodded. “The Paramount War definitely set him off.”

 “It set a lot of things off,” Law said.

 “Yeah, but…Kaido’s been building up his forces ever since,” Marco said, tapping his chin. “He employed that guy on Punk Hazard, and from what we saw in the labs the plan was making artificial Zoan fruits…”

 “What is it with this guy and Zoans? There’s a theme and then there’s just…obsession!” Sabo said, shaking his head.

 “He’s been going after the Supernovas, who are the most likely to upset the established order,” Robin said, her eyes widening. “Not the Marines, who are moving more and more into the New World, not Big Mom as she seizes more for herself…”

 “Not my crew, in the aftermath of the Marinford fight,” Marco added.

 “…Hm. It’s a workable idea, but it’s a negative so it’s not something we can prove easily,” Law said. “Kaido doesn’t want One Piece, he just wants to make sure no one else gets it? We’d need a why.”

 “I’ve noticed reasoning is not something you pirates are always big on,” Kin’emon noted dryly.

 “That’s true!” Luffy said. “A lot of us just do stuff cause we want to!”

 “Our crew in a nutshell,” Bentham agreed.

 “So true,” Perona agreed, slinging an arm around Zoro, pointing at him with her free hand.

 “I don’t exactly love working off the idea that our opponent is just doing whatever…but sure, okay,” Law said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “We can work with it.”

 “All right masterminds, tell me you’ve got a plan for this,” Nami said, grinning at Law and Robin.

 “Oh, we may have been working on something,” Robin said, smiling and putting a hand on her chest.

 “Do tell?” Sabo chuckled.

 “Luffy-ya, want to make trouble?” Law asked.

 Luffy gave him a thumbs-up, “You’re the best, Traffy!”

.o.o.o.

 “You’re all insane,” Drake said. “Certifiable, even.”

 “Oh calm down, you don’t even have to do anything,” Nami scolded as she watched through binoculars.

 “He’s right, this is a bad idea. Do you even know what you’re doing?” Oven demanded.

 “Hey, you wanted to pal around with our crew, so sit back and have fun,” Jean Bart said. “The captains know what they’re doing.”

 “And one…two…and,” Nami said, grinning.

 A forest fire erupted.

 “That’ll get some attention. We’ll take out the first responders, and use them to gauge what to do next,” Nami said, putting the binoculars down. “All right, Poneglyph team, move out while the distraction’s freshest! Rescue team, we’re on the move too!”

 Zoro and Sanji led the Poneglyph team forward, Robin, Pudding, Nitro, and Perona close together and right on their heels. Nami led the Rescue team, following her were Vivi, Chopper, Faust, Bellamy, Kanjuro, and Drake.

 While both teams wanted the palace, they wanted different places. Rescue wanted the medical wing and dungeon to spring Hawkins and Kid, while the other team had to find wherever the Poneglyphs were stored to read them. Both would take separate paths, to avoid all getting caught up in the chaos their friends were getting up to down below.

 “No one’s knocked Marco out of the sky yet!” Bellamy called as they ran.

 “Has anyone shot at him at all?” Nami asked. “I’m sure Usopp and the snipers are keeping shots away!”

 “Nothing’s hit, at least!” Bellamy conceded.

 “It’s not quite dawn yet, and the Beast Pirates tend to be late risers! With any luck, it will disrupt their response!” Faust said as he bounded through the trees above the rest of the team. “If we act fast, we might not run into anyone on our way in!”

.o.o.o.

 “How’s Marco doing?” Ace called as he torched some more ground cover. Thankfully the largest trees were surviving the flames pretty easily, but Law would allegedly Shambles the fire elsewhere if it got out of control.

 Allegedly.

 “He’s doing a good job of lighting up our bit of the sky, think the snipers have him covered,” Sabo said. “You sense that?”

 “Yeah, something big’s coming in!” Ace called. “Everyone get ready!”

 A giant rolling ball of scales crashed through the clearing.

 “Pinto, slick it up!” Sabo called to the paint-logia. The young pirate saluted, spraying paint in the ball’s path. It skidded as soon as it hit the oily substance, sliding to the side, smashing into a great tree, and unfurling.

 “It’s the Hurricane! Raul the Hurricane!” Law said. “Luffy, gut punch him!”

 “Gum-Gum Elephant Gun!” Luffy said, only for his fist to rebound off of haki armor. “Aw! Come on!”

 Raul quickly rolled onto all-fours, increasing his Ankylosaur armor with Haki as his tail sent several of the alliance flying. “You thought this would be easy?”

 “Would be nice, yeah,” Luffy admitted.

 “Get this bastard on his back, men!” Vista yelled, dramatically unsheathing his sword.

 “You know, this would be so much easier with Ice around. Just making this asshole slip, all the time,” Law said as Pinto tried to get more oil paint under Raul’s feet.

 “Well, we don’t have your stepdad, so improvise!” Sabo said, trying to shoot Raul in the eyes.

  “Working on it!” Law said, ducking a Beast Pirate lacky that Bepo shocked into submission. “Luffy, try and flip him!”

 “Robin would be good here, she could push him from underneath,” Koala mused. “Hm…”

 “Franky, rockets, right under him!” Law called.

 “On it, bro!” Franky said.

 “I see where this is going,” Koala said. “Sabo, get up high!”

 “Okay!” Sabo said as the rockets made Raul buckle. Luffy and Ace took their chance, shoving the ankylosaur over, baring his stomach.

 Sabo jumped into Franky’s hands and Franky tossed him skyward so he could shoot Raul in the gut with seastone.

 “Didn’t get through the armor!” Jozu warned as Sabo dropped back down. “Good try!”

 “So we try again!” Vista declared, jumping onto Raul’s stomach and stabbing downwards.

 “Vista!” Marco yelled as Raul quickly rolled over, trapping Vista beneath him.

 “Fuck!” Ace said, shooting fire at Raul’s right foreleg to try and dislodge him.

 “Can you warp the ground under his feet?” Koala asked Law before they both had to duck another one of Raul’s lackeys, this one bearing a polearm. Law made an irritated noise and warped the polearm away.

 “I could if everything stopped distracting me!”

 Raul roared again, but this time sounded different. Pained.

 “He’s getting tired! Jozu, Luffy, let’s go!” Ace said. 

 The three of them managed to knock Raul over…to reveal Vista’s sword lodged in his gut, and Vista hanging onto the hilt for dear life, covered in blood.

 “Did that work?” Vista asked.

 “I’m no expert on Ankylosaur anatomy but…that’s pretty decent blood loss, even for something that size,” Law admitted. “At the very least he’s going into shock, if not dying.”

 Several other Whitebeard pirates quickly pounced the prone Raul, making Law’s statement irrelevant in their effort to make sure Raul wasn’t going to get back up.

 “Hope that was a big enough distraction!” Luffy laughed, only for Sabo to smack him upside the head.

 “We haven’t beaten everyone here yet! Don’t go saying it’s a…that!” Sabo said.

.o.o.o.

 “This hasn’t been so bad,” Zoro commented. Outside of his teammates occasionally snagging him by the collar and scolding him for ‘wandering off’ at points, he thought it had been a pretty simple task to get into the castle.

 It probably helped that he had just carved a door in the east wall, but hey, nothing was perfect. 

  “Thanks for jinxing us,” Perona huffed. “…But okay, yeah. We’ve barely run into anyone. Just some leftovers. Guess Luffy’s group’s getting all the fun.”

 “We can avoid ‘fun’ until Fair Robin and Pudding are done reading,” Sanji said.

 “Two up ahead, guarding what looks like the door Momonosuke described to his family’s glyph,” Robin said, peering around a corner. “Someone might notice if they leave their post or go missing…hm. We’ll go around, and then I’ll distract them with a clone to give us more time.”

 “I can try ghosting one person at a time through the floor, down, and back up,” Perona said. At Zoro and Sanji’s leery looks she folded her arms angrily, “I’ve gotten better!”

 “That gives me an idea,” Robin said. “We go back up the stairs and go until we’re in the room above the one we want. Then Zoro cuts through the floor.”

 “Floor dropping will make noise,” Sanji noted as they crept up the stairs.

 “I’ll catch it from below,” Robin said. “Now shh. Let me count steps.”

 They crept after Robin, Nitro snaking around Pudding this way and that to try and keep a lookout behind them. They slipped into an unguarded room, and robin pulled out a pencil, drawing a circle on the floor.

 “There!”

 Zoro nodded, cutting it easily.

 The stone dropped, only to slow in its decent and be lowered by two giant arms from the floor of the room they wanted.

 “No one inside waiting. Suckers,” Nitro chuckled.

 They all dropped through the hole…only to be met with more than they expected.

 “They’re both in the same room?” Pudding whispered in shock as she peered at two huge Poneglyphs.

 “…I suppose that makes this easier,” Sanji said.

 “Probably makes them easier to protect,” Zoro said, shrugging. “Robin, plan?”

 “Pudding and I will handle the reading and memorizing, the rest of you will guard for attacks,” Robin said. The door started to open, and Robin hurriedly folded her arms.

 The guards made noises of surprise at what was probably Robin’s clone and rushed after it, their footsteps quickly fading.

 “Zoro, bar the door!” Robins aid. Zoro rushed over, quickly bolting the locks. Sanji kicked a table over for him to prop against the doors as Pudding and Robin went for the glyphs.

 “Oh wow, I’ve never seen two at once…” Pudding said, lifting the gem from her tiara for a better look with her third eye. “Let’s see…the…the last…”

 “The three knives show the way…” Robin mused as she read.

 Pudding looked at her in shock, “You understand it?”

 “Of course, I’m from Ohara,” Robin said.

 Pudding looked shaken before going back to the glyphs. “O-okay then. That’s good. We…we can check each other’s translations.”

 “That would be excellent,” Robin agreed.

 “I’m going to send ghosts out, see how much time we have,” Perona said.

 “Good plan,” Sanji said, putting his ear to the door as he and Zoro waited.

.o.o.o.

 Nami’s group ended up using a window to get to the infirmary, leading to an ungainly sprawl on the floor.

 “Hawkins! My man!” Drake said as he popped back up.

 “I am not your man,” Hawkins said flatly.

 Vivi shook her head as she took the scene in. Hawkins lay in the bed in an odd position and seemed pretty heavily bandaged. All this over chances.

 “Oh, this is bad,” Faust said, putting a paw to his mouth as Hawkins’ condition. “We should have brought the Surgeon of Death…”

 Nami flicked him in the ear, “Bad kitty. We have a perfectly good doctor right here!”

 Chopper blushed before composing himself, “H-he mostly seems to be burnt, and with damage to his arms. If necessary, we could evacuate him without much treatment, but I’d prefer to get fresh bandages on everything!”

 “Wait, his legs work?” Vivi asked. “But they’re in such an odd position!”

 Hawkins shrugged, before wincing at moving his battered shoulders, “I don’t tell you how to lie down. I’m more comfortable with them like that.”

 Bellamy snickered as Faust and the girls groaned in exasperation.

 “I think he’ll be okay to get up and moving if we don’t put too much stress on him,” Chopper said. “Bellamy, you’re the same height, okay with Hawkins leaning on you a bit?”

 “No prob,” Bellamy said.

 “I’ve got to know, Captain,” Faust said. “What was the prediction that drove Kaido mad?”

 Hawkins looked confused, “He was already mad.”

 “He means the one your ass got kicked for,” Nami said, adding, “And apparently your brain rattled” under her breath.

 “Ah. The prediction…” Hawkins said. “…He wasn’t going to…to…”

 “Win?” Vivi asked eagerly.

 “Survive?” Faust asked. 

 “Be Pirate King?” Nami tried.

 Hawkins smiled mysteriously only to yelp as Chopper made him sit up so that he could bandage his back.

 “…If you don’t remember, then say so, but if you’re pausing for drama then Chopper will have more work to do,” Nami warned.

 “He wasn’t going to be certain to win,” Hawkins said.

 “…Oh, right. Percentages,” Faust said.

 “Kaido…kicked your ass…because you said he might lose?” Nami asked.

 “Well the man is a well-known asshole,” Faust noted.

 “Fuck!” Nami hissed. “And Luffy thinks he’s going to win!”

 “Luffy thought that before statistics and prophecies got involved, though,” Vivi pointed out.

 “Yeah, that’s just…how the Captain thinks,” Bellamy agreed, shrugging.

 Nami frowned at them both before sighing, “Yeah, we really work for a knucklehead.”

 “So, Straw Hat Luffy is going to challenge Kaido here and now?” Hawkins asked. “Interesting…”

 A deck of cards floated out of Faust’s jacket.

 “Boss?” Faust asked.

 “We know more of the variables now, the wheels of fate have a specific path to take,” Hawkins said as Chopper helped him sit up and swing his feet over the side of the bed. “I might be able to manage a more…exact prediction.”

 “Forgive me for thinking Luffy’s going to do the unpredictable anyway,” Nami said. “While you’re working on that, where’s Kid?”

 “Heat and Wire know. They’ve been sneaking me extra food,” Hawkins said. “They’ll probably try to get to him in the commotion, or come up here to me if they are unable. Hmm.”

 “Does that mean something?” Vivi asked, peering at the cards with Chopper and Hawkins.

 “…Death to the bear. Does anyone know a bear?” Hawkins asked blankly. “They’re…going to die, it seems.”

 “Nope,” Nami groaned. “Let’s…just go get Kid. Drake, take point. You're going to be our dinosaur shield.”

.o.o.o.

 Luffy laughed as their group crashed through a camp that had been set up by some of Kaido’s guys in the jungle. The camp had been scrambling to reinforce Raul, only to get steamrolled by Luffy’s team and a bunch of angry ninjas and samurai.

 “Hey, guys, look!” Luffy said, grabbing a devil fruit off the ground and stuffing it in his vest. “One less fruit for these guys!”

 “What is it?” Koala asked.

 “Not sure,” Sabo admitted. “Lu, don’t pull it out and give these losers a chance to get it.”

 “Yeah, yeah!” Luffy said, pausing as a loud roar rocked the island. “That him?”

 “That’s Kaido,” Marco said darkly. “I’ll head up and see where he’s at.”

 “Take me, I’ve got a plan!” Ace said, jumping onto the phoenix’s back.

 “This is a really big day for you three planning things,” Law noted idly as he warped a Beat Pirate right into a punch from Jozu.

 “Oh, shut up,” Sabo groaned.

.o.o.o.

 “We have what we need. On to phase two—sabotaging the Beast Pirate ships,” Robin said as they crept through the castle.

 “Sounds good!” Pudding chirped form where she guarded the rear.

 Inside, she was petrified. Her main idea to barter with the Straw Hats and Hearts had been offering to read poneglyphs for them! “I can’t believe she could read them too…”

 “We need to do something about that,” Nitro warned. “Mama’s either going to want her, or want her taken out.”

 “Keep quiet will you,” Pudding huffed. “We’ll do something when I decide to, got it?”

 She’d give him something, all right…

 “We’re going to need to move fast to get to the harbor from here,” Sanji said. “Fair Robin, do you think you could throw us that far?”

 “If we start from somewhere safer, perhaps,” Robin said. “We’ll need to be careful. Things have been going a bit well for us so far…”

Chapter Text

 “Are you sure this is the way to the dungeons?” Vivi asked Faust.

 “Our path is true,” Hawkins said before anyone else could answer.

 “Are you sawing that because you know Faust knows where he’s going or because you checked your cards?” Bellamy asked.

 Hawkins smirked mysteriously.

 “That’s already getting old,” Nami muttered. “Faust, are you sure Wire and Heat said this was the way?”

 “Yeah, I—whoa!” Faust yelped, ducking as Wire went flying over the group’s heads, Drake trying to catch him but missing.

 “We’ve been found out!” Nami said, swinging the Clima Tact forward. “All right, time to…Bentham?”

 “Yes?” Bentham asked from where he’d pinned Heat to the wall with his foot, just around the corner.

 “How. Why. And possible when,” Nami sighed.

 “I was worried!” Bentham said. “…They’re on our side, aren’t they?”

 “Yes,” Nami, Chopper, Vivi, and Bellamy sighed.

 “Oops,” Bentham said, letting Heat down. “I didn’t hurt Wire too badly, did I?”

 Faust poked Wire with a paw. Wire swatted at him irritably. “Yeah, he’s good.”

 “We’re on the way to rescue Kid,” Nami said.

 “Ah, so things are going well!” Bentham said happily as Faust and Heat helped Wire to his feet.

 “Yep. Apparently we have a chance at taking out Kaido too, though Hawkins gave this cryptic prediction about a bear dying,” Bellamy said.

 Bentham gasped in horror.

 “Oh, you know who that is?” Bellamy asked.

 “And you call yourself a member of the B Team!” Bentham yelled, looking horrified.

 “B Team?” Faust asked, looking confused.

 “Yeah, Bellamy, Brook, Bentham, Jean Bart, and…Bepo!” Nami gasped.

 “Bepo is a bear! I forgot Bepo is a bear!” Chopper screamed, pulling his hat down over his eyes in shame.

 “We have to save Bepo! Let’s hurry up and get Kid—ai!” Vivi yelped as she ducked an unusually sharp and loud patch of air as it whooshed by her.

 “Well. Erm…guess we shouldn’t have all started yelling,” Drake mused, glaring down the hall at Sctachman Apoo.

 “I started it. Sorry,” Bentham said, shrugging.

 “Forgiven. We may have to split up,” Nami said.

 “We’ll cover you. Find our captain,” Wire said.

 “Getting Chopper to him is the mot important thing,” Vivi said, pulling out the peacock slicers. “Bentham, can you cover his, Bellamy, and Nami’s escape?”

 “For friendship!” Bentham cried, his dramatic shout drowning out whatever noise Apoo tried to make as his foot hit the musical mayhem-maker in the face.

.o.o.o.

  Luffy bounced on his toes impatiently despite still fighting, stealing glances up at Marco.  

 Marco circled carefully, thankful for the cover provided by the group’s various snipers, until he caught a glimpse of the Emperor. He quickly glided back down to the battlefield, casually kicking a beast in the face to knock it away from Law as he landed.

 “He’s on an outcropping. Cliff. Outside the jungle.”

 Law frowned, “Probably didn’t want to give Ace the chance to catch him in a forest fire…but open ground could be risky…”

 “For him or us?” Luffy asked.

 “Both. But the outcropping…that’s worse for us. Four of six can’t swim,” Law said. “We should-”

 He went to warp the head off an incoming attacker, only for a tiny ninja girl to leap up and headbutt the lemur-zoan-user in face.

 “Vengeance!” the tiny ninja declared.

 “…I’m seeing why you and Ace like Momo now,” Law commented thoughtfully as the little kunoichi bounded through the fray, merrily wreaking havoc while the stronger ninjas decimated the distracted beasts she left open.

 “Cool! A ninja kid! I kind of wanted to be a ninja as a kid, but I wanted to be Pirate King more!” Luffy said, before grabbing Marco by the arm. Law sighed, reisgning himself to the defense of all three while Luffy demanded the phoenix’s attention. “Marco, so Marco, where is he?”

 “That way,” Marco said flatly, pointing. Luffy instantly began smashing a path in that direction.

 “You’re getting used to him,” Law observed as Sabo and Ace scrambled after their brother. “And them.”

 “Honestly, my brothers aren’t always so different,” Marco said, flashing a small smile at some of said brothers dogpiling a giant stegosaurus before following Law and Koala after the brothers.

.o.o.o.

 Kid groaned as someone started moving his legs and arm. “Here t…finish me…hwa?”

 He blinked at the deer in the hat, confused. Kaido didn’t have a deer in a hat, to his knowledge…straw Hat did thought.

 Kid groaned again, this time out of annoyance. “You guys? Really?”

 “This is a jailbreak, idiot, now on your feet!” Nami ordered. “Your crew is covering for us, but they won’t last forever!”

 “My crew?” Kid asked before lurching upwards. “What did you do to my-”

 Nami grabbed his cape and used it to shake him, “They-are-okay-now-let-Chopper-fix-you-you-asshole!”

 “That’s our Nami,” Chopper laughed.

 “Yeah, she’s great,” Bellamy agreed.  

 “Someone needs to know what they’re doing around here!” Nami said. “We need to keep moving, before we get attacked!”

 “I thought you said my crew was covering!” Kid argued as Bellamy pulled him upright and Chopper started splinting his legs.

 “Well we don’t know for how long,” Chopper admitted. “I mean, Drake and Hawkins can maybe handle Apoo okay-”

 “Where is that sonofabitch?” Kid snarled, starling Chopper and causing him to drop a splint.

 “One floor up, so, uh…how do you feel about being carried? Because you’re not ready for stairs,” Chopper said.

 “Bellamy, you’re a human crutch again,” Nami said.

 “Ma’am yes ma’am,” Bellamy agreed, saluting…and almost dropping Kid. “Oops.”

 .o.o.o.

 “Worst—weirdo—ever!” Wire complained as Drake and a recently-arrived Killer continued to do most of the work in fighting Apoo. Vivi and Bentham sometimes got in for sneak attacks, but Hawkins was too hurt and Wire, Heat, and Faust too weak to do much damage.

 “Ha-ha! You thought you could take me? Master of sound and fury?” Apoo asked. “I—ack!”

 Apoo looking down to see a blade coming through his stomach.

 “Hey, asshole,” Kid said, grinning. “What’s the sound effect for that, again?”

 “Captain!” his crewmates cheered.

 “Drake, I’m borrowing the axe!” Kid said. Drake let go right before it was yanked through the air, soaring for Apoo’s head.

 Apoo made a cracking sound, and the axe shattered.

 “Well shit,” Kid muttered as Drake roared, “MY AXE!” and transformed into his full Gigantasaurous form, tearing through what remained of the hallways and scattering rocks everywhere.

 “Cover your weapons in Haki to protect them!” Vivi called to everyone. “Or he’ll break everything!”

 “Who cares if it’s broken, it’s still metal!” Kid roared, the shards of the axe shooting at Apoo as shrapnel. Apoo made a noise similar to a flyswatter, and they were knocked aside, along with every pirate in front of him.

 “Someone’s gotten better, all right,” Nami muttered.

 “He is right about the anything can be an instrument thing…” Vivi said. “When I was hiding out from Crocodile, I saw plenty of normal people make improvised instrum…there’s an idea! Kid! Let Drake and Killer do the fighting for a bit, I need you for something!”

 “The fuck no, I just got here!” Kid said before swaying, Bellamy grabbing him before he hit the ground again.

 “Boss listen to her, she’s smart!” Killer assured him.

 “Do it!” Hawkins agreed.

 “Look, he needs sounds, when we yell he gets louder, but I have a plan,” Vivi said as she pulled out a stick and started to draw something in the dirt floor, “It needs to look like this all right? The big bit, and the little one.”

 “Hang on, that looks like a shitty…huh. This might be interesting,” Kid said as he set to work.

.o.o.o.

 “Seriously. How many underground tunnels does this place have?” Perona complained.

 “Enough for Zoro to be lost for years,” Sanji said, laughing as he ducked a sword swing.

 “Sanji, please,” Robin said. “Zoro could be lost in a single tunnel.”

 “Is this the ‘mock the swordsman’ hour?” Zoro complained, falling back to walk with Pudding and Nitro with a huff.

 “I think we’re all just tense. We really want whatever the beasts are hiding, huh?” Pudding said, shrugging casually.

 “Feh. I don’t care, but it may be useful,” Zoro said.

 “So…what’s it like, being Mihawk’s son?” Pudding asked, cognizant that Zoro was someone who’d be good to have on her side.

 “Eh. He’s good for training. Fair dad. Can be a jerk,” Zoro said. “Still can’t get around his Observation Haki…”

  “You know, my brother Katakuri has some pretty amazing Observation Haki,” Pudding said. “I mean, it doesn’t work exactly like Mihawk’s does, he’s a just fighter not a tracker, but…there was one thing I thought of.”

 “What’s that?” Zoro asked.

 “Well…Katakuri got a little tipsy this one time, at my sister’s wedding, and confessed that he sometimes finds his Haki scary since he can see so far into the future with it. Like, five seconds, even,” Pudding said. “Because he can’t change it. It’s going to happen, it just lets him know so he can react to that. But sometimes what he sees happen is something that, well, knowing he can’t prevent it is terrifying.”

 “I don’t get where you’re going with this,” Zoro said.

 “I do,” Sanji said, having listened in. “Zoro, Pudding’s saying it doesn’t matter if you can never beat Mihawk’s Haki when it comes to him knowing what you’re going to do if there’s still nothing he can do about it once he knows.”

 “Exactly!” Pudding said. “So, what if you can’t surprise him? Make surprise irrelevant!”

 She said it lightly, but Zoro felt there was a kind of cold weight to her words. Like she had some…history with it, in her own way. He wondered if she’d tested it on her brother in some way, for a prank or something.

 “That’s so nice of you, helping the moss-head like that,” Sanji said pleasantly. Zoro rolled his eyes at the cook.

 Nitro huffed. Pudding patted him on the head, locking her jaw to stop herself from yelling at him. Just a little longer…

.o.o.o.

 Kaido chuckled as he looked at the six opponents he faced. “Is this it?”

 “Think that all you want!” Luffy yelled before asking quietly Law, “I mean, it’s better if he underestimates us, right?”

 “I think we’re just going to have to go with whatever we can get,” Law said, shrugging.

 Marco eyed Kaido, “Interesting of you to let us get this close without a problem.”

 “I wanted to see your plan,” Kaido admitted before laughing. “And it’s pathetic!”

 “Well, if you really want to see our plan, we wouldn’t mind a bit of yours,” Law said. “What’s the endgame here? You fight us, in your head kill or subjugate us…and then what?”

 Kaido smirked. “Keep on.”

 “…Oh, you’re serious,” Koala muttered, looking ill. “this is for you, huh? Just…making others miserable?”

 “Winning,” Kaido said. “Face me if you dare!”

 Ace and Luffy hit him with a strong, combined burst of Conqueror’s Haki. It wasn’t aimed at them, but it made Marco, Law, Sabo, and Koala shake. Kaido shook a little too…before shrugging it off.

 “Hmm. Maybe you’ll be up to Red Hair’s standard…or you would, if I were to let you live!” Kaido roared, punching the ground. Law warped the group into the air before the quake generated from the punch reached them, and back down before gravity could drop them.

 “Uh oh…” Ace said.

 “Well, plan A’s out,” Law said, drawing Kikoku. “Time to give plan B a shot.”

 “Which one was that?” Luffy asked.

 “Countershock,” Law said. “…But trying to beat him up first, so I get an opening.”

 “So, the usual but try and give Law an opening?” Ace asked, cracking his knuckles. “Sounds fun!”

.o.o.o.

 “I see daylight!” Robin said, lowering her arms. “Not much further up ahead, around the corner!”

 “Finally!” Zoro said, drawing all three swords.

 “Nitro, check it out, okay?” Pudding said. “Check for traps.”

 “Me?” Nitro complained.

 “You’re jelly, we’re people. You’re more likely to make it,” Pudding said nonchalantly as she loaded her pistol. “We need to be careful! Who knows how well the ships are guarded!”

 “I could send-” Perona started.

 “No, Nitro’s sneakier than your ghosts!” Pudding said. “Right Nitro? Time to prove yourself!”

 “Fine…” Nitro sighed, slithering forward.

 “I still think my ghosts would have been fine,” Perona pouted.

 “It’s safe!” Nitro called, starting to turn. “It-”

 Pudding shot him with a bullet full of coagulation formula designed to instantly solidify Nitro, following it up with a second bullet to shatter him before he saw either coming.

 “What the hell, Pudding?” Perona gasped. “You like, killed him!”

 “Hey, this is war,” Pudding said grimly. “And trust me, Nitro was not on your side.”

Chapter Text

 “I think we need an explanation. Now,” Zoro said, re-drawing his swords.

 “Easy!” Pudding said, waving her hands. “I’m with you, I promise!”

 “Like you were ‘with’ Nitro?” Perona asked suspiciously.

 “I was never with Nitro!” Pudding scoffed. “But Mama might know if he figured out I wasn’t so I had to kill him without him knowing it was me. Obviously!”

 “And this needed to happen…why?” Sanji asked. He hadn’t moved into a fighting stance yet, but as the fastest of the four he might not need time to get ready if he was going to do something.

 “I’m double crossing Mama, but Mama thinks I’m going to double cross you,” Pudding said.

 “…What?” Zoro, Sanji, and Perona yelled. Robin pursed her lips with a scowl.

 “Mama sucks so I want Luffy to be Pirate King. How is this so hard for you?” Pudding asked, rolling her eyes.

 “Oh, so…you’re really on our side?” Perona asked.

 “And how were you planning on explaining this to everyone else?” Sanji asked.

 Pudding huffed, “Well I was going to barter my third eye’s ability to read Poneglyphs for protection until you realized I was sincere, but then Nico Robin just started reading the darn thing and I’ve been in a pickle since.”

 “Yes, Fair Robin has always been able to do that,” Sanji said, nodding.

 “Stop agreeing with the spy!” Zoro groaned.

 “Zoro, she’s a double agent who’s stabbing her family in the back for us, keep up,” Sanji said.

 “Or she’s playing you and your love of women and Perona and her want for a girly friend to lure us into an even bigger trap!” Zoro said.

 “I helped by killing Nitro!” Pudding said, offended. “I spent three days planning that!”

 “Took you three days to figure out how to squash him?” Zoro asked, raising an eyebrow.

 Pudding snarled, “You’re lucky you’re on Luffy’s crew and he’d want you back in one piece, tri-swords.”

 “Okay I don’t even care if you’re from the New World, no way could you take on Zoro just with that knife,” Perona said. “You’d have to be Mihawk, and you’re not Mihawk.”

 “She has a gun too,” Zoro pointed out.

 “I can say that myself!” Pudding snapped.

 “Excuse me, ladies, grass-brain,” Sanji said.

 “What is it, cook?” Zoro demanded as Pudding snapped, “We’re in the middle of something!”

 “What was that?” they heard someone asked as Sanji groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose.

 “I heard something and we needed to be quiet,” Sanji hissed as several Beast Pirates raced into the tunnel.

 “Oops,” Zoro and Pudding both muttered in embarrassment as they drew their swords and pistol. Robin calmly snapped the guards’ necks.

 “…Or Fair Robin could do that,” Sanji admitted.

 “We need to keep moving,” Robin said. “And keep an eye on our new friend.”

 Pudding met Robin’s gaze evenly, and followed the others out of the tunnel.

.o.o.o.

 “What are you even doing back there?” Wire asked desperately as Kid continued following Vivi’s directions. Kid cackled.

 “We’re going to out-music his ass!” Kid declared, manipulating Vivi’s peacock slicers into position on their contraption…as the strings of a giant metal violin and bow.

  “Eep,” Chopper muttered, pressing his hooves down over his ears. Nami whipped out earplugs. Faust stuffed his paws in his ears, looking panicked.

 Everyone else wasn’t so lucky as Kid began to “play.” The violin was huge, untuned, and frankly the peacock slicers only reverberated so well.

 “This…was the…plan?” Nami yelled over the racket to Vivi.

 “Out sound him! If his sounds aren’t heard, they might as well not be there!” Vivi yelled back.

 “…Dogpile on the asshole!” Killer ordered his crewmates. Drake roared, leading the charge as he morphed back to his human form and booted Apoo in the jaw.

 It seemed Vivi’s plan was working, as while Apoo morphed his limbs into instrument after instrument, the sounds were barely audible over the screeching and their effects seemed dulled as a result.

 Eventually he was overwhelmed and pummeled into the dirt, Wire having to exasperatedly stop Faust from kicking the guy after it was clear Apoo was out cold and didn’t feel it.

 “Fuck yeah! You go, plan princess!” Kid laughed manically.

 “True, but we need to run. They’ll know Apoo failed soon,” Vivi said.

 “All right, let’s move out! And find some more fights!” Kid yelled, running off cackling.

 “He really is like a weird, more violent Luffy in some ways,” Nami said.

 “In another world, they could be friends,” Bentham agreed.

 “So…Luffy’s going to want to be friends in this world, huh?” Chopper asked.

 Nami, Vivi, and Bellamy all nodded in exasperation as they set off.

.o.o.o.

 Breaking into the ship proved relatively easy up until the group of five last heavily-guarded room. Even that proved of little challenge, since the hunting group was obviously stressed from Zoro being suspicious of Pudding, Pudding being mad Zoro was suspicious of her, Sanji trying to keep the peace while also keeping an eye on Pudding, and Perona and Robin scouting as many angles as possible. Battling once more was actually kind of cathartic.

 At last the final enemy fell and they were able to search the room.

 “I mean, there’s no glyph in here, we know that…” Perona said, gesturing around. There was admittedly nowhere large enough to store one, but Zoro sliced the door off a safe to find…a single file folder.

 “…That better be one hell of a file,” Zoro complained as the girls pounced on it.

 “Hey, if Kaido wants to hide it…” Sanji said, before looking over at Pudding’s gasp.

 “Look at this…” Pudding said, flipping through the file. “This is from Dr. Vegnapunk!”

 “Didn’t Law say he’s some super scientist who works for the Marines?” Zoro asked.

 “He’s supposed to be the most brilliant man in the world!” Pudding said. “Mama’s gotten some of his ex-assistants before, like that Clown guy you let get arrested…I always wondered why he worked for the government, but this…”

 “Four Blues…” Perona said. “That’s…no way.”

 “Yeah, one of you say something, I don’t get the science terms in this thing,” Zoro said after glancing at the file.

 “Dr. Vegnapunk…made Kaido,” Perona said, putting a hand to her mouth. “He’s not human. Or giant. Or…or anything else. He’s an amalgam…meant to be an unkillable soldier.”

 “Guess Mr. Unkillable wondered why he was taking orders,” Pudding said, flicking through the file. “Why would he even keep this?”

 “He’s proud of being Kaido ‘of the Beasts’ isn’t he? Maybe he’s proud not to be human,” Zoro said.

 “Or maybe it’s just…something from home,” Sanji said. “Like Law keeping that tanto Kuzan gave him.”

 “A tanto’s useful. This could be blackmail,” Zoro argued.

 “Yeah…blackmail on the Marines,” Pudding said, her eyes widening. “That’s why they never interfere with his other stuff! They can’t kill him, and so he can blackmail them! That’s why even though they’ve managed to capture him before they’ve never gone after his organization!”

 “He’s got something on them,” Zoro said, nodding. “Makes sense.”

 “They themselves created one of their greatest threats. Seems common for them,” Robin noted.

 “Oh no…” Pudding said. “We have to get back, now!”

 “Hey, you don’t give the orders!” Zoro said, scowling at her.

 “Look at this!” Pudding said, frantically brandishing the latest sheet. “He really is unkillable! We have to warn them!”

 Robin took it, scanning it. Her lips pursed. “This is a complication. We must put our faith in the captains and others to hold out, but we'll need to move quickly.”

  The sheet was passed around before Persona took the file for safekeeping and the group grimly set out to get back as quickly as they could so they had a chance of warning their friends before it was too late.

.o.o.o.

 Law was not particularly happy with how this fight was going. Kaido seemed perfectly happy to stay on the defensive, forcing them to make harder and harder attacks against his seemingly invincible body and thus leave themselves open in desperation. Only blunt attacks even seemed to do anything, and while they could make him stagger, there was a chance of getting grabbed like he’s just grabbed Luffy-

 Shit, he’d grabbed Luffy.

 “Room!” Law said, only for Kaido to swipe at him with a kick, sending a wave of dirt that knocked him on his ass and sent him into a coughing fit.

 “Let’s make something clear,” Kaido said before whirling on his heel and hurling Luffy into the sea, far beyond where Law could expand a Room in time.

 “Luffy!” Law and Koala yelled as Ace, Sabo, and Marco shouted, “No!”

 “This is my island,” Kaido said as Luffy hit the water. “And you’re all going to die.”

 Koala snapped out of her shock first, “Ace, throw me!”

 “Where?” Ace asked.

 “The water, idiot, I’m the best swimmer!” Koala said.

 Kaido moved to stop her, but Law warped Koala and Ace behind him. Ace grabbed Koala’s shoulder and hip, “Hope you know what you’re doing!”

 “It’s the best chance we have!” Koala said before Ace whipped on his heel and threw her off the cliff, towards where Luffy had splashed down.

 “And then there were four,” Kaido noted, picking up a large boulder and slamming it down on Ace.

 The rock melted before it even touched him.

 “Not for long,” Ace growled. “But you’re gonna get it for what you did!”

 “You already know that’s not enough!” Kaido mocked, swatting away a tree Law had fied at his head with Tact.

 “Change of plan,” Marco told Ace. “We need to endure until Koala and Luffy get back.”

 “Law’s most important, energy-wise,” Ace said.

 “Then tell him,” Marco said. “I’ll keep the big guy distracted—I can take the most hits.”

 Marco leaped into the air and transformed, quickly flying around Kaido’s head to disorient the Beast with the blue and yellow flames that trailed around him.

 “What’s he doing?” Law asked as Ace sprinted over to him and Sabo.

 “Marco’s buying us a little time. Let’s let Kaido mess with us until Luffy and Koala are back,” Ace said.

.o.o.o.

 Koala did her best not to shriek as she hurtled through the air, wanting to conserved her breath so she could hopefully fine Luffy on her first dive. Entry into the water was a little rough, but her lungs weren’t burning yet so she kicked further down, looking around.

 There! Oh, good, he was still on the island’s coastal shelf and not in the deep water another hundred or so yards out. Only about thirty feet down, no problem. Koala went up for another breath to make sure she had enough in her lungs for the trip down and back along with carrying Luffy.

 Koala dove back down into the water. Luckily Luffy still seemed to be pretty good at holding his breath and she was able to pull him off the seafloor and towards the surface. Luffy sputtered and gasped as they reached breathable air and Koala tried to just maneuver around it to haul them back towards shore.

 “Koala! Koala!” Luffy said.

 “Yeah, I’m here. I’ve got you,” she said.

 “No, no, Koala, listen!” Luffy said. “I know what to do now!”

 “What?” Koala asked.

 Luffy grinned at her, “I know how to beat Kaido!”

Chapter Text

 “I know how to beat Kaido!”

 Koala stared at Luffy, “You just…figured that out while you were drowning?”

 “Yeah, because I was drowning!” Luffy said enthusiastically.

 “Drowning makes you think? Oh, shoot,” Koala said, realizing she’d become too distracted to swim properly. “Here…just let me…this doesn’t hurt too much, does it?”

 “Nah,” Luffy said as she dragged his arms above the water and then took advantage of them re-rubberizing when up there to tie them in a knot. “It’s happened before.”

 “Okay,” Koala said, settling the knotted arms around her neck. “Okay, I can swim now. Tell me the plan. Keep it simple.”

 “All right, so, I sink, right? Because of the Gum-Gum?” Luffy asked.

 “Yes, got that,” Koala said.

 “So, we can’t kill Kaido, right? But we can drown him!”

 “Luffy, people have tried drowning him before,” Koala said. “He’s been put in flooded rooms and pits.”

 “Yeah, but not like this! Remember, Traffy said they never did it enough,” Luffy said. “Because he could swim then, right? Move then, right?”

 “What are you getting at?” Koala asked as they finally reached the shallows and she picked Luffy up and tossed him onto dry land. Luffy quickly untangled his arms and reached into his jacket.

 “We feed Kaido this!” Luffy said, triumphantly holding up the Zoan he’d stolen.

 “The Devil Fruit?” Koala asked. “You…you want to give Kaido a Devil Fruit?”

 “Yeah! So we can drown him!” Luffy said.

 “You want to give Kaido extra powers,” Koala said, trying to make sure she had this right. Oh, why had she ever complained about Sabo’s crazy moments? She’d forgotten what his brothers were like…

 “Well, yeah, but he’s going to have trouble controlling it at first, right?” Luffy said. “And we take advantage of that to drown him!”

 Oh. That actually made some crazy sense.

 She had clearly spent too much time around Sabo and the three Ds. Their crazy was making sense now.

 “I think I get it now,” Koala said as she walked out of the water. “He won’t be able to move once he’s underwater! If we get him past the coastal shelf, into really deep water…”

 “We win!” Luffy said eagerly. “So long as no one else pulls him out!”

 “And if he can’t move, there’s only so long he can be down there before he really drowns…or things start eating him…” Koala said. “Luffy, that could work! We need to get back up there and tell the others!”

 “All right! Hang on, big sis!” Luffy said, holding an arm out. “I got this!”

.o.o.o.

 “Get the boy!” one of the Beast Pirates yelled, spotting Momonosuke among the crowd on the battlefield.

 A small girl with purple hair jumped in front of Momo, only for Bartolomeo to yank both of them back and into a bubble with him and several of his crew.

 “Fight smarter, not harder!” Barto scolded the girl. “Isn’t that you ninja’s thing or whatever?”

 “I had to protect Momo!” she protested.

  “Protecting Momo’s my job!” Bartolomeo protested.

 “I’m the kunoichi of Wano here!”

 “I’m the pirate with barrier powers here!”

 “Tama, Barto, stop!” Momonosuke shouted.

 “What?” Tama and Barto asked.

 Momonosuke and the rest of the Barto Club sternly pointed at the many Beast Pirates charging them with Haki-coated weaponry.

 “…Uh oh,” Bartolomeo muttered.

.o.o.o.

 “Got to admit, you are amazing on defense,” Sabo admitted as Law warped him away from Kaido’s fist right before impact.

 “It’s all I can do right now,” Law said. “My Haki isn’t strong enough to overcome his to cut him, so I’m letting Phoenix and Fire Fist handle the damage while you distract and I keep you three alive.”

 “Outside of that one good hit breaking a horn, Marco’s not that much farther along than us in the damage count,” Sabo sighed. “Ace is strong enough to hit back but we’re really up against a wall here unless we come up with a plan, and fast.”

 “I could try to warp directly in front of his chest for a Countershock. It wouldn’t make it past the Haki at full power but it would still do something,” Law said. “Or warp Ace in front of his head; give you a clean shot at his eyes. Even if he can’t burn them, there’s the hat and light facto-”

 “Move!” Ace yelled, booting Law out of the way before just barely catching Kaido’s fist.

 Law landed in a heap, not wanting to waste energy to make a new Room just to right himself with Shambles or Tact.

 This was bad. Ace was just barely able to keep up with Kaido physically, and not enough to do any significant damage in return if he got stuck doing too defense. They were already down two, and Law didn’t want to think about if Koala didn’t get to Luffy in-

 “YAHOOOO!”

 Okay, never mind that then.

 “AIEEEEEEEE!”

 Everyone turned in time to see Luffy and Koala crash into the ground, Luffy rolling them in the air so his rubber took the brunt of the impact.

 “Koala! Luffy!” Sabo yelled.

 “Oh, four blues I am never doing that again!” Koala gasped as the dust cleared. “Oh wow. Oh crap.”

“Shishishi, what are you talking about, it worked great!” Luffy cheered as he bounced to his feet. Koala staggered up after him, dusting herself off with a sigh as she wobbled a bit.

 “You’re still alive?” Kaido demanded furiously.        

 “Yeah, what’s it to you?” Luffy mocked, pulling an eyelid down and sticking out his tongue. “Nyeh! Can’t kill me that easy!”

 “Luffy-ya, don’t taunt the unkillable Emperor asshole,” Law said, idly gesturing at Kaido with his middle finger.

 “Oh, we can kill him!” Luffy said, slamming his fists together. “I’ve got a plan!”

 “Not words I ever expected from you, but okay,” Sabo said.

 “The killing or the plan?” Marco called.

 “The killing; he’s had some plans before,” Sabo said as Ace made a huge wall of fire to buy them a few moments of planning time. “What’s the plan, Lu?”

 “We make Kaido eat a Devil Fruit,” Luffy said. “Then we drown him.”

 “Also, Sabo should shoot him with seastone after he eats it,” Koala said.

 “Oh yeah, that’s good too,” Luffy agreed.

 “That’s…brilliant,” Law admitted as Luffy pulled the zoan out of his vest. “…Wait. How do we make him eat the fruit?”

 “I was kind of hoping you’d think of that part for me?” Luffy said, beaming at Law. Koala chuckled and shook her head.

 “Yeah, okay fine, we uh…give me a second,” Law said.

 “You’ve got maybe six,” Ace said, eyeing Kaido’s approach.

 “Done,” Law said. “Okay, we just need to get his mouth open. Ace, hit him. Luffy, feed him. I’ll handle swallowing. Then Sabo, shoot him. Room, Shambles!”

 Law swapped them out of the way of a blow and they all quickly set to work.

 Marco threw Ace, who landed feet-first in Kaido’s gut. Kaido had the wind knocked out of him and opened his mouth to gasp for air.

 “Gum-Gum Slingshot!” Luffy said, launching the fruit into the big target.

 “Tact,” Law said as soon as he saw the fruit fall in. He put a hand to his own throat to pay attention to what muscles needed to do what and managed to control Kaido’s just long enough to make sure he swallowed before Kaido was able to use his Armament Haki to stop the control.

 Kaido sputtered, “What the hell are you playing at, Straw Hat?”

 “Welcoming you to the Devil Fruit club!” Luffy laughed.

 “And the vulnerable to seastone club,” Sabo added as he finished loading the seastone into his rifle and took aim.

.o.o.o.

 “The fuck is even going on over there?” Kid asked as he stabbed another beast.

 “Can you stop craning your neck and please just fight?” Hawkins asked, sighing heavily.

 Kid glared at the wall of flames. “They’re taking too long.”

 “They are fighting an Emperor, you know,” Kanjuro admonished as he drew a large snake with his brush and set it upon their foes. The chaos continued unabated, to the point where said crudely-drawn snake didn’t even stand out.

 “I just feel like everyone else is having way more fun at this!” Kid said, waving his arms before punching a pirate that tried to sneak up on him. “All I got to do was distract Apoo so the rest of you could kick his ass, and now I’m just fighting grunts? Lame!”

 Killer sighed. Same old Kid.

.o.o.o.

 “I’m a genius!” Barto cheered as he kept running, his barrier rolling along.

 “Be a faster genius!” Momonosuke commanded. “They’re gaining on us!”

 “You heard Momonosuke!” Barto told his crewmates. “Keep running!”

 “I have an idea, make a left here and make the barrier wider!” Tama suggested from a perch atop a crew member’s shoulders.

 “Huh, how much wider?” Barto asked, looking at the cylander’s sides.”

 “Uh…a few feet! Yeah!” Tama said as they veered right, smashing over small trees and bushes as the barrier rolled through what looked like an old garden.

 “Done! Now what did I—ah!” Bartolomeo shrieked as after the garden there was a steep drop into a canal…that the barrier stayed above, as its width kept it balanced on the sides of the structure.

 “That!” Tama said smugly as some of their pursuers fell in the water.

.o.o.o.

 “Hi, we’re back!” Pudding said cheerily as Zoro and Sanji raced into the fray.

 “Was the operation a success?” Jinbe asked her and Robin.

 “We found even more than we were looking for,” Robin said. “Law’s going to want to see it, easily.”

 “And we wrecked their ships enough to prevent a major escape,” Pudding said. ‘And Sanji and Zoro brought all these seastone chains if we need them for something…”

 “I think Franky could put them to best use,” Robin said, spotting the cyborg on the field and growing an arm from his back to tap him on the shoulder for attention. “Oh, and Jinbe…try to isolate Oven and Pan. I’ll explain more later.”

 “Very well,” Jinbe mused. “I shall expect quite the explanation for moving against some of Big Mom’s crew, especially with one of her daughters right here.”

 “Oh, you will get it,” Robin said, giving Pudding a smile that made the other woman shiver.

.o.o.o.

 Kaido grabbed his head, roaring as fur started to erupt form his skin.

 “We’ve probably got less than a minute before he acclimates!” Law warned.

 “We’re not giving him a minute,” Sabo said, firing the seastone bullets to stagger Kaido now that they’d weaken him. “Marco, Ace, you’re up!”

 Ace grabbed Marco and spun, whipping the phoenix forward to nail a hard kick into Kaido’s left ankle while Luffy sprinted at Koala, who helped him vault into the air.

 “Here we go!” Luffy yelled as Kaido toppled back on one leg. “Gum-Gum Super Emperor-Size King Kong Gun!”

 The force of the Conqueror’s Haki alone shook the sky. The clamor from battles on the rest of the island died away as everyone wondered just what the hell had happened.

 “…Maybe he had a little more in him than he thought,” Ace mused right as Luffy’s fists made impact.

 The whole island shook when the shockwaves coming off the blow hit it, and the ocean around them began to throw huge waves every which way.

 If anyone had listened very carefully, they would have heard Kaido gasp as his breath was knocked clean out of him. But it was only an instant within an instant, and everything happened so fast that no one had time to even think they might need to listen.

 Kaido went flying.

 He rocketed well past where he’d thrown Luffy, past the coastal shelf and over deep water.

 Then he hit.

 Then he sunk.

 Luffy, rebounding from the hit, skidded as he landed on the shore. He grabbed his head to make sure his hat was still there, before looking forward at the sea.

 There were still large ripples—waves, really—emanating from where Kaido sunk.

 “…That was…was far enough, right?” Luffy asked quietly. He felt like this was a moment to be quiet. This was big.

 “That was far enough,” Koala agreed breathlessly after pulling out a spyglass to check.

 “And…and he’s not coming up?” Luffy asked, looking around at the others for confirmation of what he was seeing.

 “No,” Law confirmed. “I don’t think he’s trying to swim either, I mean, with the Devil Fruit he couldn’t but…it worked. Shit. It worked.” Law started to chuckle towards the end of the sentence, a small smirk forming on his lips.

 “Congrats, yoi. I think you just killed an Emperor,” Marco told Luffy, clapping him on the shoulder.

 “And you used your brains to do it. I’m in shock,” Sabo said, putting a hand on his chest. “No, seriously, I think I’m in shock.”

 Law walked over to him and checked him over. “Sit down. Now.”

  Sabo did so, laughing quietly as he leaned against Koala’s legs.

 “Well. Now what?” Ace asked, flopping down on his back in the dirt. Marco rolled his eyes at him.

 “We go find Jinbe or Namur or somebody else who swims really well,” Koala said. “Who’s not me because I already took a dip today and swimming while carrying Luffy and then going back to fighting Kaido wore me out. So, get someone else and then we’ll see if he’s still down there.”

 She sat down, barely managing to keep Sabo upright. “Okay yeah, I don’t think I can even walk anymore.”

 “Which is kind of bad since there’s still fighting going on,” Ace noted, rolling onto his side and propping himself up on his elbow to look towards his fire wall. “Or it was…yeah, I think it’s still going on.”

 “Dang it, why can’t this be like Dressroba and we win when the bad guy goes down?” Luffy whined.

 “Dressrosa," Law corrected as he and Luffy started walking towards the battle below after Ace extinguished the fire wall.

 “Huh?” Luffy asked.

 Law shook his head, “Never mind…”

.o.o.o.

 “Fire’s dying!” Wire yelled suddenly, to Kid’s glee.

 “Fuck yeah, going to get in on that!” he laughed, rushing towards the cliffs, only to stop at what he and everyone else heard next.

 “Guess who just KILLED KAIDO?” was kind of something to listen to.

 Several of the Beast Pirates up and dropped their weapons in sheer panic. The rest were startled enough by the proclamation to be quickly overrun.

 Luffy bounded over to Jinbe, waving and then grabbing him by the collar of his robe and breathlessly asking him to go see if Kaido was on the seafloor because where else would he be?

 Jinbe shared a glance with Robin and Pudding before leaving to do as his captain asked. Robin smiled, nodding in Franky’s direction.

.o.o.o.

  Bartolomeo sighed in relief as he was able to drop the barrier once their allies rounded up their pursuers with news of Kaido’s demise. “Whew. Was getting rank in there.”

 “Yeah, you pirates stink,” Tama agreed. Momonouke laughed.

.o.o.o.

 “Well?” Marco asked.

 “He’s still down there,” Jinbe said. “He cannot move, not even crawl along the bottom. I don’t know how long it will take him to drown, however.”

 “Yeah, well, he’ll get there,” Law huffed. “Not our problem if it takes him a while.”

  “Maybe we’ll get lucky and something will start eating him. Like some Sea Kings or whatever,” Ace mused.

 “That is honestly more likely,” Jinbe admitted. “Robin found some things on Kaido…Law, from what she told me, you’ll make the most of them.”

 “Thank you,” Law said, stifling a yawn. “Maybe…not this second?”

 “So, did everyone else have everything go okay? I’m sorry I couldn’t help anyone since we had to deal with Kaido and all,” Luffy said to his crew, rocking on his feet as he looked them over, pleased to see no obvious injuries beyond one of Zoro’s arms being covered in blood. Frankly, just one limb like that should have counted as a record low for Zoro, so he wasn’t too worried about it.

 “Oh yeah,” Zoro said, snapping his fingers on his good arm. “Pudding’s mom thinks Pudding was going to backstab us this whole time but really Pudding is backstabbing her mom with Pekoms so we need to beat up Oven and Pan or something. We already killed Nitro.”

 “What?” Oven gasped before gulping as Franky quickly lassoed him and Pan with a seastone chain and gave Robin a thumbs-up. “Seriously?”

 “Good thing they were tired, too,” Pekoms said, wiping some sweat off his brow.

 “It’s not super that you kept that from us,” Franky scolded Zoro. “Robin only told me, like, a minute ago!”

 “We only found out today, and only just got done with the fighting to tell you!” Zoro said.

 “Sorry I didn’t say anything sooner,” Pudding said. “But if I did then Nitro and the others would make sure Mama knew and then, well, all for nothing.”

 “She’s like some super actress or something, really good liar,” Perona added.

 “I knew it!” Law yelled before grabbing his head and groaning.

 “You did?” Marco asked.

 Law flipped him off before hissing and rubbing his temples.

 “Asshole,” Ace muttered. Law weakly kicked at him.

 “Guys, let Law be right,” Nami said. “You know how much it means to him.”

 “I did know it, I was suspicious of her since she got here!” Law argued.

 “Yep,” Zoro agreed as Pudding added, “He was watching me a lot, you know.”

 “…Okay, so Traffy was right, but she was only being sneaky for us, yay, good, moving on!” Luffy said quickly.

 “We found out a lot about Kaido, he had some hidden stuff on his ship,” Sanji said, supporting a woozy-looking Kin’emon on his way over. The samurai appeared to have a head injury.

 “Yes, I told them that,” Jinbe said.

 “And you were on his ship why?” Sabo asked.

 “Zoro got lost,” Robin, Sanji and Perona said.

 Several members of the crew burst out laughing, to Zoro’s indignation and their allies’ complete confusion.

Chapter Text

It turned out that battles to free an island led to a rather massive amount of injuries to tend to. While some of the Straw Hearts had remembered from Dressrossa, the sheer number of Wano citizens who’d gotten into the fighting had rather increased the injury count.

 Law of course wanted to do plently of the work himself but Chopper put his hoof down and only let Law do a check-over of their crew and then leave instructions while resting in the room Momonosuke had given to him and Luffy. Law was in little state to do anything more and constant exposure to his fellow doctor meant that Chopper was pretty much immune to Law’s standard snarling and threats.

 “I know you care about everyone and want them to have the best care possible,” Chopper said in reply to a dark mutter about removing his antlers, “but right now that care’s not with you. You’re not in any shape to provide best care, Dr. Trafalgar. And until you are it’s going to be my job.”

 Law annoyance morphed into a smirk, “Fine. But I expect good quality for this trade.”

 “Sure. And as soon as he wakes up you can have Luffy,” Chopper added. “You’re the only one who can keep him still when he’s hurt this bad.”

 “Only one willing to tie him up, you mean,” Law shot back.

 “I still question the medical ethics of that, but cannot deny the results,” Chopper sighed. “All right! Get some rest!”

 “Aye-aye, Dr. Tony,” Law chuckled.

 “Here. Reading material,” Chopper said, tossing the file Sanji’s group had found at Law. “You’ll probably make the most sense of it…”

 “Threats revoked,” Law said, eyes eagerly devouring the contents. After some hours of reading, he managed a breakthrough that perhaps he was the most-suited to have.

 “That’s why…” Law said.

 “What?” Luffy asked sleepily, having started waking up about half an hour ago.

 “To make sure the experiment would live, one of the doctors used the Eternal Life operation on him,” Law said. “That’s how come nothing else could kill him…until we added a new weakness.”

 “So…wait…” Luffy said, frowning as he rolled onto his back. “An old scientist had the Op-Op?”

 “Right,” Law said. “Depending on how long the Op-Op took to reappear and be found, it could have even been my direct predecessor.”

 “Huh,” Luffy said, folding his arms behind his head, starting at the ceiling. Near one corner there was a small hole into the room above, which was allegedly a storage area. “So…Kaido wasn’t much older than you?”

 “He was made an adult, so, technically he was,” Law said. “But in another way, he wasn’t.”

 “Huh,” Luffy said.

 Law frowned, tapping the file, “Maybe that’s why the Marines switched to the Pacifista. Reliable programming. I’d have to ask our cyborg about that one.”

 “Huh…” Luffy repeated. “Shanks says when he was a kid, the Marines started having a lot of giants around, so they must have recruited a lot before he was born. So…they tried giants, and then Kaido, and then the robots?”

 “They want something that can’t be stopped,” Law said.

 “Isn’t that the Admirals’ job?” Luffy asked.

 “Didn’t work against the Emperors,” Law reminded him.

 Luffy nodded, “Yeah. So they wanted something for the New World?”

 “They want control over what they don’t control. The New World is definitely that,” Law mused. “I don’t know. This could just be an early-stage plan that got horrendously out of hand. There’s too much to make a definitive conclusion.”

 “Sleep on it then,” Luffy yawned, tugging Law down.

 Law sighed, using some of the last of his energy to warp the folder over to a table. “So pushy.”

 “You love it.”

 “Lies.”

.o.o.o.

 Sanji found Zoro sleeping on a flat bit of rubble and rolled his eyes. Typical the idiot had refused a bed.

 “Oi, wake up,” he said, nudging Zoro with a foot.

 “Don’t want to,” Zoro muttered, the words slurring a little.

 “I said up,” Sanji said. Zoro scowled and went to sit up, avoiding his injured arm. After a moment of him stuggling, Sanji stepped in.

 “Come on, here,” Sanji said, helping Zoro sit up by moving next to him. “Doctors say you need to eat and I agree.”

 “What is it?” Zoro asked.

 “Soup, now come on,” Sanji said, helping Zoro lean on him. “There we go. Help me keep the bowl steady, okay? Okay, good.”

 Zoro sighed, “I can do it myself.”

 “You have one working arm and Chopper and Law agreed no lifting until you recover from the blood loss, which why you need calories,” Sanji said. “Come on, moss head, let me help.”

 “Shit cook,” Zoro muttered, but he obligingly opened his mouth when Sanji brought a spoonful of soup to it.

 Sanji slowly stirred the soup a bit as Zoro chewed the chunks of meat and vegetables before swallowing. Sanji glanced at him, “How is it?”

 “Good. Thanks,” Zoro said. “Take you long to make?”

 “Not too long. The Beast Pirates had the kitchens well stocked,” Sanji said, giving him another spoonful. “Some of Kid and Killer’s crew knew the way around and showed us everything. Killer helped out. He makes some lovely spaghetti.”

 “That’s nice,” Zoro said. “What’d we do with the Beasts? Fell asleep before we decided…”

 “Chained up in the dungeons,” Sanji said. “Guarded by those who can right now. Apoo’s down there too. Kid keeps trying to sneak down and kill him. Marco already threw him in the sea once. Kid, I mean.”

 “No shit?” Zoro chuckled.

 “No shit. Marco says no murdering defeated, chained-up assholes,” Sanji agreed. “Just broth left. Want to drink it or keep doing this?”

 “Drink,” Zoro said. Sanji brought the bowl up to his lips and gently tilted it. Zoro drank it down steadily. He hummed in appreciation as he finished it off, “That was damn good. Got any alcohol?”

 “You’re lucky I love you,” Sanji muttered, pulling a flask and shot glass out of his jacket. “One shot of whiskey. You can have more later.”

 “Cook…” Zoro whined.

 “No. We’re taking this slow,” Sanji said. “You need to recover.”

 “Alcohol helps me recover…” Zoro tried.

 “No. Again. No,” Sanji said. “Get some rest. You like naps, and naps help you more than alcohol right now. Do that instead.”

 “You’re lucky you’re too good looking to argue with,” Zoro yawned after downing his shot.

 “…Okay yeah, you’re really out of it,” Sanji chuckled. “Usually takes a barrel of beer to get to the sweet talk. Get some rest, tri-swords. Things’ll keep until you wake up.”

 Zoro huffed.

.o.o.o.

 “How goes the deciphering?” Nami asked Pudding and Robin.

 Pudding yawned, “We’re…doing our best. Just tiring.”

 “Well, we grabbed more blankets,” Vivi offered as Carrot and Wanda came in with even more. “And…so did they. The people of Wano are being very generous.”

 “It’ll be like a sumbler party!” Persona offered cheerfully as she came in with a large pillow she promptly tossed on the floor to use as a mattress.

 “I could use some sleep,” Robin admitted, carefully tucking away her notes as Pudding did the same.

 “Good idea,” Vivi said. “I think some of us have, ah,” she paused to yawn, “been awake too long, keeping an eye out.”

 “I think things are settled enough to sleep,” Nami agreed, grabbing some blankets and leading Vivi over to a corner of the room. “Let’s get some while we can.”

.o.o.o

 There was a noise in the hallway.

 Pudding’s eyes snapped open and she sat up, grabbing her gun, “Who’s there?”

 “Wha…” Perona muttered, yawning.

 “Heard someone,” Pudding said, glaring around the room. Wanda and Carrot were both still out, as were Nami and Vivi, huddled in their little nook. No one else seemed to have come in…

 “We’re in a half-broken palace full of people, a lot of whoom are twitchy after the fight. Course you heard someone,” Perona said. “Look, I’ll just…send some ghosties out, okay? You’ll see, it’s fine.”

 Two of Perona’s ghosts slid through the door and into the hall. One returned quickly and whispered to its mistress.

 “It’s just Sanji,” Perona said.

 “Sanji?” Pudding asked. A moment later Sanji eased the door open. “I thought you all said he wasn’t a peeping tom.”

 Sanji scanned the room but instead of being embarrassed to see them awake looked relieved and waved them over. Pudding frowned, but before she could comment Perona was on her feet and heading for the door. Pudding sighed, grabbed her holster, and did the same.

 “What’s going on?” Pudding asked as she buckled the gun belt over her sleep shirt.

 “Zoro heard something,” Sanji said. “So did Bepo. They’re going to get Koala and Usopp. I’ve been going around to see if it woke anyone else up.”

 “Yeah, Pudding,” Perona said. “First thing she did was grab her gun.”

 “With my family, that’s a standard reaction,” Pudding said flatly.

 “Oh. Well…then…” Sanji said slowly. “What did you hear?”

 “It wasn’t just hearing,” Pudding said. “More like a feeling. A really familiar one. Like when Anana’s sneaking around with scissors…”

 At Sanji and Perona’s blank looks she added, “Little sister. Seven.”

 “Ack,” Perona muttered, making a disgusted face. “Sanji, you don’t have the most screwy family anymore.”

 “Please, Law’s related to Doflamingo. I never did,” Sanji huffed.

 “We need to figure this out,” Perona said. “This many people feeling bad…and with some of the strongest still recovering…”

 “Whitebeads who were still feeling good have been patrolling the shore since the battle,” Sanji mused.

 The all froze at the sound of a gunshot, before taking off running.

.o.o.o.

 Law woke up at the soft click of a gun being cocked. The Room began to swirl as energy around his hand as he sat up—the sudden motion jostling Luffy—and found himself looking at a gun barrel.

 The assassin didn’t seem surprised and simply pulled the trigger.

 Law hit the floor, rammed aside hard by Luffy as the gun fired. Red blood splashed across Law’s face.

 Law’s eyes widened at the large hole in Luffy’s back. “Room.”

 The assassin began to backtrack. Law growled out “Tact” to toss him against a wall and hold him there before turning his attention to Luffy, sprawled on the bed. He faintly heard running, but that didn’t matter. Friends could take whoever this assassin was, foes could die with them.

 Shit, seastone bullet. Law couldn’t use Tact on seastone, and if he touched it the Room would short out. Law scowled and summoned his coat, digging around inside for some sterile gloves in the pockets.

 The assassin started squirming a bit much for his taste. Law shoved them against the wall harder.

 The door burst open as he finally found his gloves in their bag. Sanji, Perona, and Pudding. Law jerked a thumb at the assassin before going to work, trusting them to handle it. He didn’t need to waste time with split concentration anymore and dropped using Tact. Those three could finish that part for him.

 Pudding took one look at Luffy and the bloodied sheets, let out an unholy screech that made everyone flinch, and started trying to fill the assassin full of brightly colored candy bullets.

 “The hell did you do?” Law muttered as he used his powers to manipulate the wound so he had a clear sight line for the bullet. Luffy came to with a hiss of pain as Law had to widen it a little bit.

 “Was gonna…hit your brain…” Luffy muttered. “Back’s…better ‘n brain…right?”

 “Shut up,” Law ordered. “You…you stupid…know nothing about anatomy…shut up!”

 “Traffy’s worried,” Luffy teased dazedly.

 “Yes, I’m fucking worried!” Law snapped. “Shut up and stop distracting me!”

 There, he could see it now. Law carefully reached in and grasped the bullet. The gloves were substantial enough to not let him touch the seatone while still being thin enough for his nails to help him keep a grip on it as he tugged it out of Luffy and dropped it on the sheets. Good, now he just had to patch it…and the lung it hit, fuck…

 Ace, Marco, Sabo, and Koala rushed in as Sanji gently pushed a hysterically sobbing, yelling, and trying-to-reload Pudding at Perona before practically teleporting to the assassin and kicking them repeatedly.

 Ace’s Conqueror’s haki made the room shudder as soon as he saw Luffy, “What the fuck happened?”

 “Assassin. Seastone bullet. Fixing it,” Law said. “Could you hold him up a bit?” He was having trouble keeping Luffy at a good angle and Luffy was drifting back out again.

 Ace and Sabo scrabbled onto the bed as Koala sighed and tugged Sanji off the assassin while Marco went over to inspect the guy.

 Law realized he still had no clue who it even was. “Anyone recognize ‘em?”

 Sanji frowned, “…I feel like I’ve kicked this man before.”

 “Oh, well, very specific,” Perona said, batting Pudding’s hands down when Pudding finally managed to reload and tried to aim at the assassin again. “Wait. We want him to talk, probably.”

 “Government sidearm,” Marco said, eyeing the pistol that had shot Luffy. “Probably Cipher Pol.”

 “But why would Cipher Pol want to shoot Law?” Perona asked. “…Oh, wait. His dad. Silly me.”

 “Shoot you?” Ace growled at Law. “Last I checked, Lu’s the one who got shot.”

 “He woke up and took the bullet,” Law said bitterly. “He does shit like that.”

 “Yeah, he does,” Sabo sighed. “How’s it going?”

 “Fine, should be done soon,” Law said. Luffy’s rubber-ness made stitching him back together fairly easy once any seastone interference was handled, even his lungs. “Frankly I’m still mad at him.”

 “For saving your life. Of course you are,” Ace said.

 “For getting shot!” Law snapped. “I’m allowed to be angry and worried!”

 “Calm down, both of you,” Sabo sighed.

 Marco wiped some of the blood off the man’s face so Sanji could get abetter look at him.

 “…Jabra,” Sanji said as it suddenly came to him. “Jabra, from CP-9!”

 “Good, we know who he is, now let me kill him!” Pudding snarled. Perona pushed her gun down again and Pudding growled and swung at her. Perona rolled her eyes and let Pudding’s fist pass right through her.

 “Let’s calm down,” Sanji said, plucking Pudding’s gun out of her hands. “We need him to,” he ducked another wild swing from Pudding, “talk so let’s just take some deep breaths and plan his demise at a later date. How about I take you to Fair Robin? She’s sure to have lovely ideas.”

 “Yes, Robin, good idea,” Perona said. “Pudding, Robin will have so many revenge ideas. Don’t you want ideas for terrible vengeance?”

 Pudding burst into sobs, but nodded.

 “Very good, terrible vengeance, right away,” Sanji said, steering her out of the room with Perona on their heels. He looked over his shoulder, giving the group on the bed an apologetic look. Sabo waved him on. Pudding not going on an immediate rampage was pretty important, too.

 “So…interesting timing,” Koala noted.

 “Probably intentional. Post-Dressrosa the government knew you and Kaido were on a collision course,” Marco said. “Let us take out the threat they couldn’t, then cripple us by trying to kill part of leadership.”

 “Also get back at Rocinante for whatever he’s doing with the Revolutionary Army,” Koala added. “If they managed Law. The plan might have been to kill Luffy instead by hoping he’d take the shot.”

 “No. The asshole wasn’t ready for me to retaliate,” Law said as he closed up Luffy’s wound and sagged against the headboard. “And…I’m going to need even longer to rest up now. Damn it.”

 “Yeah, yeah, Chopper will lord it over you, now rest with Lu,” Sabo said, ruffling Law’s hair. Law bared his teeth at him. “As if I’m going to stop messing with you, Law.”

 “I’ll guard the door,” Ace said.

 “Not with your narcolepsy you won’t. Sabo and I will handle it,” Koala said.

 “She’s right. You and Marco should sweep the island with whoever else is up, make sure there’s no other spies or assassins,” Sabo agreed. “Alert Momo’s guards too, just in case.”

 “Kinemon’s been up since the shot, he’s standing guard right now, yoi,” Marco said. He glared at Jabra. “We’ll lock this one up. Pretty sure this was a suicide mission.”

 “It’s going to be one now whether it was before or not,” Ace muttered as he headed out.

.o.o.o.

 News of the attack on Law and Luffy kept the palace in an uproar for the rest of the next day and well into the evening. The pirates could barely guard Jabra’s cell, so many Wano citizens outraged at the attack on their heroes were sitting there to keep an eye on the assassin.

 Law finally got up around dinner and made his way to the kitchen, smirking as Sanji almost immediately shoved him a bowl of rice and chicken with a curt, “You’re up? Calories. Now.”

 “Yes sir, good chef,” Law said, wandering over to the tables where Chopper appeared to be in consult with Killer and Kid.

 “So therefore I’d recommend talking to Franky about the connection between the—oh, Dr. Trafalgar!” Chopper said. “We were just talking about Captain Kid’s arm!”

 “Your smaller doctor is very knowledgeable,” Killer said politely.

 “We collaborate,” Law said, sitting down. “He has many ingenious ideas.”

 Chopper wiggled in delight, waving off Law’s compliment.

 “So, heard some ass went to get you and Straw Hat in your sleep. What a coward,” Kid scoffed.

 “Glad to know such underhanded tactics are off your list,” Law said.

 “Don’t you worry, Surgeon. There’s plenty still on there,” Kid chuckled.  

 “Eh, no offense, but I’ve had to fight Doflamingo, Kaido, and plenty of other assholes before you, so you’re not that threatening at the moment,” Law said.

 “Can’t belive you didn’t let me get a crack at Kaido…” Kid sulked.

 “You were in no condition to!” Killer and Chopper both argued, before staring at each other and then laughing at their similar concerns.

 “Glad you’ve made a friend, Dr. Tony,” Law said.

 “Yeah, he’s cool,” Killer said. “Excellent on medical advice.”

 “You know, Kuzan complimented you on almost being almost Admiral level at twenty-five,” Chopper said. “And now in the same year you’ve beaten-”

 “Wait, shit, Trafalgar’s twenty-five?” Kid demanded.

 “Why are we discussing my age?” Law asked Killer, annoyed. Killer shrugged and Law scowled. “Yes. I will be twenty-six in a few months.”

 “No fucking way!” Kid said. “No way you’re three years older than me, you shrimp-stick!”

 Law blinked, wide-eyed. Then slowly his eyes narrowed as his lips began to curve downwards, turning his moderately annoyed scowl into an outright frown. He started to lean forward and Chopper knew that look, Chopper knew this wasn’t to go anywhere good and Shanks and Ace only got away with calling Law too-skinny or a beanpole because Shanks could kick his ass and Ace and Law mutually agreed to dislike each other and this would not end well.

 Chopper quickly intervened, “Dr. Trafalgar I think your energy’s getting a bit low. Maybe you can go help Pudding, Ace, and Sabo plot revenge or something until you’ve recovered more?”

 At the very least that temporarily distracted Law. “Hmm? No, I feel fine. Thank you, Dr. Tony.”

 Chopper’s eye twitched, “Dr. Trafalgar, I think-”

 “You’re sure he’s twenty five?” Kid asked Chopper.

 “Dr. Tony is correct, yes. Now, what was that you were saying about me, Eustass-ya?” Law asked coolly.

 “I was saying you’re-”

 “Captain, I think Heat’s singalling he needs to see us?” Killer suggested quickly. Chopper sighed in relief.

 “In a minute, Killer, he can wait!” Kid said. “I’m saying there’s no way you’re older than-”

 “He is!” Chopper exploded. “Trafalgar D. Water Law is three years older than you and that fact should not be surprising due to the typical amount of size dimorphism displayed by humans meaning that it is entirely possible for you to be younger than him while displaying greater height and muscle mass! Why is that so hard?”

 Kid stared at Chopper, wide-eyed, while Law started snickering, “Excellent summary, Dr. Tony!”

 Chopper panted heavily. Urgh. Today could not get any longer.

.o.o.o.

 “We have to kill him,” Sabo said, shrugging. “We can leave the pirates for government pickup, even Oven and Pan, but Jabra will talk and will be believed.”

 “I wouldn’t let you not kill him,” Pudding growled.

 “We noticed,” Ace said, patting her on the shoulder. “I’m thinking…Law’s a doctor, right?”

 Sabo snorted, “Don’t let him hear you having to ask.”

 “Yeah, yeah,” Ace said, waving it off. “What I mean is…he could keep Jabra alive. So, everyone can get in a swing if they want. He’s got more flexible ethics than Chopper for stuff like that, and Chopper will just want to punch the guy, anyway.”

 “I mean he can do all sorts of stuff so…I guess?” Sabo hazarded.

 “Sounds good. Let’s do it,” Pudding said.

 “Down, girl,” Sabo sighed. Jeez, finding out your childhood friend was scary as fuck had its downsides.

 “Look, I know Robin’s supposed to be getting stuff out of him and shit but I wanna kill him now,” Pudding whined, sounding more like a child being denied candy than a woman pleading vengeance.

 “I do too, but we have to wait,” Ace said, patting her on the shoulder consolingly.

 “Besides, as you said, I can make it last,” Law commented, coming into the room. “Now, how long do we want to prolong this?”

 “Only until we leave, obviously,” Sabo said. “Which will be in a couple of days. Once everyone else is rested.”

 “Eh. That’s nothing. You all can do as you please then,” Law said. “I can handle it.”

 “Let’s not wear you out again too soon, especially in the same of vengeance for Lu. He won’t like it,” Ace admitted.

 “Keeping someone alive for a day or two isn’t that hard,” Law insisted. “Especially if most of you want to stick to bludgeoning.”

 “Well…” Ace said.

 “I know how strong your bludgeoning is, First Fist. I have taken it into account,” Law assured him.  

 “He meant Pudding wants to shoot the guy lots,” Sabo said. Pudding nodded.

 “Oh. Hm. Well, let’s discuss some of the best locations for that, then,” Law decided.

 Pudding hugged him gleefully. “Yes! Yes!”

 “Oh, now you like me,” Law muttered.

.o.o.o.

 “So then, we look at these lists and make sure the amounts are correct,” Nami said to Momomosuke, showing him her notes. “And that’s the basics of personal finance!”

 “Oh, so just scale it up for a kingdom?” Momo asked.

 “Eh,” Vivi admitted, waggling a hand. “That gets more complicated. But you’ll have lots of help. Don’t forget that. But not over-spending as a monarch is an important skill, especially when your kingdom is rebuilding.”

 “I understand,” Momo said. “I’m worried we haven’t found any other spies…”

 “That is concerning,” Vivi agreed. “It may have simply been a suicide mission to take out Law after all. If his theory about Kaido being unkillable thanks to the porevious user of Law’s fruit is true, then many they were worried he might use that technique on Luffy.”

 “Luffy would NEVER let him,” Momo said firmly. “I know Luffy.”

 “Exactly,” Nami said. “But the Government doesn’t. Now, what’s our cover story?”

 “I got kidnapped by pirates and Luffy decided I was funny and kept me alive. Freeing Wano was incidental to you all wanting to kill Kaido. I and my people absolutely did not team up with pirates at all during this,” Momonosuke recited.

 “Good job, young shogun!” Nami praised. “You’ll have whoever they send around your little finger in no time!”

.o.o.o.

 Luffy yawned, opening his eyes, “Wha…”

 “Ace is taking you back to the Sunny. We’re leaving tomorrow,” Law said from beside Ace.

 “And you are just about healed, but we didn’t want you ramapaging through the palace kitchen. You should ramapage through our kitchen,” Ace explained as they got to Law and Luffy’s room.

 “All ready!” Puddy said as they opened the door, gesturing to a fresh plate of bacon held by Sabo that Luffy happily gobbled before flopping down on the bed.

 Luffy yawned, “Yeah okay, I guess we have to go soon. So how was everything while I was out?”

 Pudding smiled sweetly, “Your brothers and boyfriend had everything under control.”

 Law smirked, “Yeah. Guess we did. But don’t do that again.”

 Luffy scowled, “I’m not letting you get shot!”

 “I meant the getting yourself shot part!” Law yelled back.

 Sabo checked an imaginary pocket watch, “Yep, right on time.”

 “He was gonna shoot you!” Luffy said.

 “And he did shoot you!” Law shot back.

 “I’m going to go tell Marco he’s going to need to handle organizing the departure,” Ace sighed.

 “I didn’t plan that okay?” Luffy groaned.

 “You planned to take the bullet you rubber moron!” Law hissed.

 “No name calling!” Luffy whined.

 Pudding shook her head as she shut the door. At least Luffy was alive.

 Long live the king.