Chapter Text
Once upon a time, in a faraway kingdom where desert reigned supreme, a man sought to confront the gods. Convinced of the existence of a great treasure lost in the sand, he had travelled heaven and earth to find it. With the help of an acolyte, he eventually found the Cave, which concealed the most coveted treasure of them all: the ‘Innocence Diamond’. But the gods were not so fond of the man’s boldness, so they punished him. Ever since, legend has it that whoever seeks the Innocence Diamond hidden in the Cave will endure centuries of a terrible curse.
***
Life was rough, sometimes.
This sentence turned and turned inside his head, which was spinning due to the acrobatic figures he did to escape the guards. The clamor of authoritative voices and boots hitting the sand disrupted the usual quietness of streets.
Using one hand to grasp a metal bar sticking out of an old abandoned house, he launched himself on a balcony, and landed like a cat. The ochre walls formed a Great Wall of sand and rock around him, as if the sultan’s gold was closing itself on him. The ruthless wind of deserts hit him with full force, given that he had reached the city heights. He could not let himself be caught, otherwise he would end up on the scaffold, and this time death would be rough. So he jumped off the balcony in one swift movement.
“Oh my God, look! The thief!”
Bystanders and curious onlookers stopped to see the shadow of a young man fly to the opposite wall, with exceptional agility. They all let out astonished gasps, fearing that the bandit would crash onto the ground in a pool of blood. But none of those conjectures hopefully came to reality. Instead, the mysterious thief, the obvious target of an armada of royal guards, leaped to another wall. He barely reached it, throwing his hands on the edge, feeling the burning stone ripping his skin off. The weight of fruits in his bag slowed him down considerably. But with another pull, he stood up and only saw a vast water body down below. The guards yelled at him, ordering his surrender.
“Portgas D. Ace, you’re under arrest!” the captain of Janissary shouted. “You cannot go any further!”
The interested party arrogantly shrugged, and grinned to himself without looking at the assailants. “Come on Smoker. Without me, you’re jobless.”
And he jumped once again, this time into the gigantic pool of a very esteemed vizir. The crowd audibly gasped like one man, as the lean silhouette covered with a famous hat disappeared from the edge of the wall.
“He jumped!”
“And into the vizir’s pool!” they shouted, horrified. The Janissary captain Smoker gritted his teeth in front of the wall, chewing on his pipe in anger.
“Get him, now! I don’t care if we step into the vizir’s riyad!” he barked. “Burst those doors open!”
And they did, pushing altogether on the massive sculpted doors of the esteemed vizir; they eventually gave in, as panicked servants came to open. The guards rushed inside the palace, eager to find the outlaw. A few moments later, no one was left on the streets, and every soldier was inside the riyad, looking frantically for the thief.
Ace thus chose this moment to go up the ivy creeper he had gripped, instead of jumping into the pool like everyone thought. Still grinning like an idiot, proud of his ruse, he pushed on his arms, wiggling his feet by reflex, and reached the top of the wall once again. From there, he would have it sweet: the guards were trapped in the riyad, the vizir would be furious, and they would find no one, because he’d be long gone.
Tiptoeing his way onto the edge, he used his skills to go down and reconnect with the firm ground. The man checked if the stolen content of his bag was intact – four pomegranates and three apples. Mission complete. Ace nonchalantly started walking, heading towards his den of criminals.
“What took you so long, asshole?”
The den of criminals was more of a crappy house of badly-raised adults: proof was, Ace’s colleague in shenanigans had just insulted him. Laying on the ground like the deprived swordsman he was, leaning on the stone wall, he looked at the thief with an eye from under his orange keffiyeh. His three swords were always next to him, like a scary plushie.
“An entire Janissary armada led by Smoker, a clingy sugar dealer, and my poor blistered feet, you bastard!” Ace complained, dropping the bag of fruits on a shabby table that barely held straight. The hovel let in a single ray of sunlight, a necessary condition in order not to be discovered by the sultan’s little soldiers. Ace could not finish his rant that an overexcited monkey jumped to his neck, letting out contented gurgles.
“AaaaAAaaaaAAAce!” he cried out. “You brought meat, tell me you brought meat?!”
“No Luffy, I did not bring meat, because I only have this bag with me and it would stink with meat grease!” the thief protested. “If you want meat, fetch it yourself!”
“You can put it in your pants, it’s a great hideaway,” the youngest boy named Luffy advised.
“Or under your hat,” the swordsman added.
“Are you two retarded? We barely have enough money to buy one shirt for three, I’m not rubbing myself with grease for your sorry asses,” Ace retorted. “I got you freaking pomegranates, that’s really expensive.”
The swordsman stood up lazily, dragging up the weight of his muscular body by resting a hand on his sword. He bawled without refinement and made his way to the table, to gaze at the red fruits. “Do you think we’re 30-year-old belly dancers who need to eat healthily? You can stick your pomegranates in your ass.”
“My ass is what I work off and that’s how you say thank you, bitch?!”
“Oi, Zoro, we have dessert,” Luffy chirped happily. “All we have to do is go get meat now, right, Ace?”
There was a moment of silence, expressing Ace’s despair: he had always been stuck with Luffy since they were kids, and they had lived like beggars since then. When they were old enough to steal and not get caught, running through the streets of Alabasta, they had made a life-changing encounter. The brothers had indeed tried to take Zoro’s swords to sell them – a bad call. After a nasty fight, they all concluded they could work together and get twice as much profit. Like four pomegranates and meat, for instance.
“Yeah, right,” Ace sighed. “You do the dirty work, I’ll watch the surroundings.”
***
The sultan’s palace was a monument of opulence: with its golden bulbs that made light shimmer even brighter, its tall immaculate towers rising at the city’s feet and its luxurious gardens, it inspired respect and forced admiration. The sultan governing the country was as appreciated as the magnificent architecture watching over the town; known as Cobra, he was a man of honour and integrity. Far from owning the flaws of his name, he was adored for his kindness, his generosity towards the people, and his will to suppress taxes on the poor more recently. Some would even say that he was lenient, out of touch with reality and gullible.
His daughter, however, was an apple that fell far from the tree.
“I said NO! Do you want me to say it in three other languages, father?!”
If her appearance confirmed every princess-like feature, such as the long silky sapphire hair, the sumptuous ocean dress slotted on the side to reveal large trousers, the big hazelnut eyes with long lashes and the delicate tanned skin texture, the princess refused to settle into her nice and passive heir role. She was pacing inside her room, arms crossed on her chest, and evidently scaring her dad.
“Vivi, for the love of God, please calm down,” Cobra pleaded, hands raised in surrender. “Every time we tackle the subject, you get so violently upset!”
“And how should I react?” Vivi barked, turning around abruptly. “I thought you were more evolved than this, father. Male primogeniture is an obsolete and patriarchal concept! And I don’t want to change who I am for it!”
“Male what?”
“THE RULE THAT DICTATES ONLY A MAN CAN REIGN, DAD! AND WHICH FORCES ME TO MARRY!”
“Oh, sorry, you’re so smart for me, I can’t even follow,” Cobra stated, visibly embarrassed and scratching his head. Vivi sighed, angry at herself for yelling, but angry at her father for being so credulous too.
“It’s not a question of intelligence,” she continued softly. “But of modernity and judgement. I won’t marry someone I don’t genuinely love. That’s my final word. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to blow off some steam outside!”
And she stepped forward with frantic zealousness, the cyan veil of her costume flowing behind her. Cobra could not stop her, fearing for his own life. “Wait, you’re not going outside the palace, are you?!”
“DON’T TELL ME WHAT TO DO!”
And the doors were slammed with unprecedented strength, leaving the poor sultan alone with his doubts.
***
The vizir’s riyad was a horrible mess after the Janissary’s relentless search.
The graceful palm trees had been bent like vulgar reeds, the pool was full of dirty leaves and grass, without mentioning the numerous footprints ruining the perfectly smooth sand that drew a path meandering through the gardens. And on top of that, the damn thief was nowhere to be found.
“What does this mean?”
The guards suddenly tensed up, as if a polar breeze was blowing on the arid land. Among the confusion, a man had come out from the riyad to proudly stand on top of the marble stairs. He projected an immense shadow that swallowed everything on its path: flowers, light and courage. “I am reiterating my question. What does this mean?”
“My Great Vizir, please forgive our impudence!” a guard bowed down. “We saw a criminal hide into your property, and wanted to arrest him on captain Smoker’s order!”
The vizir kept silent, staring at the crowd of soldiers gathered under his feet. A dry breeze lifted his long black cape, that only increased the height of his shadow; the men were mesmerized by the infamous scar that streaked his face, and the incredibly malevolent aura that escaped from his tall figure.
“And you found him, obviously.”
“W-Well, about that…” the soldier stammered. “He might have escaped while we were focusing on the garden-”
His sentence was interrupted by a dreadful scream of pain. The vizir had thrown the burning part of a hookah into the soldier’s face, whose skin melted under the deadly heat. The poor man crumbled to the ground, as his colleagues were helpless. The vizir resumed speaking.
“Not only do you barge into my property without a warning, but you also are incapable of fulfilling the only mission that was ever given to you,” he explained with a frightening calm. “I am on my way to meet the sultan. When I come back, I want the criminal arrested, and my riyad in its state of origin.”
“Yes, my Great Vizir!”
***
The three outlaws were walking in the streets of Alabasta, draped in their covering clothes to protect themselves from the sun, but also from the army. Luffy led the way, trusting his nose to find the most delicious piece of meat on the market, while Zoro and Ace followed. Like the emotionally repressed men they were, none of them had apologized for earlier; but the misunderstanding would be cleared up in a second. Ace was keeping the pomegranates to himself, savouring them since his airheads of acolytes did not appreciate good things in life.
“Oi Zoro, you can go with Luffy,” he exclaimed. “I’ll watch around. Just don’t get caught too easily.” The swordsman turned around, grinning like a demon.
“Are you insulting me as payback for earlier? I’m not like you, I’m not gonna get caught at all.”
“Yeah, whatever. Pick up the saliva dropping from Luffy’s mouth too.”
The market was a festival of colours, scents, tastes and fabrics: and if it was already rich with things capable of filling your five senses, the ambient heat compounded their vividness and carried them through the ochre streets. The little stone houses that offered some shadow, the rare flowers that grew despite the climate’s hostility, the people’s kindness at every corner, and the feeling of authenticity: this was all Vivi wanted, all she liked about her country. Not the fancy receptions, the silk dresses and the female objectification.
“See? This is why I love wandering through this neighbourhood,” Vivi sung, admiring the market effervescence. “The authenticity.”
“Yeah, you love authenticity because you never experienced it,” a ginger woman next to the princess launched. “I’ll give you the authenticity of sunburn, camel poop and drunkards.”
“I’m sorry Nami, you’re right, my privileged birth right is speaking instead of me,” the princess acknowledged, holding tight onto her blue veil. Another veil covered her mouth and nose only to let her warm chocolate eyes visible. “But you have very pale skin, maybe that’s why you got sunburnt.”
“You definitely took the least terrible of the things I said!” Nami complained. “I swear, you better raise my wage! Accompanying you in such vile places, where we’re risking our lives!”
Vivi took her hand, a token of their hidden friendship. “I will. But I promise you, the world outside the palace is not as bad as you think-”
She was suddenly pushed by a man who started running. It took only one second for Nami to run to him, catch him up, and send a magnificent kick into his male parts to retrieve the content.
“He stole your necklace!” she roared. “How’s that for a glimpse of the world outside the palace?!”
“I-I never thought- oh my God, the Janissary army, why are they here?!”
The princess was mortified with fear, persuaded that her father or that cunning Great Vizir of his had sent Smoker after her. The soldiers were popping up like wildflowers, appearing at every angle of the central market. The crowd gathered to buy their food started to disperse, afraid of the military shouting and captain Smoker’s triumphal arrival. With astonishment, Vivi and Nami witnessed the arrest of dangerous criminals. A poor little boy and his one-eyed father were at the centre of the square, alone under the merciless sun, surrounded by the armed forces. Was this the sad reality of Alabasta?
“Put your hands in the air! You’re done like rats!” Smoker ordered.
In the middle of the market, Luffy began heavily sweating under his strawhat. Zoro was trying to find a solution, recalling every moment he had told the boy to change his hat otherwise they were gonna get caught way easier and the other had of course not listened. If someone was hard-headed, it was Luffy. If he ever had a child like him, he would cut his stomach open. Now, thanks to him and his big piece of meat hanging from his mouth, they were screwed. Or maybe not.
“Yo, captain Smoker!” Zoro greeted without any interest for his interlocutor still chewing on his pipe. “Are you buying meat as well?”
“You don’t buy anything, rascals, you steal it.”
“Pwease, I don’t wanna eatch pomegranatches my whole life!” Luffy begged with his mouth full.
“You stole pomegranates on top of that?” Smoker choked on his saliva. “From the sultan’s favourite stall?!”
“Wait, that is why you chased Ace?”
“NO! It’s because it’s illegal to steal, you macaques! Seize them!”
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, captain!”
The third voice that was awaited by the soldier finally emerged from the crowd. Ace was in a dark street, and attracted all the gazes on him. Smoker took a few steps to see what the thief was up to to save his comrades, and swallowed in shock.
Vivi suddenly felt the cold metal of a dagger against her neck, right under her veil. With terrified wide eyes, she looked in front of her to seek the captain; the warmth of another person behind her convinced her that something bad was about to happen. Or had already happened. Anyhow, her instinct was quite bad, and judging from Nami’s horrified expression, the situation was bad too. As she let out a natural hiccup of fear, she felt a callous hand grab her arm.
“How dare you, you animal?” Smoker hissed like a snake.
Ace was entrapping the princess-without-knowing-she-was-one with a knife on her throat; he was the one firmly maintaining her in a hostage’s position. His voice was loud in Vivi’s ear.
“Listen to me, I don’t wanna hurt anyone,” he began grandiloquently. “So leave the two alone, repack your dogs and leave the market. Otherwise this lady won’t have time to marry.”
Smoker groaned in frustration, upset to have been tricked so easily by a youngster, twice in a day. There he was, grinning as usual, his jet black wavy hair covered by a big hat. But the thing that caught his attention even more was the shivering emanating from the hostage. Even the witnesses could sense it. Vivi was indeed trembling like a leaf, and not from fear.
“Time… to… marry…?” she articulated carefully, transforming into a dragon. The shiver muted into a tension in her muscles that was reflected by her contracted jaw and the ominous rumble in her throat.
“Wait, my lady, don’t do anything please-”
“WHY?”
She first freed her hand from the man’s grasp, without effort.
“DO YOU ALL SPEAK?”
She then headbutted Ace backwards to make him drop the blade.
“OF MARRIAGE?!”
Nami seized the opportunity of an opening, and launched herself at the thief with unparalleled speed to send a flying kick into the man’s ribs. “HUH!”
As he was projected on the opposite wall, the knife slipped and cut through Vivi’s face veil. Ace hit the hard stone, but did not collapse; in the distance, on the market, he heard Zoro and Luffy wreak havoc to get away. By the time he came back to his senses, unable to understand what had happened, he saw the ginger servant stare at him with wrath. And reported his gaze on the former hostage.
It was a good thing he leaned against a wall, because he would have never guessed the lady in blue had such stunning features. Her coppery skin, in contrast of his pale complexion dotted with freckles, displayed sumptuous golden hues; her wide eyes, of a mahogany colour that showed welcoming benevolence, stood out from his onyx gaze topped by heavy lids; her slightly curved nose and fleshy lips were far away from his sharp and severe curves. But the dream took an abrupt end. The lady threw her hands onto her face with the clear intention of hiding it, as her ginger friend planted herself in between the two.
“I don’t know how to fight, but when it comes to defending women, especially my master, I have no mercy.”
“Wait no, you got the wrong idea! It was just an act-”
“Now that you have seen her face, you must die!”
And she prepared herself to stab him with the knife, as Ace’s brain was overheating. From a lot of things. And to perpetuate this state of utter confusion, someone dropped a haystack from the roofs above their heads. The package exploded on the ground, projecting billions of pieces of straw and blinding everyone with dust. Vivi moved back, coughing her lungs out and closing her eyes, while Nami soon imitated her.
By the time the dirt had settled, Ace had disappeared. Hopefully, Luffy had the ability to find two things very easily: meat, and straw. It was pretty useless most of the time, but in such dire situations, it saved his brother’s life. Just like he had saved his before, with this stupid hostage idea. He would never do that again.
Smoker gestured to his men to search all the town until the fugitives were found and put in a cell. The Janissary guards went up the adjacent streets in a deafening noise, leaving the market like a battlefield. Vivi stood on her two feet, faltering a little, a great quantity of straw in her ocean hair. Nami took her hand, her traits distorted with worry, and reported her vengeful brown eyes on the back of the street.
“That man…” she mumbled lowly. “He saw your face. He must die.”