Chapter Text
Just above the ocean floor lies one of the special officers of the Donquixote pirates. After being defeated by the Strawhat pirates, she and her crewmates were sent to the underwater prison Impel Down to live out the rest of their lives in tortuous pain and misery. This aquamarine haired girl, who appears far younger than her actual age, sits and waits for time to pass. This is the story of Sugar.
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Cold
As Sugar sat on the floor of her blisteringly cold cell, she pondered every choice that led her to this frozen hell. The walls of her relatively spacious room were gray and cracked, yet effectively unbreakable. There were no utensils or furniture of any kind, no items would be allowed in this vault, it only carried one treasure. Miles under the sea, in the middle of the “Greatest Prison Ever Made” Impel Down, alone in a cage, with nothing to her name but a red bear hoodie, and seastone cuffs, Sugar laid there shivering. Looking outside she could make out large structures of stone and iron, chambers that appeared empty and uninviting, bridges coming and going from nowhere, and covering it all was a blanket of thick white snow. This snow filled up her enclosure, she was numbingly cold, freezing in pain, but despite the biting of the frost, the bitterness of the icy situation, there was a nostalgic comfort, being engulfed in snow once again.
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Stupid
How she got here was stupid. A stupid pirate, made a stupid face, and scared her stupid self, into unconsciousness. What a stupid face. What a stupid nose. What a stupid way of losing 10 long years of power over an entire kingdom. If she never fed him that stupid trap, if she had just turned him into a stupid toy, she would still be eating grapes and living like a queen. She had everything she could want, all the power in the world backed by a captain feared in every sea. She was an irreplaceable tool. How far has she fallen?
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Sugar's treatment in Impel down was rather unique. Due to her incredibly dangerous Devil Fruit, The Hobby-Hobby Fruit, allowing her to make a loyal servant of effectively any guard or prisoner she could touch, there were many precautions taken to make sure she stayed away from any potential unwilling helping hand. They made sure she was given her own private cell, as well as sea stone shackles, in case she managed to get out. Along with the shackles, as an extra precautionary measure, they hid a seastone needle in the back of her neck, permanently making her feel tired, an extra punishment to go along with everything else. Paradoxically though, Sugar was also shown more care, than your average prisoner (though that's not saying much). Due to her fruit being so powerful, if it got in the wrong hands, countries could be destroyed, in a matter of years tens of thousands of people could be made into slaves, and so she was kept alive. Her lonely cell was both empty to stop her from getting help, as well as to stop her from being taken advantage of. The kinds of things some inmates would do to the body of a nine year old girl were taken into account when deciding her placement in the prison. It was hard not to pity someone who looked so young, but in the underwater prison, mercy is a word long forgotten, only echoed through the cracks in the walls.
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Warmth
It's hard to know how long she's been here, it feels like it's been forever since she's felt the warmth of the sun, or any warmth for that matter. In reality, it's only been two months since she took to her new abode, but the solitude is getting to her. They barely feed her enough, she's starving, and she's cold, and she's angry, and she's sad. She wants to see him again, her captain Doflamingo. She wants him to save her, and break her out of this hell, and kill every guard and prisoner that's not family. She wants to go back to her home, where it’s sunny, and she can eat whatever she wants, and she can control every one that looks down at her, to show every idiotic peon who thinks she's weak just how wrong they are. But more than anything else, more than any luxury, more than any revenge, she wants to see her sister again.
She feels like crying, but no tears come out. She lays there in a shivering silence, wondering if there's a point in continuing on. It’s so cold, there is so little hope, but she cannot die. Her sister should be here, and she will find her. The snow stays a cold comfort.
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Nothing
Nothing changes as the weeks go by. Guards come to give her food. Sometimes they pity her, sometimes they show no emotion at all. Two more months have passed. She has gotten used to the hunger. She barely acknowledges the cold. But the chattering of her teeth, it's maddening. Only the sound of the howling wind and crunch of the ice can be heard from afar, but her teeth chatter together endlessly. She can’t ignore it. What she would give for a moment of silence, a moment of peace in this lonely little lair. She holds herself tightly, tries to force her mouth shut, tries to comfort herself, but she can’t. Her fingers are cracked and bloody from being semi-frozen, she tries so desperately to warm them with her hoodie. She would punch the bars, but she hasn't got the strength. It feels as though she can barely move about her room, on most days she doesn't. She doesn't know when the days pass, she falls unconscious when the world lets her, often when she wakes up, it's to cold food and thoughtless glances. Her birthday comes and goes and she doesn't even realize. Her body has stayed the same since she was nine years old, never growing, even now at 23 she looks the very same as the day she first ate the cursed fruit. She hated it, losing the ability to grow up, but without her even knowing it, the expression on her face made her look far beyond her years. She turns around and looks at the wall behind her, nothing changes.
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Time
The only time she moves is to grasp at food, but she never looks away from the wall in front of her. She stays frozen in place, trying her hardest to disassociate from this reality. She counts the lines in the wall, she counts the stalactites on the ceiling, she counts the seconds that go by. She's going insane, but as time goes on, she does not forget her big sister, and so, she continues
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…
…
…
…In a sea of white, a red bump is impossible to miss. Even still, it takes a while for the o-kama to notice her. Ever since they lost their heaviest hitters, getting any new member has been tough, and without the miracle worker, the dangers all rise exponentially. They've gotten a new key though, after losing the previous one, and this red dot is just asking to be investigated. When Bentham finally reaches the cage, he sees the bear ears of the red hoodie and calls out,
“Hey bear-boy! What are you deuxing in that little den of yours?”
His smile drops, as Sugar turns around, and he sees what looks to be a malnourished child, freezing alone in a cell. Many emotions enter the o-kamas' minds. Rage, disgust, sadness, questions well within him, the very idea of finding a child here disturbs him, he's beyond shocked. He doesn't know whether to cry, throw up, or make new plans to kill every single guard he comes across for the next forever. He’s scared for her life, and he's cursing himself for not checking sooner. Without thinking he rushes to open the cell door, the girl looks at him, like she doesn't understand what is happening, which only breaks his heart even more.
“Hello! Bear-girl, do you hear me? Are you okay?"
...
"Are you hungry, are you thirsty? Say something!"
...
"Do you know why you are here? Are you scared, I promise I won't hurt you!”
...but there's no response
He picks her up, and as he holds her in his arms, the new Miracle Worker says,
“I am taking you away from this place, I am taking you to a paradise where you can laugh and play and eat, where you will always be smiling and singing. And you will never see that cell again, and I am sorry I didn't save you earlier, and I promise you bear-girl, you will be happy in the o-kama floor! Please, rest now, recover your strength, I will protect you!”
And as Sugar looks up at this angel carrying her, endlessly talking as she starts to drift into slumber, she wonders if this is real, if she's actually being saved. She thinks about her big sister as she starts to feel the warmth of another person holding her tight. As they enter a crack in the wall, undetectable to anyone looking into the icy white forest, Sugar closes her eyes, for the first time in a while, she feels excited. She starts to smell something delicious, and as Bentham nears the entrance to level 5.5, Sugar finally falls asleep, peacefully dreaming of better times. Bentham looks down at the girl, now with the faintest smile forming, and he lets out a sob. He carefully lays her down into a bed, and leaves to get help, and once again Sugar is left alone, dreaming of her sister, the snow woman, Monet.
End of Act 1