Work Text:
“Hard to believe how far you’ve come.”
“Yeah, I know. Seems like only yesterday we were making our first pitch to Pandaman Studios, and now look at us.”
Glancing up from his laptop, Luffy gave a small grin at seeing the TV playing the interview he and Ace did about a week earlier. Bartholomew Kuma was one of the biggest names in entertainment news, and if you weren’t already famous, getting on his show was a surefire way to earn attention.
“Lone Shard has become one of the most iconic animated shows in the world,” said Kuma as several photos began to pop up on the background screen. “Between the merchandise, the cosplay, the fanfiction...”
“Ugh, don’t get me started on the fanfiction,” groaned the onscreen Ace, just as the front door opened and the man himself stepped in, dropping his bag onto the floor as he shut the door behind him.
“Hi Ace,” Luffy said cheerfully. “The interview’s on!”
“So I see.” Ace tossed a can of soda into the air, and Luffy stretched an arm to snag it. “You think you can concentrate on the script and watch at the same time? I don’t think either of us wants a repeat of the Wapol mess.”
Luffy—who very clearly remembered how Wapol unthinkingly revealed himself as having been on a mix of pain pills and cheap rum while writing Hunger Games fanfiction—which somehow led to the creation of WUnnamed—during a documentary—was about to reply, but Kuma’s voice cut in.
“People were pretty upset when Bishop was killed off. I hear the studio actually got a few death threats.”
The onscreen Ace nodded. “Yeah, it got pretty bad, but we did promise Jay that we wouldn’t say anything until the time came.”
“Even though we wanted to,” Ace muttered as he joined Luffy on the couch, earning him a nod from his younger brother. Neither of them wanted to kill off Bishop (especially since he had been based partially on Ace), but it just didn’t feel right replacing Jacob ‘Jay’ Newingham—the man was the perfect voice actor for him, and they couldn’t imagine anyone else in the role. When Jay eventually passed away from a terminal illness, the studio wrote a flashback episode about how Inaki and Bishop met and dedicated it to him.
“Well, I can certainly respect that,” Kuma said before turning to Luffy. “Now, there’s something I’ve been curious about for a while. According to an interview you gave some time ago, Lone Shard was inspired by a dream you had. Is that true?”
The onscreen Luffy nodded. “I was seventeen at the time, and I hadn’t really figured out what I wanted to do with my life…”
As the interview continued to play, Luffy let his mind travel back to that fateful dream…
🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️
What is this place?
Luffy looked around in confusion and wonder. It looked like he was inside some kind of temple—the Ancient Greek or Old Testament kind. All over the white marble walls were pictures of what looked like a man with flame-shaped hair and limbs like a rubberhose cartoon character, dressed in a purple and white kilt-like garment along with wooden sandals and a scarf that looked to be made of clouds. The scenes in said pictures also reminded Luffy of rubberhose cartoons, in that they showed the man stretching and warping his body in various ways while getting the better of some very ugly looking people. Luffy also noticed that in many of the pictures, there were other people with chains on their wrists and ankles, watching with looks of admiration and hope.
“Come, children!”
Turning towards the voice, Luffy saw an old woman sitting underneath a picture of the man leaping in front of the sun. A band of school-age children—some of whom were clearly human, others not so much—were gathering in front of her, eager looks on their faces as they sat down. One of them, a boy with hair as red as fire beckoned to Luffy eagerly, and as Luffy came over, shifted to make room for him.
“Are you going to tell us about how Nika stole back the rain?” asked a boy with small wings sprouting from his back.
“Or how he saved the Prince of Flames?” a girl with grayish skin and sharp teeth inquired.
The woman laughed. “No, children. This time, I will tell you the story of Nika’s first chosen…”
One day, not long after Nika went from demigod to full god, he was walking in disguise through a marketplace when he came upon a boy in ragged clothes sitting beside a large stall and crying. He approached and knelt beside the boy, asking “why are you crying, child?”
“This is where my master sells fruit,” the boy said. “But much of his stock has gone missing, and he believes I have been stealing from him. If I do not find out what has happened to his fruit, he will punish me.”
“I will help you,” said Nika. “Show me where he keeps his fruit.”
That night, Nika and the boy watched over the fruit, and eventually caught sight of four strange creatures approaching. Casting off his disguise, Nika stretched out his arms and bound the creatures.
“Are you the ones who have been stealing this fruit?” he asked.
“Please, great Nika,” one of the creatures begged. “We do not like to steal, but we have no choice.”
“If we are seen, our former master will find us,” another cried.
“Who is your master?” the boy asked, for he could recognize fellow slaves with ease.
“He calls himself the Sea Lord,” the third said. “And though we do not know his name, we all fear him, for he is a mighty god.”
“The four of us barely escaped from him not long ago,” said the fourth. “Please do not send us back to him.”
“He will not take you back,” Nika promised. “And there is no god of the sea, only a goddess. Stay with this boy, while I find out the truth of your former master.”
As the storyteller went on, Luffy found himself entranced. He hung on to every word, listening as the storyteller told them of how Nika found the castle of the ‘Sea Lord’ (who turned out to be some kind of devil figure falsely claiming to be a god) and rescued the other spirits (who were beings born from dreams and desires that had been enslaved by the Sea Lord). There was something about Nika that resonated with him, and that same something caused a spike of anger when the Sea Lord, infuriated by Nika’s trickery, declared—
“If they ever return to the sea, they will be mine again forever.”
Nika brought the rescued spirits to where their friends were waiting with the boy, and explained what had happened.
“But the seas are so vast,” one spirit said. “How can we stay free?”
“There are stories about how spirits make deals with mortals,” the boy said. “Maybe you can do something like that.”
“What do you mean?” asked one of the spirits.
“Hide inside the fruit,” the boy said. “And if someone eats one, you allow them to use your power in exchange for keeping you out of the sea.”
“But what happens when that person dies?” asked another spirit worriedly.
Nika laughed. “I will make it so that you can simply enter another fruit, even if that person dies in the sea.”
So the spirits hid within the fruits, and Nika placed the charm upon them, enabling them to become the first incarnations of the Devil Fruits. And while the boy knew he would be punished when he found out, he was not sorry for helping them.
“It is good that they were able to get away from the Sea Lord,” he said. “They do not deserve to be enslaved to such a cruel master. They deserve to be free.”
“And you can be free, too,” said Nika. “More free than you have ever been before.”
He picked up the one fruit that did not have a spirit within—a large melon—and placed a small piece of his power within, handing it to the boy before departing. Once he was gone, the boy ate the fruit, ignoring the unpleasant taste, and once his stomach was full, he fell asleep.
When the boy awoke, he found that his body had been transformed into rubber, allowing him to stretch, bend, inflate, bounce, and twist in any way he imagined. Delighted by his newfound powers, he vowed to never be chained again, and left the life of a slave behind forever, taking to the seas as a pirate. Since his powers brought him such great joy, he cast off his slave name, which was forever lost, and took the name Joy Boy.
“Is that what Gemi was talking about?” one of the children asked. “You know, in the story where she fell in love with Nika?”
The storyteller chuckled. “I doubt we will ever know for sure, but perhaps it was.”
“Can I hear that story?” Luffy asked in curiosity.
“Maybe another time,” the storyteller said. “If you are willing to do one thing…”
All of a sudden, the world around Luffy started to warp and fade, a sign that he was starting to wake up.
“Tell the stories. Help us keep them alive.”
“I will! I promise!”
🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️
And Luffy had kept that promise, writing the story down almost as soon as he awoke (though not before grabbing breakfast, of course). Truth be told, he would have done it regardless of whether he was asked to or not—he knew that it needed to be told—and he suspected that the miracle that happened to him shortly after would have occurred anyway. Not that he was complaining about that latter part. When he discovered the transformation he underwent only a short time after having the dream, he was elated—bye bye EDS, hello rubber body! He’d actually based the scene in the Lone Shard retelling of the story where Joy Boy realized the effects of the fruit on his own revelation, having a very good idea of how it felt to find yourself with that sort of freedom.
“It’s truly become a cultural phenomenon,” the onscreen Kuma said, jolting Luffy out of his thoughts. “So hard to believe the story’s in its final stages.”
“Yeah, well, between the reveal of Onaeco’s existence as the ultimate Big Bad of Lone Shard and Inaki’s first transformation into his Mode Five form, I’d say we’re building up to quite the climax.” Onscreen Luffy paused for a moment. “That may have come out wrong. But anyway, while I won’t get into spoilers, I will say that Onaeco’s ultimate plan never had a chance at success to begin with.”
Kuma laughed. “That’s good to hear. Moving on, I heard from Hancock that you’ve been toying with a few new projects.”
“A while ago, Usopp showed us some pictures he drew of the Wetwork Squad 9 agents as a real world black ops team,” the onscreen Ace said with a nod. “We also got a letter from Drake with his thoughts on Pellew, and combined with Usopp’s pictures, it got us thinking about doing something with the basic concept of Zoans—not something in the Lone Shard universe, but a completely different story.”
“I’ve been thinking about doing the same with Paramecia and Logia powers,” added onscreen Luffy. “Though those are probably going to have to wait a while.”
A ding from Ace’s phone drew the brothers’ attention away. It was a text from Sabo, letting them know he’d be back late due to the hearing for a case his firm had taken on—some actress trying to get full custody of her kids from her washout ex-husband—taking longer than expected. Luckily, Luffy had set the interview to record so that Ace’s fellow fire wielder could watch it later.
“You eat yet?” Ace asked as he put his phone away.
“Finished off the leftovers from last night,” Luffy answered. “Aside from the chow mein, since you told me you wanted that.”
Shrugging, Ace flopped onto his side, his hat falling to the floor as he grabbed a pillow. “Had a couple of slices on my way home, so I’ll probably have it tomorrow.”
Luffy gave his brother a concerned look. “Ace, did you take your meds today?”
“Yeah, this is just regular tired,” Ace replied as he shifted slightly. “Had a really long and busy day today.”
Nodding, Luffy gave the script he was working on a quick review, decided he could finish it the next day, and saved the file. By that time, the interview had concluded, and the channel had moved on to another entertainment-based talk show, this one hosted by Charlotte Custard—while she wasn’t as famous as Kuma, she’d made quite a reputation in the media news scene, and not just because of her being a renowned actress’s daughter. In fact, Zoro and Sanji had met Custard not long after they and Pudding became a polycule, and they seemed to think their mutual girlfriend’s aunt had earned that reputation.
“Good evening, and welcome to the show. Our first guest tonight is none other than Rob Lucci, back from filming Terminal Klash 2. So Lucci, I hear you’re planning on auditioning for the new Sigma Force movie. Going for the role of Leopardus, I’m guessing?”
Lucci chuckled. “After the whole Jabra fiasco, I decided I might as well embrace the cat within. ‘Sides, much as I like Carcajou, I’m not afraid to admit that I’m a lot better at playing bad guys.”
“You’re not wrong there,” Custard agreed. “Now, if I’m not mistaken, this film is adapting the Nega-Dragon storyline…”
“Sounds like this one’s gonna be exciting,” Luffy thought aloud. “You wanna go see it, Ace?”
No answer.
“Ace?”
Luffy looked over at his brother only to see that he’d fallen asleep, one arm hugging the pillow like he sometimes did when they were younger.
“Suppose I should get some sleep too.”
Grabbing a blanket that had been tossed over Sabo’s desk chair, Luffy draped it over the two of them as he curled up against Ace, and with the TV playing in the background, he joined his brother in peaceful dreams.