Chapter Text
The sky on Planet D-606 was a permanent, suffocating shade of violet, and the air always carried the faint, metallic scent of ozone and ancient machinery. For Monkey D. Luffy, it was a cage.
She sat atop a jagged spire of floating rock, her legs swinging over an abyss that led down to the core of the planet. In her lap, she held her most prized possession: a thick, bound collection of paper that had fallen from a wreckage-cloud when she was just a child.
It was called One Piece.
The book told stories of a place called “Earth,” a world where the ground was covered in something called “water” that stretched until the sky turned blue. Luffy traced the ink-drawn face of a man in a straw hat. To her species, humans were fragile, short-lived creatures with only two arms and zero capacity for energy projection. But to Luffy, they were the most interesting things in the galaxy. They ate giant chunks of meat on the bone, they laughed until they cried and they sailed across liquid oceans to find freedom.
“I’m going to go there,” she whispered to the violet sky. “I’m going to find a hat just like that, and I’m going to be the King of the Pirates.”
“You’re going to be a corpse if you don’t get down from there!” a voice thundered, vibrating the very stone beneath her. Her grandfather, Monkey D. Garp, stood on a hovering platform, his arms crossed over a chest that could withstand a supernova. “Earth’s a primitive rock! They do not even have FTL travel! You would be bored before you even landed!”
Luffy rolled her eyes, her gaze drifting to the heavy, pulsing medallion on Garp’s chest—the Sigil of the Five Elders. To her, it was just a shiny piece of junk, but to the rest of the galaxy, it meant her grandfather was the Grand Enforcer of the Interstellar Government. He spent half his time talking about “Absolute Order” and the other half guarding the Sun God Core, a battery of pure energy he had confiscated from a rebel fleet years ago. Gramps called it a “weapon of mass instability,” but Luffy had seen the way it vibrated when she held her book near it. It wanted to move because it was the only thing powerful enough to tear a hole through the planet’s atmosphere, and she knew exactly where he kept the spare.
Luffy stood up, tucking the manga into her tunic with a grin. “They have adventures, Gramps! And they have ‘romance’ and ‘dreams’! I’m going to see it for myself!” She then hopped off the spire, floating down like a dandelion seed until her boots hit his hovering platform with a dull thud. “You’re just grumpy because you’re old and your brain’s getting dusty,” she chirped, poking his Sigil with a finger. “And besides, you talk too much. What’s for supper? If it’s those dried protein cubes again, I’m definitely leaving tonight.”
Luffy’s grandpa looked like he wanted to roar, but his stomach let out a thunderous growl first. His shoulders slumped, and he wrapped a heavy arm around her neck, pulling her into a suffocating side-hug. “It’s roast sea-beast from the southern moons. Your favourite. Now come on, and stop talking about Earth. It’s a death trap for girls with too much imagination.”
Supper was served in a hall large enough to house a fleet, but it felt smaller than the tiny cabins of the ships in her manga. Gramps ate with the ferocity of a man who had conquered worlds, lecturing her between bites about how Earth was a “primitive glitch” in the universe.
Luffy just stared at her plate, seeing the “Meat” that the man in the straw hat ate.
She wondered if Oda knew, when he drew those panels, that a girl from a violet-sky world would find her soul in his lines. Gramps called her imagination a “death trap,” but the real death was this—sitting in a perfect city, eating perfect food and never seeing a real horizon. She felt the Sun God Core’s vibration even from miles away, a heartbeat calling to her own.
Luffy swallowed a large gulp of cider and leaned back, looking up at the vaulted ceiling. “I bet Dad found Earth already. I bet he’s wearing a straw hat right now and laughing at us for staying in this violet fog.”
Garp’s grip on his knife tightened. “Your father’s a loyal servant of the Sovereignty. He’s out there mapping sectors, not playing pirate on some water-rock. He... he will come back when the mission’s over.”
“You have been saying ‘mission’ since I was a baby,” Luffy said. “Why can’t I just go help him?”
“Because you’re a Dock-Crane Operator, not a navigator!” Garp snapped, standing up to end the conversation. “You spend your days lifting star-cruisers into place because you have more power in your arms than a hydraulic press. It’s a vital job, Luffy. It’s a local job. I’m not losing... I mean, I’m not letting you throw away a career just to go look for a man who’s too busy to send a postcard.” He walked over and gave her a suffocating side-hug, his hand trembling just slightly.
She was not stupid.
She knew “mapping sectors” was a lie.
She had heard the whispers in the docks about how her father, Monkey D. Dragon, had made enemies of the High Celestials by digging into forbidden star-charts. She knew his ship had vanished in a nebula raid when she was just a hatchling. In the city, people said he was a ghost, and she could see the same fear haunting the corners of Gramps’s eyes.
“Shishishi! You’re so dramatic, Gramps!” Luffy suddenly barked out a laugh, punching his armoured bicep with a sound like a hammer hitting an anvil. “You’re just worried no one else can move those Triple-Class cruisers as fast as I can! Admit it, the port would fall apart in a day without me. I’m the best Crane-Operator this boring planet has ever seen!”
Garp blinked, the tension breaking as he let out a booming roar of a laugh. “The best?! You have the highest property damage record in the history of the sector, you brat!” He delivered a light “Fist of Love” to the top of her head—enough to crack a mountain, but for her, it was just a nudge. “Stay right there. I will go get another slab of sea-beast before you eat the table too.”
“And bring the crispy nebula-greens too!” Luffy shouted after him, waving her fork in the air. “The ones with the spicy star-salt! I want a whole mountain of them!”
Garp paused at the kitchen archway. “Ordering me around like I’m a cabin boy... and vegetables? Since when do you want the green stuff?” He turned back, his eyes narrowing as he looked at her lean, athletic frame. “You’re far too thin, Luffy. I bet you have been watching those hollow-stream broadcasts again, haven’t you? Those ‘Star-Idols’ from the Inner Rim who look like they would blow away in a light solar wind. They’re not real people!”
Luffy just laughed. “I just like the crunch, Gramps! Now go! My stomach’s protesting!”
As her grandpa vanished into the kitchen, she ripped a piece of meat from the bone with her teeth, the smoky, peppery flavour flooding her tongue. It was followed by a bite of a sun-pear—cool, crisp, and so sweet. As she ate, she remembered the woman in the shimmering dress who had tried to give her an “audition” card near the Gravity-Wells.
The woman had said Luffy had the “face of a protagonist,” whatever that meant.
Luffy had almost said yes—mostly because she thought an audition was a type of snack—but then she saw the woman’s face turn grey when Gramps’s name came up on her scanner. The poor scout had nearly tripped over her own cape trying to run away.
It was hilarious.
However, Luffy didn’t want to be a star on a screen.
She wanted to be a King on the ocean.
“More! More!” she cheered as her grandpa returned, grunting under the weight of a second, even larger serving of roast sea-beast and a bowl of those spicy greens. He set it down with a heavy thud. Luffy lunged for the new plate.
Gramps was the greatest man she knew, even if he was a bit of an old fossil.
She loved him more than anything…
…Well, anything except a fresh, hot meal.
Luffy ate with a focused quiet, her palate picking apart the layers of the roast. She could taste the cedar-smoke from the kitchen’s fires and the sharp, ozone-like bite of the spice. She liked the way the flavours told a story of how the food was made.
“I still do not get why you cherish that scrap-heap of paper,” Gramps muttered, leaning back. “It was just a ‘Hail Mary’ from a small planet. Our ancestors found those capsules drifting in the Void. They thought humans were just children playing with radio waves.”
“Then I guess I’m a child too!” Luffy chirped, wiping her mouth with her sleeve. “Because it feels like they’re talking right to me.”
Garp let out a long, heavy breath. “Maybe they’re. But be careful what you listen to. The ‘Great Silence’ of our planet exists for a reason. Just remember, once you step out of the light of this city, there’s no turning back. Some journeys are one-way trips, and you’re not as ready as you think you are.”
... ...
Boa Hancock pulled the collar of her coat tighter, though she was indoors.
The warmth had left her life the day the “Blackbeard” rumours started.
Marshall D. Teach had been a parasite, a man who smiled while he cut the strings of her career, leaving her to fall from the highest pedestal in the world. She didn’t regret being proud. Her beauty was her shield in a world that wanted to consume her, but now that shield was shattered. She had been the “Star,” the “Empowerment Idol,” the woman who had everything.
Now, she was just a ghost in a city that had forgotten her.
The agency had turned their backs, the fans were silent and the bank accounts were draining into the sterile, white halls of the hospital where her sisters lay. Sandersonia and Marigold were getting worse, and every time Hancock closed her eyes, she felt like she was drowning in stagnant water. She was tired of fighting, tired of being the “Snake Princess” for a world that didn’t care if she lived or died.
But then she thought of her sisters’ smiles.
She had to stay.
She had to endure.
Even if she was suffocating in the dark, she would not let them go down with her.
The industry had a way of making you pay for your own execution.
Hancock had lived modestly for a woman of her stature, but she had not accounted for the “Morality Clauses” Teach had buried in her contracts.
When the scandals broke—orchestrated by Teach and funded by the rival World Govt. Agency—every brand she represented sued her for “brand damage.” The millions she had saved for her sisters’ future vanished into legal fees and hush-money that failed to hush anyone. Teach had been bought by a conglomerate with deeper pockets.
And he had executed his betrayal with the ruthless pull of a black hole.
It tore apart the fabric of their bond and consumed everything entirely.
Now, Hancock spent her days in a cheap hoodie and a mask, taking whatever manual labour she could find in the industrial district. She had just walked out on a warehouse gig because the foreman thought her desperation made her a target for his wandering hands. She would rather starve than let a man like that touch her.
She was currently scouring the job boards for anything that did not require a background check or a face. She just needed a place to disappear and work—a quiet corner where no one would recognise the ghost of the Snake Princess.
The biting wind of a Tokyo December sliced through her thin hoodie as she collapsed onto a concrete planter in a quiet alley. It was nearly 10:00 PM, and the first dusting of snow began to settle on her boots.
She had not eaten since a half-stale rice ball at dawn. Her stomach was past the point of cramping, settled into a numb, hollow ache. She pulled out her phone, the screen cracked but still functional. She had deleted her official accounts months ago, but like a tongue probing a sore tooth, she found herself searching the “Idol-Watch” forums.
A thread titled “The Fall of the Toxic Snake” sat at the top with thousands of replies.
[Glad she’s gone, she always looked like she thought she was a goddess,] one comment read, garnering hundreds of likes.
[Teach was a saint for putting up with her,] said another.
But buried in the vitriol, a small group of users with “Kuja-Fan” badges were fighting back.
[She donated half her salary to children’s hospitals! She isn’t a monster!] they cried, only to be swamped by trolls calling them “simps” for a fallen star.
Hancock closed her eyes. The truth didn’t matter in the face of a good story, and right now, she was the villain the world wanted. She checked another niche fan-board one last time. A thread titled “Where is Hancock?” was filled with theories—mostly hateful ones suggesting she had fled the country with stolen money.
But then—
What?
Hancock stood up and rubbed her eyes, certain she was hallucinating from the hunger.
A restaurant called “The Sun God’s Kitchen” sat before her, its windows glowing with a soft violet-blue light that she hadn’t noticed when she walked down the street. A recruitment flyer was fluttering against the door.
“Hey! Do you want to work? Or’re you just a ghost?”
Hancock jumped, looking down to see a girl who looked like she belonged in a different world.
The girl was wearing a red vest in the middle of winter, looking perfectly comfortable. Her beauty was different from the “Stars” Hancock knew. It was raw, honest and blinding. She radiated a strange, sun-like energy that seemed to push back the winter chill. Her smile was so wide it looked impossible.
Hancock felt a flush of embarrassment, realizing how haggard she must look. She then blinked, her brain struggling to catch up with the sheer energy of the person in front of her. “Pardon me? You think I’m here for... the job?”
“Yeah! Why else would you be standing in the freezing cold?” the girl laughed, her eyes crinkling into happy crescents. “My Gramps’s a great cook, but he’s a fossil and forgets to clean the rafters. We need someone to scrub the floors, organize the pantry and help me with the heavy lifting because I get distracted by the snacks. We were going to pay a hundred thousand per shift, plus all the meat you can eat. Is that okay?”
Hancock stared at her, her jaw practically dropping. “A hundred thousand? For a cleaning job? Young lady, do you have any idea how money works? That’s a fortune! You’re being far too generous, it’s—it’s suspicious!”
The girl just grinned, seemingly oblivious to the concept of suspicion. “Is it? I just picked a number that sounded big! If you want more, just say so! Anyway, do you want the job? Gramps’s already starting supper!”
Before Hancock could explain the basic principles of finance, her hands were captured by the girl’s. The sensation was intoxicating—the skin was so soft and the warmth so piercingly kind that it drove the winter chill out of Hancock’s bones for the first time in months.
Hancock felt a strange, fluttering sensation in her chest, a sudden desire to stay in this heat forever. Without another word, she let the younger girl pull her into the restaurant, leaving the cruel city and the digital haters behind.
The restaurant felt like a pocket dimension.
It was filled with the scent of spices Hancock couldn’t name—sharp, sweet and metallic all at once. The furniture was polished to a mirror sheen, but the angles of the room felt “wrong,” as if the floor were slightly curved like the hull of a ship. It was the warmest place Hancock had ever been.
“You will like it here,” the girl said, pulling Hancock toward the counter. “It’s much better than the cold planet. Gramps says we have to blend in because if people find out we’re aliens who stole a Sun Core, they might try to eat us!”
A heavy iron pot lid came sailing out of the kitchen, clattering against the wall.
“Luffy, you idiot!” the old man barked, emerging from the steam. He looked like a retired general who could crush a tank with his bare hands. “Stop blabbing! Do you want the Interstellar Government to track us here? We’re supposed to be secret cosmic fugitives!”
Hancock stared, her mind reeling. Aliens? Cosmic fugitives? It had to be a joke. Some kind of elaborate hidden-camera show designed to humiliate her further. Yet, there were no wires, no crews, only the intense heat radiating from the girl.
The girl laughed, her hands still wrapped firmly around Hancock’s. “Gramps’s just grumpy. Hey, I’m Luffy! I forgot to ask who you are.”
Hancock looked into Luffy’s wide, honest eyes. Every instinct told her to hide, to protect herself, but she felt a strange, inexplicable safety here. “My name,” she said, her voice steadying, “is Boa Hancock.”
She felt a wave of regret so sharp it made her dizzy.
Boa Hancock. The name that was currently trending as a synonym for ‘Toxic’ and ‘Arrogant.’
She expected the girl to recoil, but Luffy’s hands remained warm and steady.
“Hancock! That’s a pretty name!” Luffy beamed, seemingly oblivious to the weight of the words. “Gramps! We’re keeping her! She’s my first mate—I mean, my assistant!” She announced, giving Hancock’s hands a final, lingering squeeze before letting go. “But we have to do the interview thingy. Foralaty! That’s what you said, right?”
“Don’t decide things on a whim! And it’s ‘formality’, you dimwit!” the old man roared, wiping his hands on an apron. He stomped closer, his shadow looming over Hancock. He looked like he was inspecting a broken engine. “I’m Monkey D. Garp. I’m this brat’s grandfather. As for you...” He leaned down. “You look like you’ve been eating nothing but air and spite. It’s pathetic. How do you expect to scrub a floor when you can barely stand up?”
“I... I can work,” Hancock whispered, her pride stinging at his bluntness.
“Not while you look like a walking skeleton, you can’t,” Garp grunted, pulling out a chair so hard it screeched. “Sit. Drink some water. Eat a bowl of soup. I don’t interview people who have one foot in the grave. You’re lucky we’re ‘foreigners’ or I’d think you were trying to sue me for starving you on my property.”
Hancock was practically shoved into the chair by the older man’s sheer presence. She opened her mouth to ask about the hundred-thousand-yen salary—it was still ringing in her ears like a fever dream—but the words died when the younger girl plopped down right next to her. The girl leaned in close, her eyes wide and sparkling with a terrifying amount of genuine joy.
“Wow, you’re so pretty!” the girl chirped, propping her chin on her hands. “Are all humans as pretty as you? I thought they would be more... squishy and boring.”
Hancock felt a hot flush crawl up her neck. A few months ago, she would have accepted the compliment as her birthright. Now, she felt like a fraud. Her skin was dry, her hair was a tangled mess under her hood, and she felt grey and hollow. “Do not be ridiculous,” Hancock whispered, reaching up to frantically adjust her surgical mask. “I’m a mess. Besides, I’m wearing a mask—how could you possibly know what I look like?”
The girl tilted her head, her grin never wavering. “I do not need to see your face to see you! Back home, we can see the colours people make. Yours’s real bright, like a sunset, even if it’s a bit shaky right now.”
Hancock stared at her, completely lost.
Colours? Sunset?
It sounded like the girl was suffering from a severe case of “Middle School Syndrome,” making up elaborate fantasies to sound cool. It was childish, but as Hancock looked at Garp grumbling in the kitchen, she realised they both seemed to live in this strange, harmless play-pretend world.
“So, since you’re a human,” Luffy started, leaning in so close Hancock could see the gold flecks in her dark eyes, “do you really have to eat every single day? And is it true that humans poop? I heard someone say it once, but I do not see how it fits in such a small body!”
Hancock’s brain stalled.
The sheer nature of the question should have been offensive—disgusting, even—but the girl’s expression was so purely curious, like a scientist studying a new species, that Hancock found herself let out a startled, weak laugh.
“Yes... we eat. And yes, that’s... a normal biological function.” As she spoke, Hancock noticed the heavy lethargy in her limbs beginning to lift. It was as if the girl’s proximity was a battery, charging her through the air. The oppressive weight of the city seemed a world apart.
“LUFFY!” Garp’s voice thundered from the kitchen, followed by the sound of a heavy tray slamming onto a counter. “Stop asking the poor girl about her guts! Get over here and serve our new employee! You’re the manager, so start taking care of her before she withers away!”
“I’m going, I’m going! You’re so loud, you old fossil!” Luffy pouted, sticking her tongue out as she stood up. She shot a wink at Hancock. “He’s already decided to keep you, he’s just being a big baby about the rules.”
“I HEARD THAT!” Garp bellowed. “AND WE ARE STILL DOING THE INTERVIEW!”
“Here! This is the good stuff!” Luffy announced, plopping a massive plate of ginger pork and stir-fried greens in front of Hancock. The aroma was intoxicating—the sharp ginger clashing with the sweet soy glaze.
Hancock took off her hood and mask, revealing her pale but striking face. Luffy didn’t even blink at her beauty, but she just pushed a bowl of rice toward her. “Eat! You have to chew fast so you can eat more!”
Hancock took a bite, and the flavour was a revelation. The ginger was bright and biting, the pork so tender it felt like it was melting into her soul. It was the taste of home, of safety and of a power she didn’t understand. It was better than any five-star meal she had eaten as an idol.
In that moment, the “Snake Princess” fell.
She dropped her chopsticks and seized Luffy’s hands across the table. “I have found it,” she declared, her voice trembling. “The soulmate I was destined for! Luffy, I’m currently unemployed, but I will rebuild my empire for you! I will be your greatest asset! Please, let us unite our destinies!”
“Shishishi! You have big dreams! I like that!” Luffy cheered, hitting the table. “I’m going to find the One Piece and be the King of the Pirates!”
“A King! Truly, a soulmate of the highest calibre!” Hancock cried, her eyes turning into hearts. “Then I shall be your Divine Empress of the Imperial Kitchen!”
“I’m still right here!” Garp yelled, throwing a dish towel at them. “No proposals during work hours! And no weddings for my granddaughter for another forty years, you crazy woman!”
Hancock did not even flinch at the flying towel. She straightened her back, her chin tilting upward in that regal, haughty arc that had once dominated every billboard in Tokyo. The warmth from the food—and the girl—was like a high-voltage jumpstart to her system, purging the lethargy of the past few months.
She looked at Garp with a gaze of pure ice. “Be silent, old man. You’re lucky I’m currently between empires, or I would have you relocated for speaking to me with such a lack of refinement. I’m a woman of top-tier quality. You should be honoured I’m even sitting here.”
She turned back to Luffy, her fingers lacing deeper with hers.
It was strange.
Hancock had spent her life guarded and cynical, never believing in “destiny” or fairy tales. Yet, looking into those honest eyes, the world felt less like a cruel trap and more like a stage waiting for her return.
“Do not listen to the fossil, dear. My reputation may be in the gutters now, but I will wash away the filth Teach left behind. I will build a throne higher than any pedestal that manager ever placed me on, and you shall sit upon it with me. I do not know how I stumbled into this shop, but I know my life’s already infinitely better because you’re in it.”
The girl laughed, a sound like pure sunshine. “That sounds like a big fight! I love fights! Shishishi!”
Garp grumbled something about “insane women,” but Hancock did not care.
She had found her anchor, and she was never letting go.