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Sometimes, in the search for greatness, you find nothing.
Or, alternatively, you find very little to satisfy you.
Piracy was always a promise. The yearning for something more. To never fit into moulds. To outgrow expectations. To be feared, to be powerful. To scream so loud that the ocean screamed back at you.
It was freedom, though for you, it would never be so.
There would always be something lacking. A hole within you that the freedom of the sea could never fill.
Maybe it was because it was impossible to find the one piece that every pirate was searching for. It was impossible to find something when nobody knew what it was. It was impossible to find something that was a man’s last words before he died.
It was possible though, for the proclaimed King of the Pirates to have lost his last marble on the executioner’s platform.
That at least, was probable.
You had left that all behind though. Yourself, your persona, your legacy, your memory. It was all left to the bottom of the sea. You had settled down, and every time your name is mentioned by pirates now, it was laced with disappointment.
Now they could have been wonderful. Could have ruled the seas. Worthy of it, for sure.
Did you know they now run a bookshop? In Loguetown?
Yes, it was a bit ridiculous that the place you chose to settle was filled with Marines. There was some sort of weird irony in there. These same Marines spent years hunting your captain and crew down but now pass you in the street like you are nothing. Some of them even say good morning to you.
Sometimes, when you’re in the mood, you even say it back.
And they don’t know you. They don’t remember you. You looked different now, instead of in your ridiculous outfit and wild powers. You stripped it all back, back to the core of who you began as before the sea changed you.
There was nothing else of who you were now. You had become a simple citizen, with a simple bookshop, in a simple town where the King of the Pirates was executed.
This day was a special one. They were celebrating his execution, and around the platform a funfair had been set up to mark the occasion. You were not one to participate in such things though. Not because you disliked cotton candy and games. But because you had spotted the signs that a certain group of pirates were hanging around. And even more so when you saw a certain ship with a ram at its head come into the dock.
It was going to be a fight worth witnessing. But you were content to happily watch it from a distance. Some of your old associates had given you the heads up, even offered to let you in on the action. A fight, in honour of the good old days. When blood was as merry as the booze.
You declined, naturally.
You would let this play out. You knew how it would end anyway.
And besides, it seemed a bit silly to start a fight with the Straw Hats that you had no intent in finishing.
But as you manned your bookshop that day, you saw two of them approach. They looked at your table. One of them was talking about needing a disguise, for some reason, and the other was admiring your collection of new atlases of the East Blue.
She said how she had one when she was a child. He told her to get one. She said no. He said it would be something to help remember where she started.
You took the money from her, smiling as you did. Making polite conversation about how its a beautiful book and illustrations are wonderful. Apparently she was a ng.mapmaker.
How sweet. How sentimental. You wondered to yourself how much of the world she would be able to map. How far she would go.
She commented to her companion that the wind was picking up. A storm was coming. As they walked away, you smiled. You could already feel it crackling between your fingers.
Your little secret. Your power. All thanks to a silly little fruit.
You had the ability to make great storms. You knew now, this one would be tiny. But where would be the fun in that? If the pirates wanted a fight, you might as well give them a dramatic backdrop for it.
Give them a few lightning bolts. A few crashes of thunder. A downpour.
You watched it that night. That silly clown pirate holding the captain of Straw Hats on the execution platform. The captain laughed at the thought he was going to die. Even as you waved your hands to weave the storm, his laughter could be heard over everything.
Gold Rogers would be proud.
Admittedly though, you had vendettas of your own. That Buggy had crossed you wrongly once before. It was an old wound now, but there was still pain. Frustration. Annoyance. And it all came rushing back to you in his great moment of triumph.
You snapped your fingers.
He burst into a million pieces as a bright blue bolt of lightening hit the execution platform.
The Marines came in after that, arresting anyone who was so much as breathing in the aftermath of the funfair. You sat and watched it all, eating the salted nuts you had brought with you as a snack. The storm subsided when you decided it was time.
Loguetown returned back to normal.
And you returned to your bookshop.