#committed to being the world's greatest swordsman but first & foremost he is committed to his CREW. to the group of strays he loves!

[fiapple]

...the "nothing happened" scene has caused my brain to latch on to zoro with a vice grip. send help.

[forcedapotheosis-blog]

Servant of Fate (Part 2)

As promised, one part every day. Here’s the second one. This one’s a little longer than the first, too :D

An hour passed and he couldn’t do anything but smoke and stare at the open sea, a sight that usually had a soothing effect on him. It meant freedom and adventure, it reminded him of times past, old and new friends, of his dream, of his true family. The open sea eased the pain of all the wounds he had sustained throughout his life, even throughout the last weeks. A miraculous cure for just about anything.

Anything but a broken heart.

No amount of cigarettes would be able to numb the pain of a broken heart, no hours on end of watching the black sea at night, not even the timeless beauty of all the stars in the sky.

Just when he was about to put another cigarette between his lips, his Kenbunshoku Haki awoke and raised the alarm, enabling him to grab on to Sunny’s rail a split second before the tempest arrived. The storm wind’s advent was short and brutal, like the powerful beat of a gigantic wing, but other than taking the smoke from his lips, it did not do any damage to the ship or his still bruised body. Sanji had only raised one arm to cover his face while he used to other to cling to the rail, thus, if only for a moment, he wasn’t able to see what was happening on deck.

It sure did surprise him when he finally realised what the wind had brought onto the ship.

An ambush? A devil fruit-user!

Only a moment later he had both his hands stowed within his pockets and, ignoring the pain of his most recent wounds, raised his right leg to defend his crew and himself.

Surprisingly enough, that seemed to be a waste of time, as the unexpected guest was neither armed nor seemed to be hostile. He simply raised a hand to greet him, a weary smile on his lips.

“She’s got an adamantine will, hasn’t she?”, his voice was deep, pleasant to listen to and didn’t carry even the slightest threat.

“Eavesdropping is considered incredibly impolite throughout this world. Who the hell are you?!”, Sanji was unconsciously raising his voice to gloss over the fact that this stranger, as mundane and unthreatening as he seemed, scared the living guts out of him.

When a person uses Kenbunshoku or, as it is sometimes called, Observation Haki, a lot of changes happen within the perception of said person. First and foremost, all of their senses are sharpened to overcome basic human limits, some people are even able to enhance and refine this type of Haki so much that they are enabled to look a few seconds into the future. One shared trait of all users of it, though, was that they were able to literally see and feel a person’s aura, to sense their strength. If you looked at a living legend, like the Red-haired Shanks, for example, it would be like gazing right into the sun, while a normal human being would have an aura that was rather easy to look at.

The stranger was different, though. No matter how much Sanji tried, there was nothing to see or feel about him, the second sight that his Haki granted him wasn’t able to get the slightest grasp about who or what he was facing. Considering that even their undead bard Brook did possess, even though a slightly altered, aura, this was a very real reason to be concerned.

“I'm just a humble servant, wishing you no harm.”, was the answer he received, but considering the lack of something he could work with, it was a little hard to believe. Watching this man with his normal eyes, he still didn’t seem like much of a threat. A little smaller than himself, with a clean-shaven face and brown eyes, there was nothing of particular note about him. He was clad in a dark suit and wore a tie of the colour of a ruby, had brown eyes and a rather distinct chin. Only his long, dark hair, which he wore untied, and that reached even over his hips was something that was even slightly out of the orderly.  

“A servant of whom?! And you still didn’t answer on why you were eavesdropping.”, Sanji’s leg was still raised, just out of caution. Not being able to read him was a stressful situation in and of itself.

“You will understand in time, my friend. For now, the only thing you have to know is that the incredibly strong will of your navigator, even though admirable, is a great obstacle.”, he slowly walked towards Sanji, brushing his shoulder as he passed. Strangely enough, it sounded somewhat like the rustling of feathers.  

“So you’re here to break her will?! I won’t let that happen, you bastar-..”, he breathed in sharply when he turned around to follow the stranger, only to see that the stranger was no more, someone different had taken his place.

An okama?!, the thought didn’t occur by chance. Were just a minute ago the stranger was a man, there stood a woman in his place. A beautiful woman nonetheless, at least one could think that when seeing her, absolutely stunning, back. It was adorned with a small tattoo on her left shoulder, depicting a black bird, possibly a raven. When she turned around to look at him, his heart made a small leap. Contrary to all the other okama he had met (too many, at least for his taste) throughout his life, this woman looked exactly like a woman should look. She wore a black dress that exposed much of her back and had eyes that were of the clearest emerald green, a face in the shape of a heart, the perfect mixture of youthfulness and maturity, dark hair that was pinned up to provide an excellent look onto her flawless neck. In another time, another place and another story, he would have been swooning all over her within a moment’s thought.

“I’ve had my fair share of okama for one lifetime, you won’t blindside me.”, even though the words left his mouth, his right leg was lowered.

“Oh, that wasn’t my intent. And I’m not an okama, my friend. I’m neither one nor the other, but more than the sum of their parts. I just thought that you’d prefer this form of mine.”, she smiled to support her smoky, seductive voice, but his will was unwavering for once, at least when it came to physical attraction.

“I still don’t know what you want from me.”, by now, his right foot had reached the ground and the tension within his body was mostly gone. She smiled again.

“Your captain wants to be the King of Pirates, my friend. And he won’t be able to achieve that if even one piece of the confusing and strange puzzle that you call ‘crew’ is missing, but with all the pieces together, it is possible.”, she took a small break and watched the sky.

“Unfortunately, you wanting to ask her to marry you has set a different chain of events in motion.”, she sighed, facing him.

“Everything in this world exists and will continue to exist until a sufficient force acts against it. This force, my friend, is her iron will. No, it’s not that she doesn’t want to be with you. It’s that she does not want to see you die, even less so after a commitment of such gravity. As you know, her whole life was a tragic story of love and loss, of purest joy and deepest sorrow. The whole of you are walking down a dangerous path. Death could take anyone of you within the blink of an eye, and after losing so much, she is sure that losing you would destroy her. Even more so when the both of you are committed to each other as lovers.”, all of a sudden, the woman looked and sounded rather weary and tired, while Sanji appalled from hearing these words.

“Does .. does that mean that she’s feeling the same as I do?!”, well, he was optimistic to a fault. The woman sighed another time.

“Yes, she indeed reciprocates your feelings. And that will invariably lead to either you or her leaving the crew, which will, in turn, make it impossible for your captain to become the new king.”, his optimism vanished in the blink of an eye, these words felt like a sucker punch right into his stomach. Their feelings would destroy Luffy's dreams?!

“How’s that possible?!”, he didn’t care about the fact that he was shouting.

“Don’t you understand? It’s of no matter if it’s the sniper or the swordsman, you or her, the little doctor, the archaeologist, the cyborg and the bard or the bunny. All of you have been a part of his beating heart from the moment you joined his crew, even from the moment he laid eyes on you. A heart that cannot go on if a part of it is missing.”

“I .. this cannot be! Just me being an idiot right now changes this course?!”, sometimes, all it took was a snowball to start an avalanche.

“I promise you that you’re not the only one who’s annoyed by that. I’ve been specifically watching over the both of you for some time and misfortune does seem to follow.”, a sad smile accompanied her words.

“Could .. could I make things right by taking back my proposal?”, Sanji asked, his voice on the verge of breaking.

“Unfortunately not, no. The chain of events has already been set in motion.”

“Then why the hell are you here?! Is it some kind of sick enjoyment of our pain?!”, to that, she just let out a short, dry laugh.

“Absolutely not. I’m here to ensure the order of things. Tell me, my friend, what is it that you wish for the most?”, the woman inclined her head to the side, now looking interested again.

“I wish for them to be happy, what else?! I .. I wish for Nami to have a happy, wonderful and fulfilled life, even if it is without me .. and I wish for Luffy to become the King of Pirates, I wish that all of them can fulfil their dearest wishes and dreams, even that green-haired punk shall become the greatest swordsman in the world ..”

“Since I’m feeling generous today, you will have the chance to prove what your words are worth.”, she simply said, touching his forehead with the tip of her finger. In the corner of his eye, he caught the glimpse of the spreading of tremendous black wings, engulfing the both of them in a soft embrace. After that, only darkness remained.