#but I'm still recovering from Mnemosyne so please be patient<3

[missmungoe]

Omg omg I’m literally screaming just came back from finals to find THIS😭😭😭 literally made my day🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹

I saw your other ask about mistaking the WIP meme for a recent one, but no worries!! I've been wondering if I should do it again, so here you go! From Heart and Anchor, a longer snippet, since it's been a minute<3

Her morning regulars left as the day sank into a deep blue afternoon, a quiet lull between shifts where she usually caught up with chores, but with her glasses polished and her floors mopped, there wasn’t much left for her to do, allowing her a moment’s peace, humming under her breath as she did the books, going over unpaid tabs and next month's shipment, listening to their muffled voices in the kitchen where the boys had taken it upon themselves to do the dishes. So far Makino had counted three plates breaking, and primly ignored the fourth, followed by Luffy's muffled "it was Ace!"

It was probably about time she got new dishware anyway.

She was behind the counter, her back turned to the room, when the bat-wing doors swung open, the floorboards creaking gently, and pausing, she frowned, but then she’d always had an uncanny ability to know who’d be coming through her doors before she saw them, only this time, Makino couldn’t even make a guess.

But she realised why when she turned, only to find an unfamiliar man in her doorway.

He was looking around the empty common room, but with her crew away for the day, the tables were empty, although he didn’t look like he’d come with a drink in mind, Makino thought, even before he fixed his gaze on her.

He was well-dressed, a burgundy velvet coat with shiny brass buttons above a high-necked shirt, the fine quality standing out, which ruled out a common sailor or pirate, although no merchant she'd ever seen had looked like this, as though he was about to go on stage. A trimmed moustache curled along his upper lip, giving him a cheerful air, and he wore his hair arranged to perfection.

“Can I help you?” Makino asked, and hoped he couldn’t tell that she was uneasy, but then ever since the raid, she’d been wary about new visitors. And while she couldn’t be suspicious of every newcomer to her shores, she couldn’t seem to shrug off the sensation now.

He didn’t answer, considering her where she stood behind the bar, his eyes lingering on her face a beat too long, but while it wasn't a leering look, the feeling it left was worse.

“I am looking for a pirate,” he said then, withdrawing something from the inner pocket of his coat, and coming up to the bar, he slid it towards her.

She’d already recognised the black lettering of a Government-issued wanted poster, although catching a look at the photograph beneath, her eyes widened.

Shanks’ face looked back, her wide eyes moving over the handsome features captured on the page, his scars and the crooked grin that defied them, but even instantly recogniseable, it took a full second for Makino to understand just whose wanted poster she was looking at.

Then she saw the row of numbers printed beneath his picture. And even if she'd always known there was likely a price on his head, she wasn’t prepared to see the truth in print, or for it to be what it was.

She couldn't drag her gaze away from the numbers, her mind struggling just to take in the obscene amount, let alone reconcile it with the face in the picture, and the pirate captain who'd woken up in her bed that morning; the same one whose child she was carrying.

He had a bounty of over a billion berri?!

Her own face had betrayed her, because the stranger mused, “It seems I have found the right place.” Although with a glance around her empty bar, “But he is not here, and I couldn't see his ship in the harbour,” he said, before his gaze settled on her and stayed. “But maybe it’s just as well.”

Then, this time in a business-like tone, “I was told this was where my shipment got lost,” he said. He hadn’t taken his eyes off her, and her heart dropped like a stone when he added, “I am here for compensation.”

Her former unease had deepened to fear, but while he might have just been a merchant whose ship had gone aground, Makino knew then which shipment he was talking about, and that if he was a merchant, it wasn’t grain and spirits that filled his hold but living cargo.

She’d taken an instinctive step back without thinking, only for the cupboards to meet her, and realised her mistake a second later when his gaze dropped from her face to her belly, before they lit up.

“Oh?” he said, this time with a pitch that made her blood run cold. His eyes were fixed on her belly, heavy in the cup of her hand. “Perhaps I might salvage this after all.”

His eyes lifted, as he took her in anew, but where his interest had made her uneasy before, the look in them now froze her in place. “Exquisite. You'll fetch a high price, I wager. Enough to make up for my lost shipment and more besides. Or at least enough to get my gracious benefactor off my back for losing him valuable business.”

She couldn’t move, frozen where she stood behind the counter, although it felt like a paltry shield. She couldn't even reach for Yasopp’s pistol, all of her seized by that calm, assessing gaze where it weighed her worth.

Her heart was racing, her thoughts stumbling over each other as she tried to keep calm. Beneath her hand, the child in her belly was unusually quiet.

On the counter before her, Shanks’ wanted poster lay, but they wouldn’t be back from Goa for another few hours, and she couldn't make a run for it with the boys in her kitchen.

As though in answer to the thought, she heard the door to the kitchen swinging open, and her heart stuttered with her breath as they appeared.

Stopping at the sight of the man in her bar, “Who the hell are you?” Ace asked, as narrowed eyes swept across him. The front of his shirt was wet, and his hands were wrinkled from washing up.

Sabo and Luffy were with him, although the former put the latter behind him, coming up beside Ace where he was seizing up the newcomer.

For his part, he only spared them a perfunctory glance, before he gave a snap of his fingers, and they must have been waiting, because it wasn’t a second before the bat-wing doors swung open again, admitting four men, although none as finely dressed as the first. Instead, they wore uniforms, although she only caught a glimpse of the symbol emblazoned over their backs, red like a bloody hoof-print, before they came to stand beside the one who was ostensibly their boss. One of them was holding something; it looked like heavy metal ring.

A chill went through her, as, “Ace,” Makino said, and saw him look at her, but she hadn’t taken her eyes off the slavers. Her voice was even; a calm she didn’t feel. “Take your brothers and go.”

His eyes widened, the suspicion on his face swept off with his surprise. “What?”

“Go,” Makino said, and was glad when her voice didn't waver. “Get Dadan.”

They all reacted with shock, as Ace snapped, “We’re not leaving you!”

“Yeah, not a chance,” Sabo said, as Luffy brandished his fists.

“Like hell!”

They’d moved to stand before the counter, putting themselves between her and the slavers, although the leader of their operation didn’t seem overly concerned by their presence or their anger.

Nodding to the one holding the metal ring, “Collar her,” he said, as Makino’s breath seized, her gaze shooting to the collar. “But be mindful of the child. I know a Celestial Dragon who’d pay a fine fee for it, and I mean to get my money's worth.”

The slaver hadn’t even taken a step towards her when Luffy shot forward. “I’ll kick your ass!”

His arm shot out, extending from his boy, although his fist missed its mark, bouncing off the wall instead, and she saw the surprise on the slavers’ faces.

“A devil fruit user?” the leader asked, his eyes alight where they’d fixed on Luffy, and her heart lurched in her chest. “Interesting.” Then to his men, “Take them both," he said, and with a dismissive jerk of his chin, “Kill the other two.”

One of the slavers reached for Luffy as Sabo lunged forward, although Ace hesitated, torn as his gaze shot up to her, but before Makino could shout at them to run, the slaver knocked Sabo out of the way, seizing the back of Luffy’s shirt to lift him up as he shouted, striking out blindly. "Let me go!"

“Luffy!” Ace shouted, and was about to move towards him when the slaver holding him snapped the collar around his neck, and he froze.

Luffy’s eyes sprang wide as his hands shot up to grip it, confusion twisting his face as Makino cried out, “Luffy!”

His bravado had disappeared, clutching the heavy collar, and she saw from the distress that shaped his features that something was wrong, although didn't know what had put that fear in his eyes, knew only that he was afraid, the force of his feelings so great Makino almost thought she felt it, like a ripple across her senses, and her eyes widened as she felt something within her responding.

It happened so fast.

The windows exploded outwards, along with every surface of glass within, a sudden force ripping through her bar like a shockwave, so great it shoved her back against the cupboards, knocked out before her head even struck the counter.

The last thing she felt before it went dark was from within, a voice she didn't recognise, that wasn’t even a voice, that was only a feeling, as instinctive as it was fierce, and leaving the impression within her quiet mind, of a tiny but resounding roar.

—

“—she okay? Doc!”

“—leeding. Shallow cuts, but a lot of them—”

“—the baby? Doc? Doc!"

“—fine. Jesus, Boss, calm down. It’s kicking, but she’s—”

There were voices speaking somewhere above her head, but they were muffled, as though she was underwater. Was she underwater?

“—the boys?”

“—no outward injuries. Looks like they were knocked out—”

“—the hell did this?”

She couldn’t make out what they were saying, the words like broken flotsam, bobbing in and out of hearing. Her head hurt, a throbbing that seemed to be growing in intensity.

“—kind of destruction. If I didn’t know better, I’d think it was—”

Her ears were ringing, a high, persistent keening, and she couldn’t help the sound that shattered on her tongue, begging it to stop.

“She's coming to. Boss!”

Then a voice she knew carved through the muffled layers, the warm timbre like a lifeline.

“—kino? Makino!”

Blinking dazedly, she struggled to focus. The world was a blur, and her mind jumbled with so many thoughts and feelings, she couldn’t even find herself in the midst of it all.

Faces were coming into view as her vision slowly cleared, and she'd latched onto the familiar red of his hair before she saw him, his scars taking shape, furrowed above his eyes as Makino blinked hers open.

He was kneeling in front of her, his hand cradling her face, lolling a bit as she tried to fix her gaze on him.

“Hey,” Shanks said, gently. His voice was a mooring, keeping her from drifting. “Can you hear me?”

She nodded, although regretted it when a splitting headache lanced through the back of her skull, and sucked a startled hiss through her teeth.

She saw him draw his hand back from where he’d cradled her head, his fingers streaked with blood. “Doc!”

“Careful,” said a new voice, and Hongou was beside her, Makino saw then, although couldn't understand why he looked so serious.

She tried to move when Shanks stopped her, his hand cradling her head gently to keep it in place. “Stay still,” he said firmly, before he added in a gentler pitch, “You’ll cut yourself.”

Her brows knitted, but looking down, she saw what he meant.

She was sitting behind the counter, her back to the cupboards. The floor around her was covered in broken glass and liquid, seeping into her skirt, sticky and smelling heavily of spirits, a sickening mixture of different liquors, and lifting her eyes to the shelves above saw that there wasn’t so much as a shot glass left.

“Makino?”

She couldn’t formulate her thoughts, or what she was feeling, could only feel, everything, as though her senses had been heightened to an uncomfortable degree. The world was too bright, too vivid, every sound and sensation like the broken shards of glass around her, so sharp that every little movement felt like she might cut herself.

“I don’t—” She clenched her jaw over a shivering whimper. “What—”

“Easy,” Shanks said, the soothing pitch of his voice anchoring her, like his gaze. “Breathe.”

She tried, although it was hard to find herself through the chaos, so many feelings she couldn't even tell them apart. It felt like she was drowning, tossed around like a piece of driftwood on a heaving sea.

But the hand cradling her neck was steady, like his big frame where he knelt in front of her, his presence anchoring her panic, and seizing it, Makino tried to fill her lungs, a shivering sob escaping with her exhale.

“Attagirl,” Shanks murmured, with something that almost sounded like pride, even if she didn’t know why, when all she was doing was breathing. “Awakened observation takes some getting used to. Just try to keep your head above water for now.”

“Haki?” someone whispered.

“She always was a latent user,” someone else said. Lucky Roo. “Boss said so, anyway.”

“This is a helluva lot more than observation.” Yasopp.

She was trying to focus, but every time someone spoke, it was like she could feel them, outlined in her mind, their feelings and their heartbeats, every pulse painfully present.

Lifting her eyes from Shanks' found them watching from above the counter, their faces ashen as they looked around the broken furniture of her bar, the shattered windows and the ceiling lamp hanging on by a thread. Every single bottle and glass had exploded, the broken shards in piles around her where she sat, small and confused amidst the destruction and unable to even remember what had caused it.

She started at the gentle brush of his thumb over her bottom lip, and realised with a hiss that it was split, although now that she was becoming aware of her surroundings and herself, she could feel more cuts, stinging her cheeks and her hands, and something wet trickling down her temples and the back of her neck.

She looked at Shanks, conscious now but confused. The sun had dipped beneath the horizon, the gathering shadows deepening his scars, furrowed above his eyes where he watched her. Wait, when had he come back from Goa?

Then she remembered—the stranger in the velvet coat, who’d talked about compensation. The metal collar, and Ace and Sabo, and Luffy—

Her thoughts must have broken through her confusion, because, “They’re okay,” Shanks said, still cradling her head to keep her from moving, and looking up, she saw them. Ben had Luffy in his arms, the collar gone from around his neck, and Lucky and Yasopp had Ace and Sabo, all of them out cold.

She couldn’t see the slavers anywhere. “What—” she tried again, but her voice was so hoarse, she struggled sounding out the words. In her belly, the baby was kicking, which was at least a relief, and she felt his hand releasing her neck to settle over the curve, the broad width covering it, warm through her skirt. Seeking his eyes, “What happened?” Makino croaked.

Shanks was watching her, the look on his face somewhere between shock and wonder, and she found it in his voice when he said, “Conqueror’s haki.”

The words registered, even as their meaning eluded her. But his crew understood, because their eyes widened, their shock surging like a wave through the quiet waters of her mind.

“Conqueror's haki?" someone asked, seeming on behalf of them all. "Makino has it?”

She didn’t understand what was going on, but then she couldn’t make sense of what they were saying. What did she have?

“No,” Shanks said. His eyes hadn’t released hers, although he seemed to be looking further, as he lowered them to her belly, his hand shaking where it spanned the taut curve as he said, his voice rough with a terrified wonder,

“Not her.”